Authorities hunt for suspects involved in illegal elk poaching after four found dead
(NEW YORK) — Four elk were shot and killed in a poaching incident at a national park, according to authorities.
Redwood National and State Park rangers and wardens from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife are now asking for the public’s help in “an investigation of elk poaching,” after four dead elk were discovered on July 21 near the Williams Ridge area along Bald Hills Road, according to a statement from the National Park Service released on Tuesday.
“An investigation determined that the four elk had been killed and no meat had been taken,” NPS officials said. “The area where the elk were killed is located within Redwood National Park, where hunting is prohibited by federal and state law. Officers also determined that lead shot was used to shoot the elk. Lead poisoning from ingestion of lead ammunition is the single largest threat to free-flying California condors.”
The Yurok Tribe, in partnership with Redwood National and State Parks and other agencies including the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and California Department of Parks and Recreation, have only reintroduced California condors to the region two years ago and officials are now concerned about their wellbeing since “poaching and illegal game killing pose a grave danger to the birds,” according to NPS.
Redwood National and State Parks in California contain 133,000 acres of federal and state land in Humboldt and Del Norte Counties, NPS said.
“Seven elk herds call Redwood National and State Parks home. The Roosevelt elk (Cervis elaphus roosevelti), is the largest of the six recognized subspecies of elk in North America; they once inhabited areas from southern British Columbia to Sonoma County, Calif,” officials said in their statement announcing the poaching investigation.
“Roosevelt elk in California persist today only in Humboldt and Del Norte Counties and western Siskiyou County,” authorities said. “Tourists from all over the world and Californians alike enjoy the opportunity to see Roosevelt elk within their historical home range at Redwood National and State Parks. Park rangers are committed to protecting these amazing animals and urge the public to help them in this effort.”
Anyone with information about this incident is urged to contact park officials at 707-465-7751 or call the park’s anonymous crime tip line at 707-765-7353.
(NEW YORK) — A 47-year-old man has been arrested in connection with several improvised explosive devices found on the Hawaiian island of Maui, police said.
Robert Francis Dumaran made his initial appearance in court in Hawaii on Tuesday, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Hawaii. Dumaran is charged with possessing an unregistered destructive device and attempting to damage property by means of an explosive, according to an unsealed criminal complaint.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said Dumaran’s preliminary hearing is set for Aug. 27. He is being held without bail, the office said.
Authorities said they have been grappling with a series of homemade bombs — described by the FBI as IEDs — found on Maui, hidden in trash cans and elsewhere disguised in baskets. There have been multiple explosions on the island over the past week attributed to the devices, authorities said.
The first IED was discovered on July 23 by Maui Police Department officers responding to a call about a suspicious item close to the Kahului Elementary School. The bomb was made up of explosive powder, a battery and shrapnel. Investigators said they found Dumaran’s fingerprints on “clear packing tape” used to build it.
The unsealed complaint noted that “multiple IEDs” of similar design were detonated along Kaamana Street in Kula, Hawaii, on Aug. 7. Another device exploded on Aug. 8, damaging a passing car, while another was attached to a guardrail before detonating and “caused considerable damage to the guardrail and vicinity,” per the complaint.
The criminal complaint notes that the investigation is still ongoing, and Dumaran may yet face further charges.
Dumaran has been investigated previously, investigators said. The complaint said police searched his home in January 2022 and found custom fireworks, ammunition and other components that could be used to create IEDs. This is when authorities obtained his fingerprints, the complaint said.
Fingerprints and cell-tower data aided the police in their investigation, they said. Dumaran’s cellphone was found to be in the area of the Kahului Elementary School the day the IED there was discovered, as well as close to Kaamana Street days before devices were found there, the complaint said.
The unsealed complaint details Dumaran’s text conversations with an unidentified third party. In them, the defendant allegedly says that he wanted to set off explosions to “make me feel better.”
(TALLAHASSEE, FL) — The New College of Florida is under fire after what appears to be hundreds of books that have been wiped from its collection and discarded on the street.
