Authorities say army contractor James Thomas Ashbacher shared top-secret data online and stole night-vision goggles

The FBI has arrested a former North Carolina government contractor for allegedly leaking classified national defense information on social media.

James Thomas Ashbacher, 37, of Spring Lake, was taken into custody after charges that he shared top-secret safety data online, unlawfully stored national defense materials at his residence and stole night-vision equipment from the US army special operations command.

Miami-Dade officials drop charge of battery by strangulation against rapper due to ‘insufficient evidence’

Florida prosecutors on Thursday dropped a felony charge against rapper Rick Ross nearly a month after he was arrested in Miami Beach when a woman he was living with told police he hit her, court records said.

The Miami-Dade state attorney’s office filed paperwork on Thursday to drop a felony charge of battery by strangulation because of “insufficient evidence”. Ross, whose legal name is William Roberts II, still faces a misdemeanor charge of battery domestic violence.

Agent Mario Alberto Morale charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon over incident in Houston

A federal immigration agent who drove into and seriously injured a Texas man on 10 October after a botched traffic stop was indicted Friday on a charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

Mario Alberto Morales, 33, an agent with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), deliberately veered his SUV into Miguel Parra Hernandez, 48, causing multiple leg fractures and a hip injury, journalists at a news conference in Houston were told.

Eljay Crisp-Carr, 20, spent five months behind bars before prosecutors asked to dismiss charges

Ohio prosecutors on Friday dropped charges against a man arrested in connection with the 6 June shooting at Toledo’s Old West End festival that injured 12 people.

Eljay Crisp-Carr, 20, had faced more than 50 felony charges stemming from the shooting, including 25 counts of attempted murder. He was released after spending about five months behind bars.

Daniel Jones held on $3m bail after studio art chair Pipo Nguyen-Duy and Tran Thi Phong found dead at home

Oberlin College was shaken on Friday after an award-winning professor of photography who had worked at the Ohio liberal arts college for nearly 30 years was found shot and killed on Wednesday, officials said.

Pipo Nguyen-Duy, 64, and his wife, Tran Thi Phong, 56, were found shot to death in their home.

Pike is facing death penalty for 1995 murder of classmate, despite surviving a botched execution last month

Christa Pike has marked a month since her failed execution by Tennessee and released a statement in which she laments the “incompetence” that has led to this moment, adding that despite ongoing healing she remains in constant physical pain and mental anguish.

In comments released by her legal team on Friday, the prisoner said that there had not been a moment since she was injected with a massive dose of the sedative pentobarbital that she had not been in pain. “My body hurts. My arms hurt. My hands hurt. My throat hurts. I still struggle to speak. And the pain isn’t just physical. There is pain in my mind and in my soul,” she said.

Pike is facing death penalty for 1995 murder of classmate, despite surviving a botched execution last month

Christa Pike has marked a month since her failed execution by Tennessee and released a statement in which she laments the “incompetence” that has led to this moment, adding that despite ongoing healing she remains in constant physical pain and mental anguish.

In comments released by her legal team on Friday, the prisoner said that there had not been a moment since she was injected with a massive dose of the sedative pentobarbital that she had not been in pain. “My body hurts. My arms hurt. My hands hurt. My throat hurts. I still struggle to speak. And the pain isn’t just physical. There is pain in my mind and in my soul,” she said.

Twin brothers, 22, from Ghana and a 53-year-old American woman targeted older adults in 25 US states, officials say

Three people have pleaded guilty in a $9m romance fraud scam that targeted elderly Americans.

On Monday, the US attorney’s office in the northern district of Ohio announced that twin brothers from Ghana and an American woman pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

‘You try to leave, it is death,’ Halima Salman testified. Her mother and defense attorneys wept after the verdict

A New York woman whose father took her to Syria as a teenager and arranged her marriage to an Islamic State fighter was convicted on Tuesday of receiving weapons training from the militant group.

Prosecutors said Halima Salman, a US citizen, pledged loyalty to the extremist group and willingly participated in its activities. Jurors were shown a video of her holding an assault rifle, a photo of her with the group’s flag and loving text messages she sent her husband.

James O’Keefe and Cam Higby were trying to show vulnerabilities in allowing a voter to vouch for another

Two rightwing influencers have been charged with felonies in Minneapolis over attempts in the state’s election primary to disguise themselves in what they called “Muslim garb” and claim they were local voters.

James O’Keefe and Cam Higby went to polling places in Minnesota during the state’s August primary in an attempt to show vulnerabilities in the practice of “vouching”, where a registered voter from the same precinct can vouch for another voter’s eligibility.

Twin brothers, 22, from Ghana and a 53-year-old American woman targeted older adults in 25 US states, officials say

Three people have pleaded guilty in a $9m romance fraud scam that targeted elderly Americans.

On Monday, the US attorney’s office in the northern district of Ohio announced that twin brothers from Ghana and an American woman pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

‘You try to leave, it is death,’ Halima Salman testified. Her mother and defense attorneys wept after the verdict

A New York woman whose father took her to Syria as a teenager and arranged her marriage to an Islamic State fighter was convicted on Tuesday of receiving weapons training from the militant group.

Prosecutors said Halima Salman, a US citizen, pledged loyalty to the extremist group and willingly participated in its activities. Jurors were shown a video of her holding an assault rifle, a photo of her with the group’s flag and loving text messages she sent her husband.

Mexican police had said they found Shayna Feinman in Tijuana, raising the hopes of missing Arizonan’s family

Arizona authorities say their Mexican counterparts were resoundingly mistaken when they publicly claimed recently that they found alive a woman who was feared slain after disappearing in 2024 – a turn of events that her sister has called “turmoil” and “heartbreaking”.

The case in question centers on Shayna Feinman, who was reported missing in rural Yavapai county, Arizona, in March 2024 at age 38.

Discovery comes months after Utah county detectives confirmed that Bundy had killed another Utah girl that year

The notorious serial killer Ted Bundy has been found responsible, through DNA evidence, for the murder of a 17-year-old Utah girl who went missing in 1974 before her nude body was found days later, state authorities announced at a Tuesday news conference.

The breakthrough in the investigation of Melissa Ann Smith’s death comes months after Utah county detectives confirmed in April that Bundy had killed another Utah girl, 17-year-old Laura Ann Aime, in 1974.

Oren, Alon and Tal Alexander sentenced to prison in New York after being convicted in sex trafficking case

Three Florida brothers who exploited the wealth and influence of their family’s luxury real estate business to drug and rape dozens of women were each sentenced to 30 years in prison in New York on Tuesday for sex trafficking.

Twins Oren and Alon Alexander, 39, and Tal Alexander, 40, were convicted in March on multiple charges after a five-week trial heard details of years of sexual assaults committed in Miami, New York and other high-end locations including the Hamptons; Aspen, Colorado; and on a Caribbean cruise.

Devin Jacob Ballard, 20, denies charges that he fatally strangled Anna Yagi, 39, in a hotel on the island of Okinawa

Prosecutors in Japan have filed formal charges against a US marine suspected of murdering and robbing a woman while stationed on the country’s island of Okinawa, according to Japanese media.

Devin Jacob Ballard, a 20-year-old lance corporal assigned to Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in Okinawa, is charged with fatally strangling Anna Yagi, 39, at a hotel in the city and stealing from her a backpack containing a wallet, the public broadcaster NHK reported.