U.S./World category, Page 1064
Xi calls situation grave as China scrambles to contain virus
BEIJING — China’s leader on Saturday called the accelerating spread of a new virus a grave situation, as cities from the outbreak’s epicenter in central China to Hong Kong scrambled to contain an illness that has infected more than 1,200 people and killed 41. President Xi Jinping’s remarks, reported by...
Woman kills retired trooper, self at Chicago-area cigar bar
LISLE, Ill. — A woman fatally shot a retired Illinois State Police trooper and wounded another retired state trooper and an off-duty trooper Friday night before turning the gun on herself at a cigar lounge in the Chicago suburbs, police said. The shooting at the Humidor Cigar Lounge in Lisle...
Week 1 of Weinstein trial: Vile allegations, X-rated gifts
NEW YORK — Harvey Weinstein trundled into court this week for the start of a New York City rape trial, facing the prospect of a conviction that could put him in prison for the rest of his life. Within the first three days of the #MeToo-era trial, the once-heralded Hollywood...
Rare copy of a Christopher Columbus letter stolen in Venice is recovered by authorities in Delaware
PHILADELPHIA — Sometime in the mid-1980s, someone made their way into the Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana in Venice, Italy, and walked out with a 500-year old Latin copy of the first letter Christopher Columbus wrote to Ferdinand, King of Spain, describing the wonders he beheld in the Americas. This week, after...
Jamal Khashoggi doc ‘The Dissident’ lands at Sundance
PARK CITY, Utah — A searing documentary about the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khassoggi made its anticipated debut at the Sundance Film Festival, unveiling a detailed investigation into the Saudi Arabia regime and the companies and governments that do business with it. Bryan Fogel’s “The Dissident” was one...
Trump lawyers argue Democrats just want to overturn election
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s lawyers plunged into his impeachment trial defense Saturday by accusing Democrats of striving to overturn the 2016 election, arguing that investigations of Trump’s dealings with Ukraine have not been a fact-finding mission but a politically motivated effort to drive him from the White House. “They’re...
Jeff Sessions stresses Trump loyalty in Alabama Senate race
VESTAVIA HILLS, Ala. — Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, giving a recent campaign speech to a suburban Republican club, recalled his 2016 decision to endorse then-presidential candidate Donald Trump at a time when many party members were uncertain about the bellicose outsider. “‘Jeff, are you sure?’” he said, recalling questions...
Spacewalking astronauts plug leak, finish fixing cosmic ray detector
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Spacewalking astronauts plugged a leak in a cosmic ray detector outside the International Space Station on Saturday, completing a series of complex repairs to give the instrument new life. The $2 billion Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer could resume its hunt for elusive antimatter and dark matter by...
Woman charged with killing kids faced child-welfare scrutiny
PHOENIX — A woman charged with murder in the deaths of her three young kids in Phoenix was the subject of several home visits by police and child-welfare authorities when she previously lived in Oklahoma, according to police reports. The reports released Friday by police in Prague, Oklahoma, say a...
NYPD officer charged in the death of his 8-year-old son
CENTER MORICHES, N.Y. — A New York Police Department officer and his fiancee left the officer’s 8-year-old son in a garage overnight in freezing temperatures and then did nothing to help him as he died of hypothermia, prosecutors said Friday. “They evinced no regard for this child’s human life,” Suffolk...
The big lesson from the Bezos hack: Anyone can be a target
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — You may not think you’re in the same league as Jeff Bezos when it comes to being a hacking target. Probably not, but you — and just about anyone else, potentially including senior U.S. government figures — could still be vulnerable to an attack similar to...
Officials identify remains found in burnt-out Hawaii home
HONOLULU — The Honolulu Medical Examiner’s Office has identified the remains of two people found in a burnt-out home where a man allegedly shot and killed two Honolulu police officers and attacked a neighbor before setting the house ablaze last weekend. Officials on Friday released a statement identifying the homeowner,...
