“BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP) — Three men were convicted of murder Wednesday in the killing of Ahmaud Arbery, the Black man who was running empty-handed through a Georgia subdivision when the white strangers chased him, trapped him on a quiet street and blasted him with a shotgun.
The February 2020 slaying drew limited attention at first. But when video of the shooting leaked online, Arbery’s death quickly became another example in the nation’s reckoning of racial injustice in the way Black people are treated in their everyday lives.
Now the men all face a mandatory sentence of life in prison. The judge will decide whether their sentences are served with or without the possibility of parole.
As the first of 23 guilty verdicts were read, Arbery’s father had to leave the courtroom after leaping up and shouting. At the reading of the last criminal count, Arbery’s mother dropped her head and quietly pumped her fists.
‘He didn’t do nothing but run and dream,’ Marcus Arbery Sr. said of his son. Outside the courthouse, dozens of Black supporters hugged and cried.
The jury deliberated for about 10 hours before convicting Greg McMichael, son Travis McMichael and neighbor William ‘Roddie’ Bryan.
The McMichaels grabbed guns and jumped in a pickup truck to pursue the 25-year-old Arbery after seeing him running outside the Georgia port city of Brunswick. Bryan joined the pursuit in his own pickup and recorded cellphone video of Travis McMichael fatally shooting Arbery.
The father and son told police they suspected Arbery was a fleeing burglar. But the prosecution argued that the men provoked the fatal confrontation and that there was no evidence Arbery committed any crimes in the neighborhood.” Read more at AP News
“British and French leaders have traded accusations after at least 27 people died trying to cross the Channel in the deadliest incident since the current migration crisis began.
In a phone call with Boris Johnson on Wednesday night, French president Emmanuel Macron stressed ‘the shared responsibility’ of France and the UK, and told Johnson he expected full cooperation and that the situation would not be used ‘for political purposes,’ the Élysée said.
Thirty-four people were believed to be on the boat when it sank on Wednesday, leading to what the International Organisation for Migration said was the biggest single loss of life in the Channel since it began collecting data in 2014. Two survivors are in intensive care.
The British prime minister renewed calls for France to agree to joint police patrols along the Channel coast, and said Wednesday’s incident highlighted how efforts by French authorities to patrol their beaches ‘haven’t been enough’.” Read more at The Guardian
“A few days before Trump supporters stormed the Capitol building, one of the top organizers for the rally that preceded the riot reportedly issued an unusual request to some underlings. According to Rolling Stone, Jan. 6 planners were ordered to use cash to purchase burner phones that were used to communicate directly with the Trump family and White House officials. The request reportedly came from Kylie Kremer from the ‘March for Trump’ group that helped plan the D.C. rally that later turned into the Capitol riot. According to the report, the phones were used to talk to figures including Donald Trump’s son Eric, his wife Lara Trump, and Mark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff. An anonymous ‘March for Trump’ team member said: ‘[Kremer] needed burner phones in order to communicate with high level people is how she put it.’ Kremer didn’t respond to a request for comment on Rolling Stone’s report, nor did any Trump family members or Meadows.” Read more at Rolling Stone
“President Biden’s approval rating hit a new low in an NPR/Marist poll released Wednesday.
Just 42 percent of the survey's participants approve of the job that Biden is doing in office, the lowest rating Biden has received in this particular poll since he was inaugurated in January.
The newest polling numbers come as the Biden administration attempts to solve the problem of rising prices. A report released earlier this month by the Labor Department showed that inflation had reached a 30-year high, rising 6.2 percent in the 12-month period ending in October.
Biden and Democrats have been hit by critics and Republicans over rising food and gas prices, particularly as the holidays approach. The U.S. economy has been slammed with consumer demand that businesses have not been able to meet.
The administration has sought to alleviate the surge in gas prices by releasing 50 million barrels of oil from the national reserve, though energy experts says it's unclear how the move will immediately affect prices at the pump.” Read more at The Hill
“BERLIN (AP) — Official figures released Thursday show Germany has become the latest country to surpass 100,000 deaths from COVID-19 since the pandemic began.
Germany’s disease control agency said it recorded 351 additional deaths in connection with the coronavirus over the past 24 hours, taking the total toll to 100,119.
In Europe, Germany is the fifth country to pass that mark, after Russia, the United Kingdom, Italy and France.
The Robert Koch Institute, a federal agency that collects data from some 400 regional health offices, said Germany also set a record for daily confirmed cases — 75,961 in a 24-hour period. Since the start of the outbreak, Germany has had more than 5.57 million confirmed cases of COVID-19.
The surge in cases prompted Germany’s government-in-waiting on Wednesday to announce the creation of a new permanent expert group to advise officials on how to tackle the pandemic.
While the number of daily infections is higher than that seen during the last winter surge, there are currently fewer daily deaths per confirmed case. Experts argue this is because of vaccinations, which they say reduces the likelihood of serious illness.
