The Widow And Aides Of Assassinated Haitian President Jovenel Moïse Are Indicted In His Killing

Haiti's President Jovenel Moise sits with his wife Martine during his swearing-in ceremony at Parliament in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2017. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery, File)

BY DÁNICA COTO AND EVENS SANON

PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI (AP) — A judge in Haiti responsible for investigating the July 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse has indicted his widow, Martine Moïse, ex-prime minister Claude Joseph and the former chief of Haiti’s National Police, Léon Charles, among others, according to a report obtained Monday.

The indictments are expected to further destabilize Haiti as it struggles with a surge in gang violence and recovers from a spate of violent protests demanding the resignation of current Prime Minister Ariel Henry.

Dozens of suspects were indicted in the 122-page report issued by Walther Wesser Voltaire, who is the fifth judge to lead the investigation after previous ones stepped down for various reasons, including fear of being killed.

Charles, who was police chief when Moïse was killed and now serves as Haiti’s permanent representative to the Organization of the American States, faces the most serious charges: murder; attempted murder; possession and illegal carrying of weapons; conspiracy against the internal security of the state; and criminal association.

Meanwhile, Joseph and Martine Moïse, who was injured in the attack, are accused of complicity and criminal association.

Charles could not be immediately reached for comment, and Martine Moïse’s attorney did not return a message for comment,

Meanwhile, Joseph, the former prime minister, shared a statement with The Associated Press accusing Henry of “undermining” the investigation and benefitting from the president’s death.

“Henry ... is weaponizing the Haitian justice system, prosecuting political opponents like me. It’s a classic coup d’état,” Joseph said. “They failed to kill me and Martine Moïse on July 7th 2021, now they are using the Haitian justice system to advance their Machiavellian agenda.”

Joseph again called on Henry to resign and noted that while he was still prime minister, he invited the FBI to help local authorities investigate the killing and wrote the U.N. and OAS for help.

“I won’t stop my fight. Justice must be served,” he said.

In his report, the judge noted that the former secretary general of the National Palace, Lyonel Valbrun, told authorities that he received “strong pressure” from Martine Moïse to put the president’s office at the disposal of Joseph because he needed it to “organize a council of ministers.”

Valbrun also said that two days before her husband was killed, Martine Moïse visited the National Palace and spent nearly five hours, from 10 p.m. to 3 a.m., removing “a bunch of things.”

He said that two days after Jovenel Moïse was slain, Martine Moïse called to tell him that, “Jovenel didn’t do anything for us. You have to open the office. The president told Ti Klod to create a council of ministers; he will hold elections in three months so I can become president, now we will have power.”

While the document did not identify Ti Klod, the former prime minister, Claude Joseph, is known by that name.

The judge also stated in his report that Martine Moïse “suggested” she took refuge under the marital bed to protect herself from the attackers, but he noted that authorities at the scene found that not “even a giant rat…whose size measures between 35 and 45 centimeters” could fit under the bed.

The judge said the former first lady’s statements were “so tainted with contradictions that they leave something to be desired and discredit her.”

Others who face charges including murder are Christian Emmanuel Sanon, a Haitian-American pastor who visualized himself as Haiti’s next president and said he thought Moïse was only going to be arrested; Joseph Vincent, a Haitian-American and former informant for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration; Dimitri Hérard, presidential security chief; John Joël Joseph, a former Haitian senator; and Windelle Coq, a Haitian judge whom authorities say is a fugitive.

Sanon, Vincent and Joseph were extradited to the U.S., where a total of 11 suspects face federal charges in the slaying of Haiti’s president. At least three of them already have been sentenced.

Meanwhile, more than 40 suspects are languishing in prison in Haiti awaiting trial, although it was not immediately clear how quickly one would be held following Monday’s indictments. Among them are 20 former Colombian soldiers.

Milena Carmona, wife of Jheyner Alberto Carmona Flórez, told The Associated Press that he is innocent.

“What’s happening is that this crime is a conspiracy of great magnitudes in which powerful people are behind the scenes running everything, and that’s why they’re not given freedom,” she said of the former soldiers.

U.S. prosecutors have described it as a plot hatched in both Haiti and Florida to hire mercenaries to kidnap or kill Moïse, who was 53 when he was slain at his private home near the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince.

The attack began late July 6 and ended July 7, according to witnesses.

Martine Moïse and others who were interrogated said they heard heavy gunfire starting around 1 a.m. that lasted between 30 to to 45 minutes before armed men burst into the bedroom of the presidential couple.

Moïse said she was lying on the ground when she heard the attackers yell, “That’s not it! That’s not it! That’s not it!”

She said the suspects made a video call to identify the exact location of what they were searching as they killed the president. She added that she was face down when the suspects tilted her head and tugged on one of her toes “to ensure that she wasn’t alive.”

Once they left, Moïse said she dragged herself on the ground and whispered to her husband that she was going to try and go to the hospital.

“That’s when she noticed that the president was dead and that his left eye had been removed from the socket,” the report stated.

Moïse said a group of about 30 to 50 police officers were supposed to guard the presidential residence, but the judge noted that only a handful of officers were present that night. One officer told the judge that he heard explosions and a voice through a megaphone saying, “Do not shoot! It’s a DEA operation! US Army! We know how many officers are inside. Exit with two hands lowered.”

Another officer said the head of security of the first lady found her “in critical condition” surrounded by her two children. He said he also saw an undetermined number of people coming out of the president’s residence “with briefcases and several envelopes in their possession.”

The report quotes Inspector General André Vladimir Paraison saying that the president called him at 1:46 a.m. and told him, “Paraison! Man, hurry up! I’m in trouble! Come quickly and save my life.” He said he encountered heavily armed men and couldn’t access the residence immediately.

Officers at the scene said they found cars, windows and doors at the president’s private home riddled with bullet holes, along with surveillance cameras cut off and a broken lock on the double-wooden door leading to the presidential bedroom.

The judge said some police officers at the residence were disarmed and handcuffed, while others “had time to throw themselves down a ravine” for safety. In addition, the police officer overseeing presidential security was accused of receiving $80,000 to bribe certain officers “to remain inactive” during the assassination, according to the report.

The judge noted how “none of the police providing security to the head of state was in danger. Unfortunately, the head of state was assassinated with ease.”

Coto reported from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Associated Press reporter Astrid Suárez in Bogotá, Colombia contributed.

Book Review: ‘Almost Surely Dead’ Is A Smart Supernatural Thriller For A Stormy Night

This cover image released by Mindy's Book Studio shows "Almost Surely Dead" by Amina Ahktar (Mindy's Book Studio via AP)

BY DONNA EDWARDS

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Dunia Ahmed disappeared over a year ago. But before she vanished, weird things were happening, including multiple attempts on her life. So, obviously, two self-proclaimed journalists start a podcast to monetize her tragedy.

In her third novel, “Almost Surely Dead,” Amina Akhtar departs from trends and fashion to sink deep into a missing-person mystery with humorous cynicism and an increasingly creepy edge.

Two years ago, Dunia, a pharmacist, was in the middle of her regular commute when a fellow subway rider tried to throw her onto the tracks. And this New York nightmare scenario isn’t the first she’ll face.

Between her stalker ex-fiancé, David, and the unsettling notes showing up at her work and apartment, it seems like an open and shut case. But flashbacks to when Dunia was 5 suggest there may be something more sinister at play.

In these chapters, we see young Dunia’s beloved father telling her ghost stories on the sly, teaching her the pieces of her Desi culture that her mother would rather they sweep under the rug: jinns stealing princesses and grotesque churail. Dunia’s also a perceptive kid; she hears the whispers and knows her aunt was also deemed “pagal” — mentally ill, locked up somewhere back in Pakistan.

On top of the childhood trauma and jinn stories, Dunia’s been sleepwalking again since her mother’s death. Disoriented and exhausted, she can’t trust her own eyes and ears.

