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Biden, state lawmakers respond to mass shooting in Maine

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

While the search for the gunman continued the day after the senseless slaughter of more than a dozen in Maine, President Biden decreed flags should be flown at half-staff for the next five days in recognition of those lost.“As a mark of respect for the victims of the senseless acts of violence,” the president has declared flags should be “flown at half-staff at the White House and upon all public buildings and grounds, at all military posts and naval stations, and on all naval vessels of the Federal Government.”Biden’s order stands until Oct. 30.The proclamation came Thursday morning, as the country began another, now all too familiar, collective mourning period after 18 were slaughtered and 13 more injured by an eruption of gunfire, this time in a quiet corner of Maine.As of this writing the hunt for a lone shooter continues, with agents from the FBI, ATF, TSA assisting the Maine State Police and local law enforcement with the search.According to the White House, the president spok...

Maine mass shooting: ‘Why do people do this?’

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

In the wake of a mass shooting that left 18 dead and 13 injured in Lewiston, Maine, on Wednesday evening, many are speaking out on the event’s devastating toll on their family, friends and community.Here are some:‘Why do people do this?’ 10-year-old victim asksWhen Zoey Levesque felt a bullet graze her leg she wasn’t worried about the injury, the 10-year-old told ABC News on Thursday, she was too busy running for her life.Her mom Meghan Hutchinson was watching the kid practice with her youth bowling league when she heard a “loud pop,” turned around and saw the shooter right behind her.Zoey was shot — a shallow graze to her leg — as the pair ran to barricade themselves in a back room with other families. Another young boy came into the room had a “massive hole” in his arm bleeding badly, Hutchinson told ABC, and a second mom called 911.The police arrived 20 minutes later, the mother said, but the group was too scared to let ...

Vintage Chicago Tribune: 10 key moments in George Halas’ life on the 40th anniversary of his death

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

Halloween marks 40 years since Chicago Bears founder, owner, coach and player George Halas died.Just a child then, I now have questions about his remarkable life. What were the key moments that shaped his career? And, what don’t I know about one of the founding fathers of the National Football League?I picked up a copy of his autobiography, “Halas by Halas,” from a local library to help with this research. He cowrote the 338-page memoir with longtime husband-and-wife Tribune reporting team Gwen Morgan and Arthur Veysey in 1979.Don Pierson, a former sports reporter who covered the Bears for the Tribune from the late 1960s through the team’s Feb. 4, 2007 loss to the Indianapolis Colts in Super Bowl XLI, provided invaluable guidance.It was difficult to consolidate the list into just 10 highlights. And the surprises were plentiful. Did you know Halas narrowly avoided Chicago’s deadliest boating mishap? That he played right field for the New York Yankees? He...

The party’s over: Boston Police will no longer permit crime at Mass and Cass, commissioner says

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

The city’s permissive attitude toward open-air drug use and violence occurring in the Mass and Cass zone will drastically change on Nov. 1, when authorities begin enforcing a new anti-encampment ordinance, Boston Police Commissioner Michael Cox said on Thursday.There will be a “heavy” police presence in the area, as cops begin taking down the tents and tarps contributing to much of the crime occurring at the intersection known as Methadone Mile, Cox said at a City Hall press conference.While he vowed to partner with the Wu administration in adhering to the spirit of the mayor’s ordinance, which is to get homeless individuals and addicts the help that they need, Cox issued this warning: People coming to Atkinson Street to engage in criminal activity will no longer encounter “an area of permissiveness.”“We want to make it clear to the people who come to the city with a different intent, whether it’s to sell drugs or criminality, or to victimize the people that are in these areas, we’r...

Ticker: UMass economic impact: $8.3B; Mortgage rates tick up, again

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

Spending by UMass students and faculty, construction projects, and university purchases of goods and services are driving a record $8.3 billion economic impact across the five-campus system, according to a new report.The analysis  also determined that the university system is responsible for nearly 40,000 external jobs across the state, that more than 330,000 university alumni live in Massachusetts, and that the university issues 20,000 undergraduate and graduate degrees each year.“As a center of undergraduate and professional education, as well as research and innovation, the University of Massachusetts is a key driver of the Commonwealth’s economy and workforce, helping to set Massachusetts apart as it competes, both domestically and globally,” said Mark Melnik, director of economic and policy research at the the UMass Amherst-based Donahue Institute, which authored the report.Mortgage rates tick up, againThe average rate on 30-year fixed mortgages remained at generati...

