A Coloradan who purchased an abandoned Douglas County storage unit found that it contained 1.7 million counterfeit fentanyl pills, plus several pounds of meth and fentanyl powder, law enforcement officials said Monday.

The discovery amounted to a record seizure of fentanyl in Colorado, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the sixth-largest in U.S. history.

The unit was purchased at auction after its previous renter lapsed on its payments.

The new owner then called law enforcement, including the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, after opening it to discover the pills. The unit also contained 12 kilograms of fentanyl powder and two and a half pounds of methamphetamine. Law enforcement subsequently learned that the unit’s previous owner had been arrested by the DEA in April, which is why the unit’s rent went unpaid.

Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that’s at least 50 times more powerful than morphine. While it has legitimate medical uses, illicitly created fentanyl has become the dominant opioid on the U.S. drug market, and it fueled an overdose crisis that surged in Colorado and across the rest of the United States. The street version of the drug is primarily pressed into pill form, typically to mimic the look of other legitimate opioid pills.

“I want to thank the citizen who reported this discovery, the storage facility staff for their cooperation, and the deputies who responded quickly and professionally,” said Douglas County Sheriff Darren Weekly said in a statement. “Let me send a strong and unmistakable message: fentanyl and illegal narcotics will not be tolerated in Douglas County.”

The powder seized in the operation was enough to create another six million pills, the DEA said.

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Months after federal officials demanded voter data from Colorado and several other states, Secretary of State Jena Griswold and several peers are trying to determine what exactly the Trump administration is doing with the data.

“As Secretaries of State and chief election officials of our respective states, we write to express our immense concern with recent reporting that the Department of Justice has shared voter data with the Department of Homeland Security, and to seek clarity on whether DOJ and DHS actively misled election officials regarding the uses of voter data,” Griswold and nine other secretaries of state wrote in a letter sent Tuesday morning.

It was addressed to Pam Bondi, the U.S. attorney general, and Kristi Noem, the Homeland Security secretary.

Bondi’s Justice Department sent letters to Colorado and other states in the spring asking for voter rolls and, in some cases, it has sought more detailed data, including partial social security numbers and birth dates.

The state officials’ new letter asks Bondi and Noem whether the voter rolls were shared with Noem’s department, which has served as the tip of the spear in the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, or any others. The secretaries of state who signed on are all Democrats.

Colorado provided some of the information requested by the Justice Department as required by law, Griswold said in an interview Monday. Other states, particularly those tasked with turning over more extensive voter data, refused; six of them have since been sued by the federal government.

Griswold said federal officials had provided shifting answers on whether the Homeland Security Department had been given access to the data that had been turned over to the DOJ, including from Colorado.

Heather Honey, the agency’s deputy assistant secretary for election integrity, told the secretaries of state in September that DHS hadn’t received or asked for the data, according to the secretaries’ letter. But the next day, the agency confirmed to Stateline that it was collaborating with the Justice Department to “scrub aliens from voter rolls.”

Six weeks later, on Halloween, the agency posted an administrative update indicating it was expanding a tool — used previously to ensure federal benefits don’t go to immigrants without proper legal status — to check voting rolls.

“We would like the attorney general and the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security to explain what they’re doing collecting mass voter data on American voters,” Griswold said. “It also looks like the DOJ or DHS misled secretaries of state.”

Attempts to reach both federal departments for comment Tuesday were not successful.

Griswold said some of her staff members also had a brief conversation with officials from the Justice Department’s criminal division earlier this summer. The federal officials asked if Colorado election officials had a way to report election crimes to the state attorney general, Griswold’s office said. State officials replied that they did, and the conversation ended.

The state officials request a response from Bondi and Noem by Dec. 1.

In addition to Colorado, the secretaries of state from California, Minnesota, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Maine, Vermont, Oregon and Washington also signed the letter.

Exiled by the elite after his conviction for sexually soliciting a teenage girl and failing to rehabilitate his image as a sexual predator, an embittered Jeffrey Epstein in 2011 believed his old friend Donald Trump had escaped scrutiny.

“I want you to realize that that dog that hasn’t barked is trump,” Epstein wrote to his longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell that April, noting Trump had “spent hours at my house” with Virginia Giuffre, one of the most prominent women to speak out about being abused by the financier, who died by suicide in April.

The correspondence, obtained from Epstein’s estate by the House Oversight Committee, was included among more than 20,000 documents released this week that brought the men’s relationship history into greater focus. Scores of emails in the cache chart Epstein’s obsession with Trump as he spiraled into scandal and his Palm Beach neighbor ascended to the presidency.

Epstein was at a low point when he sent the missive to Maxwell after serving jail time in Florida for soliciting a 16-year-old. Two months earlier, a Manhattan judge had rejected a bid to downgrade his sex offender status, despite the well-connected wealth manager having then-District Attorney Cyrus Vance, Jr., in his corner.

Giuffre had publicly spoken out about her allegations that Epstein trafficked her to powerful men for sex, sharing with the Daily Mail a now-infamous photograph of her with his friend Prince Andrew and Maxwell as apparent evidence.

Epstein’s 2011 email to Maxwell marveled that Trump, then hosting “The Apprentice” and floating a run for president had “never once been mentioned.”

“I have been thinking about that…,” Maxwell replied.

Democrats released Epstein’s 2011 message to Maxwell among a set of emails early Wednesday that appeared to suggest the president knew about the financier’s depraved lifestyle and its young victims.

Claiming that their colleagues across the aisle had engaged in a cherry-picking mission, House Republicans later published thousands of Epstein’s digital files online, revealing Giuffre’s identity in the 2011 message, which the Democrats had previously redacted. Many came to the president’s defense, arguing that it proved nothing. Giuffre, they noted, had denied that Trump had abused her or that she’d seen him abuse others in the years before her death.

The president has long denied engaging in any abuse and claimed he stopped talking to Epstein — whom he’d counted as a friend since the 1980s — in the early 2000s over a dispute related to real estate.

On Friday, following a barrage of reporting about the emails, Trump took to his social media site Truth Social to slam what he calls the “EPSTEIN HOAX.” He demanded the Justice Department investigate Epstein’s “involvement and relationship with Bill Clinton, Larry Summers, Reid Hoffman, J.P. Morgan, Chase, and many other people and institutions, to determine what was going on with them, and him.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi said Jay Clayton, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, would head the probe.

Dirt on Trump

The trove of Epstein emails released this week, massive in volume and spanning 2011 to 2019, includes 1,625 references to Trump, although there is no direct communication between the two men.

Made clear throughout is that — whether or not he did — Epstein maintained he had dirt on Trump.

Messaging ahead of a presidential debate in December 2015, Epstein asked his quasi-consultant, Trump biographer Michael Wolff, with whom he spoke regularly, how Trump might best answer a potential question about their relationship.

“I think you should let him hang himself. If he says he hasn’t been on the plane or to the house, then that gives you a valuable PR and political currency. You can hang him in a way that potentially generates a positive benefit for you, or, if it really looks like he could win, you could save him, generating a debt,” Wolff responded.