Still, hospitals have warned that intensive care beds are running out, with almost 4,000 already occupied by COVID-19 patients. Some hospitals in the country’s south and east have begun transferring patients to other regions.” Read more at AP News
“Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a memo Wednesday directing federal prosecutors to prioritize investigations into crimes committed on planes, as record numbers of unruly passengers continue to disrupt travel….
The Federal Aviation Administration has been using its civil authorities to try to crack down on misbehaving passengers, opening 266 enforcement cases, and has sought federal criminal investigations in 37 cases. The majority of incidents have stemmed from disputes over wearing masks, which is required throughout the aviation system.” Read more at Washington Post
“A long-running criminal investigation into Donald J. Trump and his family business is reaching a critical phase as Cyrus R. Vance Jr., the prosecutor overseeing the inquiry, enters his final weeks as Manhattan district attorney.
Mr. Vance’s prosecutors have issued new subpoenas for records about Mr. Trump’s hotels, golf clubs and office buildings. They recently interviewed a banker employed by Deutsche Bank, Mr. Trump’s top lender. And earlier this month, they told a top Trump executive who had been under scrutiny, Matthew Calamari, that they did not currently plan to indict him in the purported tax-evasion scheme that led to charges against Mr. Trump’s company and its chief financial officer.
The developments, described by people with knowledge of the matter, show that the Manhattan prosecutors have shifted away from investigating those tax issues and returned to an original focus of their three-year investigation: Mr. Trump’s statements about the value of his assets.
In particular, the people said, the prosecutors are zeroing in on whether Mr. Trump or his company inflated the value of some of his properties while trying to secure financing from potential lenders. If Mr. Vance’s office concludes that Mr. Trump intentionally submitted false values to potential lenders, prosecutors could argue that he engaged in a pattern of fraud.
Mr. Trump and his company have denied wrongdoing, calling the inquiry a politically motivated witch hunt by Mr. Vance, a Democrat. His prosecutors are working with the office of the New York State attorney general, Letitia James, also a Democrat, who is running for governor and has been a vocal critic of Mr. Trump.
The investigation is playing out as Mr. Trump continues to wield enormous influence over the Republican Party and flirts with another presidential run in 2024. It has yet to hamper his political standing and could even energize his base, though the inquiry could also serve as a costly distraction.
It is unclear whether any new charges will be brought, but if they are, it could be difficult to prove that Mr. Trump or his company defrauded their lenders. One challenge is that the lenders are sophisticated financial institutions that most likely conducted their own assessments of Mr. Trump’s property values without relying entirely on him.
Still, Mr. Vance’s prosecutors have issued a flurry of subpoenas in recent months.
At least one subpoena issued this summer to Mr. Trump’s company, the Trump Organization, demanded information about how the company valued various assets, according to the people, who all spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter.
The company is resisting turning over some documents, a matter that is the subject of sealed litigation in Manhattan.” Read more at New York Times
“Brain scans of former American football players reveal signs of white matter injury, according to research into the lasting effects of repetitive head impacts in sport.
The finding is viewed as significant because until now it has been difficult to identify such damage in the brain until after death. The latest work suggests that markers of injury could be detectable using specialised MRI scans, allowing doctors to study, and potentially diagnose, such damage more readily….
The findings come as sporting bodies continue to grapple with the question of how to improve safety as evidence has emerged linking repetitive impacts, such as during tackles in rugby or heading the ball in football, to cognitive problems such as dementia.
Alosco said that further work would be needed before the scans could be used to diagnose individuals, but that it would provide an immediate research tool to help illuminate the link between sports such as American football, boxing and rugby, and conditions such as dementia.
The study involved 75 people who were exposed to repetitive head impacts and had undergone scans as part of medical assessments. This included 67 American football players, eight other athletes in sports such as football and boxing, and military veterans. Of the American football players, each of whom played for an average of 12 years, 16 athletes played professionally and 11 played semi-professionally.” Read more at The Guardian
“WASHINGTON — The Pentagon on Tuesday night announced a new group to investigate reports of unidentified aerial phenomena in sensitive areas, work that will be overseen by both the military and the intelligence agencies.
The group will lead an effort to ‘detect, identify and attribute objects’ in restricted airspace, as well as mitigate any threats to military flights.
The announcement follows the release of a report in June that failed to provide explanations of 143 sightings of strange phenomena by military pilots and others over the past two decades.
The report frustrated some inside the intelligence community who believed more analysis and research should have been done to try to categorize and explain the phenomena. Releasing a report that said the sightings were unexplained further drove theories that the videos or pictures could be visitors from space, a theory that few in the US government take seriously.” Read more at Boston Globe
“The White House has launched a new energy division of its Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and appointed Sally Benson, a well-known energy expert at Stanford University, to a high-level position to coordinate climate change policy.
The announcement on Wednesday illustrates that the White House is racing to fulfill President Biden’s ambitious commitments to combat climate change, particularly as Republicans ramp up their attacks on the administration over high gas prices ahead of the holiday season.