As the story progresses and the world opens up more, truths that Dunia couldn’t see at 5 years old come sifting up to the surface, and suddenly the narrative is a lot more complicated. Who should we direct our anger and fear at?

In a stark commentary on victim-blaming, other characters seem to answer: Dunia.

Dunia is victimized over and over — by people who seem to see it as their right to treat her poorly or make her relive her near-death experience, from virtual strangers wanting to hear about how she was almost killed to her sister demanding a level of communication not merited by their thin thread of a relationship.

Then there’s the podcast — at first fairly serious, but the transcripts soon devolve into “No spoilers!” and absurdly tasteless promotional ads. In one of many ruthless portrayals of society and the media, both hosts let David’s racism slide without comment when he calls Dunia exotic and talks about how he had a thing for Indian girls in his interview.

And beneath it all, growing until it can’t be ignored any longer, the supernatural stays at a steady hum.

“Almost Surely Dead” is the perfect psychological thriller for a dark and stormy night or a rainy day alone on the couch. Strap in, because there’s never a good stopping point with Akhtar, a master of pacing and suspense who keeps you guessing until the end.

AP book reviews: https://apnews.com/hub/book-reviews

Los Angeles Becomes First US City To Outlaw Digital Discrimination

BY AARON SANKIN

A Markup investigation in 2022 found households in L.A.’s poorest neighborhoods were disproportionately asked to pay high prices for slow internet service

Last week, the city council in Los Angeles, Calif. passed a motion banning “digital discrimination,” which is when internet service providers (ISPs) inequitably deploy high-speed internet connections or disproportionately withhold the best deals for their services from racially or socio-economically marginalized neighborhoods.

The legislation, authored by Councilmember Marqueece Harris-Dawson, expanded the types of discrimination the city could investigate to include digital discrimination. Members of the public will be able to submit complaints alleging digital discrimination, which the city’s Civil, Human Rights and Equity Department will investigate. The department will be required to collect demographic information about the people making complaints and report on any trends.

The Bureau of Street Lighting is also tasked with delivering a report on what work the city has done to close the digital divide.

“It’s so important for everyone to have broadband access for full participation in modern society and no one should be charged more based on their neighborhood,” Harris-Dawson wrote in a statement to supporters. “This is a big win and we’ll keep pushing equity on all fronts forward!”

“There have been multiple studies showing the impact of industry pricing practices that worsen the digital divide by exacerbating the challenge of affordability,” the legislation reads. “Studies demonstrate that providers systematically offer worse service – slower, delivered over older technology – to low-income communities at the same price that they offered fast, reliable service to higher income communities.”

In 2022, The Markup published an investigation showing how ISPs in 38 U.S. cities, including AT&T in Los Angeles, were offering high-speed broadband connections for the same price as sluggish ones to different households in the same city. In almost every case, lower-income, less White, and historically redlined neighborhoods tended to disproportionately get offered the worst deals.

AT&T, our investigation found, was 21 percentage points more likely to offer slow service to households in L.A.’s poorest neighborhoods than the company was in the city’s richest areas. An AT&T spokesperson called our analysis “fundamentally flawed.”

A report released around the same time by the California Community Foundation found Charter Communications, L.A.’s dominant cable provider, engaging in similar conduct. “People who live in higher poverty neighborhoods are not only routinely offered slower service at higher prices, but are offered contracts with worse terms and conditions,” the report read. “For example, Charter’s…promotional offers – guaranteeing a period of time before prices will increase – are for two years in wealthy communities, but for just one year in high-poverty communities.”

In an email to the Los Angeles Times, Charter insisted the California Community Foundation’s report was “intentionally misleading.”

To close the digital divide and ensure equitable access to the fast, reliable, and affordable internet necessary to access education and health care and to fully participate in the City’s economic opportunities and civic life, we must address the disparate outcomes of provider decisions (regardless of whether providers intended those outcomes.) Tackling digital discrimination is not the only action needed to ensure digital equity, but it is a necessary action.

Since Los Angeles has never codified exactly what “digital discrimination” means, the legislation asked city officials to strongly consider using the Federal Communication Commission’s (FCC) definition of the term.

Last November, the FCC approved rules prohibiting digital discrimination at the national level–defining it as “Policies or practices, not justified by genuine issues of technical or economic feasibility, that (1) differentially impact consumers’ access to broadband internet access service based on their income level, race, ethnicity, color, religion, or national origin or (2) are intended to have such differential impact.”

A crucial element of the FCC’s definition of digital discrimination is that it allows for finding actions to be discriminatory even if the intent behind them wasn’t explicitly to treat different groups inequitably. Instead, all that would be necessary is showing that a decision made by an ISP caused the groups to be impacted differently.

Digital Equity LA, a coalition of 70 nonprofit organizations, urged the city to incorporate the FCC’s standard into its enforcement process. “To close the digital divide and ensure equitable access to the fast, reliable, and affordable internet necessary to access education and health care and to fully participate in the City’s economic opportunities and civic life, we must address the disparate outcomes of provider decisions (regardless of whether providers intended those outcomes),” the coalition wrote in a letter to that council that cited digital divide investigations by the California Community Foundation and The Markup. “Tackling digital discrimination is not the only action needed to ensure digital equity, but it is a necessary action.”

While the Los Angeles legislation passed without a dissenting vote, it wasn’t without controversy. In a letter sent to the city council in mid-January, the Central City Foundation of Los Angeles–an advocacy group representing businesses and professional associations, including AT&T and Charter–urged the city to focus its digital inclusion efforts elsewhere.

“Instead of duplicating the FCC’s system, we believe that City resources would be more prudently used by focusing on the areas that the FCC advised in their best practices for states and localities, such as digital education, affordability programs and device availability,” wrote Central City Association President & CEO Nella McOsker.

As the Institute For Local Self-Reliance noted, with the passage of this legislation Los Angeles became the first city in the United States to tackle digital discrimination locally.

_______THE MARKUP

Washington Seeks Deeper Ties To Africa As Russian And Chinese Influence Abounds

Secretary of State Antony Blinken receives a football jersey with his name on from Robert Beugré Mambé, prime minister of the Ivory Coast, as the Confederation of African Football President Patrice Motsepe on Jan. 22. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/Pool/AP)

BY WILLY LOWRY

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken swept through West Africa last week courting regional partners as the administration of President Joe Biden looks to deepen its ties to the continent.

Mr Blinken’s charm offensive comes as the administration sees an opportunity to invest in the region and strengthen relationships as Chinese and Russian influence rises.

He made his fourth trip to the continent since taking office, travelling to Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, Nigeria and Angola.

The Biden administration has been adamant that it regards African countries as important partners for the future and key allies in the fight against extremists in the Sahel.

In Ivory Coast and Nigeria, Mr Blinken promoted US investments and announced $45 million in new funding for security, which has been threatened by terrorism and coups across the region in recent years.

“Cote d'Ivoire [Ivory Coast] is an essential partner for us and for other countries in the region that are trying to move forward,” Mr Blinken said next to Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara at the country’s presidential palace in Abidjan.

“We appreciate particularly the leadership shown by Cote d'Ivoire in countering extremism and violence.”

In July, Washington lost a key ally in Niger, a country in which it had invested heavily, when the military junta overthrew democratically elected president Mohamed Bazoum.

Coups in Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso have fractured the Economic Community of West Africa, an important economic driver for the region.

On Sunday, the three countries, which had each been suspended from the bloc after the coups, announced that they were officially leaving.

Russia has honed in on the Sahel as a region of opportunity, with the mercenary group Wagner maintaining a presence in Mali and Russian troops recently flying into Burkina Faso.

During his whirlwind tour, in which he slept in a different city every night, Mr Blinken sought to highlight Washington's positive influence on the region and its deepening economic ties with countries.

In Angola, his last stop, he promoted more than $1 billion in US investments, including $900 million for solar energy projects and a $250 million investment in the Lobito rail corridor, an ambitious project that connects resource-rich central Africa to the Atlantic Ocean through the Angolan coast.

