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(SAN JOSE, Calif.) — The San Jose City Council voted unanimously to approve an ordinance that would ban so-called ghost guns in the city.
The ordinance prohibits the possession, manufacturing, sale, assembly, transfer, receiving and distribution of firearms, as well as related components, that are not imprinted with a federal or state-authorized serial number.
Privately manufactured firearms, also referred to as ghost guns, are untraceable firearms that are often assembled by unlicensed individuals, the ordinance explains. They’re typically sold through unregulated sellers, without background checks, waiting periods, sales records retention, age restrictions or other restrictions.
San Jose follows other California cities that have banned ghost guns, including San Francisco, San Diego and Los Angeles.
The ordinance is part of the mayor’s move to reduce gun harm and shift the financial burdens from taxpayers and victims to gun owners, the office of San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo said in a statement.
“In cities like San José and LA, a quarter of the illegal guns seized by the police are ‘ghost guns’ lacking any serial number or other identifying mark, enabling criminal gangs to deploy them without accountability,” Liccardo said in the statement.
Residents in possession of unserialized ghost gun components will have 120 days to comply with the ordinance before the rule is enforced, the statement says.
In California alone, ghost guns accounted for 25 to 50% of firearms recovered at crime scenes over an 18-month period during 2020 and 2021, according to the County of Santa Clara Crime Lab.
The number of ghost guns seized by San Jose police during criminal investigations in the last five years has increased “dramatically” from nine in 2017 to 221 in 2021, the ordinance states.
The ordinance will go into effect after June 16.
San Jose passed a groundbreaking rule in January that required gun owners to purchase liability insurance and pay an annual “gun harm reduction” fee. San Jose was the first city in the U.S. to pass such a law. It goes into effect in August.
President Joe Biden announced a new ghost gun measure last month, in an effort to crack down on what law enforcement has been calling a growing problem. Biden also called on Congress to pass universal background checks.
“We applaud the recent steps the Biden Administration has taken to stem the rising tide of ghost guns by banning their distribution. An ocean of ghost guns remain in our cities, however, requiring local communities to act to ban the possession of these untraceable guns and their component parts,” Liccardo said in the statement.
(OXFORD, Mich.) — Oxford Community Schools rejected a second offer from the Michigan attorney general’s office to investigate a school shooting in November. The school board said it will launch a third party investigation after the civil cases against the district have been litigated.
The school board said it has been fully cooperating with the Oakland County prosecutor’s investigation and will continue to do so.
Ethan Crumbley, a former student at Oxford High School, is accused of shooting and killing four other students at the school on Nov. 30. He has pleaded not guilty and is set to stand trial in September.
His parents, Jennifer and James Crumbley, are also facing four counts of involuntary manslaughter for allegedly failing to recognize warning signs about their son in the months before he fatally shot his classmates. Two judges have declined to reduce their bail.
The Crumbleys have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
A lawsuit alleges that the district failed to heed warning signs before the shooting, which the district has denied. The board said reports and analyses will be made public throughout the litigation process.
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel criticized the board’s rejection of her office’s offer.
“I am deeply disappointed by the school board’s repeated rejection of my offers to perform an independent and thorough review of the systems and procedures in the days leading up to and on November 30, 2021,” Nessel said in a statement Wednesday.
She said her department would only be able to perform an exhaustive and thorough review with the cooperation of the school board and district.
“Absent that partnership, I am restricted to the publicly available information we have all read and reviewed,” Nessel said.
The school board said it will wait to launch the third-party investigation and said it will be engaging experts as part of the litigation process to thoroughly review the tragedy and the events leading up to it.
“The ongoing criminal cases have understandably delayed the release of information that could be essential to our extensive review. Oxford Community Schools is also responding to numerous lawsuits at the state and federal levels which will require attention and time from our legal team, our staff and the Board,” the school board said in a statement Tuesday.
The board added, “Once the litigation process is completed and all information has risen to the surface, a team of experts will conduct a third-party review.”
