Amazon, BlackRock, Google, Starbucks, billionaire investor Warren Buffett and hundreds of other companies published a letter on Wednesday condemning “discriminatory legislation” designed to hinder voting rights in the US.
The letter – the biggest statement yet from corporate America – follows weeks of heated debate over corporate opposition to a series of Republican-sponsored bills that critics charge will restrict voting rights in states across the US.
“We Stand for Democracy,” the double-page, centrefold advertisement published in the New York Times and Washington Post, begins. “Voting is the lifeblood of our democracy and we call upon all Americans to take a nonpartisan stand for this basic and most fundamental right of all Americans,” the statement reads.
The statement was organized by two of the US’s most prominent Black executives, Kenneth Chenault, former chief executive of American Express, and Kenneth Frazier, the chief executive of Merck. Both executives have been prominent in opposition to restrictive voting laws and in leading a response from the business community.
The statement does not address specific election legislation in states but it is the clearest indication yet that US corporations are looking to present a united front despite calls from several senior Republicans, including the former president Donald Trump and Senator Mitch McConnell, to stay out of politics.
In an interview with the Times, Chenault said: “It should be clear that there is overwhelming support in corporate America for the principle of voting rights.” Frazier added that the statement was intended to be non-partisan.
“These are not political issues,” he said. “These are the issues that we were taught in civics.”
The effort to rise above partisan politics comes after several companies, including Coca-Cola and Delta Airlines, found themselves at the center of a dispute over voting rights legislation passed in Georgia. Lawmakers in the state threatened to withdraw tax breaks after the companies spoke out against the measures and others, including Trump, called for boycotts.
The new statement comes after Chenault and Frazier convened a Zoom call of 100 CEOs over the weekend and is notable also for several companies that did not add their names, including Coca-Cola, Delta, Home Depot and JP Morgan.
Coca-Cola and Delta declined to comment, according to the Times, while Home Depot said in a statement on Tuesday that “the most appropriate approach for us to take is to continue to underscore our belief that all elections should be accessible, fair and secure.”
The JPMorgan Chase chief executive, Jamie Dimon, made a statement on voting rights before many other companies, saying: “We believe voting must be accessible and equitable.”
Some signatories, including Buffett, chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway, elected to sign personally rather than on behalf of their companies. Buffett has previously stated that businesses should not be involved in politics but he did not put his personal political views “in a blind trust at all when I took the job”.
The statement follows a declaration on Tuesday by automakers ahead of voting legislation hearings in Michigan that they oppose election laws that would inhibit voting.
In a separate statement, GM posted on Twitter: “We are calling on Michigan lawmakers and state legislatures across the nation to ensure that any changes to voting laws result in protecting and enhancing the most precious element of democracy.
“Anything less falls short of our inclusion and social justice goals,” the company said.
BROOKLYN CENTER, Minn.—The former police officer who fatally shot 20-year-old Daunte Wright was taken into custody Wednesday and charged with second-degree manslaughter in connection with the killing that has sparked three nights of protests in this Minneapolis suburb.
Kim Potter, a 26-year veteran of the Brooklyn Center Police Department, will stay in jail until her first court appearance Thursday, said Washington County Attorney Peter Orput. The charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison under Minnesota law. Ms. Potter resigned Tuesday.
“Officer Potter abrogated her responsibility to protect the public when she used her firearm rather than her Taser,” said Imran Ali, the assistant criminal division chief in the Washington County Attorney’s office, in a statement. “Her action caused the unlawful killing of Mr. Wright and she must be held accountable.”
Ms. Potter’s lawyer, Earl Gray, didn’t respond to requests for comment. His fees are being paid for by the legal-defense fund for the Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association, a statewide group representing rank-and-file municipal police officers, the group said.
Paul Flores killed Kristin Smart in his college dorm room as he sexually assaulted the 19-year-old student, prosecutors alleged Wednesday.
The grim details of how Smart is believed to have died while a freshman at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo came on a day when Flores was formally charged with first-degree murder in the case and accusations surfaced that he has assaulted other women in the decades after allegedly killing Smart.
Los Angeles Police Capt. Jonathan Tippet, head of the agency’s Robbery-Homicide Division, said detectives in recent months gathered evidence against Flores in three sexual assaults that allegedly occurred over several years.
Detectives, according to Tippet, presented their findings to the L.A. County district attorney’s office for criminal charges against Flores, although a D.A. spokesman said the office has not conducted a formal review of the cases. The spokesman said prosecutors did review a rape allegation against Flores brought by Redondo Beach police in 2013, but declined to charge him “due to insufficient evidence.”
In announcing the murder charge against Flores, San Luis Obispo County Dist. Atty. Dan Dow acknowledged authorities remain interested in those alleged earlier attacks, saying his office is looking into whether Flores sexually assaulted other women in San Pedro, an area of Los Angeles where he has lived since about 2005.
And Dow claimed his office has evidence that an unspecified number of victims have had “some kind of a criminal act perpetrated on them by Mr. Flores.” Saying Flores was known to frequent bars in the San Pedro area, the district attorney asked that women who may have been assaulted by Flores contact San Luis Obispo authorities.
Paul Flores, long described as a ‘prime suspect,’ was taken into custody by San Luis Obispo County sheriff’s officials
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Flores, 44, was arrested Tuesday at his home, nearly 25 years after Smart left a party near the Cal Poly campus and vanished on the way back to her campus dormitory.
From the start, investigators focused their attention on Flores, a classmate of Smart’s and the last person seen with her. Two students told the police they had left the party with Smart when Flores appeared and promised to see her back to her dormitory.
Over the years, San Luis Obispo authorities called Flores a “person of interest,” then a “suspect,” then a “prime suspect.” They searched his homes. They searched his parents’ homes. They called him before a grand jury, tapped his cell phone and read his text messages. But hamstrung by their inability to find Smart’s body, they stopped short of accusing him of the killing.
