Author: rpnadmin

RALEIGH, N.C. — A state judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by 31 former N.C. State male athletes alleging sexual abuse under the guise of treatment and harassment by the Wolfpack’s former director of sports medicine. In orders filed Tuesday, Wake County Superior Court Judge Bryan Collins dismissed claims against Robert M. Murphy Jr., as well as multiple N.C. State athletics officials tied to their oversight rules, citing procedural reasons. The lawsuit was filed in February in state court in a case that began with a federal lawsuit from a single athlete filed in 2022. That complaint alleged years of…

NEW YORK — A former Taliban commander was sentenced to 42 years in prison on Tuesday for crimes including kidnapping a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and providing support that led to the deaths of three American soldiers. Haji Najibullah’s sentencing capped a daylong proceeding in Manhattan federal court that featured a dramatic few moments when the reporter, David Rohde, faced Najibullah and described how Najibullah took part in the abduction of him and two other men in 2008 in Afghanistan but was now “refusing to take responsibility as I look at him today.” Rohde, who is MSNOW’s national security reporter and…

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A federal judge on Tuesday permanently blocked Alabama from executing an inmate with nitrogen gas after declaring the method violates the ban on cruel and unusual punishment. U.S. District Judge Emily C. Marks issued the decision a day after an appeals court reversed her ruling that the method is constitutional. Marks permanently enjoined the state from executing Jeffery Lee by nitrogen gas. Lee was scheduled to be executed Thursday at an Alabama prison. A spokesman for Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said the state is reviewing the decision and considering next steps, including an appeal. The case…

DETROIT — The Michigan Court of Appeals on Tuesday threw out the conviction of a man who was found guilty of a secondary role in a plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2020. Joe Morrison was convicted of providing material support for an act of terrorism and other charges. In a 3-0 ruling, the appeals court reversed the results on technical grounds, saying kidnapping is not an underlying violent felony that can support a conviction under Michigan’s terrorism law. Morrison, 32, has been in prison since 2022. He was given a minimum sentence of 10 years for three crimes,…

MCKINNEY, Texas — A Texas teenager who fatally stabbed a 17-year-old track athlete from a rival team during a high school meet was convicted of murder and sentenced to 35 years in prison on Tuesday in a case that drew wide attention beyond the booming Dallas suburb where they were students. A jury rejected Karmelo Anthony’s claims of self-defense during a confrontation with Austin Metcalf in stadium bleachers last year. Most people who testified were students who described a heated exchange over Anthony’s refusal on a rainy spring day to leave a tent that belonged to Metcalf’s team. Anthony, now…

VILAFRANCA DEL PENEDES, Spain — Bruna Vall Galán, 8, gave a unique welcome to Catalonia to Pope Leo XIV Tuesday night – from the top of a nearly 33-foot human tower created at the start of Leo’s prayer vigil in Barcelona. Human towers, or “castells” in the Catalan language, are not only a feat of equilibrium, strength and teamwork, but a crucial part of the proud identity in this northeastern Spanish region. One of the most celebrated groups to uphold this tradition, the Castellers de Vilafranca, was tapped to perform for the pope during his seven-day trip to Spain and…

A 20-year-old McDonald’s shift manager in Northern California remained in the intensive care unit Tuesday after a coworker allegedly threw hot cooking oil on him, leaving him with severe burns across his face, neck, arm and back. Officers responded to the McDonald’s restaurant on Harter Parkway in Yuba City around 11:15 p.m. on May 30 and found the employee, Jacob Smith, with significant burns to his face, neck, hands, shoulder and upper body. The injured worker was taken to a hospital in Sacramento County. Mr. Smith’s mother, Amber Smith, told ABC7 that her son had been preparing to close out…

A Texas jury on Tuesday found Karmelo Anthony guilty of murder in the fatal stabbing of 17-year-old Austin Metcalf at a Frisco high school track meet last year, concluding a closely watched trial that drew national attention over questions of race, self-defense and school safety. The Collin County jury deliberated for about three hours before returning its unanimous verdict. The same jury will now decide Anthony’s sentence. Under Texas law, a murder conviction is punishable by five to 99 years in state prison.  Before the judge and jury entered the courtroom, Anthony’s attorney, Mike Howard, had his arm around Anthony,…

The man accused of fatally stabbing Iryna Zarutska aboard a Charlotte, North Carolina, light rail train has been ruled incompetent to stand trial by a federal judge, though prosecutors say they expect his mental capacity to be restored. U.S. District Judge Kenneth Bell on Tuesday adopted findings from a federal evaluator in Chicago — where Mr. Brown had been held for competency observation — that Decarlos Brown Jr. is not mentally competent to stand trial at this time, but that his prognosis for restoration with medication is good. The ruling follows a May 7 motion in which Mr. Brown’s federal…

Police are looking for a gang of thieves who stole more than 10,000 bottles of bourbon from a Philadelphia warehouse. The victim, alcoholic beverage company A21 Wine & Spirits, said that 1,800 cases of Noble Oak bourbon were stolen from the warehouse on Friday afternoon. That’s about 10,800 bottles of whiskey. The company called the heist “a coordinated cargo theft operation.” The theft was reported to Philadelphia police and the FBI. Mark Newman, the CEO of A21 parent company Apogee 21 Holdings, told USA Today that the company had just finished bottling the shipment and sent it to the warehouse…