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The Navy will start randomly testing SEALs and special warfare troops for steroids

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

By LOLITA C. BALDOR (Associated Press)WASHINGTON (AP) — The Navy will begin randomly testing its special operations forces for steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs beginning in November, taking a groundbreaking step that military leaders have long resisted.Rear Adm. Keith Davids, commander of Naval Special Warfare Command, announced the new program Friday in a message to his force, calling it necessary to protect their health and military readiness. The Navy will be the first to begin random testing, but Army Special Operations Command said it will soon follow suit, although no start date has been set.The Army and Navy have the largest and most well known special operations forces, including the Navy SEALs and Army’s Delta Force, Green Berets and Ranger Regiment. They are often called on to do the military’s most sensitive and dangerous missions. The physical and mental challenges of getting through their selection and training programs and the pressur...

New York City area under state of emergency after storms flood subways, strand people in cars [+gallery]

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

By JAKE OFFENHARTZ and JENNIFER PELTZ (Associated Press)NEW YORK (AP) — A potent rush-hour rainstorm swamped the New York metropolitan area on Friday, shutting down some subways and commuter railroads, flooding streets and highways, and delaying flights into LaGuardia Airport.Traffic is piled up along Flatbush Ave heading to the Manhattan and the Brooklyn bridges in the Brooklyn borough of New York on Friday, Sept. 29, 2023. A potent rush-hour rainstorm has swamped the New York metropolitan area. The deluge Friday shut down swaths of the subway system, flooded some streets and highways, and cut off access to at least one terminal at LaGuardia Airport.(AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)Traffic makes its way through flood waters along the Brooklyn Queens Expressway, Friday, Sept. 29, 2023, in New York. A potent rush-hour rainstorm has swamped the New York metropolitan area. The deluge Friday shut down swaths of the subway system, flooded some streets and highways, and cut off access to at lea...

United Auto Workers strikes spread as 7,000 more workers at two plants join the picket line

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

By TOM KRISHER and DAVID KOENIG (AP Business Writers)DETROIT (AP) — The United Auto Workers union expanded its strikes against Detroit automakers Friday, ordering 7,000 more workers to walk off the job in Illinois and Michigan to put more pressure on the companies to improve their offers.It was the second time the union has widened the walkout, which started two weeks ago at three assembly plants before the most recent addition of a Ford plant in Chicago and a General Motors assembly factory near Lansing.Union President Shawn Fain told workers in a video appearance that the strikes were escalated because Ford and GM refused “to make meaningful progress” in ongoing contract talks. Jeep maker Stellantis was spared from the third round of strikes.Ford and GM shot back as a war of words with the union also intensified. Ford accused the UAW of holding up a deal mainly over union representation at electric vehicle battery plants, most of which are joint ventures with ...

Ex-Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark can’t move Georgia case to federal court, a judge says

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

ATLANTA (AP) — A judge on Friday rejected a request by former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark to move the Georgia election subversion charges against him from state court to federal court.U.S. District Judge Steve Jones said he was making no ruling on the merits of the charges against Clark, but he concluded that the federal court has no jurisdiction over the case. He said “the outcome of the case will be for a Fulton County judge and trier of fact to ultimately decide.”Jones had earlier rejected a similar request from Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. He is weighing the same question from three Georgia Republicans who falsely certified that then-President Donald Trump won in 2020. They are among 19 people, including the former president himself, who have pleaded not guilty to participating in a wide-ranging scheme to overturn Democrat Joe Biden’s presidential victory and keep the Republican Trump in power.The practical effects of moving to federal court would...

A child sex abuse suspect kills himself after wounding marshals trying to arrest him, police say

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

IRMO, S.C. (AP) — A man wanted by police for child sex abuse crimes shot and killed himself Friday after wounding two federal marshals trying to arrest him at a South Carolina hotel, investigators said.A special team of U.S. Marshals was trying to arrest George Curtis at an extended stay hotel near Columbia when they were fired on, the agency said in a statement.Two marshals were hit and their injuries aren’t life-threatening, officials said.After the shooting, Curtis turned the gun on himself, authorities said.Curtis was wanted by the Richmond County Sherriff’s Office in Georgia on charges of child rape, aggravated child molestation, aggravated sexual battery and two counts of child molestation.Television footage from the Extended Stay America hotel in Irmo showed dozens of police cars and a shattered side door surrounded by crime scene tape.The Associated Press

