Man charged with ethnic intimidation after allegedly stabbing Philadelphia park ranger
(PHILADELPHIA) — A man accused of stabbing a Philadelphia park ranger on Sunday has been charged with ethnic intimidation, police said.
The suspect — 34-year-old Thomas Riceman — also faces charges of attempted murder, aggravated assault and terroristic threats, a spokesperson for the Philadelphia Police Department told ABC News.
Police said they responded to reports of an assault Sunday afternoon in Rittenhouse Square, where they found the victim in the park’s security booth suffering from multiple stab wounds.
The victim, who had been working inside the security booth, told police the suspect had entered the booth and laid down before the alleged attack.
When the victim asked the suspect to leave, the suspect “suddenly attacked,” stabbing the victim in the face and head with scissors, police said.
According to police, the ethnic intimidation charge was filed because the suspect allegedly told the park ranger to “go back to his own country.”
Despite being injured, police said the victim managed to handcuff the suspect and hold him until police arrived.
The victim was transported to a hospital, where police said he was last listed as being in stable condition.
ABC News wasn’t immediately able to determine if the suspect had retained legal counsel.
(NEW YORK) — Police in Iowa are warning residents to stay away from a “dangerous,” injured water buffalo that has been on the loose since Saturday.
The Pleasant Hill Police Department said officers had responded to a call Saturday about an “animal in the road” in the city, located about six miles east of Des Moines. The animal turned out to be an “aggressive” water buffalo, according to its owner, police said.
The police department said an officer shot the animal, injuring it, after the water buffalo showed “aggressiveness” toward responding officers. The animal was then able to escape, police said.
Officers were working with the Des Moines Animal Control to contain the animal and return it to its owner’s property, though did not have “tranquilizers or equipment to handle such a unique situation,” the police department said in a statement Monday on Facebook.
Pleasant Hill police said that they are employing ATVs to search bicycle trails and along Little Fourmile Creek, where it was last seen as of Monday afternoon. They are also partnering with the Polk County Sheriff’s Office to use their drone technology and with “local individuals who have expertise in containing this type of animal,” they said.
“The safety of the Pleasant Hill community is our top priority,” police said. “With a dangerous animal loose in our community, we are using all resources available to keep our community safe and attempt to return the animal to its owner, if possible.”
The Iowa Farm Sanctuary said in a statement on Facebook Monday that if the injured water buffalo is found alive, they “will be doing everything we can to ensure we can get him to the vet immediately.”
According to the Iowa Farm Sanctuary, which indicated it is in touch with the owner of the property the water buffalo escaped from, the animal initially got loose while being loaded for meat processing.
The group, which nicknamed the animal “Hank” in its Facebook post, said they ultimately hope to bring the animal to a sanctuary, though added that there “is the possibility the owner will go through with the original plan.”
“We remain cautiously optimistic!” they said. “At this point, I think most of our state is rooting for a happy ending for Hank!”
Amid the search, the water buffalo was seen on Ring footage on Monday near the front door of a home in Pleasant Hill. A Pleasant Hill resident also filmed the animal in his backyard on Monday.
Police urged anyone who sees the animal to not approach it and call the Pleasant Hill Police Department at 515-265-1444.
(KAPOHO, Hawaii) — A man recently identified as a suspect in the 1991 murder of a 23-year-old woman has died by suicide, days after a DNA swab from his cheek matched DNA evidence collected at the crime scene 33 years ago, according to the Hawaii Police Department.
Albert Lauro Jr., 57, was identified as a suspect in the murder of Dana Ireland, who had been kidnapped and raped in the Kapoho area of Hawaii Island on Dec. 24, 1991, according to police. She died a day later at a local hospital.
“This case is still under investigation. Albert Lauro Jr. has been linked to the victim by DNA; however, his exact involvement is still under investigation. And his death was ruled a suicide by the forensic pathologist,” Hawaii Police Department Captain Rio Amon-Wilkins told ABC News.
