5-year-old girl found dead after being swept away in ocean in Laguna Beach: Officials
Crews have suspended the search for a missing 5-year-old girl who was swept away in the ocean in Laguna Beach, California. (KABC)
(LAGUNA BEACH, Calif.) — A 5-year-old girl who went missing when she was swept away in the ocean in Laguna Beach, California, has been found dead, city officials said.
Her body was found Thursday morning about one-quarter mile north of where she went into the water, Laguna Beach officials said.
The girl went missing at about 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday near Treasure Island Beach, officials said. She was with her mother and a sibling near the shoreline when the three of them were swept into the ocean by powerful water conditions, the city officials said.
Bystanders ran into the ocean and were able to rescue the mother and one of her children, but the 5-year-old remained missing, officials said.
The search and recovery effort continued on Wednesday, with rescuers working “under challenging and hazardous ocean conditions, including large surf, powerful currents, and limited underwater visibility,” city officials said.
The search ended Wednesday evening after rescuers worked more than 30 hours and covered more than 90 square miles, the Coast Guard announced.
“Our deepest condolences go out to the child’s family and loved ones during this incredibly difficult time,” Capt. Stacey Crecy, commander of Coast Guard Sector Los Angeles-Long Beach, said in a statement. “Suspending a search is an extremely difficult decision.”
“This is one of the most heartbreaking incidents I have witnessed during my time serving this community,” Laguna Beach Mayor Mark Orgill said in a statement. “Our hearts go out to the young victim’s family, friends, and all those affected by this tragic loss.”
“I am incredibly proud of the dedication and professionalism demonstrated by our Marine Safety, Fire, and Police personnel, as well as every agency that assisted in this effort,” the mayor added. “These men and women put themselves in harm’s way, entering the same dangerous ocean conditions in an attempt to bring this young girl home to her family.”
Police cordon off an area close to the Islamic Center of San Diego after reports of an active shooter on Monday, May 18, 2026. (K.C. Alfred / The San Diego Union-Tribune via Getty Images)
(SAN DIEGO) — Three adult men, one of whom was a security guard, were killed in a shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego on Monday, authorities said.
The security guard appeared to play a “pivotal role” in keeping the shooting from being worse, police said at a news conference.
Both suspects, who are teenagers, are dead from apparent self-inflicted gunshot wounds, police said.
All children are safe, police said.
Photos show children being evacuated from the area.
Police said the shooting is currently being considered a hate crime since it took place at a mosque.
The Islamic Center of San Diego says it is the largest mosque in San Diego County.
“We strongly condemn this horrifying act of violence,” Tazheen Nizam, the executive director of the San Diego chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said in a statement. “Our thoughts are with everyone impacted by this attack. No one should ever fear for their safety while attending prayers or studying at an elementary school.”
In New York City, the NYPD said there’s “no known nexus to NYC or specific threats to NYC houses of worship,” but the department said it is increasing officer deployments to mosques “out of an abundance of caution.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
President Donald Trumps supporters gather outside the Capitol building in Washington D.C. on January 06, 2021. (Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Two police officers who defended the U.S. Capitol in 2021 during the Jan. 6 attack are suing to stop the creation of President Donald Trump’s $1.7 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” calling it the “most brazen act of presidential corruption this century.”
Former Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn and Metropolitan Police Department Officer Daniel Hodges alleged that the compensation fund, which was announced by the Justice Department on Monday, would not only encourage those who committed violence in the name of President Trump but that it would directly finance their operations.
“To prevent the public financing of paramilitary organizations in the United States, and to protect Plaintiffs from further violence, the fund must be dissolved,” the lawsuit said.
The fund, which was part of a settlement agreement in Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service, was established by the Trump administration to compensate those who allege they were wrongly targeted under the Biden administration.
The officers alleged that the creation of the fund is arbitrary and capricious — and therefore a violation of the Administrative Procedures Act — and runs afoul of a prohibition in the Fourteenth Amendment barring the government from funding insurrections.
“No statute authorizes its creation, the settlement on which it is premised is a corrupt sham, and its design violates the Constitution and federal law,” the lawsuit said.
