U.S./World category, Page 1296
Hawaiian Air flight diverted after flight attendant dies
SAN FRANCISCO — A Hawaiian Airlines flight from Honolulu to New York City was diverted to San Francisco after a flight attendant died of an apparent heart attack, officials said Friday. Hawaiian Airlines Flight 50 landed Thursday night after a crew member had “a suspected heart attack,” San Francisco airport...
Police: Woman drove drunk on vanilla extract
NEW CANAAN, Conn. — Police say a Connecticut woman charged with driving under the influence was drunk on vanilla extract, which contains a significant amount of alcohol. Hearst Connecticut Media reports that New Canaan police found 50-year-old Stefanie Warner-Grise sitting in a car at an intersection with her eyes closed...
Faraway space snowman is pitted and has bright ‘collar’
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — The space snowman visited by NASA on New Year’s Day is pitted all over and has a bright “collar” between its two fused spheres. These are the newest details to emerge about Ultima Thule, the most distant object ever explored. A close-up picture taken by NASA’s...
Marijuana business owners plead to drug, racketeering counts
DENVER — The owners of a Denver marijuana business have pleaded guilty to drug and racketeering charges, stemming from a yearlong grand jury investigation that prosecutors say uncovered more than two tons of marijuana entering the black market. Matthew Aiken, Christian Johnson and Anthony Sauro pleaded guilty Friday to violating...
Several flights between Pittsburgh, New York delayed over FAA staffing
Several flights between Pittsburgh and New York were delayed Friday morning following a “slight increase in sick leave” at two East Coast air traffic control facilities, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. At least four flights traveling from LaGuardia to Pittsburgh were delayed, along with at least seven flights from...
Sanders says White House wants shutdown deal
WASHINGTON — White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders says the administration wants to negotiate a government shutdown deal but is not saying how much President Donald Trump wants as a “down payment” on his long-promised U.S.-Mexico border wall. Sanders spoke to reporters at the White House on Friday, a day...
Coast Guard halts search for missing Royal Caribbean crewmember
MIAMI — The Coast Guard has ended the search for a crewmember from a cruise ship in the Atlantic Ocean off Florida’s coast. According to the Royal Caribbean cruise line, co-workers saw the 26-year-old crewmember go overboard from the Majesty of the Seas early Thursday. The ship was about 40...
Japan court upholds sterilization to register gender change
TOKYO — Human rights and LGBT activists on Friday denounced a ruling by Japan’s Supreme Court upholding a law that effectively requires transgender people to be sterilized before they can have their gender changed on official documents. The court said the law is constitutional because it was meant to reduce...
Pakistan to ease restrictions on visas to promote tourism
ISLAMABAD — Pakistan has announced plans to ease visa restrictions for tourists from 90 countries, including the U.S. and Europe, in a bid to revive its tourism sector, decimated by years of negligence and problems with militants. Cabinet minister Fahmida Mirza announces the plans on Friday in Islamabad. She pledged...
2 UN peacekeepers killed in attack in central Mali
BAMAKO, Mali — The spokeswoman for the United Nations mission in Mali says two Sri Lankan peacekeepers have been killed after their convoy struck an explosive device in the central Mopti region. Myriam Dessables says the blast occurred early Friday in the Douentza area. She says several other people were...
NATO chief says missile pact in danger after Russia talks
BRUSSELS — NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg warned Friday that Russia shows no sign of respecting a major Cold War-era missile treaty and that the future of the pact is in danger as the United States readies to start pulling out of it next week. “The treaty is now in jeopardy...
Video shows brutal knife attack on helpless Ohio inmates
COLUMBUS, Ohio — A newly released video shows the brutality of an Ohio inmate’s knife attack on four prisoners who were handcuffed to a table and unable to defend themselves. The video obtained by the Associated Press reveals for the first time the extent of the victims’ injuries and raises...
