Month: January 2023

Jurors have reached a guilty verdict in the federal death penalty case of a 34-year-old man who killed eight people on a Manhattan bike path five years ago. Sayfullo Saipov, an Uzbek national living in New Jersey at the time of the 2017 Halloween attack, was convicted Thursday by a federal court jury of murder and attempted murder in order to gain entry to ISIS, making him eligible for the death penalty. He was also convicted of providing material support to ISIS. Jurors will decide next month whether Saipov should face the death penalty.

Saipov drove a Home Depot rental pickup truck at least 10 blocks down the Hudson River Greenway bike path, hitting nearly a dozen pedestrians and bicyclists before crashing into a school bus. In addition to the eight people killed, nearly a dozen others were hurt, some seriously. Authorities described the incident as a “cowardly act of terrorism,” and witnesses said at the time that school bus crash appeared deliberate. Prosecutors said in closing arguments that Saipov allegedly showed no remorse. saying he was proud of what he did and asking to hang the flag of the Islamic State group in his Manhattan hospital room.

Saipov had pleaded not guilty to multiple charges, including murder in the aid of racketeering and providing and attempting to provide material support or resources to a foreign terrorist organization. The truck attack was the deadliest terror attack in New York since Sept. 11, 2001.

Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy announced Thursday that the five former Memphis police officers who were fired for their actions during the arrest earlier this month of Tyre Nichols – a 29-year-old Black man – were indicted on charges including murder and kidnapping.

The former officers, Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Justin Smith, Emmitt Martin, and Desmond Mills Jr., have each been charged with second-degree murder, aggravated assault, two charges of aggravated kidnapping, two charges of official misconduct and one charge of official oppression, Mulroy said, adding, ‘while each of the five individuals played a different role in the incident in question, the actions of all of them resulted in the death of Tyre Nichols, and they are all responsible.’ All five officers are in custody, Mulroy added. They were booked into the Shelby County Jail, and bond was set at $350,000 for Haley, 30, and Martin, 30, and $250,000 for Bean, 24, Mills, 32, and Smith, 28, according to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.

The criminal charges come about three weeks after Nichols was hospitalized after a traffic stop and “confrontation” with Memphis police that family attorneys have called a savage beating. Nichols died from his injuries on January 10, three days after the arrest.

President Joe Biden said in a statement that Nichols’ family “deserves a swift, full, and transparent investigation” into his death and and that the killing is a “painful reminder that we must do more to ensure that our criminal justice system lives up to the promise of fair and impartial justice, equal treatment, and dignity for all.”

President Biden announced Wednesday that the United States will send 31 M1 Abrams battle tanks to Ukraine, which will provide a major boost to Ukrainian firepower over the coming months. Flanked by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, the President said at the White House: “Today, I’m announcing that the United States will be sending 31 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, the equivalent of one Ukrainian battalion.”  The Pentagon said the security package is worth roughly $400 million. The delivery of the Abrams tanks will take several months, given the time needed to procure them and train Ukrainian troops on their use.

The move comes after Germany said it is providing 14 of its own Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine and allow Western partners to re-export their own. Biden noted that France, the U.K., Finland, the Netherlands and other nations are also sending key security assistance, and said that the United States’ move is part of a concerted effort by Western allies: “Today’s announcement builds on the hard work and commitment from countries around the world, led by the United States of America, to help Ukraine defend its sovereignty and its territorial integrity. That’s what this is about, helping Ukraine protect and defend Ukrainian land. It is not an offensive threat to Russia. There is no offensive threat to Russia. If Russian troops return to Russia … where they belong, this war would be over today.”

Biden said the M1 Abrams is the U.S. military’s main tank system and “the most capable tanks in the world.”  The Abrams tanks and other armored vehicles are key to helping Ukraine fight the Russians on open terrain, like that found in the mostly flat Donbas region, which has seen intense fighting between Ukraine and Russia-backed separatists since 2014.

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Social media giant Meta announced Wednesday that former President Donald Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts are being reinstated, over two years after he was suspended from the platforms over incendiary posts on the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.  Nick Clegg, president of global affairs at Meta (which owns Facebook and Instagram) said Trump’s accounts will be reinstated “in the coming weeks … with new guardrails in place to deter repeat offenses.” Clegg said on the company’s website that those guardrails will include “heightened penalties for repeat offenses — penalties which will apply to other public figures whose accounts are reinstated from suspensions related to civil unrest under our updated protocol. In the event that Mr. Trump posts further violating content, the content will be removed and he will be suspended for between one month and two years, depending on the severity of the violation.”

The move comes weeks after the timeframe Facebook gave itself to re-evaluate the 2021 decision. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy vowed to “rein in big tech power over our speech” after Facebook announced the duration of Trump’s suspension in 2021.  Additionally, Trump’s presidential campaign officially petitioned Meta to allow Trump back on to the platform earlier this month, writing in a letter dated Jan. 17th: “We believe that the ban on President Trump’s account on Facebook has dramatically distorted and inhibited the public discourse.”

Facebook announced in June 2021 that it was banning Trump from Facebook and Instagram until at least January 2023 for a “severe violation of our rules” stemming from his role in the Jan. 6 riot. The ban was initially slated to last 24 hours, but was extended until the end of his term by Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, who said the “risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great … therefore, we are extending the block we have placed on his Facebook and Instagram accounts indefinitely and for at least the next two weeks until the peaceful transition of power is complete.”  Trump was also permanently banned from Twitter at the time, but his account was reinstated on Nov. 19 by the platform’s new owner, Elon Musk.  About a year after leaving office, Trump launched his own social media site called ‘Truth Social.’  Trump’s reach on Truth Social is not nearly as large as it was on the other platforms. He has slightly more than 4.8 million followers on Truth Social, compared to nearly 88 million on Twitter and 34 million on Facebook.

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