Nation & World Glance
Trump commutes term of Kardashian-championed drug offender
WASHINGTON — Flexing his clemency powers once again, President Donald Trump on Wednesday commuted the life sentence of a woman whose cause was championed by reality TV star Kim Kardashian West.
“BEST NEWS EVER !!!! ” was the exuberant Twitter response from Kardashian West, who visited the White House last week to press the case.
Alice Marie Johnson, 63, had spent more than two decades behind bars, serving life without parole for drug offenses. She was released hours after the White House announcement and ran into her family members’ arms.
Michael Scholl, a member of Johnson’s legal team, said she was released just before 6 p.m. from federal prison in Aliceville, Alabama. Footage from local news station WVTM-13 showed Johnson running toward her family, throwing her arms wideopen and embracing them in front of a crowd of onlookers.
“Everybody was crying and hugging,” Scholl said.
SAN MIGUEL LOS LOTES, Guatemala — Emergency crews pulled more bodies from what remained of villages devastated by the eruption of Guatemala’s Volcano of Fire on Wednesday, but time was quickly running out to find survivors as the confirmed death toll rose to 99 with nearly 200 still missing.
Thousands of people displaced by the eruption have sought refuge in shelters, many of them with dead or missing loved ones and facing an uncertain future, unable to return to homes destroyed by the volcano.
Firefighters said the chance of finding anyone alive amid the still-steaming terrain was practically nonexistent 72 hours after Sunday’s volcanic explosion. Thick gray ash covering the stricken region was hardened by rainfall, making it even more difficult to dig through the mud, rocks and debris that reached to the rooftops of homes.
“Nobody is going to be able to get them out or say how many are buried here,” Efrain Suarez said, standing amid the smoking holes dotting what used to be the village of San Miguel Los Lotes on the flanks of the mountain. “The bodies are already charred,” the 59-year-old truck driver said. “And if heavy machinery comes in they will be torn apart.”
Authorities: 1 killed in collision of 2 trains in Arizona
TRUXTON — One person was killed and another injured after a BNSF Railway train and a train pushing maintenance equipment collided on the freight railroad’s tracks in a remote area of northwestern Arizona, authorities said Wednesday.
The wreck occurred Tuesday afternoon near Truxton, a small community 103 miles west of Flagstaff, according to the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office.
The dead man and injured man were employees of Herzog Railroad Services. Walter Erickson, 63, of Lenexa, Kan., was pronounced dead at the scene while Matthew Thompson, 26, of Salem, Mo., was airlifted to a Nevada hospital with serious injuries but was listed in stable condition, according to sheriff’s officials.
BNSF spokeswoman Lena Kent said the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the cause of the crash, which left the BNSF freight train with significant front-end damage and derailed several cars on the Herzog train.
Judge sides with Philadelphia in ‘sanctuary city’ fight
PHILADELPHIA — A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration cannot cut off grants to Philadelphia over the way the city deals with immigrants in the country illegally.
U.S. District Judge Michael Baylson said in his ruling that the conditions the federal government placed on the city in order to receive the funding are unconstitutional, “arbitrary and capricious.” He also wrote that Philadelphia’s policies are reasonable and appropriate.
Philadelphia has said it will turn over immigrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement only if the agency has a warrant signed by a judge. The federal requirements included allowing Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers access to prisons to interview people of interest, providing advanced notice of release of those people and following rules prohibiting restrictions on disclosure of any person’s immigration status. Federal attorneys had said the city’s policies put federal immigration agents in danger and create situations where criminals in the country illegally are released and allowed to reoffend.