Death penalty aired at Buffalo gunman’s first fed court appearance
BUFFALO, N.Y. — The white man who killed 10 Black people at a Buffalo supermarket made his first appearance in federal court on hate crime charges Thursday, and the judge urged prosecutors to quickly decide whether to pursue the death penalty given the “substantial” cost of those cases.
In a brief proceeding, presiding Magistrate Judge H. Kenneth Schroeder said Payton Gendron was eligible to be represented by public defenders based on his financial situation. Fielding a series of questions from the judge mostly with “yes” or “no” responses, Gendron said he had not been employed in a year, had $16 in a bank account, had no car and two shares of Disney stock.
Gendron has been held without bail since his arrest shortly after the May 14 attack at a Tops Friendly Supermarket, which also left three people wounded.
He appeared in U.S. District Court on a criminal complaint charging him with 10 counts each of hate crime resulting in death and using a firearm to commit murder. The complaint also includes three counts each of hate crime involving bodily injury and attempt to kill, and using a firearm in a violent crime.
No plea was entered during the proceeding, and Gendron’s parents were not in the courtroom.
Attorney General Merrick Garland, who met with the victims’ families in Buffalo on Wednesday, has not ruled out seeking the death penalty against Gendron.
In calling for prosecutors to make a quick decision on the death penalty, Schroeder noted such cases typically require expert testimony from psychiatrists and medical examiners.
Federal prosecutor Joseph Tripi said the next step in the process involves an indictment. At that point, it will be the attorney general’s “sole decision” whether to seek the death penalty.
The federal hate crimes case is based partly on documents in which Gendron detailed his plans for the attack.
The writings included “statements that his motivation for the attack was to prevent Black people from replacing white people and eliminating the white race, and to inspire others to commit similar racially-motivated attacks,” according to the complaint.
Red Lodge, Montana, a gateway town to Yellowstone National Park, has become a dead end, a casualty of the severe flooding that tore through one of America’s most beloved natural attractions and swept away roads, bridges and homes.
The unprecedented flood has closed the entire park and forced the evacuation of 10,000 visitors. And towns like Red Lodge that lead to Yellowstone’s northern entrances and rely on tourists passing through could suffer for the rest of the summer.
Officials have said the park’s southern part, which features Old Faithful, could reopen next week. But the north end, which includes Tower Fall and Lamar Valley, could stay closed for months after miles of a major road inside Yellowstone were washed away.
At least 88 people were rescued by the Montana National Guard over the past few days from campsites and small towns, and hundreds of homes were damaged by muddy waters. No deaths or serious injuries have been reported.
President Joe Biden
Yellowstone flooding:
declared a disaster in Montana, ordering federal assistance be made available.
Actor Spacey granted bail:
Kevin Spacey “strenuously denies” allegations of sexual assault, his lawyer said Thursday, as the Oscar-winning actor appeared in a London court to face five charges of offenses against three men.
Spacey, 62, arrived at London’s Westminster Magistrates Court for the preliminary hearing accompanied by members of his legal team and two police officers.
He was not asked to enter a formal plea, but his lawyer, Patrick Gibbs, said: “Mr. Spacey strenuously denies any and all criminality in this case.”
Deputy Chief Magistrate Tan Ikram granted Spacey unconditional bail until his next appearance, a plea hearing scheduled for July 14. He is free to return to the U.S. in the meantime.
The alleged incidents took place between March 2005
and August 2008, and in April 2013.
The alleged victims are now in their 30s and 40s.
New NKorea outbreak:
North Korea reported a new “epidemic” of an intestinal disease on Thursday, an unusual announcement from the secretive country that is already contending with a COVID-19 outbreak and severe economic turmoil.
It’s unclear how many people are infected in what the official Korean Central News Agency said was “an acute enteric epidemic” in southwestern Haeju city.
The agency didn’t name the disease, but enteric refers to intestinal illnesses, such as typhoid, dysentery and cholera, which are caused by germs in contaminated food or water or contact with the feces of infected people.
Such diseases routinely occur in North Korea, where there is a shortage of water treatment facilities and the public health system has been largely broken for
decades.
Some observers said the purpose of the announcement was not so much to report the infections themselves as to mention that leader Kim Jong Un donated medicine from his personal stock — an apparent effort to burnish his image at a moment of extreme hardship.
Africa vaccinations: Most countries in Africa have made significant gains in vaccinating two vulnerable groups against COVID19, but new infections are creeping upward as summer travel begins and some countries ease public health measures, the World Health Organization said Thursday.
About half of public health workers and people older than 60 have been fully vaccinated in 31 countries, according to Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, the WHO’s regional director. Moeti described that as an “impressive turnaround” since the end of 2021, when just one-third of health workers and 10% of
older people had been fully inoculated.
The WHO has predicted a sharp reduction in the number of COVID-19 deaths this year in its 48-nation Africa region, which covers most of the continent.
Amazon killings: A fisherman confessed to killing a British journalist and an Indigenous expert in Brazil’s remote Amazon region and took police to a site where human remains were recovered, a federal investigator said after a grim 10-day search for the missing pair.
Authorities said they expected to make more arrests in the case of freelance reporter Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira of Brazil, who disappeared June 5. None had been made as of Thursday.
They gave no immediate explanation of a motive for the killings, but officials earlier suggested that Pereira’s work to stop illegal fishing in an Indigenous reserve had angered local fishermen.