Social Equity Through Education Alliance (SEE), a local activist group, was alerted on Thursday by a New College student who reported seeing what they believed was up to “thousands” of books being “shoved into a dumpster” behind the college’s library.
“We basically tried to communicate to officials that there were educational nonprofits and shelters that were immediately willing to bring trucks and save all of the books … and officials refused,” said Zander Moricz, executive director at SEE.
Moricz continued, “There were Bibles, there were stories of Black authors, of Latin authors, female stories, there were LGBTQ+ and queer stories, or trans stories, all thrown into a dumpster. It sends the message that New College of Florida wants to send stories of gender and diversity to the dump, and it was so heartbreaking and also very frustrating.”
In a statement to ABC News, a New College spokesperson said it’s following “longstanding annual procedures for weeding its collection, which involves the removal of materials that are old, damaged, or otherwise no longer serving the needs of the College.”
“The images seen online of a dumpster of library materials is related to the standard weeding process,” the statement read. “Chapter 273 of Florida statutes precludes New College from selling, donating or transferring these materials, which were purchased with state funds. Deselected materials are discarded through a recycling process when possible.”
Some of the books found on the street were associated with the school’s discontinued Gender Studies program that were primarily donated and were not part of any official college collection or inventory, according to New College’s statement. When the books were not claimed for pickup from the program’s former room, the college also left them on the street, the college told ABC News.
The New College, a public liberal arts school in Sarasota, has been a target of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ anti-“woke” policy efforts, who has said he hopes to shed the institution’s liberal reputation.
DeSantis overhauled the Board of Trustees and touted the “replacement of far-left faculty with new professors aligned with the university’s mission” with a slate of terminations in recent years as well as the elimination of positions aligned with diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) standards.
“The New College Board of Trustees is succeeding in its mission to eliminate indoctrination and re-focus higher education on its classical mission,” said DeSantis in an August 2023 statement.
Some of the books that have been discarded, according to a spokesperson for New College, were from the school’s gender studies programs — which were terminated under DeSantis’ appointed Board of Trustees.
Florida officials have long been under scrutiny for restrictions and bans on books in the state amid legislation that is aimed at restricting certain topics regarding race, gender, sex and more in higher education and K-12.
The Parental Rights in Education Bill and the Stop Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees (WOKE) Act restrict content on LGBTQ identities and race in schools, respectively.
Florida law also allows parents and residents to object to books and have them reviewed and potentially removed from schools.
Since the implementation of these laws, Florida has seen a rise in book-banning attempts across the state, according to the American Library Association (ALA) and free speech advocacy group PEN America.
In the first half of the 2023-2024 school year alone, PEN America found that Florida experienced the highest number of cases focused on banning materials, with 3,135 attempts across 11 school districts.
Critics — including parents, studentsand local activists — have instead led banned book campaigns to encourage the reading and distribution of booksthat have been targeted.
DeSantis later signed a bill in April he hoped would limit the amount of book objections that can be made by people who don’t have a child with access to school materials.
Parents of children in the school districts or using district materials will still be able to object to an unlimited amount of material.
DeSantis’ office said the change to these policies “protects schools from activists trying to politicize and disrupt a district’s book review process.”
Moricz and other activists were able in the end to take several books: “These were readable books. These were books that did not have tears in the pages. Have clean covers. These are books that could have been used, and it’s truly unforgivable.”
(WASHINGTON) — The FBI continued to mishandle tips regarding sexual abuse against children even after the agency promised reforms in the wake of its botched handling of assault allegations against former USA Olympics gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar, according to a Justice Department watchdog report released Thursday.
DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s findings were a result of an extensive audit undertaken in the 16 months after his office released its scathing 2021 report that detailed the FBI’s failures in acting on multiple credible abuse claims against Nassar by athletes under his care. While the report details how the FBI updated its policies and training to handle such tips in the wake of the Nassar report, it found multiple instances where bureau employees failed to properly act on the allegations.
Of nearly 4,000 child sexual abuse cases opened by the FBI between October 2021 and February 2023, the IG’s office reviewed 327 and found 42 cases where investigators had to flag it to the FBI for their “immediate attention,” according to the report.
