NEW YORK (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump’s lawyers formally asked a judge Monday to throw out his hush money criminal conviction , arguing that continuing the case would present unconstitutional “disruptions to the institution of the Presidency.“ In a filing made public Tuesday, Trump’s lawyers told Manhattan Judge Juan M. Merchan that anything short of immediate dismissal would undermine the transition of power, as well as the “overwhelming national mandate" granted to Trump by voters last month. They also cited President Joe Biden’s recent pardon of his son, Hunter Biden, who had been convicted of tax and gun charges . “President Biden asserted that his son was ‘selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted,’ and ‘treated differently,’" Trump’s legal team wrote. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, they claimed, had engaged in the type of political theater "that President Biden condemned.” Prosecutors will have until Dec. 9 to respond. They have said they will fight any efforts to dismiss the case but have indicated a willingness to delay the sentencing until after Trump’s second term ends in 2029. In their filing Monday, Trump's attorneys dismissed the idea of holding off sentencing until Trump is out of office as a “ridiculous suggestion.” Following Trump’s election victory last month, Merchan halted proceedings and indefinitely postponed his sentencing, previously scheduled for late November, to allow the defense and prosecution to weigh in on the future of the case. He also delayed a decision on Trump’s prior bid to dismiss the case on immunity grounds. Trump has been fighting for months to reverse his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal a $130,000 payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels to suppress her claim that they had sex a decade earlier. He says they did not and denies any wrongdoing. The defense filing was signed by Trump lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, who represented Trump during the trial and have since been selected by the president-elect to fill senior roles at the Justice Department. Taking a swipe at Bragg and New York City, as Trump often did throughout the trial, the filing argues that dismissal would also benefit the public by giving him and “the numerous prosecutors assigned to this case a renewed opportunity to put an end to deteriorating conditions in the City and to protect its residents from violent crime.” Clearing Trump, the lawyers added, would also allow him to “to devote all of his energy to protecting the Nation.” Merchan hasn’t yet set a timetable for a decision. He could decide to uphold the verdict and proceed to sentencing, delay the case until Trump leaves office, wait until a federal appeals court rules on Trump’s parallel effort to get the case moved out of state court or choose some other option. An outright dismissal of the New York case would further lift a legal cloud that at one point carried the prospect of derailing Trump’s political future. Last week, special counsel Jack Smith told courts that he was withdrawing both federal cases against Trump — one charging him with hoarding classified documents at his Florida estate, the other with scheming to overturn the 2020 presidential election he lost — citing longstanding Justice Department policy that shields a president from indictment while in office. The hush money case was the only one of Trump’s four criminal indictments to go to trial, resulting in a historic verdict that made him the first former president to be convicted of a crime. Prosecutors had cast the payout as part of a Trump-driven effort to keep voters from hearing salacious stories about him. Trump’s then-lawyer Michael Cohen paid Daniels. Trump later reimbursed him, and Trump’s company logged the reimbursements as legal expenses — concealing what they really were, prosecutors alleged. Trump has said the payments to Cohen were properly categorized as legal expenses for legal work. A month after the verdict, the Supreme Court ruled that ex-presidents can’t be prosecuted for official acts — things they did in the course of running the country — and that prosecutors can’t cite those actions to bolster a case centered on purely personal, unofficial conduct. Trump’s lawyers cited the ruling to argue that the hush money jury got some improper evidence, such as Trump’s presidential financial disclosure form, testimony from some White House aides and social media posts made during his first term. Prosecutors disagreed and said the evidence in question was only “a sliver” of their case. If the verdict stands and the case proceeds to sentencing, Trump’s punishments would range from a fine to probation to up to four years in prison — but it’s unlikely he’d spend any time behind bars for a first-time conviction involving charges in the lowest tier of felonies. Because it is a state case, Trump would not be able to pardon himself once he returns to office.Olivia Miles notched a triple-double (11 points, 10 rebounds, 14 assists) and Sonia Citron added 25 points and 11 rebounds as No. 3 Notre Dame dominated Virginia 95-54 in an Athletic Coast Conference matchup Sunday in South Bend, Ind. Hannah Hidalgo scored 28 points and Liatu King chipped in