News

(NEW YORK) — A “bomb cyclone” is wreaking havoc across an already soaked California, killing at least five people in the San Francisco Bay Area, including four hit by falling trees or limbs, officials said.

A dramatic drop in atmospheric pressure triggered the so-called bomb cyclone that swept in from the Pacific Ocean and clobbered the San Francisco area. The storm packed heavy rain and wind gusts of up to 90 mph that knocked down trees, blocking major roadways and highways, officials said.

Tens of thousands of utility customers lost power, according to officials.

One person was killed and another was injured in the gated community of Rossmoor, about 25 miles east of San Francisco, when a tree fell on a moving car, according to the California Highway Patrol. Another motorist was killed around 1:30 p.m. local time Tuesday when a toppled tree crushed a work van in San Mateo County, about 30 miles south of San Francisco, according to CHP.

A man was killed at Oakland’s Lake Merritt when a tree fell on him, officials said. Two people in San Francisco were killed in storm-related incidents, including a person who was struck by a tree limb, according to San Francisco Mayor London Breed’s office.

The gale-force winds knocked down at least 700 trees and limbs across San Francisco on Tuesday alone, city officials said.

On Wednesday morning, the town of Woodside, about 32 miles south of San Francisco, was under a “highly recommended evacuation” after a mudslide shut down a road, impacting about 30 homes, officials said.

“If you live in this area, please pack your ‘Go Bag,’ with all necessary essentials: insurance policy, pets, medications, a change of clothes, and LEAVE NOW,” San Mateo County officials said in a Twitter post Wednesday. “Once the road gives out completely, residents in that area will not have access to emergency services for the foreseeable future.”

The mudslide unfolded as the National Weather Service issued a flood advisory for Woodside and nearby San Mateo County communities Wednesday morning after about 3 inches of rain fell in the area over a 24-hour period.

The powerful springtime storm is also being blamed for the derailment of an Amtrak train near Martinez, about 35 miles east of San Francisco. The train was carrying 55 passengers when it struck a downed tree on the tracks, according to Amtrak officials. No injuries were reported.

High wind gusts also caused a tractor-trailer rig to overturn on the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, blocking the eastbound lanes and snarling traffic during the evening commute, according to CHP.

The winds were so strong in downtown San Francisco Tuesday that it knocked out windows in high-rise buildings, sending shattered glass to the ground, according to the San Francisco Fire Department.

San Francisco International Airport recorded wind gusts of 64 mph, while gusty winds reached 74 mph in Oakland. Gusts hit nearly 90 mph between San Francisco and Sacramento.

The “bomb cyclone” developed off the coast of San Francisco Tuesday when the atmospheric pressure dropped 24 millibars in 17 hours, producing the strongest March storm ever recorded in the Bay Area.

The same storm system walloped Southern California Tuesday with wind gusts of up to 100 mph in the San Gabriel Mountains north of Los Angeles. The town of Lytle Creek in the San Gabriel Mountains recorded more than 6 inches of rain, while nearly an inch-and-a-half of rain fell in downtown Los Angeles.

The weather system is expected to weaken Wednesday, but most of California will remain under a flood watch and high-wind alerts are expected to persist into the afternoon.

The storm, the latest in a series of atmospheric river systems that has nearly eliminated the state’s multi-year drought, is expected to move southeast, bringing severe weather to parts of Texas, Alabama and Oklahoma. Severe weather on Thursday and Friday could produce large hail and damaging winds from the Dallas-Fort Worth area to San Angelo, more than 250 miles southwest of Dallas.

As the storm moves east on Friday, a possible tornado outbreak could form in parts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Arkansas, according to the National Weather Service.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(EL PASO, Texas) — The Department of Homeland Security says its new fentanyl targeting operation has already seized 900 pounds of the drug in its first week.

“Operation Blue Lotus,” a targeted operation that involves more stops and the use of advanced technology along the border, started on March 13. The operation has led to 18 seizures, 16 federal arrests and two state arrests, according to DHS. Those seizures prevented over 900 pounds of fentanyl, 700 pounds of methamphetamines and 100 pounds of cocaine from entering the United States through last Sunday.

“Operation Blue Lotus is a DHS-led, coordinated surge effort to curtail the flow of illicit fentanyl smuggled into the United States from Mexico and bring to justice the dangerous criminal organizations profiting from the illegal production, distribution, and sale of this dangerous substance,” DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said after meeting with CBP agents along the border on Tuesday.

