(AKRON, Ohio) — The eight officers who fatally shot Jayland Walker, the 25-year-old Black man killed during an attempted traffic stop in Akron, Ohio, have been reinstated, according to the Akron Police Department.
Some community leaders are opposing the move, saying it will lead to “the erosion of any trust remaining between the community and police.”
The officers remain under investigation by their own department as well as the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, authorities said.
The officers were on paid administrative leave following the fatal shooting. According to ABC affiliate WEWS-TV, they were brought back on duty because to a staffing “crisis” at the department, Akron Police Chief Steve Mylett said. According to the department, the officers are on administrative duty and will not be in uniform or on patrol.
“I recognize that this decision will have an impact. And there may be some community concern, but I didn’t take this decision lightly,” Mylett told the local station. “And I think this decision is in the best interests of the citizens and businesses of Akron.”
Bishop Joey Johnson, a pastor at The House of the Lord, said that the move to reinstate the officers will cause a lot of pain in a city that’s still healing. He was one of 43 community activists and religious leaders who penned a letter dated Oct. 21 to the chief about their frustrations regarding his choice to move forward with reinstating the officers.
“The family is hurting. They’re in grieving. They are traumatized,” said Johnson. “Bringing people back before the investigation is done seems like it is bringing more pain,” Johnson said.
Mylett did not respond to ABC News’ request for comment. But on Oct. 25, he released a response letter to the Akron community, saying the decision was not made “in haste,” that he still thinks it was “the correct decision given the public safety challenges of the entire community” and stands by the decision “and his commitment to build a stronger Akron.”
The chief told the Akron Beacon Journal that he was disappointed by the letter, saying he had a “consensus” from community leaders to move forward with the reinstatement.
While community leaders figure out what next steps to take in their fight for “love and justice,” Johnson said they’re focused on being able to “move toward unity … with all parties.”
“Our priority is being able to help our community, particularly when the verdict comes out,” said Johnson. “The family is hurting. They’re in grieving. They are traumatized.”
The Walker family applauded religious leaders for their letter, and slammed Mylett for returning the officers to the department.
“It is the very definition of hypocrisy for Chief Mylett to claim, as he has previously, that his department is working hard to build trust among Akron’s minority communities, and then make a callous decision like this that fosters further distrust of the Akron Police Department among this population, while jeopardizing the legitimacy of BCI’s investigation,” read a statement from the family’s legal team.
Walker was unarmed when he was fatally shot by police on June 27 after a traffic stop turned into a pursuit. He was running away when eight officers opened fire on him, body camera footage released by the city showed.
As officers pursued Walker, officials said a flash of light seen in body camera footage appeared to be the muzzle flash of a gun coming from the driver’s side of Walker’s car.
In a second body camera video, officers are heard radioing that a shot was being fired from Walker’s car.
Later in the pursuit, Walker slowed down and jumped out of the passenger side door before it came to a full stop, according to the footage. As Walker ran away from police, several officers simultaneously fired several bullets, fatally shooting him, body camera footage released by the city showed.
He was unarmed when he was shot, but a gun was found in his car by officials.
Walker had 46 gunshot wounds on his body, according to an autopsy report conducted by the Summit County Medical Examiner’s Office.
Walker also had injuries to his face, heart, both lungs, liver, spleen, left kidney, intestines, pelvis, iliac artery and several bones in his legs, to chief medical examiner Lisa Kohler.
His manner of death has been ruled homicide and the toxicology report showed no use of drugs nor alcohol by Walker at the time of the incident.
“The family is devastated by the findings of the report and still await a public apology from the police department,” the Walker family’s legal team said in a statement to ABC News.
(SAN FRANCISCO) — Paul Pelosi has been released from the hospital, two sources familiar with the matter told ABC News, six days after being attacked in his home.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — A 43-year-old woman said she was raped while jogging along Manhattan’s West Side Highway Thursday morning, according to police.
The woman told authorities she was jogging near Pier 45 when, at about 5:30 a.m., a man grabbed her from behind, choked her and knocked her to the ground, the New York Police Department said.
She said he raped her, stole her wallet and phone and then fled on foot, according to police.
