National

(NEW YORK) — Donald Trump’s one-time lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen arrived Wednesday at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office to meet with prosecutors investigating the former president’s role in alleged hush payments to a porn actress before the 2016 election.

This is Cohen’s 15th interview with the district attorney’s office but the first since a recently convened grand jury began hearing evidence about the $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about a long-denied affair with Trump.

Cohen helped arrange the payment with David Pecker, then-publisher of the National Enquirer. Pecker appeared before the grand jury on Jan. 30.

The hush-money case was rejected by former District Attorney Cy Vance, but revived under current District Attorney Alvin Bragg, whose office has been fending off criticism of a decision not to charge Trump earlier.

“I thought it’s important not only to shed light on the evidence but also the back and forth that took place,” said Mark Pomerantz, a former special assistant district attorney who co-led the investigation until his resignation last year and the author of a new book, People vs. Donald Trump: An Inside Account.

“The underlying question of guilt was not one that divided people,” Pomerantz told GMA3 in an interview airing Wednesday. “I think there was a fear that if you go forward with the case and don’t win, you shake public confidence in the legal system.”

Bragg has said the case Pomerantz wanted to bring, that centered on Trump’s allegedly fraudulent statements of financial condition, was “not ready” and he expressed concern the book’s publication could hurt the ongoing investigation.

“I didn’t write the book to try and help Donald Trump avoid prosecution. The message of the book is the evidence was there,” Pomerantz said.

Trump has always denied having an affair with Daniels and has called Bragg’s investigation a “witch hunt.”

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(DETROIT) — The Michigan State Police says it continues to investigate the deaths of three Michigan rappers after confirming Tuesday each died of multiple gunshot wounds.

Police have determined that their deaths were not a random incident and believe they have determined a motive, though it has not yet been released.

The rappers — 38-year-old Armani Kelly, 31-year-old Dante Wicker and 31-year-old Montoya Givens — were last seen on Jan. 21.

Their remains were found last week in the basement of an abandoned apartment complex in Highland Park, Michigan.

The men were scheduled to perform for a rap event at Lounge 31 that was canceled at the last minute due to an issue with the DJ.

Police had been concerned about their disappearance because there had not been any activity on their phones or online accounts.

Police said the three men were together at some point on Jan. 21, but they do not know if they left Lounge 31 together.

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(NEW YORK) — A 72-year-old grandmother has been arrested and charged with first degree murder in the beating death of her own 8-year-old granddaughter.

Authorities were first notified of the incident at approximately 4 p.m. on Tuesday when officials from the Nash County Sheriff’s Office were notified of a juvenile who had been brought into the emergency room with severe injuries and was dead upon arrival at Nash UNC Healthcare in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, about 50 miles east of Raleigh.

Deputies and detectives from the Nash County Sheriff’s Office immediately responded to the hospital to further investigate the cause of death and it was determined that the 8-year-old girl lived in the 5000 block of Dutchman Road in Nashville, North Carolina, only several miles away from the hospital.

“Based on the investigation, it was determined that the 8-year old juvenile was beaten so severe by the Grandmother that she died from the injuries,” Nash County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement announcing the death of the young girl. “The child had severe injuries throughout her entire body and head.”

The 8-year-old girl lived at the home with her grandmother, who was the child’s legal guardian along with several other siblings who lived there as well.

The grandmother — named by police as 72-year-old Patricia Ann Ricks — was subsequently arrested and taken to the Nash County Sheriff’s Office where she made no statement regarding the case, police say.

She was charged with First Degree Murder and Felony Child Abuse with Serious Injury and placed into the Nash County Detention Center with no bond, authorities said.

Ricks is scheduled to make her first court appearance on Thursday in Nash County District Court.

Police said they are currently unaware of any possible motive for the beating death of the 8-year-old girl and that her surviving siblings are now in the custody of the Nash County Department of Social Services. The investigation is ongoing.

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(FAYETTEVILLE, N.C.) — An infant has been shot and two adults have been pronounced dead following a shooting inside a North Carolina home, police said.

The incident occurred at approximately 8:28 p.m. on Tuesday when officers from the Fayetteville Police Department responded to reports of a shooting on the 1100 block of Bunce Road in Fayetteville, North Carolina, about 10 miles south of Fort Bragg.