The board also said it is working on a three-year recovery plan which is currently under development by the superintendent and district administration. Upon completion, the plan will be reviewed by a third-party before being implemented at the start of the 2022-2023 school year.
Third-party group Secure Education Consultants have also completed an independent review into all district safety practices and procedures, the board said.
Nessel claimed the board’s rejection stands in the way of transparency.
“The rejection sends a message that the board is more focused on limiting liability than responding to the loud outcry from the Oxford community to deliver greater peace of mind to the students, parents and educators that lived through this traumatic event,” she said.
(RALEIGH, N.C.) — Friends and volunteers formed a search party Wednesday and fanned out in Raleigh, North Carolina, looking for clues and raising awareness about a popular nightclub bouncer, who they say went missing a week ago while driving home.
Robert Richardson, 41, was reported missing by friends, who say he disappeared after getting into a minor car accident on the evening of May 4.
“He’s out there somewhere and somebody knows something,” Kensley Perry, a friend of Richardson, told ABC station WTVD in Durham.
Perry works as head of security at The Village Entertainment Complex in Raleigh’s Glenwood South nightlife district, where Richardson is employed as a door bouncer.
The Raleigh Police Department confirmed that Richardson’s friends filed a missing person report, but said they have no solid leads on where he might be.
Richardson was driving home to nearby Sanford on May 4 after meeting friends for dinner and got into a fender bender, Perry said. He said Richardson exchanged insurance information with the driver of the other car.
Perry said Richardson inexplicably walked away, leaving his vehicle behind with his two cell phones and laptop computer inside. Police responded and towed the vehicle away, Perry said.
Perry said he received a report that Richardson was spotted on May 5 walking toward downtown Raleigh, but there have been no sightings since.
Worried that Richardson may have been injured in the crash and has become disoriented, friends have called local hospitals and homeless shelters looking for the man. Friends and volunteers spent Wednesday plastering downtown Raleigh with missing person fliers containing Richardson’s photo.
Richardson is described as 6-foot-2 to 6-foot-3 and around 280 pounds.
“He’s got tattoos so he sticks out,” Perry said.
Asked if Richardson, who moved to North Carolina from Pennsylvania a year ago, had disappeared before or has a history of substance abuse, Perry said, “He’s not that type of guy. No history of that, to our knowledge, whatsoever.”
Perry said Richardson is a “nice, fun-loving social dude.”
“Always got a smile on his face,” Perry said of his friend.
(MIAMI) — A nearly $1 billion settlement in last year’s shocking collapse of a Miami Beach condo building was unexpectedly announced during a routine status conference in a Florida courtroom Wednesday afternoon.
Lawyers involved in the class-action lawsuit representing tenants from the oceanfront building in Surfside announced a $997 million settlement had been worked out.
Upon the news, Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Michael Hanzman said he was “speechless.”
“That’s incredible news,” the judge said.
“I’m shocked by this result — I think it’s fantastic,” the judge told the courtroom. “This is a recovery that is far in excess of what I had anticipated.”
Litigation stemming from the catastrophic collapse in June 2021, which killed 98 people, had been moving slowly as the first-anniversary approaches.
ABC News’ Jared Kofsky contributed to this report.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
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(NEW YORK) — John Eastman, Donald Trump’s former lawyer, urged Pennsylvania lawmakers to sow doubt in the 2020 election and even suggested throwing out absentee ballots so Trump could take the lead in the state, according to emails obtained by ABC News and sent to the Jan. 6 committee by the Colorado Ethics Institute.
“For example, depending on how many ballots were counted that were received after the statutory deadline (say 10,000 for example’s purpose), those 10,000 votes need to be discarded, and you can take the absentee ballot ratio for each candidate in the counties were late-received ballots were illegally counted and deduct the pro-rated amount from each candidate’s total,” Eastman wrote to Pennsylvania Republican state Rep. Russ Diamond on Dec. 4, 2020.
