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New York fraud trial accusing Trump of lying about his wealth opens as he denounces it as a ‘scam’

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — The fraud lawsuit that could cost former President Donald Trump control of some of his most prized properties went to trial Monday, with New York state lawyers vowing to hold him accountable while he denounced the case as a politically motivated “scam.”The civil case, brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James, accuses the business-mogul-turned-politician and his company of deceiving banks, insurers and others by habitually misstating his wealth in financial statements.“They were lying year after year after year,” Kevin Wallace, a lawyer in James’ office, said in an opening statement as Trump sat at the defense table. He looked straight ahead, arms crossed, facing away from a screen that showed details of Wallace’s presentation. Defense lawyers, in their openings, said that the financial statements were true. Trump’s holdings are “Mona Lisa properties” that can command top dollar, attorney Alina Habba said.“That is not fraud. Tha...

TTC launching app to give Wheel-Trans customers more options

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

The TTC has announced that they have launched a new mobile app that will allow Wheel-Trans customers to schedule and manage trips from their smartphones.The Wheel-Trans mobile app, available for both iOS and Android devices, supports most of the same functions that are currently available on the Wheel-Trans self-booking website.The app can be used to plan both door-to-door and Family of Services (FOS) trips.Customers can use the Wheel-Trans app to book, review, modify or cancel trips, use the ‘Where is My Ride?’ option to see the vehicle location on a map in real time (available only for buses), schedule and manage both door-to-door and Family of Services trips, and receive service alerts and view trip history.The app is now one of four ways that Wheel-Trans customers can book trips, along with using the existing Wheel-Trans self-booking website, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) or by contacting Wheel-Trans reservations.

Environmental groups demand emergency rules to protect rare whales from ship collisions

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — A coalition of environmental groups is calling on the federal government to enact emergency rules to protect a vanishing species of whale from lethal collisions with large ships.The groups filed their petition with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Sept. 28 in an effort to protect the North Atlantic right whale. The giant whale numbers less than 340 and has been in steep decline in recent years.Ship collisions are among the most dire threats to the survival of the whale, according to NOAA. The groups cited a proposed rule from the agency designed to prevent such ship strikes by making more vessels slow down for whales. NOAA has yet to release a final updated speed rule despite proposing new rules more than a year ago, the environmental groups said.The groups argue it’s critically important to get new rules on the books before the upcoming calving season, during which the whales migrate hundreds of miles from waters off New England an...

Book Review: Romance strikes in ‘Maybe Once, Maybe Twice’ with quirky lines and an epic soundtrack

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

On Maggie Vine’s 30th birthday, she makes a marriage pact with the handsome, broad-shouldered, sunbeam-smile-having Garrett Scholl. Thing is, the struggling singer-songwriter had already made a similar deal with her first boyfriend, Asher Reyes, who’s now an extremely successful — and attractive — actor. Thus the two great loves of Maggie’s life come crashing back to her at 35. Alison Rose Greenberg’s second novel, “Maybe Once, Maybe Twice,” is a long, luscious buildup of will-they-won’t-they, love-triangling, song-writing, and trips down memory lane as the narrative hops back to teen Maggie and 20-something Maggie to flesh out her past.Greenberg writes exceptional characters who still fit into the ordinary world, like our protagonist. Maggie Vine is the chic, All The Feels, folk-singing heroine we wanted but secretly didn’t believe could exist so tastefully. She’s got humor and sorrow, pride and doubt, good moments and bad, and a model-gorgeous, standoffish-yet-lovable ...

Four people have died in a plane crash near the Utah desert tourist community of Moab

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

MOAB, Utah (AP) — A plane crash outside the eastern Utah tourist town of Moab killed all four people on board, authorities said Monday.The plane crashed Sunday evening shortly after taking off from Canyonlands Airfield about 15 miles (24 kilometers) north of Moab, according to a Grand County Sheriff’s Department statement posted on Facebook.The crash of the single-engine Piper plane was being investigated, the National Transportation Safety Board said in a post on X, the social media website formerly called Twitter.A phone message left with sheriff’s officials seeking additional information wasn’t immediately returned Monday.Moab is a tourism-centered community of about 5,300 people near Arches and Canyonlands national parks.The Associated Press

Patrick Stewart, a Shakespearean actor who soars in sci-fi, looks back on his life in memoir

