Archaeologists: Site of Harriet Tubman’s father’s home found
ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Archaeologists in Maryland say they believe they have found the homesite of famed abolitionist Harriet Tubman’s father. The homesite of Ben Ross was found on property acquired last year by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as an addition to Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge, officials said Tuesday....
Man shoots 3 colleagues, 1 fatally, at New York grocery storeVideo
WEST HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. — A man suspected of shooting three workers inside a manager’s office at a Long Island grocery store Tuesday, killing one of them, was arrested after fleeing the scene and remaining at large for several hours, police said. Nassau County Executive Laura Curran tweeted around 3:15 p.m....
Out of sight but center stage, jurors weigh Chauvin’s fate
MINNEAPOLIS — The jurors who sat off-camera through three weeks of draining testimony in Derek Chauvin’s murder trial in George Floyd’s death were in the spotlight Tuesday, still out of sight but now in control of verdicts awaited by a skittish city. The jury of six white people and six...
Biden praying for ‘right verdict’ in Chauvin trial
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden said Tuesday that he is “praying the verdict is the right verdict” in the trial of former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin and that he believed the case, which has gone to the jury and put the nation on edge, to be “overwhelming.” Biden, ahead...
Ted Nugent, who once dismissed covid-19, sickened by virus
Rocker Ted Nugent is revealing he was in agony after testing positive for coronavirus — months after he said the virus was “not a real pandemic.” “I thought I was dying,” Nugent says in a Facebook live video posted Monday. “I literally could hardly crawl out of bed the last...
EU agency links J&J shot to rare clots, says odds favor use
LONDON — The European Union’s drug regulatory agency said Tuesday that it found a “possible link” between Johnson & Johnson’s covid-19 vaccine and extremely rare blood clots and that a warning should be added to the label. But experts at the agency reiterated that the vaccine’s benefits outweigh the risks....
Sheriff: Woman purposely drove into teens playing basketball
GREENVILLE, N.C. — A white North Carolina woman was charged with driving her car into a yard where three Black teenagers were playing basketball, injuring one of them. A Pitt County Sheriff’s Office news release said deputies responded Sunday afternoon to a report of a child intentionally hit by a...
Ohio researcher who sold trade secrets to China gets 33 months
COLUMBUS, Ohio — A former researcher at an Ohio children’s hospital has been sentenced to 33 months in prison for conspiring to steal trade secrets and sell them in China. Yu Zhou, 51, was sentenced Monday. Federal authorities say he and his wife Li Chen, 48, who formerly lived in...
Pandemic puts tulips, bluebells, cherry blossoms in hiding
HALLE, Belgium — There is no stopping flowers when they bloom, blossoms when they burst. Unfortunately, people have been stopped from enjoying them these days. In pandemic times, when so much goes against the grain, some beauties of nature are no longer embraced but kept at bay. From Japan’s cherry...
Bush criticizes GOP isolationism, anti-immigration rhetoric
WASHINGTON — George W. Bush says the Republican Party he served as president has become “isolationist, protectionist and, to a certain extent, nativist” and says he’s especially concerned about anti-immigration rhetoric. “It’s a beautiful country we have and yet it’s not beautiful when we condemn, call people names and scare...
Grizzly mauling near Yellowstone kills backcountry guide
WEST YELLOWSTONE, Mont. — A Montana backcountry guide has died after he was mauled by a large grizzly bear that was probably defending a nearby moose carcass just outside Yellowstone National Park, officials said Monday. Charles “Carl” Mock, 40, who lived in the park gateway community of West Yellowstone, died...
Teen’s death in Chicago puts focus on split-second police decisions
It happened in less than a second. Thirteen-year-old Adam Toledo dropped the gun he’d been holding, turned and began raising his hands just as the officer had commanded. Then the cop fired a single shot, killing the boy in the dark Chicago alley. The graphic video that became the latest...
