Tracy Mingo is accused of using disguises to evade identification so he could target employees at Circle K, Subway and Family Dollar stores throughout the Atlanta area between October 2025 and January 2026, the FBI said. (U.S. Attorney’s Office for the northern District of Georgia)
(NEW YORK) — A man who federal prosecutors in Atlanta nicknamed “master of disguise” is facing federal charges Thursday for allegedly robbing 10 businesses at gunpoint while dressed in different costumes.
Tracy Mingo is accused of using disguises to evade identification so he could target employees at Circle K, Subway and Family Dollar stores throughout the Atlanta area between October 2025 and January 2026, the FBI said.
Mingo allegedly entered each of the stores late at night — after all or nearly all customers had left — and robbed employees at gunpoint, officials said.
He allegedly donned disguises, including a construction worker, a health care professional and a security guard, according to the indictment.
Police and the FBI arrested Mingo in January when they said it appeared he was putting on the same security guard disguise used during the robbery of a Circle K store the night before. Mingo, 33, of College Park, Georgia, is now charged with 20 counts, including Hobbs Act robbery, attempted Hobbs Act robbery, brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
“For months, Mingo allegedly used disguises in an attempt to evade identification and continue targeting innocent workers at gunpoint,” FBI Atlanta Special Agent in Charge Marlo Graham said in a statement. “He underestimated the determination of the investigators pursuing him and the strength of the partnerships that exist between the FBI and our state and local law enforcement partners.”
Laura Rojas Ortiz has been in ICE detention for more than 40 days, her family says. (Photo courtesy Laura Rojas Ortiz’s mother, Paolo)
(WASHINGTON) — A 21-year-old pregnant mother has been detained, along with her infant son, for more than a month at the family immigration detention center in Dilley, Texas, her family and an advocacy group told ABC News.
Laura Rojas Ortiz was in the process of applying for a U visa — which is for victims or witnesses of crimes — when she was detained during a check-in with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Texas, her mother said.
“She was called to appear [at an ICE office] in Dallas,” her mother, Paola, said in Spanish. “She showed up like she always does, and they detained her.”
Paola told ABC News that her daughter turned herself in at the southern border over a year ago with her infant son and partner. The mother claims Rojas Ortiz later began the process of applying for a U visa after there was a shooting in her neighborhood and a bullet went through the walls, allegedly grazing her son.
According to Paola and a friend of Rojas Ortiz, the 21-year-old had been wearing an ankle monitor and regularly checking in with ICE before she was detained with her son as part of the Trump administration’s ongoing immigration crackdown.
Rojas Ortiz, who is five months pregnant, has been detained for more than 40 days, her family said. Her mother says Rojas Ortiz has a high-risk pregnancy and has not been seen by medical staff at Dilley.
“To this day, she hasn’t gotten an ultrasound or been seen by a specialist,” Paola told ABC News. “They haven’t done blood tests or anything.”
Immigrant advocacy groups have said that arrests and detentions of pregnant women violate an ICE directive stating that the agency should not “detain, arrest, or continue to detain individuals known to be pregnant, postpartum, or nursing” except under exceptional circumstances.
Paola said her grandson, who had been drinking only lactose-free milk, has been given whole milk at Dilley.
Paola also told ABC News that when lawmakers recently visited the facility, ICE staff moved her daughter to a “medical room,” where she was told she was going to be checked by a doctor.
“And when they left — so that the politicians wouldn’t see her pregnant — that’s when they let her out of that medical room,” Paola said.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment from ABC News.
Last week, Rep. Joaquin Castro, along with a group of Democratic lawmakers, visited the Dilley facility, where he said more than 500 people are currently detained. Castro said he was only allowed by staff to meet with one minor.
“There are now more children there than there were before,” Castro said at a press conference last week. “I believe that is the result of the ICE surge that we’ve seen over the last month or so. We’ve seen these raids on the street. We’ve seen families that have been torn apart on the street, brutality on the street.”
Casey Revkin, the executive director of Each Step Home, an organization that supports immigrant detainees, told ABC News that her group has been providing Rojas Ortiz with financial assistance.
“We’ve been filling Laura’s commissary account and the accounts of the families at Dilley every week. These deposits are a lifeline to families in detention,” Revkin said. “It’s heartbreaking to think of a child not eating, and we’re always so relieved when we hear that a mom was able to use the commissary support to buy her children food they can enjoy.”