"Our relationship is stronger, it’s more consequential, it’s farther-reaching than at any point in our 30-year friendship," Mr Blinken said while in Luanda.

The Lobito project is the biggest US investment in infrastructure on the continent in a generation.

“This project has genuinely transformative potential for this nation, for this region, and – I would argue – for the world,” Mr Blinken said next to Angolan Foreign Minister Tete Antonio.

The corridor, part of which is already operational, will allow critical minerals such as cobalt and copper to more easily reach global markets.

US officials said the investments are advancing the Biden administration’s climate goals by having “clean energy through solar” and diversifying US supply chain access.

“Africa has the lowest rail and road density in the world and the refurbishments, plus the additions, is addressing a major deficit on the continent and it redounds to the US brand, the US reliability and US leadership,” a US official said.

It also is helping the US to bolster a new relationship with Angola at a time when the country appears to be turning away from China and Russia, two longtime allies.

Angola emerged from three decades of civil war in 2002. Historically, it has looked to China for major infrastructure projects.

In the years after the devastating civil war, Angolan president Jose Eduardo dos Santos sought Chinese loans and investments to rebuild the country. Years of borrowing have left Angola heavily indebted to Beijing.

“Angola is not about to become a Kenya, a sort of pro-West stalwart,” said Ricardo Soares de Oliveira, a professor at the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford.

“But becoming closer to America does have the positive effect of diluting the overwhelming Chinese role in Angola, which the Angolans want to dilute."

American officials insisted that US interest in the region was genuine and mutually beneficial, and rebuffed the idea that there was any geopolitical jostling.

For the better part of four decades, Angola was ruled by Mr do Santo. The current President, Joao Lourenco, appears to be cutting a different path, away from Russia and China.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

Israel Defends Itself At The UN’s Top Court Against Allegations Of Genocide In Gaza

Judges and parties stand up during a hearing at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, Friday, Jan. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Patrick Post)

THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (AP) — Accused of committing genocide against Palestinians, Israel insisted at the United Nations’ highest court Friday that its war in Gaza was a legitimate defense of its people and that it was Hamas militants who were guilty of genocide.

Israel described the allegations leveled by South Africa as hypocritical and said one of the biggest cases ever to come before an international court reflected a world turned upside down. Israeli leaders defend their air and ground offensive in Gaza as a legitimate response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, when militants stormed through Israeli communities, killing some 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostage.

Israeli legal advisor Tal Becker told a packed auditorium at the ornate Palace of Peace in The Hague that the country is fighting a “war it did not start and did not want.”

“In these circumstances, there can hardly be a charge more false and more malevolent than the allegation against Israel of genocide,” he added, noting that the horrible suffering of civilians in war was not enough to level that charge.

On Friday afternoon, Germany said it wants to intervene in the proceedings on Israel’s behalf, saying there was “no basis whatsoever” for an accusation of genocide against Israel.

“Hamas terrorists brutally attacked, tortured, killed and kidnapped innocent people in Israel,” German government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said in a statement. “Since then, Israel has been defending itself against the inhumane attack by Hamas.”

He acknowledged that various countries view Israel’s actions in Gaza differently but that Germany expressly rejects the accusations of genocide.

While the legal implications of German’s announcement were not immediately clear, its support for Israel carries some symbolic significance given Germany’s Nazi history.

Hebestreit said Germany “sees itself as particularly committed to the Convention against Genocide.” He added: “We firmly oppose political instrumentalization.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomed the announcement, saying the gesture “touches all of Israel’s citizens.”

South African lawyers asked the court Thursday to order an immediate halt to Israeli military operations in the besieged coastal territory that is home to 2.3 million Palestinians. A decision on that request will probably take weeks, and the full case is likely to last years — and it’s unclear if Israel would follow any court orders.

On Friday, Israel focused on the brutality of the Oct. 7 attacks, presenting chilling video and audio to a hushed audience.

“They tortured children in front of parents and parents in front of children, burned people, including infants alive, and systematically raped and mutilated scores of women, men and children,” Becker said.

South Africa’s request for an immediate halt to the Gaza fighting, he said, amounts to an attempt to prevent Israel from defending itself against that assault.

Even when acting in self-defense, countries are required by international law to follow the rules of war, and judges must decide if Israel has.

As two days of hearings ended Friday, ICJ President Joan E. Donoghue said the court would rule on the request for urgent measures “as soon as possible.”

Israel often boycotts international tribunals and U.N. investigations, saying they are unfair and biased. But this time, Israeli leaders took the rare step of sending a high-level legal team — a sign of how seriously they regard the case and likely their fear that any court order to halt operations would be a major blow to the country’s international standing.

Still, Becker dismissed the accusations as crude and attention-seeking.

“We live at a time when words are cheap in an age of social media and identity politics. The temptation to reach for the most outrageous term to vilify and demonize has become, for many, irresistible,” he said.

In a statement from New York, Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Gilad Erdan called the case a “new moral low” and said that by taking it on, “the U.N. and its institutions have become weapons in service of terrorist organizations.”

Becker said the charges Israel is facing should be leveled at Hamas, which seeks Israel’s destruction and which the U.S. and Western allies consider a terrorist group.

“If there have been acts that may be characterized as genocidal, then they have been perpetrated against Israel,” Becker said.

More than 23,000 people in Gaza have been killed during Israel’s military campaign, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-run territory. That toll does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Nearly 85% of Gaza’s people have been driven their homes, a quarter of the enclave’s residents face starvation, and much of northern Gaza has been reduced to rubble.

South Africa says this amounts to genocide and is part of decades of Israeli oppression of Palestinians.

“The scale of destruction in Gaza, the targeting of family homes and civilians, the war being a war on children, all make clear that genocidal intent is both understood and has been put into practice. The articulated intent is the destruction of Palestinian life,” said lawyer Tembeka Ngcukaitobi, adding that several leading politicians had made dehumanizing comments about people in Gaza.

The Palestinian Authority’s foreign ministry welcomed the case, saying in a written statement that South Africa “delivered unequivocal evidence that Israel is deliberately and systematically violating its obligations under the Genocide Convention.”

Malcolm Shaw, an international law expert on Israel’s legal team, rejected the accusation of genocidal intent and called the remarks Ngcukaitobi referenced “random quotes not in conformity with government policy.”

Israel also says that it takes measures to protect civilians, such as issuing evacuation orders ahead of strikes. It blames Hamas for the high civilian death toll, saying the group uses residential areas to stage attacks and for other military purposes.

Israel’s critics say that such measures have done little to prevent the high toll and that its bombings are so powerful that they often amount to indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks.

If the court issues an order to halt the fighting and Israel doesn’t comply, it could face U.N. sanctions, although those may be blocked by a veto from the United States, Israel’s staunch ally. In Washington, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby called the allegations “unfounded.” The White House declined to comment on how it might respond if the ICJ determines Israel has committed genocide.

The extraordinary case goes to the core of one of the world’s most intractable conflicts — and for the second day protesters rallied outside the court.

Pro-Israeli demonstrators set up a table near the court grounds for a Sabbath meal with empty seats, commemorating the hostages still being held by Hamas. “We want to symbolize the empty chairs, because we are missing them,” said Nathan Bouscher from Center for Information and Documentation on Israel.

Nearby, over 100 pro-Palestinian protesters waved flags and shouted protests.

The case also strikes at the heart of both Israel’s and South Africa’s national identities.

Israel was founded as a Jewish state in the wake of the Nazis’ slaughter of 6 million Jews during World War II. South Africa’s governing party, meanwhile, has long compared Israel’s policies in Gaza and the West Bank to its own history under the apartheid regime of white minority rule, which restricted most Black people to “homelands.”

The world court, which rules on disputes between nations, has never judged a country to be responsible for genocide. The closest it came was in 2007, when it ruled that Serbia “violated the obligation to prevent genocide” in the July 1995 massacre by Bosnian Serb forces of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica.

Casert reported from Brussels. Associated Press journalists Aleksandar Furtula and Ahmad Seir in The Hague, Netherlands, contributed to this report.

