On July 19th, seventeen people died after a Missouri duck boat capsized and sunk on Table Rock Lake in Branson, Missouri. The boat, with 31 people aboard, sank around 7pm Thursday evening after it left for a ride on the lake that was hit by a thunderstorm generating near-hurricane strength winds. Witnesses captured video of two of the Ride the Ducks vessels being tossed around by waves as they struggled to make it back to land, only one made it back safely. One video shows water from the waves entering the craft before it capsized (rolled over onto its side) and then sank below the waves. It is believed the boat sunk in 40 feet of water, rolling as it sank, before landing on its wheels in 80-feet-deep lake water.
Duck boats are amphibious vehicles equipped with wheels and propellers that can be driven on roadways or on water. With a push of a lever, the vehicle can switch from being wheel-driven to relying instead on the rear-mounted propeller. Originally built to transport troops during WWII, they are now popular in many tourist areas with large bodies of water. The 17 victims in the tragedy ranged in age from 1 to 76 years with nine victims from the same family. None of the victims were wearing life jackets when found. There were life jackets on the boat but passengers weren’t required to wear them.
The National Transportation Safety Board recorded wind readings of 73 mph which were estimated to cause waves that rose to around 4 feet, with a possibility of 6-foot crests. An investigation into the cause of the tragedy and why the Ride the Ducks boat entered the lake despite severe thunderstorm warnings for the area. Branson is about 200 miles from Kansas City, and is considered a major family vacation destination. The town was under a severe thunderstorm warning issued about half an hour before the boat capsized.
Tia Coleman and 10 of her relatives were on a family vacation from Indiana. Her husband, her three children and five other members of her family died in the accident. Their names were: Angela, 45; Arya, 1; Belinda, 69; Ervin, 76; Evan, 7; Glenn, 40; Horace, 70; Maxwell, 2; and Reece, 9. Only Tia and her 13 year old nephew Donovan survived when the boat sank. The other victims included the driver of the duck boat, Robert Williams, 73; Steve Smith, a retired teacher from Osceola, Arkansas, and his teenage son, Lance; William and Janice Bright, a married couple from Higginsville, Missouri; William Asher and his partner, Rosemarie Hamann from Missouri; and Leslie Dennison from Illinois.
Tia Coleman, one of the 14 survivors, said passengers were told there was a storm coming before the trip and that they would alter their route to tour the lake before the storm hit. During an emotional interview from her hospital bed she said that the captain mentioned the life jackets before they went on the lake but said, “you won’t need them so we didn’t grab them, nobody did.”
She described the amphibious vessel being hit by waves and taking on some water. She said that immediately after a large wave went over the vessel, they were plunged under water where she couldn’t see or hear anything but felt her head hitting the top of the craft. Passengers were unable to make an immediate escape as the craft sank because the sides of the craft are windows with a canopy top. Once the canopy top gave way, some were able to swim to the surface as the craft continued to sink in the murky later water.
Vacationers and employees of a nearby dining showboat immediately began throwing life preservers, and life rafts into the water. Others jumped in and pulled people out of the water. Several people nearby with medical training tried unsuccessfully to revive unresponsive victims. Rescuers searched late into the night for survivors before calling it off due to poor visibility. The searching resumed the next morning until the remaining victims were found.
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In Thailand, rescuers raced to free 12 members of a youth soccer team and a coach who had been trapped in a flooded cave for nearly three weeks. Divers found the teammates and coach alive, but had been unable to rescue them. In the last 18 days, a local search for the missing 13 turned into a complex rescue operation, involving hundreds of experts who flew in from around the world to help in the rescue efforts. The rescue has been a race to extract the boys and their coach ahead of monsoon rains that could haved flooded the cave completely. Cave experts grappled with the problem of how to free the young, malnourished boys, some of whom couldn’t swim, from a flooded cavern as monsoon rains threatened to raise water levels even further. The boys received a crash course in swimming and the use of SCUBA gear.
The final boy and his coach rescued Tuesday are still being treated at an on-site medical center, while three other boys have been transported to a nearby hospital where eight of their teammates are recuperating after being rescued Sunday and Monday. Nineteen divers entered the cave at 10 a.m. local time Tuesday (11 p.m. Monday ET), many on their third mission in three days, with the aim of bringing everyone inside the cave out. Tuesday’s rescue efforts took nine hours from the time the divers entered the cave to bringing out the boys and their coach.
