California
Paul Pelosi prohibited from driving after pleading no contest to hit-and-run charge
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Paul Pelosi, husband of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was prohibited from driving for six months and ordered to complete a work program after pleading no contest Tuesday to a misdemeanor hit-and-run charge.
Paul Pelosi, 86, was charged after a collision with a legally parked car on the side of the road July 3, the Napa County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement at the time. He was driving his brown convertible in Yountville, California, a town in the heart of wine country. He briefly stopped and then allegedly drove away. The parked car was unoccupied, and no injuries were reported.
State law requires drivers involved in accidents resulting in property damage to stop and provide their vehicle and license information. Pelosi was charged with a misdemeanor violation of that law. In addition, Pelosi was charged with an infraction for making an unlawful turn, Napa County prosecutors said.
Officials have said no alcohol was involved in the collision.
Pelosi pleaded no contest to both the misdemeanor and infraction, prosecutors said Tuesday. He was placed on one year of summary probation, a type of unsupervised release that does not involve reporting to a probation officer, and is prohibited from driving for six months. He was also ordered to complete a 10-day work program.
Pelosi paid about $11,200 in restitution to the owner of the car he struck along with court fines and fees.
Pelosi pleaded guilty in 2022 to misdemeanor charges of driving under the influence in Napa County and was sentenced to five days in jail and three years of probation. He served two days in jail and received good conduct credit for two other days, leaving just one day to serve in a work program at the courthouse.
As part of his probation, Pelosi was required to pay thousands in fines and victim restitution, attend a three-month drinking driver class and install an ignition interlock device, which forces drivers to provide a breath sample to prove sobriety before the engine will start.
Australia
Government lawyers argue in court that social media ban is needed to protect children’s brains
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Government lawyers told Australia’s highest court on Wednesday that a world-first ban on children younger than 16 from holding social media accounts was necessary to protect developing brains.
The Australian government is fighting in the High Court two constitutional challenges to the ban that took effect last year on young children holding accounts on Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, Kick, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, X, YouTube and Twitch.
The challenges were brought by Reddit, a U.S. online forum, and Sydney-based rights group Digital Freedom Project.
Government lawyer Joanna Davidson on Wednesday continued to outline seven risks to children she argued were posed by social media platform design features.
The risks were addictive use, adverse sleep effects, depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, exacerbation of disordered eating, and intensification of ADHD symptoms, Davidson said.
The challengers argue the ban deprives young children of a right to freedom of political communication implied in Australia’s constitution.
The seven judges must decide whether the harm done by limiting children’s political engagement outweighs the harm done by social media platforms.
The two-day hearing began on Tuesday. The verdict will likely take months.
Government lawyer Stephen Lloyd told the judges on Wednesday the ban’s burden on the freedom of political communication was “indirect in nature and modest in extent.”
Reddit lawyer Perry Herzfeld argued the ban was “ill-targeted” and “over broad.” Herzfeld said Reddit should never have been included on the government’s list of 10 age-restricted platforms.
The ban puts the onus on the platforms to exclude young children. The targeted platforms face fines of up to 49.5 million Australian dollars ($34.5 million) if they fail to take reasonable steps to remove the accounts of young children.
Government data showed in July that 5 million Australian social media accounts had been closed since the ban came into force in December last year. Australia’s population is 28 million.
But the government has acknowledged that the ban has not been as effective as hoped.
The government announced in June it was considering strengthening laws behind the ban.
London
Ex-Prince Andrew called to testify in civil case, 1st royal in 176 years to get summons
LONDON (AP) — The former Prince Andrew has been called to testify as a witness in a civil fraud trial, marking what is believed to be the first time in more than 150 years that a member of the royal family has received a witness summons, British media reported on Wednesday.
The summons comes after a judge at the High Court in London gave the green light last month for the former prince, now known as Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, to be called to testify about payments he allegedly received from the parties in the case. Mountbatten-Windsor may apply to have the summons set aside, so there is no guarantee he will testify.
The lawsuit was filed by Turkish national Nebahat Evyap Isbilen, who alleges that her former adviser Selman Turk misappropriated tens of millions of pounds of her money. As part of the case, she says Turk misled her about a 750,000-pound ($1 million) payment he arranged for her to make to Mountbatten-Windsor in 2019.
Mountbatten-Windsor, a younger brother of King Charles III, repaid the money in 2021 and he is not a party to the suit.
