South Carolina
Trump attorney relinquishes law license, ‘retires’
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Attorney Lin Wood, who filed legal challenges seeking to overturn Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss, is relinquishing his law license, electing to retire from practicing rather than face possible disbarment. Multiple states have weighed disciplining him for pushing Trump’s false claims that he defeated Democrat Joe Biden.
On Tuesday, Wood asked officials in his home state of Georgia to “retire” his law license in light of “disciplinary proceedings pending against me.” In the request, made in a letter and posted on his Telegram account, Wood acknowledges that he is “prohibited from practicing law in this State and in any other state or jurisdiction and that I may not reapply for admission.”
Wood, a licensed attorney in Georgia since 1977, did not immediately respond to an email Wednesday seeking comment on the letter. A listing on the website for the State Bar of Georgia accessed on Wednesday showed him as retired and with no disciplinary infractions on his record.
In the wake of the 2020 election, Trump praised Wood as doing a “good job” filing legal challenges seeking to overturn his loss, though Trump’s campaign at times distanced itself from him. Dozens of lawsuits making such allegations were rejected by the courts across the country.
Officials in Georgia had been weighing whether to disbar Wood over his efforts, holding a disciplinary trial earlier this year. Wood sued the state bar in 2022, claiming the bar’s request that he undergo a mental health evaluation as part of its probe violated his constitutional rights, but a federal appeals court tossed that ruling, saying Wood failed to show there was “bad faith” behind the request.
In 2021, the Georgia secretary of state’s office opened an investigation into where Wood had been living when he voted early in person in the 2020 general election, prompted by Wood’s announcement on Telegram that he had moved to South Carolina. Officials ruled that Wood did not violate Georgia election laws.
Wood, who purchased three former plantations totaling more than $16 million, moved to South Carolina several years ago, and unsuccessfully ran for chairman of that state’s GOP in 2021.
In May, a Michigan watchdog group in filed a complaint against Wood and eight other Trump-aligned lawyers alleging they had committed misconduct and should be disciplined for filing a lawsuit challenging President Joe Biden’s 2020 election win in that state. A court previously found the attorneys’ lawsuit had abused the court system.
Wood, whose name was on the 2020 Michigan lawsuit, has insisted that the only role he played was telling fellow attorney Sidney Powell he was available if she needed a seasoned litigator. Powell defended the lawsuit and said lawyers sometimes have to raise what she called “unpopular issues.”
Other attorneys affiliated with efforts to keep Trump in power following his 2020 election loss have faced similar challenges. Attorney John Eastman, architect of that strategy, faces 11 disciplinary charges in the State Bar Court of California stemming from his development of a dubious legal strategy aimed at having then-Vice President Mike Pence interfere with the certification of Biden’s victory.
California
‘Smallville’ actor released from prison for role in sex-trafficking
The television actor Allison Mack, who pleaded guilty for her role in a sex-trafficking case tied to the cult-like group NXIVM, has been released from a California prison, according to a government website.
Mack, best known for her role as a young Superman’s close friend on “Smallville,” was sentenced to three years behind bars in 2021 after pleading guilty two years earlier to charges that she manipulated women into becoming sex slaves for NXIVM leader Keith Raniere.
Online records maintained by the Federal Bureau of Prisons said Mack, 40, was released Monday from a federal prison in Dublin, California, near San Francisco. Her release was first reported by the Albany Times-Union.
Mack avoided a longer prison term by cooperating with federal authorities in their case against Raniere, who was ultimately sentenced to 120 years in prison after being convicted on sex-trafficking charges.
Mack helped prosecutors mount evidence showing how Raniere created a secret society that included brainwashed women who were branded with his initials and forced to have sex with him.
In addition to Mack, members of the group included an heiress to the Seagram’s liquor fortune, Clare Bronfman; and a daughter of TV star Catherine Oxenberg of “Dynasty” fame.
Mack would later repudiate Raniere and express “remorse and guilt” before her sentencing in federal court in Brooklyn, New York.
Pennsylvania
Suspect arraigned on murder charges in mass shooting
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A 40-year-old accused of killing a man in a house and then gunning down four others on the streets of a southwest Philadelphia neighborhood before surrendering to police officers has been arraigned on murder and other charges.
Kimbrady Carriker was arraigned Wednesday on five counts of murder as well as charges of attempted murder, aggravated assault and weapons counts of possession without a license and carrying firearms in public, prosecutors said.
A 2-year-old boy and a 13-year-old youth were also wounded by gunfire and another 2-year-old boy and a woman were hit by shattered glass in the Monday night rampage that made the working-class area of Kingsessing the site of the nation’s worst violence around the July Fourth holiday.
