Three rural Illinois men charged with mosque bombing
CHICAGO — Federal authorities on Tuesday charged three men from rural central Illinois with the bombing of a Minnesota mosque last year and said one of the suspects told an investigator the goal of the attack was to “scare” Muslims out of the United States.
A statement from the U.S. attorney’s office in Springfield, Illinois, says the men also are suspected in the attempted bombing of an abortion clinic in November.
The Dar Al-Farooq Islamic Center in Bloomington, Minnesota, was bombed just before morning prayers on Aug. 5, causing a fire and extensive damage although no one was injured or killed. There was an attempted bombing of the Champaign, Illinois, Women’s Health Practice on Nov. 7.
The three men are identified as Michael B. Hari, 47; Joe Morris, 22; Michael McWhorter, 29. All are from Clarence, a rural community 35 miles (56 kilometers) north of Champaign-Urbana. A fourth man was charged with a gun offense, but he was not identified as a suspect in the bombing or attempted bombing.
A complaint said a tip in December led authorities to investigate the three men, after a person sent the local sheriff photos of guns and bomb-making material inside Hari’s parents’ home, where Hari often stayed. In January, a second informant told authorities that the three men had carried out the mosque bombing and the failed clinic bombing, according to the complaint.
House Democrats cite ‘evidence’ of collusion with Russia
WASHINGTON — Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee are sharply disagreeing with Republicans on the panel who say they don’t see any evidence of collusion or coordination between President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia.
California Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the panel, said Tuesday that he believes there is “significant evidence” of collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia, though he couldn’t say if there was criminal wrongdoing.
Republicans on the committee announced Monday that they’d completed a draft report and they saw no evidence of collusion. Schiff, who saw the GOP report for the first time on Tuesday, said Democrats on the committee would try to continue the investigation where possible and would write their own report to lay out conclusions from the intelligence panel’s yearlong investigation into Russian meddling.
The GOP report “misleadingly characterizes events, and paints a portrait and tells a story that could not have been better written if it was written in the White House itself,” Schiff said.
Trump enthusiastically praised the draft Republican report, telling reporters Tuesday morning that the White House is “very, very happy” with the GOP conclusions.
Families of two Austin bomb victims
knew each other
AUSTIN, Texas — Families of two people killed by package bombs left on their doorsteps in Austin knew each other and were connected through local activism in the black community, a civic leader said Tuesday. But it was not clear how they might be tied to a third household where a package bomb also exploded.
Investigators have said the three blasts that killed two people and wounded two others could have been hate crimes since all the victims were black or Hispanic. But they also said they have not ruled out any possible motive.
Draylen Mason, 17, was killed and his mother wounded when a package bomb was opened Monday in their kitchen. The teen’s grandfather is Norman Mason, a prominent dentist in east Austin. He was friends with Freddie Dixon, stepfather of 39-year-old Anthony House, who died in a similar attack in another part of the city on March 2, said Nelson Linder, president of the Austin chapter of the NAACP.
“I don’t believe in coincidences,” Linder said, explaining that he was concerned by the fact that the families were acquainted.
Still unknown is what connection — if any — the two families had to a third household where another package bomb exploded Monday, wounding a 75-year-old Hispanic woman who remains hospitalized in critical condition but has not yet been identified.
Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said he was aware of the connection but did not know if would affect the case.
“Our detectives are currently looking at that to evaluate that lead and to see if it is in fact relevant to what we are investigating,” Manley said.
Business records indicate that Dixon was a leader of Austin’s African American Cultural Heritage District, or “Six Square,” which the city defines as 6 square miles of east Austin that was originally created as the Negro District by the Austin City Council in 1928. He also was a longtime pastor at Wesley United Methodist Church, one of the city’s oldest historically black churches.
Dog dies after airline worker has it placed in an overhead bin
A dog died on a United Airlines plane after a flight attendant ordered its owner to put the animal in the plane’s overhead bin.
United said Tuesday that it took full responsibility for the incident on the Monday night flight from Houston to New York.
In a statement, United called it “a tragic accident that should never have occurred, as pets should never be placed in the overhead bin.”
The dog was in a small pet carrier designed to fit under an airline seat.
Passengers reported that they heard barking during the flight and didn’t know that the dog had died until the plane landed at LaGuardia Airport.
By wire sources
