Bomb cyclone impacts West Coast, 1 dead in Washington state
ABC News
One person was killed and two were injured by falling trees in Washington state as a powerful storm moved into the Pacific Northwest.
In Lynwood, a woman in her 50s was killed when a tree fell on a homeless encampment Tuesday night. In Puget Sound, two were transported to hospitals when a tree fell on a trailer, officials said.
The storm exploded into a bomb cyclone off the coast, near Vancouver Island, Canada, where winds gusted near 101 mph.
A bomb cyclone means the pressure in the center of the storm drops 24 millibars within 24 hours.
Wind gusts reached 50 to 84 mph from Northern California to Washington.
As the storm sits and spins over the ocean this week, it will help to push a plume of Pacific moisture called an atmospheric river into Oregon and Northern California.
Alerts are in effect through Friday for flooding, snow, avalanches and high winds.
Some places could see more than 1 foot of rain this week. A flood watch has been issued in Northern California.
(GALLATIN COUNTY, MT) — Investigators are asking for help solving a “vicious” murder that was so brutal a 911 caller had reported it as a possible bear attack, according to the Gallatin County Sheriff’s Office.
A friend found 35-year-old Dustin Kjersem dead in a tent on Saturday morning about 2.5 miles up Moose Creek Road, in a fairly remote camping area in Montana, according to Gallatin County Sheriff Dan Springer.
Kjersem was last heard from on Oct. 10 as he was leaving to go camping for the weekend. He had plans to meet with a friend on Friday afternoon, according to the sheriff’s office.
After he did not make it to the meetup location, Kjersem’s friend went looking for him and ultimately found him dead.
When investigators responded to the scene of the crime, a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks agent with expertise in bear attacks did not find any signs of bear activity at the scene, prompting investigators to treat the incident as a murder, according to the sheriff’s office.
This was further confirmed through evidence gathered during an autopsy which determined multiple wounds led to his death.
Investigators are not sure what the murder weapon was, but the weapon was something “hard enough to cause significant damage to the skull as well as some flesh areas of the body,” Springer said at a press conference Wednesday.
“This incident was a vicious attack, and detectives are working hard to develop and track down leads. A suspect has not been arrested at this time,” the sheriff’s department said in a statement.
It has not yet been determined what time he was killed and investigators have not identified any suspects in the murder.
Kjersem had lots of equipment at the campsite with him and it was “very well kept,” according to Springer.
The remote location of the murder makes it difficult for the investigation due to limited cellphone services, which typically can be very helpful to investigators, Springer said.
“If you are out in the woods, I need you to be paying attention, you need to remain vigilant. Please, just call us,” Sheriff Dan Springer said at a press conference Wednesday.
The sheriff’s office said people have reached out to them already, giving them multiple leads that they will explore as the investigation into what happened continues.
“If you were in the Moose Creek area, or anywhere in Gallatin Canyon, between Thursday afternoon and early Saturday morning and noticed anything unusual — whether you saw Dustin, Dustin’s truck, noticed suspicious activity, have footage from game cameras or in-vehicle cameras from the area or observed something out of place — please come forward. Even the smallest detail could be crucial to the investigation,” the Gallatin County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement on Facebook.
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) Special counsel Jack Smith is urging the judge overseeing former President Donald Trump’s federal election interference case to reject an effort by Trump’s attorneys to throw out obstruction-related charges brought against him following a Supreme Court ruling this summer that narrowed the statute’s use against Jan. 6 rioters.
Trump’s attorneys have argued that the obstruction of an official proceeding statute should no longer apply to Trump’s alleged conduct in the indictment against him, arguing that Trump was never directly involved in obstructing the Jan. 6 vote-certification proceedings.
But Smith, in his new filing, said his recent superseding indictment clearly alleges Trump and his co-conspirators’ involvement in attempting to send fraudulent certificates to Congress that day, for then-Vice President Mike Pence to use as he presided over the certification.
“As set forth in the superseding indictment, the defendant and others began in early December 2020 to cause individuals to serve as the defendant’s purported electors in several targeted states with the intent that those individuals ‘make and send to the Vice President and Congress false certifications that they were legitimate electors,'” Smith wrote.
“Ultimately, the defendant sought” to “certify illegal votes” through “fraudulent elector certificates” that were “mailed to the President of the Senate, the Archivist of the United States, and others in connection with the January 6 proceeding to certify the 2020 presidential election results,” wrote Smith.
Trump last year pleaded not guilty to federal charges of undertaking a “criminal scheme” to overturn the results of the 2020 election in order to remain in power. In July, the Supreme Court ruled in a blockbuster decision that Trump is entitled to immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts undertaken while in office.
Smith subsequently charged Trump in a superseding indictment that was adjusted to respect the Supreme Court’s ruling.
In his new filing, Smith also disputed arguments put forward by Trump’s attorneys that the former president “bears no factual or legal responsibility” for the Jan. 6 Capitol attack.
The superseding indictment “plainly alleges that the defendant willfully caused his supporters to obstruct and attempt to obstruct the proceeding by summoning them to Washington, D.C., and then directing them to march to the Capitol to pressure the Vice President and legislators to reject the legitimate certificates and instead rely on the fraudulent electoral certificates,” Smith wrote.
(LITTLE ROCK, Ark.) — Shots rang out at the Park Plaza Mall in Little Rock, Arkansas, on Black Friday, leaving two people injured, police said in an update Friday evening.
The Little Rock Police Department had initially reported three injuries.
The shooting occurred at 1:44 p.m., according to police.
Two people were taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, including one with gunshot wounds, police said.
“Initially reported as a potential active aggressor situation, officers quickly determined it was an isolated incident upon arrival,” the Little Rock Police Department said in an update Friday evening.
Police said the incident appears to have stemmed from a “disturbance” between two individuals, which escalated into gunfire.
Shots rang out at the Park Plaza Mall in Little Rock, Arkansas, on Black Friday, leaving two people injured, police said in an update Friday evening.
The Little Rock Police Department had initially reported three injuries.
The shooting occurred at 1:44 p.m., according to police.
Two people were taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, including one with gunshot wounds, police said.
“Initially reported as a potential active aggressor situation, officers quickly determined it was an isolated incident upon arrival,” the Little Rock Police Department said in an update Friday evening.
Police said the incident appears to have stemmed from a “disturbance” between two individuals, which escalated into gunfire.