“Of course, it is possible that, when asked, he’ll say Jeffrey is a great guy and has gotten a raw deal and is a victim of political correctness, which is to be outlawed in a Trump regime.”

Wolff suggested it could be time to pull the trigger less than two weeks before Trump won the presidency in 2016, following the release of “Filthy Rich,” a book about Epstein’s perversions.

“There’s an opportunity to come forward this week and talk about Trump in such a way that could garner you great sympathy and help finish him. Interested?” Wolff wrote on Oct. 29. It’s not clear from the release whether Epstein responded.

The batch of emails released this week, made searchable online by the Courier Newsroom, is separate from the federal government’s investigative records — the so-called “Epstein files” — whose release the House of Representatives is set to vote on next week.

The trove sheds light on Epstein’s state of mind in the years before his death, and how closely he followed the president’s whereabouts, policy moves, and his own set of scandals. In countless typo-laden emails, the Brooklyn-born financier situated himself as a POTUS expert in conversations with journalists and various confidants, spoke with members of Trump’s inner circle, and sought to shape U.S. policy.

In June 2018, he asked former Norwegian Prime Minister Thorbjørn Jagland to convey a message to Russian President Vladimir Putin about his willingness to provide insight on Trump.

His correspondence with Wolff is featured throughout the records, and Epstein also frequently spoke about Trump with former New York Times reporter Landon Thomas Jr., joking about sending him a photo of Trump with girls in bikinis in his kitchen in December 2015.

Epstein communicated regularly with the often foul-mouthed former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, whom he told Trump was “borderline insane,” the emails show.

He also chatted often with Trump adviser Steve Bannon, who in August 2018 told the financier they had to discuss “a crazed jihad against u,” and that “somebody big has u in the gunsights.”

After Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, pleaded guilty to breaking campaign finance laws for then-President Trump in the now-notorious Stormy Daniels hush money scheme in 2018, Epstein alluded to his insider’s perspective in correspondence with Kathy Ruemmler, a former Goldman Sachs executive and Obama aide, with whom the cache shows he frequently chatted.

“You see, i know how dirty donald is,” the financier quipped. “my guess is that non-lawyers ny biz people have no idea. what it means to have your fixer flip.”

“The real villain”

That December, The Miami Herald published the most complete account yet of allegations Epstein had serially exploited vulnerable teenage girls. The piece laid out how Epstein had effectively gotten off with a slap on the wrist in his 2008 plea deal due to former U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta, who Trump had tapped as his Labor Secretary.

Epstein strategized with Wolff, who believed “directly debunking” the claims wasn’t the right move.

“That’s going against virtue itself,” Wolff wrote. “What I’d like to do is game out everything, creating a structure for thinking this through. Definitely not a piecemeal response. Figure out where we want to be and where we can reasonably get and work backwards.”

Epstein replied, “im thinking what would trump do.”

“Claims are ludicrous and self-serving, media is working with the other side’s lawyers, this is all about Donald Trump,” Wolff responded.

“…all about Donald Trump, the real villain,” Epstein said.

Less than two months later, Epstein explicitly implicated Trump, mentioning Mar-a-Lago to Wolff in a partially redacted email on January 31, 2019, and writing, “trump said he asked me to resign, never a member ever. . of course he knew about the girls as he asked ghislaine to stop.”

Epstein was apparently still focused on the president the following June, when an email outlining some of Trump’s potentially questionable financial dealings landed in his inbox. Epstein’s accountant Richard Kahn sent over “interesting findings” from financial disclosures, or what Kahn called “trumps 100 pages of nonsense.”

Within eight weeks, Epstein was dead. Officials said he’d killed himself in his lower Manhattan jail cell a month after his arrest on sweeping sex trafficking charges.

Maxwell, his longtime partner in crime, was indicted a year later for aiding the abuse for at least a decade in the 1990s and convicted at trial in December 2021. This summer, she was transferred to a cushy prison facility in Bryan, Texas, after meeting with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, Trump’s former personal lawyer, for a highly unusual sit-down.

Transcripts of the meeting showed that Epstein’s longtime right-hand revealed little new information but notably praised the president, whom she is reportedly now planning to ask for a pardon.

President Trump announced he’s withdrawing his support of Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, calling his former ally a “ranting lunatic” and a “disgrace to our great Republican party” for publicly blasting his handling of various issues, including the Epstein files.

In a wild post shared on his social media platform Friday night, Trump wrote that despite accomplishing what he called “record achievements for our country” and turning the U.S. into the world’s “hottest” nation, all that “Wacky Marjorie” does is “complain, complain, complain.”

He said he would endorse a challenger against Greene “if the right person runs” in next year’s midterm elections, claiming the people of her district are similarly “fed up with her and her antics.”

The political breakup appears to be the culmination of a dispute that had been simmering for at least six months, which the president suggested began when he discouraged Greene from running for Senate or governor.

She also “told many people that she is upset” that Trump doesn’t “return her phone calls anymore,” the president said.

“With 219 congressmen/women, 53 U.S. senators, 24 Cabinet members, almost 200 countries, and an otherwise normal life to lead, I can’t take a ranting lunatic’s call every day,” Trump wrote on Truth Social around 8:30 p.m. Friday.

President Trump just attacked me and lied about me. I haven’t called him at all, but I did send these text messages today. Apparently this is what sent him over the edge.

The Epstein files.

And of course he’s coming after me hard to make an example to scare all the other… pic.twitter.com/EcUzaohZZs

— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (@RepMTG) November 15, 2025

Less than an hour later, the polarizing Georgia lawmaker — and former MAGA powerhouse — fired back at Trump’s claims in a lengthy post on X, sharing a screenshot of a text message she said “sent him over the edge.”

“President Trump just attacked me and lied about me. I haven’t called him at all, but I did send these text messages today,” she wrote, posting a message in which she tells the president about the importance of “releasing the Epstein files.”

Greene was one of a handful of Republicans to sign on with House Democrats to force a vote over releasing the files related to the sex trafficking investigation into the disgraced late financier.

“It’s astonishing really how hard he’s fighting to stop the Epstein files from coming out — that he actually goes to this level,” Greene continued.

Despite being a longtime and ardent supporter of the president and the MAGA agenda, Greene said she doesn’t “worship or serve Donald Trump.”

....

Early Saturday morning, Trump doubled down on his attack, slamming “Marjorie ‘Traitor’ Greene” as someone who has “betrayed the entire Republican party when she turned left.”

A few hours later, Greene suggested the exchange is making her fear for her life.

“I am now being contacted by private security firms with warnings for my safety as a hot bed of threats against me are being fueled and egged on by the most powerful man in the world,” she wrote on X. “The man I supported and helped get elected.”

“As a Republican, who overwhelmingly votes for President Trump‘s bills and agenda, his aggression against me, which also fuels the venomous nature of his radical internet trolls (many of whom are paid), this is completely shocking to everyone,” wrote Greene, who in 2019 famously stalked and confronted Parkland school shooting survivor David Hogg with claims that his gun control activism was being funded by Democrats.

