5 dead in small plane crash south of Austin, officials say
Cessna Golden Eagle (Francois Joseph Berger / 500px/Getty)
(WIMBERLEY, Texas) — Five people were killed in a plane crash in Texas on Thursday night, investigators said.
Hayes County Judge Ruben Becerra said first responders received a call around 11:00 p.m. local time about a plane down in the area of Wimberley, which is roughly 30 miles southwest of Austin.
Fire and EMS crews found the downed Cessna 421C, along with the bodies of the five deceased passengers. Their identities were not immediately released.
Stacey Rohr lives in a house close to the crash site and told local reporters, including one from ABC affiliate KVUE, Friday morning that the crash rattled the neighborhood.
“It felt like an earthquake,” she said.
Although a cause of the crash was not immediately determined, investigators said preliminary information shows that there was no midair collision.
“Preliminary information indicates the aircraft was traveling at a high rate of speed at the time of impact,” Becerra said in a statement.
The Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board will take over the investigation, according to the judge.
The NTSB said in a statement that the Cessna was destroyed in a post-impact fire. An investigator is on the way to the scene, according to the agency.
Preliminary flight data obtained by ABC News found that the plane took off from Amarillo, Texas, which is about 420 miles northwest of the crash area, and was in the air for almost two hours before it crashed.
Luigi Mangione appears for a suppression of evidence hearing in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan Criminal Court on December 16, 2025 in New York City. (Photo by Seth Wenig-Pool/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Luigi Mangione is returning to federal court in Manhattan, where his attorneys will try to convince the judge to postpone his federal trial until next year.
On Wednesday, the defense will ask U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett to delay Mangione’s September 2026 trial until January 2027 so defense attorneys can ask the judge overseeing the state prosecution, Gregory Carro, to move the state trial from June 2026 to September 2026.
“As a result of these competing schedules, Mr. Mangione is now in the position of needing to prepare for two complicated and serious trials at the same time,” defense attorney Karen Friedman Agnifilo said in a letter ahead of Wednesday’s hearing.
“Because Justice Carro scheduled the state trial for June 8, 2026, Mr. Mangione is now in the impossible position of having to review 800 jury questionnaires during the week of June 29, 2026, while on trial for second-degree murder in state court,” she said. “As a practical matter, this would not be possible.”
The defense also argued the effectiveness of Mangione’s defense would be diminished without the rescheduling.
“Though fierce advocates for their clients, defense counsel cannot be in two places at once,” Friedman Agnifilo said.
“Realistically, defense counsel cannot be defending Mr. Mangione in state court on second-degree murder charges that carry a maximum sentence of twenty-five years to life while, at the same time, also reviewing 800 questionnaires for a federal case that carries a maximum life sentence. Moreover, counsel will not be able to adequately prepare for the federal trial because they will be on trial in state court.”
Mangione pleaded not guilty to state and federal charges after he was arrested for allegedly gunning down UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Midtown Manhattan in December 2024.
Federal prosecutors are opposed to delaying the trial.
“The concerns identified by the defense can be fully addressed through targeted modifications to the questionnaire process, rather than a wholesale continuance of the trial date in this case,” prosecutor Sean Buckley wrote.
Mangione, 27, faces the possibility of life in prison if he’s convicted in either case. Garnett previously threw out the federal charges that carry the possibility of the death penalty and Carro previously tossed out an enhancement to the state murder charges that said Mangione’s alleged conduct amounted to terrorism.
Ballots are counted on election night at the Fulton County Elections Hub and Operation Center on November 5, 2024 in Fairburn, Georgia. (Photo by Megan Varner/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The FBI’s application for the warrant that led to the search and seizure of more than 650 boxes of 2020 election records from a Fulton County, Georgia, election site in January lacked any kind of evidence of intentional misconduct and relied on incorrect information, an elections expert with twenty years of experience told a federal judge Friday.
Testifying as Fulton County’s first witness in its lawsuit against the Trump administration, Ryan Macias told the court that his review of the claims made by the FBI in their application lacked a “basis in reality.”
“The content of the witnesses is incorrect and in many cases contradictory,” he said. “The information in there is not based in reality.”
Lawyers with the Department of Justice attempted to cast doubt on Macias’ testimony by arguing he lacks direct knowledge of the testimony in the case and is inexperienced in criminal investigations, though he was only qualified as an expert on election administration. Macias worked for both the federal government and California to administer elections as well as consulted for Fulton County in 2020.
Assistant Attorney General Tysen Duva broadly claimed, without citing any examples, that criminal investigations regularly stem from matters where initial investigations found no evidence of wrongdoing.
“Are you aware that happens all the time?” Duva asked Macias.
“No,” Macias responded.
“That’s because you don’t know,” Duva responded.
During his direct examination, Macias went through each of the claims made in the FBI’s application for the warrant to debunk and cast doubt on each allegation.
