(NEW YORK) — A woman has fallen 100 feet to her death while exploring inside a cave in Virginia, according to authorities.
The fall happened on Friday at approximately 4:13 p.m. when authorities at the Giles County Sheriff’s Office 911 Dispatch Center received a call that a “female individual had fell approximately 100 feet within a cave in the Staffordsville Community outside of Pearisburg,” according to a statement released by Giles County Emergency Services.
The circumstances surrounding what led up to the woman falling 100 feet to her death have not yet been released by officials, but authorities did confirm that the unnamed victim was found deceased upon their arrival at the scene of the accident.
“Giles County Sheriff’s Office Deputies, Pearisburg Fire Department, and Giles Rescue Squad were dispatched, responded, and quickly identified the need for additional specialized resources,” authorities said. “Celco Emergency Response team along with Blacksburg Rescue Squad’s Technical Rescue Cave team were both requested, responded, and assisted with the rescue efforts.”
Once the woman was located and she was pronounced dead, her body was extricated from the cave by rescue personnel working the incident.
The investigation into what led up to the accident is ongoing and remains an open investigation by the Giles County Sheriff’s office.
(NEW YORK) — A federal judge has denied former Trump White House adviser Peter Navarro’s request for a new trial after he was convicted of ignoring a subpoena from the House Jan. 6 committee.
Navarro argued that the jury that found him guilty of contempt of Congress may have been influenced by protesters outside the courthouse when the jurors exited the building for a break before returning a verdict.
On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta said that while there were demonstrators outside the courthouse, they did not have direct contact with the jurors.
“The evidence establishes that the jurors only interacted with each other and [Court Security Officer] Torres in John Marshall Park,” Mehta wrote in his ruling. “No one directed any words or displayed any signs at them.”
“Defendant not only fails to demonstrate prejudice, he has not shown that any juror was actually exposed to any improper external influence,” Mehta ruled.
Navarro was found guilty of contempt of Congress last September, for defying a subpoena issued in February 2022 by the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack.
The former Trump adviser was convicted on one count over his refusal to appear for a deposition in front of the committee, and on a second count for refusing to produce documents.
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department will issue a report on Thursday on its review of the law enforcement response to the Uvalde school shooting, a DOJ spokesperson confirmed.
The “Critical Incident Review” is not a criminal investigation into the May 2022 shooting at Robb Elementary School in which 19 children and two teachers were killed, the DOJ said. It is intended to provide the most independent and comprehensive account of how law enforcement responded to the shooting — examining things like officer training, command and control response, deployment of resources and the support provided to victims and their families.
The review was conducted by the DOJ’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), a team made up of federal staff and subject matter experts including former local, state and federal law enforcement officials.
Uvalde families and state officials have spoken out against the law enforcement response during the massacre, the second deadliest school shooting in U.S. history. It took 77 minutes for any of the nearly 400 law enforcement officers assembled that day to confront the killer, ABC News previously reported.
The siege ended with a counterassault led by a SWAT team from the U.S. Border Patrol. In the process, lone gunman Salvador Ramos was shot and killed.
A criminal investigation by the Texas Department of Public Safety into whether the public safety failures led to the deaths of the victims has yet to be released. In the months after the shooting, school district police chief Pete Arredondo was fired, the entire district police force was disbanded and several state troopers were dismissed.
Former President Donald Trump speaks at his caucus night event at the Iowa Events Center, Jan. 15, 2024 in Des Moines, Iowa. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump is on trial this week in New York City to determine whether he will have to pay former Elle magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll additional damages for defaming her in 2019 when he denied her allegations of sexual assault.
Last year, in a separate trial, a jury determined that Trump was liable for sexually assaulting Carroll in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store in the 1990s, and that he defamed her in a 2022 social media post by calling her allegations “a Hoax and a lie” and saying “This woman is not my type!”
Trump has denied all wrongdoing and has said he doesn’t know who Carroll is.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Jan 16, 4:00 PM
Trump ‘unleashed his followers,’ Carroll’s attorney says
Donald Trump’s lies about E. Jean Carroll “unleashed his followers to go after her,” and as Trump campaigns for president he “continues to lie about Ms. Carroll,” Carroll’s attorney said in her opening statement.
