(ITHACA, NY) — Cornell University announced Monday that it’s suspending frat parties after students reported they were drugged and one student alleged being sexually assaulted at a residence off-campus, school officials said.
The school’s president, Martha E. Pollack and Ryan Lombardi, the vice president of student and campus life, addressed the suspension in a letter to students on Monday.
Student leaders at the school’s Interfraternity Council (IFC), which governs IFC-recognized fraternities at the university, decided to suspend the fraternities on Sunday during an emergency meeting.
On Friday, Cornell University Police issued a crime alert saying that between Sept. 24 and Nov. 3 there were four incidents where students claimed that they drank very little or no alcohol but became debilitated while at the frat parties and said they were “roofied.”
“Fraternity leaders will take this time to implement stronger health and safety plans,” Pollack and Lombardi wrote. “No IFC-affiliated social events will resume until student leaders and Cornell staff are confident activities can take place responsibly and safely.”
According to Cornell police, in a second crime alert, someone reported that they were sexually assaulted on Sunday at a location off-campus.
The Ithaca Police Department is investigating the incident, according to Cornell police.
Ithaca police did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.
Ed Sheeran‘s “Celestial” was featured in a trailer for the new Pokémon Scarlet/Violet games. The official Pokémon Twitter account teased, “A journey of celestial proportions awaits. Thanks for the incredible track Ed Sheeran!” The games come out November 18.
Lindsey Stirling helped rusher in the holidays on The Kelly Clarkson Show by performing “Joy To The World.” Of course Lindsey showed off her dance moves and was joined by some professional dancers onstage.
Justin Bieber is apparently “scared to death” of Judge Judy. The icon told Access Hollywood of her old neighbor, “I understood he was paying the front door people to let him know when I was there — coming and going — so he wouldn’t have to bump into me!”
Dua Lipa will be headlining night two of Capital’s Jingle Bell Ball at London’s O2 Arena. She’ll play the night of Sunday, December 11.
The Weeknd‘s music is coming to Beat Saber, a VR music rhythm game. Fans can now smash cubes to the beat of The Weeknd’s biggest hits for $12.99.
Lauren Spencer-Smith will perform at the 2022 MTV EMAs, which will stream on Paramount+ on November 12.
Shakira is moving to Miami with her sons after ending her relationship with Gerard Piqué. Peoplereports the pair worked out a custody agreement that is “best for their kids” and allows for Milan, 9, and Sasha, 7, to live with their mom.
Martha Stewart is keeping mum on whether Mariah Carey is invited to her famous Thanksgiving dinner — which Mimi requested to attend. Martha told Entertainment Tonight she’s inviting a “small group” to the event and isn’t “telling a soul” who’s on the invite list.
Blackmore’s Night, the group featuring ex-Deep Purple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore and his wife, Candice Night, has been making their brand of traditional medieval and folk rock music for 25 years — and they’re going to mark that milestone with a special release.
On March 10, 2023, a 25th Anniversary Edition of Shadow of the Moon, the debut album by Blackmore’s Night, will arrive. You can listen to the 25th Anniversary mix of the album’s title track now. The package includes two previously unreleased acoustic versions of “Spirit of the Sea” and “Shadow of the Moon,” recorded by Blackmore and Night in 2022.
The physical copies of the album feature a bonus DVD with a making-of documentary and videos for “Shadow of the Moon,” “No Second Chance” and “Renaissance Faire.”
If you buy the album as a two-LP vinyl set, you may discover a Golden Ticket inside. Only two albums will have this ticket, but if you’re one of those two lucky fans, you’ll win a Fender Ritchie Blackmore Signature Stratocaster guitar.
Ed Sheeran‘s “Celestial” was featured in a trailer for the new Pokémon Scarlet/Violet games. The official Pokémon Twitter account teased, “A journey of celestial proportions awaits. Thanks for the incredible track Ed Sheeran!” The games come out November 18.
Millie Bobby Brown wants to play Britney Spears in a movie, telling Drew Barrymore, “I think her story, first of all, resonates with me … I feel like I could tell her story in the right way.” Britney seemingly didn’t love the idea and wrote on Instagram, “I hear about people wanting to do movies about my life … dude I’m not dead !!!”
Justin Bieber is “scared to death” of Judge Judy, who told Access Hollywoodof her former neighbor, “I understood he was paying the front door people to let him know when I was there — coming and going — so he wouldn’t have to bump into me.”
Dua Lipa will be headlining night two of Capital’s Jingle Bell Ball at London’s O2 Arena. She’ll play Sunday, December 11.
Tate McRae and Lauren Spencer-Smith will perform at the 2022 MTV EMAs, which will stream on Paramount+ on November 12.
The Weeknd‘s music is coming to Beat Saber, a VR music rhythm game. Fans can now smash cubes to the beat of The Weeknd’s biggest hits for $12.99.
