(MOSCOW, Idaho) — The father of Kaylee Goncalves, one of the four University of Idaho students mysteriously stabbed to death in an off-campus house, said he’s feeling “a little defeated” and frustrated by the lack of transparency from police.
But Steve Goncalves said he supports and trusts the law enforcement officers who are diligently working on the investigation.
“I have to assume and hope that this is all part of their plan and … they’ve got this all figured out,” he told ABC News. “I know that there’s some really good, hard-working guys and girls that are on this case that I’ve met. And they looked me in the eyes and they told me straight-out that they’re working and they’re doing everything in their power.”
Goncalves added, “My wife’s biggest fear, part of the reason we didn’t have a funeral, is because she couldn’t be guaranteed that that monster was going to not be there.”
Goncalves, 21, her lifelong best friend, Madison Mogen, 21, another roommate Xana Kernodle, 20, and Kernodle’s boyfriend Ethan Chapin, 20, were killed in the girls’ off-campus house in the early hours of Nov. 13. No suspects have been identified.
Two other roommates were in the house at the time and survived, appearing to have slept through the crimes, according to police. The surviving roommates are not considered suspects, police said.
“You can’t imagine sending your girl to college and they come back … in an urn,” Goncalves said. “You’re numb … you can’t absorb that amount of pain and agony.”
Kaylee, the Goncalves’ middle child, was planning to move to Texas. She had mentioned going to Chicago, but her parents said it wasn’t safe enough.
“She was going places. She was highly motivated,” her dad said. “I hope people understand how all these kids … were doing everything right and they were going to be the type of people that you want to be your neighbor.”
The Goncalves considered Mogen their “bonus child.”
“When you’re sick and you’re down and you’re out, you want to have that one great friend that’s always there for you — and that’s what they had,” Goncalves said. “There is no Kaylee without Maddie.”
It’s believed the four students were killed between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m. on Nov. 13, according to Moscow Mayor Art Bettge. On the morning of Nov. 13, the two surviving roommates called friends over because they thought one of the victims had passed out and wasn’t waking up, police said.
At 11:58 a.m., a 911 call from one of the roommate’s phones requested help for an unconscious person, police said. “Multiple people talked with the 911 dispatcher,” police said, adding that they do not believe anyone at the house at the time of the 911 call was involved in the murders. Responding officers found the four victims on the second and third floors, police said.
Goncalves said the students died quickly and did not bleed for hours, so an earlier 911 call would not have saved their lives.
“Nobody suffered and nobody felt like that kind of pain,” Goncalves said.
The murder weapon — which police believe to be a fix-blade knife — has not been found.
Goncalves said the victims suffered “large punctures” from a “brutal weapon.”
“The detective said this weapon is probably something [the killer] paid money for and something that they’re proud of,” he said.
Goncalves said the only thing worse than losing his child is knowing that her killer is “having a great life out there — and you’re just left in shambles.”
“I have to have my justice. These families deserve that,” Goncalves said. “We just have to come together as a community. Submit all those pieces of evidence … and get this guy off the streets.”
Anyone with information can upload digital media to fbi.gov/moscowidaho or contact the tip line at tipline@ci.moscow.id.us or 208-883-7180.
ABC News’ Timmy Truong contributed to this report.
(UVALDE, Texas) — The mother of a girl killed during the school massacre in Uvalde, Texas, last May, filed a lawsuit Monday against gun distributors, local governments and 16 law enforcement officers on the scene during the shooting — claiming their negligence led to her daughter’s death.
“Eliahna loved her family, and she knew how much we loved her,” Sandra Torres, the mother of 10-year-old Eliahna Torres, said in a news release. “I miss her every moment of every day. I’ve brought this lawsuit to seek accountability. No parent should ever go through what I have.”
Filed Monday in Del Rio, Texas, the lawsuit is the first submitted by the family of one of the children killed during the mass shooting.
Eliahna was among 19 students and two teachers killed on May 24 at Robb Elementary School in the small south Texas community.