The victim flagged down another jogger who dialed 911, police said.
She was taken to a hospital in stable condition, police said.
Police announced the arrest of 29-year-old Carl Phanor on Thursday in connection with the jogger’s rape. Phanor has also been charged in the March 27 rape of a different woman in a nearly identical location. Additionally, police said Phanor has been charged in a third incident, an attack on a woman on the East Side of Manhattan. He is facing charges of sexually motivated robbery, robbery, grand larceny, strangulation, predatory sexual assault and criminal sex act.
Police said Phanor is undomiciled.
Law enforcement sources told ABC News earlier that a suspect was apprehended after police said he used the victim’s credit card at a Target in Midtown Manhattan.
Gabrielle Sumkin, who identified herself as the jogger who called 911, told ABC News she was on her usual running route when she noticed the victim, who she said appeared to be in distress. She said the victim had blood on her arm and elbows and was covering her eyes with her hand.
The 23-year-old said the victim could barely speak. Sumkin said, while she was on the phone with 911, the woman kept repeating, “I need help.”
She said she didn’t want to press the woman about what happened, and said she left the scene once first responders arrived. Sumkin said it wasn’t until news reports came out that she learned the woman had been raped.
Sumkin said she was sickened when she found out, and excused herself from work to go on a walk and cry.
“It’s disgusting. I’m a staunch feminist. I support women,” she said. “People who commit crimes like that are at the absolute bottom of my list.”
(NEW YORK) — The FBI on Thursday said it has “received credible information of a broad threat” to New Jersey synagogues.
In a tweet, the FBI urged people to “stay alert” and “take all security precautions to protect your community and facility.”
The threat, which originated online, was not specific to any one synagogue, law enforcement sources told ABC News.
The nature of the threat was not immediately clear, but law enforcement sources said it was not a bomb threat.
“Law enforcement will be increasing patrols in sensitive areas,” New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin said in a statement. “Some of these patrols will be in marked vehicles and others will not — but please do not be alarmed if you observe an increase in police presence as we are taking these steps in an abundance of caution.”
Platkin also urged residents “to be extra vigilant” and report any suspicious activity to the police.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy tweeted that he’s in touch with the FBI, the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office and the New Jersey Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness.
“We are closely monitoring the situation and are working with local law enforcement to ensure that all houses of worship are protected,” the governor said.
The New York Police Department said it’s aware of the FBI’s alert.
“In an abundance of caution, the NYPD’s Intelligence and Counterterrorism Bureaus are working diligently alongside the Joint Terrorism Task Force and the FBI to ensure the safety and well-being of every area that encompasses our Jewish citizens and synagogues here in New York City and the Tri-State area,” the department tweeted.
(WASHINGTON) — In the wake of the 2020 election, state and local election officials have faced a wave of threats and misinformation, prompting mass resignations up and down their ranks — and stoking fear among some experts that their replacements would put partisan loyalties above the free and fair administration of the election.
In the weeks and months after the 2020 vote, the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University Law School found that one-third of election workers reported feeling unsafe because of their job. Nearly one-fifth of respondents listed threats to their lives as a job-related concern.
ABC News reported in June 2021 that dozens of election administrators at the state and local level had resigned their posts at an alarming rate in places like South Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. In August, ABC News reported that persistent threats and misinformation had prompted a “second wave” of resignations in at least nine states.
Election worker threats
In Georgia, two election workers, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, were forced into hiding after Rudy Giuliani and conservative media outlets accused the mother-daughter duo of conspiring to commit election fraud. The two testified about their experience before the Jan. 6 committee.
Stephen Richer, the Republican chief elections officer in Maricopa County, Arizona, faced an onslaught of death threats after overseeing a controversial audit of the 2020 election, which lead him to cease attending political events for fear of his safety.
In response to the wave of threats targeting election workers, the Justice Department launched a task force focused on these complaints — but results have been paltry, state and local officials have said. In August, the task force said it had reviewed “over 1,000” reports of threats — though only 11% had met the threshold for federal criminal investigation. Seven cases have been charged — one of whom was convicted and sentenced in October to 18 months in prison.
Georgia’s office of secretary of state has launched a text message alert notification tool for election workers to report threats or security issues.
