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(FLINT, Mich.) — While weekly bottled water donations have ended for citizens of Flint, Michigan, according to city officials, the water crisis there is ongoing.

Health officials are urging residents to continue to use faucet filters certified to remove lead until the residential lead service line replacement is completed.

The residential lead service line replacement was initially set to be finished in 2019, according to a settlement agreement with the city. That deadline was eventually pushed back to the fall of 2022 and has most recently been set for completion in August 2023, according to city officials.

The city is offering free water filter units, replacement cartridges and water testing kits for Flint residents for pick up at City Hall or for delivery by the Office of Public Health.

The state is required to fund water filters for one year following the completion of the lead service line replacement project, which has been ongoing since 2016.

“More than 95% of lead pipes in Flint have been replaced, and we will continue the work until the job is done,” Flint Mayor Sheldon Neeley said in a recent statement on the water filters. “I will work with anyone who is committed to making that happen. I ask those remaining homeowners to give our crews right of entry so that we can fix this once and for all.”

The city received an extension and funding from the Environmental Protection Agency for the remaining 5% of lead pipe replacements and excavations.

In 2014, Michigan switched the city’s water supply to the Flint River.

The water source was switched back to Lake Huron in 2015 but according to the Michigan Department of Attorney General, “the damage had been done.”

Highly toxic levels of lead were discovered in the water and outbreaks of Legionnaires’ disease coincided with the switch, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, prompting a state of emergency declaration in 2016.

“The switch was made without the required anti-corrosive chemicals being added,” read a statement from the city announcing the lead pipe replacement project in 2016. “The corrosive water removed a protective coating on the inside of the pipes, allowing lead to leach into the water going to homes and businesses,” the statement continued.

In their latest announcement, city officials said that since July 2016, the city’s water system has met state and federal standards for lead in drinking water for 12 consecutive monitoring periods, and “bottled water has no health benefits over filtered tap water.”

The city also said that common point-of-use faucet filters like Brita and Pur effectively remove lead when installed and maintained properly.

Since 2018, 100,000 water bottles had been delivered weekly by BlueTriton Brands, Inc — a Connecticut-based beverage company — serving approximately 3,000 people per week, according to Flint officials.

Lack of trust in the city’s tap water has been an ongoing struggle for residents.

“There are huge victories that have [been] accomplished, but there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done,” Flint resident LeeAnne Walters told ABC News in 2021.

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(CHICAGO) — A 21-year-old man with special needs was shot three times, including once in the head, while he waited for the bus to go to school in Chicago, according to police.

He’s in a hospital in critical condition, Chicago Police Commander Don Jerome said at a news conference.

The victim’s 15-year-old brother, who also has special needs, and the brothers’ father were with him at the bus stop when gunfire rang out around 6:30 a.m. Wednesday, Jerome said. The brother and father were not hurt.

Police are looking for three or four suspects who were seen approaching the area, firing multiple shots and fleeing on foot, Jerome said.

No arrests have been made and police are asking for the community’s help.

Authorities believe the suspects were gang members who “likely thought that the victims were rival gang members,” Jerome said.

He stressed, “None of the family involved — the father nor the 15-year-old nor the 21-year-old victim — have any gang affiliation whatsoever.”

“No one should be shot, let alone shot while standing waiting for a school bus. No father should see his children shot like this,” Jerome said.

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(NEW YORK) — “Extreme” drought has been completely eliminated in California for the first time in nearly three years, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.

While the drastic change for California has happened over the last few weeks, the most recent batch of rain has completely eliminated the “extreme” drought category. However, while smaller reservoirs have returned to averages, many larger ones still remain low, according to experts. And it’s still “too early to tell if the wet weather is enough to end the drought.”

This is the first time since April 2020 that there has been no “extreme” drought in California.

While drought in the western U.S. continues to improve overall, the Colorado River Basin lags behind the Sierra Nevadas in terms of recovery.

It will take several seasons such as this one to help eliminate the drought in the area, which includes reservoirs Lake Mead and Lake Powell.

The National Weather Service Weather Prediction Center recently released top totals from the parade of storms that moved into California from Dec. 26 through Jan. 17. The top snow total was 240 inches in Mammoth Mountain and near Honeydew, California, nearly 4 feet of rain fell (47.7 inches).

The California snowpack continues to remain above normal for the entire season. When looking at season to date, parts of the Sierra Nevada Mountains are nearly three times their average for this time of year.