Black American Solidarity With Palestinians Is Rising And Testing Longstanding Ties To Jewish Allies

In this photo provided by Black Jerusalem, members of the “Black Jerusalem” trip pose for a photograph in the Ein Karem neighborhood of Jerusalem, on Friday, Sept. 29, 2023. (Black Jerusalem via AP)

BY NOREEN NASIR AND AARON MORRISON

Cydney Wallace, a Black Jewish community activist, never felt compelled to travel to Israel, though “Next year in Jerusalem” was a constant refrain at her Chicago synagogue.

The 39-year-old said she had plenty to focus on at home, where she frequently gives talks on addressing anti-Black sentiment in the American Jewish community and dismantling white supremacy in the U.S.

“I know what I’m fighting for here,” she said.

That all changed when she visited Israel and the West Bank at the invitation of a Palestinian American community organizer from Chicago’s south side, along with two dozen other Black Americans and Muslim, Jewish and Christian faith leaders.

The trip, which began Sept. 26, enhanced Wallace’s understanding of the struggles of Palestinians living in the West Bank under Israeli military occupation. But, horrifyingly, it was cut short by the unprecedented Oct. 7 attacks on Israel by Hamas militants. In Israel’s ensuing bombardment of the Gaza Strip, shocking images of destruction and death seen around the world have mobilized activists in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Wallace, and a growing number of Black Americans, see the Palestinian struggle in the West Bank and Gaza reflected in their own fight for racial equality and civil rights. The recent rise of protest movements against police brutality in the U.S., where structural racism plagues nearly every facet of life, has connected Black and Palestinian activists under a common cause.

But that kinship sometimes strains the more than century-long alliance between Black and Jewish activists. From Black American groups that denounced the U.S. backing of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory to Black protesters demonstrating for the Palestinians’ right to self-determination, some Jewish Americans are concerned that support could escalate the threat of antisemitism and weaken Jewish-Black ties fortified during the Civil Rights Movement.

“We are concerned, as a community, about what we feel is a lack of understanding of what Israel is about and how deeply Oct. 7 has affected us,” said Bob Kaplan, executive director of The Center for Shared Society at the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York.

“Antisemitism has to be seen as a reprehensible form of hate ... as any form of hate is,” he said. “Antisemitism is as real to the American Jewish community, and causes as much trauma and fear and upset to the American Jewish community, as racism causes to the Black community, or anti-Asian feeling causes to the Asian community, or anti-Muslim feeling causes in the Muslim community.”

But, he added, many Jews in the U.S. understand that Black Americans can have an affinity for the Palestinian cause that doesn’t conflict with their regard for Israel.

According to a poll earlier this month from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, Black adults were more likely than white and Hispanic adults to say the U.S. is too supportive of Israel — 44% compared to 30% and 28%, respectively. However, Black Americans weren’t any more likely than others to say the U.S. is not supportive enough of the Palestinians.

Generational divides also emerged, with younger Americans more likely to say the U.S. is too supportive of Israel, according to the poll. Even within the Jewish American community, some younger and other progressive Jews tend to be more critical of some of Israel’s policies.

Black American support for the Palestinian cause dates back to the Civil Rights Movement, through prominent left-wing voices, including Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael and Angela Davis, among others. More recent rounds of violence, including the 2021 Israel-Hamas war and now Israel’s unprecedented bombing campaign against Gaza shown live on social media have deepened ties between the two movements.

“This is just the latest generation to pick up the mantle, the latest Black folks to organize, build and talk about freedom and justice,” said Ahmad Abuznaid, the director of the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights.

During a week-long truce between Israel and Hamas as part of the recent deal to free dozens of hostages seized by Hamas militants, Israel released hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and detainees. Many were teenagers who had recently been picked up in the West Bank for minor offenses like stone-throwing and had not been charged.

Some Black Americans who watched the Palestinian prisoner release and learned about Israel’s administrative detention policy, where detainees are held without trial, drew comparisons to the U.S. prison system. While more than two-thirds of jail detainees in the U.S. have not been convicted of a crime, Black people are jailed at more than four times the rate of white people, often for low-level offenses, according to studies of the American judicial system.

“Americans like to talk about being innocent until proven guilty. But Black folks are predominantly and disproportionately detained in the United States regardless of whether anything has been proven. And that’s very similar to Israel’s administrative detention,” said Julian Rose, an organizer with a Black-run bail fund in Atlanta.

Rami Nashashibi, executive director of the Inner-City Muslim Action Network, invited Wallace and the others to take part in the trip called “Black Jerusalem” — an exploration of the sacred city through an African and Black American lens.

They met members of Jerusalem’s small Afro-Palestinian community — Palestinians of Black African heritage, many of whom can trace their lineage in the Old City back centuries.

“Our Black brothers and sisters in the U.S. suffered from slavery and now they suffer from racism,” said Mousa Qous, executive director of the African Community Society Jerusalem, whose father emigrated to Jerusalem from Chad in 1941 and whose mother is Palestinian.

“We suffer from the Israeli occupation and racist policies. The Americans and the Israelis are conducting the same policies against us and the Black Americans. So we should support each other,” Qous said.

Nashashibi agreed, saying: “My Palestinian identity was very much shaped and influenced by Black American history.”

“I always hoped that a trip like this would open up new pathways that would connect the dots not just in a political and ideological way,” he said, “but between the liberation and struggles for humanity that are very familiar to us in the U.S.”

During the trip, Wallace was dismayed by her own ignorance of the reality of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation.

At an Israeli checkpoint outside the Western Wall, the Jewish holy site, Wallace said her group was asked who was Jewish, Muslim or Christian. Wallace and the others showed IDs issued for the trip, but when an Israeli officer saw her Star of David necklace, she was waved through, while Palestinians and Muslims in the group were subjected to intense scrutiny and bag checks.

“Being there made me wonder if this is what it was like to live in the Jim Crow-era” in America, Wallace said.

Kameelah Oseguera, who grew up in an African American Muslim community in Brooklyn, New York, also said the trip opened her eyes.

At the entrance to the Aida refugee camp near Bethlehem in the West Bank, Oseguera noticed a massive key — a Palestinian symbol of the homes lost in the 1948 creation of Israel, referred to as the Nakba, or “catastrophe.” Many kept keys to the homes they fled or were forced out of — a symbol signifying the Palestinian right to return, which Israel has denied.

Oseguera said the key recalled her visit to the “door of no return” memorial in Senegal dedicated to the enslaved Africans forced onto slave ships and brought to the Americas. As a descendant of enslaved Africans, it brought thoughts of “what the dream of my return would have meant for my ancestors.”

Returning to home, she said, is a “longing that is transmitted through generations.”

Israel’s Law of Return grants all Jews the right to settle permanently in Israel and acquire Israeli citizenship — a concept that drew support from many Black American civil rights leaders, including A. Phillip Randolph, Bayard Rustin, Dorothy Height, Shirley Chisholm and Martin Luther King, Sr., the father of the slain civil rights leader.

Over the last decade, however, Black Americans and the Palestinians have also found growing solidarity.

In 2020, the murder of George Floyd by a white police officer resonated in the West Bank, where Palestinians drew comparisons to their own experiences of brutality under occupation, and a massive mural of Floyd appeared on Israel’s hulking separation barrier.

In 2014, protests in Ferguson, Missouri, erupted after the police killing of Michael Brown, a Black teenager, which gave rise to the nascent Black Lives Matter movement. While police officers in Ferguson fired tear gas at protesters, Palestinians in the occupied West Bank tweeted advice about how to manage the effects of the irritants.

In 2016, when BLM activists formed the coalition known as the Movement for Black Lives, they included support for Palestinians in a platform called the “Vision for Black Lives.” A handful of Jewish groups, which had largely been supportive of the BLM movement, denounced the Black activists’ characterization of Israel as a purportedly “apartheid state” that engages in “discrimination against the Palestinian people.”

