Court Digest

Washington
Commercial fishing groups sue 13 U.S. tire makers over rubber preservative
TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — The 13 largest U.S. tire manufacturers are facing a lawsuit from a pair of California commercial fishing organizations that could force the companies to stop using a chemical added to almost every tire because it kills migrating salmon.

Also found in footwear, synthetic turf and playground equipment, the rubber preservative 6PPD has been used in tires for 60 years. As tires wear, tiny particles of rubber are left behind on roads and parking lots, breaking down into a byproduct, 6PPD-quinone, that is deadly to salmon, steelhead trout and other aquatic wildlife when rains wash it into rivers.

“This is the biggest environmental disaster that the world doesn’t quite know about yet,” said Elizabeth Forsyth, an attorney with the environmental law firm Earthjustice, which is representing the fishing groups. “It’s causing devastating impacts to threatened and endangered species.”

The Institute for Fisheries Resources and the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Francisco on Wednesday against Goodyear, Bridgestone, Continental and others.

The U.S. Tire Manufacturers Association, which is not named as a defendant, said in a statement last week that work is already underway to identify a chemical to replace 6PPD while still meeting federal safety standards. Forcing the companies to change too quickly would be bad for public safety and the economy, it said.

“Our members continue to research and develop alternative tire materials that ensure tire performance and do not compromise safety, consistent with our industry’s commitment to sustainability and respect for the environment,” the association said in another statement Wednesday.

The fishing organizations filed the lawsuit a week after U.S. regulators said they would review the use of 6PPD in tires in response to a petition from three West Coast Native American tribes. Coho salmon appear to be especially sensitive to the preservative; it can kill them within hours, the tribes argued.

The tribes — the Yurok in California and the Port Gamble S’Klallam and Puyallup tribes in Washington — asked the Environmental Protection Agency to prohibit 6PPD earlier this year.
The agency’s decision to grant the petition is the start of a long regulatory process that could see it banned — one of several effort on different fronts to recover salmon populations as well as the endangered killer whales in the Pacific Northwest that depend on them.

The chemical’s effect on human health is unknown, the EPA noted.

Forsyth said that as long as 6PPD remains in tires, the companies need a federal permit allowing them to harm species that are protected under the Endangered Species Act. To do so, they would have to show that they’ve mitigated the harm to salmon to the fullest extent possible, which could mean funding stormwater improvements to keep the chemical from entering aquatic habitats.

No tire company has such a permit, the lawsuit said.

“This has been a problem that has been identified by the industry itself for more than a decade,” said Glenn Spain, the northwest regional director at Institute for Fisheries Resources. “You can’t just sit on your thumbs and hope it will go away. It will not go away.”

The commercial fishers represented by the groups depend on the fish for their livelihood, he said.

Replacing the chemical with another that will make rubber durable without killing fish is a tall task, but one the industry can tackle, Forsyth said: “We’re the nation that figured out how to get lead out of gasoline and still have our cars run. It would shock and surprise me if we cannot make a tire that does not kill up to 100% of coho returning to their native streams.”

Salmon spend their early months or years growing and feeding in freshwater streams and estuaries, before entering the ocean to spend the next few years foraging. They then return to the streams where they were born to spawn.

The chemical’s effect on coho was noted in 2020 by scientists in Washington state, who were studying why fish populations that had been restored in the Puget Sound years earlier were struggling.

“This chemical is ubiquitous in stormwater runoff,” Forsyth said. “It’s ubiquitous in aquatic habitats and is ubiquitous at levels that can kill coho salmon and harm salmon and steelhead at very minute levels.”

Florida
Woman charged with threatening judge in abortion pill case arrested
FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) — A woman accused of threatening to kill a federal judge in Texas who suspended approval of the abortion drug mifepristone earlier this year was arrested Wednesday in Florida, court records.

Alice Marie Pence made her initial appearance in Fort Myers federal court after her arrest, according to court records. She faces charges of transmitting a threatening interstate communication and influencing a federal official by threat. Her next hearing is scheduled for Nov. 22 in Dallas federal court.

Court records didn’t list an attorney for Pence.

According to an indictment, Pence called the chambers of a federal judge in Amarillo, Texas, in March and threatened to kill him. The indictment doesn’t name the judge, but the only federal judge in Amarillo is U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk.

In April, Kacsmaryk, an appointee of former President Donald Trump, ordered a hold on federal approval of mifepristone in a decision that overruled decades of scientific approval. The ruling came nearly a year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and curtailed access to abortion across the country. President Joe Biden’s administration is fighting the Texas ruling.

