(OXFORD, Mich.) — Three people, all believed to be students, were killed in a shooting at Oxford High School in Oxford, Michigan, on Tuesday, authorities said.
Six others were shot and injured, including a teacher, authorities said. Their conditions were not immediately clear.
The suspected shooter, a 15-year-old male student, was taken into custody within five minutes, authorities said. A handgun has been confiscated, the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office said.
Authorities said they believe he acted alone. The teen has not mentioned a motive, authorities said.
Over 100 calls poured into 911 as the shooting unfolded, authorities said. The entire incident lasted five minutes, authorities said.
Oxford is about 40 miles north of Detroit.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — A woman prosecutors have referred to as “Jane,” one of the three alleged minor victims whose allegations against Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell are detailed in a federal indictment, testified on the second day of her trial.
She told the jury that she met Maxwell and Epstein while attending summer camp at the Interlochen Center for the Arts in Michigan, the beginning of what prosecutors earlier called “a nightmare that would last for years.”
After returning home to Palm Beach, Florida, “Jane” said, she began visiting Epstein at his seaside mansion, where she testified that she had her first sexual contact with Epstein in 1994 when she was just 14. According to “Jane,” Epstein abruptly took her to his pool house, pulled down his pants and “proceeded to masturbate on me” while she remained “frozen in fear.”
The abuse continued, “Jane” said, during subsequent visits to Epstein’s house, and Maxwell contributed, she alleged, by “leading me to a massage table and showing me how Jeffrey likes to be massaged.”
On Tuesday morning, Epstein’s former pilot, Larry Visoski, testified that he met “Jane” in the cockpit of Epstein’s plane, though he later acknowledged he did not know how old she was at the time and could not recall whether she had actually taken a flight.
Maxwell faces a six-count indictment for allegedly conspiring with and aiding Epstein in his sexual abuse of underage girls between 1994 and 2004. She has been held without bail since her arrest in July 2020 and has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(LAS VEGAS) — More than 40 years after a teenage girl’s murder in Las Vegas, her suspected killer has been identified through DNA evidence and genetic genealogy.
Kim Bryant, 16, was kidnapped, raped and killed on Jan. 26, 1979, police in Las Vegas said.
The teen was last seen at a Dairy Queen restaurant near her high school and was reported missing after she didn’t return home, police said.
Her body was found one month later in a desert area, police said.
For decades, her slaying went unsolved.
Semen from a suspect was recovered during Bryant’s autopsy, but the DNA sample could not be identified at the time, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Lt. Raymond Spencer said at a news conference on Monday.
“We first attempted DNA on this particular case back in 2008. We were not able to get a DNA profile,” Kimberly Murga, director of laboratory services for the Las Vegas police, said at the news conference. “Technology has continued to advance and revolutionize. We again attempted DNA on different items of evidence in January of this year. We were able to obtain a foreign male DNA profile on some evidence and we put that DNA profile into CODIS — the Combined DNA Index System — and at that time we obtained no hits.”
That’s when the department turned to advanced genetic genealogy testing, she said.
Through genetic genealogy, DNA left at a crime scene can be used to identify a suspect’s family members, who voluntarily submit their DNA to a genealogy database. This allows police to create a more detailed family tree than if they were limited to using law enforcement databases like CODIS. Genetic genealogy gained visibility as an investigative tool in 2018 when the “Golden State Killer” was arrested.
Employees of Othram Inc., a private laboratory, built a genealogical profile of Bryant’s unknown killer through his family tree, Michael Vogen, director of case management at Othram, said at the news conference.
Othram and police eventually narrowed the search to a relative who was willing to give a DNA sample, officials said.
That sample allowed investigators to zero in on their suspect, Johnny Peterson, who died in January 1993, police said.
Peterson was 19 and living in Las Vegas at the time of the murder, Spencer said. Peterson had previously attended Bryant’s school, though it’s not clear if they had interacted, Spencer said.
In April 1980, Peterson was arrested for sexual assault, but that case was dismissed, Spencer said.
Peterson was never on the department’s radar as a suspect in Bryant’s case, Spencer said.
For Bryant’s family, Spencer said, “Nothing is gonna make the pain go away, but at least the family has some closure.”
(NEW YORK) — A spacewalk by two U.S. astronauts was called off on Tuesday morning due to the risk of space debris, NASA announced in a statement.
