FBI says suspicious parcel was addressed to CNN in Atlanta
By CURT ANDERSON, AP Legal Affairs Writer
MIAMI (AP) — Bomb squads were called to a post office in Atlanta on Monday about a suspicious package sent to CNN, investigators said Monday, just hours before a court hearing for a Florida man accused of sending packages containing explosive material to prominent Democrats.
The FBI said via its Twitter account that the recovered package was “similar in appearance” to those sent by 56-year-old Cesar Sayoc, whom authorities accuse of sending explosive material to Democrats and other prominent critics of President Donald Trump.
CNN President Jeff Zucker says all mail to CNN has been screened offsite since last week, when a series of package bombs began appearing around the country. Among them were two apparent mail bombs sent to CNN.
Sayoc was scheduled to appear Monday in federal court in Miami. He is accused of sending bubble-wrapped manila envelopes to Democrats such as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. The packages were intercepted from Delaware to California. At least some listed a return address of U.S. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, former chair of the Democratic National Committee.
She represents the Florida district where the former male stripper, pizza driver and strip club DJ lived in an older van covered with bumper stickers praising Trump, disparaging Democrats and CNN and showing rifle crosshairs over liberals like Clinton and filmmaker Michael Moore.
Although authorities did not immediately say who might be responsible for the most recent package to CNN, the FBI said it believes the package discovered Monday is “similar in appearance” to those that Sayoc is accused of sending. Law enforcement officials have said they believe the packages were staggered and more could be discovered.
Separately, a U.S. official told The Associated Press that Sayoc kept a list of elected officials and others who investigators believe were intended targets. The official also said authorities recovered soldering equipment, a printer, and stamps similar to those used on the package bombs.
The official wasn’t authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation and spoke on condition of anonymity to the AP.
Sayoc was arrested Friday outside a South Florida auto parts store after investigators said they identified him through fingerprint and DNA evidence. He is being prosecuted in New York, so his Florida hearing will likely be brief and process-oriented. The main issue will be whether he waives extradition to New York and whether he seeks release on bail.
Authorities say Sayoc faces more than 50 years in prison if convicted on all charges. None of the bombs exploded and no one was injured.
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Associated Press writer Michael Balsamo contributed to this report from Washington.

THREE POLICE OFFICERS WERE HONORED IN ALIQUIPPA OVER THE WEEKEND. BEAVER COUNTY RADIO NEWS CORRESPONDENT SANDY GIORDANO HAS MORE. Click on ‘play’ to hear Sandy’s report…

 

 

TWO HOPEWELL HIGH SCHOOL SECRETARIES HAVE ANNOUNCED THEIR RETIREMENT. BEAVER COUNTY RADIO NEWS CORRESPONDENT SANDY GIORDANO HAS DETAILS. Click on ‘play’ to hear Sandy’s report…

 

WEATHER FORECAST FOR MONDAY, OCTOBER 29TH, 2018

 

TODAY – SHOWERS THIS MORNING. REMAINING CLOUDY
FOR THE AFTERNOON. HIGH – 48.

TONIGHT – PARTLY CLOUDY. LOW – 37.

TUESDAY – MOSTLY SUNNY. HIGH – 58.

