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Federal court rules firearm restrictions on defendants awaiting trial are constitutional

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Court orders that prohibited two criminal defendants from possessing firearms while they awaited trial were constitutional because they were in line with past restrictions on firearms, a federal court ruled Monday.

Judge Gabriel P. Sanchez, writing for a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, found that U.S. laws have historically sought to disarm dangerous criminal defendants, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Sanchez said those previous prohibitions justified the restrictions placed on John Thomas Fencl and Jesus Perez-Garcia, defendants in California whose challenges to the law were consolidated in Monday’s order.

“Here, the historical evidence, when considered as a whole, shows a long and broad history of legislatures exercising authority to disarm people whose possession of firearms would pose an unusual danger, beyond the ordinary citizen, to themselves or others,” Sanchez wrote. “The temporary disarmament of Fencl and Perez-Garcia as a means reasonably necessary to protect public safety falls within that historical tradition.”

Katie Hurrelbrink, an attorney for both men, told the Times she intended to “continue litigating this” by asking for a review by a larger, en banc appellate panel and, if necessary, the U.S. Supreme Court.

U.S. Attorney Tara McGrath said in a statement that the ruling “recognized the long history of keeping firearms out of the hands of those who refuse to abide by the law.”

The Times cited court records that show Fencl was arrested and charged with various crimes after law enforcement officials discovered more than 100 guns in his home near San Diego. Perez-Garcia was arrested at the U.S.-Mexico border when a customs inspection of a vehicle in which he was a passenger uncovered about 11 kilograms of methamphetamine and half a kilogram of fentanyl, court records show.

Both Fencl and Perez-Garcia argued that while detained defendants had historically had firearms taken away from them, there was no historical record of detainees who had been released from detention being precluded from possessing firearms.

Sanchez wrote that the decision to take their guns was “consistent with our nation’s long history of temporarily disarming criminal defendants facing serious charges and those deemed dangerous or unwilling to follow the law.”

Both men were released from custody pending trial and subsequently challenged the terms of their release under a “history and tradition” test the U.S. Supreme Court established in 2022 for assessing the constitutionality of gun laws nationwide. In New York State Rifle & Pistol Assn. vs. Bruen, the high court said that gun laws are legitimate only if they are rooted in U.S. history and tradition or are sufficiently analogous to some historic law.

The Bruen decision led to a surge in challenges to gun laws.


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KEYWORD NOTICE – New York mayor accused of sexually assaulting transit co-worker in 1993

By Steve Gorman

(Reuters) – A former New York City employee filed suit on Monday accusing Mayor Eric Adams of sexually assaulting her in 1993, when both worked for the municipal transit police bureau, after she went to him seeking help in navigating a hostile office environment.

In a 26-page civil complaint filed in New York state court in Manhattan, Lorna Beach-Mathura alleged that Adams, then a transit officer, assaulted her in his car while parked along the Hudson River after promising her a ride home to discuss her career problems.

She had trusted Adams and sought his help because of his role at the time as both a police department officer and leader in the NYPD Guardians Association, a fraternal group advocating equality and fair treatment for Black employees, the suit said.

Adams flatly denied the allegations in a statement issued by city lawyers.

Beach-Mathura said the alleged assault capped years of pervasive sexual harassment, discrimination and repeated denials of promotion she had endured as an administrative aide for the city transit bureau, now a part of the New York Police Department.

According to the complaint, Adams agreed to help her obtain a promotion and offered to drive her home one evening to discuss the matter, but instead took her to a darkened, vacant lot where he demanded sexual favors in return for his assistance.

As described in Beach-Mathura’s account, she refused his advances and pulled away her hand when Adams forcibly placed it on his exposed genitals before he masturbated himself to climax and ejaculated on her inside the car. She says he then dropped her off at a subway station.

According to Beach-Mathura, Adams also was behind her subsequent transfer to another department where she lost seniority and was forced from her job during layoffs “in retaliation for refusing his quid pro quo sexual demands.”

The lawsuit was filed under New York’s Adult Survivors Act, allowing accusers to sue over alleged long-ago sexual abuse even if statutes of limitations have expired. Beach-Mathura reserved her right to bring such a suit in a less-detailed court summons initially filed against Adams in November.