Some of the defendants in the case, including then-school district Police Chief Pete Arredondo, former acting Uvalde Police Chief Mariano Pargas and gun manufacturer Daniel Defense, are already facing separate cases filed in federal court back in September by families of some who survived the shooting.
The Torres family is seeking unspecified punitive damages.
In an August interview with ABC News, Sandra Torres described how hard it has been processing her daughter’s death.
“It’s like sometimes it feels unreal like you know, it’s just a bad dream,” the mother said. “You know, she’s going to appear one day and then reality hits and my baby’s never coming back.”
Eliahna was known by her friends and family for her love of softball, according to the complaint, but she never made it to her final game of the season, which was scheduled for the night of the massacre.
“She hated sweating (despite the Uvalde heat), but she had fallen in love with playing softball and was a promising young infielder,” read the complaint.
The officers listed in the lawsuit work for the Uvalde Police Department, the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Uvalde school district police force.
A special investigative committee of the Texas House of Representatives released a report in July concluding that the police response to the shooting was riddled with failures, allowing the shooter to remain in the classroom for 77 minutes even though 300 officers had arrived at the scene. The lawsuit argues that that delay is evidence of negligence.
Arredondo, the school district police chief who was later fired because of the response, has said he took all “reasonable actions” on the day of the shooting. He did not respond to questions about this lawsuit. Pargas, a Uvalde police lieutenant who was in charge of the city’s police force on the day of the shooting, also did not respond to requests for comment. Pargas quit two weeks ago, after the city’s leaders announced they planned to fire him.
The Torres family is also suing the city of Uvalde, the county of Uvalde, the Uvalde School District, the gun shop where the shooter purchased his firearms and gun manufacturer Daniel Defense.
The city, county, school district and Daniel Defense did not respond to requests for comment.
(DALLAS) — The trial of now-former police officer Aaron Dean in the 2019 fatal shooting of Atatiana Jefferson began Monday after several delays.
Jury selection began Monday with Judge George Gallagher saying he hoped 12 jurors and two alternates would be in place by Friday.
There were concerns the trial would be delayed again after Dean’s lead attorney, Jim Lane, reportedly died Sunday morning, according to Dallas ABC affiliate WFAA-TV, just one day before the jury selection in the case was set to begin. Lane had been ill and two other lawyers took over as lead attorneys in May, according to WFAA.
Dean is charged with murder in the death of Jefferson, a Black woman who was allegedly fatally shot by Dean inside her Fort Worth, Texas, home on Oct. 12.
The department said that police received a call just before 2:30 a.m. to respond to her home on East Allen Avenue.
Two officers arrived at the house shortly after and parked near Jefferson’s home, but not in front of the residence, according to officials.
The front door appears open in the body-camera footage, but a screen door looks to be closed in front of it. The officer doesn’t appear to knock.
Officials said the officers walked around the back of the house and that one of the officers observed a person through the rear window of the home and opened fire.
Fort Worth Police Lt. Brandon O’Neil said the officer who opened fire on Jefferson never identified himself as a police officer.
Body camera footage released by the department shows the officer approaching a rear window of the home with his gun drawn. The officer sees the woman through the window, shouts, “Put your hands up, show me your hands,” and fires one shot.
The video seems to confirm the officer never identified himself as police before he opened fire.
Jefferson’s 8-year-old nephew, who witnessed his aunt being fatally shot that morning, told investigators she had retrieved a handgun from her purse and pointed it toward a window when she was killed, according to an arrest warrant issued for the officer.
Police officials said Jefferson was within her rights to protect herself and her nephew when she heard noises in her backyard and went to the window to investigate. Jefferson was playing video games with her nephew when she went to investigate the noise, according to the arrest warrant.
Dean’s lawyers asked the judge to move the location of the trial Monday due to its high-profile nature, but Gallagher said he would not yet rule on the motion.