DNA evidence had been recovered from a swab taken from Ireland’s body, from a sheet used to transport her to the hospital and from a t-shirt found at the scene and was used by police to identify a suspect in her murder this month, according to Hawaii PD.
At the time of the murder, there was no match for the evidence in any DNA database, police said.
In 2008, the DNA evidence was sent to the Forensic Analytical Crime Lab in California, and additional DNA evidence was collected from the T-shirt, which matched other samples from the scene, according to Hawaii PD.
DNA experts are now able to take data from a DNA sample and build a family tree based on known DNA from relatives. Earlier this year, an FBI agent from the Honolulu Field Office contacted police investigators with the names of some people who could potentially match the DNA sample — including Lauro Jr., according to Hawaii PD.
Lauro Jr. lived in the Kapoho area at the time of the murder, so police surveilled him, eventually collecting a utensil that he had been using and then threw away. The DNA collected from the utensil matched the DNA evidence connected to the crime, police said.
The evidence established probable cause for the crime of rape. The statute of limitations for the crime had run out, but investigators were able to continue to investigate the case as a murder — though they did not have enough evidence to establish probable cause and arrest Lauro Jr., according to Hawaii PD.
Investigators obtained a court order for a cheek swab from the suspect, then asked him to come to the station and talk to investigators — but he was not taken into custody at the time. After the swab was taken he asked to leave and was allowed to do so. The swab then matched the DNA taken from the scene of the crime 33 years ago after it was analyzed at the California lab, according to Hawaii PD.
“The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects individuals from unwarranted search and seizure,” Hawaii Police Department Chief Benjamin Moszkowicz said in a statement. “In order to obtain a search warrant, investigators would have to have established probable cause for the crime of murder and explained specifically what evidence it was seeking.”
“We remain focused on Dana Ireland, a young woman who was brutally murdered. There is still a lot about this case that we do not know and our investigation into this case continues to push forward. Our search for the truth is not over,” Moszkowicz said.
(NEW YORK) — The Border Patrol has made fewer than 1,800 apprehensions per day over the past week, a major decline following the implementation of new asylum restrictions that significantly cut humanitarian protections for those who cross the border illegally.
Migrant encounters along the southern border are down 55% since the restrictions took effect seven weeks ago, according to new data from the Department of Homeland Security.
The Border Patrol made 83,536 apprehensions in June, the lowest number since Biden took office in Jan. 2021.
DHS officials credit a dual-track approach that balances increased enforcement measures along with the expansion of new options for legal migration. The measures, announced at the beginning of last month, all but banned asylum for those who crossed into the U.S. illegally. Meanwhile, at U.S. ports of entry, the administration continues to admit a limited number of pre-screened migrants for asylum processing.
“So it’s the kind of culmination of a yearslong effort to build up both of those things, and I think that we are really seeing that pay dividends,” one senior Customs and Border Protection Official said.
“We’ve been kind of building up both enforcement at the border and access to lawful pathways since, since we started here,” the official added.
The official said the White House has been directly involved in this effort, including Vice President Kamala Harris herself, to craft the strategy that has brought illegal border crossings down dramatically.
“I think we’ve, we’ve got some real positive impacts here, and we’re also continuing to work to maximize them, and to double down on these efforts, both ourselves and in coordination with our foreign partners, to not only maximize enforcement at our border, but to disrupt the way that people are moving up and getting to our border,” the official said.
DHS continues to engage in an aggressive deportation effort, removing or voluntarily returning 65,000 individuals to more than 125 countries, with more than 200 international repatriation flights in recent weeks, according to DHS. The number of people released into the U.S. pending deportation proceedings has declined by 70%, officials say.
The San Diego region continues to see the highest level of migrant encounters compared to other border regions, but those numbers have reduced by 60% in recent weeks, according to a senior CBP official.
“So we’re really now, just now, starting to see the full impact out there,” the official told ABC News. “And I think that’s definitely an indication of success, and also something that we continue to work to even see if we can achieve further results.”