Police in Utica, N.Y., say an officer fatally shot a 13-year-old boy after a foot chase on Friday evening. Police say officers believed the boy brandished a handgun. Above, vehicles move along Genesee Street after a fresh snowfall, in Utica, N.Y., on Jan. 31, 2017. Hans Pennink/AP
Hans Pennink/AP
Grief and anger engulfed the city of Utica, N.Y. after a police officer shot and killed Nyah Mway, a 13-year-old boy, on Friday night.
The Utica Police Department said the fatal shooting occurred amid a foot chase between Mway and three officers. The officers saw what they believed to be a handgun on Mway, according to a statement released by the department on Facebook. Mway, who graduated from middle school just two days earlier, was then tackled to the ground before an officer, later identified by police as Patrick Husnay, discharged his firearm. The weapon on Mway was later determined to be a pellet gun.
Efforts to contact relatives of Mway were unsuccessful, but on a GoFundMe page set up by his family he was remembered as "an outgoing kid who loved to be outside biking and playing." The family said he was "a good kid" who "has never gotten in trouble with law enforcement before."
Mway and his family came to the U.S. from Myanmar, also known as Burma, as Karen refugees over eight years ago, according to the GoFundMe page. Over the years, thousands of Karen refugees have settled in Utica to flee ethnic and religious persecution by the Myanmar government.
How the shooting unfolded
On Friday night, police officers patrolled the streets of West Utica to investigate a string of armed robberies in the area. The suspects were described as Asian males who carried a black firearm, police said.
Around 10 p.m., three officers stopped Mway and another 13-year-old boy outside on a street, believing the two boys fit the description of the robbery suspects, police said.
In body-camera footage released by law-enforcement, an officer asks to pat down Mway in search of a possible weapon, and Mway tries to run away. The officers followed.
In a statement, the police said the officers believed Mway was holding and pointing a firearm at the officers. In the body-camera footage, an officer yelled out "Gun!" and tackled Mway to the ground. Soon, all three officers appeared hovering over Mway. Roughly 15 seconds after the chase began, a shot was fired by police.
Screams from onlookers followed. One officer attempted to do chest compressions on Mway. He was later transported to Wynn Hospital where he died from his wounds.
Police said they recovered a replica of a Glock 17 Gen5 handgun with a detachable magazine on scene. It was later determined to be a pellet gun.
Police officers are put on administrative leave with pay
Utica Police identified the officers involved as Husnay, a six-year veteran of the Utica Police Department; Bryce Patterson, a four-year veteran; and Andrew Citriniti, who has been on the force for two-and-a-half years.
Police Chief Mark Williams said all three officers were put on administrative leave with pay.
Utica Police said an internal investigation has been launched. The New York State's Attorney General’s Office of Special Investigations will also investigate if the shooting violated any state laws.
On Saturday, the Utica police department said in a statement, "Our thoughts are with our officers involved, and the family of the deceased juvenile."
In a later statement on Saturday night, the department added, "It is our sincerest desire that at the conclusion of these investigations an impartial, fair, and thorough investigation will have been completed, giving answers to any remaining lingering questions."
Response from the community
At a news conference on Saturday, Utica mayor Michael P. Galime said transparency will be a priority.
"What happened yesterday evening in our community is an event that has become all too familiar and routine, over and over and over again,” he said.
Troves of family, friends and community members attended the conference, expressing their anger, grief and disbelief to the situation.
On Saturday, hundreds also gathered for a vigil in honor of Mway, bringing flowers, balloons and candles.
"We won't be satisfied until the murderers are put in jail," said Mway's older brother, The Daily Sentinel reported.
NEW YORK (AP) — Video released late Saturday shows an officer in upstate New York fatally shooting a 13-year-old boy who had been tackled to the ground after he ran from police and pointed a replica handgun at them.
The teen was killed a little after 10 p.m. Friday in Utica after officers in the city about 240 miles (400 kilometers) northwest of Manhattan stopped two youths in connection with an armed robbery investigation, police said.
The youths, both 13, matched the descriptions of the robbery suspects and were in the same area at around the same time the day after, police said. One was also walking in the road, a violation of state traffic law.
The body camera video released by police captures an officer saying he needs to pat them down to ensure they don’t have any weapons in their possession. Immediately one of the two, identified by police as as Nyah Mway, runs away.
Authorities froze frames of the video where a running Nyah Mway appears to point the gun at the pursuing officers. Police also edited the video to insert a red circle around the weapon to show it to viewers.
The officers believed it was a handgun, police said, but it was later determined to be a replica of a Glock 17 Gen 5 handgun with a detachable magazine.
“During a ground struggle” with the teen, one of the officers fired a single shot that struck the boy in the chest, Utica Police Chief Mark Williams said.
The teen was given “immediate” first aid by the officers and taken to Wynn Hospital, where he died, the chief said.
The replica gun carried by the teen “is in all aspects a realistic appearing firearm with GLOCK markings, signatures, detachable magazine, and serial numbers,” Lt. Michael Curley, a police spokesperson, said via email. “However ultimately it fires only pellets or BB’s.”
A bystander video posted to Facebook shows one of the officers chasing after Nyah Mway and tackling him to the ground. It also shows the officer punching the teen as two other officers arrive. A gunshot rings out as the teen is on the ground and the officers quickly stand up.
The officer who fired his gun was identified as Patrick Husnay, a six-year veteran of the agency. Husnay and Officers Bryce Patterson and Andrew Citriniti were placed on administrative leave with pay.
The police body camera video shows a chaotic scene.
Nyah Mway points the replica handgun at the officers while he runs from them. The officers scream “gun!” to each other as they run. Patterson then tackles and punches Nyah Mway, and as the two are wrestling on the ground, Husnay opens fire.