Divers involved in the rescue described dangerous conditions involving fast-moving shallow water passing through very narrow passages. Poor visibility, razor sharp rocks and narrow passages made the rescue very tricky. As rain threatened to hamper what was already a complicated rescue mission it became clear the boys were going to have to dive out Officials scrambled to find full-face oxygen masks small enough to fit the boys and experts were sent in to teach them how to use scuba gear.
Two days before the first four boys were rescued, officials warned that oxygen levels within the cave had fallen to 15%. The “optimal range” of oxygen needed in the air a person breathes in order to maintain normal function is between 19.5% and 23.5%. Such low levels creates the risk of hypoxia, a condition that causes altitude sickness.
During the hours-long trip out of the cave, each boy was accompanied underwater by two divers helping them navigate the dark, murky water. The most dangerous part required the divers and boys to squeeze through a narrow, flooded channel. Rescuers had to hold the boys’ oxygen tanks in front of them and swim pencil-like through submerged holes. Once they completed this section, the boys were then handed over to separate, specialist rescue teams, who helped assist them through the remainder of the cave, much of which they can wade through.
All the boys rescued are being treated in an isolation ward in a Chiang Rai hospital. Medical officials told reporters that they’re healthy, fever-free, mentally fit and “seem to be in high spirits.” They will remain in insolation until the risk of infection has passed. Parents of the boys have been able to see their children through a glass window and talk to them on the phone. They’ll be allowed to enter the room if tests show the boys are free of infection.
The permanent secretary of the Thai Health Ministry, said the first group of boys taken out on Sunday were aged 14 to 16. Their body temperatures were very low when they emerged, and two are suspected of having lung inflammation. The second group freed on Monday were aged 12 to 14. Authorities will look for signs of Histoplasmosis, also known as “cave disease,” an infection caused by breathing in spores of a fungus often found in bird and bat droppings. They are all likely to stay in hospital for seven days due to their weakened immune systems.
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In an effort to broaden the company’s “social interaction” with our clients and FaceBook fans, Daily Trivia Questions are posted on both of our business pages. Here are the weekly standings for this past week, and the winner of the Sunday night Weekly Drawing for an AmEx gift card!
Congratulations – To this past week’s Trivia Contest Winner!! Our latest contest winner for the weekly FaceBook HealthInsurance4Everyone/Health & Life Solutions, LLC Trivia Contest, drawn randomly by computer late Sunday evening, June 24th, 2018 was:
DAWN RAASCH
Allen Park, MI
Winner Of A $25.00 AmEx Gift Card
Each day, fans who have “liked” either of our company FaceBook pages (HealthInsurance4Everyone or Health & Life Solutions LLC) are able to test their skills with our Daily TRIVIA QUESTION. The first 20 winners who post the correct answer to the TRIVIA QUESTION, will then get entered into the weekly drawing held late on Sunday evenings for a $25.00 Am Ex Gift Card.
Weekly Gift Card winners will be posted in our blog at this site. Remember to become a FaceBook “fan” on either of our company pages to enter and post your answers.
Here are the daily contestants from last week’s Trivia Contest that were entered into the Sunday drawing:
6/18/18
Jill Nauyokas
Sherri Kidwell
Tonya Velazquez
Christine Le
Amber Chandler
Heather Marocco
Murphy Mya
Priscilla Shimp
Karyn Koehler
Jennifer Lee Clack
Nicole Blaha
Don Redfield Jr.
