US clears officer in Ferguson case, criticizes police force

US clears officer in Ferguson case, criticizes police force 

Attorney General Eric Holder speaks at the Justice Department in Washington, Wednesday, March 4, 2015, about the Justice Department’s findings related to two investigations in Ferguson, Mo. The Justice Department will not prosecute a white former police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old whose death in Ferguson sparked weeks of protests and ignited an intense national debate over how police treat African-Americans. But the government released a scathing report Wednesday that faulted the city for racial bias.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Justice Department cleared a white former Ferguson, Missouri, police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old on Wednesday, but also issued a scathing report calling for sweeping changes in city law enforcement practices it called discriminatory and unconstitutional.

The dual reports marked the culmination of months-long federal investigations into a shooting that sparked protests and a national dialogue on race and law enforcement as the tenure of Attorney General Eric Holder, the first black person to hold that office, draws to a close.

In pairing the announcements, the Obama administration sought to offset community disappointment over the conclusion that the shooting of Michael Brown was legally justified with a message of hope for Ferguson's majority-black citizens. Officials announced 26 recommendations, including training officers in how to de-escalate confrontations and banning the use of ticketing and arrest quotas, for the police force and municipal court.

Holder called the federal report a "searing" portrait of a police department that he said functions as a collection agency for the city, with officers prioritizing revenue from fines over public safety and trouncing the constitutional rights of minorities.

"It is not difficult to imagine how a single tragic incident set off the city of Ferguson like a powder keg," Holder said.

Ferguson Mayor James Knowles III said the city had cooperated with the Justice Department and has made some changes, including a diversity training program for city employees.

The decision not to prosecute Darren Wilson, the white officer who was cleared in November by a state grand jury and has since resigned, had been expected. To win a federal civil rights case, officials would have needed to prove that Wilson willfully deprived Brown of his rights by using unreasonable force.

Instead, the report found no evidence to disprove Wilson's testimony that he feared for his safety during the Aug. 9 confrontation. Nor were there reliable witness accounts to establish that Brown had his hands up in surrender when he was shot, Justice Department lawyers said.

One of Wilson's attorneys, Neil Bruntrager, said his client was satisfied with the outcome. Brown family lawyer Benjamin Crump said the family was not surprised but very disappointed, and one of Brown's uncles, Charles Ewing, said he believed Wilson was "getting away with it."

"I really was hoping they would have come up with better findings because this whole thing just does not add up," Ewing said. "Everything just doesn't make sense."

While the federal government declined to prosecute Wilson, it found the shooting occurred in an environment of systematic mistreatment of blacks, in which officials swapped racist emails and jokes without punishment and black residents were disproportionately stopped and searched without good reason, fined for petty offenses and subjected to excessive police force.

The report on the department found its lack of racial diversity - only four of 54 commissioned officers are black - undermined community trust. It also said the city relied heavily on fines for raise revenue and issued arrest warrants for minor infractions including jaywalking and late fees. The confrontation that led to Brown's death began when Wilson directed him and a friend to move from the street to the sidewalk.

The document was filled with examples of what it called a discriminatory criminal justice system. Among them: One black woman spent six days in jail because of a parking violation. A lawful protest was broken up with a police warning of "everybody here's going to jail." And a black man sitting in a car with tinted windows was accused without cause of being a pedophile by an officer who pointed a gun at his head.

Between 2012 and 2014, black drivers were more than twice as likely as others to be searched during routine traffic stops, but 26 percent less likely to be carrying contraband.

The report also included seven racially tinged emails, including some from city officials who remain employed, that did not result in punishment. The writer of one 2008 email stated that President Barack Obama wouldn't be in office for long because "what black man holds a steady job for four years." Knowles, the mayor, said one employee was fired and two others are on leave over the emails.

The report's recommendations, if accepted by city officials, could lead to an overhaul of basic police and court practices. Those include improving officer supervision, better recruiting, hiring and promotion, new mechanisms for responding to misconduct complaints and a new system to reduce fine amounts.

Federal officials on Wednesday described Ferguson city leaders as cooperative and seemingly open to change, saying there were already some signs of improvement. The city, for example, has eliminated bond requirements for many municipal offenses and has extended a program that allows individuals to have warrants recalled and assigned a new court date.

In the last five years, the Justice Department has investigated roughly 20 police departments over alleged civil rights violations. Some have led to the appointment of independent monitors and have been resolved with negotiated agreements in which the police department commits to major changes in its practices. Federal officials say they hope to avoid a protracted court fight with Ferguson to force change.

"It is time for Ferguson's leaders to take immediate, wholesale and structural corrective action," Holder said.

`It WAS him': Defense admits Tsarnaev bombed Boston Marathon

`It WAS him': Defense admits Tsarnaev bombed Boston Marathon 

It this courtroom sketch, U.S. Attorney William Weinreb, left, is depicted delivering opening statements in front of U.S. District Judge George O'Toole Jr., right rear, on the first day of the federal death penalty trial of Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Wednesday, March 4, 2015, in Boston. Tsarnaev, depicted seated second from right between defense attorneys Judy Clarke, third from right, and Miriam Conrad, right, is charged with conspiring with his brother to place two bombs near the marathon finish line in April 2013, killing three and injuring 260 people.

  

BOSTON (AP) -- The question, for all practical purposes, is no longer whether Dzhokhar Tsarnaev took part in the Boston Marathon bombing. It's whether he deserves to die for it.

In a blunt opening statement at the nation's biggest terrorism trial in nearly 20 years, Tsarnaev's own lawyer flatly told a jury that the 21-year-old former college student committed the crime.

"It WAS him," said defense attorney Judy Clarke, one of the nation's foremost death-penalty specialists.

But in a strategy aimed at saving Tsarnaev from a death sentence, she argued that he had fallen under the malevolent influence of his now-dead older brother, Tamerlan.

"The evidence will not establish and we will not argue that Tamerlan put a gun to Dzhokhar's head or that he forced him to join in the plan," Clarke said, "but you will hear evidence about the kind of influence that this older brother had."

Three people were killed and more than 260 hurt when two shrapnel-packed pressure-cooker bombs exploded near the finish line on April 15, 2013. Tsarnaev, then 19, was accused of carrying out the attacks with 26-year-old Tamerlan, who was killed in a shootout and getaway attempt days later.

Authorities contend the brothers - ethnic Chechens who arrived from Russia more than a decade ago - were driven by anger over U.S. wars in Muslim lands.

Federal prosecutors used their opening statements, along with heartbreaking testimony and grisly video, to sketch a picture of torn-off limbs, ghastly screams, pools of blood, and the smell of sulfur and burned hair in the streets of Boston. They painted Tsarnaev as a cold-blooded killer.

Tsarnaev planted a bomb designed to "tear people apart and create a bloody spectacle," then hung out with his college buddies as if he didn't have a care in the world, prosecutor William Weinreb said.

"He believed that he was a soldier in a holy war against Americans," Weinreb said. "He also believed that by winning that victory, he had taken a step toward reaching paradise."

Among the first witnesses for the prosecution were two women who lost legs in the attack, including Rebekah Gregory, who walked slowly to the stand on an artificial limb.

"I remember being thrown back, hoisted into the air," said Gregory, who had gone to watch the race with her 5-year-old son, Noah. "My first instinct as a mother was, where in the world was my baby, where was my son?"

