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(NEW YORK) — A former librarian has filed a lawsuit against Llano County, Texas, and local library officials after she says she was fired for refusing to purge certain books from the library’s collection.

“A public library is a foundation of any good society,” Suzette Baker, who had been appointed head librarian of Kingland Library in 2021, said in an interview with ABC News. “It’s like the cornerstone for our society and if that cornerstone were to fall, we would collapse. We would have no basis to form our own independent thoughts.”

She is accusing county officials of violating her First and 14th Amendment rights as well as those of the library’s patrons.

Baker alleges in her lawsuit that she was fired for “insubordination,” “creating a disturbance,” “violation of policies,” “failure to follow instructions,” and “allowing personal opinions to interfere with job duties and procedures” after refusing to remove the books.

Baker said she feels particularly passionate against what she is calling “censorship” because of the oath she said she made while serving in the military to uphold the U.S. Constitution: “That still resonates with me.”

ABC News has reached out to Llano County and library officials for comment on this most recent lawsuit regarding Baker’s termination.

In 2021, community groups began pushing for the removal of books that they declared inappropriate or unnecessary for the library’s collection. In some cases, they likened the books to “pornography” or “grooming,” the lawsuit states.

These books were predominantly written by or about people of color and LGBTQ individuals. They touched on topics such as race, gender, health, and sexual orientation.

“They’re using incredibly stigmatizing and derogatory language and stereotypes, while attempting to censor these books,” said Baker’s attorney Iris Halpern. “The language that they’re using, how they’re collapsing criminality with the content of these books or their authors, I think only further highlights the animus against LGTBQ [sic] people and people of color.”

Titles like How to be an Anti-Racist, They Called Themselves the KKK: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group, and Being Jazz: My Life As A Transgender Teen were impacted by county efforts to remove the books from shelves.

In some cases, books that “depict bodily functions in a humorous manner in cartoon format,” such as My Butt is so Noisy, were criticized by these groups as “obscene” and promoting “‘grooming’ behavior,” according to court documents.

It’s Perfectly Normal, a book about human biology depicted through cartoons, was also removed because critics claimed it encouraged “child grooming,” according to federal judge Robert Pitman.

Some of these book restrictions were inspired by a 2021 list sent by Texas State Representative Matt Krause to the Texas Education Agency and several school district superintendents with more than 800 books that “might make students feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress because of their race or sex,” he said in a letter first reported by the Texas Tribune.

In April 2022, several Llano County residents sued county officials and the library over the book removals.

Seventeen of the removed books were returned to shelves under a court order from Pitman in March 2023 that asserted that the books were protected by the First Amendment.

The county appealed the judge’s ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit where the case is still pending. At the time of the appeal’s filing, the Llano County Commissioners Court, an elected governing body of the county, called a special meeting. The presiding officer of the Comissioner’s Court, Judge Ron Cunningham, issued a press release defending the Commissioners Court’s actions and decrying the expense the litigation had cost the county.

At the special meeting, officials also considered ceasing operations of the library system.

“Our librarians weed books all the time, and almost every public library must continually weed books that aren’t being checked out to make room for new books given our limited shelf space,” according to the April 2023 press release.

It continued, “The plaintiffs have falsely accused our librarian of weeding these books because of their content, even though our librarian has stated repeatedly under oath that she hasn’t even read the books and weeded them for reasons unrelated to their content or viewpoints.”

Baker also claimed in the lawsuit that some of the books removed from shelves did not meet the standards necessary to be “weeded out” in order to make room for new content.

Baker said these books are vital for people to see themselves in different stories and learn more about the people and world around them.

“One of the lessons I grew up with was you don’t judge anybody unless you walk a mile in their shoes,” said Baker. “How do you walk a mile in their shoes, especially when it’s in a small county? … You can pick up a book at a public library, and you can walk in somebody else’s shoes, and you can learn something outside of your little bubble of community. And that’s what those books are so important for.”

Book bans have been seen across the country in record-breaking numbers: Roughly 1,269 demands were made to censor library books and resources in 2022, according to the American Library Association. The organization says it is the highest number of attempted book bans since it began collecting data over 20 years ago.

The vast majority of book banning attempts were made against literature written by or about members of the LGBTQIA+ community and people of color, according to the ALA.

