(NEW YORK) — After his home was raided by cops last year, despite no criminal charges, rapper Afroman said he decided to turn his emotions over the incident into his art.
“The best thing I came up with was to write songs about my experience and try to sell them and make some money to pay for the destruction that they brought to my house,” the “Because I Got High” singer told ABC News Live.
But now, he’s facing a court battle over that song’s music video, which features footage of the Aug. 21, 2022, incident taken from his security cameras, because the police say it ruined their officers’ reputations.
Afroman, whose real name is Joseph Edgar Foreman, contends that he was in his right to express his frustration with what unfolded at his home in Winchester, Ohio.
Deputies from the Adams County Sheriff’s Department pulled up in tactical gear, broke down his door and went through his rooms and belongings, including his collection of cars, during a search warrant.
The warrant claimed the deputies were investigating drug and kidnapping allegations and alleged that the police received a tip from a confidential informant who had seen large amounts of weed and money at the property and claimed Afroman kept women locked in his basement.
No one was found inside the residence and the rapper was never charged.
Afroman, who wasn’t at home at the time of the incident, said he saw the raid from live security camera footage on his phone.
“I felt powerless,” he said.
Afroman claimed the head officer involved in the incident denied his request for help to fix the damage to his home.
“So I got to start from right there and figure out what’s my move,” he said.
Afroman wrote three songs about the incident, including one titled “Will You Help Me Repair My Door,” and released music videos that featured the security footage.
Three months after the songs were released, Afroman said he received a letter from the sheriff’s office claiming they were suing him over the videos and songs claiming the officers “suffered humiliation, ridicule, mental distress, embarrassment, and loss of reputation after the music videos were released.”
Their claim demanded they should receive the proceeds that Afroman made using their image.
The Adams County Sheriff’s Department declined to comment citing ongoing litigation.
Robert Klinger, the attorney representing the officers, said in a statement to ABC News, “I intend to argue my client’s case in the Adams County Court, not in the court of public opinion or the press.”
Channa Llyod, an ABC News legal contributor, said the case does raise serious questions about what are the boundaries of privacy in a court of law.
“Officers acting in their job, executing their job functions, is typically not going to rise to the level of a violation of privacy,” she said.
(BUCKS COUNTY, Penn.) — Rescuers will assess Friday morning whether or not they can continue the search for a 2-year-old girl and her 9-month-old brother who were washed away with their mother in a flash flood in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, after severe weather on Wednesday halted efforts to find the children, officials said.
Search operations included K-9s from the Philadelphia Police Department and heavy equipment, the Upper Makefield Township Police Department wrote on Facebook, adding: “We will assess in the morning as to whether we can continue our search to bring Mattie and Conrad home.”
As rescue crews on Thursday resumed the search for 2-year-old Matilda “Mattie” Sheils and her 9-month-old brother, Conrad Sheils, who have been missing since their family was caught in the deluge over the weekend while driving near Upper Makefield Township, President Joe Biden made his first public comments about five lives lost in the flash flood, including the missing children’s mother.
“I want to say we’re praying for those who lost their lives in the flooding in Bucks County. The idea that there’s not global warming, I think can’t be denied by anybody anymore,” Biden said during an event in Philadelphia to tout his economic agenda. “Anyway, we’re grateful for the first responders who continue to look for a 2-year-old, Mattie, and her baby brother, Conrad. By the grace of God, maybe something will come of it.”
Efforts to locate the children resumed Thursday morning after severe weather paused the search all day Wednesday.
“We are in the process of getting dog teams and having the dive unit check the conditions of the river to see if they can get into the water today,” the Upper Makefield Township Police Department said in a statement released Thursday.
As of noon Thursday, K-9 teams from the Philadelphia Police Department were back searching the flood zone and heavy equipment had been brought in to help thoroughly comb through what police described as “extremely large debris piles,” the Upper Makefield Police Department said in a statement.
Divers are prepared to enter a creek that spilled its banks during Saturday’s flooding and the nearby Delaware River as soon as conditions allow them to commence an underwater search, police said.
“Unfortunately, we do not anticipate that occurring today,” the police department said in its statement.
The children have been missing since Saturday afternoon when they and their family were caught in the flash flood while driving on Route 532 to a barbecue, authorities said.
The children’s mother, 32-year-old Katie Seley, died after she grabbed Mattie and Conrad and tried to escape their vehicle but ended up being swept away in the violent weather event, officials said.
Seley was among five people killed in the storm. Her body was recovered on Sunday.
Rescue crews are expected to scale back the search after more than 100 emergency personnel scoured the flooded area along Hough’s Creek between Saturday afternoon when the children and their mother were reported missing to Tuesday evening, Chief Tim Brewer of the Upper Makefield Fire Company said. He said crews have used cadaver dogs in ground searches of the creek’s banks and have deployed sonar equipment and drones to search the creek, a tributary that leads to the Delaware River.
