MGM sues Vegas shooting victims in push to avoid liability
LAS VEGAS — MGM Resorts International has sued hundreds of victims of the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history in a bid to avoid liability for the gunfire that rained down from its Mandalay Bay casino-resort in Las Vegas.
The company argues in lawsuits filed Friday in Nevada and California that it has “no liability of any kind” to survivors or families of slain victims under a federal law enacted after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
The lawsuits target victims who have sued the company and voluntarily dismissed their claims or have threatened to sue after a gunman shattered the windows of his Mandalay Bay suite and fired on a crowd gathered below for a country music festival.
58 people were killed and hundreds more were injured. Victims with active lawsuits against MGM don’t face the company’s legal claim.
Prosecutor in girl’s 1988 killing hails genealogy databases
FORT WAYNE, Ind. — An Indiana prosecutor is crediting genealogy databases with helping identify a suspect in the 1988 abduction, rape and killing of an 8-year-old girl, saying criminals should be worried about these powerful new crime-fighting tools.
John D. Miller, 59, was arrested Sunday on preliminary charges of murder, child molestation and criminal confinement in the killing of April Marie Tinsley. He’s due to be formally charged Thursday.
Investigators examined genealogy databases in the search for Tinsley’s killer, according to an affidavit filed Sunday. California investigators used the same approach to arrest Joseph DeAngelo in April for dozens of rapes and 12 killings in the 1970s and 80s.
Allen County Prosecutor Karen Richards said in the affidavit that investigators consulted with Parabon Nanolabs, a Virginia-based DNA phenotyping company that assists law enforcement organizations, and it narrowed DNA in the Tinsley case to two surviving brothers, including Miller. Miller’s brother isn’t accused of wrongdoing.
A genetic genealogist used publicly available genealogy database research in the company’ work, the affidavit states.
Dems see Kavanaugh as Obamacare threat, but law likely safe
BOSTON — The heated debate over how Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh would vote on the Affordable Care Act might not matter. As long as five past defenders of the health care law remain on the nation’s highest court, the odds tilt in favor of it being allowed to stand.
Some Democrats are warning that President Donald Trump’s designee could spell doom for the statute, even as some conservatives are portraying Kavanaugh as sympathetic to former President Barack Obama’s landmark legislation.
But where Kavanaugh would vote if he joins the Supreme Court is less clear than both sides suggest, according to an Associated Press review of the appeals court judge’s decisions, other writings and speeches.
Kavanaugh could get to weigh in on the health care statute if the high court takes up a lawsuit brought by Texas and 19 other states. Those states are seeking to strike down the entire law because the Republican-backed tax overhaul removed fines for not having health insurance.
By wire sources