At the time, a spokesperson for the mayor denied the claim and said Adams did not know the accuser or recall meeting her.

In a statement issued on Monday, New York City Corporation Counsel Sylvia Hinds-Radix said the mayor still “fully denies these outrageous allegations and the events described.”

It adds that Adams in 1993 “was one of the most prominent public opponents of the racism within the NYPD, which is why the suit’s allegations that he had any sway over promotions of civilian employees is ludicrous.”

The NYPD Transit Bureau, the Guardians Association and the city of New York are also named as defendants in the suit, which seeks unspecified damages.

(Reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)


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Negotiators race to finish government funding bills after reaching deal on Homeland Security bill

WASHINGTON (AP) — Negotiators from Congress and the White House scrambled Monday to complete work on the remaining government funding bills for the fiscal year and avoid a partial shutdown for key departments that would begin this weekend without legislative action.

Six months into the fiscal year, Congress is about halfway home in passing spending measures expected to total about $1.65 trillion. Lawmakers passed the first portion of spending bills in early March, funding about 30% of the government. Now lawmakers are focused on the larger package, and in what has become routine, are brushing up against the deadline when federal funding expires.

Agreement had been reached on five of the six spending bills that make up the second package, but negotiators clashed over the measure that provides funding for the Department of Homeland Security, which is responsible for securing and managing U.S. borders, among other things. A person familiar with the negotiations but not authorized to discuss them publicly said late Monday that a deal had been reached on the Homeland Security spending. The breakthrough sets the stage for Congress to dodge a partial shutdown.

The stakes for both sides are immense as border security emerges as a central issue in the 2024 campaigns and the flow of migrants crossing the southern border far outpaces the capacity of the U.S. immigration system to deal with it.

Negotiators had been moving toward a simple solution: passing a continuing resolution that would mostly extend funding for the Department of Homeland Security, though with some increase from 2023 spending levels.

But a senior Republican aide said House Republicans pushed for more resources for the border than the continuing resolution would have provided. The White House also eventually rejected the continuing resolution approach but didn’t make that clear in communications with congressional allies until the “11th hour,” the aide said, increasing the risk of a short-term shutdown.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Monday declined to speak to timelines during the negotiations but emphasized that funding the government is lawmakers’ responsibility.

“It is their job to keep the government open,” she said.

Drilling down more specifically on funding for the Department of Homeland Security, she said the Biden administration has “maximized their operations” and removed more people in the past 10 months than during any year since fiscal year 2013. She said it was important to continue “that operational pace.”

“Obviously, we believe DHS needs additional funding. We’ve always said that,” Jean-Pierre said.

Even with the possible release of legislative text early this week, it’s unclear whether Congress can avoid a brief partial shutdown. House rules call for giving lawmakers 72 hours to review a bill before voting. House Speaker Mike Johnson will then likely have to bring the bill up through a streamlined process requiring two-thirds support to pass.

Most of the “no” votes are expected to come from Republicans, who have been critical of the overall spending levels as well as the lack of policy mandates sought by some conservatives, such as restricting abortion access, eliminating diversity and inclusion programs within federal agencies, and banning gender-affirming care.

Then, the Senate would act on the bill, but it would require all senators to agree on speeding up the process to get to a final vote before the midnight Friday deadline. Such agreements generally require Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to allow for votes on various amendments to the bill in return for an expedited final vote.

The package being finalized this week is expected to provide about $886 billion for the Pentagon. The bill will also fund the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and others.

Overall, the two spending packages provide about a 3% boost for defense, while keeping nondefense spending roughly flat with the year before. That’s in keeping with an agreement that former Speaker Kevin McCarthy worked out with the White House, which restricted spending for two years and suspended the debt ceiling into January 2025 so the federal government could continue paying its bills.

House Republicans have been determined to end the practice of packaging all 12 annual spending bills into one massive bill called an omnibus. They managed this time to break the spending bills into two parts.

___

Associated Press staff writer Chris Megerian contributed to this report.


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Trump says Jews who vote for Democrats ‘hate Israel’ and their religion

NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump on Monday charged that Jews who vote for Democrats “hate Israel” and hate “their religion,” igniting a firestorm of criticism from the White House and Jewish leaders.

