Court monitor warned of medical care issues at facility

MCALLEN, TEXAS » A court-appointed monitor said in January that child migrants held in medical isolation may be overlooked when Border Patrol stations get too crowded, a warning issued five months before an 8-year-old girl with a heart condition died in custody during an unusually busy period in the same Texas region he inspected.

Dr. Paul H. Wise, a pediatrics professor at Stanford University, called the death of Anadith Tanay Reyes Alvarez of Panama “preventable” during an interview this week while in Texas' Rio Grande Valley to look into the circumstances.

“Any child who is ill, but particularly kids with chronic problems, there should be little hesitation to refer them to local hospitals, preferably a children's hospital or hospital with good pediatric capabilities,” Wise said. U.S. Customs and Border Protection has acknowledged the girl was seen at least three times by medical personnel the day she died.

GOP-led House to vote on possible impeachment of AG

AUSTIN, TEXAS » The Republican-led Texas House of Representatives has set a historic vote today to possibly impeach embattled state Attorney General Ken Paxton and suspend him from office, just as some prominent conservatives began to rally around him.

Paxton, a 60-year-old Republican, finds himself on the brink of impeachment after years of scandal, criminal charges and corruption accusations. The House will begin considering a resolution calling for Paxton's impeachment at 1 p.m. today, according to a statement released Friday by the House Committee on General Investigating.

If impeached, Paxton would be forced to leave office immediately. He would be just the third person in the state's nearly 200-year history to be impeached and the first statewide officer since former Gov. James “Pa” Ferguson in 1917.

The GOP-led committee spent months quietly looking into Paxton.

2 more Oath Keepers are sentenced to prison terms

WASHINGTON » Two Army veterans who stormed the U.S. Capitol in a military-style formation with fellow members of the Oath Keepers were sentenced Friday to prison terms, a day after the far-right extremist group's founder received a recordsetting 18-years behind bars in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.

U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta sentenced Jessica Watkins, of Woodstock, Ohio, to eight years and six months behind bars and sentenced Kenneth Harrelson, of Titusville, Fla., to four years in prison.

A federal jury acquitted Watkins and Harrelson of the seditious conspiracy charge that Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes was found guilty of in November. But jurors convicted Watkins and Harrelson of other Jan. 6 charges, including obstructing Congress' certification of President Joe Biden's victory.

Rhodes' 18-year term is the longest prison sentence that has been handed down so far.

Pope Francis skips meeting because he is running a fever

VATICAN CITY » Pope Francis skipped meetings Friday because he was running a fever after a particularly busy day, the Vatican said.

The Vatican No. 2, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, said Francis was tired and attributed the fever to the fact that Francis had greeted, one by one, a particularly big crowd of his school foundation Thursday afternoon.

“He wanted to greet all of them and probably at a certain point lost his resistance,” Parolin was quoted as saying by the LaPresse news agency.

The last time Francis spiked a serious fever, in March, the 86-year-old pontiff was rushed to the hospital where he was diagnosed with acute bronchitis. He received intravenous antibiotics and was released three days later.

A Vatican official, speaking on condition of anonymity, had confirmed Francis didn't receive anyone in audience Friday “because of a feverish state.”