Biden has called for achieving 100 percent clean electricity by 2035 and eliminating the nation’s carbon emissions by 2050. Meeting those goals will require a total transformation of America’s industrial and transportation systems, including a massive shift away from fossil fuels and toward renewable energy to power homes, businesses, cars, and factories.” Read more at Boston Globe
“Crossing China | Jamie Dimon’s expression of regret over a joke about the Communist Party shows the power China wields over foreigners who want to do business in the world’s second-biggest economy. But even as the CEO of JPMorgan, the biggest U.S. bank, backtracked, the episode also shows how people and organizations are becoming bolder in challenging Beijing.
The number of Hong Kongers applying for a visa that gives a pathway to U.K. citizenship continues to fall, after officials originally estimated more than 320,000 people could take up the offer in its first five years.
China slammed a U.S. decision to add dozens of companies to a trade blacklist, saying it violated an understanding between their leaders
Chinese firms are showing interest in exploiting Afghanistan’s vast untapped mineral resources estimated to be worth $1 trillion or more.” Read more at Bloomberg
“Sweden got its first female prime minister yesterday, for all of eight hours. Magdalena Andersson was forced to resign the same day as she took office after her budget failed to pass in parliament. While she’s likely to try again as soon as Monday, hers is the second government to collapse in six months, showing the volatility injected into Sweden’s political system by the rise of the anti-immigration right.” Read more at Bloomberg
“FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — The holiday tree is towering over the main square in this central German city, the chestnuts and sugared almonds are roasted, and kids are clambering aboard the merry-go-round just like they did before the pandemic. But a surge in coronavirus infections has left an uneasy feeling hanging over Frankfurt’s Christmas market.
To savor a mug of mulled wine — an uncomplicated rite of winter in pre-pandemic times — masked customers must pass through a one-way entrance to a fenced-off wine hut, stopping at the hand sanitizer station. Elsewhere, security officers check vaccination certificates before letting customers head for the steaming sausages and kebabs.
Despite the pandemic inconveniences, stall owners selling ornaments, roasted chestnuts and other holiday-themed items in Frankfurt and other European cities are relieved to be open at all for their first Christmas market in two years, especially with new restrictions taking effect in Germany, Austria and other countries as COVID-19 infections hit record highs. Merchants who have opened are hoping for at least a fraction of the pre-pandemic holiday sales that can make or break their businesses.” Read more at AP News
“Reports of online abuse directed toward women and girls — along with LGBTQ and nonbinary people and other marginalized groups — have risen during the nearly two years of the coronavirus pandemic, studies show.
Even as governments grapple with a growing impetus to regulate behemoth social media companies and stop cybercrimes, this overarching fact of life online — that women and girls face a heightened risk of abuse and harassment — is often missing from legislative efforts for change, anti-abuse activists say.” Read more at Washington Post
“NEW YORK (AP) — For 50 years, the fixed narrative had the Beatles’ ‘Let it Be’ recording session as a miserable experience with a band where members were sick of each other, sick of their work and in the process of breaking up.
The nearly 8-hour, Peter Jackson-produced documentary culled from film and recording outtakes of those sessions instead reveal a self-aware band with a rare connection and work ethic that still knew how to have fun — yet was also in the process of breaking up.
The ‘Get Back’ series unspools over three days starting Thanksgiving on Disney+.
Produced by a Beatlemaniac for fellow Beatlemaniacs, it can be an exhausting experience for those not in the club. But the club is pretty big. Beyond the treats it offers fans, ‘Get Back’ is a fly-on-the-wall look at the creative process of a band still popular a half-century after it ceased existence.
Jackson, the Academy Award-winning maker of the ‘Lord of the Rings’ series, was discussing another project with the Beatles when he inquired about what happened to all the outtakes of director Michael Lindsay-Hogg’s 1970 ‘Let it Be’ film.
Nearly 60 hours of film taken over three weeks existed, mostly unseen, and the band had been considering what to do with it. Jackson took that material, as well as 150 hours of audio recordings, and spent four years building a story.
He approached with the fear that it might be a depressing slog.
Lindsay-Hogg’s film is viewed as a chronicle of the band’s demise — unfairly, in Jackson’s view — because it was released shortly after the break-up was announced. Individual Beatles reinforced the notion with negative comments about the experience, where they had given themselves a tight deadline to write and record new material in preparation of a live show, with cameras following it all.
‘I just waited for it to go bad,’ Jackson said. ‘I waited for the arguments to begin. I waited for the conflict to begin. I waited for the sense that they hated each other. I waited for all the things I had read in the books, and it never showed up.’
Oh, there’s conflict. History overshadows the enjoyable moments revealed in the outtakes, like John Lennon singing ‘Two of Us’ as a Bob Dylan impersonator, or he and Paul McCartney challenging each other to a run-through without moving their lips. Jackson restores the balance.
‘The connection was incredible,’ drummer Ringo Starr recalled in a recent Zoom interview. ‘I’m an only child (but) I had three brothers. And we looked out for each other. We looked after each other. We had a few rows with each other — that’s what people do. But musically, every time we would count in — one, two, three, four — we were into being the best we could be.’” Read more at AP News
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