Another setback for the Biden Administration as the battle over Title 42 rages on.
New information on the house fire in Brooklyn that killed two – why we may never know how it started.
Cardinal Timothy Dolan is already in Rome and heading east.
High-tech glasses that can help blind people to see again.
Currents News Staff
American Trevor Reed is a free man once more as the U.S. and Russia agreed to a prisoner swap.
“It’s been almost 1,000 days,” said Paula Reed, the Mother of Trevor Reed, “so I’m just excited to see him.”
Reed’s parents are calling his release an answer to their prayers.
“Finally after waiting all this time,” said Paula, “I’m going to get to hug my kid, wrap my arms around him.”
The Texan had been detained for nearly three years on charges of fighting with Russian police.
“He looks terrible to us,” his mom said. “As his parents, we know he does not look well. He’s very thin. He was walking strange. It looked like he needed help getting on the plane.”
As part of the deal, the U.S. is releasing a Russian pilot sentenced for drug trafficking. But no answers yet for two other Americans who are still under Russian detention – WNBA star Brittney Griner and former Marine Paul Whelan.
“Our work is not yet finished,” said Ned Price, U.S. State Dept Spokesman. “Of course, we’re going to continue at it.”
In a devastating move, Moscow cut off NATO countries Poland and Bulgaria from its gas supply after they refused to pay in Russian rubles. It’s a move that the EU is calling “blackmail.” Russia is reporting blasts on their territory of three regions bordering Ukraine.
New video evidence contradicts Russia’s repeated denials of responsibility for the mass killings.
“I don’t think Putin cares about being a pariah,” said Garry Kasparov, the Chairman of Renew Democracy Initiative. “It’s about staying in power.”
Currents News Staff
Pope Francis sent a video message to the participants of this year’s Raíces y Alas conference in Washington, D.C., the 6th National Catholic Congress on Hispanic Ministry in the United States.
“I invite you to reflect on the need to be Christian that transforms structures and that can build bridges across all sectors of society,” said Pope Francis.
The pontiff observed that in this time of war and pandemic, humanity needs to change its mentality away from “schemes of war,” to focus on projects of peace.
“I need peace,” said the pontiff, “you need peace, the world needs peace, breathing peace is healthy. We need tangible signs of peace. Christians must set the example.
Most Reverend Bishop Robert J. Brennan’s Homily from Wednesday’s Mass on 4/27/22
Currents News Staff
A Catholic institution of higher learning is moving up a grade. St. Joseph’s College is now St. Joseph’s University, New York, thanks to a new state designation.
The university’s president, Donald Boomgaarden, says the new designation is part of the mission of the school’s founders – the Sisters of St. Joseph.
For those wondering about the difference, a college is often a smaller institution that emphasizes undergraduate education, while universities are typically larger institutions that have both undergrad and graduate programs.
The change will not impact the curriculum or the tuition at the school. So how does a college even become a university? St. Joseph’s had to submit a charter amendment to the New York State Department of Education and the Board of Regents.
The school has to reach these requirements: One, offer a range of registered undergrad and graduate curriculums in the liberal arts and sciences. Two, allow students to get degrees in two or more professional fields and three, have doctoral programs in at least three academic fields.
The only Hispanic woman on death row has been granted a stay of execution.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked the White House from lifting Title 42.
Millions of refugees have fled Ukraine since Russia invaded. Many have gone to neighboring Poland.
Currents News Staff
The Biden White House is temporarily blocked from ending “Title 42” by a federal judge in Louisiana.
“If President Biden lifts Title 42, what we see today will be much worse. A country without a secure border is not a country,” said Rep. Kevin McCarthy.
“Title 42” allows U.S. border officials to turn migrants away due to public health concerns. Namely, the COVID-19 pandemic.
“This is not an immigration policy. This title 42 is a health authority that’s determined by the CDC and we need to have a conversation about immigration reform that’s vital, maybe this is a reminder of that,” said White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki.
Critics of removing the order say it is likely to cause a greater surge of migrants at an already stressed border.
“Title 42 is a band aid on a gunshot wound. It’s not actual border security. It’s important but it represents the ability to turn people away and actually secure the border,” said Rep. Chip Roy of Texas.
President Joe Biden wants to end the policy, which was invoked during the Trump administration, on May 23. A White House source says the federal judge’s block may not disrupt those plans.
“I would note that there are a range of views on Title 42 there are some you noted who are very vocal about how they would like to see an extended. There are some who are very vocal about how they would not like to see that happen. So that’s an important discussion that will be happening over the coming days and weeks,” said Psaki.
By Currents News Staff and Carol Zimmerman
WASHINGTON (CNS) — Catholic leaders were thankful that death-row inmate Melissa Lucio was granted a last-minute stay of execution April 25, but they also said her sentence shows a failure in the use of capital punishment in this country and stressed that they would continue to pray for Lucio and her family and advocate on her behalf.
Lucio, 53, a Catholic mother of 14 and a grandmother, was scheduled for execution April 27 for the 2007 death of her 2-year-old daughter, Mariah, that Lucio has maintained was due to her daughter’s accidental fall down a stairwell.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which issued a stay of execution, ordered the 138th Judicial District Court of Cameron County to consider the new evidence presented by Lucio’s legal team.
Lucio will remain on death row while her case goes back to trial court to examine new evidence her attorneys say shows that the toddler’s death was an accident caused by an undiagnosed injury sustained after falling down the stairs two days before she died.
“I am grateful the court has given me the chance to live and prove my innocence. Mariah is in my heart today and always,” Lucio said in a statement through her attorneys. “I am grateful to have more days to be a mother to my children and a grandmother to my grandchildren.”