She said she looked down at her leg: "My bones were literally laying next to me on the sidewalk and blood was everywhere." She saw other peoples' body parts all around her, and "at that point, I thought that was the day I would die."

"I could hear Noah, I don't know how, but I could hear my little boy. She said he was saying, `Mommy, Mommy, Mommy,' over and over again."

"I said a prayer. I said, `God, if this is it, take me, but let me know that Noah is OK.'"

She said someone finally picked up her son and put him down beside her. Breaking down in tears, she testified that as she looked for the boy, she saw a woman dead on the pavement.

Karen Rand McWatters, whose left leg had to be amputated, described how she watched her close friend Krystle Campbell, a 29-year-old restaurant manager, die on the pavement next to her.

"She very slowly said that her legs hurt, and we held hands, and shortly after that, her hand went limp in mine and she never spoke again after that," she said, choking back tears.

A shaggy-haired, goateed Tsarnaev slouched in his seat and showed little reaction as the case unfolded. The defense did not ask a single question of the four victims who testified Wednesday.

About two dozen victims who came to watch the case took up an entire side of the courtroom, listening somberly to details of the carnage. Several hung their heads and appeared to fight back tears.

Prosecutors also showed the jury a gruesome video of people lying in pools of blood. The footage was punctuated by screams, moans and the crying of a boy. The ground was strewn with ball bearings and chunks of metal, and smoke wafted over the victims.

The 10 women and eight men on the jury watched somberly. Several grimaced, especially at the sight of a gaping hole in a woman's leg.

In his opening statement, the prosecutor also described how 8-year-old Martin Richard stood on a metal barrier with other children so he could get a good view of the runners.

"The bomb tore large chunks of flesh out of Martin Richard," and he bled to death on the sidewalk as his mother looked on helplessly, Weinreb told the jury, with the boy's parents in the courtroom.

Because of a wealth of evidence against Tsarnaev - including a video of him leaving a backpack at the scene, and incriminating graffiti scrawled on the boat where he was captured - legal experts have said there is little chance of escaping conviction during the guilt-or-innocence phase of the trial.

Instead, they said, Tsarnaev's lawyers will concentrate on saving his life by arguing that Tamerlan was the driving force in the plot.

Clarke called the bombings "senseless, horribly misguided acts." But she asked the jurors to "hold your hearts and minds open" until the penalty phase, when the panel will decide whether Tsarnaev should be executed or get life in prison.

She held up two enlarged photos - one showing the two brothers years before the bombings, the other showing them carrying the backpacks containing the explosives - and asked the jury to contemplate: "What took Dzhokhar Tsarnaev from this ... to this?"

While the outcome of the guilt-or-innocence phase is now a foregone conclusion, it is not necessarily an empty exercise.

Robert Bloom, a Boston College law professor and former prosecutor, said the defense will use this phase to build the case that Tsarnaev was a follower, not a mastermind.

"They'll want to use every opportunity they can to show he was influenced by his brother," Bloom said. "Who bought the pressure cookers? Who bought the BBs? All of that."

Prosecutors, for their part, will use this portion of the trial to get across the horror of the attack and prime the jury to come back with a death sentence in the next stage, Bloom said.

Right up until the moment the jury filed into the courtroom, Tsarnaev's lawyers fought to have the trial moved out of Massachusetts, arguing that the emotional impact of the bombings ran too deep and too many people had personal connections to the case. But U.S. District Judge George O'Toole Jr. and a federal appeals court rejected the requests.

It is the most closely watched terrorism trial in the U.S. since the Oklahoma City bombing case in the mid-1990s.

Clarke has saved a string of high-profile clients from the death penalty, including Atlanta Olympics bomber Eric Rudolph; Unabomber Ted Kaczynski; and Jared Loughner, who shot and killed six people and gravely wounded then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in a 2011.

LA police chief: Man killed on Skid Row reached for gun

LA police chief: Man killed on Skid Row reached for gun 
 

Los Angeles Police detective Meghan Aguilar points at photos released by police that could indicate evidence of a suspect holding a police officer's gun, seen in a video grab scene shot by a witness at the scene of the shooting of a homeless man on Skid Row of Los Angeles, displayed at a news conference at police headquarters Monday, March 2, 2015. Chief Charlie Beck says officers fatally shot a homeless man on Skid Row after he grabbed an officer's holster during a struggle. Three Los Angeles police officers shot and killed the man on Sunday, as they wrestled with him on the ground, a confrontation captured on video that millions have viewed online. Authorities say the man was shot after grabbing for an officer's gun.

  

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Police fatally shot a homeless man on Skid Row during a "brutal" videotaped struggle in which a rookie officer cried out that the man had grabbed his gun, the Los Angeles police chief said Monday.

Video showed the man reaching toward the officer's waistband, Chief Charlie Beck said. The officer's gun was found partly cocked and jammed with a round of ammunition in the chamber and another in the ejection port, indicating a struggle for the weapon.

"You can hear the young officer who was primarily engaged in the confrontation saying that `He has my gun. He has my gun,'" Beck said. "He says it several times, with conviction."

Then three other officers opened fire.

The man was black, as was the rookie officer who was just short of completing his probationary year on the force, police said.

Beck's narrative of the shooting, including photos from video showing the condition of the gun, was rare, emerging just 24 hours after an officer-involved shooting. It came amid heightened attention to killings by police officers that have led to protests, some violent, across the country.

Sunday's violence had echoes of the August police shooting of 25-year-old Ezell Ford, whose death in a struggle with LA officers brought demonstrations in the city. Ford was unarmed. Police said he was shot after reaching for an officer's gun.

Mayor Eric Garcetti said he and the police chief needed to respond quickly to reassure residents that there is a robust investigation into the shooting, which occurred in the downtown area that is home to the city's highest concentration of homeless people.

"I watched the video, I watched the tragic events on Skid Row unfold," the mayor said. "We owe the city a thorough investigation as to what happened."

The shooting was caught by at least four cameras, two held by witnesses and two worn by officers who fired their weapons. There was also a camera in a police car and a security camera on a nearby shelter captured events leading up to the incident.

The American Civil Liberties Union called on the Police Department to quickly release footage shot by the officers' body cameras.

One witness posted his video to Facebook, which drew millions of views.

Police were investigating a reported robbery when they tried to talk with the suspect and he refused to obey their commands and started fighting, Beck said. Stun guns fired at the man had "appeared to have little effect and he continued to violently resist."

As the man took swings, four officers wrestled him to the ground. Two other officers subdued and handcuffed a woman who had picked up a dropped baton.

The struggle became blurry and distant, but shouting could be heard, followed by five apparent gunshots.

A memorial sprung up where the shooting occurred. White roses were placed over a tent, blankets and clothing belonging to the dead man known as "Africa."

James Attaway, 48, said the man's first name was Shawn, but he nicknamed him because he was from Africa, though he had family in Boston. They met six months ago, and Attaway said they slept near each other.

Africa had been living on the street for about a year, Attaway said. They met talking about God and had done that earlier Sunday.

"He was on the spiritual side, very intelligent," Attaway said.

Tents and cardboard shelters cover the sidewalks of Skid Row, where an estimated 1,700 homeless people live. Many of them struggle with mental illness and addiction and are no strangers to the police.

