
Who is Adrienne Vaughan's husband? Bloomsbury USA president's partner suffers major injuries in tragic speedboat accident
The horrific accident took place on the Amalfi coast where Adrienne Vaughan was on a family vacation with her husband, Mike, and her two children
2023-08-05 01:32

Amazon deforestation at six-year-low in Brazil after plunging 66% in July
Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon fell by 66% last month compared to July 2022 and is now at its lowest rate in six years, according to preliminary data released by Brazil's National Institute for Space Research (INPE) on Thursday.
2023-08-05 01:10

Flood emergencies force evacuations and water rescues across the South
Life-threatening flash flooding forced evacuations and water rescues across parts of the South Friday morning and more rainfall throughout the day could worsen the situation.
2023-08-05 01:07

Armed experts re-enact Parkland school shooting for lawsuit evidence
Live bullets will be fired inside the school to assess whether they could be heard outside.
2023-08-05 01:03

Defense secretary issues new memo on how to reshuffle Pentagon leadership roles amid Tuberville blockade
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has issued guidance to the military workforce for the first time about how Pentagon leadership roles will likely need to be reshuffled as a result of Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville's hold on military confirmations.
2023-08-05 00:39

Major cases await as liberals exert control of Wisconsin Supreme Court
Conflicts on Wisconsin’s newly liberal controlled state Supreme Court spilled out publicly as the court majority flipped this week, setting the stage for deep divisions on major cases that could determine voting rules in this battleground state, the legality of abortions and legislative boundary lines
2023-08-05 00:35

Mississippi governor ignores low-budget challengers in GOP primary, focusing on Democrat in November
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves barely acknowledges his two challengers in next week’s Republican primary
2023-08-04 22:51

Deutsche, HSBC See Turkish Lira Diving to New Lows on Inflation
Turkey’s rebounding inflation is prompting bank economists to issue more pessimistic forecasts for the lira, already one of
2023-08-04 20:54

