Justice

L.A. County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman did something last week few prosecutors ever do — changed his mind in public, swapping out felony charges for misdemeanors in the case of an LAPD officer accused of secretly taping homophobic, racist and misogynistic remarks made by colleagues.

Since then, Hochman has been slammed for playing politics, embarrassing his office and even backing down for no reason other than the pressure was too intense.

Not a stellar look for a politician relatively new to elected office.

After speaking with Hochman about the reversal, I have a more optimistic take on it — drawn from a Talmudic quote that Hochman keeps on his desk, and which his father — a tax lawyer who represented at least one mobster — kept on his desk before him.

It’s Deuteronomy 16:20, “Tzedek, tzedek, tirdof” — Justice, justice you shall pursue.

It’s that double justice that holds weight in this situation, because, as Hochman explains it, his god rarely repeats himself without reason. Hochman said he reads that echo as referring to two parts of delivering justice — the process and the result.

“We try to get the right result. We try to get it in the right way,” Hochman told me.

When things go wrong, like they did in this case, he’ll reevaluate, he said, even if it leaves him with egg on his face.

“If that means that I have to publicly come out at a press conference and say that our initial decision-making, and what went into it, turns out not to have been perfect, and it is not set in stone, and we think there’s a better way of doing something, I’m going to stand up in a press conference and say exactly that,” he said.

A prosecutor who is willing to change his or her mind is critical to delivering real justice, because people get things wrong. Hochman holds incredible power over the thousands of lives entangled in the matters his office handles. Leaving that power of process in the hands of someone who can’t admit they made a mistake (as is the case with more D.A.’s than not) puts justice on a greased slide into a cesspool of hubris.

The distinction between the two forms of justice may seem like splitting hairs, but to anyone who has ever been involved with our justice system — as a victim or defendant, innocent or guilty — being dragged into a prosecution can often feel like an avalanche of misfortune.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think every person charged with a crime is a victim. There are plenty of predators out there, committing violations big and small, that require accountability.

But the process of administering justice is far more subjective and messy than we often admit. Sometimes, even when the prosecutor involved almost certainly knows something other than justice is in the works, there is a momentum of ego and bureaucracy that is hard to reverse.

And it doesn’t take a guilty verdict to derail a life. Simply having charges filed can mean a job loss, losing custody of kids, incarceration for months or years waiting for a trial, financial hardship and stigma.

We like to think of an innocent verdict as a great vindication, but by the time one arrives, if it does, a lifetime of damage may already have been done — that is the unseen power of process.

Just ask Daniel Flores, the LAPD officer whose case we’re talking about. Though he likely will eventually see all criminal charges dismissed, Flores told my colleagues Libor Jany and Richard Winton that this incident has “ruined” his life.

Hochman for weeks has faced intense public anger over his initial decision to charge Flores with 16 felonies. Folks from the lofty heights of the mayor to this lowly columnist objected, pointing out that punishing whistleblowers, even ones who may have technically broken the law as Hochman said Flores likely did (though Flores’ lawyer disputes that), would chill other officers from coming forward.

Hochman at first defended the charges, pointing out that as a sworn officer, Flores had an even higher duty to adhere to the letter and spirit of the law.

But, he said, he was unprepared for how strongly the public would react to the whistleblower part of the case. Though he contends he never meant to send a message silencing those who would expose wrongdoing, he concedes that did happen.

“People interpreted it that we’re trying to discourage all whistleblowers by the way we went about this prosecution,” Hochman said.

He also acknowledges that he is still learning what it means to be in this elected office. Though he has been both a federal prosecutor and a defense attorney, this is by far the most publicly accountable and visible role he has held, and he’s still figuring out that part of the job. It’s easy to be the candidate lobbing criticisms, or even the defense lawyer arguing the facts. It is much harder to be the person answerable to the nearly 10 million people of Los Angeles County when it comes to ensuring they feel both protected and respected by the law.

In his first year in office, more than one civil liberties advocate has taken issue with his approach.

“It is a continuous learning experience. In fact, anyone who takes this job and doesn’t view this as a daily learning experience cannot possibly do the job well,” he said. “If you don’t adapt to what’s out there, you don’t listen to what’s going on … you will fail, and by failure, I mean that you won’t achieve a society where people trust that the district attorney’s office is doing its job and doing it as best as it possibly could,” he said.

He blames the media in part for distracting from his accountability message in favor of the whistleblower-chilling angle in the Flores case — likely including headlines such as the one I wrote, “Protecting the blue wall of silence is not justice in LAPD whistleblower case.”

I’m willing to stand by the process that got me to that opinion, and also to give Hochman credit for being willing to change direction on his process when it was leading our city down the wrong path.

There are plenty of places where I hope Hochman will apply that rigor in the future — issues such as the death penalty, which he has brought back to Los Angeles, or in other difficult cases such as the killing of Keith Porter Jr. by an off-duty ICE agent. Porter’s family recently asked Hochman to convene a grand jury to hear the facts.

But that Hochman thinks about process, and the power that it holds, speaks well for justice in Los Angeles — even, maybe especially, when things go awry.

The Justice Department’s latest salvo in the battle over the future of the Kennedy Center claims President Trump’s “efforts and prestige provide the sole hope for the Center’s financial survival, and structural renewal,” according to a Monday court filing, which also threatens a possible demolition of the historic building.

Without the president’s interventions, says the filing, “the Center will deteriorate further into an unsafe, decrepit structure that will be required to be taken down, with a determination to follow on what to build on the site.”

The filing by the administration’s lawyers came in response to the efforts of Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) to block the Kennedy Center board from adding the president’s name to the building. The 21-page document argues that the “prestige” afforded by such an addition is both necessary and warranted.

“The Board also underscores, and the undisputed evidence demonstrates, that without the prominent recognition of The Trump Administration, and President Trump’s efforts, the donors will not contribute, and the Center will continue to be in a financial and structural death spiral,” the filing reads. “The Trump Administration, and President Donald J. Trump, should, therefore, be given the respect and dignity of acknowledgement.”

The filing also suggests what could replace the center if the building were to be torn down: “a large outdoor amphitheater overlooking the Potomac River … has been proposed, by some, for many years.”

“Such a replacement will fail to adequately honor President John F. Kennedy, but would be simpler and more economical to build, operate, and maintain,” the administration’s lawyers wrote in the filing.

Such a tear down would face enormous legal pushback, but preservation groups are already on high alert after Trump’s swift demolition of the White House’s East Wing, which was completed before a challenge could be fully mounted.

The Kennedy Center has been mired in controversy since Trump fired its board and had himself appointed chairman in the early months of his second term. Artist and staff defections became common after that, but the question of the center’s survival came into stark relief in early February when Trump declared his intention to shutter the center for two years of renovations.

That decision came after the Kennedy Center board voted in December to add Trump’s name to the building. Both the closure and the renaming were halted in a May ruling by Federal District Court Judge Christopher R. Cooper who is still overseeing the legal back-and-forth over the center’s fate.

Cooper originally gave the administration until mid-June to remove Trump’s name from the building. The administration complied by placing a tarp over the sign, which has remained ever since.

This month the board again voted to move forward with the renovation, and also to add Trump’s name to the building with the words, “Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump.”

The most recent court filing claiming the center’s survival rests with Trump is in stark contrast to a recent Washington Post investigation that found the center’s revenue plunged after Trump’s name was added to the building.

Aug. 25 (UPI) — A man is facing federal charges for forging the signature of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and impersonating a federal agent.

Joshua M. Culver was indicted Friday in the Northern District of Indiana on four counts of falsely impersonating an officer of the United States and one count of forging the signature of a judge and court seal.

He was arrested in Colorado and has been assigned a public defender there.

The indictment alleges that Culver identified himself as a National Security Agency agent on at least two occasions in September 2025. He allegedly did so at the Tippecanoe County Sheriff’s Office trying to get information about the location of a family member. The indictment also alleges that he made phone calls to someone at their employer threatening them and accusing them of breaking the law.

In January 2026, Culver allegedly claimed to be a “Special Master enforcing orders of the United States Supreme Court” to get a Lake County, Ind., judge to dismiss criminal cases and judgments against him.

He’s accused of forging Roberts’ signature and using a counterfeit seal on an order in September that told a Grant County, Ind., court to drop theft charges against him.

August 25 is an incredibly painful day for the Rohingya. It marks the anniversary of the 2017 genocidal campaign by the Myanmar military. Babies and young children were thrown into fires. Women and young girls were systematically gang-raped and mutilated. Entire families were slaughtered as they fled. Others were trapped inside their homes and burned alive. More than 700,000 of our people were forced to flee to Bangladesh.

The Rohingya, who are an ethnic Muslim-majority group who speak their own language from the Indo-Aryan family, have long faced discrimination and persecution in Myanmar.

Today, about 1.2 million Rohingya remain trapped in camps in Bangladesh, while a new wave of persecution is forcing more Rohingya from their homes in Rakhine state. Others are risking their lives at sea in a desperate search for safety.

In this desperate situation, there is a ray of hope raised by international justice proceedings in Argentina and the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Still, the international community is falling short in fulfilling its commitments to ensure accountability and protect the Rohingya.

The genocide never stopped

Over the past two years, the balance of power in Rakhine has dramatically changed. The Arakan Army (AA), an ethnic Rakhine armed group, now controls most of the state, including the main Rohingya areas in the north. But the brutality and persecution Rohingya face have not ended.

As the AA has consolidated its control, evidence has mounted of mass killings and targeted attacks on civilians, documenting what Rohingya communities have been warning of.

Rohingya also face forced recruitment, forced labour, detention and severe restrictions on movement. Sexual violence, a hallmark of the Rohingya genocide, is continuing under AA authority.

Rohingya in Rakhine report that the violence and oppression they now face from the AA is just as brutal as the Myanmar military’s ethnic cleansing in 2017. Taken together, we see these abuses as part of a deliberate strategy to drive Rohingya from their homes and continue their erasure from Myanmar.

The same anti-Rohingya racism that drove decades of persecution by the Myanmar military is also at the heart of the AA’s treatment of the Rohingya. The perpetrators may have changed, but the dehumanisation and denial of our identity and rights continue.

