Antisemitic hate crimes in NYC are on the rise, NYPD figures show
NEW YORK — Antisemitic hate crimes in New York City more than doubled last month from a year ago, New York Police Department data show — a troubling trend that unfolded against a backdrop of high-profile figures making headlines for remarks targeting Jewish people.
The five boroughs had 45 antisemitic crimes in November compared with 20 in November 2021, according to newly released NYPD statistics.
The 125% jump came the same month two men were busted for plotting to shoot up a city synagogue. Meanwhile, the musician Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, has unleashed a steady stream of antisemitic and Hitler-praising remarks online and in interviews in recent weeks.
Closer to home, Brooklyn Nets star guard Kyrie Irving was suspended for “conduct detrimental to the team” after posting a link to an antisemitic movie on social media. Given the prevalence of hateful speech in the public sphere, former Brooklyn Councilman David Greenfield called the increase in antisemitic attacks “sad, but not surprising.”
—New York Daily News
Feds say life in prison 'sufficient' for Whitmer kidnap plotter
DETROIT — A life prison sentence for Adam Fox, a convicted ringleader of a plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, is sufficient for trying to "light the fire of a second revolution," federal prosecutors said late Monday.
The maximum penalty could help deter terrorism and widespread, anti-government, militia extremism that has flared in the two years since Fox and a group plotted to kidnap Whitmer, angered by the governor's pandemic restrictions, prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.
The memo was filed one week before the 39-year-old Potterville resident is scheduled to be sentenced in federal court in Grand Rapids for heading a plot that represented the largest domestic terrorism case in a generation that has shed light on political extremism in Michigan.
So far, seven people have been convicted on state or federal charges related to the plot while an eighth individual, FBI informant Stephen Robeson, was convicted of a federal gun crime. Delaware truck driver Barry Croft, the other convicted ringleader, is set to be sentenced Dec. 28.
—The Detroit News
Amber Heard appeal alleges myriad errors led to Johnny Depp’s win in defamation trial
Amber Heard has officially appealed the decision in the defamation case brought by Johnny Depp, with her attorneys citing what they believe to be numerous errors committed at trial, including allowing the case to be heard in Virginia and refusing to allow communications between Heard and certain doctors to be admitted as evidence.
The “Pirates of the Caribbean” star in June was awarded $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages — the latter reduced to $350,000 in line with Virginia statute — after Heard was found liable for defaming him in an essay published by the Washington Post.
Heard, who had filed a countersuit, was awarded $2 million at the same time after the jury found Depp liable for a comment made about Heard by his then-attorney Adam Waldman. Heard’s appeal was filed Nov. 23 with the Court of Appeals in Virginia.
Depp originally sued the “Aquaman” actor for $50 million in March 2019, alleging that an essay published by the Washington Post — whose servers are in Virginia — dubbed him a perpetrator of “sexual violence” and cost him tens of millions of dollars’ worth of lost work.
—Los Angeles Times
Mass extinctions are happening. Can they be stopped?
Scientists, conservationists and government representatives will gather this week in Montreal to decide on a plan to stop a stunning loss of plant and animal life around the globe. The United Nations' COP15 — a conference on biological diversity — offers a rare chance for countries to set mutual commitments and milestones for restoring and protecting key lands and waters.
The much-delayed and anticipated conference that begins Wednesday comes three years after a U.N. report found that more than 1 million species are at risk of extinction within the next few decades. Scientists are calling it the earth's sixth mass extinction — the first caused by humans. The decline has already begun and is affecting every part of the world, including Minnesota, where at least 150 species of animals and plants are on the verge of disappearing.
To reverse the trend, nations need to set concrete goals for saving land, funding restoration and protecting species, said Jeannine Cavender-Bares, a professor of ecology, evolution and behavior at the University of Minnesota.
Any commitments need to be clear, precise and measurable. They need to be monitored as they're implemented. "Scientists are really worried that these targets are getting watered down," she said.
—Star Tribune
