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    Warning Sirens Were Silent Ahead of Deadly Tornado in St. Louis, City Says

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    Mayor Cara Spencer placed the city’s emergency manager on administrative leave pending an investigation into the failure to warn residents.Just before a tornado descended on St. Louis with a roar — killing five people and injuring dozens during its sweep through the city on Friday — there was a silence where there should not have been.There was no wailing warning from the city. No high-pitched alarm. Nothing to warn the city’s residents and send them scrambling to their basements or bathtubs. Only wind.The city’s sirens to warn people of a tornado threat were never activated by the City Emergency Management Agency, and a backup to activate the mechanism that is operated by the Fire Department was broken.Mayor Cara Spencer has placed the city’s emergency manager, Sarah Russell, on paid administrative leave while an investigation is conducted into a series of failures, Ms. Spencer’s office said in a statement issued on Tuesday. The mayor’s office also said that it had changed the protocol for activating the warning system as a result of what had happened.The city’s emergency management agency “exists, in large part, to alert the public to dangers caused by severe weather, and the office failed to do that in the most horrific and deadly storm our city has seen in my lifetime,” Ms. Spencer said in her statement.Ms. Russell could not immediately be reached for comment on Wednesday.City officials confirmed that one of five people killed in Friday’s storm was outside when the tornado ripped through St. Louis. About 40 people were injured in the storm, but city officials did not know how many of them were outdoors when they were hurt.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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      Mexican Ship in Fatal Crash Accelerated Before Hitting Brooklyn Bridge

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      As a federal investigation began, officials said the Cuauhtémoc backed into the bridge, killing two, less than five minutes after leaving a Manhattan pier.A Mexican naval ship in the East River accelerated suddenly in the wrong direction before slamming its masts into the Brooklyn Bridge in a crash that killed two crew members, federal transportation officials said on Monday.The ship, the Cuauhtémoc, was moving at a speed of about 2.3 knots after shoving off from a Lower Manhattan pier Saturday night with a tugboat’s help, Brian Young of the National Transportation Safety Board said at a news conference.The 300-foot-long ship, which had 277 people on board, maintained that pace for “a bit of time” before “the speed began to increase,” said Mr. Young, the investigator leading the safety board’s inquiry into the crash. The Cuauhtémoc’s speed had risen to six knots when it hit the bridge less than five minutes after leaving shore, he said.It was unclear what caused the sudden acceleration, Mr. Young said. But it will be among the issues investigators focus on in the course of an examination that is in its earliest stages and that could take up to two years to complete.“This is a start of a long process,” Michael Graham, an N.T.S.B. board member, said at the news conference, noting that the agency expected to issue a preliminary report of its findings within 30 days. “We will not be drawing any conclusions. We will not speculate.”Mr. Graham said agency officials were working with their Mexican counterparts to gain access to the ship so that investigators could inspect the engine, interview crew members still on board and recover any data recorders the vessel may have. The damaged vessel is now docked at Pier 36 in Manhattan.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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      Palm Springs Bombing Kills 1 and Damages Fertility Clinic, Officials Say

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      The explosion on Saturday morning, which occurred in or near a vehicle less than a mile from downtown Palm Springs, Calif., was “an intentional act of terrorism,” the F.B.I. said.The mayor of Palm Springs, Calif., said it was unclear how or whether the victim was connected to a blast that damaged a fertility clinic.Kyle Grillot for The New York TimesOne person is dead and at least four are injured in the desert oasis of Palm Springs, Calif., after a bomb exploded on Saturday morning outside a fertility clinic, damaging buildings and leaving windows shattered across several blocks in what authorities called a terrorist attack.“This explosion was significant,” said Akil Davis, the assistant director in charge of the F.B.I.’s Los Angeles Field Office. “Make no mistake, this is an intentional act of terrorism.” He added that officials believed the clinic was specifically targeted. Mr. Davis said that the bureau had begun one of the largest bombing investigations ever in Southern California and that it was not yet clear whether the event had been an act of domestic or international terrorism. Authorities have identified a person of interest but did not name the person on Saturday afternoon. They also did not say whether the person who died was connected to the blast. Mr. Davis said that “we are not actively out searching for a suspect.”The explosion was in or near a vehicle parked by the clinic, according to the mayor, Ron deHarte. But many other details were unclear, including the vehicle’s make and model. All that was left of it at the scene was an axle, authorities said. The bombing was an isolated incident and the community was no longer at risk, Andy Mills, the Palm Springs police chief said.Reports of a loud boom and images of broken glass and billowing smoke began to be shared on social media around 11 a.m. local time. The blast area extended for blocks, and some buildings were severely damaged, with shattered windows visible in many restaurants, shops and apartment buildings throughout the city’s downtown.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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      36 Deaths in Police Custody Should Have Been Called Homicides, Report Finds