For those 13% of the cases audited by the IG, the report said, investigators had concerns that varied from a lack of recent investigative activity or referrals to appropriate agencies, leads that were not properly followed up on and, in some instances, clear violations of FBI policy regarding handling sexual abuse claims.
In one specific instance identified in the report, FBI agents failed to follow up on an allegation involving abuse against a minor by a registered sex offender, which led to the offender victimizing at least one additional minor “for a period of approximately 15 months,” the report said.
“After we raised this incident to the FBI’s attention, the FBI took appropriate action, and the subject was indicted on federal charges,” Horowitz said in a taped video statement.
The report further found significant issues regarding FBI agents’ obligation to report allegations of sexual abuse against children to various entities immediately after they are received.
In 47% of incidents reviewed by the IG, they found no evidence that FBI employees complied with mandatory reporting requirements to state and local law enforcement agencies, and in 50% of cases, they found no evidence that they reported the allegations to social services agencies, according to the report.
“Additionally, we found that FBI employees didn’t always comply with FBI policies put in place to protect victims,” the report said. “For example, in the incidents we reviewed, we found 40 percent of the active child sexual abuse allegations did not include evidence that the FBI responded within 24 hours.”
A central issue identified in the IG report was a surge in recent years of claims of child sexual abuse that have caused a strain on FBI resources.
One agent who spoke to the IG said they had been assigned approximately 60 such cases and that the risk of them “falling through the cracks” was in large part due to high agent workloads. But, according to the IG, FBI Headquarters denied requests from all but one of 15 field offices that requested an increase in the number of special agents dedicated to investigating child abuse threats in 2022, and further denied requests from seven of those field offices when they again appealed for help.
In a letter responding to the report released Thursday, the FBI said they “recognize further action is necessary to ensure our corrective measures have the full intended effect of improving the FBI’s handling of allegations of hands-on sex offenses.”
But the bureau also argued that “most of the incidents” flagged by the IG’s office appeared to reflect failures in documentation rather than clear failures in proper investigative actions being taken.
“Ensuring the safety and security of children is not just a priority for the FBI; it is a solemn duty that we are committed to fulfilling with the highest standards,” the FBI said in a statement. “The FBI’s efforts combating crimes against children are among the most critical and demanding undertakings we do. The FBI deeply values the trust the public places in us to protect the most vulnerable members of society. We are committed to maintaining the public’s trust by implementing the necessary improvements to ensure the important changes we made to our Violent Crimes Against Children program in 2018 and 2019 have the intended effect of promoting the highest level of compliance and effectiveness.”
Crimes against children are among the top priorities for the FBI, but the bureau continues to be challenged by an increasing number of sexual abuse tips and has previously failed to take necessary investigative measures, an FBI official acknowledged to reporters on Thursday.
“It’s staggering,” the official said, referring to the growing number of reports as an “overwhelming situation.”
“Any mistake or deficiency is unacceptable and the FBI recognizes that,” the official said.
Thursday’s report is likely to draw further criticism of the bureau and FBI Director Christopher Wray, who in the wake of the Nassar report issued a personal apology to the gymnasts abused by Nassar.
“I am sorry that so many people let you down over and over again and I am especially sorry that there were people at the FBI who had their own chance to stop this monster back in 2015 and failed, and that is inexcusable,” Wray said in September 2021 congressional testimony. “It never should have happened, and we are doing everything in our power to make sure it never happens again.”
Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin said in a statement Thursday that he intends to hold a hearing with the FBI in the coming weeks.
“The FBI’s failures enabling Larry Nassar’s abuse of young victims continue to remain a stain on the Bureau,” Durbin said. “Today’s report shows that new policies implemented by the FBI to address these egregious failures are effectively being ignored, leading to similar abuses as seen in the Nassar investigation. It’s shameful that the FBI is continuing to fail victims.”
Nassar pleaded guilty in 2017 in connection with crimes against several victims and was sentenced to 60 years behind bars for child pornography and other charges. He again pleaded guilty in 2018 and was sentenced to an additional 40 to 175 years for multiple counts of sexual assault of minors.