Trump, in an interview, had been asked about Democrats’ growing criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over his handling of the war in Gaza as the civilian death toll continues to mount.

“I actually think they hate Israel,” Trump responded to his former aide, Sebastian Gorka. “I think they hate Israel. And the Democrat party hates Israel.”

Trump, who last week became the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee, went on to charge: “Any Jewish person that votes for Democrats hates their religion. They hate everything about Israel and they should be ashamed of themselves because Israel will be destroyed.”

The comments sparked immediate backlash from the White House, President Joe Biden’s campaign and Jewish leaders. The vast majority of Jewish Americans identify as Democrats, but Trump has often accused them of disloyalty, perpetuating what critics say is an antisemitic trope.

At the White House, spokesperson Andrew Bates cast the comments as “vile and unhinged Antisemitic rhetoric” without mentioning Trump by name.

“As Antisemitic crimes and acts of hate have increased across the world — among them the deadliest attack committed against the Jewish people since the Holocaust — leaders have an obligation to call hate what it is and bring Americans together against it,” he said. “There is no justification for spreading toxic, false stereotypes that threaten fellow citizens. None.”

Biden’s campaign said, “The only person who should be ashamed here is Donald Trump.”

“Trump is going to lose again this November because Americans are sick of his hateful resentment, personal attacks, and extreme agenda,” said spokesman James Singer.

Jonathan Greenblatt, who heads the Anti-Defamation League, said, “Accusing Jews of hating their religion because they might vote for a particular party is defamatory & patently false.”

“Serious leaders who care about the historic US-Israel alliance should focus on strengthening, rather than unraveling, bipartisan support for the State of Israel,” he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Trump’s comments come as Biden has been facing mounting pressure from the progressive wing of his party over his administration’s support for Israel in its retaliatory offensive in Gaza. More than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-ruled territory.

While Biden continues to back Israel’s right to defend itself, he has increasingly criticized Netanyahu. After his State of the Union speech, he said he needed to have a “come to Jesus” conversation with the Israeli leader. He has also accused Netanyahu of “hurting Israel more than helping Israel,” saying, “he must pay more attention to the innocent lives being lost as a consequence of the actions taken.”

Trump took particular issue with recent comments from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, the country’s highest-ranking Jewish official. In a speech last week, Schumer sharply criticized Netanyahu’s handling of the war in Gaza, warning that the civilian toll was damaging Israel’s standing around the world. He also called for Israel to hold new elections.

While the White House formally distanced itself from Schumer’s comments, the Democratic leader and key ally was voicing an opinion increasingly held across Biden’s administration.

Schumer — whom Trump accused of being “very anti-Israel now” — responded by accusing Trump of “making highly partisan and hateful rants.”

“To make Israel a partisan issue only hurts Israel and the US-Israeli relationship,” he wrote on X.

The Pew Research Center reported in 2021 that Jews are “among the most consistently liberal and Democratic groups in the U.S.,” with 7 in 10 Jewish adults identifying with or leaning toward the Democratic Party. In 2020, it found that nearly three-quarters of American Jews disapproved of Trump’s performance as president, with just 27% rating him positively.

Americans have also increasingly soured on Israel’s military operation in Gaza, according to surveys from The Associated Press and the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. In January, 50% of U.S. adults said the military response from Israel in the Gaza Strip had gone too far, up from 40% in November.

That number was higher among Democrats, 6 in 10 of whom said the same thing in both surveys.

___ AP White House correspondent Zeke Miller contributed to this reported from Washington.


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US and Japan seek UN resolution calling on all nations to ban nuclear weapons in outer space

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United States and Japan are sponsoring a U.N. Security Council resolution calling on all nations not to deploy or develop nuclear weapons in space, the U.S. ambassador announced Monday.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield told a U.N. Security Council meeting that “any placement of nuclear weapons into orbit around the Earth would be unprecedented, dangerous, and unacceptable.”

The announcement that the U.S. and Japan had circulated a resolution follows White House confirmation last month that Russia has obtained a “troubling” anti-satellite weapon capability, although such a weapon is not operational yet.

