SAN FRANCISCO — Without warning or hesitation, David DePape swings a hammer, slamming it into the head of Paul Pelosi as San Francisco police officers stand nearby, attempting to defuse the early morning confrontation in the doorway of Nancy Pelosi’s family home.
The images from the SFPD bodycams are stunning. The video was made public Friday morning after San Francisco Superior Court Judge Stephen M. Murphy — at the legal urging of news outlets — ruled there was no reason to keep the footage secret.
The early morning break-in and assault on Oct. 28 at the Pelosi’s Pacific Heights home sent shockwaves across the nation’s divided political landscape.
David DePape (L) and Paul Pelosi are seen struggling over a hammer at Pelosi’s residence in San Francisco, October 28, 2022.
San Francisco Superior Court
Along with the body cam video, the release of evidence included the 911 call, home security footage, and a portion of an interview conducted with DePape.
During the 9-1-1 call, Pelosi is heard calmly trying to relay information to the dispatcher.
“This is San Francisco police,” the dispatcher said. “Do you need help?”
“Well, there’s a gentleman here,” answered Paul Pelosi. “Who is waiting for my wife to come back. Nancy Pelosi.”
For about three minutes, Pelosi tries to explain what’s unfolding to the dispatcher.
“I’ve got a problem,” he said. “But he thinks everything’s good.”
At one point, DePape even joins in on the conversation.
“My name is David,” he said aloud.
“And who is David,” the dispatcher asked.
“I don’t know,” Pelosi said.”
“I’m a friend of theirs,” DePape added.
“He wants me to get the hell off the phone,” Pelosi finally says.
The police body camera video shows officers approaching the home and knocking on the front door. After a few seconds, the front door opens, revealing Pelosi standing alongside DePape. Both are holding onto a hammer, and DePape is gripping Pelosi’s wrist.
The police exchange a few words with the men, and officers order DePape to drop the hammer.
“Um, nope,” DePape responds, yanking the hammer away and swinging it at Pelosi.
Police then rush into the home and pull DePape off Pelosi, who remained on the floor. Police can be heard requesting backup as they handcuffed DePape.
The 82-year-old Pelosi suffered a fractured skull and injuries to his arms and hands and underwent surgery after the attack. DePape, 42, allegedly broke into the home shortly after 2 a.m. and demanded to know where the congresswoman was. Paul Pelosi was eventually able to make a surreptitious 911 call that authorities have said likely saved his life.
The home security footage shows DePape walking up to a back patio door and peering inside before walking away and retrieving two backpacks. DePape is then seen putting on gloves and breaking the glass of the patio door before entering the home.
Security camera video (edited for brevity):
Paul Pelosi attack: Security camera video shows break-in by David DePape
02:14
But both sides in the case objected to the release of the images.
The San Francisco District Attorney’s office argued releasing the footage publicly would only allow people to manipulate it in their quest to spread false information.
Public defender Adam Lipson, who is representing DePape, released an additional statement Friday.
“I think it was a terrible mistake to release this evidence, and in particular the video. Releasing this footage is disrespectful to Mr. Pelosi, and serves no purpose except to feed the public desire for spectacle and violence,” the statement read. “The footage is inflammatory and could feed unfounded theories about this case, and we are extremely concerned about Mr. DePape’s ability to get a fair trial.”
“It’s a concern for the defense, and that, in turn, becomes a concern for the district attorney,” explained attorney and former Federal Prosecutor Tony Brass. “Because the district attorney does not want to provide a change of venue motion to the defense, who can then take a case on the road someplace, when it’s a legitimate San Francisco case.”
Attorney: Release of Paul Pelosi attack videos complicates legal case against David DePape
04:46
Authorities said DePape intended to kidnap Nancy Pelosi and told officers he wanted to “break her kneecaps.” The congresswoman was in Washington, D.C., at the time of the home invasion and attack. She announced the following month she was stepping down from Democratic leadership, though remaining in Congress.
Also released Friday was a recording of the SFPD interview of DePape
After reading him his rights, police ask DePape how he ended up at the Pelosi home, which prompted DePape to complain about dishonesty in Washington, and Nancy Pelosi lying about Donald Trump.
They go from one crime, to another crime, to another time, to another crime,” DePape says in the recording. “It’s just like the whole f—–g four years, until they could finally steal the election.”
From there, DePape outlined a plan to hold Nancy Pelosi hostage, saying he knew he was on camera at the Pelosi home, and that Paul Pelosi only woke up when he reached the bedroom.
“And so then he basically wakes up,” DePape said. “And we’re kind of talking. I don’t really have the specifics, but like, vaguely, I kind of told him that I was looking for Nancy Pelosi. And he’s like, ‘she’s not here.'”
DePape said he also knew the 9-1-1 call was certain to bring the police.
“There’s no way they got that f—–g phone call and they ain’t f—–g coming here,” he said during the questioning.
“Why didn’t you think about leaving,” San Francisco Police asked. “You knew they were coming. Why not just leave?”
“It’s like the founding fathers,” DePape answered. “They fought the British. They fought the tyranny. They didn’t just f—–g surrender to it. And when I left my house, I left to go fight tyranny. I did not leave to go surrender.”
Finally, DePape described the encounter at the front door, saying he thought Pelosi let his guard down upon seeing police, and that he tried to hit Pelosi full force.
