- U.S.Michael WalshBrentley Vinson: The Charlotte cop involved in deadly shooting
Much of this attention has fallen upon the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, as it investigates the circumstances leading up to the death of Keith Lamont Scott, 43, on Tuesday. Scott’s family disputes this. The department swiftly identified the officer who shot and killed Scott as Brentley Vinson, 26, and placed him on administrative leave.
- U.S.The DriveMultimillionaire Gym Mogul Crashes Lamborghini Murciélago, Kills Uber Driver
J. Gerald Smith, an 82-year old Uber driver, died this week after a yellow Lamborghini Murciélago struck his Buick Enclave, which was sitting at a stop sign. Roger Wittenberns, the 60-year old multimillionaire health club mogul, was behind the wheel of the Murciélago at the time of the wreck. Mr. Smith was a retired real estate agent.
- WorldReutersU.S., Russia send mixed signals on Syria as bombing goes on
By Yara Bayoumy and Michelle Nichols UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The United States and Russia sent mixed signals on whether any headway was made on reviving a moribund Syria truce amid intense bombardment of Aleppo on Friday suggesting the effort was dead. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said he made "a little progress" on halting the violence in talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who cited no progress and accused the United States of failing to honor the latest ceasefire deal.
- BusinessThe DriveExploring the Remains of the Wyoming Company That Used WWII Bombers to Fight Wildfires
Hawkins & Powers got off the ground in the early ‘60s, snatching up planes and the retired crew necessary to keep them in the air. The company struggled on for a while, racking up debt to pay pilots and mechanics to keep their birds on the ground.
PoliticsAssociated PressAs Clinton, Trump tout parental leave, 3 states offer modelsAs the two leading presidential candidates tout competing campaign proposals to provide paid leave to care for a baby, the three states that already have such programs show how it could work. The proposals from Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump are significantly different in how they'd be funded and who they'd help. California pioneered paid family leave in 2004, followed by New Jersey in 2009 and Rhode Island in 2014.
WorldAFPS. Korea rules out flood aid to N. KoreaSouth Korea Friday ruled out giving aid to flood-hit North Korea, saying leader Kim Jong-Un would claim credit for any assistance following what Pyongyang calls the "worst disaster" since World War II. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) appealed Wednesday for $15.5 million in emergency funding to help North Koreans. The IFRC said about 70,000 remain homeless after tens of thousands of houses were damaged or destroyed.
- WorldYahoo News PhotoChina’s rice terraces — The most beautiful in the world
The pretty paddies were snapped by Italian photographer Enrico Barletta during a business trip to China. The unique aerial views of the fields, which are in China's Yuanyang County in Yunnan Province, show the beautiful patterns created by the growing rice.
- LifestyleThe DriveLexus’s New UX Concept Is Packed with Holographic Displays
When Lexus gave the world its first glimpse of the UX Concept a couple weeks back in advance of the car’s Paris Motor Show debut, we at The Drive were, well, less than wowed. The sole pic Lexus dropped—a rear three-quarter shot—revealed a two-box crossover that looked like a cross between the Ferrari GTC4Lusso and a Ford Raptor. It wasn’t ugly, but generally speaking, Lexus crossovers don’t do much for us.
WorldReutersMorocco, seeking support for W.Sahara plan, asks to rejoin African blocMorocco has applied to rejoin the African Union 32 years after it left, the bloc said on Friday, as the North African kingdom seeks support for its plan to end a decades-old row over Western Sahara. Morocco, which claims the sparsely populated stretch of desert, left the African Union in 1984 when the bloc recognized a republic covering part of the territory declared by Polisario Front independence fighters. Morocco submitted its letter of intention to rejoin the union on Thursday, the AU said in a statement, without giving details of any reasons.
- U.S.Inside EditionPolice Chief Defends Pepper Spraying Handcuffed 15-Year-Old Girl, Releases Body-Cam Footage
Police in Maryland released body-camera footage of an officer pepper-spraying a handcuffed 15-year-old girl who they say refused to cooperate after her bike collided with a car, saying it was a last resort action to de-escalate a potentially dangerous situation. Officers with the Hagerstown Police Department responded to a reported collision involving a car and a bicycle at Randolph and N. Locust Streets at about 2:30 p.m. Sunday, where the driver of the car told police that a teenage girl hit his car and attempted to leave, refusing medical attention at the scene.
- LifestyleThe DriveHonda Civic Hatchback Pricing Announced and the Chevy Equinox Gets a Diesel Engine: The Evening Rush
The Evening Rush is your daily roundup of auto, gear, and lifestyle news, all in one place. The Honda Civic has always been affordable, but nowadays, it also packs enough niceties that it doesn't feel like a compromise. Case in point: the 2017 Honda Civic Hatchback is loaded to the gills with nice little features, yet it starts at just $20,535.
- U.S.Reuters'Bridgegate' trial star witness describes favors for endorsements
By Hilary Russ NEWARK, N.J. (Reuters) - New Jersey Governor Chris Christie's office turned a regional transportation agency into a "goodie bag" from which to dole out favors and funds to Democrats who might endorse the Republican during his 2013 re-election campaign, according to prosecutors' star witness in the so-called Bridgegate trial on Friday. David Wildstein, a former executive at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey who pleaded guilty and is testifying for the prosecution, described how requests from state officials went first to a top Christie aide for approval - for everything from patronage jobs at the agency to tours of the World Trade Center site, which the Port Authority owns. The aide, Christie's then-deputy chief of staff Bridget Anne Kelly, and William Baroni, the former deputy executive director of the Port Authority, are on trial for wire fraud and civil rights deprivation.