eight points and 12 rebounds as the Fighting Irish (11-2, 2-0) jumped out to a 37-9 lead behind a 28-0 run, easily winning the battle of the boards (54-31), points in the paint (44-26) and fastbreak points (39-10). Winning its sixth straight game, Notre Dame shot 51.4 percent from the floor and 38.5 from 3-point range while dishing out 32 assists on 38 made baskets. For the Cavaliers (8-6, 0-2), Kymora Johnson led the way with 12 points on a day the visitors shot just 29.7 percent from the floor, including 23.8 percent on 3-point attempts. No. 2 South Carolina 93, Wofford 47 Joyce Edwards scored 16 points off the bench to lead five players in double figures as the Gamecocks trounced the Terriers in Columbia, S.C. Tessa Johnson added 14 points, Raven Johnson had 13, Te-Hina Paopao tallied 12 and MiLaysia Fulwiley netted 11 for South Carolina (12-1), which rattled off 17 straight points in the second quarter to open up a 36-14 lead. The Gamecocks never trailed and scored the game's final 22 points to win their seventh straight. Wofford (6-5) got 20 points from Rachael Rose but shot just 21.1 percent as a team and suffered its third straight loss. Evangelia Paulk managed five points on 1-of-18 shooting, though she did grab a game-high 11 rebounds. No. 6 LSU 83, Albany 61 Aneesah Morrow tallied 10 points during the Tigers' game-ending 25-2 run that helped them pull away from the pesky Great Danes in Baton Rouge, La. LSU trailed 59-58 before Morrow's three-point play with 7:41 left sparked the decisive surge. She finished with 20 points and 18 rebounds, including 10 of each in the fourth quarter alone. Mikaylah Williams scored 18 points, while Flau'Jae Johnson bundled 15 points with nine rebounds as the Tigers (15-0) wrapped up an unbeaten nonconference slate. Kaci Donovan notched 17 points to lead Albany's upset bid before fouling out with 4:15 left in the game. Kayla Cooper and Lilly Phillips each had 14 points for the Great Danes (10-3), who led by as many as 12 in the second quarter but missed their final 11 shots in the fourth. No. 7 UConn 67, Providence 41 Paige Bueckers scored 14 of her game-high 23 points during a dominant first quarter that propelled the Huskies to a blowout win over the visiting Friars in Hartford, Conn. Bueckers shot 5-of-5 from the floor in the first period and contributed eight points to a 15-0 run that helped UConn build a 28-6 lead after one. The All-American finished 8-of-12 overall, while Sarah Strong chipped in 14 points as the Huskies (11-2, 2-0 Big East) rebounded from a two-point home loss to then-No. 7 Southern California on Dec. 21. Grace Efosa had 11 points and seven rebounds and Olivia Olsen paired eight points with 11 boards for Providence (7-8, 0-2), which surrendered 40 points off 31 turnovers. No. 8 Maryland 72, No. 19 Michigan State 66 The Terrapins narrowly avoided their first loss of the season, thanks in part to Kaylene Smikle's team-high 19 points in a hard-fought Big Ten Conference victory over the Spartans in College Park, Md. Maryland (12-0, 2-0 Big Ten) led by nine entering the fourth period, but Michigan State (11-2, 1-1) staged a 9-0 run to tie the game at 57. Saylor Poffenbarger (14 points, 10 rebounds) halted the run with a 3-pointer as the Terrapins -- who shot 42.9 percent from the field -- took the lead for good with 5:06 left. Theryn Hallock (20 points) and Julia Ayrault (17 points, 12 rebounds) kept the Spartans in it, but the visitors shot just 32.4 percent from the field, including 25 percent from 3-point range. No. 10 Ohio State 77, Rutgers 63 Cotie McMahon and Ajae Petty each posted a double-double to help the Buckeyes earn a conference road win over the Scarlet Knights in Piscataway, N.J. McMahon recorded 16 points and 11 rebounds, while Petty added 16 points with 10 boards before fouling out late in the fourth quarter. Chance Gray chipped in 15 points for Ohio State (13-0, 2-0 Big Ten), which racked up 22 takeaways and held a 29-7 advantage in points off turnovers. Rutgers (8-5, 0-2) fell despite getting 31 points and 17 rebounds from Destiny Adams, who also had five steals and two blocks. The Scarlet Knights trailed 46-25 at halftime and never got closer than nine the rest of the way. Rutgers visits No. 8 Maryland next before hosting No. 4 USC. No. 13 Georgia Tech 100, Pitt 61 Freshman Dani Carnegie poured in a season-high 24 points to help the Yellow Jackets pummel the Panthers in Atlanta. Kara Dunn racked up 28 points for Georgia Tech (14-0, 2-0 Atlantic Coast Conference), which shot 50.7 percent and hit triple digits for the first time this season. Chazadi Wright had 16 points and Tonie Morgan contributed 15 with eight assists. Khadija Faye led Pitt (8-7, 0-2) with 22 points, while Brooklynn Miles scored 11 and Aislin Malcolm chipped in 10 off the bench. The Panthers finished 39.3 percent from the floor and committed 21 turnovers. No. 20 Alabama 93, Jacksonville 46 Aaliyah Nye poured in 30 points on 9-of-12 shooting from the floor, including a scorching 8-for-10 from 3-point range, as the Crimson Tide throttled the Dolphins in Tuscaloosa, Ala. In its final tune-up before opening Southeastern Conference play on Thursday against visiting Florida, Alabama (13-1) only led by two after the first quarter but outscored Jacksonville 32-11 in the second quarter. Three other Crismon Tide players -- Eris Lester (14 points, eight rebounds), Zaay Green (13 points) and Sarah Ashlee Barker (12 points) -- scored in double figures as the team shot 54.2 percent from the field and a red-hot 53.8 percent from beyond the arc. For the Jaguars (6-6), Saniyah Craig scored a team-high 11 points as the visitors struggled from the field, shooting just 29.5 percent. --Field Level Media