Police called to the scene found gunshot victims and started to help them before hearing more shots. Some officers rushed victims to hospitals while others ran toward the gunfire and chased the firing suspect.
Staff Inspector Ernest Ransom, the homicide unit commander, said witness interviews and video indicated that the suspect went to several locations in a ski mask and body armor, carrying an AR-15-style rifle.
“The suspect then began shooting aimlessly at occupied vehicles and individuals on the street as they walked,” he said. The vehicles included a mother driving her 2-year-old twins home — one of whom was shot four times in the legs and the other who was hit in the eyes by shattered glass.
Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw said the “armed and armored individual” was firing “seemingly at random.”
Cornered in an alley, the suspect surrendered and was found to have not only the rifle but also a pistol, extra magazines, a police scanner and a bulletproof vest, police said.
Philadelphia police on Tuesday afternoon identified the victims as 20-year-old Lashyd Merritt, 29—year-old Dymir Stanton, 59-year-old Ralph Moralis and 15-year-old Daujan Brown, all pronounced dead shortly after the Monday night gunfire; and 31-year-old Joseph Wamah Jr., who was found in a home early Tuesday, also with multiple bullet wounds.
Investigators believe Wamah was the first victim killed, but he wasn’t found by family members until hours later, Ransom said.
A representative of the Defender Association of Philadelphia said he believed the office would be representing Carriker and declined immediate comment on the charges.
Califronia
Death of inmate to be investigated as a homicide
DELANO, Calif. (AP) — The death of a 25-year-old inmate at California’s North Kern State Prison is being investigated as a homicide, corrections officials said Tuesday.
An officer conducting a security check discovered Ricardo Saldivar unresponsive in a cell Monday afternoon, the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said in a statement.
Saldivar was taken to the prison’s medical treatment area, where he was pronounced dead, the statement said. The Kern County Coroner will determine the official cause of death.
The cell where Saldivar was found was also occupied by a 47-year-old inmate, officials said.
The death will be investigated by the prison’s investigative services unit along with the county district attorney’s office.
Saldivar arrived at North Kern State last month after being sentenced to life with the possibility of parole for first-degree murder.
The prison in Delano, just north of Bakersfield, is a medium security facility housing about 3,500 inmates.
Arizona
Governor asked to rescind EO limiting prosecution of abortion cases
PHOENIX (AP) — Twelve of Arizona’s 15 county attorneys are calling for Gov. Katie Hobbs to rescind her recent executive order that limits them from prosecuting abortion-related cases.
“The governor’s office should not interfere with the discretion of prosecutors in fulfilling their duties as elected officials,” said the attorneys’ letter sent to Hobbs late Monday. “Whether this was the intended purpose, the result is an unnecessary and unjustified impingement on the duties and obligations of elected county attorneys in Arizona.”
Gubernatorial spokesman Christian Slater said the governor will not be rescinding the order.
“Governor Hobbs will never stop fighting for reproductive freedoms in Arizona,” Slater said in a statement. “She will continue to use her lawful executive authority to put sanity over chaos and protect everyday Arizonans from extremists who are threatening to prosecute women and doctors over reproductive healthcare.”
Hobbs’ order signed on June 22 gives state Attorney General Kris Mayes the power to handle any attempted county prosecution under state abortion laws, bans state agencies from assisting investigations for alleged violations in other states and bans extradition of people accused of violating other states’ abortion laws.
“This executive order results in an exercise of authority not vested in the governor’s office. It is a substantial overreach to suggest the governor may strip away prosecutorial discretion from local, elected officials,” Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell wrote in a letter to Hobbs.
Mitchell is a Republican while Hobbs and Mayes are Democrats.
Abortions are currently allowed in Arizona in the first 15 weeks of pregnancy under a 2022 law. Last year, the Arizona Court of Appeals ruled that abortion doctors cannot be prosecuted under a law dating back to 1864 that criminalizes nearly all abortions. That pre-statehood law was already barred from being enforced for decades because of Roe v. Wade.
Florida
US judge blocks portions of new elections law
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A federal judge on Monday blocked Florida from enforcing part of a new elections law that bans non-citizens from handling or or collecting voter registration forms, saying the state can’t restrict individual rights and gave no proof it was necessary to do so.
The ruling also blocks a ban on third-party voter registration groups retaining personal information collected when registering new voters.
The NAACP and other groups that register voters sued the state over provisions in a larger elections bill Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed on the same day he announced he is running for president. Opponents say it makes registering voters in marginalized communities more difficult, while Republicans said they were making elections more secure.
“The State of Florida is correct to seek integrity in our electoral system,” Judge Mark Walker wrote. “Here, however, Florida’s solutions for preserving election integrity are too far removed from the problems it has put forward as justifications.”