With so many election officials leaving their jobs, democracy experts fear their departures will leave an “institutional knowledge” gap about election administration, and their replacements may harbor partisan motivations.
Indeed, as ABC News reported in January, many Republican-led efforts to recruit new poll workers took on a partisan bent. More recently, ABC News reported that allies of former President Donald Trump have used false election claims to recruit ex-military members as poll workers.
Voting machines
Electronic voting machines became a target of many falsehoods and disproven conspiracy theories in the wake of 2022, with Republican activists falsely claiming that certain devices were somehow manipulated to switch votes from Trump to President Joe Biden, among others.
Dominion Voting Systems, one of the nation’s largest voting machine purveyors, filed multiple lawsuits against conservative news outlets and Trump allies over the promulgation of “outlandish” conspiracy theories involving its product.
Tina Peters, a county recorder in Mesa County, Arizona, was indicted in May 2021 on charges associated with a security breach in her office. Peters, a Trump supporter and election denier, allegedly allowed an unauthorized person to obtain voter machine logs and a forensic copy of its hard drive. The documents later emerged on the internet. Peters has pleaded not guilty.
Concerns over voting software and hardware will be front and center again in 2022, and the Ballotwatch team will be on the lookout for both unfounded claims and legitimate vulnerabilities with election infrastructure.
Nevada Secretary of State, Republican Barbara Cegavske, recently approved a proposal to allow counties to hand-count votes this fall after Nye County, based on unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election, decided earlier this year to abandon the Dominion voting machines it had relied on for years.
Access to the vote
Long lines and access to polling locations have long been the scourge of democracy advocates — and 2022 will likely be no different. Republican-led state legislatures have enacted dozens of laws restricting voting access since 2020, including many that would repeal 2020 exceptions for the covid-19 pandemic.
Since the beginning of 2021, lawmakers have passed at least 42 restrictive voting laws in 21 states, according to the Brennan Center. Among those laws, 33 contain at least one restrictive provision that is in effect for the midterms in 20 states.
ABC News recently reported that the promulgation of election-related threats has made some schools and churches reconsider whether it is safe to continue serving as polling locations, prompting concerns among some election officials that voters may face more difficulty casting their ballots in November and beyond.
Voter intimidation and poll watchers
Partisan poll watchers representing both Republicans and Democrats have observed elections for decades. But in the run-up to the 2020 election, former President Trump’s allies sought to weaponize these actors for their own political benefit, demonstrating behavior that some democracy advocates say amounted to voter intimidation.
Ahead of the midterms, more of the same appears to be underway.
In Arizona, for example, multiple cases of alleged voter intimidation at drop box locations have already been referred to the Justice Department. Complaints described individuals loitering near the drop box locations, filming, and photographing voters as they returned their ballots and, in some cases, taking photographs of the voters’ license plates.
On Tuesday, a federal issued a temporary restraining order to prohibit some people accused of voter intimidation from gathering near ballot boxes and surveilling voters, ruling that observers must remain at least 75 feet away from drop boxes and banning open carry and body armor within 250 feet.
(HOUSTON) — At least three people were shot in Houston on Wednesday during what police described as a human smuggling operation.
Officers from the Houston Police Department were dispatched to an IHOP restaurant on West Sam Houston Parkway in the Westchase neighborhood of the Texas metropolis at around 11:30 a.m. local time, after receiving at 911 call about a shooting. Upon arrival, the officers found two men — one of whom had been shot in the arm — who “told them that they had escaped from a human smuggling situation at a nearby hotel,” according to Houston Police Commander Jonathan Halliday.
“While speaking to the victims, they told us that the shooting happened earlier in the morning approximately two hours west of here, in the greater San Antonio area, but the exact location is not known,” Halliday said during a press conference Wednesday. “We believe they were being smuggled and they were brought to this area after the shooting occurred.”
The pair had escaped the hotel room and ran to the nearby IHOP, where they called 911 for help. They were both taken to a local hospital, though only one was wounded, according to Halliday.
Two other men, who also escaped after being shot in the arm and leg, fled the scene and later showed up at a local hospital for treatment, but it was not immediately clear how they got there, Halliday said.