Trump calls Pittsburgh synagogue attack ‘evil’ anti-Semitism
By CATHERINE LUCEY, Associated Press
MURPHYSBORO, Ill. (AP) — President Donald Trump mourned the dead and forcefully condemned anti-Semitism after a mass shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue that left 11 dead. But faced with another national tragedy, he did not long turn his focus away from the midterm elections or himself.
Nine days from elections that will determine the control of Congress, Trump stuck to his plans to appear at an agricultural convention and a political rally Saturday. Throughout the day, he expressed sorrow, called for justice and bemoaned hate, getting regular updates on the shooting. But he also campaigned for candidates, took shots at favorite Democratic targets House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Elizabeth Warren and made jokes about his hair.
At a massive rally in southern Illinois for U.S. Rep. Mike Bost, Trump condemned the shooting as an “evil anti-Semitic attack.” But he said cancelling his appearance would make “sick, demented people important.” He pledged to change his tone for the evening and did cool some of his most fiery rhetoric.
The slaughter at Sabbath services followed a tense week dominated by a mail bomb plot with apparent political motivations and served as another toxic reminder of a divided nation. It also again underscored Trump’s reluctance to step into the role of national unifier at tense moments as well as his singular focus heading into elections that could dramatically change his presidency.
Trump acknowledged the weight these moments carry, telling reporters that experiencing such events as president, “it’s a level of terribleness and horror that you can’t even believe. It’s hard to believe.”
The White House said Trump was getting regular briefings on the attack. He spoke with the governor of Pennsylvania and the mayor of Pittsburgh. He also spoke with his daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, who are Jewish.
Shortly after returning to Washington late Saturday, Trump ordered flags at federal buildings throughout the country to be flown at half-staff until Oct. 31 in “solemn respect” for the victims.
Trump sought to energize turnout for Bost, who is fighting to hold on to a seat that was once a Democratic stronghold, but turned out for Trump in 2016. To bolster his argument for sticking with the rally, Trump argued that the New York Stock Exchange was opened the day after 9/11, though in fact it was re-opened on September 17.
Speaking to a massive, cheering crowd at an airport hangar in southern Illinois, Trump said “the hearts of all Americans are filled with grief, following the monstrous killing.” He told reporters before the rally that he would travel to Pittsburgh, though he did not offer details. He also sought to distance himself from the man arrested in the shooting, calling him “sick” and saying “he was no supporter of mine.”
Although his tone was softer, he still targeted Pelosi and Democrats and the crowd gleefully shouted “lock her up,” in reference to Hillary Clinton, one of the targets of the bomb plot. And he continued to emphasize his hardline immigration rhetoric. “Republicans want strong borders, no crime, and no caravans,” Trump said.
Trump’s speech to a convention of the Future Farmers of America had all the hallmarks of a Trump rally, as the president riffed on trade, jobs and some of his political enemies. At one point he also joked about his hair. He said it was ruffled by the rain as he left Washington, adding “I said, ‘maybe I should cancel this arrangement because I have a bad hair day.”
Trump offered an unsparing denunciation of anti-Semitism, which he said was the motive behind the attack, in contrast to remarks after clashes between white supremacists and counterprotesters in Charlottesville last year. Then, he only inflamed tensions by blaming both sides for the violence.
Speaking to young farmers in Indianapolis, Trump called on the country to come together, before inviting a pastor and rabbi on stage to pray.
Earlier in the day, Trump speculated that the death toll in Pittsburgh would have been curbed if an armed guard had been in the building. With both the number of deaths and details of the synagogue’s security still to be disclosed, Trump said gun control “has little to do with it” but “if they had protection inside, the results would have been far better.”
But the attack did not persuade him that tighter gun controls are needed.
“This is a case where, if they had an armed guard inside, they might have been able to stop him immediately,” Trump said. “Maybe there would have been nobody killed, except for him, frankly. So it’s a very, very – a very difficult situation.”
In previous mass shootings, Trump has at times said he would consider tightening gun laws but in the main has called for more armed guards in places such as schools.
“The world is a violent world,” he said before his speech. “And you think when you’re over it, it just sort of goes away, but then it comes back in the form of a madman, a wacko. … They had a maniac walk in and they didn’t have any protection and that is just so sad to see, so sad to see.”
Trump said lawmakers “should very much bring the death penalty into vogue” and people who kill in places such as synagogues and churches “really should suffer the ultimate price.”
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For AP’s complete coverage of the Pittsburgh synagogue shootings: https://www.apnews.com/Shootings

