Category: Opinion

The husband of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pleaded guilty Tuesday to DUI charges related to a May crash in California’s wine country and was sentenced to five days in jail and three years of probation.

Paul Pelosi already served two days in jail and received conduct credit for two other days, Napa County Superior Court Judge Joseph Solga said. Mr. Pelosi will work eight hours in the court’s work program in lieu of the remaining day, Solga said during sentencing, which Mr. Pelosi did not attend.

Mr.Pelosi will be required to attend a three-month DUI class, and install an ignition interlock device in his vehicle, where the driver has to provide a breath sample before the engine will start. He will also have to pay nearly $7,000 in fines, the judge said.

Pelosi was arrested following a May 28 wreck in Napa County, after a DUI test showed he had a blood alcohol content of .082%, just over the legal limit.

Police responding to the crash, shortly after 10 p.m., said they found Pelosi in the driver’s seat of a 2021 Porsche Carrera and the other driver standing outside a sport utility vehicle, according to the complaint.

California Highway Patrol officers reported that Pelosi was “unsteady on his feet, his speech was slurred, and he had a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage.”

Pelosi offered to officers his driver’s license along with an “11-99 Foundation” card when asked for identification, the complaint says. The 11-99 Foundation supports CHP employees and their families.

Prosecutors filed the case as a misdemeanor because of injuries to the 48-year-old driver of the SUV. The other driver has not been named as the person has requested privacy.

In an interview with investigators from the district attorney’s office, the driver reported pain in his upper right arm, right shoulder, and neck the day after the crash. He said he also had headaches.

Pelosi was released on $5,000 bail after his arrest. Speaker Pelosi was in Rhode Island to deliver the commencement address at Brown University at the time. Her office has declined to comment.

A postal worker died after she was attacked by dogs in an Interlachen neighborhood on Sunday afternoon.

The 61-year-old woman was attacked by five dogs in the Interlachen Lake Estates neighborhood after her delivery truck broke down, according to the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office on Monday.

Witnesses told deputies they heard the woman screaming and saw her on the ground being attacked by the five dogs.

Neighbors tried to pull the dogs off of her and one fired a rifle into the ground to scare the dogs away.

When deputies arrived, the woman was on the ground bleeding and the dogs were inside a fence nearby in the 2000 block of Walker Drive.

The woman was taken to HCA Florida Putnam Hospital by ambulance and then flown to a trauma center in Gainesville in critical condition where she succumbed to her injuries.

The five dogs were taken into custody by Animal Control.

“Our hearts are with the victim and her family as they navigate through this tragic event,” Sheriff H.D. ‘Gator’ DeLoach said in the news release. “It is imperative that dog owners take responsibility in keeping their animals in a secured location for their safety and those around.”

The U.S. Postal Service released the following statement on the death of the postal worker:

“A postal family member lost her life in a dog bite attack. The U.S. Postal Service is deeply saddened at the loss of our employee. Our thoughts and prayers are with her family and her co-workers at this time.”

Former President Trump and his legal team filed a motion Monday evening seeking an independent review of the records seized by the FBI during its “unprecedented” and “unnecessary” raid on Mar-a-Lago earlier this month, claiming that the decision to search his private residence just months before the 2022 midterm elections “involved political calculations aimed at diminishing the leading voice in the Republican Party, President Trump.”

A motion filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida states Trump and his legal team are seeking an order assigning a special master to review the records taken during the search; stonewalling the government from further reviewing seized materials until a special master is appointed. This would require the Justice Department to hand over a more detailed receipt for property and force the government to return any item seized that was not included in the search warrant.

Trump explained the motion is “strongly asserting” his rights, “including under the Fourth Amendment of our Constitution, regarding the unnecessary, unwarranted, and unAmerican Break-In by dozens of FBI agents, and others, of my home, Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida.”

“They demanded that the security cameras be turned off, a request we rightfully denied. They prevented my attorneys from observing what was being taken in the raid, saying ‘absolutely not,’” said the former president. “They took documents covered by attorney-client and executive privilege, which is not allowed. They took my passports. They even brought a ‘safe cracker’ and successfully broke into my personal safe, which revealed…nothing!”

Trump said he is “now demanding that the Department of ‘Justice’ be instructed to immediately STOP the review of documents illegally seized from my home.”