“We have searched the entire flood zone more than a dozen times,” Brewer said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon, adding that the search covered roughly 117 acres.
Brewer said the focus of the search is switching to a “dive rescue operation.”
“That will mean underwater assets mainly in the creek and we will work out from there. We still have K-9 assets in place, but we are going to begin to scale down,” said Brewer, adding that crews have searched and re-searched the area.
“Tracking logs are over 160 miles, meaning we have backtracked several times,” Brewer said.
The tragedy unfolded around 5:30 p.m. Saturday when more than 7 inches of rain fell within 45 minutes, causing Hough’s Creek to spill its banks and generating a “wall of water” that took drivers on Route 532, also known as Washington Crossing Road, by surprise, Brewer said. He said 11 cars were washed away in the flash flood and at least one was found 1.5 miles from where it was swept into the creek.
The missing children and their family are from South Carolina and were in Pennsylvania visiting friends and relatives when disaster struck.
Mattie and Conrad’s father, Jim Sheils, and their grandmother grabbed ahold of the missing siblings’ 4-year-old brother and escaped their car as it and other vehicles were being washed away, according to officials. The father, grandmother and 4-year-old were found alive, officials said.
“They were caught in a flash flood,” Brewer said. “The wall of water came to them, not the other way around.”
Besides Katie Seley, four other people were confirmed dead in the Bucks County flooding. They were identified by the Bucks County Coroner’s Office as Enzo Depiero, 78, and Linda Depiero, 74, both of Newtown Township, Pennsylvania; Susan Barnhardt, 53, of Titusville, New Jersey; and Yuko Love, 64, of Newtown Township.
The coroner’s office said all of the victims died from drowning.
(FRANKLIN, N.J.) — A school bus monitor is facing charges after a 6-year-old girl with special needs died following an incident on a bus ride in New Jersey, prosecutors said.
The child, who uses a wheelchair, was being transported on a school bus to an extended school year program at a local school in Franklin Township on Monday morning when she became unresponsive, prosecutors said.
During the ride, “a series of bumps in the road caused the 6-year-old to slump in her wheelchair seat making the 4-point harness which secured her to the chair to become tight around her neck, ultimately blocking her airway,” the Somerset County Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement on Thursday.
The school bus monitor who secured the child to the chair was seated toward the front of the bus at the time and “was utilizing a cellular telephone while wearing earbud headphone devices in both ears,” the office said.
“The investigation revealed that this was in violation of policies and procedures,” the office said.
Police responded to a school in Franklin Township shortly after 9 a.m. and administered CPR to the unresponsive child, prosecutors said. She was transported to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
Following an investigation, the school bus monitor — identified by prosecutors as 27-year-old Amanda Davila of New Brunswick — was arrested on Wednesday and charged with second-degree manslaughter and second-degree endangering the welfare of a child, prosecutors said.
She was being held in Somerset County Jail pending a detention hearing, which is scheduled to occur possibly on Tuesday, the prosecutor’s office said. It is unclear if she has an attorney who can speak on her behalf. Attempts by ABC News to reach Davila for comment were unsuccessful.
Somerset County Prosecutor’s Office Police Chief Francisco Roman told ABC News they are not releasing the child’s name at the wishes of her family. An autopsy report is pending, he said.
In an interview with New York ABC station WABC, her parents said the girl was diagnosed with a rare chromosome disability called Emanuel syndrome.
“She did not deserve this, to be taken away from us in such a way that had nothing to do with her condition,” her mother, Najmah Nash, told the station.
The child was nonverbal, her father told WABC.
“My daughter, she can’t speak, she’s helpless,” her father, Wali Williams, told the station. “She can’t even take the harness off on her own, she can’t even take the seat belt off. The only thing she can do is move her arms.”
The bus monitor was employed by Montauk Bus Company, according to Franklin Township Public Schools. ABC News has reached out to the bus company for comment.
“Our thoughts and prayers continue to be with this student’s family and friends,” Franklin Township Public Schools Superintendent John Ravally said in a letter to the school community.
(AUSTIN, Texas) — On the second day of a hearing over a lawsuit filed against the state of Texas, an anti-abortion doctor who practices in the state testified Thursday in support of the ban, stating “the law is clear” and that if doctors believe they cannot provide proper care, it’s because they misunderstand the law.
Meanwhile, two physicians who practice medicine outside the state testified for the plaintiffs, arguing that Texas’ abortion laws are confusing and would make it difficult to provide necessary care to patients.
They were joined by a physician in Texas who was pregnant herself and delivered emotional testimony about having to go out of state to get an abortion.
The hearing is part of an ongoing lawsuit filed by the Center for Reproductive Rights on behalf of 15 women in the state of Texas alleging that the state’s abortion laws put their lives in jeopardy.