(NEW YORK) — About 100 people fishing on a frozen lake in Minnesota were rescued after a large chunk of the ice broke off, leaving them stranded.
Emergency dispatchers received a 911 call just after 11:30 a.m. Monday from people who were fishing on Upper Red Lake in northern Beltrami County, according to a news release from the Beltrami County Sheriff’s Office. The callers stated that a large chunk of ice broke free from the main shoreline, stranding about 100 individuals, authorities said.
Once first responders arrived, they estimated the fishermen had drifted up to 30 yards into open water following the breakage, according to the sheriff’s office.
Several water rescue agencies and vehicles were dispatched to the scene and assessed the extent of the open water with visual and drone operations. Authorities found a narrow spot of the separation to deploy a temporary bridge to evacuate the stranded fishermen.
On Facebook, the Beltrami County Sheriff’s Office advised those who needed to evacuate to head toward the access point at JR’s Corner.
A fisherman named Shane from North Woods Fish Houses in Beltrami County said in a video posted to Facebook that “a pretty big crack” opened up from east to west.
“We have some people on the other side of the water line,” he said. “We are going to get to you.”
The upper Midwest has had a very warm fall season, with temperatures near 70 degrees in early November after above-average temperatures in October and September.
Northern Minnesota had a cold snap before the Thanksgiving holiday, when many lakes produced ice cover. But after the holiday, temperatures reached close to 50 degrees, forecasts show, resulting in the thawing and melting of ice.
Gusty southeast winds on Monday likely loosened the ice up even more.
Much colder weather is on the way for the upper Midwest over the next few days and more ice will be forming.
Due to the urgent nature of getting people off the ice and the likelihood that several groups were unaware of the separation, the first responders sent out a wireless emergency alert, according to the sheriff’s office. Just after 2:30 p.m., officials announced that everyone — an estimated 100 people — had been evacuated from the ice.
Authorities warned those who plan on ice fishing to remain cautious and vigilant.
“The Beltrami County Sheriff’s Office reminds those who are thinking of heading on the ice that early season ice is very unpredictable,” authorities said. “Extreme caution should be used when heading on the ice and to check the thickness frequently to ensure an adequate amount of ice.”
(NEW YORK) — Parts of the Northwest could get up to two feet of snow on Monday and Tuesday, as a cross-country storm will bring snow and tornadoes in parts of the U.S.
A winter storm watch has been issued for Spokane, Washington late Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, with heavy snowfall expected, the National Weather Service Spokane office tweeted.
A cross-country storm moving east is expected to bring heavy snow from Nebraska to Michigan on Monday night into Tuesday morning. Eighteen states are on alert for snow and strong winds due to the incoming storm.
Salt Lake City, Utah; Denver, Colorado; and Casper, Wyoming, are expected to get between 6 and 12 inches of snow in the next two days.
Warm moist air could help produce tornadoes in parts of the South Tuesday afternoon into the evening.
The storm system could also bring strong, long-tracked tornadoes Tuesday evening to Memphis and Nashville, Tennessee; Greenville and Jackson, Mississippi; and Monroe, Louisiana.
In addition to tornadoes, damaging winds of more than 60 mph and large hail are also possible for the lower Mississippi River Valley and the Gulf Coast states.
Around 15 million Americans in the South will remain on alert as New Orleans to Nashville could see severe storms on Tuesday night.
(WASHINGTON) — Lawmakers return to Washington after Thanksgiving break with a long agenda and just weeks until a new Congress begins.
Come Jan. 3, Republicans will run the House, ending two years of total Democratic control of the federal government. Already, GOP members are jockeying for new leadership positions and turning their attention toward how they will mount a response to the Biden agenda.
But partisan preparation aside, the next few weeks are going to require some across the aisle cooperation if Congress is to get anything done in what is known as the lame duck between the election and the end of the current term. There is a laundry list of must-pass agenda items hanging in the balance. Among them: funding the government and passing a massive military spending bill.
Democrats, meanwhile, will look to maximize their final days unchecked by GOP blockades.