The AA is completing what the Myanmar military started. Rohingya are being driven from their villages and prevented from returning, while their land is confiscated and new Rakhine settlements are built on it, sometimes by Rohingya coerced into forced labour. The possibility of return is being destroyed in real time.

Nowhere safe to go

More than 150,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh since late 2023, just as international humanitarian funding for refugees is being slashed. Learning centres in Cox’s Bazar have closed and essential services are being cut. Children who fled genocide are growing up without education or hope for their future. Others were born in the camps and have never known a life outside them. The international community is allowing an entire generation of Rohingya children to be abandoned.

Rohingya are being forced to choose between continuing persecution in their homeland and hunger, insecurity and an increasingly desperate existence in camps.

For those forced to flee, there is often no safe route to protection. The very people forcing Rohingya to flee are often involved in and profiting from their trafficking as they try to escape. In July, two boats carrying more than 500 Rohingya, including children and young people, sank after leaving Rakhine. No one would put their children on such a dangerous journey unless staying was even more dangerous.

Meanwhile, there is growing anti-Rohingya sentiment in countries that host them as refugees. Governments talk about Rohingya returning home while more are being forced out and the land they would return to is being taken. We want to go home. But we want to go home with our rights: citizenship, equal rights and the right to return to our own land.

Nine years of impunity

For nine years, the Myanmar military leaders responsible for genocide against Rohingya have faced no real consequences. The architects of the genocide remain free, while the same military has gone on to commit atrocities against communities across Myanmar. Accountability is not only about the past. It is about stopping the violence happening now and preventing further atrocities.

The world cannot repeat the same failure with the Arakan Army. We have seen this pattern before and know where it leads. The longer the Myanmar military and AA are allowed to act with impunity, the closer we come to the complete erasure of the Rohingya from Rakhine.

Rohingya survivors and organisations have spent years documenting crimes, giving evidence and fighting for accountability. We had to pursue justice on the other side of the world because governments and international institutions failed to deliver it.

That fight is finally producing results. My organisation, the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK (BROUK), brought a universal jurisdiction case in Argentina which has resulted in international arrest warrants for 22 Myanmar military officials and three civilians, including the military government’s leaders Senior General Min Aung Hlaing and General Soe Win, for genocide and crimes against humanity. We are also pursuing reparations for Rohingya survivors.

A judgement is also expected in the coming months in the genocide case brought by The Gambia against Myanmar at the ICJ.

Rohingya are getting closer to justice in international courts but at the same time are being pushed further from our homeland. Legal progress means little if Rohingya continue to be killed, forced out and stripped of the land to which they hope one day to return.

We have fought for years to get this far. Now governments must act. Every possible pressure point must be applied.

States must enforce the Argentinian arrest warrants whenever those wanted enter their jurisdictions, and Interpol must act on Argentina’s request for red notices. Governments must impose coordinated targeted sanctions on the AA and the Myanmar military, alongside restrictions on arms, aviation fuel and revenue streams that enable further atrocities. Maximum international pressure must be applied on the AA to end its persecution of Rohingya and ensure our protection and equal rights.

The United Nations Security Council must act. The United Kingdom, as penholder on Myanmar, must push for an urgent council meeting on the atrocities taking place in Rakhine and the continued failure to protect the Rohingya.

Governments must restore and increase humanitarian funding for Rohingya in Bangladesh and Rakhine, facilitate cross-border aid and pressure the Myanmar military and the AA to end restrictions on humanitarian access.

Governments must pursue every available route to justice and accountability for crimes by the Myanmar military and the AA. They must also be ready to respond to the forthcoming ICJ judgement.

Justice and accountability delivered years too late will mean nothing if there are no Rohingya left in Myanmar.

Justice is not only about what happens in courtrooms. For Rohingya, it means being able to return to our villages and our land. It means restoring the citizenship and rights that have been taken from us. Above all, it means being able to live freely and as equals in Myanmar, without ever again facing persecution and genocide.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

Reporting from Washington — Jared Kushner may finally get a win.

President Trump’s son-in-law has been a drag on the administration for his friendship with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman since the Oct. 2 killing of a U.S.-based dissident Saudi journalist. His family business continues to raise questions of conflicts of interest, he repeatedly has amended financial disclosure reports to remedy omissions, and he endured an embarrassing yearlong delay in obtaining a security clearance. Meanwhile, his chief assignment, a Mideast peace plan, is as elusive as ever.

Lately, however, Kushner has been instrumental in helping his father-in-law secure a rare bipartisan victory: a long-sought overhaul of the criminal justice system.

Both Republicans and Democrats who’ve worked on the bill in Congress credit Kushner as a key architect. He helped convince the two most powerful Republicans in Washington — his father-in-law and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, both of whom embrace the traditionally Republican tough-on-crime stance — to make the criminal justice system less punitive.

The bill cleared a procedural hurdle in the Senate on Monday evening, 82 to 12, a vote margin that belies the arduous effort to overcome initial opposition from conservatives. Final Senate passage is expected later this week and the legislation is expected to easily get through the House and to the White House for Trump’s signature.

Called the First Step Act, the legislation would undo some of the sentencing crackdowns of the 1990s and create programs to reduce prisoner recidivism.

It would allow low- and minimum-risk prisoners to earn time credits for early release to either reentry centers or home confinement; reduce some mandatory minimum sentences, including those imposed by so-called three-strikes laws that automatically result in life imprisonment; and allow reviews of sentences that reflect significant disparities between harsh punishments for crack cocaine use, which disproportionately involve minorities, and lesser penalties for powder cocaine.

Kushner, driven by the experience of his father’s 14-month prison sentence for tax evasion and other crimes, has made prison and sentencing changes a priority since the beginning of the Trump administration. But unlike loftier goals Kushner has embraced, such as peace between Israel and Palestinians, criminal justice reform is likely to be signed by the president.

Kushner helped work on policy details and knew where the political fault lines would be, according to lawmakers. He was on the phone repeatedly with other advocates to discuss strategy and next steps. He personally lobbied senators, including McConnell, who openly was not eager to make time for a Senate vote. And he served as a bridge to conservative media, which could have blown up the effort with even a whiff of opposition.

“There would be some very outspoken right-wing [opponent] and [Kushner] would tell me, ‘I called him this morning. I straightened him out and now he’s going to be OK,’” said Democratic supporter Sen. Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, declining to name the commentator. “I’m thinking, ‘Who would have dreamed that a bill I’m cosponsoring would be OK with this person?’”

Advocates of the criminal justice overhaul tried to pass a similar bill at the end of the Obama administration, only to be stymied by congressional Republicans. They had little hope of getting it through during the Trump administration given the president’s campaign rhetoric on crime, including a call to execute drug dealers, and because of the fierce opposition of his first attorney general, Jeff Sessions.

“This is a president that ran on American ‘carnage,’” said Jessica Jackson, a Mill Valley, Calif., City Council member who started the advocacy group #cut50 with liberal CNN host and commentator Van Jones. “I thought everything was over.”

“I’m a Democrat,” Jackson said, but “Jared is politically brilliant and he’s relentless and he’s also extremely loyal. If he tells you he’s going to do something, he does it.”

Kushner started early. He made his support for criminal justice changes known to the leaders of the bipartisan congressional effort — including Durbin, the Senate’s second-ranking Democrat, and Republican Sen. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee — within weeks of Trump’s inauguration.

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), another architect of the plan, knew Kushner was taking the issue seriously when Kushner started dropping “the very precise nomenclature thrown around by criminal justice reform geeks” — for example, citing the relevant U.S. criminal code lines by their numbers.

While Kushner’s initial goal was prison reform, which is an easier sell with conservatives, it quickly became clear that had to be paired with sentencing reform to get the backing of Grassley and Durbin.

Perhaps the biggest obstacle was McConnell’s reluctance to bring up a bill that would unify Democrats and divide Republicans, handing the opposition a potential political cudgel in the 2020 campaign. He told a group of Republican advocates in September that he would bring the bill to the Senate floor only if it was endorsed by Trump and they secured 65 votes — five more than the minimum number needed to overcome procedural roadblocks.

Given the goal, Kushner relentlessly lobbied reluctant Republican senators to get on board, according to sources familiar with the discussions.

He called “everybody — and often,” said Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Senate Republican, whose late endorsement was part of a groundswell that made clear that enough Republicans would support the legislation. “He was dogged.”

On numerous occasions he lobbied McConnell directly, even trying to figure out the Republican leader’s dinner companions so that he could lobby them before their meal.

Advocates of the First Step Act also rallied high-profile celebrity supporters, such as Kim Kardashian West, which demonstrated to the media-obsessed Trump the positive publicity he could get. Kushner worked with Jones, and eventually got support from celebrities including Alyssa Milano and former Fox News host Eric Bolling.

“Jared Kushner absolutely was one of the main conduits,” Bolling said.

The dam broke this month when Trump tweeted “go for it, Mitch” and several noteworthy conservatives backed the bill, including Sens. Cornyn, Thom Tillis of North Carolina and Ted Cruz of Texas.

Lee, the Republican senator allied with Kushner, said: “One of the things I’ve appreciated about him is he doesn’t cut corners with this. I haven’t seen him abuse the position of trust as the president’s son-in-law. He doesn’t throw that around.”

Everyone in Washington knows Kushner’s trusted place in the Trump orbit; members of Congress return his phone calls and know he speaks for the president, at least as much as anyone can. Yet when Vice President Mike Pence came to a meeting of Senate Republicans to lobby on the bill last month, Kushner was deferential; attendees said he sat in the room but barely said a word.

The bill does have significant critics. Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and John Kennedy (R-La.) argue that it could allow dangerous criminals to get early release, and have proposed a series of amendments that could get votes this week. Still, passage is considered all but certain.

The latest from Washington »

jennifer.haberkorn@latimes.com

@jenhab

WASHINGTON — Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts is allowing the White House to continue construction on President Trump’s $400 million ballroom project for now.

Roberts signed a temporary order on Friday allowing work to continue while the court considers an emergency appeal from the Trump administration.

Lower courts had ordered a halt to the project, finding that it must have congressional approval. That ruling was set to take effect on Friday. Roberts signed the order because he oversees appeals of Washington-based cases.

