Judge rejects Rep. Zephyr’s bid to return to Montana House floor

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Judge rejects Rep. Zephyr’s bid to return to Montana House floor By Amy Beth Hanson and Matthew Brown | Associated PressHELENA, Mont. — Rep. Zooey Zephyr, the transgender Montana lawmaker silenced after telling Republicans they would have blood on their hands for opposing gender-affirming health care for kids, was barred from returning to the statehouse House floor in a Tuesday court ruling that came just hours before the Legislature planned to wrap up its biennial session.District Court Judge Mike Menahan said it was outside his authority to overrule lawmakers and return Zephyr to the House floor. He cited the importance of preserving the Constitution’s separation of powers between the legislative, executive and judicial branches.“Plaintiffs’ requested relief would require this Court to interfere with legislative authority in a manner that exceeds this Court’s authority,” Menahan wrote in his ruling.Attorneys for the state of Montana had asked the judge to reject an emergency motion from Zephyr’s lawyers chall...

Boy arrested after fire burns 2 classrooms at Palo Alto community center

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Boy arrested after fire burns 2 classrooms at Palo Alto community center (KRON) -- A 16-year-old boy was arrested after he was accused of setting a fire that burned two classrooms at Cubberley Community Center in Palo Alto. The Palo Alto Police Department said the boy also set a small fire at an elementary school's picnic table.The Palo Alto Fire Department responded to the community center, located at 4000 Middlefield Road, just after midnight on Sunday after its fire alarm went off. Crews originally did not discover the fire, but at 12:53 a.m. a passerby reported seeing smoke. Man who allegedly cut someone’s face with box cutter on BART arrested The fire department returned and extinguished a fire burning in the B-Wing of the community center. PAPD said that an investigation revealed that the fire had been set intentionally adjacent to two classrooms. The fire "severely damaged" the two classrooms, which are used for post-secondary education classes by the Palo Alto school district.Police and fire investigators worked with the school district to ide...

Mets-Tigers series-opening game postponed due to rain

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Mets-Tigers series-opening game postponed due to rain DETROIT (AP) — The New York Mets and Detroit Tigers were rained out on Tuesday night.The series-opening game was postponed about an hour after the scheduled start. It will be made up as part of a doubleheader on Wednesday.New York Mets star pitchers Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer are returning to the mound in the series against one of their former teams.The 40-year-old Verlander is scheduled to make his Mets debut on Thursday against the Tigers, who drafted the right-hander No. 2 overall in 2004 and traded him to Houston in 2017. Verlander’s season-opening start was delayed due to a back injury.The 38-year-old Scherzer is due to pitch Wednesday night for the first time since April 19, when he was ejected for violating MLB’s foreign substance policy. Scherzer, who pitched for the Tigers from 2010-14 before signing with Washington, is returning from a 10-game suspension.Mets left-hander Joey Lucchesi and Tigers left-hander Joey Wentz are scheduled to start in the first game of the ...

300 arrested in global crackdown on dark web drug market

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

300 arrested in global crackdown on dark web drug market THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Authorities in the U.S. and Europe arrested nearly 300 people, confiscated over $53 million, and seized a dark web marketplace as part of an international crackdown on drug trafficking that officials say was the largest operation of its kind. The operation targeting the “Monopoly Market” is the latest major takedown of sales platforms for drugs and other illicit goods on the so-called dark web, a part of the internet hosted within an encrypted network and accessible only through specialized anonymity-providing tools.Most of the arrests were made in the U.S., which is in the grips of an overdose crisis. Synthetic opioids, mostly fentanyl, kill more Americans every year than died in the Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan wars combined. “Our message to criminals on the dark web is this: You can try to hide in the furthest reaches of the internet, but the Justice Department will find you and hold you accountable for your crimes,” said U.S. Attorney General...

McIlroy needed ‘a reset’ after missing cut at the Masters

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

McIlroy needed ‘a reset’ after missing cut at the Masters CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Rory McIlroy said he needed “a reset” after missing the cut at the Masters.That’s why the world’s third-ranked player didn’t touch his clubs for more than two weeks, went on vacation to Manhattan with his wife, Erica, to celebrate their anniversary, and withdrew from RBC Heritage — a move that may cost him $3 million.“It was like, I need to reassess the place I am in my life and what is important to me and what I need to focus my energy on,” McIlroy said Tuesday night in his first comments to reporters in nearly a month.McIlroy is playing this week in the Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow, where he’s a three-time champion.While the Masters proved to be a tipping point, McIlroy said it wasn’t his play that prompted him to take a short break. Instead, he said it was the other stresses that engulfed the PGA Tour over the last year, which he has been highly involved in while serving as a player director for the tour’s policy board.He’s had to deal with a va...