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Patrick Stewart, who famously played a “Star Trek” captain, has boldly gone where no one has gone before — into his past.The actor spent much of the pandemic at his computer writing his memoir, and the result is out this fall, “Making It So,” borrowing his catchphrase from “Star Trek: The Next Generation.”“My long-term memory is very strong. It only needed me to turn the key on day one for the door to be open and memory after memory after memory and sensation and sensation and feelings all came scuttling back,” said Stewart, 83, in a Zoom interview from his Los Angeles home.It is a remarkable story of a boy who grew up poor in the north of England, became a great Shakespearean stage actor and then a sci-fi movie icon aboard the USS Enterprise and the “X-Men” movie franchise.He grew up without a toilet or a bathroom in his home, sold furniture as a young man, worked up the rungs of regional theater in England — including touring and crushing on Vivien Leigh — before a...

Pope suggests blessings for same-sex unions possible in response to 5 conservative cardinals

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis has suggested there could be ways to bless same-sex unions, responding to five conservative cardinals who challenged him to affirm church teaching on homosexuality ahead of a big meeting where LGBTQ+ Catholics are on the agenda.The Vatican on Monday published a letter Francis wrote to the cardinals on July 11 after receiving a list of five questions, or “dubia,” from them a day earlier. In it, Francis suggests that such blessings could be studied if they didn’t confuse the blessing with sacramental marriage.The Vatican holds that marriage is an indissoluble union between man and woman. As a result, it has long opposed gay marriage. But even Francis has voiced support for civil laws extending legal benefits to same-sex spouses, and Catholic priests in parts of Europe have been blessing same-sex unions without Vatican censure.Francis’ response to the cardinals, however, marks a reversal from the Vatican’s current official position. In an explanat...

Toronto man arrested after fatal shooting near Kensington Market

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

A Toronto man is facing a first-degree murder charge in connection with a fatal downtown shooting near Kensington Market earlier this year.On Aug. 21, officers were called to the area of College Street and Spadina Avenue around 4:50 a.m. for reports that someone had been shot.Police say there were a group of males arguing outside when one man allegedly pulled out a gun and shot another man.A man in his 40s was found outside a storefront on Spadina with gunshot wounds. He was rushed to hospital with life-threatening injuries where he was eventually pronounced dead.The victim has been identified as 41-year-old Oluwobi ‘Tobi’ Alaga of Toronto.On Saturday, investigators arrested a suspect in Innisfil Ont., south of Barrie, with help from Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and South Simcoe Police.Toronto resident Carlos Swaby-Palacios, 26, is facing a first-degree murder charge. The accused appeared in a Toronto courtroom on Sunday.Anyone with additional information is being ask...

10 people are dead after Mexico church roof collapses. No more survivors believed buried in rubble

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

CIUDAD MADERO, Mexico (AP) — The collapse of a church roof during a mass in northern Mexico has killed at least 10 people and injured 60, and searchers said Monday that no further people were believed to be trapped in the wreckage. State police had initially estimated about 100 people were inside the church in the Gulf coast city of Ciudad Madero when it collapsed during a baptism Sunday, and said that approximately 30 parishioners may have been trapped in the rubble when the roof caved in.But Tamaulipas state Gov. Américo Villarreal later said only 70 may have been inside. Villarreal said that, after sending search dogs and thermal imaging cameras under the collapsed concrete slab, it appeared that nobody was still trapped, apart from the ten bodies already recovered. “The most likely thing, I can’t affirm it 100%, is that there aren’t any more people trapped,” Villarreal said. Describing the searches by dogs and rescue teams, he said “there are no indications of life i...

Philadelphia journalist who advocated for homeless and LGBTQ+ communities shot and killed at home

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:13:47 GMT

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A journalist and advocate who rose from homelessness and addiction to serve as a spokesperson for Philadelphia’s most vulnerable was shot and killed at his home early Monday, police said. Josh Kruger, 39, was shot seven times at about 1:30 a.m. and collapsed in the street after seeking help, police said. He was pronounced dead at a hospital a short time later. Police believe the door to his Point Breeze home was unlocked or the shooter knew how to get in, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. No arrests have been made and no weapons have been recovered, they said.Authorities haven’t spoken publicly about the circumstances surrounding the killing.“Josh cared deeply about our city and its residents, which was evident both in his public service and in his writing. His intelligence, creativity, passion, and wit shone bright in everything that he did — and his light was dimmed much too soon,” Mayor Jim Kenney said in a statement. Kruger handled social media ...