U.S. takes steps to protect electric system from cyberattacks
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration is taking steps to protect the country’s electric system from cyberattacks through a new 100-day initiative combining federal government agencies and private industry. The initiative, announced Tuesday by the Energy Department, encourages owners and operators of power plants and electric utilities to improve their capabilities...
Military: Chadian president killed after 30 years in power
N’DJAMENA, Chad — Chadian President Idriss Deby Itno, who ruled the central African nation for more than three decades, was killed Tuesday on the battlefield in a fight against rebels, the military announced on national television and radio. The military said that a transitional council will be led by Deby’s...
Should states set pot policy by its potency? Some say yes
NEW YORK — As marijuana legalization spreads across U.S. states, so does a debate over whether to set pot policy by potency. Under a law signed last month, New York will tax recreational marijuana based on its amount of THC, the main intoxicating chemical in cannabis. Illinois imposed a potency-related...
Man held for allegedly attacking Asian couple in California
ORANGE, Calif. — A man who said he hates Asians was arrested on suspicion of assaulting an elderly Korean American couple at a Southern California park after allegedly threatening violence against a Japanese American Olympic athlete, police said. Michael Orlando Vivona, 25, was arrested Sunday on suspicion of elder abuse...
Walter Mondale, Jimmy Carter’s vice president, dies at 93Video
MINNEAPOLIS — Former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, a liberal icon who lost the most lopsided presidential election after bluntly telling voters to expect a tax increase if he won, died Monday. He was 93. The death of the former senator, ambassador and Minnesota attorney general was announced in a...
Pa. pensions board votes to raise rates for 94K school employees
HARRISBURG — The board of Pennsylvania’s largest public pension system on Monday night voted to raise contribution rates for tens of thousands of public school employees after a mistake in a calculation of the fund’s long-term investment performance was revealed last month. The board of the $64 billion Public School...
Murder case against Derek Chauvin in George Floyd’s death goes to the juryVideo
MINNEAPOLIS — The murder case against former Officer Derek Chauvin in the death of George Floyd went to the jury Monday in a city on edge against another round of unrest like the one that erupted last year over the harrowing video of Chauvin with his knee on the Black...
Mass fossil site may prove tyrannosaurs hunted in packs like wolves
SALT LAKE CITY — Ferocious tyrannosaur dinosaurs may not have been solitary predators as long envisioned, but more like social carnivores such as wolves, new research unveiled Monday found. Paleontologists developed the theory while studying a mass tyrannosaur death site found seven years ago in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument...
Report: Mike Pompeo, wife made more than 100 personal requests of State Department employees
WASHINGTON — Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his wife, Susan Pompeo, repeatedly misused State Department resources and staff for personal business, violating the ethical standards of the department, according to a long-awaited inspector general’s report. The report details over 100 instances of misconduct that “had no apparent connection...
Colorado judge resigning after censure for racial slur
DENVER — A Colorado judge will resign after being censured for repeatedly saying a racial slur in a conversation with a Black employee, expressing her views on racial justice while on the bench as well as using court employees to work on personal business. The Colorado Supreme Court issued the...
Medical ruling: Capitol cop Brian Sicknick died of natural causes
WASHINGTON — Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, who was injured while confronting rioters during the Jan. 6 insurrection, suffered a stroke and died from natural causes, the Washington, D.C., medical examiner’s office ruled Monday, a finding that lessens the chances that anyone will be charged in his death. Investigators initially...
Arizona governor orders ‘vaccine passport’ ban for the state
PHOENIX — Gov. Doug Ducey used his executive powers Monday to prohibit local and regional governments from making “vaccine passports” a requirement for people to enter businesses or get services, calling it an encroachment on the private medical information of Arizona residents. The Republican governor signed an executive order that...
New York AG investigating Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s use of aides on book
ALBANY, N.Y. — New York’s attorney general is investigating whether Gov. Andrew Cuomo broke the law by having members of his staff help write and promote his pandemic leadership book. In a letter dated April 13, but made public Monday, state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli authorized State Attorney General Letitia James...