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      Weinstein Juror Complains to Judge About ‘Playground Stuff’ by Others

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      A member of the jury at Harvey Weinstein’s Manhattan retrial on sex crime charges said that another had become the subject of a “bit of a shunning” during deliberations.As the Manhattan jurors deciding Harvey Weinstein’s fate were about to begin their second day of deliberations on Friday, a note was delivered to the judge. One of the 12 had a concern.The juror, a young man, was summoned to the courtroom. He sat in the jury box and began to vent his frustrations.He wanted to “report what I heard and saw yesterday,” he told Justice Curtis Farber of State Supreme Court, who is overseeing the trial. The man said he had overheard others on the jury — in an elevator and outside the courthouse on Thursday — talking about another member of the group. What he had observed, he believed, amounted to misconduct.Justice Farber thanked the man and sent him back to the jury room. The judge then denied a motion by Mr. Weinstein’s lawyers for a mistrial, saying it did not appear that the discussions cited by the juror involved actual trial evidence.“Notably,” the judge said, “whoever was the topic of conversation has not reported it to the court.”The surprising episode provided a rare peek into the friction that can develop among jurors in a high-stakes trial, disagreements that generally remain behind closed doors. It also seemed, at least briefly, as though it might derail the disgraced film mogul’s second New York trial on sex crime charges, and create another twist in the long-running case.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Return of Abrego Garcia Raises Questions About Trump’s Views of Justice

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      For the nearly three months before the Justice Department secured an indictment against the man, it had repeatedly flouted a series of court orders to “facilitate” his release from El Salvador.When Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on Friday that Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia had been returned to the United States to face criminal charges after being wrongfully deported to a prison in El Salvador, she sought to portray the move as the White House dutifully upholding the rule of law.“This,” she said, “is what American justice looks like.”Her assertion, however, failed to grapple with the fact that for the nearly three months before the Justice Department secured an indictment against Mr. Abrego Garcia, it had repeatedly flouted a series of court orders — including one from the Supreme Court — to “facilitate” his release.While the indictment filed against Mr. Abrego Garcia contained serious allegations, accusing him of taking part in a conspiracy to smuggle undocumented immigrants as a member of the street gang MS-13, it had no bearing on the issues that have sat at the heart of the case since his summary expulsion in March.Those were whether Mr. Abrego Garcia had received due process when he was plucked off the streets without a warrant and expelled days later to a prison in El Salvador, in what even Trump officials have repeatedly admitted was an error. And, moreover, whether administration officials should be held in contempt for repeatedly stonewalling a judge’s effort to get to the bottom of their actions.Well before Mr. Abrego Garcia’s family filed a lawsuit seeking to force the White House to release him from El Salvador, administration officials had tried all means at their disposal to keep him overseas as they figured out a solution to the problem they had created, The New York Times found in a recent investigation.Cesar Ábrego García, left, and Cecilia García, center, the brother and mother of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, participated in a press conference with Senator Chris Van Hollen, Democrat of Maryland, following his trip to El Salvador.Allison Bailey for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Signs Executive Orders Intended to Jolt U.S. Drone Manufacturing

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      President Trump also eased restrictions on commercial drone flights and called for the revival of supersonic flights for nonmilitary aircraft.President Trump on Friday signed executive orders aimed at bolstering the U.S. drone industry, cracking down on unauthorized, unmanned flights and countering threats to national security and public safety.The orders sought to expand opportunities for commercial and recreational drone use, and tighten restrictions to address security threats. American officials have been concerned about foreign adversaries using drones to spy on sensitive areas, including military installations, and about China’s dominance of the drone market, which they see as a national security threat.“Building a strong and secure domestic drone sector is vital to reducing reliance on foreign sources, strengthening critical supply chains and ensuring that the benefits of this technology are delivered to the American people,” one of the orders said.Mr. Trump’s drone orders were part of a broader federal push into airborne technology. A third order he signed on Friday sought to revive high-speed commercial air travel, by repealing regulations prohibiting cross-country supersonic flights, which for decades have precluded nonmilitary air travel over land at faster-than-sound speeds.Democratic and Republican administrations, as well as Congress, have grappled in recent years with the risks posed by Beijing’s role in drone manufacturing. The United States has struggled to develop alternatives at a scale necessary to wean drone operators, including the U.S. military, completely off Chinese components.At the same time, the growing popularity of both commercial and recreational drones, and an increase in incidents of drones flying over sensitive sites, have heightened demand for regulations.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      ‘Devil in the Ozarks’ Escapee Is Caught Near Arkansas Prison

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      Grant Hardin, who came to be known as the “Devil in the Ozarks,” was captured on Friday, nearly two weeks after his May 25 escape from a high-security prison.A former Arkansas police chief and convicted murderer known as the “Devil in the Ozarks” was captured on Friday, less than two miles from a high-security prison from which he escaped on May 25, the authorities said.The fugitive, Grant Hardin, was caught about 3:45 p.m. not far from the Calico Rock North Central Unit, ending an intense manhunt that began nearly two weeks ago when he slipped out of the prison dressed in a fake law enforcement uniform.Mr. Hardin, 56, who had previously served as the police chief in Gateway, Ark., for a short time, disappeared about 15 to 20 minutes before an inmate count.Grant Hardin worked in several law enforcement positions before he was convicted of rape and murder. Arkansas Department of CorrectionsOfficials had described Mr. Hardin, who was serving a decades-long sentence for first-degree murder and rape, as extremely dangerous.In 2017, he was arrested in connection with the shooting death of James Appleton just outside Gateway, where Mr. Appleton had worked in the water department.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      What to Know About the Effects of Ketamine

