April 26, 2023 2:22 am
A Washington man who was accused of hitting a child with his vehicle will not face charges. Kenneth Reed, 37 was accused by witnesses of driving at a high rate of speed and hitting a child in their yard on Sycamore Street in November of last year. Felony charges of aggravated assault and accidents involving death or injury plus three other traffic summary offenses were dismissed when the victim’s parent failed to appear as a witness at the preliminary hearing on Wednesday. Reed was being held in the Washington County Jail unable to post a $20,000 bond.
April 25, 2023 4:49 pm
NEW YORK (AP) — A former advice columnist’s nearly 30-year-old rape claim against Donald Trump has gone to trial. The six-man, three-woman jury in E. Jean Carroll’s federal civil case got its first look Tuesday at her allegation that Trump raped her in 1996 in a luxury department store dressing room. The former president says nothing happened between them. Carroll says a chance encounter with Trump turned violent two decades before he became president. Trump says she fabricated the claim to sell a 2019 memoir. Trump wasn’t in court Tuesday and isn’t likely to testify, but his lawyers have not ruled it out.
April 25, 2023 4:48 pm
(WPXI) – Two men are in custody after a 15-year-old boy from Butler County was found in Missouri over the weekend after chatting with strangers online, according to Adams Township police. Nicholas Padgett and Nathaniel Archer, both of Arkansas, are awaiting extradition to Butler County. They face multiple charges, including interference with the custody of children, theft, receiving stolen property, and criminal use of a communication facility. The search began over the weekend when Adams Township Police said they got a call for a missing teenage boy.
That boy was then found 11 hours away in Missouri after allegedly chatting with the two men online.
April 25, 2023 10:17 am
NEW YORK (AP) — Harry Belafonte has died at age 96. He was a dedicated activist and award-winning actor and singer. He sold millions of records and starred on stage and screen before scaling back his career and becoming a relentless supporter of civil rights and other causes. Belafonte not only participated in protest marches and benefit concerts, but helped organize and raise support for them. He worked closely with his friend and generational peer the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., often intervening on his behalf with both politicians and fellow entertainers.
April 25, 2023 4:12 am
North Dakota Republican Gov. Doug Burgum has signed legislation banning abortion in almost all cases. The new law prohibits all abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. Before then, only women or girls subject to rape, incest or who are suffering from narrowly defined medical emergencies would be allowed to end their pregnancies. After six weeks, even those exceptions disappear, making the North Dakota law one of the strictest abortion bans in the country. The bill’s sponsor says it will go into effect immediately. That’s despite a ruling last month from the North Dakota Supreme Court, which is blocking another ban on abortion in the state while a lawsuit over its constitutionality proceeds.
April 25, 2023 4:10 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — Dominion Voting Systems’ lawsuit against Fox News didn’t go to trial, but still revealed plenty of what Fox personalities, including Tucker Carlson, had been saying about false 2020 election claims. The network’s top-rated host was let go Monday. His unexplained departure has turned a spotlight on what he said in depositions, emails and text messages among the thousands of pages Dominion released in the leadup to jury selection in the case. Carlson’s messages lambasted Fox’s news division and management, revealed how he felt about Donald Trump and demonstrated his skepticism of the election lies the network was airing repeatedly.
April 25, 2023 4:06 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden has formally announced he’s running for reelection in 2024. Biden made the announcement Tuesday. The Democratic president is asking voters to give him more time to “finish the job” he began when he was sworn in to office and set aside their concerns about extending the run of America’s oldest president for another four years. Biden would be 86 at the end of a second term. Biden is betting his first-term legislative achievements and 50-plus years of experience in Washington will count for more with voters. Biden faces a smooth path to winning his party’s nomination but a hard-fought struggle to retain the presidency in a bitterly divided nation.
April 25, 2023 4:03 am
PITTSBURGH (AP) — Jury selection has begun in the federal death penalty trial of a man accused of shooting to death 11 Jewish worshippers at a Pittsburgh synagogue in the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. Robert G. Bowers, from the Pittsburgh suburb of Baldwin, faces 63 counts in the Oct. 27, 2018, attack at the Tree of Life synagogue, where members of three Jewish congregations were holding Sabbath activities. U.S. District Judge Robert Colville thanked prospective jurors at the start of Monday’s proceedings. If convicted, Bowers could get the death sentence. The 50-year-old offered to plead guilty in return for a life sentence, but federal prosecutors turned him down.
April 25, 2023 4:00 am
Peters Township Council quickly dispensed of their meeting agenda Monday night. Council began with a public hearing to amend their zoning ordinance as it relates to the Mixed Use Activity Center. The amendments suggested a change in the maximum floor area ratio from 1 to .85. This will have an impact of reducing the maximum size of a structure on a site. The second amendment would eliminate the requirement that structures be no further back than 25 feet from a road. The third amendment repeals the requirement that 50% of all parking in a multi-family development be covered parking. Immediately after the public hearing, council passed the amendments to the ordinance 6-0. Council also awarded a contract to Parking Lot Painting Company for $46,700 to install thermoplastic traffic markings along Route 19. The intersections covered by the contract are from the Allegheny County line to Donaldson’s Crossroads.
April 25, 2023 3:59 am
A Washington man will face trial for assaulting his roommate earlier this month. Brad Sumner, 39 faced his preliminary hearing Monday and had two felony aggravated assault charges and one misdemeanor reckless endangerment charge held for court. Victim testimony described Sumner as a housemate in an Allison Avenue home. They described how Sumner passed by the victim in their room on the way to the kitchen. Sumner quickly returned and entered the victim’s room and stabbed them in the abdomen and knee with a serrated edge knife. Sumner ran out of the house and other housemates called county 9-1-1 for help. The victim was taken to a Pittsburgh hospital for surgery. Sumner was arrested the next day by South Strabane Township police. Sumner remains in the Washington County Jail unable to post a $100,000 bond. He will be formally arraigned on May 25.
