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(ATLANTA) — In the year since a gunman killed eight people at three Atlanta-based Asian-owned or operated spas, family members who lost a loved one say the pain is still fresh.

Robert Peterson, whose mother, Yong Ae Yue, 63, was the last person killed in the shooting spree while she was working at Aromatherapy Spa told ABC’s “Nightline” that he still can’t get that day out of his head, but he continues to push through.

“I have no choice but to heal,” he said.

Peterson and others in the AAPI community said their anguish has only been compounded with the rise in anti-Asian crimes and rhetoric taking place across the country. Advocates said these incidents are becoming a wake-up call to the community to make a stand against racism.

Watch “Nightline’s” full episode on the anniversary of the Atlanta spa shooting Wednesday night at 12:35 a.m. ET on ABC.

On March 16, 2021, Xiaojie “Emily” Tan, 49; Daoyou Feng, 44; Delaina Yaun, 33; and Paul Michels, 54, were killed at Young’s Asian Massage near the Atlanta suburb of Woodstock in Cherokee County, police said. Suncha Kim, 69; Soon Chung Park, 74; Hyun Jung Grant, 51; and Yue were shot and killed a short time later at Gold Spa and Aromatherapy Spa in Fulton County, according to police.

Police arrested Robert Aaron Long shortly after the shootings. He claimed he didn’t target his victims based on their race, but instead said he was dealing with sex addiction. Capt. Jay Baker, a spokesperson for the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office, came under fire after he claimed Long had a “really bad day” during a news conference following his arrest. Baker was soon replaced as the police spokesperson for the case.

Peterson said he was hurt when the authorities downplayed the race of the victims even though six out of the eight people killed were Asian women.

“He got the benefit of the doubt when these victims did not. They were persecuted. They were negatively judged. They were stigmatized,” Peterson said.

Randy Park, Grant’s son, told ABC’s “Nightline” that his mother rarely talked about her job at Gold Spa because of the stigma.

Park, 23, said Grant worked long hours to provide for him and his brother Eric, 21, and always made sure that they were safe. Park said he still misses his mother’s nightly check-ins.

“Around 9 to midnight rolls around, when we would get those calls,” Park told ABC News, “my soul feels just kind of silent, because I know I’m supposed to get that, but I can’t anymore.”

Long pleaded guilty to the four murders that took place in Cherokee County and will serve life in prison. Cherokee County District Attorney Shannon Wallace said that their investigation found no evidence of racial bias.

He is awaiting trial in Fulton County on murder charges, which he plead not guilty to in the fall. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis said she’d seek the death penalty and hate crime charges against Long.

Even though major cities saw a 261% increase of alleged hate crimes last year, according to a report by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism, very few hate crime charges are handed out by prosecutors. Law enforcement members and prosecutors have said getting key evidence that shows a suspect was motivated by racial bias is difficult.

Peterson said he believes Long has shown bias, and he hopes that prosecutors can find a way to convict him on hate crime charges.

“Before we could end racism, we have to be able to see it. We have to be able to call it out. We have to be able to label it,” he said. “If we don’t, then we allow the perpetrator to get away, absolving himself of accountability and responsibility.”

Peterson isn’t alone in this call for action. The spa murders sparked rallies, protests and calls for actions by lawmakers to crack down on anti-Asian crimes and the perpetrators.

Cam Ashling, the co-founder and chairwoman of the Atlanta-based non-profit Asian American Action Fund, told ABC News that the spa shootings were the tipping point of rising anti-Asian attacks, and many in the community began to rethink their initial reluctance to speak out.

“Asian people are not into, ‘Let’s all shine national media on my tragedy.’ We don’t want our suffering and our tragedy on video forever,” she said. “New immigrants don’t want to have attention on them. They feel like they’re supposed to hide and kind of let it pass.”

She added that Asians are still fighting an uphill battle as more Asian Americans have become targets of assaults and killings.

Last month, Christina Yuna Lee was stabbed to death in her Manhattan apartment after a suspect followed her home, police said. The city has seen other Asian women pushed in subways and assaulted in the street, according to police.