Officers initially thought Nyah Mway may have shot himself, and Patterson says, “I don’t know if he shot me.” It is not clear whether he is referring to Nyah Mway or his fellow officer. Patterson was not struck.
Bystanders scream at the police throughout the recordings, and at one point an officer yells back: “We’re trying to save him right now!”
The other youth was detained in the back of a police vehicle and was not involved in the shooting.
During his “public safety statement,” a brief interview typically done in the aftermath of a police shooting to ensure there is no additional threat, Husnay said he fired one round “straight towards the ground.” He did not know whether Nyah Mway had fired at the officers but said he thought the weapon was a 22-caliber handgun.
The police department released the body camera videos following a public outcry as the shooting roiled Utica, a city with a population of 65,000. It is home to more than 4,200 people from Myanmar, according to The Center, a nonprofit that helps to resettle the refugees.
Nyah Mway, who local media reports said was an 8th grader at Donovan Middle School, was identified as a refugee born in Myanmar and a member of the Karen ethnic minority.
Karens are an ethnic minority among the groups warring with the military rulers of Myanmar, the Southeast Asian country formerly known as Burma. The army ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021 and suppressed widespread nonviolent protests that sought a return to democratic rule.
A tense news conference Saturday ended early as Williams, the city’s mayor and an interpreter struggled to speak over repeated audience outbursts. Members of the community, including the youth’s family, were in attendance.
The police department is conducting an internal investigation to see whether officers followed policies and training. The state attorney general will open its own case to determine if the shooting was justified.
“I want to offer my heartfelt condolences to the family of the deceased party during this difficult time,” Williams said. “This is a tragic and traumatic incident for all involved.”
'A reality show': World reacts to Trump-Biden debate
A vendor in Hong Kong, China, sells newspapers covering the US debate
A weak Joe Biden self-destructed in front of the whole world, while an aggressive Donald Trump told lies and mangled his sentences in a presidential debate that was like a reality show, according to international media.
The verdicts of pundits from around the globe to Thursday night’s televised clash in Atlanta, Georgia, between the two White House rivals was damning.
From Beijing to New Delhi and beyond, the reviews were most scathing of President Biden’s performance at the CNN forum, but his Republican challenger did not escape criticism.
Russian media brand Biden 'total failure'
Even before last night's debate, the main evening news shows on Russian TV on Thursday were speculating that Mr Biden would not be able to survive it.
"An hour and a half live on air is a test of mental and physical fitness," Channel One said, asserting that Mr Biden would "find it difficult to withstand this".
Both state-owned Channel One and Rossiya 1 reported opinion polling showing that some 60% expected Mr Biden to be given a stimulant to get through the debate.
Afterwards, pro-Kremlin commentators portrayed Mr Biden's performance in the debate as lacklustre.
Military blog Rybar branded his performance a "total failure"; while the Telegram channel of the Russia in Global Affairs magazine said that Mr Biden had failed to prove that he was in "proper physical shape" to lead the country and that his performance "appears to have frightened his supporters".
Rossiya 1 TV said on Friday morning that voters were concerned about Mr Biden's "mental health".
It also highlighted Trump's attacks on Mr Biden's handling of the Ukraine war.
'Like a reality show' - Chinese media
Chinese media were enthused by the theatrics of last night’s debate, and many outlets highlighted that Mr Biden and Trump didn’t shake hands at the beginning of the debate and went on to launch “fierce personal attacks against each other”.
The state-owned Global Times describes the debate as “like a reality show”.
Chinese satirical cartoons often depict a fierce, quite literal, battle between the two candidates, but Chinese audiences enjoyed the more quirky aspects of the debate, such as the pair going “off topic to discuss their golf skills”.
Generally, Chinese media want to paint a picture for audiences of general apathy and frustration among US voters at both candidates.
Global Times says they were both scrutinised over their “age and stamina”; noting that on the campaign trail, Trump was “frequently mangling his sentences” and that Mr Biden “often makes verbal slip-ups”.
Some outlets take aim at Trump over “lying” and Mr Biden “mumbling”.
China frequently highlights growing divisions in US society and often suggests the US may descend into civil war.
The overall message is that both Trump and Mr Biden are “currently facing difficulties”.
After last night’s debate, many took to social media to express “concerns about America’s future”, Xinhua news agency says.
Indian media highlight 'aggression' of Trump
Prominent Indian media outlets highlighted a "shaky" performance by Mr Biden and "aggression" by Trump in their coverage of the debate.
Analysing the "key takeaways", a report on Hindustan Times newspaper's website described the debate as a "high stake face-off that will turn the tide for rest of the campaign".
It said that Mr Biden appeared to be "struggling and even froze several times".
Trump showed "more aggression" and "capitalised on Biden’s missteps" such as during a discussion on immigration, it added.
Some media outlets picked up on Trump's claim Mr Biden was getting "paid by China".
"'Manchurian Candidate, Paid By China': Trump's Big Charge Against Biden," read a headline on the NDTV channel's website.
A report on Firstpost website noted that climate change was a topic where India and China figured in the debate.
The US election result is not expected to change India-US ties much as Prime Minister Narendra Modi - who's just started a third term in power - shares a good rapport with both Mr Biden and Trump.
Israel media talks of Biden 'weakness'
In Israel, media agreed that Mr Biden looked “weak”, and theorised how a Trump presidential win would affect the ongoing Gaza war.
During the debate, Trump said if he was president, the 7 October Hamas-led attack on Israel would not have happened.
Media highlighted Trump’s pro-Israel credentials as he accused Mr Biden of weakness: “He’s become like a Palestinian. But they don’t like him. Because he’s a very bad Palestinian. He’s a very weak one,” Trump said.