Russian President Vladimir Putin declared later that Moscow has no intention of deploying nuclear weapons in space, claiming that the country has only developed space capabilities similar to those of the U.S.

The Outer Space Treaty ratified by about 114 countries including the United States and Russia prohibits the deployment of “nuclear weapons or any other kinds of weapons of mass destruction” in orbit or the stationing of “weapons in outer space in any other manner.”

Japan’s Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa, who chaired the council meeting, said that even during “the confrontational environment” of the Cold War, the rivals agreed to ensure that outer space remained peaceful. That prohibition on putting any weapons of mass destruction into orbit must be upheld today, she said.

Thomas-Greenfield said all parties to the treaty must commit to the ban on nuclear and other destructive weapons, “and we must urge all member states who are not yet party to it to accede to it without delay.”

She said the United States looks forward to engaging with the other members of the 15-nation Security Council “to forge consensus around this text.”

Russia’s deputy U.N. ambassador Dmitry Polyansky said Moscow’s initial impression is that the proposed resolution is “yet another propaganda stunt by Washington,” “very politicized” and “divorced from reality.”

He criticized the text, saying the wording wasn’t worked out by experts nor discussed at specialized international platforms such as the U.N. Conference on Disarmament or the U.N. Committee on Outer Space.

Outside the Security Council, Thomas-Greenfield said the U.S. is interested in engaging with parties to the treaty “to explore ways to increase confidence in compliance” with the ban on nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction in outer space.

“The United States has already begun considering approaches to help ensure that countries cannot deploy nuclear weapons in orbit undetected, and we intend to engage with other states parties as our ideas evolve,” she said.

Thomas-Greenfield also reiterated to the council the United States is willing to engage Russia and China right now, without preconditions, on bilateral arms control issues.

But Russia’s Polyansky accused the West of “trying to inflict strategic defeat on my country.”

“Any interaction will only be possible if the United States and NATO review their anti- Russian course, and when they show that they are ready to participate in comprehensive dialogue, taking into account all of those strategic stability factors and removing all of the concerns that we have about our security,” he said.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres briefed the council, saying “geopolitical tensions and mistrust have escalated the risk of nuclear warfare to its highest point in decades.”

He said the movie “Oppenheimer” about Robert Oppenheimer, who directed the U.S. project during World War II that developed the atomic bomb, “brought the harsh reality of nuclear doomsday to vivid life for millions around the world.”

“Humanity cannot survive a sequel to Oppenheimer,” the U.N. chief said.


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Biden to host Japan PM Kishida, Philippines President Marcos for White House summit

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden will host Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for a White House summit next month amid growing concerns about North Korea’s nuclear program, provocative Chinese action in the South China Sea and differences over a Japanese company’s plan to buy an iconic American steel company.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in a statement on Monday said the first-ever U.S.-Japan-Philippines leaders’ summit is an opportunity to highlight the countries’ “growing economic relations, a proud and resolute commitment to shared democratic values and a shared vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific.”

The three leaders have no shortage of issues to discuss.

The announcement came as North Korea’s state media reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un supervised a live-fire drill of nuclear-capable “super-large” multiple rocket launchers designed to target South Korea’s capital. The North Korean claim followed the South Korean and Japanese militaries reporting on Monday that they had detected North Korea firing multiple short-range ballistic missiles toward waters off its eastern coast, adding to a streak of weapons displays that have raised regional tensions.

The U.S.-Japan relationship is facing a rare moment of friction after Biden announced last week that he opposes the planned sale of Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel to Nippon Steel of Japan. Biden argued in announcing his opposition that the U.S. needs to “maintain strong American steel companies powered by American steelworkers.”

Nippon Steel announced in December that it planned to buy U.S. Steel for $14.1 billion in cash, raising concerns about what the transaction could mean for unionized workers, supply chains and U.S. national security.

Meanwhile, long-running Philippines-Chinese tensions have come back into focus this month after Chinese and Philippine coast guard vessels collided in the disputed South China Sea.

The Chinese coast guard ships and accompanying vessels blocked the Philippine coast guard and supply vessels off the disputed Second Thomas Shoal and executed dangerous maneuvers that caused two minor collisions between the Chinese ships and two of the Philippine vessels, Philippine officials said.

