Tag Archives: sexual assault

Entertainment

Ghislaine Maxwell claims Prince Andrew photo with Virginia Giuffre is ‘fake’

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CNN
 — 

Convicted child sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell has said a decades-old photograph of Prince Andrew with his sexual abuse accuser Virginia Giuffre is “fake,” in a series of interviews from prison.

The disgraced British socialite is currently serving a 20-year sentence in US federal prison for carrying out a years-long scheme with her longtime confidante Jeffrey Epstein to groom and sexually abuse underage girls.

Speaking from a Florida jail to UK broadcaster TalkTV, which aired a special program on Monday night, the 61-year-old – who also appears in the photograph – said she doesn’t “believe it happened.”

“I don’t believe it is real for a second, in fact, I’m sure it’s not. There has never been an original. I don’t believe it happened and certainly, the way it’s described would have been impossible. I don’t have any memory of going to Tramp [nightclub],” Maxwell said.

Prince Andrew, who is one of King Charles III’s younger brothers, has strenuously denied Giuffre’s allegation that he was introduced to her at London’s Tramp nightclub in 2001 with Maxwell, before then-17-year-old Giuffre was allegedly forced to perform sex acts with the British royal.

Giuffre filed a civil lawsuit in a US court in 2021 against Andrew, who is also known as the Duke of York, alleging sexual abuses while she was a minor on multiple occasions. Andrew later settled out of court for an undisclosed figure without admitting any wrongdoing and the case was dismissed. Still, the allegations against the senior royal severely tarnished his reputation. He stepped back from royal duties in late 2019 and was stripped of his military titles and royal patronages last year.

Maxwell appeared to show little remorse to Epstein’s victims and offered no apology in the interviews broadcast Monday. Instead, she said the victims should “take their disappointment and upset out on the authorities who allowed” the billionaire pedophile to die in prison.

Maxwell also told TalkTV that she believes Epstein was murdered – a conspiracy theory for which she offered no evidence. Authorities ruled Epstein died by suicide in 2019 while he was awaiting trial on federal charges accusing him of sexually abusing underage girls.

Regarding the victims, Maxwell said, “I hope they have some closure via the judicial process that took place.”

Maxwell acknowledged during her sentencing hearing last year that she had been convicted in the sex trafficking scheme but stopped short of taking responsibility. She did not testify in her defense during the trial in late 2021, which ended with her conviction on five counts, including sex trafficking of a minor.

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World

David Carrick: London Metropolitan Police officer admits to dozens of offenses against women, including 24 cases of rape

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London
CNN
 — 

A serving officer in London’s Metropolitan Police has admitted to 49 offenses, including 24 counts of rape over an 18-year period, reigniting calls for urgent reform in the United Kingdom’s largest police force.

David Carrick appeared at Southwark Crown Court in the British capital Monday to plead guilty to four counts of rape, false imprisonment and indecent assault relating to a 40-year-old woman in 2003, the UK’s PA Media news agency reported.

At the Old Bailey criminal court in London last month, Carrick admitted to 43 charges against 11 other women, including 20 counts of rape, between March 2004 and September 2020, according to PA.

A series of recent scandals has shed light on what the UK police watchdog called a culture of misogyny and racism in London’s police service.

In September 2021, Metropolitan Police officer Wayne Couzens was sentenced to life in prison without parole for the abduction, rape and murder of Sarah Everard, a case that horrified the nation and sparked debate about violence against women.

The Metropolitan Police Service Commissioner Cressida Dick resigned from her post in 2022, after a damning review by the Independent Office for Police Conduct issued 15 recommendations “to change policing practice” in the country.

London’s Metropolitan Police are now investigating as many as 1,000 sex offenses and domestic abuse claims involving approximately 800 of its officers, the force’s Commissioner Mark Rowley admitted Monday.

“That’s 1,000 cases to look at. Some of those will be things of no concern in the end when we look at them because it will be an argument overheard by neighbors where inquiries show there’s nothing to be concerned about,” Rowley said in an interview with UK media.

“But in there, I’m sad to say, there will be some cases where in the past we should have been more assertive and looked to throw officers out and we haven’t done.”

“We are going to turn all those stones over, we’re going to come to the right conclusions and we’ll be ruthless about rooting out those who corrupt our integrity. You have my absolute assurance on that,” he said.

The UK’s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) called Carrick’s case one of the “most shocking” it’s ever seen.

“The scale of the degradation Carrick subjected his victims to is unlike anything I have encountered in my 34 years with the Crown Prosecution Service,” CPS Chief Crown Prosecutor Jaswant Narwal said.

“I commend every single woman who courageously shared their traumatic experience and enabled us to bring this case to court and see justice served,” Narwal continued while speaking outside Southwark Crown Court Monday.

The senior investigating officer in the case, Detective Chief Inspector Iain Moor, called Carrick’s crimes “truly shocking.”

“The police service is committed to tackling violence against women and girls in all its forms,” Moor said, adding “no one is above the law.”

Assistant Commissioner for the Metropolitan Police Barbara Gray also apologized on behalf of the police force to all the victims.

Gray said Monday that Carrick “should have been dismissed from the police service a long time ago.”

She later added: “We should have spotted his pattern of abusive behavior and because we didn’t, we missed opportunities to remove him from the organization. We are truly sorry that Carrick was able to continue to use his role as a police officer to prolong the suffering of his victims.”

“The duration and nature of Carrick’s offending is unprecedented in policing. But regrettably he is not the only Met officer to have been charged with serious sexual offences in the recent past,” she said.

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said: “Londoners will be rightly shocked that this man was able to work for the Met for so long and serious questions must be answered about how he was able to abuse his position as an officer in this horrendous manner.”

Khan commented that work to reform the culture and standards of the Met has already started following an interim review and that a new, anonymous police complaints hotline and anti-corruption team has recently been established by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley.

“But more can and must be done,” added Khan on Twitter. “It’s vital that all victims of crime have confidence in our police, and we simply must do more to raise standards and empower police leaders to rid the Met and all other police services of those officers who are clearly unfit to serve.”

Women’s rights organizations called for an inquiry into the Met following Carrick’s case.