The case comes before the nation’s highest court as Trump, a Republican, exercises unparalleled assertions of presidential power and increasingly seeks to mold the capital in his own image.

The Trump administration has scored a series of victories on the high court’s emergency docket, though the justices have ruled against some of the president’s signature policies after fuller review.

The administration has argued that the president has total authority to renovate the White House and other federal buildings as he sees fit and that the ballroom project must be completed due to national security concerns.

When Trump first announced the plans for a new ballroom, he did not emphasize national security. He said the project would be funded by private donations, including from himself.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation argues that Trump has no unilateral authority to undertake the work, which has included demolishing the East Wing. Lawyers for the preservation group accused the White House of trying to “outrun the courts” by accelerating construction.

The Trump administration says 65% of work has already been completed on the planned 90,000-square-foot (8,400-square-meter) ballroom, where the East Wing stood before the president ordered its demolition. Crews are working 20 hours a day, seven days a week on the project, where about $200 million in private donations has been spent or committed, Justice Department attorneys said in court documents.

A district court judge ordered a stop to aboveground construction of the planned ballroom in April in a ruling that was suspended before being upheld by an appeals court panel. The order from U.S. District Judge Richard Leon in Washington allows belowground work on bunkers and military installations to continue. Leon was nominated by President George W. Bush, a Republican.

Two appeals-court judges appointed by Democratic presidents found the project was for Congress to decide and “not a matter for Executive self-help.” A third judge, appointed by Trump, found that the preservationist group that challenged the project had no legal right to sue.

Solicitor General D. John Sauer picked up on that argument, calling the decision halting the work “extraordinary and unlawful.” He said the completion of the project was “vitally required by national security.”

Whitehurst and Kunzelman write for the Associated Press.

NASHVILLE — The Justice Department is pushing to revive criminal charges against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, telling a federal appeals court late Monday that a judge erred in his scathing ruling that called the case against the man mistakenly deported to an El Salvador prison an “abuse of prosecuting power.”

The government is appealing the May ruling by U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw that threw out charges of human smuggling against the Salvadoran national. The ruling amounted to an extraordinary rebuke of a Justice Department that under President Trump has repeatedly been accused of targeting defendants for political purposes.

Crenshaw found that Abrego Garcia would never have faced criminal charges had he not successfully sued the government over his 2025 deportation. The ruling was an embarrassment for the Trump administration, which only brought him back after securing a criminal indictment against him.

Crenshaw stopped short of finding the government acted with “actual vindictiveness,” a rarely-met standard that usually requires evidence such as a prosecutor admitting that charges were filed in retaliation against someone. But the judge did find there was enough evidence of “presumptive vindictiveness.”

That included the timing of the indictment. Homeland Security had been aware of the 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee that was the basis for the human smuggling charges for more than two years before Abrego Garcia was deported. The agency only reopened the case and began investigating in earnest after Abrego Garcia was ordered returned to the U.S.

Crenshaw also found that statements by U.S. Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche, who was a deputy at the time, suggested the Justice Department was targeting Abrego Garcia because he won his wrongful-deportation case.

In a brief filed Monday night with the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, federal prosecutors argued that Crenshaw got it wrong. Blanche’s statements, they argue, demonstrated a legitimate motive for prosecuting him. His rationale reflected a “normal assessment of the societal interest in punishment,” not an “improper penalty,” they said. The statements “explained that the government was seeking to protect the public and confirm its prior assertions about Abrego’s criminal activity,” the brief states.

But even if Blanche’s statements reflected an animus against Abrego Garcia, they are irrelevant because the person who actually brought the charges was then-Acting U.S. Atty. for the Middle District of Tennessee Rob McGuire, the brief states — rehashing an argument thoroughly rejected by Crenshaw that McGuire’s motives were the only motives that mattered in the case.

Crenshaw’s ruling noted the sustained oversight of the case by top Justice Department officials, including regular communications between McGuire and Associate Deputy Atty. Gen. Aakash Singh, in finding that the criminal case was thoroughly tainted. Crenshaw also noted that prosecutors never called as a witness the investigator who actually reopened the case, to explain why.

Abrego Garcia, 31, is a Salvadoran citizen with an American wife and child who has lived in Maryland for years, although he immigrated to the U.S. illegally as a teenager. A 2019 order by an immigration judge prohibited his deportation to El Salvador, finding he had a “well founded fear” of a gang that had targeted his family there. The judge allowed him to live and work in the U.S. under Immigration and Customs Enforcement supervision, but he was not given residency status.

Blocked from re-deporting Abrego Garcia to El Salvador, the Trump administration has vowed to deport him to a third county, threatening to send him to Uganda, Eswatini, Ghana and, most recently, Liberia. Abrego Garcia has said he would agree to be deported to Costa Rica, which has said it will accept him, but the government has so far declined to send him there.

He is fighting deportation to Liberia in a separate federal court case in Maryland.

Loller writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department finalized a rule Monday that will pave the way for people who have been barred from owning firearms because of criminal convictions to apply to have their gun rights reinstated.

The process launched by newly confirmed Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche is a victory for 2nd Amendment advocates who have long pushed for nonviolent people with felony convictions to be given a pathway to regain their legal right to own firearms.

“The Second Amendment is not a second-class right, and the federal government should not permanently deprive Americans of a constitutional right without regard to whether they pose a danger to public safety,” Blanche said in a statement. The attorney general said the new process will protect “public safety while giving deserving Americans a real path to restoration.”

It’s the latest move by President Trump’s administration to ease firearms restrictions. The Justice Department moved earlier this year to roll back and modify a slate of gun regulations. Separately, the department recently decided against challenging a court ruling that struck down regulations on firearm suppressors and certain guns.

Federal law has long allowed people who have had their gun rights stripped because of felony convictions to petition the government for the ability to own firearms again, but Congress since 1992 has effectively barred the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives from processing applications.

The Trump administration’s rule aims to circumvent that by establishing a new application system using an online portal.

The Justice Department says restoration will be granted on a case-by-case basis, weighing a person’s record and reputation to determine whether they pose a likely threat to public safety. Officials say people who have been convicted of violent crimes, registered sex offenders, people living in the country illegally and others whom officials believe pose a danger to society will be denied “absent extraordinary circumstances.”

Richer writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday again rebuffed President Trump’s push to throw out a jury’s $5 million finding that he sexually abused the writer E. Jean Carroll at a New York City department store in the mid-1990s and later defamed her.

The Republican president’s lawyers had asked the justices to reconsider their refusal to hear his appeal. The court denied Trump’s petition along with several others.

It’s unusual — although not unheard of — for the court to grant such requests. Trump paid the judgment shortly after the court declined to take up his appeal in June.

Trump and the Justice Department are also asking the high court to toss out a second Carroll verdict totaling $83 million. They argue he’s immune from being sued over comments he made about her in 2019, when he was president. The court has not yet acted on that appeal.

Carroll is a longtime advice columnist and former TV talk show host. She testified at a 2023 trial that Trump turned a friendly 1990s encounter into a violent attack in the dressing room at Bergdorf Goodman, a luxury retailer across the street from Trump Tower in Manhattan. The jury found Trump liable for defaming Carroll when he denied her allegation in 2022.

Trump has denied any wrongdoing.

The Associated Press does not identify people who say they have been sexually assaulted unless they come forward publicly, as Carroll has done.

Whitehurst writes for the Associated Press.

The U.S. Department of Justice and Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department have agreed to settle a lawsuit over what federal prosecutors alleged last year was a pattern of delaying applications for permits to carry concealed firearms for “unreasonable” lengths of time.

The Sheriff’s Department will “bring its procedures in line with the Supreme Court’s landmark Bruen decision,” the DOJ said in a statement Thursday, referring to a 2022 high court decision affirming a constitutional right to carry a handgun in public for self-defense.

Excessively delaying applications for concealed carry permits, the DOJ had alleged, effectively violated the applicants’ constitutional rights.

In response to its lawsuit, the DOJ’s statement said, the Sheriff’s Department “drastically cut those waiting times and is now in compliance with statutory deadlines.” The development is “a huge win for the residents of Los Angeles County and for the Second Amendment,” the federal agency added.

“The Justice Department supports our law enforcement partners.” Assistant Atty. Gen. Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said in the statement. “The sheriff acknowledged the problem and devoted substantial additional resources, including new processing software and additional personnel, to cutting waiting times dramatically.”

The Sheriff’s Department did not immediately provide comment on the settlement.

In its complaint filed in federal district court in L.A. in September, the DOJ claimed that the Sheriff’s Department had “systematically denied thousands of law-abiding Californians their fundamental Second Amendment right to bear arms outside the home — not through outright refusal, but through a deliberate pattern of unconscionable delay.”

The complaint stated that between Jan. 2, 2024, and March 31, 2025, the Sheriff’s Department received almost 4,000 applications for new concealed carry licenses, but issued only two. Two others were denied and the rest were either withdrawn or were still pending, according to the DOJ.

The DOJ complaint also cited Sheriff’s Department data that showed that over those 15 months, it took an average of nearly 300 days for the department to advance the more than 8,000 new permit applications and renewals it received.

The Sheriff’s Department said in September that Sheriff Robert Luna, who was also listed by name as a defendant in the original federal complaint, “inherited a dysfunctional system” when he took office in 2022, and that he had only 13 people to manage the avalanche of applications for concealed carry permits filed each year in L.A. County.

The department also said in September that since December 2022, it had reduced “the backlog” of applications for concealed carry licenses from about 10,000 to about 3,200, and that more than 19,000 such applications had been “successfully approved” since 2020.

Aug. 13 (UPI) — Gun control groups are concerned that the Trump administration has yet to appeal a federal court ruling last week that struck down parts of the National Firearms Act that limited deregulated short-barreled rifles, shotguns, and silencers

U.S. District Judge Wesley Hendrix of the Northern District of Texas ruled Aug. 5 that federal restrictions on gun control could not stand after last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act eliminated a $200 fee to transfer or produce certain firearms.

Hendrix gave a one-week deadline to request a stay of his ruling, which expired early Thursday.

