FBI had interviewed FedEx killer
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INDIANAPOLIS -- The former employee who shot and killed eight people at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis was interviewed by FBI agents last year, after his mother called police to say that her son might commit "suicide by cop." Coroners began the slow process of identifying the victims as family members spent hours agonizing over word of their loved ones. The shooter was identified as Brandon Scott Hole of Indianapolis, Deputy Police Chief Craig McCartt told a news conference. Investigators searched a home in Indianapolis associated with Hole and seized evidence, including desktop computers and other electronic media. T Hole began firing randomly at people in the parking lot of the FedEx facility late Thursday, killing four, before entering the building, fatally shooting four more people and then turning the gun on himself, McCartt said. He said the shooter apparently killed himself shortly before police entered the building. He said he did not know if Hole owned the gun legally. "There was no confrontation with anyone that was there," he said. "There was no disturbance, there was no argument. He just appeared to randomly start shooting." McCartt said the slayings took place in a matter of minutes, and that there were at least 100 people in the facility at the time. Many were changing shifts or were on their dinner break, he said. Several people were wounded, including five who were taken to the hospital. A FedEx employee said he was working inside the building when he heard several gunshots in rapid succession. "I see a man come out with a rifle in his hand and he starts firing and he starts yelling stuff that I could not understand," Levi Miller said. "What I ended up doing was ducking down to make sure he did not see me because I thought he would see me and he would shoot me." Hole was a former employee of FedEx and last worked for the company in 2020. The deputy police chief said he did not know why Hole left the job or if he had ties to the workers in the facility. The agonizing wait by the workers' families was exacerbated by the fact that most employees aren't allowed to carry cellphones inside the FedEx building, making contact with them difficult. "When you see notifications on your phone, but you're not getting a text back from your kid and you're not getting information and you still don't know where they are ... what are you supposed to do?" Mindy Carson said early Friday, fighting back tears. Carson later said she had heard from her daughter Jessica, who works in the facility, and that she was OK.
Police critics call for charges
CHICAGO -- Newly released video that shows a Chicago police officer fatally shoot a 13-year-old will be key evidence when prosecutors consider a case against the officer and are confronted with both the emotions surrounding the chilling footage and legal precedent that makes it difficult to bring charges against law enforcement. Video of last month's encounter was released Thursday and provoked an outpouring of grief and outrage. It shows Officer Eric Stillman shooting Adam Toledo less than a second after the boy drops a handgun, turns toward Stillman and begins raising his hands. Some viewers have called for Stillman to be charged or fired. But for others, the video shows how difficult such decisions might be for prosecutors and police higher-ups, with an officer making a quick decision to shoot after chasing a suspect down a dark alley while responding to a report about gunshots. Whether Stillman is charged will be up to the Cook County state's attorney's office, which will get the Civilian Office of Police Accountability's report after the independent board completes its investigation. Several legal experts said Friday that they don't think Stillman could be charged under criteria established by a landmark 1989 Supreme Court ruling on the use of force by police, though another said prosecutors might see enough evidence to justify an involuntary manslaughter charge and let a jury decide guilt or innocence.
Biden will lift refugee cap in May
WASHINGTON -- Facing swift blowback from allies and aid groups, the White House on Friday said President Joe Biden plans to lift his predecessor's historically low cap on refugees by next month, after initially moving only to expand the eligibility criteria for resettlements. In an emergency determination signed by Biden earlier in the day, he stated the admission of up to 15,000 refugees set by former President Donald Trump this year "remains justified by humanitarian concerns and is otherwise in the national interest." But if the cap is reached before the end of the current budget year and the emergency refugee situation persists, then a presidential determination may be issued to raise the ceiling. That set off a deluge of criticism from ranking Democratic members of Congress, including Senate Majority Whip and Illinois Democrat Dick Durbin, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who called it "unacceptable." White House press secretary Jen Psaki said later that Biden has been consulting with his advisers to determine what number of refugees could realistically be admitted to the United States between now and Oct. 1, the end of the fiscal year. She said "given the decimated refugee admissions program we inherited," it's now "unlikely" Biden will be able to boost that number to 62,500, as he had proposed in his plan to Congress two months ago.
Raul Castro ends era in Cuba
HAVANA -- Raul Castro said Friday he is resigning as head of Cuba's Communist Party, ending an era of formal leadership that began with his brother Fidel and country's 1959 revolution. Castro, 89, made the announcement in a speech at the opening of the eighth congress of the ruling party, the only one allowed on the island. He said he was retiring with the sense of having "fulfilled his mission and confident in the future of the fatherland." "Nothing, nothing, nothing is forcing me to make this decision," said Castro, part of whose speech to the closed Congress was aired on state television. "As long as I live I will be ready with my foot in the stirrup to defend the homeland, the revolution and socialism with more force than ever." Castro didn't say who he would endorse as his successor as first secretary of the Communist Party. But he previously indicated he favors yielding control to 60-year-old Miguel Diaz-Canel, who succeeded him as president in 2018 and is the standard bearer of a younger generation of loyalists who have been pushing an economic opening without touching Cuba's one-party system.