UK domestic abuse charity Refuge called Carrick’s crimes “utterly abhorrent.”

“When a man who has been charged with 49 offences, including 24 charges of rape, is a serving police officer, how can women and girls possibly be – or feel – safe,” Refuge tweeted Monday.

UK organization End Violence Against Women also posted on Twitter: “This is an institution in crisis. That Carrick’s pattern of egregious behaviour was known to the Met and they failed to act speaks more loudly than their empty promises to women.”

“Solidarity with the victims & all who are feeling the weight of the traumatic details being reported,” it added.

The British Women’s Equality Party tweeted: “The Met knew about the allegations for TWENTY years. They did nothing as a serial rapist abused his power. They are complicit. Misogyny will never be stripped from the police without a nationwide, statutory inquiry.”

The Fawcett Society, which campaigns for gender equality and women’s rights, said on Twitter: “Any act of sexual violence is a disgrace. But it is particularly harmful when, yet again, these crimes have been perpetrated by a person who has additional responsibilities to keep the public safe.”

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Entertainment

How WWE’s Vince McMahon ruthlessly got his job back despite allegations of sexual assault and misuse of company funds

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Washington
CNN
 — 

Professional wrestling is known for its outlandish, dramatic stories that have captivated generations. It’s an athletic soap opera built on emotional drama with wrestlers sometimes scheming in the background for months only to make their move at the opportune moment, drawing crazed reactions from arenas packed with fans who have followed every beat.

But the real-life saga playing out in World Wrestling Entertainment’s corporate office over the last several weeks surpasses even what most of what those performers and their backstage colleagues could dream up.

Vince McMahon, the longtime force behind WWE at the corporate and creative levels, made a shocking return to the company on January 10, nearly six months after announcing his retirement. McMahon was alleged to have used company funds to pay millions to multiple women in order to cover up infidelity and allegations of sexual misconduct.

But over a series of just a few days last week, McMahon engineered his return to the company’s board of directors, reshaped it by forcing out some members, replaced them with his own allies, and used that new boardroom power to install himself in his old job as executive chairman. His own daughter – the heir apparent to the company who had appeared groomed to take the job for years – resigned.

The stunning and swift developments have the wrestling world reeling, with rumors of a sale burning up Wrestling Twitter and people inside and outside the company wondering what it all means for the future of WWE and professional wrestling itself.

In July, Vince McMahon – an ever-present force in WWE and professional wrestling, the man who remade the business in service of a vision that upended generations of tradition, creating his own hegemony – retired. Or he resigned, depending on who you ask.

It was a moment many wrestling fans and observers never thought would come. The longtime chairman and CEO of WWE was such an intense micromanager that he barely slept, rarely took vacations and almost never stopped putting his own spin on every single aspect of the company’s output. Many longtime followers of the company simply assumed he’d die in the role rather than retire.

But a series of revelations first reported in The Wall Street Journal about hush money payments to multiple women to cover up infidelity and allegations of sexual misconduct seemed to bring McMahon’s legendary run as the head of wrestling’s most important company to an end. Additional reporting came in December, with additional women accusing McMahon of sexual assault, seemed to cement his status as being permanently gone from WWE.

WWE has always been a family business – Vince McMahon, Sr., handed over the reins to his son in the 1980s – and it seemed set to continue that way. Vince McMahon’s daughter, Stephanie, who only weeks before had taken a leave of absence from the company, stepped into the role of co-CEO with Nick Khan, a longtime executive in the entertainment and media industry.

And Paul Levesque – Stephanie McMahon’s husband and a Hall of Fame professional wrestler himself and better known by his ring name, Hunter Hearst Helmsley, or Triple H – assumed the job as the head of creative, putting him in charge of WWE’s storylines and in-ring action, which his father-in-law had long managed.

That moment last summer signaled a sea change in the professional wrestling industry.

Vince McMahon was more akin to a king than a business executive in the world of WWE, his fingerprints on everything. Through his ruthless business practices, he had molded the industry in his image, running most of his competition out of business and turning his company into the destination for pro wrestling. For most of two decades, he had a monopoly on the business.

But his creative output cratered in recent years. Stars who left WWE described a frustrating creative process dominated by McMahon that stifled their visions and led to a homogenized product that felt miles away from the company’s peak in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

With the vast majority of company revenue coming from TV rights, instead of fans spending money on tickets or pay-per-view events, the need to give the people what they want was replaced by content production. Sometimes it seemed as if Vince McMahon’s creative decisions were meant to antagonize and annoy his audience, appearing to ram home his vision of “sports entertainment” whether they liked it or not.

A turning point for many was the 2015 Royal Rumble event. Fans were clamoring for their favorite Daniel Bryan, one of the most gifted wrestlers on the planet, to win the event’s namesake. To many fans, Bryan’s run symbolized hope that the company would promote their favorite wrestlers instead of McMahon’s chosen ones.

But Bryan was unceremoniously eliminated in the first half of the match. The crowd in Philadelphia booed throughout the second half, chanting Bryan’s name and refusing to celebrate when Roman Reigns – widely seen as McMahon’s choice to be the future of the company despite fan apathy – won.

Shrinking viewership numbers reflected that loss of hope. While TV ratings overall have dropped in the last several years, with some exceptions, WWE’s drop outpaced the general decline in overall viewership and in the key 18-49 demographic, according to Wrestlenomics, a website that tracks the business side of the industry.

Once considered a wrestling genius, critics have more recently come to consider Vince McMahon a creative liability. The elevation of Levesque and the Stephanie McMahon-Khan duo appeared to signal hope that a new era was dawning over the WWE and that its creative system would finally get the long-needed injection of new ideas, new faces and new energy.

In December, The Wall Street Journal reported McMahon was eying a comeback – the first rumblings that the new era might be on shaky ground.

According to the Journal’s reporting, McMahon was telling people around him that he had received bad advice to step aside after the paper reported he used company funds to pay more than $12 million in hush money settlements to women to cover up “allegations of sexual misconduct and infidelity.”

The WSJ also reported McMahon believed the controversy would have blown over if he had just stayed on as head of creative and chairman of the company’s board of directors.