Cmdr. Andrew Smith said the man had previous encounters with officers, though he would not elaborate. Authorities withheld the man's name.

The three officers who fired their weapons were veterans of the beat and had special training to deal with the homeless and mentally ill.

"They were trained to work with homeless," said Police Commission President Steve Soboroff. "It wasn't a SWAT team looking for problems."

The shooting is being investigated by the Los Angeles Police Department's inspector general and the city's district attorney.

Activists called on Gov. Jerry Brown to appoint a special investigator to examine the killing.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson, head of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable, urged the city Police Commission to hold a special hearing on use of force by officers in Skid Row.

Two of the officers suffered minor injuries in the scuffle, including the rookie officer, who is on crutches. All four officers were placed on paid leave.

30,000 marchers in Moscow mourn slain Putin foe

30,000 marchers in Moscow mourn slain Putin foe 

People with Russian national flags march in memory of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, who was gunned down on Friday, Feb. 27, 2015 near the Kremlin, in Moscow, Russia, Sunday, March 1, 2015. Thousands converged Sunday in central Moscow to mourn veteran liberal politician Boris Nemtsov, whose killing on the streets of the capital has shaken Russia’s beleaguered opposition. They carried flowers, portraits and white signs that said “I am not afraid.”

 

MOSCOW (AP) -- For the tens of thousands bearing flowers and tying black ribbons to railings in honor of slain Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov, the solemn march through the Moscow drizzle on Sunday was a time for silence, not slogans.

The marchers occasionally broke into chants of "Russia without Putin," or "Say no to war," but often the only sound was the steady thwack of police helicopters overhead or the hum of police boats patrolling the shores of the Moscow River.

While the killing of Nemtsov has shaken the Russian opposition, which sees the Kremlin as responsible, it is unclear whether his death will be enough to invigorate the beleaguered movement. Despite the Ukraine conflict and Russia's economic crisis, support for President Vladimir Putin has been above 80 percent in the past year.

Since mass anti-Putin protests brought hundreds of thousands to the streets of Moscow in 2011 and 2012, Putin has marginalized and intimidated his political opponents, jailing some, driving others into exile, and ramping up fines and potential jail time for those detained at protests.

The 55-year-old Nemtsov was among the few prominent opposition figures who refused to be cowed. But while many at the march expressed respect for his long political career and grief at his loss, few believed that his death would spark major change in Russia because of the Kremlin's control over national television, where a vast majority of Russians get their news.

"Maybe if 100 people were to die people would rise up, but I don't really believe in that," said Sergei Musakov, 22. "People are so under the influence of the (TV) box that they will believe anything that television tells them. If it tells them that terrorists from the Islamic State group came to Russia in order to blow up the fifth column, they'll believe it."

The Kremlin had identified Nemtsov as among the leaders of a "fifth column," painting him and other opposition figures as traitors in the service of a hostile West.

About 30,000 people attended the march, making it the largest opposition rally in more than a year. The demonstrators bore Russian flags and signs that read "I am not afraid" or "Propaganda kills." At the site where Nemtsov was killed, a pile of flowers grew by the minute, as mourners tossed down bouquets of every color.

Nemtsov was gunned down shortly before midnight Friday as he walked across a bridge near the Kremlin. The killing came just hours after a radio interview in which he denounced Putin's "mad, aggressive policy" in Ukraine.

At the time of his death, Nemtsov was working on a report that he believed proved that Russian troops were fighting alongside the separatists in Ukraine, despite the official denials.

No one has been arrested in the killing. Investigators said they were looking into several possible motives and have offered 3 million rubles (nearly $50,000) for information about the shooting.

TV Center, a station controlled by the Moscow city government, broadcast a poor-resolution video from one of its web cameras that it said shows Nemtsov and his date shortly before the killing.

The station, which superimposed its own time code on the footage, circled figures that it said were Nemtsov and the woman walking across the bridge on a rainy night. A snowplow that moved slowly behind the couple obscured the view of the shooting.

TV Center then circled what it said was the suspected killer jumping into a passing car. The authenticity of the video could not be independently confirmed.

Investigators said Sunday they were again questioning the woman, Ukrainian citizen Anna Duritskaya. Russian media have identified her as a model and shown photos of her in alluring poses.

Fellow opposition activists said they hoped Nemtsov's death would encourage people to take action, rather than intimidate them.

"Essentially it is an act of terror," said Ilya Yashin, an opposition leader and friend. "It is a political murder aimed at frightening the population, or the part of the population that supported Nemtsov or did not agree with the government. I hope we won't get scared, that we will continue what Boris was doing."

Mikhail Kasyanov, a former prime minister who joined the opposition, told the crowd the killing should be a turning point for Russia "for the simple reason that people who before thought that they could quietly sit in their kitchens and simply discuss problems within the family, now will start reconsidering everything that's going on in our country."

Since Nemtsov's death, investigators, politicians and political commentators on state television have suggested numerous motives for the attack. The most popular theory seemed to be that Western secret services were behind the hit, with the aim of destabilizing Russia. Putin's spokesman said the president saw the attack as a "provocation" against the state.

Some bristled at Western coverage that suggested Nemtsov was killed for his relentless opposition to Putin.

"We haven't even recovered, the man hasn't even been buried, and the West is shoving down our throats that Russia supposedly has killed a key opposition politician," Dmitry Kiselyov, an influential television anchor famous for his anti-Western broadcasts, said on his Sunday evening show.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said the United States had no intelligence on who was behind the shooting.

"The bottom line is we hope there will be a thorough, transparent, real investigation, not just of who actually fired the shots, but who, if anyone, may have ordered or instructed this or been behind this," Kerry said Sunday on ABC's "This Week."

Kiselyov noted that while Nemtsov was known in Russia from his political activity in the 1990s, when he served as a deputy prime minister overseeing reforms, he was no longer popular. The anchor suggested that the West may have believed his death would resonate more with average Russians than his political activity: 

"When he was alive, Nemtsov was no longer necessary to the West, he had no prospects. But dead, he was a lot more interesting."

For those at the march, it's that rhetoric on state television that makes the prospects for change dim.

"From my experience, trying to convince people isn't possible," said Mikhail Trofimenko, a 42-year-old screenwriter. "I think things will only get worse, but I hope that by some miracle Russia will not fall apart and remain a united country."

He held up a painting of the Russian flag riddled with four bullet holes, the number found in Nemtsov's body.

Another mourning march was held earlier Sunday in St. Petersburg, drawing several thousand people.

Nelly Prusskaya, a 66-year-old doctor, said she came to pay her respects to Nemtsov. "I also came to say that I'm against the war in Ukraine," she said. "I'm against political murders."

From Van Stone: Nina Milano Best Selfie Model of Van Stone This Week Latinamerica and USA Fashion and Beauty Collection

From Van Stone: Nina Milano

Best Selfie Model of Van Stone This Week

'Jihadi John' identified as London-raised college grad

'Jihadi John' identified as London-raised college grad
 

CAGE research director, Asim Qureshi talks during a press conference held by the CAGE human rights charity in London, Thursday, Feb. 26, 2015. A British-accented militant who has appeared in beheading videos released by the Islamic State group in Syria bears “striking similarities” to a man who grew up in London, a Muslim lobbying group said Thursday. Mohammed Emwazi has been identified by news organizations as the masked militant more commonly known as “Jihadi John.” London-based CAGE, which works with Muslims in conflict with British intelligence services, said Thursday its research director, Asim Qureshi, saw strong similarities, but because of the hood worn by the militant, “there was no way he could be 100 percent certain.”

