(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Thursday’s sports events:
MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL
AMERICAN LEAGUE
Tampa Bay 6, Toronto 3
Detroit 7, Chi White Sox 2
Baltimore 3, NY Yankees 1
Seattle 3, Oakland 2
NATIONAL LEAGUE
St. Louis 2, Cincinnati 1
Colorado 7, Miami 6
San Diego 8, Washington 6
Atlanta 8, Philadelphia 5
NY Mets 10, Chi Cubs 1
San Francisco 5, Milwaukee 0
NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION PLAYOFFS
Boston 110, Miami 97 (Miami leads 3-2)
NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE PLAYOFFS
Dallas 3, Vegas 2 (OT) (Dallas leads 3-1)
WOMEN’S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Las Vegas 94, Los Angeles 85
Phoenix 90, Minnesota 81
(INDIANAPOLIS) — The Indiana Medical Licensing Board decided late Thursday to reprimand and fine a doctor after ruling that she violated patient privacy laws by talking to a newspaper reporter about providing an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim from neighboring Ohio.
After an hourslong hearing, the board voted to issue Indianapolis obstetrician-gynecologist Dr. Caitlin Bernard a letter of reprimand and a fine of $3,000, but refused a request from Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita to suspend Bernard’s license. The board dismissed Rokita’s allegations that Bernard violated state law by not reporting the child abuse to Indiana authorities.
Bernard has become a flashpoint in the national debate on abortion rights since performing the procedure on the Ohio girl last June, not long after the United States Supreme Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortion nationwide nearly 50 years ago. The unprecedented Supreme Court decision put into effect an Ohio law that banned abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. Bernard said the girl was six weeks and three days into her pregnancy when she traveled across state lines to Indiana, which at the time allowed abortions to be performed up to 20 weeks after fertilization.
The physician has been under fire from Rokita, a Republican who opposes abortion, and the two have been in a dispute for months. The Indiana attorney general submitted a complaint against Bernard to the state medical licensing board in December, claiming that she violated federal and state law relating to patient privacy and reporting child abuse.
A judge then threw out a lawsuit filed by Bernard and her colleague, Dr. Amy Caldwell, against Rokita to prevent his office from accessing patients’ medical records and investigating abortion providers. The judge declined to provide a preliminary injunction against Rokita due to his referral of investigations into Bernard to the Indiana Medical Licensing Board, saying the board now has jurisdiction over the investigations.
Bernard’s lawsuit had accused Rokita of infringing on patient-doctor confidentiality and claims that he is targeting physicians who provide legal medical care including abortions, according to court filings.
An Ohio investigation ultimately resulted in a 27-year-old man being charged with the rape of the 10-year-old girl.
Bernard told the Indiana Medical Licensing Board that she complied with the investigation. She said the patient was hospitalized after being given a medication abortion so that the fetal remains could be collected and submitted as evidence.
In her testimony at a hearing in Indianapolis on Thursday, Bernard heavily criticized Ohio and Indiana politicians for politicizing the case.
“I think that if the Attorney General, Todd Rokita, had not chosen to make this his political stunt we would not be here today,” Bernard said. “I don’t think that anyone would have been looking into this story as any different than any other interview that I have ever given if it was not politicized the way that it was by public figures in our state and in Ohio.”
Bernard argued that she does not see abortion as a political issue, but rather a part of comprehensive reproductive healthcare. Bernard said she was one of only two complex family specialists in Indiana and has done interviews with reporters in the past that have not received as much attention.
Bernard told the board that she did not reveal any identifiable information about the patient to the press, but thought it was important for the public to know the impact abortion bans could have on care in the state. She said a hypothetical would not have sent across that message.
“I think that it is incredibly important for people to understand the real-world impacts of the laws of this country about abortion or otherwise,” Bernard said in her testimony. “I think it is important for people to know what patients will have to go through because of legislation that is being passed and a hypothetical does not make that impact.”
“It does not help people understand what is happening and I think people need to know, again, the real-life impacts of those laws so that they could make their own determinations about whether to support or oppose them, again. Particularly if those laws are about to be passed in their own states,” she added.
Bernard also told the board she properly reported the case of child abuse in line with her hospital’s guidelines when she reported it to Ohio authorities. Ohio is where the patient lived at the time and where the abuse occurred.