Then, in early January, McMahon made his move.

As revealed in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, McMahon said he had to return to the company because negotiations over media rights and a “strategic alternatives review” required his “direct participation, leadership and support.” He told the SEC he was putting himself back on the company’s board of directors, along with two longtime allies – both of whom McMahon had fired from the company in 2020.

How could he do this, despite retiring in disgrace and ostensibly being away from the company for months? McMahon never sold his stock in the company and remained WWE’s controlling shareholder.

“The only way for WWE to fully capitalize on this opportunity is for me to return as Executive Chairman and support the management team in the negotiations for our media rights and to combine that with a review of strategic alternatives,” McMahon said in a news release. “My return will allow WWE, as well as any transaction counterparties, to engage in these processes knowing they will have the support of the controlling shareholder.”

Over the course of just a few days, he had gone from ostracized former wrestling executive to once again running the company that he had taken from a regional player to a global power. It just was the kind of swerve one might have expected from “Mr. McMahon,” Vince McMahon’s devious on-screen character, who served as wrestling’s greatest heel for years in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Just days after reinstalling himself on the company’s board, WWE’s board of directors unanimously returned him to his old job as executive chairman.

Not only that, his daughter, Stephanie McMahon – who had seemed groomed to take over the company for years and played prominent roles on screen and off – resigned as chairwoman and co-CEO of WWE, leaving it all together.

Nick Khan was left as the company’s lone CEO. But the corporate machinations over the last week showed that, once again, McMahon was the real power in WWE.

There are reports that McMahon is exploring selling the company, but it’s not clear if there’s any truth to them.

So far, all of McMahon’s statements about his intentions pertain to business negotiations. But Stephanie McMahon’s departure has cast a cloud over her husband’s future with the company.

As his father-in-law forced his way back into the company, Levesque was gearing up for his first major period in charge of WWE’s storytelling heading into its most important time of year. WrestleMania season kicks off with January 28’s Royal Rumble event and continues through the first weekend of April, when WWE runs a two-night WrestleMania event – its biggest shows of the year – at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. This was likely to be the first major test for Levesque’s creative vision for WWE and had been hotly anticipated by wrestling fans.

McMahon’s reemergence now leads to questions over how much influence the chairman will seek to exercise over the creative direction of the company, and how it might clash with Levesque’s own vision.

Upon taking control of creative, the WWE Hall of Famer re-signed scores of wrestlers who McMahon had released in recent years, including stars like Bray Wyatt and Braun Strowman, and given priority to other wrestlers who don’t fit McMahon’s typical vision of a professional wrestler – someone taller than 6-foot-3 inches, muscular, good looking and with actual wrestling ability considered optional.

The futures of those Levesque favorites now seem less certain than they did just a few weeks ago.

There are real questions over how fans will receive the news of McMahon’s return. A man once seen as a legend in the business is accused of sexually assaulting multiple women, then using the levers of corporate power to escape accountability. Fans have already tuned out from the company in droves in recent years and some may decide not to spend their money, time and attention on a product helmed by McMahon.

And then there’s the question of how McMahon’s return affects the pro wrestling industry as a whole.

All Elite Wrestling (AEW), an upstart promotion begun in 2019 by Tony Khan – the son of auto parts billionaire Shahid Khan and no relation to the WWE CEO – and several of independent wrestling’s biggest stars, has become the second-biggest wrestling company in the world by simply being what WWE is not.

Its focus on long-term storytelling, great matches, charismatic stars and less sanitized production has allowed AEW to break WWE’s monopoly on the wrestling industry and become a verified player in the business.

As such, it had become a home for some of the highest profile wrestlers in the industry who had been burnt out on WWE’s corporate culture and bending to McMahon’s whims. His departure back in July and Levesque’s ascension to the WWE creative throne led many observers to wonder if AEW stars would be looking to jump ship and head to WWE.

There were some hopes among WWE diehards that Levesque’s new regime might be successful enough to snuff out AEW’s rise. McMahon’s return may toss some doubt into the minds of AEW wrestlers who were thinking about moving to WWE in the future.

Read original article here

Entertainment

How WWE’s Vince McMahon ruthlessly got his job back despite allegations of sexual assault and misuse of company funds

Leave a comment


Washington
CNN
 — 

Professional wrestling is known for its outlandish, dramatic stories that have captivated generations. It’s an athletic soap opera built on emotional drama with wrestlers sometimes scheming in the background for months only to make their move at the opportune moment, drawing crazed reactions from arenas packed with fans who have followed every beat.

But the real-life saga playing out in World Wrestling Entertainment’s corporate office over the last several weeks surpasses even what most of what those performers and their backstage colleagues could dream up.

Vince McMahon, the longtime force behind WWE at the corporate and creative levels, made a shocking return to the company on January 10, nearly six months after announcing his retirement. McMahon was alleged to have used company funds to pay millions to multiple women in order to cover up infidelity and allegations of sexual misconduct.

But over a series of just a few days last week, McMahon engineered his return to the company’s board of directors, reshaped it by forcing out some members, replaced them with his own allies, and used that new boardroom power to install himself in his old job as executive chairman. His own daughter – the heir apparent to the company who had appeared groomed to take the job for years – resigned.

The stunning and swift developments have the wrestling world reeling, with rumors of a sale burning up Wrestling Twitter and people inside and outside the company wondering what it all means for the future of WWE and professional wrestling itself.

In July, Vince McMahon – an ever-present force in WWE and professional wrestling, the man who remade the business in service of a vision that upended generations of tradition, creating his own hegemony – retired. Or he resigned, depending on who you ask.

It was a moment many wrestling fans and observers never thought would come. The longtime chairman and CEO of WWE was such an intense micromanager that he barely slept, rarely took vacations and almost never stopped putting his own spin on every single aspect of the company’s output. Many longtime followers of the company simply assumed he’d die in the role rather than retire.

But a series of revelations first reported in The Wall Street Journal about hush money payments to multiple women to cover up infidelity and allegations of sexual misconduct seemed to bring McMahon’s legendary run as the head of wrestling’s most important company to an end. Additional reporting came in December, with additional women accusing McMahon of sexual assault, seemed to cement his status as being permanently gone from WWE.