  

LONDON (AP) -- The world knows him as "Jihadi John," the masked, knife-wielding militant in videos showing Western hostages being beheaded by the Islamic State group. On Thursday he was identified as a London-raised university graduate known to British intelligence for more than five years.

The British-accented militant from the chilling videos is Mohammed Emwazi, a man in his mid-20s who was born in Kuwait and raised in a modest, mixed-income area of west London.

No one answered the door at the brick row house where Emwazi's family is said to have lived. Neighbors in the area of public housing projects either declined comment or said they didn't know the family.

British anti-terror officials wouldn't confirm the man's identity, citing a "live counterterrorism investigation." But a well-placed Western official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly, confirmed he is Emwazi.

One man who knew Emwazi portrayed him as compassionate, a description completely at odds with the cruelty attributed to him.

"The Mohammed that I knew was extremely kind, extremely gentle, extremely soft-spoken, was the most humble young person that I knew," said Asim Qureshi of CAGE, a London-based advocacy group that counsels Muslims in conflict with British intelligence services.

Qureshi noted strong similarities between the man in the beheading videos and Emwazi, who he first met in 2009. But, "I can't be 100 percent certain."

"The guy's got a hood on his head. It's very, very difficult," Qureshi said, adding that his last contact with Emwazi was in January 2012.

Asked whether it was helpful or hurtful to have the jihadi publicly identified, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that investigators over the last several months "have found it to their advantage to not talk publicly about the details or progress of that investigation." He didn't confirm the identity of the suspect.

The Center for the Study of Radicalization and Political Violence at King's College London, which closely tracks fighters in Syria, said it believed the identification was correct.

"Jihadi John" appeared in a video released in August showing the slaying of American journalist James Foley, denouncing the West before the killing. Former captives identified him as one of a group of British militants that prisoners had nicknamed "The Beatles."

A man with similar stature and voice was also featured in videos of the killings of American journalist Steven Sotloff, Britons David Haines and Alan Hemming, and U.S. aid worker Abdul-Rahman Kassig.

The Washington Post and the BBC, which first identified the masked man in the video as Emwazi, said he was born in Kuwait, grew up in west London and studied computer programming at the University of Westminster. The university confirmed that a student of that name graduated in 2009.

"If these allegations are true, we are shocked and sickened by the news," the university said in a statement.

The news outlets said Emwazi was known to British authorities before he traveled to Syria in 2012, and Qureshi said Emwazi had accused British intelligence agents of harassing him.

Emwazi first contacted CAGE in 2009, Qureshi said. He had traveled to Tanzania with two other men after leaving university, but was deported and questioned in Amsterdam by British and Dutch intelligence services, who suspected him of attempting to join al-Shabaab militants in Somalia.

The following year, Emwazi accused the British intelligence services of preventing him from traveling to Kuwait, where he planned to work and marry.

CAGE quoted an email Emwazi had sent saying, "I had a job waiting for me and marriage to get started. But now I feel like a prisoner, only not in a cage, in London."

Qureshi accused British authorities of alienating and radicalizing young British Muslims with heavy-handed policies.

"When we treat people as if they are outsiders, they will inevitably feel like outsiders, and they will look for belonging elsewhere," he said.

Congregants leaving a mosque in the west London neighborhood where Emwazi is believed to have lived said they didn't know Emwazi and didn't believe he had worshipped there.

Neighbor Janine Kintenda, 47, who said she'd lived in the area for 16 years, was shocked at the news.

"Oh my God," she said, lifting her hand to her mouth. "This is bad. This is bad."

Shiraz Maher of the King's College radicalization center said he was investigating whether Emwazi was among a group of young west Londoners who traveled to Syria in about 2012.

Many of them are now dead, including Mohammad el-Araj, Ibrahim al-Mazwagi and Choukri Ellekhlifi, all killed in 2013.

Maher said it appears that Emwazi survived, and has become one of the most prominent members of the Islamic State group, a fighter whose confidence and Western accent are calculated to strike fear into viewers of the group's grisly videos.

Maher said Emwazi's background was similar to that of other British jihadis, and disproved the idea "that these guys are all impoverished, that they're coming from deprived backgrounds."

"They are by and large upwardly mobile people, well educated," he said.

The daughter of British aid worker Haines, who was killed in September, told ITV News that identifying the masked man was "a good step."

"But I think all the families will feel closure and relief once there's a bullet between his eyes," Bethany Haines said.

Sotloff's family said they felt "relieved" and "take comfort" after Emwazi's identity was revealed, and hope he will be caught and sent to prison.

"We want to sit in a courtroom, watch him sentenced and see him sent to a super-max prison where he will spend the rest of his life in isolation," family spokesman Barak Barfi told the BBC.

Experts: Insanity case as in 'American Sniper' hard to win

Experts: Insanity case as in 'American Sniper' hard to win 
 

Former Marine Cpl. Eddie Ray Routh stands during his capital murder trial at the Erath County, Donald R. Jones Justice Center in Stephenville Texas, on Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2015. Routh, 27, of Lancaster, is charged with the 2013 deaths of Chris Kyle and his friend Chad Littlefield at a shooting range near Glen Rose, Texas.

  

STEPHENVILLE, Texas (AP) -- The former Marine convicted of killing "American Sniper" author Chris Kyle and another man was hospitalized multiple times for psychiatric treatment and was prescribed medication to treat schizophrenia. He spoke of pig-human hybrids and the apocalypse and was described by Kyle himself as "straight-up nuts."

But jurors found the insanity defense for Eddie Ray Routh failed to meet the legal threshold: a mental illness so severe he didn't know right from wrong. His case illustrates the difficulty of succeeding with such a defense at a time when a Colorado court is preparing to hear similar arguments in the trial over a movie theater shooting in which 12 people were killed.

"The insanity defense is very rare, and it's even rarer that a defendant wins it," said George Dix, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin.

He said when a brutal crime is committed it's difficult to convince a jury the person accused doesn't "deserve the condemnation that comes from a finding of guilty." He added, "And here, we've got him causing the death of an American hero."

Kyle, a former Navy SEAL sniper, volunteered with veterans facing mental health problems after he left the military. A blockbuster film based on his memoir about his four tours in Iraq contributed to intense interest in the case.

Legal experts say a defense attorney's task to convince a jury that a client is legally insane is even more difficult in cases like that of Routh, who confessed to killing the men, apologized to the family and fled from police.

"If someone is admitting that they committed the murder, it's a pretty tough burden to get a jury to say, `Let's excuse him anyway,'" said Dallas defense attorney Michael Snipes.

Kyle and his friend, Chad Littlefield, were killed after taking Routh to a shooting range on Feb. 2, 2013. Routh's mother had asked Kyle if he could help her son, who she said had suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder after serving in Iraq and Haiti.

But the focus of the trial was not PTSD. Routh's attorneys said he suffered from schizophrenia and was having a psychotic episode at the time of the shootings, and noted that Kyle described Routh as "straight-up nuts" in a text message to Littlefield as they drove to the range.