“Today, our government is failing us,” Brady President Kris Brown said in a statement on Thursday. “At midnight, uniquely lethal weapons and devices — including silencers, short-barreled rifles, and shotguns — were deregulated for the first time in nearly a century. The Department of Justice had the opportunity to act to protect our safety, but it failed to do so.”

A Department of Justice official reportedly told news outlets the Justice Department “is currently assessing the impact of the court’s ruling.”

“The Department of Justice’s decision is a failure to defend public safety,” Emma Brown, executive director of gun-control group Giffords, said in a statement.

“For nearly 100 years, Congress has required background checks before someone could buy a silencer, short-barreled rifle, or short-barreled shotgun,” she continued. “These commonsense safeguards keep these dangerous devices out of the wrong hands. Silencers make it harder for law enforcement to detect and locate active shooters. And short-barreled rifles and shotguns are easily concealable and extremely dangerous.

The lawsuit in Texas consolidated two separate cases. The first one was brought by B&T USA, Firearms Regulatory Accountability Coalition, Gun Owners Foundation, Gun Owners of America, Palmetto State Armory, Silencerco Weapons Research, Silencer Shop Foundation, 15 Republican-controlled states and several individuals.

The second lawsuit was filed by the Texas State Rifle Association, Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, FPC Action Foundation, Hot Shots Custom, and several others.

Hendrix’s ruling only applies to the parties in the two cases.

“For nearly a century, Americans have been forced to beg the federal government for permission to exercise their Second Amendment rights,” Erich Practt, senior vice president of Gun Owners of America, said in a statement. “That changes tonight.”

Meanwhile, Gun Owners of America and Silencer Shop announced two of its members “lawfully acquired suppressors without complying with the currently enjoined registration requirements of the National Firearms Act of 1934.”

Aug. 13 (UPI) — The Trump administration has filed fraud-related charges against a former Southern Poverty Law Center official who testified during the Jan. 6 insurrection investigation, as its crack down on the anti-hate group and President Donald Trump‘s perceived opponents.

The Justice Department originally charged SPLC in an 11-count indictment in April, alleging that the frequent target of right-wing criticism had defrauded donors by using their money to pay informants within hate groups they were monitoring. The Trump administration has framed the payments as paying the hate groups it was supposed to monitor, such as the KKK. SPLC vehemently denies the allegations.

On Wednesday, federal prosecutors unveiled a superseding indictment against Heidi Beirich, 59, a political extremism expert and former SPLC chief financial officer, and the SPLC, charing them with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to submit false statements to a federally insured bank.

Beirich, of Palm Springs, Calif., was arrested Wednesday morning, FBI Director Kash Patel said in a statement.

“The indictment unsealed today reflects the continued work of federal investigators and prosecutors in examining this alleged scheme,” U.S. Attorney Thomas Govan said in a statement.

“We look forward to presenting the evidence in court and allowing the judicial process to determine the facts and the defendants’ responsibility for the alleged crimes.”

The SPLC has long faced criticism from some Republicans and conservatives, who say the prominent anti-hate group has drifted from its mission of fighting extremism and White supremacy by labeling several right-wing organizations as hate groups.

Pressure from the White House has mounted on the group since Trump returned to the helm of the government. The Trump administration has brought a number of federal and civil prosecutions against the president’s perceived opponents, attracting criticism from judicial and civil rights advocates as well as Democrats who accuse it of weaponizing the Justice Department.

As an expert in far-right extremist political violence, Beirich, in her role as co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, testified before the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection attempt by Trump supporters, stating that there was substantial political and personal overlap between the Proud Boys and Trump’s movement.

In October, FBI Director Kash Patel severed ties with the SPLC, saying it had “long abandoned civil rights work and turned into a partisan smear machine.”

The April indictment alleges that between 2014 and 2023, SPLC paid some $3 million in donated funds to members of violent extremist groups. In the superseding indictment unveiled Wednesday, the Justice Department no contends that it paid more than $4 million between 2007 and 2023.

During an unrelated press conference on Wednesday, newly confirmed Attorney General Todd Blanche, a former personal lawyer of the president, said Beirich is believed to have been part of an effort “to open bank accounts in completely fictitious companies’ names to make payments to individuals for reasons that were not accurate as described.”

Michael Proctor, Beirich’s attorney, accused the Trump administration of using the justice system to silence its political opponents.

“Heidi Beirich has dedicated her life to fighting hate groups and extremist movements like the KKK, neo-Nazis and other White supremacists,” Proctor said in a statement, NBC News reported.

“She has combatted these hateful, ugly and un-American extremists and their repeated uses of violence and intimidation in order to promote a fairer, safer and more just America. Her decades-long record of success dismantling hate groups — and the resulting threats to her life — speak volumes. For this, she has been indicted.”

Aug. 12 (UPI) — The U.S. Justice Department announced Wednesday that 11 people have been charged with in connection in a marriage fraud scheme that allegedly lasted more than a decade.

The department said in a release that those charged conspired to orchestrate more than 1,000 fraudulent marriages. These marriages allegedly were intended to obtain immigration status for foreign nationals, mostly citizens of China.

“The individuals who were arrested today allegedly orchestrated elaborate schemes to illegally obtain citizenship for foreign nationals through sham marriages,” U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche said. “Schemes like this are a deliberate affront to the United States and our laws and will not be tolerated under the Trump administration.”

The indictment was filed in the Southern District of New York. Some people paid up to $100,000 for a sham marriage to help them obtain a green card, with the U.S. citizens involved receiving as much as $30,000 from that fee, the Justice Department said.

At a press conference, Blanche said this marks one of the biggest marriage fraud prosecutions in U.S. history.

“This scheme was not a quick, fly-by-night operation, but rather a years-long, multimillion-dollar cottage industry to criminally assist people who would not, or legally could not, otherwise become citizens of the United States,” he said.

Those allegedly running the scheme include defendants Amy Cheng, Xiao Mei Chan, Gang Zheng and Xiao Yan Chan. Others charged include “recruiters” who allegedly found U.S. citizens to take part and “officiators” who presided over the marriage ceremonies.

The Justice Department said organizers allegedly paired foreign nationals with U.S. citizens, arranging fake marriage ceremonies and staging photographs meant to make the wedding look authentic. Scheme participants also allegedly manufactured further evidence, including joint financial accounts and insurance policies.

Jamie McDonald, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, said at the press conference that the scheme generated “tens of millions of dollars.”

WASHINGTON — The Senate confirmed Todd Blanche as attorney general in a vote early Saturday, cementing the command of President Trump’s former personal lawyer at a Department of Justice that Trump has sought to bend to his will.

The Republican-led Senate voted 50 to 49 to make Blanche the second confirmed attorney general since Trump returned to the White House last year with a stated desire to use the law enforcement agency to investigate his political enemies. While Blanche has already been leading the department in an acting capacity, his confirmation could free him to pursue the administration’s agenda even more aggressively.

Blanche said on social media that he was “deeply honored by the trust and confidence President Trump has placed in me,” adding that he was “grateful” to senators for working late to confirm him.

The vote followed a tumultuous confirmation fight that exposed deep concerns — from some Republicans as well as Democrats — about installing Trump’s close ally atop a Justice Department that historically prided itself on its independence from the White House.

In the end, Blanche was confirmed by the narrowest of margins, opposed by two Republicans — Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — and by every Democrat.

The path to confirmation for Blanche was unusually rocky, due in large part to Republican concerns about a controversial settlement of Trump’s lawsuit against the IRS.

Under pressure, Blanche publicly promised in writing that the department would abandon Trump’s proposed $1.8-billion compensation fund for the president’s allies, including those who attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and rein in another piece of the settlement designed to shield Trump and his family from IRS tax audits.

His appeals were enough to win over Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, the decisive vote who threw his support behind Blanche on Friday morning. Cassidy said no other nominee may be able to run the department better under Trump and suggested Blanche’s role as Trump’s former criminal defense lawyer can make him more effective at resisting the Republican president’s demands.

“This is not a referendum on President Trump. It is a decision regarding Mr. Blanche in very specific circumstances,” said Cassidy, who lost his primary this year to a Trump-backed challenger.

Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said confirming Blanche would be a “serious mistake.” He begged his colleagues not to be on the “wrong side” of history.

“If there is ever a moment in history when we need an attorney general above reproach, who is clearly dedicated to ending corruption, even at the highest level of our government, it’s right now,” Durbin said.

Loyalty to Trump

The vote capped off a bruising confirmation fight, with Blanche’s loyalty to Trump at the center of the stalemate.

Blanche was elevated to the top Justice Department post in an acting capacity after Trump fired Pam Bondi in April. Blanche moved swiftly to advance the president’s interests, accelerating investigations into Trump’s perceived foes and announcing the settlement that created the $1.8-billion “anti-weaponization fund” to compensate Trump allies who feel mistreated by the criminal justice system and provided the president and his family members with immunity from tax audits.

The controversial settlement threatened to torpedo Blanche’s nomination until he formally rescinded the fund in writing under pressure from Republican Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina. The deal reached between the senators and the department unlocked a vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee, which advanced Blanche’s nomination earlier this week.

Even after the deal, Blanche faced opposition from some Republican senators concerned with the settlement fund and the tax audit immunity.

Murkowski announced early Friday that she would join Collins in opposing Blanche’s nomination, saying the country needs an attorney general “who will check the worst impulses of this administration.”

Former prosecutor rises as Trump’s defender

A former federal prosecutor in New York, Blanche rose to public prominence as a lead attorney on Trump’s defense team, including during Trump’s hush money trial in New York in which he was found guilty of felony fraud.

He also defended Trump against criminal charges in the two federal cases brought by the Biden administration’s Department of Justice, related to Trump’s attempts to overturn his loss in the 2020 election and his hoarding of classified documents at his home in Florida. Both cases were dropped after Trump won reelection in 2024, and despite the seriousness of the charges, Blanche said that experience provided him a firsthand look at what he claims was the weaponization of the criminal justice system against Trump.

Blanche entered the Justice Department last year as deputy attorney general under Bondi, overseeing the agency’s day-to-day operations and serving as the public face for high-profile and controversial matters, like the release of millions of investigative files related to disgraced late financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Democrats have accused Blanche of prioritizing his loyalty to Trump above all else through investigations against perceived Trump foes such as former FBI Director James Comey and a radical reshaping of the department. Under Bondi and Blanche’s leadership, the department has lost thousands of employees through firings, resignations or voluntary departures.

