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      Teacher Secretly Sold His Students’ Art on Mugs and Shirts, Lawsuit Says

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      Parents of a dozen students at a school near Montreal accused an art teacher in a lawsuit of reproducing portraits from a class assignment and putting them on items that he offered for sale online.In January, students at a junior high school outside Montreal received an assignment to draw a classmate or a self-portrait in the style of Jean-Michel Basquiat.“The challenge is to make an original artwork in Basquiat’s style; not to copy one of his images,” the teacher, Mario Perron, wrote to his students on the junior campus at Westwood High School in St.-Lazare, Quebec. “I am very familiar with Basquiat’s work and will return copied work, because it is considered plagiarism.”The assignment was titled “Creepy Portrait.”Basquiat was a worthy subject: He was the influential Brooklyn-born artist of Haitian and Puerto Rican descent who was known for a brief career in which he innovated with graffiti and other types of improvisational pieces. He died at 27 in 1988.But parents of some students who completed the assignment were shocked to find that Mr. Perron had copied the portraits and was offering mugs, cushions, bags, apparel and other items for sale online bearing reproductions of the artwork, according to a class-action lawsuit filed last week in Quebec Superior Court.Joel DeBellefeuille, who learned what was happening from his 13-year-old son, Jax, accused Mr. Perron in an interview of perpetrating a “premeditated” scheme. A portrait of Jax by one of his classmates was among the student artwork being offered for sale, he said. “I freaked out,” Mr. DeBellefeuille said. “I was full of emotions. Still now, it’s really unbelievable.”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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      It’s a Golden Age for Shipwreck Discoveries. Why?

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      More lost shipwrecks are being found because of new technology, climate change and more vessels scanning the ocean floor for science or commerce.Some were fabled vessels that have fascinated people for generations, like Endurance, Ernest Shackleton’s ship that sank in the Antarctic in 1915. Some were common workhorses that faded into the depths, like the Ironton, a barge that was carrying 1,000 tons of grain when it sank in Lake Huron in 1894.No matter their place in history, more shipwrecks are being found these days than ever before, according to those who work in the rarefied world of deep-sea exploration.“More are being found, and I also think more people are paying attention,” said James P. Delgado, an underwater archaeologist based in Washington, D.C. He added: “We’re in a transitional phase where the true period of deep-sea and ocean exploration in general is truly beginning.”So what’s behind the increase?Experts point to a number of factors. Technology, they say, has made it easier and less expensive to scan the ocean floor, opening up the hunt to amateurs and professionals alike. More people are surveying the ocean for research and commercial ventures. Shipwreck hunters are also looking for wrecks for their historical value, rather than for sunken treasure. And climate change has intensified storms and beach erosion, exposing shipwrecks in shallow water.Underwater robots and new imaging are helping.Experts agreed that new technology has revolutionized deep-sea exploration.Free-swimming robots, known as autonomous underwater vehicles, are much more commonplace than they were 20 years ago, and can scan large tracts of the ocean floor without having to be tethered to a research vessel, according to J. Carl Hartsfield, the director and senior program manager of the Oceanographic Systems Laboratory at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts.Remotely operated vehicles can travel 25 miles under the ice sheet in polar regions, he said. And satellite imagery can detect shipwrecks from plumes of sediment moving around them that are visible from space.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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      Iowa Passes Bill to Make Returning After Deportation a State Crime

