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Texas AG Ken Paxton’s securities fraud trial set for April, more than 8 years after indictment

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

HOUSTON (AP) — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton will stand trial on securities fraud charges in April, a judge ruled Monday, more than eight years after the Republican was indicted and a month after his acquittal in an impeachment trial over separate corruption accusations.Paxton was in the courtroom when state District Judge Andrea Beall of Houston set the April 15 trial date in the long-delayed criminal case, which began in 2015 when a Texas grand jury indicted him on charges of duping investors in a tech startup. At the time, the felony charges appeared to threaten his political career. But Paxton, who has pleaded not guilty, has instead become an even more dominant figure in the Texas GOP and won reelection twice since his indictment.The scheduling of the trial comes at a moment when Paxton has appeared politically recharged after the Texas Senate acquitted him on impeachment charges over accusations that he used his office to help a political donor. Since then, Paxton has retu...

Federal charge says former North Dakota lawmaker traveled to Prague with intent to rape minor

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — A former, longtime North Dakota lawmaker has been indicted on a federal charge alleging he traveled to Prague with the intent to rape a minor.The four-page indictment against former state Sen. Ray Holmberg also charges him with one count of receiving images depicting child sexual abuse. The indictment was filed Thursday in federal court in North Dakota. It accuses the 79-year-old Holmberg of traveling from North Dakota to the Czech Republic from about June 2011 to November 2016 to rape a person under age 18. Phone and text messages left with Holmberg’s attorney on Monday were not immediately returned. A text message sent to Holmberg was not immediately returned and voicemail on his phone was not set up, so a message could not be left. Jack Dura, The Associated Press

Halloween weekend shootings across US leave at least 11 dead, scores injured

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — Shootings across the U.S. over the weekend before Halloween have left at least 11 people dead and more than 70 injured, authorities said.The deaths between Friday and Sunday included two in Tampa, Florida, three in Texarkana, Texas, and two each in Dodge City, Kansas; San Antonio, Texas; and Mansfield, Ohio, according to police. Many involved altercations arising from Halloween celebrations, including the mass shooting in Tampa’s Ybor City section early Sunday as bars were closing and scores of people in costumes spilled out on the streets before groups began arguing.The spate of weekend violence unfolded as people mourn the 18 people killed by a gunman last week in Lewiston, Maine. More than 1,000 people turned out Sunday for a vigil.“A neighborhood bar. A bowling alley. A Halloween party. It seems we can’t go one day without a mass shooting in America,” said Kris Brown, president of Brady, a gun violence prevention group. “Anger plus firearms is a...

Passenger rights overhaul will barely dent bottom line, Air Canada says

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

MONTREAL — Air Canada says the country’s passenger rights overhaul will hardly hurt its bottom line.On a call with analysts Monday, chief financial officer John Di Bert said the financial impact of the reforms will be “incremental.”He says the full impact of the updated rights charter will become more apparent in 2024, noting there would be some added pressure.In April, the federal government announced sweeping reforms to the Air Passenger Protection Regulations, with the specifics now being hashed out by Canada’s transport regulator.The changes appear to scrap a loophole through which airlines have denied customers compensation for flight delays or cancellations when they were required for safety purposes.The new rules also ratchet up the maximum penalty for airline violations to $250,000 — a tenfold increase — and put the regulatory cost of complaints on carriers.This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 30, 2023.Companies in this story: (T...

Tropical Storm Pilar heads toward El Salvador and is expected to bring heavy rain to Central America

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — Tropical Storm Pilar threatened to bring heavy rain and flash flooding to El Salvador and other parts of Central America as it sat just off the Pacific coast Monday.The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Pilar was located about 225 miles (360 kilometers) southwest of San Salvador with winds of 50 mph (85 kph) and was moving east-northeast at 6 mph (9 kph).The storm was expected to maintain that general track for the next day or two, stall for a day or more just off the coast and then abruptly turn around and head back out to sea without making landfall, the center said.The storm was forecast to dump five to 10 inches (12-24 centimeters) of rain from El Salvador to Costa Rica with as much as 15 inches (38 centimeters) in some areas.El Salvador’s government put the country on alert Sunday and Congress declared a national emergency, which allows civil defense authorities to force evacuations for people who are at risk.Classes were suspended across the ...