“When officers arrived on scene they located two adult victims inside a residence suffering from gunshot wounds and they were pronounced deceased on scene,” the Fayetteville Police Department said in a statement following the shooting.

The other victim, an infant, was also struck by gunfire and taken to a local area hospital for treatment. Authorities did not disclose the age of the child or if the infant had any relation to the two who were pronounced dead on the scene.

The Fayetteville Police Department did not give any further details on the condition of the baby or the severity of the injuries suffered in the shooting.

Authorities have closed off the road in both directions as they continue to investigate.

“Detectives with the Fayetteville Police Department’s Homicide Unit have assumed the investigation, and the investigation is ongoing,” said the Fayetteville Police Department. “Additional information will be released as it becomes available.”

Anyone with information regarding this homicide investigation is asked to contact Detective M. Waters at (910) 635-4978 or Crimestoppers at (910) 483-TIPS (8477).

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(NEW YORK) — A Massachusetts 32-year-old woman charged with strangling her three young children to death last month planned the killings, prosecutors argued on Tuesday, disclosing new details about the alleged actions of the woman, Lindsay Clancy, on the day of the incident.

Prosecutors, trying to prove that Clancy was not mentally compromised on Jan. 24, the day of the deaths, described in court a day that suggested nothing out of the ordinary. She took a child to the pediatrician’s office and built a snowman with her kids in their backyard, they said.

Later that afternoon, according to prosecutors, Clancy, who appeared in court Tuesday via Zoom from her hospital bed, searched on Apple Maps the time it would take to drive to and from a restaurant in an adjacent town. She then called the restaurant to place a pick-up order before asking her husband, Patrick, to drive to get the meal, prosecutors said.

The restaurant, in Plymouth, Massachusetts, was farther from the family’s Duxbury home than where they normally ordered take-out from, said Jennifer Sprague, the Plymouth County Assistant District Attorney, who added that Clancy sounded mentally intact when placing the order.

“The hostess who took the call said there was nothing out of the ordinary about this call. Her voice was not slurred or impaired in any way,” Sprague said Tuesday.

Shortly after her husband left, Clancy texted him to ask him to buy medication at CVS on the way to the restaurant. While there, he called Clancy to clarify which medicine to get — a phone call Patrick Clancy told prosecutors was “completely normal,” though he noted that his wife “seemed like she was in the middle of something.”

Patrick Clancy described to prosecutors returning home to his wife on the ground in the backyard, with cuts on her wrist and neck. The window of their second-floor bedroom was open. She was conscious, prosecutors said.

When Patrick asked where the kids were, Lindsay replied, “In the basement,” according to Sprague.

There, Patrick found his three children with exercise bands still wrapped around each of their necks.

On Monday, Sprague said, Lindsay Clancy called her husband from her hospital bed and told him she killed their children “because she heard a voice and had ‘a moment of psychosis,'” though Patrick told prosecutors his wife had never mentioned hearing voices.

“She planned these murders. She gave herself the time and privacy she needed to commit the murders, and then she strangled each child in the place where they should have felt the safest – at home with their mom,” said Sprague.

Clancy’s defense attorney, Kevin Reddington, argued that the killings “were not planned by any means” and were a product of mental illness. He added that Clancy had previously mentioned having suicidal thoughts and checked herself into a mental health facility for five days in early January.

On Tuesday, a judge ordered Clancy to remain hospitalized until medically cleared to move to a rehabilitation facility. A probable cause hearing was scheduled for May 2.

On the day of the incident, police received a 911 call just after 6 p.m. ET, from a man who said his wife had attempted suicide by jumping out of a window at their house.

First responders rushed to the home and located Lindsay Clancy, whom they treated on scene before transporting her to a Boston hospital, Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz said last month.

First responders subsequently found three young children, a 5-year-old girl, a 3-year-old boy and a 7-month-old boy, inside the home “unconscious with obvious signs of severe trauma,” Cruz said.

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(NEW YORK) — A former Brooklyn man, who became a sniper and weapons instructor for ISIS, was convicted Tuesday of providing material support to terrorism and other charges.

Ruslan Maratovich Asainov, a U.S. citizen and former resident of Bay Ridge, was found guilty on all five counts, including charges that his material support for ISIS resulted in death. He faces up to life in prison.