Special agent Jimena Noonan with the FBI’s Newark office has been investigating burglary rings that target Asian businesses and homeowners since 2019. She told ABC News that these types of crimes are also on the rise, adding that criminals are going as far as to stake out their victims’ businesses and homes, watching to see the homeowner is not home before breaking in.

She advised that concerned Asian business owners need to make sure the doors to their homes, businesses and cars are locked, and they should have security cameras installed on their properties.

“In addition to that, I recommend license plate recognition cameras, which help law enforcement tremendously in obtaining a better description of suspect vehicles that are used by these burglaries,” Noonan told ABC News.

In the meantime, elected officials have scrambled to address the rise in anti-Asian harassment and crimes. Last year, President Joe Biden signed the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act into law.

The law directs the Justice Department to designate a point person to assist with expedited review of COVID-19 hate crimes, provided guidance for state and local law enforcement agencies to establish online reporting of hate crimes in multiple languages and expanded “linguistically appropriate” public education campaigns.

Ashling said the political actions are a good start, but she believes it’s going to take more work before the Asian American community will feel safe. She urged more people to speak out and call on their lawmakers to enact change.

“If you do not get yourself together and become more outspoken and advocate for yourself, your family [and] your community, we will not have a community,” she said.

The Atlanta spa shooting victims’ families said at this point, they have no choice but to carry on and honor the memories of their loved ones.

Park, who said he’s received messages of support from people around the world, said he feels his mother’s spirit is still watching over him and his brother.

“It just feels like she’s basically pushing Eric and I along,” Park said.

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(NEW YORK) — Throughout the pandemic, several professional and collegiate sports leagues cancelled major events and seasons, in part to slow the spread of COVID-19, but also due to alarming reports of athletes developing a syndrome called myocarditis — inflammation of the heart muscle — following a COVID-19 infection.

After two years of research, the American College of Cardiology released guidance Tuesday that states the incidence of heart inflammation among athletes after COVID-19 is lower than originally thought, but they still suggest a step-by-step plan to help competitive athletes and weekend warriors alike that will help them safely return to their activities.

“For athletes recovering from COVID-19 with ongoing cardiopulmonary symptoms … further evaluation should be performed before resuming exercise,” the ACC Expert Consensus Decision Pathway, which was published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, states. “For all others who are asymptomatic or with symptoms less suggestive of a cardiopulmonary etiology … additional cardiac testing is not recommended.”

Evolving science

Doctors were performing “very rigorous testing searching for myocarditis” early in the pandemic, Dr. Tamanna Singh, co-director of the Cleveland Clinic Sports Cardiology Center, who was not involved in the new guidance, told ABC News, noting that, at the time, they were worried that the incidence of myocarditis “was going to be much higher than it actually was.”

Back in September 2020, when much was still unknown about COVID-19, researchers at Ohio State University examined 26 athletes following a mild COVID-19 infection that did not require hospitalization. Myocarditis was found in 15% of the athletes, while 30% had developed a scar on their heart, raising a sense of uncertainty surrounding the safety of athletes returning to play following an infection.

“While the data on cardiomyopathy is preliminary and incomplete, the uncertain risk was unacceptable at this time,” Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren wrote in an August 2020 open letter on the decision to cancel the college conference’s 2020-2021 fall sports season.

But over time, it was discovered that the incidence appears to be much lower than first thought.

“Many conferences, including the Big Ten, were doing cardiac MRIs on every athlete who recovered from COVID, and what they found was that the incidence of serious MRI abnormalities was very low, on the order of 1 to 2%,” said Dr. Nicole Bhave, a cardiologist and echocardiographer at the University of Michigan and a co-chair of the committee that released this new guidance.

Typical rates for myocarditis involvement in athletes is “very low, with rates typically being around 0.6 to 0.7%,” Singh said.

While experts’ understanding of COVID-19 evolves, it is clear that many patients continue to have symptoms, obvious or subtle, following infection. And while not every athlete with COVID-19 will experience myocarditis, it’s dangerous enough to make doctors take notice.

“Myocarditis is a very rare but serious complication of COVID,” Bhave said. “Patients with COVID myocarditis really should be managed at a high-level center [with the proper equipment], because these patients can go south fast.”