Lucio heard the news of the stopped execution in a phone call with state Rep. Jeff Leach, a Republican, and began sobbing when she heard it, attorneys told reporters in an April 25 Zoom call.
Lucio’s sister, Sonya Valencia, told reporters that the family members were thankful for support they had been given and added: “Our faith has gotten us through this.”
The Texas Catholic bishops had joined a broad coalition of faith leaders, Latino organizations, anti-domestic violence groups and the Innocence Project in urging state leaders to commute Lucio’s sentence and conduct a meaningful review of her case.
An application for clemency submitted March 22 by her attorneys included new evidence not only about Lucio’s daughter but information the jury never heard that shows Lucio was a victim of sexual abuse and domestic violence.
The evidence also said Lucio’s confession was just repeating what officers said during her five-hour interrogation and that she asserted her innocence more than 100 times during that interrogation. It included statements from four jurors who said they have grave concerns about evidence withheld from them at the trial.
“We give thanks to God that Melissa will not be executed this week and that she will soon have the opportunity for a new trial to prove her innocence,” said Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, executive director of Catholic Mobilizing Network.
In an April 25 statement she added that with Lucio’s case, “we see clearly how deeply flawed our capital punishment system is, and how it places innocent lives at risk. Her story also reveals how this system targets the most vulnerable among us, including people of color and those with histories of serious trauma.”
Vaillancourt Murphy said Lucio is “a Mexican-American mother, a devout Catholic and a lifelong victim of sexual and physical abuse. It has been disturbing to learn how, after suffering the unimaginable loss of her young daughter, Melissa was then further victimized and retraumatized by our legal system.”
She also thanked the Catholic bishops of Texas for their “committed advocacy on Melissa’s behalf.”
The Texas Catholic Conference of Bishops similarly commended the state court for intervening for Lucio but emphasized that her case “highlights the serious flaws in our justice system that allowed her to be condemned to death on the basis of a dubious conviction.”
Sister Helen Prejean, a Sister of St. Joseph of Medaille and longtime opponent of the death penalty, echoed this view, tweeting April 25 that she was “so thankful that a court finally stepped in today and stopped Melissa Lucio’s execution.”
“The death penalty is always horrific, but executing a mother for a crime that never even happened? Melissa was coerced into making a false confession 15 years ago. May the truth come out now,” she said.
She also said that those in the criminal legal system “should prioritize accuracy and getting to the truth.”
“Isn’t that the least we should expect? What does it say about priorities in the system when police and prosecutors fight tooth and nail against reforms to prevent false confessions?” she tweeted.
In a recent court appeal filed by Vanessa Potkin, an attorney for Lucio and director of special litigation at the Innocence Project, said: “There is just too much doubt. We cannot move forward in this case and risk executing an innocent woman.”
Attorneys for Lucio have sought relief multiple times to no avail. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit said Lucio had been denied her right to fully defend herself but that procedural rules barred the court from overturning her conviction. The Supreme Court has declined to take up Lucio’s case.
The Innocence Project, in a brief filed with the Supreme Court, questioned the manner of interrogation used on Lucio about her daughter’s death. “Interrogation may sometimes psychologically pressure even innocent people to confess to crimes they did not commit,” it said, adding that the risk of a false confession is “heightened when the interrogated suspect is a battered woman.”
Currents News Staff
WASHINGTON (CNS) — A federal judge at an April 25 hearing said he would grant the requests of three states to force the federal government to keep in place a public-health order at the U.S.-Mexico border that has increased the number of expulsions of immigrants trying to cross into the United States.
The public-health order, known as Title 42, allows the United States to bar entry of persons who have recently been in a country where a communicable disease was present. It was applied by the Trump administration in March 2020, soon after the coronavirus pandemic was declared by the World Health Organization.
U.S. District Judge Robert R. Summerhays of the Western District of Louisiana, an appointee of former President Donald Trump, said he would sign an order to keep the policy in place, and to order the federal government to certify that it is not acting ahead of its announced May 23 date to drop the Title 42 provision.
The Biden administration has come under fire from both Republicans and Democrats for planning to end the policy. The Centers for Disease Control and Protection announced in April that the restriction could be dropped in late May.
Catholic groups that support immigrants have long been calling for an end to this restriction.
Since Title 42 was applied at the border, 1.61 million people have been expelled by the United States through January, the latest month for which statistics are available. The vast majority, 1.56 million, were expelled by the U.S. Border Patrol, while 52,735 were expelled by the Office of Field Operations.
Immigration advocates criticized the policy when it was first enacted by Trump, and have pressed the Biden administration to drop it.
Some elected officials have predicted an overwhelming surge in immigration should Title 42 be lifted, predicting 12,000 to 13,000 border crossings daily. The Biden administration said it is planning for 18,000 daily crossings effective May 23.
Summerhays has not yet ruled on another request in the suit to force the Biden administration to keep Title 42 in place. The United States has made exceptions to the policy, particularly in the case of well-founded fears of violence and death if not admitted into the country.
The suit was brought by the states of Arizona, Louisiana and Missouri, the latter two of which have no land border crossing with Mexico.
While the majority of immigrants hail from the “Northern Triangle” countries of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, a growing number of refugees from countries even further from Mexico — such as Cuba, Brazil and India — have shown up at the border. Mexico has been loath to accept them after they were expelled by the United States.
In recent weeks, Ukrainians fleeing their homeland after Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine have also been seeking entry into the United States from Mexico.
The FDNY is in mourning a day after 31-year-old firefighter Timothy Klein was killed in a Brooklyn house fire.
Russia’s military showed no signs of letting up on its attacks in Ukraine during the Orthodox Easter weekend.