“It’s like, I didn’t come to surrender,” DePape said. “And I told him that I would go through him. So I basically yanked it away from him, and I hit him.”
Depape has pleaded not guilty to a list of state and federal charges. His next court appearance is scheduled for Feb. 23rd.
Meanwhile, there is a parallel prosecution going on in federal court where the Richmond man has been charged with assault and attempted kidnapping. He has pleaded not guilty to those charges and is being held without bail.
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Paul Pelosi assault suspect David DePape.
California DMV
At DePape’s preliminary hearing, officer Kyle Cagney — who was among those who responded to the home — described the doorway confrontation and displayed the hammer to the courtroom.
DePape preliminary hearing sketch showing the hammer allegedly used in the home invasion and assault of Paul Pelosi.
Vicki Behringer
Prosecutors say an enraged DePape allegedly broke into the home searching for the former House speaker, who was in Washington at the time.
Court records say the San Francisco police “recovered zip ties in Pelosi’s bedroom and in the hallway near the front door of the Pelosi residence” and found “a roll of tape, white rope, one hammer, one pair of rubber and cloth gloves, and a journal” in his backpack.
Paul Pelosi
AP Photo
Since undergoing surgery hours after the attack, Paul Pelosi has been recovering mostly in private away from the limelight.
Nancy Pelosi told reporters her husband’s well-being was paramount and she did not know if she would view the video once it was released.
“With a grateful heart and on behalf of my entire family, that we continue to thank people for all of their prayers that they continue to send us,” she said. “Asking about the progress my husband is making. And he is making progress, but it will take more time.”
“As you know, today, there was a release of some information. I have not heard the 911 call. I have not heard the conversion. I have not seen the break in. And I have absolutely no intention of seeing the deadly assault on my husband’s life. I won’t be making any more statements about this case. As it proceeds, except to again, thank people and inform them of Paul’s progress. But that will be the end of what I’ll say about the case.”
ATLANTA — A peaceful protest in downtown Atlanta turned violent Saturday evening when protesters set a police car on fire and started smashing windows.
Six protesters were arrested, Atlanta Police Chief Darin Schierbaum announced in a news conference on Saturday night. Those people have not been identified and their charges have not been released.
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said several of those who were arrested do not live in the Atlanta area or in Georgia.
Hundreds of protesters, who are opposed to the construction of an APD training center, gathered at Underground Atlanta before moving down Peachtree St. in the heart of downtown Atlanta.
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Chief Schierbaum said a group of the protesters dressed in all black then began peacefully marching down Peachtree St. When they got to the intersection of Ellis Street, some of the protesters began breaking windows and attacking APD patrol cars. One of the APD cruisers was set on fire.
Within two blocks, Atlanta police officers on the scene had stopped the violence from spreading further into downtown. Chief Schierbaum said the group’s intention was to continue causing damage.
Three businesses, including a Wells Fargo bank, were damaged, Schierbaum said.
No officers or citizens were injured.
Spokespeople with “Stop Cop City,” who have claimed several times that they are peaceful protesters, released a statement saying they are not backing down and do not believe their actions on Saturday night are violent.
“Destruction of material is fundamentally different from violence. All reported acts appear to be explicitly targeted against the financial backers & goons of the Atlanta Police Foundation, a shady nonprofit that funnels weapons and military gear into our city to wage war on black and brown folks. The police have raided the forest for over 7 months, destroying material by trashing camps and water supplies, threatened the lives of forest defenders and now have murdered one. Protestors are only leveling the playing field & preventing future violence by disabling the economic machine of the Atlanta Police Foundation that seeks to sterilize all life within the Weelaunee Forest.”
They later released an amended statement that read:
“What is the proper reaction to police killing Manuel ‘Tortuguita’ Esteban Paez Teran? Destruction of material is fundamentally different from the violence that led to extinguishing someone’s light. We are seeing what we have seen across the country, a community in grief seeking accountability against the financial backers and goons of the Atlanta Police Foundation, a shady nonprofit that funnels weapons and military gear into our city to wage war on Black, Indigenous, Brown and poor folks in the community. The police have evoked violence when they raided the forest for over 7 months, destroying material by trashing camps and water supplies and threatening the lives of forest defenders. It seems the community is trying to disable the economic machine of the Atlanta Police Foundation that seeks to sterilize all life within the Weelaunee Forest to protect the community they love from further violence.“
Mike Register, the Director of the GBI, said the protesters are not peaceful, but were violent on many occasions.
“Arson, attacking citizens, shooting police officers, using explosives,” Register said at a news conference Wednesday.
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Earlier this week, Georgia State Patrol and other agencies were at the site of the proposed facility clearing protesters who had been camped out in the forest for months.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation says one of the protesters, Manuel Teran, shot a state trooper and was then killed by return fire.
Friends of Teran, who went by the nickname “Tortuguita,” have repeatedly claimed since the shooting that they are peaceful protesters.
Seven fellow protesters were arrested on Wednesday and charged with domestic terrorism and criminal trespass.
The governor’s office released a statement saying they will not tolerate any unlawful crimes in the name of peaceful protest.
The governor remains well informed of the situation through regular updates from state law enforcement and is actively monitoring the situation. State patrol is well equipped to respond to any and all threats to public safety and is coordinating closely with other state agencies and local PD.