Guidance for athletes

The new ACC guidance suggests that it is safe for athletes with no symptoms from COVID-19 to return to exercise three days following self-isolation. For those with mild symptoms not involving the heart or lungs, it is safe to return to exercise once symptoms resolve.

Athletes suffering from persistent chest pain, palpitations or passing out require further cardiac testing. If the findings are concerning for myocarditis, the ACC recommends abstinence from exercise for three to six months.

“We don’t think that a routine MRI is needed for everyone who has had COVID before they start exercising again,” Bhave said.

If an athlete has persistent symptoms, Bhave said, “One of the recommendations that we’re making in the document is that people engage in recumbent exercise, so rather than trying to walk, doing something where they’re actually sitting down, so that orthostatic intolerance [the inability to tolerate quick movements] isn’t a big deal.”

For athletes who experience long-haul COVID-19 symptoms, the recovery process can be frustrating.

“You’re essentially seeing someone who has had a decade and a half, maybe even two decades, of unrestricted sports participation and unlimited exercise capacity who now has severe limitations,” Singh said. “They’re losing not only their physical connection to self, but also their social connection to their community, which can be really mentally devastating.”

Singh and Bhave both said that re-introduction of exercise following infection should be gradual, starting with small amounts and increasing frequency, duration and intensity as tolerated.

“It’s important as physicians to say, ‘Hey, I’m here with you, and I know you’re still not back to where you were. I share your frustration and I’m not going to abandon you,'” Bhave said. “We still have a lot to learn, and I think that’s a message that is very helpful to patients who are feeling frustrated.”

Nicholas P. Kondoleon, M.D., is an internal medicine resident at Cleveland Clinic and a contributor to the ABC News Medical Unit.

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(NEW YORK) — A suspect remains at large nearly a week after an 87-year-old woman was shoved to the ground in an unprovoked attack on a New York City street, subsequently dying from her injuries, police said.

The victim was walking in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood on Thursday at around 8:25 p.m. when the assailant crossed the street, approached her from behind and pushed her, “causing her to fall and hit her head,” New York City police said. She was transported to an area hospital in critical condition.

The suspect, described as a woman with long, dark hair wearing a black jacket, black leggings, white skirt or dress and dark shoes, fled the scene and remains at large, police said.

The victim, who was identified by officials as Barbara Maier Gustern, died from her injuries on Tuesday, police said.

“We’re asking the public’s health in solving this disgusting, disgraceful offense committed against a vulnerable, elderly female who was doing nothing but walking down the streets of New York City,” New York Police Department Chief of Detectives James Essig said during a briefing Tuesday.

The NYPD released a surveillance video of the suspect as the search continues.

Barbara Maier Gustern, an 87-year old Chelsea resident, was attacked on West 28th Street on Thursday at around 9:30 pm. The suspect is a woman with long dark hair who remains at large.

🚨 If you have information call Crime Stoppers at 800-577-8477 (TIPS)pic.twitter.com/WtDp0bLGv0

— Senator Brad Hoylman (@bradhoylman) March 14, 2022

New York state Sen. Brad Hoylman said he was “devastated” to learn of Gustern’s death.

“Her assailant, who is still at large, must be apprehended and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” he said on Twitter.

Gustern was a well-known and beloved member of the city’s cabaret scene and a vocal coach.

Her friend, Barbara Bleier, was rehearsing with her for a cabaret show before last week’s attack.

“She is one of the most inspirational women I have ever met,” Bleier told ABC affiliate WABC on Monday.

Gustern’s grandson, AJ Gustern, said he had flown to New York to be by his grandmother’s side while she was in the hospital,

“She’s the light of my life,” he told WABC on Monday. “I’m angry at the state of the world. I’m angry at the state of the city.”

Condolences have poured in in the wake of Gustern’s passing.

“God bless the memory of this woman who defined extraordinary,” opera singer Stephanie Blythe said on Twitter. “That she should pass from this life as a result of violence after the incredible and generous life she lived is past all understanding.”

Police are asking anyone with information to call 1-800-577-8477 or go to crimestoppers.nypdonline.org to report confidential tips.

