Florida prosecutors seeking death penalty in school shooting
By CURT ANDERSON, Associated Press
MIAMI (AP) — Prosecutors intend to seek the death penalty for the former student charged with killing 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last month even though attorneys for Nikolas Cruz indicated he would plead guilty if his life was spared.
Cruz, 19, is scheduled for formal arraignment Wednesday on a 34-count indictment, including 17 first-degree murder charges. The office of Broward County State Attorney Michael Satz filed the formal notice of its intentions Tuesday, though the action does not necessarily mean a plea deal will not be reached.
The only other penalty option for Cruz, if convicted, is life in prison with no possibility of parole.
Ira Jaffe, whose son and daughter survived the shooting, said he respects the wishes of the 17 families whose children were killed and that time is better spent finding solutions to the problem of mass school shootings.
“Live forever in jail or die – I don’t care,” Jaffe said in an email. “Cruz will rot in hell no matter when it is that he arrives there.”
Fred Guttenberg, whose daughter Jamie Guttenberg died in the shooting, was angry the state decided to pursue the death penalty, noting how tortuously long capital punishment cases last.
“My reaction is as a parent of a deceased student, I expected that the state would have pulled the parents together to ask what we wanted and they didn’t,” he said.
“This guy’s is willing to plea and spend the rest of his life in the general population. Let him do that and let them do what they want with him,” Guttenberg added. “Why not take the plea and let the guy rot in hell?”
Broward County Public Defender Howard Finkelstein, whose office is representing Cruz, has said there were so many warning signs that Cruz was mentally unstable and potentially violent, and that the death penalty might be going too far.
In an email Tuesday, Finkelstein said Cruz is “immediately ready” to plead guilty in return for 34 consecutive life sentences.
“If not allowed to do that tomorrow (at the hearing), out of respect for the victims’ families we will stand mute to the charges at the arraignment. We are not saying he is not guilty but we can’t plead guilty while death is still on the table,” Finkelstein said.
If Cruz does not enter a plea, a not guilty plea will likely be entered on his behalf by Broward Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer to keep the legal process moving along, his attorneys have said.
In other developments, a student who is credited with saving the lives of 20 students by attempting to close and lock a classroom door during the attack was improving at a hospital. Anthony Borges, 15, was shot five times. Weeks after being shot, he fell critically ill of an intestinal infection. After surgeries, his condition was upgraded to fair.
Meanwhile, Florida voters may get a chance to decide whether or not they want to approve new gun control restrictions.
While Gov. Rick Scott just signed a new school safety and gun bill into law, the state’s Constitution Revision Commission may vote to place gun restrictions on this year’s ballot. The commission, a special panel that meets every 20 years, has the power to ask voters to approve changes to the state’s constitution.
Tony Montalto, whose daughter was one of the 17 killed at Stoneman Douglas, asked commissioners at a public hearing Tuesday to put the proposals before voters. He said they need to act because the National Rifle Association has filed a lawsuit against the new law approved by the Legislature.
“You can help defeat this challenge,” Montalto told commissioners.
Shortly before the commission hearing in St. Petersburg, students from Tampa Bay area schools spoke passionately in favor of additional gun regulations, as did the father of a student who attends Marjory Stoneman Douglas.
“Our kids are not asking to do away with the 2nd Amendment. They’re not asking to take away people’s guns or their ability to hunt,” said John Willis. “What they’re saying is, that these weapons of mass destruction that do nothing but tear human beings apart in an unbelievable way, do not belong in civilian hands.”
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Follow Curt Anderson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Miamicurt
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Associated Press writers Gary Fineout in Tallahassee, Jason Dearen in Gainesville and Tamara Lush in St. Petersburg contributed to this story.