“As proven at trial, Asainov was a member of ISIS, a violent foreign terrorist organization, which has committed numerous acts resulting in the deaths of many U.S. citizens and others,” said United States Attorney Breon Peace. “The defendant committed to the terrorist organization’s evil cause and made an extraordinary journey to the battlefield in Syria, where he became a lethal sniper for ISIS and trained many other ISIS members to kill. Even after being captured, he still pledged his allegiance to ISIS.”

Asainov is a naturalized U.S. citizen who converted to Islam in 2009 and became increasingly interested in Islamic extremism. By 2013, he was consuming radical content online, dropped out of Borough of Manhattan Community College and began preparing to travel to Syria.

Asainov abandoned his wife and daughter in Brooklyn before traveling on a one-way ticket from New York to Istanbul, Turkey, to obtain entry into Syria. Upon his arrival, he fought for five years on behalf of ISIS, including the Islamic State’s last stand in Syria Baghouz, in March 2019. His wife testified he sent her a photograph of three dead fighters, one of whom was wearing a patch that stated, “Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham,” in Arabic script.

Asainov received training on how to use automatic rifles, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and trained as a sniper. During the two-week trial, a former U.S. Navy SEAL scout sniper testified the sniper training course Asainov was in was consistent with what the former SEAL would expect to be taught in a sniper training program.

Asainov was captured in Syria and told his mother in a recorded phone call from prison he was carrying out Allah’s orders when he waged jihad and killed for ISIS. He also said that he intended to return to waging jihad if released, and that he would fight until he “meet[s] Allah,” according to the indictment.

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(MEMPHIS, Tenn.) — One of the former Memphis officers charged in connection with Tyre Nichols’ death took a photo of Nichols after he was handcuffed and texted it to multiple people, according to newly obtained state records.

Demetrius Haley took two pictures on his personal cell phone of the “obviously injured” Nichols after he had been handcuffed, according to a Tennessee Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission document obtained by ABC News. He admitted to sharing a photo in a text message with five people, according to the document.

The document was part of the process to decertify Haley and the four other former officers charged with second-degree murder.

A sixth officer has also been fired following a violent encounter with Memphis police caught on body camera.

Seven additional Memphis police officers could face discipline in connection with the incident, the city’s chief legal officer, Jennifer Sink, told ABC News Tuesday.

Those additional officers will be receiving a “statement of charges,” which notifies an officer about a policy violation prior to an administrative hearing and decision about discipline, officials said.

“The administrative investigation is still ongoing, and so this information is subject to change,” Sink said in a statement. “The administrative investigation is solely to determine if city policies were violated and what disciplinary action should be taken.”

Graphic footage of the Jan. 7 traffic stop, which showed officers beating Nichols, was released to the public last month and sparked nationwide outrage.

Nichols, 29, died on Jan. 10, after spending three days in a hospital.

Nichols’ mother and stepfather, RowVaughn and Rodney Wells, who have been pushing for charges in their son’s case, will be attending Tuesday night’s State of the Union as guests of the first lady.

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(NEW YORK) — The 26-year-old NYPD officer who was shot during a robbery while off-duty has died at Brookdale University Hospital, according to city and police officials.

Adeed Fayaz had been on the force for five years, officials said, and is survived by a wife and two children.

A cordon of officers awaits the dignified transfer of his body from the hospital to the medical examiner’s office, officials said.

A 38-year-old man suspected of shooting Fayaz on Saturday night has been arrested in Rockland County, New York, where he was found hiding out in a hotel, according to police.

Charges are pending against Randy Jones, who was apprehended at a Days Inn in Nanuet on Monday and taken into custody in the wounded officer’s handcuffs, police said.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams had said Saturday that Fayaz was “fighting for his life.”

Just before 7 p.m Saturday, Fayaz and his brother-in-law went to a location in Brooklyn to meet someone to buy a car, according to authorities.

Fayaz and his brother-in-law were met by Jones, who asked whether either of them was carrying a gun, NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig said. When they said no, Jones allegedly put Fayaz in a headlock, pointed a gun at him and demanded money, police said.

Fayaz broke free and Jones shot him in the head, Essig said. The brother-in-law took a gun from Fayaz’s holster and returned fire, getting off six shots before Jones fled in a 2011 BMW, according to authorities. Police tracked the car to Jones’ mother, according to police.

