Crime
Secret Service Director Resigns After Assassination Attempt On Former President Trump At Rally
WASHINGTON (AP) — The director of the Secret Service resigned Tuesday after the failed assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump sparked outrage that the agency had failed in its core job of protecting current and former presidents.
Kimberly Cheatle, acting director of the Secret Service since August 2022, has faced mounting calls for her resignation and several other investigations into how a gunman managed to get so near the Republican presidential candidate during an outside campaign rally in Pennsylvania.
“I take full responsibility for the security breach,” she said in an email to staff obtained by The Associated Press. “In light of recent events, it is with a heavy heart that I have made the difficult decision to resign as your director.”
Cheatle’s departure is unlikely to finish scrutiny of the long-troubled agency after the July 13 setbacks, coming at a critical time before the Democratic National Convention and a busy presidential campaign season. Lawmakers on each side of the aisle have promised more investigations. The inspector general’s investigation and an independent, bipartisan effort launched by President Joe Biden will keep the agency within the highlight.
Cheatle’s resignation got here a day after she appeared before a congressional committee and was criticized for hours by Democrats and Republicans for her security lapses. She called the assassination attempt on Trump the Secret Service’s “biggest operational failure” in a long time but angered lawmakers by not answering specific questions on the investigation.
Biden said in a press release that “what happened that day must never happen again” and that he plans to call a brand new director soon, but didn’t provide a timeline.
The president and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas thanked Cheatle for her service. Mayorkas named Deputy Director Ronald Rowe as acting director. He had worked for the agency for 23 years.
“At this point, we must remain focused,” Rowe said in a memo to staff obtained by the AP. “We will restore the faith and trust of the American public and the people we are entrusted to protect.”
Congressional hearing
During Monday’s hearing, Cheatle remained adamant that she was “the right person” to steer the Secret Service, at the same time as she said she took responsibility for its failures. When Republican Rep. Nancy Mace suggested Cheatle start writing her resignation letter within the courtroom, Cheatle responded, “No, thank you.”
The 20-year-old shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, was capable of get to inside 135 meters (157 yards) of the stage where the previous president was speaking when he opened fire. This happened despite a threat against Trump from Iran that led to extra security for the previous president in the times before the rally.
Cheatle acknowledged Monday that the Secret Service was briefed on a suspicious person two to 5 times before the shooting on the rally. She also said the rooftop from which Crooks fired the shot had been identified as a possible weak point days earlier. But she didn’t answer many questions on what happened, including why agents weren’t on the roof.
Trump, covered in blood, was quickly escorted off stage by Secret Service agents, and agency snipers killed the shooter. Trump said a part of his right ear was pierced within the shooting. One rallygoer was killed and two others were seriously wounded.
Details are still emerging in regards to the signs of trouble that day and the role of the Secret Service and native authorities. The agency routinely relies on local law enforcement to secure the perimeter of events. Former top Secret Service agents have said the shooter should never have gotten to the roof.
After Cheatle resigned, Trump wrote on social media: “The Biden/Harris Administration failed to protect me and I was forced to take a bullet for democracy. IT WAS A GREAT HONOR FOR ME TO DO THIS!”
The House Homeland Security Committee asked Cheatle to testify Tuesday at one other hearing on the attempted bombing, but lawmakers said she declined. Cheatle’s name appeared on a note on a table in front of an empty chair through the hearing, which began shortly before her decision to resign was made public.
Featured Stories
Researching the ever-increasing variety of threats
The Secret Service is a component of the Department of Homeland Security, which incorporates immigration, transportation security, and the Coast Guard. The department was created after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
There was a movement several years ago to maneuver the agency back to the Treasury Department, where it was housed before 9/11, particularly because Homeland Security’s intense concentrate on immigration had deepened a growing divide between what the Secret Service sees as its dual missions — protecting the president and investigating financial crimes — and that of its parent department. But that movement has stalled.
About half of the Secret Service’s $3 billion budget goes to protective services. It also has a strong cybercrime unit, state-of-the-art crime labs and a threat assessment center that studies learn how to mitigate threats and trains to combat them.