Trump can’t decide if he had a ‘good’ or ‘sad’ day at 2020 election arraignment
Donald Trump couldn’t seem to decide whether he had a “good day” or a “sad day” as he was arrested and arraigned on four criminal charges over his attempts to overthrow the 2020 presidential election. The former president appeared in court in Washington DC on Thursday afternoon, where he pleaded not guilty to all charges in what now marks his third criminal case. Following the arraignment, he returned to his Bedminster estate and took to Truth Social where, he claimed – in a full-caps late-night rant – that he had a “very good day”. “CONSIDERING THE FACT THAT I HAD TO FLY TO A FILTHY, DIRTY, FALLING APART, & VERY UNSAFE WASHINGTON, D.C., TODAY, & THAT I WAS THEN ARRESTED BY MY POLITICAL OPPONENT, WHO IS LOSING BADLY TO ME IN THE POLLS, CROOKED JOE BIDEN, IT WAS A VERY GOOD DAY!” he wrote on Truth Social. However, this positive outlook appears to jar with the mood he displayed on the tarmac as he jetted out of DC on his private plane – not to mention the mood sources said he displayed behind the scenes. “This is a very sad day for America,” Mr Trump told reporters as he embarked Trump Force One to head back to his Bedminster club. “It was also very sad driving through Washington DC and seeing the filth and the decay and all of the broken buildings and walls and the graffiti. “This is not the place that I left. It’s a very sad thing to see it.” His comments on Washington DC’s apparent deterioration came after Mr Trump left the capital in January 2021 as it was reeling from the January 6 Capitol riots – an attack which came out of the false claims he spread of 2020 election fraud. Meanwhile, sources behind the scenes of Thursday’s hearing revealed a somewhat “dejected” mood. The former president was said to be “irked” that US District Judge Moxila Upadhyaya had referred to him as “Mr Trump” and not “Mr President” during his court appearance. “I’m learning tonight that Trump left here in a sour and dejected mood,” said CNN host Kaitlan Collins. “He was, quote, ‘pissed off,’ according to someone who spoke to him.” She added: “I am told that the former president, one thing that irked him particularly, was during that hearing today that lasted about 27 minutes, was when the magistrate judge referred to him as simply ‘Mr Trump.’” Mr Trump’s alleged annoyance comes as the staff at his Mar-a-Lago and Bedminster estates typically still refer to him as “President Trump” – despite leaving the White House over two years ago. “That may not sound odd to anyone else, but he is still referred to by his former title ‘President Trump’ when he’s at his Bedminster golf club in New Jersey, as he is tonight, or at Mar-a-Lago,” revealed Ms Collins. Instead of being waited on by his staff and called “Mr President”, Mr Trump was forced to endure a court appearance similar to that of many criminal defendants. He had to wait around 15 minutes for the judge to arrive and came face to face with prosecutors pursuing charges against him – at one point having something of a stare off with special counsel Jack Smith in the courtroom. However, in other ways his treatment was different – as he did not have his mugshot taken and was not placed in handcuffs. Mr Trump surrendered to authorities and was arrested on four federal charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights. He then appeared for his arraignment at the E Barrett Prettyman Federal Courthouse where he stared down special counsel Jack Smith before pleading not guilty to all charges. The former president is accused of conspiring with his allies to overturn the 2020 election, in a bid to sabotage the vote of the American people. A grand jury, which has spent months hearing evidence in