Immigrant advocates, medical professionals, and lawmakers have previously raised concerns about conditions at the South Texas facility.
The top medical official at the Department of Homeland Security, which operates the nation’s migrant detention centers, has disputed any suggestion that detainees are being denied proper care.
“These allegations of illegal aliens being denied proper medical care in ICE custody are FALSE,” DHS Chief Medical Officer Dr. Sean Conley previously told ABC News in a statement. “It is both policy and longstanding practice for aliens to receive timely and appropriate medical care from the moment they enter ICE custody. This includes medical, dental, women’s health, mental health services, any needed follow-up medical appointments, as well as 24-hour emergency care.”
“This is better, more responsive healthcare than many aliens have ever received in their entire lives,” Conley’s statement said.
A water tower is illuminated at dusk, Sept. 17, 2016, in Seaside Park, New Jersey. (Mark Makela/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Two municipal water systems in New Jersey were targeted in cyberattacks in the last week, widely thought to be the work of Iran, the state said Wednesday.
The affected utilities, which were not named, were temporarily blinded when automated systems went down. Both utilities shifted to manual operations and the state said there was no disruption to service and both systems have been “secured with strengthened access controls.”
“Our New Jersey Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Cell (NJCCIC) responded to two cyber incidents affecting New Jersey municipal water systems this past week. The NJCCIC is working directly with the affected utilities alongside our federal partners at the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency,” the state said Wednesday.
“The investigations found that the incidents involved vulnerable internet-exposed control systems, which temporarily limited operators’ ability to monitor or manage them remotely. In both cases, staff shifted quickly to manual operations, and there was no disruption to service. Customers had uninterrupted access to safe drinking water throughout,” the state said.
Sources told ABC News that Iran remains the prime suspect, perhaps showing how it could retaliate as President Donald Trump threatens to escalate the war.
Officials are also assessing whether this could be the work of a different state actor mimicking Iran’s tactics in a possible attempt to influence what the U.S. does next.
In Georgia, the Clayton County Water Authority briefly issued a boil-water advisory when it was targeted by hackers. Columbus Water Works said it also detected an intrusion, but drinking water was unaffected.
The recent hacks, affecting water and wastewater utilities in at least a dozen states, exploited a vulnerability in widely used utility software, sources told ABC News.
A fix has been issued, but utilities across the country that run the same software are racing to see if they were also hacked.
So far, it appears nobody has become sick, and there have been no widespread disruptions to water supplies. However, officials are still working to understand the scope of the hack and what could have happened to systems Americans depend on every day.
(WASHINGTON) — Attorneys for David Hearn, who was alleged to have vandalized the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, filed a motion in D.C. Superior Court, citing “exceptional facts and circumstances” to have the indictment against him dismissed with prejudice.
The Justice Department moved last week to dismiss the criminal case against Hearn, a former Olympian, acknowledging the damage to the pool “was the result of flawed installation by the contractor.”
The filing by Hearn’s attorneys follows U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s motion on Friday seeking to dismiss the case without prejudice, which could still leave Mr. Hearn exposed to a future indictment.
If the motion filed by Hearn’s attorneys is granted, it would block the government from trying to charge him again for the same alleged crime in the future.
“Here, amid extraordinary political pressure and public pronouncements from President Trump demanding action, and in apparent disregard for their special duties as prosecutors, USAO-DC rushed to obtain a public felony indictment,” the filing states, using an acronym for the United States Attorney’s Office in the District of Columbia.
“Defying both decency and common sense, the government proceeded to indict Mr. Hearn before it had obtained or evaluated the information necessary to establish a good-faith basis for the charge,” the filing continued.
“The Court should not leave the defendant subject to the possibility of renewed prosecution,” the filing states.
Hearn pleaded not guilty to a felony destruction of property charge last month after Pirro’s office accused him of allegedly “forcefully and violently” ripping up parts of the pool floor.
Citing President Donald Trump’s comments on the matter in recent days, the attorneys representing Hearns added, “That is particularly true when the President of the United States has already voiced his vigorous disagreement with USAO-DC’s dismissal of the case against Mr. Hearn — saying that the U.S. Attorney “choked,” “folded like an umbrella,” and “made a mistake,” and doubling down on the false claim that the damage was caused by vandalism — and has previously not hesitated to insinuate himself into cases that historically have been the exclusive province of the DOJ.”