Shakira is moving to Miami with her sons after ending her relationship with Gerard Piqué. Peoplereports the pair worked out a custody agreement that’s “best for their kids” and allows for Milan, 9, and Sasha, 7, to live with their mom.
Martha Stewart is keeping mum on whether Mariah Carey is invited to her famous Thanksgiving dinner — which Mimi requested to attend. Martha told Entertainment Tonight she’s inviting a “small group” to the event and isn’t “telling a soul” who’s on the invite list.
Yung Bleu‘s new album, TANTRA, is days away from its scheduled release. Set to drop Friday, November 11, the project boasts 17 songs and a slew of guest appearances.
Among the features on the project are Fivio Foreign, Nicki Minaj, Lil Wayne and French Montana. Pop star Zayn is on a song called “Fire Inside,” while Lucky Daye, Destiny’s Child‘s Kelly Rowland, Ty Dolla $ign and Ne-Yo are bringing some R&B flavor to the album.
In an interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe, Bleu says TANTRA sees him “kind of summing up what’s been going on with my career now.”
He adds that it’s “just one of those type of albums where I just take my time with it and just give people songs that’s gon’ last.”
Luke Sharrett for The Washington Post via Getty Images
(LEXINGTON, KENTUCKY) — A female student who was caught on camera using racial slurs towards a Black student at the University of Kentucky will voluntarily withdraw from the university, according to her attorney.
Sophia Rosing, 22, the senior at the University of Kentucky, plans to withdraw Tuesday or Wednesday, her lawyer, Fred Peters, told ABC News.
The video, which was recorded early Sunday morning, shows Rising apparently drunk and saying derogatory, racial slurs to Kylah Spring, a first-year student who was working an overnight shift at the university’s front desk.
“It is our story,” Spring said at a demonstration held on campus grounds Monday night.
“There’s a whole video of “This is a recurring issue in and across American school systems no matter what age,” she added.
Rosing refused to give her name when authorities were called. She was taken into custody at the Fayette County Detention Center and registered as Jane Doe and has since been released from custody after her parents paid a cash bond of $10,000, according to Peters. Rising pleaded not guilty according to the Fayette County Sheriff’s office.
She faces two assault charges, one against Spring and the other towards a police officer. She was also given a disorderly misconduct charge and a public intoxication charge, according to her lawyer.
“She regrets everything and is humiliated and embarrassed,” Peters said about his client.
University President Eli Capilouto released a statement following the incident condemning the behavior and said the school “will not tolerate it under any circumstance. The safety and well-being of our community has been — and will continue to be — our top priority.”
ABC News sent a request for comment to the University of Kentucky.
Spring assembled a diverse crowd Monday night to address the situation during a peaceful demonstration. Many supporters including her parents surrounded Spring while she delivered a short, emotional speech describing her experience — encouraging the crowd to follow Michelle Obama’s famous philosophy of “when they go low, we go high.”
“I was physically, verbally and racially assaulted by Jane Doe, aka Sophia Rosing,” Spring said at the protest.
Spring said she was “deeply saddened” about the incident but is “grateful for the justice to come.”
“To Ms. Rosing, you will not break my spirit,” Spring said. “I only pray that you open your heart to love,” Spring said.
Rosing’s first court hearing is set for next Monday at 8:30 a.m., according to Peters.
There’s no word from ABC News’ parent company, Disney, or its subsidiary Lucasfilm, but Variety reports both companies have been meeting with writers to help get an Indiana Jones series off the ground for Disney+.
It’s not known whether the show will be a prequel series, as the Emmy-winning Young Indiana Jones Chronicles was in the early ’90s, or some kind of in-universe tie-in to 2023’s forthcoming fifth Indy adventure, the last starring Harrison Ford as the man in the hat.
Ford himself cameoed in an episode of ABC’s Young Indiana Jones series — specifically, “Young Indiana Jones and the Mystery of the Blues” in 1993. Each episode of the show was bookended with an elderly — and eyepatch-wearing — Indy, played by the late George Hall, looking back at his earlier adventures. Corey Carrier and SeanPatrick Flanery both played the younger Henry Jones Jr., whose adventures took him from the trenches of World War I to the streets of India and beyond.
The fifth Indiana Jones adventure hits theaters June 23, 2023 — just before Ford’s 81st birthday.
(NEW YORK) — Filmmaker Cynthia Lowen began the process of making the new documentary film “Battleground” with a genuine curiosity about the anti-abortion movement.
Lowen wanted to understand how, despite being in the minority, anti-abortion movement organizers “were being so successful in advancing their agenda,” she told ABC News Correspondent Phil Lipof.
The new documentary “Battleground,” which was released this year in theaters and is now available on streaming platforms, began in the summer of 2019, a full three years before Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Lowen said she started filming in Alabama, where the team was focused at first on documenting the abortion-rights movement.
She quickly realized, she told ABC News, how crucial it would be to frame the film from a minority perspective by including multiple important voices from the anti-abortion movement.
