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Wagner chief Prigozhin is in Belarus, Lukashenko says

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin has arrived in Belarus, the country’s authoritarian ruler Alexander Lukashenko said Tuesday.“Yes, indeed, he is in Belarus today,” Lukashenko said, according to Belarusian state-owned news agency BELTA.A private jet belonging to Prigozhin had reportedly landed at a military airstrip near Minsk on Tuesday morning.Prigozhin was exiled from Russia — under a three-party deal between the Kremlin, Wagner and Belarus — after leading an aborted mutiny by his Wagner Group forces against President Vladimir Putin last weekend. The mutinous warlord resurfaced Monday afternoon, posting a defiant message on social media in which he defended his troops’ rebellion against Russia’s military leadership.In his message, Prigozhin said Minsk had offered ways for his men to continue work from Belarus.Earlier Tuesday, Lukashenko said Belarus could benefit from the presence of Wagner troops on its territory.“They will tell us about the ...

City releases recordings of 911 calls made after equipment fell on woman at Harvard T station

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

The city of Cambridge has released 911 calls made from the MBTA’s Harvard station moments after a piece of electrical equipment fell on a woman standing on a platform last month. The incident happened on May 1. Now, call recordings show callers said they could not find any T employees nearby to help in the immediate aftermath. “Hi there,” a caller says in one recording. “I didn’t know where to call. It’s in the Harvard MBTA station — on the lower platform — on the inbound platform. There’s equipment that fell and hit a person. So, there’s a lot of us who saw it. Somebody needs to get here. I don’t know the MBTA 911 number, but there’s nobody here.”The city of Cambridge only agreed to release recordings after altering the voices of the callers. In calls, a good Samaritan can be heard telling a dispatcher they could not find any T employees nearby. Another caller told Cambridge police the same thing when they dialed 911.&n...

Kansas City teenager Ralph Yarl recounts being shot after he rang the wrong doorbell

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — There was no way, Ralph Yarl thought, that the white man pointing the gun at him through the glass door would shoot him. But the Black teenager, who had gone to the wrong house in Kansas City looking for his younger brothers, was wrong a second time.Yarl’s brothers were actually at a home a block away, and he said in an interview with “Good Morning America” anchor Robin Roberts that aired Tuesday that he hadn’t met the family of his brothers’ friends, “so maybe it was their house.”After ringing the doorbell, he said, he waited a long time on the porch before the door opened.“I see this old man and I’m saying, ‘Oh, this must be like, their grandpa,’” said Yarl, now 17. “And then he pulls out his gun. And I’m like, ‘Whoa!’ So I like, back up. He points it at me.”Yarl, whose brothers were actually at a home a block away, braced and turned his head.“And then it happened, and then I’m on the ground. I fall on the glass, the shattered glas...

Court date postponed for Trump valet Walt Nauta in classified documents case

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

MIAMI (AP) — A court appearance was postponed Tuesday for a Donald Trump valet who’s charged with helping the former president hide classified documents that the Justice Department wanted back.A lawyer for the valet, Walt Nauta, told a judge that Nauta had been unable to find a Florida-based attorney and that he was stuck in Newark, New Jersey, and unable to fly down for the arraignment because of a flight that sat for hours on the tarmac before being canceled.The lawyer, Stanley Woodward, said Nauta expressed his apologies to the court for not being present.“Mr. Nauta takes very seriously the charges that he is facing,” he said.As a result, a judge pushed Tuesday’s scheduled arraignment back until July 6.Nauta was charged earlier this month alongside Trump in a 38-count indictment filed by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith. Trump, a Republican, pleaded not guilty earlier this month to 37 counts related to the alleged mishandling of classi...

Deliberations continue over then-Parkland school resource officer’s fate in rare trial over police conduct in a mass shooting

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

(CNN) — Deliberations continue for a second day Tuesday in the trial of the former school resource officer who stayed outside during the 2018 mass shooting at a Parkland, Florida, high school – the culmination of a rare prosecution of a law enforcement officer over his response to a mass shooting.Prosecutors say Scot Peterson, 60, ignored his training and common sense and chose to do nothing as 17 people, including 14 students, were gunned down at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in the deadliest high school shooting in US history. His attorney argued the then-deputy for the Broward Sheriff’s Office didn’t enter the building where the carnage unfolded because he couldn’t tell where the shots were coming from.“His job was to go and investigate and make his presence known, and that simply did not happen,” Assistant State Attorney Christopher Killoran said in closing rebuttal arguments Monday.The verdict is anticipated as ...