WWE has always been a family business – Vince McMahon, Sr., handed over the reins to his son in the 1980s – and it seemed set to continue that way. Vince McMahon’s daughter, Stephanie, who only weeks before had taken a leave of absence from the company, stepped into the role of co-CEO with Nick Khan, a longtime executive in the entertainment and media industry.

And Paul Levesque – Stephanie McMahon’s husband and a Hall of Fame professional wrestler himself and better known by his ring name, Hunter Hearst Helmsley, or Triple H – assumed the job as the head of creative, putting him in charge of WWE’s storylines and in-ring action, which his father-in-law had long managed.

That moment last summer signaled a sea change in the professional wrestling industry.

Vince McMahon was more akin to a king than a business executive in the world of WWE, his fingerprints on everything. Through his ruthless business practices, he had molded the industry in his image, running most of his competition out of business and turning his company into the destination for pro wrestling. For most of two decades, he had a monopoly on the business.

But his creative output cratered in recent years. Stars who left WWE described a frustrating creative process dominated by McMahon that stifled their visions and led to a homogenized product that felt miles away from the company’s peak in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

With the vast majority of company revenue coming from TV rights, instead of fans spending money on tickets or pay-per-view events, the need to give the people what they want was replaced by content production. Sometimes it seemed as if Vince McMahon’s creative decisions were meant to antagonize and annoy his audience, appearing to ram home his vision of “sports entertainment” whether they liked it or not.

A turning point for many was the 2015 Royal Rumble event. Fans were clamoring for their favorite Daniel Bryan, one of the most gifted wrestlers on the planet, to win the event’s namesake. To many fans, Bryan’s run symbolized hope that the company would promote their favorite wrestlers instead of McMahon’s chosen ones.

But Bryan was unceremoniously eliminated in the first half of the match. The crowd in Philadelphia booed throughout the second half, chanting Bryan’s name and refusing to celebrate when Roman Reigns – widely seen as McMahon’s choice to be the future of the company despite fan apathy – won.

Shrinking viewership numbers reflected that loss of hope. While TV ratings overall have dropped in the last several years, with some exceptions, WWE’s drop outpaced the general decline in overall viewership and in the key 18-49 demographic, according to Wrestlenomics, a website that tracks the business side of the industry.

Once considered a wrestling genius, critics have more recently come to consider Vince McMahon a creative liability. The elevation of Levesque and the Stephanie McMahon-Khan duo appeared to signal hope that a new era was dawning over the WWE and that its creative system would finally get the long-needed injection of new ideas, new faces and new energy.

In December, The Wall Street Journal reported McMahon was eying a comeback – the first rumblings that the new era might be on shaky ground.

According to the Journal’s reporting, McMahon was telling people around him that he had received bad advice to step aside after the paper reported he used company funds to pay more than $12 million in hush money settlements to women to cover up “allegations of sexual misconduct and infidelity.”

The WSJ also reported McMahon believed the controversy would have blown over if he had just stayed on as head of creative and chairman of the company’s board of directors.

Then, in early January, McMahon made his move.

As revealed in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, McMahon said he had to return to the company because negotiations over media rights and a “strategic alternatives review” required his “direct participation, leadership and support.” He told the SEC he was putting himself back on the company’s board of directors, along with two longtime allies – both of whom McMahon had fired from the company in 2020.

How could he do this, despite retiring in disgrace and ostensibly being away from the company for months? McMahon never sold his stock in the company and remained WWE’s controlling shareholder.

“The only way for WWE to fully capitalize on this opportunity is for me to return as Executive Chairman and support the management team in the negotiations for our media rights and to combine that with a review of strategic alternatives,” McMahon said in a news release. “My return will allow WWE, as well as any transaction counterparties, to engage in these processes knowing they will have the support of the controlling shareholder.”

Over the course of just a few days, he had gone from ostracized former wrestling executive to once again running the company that he had taken from a regional player to a global power. It just was the kind of swerve one might have expected from “Mr. McMahon,” Vince McMahon’s devious on-screen character, who served as wrestling’s greatest heel for years in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Just days after reinstalling himself on the company’s board, WWE’s board of directors unanimously returned him to his old job as executive chairman.

Not only that, his daughter, Stephanie McMahon – who had seemed groomed to take over the company for years and played prominent roles on screen and off – resigned as chairwoman and co-CEO of WWE, leaving it all together.

Nick Khan was left as the company’s lone CEO. But the corporate machinations over the last week showed that, once again, McMahon was the real power in WWE.

There are reports that McMahon is exploring selling the company, but it’s not clear if there’s any truth to them.

So far, all of McMahon’s statements about his intentions pertain to business negotiations. But Stephanie McMahon’s departure has cast a cloud over her husband’s future with the company.

As his father-in-law forced his way back into the company, Levesque was gearing up for his first major period in charge of WWE’s storytelling heading into its most important time of year. WrestleMania season kicks off with January 28’s Royal Rumble event and continues through the first weekend of April, when WWE runs a two-night WrestleMania event – its biggest shows of the year – at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. This was likely to be the first major test for Levesque’s creative vision for WWE and had been hotly anticipated by wrestling fans.

McMahon’s reemergence now leads to questions over how much influence the chairman will seek to exercise over the creative direction of the company, and how it might clash with Levesque’s own vision.

Upon taking control of creative, the WWE Hall of Famer re-signed scores of wrestlers who McMahon had released in recent years, including stars like Bray Wyatt and Braun Strowman, and given priority to other wrestlers who don’t fit McMahon’s typical vision of a professional wrestler – someone taller than 6-foot-3 inches, muscular, good looking and with actual wrestling ability considered optional.

The futures of those Levesque favorites now seem less certain than they did just a few weeks ago.

There are real questions over how fans will receive the news of McMahon’s return. A man once seen as a legend in the business is accused of sexually assaulting multiple women, then using the levers of corporate power to escape accountability. Fans have already tuned out from the company in droves in recent years and some may decide not to spend their money, time and attention on a product helmed by McMahon.

And then there’s the question of how McMahon’s return affects the pro wrestling industry as a whole.