“The political industrial complex and the toxic violent nature of American politics must end,” she said. “Our country is worth saving and it can only be done if we pull together and save ourselves.”

A federal judge Wednesday ordered the release of video taken during an hourslong deposition given last week by U.S. Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino.

The Chicago Tribune and Chicago Public Media petitioned U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis to release the recordings, which were filed under seal as part of a lawsuit led by the Chicago Headline Club, a nonprofit journalism advocacy organization, and a consortium of other media groups. The journalism organizations allege federal immigration enforcement officials have systematically violated the constitutional rights of protesters and reporters during President Donald Trump’s mass deportation mission, which began in early September and shows no sign of slowing down.

Ellis, who issued a temporary restraining order last month, announced Thursday that she will put longer-term restrictions on federal agents’ use of chemical agents on crowds and provide enhanced protections for protesters and members of the media.

The released videos can be seen in their entirety on the Tribune’s YouTube channel, but here are some of the highlights:

U.S. Customs and Border Patrol in Chicago

Bovino, who is leading Trump’s immigration enforcement effort in the Chicago area, testified that he is leading roughly 220 U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents as part of the so-called Operation Midway Blitz. He said he reports directly to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.

‘More than exemplary’

Asked by veteran Chicago civil rights attorney Locke Bowman if he stood by remarks he made to CBS that the use of force at the Broadview ICE facility has been “exemplary,” Bovino at first surprised everyone by saying, “No.”

“The uses of force have been more than exemplary,” Bovino clarified.

In placing longer-term restrictions Thursday, Ellis disagreed.

“The use of force shocks the conscience,” she said.

‘Violent rioters’

During the deposition, Bovino said he had not witnessed his agents using tear gas or pepper-spray balls against protesters in Broadview, but chemical agents were used against “violent rioters” and “assaultive subjects.”

Definition of a protester

When asked to define “protester,”  Bovino said it’s a person “exercising their constitutional rights to speak — to speak their opinion, to speak their mind in a peaceful fashion … in accordance with laws, rules and with the Constitution.”

“We get protesters on both sides of the issue. Sometimes they protest against, say, a Title 8 immigration enforcement mission, tell us they don’t like it, we shouldn’t be there, we need to go home, use very foul language oftentimes,” he said. “And then there’s also protesters on the other side of the issue that say ‘hey, you should be there. We’re glad you’re here. Continue to be here.’ So, I look at those as peaceful individuals exercising their right to, one, be there and, two, speak their mind. It’s freedom of assembly, freedom of speech.”

Bovino then rattled off a list of public actions he said his agents have experienced, actions he uses to draw a distinction between protesters and “violent rioters” or “assaultive subjects”: “Removing masks, kicking agents, grabbing agents’ groins, assisting and abetting prisoners from escaping, shooting fireworks, knifing and slashing tires with weapons, throwing rocks through windows of vehicles to hurt agents and/or detainees.”

‘Not a reportable use of force’

On the video, Bovino is asked about an Oct. 3 arrest he made involving a man protesting outside the Broadview facility. According to the complaint, Bovino ordered a man to move down the street after the man told him, “you love to be on television.” As the man started to move, the complaint states, Bovino “stepped across a barrier,” tackled the man and arrested him.

During the Nov. 4 deposition, Bovino said the arrest “was not a reportable use of force. I placed him under arrest. I didn’t tackle him.”

More about Bovino’s interaction with the protester

Bovino was asked about an encounter with the man, Scott Blackburn, who was protesting at Broadview. The lawyer and Bovino disagreed over whether he used force when he tackled the protester.

“He doesn’t like the fact that you are instructing him to move down,” the lawyer said to Bovino.

Bovino objected to the lawyer’s characterization, saying instead, “That individual is failing to follow instructions to vacate the area.”

The video shows Bovino tackling the protester. But Bovino characterized it a different way.

“I’m imploring Mr. Blackburn, or whoever that individual was, to comply with leaving the area and to comply with instructions,” Bovino said.

Asked if he was “making physical contact,” Bovino said he was. But he denied that it was a use of force, saying it was different than using deadly force or “open-hand strikes.”

But he disputed that he used force against the protester.

“The use of force was against me,” Bovino said.

The judge, however, said she did not believe Bovino’s testimony about force that his agents and he personally inflicted in incidents across the Chicago area.

“In one of the videos, Bovino obviously attacks and tackles the declarant, Mr. Blackburn, to the ground,” Ellis said. “But Mr. Bovino, despite watching this video (in his deposition) says that he never used force.”

Pastor struck in the head

In video taken at a protest outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, the Rev. David Black walks toward the building and appears to talk with someone on the roof. A fellow demonstrator offers Black a bullhorn, which the Presbyterian pastor appears to ignore.

Seconds later, Black begins dodging pepper-spray projectiles fired at him, as another protester lifts his shirt and dances a jig as if daring someone to shoot at him. Black initially takes a few steps back, then moves forward with his arms outstretched, looking up toward the building and talking.

On the video, pepper-spray balls can be seen striking the ground in front of Black. He is then struck in the right arm by one. He appears to try and turn away before he is struck again, this time in the head.

Other protesters quickly gather around him as he kneels or falls to the ground, the recording shows. Bystanders lift him and help spirit him away.

Struck again

On the video, Black returns to sidewalk in front of the detention center with a megaphone in hand. As he appears to speak to someone on the roof, pepper-spray balls are fired in his direction.

A protester appears to try to shield him with a sign, but it doesn’t work. Black is hit in the head again.

Bovino on the incident with Pastor Black

Bovino was asked about Rev. David Black, a Presbyterian pastor who was shot in the head by a federal agent. He declined to answer the question, which was framed as a hypothetical, saying he was “unable to comment on that use of force.”

Pressed further, Bovino said: “I don’t know what the use of force was here. I can’t make a judgment either way because I don’t know.”

The Louvre had an alarmingly weak password for its security surveillance system when it was hit by a group thieves, who made off with more than $100 million in jewels.

The brazen daylight heist took place on Oct. 18, triggering  a massive investigation that has since revealed the suspects used power tools to bust through the second-floor window of the Apollo Gallery around 9 a.m. The entire operation took under seven minutes, and none of the robbers were at anytime captured by the lone security camera outside the gallery.

During testimony before a French Senate committee last month, Laurence des Cars, the president and director of the Louvre, said the camera had been facing west and did not cover the window the thieves used to gain access to Paris’ most popular museum.

“The security system, as installed in the Apollo Gallery, worked perfectly,” he said, per ABC News. “The question that arises is how to adapt this system to a new type of attack and modus operandi that we could not have foreseen.”

Despite touting its functionality, France’s National Cybersecurity Agency was able to access a server managing the museum’s video surveillance by cracking its ridiculously simple password: “LOUVRE,” according to confidential documents obtained by Libération. The eponymous password was initially uncovered by the agency during an audit in 2014. Additional audits revealed “serious shortcomings” in the museum’s security systems, including the use of 20-year-old software.