All three gunshot victims — each of them male and approximately 30 to 40 years old — were hospitalized in stable condition and are expected to survive. There were initial reports of a fourth gunshot victim, but so far police have been unable to confirm that information or locate the individual, according to Halliday.
“We continue to check hospitals for anyone else that might be connected to this incident,” he told reporters. “At this point, we believe one of the three people shot may possibly be one of our suspects but final determination hasn’t been made yet.”
Officers stopped two vehicles that were leaving the hotel and detained the occupants — a total of nine people, all adult males, according to Halliday, who added that “we’re not sure which of them are victims and which are possible suspects at this time.”
Police believe the victims were being held in the hotel room since they were brought there sometime on Wednesday morning. Officers cleared the room, with no one else found inside, according to Halliday.
The identities of all those involved have not been released and Halliday said their nationalities were not yet known.
“I don’t know where they were coming from or where they were going,” he told reporters.
No charges had been filed as of Wednesday, but Halliday noted that the investigation is still in the “very early” stages.
Halliday said there is “no public safety threat” and that police are not actively searching for any additional suspects at this time.
Investigators from the Houston Police Department remain at the scene, while agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security were en route Wednesday, according to Halliday.
“We’ll be interviewing all the parties detained with our HPD detectives, with the Homeland Security agents to try and, you know, figure everything out, determine who’s suspects, who are victims and get them the appropriate resources,” he added.
(NEW YORK) — More than six months after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched an invasion into neighboring Ukraine, the two countries are engaged in a struggle for control of areas throughout eastern and southern Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whose forces began an offensive in August, has vowed to take back all Russian-occupied territory. But Putin in September announced a mobilization of reservists, which is expected to call up as many as 300,000 additional troops.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Nov 02, 12:14 PM EDT
North Korea covertly shipping ammunition to Russia for war in Ukraine, US says
North Korea was secretly sending ammunition to Russia to use in its invasion of Ukraine and is disguising the shipments as appearing to be destined to the Middle East or North Africa, the White House said Wednesday.
“Our information indicates that [North Korea] is covertly supplying Russia’s war in Ukraine with a significant number of artillery shells, while obfuscating the real destination of the arms shipments by trying to make it appear as though they’re being sent to countries in the Middle East or North Africa,” White House spokesman John Kirby said.
Kirby said North Korea was sending “a significant number of artillery shells.” He did not specify an exact number but said it was more than “dozens.”
“But we don’t believe that they are in such a quantity that they would tangibly change the direction of this war or tangibly change the momentum either in the east or in the south” of Ukraine, he said.
Kirby added, “We’re gonna continue to monitor whether these shipments are received.”
In September, the U.S. had said Russia is looking to purchase millions of rockets and artillery shells from North Korea, saying at the time that this indicated the Russian military continues to suffer from severe supply shortages in Ukraine.
Nov 02, 12:01 PM EDT
Russia waives veiled threat on use of nuclear weapons
The Russian Foreign Ministry issued a warning to nations with nuclear capabilities, calling on them to abandon attempts to infringe on each other’s vital interests, warning that direct armed conflict and provocations with weapons of mass destruction can lead to catastrophic consequences.
Russia claimed it believes there can be no winners of nuclear war and said it reaffirms its commitment to the prevention of nuclear warm.
“A reaction with the use of nuclear weapons is hypothetically allowed by Russia only in response to aggression using weapons of mass destruction or aggression using conventional weapons, when the existence of the state is threatened,” the ministry said in a statement.
The White House has said it will not confirm or deny New York Times reporting that senior Russian military officials had recently discussed when and how Russia might use a tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine. The intelligence about the conversations was reportedly circulated inside the U.S. government in mid-October.
But, Russian President Vladimir Putin was not a part of these alleged conversations, according to the New York Times.
The White House on Wednesday said it still sees “no indications that Russia is making preparations” to use nuclear weapons.
Nov 02, 8:40 AM EDT
Russia rejoins wartime deal on Ukrainian grain exports
Turkish Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Wednesday that Russia has agreed to resume its participation in a deal brokered by Turkey and the United Nations to keep grain and other commodities shipping out of Ukraine’s ports amid the ongoing war.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu informed his Turkish counterpart, Hulusi Akar, that the so-called Black Sea Grain Initiative would “continue in the same way as before” as of noon Wednesday, according to Erdogan.