UPDATE: The Beaver County District Attorney has released new details in the investigation of Dion and Malisa Stevens – a pair of Aliquippa parents – who waterboarded their 12-year-old daughter. Beaver County Radio News Correspondent Sandy Giordano has the latest information from the D-A’s office. Click on ‘play’ to hear Sandy’s report…

St. George Serbian Orthodox Church held its Lenten vespers over the weekend. Beaver County Radio News Correspondent Sandy Giordano was there. Click on ‘play’ to hear Sandy’s report…

A New Castle man accused of forcing an 8-year-old to drive him to Ohio while he was intoxicated recently pleaded guilty in the case in Beaver County Court. 24 year old Kevin Cook pleaded guilty to drunken driving and will serve two years on the Accelerated Rehabilitative Disposition program, which is offered to first-time, non-violent offenders. According to police, Cook made a child get behind the wheel to drive him across state lines. Police said the child nearly wrecked the car at least twice before he was stopped near Route 51 in Darlington Township.

BREAKING NEWS: Rex Tillerson is out as secretary of state. President Donald Trump is telling reporters that he made the decision to oust Tillerson “by myself.” The president is adding that Tillerson will be “much happier now,” and he appreciates his service. Trump says he and Tillerson had been “talking about this for a long time,” and they had disagreed on issues like the Iran deal. Trump is praising the energy and intellect of his incoming Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, who has led the CIA. This breaking news report is brought to you by…

Eliminating abortion procedures that are performed specifically to prevent the birth of Down syndrome children was the topic of a rally held Monday in the state capitol. House Speaker Mike Turzai (R-Allegheny) and Rep. Judy Ward (R-Blair) were joined by other lawmakers in support of their bill, which would amend the Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act to prevent the abortion of any child solely due to a diagnosis of possible Down syndrome. Rep. Jim Marshall (R-Beaver) commented on the proposed legislation…

Schools all across Beaver County are making preparations for Wednesday’s planned national 17-minute student walkout.  Beaver County Radio News Correspondent Sandy Giordano has details. Click on ‘play’ to hear Sandy’s report…

WEATHER FORECAST FOR TUESDAY, MARCH 13TH, 2018

TODAY – FLURRIES AND A FEW SNOW SHOWERS
THROUGHOUT THE DAY. HIGH – 35.

TONIGHT – PARTLY CLOUDY SKIES. A FEW FLURRIES OR
SNOW SHOWERS POSSIBLE. LOW – 24.

WEDNESDAY – CLOUDY SKIES. A FEW FLURRIES OR SNOW
SHOWERS POSSIBLE. HIGH – 34.

