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BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Relatives of victims of a racist mass shooting at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket have been called to federal court Friday for a "substantial update" in the legal case against the gunman, their attorney said. The meeting between Department of Justice representatives and victims of Payton Gendron will take place ahead of a previously scheduled afternoon status conference, attorney Terrence Connors said. Connors represents relatives of some of the 10 Black people killed and three other people wounded in the May 14, 2022, a...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Tech and social media giants like Facebook, Amazon and Google bear responsibility for radicalizing the Buffalo supermarket shooter, who was fueled by racist conspiracy theories he encountered online, the victim's relatives said in a lawsuit filed Wednesday. "They were the conspirators, even if they don't want to admit it," civil rights attorney Ben Crump said at a news conference announcing a 171-page lawsuit, which seeks unspecified financial damages as well as changes in how the companies operate. The suit names s...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — A white supremacist who killed 10 Black people at a Buffalo supermarket was sentenced to life in prison without parole Wednesday after relatives of his victims confronted him with pain and rage caused by his racist attack. Anger briefly turned physical at Payton Gendron's sentencing when a victim's family member rushed at him from the audience. The man was quickly restrained; prosecutors later said he wouldn't be charged. The proceeding then resumed with an emotional outpouring from people who lost loved ones or were t...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Roads reopened Thursday in storm-besieged Buffalo as authorities continued searching for people who may have died or are stuck and suffering after last week's blizzard. The driving ban in New York's second-most-populous city was lifted just after midnight Thursday, Mayor Byron Brown announced. At least 40 deaths in western New York, most of them in Buffalo, have been reported from the blizzard that raged across much of the country, with Buffalo in its crosshairs on Friday and Saturday. "Significant progress has been m...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — The National Guard went door to door in parts of Buffalo on Wednesday to check on people who lost power during the area's deadliest winter storm in decades, and authorities faced the tragic possibility of finding more victims amid melting snow. Already, more than 30 deaths have been reported in western New York from the blizzard that raged Friday and Saturday across much of the country, with Buffalo in its crosshairs. Carolyn Eubanks, who relied on an oxygen machine, collapsed after losing electricity at her Buffalo home d...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — The death toll from a Buffalo-area blizzard rose to 27 in western New York, authorities said Monday, as the region reeled from one of the worst weather-related disasters in its history. Much of the rest of the United States was hit by ferocious winter conditions. Those who lost their lives around Buffalo were found in cars, homes and snowbanks. Some died while shoveling snow, others when emergency crews could not respond in time to medical crises. President Joe Biden said his prayers were with the victims' families, and o...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — The white gunman who massacred 10 Black shoppers and workers at a Buffalo supermarket pleaded guilty Monday to murder and hate-motivated terrorism charges, guaranteeing he will spend the rest of his life in prison. Payton Gendron, 19, entered the plea Monday in a courthouse roughly two miles from the grocery store where he used a semiautomatic rifle and body armor to carry out a racist assault he hoped would help preserve white power in the U.S. Gendron, who was handcuffed and wore an orange jumpsuit, occasionally licked a...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — The white man accused of killing 10 Black people in a racist attack on a Buffalo supermarket was indicted by a grand jury Wednesday on a state domestic terrorism and hate crime charge that would carry a mandatory sentence of life in prison. Payton Gendron is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday on the new, 25-count indictment, which builds on a previous murder charge hastily prepared in the hours after the May 14 shooting. The 18-year-old has now also been charged with the attempted murders of three people who were shot d...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Relatives of the 10 Black people massacred in a Buffalo supermarket pleaded with the nation Thursday to confront and stop racist violence, their agony pouring out in the tears of a 12-year-old child, hours after the white man accused in the killings silently faced a murder indictment in court. Jaques "Jake" Patterson, who lost his father, covered his face with his hands as his mother spoke at a news conference. Once she finished, Jake collapsed into the arms of Rev. Al Sharpton, the veteran civil rights activist, and c...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — The 18-year-old gunman who authorities say killed 10 people at a Buffalo supermarket had previously threatened a shooting at his high school and was sent for mental health treatment. A law enforcement official told The Associated Press that Payton Gendron had appeared on the radar of police last year after he threatened to carry out a shooting around the time of graduation. Officials also say the gunman had researched the local demographics and arrived in the area a day in advance to conduct reconnaissance with the "express...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — The white gunman accused of massacring 10 Black people in a racist rampage at a Buffalo supermarket planned to keep on killing if he had escaped the scene, the police commissioner said Monday, as the possibility of federal hate crime or domestic terror charges loomed. The gunman, who had crossed the state to target people at the Tops Friendly Market, had talked about shooting up another store as well, Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia told CNN. "He was going to get in his car and continue to drive down J...
Low-fat chocolate milk instead of only non-fat. Fewer whole-grain offerings. Less severe salt limits. The Biden administration issued transitional standards for school lunches Friday that are meant to ease the path for cafeterias to get back on a more healthful course as they recover from pandemic and supply chain disruptions. Schools have struggled to meet the government's nutrition benchmarks through the pandemic but have not been punished for falling short. The "bridge" rule announced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture extends emergency...