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      An audit of deaths in Maryland found that in cases of people who died after being restrained by the police, medical examiners often classified the deaths as natural or accidental.Medical examiners in Maryland miscategorized dozens of deaths that happened in police custody over the past two decades, according to a report released by state officials on Thursday.At least 36 of those deaths should have been called homicides, the report said. Instead, medical examiners had classified them as accidental, or as a result of natural or undetermined causes.The report, 70 pages long, capped a yearslong audit that revisited medical examiners’ reports over 17 years ending in 2019 — a time period matching Dr. David R. Fowler’s tenure as Maryland’s chief medical examiner — and found evidence of racism and pro-police bias.Anthony Brown, Maryland’s attorney general, said at a news conference on Thursday that medical examiners had been less likely to call a death a homicide if the person who died was Black, or if he or she had died after being restrained by police officers.“These findings have profound implications across our justice system,” Mr. Brown said. “They speak to systemic issues rather than individual conduct.”Dr. Fowler did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday. He was not solely responsible for the decisions made by medical examiners during his tenure, and in the past he has defended the work of the pathologists in his office.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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      Drug Overdose Deaths Plummeted in 2024, C.D.C. Reports

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      The progress comes as the Trump administration is proposing to cut funding for many programs believed to have contributed to the improvement.Overdose deaths in the United States fell by nearly 30,000 last year, the government reported on Wednesday, the strongest sign yet that the country is making progress against one of its deadliest, most intractable public health crises.The data, released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is the latest in a series of reports over the past year offering hints that the drug-related death toll that has gutted families and communities could be starting to ease.Public health experts had been carefully watching the monthly updates, with skepticism at first, and then with growing hope. Wednesday’s report was the most encouraging yet. Deaths declined in all major categories of drug use, stimulants as well as opioids, dropping in every state but two. Nationwide, drug fatalities plunged nearly 27 percent.“This is a decline that we’ve been waiting more than a decade for,” said Dr. Matthew Christiansen, a physician and former director of West Virginia’s drug control policy. “We’ve invested hundreds of billions of dollars into addiction.”Addiction specialists said that changes in the illicit drug supply as well as greater access to drug treatment and the use of naloxone to reverse overdoses seemed to be playing a role, but whether the country could sustain that progress was an open question.In announcing the new numbers, the C.D.C. praised President Trump, saying in a statement that since he “declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency in 2017” the government had added more resources to battle the drug problem.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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      A Schoolyard Fight, a Burst of Gunfire and a Teen Charged With Murder

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      A boy in the Bronx fired three shots into a crowd, most likely aiming at another boy who had punched him, the police said. One bullet struck Evette Jeffrey, 16, in the head, killing her.The fight that ended the life of Evette Jeffrey began like so many others.“It was a fistfight,” said Joseph Kenny, the Police Department’s chief of detectives. “An old-school, schoolyard fistfight.”He was describing the back story to the stray gunshot that killed Evette, 16, near a Bronx school building on Monday — a shooting that recalled the fights between rival gangs in the 1980s and ’90s that left teenagers in jail or dead.After school let out on Monday, a 14-year-old boy got into a fight outside the building in the Morrisania neighborhood, Chief Kenny said at a news conference on Tuesday. The fight followed another one earlier in the day. The boy walked away the apparent victor, the chief said.But then another boy ran up and punched him. Someone handed the 14-year-old a gun, and he fired three shots into a crowd, with the boy who had just punched him the likely target, Chief Kenny said. The shooter fled.The 14-year-old boy was arrested on Tuesday as he tried to enter a taxi near where the shooting happened, the police said. He was charged with murder, the police said, as well as manslaughter and criminal possession of a weapon. The police have not released his name.Mayor Eric Adams spoke at the scene of the shooting on Monday.Dakota Santiago 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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      Girl, 16, Is Fatally Shot Near a Bronx School Building, Police Say