“There tends to be this doubt or astonishment that Black people care about other oppressed people around the world,” said Phil Agnew, co-director of the national advocacy group, Black Men Build, who has taken four trips to the West Bank since 2014.

It would be a mistake, Agnew said, to ignore significant numbers of Black and Jewish Americans who are united in their support for the Palestinians.

None of the members of the “Black Jerusalem” trip anticipated it would come to a tragic end with the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in which some 1,200 people were killed in Israel and about 240 taken hostage. Since then, more than 18,700 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s blistering air and ground campaign in Gaza, now in its third month. Violence in the West Bank has also surged.

Back home in Chicago, Wallace has navigated speaking about her support for Palestinians while maintaining her Jewish identity and standing against antisemitism. She says she doesn’t see those things as mutually exclusive.

“I’m trying not to do anything that alienates anyone,” she said. “But I can’t just not do the right thing because I’m scared.”

AP writer Isabel DeBre in Jerusalem contributed.

Nasir and Morrison are members of AP’s Race and Ethnicity team. Follow Nasir on social media. Follow Morrison on social media.

Homelessness Is A Crisis In California But We Can’t Treat It Like An Emergency

Local governments in the Los Angeles area declared a state of emergency on homelessness this year to spur action and marshal resources. But there are drawbacks to applying an emergency label to this issue.

BY PETER LAUGHARN AND MIGUEL SANTANA

As her first official act as the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass declared a state of emergency over homelessness. She was later joined by the mayors of neighboring Long Beach, Santa Monica and Culver City, and the L.A. County Board of Supervisors.

Following these five declarations, the supervisors also announced the largest-ever investment in the county’s homeless response: $609 million dollars over the next fiscal year. In May, the L.A. City Council approved a record $1.3 billion for homelessness programs.

For the 10 million people living in L.A. County, home to the worst of the state’s homelessness crisis, this feels like a turning point – one that all of California can get behind.

We witnessed how emergency declarations escalated the response during the pandemic when FEMA covered the cost of filling motels and hotels with vulnerable unhoused people, and the state allocated substantial funding for housing and emergency services.

Just as the pandemic sparked action, these declarations can unlock resources at a moment when everyone is eager for change.

But there are drawbacks to applying an emergency label to homelessness. For one, it gives the impression that homelessness is a natural phenomenon like an earthquake rather than the result of policies that should not be repeated.

It can also imply a need for temporary solutions and short-term funding. A one-time infusion of cash can’t overcome a systemic failure that is decades in the making. We demand long-term accountability from our homeless service providers but fail to make the long-term financial commitment they need to budget, plan and build on their successes.

The crisis frame can also push resources toward temporary shelters and away from permanent housing. That would be a mistake, since permanent housing has proven to be the most effective intervention. According to a recent report, 92% of supportive housing residents stay housed after six months.

Shelters certainly have a role to play, but they shouldn’t distract us from achieving true success.

These emergency declarations are a phenomenal way to electrify our stalled approach to homelessness, but they will ultimately fail if we do not think in terms of permanent change. That means permanent funding for service providers, permanent homes for people living on the streets, and permanent reform to our tangled web of interconnected bureaucracies.

To start with, creating a more collaborative way for local governments to work together could improve how quickly housing is permitted and services are delivered. This approach has succeeded elsewhere: Houston made a 60% reduction in homelessness in four years by aligning all levels of government and the civic community on a single plan of action.

That level of collaboration would be a paradigm shift in sprawling L.A. County, where a hundred different quarterbacks call their own plays and then look for someone to blame for system failings. If we succeed here, as they have in Houston, other California cities could follow.

History has shown us that urgency cannot be taken for granted. Indeed, the city of Los Angeles’ declaration is scheduled to expire on Monday. Without real structural change, we will find ourselves where we started before these emergencies were declared, with a fragmented and fitful approach to our most difficult challenge.

In fairness, our actions so far have laid a critical foundation. It’s a testament to the many individuals working to solve homelessness that over the last five years: 84,000 unhoused people in L.A. County moved into permanent housing. Thanks also to investments by taxpayers and philanthropy, L.A. is rehousing more people every year than any other large city in California.

Significant progress has been made, but we cannot expect Californians to see it that way when the scale of homelessness remains enormous.

Homelessness is both an emergency and an ongoing challenge. It’s good to hear our leaders recognize it. Let’s take this energy and get to work creating a lasting model for change that can inspire cities and counties across the state.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

Florida Official Says Migrants Flown To California Went Willingly, Refutes Claims Of Coercion

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Sacramento is seen in Sacramento, Calif., Monday, June 5, 2023. Sixteen migrants from Venezuela and Colombia were brought to the diocese's offices on Friday, June 2, 2023, after being flown from Texas to Sacramento. (AP Photo/Tran Nguyen)

BY TRÂN NGUYỄN AND OLGA R. RODRIGUEZ

SACRAMENTO, CALIF. (AP) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration said Tuesday that three dozen migrants whom the state flew from the U.S. southern border to California on private planes all went willingly, refuting allegations by California officials that the individuals were coerced to travel under false pretenses.

Two planes arrived in Sacramento, on Friday and Monday, each carrying asylum-seekers mostly from Colombia and Venezuela. The individuals had been picked up in El Paso, Texas, taken to New Mexico and then put on charter flights to California’s capital of Sacramento, said California Attorney General Rob Bonta. He’s investigating whether any violations of criminal or civil law occurred.

Alecia Collins, a spokeswoman for the Florida Division of Emergency Management, said in a statement that “through verbal and written consent, these volunteers indicated they wanted to go to California.” She also shared a video compilation that appeared to show people signing consent forms and thanking officials for treating them well.

The clips had no time stamps, and Collins declined to share additional details about when and where they were recorded.

It was the DeSantis administration’s first acknowledgment that it coordinated the flights.

This isn’t the first time DeSantis’ administration has transported migrants from Texas to other states. Last fall, Florida flew 49 Venezuelans to the upscale Massachusetts island of Martha’s Vineyard. The move was intended to protest federal immigration policy.

Last month, DeSantis, who recently announced a presidential bid, signed into law a bill approving $12 million for a program to relocate migrants, even if they never step foot in Florida.

Bonta, who met with some of the migrants who arrived Friday, said they told him they were approached by two women who spoke broken Spanish and promised them jobs in El Paso. The women traveled with them by land from El Paso to Deming, New Mexico, where two men then accompanied them on the flight to Sacramento. The same men were on the flight Monday, Bonta said.

He said the asylum seekers have court dates in New York, Utah and Colorado and carried a document that “purports to be a consent and release form” that is designed to shield Florida from liability.

“Of course, what’s important is what is actually said and represented and told to the individuals and we’ve got good indications of what that was and the fact that it was false, misleading, and deceptive,” Bonta said.

Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg and faith-based groups are working together to help the newcomers, who are staying at two undisclosed locations in the city and have been given food, clothing and cellphones to contact their families.

“Sacramento should be a model for the rest of the state and the rest of the nation,” Steinberg said at a news conference Tuesday.

None of the migrants spoke at the news conference.

Gabby Trejo, executive director of Sacramento ACT, a collaboration of religious congregations in the Sacramento area, said all of the migrants had already been given pending court dates by U.S. immigration officials before they were approached in Texas by people promising jobs. Trejo said that they had been “lied to and deceived.”

“They couldn’t have landed in a better place because Sacramentans know what it means to come together and we are here to walk with them,” Trejo said.

Sacramento ACT did not immediately respond to a request for comment later Tuesday about the video released by DeSantis’ administration and the assertions that all the migrants went to California willingly.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office, meanwhile, doubled down on its criticism of DeSantis.

“This is exploitative propaganda being peddled by a politician who has shown there are no depths he won’t sink to in his desperate effort to score a political point,” said Anthony York, a spokesman for Newsom.

Newsom indicated in a tweet Monday that California may consider kidnapping charges against DeSantis. Such charges would likely be extremely difficult to prove, particularly given the migrants signed waivers. Bonta has not directly said he is considering kidnapping charges.