NASA astronauts Kayla Barron and Thomas Marshburn were scheduled to leave through the International Space Station’s Quest airlock at 5:30 a.m. EST to replace a part on the space station, according to a NASA blogpost.
“Marshburn and Barron will work at the Port 1 truss structure, where the antenna is mounted. The antenna recently lost its ability to send signals to Earth via NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System,” NASA said in the blog.
However, four hours before the scheduled spacewalk, the ISS tweeted that the repair would be delayed until more information was available.
The source of the debris hasn’t been confirmed. Two weeks ago Russia had conducted an anti-satellite test that created a “dangerous” debris field in the orbit.
The spacewalk was scheduled to last 6 1/2 hours and be Barron’s first and Marshburn’s fifth spacewalk, NASA said.
(NEW YORK) — Julie Anne Genter, a Green Party member of the New Zealand Parliament, is a keen cyclist who used her skills to bike to the hospital in the middle of the night while in labor Sunday. Within an hour of setting off, she gave birth to a healthy baby girl.
“I genuinely wasn’t planning to cycle in labor,” she wrote on Instagram later that day, “but it did end up happening.”
Genter shared photos of her nighttime journey on a cargo bike, smiling through contractions while locking up in the Wellington, New Zealand, hospital car park.
“My contractions weren’t that bad when we left at 2 a.m. to go to the hospital,” she said on Instagram. “Though they were 2-3 min apart and picking up in intensity by the time we arrived 10 minutes later.”
At 3.04 a.m., her daughter was born.
Originally, the plan was for her partner Peter Nunns to cycle with her in front, Genter told New Zealand outlet Stuff. When they realized there was too much weight with her hospital bag, Genter “just got out and rode.”
Genter is a dual U.S.-NZ citizen. She grew up in Los Angeles and moved to New Zealand in 2006 as a post-grad scholar at the University of Auckland. She credits her L.A. upbringing with her interest in transportation and urban design. She worked in transport and urban planning before becoming a Member of Parliament in 2011 where she has been an advocate of cycling and increasing bike infrastructure. Her baby girl was born two days after her 10-year anniversary in parliament.
This is the second time the lawmaker has cycled to the hospital to give birth. She did so in 2018 for the birth of her first child, although on that occasion, labor was induced, she said.
New Zealand’s parliament is one of the most gender-equal in the world, electing 49% female members in its 2020 election. It also has a reputation for being family-friendly.
The country’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern gave birth to her daughter Neve while in office in 2018, making headlines as one of the first sitting world leaders to do so. Genter followed her lead, bringing her firstborn to a UN meeting a year later.
In 2019, the Speaker of Parliament, Trevor Mallard, appeared in headlines around the world when he cradled and fed a bottle to a baby boy during a general debate.
Mallard told ABC News at the time that inclusivity is something that he focused since becoming speaker in 2017. “When I became speaker, I made it clear that I wanted the parliament to be much more family-friendly than it had been,” he said.
(NEW YORK) — A bitter cold is gripping the South with states from Florida to Georgia experiencing wind chills in the 30s.
The wind chill — what temperature it feels like — plunged Tuesday morning to 24 degrees in Raleigh and 31 degrees in Atlanta, Charleston and Montgomery.
A freeze warning has been issued as far south as Tallahassee, where the actual temperature fell to 30 degrees.
The wind chill dropped Tuesday morning to 15 degrees in Boston and 25 degrees in New York City.
Milder air will thaw the East Coast by Wednesday and Thursday. Temperatures are expected to reach the middle to upper 50s for Boston and New York City and near 60 degrees in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.
Meanwhile, on the West Coast, more heavy rain is expected for Washington state and Oregon, where some areas could see 3 to 6 inches over the next few days.
Two weeks ago, over 1 foot of rain pummeled the Pacific Northwest within days, bringing rivers into major flood stages and flooding roads and neighborhoods.
(DAYTON, Ohio) — The suspect who carried out a mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio, on an early August morning in 2019 had an “enduring fascination with mass violence,” the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit concluded in a report released Monday.
Just after 1 a.m. on Aug. 4, 2019, Connor Betts killed nine people and wounded 27 when he opened fire in downtown Dayton.
It was the second mass shooting that weekend, after 23 people were killed at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, the day before.