All Elite Wrestling (AEW), an upstart promotion begun in 2019 by Tony Khan – the son of auto parts billionaire Shahid Khan and no relation to the WWE CEO – and several of independent wrestling’s biggest stars, has become the second-biggest wrestling company in the world by simply being what WWE is not.

Its focus on long-term storytelling, great matches, charismatic stars and less sanitized production has allowed AEW to break WWE’s monopoly on the wrestling industry and become a verified player in the business.

As such, it had become a home for some of the highest profile wrestlers in the industry who had been burnt out on WWE’s corporate culture and bending to McMahon’s whims. His departure back in July and Levesque’s ascension to the WWE creative throne led many observers to wonder if AEW stars would be looking to jump ship and head to WWE.

There were some hopes among WWE diehards that Levesque’s new regime might be successful enough to snuff out AEW’s rise. McMahon’s return may toss some doubt into the minds of AEW wrestlers who were thinking about moving to WWE in the future.

Read original article here

Sports

Los Angeles Dodgers officially cut ties with pitcher Trevor Bauer who served suspension for violating MLB policies

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CNN
 — 

The Los Angeles Dodgers have officially cut ties with pitcher Trevor Bauer, the team announced Friday.

The former Cy Young award winner was previously suspended by Major League Baseball for violating the league’s joint domestic violence, sexual assault, and child abuse policy, but was reinstated last month when an arbitrator reduced his suspension from 324 games to 194, effective immediately.

Bauer has not played since June 2021, after a San Diego woman claimed he had sexually assaulted her. The pitcher, whom a prosecutor in Los Angeles declined to charge with a crime, has denied the sexual assault allegations and maintained his encounters with the woman were consensual.

“The Dodgers organization believes that allegations of sexual assault or domestic violence should be thoroughly investigated, with due process given to the accused,” the team said in a statement Friday. “From the beginning, we have fully cooperated with Major League Baseball’s investigation and strictly followed the process stipulated under MLB’s Joint Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault and Child Abuse Policy.

The team said “two extensive reviews of all the available evidence in the case,” performed by MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred and another by a neutral arbitrator, “concluded that Mr. Bauer’s actions warranted the longest ever active player suspension in our sport for violations of this policy. Now that this process has been completed, and after careful consideration, we have decided that he will no longer be part of our organization.”

Bauer said on Twitter on Friday that he talked to “Dodgers leadership” in Arizona on Thursday and he was told they wanted him to pitch there next season.

“While I am disappointed by the organization’s decision today, I appreciate the wealth of support I’ve received from the Dodgers clubhouse,” he wrote. “I wish the players all the best and look forward to competing elsewhere.”

CNN Sports has reached out to the Dodgers for further comment

Bauer was placed on administrative leave by the league in July 2021 and in April he was suspended for 324 games. But on December 22 an arbitrator reduced the suspension, making him eligible to play next season.

At the time his attorneys – Jon Fetterolf, Shawn Holley, and Rachel Luba, – said: “While we are pleased that Mr. Bauer has been reinstated immediately, we disagree that any discipline should have been imposed. That said, Mr. Bauer looks forward to his return to the field, where his goal remains to help his team win a World Series.”

According to league rules, the Dodgers had 14 days from reinstatement – until Friday – to decide whether to put Bauer back on the team’s 40-man roster.

According to the team website, Bauer was designated for assignment, which means a player can be traded or released within seven days. If Bauer was released, any of the other 29 teams can sign him.



Read original article here

US

Missouri carries out first known execution of an openly transgender person for 2003 murder

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CNN
 — 

Missouri carried out the first known US execution of an openly transgender person Tuesday when Amber McLaughlin, who was convicted of a 2003 murder and unsuccessfully sought clemency from the governor, was put to death by lethal injection.

“McLaughlin was pronounced dead at 6:51 p.m.,” the Missouri Department of Corrections said in a written statement. A spokesperson did not say if McLaughlin had a final statement.

McLaughlin’s execution – the first in the US this year – is unusual: Executions of women in the United States are already rare. Prior to McLaughlin’s execution, just 17 had been put to death since 1976, when the US Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty after a brief suspension, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. The non-profit organization confirmed McLaughlin is the first openly transgender person to be executed in the United States.

McLaughlin, 49, and her attorneys had petitioned Republican Gov. Mike Parson for clemency, asking him to commute her death sentence. Aside from the fact a jury could not agree on the death penalty, they say, McLaughlin has shown genuine remorse and has struggled with an intellectual disability, mental health issues and a history of childhood trauma.

But in a statement Tuesday, Parson’s office announced the execution would move forward as planned. The family and loved ones of her victim, Beverly Guenther, “deserve peace,” the statement said.

“The State of Missouri will carry out McLaughlin’s sentence according to the Court’s order,” Parson said, “and deliver justice.”

McLaughlin – listed in court documents as Scott McLaughlin – had not initiated a legal name change or transition and as a death-sentenced person, was kept at Potosi Correctional Center near St. Louis, which housed male inmates, McLaughlin’s federal public defender Larry Komp and the governor’s office have said.

McLaughlin was sentenced to death for Guenther’s November 2003 murder, according to court records.

The two were previously in a relationship, but they had separated by the time of the killing and Guenther had received an order of protection against McLaughlin after she was arrested for burglarizing Guenther’s home.

Several weeks later, while the order was in effect, McLaughlin waited for Guenther outside the victim’s workplace, court records say. McLaughlin repeatedly stabbed and raped Guenther, prosecutors argued at trial, pointing in part to blood spatters in the parking lot and in Guenther’s truck.

A jury convicted McLaughlin of first-degree murder, forcible rape and armed criminal action, court records show.

But when it came to a sentence, the jury was deadlocked.

Most US states with the death penalty require a jury to unanimously vote to recommend or impose the death penalty, but Missouri does not. According to state law, in cases where a jury is unable to agree on the death penalty, the judge decides between life imprisonment without parole or death. McLaughlin’s trial judge imposed the death penalty.

If Parson were to grant clemency, McLaughlin’s attorneys argued, he would not have subverted the will of the jury, since the jury could not agree on a capital sentence.