As the migrants arrived in California Monday, a Texas sheriff’s office announced it had recommended misdemeanor and felony charges for “unlawful restraint” over the two flights to Martha’s Vineyard last year. Johnny Garcia, a spokesman for the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office, said the office is not naming suspects at this time, and it’s not clear whether the local district attorney will pursue the charges.

DeSantis’ latest apparent move to send migrants to California’s capital city appears to be a direct shot at Newsom. Though Newsom has no plans to run for president in 2024, he and DeSantis have frequently used each other as political foils as they cast their own governing approach as a model for the nation. Beyond immigration policy, the two have sparred on abortion access, LGBTQ+ and civil rights, and a host of other cultural issues.

On the campaign trail, DeSantis has been eager to slap at progressive policies in Democratic strongholds such as New York and California, claiming that Florida’s population boom in recent years has been driven by people fleeing blue-state policies.

DeSantis is currently positioned as the strongest Republican alternative to former President Donald Trump in the GOP’s crowded primary, although Trump maintains a big lead in early polls.

It’s not yet clear if the new arrivals in Sacramento plan to stay in California or will eventually seek to go elsewhere, advocates said. Four who arrived on the first flight on Friday have already been picked up by friends or family members, but the rest remain in the care of local advocacy groups.

The faith-based coalition is also connecting the migrants with medical and legal services, said Shireen Miles, a longtime Sacramento ACT volunteer. She said several people have court hearings as soon as next week in places such as Chicago, New York and Denver, which immigration attorneys are working to reschedule.

Since they arrived, advocates have taken the migrants to a thrift store to pick out clothing and have let them choose what meals to eat, advocates said.

“We’re allowing them to define what their needs are and how we can best meet them,” said Cecilia Flores, of Sacramento ACT. ___

Rodriguez reported from San Francisco. Associated Press writers Anthony Izaguirre in Tallahassee, Fla., Paul J. Weber in Austin, Texas, Susan Montoya Bryan in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Elliot Spagat in San Diego contributed.

___

Find more AP coverage of immigration: https://apnews.com/hub/immigration

Report Says 2.3 Billion People Globally Use Polluting Fuel To Cook; 675 Million Have No ELECTRICITY

Antonius Makambombu, a worker of Sumba Sustainable Solutions, performs maintenance work on a solar panel on the roof of a customer's shop in Laindeha village on Sumba Island, Indonesia, March 22, 2023. Up to 2.3 billion people around the world are still using polluting fuels to cook and 675 million don't have electricity, according to a report released Tuesday by five international organizations. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara)

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Up to 2.3 billion people around the world are still using polluting fuels to cook and 675 million don’t have electricity, according to a report released Tuesday by five international organizations.

The report said that at current rates, 660 million people are projected to be without electricity and 1.9 billion won’t have clean cooking opportunities by 2030. That’s the target date to achieve a United Nations goal set in 2015 “to ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all.”

The report by the International Energy Agency, International Renewable Energy Agency, U.N. Statistics Division, World Bank and World Health Organization said that at the midway point toward the goal, the world is not on track to reach the energy target, which will negatively impact the health of millions and accelerate climate change.

“The energy crisis sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues to have a profound impact on people all around the world,” International Energy Agency Executive Director Fatih Birol said in a statement. “High energy prices have hit the most vulnerable hard, particularly those in developing economies.”

He said that while the transition to clean energy is happening faster than people think, a great deal of work is still needed to provide it to the billions still living without it.

According to the report, global access to electricity increased from 84% in 2010 to 91% in 2021, but the pace of growth slowed in 2019-2021, which includes the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the electrification of rural areas contributed to progress, there is still a large gap in urban areas, it said.

More than 80% of those without electricity — 567 million in 2021 — lived in sub-Saharan Africa, similar to the deficit in 2010, it said.

The report also found that up to 2.3 billion people still use polluting fuels and technologies, including firewood.

Francesco La Camera, director-general of the International Renewable Energy Agency, said: “Cost-competitive renewable energy has yet again demonstrated remarkable resilience, but the poorest in the world are still largely unable to fully benefit from it.”

According to estimates by WHO in 2019, 3.2 million premature deaths every year were attributable to household air pollution from polluting fuels and technologies.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said investing in clear and renewable solutions to achieve universal energy access “can play a crucial role in protecting the health of our most vulnerable populations.”

Guangzhe Chen, the World Bank’s vice president for infrastructure, called for urgent efforts “to ensure that the poorest and hardest-to-reach people are not left behind.”

Los Angeles Mayor Proclaims Juneteenth Official City Holiday

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti on Monday signed a proclamation making Juneteenth an official city holiday to celebrate the end of slavery in the United States.

Garcetti said during a signing ceremony at City Hall that the commemoration was overdue and a small step toward undoing systemic racism in our country.

“We want every child to know what Juneteenth commemorates,” Garcetti said.

The holiday marks June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to enslaved Black people in Galveston, Texas, two months after the Confederacy had surrendered. It was about 2 1/2 years after the Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves in Southern states.

President Joe Biden signed a bill last year making Juneteenth a federal holiday. The Los Angeles proclamation makes it a paid holiday for all city employees.

The LA City Council voted unanimously in 2020 to start the process of making Juneteenth a Los Angeles holiday.

Councilmember Curren Price said at the time that he was moved to support the measure following nationwide demonstrations demanding racial equity and protesting the killings of Black Americans by police.

Price said Monday that the city's proclamation “offers a sense of vindication" for Black Angelenos.

“Juneteenth for the Black community serves as a brighter chapter. Our freedom day. Our true day of emancipation. This will now be a day of remembrance for our City,” Price said in a statement.

Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Gunmen At Nigeria Church Shot From Both Inside And Outside

A view of the St. Francis Catholic Church in Owo Nigeria, Sunday, June 5, 2022. Lawmakers in southwestern Nigeria say more than 50 people are feared dead after gunmen opened fire and detonated explosives at a church. Ogunmolasuyi Oluwole with the Ondo State House of Assembly said the gunmen targeted the St Francis Catholic Church in Ondo state on Sunday morning just as the worshippers gathered for the weekly Mass. (AP Photo/Rahaman A Yusuf)

BY CHINEDU ASADU

ABUJA, NIGERIA (AP) — As attackers opened fire on worshippers inside a Catholic church in southwestern Nigeria, other gunmen waited outside to kill those who tried to flee, church officials and witnesses said Monday.

At least 50 people including children were killed in the attack, according to a state lawmaker from the area. No one has claimed responsibility for the massacre, and local authorities said the gunmen had evaded capture.

While northern Nigeria has battled an Islamic insurgency for more than 13 years, Ondo state has long been considered one of the most peaceful states in the country.

Worshippers were attending Pentecost Sunday Mass when gunfire erupted at the St. Francis Catholic Church in Ondo state. Bishop Jude Arogundade of the Ondo Diocese said there were gunmen inside the church but also other gunmen outside who then killed churchgoers fleeing in terror.

Steven Omotayo, who lives near the church, rushed to the scene upon hearing the gunshots.

“I saw a lot of dead bodies — both young and old, even children,” he said. “The people came in and started shooting from the gate.”

He said the church has three entrances and the main entrance was said to have been locked, making it difficult for many to escape.

“They were just shooting. If they see anyone trying to escape or stand up, they will just shoot the person,” he said. “Everybody standing was bombarded with bullets.”

Hospital workers struggled to treat scores of wounded following the attack. The Nigeria Medical Association in Ondo state directed all available doctors to head to the hospitals to offer any help to dozens of critically wounded.

“At a stage, even the blood got exhausted at our blood bank and we had to be pleading for blood,” said a doctor at the Federal Medical Center in Owo who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to journalists.

“Even as a physician, I have attended to a good number of casualties but what I saw yesterday was far beyond whatever I have seen before in my life and in the practice.”

State Police Commissioner Oyeyemi Oyediran said security forces were “on top of the situation.”