The renewed agreement, first reached over the summer, will prioritize shipments to African countries, including drought-ravaged Somalia, after Russia expressed concerns that most of the grain was ending up in richer nations.
Moscow agreed to return to the deal after receiving written guarantees from Kyiv that Ukraine would not use the safe shipping corridors through the Black Sea for military actions against Russian forces, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense.
Russia had suspended its role in the deal over the weekend, after accusing Ukrainian forces of carrying out a “massive” drone attack on its Black Sea fleet on Saturday.
Turkey and the U.N. brokered separate deals with Russia and Ukraine in July to allow Ukraine to resume its shipment of grain from the Black Sea to world markets and for Russia to export grain and fertilizers.
Since Russian forces invaded neighboring Ukraine on Feb. 24, the cost of grain, fertilizer and fuel has skyrocketed worldwide. Russia and Ukraine — often referred to collectively as Europe’s breadbasket — produce a third of the global supply of wheat and barley, but a Russian blockade in the Black Sea combined with Ukrainian naval mines have made exporting siloed grain and other foodstuffs virtually impossible. As a result, millions of people around the world — particularly in Africa and the Middle East — are now on the brink of famine.
Nov 01, 3:01 PM EDT
Ukraine does not have effective defenses against Iranian ballistic missiles, air force official claims
Iranian ballistic missiles, which Russia plans to purchase from Iran, will probably be placed on the northern border of Ukraine, the spokesman of the Ukrainian Airborne Forces Yuri Ignat said Tuesday.
Ignat claimed the ballistic missiles’ range was 300 km for one and 700 km for another.
“We have no effective defense against these missiles. It is theoretically possible to shoot them down, but in fact it is very difficult to do it with the means we have at our disposal. We have air defense, not missile defense,” he said.
-ABC News’ Yulia Drozd
Nov 01, 3:01 PM EDT
Russia announces wider evacuation of occupied southern Ukraine
As Ukrainian forces advance to capture the city of Kherson, Russian forces are ordering civilians out of parts of the now-occupied city. Some 70,000 people along a 15 kilometer (10 mile) stretch of the left bank of the Dnipro River will be evacuated deeper into the Kherson region or to Russia, according to the Russian-installed leader of the occupied Kherson region, Vladimir Saldo.
Russia had previously ordered civilians out of an area it controls on the west bank of the river.
-ABC News’ Will Gretsky
Oct 31, 7:07 PM EDT
Russia’s withdrawal from grain deal ‘collective punishment’ for world: State Department
State Department spokesperson Ned Price on Monday lambasted Russia’s recent decision to withdraw from the U.N.-brokered deal that allowed for grain to be exported through the Black Sea — likely to be a chief focus of this week’s G-7 ministerial meeting and potentially the G-20 Leaders’ Summit next month.
“We deeply regret Russia’s decision to suspend its participation in the Black Sea Grain Initiative, which is having immediate, harmful impacts on global food security,” Price said during a press briefing. “Russia should return to full participation in the initiative, and we urge all parties to swiftly agree to sustain this crucial program through the months to come.”
“Any disruption to the initiative risks spiking food prices, lowering the confidence of insurers and commercial shippers who have returned to Black Sea routes, and further imposing hardships on low-income countries already reeling from dire humanitarian crises and global food insecurity,” he added.
Price said Russia’s reneging had already caused future contracts for foodstuff to rise, even though some ships appear to have been allowed to pass through the water routes with their cargo following Moscow’s announcement.
“We’ve seen Russia engage in what appears to be collective punishment for the people of Ukraine,” he said. “But Moscow’s suspension of the initiative would be tantamount to collective punishment for the rest of the world — but especially lower- and middle-income countries that so desperately needed this grain.”
ABC News’ Shannon Crawford
Oct 31, 3:32 PM EDT
Ukraine energy company warns about attacks on energy infrastructure
Following a series of coordinated strikes across Ukraine this Monday morning, Ukraine’s largest private energy company DTEK says it’s running out of equipment and spare parts needed for repairs of the damaged infrastructure facilities.