Dems zero-in on 2 outstanding priorities
Democrats are expected to seal a win later this week by finally passing federal legislation that would enshrine into law protections for same-sex and interracial marriages. While procedural votes still remain, the legislation cleared a key test vote in the Senate just before Thanksgiving, with 12 Republicans joining all Democrats in the chamber to prevent a filibuster.
“Let me be clear: Passing the Respect for Marriage Act is not a matter of ‘if’ but only of ‘when,'” Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said after that successful vote.
Approving the legislation would be a victory for Democrats who have been seeking to codify same-sex marriage — currently legalized by the Supreme Court decision Obergefell v. Hodges — since the high court overturned the right to an abortion earlier this year, with Justice Clarence Thomas suggesting in a separate opinion that Obergefell should also be reversed.
While the Senate’s marriage bill will need to return to the House once passed, a previous version cleared the House with the support of 47 Republicans.
Democrats also hope to take up legislation later this month that aims to clarify the role, as spelled out in the Electoral Count Act (ECA) of 1887, that the vice president plays in certifying election results. The new legislation is intended to head off arguments like those made by former President Donald Trump around Jan. 6, 2021: that the vice president holds the power to unilaterally reject electors presented by the states. The legislation would instead define the vice president’s role in certification as purely ceremonial.
ECA reform comes after months of behind-the-scenes bipartisan coalition building and has more than the requisite 10 Senate Republican co-sponsors, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. But it’s still not clear if or when the Senate will take it up.
“We’re working on it. We want to get it done,” Schumer said Monday when asked about the timing of a potential vote.
Other priorities are likely to fall on the cutting room floor as the clock ticks down.
Some Democrats had hoped to pass some sort of immigration reform to secure a pathway to citizenship for recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, whose fate currently awaits a court ruling. But there’s little appetite for such a measure from Republicans and at least 10 would be needed to move any proposal in the limited remaining time.
A group of Democrats are also angling to reinstate their popular, pandemic-era child tax credit. Success on that front is also unlikely.
Any legislation that fails to make it to the finish line come the installment of the new Congress, in January, must return to square one with the next group of lawmakers.
Leadership fights take center stage
While Democrats will look to make the most of their remaining weeks in control of both chambers of Congress, House Republicans will spend much of that time trying to figure out who will be at the helm come Jan. 3.
Current House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy is eying the speaker’s gavel, but it remains to be seen if he’ll have the votes he needs to secure it. Earlier this month, he won his party’s nomination during a closed-door election. But it was far from unanimous support among his own party — which will control at most 222 seats in the next House — and to clench the speakership, McCarthy will need 218 votes, which means he can avoid few defections.
So far, five House Republicans have said they are hard “no” votes for McCarthy.
Meanwhile, House Democrats will elect a new, history-making generation of leaders this week during elections on Wednesday and Thursday, following Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s pre-Thanksgiving announcement of her intention to step away from party leadership.
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York is largely expected to ascend to Pelosi’s post. Jeffries won’t have to scrap for votes; he is expected to take over for Pelosi with the overwhelming — if not unanimous — support of his caucus, putting the 52-year-old on track to be the first Black lawmaker to lead a party in Congress.
It will also be the first time in 20 years that Pelosi hasn’t been in that role. The whip will be a woman — Katherine Clark of Massachusetts — and the No. 3, Pete Aguilar, will become the highest-ranking Latino in Congress; the Californian rose to prominence from his perch on the high-profile Jan. 6 committee.
Republican leadership in the Senate has already been decided, with members meeting behind closed doors last week and overwhelmingly selecting McConnell to remain at the party helm, despite facing his first challenge for the position in 15 years.
Rick Scott of Florida, the outgoing head of Senate Republicans’ campaign arm, had 10 supporters back his bid to replace McConnell.
Senate Democrats are expected to hold their leadership elections later this month, likely after the Dec. 6 Georgia runoff election. Schumer is largely expected to remain atop the party.