The testimony was given during a court hearing that began Wednesday as part of plaintiffs’ request for a temporary restraining order on abortion bans, permitting women to receive lifesaving emergency abortions.
Lawyers are asking the court to provide a “remedy applied to patients whose life, health or fertility is at risk from an emergent medical condition,” Molly Duane, a senior staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights and lead attorney on the case, said during opening statements Wednesday.
Dr. Austin Dennard, a plaintiff in the lawsuit and an OB-GYN who had to travel out of state to receive abortion care for a nonviable pregnancy, took the stand Thursday. Dennard — who is currently pregnant again — testified that she and her husband made the “very difficult decision” to abort a pregnancy in 2017 after the fetus was diagnosed with a very rare genetic disorder.
In emotional testimony, Dennard testified that she found out she was pregnant in June 2022.
At her second ultrasound appointment, Dennard — who was nervous because she had a miscarriage months before — said she realized that her baby had acrania, a fatal condition in which a fetus does not have a skull, leaving brain tissue exposed to amniotic fluid, as soon as she saw the ultrasound.
“I immediately realized that there was something catastrophically wrong,” Dennard said.
“I was devastated. We were trying so hard. I had been hoping and praying for another baby and just had envisioned having a third and realizing that this pregnancy was not going to end with another little toddler running around my house. That’s hard,” Dennard said.
At a second ultrasound, a maternal fetal medicine specialist then diagnosed the fetus with anencephaly — but there was still a cardiac heartbeat.
“I think I was crying at that time. And she came over and just gave me a big hug and said, ‘I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry you’re going through this torture when you got the diagnosis of anencephaly,'” Dennard said.
Dennard testified that anencephaly is a fatal, severe defect for the fetus that poses a risk to the health of the mother as well.
“[The babies live] seconds, minutes, maybe a day. They essentially just gasp for air until they pass away,” Dennard said.
Dennard said she made the decision to travel to get an abortion out of state and described what it felt like to not have access to care in Texas and be forced to carry a nonviable pregnancy.
“I felt like my pregnancy was not my own, that it belonged to the state because I no longer had a choice of what I could do. I felt abandoned. I couldn’t believe that after spending my entire life in the state, being a sixth generation Texan, practicing medicine in the state, that the state had completely turned their back on me,” Dennard said.
“And for them my only choice was to continue the pregnancy, putting my life at risk and my mental and emotional health at risk for a fetus that was never going to survive. So I had a lot of big feelings about it,” Dennard said.
Dennard testified that her emotional recovery takes longer time than her physical recovery and said the grief of losing a child “never really goes away.”
She said she considered going public with her story earlier but did not do so initially out of fear and because she was not ready.
In cross-examination, a representative for the state asked Dennard about her age and whether her pregnancy was higher risk because she was “over 35.” She then asked Dennard if she would have been “considered geriatric” due to her age, to which Dennard responded, sarcastically, “Well that’s a nice word,” adding, “Geriatric is not a medical term.”
Testimony from out of state physicians
The two physicians who testified Thursday practice medicine in Oregon and Massachusetts, but said they would find it difficult to practice medicine in Texas under the bans.
“My opinion is that the laws as they’re currently written — the medical exceptions — they’re confusing. And that confusion and lack of clarity is keeping physicians from being able to exercise their good faith judgment in the treatment of patients,” said Dr. Ali Shahbizraja, an emergency medicine physician at Massachusetts General Hospital.
“It, also, is pretty evident that the fact is that the consequences of those laws are severe, personally, to the physicians themselves. And as a consequence of that, they are going to they’re going to, in patients where there’s a gray zone and there’s a lack of clarity, they’re going to err on the side of not treating,” Shahbizraja said.
Shahbizraja testified that this appeared to be the case when physicians were treating patients who are plaintiffs in this lawsuit.
“It’s making it hard to determine when physicians can act and exercise that in good faith clinical judgment, and that’s clear based on the patient’s understanding of their discussions with their physicians in their affidavits,” Shahbizraja said.
Another expert agreed and said wording of the laws would scare physicians.
“Given that physicians in Texas are practicing under the abortion ban — where if they’re prosecuted they carry risk of losing their license, their livelihood and time in jail — they’re going to practice the most conservatively as possible,” Dr. Aaron Caughey, a maternal fetal medicine specialist at Oregon Health & Science University, testified in court Thursday.
“It is hard to create a list that would delineate all the conditions that would meet a medical indication for abortion. I gave some examples above to give a sense of how you might think about it. But creating an exhaustive list, I believe, would be an impossible task,” Caughey said.
Caughey also testified to the care the women who are plaintiffs in the lawsuit could have received in the absence of Texas’ bans.