The arrest comes nearly 25 years after Smart vanished while walking back to her dorm at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
Dow said prosecutors decided they could prove Flores’ guilt after investigators discovered more evidence and interviewed new witnesses in the last two years. He declined to provide specifics, saying only that text messages taken from Flores’ phone had been “helpful” and that detectives obtained “very important” information in March. Investigators that month searched a home owned by Flores’ father with cadaver dogs and ground-penetrating radar.
“We’ve got physical evidence,” Dow said, “we have witness statements, things that, in our view, in their totality, have brought us to the point where we believe we can go forward and prosecute Mr. Flores for the murder of Kristin Smart.”
Dow declined to say how Smart died or why investigators now believe the killing occured in Flores’ dormitory room while he raped or attempted to rape Smart.
Flores’ father, Ruben Flores, 80, was also charged Wednesday as an accessory to Smart’s murder. He is accused of helping his son dispose of Smart’s remains. Both men have yet to enter a plea and are due to be arraigned Thursday morning in San Luis Obispo Superior Court.
Despite numerous investigations, searches and legal procedures, it took 24 years for an arrest to be made in the disappearance of Kristin Smart.
The whereabouts of Smart’s body remain a mystery. On Wednesday, Dow said “we do believe we have the location where the body was buried,” but would not elaborate. Authorities have not found Smart’s remains and are continuing to search for them, Sheriff Ian Parkinson said Tuesday.
Dow said it was “premature to even speculate” whether his office would consider offering Paul Flores some leniency if he would reveal where Smart’s remains are now. If Smart’s remains are not found, Dow’s prosecutors will face the challenge of proving to a jury that a murder and cover-up occurred without being able to show definitively that Smart was killed. Dow called the task “obviously complicated and difficult” but not impossible, pointing to a recent conviction won by his office in the murder of an elderly woman whose remains were never recovered.
Such no-body prosecutions, Dow said, are “incredibly important for the victim’s family because they want closure.”
One warm Friday night in late spring 10 years ago, Kristin Denise Smart and three other young women started walking from their dorms at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
Dow was asked at the news conference if any other member of Flores’ family could be charged in Smart’s killing, specifically his mother. His office had insufficient evidence to bring charges against anyone else, he said, but added that the investigation was continuing.
“If it were to lead to other suspects,” he said, “we will follow that evidence when it becomes available.”
Fowler also testified that he would classify the manner of death “undetermined,” rather than homicide, as the county’s chief medical examiner ruled. He said Floyd’s death had too many conflicting factors, some of which could be ruled homicide and some that could be considered accidental.
Chauvin attorney Eric Nelson is trying to prove that the 19-year Minneapolis police veteran did what he was trained to do and that Floyd died because of his illegal drug use and underlying health problems.
Prosecutors say Floyd died because the white officer’s knee was pressed against Floyd’s neck or neck area for 9 1/2 minutes as he lay on the pavement on his stomach, his hands cuffed behind him and his face jammed against the ground.
Fowler listed a multitude of factors or potential ones: Floyd’s narrowed arteries, his enlarged heart, his high blood pressure, his drug use, the stress of his restraint, the vehicle exhaust, and a tumor or growth in his lower abdomen that can sometimes play a role in high blood pressure by releasing “fight-or-flight” hormones.
Fowler said all of those factors could have acted together to cause Floyd’s heart to work harder, suffer an arrhythmia, or abnormal rhythm, and suddenly stop.
Prosecutor Jerry Blackwell launched an aggressive cross-examination, attacking Fowler’s findings down the line. He got Fowler to acknowledge that even someone who dies from being deprived of oxygen ultimately dies of an arrhythmia.
He also got Fowler to admit that he didn’t take the weight of Chauvin’s gear into account when he analyzed the pressure on Floyd’s body. Blackwell further accused Fowler of jumping to conclusions and suggesting to the jury that Floyd had a white pill in his mouth in the video of his arrest. Fowler denied saying that.
Blackwell also attacked Fowler’s testimony about carbon monoxide, which displaces oxygen in the bloodstream.
In his original testimony, Fowler said carbon monoxide could have contributed to oxygen depletion in Floyd, noting that he was facing the tailpipe end of a squad car. But Floyd’s blood was never tested for carbon monoxide.
“You haven’t seen any data or test results that showed Mr. Floyd had a single injury from carbon monoxide. Is that true?” Blackwell asked.
“That is correct, because it was never sent,” Fowler said.
Blackwell also noted that the squad car was a gas-electric hybrid and that Fowler had no data on how much carbon monoxide was actually released. And he suggested that the witness assumed the engine was running at the time. Fowler said he believed it was.
The prosecutor also got Fowler to agree that it would take four minutes to cause irreversible brain damage if the brain is starved of oxygen, and that insufficient oxygen can cause the heart to stop.
“And if a person dies as a result of low oxygen, that person is also going to die ultimately of a fatal arrhythmia, right?” Blackwell asked.
Fowler responded: “Correct. Every one of us in this room will have a fatal arrhythmia at some point.”
Fowler further agreed that Floyd should have been given immediate attention when he went into cardiac arrest because there still was a chance to save him at that point.
A number of medical experts called by prosecutors have said Floyd died from a lack of oxygen because his breathing was constricted by the way he was held down. A cardiology expert rejected the notion that Floyd died of heart problems, saying all indications were that he had “an exceptionally strong heart.”
But Fowler said that Chauvin’s knee on Floyd was “nowhere close to his airway” and that Floyd’s speaking and groaning showed that his airway was still open. He also testified that Chauvin’s knee was not applied with enough pressure to cause any bruises or scrapes on Floyd’s neck or back.
And he said that Floyd did not complain of vision changes or other symptoms consistent with hypoxia, or insufficient oxygen to the brain, and that he was coherent until shortly before he suddenly stopped moving.
“The bottom line is, moving air in and out, and speaking and making noise is very good evidence that the airway was not closed,” Fowler said.
Blackwell ended his cross-examination by getting two questions before the jury: Whether Chauvin’s actions played a role in Floyd’s death, or whether Floyd’s death was coincidental and unrelated. But the defense objected, and Fowler was not permitted to answer.