While the state continues to respect peaceful protest, acts of violence against person or property will NOT be tolerated. Those committing such unlawful acts will be arrested and prosecuted fully.
A short time later, Governor Brian Kemp himself tweeted a statement.
Violence and unlawful destruction of property are not acts of protest. They are crimes that will not be tolerated in Georgia and will be prosecuted fully.
Thank you to the hardworking @ga_dps, @GBI_GA, @Atlanta_Police, and others actively keeping our streets safe tonight.
— Governor Brian P. Kemp (@GovKemp) January 22, 2023
Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr tweeted calling those involved “rioters.” Carr told Channel 2′s Mark Winne earlier this week he is working on a sweeping indictment to charge these protesters with domestic terrorism.
Atlanta police released the following statement to Channel 2 Action News:
“The Atlanta Police Department is aware of the ongoing events, and we will continue to monitor them and address accordingly. We stand ready to respond to demonstrations to ensure the safety of those in our communities and those exercising their first amendment right, or to address illegal activity, should the need arise.”
At 6:45 p.m., Atlanta police released an update saying:
“Atlanta Police have responded to a group damaging property at several locations along Peachtree St. Several arrests have been made at this time and order has been restored to the downtown space. This is still an active and ongoing investigation and we will not be able to provide specifics on arrests numbers or damaged property, at this time.”
Chief Schierbaum said the FBI, GBI, ATF and Georgia Attorney General’s Office are assisting them in their investigation.
Channel 2 Action News is working to get additional information.
APD car set on fire during violent protest in downtown Atlanta (WSB-TV Viewer)
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Watch the full news conference with Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens and Atlanta Police Chief Darin Schierbaum here.
Atlanta mayor, APD chief provide update on violent protests in downtown Atlanta
Scores of police raided a Lima university on Saturday, smashing down the gates with an armoured vehicle, firing teargas and detaining more than 200 people who had come to the Peruvian capital to take part in anti-government protests.
Images showed dozens of people lying face down on the ground at San Marcos University after the surprise police operation. Students told the Guardian they were pushed, kicked and hit with truncheons as they were forced out of their dormitories.
The police raid on San Marcos University – the oldest in the Americas – is the latest in a series of affronts driving growing calls for President Dina Boluarte to step down after six weeks of unrest that has claimed 60 lives, while leaving at least 580 injured and more than 500 arrested.
The demonstrations began in early December in support of the ousted former president Pedro Castillo but have shifted overwhelmingly to demand Boluarte’s resignation, the closure of Congress and fresh elections. Boluarte was Castillo’s vice-president and replaced him after he attempted to shutter congress and rule by decree on 7 December.
People detained on the University of San Marcos campus in Lima. Photograph: Juan Mandamiento/AFP/Getty Images
Many of those arrested in Saturday’s raid had travelled from southern Peru to the capital to take part in a demonstration last Thursday labelled the “takeover of Lima” which began peacefully but descended into running battles between protesters and riot police amid stone-throwing and swirls of teargas.
In a statement on Twitter, the office of the UN high commissioner for human rights called on the Peruvian authorities to “ensure the legality and proportionality of the [police] intervention and guarantees of due process”. It emphasised the importance of the presence of prosecutors, who were absent for the first hours of the raid.
Students living in halls of residence said they were violently forced out of their rooms by armed police who busted in doors and used shoves and kicks to eject them.
Esteban Godofredo, a 20-year-old political science student, was given medical treatment for injuries to his leg. “He hit me with his stick and he threw me to the ground and started kicking me,” Godofredo told the Guardian as he sat on the grass outside the residence with a heavily bruised, bandaged right calf.
Esteban Godofredo, a student, receives treatment for injuries to his leg. Photograph: Dan Collyns/The Guardian
Videos seen by the Guardian showed confused and terrified students massed outside their halls, some still in pyjamas, as riot police shouted orders and insults. Young men were forced to stand against a wall or kneel in a row.
“They pointed their guns at us, and shouted ‘Out out.’ We didn’t even have time to get our IDs,” said Jenny Fuentes, 20, a student teacher. “They forced us to kneel. Many of the girls were crying but they told us to shut up.”
“They didn’t tell us why we were being forced out of our rooms,” she said. The group of about 90 students, who had remained on campus during the summer holidays to work and study, were then marched to the main patio, a 10-minute walk, where the other people had been detained.
Several hours after the raid, they had not been allowed to return to their rooms which were being searched by police.
Items that Peruvian police said belonged to detained protesters who were staying on the campus of San Marcos University in Lima. Photograph: Dan Collyns/The Guardian
“I have been a student at San Marcos [University] and since the 1980s we have not experienced such an outrage,” Susel Paredes, a congresswoman, told the Guardian as she was prevented from entering the campus by a police cordon.
“The police have entered the university residence, the rooms of the female students who had nothing to do with the demonstrators. They have threatened them and taken them out of their rooms while they were sleeping.”
Paredes said it was a flashback to regular police and armed forces raids on the public university in the 1980s and 90s, when the campus was seen as a hotbed for subversion during the state’s conflict with the Mao-inspired Shining Path rebels.
“We are not in that time, we are supposedly under a democratic government that should respect fundamental rights,” Paredes said.
Amid the demonstrations and with roadblocks paralysing much of the country, Peruvian authorities on Saturday ordered the closure “until further notice” of the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu and the Inca trail that leads to the world heritage archeological site – Peru’s biggest tourist attraction which brings in more than 1 million visitors a year.