special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation, returned a federal indictment on Tuesday hitting him with four federal charges. The Justice Department alleges that Mr Trump and his circle of co-conspirators knew that he had lost the election but launched a multi-prong conspiracy to do everything they could to enable him to cling to power. This included spreading “knowingly false claims of election fraud to get state legislators and election officials to subvert the legitimate election results and change electoral votes for the Defendant’s opponent, Joseph R. Biden, Jr., to electoral votes for the Defendant”, the indictment states. Mr Trump and his allies also allegedly plotted to send slates of fake electors to seven “targeted states” of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin which President Joe Biden had won – to get them to falsely certify the election for Mr Trump. The indictment also alleges Mr Trump tried to use the DOJ to “conduct sham election crime investigations”, sending letters to the seven states claiming that “significant concerns” had been found in the elections in those states. As well as the false claims about the election being stolen from Mr Trump, the scheme also involved pushing false claims that Vice President Mike Pence had the power to alter the results – and pushing Mr Pence to “fraudulently alter the election results”. When Mr Trump’s supporters stormed the US Capitol in a violent attack that ended with five deaths, Mr Trump and his co-conspirators “exploited” the incident by “redoubling efforts to levy false claims of election fraud and convince Members of Congress to further delay the certification based on those claims,” the indictment claims. At a press conference on Tuesday, Mr Smith placed the blame for the January 6 attack on the US Capitol firmly on Mr Trump’s shoulders. “The attack on our nation’s capitol on January 6, 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy,” he said. “As described in the indictment, it was fueled by lies. Lies by the defendant targeted at obstructing a bedrock function of the US government – the nation’s process of collecting, counting and certifying the results of the presidential election.” The indictment marks Mr Trump’s second federal indictment, his third criminal indictment overall – and potentially his most serious. While the former president is the only person charged in the case, the indictment also refers to six co-conspirators who worked with him to try to overturn the 2020 presidential election. The six individuals – four attorneys, one Justice Department official and one political consultant – have not been named in the charging documents because they have not yet been charged with any crimes. However, based on the details in the indictment and records already known about the events leading up to the Capitol riot, the identities are apparent as Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, John Eastman, Jeffrey Clark, Kenneth Chesebro and Boris Epshteyn. This marks Mr Trump’s third indictment after he was hit with New York state charges following an investigation into hush money payments made prior to the 2016 election and then separate federal charges over his alleged mishandling of classified documents on leaving office. He has pleaded not guilty in both of those charges as well. Read More Live updates: Trump pleads not guilty at arraignment in 2020 election case Meet Jack Smith: The special prosecutor who could take down Trump Trump appears to stumble over his name and age at arraignment Watch: Donald Trump’s motorcade blocked by herd of goats Chairman of UK Republican group wishes Donald Trump would not run for president Will Trump’s alleged co-conspirators in the Jan 6 indictment turn on him?
2023-08-04 20:53