Judge says Georgia’s congressional and legislative districts are discriminatory and must be redrawn

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

By JEFF AMY and KATE BRUMBACK (Associated Press)ATLANTA (AP) — A federal judge ruled Thursday that some of Georgia’s congressional, state Senate and state House districts were drawn in a racially discriminatory manner, ordering the state to draw an additional Black-majority congressional district.U.S. District Judge Steve Jones, in a 516-page order, also ordered the state to draw two new Black-majority districts in Georgia’s 56-member state Senate and five new Black-majority districts in its 180-member state House.Jones ordered Georgia’s Republican majority General Assembly and governor to fix the maps by Dec. 8, saying he would redraw districts if lawmakers did not. Hours after the ruling, Gov. Brian Kemp issued a call for a special session to begin Nov. 29 to redraw congressional and legislative districts, although a spokesperson for the governor said that is a scheduling decision and doesn’t mean the Republican opposes an appeal.Jones’ ruling follows an eight-day September trial ...

Surfers find body floating near La Jolla Shores Beach; man identified

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

LA JOLLA, Calif. -- Two surfers found an unresponsive man floating in the water near La Jolla Shores Beach last weekend.According to the San Diego Medical Examiner's Office, 65-year-old William Cunningham Jr. of San Diego was found floating about 150 yards off shore on the morning of Saturday, Oct. 21. Elderly woman killed in East County house fire identified The surfers alerted San Diego Lifeguards who responded to the location and removed the man from the water. The medical examiner's office said responding paramedics confirmed the man's death at that time due to "obvious postmortem changes."Cunningham Jr.'s cause of death was listed as "blunt force injury complicated by drowning." The San Diego Police Department is investigating. Anyone with additional information regarding these incident is encouraged to call the Crime Stoppers tip line at (888) 580-8477.

Radio host Larry Elder ends Republican presidential campaign and endorses Donald Trump

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

Conservative talk radio host Larry Elder announced Thursday that he was ending his 2024 Republican campaign for president and endorsing former President Donald Trump.Elder, who sought to replace California Gov. Gavin Newsom in a failed 2021 recall effort, said in a statement that he had made the “difficult decision” to end his bid after “careful consideration and consultation” with his team and to throw his support behind Trump. Trump’s leadership, he said, was “instrumental in advancing conservative America-first principles and policies that have benefited our great nation.”He said now was the time to unite behind Trump to beat President Joe Biden. He also said he hoped his campaign had shined a light on the issues important to him, including fatherlessness, fighting crime and opposition to the idea that the U.S. is a racist country.Elder is the fourth major candidate to suspend or end his 2024 GOP bid, following Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, former Texas congressman Will Hurd ...

Palestinians plead ‘stop the bombs’ at UN meeting but Israel insists Hamas must be ‘obliterated’

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — “Stop the bombs and save lives!” the Palestinian ambassador pleaded at an emotional U.N. meeting Thursday on the war in Gaza. But Israel’s envoy was adamant, declaring again, “We will not rest until Hamas is obliterated.”The war sparked by Gaza’s Hamas rulers’ surprise attacks on Israel on Oct. 7 played out in the vast hall of the 193-nation General Assembly, where Arab nations expected to adopt a resolution Friday calling for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza after the Security Council’s four failed attempts to agree on any action.At the assembly’s resumed emergency special session on Israeli actions in the Palestinian territories Thursday, speaker after speaker backed the Arab resolution’s cease-fire call — except for Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Gilad Erdan, who told the 193-member world body, “A cease-fire means giving Hamas time to rearm itself, so they can massacre us again.”After quoting several Hamas statements vowing to destroy Israel and the Jews, he said, ...

Carjacking call led police to chief’s son who was wanted in officers’ shooting. He died hours later

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:41:55 GMT

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — John Drake Jr. had been on the run for days when he showed up in a ski mask in a Nashville neighborhood and asked a woman for a ride in her car. His face was all over “wanted” notices, a suspect in the shooting and wounding of two police officers near Nashville, where his father is the police chief. When the woman said she didn’t have enough gas, Drake Jr. pulled out a pistol and stole her car.About two hours after the carjacking on Tuesday, the chief’s estranged son was dead.A newly released recording of the carjacking victim’s 911 call and bird’s-eye-view police video show some of Drake Jr.’s final movements. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is probing Drake Jr.’s death, and an autopsy is planned.Drake Jr. crashed the stolen vehicle into another car, then ran through alleys and hopped fences into yards before breaking into a shed, according to video footage shot from a Nashville police helicopter that the department releas...