Mississippi
Judge pauses the state’s ban on DEI programs in schools and universities
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A Mississippi law that bans diversity, equity and inclusion programs from public schools and universities was temporarily blocked by a federal judge Sunday.
U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate approved the request for a temporary restraining order brought by a group of plaintiffs, including the Mississippi Association of Educators.
The plaintiffs also requested a preliminary injunction, a longer-term order that would prevent the law from being enforced while litigation plays out in court.
The temporary restraining order will stay in place until Wingate rules on the request for preliminary injunction.
In his ruling, Wingate cited instances where the law is already having an impact as part of his reasoning for siding with the plaintiffs.
Faculty members at Jackson State University have been instructed not to discuss gender theory or systemic racism, he wrote.
“Suppressing constitutional speech through vague prohibitions and the specter of financial retribution does not serve the public good — it undermines it,” the ruling reads.
Both parties will argue their case at a hearing about the potential preliminary injunction Wednesday.
New York
Court orders new trial for man convicted in 1979 Etan Patz case
NEW YORK (AP) — The man convicted of killing 6-year-old Etan Patz in 1979 was awarded a new trial Monday as a federal appeals court overturned the guilty verdict in one of the nation’s most notorious missing child cases.
Pedro Hernandez has been serving 25 years to life in prison since his 2017 conviction. He had been arrested in 2012 after a decadeslong, haunting search for answers in Etan’s disappearance on the first day he was allowed to walk alone to his school bus stop.
The appeals court overturned the conviction because of an issue involving how the trial judge handled a jury note during Hernandez 2017 trial — his second. His first trial ended in a jury deadlock in 2015. The ruling says that the judges concluded that the state trial court’s instruction was not only “clearly wrong” but “manifestly prejudicial”
The court ordered his release unless the state gives him a new trial within a reasonable period to be set by the lower court judge.
Emily Tuttle, a spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney, said “We are reviewing the decision.”
Harvey Fishbein, an attorney for Hernandez, declined to comment when reached Monday by phone.
Hernandez was a teenager working at a convenience shop in Etan’s Manhattan neighborhood when the boy vanished.
Hernandez, who’s from Maple Shade, New Jersey, later confessed to choking Etan. But his lawyers said he was mentally ill and his confession was false.
Etan was among the first missing children pictured on milk cartons. His case contributed to an era of fear among American families, making anxious parents more protective of kids who many once allowed to roam and play unsupervised in their neighborhoods.
“Through this painful and utterly horrific real-life story, we came to realize how easily our children could disappear,” said Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., a Democrat who made a 2009 campaign promise to revisit the case if elected.
The Patzes’ advocacy helped to establish a national missing-children hotline and to make it easier for law enforcement agencies to share information about such cases. The May 25 anniversary of Etan’s disappearance became National Missing Children’s Day.
Maine
Prosecutors seek to try teen as an adult in death of paddleboarder
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Prosecutors in Maine said Monday they will seek to try a 17-year-old charged with murder in the death of a paddleboarder as an adult.
The body of Sunshine “Sunny” Stewart, 48, of St. George, was found earlier this month on Crawford Pond in Union, about 80 miles (130 kilometers) north of Portland in a part of the state beloved by summer campers and nature lovers. Stewart went missing while paddleboarding before her killing, and her death sent shockwaves through the local community.
Police charged Deven Young, of Frankfort, Maine, with murder in the death of Stewart last week. He has been held at a youth detention facility in the Portland area and is due in court for a status conference on Aug. 22.
The Office of the Maine Attorney General is moving to bind Young over so he can be tried as an adult, said Danna Hayes, a spokesperson for the office. A judge will need to rule on the request.
The motion to try Young as an adult has been impounded by court and is not publicly available, Hayes said.
“Although the court allowed us to release the name of the defendant, all of the other documents remain impounded, so we do not have additional information we can share at this time,” Hayes said.
Young made a brief initial court appearance on Friday in which he entered a denial to the charge. His attorney, Jeremy Pratt, declined to comment Monday. If convicted of murder as an adult, Young faces a prison sentence of 25 years to life.
A medical examiner determined Stewart’s cause of death was strangulation and blunt force trauma, police have said.
Authorities have not revealed a motive. Court documents released about the case contain little detail, and Maine State Police have declined to comment beyond announcing the arrest last week. They’ve said the investigation into Stewart’s death is still active.
Stewart lived about 21 miles from the pond in the Tenants Harbor neighborhood in St. George.
Friends of Stewart have described her as a fiercely independent adventurer who was deeply dedicated to her friends. Over the years, she worked as a fisherman, boat captain, carpenter and bartender, among other jobs, friends said.
“She was just a wonderful friend, a really loyal, wonderful friend,” said a lifelong friend, Bethany Leach Parmley of Washington, Maine. “She was just so fun and funny and you couldn’t help but have a good time around her.”
The pond, in the 2,400-resident town of Union, is about 600 acres (243 hectares) and does not have public access. It is available for a variety of uses, including boating and fishing. The 100 Acre Island preserve in the center of the pond is a wooded island reachable by canoe, kayak or paddleboard from a nearby campground.
