AP-National

By JAVIER CÓRDOBA Associated Press SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (AP) — Many Costa Ricans are welcoming a ruling this week by the country’s Supreme Court of Justice eliminating the requirement that people use their father’s surname before their mother’s on identification documents. In Spanish-speaking nations, people usually go by two last names. In Costa Rica,

By JEFF AMY Associated Press ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s Senate is backing a plan to give the state’s appointed election board the power to investigate Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s handling of elections. The bill passed 30-19 Friday despite the measure’s sponsor saying that the bill is in “murky water” when it comes to its

By JACK DURA Associated Press BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — Newly released investigative reports into last year’s deadly ambush of Fargo police officers show the gunman’s movements in the hours before the shooting. Still images from Mohamad Barakat’s apartment and surveillance cameras show him loading his weapons into a garage and visiting a gun range on

By KEVIN McGILL Associated Press NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The manslaughter retrial of a man who fatally shot former New Orleans Saints star Will Smith is nearing its end. Prosecution and defense attorneys spent Friday afternoon delivering closing arguments to the jury that will decide 36-year-old Cardell Hayes’ fate. Hayes shot Smith following a traffic

By LEAH WILLINGHAM Associated Press CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A bill that would decriminalize all strips used to test drugs for deadly substances now goes to West Virginia’s governor. Republican Jim Justice hasn’t said publicly whether he supports the bill, which has received bipartisan support in the state with the nation’s highest overdose rate. Justice

NEW YORK (AP) — Pornographic deepfake images of Taylor Swift are circulating online, making the singer the most famous victim of a scourge that tech platforms and anti-abuse groups have struggled to fix. Sexually explicit and abusive fake images of Swift began circulating widely this week on the social media platform X. Her ardent fanbase

By WAYNE PARRY Associated Press New Jersey’s public transit agency is scrapping plans for a backup power plant that would have been fueled by natural gas, heartening environmental justice advocates who targeted it and several other proposed power plants in largely minority areas. NJ Transit said Friday it is redirecting $503 million that would have

By OMAR FARUK Associated Press MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — The president of Somalia’s breakaway region of Somaliland has said his government will press ahead with an agreement signed earlier this month with landlocked Ethiopia to give it access to the sea. The deal has been condemned by regional and international groups, as well as Western

By JAKE COYLE AP Film Writer “In the Summers,” an affecting, years-spanning drama about a complicated parent-children relationship, nabbed the Grand Jury prize at the 40th Sundance Film Festival, while the top honor for documentary went to “Porcelain War,” about a Ukrainian couple who craft fragile, intricately painted ceramics while war rages around them. “Sujo,”

By MATTHEW BROWN Associated Press An 18th century British painting stolen by mobsters in 1969 has been returned more than a half-century later to the family that bought the painting during the Great Depression. “The Schoolmistress” by John Opie is the sister painting of a similar work housed in the Tate Britain art gallery in

By ROB GILLIES Associated Press TORONTO (AP) — The lawyer for a Canadian man accused of selling lethal substances on the internet to people at risk of self harm says he will be pleading not guilty to upgraded murder charges. Kenneth Law was charged last month with 14 counts of second-degree murder, and his lawyer

LONDONDERRY, N.H. (AP) — Authorities say a small plane crashed in a neighborhood near the Manchester-Boston Regional Airport in New Hampshire shortly after takeoff, and firefighters helped remove the trapped pilot, who was taken to a hospital. The Federal Aviation Administration says the pilot was the only person on board the Wiggins Airways plane. The

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A jury has found a St. Louis rapper not guilty of murder after the 19-year-old claimed he was acting in self defense during a 2022 road-rage shootout. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that CTS Luh Wick, whose legal name is Michael Henderson, was acquitted of first-degree murder and armed criminal action

By ED WHITE Associated Press PONTIAC, Mich. (AP) — Prosecutors are portraying the mother of a Michigan school shooter as an aloof parent more interested in horses than the mental health of her teenage son. They said Friday that Ethan Crumbley was apparently having hallucinations months before killing four students at Oxford High School in

By JEFF AMY Associated Press ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s state Senate joined attempts to investigate Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis on Friday, voting 30-19 to create a special committee that Republican senators say is needed to determine whether the Democratic district attorney misspent state tax money in her prosecution of former President Donald Trump

By MENELAOS HADJICOSTIS Associated Press NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) — The government of ethnically split Cyprus has promised breakaway Turkish Cypriots a package of measures aimed at winning their trust ahead of a renewed United Nations attempt to revive long-dormant peace talks. It includes promises to expedite citizenship applications, grant pensions to widows, offer more job

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A St. Louis man who gained notoriety for pointing a gun at social justice demonstrators as they marched past his home asked a local judge to wipe the misdemeanor from his record. Mark McCloskey pleaded guilty in 2021 to misdemeanor fourth-degree assault and was fined $750. Republican Gov. Mike Parson pardoned

By STEPHEN GROVES Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden on Friday pressed Congress to embrace a bipartisan Senate deal to pair border enforcement measures with Ukraine aid, but House Speaker Mike Johnson suggested the compromise on border and immigration policy could be “dead on arrival” in his chamber. The Democratic president said in

By STEVE REED AP Sports Writer CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — The National Football League has urged teams for years to hire more minority head coaches. That mission finally seems to be paying off. Four minority head coaches have been hired this year — Atlanta’s Raheem Morris, New England’s Jerod Mayo, Las Vegas’ Antonio Pierce and

By The Associated Press Russian President Vladimir Putin is pledging to make public the findings of Moscow’s investigation into the crash of a transport plane that he alleges Kyiv’s forces shot down despite having been informed Ukrainian prisoners of war were on board. In his first public remarks on Wednesday’s crash, Putin repeated previous comments