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St. Petersburg seeks profile boost as new Tampa Bay Rays ballpark negotiations continue

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — Officials in the city of St. Petersburg, Florida, want to make it clear that their city is the current and future home of the Tampa Bay Rays as negotiations continue on details surrounding a proposed new $1.3 billion ballpark that would be ready for the 2028 season opener.The Rays adamantly oppose changing the team name to the St. Petersburg Rays, as some on the city council and in the business community have suggested as a way of raising the national profile of the tourism-dependent city and its nearby Gulf Coast beaches. The council heard Thursday from city officials about other marketing and branding options, including at least one home game a year in which alternate team uniforms would sport the St. Petersburg name, said Doyle Walsh, chief of staff to Mayor Ken Welch. The talks include allowing the city to have input in naming the ballpark, placing prominent St. Petersburg signs inside the park and a marketing plan that would “promote the team, the st...

Nikki Haley’s Republican rivals are ramping up their attacks on her as Iowa’s caucuses near

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nikki Haley’s rivals for the Republican presidential nomination are ratcheting up their attacks on her as Iowa’s first-in-the-nation voting draws closer.The barbed news releases, attack ads and amped up back-and-forth come as the former South Carolina governor and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis battle for a distant second place to former President Donald Trump with less than two weeks until Iowa’s leadoff caucuses. For months, Trump has trained his focus on DeSantis, who has long argued that he’s the party’s best chance at unseating Trump from atop the field. But in recent weeks, Trump’s campaign has increasingly shifted its target to Haley, calling her a “sellout” and criticizing her stances on taxes and the U.S.-Mexico border.Her campaign on Thursday said Trump’s attention to Haley, who served as his United Nations ambassador, reflects his concern that she is gaining on him.DeSantis, who is preparing to face off against Haley next week in their...

Bomb threats prompt evacuations of government buildings in several states, but no explosives found

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

JACKSON, Miss (AP) — Government buildings in several states were evacuated Thursday following bomb threats, briefly disrupting government affairs for the second day in a row in some places.The Mississippi Capitol and courthouses in Arkansas and Montana were evacuated, but no explosives were immediately found, and the buildings were reopened to the public. The latest round of evacuations comes after an emailed threat to officials in several states prompted lockdowns at multiple state capitols Wednesday. The threats also follow a spate of false reports of shootings at the homes of public officials in recent days.In Jackson, Mississippi, officials said the state Supreme Court, which is across the street from the state Capitol building, received a bomb threat. Bomb-sniffing dogs circled the building before officials cleared the area. The FBI said it was aware of “numerous hoax incidents” Thursday. “The FBI takes hoax threats very seriously because it puts innocent people at risk,” Marsh...

Quebec Amber Alert: Father faces abduction charge after one-year-old found safe

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

MONTREAL — Quebec authorities say the father of a one-year-old girl who was the subject of an Amber Alert earlier this week was charged today with abduction.The child’s mother appeared in court on Wednesday on charges of abduction and breaking and entering.Quebec’s Crown prosecutor’s office says the father will remain detained and his case has been adjourned to Friday.The child was reported missing Tuesday morning from the Montreal home of her grandparents, who had custody of her. The mother and the baby were found in an unspecified location in northwestern Montreal just after 2 a.m. Wednesday, the day after police triggered an Amber Alert.A publication ban prevents the release of any information identifying the child.This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 4, 2024.The Canadian Press

Toronto man wanted by Peterborough police for violating probation arrested at Pearson

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

A Toronto man wanted in Peterborough for breaching his probation, among other charges, has been arrested at Pearson International Airport, police say.According to the Peterborough Police Service, officers with the Canadian Border Services Agency at Pearson arrested the 30-year-old man on Wednesday.He is charged with two counts of failing to comply with probation, fraud over $5,000 and possession of property obtained by crime.Peterborough police brought the accused back to their jurisdiction, where he is being held in custody.