ATLANTA — A peaceful protest in downtown Atlanta turned violent Saturday evening when protesters set a police car on fire and started smashing windows.
The protesters are opposed to the construction of an APD training center in a forest in DeKalb County.
Hundreds of protesters gathered at Underground Atlanta before moving down Peachtree St. in the heart of downtown Atlanta.
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Shortly after, some of the protesters dressed in all black began marching down the streets of downtown.
Protesters then turned violent, setting an Atlanta police cruiser on fire and smashing windows of local businesses, including a Wells Fargo bank.
Earlier this week, Georgia State Patrol and other agencies were at the site of the proposed facility clearing protesters who had been camped out in the forest for months.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation says one of the protesters, Manuel Teran, shot a state trooper and was then killed by return fire.
Friends of Teran, who went by the nickname “Tortuguita,” have repeatedly claimed since the shooting that they are peaceful protesters.
RELATED STORIES:
The governor’s office released a statement saying they will not tolerate any unlawful crimes in the name of peaceful protest.
The governor remains well informed of the situation through regular updates from state law enforcement and is actively monitoring the situation. State patrol is well equipped to respond to any and all threats to public safety and is coordinating closely with other state agencies and local PD.
While the state continues to respect peaceful protest, acts of violence against person or property will NOT be tolerated. Those committing such unlawful acts will be arrested and prosecuted fully.
A short time later, Governor Brian Kemp himself tweeted a statement.
Violence and unlawful destruction of property are not acts of protest. They are crimes that will not be tolerated in Georgia and will be prosecuted fully.
Thank you to the hardworking @ga_dps, @GBI_GA, @Atlanta_Police, and others actively keeping our streets safe tonight.
— Governor Brian P. Kemp (@GovKemp) January 22, 2023
Atlanta police released the following statement to Channel 2 Action News:
“The Atlanta Police Department is aware of the ongoing events, and we will continue to monitor them and address accordingly. We stand ready to respond to demonstrations to ensure the safety of those in our communities and those exercising their first amendment right, or to address illegal activity, should the need arise.”
At 6:45 p.m., Atlanta police released an update saying:
“Atlanta Police have responded to a group damaging property at several locations along Peachtree St. Several arrests have been made at this time and order has been restored to the downtown space. This is still an active and ongoing investigation and we will not be able to provide specifics on arrests numbers or damaged property, at this time.”
Channel 2 Action News is working to get additional information.
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IN OTHER NEWS:
GBI confirms dead suspect’s gun fired shot that injured state trooper at APD training facility
Protests in Peru related to the arrest of former President Pedro Castillo have become increasingly violent, leading to many deaths, and show no real signs of abating. Despite the unprecedented political violence and calls for her resignation, Castillo’s successor and former Vice President, President Dina Boluarte, refused on Sunday to step down, saying, “My commitment is with Peru.”
In the just-over a month since the protests began, 49 people, including children and police officers have been killed, the Associated Press reported Friday. Demonstrations are concentrated in Peru’s southern Andean area, particularly in the region of Puno, Peru’s poorest and which has the highest Indigenous concentration, and in the cities of Ayacucho and Arequipa, among others, though they have also occurred in the capital Lima as recently as this week. These are the areas where calls for Boluarte’s resignation are the most resonant,among rural populations who saw in Castillo one of their own — a “son of the soil” — penetrate the elite world of politics in Lima.
However, Castillo came into office inexperienced, unprepared, and unwilling to compromise or make alliances. For that reason his campaign promises of greater prosperity, improved education and healthcare for the rural poorhave largely gone unrealized. Just prior to a third attempt by Peru’s congress to impeach him, Castillo announced an autogolpe, a self-coup, dissolving the government and instituting governance by decree. However, his ignominious tenure ended in his arrest; he’s now in prison on multiple charges including corruption.
Boluarte and Peru’s security forces, meanwhile, have been accused of using excessive force resulting in the deaths and injuries of dozens of protesters.
Castillo squandered an opportunity for change in Lima
Castillo’s win against Keiko Fujimori, the daughter of former President and dictator Alberto Fujimori, represented a dramatic break with decades of right-leaning rule by Lima’s elites in July 2021. But Castillo’s total lack of experience and political infrastructure, among other failings, meant that despite his momentous election, he couldn’t govern.
“The party of Castillo has never been in government, they don’t have the experience, so if you think that Castillo represents the Left in Peru, the Left has never been in power,” Moisés Arce, a professor of Latin American social sciences at Tulane University, told Vox. “So they don’t have professionals, a workforce, that could be capable of creating or producing a good government.”
Castillo ran on a Marxist platform, promising to nationalize the country’s massive mining industry, rewrite the Fujimori-era constitution, and impose higher taxes on the wealthy. Those promises, as well as Castillo’s own identity as a former schoolteacher, union leader, and campesino garnered him support in rural areas and among the Indigenous population, which represents about a quarter of the total population of Peru.
“If there was a moment to create redistribution, greater social programs for the poor, expand healthcare, you name it — it was Castillo,” Arce said, indicating that the conditions for change were there, but Castillo failed to meet the moment due to “a complete lack of preparation.”