As part of the operation, additional Homeland Security Investigations agents were deployed and CBP’s Forward Operating Labs at Points of Entry conduct “real-time analysis of unknown substances.”

Fentanyl has killed on average 100,000 Americans each year, according to the Center for Disease Control.

Mayorkas has been in the hot seat from congressional Republicans about how the administration has handled the border, with several lawmakers repeatedly saying they want to impeach him over the issue.

He is set to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee next week.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(PARLIN, N.J.) — The family of 30-year-old New Jersey councilwoman Eunice Dwumfour, who was shot and killed outside her home in February, spoke out publicly for the first time since her death, calling for justice for her death and that those responsible be apprehended.

Eunice Dwumfour — a Church leader and mother of a 12-year-old girl — was shot and killed in her SUV outside her home on Feb. 1. She sustained multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene, according to officials.

While it has been over a month since her death, family members told reporters that police have not shared details of the investigation with them. Few details have been released regarding Dwumfour’s murder and no known arrests have been made in connection.

“We are not happy about that, we need justice,” Eunice Dwumfour’s father, Prince Dwumfour, said during a press conference Wednesday.

The family said they waited so long before speaking out publicly because they were mourning the death of their daughter.

“Our daughter’s death has cost a lot in our life,” Prince Dwumfour said.

The family does not know who would want her dead or what motive they could have for killing her, John Wisniewski, the family’s lawyer, told reporters.

Wisniewski joined Dwumfour’s parents Prince and Mary Dwumfour, husband Peter Akwue and the family’s pastor Karl Badu.

“I believe the authorities should do something quickly,” Akwue said. “It’s painful.”

Akwue and Dwumfour met in Nigeria in 2019 and married last November.

Dwumfour had just dropped someone off at her townhome and was heading somewhere else when the assailant approached on foot, sources told ABC News last month.

No words appear to have been exchanged between the two, according to sources.

Eyewitnesses reported hearing more than 10 shots fired, according to sources.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(SUMTER, S.C.) — A military veteran allegedly gunned down three children and an active-duty soldier in a domestic mass shooting in South Carolina, authorities said.

The suspect, 42-year-old Charles Slacks, Jr., allegedly carried out the shootings at his ex-wife’s home around 10 p.m. Tuesday in Sumter, which is about 45 miles east of Columbia, police said.

Slacks allegedly shot the soldier, who was sitting in the backyard, and then killed the three children, two of whom were his own, Sumter Police Chief Russell Roark said at a news conference Wednesday.

Slacks then died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Roark said.

Slacks’ ex-wife was the only survivor, the chief said.

The children were ages 5, 6 and 11, Roark said.

Police only identified the adult victim as a 38-year-old active-duty Army member, citing the military’s need to notify next of kin.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(BAMBERG, S.C.) — South Carolina authorities have confirmed they are investigating the death of Stephen Smith as a homicide, nearly eight years after the 19-year-old was found dead in the middle of a rural road from what was ruled to be a hit-and-run.

The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) opened an investigation into Stephen Smith’s death in June 2021 after discovering new evidence during the investigation into the murders of Maggie and Paul Murdaugh, a mother and son who were found fatally shot at the prominent legal family’s South Carolina hunting estate that month.

Stephen Smith’s death was determined to be highway vehicular manslaughter and no suspects were ever apprehended. His mother has long asked for the unsolved case to be re-examined.

Lawyers representing his mother announced that the death is now being considered a homicide Tuesday night, citing a phone call with SLED.

“SLED is publicly supporting us, Sandy Smith, and her efforts to find out what really happened to her son,” Ronnie Richter, with the Bland Richter Law Firm, said in a statement.

A SLED spokesperson confirmed to ABC News that the case is being investigated as a homicide.

“It’s a day that I have been waiting for. The best news I’ve heard in eight years,” Sandy Smith told ABC News.

“Stephen was an amazing kid and he didn’t deserve to die this way,” she added. “And I know somebody did it, and whoever did it needs to come forward and bring peace to this family.”

SLED said in a statement Wednesday that it opened its investigation into the death in June 2021 after its agents reviewed the South Carolina Highway Patrol’s case notes on the incident and found it apparent that that agency “did not believe Mr. Smith’s death was a hit and run by a motor.”