Judge pauses the state’s ban on DEI programs in schools and universities
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A Mississippi law that bans diversity, equity and inclusion programs from public schools and universities was temporarily blocked by a federal judge Sunday.
U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate approved the request for a temporary restraining order brought by a group of plaintiffs, including the Mississippi Association of Educators.
The plaintiffs also requested a preliminary injunction, a longer-term order that would prevent the law from being enforced while litigation plays out in court.
The temporary restraining order will stay in place until Wingate rules on the request for preliminary injunction.
In his ruling, Wingate cited instances where the law is already having an impact as part of his reasoning for siding with the plaintiffs.
Faculty members at Jackson State University have been instructed not to discuss gender theory or systemic racism, he wrote.
“Suppressing constitutional speech through vague prohibitions and the specter of financial retribution does not serve the public good — it undermines it,” the ruling reads.
Both parties will argue their case at a hearing about the potential preliminary injunction Wednesday.
New York
Court orders new trial for man convicted in 1979 Etan Patz case
NEW YORK (AP) — The man convicted of killing 6-year-old Etan Patz in 1979 was awarded a new trial Monday as a federal appeals court overturned the guilty verdict in one of the nation’s most notorious missing child cases.
Pedro Hernandez has been serving 25 years to life in prison since his 2017 conviction. He had been arrested in 2012 after a decadeslong, haunting search for answers in Etan’s disappearance on the first day he was allowed to walk alone to his school bus stop.
The appeals court overturned the conviction because of an issue involving how the trial judge handled a jury note during Hernandez 2017 trial — his second. His first trial ended in a jury deadlock in 2015. The ruling says that the judges concluded that the state trial court’s instruction was not only “clearly wrong” but “manifestly prejudicial”
The court ordered his release unless the state gives him a new trial within a reasonable period to be set by the lower court judge.
Emily Tuttle, a spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney, said “We are reviewing the decision.”
Harvey Fishbein, an attorney for Hernandez, declined to comment when reached Monday by phone.
Hernandez was a teenager working at a convenience shop in Etan’s Manhattan neighborhood when the boy vanished.
Hernandez, who’s from Maple Shade, New Jersey, later confessed to choking Etan. But his lawyers said he was mentally ill and his confession was false.
Etan was among the first missing children pictured on milk cartons. His case contributed to an era of fear among American families, making anxious parents more protective of kids who many once allowed to roam and play unsupervised in their neighborhoods.
“Through this painful and utterly horrific real-life story, we came to realize how easily our children could disappear,” said Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., a Democrat who made a 2009 campaign promise to revisit the case if elected.
The Patzes’ advocacy helped to establish a national missing-children hotline and to make it easier for law enforcement agencies to share information about such cases. The May 25 anniversary of Etan’s disappearance became National Missing Children’s Day.
Maine
Prosecutors seek to try teen as an adult in death of paddleboarder
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Prosecutors in Maine said Monday they will seek to try a 17-year-old charged with murder in the death of a paddleboarder as an adult.
The body of Sunshine “Sunny” Stewart, 48, of St. George, was found earlier this month on Crawford Pond in Union, about 80 miles (130 kilometers) north of Portland in a part of the state beloved by summer campers and nature lovers. Stewart went missing while paddleboarding before her killing, and her death sent shockwaves through the local community.
Police charged Deven Young, of Frankfort, Maine, with murder in the death of Stewart last week. He has been held at a youth detention facility in the Portland area and is due in court for a status conference on Aug. 22.
The Office of the Maine Attorney General is moving to bind Young over so he can be tried as an adult, said Danna Hayes, a spokesperson for the office. A judge will need to rule on the request.
The motion to try Young as an adult has been impounded by court and is not publicly available, Hayes said.
“Although the court allowed us to release the name of the defendant, all of the other documents remain impounded, so we do not have additional information we can share at this time,” Hayes said.
Young made a brief initial court appearance on Friday in which he entered a denial to the charge. His attorney, Jeremy Pratt, declined to comment Monday. If convicted of murder as an adult, Young faces a prison sentence of 25 years to life.
A medical examiner determined Stewart’s cause of death was strangulation and blunt force trauma, police have said.
Authorities have not revealed a motive. Court documents released about the case contain little detail, and Maine State Police have declined to comment beyond announcing the arrest last week. They’ve said the investigation into Stewart’s death is still active.
Stewart lived about 21 miles from the pond in the Tenants Harbor neighborhood in St. George.
Friends of Stewart have described her as a fiercely independent adventurer who was deeply dedicated to her friends. Over the years, she worked as a fisherman, boat captain, carpenter and bartender, among other jobs, friends said.
“She was just a wonderful friend, a really loyal, wonderful friend,” said a lifelong friend, Bethany Leach Parmley of Washington, Maine. “She was just so fun and funny and you couldn’t help but have a good time around her.”
The pond, in the 2,400-resident town of Union, is about 600 acres (243 hectares) and does not have public access. It is available for a variety of uses, including boating and fishing. The 100 Acre Island preserve in the center of the pond is a wooded island reachable by canoe, kayak or paddleboard from a nearby campground.