A small Philippine marine and navy contingent has kept watch onboard a rusting warship, the BRP Sierra Madre, which has been marooned since the late 1990s in the shallows of the Second Thomas Shoal.

China also claims the shoal lying off the western Philippines and has surrounded the atoll with coast guard, navy and other ships to press its claims and prevent Filipino forces from delivering construction materials to fortify the Sierra Madre in a decades-long standoff.

Close U.S.-Philippines relations were not a given when Marcos, the son and namesake of the former Philippines strongman, took office in 2022.

But both Biden and Marcos have thrown much effort into strengthening the historically- complicated relationship between the two countries, with the two leaders sharing concerns about aggressive Chinese action around the region.

A U.S. appeals court in 1996 upheld damages of about $2 billion against the elder Marcos’ estate for the torture and killings of thousands of Filipinos. The court upheld a 1994 verdict of a jury in Hawaii, where he fled after being forced from power in 1986. He died there in 1989.

The elder Marcos placed the Philippines under martial law in 1972, a year before his term was to expire. He padlocked the country’s congressional and newspaper offices, ordered the arrest of many political opponents and activists and ruled by decree.

The younger Marcos made an official visit to Washington last year, the first by a Philippine president in more than 10 years. The U.S. made the announcement of Marcos’ coming trip to Washington as Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Manilla.

Jean-Pierre said that in addition to the leaders’ summit Biden will hold one-on-one talks with Marcos. She said the leaders would discuss efforts to expand cooperation on economic security, clean energy, people-to-people ties, human rights and democracy.

Biden is set to honor Kishida a day before the leaders summit with a state visit. The White House announced the state visit in January.


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Man pleads guilty to murder in Hawaii after killing lover and encasing his body in tub

HONOLULU (AP) — A man pleaded guilty to murder Monday, about two years after his lover’s decomposing body was found encased in concrete in a bathtub in one of Hawaii’s most exclusive gated communities.

Juan Tejedor Baron, now 25, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the death of Gary Ruby, 73. As part of a plea deal, prosecutors won’t seek a sentence of life without possibility for parole. Prosecutors will recommend a minimum term of 20 years to the Hawaii Paroling Authority, according to the plea agreement.

According to court documents, Baron killed Ruby, poured cement over this body and planned to fraudulently take ownership of his car and home in Honolulu’s Hawaii Loa Ridge neighborhood. Property records showed Ruby purchased the house in 2020 for nearly $2.2 million.

Ruby’s decomposing body was excavated by authorities in March 2022 from a standalone soaking tub, after his brother told police he hadn’t heard from Ruby in weeks. Ruby’s last email to his brother mentioned he had “met a new love interest named Juan” who was significantly younger, police said.

Police said Baron covered the cement with coffee grounds to mask the smell.

U.S. Marshals and Los Angeles police arrested Baron after finding him in a crawl space at the back of a Mexico-bound bus in Anaheim, California.

Baron had long wanted to take responsibility, but Baron’s lawyers had discovered evidence of possible prosecutorial misconduct in the case, said defense attorney Kyle Dowd.

The plea agreement says Baron’s attorneys will withdraw a motion alleging that a former prosecutor on the case showed photographic evidence during presentations to community members, which could have tainted the jury pool.

Baron is considered to have overstayed a visa, according to the plea document. If he’s granted parole, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will take custody of Baron and start removal proceedings. Baron is from Colombia, Dowd said.

___

This story has been corrected to show that Ruby bought the house in 2020, not 2002.


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New Jersey’s unique primary ballot design seems to face skepticism from judge in lawsuit

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey’s one-of-a-kind method of drawing primary ballots prompted some apparent skepticism from a federal judge Monday as he considered a legal challenge claiming the system favors preferred candidates of establishment party leaders.

The hearing Monday in federal court in Trenton unfolded a day after the state attorney general said he considered the longstanding system unconstitutional.

The lawsuit was filed by Democratic Rep. Andy Kim and others seeking to stop the state’s so-called county line system of primary ballot design. The outcome could determine whether that ballot design is carried into a contentious June 4 Democratic Senate primary pitting Kim against first lady Tammy Murphy.

