LONDON (AP) — A very fast car has made a very slow return.
British police said Monday that they have recovered a Ferrari stolen from Austrian Formula One driver Gerhard Berger in Italy almost three decades ago.
The red Ferrari F512M was one of two sports cars taken while their drivers were in Imola for the San Marino Grand Prix in April 1995.
Neither was ever found, until London’s Metropolitan Police force was tipped off by the manufacturer in January that a Ferrari in the process of being sold to a U.S. buyer by a U.K. broker had been flagged as a stolen vehicle.
The force’s Organized Vehicle Crime Unit investigated and found the car had been brought to Britain from Japan in late 2023. Officers seized the car, which the force said is valued at close to 350,000 pounds ($444,000).
“Our inquiries were painstaking and included contacting authorities from around the world,” said Constable Mike Pilbeam, who led the investigation.
“We worked quickly with partners including the National Crime Agency, as well as Ferrari and international car dealerships, and this collaboration was instrumental in understanding the vehicle’s background and stopping it from leaving the country.”
No one has been arrested, and the second stolen Ferrari remains missing.
Ferrari manufactured 501 of the F512M model between 1994 and 1996. The car has a top speed of 315 kilometers an hour (196 miles per hour).
BY PATRICK ORSAGOS AND BRUCE SHIPKOWSKI for the Associated Press
WHITEHALL, Ohio (AP) — Two Ohio lawmakers are looking to ease a looming financial burden on law enforcement agencies in their state that will have to replace marijuana-sniffing dogs after voters approved a plan last year to legalize recreational marijuana use.
Nearly 400 police dogs in Ohio trained in the detection of marijuana will need to be retired because they cannot be reliably retrained. That means any alert they give to the presence of drugs could be challenged in court because they cannot unlearn the smell of cannabis.
State Rep. Sean Brennan, a Democrat from Parma, called that an “unintended consequence” of the decision by Ohio voters in November to legalize recreational use.
Brennan and Rep. Josh Williams, R-Sylvania, are the lead sponsors of a bill that would provide each agency with up to $20,000 per dog to offset the cost of acquiring, training and equipping narcotics dogs that don’t alert to the smell of marijuana.
“I don’t think that anybody that voted for the issue, either intended or knew that this was even going to be a problem for our police departments, and it’s a real concern,” Brennan said.
He noted that acquiring the dogs and training them is a major expense.
“The fact that we’re now going to need 300 canines, like overnight in Ohio, the demand for dogs and for training is going to be at a premium,” he added.
Whitehall Police Officer Matthew Perez, a trained dog handler who serves with his canine partner Rico, said the measure would greatly help communities such as his.
“These dogs can range (in price) from $7,500 to $11,000, and some places might sell them more,” Perez said.
He encouraged support for the bill.
“I think the (grant money) would be super beneficial for some departments that may not have as much money or profit coming in, you know, and they’re needing a dog, or they’re wanting a dog and they’re wanting to continue that program,” he said.
Whitehall Police Deputy Chief Dan Kelso said the dogs on staff live with their handlers and the handlers will be able to buy the dogs from the city for $1 when they’re retired.
Under the referendum approved by voters, adults in Ohio can legally legally grow and possess cannabis at home. However, they cannot legally buy it yet since the state legislature and state regulators are still debating exactly how the new rules will be phased in. A hearing on that plan was held Thursday, but it’s not clear when a final decision will come.
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Residents and schoolkids in Mexico City helped squads of police in a long-winded pursuit of a wolf loose in one of the city’s neighborhoods, authorities said.
Citizens and police officers chased the animal on foot and on motorbikes in the north-side neighborhood, before the medium-sized wolf finally was cornered “with the help of neighbors,” the city police department said late Monday.
The Milenio television station interviewed a 15-year-old boy who headed off the wolf with his motorbike. “We came to catch the wolf,” the boy said.
Once corned, police animal-control officers snared the wolf with a rope and forced the German-shepherd-sized animal into a cage for transport.
It was unclear where the wolf came from. It appeared trotting down sidewalks in a densely built-up neighborhood near a city zoo. But the city’s Environment Department said all of the zoo’s wolves were accounted for.
Wolves are native to central Mexico, but are rarely if ever seen in the metropolis of 20 million.
BROCKTON, Mass. (AP) — Officials have asked Gov. Maura Healey to send in the Massachusetts National Guard to stop violence and address security concerns at a troubled high school in a city south of Boston, some school committee members said Monday.