Blanche’s supporters say his experience as a federal prosecutor and the trust he earned from Trump in the courtroom make him better equipped than Bondi to explain to the White House the legal constraints of its demands. Republicans have also touted his efforts to bring down violent crime, tackle illegal immigration and combat violent cartels and drug trafficking.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, the Judiciary Committee chairman, gave a full-throated endorsement of Blanche ahead of voting, saying he’s led the Justice Department with distinction. “Mr. Blanche is the right choice,” said Grassley (R-Iowa).

It is unclear whether Blanche will fare any better in delivering on Trump’s desire for retribution than Bondi, whom Trump fired amid resistance from judges, grand jurors and the department’s own workforce as prosecutors sought to establish criminal conduct by one Trump foe after another.

Shortly after Blanche took the top post, the Justice Department moved to indict Comey on charges of threatening the 47th president by posting a social media photograph of seashells in the numerical arrangement of “86 47.” Comey’s lawyers are pressing to have the case dismissed, accusing the department of misleading judges, submitting documents containing false statements and withholding key facts.

Blanche has also appointed Joseph DiGenova, a former Justice Department prosecutor from the Reagan administration, to oversee a Florida-based investigation into whether former law enforcement and intelligence officials conspired over the last decade to undermine Trump. But it remains uncertain whether that inquiry will result in any criminal charges.

Durkin Richer and Mascaro write for the Associated Press. AP writers Bill Barrow in Atlanta and Kevin Freking and Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington contributed to this report.

Heated Rivalry will be retuning to Sky next year for UK audiences with two new leads

Smash hit romance series Heated Rivalry will be returning to screens and there is one face that will be surprisingly familiar.

Having first been aired on Canadian streaming service Crave back in November 2025, it was then picked up by HBO Max in the US and was renewed for a second series just a month after it became a huge hit around the world.

Based on the bestselling book by Rachel Reid, it follows two elite professional hockey players who have a secret love affair. According to Sky: “The first season told the story of rival hockey players Shane Hollander (Williams) and Ilya Rozanov (Storrie).

“Bound by ambition, rivalry and a magnetic pull neither of them fully understood, what began as a secret fling between two fresh-faced rookies evolved into a years-long journey of love, denial, and self-discovery.”

Confirmed to return to Sky and NOW in Spring 2027 in the UK, it was today announced (August 7) that Justice Smith and Charlie Gillespie have also been confirmed as new cast additions playing Harris Drover and Troy Barrett.

Justice Smith may already appear familiar to some fans, but who is the star and where have you seen him before?

Who is Justice Smith?

Justice Smith is an American actor well known for his role in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom as well as I Saw the TV Glow and Pokemon Detective Pikachu.

Aged 30, Justin made his on-screen acting debut back in 2012 with thriller Trigger Finger and some television programmes before his first major role as Radar in Paper Towns in 2015.

Fans may also recognise the star from his appearance in Every Day (2018) as well as Sharper in 2023 and more recently, Now You See Me: Now You Don’t.

Writer, director, and executive producer Jacob Tierney and executive producer Brendan Brady said about the cast announcement: “Rachel Reid has given us two beautifully layered characters in Harris and Troy who you can’t help but root for.

“From the start of the casting process, we knew we were looking for actors who could create something truly special together and bring that same depth and heart to the screen.

“Justice and Charlie do exactly that. They immediately connected with the vulnerability and resilience at the core of these characters, bringing an instinctive understanding of who Harris and Troy are.”

Heated Rivalry season 2 will be coming to Sky and streaming service NOW in Spring 2027.

Aug. 7 (UPI) — Justice Samuel Alito said Friday in a rare interview that he is committed to returning for another term at the Supreme Court.

Speculation that Alito, 76, would retire swelled in June, after NPR mistakenly reported that he planned to step down at the end of this term.

On Friday, the justice put those rumors to bed.

“Obviously I’m here for another term,” Alito told The Wall Street Journal.

“It’s not pleasant, in the sense that it’s a reminder of mortality,” he said to the newspaper about questions related to his retirement.

“It’s like, what are those vultures doing up there?” the justice added. “They are flying around. But it goes with life tenure.”

Alito’s non-retirement was reported by NPR reporter Nina Totenberg, a veteran of Supreme Court coverage, on June 30.

NPR retracted the story later that same day.

Totenberg said she heard a retirement announcement while rushing out of the courtroom and mistakenly assumed it was Alito.

She called it “the worst professional mistake of my more than 50 years in journalism.”

Alito, a staunch conservative, was appointed by President George W. Bush and joined the court in 2006.

Justice Department Watchdogs Face Sharp Decline

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is facing growing scrutiny after internal watchdog offices responsible for investigating attorney misconduct and departmental wrongdoing experienced significant staffing losses during President Donald Trump’s second term, even as complaints against the department reached record levels.

According to a Reuters review of government records and interviews with former Justice Department officials, the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) and the Office of Inspector General (OIG) have seen substantial reductions in personnel, raising concerns about their ability to independently oversee the country’s top law enforcement agency.

Federal judges have increasingly criticized DOJ attorneys for alleged misconduct, including accusations of making false statements, ignoring court orders and using legal processes against political opponents.

Misconduct Complaints Rise as Investigations Fall

The Office of Professional Responsibility, which investigates misconduct by Justice Department lawyers, has seen its workforce fall from 29 employees to just 16 since Trump returned to office.

At the same time, misconduct complaints have climbed to their highest level in two decades.

Despite receiving 1,666 complaints during the 2025 fiscal year, the office opened only seven formal investigations, the lowest number recorded in the past twenty years. Over the previous decade, the office averaged more than 18 new investigations annually.

Former Justice Department officials told Reuters that staff departures, combined with concerns about political retaliation, have significantly slowed oversight activities.

Justice Department spokesperson Kiersten Pels rejected those concerns, saying OPR remains committed to investigating attorney misconduct and ensuring accountability.

Inspector General Office Also Loses Staff

The Department’s Office of Inspector General, responsible for investigating fraud, waste and abuse across the DOJ, has also experienced notable staff reductions.

Government employment records show the office lost 99 employees since the end of former President Joe Biden’s administration, reducing its workforce to 477.

Former officials interviewed by Reuters said the office has become increasingly reluctant to pursue politically sensitive investigations, although Inspector General spokesperson John Lavinsky denied that claim, insisting the office continues to conduct independent oversight regardless of political sensitivity.

Jack Smith Investigation Remains Unresolved

Among the most prominent internal cases is the ethics investigation involving former Special Counsel Jack Smith, who led federal prosecutions related to Trump’s handling of classified documents and efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

The investigation examined allegations by Republican lawmakers that Smith’s team improperly influenced the 2024 election and pressured witnesses.

Reuters reported that Smith had already been interviewed by investigators and the inquiry was expected to conclude last year. However, the investigation remains unresolved after reportedly being paused by political appointees.

Separately, the Justice Department has since launched a criminal investigation into Smith, who has denied wrongdoing.

Federal Judges Increase Criticism of DOJ Conduct

The weakening of internal oversight coincides with an increasing number of judicial rebukes directed at the Justice Department.

Federal judges have criticized government attorneys in several high profile cases involving evidence handling, courtroom conduct and legal strategy.

Among the most notable rulings was a decision by U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams, who accused senior Justice Department officials, including Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, of failing to properly defend the government in litigation involving former President Trump and instead negotiating what she described as an inappropriate settlement.

DOJ officials have disputed those judicial findings, arguing that several courts have demonstrated political hostility toward the administration.

Concerns Over External Oversight

The Trump administration has also moved to limit outside scrutiny of Justice Department attorneys by challenging state level ethics investigations and seeking expanded authority to restrict oversight by legal licensing bodies.

Administration officials argue that many state investigations are politically motivated and designed to discourage government lawyers from implementing the president’s policies.

Legal ethics experts, however, warn that diminishing both internal and external oversight risks undermining public confidence in the department’s accountability mechanisms.

Analysis

The reported weakening of the Justice Department’s internal watchdog offices comes at a time when judicial scrutiny of government conduct has intensified, placing institutional accountability under renewed focus. While the administration argues that oversight mechanisms remain fully operational and that many judicial criticisms are politically motivated, the decline in staffing and investigations raises broader questions about the effectiveness and perceived independence of internal accountability structures. As politically sensitive cases continue to move through U.S. courts, the credibility of the DOJ’s oversight institutions is likely to remain central to debates over the balance between executive authority, legal ethics and public trust in federal law enforcement.

With information from Reuters.

WASHINGTON — President Trump’s choice for attorney general is facing a tight vote for confirmation in a Republican-controlled Senate nearly halfway through his second term, reflecting mounting doubts about his leadership of the Justice Department as bipartisan concerns over the weaponization of justice intensify.

The confirmation of Todd Blanche hangs on the support of two Republicans who have repeatedly criticized Trump’s stewardship of the department, where Blanche has served as deputy and acting attorney general, roles he assumed after working as the president’s personal lawyer for nearly two years.

Republican senators resisted Trump’s approach to the Justice Department from the start of the presidential transition, rejecting his first choice to lead it, Matt Gaetz, amid concerns he would use the department to pursue political retribution. But after Gaetz withdrew, Trump’s replacement, Pam Bondi, won bipartisan confirmation with the support of the entire Republican caucus.

Blanche is already guaranteed a narrower margin, with Sen. Susan Collins of Maine announcing she will vote to reject his confirmation, and with Sen. Mitch McConnell absent for health reasons. Democrats are expected to be united in opposition against him.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, a figure the president has referred to as a “terrible,” “Trump-deranged” “loser” who “should never be elected,” has refused to comment on her plans.

Her staff has said she is reviewing a commitment Blanche made in writing to formally rescind a controversial, $1.8-billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” announced in May to compensate Trump’s political allies, including those who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Blanche also said he would limit immunity offered to Trump and his family for future tax audits, although his wording left the door open to negotiating a future deal along similar terms.