Chauvin, 45, is charged with murder and manslaughter in Floyd’s death after his arrest on suspicion of passing a counterfeit $20 at a neighborhood market. The video of Floyd gasping that he couldn’t breathe as bystanders yelled at Chauvin to get off him triggered worldwide protests, violence and a furious examination of racism and policing in the U.S.
The defense hasn’t said whether Chauvin will take the stand.
Earlier Wednesday, Judge Peter Cahill turned down a defense request to acquit Chauvin, rejecting claims that prosecutors failed to prove Chauvin’s actions killed Floyd. Requests for an acquittal are routinely made midway through a trial and are usually denied.
COLUMBIA — A soldier at Fort Jackson has been charged after a video showed a White man berating and threatening a Black man who was walking inside a Richland County subdivision.
A two-minute clip of the confrontation spread across social media over the past two days, sparking protests in the neighborhood where the men clashed and triggering angry responses from lawmakers as the country grapples with race relations.
“What else has to happen? It’s like a ticking time bomb,” state Sen. Mia McLeod, D-Columbia, said during an impassioned speech from the Senate floor April 14. “We have to decide right here, right now, whether we’re going to move forward in 2021 or we’re going back to 1921.”
Jonathan Pentland, who according to online records is an Army sergeant stationed at Fort Jackson, was charged April 14 with assault and battery in the third degree and released without posting bond, according to Richland County Sheriff’s Department and court records. The charge is a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $500 or 30 days in jail.
Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott called the confrontation “disturbing” during a news conference about the incident in The Summit, a large and diverse neighborhood in Northeast Richland.
“It was terrible,” Lott told reporters about when he first saw the video. “It was unnecessary.”
Booking photo of Army Sgt. Jonathan Pentland
Provided by Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center
The U.S. Department of Justice also is looking into the confrontation, Fort Jackson said.
“The leaders at Fort Jackson in no way condone the behavior depicted in the video posted recently,” Fort Jackson Commander Brig. Gen. Milford Beagle said in a statement. “This action deeply impacts our community — the neighbors in the Summit, the city of Columbia, Richland and Lexington counties, and our Army family.”
The video clip posted April 13 shows a White man shouting at a Black man less than a foot apart on a sidewalk in The Summit.
“Go away, right now,” the White man says. “What is it you’re doing here?”
The Black man says he was walking and suggested the White man call police. A woman not seen on camera says officers have been called.
“You’re aggressing on our neighborhood,” the White man says, shoving the Black man. “You better walk away or I’m going to carry your (expletive) out of here.”
“I didn’t do anything,” the Black man says.
“I’m about to do something to you,” the White man says. “You better start walking.”
Then the White man and the Black man trade accusations over who started the argument.
“You’re in the wrong neighborhood, (expletive),” the White man shouts. “Get out. Get out.”
The White man said the Black Man was “harassing the neighborhood.” The Black man says he lives in the neighborhood but does not answer questions asking where.
“Check it out, we are a tight-knit community,” the White man says. “We take care of each other.”
The video does not show how the confrontation started or ended.
Pentland told deputies he acted out in fear for he and his wife, according to an incident report.
Shadae McCallum, who lives in the neighborhood and shot the video of the confrontation, said people in The Summit, a network of neighborhoods off Clemson Road, often walk among the various communities and it’s not out of the ordinary.
While on a walk April 12, McCallum said she saw a Black man being confronted by women who accused him of harassing their daughters.
A White man came out from a house and was initially calm but quickly became irate, said McCallum, who then started her video.
McCallum said she stopped recording when two Black women began walking the Black man away from the area and she thought the situation was over.
But after she stopped recording, the White man followed the Black man down the sidewalk, slapped the phone from his hand and stepped on it, McCallum said.
Pentland told deputies he slapped the phone away from the Black man and pushed him, according to the incident report.
Authorities waited more than a day to make an arrest because deputies on the scene didn’t have enough information to act on, Lott said. The video helped the case and Lott thanked the person who shot it.
Pentland, 42, was charged with assault because he “put his hands” on the victim, the sheriff said.
As part of his release agreement, Pentland was ordered not to have direct contact with the victim and stay 1,000 yards away from the victim’s place of work, home, school or worship.
Lott did not mention any racial component to the confrontation, instead saying, “We’re not going to let people be bullied in our community.”
Lott said he would not name the victim or discuss anything that led up to the confrontation.
However, on April 13 and 14, the Richland County Sheriff’s Department released a statement and incident reports alleging the Black man in the video could have been the same person involved in two incidents in the neighborhood days prior to the confrontation.
A 22-year-old Black man twice put his hand around a woman’s waist and picked up a baby without consent, according to incident reports supplied from the sheriff’s office.
Later April 14, Lott made it clear the Black man was the victim in the confrontation and is not facing any charges despite any previous allegations.
Asked if the earlier incidents led to the confrontation, Lott said, “There may be some connection to it, but it doesn’t justify it.”
About 40 protesters showed up outside the home of the soldier around noon April 14, shouting, “This is our neighborhood, too!”
“This young brother could have been another hashtag instead of a living, breathing warrior,” Jerome Bowers, CEO of One Common Cause: Community Control Initiative, said during the protest.
The confrontation also angered state lawmakers who represent the area that includes The Summit.
“Stop being silent when you see these injustices,” McLeod, who is Black, said from the Senate podium. “It’s not just happening to people who look like me. It’s impacting people who look like you, too.”
State Rep. Ivory Thigpen, D-Columbia, said, while he understands something might have occurred before the video, “What we did see, in my opinion, was an assault and intimidation.”
“Putting race aside, I was infuriated by what I saw as bullying and I loathe bullies,” Thigpen told The Post and Courier. “There needs to be clear fact finding, actions taken, hopefully mediation and resolution to promote harmony in the community.”
Stephen Fastenau and Seanna Adcox contributed from Columbia.
Kim Potter, the Minnesota police officer who fatally shot Daunte Wright, was arrested Wednesday morning on a charge of second-degree manslaughter, authorities said.
