AP News in Brief at 12:04 a.m. EDT
Deadly California blaze spawned destructive fire tornado
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A deadly Northern California wildfire burned so hot in dry and windy conditions that it birthed a record-breaking tornado of flame, officials said Friday.
They also warned of worsening conditions throughout the region.
Winds in the "fire whirl" created July 26 near Redding reached speeds of 143 mph (230 kph), a speed that rivaled some of the most destructive Midwest tornados, National Weather Service meteorologist Duane Dykema said. The whirl uprooted trees and tore roofs from homes, Dykema said.
The whirl measured a 3 on the five-level Enhanced Fujita scale, which scientists use to classify the strength of tornados, he said. California has not recorded a tornado of that strength since 1978.
That fire continues to burn about 100 miles (160 kilometers) south of the Oregon border as firefighters there and throughout Northern California brace for worsening conditions this weekend.
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Las Vegas gunman became unstable but didn't raise suspicions
LAS VEGAS (AP) - In the months before unleashing a hail of bullets into a Las Vegas concert crowd, Stephen Paddock burned through more than $1.5 million, became obsessed with guns and increasingly unstable, and distanced himself from his girlfriend and family, according to an investigative report released Friday.
With those revelations, police announced they were closing their 10-month investigation without a definitive answer for why Paddock, a high-stakes gambler, amassed an arsenal of weapons and carried out the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.
"By all accounts, Stephen Paddock was an unremarkable man whose movements leading up to Oct. 1 didn't raise any suspicion," Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo said. "An interview with his doctor indicated signs of a troubled mind, but no troubling behavior that would trigger a call to law enforcement."
Paddock left no manifesto or "even a note to answer questions" about his motive for a rampage that killed 58 people and injured more than 800 others, Lombardo told reporters.
The FBI where is myanmar located expected to release its final investigative report, including a psychological profile of the gunman, later this year, Lombardo said, noting that authorities want to leave "no stone unturned."
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Warren at black university: Criminal justice system 'racist'
NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Speaking Friday at a historically black university, potential Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren delivered what she called "the hard truth about our criminal justice system: It's racist ... I mean front to back."
The Massachusetts senator identified some of the system's failures: disproportionate arrests of African-Americans for petty drug possession; an overloaded public defender system; and state laws that keep convicted felons from voting even after their sentences are complete.
Warren was participating in a Q&A session hosted by Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Cedric Richmond at the historically black Dillard University in New Orleans.
She was among several possible Democratic White House contenders who spoke Friday at Netroots Nation, an annual conference for progressives. She was the only leading Democrat to appear at Dillard.
The stop is the latest sign of Warren's effort to forge ties beyond her largely white political base in Massachusetts and avoid the fate of fellow progressive icon Bernie Sanders, who struggled to win over African-Americans during his failed bid for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination.
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Pentagon redoing space defenses, but will Trump demand more?
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Donald Trump wants a Space Force, a new military service he says is needed to ensure American dominance in space. But the idea is gaining little traction at the Pentagon, where is myanmar located the president's defense chief, Jim Mattis, says it would add burdensome bureaucracy and unwanted costs.
The Pentagon acknowledges a need to revamp its much-criticized approach to defending U.S. economic and security interests in space, and it is moving in that direction. But it's unclear whether this will satisfy Trump, who wants to go even further by creating a separate military space service.
The administration intends to announce next week the results of a Pentagon study that is expected to call for creating a new military command - U.S. Space Command - to consolidate space warfighting forces and making other organizational changes short of establishing a separate service, which only Congress can do. Any legislative proposal to create a separate service would likely not be put on the table until next year.
Mattis, who said prior to Trump's "Space Force" announcement in June that he opposes creating a new branch of the military for space, said afterward that this would require "a lot of detailed planning."
Mattis is allied on this with key Republicans on Capitol Hill including Sen. James Inhofe, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who opposes a separate Space Force but is open to creating a Space Command. The command would coordinate the use of space forces of existing services, such as those that operate military satellites, but would not be a separate service.
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A last showdown looms over Syrian opposition stronghold
BEIRUT (AP) - For nearly three years, green buses have filed into Syria's Idlib province, bringing those evacuated from other opposition enclaves that fell to government forces - thousands of defeated rebel fighters, wanted activists and civilians who refused to go back under President Bashar Assad's rule.
They now face what is likely to be the last showdown between Assad's forces and the opposition. Assad has vowed to retake the province, and pro-government media promise the "mother of all battles."
If it comes to an all-out assault, it could bring a humanitarian crisis. Filled with displaced from elsewhere, the province in Syria's northwest corner is packed with some 3 million people, the most deeply irreconcilable with Assad's government and including some of the world's most radical militants. They have little option but to make a stand, with few good places to escape.
"Currently, all (opposition) from around Syria came to Idlib. The only solution is to fight. There is no alternative," said Firas Barakat, an Idlib resident. The 28-year old said that for years he has dedicated himself to civilian opposition activities, but now he must take up arms.