Turk claims that Isbilen authorized the payment in hopes that Mountbatten-Windsor might be able to use his connections to help her husband, who has been imprisoned in Turkey since 2015. Isbilen alleges that her husband is the victim of political persecution.
Isbilen’s attorneys said last month that they believed this would be the first time since 1870 that a member of the royal family was subject to a witness summons.
At that time, the future King Edward VII, then the Prince of Wales, was called to testify in the divorce case brought by Charles Mordaunt, a baronet and member of Parliament. The prince accepted the summons and denied having improper relations with Mordaunt’s wife, Harriet Mordaunt.
Mountbatten-Windsor is facing his own legal troubles as several British police forces investigate his links to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. British authorities began their inquiries after the U.S. Department of Justice released millions of pages of documents from its investigation of Epstein earlier this year.
Charles stripped Mountbatten-Windsor of his princely title in late 2025 as he tried to shield the royal family from the scandal surrounding his brother’s relationship with Epstein.
Indiana
Execution of man who killed 2 kids will go ahead
Indiana’s governor turned down a clemency request Monday and said an execution planned for this week would go forward for a man who set a fire that killed his girlfriend’s two children in 2010.
Gov. Mike Braun said he would follow the Indiana Parole Board’s recommendation to let the death sentence stand for Jeffrey Weisheit.
Weisheit, 50, had a right under Indiana law to ask Braun to reduce the death sentence to a life sentence for his murder and arson convictions.
Weisheit acknowledged his crimes during an Oct. 16 public hearing but said he wanted to live and improve the lives of other people in prison.
The remains of 8-year-old Alyssa Lynch and 5-year-old Caleb Lynch were recovered from the ruins of a fire at their home in the Evansville area.
Alyssa’s body was in a closet. Caleb’s body was on a mattress, restrained with duct tape. A railroad flare was in his underwear and another was under his body.
The children’s mother, Lisa Lynch, was at work at the time. She was in a relationship with Weisheit but it was breaking down, investigators said.
Weisheit’s lawyers say he has a history of head injuries and mental health problems that didn’t get enough attention at his 2013 trial. Separately, his legal team has asked the governor to delay the execution and review how the state acquires drugs for lethal injections.
The lawyers said Indiana purchased pentobarbital from a pharmacy that is under scrutiny by the state attorney general. They also cited the recent failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee, and Gov. Bill Lee’s decision there to review what happened during the attempted lethal injection.
But Braun spokesperson Griffin Reid said the “process is over.”
Germany
U.S. contractor admits passing top-secret info to Ethiopia in its war against rebels
HAMBURG, Germany (AP) — A former U.S. government contractor has admitted passing classified intelligence to Ethiopia that officials used in military operations, the U.S. Justice Department said Tuesday.
Abraham Teklu Lemma, 54, supplied secrets to senior Ethiopian officials for more than two years urging them to deploy drones against fighters battling the government, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington.
Lemma, of Silver Spring, Maryland, pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiring to transmit national defense information to a foreign government. He worked as an information technology contractor at the State Department, Justice Department and National Reconnaissance Office, prosecutors said.
According to prosecutors, the information reached Ethiopia’s military and intelligence branches between 2021 and August 2023, when he was arrested.
Prosecutors described a December 2021 message in which Lemma pressed an Ethiopian contact to act against their government opponents.
“We have to finish these people once and for all, otherwise there will never be peace in Ethiopia,” he wrote, according to the Washington prosecutor’s office.
An FBI counterintelligence official, Roman Rozhavsky, said Lemma admitted that Ethiopian officials used the intelligence he supplied in military operations. The Justice Department statement did not publicly reveal the specific operations or say whether anyone was killed as a result of the intelligence breach.
An FBI affidavit filed in 2023 alleged that Lemma sent top-secret satellite imagery and classified reports through an encrypted messaging application to Ethiopian government operatives.
The disclosures began during Ethiopia’s 2020–2022 war between federal forces and Tigrayan fighters. Researchers at Belgium’s Ghent University estimated that 500,000 civilians died through violence, famine and the collapse of health services.
The Pretoria peace agreement ended that war, but fighting resumed in September. Government-allied fighters entered Mekelle, Tigray’s capital, on Oct. 4, after the Tigray People’s Liberation Front withdrew.
The U.S. statements did not name any of the armed groups that the Ethiopian government targeted with Lemma’s intelligence.
His plea agreement with U.S. federal prosecutors provides for a prison term of between 10 years and 21 years and 10 months, subject to the court accepting. Lemma is due to be sentenced on April 14, 2027, the Justice Department said.
