(NEW YORK) — Allen Weisselberg, the ex-chief financial officer of former President Donald Trump’s family real estate company, will plead guilty Monday to perjury charges that resulted from his testimony during Trump’s civil fraud trial, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.
The terms of the plea remain sealed until Weisselberg appears in court Monday.
This will be Weisselberg’s second criminal conviction after he pleaded guilty in 2022 to evading taxes on nearly $2 million in off-the-books compensation from the Trump Organization, including an apartment, a luxury car and his grandchildren’s school tuition.
As ABC News reported last month, Weisselberg, 75, had been in plea talks with the Manhattan district attorney’s office to resolve charges that he lied on the witness stand when he testified in October at the civil trial in which he was also held liable for fraud.
During his testimony, Weisselberg struggled to explain why Trump’s Fifth Avenue Manhattan triplex, which is less than 11,000 square feet, was listed on Trump’s statements of financial condition as 30,000 square feet.
“It was almost de minimis relative to his net worth, so I didn’t really focus on it,” Weisselberg said during the trial. “I never even thought about the apartment.”
But Forbes magazine published an article following Weisselberg’s appearance that accused him of lying under oath and suggested Weisselberg did think about the apartment because he played a key role in trying to convince the magazine the apartment was as big a Trump’s financial statements represented.
At the trial, a lawyer with the New York attorney general’s office, Louis Solomon, confronted Weisselberg with emails from a Forbes reporter seeking clarity about the apartment’s size and a letter signed by Weisselberg certifying the excessive square footage to the Trump Organization’s accountant, Mazars USA.
“Forbes was right, the triplex was actually only 10,996 right?” Solomon asked.
“Right,” Weisselberg finally conceded.
Weisselberg is not expected to be called as a witness in the criminal trial that starts later this month accusing Trump of falsifying business records related to a hush money payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels just before the 2016 presidential election. Trump has pleaded not guilty and denied all wrongdoing.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office has said in court filings Weisselberg that advised then-Trump attorney Michael Cohen how to pay off Daniels, and later arranged for Cohen to be paid back in monthly installments.
Flaco, a Eurasian eagle owl that escaped from the Central Park Zoo, in Central Park, New York City, Feb. 15, 2023. — Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis via Getty Images/FILE
(NEW YORK) — A memorial service for Flaco, the Eurasian eagle owl who escaped from his vandalized enclosure at the Central Park Zoo and spent more than a year as a wild bird, drew several hundred fans on Sunday, including speakers who eulogized the apex predator, citing his resilience and underdog quest to live free.
Flaco, who would have turned 14 years old this month, was remembered in poems and songs, as well as heartfelt words from those he inspired with his escapades around Manhattan.
Photographer Jacqueline Emery, who took thousands of pictures of the owl in the wild, told the crowd that the one thing she’ll miss most about Flaco is his hooting.
“He was just starting to find his voice. In time his hoots would become louder and more confident,” Emery said.
She played a recording made of Flaco once sounding off from the top of a tall building on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Like a voice from the grave, a hooting Flaco came over a loudspeaker, bringing smiles to some mourners and tears to others.
The large crowd gathered around one of Flaco’s favorite oak trees in the North Woods of Central Park, where a makeshift memorial sprang up in the wake of his death. Organizers called the event “Flaco Remembrance Day.” The service was even live-streamed, with people viewing it from around the world.
Lynn Johnston, a Manhattan resident, read a letter she wrote for Flaco, recalling how he used to stretch his six-foot wing span while perched in a tree.
“I was surprised to feel such elation,” said Johnston. “I’d pump my fist in the air as you eviscerated rat after rat.”
New York City musician Jonathan Green performed a song he wrote about Flaco, singing, “Ooh, ooh, Flaco the owl … upon my roof. Ooh, ooh, Flaco the owl, I’m so like you always wondering who.”
Another musician, Elijah Shiffer, also played a song on his saxophone that he said was inspired by Flaco.
Wildlife photographer David Lei told the gathering how he watched with amazement over the year as Flaco taught himself how to survive in America’s largest city, recalling how initially the owl appeared to be a clumsy flyer and recalled hearing “a crash of branches everywhere he went.”
“We hoped he would be rescued quickly and uneventfully. But Flaco had other ideas and he transformed himself into a wild bird before our eyes,” Lei said.
Broadway playwright Nan Knighton, who on Nov. 14 looked out the kitchen window of her 13th-floor Upper East Side apartment and saw Flaco perched on the narrow ledge staring back at her for three hours, read a poem she wrote about the owl, titled, “A Celebration of Flaco.”