After a mass shooting or incident, it is typical for the FBI to use its Behavioral Analysis Unit to try and determine a motive or find other factors at play when an attacker carries out an incident.
The FBI concluded in its report that Betts “likely violated federal law” by lying to federal investigators about his drug use when he purchased the gun used in the attack.
The agency also concluded that Betts likely suffered from mental illness.
“The FBI’s BAU assessed the attacker’s enduring fascination with mass violence and his inability to cope with a convergence of personal factors, to include a decade-long struggle with multiple mental health stressors and the successive loss of significant stabilizing anchors experienced prior to August 4, 2019, likely were the primary contributors to the timing and finality of his decision to commit a mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio,” the report stated.
There were no specific warnings that Betts would one day commit a crime, the FBI said, despite having “suicidal and violent fantasies” for over a decade.
“This underscores the importance of bystanders’ attentiveness to more subtle changes an individual may exhibit that could be indicative of their decision to commit violence, such as a change in personal circumstances, an increase in perceived stressors, or language indicating they may be contemplating suicide,” the FBI said.
One reason that family and friends did not alert authorities about Betts was potentially because of “bystander fatigue,” according to the report. Bystander fatigue occurs when people around the suspect don’t pay attention or take any action “due to their prolonged exposure to the person’s erratic or otherwise troubling behavior over time,” according to the Behavioral Analysis Unit.
The special agent in charge of the FBI’s Cincinnati field office said there were some technical issues with the investigation that made it harder to get to the bottom of what happened.
“Finding answers for the victims and their families has been a driving motivator each day,” FBI Cincinnati Special Agent in Charge J. William Rivers said in a statement.
“From the start, this has been a thorough and deliberate investigation. Due to technical challenges accessing lawfully acquired evidence that was encrypted, this investigation has taken significantly longer than expected,” he said. “However, we are confident that it has uncovered the key facts and that we have done everything in our ability to provide answers to all those impacted by this horrible attack.”
(NEW YORK) — “The biggest science event of the year quickly became the biggest political debate in our country, and the word at the center of both stories is vaccine,” Peter Sokolowski, Merriam-Webster’s editor at large, said in a press release. “Few words can express so much about one moment in time.”
The selection, which is based on search volume, comes as more than 196 million Americans are fully vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus. The dictionary publishing company said in a press release Monday that even though the choice may be seen as “obvious,” data from its website’s search history paints a more complicated picture.
“Vaccine lookups increased 600%, and the story is about much more than medicine,” Sokolowski said in the press release. “It was at the center of debates about personal choice, political affiliation, professional regulations, school safety, healthcare inequity, and so much more.”
Sokolowski told ABC News on Monday that there was already increased search for vaccines coming into the year, as the first shots were administered in late 2020. Those searches continued in 2021, spiking in early summer and fall.
The dictionary publisher also expanded its definition of vaccine to include scientific advances in how vaccines work, adding information about the use of mRNA technology.
“Insurrection” was a notable runner-up as searches for the term spiked following the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Sokolowski told ABC News that there was a 61,000% increase in searches for the word following the attack.
Another contender was “infrastructure,” which spiked in April as President Joe Biden made his pitch for a more than $2 trillion package investing in infrastructure.
Other words related to pop culture and lifestyle also trended, including “nomad,” which spiked after “Nomadland” swept the Oscars in April. The word “cicada” increased by 1,442% in May as Brood X emerged in the Northeast, with millions of the insects making their noisy entrances.
Sokolowski said some of 2021’s most popular words, like vaccine, may already be in the vocabulary of the average American and that the interest in the words may have “nothing to do with the spelling of vaccine, but it has a lot to do with our understanding of vaccines.”
“I’m betting most of the words that you look up in a given day are words that you have encountered before,” Sokolowski told ABC News. “Looking up a word isn’t the signal of ignorance, it’s the opposite of ignorance. It means that you want to know more nuanced, more specific knowledge”
(NEW YORK) — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5.2 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 778,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.
Just 59.3% of the population in the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Nov 30, 7:22 am
Omicron was circulating in the Netherlands 11 days ago, authorities say
Dutch health authorities announced Tuesday that they have detected omicron in two previously tested samples, dating back as much as 11 days, indicating that the new variant was already circulating in western Europe before it was first identified in southern Africa.