Four of the seven members of the Brockton School Committee backed the National Guard request amid teacher shortages and budget deficits, but city officials weren’t unanimous in their support.
The governor’s office acknowledged the concerns about Brockton High School, where teachers reported fighting and drug use in the hallways, and verbal abuse of staff. “Our administration is committed to ensuring that schools are safe and supportive environments for students, educators, and staff,” Healey’s office said.
Brockton Mayor Robert Sullivan, who serves as chair of the school committee, said he forwarded the request to the governor on Friday, even though he opposed it. “National Guard soldiers are not the answer,” he said.
School committee members who backed the request held a news conference Monday to press their case for help. They said National Guard personnel could be used as hall monitors or even substitute teachers.
“We’re not asking them to deploy a whole army to our school. We’re asking for support,” committee member Ana Oliver said.
“If you support safety in our schools, you will support the National Guard to come in here and keep our schools safe,” said Tony Rodrigues, another committee member.
Students are not in class this week. The police chief will provide an update on efforts to address the problems after the winter break concludes, the mayor said.
LONDON (AP) — Law-enforcement agencies have infiltrated and disrupted Lockbit, a prolific ransomware syndicate behind cyberattacks around the world, Britain’s National Crime Agency said Tuesday.
The agency said it led an international operation targeting LockBit, which provides ransomware as a service to so-called affiliates who infect victim networks with the computer-crippling malware and negotiate ransoms. The group has been linked to thousands of attacks since 2019.
Hours before the announcement, the front page of LockBit’s site was replaced with the words “this site is now under control of law enforcement,” alongside the flags of the U.K., the U.S. and several other nations.
The message said the website was under the control of the U.K.’s National Crime Agency “working in close cooperation with the FBI and the international law enforcement task force, Operation Cronos.”
It says it is an “ongoing and developing operation” that also involves agencies from Germany, France, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Canada, among others, including Europol.
LockBit, which has been operating since 2019, has been the most prolific ransomware syndicate two years running. The group accounted for 23% of the nearly 4,000 attacks globally last year in which ransomware gangs posted data stolen from victims to extort payment, according to the cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks.
A rare offensive cyber-operation for the U.K. crime agency, the operation aimed to steal all of LockBit’s data and then destroy its infrastructure, causing a “significant major degradation” of the cybercrime threat.
LockBit is dominated by Russian speakers and does not attack former Soviet nations. The syndicate provides clients with the platform and the malware to conduct attacks and collect ransoms.
It has been linked to attacks on the U.K.’s Royal Mail, Britain’s National Health Service, airplane manufacturer Boeing, international law firm Allen and Overy and China’s biggest bank, ICBC.
Last June, U.S. federal agencies released an advisory that attributed about 1,700 ransomware attacks in the United States since 2020 to LockBit and said victims included “municipal governments, county governments, public higher education and K-12 schools, and emergency services.”
An NCA official called LockBit “the Instagram or Rolls-Royce” of ransomware and said the aim of the operation was to discredit the syndicate and “obliterate their reputation.”
“Attacking the brand is as important as attacking the infrastructure,” said an NCA official, adding that the goal of the operation was to “sow distrust amongst all the criminal users, shatter their credibility.”
Ransomware is the costliest and most disruptive form of cybercrime, crippling local governments, court systems, hospitals and schools as well as businesses. It is difficult to combat as most gangs are based in former Soviet states and out of reach of Western justice. Law enforcement agencies have scored some recent successes against ransomware gangs, most notably the FBI’s operation against the Hive syndicate. But the criminals regroup and rebrand.
Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre has previously warned that ransomware remains one of the biggest cyber threats facing the U.K. and urges people and organisations not to pay ransoms if they are targeted.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Lawmakers in at least six states are considering longer prison sentences or bigger fines for harming or killing police dogs, and the idea has bipartisan support despite questions about how the animals are used and a fraught history.
In Kansas on Wednesday, the Republican-controlled House voted 107-4 to pass a bill sponsored by its top leader to allow judges to sentence first-time offenders to five years in prison and mandate a fine of at least $10,000 for killing dogs used by police, arson investigators, game wardens or search and rescue teams, and for killing police horses. Those crimes already are felonies, but the maximum prison sentence is one year; the maximum fine is $5,000, and the law does not specifically cover horses.
Two days ago, Colorado’s Democratic-dominated House voted 52-12 for a measure that would require people convicted of aggravated cruelty to a law enforcement animal to also pay a minimum fine of $2,000 and reimburse an agency for its costs in caring for the animal or replacing it. They already face a prison sentence of up to six years.