Lawyers representing Stephen Smith’s mother have said they do not believe the evidence maintains that he was hit by a car, but rather may have been killed somewhere else and then placed on the road. His mother has raised more than $80,000 to exhume her son’s body to conduct an independent autopsy.

“A fresh set of eyes and a new autopsy may yield a different conclusion that Stephen was not killed on Sandy Run Road in Bamberg County, that maybe he was killed somewhere else,” her attorney, Eric Bland, told reporters this week.

The mother’s attorneys said they are petitioning a judge to allow them to exhume the body. SLED officials will “be present and participate in any exhumation of Stephen’s body to gather more evidence,” Bland and Richter said Tuesday.

“SLED officials have revealed that they did not need to exhume Stephen Smith’s body to convince them that his death was a homicide,” they added.

Stephen Smith was a former classmate of Buster Murdaugh, whose father, Alex Murdaugh, was convicted earlier this month in the murders of Maggie and Paul Murdaugh. The disgraced former attorney was sentenced to life in prison for the 2021 killing of his wife and younger son.

SLED officials reportedly were waiting until the high-profile Murdaugh trial was over before announcing developments in the Stephen Smith case “out of concern that witnesses would not be as forthcoming under the Murdaugh sphere of influence,” Bland and Richter said.

“Since the conclusion of the Murdaugh trial, more resources have been devoted and will be devoted to Stephen Smith’s case,” the law firm added.

SLED said Wednesday that its investigation remains “active and ongoing” and that more agents have been assigned to work the case “in the hopes that those who may know what happened to Mr. Smith are more willing to speak freely now than they may have been in 2015 or 2021.”

Buster Murdaugh spoke out this week against what he called “baseless rumors” alleging his involvement in Stephen Smith’s death.

“Before, during and since my father’s trial, I have been targeted and harassed by the media and followers of this story. This has gone on far too long,” he said in a statement on Monday. “These baseless rumors of my involvement with Stephen and his death are false. I unequivocally deny any involvement in his death, and my heart goes out to the Smith family.”

ABC News’ Ahmad Hemingway contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — An attorney for Dominion Voting Systems accused Fox News on Wednesday of improperly redacting internal materials that the network was forced to hand over as part of Dominion’s billion-dollar defamation suit against it.

“They’re essentially redacting embarrassing information,” attorney Davida Brook told the judge hearing the case.

The claim came during a pivotal summary judgment hearing in which each side has asked the judge to rule in their favor before the case is set to head to trial next month.

Dominion’s $1.6 billion suit accuses Fox News of knowingly pushing false conspiracy theories about the voting machine company in the wake of the 2020 election, in order to combat concerns over ratings and viewer retention.

In February and March, Dominion filed bombshell findings from the discovery process containing a trove of emails, texts, testimony, and other private communications from some of Fox’s biggest stars and executives, privately bashing Trump and his election fraud claims while they continued to broadcast them on air.

“I did not believe it for one second,” said Sean Hannity in regard to one of Trump’s attorney’s claims, according to one of Dominion’s filings.

An attorney for Fox defended Fox’s redactions and pointed to the hundreds of communications that have already been entered into the public record.

“I don’t think there any lack of public access here,” the attorney, Katharine L. Mowery, said.

Earlier this month, Dominion filed a motion with the judge pushing back on some of Fox’s redactions, calling them “not warranted.”

“Dominion does not challenge Fox’s decision to redact contact information such as phone numbers and emails provided,” the filing states. “As for Fox’s substantive redactions … Dominion hereby brings this notice of challenge to the confidential treatment of these redacted briefs, certifications, affidavits, exhibits, declarations, and appendices.”

In its own filing, Fox said “almost all” relevant materials had been unsealed “after a careful redaction process consistent with Court rules and Delaware law.”

“Throughout three rounds of briefing, Dominion jammed the record with 700 exhibits, many of which were personal text messages between Fox employees with no connection to any of the challenged broadcast or statements,” Fox wrote in its filing. “On top of this, Dominion attached other internal Fox communications — often inflammatory and headline-grabbing, but irrelevant to any issue in dispute.”

After the hearing, a Fox spokesperson said in a statement, “Despite the noise and confusion that Dominion has generated by presenting cherry-picked quotes without context, this case is ultimately about the First Amendment protections of the media’s absolute need to cover the news. FOX will continue to fiercely advocate for the rights of free speech and a free press.”

The judge overseeing the case, Eric Davis, said his ruling on the summary judgment motions would come later in writing.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.