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British Columbia business owner Joe Chaput will spend $5,500 a month on security guards during the holiday season and plans on upgrading his store’s video camera system for around $5,000 more. He’s not selling luxury brands or expensive jewels. Chaput sells cheese, and at Christmas, cheese is a hot commodity. He is the co-owner of specialty cheese store les amis du Fromage, with two locations in Vancouver. While cheeselifting is rare in their Kitsilano store, the outlet in East Vancouver is hit in waves, with nothing happening for a month, then three of four people trying to steal their inventory within a week. “Sometimes, you miss it. Sometimes, you catch it. The way shoplifters behave ... they tend to gravitate toward expensive things,” said Chaput. Expensive cheese is on shoplifters’ Christmas list, he said. “They tend to do the classic examples of staying away from customer service and trying to go to a different part of the store so they can be left alone to steal.” Chaput isn’t alone. Police say food-related crimes on are the rise in Canada and as prices climb for items such as cheese and butter, they become lucrative on the black market for organized crime groups, not to mention theft for local resale. Sylvain Charlebois, the director of Dalhousie University’s Agri-food Analytics Lab, said a black market tends to emerge as soon as food prices surge. “Organized crime will steal anything (if) they know they can sell it and so, they probably would have known who their clients are before even stealing anything at all, and that’s how a black market is organized,” said Charlebois. He said he believes there are two categories of people shoplifting — those who do so out of desperation because they can’t afford the food, or organized criminals, profiting from sales on the black market. Mounties in North Vancouver made cheesy headlines when they ran into a man with a cart of stolen cheese in the middle of the night in September. The cheese, valued at $12,800, was from a nearby Whole Foods Store. While the cheese was recovered, it had to be disposed of because it hadn’t been refrigerated. Const. Mansoor Sahak, with the North Vancouver RCMP, said officers believe cheese is targeted because it’s “profitable to resell.” “If they are drug addicts, they will commit further crimes with that or feed their drug habits. It’s a vicious cycle,” said Sahak. Sahak said meat is also a top target for grocery thieves, with store losses sometimes in the thousands. “So, we’re not surprised that this happened,” said Sahak. Police in Ontario have been chasing down slippery shoplifters going after butter. Scott Tracey, a spokesman with Guelph Police Service, said there have been eight or nine butter thefts over the last year, including one theft last December worth $1,000. In October, two men walked into a local grocer and filled their carts with cases of butter valued at $936, and four days later a Guelph grocer lost four cases valued at $958. Tracey said he has looked at online marketplaces and found listings by people selling 20 or 30 pounds of butter at a time. “Clearly, somebody didn’t accidentally buy 30 extra pounds of butter. So, they must have come from somewhere,” said Tracey, “I think at this point it appears to be the black market is where it’s headed.” He said the thefts seem to be organized, with two or three people working together in each case. Police in Brantford, Ont., are also investigating the theft of about $1,200 worth of butter from a store on Nov. 4. Charlebois said retailers could invest in prevention technologies like electronic tags, but putting them on butter or cheese is rare. He said up until recently grocery store theft has been a “taboo subject for many years.” Stores didn’t wanted to talk about thefts because they didn’t want to alarm people but now they feel they need to build awareness about what is “becoming a huge problem,” said Charlebois. Chaput, the cheese store owner, said he had been running the East Vancouver store for 15 years while managing the store in Kitsilano for 30 years, and he loves his customers. “It’s really one of the best parts of our businesses, seeing familiar faces and making new customers. It’s why we come to work, really. Partly it’s the cheese, and partly it’s the people,” said Chaput. He said his strategy to combat would-be thieves is to give them extra customer service to make it harder for them to steal. He admits, however, that the shoplifting causes him stress. “It’s challenging. You’re busy trying to run your business day to day and take care of customers and take care of employees. Having to deal with criminals, just kind of scratches away. It can be a bit exhausting,” said Chaput.Misogyny, Harassment Haunt Kashmiri Women On Social Media Platforms
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