Man deliberately drives into a home and crashes into a police station in New Jersey, police say

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

INDEPENDENCE TOWNSHIP, N.J. (AP) — A New Jersey man deliberately drove his SUV into a home and the offices of a municipal police department earlier this month, authorities announced Friday.No one was injured in either crash, which both occurred Sept. 20, the Warren County Prosecutor’s Office said in a news release. However, at least one officer narrowly escaped being struck when John Hargreaves, 34, of Belvidere, drove into the Independence Township police headquarters, causing significant damage.Hargreaves’ vehicle came to rest in the department’s squad room. As he got out of the vehicle, prosecutors said Hargreaves put his hands in the air and appeared to be celebrating while loudly playing the Guns N’ Roses song “Welcome to the Jungle” on his car stereo as officers took him into custody.That crash happened just minutes after Hargreaves had driven into the garage door of a home in Liberty Township, an act prosecutors said was intended to harass the homeowne...

Baltimore Archdiocese says it will file for bankruptcy before new law on abuse lawsuits takes effect

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

BALTIMORE (AP) — The Archdiocese of Baltimore announced Friday that it filed for Chapter 11 reorganization days before a new state law goes into effect removing the statute of limitations on child sex abuse charges and allowing victims to sue their abusers decades after the fact.The step will “allow the archdiocese to equitably compensate victim-survivors of child sexual abuse” while the local Catholic church continues its mission and ministries, Archbishop William E. Lori said in a statement posted on the archdiocese website.The Associated Press

Judges maintain bans on gender-affirming care for youth in Tennessee and Kentucky

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee and Kentucky can continue to ban gender-affirming care for young transgender people while legal challenges against those state laws proceed, federal appeals judges ruled.In a 2-1 decision by a 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel late Thursday, the majority wrote that elected lawmakers made “precise cost-benefit decisions” in instituting the bans and “did not trigger any reason for judges to second-guess them.” The laws were passed by Republican majorities in both states.“Prohibiting citizens and legislatures from offering their perspectives on high-stakes medical policies, in which compassion for the child points in both directions, is not something life-tenured federal judges should do without a clear warrant in the Constitution,” Chief Judge Jeffrey Sutton wrote.The laws had already kicked in under previous rulings by the appeals judges, despite decisions in lower courts that temporarily kept significant parts of the bans from taking effect. T...

‘Incredibly convincing’: Family loses life savings after computer virus alert

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

This has likely happened to you while on the computer. You’re surfing the internet and get an alert that your computer has been compromised.A Toronto woman whose mother, unfortunately, got a computer virus is speaking out to share her hard-earned lesson.“My mom panicked, and so did I,” the woman, who asked only to be identified as “Linda,” said. “Our computer was locked, and the screen told us to call a number for what we thought was Microsoft.”That’s when things got strange, but now, in hindsight, Linda says it’s crystal clear.“This was a very organized effort to get money from us, and it worked.”When she called the number on the alert, a woman, who again said she was with Microsoft, asked her a series of questions about the computer.“She was incredibly knowledgeable and did try to walk us through ways to get it fixed, I’m sure, just to gain some type of trust.”Linda was told that her computer was l...

Witness to the 1996 drive-by shooting of Tupac Shakur indicted on murder charge in rapper's death

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:12:19 GMT

LAS VEGAS (AP) — One of the last living witnesses to the fatal drive-by shooting of rapper Tupac Shakur in Las Vegas was charged with murder Friday in the 1996 killing, a long-awaited breakthrough in a case that has frustrated investigators and fascinated the public.Duane “Keffe D” Davis has long been known to investigators and has himself admitted in interviews and in his 2019 tell-all memoir, “Compton Street Legend,” that he was in the Cadillac from which the gunfire erupted during the September 1996 drive-by shooting. Shakur was 25 when he was killed.A Nevada grand jury indicted Davis in the killing, prosecutors announced in court Friday. Chief Deputy District Attorney Marc DiGiacomo said a grand jury had been seated in the case for several months. DiGiacomo described Davis as the “on-ground, on-site commander” who “ordered the death” of Shakur.The charges were revealed hours after Davis, 60, was arrested this morning while on a walk near his home, according to DiGiacomo.Las Vega...