So far, seven people have been arrested in connection with the heist, two of whom have partially admitted their involvement.

An investigation into the matter is ongoing, and the stolen jewels remain missing weeks later.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Multiple people who had been allegedly plotting a violent attack over the Halloween weekend were arrested Friday morning in Michigan, FBI Director Kash Patel said in a social media post.

Patel didn’t release further information about the arrests, but said more information would be coming.

Dearborn Police said in a social media post that the department was made aware that the FBI conducted operations in the city on Friday and assured residents that there is no threat to the community.

By ALANNA DURKIN RICHER and MICHAEL KUNZELMAN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department has stripped references to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack from court papers and punished two federal prosecutors who filed the document seeking prison time at sentencing Thursday for a man arrested with guns and ammunition near former President Barack Obama’s home.

The prosecutors from the U.S. attorney’s office in the District of Columbia were locked out of their government devices and told they were being put on leave Wednesday morning shortly after they filed a sentencing memorandum describing the crowd of President Donald Trump supporters who attacked the Capitol as a “mob of rioters,” according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss personnel issues.

Later Wednesday, the Justice Department replaced the court filing with an updated version that stripped references to the Jan. 6 riot. The new filing also no longer included a reference to the fact that Trump posted on social media what he claimed was Obama’s address on the same day that the defendant, Taylor Taranto, was arrested in the former president’s neighborhood.

It’s the latest move by the Justice Department to discipline attorneys tied to the massive Jan. 6 prosecution and represents an extraordinary effort by the government to erase the history of the riot that left more than 100 police officers injured.

Trump himself for years has worked to downplay the violence and paint as victims the rioters who stormed the Capitol and sent lawmakers running into hiding as they met to certify Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory. Since Trump’s sweeping Jan. 6 pardons in January, his administration has fired or demoted numerous attorneys involved in the largest investigation in Justice Department history.

The Justice Department declined to comment on Thursday.

Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, said her office would not comment on personnel decisions, but added: “We have and will continue to vigorously pursue justice against those who commit or threaten violence without regard to the political party of the offender or the target.”

Prosecutors are seeking more than two years in prison for Taranto when he is sentenced Thursday in federal court in Washington. He was convicted in May for illegally possessing two guns and roughly 500 rounds of ammunition in Obama’s neighborhood in June 2023. U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, who was nominated to the bench by Trump, also convicted Taranto of recording himself making a hoax threat to bomb a government building in Maryland.

The defense argued at trial that the video showed Taranto was merely joking in an “avant-garde” manner, and that he believes he is a “journalist and, to some extent, a comedian.”

Taranto, a Navy veteran from Pasco, Washington, was separately charged with four misdemeanors related to the Capitol attack before Trump’s sweeping clemency order erased his case. He was captured on video at the entrance of the Speaker’s Lobby in the House around the time that a rioter, Ashli Babbitt, was fatally shot by an officer as she tried to climb through the broken window of a barricaded door.

The prosecutors overseeing Taranto’s case were not told why they were being put on leave, the person familiar with the matter said. Two new prosecutors, including the head of the criminal division for the office, entered the case and submitted the new brief on Wednesday. ABC News first reported that the prosecutors, Samuel White and Carlos Valdivia, had been placed on leave.

Trump’s pardons in January released from prison people caught on camera viciously attacking police as well as leaders of far-right extremist groups convicted of orchestrating violent plots to stop the peaceful transfer of power after his 2020 election loss. Those pardoned include more than 250 people who were convicted of assault charges, some having attacked police with makeshift weapons such as flagpoles, a hockey stick and a crutch.

In January, then-acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove ordered the firings of about two dozen prosecutors who had been hired for temporary assignments to support the Jan. 6 cases, but were moved into permanent roles after Trump’s presidential win in November.

And in June, the department fired two attorneys who worked as supervisors overseeing the Jan. 6 prosecutions in the U.S. attorney’s office in the District of Columbia, as well as a line attorney who prosecuted cases stemming from the Capitol attack.

There’s a new park on the riverfront in downtown Detroit, and you can’t miss it. 

The 22-acre Ralph C Wilson, Jr. Centennial Park is located along Detroit’s riverfront between the Ambassador Bridge and the Renaissance Center. It features a whimsical playground and splash pad, two covered basketball courts, hundreds of newly-planted trees and a water garden.

The park’s opening is the result of 8 years of outreach, planning and design. The seed funding was provided by the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation and the project was led by the Detroit Riverfront Conservancy.

Cassie Brenske, spokesperson for the Detroit Riverfront Conservancy, told WDET’s Alex McLenon that a community advisory team of 22 Detroit residents were part of the planning process early on.

Listen: Residents’ involvement in new park design

“We took them across the country to New York, Philadelphia and Chicago, and gave them the opportunity to see what other parks across the country looked like and what we might want to see here in Detroit.”

Jim Boyle, Vice President of Programs and Strategy at the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation told The Metro the new park connects neighborhoods that border downtown via the Joe Louis Greenway and the Riverwalk.

“It’s a regional asset that’s an economic driver for talent, and a major place where people want to be. But, it’s also a neighborhood amenity that makes living in those neighborhoods that much better.”

The Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation Centennial Park is now open to the public on Detroit’s Riverfront.

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NEW YORK (AP) — The stunning indictment that led to the arrest of more than 30 people, including Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and other NBA figures, on charges of illegal sports betting has drawn new scrutiny of the booming business of professional sports gambling across the U.S.

Since widespread legalization, the multibillion-dollar industry has made it easy to place wagers on everything from the outcome of games to that of a single play with just a few taps of a cellphone. It’s just about impossible to go to a basketball, football, baseball or other pro game today — or watch a matchup on TV — without seeing ads for sports betting.

Fans can place wagers from their stadium seats, while “Bet” tickers scroll on TV sports broadcasts. Star athletes are frequently at the center of ads promoting it all.

Regulating sports wagering has proven to be a challenge — and experts warn about the ramifications for gamblers who typically lose money. Professional leagues’ own role in promoting gambling has raised eyebrows.

Sports betting also faces criticism for opening the door to addictive gambling.

“The fact that it’s normalized, the advertising is aggressive, it’s available 24/7, the micro bets — all of this is adding up to tremendous increase in usage across individuals,”  Wayne Taylor, a professor of marketing at Southern Methodist University, told the Associated Press, citing algorithms and other incentives betting platforms use to increase engagement.

Isaac Rose-Berman, whose research focuses on sports betting as a fellow at the American Institute for Boys and Men, noted that platforms make the most off of returning “biggest losers.” Recent research suggests that young men in low-income communities are particularly affected by financial consequences tied to sports gambling.

“Upwards of 90% of sports bettors are not really going to experience significant negative impacts — but it’s really concentrated among those big losers and it’s going to be devastating for them,” he said.

So, how do you know if you have a gambling problem?