Colorado River Basin

The Colorado River Basin — parts of Southern California, Utah, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Wyoming — has not had the large rain totals seen in Northern California, but the region is having an excellent season for snow and rain.

Some parts of the basin are now seeing their wettest season on record and this will greatly alleviate the drought in some areas.

Colorado’s current snowpack is at 128%. Some parts of Utah have reported over 200% of their snow-water equivalent compared to average. When the snow melts, it will eventually flow into the Colorado River and help alleviate reservoir stress.

However, critical reservoirs in the southwest U.S., like Lake Mead and Lake Powell, need this rainy and snowy pattern to happen for multiple seasons in a row. Daniel Swain, a climate expert at University of California, Los Angeles, told ABC News last year that it could take until the end of this century to eradicate this deep of a drought.

Additionally, it may take time before the relief hits the reservoirs since some of it comes from snowmelt. Lake Mead is currently at 28% capacity, which is well below where the lake has been at this time in the last few years.

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(SPRINGFIELD, Ill.) — Two Illinois paramedics accused of killing a patient are expected to appear in court on Thursday.

Peter J. Cadigan, 50, and Peggy Jill Finley, 45, are facing first-degree murder charges following the death of a man in their care last month. They are being held in the Sangamon County Jail on $1 million bonds. Both defendants are scheduled for a preliminary hearing before a circuit judge in the Sangamon County Courthouse in Springfield on Thursday at 9 a.m. local time, according to online records.

The paramedics were responding to a call for assistance with a man “suffering from hallucinations due to alcohol withdrawal” at a residence in Springfield on Dec. 18, 2022, just after 2 a.m. local time, according to a press release from the Springfield Police Department. The police officers on scene were wearing body cameras, and video from that night was released last week by the Sangamon County States Attorneys Office.

In the video, Finley can be heard yelling at a Black man on the floor, who identified himself as 35-year-old Earl L. Moore, Jr., to “sit up” and “quit acting stupid.” She is also heard telling Moore: “We ain’t carrying you” and “I am seriously not in the mood for this dumb [stuff],” using an expletive in her remark.

Eventually, as the video shows, the officers on scene help Moore walk outside to where an ambulance and a stretcher awaits him. Finley and Cadigan are then seen strapping the patient onto the stretcher in what police called “a prone position,” or lying facedown.

According to police, the officers attempted to provide Moore care after the paramedics “acted indifferently to the patient’s condition.”

“The officers took steps to assist the patient, to get him the care he needed, even waiting on the scene to ensure the medical personnel loaded the patient into the ambulance,” the Springfield Police Department said in its press release last week. “The officers, who are not emergency medical professionals, are not trained nor equipped to provide the necessary medical treatment or to transport patients in this type of situation.”

Moore died after he was transported to a local hospital, according to police.

ABC News has reached out to the respective attorneys for Cadigan and Finley for comment.

A representative for LifeStar Ambulance Service, Inc., which employs Finley and Cadigan, told ABC News last week “no comment,” in regards to the ongoing investigation into the incident. ABC News has since reached out again for comment.

Teresa Haley, president of the Springfield branch of the NAACP, said watching the bodycam footage reminded her of George Floyd, the unarmed 46-year-old Black man who died in handcuffs while being pinned under the knee of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin on May 25, 2020.

“They literally threw his hands behind and strapped him down. He couldn’t move if he wanted to and he’s face down,” Haley said at a press conference last week. “They did not show any compassion whatsoever to this individual. He should be alive today.”

Moore’s family have retained nationally-renowned civil rights and personal injury attorneys Ben Crump and Bob Hilliard. They are expected to announce the filing of a wrongful death lawsuit against Cadigan, Finley and LifeStar during a press conference at the NAACP office in Springfield on Thursday at 12:30 p.m. local time.

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(PHILADELPHIA) — Missing mom Jennifer Brown has been found dead in Royersford, Pennsylvania, Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele announced.

Investigators responded to an industrial complex on Wednesday, Philadelphia ABC affiliate WPVI-TV reported. It was unclear what led authorities to the site where they found the body.

Brown, 43, of Limerick Township, was last seen at 2 p.m. on Jan. 3 by a “friend and business associate,” according to the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office. Authorities did not immediately release additional information or her cause of death.

Brown was scheduled to pick up her son from the bus stop the afternoon of Jan. 4 “but did not show up,” the district attorney’s office has said in a statement.

“Her vehicle was parked outside of her home, and her car keys, wallet, purse and work cellphone were found inside,” the district attorney’s office said.