Lawmakers will grapple with must-pass funding
One thing lawmakers must do in the coming weeks of the lame-duck session is fund the government. Current funding runs out on Dec. 16.
Democrats want to try to pass a year-long funding package composed of 12 major bills rolled into one. But there’s yet to be an agreement on a top-line figure for that massive package, slowing negotiations.
A huge sticking point in those discussions has been a request from the Biden administration to provide Ukraine with $38 billion in additional funding — the latest in a series of such aid — to assist the country in its war against Russia.
All along, funding for Ukraine has had strong bipartisan support. But some Republicans have recently signaled that the party would not back additional funding during the lame-duck without guarantees of what they called transparency and accountability.
McCarthy has said his conference would not support writing a “blank check” for Ukraine if they captured the majority. He later walked back his comments, saying he is supportive of Ukraine. Reps. Michael McCaul and Mike Turner said on “This Week” on Sunday that the incoming House Republican majority will support Ukraine, downplaying critics inside the GOP like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.
There are a few paths forward to avert an immediate shutdown. Among them is a short-term funding bill to punt the problem slightly down the road, giving lawmakers more time to make a deal. Some Republicans favor this option, figuring they’ll have more negotiation power in the House come Jan. 3.
It’s not yet clear how Congress will maneuver through this and, before they do, senators are also set to wrangle a must-pass military appropriations bill: the National Defense Authorization Act.
That must-pass legislation has cleared the chamber every year for 50 years, and this Congress is behind schedule.
Chance to raise debt limit seems to be slipping
The federal debt limit, which allows the government to borrow money in order to pay for spending required by Congress, will need to be raised sometime next year. But previous increases of the debt limit — as under President Barack Obama and a Republican Congress — became politically poisonous battles.
Some Democrats in this Congress want to go ahead and deal with it now, before GOP cooperation is required in the new year.
Some House Republicans, meanwhile, have indicated they will use a deal over raising the debt limit to extract cuts to government spending, such as on social programs.
But hiking the limit without GOP support would require use of a cumbersome fast-track budget process known as reconciliation. The process eats up an incredible amount of floor time, all but wiping Democrats’ chances of using their remaining weeks in control to tackle other priorities.
While Democratic leadership has signaled interest in raising the debt limit before turning the House gavel over to Republicans, it does not seem likely to happen this Congress.
ABC News’ Lauren Peller contributed to this report.
(OXFORD, Mich.) — Two resigned Oxford, Michigan, school board members claim the district failed to implement its threat assessment playbook that they say could’ve prevented last year’s mass shooting at Oxford High School.
“This board had been told over and over that the school had all the policies in place and that our team did everything right,” former school board treasurer Korey Bailey said — but he claims that’s not true.
The whistleblowers’ Monday news conference came just two days before the one-year anniversary of the Nov. 30, 2021, shooting that was carried out by a student and left four students dead and several injured.
Former school board president Tom Donnelly said, in August, Bailey started looking into the threat assessment policies and guidelines, and he came across a Homeland Security protocol referenced in their policies.
Donnelly said this document “changed everything from my perspective.”
The document showed the playbook for preventing school violence, which “clearly defines every step” of identifying and preventing threats, Bailey said at the news conference. The playbook was most recently updated in June 2021, just months before the shooting, he said.
Donnelly said the protocol is to address a threat preemptively, and assumes that trained counselors, resource officers and other staffers collect “markers” to help stop an incident before it happens. “Markers” include: changes in grades, changes in attendance, and students showing violent tendencies, Donnelly said.
The document “clearly states that the threshold for pulling a team together [to investigate] should be low,” Donnelly said. “It’s the team’s job to decide whether you have a low or a medium or a high-risk factor.”
“The district certainly didn’t use [the playbook] as designed in the months leading up to the shooting,” Donnelly said. “There’s no evidence that we’ve ever used it as designed — even though, since 2011, the policies and guidelines have been in our system.”