“ALL documents have been previously declassified,” Trump continued. “We are demanding the appointment of a SPECIAL MASTER to oversee the handling of the materials taken in the raid. We are further demanding that the DOJ be forced to turn over a REAL, without ‘plants,’ inventory of my property that was taken and disclose where that property is now located.”

Trump let the FBI know that he and his legal team are “demanding that all items wrongfully taken from my home be IMMEDIATELY returned.”

Dozens of dogs in Michigan have reportedly been sickened and killed by a parvovirus-like illness, local animal shelters said.

Areas in northern and central Michigan have been hit by the outbreak. Canine parvovirus is a highly contagious disease that primarily affects elderly dogs and puppies under the age of two.

The disease spreads through feces. Tiredness, loss of appetite, and diarrhea are among the symptoms.

According to Melissa FitzGerald, Otsego County’s animal control and shelter director, more than 30 dogs have died from an unidentified illness that appears to be similar to parvovirus.

Surprisingly, despite showing disease symptoms, all of the dogs that died tested negative for parvovirus.

Both the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Michigan State University Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory are conducting investigations into the outbreak.

“What exactly is it, a strain of Parvo? Is it something else? Is it combined? There’s a lot of unanswered questions that they’re looking into at this point,” FitzGerald explained.

In the meantime, dog-owners all over Michigan are strongly encouraged to their dogs’ vaccinations up to date.

“Make sure they’re up to date on all their vaccinations, make sure they were properly vaccinated when you got them whether it was when they were puppies or when they were three,” FitzGerald suggested. “Keep your dogs close. Don’t let them sniff about – No common water dishes, anything like that.”

Texas police said they found a tiger cub inside the home of Dallas rapper Trapboy Freddy on Wednesday.

Dallas police officers were assisting the U.S. Marshals in serving a federal warrant at the rapper’s home when they discovered the tiger cub.

The Dallas Animal Services took the exotic animal to an undisclosed location.

Devarius Dontez Moore, 30, aka, rapper Trapboy Freddy, was taken into custody and charged with one count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

Moore has a lengthy criminal history, including involvment with organized criminal activity, assault, drug possession, and other crimes.

Moore was released from jail with an ankle monitoring device after pleading not guilty during a court hearing. His next court appearance is set for October 24.

Moore is banned from traveling outside the Northern and Eastern Districts of Texas without court approval.

The Dallas rapper has also been barred from housing “wild or dangerous animals in [his] residence” as part of a release agreement.

Queen Elizabeth’s former private chef, Darren McGrady, claimed that the reigning monarch has eaten jam sandwiches every day since she was a toddler. He revealed that the 96-year-old prefers a strawberry preserve made from fruits picked on the grounds of her Balmoral Castle in Scotland.

“The queen was served jam pennies in the nursery as a little girl,” said McGrady in a video from his YouTube channel. “She’s had them for afternoon tea ever since.”

The sandwiches, according to McGrady, are made from bread with a little butter and a spread of jam, then cut into circles the size of an old British penny.

As part of the genteel tradition of afternoon tea, McGrady, the queen’s chef for 11 years, revealed the monarch’s solution to a common dilemma for British scone lovers: jam first or cream first?

“The queen was always jam first,” he said. “The jam went on followed by that delicious, clotted cream.”

In addition to the preserve, Elizabeth has always favored fresh strawberries.

“The queen would eat strawberries three or four nights a week in Balmoral if they were in season,” he added.

However, anyone who tried to give her out-of-season berries should watch their necks. A January batch presented to the queen would mean “off with your head,” McGrady joked.

Three Arkansas law enforcement officers have been suspended while Arkansas State Police investigate a video posted on social media that allegedly shows them punching and kicking an arrested suspect.

One officer punches the man in the head and slams his head against cement in the video, while another officer appears to kick him in the lower body. The suspect is restrained by a third officer.

Two of the officers work for the Crawford County Sheriff’s Department, and the third works for the Mulberry Police Department.

Randall Worcester, 27, of Goose Creek, South Carolina, was identified as the suspect by Arkansas State Police. According to police, he was taken to a nearby hospital for examination and treatment before being released and imprisoned.

Worcester was charged with second-degree battery, resisting arrest, refusing to submit to arrest, possessing an instrument of crime, criminal trespass, criminal mischief, terroristic threatening, and assault in the second degree.

The arrest is shown in a video posted by Fox 16’s Mitchell McCoy. The video was apparently uploaded to TikTok first. It was later removed from the platform.