AP Election Brief | What to expect in Ohio's special election
The battle over abortion rights looms over an Ohio ballot measure being voted on statewide Tuesday
2023-08-04 20:10

Bryan Kohberger finally reveals vague alibi for night of Idaho murders
Bryan Kohberger has finally offered up a vague alibi for his movements on the night that he is accused of brutally stabbing four University of Idaho students to death in their beds. The 28-year-old criminal justice PhD student claims that he was out on a solo drive throughout the night of 12 November and into the early hours of 13 November – but admits that there are no witnesses to back up his version of events. “Mr. Kohberger has long had a habit of going for drives alone. Often he would go for drives at night,” his attorney Anne Taylor wrote in a new court filing. “He did so late on November 12 and into November 13, 2022. Mr. Kohberger is not claiming to be at a specific location at a specific time; at this time there is not a specific witness to say precisely where Mr. Kohberger was at each moment of the hours between late night November 12, 2022 and early morning November 13, 2022. “He was out, driving during the late night and early morning hours of November 12-13, 2022.” The claims about Mr Kohberger’s unusual nighttime habits – and his whereabouts on the night of the murders – come after prosecutors demanded that his legal team reveal his alibi ahead of his October trial. Under Idaho law, defendants have 10 days to provide a written statement about where they claim to have been at the time of the alleged crime and offering information about any witnesses who can support their claim. On 23 May – one day after he was arraigned on four murder charges – Latah County Prosecutor’s Office put in a demand for Mr Kohberger’s notice of alibi. Back then, Mr Kohberger’s legal team asked Judge John Judge for an extension, saying that they needed more time due to the wealth of evidence in the high-profile case, and the deadline was extended to 24 July. But the deadline came and went, with Mr Kohberger’s legal team hinting that he has evidence placing him in another location at the time of the murders – but stopping short of revealing where and instead saying it may come to light at trial. The prosecution subsequently filed a motion seeking to compel an alibi. While Mr Kohberger’s attorney said that there is no specific witness to say where he was throughout the time of the murders, she wrote in the new filing that she anticipates “corroborating witnesses” will back up his explanation at trial. Mr Kohberger is facing the death penalty over the brutal 13 November murders of Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin. He is due to stand trial on 2 October after being indicted by a grand jury on four counts of first-degree murder and one burglary charge. His explanation that he was out on a solo drive that night comes as prosecutors tied him to the murders, in part, through surveillance footage showing his white Hyundai Elantra travelling to and from the crime scene. The affidavit, released in January, outlined some of the evidence against the accused killer – including his DNA on a knife sheath left behind at the scene of the murders, the surveillance footage and cellphone activity. The sheath – for a military or Ka-Bar style knife – was found partly under Mogen’s body after she and Goncalves were found stabbed multiple times on Mogen’s bed on the third floor of the home. DNA on the button clasp of the sheath was then found to match that of the 28-year-old accused killer. Mr Kohberger’s attorneys have sought to cast doubts on the strength of this DNA evidence, in particular the use of genetic genealogy. According to the affidavit in the case, the FBI used genetic genealogy databases to try to identify the DNA source. Trash was then collected from the suspect’s parents’ home in the Poconos Mountains and a familial match – from Mr Kohberger’s father – was made to the sheath, according to the criminal affidavit. Following Mr Kohberger’s arrest on 30 December, DNA samples were then taken directly from the suspect and came back as “a statistical match”, say prosecutors. Mr Kohberger is accused of breaking into an off-campus student home on King Road in the early hours of 13 November and stabbing the four students to death with a large, military-style knife. Two other female roommates lived with the three women at the property and were home at the time of the massacre but survived. One of the survivors – Dylan Mortensen – came face to face with the masked killer, dressed in head-to-toe black and with bushy eyebrows, as he left the home in the aftermath of the murders, according to the criminal affidavit. For more than six weeks, the college town of Moscow was plunged into fear as the accused killer remained at large with no arrests made and no suspects named. Then, on 30 December, law enforcement suddenly swooped on Mr Kohberger’s family home in Albrightsville, Pennsylvania and arrested him for the quadruple murders. The motive remains unknown and it is still unclear what connection the WSU PhD student had to the University of Idaho students – if any – prior to the murders. The murder weapon – a fixed-blade knife – has still never been found. As a criminal justice PhD student at WSU, Mr Kohberger lived just 15 minutes from the victims over the Idaho-Washington border in Pullman. He had moved there from Pennsylvania and began his studies there that summer, having just completed his first semester before his arrest. Before this, he studied criminology at DeSales University – first as an undergraduate and then finishing his graduate studies in June 2022. While there, he studied under renowned forensic psychologist Katherine Ramsland who interviewed the BTK serial killer and co-wrote the book Confession of a Serial Killer: The Untold Story of Dennis Rader, the BTK Killer with him. He also carried out a research project “to understand how emotions and psychological traits influence decision-making when committing a crime”. Read More Bryan Kohberger claims DNA may have been planted at Idaho murders scene – as alibi deadline looms Bryan Kohberger defence hints at alibi in Idaho murders - but won’t reveal what it is as deadline passes Bryan Kohberger could face the firing squad for the Idaho murders. What would this mean?
2023-08-04 20:10