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(WASHINGTON) — In his first court appearance on Wednesday, a judge denied the release of the suspect accused of a series of shootings targeting homeless people in Washington, D.C., and New York.

30-year-old Gerald Brevard III appeared in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia where he is facing charges stemming from three attacks on homeless people in D.C., including one murder.

Brevard is accused of five shootings of people experiencing homelessness, two of which were fatal, in New York and D.C. this month.

In D.C., Brevard is charged with assault with a dangerous weapon, assault with intent to kill and first-degree murder while armed.

According to investigators, the same firearm was used in the D.C. shootings and firearm casings from the New York shootings have been preliminarily linked to the same gun, court filings show.

Attorneys for Brevard claimed prosecutors did not prove probable cause and requested his release.

Attorneys for Brevard listed inconsistencies in some of the witness descriptions, claiming Brevard did not meet the descriptions of the shooter, and requested that he be released, but the judge sided with prosecutors, saying they had established probable cause.

Prosecutors said that cellphone evidence places Brevard in D.C. and New York at the times of the shootings and that the incidents were unprovoked attacks against vulnerable people, some of whom were sleeping when they were shot.

Prosecutors also noted that the attacks were all committed within a short period of time, with all five shootings happening between March 3 and March 12.

The judge found probable cause, saying the inconsistencies in the case against Brevard does not defeat the probable cause.

Brevard is set to appear again in court in April.

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(MIDLAND, Texas) — The head coach and six members of the University of the Southwest men’s and women’s golf teams were among nine people killed in a head-on vehicle crash in Texas, authorities said.

The crash occurred Tuesday night near Midland, Texas, and only two people aboard the college team’s van survived, according to a statement from the University of the Southwest in Hobbs, New Mexico.

The college confirmed that Tyler James, the head coach of both the men’s and women’s golf teams, was among those killed. The coach and his teams were returning home from a tournament in Midland when the crash occurred, according to the school’s statement.

“The USW campus community is shocked and saddened today as we mourn the loss of members of our university family,” school officials said in the statement to ABC affiliate station KMID in Midland.

The names of the students killed were not immediately released.

Two passengers in the team van who survived the wreck were in critical condition Wednesday at a hospital in Lubbock, Texas, the school’s statement said.

“We would ask for prayers for their recovery and for comfort and strength for all of families and friends and students of those whose lives have been lost,” school officials said in the statement.

Sgt. Steven Blanco of the Texas Department of Public Safety said the crash happened around 8:17 p.m. Tuesday on a two-lane road about nine miles east of Andrews, Texas, when the 17-seat passenger van carrying the golf teams collided with a pickup truck.

Two people in the pickup truck were killed, authorities said.

A preliminary investigation indicates that the driver of the southbound pickup truck for unknown reasons veered into the northbound lanes, colliding with the van, the Department of Public Safety said Wednesday. The agency said both vehicles caught fire following the crash.

Blanco said the cause of the crash remains under investigation by the Texas Highway Patrol’s West Texas Region.

“It’s a very tragic scene. Very very tragic,” said Blanco, describing the crash when officers first arrived.

University officials confirmed that James was driving the vehicle when the collision happened.

James was in his first year as head coach of both the women’s and men’s golf teams, school officials said.

School officials said they were working Wednesday to notify the families of all those involved in the crash and to provide counseling and religious services to all students, faculty and staff on campus.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott released a statement Wednesday asking Texans to join in praying for the families of those whose lives were lost and for the recovery of two critically injured students.

“We grieve with the loved ones of the individuals whose lives were horrifically taken too soon in this fatal vehicle crash near Andrews last night,” Abbott said.

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(NEW YORK) — Teachers in Florida and around the country are speaking out as the state’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill heads to the governor’s desk.

The controversial bill bans discussion “on sexual orientation or gender identity” in Florida’s K-3 classrooms. Officially known as the “Parental Rights in Education” bill (HB 1557), it is scheduled to go into effect on July 1, if Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has indicated his support for the bill, signs it into state law.

One of the stipulations in HB 1557 states that “classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”

House Rep. Joe Harding, who sponsored the bill in the Florida House, spoke to ABC News after the bill passed.

