Government sues Ferguson after city tries to revise deal
Government sues Ferguson after city tries to revise deal
FERGUSON, Mo. (AP) — The federal government sued Ferguson on Wednesday, one day after the city council voted to revise an agreement aimed at improving the way police and courts treat poor people and minorities in the St. Louis suburb.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Ferguson’s decision to reject the deal left the department no choice except to file a civil-rights lawsuit.
“The residents of Ferguson have waited nearly a year for the city to adopt an agreement that would protect their rights and keep them safe. … They have waited decades for justice. They should not be forced to wait any longer,” Lynch told a Washington news conference.
The Justice Department complaint accuses Ferguson of routinely violating residents’ rights and misusing law enforcement to generate revenue — a practice the government alleged was “ongoing and pervasive.”
Ferguson leaders “had a real opportunity here to step forward, and they’ve chosen to step backward,” Lynch said.
Russia proposes March 1 ceasefire in Syria; US wants it now
MUNICH (AP) — Russia has proposed a March 1 ceasefire in Syria, U.S. officials said Wednesday, but Washington believes Moscow is giving itself and the Syrian government three weeks to try to crush moderate rebel groups.
The United States has countered with demands for the fighting to stop immediately, the officials said. Peace talks are supposed to resume by Feb. 25.
The talk of new ceasefire plans comes as the U.S., Russia and more than a dozen other countries meet in Munich to try to halt five years of civil war in the Arab country. The conflict has killed more than a quarter-million people, created Europe’s biggest refugee crisis since World War II and allowed the Islamic State to carve out its own territory across parts of Syria and neighboring Iraq.
Russia says it is supporting Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government as part of a counterterrorism campaign. But the West says the majority of its strikes are targeting moderate groups that are opposed to Assad and the Islamic State.
The most recent Russian-backed offensive, near Aleppo, prompted opposition groups to walk out of peace talks last month in Geneva, while forcing tens of thousands of civilians to flee toward the Turkish border.
2 deputies killed, suspect dead in shopping center shootout
ABINGDON, Md. (AP) — A gunman fatally shot a sheriff’s deputy inside a crowded restaurant at lunchtime Wednesday and killed another deputy in a shootout, authorities and witnesses said.
The gunman was killed in the exchange of gunfire not far from the shopping center where the restaurant was located, Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler said. Remarkably, no bystanders were hurt.
Police haven’t released a motive for the shooting, but the sheriff said he believed the first deputy who approached the gunman was shot because he was wearing a uniform. The shooter, identified as 67-year-old David Brian Evans, had warrants out for his arrest in Harford County and Florida, where he was accused of assaulting a police officer.
The initial shooting took place inside a Panera restaurant in Abingdon, which is about 20 miles northeast of Baltimore.
Sophia Faulkner, 15, said she and her mother were getting lunch and almost sat right next to the gunman. Instead, they chose a booth about 10 feet away because the man appeared “sketchy” and disheveled. He was sitting in the back and hadn’t ordered any food, Faulker and her mother said.
Christie, Fiorina end 2016 White House bids
NASHUA, N.H. (AP) — New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie dropped out of the Republican nomination for president Wednesday, a day after his disappointing sixth-place finish in New Hampshire’s primary.
Campaign spokeswoman Samantha Smith said Christie shared his decision with staff at his campaign headquarters in Morristown, N.J., late Wednesday afternoon, and was calling donors and other supporters.
Christie dropped out of the race the same day that Carly Fiorina announced on social media that she, too, was calling it quits. The former chief executive of Hewlett-Packard won just 4 percent of the vote in New Hampshire. Christie had 7 percent.
Ex-priest arrested in 1960 slaying of Texas beauty queen
HOUSTON (AP) — For more than half a century, the unsolved killing of a young schoolteacher and beauty queen who was last seen at church haunted the Texas city of McAllen.
But now, nearly 56 years after the bludgeoned body of 25-year-old Irene Garza was pulled from an irrigation canal, police have arrested the man long suspected in her slaying: the former priest who apparently heard her final confession.
Using a walker, a frail-looking John Bernard Feit, now 83, appeared in court Wednesday in Phoenix after being arrested a day earlier at his home in Scottsdale, Arizona, on murder charges. He was jailed on $750,000 cash bail while he awaits transfer back to Texas.
“This whole thing makes no sense to me because the crime in question took place in 1960,” he said.
Feit’s arrest followed other investigations over the years, including a grand jury probe in 2004 that concluded there was insufficient evidence to charge him.