Texas OB-GYN testifies for the state
Dr. Ingrid Skop, a Texas OB-GYN, testified as an expert witness for the state Thursday, arguing that abortion care hadn’t changed in Texas despite the state’s ban on the procedure. Skop works for the Charlotte Lozier Institute, an anti-abortion group, and has shared her views on abortion publicly in the past.
She said many physicians in Texas are confused about the new abortion law and are misinterpreting it because they don’t understand it, which has led to “suboptimal care.”
“The law is quite clear,” Skop said. “The fault lies with the physicians are not being given guidance by the organizations that usually will give them guidance — the medical societies and the hospital societies.”
“They should have known they could intervene,” she added in reference to reports of women who have been in life-threatening situations after not being able to get an abortion in Texas. “They should not have waited until women were on the verge of death and going to the ICU to intervene.”
Skop also argued that, in situations where a fetus cannot be saved, she believes induction is more appropriate than performing a procedure such as dilation and curettage.
“A much more holistic way to progress through the grieving process than to dismember your child and not have a way to grieve.”
She added that palliative care and hospice care, including perinatal palliative care should be provided.
Skop added that life-threatening complications often occur close to viability, which she said is around 22 weeks gestation, and “the child is able to survive.”
She said doctors can use their judgment in determining if the medical exception applies in a patient’s case, but conceded the Texas Medical Board could clarify the law and help physicians understand when abortions are medically necessary.
Closing arguments
In closing arguments, the plaintiffs’ attorneys argued that the bans are “dehumanizing” and are putting patients through “torture.”
“Far from furthering life, Texas abortion bans harm the life of pregnant people and the lives of their children,” Duane, the Center’s attorney, said during closing.
Meanwhile, the state argued that the medical exception under the Texas abortion ban passed rational basis review, which is a judicial review to determine if a law is constitutional.
The state also said that because two plaintiffs who testified Wednesday — Amanda Zurawski and Samantha Casiano — had their fertility compromised and Dennard’s current pregnancy is past viability, they don’t risk being harmed by the ban.
District Judge Jessica Mangrum told the attorney in the case it would likely take her “several weeks” to rule, adding, “It will take some time because it’s necessary to fully and fairly evaluate what you’ve put in front of this court.”
In a press conference after the hearing, Duane said, “This is not about the right to an abortion. This is about basic human rights.”
Wednesday’s hearing
Thursday’s testimony follows emotional testimony from three of the women filing the suit who detailed the harm they experienced due to the state’s abortion ban. All three plaintiffs gave their testimony through tears, with one of the plaintiffs even getting sick on the stand when recalling continuing her pregnancy after not being offered care.
The plaintiffs who testified were Amanda Zurawski, who developed sepsis and nearly died after being refused an abortion when her water broke at 18 weeks; Ashley Brandt, who had to travel to Colorado for abortion care after one of the twins she was carrying was diagnosed with a fatal condition; and Samantha Casiano, who was not offered abortion care and had to carry a nonviable pregnancy to term and give birth to a baby who died four hours later.
A fourth plaintiff, Dr. Damla Karsan, an OB-GYN who practices in Texas, also testified Wednesday.
The suit alleges that Texas’ abortion bans have denied the plaintiffs and countless other pregnant people necessary and potentially lifesaving medical care because physicians in the state fear liability, according to the suit.
Texas has several abortion laws in place, prohibiting all abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, except in medical emergencies, which the laws do not define. One of the bans — called SB 8 — prohibits abortions after cardiac activity is detected, which kept several plaintiffs from accessing care despite their pregnancies being nonviable, according to the suit.
Under Texas’ bans, it is a second-degree felony to perform or attempt an abortion, punishable by up to life in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. The law also allows private citizens to sue anyone who “aids or abets” an abortion.
The suit is the first to be filed by women impacted by the abortion bans since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year, ending federal protections for abortion rights.
The lawsuit is filed against the state of Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton — who was recently impeached — and the Texas Medical Board.
(NEW YORK) — Oceans all over the world are experiencing warmer-than-normal temperatures, but waters off the southern U.S. could be on the brink of an ocean heat wave emergency as temperatures rise to unprecedented levels.
More than 40% of all global ocean temperatures are currently experiencing a heat wave, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The heat is even more acute off the coast of Florida, where ocean temperatures are currently “strikingly warm,” Brian McNaldy, senior research associate at the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science, told ABC News.
Dangerous heat indexes blanket Florida for over a month
On Thursday, Miami reached a heat index in the triple digits for the 39th consecutive day, extending a record the city had broken the week before, according to the National Weather Service.
“When you’re breaking records by such large margins, that’s what makes it alarming,” McNaldy said. “We’re not even close to what the previous record was, let alone the average.”