“The rooftops are empty. The railings are bare. And no graceful owl is seen cruising the air. There’s no gentle hooting to soften the night. No gold-brindled feathers to catch the light,” Knighton said, reciting her poem to the crowd.
New York astrologer Breanne Delgado, who officiated over the event, read a long list of words she solicited from Flaco fans to describe the beloved owl, including majestic, joy, inspiring, freedom, heavenly, faithful, warrior, heroic and indefatigable.
“Just watching his story of resiliency and learning how to be an owl … really proved that it’s safe for all of us to break out of our cages right now and leave the matrix systems that are put in place to disempower us,” Delgado said.
Flaco died on Feb. 23 after apparently colliding with a building on West 89th Street in Manhattan, according to a statement from the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), which runs the Central Park Zoo.
People in the building reported the downed owl to the Wild Bird Fund (WBF). Staff from the WBF quickly responded, but Flaco was nonresponsive and they declared him dead shortly afterward.
Flaco unwittingly transformed from an obscure bird to a cause célèbre after being reported missing on Feb. 2, 2023, from the cramped Central Park digs that served as his home since 2010, when he arrived in the city as a fledgling from a North Carolina bird sanctuary. The New York Police Department said a vandal cut a hole in the steel mesh lining of the owl’s enclosure, enabling Flaco to bolt into the wilds of New York City.
The case remains under investigation, but no arrests have been announced.
Bird experts initially feared that Flaco would not be able to survive on his own and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), which runs the Central Park Zoo, initially launched a team to try to recover him by setting traps, chasing him with nets and even playing audio recordings of siren calls from female Eurasian eagle owls.
But after about a week on the lam, the fugitive fowl taught himself to hunt and perfected his flying skills, prompting zoo officials to halt efforts to catch him, saying in a Feb. 12, 2023, statement, “A major concern for everyone at the beginning was whether Flaco would be able to hunt and eat; that is no longer a concern.”
New York City Council member Gale Brewer, who represents the Upper West Side, called Sunday’s ceremony for Flaco “wonderful” and said she was impressed by the large crowd that turned out to pay respects.
“Flaco was very exciting to a lot of people,” said Brewer, who attended the ceremony, adding she is happy that proposed legislation to protect birds in New York by requiring new or significantly altered state buildings to incorporate bird-friendly designs, particularly in their windows, has been renamed the FLACO Act.
(KING CITY, Calif.) — Four people were killed Sunday afternoon when a group of gunmen opened fire outside a party at a house in King City, California, police said.
A silver Kia pulled up outside the party on North 2nd Street on Sunday afternoon, the King City Police Department said in a statement. Three men hopped out of the vehicle and “shot multiple rounds at the partygoers in the front yard,” police said.
“The suspects got back in their vehicle and fled the scene,” police said. “The suspects were wearing dark-colored clothing and had dark-colored masks over their heads. They have not been identified and remain outstanding.”
Police were dispatched to the scene at about 6 p.m., according to the statement. Three men were pronounced dead outside the house and a woman was transported to Mee Memorial Hospital, where she later died, police said.
Three other men were transported to Natividad Hospital in Salinas for medical treatment, police said.
(HONOLULU) — An 11-year-old girl suffered a possible shark bite off Honolulu, officials say.
Honolulu Ocean Safety, Honolulu Emergency Medical Services and the Honolulu Fire Department responded to a possible shark bite Saturday afternoon, Shayne Enright of the Honolulu Emergency Services Department told ABC News.
“The 911 call came in just before 1:30 p.m. for an 11-year-old girl who may have suffered a shark bite to her left foot at [a] spot known as Rainbows in Ka’a’awa (across from the back gate to Kualoa Ranch),” Enright said in an email.
The child suffered non-life-threatening injuries and her parents declined EMS transport to an emergency room, she said.
“A witness described seeing what appeared to be a small reef shark in the area,” Enright said.
The report said the girl “was close to shore when this occurred,” Enright added.
Honolulu Ocean Safety was working to post warning signs in the area.
(AUSTELL, Ga.) — Multiple suspects are being sought after a 15-year-old was shot when police exchanged gunfire with what they described as an “unruly crowd” of up to 600 people near the Six Flags Over Georgia amusement park in suburban Atlanta, authorities say.
The shooting erupted around 6:15 p.m. Saturday on a service road just off the 290-acre theme park’s property in Austell, about 17 miles northwest of Atlanta, according to the Cobb County Police Department.