“Then, having done that math, you’d be left with a significant Trump lead that would bolster the argument for the Legislature adopting a slate of Trump electors — perfectly within your authority to do anyway, but now bolstered by the untainted popular vote,” he continued. “That would help provide some cover.”
The Colorado Ethics Institute obtained the Eastman emails via a Freedom of Information Act request for Eastman’s communications while he was employed by the University of Colorado-Boulder from August 2020 until May 2021.
The Denver Post first reported on the emails, which were later obtained by ABC News.
Eastman is under investigation by the Jan. 6 committee and a judge recently ruled he must turn over some documents to the committee he had been withholding. He drafted a plan for Trump to cling to power by falsely claiming then-Vice President Mike Pence could reject legitimate electors during the 2020 presidential election.
ABC News reported exclusively that Eastman was recently part of a small group of Trump allies who secured a private meeting in March to try and convince the Republican leader of the Wisconsin state Assembly to decertify Biden’s win.
Eastman was subpoenaed in November 2021 by the congressional committee looking into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. He had been rejecting the panel’s request for documents, claiming attorney-client privilege, until a federal judge ordered most of them turned over.
ABC News’ Will Steakin and Laura Romero contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — In the wake of a bombshell leak last week of a Supreme Court draft opinion indicating the court’s conservative majority could soon overturn Roe v. Wade, Senate Democrats on Wednesday forced a vote to advance a bill that would enshrine abortion rights into federal law.
The Women’s Health Protection Act would codify the Roe v. Wade ruling while also banning requirements some states have put into place related to abortion care, such as waiting periods and mandatory doctor visits before the procedure. But without the 60 votes needed to overcome a GOP-led filibuster, the legislation failed in the Senate 49-51, sending Democrats scrambling for alternatives.
Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia broke from his party and joined every single Republican senator to vote against advancing the bill.
Still, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer argued the vote was worth taking, to put Republicans on the record, calling it “one of the most consequential we will take in decades.”
“All of us will have to answer for this vote for the rest of our time in public office,” Schumer said in floor remarks Wednesday morning. “Before the day is over, every member of this body will make a choice stand with women to protect their freedoms or stand with MAGA Republicans to take our country into a dark and repressive future.”
“This is a cruel repressive dangerous vision for our country, but it is precisely the future that MAGA Republicans are working towards,” he added, portraying a nation without abortion access.
Vice President Harris presided as the afternoon vote began, not to break a tie on the bill, but because she has long fought to protect reproductive rights, the White House said.
Schumer filed cloture on Monday on a motion to start debate on the Women’s Health Protection Act, setting the bill up for a procedural roll call vote on Wednesday. The bill cleared the House last year but already failed once to pass through the upper chamber in February, when Schumer failed to get the entire Democratic caucus on board, in a 46-48 vote. Democrats currently control 50 seats in the Senate with Harris, as president of the Senate, serving as their tie-breaking vote — but 60 votes are needed to end debate on a piece of legislation, under the filibuster rule.
Not only did Democrats lack the 60 votes needed to get past a GOP-led filibuster, but they lacked the full support of their caucus, since Manchin, who voted with Republicans to block the measure earlier this year, said earlier Wednesday he would, again, vote “no.”
“I would vote for a Roe v. Wade codification if it was today. I was hopeful for that, but I found out yesterday in caucus that wasn’t going to be,” he told reporters.
Republicans and Manchin have called the Women’s Health Protection Act too broad, prompting Democrats to draft a modified version. Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — the sole Senate Republicans who support abortion rights — told reporters this week the bill still goes too far for them and that they would be voting “no.” For instance, the bill doesn’t protect the right of Catholic hospitals to refuse to perform abortions, which Collins took issue with.
“After today’s vote fails, I plan to continue working with my colleagues on legislation to maintain — not expand or restrict — the current legal framework for abortion rights in this country,” Collins said in a statement Wednesday.
She and Murkowski have their own proposal to codify Roe called the Reproductive Choice Act, which they say would prohibit states from imposing an “undue burden” on the ability of a woman to choose to terminate a pregnancy pre-viability but allow states to keep other restrictions in place. However, at least 17 abortion-rights groups this week said would not protect the right to abortion.