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(NEW YORK) — A former cheese producer in New York has pleaded guilty in connection to manufacturing raw milk products that were linked to an outbreak of listeria which resulted in two deaths and eight hospitalizations, authorities say.

Johannes Vulto and his company, Vulto Creamery LLC, each pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of causing the introduction of adulterated food into interstate commerce on Tuesday after it was discovered that a 2016-2017 outbreak of listeriosis, the disease caused by the pathogen Listeria monocytogenes, was linked back to cheese made in his factory, according to a press release published by the Department of Justice on Tuesday.

“Vulto oversaw operations at Vulto Creamery manufacturing facility in Walton, New York, including those relating to sanitation and environmental monitoring,” the Department of Justice said. “In pleading guilty, Vulto and Vulto Creamery admitted that between December 2014 and March 2017, they caused the shipment in interstate commerce of adulterated cheese.”

Environmental swabs taken at the Vulto Creamery facility between July 2014 and February 2017 repeatedly tested positive for Listeria species, according to the plea agreement.

“The Listeria family includes both harmless species and L. monocytogenes, which can cause listeriosis in humans. In March 2017, after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) linked Vulto Creamery’s cheese to an outbreak of listeriosis, Vulto shut down the Vulto Creamery facility and issued a partial recall that was expanded to a full recall within weeks,” the DOJ said.

The listeriosis outbreak caused by the sanitation issues resulted in eight hospitalizations and two deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“It is crucial that American consumers be able to trust that the foods they buy are safe to eat,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian Boynton, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “The department will continue to work with its law enforcement partners to hold responsible food manufacturers that sell dangerously contaminated products.”

Listeriosis is a severe, invasive illness that can be life-threatening in some cases, particularly for pregnant women and their newborns, the elderly and persons with weakened immune systems.

“This investigation and prosecution holds accountable the defendant and his business who through unsafe practices caused illness and death to consumers in an entirely preventable tragedy,” said U.S. Attorney Carla B. Freedman for the Northern District of New York. “The law enforcement and regulatory partners involved in this case will continue to work together to bring to justice those who endanger the public through unsafe and unsanitary products and facilities.”

Vulto and Vulto Creamery pleaded guilty in Syracuse, New York, and a sentencing date is expected to be set by the court at a later date.

“U.S. consumers rely on the FDA to ensure that their food is safe and wholesome,” said Special Agent in Charge Fernando McMillan of the FDA’s Office of Criminal Investigations New York Field Office. “When companies and individuals put themselves above the law by producing food that endangers and harms the public, as occurred in this case, we will see that they are brought to justice.”

The FDA’s Office of Criminal Investigations investigated the case.

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(CLEARWATER, Fla.) — New details have emerged in the February small plane crash at a Clearwater, Florida, mobile home park that left three dead.

According to the preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board released on Tuesday, two people at Clearwater Air Park told the Federal Aviation Administration that the pilot of the Beech 35 plane said he could not find the airport. He “asked them to turn on the runway lights, which were already on from an airplane that had just landed,” the report said.

The pilot, Jemin Patel, 54, of Melbourne Beach, asked air traffic control in another communication to turn the runway lights on, the report said. Although the air traffic controllers changed the lighting to its “highest intensity,” per the report, the pilot was unable to locate the airport.

The pilot then announced he had a “fire,” the officials said, according to the NTSB preliminary report. A few minutes later, he said he was going to Albert Whitted airport since he couldn’t find CLW, the report said.

The Clearwater air traffic control asked the pilot to turn 180 degrees and maintain his altitude, but he reportedly said he was “losing engine,” according to the report. The controller asked the pilot if he could see the St. Petersburg-Clearwater International Airport, which was three miles ahead, but no further communications came through from the aircraft.

Two witnesses of the incident — a pilot, and a passenger in a car — both reported seeing a bright light before the plane crashed. The passenger described it as a “fireball,” according to the report. The nearby pilot then saw the plane crash.

As ABC News previously reported, the small plane crashed into a mobile home in Clearwater, Florida, on Feb. 1. The pilot and two people who were in one of the mobile homes hit by the plane died. Authorities later confirmed the victims from the home were Martha Perry, 86, and Mary Ellen Pender, 54. Perry lived in the home and Pender was visiting, the city previously said. Another person suffered minor injuries.

A total of four homes were engulfed in fire following the crash, but firefighters quickly doused the flames, officials said at the time.