Bailey said a report completed by Secure Education Consultants “praised our team” for developing and executing comprehensive security protocols. But Bailey said this report “was not based on a complete investigation — it only focused on if we had the policies. It never touched on if we ever implemented or trained people to carry out these policies.”
Bailey said he later learned no schools put this playbook into practice. He said he learned that those responsible for safety had raised concerns over the lack of training, and those concerns were ignored.
“Oxford neglected to train,” Bailey said, and “the results were fatal.”
Donnelly said district counsel disagreed with his and Bailey’s assessment.
“I couldn’t in good conscience stay on the board,” Donnelly said.
“Our options became clear that we could either … go along and stay silent, or we could move along and be a voice for change,” Bailey added. “Remaining silent was not being honest or transparent.”
Days before the 2021 shooting, a teacher allegedly saw 15-year-old shooter Ethan Crumbley researching ammunition in class; school officials contacted his parents but they didn’t respond, according to prosecutors. His mother texted her son, writing, “lol, I’m not mad at you, you have to learn not to get caught,” according to prosecutors.
Bailey said, if the school “actually trained on threat assessment, the situation would’ve ended” there.
Hours before the shooting, according to prosecutors, a teacher saw a note on Crumbley’s desk that was “a drawing of a semi-automatic handgun pointing at the words, ‘The thoughts won’t stop, help me.’ In another section of the note was a drawing of a bullet with the following words above that bullet, ‘Blood everywhere.'”
Crumbley’s parents were called to the school over the incident and said they’d get their son counseling, but they did not take him home.
Crumbley pleaded guilty last month to all charges against him, including terrorism and murder. The teen’s parents, Jennifer and James Crumbley, were charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter after allegedly making the gun accessible and failing to recognize warning signs about their son before the shooting. They have pleaded not guilty.
Secure Education Consultants said in a statement to ABC News that it “conducted a safety and security assessment” after the shooting at the request of the school district.
“Our role was not to review the shooting but to assess the district’s facilities, technology, policies, procedures and training protocols through the lens of evaluating and enhancing security,” the statement said. “As part of our assessment, we recommended ways the district could improve its overall security through investments in detection and alarm devices, strengthened communications and increased security presence. We also recommended and provided trainings to district staff.”
The Oxford school district did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.
(SAVANNAH, Ga.) — Bones found in a Georgia landfill are confirmed to belong to missing Savannah, Georgia, toddler Quinton Simon, the FBI announced Monday.
The search for 20-month-old Quinton began on Oct. 5 when his mother, 22-year-old Leilani Simon, reported him missing. One week later, Chatham County police said they believed Quinton was dead and authorities named the boy’s mother as the primary suspect.
On Oct. 18, police said they believed Quinton had been left in a dumpster, and authorities said a search was underway for his body in the local landfill.
Searchers spent 30 days scouring 1.2 million pounds of trash, police said.
On Nov. 21, police said remains had been recovered in the landfill and testing was underway to determine whether they belonged to Quinton.
Police also announced last week that Simon had been charged with malice murder, concealing the death of another person, false reporting and making false statements.
(BUFFALO, N.Y.) — Payton Gendron pleaded guilty Monday to state charges stemming from the May shooting at a Tops supermarket in Buffalo, New York.
Gendron pleaded guilty to 15 charges in all, including domestic terrorism motivated by hate, murder and attempted murder. He still faces more than two dozen federal charges, some of which carry the possibility of the death penalty. His sentencing is scheduled for Feb. 15, 2023. Domestic terrorism motivated by hate carries a mandatory life sentence.
“Thank God the families and the victims who survived this and this community don’t have to endure a long, protracted trial,” Erie County District Attorney John Flynn said following the plea. “Nothing will ever bring back the 10 beautiful people who lost their lives on that day. This past Thursday on Thanksgiving, there were 10 empty chairs at the Thanksgiving dinner … I can never provide full closure. There’s never going to be full closure for the families.”