Wright’s death, which occurred as he fled a police traffic stop, heightened already-high tensions in and around Minneapolis due to the murder trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin for last year’s killing of George Floyd.
Body camera video footage from Potter during Sunday’s confrontation suggests she believed she had pulled out a Taser when she pointed the weapon at Wright and fired after he twisted away from another officer who was trying to handcuff him next to his SUV.
Police then tried to arrest Wright after learning that he was wanted on an outstanding warrant for failing to appear in court in a criminal case, where he was charged with carrying a gun without a permit, as well as with fleeing from police in June.
Potter frantically and repeatedly yelled “Taser!” before shooting Wright as he sat in his vehicle’s driver seat after ducking away from the other officer.
Potter’s Taser is colored bright yellow, in contrast to her black Glock 9mm pistol.
Washington County, Minnesota, prosecutor Pete Orput announced that Potter would be criminally charged for Wright’s death.
She was arrested Wednesday morning at the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Authorities said she would be booked into the Hennepin County Jail, and that the Washington County prosecutor’s office would file charges later Wednesday.
Authorities said that the investigation of the shooting remains active.
Wright’s older brother told NBC News that the family had hoped that Potter would be charged with a more serious crime.
“I’m not too happy about it but I’ll take every win I can get at the moment,” Dallas Bryant, Wright’s 23-year-old brother.
A group of attorneys representing the Wright family said in a statement, “”While we appreciate that the district attorney is pursuing justice for Daunte, no conviction can give the Wright family their loved one back.”
“This was no accident. This was an intentional, deliberate, and unlawful use of force,” the lawyers said.
Potter, who served 26 years on the Brooklyn Center force and previously was president of its police union, has retained a defense attorney, Earl Gray, according to the Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association. Gray did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Gray is also representing former Minneapolis police officer Thomas Lane, one of two other ex-officers scheduled to be tried separately from Chauvin on lesser charges related to the death of Floyd, who like Wright was black.
President Joseph R. Biden Jr. visits Arlington National Cemetery to pay his respects to service members who have lost their lives.Credit…Doug Mills/The New York Times
President Biden formally announced his decision to end the 20-year, largely unsuccessful American effort to remake Afghanistan, declaring on Wednesday that he would withdraw the remaining few thousand United States troops in the country by Sept. 11.
“It is time to end the forever war,” Mr. Biden said.
Speaking from the Treaty Room in the White House, the president made the case that the United States had only one real task in the country: ousting Al Qaeda and making sure that the country would never again be the launching pad for a terror attack on the United States, as it was on Sept. 11, 2001.
“War in Afghanistan was never meant to be a multigenerational undertaking,” Mr. Biden said. “We were attacked. We went to war with clear goals. We achieved those objectives.”
Moments after speaking, Mr. Biden traveled to Arlington National Cemetery to visit the graves of service members who lost their lives in Afghanistan. He said the decision to withdraw American troops was “absolutely clear” to him.
Standing in the rain among rows of white headstones, the president said he was “always amazed at, generation after generation, women and men are prepared to give their lives for their country.”
Video
transcript
‘Increasingly Unclear,’ Biden Says of Reasons for Troops in Afghanistan
President Biden announced his intentions to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan, to end the longest war in American history. The president said he wanted to begin withdrawing troops in May.
We delivered justice to bin Laden a decade ago, and we’ve stayed in Afghanistan for a decade since. Since then, our reasons for remaining in Afghanistan have become increasingly unclear, even as the terrorist threat that we went to fight evolved. I’m now the fourth United States president to preside over American troop presence in Afghanistan. Two Republicans, two Democrats — I will not pass this responsibility onto a fifth. After consulting closely with our allies and partners, with our military leaders and intelligence personnel, with our diplomats and our development experts, with the Congress and the vice president, as well as with Mr. Ghani and many others around the world, I’ve concluded that it’s time to end America’s longest war. So in keeping with that agreement and with our national interests, the United States will begin our final withdrawal, begin it, on May 1 of this year. We’ll not conduct a hasty rush to the exit. We’ll do it, we’ll do it responsibly, deliberately and safely, and we will do it in full coordination with our allies and partners who now have more forces in Afghanistan than we do. And the Taliban should know that if they attack us as we draw down, we will defend ourselves and our partners with all the tools at our disposal.
President Biden announced his intentions to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan, to end the longest war in American history. The president said he wanted to begin withdrawing troops in May.CreditCredit…Pool photo by Andrew Harnik
In announcing his decision, the president made only passing mention of the other objectives that were added to the mission over the years and that came to justify the continued American military presence. That included building a stable democracy, eradicating corruption and the drug trade, assuring an education for girls and opportunity for women, and, in the end, creating leverage to force the Taliban into peace negotiations.
All may have been noble goals, he suggested, but keeping American troops in the country until they were accomplished was a formula for a perpetual presence after the killing of Al Qaeda’s leader, Osama bin Laden.
“We delivered justice to bin Laden a decade ago,” he said. “And we’ve stayed in Afghanistan for a decade since. Since then, our reasons for remaining Afghanistan have become increasingly unclear.”
If Mr. Biden carries through on his vow to remove all American troops permanently based in the country by the 20th anniversary of 9/11, he will have accomplished a goal that his two immediate predecessors, Presidents Barack Obama and Donald J. Trump, embraced but never completed. Yet a clean break will not be easy, and the risks are considerable.
In a series of briefings during which Pentagon officials argued for a continued, modest presence in Afghanistan to collect intelligence and provide support to still-shaky Afghan forces, they warned that the Taliban could attack American troops and their NATO allies on their way out of the country. So Mr. Biden issued a warning, saying “we’re going to defend ourselves and our partners with all the tools at our disposal.’’
White House officials said Mr. Biden had spoken with Mr. Obama about his decision, and the president said he had also informed former President George W. Bush, who ordered American forces into Afghanistan almost two decades ago. But after noting that he was the fourth president to deal with the question of troops in Afghanistan — two Republicans and two Democrats — Mr. Biden said,“I will not pass this responsibility on to a fifth.”