The NTSB is continuing to review videos from commercial businesses that recorded the incident. The NTSB said wreckage from the scene was collected for further examination.

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(NEW YORK) — The public release of the now-infamous 2005 Access Hollywood tape before the 2016 presidential election “served as the catalyst” for Donald Trump’s hush payment to Stormy Daniels and should be admissible at Trump’s upcoming hush money trial, prosecutors argued in a court filing Tuesday.

Trump’s defense team had asked the judge to keep the tape out of the trial, arguing it is “inflammatory” and of limited value.

On the tape, Trump can be heard saying that “when you’re a star, you can do anything” to women, including “Grab them by the p—-.”

“I said it, I was wrong and I apologize,” Trump said after the tape surfaced about a month before the 2016 election.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office argued the tape “bears directly on defendant’s intent and motive” for making the hush payment about three weeks later, then allegedly falsifying business records to hide the hush payment’s true purpose from voters.

Trump in April pleaded not guilty to a 34-count indictment charging him with falsifying business records in connection with the hush money payment his then-attorney Michael Cohen made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels just days before the 2016 election. The former president has denied all wrongdoing.

“Indeed, the evidence will demonstrate that the release of the Access Hollywood Tape caused a panic within the campaign about defendant’s electoral prospects and ultimately served as the catalyst for consummating the Stormy Daniels payoff,” assistant district attorney Matthew Colangelo wrote in Tuesday’s filing.

The district attorney’s filing also opposed a defense request to keep Cohen from testifying at trial.

The defense argued prosecutors would be suborning perjury if they called Cohen to the witness stand, but prosecutors called the argument “intentionally inflammatory and totally meritless” since Cohen would be subject to cross-examination.

“In an argument that reads more like a press release than a legal filing, defendant makes the obviously unsupportable request that the Court preclude one of the People’s witnesses from testifying at trial on the ground that defendant anticipates that he will disbelieve the witness’s expected testimony,” the filing said.

Cohen served time in federal prison for lying to Congress in 2017, but Judge Arthur Engoron, who presided over Trump’s recent civil fraud trial in New York, found that Cohen “told the truth” when he testified that Trump directed him to inflate his net worth.

“And it is misleading for defendant to argue otherwise without even advising this Court that Justice Engoron found Cohen’s testimony credible and truthful,” Colangelo wrote in Tuesday’s filing.

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(NEW YORK) — Law enforcement in Georgia said they seized hundreds of pounds of methamphetamine after discovering it in a storage unit.

The Clayton County Police Department confirmed Tuesday, alongside the Drug Enforcement Administration, it had recovered 855 pounds of crystal meth. The drugs were recovered on Monday, police said.

The drugs were found in a storage unit located in a storage facility on Jimmy Carter Boulevard in Norcross, Georgia. Authorities didn’t provide further details on the seizure.

The street value of the drugs was estimated by authorities to be worth $1.5 million.

Authorities released a photo of officers and DEA agents standing behind the drugs, much of them stored in plastic food storage containers with colored lids.

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(SKWENTNA, Alaska) — Five-time Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race champ Dallas Seavey was forced to fatally shoot and gut what he described as an “angry moose” after the animal became entangled with his team of dogs, critically injuring one, according to officials of the famed Alaska competition.

The wild encounter occurred Monday just before 2 a.m. Alaska time about 14 miles from a race checkpoint in Skwentna, Iditarod race Marshal Warren Palfrey said in a statement.

“Race officials were notified at 1:43 a.m. that veteran musher Dalley Seavey was forced to dispatch a moose in self-defense after the moose became entangled with the dogs and the musher on the trail,” according to Palfrey.

Seavey immediately notified Alaska State Troopers and the race marshal of the encounter in keeping with the competition’s rules.

After shooting the moose with a handgun, Seavey gutted the animal as required by Rule 34 of the race.

The rule states that “in the event that an edible big game animal, i.e., moose, caribou, buffalo, is killed in defense of life or property, the musher must gut the animal and report the incident to a race official at the next checkpoint.”

After killing and gutting the moose, Seavey continued with the 1,000-mile race, stopping only to rest and feed his dogs at the Finger Lake checkpoint at 8 a.m., race officials said.

Seavey dropped off his injured dog at the Finger Lake checkpoint and carried on with the race, officials said.

The dog was flown to Anchorage, where it was being treated at a veterinary clinic.