The waters surrounding the Sunshine State have been no different. This week, while land temperatures have been about 95 degrees in South Florida, ocean temperatures clocked in at about 94 degrees — up to 7 degrees warmer than they should be this time of year. Water temperatures do not typically measure this high until late August or early September, experts said.
The relentless heat on both land and ocean are expected to persist through the rest of July and August — traditionally the hottest time of the year — forecasts show.
Days with water temperature above 90 degrees Fahrenheit have increased by 2500% in the Florida Keys since 1975, according to Ian Enochs, NOAA research ecologist and head of the Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory’s Coral Program.
Relative to temperatures recorded from 1991 to 2020, the waters surrounding South Florida are 5 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit above normal, McNaldy said.
While reliable records only go back between 40 and 80 years for water temperatures on buoys and observation docks in the Keys, inferred heat data indicates this is the hottest ocean waters have gotten since humans have been on Earth, McNaldy said.
How ocean warming will affect marine life
The warming can have “significant impacts on marine life as well as coastal communities and economies,” according to NOAA, which has issued a level 2 alert for the reefs, the highest level, indicating bleaching of the coral reefs surrounding South Florida is likely to occur.
“Florida’s coral reefs don’t respond well to this,” Abigail Clark, an assistant professor of marine science and technology at The College of the Florida Keys, told ABC News.
The effects of a mass coral die-off could be devastating, as 25% of all marine life, including dolphins, turtles and sharks, depend on the reef for survival. The reef also brings in billions in revenue to the state through the tourism and commercial fishing industries.
This bleaching event is different than anything the Florida Keys has ever seen, said Keri O’Neil, director and senior scientist of the Coral Conservation Program at The Florida Aquarium in Tampa. While some of the coral in the region has survived 3,000 years of change, several coral ecosystems have succumbed to the heat in the past 10 days, O’Neil said.
The last four decades have not been kind to the Florida Reef Tract, North America’s only barrier reef that stretches about 360 miles from Dry Tortugas National Park west of the Florida Keys to the St. Lucie Inlet in Martin County, O’Neil said.
The barrier reef has lost about 90% of its live coral cover since the 1980s, O’Neil said.
The Florida Aquarium and its partners restore Florida’s coral reef with a “concrete seawall” that aims to absorb storm surge and wave action. Researchers at the Florida Aquarium have also created an ocean greenhouse near Tampa where they genetically select and breed coral for strength and heat resilience.
The “babies” that were planted four years ago have thrived despite transient periods of warmth because there have also been periods of relief.
Relief likely won’t come this year, as the next six weeks are forecast to be just as hot.
The bleaching events have already started, and alert levels for corals are at their highest mark, across the Caribbean.
“Our staff might come up high-fiving or they might come up in tears,” O’Neil said of the monitoring.
Climate change is likely contributing to ocean warming, scientists say
The ocean warming is widespread. Elsewhere in the world, marine heat waves are currently occurring in the equatorial Pacific; the Northeast Pacific; the Northwest Pacific in the Kuroshio extension region and the Sea of Japan; the tropical North Atlantic; the Northeast Atlantic along the Iberian coast as far northward as Ireland and the U.K.; the Southwest Pacific just southeast of New Zealand; and the Western Indian Ocean southeast of Madagascar, according to NOAA.
The average sea surface temperature for June across the north Atlantic was 0.91 degrees Celsius above average, according to Copernicus, the the European Union’s climate change service. This is around 0.5 degrees Celsius more than the previous warmest June, recorded in 2010.
The warming atmosphere may also be contributing to ocean warming in the region. January through June ranked as the warmest on record for air temperature in Florida, which could be causing increases in ocean temperatures as well, experts say.
The current ocean temperatures in the North Atlantic are typical of late summer, rather than early to mid-summer, experts say.
The warming could also affect the intensity of hurricanes to come later in the season.
Because of the warm temperatures on land and sea, hurricane forecasters at Colorado State University have revised their predictions for the number of named storms in the 2023 season from 13 to 18. When a tropical cyclone goes over unusually warm water, it makes them resilient to wind shear, and gives them a chance to rapidly intensify.
Anomalous warmth may not be directly tied to climate change, but it makes marine heat waves like this more likely, McNaldy said.
Climate scientists have attributed warming oceans to human-caused climate change, as oceans absorb about 90% of the heat generated by emissions. While water is much more difficult to heat than land, it is also much harder to cool.
As the excessive heat and energy warms the ocean, the change in temperature leads to “unparalleled cascading effects,” including ice-melting, sea-level rise, marine heat waves and ocean acidification, according to the United Nations.
The changes will cause a “lasting impact” on marine biodiversity, as well as the 680 million people around the world who live in low-lying coastal areas and almost 2 billion people — about one-quarter of the world’s population — who live in half of the world’s coastal megacities, according to the U.N.