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      Evette Jeffrey was the unintended victim of a fight among teenagers leaving a schoolyard, the police commissioner said. A 14-year-old boy was being sought in the killing.A 16-year-old girl was fatally shot near a South Bronx school building Monday afternoon, and a 14-year-old boy was being sought in her killing, officials said.The girl was an unintended victim of a shooting that occurred after a fight broke out among children who were leaving the building’s schoolyard around 5 p.m., Jessica Tisch, the police commissioner, said at a news conference Monday evening.“Our city has suffered another senseless tragedy tonight,” Commissioner Tisch said.Mayor Eric Adams, speaking at the news conference, said, “We feel the loss.”Officers responding to 9-1-1 calls and notifications from a gunfire-detection system arrived at Home Street and Tinton Avenue in the Morrisania neighborhood to find the girl, Evette Jeffrey, with a gunshot wound to the head, officials said. She was taken to Lincoln Hospital in critical condition and later pronounced dead, the police said.The shooting occurred near a building that houses three schools: the Dr. Richard Izquierdo Health and Science Charter School, Bronx Latin and the Bronx Career and College Preparatory High School.Commissioner Tisch said that Evette attended a different high school nearby and, citing video captured by security cameras at the school building, gave the following account of the events leading up to the shooting:A group of children left the schoolyard and entered a walkway alongside the building when a fight broke out among some of them. Amid the fighting, one boy punched another in the face, knocking him to the ground, and then began to punch several other children.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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      Flu Killed 25 Children in New York This Season, the Most in Many Years

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      Amid declining vaccination rates, the 2024-25 influenza season exacted a heavy toll, with 216 pediatric deaths nationwide.Amid dropping vaccination rates, 25 children in New York State died from influenza during the 2024-25 flu season — more than in any recent flu season, state health authorities said on Wednesday.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has estimated that more than 47 million people nationwide caught the flu between fall and spring and that more than 600,000 have been hospitalized. The hospitalization rate for flu is the highest it has been in 15 years.A number of factors have probably contributed to influenza’s heavy toll. Since the Covid-19 pandemic, more people have chosen not to be vaccinated against the seasonal flu. And some researchers believe that the mix of strains circulating this year tend to be associated with more intense flu seasons.The C.D.C. has attributed 216 pediatric deaths nationwide to the flu this season, a number that is expected to climb before the end of the season, which is receding. More than 10 percent of those deaths occurred in New York State, which is home to less than 6 percent of the nation’s children.Of the 25 children who died from flu, only one was vaccinated, the state health commissioner, Dr. James V. McDonald, noted. Five were too young to be vaccinated, he said in a statement. The flu vaccine is not approved for children younger than 6 months.The decline in flu vaccinations reflects a rising tide of distrust of the scientific establishment, which has left many people questioning the safety or effectiveness of vaccines. Before the pandemic, the share of Americans who received an annual flu shot had been slowly climbing.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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      Arizona Restaurant Shooting Leaves at Least 3 Dead and 5 Injured

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      Witnesses told local news stations that the shooting took place at a Cinco de Mayo event.At least three people were killed and five people were wounded in a shooting that erupted on Sunday at a restaurant in Arizona where a crowd of people was celebrating Cinco de Mayo, the police and a witness said.The police in Glendale, a suburb of Phoenix, responded at about 7:45 p.m. to calls saying that shots had been fired at the El Camaron Gigante Mariscos & Steakhouse, a spokesman for the Glendale Police Department, Officer Moroni Mendez, told local news stations in a briefing late on Sunday.Officers found a “chaotic” scene in which multiple people had been shot, he said. Detectives were investigating but they believed there was more than one shooter.It was not immediately clear whether the shooting was an exchange of gunfire or if several people had acted together in firing on the crowd, Officer Mendez said.There were no arrests, although Officer Mendez said that the public was not in danger.Officer Mendez did not identify the victims or provide their ages. The injuries of those wounded were either caused by shrapnel or gunfire, he said.He could not immediately be reached early on Monday, and calls to the restaurant went unanswered.A witness told 12 News that dozens of people, including families with children, were at the restaurant for Cinco de Mayo, an annual celebration that commemorates Mexico’s victory over France in the Battle of Puebla.The witness said there were several rounds of gunfire, and then a pause before a second set of shots was fired. More