And Monday, the GOP-controlled Missouri House gave its initial approval to legislation that would increase the penalties for harming dogs and horses used by law enforcement, with a final vote expected next week. The penalty for severely injuring or killing an animal is up to four years in prison, and the bill would make it up to seven years.
Similar bills have been filed this year in Democratic-led Hawaii and in GOP-leaning South Carolina and West Virginia.
In South Carolina, GOP Gov. Henry McMaster mentioned Rico, a police dog who died along with fallen police, firefighters and paramedics, during his State of the State address after attending the dog’s funeral in October.
“When Rico had his funeral, I’ve never seen so many people at the police academy. There wasn’t a dry eye in the place,” McMaster said, after becoming a little emotional when he paused at Rico’s name.
But in Missouri, Black lawmakers have raised concerns about the legislation, suggesting it could be too broadly applied.
“Historically, police animals have been used to affect and, quite frankly, harass marginalized communities,” Democratic Rep. LaKeySha Bosley of St. Louis said during Monday’s debate.
A final vote in the Missouri House will determine whether the bill goes to the Senate. The measures in Colorado and Kansas went to their senates.
The federal government and other states have acted on the issue. Under a 2000 federal law, a person who kills a police dog can be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison. In 2019, the possible penalty in Florida increased from up to five years in prison to up to 15 years. Tennessee increased its penalties in 2022, and Kentucky did so last year.
Supporters of the tougher penalties argue that the animals cost thousands of dollars to obtain and train, are vital to protecting the public and are like family both to the officers who work with them and their relatives.
In a Kansas House committee hearing earlier this month, Tyler Brooks, a sheriff’s deputy in the Wichita area, paid tribute to Bane, an 8-year-old dog who died in November.
“It’s kind of funny to me that this very large dog who frequently broke things and knocked everything over during a training session would be the one that would be the one that would break my 7-year-old autistic son of his crippling fear of dogs,” Brooks told the committee.
Authorities say a suspect in a domestic violence case took refuge in a storm drain and strangled Bane when a deputy sent the dog in to flush out the suspect.
The dog’s death inspired the Kansas measure, and House Speaker Dan Hawkins immediately dubbed it “Bane’s Law” after Wednesday’s vote. Hawkins is a Wichita Republican who is sponsoring the bill along with the House Corrections and Juvenile Justice Committee’s chair.
During the Colorado House debate Monday, rural Republican Rep. Ryan Armagost stood beside Majority Leader Monica Duran, a Denver-area Democrat, to promote that state’s measure.
“It is a huge hit on every agency to lose an animal that’s part of their team. So, I encourage everyone to get behind this, support this, protect those that protect us,” Armagost said.
But injuries caused by police dogs have made headlines.
In rural Ohio in July 2023, a police dog bit a Black truck driver severely enough that he needed hospital treatment after the man was on his knees with his hands in the air.
The Salt Lake City police department suspended its dog apprehension program in 2020 after a Black man was bitten and an audit found 27 dog bite cases during the previous two years. And the same year, a Black man in Lafayette, Indiana, was placed in a medically induced coma after police dogs mauled him as he was arrested in a battery case.
During Tuesday’s debate in the Kansas House, Democratic Rep. Ford Carr, of Wichita, one of six Black members, mentioned the Ohio case and recalled how during the Civil Rights Movement, authorities turned dogs on peaceful Black protesters.
Carr also suggested the Wichita suspect was defending himself.
“I don’t think that there’s any one of us here who would sit idly by and let an animal maul you without fighting back,” Carr said.
___
Lieb reported from Jefferson City, Missouri. Associated Press writers Jesse Bedayn in Denver and Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, South Carolina, also contributed.
BOSTON (AP) — A U.S. Customs and Border Protection dog sniffed out something unusual in luggage from a traveler returning from Africa — mummified monkeys.
EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT – This undated photo shows the mummified remains of four monkeys discovered and seized from luggage from a traveler who’d been to the Democratic Republic of Congo before arriving at Boston Logan Airport. (Customs and Border Protection via AP)
The passenger returning from a visit to the Democratic Republic of Congo reported that the luggage contained dried fish, but an inspection at Boston Logan Airport revealed dead and dehydrated bodies of four monkeys, agents said. The traveler said he brought the monkeys into the U.S. for his own consumption, Ryan Bissette, a CPB spokesperson, said Sunday.
Raw or minimally processed meat from wild animals, sometimes referred to as “bushmeat,” is banned in the U.S. because of the threat of disease.