“How much money will it take to make him stop?” Carroll’s attorney, Shawn Crowley, said. “He kept up those very same lies even after a federal jury sat in this courtroom and unanimously found that he sexually assaulted her and defamed her.”
Crowley reminded the jury that Trump “was president when he made those statements and he used the world’s biggest microphone to humiliate her” — the result of which was that he “wrecked” Carroll’s reputation in a matter of days, Crowley said.
“Donald Trump’s response was swift and brutal,” Crowley said. “Donald Trump did not just deny the assault. He went much, much further.”
She quoted Trump’s statements from June 22, 2019: “‘People should pay dearly for making up accusations” about him.
Crowley also quoted Trump saying “she’s not my type” on that day in 2019. “In other words, she was too ugly to assault. She must have been lying because she was too unattractive for Mr. Trump to sexually assault,” Crowley said.
Carroll, who is now 80, sat at the plaintiff’s table as her attorney showed the jury messages Trump’s followers posted calling her ugly and urging her to kill herself.
“When Donald Trump called Ms. Carroll a fraud and a liar, they listened and they believed and they decided to go after her,” Crowley said. “Donald Trump knew exactly what he was unleashing.”
Jan 16, 3:40 PM
‘This is not a do-over,’ judge instructs jury
Judge Lewis Kaplan told the nine jurors that they must accept as true that Trump forcibly sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll and defamed her when he denied it.
“Ms. Carroll did not make up her claim of forcible sexual abuse,” Judge Kaplan told the panel. “His false statements tended to disparage Ms. Carroll or tended to expose her to hatred or to induce an unsavory opinion of her.”
The judge made it clear the jury was only determining damages related to two defamatory statements Trump made in June 2019 when he denied Carroll’s rape allegation. He said the trial was not an opportunity to re-litigate the prior trial, in which a jury found Trump liable for defamation and sexual assault.
“This trial is not a do-over of the previous trial which determined those facts,” Kaplan said.
Jan 16, 3:18 PM
Trump departs before opening statements
Former President Trump has departed Manhattan federal court prior to the delivery of opening statements in his defamation damages trial.
Trump voluntarily showed up to court for jury selection this morning, and did not return after the lunch break. He has a campaign event scheduled later today in New Hampshire.
His attorney suggested Trump would return to court for at least part of tomorrow’s proceedings, when E. Jean Carroll is expected to be the first witness.
The jury has been sworn in, with opening statements to begin following instructions from the judge.
Jan 16, 2:08 PM
2 election deniers don’t make cut as jury is seated
A jury of nine has been selected to hear the evidence in the case.
One juror is a married father of two grown children who works in the subway system. and said he is an avid local news viewer. Another juror is a German native who emigrated to the United States and said she does not watch the news.
The jury also includes a newlywed who works in property management and gets his news from social media, a woman with a master’s degree who works as a publicist for a tech firm, and a single man who works in television.
Two people who said they believed that the election was stolen from Donald Trump by President Joe Biden did not make the jury. Nor did a man who said he believed Trump was being treated unfairly by the United States court system.
Opening arguments will begin follow the lunch break. As they exited the courtroom, Trump and Carroll came within feet of each other but appeared to ignore one another.
Jan 16, 12:11 PM
Prospective jurors questioned about political leanings
Former President Trump has been twisting and turning in his seat at the defense table as prospective jurors answer the judge’s questions about their political affiliations, voting habits, campaign donations, and any experience with sexual assault — and whether they ever watched The Apprentice or read E. Jean Carroll’s advice column in Elle magazine.
As another columnist was known to say, “Only in New York, kids.”
One prospective juror, number 68, affirmed that he donated to Trump’s campaign, followed him on social media, and believed that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump by President Joe Biden.
Prospective juror 63 was excused after he said that his knowledge of Trump’s criminal indictments — of which there are four that the former president is currently facing — would impact his ability to be fair and impartial.
The majority of prospective jurors signaled they were registered to vote, prompting the judge to ask if they had voted in 2016 and 2020. Trump turned to look at those who answered in the affirmative.