Prosecutors painted the 27-year-old as a troubled drug user who nonetheless knew right from wrong.

A psychologist testifying for prosecutors said Routh was not legally insane but had a paranoid disorder made worse by his use of alcohol and marijuana. In contrast, a psychiatrist testifying for the defense said Routh had schizophrenia and had described seeing neighbors and friends turning into pig-human hybrids.

Snipes said that ultimately, experts cancel each other out in the minds of jurors, who instead look at the defendant's actions.

Juror Barrett Hutchinson told ABC's "Good Morning America" they were not convinced by the claim that Routh was having a psychotic episode. "He knew the consequences of pulling the trigger," Hutchinson said.

The defense plans an appeal, but Routh's attorney J. Warren St. John said he's not yet ready to discuss specifics.

The jury had three options: find Routh guilty of capital murder, find him not guilty or find him not guilty by reason of insanity. With the conviction, Routh received an automatic sentence of life in prison without parole.

Under a finding of not guilty by reason of insanity, Routh would have faced up to life in a state mental hospital. Experts say he would have had the possibility of release only if the state could no longer establish that he had a severe mental illness and was likely to harm another person if he didn't receive inpatient treatment.

But jurors couldn't be told the potential consequences of that finding, a stipulation St. John called a hurdle. 

Houston defense attorney George Parnham, who was not involved in the case, said it lets jurors assume such a verdict could mean the defendant "will ride down the elevator" with them.

Parnham represented Andrea Yates, the Houston-area woman convicted of drowning her five young children before being retried and found not guilty by reason of insanity. Yates is now in a minimum security state mental hospital.

He said that for the retrial, the defense focused less on mental health records and experts and more on getting jurors to see into the mind of the woman who Parnham said drowned her children because she thought that if she didn't they would be taken by Satan.

In Colorado, jurors are now being selected to hear the case against James Holmes, who has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to killing 12 people and injuring 70 in a 2012 attack at a suburban Denver theater.

As in Texas, Colorado law defines insanity as the inability to tell right from wrong - specifically because of a mental disease or defect. But Colorado is one of only a few states that puts the burden of proving sanity on the prosecution. Once a judge allows someone to plead not guilty by reason of insanity, prosecutors must convince the jury the defendant was sane.

AP: Trayvon Martin's mother says killer got away with murder

AP: Trayvon Martin's mother says killer got away with murder 

Sybrina Fulton, mother of Trayvon Martin, speaks with the Associated Press in Miami, Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2015. The U.S. Justice Department said Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2015, that George Zimmerman, the former neighborhood watch volunteer will not face federal charges in the shooting death of unarmed 17-year-old Martin. Zimmerman was acquitted in 2013 of second-degree murder.

  

MIAMI (AP) -- The mother of Trayvon Martin says she's disappointed that federal prosecutors decided not to charge a neighborhood watch volunteer with a hate crime for killing her son three years ago.

Speaking with The Associated Press on Wednesday before the third anniversary of her 17-year-old son's death, Sybrina Fulton says she still believes George Zimmerman got away with murder.

"He took a life, carelessly and recklessly, and he shouldn't deserve to have his entire life walking around on the street free. I just believe that he should be held accountable for what he's done," Fulton said.

Zimmerman claimed he shot the unarmed teenager in self-defense after confronting Martin while volunteering for his neighborhood watch group. A jury acquitted him of second-degree murder the next year.

The case sparked a national conversation about race, bias and crime in part because Zimmerman, who identifies himself as Hispanic, was not immediately arrested after shooting Martin, who is black.

The U.S. Justice Department announced Tuesday that it found insufficient evidence to establish that Zimmerman willfully deprived Martin of his civil rights or killed him because of his race.

"The Justice Department is the top of the line here," Fulton said. "But what they found just wasn't enough."

Zimmerman, for his part, is relieved the case is closed, according to his attorney, Don West.

"This cloud he was under has been lifted," West told the AP, adding that he finds it misleading to suggest that charges weren't filed only because the legal standard for federal hate crime is so tough to meet.

"There simply was never any compelling evidence that this was a federal hate crime. Race played no role in it whatsoever," West said.

The February 2012 confrontation began after Zimmerman spotted Martin walking through the neighborhood, returning to his father's home after buying candy and a soft drink at a convenience store.

Zimmerman called 911 to report a suspicious person, and got out of his car to follow Martin despite being warned by the dispatcher not to. Zimmerman did not testify at his trial, but he told investigators he feared for his life as Martin straddled him and punched him during the ensuing fight.

Wearing a T-shirt bearing a black-and-white image of her son in a hoodie, Fulton said she still longs for Zimmerman to be held responsible.

"I want to see people held accountable for what they're doing. It's just upsetting to know that a person can shoot and kill someone and justify it," Fulton said.

Fulton now channels her grief into work with The Trayvon Martin Foundation, which reaches out to other families who have lost children to violence, awards scholarships and collects school supplies for poor students.

She's also watching to see how the Justice Department handles other high-profile killings of unarmed blacks. Decisions are pending on whether to charge police in New York and Ferguson, Missouri with depriving the victims of their civil rights by using excessive force in the course of duty.

"What we want is accountability, we want somebody to be arrested, we want somebody to go to jail, of course," Fulton said. "But ... we have grand juries and special grand juries; they're making a decision to not even arrest a person."

Justice Dept.: No federal charges in Trayvon Martin death

Justice Dept.: No federal charges in Trayvon Martin death 
 

FILE - This Jan. 10, 2015 booking file photo provided by the Seminole County Public Affairs shows George Zimmerman. The U.S. Justice Department said Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2015, that the former neighborhood watch volunteer will not face federal charges in the shooting death of unarmed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. Zimmerman was acquitted in 2013 of second-degree murder.

MIAMI (AP) -- George Zimmerman, the former neighborhood watch volunteer who fatally shot Trayvon Martin in a 2012 confrontation with the teenager, will not face federal charges, the Justice Department said Tuesday.

The decision, announced in the waning days of Attorney General Eric Holder's tenure, resolves a case that focused public attention on self-defense laws and became a flashpoint in the national conversation about race two years before the Ferguson, Missouri, police shooting.

Zimmerman has maintained that he acted in self-defense when he shot the 17-year-old Martin during a confrontation inside a gated community in Sanford, Florida, just outside Orlando. Martin, who was black, was unarmed when he was killed. Zimmerman identifies himself as Hispanic.

Once Zimmerman was acquitted of second-degree murder by a state jury in July 2013, Martin's family turned to the federal investigation in final hopes that he would be held accountable for the shooting.

That probe focused on whether Zimmerman could be charged with a federal hate crime in the killing and whether he willfully deprived Martin of his civil rights, a difficult legal standard to meet. Federal investigators, who independently conducted dozens of interviews, ultimately determined there was insufficient evidence to prove Zimmerman killed the teenager on account of his race.

"Our decision not to pursue federal charges does not condone the shooting that resulted in the death of Trayvon Martin and is based solely on the high legal standard applicable to these cases," Vanita Gupta, the Justice Department's top civil rights lawyer, said in a statement announcing the decision.

Zimmerman's attorney, Don West, was on a flight and couldn't immediately comment on the decision. A call to Zimmerman's cellphone went directly to voicemail.