NARAL Pro-Choice America President Mini Timmaraju said their legislation, as written, would actually weaken protections found under current law.
“If these senators truly cared about safeguarding reproductive freedom in the face of an unprecedented assault from the Supreme Court, they could vote for the Women’s Health Protection Act (WHPA), a bill that actually secures the right to abortion against medically unnecessary bans and restrictions,” she said in a statement. “Instead, they’re engaging in political theater and making misleading claims about what WHPA is and does.”
Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., told ABC News’ Trish Turner on Tuesday he’s been negotiating with Collins since last week to try to change the Reproductive Choice Act to find a way in federal law to protect access to abortion and contraception.
“We would like to codify the set of holdings beginning with Griswold up through the Whole Women’s Health case,” Kaine said of the bipartisan effort, referring to the Supreme Court case Griswold v. Connecticut upholding a constitutional marital right of privacy. But that measure, again, would need 60 votes to clear a GOP filibuster.
Anticipating the Senate vote, abortion-rights activists spilled over from outside the Supreme Court to the steps of the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday night, calling on lawmakers to protect abortion access nationwide.
“There’ll be no more hiding. There’ll be no more distracting. No more obfuscating where every member in this chamber stands,” Schumer said Tuesday on the Senate floor. “Senate Republicans will face a choice. Either vote to protect the rights of women to exercise freedom over their own bodies, or stand with the Supreme Court as 50 years of women’s rights are reduced to rubble before our very eyes.”
ABC News’ Allison Pecorin contributed to this report.
(PHOENIX, Ariz.) — Arizona performed its first execution in nearly eight years, after the U.S. Supreme Court denied an eleventh-hour request from attorneys who said the man had schizophrenia and should not be put to death.
The high court denied a request for a stay of execution early Wednesday, clearing the way for Arizona to move forward with the execution of 66-year-old Clarence Dixon by lethal injection at 10 a.m. local time. The drugs were administered at 10:19 a.m. and he was pronounced dead officially at 10:30 a.m.
Dixon was convicted of murder and sexual assault in connection with the death of 21-year-old Arizona State University student Deana Bowdoin in 1978.
The case went unsolved for decades until DNA connected Dixon to the murder in 2001, according to authorities. He was convicted and sentenced to death in 2008.
A judge ruled on Friday that he was mentally fit to be put to death.
Dixon gave his last words before a doctor administered the drugs for the lethal injection.
“Maybe I’ll see you on the other side, Deana,” Dixon said in part, according to officials. “I don’t know you and I don’t remember you.”
Bowdoin’s sister, Leslie James, gave a statement to the press following the execution and said that it was her late mother’s wish that her sister’s name be remembered.
“It was way too long. This process was way, way, way too long,” James said of the decadeslong case.
“I don’t know how I’m going to feel,” she said. “The process is final.”
This was Arizona’s first use of the death penalty since the execution of Joseph Wood in 2014. That execution took almost two hours and witnesses reported Wood gasped and snorted, prompting his lawyers to request an emergency halt to the procedure.
Officials said the only time Dixon showed any signs of discomfort was when the IV was put in.
Dixon was the sixth inmate to be put to death in the U.S. so far this year.
(HOUSTON) — Nearly 2,400 people required medical treatment following last year’s deadly Astroworld music festival in Houston, according to a new court filing.
Attorneys representing thousands of people suing promoter Live Nation, headliner Travis Scott and dozens of other companies over the tragedy said in a court document filed this week that 732 claimants sustained an injury requiring “extensive medical treatment” during the concert on Nov. 5, 2021. Another 1,649 claimants suffered an injury requiring “less extensive medical treatment,” according to the filing, which does not define the injury categories.
Additionally, the injuries of another 2,540 claimants are under review, attorneys said.
“Plaintiffs will continue to evaluate and update this for the Court as additional information and details are received and reviewed,” the attorneys stated in the document, filed in the 11th Judicial District in Harris County on Monday.