Gendron fatally shot 10 Black people “because of the perceived race and/or color” of the victims, according to the indictment by the Erie County district attorney.
He was charged with carrying out a “domestic act of terrorism motivated by hate” along with 10 counts of murder in the first degree, 10 counts of murder in the second degree as a hate crime, three counts of attempted murder as a hate crime and one count of criminal possession of a weapon.
Flynn said Gendron illegally modified his gun, practiced shooting at state parks in Broome County and wrote 180 pages of racist screed that also contained the names of past mass shooters he admired.
White supremacist rhetoric online, including the promotion of racist conspiracy theories, has been linked to Gendron and his motive behind the Buffalo attack, ABC News has previously reported. Gendron traveled from his home near Binghamton, New York, to carry out the shooting, according to officials.
A document of Gendron’s uncovered by investigators outlined “the goals behind the attack which were to kill as many African Americans as possible, avoid dying and spread ideals,” Flynn said. “The document also detailed the defendant’s hateful beliefs, specifically his hatred for African Americans, Jewish people, immigrants, and other minorities.”
Gendron is the first to be charged with domestic terrorism motivated by hate in New York under a 2020 statute, which was implemented following an El Paso, Texas, shooting targeting Latinos in 2019.
He has been charged by federal prosecutors with a total of 26 counts of committing a hate crime resulting in death and a hate crime involving bodily injury. He’s also charged with using a firearm to commit murder during a crime of violence. In July, Gendron’s public defender entered a not guilty plea on his behalf.
“His decision to plead guilty will deliver the families some justice, but it will not end the racism that drove him to kill in the first place,” said Rev. Al Sharpton, founder and president of civil rights group National Action Network. “That horrific day was the byproduct of a white supremacy so blatant that its followers don’t hide under a hood — they livestream their hate for everyone to see,” referring to the livestream of the shooting captured by a camera on Gendron’s helmet during the attack.
The families of Buffalo victims are expected to speak following the hearing.
(NEW YORK) — Ash and lava have begun spewing out of the Mauna Loa volcano on Hawaii’s Big Island — the largest active volcano in the world.
The activity, which began Sunday and continued into Monday morning, is the first eruption from Mauna Loa in nearly 40 years.
The lava was contained to the summit, and there are currently no threats to populated areas, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. However, lava flows are significant enough to be visible from Kona, dozens of miles away.
Mauna Loa is so large it takes up more than half of the Big Island. The last time it erupted was in March and April 1984.
Hawaii Volcanoes National Park has closed the Mauna Loa Summit Area to visitors as a precaution.
Video posted to Twitter by the U.S. Geological Survey’s Hawaiian Volcano Observatory shows thermal footage of the lava flowing out of the volcano’s summit.
In conjunction with the lava flow, were more than a dozen earthquakes in the region of more than 2.5 magnitude early Monday morning, according to the USGS.
Lava was still erupting from the summit and was overflowing from the caldera as of 5 a.m. local time, according to USGS Volcanoes. The National Weather Service issued an ashfall advisory for depositing ash and debris, as well as light accumulation of ash on vessels, until 6 a.m. along the Alenuihaha Channel, Big Island windward waters, Big Island leeward waters and Big Island southeast waters.
The NWS advised that vessels should remain at port or avoid advisory areas, and those with respiratory sensitivities should take extra precautions to minimize exposure.
Falling volcanic ash and debris can also render engines or electronics inoperative, according to the NWS.
Hawaii is home to several active volcanos, including the Kīlauea volcano on the Big Island, one of the most active in the world.
Volcano activity has been recorded all around the globe over the past year.
Major eruptions could be underway from two volcanoes on Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula after clouds of ash and lava began spewing on Nov. 20.
In July, an eruption at the Sakurajima volcano in Japan prompted evacuation orders for residents nearby in the southwestern prefecture of Kagoshima.
And last week, marine geologists announced that the underwater volcano eruption that occurred on Jan. 15 in the Tongan archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean is the largest ever recorded.