With a workforce of seven,800 special agents, uniformed officers, and other personnel, the Secret Service investigated an ever-increasing variety of threats against the president and other officials under its protection. It also managed a growing variety of senior government officials requesting support. Staffing couldn’t sustain with the growing workload. Around 9/11, there have been about 15 full-time protected personnel. That number has now greater than doubled.
Trump is the primary modern former president to hunt one other term, and since of his high profile, his security has at all times been larger than some others. That protective bubble has tightened in recent months as he approaches the nomination. All major-party nominees are receiving beefed-up protection, with counterattack and countersniper teams just like the president’s.
An appeal for responsibility
Calls for accountability have emerged across the political spectrum, with congressional committees immediately starting investigations and issuing subpoenas. Top Republican leaders in each the House and Senate have said Cheatle should resign.
Biden, a Democrat, has ordered an independent review of security on the rally, and the Secret Service inspector general has launched an investigation. The agency can also be reviewing the “readiness and operations” of its countersniper team.
On Tuesday, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said Cheatle’s resignation was “long overdue.”
“Now we have to pick up the pieces. We have to rebuild the faith and trust of the American people in the Secret Service as an agency,” Johnson said.
Meanwhile, Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Catherine Cortez Masto (R-Nevada) on Tuesday filed a bill requiring Senate confirmation of future Secret Service directors.
Cheatle served within the Secret Service for 27 years. She left in 2021 to turn into chief security officer at PepsiCo before Biden asked her to return in 2022 to steer the agency.
She took the position amid the controversy over missing text messages that emerged across the time hundreds of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, following his loss to Biden within the 2020 election.
During her time on the agency, Cheatle was the primary woman appointed deputy director of protective operations, the division that protects the president and other dignitaries, where she oversaw a budget of $133.5 million. She was the second woman to steer the agency.
When Biden announced Cheatle’s nomination, he said she had served on his security detail when he was vp, and he and his wife had “grown to trust her judgment and advice.”
Crime
Sean “Diddy” Combs faces five new sexual assault trials
Several more plaintiffs got here forward this week accusing rap mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs of sexual abuse. On November 19, three men and two women filed separate complaints against the Bad Boy Records founder through Tony Buzbee, a lawyer who previously said he would represent greater than 100 clients accusing Combs of misconduct.
“For years, Combs and his companies have engaged in a persistent and pervasive pattern of violence against women, men and minors,” the entire complaints read: in keeping with People magazine. “This abuse was at times verbal, emotional, physical and sexual. As part of his pattern of molestation, Combs manipulated both men and women into participating in highly orchestrated performances of sexual activity, with both prostitutes and unsuspecting partygoers.”
The new plaintiffs include an unidentified man who claims the rapper sexually assaulted him when he was 39 years old. At a house party in New York in 2022, the plaintiff alleged that he was given a drink that left him feeling disoriented and uncontrolled. his body, which ultimately caused him to lose consciousness.
When he regained consciousness, he recalls being in a “dark bedroom with black walls, on a bed with black sheets”, where he realized that Combs was “sodomizing him”. The plaintiff claims he fought with the rapper before leaving the party.
Other male plaintiffs, including an unnamed former actor, remember feeling disoriented, passing out and waking up as Combs sexually assaulted them. With allegations dating back to 2001, all five complaints said Combs’ alleged abuse was “shockingly typical” since the star believed he was “above the law.”
“That said, Mr. Combs vehemently and categorically denies as false and defamatory any claim that he sexually abused anyone, including minors,” attorney Erica Wolff added in a press release. “He looks forward to proving his innocence and defending himself in court where the truth will be determined by evidence, not speculation.”
Combs is currently in federal custody awaiting trial on criminal charges including sex trafficking and racketeering. The star’s trial is scheduled to happen in May 2025.
Crime
Founder of an AI Tech startup accused of fraud and combining numbers with investors
Joanna Smith-Griffin, 33, CEO of startup AllHere Education, Inc. dealing with AI education accused of defrauding investors.
The Southern District of New York prosecuted Smith-Griffin securities fraud, wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. The grand jury indictment alleged that Smith-Griffin lied concerning the education platform’s funds and posed as a financial consultant to supply false information to investors. While acting as a financial consultant for AllHere Education, Smith-Griffin is accused of falsifying the corporate’s financial records mislead potential investors and inflate the worth of her company and its revenues.
