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Nashville school shooter sent alarming messages before the massacre, former teammate says

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

Nashville school shooter Audrey Hale sent alarming messages to a former middle-school basketball teammate shortly before Monday’s deadly massacre, the ex-classmate said.Hale wrote she planned to commit suicide and that she’d likely be covered on the news in a series of direct messages to Averianna Patton over Instagram at 9:57 a.m. Monday, Patton told the Nashville news station WTVF.“One day this will make more sense,” Hale wrote, according to the messages published by the TV outlet. “I’ve left behind more than enough evidence behind. But something bad is about to happen.”Police say they received an active-shooter call at the Covenant School, where Hale was a former student, at 10:13 a.m. The shooting left three 9-year-old students and three adults dead, and Hale was fatally shot by police, officials said.Patton says she tried to help Hale after receiving her messages.“I tried to comfort and encourage her and subsequently reached out to the Suicide Prevention Help Line after being i...

Stocks hold steady as some calm remains on Wall Street

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are mixed in relatively quiet trading on Tuesday, and Wall Street is regaining some cool at the tail end of what’s been a turmoil-filled month.The S&P 500 was virtually unchanged in morning trading. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 99 points, or 0.3%, at 32,531 as of 10:15 a.m. Eastern time, while the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% lower. There was calm even in the bond market, which has been home to some of Wall Street’s wildest moves since fears flared about the banking system earlier this month. Yields were holding relatively steady following their historic-sized moves in prior weeks. This month has been dominated by worries that banks around the world may be cracking under the pressure of much higher interest rates. In the U.S., investors have been on the hunt for smaller and midsized banks that could see a quick exodus of customers akin to the run that toppled Silicon Valley Bank. In Europe, meanwhile, big banks have come under pressure at times as ...

Comic Relief launches metaverse fundraiser to fight poverty

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

Can playing more Roblox make your kids more philanthropic?That’s what the nonprofit Comic Relief US hopes, announcing Tuesday its new Kids Relief initiative to encourage giving and community building with a new virtual world on the social gaming platform. The “Kids Relief Presents: Solarpunk Simulator” experience on Roblox will also serve as a fundraiser for Comic Relief’s real-life programs battling poverty in America, especially those empowering young people in that fight.Alison Moore, CEO of Comic Relief US, told The Associated Press that the Roblox virtual world and the entire Kids Relief initiative is designed to “support young people’s ability to drive change.”“Children and young people have a deeper understanding that they have the power to make change,” said Moore. “They have the power to gather together and link their arms to do something to change the world tomorrow. They’ve got the mindset that adults don’t have — that they can do it.”Comic Relief US is behind high-...

Bankman-Fried charged with paying $40M bribe to China

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was charged with directing $40 million in bribes to one or more Chinese officials to unfreeze assets relating to his cryptocurrency business in a newly rewritten indictment unsealed Tuesday.The charge of conspiracy to violate the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act raises to 13 the number of charges Bankman-Fried faces after he was arrested in the Bahamas in December and brought to the United States soon afterward.FTX filed for bankruptcy on Nov. 11, when it ran out of money after the cryptocurrency equivalent of a bank run. He has remained free on a $250 million personal recognizance bond that lets him stay with his parents in Palo Alto, California.He has pleaded not guilty to charges that he cheated investors out of billions of dollars before his business collapsed.The alleged bribes stemmed from the operation of Alameda Research, which is affiliated with FTX, Bankman-Fried’s global cryptocurrency exchang...

MLB The Show breaks barrier with Negro League players

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — MLB The Show has broken a video game barrier: For the first time, the franchise will insert some of the greatest Negro League players — from Satchel Paige to Jackie Robinson — into the 2023 edition of the game as playable characters.Video gamers are now able to venture into a storyline mode involving eight Negro League legends through MLB The Show 23, which releases Tuesday. The narrative experience will feature short videos about the players along with gameplay focused on the epic moments of their careers.Along with Robinson and Paige, the game also features other players including Buck O’Neil, Rube Foster, Hilton Smith, John Donaldson, Hank Thompson and Martin Dihigo.“This made sense on multiple levels,” said Bob Kendrick, the narrator of storyline experience and president of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, which is located in Kansas City, Missouri. Along with the museum, he partnered with Sony for the historic Black players’ insertion into the ga...