Three prospective jurors said they had donated to Trump’s campaign. Eleven said they donated to either the Obama, Clinton or Biden campaigns. At least ten watched The Apprentice.
Jan 16, 11:32 AM
Judge explains case to prospective jurors
Judge Kaplan explained the case to prospective jurors, saying, “Ms. Carroll sued Mr. Trump for defamation for certain statements he made” shortly after she publicly accused him of raping her.
“This trial is limited to the issue of the money damages, if any, that Ms. Carroll should receive for those publications. The reason that’s so is that the court determined in a previous decision that Mr. Trump is liable,” Kaplan said. “It has been determined already that Mr. Trump did sexually assault Ms. Carroll.”
To whittle down the jury pool, Kaplan began with this question: “Having heard what you have heard about this case so far, would you be unable to give both sides a fair trial and to decide this case solely on the basis of the evidence you hear during this trial and the instructions I give you?”
Three prospective jurors were immediately excused for signaling they could not be fair.
One woman said she worked for Ivanka Trump’s company from 2017 to 2018. “Would that experience have any effect on your ability to be fair and impartial to both sides in this case?” Judge Kaplan asked regarding her connection to Trump’s eldest daughter. “No,” the woman replied.
After the judge asked if anyone else had worked for Trump or his family, a man indicated he was an officer in the U.S. Navy while Trump was commander in chief. The man said it would have no impact on his ability to be fair.
Jan 16, 11:23 AM
Prospective jurors enter courtroom to begin selection process
As prospective jurors filed into the courtroom for jury selection, Donald Trump surveyed the group. One woman appeared to smile upon recognizing Trump. A man leaned forward and appeared to stare for several seconds.
“You’ve been summoned for possible service in a civil case,” Judge Kaplan said before introducing the plaintiff and defendant. “This case is between a writer, advice columnist E. Jean Carroll, and former President Donald Trump,” he said.
Jurors were told the case is expected to last three to five days and that they would sit through Thursday and, if necessary, return on Monday. They were also told they will be anonymous.
“That means neither your names nor the names of the jurors who are ultimately selected will be made public,” Judge Kaplan said. He had earlier cited Trump’s rhetoric as among the reasons for the anonymous jury.
Jurors will assemble daily at an off-site location and be driven to court under guard, the judge said.
“This is for your own protection. As you may understand, this case has attracted media attention and that’s likely to continue,” Kaplan said.
Jan 16, 10:40 AM
Layout of courtroom has Trump sitting 2 tables behind Carroll
Unlike courtrooms where the counsel tables are arranged side by side, the counsel tables in the courtroom this morning are arranged behind one another, with Trump and his attorneys seated two tables behind Carroll and her counsel.
Trump appeared to take note of that arrangement when he entered the courtroom.
He appeared to point at Carroll, then he and his team asked a man seated at the table between them to slide over — possibly to block Trump’s view of Carroll, or to provide a better view of the proceedings.
Jan 16, 10:27 AM
Judge again declines to delay trial
On Friday, Judge Kaplan denied a request from Trump’s attorneys to postpone the trial for a week so Trump could attend Thursday’s funeral of Amalija Knavs, the mother of former first lady Melania Trump, who died last Tuesday after a long health battle.
In court this morning, Trump attorney Alina Habba repeated her request for an adjournment so Trump can attend Knavs’ funeral.
“You asked me for a week’s adjournment and I denied it,” Judge Kaplan said. “The repetition is not accomplishing anything.”
The judge said Friday that he would grant a continuance so the trial, which was initially scheduled to conclude this week, would be extended so Trump could testify on Monday, Jan. 22.
Jan 16, 10:12 AM
Defense lodges several objections as court gets underway
“The court has made a number of rulings precluding evidence and argument,” said Judge Lewis Kaplan as court got underway, asking each side’s lead attorney to affirm that the parties understood the rules.
The defense objected, arguing that the court lacked jurisdiction. Kaplan quickly dispensed with the objection, saying, “Overruled.” Kaplan, who has a reputation as a no-nonsense judge, also overruled several other defense objections.
“I do think these are issues that will become an issue on appeal. We still don’t know what witnesses are coming in and which aren’t,” Trump attorney Alina Habba said, before Kaplan interrupted, saying, “Ms. Habba you have had a witness list for months.”