Mr. Biden is the first president to have rejected the Pentagon’s recommendations that any withdrawal be “conditions based,’‘ meaning that security would have to be assured on the ground before Americans pulled back. To do otherwise, military officials have long argued, would be to signal to the Taliban to just wait out the Americans — after which, they would face little opposition to taking further control, and perhaps threatening Kabul, the capital.
But some architects of the policy agreed that it was time to go. Douglas Lute, a retired general who ran Afghan policy on the National Security Council for Mr. Bush and then for Mr. Obama, wrote for CNN with Charles A. Kupchan on Wednesday that “those who argue that we need to stay in Afghanistan to thwart attack against the homeland are wrong,” because the terror threat from inside the country “has been dramatically reduced in the last 20 years.”
For the United States, Mr. Biden’s announcement was a humbling moment. The Afghan war was not only the longest in American history, it was one of the costliest — more than $2 trillion. Nearly 2,400 American service members were killed, and more than 20,000 were wounded.
But the president said the United States would continue fighting terrorists, “not only in Afghanistan, but anywhere they may arise, and they’re in Africa, Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere.”
SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — The San Luis Obispo County district attorney said Wednesday that missing California college student Kristin Smart was killed in 1996 during an attempted rape by a fellow student and the suspect’s father helped hide her body.
District Attorney Dan Dow said Paul Flores, 44, will be charged with first-degree murder and his father, Ruben Flores, 80, will be charged with accessory after murder.
The son and father were arrested Tuesday.
Smart, 19, of Stockton, was last seen May 25, 1996, while returning to her dorm at California Polytechnic State University campus in San Luis Obispo after an off-campus party. She was inebriated at the time and Flores, a fellow freshman at the school, had offered to walk her home.
Flores killed Smart in his dorm room, Dow said. Investigators, who launched a renewed search Tuesday at his father’s property in nearby Arroyo Grande, believe they know where the body was buried.
Dow said in more recent years Flores frequented bars around his home in the Los Angeles area of San Pedro and may have committed other sexual assaults. He urged the public to come forward with any information.
A lawyer for Paul Flores has declined to comment. A lawyer for Ruben Flores said his client is innocent.
Paul Flores was taken into custody in the San Pedro neighborhood of Los Angeles. Ruben Flores was arrested as an accessory at his Arroyo Grande home, where sheriff’s investigators conducted another search.
San Luis Obispo County Sheriff Ian Parkinson said Paul Flores was being held on no bail after he was arrested for murder and transported brought back to the county. His father was being held on $250,000 bail.
This booking photo of Paul Ruben Flores, the suspect in the murder of Kristin Smart, was released by the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office on April 13, 2021.
San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office
Parkinson said Smart’s remains have still not been found.
“We have not recovered Kristin,” the sheriff said at an afternoon news conference. “We’ll continue to focus on finding her remains regardless of any court action. We will continue the process of finding out where Kristin is. We know that’s an important issue to the family.”
The Smart family issued a lengthy, emotional statement following the sheriff’s announcement, reading in part:
“For over twenty-four years, we have waited for this bittersweet day. It is impossible to put into words what this day means for our family; we pray it is the first step to bringing our daughter home. While Kristin’s loving spirit will always live in our hearts, our life without her hugs, laughs and smiles is a heartache that never abates. The knowledge that a father and son, despite our desperate pleas for help, could have withheld this horrible secret for nearly 25 years, denying us the chance to lay our daughter to rest, is an unrelenting and unforgiving pain. We now put our faith in the justice system and move forward, comforted in the knowledge that Kristin has been held in the hearts of so many and that she has not been forgotten.”
Last month the sheriff’s office served a search warrant at a house in Arroyo Grande belonging to Ruben Flores.
Cadaver dogs and ground-penetrating radar (GPR) were said to be used during their search of the property. The warrant remained sealed, and authorities did not provide further information on the developments in their investigation at the time.
Last year, authorities also served search warrants at several locations in California and Washington.
Parkinson said there has been an extensive investigation into the case over the years.
Since he took office in 2011, he said, the department has served 41 search warrants on the case to investigate 16 different locations, submitted 37 items of physical evidence from the initial investigation for modern DNA testing; and conducted 137 interviews. The data from the investigated, he estimated, would fill more than three terabytes on a hard drive.
An 8-part podcast called “Your Own Backyard” by musician Chris Lambert in 2019 also helped renew interest in the case and helped prompt more people to come forward with evidence relative to the case, the sheriff acknowledged. The Smart family’s statement also thanked Lambert for his “unselfish dedication” in bringing new light to the case.
The sheriff did not disclosed specific evidence that was obtained by investigators that led to the arrest, saying that would be part of the courtroom case.
Paul Flores has remained mum through the years, invoking his Fifth Amendment right to not answer questions before a grand jury and in a deposition for a lawsuit that was brought against him.
He was arrested in February on a weapons charge and released on bond. He has drunken driving convictions on his record in Los Angeles County.
Paul and Ruben Flores are expected to make their first court appearance in this case on Thursday.
NEW YORK – Bernie Madoff, the financier who pleaded guilty to orchestrating the largest Ponzi scheme in history, died Wednesday in federal prison.
The federal Bureau of Prisons confirmed that Madoff, 82, died of natural causes early Wednesday. Bureau of Prisons spokeswoman Kristie Breshears said Madoff’s family was notified of his passing at the agency’s medical facility in Butner, North Carolina.
“His life has ended, but his larcenous legacy has been indelibly etched in investment lore,” said Sam Stovall, author of “The Seven Rules of Wall Street” and chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.
A court-appointed trustee has recovered more than $13 billion of an estimated $17.5 billion that investors put into Madoff’s business. At the time of Madoff’s arrest, fake account statements were telling clients they had holdings worth $60 billion.
Madoff, a former Nasdaq stock market chairman from New York City, ran a decadeslong scam that gave celebrities, charities, financial funds and ordinary investors lucrative, eerily steady returns on their investments.