(WASHINGTON) — The 123 federal prisons in the United States need roughly $2 billion worth of “maintenance” and most are “aging and deteriorating,” according to a DOJ inspector general report.
In three prisons, the conditions are so bad they had to be closed — including the Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC) in Manhattan, which held Jeffrey Epstein prior to his death.
“We’re seeing crumbling prisons,” DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz told Chief Justice Correspondent Pierre Thomas. “We’re seeing buildings that we go into that have actually holes in the ceilings in multiple places, leading to damages to kitchens, to doctor’s offices to gymnasiums. And they’re not being fixed.”
The inspector general’s investigation showed crumbling infrastructure in MCC New York, which was closed by Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco and currently has no reopening date.
While BOP sought $200 million for infrastructure repairs in fiscal year 2022 and was allocated just $57 million from Congress, the costs to fix all the facilities would cost closer to $2 billion, per the report released earlier this month.
“And that what we’ve seen is when you don’t fix your infrastructure, we don’t keep your building up to speed,” Horowitz said. “You create safety and security issues. We’ve seen inmates sleeping with pipes running over their heads that leak, that aren’t getting fixed.”
It is not only inmates that have to deal with dilapidated infrastructure, but staff who work in the prisons have to as well.
“We’ve been complaining about our prison conditions for many, many years, and it’s the conditions of confinement for the offenders, but it’s also the working conditions that our employees work in,” Shane Fausey, president of the Council of Prisons Locals, told ABC News.
Fausey, who represents over 30,000 federal corrections officers in the country, said the employees he represents go into work in tough conditions with little fanfare because they are dedicated to keeping their communities safe.
The inspector general also released three other reports detailing some of the other failures at the BOP. The Taft Correctional Institution in Taft, California was so unsafe, according to the IG, that the Justice Department had to shut down its operations. The facility was built in 1996 and had problems from its opening with unstable soil that caused cracks throughout the facility. Those cracks were so big that the sun shines through them, according to the report.
“We’re seeing problems in every institution,” Horowitz told ABC News. “It’s a global problem. The business as usual isn’t working for the BOP. They have to change that, and they have to address these very serious problems.”
But BOP’s problems extend beyond the dire need for physical repairs, extending to ongoing security problems that have allowed a steady stream of contraband like drugs, cell phones and weapons to enter several of the federal prisons the IG examined.
A 2021 search of a federal prison in Atlanta found 134 inmate-made weapons, marijuana, methamphetamines and enough prescription pills to fill two one-gallon bags along with 705 cell phones — some hidden in prison walls.
“I’m not just talking about guns [and] knives. You clearly want that out of the prison,” Horowitz said. “But what we’re seeing is tobacco, which is often a currency in the prisons. We’re seeing synthetic drugs coming in. We’re seeing cell phones coming in a cell phone in a prison is a deadly weapon.”
Cell phones in prison have proved deadly. In 2013, inmates at a federal prison in Puerto Rico were accused of using a cell phone to orchestrate the murder of corrections officer Lt. Osvaldo Albarati. Four inmates plead guilty for their roles in the plot.
The Inspector General found that more than half of the security cameras in the Atlanta facility were inoperable or malfunctioning. At MCC, there were “serious operational issues related to…camera functionality.”
In a statement to ABC News, Bureau of Prisons Director Colette Peters said she is committing to work with the IG and Government Accountability Office in the areas highlighted in the report.
“The BOP will carefully evaluate and implement any necessary corrective actions to ensure that our mission of operating safe, secure, and humane facilities continue to be fulfilled,” she said. “I am confident our processes and procedures now in place will ensure future success. We continue to take concrete steps that will not only meet but exceed the expectations of our external partners, and we will utilize the data gathered from the reports to optimize the allocation of resources.”
Congress has set aside over $1 billion for BOP to construct two new institutions, but the funds remain largely unspent and the projects have remained in the planning stages for over a decade. BOP has asked Congress to cancel one project and revoke funding, but that request has not been acted on.
Shinedown‘s debut album, Leave a Whisper, turns 20 this Saturday.