“What we’re preventing is a school district deciding they’re going to create a curriculum to insert themselves,” he said in an interview with ABC News’ “Start Here” podcast. “The school district doesn’t need to insert themselves at that point when children are still learning how to read and do basic math.”

High school students, especially LGBTQ youth have been protesting the bill, saying the pending legislation will be harmful to students who are already at higher risk for abuse and mental health conditions.

Some teachers and their unions are also calling out the bill, saying it’s politicizing the classroom and warning that the legislation could lead to bullying.

Karla Hernández-Mats, the president of United Teachers of Dade, a local union that represents 30,000 employees of Miami-Dade County Public Schools, told GMA she has heard from both teachers and parents about the “Parental Rights in Education” bill.

“Teachers find it ludicrous that we’re being used as scapegoats because, first of all, teachers don’t teach children to be gay. That’s absurd,” Hernández-Mats said, pointing out that sexual education is not a part of the existing K-3 curriculum in the state.

She went on, “We know that the curriculum for every school in Florida is set by the Florida Department of Education. So we understand that this is an attack on teachers, an attack on students, an attack on their freedom. Despite these attacks, we’re gonna keep on pushing forward.”

Hernández-Mats said parents are being misled about what is actually being taught in K-3 classrooms. She also argued that teachers should have the ability to guide students when new ideas and concepts are brought up by students themselves.

“The reality is that if there is a child that has something that they want to say that maybe they only feel safe in our school district, then we should be able as educators not only to embrace them and listen to what it is that they’re saying but provide them the resources also so that they can get the help that they need,” said Hernández-Mats, who has also worked as a middle school special education science teacher.

Some educators are also voicing their support for LGBTQ students and speaking out on social media and using the hashtags #dontsaygay and #dontsaygaybill on platforms like TikTok and Twitter.

Meghan Mayer, a public school teacher in North Port, Florida, shared a TikTok video with her perspective, saying in part, “Public education in America is under attack … we’re now going after our most vulnerable student population, or LGBTQ+ students. These students already face a higher rate of bullying and are at higher risk of suicide as compared to their straight cisgender peers.”

“As a Florida educator and honestly as a parent in Florida, I’m feeling pretty helpless,” Mayer said, before telling viewers to vote with their wallets and boycott corporations that have donated to lawmakers behind the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

The middle school reading teacher, who is considering switching to the elementary level, told “GMA” she is concerned about its real-world impact on students, some of whom have come to her asking for more information about the bill.

“It’s something that definitely concerns me, making that transition from middle to elementary because I want all of my students to feel loved and to feel seen and heard and valued and it’s gonna be really difficult to tell a student, ‘No, you can’t talk about your family. No, we’re not allowed to do that,'” she said. “I mean, how do you say that to a kindergartener or a first grader?”

Mayer said she read the text of the bill and found its language “so vague.”

“I just feel like it is really going to open the door for just a lot of discrimination. I think it’s going to do a lot of harm to a lot of our students,” she said.

Mayer also said it’s not just students who might be affected but her fellow teachers as well.

“When teachers have been through so much already, just like a lot of other essential workers have, a bill like this just continues to invalidate us as educators, like we don’t know what’s best,” she said. “I think that’s the thing that bothers me the most is that, ‘Do you think so little of us that you really think that we don’t know what’s appropriate and what’s not appropriate to talk about with students in our classroom?’ Once again, we’re just not respected as educators.”

“This bill worries me for educators too, who are LGBTQ,” Mayer continued. “Because does that mean that they can’t have a picture of them and their spouse on their desk for fear that somebody might ask about it and then that’s going to lead to some sort of conversation? I feel like it specifically targets LGBTQ students and teachers.”

President Biden has called the bill “hateful” and U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said his department opposes the state bill.

“Leaders in Florida are prioritizing hateful bills that hurt some of the students most in need,” he said in a statement. “The Department of Education has made clear that all schools receiving federal funding must follow federal civil rights law, including Title IX’s protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. We stand with our LGBTQ+ students in Florida and across the country, and urge Florida leaders to make sure all their students are protected and supported.”

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(NEW YORK) — Authorities will not bring any charges against the man accused of fatally shooting Jamaican immigrant Peter Spencer nine times on a camping trip in western Pennsylvania last December.

