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Minnesota man gets 2 years in prison for laser strike on jet

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A federal judge in Wisconsin sentenced a Minnesota man on Friday to two years in prison for aiming a laser at a Delta Air Lines jet in 2021, an act that prosecutors said disrupted the pilots’ efforts to land and putting passengers in “incredible danger.”James Link, 43, of Rochester, Minnesota, pleaded guilty in January.Laser strikes on planes and helicopters hit a record in the U.S. in 2021. Pilots reported 9,723 incidents, a 41% jump over the year before, according to Federal Aviation Administration figures. The FAA said it handed out $120,000 in fines in 2021. Violators like Link can also face up to five years in prison.According to the U.S. attorney’s office in Madison, the pilots of the Delta flight from Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, to Minneapolis on Oct. 29, 2021, reported that their cockpit was lit up three times by a bright blue laser while they were at an altitude of 9,000 feet (2,700 meters) just west of River Falls, Wisconsin. At the time, air...

Officer Cottontail? Bunny joins police force. Fur real.

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

YUBA CITY, Calif. (AP) — Meet Percy, the police rabbit. Yes, that’s fur real.Some bunny — also known as Officer Ashley Carson — found a lost rabbit last year in the middle of Percy Avenue in Yuba City, California.Carson scurried back to the police station and handed the rabbit over to animal control, who could find neither hide nor hare of the bunny’s family.In a hoppy ending, a police services analyst adopted the allegedly “docile and friendly” animal and named him Percy. The Yuba City Police Department — about 40 hopping miles (64.37 kilometers) north of Sacramento — announced the rabbit’s promotion to the rank of “wellness officer” just days before Easter Sunday.“Officer Percy lounges at the police department during the day and is a support animal for all,” the department wrote on Facebook Wednesday.The Easter Bunny could not be reached for comment. Case closed.The Associated Press

Regulators say railroads must examine how they build trains

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Federal regulators said Friday that railroads need to re-examine how they assemble their trains after a string of derailments in recent years that were at least partly caused by the way empty and loaded cars were mixed together with locomotives. Heavy cars at the back of a train can push and pull against empty cars in the middle of a train as it goes over hills and around corners. Those forces have become more of a problem as the industry increasingly relies on longer trains with a wide variety of freight aboard. Another factor complicating the issue is the industry’s practice of placing locomotives throughout trains. The locomotives can amplify the forces if they’re not used correctly.The Federal Railroad Administration’s advisory cites six derailments since 2021 where those forces were a factor. They include a Norfolk Southern derailment near Springfield, Ohio, last month and a 2021 Union Pacific derailment that forced the evacuation of Sibley,...

Police union director fired after opioid smuggling arrest

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — The executive director for a Northern California police union who was charged with attempting to illegally import synthetic opioids from India and other countries has been fired from her job, officials said Friday. Joanne Marian Segovia, who was the executive director of the San Jose Police Officers’ Association, was arrested last week on charges she attempted to unlawfully import valeryl fentanyl, a synthetic opioid. If convicted, she faces up to 20 years in prison. Starting in 2015, Segovia had dozens of drug shipments mailed to her San Jose home from India, Hong Kong, Hungary and Singapore with manifests listing their contents as “wedding party favors,” “gift makeup,” “chocolate and sweets” and “food supplement,” according to a federal criminal complaint. Segovia, 64, at times used her work computer to make the orders and at least once used the union’s UPS account to ship the drugs within the country, federal prosecutors said.Her attorney, Will Edelman, di...

Attacks in Israel, West Bank kill 3 in worsening violence

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

JERUSALEM (AP) — Palestinian militants carried out a pair of attacks on Friday, killing three people and wounding at least six as tensions soared after days of fighting at Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site. Earlier in the day, retaliatory Israeli airstrikes had hit Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, sparking fears of a broader conflict.Israeli authorities said an Italian tourist was killed and five other Italian and British citizens were wounded when a car rammed into a group of tourists in Tel Aviv, Israel’s commercial hub.In a separate incident, two British-Israeli women were shot to death near a settlement in the occupied West Bank.The spasm of violence in Israel and the West Bank heightened fears of an even more intense surge, with the rare convergence of the holy Muslim month of Ramadan, the Jewish Passover holiday and Easter now underway. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was calling up all reserve forces in Israel’s border police, a paramilitary force usually deploy...