“The potential dangers posed by bringing bushmeat into the United States are real. Bushmeat can carry germs that can cause illness, including the Ebola virus,” said Julio Caravia, local port director for Customs and Border Protection.
The incident happened last month but was made public on Friday.
Bissette said Sunday that no charges were filed but all of the luggage was seized and the nearly 9 pounds (4 kilograms) of bushmeat were marked for destruction by U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
BY HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH AND NICK INGRAM for the Associated Press
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A historic railway station on the edge of downtown Kansas City became the latest backdrop for a mass shooting as gunfire near the end of the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl celebration sent terrified fans scrambling for cover and left 21 people wounded — including at least eight children — and a mother of two dead.
Wednesday’s shooting outside Union Station happened despite the presence of more than 800 police officers who were in the building and nearby, including on top of nearby structures, said Mayor Quinton Lucas, who attended with his wife and mother and ran for safety when the shots rang out.
“Parades, rallies, schools, movies. It seems like almost nothing is safe,” Lucas said.
Three people were detained and firearms were recovered, Police Chief Stacey Graves said at an evening news conference. She said police were still piecing together what happened and did not release details about those who were detained or a possible motive.
“I’m angry at what happened today. The people who came to this celebration should expect a safe environment,” Graves said.
It is the latest sports celebration in the U.S. to be marred by gun violence, following a shooting that wounded several people last year in Denver after the Nuggets’ NBA championship, and gunfire last year at a parking lot near the Texas Rangers’ World Series championship parade.
Social media users posted shocking video of police running through Wednesday’s crowded scene as people scrambled for cover and fled. One video showed someone apparently performing chest compressions on a victim as another person, seemingly writhing in pain, lay on the ground nearby. People screamed in the background.
Police clear the area following a shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs NFL football Super Bowl celebration in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Reed Hoffmann)
Another video showed two people chase and tackle a person, holding them down until two police officers arrived. In an interview Thursday with ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Trey Filter of Wichita, Kansas, said he saw someone being chased and took action.
“I couldn’t see much. I heard, ‘Get ‘em!’ I saw a flash next to me. And I remember I jumped and remember thinking, ‘I hope this is the fool they were talking about,’” he said. “They started yelling that, ‘There’s a gun, there’s a gun!’”
Filter said he and another man kept the person pinned down until officers arrived. “I remember the officers pulling my feet off of him and at that point I was just looking for my wife and kids.” It was not immediately clear if the person he held down was involved in the shooting, but Filter’s wife, Casey, saw a gun nearby and picked it up,
“There honestly was not much to think about except just my husband and my kids,” Casey Filter said. “And then a gun I saw obviously, there. I was just wanting everyone to be safe. That was my main concern.”
The woman killed in the shooting was identified by radio station KKFI as Lisa Lopez-Galvan, host of “Taste of Tejano.”
“This senseless act has taken a beautiful person from her family and this KC Community,” KKFI said in a statement on its Facebook page.
Fans watch as the Kansas City Chiefs celebrate during their victory rally at Union Station in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
Law enforcement personnel clear the area around Union Station following a shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs NFL football Super Bowl celebration in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Reed Hoffmann)
Lopez-Galvan, whose DJ name was “Lisa G,” was an extrovert and devoted mother from a prominent Latino family in the area, said Rosa Izurieta and Martha Ramirez, two childhood friends who worked with her at a staffing company. Izurieta said Lopez-Galvan attended the parade with her husband and her adult son, a die-hard Kansas City sports fan who also was shot.
“She’s the type of person who would jump in front of a bullet for anybody — that would be Lisa,” Izurieta said.
Kansas City has long struggled with gun violence, and in 2020 it was among nine cities targeted by the U.S. Justice Department in an effort to crack down on violent crime. In 2023 the city matched a record with 182 homicides, most of which involved guns.
Lucas has joined with mayors across the country in calling for new laws to reduce gun violence, including mandating universal background checks.
“We had 800 officers out yesterday,” Lucas, a Democrat, said in an interview on KMBC-TV Thursday. “We had snipers on roofs, we had cameras everywhere. We did everything to make this event as safe as possible. But as long as we have fools who will commit these types of acts, as long as we have their access to firearms with this level of capacity, then we may see incidents like this one.”
A person is taken to an ambulance following a shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs NFL football Super Bowl celebration in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
A law enforcement officer looks around the scene following a shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs NFL football Super Bowl celebration in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
The parade and rally was the third in five years following Chiefs’ Super Bowl wins. Lucas said it may be time to reconsider how to handle the next one if they win again, perhaps holding a “vastly smaller event” at Arrowhead Stadium, with fans going through metal detectors.