Habba pressed on, with Kaplan noting her objections.
“I have heard you, I have considered what you have to say and I have ruled,” Judge Kaplan said.
Jan 16, 9:56 AM
Trump seated in courtroom
Donald Trump has taken a seat in court, where jury selection in his defamation trial is scheduled to get underway this morning.
His decision to attend this trial is a clear shift for the former president, whose lawyers portrayed his absence from last year’s defamation and battery trial as a service to New York City, saying the city would not have to suffer the “logistical and financial burdens” of Trump’s attendance.
Carroll’s attorneys, however, pounced on Trump’s absence.
“He didn’t even bother to show up here in person,” attorney Roberta Kaplan told the jury.
Writing on social media last month, Trump blamed his absence at the trial on “not good advice” from his then-lawyer Joe Tacopina.
“I was asked by my lawyer not to attend–‘It was beneath me, and they have no case.’ That was not good advice,” Trump wrote.
Trump attorney Alina Habba is serving as Trump’s lead defense attorney for this week’s trial.
Jan 16, 9:21 AM
Carroll arrives for trial
E. Jean Carroll has arrived at the courthouse for the first day of the trial.
She smiled to reporters as she entered court.
Jan 16, 9:03 AM
Trump arrives at courthouse
Following his victory in Iowa, former President Trump landed at 3:30 a.m. in New York and just arrived at his civil defamation trial in lower Manhattan.
Trump is not required to attend the trial, though his decision not to attend last year’s defamation and battery trial by the same plaintiff, writer E. Jean Carroll, was mocked by Carroll’s attorney.
Trump’s motorcade pulled up to the courthouse this morning at at 8:50 a.m. ET.
Jan 16, 8:51 AM
On heels of Iowa victory, Trump is back on trial
When Donald Trump’s federal defamation trial gets underway in lower Manhattan this morning, it will be only about 11 hours since the former president claimed victory in the Iowa caucuses.
The trial is expected to take about a week, which could take Trump right to the doorstep of the New Hampshire Primary, scheduled for next Tuesday.
Trump has said that he plans to attend the trial at some point during the week, but has not indicted when.
The former president did not attend last year’s trial, held at the same courthouse, where a New York jury found him liable for sexually assaulting E. Jean Carroll and defaming her when he denied her accusation in a 2022 social media post.
(NEW YORK) — More than 100 million Americans are on alert Tuesday for dangerous wind chills, while a weather system ended yearslong snow droughts in cities including New York and Washington, D.C.
Weather-related school closures are affecting more than a million students nationwide on Tuesday amid a major winter blast of brutal wind chills, record low temperatures, record snow in parts of the South and dangerous ice.
More than 2,100 flights have been canceled as of Tuesday afternoon, following nearly 3,500 cancellations on Monday, according to FlightAware.
Snow from north to south
Snow has turned to ice across much of the Interstate 95 corridor, with snow and icy conditions expected to continue in parts of New England through the evening.
The weather system is forecast to keep pushing north and snowfall should end in New York City by 5 p.m. ET and in Boston by 8 p.m. ET. There could be a light glaze of ice with freezing rain or drizzle in those areas as temperatures warm back up near the freezing mark.
Up to 6 inches of snow is possible for Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, while 1 to 4 inches could accumulate from New York City to Boston. Maine could end up with up to a foot of snow in some places.
The snow drought has officially ended after 728 days in Washington, D.C., with 3.4 inches on Monday, after 716 days in Baltimore with 4.1 inches on Monday, after 715 days in Philadelphia with 1.5 inches on Monday and after 701 days in New York City with 1 inch on Tuesday so far. An area must get at least 1 inch of snowfall in a single day to break the drought.
Lake-effect snowfall could dump an additional 1 to 3 feet in Buffalo, New York, from Wednesday morning through Thursday night.
Elsewhere, parts of Tennessee such as Nashville and Knoxville saw up to 9 inches of snow on Monday, while 3 to 5 inches accumulated in western Virginia and through Maryland.
Avalanche warnings are also in effect in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, including the ski resort towns of Aspen and Vail, through Thursday.
