In the news
■ Payton Shires, 24, a social worker formerly employed with the National Youth Advocate Program, was charged with sexual conduct with a minor as police in Columbus, Ohio, say she engaged in sexual acts with a 13-year-old boy she was counseling.
■ Sergey Skvortsov, 60, a Russia-born Swedish citizen accused of “gross illegal intelligence activities against Sweden” and the United States, was released ahead of a verdict, with the Stockholm District Court saying that “there is no longer reason to keep the defendant in custody.”
■ Desiree Lowery, 27, of Decatur, Ga., was fired from the Clayton County jail and arrested on an accusation of attempting to take contraband into the correctional facility, Sheriff Lavon Allen said in a news release. m James Sconiers, a Vietnam veteran of Titusville, Fla., said a 69-year-old skydiver fell hard onto his lawn and was unresponsive, and speculated that “there’s a problem” with the man’s safety mechanism on his parachute, causing the victim’s death.
■ Drambi Vandi, a Nigerian police officer, “will be hanged by the neck ‘till you are dead’” for the Christmas 2022 fatal shooting of a pregnant lawyer who failed to stop her vehicle at a checkpoint, Lagos High Court Justice Ibironke Harrison said.
■ Jason St. Pierre, principal of Walker High School in Louisiana, apologized for punishing a student for dancing at an off-campus party, noting that “I do understand it is not my responsibility to determine what students’ or others’ religious beliefs may be — that should be the responsibility of the individual.”
■ Mawuli Davis, lawyer for the family of a 62-yearold church deacon that was shocked with a stun gun by Atlanta police before his death, said an autopsy found that his death was a homicide “confirms what I already knew.”
■ David Scott, 49, a senior vice president of Exxon’s upstream shale business, “will not continue work responsibilities as the investigation proceeds” after he was charged in a sexual assault at a hotel in Magnolia, Texas, about 15 miles northwest of the company’s headquarters.
■ Kamala Harris, Democratic vice president of the United States, will speak at a summit of politicians, academics and technology experts organized by the British government focused on creating guardrails around artificial intelligence, Bloomberg reported.