“We believe in this case that there is enough evidence presented for self-defense that we are not going to be able to overcome our burden and show this was not self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt, and for that reason, there will be no charges filed against the suspect in this case,” District Attorney Shawn White told reporters Tuesday.

“This is my call,” he added. “I believe it’s the right one.”

Spencer who is Black, went on a camping trip with a co-worker, who is white, in Rockland Township, Pennsylvania, on Dec. 11, 2021. A few hours after going on the trip, in the early hours of Dec. 12, Pennsylvania State Police were called to the scene and Spencer was found on the front lawn of the rural cabin with nine bullet wounds in his body, including six in his chest.

White said Spencer was using hallucinogenic mushrooms and started “acting crazy” as he fired multiple rounds from an AK-47 he had brought with him. White said Spencer was “not ambushed” and that he began firing the gun and ordered other campers to stay at gunpoint. Spencer’s co-worker then shot him.

Police said they found multiple firearms, “ballistic evidence” and controlled substances at the cabin.

The case was brought to the Heritage Affairs Team, which investigates hate crimes, but Corp. Aaron Allen, the liaison for the office, said he also will not be bringing charges.

“We also have been making sure that there isn’t any hate and/or bias detected throughout this investigation, and I can tell you right now that there’s not been any sort of hate and/or bias detected,” Allen said.

The Spencer family said it is not giving up despite the announcement charges will not be filed.

“We are not surprised by it, this is the type of behavior we have seen from the PA State Police and Venango County District Attorney from the outset,” Paul Jubas, the attorney for Peter Spencer’s family, said in a statement.

While state charges will not be filed, it is possible that there could be federal hate crime charges brought. Cindy Chung, the U.S. attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, will make that decision.

“If you want to know from a federal standpoint whether there’s any hate crime, I’m not competent to testify to that or give you an answer,” White said. “That’s her jurisdiction, she’s aware of the facts. Give her office a call.”

Spencer’s family said it will host a press conference next week with independent forensic pathologist Dr. Cyril Wecht to discuss their next steps.

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(SEATTLE) — Three people who were injured and the families of two people killed after a crane collapsed on a Seattle construction site in 2019, will receive $112 million in a settlement, David Beninger, a lawyer for one of the victims told ABC News Tuesday.

The crane fell from the construction site which included a Google office building in the South Lake Union neighborhood in April 2019 as it was being dismantled, killing four people.

Lawsuits filed by families of two of the victims killed in the collapse and three who were injured, were consolidated into one case in the King County Superior Court, involving multiple firms involved in the construction site where the crane collapsed.

In the Monday verdict, a jury found four of the construction companies negligent, but only three of the companies’ negligence resulted in the death of Sarah Wong and Alan Justad, and injury of Brittany Cadelina, Ali Edriss and Sally Beaven.

While the jury found GLY Construction, the company that leased the crane, negligent, it was not found responsible for the deaths and injuries.

The other companies named in the lawsuit are Morrow Equipment, which owned and leased the crane to the construction project and provided expertise for the building and dismantling of the crane; Northwest Tower Crane Service, which was in charge of setting up and dismantling the crane; and Omega Morgan, a mobile crane subcontractor.

The jury attributed 45% of the negligence to Northwest Tower Crane, 30% to Omega Morgan and 25% to Morrow Equipment.

The jury awarded the victims more than $150 million in damages, but Morrow Equipment Company did not participate in the trial as it is in discussions regarding other agreements with the victims, according to Beninger.

Wong’s estate, her parents and sibling are to receive a combined $54.15 million. Nineteen-year-old Wong, a student at Seattle Pacific University, was a passenger in a car when parts of the crane struck it causing her fatal injuries.

Justad’s estate and his three daughters will receive a combined $39.15 million. Seventy-one-year-old Justad was in his car when parts of the crane landed on top of the vehicle.

Cadelina and Edriss will each receive $9.2 million and Beaven will receive $975,000, according to Beninger and amounts awarded by the jury.