Detienen a Francisco Oropesa, sospechoso del tiroteo en Cleveland, Texas, dicen fuentes a CNN

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Detienen a Francisco Oropesa, sospechoso del tiroteo en Cleveland, Texas, dicen fuentes a CNN (CNN) –– Tras una búsqueda intensa que se extendió por varios días, Francisco Oropesa, el hombre señalado de perpetrar un tiroteo en Cleveland, Texas, está bajo custodia, dijeron a CNN dos fuentes policiales federales familiarizadas con la investigación.El arresto se realizó en la ciudad de Cut and Shoot, Texas, según una fuente policial federal.Cut and Shoot está aproximadamente a 27 kilómetros al oeste de Cleveland, donde ocurrió la masacre.Se espera una conferencia del FBI a las 9:30 p.m., hora de Miami.¿Quién es Francisco Oropesa, sospechoso del tiroteo en Cleveland, Texas? Lo que sabemosLas autoridades buscaban a Oropesa desde el viernes pasado cuando, según la policía, abrió fuego contra sus vecinos y dejó cinco personas muertas, incluida una madre y su hijo de 9 años.Los agentes de la Patrulla Fronteriza de EE.UU. estaban atentos al fugitivo en caso de que intentara de huir a México, le dijo previamente a CNN una fuente policial familiarizada con la investigación.Noticia en d...

Furyk appointed US Presidents Cup captain for 2024 in Canada

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Furyk appointed US Presidents Cup captain for 2024 in Canada Jim Furyk gets another crack at being U.S. captain for a road game, this time the Presidents Cup in Canada.The PGA Tour on Tuesday introduced Furyk as captain for the 2024 matches at Royal Montreal, where the Americans will try to win for the 10th consecutive time.Mike Weir previously was named International team captain for the Presidents Cup, which returns to Canada for the second time.“Being selected by my peers to take on the role as captain of the U.S. Team for the 2024 Presidents Cup is truly an honor that I am humbled and excited to accept,” Furyk said.Furyk is the fourth Presidents Cup captain — and second in a row — to have been a Ryder Cup captain previously. He had that job in 2018 in France against a hostile crowd, and it ended with a seven-point European victory. “My favorite question is, ‘Would you have done anything differently?’ I laugh,” Furyk said in an interview in October, after he served as an assistant Ryder Cup captain to Steve Stricker at Whistling Straits. “...

Around-the-world regatta runs into giant seaweed flotilla

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Around-the-world regatta runs into giant seaweed flotilla A 5,000-mile-long flotilla of seaweed stretching from Africa to the Gulf of Mexico is slowing the boats in the around-the-world Ocean Race as they make their way from Brazil to Newport, Rhode Island. The Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt is getting caught on the boats’ rudders, foils and keels, disrupting the finely tuned hydrodynamics the teams in the Ocean Race spend millions on so they can minimize drag and maximize speed. Sailors say they expect the giant patch to get thicker as they sail away from the doldrums off the South American coast on the 5,550-nautical-mile (6,387-mile, 10,279-kilometer) leg to New England. “We’ve just started to enter some patches of it. It’s very challenging,” Team Malizia skipper Will Harris said Tuesday on a Zoom call from the boat’s cockpit. “The wind is just building, the trade winds, and you need to reduce drag as much as possible. When you have seaweed on the rudder and the foils it makes it really hard to hit our performance targets....

Suspected gunman in custody after 5 killed in Texas shooting: authorities

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Suspected gunman in custody after 5 killed in Texas shooting: authorities CLEVELAND, Texas (AP) — Authorities near Houston say they have caught a man suspected of killing five of his neighbors, including a 9-year-old boy, with an AR-style rifle after the family confronted him late at night about firing rounds in his yard.Francisco Oropeza, 38, was arrested Tuesday, four days after the shooting late Friday in the town of Cleveland, about 45 miles north of Houston, according to Montgomery County Sheriff Rand Henderson.Oropeza was arrested without incident, Henderson said. The sheriff would not say whether Oropeza was armed or how authorities figured out where he was.Additional details have yet to be released but the FBI has scheduled a press conference for 9 p.m. CT Tuesday. Authorities say the shooting happened Friday after Oropeza’s neighbors asked him to stop firing off rounds in his yard because a baby was trying to sleep. Woman IDs her daughter, 3 grandchildren among 7 Oklahoma bodies Neighbors frequently fire guns in the rural community to unwind. B...

Is it too early to plant flowers in Denver?

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 07:05:52 GMT

Is it too early to plant flowers in Denver? DENVER (KDVR) -- Now that we are in the month of May, people start getting excited to plant flowers and turn on their sprinklers. However, it is likely still too early to do that in Denver. The average date of our last freeze is May 5. Still, many years see freezing temperatures after that point. The earliest Denver has seen its last freeze was April 5 back in 1977 and 1981 and the latest last freeze was on June 8 in 2007. Full list of concerts at Red Rocks for May Although there are no freezing temperatures in the current seven day forecast for Denver, four out of the last five years had their last freeze after the average date. Two of those years happened in the last two weeks of the month. The statistics show that it is best to wait until at least Mother's Day (if not a week or two longer) before planting in Denver. Denver's average date of the last snowfall is April 28.