Ten people died in a massive crowd surge during Scott’s set, including a victim as young as 9 who was trampled in a crowd of 50,000 people at NRG Park, according to officials.
According to Houston Police and witness accounts, a wave of tens of thousands of people surged toward the stage when Scott — and later rapper Drake — appeared. Concert attendees say they were pushed into one another from all sides. As the crowd pressed its way forward, some began to fall, pass out and get trampled by others in the audience.
Hundreds of lawsuits filed against the event organizers, managers and performers in the wake of the tragedy were consolidated and are being handled by one judge.
Following the concert, Scott released a statement on Twitter, saying, “I’m absolutely devastated by what took place last night. My prayers go out to the families and all those impacted by what happened at Astroworld festival.”
In an extensive interview with radio host Charlamagne Tha God in December, the rapper said he was unaware of the injuries and fatalities among fans until after his performance was over.
Asked if he feels responsible for the tragedy, Scott said, “I have a responsibility to figure out what happened here. I have a responsibility to figure out the solution.”
In a statement to ABC News in the days after the concert, Live Nation said it was working with law enforcement to get answers.
“We continue to support and assist local authorities in their ongoing investigation so that both the fans who attended and their families can get the answers they want and deserve, and we will address all legal matters at the appropriate time,” Live Nation said.
The Houston Police Department is investigating the deadly concert. The House Oversight and Reform Committee also launched a probe into the deaths late last year.
ABC News’ Kiara Alfonseca and Josh Margolin contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Amidst the nation’s latest resurgence in COVID-19 infections, new forecast models used by the CDC show that daily hospital admission levels and new virus-related deaths in the U.S. are projected to continue increasing over the next four weeks.
The forecast comes as a growing number of COVID-19 positive patients are entering hospitals and requiring care each day, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
There are now more than 20,000 virus-positive Americans currently receiving care in the U.S., the data shows — the highest total number of patients hospitalized since mid-March. On average, more than 2,500 virus-positive Americans are entering the hospital each day — a total that has increased by 18.1% in the last week. This also marks the highest number of patients entering the hospital in nearly two months.
However, totals remain significantly lower than during other parts of the pandemic when there were more than 160,000 patients hospitalized with the virus in January.
The forecast also predicts that about 5,400 deaths will occur over the next two weeks. California, New York and Florida are projected to see the largest death tolls in the weeks to come.
A new ABC News analysis this week showed a growing proportion of COVID-19 deaths are occurring among the vaccinated. In August 2021, about 18.9% of COVID-19 deaths were occurring among the vaccinated. Six months later, in February 2022, that percent of deaths had increased to more than 40%.
Comparatively, in September 2021, just 1.1% of COVID-19 deaths were occurring among Americans who had been fully vaccinated and boosted with their first dose. By February 2022, that percent of deaths had increased to about 25%.
Health experts said vaccines and boosters continue to provide significant protection against severe disease. However, waning immunity re-emphasizes the urgency of boosting older Americans and high-risk Americans with additional doses.
During an interview with CBS News on Tuesday, Dr. Anthony Fauci acknowledged there has been an increase in the number of vaccinated people who are dying of COVID-19, many of whom are elderly, immunocompromised or have underlying conditions.
“As long as you have vulnerable people in the population, even though the unvaccinated are going to be much more at risk, even vaccinated with underlying conditions and a high degree of susceptibility to severe disease will account for those deaths,” he said.
The other group of Americans, who are becoming severely ill and dying, is still the unvaccinated, Fauci said. He stressed that a large proportion — about a third of Americans — have not been fully vaccinated, while about half of eligible Americans are still unboosted with their first dose.
Fauci said that in order for the U.S. to move into an endemic phase, the prevalence of the virus across the country has to come down.
“What we’re hoping for is that when the level comes down, it stays in a well-controlled level, and those people who’ve been vaccinated and boosted even though they might get infected, they won’t get a severe disease that would lead to hospitalization, and tragically in many cases, to deaths of individuals,” Fauci explained.