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      Iowa lawmakers passed a bill on Tuesday that would make it a crime to enter the state after being deported or denied entry into the United States. The passage puts the Midwestern state on track to join Texas in enforcing immigration outside the federal system.The Iowa bill, which passed on the same day that the Supreme Court allowed Texas to enforce a new law empowering police officers to arrest unauthorized migrants, now goes to the desk of Gov. Kim Reynolds, a Republican, who said she planned to sign it.“President Biden and his administration have failed to enforce our immigration laws and, in doing so, have compromised the sovereignty of our nation and the safety of its people,” Ms. Reynolds said Tuesday evening in a statement. “States have stepped in to secure the border, preventing illegal migrants from entering our country and protecting our citizens.”Iowa Democrats, who have lost power over the last decade and are vastly outnumbered in the Legislature, mostly opposed the legislation but were powerless to stop it.“This bill is a political stunt and a false promise that doesn’t contain the needed resources,” State Senator Janice Weiner, a Democrat from the Iowa City area, said when her chamber debated the measure. “It’s a gotcha bill.”The bill would make it a misdemeanor for someone to enter Iowa if they were previously deported, denied entry to the United States or had left the country while facing a deportation order. In some cases, including if the person had certain prior convictions, the state crime would become a felony. Iowa police officers would not be allowed to make arrests under this legislation at schools, places of worship or health care facilities.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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      Bones Found on Prince Edward Island Beach Are Likely From a Shipwreck, but Which One?

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      Human remains found last month in an area of Prince Edward Island that was perilous for ships were most likely buried after a shipwreck in the 1800s, experts say.Human bones were found protruding from the side of an eroding cliff on Prince Edward Island in Canada late last month.But it wasn’t a crime scene. The remains, discovered by a resident who was out for a walk along the province’s western coast, were most likely from a shipwreck that occurred roughly 150 years ago.It is also possible that the bones had been previously found and reburied, said Scott Ferris, a spokesman for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Prince Edward Island. Hurricane Fiona, he added, caused erosion and damage to the island in 2022, raising the possibility that more such remains could be found.The authorities came to the conclusion that the bones were most likely from a shipwreck largely by speaking with locals familiar with the island’s history and by reviewing historical accounts, said Cpl. Gavin Moore, another spokesman for the R.C.M.P. in Prince Edward Island.While an investigation is ongoing, Corporal Moore said it was unlikely that the bones were connected to any recent events.But if local experts agree that a shipwreck is the most likely scenario, it raises a question: Which one?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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      Canadian Is Sentenced to 14 Years for Passing Along State Secrets

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      Cameron Ortis was convicted of passing state secrets to men under police investigation, but his motives remain unknown. He said it was all part of an international mission he could not disclose.A former civilian director of an elite intelligence unit in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police was sentenced to 14 years in prison on Wednesday after his conviction last year of giving confidential operational information to four men who were targets of police investigations.The sentence is half of what prosecutors had sought for the intelligence official, Cameron Ortis, whose motive, they acknowledged, remains unknown and who, they agreed, had been highly respected as the director general of the national intelligence coordination unit in Canada’s national police force.Mr. Ortis will get credit for the six and a half years he had spent in jail while awaiting trial and following his conviction in November.The case was the first time that charges under Canada’s 1985 Security of Information Act had been brought to trial. The act’s provisions meant that Mr. Ortis was “permanently bound to secrecy,” therefore his testimony was conducted in secret with only censored transcripts made public. Other evidence has been kept secret.Mr. Ortis repeatedly declared his innocence and testified that his actions had been part of a top-secret, international mission he had embarked on during a leave of absence in 2015 — to study French — and that the mission had been brought to him by someone at “a foreign agency.”He testified that binding promises he had made in taking on the operation prevented him from naming that person, identifying where he or she worked or telling the court what threat to Canada had prompted him to take on the task.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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      Canada Delays Plan to Offer Medically Assisted Death to the Mentally Ill

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      A parliamentary panel concluded that there are not enough doctors, particularly psychiatrists, in the country to properly assess patients.Canada is postponing a plan to offer people suffering from mental illnesses the option of a medically assisted death, two cabinet ministers said on Monday.The announcement by Mark Holland, the health minister, and Arif Virani, the justice minister, came after a special parliamentary committee looking into the plan concluded that there are not enough doctors, particularly psychiatrists, in the country to assess patients with mental illnesses who want to end their lives and to help them do so.“The system needs to be ready, and we need to get it right,” Mr. Holland told reporters. “It’s clear from the conversations we’ve had that the system is not ready, and we need more time.”Neither minister offered any timeline for the latest extension. Following an earlier delay, the expansion had been scheduled to come into effect on March 17.Canada already offers medically assisted death to terminally and chronically ill people, but the plan to extend the program to people with mental illnesses has divided Canadians.Some critics say the plan is a consequence of the inability of Canada’s public health care system to offer adequate psychiatric care, which is chronically underfunded and facing demand that outstrips its availability.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?  More

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      More Atmospheric Rivers Are on the Way. Here’s What the West Can Expect.