If you’re hiding the fact that you gamble to your friends and family, do it when you’re stressed and experience mood changes, you may be showing warning signs of a gambling addiction. The Associated Press explains in the video below:

By Alex Brown, Stateline.org

For years, Western leaders have debated the creation of a regional energy market: a coordinated grid to pool solar power in Arizona, wind in Wyoming, hydro in Washington and battery storage in California.

The shared resources would meet the demands of 11 different states, bolstering utilities’ local power plants with surplus energy from across the region.

With the passage of a landmark new law in California, that market is finally on its way to becoming a reality. Proponents say it has the potential to lower energy costs, make the grid more resilient and speed up the deployment of clean energy.

But the market’s success, experts agree, depends heavily on which states and utilities decide to opt in. As energy issues have become increasingly politicized, it’s uncertain whether Western leaders can buy into a common vision for meeting the region’s power needs.

“As we move toward weather-dependent renewables to run our grid, we’ve got to have a grid that is bigger than a weather pattern,” said California Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris, a Democrat who sponsored the legislation aimed at establishing the new market. “A Western energy market is critical.”

The California measure earned bipartisan support, and leaders in conservative and liberal states alike have long touted the benefits of a region-wide market.

But some skeptics worry about merging the power systems of states with varying climate goals. And some fear the new market could give federal regulators appointed by President Donald Trump an opening to interfere and mandate more fossil fuel-powered plants that can be turned on regardless of the weather.

A bigger market

Across the 11 Western states that straddle or sit west of the Rocky Mountains, 37 separate private and public utilities operate portions of the grid.

This fragmented structure differs from the grid systems in Eastern and Midwestern states, where regional transmission organizations, or RTOs, coordinate and plan for energy needs across vast swaths of the country.

Backers of a Western market argue that a region-wide approach would be much more efficient.

Under the current system, each utility is required by state public utility commissions to build enough power to meet peak energy demands. That could mean building gas plants that only turn on a few times a year during extreme heat waves.

As part of a West-wide market, utilities could manage those high-demand events by importing power from other parts of the region that are generating surplus electricity. Such agreements could also prevent the periodic shutdowns of wind and solar farms when they produce more energy than local utilities can use.

“We could be drawing on the solar resources from the Southwest during the day, and then in the evening the wind resources in Montana and Wyoming are a great benefit,” said Austin Scharff, senior energy policy specialist with the Washington State Department of Commerce. “We have a lot of hydro resources, and we can help make sure the regional grid stays balanced when those are needed.”

Some industry leaders say such trading would allow states to pull in cheap electricity from elsewhere, rather than building expensive new power plants.

“When you have this bigger market, not everybody has to build to their peak in the same way,” said Leah Rubin Shen, managing director with Advanced Energy United, an industry group focused on energy and transportation. “Everybody’s able to share.”

Western states do trade electricity on a bilateral basis between individual utilities. Utilities spanning much of the West also transact through a real-time market that allows them to address pressing short-term demand issues. Some are poised to join a new day-ahead market that will conduct planning based on daily demand and production forecasts.

But some lawmakers and officials believe the region needs a larger vision that goes beyond moment-by-moment needs, a market that can plan interstate transmission lines and energy projects to serve the whole region in the decades to come.

“We’re facing really rapidly growing energy demand,” said Nevada Assemblymember Howard Watts, a Democrat. “The best way for us to meet that is to effectively move energy all across the Western U.S. The only way we can do that is through an RTO.”

Watts sponsored a bill, enacted in 2021, that requires Nevada to join an RTO by 2030. Colorado also passed a law that year with a 2030 deadline for utilities to join an RTO.

“Any future is better than our status quo, which is 37 separate grids in the West,” said Chris Hansen, a former Democratic senator who sponsored the Colorado legislation. “We can lower costs and provide greater reliability if we’re sharing resources.”

Hansen now serves as CEO of La Plata Electric Association, an electric cooperative in southwestern Colorado.

A new market

The push for a West-wide market had always faced one major hurdle: Any market would likely include the massive geographical footprint and energy supply managed by the California Independent System Operator, or CAISO. As the West’s largest grid operator, CAISO manages the flow of electricity across most of the Golden State. It’s governed by a five-member board appointed by California’s governor, and other states were unlikely to sign up for a market in which they have no representation.

The law passed by California legislators last month allows for a new organization with independent governance from across the region to oversee Western energy markets.

“This legislation is a key reset and has been the largest sticking point in building a regional market,” said Amanda Ormond, managing director of the Western Grid Group, which advocates for a more efficient grid. “This is a primary concern of a lot of folks that has now been solved.”

The law sets in motion a yearslong process that will task regional leaders with establishing the organization’s governance and navigating a series of regulatory procedures. The new market could be in place by 2028.

State leaders across the West say the California law is a long-awaited development.

“You get this really good benefit from being able to optimize across a larger footprint than an individual utility can,” said Tim Kowalchik, research director with the Utah Office of Energy Development. “Those resources can play really well together.”

Utah led a study in 2021, collaborating with other Western states, exploring the potential for energy markets in the region. State officials say the research has helped drive the current effort.

“It was fascinating how substantial the benefits were,” said Letha Tawney, chair of the Oregon Public Utility Commission. “The interdependence of the West started to become much more apparent, and it really changed the conversation.”

The study looked at a variety of market options and found that an RTO would have significant benefits, lowering costs for electricity customers and promoting clean energy. Based on the study’s projections, the market would produce roughly $2 billion in gross benefits per year, largely by saving utilities from building extra capacity.

Another study in 2022, conducted by a pair of consulting firms, found that an RTO would create as many as 657,000 permanent jobs and bolster the region’s economy.

While Western leaders say the potential benefits are massive, no states outside of Nevada and Colorado have committed to joining a regional RTO. State leaders say they’ll be watching carefully to see what emerges from the new California law. While the decision on joining the market will largely be left to individual utilities, state regulators can play a major role by directing them to conduct an economic analysis of such a move.

State sovereignty

The push for a regional market has also faced opposition from skeptics who fear it undermines states’ power to set their own energy and climate goals. Some point to Eastern governors’ frustration with PJM Interconnection, the RTO that manages the grid across a swath of the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic.

“It’s very dangerous,” said Jamie Court, president of Consumer Watchdog, a California-based nonprofit advocacy group. “We’re giving up control of our sovereignty. Once a state’s in, it’s not the state that has the control.”

Some experts fear that states with significant coal or gas industries may be hesitant to join a market that could incentivize their utilities to import cheap solar power from elsewhere. On the flip side, some climate advocates in California are wary of plugging into a market that could support coal power from out of state.

“Some states are parochial-minded: ‘This is a California thing, and we don’t want anything to do with California,’” said Vijay Satyal, deputy director of markets and transmission with Western Resource Advocates, a nonprofit climate-focused group. “That one state’s government will not decide how a market will be operated, it’s a seismic shift in the industry.”

Backers of an RTO argue that it can incorporate states’ varying energy goals. They point to research showing that the market will support renewable power. But others fear merging fates with coal-heavy states could give federal regulators more leverage to intervene in favor of fossil-fuel power.