A judge in Oregon refuses to dismiss a 2015 climate lawsuit filed by youth

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

EUGENE, Ore. (AP) — A judge in Oregon has rejected a U.S. Department of Justice request to dismiss a 2015 lawsuit brought by young people that alleges the federal government knew the dangers posed by carbon pollution but that it has continued through policies and subsidies to support the fossil fuel industry.U.S. District Court Judge Ann Aiken said the parties “do not disagree that the climate crisis threatens our ability to survive on planet Earth. This catastrophe is the great emergency of our time and compels urgent action.”“While facts remain to be proved, lawsuits like this highlight young people’s despair with the drawn-out pace of the unhurried, inchmeal, bureaucratic response to our most dire emergency,” she wrote in her decision late last week.In a statement, Julia Olson, an attorney with the group Our Children’s Trust representing the plaintiffs, said she expects a trial in the case later this year.In a similar lawsuit in Montana, a judge last year ruled the Montana Enviro...

Unsealed documents show again how Jeffrey Epstein leveraged his powerful connections

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Newly released court documents describing Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse of teenage girls provide a reminder of how the financier leveraged connections to the rich, powerful and famous to recruit his victims and cover up his crimes.The more than 40 documents released late Wednesday — the latest of thousands that have been made public — were sprinkled with the names of celebrities and politicians who socialized with Epstein or worked with him in the years before he was publicly accused nearly two decades ago of paying underage girls for sex.Most of those names were familiar to anyone who has followed the scandal closely, including the criminal trial of Ghislaine Maxwell, who was Epstein’s former girlfriend, household manager and chief recruiter of young, vulnerable females.It was during Maxwell’s criminal trial two years ago that Epstein’s victims, some of whom aspired to be models or artists, described how he dropped the names of his famous and infl...

Weekend need-to-know: Skate with Toronto’s mayor

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

Fight off those holiday blues with some skating adventures happening across Toronto and it’s your last chance to head to the Distillery Winter Village.There are no TTC or GO Train interruptions this weekend as well.Mayor’s Skating PartyIf you’ve been waiting for your chance to rub shoulders with Mayor Olivia Chow and other city council members, this weekend is your chance.Chow will be hosting the annual Mayor’s Skating Party at Nathan Phillips Square this Sunday. There will be free skates, treats and an opportunity to meet the people who run your city.It’s all ages and kicks off from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.Toronto Marlies gamesThe Toronto Marlies will be taking on the Syracuse Crunch in a double-header this weekend, so there are two chances to catch the AHL team in action at Coca-Cola Coliseum.The first game will be happening Saturday afternoon at 4 p.m. and puck drops on Sunday at 4 p.m. as well. Tickets are still available online.Last weekend of the Distille...

This glass ceiling-breaking Liberal mom is looking to give the Tories a time out

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

OTTAWA — Karina Gould knows how to throw a hefty political punch, and she often does it with a smile. Just six months into her role as government House leader, Gould has redefined what it means to be a prime minister’s chief attack dog. During a fall parliamentary sitting that often looked out of control, political insiders say Gould was a steady thorn in her opponents’ sides: calm and cutting at the same time. They are crediting her with re-energizing the Liberal caucus after the party’s poll numbers plummeted last year, while Opposition Conservatives relished in their own gains.“For the last year, it felt like the Conservatives were the only party competing,” said Fred DeLorey, a former national campaign manager for the Conservative Party of Canada.“It wasn’t clear what the Liberals were doing, if they were in search of a narrative or if they didn’t understand they needed one. But it feels like in the last month, especially, there...

Oscar Pistorius is set to be released on parole. He will be strictly monitored until December 2029

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:12:57 GMT

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — Oscar Pistorius is due to be released from prison Friday to live under strict conditions at a family home having served nearly nine years of a murder sentence for the shooting death of girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.The double-amputee Olympic runner from South Africa is set to leave the Atteridgeville Correctional Centre in Pretoria after being approved for parole in November, the second time he had applied. It will give the world a chance at its first glimpse in nearly a decade of the one-time sporting superstar who stunningly fell from grace after shooting Steenkamp multiple times through a closed toilet door at his home in the predawn hours of Valentine’s Day 2013.South Africa’s Department of Corrections declined to give any detail of when and how Pistorius would be released, saying “inmates and parolees are never paraded.” Pistorius’ public profile “does not make him different from other inmates nor warrant inconsistent treatmen...