Andrew Tate: A timeline of his rise and fall
Andrew Tate, the controversial former kickboxing world champion turned social media influencer, has been released from house arrest in Romania after mounting a successful appeal as he awaits trial on human trafficking charges. The Bucharest Court of Appeals said in a written ruling that it would be replacing its earlier “house arrest measure with that of judicial control for a period of 60 days from August 4 until October 2”, a lighter restriction that will nevertheless require him to seek permission before leaving the municipality. The influencer, his brother Tristan Tate and two Romanian women were arrested in December 2022 and charged in June with rape, human trafficking and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women, with seven women alleged to have been targeted. The quartet deny the charges. Mr Tate has amassed millions of followers across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and TikTok over the past decade. But he has also seen his accounts banned over inflammatory statements he has made, often appearing to advocate violence against women, which the platforms ruled violated their policies. Frequently accused of embodying toxic masculinity and misogyny, having claimed that women cannot drive, belong in the home and are a man’s property, Mr Tate has made inconsistent statements on the subject. He told the Anything Goes with James English podcast in June 2021 that he was “absolutely sexist” and “absolutely a misogynist”, only to then claim on Piers Morgan Uncensored more recently that he was “absolutely not”. He has also claimed that his remarks, viewed by millions online, are made in the persona of a “comic character” and have been unfairly taken out of context. “I play an online character and am brash and bravado but my views are pure and simply say to find the highest value men and women you can with good hearts,” he told The Independent in response to criticism from the domestic violence organisation White Ribbon. Mr Tate has also made claims about the extent of his personal wealth and his online popularity that have not been substantiated. But he has found an eager audience online for his messages of male empowerment, with teachers increasingly coming forward to express concern about his potentially radicalising influence on impressionable teenage boys, fearing they could take the wrong lessons from pronouncements like the “41 Tenets” on his website. “I believe that men have the divine imperative to become as capable, powerful, and competent as possible in this life,” states the first. Here is a brief introduction to the life and times of Andrew Tate. 1986 Emory Andrew Tate III was born in Washington, DC, on 1 December to Emory Tate Jr, a sergeant of the US Air Force and a chess International Master, and his English wife Eileen, a catering assistant. Initially raising their children in Chicago, Illinois, the couple divorced in 1997, at which point Eileen Tate relocates to a council estate in Luton, Bedfordshire, with her young family, where she reportedly still lives. Tate has described his mother as “my hero” but says they were “broke as a joke” during his childhood. Of his father, he told The Times last September he would be away from home for extended periods while serving but would say to his son upon returning: “Look, your mother has to do the day-to-day stuff. I’m a man. I have to make sure you’re protected.” 2005 The young Andrew Tate starts boxing and martial arts training while reportedly also working as a TV producer. 2009 Earns his first kickboxing championship when he wins the British ISKA Full Contact Cruiserweight Championship in Derby, going by the name King Cobra. 2011 Wins his first ISKA world title by beating Jean-Luc Benoit via knockout. As his celebrity begins to grow, Tate joins Twitter, initially as @Cobratate. 2012 Tate and his brother Tristan begin their first adult webcam business employing lingerie-clad models to engage in chat sessions with men. In a later interview with The Mirror in March 2022, the brothers joke that their webcam ventures, which charge customers $4 (£3.30) an hour, are “a total scam” because the models featured often tell lonely male callers “fake sob stories” to elicit sympathy and earn larger tips. Tristan Tate tells the newspaper the brothers are protected by two lines in their terms and conditions: “One is broadcasting is ‘for entertainment purposes only’. That means if a model says she has a sick dog or a sick grandma it doesn’t have to be true. “The next is that all cash given to models is ‘a voluntary sign of gratitude for their time broadcasting’.” 2013 Wins his second ISKA world title in a 12-round match against Vincent Petitjean. 2016 Invited onto the 17th season of the reality TV show Big Brother, Tate quickly attracts scrutiny over his track record of controversial statements. He is removed from the house after just six days when a video surfaces showing him hitting a woman with a belt. In a statement, both he and the woman featured in the clip say they are friends and that the actions depicted were consensual. 2017 Moves to Bucharest, Romania, with Tristan, setting up home in a heavily-fortified suburban compound and claiming the UK has “gone downhill”. He said the prospect of avoiding rape charges more easily was “probably 40 per cent of the reason” for moving to Central Europe, adding: “I’m not a f***ing rapist, but I like the idea of just being able to do what I want. I like being free. “If you’re a man living in England or Germany or America or any of the Western world right now you’ve decided to live in a country where any woman … at any point in the future can destroy your life.” He later tells The Times this was intended as an attack on litigation culture, commenting: “A dying empire adopts laws like a sick man adopts medicine.” Having already stirred controversy on Twitter by claiming depression “isn’t real”, Tate is permanently suspended from the platform after saying on 18 October that women should “bear some responsibility” for being sexually assaulted, part of a thread commenting on the Harvey Weinstein affair. “I don’t agree with being banned, people