Helen Saez Deverter
Sarah Harrison
Tanya Holmes
Ashley Agner
Georgiann D’Angelo
Dawn Raasch
Sunney Michelle Johnson
Jade Good
Kathleen Hickman
Sarah Frank
6/19/18
Dale Fish
Sunney Michelle Johnson
Brittany Light
Melissa Maestas
Jennifer Lee Clack
Marie Beauregard
Andrea Workman
Tina Mimick
Jane Peterson
Nelle Bailey
Mike Adamski
Mikey Mellor
Tonya Velazquez
Trish Musgrave
Marisela Zuniga
Tiffany Greene Elliott
Chrissy Kim
Kelsey Brooke Vinson
Darlene Whyte
Sherry Lilly
Trish Hysell
Suzie Mize Lockhart
6/20/18
Gina Taylor
Angela Janisse
Naomi Whitlatch
Be Schwerin
Preeti Chand
Alexandra Vindiola
Susanne Killion
Ashley Stamey Phillips
Angel Shearl
Eleazar Ruiz
Alisa Jones
Johanna Landsaw-Davis
Brandi K Chaney
Sherri Kidwell
Annette Broxton
Jenn Smith Jackson
Priscilla Shimp
Sunney Michelle Johnson
Trish Musgrave
Dawn Raasch
6/21/18
Kathleen Marks
Eleazar Ruiz
Jill Nauyokas
Nicole Blaha
Misty Shallcross
Brandi K Chaney
Theresa Sigourney
Jade Good
Beth Embrey
Melissa White
Destiny Landsaw Davis
Jenifer Garza
Marilyn Wall
Trish Musgrave
Wendi Black
Russell Stuessy
Deborah Farris
Jane Peterson
Alyssa DiFazio
Jennifer Cameron
Diane Hamric
Kristina Harris
Murphy Mya
6/22/18
Kathleen Marks
Brittany Whitley
Lia Bonita
Sunney Michelle Johnson
Dale Fish
Lori Capobianco
Diane Hamric
Jennifer Lee Clack
Marcy Coull
Jill Nauyokas
Heather Way
Sarah Harrison
Sherri Kidwell
Nicole Rea
Morgan Fam
Hunter Coffey
Jennifer Kinner
Patricia Oehlert Vazquez
Kelsey Polacek
Nancy Pfirrman Schools
Michelle Tyler Jeske
Karron Redfield
Dean Bruss
6/23/18
Eleazar Ruiz
Joanie Waterman
Wilma Mast
Nicole Blaha
Sarah Haught
Jen Freese
Mary Achio
Jenifer Garza
Kiki Roberson
Joann Tompkins-Winborn
Jean Simmons Homfeld
Michelle Webb
Mary Ann Cody
Nacole Patrick
Sheila Vives
Bea Patrick
April Ashcraft
Amber Chandler
Christy Martinez
Melissa White
6/24/18
Tabitha Sinks
Tracy Shafer
Jill Nauyokas
Nikki Hunsaker
Kimberly Taylor Hall
Cyndi Jansheski
Nancy Pfirrman Schools
Amanda Rosario
Melissa White
Vickie Gipson
Eleazar Ruiz
Sarah Harrison
Kathleen Hickman
Felicia Block
Angela Janisse
Angel Shearl
Hunter Coffey
Jennifer Marie
Alicia Dansby
Carole Jacobs
Jenifer Garza
Be sure to watch both of our FaceBook pages for your chance to win and enter again next week, with questions posted daily on HealthInsurance4Everyone or at Health & Life Solutions, LLC!!
Remember that if you try your hand at answering the Trivia Question several days each week, your odds of winning the Sunday weekly drawing are much better.
Also note that a number of the posted answers each day are from contestants who have forgotten to “Like” one of our pages, so their names WILL NOT be entered at the end week drawing for the gift card, giving our fans a better chance!
You may also find that if you “Like” BOTH of the business pages, you will receive faster notifications of the other players as they post their answers to compete with you!
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Massachusetts has filed a lawsuit against 16 top executives of Purdue Pharma, the maker of the popular drug OxyContin, claiming they misled doctors, patients and the public about the dangers posed by the opioid-based painkiller. Attorney General Maura Healey said “Their strategy was simple: The more drugs they sold, the more money they made—and the more people died. We found that Purdue engaged in a multibillion-dollar enterprise to mislead us about their drugs. Purdue pushed prescribers to give higher doses to keep patients on drugs for longer periods of time, without regard to the very real increased risk of addiction, overdose and death.” Texas, Florida, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota and Tennessee have filed similar lawsuits in state courts against the drug maker, whose headquarters are in Stamford, Connecticut.