Should the court deny the motion to dismiss the indictment with prejudice, Hearn’s attorneys asked the court to disclose grand jury materials or to conduct a review in chambers of those materials before granting the government’s motion to dismiss the case without prejudice.
Savannah Guthrie and mother Nancy Guthrie, June 15, 2023. (Nathan Congleton/NBC via Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The recent release of two credible ransom notes sent to Nancy Guthrie’s family in the days after her abduction generated a “slight increase” in tips, but none that have cracked the case, authorities told ABC News.
The 84-year-old mother of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie was kidnapped from her Tucson, Arizona, home in the early hours of Feb. 1 and remains missing.
On Friday, the Pima County Sheriff’s Department released details from two ransom notes received by Tucson media in the days after the abduction.
The first note, sent on Feb. 2 to Savannah Guthrie, said, “We have your mother Nancy. She is safe but scared.” The note asked for millions of dollars in Bitcoin and said “she will be killed” if payment was not received.
The note included descriptions of a smartwatch near her bed and a damaged floodlight in the home’s backyard.
The second note, sent on Feb. 6 to the Guthrie family, said Nancy Guthrie died and “is buried in nature now,” according to the sheriff’s department.
“We did not fully grasp the seriousness of her physical condition,” the note stated. “We never intended to hurt her, that was not our intention. She perished shortly after she was taken.”
The note included an apology and said to the family, “Nothing you could have done could have changed the outcome. We want your family to know this and hope you all can find peace.”
In response to an inquiry from ABC News, the sheriff’s department said Tuesday that “investigators have seen a slight increase in tips since the two ransom notes were released,” adding that “all tips have been followed up on.”
Savannah Guthrie again pleaded for help in an Instagram post Saturday, writing, “We need someone to come forward.”
“Someone knows something. Someone suspects something,” the journalist said. “Someone recognizes the writing in the ransom demand notes. Someone has noticed something different, strange, troubling or just unusual — perhaps with someone they deeply love. Perhaps they are afraid to come forward.”
“We are real people, facing real grief,” she said. “We will never stop looking for answers.”
Anyone with information is urged to call 911, the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI, or the Pima County Sheriff’s Department at 520-351-4900.
People hold photos of those who perished in the Eaton Fire during a memorial service, July 7, 2025, honoring the 19 lives lost in Altadena, California. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — More than 18 months after it ignited and became one of the most destructive wildfires in U.S. history, authorities announced the cause of the 2025 Eaton Fire in Southern California.
The Los Angeles County Fire Department (LACFD) and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) on Tuesday released a report blaming the Eaton Fire on electrical arcing events that took place on an out-of-service Southern California Edison (SCE) tower.
The Eaton Fire, which started on Jan. 7, 2025, ravaged the community of Altadena near Los Angeles, killing 19 people and destroying more than 9,400 homes and businesses, authorities said.
“I recognize that no report or investigation into the Eaton Fire can ease the deep pain and tragedy our residents have endured,” Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony C. Marrone said in a statement. “While the cause has been determined, our focus remains on assisting our residents to rebuild their homes and livelihoods, and ensuring lessons learned drive meaningful and impactful change in memory of the 19 lives lost.”
SCE is the primary electric utility company for much of the Southern California, serving 15 million people.
Lawyers representing plaintiffs in numerous lawsuits against SCE released a joint statement, saying the report leaves the company “no place to hide,” and called it “an important step toward accountability.”
Besides the thousands of homes lost in the Eaton Fire, more than 1,000 other homes were damaged, according to the plaintiffs’ lawyers.
The Eaton Fire caused an estimated $8 billion to $10 billion in damage, according to a 2025 report by Verisk, a global data analytics company serving the insurance sector.
“It’s time for Edison to stop fighting the victims it harmed and provide every Eaton Fire survivor with the full compensation they deserve,” the plaintiffs’ lawyers said.
The report by LACFD and Cal Fire found that the origin of the Eaton Fire was a hillside transmission tower above Eaton Canyon Wash, and sparks from the arching electrical lines set dry vegetation beneath the tower on fire. Gusting winds in the area rapidly spread the blaze into residential areas of Altadena, destroying block after block of homes and prompting thousands of evacuations.
