Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, eeff, Magnifico, annetteboardman, Besame, jck, and JeremyBloom. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Interceptor 7, Man Oh Man, wader, Neon Vincent, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck (RIP), rfall, ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
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Chicago Sun-Times: Power brokers, political insiders asked judge to go easy on convicted top aide to Michael Madigan by Dave McKinney
A former Illinois Supreme Court chief justice, a retired congressman, the sister of a convicted Springfield power broker and an array of other political insiders sought leniency for the convicted top aide of former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.
By the dozens, friends, colleagues and family members of Timothy Mapes wrote stirring character letters on his behalf, urging a federal judge to impose a light sentence on the once-powerful state bureaucrat convicted of lying to a federal grand jury.
Mapes was regarded as an important cog in the federal government’s long-running investigation into alleged corruption involving Madigan, who is facing a racketeering, bribery and conspiracy trial in October.
Mapes had been granted immunity by federal investigators, but a jury found he still tried to stymie the feds’ intensive probe of Madigan with his grand jury testimony.
The Mapes character letters, made public for the first time in federal court records Tuesday, were reviewed by U.S. District Judge John Kness, who told Mapes during his sentencing that he had “zero hesitation in agreeing, wholeheartedly, that you are a good man.”
Last month, the judge imposed a 2½ year sentence on Mapes, less than the 4¼ to 5¼ years in prison that federal prosecutors recommended.
The Washington Post: A massive Texas wildfire is finally dying down. Its impact could last years. By Scott Dance
Texans are praying a spate of wildfires that roared across its panhandle region — including one now among the largest in United States history — will finally be extinguished in a matter days. But even as the embers die out, leaders of the state’s agriculture industry say it could be years before farms and ranches recover from the historic blazes.
Fast-moving flames devastated what is the heart of Lone Star State cattle country, torching about 2,000 square miles of grasslands that feed tens of thousands of cattle. Some 3,600 animals have died, and more will be euthanized because fires burned their hooves and udders, said Sid Miller, Texas’ commissioner of agriculture. It could take years for grasses to regrow and cattle to return, he said, while costs of rebuilding fencing, barns and other ranch infrastructure, estimated to be massive, won’t be covered by insurance.
The disaster comes less than a year after flooding from nearly a year’s worth of rain inundated other parts of the panhandle region. Then, drought conditions parched vegetation across the region. It’s a cycle that is heightening wildfire risks across the West and Southwest, experts say, but that some Texas farmers say is just part of life in the panhandle.
Gov. Ron DeSantis is dispatching 140 state troopers throughout Florida, including Miami Beach, in an effort to curb outbreaks of spring break violence.
The move comes after two deadly shootings in Miami Beach during spring break last year led to a state of emergency and a midnight curfew in the popular destination for vacationing college students. More than 40 troopers will be deployed in MIami Beach, according to the city’s mayor.
“We at the state level stand ready to help our local communities maintain order,” DeSantis said Tuesday.
“We don’t welcome mayhem,” DeSantis said. “The state has a lot going on, it’s a fun place to be at… we want to see people do that, but we also are going to insist that people respect the law.”
DeSantis said the troopers will assist 17 law enforcement agencies, and a rapid-response team of 24 troopers will be on standby in Bay, Volusia, Broward and Miami-Dade counties.
NBC News: Trump breaks silence on Israel's military campaign in Gaza: 'Finish the problem' by Vaughn Hillyard and Allan Smith
Former President Donald Trump declared Tuesday that Israel must “finish the problem” in its war against Hamas, his most definitive position on the conflict since the terror group killed 1,200 Israelis and took more than 200 hostages on Oct. 7.
“You’ve got to finish the problem,” Trump said on Fox News on Tuesday when asked about the war. “You had a horrible invasion that took place that would have never happened if I was president.”
When asked on the program whether he supported a cease-fire in Gaza, Trump demurred, avoiding an explicit position on Israel’s military effort that has now also left more than 30,000 people dead in Gaza, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. The likely 2024 Republican nominee has not provided his own position on U.S. or Israel's strategy throughout the five months of the war.
Though a stalwart defender of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration during his presidency, Trump has also attempted to strike an anti-war posture on the campaign trail in the last year, attempting to contrast himself from President Joe Biden and his remaining Republican rival, Nikki Haley.
BBC News: German patient vaccinated against Covid 217 times by Michelle Roberts
A 62-year-old man from Germany has, against medical advice, been vaccinated 217 times against Covid, doctors report.
The bizarre case is documented in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal.
The shots were bought and given privately within the space of 29 months.
The man appears to have suffered no ill effects, researchers from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg say.
"We learned about his case via newspaper articles," Dr Kilian Schober, from the university's microbiology department, said.
"We then contacted him and invited him to undergo various tests in Erlangen. He was very interested in doing so."
The man provided fresh blood and saliva samples.
The researchers also tested some frozen blood samples of his that had been stored in recent years.
Ephraim Escudero had been missing for five days when a neighbour showed his family a news clipping.
The bodies of two unknown men had been found in Pampanga, about five hours from their home east of Manila in Laguna, but the report contained enough identifying details that the family knew instantly. “It was Ephraim,” said his sister, Sheerah.
“Both [victims] were wrapped with packaging tape around their heads,” Sheerah recalled. “[Ephraim] was hogtied. His hands were behind his back. His feet were tied with plastic and brown packaging tape. He also had gunshot wounds.”
When 18-year-old Ephraim first went missing in September 2017, local police had shown little interest in helping. An investigator in Pampanga acknowledged that Ephraim may have been killed because of the drug war unleashed by then President Rodrigo Duterte, but after the family submitted evidence, “we heard nothing from them,” Escudero said. “They were just fooling around, pretending like they were investigating, but they’re really not.”
Seven years and one president later, Escudero is no closer to finding justice.
Guardian: US says no troops to Haiti as country reels from explosion of gang violence by Tom Phillips and Etienne Côté-Paluck
The United States has said it will not send troops to Haiti after a stunning eruption of gang violence seemingly designed to bring down the Caribbean nation’s enfeebled government and its unpopular prime minister, Ariel Henry.
On Monday night, nearly five days after powerful organized crime bosses launched a wave of deadly and apparently coordinated attacks, the US news group McClatchy reported there had been “frantic” exchanges between US and Haitian diplomats that had raised the prospect of an emergency deployment of US special forces to help restore order.
However, a national security council official poured cold water on the suggestion there would be US “boots on the ground” in
Haiti, telling the Washington-based agency: “The United States is not sending US troops to Haiti to support the Haitian national police’s security operations.”
More than 2,300km south in Haiti’s seaside capital, Port-au-Prince, the mood remained jittery and uncertain amid the still-developing gang uprising that has seen rifle-toting combatants target highly strategic and symbolic locations including police stations, penitentiaries, a container port and the city’s international airport, where residents could hear intense gunfire as army troops sought to repel heavily armed invaders.