Pope Francis skips Good Friday at Colosseum in chilly Rome

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis, hospitalized recently with bronchitis, skipped the traditional Good Friday nighttime procession at the Colosseum because of chilly weather in Rome, staying instead at his home at the Vatican while thousands of faithful turned out for the torchlit event.This Good Friday was the first time a pontiff was a no-show at the Colosseum Way of the Cross procession since 2005. Then, a weakened and ailing St. John Paul II, eight days before his death, silently watched the Way of the Cross ritual on TV at his apartment in the Apostolic Palace.The Vatican had said Francis would preside at the ancient Roman arena at the procession that recalls Jesus’ suffering before his crucifixion and death on a cross. But just a few hours before the procession’s start, the Vatican, citing the “intense cold” that has made evenings unseasonably chilly in Rome these days, revealed that Francis would stay at his residence in a hotel in Vatican City and follow the event from there.Th...

Skilling: Warm temps arrive ahead of Easter weekend

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

Beautiful Easter/Passover weekend with (except for markedly cooler lakeshore and beach air temps) the warmest weekend of 2023 ahead.It's cooler near the lake season and easterly lake breezes off the 42-deg lake waters mean immediate shoreline locations are likely to warm no higher than the mid to upper 40s Saturday while inland high temps surge into the low to mid 60s.Sunday is to see high surge several degrees higher inland with lakeshore and beach temps rising to the mid to upper 50s as a south/southeast wind flow locks in. SSE winds travel over less water than easterly winds which means they have less time to be cooled by their interaction with the chilly lake water.But the real warmth takes hold next week with a 70-deg high predicted Monday—then summer level upper 70s to low 80s due Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday with no rain or storminess.Back to back 80-deg or warmer daytime highs appear a distinct possibility Wednesday and Thursday which, if true, would mark the first consec...

Marcus Stroman makes his 200th start a great one

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

CHICAGO — If you're going to have a milestone start, you might as well make it one to remember. That's what Marcus Stroman did on a sunny day at Wrigley Field on Friday as he continues a strong first two weeks of the season. Making his 200th start of his career, the Cubs' pitcher pitched six shutout innings against the Rangers in a 2-0 win that starts a six-game homestand at the Friendly Confines. Cody Bellinger's single in the fourth and Ian Happ's double in the sixth were the only runs the home team would need thanks to the starter. Stroman allowed just two hits while striking out six batters compared to three walks in 89 pitches. Only one runner reached third base all day, and that was in his last inning, as the starter mostly stayed out of trouble all day.Mark Leiter Jr. pitched a clean seventh inning before Michael Fulmer struck out four in t he final two frames to preserve the shutout as the Cubs evened their record at 3-3.This performance is on-par with his Opening Day start ...

FBI: Financial sextortion cases rising in Chicago area

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

CHICAGO — A new report from the FBI indicates an alarming increase in financial sextortion cases nationwide, especially in the Chicago area. Nationwide reports of sextortion cases jumped 463% from 2021 to 2022, with a 539% rise in local cases. FBI seeing ‘explosion’ in reports of young boys being extorted online There was a 322% rise nationally in financial sextortion cases with a 383% increase in Chicago. Conventional sextortion typically targets young women and girls for the purpose of obtaining sexual content.Targets of financial sextortion tend to be young men and boys with the ultimate goal of getting money. Grieving mom warns about ‘sextortion’ after son’s death The FBI has a number of resources online to help people prevent becoming a victim, including a program for children in grades 3 through 8 to teach them about online safety through a video game.The program is offered in English and Spanish.The FBI encourages people to be selective about what they share online, be wa...

49 percent agree with criminal case being brought against Trump: poll

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:08 GMT

Just under half of Americans say they think it was right for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg (D) to pursue criminal charges against Trump for his role in a 2016 hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels, according to a new Reuters-Ipsos poll released on Friday.However, that 49 percent breaks down drastically along party lines, with 84 percent of Democrat respondents agreeing with the decision to bring charges compared to the just 16 percent of Republican respondents who said the same, the poll found.This partisan split reflects the difference of opinion in Washington, where Republican lawmakers have repeatedly denounced the case as “politically motivated” and an “unprecedented abuse of power.”Republicans in the Reuters poll largely agreed with such sentiments, with 76 percent saying some members of law enforcement are attempting to delegitimize Trump through politically motivated investigations.The vast majority of American respondents — 73 percent — say...