Filed in D.C. federal court, the lawsuit asked a judge to block the creation and funding of the compensation fund. The settlement agreement that initiated the fund gave the acting attorney general 30 days to create the entity and appoint five commissioners to run it.
Dunn and Hodges are some of the most high-profile members of law enforcement who defended the Capitol that day. Hodges was pinned against a door frame, attacked, and crushed by rioters. Dunn was inside the Capitol and directly engaged the rioters. He ran for Congress unsuccessfully in 2024 and is currently running for Maryland’s 5th Congressional District.
U.S. President Donald Trump waves as he prepares to board Air Force One at Beijing Capital International Airport on May 15, 2026 in Beijing, China. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Department of Justice is finalizing a deal to launch a so-called “Truth and Justice Commission” and establish a compensation fund of $1,776,000,000 to pay claims made by alleged victims of government “weaponization” in exchange for President Donald Trump dropping his ongoing lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service, sources told ABC News.
Sources told ABC News that the proposed deal — which is likely to face legal hurdles and has already been criticized by Democrats as a “slush fund” for Trump’s allies — arose after months of deliberations between the White House and DOJ officials who originally attempted to craft a legal justification for the settlement to compensate Trump directly.
Internally, DOJ lawers believed they could ignore the conflict of interest outright, privately arguing that Trump has both the right to sue as a private citizen and the power to command the executive branch as president, according to sources familiar with their discussions.
Advocating a centuries-old legal principle known as the “rule of necessity,” DOJ lawyers have argued that no alternative existed other than letting the lawsuit proceed with Trump acting as the plaintiff while being directly in charge of the defendants — the IRS and Treasury — according to sources.
Sources said that plan was ultimately scuttled in favor of the $1.776 billion compensation fund — with the figure being a nod to the nation’s founding — as the judge overseeing Trump’s IRS lawsuit began to raise issues with Trump suing the very government he leads. In an order last month, U.S. District Judge Katheen Williams ordered Trump’s lawyers in the case and the Department of Justice to submit court filings by next week to justify whether both sides of the case were sufficiently adverse for the matter to proceed.
Terms of the proposed compensation arrangement could change before the deal is finalized, sources said.
Judge Williams also appointed a group of prominent attorneys — including a former solicitor general as well as a federal judge — to weigh in on the case.
In a court filing this week, the attorneys identified serious issues with the lawsuit, arguing that Trump has “extraordinary” control over the defendants in the case and that the “circumstances raise the specter that Defendants and their attorneys may instead be operating at the President’s direction.”
“Additionally, since taking office, President Trump has significantly expanded the President’s oversight and control over the Attorney General and DOJ, including in ways that blur the line between fidelity to the President’s policy priorities and fidelity to the President himself,” the filing said.
Trump sued the IRS after a government contractor pleaded guilty in 2023 to stealing the tax information of Trump and other wealthy Americans and leaking it to media outlets in 2019 and 2020.
With Judge Williams scrutinizing the case, sources said that DOJ officials formulated the proposal to create a compensation fund on the condition that Trump drops the lawsuit as well as two civil claims for $230 million related to the Russia collusion investigation he faced during his first term in office and the 2022 search of his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Trump himself would not be eligible for payment from the fund for those three dropped claims, though entities associated with the president are not barred from filing claims, the sources said.
Sources said the “President Donald J. Trump Truth and Justice Commission” would include five commissioners — four of whom are appointed by the attorney general — that Trump would have the right to remove without cause. The commission would also be under no obligation to disclose the process for awarding the nearly $2 billion.
It is unclear how Judge Williams might respond to the proposed settlement — which has yet been disclosed to the court — though DOJ lawyers believe the settlement would not require any approval from the court.
Democratic lawmakers have already raised concerns about the reported settlement and called on Congress to pass legislation to restrict the use of taxpayer dollars for the proposed compensation fund.
“It’s outright corruption. What we’re seeing here is outright corruption,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said Friday. “We’re looking at a billion dollars for a ballroom; $1.7 billion for a slush fund for the president’s friends.”
Across the aisle, Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick suggested the matter could end up before the Supreme Court.
“I don’t even know how that’s allowable to happen,” Fitzpatrick told ABC News regarding the compensation fund. “It sounds like a question our colleagues across the street are going to have to resolve pretty quickly.”