With teacher absences mounting and substitutes in short supply, parents may be wondering: Who's teaching the kids? The answer around the U.S. could be a local police officer, National Guard soldier, state budget analyst, parent or recent high school graduate — nearly anyone willing to help keep schools' doors open through the omicron-driven staffing crunch. States have been loosening teaching requirements to give schools more flexibility on hiring as coronavirus exposures, illness and quarantines add to strains on schools that also have been t...
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Parents held children born while they were stuck abroad. Long-separated couples kissed, and grandparents embraced grandchildren who had doubled in age. The U.S. fully reopened to many vaccinated international travelers Monday, allowing families and friends to reunite for the first time since the coronavirus emerged and offering a boost to the travel industry decimated by the pandemic. The restrictions closed the U.S. to millions of people for 20 months. Octavio Alvarez and his 14-year-old daughter zipped through a pedestrian c...
President Joe Biden is pushing for K-8 schools to fully reopen in his first 100 days. But don’t look for Omeisha Snape’s kids in the classrooms. The New York City mother made the decision to keep her six children home in the fall when given the option of some in-person learning, and she’s heard nothing to change her mind about continuing remote learning for the rest of the school year. Other parents, though, have joined lawsuits to force schools to fully open their doors, illustrating a divide that often breaks down along racial lines. The r...
The first report cards of the school year are arriving with many more Fs than usual in a dismal sign of the struggles students are experiencing with distance learning. School districts from coast to coast have reported the number of students failing classes has risen by as many as two or three times — with English language learners and disabled and disadvantaged students suffering the most. "It was completely off the rails from what is normal for us, and that was obviously very alarming," said Erik Jespersen, principal of Oregon's McNary H...
ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) — It's the big question looming over one of this year's bloodiest mass shootings: Who opened fire at a crowded house party in Rochester, New York, on the last weekend of summer, killing two teenagers and wounding 14 other people? Nearly a month a fter gunshots rang out just after midnight on Sept. 19, there have been no arrests, no rewards offered and little word from authorities on where the investigation stands. If the police have suspects in mind, they haven't said so publicly. Nor have they told people who lost loved o...
After a rocky transition to distance learning last spring, Georgia teacher Aimee Rodriguez Webb is determined to do better this fall. She bought a dry-erase board and a special camera to display worksheets, and she set up her dining room to broadcast school lessons. "I'm getting myself geared up for what I feel will prepare me and allow me to teach remotely with more fidelity now that I know what I want it to look like," Rodriguez Webb said. She and other teachers from suburban Atlanta's Cobb County School District recently started three weeks...
Grace Brown's schedule at West Potomac High School in northern Virginia is filled with all the usual academics, and she's packed in Latin, chorus and piano as extras. What she can't cram into the 8:10 a.m. - 2:55 p.m. school day is gym class. So she's taking that one minus the gym, and on her own time. The 14-year-old freshman is getting school credit for virtual physical education, a concept that, as strange as it may sound, is being helped along by availability of wearable fitness trackers. For students whose tests and textbooks have...
There were so many questions after 17-year-old Ely Serna brought a shotgun to his Ohio school and opened fire in 2017, wounding two. Along with the whys, West Liberty-Salem High School assistant principal Andy McGill recalled thinking, "Is there something I missed?" "I never would have thought in a million years that it would be that person," he said. The questions now focus on how to prevent anything like that from happening again. Schools like McGill's have been setting up teams to assess threats posed by students who display signs of...
BALTIMORE (AP) — The actions of students who died tackling gunmen at two U.S. campuses a week apart have been hailed as heroic. At a growing number of schools around the country, they also reflect guidance to students, at least in some situations, to do what they can to disrupt shootings. A majority of school districts have now embraced such an approach, with experts saying educators need to give staff and students as many options as possible in the worst-case scenario. "In all honesty, I don't know of another strategy," said teacher Kelly C...
WASHINGTON (AP) — Twenty years after the Columbine High School shooting made practicing for armed intruders as routine as fire drills, many parents have only tepid confidence in the ability of schools to stop a gunman, according to a new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. And while most Americans consider schools less safe than they were 20 years ago, the poll finds a majority say schools aren't at fault for shootings. Bullying, the availability of guns, the internet and video games share more of the blame. L...
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — With dreams of UCLA for her daughter, single mother Donna Balancia chose a high-rent apartment to get her into Beverly Hills High School, which she hoped would give her the best shot at the college of her choice. Once there, she'd bring her daughter to the UCLA tennis court to practice, hoping she would be noticed by the coach. Her daughter excelled as a varsity athlete in tennis and lacrosse and earned a 3.9 GPA. But in the end, the teen's SAT scores were too low for UCLA or the University of Southern California. "I did s...
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Long before an ex-student opened fire on his former classmates in Parkland, Florida, many school districts conducted regular shooting drills — exercises that sometimes included simulated gunfire and blood and often happened with no warning that the attack wasn't real. The drills began taking shape after the Columbine High School shooting in 1999. But 20 years later, parents are increasingly questioning elements of the practice, including whether the drills traumatize kids. April Sullivan was pleasantly surprised by an "I...
The setting is different, but the complaints of teachers who are out on strike Tuesday in Los Angeles are echoing those heard in walkouts nationwide. Unlike protests that closed schools last spring in states including West Virginia, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Arizona, the strike that began Monday is unfolding in a liberal-leaning state and one of the country's biggest cities. But it highlights common challenges facing educators across the country. Public education funding in many states has not returned to levels seen before the Great Recession,...