“It’s a shame that this is what we’ve come to today in America and in our city. But I think this is something that we need to evaluate,” Lucas said.
Lisa Money of Kansas City was trying to gather some confetti near the end of the parade when she heard somebody yell, “Down, down, everybody down!” At first she thought it might be a joke, until she saw the SWAT team jumping over the fence.
“I can’t believe it really happened,” Money said. “Who in their right mind would do something like this?”
Kevin Sanders of Lenexa, Kansas, said he heard what sounded like firecrackers and then people started running. After that initial flurry, calm returned, and he didn’t think much of it. But 10 minutes later, ambulances started showing up.
“It sucks that someone had to ruin the celebration, but we are in a big city,” Sanders said.
Emergency personnel, left, take a stretcher into Union Station following a shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs NFL football Super Bowl celebration in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Reed Hoffmann)
University Health spokesperson Nancy Lewis said the hospital was treating eight gunshot victims. Two were in critical condition and six were stable. The hospital also was treating four people for other injuries resulting from the chaos after the shooting, Lewis said.
Stephanie Meyer, chief nursing officer for Children’s Mercy Kansas City, said it was treating 12 patients from the rally, including 11 children between the ages of 6 and 15, many of whom suffered gunshot wounds. All were expected to recover, she said.
When asked about the condition of the children, Meyer responded: “Fear. The one word I would use to describe what we saw and how they came to us was fear.”
St. Luke’s Hospital of Kansas City received one gunshot patient in critical condition, a spokesperson said.
Chiefs trainer Rick Burkholder said he was with coach Andy Reid and other coaches and staff members at the time of the shooting, and that the team was on buses and returning to Arrowhead Stadium.
“We are truly saddened by the senseless act of violence that occurred outside of Union Station at the conclusion of today’s parade and rally,” the team said in a statement.
Missouri’s Republican Gov. Mike Parson and first lady Teresa Parson were at the parade during the gunfire but were unhurt. In a statement, he thanked security officers and first responders for their professionalism.
President Joe Biden, who was briefed on the shooting and received updates throughout the day, said the tragedy “cuts deep in the American soul” and called for Congress to take action to prevent gun violence.
“And I ask the country to stand with me,” Biden said in a statement. “To make your voice heard in Congress so we finally act to ban assault weapons, to limit high-capacity magazines, strengthen background checks, keep guns out of the hands of those who have no business owning them or handling them.”
Throngs had lined the parade route before the shooting, with fans climbing trees and street poles or standing on rooftops for a better view. Players rolled through the crowd on double-decker buses, as DJs and drummers heralded their arrival.
___
Associated Press writers Scott McFetridge in Des Moines, Iowa; Jim Salter in St. Louis; Josh Funk in Omaha, Nebraska; Summer Ballentine in Columbia, Missouri; and John Hanna in Topeka, Kansas, contributed to this report.
MADRID (AP) — Two Spanish police officers have been killed when a speedboat suspected of belonging to drug smugglers smashed into their patrol craft, Spain’s Civil Guard said Saturday.
The incident occurred late on Friday, police said, when the Civil Guard craft was tasked with identifying speedboats spotted in the southern port of Barbate. Video footage showed how one speedboat slammed into the patrol craft in the port’s waters.
The Civil Guard said Saturday that it had arrested eight suspects.
Another two officers from the six-member crew were hurt, the Civil Guard said.
GOODYEAR, Ariz. (AP) — The pilot and lone passenger escaped injury when a small airplane made a crash landing Saturday on a residential street in a suburban neighborhood on the west edge of Phoenix, Goodyear police said.
The single engine plane experienced mechanical problems shortly after takeoff Saturday morning from nearby Glendale Airport, police said.
The pilot attempted to make an emergency landing at Phoenix Goodyear Airport but the engine lost power so the pilot had to put the aircraft down on the street in Goodyear, south of Interstate 10, at about 8:30 a.m., police said.
The Cessna 172P struck a tree, a mailbox and a parked, unoccupied vehicle that suffered minimal damage but no one in the plane or on the ground was hurt, police said.
Fire crews cleaned up about 5 gallons (19 liters) of leaking fuel. The street remained closed at midday. No names have been released.
The Federal Aviation Administration was taking over the investigation of the crash, Goodyear Police spokeswoman Lisa Berry said in an email to The Associated Press.
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