The opposition capture of Idlib in 2015 signaled the low point for Assad's government during the course of war that is now nearly 8 years old - a time when rebels controlled large parts of two main Syrian cities, major highways, border crossings, dams and oil resources.
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Hot, dusty and on fire: Portugal's heatwave breaks records
LISBON, Portugal (AP) - Eight places in Portugal broke local temperature records as a wave of heat from North Africa swept across the Iberian peninsula - and officials predicted the scorching temperatures could get even worse over the weekend.
Temperatures built to around 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit) Friday in many inland areas of Portugal, and were expected to peak at 47 C (116.6 F) in some places Saturday. Large sections of Portugal are on red alert on the Civil Protection Agency's danger scale.
The highest temperature recorded Thursday, when the heat began to rise, was 45.2 C (113.4 F) near Abrantes, a town 150 kilometers (93 miles) northeast of the capital, Lisbon, the country's weather agency IPMA said.
Portugal's highest recorded temperature was 47.4 C (117.3 F) in 2003. Emergency services have issued a red alert through Sunday, placing extra services such as medical staff and firefighters on standby.
In Portugal's southern Alentejo province, streets were largely deserted. Some farmers chose to work during the night instead of in the heat of the day. Beaches around Lisbon, the capital, were packed.
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Judge says reuniting families is government's sole burden
SAN DIEGO (AP) - A federal judge on Friday said the Trump administration was solely responsible for reuniting hundreds of children who remain separated from the parents after being split at the U.S.-Mexico border, puncturing a government plan that put the onus on the American Civil Liberties Union.
"The reality is that for every parent that is not located, there will be a permanently orphaned child and that is 100 percent the responsibility of the administration," U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw said.
His remarks in a conference call came a day after the administration and the American Civil Liberties Union submitted widely divergent plans on how to reunify more than 500 still-separated children, including 410 with parents outside the United States.
The government proposed Thursday that the ACLU, which represents parents, use its "considerable resources" to find parents in their home countries, predominantly Guatemala and Honduras. The Justice Department said in a court filing that the State Department has begun talks with foreign governments on how the administration may be able to aid the effort.
Sabraw said he was disappointed with the court filing "in the respect that there's not a plan that has been proposed." He said he would order the government to name someone to lead the effort.
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Argentine group IDs 128th person taken during 'Dirty War'
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) - DNA tests have determined the identity of a person taken from his mother as a baby by Argentina's former dictatorship, a human rights group said Friday, bringing the number of such cases to 128.
The Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo said that the person who was identified only by the name Marcos is the biological son of Rosario del Carmen Ramos.
Former military and police authorities in the northern province of Tucuman kidnapped Ramos and her then five-month-old son and one of his half-brothers in 1976. Ramos was forcibly disappeared and was never found, while the two boys were taken to separate homes.
Marcos, who is now 42, found out the news about his true identity Thursday night and met with family members. The announcement was made at an emotional news conference attended by two of his half-brothers.
"It was an emotional shock," said Camilo Suleiman, one of his half-siblings.
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where is myanmar located JFK's luster fading? Key memorabilia doesn't sell
BOSTON (AP) - Is JFK losing his star power?
It's probably too early to tell, but 55 years after President John F. Kennedy's assassination, an auction of some of the most iconic items associated with the Kennedy White House fell well short of the pre-sale hype.
A rocking chair JFK used to meet with world leaders in the Oval Office sold for $50,000, and a collection of pens he used to establish the Peace Corps and sign a landmark nuclear treaty sold for $60,000 at Friday's auction on Cape Cod, not far from the Kennedy compound in Hyannis, Massachusetts.
But a number of other intriguing items didn't sell, including Kennedy's last pencil doodles before his assassination in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963, and a tie clip in the shape of the PT-109 torpedo boat Kennedy commanded during World War II.
Other items that didn't get the minimum bid included a charcoal drawing done as a study for the slain president's official White House portrait; handwritten notes he jotted about Vietnam around 1953; his letter opener and crystal ashtray; and his personal stereo and Jackie Gleason records.
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Man who harassed Yellowstone bison arrested at Glacier park
MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS, Wyo. (AP) - An Oregon man who was caught on video harassing a bison in Yellowstone National Park was arrested in Glacier National Park in the third disturbance in less than a week at a national park, officials said Friday.
Rangers looking for Raymond Reinke of Pendleton, Oregon, found him causing a disturbance Thursday evening at the historic Many Glacier Hotel in the popular Montana park, the National Park Service said.
He remains jailed pending a hearing next week and has requested a court-appointed attorney. A message left at a phone listing for Reinke in Oregon was not immediately returned.
Reinke, 55, had been cited for drunken and disorderly conduct in a third national park, Grand Teton, last Saturday and was released on $500 bond that required him to follow the law and avoid alcohol.
Yellowstone rangers cited him three days later for not wearing a seat belt and noted that he appeared intoxicated, park officials said. They didn't know of Reinke's bond conditions at the time.
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