“With help from snowmobile-aided support in the area, we are making sure that every attempt is made to utilize and salvage the moose meat,” Palfrey said in the statement.

On his Facebook page, Seavey identified his injured dog as “Faloo.”

“As a result of an angry moose on the trail, Faloo was flown to Anchorage and was taken to the Anchorage Vet Clinic,” Seavey said in the Facebook post.

He said Faloo arrived at the Anchorage clinic in critical condition and underwent surgery.

“We received an update [Monday] evening that she is out of surgery and remains in critical condition,” Seavey said. “We promise to keep you all updated once we receive more updates. We appreciate all of the thoughts and prayers.”

Seavey, who last won the Iditarod in 2021, was listed in sixth place Tuesday on the race leaderboard.

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(NEW YORK) — Six people were arrested Tuesday in connection with a scheme to smuggle thousands of pounds of raw goose and duck intestines from China, through Los Angeles, and ultimately to New York City for sale to restaurants and consumers.

Five of the defendants reside in Brooklyn and one in Queens, according to a criminal complaint. They are charged with importing and selling illegal merchandise from China.

According to the criminal complaint, shipments of the illegal products were falsely labeled. An August 19, 2022, a shipping container that arrived in Long Beach, California, from China falsely stated the container held “1,966 cartons of pet grooming tool pet nail clippers.”

Federal law prohibits the importation of raw goose and duck intestines from China and duck-blood products from any unapproved establishments in China. Federal prosecutors said the products seized in the investigation contained both.

In the August shipment, investigators said they observed 79 cartons containing approximately 1,800 pounds of illegal goose intestines and 960 pounds of illegal duck intestines.

In another shipment, the illegal products were concealed under packaged rattlesnakes, the complaint says.

“Each defendant knew of the illegal nature of their conduct,” federal prosecutors said. Five of the defendants had been warned previously by USDA authorities, they said. Investigators believe there are additional shipments of illegal products that have gone undiscovered.

“[S]hipment records for the companies involved in the shipments of illegal merchandise described above indicate a broader conspiracy than just the shipments that have been identified to date,” the complaint said.

The six defendants were expected to make an initial appearance in Brooklyn federal court later Tuesday. It was not immediately clear whether they had lawyers.

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(NEW YORK) — Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., and his wife faced new obstruction allegations and charges Tuesday in a superseding indictment filed by federal prosecutors in Manhattan.

The superseding indictment charges the senator and Nadine Menendez with new counts of conspiracy to obstruct justice and obstruction of justice related to their alleged attempts to cover up the bribe payments the senator is accused of taking from several New Jersey businessmen.

The pair allegedly instructed their attorneys at the time to tell federal investigators they thought a mortgage payment on Nadine Menendez’s house and a payment for her Mercedes-Benz were loans when, in fact, prosecutors said they knew the payments were bribes.

The new accusations appear to result from last week’s guilty plea of co-defendant Jose Uribe, who admitted to providing Nadine Menendez with a Mercedes-Benz convertible in exchange for the senator’s help.

When Menendez and his wife learned of the federal investigation in 2022, prosecutors said they sought to cover up the bribe payments.

“In truth and in fact, as Menendez well knew, Menendez had learned of both the mortgage company payment and the car payments prior to 2022, and that they were not loans but bribe payments,” the superseding indictment said.

The senator, his wife and other defendants previously pleaded not guilty to charges in the bribery case. The trial was scheduled for May.

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(NEW YORK) — More human remains were found in two locations in West Babylon, New York, on Tuesday a week after severed body parts belonging to two people were found in a Long Island park, according to police.

Human remains were found in Bethpage State Park and in a wooded area across 103 Lakeway Drive on Tuesday, according to Suffolk County police.

The remains found at both locations are believed to belong to the same two victims whose body parts were found in Southards Pond Park in Babylon last week, police said. Officials did not specify what new remains were found.

The identity of the woman, who was 59 years old, has been confirmed, police said, while they have tentatively identified the man, who was 53 years old, according to police. The woman’s name was not released pending notification of her next of kin.

Their last known address was the same location in Yonkers, but police said they are unsure when the two last resided there.

A search warrant was also executed at a home in Amityville, also on Long Island, on Monday, but officials said no human remains were found.

Police said the murders appear to be an isolated incident and there is no threat to the public.