Paul Pelosi prohibited from driving after pleading no contest to hit-and-run charge
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Paul Pelosi, husband of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was prohibited from driving for six months and ordered to complete a work program after pleading no contest Tuesday to a misdemeanor hit-and-run charge.
Paul Pelosi, 86, was charged after a collision with a legally parked car on the side of the road July 3, the Napa County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement at the time. He was driving his brown convertible in Yountville, California, a town in the heart of wine country. He briefly stopped and then allegedly drove away. The parked car was unoccupied, and no injuries were reported.
State law requires drivers involved in accidents resulting in property damage to stop and provide their vehicle and license information. Pelosi was charged with a misdemeanor violation of that law. In addition, Pelosi was charged with an infraction for making an unlawful turn, Napa County prosecutors said.
Officials have said no alcohol was involved in the collision.
Pelosi pleaded no contest to both the misdemeanor and infraction, prosecutors said Tuesday. He was placed on one year of summary probation, a type of unsupervised release that does not involve reporting to a probation officer, and is prohibited from driving for six months. He was also ordered to complete a 10-day work program.
Pelosi paid about $11,200 in restitution to the owner of the car he struck along with court fines and fees.
Pelosi pleaded guilty in 2022 to misdemeanor charges of driving under the influence in Napa County and was sentenced to five days in jail and three years of probation. He served two days in jail and received good conduct credit for two other days, leaving just one day to serve in a work program at the courthouse.
As part of his probation, Pelosi was required to pay thousands in fines and victim restitution, attend a three-month drinking driver class and install an ignition interlock device, which forces drivers to provide a breath sample to prove sobriety before the engine will start.
Australia
Government lawyers argue in court that social media ban is needed to protect children’s brains
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Government lawyers told Australia’s highest court on Wednesday that a world-first ban on children younger than 16 from holding social media accounts was necessary to protect developing brains.
The Australian government is fighting in the High Court two constitutional challenges to the ban that took effect last year on young children holding accounts on Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, Kick, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, X, YouTube and Twitch.
The challenges were brought by Reddit, a U.S. online forum, and Sydney-based rights group Digital Freedom Project.
Government lawyer Joanna Davidson on Wednesday continued to outline seven risks to children she argued were posed by social media platform design features.
The risks were addictive use, adverse sleep effects, depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, exacerbation of disordered eating, and intensification of ADHD symptoms, Davidson said.
The challengers argue the ban deprives young children of a right to freedom of political communication implied in Australia’s constitution.
The seven judges must decide whether the harm done by limiting children’s political engagement outweighs the harm done by social media platforms.
The two-day hearing began on Tuesday. The verdict will likely take months.
Government lawyer Stephen Lloyd told the judges on Wednesday the ban’s burden on the freedom of political communication was “indirect in nature and modest in extent.”
Reddit lawyer Perry Herzfeld argued the ban was “ill-targeted” and “over broad.” Herzfeld said Reddit should never have been included on the government’s list of 10 age-restricted platforms.
The ban puts the onus on the platforms to exclude young children. The targeted platforms face fines of up to 49.5 million Australian dollars ($34.5 million) if they fail to take reasonable steps to remove the accounts of young children.
Government data showed in July that 5 million Australian social media accounts had been closed since the ban came into force in December last year. Australia’s population is 28 million.
But the government has acknowledged that the ban has not been as effective as hoped.
The government announced in June it was considering strengthening laws behind the ban.
London
Ex-Prince Andrew called to testify in civil case, 1st royal in 176 years to get summons
LONDON (AP) — The former Prince Andrew has been called to testify as a witness in a civil fraud trial, marking what is believed to be the first time in more than 150 years that a member of the royal family has received a witness summons, British media reported on Wednesday.
The summons comes after a judge at the High Court in London gave the green light last month for the former prince, now known as Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, to be called to testify about payments he allegedly received from the parties in the case. Mountbatten-Windsor may apply to have the summons set aside, so there is no guarantee he will testify.
The lawsuit was filed by Turkish national Nebahat Evyap Isbilen, who alleges that her former adviser Selman Turk misappropriated tens of millions of pounds of her money. As part of the case, she says Turk misled her about a 750,000-pound ($1 million) payment he arranged for her to make to Mountbatten-Windsor in 2019.
Mountbatten-Windsor, a younger brother of King Charles III, repaid the money in 2021 and he is not a party to the suit.