Before the shooting, Cobb County police officers were called to the park by Six Flags Over Georgia security to help disperse “a sizeable unruly crowd” of 500 to 600 people “running through the park and fighting,” Cobb County police said in a statement to Atlanta ABC affiliate WSB-TV.
When police arrived, they were confronted by a large crowd leaving the park, which was celebrating its opening day of the season, according to authorities.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which is leading an investigation into the shooting, said in a statement Sunday afternoon that preliminary information indicates Cobb County officers were responding to assist with crowd control near the park’s entrance “after several fights had taken place amongst patrons” leaving the park.
“At some point, multiple people began shooting, hitting an unoccupied CCPD marked patrol car,” according to the GBI statement. “As officers identified where the shots were coming from, they ran after people who had run into the woods. During the incident, one CCPD officer fired his weapon, hitting one minor.”
The wounded teenager was taken to Grady Hospital in Atlanta, where he was in critical condition on Sunday, according to the GBI. The teenager’s name was not released.
A handgun was recovered by police near where they located the wounded teenager, according to the GBI.
“It is incredibly disappointing that our community is disrupted at public events throughout the region by groups of underaged youth. Just like other venues in the area, we are committed to keeping this type of trouble outside our park and off our property,” Six Flags Over Georgia said in a statement.
The shooting occurred on the South Service Road, which is not owned or operated by Six Flags, theme park officials said.
“However, we join our community and the Atlanta region in our commitment to safety and security. We won’t put up with that type of activity here,” park officials said, adding that the park has “state-of-the-art security systems and metal detection.”
“Every guest is expected to follow our strict code of conduct and anyone unwilling to follow that code of conduct is unwelcome,” park officials added.
(BETHLEHEM, Pa.) — The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating a collision and derailment involving three Norfolk Southern trains on Saturday, the agency said in a post on X.
The derailment occurred in Lower Saucon Township, Pennsylvania, Norfolk Southern said.
There is “no threat to the public, no hazardous material concerns from the railcars, and no reports of injuries to our crew members,” Norfolk Southern spokesperson Connor Spielmaker said in a statement to ABC.
Images from the Nancy Run Fire Company’s Facebook page show a freight train derailed and off its tracks on Riverside Drive in Lower Saucon Township, Pennsylvania, on Saturday morning.
The train was hauling boxcars and tanker cars, the photos show. No injuries are being reported.
According to Norfolk Southern, a “small diesel fuel leak” at the derailment site has been contained with booms and will be vacuumed out. The company says such a leak is “common when locomotives are involved.”
One car containing plastic pellets has spilled its contents onto the ground, which Northfolk Southern said will also be cleaned up. The derailment has led to nearby road closures.
Cleanup crews and contractors with Norfolk Southern will remain on scene over the coming days, Spielmaker said.
“We appreciate the quick, professional response by local emergency agencies,” said Spielmaker. “Our crews and contractors will remain on-scene over the coming days to cleanup, and we appreciate the public’s patience while they work as quickly, thoroughly, and as safely as possible. We are always working to advance safety. We will investigate this incident to understand how it happened and prevent others like it.”
(NEW YORK) — The New York Attorney General’s Office sent a cease-and-desist letter to Nassau County over its recent anti-transgender sports ban.
“The Order’s immediate effect is to force sports leagues to make an impossible choice: discriminate against transgender women and girls, in violation of New York law, or find somewhere else to play,” said the letter addressed to Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman.
Blakeman announced an executive order on Feb. 22 that bans transgender athletes from competing in events aligning with their gender identity in county-run facilities.
The executive order states that sports leagues, organizations, teams and other entities in the Long Island county must expressly designate teams based on an athlete’s sex assigned at birth when applying for a “use and occupancy” permit at a Nassau County Parks property for a sporting competition or event on all levels.
The AG’s office argues that the order is “in clear violation of New York State anti-discrimination laws and demands that it be immediately rescinded.”
The letter argues that not only will the policy deter inclusive teams from attending events in about 100 venues in the county, but also “by requiring teams and leagues to exclude transgender women and girls as a condition of using covered facilities, it invites invasive policing of the sex and gender identity and expression of all girls and women.”
In a social media post, Blakeman defended the transgender sports ban.
“My [executive order] stops the bullying of women and girls by transgender males who have many outlets to compete without putting the safety and security of females in danger,” said Blakeman. “In Nassau we will continue to fight for females’ right to be safe, secure, and have a level playing field to compete.”
Under the executive order, permits will not be given to any event or competition that allows transgender women or girls to compete in girls’ or women’s sporting events. This restrictions were set to go into effect immediately, according to Blakeman’s office.