Unique in the country, New Jersey brackets candidates together who run on the same party slogan, often with those who get the county political party backing in prime position.

Kim appeared in U.S. District Court and testified Monday.

His contest against the first lady came about after U.S. Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez was indicted on federal bribery charges last September, prompting Kim to declare his candidacy a day later. Murphy, a first-time candidate and the spouse of Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy, joined the contest in November.

Menendez hasn’t announced his plans, but many Democrats have abandoned him, calling for his resignation. He’s pleaded not guilty and vowed to fight the charges.

Meanwhile, shortly after Murphy’s entrance to the race party leaders in several populous counties including Bergen and Essex backed the first lady in a signal that she would get the county line.

Tammy Murphy has said she’s competing in the system that’s in place in the state. Kim began calling for the end of the system, which has been reviled by a number of influential progressive groups in the state.

U.S. District Court Judge Zahid Quraishi set aside Monday to decide whether to grant an emergency injunction to end the county line system. March 25 is the filing deadline for the primary, and he told defendants’ attorneys in court that he wouldn’t take too much time “so you can force the court to be able to say, ‘It’s too late, Judge’.”

It’s unclear when he would rule on the matter, but he gave attorneys until later in the week to address the attorney general’s statement.

At times, he sounded skeptical of the attorneys for the defendants — most of the state’s county clerks whose job it is to design and implement ballots.

He responded tersely to a defendant’s attorney who argued that the current system had been in place for 100 years.

“The argument that because this is how we’ve always done it is how it should be done is not going to work in this court,” he said.

At one point, when an attorney for the defendants said political parties have a right to associate and endorse their candidates, Quraishi responded with a question.

“Why does it have to be they also control the ballot,” he asked.

The attorney, William Tambussi, responded that the law allows for slogans, which is how parties identify themselves, on the ballot.

Kim, a three-term congressman, watched hours of testimony and cross-examination of an elections expert his attorneys brought as a witness before taking the stand himself.

He said that while first considering a run for office in 2018, he was told of the importance of getting the county line and that it was “seen as very much determinative of if I would be successful.”

But Kim had reservations about the system, he said, pointing out that he did not always know all the candidates he was bracketed with on the ballot.

“I felt like I had no choice (but) to participate,” he said.

The defendants had argued there isn’t enough time to overhaul the ballots in time for the primary, and their attorneys cast the elections expert Kim’s attorney’s put forward as a witness as lacking knowledge and experience in New Jersey.

A day before the testimony, Attorney General Matt Platkin lobbed what one defendant’s attorney called a “litigation grenade” into the case, submitting a letter to the judge concluding that the state’s primary ballot system was “unconstitutional” and that he wouldn’t defend it.

Quraishi seemed irked by the letter, saying that he wasn’t sure he should consider it. He added that the attorney general could simply have said he wasn’t going to intervene in the case.

“He’s lobbing his opinion from the cheap seats,” the judge said. “He’s not here today.”

The attorney general’s office declined to comment beyond Platkin’s letter.

Outside the courthouse, a couple of dozen protesters carried signs reading “abolish the line” and chanted: “This is what democracy looks like.”


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Reddit, YouTube must face lawsuits claiming they enabled Buffalo mass shooter

By Jonathan Stempel

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Reddit and Google’s YouTube were ordered by a New York state judge to face lawsuits seeking to hold them responsible for helping enable the avowed white supremacist who killed 10 Black people in 2022 at a Buffalo, New York grocery store.

Justice Paula Feroleto of the Erie County Supreme Court said 25 plaintiffs could try to prove that the social media platforms were designed to addict and radicalize users, and gave Payton Gendron knowledge of the equipment and training needed for his racially motivated mass shooting at Tops Friendly Markets.

The 25 plaintiffs included store employees and customers who witnessed the May 14, 2022 shooting, and the son of one of those killed. Gendron was 18 at the time.

In seeking dismissals, Reddit and YouTube said they merely hosted third-party content and were not liable under a federal law governing such content, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, or the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment.

But the judge said the plaintiffs could try to show Reddit and YouTube owed them a duty because their platforms were defective and led to injuries.