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      A sequence of atmospheric rivers will bring heavy rainfall and snow to the Western U.S. and Canada over the next week.The Western United States and Canada are likely to see excessive rain and heavy snowfall from a sequence of back-to-back atmospheric rivers beginning this weekend and continuing into next week.An atmospheric river is like a powerful fire hose with only one person holding it. It often has a narrow path of the heaviest and strongest precipitation. It can be challenging to pinpoint where the heaviest stream of water will fall. It could be strong in the San Francisco Bay Area, and little might fall in Southern California, or vice versa.This early in the forecast, meteorologists are certain that the weather pattern is set up for a series of atmospheric river events — in some locations likely reaching a three or a four on the Atmospheric River five-point scale developed by the SCRIPPS Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego — along the West Coast. But they are less certain where the heaviest precipitation will fall, especially later in the week. There are at least three atmospheric rivers over the next week, and an additional one beyond that. More

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      A Sharp Warning About Donald Trump

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      More from our inbox:About Taylor SwiftLess Polluting TrucksUnity in Canadian Hockey Illustration by Rebecca Chew/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “This Election Year Is Unlike Any Other” (editorial, Jan. 7):The editorial board deserves a monumental “thank you!” for spelling out in such detail how uniquely dangerous Donald Trump is. There was no misguided nod to both-sides-ism here. This was the full-throated condemnation of Donald Trump that the facts demand. The actions that Mr. Trump is openly pledging to carry out would create political and social disaster.Therefore, the editorial board needs to repeat this unvarnished message regularly, matching Mr. Trump’s constant repetition of his lies and provocations to violence.The editorial board must also include in future condemnations that the country cannot afford four years of climate inaction. Mr. Trump would give the fossil fuel industry a free hand and totally squander four years that are crucial to accelerate reductions in air pollution and carbon emissions, and create clean energy infrastructure across the nation.The horrendous results of a complete standstill in climate action that a Trump presidency guarantees are too horrific to imagine.Gary StewartLaguna Beach, Calif.To the Editor:Dire warnings about a second Trump term from The New York Times and other media outlets are being ignored at best and fueling the MAGA movement’s hunger to “own the libs” at worst.Many Americans are unfortunately tuned out and exhausted from politics thanks to Donald Trump’s wearing us down to a nub. The constant noise and slow-motion boil of disorder have left much of our nation cynically apathetic to the danger on the horizon.Whether this was by Mr. Trump’s design or just dumb luck is anyone’s guess. But this mix of chaos and civic ennui is his best ally.I predict that Mr. Trump will win and we all will be thrust back into the anarchy of his first term, but worse, as your paper warns.Miles KahnQueensTo the Editor:It’s time to move from opinion to action. It is not inevitable that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee. We can all help to deny him the nomination by voting for whoever is polling most strongly against Mr. Trump at the time of the Republican primary.In New York, if you are not already a registered Republican, you can change your party affiliation easily.If you live elsewhere, the website PrimaryPivot has links to every state’s requirements. Some states allow any registered voter to cast a ballot in the Republican primary; others allow both Republicans and independents.We can certainly stop Mr. Trump in his tracks. Let’s do it.Helene PresskreischerNeedham, Mass.To the Editor:The no-holds-barred opinion pieces in your Jan. 7 paper — the editorial “This Election Year Is Unlike Any Other” and Maureen Dowd’s column, “Time to Conquer Hell” — acutely explicate Donald Trump’s flawed character and the potential dangers that would descend on the world if, God forbid, he is elected again to