“Unfortunately, we have already used up the stock of equipment that we had in our warehouses after the first two waves of attacks that have been taking place since Oct. 10,” said DTEK Executive Director Dmytro Sakharuk. “We were able to purchase some equipment. But unfortunately, the cost of the equipment is now measured in hundreds of millions of dollars.”
Most parts have been already used for repairs following previous Russian strikes, he added.
Oct 31, 4:54 AM EDT
Russia launches waves of missiles at energy targets
Russia on Monday morning again launched a series of coordinated strikes across Ukraine, targeting energy infrastructure, including in the Kyiv region.
Ukraine’s military said it shot down 44 cruise missiles as the Russians launched “several waves of missile attacks on critical infrastructure facilities” across the country.
About five distant booms could be heard in central Kyiv at about 8 a.m. local time.
Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, confirmed that a power plant has been hit, meaning mid-morning around 350,000 homes in the capital were left without power. Kyiv’s water supply has also been compromised, according to a water company.
A local official said “critical infrastructure” had also been hit in the Chernivtsi region in southwestern Ukraine.
Critical infrastructure has also been hit and damaged in Zaporizhzhia in the south, according to another local official.
Other regions of Ukraine appear to have been targeted, including Kharkiv, Odesa, Dnipro, Poltava and Lviv.
There are currently no reports of significant casualties.
ABC News’ Tom Soufi Burridge
Oct 30, 10:02 AM EDT
Blinken accuses Russia of ‘weaponizing food’
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken slammed Russia’s decision to pull out of the Black Sea Grain Initiative as a statement from the Kremlin that “people and families around the world should pay more for food or go hungry.”
Russia announced it is withdrawing from the U.N.-brokered grain deal in response to a drone attack Saturday in the waters of the Sevastopol Bay, in the Black Sea near Crimea.
Russia’s decision, Blinken said, is jeopardizing grain shipments he described as “life-saving.”
“In suspending this arrangement, Russia is again weaponizing food in the war it started, directly impacting low- and middle-income countries and global food prices, and exacerbating already dire humanitarian crises and food insecurity,” Blinken said in a statement released Saturday night.
He said 9 million metric tons of food has been shipped under the agreement, which was signed and launched in July. He said the shipments have reduced food prices around the world.
“We urge the Government of Russia to resume its participation in the Initiative, fully comply with the arrangement, and work to ensure that people around the world continue to be able to receive the benefits facilitated by the Initiative,” Blinken said.
Blinken’s statement echoed what President Joe Biden said earlier Saturday, calling Russia’s withdrawal from the initiative, “purely outrageous.”
“It’s going to increase starvation. There’s no reason for them to do that, but they’re always looking for some rationale to be able to say the reason they’re doing something outrageous is because the West made them do it. And it’s just not,” Biden said. “There’s no merit to what they’re doing. The UN negotiated that deal and that should be the end of it.”
(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump asked a Florida court on Wednesday to shield his revocable trust from New York Attorney General Letitia James, who has filed a $250 million civil lawsuit against Trump and his family.
In a 41-page civil lawsuit laden with familiar grievances, the former president accused James of “intimidation and harassment” and of making repeated “attempts to steal, destroy or control all things Trump,” including the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust that contains his private estate plan, and decisions about the disposition of his assets upon death.
The lawsuit said the trust “requires protection from James’ demand to invade his privacy.” As part of her lawsuit, James has sought documents about the trust, its terms and its contents.
“These are private matters to President Trump, and under Florida law, revelation of a settlor’s revocable trust while the settlor is still alive threatens the settlor’s right to privacy guaranteed by Article I, Section 23 of the Florida Constitution and the common law,” Trump’s lawsuit states.
A spokeswoman for James issued a statement Wednesday night, saying, “Multiple judges have dismissed Donald Trump’s baseless attempts to evade justice, and no number of lawsuits will deter us from pursuing this fraud. We sued Donald Trump because he committed extensive financial fraud. That fact hasn’t changed, and neither will our resolve to ensure that no matter how powerful or political one might be, no one is above the law.”