get banned from Twitter all the time and make new profiles,” he said subsequently. “I’m not inciting violence, promoting terrorism or harassing anyone. This is censorship of free speech. I’ve never had specific tweets banned or been cautioned.” The controversy boosts his profile among far-right conservatives, bringing him into the company of Alex Jones, Paul Joseph Watson and Donald Trump Jr in America and Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson in the UK August 2022 Having continued to build his following on social media and in right-wing media, a campaign to de-platform Tate resulted in his being banned from Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. In a “final” video, Tate claims that many of the criticisms levied at him are based on clips that have been misrepresented. “I have some responsibility to bear. I still blame myself, because my rise has been so meteoric and I became so famous so quickly,” he said. “My responsibility is that any negative connotations in my videos are removed. The way you say things in a video that gets 500 views is very different from the way you say things in a video that gets 50 million views – the more people you reach, the more important it is that people don’t take things out of context. “If there was as many people cutting up videos like they did mine and those people had a negative agenda, they could make Mickey Mouse look evil, you could make anyone look bad.” His message is dismissed by Hope Not Hate’s research director, Joe Mulhall, who tells The Independent the clip attempts “to completely rewrite his behaviour, justify the unjustifiable, and … takes no responsibility”. That same month, financial services company Stripe pulls out of processing subscriptions for Hustler’s University, another Tate business billed as an online “academy” where members pay a monthly membership fee in exchange for advice on how to make a passive income from online industries such as cryptocurrency. The venture reportedly has around 100,000 paying subscribers who are charged around $49 (£40) per month but Stripe’s decision prompts it to shut its affiliate marketing programme, which had encouraged the spread of Tate videos across social networks. October 2022 After a video of Tate praying at a mosque in Dubai with MMA fighter Tam Khan goes viral, he announces he has converted to Islam in a post on Gettr. November 2022 Tate is reinstated on Twitter by new owner Elon Musk, along with other previously banned right-wing figures including Donald Trump, Kanye West and Jordan Peterson. 28 December 2022 Shortly after Christmas, Tate posts his now-infamous tweet to Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, boasting about his Bugatti and Ferraris and asking for her email address so he can “send a complete list of my car collection and their respective enormous emissions”. “Yes, please do enlighten me,” she responded. “Email me at smalldickenergy@getalife.com.” The internet duly erupts, prompting Tate to respond initially rather weakly by asking “How dare you?!”. He then returned with a video of himself sporting a dressing gown and smoking a cigar claiming to believe the joke has backfired on Thunberg and accusing the “global matrix” of deploying a “bot farm” to send her tweet viral. 29 December A day later, Tate and his brother are detained in Romania for 30 days, along with two women, on suspicion of human trafficking, rape and forming an organised crime group. Prosecutors say they have found six women who claim to have been sexually exploited by the suspects for the purpose of creating internet pornography. An investigation has reportedly been underway since April. 30 December As excitable social media rumours suggest that a Jerry’s Pizza box featured in Tate’s video inadvertently revealed his location to the authorities, Thunberg tweets about him again, declaring: “This is what happens when you don’t recycle your pizza boxes.” 3 January 2023 Tate’s valuable luxury car collection is seized by the Romanian authorities. 8 January One of the two Tate brothers is allegedly hospitalised after a medical check-up in jail, according to Antena 3, a CNN-partnered Romania news site. A cryptic tweet follows from Tate’s account, although it is unclear if he wrote it himself, which states: “The Matrix has attacked me. But they misunderstand, you cannot kill an idea. Hard to Kill.” 10 January Tate appears in court in Bucharest to appeal his detention, arriving wearing handcuffs and bearing a copy of the Quran. His lawyers insist there is “no evidence” against him but the judge rules against him. 31 March Tate wins an appeal to replace his detention with house arrest after the Bucharest Court of Appeal rules against a judge’s decision to extend his incarceration for a fourth time for another 30 days. 20 June Andrew and Tristan Tate formally charged with human trafficking, rape and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women. The pair are accused, along with the two Romanian women, of tricking seven alleged victims with false declarations of love and transporting them to take part in pornography. The women were allegedly controlled by “intimidation, constant surveillance” and claims they were in debt, the prosecution says. 13 July The Tates launch a $5m lawsuit against a Florida woman whom they claim falsely accused them of imprisoning her in Romania, leading to their arrest there on human trafficking charges. 4 August Andrew Tate’s appeal against house arrest succeeds. Speaking to reporters outside court two days earlier, the influencer had promised: “The truth will be known very soon.” Read More Andrew Tate released from house arrest over sex trafficking charges Andrew Tate claims ‘truth will be known very soon’ as he arrives at Court of Appeal Who is Tristan Tate? All we know about Andrew Tate’s brother arrested in human trafficking raid Influencer Andrew Tate released from house arrest while he awaits human trafficking and rape trial Andrew Tate released from house arrest over sex trafficking charges Andrew Tate claims ‘truth will be known very soon’ as he arrives at Court of Appeal
2023-08-04 19:33
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