That, however, was just one of several grounds on which McLaughlin’s attorneys said Parson should grant her clemency, according to the petition submitted to the governor.

In addition to the issue of her deadlocked jury, McLaughlin’s attorneys pointed to her struggles with mental health, as well as a history of childhood trauma. McLaughlin has been “consistently diagnosed with borderline intellectual disability,” and “universally diagnosed with brain damage as well as fetal alcohol syndrome,” the petition said.

McLaughlin was “abandoned” by her mother and placed into the foster care system, and in one placement, had “feces thrust into her face,” according to the petition.

She later suffered more abuse and trauma, including being tased by her adoptive father, the petition said, and battled depression that led to “multiple suicide attempts.”

At trial, McLaughlin’s jury did not hear expert testimony about her mental state at the time of Guenther’s murder, the petition said. That testimony, her attorneys said, could have tipped the scales toward a life sentence by supporting the mitigating factors cited by the defense and rebutting the prosecution’s claim McLaughlin acted with depravity of mind – that her actions were particularly brutal or “wantonly vile” – the only aggravating factor the jury found.

A federal judge in 2016 vacated McLaughlin’s death sentence due to ineffective counsel, court records show, citing her trial attorneys’ failure to present that expert testimony. That ruling, however, was later overturned by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.

McLaughlin’s execution “would highlight all the flaws of the justice system and would be a great injustice on a number of levels,” Komp, her attorney, told CNN previously.

“It would continue the systemic failures that existed throughout Amber’s life where no interventions occurred to stop and intercede to protect her as a child and teen,” Komp said. “All that could go wrong did go wrong for her.”

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Entertainment

Harvey Weinstein: Los Angeles jury deadlocks on factors that could have increased his sentence

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CNN
 — 

After convicting former film producer Harvey Weinstein of rape and sexual assault, a Los Angeles jury could not reach a unanimous verdict Tuesday on alleged aggravating factors that could have increased his sentence.

The three charges Weinstein was convicted of – rape, sexual penetration by foreign object and forcible oral copulation – were all tied to one of his accusers, Jane Doe 1, a model and actress who testified the movie mogul assaulted her in a Beverly Hills hotel room in February 2013.

Jurors were asked to determine if Jane Doe 1 was harmed and particularly vulnerable, and if Weinstein committed the crimes with planning, professionalism, or sophistication.

Ten members of the jury found the aggravating factors had been met, but two jurors could not be swayed, one of the jurors told CNN.

“The jury has said they are not able to reach a unanimous verdict on these issues,” Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Lisa Lench said, according to a pool report. “I am going to declare a mistrial with respect to the allegations.”

Had the jury found Weinstein guilty of the aggravating factors, a new California law would have then allowed the judge to enact a harsher sentence.

Jurors had deliberated for several hours Tuesday. After the jury indicated further deliberations would not sway them, neither the prosecution or the defense pushed to have the jurors deliberate further.

When Lench asked prosecutor Paul Thompson if Weinstein will be retried on the deadlock counts, the pool report said he responded: “We need to consult the victims first and foremost.”

Weinstein’s sentencing was tentatively set for January 9, with Lench allowing only Jane Doe 1 to offer a victim impact statement. He is expected to serve 18 years.

“Harvey Weinstein forever destroyed a part of me that night in 2013. I will never get that back,” said Jane Doe 1 in a statement released through her attorney. “The criminal trial was brutal. Weinstein’s lawyers put me through hell on the witness stand. But I knew I had to see this through the end, and I did … I hope Harvey Weinstein never sees the outside of a prison cell during his lifetime.”

The disgraced movie mogul was found guilty Monday of three of seven charges against him in his second sexual assault trial. The jury acquitted Weinstein of one count of sexual battery by restraint against a massage therapist in a hotel room in 2010.

They were a hung jury on one count of sexual battery by restraint, one count of forcible oral copulation and one count of rape related to two other women – including Jennifer Siebel Newsom, a filmmaker and first partner to California Governor Gavin Newsom.

Weinstein had pleaded not guilty to all charges against him. His spokesman said he was “disappointed” with the outcome of the trial but “he is prepared to continue fighting for his innocence.”

The verdict was reached as jurors entered their third week of deliberations, meeting for a total of 41 hours over a period of 10 days following weeks of oftentimes emotional testimony.

Two jurors who spoke with CNN after they were dismissed from court Tuesday shared their thoughts on the trial, both saying politics played absolutely no role in their deliberations.

“Everyone realized the weight of this trial. There’s a lot riding on this for both sides,” said Michael, a 62-year-old juror who declined to share his last name.

Michael said the contact the accusers had with Weinstein following their alleged assaults was a key factor in deciding the verdict. That was specifically applied to Siebel Newsom, who, according to dozens of emails presented as evidence in the trial, maintained contact with Weinstein.

Michael said he found Jane Doe 1 to be the most convincing.

“We felt horrible for everybody,” but felt like the addition of uncharged witnesses became confusing for some jurors, said Jay, another juror who also declined to share his last name.

“Everybody seemed believable. It’s hard to prove all of them with time and memory,” Jay added.

Elizabeth Fegan, an attorney representing Siebel Newsom, who was identified in court as Jane Doe 4, said they were disappointed the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict on the charges related to her client.

“My client, Jane Doe 4, shared her story not with an expectation to testify but to support all the survivors who bravely came forward,” Fegan said in a statement to CNN. “While we are heartened that the jury found Weinstein guilty on some of the counts, we are disappointed that the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict on Jane Doe 4. She will continue to fight for all women and all survivors of abuse against a system that permits the victim to be shamed and re-traumatized in the name of justice.”

Weinstein is two years into a 23-year sentence for a 2020 New York conviction, which his attorneys have appealed, putting more attention on the outcome of the trial in Los Angeles.

The weekslong Los Angeles trial saw emotional testimony from Weinstein’s accusers – a model, a dancer, a massage therapist and Siebel Newsom – all of whom were asked to recount the details of their allegations against him, provide details of meetings with the producer from years ago, and explain their reactions to the alleged assaults.