Trump associate Stone arrested, faces obstruction charge
WASHINGTON — Roger Stone, a confidant of President Donald Trump, was arrested Friday morning in the special counsel’s Russia investigation and was charged with lying to Congress and obstructing the probe. The seven-count indictment against Stone, a self-proclaimed “dirty trickster,” is the first criminal case in months from special counsel...
Report forecasts continued robust growth in U.S. energy production, exports
For the first time in almost 70 years, the U.S. will export more energy than it imports in 2020, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said. The projection was part of the agency’s “Annual Energy Outlook 2019” report, released on Thursday. The report, which based its findings on a “reference case”...
12-year-old boy charged in slaying of South Texas boxer
UVALDE, Texas — Police say a 12-year-old boy has been charged with capital murder in the fatal shooting of a boxer at the victim’s South Texas home. Uvalde police said Thursday that the boy is charged in the slaying of John Duane VanMeter and is being held at a juvenile...
As shutdown ends, workers have little faith about future
Federal workers who have gone a month without getting paid during the longest government shutdown in U.S. history expressed relief Friday that a deal had been reached to end the impasse, but are worried they’ll be in the same spot in a few weeks. Ivan Tauler and his wife spent...
White House grants S.C. foster care group waiver to deny gays, Jews
The Trump administration granted a waiver to South Carolina this week allowing the state to provide federal funding to a foster care agency that works only with Protestant foster parents. In its decision, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said it was approving the request from Gov. Henry...
Suspect in 4 slayings accused of selling victims’ jewelry
CARSON CITY, Nev. — A suspect in four fatal shootings in Nevada was accused in court Thursday of being in the U.S. illegally and possessing weapons and selling jewelry stolen from some of the dead. Wilber Ernesto Martinez-Guzman, a 19-year-old immigrant from El Salvador, appeared before a judge in Carson...
Official: Asylum seekers to wait in Mexico starting Friday
SAN DIEGO — The Trump administration on Friday will start forcing some asylum seekers to wait in Mexico while their cases wind through U.S. courts, an official said, launching what could become one of the more significant changes to the immigration system in years. The changes will be introduced at...
Florida Secretary of State Michael Artel steps down after blackface photos surface
FORT LAUDERDALE — Florida Secretary of State Michael Ertel resigned Thursday when photos emerged of him wearing blackface as a Hurricane “Katrina victim” at a Halloween party in 2005. The stunning development ended the former Seminole County election supervisor’s 16-day stint as Florida’s top elections officer. The Tallahassee Democrat obtained...
Police: St. Louis officer killed in accidental shooting
ST. LOUIS — A St. Louis police officer “mishandled” a gun and accidentally shot and killed a colleague early Thursday, authorities said. The shooting happened around 1 a.m. at an officer’s home, police Chief John Hayden told reporters during a news conference shortly after the shooting. Two on-duty male officers...
Multi-week Australia heatwave is blasting through records, threatening wildlife
A multi-week heatwave in Australia has parched the landscape, triggered damaging wildfires, pushed the demand on the power grid to the brink and has toppled at least two significant records as of Thursday. The first record was broken twice in one night Jan. 18, when the low temperature in Noona,...
High heat but no record: 2018 was 4th warmest year on Earth
WASHINGTON — While Earth was a tad cooler last year than the last couple of years, it still was the fourth warmest on record, a new analysis shows. With the partial U.S. government shutdown, federal agency calculations for last year’s temperatures are delayed. But independent scientists at Berkeley Earth calculate...
Police describe execution-style killings inside Florida bank
SEBRING, Fla. — Investigators have found no obvious reason why a man accused of fatally shooting five women picked a small-town bank in Florida as the place to carry out his attack, authorities said Thursday. Zephen Xaver’s attack did not appear to be part of a robbery, and he had...
Drunk man on smoke break ends up between train cars at 125 m.p.h. in frigid German weather
BERLIN — Police say an intoxicated German man who ducked out of a train for a cigarette during a short stop got into trouble when he tried to jump back on board between two cars after the train departed without him. Police said Thursday the 33-year-old clung on to the...