Grand jury votes not to indict
A grand jury investigating the police suffocation death of Daniel Prude last year in Rochester, New York, voted 15-5 not to indict the three officers who restrained him, according to transcripts of the proceedings released Friday. Prosecutors from the state attorney general's office had asked the grand jury to consider a criminally negligent homicide charge for the officers, who were seen on body camera footage holding and pressing the 41-year-old Black man against the frigid pavement in March 2020 until he stopped breathing. Prosecutors sought no other charges, according to the transcripts, and told grand jurors that they had the option of choosing not to indict if they believed the officers' use of force was justified. Five jurors indicated they would have voted to indict at least one of the officers. "You are not an arm of the prosecution and you are to draw no conclusions about, quote, unquote, we think, feel or anything else," Jennifer Sommers, the deputy chief of Special Investigations, instructed the grand jury, according to the transcripts. "You are an independent body." The grand jury's decision not to indict the officers was announced at the time it was made in February, but the transcripts of nine days of testimony from witnesses -- including Prude's brother, police officers and experts -- offer a rare window into a process of accountability normally kept under wraps.
Russia to expel 10 US diplomats
MOSCOW -- Russia on Friday responded to a barrage of new U.S. sanctions by saying it would expel 10 U.S. diplomats and take other retaliatory moves in a tense showdown with Washington. The Russian Foreign Ministry also published a list of eight current or former U.S. officials barred from entering the country, including U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, FBI Director Christopher Wray, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also said Moscow will move to shut down those U.S. nongovernment organizations that remain in Russia to end what he described as their meddling in Russia's politics. The top Russian diplomat said the Kremlin suggested that U.S. Ambassador John Sullivan follow the example of his Russian counterpart and head home for consultations. Russia will also deny the U.S. Embassy the possibility of hiring personnel from Russia and third countries as support staff, limit visits by U.S. diplomats serving short-term stints at the embassy, and tighten requirements for U.S. diplomats' travel in the country. The others banned from entering Russia are Susan Rice, a former U.N. ambassador and now head of the Domestic Policy Council; John Bolton, who was a national security adviser under former President Donald Trump; James Woolsey, a former CIA director; and Michael Carvajal, director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Network to track virus variants
WASHINGTON -- The U.S. is setting up a $1.7 billion national network to identify and track worrisome coronavirus mutations whose spread could trigger another pandemic wave, the Biden administration announced Friday. White House officials unveiled a strategy that features three components: a major funding boost for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state health departments to ramp up coronavirus gene-mapping; the creation of six "centers of excellence" partnerships with universities to conduct research and develop technologies for gene-based surveillance of pathogens, and building a data system to better share and analyze information on emerging disease threats, so knowledge can be turned into action.
Temple business dean indicted
PHILADELPHIA -- The former dean of Temple University's business school has been charged with falsifying data to boost the school's rankings, draw more students and vastly increase the school's revenue. The federal indictment unsealed Friday charges Moshe Porat, 74, with conspiracy and wire fraud for allegedly submitting phony information about its graduate business programs to U.S. News & World Report. The information about student test scores, work experience and other data helped the Philadelphia university's Fox School of Business claim the top-ranked spot on the magazine's influential list of online MBA programs for several years and quadruple its enrollment. The school charged about $60,000 for its online MBA and enrolled more than 330 students by 2017, before the scandal broke and Fox was removed from the rankings. By 2019, enrollment dropped to 106 students. The indictment follows both a state investigation by Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, which led to a settlement with Temple, and an ongoing $25 million defamation lawsuit Porat filed against Temple and its president over his 2018 ouster.
New blast at St. Vincent volcano
KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent -- La Soufriere volcano shot out another explosive burst of gas and ash on Friday as a cruise ship arrived to evacuate some of the foreigners who had been stuck on a St. Vincent island coated in ash from a week of violent eruptions. The explosions that began on April 9 forced some 20,000 to flee the northern end of the eastern Caribbean island for shelters and contaminated water supplies across the island. Friday morning's blast "wasn't a big explosion compared to the ones that we last weekend, but it was big enough to punch a hole through the clouds," said Richard Robertson, lead scientist at the University of the West Indies Seismic Research Center, in an interview with local NBC radio. "Probably got up to 8,000 meters (26,000 feet)." During a comparable eruption cycle in 1902, explosive eruptions continued to shake the island for months after an initial burst killed some 1,700 people, though the new eruptions so far have caused no reported deaths among a population that had received official warning a day earlier that danger was imminent. Meanwhile, British, U.S. and Canadian nationals were being evacuated aboard Royal Caribbean Cruises' Celebrity Reflection from the harbor in the Kingstown, capital of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. The ship was due to arrive Saturday in Dutch Sint Maarten.