According to McCoy, the Crawford County Sheriff’s Office, a store clerk called police after Worcester allegedly spat in their face and made threats. When officers confronted Worcester, he allegedly pushed a deputy to the ground and punched the back of his head, resulting in the arrest seen in the video.

#BREAKING: Arkansas State Police launch investigation into this incident, captured on camera, outside a convenience store in Crawford County. ASP says two county deputies and a Mulberry police officer were involved. #ARNews

**WARNING: GRAPHIC VIDEO / No audio** pic.twitter.com/dYE0htfAsf

— Mitchell McCoy (@MitchellMcCoy) August 21, 2022

Crawford County Sheriff Jimmy Damante confirmed that the two deputies would be suspended while Arkansas State Police conducted an investigation.

The officer from Mulberry was also suspended.

Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson responded to the arrest on social media.

I have spoken with Col. Bill Bryant of the Arkansas State Police and the local arrest incident in Crawford County will be investigated pursuant to the video evidence and the request of the prosecuting attorney.

— Gov. Asa Hutchinson (@AsaHutchinson) August 22, 2022

Florida authorities are searching for a “violent and dangerous criminal” who bound his victim with duct tape, stabbed him, and injected him with fentanyl against his will in an attempted murder last week.

The incident occurred Monday evening in Tampa when two suspects conspired and attempted to kill a known associate who they believed would report their illegal activities to the police, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office said Friday.

The two suspects forced the victim into the bathroom of a home on the 5300 block of Garden Lane, where they bound and assaulted him.

The victim was able to break free following the attack and was rushed to Tampa General Hospital, where he remains in stable condition, the sheriff’s office said.

Authorities arrested, 44-year-old Ciriaco DelaCruz, he faces multiple charges including attempted first-degree murder with a weapon.

The second suspect is known only as “TC” at this time, according to detectives, who say the suspect is a transient believed to be near Hillsborough Avenue and North Habana Avenue.

Deputies described “TC” as a white Hispanic male, approximately 28 to 33 years old, 6 feet tall, with a thin build, short black hair, and a short black beard. The suspect is believed to have at least two tattoos, including a flame on his neck and a five-point star on one of his arms.

“This is a violent and dangerous criminal that needs to be found and arrested,” Sheriff Chad Chronister said in a written statement.

A Georgia couple is under arrest after police found a bag of drugs in their car lying next to a 2-year-old child’s McDonald’s happy meal.

Jonathan Loftis, 34, and Bethany Smith, 23, have been charged with felony trafficking of methamphetamine and misdemeanor marijuana possession after they were pulled over on Interstate 85 earlier this month by Coweta County deputies, who say that Loftis was driving erratically.

Deputies say there was a strong odor of marijuana coming from the car, and they could see Smith’s 2-year-old daughter in the backseat.

When deputies asked Smith to exit the car, they said she was having difficulty walking.

Officers said they found a bag containing enough meth and marijuana to charge them with drug trafficking lying on the floorboard.

The bag was next to the 2-year-old child’s McDonald’s Happy Meal, authorities say.

“Not only was there a 2-year-old found in the car, but the drugs were found in very close proximity to a Happy Meal box, which makes the whole thing worse,” Coweta County Investigator Toby Nix said about the incident.

Deputies said that the child was turned over to a relative.

An angry elephant used his tusk to rip his owner in half in the Thai province of Phang Nga after being forced to work under extremely hot weather conditions.

Officers from Takua Thung Police Station responded to a call about the elephant owner’s death at around 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday in the Tha Yu subdistrict.

Upon arrival, authorities were informed that 32-year-old Supachai Wongfaed had been ripped apart by Pom Pam, his 20-year-old male elephant.

Rescue workers, officers, and the village chief went to the gruesome scene where they found Wongfaed’s corpse split in half in a pool of blood with Pom Pam standing over it.

Phang Nga Provincial Livestock officers were called to sedate the animal so rescue workers could retrieve Wongfaed’s body.

During their preliminary investigation, Takua Thung Police officers learned that Pom Pam had been forced to carry wood in the rubber plantation prior to the attack. The officers suggested that the hot weather caused the elephant to “go crazy” and attack its owner.

Although the practice of using elephants to carry wood through forested areas was banned by Thailand’s government in 1989, the practice still occurs in some areas around the country.

Elephants are typically seen as good-natured animals, but they can potentially hurt humans if they feel unsafe or distressed. One elephant made headlines in June for killing a 70-year-old woman and then crashing her funeral to trample on her corpse.