Judge in case of attempted Trump assassination declines to step aside

The federal judge presiding over the criminal case of a man charged with trying to assassinate former President Donald Trump declined Tuesday to recuse herself, saying a defense request that she do so was without merit.

Lawyers for Ryan Wesley Routh had urged U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon to step aside, saying her handling of Trump’s classified documents prosecution created at least the appearance of bias in favor of the former president and current Republican nominee. They cited the fact that she was appointed to the bench by Trump and has been repeatedly praised by him for her rulings in the documents case, including her dismissal in July of the prosecution — a decision now being appealed by special counsel Jack Smith.

Cannon rejected the recusal request, writing Tuesday that she has “no control over what private citizens, members of the media, or public officials or candidates elect to say about me or my judicial rulings” and was not concerned about the political consequences of her rulings.

Lawsuit claims ICE withheld $300M in bond payments from immigrants

U.S. immigration authorities illegally kept more than $300 million in bond payments from tens of thousands of low-income immigrant families and U.S. citizens, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement kept the money for so long that $240 million was transferred to a U.S. Treasury account for unclaimed funds, said Motley Rice LLC, one of the firms that filed the lawsuit in federal court for the Eastern District of New York.

The lawsuit, which addresses long-standing complaints, seeks class-action status for those who paid cash to bail out family members detained by ICE. Motley Rice, a firm that represents clients on a wide variety of class-action lawsuits, said it had been investigating the issue for two years.

Man serving 30 years for attacking Pelosi’s husband gets a life term from state

The man who was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for attacking the husband of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with a hammer in their California home was given a life term without the possibility of parole on Tuesday following a separate state trial.

A San Francisco jury in June found David DePape guilty of charges including aggravated kidnapping, first-degree burglary and false imprisonment of an elder.

Before sentencing DePape to life for the kidnapping conviction, Judge Harry Dorfman rejected defense attorneys’ arguments that he be granted a new state trial for the 2022 attack against Paul Pelosi, who was 82 years old at the time.

“It’s my intention that Mr. DePape will never get out of prison, he can never be paroled,” Dorfman said while handing out the punishment.

Authorities: Funeral home owner jailed after 18 decomposing bodies found

A funeral home owner in south Georgia has been arrested and accused of neglecting human corpses after authorities said they found 18 bodies in various stages of decomposition while serving an eviction notice at the business.

Chris Lee Johnson, 39, of Douglas, has been charged with 17 counts of abuse of a dead body, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation announced in a statement Monday.

The state’s leading law enforcement agency began investigating over the weekend after Coffee County sheriff’s deputies requested help while carrying out an eviction process.

Arrest warrants state that in multiple cases, Johnson disregarded the proper storage of bodies, which resulted in “the serious disfigurement” of the deceased people at Johnson Funeral & Cremation Services in Douglas.

— Denver Post wire services