Even if Trump is out of office when the market comes online, the regulators he appoints to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission will still be serving out their terms. Some believe FERC could set rules that require the new market to favor fossil fuel-powered resources.

“When you have a mixed market with a lot of coal plants, it creates opportunities for the Trump administration to rejigger the rules to favor coal,” said Matthew Freedman, renewables attorney with The Utility Reform Network, a California-based consumer advocacy group. “In another reality, this would have sounded like a hysterical concern, but it’s pretty obvious where [Trump’s appointees to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission] want to go.”

Freedman’s group pushed California lawmakers for protections that would have given states more flexibility to withdraw from the market, while also prohibiting “resource adequacy” mandates that could be used by the feds to prop up coal. While those elements were included in a Senate version of the bill, they were stripped from the Assembly bill that ultimately was passed.

Supporters of the bill say such concerns are overblown, and the new market is structured to avoid the pitfalls facing other RTOs.

“The simple economic fact is that right now clean energy resources are the cheapest in the world,” said Petrie-Norris, the law’s sponsor. “We’re going to see solar displacing dirty fuels rather than the reverse.”

Much depends on convincing states and utilities it’s in their best interests to join the market. The strength-in-numbers advantages of an RTO depend on widespread participation. While many Western leaders have long touted a region-wide market, the opportunity is arising at a time where energy has become a partisan issue.

Meanwhile, the long-awaited market emerging from California is facing new competition from the east. The Southwest Power Pool, an Arkansas-based RTO serving the middle of the country, is expanding its footprint in the West, with several utilities poised to join its day-ahead market.

“Anytime you have two neighboring utilities in different markets, you have seams that create a lot of friction and inefficiency,” said Rubin Shen, with the energy industry group. “Whether or not everybody can come together and be all-in on a full West-wide market, it’s too soon to tell.”

Stateline reporter Alex Brown can be reached at abrown@stateline.org.

©2025 States Newsroom. Visit at stateline.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

The Texas National Guard sent home seven soldiers whose fitness levels seemingly “did not meet mission requirements” for their deployment to Illinois, a Texas Military Department spokesperson confirmed Tuesday.

In a statement provided to the Tribune, the spokesperson said the service members were replaced “during the pre-mission validation process” at the U.S. Army Reserve training center in suburban Elwood, where the troops have been garrisoned since last week.

“These service members were returned to home station,” according to the statement.

The decision comes after some soldiers were ridiculed on social media for their physical appearance upon their arrival in Illinois. Widely circulated media photographs showed heavier guardsmen at the Elwood base, prompting critics to question how the troops fit in with U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth insistence that all military members must meet height and weight standards.

Hegseth — who told top military leaders last month that it was “tiring” to see “fat troops” — signaled his support for the soldiers’ removal on social media Monday.

“Standards are back at The @DeptofWar,” he posted on X, along with a screenshot of a story about the Texas National Guard’s decision.

The Texas Military Department did not specify which standards the seven Guard members did not meet, but the statement said the department “echoes Secretary Hegseth’s message to the force: ‘Our standards will be high, uncompromising, and clear.’”

A federal judge in Chicago last week blocked the Trump administration from deploying National Guard troops to Chicago and the rest of Illinois as part of its ongoing immigration enforcement push. In response, the Trump administration requested an emergency stay of the order, which was denied by a federal appeals court in Chicago on Saturday.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, however, did allow National Guard members already in Illinois to remain here during the appeal.

“Members of the National Guard do not need to return to their home states unless further ordered by a court to do so,” the court order said.

In her oral ruling from the bench, U.S. District Judge April Perry, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, said National Guard troops are “not trained in de-escalation or other extremely important law enforcement functions that would help to quell these problems,” and that allowing troops to come into Chicago “will only add fuel to the fire that the defendants themselves have started.”

The Department of Justice argued in a filing Friday night that Perry’s order “improperly impinges on the Commander in Chief’s supervision of military operations, countermands a military directive to officers in the field, and endangers federal personnel and property.”

There has been no visible presence of the Texas National Guard since last week’s ruling. Before the judge’s ruling, the troops were spotted at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in west suburban Broadview, but they did not interact with protesters.

The Pentagon has not clarified what the Guard members will be doing while the appeal plays out. Uniformed troops have been spotted a U.S. Army Reserve Center in recent days, with a few appearing to be carrying rifles as they walked around the 3,600-acre property about 50 miles southwest of Chicago.

ostevens@chicagotribune.com

By HILLEL ITALIE, AP National Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — Drawing upon her personal and political past, Jane Fonda has revived an activist group from the Cold War era that was backed by her father and fellow Oscar winner, Henry Fonda.

Jane Fonda announced she had launched a 21st century incarnation of the Committee for the First Amendment, originally formed in 1947 in response to Congressional hearings aimed against screenwriters and directors — notably the so-called “Hollywood Ten” — and their alleged Communist ties. Signers of the new organization’s mission statement include Florence Pugh, Sean Penn,Billie Eilish, Pedro Pascal and hundreds of others.

Wednesday’s news comes in the wake of Jimmy Kimmel’s brief suspension by ABC over his on-air comments after conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s assassination. President Donald Trump was among those who had wanted Kimmel to be fired.

“The federal government is once again engaged in a coordinated campaign to silence critics in the government, the media, the judiciary, academia, and the entertainment industry,” the committee’s mission statement reads in part.

“We refuse to stand by and let that happen. Free speech and free expression are the inalienable rights of every American of all backgrounds and political beliefs — no matter how liberal or conservative you may be. The ability to criticize, question, protest, and even mock those in power is foundational to what America has always aspired to be.”

The Fondas each have had long histories of activism, whether Jane Fonda’s opposition to the Vietnam War or Henry Fonda’s prominent support for Democratic Party candidates, including John F. Kennedy, for whom the elder Fonda appeared in a campaign ad in 1960.

Henry Fonda, who died in 1982, joined the 1947 First Amendment committee along with such actors and filmmakers as Humphrey Bogart, John Huston, Lucille Ball and Frank Sinatra. Although highly publicized at the time, the committee had a short and troubled history. Bogart and others would find themselves accused of Communist sympathies and would express surprise when a handful of the Hollywood Ten, including screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, turned to have been Communist Party members at one time or another.

By the following year, Bogart had published an essay in Photoplay magazine entitled “I’m No Communist,” in which he confided that “actors and actresses always go overboard about things” and warned against being “used as dupes by Commie organizations.” Trumbo and others in the Hollywood Ten would be jailed for refusing to cooperate with Congress and found themselves among many to be blacklisted through the end of the 1950s and beyond.

By Max Reinhart, MediaNews Group

The owner of a Troy medical facility where a 5-year-old boy died in a hyperbaric chamber explosion was sent to jail Tuesday, reportedly for failing to meet the conditions of her release on bond.

According to online Oakland County Jail inmate information, Tamela Peterson, who faces felony charges of second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter in the death in January, was booked into the jail Tuesday and will be released Wednesday.

Peterson, 58, was released from police custody in April after posting a $2 million bond. However, she returned to 52-4 District Court in Troy on Tuesday for a hearing related to a bond violation, according to online court records.