She also said the mental distress that many witnesses suffered from the “horrific” attack was a “special circumstance” justifying their pursuit of negligence-based claims.

In a statement, Reddit said hate and violence “have no place” on its platform. It also said it constantly evaluates means to remove such content, and will continue reviewing communities to ensure they are upholding its rules.

The decision’s timing appeared unrelated to Reddit’s initial public offering, which is expected to be priced on Wednesday.

YouTube spokesman Jose Castaneda said that the platform disagreed with Feroleto’s decision and will appeal.

He also said YouTube had “deepest sympathies” for attack victims and their families, and tries to find and remove extremist conduct while also working with law enforcement.

The lawsuits were filed by the gun control advocacy group Everytown Law, and seek civil damages.

“We must hold accountable every single bad actor that prepared and equipped the shooter to target and kill members of Buffalo’s Black community,” its executive director Eric Tirschwell said.

Other defendants include Alphabet, Google, retailers that allegedly sold firearm equipment and body armor to Gendron, and Gendron’s parents.

Gendron pleaded guilty to charges including murder and terrorism motivated by hate, and was sentenced in February 2023 to life in prison without parole.

He also faces federal charges, and the U.S. Department of Justice said in January it plans to seek the death penalty.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)


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Pro-Trump Michigan attorney arrested after hearing in DC over leaking Dominion documents

An attorney facing criminal charges for illegally accessing Michigan voting machines after the 2020 election was arrested Monday after a hearing in a separate case in federal court in Washington, D.C.

Stefanie Lambert was arrested by U.S. Marshals after a hearing over possible sanctions against her for disseminating confidential emails from Dominion Voting Systems, the target of conspiracy theories over former President Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss. Lambert obtained the Dominion emails by representing Patrick Byrne, a prominent funder of election conspiracy theorists who is being sued by Dominion for defamation.

In a statement, the Marshals office said Lambert was arrested on “local charges.” A Michigan judge earlier this month issued a bench warrant for Lambert after she missed a hearing in her case, in which she’s charged with four felonies for accessing voting machines in a search for evidence of a conspiracy theory against Trump. Lambert had earlier, unsuccessfully, sued to overturn Trump’s loss in Michigan.

Earlier Monday, Lambert had acknowledged passing on the records from Dominion Voting Systems to “law enforcement.” She then attached an affidavit that included some of the leaked emails and was signed by Dar Leaf, a county sheriff in northern Michigan who has investigated false claims of widespread election fraud from the 2020 election, to a filing in her own case in Michigan. The rest of the documents were posted to an account under Leaf’s name on X, the social platform formally known as Twitter.

Leaf did not respond to requests for comment. Lambert’s attorney, Daniel Hartman, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Byrne wrote in a text that he did not know if Lambert had been arrested, “but if she was, I respect her even more, and she can raise her rate to me.”

Lambert contended the Dominion documents obtained under discovery were evidence of “crimes” and needed to be disclosed.

Byrne wrote on X that Lambert “signed an NDA, but she found evidence of ongoing crime, and reported it to law enforcement. If she found a severed head in discovery box she had a duty to report it to law-enforcement, too.”

Dominion on Friday filed a motion demanding Lambert be removed from the Byrne case for violating a protective order that U.S. District Court Judge Moxila A. Upadhyaya had placed on documents in the case. It said Lambert’s disclosure had triggered a new round of threats toward the company, which has been at the center of elaborate conspiracy theories about Trump’s loss.

“These actions should shock the conscience,” Dominion wrote in its motion seeking to disqualify Lambert. “They reflect a total disregard for this Court’s orders, to say nothing of the safety of Dominion employees.”

Upadhyaya during a hearing Monday said she had scheduled a subsequent one to determine whether sanctions against Lambert or removing her from the case were appropriate.

Dominion filed several defamation lawsuits against those who spread conspiracy theories blaming its election equipment for Trump’s 2020 loss. Fox News settled the most prominent of these cases for $787 million last year.

Dominion’s suit against Byrne is one of several the company has filed against prominent election deniers, including MyPillow founder Mike Lindell and attorney Sidney Powell.

___


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