The move goes against guidelines from local and national sports associations.
The New York State Public High School Athletic Association’s transgender policy states that it is “committed to providing all students with the opportunity to participate … in a manner consistent with their gender identity and the New York State Commissioner of Education’s Regulations.”
The governing bodies of several national and international sports leagues, including the International Olympic Committee, require transgender women to meet certain hormone levels in order to play on sports teams with cisgender women.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association transgender guidelines vary from sport to sport. Transgender student-athletes typically need to document sport-specific testosterone levels at the beginning of their season and a second documentation six months later, and then another documentation four weeks before championship selections.
There is no clear data on whether transgender women have an advantage physiologically, according to health experts.
One study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine found that the athletic advantages of 46 trans women over their cisgender counterparts declined with feminizing therapy. However, this study also found they had a 9% faster mean run speed than cisgender women after a one-year period of testosterone suppression.
A different study in the American Journal of Sports Medicine found that there is not yet any direct or consistent research suggesting transgender women have an athletic advantage at any stage of their transition.
Experts wrote in a recent JAMA Pediatrics editorial that preventing trans youth from participating in school sports could be harmful for the mental and physical health of an already at-risk population because they lose out on the developmental benefits of sports participation.
Blakeman, a Republican, said he believes the designation of separate athletic teams or sports based on sex assigned at birth “is necessary to maintain fairness for women’s athletic opportunities.”
“Women and Girls hard work, on-field achievements, and athletic futures deserve to be fostered, nurtured, and celebrated,” Blakeman stated in the executive order.
Local civil rights advocacy groups, including the New York Civil Liberties Union, argued the executive order is illegal.
“Requiring girls who are trans to compete on boys’ teams effectively bars them from sports altogether,” NYCLU said in a statement to ABC News. “Participating would mean being outed and being denied the same opportunities other girls enjoy: to challenge themselves, improve fitness, and be part of a team of their peers.”
(SPARTANSBURG, Pa.) — Police have announced an arrest in connection to the death of 23-year-old pregnant Rebekah Byler that has shaken an Amish community in Pennsylvania.
The Pennsylvania State Police announced early Saturday morning that Shawn Cranston — a 52-year-old man from Corry, Pennsylvania — has been arrested in connection with the murder of the Amish woman and is now facing multiple charges, including criminal homicide, criminal homicide of an unborn child, burglary and criminal trespass.
Cranston was arraigned Saturday morning and is currently being held without bond at the Crawford County Jail.
On Feb. 26, police responded to a home in Sparta Township, where they found Byler dead, according to Pennsylvania State Police. Byler’s cause of death has not been released.
Sparta Township is a small township in Crawford County, just outside of the borough of Spartansburg and about 35 miles southeast of Erie, Pennsylvania.
“Everyone is stunned — this doesn’t happen here,” Charleen Hajec, a pharmacist who was born and raised in Spartansburg, told ABC News. “Everyone is talking. It’s scary and frustrating.”
Hajec said she couldn’t believe a murder would happen in Sparta Township, which she called a “tight-knit community.”
“The outside world doesn’t get in,” Hajec said. “To have something this tragic … it doesn’t happen here.”
ABC News’ Emily Shapiro and Stephanie Ramos contributed to this report.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — An apple a day may keep the doctor away, but a banana a day is cheaper.
While inflation has pushed prices up in most aisles of the grocery store, the common yellow fruit has impressively defied produce inflation and remained accessible to consumers across the country.
The average price of bananas, per pound, is 62 cents, while neighboring produce section fruits’ price tags are significantly higher, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which reports the average price of apples ($1.32), lemons ($2.08), grapefruit ($1.71) and oranges ($1.55).
“Bananas are a fascinating example of everyday items that most people in the United States take for granted,” John Soluri, a history professor at Carnegie Mellon University and the author of “Banana Cultures: Agriculture, Consumption, and Environmental Change in Honduras and the United States,” told ABC News.
“We don’t think too much about bananas, because they are so ubiquitous, not only in grocery stores, but even in popular culture as well,” Soluri said, adding that bananas are considered “the poor man’s luxury.”
Bananas have been a staple fruit in the American diet for decades, with the U.S. importing more bananas by volume than any other country since 1961, according to the USDA.
The average American consumes nearly 27 pounds of bananas each year, which equates to about 90 bananas, and around the world, more than 100 billion bananas are eaten annually, according to Mayo Clinic.