Police: Gunman said Jews were committing genocide
By MARK SCOLFORO, ALLEN G. BREED and CLAUDIA LAUER, Associated Press
PITTSBURGH (AP) — The suspect in the mass shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue told officers that Jews were committing genocide and that he wanted them all to die, according to a charging document made public early Sunday.
Robert Gregory Bowers killed eight men and three women inside the Tree of Life Synagogue on Saturday during worship services before a tactical police team tracked him down and shot him, police said in the affidavit, which contained some previously unreported details on the shooting and the police response.
Calls began coming in to 911 from the synagogue just before 10 a.m. Saturday, reporting “they were being attacked,” the document said. Bowers shot one of the first two officers to respond in the hand, and the other was wounded by “shrapnel and broken glass.”
A tactical team found Bowers on the third floor, where he shot two officers multiple times, the affidavit said. One officer was described as critically wounded; the document did not describe the other officer’s condition.
Two other people in the synagogue, a man and a woman, were wounded by Bowers and were in stable condition, the document said.
Bowers told an officer while he was being treated for his injuries “that he wanted all Jews to die and also that they (Jews) were committing genocide to his people,” the affidavit said.
Bowers was charged late Saturday with 11 counts of criminal homicide, six counts of aggravated assault and 13 counts of ethnic intimidation in what the leader of the Anti-Defamation League called the deadliest attack on Jews in U.S. history.
It wasn’t clear whether Bowers had an attorney to speak on his behalf. Law enforcement officials planned to discuss the massacre at a news conference Sunday morning.
The nation’s latest mass shooting drew condemnation and expressions of sympathy from politicians and religious leaders of all stripes. With the midterm election just over a week away, it also reignited a longstanding and bitter debate over guns.
Pope Francis led prayers for Pittsburgh on Sunday in St. Peter’s Square.
“In reality, all of us are wounded by this inhuman act of violence,” he said. He prayed for God “to help us to extinguish the flames of hatred that develop in our societies, reinforcing the sense of humanity, respect for life and civil and moral values.”
President Donald Trump said the outcome might have been different if the synagogue “had some kind of protection” from an armed guard, while Pennsylvania’s Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, up for re-election, noted that once again “dangerous weapons are putting our citizens in harm’s way.”
Calling the shooting an “evil anti-Semitic attack,” Trump ordered flags at federal buildings throughout the U.S. to be flown at half-staff in respect for the victims. He said he planned to travel to Pittsburgh, but offered no details.
In the city, thousands gathered for a vigil Saturday night. Some blamed the slaughter on the nation’s political climate.
“When you spew hate speech, people act on it. Very simple. And this is the result. A lot of people dead. Senselessly,” said Stephen Cohen, co-president of New Light Congregation, which rents space at Tree of Life.
Little was known about Bowers, who had no apparent criminal record but who is believed to have expressed virulently anti-Semitic views on social media. Authorities said it appears he acted alone.
Worshippers “were brutally murdered by a gunman targeting them simply because of their faith,” said Bob Jones, head of the FBI’s Pittsburgh office, though he cautioned the shooter’s full motive was not yet known.
Scott Brady, the chief federal prosecutor in western Pennsylvania, pledged that “justice in this case will be swift and it will be severe.”
The gunman targeted a building that housed three separate congregations, all of which were conducting Sabbath services when the attack began just before 10 a.m. in the tree-lined residential neighborhood of Squirrel Hill, about 10 minutes from downtown Pittsburgh and the hub of Pittsburgh’s Jewish community.
The synagogue door was unlocked on the Sabbath “because people are coming for services, and the bell would be ringing constantly. So they do not lock the door, and anybody can just walk in,” said Marilyn Honigsberg, administrative assistant for New Light. “And that’s what this man did.”
Michael Eisenberg, the immediate past president of the Tree of Life, said synagogue officials had not gotten any threats that he knew of before the shooting. But security was a concern, he said, and the synagogue had started working to improve it.
Zachary Weiss, 26, said his father, 60-year-old Stephen Weiss, was inside the synagogue but was unharmed. Weiss said his father told him that he and Tree of Life’s rabbi helped congregants take shelter and follow the active shooter response training they’d received months earlier. Stephen Weiss made it out of the building and used a janitor’s cellphone to call his family at home.
The attack, his son vowed, “will not define our congregation and will not define our city.”
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Breed reported from Raleigh, North Carolina, and Lauer reported from Philadelphia. Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Mark Gillispie and Gene Puskar in Pittsburgh, Eric Tucker and Michael Balsamo in Washington, Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Michael Kunzelman in Silver Spring, Maryland, and Michael Rubinkam in northeastern Pennsylvania.
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For AP’s complete coverage of the Pittsburgh synagogue shootings: https://www.apnews.com/Shootings

Casey, Barletta duel over guns, immigration in 2nd debate

By MARC LEVY, Associated Press
PITTSBURGH (AP) — Pennsylvania’s Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Casey and his Republican challenger, U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta, dueled over guns, immigration and the economy in their second and final debate.
Friday’s hour-long debate taped at KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh featured several sharp exchanges. It was to be broadcast Friday night and made available to other stations.
The 58-year-old Casey, of Scranton, is seeking a third six-year term in Nov. 6’s election. The 62-year-old Barletta is a fourth-term congressman from Hazelton.
Barletta has badly lagged Casey in fundraising and polls, making it a low-profile race in a state President Trump won in 2016.
Casey is a critic of Trump’s tax-cutting law and immigration policies, and opposed Trump’s Supreme Court nominees. Barletta is one of Trump’s biggest allies on Capitol Hill, and is endorsed by the president.