(WASHINGTON) — More than 500 American Indian, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian children died over the course of 150 years in Indigenous boarding schools run by the American government and churches to force assimilation, according to a new report.
The federal report follows an investigation launched in June 2021 by Department of the Interior Secretary Deb Haaland into the government’s role in the schools as part of an effort to dispossess Indigenous people of their land to expand the United States. The probe began after nearly 1,000 unmarked graves of Indigenous children were unearthed at Indigenous boarding schools in Canada.
Native Nations scholars estimate that almost 40,000 children have died at Indigenous boarding schools. And according to the federal report, the Interior Department “expects that continued investigation will reveal the approximate number of Indian children who died at Federal Indian boarding schools to be in the thousands or tens of thousands.”
“I come from ancestors who endured the horrors of the Indian boarding school assimilation policies carried out by the same department that I now lead,” a tearful Haaland said during a press conference on Wednesday.
Haaland, the first Native American to hold a Cabinet position, oversees the government agency that historically played a major role in the forced relocation and oppression of Indigenous people.
She is a member of the Laguna Pueblo Tribe and previously told ABC’s “Nightline” that her great grandfather was taken to the United States Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, which was open from 1879 to 1918.
“When my maternal grandparents were only 8 years old, they were stolen from their parents, culture and communities, and forced to live in boarding schools until the age of 13,” Haaland said on Wednesday. “Many children like them never made it back to their homes. Each of those children has a missing family member, a person who was not able to live out their purpose on this earth. Because they lost their lives as part of this terrible system.”
The United States operated or supported 408 Indigenous boarding schools in 37 states in which hundreds of thousands of Indigenous children were taken from their families, according to the report.
Interior Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Bryan Newland, who led the initiative, said Wednesday the report shows the federal government targeted Indian children to further its policies.
“Federal Indian boarding schools have had a lasting impact on Native people in communities across America,” Newland said in an emotional address. “That impact continues to influence the lives of countless families. From the breakup of families of tribal nations to the loss of languages and cultural practices and relatives, this has left lasting scars for all Indigenous people.”
The deaths of the children occurred at approximately 19 federal Indian boarding schools, but the Interior Department expects the number of recorded deaths to rise as the investigation continues. The report also identified 53 burial sites for Indigenous students and emphasizes that more sites could be unearthed.
Some of the abuse children experienced included the “rampant physical, sexual, and emotional abuse; disease; malnourishment; overcrowding; and lack of health care,” the report found.
“I am here because my ancestors persevered,” Haaland said. “I stand on the shoulders of my grandmother and my mother and the work we will do with the federal Indian boarding school initiative will have a transformational impact on the generations who follow.”
Asked by ABC News if the federal government plans to offer reparations for Native American families impacted by the policies, Newland said the report is a “first step of this initiative.”
“There’s a lot more work that has to be done to simply tell them the truth and lay out the scope of the federal Indian boarding school system,” he added.
The second phase of the investigation will identify children who died and bring their remains back to their communities, as well as identify living survivors and descendants of attendees of Indian boarding schools to document their experiences, the report says.
It also commits to backing federal funding for the advancement of Native language revitalization, supporting scientific studies that promote Native health research and holding a federal memorial to recognize the generations of children forced into the boarding schools. It pledged to ensure that policies and practices are in compliance with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.
“I have a great obligation, but I was taught by my mother and my grandfather and my grandmother that when you are asked to do something for your people that you step up,” Haaland told “Nightline” earlier this earlier.
Haaland said she is launching a yearlong tour, “The Road to Healing,” in which she will travel across the country to meet with families impacted by the painful legacy of Indigenous boarding schools and give them a platform to share their stories and heal from “intergenerational trauma.”
“We have lived with the intergenerational trauma of federal Indian boarding school policies for many years,” Haaland said. “But what is new is the determination in the Biden-Harris administration to make a lasting difference in the impact of this trauma for future generations.”
ABC News’ Abby Cruz and Tenzin Shakya contributed to this report.