Income poured in, making Madoff and his family rich. His upscale lifestyle included a Manhattan condo, an oceanfront home in Montauk, New York, on Long Island’s East End, a vacation home on Nantucket in Massachusetts, and a three-bedroom vacation apartment in the south of France.
But Madoff masterminded a classic Ponzi scheme, one in which money from more recent investors went to pay earlier investors.
The scam collapsed in December 2008, when Madoff’s businesses could not cover the growing withdrawal requests from investors who sought money amid the Great Recession.
For many of those who’d previously trusted and even revered Madoff, the collapse wiped out their life savings and retirement plans. Some had to seek new jobs or move in with friends and relatives.
For Madoff, the beginning of the end came when he confessed the truth to his sons, Mark and Andrew. They notified federal authorities, who arrested Madoff.
He pleaded guilty in 2009 and insisted that he alone ran the Ponzi scheme and masterminded decades of lies. Federal judge Denny Chin sentenced him to 150 years in prison, a true lifetime term more typical of the sentences imposed on the worst mobsters and violent criminals.
“One hundred and fifty years made me feel really good that for the first time, the government came down on our side and did the right thing,” said Michael DeVita, a Madoff investor from Chalfont, Pennsylvania, after Chin handed down the sentence.
Five former Madoff employees were convicted in 2014 on charges of aiding the massive scam. In that case, a sixth former employee served as the government’s chief witness after confessing his own involvement.
Madoff spent most of his sentence at a federal prison and medical center in Butner, North Carolina, as inmate register number 61727-054. His fellow inmates included the late Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, who was convicted in a 1990s terror plot to bomb the World Trade Center and landmarks around New York City.
By early 2020, Madoff was confined to a wheelchair. He was suffering shortness of breath that required him to be hooked up to oxygen at night. And he had cardiovascular disease, according to his attorney, Brandon Sample.
Madoff’s lawyers filed court papers last year to try to get him released from prison in the COVID-19 pandemic, saying he had suffered from end-stage renal disease and other chronic medical conditions. The request was denied.
Madoff was admitted to a comfort care unit at the prison in July 2019. After initially refusing dialysis, the blood-filtering procedure commonly prescribed for kidney-failure patients, he agreed to start the treatment in December, the court filing said.
While stressing that Madoff doesn’t dispute “the severity of his crimes” or “seek to minimize the suffering of his victims,” Sample argued the convicted scammer’s conditions met the guidelines for compassionate release.
The court said no.
Contributing: Michael Balsamo of the AP and Kevin Johnson of USA TODAY
The defense presented medical expert testimony Wednesday in the trial of Derek Chauvin, the fired Minneapolis police officer charged in George Floyd’s death. Dr. David Fowler, a forensic pathologist and former Maryland chief medical examiner who reviewed Floyd’s case for the defense, testified he believes Floyd died of a sudden cardiac arrhythmia due to his underlying heart disease during his restraint and subdual by police.
Dr. David Fowler testifies on Wednesday, April 14, 2021, in the trial of former Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin at the Hennepin County Courthouse in Minneapolis.
Court TV via AP
Fowler said contributing significant factors included Floyd’s ingestion of fentanyl and methamphetamine, exposure to vehicle exhaust and possible carbon monoxide poisoning, and Floyd’s paraganglioma, a tumor in his pelvis which in some cases secretes adrenaline.
“All of those combined to cause Mr. Floyd’s death,” Fowler said.
Fowler testified that Floyd had “so many conflicting potential mechanisms of death” that he considers the manner of death to be undetermined. Floyd’s death was previously ruled a homicide by the Hennepin County Medical Examiner, who stood by the classification during his testimony.
Medical examiners in determining manner of death can choose one of five classifications — homicide, natural, accidental, undetermined or suicide.
The defense launched its case on Tuesday. Testimony focused on Floyd’s drug use, and a defense use-of-force expert said Chauvin was justified in restraining Floyd.
The defense case centers around how Floyd died, which has been a key point of dispute at trial. A string of medical experts have testified for the prosecution, saying the police restraint restricted oxygen to Floyd’s body and caused his heart to stop. But defense attorney Eric Nelson has argued a combination of Floyd’s underlying heart disease, adrenaline and the fentanyl and methamphetamine he had ingested prior to the arrest amounted to a fatal combination.
Judge Peter Cahill said testimony is likely to wrap up by the end of the week, possibly with Friday off. He told jurors to expect to be sequestered following closing arguments on April 19. He had earlier denied a defense request for the jury to be further questioned and immediately sequestered in light of the fatal police shooting Sunday of Duante Wright in nearby Brooklyn Center, which led to several nights of protests.
Chauvin, who was seen in disturbing videos kneeling on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes, is charged with second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.
Chauvin has pleaded not guilty. The other three officers involved are charged with aiding and abetting, and are expected to be tried jointly in August.
April 15 is a day on the calendar that can come — and go — in 2021 for many taxpayers, but not all.
This tax season, the traditional federal income tax deadline for individual returns shifts from April 15 until May 17. Ditto for the Michigan income tax deadline.
Of course, the extension for filing a return — granted by the IRS due to the ongoing pandemic — doesn’t mean we can all stop worrying about taxes completely.
April 15 remains a key deadline for some freelance and gig workers, small business owners and some people with substantial earnings from interest and dividends, rent and alimony.
Even though federal and state tax returns are due May 17, many people still need to pay their first-quarter 2021 estimated tax payments that are still due April 15, said George Smith, a CPA with Andrews Hooper Pavlik in Southfield.
That’s true for first-quarter estimated payments for the state of Michigan, too, as those payments for tax year 2021 remain due on April 15.
And frankly, it can be a little tough for small business owners and others to calculate an estimated tax payment for the first quarter of this year if they aren’t looking at a completed 2020 tax return.
CPAs and other tax professionals had hoped that the Internal Revenue Service would extend the deadline for those estimated payments to May 17.
IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig has maintained that the tax filing deadline extension is designed to accommodate the needs of the “most vulnerable individuals” and those struggling to gather their tax information.
But he has argued that many wealthy taxpayers don’t make estimated payments as they should and then invest the money to their advantage. “And we’re not going to give them a break of interest and penalties to do so,” Retting told a congressional hearing in March.