It took about a month for firefighters to fully extinguish the Eaton conflagration, which burned about 22 square miles.
The Eaton Fire occurred the same week as the Palisades Fire, which killed 12 people and wiped out more than 6,800 homes in nearby Pacific Palisades and Malibu. The cause of the Palisades Fire was determined to be arson, and a 29-year-old Florida man was arrested in October of 2025 on charges of setting the fire, officials said.
Together, the Eaton and Palisades fires caused an estimated $28 billion in damage, according to Verisk.
David Eisenhauer, an SCE spokesperson, told ABC News on Tuesday afternoon that the utility giant is reviewing the report from the LA County Fire Department and Cal Fire.
“We have taken our potential role in the start of this fire seriously from the beginning,” Eisenhauer said. “As we’ve previously said, SCE believes that it is likely that its equipment was associated with the ignition of the Eaton Fire.”
Eisenhauer added, “Our hearts are with the Altadena community, and we continue to support them as they recover and rebuild through our Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program.”
ABC News reported on Jan. 13, 2025, as the Eaton and Palisades fires were still burning, that one possible theory for the cause of the Eaton blaze involved transmission lines or electric facilities.
At the time, witnesses shared with ABC News Ring camera and cellphone videos that appeared to show what they believe to be the start of the Eaton Fire at the base of a transmission tower in the Eaton Canyon area.
In their report, fire investigators said that pursuant to the California Public Utilities Code, “SCE is to maintain and operate its electrical lines and equipment in a manner that would minimize the risk of catastrophic wildfire posed by them.”
SCE has claimed in lawsuits filed earlier this year that Los Angeles County emergency authorities failed to send timely evacuation warnings to residents in east and west Altadena. Most of the people who died in the fire lived in west Altadena.
A logo is displayed on the doors to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) headquarters at the Hubert H. Humphrey Building on May 30, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Kevin Carter/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Trump administration is set to award a multimillion-dollar contract to a small Texas law firm without immigration expertise to provide legal representation for thousands of unaccompanied migrant children in government custody during immigration proceedings.
In a notice published in the Federal Register, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced its intent to award the $150 million contract to Burke Law Group, a law firm headquartered in Houston, Texas.
The notice states the contract would “provide legal orientation, legal consultation, and attorney-of-record representation services for eligible unaccompanied alien children” during immigration proceedings and hearings before U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services while the children remain in government custody.
The proposed award comes after legal service providers across the country have said that the administration has withheld $65 million in overdue fees from the previous contract, alleging it is an attempt to force them to turn over confidential information about the migrant children they represent.
Burke Law Group has 26 employees across eight offices, according to its website. None of the firm’s attorneys list immigration law as a practice area. Instead, their practices include administrative law, white-collar defense, commercial litigation, securities litigation and other areas.
ABC News reached out to the law firm for comment and did not immediately get a response.
In December 2023, the Acacia Center for Justice, an immigrant advocacy group, became the prime contract holder with HHS for the Unaccompanied Children Program, overseeing subcontracts with more than 100 service providers that provide legal representation to more than 20,000 unaccompanied migrant children.
A spokesperson with HHS previously told ABC News that its sub-agency, the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), “offered Acacia the opportunity” to receive a new federal contract “based on requirements that include they provide the data on who they represent and that they bill [HHS] when they submit applications for immigration relief.” The HHS spokesperson said Acacia refused.
Legal services providers including Acacia have said that ORR was demanding “client-level data that is confidential and legally privileged.”
During the Trump administration, Acacia and many of its subcontracted groups have alleged that unaccompanied children and their sponsors are among those being targeted under the administration’s immigration crackdown.
In June, DHS agents visited the offices of several Washington-area nonprofit organizations that provide legal services to unaccompanied migrant children. Last year, ABC News reported that the administration was directing immigration agents to track down unaccompanied migrant children in the United States.
A sign is posted in front of the Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles on June 16, 2026 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
(LOS ANGELES) – A man allegedly armed with a pistol was arrested after he was seen taking photos and videos of the Trump National Golf Club grounds in Los Angeles County over the weekend, authorities announced on Tuesday.
Following his arrest, detectives found more firearms and “multiple notebooks containing concerning statements” at the suspect’s residence, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.