Martin's parents were too distraught after their meeting in Miami with Justice Department officials to speak with reporters, said their attorney Ben Crump, who called the decision a "bitter pill to swallow" even though it was expected.

"What they told his family and I was that because Trayvon wasn't able to tell us his version of events, there was a lack of evidence to bring the charges. That's the tragedy," Crump said.

The February 2012 confrontation began after Zimmerman observed Martin while driving in his neighborhood. Zimmerman called police and got out of his car and approached Martin, who was returning from a store while visiting his father and his father's fiancee at the same townhome complex where Zimmerman lived.

Prosecutors contended that Zimmerman was profiling Martin and perceived him as someone suspicious in the neighborhood; Zimmerman did not testify at his trial, but he earlier told investigators that he feared for his life as Martin straddled him and punched him during the fight.

Federal investigators said they examined the case under multiple civil-rights provisions, including ones that make it illegal to use force against someone based on their race and another that criminalizes race-based interference with a person's federally protected housing rights. They said they conducted roughly 75 witness interviews, examined police reports and reviewed all of the evidence gathered during the state prosecution.

Tamara Rice Lave, a professor of the University of Miami's School of Law, said the Justice Department conclusion was not surprising because there was no direct or circumstantial evidence that Zimmerman's actions were motivated by race.

In a 911 call, as he followed Martin through their Sanford neighborhood, Zimmerman said the teenager "looks black."

"But he doesn't say the things that would make you think it was motivated by race," Lave said. "He doesn't call him the N-word."

Black leaders in Sanford, where Martin was shot, also said they weren't surprised by the decision.

"I was expecting this to happen," said Turner Clayton, a former local leader of the NAACP.

Truck stalls on track before fiery train crash, 28 injured

Truck stalls on track before fiery train crash, 28 injured 
 

A firefighter climbs into the wreck of a Metrolink passenger train that derailed, Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2015, in Oxnard, Calif. Three cars of the Metrolink train tumbled onto their sides, injuring dozens of people in agricultural country 65 miles northwest of Los Angeles. Metrolink spokesman Scott Johnson told the Los Angeles Times that at least 30 people were injured.

OXNARD, Calif. (AP) -- A commuter train bound for Los Angeles derailed before dawn Tuesday in a fiery collision with a pickup truck abandoned by its driver after it got stuck on the tracks.

There was a loud boom and the screech of brakes before three of the train's five cars toppled over, injuring 28 people, four critically.

"It seemed like an eternity while we were flying around the train. Everything was flying," said passenger Joel Bingham. "A brush of death definitely came over me."

Lives were likely saved by passenger cars designed to absorb a crash that were purchased after a deadly collision a decade ago, Metrolink officials said. The four passenger cars remained largely intact as did the locomotive.

Police found the disoriented driver of the demolished Ford F-450 pickup truck about a mile or two from the crossing, said Jason Benites, an assistant chief of the Oxnard Police Department.

The driver, Jose Alejandro Sanchez Ramirez, 54, of Yuma, Arizona, was arrested on suspicion of felony hit-and-run, Benites said at an afternoon news conference.

Sanchez Ramirez was hauling a trailer to deliver produce and told police he tried to turn right at an intersection but turned prematurely onto the tracks and got stuck. He was hospitalized for observation.

The crossing has been the scene of many collisions over the years.

The train, the first of the morning on the Ventura route, had just left its second stop of Oxnard on its way to downtown Los Angeles, about 65 miles away, when it struck the truck around 5:45 a.m. There were 48 passengers aboard and three crew members, who were all injured.

The engineer saw the abandoned vehicle and hit the brakes, but there wasn't enough time to stop, Oxnard Fire Battalion Chief Sergio Martinez said.

Bingham said the lights went out when the train fell over. He was banged up from head to toe but managed to find an escape for himself and others where the train was resting above an indentation in the ground.

"I was just shaking," he said. "I opened the window and told everybody, `Come to my voice.'"

Firefighters set up red, yellow and green tarps to categorize people according to their injuries. Many of the 23 people who weren't injured stood nearby wrapped in white blankets.

Others were taken to several nearby hospitals and treated for a variety of ailments.

"Patients have complained of dizziness, of headaches, of lower back pain, of pains related to being bumped, thrown, hit and so forth," said Dr. Bryan Wong, chief medical officer at Ventura County Medical Center.

One patient described how he had been working on his laptop and a moment later there was a sudden jerking motion that happened so quickly he wasn't able to grab hold of anything, Wong said. He was violently tossed against a wall of the train.

The train typically would be accelerating out of the Oxnard station past verdant farm fields at about 55 mph, Metrolink spokesman Scott Johnson said. With braking, he estimated it would have hit the truck at between 40 mph and 55 mph.

The train was pushed by a locomotive in the rear, allowing trains to change direction without having to turn around or swap engines. It's a configuration that has been criticized for putting passengers in a vulnerable position in a crash.

After such a crash killed 11 people and injured 180 others in Glendale in 2005, Metrolink invested heavily to buy passenger cars with collapsible bumpers and other features to absorb impact.

Metrolink spokesman Jeff Lustgarten said the Oxnard crash showed the technology worked.

"Safe to say it would have been much worse without it," he said.

The city of Oxnard has wanted to build a $30 million bridge over the crossing for 10 years, but is only at the environmental review stage, said Darren Kettle, executive director of the Ventura County Transportation Commission.

There have been six accidents at the crossing in the past seven years, including one in which a driver accidently turned onto the tracks in 2010 and was struck by a Metrolink train and injured, according to federal railroad accident reports. Two people were killed at the crossing last year when a car struck an Amtrak train.

The driver said he turned onto the tracks before the crossing arm came down, which occurs 29 seconds before a train arrives. It wasn't clear how long his truck was stuck before the train hit it.

The accident on Tuesday happened on the same line as Metrolink's worst disaster when 25 people were killed Sept. 12, 2008. A commuter train engineer was texting and ran a red light, striking a Union Pacific freight train head-on in the San Fernando Valley community of Chatsworth. More than 100 people were hurt in what was one of the worst railroad accidents in U.S. history.

The National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Railroad Administration were sending investigators to the Tuesday crash in Oxnard.

The tracks, which are also used by Amtrak and freight trains were shut down.

Sydney Mitchell: Best High School Girl Photo-Bodine High School of International Affairs

Sydney Mitchell: Best High School Girl Photo-Bodine High School of International Affairs

Sydney Mitchell Best High School Female Photo of the Month

From Van Stone: International and USA Fashion and Beauty Collection

Up and coming hot female high school model, Sydney Mitchell wowed the crowd because she is a star in two or more categories. Girls Basketball and Girls Amateur Modeling Just for Fun.

Sydney Mitchell, who is a young positive Black American Female, can impress if it is her desire by any talented outfits, custom makeup, killer jewelry and amazing modeling skills of the younger and older generation.

Watch for Sydney Mitchell from Philadelphia, PA -USA.

Impasse in Senate on Homeland budget bill as shutdown looms

Impasse in Senate on Homeland budget bill as shutdown looms

Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, joined by the department employees, during a news conference in Washington, Monday, Feb. 23, 2015. A partial shutdown of the Homeland Security Department loomed at week’s end, but no solution was in sight as senators returned to the Capitol from a week-long recess Monday to confront an impasse over the issue.