“I think certainly the fact that he has signed this order, basically disbanding [the Anti-Weaponization Fund] — that’s a pretty good step,” Murkowski said , adding that she would “like to find out a little bit more about the negotiations.”

Blanche has taken steps to curry Murkowski’s favor in recent months, visiting Alaska and announcing a $400-million settlement benefiting Alaska natives’ healthcare in July.

Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, the other uncommitted lawmaker in the chamber, said he had concerns that Blanche was still effectively working as Trump’s personal attorney under the guise of public service.

“I am very concerned about so-called lawfare — people being prosecuted not for a valid reason beyond somebody in high office being angry at them,” Cassidy said.

“So, I’ve not made a decision regarding Mr. Blanche,” he added. “I’ve got to be convinced that he is an attorney general who just happens to have once been President Trump’s personal attorney, as opposed to President Trump’s personal attorney who is now the attorney general. I think there’s a big difference between the two.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota said that he was still working to secure the votes needed for Blanche’s confirmation.

“I’m hoping we’ll get there eventually,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

Blanche became the acting attorney general in April after Bondi was fired. Blanche had previously served as deputy attorney general and has been linked to some of the most controversial policies of the Trump administration.

His connection to the settlement between Trump and the Internal Revenue Service took center stage during his confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Blanche said during the hearing that the controversial fund created as part of the IRS settlement was dead.

But Republican Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina refused to vote for Blanche until he issued a more explicit order that killed the fund, which was designed to provide payouts to allies of Trump.

Cornyn and Tillis also demanded that the Justice Department provide constraints to tax audit immunity that was granted to Trump, two of his sons and their business as part of the lawsuit settlement.

The federal judge who presided over the IRS case blasted the proceedings and the agreement as “improper” saying that the two sides — Trump and the IRS — were not truly independent of each other.

The written assurances provided by Blanche were enough to win support from Cornyn and Tillis, though Democrats pointed out that they did not foreclose the possibility that a similar fund could be resurrected in the future.

“The president himself has largely telegraphed that’s his plan,” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the top Democrat on the committee, said Tuesday before the vote.

Blanche has been the face of the administration’s release of files related to deceased sex abuser Jeffrey Epstein. Bondi told the House Oversight Committee in May that Blanche had overseen the process, which included delays in the release of files and major redaction issues.

Blanche also faced criticism for a July 2025 prison interview he conducted with Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted of facilitating Epstein’s abuse.

Shortly after the interview, she was moved from her Florida prison to a low-security prison in Texas where she has reportedly gotten favorable treatment.

United States President Donald Trump has criticised his own Department of Justice after it decided to drop criminal charges against a former Olympic athlete for the alleged vandalism of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in Washington, DC.

Trump voiced his opposition to the decision on Saturday, a day after US Attorney Jeanine Pirro announced she was dismissing the charges against 67-year-old competitive canoeist David Hearn.

Pirro said the damage was the result of “a botched installation and not vandalism”, contradicting both her own previous statements and claims made following Hearn’s June 19 arrest.

On Saturday, Trump wrote on his Truth Social page that he disagreed “100 percent” with Pirro, although he did not directly reference Hearn. Instead, he maintained that vandalism had been committed at the Reflecting Pool.

“To me, it was a pure case of VANDALISM,” Trump wrote. “There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!”

He followed his statement by posting a video showing an individual, though not Hearn, sticking a hand into the Reflecting Pool.

He also shared a photo of the numbers “86 47” etched into the lawn of the nearby National Mall, which has been interpreted as a call to “86” — or “nix” — the 47th president by removing him from his office.

There is no evidence that the numbers on the lawn are related to the Reflecting Pool, which has become a major political flashpoint for Trump.

Through a series of controversial renovation projects, Trump has sought to physically transform Washington, DC, including by resurfacing the pool.

He initially used the pool’s condition and previous renovation projects to criticise past presidents.

But his own attempt to fix the Reflecting Pool instantly attracted scrutiny, particularly after Trump hand-picked a company he had previously used in a private capacity.

It had never before received a government contract, and the multimillion-dollar deal was awarded without a competitive bidding process, as is standard.

Upon the renovation’s completion, problems soon emerged. The Reflecting Pool’s new lining quickly appeared to peel, and algae blooms sprouted in early June.

Trump repeatedly blamed the situation on “vandals”. The announcement of at least seven arrests connected to the pool sparked accusations of political scapegoating.

Hearn, who represented the US three times at the Olympics, emerged as the most high-profile case.

The athlete said he was bicycling past the Reflecting Pool when he stopped, reached in and felt the peeling sealant. He has denied committing any vandalism, with his lawyers calling his arrest an attempt to distract from the shoddy renovation work.

Pirro, a former Fox News host and Trump loyalist, had initially accused Hearn of “forcefully and violently” ripping the pool’s liner, decrying his actions as “an affront to the dignity of our shared history”.

In their court filings, federal prosecutors alleged that the damage Hearn caused exceeded $1,000, justifying federal charges.

They further claimed that all of the damage done to the Reflecting Pool had been caused by vandals.

Pirro struck a far different tone in her filing on Friday. She claimed she had received new information, leading her to dramatically pivot.

“It was not until after the return of the indictment, that the [Department of Interior] provided additional documents to the [US Attorney’s Office for Washington, DC] indicating that damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in June 2026 was the result of flawed installation by the contractor,” Pirro wrote.

The Department of the Interior’s documents, she continued, showed “that the damage was the result of a botched installation and not vandalism”.

Pirro further blamed the damage on pressure to finish the project by July 4, a date that coincides with US Independence Day and the country’s 250th anniversary.

“The rush to complete the project led to hasty and botched work that was not remediated before the project was finished and the fencing removed,” Pirro wrote.

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department moved Friday to dismiss a criminal case charging a former Olympian with deliberately damaging the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

Government lawyers said in a 20-page court filing that information provided since the indictment of David Hearn shows that the damage was the result of a “flawed installation by the contractor” as well as “the rush to complete the project prior to events associated with the America 250 celebration in the weeks surrounding Independence Day 2026.”

“Given all of this newly discovered information, it is difficult to attribute the widespread damage to the Reflecting Pool to vandalism, let alone to establish that fact beyond a reasonable doubt,” said the filing from U.S. Atty. Jeanine Pirro.

Hearn’s lawyers said in a statement that the case against him should never have been brought.

“Its dismissal today does not erase the abuse of government power in arresting and charging a patriotic American who did nothing wrong. The government’s approach was ready, fire, aim. The administration owes Mr. Hearn an apology,” the lawyers said.

Hearn pleaded not guilty earlier this month to one felony count of property destruction and has a trial scheduled to start Sept. 28 in D.C. Superior Court. The charge, which carries a maximum prison sentence of 10 years upon conviction, accuses Hearn of causing at least $1,000 in damage to the pool.

Hearn told the Associated Press he was detained by National Guard troops and U.S. Park Police for five hours after stopping by the pool during a bike ride on June 19. He said he reached in to examine the pool’s newly peeled coating and briefly touched a chunk attached to the side of the pool, but said he obeyed a park worker who told him to let go of it.

Hearn, 67, of Bethesda, Md., competed in three Summer Olympics, earning his best finish, ninth, at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee says on its website.

He and his supporters have said the prosecution is a politically motivated attempt by the Trump administration to deflect blame and scapegoat others.

Tucker writes for the Associated Press.

Modern conflicts are not just waged by state sponsored armed forces. In the last two decades there has been a rapid growth in the international recruitment of Private Military Companies (PMCs), used for everything from protecting top-level diplomats from harm in the Middle East to defending resource mining sites throughout Sub-Saharan Africa.

These commercial security contractors are indispensable partners to states, NGOs and corporations the world over. The growth of privatized conflict presents structural issues for international law and diplomacy.

The Loopholes of Modern Legal Systems in War

Among the most consistent and frequent challenges to global peace and security is the glaring accountability vacuum relating to non-state actors. When a uniformed state soldier is found to have committed crimes they are subject to the rigorous legal structures of the military justice system, including the Geneva Convention. By comparison, PMC operators often exist in a legal grey area.

Host nations where such operators act, often experience a level of domestic instability where their own legal systems are overstretched, or politically weak to effectively take action against powerful private security forces. The nations routinely lack either the will or capacity to pursue legal action against heavily armed foreign PMC personnel. The home states of PMCs are never eager to prosecute for alleged offences committed abroad by the corporations which they sanction. This leads to an accountability vacuum.

Bringing the War-Zone Back Home

Attempts by domestic prosecutors to seek convictions for offenses such as murder or assault against their country’s PMC operators has led to lengthy and complex legal proceedings. Acts normally described a felony assault charge were made all the more difficult due to a defence team pointing to the hostile environment, self-defense and chain of command arguments during combat.

Diplomatic Fallout and Tensions

International Cooperation Needed for PMC Regulation

It was at 11:21 a.m. on Sunday, June 21, that things started to fall apart. Aliyu Muhammad was in the Malali area, Kaduna, northwestern Nigeria, working underneath a car when he missed a call from his wife. When he called back, someone else answered and asked him if he knew the owner of the phone. 

“He said whatever he would tell me are just unconfirmed suspicions,” he recounted. “Then, he told me some women saw my wife and suspected she was a child kidnapper. I told him that I left her at home and she was supposed to attend an event. He said that’s exactly what she told them, but the people, seeing a stranger with a hijab and niqab talking to some children while there is a high rate of kidnapping, were suspicious. He asked me to send a representative since I wasn’t around.”

The man who called introduced himself as the Mai Anguwa (community head). Aliyu sent his friend, Suleiman Isa, to fill in for him. Fortunately, the man knew the friend.  

Ummulkhairi left her home in Sabon Gari Marraraban Jos, Kaduna, that morning to attend an Islamic lecture in Madrasat Tashiyhul Iman, an area she wasn’t familiar with. This led her to ask a group of children for directions. However, being a fully covered Muslim woman with a hijab and a face veil (niqab), some of the residents profiled her as dangerous. They mistook her for a child kidnapper. Within a short time, a mob gathered, and they eventually killed her, then set her body on fire, despite attempts to save her life.

The Kaduna State Police Command claimed that officers attempted to save her life, but the mob stormed the police station, overpowered them, and forcefully took Ummulkhairi out. However, eyewitness accounts tell a different story. 