There, she told Judge Maureen M. McGinnis that she sold a firearm that she had possessed rather than surrendering it to the court, per the conditions of her bond, according to a WDIV-TV (Channel 4) report.

Peterson’s attorney, Thomas W. Cranmer, didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment.

Five-year-old Thomas Cooper died Jan. 31 at the Oxford Center in Troy after the hyperbaric chamber in which he was being treated for sleep apnea and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder suddenly exploded, attorneys for the boy’s family said.

In addition to Peterson, the center’s safety director, Jeffrey Mosteller, and its primary manager, Gary Marken, also are charged with murder and involuntary manslaughter. If convicted of murder, they face up to life in prison. Aleta Moffitt, who worked at the center and operated the chamber, is charged with involuntary manslaughter and intentionally placing false information on a medical record.

All four are accused of disregarding safety protocols and failing to follow the manufacturer’s recommended guidelines for hyperbaric treatment, according to the Michigan Attorney General’s Office, which is handling the case.

Last week, attorneys for Cooper’s family announced a more than $100 million lawsuit against the four suspects, as well as the chamber’s manufacturer, Anaheim, California-based Sechrist Industries Inc., and Office Ventures Troy I LLC, which owns the Troy property where the Oxford Center operated. The center’s nonprofit is also named in the litigation.

Attorneys say the defendants failed to explain the potential dangers of the treatment to the boy’s family. They also allege that the Oxford Center deceitfully sold hyperbaric treatment plans for more than 100 conditions although the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has only approved it for treatment of 13 conditions, which does not include ADHD or sleep apnea.

The case against a 33-year-old Texas man accused of human trafficking and other crimes in Oakland County has been bound over to circuit court for possible trial following a Sept.30 preliminary exam in Southfield’s 46th District Court.

Randolph Lewis was arrested July 21 in Southfield. The case against him unfolded when — according to police — officers responded to the Quality Inn on Telegraph Road for a malicious destruction of property complaint, and spoke with a woman who said a man she described as her boyfriend had broken her car windshield.

An investigation revealed the woman may be a victim of human trafficking; she reportedly told police she had met Lewis in Louisiana and he had introduced her to sex dates — listing her online for commercial sex services and collecting her earnings after the encounters, police said.

The woman also told officers that Lewis had sexually assaulted her, police said.

Lewis was located at another hotel nearby and taken into custody. A second possible human trafficking victim was with him, but she refused assistance from officers, police said.

The investigation also revealed that Lewis has operated in several cities, police said.

Lewis, of Arlington, Texas, is charged with human trafficking enterprise resulting in injury/commercial sexual activity, prostitution, and using a computer to commit a crime. Two counts of assault with intent to commit sexual penetration he had been charged with have been dismissed. Arraignment in Oakland County Circuit Court is scheduled for Oct. 8 before Judge Michael Warren.

Lewis is in the Oakland County Jail with bond set at $300,000 cash or surety.

Police said Lewis also has charges pending in Louisiana.

Case advances against man accused of striking bank employee with hatchet during robbery

Walk to raise domestic violence awareness this Sunday in Southfield

Colorism is defined in the Oxford dictionary as “prejudice or discrimination against individuals with a dark skin tone, typically among people of the same ethnic or racial group.” 

It’s one facet of discrimination that often goes without proper acknowledgment, and one that Professor Rogerio Pinto aims to shine a light on through his work.

Rogerio Pinto is a University Diversity Social Transformation Professor. He is a Berit Ingersoll-Dayton Collegiate Professor of Social Work and he’s a Professor of Theatre and Drama, School of Music, Theatre & Dance at The University of Michigan. 

Born in Brazil, Professor Pinto has dedicated his life to breaking the social constructs of colorism and other “-isms” that divide people. 

Earlier this year, Professor Pinto curated and hosted “Colorism,” a mixed-media installation that used video, photography, tactile elements and a montage to explore colorism. “Colorism” took a look at the term from its roots to where we are today in society.

Professor Pinto also curated a Secret Society of Twisted Storytellers live event on colorism.

Professor Pinto stopped by The Metro to explore the complexities of colorism and its impact on people immigrating to the U.S., and how to tackle identity in times of division.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Subscribe to The Metro on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or NPR or wherever you get your podcasts.

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Video surveillance caught the liquid larceny: A man pulled a box truck behind a Minnesota strip mall in the wee hours in late October, got out, grabbed a hose and jammed it into a bin of used cooking oil outside Great Moon Buffet.

He siphoned nearly $800 worth of grease from the restaurant, pumping it into a storage container in the back of the truck and slipping away into the darkness, according to felony charges against the alleged culprit, who’s also accused of hitting up two other restaurants.

“I had never heard of anything like this before,” said Derek Fritze, a 10-year Maplewood police detective who investigated the case. “Apparently, it’s a big thing.”

But it’s not new, just more widespread as used cooking oil has become liquid gold over the past decade because it’s recycled for the production of biofuel, said Kent Swisher, president and CEO of the North American Renderers Association. He said thieves are stealing up to $80 million worth of the grease every year, up from $42 million in 2013.

“So, yeah, it’s across the country,” he said of the thievery. “And as prices have gotten stronger over time, you’d think the renderers would be happy. But it actually created more problems, because it created more people trying to steal it.”

Renderers and smaller businesses collect the oil from restaurants, who are compensated depending on the volume. It’s then processed and sold to refineries. Besides biofuel, it’s used as a nutritional additive in animal feed.

The global used cooking oil market is expanding rapidly. It was valued at $7 billion in 2023 and is expected to top $14 billion by 2033, according to market analysts.

Meanwhile, U.S. restaurants have been getting 10 to 50 cents per gallon this year for the grease, says Florida-based recycler Grease Connections.

Slippery bandit

A manager at Great Moon Buffet noticed the restaurant had only been getting about $15 a month — instead of the usual $600 to $700 — because the amount of used cooking oil in the barrel out back was low when picked up by Sanimax, a rendering company with a plant in South St. Paul.

So he put up surveillance cameras, which caught the illicit act going down just before 4 a.m. Oct. 23. Cameras got an image of the man’s face, and the back license plate of his white box truck. The manager reported the theft to police on Oct. 28.

Less than two weeks later, around 4:20 a.m. Nov. 7, police saw the truck parked outside a restaurant on Beam Avenue, the criminal complaint says. The driver denied stealing used oil from any restaurant. He said the truck belonged to his friends, and that he stopped in the parking lot because his truck was not working.

Police say they later matched the driver’s face to the man in the Great Moon Buffet surveillance video.

Sanimax gave police a list of other restaurants where surveillance cameras allegedly caught the same man stealing grease: New Hong Kong Wok in New Brighton about 6:30 a.m. on Aug. 10, 2024, and Peking Garden Restaurant in St. Paul around 4 a.m. eight days later.

Sanimax put the value of the oil stolen from the three restaurants at just over $3,600.

The Ramsey County Attorney’s Office charged the Minneapolis man with three counts of theft, two at the felony level. His attorney did not respond to the Pioneer Press’ requests for comment on the allegations.