“A team pursued the assailants along with the military but unfortunately, we could not catch up with them,” he said.

Man Brought From Nigeria To Lexington To Face Charges In Romance Scam

Adedunmola Gbadegesin

Nigerian national Adedunmola Gbadegesin is accused of defrauding elderly victims and money laundering

BY TOM KENNY

LEXINGTON, KY> (WTVQ) – A Nigerian national was brought from Nigeria to Lexington on Wednesday to face federal charges in a so-called ‘romance scam.’

Prosecutors say 33-year old Adedunmola Gbadegesin, of Lagos, Nigeria, created fake online dating profiles for online dating websites which led to online chats, emails and phone calls with unwitting victims in the United States, including an elderly woman in Lexington.

Prosecutors say victims were convinced to send money to romantic partners who didn’t really exist or give them access to their financial accounts to initiate money transfers.

According to recently unsealed Court documents, a federal grand jury in Lexington returned an indictment charging Gbadegesin alongside two others, 34-year old Olatunbosun Oluwakayode Ajayi, of Atlanta, Georgia, and 45-year old Otunuya Ineh Eqwem Livingstone, of Houston, Texas, with conspiracy to commit money laundering.

The indictment alleges that Gbadegesin hired others in the U.S. to receive funds from victims and to launder those funds, so the funds could be returned back to Gbadegesin in Nigeria. Those United States-based money launderers included Ineh Eqwem, Ajayi, and Ismaila Fafunmi.

Fafunmi pleaded guilty to his role in the money laundering scheme; and in August 2021, he received 51 months in prison. Ineh Eqwem and Ajayi have also pleaded guilty for their roles in the money laundering scheme; they were sentenced to 24 months and 12 months, respectively, according to prosecutors.

Gbadgesin was arrested by Nigerian authorities on Sept. 22, 2021, in Lagos, Nigeria at the request of the United States. At the time of his arrest, Gbadgesein had been living in Lagos, Nigeria. Nigeria approved his extradition on March 21, 2021, and he was transferred into U.S. custody on April 26, 2022.

Carlton S. Shier, IV, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky, and Jodi Cohen, Special Agent in Charge, FBI, Louisville Field Office, jointly announced the indictment.

The investigation preceding the indictment was conducted by the FBI. The indictment was presented to the grand jury by Assistant U.S. Attorney Kate Dieruf. The U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of International Affairs, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission of Nigeria, the Nigerian Attorney General’s Office, the Central Authority Unity, and the FBI Louisville Field Office assisted with the extradition of Gbadgesein.

Gbadegesin has his first appearance in Court on May 2, 2022 at 11:30 a.m. He faces up to 20 years in prison and a maximum fine of $500,000. However, any sentence following a conviction would be imposed by the Court, after its consideration of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and the federal sentencing statutes.

This case is being prosecuted as part of the Department of Justice’s efforts to identify and prosecute those persons who facilitate elder financial exploitation.

The Department of Justice’s Elder Justice Mission, being carried out through the Kentucky Elder Justice Task Force, is to seek justice for victims of elder financial exploitation.

Anyone that knows someone, who may be a victim of an elder financial exploitation, is encouraged to contact law enforcement.

As Offerings Dwindle, Some Churches Fear For Their Future

The Rev. Alvin J. Gwynn Sr., of Friendship Baptist Church in Baltimore, sits in his church's sanctuary, Thursday, March 19, 2020. He bucked the cancellation trend by holding services the previous Sunday. But attendance was down by about 50%, and Gwynn said the day’s offering netted about $5,000 compared to a normal intake of about $15,000. “It cuts into our ministry,” he said. “If this keeps up, we can’t fund all our outreach to help other people.” (AP Photo/Steve Ruark)

BY DAVID CRARY

NEW YORK (AP) — As in-person worship services are canceled or downsized amid the coronavirus outbreak, some churches across the U.S. are bracing for a painful drop in weekly contributions and possible cutbacks in programs and staff.

One church leader, Bishop Paul Egensteiner of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s Metropolitan New York Synod, said some of the 190 churches in his region were unlikely to survive because of a two-pronged financial hit. Their offerings are dwindling, and they are losing income from tenants such as preschools which can no longer afford to rent church venues.

“As much as I’d like to help them, everybody’s reserves are taking a hit because of the stock market,” Egensteiner said,

At Friendship Baptist Church in Baltimore, a mostly African American congregation of about 1,100, the Rev. Alvin Gwynn Sr. bucked the cancellation trend by holding services last Sunday. But attendance was down by about 50%, and Gwynn said the day’s offering netted about $5,000 compared to a normal intake of about $15,000.

“It cuts into our ministry,” he said. “If this keeps up, we can’t fund all our outreach to help other people.”

There was a brighter outcome at the Church of the Resurrection, a large United Methodist Church congregation that operates out of five locations in the Kansas City area.

Cathy Bien, the church’s communications director, said about 25,700 people logged in to join online worship last Sunday after in-person services were canceled. That compared to normal Sunday participation of 14,000 worshippers -– 8,000 in person and 6,000 online.

“It blew our minds,” Bien said. “They were coming from all over the country -– a lot of Methodists from other churches.”

The huge turnout didn’t translate into a larger than normal offering, although the church is still processing checks that were sent by some of the worshippers, Bien said. She expressed hope that financial support will remain robust as the church stresses the need to bolster food pantries and other community programs in the face of COVID-19.

At Trinity Presbyterian Church in Charlottesville, Virginia, giving was down modestly last weekend as the church cancelled in-person worship and made the service available online.

The pastor, Walter Kim, said some of his roughly 1,000 congregants have grown accustomed to online giving in recent years, but many worshippers still give in person at the services - an option not available for now.

“We’ll be asking them to sign up (for online giving) or mail a check,” said Kim. He will be urging congregants to bolster the church’s “mercy fund” for use assisting hard-up members of the community as job losses multiply.

In addition to his pastoral duties Kim is president of the National Association of Evangelicals, which represents more than 45,000 evangelical churches. The NAE will be co-hosting a two-day digital summit next week featuring videos from church leaders advising other pastors nationwide how to respond creatively and effectively to the virus outbreak.

The co-host is the Humanitarian Disaster Institute at Wheaton College in Illinois, which already has offered resources to churches in response to COVID-19.

“Some changes are going to be required,” Kim said. “The church is a very creative institution. In the end it will find ways of fulfilling its mission.”

In Western Massachusetts, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield has indefinitely cancelled all public Masses, and recently rescinded permission for parishioners to pray individually at their churches.

Funeral Masses were still allowed with a maximum attendance of 25; the diocese said the times of those Masses were not to be shared in the media,

“Lack of access to the churches and Eucharist is particularly difficult for many older parishioners whose entire daily routine is built around getting up, out of the house, and going to Mass,” said the Rev. Mark Stelzer, who has served in the diocese as a parish priest and college chaplain.

The Rev. William Tourigny, pastor of Ste. Rose de Lima Church in Chicopee, Massachusetts, said his parish had a solid financial foundation and expected it could maintain all programs and staff payroll for the time being.

“For smaller faith-based communities with little or no reserved funds, difficult decisions will need to be made,” he said.

Joe Wright, executive director of the Bivocational and Small Church Leadership Network in Nashville said many pastors in the network have been holding regular in-person services, while monitoring the spread of the virus.

“Once the coronavirus rises to the level where it starts hitting smaller groups, then we’ll see even the smaller groups back away and seek ways to gather, probably electronically,” he said.

When that happens, Wright said, financial giving will depend on the church, especially the age of the congregations.

“Some churches with older congregations do not give electronically so the transition to that will be a little bit harder,” he said.

Ron Klassen, executive director of Rural Home Missionary Association, said it’s too early to say how the rural churches he represents are being impacted.

“My sense is that in the past, people rise up and, if anything, the giving might increase,” he said. “People are going to give. They’ll take care of their church and their community.”

In Baltimore, pastor Gwynn worries that tensions might rise past the point that church outreach programs can help.