Florida man charged after weeklong bomb-package scare
By MICHAEL BALSAMO, ERIC TUCKER and COLLEEN LONG, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — A Florida man with a long criminal history was charged Friday in the nationwide mail-bomb scare targeting prominent Democrats who have traded criticism with President Donald Trump. It was a first break in a case that has seized the national conversation and spread fear of election-season violence with little precedent in the U.S.
Justice Department officials revealed that a latent fingerprint found on one package helped them identify their suspect as Cesar Sayoc, 56, of Aventura, Florida. The criminal complaint charges Sayoc with illegally mailing explosives, illegally transporting explosives across state lines, making threats against former presidents, assaulting federal officers and threatening interstate commerce.
Court records show Sayoc, an amateur body builder with social media accounts that denigrate Democrats and praise Trump, has a history of arrests for theft, illegal steroids possession and a 2002 charge of making a bomb threat.
The development came amid a nationwide manhunt for the person responsible for at least 13 explosive devices addressed to prominent Democrats including former President Barack Obama, former Vice President Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton. The case continued widening Friday even as Sayoc was detained, as investigators in California scrutinized a similar package sent to Democratic Sen. Kamala Harris, her office said.
In Washington, Attorney General Jeff Sessions cautioned that Sayoc had only been charged, not convicted. But he said, “Let this be a lesson to anyone regardless of their political beliefs that we will bring the full force of law against anyone who attempts to use threats, intimidation and outright violence to further an agenda. We will find you, we will prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law.”
In Florida, law enforcement officers were seen on television examining a white van, its windows covered with an assortment of stickers, outside the Plantation auto parts store. Authorities covered the vehicle with a blue tarp and took it away on the back of a flatbed truck.
The stickers included images of Trump, American flags and what appeared to be logos of the Republican National Committee and CNN, though the writing surrounding those images was unclear.
Trump, after Sayoc was apprehended, declared that “we must never allow political violence take root in America” and Americans “must unify.” As in comments earlier in the week, he did not mention that the package recipients were all Democrats or officials in Obama’s administration, in addition to CNN, a news network he criticizes almost daily.
Earlier Friday, he complained that “this ‘bomb’ stuff” was taking attention away from the upcoming election and said critics were wrongly blaming him and his heated rhetoric.
The Justice Department scheduled a Friday afternoon news conference in Washington that was to include New York Police Commissioner James O’Neill, whose department investigated the mailings with the FBI.
Law enforcement officials said they had intercepted a dozen packages in states across the country. None had exploded, and it wasn’t immediately clear if they were intended to cause physical harm or simply sow fear and anxiety.
Earlier Friday, authorities said suspicious packages addressed to New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and former National Intelligence Director James Clapper — both similar to those containing pipe bombs sent to other prominent critics of Trump— had been intercepted.
Investigators believe the mailings were staggered. The U.S. Postal Service searched their facilities 48 hours ago and the most recent packages didn’t turn up. Officials don’t think they were sitting in the system without being spotted. They were working to determine for sure. The officials spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.
Online court records show that Sayoc in 2002 was arrested and served a year of probation for a felony charge of threatening to throw or place a bomb. No further details were available about the case.
Sayoc was convicted in 2014 for grand theft and misdemeanor theft of less than $300, and in 2013 for battery. In 2004, he faced several felony charges for possession of a synthetic anabolic-androgenic steroid. He also had several arrests for theft in the 1990s.
He filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2012, informing the court he had $4,175 in personal property and more than $21,000 in debts. His name is also listed on business records tied to dry cleaning and catering businesses. Records show he was born in New York and according to an online resume he attended college in North Carolina.
“Debtor lives with mother, owns no furniture,” Sayoc’s lawyer indicated in a property list.
Investigators were analyzing the innards of the crude devices to reveal whether they were intended to detonate or simply sow fear just before Election Day.
Law enforcement officials told The Associated Press that the devices, containing timers and batteries, were not rigged to explode upon opening. But they were uncertain whether the devices were poorly designed or never intended to cause physical harm.
Most of those targeted were past or present U.S. officials, but one was sent to actor Robert De Niro and billionaire George Soros. The bombs have been sent across the country – from New York, Delaware and Washington, D.C., to Florida and California, where Rep. Maxine Waters was targeted. They bore the return address of Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the former chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee.
The common thread among the bomb targets was obvious: their critical words for Trump and his frequent, harsher criticism in return.
The package to Clapper was addressed to him at CNN’s Midtown Manhattan address. Clapper, a frequent Trump critic, told CNN that he was not surprised he was targeted and that he considered the actions “definitely domestic terrorism.”
The devices were packaged in manila envelopes and carried U.S. postage stamps. They were being examined by technicians at the FBI’s forensic lab in Quantico, Virginia.
The packages stoked nationwide tensions ahead of the Nov. 6 election to determine control of Congress — a campaign both major political parties have described in near-apocalyptic terms. Politicians from both parties used the threats to decry a toxic political climate and lay blame.
The bombs are about 6 inches (15 centimeters) long and packed with powder and broken glass, according to a law enforcement official who viewed X-ray images. The official said the devices were made from PVC pipe and covered with black tape.
The first bomb discovered was delivered Monday to the suburban New York compound of Soros, a major contributor to Democratic causes. Soros has called Trump’s presidency “dangerous.”
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Associated Press writers Laurie Kellman, Ken Thomas, Jill Colvin and Chad Day in Washington and Jim Mustian, Deepti Hajela, Tom Hays and Michael R. Sisak in New York contributed to this report.
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For the AP’s complete coverage of the mail-bomb scare: https://apnews.com/PipeBombAttacks