Barak Ravid, the diplomatic correspondent for the Walla news site, said that Mr Biden was "unfocused” on the conflict.
"He failed to explain the extent of his support for Israel and it was possible for Trump to attack him, and present him as someone who is trying to prevent Israel from eliminating Hamas," Ravid said.
Ynet’s veteran defence analyst, Ron Ben-Yishai, said: "Trump is now seen as a candidate whose victory in the presidential elections is almost certain, and all the actors and elements, from Russia and Ukraine to Israel and Saudi Arabia, and also Iran, will conduct themselves from now on according to this assumption."
Ben-Yishai said certain elements in Israel ”are already rubbing their hands with joy” at the prospect of a second Trump presidency.
Latin America media say Biden 'hesitant and confused'
Latin America's media were riveted by what they called the "tense" presidential debate, highlighting their rancorous exchanges over immigration, the economy, abortion and global politics.
Many media pundits in the region saw Trump succeeding in stoking doubts about Mr Biden's age by pummelling him energetically on issues sensitive to US voters, such as inflation and immigration.
"Trump corners Biden in tense debate," was how leading Brazilian daily Folha de Sao Paulo headlined its initial report.
Mr Biden’s “hesitant and confused performance… could radically change the scenario of the elections", Folha added.
Posting on X, prominent Mexican journalist Leon Krauze drew a similar conclusion, saying Mr Biden "stumbled, lost his thread and was incapable of showing up the lies of his rival".
Meanwhile, Argentina’s La Nacion said that "the Democrat president was not able to dispel the doubts about his age and his health, and he set off alarms in his party".
Colombian daily El Tiempo saw the exchanges between Trump and Mr Biden characterised by "insults, jibes and few proposals" in which "neither of the two appeared to overcome the concerns over their advanced age".
“The debate shows Trump strong and Biden weak," was how Brazilian daily O Estado de S. Paulo summed up one analysis.
"Biden self-destructed in front of the American public and the world... Biden debated desperately badly," Brazilian analyst Demetrio Magnoli said on the popular G1 news website.
Mexican media cite 'nest of rats' comment by Trump
In Mexico, media tend to be wary of calls from US politicians for drastic measures to stem the flow of migrants and illicit drugs, so reporting on the debate homed in on the repeated clashes over immigration, mostly consisting of Trump slamming what he called Mr Biden's failure to secure the border.
Left-wing Mexican daily La Jornada highlighted the debate "clash over migration and the economy".
"During the first presidential debate, ex-President Donald Trump criticised the immigration policy of the Joe Biden Government and said that migrants would have to be removed from the country for alleged crimes committed against Americans," Mexican daily Reforma told its readers.
In its coverage, Mexican news magazine Proceso focused on Trump asserting that the US had become a "nest of rats" because he said Mr Biden's immigration policies had "opened the door to criminals, murderers and rapists".
Turkish media: New Trump era is approaching
Turkish media outlets and social media users criticised Mr Biden’s “poor” debate performance, which many said led to “panic” among the Democrats.
"Biden had difficulty understanding the questions and hesitated when answering," Hurriyet newspaper said, describing the debate as a "disaster" for Biden.
Academic Hilmi Bolatoglu said in a post on X that Mr Biden’s performance strengthened indications that a “new Trump era is approaching”.
Coverage also raised eyebrows about the general quality of the debate.
"There were many gaffes in the 90-minute debate. Insults and mockery flew in the air, Biden had several hiccups and Trump gave a lot of misinformation," Milliyet newspaper said in a report.
“Looking at… the list of lies and distortions that both leaders told, one wonders which of them American voters will elect to wreak havoc on the world,” veteran journalist Murat Yetkin said on his YouTube channel.
Many pundits in Turkey have long been cool on Mr Biden’s presidency, accusing him of “hypocrisy” on the Israel-Gaza war and voicing doubt about his emphasis on defending the “liberal international order”.
Police fatally shot a 13-year-old after a chase in upstate New York after the teen displayed what appeared to be a handgun, the Utica Police Department said in a statement.
Officers stopped two teenagers on Friday around 10 p.m. local time in Utica, a city of 64,000 people in upstate New York located about an hour's drive from Syracuse, police said. While the authorities were questioning the teens, one of them fled on foot, the statement said.
As he ran, police spotted what "appeared to be a handgun" pointed at the officers. One of the officers fired his gun and hit the teen, described as an Asian male. He was given immediate first aid by the police officers and was brought to Wynn Hospital where he died from his wounds, Utica Police Chief Mark Williams said at a Saturday morning news conference.
Officers said they found a replica Glock handgun with a detachable magazine following the shooting.
"This replica handgun was ultimately found to be a pellet gun," Williams said.
Authorities have not yet released the names of the deceased 13-year-old or the officer who shot him until the next of kin is notified. An interpreter was at the news conference to provide translation for the family and their community.
Utica City School District's interim superintendent released a statement on Saturday saying out of respect for the student's family they wouldn't release his name.
"This tragedy reminds us of the tremendous challenges our community faces, particularly our partners in law enforcement, who tirelessly strive to ensure our streets remain safe," interim superintendent Dr. Kathleen Davis said.
A social media video related to the incident has been circulating on the internet. Regarding the video, police said, "We are aware of a video of the incident circulating on social media platforms, which does not portray the incident in its entirety."
Police said they are conducting an investigation following the shooting and said they will release items related to the shooting over the next several days, including a critical incident brief and the full bodycam footage.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Cara Tabachnick is a news editor at CBSNews.com. Cara began her career on the crime beat at Newsday. She has written for Marie Claire, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. She reports on justice and human rights issues. Contact her at cara.tabachnick@cbsinteractive.com
WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump has been out of office for more than three years, but he just notched a big win at the Supreme Court.