Brown’s personal cellphone, which was not found, has been silent since the morning of Jan. 4, authorities said.

“It’s literally like we’re living in a movie that we watch on TV, it’s so surreal and unbelievable,” Tiffany Barron, a spokesperson for the family, previously told WPVI. “Jennifer would never ever just disappear, she would never abandon her son.”

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(ATLANTA) — An officer is in the hospital and the man who shot him has been killed following a confrontation Wednesday in a wooded area near where a police training center is set to be built, police said.

The incident occurred at approximately 9 a.m. in a wooded area just outside of Atlanta, Georgia, at the site of a proposed law enforcement training center.

“As law enforcement was moving through the property, officers located a man inside a tent in the woods,” the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) said in a statement following the incident. “Officers gave verbal commands to the man who did not comply and shot a Georgia State Patrol Trooper.”

Police returned fire on the man — who died on scene — and the injured Georgia State Patrol Trooper who was hit in the shooting was evacuated to a safe area before being taken to hospital where he underwent surgery for injuries suffered during the incident.

Activists who are protesting the 85 acre and $90 million construction project — nicknamed “Cop City” — have been camping out on the site for months in an attempt to cease progress on the development.

In December, five people were arrested and charged with domestic terrorism and other charges following a joint operation at the planned construction site.

Authorities said there are a litany of crimes being committed at the protest site following the five arrests last month.

“Some of the criminal activities include carjacking, various crimes against persons, destruction of property, arson, and attacks against public safety officials,” said the GBI. “Law enforcement continues to address the criminal acts committed by the individuals that continue to occupy the area of the proposed training site.”

The GBI even said that protesters threw rocks at police cars and attacked EMTs outside nearby fire stations with rocks and bottles in December.

A handgun and shell casings were located at the scene of the latest incident on Wednesday and the investigation into what happened is still active and ongoing, said the GBI.

Several other people were arrested and taken to the DeKalb County Jail after Wednesday’s shootout though the GBI did not confirm how many were taken into custody or confirm their identities. Charges against the individuals are now pending and the GBI said updates will be provided at a later time.

Meanwhile, the identity of the protester who was shot and killed by police is currently pending while his next of kin is notified.

A tweet published by the “Defend the Atlanta Forest” movement blamed the police for the shooting, saying “police killed a forest defender today, someone who loved the forest, someone who fought to protect the earth & its inhabitants.”

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp also acknowledged the shooting in a tweet and said that his “thoughts remain with [the injured trooper] and his family, our resolve also remains steadfast and strong to see criminals brought to justice.”

Protesters say that, if constructed as planned, the police training center will only further militarize law enforcement and that the conflict between the protesters and authorities has been escalating in recent months.

“What is taking place is a classic example of tyrannical government overreach,” activists said in a statement published by the Atlanta Community Press Collective. “The public has a right to defend its interests. We are advocates of a free and peaceful society built on cooperation and mutual understanding. The government is escalating this situation pointlessly.”

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(BOSTON) — Mohammed Chowdhury’s alleged plan to hire contract killers to murder his wife and her boyfriend was finally coming into place on Tuesday, according to federal prosecutors.

Authorities said that Chowdhury, 46, had shared their work and home locations, photos and work schedules with contract killers, along with clear instructions to kill them and ensure the evidence did not link back to him. His last step was to meet with the contract killers to pay a $500 downpayment, officials said.

However, rather than securing the down payment, the contract killers had been federal agents all along and Chowdhury left their meeting in handcuffs, officials said.

The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts charged Chowdhury with one count of murder-for-hire on Tuesday. The arrest occurred the same day another Massachusetts man, Brian Walshe, was charged with the murder of his wife, Anne Walshe, who had been missing since the start of the new year.

According to a press release from the United States Attorney’s Office, Chowdhury began soliciting someone to murder his wife around November 2022. When the original individual hired to conduct the murder took Chowdhury’s money but did not follow through with the crime, Chowdhury allegedly asked another person to complete the murder.

“…Chowdhury subsequently told the individual that he needed the murder done as soon as possible and that he would get the money to do so, even robbing a store if necessary to obtain the funds,” the press release noted.

That individual provided Chowdhury’s phone number to law enforcement, the release said.

Over the last two months, undercover agents posing as contract killers meet with Chowdhury to plan the murder. The release noted that Chowdhury was explicitly interested in covering up the murder and ensuring the crime did not link to him.

“So how we gonna disappear his, uh, body?” he asked, according to the release. “No evidence. No evidence. No evidence from like, you know, that, uh, I did something, you know?”