Mifepristone is one of two pills used in medication abortions. The other drug, misoprostol, is also used to treat other medical conditions. Health care providers have said they could switch to misoprostol if mifepristone is no longer available or is too hard to obtain. Misoprostol is somewhat less effective in ending pregnancies.

Indiana
Judge sets bail for woman accused of driving into building she believed was ‘Israeli school’
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — An Indianapolis woman accused of backing her car into a building she believed held an “Israeli school” was ordered Wednesday by a judge to stay away from synagogues and other Jewish religious and cultural centers.

Ruba Almaghtheh, 34, was formally charged Tuesday with intimidation, criminal recklessness and institutional criminal mischief, all felonies. A Marion County judge entered a not guilty plea for her and set her bond at $200,000 during her initial court hearing Wednesday.

Two adults and three children were inside the Israelite School of Universal and Practical Knowledge on Saturday when Almaghtheh allegedly backed into it and shouted “Free Palestine.” No one was injured.

Her attorney, Gary Colasessano, told The Associated Press that his client doesn’t remember driving into the building. He said he believes she experienced an “episode,” possibly due to several medications she takes for physical disabilities and the mental stress of a pending divorce while caring for her three children.

According to a probable cause affidavit, Almaghtheh told officers at the scene that she had been watching TV coverage of the war in the Middle East “and decided to plan an attack by crashing into the building on purpose because she observed a symbol located on the residence that she took high offense to and related it to being an Israeli school.”

The front of the building has a “Hebrew Israelite” symbol resembling a Star of David with lettering, the affidavit says.

The Israelite School of Universal and Practical Knowledge is in fact listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center among various groups it terms “Radical Hebrew Israelites,” and which the law center has designated a “hate group,” noting its ideology has become increasingly antisemitic, anti-white, anti-LGBTQ, xenophobic and misogynistic since the 1960s.

The leader of the Israelite School of Universal and Practical Knowledge in Indianapolis, Captain Chaapash Yahawadah, said Wednesday it is part of an international organization with several schools, including some in the United Kingdom. He said it is challenging the Southern Poverty Law Center’s designation.

A man who had been sitting in a car outside the school building told police he watched a woman put her car in reverse and back directly into the building, the affidavit states. He told police he went to check on the driver and she “immediately starting ranting, yelling `Free Palestine, Free Palestine’” and accused him “of sending money to keep her people oppressed.”

The affidavit said another man who came out of the building after hearing a “big boom” told police the woman made similar comments to him. The court record said the building sustained about $10,000 in damage.

Colasessano said his client is Muslim and is a U.S. citizen originally from Jordan who has no previous arrest or criminal record. He was not aware of any ties to Palestine but said that before Saturday she had been watching “the constant barrage of news about the war in Gaza” and became overwhelmed.

He said Almaghtheh recently filed for divorce after her husband left her and moved to Africa. He said she has also been under a doctor’s care for several physical ailments that cause her physical pain.
He said her $200,000 bond is “astronomically high” given the charges.

A deputy prosecutor wrote in a motion seeking the greater than standard bond that Almaghtheh “intentionally crashed her vehicle into a building that she believed was home to a religious or cultural center that supports Israel.”

At Wednesday’s hearing, a judge set a bail review hearing for Nov. 17 and approved a no-contact order ordering Almaghtheh to stay away from the Israelite School of Universal and Practical Knowledge and “all synagogues, temples, and other Jewish religious and cultural centers in Marion County.”

“The allegations in the probable cause affidavit are extremely disturbing. We cannot and will not tolerate hate in our community,” Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears said Wednesday in a statement.

California
LA coroner’s investigator accused of stealing crucifix from around neck of a dead man
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A Los Angeles County coroner’s investigator has been arrested on suspicion of stealing a gold chain and crucifix from around the neck of a dead man, prosecutors said Wednesday.

The suspect, a 34-year-old man, faces one felony count of grand theft and one misdemeanor count of petty theft, the district attorney’s office said in a statement.

While responding to the heart-attack death of a warehouse worker last January, the investigator was recorded on surveillance video removing the crucifix necklace from the body and placing it in his medical bag, the statement said. He did not return the item or document it as required in a property receipt.

In addition, when authorities searched the suspect’s desk, they found antique coins with a receipt in the name of a man who died in November 2022. The suspect, employed by the Medical Examiner’s Office since 2018, had handled the man’s death investigation.

District Attorney George Gascón said the allegations represent a violation of trust the community places in the Medical Examiner’s Office.

"The theft of items, potential family heirlooms and sentimental pieces from the deceased, not only violates this trust but desecrates the memory of a loved one," Gascón said in a statement.

Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Odey Ukpo said his office was cooperating with the investigation.