LOS ANGELES — A few days after the 2020 memorial for Kobe Bryant, the basketball star’s widow, Vanessa, was home watching TV with family when she learned that Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies had shared gruesome photos of the helicopter crash that killed her husband and the couple’s 13-year-old daughter, Gianna.

“I bolted out of ...Read more

ATLANTA — Fulton County prosecutors pushed back Friday against U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who is seeking to delay his testimony before the special purpose grand jury studying interference in Georgia’s 2020 elections as he appeals a recent ruling from a federal judge.

The District Attorney’s office argued in a new federal court ...Read more

MIAMI — A disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico is becoming better organized and now has a high chance of turning into a tropical depression soon, forecasters said Friday afternoon.

The National Hurricane Center at 2 p.m. Eastern time upped the system’s formation chances again from 60% to a high 70% for the next two to five days. Forecasters ...Read more

Transgender girls in Utah will be allowed to play on girls’ sports teams when classes start this fall after a judge issued an order blocking the enforcement of a controversial statewide trans youth sports ban.

HB 11, which barred all transgender girls from playing on girls’ sports teams, passed both chambers of the Utah legislature in the ...Read more

The armorer who was on the New Mexico set of the movie “Rust” when cinematographer Halyna Hutchins died after being struck by a gunshot last year is blasting the Santa Fe Sheriff’s Office for what she sees as a faulty investigation.

On Thursday, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed didn’t measure any words when putting into question investigators’ ...Read more

CHICAGO — R. Kelly’s attorney on Friday began to cross-examine the key witness in his Chicago federal trial, a woman who now says she was the young teenager seen on an infamous sex tape that led to Kelly’s indictment on child pornography charges two decades ago.

The woman, who was referred to in court by the pseudonym “Jane,” spent ...Read more

Mike Pompeo says he “never seriously” tried to use the 25th Amendment to remove former President Donald Trump from office after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

The ex-secretary of state sought to downplay — but pointedly did not deny — reports that he and other Cabinet members talked about ousting Trump for inciting the riot.

“They...Read more

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Justice Department must release a 2019 memo advising then-Attorney General Bill Barr on how to handle the conclusion of the Mueller investigation and the department’s decision not to charge Donald Trump, a federal appeals court ruled.

The 3-0 decision Friday, by a panel of judges of the appeals court in Washington, ...Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California hospitals have long sought to weaken legally required — and costly — seismic upgrades meant to ensure their doors can remain open to patients after a major earthquake.

Now, the hospitals have a new and unexpected ally — an influential union that is supporting the watered-down seismic standards in a deal ...Read more

Maureen Miller, an infectious disease epidemiologist and medical anthropologist at Columbia University, was not surprised to learn this week that an Italian greyhound in Paris had become the first dog known to catch monkeypox from a human.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention along with the World Health Organization have ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — When it comes to machinery that spins, a turntable not a washing machine seems a more fitting association with rap artist Dr. Dre.

But for students from the Los Angeles school district's new high school — the brainchild of Andre "Dr. Dre" Young and fellow music industry mogul Jimmy Iovine — the lowly washing machine became ...Read more

Snipers from Russia and other countries hostile to the United States are competing in war games being held this week in Venezuela in events described as Olympic games for soldiers that were organized not only to show that Moscow still has friends but also that some of them are in Latin America.

The international war games have been held yearly ...Read more

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Disbarred South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh has been indicted on charges that he stole money from his former Hampton law firm and a loan that was issued to one of his brothers, according to new state grand jury indictments.

The indictments were handed down earlier this week and were released Friday by the South Carolina ...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — For the past two years, college and university administrators have welcomed the start of the fall semester with a mix of excitement and trepidation about the coronavirus pandemic.

This year, even as COVID-19 continues to spread, colleges are confronting another public health threat: Monkeypox, which so far has predominantly ...Read more

PONTIAC, Mich. — An Oakland County judge ruled Friday that county prosecutors cannot enforce the state's 1931 abortion law as courts consider a lawsuit brought by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer that seeks to overturn the ban as unconstitutional.

This means abortion will likely remain legal in Michigan until Whitmer's case or a lawsuit brought by ...Read more

MIAMI — A disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico could turn into a tropical depression soon, forecasters said Friday.

The system, described to be a broad area of low pressure, was producing disorganized showers over the southwestern Gulf of Mexico and the Bay of Campeche, according to the National Hurricane Center’s 8 a.m. advisory.

Forecasters...Read more

TAMPA, Fla. — It has been well over a month since the Atlantic Ocean has had any rumblings of tropical storm activity.

There have been only three named storms so far this year. The last was Tropical Storm Colin, which fizzled out along the South Carolina coast over the Fourth of July weekend.

But in the coming weeks, experts expect tropical ...Read more

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is at a near-operational standstill, with neither side currently able to launch an offensive that would materially affect the course of the conflict, according to an assessment from Western officials.

With both sides more conscious that they face a marathon rather than a sprint in a war already close to six months...Read more