the presidency.The fact that after all the years we have endured his despicable public behavior and utterances there are still millions of Americans today who consider him appealing and fit for office, necessitating the publication of such opinion pieces, is mind-boggling and painfully demoralizing.Jim BellisKfar Vradim, IsraelAbout Taylor SwiftDuring the Eras Tour, Ms. Swift traps her past selves — including those from her “Lover” era — in glass closets.John Shearer/Getty Images for TAS Rights ManagementTo the Editor:Re “Look What We Made Taylor Swift Do,” by Anna Marks (Opinion guest essay, Jan. 7):I’m deeply disappointed with this article’s interrogation of Taylor Swift’s sexuality. Though it began with useful commentary on the evolution of L.G.B.T. rights in country music, it devolved into pointless speculation the moment it mentioned Taylor Swift. Her sexuality is no one’s business but her own — full stop.As Ms. Swift writes in the prologue to “1989 (Taylor’s Version)”: “If I only hung out with my female friends, people couldn’t sensationalize or sexualize that — right? I would learn later on that people could and people would.”Few of us would speculate so publicly about a friend’s sexuality out of respect for their privacy. I see no reason this courtesy should not be extended to celebrities, including but not limited to Taylor Swift.If Ms. Marks wants to interpret Ms. Swift’s music through a queer lens, then she should. After all, Ms. Swift’s talent lies in her ability to tell highly specific stories about her own life that we all relate to because of their universal themes. However, sharing her interpretation of Ms. Swift’s own sexuality has no intellectual value. She deserves better.Amanda WassermanNew YorkLess Polluting Trucks Jeffrey MilsteinTo the Editor:Re “Electrify All the Big, Noisy, Belching Trucks” (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, Dec. 30): Andrea Marpillero-Colomina is right to emphasize the need for a national framework to reduce emissions. She is also right to highlight the impact that pollution from all sources imposes on communities like Hunts Point in the Bronx. Where she errs, however, is minimizing reasonable concerns about electric vehicle infrastructure and ignoring the significant industry progress on emissions.In New York, 90 percent of communities rely exclusively on trucks to deliver goods of all kinds, including food and medicine, the delivery of which would be delayed and more expensive without a cohesive charging infrastructure. This isn’t just an inconvenience for our nation’s truck drivers; lack of chargers and alternative fueling stations will have significant supply chain impacts, ultimately affecting consumers’ wallets.Fortunately, real progress is being made ­— and has been for some time. Since 1974, clean diesel technology has already reduced pollutants by 99 percent, and 60 trucks today equal the output of one in 1988. The trucking industry is committed to reducing the environmental impacts of moving freight and continues to invest in clean technology, including electric vehicles.In other words, big, noisy, belching trucks are already a relic of yesteryear. Americans need and deserve real plans to build on that progress — not flashy rhetoric.Kendra HemsClifton Park, N.Y.The writer is president of the Trucking Association of New York.Unity in Canadian HockeyA display outside the Vidéotron Center teaches fans about the history of the Nordiques.Renaud Philippe for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Long-Gone Hockey Team Remains Symbol of Nationalist Pride” (Quebec Dispatch, Jan. 7), about the Quebec Nordiques:I am an Anglo Canadian Torontonian with some connection to the province of Quebec. My wife is from Montreal, and we visit her family there often. I love hockey and my Toronto Maple Leafs.I loathe the Montreal Canadiens, as I do the idea of separatism and the appalling anti-English bullying and lying of the politicians who support it. But I love the province, the people, the traditions, the cities, the beautiful countryside and wild terrain.I would love to see the Nordiques back in the National Hockey League. I want to see a resurgence in French Canadian hockey. It is probably the only thing I agree with Premier François Legault of Quebec about.I see it as good for Canadian culture, not just Québécois culture. Hockey unites us as a people.Nigel SmithToronto More