House panel’s initial report says no collusion with Russia
By MARY CLARE JALONICK, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee have completed a draft report concluding there was no collusion or coordination between Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and Russia, a finding that pleased the White House but enraged Democrats who had not yet seen the document.
After a yearlong investigation, Texas Rep. Mike Conaway announced Monday that the committee has finished interviewing witnesses and will share the report with Democrats for the first time Tuesday. Conaway is the Republican leading the House probe, one of several investigations on Russian meddling in the 2016 elections.
“We found no evidence of collusion,” Conaway told reporters, suggesting that those who believe there was collusion are reading too many spy novels. “We found perhaps some bad judgment, inappropriate meetings, inappropriate judgment in taking meetings. But only Tom Clancy or Vince Flynn or someone else like that could take this series of inadvertent contacts with each other, or meetings or whatever, and weave that into sort of a fiction page-turner, spy thriller.”
Hours later, Trump tweeted his own headline of the report in excited capital letters: “THE HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE HAS, AFTER A 14 MONTH LONG IN-DEPTH INVESTIGATION, FOUND NO EVIDENCE OF COLLUSION OR COORDINATION BETWEEN THE TRUMP CAMPAIGN AND RUSSIA TO INFLUENCE THE 2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.”
Conaway previewed some of the conclusions, but said the public will not see the report until Democrats have reviewed it and the intelligence community has decided what information can become public, a process that could take weeks. Democrats are expected to issue a separate report with far different conclusions.
In addition to the statement on coordination with Russians, the draft challenges an assessment made after the 2016 election that Russian meddling was an effort to help Trump. The January 2017 assessment revealed that the FBI, CIA and NSA had concluded that the Russian government, at the direction of President Vladimir Putin, waged a covert influence campaign to interfere in the election with the goal of hurting Democrat Hillary Clinton’s candidacy and helping Trump’s campaign.
House Intelligence Committee officials said they spent hundreds of hours reviewing raw source material used by the intelligence services in the assessment and that it did not meet the appropriate standards to make the claim about helping Trump. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the intelligence material.
Conaway said there will be a second report just dealing with the intelligence assessment and its credibility.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence issued a statement soon after the GOP announcement, saying it stood by the intelligence community’s findings. DNI spokesman Brian Hale said the office will review the findings of the committee’s report.
According to Conaway, the report will agree with the intelligence assessment on most other details, including that Russians did meddle in the election. It will detail Russian cyberattacks on U.S. institutions during the election and the use of social media to sow discord. It will also show a pattern of Russian attacks on European allies — information that could be redacted in the final report. And it will blame officials in President Barack Obama’s administration for a “lackluster” response and look at leaks from the intelligence community to the media.
It will include at least 25 recommendations, including how to improve election security, respond to cyberattacks and improve counterintelligence efforts.
Democrats have criticized Republicans on the committee for shortening the investigation, pointing to multiple contacts between Trump’s campaign and Russia and saying they have seen far too few witnesses to make any judgment on collusion. The Democrats and Republicans have openly fought throughout the investigation, with Democrats suggesting a cover-up for a Republican president and one GOP member of the panel calling the probe “poison” for the previously bipartisan panel.
The top Democrat on the intelligence panel, California Rep. Adam Schiff, suggested that by wrapping up the probe the Republicans were protecting Trump. He called the development a “tragic milestone” and said history would judge them harshly.
Republicans “proved unwilling to subpoena documents like phone records, text messages, bank records and other key records so that we might determine the truth about the most significant attack on our democratic institutions in history,” Schiff said.
The report is also expected to turn the subject of collusion toward the Clinton campaign, saying an anti-Trump dossier compiled by a former British spy and paid for by Democrats was one way that Russians tried to influence the election. Conaway did not suggest that Clinton knowingly coordinated with the Russians, but said the dossier clearly “would have hurt him and helped her.”
He also said there was no evidence that anything “untoward” happened at a June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower between members of the Trump campaign and Russians, though he called it ill-advised. Despite a promise of dirt on Clinton ahead of the meeting, there’s no evidence that such material was exchanged, he said.
The Senate Intelligence Committee, which is also investigating the Russian intervention, is expected to have a bipartisan report out in the coming weeks dealing with election security. The Senate panel is expected to issue findings on the more controversial issue of coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia at a later date.
The Senate Judiciary Committee, also investigating the meddling, is expected to release transcripts soon of closed-door interviews with several people who attended the 2016 meeting between the Trump campaign and Russians. It’s unclear if the Judiciary panel will produce a final report.
The congressional investigations are completely separate from special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe, which is likely to take much longer. It has already resulted in charges against several people linked to Trump’s campaign.
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Associated Press writer Chad Day contributed to this report.