Bananas were first introduced to the U.S. market during the World’s Fair in Philadelphia in 1876 as an “exotic” tropical fruit.
With increased market value for bananas, the United Fruit Company acquired huge amounts of land for plantations in Central and South America, according to Britannica, which notes, the term “Banana Republic” originated during this era.
“They started to acquire land, they built railroads, and they created a vertically integrated economy and commodity chain,” Soluri said. “They were growing and shipping bananas wholesale to the U.S.”
The United Fruit Company became part of the United Brands Company, in 1970, which was renamed Chiquita Brands International in 1990, according to Britannica, which remains one the world’s largest banana brands.
Most of the bananas the U.S. imports are grown in Guatemala, which accounts for approximately 41% of America’s supply, according to the USDA, which notes, Guatemala is the third largest banana exporting country globally, trailing Costa Rica and Columbia.
Bananas are perennial plants, meaning they live for more than one growing season without needing to be replanted. They also are a high-yield herb, offering up to 240 bananas per plant, according to the Rainforest Alliance.
The abundance of bananas grown in regions with low labor costs intersects with the fruit’s short shelf life and makes for a product that producers and grocery stores alike want to sell quickly.
There are hundreds of different varieties of bananas grown around the world, however, America mostly imports one variety — Cavendish bananas, according to Soluri, who suggests the monoculture of bananas in America makes the import system a well-oiled machine.
“Bananas arrive to grocery stores reliably, every week, and are priced relatively the same, with the quality being more or less the same,” Soluri said. “This only happens because a lot of people are working quite hard to make that possible — and, frankly, leading a lifestyle that would probably not satisfy a lot of the consumers in the United States.”
(OWASSO, Okla.) — The Department of Education is opening an investigation into Owasso Public Schools where student Nex Benedict, a member of the 2SLGBTQ community, got in a fight with several other students the day before they died, according to a letter from the agency obtained by ABC News.
The investigation follows a complaint from the Human Rights Campaign alleging that the District discriminated against students by failing to respond appropriately to sex-based harassment at Owasso High School during the 2023-2024 school year.
“Nex’s family, community, and the broader 2SLGBTQI+ (two spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex+) community in Oklahoma are still awaiting answers following their tragic loss,” said Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign. “We appreciate the Department of Education responding to our complaint and opening an investigation–we need them to act urgently so there can be justice for Nex, and so that all students at Owasso High School and every school in Oklahoma can be safe from bullying, harassment, and discrimination.”
The Owasso Public Schools said in a statement that they received notice of the investigation.
“The district is committed to cooperating with federal officials and believes the complaint submitted by HRC is not supported by the facts and is without merit,” the statement read in part.
In a past statement to ABC News, the district also said that the “safety and security of our students is our top priority and we are committed to fostering a safe and inclusive environment for everyone.”
“Bullying in any form is unacceptable,” the statement read. “We take reports of bullying very seriously and have policies and procedures in place to address such behavior.”
In the letter, the Department noted “that opening the complaint for investigation in no way implies that OCR has made a determination on the merits of the complaint.”
Anti-LGBTQ bullying and violence have been the center of conversation in the aftermath of Nex’s death earlier this month, as Nex Benedict’s family calls for action and answers concerning the bullying they say Nex faced in school.
“The Benedicts know all too well the devastating effects of bullying and school violence, and pray for meaningful change wherein bullying is taken seriously and no family has to deal with another preventable tragedy,” the family said via their attorney in a statement to ABC News.
Authorities are awaiting the full results of the autopsy and toxicology reports for more insight into the circumstances surrounding the teen’s death. The state medical examiner’s office will determine the final cause and manner of death.
The HRC also joined about 350 local, state, and national organizations in an open letter calling for state Superintendent Ryan Walters’ immediate removal from office for, the letter claims, “fostering a culture of violence and hate against the 2SLGBTQI+ community in Oklahoma schools.”
The letter – which was created and circulated Wednesday by the advocacy groups Freedom Oklahoma, GLAAD, Human Rights Campaign, and the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network (GLSEN) – also demands an investigation into the state Department of Education “to determine what actions and policies have led to a culture where rampant harassment of 2SLGBTQI+ students has been allowed to go unchecked.”
In a statement to ABC News, Walters called the letter a “standard tactic of the radical left, and they will stop at nothing to destroy the country and our state.”
Walters further accused critics of engaging in a “desperate political game” that seeks to “exploit the death of a young Oklahoman. I will never stop fighting, I will not play woke gender games, and I will not back down to a woke mob.”
ABC News’ Tesfaye Negussie contributed to this report.