Turk claims that Isbilen authorized the payment in hopes that Mountbatten-Windsor might be able to use his connections to help her husband, who has been imprisoned in Turkey since 2015. Isbilen alleges that her husband is the victim of political persecution.
Isbilen’s attorneys said last month that they believed this would be the first time since 1870 that a member of the royal family was subject to a witness summons.
At that time, the future King Edward VII, then the Prince of Wales, was called to testify in the divorce case brought by Charles Mordaunt, a baronet and member of Parliament. The prince accepted the summons and denied having improper relations with Mordaunt’s wife, Harriet Mordaunt.
Mountbatten-Windsor is facing his own legal troubles as several British police forces investigate his links to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. British authorities began their inquiries after the U.S. Department of Justice released millions of pages of documents from its investigation of Epstein earlier this year.
Charles stripped Mountbatten-Windsor of his princely title in late 2025 as he tried to shield the royal family from the scandal surrounding his brother’s relationship with Epstein.
Indiana
Execution of man who killed 2 kids will go ahead
Indiana’s governor turned down a clemency request Monday and said an execution planned for this week would go forward for a man who set a fire that killed his girlfriend’s two children in 2010.
Gov. Mike Braun said he would follow the Indiana Parole Board’s recommendation to let the death sentence stand for Jeffrey Weisheit.
Weisheit, 50, had a right under Indiana law to ask Braun to reduce the death sentence to a life sentence for his murder and arson convictions.
Weisheit acknowledged his crimes during an Oct. 16 public hearing but said he wanted to live and improve the lives of other people in prison.
The remains of 8-year-old Alyssa Lynch and 5-year-old Caleb Lynch were recovered from the ruins of a fire at their home in the Evansville area.
Alyssa’s body was in a closet. Caleb’s body was on a mattress, restrained with duct tape. A railroad flare was in his underwear and another was under his body.
The children’s mother, Lisa Lynch, was at work at the time. She was in a relationship with Weisheit but it was breaking down, investigators said.
Weisheit’s lawyers say he has a history of head injuries and mental health problems that didn’t get enough attention at his 2013 trial. Separately, his legal team has asked the governor to delay the execution and review how the state acquires drugs for lethal injections.
The lawyers said Indiana purchased pentobarbital from a pharmacy that is under scrutiny by the state attorney general. They also cited the recent failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee, and Gov. Bill Lee’s decision there to review what happened during the attempted lethal injection.
But Braun spokesperson Griffin Reid said the “process is over.”
Germany
U.S. contractor admits passing top-secret info to Ethiopia in its war against rebels
HAMBURG, Germany (AP) — A former U.S. government contractor has admitted passing classified intelligence to Ethiopia that officials used in military operations, the U.S. Justice Department said Tuesday.
Abraham Teklu Lemma, 54, supplied secrets to senior Ethiopian officials for more than two years urging them to deploy drones against fighters battling the government, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington.
Lemma, of Silver Spring, Maryland, pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiring to transmit national defense information to a foreign government. He worked as an information technology contractor at the State Department, Justice Department and National Reconnaissance Office, prosecutors said.
According to prosecutors, the information reached Ethiopia’s military and intelligence branches between 2021 and August 2023, when he was arrested.
Prosecutors described a December 2021 message in which Lemma pressed an Ethiopian contact to act against their government opponents.
“We have to finish these people once and for all, otherwise there will never be peace in Ethiopia,” he wrote, according to the Washington prosecutor’s office.
An FBI counterintelligence official, Roman Rozhavsky, said Lemma admitted that Ethiopian officials used the intelligence he supplied in military operations. The Justice Department statement did not publicly reveal the specific operations or say whether anyone was killed as a result of the intelligence breach.
An FBI affidavit filed in 2023 alleged that Lemma sent top-secret satellite imagery and classified reports through an encrypted messaging application to Ethiopian government operatives.
The disclosures began during Ethiopia’s 2020–2022 war between federal forces and Tigrayan fighters. Researchers at Belgium’s Ghent University estimated that 500,000 civilians died through violence, famine and the collapse of health services.
The Pretoria peace agreement ended that war, but fighting resumed in September. Government-allied fighters entered Mekelle, Tigray’s capital, on Oct. 4, after the Tigray People’s Liberation Front withdrew.
The U.S. statements did not name any of the armed groups that the Ethiopian government targeted with Lemma’s intelligence.
His plea agreement with U.S. federal prosecutors provides for a prison term of between 10 years and 21 years and 10 months, subject to the court accepting. Lemma is due to be sentenced on April 14, 2027, the Justice Department said.