Frigid chill in the South and Midwest
There are wind chill alerts alone for 100 million Americans that stretch through the middle of the country from the northern border to the southern border.
The wind chill — what the temperature feels like — was below zero as far south as Dallas Tuesday morning.
Record low temperatures were recorded Tuesday in Tulsa, Oklahoma (minus 2 degrees) and Fayetteville, Arkansas (minus 10 degrees).
The low in Kansas City, Missouri, Tuesday morning was minus 10 degrees — marking the fourth consecutive day of temperatures reaching minus 10 degrees or lower in the city.
Wind chill alerts remain in effect through Wednesday morning for the Great Lakes to the Deep South, while hard freeze warnings are in effect from Texas to Florida.
Temperatures are forecast to get a bit warmer later in the week but will still be brutally cold for many. On Friday morning, the wind chill is expected to be around minus 20 degrees in Kansas City and minus 15 in Chicago.
Next cross-country storm
Another winter storm is expected to move into the Pacific Northwest later Tuesday and unleash rain from Seattle to San Francisco as well as snow to the Cascade mountain range.
An ice storm warning is in effect for Portland, Oregon, for freezing rain Tuesday night into Wednesday.
The new system is forecast to bring more snow to the Rockies on Wednesday, to the Plains of the Dakotas, Nebraska and Missouri on Thursday and possibly even to Washington, D.C., by Friday.
(NEW YORK) — Prosecutors charged alleged serial killer Rex Heuermann on Tuesday with murdering Maureen Brainard-Barnes, who disappeared in 2007 while working as an escort, linking him to her death through DNA and other evidence.
Defense attorney Michael Brown entered a not guilty plea on Heuermann’s behalf to the second-degree murder charge in Suffolk County Court. Heuermann was once again remanded to Suffolk County jail, and the judge set the next court date for Feb. 6.
The former architect has already been charged with murdering three other escorts on New York’s Long Island. Like Megan Waterman, Amber Costello and Melissa Barthelemy, the remains of Brainard-Barnes were found in a desolate spot along the ocean near Gilgo Beach.
The New York City architect who lived on Long Island with his wife and children was arrested in July 2023.
“Today, Defendant Rex A. Heuermann stands before this Court charged by the Grand Jury in a Superseding Indictment, which incorporates not only the above counts, but the additional charge of: MURDER IN THE SECOND DEGREE, in violation of New York State Penal Law Section 125.25(1), a class A-I violent felony for the death of Maureen Brainard-Barnes on or about July 9, 2007,” Suffolk County prosecutors wrote in a court filing.
Prosecutors said Heuermann’s now-estranged wife, Asa Ellerup, and his children were out of town when Brainard-Barnes disappeared and was killed, fitting an alleged pattern of Heuermann being home alone when the other three killed.
“As set forth in Exhibit A, travel and cellular telephone billing records had previously established that Defendant Heuermann’s wife and children were out of the state during the disappearances and murders of three of the four victims, specifically, Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman, and Amber Costello,” prosecutors said, citing documents they obtained during a search of a storage unit leased by Heuermann.
The documents include a credit card statement that shows Ellerup checked into an Atlantic City hotel July 6, 2007 and stayed through July 20.
“Based on the foregoing, the murders of all four victims occurred at times when Defendant Heuermann’s wife and children were traveling out of state, which allowed Defendant Heuermann unfettered time to execute his plans for each victim without any fear that his family would uncover or learn of his involvement in these crimes,” prosecutors said.
The new filing also revealed that prosecutors seized two phones from Heuermann at the time of his arrest that they said were held by him “in fictitious names and used for illicit activities.” Prosecutors said Heuermann “utilized these phones in furtherance of hundreds of contacts with sex-workers between 2020 and 2023.”
Prosecutors additionally revealed Tuesday they seized hundreds of electronic devices from Heuermann’s Massapequa Park home and Manhattan office following his arrest.
Heuermann used the devices to search for the deceased victims and their family members; the status of the instant investigation; for software that would assist in wiping or erasing data from computers and other similar digital devices and purchase digital masking and forensic wiping tools, prosecutors said.
