September 26, 2019 4:10 am
BOSTON (AP) – A Los Angeles businessman has been sentenced to four months for paying $400,000 to get his son into Georgetown University as a fake tennis recruit. Fifty-three-year-old Stephen Semprevivo was sentenced in Boston’s federal court Thursday after pleading guilty to a single count of fraud and conspiracy in May. He is the third parent to be sentenced in a sweeping college admissions scandal. Authorities say Semprevivo paid $400,000 to an admissions consultant who orchestrated the scheme in 2016. It’s one of the largest bribes in the scheme. Prosecutors recommended 13 months in prison, a fine and restitution to Georgetown. Semprevivo’s lawyers said he deserved probation and 2,000 hours of community service. Semprevivo previously said he acted out of “foolish ambition” for his son’s happiness. Georgetown expelled his son over the scheme.
September 26, 2019 3:47 am
HARLAN, Ky. (AP) – A group of Kentucky coal miners blocking a shipment of coal to protest bounced paychecks is ending a standoff after two months. Miners formerly employed by Blackjewel in Harlan County started the protest in early August when their checks bounced amid the company’s bankruptcy. WYMT-TV reports many of the miners have found other jobs or moved away. The news station reported Thursday that they were packing up tents and other items at the site of the protest. Former Blackjewel miner Chris Rowe says he’s happy to go home but “not really satisfied because we were unable to see it all through…” Blackjewel filed for bankruptcy July 1. A lawyer for the miners said Thursday that they could go into mediation in federal court if there is no resolution to the bounced checks.
September 25, 2019 3:47 pm
FALLS CHURCH, Va. (AP) – The Army is proposing new rules to significantly restrict eligibility for burial at Arlington National Cemetery, seeking to preserve a dwindling number of gravesites. The Army says the new rules preserve the lifespan of the cemetery for another 150 years. Without new restrictions it says the cemetery would run out of space by the mid-2050s. More than 400,000 people are buried in the cemetery now, and 95,000 burial spaces remain. Under the proposals, veterans who retired from active duty and were eligible for retirement pay would no longer be automatically eligible for in-ground burial. They would be eligible though for above-ground “inurnment” of cremated remains. Those killed in action or who received awards such as the Purple Heart or Silver Star could still receive an in-ground burial. U.S. presidents and vice presidents also would retain eligibility.
September 25, 2019 10:25 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – A whistleblower complaint that has triggered a renewed impeachment effort in the House will be available to some members and staff of congressional intelligence committees Wednesday, according to two people familiar with the matter. The House and Senate intelligence committees have been working to pry loose the complaint, which was withheld from Congress and started a firestorm over President Donald Trump’s dealings with Ukraine. Lawmakers were hoping to review the complaint before hearings on Thursday with Acting Director of national Intelligence Joseph Maguire, and they have been negotiating with his agency to see it. The people were granted anonymity to discuss confidential deliberations. The complaint is at least in part related to a July phone call between Trump and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
September 25, 2019 9:24 am
NEW YORK (AP) – The U.S. tobacco giants Philip Morris and Altria are calling off merger talks and Juul’s CEO is stepping down with safety concerns over e-cigarettes intensifying. The makers of Marlboro cigarettes said last month that they were in discussions to become a single company, more than a decade after splitting into two as lawsuits mounted. Altria has exclusively sold Marlboro cigarettes and other tobacco brands in the U.S., while Philip Morris has handled international sales. Philip Morris International Inc. CEO Andre Calantzopoulos said Wednesday that the companies will instead focus on launching IQOS in the U.S. IQOS is a heat-not-burn cigarette alternative made by Philip Morris. Altria Group Inc. also announced that K.C. Crosthwaite will become JUUL’s new CEO, replacing Kevin Burns.
September 25, 2019 9:22 am
NEW YORK (AP) – A grim new international science assessment concludes that climate change is making the world’s oceans warm, rise, lose oxygen and get more acidic at an ever-faster pace, while melting even more ice and snow. But that’s nothing compared to what Wednesday’s special U.N.-affiliated oceans and ice report says is coming if global warming doesn’t slow down. It projects three feet of rising seas by the end of the century, much fewer fish, weakening ocean currents, even less snow and ice and nastier hurricanes. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says warming of oceans and ice will harm people, plants, animals, food and the world economy. Report co-author Hans-Otto Portner says with sea level rise and all these changes, Earth is looking at a future completely different than it is now.
September 25, 2019 4:21 am
BOSTON (AP) – Additional charges are being added for the latest parent accused in the sweeping college admissions bribery scheme. Federal prosecutors said Tuesday that Xiaoning Sui faces new charges of international money laundering and additional fraud charges. She was charged Sept. 17 with a single count of conspiracy and fraud. Sui is accused of paying $400,000 to get her son into the University of California, Los Angeles, as a fake soccer recruit. New charging documents say the payments came from Canada, where Sui lives. Authorities say Sui was arrested in Spain last week and is being extradited to Boston. It was unclear if she has an attorney. Her son was admitted to UCLA in 2018 with a 25% scholarship. UCLA says it took “immediate corrective action” when it learned of the case.
September 25, 2019 4:18 am
UNITED NATIONS (AP) – Iran’s president has warned world leaders that security in the energy-rich locus of the Persian Gulf can quickly collapse with a “single blunder.” In a speech to the U.N. General Assembly, President Hassan Rouhani accused the U.S. of “merciless economic terrorism” against his country. He said Iran would not negotiate on the issue of its nuclear program as long as U.S. sanctions remain in place.
September 25, 2019 4:12 am
PHILADELPHIA (AP) – Bill Cosby has been hit with a $2.75 million legal bill as he marks the end of his first year in prison. The 82-year-old Cosby had challenged a California arbitration award that upheld nearly $7 million of a $9 million bill submitted by just one firm in the run-up to his first sexual assault trial in Pennsylvania in 2017. A judge sided Friday with Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, of Los Angeles, rejecting Cosby’s claim that the bill was “egregious.” Cosby spokesman Andrew Wyatt isn’t commenting on the fee dispute. But he says the actor is holding up well in a suburban Philadelphia prison, mentoring other inmates as he marks a year in prison Wednesday. Cosby is serving three to 10 years for drugging and molesting a woman in 2004. The Pennsylvania Superior Court is weighing his appeal of the 2018 conviction.
September 25, 2019 4:08 am
A nearly 3 year long PennDot construction project encompassing East Wylie Avenue, Allison Avenue and Jefferson Avenue and State routes 18 and 844 is slated to begin in April of 2020. Drainage, road widening and reconstruction plus the replacement of 3 traffic signals and the addition of two more will certainly have city residents looking for alternative routes. No cost for the project has been identified but PennDot Transportation Planning Manager Angela Saunders states that 80% of the funding will come from the federal government and the other 20% will be paid from multimodal funds from the state. The project is set to go out for bid and once construction begins, PennDot expects the project to last two and a half construction seasons. Barring any delays, construction will be complete in the spring of 2022.