The suspect was identified as 38-year-old Jeanine John Taele of Downey, California. Taele is being held on $250,000 bond and is expected to appear in court on Aug. 26.
Taele is charged in a federal criminal complaint with possession of an unregistered short-barreled rifle, a felony carrying a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in federal prison, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California.
“While we are still investigating the motives of this individual, we are thankful he was apprehended before the President’s visit,” Bill Essayli, first assistant U.S. attorney, said in a statement. “Federal and local law enforcement stepped in early and prevented what could have been a dangerous situation from occurring. This investigation remains ongoing.”
The golf club incident occurred on Sunday, the sheriff’s department said, a day before it was announced that President Donald Trump is set to visit the Rancho Palos Verdes property this week for a Republican National Committee dinner.
Deputies responded to the golf course Sunday afternoon after plainclothes federal agents reported a “suspicious individual” who was seen walking on the grounds, taking photos and videos and “appearing to monitor security-planning activities,” the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said in a release on Tuesday.
Deputies detained the suspect, later identified as Taele, and located his vehicle in the golf club’s parking lot, the sheriff’s department said.
Deputies recovered a 16-round magazine containing hollow-point ammunition from his pants pocket, as well as a loaded pistol with a round chambered and an additional loaded magazine containing hollow-point ammunition from his vehicle, authorities said.
Taele was arrested for carrying a concealed firearm and possession of armor-piercing/prohibited ammunition, the sheriff’s department said.
Detectives executed a search warrant at Taele’s residence Monday afternoon due to the “potential security implications surrounding the incident” and recovered more firearms and ammunition, as well as “multiple notebooks containing concerning statements,” body armor and two radio signal devices, the sheriff’s department said. It did not elaborate on what was allegedly found in the notebooks.
Taele remains in custody, authorities said. Investigators presented the case to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office earlier Tuesday for filing consideration.
The incident remains under investigation in coordination with the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force and the United States Secret Service, the sheriff’s department said. Authorities have “identified no credible threat to our communities,” it said.
Trump is planning to attend an RNC dinner at his Rancho Palos Verdes golf club Tuesday evening, where he is set to deliver an economics-focused speech, according to the White House.
Last year, a jury found a man guilty of trying to assassinate Trump at his Florida golf course. Prosecutors said Ryan Routh hid in the bushes of the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach and pointed a military-grade SKS rifle towards Trump and a Secret Service agent. Routh was sentenced earlier this year to life in prison.
Demonstrators chant and hold signs outside U.S. Supreme Court on April 29, 2026, in Washington, DC. The court heard arguments challenging DHS’s termination of Temporary Protected Status for asylum seekers. (Photo by Tom Brenner/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Hundreds of Haitian immigrants in Ohio who had Temporary Protected Status have been summoned by the Department of Homeland Security for in-person “check-ins” with the agency, where some have been fitted with ankle monitors, immigration advocates tell ABC News.
The move from the government comes after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June that the Trump administration could end TPS for about 350,000 Haitians, as part of the administration’s ongoing immigration crackdown.
Steve Foster, the immigration policy coordinator for the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti, said “Haitians with TPS, regardless of whether they have a pending asylum claim, have gotten a ‘DHS Call-In Letter’ to appear at ICE offices in person.”
Some have been given ankle monitors and future court dates, Foster said.
Viles Dorsainvil, executive director of a Haitian support group in Springfield, Ohio, confirmed the government’s effort to call Haitians in Ohio with TPS into ICE offices and fit some of them with ankle monitors.
“We are just helping these folks to go to this appointment, and when they get there, they interview them and eventually put [an] ankle monitor on them,” Dorsainvil said.
TPS status, established by the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, provides work authorization and protection from deportation if a foreign country is deemed by the government to be unsafe because of armed conflict, natural disaster, or “extraordinary and temporary conditions.”
In a statement, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said, “Temporary Protected Status is exactly that — temporary. For too long, TPS has been allowed to function as a de facto amnesty program despite Congress never intending it to be permanent.”
“What we would say now is it’s closing time, which means you don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here,” the statement said.
Dorsainvil said that some TPS holders have lost their work permits, while others who have pending asylum cases still have valid work authorization.
“There is so much anxiety, and they are fearful, and they are uncertain when it comes to what they should do next,” he said.
(WASHINGTON) — The Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday voted to advance acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s nomination to permanently lead the Department of Justice.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