- BusinessThe DriveHow We Broke The Electric and Autonomous Cannonball Run Records
Two days ago, Franz Aliquo, Warren "Mr. X" Ahner, and I announced that we broke both the electric and autonomous vehicle Cannonball Run records, covering 2,877 miles from Redondo Beach, California to the Red Ball Garage in 55 hours—97.7 percent of that time with Tesla’s Autopilot in operation. California is the finish line of the Western world. Regular gas cars don’t have a lot of room for improvement, but with electric and self-driving cars, the sky’s the limit.
- WorldAssociated PressSyria diplomacy: A US-Russia deal unravels and war revs up
In a New York hotel room earlier this week, Russia thought it was close to a deal with the U.S. to revive a cease-fire deal for Syria. A three-day period of calm would go into effect, accompanied by Syrian and Russian planes leaving the skies over northern Syria, according to a concept that Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov developed late Wednesday night. Lavrov, according to one official, threw up his hands in exasperation.
- PoliticsABC News VideosHillary Clinton and Donald Trump Take On Ohio
In a key battleground state, both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump face an uphill battle with voters.
ScienceAFP'Man-goat' among winners of spoof Nobel prizesA man who lived as a goat in the Swiss Alps and a scientist who studied how pants affect the sex drive of rodents are among the winners of this year's spoof Nobel prizes. The 26th edition of the annual Ig Nobel Prizes, which celebrate the silly side of science, were handed out Thursday at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The top honor in the reproduction category went to the late Ahmed Shafik from Cairo University, who died in 2007, for his work that showed how the sex lives of rats are affected by the fabric of pants they are fitted with.
- HealthLiveScience.comA Look at Holiday Weight Gain in 3 Countries
Holiday weight gain isn't unique to the United States: A new analysis finds that people in Germany and Japan also pack on pounds during festive seasons. In the study, which was published today (Sept. 21) in the New England Journal of Medicine, the researchers gave wireless digital scales to nearly 3,000 participants in Germany, Japan and the United States. People in all three countries gained weight, on average, around Christmas, according to the study.
U.S.Associated PressMost Puerto Ricans face a second night without electricityMost Puerto Ricans faced another night of darkness Thursday as crews slowly restored electricity a day after a fire at a power plant caused the aging utility grid to fail and blacked out the entire island of 3.5 million people. Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla said he hoped more than half would be reconnected by Friday morning, adding that public school classes were canceled on Friday. Garcia, who declared a state of emergency, expressed sympathy for people's frustrations over the outage, which comes amid a decade-long economic crunch that has worn down Puerto Ricans.
- U.S.Inside EditionSurveillance Footage Shows Woman Returning Gunfire at Armed Burglars in Her Home, Killing 1
The Gwinnett County Police Department released the surveillance footage Thursday, which showed three black males breaking into an Atlanta home in the middle of the night. Home Invasion suspects caught on video clip #3. "At that point, she began firing rounds from her handgun and struck at least one suspect in the torso, killing him," a press statement from the Gwinnett County said.
- LifestyleU.S.News & World ReportTarget Corporation Spikes Kid Shopping Carts Amid Store Chaos (TGT)
The kids are not all right, as far as Target Corporation (ticker: TGT) is concerned. Target recently ended a test of kid shopping carts in certain Target stores. The company stopped the test on the account of consumer social media complaints, detailing ankle and shin bruising in addition to having trouble keeping control of kids and their carts, reports the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.
- U.S.ReutersOne hurt in explosion at Massachusetts power plant: local media
One person was injured in an explosion at a power plant north of Boston, local media reported on Friday, with a fire official in the town of Taunton confirming only that an incident had occurred. Taunton is located about 33 miles (53 km) north of Boston.
- BusinessThe DriveThe 2015 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution Final Edition Is the End of an Era
Because good luck finding a new Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution on a dealership lot anywhere in the United States, since Mitsubishi pulled the plug on the Evo's production line back in August, as one of the final chapters of the company's two-decade realignment from "fun alternative Japanese carmaker" to "boring crossover-and-EV company." Hence this, the final version of the final car to carry on the performance legacy of the 3000GT, the Eclipse, and so forth. Don't think the Final Edition is one of those badges-and-floormats special editions, though. The Final Edition is the most potent stock Lancer Evolution ever to hit American streets, packing 303 horsepower and 305 lb-ft of torque.
- U.S.ABC News VideosPolice Remain Confident They Will Find Faith Hedgepeth's Killer: Part 6
Each year, Faith Hedgepeth's family holds a fundraiser and gives away two scholarships in her memory.
WorldAssociated PressRouhani: Halt on flights over Syria would help radicalsIranian President Hassan Rouhani on Thursday joined in opposing a call by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to halt all flights over Syria in efforts to get relief shipments through, saying that would only help Islamic radicals gain ground. Rouhani also alleged Washington was sowing fear among financial institutions wanting to do business with his country as part of the sanctions relief due Tehran under a deal with six powers in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program.
WorldAFPThird deadly drone strike in a week hits Yemen QaedaAden (AFP) - An apparent US drone strike has killed five suspected Al-Qaeda members in Yemen in the third such attack this week, a security official said on Saturday.Washington is the only government to operate drones over Yemen but only sporadically
