March 19, 2023 8:04 am
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The Kremlin says that Russian President Vladimir Putin has visited the occupied port city of Mariupol, his first trip to Ukrainian territory that Moscow illegally annexed in September. Mariupol became a worldwide symbol of defiance after outgunned and outmanned Ukrainian forces held out in a steel mill there for nearly three months before Moscow finally took control of it in May. Putin traveled to Mariupol late Saturday after visiting Crimea, a short distance southwest of Mariupol, to mark the ninth anniversary of the Black Sea peninsula’s annexation from Ukraine. The visit has come as a show of defiance by the Russian leader two days after a court issued a warrant for his arrest on war crimes charges.
March 19, 2023 4:15 am
MCKEESPORT, Pa. (WPXI) — The Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office announced Friday that the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania filed a notice of intention to seek the death penalty against the man accused of killing a McKeesport police officer and injuring another in February. Johnathan Morris is accused of killing Officer Sean Sluganski and injuring Officer Charles Thomas on Feb. 6. Police were responding to a call from his mother, who said the military veteran was having a PTSD episode. Morris allegedly fled from police when they tried talking to him, ending up in a yard in the 1300 block of Grandview Avenue. Witnesses driving on Grandview Avenue told police Morris approached them and told them police were trying to kill him. He asked them to film him, which they did, according to court documents. The witnesses told police that soon after, Officer Thomas, driving a police car, pulled into an alley off 1300 Grandview Avenue, and Officer Sluganski arrived on foot. Morris pulled out a gun and shot Officer Thomas and then shot Officer Sluganski, according to court documents. Morris was shot in the leg when Officer Thomas returned fire. He fled to a nearby convenience store, where a man applied a tourniquet to his leg before more officers arrived and took Morris into custody. He was taken to the Allegheny County Jail after being released from the hospital. Morris is charged with criminal homicide, aggravated assault, assault of a law enforcement officer and criminal attempted murder of a law enforcement officer.
March 19, 2023 1:52 am
Washington County District Attorney Jason Walsh says there was a drug bust in the city of Washington on Friday. Walsh says a search warrant was served at 90 East Beau Street following a several months long investigation by multiple law enforcement agencies. According to Walsh, the bust resulted in the arrest of 45-year-old Carl Darnell Jones. He says agents, during their search, seized some seven ounces of cocaine, cash and drug paraphernalia. Jones was subsequently arraigned on multiple drug charges and lodged in the Washington County Jail in lieu of 150-thousand-dollars cash bond.
March 19, 2023 1:20 am
No April fools joke. It’s going to cost more to ride Freedom Transit come April 1. For the first time since 2018, fares will increase for Shared Ride and ADA Complementary Paratransit service. Executive Director Sheila Gombita says rising operating costs are to blame. Shared Ride passengers will pay between 25-and-50-cents more per one-way trip. Riders on the ADA Complementary Paratransit service will pay 45-cents more per trip. Gombita says the average cost per trip has increase by 33-percent since the last fare increase. Those increases include fuel, wages and insurance. Trips to senior centers and adult day cares for registered individuals age 65 and older will continue to be provided at no charge thanks to a sponsorship from the Southwest Pa. Area Agency on Aging. Freedom Transit will also be offering same-day trips for riders registered in the Shared Ride program. Historically, riders have been required to make reservations at least one day in advance. Under the pilot program, passengers with last minute needs can request a trip for the same day as long as space is available at no additional cost.
March 18, 2023 4:28 am
BEIJING (AP) — The mystery to the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic now has some new clues. International scientists have found raccoon dog DNA commingled with the virus in previously unavailable genetic data. It came from samples collected in early 2020 at the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China, shortly after the first human cases were detected in the city. It could mean that the pandemic originated from animals, not one of the labs near the market. But their analysis has not been reviewed for publication and other scientists say how the virus began sickening people remains to be determined.
March 18, 2023 4:26 am
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon has signed a bill prohibiting medication abortions in the state and also allowed a separate measure restricting abortion to become law without his signature. The pills are already banned in 13 states with blanket bans on all forms of abortion, and 15 states already have limited access to abortion pills. The Republican governor’s decision comes after the issue of access to abortion pills took center stage this week in a Texas court. Wyoming’s ban on abortion pills would take effect in July, pending any legal action that could potentially delay that.
March 18, 2023 4:25 am
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s president has said that U.S. families are to blame for the fentanyl overdose crisis because they don’t hug their kids enough. The comment by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador caps a week of provocative statements from him about the crisis caused by the synthetic opioid. Fentanyl has been blamed for about 70,000 deaths per year in the United States. López Obrador said family values have broken down in the United States, because parents don’t let their children live at home long enough. He has also denied that Mexico produces fentanyl. On Friday, the Mexican president said the problem was caused by “a lack of hugs, of embraces.”
March 18, 2023 4:24 am
PARIS (AP) — It’s a time of protest in Paris and much of France, where opponents hope to bring down the government of President Emmanuel Macron. They’re blocking the streets over his decision to force a pension system change through parliament without a vote. Raising the retirement age from 62 to 64 is wildly unpopular. Macron’s opponents filed motions Friday that will trigger no-confidence votes next week. Meanwhile traffic is snarled, campuses are blocked and sanitation workers are keeping foul-smelling rubbish from reaching Europe’s largest incineration site. Unions want people to leave schools, factories, refineries and other workplaces until Macron withdraws the bill.
March 18, 2023 4:23 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — A retired Air Force officer who stormed the U.S. Capitol dressed in combat gear and carried zip-tie handcuffs into the Senate gallery has been sentenced to two years in prison. U.S. District Judge John Bates also sentenced Larry Brock on Friday to two years of supervised release after prison and 100 hours of community service. Brock declined to speak in court before the judge imposed his sentence. Brock joined other rioters on the Senate floor only minutes after then-Vice President Mike Pence, senators and their staff evacuated the chamber to escape the mob attacking the building on Jan. 6, 2021.
March 18, 2023 4:22 am
NEW YORK (AP) — Law enforcement officials in New York are making security preparations for the possibility that Donald Trump could be indicted in the coming weeks by a Manhattan grand jury and appear in a courtroom in an investigation examining hush money paid to women who alleged sexual encounters with the former president. That’s according to four law enforcement officials who spoke Friday to The Associated Press. There has been no public announcement of any timeframe for the grand jury’s secret work. The officials say authorities are just preparing in case of an indictment, so they are considering security, planning and the practicalities of a potential court appearance. Trump has cast the investigation as a political “witch hunt.”