Friday’s ruling that overturned an important 1984 ruling called Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council was a belated victory for Trump’s deregulatory agenda, with all three of his appointees to the high court joining the 6-3 conservative majority.
“The decision was the culmination of a decades-long, billionaire-funded campaign to capture and weaponize the unelected power of the Supreme Court to deliver huge windfalls for corporate interests at the expense of everyday Americans,” said Alex Aronson, a former Democratic staffer in Congress who is executive director of Court Accountability, a judicial oversight group.
During the Trump administration, the Republican-led Senate, which had the job of confirming the president’s judicial nominees, “became a conveyor belt for ideological, corporatist judges,” he added.
Business groups hailed the ruling, with the National Federation of Independent Business saying on Friday that it will “level the playing field in court cases between small businesses and administrative agencies.”
Overturning Chevron, a ruling that business interests long disliked, has long been a goal of conservative lawyers, who saw it as giving bureaucrats too much power.
The original decision said courts should defer to federal agencies in interpreting laws that were ambiguous, but in Friday’s ruling, Chief Justice John Roberts said that approach was “fundamentally misguided.”
“Perhaps most fundamentally, Chevron’s presumption is misguided because agencies have no special competence in resolving statutory ambiguities. Courts do,” he added.
Don McGahn, Trump’s White House counsel, memorably said in 2018 at a conservative political conference that the president’s judicial selections and the attempt to roll back regulations “are really the flip side of the same coin.”
He cited Justice Neil Gorsuch, who had just been appointed at the time, as an example of what the administration was looking for in nominees. One of the reasons Gorsuch appealed to McGahn and others who had a say in his nomination in 2017 was that he had written a scathing opinion suggesting Chevron should be overturned.
Gorsuch duly signed on to Robert’s majority opinion on Friday, as did fellow Trump appointees Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.
McGahn, who is now back in private practice with the Jones Day law firm, did not respond to a request seeking comment about Friday’s ruling. The Trump campaign did not respond either.
On another deregulatory issue, the Supreme Court in the coming days could act on a petition filed by McGahn and his Jones Day colleagues that seeks to gut the power of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to set workplace safety rules.
Sean Donahue, a lawyer who often represents environmental groups, said that overturning Chevron became “a kind of litmus test” on the right for selecting judges, along with hostility to the abortion rights ruling Roe v. Wade, which the Supreme Court overturned two years ago.
One criticism of the latest ruling — echoed by liberal Justice Elena Kagan in her dissenting opinion — is that the court is seizing power for itself from federal agencies.
“A rule of judicial humility gives way to a rule of judicial hubris. In recent years, this court has too often taken for itself decision-making authority Congress assigned to agencies,” Kagan wrote.
Democratic members of Congress also weighed in, with Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., describing the ruling as “prioritizing corporate greed over the health, safety, and welfare of the American people.”
The ruling came a day after the court in another 6-3 decision on ideological lines had weakened the power of the Securities and Exchange Commission, prompting an equally vigorous dissent from liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
The fear among those on the left is that the Chevron ruling will handcuff agencies from tackling major issues like climate change because judges will constantly second-guess their expertise.
Whether the ruling will have such a broad impact remains to be seen, with some commentators saying that in most cases judges will still give close attention to what agency experts say.
Thomas Berry, a scholar at the libertarian Cato Institute, said the ruling correctly ended a doctrine that gave too much power to agencies to judge the scope of their own power.
“Contrary to the dissenters’ view, overruling Chevron will not give judges a newfound power to decide questions of policy,” he added.
Iowans supporting access to abortion rally on Thursday, April 11, 2024, outside the courthouse in Des Moines, Iowa, where the Iowa Supreme Court heard arguments on the state's restrictive abortion law. The law that bans most abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy. Hannah Fingerhut/AP
Hannah Fingerhut/AP
Iowa is set to become the latest state to tightly restrict accessto abortion after the state's supreme court upheld a law banning abortions at six weeks of pregnancy.
That will replace the current ban on abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. It sets a short timeline for getting the procedure, with many women not aware of their pregnancy for the first several weeks.
It's unclear when the law will take effect, with some saying it won't be for at least three weeksas other court procedures still play out.
Abortions after six weeks of pregnancy will be allowed in cases of rape if the assault is reported to law enforcement within 45 days, in cases of incest reported within 140 days, and if the pregnancy endangers the life of the pregnant person. It allows abortion in the case of life-threatening fetal abnormalities.
In the two years since the U.S. Supreme Court ended a federal right to abortion in the Dobbs case, state lawmakers around the country have been making a new patchwork of reproductive rights. In many states, that's meant setting new restrictions on abortion - though the number of abortions being carried out has increased.
The law had been in effect for a few days after Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds signed it last year but was blocked by a lower court in a lawsuit filed by Planned Parenthood of the Heartland.
Today the court found that there is a "rational basis" to write a law banning abortion based on the detection of a fetal heartbeat, stating, "We conclude that the fetal heartbeat statute is rationally related to the state’s legitimate interest in protecting unborn life."
In a dissenting opinion, Chief Justice Susan Christensen wrote, "The majority’s rigid approach relies heavily on the male-dominated history and traditions of the 1800s, all the while ignoring how far women’s rights have come since the Civil War era."
The ruling will put Iowa among 18 states that either ban nearly all abortion or ban abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. That includes 14 with near total bans and now four with six-week bans, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that backs abortion rights.
The Midwest is still a mixed picture for abortion rights. Neighboring Iowa are Minnesota, Wisconsin, Kansas and Illinois that still allow access to abortion beyond 20 weeks. But Missouri and the Dakotas have near-total bans and Nebraska has a 12-week ban.
