Deadly fire shuts down key route to Yosemite National Park

MARIPOSA, Calif. — A wildfire that killed a California firefighter grew quickly and forced the closure of a key route into Yosemite National Park as crews contended with sweltering conditions Sunday, authorities said.

The blaze that broke out Friday scorched more than 6 square miles of dry brush along steep, remote hillsides on the park’s western edge. It was burning largely out of control, and officials shut off electricity to many areas, including Yosemite Valley, as a safety precaution.

Guests were ordered to leave Yosemite Cedar Lodge on Saturday as flames crept up slopes and the air became thick with smoke.

“You can’t see anything, it’s so smoky outside. It’s crazy,” said front desk clerk Spencer Arebalo, one of a handful of employees who stayed behind at the popular hotel inside the park.

He said it was surreal to see the property empty at the height of tourist season.

Suspect dead after wounding

three Kansas City officers

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A gunman being investigated in the killing of a university student from India shot and wounded three Kansas City police officers Sunday before dying in an exchange of gunfire with police, authorities said.

The three officers’ wounds were not life-threatening, police said.

The suspect, whose name has not been released, had been identified as a person of interest in the slaying of Sharath Koppu and officers had him under surveillance, according to police. Koppu, 25, was a master’s degree student from India who was studying at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

Koppu was shot on July 6 during an armed robbery at a fast food restaurant in Kansas City where he worked.

Jagdeesh Subramanian, president of the India Association of Kansas City, said the group is grateful to police for pursuing Koppu’s shooting diligently and that “there is some closure” with the person of interest’s death.

Kushner tenants pushed out for luxury condo buyers

NEW YORK — The hammering and drilling began just months after Jared Kushner’s family real estate firm bought a converted warehouse apartment building in the hip, Williamsburg section of Brooklyn.

Tenants say it started early in the morning and went on until nightfall, so loud that it drowned out normal conversation, so violent it rattled pictures off the walls. So much dust wafted through ducts and under doorways that it coated beds and clothes in closets. Rats crawled through holes in the walls. Workers with passkeys barged in unannounced. Residents who begged for relief got a standard reply, “We have permits.”

More than a dozen current and former residents of the building told The Associated Press that they believe the Kushner Cos.’ relentless construction, along with rent hikes of $500 a month or more, was part of a campaign to push tenants out of rent-stabilized apartments and bring high-paying condo buyers in.

If so, it was a remarkably successful campaign. An AP investigation found that over the past three years, more than 250 rent-stabilized apartments — 75 percent of the building — were either emptied or sold as the Kushner Cos. was converting the building to luxury condos. Those sales so far have totaled more than $155 million, an average of $1.2 million per apartment.

“They won, they succeeded,” says Barth Bazyluk, who left apartment C606 with his wife and baby daughter in December. “You have to be ignorant or dumb to think this wasn’t deliberate.”

Man killed by Chicago police ran away, reached for waist

CHICAGO — A man killed by Chicago police had a gun in a holster at his hip and was shot multiple times as he ran away, spun around and reached toward his waist, according to footage released Sunday from an officer’s body-worn camera.

Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said it’s the quickest he has ever ordered such video released and that he hoped to dispel rumors that Harith Augustus, 37, was unarmed. He also hoped that making the 30-second clip public before a planned protest would prevent another violent confrontation between residents and officers.

Protesters angry about the killing Saturday took to the streets in a city that’s struggled with police shootings, especially against black men and other minorities. Some threw rocks and bottles at officers — including ones filled with urine — and police pulled people to the ground and hit them with batons.

“The community needs some answers and they need them now,” he told reporters Sunday. “We can’t have another night like last night.”

He said Augustus’ family was in favor of releasing the video for the same reason.

From wire sources

Syrian government targets rebels near Israel-occupied Golan

BEIRUT — Syrian government forces unleashed hundreds of missiles on a rebel-held area near the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights on Sunday, activists said, the latest phase in an offensive to clear southern Syria of insurgents.

The government’s push came after it had secured control of most of Daraa province in an offensive that began in June. On Sunday, the first batch of armed fighters and their families left the city of Daraa, the provincial capital, in buses that would take them to the rebel-held Idlib province in the north.

Similar deals in other parts of Syria resulted in the evacuation of thousands of opposition fighters and civilians — evacuations that the United Nations and rights groups have decried as forced displacement.

Syrian President Bashar Assad said Sunday the success in driving the opposition out of Daraa embodies the will of his army and allied forces to “liberate all of Syrian territories” of “terrorism.”

In recent months and backed by Russian air force, the Syrian government has restored control of over 60 percent of previously rebel-held territory across the country.

___

Pussy Riot upstages Putin with protest that halts World Cup

MOSCOW — Protest group Pussy Riot, long a thorn in Vladimir Putin’s side, claimed responsibility Sunday for four people who brought the World Cup final to a brief halt by running onto the field dressed in police uniforms as the Russian president and a global audience watched.

Stewards tackled the three women and one man who charged onto the field simultaneously in the 52nd minute of one of the world’s most viewed sporting events.

Croatia defender Dejan Lovren pushed the man, helping a steward to detain him, and suggested the incident put Croatia off its game. The team was 2-1 down when the protest happened, and eventually lost 4-2.

“I really was mad because we’d been playing at that moment in good shape,” he said. “We’d been playing good football and then some interruption came. I just lost my head and I grabbed the guy and I wished I could throw him away from the stadium.”

Before being hauled away, one of the women reached the center of the field and shared a double high-five with France forward Kylian Mbappe.

___

Eighth animal dies after jaguar escapes Audubon Zoo habitat

NEW ORLEANS — Eight animals have now died after a jaguar escaped from its habitat at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans.

NOLA.com reports an alpaca and fox died Sunday, the day after the male jaguar killed four alpacas, one emu and one fox Saturday morning. The jaguar was captured and returned to its night house after being sedated by a vet team.

No people were hurt and the zoo was reopened Sunday.

The zoo acquired the alpacas in March from farms in Alabama and Mississippi. The alpaca that died overnight Sunday was the zoo’s last living alpaca.

One injured fox continues to be monitored.