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2 organized crime groups arrested after theft of more than 40 marijuana dispensaries

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) — Members from two organized crime groups are facing charges after allegedly burglarizing more than 40 marijuana dispensaries resulting in the theft of approximately $780,000 in cash and property. Following multi-agency investigations conducted by city, state and nationwide agencies, 23 members of the two separate organized crime groups will be charged with stealing or carjacking vehicles and using them to burglarize marijuana dispensaries, federal firearms licensees and other businesses in the Denver metro area between September 2022 and November 2023.  Suspected DUI driver crashes into 2 police officers, 2 firefighters on I-76 The defendants will face other charges including aggravated robbery, carjacking, kidnapping, illegal possession of firearms (including a firearm linked to an open murder investigation) and violations of the Colorado Organized Crime Control Act, according to Denver District Attorney Beth McCann.“These arrests send an unmistakable message that ...

BCPS and BSO launch campaign warning teenagers of sextortion crimes

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

Broward County Public Schools and the Broward Sheriff’s Office are spreading awareness to a crime that targets teenagers. On Friday, Superintendent Peter Licata and Sheriff Gregory Tony discussed a new campaign aimed at combating sextortion. Sextortion is a form of blackmail where a suspect threatens to distribute a victim’s sexual content if their demands are not met.“Sextortion is more of a threat to our students and to our school population in general then what we’re dealing with in terms of violence,” Tony said.In the past, sextortion mostly target young women, but, according to officials, the crime has elevated to financial sextortion and the victims are now mostly young men. To combat these crimes, BCPS and BSO are teaming up to warn teenagers and parents to be vigilant. “The message out to everybody, make them aware so that our kids, when they are online, they think before they send, they think before twice if I’m talking to a girl or...

TSA advises do’s and don’ts for travelers who plan to travel with their gun

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

TSA wants travelers to be mindful about their carry-on items this holiday season, especially if you plan to travel with your firearm.TSA officials report that since it became legal to carry a gun without a permit in the state of Florida, almost 200 guns have been taken at security checkpoints across South Florida’s two largest airports, and 750 confiscations statewide in just six months. “There’s some confusion with everyone thinking they can bring their guns through the checkpoint.. it is still illegal,” said Sgt. Toni Hopkins from the Broward Sheriff’s Office. TSA officials said the uptick in gun confiscations at South Florida airports is due to people taking their guns everywhere with them “It becomes part of a daily routine. People are heading out the door now with firearm, keys, wallet and cell phone to go about their business,” said TSA’s Mark Howell. That’s why the TSA is reminding passengers of the do’s and don̵...

Two gene therapies for sickle cell disease approved in US

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

Regulators on Friday approved two new gene therapies for sickle cell disease that doctors hope can cure the painful, inherited blood disorder that afflicts mostly Black people in the U.S.The Food and Drug Administration said the one-time treatments can be used for patients 12 and older with severe forms of the disease. One, made by Vertex Pharmaceuticals and CRISPR Therapeutics, is the first approved therapy based on CRISPR, the gene editing tool that won its inventors the Nobel Prize in 2020. The other is made by Bluebird Bio and works differently.“Sickle cell disease is a rare, debilitating and life-threatening blood disorder with significant unmet need,” the FDA’s Dr. Nicole Verdun said in a statement announcing the approvals. “”We are excited to advance the field especially for individuals whose lives have been severely disrupted by the disease.”In the U.S., an estimated 100,000 people have the disease and about a fifth of them have the severe form. Sickl...

Finland: We ‘trust’ China will help probe Baltic Sea pipeline damage

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen said she trusts Chinese authorities to assist Finland in its investigation into the Baltic Sea gas pipeline damage, which Helsinki suspects was carried out by Chinese boat Newnew Polar Bear.“Now that the vessel has indeed arrived in China, there will be joint action together with the Chinese authorities and the Finnish ones and probably also the Estonian ones to investigate,” Valtonen told POLITICO in an interview Friday. “On a diplomatic level, China has promised their assistance for the investigation and we trust them to help us out in this, that we have a thorough and transparent investigation,” she added.A Finnish probe has identified Chinese container ship Newnew Polar Bear as the primary suspect in the rupture of the Balticconnector, a 77-kilometer-long gas pipeline that connects the NATO members Estonia and Finland beneath the Baltic Sea. Authorities believe the vessel dragged its anchor across the Baltic Sea bed, cutting through t...