Iowa’s Supreme Court on Friday allowed a six-week ban on abortion to take effect, one of the latest rulings to restrict abortion access since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision ending federal protections for the procedure.
The measure restricts the procedure after six weeks of pregnancy, the point when fetal cardiac activity can be detected. Planned Parenthood and others had sued to block the law and won a preliminary injunction from a lower court, keeping abortion temporarily legal in the state up until 22 weeks of pregnancy.
The judges ruled 4-3 that the law — passed by the Republican-led legislature in 2023 — is constitutional, reversing a temporary injunction put in place by a district court last year, while allowing the ongoing litigation at that level can proceed.
The Supreme Court’s ruling again disrupts the landscape of reproductive health in Iowa, with most women now having to travel outside the state to terminate a pregnancy. About 4,000 women in Iowa sought abortions in each of the last two years. The statute has limited exceptions for rape and incest or if a woman’s life is in danger.
End of carousel
In a statement Friday morning, Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) said that “[t]here is no right more sacred than life” and that she was “glad” the high court had upheld the ban. She said her administration would “continue to develop policies that encourage strong families, which includes promoting adoption and protecting in vitro fertilization.”
The ACLU of Iowa called the court’s decision “a devastating blow to Iowans’ access to essential health care,” while the head of the Iowa Democratic Party took aim at the GOP, saying in a statement that “Republicans went too far with this abortion ban.”
“Today, Iowa women have been stripped of reproductive rights that they have maintained for more than 50 years,” chair Rita Hart said. “It’s obvious Kim Reynolds and Iowa Republicans do not trust women to make their own decisions regarding their own medical care or for doctors to use their best judgment while treating their patients.”
Abortion providers in Iowa have been doing contingency planning for months in advance of the court’s ruling, according to Ruth Richardson, president of Planned Parenthood North Central States, which has three Iowa facilities that provide abortion care. The organization didn’t schedule any abortions for Friday to protect patients in case of an adverse ruling, she said. It already has expanded locations in nearby states — doubling the number of patient beds in Omaha and moving to a larger site in Mankato, Minn. — to assist women coming from Iowa, she said.
“We wanted to make sure that no matter what happened we will continue to meet the needs of Iowans that need access to abortion care,” Richardson said.
Under Iowa court rules, it will take at least 21 days for the case to be sent back to the district court, the ACLU noted. Abortion will remain legal in the state until then.
During the court’s oral arguments on April 11, the justices quizzed lawyers from both sides on earlier rulings that first expanded and then limited the scope of abortion protections in the state and whether this case should have been sent back to a lower court for further arguments and review.
The law will limit the procedure to a time frame in which many women don’t yet know they are pregnant. The exceptions will only apply if a sexual assault is reported to law enforcement or a health provider within 45 days for rape and 145 days for incest. Medical exceptions include a fetal abnormality “incompatible with life” or if the pregnancy endangers the woman’s life.
Across the country, abortion remains a contentious issue at both the federal and state level.
In an opinion Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court permitted physicians in Idaho to resume performing emergency abortions while litigation continues in the lower courts. That ruling, however, does not resolve whether a long-standing federal law compels doctors nationwide to carry out the procedure when they believe a woman’s health is in danger.
And two weeks ago, the court unanimously preserved access to mifepristone, the medication now used in more than 60 percent of U.S. abortions.
Those decisions followed a pair of seismic state judicial rulings this spring. Florida’s Supreme Court held that abortion rights are not protected by that state’s constitution, paving the way for one of the country’s strictest bans to take effect May 1. Arizona’s Supreme Court also revived an 1864 law prohibiting the procedure except to save a mother’s life — and punishing providers with jail time — but the legislature and governor, acting amid a firestorm of condemnation, repealed the law before it could take effect this summer.
More than 1 in 3 women ages 15 to 44 now live in states where abortion is banned or mostly banned, a Washington Post analysis shows, with 18 states now banning all or most abortions.
Iowa’s legislature passed an abortion ban in 2018 that was permanently blocked by the courts. Gov. Kim Reynolds, a Republican staunchly opposed to abortion, brought lawmakers into a special session last summer to pass a second six-week ban. That was quickly enjoined by a district court judge, though the rulemaking process was allowed to move forward.
The rules subsequently adopted by the state Board of Medicine have been criticized by legal experts for being too vague and lacking specifics about when doctors can step in to save the life of a pregnant patient or how providers who violate the law would be punished.
The issue remains a deeply divisive one in the state, although a majority of Iowans say abortion should be legal in most cases. A Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa Poll released last year found that 61 percent of residents believe it should be legal in most or all cases, with 35 percent opposed.
On Saturday, hundreds of abortion opponents rallied at the Capitol in Des Moines in advance of the expected ruling.
UVALDE — A grand jury investigating the flawed police response to a shooting at an elementary school that killed 19 children and two teachers has issued indictments against two people who were law enforcement officers at the time of the May 2022 shooting, two officials with knowledge of the outcome said.
The indictments remain under seal until they are taken into custody, and their names are not yet public.
The officials identified them as Pete Arredondo, the Uvalde school district police at the time of the shooting whose name has been at the center of the police failures, and Adrian Gonzales, who also worked as a school police officer. Gonzales' role has been less public in the two years and one month since the shooting.
Arredondo was taken into custody at the Uvalde County Jail Thursday afternoon, where family members and parents of several victims of the shooting gathered.
The officers face charges of injury to a child by omission, according to two officials with knowledge of the developments.
Additionally, Sid Harle, a visiting Uvalde County district judge confirmed to the American-Statesman on Thursday that he had set bonds for two people in cases in which the original judge recused herself. He declined to comment further because of the pending matter.
