Articles written by Amy Taxin
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Ex-FBI informant charged with lying about Bidens to remain jailed while he awaits trial, judge rules
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A former FBI informant charged with fabricating a multimillion-dollar bribery scheme involving President Joe Biden's family must remain behind bars while he awaits trial, a judge ruled Monday, reversing an earlier order r...
California's big bloom aids seed collectors as climate change and wildfires threaten desert species
JOSHUA TREE, Calif. (AP) — Flowers that haven't been seen in years bloomed across Southern California this spring after massive winter downpours, creating not only colorful landscapes but a boon for conservationists eager to gather desert seeds as a...
California judge who's charged with murder texted court staff that he shot his wife, prosecutors say
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — A Southern California judge accused of killing his wife texted his court clerk and bailiff afterward to say he had shot her, prosecutors said Friday as they charged him with murder and sought new bail conditions. A court fili...
Man indicted on 98 charges including hate crimes for 2022 shooting at Taiwanese church in California
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — A man accused of fatally shooting one person and wounding five others at a Southern California church luncheon last year has been charged with dozens of federal hate crimes in connection with the attack, which i...
Snow, rain slam California as Michigan suffers without power
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Heavy snow and rain pounded California and other parts of the West on Friday in the nation's latest winter storm, while thousands of people in Michigan suffered in freezing temperatures through extended power outages wrought by o...
Sheriff: Gunman didn't know Monterey Park dance hall victims
MONTEREY PARK, Calif. (AP) — The 72-year-old gunman who sprayed bullets into a Southern California ballroom dance hall, killing 11 people, had no known connection with the victims and investigators were still trying to determine a motive for the m...
New model to enlist regular Americans to resettle refugees
SAN DIEGO (AP) — When nearly 80,000 Afghans arrived in the United States, refugee resettlement agencies quickly became overwhelmed, still scrambling to rehire staff and reopen offices after being gutted as the Trump administration dropped refugee a...
Hundreds of Afghans denied humanitarian entry into US
BOSTON (AP) — Haseena Niazi had pinned her hopes of getting her fiancé out of Afghanistan on a rarely used immigration provision. The 24-year-old Massachusetts resident was almost certain his application for humanitarian parole would get approved by...
How much oil leaked in California spill? No firm tally
HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. (AP) — Nearly a week since oil first appeared in the waters off Southern California, how much oil leaked from a ruptured underwater pipeline is still unknown—though experts say the amount should be easy to calculate. Whi...
Crews race to limit damage from major California oil spill
HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. (AP) — Crews on the water and on shore worked feverishly Sunday to limit environmental damage from one of the largest oil spills in recent California history, caused by a suspected leak in an underwater pipeline that f...
'We were them:' Vietnamese Americans help Afghan refugees
WESTMINSTER, Calif. (AP) — In the faces of Afghans desperate to leave their country after U.S. forces withdrew, Thuy Do sees her own family, decades earlier and thousands of miles away. A 39-year-old doctor in Seattle, Washington, Do remembers h...
Ruling leaves immigrants who newly applied for DACA in limbo
NEW YORK (AP) — When the text message popped up on his phone, Samuel Alfaro didn't want to believe it. It said his appointment with U.S. immigration services about his application to join the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, the one he...
US ends strict Trump-era asylum rules for violence victims
The U.S. government on Wednesday ended two Trump administration policies that made it harder for immigrants fleeing violence to qualify for asylum, especially Central Americans. Attorney General Merrick Garland issued new instructions to immigration...
US to expedite immigration cases of families on border
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Families arriving at the U.S. border with Mexico will have their cases fast-tracked in immigration court, the Biden administration said Friday, less than two weeks after it said it was easing pandemic-related restrictions on seeking...
New migrant facilities crop up to ease crowding, again
For the third time in seven years, U.S. officials are scrambling to handle a dramatic spike in children crossing the U.S.-Mexico border alone, leading to a massive expansion in emergency facilities to house them as more kids arrive than are being...
California uses ZIP codes, outreach to boost vaccine equity
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Hing Yiu Chung lives in a racially diverse San Francisco neighborhood hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic. While vaccines have been difficult to come by, the 69-year-old got one by showing proof she lives where she does. She h...
Farmworkers key to keeping US fed are wary of virus spread
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Salvador Calzadillas isn't worried about catching the coronavirus when he's picking mandarin oranges in the trees in central California. But he said the mere act of getting to the groves each day puts him and his wife, a...
CDC cites label error in mixup involving coronavirus patient
SAN DIEGO (AP) — A labeling error caused a woman infected with the novel coronavirus to be mistakenly released from a hospital but the oversight was noticed as she was returning to a San Diego military base where more than 200 evacuees from China a...
US sued over health insurance rule for immigrant families
A lawsuit Wednesday accused the Trump administration of preventing Americans from bringing their foreign spouses and parents to live with them in the United States by requiring those immigrants to prove they can afford health care before they get...
Judge blocks Trump rules for detained migrant kids
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A U.S. judge on Friday blocked new Trump administration rules that would enable the government to keep immigrant children in detention facilities with their parents indefinitely. U.S. District Court Judge Dolly Gee in Los A...
California man convicted of torture of pot dispensary owner
NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. (AP) — A California man who previously escaped from jail and was on the run for a week was convicted Friday of kidnapping and torturing a marijuana dispensary owner who he mistakenly believed had buried large sums of money in t...
Police: Bloody stabbing suspect driven by 'hate, homicide'
GARDEN GROVE, Calif. (AP) — A gang member who killed four people and wounded two others in random stabbings across two Southern California cities has a violent past, police said Thursday, and court records show he was free on bail for a charge last m...
Suspect in deadly California rampage pleads not guilty
GARDEN GROVE, Calif. (AP) — The suspect in a Southern California stabbing rampage that left four people dead and two injured pleaded not guilty Friday to murder, attempted murder and other counts. Zachary Castaneda was arrested Wednesday by police r...
'And now we are alone': Extended family separated at border
WASHINGTON (AP) — A 12-year-old boy entered the U.S. from Mexico with his brother and uncle, fleeing violence in Guatemala, but is now without them in a packed Texas border facility. Honduran sisters, 8 and 6, were taken from their grandmother w...
Better conditions for migrant children at troubled facility
CLINT, Texas (AP) — Migrant children being housed at a Border Patrol facility near El Paso appeared mostly clean and were being watched by hallway monitors on Wednesday, less than a week since they reported living there in squalid conditions with i...