Advocates for the extension noted that many struggling small businesses would face great difficulty meeting an April 15 deadline. Many pay their quarterly estimated taxes based on their returns from the previous year. So if these businesses do not file until May 17, 2021, they would not know what their estimated payment liability would be as of April 15.
Seems to make sense. But the extension didn’t happen.
As a result, some taxpayers who make estimated payments will be filing their income tax returns by April 15 if accurate information is readily available.
Others will take a small hit of a penalty and ignore the April 15 estimated tax due date. They plan to pay estimated taxes when the tax return is completed and filed.
Smith said he has some clients who will delay making their first quarterly payments and take a relatively small estimated tax penalty in order to have accurate information on hand when they make their quarterly estimated payment roughly one month later.
In short, it’s a mess.
Jan Lewis, a member of the tax executive committee of the American Institute of CPAs,called the unwillingness by the IRS to extend the first-quarter payment deadline a “classic example of the IRS not understanding that for small businesses, this may result in unnecessary penalties and a burden on the self-employed.”
She said a tax client who pays estimated taxes — as many small business owners and self-employed taxpayers do — remains at a disadvantage when there’s an extension for filing a 2020 return but no break on when quarterly estimated payments are due.
“For practitioners to run the numbers and make calculations for April 15 and then come back and finish the return by May 17 means that we would have to bill the client for that estimate preparation, and in all likelihood, our charge for that could exceed the penalty they would pay for that one-month delay,” she said.
She gave an example: “At the IRS underpayment rate of 3%, the maximum penalty will be .0025 for a month. So a $10,000 quarterly estimate that is due on April 15 but is not paid until May 17 would cost a taxpayer $25 in penalty.”
The penalty doesn’t apply if the taxpayer pays in quarterly estimates based on the safe harbor of what they owed in taxes for the prior year tax.
“But this year with the first-quarter estimated tax payment actually due before the due date of the (2020) return, this has been problematic,” she said.
Here are some other not-so-last-minute tax tips to consider:
Don’t wait if you’re owed a tax refund
If you have all your paperwork in order, tax experts recommend that you don’t wait another month to file your tax return.
By delaying filing, you’re also pushing back how soon you might get a tax refund.
The IRS has received 93.2 million individual tax returns through April 2, down 4.3% from the same year-to-date period in 2020.
The IRS processed 83.7 million individual tax returns through April 2, down 9.5% from a year ago.
So far, the IRS has issued 62.3 million income tax refunds — down 15.9% from a year ago. The average refund of those issued through April 2 was $2,893.
The IRS did not start the tax season and begin processing tax returns until Feb. 12 — a bit more than a two-week delay from last year.
Some tax refund delays might be attributed to the extra time that the IRS needs to correct mistakes that are being made when people claim the Recovery Rebate Credit. Other factors could be at play, too.
Some people who lost jobs in 2020 could see even more money than their initial income tax refund, too.
The IRS said in late March that it would take steps to automatically refund money this spring and summer to people who filed their tax return reporting unemployment compensation before the recent tax break for jobless benefits was put into place as part of the American Rescue Plan.
The first special refund payouts will likely be made in May, and they will continue into the summer.
Make sure that you are providing your tax preparer with a correct number for the amount of money that you received for two stimulus payments, the first that rolled out starting last April and the second that rolled out in January.
“One of the biggest challenges this year is accurately reporting to the IRS the stimulus amounts received by taxpayers,” said Antonio Brown, a CPA in Flint and a member of the Michigan Association of CPAs.
“We need that information. If they did not receive both stimulus payments or only received one, we need to know it because the Recovery Rebate Credit is the way to receive the stimulus money that they didn’t get,” Brown said.
If a child was born or adopted into your family in 2020, you could end up with an extra stimulus payment for your new dependent, for example.
The first stimulus program offered up to an extra $500 per qualifying dependent. The second stimulus program had a $600 cap. So some parents of 2020 newborns could receive up to $1,100 extra now if they did not receive that money earlier.
The first and second Economic Impact Payments were based on information included on your most recent tax return — which might have been the 2018 or 2019 returns.
“Some will want to file even if it is just to claim the credit,” Brown said.
The third stimulus program — which began rolling out money in March and is ongoing —offers up to $1,200 for qualifying dependents.
“Even people incarcerated, who work inside the correction facilities, can claim the recovery rebate credit so long as they file a tax return, report their wages earned, and use either direct deposit or an address other than the correction facility,” Brown said.
The IRS is correcting many mistakes that are being made after people plug in the wrong number for the Recovery Rebate Credit on their federal income tax returns. The IRS will correct the errors and issue a refund after making the adjustment.
The IRS said in early April that the agency had already issued 2.5 million letters relating to issues with the Recovery Rebate Credit. That amounted to 10.4% of almost 24 million individual e-filed tax returns received that claimed this credit.
The IRS will not figure out the Recovery Rebate Credit for you. You need to claim it when you file a 1040 return.
Kathy Pickering, chief tax officer for H&R Block, noted that the 2020 stimulus payments are not taxable income, so you’re not reporting that money as income on your tax return.
On the plus side, you’re not paying back stimulus money that you received last year if your stimulus payments were too high if your income increased in 2020, compared with 2019. Or if your kids turned 17 in 2020 and no longer qualified for the first two stimulus programs.
“You do not have to repay any overpayments and your refund won’t be reduced,” she said.
When it comes to the third stimulus payments that began being issued in March, she noted that some taxpayers could be seeing a “plus up” payment of additional stimulus money, depending on when a 2020 federal income tax return was processed.
“For the ‘plus up” payment, the IRS will re-determine your eligibility for an additional payment after you file your 2020 tax return,” Pickering said.
“If you are due more, you’ll receive another payment from the IRS for the difference.”
More stimulus news: “When you file taxes next year, you could receive an additional payment on your tax return with the 2021 Recovery Rebate Credit if in 2021 you have a child, your income drops significantly, or you file for the first time,” Pickering said.