(UPPER MAKEFIELD, Pa.) — Divers were poised Thursday to search for a 2-year-old girl and her 9-month-old brother who were washed away with their mother in a flash flood in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, after severe weather on Wednesday halted efforts to find the children, officials said.
Rescue crews were attempting to resume the search for 2-year-old Matilda “Mattie” Sheils and her 9-month-old brother, Conrad Sheils, who have been missing since their family was caught in the deluge over the weekend while driving near Upper Makefield Township, authorities said.
“We are in the process of getting dog teams and having the dive unit check the conditions of the river to see if they can get into the water today,” the Upper Makefield Township Police Department said in a statement released Thursday morning.
Crews will also be attempting to bring heavy equipment to the area to help thoroughly comb through what police described as “extremely large debris piles.”
Severe weather in the search area prevented rescue crews from resuming efforts on Wednesday to locate the children, officials said.
The children have been missing since Saturday afternoon when they and their family were caught in the flash flood while driving on Route 532 to a barbecue, authorities said.
The children’s mother, 32-year-old Katie Seley, died after she grabbed Mattie and Conrad and tried to escape their vehicle but ended up being swept away in the violent weather event, officials said.
Seley was among five people killed in the storm. Her body was recovered on Sunday.
Rescue crews are expected to scale back the search after more than 100 emergency personnel scoured the flooded area along Hough’s Creek between Saturday afternoon when the children and their mother were reported missing to Tuesday evening, Chief Tim Brewer of the Upper Makefield Fire Company said. He said crews have used cadaver dogs in ground searches of the creek’s banks and have deployed sonar equipment and drones to search the creek, a tributary that leads to the Delaware River.
“We have searched the entire flood zone more than a dozen times,” Brewer said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon, adding that the search covered roughly 117 acres.
Brewer said the focus of the search is switching to a “dive rescue operation.”
“That will mean underwater assets mainly in the creek and we will work out from there. We still have K-9 assets in place, but we are going to begin to scale down,” said Brewer, adding that crews have searched and re-searched the area.
“Tracking logs are over 160 miles, meaning we have backtracked several times,” Brewer said.
The tragedy unfolded around 5:30 p.m. Saturday when more than 7 inches of rain fell within 45 minutes, causing Hough’s Creek to spill its banks and generating a “wall of water” that took drivers on Route 532, also known as Washington Crossing Road, by surprise, Brewer said. He said 11 cars were washed away in the flash flood and at least one was found 1.5 miles from where it was swept into the creek.
The missing children and their family are from South Carolina and were in Pennsylvania visiting friends and relatives when disaster struck.
Mattie and Conrad’s father, Jim Sheils, and their grandmother grabbed ahold of the missing siblings’ 4-year-old brother and escaped their car as it and other vehicles were being washed away, according to officials. The father, grandmother and 4-year-old were found alive, officials said.
“They were caught in a flash flood,” Brewer said. “The wall of water came to them, not the other way around.”
Besides Katie Seley, four other people were confirmed dead in the Bucks County flooding. They were identified by the Bucks County Coroner’s Office as Enzo Depiero, 78, and Linda Depiero, 74, both of Newtown Township, Pennsylvania; Susan Barnhardt, 53, of Titusville, New Jersey; and Yuko Love, 64, of Newtown Township.
The coroner’s office said all of the victims died from drowning.
(NEW YORK) — A powerful tornado ripped through central North Carolina for more than a dozen miles on Wednesday, destroying homes and injuring residents, according to officials.
The National Weather Service said early Thursday that a preliminary damage survey indicates the tornado was an EF3, with peak winds up to 150 miles per hour. It’s the first EF3 tornado ever observed in central North Carolina in the month of July and the strongest twister for this time of year on record in the state.
The National Weather Service currently uses the Enhanced Fujita scale to rate tornado intensity based on wind speeds and the severity of the damage caused. The scale has six intensity categories from zero to five (EF0, EF1, EF2, EF3, EF4 and EF5), representing increasing wind speeds and degrees of damage. There is also an unknown category (EFU) for tornadoes that cannot be rated due to a lack of evidence.
The 600-yard-wide tornado touched down Wednesday afternoon at around 12:30 ET near Dortches, a tiny town in North Carolina’s Nash County, just outside the city of Rocky Mount. From there, the twister traversed 16.5 miles over a period of about 30 minutes before lifting near the Battleboro neighborhood of Rocky Mount in North Carolina’s Edgecombe County, according to the National Weather Service.
While on the ground, the tornado snapped power poles, uprooted trees and damaged buildings. Multiple mobile homes in the Dortches area were completely destroyed and removed 20 to 30 yards from their foundations. Farther northeast, a residence building suffered major damage as all exterior walls collapsed with only interior walls and a brick fireplace still standing. The twister also flattened a metal truss tower connected to the electrical transmission line as well as caused significant damage to a metal warehouse building near the Belmont Lake Golf Club in Rocky Mount, according to the National Weather Service.
Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer said its facility in Rocky Mount was damaged by the tornado but that all staff “are safe and accounted for” after evacuating the building.
Citing media reports, the National Weather Service said there were 16 storm-related injures in the affected area — including two life-threatening — and no fatalities. The Edgecombe County Sheriff’s Office confirmed it had received reports of two life-threatening injuries and one non-life-threatening injury related to the storm.
The tornado is part of a system of severe weather threatening some 57 million Americans. The latest forecast for Thursday shows destructive winds, large hail and an isolated tornado are the main threats from Denver, Colorado, to north-central Oklahoma. And from Michigan to South Carolina, the main threat will be large hail — especially from Fort Wayne, Indiana, to Detroit, Michigan — along with damaging winds and isolated tornadoes. There is also a risk for flash flooding at all locations.
Meanwhile, extreme heat continues to plague a swath of the United States with no end in sight. More than 100 million Americans across 16 states — from California to Florida — are on alert for dangerous heat on Thursday, with the latest forecast showing temperatures at or above 100 degrees Fahrenheit in the Southwest and heat index values in the 100s in the Southeast.
Arizona’s capital had it’s all-time hottest day on record on Wednesday, with a high temperature of 119 degrees and a low of 97 degrees. Temperatures in Phoenix have now been at or above 110 degrees for the past 20 days and haven’t dropped below 90 degrees for 10 straight days.
A 71-year-old man from the Los Angeles area collapsed and died at the Golden Canyon trailhead in Death Valley National Park in California on Tuesday afternoon as temperatures soared to 121 degrees, according to the National Park Service. While the Inyo County Coroner’s Office has not yet determined the cause of death, park rangers suspect heat was a factor.
It’s possibly the second heat-related fatality in Death Valley this summer. A 65-year-old man died on July 3, the National Park Service said.
(NEW YORK) — Texas authorities are doubling down and pushing back on disturbing allegations of migrant abuse along the United States-Mexico border.
A spokesperson for the Texas Department of Public Safety, Lt. Christopher Olivarez, told ABC News during an interview on Wednesday that leadership consciences are clear over how migrants are treated by the agency.
Olivarez disputed or attempted to clear up a number of allegations that were made in an email a state trooper had sent to his superior earlier this month about what he called “inhumane” treatment of migrants attempting to enter the U.S. from the southern border in Texas. ABC News has learned that the trooper in question has been on the job for more than five years and is not permanently stationed at the border but rather was there on a rotation.
One of the key claims in the email was that troopers were directed by command to “push back” migrants attempting to cross the Rio Grande, a river that flows about 1,900 miles from Colorado to the Gulf of Mexico. The trooper said in the email that commanders only reiterated the order when concerns about drowning were raised.
Olivarez told ABC News that the trooper “misinterpreted” the order. He said that when commanders order troopers to “push back” migrants, they are directing them to verbally tell the migrants to go to a port of entry and not cross illegally. When pressed why the trooper would be so clear in his understanding that the order meant to physically push migrants into the river, Olivarez said the trooper had misunderstood and that it is not the Texas Department of Public Safety’s policy to physically push back migrants.
The trooper also alleged in the email that commanders told them not to distribute water to migrants amid extreme heat. Olivarez categorically denied that claim, telling ABC News that while it’s not their job to be a welcome committee to those attempting to cross the border, they would and have never denied water to anyone in need.
In regards to the email’s litany of alleged injuries to migrants crossing, including to a pregnant woman and children, Olivarez said there is no question that the barriers the Texas Department of Public Safety have put up along the border are dangerous. That is essentially the point, he argued, telling ABC News that the idea is to put these things in place to deter crossings.
When asked if, given the email, there should be concerns about the systemic abuse of migrants along the border, Olivarez said “no.” He said the trooper’s allegations are being investigated but that, at least initially, the email has prompted no widespread soul-searching at the Texas Department of Public Safety and will not change the scope or goals of the agency’s mission.
ABC News has obtained the original email, dated July 3, and has reached out to the trooper directly as well as the Texas State Troopers Association, the union representing the troopers, but requests for comment were not returned.
The U.S. Department of Justice “is aware of the troubling reports” and is working with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security “and other relevant agencies to assess the situation,” spokesperson Xochitl Hinojosa told ABC News in a statement on Wednesday.
The Inspector General of the Texas Department of Public Safety is conducting a full investigation into the allegations.
(LAS VEGAS) — At least one Delta passenger was taken to the hospital for heat-related illness after the plane sat on the tarmac for hours on Monday in Las Vegas, where temperatures reached triple digits.
Passengers on a Delta flight to Atlanta experienced extreme heat while the plane was taxiing at Harry Reid International Airport, resulting in multiple people being treated, according to an eyewitness statement.