Another side of spring in NE
BOSTON -- New Englanders who had enjoyed an early spring were brought back to a cold, blustery reality Friday with a storm packing powerful wind gusts, lashing rain and heavy, wet snow. A foot of snow had fallen in Spofford in western New Hampshire by midday, and the wind gusted to 40 mph on the coast. Snow fell from New York's Hudson Valley to northern New York and eastward through New England.
SpaceX crew arrives in Florida
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- SpaceX's most international crew of astronauts yet arrived at their launch site Friday. By coincidence, their flight to the International Space Station is set for next Thursday -- Earth Day. It's a reminder of NASA's core mission of studying the home planet, the space agency's acting administrator Steve Jurczyk said as he welcomed the astronauts to Kennedy Space Center. The three men and one woman represent the U.S., France and Japan: NASA's Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, Thomas Pesquet and Akihiko Hoshide, all experienced space fliers. "It's definitely getting real," Kimbrough, the spacecraft commander, said after arriving by plane from Houston. This will be SpaceX's third launch of astronauts in less than a year, and the first to use a recycled Falcon rocket and Dragon crew capsule. NASA turned to U.S. private companies for crew transport after the space shuttle program ended in 2011. "Certainly, I think all of them, until we get several years under our belt, should be considered test flights," Kimbrough told reporters.
Climbing bolts on petroglyph
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo -- Federal public lands officials are investigating after climbing bolts damaged an ancient petroglyph site near Moab, Utah. The line of bolts was inserted into the middle of a large rock-art image left by Indigenous people more than 1,000 years ago, climber Darrin Reay told the Colorado Springs Gazette. He saw the bolts last week on the outcrop known as Sunshine Wall north of Arches National Park. Reay said he was was "horrified and angry." Reports of the damage online sparked a storm of outrage. The bolts have since been removed, but damage to the petroglyphs is forever, said Elizabeth Hora, archaeologist for the Utah State Historic Preservation Office. She said it's heartbreakingly common around the state where Ancestral Puebloans and Fremont people left their marks. And vandalism increased over the last year, as more people flocked to the outdoors during the coronavirus pandemic, she said. Still, "we firmly believe here in our office that shaming and blaming is not the way to make change." A Colorado Springs man, 36-year-old Richard Gilbert, took responsibility in an interview with the Gazette. He said he mistook the rock art for graffiti when he placed the bolts used by climbers to anchor their clips. When he realized what he had done, he said he reported to a ranger at Moab's Bureau of Land Management field office. Under the Archaeological Resources Protection Act, first-time violators could be fined up to $20,000 and imprisoned for up to one year.
Body of second worker found
PORT FOURCHON, La. -- The body of a second dead worker from a lift boat that capsized earlier this week was found about 33 miles from the overturned ship Friday. Divers searching survivors on a capsized lift boat prepared to enter the vessel Friday, a rescue effort complicated by daunting technical challenges and continued bad weather. The hope is that the 11 missing people have found air pockets to survive inside the Seacor Power, most of which is submerged in 50-foot seas about 8 miles (13 kilometers) off the Louisiana coast. "Right now, we're hoping for a miracle," a spokesman said. Petty Officer 3rd Class Carlos Galarza said early Friday that as long as weather permits, divers will try to get into the vessel. But Dawn Saddler, sister of Gregory Walcott, said families were told during the meeting that divers did not get onto the boat Friday morning because of rough weather.
Liberty sues Jerry Falwell Jr.
RICHMOND, Va. -- Liberty University has filed a civil lawsuit against its former leader, Jerry Falwell Jr., seeking tens of millions in damages after the two parted ways acrimoniously last year. The complaint, filed Thursday in Lynchburg Circuit Court, alleges Falwell crafted a "well-resourced exit strategy" from his role as president and chancellor in the form of a lucrative 2019 employment agreement while withholding damaging information from the evangelical school about a personal scandal that would explode into public view the following year. "Despite his clear duties as an executive and officer at Liberty, Falwell Jr. chose personal protection," the lawsuit says. It also alleges that Falwell failed to disclose and address "the issue of his personal impairment by alcohol" and has refused to fully return Liberty's confidential information and other personal property. Falwell's departure from the Virginia university in August 2020 came soon after Giancarlo Granda, a younger business partner of the Falwell family, said he had a yearslong sexual relationship with Falwell's wife, Becki Falwell, and that Jerry Falwell participated in some of the liaisons as a voyeur. Although the Falwells acknowledged that Granda and Becki Falwell had an affair, Jerry Falwell denied any participation. The couple alleged that Granda sought to extort them by threatening to reveal the relationship.