The Texas’ lawsuit accuses Purdue Pharma, the privately held manufacterer of OxyContin, of violating the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act by aggressively selling its products “when it knew their drugs were potentially dangerous and that its use had a high likelihood of leading to addiction,” state Attorney General Ken Paxton said. “As Purdue got rich from sales of its opioids, Texans and others across the nation were swept up in a public health crisis that led to tens of thousands of deaths each year due to opioid overdoses,” Paxton said.
State officials in Arizona, Alabama, Delaware, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina and West Virginia, — sued various pain-killer manufacturers and distributors for their roles in helping the opioid epidemic grow. In 2007, Purdue Pharma did not admit wrongdoing when it paid $19.5 million to settle lawsuits with 26 states and the District of Columbia after being accused of aggressively marketing OxyContin to doctors while downplaying the risk of addiction. Nevada, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas were part of that agreement while Florida and North Dakota were not.
Opioids were the cause of nearly 42,250 deaths in 2016, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Research suggests that since heroin and opioid painkillers, (including prescription ones) act similarly in the brain. Opioid painkillers are often referred to by some doctors as “heroin lite” and taking one (even “as directed”) can increase one’s susceptibility to becoming hooked on the other. Drug overdoses are now the leading cause of death for Americans under the age of 50, with opioids as the number-one driver.
Deaths from opioids (including fentynals) have been rising sharply for years with an estimated 100 drug overdoses a day across the country. Experts say the epidemic could kill nearly half a million people across America over the next decade as the crisis of addiction and overdose accelerates.
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The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE), arrested 114 undocumented immigrants working at an Ohio gardening business in one of its largest workplace raids in recent years. Tuesday’s arrests targeted employees of Corso’s Flower and Garden Center in Sandusky and Castalia, Ohio. Those arrested are expected to face criminal charges, including identity theft and tax evasion.
About 200 ICE personnel were involved in the operations, which began at 7 a.m. and continued late into the evening. Agents surrounded the perimeter of the Castalia locations, blocking off nearby streets as helicopters flew overhead. Search warrants were served at both locations without incident. They arrested 114 workers suspected of being in the country illegally and loaded many onto buses bound for ICE detention facilities.
Khaalid Walls, spokesman for ICE’s Northeastern region, said the investigation into Corso’s began in October 2017 with the arrest of a suspected document vendor. They reviewed 313 employee records and found that 123 were suspicious. He added that the majority of those arrested were Mexican nationals and some individuals were processed and released for humanitarian reasons.
Authorities are pursuing a bevy of allegations against Corso’s, including allegations of harboring illegal aliens, unlawful employment of aliens, false impersonation of a US citizen, fraud and aggravated identity theft, Walls said.
Steve Francis, special agent in charge of Homeland Security investigations said “We are attempting to identify what criminal network brought over 100 illegal aliens to Ohio to work.” “If your business is operating legitimately, there’s nothing to fear. If you are hiring illegal aliens as a business model, we will identify you, arrest you and prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law.”
In October 2017, Acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Tom Homan said he ordered the investigative unit of ICE to increase work site enforcement actions by as much as fivefold. “We’ve already increased the number of inspections in work site operations, you will see that significantly increase this next fiscal year,” Homan said at the time. Homan also said that those actions would target both the employers and the employees in violation of immigration law. “Not only are we going to prosecute the employers that hire illegal workers, we’re going to detain and remove the illegal alien workers. The aggressive efforts are meant to deter people from entering the country illegally and protect jobs for American workers.”
Corso’s employee Salma Sabala told news outlets that undercover officers showed up in an employee break room initially offering to give out Dunkin’ Donuts. Then, they started rounding up workers. “ They’re armed. They had the dogs. We hear the helicopters on top of us,” Sabala said. Videos captured by workers and reporters showed immigration agents putting employees in handcuffs and separating authorized U.S. residents from undocumented immigrants. No employees were seen fleeing.
The 114 people arrested were taken to detention facilities in St. Clair County, Michigan; Seneca County, Ohio; and the Youngstown, Ohio, area. Families of the arrested workers gathered at St. Paul Catholic Church in Norwalk, Ohio, seeking answers as to the whereabouts of their loved ones.