Jones has at least three prior arrests, including one in 2014 for strangulation. Police are also looking into several Facebook Marketplace robberies to see whether he was involved, Essig said.

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(SANTA FE, N.M.) —

Alec Baldwin’s attorney moved on Tuesday to disqualify the special prosecutor in New Mexico who investigated him over the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of “Rust.”

The special prosecutor, Andrea Reeb, is a member of the New Mexico House of Representatives. She was elected to her first term last year and assumed office on Jan. 1.

“Under Section 1 of Article III of the New Mexico Constitution, however, a sitting member of the Legislature may not ‘exercise any powers properly belonging’ to either the executive or judicial branch,” Baldwin’s defense attorney, Luke Nikas, wrote in a motion filed on Tuesday.

Baldwin has been charged with two counts of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the death of Hutchins.

His defense attorney argued Reeb cannot simultaneously exercise legislative and judicial power.

“Were the arrangement here approved by the courts, future District Attorneys could seek to curry favor with legislators who control their budgets by appointing them to high-profile cases — distorting the legislative process,” Nikas said in the motion to disqualify.

“A prosecutor who also serves as a legislator could face pressure to make prosecutorial decisions that serve her legislative interests, such as by prosecuting a prominent defendant associated with an opposing faction within the Legislature even in the face of conflicting evidence or law,” the motion continued.

The filing cited a funding request from First Judicial District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies of $635,500 from the New Mexico Board of Finance for the prosecution of individuals related to the Rust shooting. The proposed budget included $156,000 for Reeb’s salary.

“In short, there can be no question that Representative Reeb is violating both the plain text and the purpose of the New Mexico Constitution’s separation-of-powers provision by serving simultaneously as a legislator and a prosecutor. She must be removed,” Nikas said.

The district attorney’s office brushed off the motion, calling it a distraction.

“Mr. Baldwin and his attorneys can use whatever tactics they want to distract from the fact that Halyna Hutchins died because of more than mere negligence on the ‘Rust’ film set,” Heather Brewer, a spokesperson for the First Judicial District Attorney, said in a statement. “However, the district attorney and the special prosecutor will remain focused on the evidence and on trying this case so that justice is served.”

Hutchins was fatally shot on the Santa Fe set of the Western on Oct. 21, 2021. In addition to Baldwin, the film’s armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, was charged with two counts of involuntary manslaughter over her death. They both are scheduled to make their first court appearance virtually on Feb. 24.

First assistant director David Halls has already agreed to plead no contest for the charge of negligent use of a deadly weapon in connection with the shooting. The plea agreement is pending a judge’s approval, prosecutors said last week. A plea conference has been scheduled for March 8.

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(NEW YORK) — Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg responded for the first time since the release of a book Tuesday by former special assistant district attorney Mark Pomerantz, which accuses Bragg of making a mistake by failing to bring a criminal case against former President Donald Trump at the onset of his tenure.

“I bring hard cases when they are ready,” Bragg said Tuesday in response to a question from ABC News. “Mark Pomerantz’s case was not ready.”

Bragg called Pomerantz’s criticisms of the prosecutors in the district attorney’s office “appalling,” saying they’re committed to keeping the public safety “from the suites to the streets.”

The book, “People vs. Donald Trump: An Inside Account,” was released Tuesday.

Bragg said he has not read the book, but he has seen televised interviews with Pomerantz in which he criticizes Bragg for declining to bring a criminal case over Trump’s statements of financial condition.

A parallel civil case by New York Attorney General Letitia James alleged those statements were fraudulently completed to inflate Trump’s net worth so he could obtain better loan terms.

Bragg said he remained concerned the book could undermine his ongoing investigation.

Bragg’s office sent a letter in mid-January to both Simon & Schuster, the book’s publisher, and Pomerantz expressing concern that the book could interfere with the ongoing investigation.

“Based on the pre-publication descriptions of his book and the benefit of current knowledge of the matter, but without access to the manuscript, this Office believes there is a meaningful risk that the publication will materially prejudice ongoing criminal investigations and related adjudicative proceedings,” read the letter, a copy of which was obtained by ABC News.

A grand jury has started hearing evidence about Trump’s role in hush payments to Stormy Daniels, sources have told ABC News.

Trump’s former personal attorney, Michael Cohen, is expected to appear before that grand jury this week, sources told ABC News.

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