  

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama warned Monday that states will feel the pain of a Homeland Security Department shutdown if Congress can't break an impasse by week's end. But on Capitol Hill, no solution was in sight.

"It will have a direct impact on your economy, and it will have a direct impact on America's national security," Obama told the nation's governors as they visited the White House as part of their annual conference. With tens of thousands of workers in line to be furloughed if the agency shuts down at midnight Friday, and many more forced to work without pay, the president cast the standoff in starkly economic terms.

"These are folks who, if they don't have a paycheck, are not going to be able to spend that money in your states," the president said. "And as governors, you know that we can't afford to play politics with our national security."

The president's words appeared to have little impact on Capitol Hill, where Senate Republicans lined up a fourth procedural vote on House-passed legislation that funds the Homeland Security Department through the Sept. 30 end of the budget year, while also rolling back Obama's executive actions granting work permits to millions of immigrants in this country illegally.

The outcome of Monday evening's vote was expected to be the same as three other attempts earlier this month, when Senate Democrats lined up to block the legislation from advancing. Democrats say they won't agree to the bill unless the GOP-written immigration provisions are removed.

The stalemate on Capitol Hill also appeared unchanged by a federal judge's ruling last week that said Obama's executive actions exceeded his authority and put them on hold just as the first wave of immigrants, tens of thousands brought here illegally as children, were to begin applying for work permits and deportation deferrals.

The Obama administration on Monday asked U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen in Brownsville, Texas, to put his ruling on hold and filed a notice of appeal of his ruling to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans.

The legal developments increased calls from a few Republican senators to pass a "clean" Homeland Security bill without the contested language on immigration.

"I hope my House colleagues will understand that our best bet is to challenge this in court, that if we don't fund the Department of Homeland Security, we'll get blamed as a party," Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Sunday on ABC's "This Week."

But House Republicans said they had no interest in revisiting the issue after passing a $39.7 billion bill last month that funds the department through Sept. 30, the end of the budget year, while also undoing Obama's actions on immigration. Instead, they insisted that the Senate must act.

"A federal judge has confirmed that what we've done is the right thing," conservative Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio said Monday. "I hope that the U.S. Senate can see the light and do the right thing."

A short-term extension of current funding levels remained possible, but lawmakers had only a few days to come up with even that partial solution before the agency's funding expires.

A Homeland Security shutdown would result in some 30,000 administrative and other workers getting furloughed. Some 200,000 others would fall into essential categories and stay on the job at agencies like the Border Patrol, Secret Service and Transportation Security Administration, though mostly without drawing a paycheck until the situation is resolved.

Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson argued over the weekend that the furloughs could harm the U.S. response to terrorist threats and warnings, such as the one late Saturday on Minnesota's Mall of America. Some 80 percent of Federal Emergency Management Agency workers would be furloughed even as that agency contends with two months of devastating snowfall and cold from New England to the Mountain States, Johnson said.

But some Republicans have argued that because the large majority of agency staff would keep working, albeit without getting paid, the harmful impacts of a shutdown were being exaggerated.

Somalia extremists urge attacks on US shopping malls

Somalia extremists urge attacks on US shopping malls 

A Sunday, Feb. 22, 2015 photo shows the exterior of the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn. A video released late Saturday, Feb. 21, 2015, purported to be by Somalia’s al-Qaida-linked rebels, urges Muslims to attack shopping malls in North America, Britain and other Western countries, specifically mentioning the Mall of America in Minnesota, the West Edmonton Mall in Canada, and the Westfield Mall in Stratford, England.

  

JOHANNESBURG (AP) -- A video purported to be by Somalia's al-Qaida-linked rebel group al-Shabab urged Muslims to attack shopping malls in the U.S., Canada, Britain and other Western countries.

The threat came in the final minutes of a more than hourlong video in which the extremists also warned Kenya of more attacks like the September 2013 assault on the Westgate Mall in Nairobi in which 67 people were killed. The video included footage from major news organizations showing the assault on the mall and said it was in reprisal for alleged abuses by Kenyan troops against Muslims in Somalia.

The masked narrator concluded by calling on Muslims to attack shopping malls, specifically naming the Mall of America in Minnesota, as well as the West Edmonton Mall in Canada and the Westfield mall in Stratford, England.

The authenticity of the video could not be immediately verified by The Associated Press.

The narrator, his face wrapped in a black-and-white kaffiyeh-type scarf and wearing a camouflage jacket, spoke with a British accent and appeared to be of Somali origin.

"What if such an attack were to occur in the Mall of America in Minnesota? Or the West Edmonton Mall in Canada? Or in London's Oxford Street?" the man said, then called for Britain's Westfield mall to be targeted.

Speaking on morning talk shows in the U.S., Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson called the video "the new phase" of the global terrorist threat and warned the public to be vigilant.

"These groups are relying more and more on independent actors to become inspired, drawn to the cause and they'll attack on their own," Johnson said, speaking on CNN's "State of the Union."

"I am very concerned about serious potential threats of independent actors here in the United States. We've seen this now in Europe, we've seen this in Canada."

Asked about the specific threat against the Mall of America, Johnson said: "Any time a terrorist organization calls for an attack on a specific place we've got to take that seriously. What we're telling the public is you've got to be vigilant. ... There will be enhanced security there that will be apparent, but public vigilance, public awareness and public caution in situations like this is particularly important. It's the environment we're in."

The Mall of America, one of the nation's largest, located in Bloomington, Minnesota, said in a statement that it was "aware of a threatening video which includes a mention and images of the mall," and said extra security had been put in place

Shoppers seemed undeterred Sunday by the threat.

"I'm more afraid of the cold today than any terrorists," said Mary Lamminen, of St. Paul.

David Modrynski said he talked with his wife and son about whether to visit the mall after hearing about the video. "But we can't stop living our lives because somebody says they're going to do something," Modrynski said.

While al-Shabab has carried out attacks in neighboring Kenya, Uganda and Djibouti, which all have troops fighting the extremists as part of the multinational African Union force, the al-Qaida affiliate has never operated outside East Africa and the Horn of Africa.

Minnesota, home to the largest Somali population in the U.S., has been the target of terror recruiters in the past. Since 2007, more than 22 young Somali men from Minnesota have traveled to Somalia to join al-Shabab, and a handful of Minnesota residents have also traveled to Syria to fight with militant groups within the last year, authorities say. At least one Minnesotan has died while fighting for the Islamic State group.

On Thursday, a 19-year-old Minneapolis man who was stopped at a New York City airport in November as he and three others were allegedly attempting to travel to Syria was indicted on charges associated with supporting the Islamic State group.

Last week U.S. Attorney Andy Luger led a Minnesota delegation, including law enforcement officials and Somali community leaders, to a White House summit on countering extremism and radicalization. In his remarks, Vice President Joe Biden held up Minneapolis, Boston and Los Angeles as examples of communities moving ahead with programs to counter extremism locally.

In Kenya, the government dismissed the al-Shabab video.

"They're using propaganda to legitimize what cannot be legitimized. When you lead a group to go and attack a shopping mall and kill innocent shoppers that cannot be legitimized, those were not soldiers," Interior Ministry spokesman Mwenda Njoka said.

"Muslims also died in the Westgate attack. It's in our interest to ensure Somalia is stabilized because the instability affects us. The video is cheap propaganda trying to re-write history and to get more support from those support them."

