Author: Wolf Blitzer

NEW YORK (AP) — A judge has no choice but to grant the Justice Department’s unusual and divisive request to dismiss New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ corruption case, a court-appointed lawyer said Friday. But he recommended that prosecutors be barred from ever reviving the charges so they don’t hang over Adams “like the proverbial Sword of Damocles.”Paul Clement, who represented the federal government before the Supreme Court as President George W. Bush’s solicitor general, delivered the recommendation to Manhattan federal Judge Dale E. Ho in papers filed two weeks after Ho appointed him to provide neutral advice on the…

WAUKESHA, Wis. (AP) — A Wisconsin woman who nearly killed her classmate years ago to please horror character Slender Man can be released from a psychiatric hospital as planned, a judge decided Thursday, rejecting state health officials’ last-minute attempt to keep her committed.Morgan Geyser has spent the last seven years at the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren in January ordered her released after state and county health officials completed a community supervision and housing plan. State Department of Health Services officials were approaching a 60-day deadline to present the plan to the judge when they…

PHOENIX (AP) — From heartbreak and devastation to outrage, Emily Pike’s tragic death is stirring heavy emotions and spotlighting a crisis that has long plagued Native American communities, where a disproportionate number of people have been killed or have gone missing.In the case of the San Carlos Apache teenager, she disappeared from her group home in a Phoenix suburb in late January.Authorities posted her picture on social media, saying she was missing and had possibly run away. Sheriff’s deputies in a neighboring county reported finding Pike’s remains nearly a month later and more than 80 miles (129 kilometers) from where…

For more than a century, Fort Benning’s name honored a Confederate general who supported slavery. The military changed the name of the Army base in Georgia two years ago, but now the Trump administration is set on restoring the familiar one — this time for a different Benning.The new namesake is Fred Benning, a Nebraska native awarded the military’s second-highest honor for his battlefield courage as an 18-year-old corporal in 1918, near the end of World War I. The military noted that he later served as mayor of the small Nebraska town of Neligh, but it did not mention that…

BALTIMORE (AP) — Adnan Syed, whose case amassed a worldwide following of “Serial” podcast listeners, will remain free — even though his murder conviction still stands, a Baltimore judge ruled on Thursday.Judge Jennifer Schiffer agreed to reduce Syed’s sentence to time served under a relatively new state law that provides a pathway to release for people convicted of crimes committed when they were minors. The judge ruled that he will be on supervised probation for five years.“After considering the entire record, the court concludes that the Defendant is not a danger to the public and that the interests of justice…

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — When the clock strikes 6 Friday evening, a South Carolina man will walk into the death chamber, be strapped into a chair and have a target placed over his heart. He may utter last words before a hood is placed over his head, a curtain shielding him from spectators is swept aside and three volunteers armed with rifles simultaneously fire bullets designed to shatter on impact with his chest. Unless the governor or the U.S. Supreme Court grants him a last-minute reprieve, Brad Sigmon, 67, will be the first person to die by firing squad in…

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has said he wants his new education chief, Linda McMahon, to “put herself out of a job” and close the Education Department.McMahon was confirmed by the Senate on Monday, and an executive order to shutter the department could come as soon as this week. McMahon told employees it was the department’s “final mission” to eliminate bureaucratic bloat and turn over the agency’s authority to states.Eliminating the department altogether would be a cumbersome task, which likely would require an act of Congress. Already, the Trump administration has started overhauling much of the department’s work.Trump adviser…

WASHINGTON (AP) — Rural cancer patients may miss out on cutting-edge treatments in Utah. Therapies for intellectual disorders could stall in Maryland. Red states and blue states alike are poised to lose jobs in research labs and the local businesses serving them.Ripple effects of the Trump administration’s crackdown on U.S. biomedical research promise to reach every corner of America. It’s not just about scientists losing their jobs or damaging the local economy their work indirectly supports — scientists around the country say it’s about patient health.“Discoveries are going to be delayed, if they ever happen,” said Dr. Kimryn Rathmell, former…

A yearslong legal battle over the right to an emergency abortion in Idaho has been abruptly upended now that President Donald Trump has moved to drop the high-profile case. Under the Biden administration, the Justice Department had argued that emergency-room doctors treating pregnant women had to provide terminations if it was needed to save their lives or to avoid serious health consequences. Yet a little more than a month after taking over the White House, Trump’s decision to abandon the legal fight signals how the Republican administration plans on interpreting federal law designed to protect urgent care when up against…

Actor Gene Hackman died of heart disease likely a week after his wife died of hantavirus but may not have realized she was dead in their New Mexico home because he showed severe signs of Alzheimer’s disease, authorities said Friday.Hackman, 95, and his wife, Betsy Arakawa, 65, were found dead Feb. 26. Authorities previously said they did not suspect foul play, and immediate tests for carbon monoxide poisoning were negative.What we know about the deathsBoth were ruled to be from natural causes, chief medical examiner Dr. Heather Jarrell said. Hackman’s death was tied to heart disease with Alzheimer’s disease contributing.…