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U.S. officials have identified a former CIA software engineer as the primary suspect in a massive leak of the spy agency’s documents last year. Joshua Adam Schulte, who designed computer code to spy on foreign adversaries for the CIA, is believed to have leaked thousands of documents last year revealing CIA programs and tools that are capable of hacking into both Apple and Android cellphones. WikiLeaks published over 8,000 pages of documents in March 2017 under the name “Vault 7,” calling it the largest leak of secret CIA documents in history.
The loss of hacking tools to WikiLeaks was one of the most damaging breaches in modern history, experts have said, and includes hacking tools that can be used against private companies. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange crowed that the CIA had “lost control” of its entire arsenal of cyber weapons, and experts said the leak has done major damage to U.S. intelligence gathering.
The suspect, Joshua Adam Schulte, a 29-year-old New York resident, is currently in a Manhattan federal jail on child pornography charges, which he denies. Prosecutors have not brought charges against Schulte for the leak despite months of investigation. Schulte was originally charged in August 2017 with the receipt, possession, and transportation of child pornography. According to the charging document, Schulte had a 54GB encrypted section of a hard drive that depicted children — possibly as young as two years old — involved in sex acts. His lawyer Jacob Kaplan has argued that others had access to the drive.
Schulte fell under suspicion a week after WikiLeaks published the documents and authorities seized his passport and later searched his Manhattan apartment. The search “failed to provide the evidence that prosecutors needed to indict Schulte with illegally giving the information to WikiLeaks.” Instead, the Justice Department charged him with possession of child pornography, allegedly discovered on a server he built in 2009 while attending University of Texas. His attorneys described him as a computer scientist and analyst who interned at the National Security Agency and the CIA. He was later employed there for more than five years, focusing on combating “domestic and international terrorism.”
Schulte’s brother Jason said that “what the government is doing to him is wrong. They are screwing him over.” Jason Schulte said he and his brother had planned to go to Cancun together on vacation, but then the FBI raided Joshua’s apartment. The FBI searched Schulte’s apartment in New York last year and seized personal computer equipment, notebooks, and hand-written notes, court records say. Jason said that the porn images on the computer were not his brother’s and were put there by someone else. He said others had access to the server.
Authorities also found images on Schulte’s phone of an unnamed woman being sexually assaulted while “passed out on the floor” of his bathroom. The photos were reportedly taken in April 2015 in Loudoun County, Virginia, and the woman was identified as a former roommate of Schulte’s.
Kaplan argued that the information the government used to obtain the warrant was inaccurate. “What I think is important for the Court is, in April or May 2017, the government had full access to his computers and his phone, and they found the child pornography in this case, but what they didn’t find was any connection to the WikiLeaks investigation,” he said. A federal prosecutor told the court that Top Secret material was found on Schulte’s computer.
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A New York City lawyer has found himself in hot water after his racist tirade went viral. The footage shows a man now identified as Aaron Schlossberg – dressed in a white dress shirt and gray slacks, berating an employee at the Fresh Kitchen eatery in midtown Manhattan because the staff was speaking Spanish. In the video, Aaron Schlossberg, a lawyer in Midtown Manhattan makes racist remarks to Spanish-speaking patrons and threatens to call immigration enforcement after overhearing customers and staff speaking Spanish.
“Your staff is speaking Spanish to customers when they should be speaking English,” he says. “Every person I listen to: He spoke it, he spoke it, she’s speaking it.” “My guess is they’re not documented, so my next call is to ICE to have each one of them kicked out of my country,” he said. “If they have the balls to come here and live off my money — I pay for their welfare. I pay for their ability to be here. The least they can do — the least they can do — is speak English.”
Since the video went viral, Schlossberg has lost his office space and is now at risk of being disbarred. Corporate Suites, who rented an office space to Schlossberg, released a statement saying it had terminated an agreement to provide meeting space, mail handling and telephone services to Schlossberg. “Corporate Suites has a diverse and global community of business professionals working in a rich environment with mutual respect,” spokesman Hayim Alan Grant said in a statement. “We found Mr. Schlossberg’s statements offensive and contrary to our community norms.”
New York Congress member Adriano Espaillat has said he’s filed a grievance against Aaron Schlossberg and several other videos have now surfaced showing Schlossberg in a handful of other politically charged videos. In one video, at a protest against a Muslim activist last year, rallier’s held signs and icons connected to a alt-right, the far-right movement associated with racism, sexism and anti-Semitism. A man that appears to be Schlossberg, is heard cursing at the person taking the video and chanting, “Milo,” for right-wing media personality Milo Yiannopoulos.
