firing

May 11 (UPI) — A gunman armed with an assault-style rifle fired dozens of rounds at vehicles as he walked Cambridge’s iconic Memorial Drive, seriously wounding two people before being shot by state police and an armed bystander, authorities said.

The suspect, identified as 46-year-old Tyler Brown of Boston, suffered multiple gunshot wounds to his extremities and was taken for treatment to a Boston hospital, where he remains under police custody in the intensive care unit.

The shooting began around 1 p.m. EDET, authorities said.

Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan told reporters during a Monday evening press conference the suspect was firing erratically at vehicles as he walked east down the center of the famous drive that banks Charles River near Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Two males in separate cars driving the street, one a ride-share driver, were shot, suffering life-threatening injuries, she said, adding: “That does not begin to address the trauma experienced by everybody who was out there: Those individuals on the river walking, pushing baby carriages, riding by.”

“We know that that weapon had the capacity to have struck people on the other side of that river,” she said.

The suspect fired upwards of 60 rounds, striking “at least a dozen” vehicles, Ryan said, adding that people were jumping from their cars and scattering in all directions, unsure of where to find safety. Some hid under their vehicles, she said.

A Massachusetts State Police trooper responding to the shooting and a civilian, a former Marine in legal possession of a firearm, confronted the suspect, who is accused of continuing to fire, striking the cruiser the trooper had exited.

The shooting ended when the trooper and civilian opened fire on the suspect.

“Clearly people’s lives were at risk,” Ryan said.

Ryan said they expect to charge Brown with two counts of armed assault with intent to murder, firearms offenses and potentially other offenses to be determined by the ongoing investigation.

Brown was moving to Cambridge and was under the supervision of either the Massachusetts Probation Department or the Department of Parole, Ryan said, adding that his criminal record, if there is one, will be addressed at his arraignment.

Boston Police had initially notified Cambridge Police at 1:06 p.m. of a person observed acting erratically while of a rifle, according to Ryan, who told reporters that they are still investigating how he came to be on the drive.

Cambridge Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui said she is “deeply grateful” to the first responders who acted, stating their “swift action protected our community during a dangerous and rapidly evolving situation.”

“My thoughts are with the individuals who were injured, those affected by today’s violence and victims of gun violence everywhere,” she said in a statement.

“I recognize how frightening this incident was for community members, and your safety is my first concern.”

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department will adopt firing squads as a permitted method of execution as the Trump administration moves to ramp up and expedite capital punishment cases, officials said Friday.

The Justice Department is also reauthorizing the use of single-drug lethal injections with pentobarbital that were used to carry out 13 executions during the first Trump administration — more than under any president in modern history. The Biden administration had removed pentobarbital from the federal protocol over concerns about the potential for unnecessary pain and suffering.

The moves were announced as part of a broader push to step up federal executions after a moratorium under the Biden administration. Only three defendants remain on federal death row after Democratic President Biden converted 37 sentences to life in prison, though the Trump administration has so far authorized seeking death sentences against 44 defendants.

“The prior administration failed in its duty to protect the American people by refusing to pursue and carry out the ultimate punishment against the most dangerous criminals, including terrorists, child murderers, and cop killers,” Acting Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche said in a statement. “Under President Trump’s leadership, the Department of Justice is once again enforcing the law and standing with victims.”

The federal government has not previously included firing squad as a method of execution in its protocols, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. Five states currently allow executions by firing squad: Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Utah.

The pentobarbital protocol was adopted by William Barr, attorney general during Trump’s first term, to replace a three-drug mix used in the 2000s, the last time federal executions were carried out before Trump’s first term in office.

Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland in the final days of the Biden administration withdrew the pentobarbital lethal injection policy after a government review of scientific and medical research found there remains “significant uncertainty” about whether its use causes unnecessary pain and suffering.”

In 2020, under Barr’s leadership, the Justice Department published a rule in the Federal Register to allow the federal government to conduct executions by lethal injection or use “any other manner prescribed by the law of the state in which the sentence was imposed.”

A number of states allow other methods of execution, including electrocution and inhalation of nitrogen gas.

The Trump administration, in a report released Friday, said the Biden administration “got the standard and the science wrong.” The Biden administration’s findings, among other things, “failed to address the overwhelming evidence” that a person injected with pentobarbital “quickly loses consciousness — rendering him unable to experience pain,” the report said.

Currently on death row are are Dylann Roof, who carried out the 2015 slayings of nine Black members of Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C.; 2013 Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev; and Robert Bowers, who fatally shot 11 congregants at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S history.

Richer writes for the Associated Press.

A former female staffer who worked for Beast Industries, the media venture behind the popular YouTube channel MrBeast, is suing the company, alleging she was sexually harassed and fired shortly after she returned from maternity leave.