The stratification of Peruvian society and politics is noteworthy, and a significant aspect of the current unrest. “Castillo tapped into the grievance” in Peru, Arce said. “Coming out of the pandemic, poverty in Peru increased, a lot of services collapsed, the health system [collapsed] — Castillo kind of emerges out of that grievance.”
Castillo, though incompetent, politically unconnected, ill-equipped, and possibly corrupt, was a powerful symbol for low-income, rural, and Indigenous people who had no previous representation at the highest levels of Peruvian politics. As Arce explained, Castillo didn’t perform particularly well in public opinion polls; he wasn’t well liked, but congress fared even worse.
Protesters who identified with Castillo and who already held serious, legitimate grievances with the Peruvian state and its elite are now engaged in some of the bloodiest protests in Peru’s recent history. They’ve shut down airports, blocked major roads, and clashed violently with police. Meanwhile, Boluarte imposed a state of emergency in December which infringes on Peruvians’ constitutional rights to gather and to move freely within the country.
Right-leaning critics of the protesters have referred to them as terrorists, evoking the deep national trauma of the Shining Path insurgency of the ‘80s and ‘90s. Maoist Shining Path insurgents killed an estimated 31,000 Peruvians, and their actions are still evoked in the Peruvian concept of terruqueo, as Simeon Tegel wrote in the Washington Post Thursday. Terruqueo, or smearing an opponent by falsely accusing them of terrorism, has bubbled up in the recent protests — allegedly with racist overtones due to the backgrounds of the demonstrators, providing a veil of impunity for the use of excessive force.
On Thursday, protesters attempted to take over the airport in the tourist city of Cusco, prompting officials to close the airport near the Macchu Picchu Inca citadel. Protesters in Puno lit a car on fire with a police officer inside, set fire to the home of a member of congress, and stormed the airport there, while police used tear gas and live rounds against the demonstrators, according to the Washington Post.
Some groups like Amnesty International have spoken out against Boluarte’s handling of the protests, singling out the National Police and the Armed Forces for excessive use of force against the protesters, most recently on January 11, after at least 17 protesters were killed in the city of Juliaca in the Puno region. The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has also sent a delegation to Peru on Wednesday to observe the human rights conditions there.
Peru’s attorney general also opened an investigation into Boluarte and other top officials, accusing them of “genocide, qualified homicide and serious injuries,” Agence France-Presse reported Tuesday. Castillo, meanwhile, is pleading his case on Twitter from his jail cell in Barbadillo prison.
Peruvian politics has long been in crisis. That’s unlikely to change.
Peru is no stranger to political upheaval; Alberto Fujimori, a dictator and Peru’s best-known leader, began his tenure as a democratically elected president. He took power in much the way Castillo attempted to back in December. Fujimori led Peru from 1990 until 2000, after which he fled to Japan; he’s currently in prison for human rights abuses committed while he was in power.
Since 2016, no Peruvian president has finished their term, and it’s unlikely that Boluarte will complete the remainder of Castillo’s, which is set to end in 2026. Boluarte has proposed to push elections up to 2024, which the congress agreed to, although protesters demand new elections for both the presidency and the legislature as soon as possible.
Boluarte has also managed to cobble together support from the several small right-wing parties that togetherhold the majority — another point of anger for the protesters who see her as moving toward the right despite being elected as a Leftist. However, the legislature approved her government on Tuesday, a significant vote of confidence despite the unrest.
Ultimately, what happens next is dependent on what is happening in Lima, Arce said. And while the protests are violent, dramatic, and headline-grabbing, they’re concentrated outside the capital. Though according to the Council on Foreign Relations the protesters have the backing of Peru’s largest federation of unions and its largest Indigenous association, it will be difficult to maintain momentum “unless they make alliances in Lima,” Arce said.
In terms of Peru’s political future, the end of Castillo’s presidency also likely means the end of the Left in Peru for now, Arce said. Boluarte’s critics argue, perhaps rightly, that though she was elected on a Leftist ticket, she’s moved to the right since assuming office, and immediately distanced herself from Castillo after his attempted self-coup.
“You can’t really predict things in Peru,” Arce said, “but I think Castillo, in a way, has delegitimized any meaning of what the Left is or what the Left should be.”
A police officer on patrol was attacked and burned to death by protesters in the Peruvian region of Puno, as the death toll from demonstrations in the wake of the ouster of former President Pedro Castillo rose to 47, authorities said Tuesday.
José Luis Soncco Quispe, 29, was on patrol with a fellow officer in Juliaca, a city near the border with Bolivia and Lake Titicaca, on Monday night when they were attacked by a mob that later set fire to their vehicle, according to police reports.
Soncco’s partner in the patrol car, Ronald Villasante Toque, said the men were “detained and physically attacked by some 350 protesters,” according to the reports.
Villasante was taken to a hospital in Lima with multiple head injuries after being beaten. He said he was unaware of what was happening to his partner.
BRAZIL BRACES FOR NEW WAVE OF PRO-BOLSONARO PROTESTS FOLLOWING ATTACK ON CAPITOL
Prime Minister Alberto Otárola confirmed Soncco’s death in a session of Congress, saying the men were attacked by protesters.
Peru’s national police held a memorial for slain Officer José Luis Soncco Quispe, who was burned to death in his patrol car amid violent protests. (Peru Ministerio del Interior)
“Police arrived at the scene and found that one officer had been beaten and tied up, and the other, Luis Soncco Quispe, unfortunately had died,” he said. “He was burned alive in his patrol car.”