“As a consequence of failed leadership, training, and policies, 33 students and three of their teachers — many of whom had been shot — were trapped in a room with an active shooter for over an hour as law enforcement officials remained outside,” the report concluded.
The indictments also serve as yet another contrast from the initial false narrative of police heroism that authorities first provided. In the initial aftermath, officials said more children would have died had responding officers not acted more quickly — a story that fell apart over later weeks and months and was completely dismantled when the American-Statesman and KVUE-TV obtained a 77-minute video of the breakdown.
The cases mark the second and third times nationally that a law enforcement officer faced charges for failing to act during an on-campus shooting. Last year, a Broward County, Florida, jury acquitted former sheriff’s deputy Scot Peterson of child neglect and other charges for failing to confront a shooter at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland who killed 17 people.
He was the only armed school resource officer on campus when that 2018 shooting started. Legal experts said the case, had it resulted in a guilty verdict, could have set a precedent by more clearly defining the legal responsibilities of police officers during mass shootings.
Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell could not immediately be reached for comment. She has cited the ongoing grand jury investigation for not releasing investigative information sought by victims’ families and news organizations.
The Supreme Court said on Thursday that it would dismiss a case about emergency abortions in Idaho, temporarily clearing the way for women in the state to receive an abortion when their health is at risk.
The one-sentence, unsigned decision declared that the case had been “improvidently granted,” meaning a majority of the justices had changed their minds about the need to take up the case now. It reinstates a lower-court ruling that had halted Idaho’s near-total ban on abortion and permitted emergency abortions at hospitals if needed to protect the health of the mother while the case makes its way through the courts.
The decision, which did not rule on the substance of the case, closely mirrored a version that appeared briefly on the court’s website a day earlier and was reported by Bloomberg. A court spokeswoman acknowledged on Wednesday that the publications unit had “inadvertently and briefly uploaded a document” and said a ruling in the case would appear in due time.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. announced the court’s decision from the bench, as is the custom for unsigned opinions.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who in part disagreed with the court’s decision, asserting that the justices should have addressed the case on its merits, read her dissent from the bench. Such a move is rare and signals profound disagreement.
The joined cases, Moyle v. United States and Idaho v. United States, focus on whether a federal law aimed at ensuring emergency care for any patient supersedes Idaho’s abortion ban, one of the nation’s strictest. The state outlaws the procedure with few exceptions unless a woman’s life is in danger.
The decision was essentially 6 to 3, with three conservative justices siding with the liberal wing, albeit with separate writings and reasoning, in saying they would drop the case.
The dispute was the first time the court grappled with the question of statewide restrictions on abortion, many of which swiftly took effect after the court eliminated a constitutional right to the procedure two years ago.
The ruling handed a temporary victory to the Biden administration, which had turned to the federal law as one of the few, if narrow, ways to challenge state abortion bans and preserve access after the court overturned Roe v. Wade.
It also amounted to a second win, however muted, for abortion rights in recent weeks. This month, the court rejected a challenge to the longstanding approval of a commonly used abortion pill, saying that an umbrella group of anti-abortion medical organizations and doctors bringing the case lacked standing to sue. Even as the decision preserved availability of the pill, the court did not rule on the merits of the case.
Still, just as with the abortion pill battle, the case involving emergency abortions — and the underlying question of the state versus federal law — will continue in the lower courts.
Advocates for abortion rights sounded that alarm even as they welcomed the outcome.
“We are relieved for the moment, but hardly celebrating,” said Nancy Northup, the president and chief executive of the Center for Reproductive Rights, adding, “Women with dire pregnancy complications and the hospital staff who care for them need clarity right now.”
The attorney general of Idaho, Raúl Labrador, said during a news conference that he remained undeterred. “We feel pretty strongly that we’re going to win this case in the end,” he said, adding that he expected the lawsuit would again return to the Supreme Court.
Idaho had asked the justices to intervene after an 11-member panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit temporarily blocked the law. In agreeing to hear the case, the justices had temporarily reinstated the ban.
Under Idaho law, abortion is illegal except in cases of incest, rape, some instances of nonviable pregnancies or when it is “necessary to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.” Doctors who perform abortions could face criminal penalties, prison time and loss of their licenses to practice medicine.
The Biden administration had asserted that the ban conflicted with federal law and that the federal law should override it. Idaho contended that the Biden administration had improperly interpreted the federal law in an effort to bypass state bans, effectively turning hospitals into legal abortion sites.
The liberal justices, along with Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Brett M. Kavanaugh and Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., all wrote or joined in concurring opinions. The court’s remaining conservatives, Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr., Clarence Thomas and Neil M. Gorsuch, dissented.
In her partial agreement and partial dissent, Justice Jackson wrote that she would have decided on the substance of the case and that the federal law at issue, known as the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, overrides Idaho’s strict ban.
Justice Elena Kagan, in a concurring opinion, said the practical outcome of the court’s decision would forestall harrowing consequences.
The federal law, she wrote, “unambiguously requires” that hospitals receiving Medicare funding provide whatever treatment is necessary to stabilize a patient, including pregnant women.
Justice Jackson agreed. When the court allowed Idaho’s abortion ban to temporarily go into effect, a “monthslong catastrophe” ensued that could have been averted, she wrote. Instead, she noted, “Idaho physicians were forced to step back and watch as their patients suffered, or arrange for their patients to be airlifted out.”
Dismissing the case, she warned, was cause for concern, a path that simply allowed the court “to avoid issues that it does not wish to decide.”
“There is simply no good reason not to resolve this conflict now,” she wrote.
Even as Justice Alito sided with Justice Jackson in saying that the court should have heard the case on its merits, he came to the opposite conclusion as her. The Idaho abortion ban applied to emergency room care, he wrote.