Harvard president apologizes amid backlash over antisemitism testimony

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The president of Harvard University has apologized for her remarks at a congressional hearing on antisemitism, saying she got caught up in a heated exchange and failed to properly denounce threats of violence against Jewish students.In an interview Thursday with The Crimson student newspaper, President Claudine Gay clarified her response to a line of questioning that asked whether calling for the genocide of Jews would violate Harvard’s code of conduct. At the Tuesday hearing, Gay said it depended on the context, adding that when “speech crosses into conduct, that violates our policies.”Gay’s response has drawn intense national backlash, as have similar responses from the presidents of MIT and the University of Pennsylvania, who joined Gay in testifying before the Republican-led House Education and Workforce Committee. Wealthy donors and some members of Congress in both parties have called for their resignations.Gay told The Crimson she w...

Wilmington Police arrest suspect following police pursuit, car crash, escape from scene

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

A Tewksbury man is under arrest following a dramatic series of events early Friday morning across multiple jurisdictions.Ron Jeremiah Bell Jr., 24, is facing multiple charges, including assault with a dangerous weapon, carrying a firearm without a license, resisting arrest, and posession of a class B substance.Around 1:30 Friday morning officers initiated a traffic stop on a vehicle operating erratically. The driver fled south on I-93 in the vehicle, out of authorities’ sight. A short time later the car was seen on Lowell Street in Wilmington, where it attempted to ram a police cruiser twice.Officers then pursued the vehicle north on I-93; it exited the highway at Exit 35 and soon crashed on Andover Street before 2 a.m. The driver, believed to be Bell, fled into a wooded area, leaving behind the female passenger of his car. She was transported to Lahey Hospital with serious but non-life threatening injuries.Bell was located at 7 a.m. after an hours long search conducted by Wil...

Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour first ever to hit $1B mark

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

LOS ANGELES — Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour is the first tour to cross the billion-dollar mark, according to Pollstar’s 2023 year-end charts.Not only was Swift’s landmark Eras Tour the No. 1 tour both worldwide and in North America, but she also brought in a whopping $1.04 billion with 4.35 million tickets sold across 60 tour dates, the concert trade publication found.Pollstar data is pulled from box office reports, venue capacity estimates, historical Pollstar venue ticket sales data, and other undefined research, collected from Nov. 17, 2022 to Nov. 15, 2023.Representatives for the publication did not immediately clarify if they adjusted past tour data to match 2023 inflation in naming Swift the first to break the billion-dollar threshold.Pollstar also found that Swift brought in approximately $200 million in merch sales and her blockbuster film adaptation of the tour, “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour,” has reportedly earned approximately $250 million in sales...

How a local museum helped 100-plus Chicago Bears employees tell their stories through sneakers in the NFL’s My Cause, My Cleats campaign

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

When Sneakerhead University first opened its doors on State Street in fall 2022, co-founders Shay Belvin and Mykol Branch had one room with three tables, a bucket of 12 paints and a desire to preserve sneaker history and tell stories using sneakers.While students at North Carolina Central, a historically Black university in Durham, N.C., Belvin and Branch came up with the idea to sell Black empowerment T-shirts through their now-defunct label “HBCU Made.” It was during that time they also had the idea to create a sneaker museum.“We wanted a creative way to tell the Black story of different topics and the movement of America,” Belvin told the Tribune. “Selfie museums were really huge (at the time).”The two studied marketing in college, and after graduation Belvin, a Detroit native, came to Chicago to start a museum while Branch initially returned home to Baltimore to open one. They chose Chicago, they said, because they could list brands and people...

IOC confirms Russian athletes can compete at Paris Olympics with approved neutral status

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:55:01 GMT

By GRAHAM DUNBAR (AP Sports Writer)GENEVA (AP) — Some Russian athletes will be allowed to compete at the 2024 Paris Olympics, the IOC said Friday, in a decision that removed the option of a blanket ban due to the invasion of Ukraine.The International Olympic Committee decision confirmed moves it started one year ago to reintegrate Russia and its military ally Belarus into global sports, and nine months after it urged sports governing bodies to look at ways to let individual athletes compete.Though the IOC’s official position was expected, the timing surprised some Olympic watchers after reports last week in Paris suggested the long-promised decision would come in March. It is still up to each sport’s governing body, which run their own Olympic competitions, to assess and enforce neutral status for individual athletes who have not actively supported the war and are not contracted to military or state security agencies. The IOC said on Friday eight Russians and three...