AllHere Education is an AI-powered learning platform utilized in primary and secondary schools. Smith-Griffin has had little success integrating the K-12 platform into individual school districts in California and Georgia. However, the principal didn’t secure long-term contracts with school districts. She used these short-term partnerships to misrepresent to investors the reach and financial success of AllHere Education.
Smith-Griffin told potential AllHere investors that AllHere generated about $3.7 million in revenue in 2020, about $2.5 million in money and has major school district customers similar to New York City Department of Education (“NYC DOE”) and Atlanta Public Schools. In fact, AllHere generated roughly $11,000 in revenue in 2020, had roughly $494,000 in money, and had no contracts with many of the clients it represented, including the NYC DOE and Atlanta Public Schools.
Smith-Griffin continued to boost capital to support the startup, raising one other $10 million in funding. When the corporate collapsed financially, Smith-Griffin allegedly used the money injection to pay for an extravagant three-day wedding in Florida and a residence in North Carolina.
FBI Deputy Director James E. Dennehy commented on Smith-Griffin’s decision to prioritize her personal aspirations over the needs of an educational platform.
“Her alleged actions impacted the potential to improve the learning environment in core school districts by selfishly prioritizing personal expenses,” he said.
Smith-Griffin faces a compulsory two years in prison for the identity theft charge and a maximum of 20 years for every fraud charge. AllHere Education is currently in Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
Crime
Prosecutors say Sean “Diddy” Combs is trying to obstruct justice by heading to prison
NEW YORK (AP) — Sean “Diddy” Combs was trying to reach potential witnesses and influence public opinion while in prison in a bid to influence potential jurors in an upcoming sex trafficking trial, prosecutors said in a court filing during which they urged a judge to deny his latest bail request.
The government charges were filed Friday evening in federal court in Manhattan, which opposed the music mogul’s latest offer of $50 million bail. A bail hearing is scheduled for next week.
Prosecutors wrote that a review of recorded phone calls Combs made while in prison shows that he asked relations to contact potential victims and witnesses and urged them to create a “narrative” to influence the jury pool. They say he also encouraged the use of promoting strategies to influence public opinion.
“The defendant has demonstrated time and time again – even while in custody – that he’ll flagrantly and repeatedly disregard the foundations so as to improperly influence the consequence of his case. In other words, the defendant has demonstrated that he can’t be trusted to abide by the terms and conditions,” prosecutors wrote in a press release containing redactions.
Prosecutors wrote that from his behavior it might be inferred that Combs wanted to blackmail victims and witnesses into remaining silent or providing testimony helpful to his defense.
Combs’ lawyers didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Prosecutors said Combs, 55, began breaking the foundations almost immediately after being taken into custody Metropolitan Prison Center in Brooklyn after his September arrest.
He pleaded not guilty to the costs brought against him he abused and molested women for years with the assistance of a network of collaborators and employees, while silencing victims through blackmail and violence, including kidnapping, arson and physical beatings.
Two judges found he was a danger to the community and a flight risk.
His lawyers recently filed a 3rd bail application after rejecting two previous attempts, including a $50 million bail offer.
In their motion, they cited modified circumstances, including latest evidence, that they believed justified Combs’ release so he could higher prepare for his May 5 trial.
However, prosecutors said defense lawyers created the most recent bail proposal based on evidence provided to them by prosecutors, and the brand new material was already known to defense lawyers after they submitted previous bail applications.
In their presentation to the judge, prosecutors said Combs’ behavior in prison shows he must remain locked up.
For example, they said, Combs asked relations to plan and execute a social media campaign around his birthday “with the intent of influencing a potential jury in this criminal proceeding.”
He encouraged his children to post a video on their social media accounts of them gathering to have a good time his birthday, he added.
He then monitored statistics on the jail, including audience engagement, and “explicitly discussed with the family how to ensure the film would have the desired impact on potential jury members in this case,” they said.
The government also alleged that Combs made clear in other conversations that he intended to anonymously publish information that he believed would help him defend against the costs.
“Defendant’s efforts to impede the fairness of these proceedings also include his persistent efforts to contact potential witnesses, including victims of violence, who could provide strong testimony against him,” prosecutors wrote.
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