Month: August 2023

Six people were shot early Sunday morning in Louisville, Kentucky at the Southern Restaurant and Lounge at 301 W. Market Street.

Officers arrived on the scene to discover one man shot and killed with six others injured at approximately 3 a.m. First Division commander Major Shannon Lauder said the shooting Sunday morning started between restaurant patrons and people on the sidewalk. There were no details about what started the violence.

Police said around 200-300 people were in the area at the time of the shooting. The Southern Restaurant and Lounge was being investigated by Louisville Metro and Kentucky alcoholic beverage enforcement authorities for allegations its operations exceeded the permissions of its restaurant alcohol license. Posts on its social media pages over the past several months show videos of dancing and bottle service. A post on the Southern Restaurant and Lounge Facebook page mentioned relocating. with the business was marking what it called “Southern’s Last Rodeo” to mark the closing of the current location before a planned move.

Mayor Craig Greenberg said Sunday afternoon that one man who was listed in critical condition later  passed away; three women and another man had non-life threatening injuries.  LMPD said there is no suspect or suspects this early in the investigation.

Anyone with information is asked to use the the crime tip portal (click here) or call the LMPD tip line at (502)574-LMPD (5673).

Editorial credit: Fedorovekb / Shutterstock.com

Police on Sunday identified the shooter who killed three people at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida, over the weekend. Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters said at a news conference that the suspect, 21-year-old Ryan Christopher Palmeter, entered the store near Edward Waters University around 1 p.m. carrying an “AR-style” rifle, a handgun that had swastikas on it and was wearing a tactical vest. The suspected gunman alleged to have fatally shot three Black people and terrified others in a “racially motivated” rampage. Palmeter died by apparent suicide by one of the weapons, which he purchased legally.

Sheriff Waters played a brief clip from the security footage showing Palmeter shooting at a black Kia 11 times outside the store, killing his first victim seated inside the vehicle, identified as Angela Michelle Carr, 52, before storming through the front sliding glass doors and gunning down victims at random. The other victims killed in the shooting were identified as 19-year-old Anolt Joseph “AJ” Laguerre Jr. and 29-year-old Jerrald De’Shaun Gallion. Waters said that for some unexplained reason the suspect allowed other patrons, both white and Black, to leave the store.

Waters said that after killing his last victim, Palmeter texted his father instructing him to use a screwdriver to get into his bedroom, where he discovered his son’s last will and testament and a suicide note on his laptop. Waters revealed that Palmeter authored several documents including one to his parents, one to the media and one to federal agents, saying: “Portions of these manifestos detailed the shooter’s disgusting ideology of hate. Plainly put, this shooting was racially motivated and he hated Black people.”  Waters described the documents as “the diary of a madman,” full of offensive and hateful language, including racial slurs, and that they were “completely irrational.” Waters said during Sunday’s news conference: “Our community is grappling with why this atrocity occurred. I urge us all not to look for sense in a senseless act of violence. There’s no reason or explanation that will ever account for the shooter’s decisions and actions. His sickening ideology is not representative of the values of this Jacksonville community that we all love so much.”

Palmeter lived with his parents in Orange Park, about 20 miles southwest of Jacksonville, and had no criminal arrest history.  He legally purchased two guns this year, buying a Glock 20 10 mm semiautomatic handgun from the Orange Park Gun & Pawn shop on May 6 and an AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle from the Wild West Guns and Shop in Jacksonville on June 22.

Editorial credit: Red Lemon / Shutterstock.com

Former President Donald Trump was arrested on Thursday evening after surrendering at Georgia’s Fulton County Jail, on a 13-count indictment for efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia. Trump is one of 19 defendants in the indictment that alleges racketeering by a criminal organization that tried to overturn the election results.

Trump was placed under arrest inside the jail; he was processed in about 20 minutes, which included authorities collecting fingerprints and a mugshot – which is in stark contrast to Trump’s three other criminal cases, in New York, Florida and Washington, D.C., where he was processed at a courthouse during the same trip when he entered a formal plea to charges. Trump’s booking photo, provided by the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office, shows the former president in a blue suit and red tie. He was designated as inmate No. P01135809, with jail records indicating that Trump is 6 foot 3 inches tall and weighs 215 pounds. His arraignment in Georgia is expected the week of Sept. 5.

Trump agreed to a $200,000 bond and a list of strict conditions for his release — he is not allowed to make any direct or indirect threat against any witnesses, co-defendants, victims, property or the community, which includes any posts he makes on social media. Trump then headed back to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport for his flight back to Bedminster, New Jersey, where the former president made brief remarks, saying, “It’s election interference. … We did nothing wrong at all. And we have every right, every single right to challenge an election that we think is dishonest. So we think it’s very dishonest.”

The Georgia case is Trump’s fourth criminal indictment while campaigning for the 2024 presidential election. He also faces charges related to mishandling classified documents in Florida; business fraud in New York; and a conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election results, culminating in the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol, in Washington.

Editorial credit: a katz / Shutterstock.com

The United States Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against Elon Musk’s SpaceX for allegedly discriminating against refugees in its hiring practices.

According to an DOJ news release dates August 24, the lawsuit claims that “from at least September 2018 to May 2022, SpaceX routinely discouraged asylees and refugees from applying and refused to hire or consider them, because of their citizenship status, in violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)”, and alleges that SpaceX falsely claimed in its job listings that only green card holders and United States citizens could work at the company because of federal export control laws.

The International Traffic in Arms Regulations (“ITAR”) applies to companies manufacturing spacecraft and rockets and limit foreign nationals from accessing key information about the vehicles for national security reasons; however, the DOJ’s lawsuit states that regulations such as ITAR do not prevent SpaceX from hiring refugees, whose “permission to live and work in the United States does not expire, and they stand on equal footing with U.S. citizens.

Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division in a statement “Our investigation found that SpaceX failed to fairly consider or hire asylees and refugees because of their citizenship status and imposed what amounted to a ban on their hire regardless of their qualification, in violation of federal law,” adding that recruiters at Spacex “actively discouraged asylees and refugees from seeking work opportunities at the company” and “failed to fairly consider applications submitted to the company by refugees.”

Editorial credit: L Galbraith / Shutterstock.com