The employee, Lorrayne Mavromatis, a Brazilian-born social media professional, alleges in a lawsuit she was subjected to sexual harassment by the company’s management and demoted after she complained about her treatment. She said she was urged to join a conference call while in labor and expected to work during her maternity leave in violation of the Family and Medical Leave Act, according to the federal complaint filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina.

“This clout-chasing complaint is built on deliberate misrepresentations and categorically false statements, and we have the receipts to prove it. There is extensive evidence — including Slack and WhatsApp messages, company documents, and witness testimony — that unequivocally refutes her claims. We will not submit to opportunistic lawyers looking to manufacture a payday from us,” Gaude Paez, a Beast Industries spokesperson, said in a statement.

Jimmy Donaldson, 27, began MrBeast as a teen gaming channel that soon exploded into a media company worth an estimated $5 billion, with 500 employees and 450 million subscribers who watch its games, stunts and giveaways.

Mavromatis, who was hired in 2022 as its head of Instagram, described a pervasive climate of discrimination and harassment, according to the lawsuit.

In her complaint, she alleges the company’s former CEO James Warren made her meet him at his home for one-on-one meetings while he commented on her looks and dismissed her complaints about a male client’s unwanted advances, telling her “she should be honored that the client was hitting on her.”

When Mavromatis asked Warren why MrBeast, Donaldson, would not work with her, she was told that “she is a beautiful woman and her appearance had a certain sexual effect on Jimmy,” and, “Let’s just say that when you’re around and he goes to the restroom, he’s not actually using the restroom.”

Paez refuted the claim.

“That’s ridiculous. This is an allegation fabricated for the sole purpose of sparking headlines,” Paez said.

Mavromatis said she endured a slate of other indignities such as being told by Donaldson that she “would only participate in her video shoot if she brought him a beer.”

“In this male-centric workplace, Plaintiff, one of the few women in a high-level role, was excluded from otherwise all-male meetings, demeaned in front of colleagues, harassed, and suffered from males be given preferential treatment in employment decisions,” states the complaint.

When Mavromatis raised a question during a staff meeting with her team, she said a male colleague told her to “shut up” or “stop talking.”

At MrBeast headquarters in Greenville, N.C., she said male executives mocked female contestants participating in BeastGames, “who complained they did not have access to feminine hygiene products and clean underwear while participating in the show.”

In November 2023, Mavromatis formally complained about “the sexually inappropriate encounters and harassment, and demeaning and hostile work environment she and other female employees had been living and experiencing working at MrBeast,” to the company’s then head of human resources, Sue Parisher, who is also Donaldson’s mother, according to the suit.

In her complaint, Mavromatis said Beast Industries did not have a method or process for employees to report such issues either anonymously or to a third party, rather employees were expected to follow the company’s handbook, “How to Succeed In MrBeast Production.”

In it, employees were instructed that, “It’s okay for the boys to be childish,” “if talent wants to draw a dick on the white board in the video or do something stupid, let them” and “No does not mean no,” according to the complaint.

Mavromatis alleges that she was demoted and then fired.

Paez said that Mavromatis’s role was eliminated as part of a reorganization of an underperforming group within Beast Industries and that she was made aware of this.

Magistrate hands the opposition figure five-year term, that his lawyers say will be appealed.

South African opposition politician Julius Malema has been sentenced to prison time for firing a rifle in ⁠the air at a party rally.

Malema, the leader of the far-left opposition Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), was handed a five-year sentence on Thursday by Magistrate Twanet Olivier.

Malema, who is one of South Africa’s most prominent politicians, was convicted last year of charges, including unlawful possession of a ⁠firearm and discharging a weapon in a public place over the 2018 incident at a stadium in the Eastern Cape province.

The 45-year-old leader of the fourth-biggest party in parliament had pleaded not guilty, arguing the gun was a toy.

“It wasn’t … an impulsive act,” the magistrate said. “It was the event of the evening.”

Malema’s defence said the shots were only intended to be celebratory.

His lawyers applied for leave to appeal the magistrate’s decision within ⁠minutes of it being ⁠read out in a court in KuGompo City, formerly East London, on Thursday.

Outside the court, hundreds of Malema’s red-clad EFF supporters gathered for the sentencing in the politically charged case.

The EFF – a small but vocal party – says the case is an attempt to silence its outspoken leader, who is known for fiery speeches.

Party supporters have threatened protests should their leader be jailed.

The magistrate stressed it “is not a political party who has been convicted here … it is a person, an individual.”

The maximum time was a 15-year prison sentence. If confirmed after all appeals, the five-year sentence would bar Malema from serving as a lawmaker.

That would be a major setback to the EFF, which has strong support among young South Africans frustrated by the racial inequality that has persisted since the end of white minority rule in 1994.