The Netherlands’ National Institute for Public Health and the Environment said it discovered omicron in samples dated Nov. 19 and Nov. 23, preceding the cases found among people traveling from South Africa to the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol on Nov. 26.
“It is not yet clear whether these people had also visited southern Africa,” the institute said in a statement Tuesday.
Out of 624 passengers returning from South Africa who were tested for COVID-19 at the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol on Nov. 26, 61 tested positive, including 14 with the omicron variant.
“Laboratory tests identified several different strains of the omicron variant,” the institute said. “This means that the people were very probably infected independently from each other, from different sources and in different locations.”
The omicron variant was first reported to World Health Organization from South Africa on Nov. 24.
Nov 30, 6:48 am
Top South African scientist slams travel bans in response to omicron
One of the South African scientists who helped identify the omicron variant took to Twitter to slam the travel bans imposed on southern African countries as a result of their discovery.
Tulio de Oliveira, director of the Center for Epidemic Response and Innovation in Stellenbosch, South Africa, tweeted Monday night that he had “spent a big part” of his day speaking with genomic and biotech companies because “soon” his team “will run out of reagents as airplanes are not flying to South Africa.”
In a series of tweets last week, de Oliveira urged the world to “provide support to South Africa and Africa and not discriminate or isolate it.”
“We have been very transparent with scientific information. We identified, made data public, and raised the alarm as the infections are just increasing. We did this to protect our country and the world in spite of potentially suffering massive discrimination,” he tweeted.
“This new variant is really worrisome at the mutational level. South Africa and Africa will need support (financially, public health, scientific) to control it so it does not spread in the world. Our poor and deprived population can not be in lockdown without financial support,” he said in another tweet.
De Oliveira, who is leading a team of scientists analyzing the genomic sequencing of the new variant, issued an appeal to billionaires and financial institutions to support South Africa and the African continent.
“We do have funding for science, but South Africa and Africa need financial help to support their deprived population and health system,” he tweeted. “By protecting its poor and oppressed population we will protect the world.”
Nov 30, 5:16 am
Japan confirms 1st case of omicron variant
Japan confirmed on Tuesday its first case of the omicron variant, according to Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno.
Matsuno told a press conference that the patient is a man in his 30s who tested positive for COVID-19 upon arrival at Japan’s Narita International Airport on Sunday after traveling from Namibia. A genome analysis confirmed Tuesday that he was infected with the new variant, which was first identified in southern Africa last week.
The man was isolated and is being treated at a hospital, according to Matsuno, who refused to disclose the patient’s nationality. His travel companions and the passengers who sat nearby have been identified and referred to Japanese health authorities, Matsuno said.
Earlier this week, Japan announced that it will ban all foreign visitors starting Tuesday as an emergency precaution against omicron, which the World Health Organization has classified as a “variant of concern.” The government is also requiring Japanese nationals and foreigners with resident permits to quarantine 14 days upon entry.
-ABC News’ Anthony Trotter
Nov 29, 7:04 pm
3rd omicron case detected in Canada
A third person in Canada has tested positive for the omicron COVID-19 variant, health officials announced Monday.
The province of Quebec has confirmed its first case of the variant, Quebec Health Minister Christian Dube told reporters at a press conference in Montreal.
The woman who tested positive had traveled to Nigeria, said Canada Director of Public Health Dr. Horacio Arruda.
Two cases of the variant had been previously detected in Ontario, officials said Sunday.
-ABC News’ Darren Reynolds
Nov 29, 6:06 pm
Pfizer to ask FDA to authorize boosters for people 16-17: Source
Pfizer is going to ask the Food and Drug Administration in the coming days to authorize COVID-19 booster shots for 16- and 17-year-olds, a source familiar with the discussions confirmed to ABC News.
This would expand booster access from everyone over 18 to everyone over 16.
Pfizer vaccines were authorized for adolescents in May, so many fully vaccinated people are nearing their six-month mark amid growing concern over the omicron variant.
-ABC News’ Cheyenne Haslett
Nov 29, 4:15 pm
CDC strengthens booster recommendations
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday strengthened its recommendation on booster doses for adults.
The previous recommendation was that all adults 50 and older should get a booster, and those 18 to 49 may want to get boosters. Now, the CDC says all adults should get a booster shot six months after their Pfizer or Moderna vaccines or two months after the Johnson & Johnson shot.
