Feds raid home in widening Detroit corruption investigation
DETROIT — FBI agents raided a Rochester Hills home Wednesday morning as part of a broadening corruption investigation centered on public officials in Detroit, according to sources familiar with the matter.
Agents were seen swarming the home about 9 a.m. and a man was handcuffed outside. An FBI spokeswoman confirmed a search warrant was executed and an unnamed person was taken into custody.
The raid is the latest public move in a wide corruption investigation involving at least three city council members and a confidential FBI source who was tied to Detroit's towing industry. In late September, former Councilman Andre Spivey pleaded guilty to taking bribes totaling $35,900 in exchange for his help with the city's towing regulations.
Spivey's case is the first charged as part of the federal investigation, called Operation Northern Hook.
Investigators have not described publicly how the Police Department fits into the criminal probe. But a recent federal criminal case involving a former Detroit police officer and an internal Detroit police investigation documented separate alleged instances of officers steering work to specific towing companies.
—Detroit Free Press
Man who lived 3 months at O’Hare cleared of trespassing charges
CHICAGO — A man who was discovered after living at O’Hare International Airport for three months without detection was cleared of a related criminal charge this week in a case that raised security questions at one of the world’s busiest airports.
A Cook County judge found Aditya Singh, 37, not guilty on Tuesday of felony criminal trespass to a restricted area of an airport.
Judge Adrienne Davis made the ruling in a directed verdict without the defense having to put on a case. Singh still faces a separate escape charge related to an alleged violation of electronic monitoring while he was free on bond earlier this year. That case is due in court Friday.
After coming to the United States nearly six years ago to complete a master’s degree program, Singh boarded a Chicago-bound flight from Los Angeles on Oct. 19, 2020, to begin his journey home to India.
He never made it.
Prosecutors said Singh told authorities that the coronavirus pandemic left him too afraid to fly and so he instead remained in the airport, often relying on the kindness of strangers to buy him food.
—Chicago Tribune
Biden honors Tree of Life shooting victims on 3rd anniversary
PITTSBURGH — Marking the three-year anniversary of the mass shooting at Tree of Life synagogue on Oct. 27, 2018, that killed 11 worshippers and is believed to be the deadliest attack against Jews in American history, President Joe Biden said the day and its aftermath "remind all of us to embrace the better angels of our nature," to "turn pain into purpose" and to stand up against antisemitism with "clarity and conviction."
In a statement Wednesday, Biden recalled the morning a gunman attacked the synagogue — what was supposed to be a "peaceful Shabbat morning" — and "stole the lives of 11 souls in prayer."
Eleven others, the president added, managed to escape — "some with serious physical injuries, others with indelible scars of grief."
But in the days, weeks and months after the attack, the "unyielding character of a community" was revealed, Biden said. He cited "the first responders who rushed into harm’s way. The teenagers who organized a Havdalah vigil for a neighborhood in need. The art teacher who painted hearts and Stars of David in the windows of a local coffee shop. The designer who formed an iconic image that defined a city and inspired a nation with three simple words: stronger than hate."
—Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
NYT columnist Nicholas Kristof enters Oregon governor’s race
Nicholas Kristof, a crusading liberal New York Times columnist who spent the past two decades fighting for people at the bottom of the social ladder, publicly announced his plans on Wednesday to run for governor of Oregon.
Kristof, 62, grew up in the Beaver State but does not carry any of the standard qualifications for electoral politics. The Democrat has never served in public office, has never campaigned for one and almost immediately entered journalism after completing his education at Harvard College and Oxford University.
The launch of his campaign was expected. The New York Times announced Kristof’s departure from its newsroom on Oct. 14, two days after he filed to form a candidate committee in Oregon and about three months after a Portland news outlet, Willamette Week, reported that he was considering a run.
The two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, who worked at The New York Times for 37 years, took leave from the newspaper in June to begin to ponder a campaign. He lived for years in Scarsdale, New York, a suburb north of the Bronx, but also kept an address in Yamhill, a rural town in northwest Oregon.
Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat who has led Oregon since 2015, is closing in on the end of her second term and is barred from running again due to term limits. At least a half-dozen potential contenders were contemplating 2022 primary bids to replace Brown this month, The Washington Post reported.
—New York Daily News