The body parts were first found last Thursday by a young girl who stumbled across a severed limb on her way to school, police said. After telling her father, he called 911 and investigators found several severed body parts belonging to two people.

A severed head, right arm, left leg from the knee down and right upper leg found Thursday appear to belong to the adult woman, police said.

A right and left arm were also found and appear to belong to the man, according to police. Both arms had tattoos on them.

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(BATON ROUGE, La.) — Louisiana on Tuesday became one of the toughest states in the nation on crime when Gov. Jeff Landry signed a series of bills that will keep criminals in prison longer, enables citizens to carry guns without a permit, and resurrects the electric chair and adds nitrogen gas to lethal injection as methods used to execute death row inmates.

During Tuesday’s signing ceremony at the state capital building in Baton Rouge, Landry – who was Louisiana attorney general before he was elected governor in 2023 – said he was fulfilling a campaign promise to victims of violent crime.

“One of the first promises we made [was] that we were going to deal with crime and we did it in a way we listened to you all,” Landry said.

With multiple strokes of his pen, Landry aimed to change a state justice system that he said has put the rights of violent crime perpetrators over those of victims.

“We all know the statistics of how poorly Louisiana ranks in safety and we all complain about the outward migration that has been going on in the state consistently decade after decade. It’s just logical that people will not come to a place where it’s not safe,” said Landry, a conservative Republican, adding that crime costs the citizens of Louisiana’s three largest cities – New Orleans, Baton Rouge and Shreveport – $6 billion a year.

“Today, we bring some justice to the victims,” Landry declared.

The bills were sent to Landry’s desk for signing after they were passed last month by the Republican-controlled state Legislature.

Clearing the path to resume executions

Among the laws Landry signed is one that clears the way to end a 14-year pause on executions in the state.

Under the new law, nitrogen hypoxia will be added to the available execution methods, along with the reintroduction of the electric chair, which death row inmates dubbed “Gruesome Gertie.” Executions by electrocution was retired in Louisiana in 1991 when the state moved to lethal injections.

“We do it in order to hopefully deter people, to let them know that in a peaceful civilization, these are not the types conduct and acts that will be tolerated here in the state of Louisiana,” said Landry as he signed the legislation while surrounded by the families of murder victims.

No permit needed to carry concealed firearm

Landry also signed into law legislation that will allow people to carry concealed weapons without a permit or training. The law also makes Louisiana the first state to grant concealed carry license holders a degree of qualified immunity from lawsuits if they use their weapons in self-defense, a provision currently reserved primarily for law enforcement officers.

The law will also lower the age for a person to carry a concealed firearm from 21 to 18.

The governor signed the weapons bill despite critics, including New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell, saying it would make it harder for police to prevent shootings and homicides.

“I’m very much concerned and I do not at all believe that this makes our city and our people safer,” Cantrell said at a news conference on Friday.

New Orleans Police Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick added, “You will see more people who are armed that we cannot check to see whether or not they are law-abiding or not.”

But Landry said Tuesday that Louisiana joins 27 other states that have enacted the same type of legislation, and argued it will not make law enforcement more difficult.

“It’s ensuring that law-abiding citizens are not harassed or have to ask government permission to do that which the Second Amendment allows them to do,” Landry said.

He further asserted that the law “incentivizes” citizens who want to maintain a concealed carry permit by affording them some immunity if they are forced to defend themselves.

Parole eliminated, good behavior sentence reduction curbed

Landry also signed into law two bills that he said will ensure convicted criminals serve the majority of the sentences they are given, and that will eliminate the option of parole for convicted perpetrators.

One of the pieces of legislation Landry signed, the Truth in Sentencing Bill, would require an inmate to serve 85% of their sentence before they can receive a sentence reduction for good behavior, and reduces the amount of time by which a sentence can be reduced. The other bill eliminates parole altogether for anyone convicted of a crime after Aug 1, 2024.

Landry said the new laws will “place discretion and responsibility back where it belongs, on the judges.”

The governor is expected to sign more bills later this week. Among them is one that will lower the age at which a minor can be tried as an adult to 17 for all felony crimes. The law will also make juveniles convicted of first-degree and second-degree murder, first-degree rape, and aggravated kidnapping ineligible to have their sentences modified.

Under the same law, juveniles convicted of lesser felony offenses will have to serve at least half of their sentence before sentencing changes can be considered. Additionally, the legislation will for the first time allow some juvenile records to be made public.

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