NYC deputy mayor for public safety resigns, latest in Adams admin to leave
(NEW YORK) — New York City’s deputy mayor for public safety, Phil Banks III, resigned Monday in the latest fallout from the corruption scandal engulfing the administration of Mayor Eric Adams.
“We spoke yesterday and we spoke again this morning and he stated he wants to move on to other things in his life,” Adams told NY1. “I wish my good friend well.”
Banks’ brother, David Banks, resigned as schools chancellor. First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright, David Banks’ wife, is arranging her departure from the administration.
Phil Banks had his phones seized last month as part of a federal investigation into city contracts of how the police department enforced nightlife regulations. David Banks and Sheena Wright had their phones seized as well.
Phil Banks, at one point the highest-ranking uniformed officer in the NYPD, resigned from the department in 2014 amid a different corruption scandal during the prior administration. Federal prosecutors at the time named Banks an unindicted coconspirator.
Adams has pleaded not guilty to a five-count indictment charging him with bribery and fraud. He is resisting calls for his resignation.
“New Yorkers are saying keep doing the job you’ve been doing,” Adams told NY1.
(NEW YORK) — Last year’s devastating wildfires on Maui were the deadliest in modern United States history, claiming over 100 lives.
The fires also destroyed thousands of homes, businesses, and cultural and historical sites, particularly in and around the town of Lahaina, which was at one time the first capital of the sovereign Hawaiian Kingdom.
Today, many residents continue on the long road to rebuilding their lives and communities.
ABC News continues to help viewers get involved in recovery efforts for the survivors of last year’s wildfires on Maui.
The Maui Strong Fund continues to support long-term recovery needs for those impacted by the fires. HCF does not collect fees for donations and reinvests any earnings from the fund back into the fund.
(ORLANDO, Fla.) — A Jordanian citizen living in Florida has been arrested and charged for allegedly carrying out multiple attacks on businesses in Orlando, as well as a solar energy facility, based on their perceived support for Israel, the Justice Department announced Thursday.
Hashem Younis Hashem Hnaihen, 43, allegedly made numerous threats to carry out mass violence and at one point went through with an attack in late June on a solar power generation facility in Wedgefield, Florida, where he spent hours destroying solar panels.
The attack “bore signs of premeditation and sophistication,” according to prosecutors, adding: “For example, whenever Hnaihen cut a wire, he would cut so close to the panel that it was impossible to splice in a new wire, permanently decommissioning the entire panel. And as Hnaihen worked across row after row, he identified and selectively destroyed the lead panel in a daisy-chained series of panels, taking the entire chain offline.”
The attacks on the solar panels are estimated to have caused more than $700,000 in damages, prosecutors said.
Hnaihen began targeting various businesses in the Orlando area in June, prosecutors said, wearing a mask and placing “Warning Letters” after smashing doors and windows at businesses. The letters were addressed to the U.S. government and included a threat to “destroy or explode everything here in whole America. Especially the companies and factories that support the racist state of Israel.”
Hnaihen was identified and arrested on July 11 after placing another warning letter at an industrial propane gas depot in Orlando.
Further heightening concerns, prosecutors said Hnaihen attempted to purchase a gun and ammunition in February and lied on paperwork stating he was not a foreign citizen — which the government says “fortunately” was discovered to be false during the background check process so he never obtained the gun.
Hnaihen entered a not guilty plea to the charges during an arraignment hearing on Monday, court records show. At a detention hearing on Wednesday and is being held pending trial, according to the Justice Department.
He faces four counts of threats to use explosives and one count of destruction of an energy facility.
“We allege that the defendant threatened to carry out hate-fueled mass violence in our country, motivated in part by a desire to target businesses for their perceived support of Israel,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement. “Such acts and threats of violence, whether they are targeting the places that Americans frequent every day or our country’s critical infrastructure, are extremely dangerous and will not be tolerated by the Justice Department.”
ABC News has reached out to the attorney representing Hnaihen for comment.
(WILMINGTON, Del.) — A federal judge on Monday rejected the latest attempt by President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden to dismiss several tax-related charges he faces in Los Angeles, all but ensuring that the case will go to trial as scheduled early next month.
In July, attorneys for Hunter Biden filed a pair of motions seeking to dismiss his cases in both California and Delaware, citing a decision by a federal judge in Florida to dismiss the classified documents case against former President Donald Trump.
But on Monday, U.S. District Judge Mark Scarsi, the Los Angeles-based federal judge overseeing the tax case, denied that bid, concluding in a seven-page ruling that his attorneys’ arguments failed on both procedural and factual grounds.
Scarsi, in denying the motion, cited Hunter Biden’s previous ill-fated efforts to dismiss the case.
“As he concedes in his notice of the motion, Mr. Biden plainly seeks reconsideration of issues already decided upon his February motion,” Scarsi wrote, concluding that “there is no valid basis for reconsideration of the court’s [prior] order denying Mr. Biden’s motion to dismiss the indictment.”
The judge, however, determined that Hunter Biden will not face sanctions after Scarsi earlier threatened to sanction him after Hunter Biden’s attorneys suggested in court filings that special counsel David Weiss only brought the charges after he was elevated to special counsel. Biden’s legal team acknowledged in a subsequent filing that their claim had been “inartfully” articulated.
On Monday, Scarsi wrote that he would not sanction Hunter Biden, in part because of a recent shakeup of his legal team, but issued a warning, saying, “Counsel’s conduct warrants an admonition: candor is paramount.”
Hunter Biden faces nine felony and misdemeanor charges stemming from his failure to pay $1.4 million in taxes for three years during a time when he was in the throes of addiction. The back taxes and penalties were ultimately paid in full by a third party, identified by ABC News as Hunter Biden’s attorney and confidant, Kevin Morris.
The trial is scheduled to begin on Sept. 5. Hunter Biden has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
The president’s son was found guilty on three firearm-related charges in a separate case in Delaware earlier this summer.