Supreme Court rules state courts can play role in policing federal elections

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that North Carolina’s top court did not overstep its bounds in striking down a congressional districting plan as excessively partisan under state law.The justices by a 6-3 vote rejected the broadest view of a case that could have transformed elections for Congress and president.North Carolina Republicans had asked the court to leave state legislatures virtually unchecked by their state courts when dealing with federal elections.But Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court that “state courts retain the authority to apply state constitutional restraints when legislatures act under the power conferred upon them by the Elections Clause. But federal courts must not abandon their own duty to exercise judicial review.”The high court did, though, suggest there could be limits on state court efforts to police elections for Congress and president.The practical effect of the decision is minimal in that the North Carolina Supreme Court,...

International Criminal Court authorizes reopening probe into Venezuela security forces

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — International prosecutors should resume investigating alleged crimes against humanity in Venezuela by security forces under President Nicolás Maduro because the country’s own probe has fallen short, the International Criminal Court ruled Tuesday.The court had suspended an investigation into alleged wrongdoing including use of excessive force and torture — its first in Latin Americ a — after Venezuela asked to take over the case in April last year.Seven months later, Prosecutor Karim Khan sought to reopen his investigation, saying that Venezuelan efforts toward delivering justice “remain either insufficient in scope or have not yet had any concrete impact on potentially relevant proceedings.”Judges agreed, and the court said in a statement Tuesday that Venezuela’s actions do “not sufficiently mirror the scope” of the intended investigation, including by failing to focus on more than just low-level perpetrators.Human Rights Watch welcomed the ruling.“With...

A Wagner ex-convict returned from war and a Russian village lived in fear. Then he killed again

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — When Ivan Rossomakhin returned home from the war in Ukraine three months ago, his neighbors in the village east of Moscow were terrified.Three years ago, he was convicted of murder and sentenced to a long prison term but was freed after volunteering to fight with the Wagner private military contractor.Back in Novy Burets, Rossomakhin drunkenly wandered the streets of the hamlet 800 kilometers (about 500 miles) east of Moscow, carrying a pitchfork and threatening to kill everyone, residents said.Despite police promises to keep an eye on the 28-year-old former inmate, he was arrested in a nearby town on charges of stabbing to death an elderly woman from whom he once rented a room. He reportedly confessed to committing the crime, less than 10 days after his return.Rossomakhin’s case is not isolated. The Associated Press found at least seven other instances in recent months in which Wagner-recruited convicts were identified as being involved in violent crimes, ei...

Stock market today: Wall Street rises as economy holds up better than feared

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street is drifting higher Tuesday after a round of reports suggested the economy is in better shape than feared. The S&P 500 was 0.4% higher in morning trading. It’s been generally edging lower since a five-week rally carried it to its highest level in more than a year in mid-June. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 94 points, or 0.3%, at 33,808, as of 10:30 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% higher.Airlines were helping to lead the way after Delta Air Lines said it still sees pent-up demand in the pipeline as passengers make up for lost opportunities to travel during the pandemic. It highlighted high-income customers in particular, who account for three-quarters of spending on air travel and still look to be in good financial shape despite high inflation. Delta’s stock rose 2.9% after it said earnings this year should come in at the top end of the range it had earlier forecast. American Airlines climbed 3.2%, and United Ai...

Brookfield makes takeover offer for American Equity Investment Life Holding

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:24:59 GMT

TORONTO — Brookfield Reinsurance Ltd. has made a stock-and-cash offer to buy American Equity Investment Life Holding Co. (AEL) that values the company at US$4.3 billion.Under the non-binding expression of interest, the reinsurance arm of Brookfield Corp. is offering US$55 for each AEL share it does not already own. The offer includes US$38.85 in cash and US$16.15 worth of Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. class A limited voting shares.Brookfield Reinsurance would acquire the Brookfield Asset Management (BAM) shares required to pay the non-cash portion of the offer from Brookfield Corp. The transaction would reduce Brookfield Corp.’s stake in BAM to about 73 per cent from 75 per cent.Brookfield already holds about a 20 per cent stake in AEL.AEL confirmed it has received the offer and said it would not comment further until its board has completed its review of the proposal.Both companies said there was no guarantee that an agreement will be reached.This report by The Canadian Pr...