National coverage

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Wauwatosa, Wisconsin

A 15-year-old boy faces multiple charges in a shooting at a Wisconsin mall which left eight people injured, and he has been ordered held in secure juvenile detention rather than being released to his parents, the Associated Press reported.

Court Commissioner J.C. Moore Tuesday denied a defense request to allow the teen to be released to house arrest with GPS monitoring, claiming Friday’s shooting at the Mayfair Mall in the Milwaukee suburb of Wauwatosa was “an incredibly dangerous series of events.” No one was killed in the shooting, according to AP.

In a petition for juvenile delinquency, the teen faces eight felony counts of firstdegree reckless injury, and one misdemeanor count of possessing a firearm while under 18. His attorney, Assistant Public Defender Paul Rifelj, said the petition contains “a small sliver, the smallest iota or fraction” of the evidence, AP reported.

The teen was arrested Sunday in a car with Illinois plates, with a packed bag and the handgun police said was used in the shooting. Police said two others also were arrested but have not described their roles in the shooting. A plea date has been set for December 3, according to AP.

Sacramento, California

California’s system for paying unemployment benefits is so dysfunctional the state approved more than $140 million for at least 20,000 prisoners, detailing a scheme which resulted in claims filed in the names of well-known convicted murderers like Scott Peterson and Cary Stayner, the Associated Press reported.

From March to August, more than 35,000 inmates were named in claims filed with the California Employment Development Department, with more than 20,000 being paid. At least 158 claims were filed for 133 deathrow inmates, resulting in more than $420,000 in benefits paid, according to AP.

Prosecutors said they learned of the scheme from listening in on recorded prison phone calls, where inmates would talk about how easy it was for everyone to get paid. They said the scheme always involved someone on the outside, usually friends of family members of the inmates, who would then receive the benefits, AP reported.

In Kern County, home to five state prisons, one address was used to receive benefits for 15 inmates. In some cases, inmates used their real names. In others, they used fake names and even fake Social Security numbers. In one instance, an inmate used the name “poopy britches.” So far, 22 people have been charged in San Mateo County, including six who are not in prison. Prosecutors said dozens of other investigations across the state are continuing, according to AP.

Nationwide

Purdue Pharma pleaded guilty Tuesday to three criminal charges, formally taking responsibility for its part in an opioid epidemic which has contributed to hundreds of thousands of deaths but also angering critics who want to see individuals kept accountable, in addition to the company, the Associated Press reported.

In a virtual hearing with a federal judge in Newark, New Jersey, the OxyContin maker admitted impeding the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s efforts to combat the addition crisis. Purdue acknowledged it had not maintained an effective program to prevent prescription drugs from being diverted to the black market, even though it had told the DEA it did have such a program, and it provided misleading information to the agency as a way to boost company manufacturing quotas, according to AP.

Also it admitted to paying doctors through a speakers program to induce them to write more prescriptions for tis painkillers.

Also it admitted paying an electronic medical records company to send doctors information on patients which encouraged them to prescribe opioids. The guilty pleas were entered by Purdue board chairperson Steve Miller on behalf of the company, AP reported.

The deal includes $8.3 billion in penalties and forfeitures, but he company is on the hook for a direct payment to the federal government of only a fraction of that, $225 million. It would pay the smaller amount as long as its executes a settlement moving through federal bankruptcy court with state and local governments and other entities suing it regarding the toll of the opioid epidemic, according to AP.

LaSalle, Illinois

State officials have launched investigations into a COVID-19 outbreak at a veteran’s nursing home in Illinois which has infection nearly 200 residents and staff members and killed 27 veterans, the Associated Press reported.

New outlets reported Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s office and the state’s Department of Veteran’s Affairs are attempting to determine what caused the outbreak at the state-run LaSalle Veteran’s Home. The department Tuesday requested an independent probe into the facility, which was the focus of a state senate committee virtual hearing on the outbreak, according to AP.

The current outbreak was identified in late October when a staff member and a resident tested positive for the virus. The home largely was not impacted by the pandemic until then. In fact, twothirds of residents and employees tested positive since the beginning of this month, AP reported.

State officials have increased staff testing at the facility, and the governor said an infection control team was sent to the home. As of Tuesday morning, 40 residents and 24 staff members were positive for the virus. There currently are 101 residents at the home, according to AP.

Salt Lake City

Deep in the Mars-like landscape of Utah’s red-rock desert lies a mystery: a gleaming metal monolith in one of the most remote parts of the state, the Associated Press reported.

The smooth, tall structure was found during a helicopter survey of bighorn sheep in Southeastern Utah. A crew from the Utah Department of Public Safety and Division of Wildlife Resources spotted the gleaming object from the air November 18 and landed to check it out during a break from their work, according to AP.

They found the three-sided stainless-steal object is about as tall as two men put together. But they have discovered no clues about who might have driven it into the ground among the undulating red rocks or why, AP reported.

The exact location is so remote officials are not revealing it publicly, worried people might get lost or stranded trying to find it and need to be rescued. The monolith evokes the one which appears in the Stanley Kubrick movie “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Bureau of Land Management officials are investigating how long it’s been there, who might have created it and whether to remove it, according to AP.