“With all the uncertainty, I’m afraid this could turn into anarchy,” he said. “Not everybody’s patient. Not everybody’s law abiding.”

He even envisioned the possibility of a stampede toward the goods being doled out after church’s annual food drive.

“My biggest fear right now is what’s happening to the minds of our people,” Gwynn said. “How long can we hold them together?’

___

AP Religion Editor Gary Fields contributed.

Whiplash: All At Once, A Steady US Economy Screeches To Halt

Few shoppers were in the St. Louis Galleria on Thursday, March 19, 2020. Most stores were shuttered. (Robert Cohen/St. Louis Post-Dispatch via AP)

BY PAUL WISEMAN, ALEXANDRA OLSON, JOYCE M. ROSENBERG

WASHINGTON (AP) — Three weeks ago, EmpireCLS was heading toward a second straight year of record business. A car service company in New Jersey, Empire couldn’t even find enough chauffeurs and office workers to meet its needs.

Now? With stunning speed, business in the United States — as well as in Europe and elsewhere — has collapsed in the face of the coronavirus and warnings for everyone to stay home. Suddenly, no one needs a chauffeur.

“We went from full throttle to 90% revenue loss in three weeks,” said CEO David Seelinger. “We’ve been through 9/11. We’ve seen recessions. We’ve never seen anything like this.’’

Seelinger spent last Sunday laying off 750 of his 900 employees.

“It was the most difficult day of my career,” he said.

Never before has the U.S. economy screeched to such a sudden, violent stop. Its shutdown has inflicted a case of whiplash on Americans who had enjoyed a decade-plus of gains from the job market, the stock market and a steady economic expansion. The economy is cratering into what looks like a deep recession. Millions will likely lose jobs by summer.

“The economy has never gone from healthy to disaster so quickly,” said Jason Furman, who was President Barack Obama’s top economic adviser and is now a professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School.

“In the financial crisis,” Furman noted, “the housing bubble burst in 2006, the first financial tremors were in 2007 and the major financial events were spread out from February through September of 2008. What would take years in a financial crisis has happened in days in this health crisis.’’

Since the Great Recession ended in 2009, the economy has risen for a record 11 years. It hasn’t exactly been a boom. Annual growth has averaged a decent but unspectacular 2.3% since 2010. Yet the expansion has been solid and durable. Employers have added jobs for 113 straight months, the longest such streak on record.

Just two weeks ago, the government delivered a blockbuster employment report: A healthy gain of 273,000 of jobs in February. A 3.5% unemployment rate, a 50-year low.

What’s more, public confidence was up. Consumers were spending. Incomes were rising. Layoffs were rare.

In just a couple of weeks, it’s all ended with the shutdown of most business activity nationwide, and a destructive recession seems inevitable. Goldman Sachs expects the economy to shrink at a sickening 24% annual rate in the April-June quarter. That would be, by far, the worst quarterly drop on record. Just days before, Goldman had projected a 5% annual drop in that period.

This week, economists say the government could report that up to 3 million people applied for unemployment benefits last week, which would easily set a record. IHS Markit predicts 7 million job losses from April to June and for unemployment to shoot to 8.8% by late this year. Other economists see joblessness going much higher than that.

As investors have grasped the depth of the crisis, panic selling has set in. Since Feb. 12, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has plunged 35%, wiping out vast household wealth and likely undermining people’s confidence and willingness to spend.

“I’m not sure that anyone honestly has any sense of how this ultimately resolves and on what sort of timetable,″ said Daniel Feldman, a former U.S. diplomat who counsels corporations for the law firm Covington & Burling.

Policymakers are straining to help. The Federal Reserve has slashed its benchmark interest rate to near zero and is trying to ensure that companies maintain access to the short-term credit they need for payrolls and other expenses. Congress and the White House are preparing an enormous stimulus program that includes sending checks to households and ensuring some paid sick and family leave.

Typically, economists don’t recognize a recession until long after it’s begun, the warning signs apparent only in hindsight.

“Never in the course of my career have I known the week a recession started,” said Diane Swonk, chief economist at the accounting and consulting firm Grant Thornton, who calculates that the downturn began in the first week of March as the economy all but locked down.

At Stuyvesant Plaza, an office complex and shopping center outside Albany, New York, sales from shops, restaurants and fitness centers had posted double-digit increases in January and February.

And then “the world turned upside down,” said Ed Swyer, president of the plaza.

Now, he’s waiving rent for two weeks for his 60 tenants, hoping to help them survive. The restaurants, in particular, are suffering from New York state’s order to close all eateries except take-out and delivery. Swyer is offering no-interest loans to some of the businesses.

“I feel like it’s a bottomless pit, and we just don’t know how bad it is and what the duration is,” he said.

A few weeks ago, said Nicholas Calio, CEO of Airlines for America, an industry association and lobbying group, airliners were running 85% to 100% full. Now, their occupancy rates are 15% to 20%. Recently, he traveled on a plane with just 15 passengers.

And until the virus paralyzed the economy, Samantha Martin’s PR business was soaring. At Toy Fair, an industry expo — “my Super Bowl” — “we were bopping up and down aisles like nothing was happening.”

Then jittery clients started sending emails. PR and marketing expenses are often the first budget item that struggling companies cut. Martin offered clients discounts. And she asked her 16 staffers to take a 25% pay cut.

Most of her clients are staying put, for now. But Martin says she now wakes up with a knot in her stomach.

The shutdown of restaurants has stifled sales at D’Artagnan, a wholesaler of high-end meat products that supplies the food service business.

“We’re going to go from 8% growth to a huge decline,” said Andy Wertheim, president of the company in Union, New Jersey.

Automakers, too, are reeling. Until last week, the research firm Cox Automotive was forecasting 16.6 million new-vehicle sales this year, down only slightly from 2019. Now, said Michelle Krebs, a Cox analyst, it appears sales could drop as low as 14 million.

“Things are changing by the hour,” said Jeff Aznavorian, president of Clips & Clamps, a Michigan auto supplier.

Orders and shipments might hit zero next week. Aznavorian worries about his cash flow. Even when sales eventually rebound, he won’t be collecting customer payments for months. He’s having trouble sleeping.

“I feel the freight train coming at me,” he said.

For now, many U.S. households are coping — working from home and still holding on to jobs. Some of them may even be managing to save money, “which will give us more resources later,” said Scott Hoyt, senior director of consumer economics at Moody’s Analytics.

Yet for much of America, the picture is bleak. Roughly 82 million people — three-fifths of the U.S. workforce — are hourly employees. Most of them won’t be paid if they don’t work. They have rents to pay and food to buy. And it’s still unclear what financial aid the federal government will provide.

“They’re scrambling and at financial risk,” Hoyt said.

Nevin Muni, a part-time sales associate for T.J. Maxx in Astoria, Queens, was barely managing even before the store announced it was shutting down. The store had been cutting her hours because of a plunge in customers amid the virus crisis. Her manager called Thursday to tell her the store would close until further notice, with no guarantee that she’ll be recalled to work.

“I’m so worried because I don’t know long this is going to last,” said Muni, who plans to apply for unemployment benefits.

Maggie Pouncey, owner of Stories children’s bookshop in Brooklyn, had been looking toward celebrating her store’s four-year anniversary with a big bash in April on Independent Bookstore Day. She’d been hoping to begin using a truck to take books and services to schools around the city.

The bash is off. Pouncey canceled all her programming — the story times, the writing workshops, the author readings — that is vital to her business in the age of Amazon.

She’ll open her shop for pick-up orders one final time before closing — temporarily, she hopes. And she’s told customers and her staff that she can’t guarantee the store will survive the crisis.

“If it’s one month of this, that’s one thing,” Pouncey said “If it’s four months, it’s another.”

Olson and Rosenberg reported from New York.

AP Auto Writer Tom Krisher in Detroit, AP Business Writer Ken Sweet in New York and AP Airline Writer David Koenig in Dallas contributed to this report.