Man charged in Maryland with threatening to kill Fauci and his family
BALTIMORE — A 56-year-old man has been arrested and charged in Maryland federal court with making threats against Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Federal authorities said Thomas Patrick Connally Jr., who was arrested in West Virginia, repeatedly sent threatening emails to Fauci at his National Institutes of Health account, which is based in Bethesda, Maryland.
The first, in December 2020, had a subject line reading: “Hope you get a bullet in your compromised satanic skull.”
Other emails told Fauci his “entire family ... are about to be dragged into the street and slaughtered” and made references to Bill Gates and George Soros. Threatening emails were also sent to Dr. Francis Collins, director of the NIH.
“Drop the mandatory vaccine talk,” one email said.
The emails were sent from an encrypted program, but authorities say they determined his connection through linked accounts and IP addresses. The charging documents say that while the man was arrested in West Virginia, they don’t know where he lives.
If convicted, Connally faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison for threats against a federal official; and a maximum of five years in federal prison for interstate communication containing a threat to harm.
—Baltimore Sun
California State University to require COVID-19 vaccination this fall
LOS ANGELES — California State University — the nation’s largest four-year public university system — will require students, faculty and staff to be vaccinated against COVID-19 before returning to campus for the fall semester. Medical and religious exemptions will be allowed, with unvaccinated students having to undergo regular coronavirus testing.
The decision announced Tuesday was prompted by the ongoing rise in the delta variant throughout California. It came one day after state officials announced that government and health care workers would be required to show proof of vaccination, and more than a week after the University of California mandated vaccines for students and employees.
“The current surge in COVID cases due to the spread of the highly infectious delta variant is an alarming new factor that we must consider as we look to maintain the health and well-being of students, employees and visitors to our campuses this fall,” said Cal State Chancellor Joseph I. Castro. “Receiving a COVID vaccine continues to be the best way to mitigate the spread of the virus.”
Cal State’s process will largely rely on trust, spokesperson Mike Uhlenkamp said. Students would have to certify that they are fully vaccinated or seeking an exemption and attest that their answers are accurate and truthful. A Cal State campus could independently request proof of vaccination as a next step in the initial certification process.
—Los Angeles Times
Florida mom pleads not guilty in death of daughters found in canal
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Tinessa Hogan, who faces two counts of premeditated murder in the deaths of daughters Destiny, 9, and Daysha, 7, has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Hogan, 36, didn’t appear in court Tuesday. Her attorney, Erin Veit, entered the plea on her behalf.
Hogan is being held at the Broward Jail, where she’s been since her July 14 arrest. Veit had no comment after the hearing.
Hogan was placed under psychiatric care on June 22, the same day her daughters were found dead in a Lauderhill canal.
Lauderhill police got a call that day about a child’s body floating in a canal. But when officers arrived at the sprawling working class neighborhood off Sunrise Boulevard, the usual signs of a tragic, accidental drowning just weren’t there.
The girl, later identified as Destiny, wore her hair in braids. She had on denim shorts and a gray T-shirt.
Across the canal that day, in another Lauderhill neighborhood, police saw a woman shrouded in a white blanket. She belted out Bible scriptures. One minute she was claiming to be the devil and the next to be God, neighbors told the Sun Sentinel.
The woman was taken away from her neighborhood by ambulance a few hours after Destiny was pulled from the canal.
It would take several more hours before police learned the woman, Tinessa Hogan, was Destiny’s mother — and by then the body of the second child, Daysha, had surfaced in the canal.
—South Florida Sun-Sentinel
2 dead, hope for survivors dims after German chemicals site blast
COLOGNE, Germany — An explosion in a tank containing solvents at a chemicals plant in the western German city of Leverkusen on Tuesday left at least two workers dead, 31 injured and an unknown number still missing.
Five of the injured are receiving intensive medical care, the police said.
"The search for the missing is running at high pressure. Unfortunately, hope is disappearing that we will find them alive," read a statement from Lars Friedrich, the director of Chempark, the industrial park at which the blast occurred.
The blast, which was felt at a seismological station about 25 miles away, caused a plume of dense smoke over the city on the Rhine River. Leverkusen has long been a major center of the chemicals sector.
"We are deeply saddened by this tragic accident and the death of an employee. Our sympathy goes above all to the relatives, but also to the colleagues who worked with him," Friedrich said.
Leverkusen Mayor Uwe Richrath spoke of a "tragic day" for the city, which is closely linked to the chemical industry. He said he had felt the shockwave from the blast.
Residents in the parts of the city close to the plant were urged to close windows and doors and not to consume produce growing in their gardens.
Children's playgrounds were closed as the authorities set up air monitoring stations. Pollutants measured remained in the "green zone," they said.
—dpa