Another video allegedly shows Schlossberg yelling at protesters outside of Trump Tower in a “Make American great again,” hat. YouTube vlogger Willie Morris drew even more attention when he posted a video of what he said was a random encounter with Schlossberg in New York in 2016. Morris said the Fresh Kitchen video jolted his memory about the incident. “I let it go and pretty much forgot about it until I was scrolling through Twitter yesterday and randomly saw a thumbnail and thought, ‘No freaking way!'” Morris said.
According to Morris, he was walking down the street when a man coming from the opposite direction made eye contact, walked faster toward him and shoved him with his briefcase. Morris included his own commentary to the video he posted. In it he said, “He immediately … starts yelling mostly racist and xenophobic stuff. I was so shocked, I’ve lived in NYC for five years and have never had anything like this happen. I was waiting for someone to jump out and scream, ‘Gotcha!’ ” In the video, a man can be seen asking Morris, “What country are you from?” and then saying: “I’m going to call the police. You don’t run into me. I’m a citizen here, you’re not. You’re an ugly f***ing foreigner. F*** you.” Morris, who was born in Massachusetts, holds up his passport at the end of his commentary.
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Hawaii’s governor has readied plans for a mass evacuation of the state’s Big Island-warning residents to be ready to evacuate at a moment’s notice, as an eruption at Kilauea volcano strengthened. Officials say levels of toxic sulfur dioxide are rising, as is the threat of an explosion that could send lava, rocks and even large boulders into residential areas. Hundreds of residents continue to evacuate the area and more than two dozen homes have been destroyed so far. Geologists say the volcanic eruptions are expected to continue.
Concerns have been mounting since the Kilauea erupted May 3, sending 2,200-degree lava bursting through cracks into backyards in the Leilani Estates neighborhood, destroying 36 structures, including 26 homes. As the magma shifted underground, a magnitude-6.9 earthquake also rocked the Big Island. A new fissure spewing lava from Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano formed in the southeast corner of the Big Island, raising anxieties as the state braces for potentially violent eruptions.
The new fissure, a crack in the ground allowing lava to pour out, appeared to be several hundred yards long and was producing spatter rising “many tens of feet into the air,” the U.S. Geological Survey said. It was spotted west of state Highway 132 and led state officials to call for some residents along Halekamahina Loop Road to leave their homes. Steam and lava spatter could be seen from the new fissure, officials said.
Residents have been warned about the possibility of an explosive eruption at the volcano’s Halema’uma’u Crater because of the withdrawal of lava from the Kilauea summit lake. “This could generate dangerous debris very near the crater and ashfalls up to tens of miles downwind,” the warning said. The danger comes from the lava level that is dropping inside the volcano. If it falls below the water table, water will pour onto the lava, generating steam that will likely explode from the summit in a shower of rocks, ash and sulfur dioxide gases. Boulders as big as refrigerators could be tossed a half-mile and ash plumes could soar as high as 20,000 feet spread over a 12-mile area, according to the Hawaii Civil Defense.
President Trump declared the Big Island a disaster area. The move will allow federal financial assistance for state and local governments as they repair roads, parks, schools and water pipes damaged by the eruption. The Big Island, also known as the island of Hawaii, has a population of about 190,000 people. The Hawaii National Guard has prepared to use ground convoys and even helicopters to pluck hundreds of residents out of danger if necessary. The Hawaii National Guard is prepared, with only 90 minutes’ notice, to rescue 2,000 people in troop-carrying vehicles and Blackhawk or Chinook helicopters
“We can move 226 people in one convoy. So we could move 226 at once with about an hour and a half notice, and we would drop them off somewhere. The vehicles could come back, and we would just do that round-robin,” Lt. Col. Shawn Tsuha said.
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During a historic meeting between Kim Jong-un and South Korean leader Moon Jae-in at the Demilitarized Zone between the two countries, Kim Jong-un told Moon Jae-in that North Korea would be willing to denuclearize in return for a commitment that the U.S. will not invade the country. During the meeting, which was broadcast live on the Korean Peninsula and around the world, the two leaders held hands and pledged to work for peace and replace the 1953 armistice with a formal peace treaty. The two countries have been involved a tense standoff on the Korean Peninsula that’s been in place since fighting in the Korean War ended 65 years ago.