Otárola announced a three-day curfew from 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. in Puno, and a day of mourning for the fallen on Wednesday.
A woman cries over a coffin containing the remains of her friend Antonio Samillan who died during the unrest in Juliaca, Peru, Tuesday, Jan. 10, 2023. ( AP Photo/Jose Sotomayor)
Peru’s Interior Ministry shared a video with photos of the fallen officer and a large gathering of national police in uniform chanting in his memory.
Peru’s Ombudsman’s Office said that since the protests began in early December after Castillo’s dismissal, 39 civilians had been killed in clashes with police and another seven others had died in traffic accidents, as well as the fallen police officer.
Residents surround coffins during a vigil for the more than a dozen people who died during the unrest in Juliaca, Peru, Tuesday, Jan. 10, 2023. (AP)
The police officer’s death came after 17 people were killed Monday in Juliaca as protests seeking immediate elections resumed in neglected rural areas of the country still loyal to Castillo.
The unrest began following Castillo’s removal and arrest following a widely condemned attempt to dissolve Congress and head off his own impeachment.
Surrounded by security, Peruvian President Dina Boluarte waves to the press outside the government palace as Prime Minister Alberto Otarola departs in Lima, Peru, Tuesday, Jan. 10, 2023. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia)
Castillo’s successor and former running mate, Dina Boluarte, has supported a plan to push up the 2024 elections for president and congress, which originally scheduled for 2026. She has also expressed support for judicial investigations into whether security forces acted with excessive force.
However, such moves have so far failed to quell the unrest which, after a short respite around the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, have resumed with force in some of Peru’s poorest areas, where support for Castillo’s unorthodox rule had been strongest.
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Castillo, a political novice who lived in a two-story adobe home in the Andean highlands before moving to the presidential palace, eked out a narrow victory in elections in 2021 that rocked Peru’s political establishment and laid bare the deep divisions between residents of the capital, Lima, and the long-neglected countryside.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Danielle Wallace is a reporter for Fox News Digital covering politics, crime, police and more. Story tips can be sent to danielle.wallace@fox.com and on Twitter: @danimwallace.
Australian A-Leagues club Melbourne Victory has said that it is “devastated” and issued a formal apology after its fans forced the abandonment of a clash with local rivals Melbourne City by staging a violent pitch invasion, an incident which Football Australia has promised will lead to “strong sanctions.”
Planning on staging a joint-walkout in the 20th minute to protest league administrators the Australian Professional Leagues (APL) decision to sell hosting rights to the leagues’ men’s and women’s grand finals to Sydney for the next three years, both City and Victory fans began throwing flares onto the AAMI Park playing surface before they made their exits, with one appearing to hit a camera operator for broadcaster Network Ten.
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Fans had already ignited flares and small fireworks throughout the preceding 20 minutes, with City fans hurling a number of projectiles onto the pitch in celebration of Aiden O’Neill’s 11th-minute opener.
The missiles hurled in the 20th minute, however, kick-started a spiralling series of events that saw City goalkeeper Tom Glover, attempting to clear a projectile that had landed near him off the field, throw a flare off the pitch and back into the Victory supporters. This then led to a host of fans storming onto the pitch in scenes reminiscent of the violence between Nice and Marseille in 2021.
As fans converged on his position, Glover was hit in the head by a metal bucket filled with sand designed to extinguish flares hurled in his direction. He was rushed from the pitch by teammates with blood coming from the side of his head.
Referee Alex King also suffered a gash to the head from the thrown bucket, while the game’s referee coach was pushed into the fence. A Football Australia spokesperson described King as being more shaken than hurt, and he and his fellow officials were escorted to their cars by security to exit the stadium.
City officials said that Glover needed stitches and had a suspected concussion after the incident.
In a statement, Victory said that it was devastated by the incident and that it unequivocally condemned the actions of its supporters that invaded the pitch.
“The club would like to formally apologise to Tom Glover, match official, Alex King and the camera operator as well as all players, officials and those who witnessed the appalling behaviour,” it said.
Both sets of players and coaching staffs, as well as the match officials, quickly made their way off the field as the pitch invasion continued; the fans who remained on the surface turning their focus to attacking the sponsor boards and goals before being marshalled off the field by members of Victoria Police’s Public Order Response Team.
After a lengthy delay, the match was abandoned to ensure player safety, the first time that an A-Leagues fixture has been called off for such a reason.
In a statement, Victoria Police said that approximately 150-200 Victory supporters stormed the field, and confirmed the injuries to Glover and King, as well as the injuries suffered by the Network Ten cameraman when he was hit by a flare.
Police said that at this stage no arrests had been made, but investigations were ongoing.
“The Melbourne Victory fans who stormed the pitch, resulting in the assault of a player, a referee and a member of match day broadcast staff, should be subjected to the strongest possible sanctions,” a statement from player’s union Professional Footballers Australia said.
“We acknowledge the courage of players, club staff and referees who came to the aid of each other in circumstances that no one should ever be exposed to.”
Demonstrations against the APL’s decision had already occurred at the A-League Men and A-League Women games that had already taken place across the weekend, but all were of a peaceful nature.
