Most senior Brexit official resigns

Most senior Brexit official resigns

LONDON

Britain’s most senior official in charge of negotiating the country’s exit from the European Union resigned Sunday, two days after Prime Minister Theresa May announced she had finally united her quarrelsome government behind a plan for Brexit.

The Press Association news agency, the BBC and others said Brexit Secretary David Davis resigned Sunday.

Davis’s late-night resignation undermined May’s fragile government. He was a strong pro-Brexit voice in a Cabinet divided between supporters of a clean break with the bloc and those who want to keep close ties.

On Friday, Davis and the rest of May’s fractious Cabinet agreed on a plan for ties with the EU after the U.K. leaves next year.

Today, May is due to brief lawmakers on the plan agreed by the Cabinet during its 12-hour meeting. It seeks to keep the U.K. and the EU in a free-trade zone for goods, and commits Britain to maintaining the same rules as the bloc for goods and agricultural products.

Weinstein charged with assault of a third woman

NEW YORK

Harvey Weinstein is due in a New York court for arraignment on charges alleging he committed a sex crime against a third woman.

An updated indictment alleges the movie mogul-turned-MeToo villain performed a forcible sex act on a woman in 2006.

The new charges include two counts of predatory sexual assault, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison upon conviction.

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. says the 66-year-old Weinstein is charged with “some of the most serious sexual offenses” that exist under state law.

A lawyer for Weinstein has said he will plead not guilty today. Lawyer Ben Brafman says Weinstein maintains all the allegations are false and he will be vindicated.

A grand jury previously indicted Weinstein on charges involving two women.

Floating cocaine recovered off Florida coast

PENSACOLA, Fla.

A floating bale of cocaine has been recovered in the Gulf of Mexico off Florida.

Citing a U.S. Coast Guard release, news outlets report more than 75 pounds of cocaine was found in the package on Sunday. The release says a “good Samaritan” notified authorities of the buoyant oddity bobbing south of Pensacola on Saturday evening, and multiple agencies searched the area that night.

In addition to the Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, Orange Beach police, Homeland Security Investigations and the interagency Regional Coordinating Mechanism assisted with the recovery.

It’s unclear to whom the cocaine belongs.

Three killed in wrong-lane crash

AMITYVILLE, N.Y.

Three people, including a father and a son, have been killed in a car wreck in suburban New York.

Suffolk County police say Alex Demetrius, of Nesconset, was driving east in Amityville around 12:30 a.m. Sunday when his car went into the opposite lanes and hit a westbound car.

The crash killed the 27-year-old Demetrius and the driver and a passenger in the other car: 65-year-old Joseph Cloonan and his 34-year-old son, John Cloonan, who both lived on Staten Island.

Associated Press