The meeting was aimed at paving the way for Kim’s upcoming summit with President Trump. During the meeting, Kim signed a joint declaration affirming a “complete denuclearization” and “a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.” According to the South Korean government, the North Korean leader said he would invite experts and journalists from South Korea and the U.S. to witness the closing of the country’s only known underground nuclear test site. Kim announced an end to nuclear and long-range missile testing last week.
The Trump administration has been firm that complete denuclearization is required for the lifting of economic sanctions that have been placed on the country for years. U.S. officials spoke cautiously about the chances of reaching a deal and laid out a plan for the dismantling of the North’s nuclear program over a two-year period. National security adviser John R. Bolton said That would be accompanied by a “full, complete, total disclosure of everything related to their nuclear program with a full international verification.”
The two countries have recently taken other steps toward peace since the meeting with the South Korean military beginning to dismantle loudspeakers that have been blaring propaganda into the North since 2016. North Korea has announced it will shift its clocks forward 30 minutes to align with South Korea’s time zone. South Korean leader Moon Jae-in has also convinced North Korea’s Kim Jong-un to hold an upcoming summit with President Trump at the Demilitarized Zone, known as the DMZ.
Skeptics warn that North Korea previously made similar pledges of denuclearization on numerous occasions, with little or no intention of abiding by them. Kim’s could turn out to be nothing more than empty promises aimed at lifting sanctions on his isolated country. They say the closing of the nuclear site could be symbolic since the site may already be too unstable for further testing. They also question the honesty of Kim’s intentions siting the practicality of monitoring and inspections of supposedly closed sites.
The Denuclearization announcement came as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke for the first time about a “good conversation” he had with Mr. Kim during his secret visit to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, over Easter weekend. “We had an extensive conversation on the hardest issues that face our two countries. I had a clear mission statement from President Trump. When I left, Kim Jong-un understood the mission exactly as I described it today” Mr. Pompeo said. Pompeo added that the administration’s objective was “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization” with North Korea, and that Mr. Kim was prepared to “lay out a map that would help us achieve” denuclearization.
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A federal jury convicted three Kansas militia members were for their role in plotting to bomb a mosque and apartment complex housing Somali refugees. The plot was thwarted by another member of the group who tipped off federal authorities about escalating threats of violence. Gavin Wright, Patrick Stein and Curtis Allen were convicted of one count of conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction and one count of conspiracy against civil rights. Wright was also convicted of a charge of lying to the FBI. Sentencing is scheduled for June 27.
An FBI informant said they were plotting to use guns and car bombs to mass murder Somalis. The three men belonged to a militia called the Crusaders which was a splinter group of the militia Kansas Security Force. Testimony and recordings indicate the men tried to recruit other members of the Kansas Security Force to join them. The men were indicted in October 2016 for plotting an attack for the day after the presidential election in the town of Garden City, about 220 miles west of Wichita.
According to prosecutors, Stein was recorded discussing the type of fuel and fertilizer bomb that Timothy McVeigh used in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, which killed 168 people. The men discussed obtaining vehicles and filling them with explosives and parking them at the four corners of the apartment complex to create an explosion that would level the entire complex. They downloaded recipes from the internet and they experimented with and tested those explosives. Stein was arrested when he delivered 300 pounds of fertilizer to undercover FBI agents to make explosives. Wright is captured in one recording saying he hoped an attack on the Somalis would “wake people up” and inspire others to take similar action against Muslims.
Defense attorneys argued that the FBI set up the men with a paid informant and all the talk about violence wasn’t serious. They said the men had a right to free speech and association under the U.S. Constitution. Prosecutors argued that the plot was more than just words and presented enough evidence to convince the jury of a conviction.
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions called the verdicts a significant victory against domestic terrorism and hate crimes. “The defendants in this case acted with clear premeditation in an attempt to kill people on the basis of their religion and national origin,” Sessions said in a news release. “That’s not just illegal — it’s immoral and unacceptable, and we’re not going to stand for it.”
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