Pa. House election hits final day of campaign in close race
By BILL BARROW and MARC LEVY, Associated Press
CANONSBURG, Pa. (AP) — The final day of campaigning Monday before votes are cast in Pennsylvania’s closely watched congressional election drew a visit by Donald Trump Jr. and lots of door-knocking all over the southwestern district where polls show a close race.
President Donald Trump tweeted about “steel and business” in a final push to sway voters and Donald Trump Jr., visiting a candy-making business, touted Republican Rick Saccone as someone who will be “helping fight with my father” for jobs to come back from overseas.
Saccone, a 60-year-old state lawmaker, has struggled with an electorate that favored Trump by nearly 20 percentage points just 16 months ago. He’s up against 33-year-old Conor Lamb, who pitches himself as an independent-minded Democrat.
Trump Jr., eating ice cream with Saccone at Sarris Candies in front of dozens of cameras, said Trump supporters “gotta stay in the game, they gotta stay motivated.”
“Our guys just can’t take winning for granted,” Trump Jr. said. “They have to get out there, they have to continue this fight, now, for the rest of ’18, in ’20 and in eight years we can make a big difference. They just can’t be lazy. They’ve gotta get out and vote, and if they get out and vote, we win easily.”
The outcome Tuesday of 2018’s first congressional election is being closely watched as a key test of support for Republicans ahead of November’s midterms. Democrats must flip 24 GOP-held seats to claim a House majority, and an upset will embolden them as they look to win in places where the party has lost ground in recent decades.
Republicans, meanwhile, would be spooked about their prospects in this tempestuous era of Trump, who most recently visited Saturday night on Saccone’s behalf.
Trump Jr. was the latest in a line of national pro-Trump figures to appear with Saccone, a strong Trump supporter who boasts one of the most conservative voting records in Pennsylvania’s Legislature.
But that hasn’t given Saccone much traction against Lamb, a Marine veteran and former federal prosecutor in a district with influential labor unions and a long history of coal mining and steel-making.
Lamb has crystallized the debate over whether a younger, charismatic Democrat appealing to win back traditionally Democratic voters can overcome Republican party loyalty in a GOP-leaning district at a time when Trump remains a divisive figure.
A poll released Monday by Monmouth University shows Lamb at 51 percent and Saccone at 45 percent, a district previously held by former eight-term Republican Rep. Tim Murphy.
Pollsters interviewed 372 likely voters by telephone from March 8-11. The sampling margin of error was plus or minus 5.1 percentage points.
The seat is open after Murphy resigned amid the revelation that the strongly anti-abortion lawmaker had urged a woman with whom he was having an affair to get an abortion when they thought she might be pregnant.
A key difference between Murphy and Saccone: Murphy tended to have labor union support. Saccone does not.
GOP and Trump-aligned groups have spent more than $10 million to prop up Saccone and have painted Lamb as a lackey of House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California and weak on immigration.
“Lamb will always vote for Pelosi and Dems….Will raise taxes, weak on Crime and Border,” Trump tweeted Monday.
For his part, Lamb has held the national party at arm’s length, opposing sweeping gun restrictions, endorsing Trump’s new steel tariffs, avoiding attacking the president and telling voters he wouldn’t back Pelosi for speaker if Democrats won a House majority.
Lamb, however, keeps to party orthodoxy on unions.
He blasts the new Republican tax law as a gift to the wealthy and paints congressional Republicans, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, as a threat to Social Security and Medicare.
The area has trended away from conservative Democratic representation in Congress and the state Legislature to Republican over the last two decades in districts drawn by Republicans. Registered Democrats still outnumber Republicans by almost a four-to-three ratio in a district where gun rights are a high priority, and Democrats still hold some local offices.
Saccone had a full schedule of retail visits Monday, including at an ambulance company. Touring the candy-maker, he greeted workers and urged them to vote.
“Bring your friends and family, drag them out,” he told hair-netted employees boxing up chocolate for Easter.
Lamb had no public events scheduled Monday, instead spending the day knocking on doors with his campaign volunteers. Aides say he planned to visit multiple counties in the district, which includes parts of four counties in the greater Pittsburgh area.
Meanwhile, his Allegheny County field office was hopping with activity. Local volunteers were manning phone banks, while others regularly came in to pick up their instructions for visiting voters home on the final day before polls open.
“I was really down after the presidential election, but Conor has me totally enthusiastic again … his youth, his energyy, his ideas,” said Patricia Bancroft, 62, a new retiree who says Lamb is the first political candidate she’s ever volunteered for.
Saccone on Monday insisted he did not support cuts to Medicare or Social Security, and accused the left of trying to scare seniors. He also said he didn’t give the Monmouth poll much credence.
“We’re out meeting people every day and everywhere I get it’s 100 to 1 for Rick Saccone,” Saccone said. “So I’m ready. I’m ready for tomorrow.”
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Barrow reported from Carnegie, Pennsylvania. Follow Barrow and Levy on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BillBarrowAP and https://twittter.com/timelywriter .