Crime

Twitter was very amused. Via Slate: In the most 2015-esque news of 2015, the FBI just tweeted that it did not seize the single-copy Wu-Tang Clan album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin when it arrested “pharma bro” Martin Shkreli on securities fraud charges earlier Thursday. Please pause before continuing to consider how little of that sentence would have been …

Via the Philly Voice: The jury in the assault trial of Kathryn Knott on Friday will deliberate a third day as it works to reach a verdict. Judge Roxanne Covington honored the jury’s request for dismissal around 4:20 p.m. Thursday, the second full day of deliberations following four days of testimony. Not long after beginning its second day of deliberations, …

This morning the jury in Philadelphia’s trial for accused gay-basher Kathryn Knott once again sent requests to the judge. The Philly Voice reports: The jury requested police statements given by Knott and Elizabeth Foley, a defense witnesses who was among Knott’s group of 15 people on the night of the incident. However, Knott never gave a statement to police. Her …

Whoa. Bloomberg Business reports: A boyish drug company entrepreneur, who rocketed to infamy by jacking up the price of a life-saving pill from $13.50 to $750, was arrested on securities fraud related to a firm he founded. Martin Shkreli, 32, ignited a firestorm over drug prices in September and became a symbol of defiant greed. The federal case against him …

The Baltimore Sun reports: Judge Barry G. Williams on Wednesday declared a mistrial in the trial of Officer William G. Porter on all four counts. Porter, 26, was charged with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault, reckless endangerment and misconduct in office in the April arrest and death of Freddie Gray. Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn J. Mosby charged Porter and five other …

The Philadelphia jury in the case of alleged gay-basher Kathryn Knott began its deliberations today. According to reporters tweeting from inside the courtroom, this afternoon the jury asked to re-watch surveillance videos that captured Knott and her group on the Center City sidewalk near where the attack took place. The jury also wants to review the victims’ statements to police.  …

The Miami Herald reports: Lured to the United States with the promise of easy money, the slender young man from Hungary spent more than a year confined to bedrooms in New York and Miami — forced to have sex with men around the clock. His captors raped him. One of the ringleaders, who sometimes wielded a sword, threatened him and …

On the final day of her trial, today accused gay-basher Kathryn Knott denied having taken part in the September 2014 attack on a Philadelphia gay couple. Via Philadelphia’s ABC affiliate: Knott, leaving a birthday celebration with a large group of friends, said that she ran toward the fight initially to try to defuse it. Two male co-defendants have pleaded guilty …

Just last week the Democratic former state Assembly majority leader was found guilty of corruption. Aaaand here we go again, but this time it’s the guy who voted against same-sex marriage. The New York Times reports: Dean G. Skelos, the former majority leader of the New York Senate, and his son were found guilty of federal corruption charges on Friday, …

Alleged gay-basher Kathryn Knott had a bad day in court today. Philly.com reports: A second witness to a group assault on a gay couple in Center City last year Friday implicated Kathryn Knott as the woman who punched one of the victims. Knott, 25, of Southampton, Bucks County, who is not in custody and has pleaded not guilty, is on …

Nutjob anti-gay and anti-abortion activist Rives Miller Grogan pleaded guilty to disrupting the Supreme Court’s Obergefell hearing back in September. Today he was sentenced to 21 days in jail and ordered to stay away from the court building for one year. Via the Washington Post: Grogan, 50, of Mansfield, Tex., pleaded guilty in September to one misdemeanor charge of unlawful …

Authorities have begun releasing the names of the 14 people murdered yesterday in San Bernardino. Among those killed was a local gay man who trained disabled adults to work in the Inland Regional Center’s coffee shop. The Los Angeles Times has published a heartbreaking account of how the news was finally broken to the victim’s boyfriend. Their story begins: Ryan …

Late last night the Council For Islamic Relations held a joint press conference with family members of the dead San Bernardino shooter. Business Insider recaps: CAIR executive director, Hussam Ayloush said, “We unequivocally condemn the horrific act that occurred today.” Muzammil Siddiqi, a religious director with the Islamic Society of Orange County, said “we have condemned all violence, everywhere” and …

The Los Angeles Times reports: Two law enforcement sources identified one of the deceased suspects as Syed Farook, an American citizen. Public records show a person named Syed R. Farook was employed by the San Bernardino County Health department as an environmental health specialist, but it was not clear if that was the same person involved in the shooting. The …

Over the last few years the New York Daily News has devoted countless screaming headlines which denounced the NRA, its head Wayne LaPierre, and many other gun control opponents. Above is tomorrow morning’s front page reaction to the avalanche of pointless “thoughts and prayers” tweets issued today by GOP leaders.

NBC News reports: At least 14 people were killed and two suspects were dead Wednesday after up to three people on a mission that authorities described as “possibly terrorism” barged into a holiday party in a California conference room and unleashed a bloodbath. The shooter or shooters fled in a black SUV after the shooting about at 11 a.m. (2 …

NBC News reports: The man charged with killing three people at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, Colorado, has targeted the agency before, his ex-wife said Tuesday. Dear appears to have been opposed to the reproductive health agency for decades. Barbara Mescher Michaux, who was married to Dear from 1985 to 1993, said Tuesday that Dear once put glue …

According to divorce papers filed by his second wife in a South Carolina court, Colorado mass murderer Richard Dear was an End Times fanatic who believed that he could commit any action he pleased because he would “saved” by Jesus. The Post & Courier reports: His second wife, [Deborah] Mescher, described Dear in divorce papers filed in 1993 as a controlling, …

CBS News reports: Police are looking for a man who nearly killed a transgender woman in a beating in Queens. Around 4 a.m. Sunday, the attacker followed the 35-year-old victim — whose given name was Ricardo Sal but goes by the name Kathy — to the front of Sal’s apartment on 93rd Street in Jackson Heights, police said. As CBS2’s …

CNN reports: A U.S. Marine was found guilty of killing of a transgender woman who was found strangled in a Philippines hotel room in October last year. The court in Olongapo, a city 77 miles (124 km) northwest of Manila, sentenced Lance Corporal Joseph Scott Pemberton to up to 12 years in prison, according to CNN Philippines’ Ina Andolong, who …