Zainab Musa, Ummulkhairi’s sister-in-law, who was at the scene, said it was the Divisional Police Officer (DPO), CSP Abdullahi S. Akai, who handed her over to the mob, and that she tried to pull Ummulkhairi away from him but to no avail. Other witnesses, including Ummulkhairi’s co-wife, Hussaina Sani, corroborated this account. 

HumAngle visited the police station in Marrarraba Jos, where sources said the DPO “had been transferred to the Force Headquarters for investigation”. On the afternoon of Jul 16, we met DSP Mansir Hassan, the Kaduna Police spokesperson, who said he could not answer any questions because the case is under investigation and officers were not allowed to comment outside the earlier press statement.

After she was lynched, the DPO visited her house with some journalists, who interviewed him right in their compound at the centre of the family’s grief. 

“[The DPO] lifted his trousers to show us the injury he sustained from the mob. He even told us that his car was damaged, and all I could think was how any of that concerns us,” said Aminatu Isa Abdullahi, Ummulkhairi’s mother-in-law.  

On the day it happened 

As Aliyu struggled to reach the scene after the phone call, each passing second deepened his fears. “It was hard to get a bike from where I was in Malali Low-cost, so I had to walk,” he recalled. “While I was walking, I was anxiously calling my friend [Suleiman], but his number wasn’t connecting. I rushed to get my brother-in-law in Kawo Park, and we flagged down a bike.” He also called Zainab, his sister, who in turn contacted Ummulkhairi’s colleagues, who were also supposed to attend the event. 

The bike ride felt slow that day, and Aliyu’s anxiety worsened as he started receiving calls from people asking where he was as the crowd was becoming more erratic. When they reached the Marrarraban Jos Bridge, he saw cars and lorries parked on the road. The motorcyclist dropped them on the other side, and they continued on foot. 

He saw smoke from a distance. Then, as if on cue, his second wife called.

“They have killed her,” she said. 

Those words echoed in Aliyu’s head. He was struggling to hear what she was saying because she couldn’t stop crying, and when he started to ask questions, she couldn’t respond. Instead, she ended the call. 

“When I arrived there, I saw her friend. They were all crying,” he said.

Eventually, he saw his sister and second wife returning with a piece of clothing he immediately recognised as his wife’s hijab. The lemon-green fabric was torn. 

Aliyu had spent the previous night with Ummulkhairi. Every evening, even on the nights he stayed with his second wife, he would stop by to see her and the children. Every morning, before leaving for work, he did the same.

The evening before Ummulkhairi was killed was no different. She told him about her day, served him tuwo and vegetable soup, and they talked as they usually did. 

“I will always remember this as the last meal I had from her,” he said. 

The following morning, when he returned for his daily greetings, he found her seated at her favourite place, with her Qur’an open in front of her. “She reminded me to greet a sick neighbour who was her friend. I told her I would do so when I return,” he recalled.

It was then she informed him about the programme in Madrasat Tashiyhul Iman to which she was invited. He wished her well, and she asked the children to pray for him. 

Neither of them knew they were saying the final goodbye, nor did he know that hours later he would be standing at the police station, where her remains were. 

“I saw my wife’s body, burned and covered with a leaf,” Aliyu recounted. 

That day, he granted some interviews to journalists before the police released Ummulkhairi’s body to the family. “We returned her home and buried her,” he said. It was only afterwards, he said, that another loss struck him. “The phone you saw me give my daughter earlier was her phone, and something that further triggered me was when it was returned to me, I realised that I didn’t even think where her things were. The Mai Anguwa sent someone to give it to me, but he returned her shoes to me himself.”

Witnesses to tears 

When Suleiman Isa answered Aliyu’s call for help that morning, he didn’t know how the day would fracture his friend’s life. He arrived before the situation spiralled, helping to secure Ummulkhairi inside the police station. Believing she was safe, he stepped out to answer a phone call and meet a potential business customer. When he returned to the police station, he didn’t know she had already been dragged out and handed to the mob. 

“I started asking people where she was, and they told me that she had already been killed. At that point, my head turned, and I just started crying,” Suleiman recounted. 

He walked through the back entrance to the main gate, where Ummulkhairi’s body lay. “Some of us tried to stop the burning, after which we covered her body in leaves and put her on a stretcher,” he said. The family later took her home for burial. 

Although Suleiman and Ummulkhairi were not particularly close, he said the events of that afternoon left him shaken.

Grief was the last reason Ummulkhairi visited Hussaina Sani, her co-wife. Now, it is the reason Hussaina spends her day in the family compound, where Ummulkhairi lived, helping to hold together the space she left behind. 

Though the two women lived in different neighbourhoods and rarely saw one another, their relationship was warm whenever they met, Hussaina recounted. 

She had rushed to the police station after their husband called to tell her what had happened. When she arrived, Ummulkhairi had already been placed in a separate room. Inside the station, Hussaina encountered two women accusing her co-wife of being a child kidnapper. 

“They seemed angry, saying that they would not tolerate what happened. One of them got into a scuffle with the police officers,” she recounted. Unable to stay silent, Hussaina confronted one of the women herself. “I got upset and asked her if she saw her kidnapping any child. The woman said her child was kidnapped before. I asked her if it was Ummulkhairi who was responsible, and we kept going back and forth.” 

Outside, the crowd grew increasingly restless. Police officers fired tear gas over the station walls in an attempt to disperse them, but it did little to calm the situation. Soon, stones began raining into the compound. 

The officers moved the women into another room for safety and told them that reinforcements had been called. They also said Ummulkhairi would be transferred to Kaduna. Then the DPO arrived. 

“The first thing he said was, ‘Where is the culprit?’ Our sister-in-law then said, ‘Do you mean to say the suspect?’ and pointed to the room she was kept in. However, he came out dragging her, and my sister-in-law demanded to know where he was taking her. When she couldn’t stop her, she helped Ummulkhairi remove her niqab, and the DPO reached for her hijab, but Ummulkhairi held onto it tighter.” Despite the sister-in-law’s attempt to pull her back, he still pulled her outside and handed her to the mob. 

They heard her scream as the mob descended on her, but none of them could intervene because of the overwhelming crowd. Hussaina’s voice started rising as she recalled the events of the day.

She rejected the police’s account that the crowd had stormed the station. 

“I have no idea how many people there were,” he voice cracked. “There were hundreds, including men, women, and even children. At one point, both roads were filled with people; how could she even fight them?”  

Their sister-in-law, Zainab, ran into the streets pleading with the crowd to listen, explaining that Ummulkhairi was innocent. No one did. At one point, a police officer grabbed Zainab and warned that if she didn’t lay low, the mob might turn on her as well. Zainab was later taken out through a backdoor. 

The ones left behind 

On the morning of July 2, when HumAngle visited, Ummulkhairi’s home was thick with grief. In the midst of it, her children were playing about. Nearby, her mother-in-law, sister, and co-wife were moving around the hearth, trying to fill in the space her absence had left behind. The grief had thickened into the walls, but its weight was evident, even when they welcomed me with a warm smile. 

If Ummulkhairi were there, she would have woken up for dawn prayers, swept the house, and ensured her children were bathed and fed. She would have thrown danwake (bean dumplings) into a pot over the fire, like she did the day she was killed, and sliced pieces of onions into the hot oil. She would have plated it on the colourful plates her sister was now washing. 

Afterwards, she would have taken down her bag from the wall and revised what she would teach her students in her next class or left for school. If she did go to school, she would have returned around 2 p.m. Had I visited then, she would almost certainly have insisted on serving me a plate of food, even if it meant going without herself.

“Tell me about Ummulkhair,” I asked as I sat across from her younger sister, Ruqayyah Abbah, on the multicoloured mat in the sitting room. Ruqayyah had travelled from Gombi, Adamawa State, in northeastern Nigeria, after the news wrecked their home. She paused, as though weighing the question, before she started to speak. 

“Ummulkhairi had always taken care of the people around her. Ever since I knew her, she had always been one to feed and take care of any child. I can confidently say she is the kindest among us all,” she started. “But in a span of a day, all that was taken away when she was wrongly accused. I know she is innocent because I have known her all my life, and even if she wasn’t my sister, I would have said the same.” 

Ruqayyah recounted memories from when they were kids, how Ummulkhairi, who is fondly called Ummi by her family, always stayed away from fights, even when she was teased. As a child, she often preferred to play alone. 

Ummi Abba Gambo was her maiden name. She attended Gombi Primary School and Government Girls Secondary School, Gombi, for her secondary school. After marrying and relocating to Kaduna State, she enrolled in an Islamic school. Upon graduating, she was retained as a teacher due to her diligence. She taught both the children and adult sections. She last visited her family home nine months ago for her father’s funeral. 

“I would say she was the most easily terrified person I know. She always avoided things that would put her in scary or uncomfortable situations. After how she was attacked that day, even if they had left her alive, I don’t think she would have avoided being traumatised by the whole situation,” Ruqayyah said. 

When the news of Ummulkhairi’s death reached Gombi, it landed first in Ruqayyah’s ear. That morning, she and their mother had been trying to reach Ummulkhairi to talk about her youngest daughter’s education. 

“She hasn’t been put in school yet due to financial problems, and our mother wanted to send her the money. After Zuhr (midday)  prayers, I tried her number to let her know, but I couldn’t reach her,” she recalled. “I informed my mother, and we decided to call her later in the day, not knowing that she had already been killed at that point. By the time he called me, they were either about to go bury her or were coming back from it.” 

The details came in bits and pieces, because the grief hit before she could hear the rest of it. She learnt about the gut-wrenching details from their older sister, whom she called after she managed to stop crying. 

Ruqayyah arrived at Marraraban Jos on Tuesday, June 23, two days after the incident, but the reality of her sister’s death did not fully settle until she reached the family home. The first sign of absence was the lack of phone calls from her sister, who often called en route to see how her journey was going and to ask what she wanted to eat when she arrived. That had been the routine every time she travelled to Kaduna in the past. 

This time, the phone never rang, at least not from Ummulkhairi. 