Harris in Africa looks to painful past, innovative future

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

ACCRA, Ghana (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday stood before a monument commemorating Ghana’s independence from colonialism and envisioned a grand future between the U.S. and Africa, propelled by innovation on the continent. But she’s also insisting on exploring past wounds, heading to a seaside fort where enslaved Africans were loaded onto ships bound for the Americas.“We have an intertwined history, some of which is painful and some of which is prideful,” she told a crowd of gathered at the Black Stone Gate, the monument bearing the words: “Freedom and Justice” and 1957, the year the country became independent. “And all of which we must acknowledge, teach and never forget.” The events on her second full day in Ghana is part of a weeklong trip that will include visits to Tanzania and Zambia. Harris is the most high-profile member of President Joe Biden’s administration to visit Africa as the U.S. escalates its outreach to the continent.As the nation...

Portugal: Muslim center stabbings probed as possible terror

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

LISBON, Portugal (AP) — A man wielding a large knife killed two woman and injured several other people at an Ismaili Muslim center in Lisbon, and Portuguese authorities said they were investigating Tuesday’s stabbing attack as a possible terror act.The women were Portuguese staff members at the center, Ismaili community leader Narzim Ahmad told Portuguese TV channel SIC.Officers dispatched to the center late Tuesday morning encountered a man armed with a knife, according to a police statement. The officers ordered him to surrender and he was shot when he advanced toward them, the statement said. A suspect was in police custody at a Lisbon hospital. Investigators were looking into terrorism as a possible motive.Several other people were wounded, according to the statement, which provided no further details.Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa said police shot the suspect and told reporters the attack was “a criminal act.” “Everything points to this being an isolated incident...

US, UK sanction 6 Syria-linked amphetamine traffickers

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

BEIRUT (AP) — The U.S. and U.K. on Tuesday slapped sanctions on four Syrians and two Lebanese involved in manufacturing and trafficking the amphetamine drug Captagon, the two governments said. The six include cousins of Syrian President Bashar Assad and notorious Lebanese drug lynchpins.Experts say Captagon is primarily produced in Syria and Lebanon, where packages containing millions of pills are smuggled into Gulf countries, Europe and elsewhere. The trade allegedly has strong ties to Assad and his associates, as well as key ally, the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group in neighboring Lebanon. The U.K.’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office statement announcing the sanctions said the Captagon industry is worth $57 billion to Assad, and has been a key source of revenue as Syria’ uprising turned-conflict continues for a 13th year. Assad’s brutal crackdown on protests in 2011 led to his global isolation, and his forces were accused of rampant torture, bom...

HBO’s ‘Succession’ sets viewer mark for fourth-season start

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — HBO’s “Succession” opened its fourth and final season with a record first-night audience of 2.3 million viewers, the Nielsen company said on Tuesday.That tops the previous high for the drama about a backbiting family of media moguls. It beat the 1.7 million who watched last season’s finale the first night it was available, Nielsen said.For HBO, the first-night audience is usually only a fraction of the number of people who will watch one of their shows. For example, each episode last season averaged 7.2 million viewers when delayed viewing is taken into account.The numbers indicate that more people are catching on to the two-time Emmy winner for best drama just as it is approaching the end. There was anticipation for the season premiere, with HBO saying there was four times the viewership of previous “Succession” episodes on HBO Max last week compared to the week before.The first episode showed how much things are strained between family patriarch Logan R...

French authorities search 5 banks in Paris in tax fraud case

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:08:47 GMT

PARIS (AP) — Authorities raided the Paris offices of five banks Tuesday on suspicion of tax fraud, the French National Financial Prosecutor’s Office said.The raids come as part of five preliminary investigations opened in December 2021 on counts of alleged money laundering, and alleged tax fraud linked to dividend payments, the office said in a statement. It didn’t specify which banks were raided.French media said the banks searched included HSBC, BNP Paribas, Exane — a subsidiary of BNP — Societe Generale, and Natixis.The Associated Press