“Defendant’s devices also contained the following: A collection of violent, bondage, and torture pornography preceding, during, and subsequent to the disappearances and murders of the aforementioned victims between 2007 and 2010; and prostitution-related searches preceding, during, and subsequent to the disappearances and murders of the aforementioned victims between 2007 and 2010,” the filing says
The new court filing also outlines the lengths prosecutors went to obtain DNA from Heuermann’s family, including tracking his adult daughter, Victoria, on a Long Island Railroad train drinking from a gold-colored energy drink can.
Investigators saw her toss the can into the trash. They recovered it and took it for analysis, prosecutors said.
In the indictment from Heuermann’s July 2023 arrest, investigators said he was the “prime suspect” in Brainard-Barnes’ death. There are six other Gilgo Beach victims whose deaths remain unsolved.
Former President Donald Trump speaks at his caucus night event at the Iowa Events Center, Jan. 15, 2024 in Des Moines, Iowa. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump is on trial this week in New York City to determine whether he will have to pay former Elle magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll additional damages for defaming her in 2019 when he denied her allegations of sexual assault.
Last year, in a separate trial, a jury determined that Trump was liable for sexually assaulting Carroll in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store in the 1990s, and that he defamed her in a 2022 social media post by calling her allegations “a Hoax and a lie” and saying “This woman is not my type!”
Trump has denied all wrongdoing and has said he doesn’t know who Carroll is.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Jan 16, 9:56 AM
Trump seated in courtroom
Donald Trump has taken a seat in court, where jury selection in his defamation trial is scheduled to get underway this morning.
His decision to attend this trial is a clear shift for the former president, whose lawyers portrayed his absence from last year’s defamation and battery trial as a service to New York City, saying the city would not have to suffer the “logistical and financial burdens” of Trump’s attendance.
Carroll’s attorneys, however, pounced on Trump’s absence.
“He didn’t even bother to show up here in person,” attorney Roberta Kaplan told the jury.
Writing on social media last month, Trump blamed his absence at the trial on “not good advice” from his then-lawyer Joe Tacopina.
“I was asked by my lawyer not to attend–‘It was beneath me, and they have no case.’ That was not good advice,” Trump wrote.
Trump attorney Alina Habba is serving as Trump’s lead defense attorney for this week’s trial.
Jan 16, 9:21 AM
Carroll arrives for trial
E. Jean Carroll has arrived at the courthouse for the first day of the trial.
She smiled to reporters as she entered court.
Jan 16, 9:03 AM
Trump arrives at courthouse
Following his victory in Iowa, former President Trump landed at 3:30 a.m. in New York and just arrived at his civil defamation trial in lower Manhattan.
Trump is not required to attend the trial, though his decision not to attend last year’s defamation and battery trial by the same plaintiff, writer E. Jean Carroll, was mocked by Carroll’s attorney.
Trump’s motorcade pulled up to the courthouse this morning at at 8:50 a.m. ET.
Jan 16, 8:51 AM
On heels of Iowa victory, Trump is back on trial
When Donald Trump’s federal defamation trial gets underway in lower Manhattan this morning, it will be only about 11 hours since the former president claimed victory in the Iowa caucuses.
The trial is expected to take about a week, which could take Trump right to the doorstep of the New Hampshire Primary, scheduled for next Tuesday.
Trump has said that he plans to attend the trial at some point during the week, but has not indicted when.
The former president did not attend last year’s trial, held at the same courthouse, where a New York jury found him liable for sexually assaulting E. Jean Carroll and defaming her when he denied her accusation in a 2022 social media post.
(NEW YORK) — Prosecutors in Suffolk County, New York, have charged alleged serial killer Rex Heuermann with murdering Maureen Brainard-Barnes, who disappeared in 2007 while working as an escort, linking him to her death through DNA and other evidence.
Former President Donald Trump speaks at his caucus night event at the Iowa Events Center, Jan. 15, 2024 in Des Moines, Iowa. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump is on trial this week in New York City to determine whether he will have to pay former Elle magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll additional damages for defaming her in 2019 when he denied her allegations of sexual assault.