Chowdhury allegedly explained to the undercover agents that his wife did not allow him to see their children and left him for her boyfriend, who Chowdhury also wanted to be killed. The release noted that his wife had an “abuse protection order” in place which prevented him from contacting her, which Chowdhury was charged with violating in Oct. 2019.

To facilitate the murder, Chowdhury provided photos of his wife and her boyfriend, their work schedules, and the location of their work and home, prosecutors said.

Chowdhury allegedly agreed to pay $8,000 for both murders, with a down payment of $500, according to the release.

If found guilty, Chowdhury faces up to ten years in prison.

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(NEW YORK) — The Sebastian County jail in Arkansas is facing a lawsuit that accuses officials of letting a detainee die of starvation and neglect while in their care.

According to the complaint, Larry Price Jr., 51, was found by guards lying in a pool of his own urine and contaminated water, unresponsive in August 2021 after having been detained for more than a year. His once 6-foot-2-inch, 185-pound frame emaciated down to 90 pounds, the lawsuit states.

Price died of acute dehydration and malnutrition, according to the Arkansas State Crime Lab.

According to Sebastian County, Price was pronounced dead on Aug. 29, 2021, at approximately 1:35 A.M. In wellness-check documents obtained by ABC News, after Price had died, prison staff marked his log 10 different times with the same seven words, “Well-Being Check Inmate and Cell OK.”

Attorney Hank Balson, who is representing the Price estate in a lawsuit against Sebastian County that was filed Friday, said Price’s death was a failure on nearly every level of judicial process, starting from his detainment to his death.

“This is a jail. Its primary purpose is not to be a mental health facility,” Balson told ABC News. “And, yet, once the government takes somebody into custody, they are required to provide them with the basic necessities of life, food, water, and necessary medical care and mental health care to protect them from harm, to prevent them from deteriorating.”

Price was arrested in Fort Smith, Arkansas, after entering a police department on Aug. 19, 2020, and verbally threatening officers while using his empty hand to resemble a gun, according to the lawsuit.

Price was often homeless, suffered from paranoid schizophrenia, hallucinations, and “a developmental disability that significantly impaired his intellectual and adaptive functioning,” according to his lawyers.

The officers were familiar with Price because he would often enter the police department and act out erratically and he seemed more agitated this time, the lawsuit states. According to the lawsuit, after officers couldn’t calm him down, they arrested him and charged him with terroristic threatening in the first degree.

Price was detained and placed almost immediately in solitary confinement because of his mental state and deteriorated quickly, the lawsuit states.

Price’s family’s said it was difficult to get access to him since the COVID-19 pandemic blocked visitations at the jail. His brother, Rodney Price, lived in California and said the jail wouldn’t help to facilitate communication between the siblings.

“I feel like the Sebastian County jail, and every employee that had contact with him, failed my brother,” Rodney Price said in a statement through Balson. “All it would have taken was one person to sound off. If one person stepped up to the plate, I feel like my brother would be alive today.”

ABC News reached out to Sebastian County jail for a comment but did not receive a statement.

An administrator with the Sebastian County Jail said in a statement Friday it had medical personnel available to treat inmates in need of care and was conducting an internal review of Price’s case, The Washington Post reported.

Turn Key Health Clinics, an independent contractor hired by Sebastian County to care for patients in the jail, and two of its employees were also named as defendants in the lawsuit. A lawyer representing Turn Key Health told ABC News that Turn Key was not contracted by Sebastian County jails to provide mental health evaluations when Price was in custody.

“Sebastian County initially contracted with Turn Key to provide eight hours a week of case management and service as a clinical liaison between Turn Key’s psychiatrist and the local community health providers,” Turn Key said in a statement to ABC News through its lawyer. “Effective January 1, 2020, Sebastian County amended its contract with Turn Key to eliminate the clinical liaison position, and all crisis management and mental health evaluations/assessments were to be contracted by Sebastian County and performed by an independent community mental health provider, not by Turn Key.”

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(COLUMBUS, Ohio) — The fatal shooting of a Black teenager by a white man in Columbus, Ohio, who claimed self-defense was officially ruled a homicide in an autopsy report.

According to a police complaint in October, a witness to the shooting saw Krieg Butler, 36, shoot and kill 13-year-old Sinzae Reed outside of an apartment complex on Oct. 12. The witness said Butler exited his truck, fired shots at Sinzae and drove off, the complaint said.

