New 988 hotline is the 911 for mental health emergencies
Quick help for suicide thoughts and other mental health emergencies will soon be as easy as 9-8-8. The United States’ first nationwide three-digit mental health crisis hotline goes live on Saturday. It connects with an existing network and is designed to be as simple to remember and use as 911. But instead of a dispatcher sending police or paramedics, 988 will connect callers with trained mental health counselors, and eventually much more. But it won’t happen overnight. Many states have a long way to go to get comprehensive systems in place.
Prosecutor warns Georgia officials they may face charges in Trump inquiry
Two pro-Trump state senators and the chair of the state Republican Party were sent letters by an Atlanta prosecutor informing them they could be indicted, according to a person familiar with the inquiry into election meddling by former President Donald Trump. The Fulton County prosecutor, Fani T. Willis, is also weighing whether to subpoena Trump and seek his testimony before a grand jury. The letters to David Shafer, the Georgia Republican Party chair, and state Sens. Burt Jones and Brandon Beach were first reported by Yahoo News. Neither the men nor their lawyers could be reached for comment Friday.
As US COVID hospitalizations climb, chronic nursing shortage worsens
American hospitals are once again filling up with coronavirus patients — but not with nurses to care for them. Hospitalizations have risen steadily in recent weeks, and the daily average number of people in hospitals who are infected with the coronavirus now exceeds 39,000, the highest it has been since the waning days of the first omicron surge in early March. To close the gaps, hospitals are offering financial incentives for new hires, bringing in more freelance nurses and in some cases cutting services that they cannot adequately staff to provide.
Medical examiner: Jayland Walker was shot dozens of times
A preliminary autopsy report shows that Jayland Walker was shot dozens of times and that 26 bullets were recovered from his body. Walker was a 25-year-old Black man who died last month at the hands of police in the Ohio city of Akron. The county medical examiner released her report Friday. She tallied 41 entry wounds and five wounds from bullets that grazed Walker. The June 27 pursuit began when officers tried to pull Walker over for equipment violations. Authorities say Walker fired a gunshot from his car 40 seconds into the chase. An attorney for Walker’s family says there was no need for officers to kill him.
China’s leader visits Xinjiang for the first time since imposing crackdown
China’s leader, Xi Jinping, made his first visit to the western region of Xinjiang since he unleashed a campaign of mass detentions of Uyghurs there. Xi’s four-day visit that ended Friday focused on projecting that Xinjiang had become united and stable under his leadership. After his last visit in 2014, Xi set in motion drastic policies to press the region’s Uyghurs and other largely Muslim ethnic groups to identify as members of one Chinese nation loyal to the Communist Party. The visit comes just two weeks after Xi made a rare trip to Hong Kong, his first since the huge, and at times violent, protests there in 2019.
Drug kingpin convicted of killing DEA agent captured in Mexico
A drug kingpin convicted of orchestrating the torture and murder of a Drug Enforcement Administration agent was captured in northern Mexico on Friday, according to Mexican officials. Rafael Caro Quintero was captured in a joint operation involving the Mexican marines and the country’s prosecutor’s office near the town of San Simón in Sinaloa state. Caro Quintero was convicted of masterminding the 1985 killing of DEA agent Enrique Camarena and was placed on the FBI’s 10 most wanted list in 2018, after he had been released in 2013 on a legal technicality. He has been on the run since.
Russian cruise missiles rain down on southern Ukrainian city
Ukrainian officials say cruise missiles fired by Russian strategic bombers struck a southeastern Ukrainian city, killing at least three people and wounding 15. The attack on Dnipro came a day after a Russian missile strike killed at least 23 people and wounded more than 200 in Vinnytsia, a city southwest of Kyiv, the capital. Russia’s military campaign has been focusing on the Donbas in Ukraine’s east, but Russian forces also have been pounding other parts of the country in a relentless push to wrest territory from Ukraine and soften the morale of its leaders, civilians and troops as the war nears the five-month mark.
Sri Lanka’s prime minister sworn in as interim president
Sri Lanka’s prime minister has been sworn in as interim president until Parliament elects a successor to Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who fled abroad and resigned after mass protests over the country’s economic collapse. Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was acting president since Rajapaksa fled the country Wednesday after angry protesters had stormed his official residence. Lawmakers are to convene Saturday to begin choosing a new leader who will serve the remainder of Rajapaksa’s term, which ends in 2024. Protesters cooked and distributed milk rice — a food Sri Lankans enjoy to celebrate victories — after Rajapaksa’s resignation. But they insisted Wickremesinghe also should step aside.
5-letter word for fun? Hasbro, NYT create Wordle board game
The company that makes some of the world’s most iconic board games including Scrabble, Monopoly, and Clue is developing a new one based on Wordle, the obsessively popular digital word-guessing game. Hasbro Inc. and Wordle owner The New York Times announced Thursday that Wordle: The Party Game will be available for purchase in North America in October. In the free online version, players get six tries to guess a five-letter word. The drawback is that it can only be played once per day. The board game will give players the opportunity to play against others, and play as much as they want.
By wire sources