Cyprus prepares for a potential migrant influx due to the ongoing Israel-Hamas war

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) — Cyprus is doubling the existing 1,153-person capacity of its main migrant reception camp as the island nation prepares for potentially a large influx of people if the crisis in neighboring Israel and Gaza escalates, authorities said Monday.The Pournara reception camp — on the outskirts of the capital Nicosia — will see an increase in staffing to adequately provide needed care to new arrivals and expedite asylum application processing, Cypriot Interior Minister Constantinos Ioannou said in a statement.Authorities have evaluated different venues where migrants could be accommodated if arrivals exceed the capacity of the center and would immediately ask the European Union to dispatch more personnel to help process asylum applications, the statement said. Nearly 200 migrants arrived in Cyprus aboard four separate boats on Saturday alone, likely setting sail from Lebanon which is 108 miles (174 kilometers) from the country’s eastern coastline – reported...

Death toll lowered to 7 in Louisiana super fog highway crashes involving 160 vehicles

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The death toll from last week’s series of highway crashes blamed on a “super fog” of smoke from marsh fires mixed with dense fog has been lowered from eight to seven people, according to Louisiana State Police.The Oct. 24 pileups involved about 160 vehicles on Interstate 55 near New Orleans. “Due to the intense fire and the extensive wreckage, the initial investigation led Troopers to believe that there were a total of eight victims,” state police said in a Friday news release. The final number was lowered to seven after further forensic investigation involving the St. John the Baptist Parish Coroner’s Office, the Jefferson Parish Coroner’s Office, and the LSU Forensic Anthropology and Computer Enhancement Services Laboratory. The cars crashed after smoke spreading through the region from a marsh fire east of New Orleans combined with thick fog and reduced visibility on highways to near nothing. The National Weather Service dubbed it a “super fog” — fog enhanced b...

New Slovakia’s government announces a massive deployment at the Hungarian border to curb migration

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP) — The new Slovak government announced a big deployment of police and armed forces Monday along the border with Hungary to prevent growing numbers of migrants entering the country.Prime Minister Robert Fico did not immediately give details of the deployment but said that illegal migration needs to be under control or else people linked to “terrorist” groups could enter the country. Fico, who spoke after meeting Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Esto, said the deployment would start later Monday and that he would personally inspect the situation at border.His new government was sworn in last Wednesday after his leftist Smer, or Direction, party won the Sept. 30 parliamentary election, opening the way for the populist leader to become the prime minister for the fourth time.The new government has not yet released its policy program, but Fico has suggested it will include a tough stance against migration.Sutaj Esto said that the situation in the world has been serio...

St. Louis County prosecutor drops U.S. Senate bid, will instead oppose Cori Bush in House race

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

ST. LOUIS (AP) — St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell announced Monday he will drop his bid to unseat Republican U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley in 2024, and will instead make a run at a fellow Democrat — U.S. Rep. Cori Bush.Bell, 48, will oppose Bush in the 2024 Democratic primary for Missouri’s 1st Congressional District seat that covers St. Louis and part of St. Louis County. The decision comes as Bush has taken criticism for her response to the Hamas attack on Israel, including her call in a social media post to end “US government support for Israeli military occupation and apartheid.”Bell and Bush are both Black, and both emerged as political forces in the aftermath of the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014, a death that helped spark the national Black Lives Matter movement. Bush was elected to the House in 2020, pulling a stunning upset of Democratic veteran William Lacy Clay.Two years earlier, Bell pulled an equally surprising...

A 5.4 magnitude earthquake has shaken Jamaica with no immediate reports of casualties or damage

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:35:59 GMT

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — A 5.4 magnitude earthquake hit Jamaica on Monday, prompting people to flee buildings amid heavy shaking.The earthquake was located about 2 miles (4 kilometers) west-northwest of Hope Bay, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It occurred at a shallow depth of 6 miles (10 kilometers).There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.The earthquake prompted panic on the island. Members attending the International Seabed Authority meeting that began Monday could be seeing fleeing on camera before the broadcast cut off.While small earthquakes are common in and around Jamaica — some 200 a year — large ones are rare. The devastating Port Royal earthquake occurred in 1692, with a portion of the town sinking into the sea. Then in 1907, a quake struck the capital, Kingston, killing more than 1,000 people. Another big quake was reported in March 1957, affecting mostly western Jamaica, according to the University of the West Indies in Mona, Jamaica.The islan...