“Do ballot images have any impact on the final tabulation of ballots?” asked attorney Kamal Ghali, referencing the claim that election officials produced inconsistent numbers of ballot images from the 2020 election.
“No they do not,” Macias said.
“Is the absence of ballot images evidence of misconduct?” Ghali asked.
“No it is not,” he responded.
Attorney Abbe Lowell, representing the Fulton County officials, argued that the search was based on incorrect information from unreliable witnesses related to claims that are years beyond the statute of limitations.
“A week doesn’t go by without someone in the administration making an allegation of voter fraud,” Lowell said before reminding the judge that the investigation itself originated from an attorney who tried to overturn the 2020 election who was previously sanctioned for making false claims about the outcome. Lowell said the reliance on the unreliable witnesses would make “George Orwell smile in his grave.”
DOJ attorneys have insisted that the search was based on evidence of potential misconduct and accused Fulton County officials of speculating about “some kind of grand conspiracy.”
“It just seems like a loosey-goosey theory,” said DOJ attorney Michael Weisbuch. “They don’t like the vibe of what’s happening because that’s not a constitutional standard.”
U.S. District Judge JP Boulee, a Trump appointee, will decide on Fulton County’s request to force the Trump administration to return the sensitive records taken from the election site.
After election officials raised concerns about the basis for the January 2026 search, Judge Boulee last month ordered the Department of Justice to publicly release the application for the warrant, which revealed that the investigation was triggered by an attorney and close ally of President Trump who sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
According to the unsealed court records, the investigation centers on long-debunked allegations of voter fraud that have already been thoroughly investigated.
Fulton County election officials have since pushed for the return of the records, arguing that the investigation focuses on “human errors that its own sources confirm occur in almost every election … without any intentional wrongdoing whatsoever.”
“The Affidavit omits numerous material facts — including from the very reports and publicly-disclosed investigations that the Affiant cites — that confirm the alleged conduct was previously investigated and found to be unintentional,” attorneys for the Fulton County officials argued.
In a late setback ahead of Friday’s hearing, Judge Boulee quashed an attempt to force the FBI agent behind the search warrant to testify, concluding that questioning the agent could reveal “process and scope of the DOJ’s investigation,” which remains ongoing.
President Donald Trump has long criticized the outcome of the 2020 election results in Georgia, personally pushing to overturn the results after his loss and later being indicted in two criminal cases over his actions. Those cases have since been dismissed, and Trump has continued to push for criminal accountability for what he baselessly alleged was a stolen election.
Through a call with Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard — who was present at the January raid — President Trump personally addressed some of the agents who conducted the search and told them they were doing great work by investigating Georgia’s elections, ABC News previously reported.
“I was at Fulton County, sir, at the request of the president and to work with the FBI to observe this action that had long been awaited,” Gabbard told lawmakers earlier this month when asked about her presence at the search. “It is my role based on statute that Congress has passed to have oversight over election security to include counterintelligence.”
Crime scene barrier tape (Getty Images/Tetra Images)
(BATON ROUGE, La.) — Five suspects are in custody in a shooting at the Mall of Louisiana in Baton Rouge that killed one person and injured multiple others, police said.
The shots were fired in the food court, police said, describing it as a targeted incident during a fight between two groups, and not a random act of violence.
Baton Rouge Police Chief T.J. Morse said during a press conference Thursday night that officials are looking for more suspects believed to be involved. “In no way is this investigation over, and we do believe that there’s more people involved,” he said.
Morse said one handgun has been recovered from the scene.
Five people injured in the shooting were being treated at area hospitals, according to Baton Rouge police. The nature of their injuries is unclear. Police had initially said 10 people were injured before updating the total number of casualties to six.
All shoppers have been evacuated from the mall, Baton Rouge Mayor-President Sid Edwards said.
The scene has been secured, police said.
“I heard a loud ‘pop’ and then another ‘pop,'” a mall employee told ABC Baton Rouge affiliate WBRZ. “… I turn around and I see people dropping to the floor and then I saw the gun. … And he was turning around, shooting randomly.”
“I called security and said, ‘Shots fired in the food court, people are down, people are hit.’ And then the cops came and it was just total chaos … blood was everywhere,” she said.
“I’ve never seen anything like this in my life,” she said.
Police Chief Morse said that officials believe the violence began after some kind of disagreement. “It looks like guns were pulled afterwards, exchanged right in front of some of the food counters in the food court,” he said.
Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry said he’s aware of the shooting and is coordinating with law enforcement.
“Please keep the victims and their families in your prayers,” Edwards said in a statement.
Mayor Sid Edwards said during the press conference Thursday night that “Baton Rouge has a history of pulling together in tragedy, and that’s tragic unto itself.”
The Mall of Louisiana confirmed in a statement that it would be closed all day on Friday “out of respect for the victims.”
“Our deepest sympathies are with everyone who was impacted by the senseless act of violence that took place here today,” the statement read.