Krista Garvin, a field producer for Fox News, was on the Delta flight on Monday, where she tweeted about the “insane experience.”
“@Delta what an INSANE experience. First, we were delayed because you did not have a flight attendant,” Garvin tweeted. “Then we finally board and sit for almost 3 hours on a hot plane in 111-degree weather. Now we are heading back to the gate cause people are passing out. We are now being told you Can get off but there isn’t another flight out to ATL for days. This is actually nuts.”
Delta Airlines told ABC News it’s investigating the circumstances of why it got so hot in the plane.
“We apologize for the experience our customers had on flight 555 from Las Vegas to Atlanta on July 17, which ultimately resulted in a flight cancelation,” the company said in a statement. “Delta teams are looking into the circumstances that led to uncomfortable temperatures inside the cabin and we appreciate the efforts of our people and first responders at Harry Reid International.”
Passengers have said they were on the plane for at least three hours, while the company said it taxied for over an hour before heading back to the gate.
Another passenger, April Love, told ABC News, that customers were on the tarmac for about three hours and described passengers needing multiple gurneys and oxygen, as well as a flight attendant passing out.
“I saw at least four people getting the oxygen and then I saw at least three gurneys coming,” Love said.
The airline was only aware of one passenger needing medical attention.
The flight was canceled following the incident and passengers received compensation.
“[Delta] finally decided to take everyone off because too many people were sick and they want to try and cool down the plane,” Garvin said. “Praying they let us back on or we will be stuck here.”
Delta reportedly found other flights for customers.
Temperatures at Harry Reid International Airport reached nearly 115 degrees on Monday, according to the National Weather Service.
Dangerous temperatures have been plaguing much of the U.S. for the past month.
The harsh heat that has been blanketing large portions of the South and West for weeks is expected to continue into the foreseeable future, according to forecasts.
Reno, Nevada, tied its all-time high temperature on Sunday at 108 degrees, reaching that number for the first time since 2007. Las Vegas also tied its daily record on Sunday when it reached 116 degrees.
(MIDDLETOWN, Conn.) — New England liberal arts college Wesleyan University has ended legacy admissions in the wake of the Supreme Court striking down race-based affirmative action.
In a statement released Wednesday, University President Michael S. Roth addressed the importance of formally ending admission preference for “legacy applicants.”
“We still value the ongoing relationships that come from multi-generational Wesleyan attendance, but there will be no ‘bump’ in the selection process,” Roth’s statement read.
His statement continued: “As has been almost always the case for a long time, family members of alumni will be admitted on their own merits.”
Legacy admissions played a “negligible role” in the school’s admission process because being related to an alumnus indicated “little about that applicant’s ability to succeed” at the school, according to a press release from Wesleyan. But, the Supreme Court’s decision on affirmative action led to Wesleyan’s move.
Out of 2,280 students admitted for the class of 2027, only 4% had a parent who attended Wesleyan, according to the school. For the classes of 2022 to 2026 that figure hovered between 7% and 8%.
Last month, the high court decided that Harvard and the University of North Carolina’s affirmative action admissions programs violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, impacting colleges nationwide.
The court’s decision undercuts more than four decades of legal precedent and is a blow to schools that say race-conscious admissions programs are vital to building a diverse student body.
Following the court’s affirmative action ruling, the admissions process for colleges and universities came further under scrutiny, particularly regarding legacy admissions.
Earlier this month, in a federal civil rights complaint against Harvard College, various civil rights and advocacy groups, including the Chica Project and Lawyers for Civil Rights, called on the Education Department to launch a federal investigation into the school’s practices surrounding legacy and donor preferences that disproportionately favor white students.
“Harvard’s practice of giving a leg-up to the children of wealthy donors and alumni – who have done nothing to deserve it – must end,” Michael Kippins, a fellow at Lawyers for Civil Rights, said in a statement to ABC News at the time. “Particularly in light of last week’s decision from the Supreme Court, it is imperative that the federal government act now to eliminate this unfair barrier that systematically disadvantages students of color.”
Nearly half of Harvard’s white students were recruited athletes, related to alumni, children of faculty and staff, or were “of special importance to the dean of admissions,” according to a 2019 study from the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Less than 16% of African American, Asian American and Hispanic students at Harvard fall into these categories, according to the study.
Wesleyan University is the first university to end legacy admissions since the high court’s ruling.
Amherst College in Massachusetts ended legacy admissions in 2021, with then-school president Biddy Martin saying at the time, “Now is the time to end this historic program that inadvertently limits educational opportunity by granting a preference to those whose parents are graduates of the College. We want to create as much opportunity for as many academically talented young people as possible, regardless of financial background or legacy status.”
ABC News’ Kiara Alfonseca, Devin Dwyer and Alexandra Hutzler contributed to this report.
