News

Germany plans stricter controls on Facebook

NEW YORK (AP) — Germany’s justice minister says she wants closer oversight of companies such as Facebook, following a meeting with executives about the abuse of users’ private data.

Katarina Barley says Facebook representatives assured her Monday that such breaches wouldn’t occur again and pledged to inform those users who were affected.

She added that “promises aren’t enough, though. We will need to monitor companies such as Facebook much more strictly in future and also punish breaches of data protection strongly, swiftly and painfully.”

Russian shopping mall fire kills 64; no alarms reported

MOSCOW (AP) — Witnesses say fire alarms were silent and staff was nowhere to be seen when a fire at a shopping mall packed with children and their parents on the first weekend of the school recess killed 64 people in Russia’s Siberia.

The fire at the Winter Cherry mall in Kemerovo, a city about 3,000 kilometers (1,900 miles) east of Moscow, was extinguished by Monday morning after burning through the night.

Edwards, GOP leader clash on Medicaid proposal

BATON ROUGE (AP) — A House Republican leader says he’s found a way to narrow Louisiana’s budget gap next year, but Gov. John Bel Edwards calls it a gimmick similar to the shortterm fixes that have left the state struggling with financial problems for a decade.

The latest clash comes as conservative House GOP lawmakers and the Democratic governor remain at odds over the size of — and solutions to — an estimated $700 million shortfall that will exist when temporary taxes expire on July 1, the first day of the new fiscal year.

Expert: Coolers made it worse in nursing home where 12 died

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — A Florida nursing home where 12 elderly patients died of overheating after Hurricane Irma knocked out its air conditioning made matters worse by using portable units that were not properly ventilated and increased temperatures in most of the facility, an engineer testified in a deposition.

Trump signs $1.3T budget after threatening veto

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump signed a $1.3 trillion spending measure Friday, averting a midnight government shutdown just hours after declaring he was considering a veto.

Trump said he was “very disappointed” in the package, in part because it did not fully fund his plans for a border wall with Mexico and did not address some 700,000 “Dreamer” immigrants who are now protected from deportation under a program that he has moved to eliminate.

Extremist slain after deadly rampage in southern France

TREBES, France (AP) — A gun-wielding extremist unleashed bloodshed in a quiet corner of southern France on Friday, killing three people as he hijacked a car, opened fire on police and took hostages in a supermarket, where panicked shoppers hid in a meat freezer or ran through the aisles.

The 26-year-old attacker was slain as police stormed the market with the help of a heroic officer who had switched places with a captive and suffered lifethreatening wounds — one of 16 people injured in the day’s violence.

China targets $3B of US goods in tariff spat

BEIJING (AP) — China announced a $3 billion list of U.S. goods for possible retaliation in a tariff dispute with President Donald Trump and girded Friday for a bigger battle over technology policy as financial markets sank on fears of global disruption.

The Commerce Ministry said higher duties on pork, apples, steel pipe and other goods would offset Chinese losses due to Trump’s tariff hike on steel and aluminum imports. It urged Washington to negotiate a settlement but set no deadline.

Spain charges 13 Catalan separatist leaders

MADRID (AP) — A Spanish Supreme Court judge charged 13 Catalan separatist politicians with rebellion Friday for their attempts to make the region independent of Spain, dealing a heavy blow to the secessionist movement with an indictment that could put its political elite behind bars for decades.

Judge Pablo Llarena ordered five of the Catalan politicians who answered a court summons Friday to be held without bail. Another of the summoned politicians, the ERC party’s Marta Rovira, did not heed the order and announced in a letter she was fleeing the country to live “in exile.”

LA man arrested for mower theft

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Suspect connected with 2015 murder

A man connected with the 2015 murder of a Lake Arthur man was arrested Wednesday for allegedly stealing lawn equipment from a Jennings home.

Vaughn Robinson, 40, of 504 Commercial Street in Lake Arthur was arrested and charged with illegal possession of stolen things, Jeff Davis Parish Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Chris Ivey said.

At the time of his arrest Robinson was out of parish jail on bond for two different arrests, Ivey said.

Fox attends D.C. forum on La. economy

A group of travel professionals from Louisiana attended the annual Desitination Capital Hill sponsored by the U.S Travel Association which took place March 21-22.

Marion Fox, president and CEO of Jeff Davis Parish Economic Development and Tourism Commission, was part of that group.