Released May 27, 2003, Leave a Whisper put Shinedown on the map with the singles “45” and “Fly from the Inside” — as well as a cover of Lynyrd Skynyrd‘s “Simple Man” included on the deluxe version — and has been certified Platinum by the RIAA.
“Man, that’s crazy,” frontman Brent Smith tells ABC Audio of the 20th anniversary. “It literally feels like it was yesterday. It really does.”
Smith shares that he and his bandmates are working on a way to celebrate the Leave a Whisper milestone, and he has a particular dream gig in mind that he’s “throw[ing] out into the atmosphere.”
“It’d be awesome to play it in full at Madison Square Garden,” Smith says. “We’ve never played Madison Square Garden, it would be awesome to do that.”
Whether or not Shinedown ends up headlining the famed New York City arena, Smith says the group is planning to play a Leave a Whisper anniversary show somewhere this year.
“We’re gonna try and do one show this year, I don’t know where it’ll be — who knows, it might be Madison Square Garden — where we’re gonna play Leave a Whisper front to back,” Smith says. “Then obviously we’ll go off for a minute, come back, and then we’ll play another 10 songs. But we’re working on … one Leave a Whisper show, to play it in its entirety, which has never been done before.”
In the meantime, Shinedown will resume touring in support of their latest record, 2022’s Planet Zero, in July.
As Taylor Swift‘s Eras Tour has stopped in cities across the U.S., they’ve all seemed to try to outdo each other in celebrating the occasion. They’ve given her the key to the city, named streets after her, invited her to be the mayor for a day — Glendale, Arizona, even renamed itself Swift City in her honor. So what will Taylor get when her tour hits New Jersey Friday night? Not much.
In a video Thursday, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy announced that in honor of Taylor, he’s putting to rest a long-standing statewide debate about what you call the stuff you put in a ham, egg and cheese sandwich. Some people call it Taylor ham; others call it pork roll.
“Usually we let you ‘call it what you want,'” Murphy said, referring to the title of one of Taylor’s songs. “But since we have a superstar coming to town, we know ‘All Too Well’ that we should commemorate the occasion. So today, we are declaring the official state sandwich of New Jersey a ‘Taylor Swift ham, egg and cheese.'”
“Welcome back to New Jersey, Taylor — we’ve been waiting for you,” he concluded. “And it would’ve been a ‘Cruel Summer’ without you.” The video ends with a photo of the official sandwich proclamation.
While fans may have found that a bit underwhelming, they’re probably more upset that the venue in which she’s performing — MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford — is not allowing “Taylor-gating” unless you have a ticket.
While fans at other stadiums have been showing up and partying in the parking lot even without tickets, the New Jersey State Police tweeted, “Parking lots will be at maximum capacity and unauthorized crowds will create traffic and safety concerns.”
Jelly Roll‘s got two big projects rolling out soon: His debut country album, Whitsitt Chapel, and his ABC News Studio-produced documentary, Jelly Roll: Save Me.
The documentary will offer fans an inside look at Jelly Roll’s life from his early years battling addiction and mental health struggles, to spending time behind bars to rising up to music stardom.
“They left no stone unturned. They spent a lot of time with me,” Jelly Roll tells ABC Audio of his documentary. “The best part is I have no clue what’s going on because it’s an ABC News project. It’s not like a collaborative documentary. I’m used to being a part of things, where it’s like, ‘Hey, let me see something and give some opinions.’ Like, nope. We just trust them to tell the story as we presented it,” he explains. “I’ll be watching it for the first time with everybody.”
With the countless hours the production crew spent with Jelly Roll, he realizes he’s in for a surprise, too, because he doesn’t “remember what all they caught.”
“That’s another thing. You spend that many hours together,” recalls Jelly Roll. “I [had] just seen the two-minute teaser and … it was like, ‘Oh my God, I’m so glad they were there for that.’ I totally forgot they were there for that moment. They were there for so many big moments [and] so many career firsts for me.”
With the album and documentary releasing soon, Jelly Roll reveals which project he’s most excited for. “Man, the documentary. This is big. You know, this don’t get no bigger.”
Jelly Roll: Save Me premieres on Hulu May 30, and Whitsitt Chapel arrives June 2.
Jelly Roll’s currently in the top 15 of the country charts with his single, “NEED A FAVOR.”