Chicago-area imam charged with sex abuse at Islamic school

Chicago-area imam charged with sex abuse at Islamic school 

The undated booking photo provided by the Elgin Police Department shows Mohammad Abdullah Saleem, 75, of Gilberts, Ill. Saleem, the longtime head of the Institute of Islamic Education in Elgin, Ill. was arrested Sunday, Feb. 15, 2015, and charged with sexually abusing a 23-year-old woman who worked at the school. Saleem is due to appear in Cook County bond court on Tuesday, Feb. 17 in Rolling Meadows, Ill.

CHICAGO (AP) -- The longtime head of a suburban Chicago Islamic school has been charged with sexually assaulting a woman who worked there, and a civil suit filed Tuesday accuses him of abusing that employee and three teenage students. The legal actions shed light on an issue that even many Muslims say is too often pushed into the shadows within their communities.

Mohammad Abdullah Saleem, 75 - who founded the Institute of Islamic Education and is regarded as a leading Islamic scholar, or imam, in the United States - is charged with felony criminal sexual abuse. 

Prosecutors said he abused the 23-year-old woman, an administrative assistant at the Elgin school, in a series of escalating incidents over months.

The civil suit accuses Saleem of abusing that employee, as well as three female students at the school as far back as the 1980s. The lawyer in that case, Steven Denny, said Saleem took advantage of both the trust accorded to him as a religious leader and of the tendency of Muslims to remain silent on matters of sex and sexual abuse.

"This place was ripe for abuse," Denny told a news conference.

It took special courage, he added, for his clients to come forward within a culture that discourages even casual contact - never mind explicit sexual contact.

The suit says a fifth person was abused when he was 11 by a male staffer at the school, not Saleem. It accuses the school of failing to protect children, many of whom lived on campus. It asks for more than $1.5 million in compensation, saying the victims are psychologically scarred.

Defense attorney Thomas Glasgow said he talked to his client about the Elgin charges and that Saleem "categorically denies the allegations." He hadn't had a chance to speak to him about the lawsuit. No one answered the phone Tuesday at the school, which has students from grades six through 12 and is 25 miles northwest of Chicago.

Saleem, of Gilberts, was arrested Sunday, Elgin police said. Authorities started investigating after the woman contacted them in December.

During a Tuesday bond hearing, prosecutors alleged that a month after the woman started working at the school in 2012, Saleem started removing the religious veil from her face and came into her office to hug her. Over several months, prosecutors said, he would hug her and squeeze her buttocks and breasts over her clothes.

Last April, prosecutors say Saleem locked the door of the woman's office, lifted her dress, forced her to sit on top of him, massaged her and held her down when she tried to get up. Prosecutors say they collected evidence.

The lawsuit says that when one female student told a teacher Saleem touched her inappropriately, she was told, "Saleem is an old man and old people do things like that - so just forget it."

Saleem's bond was set at $250,000 and he was ordered to have no contact with the accuser, her family or anyone under age 18. Glasgow said he expected Saleem to post bond later Tuesday. Saleem, who also had to surrender his passport, is due in court again March 10.

At Denny's news conference, a statement from the 23-year-old woman called on Muslims to speak up about sexual abuse. She said, "I will no longer stay silent."

The chairman of the Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater America, to which the school belongs, says he examined the facility's bylaws and found they granted Saleem almost absolute decision-making power. In light of Saleem's arrest, Mohammed Kaiseruddin said Islamic schools nationwide should rework their bylaws to allow greater oversight.

Nadiah Mohajir, director of HEART Women and Girls, which raises awareness about sexual abuse in the Muslim community, called Saleem's arrest "a wake-up call" that presented an opportunity to address a topic that's been taboo for too long.

"The shame and stigma surrounding sexual abuse is even higher in Muslim communities, with its emphasis on purity and modesty," she said.

Kaiseruddin said the matter illustrated that Muslims were not immune to a problem that has plagued the Roman Catholic Church.

"We found out that Muslims are burdened by the same (issue) other faiths are burdened with," he said.

Alabama's stand against gay marriage crumbles

Alabama's stand against gay marriage crumbles
 

Milton Persinger, left, and Robert Povilat, both of Mobile, Ala., get married at Government Plaza as the Rev. Sandy O'Steen from Cornerstone Metropolitan Community Church officiates. They were the first same-sex couple to get married in Mobile, Ala., Thursday Feb. 12, 2015.

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) -- Alabama's stand against gay marriage crumbled Friday as judges in most counties sided with federal courts rather than their own chief justice, a Republican who once called homosexuality an inherent evil.

Many counties in the Bible Belt state reversed course and began issuing the licenses to same-sex couples after the latest strongly worded order from U.S. District Judge Callie Granade. She said Thursday that a judge could no longer deny marriage licenses to gays and lesbians, reiterating her ruling striking down the state's ban on same-sex marriage.

"These numbers represent a seismic shift in favor of equality and justice. Resistance to happy, loving and committed same-sex couples getting married is quickly crumbling throughout the state," said Fred Sainz, a top spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, which has been lobbying to expand gay rights nationwide.

Granade's ruling enabling gays to get licenses went into effect Monday after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene. But even then, Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore said county judges were not bound by her decision.

"It's my duty to speak up when I see the jurisdiction of our courts being intruded by unlawful federal authority," Moore insisted in an interview with The Associated Press later Monday.

About 20 of Alabama's counties allowed gays and lesbians to wed on Monday. By Friday that number had jumped to at least 47, the Human Rights Campaign said. Other counties said they would revisit the decision next week.

Granade's ruling made Alabama the 37th state where gays and lesbians can legally wed. It also continued her family legacy of bringing sweeping change to a place where many people didn't yet welcome it.

Her grandfather was Richard Rives, a federal appellate judge whose rulings helped desegregate the South despite resistance to the Civil Rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s.

"Judge Rives, my grandfather, really is my personal hero," Granade said during her 2001 Senate confirmation hearing. She denied then that "judicial activism" describes what her grandfather did - or what she might do.

"The issues on which he more or less broke with precedent were ones which really flew in the face of the Constitution," she said. "I think a judge will always be correct if the decisions that he or she makes are consistent with the plain language of the Constitution."

While many Republican politicians in Alabama criticized her ruling last month and tried to link her to Obama administration policies, Granade was appointed to the federal bench by President George W. Bush.

Granade could have stayed her decision pending a final U.S. Supreme Court ruling, as federal judges in Mississippi and Arkansas did. Instead, she rejected Alabama's argument that keeping gays and lesbians from marrying benefits the state's children. And after Moore urged judges this week to ignore her ruling, she reiterated that they are bound by the U.S. Constitution to treat all couples equally.

Lee County's probate judge, Bill English, said Friday that Granade's order "makes it clear" he had to open his courthouse doors.

Moore's stand against federal authority surprised no one in Alabama, where the 68-year-old jurist who twice ran for governor burnished his conservative image a decade ago with a losing fight to keep his Ten Commandments statue inside the Alabama Judicial Building.

While Moore again appeared on the losing side Friday, a longtime supporter said the 81 percent of Alabama voters who chose to ban gay marriage in 2006 would appreciate his stand.

"I think this lady judge is scaring the daylights out of these people," Orange Beach businessman Dean Young said. "The people are very thankful that Judge Moore is standing up."