First guilty plea in Capitol riot
WASHINGTON -- A member of the far-right Oath Keepers militia group and heavy metal guitarist on Friday became the first defendant to plead guilty to federal charges in connection with the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Jon Ryan Schaffer, the frontman of the band Iced Earth, has agreed to cooperate with investigators in hopes of getting a lighter sentence, and the Justice Department will consider putting Schaffer in the federal witness security program, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta said. This signals that federal prosecutors see him as a valuable cooperator as they continue to investigate militia groups and other extremists involved in the insurrection on Jan. 6. Schaffer, of Columbus, Indiana, was accused of storming the Capitol and spraying police officers with bear spray. He pleaded guilty in a deal with prosecutors in federal court in Washington to two counts: obstruction of an official proceeding, and entering and remaining in a restricted building with a dangerous or deadly weapon. The 53-year-old was not charged in the case involving Oath Keepers members and associates, who are accused of conspiring with one another to block the certification of the vote. The case is the largest and most serious brought by prosecutors so far in the attack.
S&P 500 hits another record
Stocks added to their recent gains Friday, driving the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average to new highs. The S&P 500 rose 0.4%, led by gains in companies that rely directly on consumer spending, health care stocks and banks, which benefited from higher Treasury yields. The benchmark index notched its fourth straight weekly gain. The gains were tempered by modest declines in technology stocks, which have been prone to pull back when bond yields move higher. Rising bond yields tend to make shares in technology companies that have had a strong runup over the past year look too expensive. Crude oil prices slipped, weighing down energy companies. Bond yields rose broadly after falling earlier in the week. The yield of the 10-year Treasury note rose to 1.59% from 1.53% late Thursday. Still, bond yields are down from the highs they hit earlier in the month, when the 10-year note traded at a yield of 1.75%. "There's sort of a churning with regard to interest rates and in the market itself," said Tom Martin, senior portfolio manager with Globalt Investments.
Garland rescinds Trump-era memo
WASHINGTON -- Attorney General Merrick Garland on Friday rescinded a Trump-era memo that curtailed the use of consent decrees that federal prosecutors have used in sweeping investigations of police departments. Garland issued a new memorandum to all U.S. attorneys and other Justice Department leaders spelling out the new policies on civil agreements and consent decrees with state and local governments. The memo comes as the Justice Department shifts its priorities to focus more on civil rights issues, criminal justice overhauls and policing policies in the wake of nationwide protests over the death of Black Americans at the hands of law enforcement. In easing restrictions placed on the use of consent decrees, the Justice Department is making it easier for its prosecutors to use the tool to force changes at police departments and other government agencies with widespread abuse and misconduct. The memo in particular rescinds a previous memo issued by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions shortly before he resigned in November 2018.
Cheaters must repeat a year
Most of the 73 West Point cadets accused in the biggest cheating scandal in decades at the U.S. Military Academy are being required to repeat a year, and eight were expelled. The cadets were accused of cheating on an online freshman calculus exam in May while students were studying remotely because of the coronavirus pandemic. An investigation was launched after instructors noticed irregularities in answers. All but one were freshmen, or plebes, in a class of 1,200. The other was a sophomore. Cadets at the centuries-old officer training academy on the Hudson River are bound by an honor code that they "will not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those who do." The cheating scandal is the biggest at West Point since 1976 and preceded the tightening of an academy policy that spared many cadets in this case from being kicked out. West Point said that of the 73 cases investigated by the cadet honor committee, six cadets resigned during the investigation, four were acquitted by a board of their peers, and two cases were dropped due to insufficient evidence.
Star hospitalized after crash
CASPER, Wyo. -- YouTube personality, businessman and musician Jeffree Star was hospitalized after a car crash. Star veered off a slushy road in the Casper area Friday morning and overturned his Rolls Royce. A friend, Daniel Lucas, also was in the car. Both were taken to Wyoming Medical Center in Casper with undisclosed injuries. Star is best known for his cosmetics business. He has been splitting time between California and his small ranch near Casper since December. He has drawn attention for using racist language and more recently has posed with a Confederate flag and promoted self-harm, prompting him to apologize.