Socceroo goalkeeper Danny Vukovic, who was a member of the squad in Qatar that made it to the World Cup round of 16, said on social media that Australian football was experiencing its “darkest day” in light of the events.
The A-Leagues are run independently from Football Australia, but the national federation remains the game’s regulator and enforced a national code of conduct and referees; meaning that they will lead the investigation into and resulting sanctions from the pitch invasion. Its CEO James Johnson is set to address the media on Sunday morning.
“Such behaviour has no place in Australian Football, with a full Football Australia investigation to commence immediately, where strong sanctions to be handed down,” a statement from the Federation read.
Speaking to ESPN, a Football Australia official confirmed that the organisation would use the “full force” of its regulatory and disciplinary powers regarding the incident and that members of the public had already come forward to assist them and Victoria Police with their investigation.
Football Australia has promised that “strong sanctions” will be handed down after an Australian A-League Men’s Melbourne Derby between Melbourne City and Melbourne Victory was abandoned to ensure player safety after a violent pitch invasion.
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Planning on staging a walkout in the 20th minute to protest league administrators the Australian Professional Leagues’ (APL), both sets of fans began throwing flares onto the AAMI Park playing surface before they made their exits, with one appearing to hit a camera operator for broadcaster Network Ten.
Fans had ignited flares and small fireworks throughout the preceding 20 minutes, with City fans hurling a number of projectiles onto the pitch in celebration of Aiden O’Neill’s 11th-minute opener.
That kickstarted a spiralling series of events that saw City goalkeeper Tom Glover, attempting to clear a projectile that had landed near him off the field, throw a flare off the pitch and back into the Victory supporters, which then led to a host of fans storming onto the pitch in scenes reminiscent of the violence between Nice and Marseille in 2021.
As fans stormed towards his position, Glover was then hit in the head by a metal bucket filled with sand designed to extinguish flares hurled in his direction and was rushed from the pitch with blood coming out of the side of his head.
Referee Alex King also suffered a gash to the head from the thrown bucket, while the game’s referee coach was pushed into the fence.
A Football Australia spokesperson described King as being more shaken than hurt, and he and his fellow officials were escorted to their cars by security to exit the stadium.
City officials said that Glover needed stitches and had a suspected concussion after the incident.
Both sets of players and coaching staffs, as well as the match officials, then quickly made their way off the field, while the fans that remained on the surface turned their focus to attacking the sponsor boards and goals before being marshalled off the field by members of Victoria Police’s Public Order Response Team.
After a lengthy delay, the match was then abandoned to ensure player safety, the first time that an A-Leagues fixture has been called off for such a reason.
The planned protests had been in response to APL’s decision to sell hosting rights to its next three grand finals to Sydney as part of a partnership with Destination NSW.
Demonstrations had already occurred at the A-League Men and A-League Women games that had already taken place that weekend, but all were of a peaceful nature.
“The A-League Men fixture between Melbourne City FC and Melbourne Victory at AAMI Park has been abandoned as a result of the pitch invasion by Melbourne Victory fans, and the subsequent injuries to Melbourne City FC goalkeeper Tom Glover and the match official Alex King,” an A-Leagues statement said.
“The Australian Professional League (APL) is coordinating with Football Australia regarding the ramifications of these events.”
The Australian A-Leagues are run independently from Football Australia, but the national federation remains the game’s regulator and enforces a national code of conduct.
“Following shocking scenes during the first half of the A-League Men’s match between Melbourne Victory FC and Melbourne City FC at AAMI Park on Saturday 17 December, where fans from the Melbourne Victory FC end entered the field of play, Football Australia match officials have abandoned the match in accordance with Law 5.3 of the Laws of the Game in order to protect the integrity of the match,” Football Australia said in a statement.
“Such behaviour has no place in Australian Football, with a full Football Australia investigation to commence immediately, where strong sanctions to be handed down.”
BERLIN, Dec 7 (Reuters) – Germany on Wednesday detained 25 members and supporters of a far-right group that prosecutors said were preparing a violent overthrow of the state, with some members suspected of plotting an armed attack on the parliament.
Prosecutors said the group was inspired by the deep state conspiracy theories of QAnon and the Reichsbuerger, who do not recognise the legitimacy of modern Germany, insisting the far larger “Deutsche Reich” still existed despite the Nazis’ defeat in World War Two.
The plot envisaged a former member of a German royal family, identified as Heinrich XIII P. R. under Germany’s privacy law, as the leader in a future state while another suspect, Ruediger v. P., was the head of the military arm, the prosecutors’ office said.
It said Heinrich, who uses the title prince and comes from the royal House of Reuss, which had ruled over parts of eastern Germany, had reached out to representatives of Russia, whom the group saw as its central contact for establishing its new order. It said there was no evidence the representatives had reacted positively to the request.
Russia’s embassy in Germany was quoted by RIA news agency as saying Russian diplomatic and consular institutions in Germany do not maintain contacts with representatives of terrorist groups and other illegal groups.
German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said the government would respond with the full force of the law against such endeavours against the state and said further investigations would reveal how far the group’s coup plans had progressed.
“The investigations provide a glimpse into the abyss of a terrorist threat from the Reichsbuerger milieu,” said Faeser in a statement, adding that the constitutional state knew how to defend itself against “the enemies of democracy”.
