Man charged in bike path killings speaks

Man charged in bike path killings speaks

new york

The man charged with killing eight people on a New York City bike path and injuring many more spoke out in court Friday over a prosecutor’s objection, invoking “Allah” and defending the Islamic State.

Sayfullo Saipov, 30, raised his hand to speak immediately after U.S. District Judge Vernon S. Broderick set an Oct. 7, 2019, date for the Uzbek immigrant’s trial.

Earlier, he had pleaded not guilty through his lawyer to the latest indictment in the Oct. 31 truck attack near the World Trade Center. A prosecutor said the Justice Department will decide by the end of the summer whether to seek the death penalty.

Speaking through an interpreter, Saipov said the decisions of a U.S. court were unimportant to him. He said he cared about “Allah” and the holy war being waged by the Islamic State.

Reports: HUD didn’t track lead-paint cases

washington

Two federal reports released this month blast the Department of Housing and Urban Development for failing to have procedures to adequately protect children in subsidized housing against lead-paint exposure.

The reports, from the Government Accountability Office and HUD’s Office of Inspector General, paint a portrait of an agency without a clear set of policies for local authorities to follow when reporting cases of children with elevated blood lead levels in public housing units and properties occupied by voucher holders.

They also say HUD also lacks an adequate system of communication with the thousands of housing authorities it’s tasked with overseeing, with reports on such matters often incomplete or missing entirely.

Photo fuels Trump tape speculation

LOS ANGELES

President Donald Trump’s former longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen retweeted a photo of himself with comedian Tom Arnold, who is working on a TV show to hunt down recordings of the president, fueling speculation Friday that Cohen has secret tapes of Trump and is willing to share them.

Last month, Vice Media announced Arnold would be featured in a new show called “The Hunt for the Trump Tapes” and would investigate rumored recordings of Trump.

Arnold told NBC News on Friday that he met with Cohen at the Lowes Regency Hotel in Manhattan, and they discussed the new show.

Trump: N. Korea still poses a threat

WASHINGTON

President Donald Trump declared Friday that North Korea still poses an “extraordinary threat” to the U.S.

In an executive order, the president extended for one year the so-called “national emergency” with respect to the nuclear-armed nation, re-authorizing economic restrictions against it.

While expected, the declaration comes just nine days after Trump tweeted, “There is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea,” after his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore. The order appears to undermine the president’s claim.

Rats have $19K meal

GAUHATI, India

It was a cash-machine heist with a difference: The attackers were hungry rodents.

At least one rat slipped through a hole in the back of an ATM in northeastern India and started eating. By the time it was finished, police say more than $19,000 in bills were shredded.

When technicians arrived June 11 to fix a broken State Bank of India cash machine in the town of Tinsukia they found a dead rat inside it and Indian currency notes worth nearly 1.3 million rupees, or a little over $19,000, chewed to shreds. The rat had entered the ATM through a small hole for cables, a police official said Friday.

Associated Press