Prevention tactics

On a recent weekday morning, a Sanimax driver pulled up to Concord Lanes and sucked out used cooking oil from a large bin on the side of the bowling alley. It’ll end up just down the road at the company’s South St. Paul plant, a remnant of the city’s stockyards and meatpacking days.

Mike Karman, Sanimax vice president of procurement, said used cooking oil theft has been a problem for at least a decade — mostly in larger metropolitan areas — and it’s been more prevalent in the Twin Cities over the past two summers compared to neighboring states.

“We see multiple different trucks, so we know it’s more than one actor,” he said of the local spate of thefts. “So I can say that there’s more than one truck running around doing it.”

To try to prevent the thievery, Sanimax puts its bins inside restaurants when there’s room or puts locks on them. “But the problem is,” Karman said, “most of these thieves, even if there is a lock on where you dump in the oil, they’ll just lift and bend up a corner of the lid and stick in a pipe to suck it out.”

Expensive anti-theft lids are also an option, although thieves are known to drill through the bin to get at the oil, he said.

Samimax also does its own surveillance, he said, without getting into the details.

Sanimax told police that man who took the Great Moon Buffet grease could be employed or contracted by rival recycling business Greasehauler. Sanimax did its own investigation and found the man’s truck parked at Greasehauler’s plant in Plato, Minn., several times.

Karman said he couldn’t get into all that, but added: “We take our business seriously, so when we see that there is theft, we utilize all of our resources.”

Greasehauler owner Lev Mirman, when contacted by the Pioneer Press, said he had never heard of the man charged in the Great Moon Buffet theft. He said he gets used cooking oil from several sources and that it’s possible someone gave him a fake name.

Karman said Sanimax does not buy grease from non-vetted suppliers, but there is no regulation stopping other processors from doing so.

Syndicates charged federally

Swisher, from the Virginia-based renderers association, said they started a task force in 2013 to try to get law enforcement to put more focus on the thefts “because at the time, everybody kind of giggled about stolen used cooking oil.”

That’s no longer the case, he said.

“It’s become such a big thing over the years that it’s even gotten the FBI’s attention. And some of the syndicates are quite large,” he said. “When you Google it, it’s kind of amazing how many stories pop up these days.”

The alleged capers range from a lone man with a single truck to an organized ring running a whole fleet.

A federal grand jury in North Carolina indicted 21 co-conspirators — including 12 from Mexico and one from Turkey — on several charges in 2019 for allegedly stealing nearly $4 million worth of used cooking oil over five years. The ring operated across North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia, storing the stolen grease in a warehouse, the indictment says.

In December, a federal grand jury in western New York announced the indictment of six New York men for allegedly stealing at least 90,000 pounds of used grease from restaurants in and around Rochester. They sold the oil to a broker, who sold it to a refinery in Erie, Pennsylvania, the indictment says.

Swisher said his association disbanded their task force after renderers started taking theft precautions. Many now have cameras, hire private investigators and offer cash rewards to try to catch the thieves. He knows of at least one renderer that puts electronic anti-theft devices on its bins that sense when the oil is being stolen and alerts police or private investigators.

An apology, cash offer

Peking Garden co-owner Teresa Nguyen said she didn’t know someone stole their grease last year. But that wasn’t the case five years ago at their former University Avenue location, when she caught a guy siphoning oil from a bin they shared with a neighboring restaurant, Golden Gate Cafe.

She thought at first he was a Sanimax driver collecting the grease. But then he “looked afraid” and apologized, she said, and offered her $100 cash on the spot to not call the police.

She refused, told him it wasn’t just her oil. She asked him to go to Golden Gate and explain what he had done because both restaurants had been noticing the Sanimax compensation checks were smaller than usual.

The man left in his box truck, but didn’t go to Golden Gate. The theft went unreported to police.

“Honestly, we have a lot of customers in the cities that we know get stolen from, but we can’t quite quantify it because a lot of times they don’t take all of it,” said Karman, of Sanimax. “But then the customer goes, ‘Oh, my checks are half the size they used to be. I wonder why.’ And then they just go on to doing something else and don’t report it.”

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By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — Former federal prosecutor Maurene Comey sued the U.S. government Monday to get her job back, saying her firing was for political reasons and was unconstitutional.

Her lawsuit in Manhattan federal court blamed the firing on the fact that her father is James Comey, a former F.B.I. director, “or because of her perceived political affiliation and beliefs, or both.”

Comey is seeking to be reinstated as well as a declaration that her firing was unlawful and a violation of the “Separation of Powers” clause in the U.S. Constitution.

“Defendants have not provided any explanation whatsoever for terminating Ms. Comey. In truth, there is no legitimate explanation,” the lawsuit said.

Comey, who successfully prosecuted hundreds of cases since becoming an assistant U.S. attorney in 2015, was notified of her dismissal in an email with an attachment saying she was being fired “(p)ursuant to Article II of the United States Constitution and the laws of the United States,” the lawsuit said.

James Comey was fired as FBI director by President Donald Trump in 2017. The lawsuit noted that he has since written a memoir critical of Trump and has continued to publicly criticize Trump and his administration, including a social media post in May that Trump and others perceived as threatening.

The lawsuit noted that Maurene Comey’s firing in July came the day after her supervisors had asked her to take the lead on a major public corruption case and three months after she’d received her latest “Outstanding” review.

“The politically motivated termination of Ms. Comey — ostensibly under ‘Article II of the Constitution’ — upends bedrock principles of our democracy and justice system,” the lawsuit said. “Assistant United States Attorneys like Ms. Comey must do their jobs without fearing or favoring any political party or perspective, guided solely by the law, the facts, and the pursuit of justice.”

Named as defendants in the lawsuit were, among others, the Justice Department, the Executive Office of the President, U.S. Attorney General Pamela Bondi, the Office of Personnel Management and the United States.

A message for comment from the Justice Department was not immediately returned.

Comey’s July 16 firing came amid a spate of dismissals of prosecutors by the Justice Department without explanation, raising alarm that civil service protections meant to prevent terminations for political reasons were being overlooked.

Comey’s lawsuit noted that she was employed with protections under the Civil Service Reform Act governing how and why she could be terminated, including specific prohibitions against termination for discriminatory reasons such as political affiliation.

“Her termination violated every one of those protections,” the lawsuit said.

The Justice Department also has fired some prosecutors who worked on cases that have provoked Trump’s ire, including some who handled U.S. Capitol riot cases and lawyers and support staff who worked on special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecutions of Trump.

She became a rising star in her office for her work on the case against financier Jeffrey Epstein and his onetime girlfriend, British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, and the recent prosecution of music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs.

Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence after her December 2021 conviction on sex trafficking charges. She was recently transferred from a prison in Florida to a prison camp in Texas.

Epstein took his own life in a federal jail in August 2019 as he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges. Combs is awaiting sentencing next month after his conviction on prostitution-related charges after he was exonerated in July of more serious sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy charges.