Butler was arrested days after the shooting and charged with murder, but those charges were dropped pending completion of the investigation after prosecutors said Butler claimed self-defense in the shooting during his arraignment in October, according to a statement from the Columbus Police Department.

The Franklin County autopsy report released Tuesday said the teen was shot twice, once in the hand and once in the chest, concluding the manner of death was a homicide.

The county prosecutor’s office told ABC News on Wednesday, “The matter is under internal review and as such no statements will be made at this time.”

The Columbus Police Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday on the autopsy results.

“In Ohio, the self-defense law changed and the legal part of that is the burden changed,” Channa Lloyd, criminal attorney and managing partner of The Cochran Firm, has said. “Previously, if a shooter said ‘I shot someone in self-defense,’ they had to prove it was self-defense. Now that the law has changed, it changes that burden and shifts it to the prosecution.”

According to Lloyd, the self-defense rule is a byproduct of the Stand Your Ground laws and is controversial because it protects the shooter as opposed to the victim.

“The Krieg Butler case is under review for potential presentation to the grand jury as evidence is gathered and reviewed,” the Franklin County Prosecutor’s Office previously said in a statement to ABC News. “Because this is an active case, we cannot comment further at this time.”

Columbus Police said in a statement on Dec. 31, “The investigation continues and the Division will not be providing any more statements on the case. Once the investigation is complete, it will be presented to the Franklin County Prosecutor’s Office. Any further questions regarding this case should be directed towards them.”

The mother of Sinzae, Megan Reed, told ABC News’ Linsey Davis earlier this month that she is seeking justice for her son and that she herself asked Ohio law enforcement officials to provide answers as to why her son was killed.

“I need justice for my son. My son’s no longer here,” Megan Reed told Davis. “I’m going to continue this war, and I will be his voice until he gets justice.”

Megan Reed said she believes race played a part in the death of her son and that if her son was white, he probably wouldn’t have been killed that day.

“I’m very frustrated because I know if it was the other way around,” she said, “if it was a Black man and my child was white, the Black man would be in jail and my son would have justice.”

Attempts to reach Butler or an attorney for him were unsuccessful.

Megan Reed previously told ABC News a detective on the case called her and asked her why she allowed her son to carry a gun, even though the police report never stated that Sinzae was in possession of a firearm. Reed said she would never allow her son to carry a gun.

Court documents obtained by ABC News show no record that Sinzae had a weapon during the encounter with Butler. Dejuan Sharp, a community activist in Columbus, Ohio, who said he is helping the teen’s mother search for answers regarding the death, said witnesses have told them that her son did not have a weapon during the time of the shooting.

“We have people in the community…we found witnesses that seen it, that said Sinzae didn’t have a gun, that Krieg had the gun,” Sharp said.

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(NEW YORK) — A 12-year-old boy from Massachusetts caught a great white shark while on a fishing charter in Florida.

Campbell Keenan spent 45 minutes fighting to reel in the fish before it was close enough for him to see what kind it was.

“We realized it was a shark when it was like 20 feet away, probably, and we had to get it in. We put this, like, buoy on it to make it not go under,” Campbell told ABC News in an interview.

When it was close enough, the captain said it was a great white shark and everyone on the boat was “ecstatic,” Campbell said.

“When you pull the rod up, it was like lifting a 50-pound weight,” Campbell said. “It was so hard to pull up.”

The fish turned out to be an 11-foot-long shark estimated to be between 400 to 700 pounds, Keenan’s mother Colleen Keenan, told ABC News in an interview.

“Campbell was doing the reeling and then the first mate was guiding him and telling him how to let the rod go down and then pull it back up and reel as he’s pulling up. And then I was holding on to Campbell because he wasn’t strapped in anything and the great white could have easily just taken him for a ride,” Colleen Keenan said.

Campbell said they did not pull the shark into the boat because there are regulations in the U.S. against taking great whites out of the water, as the captain advised them, but they pulled the shark in close enough for the captain to tag it, before releasing it.

“I didn’t get it closer than four feet to it. But the captain got right up there and tagged them,” Campbell Keenan said.

Campbell, who was in Florida for his sister’s hockey tournament said he goes fishing all the time and has been on two charter boats. His mom said they set out on the trip hoping to catch a sailfish or tuna.

This is the third great white shark Capt. Paul Paolucci has caught since 2003, he told ABC News in an interview.

Paolucci said he made a small puncture hole on the shark then used a 6-foot stick to attach the tag to the shark.

“It was very exciting for everybody involved. And for everybody else, it was their first great white,” Paolucci said.

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