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      Elon Musk has said that he used ketamine as a treatment in the past, but he denied reports that he was taking it frequently and recreationally.News reports detailing Elon Musk’s drug use have prompted renewed attention to ketamine, a powerful anesthetic that has become increasingly popular as a therapy for treatment-resistant depression and other mental health issues.Although Mr. Musk has acknowledged using ketamine in the past to treat depression, he has denied suggestions that he is currently using ketamine — or any other drug.“I am NOT taking drugs!” he wrote last week in a social media post following the publication of an article in The New York Times that described reports of his use of drugs on the campaign trail last year. Those drugs included ketamine and other psychedelic compounds, among them MDMA and psilocybin mushrooms.Mr. Musk left the White House last week. Since then, he and President Trump have traded barbs on social media over the president’s domestic policy bill and have mentioned government contracts with Mr. Musk’s companies and Mr. Musk’s relationship to the White House.Mr. Trump, who was briefed on the article in The Times, has been telling associates in the last day or so that Musk’s “crazy” behavior is linked to his drug use, according to a Times report citing two people with knowledge of Mr. Trump’s private conversations. But later on Friday, Mr. Trump told reporters he did not want to comment on Mr. Musk’s drug use.The very public feud between the two men has once again drawn unflattering attention to ketamine, a drug that has become increasingly available at legal clinics across the country. It is also used recreationally and can be dangerous when misused.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Jillian Sackler, Philanthropist Who Defended Husband’s Legacy, Dies at 84

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      Though the Sackler name was tarnished over Purdue Pharma’s role in the opioid crisis, Arthur Sackler’s should not be, she insisted; a company founder, he died well before the trouble began.Jillian Sackler, an arts philanthropist who struggled to preserve the reputation of her husband, Arthur, by distinguishing him from his two younger Sackler brothers and their descendants, whose aggressive marketing and false advertising on behalf of their pharmaceutical company, Purdue Pharma, triggered the opioid epidemic, died on May 20 in Manhattan. She was 84.Her death, in a hospital, was from esophageal cancer, said Miguel Benavides, her health proxy.Dr. Arthur Sackler, a psychiatrist and researcher who became a pioneer in medical marketing, bought Purdue Frederick, originally based in New York City, in the 1950s and gave each of his brothers a one-third share. They incorporated the company as Purdue Pharma in 1991. (Its headquarters are now in Stamford, Conn.)Dr. Sackler died in 1987 — nine years before the opioid OxyContin was marketed by the company as a powerful painkiller. Shortly after his death, his estate sold his share of the company to his billionaire brothers, Raymond and Mortimer, for $22.4 million.The company’s misleading advertising claim that OxyContin was nonaddictive prompted doctors to overprescribe it beginning in the 1990s. The proliferation of the medication ruined countless lives of people who became dependent on it.Ms. Sackler in 2012. She spent decades defending her husband, who died nine years before the opioid crisis.Fairchild Archive/Penske Media, via Getty ImagesIn 2021, the company proposed a bankruptcy settlement in which members of the Sackler family agreed to pay $4.2 billion over nine years to resolve civil claims related to the opioid crisis. In return, they sought immunity from future lawsuits.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Has Options to Punish Musk Even if His Federal Contracts Continue

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      The president could tighten federal oversight of the tech titan’s businesses, even if heavy reliance by the Pentagon and NASA on them makes terminating Mr. Musk’s contracts less feasible.After the relationship between President Trump and Elon Musk exploded into warfare Thursday, Mr. Trump suggested that he might eliminate the tech titan’s federal contracts.“The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it,” Mr. Trump posted on his social media platform.That’s not as easy as Mr. Trump implies. The Pentagon and NASA remain intensely reliant on SpaceX, Mr. Musk’s rocket launch and space-based communications company, to get to orbit and move government data across the world.But there are options available to the president that could make Mr. Musk’s relationship with the federal government much more difficult than it has been so far in Mr. Trump’s second administration.Mr. Trump’s most accessible weapon to punish Mr. Musk is the ability to instruct federal regulators to intensify oversight of his business operations, reversing a slowdown in regulatory actions that benefited Mr. Musk’s businesses after Mr. Trump was elected.“In an administration that has defined itself by reducing regulation and oversight, it would not be difficult to selectively ramp up oversight again,” said Steven L. Schooner, a former White House contracts lawyer who is now a professor at George Washington University.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Coal and Gas Plants Kept Open Under Trump’s Energy Emergency

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      The grid operators that draw power from the plants said they never asked for them to remain open, and consumers may have to absorb extra costs.A 63-year-old coal-fired power plant was scheduled to permanently close its doors in Michigan on June 1. So was an oil- and gas-powered plant that was built in the 1960s in Pennsylvania.But at the last minute, the Trump administration ordered both to stay open. The orders came as it pursues a far-reaching plan to boost fossil fuels, including coal, by declaring a national “energy emergency.”The grid operators in Michigan and Pennsylvania said they hadn’t asked for the orders and hadn’t planned on using the plants this summer.The costs to keep the plants open, which could total tens of millions of dollars, are expected to fall on consumers. Experts have said there’s little evidence of a national energy emergency, and 15 states have sued to challenge President Trump’s declaration, which was issued the day he took office.The emergency orders, which came last month, surprised the companies that operate the plants, and they are now scrambling to delay some workers’ retirements and reverse nearly complete plans to shutter their facilities. In Michigan, the plant operator raced to buy enough coal to power operations.The episode marks a highly unusual use of the Energy Department’s emergency powers under the Federal Power Act. In the past, the department has typically issued emergency orders at the request of regional grid operators to stabilize the power supply during extreme weather events and blackouts. More