To the contrary, he added, the federal law requires hospitals receiving Medicare funding “to treat, not abort, an ‘unborn child.’”
He expressed regret that the court lacked the desire to wrestle with a polarizing issue.
“That question is as ripe for decision as it ever will be,” Justice Alito wrote. “Apparently, the court has simply lost the will to decide the easy but emotional and highly politicized question that the case presents.”
Justice Barrett, joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kavanaugh, appeared to chart something of a middle ground.
The case should play out, for now, in the lower courts, she wrote, where a more complete picture of the facts could emerge.
The parameters of the Idaho law had “significantly changed — twice” since the lawsuit began, she added, and the parties’ positions had “rendered the scope of the dispute unclear, at best.”
Five people were charged Wednesday with the attempted bribery of a juror in Minnesota after authorities found on confiscated devices a “chilling” plan to give a juror more than $120,000 and specific instructions on how to convince other jurors to vote to acquit, federal prosecutors said.
Three of the people charged were defendants in the federal fraud trial that ended in June, while the other two were recruited, U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger said at a news conference. One of them had been acquitted of all the crimes he had faced.
The unidentified juror who was offered nearly $120,000 in cash in exchange for voting to acquit on the eve of deliberations was targeted because she was young and a person of color, Luger said.
Abdiaziz Shafii Farah, Abdimajid Mohamed Nur, and Said Shafii Farah devised a “blueprint” instructing the juror to convince the rest of the panel to vote to acquit all of the defendants because prosecutors were racist, Luger said.
“We are immigrants. They don’t respect or care about us,” the instruction manual said, according to Luger. “You alone can end this case.”
Attorneys for the three defendants did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Luger said they had "studied" the juror, "followed her, and determined that she would succumb to their scheme." They “thought carefully” about what they wanted the juror to say to the rest of the jury, and their hopes were to “inflame the jury," he said.
“This really is an attack on our system of justice,” Luger said.
Abdiaziz Shafii Farah and Abdimajid Mohamed Nur were among the five of seven defendants found guilty this month of most of the crimes they faced related to a scheme in which they misused millions of dollars meant to feed children during the pandemic.
Defendant Said Shafii Farah walks into the U.S. District Court with his attorneys during the first day of jury selection in the first Feeding Our Future case to go to trial in Minneapolis.Leila Navidi / Minneapolis Star Tribune via Reuters file
Said Shafii Farah was one of two defendants acquitted of all the crimes they faced, including conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. Prosecutors said he provided the bribe funds to the juror and deleted from his phone a since-recovered video of the person delivering the bribe to that juror’s home.
Abdiaziz Shafii Farah organized the alleged conspiracy and had deleted all of his phone contents in court after being instructed to turn it over in its current state, Luger said.
The five people were charged Wednesday with multiple crimes related to bribing a juror. Abdiaziz Shafii Farah faces an additional charge of obstruction of justice for deleting his phone, Luger said.
The juror said a woman delivered a gift bag full of cash and left it with a relative, according to an FBI search warrant affidavit. She said she was not home when the cash was delivered.
The woman who delivered the cash was identified Wednesday as Ladan Ali. Luger said Abdimajid Mohamed Nur recruited her. She followed the juror from the courthouse to the juror's home and tracked the juror's movements "day and night," Luger said.
Abdulkarim Shafii Farah, the brother to both Farah defendants, is accused of surveilling the juror "to learn more about her" and helping Ladan Ali the night she allegedly delivered the bribe.
After the attempted bribe, the juror reported the incident to the court and police and was dismissed from deliberations.
Luger praised her for those actions Wednesday. "She made a difference," he said.
The federal fraud trial, which began April 22, was the first in an alleged $250 million scheme that prosecutors said was the largest of its kind. The defendants were among 70 people charged by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota in a massive fraud scheme involving the nonprofit Feeding Our Future.
While the defendants had claimed to have fed millions of children with federal funds, prosecutors had said they used most of the money to buy multiple homes and properties and luxury vehicles.
By a 6-3 vote, the justices threw out lower-court rulings that favored Louisiana, Missouri and other parties in their claims that officials in the Democratic administration leaned on the social media platforms to unconstitutionally squelch conservative points of view.
Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote for the court that the states and other parties did not have the legal right, or standing, to sue. Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas dissented.
The decision should not affect typical social media users or their posts.
AP Washington correspondent Sagar Meghani reports the Biden administration has scored a Supreme Court win in a social media dispute with conservative states.
The cases over state laws and the one that was decided Wednesday are variations on the same theme, complaints that the platforms are censoring conservative viewpoints.
The states had argued that White House communications staffers, the surgeon general, the FBI and the U.S. cybersecurity agency are among those who applied “unrelenting pressure” to coerce changes in online content on social media platforms.
The justices appeared broadly skeptical of those claims during arguments in March and several worried that common interactions between government officials and the platforms could be affected by a ruling for the states.
The Biden administration underscored those concerns when it noted that the government would lose its ability to communicate with the social media companies about antisemitic and anti-Muslim posts, as well as on issues of national security, public health and election integrity.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the court reached the right outcome because “it helps ensure the Biden Administration can continue our important work with technology companies to protect the safety and security of the American people, after years of extreme and unfounded Republican attacks on public officials who engaged in critical work to keep Americans safe.
Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill called the decision “unfortunate and disappointing.” The court majority, Murrill said in a statement, “gives a free pass to the federal government to threaten tech platforms into censorship and suppression of speech that is indisputably protected by the First Amendment. The majority waves off the worst government coercion scheme in history.”
The justices did not weigh in on the substance of the states’ claims or the administration’s response in their decision Wednesday.
“We begin — and end — with standing,” Barrett wrote. “At this stage, neither the individual nor the state plaintiffs have established standing to seek an injunction against any defendant. We therefore lack jurisdiction to reach the merits of the dispute.”