Last year, in a separate trial, a jury determined that Trump was liable for sexually assaulting Carroll in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store in the 1990s, and that he defamed her in a 2022 social media post by calling her allegations “a Hoax and a lie” and saying “This woman is not my type!”
Trump has denied all wrongdoing and has said he doesn’t know who Carroll is.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Jan 16, 8:51 AM
On heels of Iowa victory, Trump is back on trial
When Donald Trump’s federal defamation trial gets underway in lower Manhattan this morning, it will be only about 11 hours since the former president claimed victory in the Iowa caucuses.
The trial is expected to take about a week, which could take Trump right to the doorstep of the New Hampshire Primary, scheduled for next Tuesday.
Trump has said that he plans to attend the trial at some point during the week, but has not indicted when.
The former president did not attend last year’s trial, held at the same courthouse, where a New York jury found him liable for sexually assaulting E. Jean Carroll and defaming her when he denied her accusation in a 2022 social media post.
(NEW YORK) — More than 200 million Americans are on alert Tuesday for heavy snow, ice and dangerously low wind chills as an arctic blast grips the nation.
Twenty-three U.S. states from Louisiana to Maine were under weather advisories for snow and ice alone early Tuesday, as a mix of rain and freezing rain stretched in a line from New Orleans to Maryland. This line is expected to change to mostly rain by 10 a.m. ET as it heads east and will be over Boston, Massachusetts, by 6 p.m. ET.
Strong thunderstorms are also possible Tuesday in Florida, from Jacksonville to Orlando, Tampa and Fort Myers, where there could be damaging winds and an isolated tornado.
Weather-related school closures are affecting more than a million students nationwide on Tuesday.
Snow was falling early Tuesday in the Northeast throughout much of Pennsylvania and New Jersey as well as from New York City to Boston. The snowfall is expected to continue in those areas all morning.
The weather system is forecast to keep pushing north and snowfall should end in New York City by 5 p.m. ET and in Boston by 8 p.m. ET. There could be a light glaze of ice with freezing rain or drizzle in those areas as temperatures warm back up near the freezing mark.
Up to 6 inches of snow is possible for Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, Maryland, while 1 to 4 inches could accumulate from New York City to Boston. Maine could end up with up to a foot of snow in some places.
Avalanche warnings were in effect Tuesday in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, including the ski resort towns of Aspen and Vail, as well as in much of Utah’s mountains, including around Salt Lake City.
Lake-effect snowfall could dump an additional 1 to 3 feet in Buffalo, New York, from Wednesday morning through Thursday night.
The snow drought has officially ended after 728 days in Washington, D.C., with 3.4 inches on Monday, after 716 days in Baltimore with 4.1 inches and after 715 days in Philadelphia with 1.5 inches.
New York City has yet to break its snow drought with only 0.4 inches counted on Monday. An area must get 1 inch of snowfall in a single day to break the drought.
Elsewhere, parts of Tennessee such as Nashville and Knoxville saw up to 9 inches of snow on Monday, while 3 to 5 inches accumulated in western Virginia and through Maryland.
Meanwhile, freezing rain is creating ice accumulation in areas in the South, including Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Birmingham, Alabama.
The wind chill — what temperature it feels like — were below zero Tuesday morning as far south as Dallas, Texas. Wind chill alerts alone amount to 170 million Americans and stretch the middle of the country from border to border. In the north, wind chills could get to -40 degrees Fahrenheit on Tuesday morning. In the southern tip of Texas, in Brownsville, wind chills could reach -10 degrees.
Record low temperatures are possible Tuesday morning in parts of Texas, including Dallas, Houston, Austin, Lubbock and Amarillo; as well as in Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Denver, Colorado.
Temperatures are forecast to get a bit warmer later in the week but will still be brutally cold for many. On Friday morning, the wind chill is expected to be around -20 degrees in Kansas City and -15 in Chicago.
Another winter storm is expected to move into the Pacific Northwest later Tuesday and unleash rain from Seattle, Washington, to San Francisco, California, as well as snow to the Cascade mountain range.
The new system is forecast to bring more snow to the Rockies on Wednesday, to the Plains of the Dakotas, Nebraska and Missouri on Thursday and possibly even to Washington, D.C. by Friday.