James alleges that Trump and his family enriched themselves through “numerous acts of fraud and misrepresentations” for 20 years, and her lawsuit accuses the Trumps of “grossly” inflating the former president’s net worth by billions of dollars and cheating lenders and others with false and misleading financial statements.
The civil lawsuit, filed in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, seeks a $250 million judgment and a prohibition on any of the Trumps leading a company in the state of New York.
Trump’s filing comes hours before a hearing on Thursday in New York where a judge will hear oral arguments about the attorney general’s request for a preliminary injunction to stop alleged ongoing fraud.
The attorney general’s office claimed in a court filing last month that the Trump Organization allegedly appeared to be moving assets and taking other steps to restructure the business in an attempt to “evade liability.”
James also asked the court to appoint a monitor to oversee the Trump Organization’s preparation of financial statements to ensure accuracy.
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department has offered Trump aide Kash Patel an immunity deal to testify before a grand jury probing former President Donald Trump’s mishandling of documents marked as classified found at Mar-a-Lago, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.
Patel appeared before a grand jury probing the handling of the documents last month and repeatedly invoked the Fifth Amendment.
The immunity deal for Patel wouldn’t necessarily shield him from prosecution and wouldn’t protect him from any information investigators receive independent of his testimony.
But experts argue the extension of an immunity offer, nonetheless, could signal the advanced stage the investigation is currently in and how investigators are increasingly zeroing in on Trump’s attempts to hold on to documents that were among the most highly protected government intelligence.
Patel didn’t immediately respond to a text message seeking comment, and it’s not clear how he or his team will respond to the DOJ’s offer. A lawyer representing Patel declined to comment. Department of Justice officials declined to comment.
On Aug. 9, the day after FBI agents raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate and found scores of documents marked classified, Patel issued a statement calling the raid “unlawful” and saying “corrupt government gangsters” had engaged in “the blatant weaponization of our government for political gain.”
On Monday, Patel appeared on “The Benny Show,” a right-wing podcast, and said, “I’m all in with the boss, and you know that.” Patel was responding to a question about whether he would accept the FBI director post if Trump were to be reelected in 2024.
“First I tell people, let’s win the midterms,” Patel said. “And then let’s see what he does and, you know, you and I think I know what he’s going to do. And then it’s a two-year lift and you know what, they’re going to come after us.”
(WASHINGTON0 — Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said he hopes Twitter’s new owner, Elon Musk, acts “responsibly.”
“He’s going to be in a position of responsibility with respect to an important platform, and we hope that he exercises that position responsibly,” Mayorkas told ABC News Chief Justice Correspondent Pierre Thomas during an interview at DHS headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Musk, who acquired Twitter for roughly $44 billion last week, retweeted and since deleted inaccurate information regarding the assault of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul.
The secretary noted that Musk removed the inaccurate post “rather rapidly.”
Mayorkas said that, ultimately, it’s up to Congress to regulate social media companies. The government, however, is within its purview to combat mis- and disinformation, he said.
“For example, if it involves the election — if there is false information that [says] you don’t need to vote on Nov. 8… if you miss [the] voting date, you can ask … for permission to vote five days later — with no factual basis, inaccurate information that could deceive an individual into missing their right to exercise their vote. That is something that we will correct,” he said. “That is our responsibility. That is our mission. And we execute it quite proudly.”
Disinformation from nation-state actors could be seen by a vast audience, he said, including during the 2022 midterm election, if it is not stomped out.
“Here in the online environment, the potential audience is vast,” he said. “And what we do, we have a responsibility to make sure that the American public receives accurate information.”
Earlier this year, DHS established and then quickly shut down a Disinformation Governance Board that was aimed at combatting disinformation but it was criticized by both sides of the aisle.
Mayorkas told ABC News that leaders have a responsibility to combat misinformation.
“The words of leaders matter a lot, and we need leaders to act responsibly,” he said. “It is the responsibility of government, not just the Department of Homeland Security. The responsibility of government. It is a responsibility of leaders. It is the responsibility of people in positions of trust to communicate accurate information to the American public and disabuse them of falsehoods.”
He is concerned about the “temperature” in the country and the divisiveness, the secretary added.