In dissent, Alito wrote that the states amply demonstrated their right to sue. “For months, high-ranking government officials placed unrelenting pressure on Facebook to suppress Americans’ free speech. Because the court unjustifiably refuses to address this serious threat to the First Amendment, I respectfully dissent,” he wrote for the three justices in the minority.
Some free speech advocates praised the result, but lamented how little guidance the court provided.
“The platforms are attractive targets for official pressure, and so it’s crucial that the Supreme Court clarify the line between permissible attempts to persuade and impermissible attempts to coerce,” said Alex Abdo, litigation director of the Knight First Amendment Institute. “This guidance would have been especially valuable in the months leading up to the election.”
The Supreme Court had earlier acted to keep the lower-court rulings on hold. Alito, Gorsuch and Thomas would have allowed the restrictions on government contacts with the platforms to go into effect.
Free speech advocates had urged the court to use the case to draw an appropriate line between the government’s acceptable use of the bully pulpit and coercive threats to free speech.
A panel of three judges on the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled earlier that the Biden administration had probably brought unconstitutional pressure on the media platforms. The appellate panel said officials cannot attempt to “coerce or significantly encourage” changes in online content. The panel had previously narrowed a more sweeping order from a federal judge, who wanted to include even more government officials and prohibit mere encouragement of content changes.
The decision was the sixth this term in which the court threw out rulings by the 5th Circuit, one of the nation’s most conservative appeals courts. Last week, the court upheld a gun restriction aimed at protecting domestic violence victims, overturning a 5th Circuit panel.
Earlier in June, the court unanimously ruled that anti-abortion doctors lacked standing to challenge Food and Drug Administration decisions to ease access to the abortion drug mifepristone.
SMITHLAND, Iowa − Kathryn Barber stood on a closed section of Iowa Highway 141 marveling at the power of the Little Sioux River floodwaters.
Water covered all but the roof of a nearby home. Ball fields, which in drought years are desert dusty, looked like marinas with only foul poles and scoreboards above the water's surface. Barber and her husband, Bill, live on a nearby bluff and were nervously optimistic their home would survive the floods.
"It's very surreal," Barber said. "It’s hard when you’ve got to leave all your stuff behind. I’m not 100% confident."
Swollen rivers feeding into the Mississippi River will cause major flooding in St. Paul, Minnesota, by week's end, AccuWeather said. A high pressure system locked in over parts of the southern U.S. will mean thunderstorms and possibly derechos − fierce, powerful, fast-moving and damaging storms − will continue this week and beyond, AccuWeather Lead Long-Range Meteorologist Paul Pastelok said. That means more surges of water, more flooding.
"There will be an increased threat of thunderstorm complexes, including potential derechos, from the north-central Plains and Midwest to the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley into early July," Pastelok said.
Developlments:
∎ Hot and humid conditions were returning Wednesday across much of the nation's southern tier, the National Weather Service said. Highs are forecast in the mid- to upper 90s across the region, and low 100s are expected over portions of South Carolina and Georgia as well as the southern High Plains.
∎ Europe is also seeing record heat. Greece has shut down some of its ancient sites and warned tourists not to "take unnecessary risks" in the wake of the deaths across Europe during the heat wave.
∎ A 6-foot wax statue of President Abraham Lincoln installed outside a Washington, D.C., elementary school is slowly melting into a headless blob amid soaring temperatures. Sponsor CulturalDC, which said the wax congealing point is 140 degrees, said they removed the head to protect it while they figure out how to proceed.
Rapidan Dam fails to protect home; bridge threatened
Minnesota's Rapidan Dam, which partially failed and allowed floodwaters to swamp a home Tuesday, saw "dramatic changes" in recent hours as floodwaters widened and deepened a channel flooding has cut around one side, local authorities said Wednesday.
Most of the Blue Earth River waters are now eluding the dam's gates and are racing through the channel. The waterflow has slowed slightly but remains too strong for emergency mitigation strategies and appears to be threatening the nearby Glacier Road Bridge, the Blue Earth County Sheriff's Office said in a social media post.
A portion of the house closest to the dam was "undercut" by floodwaters and fell into the river Tuesday, officials said. Homeowner Jenny Barnes told KARE-TV her family also runs the nearby Dam Store, which is also threatened.
“That’s our livelihood. It’s everything to us,” Barnes said before the house succumbed to the rushing waters. “There’s no stopping it. It’s going to go where it wants to go. It’s going to take what it wants to take.”
"The focus has shifted from the dam to the bridge given the recent erosion," the Sheriff's Office said. "We continue to work with downstream communities as the situation develops."
Forever home lost forever in South Dakota
In South Dakota, thousands in Minnehaha, Lincoln and Union counties alone have been affected by the flash floods, displacing some residents and inconveniencing others with water damage, destroying valuables and halting travel. Morgan Speichinger has lived on McCook Lake in North Sioux City since 2019. She thought it would be the forever home for her, her husband, two young children and two dogs. But the family had to leave their house behind Sunday evening when water levels rose in their neighborhood.
“This is where we were going to raise our kids, and we lost it,” Speichinger said. “We won’t be able to remediate until after they fix the roads. Our house is going to be destroyed by then. It’s going to be awful."
− Morgan Matzen and Kathryn Kovalenko, Sioux Falls Argus Leader
The flooding is being fueled by a weather pattern that began about two weeks ago, triggering rounds of storms that overwhelmed some areas with more than a month of rain in a few days, AccuWeather says. Some of the storms included heavy winds and hail.
Alex Sosnowski, senior meteorologist AccuWeather, said farmland in some areas of the Midwest could remain underwater for weeks.