“To think she couldn’t find safety in the police station. What’s the point of authorities that can’t protect someone in that situation?” The anger found its root in her voice. It wasn’t just that her sister died; it was that the system designed to protect her failed to. Her voice softened as one of Ummulkhairi’s daughters walked into the room. 

Seeing her nieces and nephews the day she arrived, she said, was the moment the reality of the loss finally overwhelmed her.

“I just hope the government gets us justice, so that these children and their father can get some peace. I feel so bad for the children. I know how much their mother loved them and how she could breathe for them if she could,” she added. 

Ruqayyah reached for a lemon-green storage box filled with the things her sister treasured. Inside were photographs from her youth and with her family. In one, she was holding one of her children, her eyes looking straight into the camera. In another, she was with friends, her face glowing with the promise of youth. 

As we looked through the pictures, three of her children gathered around, adding the little they knew to the history her sister was sharing. It was then that her second son, Usman Aliyu, brought me her favourite Qur’an, its battered pages, evidence of her love. 

Ummulkhairi is not the only victim of mob violence in Nigeria. It has become a recurring feature of public life in Nigeria, fuelled by distrust of formal justice systems and the widespread belief that communities must protect themselves. 

Suleiman Usman Yusuf, a security consultant and human rights advocate, said the roots of the problem lie not simply in public anger, but institutional failure. 

“The biggest reason is institutional failure compounded by deliberate impunity. When citizens repeatedly watch genuine criminals walk free, whether because evidence disappears, witnesses are intimidated, prosecutors receive phone calls, or judges grant bail to [people] who return to terrorise the same communities, a dangerous conclusion takes root in the public mind: that the formal justice system is not for them,” he said. 

He added that mob justice is not primarily a product of ignorance or barbarism. It is a deeply wrong response to a system that has consistently failed to deliver consequences. 

“People do not burn suspects because they enjoy violence. They do it because they have been taught, through repeated experience, that violence is the only language that produces results,” he added. “The second layer is impunity for the mobs themselves. When a crowd kills someone, and nothing happens, that crowd becomes a template. The next community that is angry enough simply follows the same script.”

He pointed to a pattern stretching across more than a decade. “We saw it with the Aluu Four in 2012. We saw it with Major General Idris Alkali in 2018. We saw it with Deborah Samuel in 2022. We are seeing it now with Malama Ummulkhairi in 2026.”

Although the incidents occurred years apart and in different parts of the country, he said, they shared a common thread. 

“Nobody was ever made to pay a price serious enough to deter the next mob,” he said. 

Suleiman believes legislation remains necessary, but it must be matched by visible accountability. He argues that Nigeria needs at least one high-profile conviction that would send an unambiguous message across the country to stop the cycle. He has been advocating for the Prohibition and Protection of Persons from Lynching, Mob Action, and Extrajudicial Bill passed by the Senate in 2017 to be signed into law. He has written formal letters to the House of Representatives, the President of the Senate, and others.

Amnesty International recorded at least 555 victims of mob violence in Nigeria between 2012 and 2023, with 33 people burnt to death. The regions with the highest cases were the North West (100) and the South West (98), mostly as a result of being accused of witchcraft, theft, blasphemy, or taking part in rituals. 

In Ummulkhairi’s family, however, mob violence is no longer a mere figure. It is a loved one, whose absence is felt every second. Her mother collapsed after hearing the news of her daughter’s death. Family members in Gombi said she remained in a state of deep distress, unable to eat or move normally after the incident. Due to pre-existing issues with hypertension and back pain, the journey was impossible for her to make down to Kaduna, but every time she remembered how her daughter died, the memories triggered another health crisis.

The last meal Ummulkhairi prepared for her family was danwake, but it was forgotten when the news reached the family. The next day, it was thrown into a basket as it had started to spoil. What happened next will haunt their paternal grandmother, Aminatu Isa Abdullahi, forever.

Twelve-year-old Usman, Ummulkhairi’s second son, attempted to eat the spoilt meal. “He looked at us and vowed that he must eat it even if it was spoiled,” Aminatu recounted. They watched him as he shoved handfuls into his mouth, an attempt to save his mother’s last meal, further breaking their hearts. 

“One day I was sitting with her youngest daughter, and she said to me: ‘Will you stay with us until our mother comes back?’” That was another exchange that shattered Aminatu’s heart, and recalling the memory made her break down in tears. She promised her she would stay as long as she was needed, not having the heart to explain that her mother was never returning. 

Aminatu called for justice. Her prayers echoed through the wall, her pain spreading through it. When she arrived at Marraraban Jos after she got the news,  the town was in uproar. As they tried to get a bike to take them to the house, someone warned her to stop crying so hard in case people suspect they are Ummulkhairi’s relatives and try to attack them too. 

“We couldn’t even do the funeral bath for her; we just had to sprinkle water on her burnt body,” Aminatu said. She had declined to see the body, afraid of what would stick in her memory. “They bought some security personnel with guns around the house, and all I could think was what they thought they were trying to protect when we had already lost her.” 

Hamza Dantani, a human rights lawyer, has since submitted a petition calling for a thorough investigation into the circumstances of this case. The alleged negligence contravenes the Police Act 2020 and violates Sections 33 and 34 of the 1999 Nigerian Constitution, which protect the fundamental rights to life and dignity. 

A history of violence 

About seven years ago, Marraraban Jos started having security issues; before then, stories like that were tales coming from far-away places. Sometimes, others from neighbouring villages would call residents to ask if they saw kidnappers approaching their side. This earned the neighbourhood its nickname, Sambisa. 

Things have eased up a little for the neighbourhood, as it was a lot worse three years ago. They hardly went a week without someone being kidnapped there. The men formed a night neighbourhood watch to protect what they could. The women at home live with anxiety every time their husbands and sons go out, not knowing how the night would end up for them. Aliyu was among the men who used to patrol the community.

Ummulkhairi’s family moved to the neighbourhood in 2020 and had lived in their current house for about two years. Right behind the house stretched acres of empty land, extending beyond what the eyes can see. 

“The men usually go out around 11 p.m. to start their patrol. Sometimes, they come back with wounds as a result of hiding in the bushes. I sometimes hear gunshots from my room, especially when one of our neighbours was kidnapped. I started to sleep fully dressed; I would wear trousers and keep a hijab beside me just in case I get kidnapped,” said Habiba Muhammad, Ummulkhairi’s friend and neighbour. 

Recently, residents said kidnapping rates had reduced, but cattle and animal rustling still happens often around that area. Still, they have never seen security personnel posted to their neighbourhood. Years of living with fear had made residents increasingly suspicious of strangers. There were times when people fled their homes simply because they feared an attack was coming.

“We can’t leave because we don’t have money to go elsewhere, and even if they kidnap us, they won’t get much. When we used to run, I would go to my grandmother’s place in Kaduna town. It disrupts our children’s education too; sometimes, they close up the schools when the kidnappings worsen. But now, I have accepted this fate; I don’t want to run anymore,” Habiba said. 

This anxiety is shared with several other people HumAngle spoke to in the area. However, some unanimously agreed that even though kidnapping was common in their part of Marraraban Jos, child kidnapping on its own rarely happens.

 “Sometimes when they can’t find the men, they will kidnap their wives, except in some circumstances where they would kidnap an entire family,” she said. Habiba recalled the experience of one neighbour whose family was attacked. “Because his wife was pregnant and couldn’t walk, they beat her up and abandoned her on the way. They also threw down one of her children when he peed on their body, and he even broke his arm.”

Retracing memory 

Aliyu has a lot to say about Ummulkhairi; her loss is overwhelming. 

“She was very kind to me, and there were many times I would be in distress, and she would offer warmth and support, even when we were going through hard times,” he recalled. “This place you are sitting in used to be her favourite place, and when she is not busy with other tasks, she prefers to sit there and study her books. Sometimes, other women from the neighbourhood come in so she can help them with theirs.” 

As he dug into his memory to answer the questions, his second son lay down the mat as he slyly tried to take his father’s phone as he spoke. When he succeeded, his legs swung in an upward motion as he lay on his stomach, playing with the phone as we spoke about his mother, a contrast from the young child who shoved pieces of spoiled food in his mouth over a week ago. 

“There are so many things I can tell you about Ummulkhairi, but I don’t even have the words. God knows I have suffered such a great loss; the only thing I can do now is pray for her,” he said. 

Uba Sani, the Kaduna State Governor, has claimed that “about 41 persons have been charged with culpable homicide. And about 41 went through investigation also; that’s 82. Thirty suspects have also been charged with unlawful assembly”. 

A June 24 report shows that 24 alleged suspects – 20 males and 4 females – have been arraigned on charges of criminal conspiracy, inciting public disturbance, mischief, mischief destruction of public and police property, and culpable homicide. 

This news reached Aliyu and his family through social media. “They said they were taken to court, but I don’t know much about that. The video I saw showed some people lined up, but I couldn’t really see their faces clearly; I only recognised one face, an old man that I see around,” he explained. 

The family, still waiting for answers about the circumstances surrounding Ummulkhairi’s death, felt excluded from the process meant to deliver justice. “No one briefed us; we have to depend on rumours for information. Her youngest son told me yesterday that if they get justice for what was done to their mother, he thinks he will be better, and I could only try not to cry,” Aliyu’s brother, Abubakar Muhammad, added. 

The recorded videos of the lynching are also a huge wound to the family, and they couldn’t bring themselves to watch them. “I cannot watch these kinds of videos. I avoid social media for that reason. I usually only go in to respond to condolence messages,” Aliyu said. He wished people cared more about how things like this would affect them.

Abubakar said Aliyu often told him that he was worried about his wife during the past few months due to the loss of her father, as it seemed to be taking a toll on her. But even then, she had continued to live life as she always had.

“The most painful part was hearing what the oldest son was saying about taking vengeance for what was done to his mother. I tried to placate him. I even tried to close his mouth, but he pushed my hand away. Things like this can only be solved by justice; only that can give us relief. And if this keeps happening, no one is safe,” Abubakar said. 

Ummulkhairi did not disappear with the smoke that burned her alive in broad daylight that day. She is present in the edges and corners of the house, on the walls where her bag lies, in the kit where she once kept everything that matters,  and in the memories of her loved ones.