One active soldier and several reservists were also among those being investigated, a spokesperson for the military intelligence service told Reuters. The active soldier is a member of the Bundeswehr’s KSK elite force, which has been overhauled in recent years due to a number of far-right incidents.
Investigators suspect individual members of the group had concrete plans to storm the Bundestag lower house of parliament in Berlin with a small armed group, the prosecutor’s office said.
In August 2020, protesters stormed the steps of Germany’s Reichstag parliament building, some of them holding far-right flags, during mass marches against coronavirus curbs.
Germany’s domestic intelligence agency attributes some 21,000 people to the Reichsbuerger (Citizens of the Reich) movement, with around 5% of them seen as far-right extremists.
Some 2,100 Reichsbuerger are prepared to use violence to reach their goals, according to the 2021 annual report of the agency.
HOUSE OF REUSS
The House of Reuss had previously distanced itself from Heinrich, calling him a confused man who pursued conspiracy theories, according to local media. The house did not immediately respond to request for comment.
In a speech in 2019 denouncing modern political structures, Heinrich Reuss said his family dynasty could be traced back to 900 AD. He said that in the former principality of Reuss, people led “happy lives” because the administrative structures were “straightforward and transparent”.
“If things didn’t work well you just went to the prince,” he said. “Who are you supposed to turn to today?”
Germany had been a vassal state since World War Two, he said, governed by the Western allies.
Germany’s monarchy was abolished a century ago. When the Weimar Constitution entered into force on Aug. 14, 1919, the legal privileges and titles of German nobility were abolished. Therefore, officially, there are no princes and princesses in Germany.
Prosecutors said the raids were conducted by more than 3,000 police officials and security forces across 11 German federal states. Suspects were arrested in the German states of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bavaria, Berlin, Hesse, Lower Saxony, Saxony, Thuringia as well as in Austria and Italy, said the office.
The suspects are accused of preparing, since the end of November 2021 at the latest, to carry out actions based on their ideology, according to the office. These actions include procuring equipment, recruiting new members and holding shooting lessons, it added.
The focus of the recruitment efforts were primarily members of the military and police officers, the office said.
The group was aware its plan would involve deaths, the office said, adding that its members considered this scenario to be a “necessary intermediate step” towards overarching system change.
The military intelligence service said it had worked with the prosecutors on their investigation and shared information with the domestic intelligence service and federal criminal investigators in the run up to Wednesday’s raids.
The detained suspects will appear before a judge at the Federal Court of Justice on Wednesday and Thursday who will issue the arrest warrants and decide on their pre-trial detention.
Reporting by Sabine Siebold, Sarah Marsh and Kirsti Knolle; Additional reporting by Dmitry Antonov; Writing by Miranda Murray and Rachel More; Editing by Paul Carrel and Alison Williams
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
The colorful, wispy remains of a star’s violent death glow like fireworks in a spectacular image captured by NASA’s venerable space telescope.
Located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, the debris forms delicate sheets and intricate filaments of orange and blue. The stunning strands in the Hubble Space Telescope image are the remnants of a supernova, a powerful explosion triggered when a massive star reaches the end of its life.
Called DEM L 19 or LMC N49, the stellar remains are located around 160,000 light-years from Earth, in the constellation Dorado, and represent the brightest supernova remnant within the Large Magellanic Cloud, Hubble scientists wrote in a statement.
Related:Dazzling imagery of supernova remnant holds clues about star’s death (video)
The colorful strands of gas glowing in orange and blue are the remains of a supernova triggered when a massive star reached the end of its life. (Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, S. Kulkarni, Y. Chu)
The light from this explosion would have washed over Earth thousands of years ago, and the sheets and fine ropes of material that the supernova left behind will eventually become the building blocks of the next generation of stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud.
The 75-light-year-wide supernova debris cloud wasn’t all the blast left behind, however. Scientists believe that this glowing cloud of material hides a rapidly spinning neutron star created when the core of the exploding massive star collapsed under the tremendous inward pressure of its own gravity.
This neutron star’s mass is around that of the sun or greater, but it’s condensed into the area of a city; it’s so dense, in fact, that a teaspoon of the material within the neutron star would weigh 4 billion tons (3.6 billion metric tons). The ultradense stellar object is spinning once every 8 seconds, and its magnetic field is around a quadrillion times stronger than Earth’s magnetosphere.
Astronomers discovered this neutron star in 1979, when it blasted out a dramatic, high-energy gamma-ray burst. Since then, it has emitted several more gamma-ray bursts, meaning it is now classified as a “soft gamma-ray repeater.” Rapidly spinning neutron stars with strong magnetic fields blasting out radiation such as this one are also known as pulsars.
The new image was created using data from two separate investigations of DEM L 19, one of which involved the Hubble Space Telescope’s now-retired Wide Field Planetary Camera 2. The aim of this first investigation was to study how supernova remnants interact with the interstellar medium — the tenuous dust between stars — in the Large Magellanic Cloud. In particular, the team wanted to know how small clouds of gas and dust cause the supernova remnant to evolve and change its structure.
The aim of the second investigation was to study the gamma-ray repeater hidden within the cloud.
This isn’t the first time that a stunning image of DEM L 190 has been presented to the public. In 2003, scientists released a Hubble image showing the supernova remnant as puffs of smoke and sparks.
The new image improves on the previous image by incorporating additional data and by taking advantage of advanced image processing techniques, leading to an even more eye-catching photo.