Additionally, four women testified they were subjected to similar behavior by Weinstein in other jurisdictions.

Weinstein initially faced 11 charges, but four counts connected to an unnamed woman were dropped without explanation. She did not testify in the trial.

In closing arguments, Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Marlene Martinez called Weinstein a “titan” who used his power in Hollywood to prey on and silence women.

Meanwhile, Weinstein’s attorneys maintained the allegations are either fabricated or occurred consensually as part of a “transactional relationship” with the movie producer, repeatedly saying there is no evidence of assault.

Defense attorney Alan Jackson called the accusers “fame and fortune seekers.”

Jane Doe 2, who was identified as Lauren Young, told her attorney Gloria Allred by phone that she was happy Weinstein was convicted on some counts despite there being a mistrial on her count, Allred said in a news conference after the verdict.

“I am relieved that Harvey Weinstein has been convicted because he deserves to be punished for the crimes that he committed, and he can no longer use his power to intimidate and sexually assault more women,” Young said in a statement read by Allred.

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Entertainment

Harvey Weinstein: Jury reaches verdict in sexual assault trial

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CNN
 — 

[Breaking news update, published at 6:05 p.m. ET]

A Los Angeles jury reached a verdict Monday in the sexual assault trial of Harvey Weinstein, the former movie producer who is accused of using his Hollywood influence to lure women into private meetings and assault them. The verdict will be announced shortly.

Weinstein has pleaded not guilty to seven charges in all: two counts each of forcible rape, sexual battery by restraint and forcible oral copulation, and one count of sexual penetration by foreign object.

If found guilty, Weinstein could face 60 years to life in prison, plus an additional five years.

The verdict was reached as jurors entered their third week of deliberations, meeting for a total of 41 hours over a period of 10 days.

Weinstein was convicted of similar charges in New York in 2020 and was sentenced to 23 years in prison.

[Original story, published at 2:02 p.m. ET]

A Los Angeles jury resumed deliberations Monday in Harvey Weinstein’s second sexual assault trial, meeting for a tenth day to decide on a verdict after weeks of testimony.

The disgraced movie mogul, who is accused of using his Hollywood influence to lure women into private meetings and assault them, awaits a decision from behind bars.

Weinstein faces two counts of forcible rape and five counts of sexual assault related to accusations from four women, including Jennifer Siebel Newsom, a filmmaker and the wife of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who alleged Weinstein raped her in a hotel room in 2005.

Weinstein has pleaded not guilty to all seven charges against him. He initially faced 11 charges, but four counts connected to an unnamed woman were dropped after she did not testify.

The jury had already deliberated for about 37 total hours when they adjourned last Wednesday, without a verdict reached.

The former film producer is already serving a 23-year sentence for a New York sexual assault conviction. His attorneys have appealed that conviction, which has placed more attention on the outcome of the trial in Los Angeles.

If the jury in Los Angeles finds him guilty, Weinstein could face 60 years to life in prison, plus an additional five years.

The Los Angeles jury has deliberated longer than the New York jury in Weinstein’s first criminal trial, in which he was convicted of criminal sex act and third-degree rape after 26 hours of deliberations.

As deliberations went on in Los Angeles, the jury asked the court a question and at least twice asked for testimony to be read back. Los Angeles Superior Court officials have not provided specifics on those requests.

The weekslong Los Angeles trial saw emotional testimony from Weinstein’s accusers – a model, a dancer, a massage therapist and Siebel Newsom – all of whom were asked to recount the details of their allegations against him, provide details of meetings with the producer from years ago, and explain their reactions to the alleged assaults.

In closing arguments, Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Marlene Martinez called Weinstein a “titan” who used his power in Hollywood to prey on and silence women.

“Rapists rape. You can look at the pattern,” fellow prosecutor Paul Thompson told jurors.

“You have irrefutable, overwhelming evidence about the nature of this man and what he did to these women,” Thompson said.

Meanwhile, Weinstein’s attorneys have maintained the allegations are either fabricated or occurred consensually as part of a “transactional relationship” with the movie producer, repeatedly saying there is no evidence of assault.

Defense attorney Alan Jackson called the accusers “fame and fortune seekers.”

The trial in Los Angeles included testimony from the four accusers identified as Jane Does in court, and other witnesses, including experts, law enforcement, friends of accusers and former aides to Weinstein.

Additionally, four women testified they were subjected to similar behavior by Weinstein in other jurisdictions.

Each morning at trial, Weinstein was brought from a correctional facility and wheeled into the Los Angeles courtroom wearing a suit and tie and holding a composition notebook.

His accusers all began their oftentimes emotional testimonies by identifying him in the courtroom as he looked on.

“He’s wearing a suit, and a blue tie and he’s staring at me,” Siebel Newsom said last month, before what was one of the most emotional moments of the trial.

On Thursday of last week, defense attorney Jackson asked jurors if they could “accept what (the Jane Does) say as gospel,” arguing what they said was a lack of forensic evidence supporting their claim.

“Five words that sum up the entirety of the prosecution’s case: ‘Take my word for it,’” Jackson said. “‘Take my word for it that he showed up at my hotel room unannounced. Take my word for it that I showed up at his hotel room. Take my word for it that I didn’t consent. Take my word for it, that I said no.’ “

Siebel Newsom described an hourslong “cat-and-mouse period,” which preceded her alleged assault. She, like other accusers, described feeling “frozen” that day.

Attorneys for Weinstein do not deny the incident occurred, but said he believed it was consensual.

Jackson called the incident “consensual, transactional sex,” adding: “Regret is not the same thing as rape. And it’s important we make that distinction in this courtroom.”

Women’s rights lawyer Gloria Allred, who is representing Jane Doe 2 in the case, told CNN she hopes the jury sees her client “has no motive at all to do anything but tell the truth.”

“She never sought or received any compensation … She doesn’t live in California anymore. But she is testifying because she’s been asked to testify and I hope that they see her as the young woman that she was when she met Harvey Weinstein, and the woman that she is today approximately nine to 10 years later. Her life has changed,” Allred said.

“To be willing to subject yourself to what could be a very brutal cross-examination. That takes a very special person to do that. And she is a special person. I’m very proud,” Allred said.