A White former police officer is facing a criminal charge for fatally shooting a Black man during a traffic stop, investigators announced Wednesday. Former Brooklyn Center police officer Kim Potter will be charged with second-degree manslaughter for the death of Daunte Wright, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension said in a statement.
The agency said the Washington County Attorney’s Office will file charges later Wednesday. Potter, a 26-year veteran who killed Wright, 20, was taken into custody late Wednesday morning, the agency said. She resigned on Tuesday, along with the city’s police chief, officials said.
Wright’s killing has sparked nights of protests and more than 60 arrests were made overnight following clashes with law enforcement, CBS Minnesota reported.
On Monday, Police Chief Tim Gannon said Potter meant to use her Taser but instead grabbed her gun.
A demonstrator hit by a riot projectile outside the police station in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota on April 13, 2021.
A U.S. Army medic took the temperatures of soldiers returning home from Afghanistan in December at Fort Drum, N.Y. President Biden will announce he is pulling all troops out of Afghanistan.Credit…John Moore/Getty Images
President Biden, frustrated in his efforts to end America’s “Forever War” a decade ago, will announce on Wednesday a Sept. 11 deadline for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan after 20 years, a move that immediately triggered similar action among the country’s NATO allies.
While a complete withdrawal has long been seen as inevitable, it is likely to lead to an expansion of the Taliban that could overwhelm the U.S.-backed government in Kabul, despite assurances by intelligence agencies that the withdrawal can be done without precipitating the kind of violent, entropic instability that led to the 2001 attacks on America.
In the hours leading up to Mr. Biden’s afternoon announcement at the White House, foreign and defense ministers met at NATO headquarters in Brussels to discuss “a safe, deliberate and coordinated withdrawal of our forces from Afghanistan,” as the American secretary of state, Antony J. Blinken, told them on Wednesday.
The ministers, many of them attending the Wednesday meeting virtually, are expected to formally back the American withdrawal date in keeping with the alliance’s mantra “in together and out together.”
Of the 9,600 NATO troops officially in Afghanistan, about 2,500 of them are American, though that number can be as many as 1,000 higher. The second-largest contingent is from Germany, with some 1,300 troops.
The German defense minister, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, referring to NATO, told the German television station ARD on Wednesday: “I am for an orderly withdrawal, and that is why I assume that we will agree to that today.”
Mr. Biden’s move, arguably the boldest foreign policy announcement of his early presidency, is rooted in his belief that there is no room for continuing 20 years of failed efforts to remake Afghanistan, as Mr. Biden pivots to pressing domestic issues.
In this regard, Mr. Biden is not drastically different than his predecessor former President Donald J. Trump. Time and again during the Obama administration, Mr. Biden lost arguments to reduce the American presence to a minimal counterterrorism force.
Mr. Biden’s approach carries clear risks. The annual worldwide threat assessment published by his intelligence chiefs on Tuesday morning, as word of his decision leaked, explicitly warned that “the Afghan government will struggle to hold the Taliban at bay” if the American-led coalition withdraws. Administration officials said that raised the specter of something akin to the 1975 fall of Saigon, after the United States gave up on another ill-considered war.
But Mr. Biden’s decision makes clear his belief that contending with a rising China takes precedence over the idea that with just a few more years in Afghanistan, and a few more billions of dollars, the United States could achieve with a few thousand troops what it could not achieve with hundreds of thousands and the more than $2 trillion already poured into two decades of warfighting and nation building.
“We went to Afghanistan because of a horrific attack that happened 20 years ago,” Mr. Biden planned to say in his afternoon remarks, according to prepared excerpts. “That cannot explain why we should remain there in 2021.”
When historians look back at this moment, they may conclude Mr. Biden’s decision was predestined.
The place is not called the Graveyard of Empires for nothing: The British pulled out in 1842, after an expedition their textbooks call the “disaster in Afghanistan,” and the Soviets in 1989, after a decade of death and frustration. What Soviet leaders learned in a decade, four American presidents learned over the span of two.
(CNN)Maryland’s former chief medical examiner testified for Derek Chauvin’s defense on Wednesday that George Floyd died due to a sudden heart issue — not the police restraint.
The letter included support from recognizable corporate names such as Target, Netflix, Bank of America, Facebook, Cisco, Twitter, Microsoft, Starbucks, Amazon, Mastercard, American Airlines, United Airlines and Vanguard, as well as prominent people such as investor Warren Buffett, law firms and nonprofit organizations.
The US coast guard and multiple other boats have rescued six people from a commercial platform vessel that capsized off the coast of Louisiana in a sudden and severe storm on Tuesday night and are still searching for more, the agency said on Wednesday.
The coast guard vessel Heartland said in a statement at around 8pm on Tuesday that it and several other vessels responded to an area of the Gulf of Mexico south of Grand Isle after the 129ft Seacor Power overturned. A search plane also flew in to assist.
“There was a microburst of weather that came through the area at the time of the incident,” coast guard petty officer 2nd class Jonathan Lally said.
“I don’t know whether that that was the cause, but we can say is that inclement weather did hit the area at the time.“
A search by air and sea was ongoing on Wednesday, he said.
The Lafourche parish president, Archie Chaisson III, confirmed that 18 people were on board before the Seacor Power took on water in rough seas, the New Orleans Advocate reported.
The Seacor Power is a commercial lift vessel, designed to become an offshore platform by dropping three towering legs down to the sea floor.
Hit by the storm, it flipped over, with one of the legs pointed awkwardly skyward as rescuers searched for the workers in rough seas.
A witness, Simon Bruce, published a post on social media saying he was on a boat near the Seacor Power at the time of the capsizing and never heard so many mayday calls at once in his life. Bruce’s post said other boats had also flipped and were taking on water.
New Orleans and areas off Louisiana’s shore were being hit by an unexpectedly strong storm that overturned vessels and damaged property, particularly in coastal towns.
President Joe Biden, who will announce Wednesday his plan to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by Sept. 11, 2021, accompanied his wife to George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C. The procedure was performed on an outpatient basis, the White House said.
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