Judge to decide if father of man accused in parade shooting will stand trial too
An Illinois judge is set to decide whether the father of the man accused of fatally shooting seven people at a suburban Chicago Fourth of July parade will stand trial himself
2023-08-28 20:58
Elizabeth Bailey: North Carolina teacher accused of having sex with student breaches bail, found drunk in car with teens
Elizabeth Bailey was in the passenger seat up front while one of the minors was driving without a license when they crashed their vehicle
2023-05-18 14:46
Fundraiser for policeman who shot French teenager reflects divisions
By Elizabeth Pineau PARIS (Reuters) -A crowdfunding campaign to raise money for the family of the policeman who shot dead
2023-07-04 22:58
UFC legend Anderson Silva shares update on Jake Paul’s MMA fighter union: 'It’s moving, it’s all in motion'
Silva agreed to help establish an association for MMA fighters if he lost against Jake Paul
2023-06-27 15:16
Boehringer latest to sue US over drug price negotiation plan
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2023-08-22 01:27
'It looked like a war zone': Parkland high school shooting victim's father describes visiting school site
The father of a Parkland, Florida, high school shooting victim who visited the untouched site five years after the massacre that left 17 people dead said he was not prepared for what he saw at the crime scene, which had "blood everywhere."
2023-07-08 14:18
UK’s Benchmark Bond Yield Hits 2008 High in Global Debt Selloff
UK government bonds slid to send benchmark yields to the highest since 2008, on concerns major central banks
2023-08-17 23:29
Iran unveils latest version of ballistic missile amid wider tensions over nuclear program
Iran has unveiled what it dubbed the latest iteration of its liquid-fueled Khorramshahr ballistic missile amid wider tensions with the West over its nuclear program
2023-05-25 16:27
Trump supporters falsely claim special counsel seeking death penalty in indictment over 2020 election
Donald Trump supporters and right-wing media outlets are incorrectly claiming that the federal government is seeking the death penalty as part of its four-count indictment against the former president for allegedly seeking to overturn the 2020 election. After the charges were announced on Tuesday, the claims quickly spread across conservative corners of the Internet. Mr Trump’s Truth Social platform sent users an alert that read “New charges against Trump carry DEATH PENALTY,” while conservative influencer Dinesh D’Souza claimed on X the alleged death sentence “proves how scared they are of Trump!” One MAGA Internet personality wrote on social media, “This is how you start a war.” A spokesperson for the special counsel’s office told The Independent these claims are “not accurate.” “The indictment does not contain the special findings required,” the DoJ official said. The misinterpretation stems from one of the federal statutes that prosecutors are accusing Mr Trump of violating, Section 241 of Title 18 of US Code. As The Independent has reported, the law is part of a landmark set of provisions passed in the brutal aftermath of the Civil War to prosecute those who sought to deprive the civil rights of newly enfranchised Black Americans. The punishment for violating this section, according to the Department of Justice, is a felony and up to 10 years in prison. That penalty can be extended to life in prison or death if the government “proves an aggravating factor (such as that the offense involved kidnapping, aggravated sexual abuse, or resulted in death)”, per the DoJ. Five people, a mix of police officers and rioters, did die during the January 6 insurrection, but, as The Washington Post noted, nowhere in the lengthy indictment against Mr Trump are prosecutors arguing the former president is responsible for any such aggravating circumstances. (Police officer Michael Byrd, who shot January 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt, was cleared of wrongdoing by the DoJ and the Capitol police in April of 2021, and two of the men who attacked Brian Sicknick, a Washington police officer who died during the insurrection, have been sentenced to prison.) Rather, the DoJ is alleging that Mr Trump and his associates knew he lost the election, but launched a multi-part conspiracy to hold onto power anyway, a scheme that included spreading false claims, attempting to send false slates of electors to Washington, and pressuring officials to meddle with the election certification process. The scheme was largely focused on a handful of counties in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Arizona, and Wisconsin, all of which have large communities of Black and Latino voters, who tend to vote for Democrats. “The attack on our nation’s capitol on January 6, 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy,” special counsel Jack Smith said Tuesday in a press conference describing the indictment. “As described in the indictment, it was fueled by lies. Lies by the defendant targeted at obstructing a bedrock function of the US government – the nation’s process of collecting, counting and certifying the results of the presidential election.” As Sean Morales-Doyle, director of the voting rights and elections programme at the Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law, told The Independent, the civil rights statute in question has been used to prosecute officials for attempting to alter election results in the past. He pointed to the example of the 1915 case US v Mosley, where Oklahoma officials were punished for trying to exclude votes from a final tally. “If you read that case, you’d never be able to tell that it’s about race. And there’s not a word about race mentioned, but that’s really the story underlying it,” Mr Morales-Doyle told The Independent. “And that’s really, throughout our nation’s history, the battle over our democracy. The battle over the right to vote has not always but pretty consistently also been a fight that has race at its heart,” he added. “And that’s true now still, and I think it is an overlooked thread underlying much of the story about Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election.” Prosecutors may not be arguing Mr Trump caused conduct worthy of the death penalty, but the former president’s sentencing still will be a delicate issue. "Possible jail time for Donald Trump if he’s convicted of one, some, or all the criminal cases is a fascinating but speculative business," former federal prosecutor Michael McAuliffe told Newsweek. "As for the federal cases charging Trump with crimes, the sentencing guidelines – which assign numerical values to various factors to create a range for a presumptive sentence – will prove inadequate." In regards to Mr Trump, both "the crimes and the defendant are singular.” Alex Woodward contributed reporting to this story. Read More Trump’s election fraud claims were always bogus. Will his history of lies finally catch up to him? Why Trump is charged under a civil rights law used to prosecute KKK terror Donald Trump due in court charged with ‘conspiracy to defraud United States’ Trump supporters claim special counsel seeking death penalty in indictment Trump supporters view the latest indictment as evidence of a crime — against Trump Selection of Thailand’s new prime minister delayed again, to await court decision on election winner
2023-08-03 17:47
Report paves way for EU to renew glyphosate use
The European Food Safety Authority said on Thursday it had not found "any critical areas of concern" preventing the controversial and widely used herbicide glyphosate from being...
2023-07-07 00:27
Is Pete Davidson planning on settling down? 'SNL' star purchased family-friendly van before checking into rehab
Pete Davidson has already revealed how thrilled he will be to have children in the future
2023-06-30 17:25
Durex is recruiting condom testers
Safe sex is imperative — especially given a nearly 24 percent increase in STI diagnoses
2023-09-13 16:18
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