In her closing arguments, Martinez also highlighted the women who testified chose to do so despite knowing they would face tough conditions in court.

“The truth is that, as you sit here, we know the despicable behavior the defendant engaged in. He thought he was so powerful that people would … excuse his behavior,” Martinez said. “That’s just Harvey being Harvey. That’s just Hollywood. And for so long that’s what everyone did. Everyone just turned their heads.”

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World

Brittany Higgins: Rape case that shook Australian politics abandoned over mental health fears

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Sydney, Australia
CNN
 — 

Prosecutors in Australia have ended high-profile legal action against a former government staffer accused of raping a colleague inside Parliament House, saying a retrial would pose a “significant and unacceptable risk” to the woman’s life.

The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) director of public prosecutions, Shane Drumgold, told reporters Friday that the risk to Brittany Higgins’ mental health must be put ahead of the need for a resolution in the case.

Higgins, a former federal government staffer, alleges she was raped by former colleague Bruce Lehrmann in the office of Australia’s then defense minister in 2019.

Lehrmann pleaded not guilty to sexual intercourse without consent and maintains he has never engaged in intercourse with Higgins, consensual or otherwise.

The charge has now been dropped.

Drumgold said he had received “compelling evidence” from two independent medical experts that the “ongoing trauma associated with this prosecution presents a significant and unacceptable risk” to Higgins’ life.

“The evidence makes it clear that this is not limited to the harm of giving evidence in a witness box,” he said.

The case went to trial in Canberra in October, but the judge ordered a retrial due to jury misconduct. The retrial had been set to take place in February 2023.

However, Drumgold told reporters Friday that a retrial was no longer in the public interest.

“This has left me no option but to file a notice declining to proceed with the retrial of this matter, which I have done this morning. This brings the prosecution to an end,” Drumgold said.

Higgins is currently in hospital, according to a statement from her friend Emma Webster on Friday.

“The last couple of years have been difficult and unrelenting,” Webster stated. “Brittany is extremely grateful for all the support she has received, particularly from our mental health care workers.”

In the original trial, the judge dismissed the 12-member jury deliberating the rape verdict after it was revealed a juror had researched the allegations and taken that information into the jury room.

Higgins alleged Lehrmann had raped her in 2019 after the two shared a taxi to Parliament House following a night out with colleagues in the capital.

Higgins approached police soon after the alleged incident but didn’t make a formal complaint, citing fears that taking the matter further could damage her career.

But in 2021, she spoke to media and the case made headlines, not only because of the location of the alleged attack but due to Higgins’ claims that she had been discouraged from coming forward to avoid political fallout before the 2019 election.

Lehrmann was arrested and charged last year but the trial was delayed, partly due to fears that publicity around the case meant he wouldn’t get a fair hearing.

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US

E. Jean Carroll sues Trump for battery and defamation as lookback window for adult sex abuse survivors’ suits opens in New York

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CNN
 — 

Ex-magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll sued former President Donald Trump for battery and defamation under a new New York law that allows adults alleging sexual assault to bring claims years after the attack.

Carroll filed the lawsuit Thursday, the first day that civil lawsuits can be brought under the new law, the Adult Survivors Act, which gives adults a one-year window to file a claim.

The lawsuit is the second Carroll has brought against Trump, but the first to seek to hold him accountable for battery for allegedly raping Carroll in the dressing room of a New York department store in the mid-1990s. The lawsuit also alleges a new defamation claim based on statements Trump made last month.

Carroll is asking a judge to order Trump to retract his defamatory statements and award compensatory, punitive and exemplary damages in an amount to be determined at trial.

“Trump’s underlying sexual assault severely injured Carroll, causing significant pain and suffering, lasting psychological harms, loss of dignity, and invasion of her privacy. His recent defamatory statement has only added to the harm that Carroll had already suffered,” the lawsuit alleges.

At a court hearing Tuesday for the earlier lawsuit, Trump attorney Alina Habba told Judge Lewis Kaplan she had not yet been retained to represent Trump in the Adult Survivors Act lawsuit.

Kaplan noted that Trump has known this lawsuit was “coming for months and he would be well advised to decide who is representing him in it.”

In 2019, Carroll sued Trump for defamation after he denied her sexual assault allegation, said he never met Carroll, that she wasn’t his type, and that she made up the story to boost sales of her new book.

In Thursday’s lawsuit Carroll re-upped those previous statements and added a new one, from October 2022, when Trump said similar things about her as he was set to sit for a deposition related to the 2019 lawsuit.

“I don’t know this woman, have no idea who she is, other than it seems she got a picture of me many years ago, with her husband, shaking my hand on a reception line at a celebrity charity event. She completely made up a story that I met her at the doors of this crowded New York City Department Store and, within minutes, ‘swooned’ her,” Trump posted on his social media platform Truth Social.

“It is a Hoax and a lie, just like all the other Hoaxes that have been played on me for the past seven years. And, while I am not supposed to say it, I will. This woman is not my type!” the post said.

Habba responding to the filing Thursday, saying, “While I respect and admire individuals that come forward, this case is unfortunately an abuse of the purpose of this Act which creates a terrible precedent running the risk of delegitimizing credibility of actual victims.”

Carroll’s 2019 defamation lawsuit against Trump has been hanging in the balance. Trump’s attorneys challenged the lawsuit saying the Justice Department should be substituted as the defendants since Trump, as president, was answering reporters’ questions about Carroll’s allegations. The Justice Department agreed.

Kaplan ruled in favor of Carroll, but Trump and the Justice Department appealed. A federal appeals court in New York ruled that Trump was a federal employee at the time but asked a Washington, DC, appeals court to determine whether the statements fell within the scope of his employment.

The DC appeals court has expedited the case and could decide early next year. If the court rules against Carroll, the case will likely be dismissed because the federal government cannot be sued for defamation.

If the 2019 case is dismissed, the defamation claims from 2022 would not be impacted since Trump was not a federal employee last month when he made the new statements.

Carroll’s lawyers previously asked Kaplan to combine the 2019 and 2022 action into one trial early next year. The judge said he would weigh in next week.

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