Actress Rosie Perez testifies about the night Annabella Sciorra revealed she was raped by Harvey Weinstein
NEW YORK — Prosecution witness Rosie Perez testified in chilling detail Friday about the phone call when her sobbing friend Annabella Sciorra finally identified Hollywood deal-maker Harvey Weinstein as the man who violently raped her just months before. “She told me that it was in fact Harvey Weinstein,” Perez declared...
Too soon to tell if new virus as dangerous as SARS cousin
The new virus from China has the world on edge because it’s a close cousin to viruses that killed hundreds in separate outbreaks. While it’s too early to tell if this latest threat will prove as deadly, health authorities are drawing on lessons from that grim past. WHAT’S THE LINK...
It didn’t take long for someone to pilfer weed from an airport bin where travelers ditch their stash
CHICAGO — One person’s trash is another person’s stash. Chicago police say someone apparently stole marijuana this week from one of the blue boxes placed at Midway Airport for travelers who need to dispose of their weed before they get on a plane. The “marijuana amnesty boxes” were placed there...
85,000 museum artifacts feared lost in NYC Chinatown fire
NEW YORK — Some 85,000 artifacts that tell the story of the Chinese migration to the United States may have been lost in a fire that struck a building in the heart of Manhattan’s Chinatown, a museum official said Friday. The president of the Museum of Chinese in America told...
Outbreak casts pall over China new year as deaths surpass 40
BEIJING — China’s most festive holiday began in the shadow of a worrying new virus Saturday as the death toll surpassed 40, an unprecedented lockdown kept 36 million people from traveling and authorities canceled a host of Lunar New Year events. The National Health Commission reported a jump in the...
Trump, a late convert to cause, attends anti-abortion rally
WASHINGTON — President Trump vowed to stand with anti-abortion activists Friday as he became the first sitting president to speak at the March for Life, an annual gathering that is one of the movement’s highest profile and most symbolic events. “Today as President of the United States, I am truly...
At least 14 dead, hundreds hurt as quake hits eastern Turkey
ANKARA, Turkey — An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 rocked eastern Turkey on Friday killing at least 14 people, injuring more than 300 and leaving several trapped in the wreckage of toppled buildings, Turkish officials said. Rescue teams from neighboring provinces were dispatched to the affected areas, and...
U.S. vows greater effort to fight flood of counterfeit goods
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration pledged Friday to step up efforts against the vast amounts of counterfeit clothing, medicine and other goods that have flooded into the U.S. in increasing waves with the rise in e-commerce. Customs and Border Patrol would subject online retailers, including the growing number of third-party...
California threatened with funds loss over abortion coverage
WASHINGTON — Saying that California is violating a federal law, the Trump administration on Friday threatened the state with a potential loss of federal health care funds over its requirement that insurance plans cover abortions. The announcement was timed to coincide with the anti-abortion March for Life in the nation’s...
Snow plow kills 2 near Kansas State University campus
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A snow plow struck and killed two pedestrians in Kansas before sunrise Friday after a winter storm coated parts of the Midwest with snow. The collision involving a Riley County plow truck happened shortly after 5 a.m., after the National Weather Service issued winter weather advisories...
Lawsuit: 2 cheated man of $4 million in lottery winnings
NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — A Massachusetts says two women cheated him out of $4 million in lottery winnings by taking advantage of his inability to read or speak English. Joao Luis DaPonte filed a lawsuit this month against Maria Oliveira and Susana Gaspar in Bristol Superior Court over the ownership...
Pentagon: 34 U.S. troops had brain injuries from Iran’s strike
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon said Friday that 34 U.S. troops were diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries suffered in this month’s Iranian missile strike on an Iraqi air base, and that half of the troops have returned to their military duties. Seventeen of the 34 are still under medical observation, according...
China expands lockdown against virus, fast-tracks hospital
BEIJING — China expanded its lockdown against the deadly new virus to an unprecedented 36 million people and rushed to build a prefabricated, 1,000-bed hospital for victims Friday as the outbreak cast a pall over Lunar New Year, the country’s biggest and most festive holiday. The number of confirmed cases...