“Northwest Tower Crane Service respects the verdict of the jury and thanks them for their service in this trial. Northwest Tower Crane changed its practices immediately after this tragic accident and continues to strive to make safety its top priority,” an attorney for Northwest Tower Crane Services said to ABC News in a statement, declining to comment any further.

Attorneys for the Wongs, Cadelina and Omega did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.

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(BALTIMORE) — A loaded 1,095-foot cargo ship remained stuck Tuesday morning in Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay, presenting Coast Guard officials with what they described as a “logistical challenge” to free the vessel without polluting the environment.

The container vessel, named Ever Forward, ran aground Sunday night after leaving Baltimore, Petty Officer 1st Class Steve Lehmann, a spokesman for the Coast Guard’s Mid-Atlantic district, told ABC News Tuesday morning.

Lehmann said the ship is stuck in about 23-feet of water but is not blocking traffic in the bay’s deep-water channel.

“It’s a pretty big logistical challenge,” Lehmann said about freeing the ship.

Lehmann said a Coast Guard environmental team boarded the ship to make an assessment of its condition and determine how to safely get it towed off what is believed to be a sandbar without polluting the water or causing harm to the crew.

“We’re making sure all boxes are checked,” said Lehmann, adding that a timeline has not yet been established on when an attempt to free the vessel will be made.

Lehmann said no one was injured and no pollution has been detected as a result of the mishap.

He said the Coast Guard was notified of the incident around 9 p.m. Sunday. The vessel was headed to Norfolk, Virginia.

Coast Guard officials said the ship was apparently traveling outside the deep-water channel when it got hung up.

Lehmann said the ship is believed to be owned by Evergreen Marine Corp., noting the company’s name on the side of the vessel. Evergreen Marine, based in Taiwan, is also the owner of a cargo ship Ever Given, which got stuck in Egypt’s Suez Canal in March 2021, blocking the world-famous waterway for six days and causing massive delays in global shipping.

ABC News has reached out to Evergreen Marine Corp. for comment but has received no immediate response.

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(NEW YORK) — Police in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday said they arrested a suspect in a series of shootings targeting homeless people in New York City and Washington.

The Metropolitan Police Department confirmed the arrest on Twitter, thanking the community “for all your tips.”

A law enforcement source told ABC News that Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents from the Washington Field Division arrested a man that investigators believe is the suspect in the shootings. The arrest was made early Tuesday morning along Pennsylvania Avenue in southeastern Washington.

The mayors of New York City and Washington, D.C., had offered a $70,000 reward in connection to deadly shootings involving people experiencing homelessness between the two cities.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams and Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser announced the news in a rare joint press conference on Monday.

“Homelessness should not be a homicide,” Adams said. “This was a cold-blooded attack.”

DC and New York City police were jointly investigating the shootings of five homeless people across both cities that they said may have been committed by the same suspect.

Because of similarities in “the modus operandi of the perpetrator, common circumstances involved in each shooting, circumstances of the victims and recovered evidence,” both police departments in New York City and Washington D.C., will jointly investigate the shootings with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, they said in a Sunday news release.

The first shootings occurred in Washington on March 3, 8 and 9. The victim found on March 9 was discovered by police when they were responding to a tent fire in the city’s northeast. He succumbed to stab and gunshot wounds, according to an autopsy.

The two shootings in New York occurred on March 12. One victim was injured and another was killed, according to the joint news release.

NYPD Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell and MPD Chief Robert J. Contee III said in the news release that they are committed to safety for homeless individuals and to finding the suspect in the shootings.

“Our homeless population is one of our most vulnerable and an individual preying on them as they sleep is an exceptionally heinous crime,” Sewell said in a statement.

“We are committed to sharing every investigative path, clue and piece of evidence with our law enforcement partners to bring this investigation to a swift conclusion and the individual behind these vicious crimes to justice,” Contee said.

Both communities “are heartbroken and disturbed by these heinous crimes in which an individual has been targeting some of our most vulnerable residents,” Adams and Bowser said in a statement on Sunday.

“It is heartbreaking and tragic to know that in addition to all the dangers that unsheltered residents face, we now have a cold-blooded killer on the loose, but we are certain that we will get the suspect off the street and into police custody,” they said.

The mayors said they spoke on Sunday about their cities working together on the investigation.

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