CDC director Rochelle Walensky said, “I strongly encourage the 47 million adults who are not yet vaccinated to get vaccinated as soon as possible and to vaccinate the children and teens in their families as well because strong immunity will likely prevent serious illness.”
(NEW YORK) — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5.2 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 778,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.
Just 59.3% of the population in the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Nov 30, 10:53 am
FDA says it’s working quickly as possible to evaluate omicron
The FDA in a new statement said it’s working as quickly as possible to evaluate the potential impact of omicron on the currently available diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines.
“Historically, the work to obtain the genetic information and patient samples for variants and then perform the testing needed to evaluate their impact takes time,’ the FDA said. “However, we expect the vast majority of this work to be completed in the coming weeks.”
The FDA stressed that vaccines, boosters and masks are the best ways to stay protected.
-ABC News’ Eric M. Strauss
Nov 30, 9:53 am
Passengers arriving in US from South Africa sent home with testing kits
The CDC said passengers who arrived in the U.S. from Johannesburg, South Africa, on Sunday — before travel restrictions took effect — were offered free at-home PCR testing kits.
Passengers were told to wait three to five days before collecting a sample that they could then mail back for testing. It’s not clear how many have done so or if any were positive.
-ABC News’ Anne Flaherty
Nov 30, 8:52 am
Global case count of omicron variant tops 200
More than 200 confirmed cases of the omicron variant, first identified in Southern Africa, have been reported in over a dozen countries around the world, according to an open-source tracker run by Newsnodes and BNO News.
The tracker shows South Africa has the highest tally by far, with 114 confirmed cases, followed by 19 in Botswana; 14 in The Netherlands; 13 in Portugal; 11 in the United Kingdom; five in Australia; five in Germany; five in Canada; five in Hong Kong; four in Italy; two in Israel; two in Denmark; one in the French island territory of Reunion; one in Austria; one in Sweden; one in Belgium; one in Czech Republic; and one in Spain.
So far, no cases have been confirmed in the United States.
Nov 30, 8:46 am
‘The virus is not tired of us,’ NIH director warns
Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, is urging Americans to be vigilant in the wake of a new variant of the novel coronavirus that is sweeping the globe.
The World Health Organization has designated omicron as a “variant of concern.” But so much remains unknown about omicron, including whether it causes severe disease and if it is more contagious than delta, which is currently the dominant variant in the United States.
“We’re collecting that information as rapidly as we can, and much credit to our colleagues in South Africa who have been totally transparent about this. We only learned about this one week ago from one of their sequencers,” Collins told ABC News’ Robin Roberts in an interview Tuesday on Good Morning America.
“So we are quickly trying to figure out in South Africa, is this in fact more contagious than other variants? It does look like it’s spreading quite quickly there,” he added. “But we don’t know how that would play out in a country like ours, where delta is already so dominant. Would omicron be able to compete with delta? We don’t know the answer to that.”
Another big question, Collins said, is whether the current COVID-19 vaccines and boosters will provide protection against omicron as they have against previous variants. The answers will “take a couple of weeks” to uncover, he said.
In the meantime, Collins encouraged all Americans to get vaccinated and boosted if eligible, and to wear face masks.
“I wear my mask if I’m indoors with other people — I don’t always know if they’re all vaccinated or not. That’s just good practice,” he said. “I know we’re all tired of this, but the virus is not tired of us and it’s continuing to exploit those opportunities where we’re careless.”
Nov 30, 7:22 am
Omicron variant was in the Netherlands earlier than thought
Dutch health authorities announced Tuesday that they have detected omicron in two previously tested samples, dating back as much as 11 days, indicating that the new variant was already circulating in western Europe before it was first identified in southern Africa.
The Netherlands’ National Institute for Public Health and the Environment said it discovered omicron in samples dated Nov. 19 and Nov. 23, preceding the cases found among people traveling from South Africa to the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol on Nov. 26.
“It is not yet clear whether these people had also visited southern Africa,” the institute said in a statement Tuesday.
Out of 624 passengers returning from South Africa who were tested for COVID-19 at the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol on Nov. 26, 61 tested positive, including 14 with the omicron variant.
“Laboratory tests identified several different strains of the omicron variant,” the institute said. “This means that the people were very probably infected independently from each other, from different sources and in different locations.”
The omicron variant was first reported to World Health Organization from South Africa on Nov. 24.