A recent survey by Pew Research Center found that 62% of Americans think abortion should be legal in all or most cases. A 2017 study by the Guttmacher Institute found that nearly 1 in 4 women will have an abortion in their lifetime.
“Battleground” features three women in influential positions within the anti-abortion movement: the president of an influential anti-abortion lobbying organization, the founder of the largest anti-abortion youth organization in the country, and the founder of Pro-Life San Francisco.
Part of the goal of the film is to challenge assumptions and notions about the anti-abortion movement by showing organizers that are neither religious nor conservative about other beliefs.
“What I discovered that really surprised me is that there are a lot of women who are leading the anti-abortion movement,” said Lowen.
One example is Terrisa Bukovinac, the founder of Pro-Life San Francisco, who identifies as an atheist, a feminist and a Democrat with progressive values. “[She] is a very different face of the anti-abortion movement than many people expect,” Lowen said.
“She represents,” Lowen added, “what the movement is trying to do in terms of appealing to young people as single-issue voters.”
“If they don’t grow their base and appeal to non-religious people, to young people and cultivate those single-issue voters,” she added, “they may not continue to have the kind of success and inroads that they’ve had legislatively.”
Despite representing a minority opinion, the anti-abortion movement has been very successful. Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022, opening up the opportunity for dozens of states across the country to restrict access to legal abortions.
One of the scenes in the documentary includes audiotape of Lowen’s team obtained from a conversation between evangelical leaders and former President Donald Trump, who was a presidential candidate at the time.
“You really hear this deal being made,” Lowen said, “which is that if Donald Trump will advance the agenda and the priorities of Christian right, the Christian white right will rally their base to get out and vote for him.”
Trump’s success in appointing three conservative Supreme Court justices was instrumental in the anti-abortion movement’s success in overturning Roe v. Wade.
The documentary also includes interviews with leaders from the abortion-rights movement, including President and CEO of Planned Parenthood Alexis McGill Johnson.
Lowen told ABC News she personally disagrees with the anti-abortion movement, saying it “deprives other people of their rights and other people of the opportunity to make health care decisions for themselves that are in their own best interests.”
Jeff Cook, the legendary country guitarist known for being a founding member of hitmaking group Alabama, has died.
According to a statement from his publicist, Cook died on Tuesday, November 7, at his beach home in Destin, Florida. He was 73 years old and had been living with Parkinson’s disease for a decade, a diagnosis that caused him to retire from touring in 2018.
Together with his Alabama bandmates Randy Owen and Teddy Gentry, Cook played on some of the group’s biggest and most enduring hit songs, such as “Dixieland Delight,” “Tennessee River,” “Love in the First Degree” and “Mountain Music.”
Cook is survived by several family members, including his wife of 27 years, Lisa. In lieu of flowers, the family has requested that anyone wishing to commemorate Cook’s life do so with a donation to The Jeff and Lisa Cook Foundation, which works to house orphaned children worldwide.
Arrangements for a memorial service will be announced at a later date.
(NEW YORK) — A COVID-19 outbreak has hit a U.S. station in Antarctica, despite being in one of the most remote areas of the world.
According to the National Science Foundation, which manages McMurdo Station — the largest base on the continent — at least 98 people have tested positive since the beginning of October out of 993 workers.
Of the cases, 64 are active. The NSF said most of the employees have mild symptoms and are isolating in their rooms. It’s unclear how the outbreak began.
To contain the outbreak, the NSF is pausing all inward travel to Antarctica for the next two weeks except for essential travel required for health and safety reasons.
In a statement, the foundation said this is “to lower the density of the population to reduce the possibility of transmission” during which time it will “reassess the situation.”
It’s unclear if the travel pause will affect any research projects. It comes as many scientists head down to the continent for their summer field season, where they work for two to three months.
It is also unknown if the pause will be extended past two weeks.
Those who test positive are required to isolate for five days and then wear a mask for an additional five days.
They are allowed to return to work after receiving two negative tests.
What’s more, the foundation said that its “expert epidemiologist” highly recommends all workers on the base wear KN-95 masks at all times and NSF “will ensure these are available to all residents at McMurdo.”
This is not the first instance of a COVID-19 outbreak occurring in Antarctica.
In December 2020, at least 11 of 33 workers at Belgium’s Princess Elisabeth Polar Station tested positive for the virus.
Additionally, during the same month, 36 cases of COVID-19 were confirmed among staff members at Chile’s Bernardo O’Higgins research station on the Antarctic Peninsula.
McMurdo Station was established in 1955 and is one of three year-round science facilities in Antarctica run by the United States.
According to the NSF, the station is made up of 85 buildings including laboratories, dormitories, repair facilities, a power plant, a firehouse and a water distillation. It also contains a harbor, two landing areas and a helicopter paid.
Scientists focus on research at McMurdo in many fields including biology, geospace sciences, glaciology and climate systems.