Def Leppard has been very busy the last week or so promoting not only their new album, Drastic Symphonies, but their book Definitely Def Leppard. And now the band is sharing a look at what they’ve been up to.
In a new behind-the-scenes vlog for their YouTube channel, Def Leppard gives fans a peek at their promotional tour, including rehearsals for their recent BBC2 Piano Room performance with an orchestra.
“One of the best experiences of my life, absolutely brilliant,” guitarist Rick Savage says of the performance, where the band played three songs, including “Pour Some Sugar On Me.” “It’s so great to play live with an orchestra in a completely different environment, sitting down, being able to play as more of a musician than just a performer.”
Drummer Rick Allen adds, “I’ve never quite experienced playing those songs before in that way … just being in the same room with the orchestra, just, what a wonderful experience.”
There’s also footage of Def Leppard at a London book signing for their book Definitely Def Leppard and at London’s Royal Festival Hall, where they did a Q&A with fans about the book.
And now that promotion is over, Def Leppard has something else to focus on. They are currently on their U.K./European Stadium tour with Mötley Crüe. The tour hits Munich, Germany, on May 27. A complete list of dates can be found at defleppard.com.
The live action remake of The Little Mermaid is expected to easily swim to the top of the box office in its debut this weekend. The film stars Halle Bailey in the lead role, and when her casting was announced there was some grumbling from anonymous corners of the internet about an African-American woman getting the role.
Daveed Diggs voices Sebastian the crab in the film, and he thinks the diversity celebrated in the film is a beautiful thing, telling ABC Audio, “The characters are all built from the inside out. The relationships are built from the inside out. And like, everybody’s sort of preliminary stresses about the ethnicities of people like immediately seem stupid.”
Diggs thinks Bailey’s casting was “perfect,” adding “her performance throughout is so undeniable.”
The Hamilton star goes on to say that Halle’s casting means a lot to him and he’s sure it’ll mean a lot to others too.
“When you’re my age, Oh man, I never had that. You know, all the little girls my age didn’t have that,” he shares. “We weren’t able to see ourselves in this story in this way.”
Adds Diggs, “Our kids shouldn’t have to question that, right? We want them to be able to imagine themselves as anything. And so having films like this are a step towards that.”
According to Billboard, Matt Bellamy and company have now brought in over $200 million is gross ticket sales. Their total concert earnings now sit at $206.6 million.
Muse passed the $200 million mark on their U.S. tour this year supporting their latest album, Will of the People. The outing also featured Evanescence on the bill, as well as Highly Suspect for select dates.
Will of the People, the ninth Muse studio effort, was released last August. It features the singles “Won’t Stand Down,” “Compliance” and “Kill or Be Killed.”
Muse will resume touring behind Will of the People with a European run kicking off this weekend.
(LOS ANGELES) — A 17-year-old suspect has been arrested for allegedly stabbing a Los Angeles Metro Bus operator multiple times, leaving him in critical condition, police said.
A male suspect boarded the bus in Woodland Hills Wednesday evening and began arguing with the driver before stabbing him, Metro Los Angeles said on Twitter.
“The bus driver and the suspect exited the bus and continued the argument, at which time the suspect produced a knife (or sharp object) and stabbed the bus driver multiple times,” police said in a press release.
The suspect then fled on foot near Erwin Street and Topanga Canyon Boulevard, officials said.
L.A. Police Department officers began a grid search of the area, chief Michel Moore said, adding that the department “has mustered a number of night watch detectives and uniform personnel to investigate this senseless attack.”
Police officials released a statement with images of the suspect.
On Thursday, Moore announced that the suspect has been identified and a 17-year-old has been taken into custody. The suspect is not being publicly identified at this time because he is a juvenile, Moore said.
Moore praised the community for tips leading to the suspect’s arrest “who came together recognizing that this type of attack could not go unaddressed.”
Moore said police are investigating the suspect’s background in an attempt to find a motive for what he called a “horrific,” “vicious” and “unprovoked” attack.
The bus driver remains in “extremely” critical condition, Moore said Thursday.
“This heinous act of violence is horrific and the harm done to one of our Metro drivers is tragic. I join the entire city family in praying for him tonight, and my heart also goes out to his family,” Mayor Karen Bass said in a statement.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
