National

COLUMBUS, MS—Sky Juliett Samuel, 18, an employee at Jack's Family Restaurant, turned herself in to the Columbus Police Department after she was accused of smearing menstrual blood on a customer's hamburger. Samuel was reportedly working at the restaurant on January 7 when she smeared her saliva and menstrual blood on a drive-thru customer's hamburger before giving it to them. The unnamed...

SAN FRANCISCO—A computer problem caused Untied Airlines to ground all domestic flights for nearly an hour around the country on January 22,  the Federal Aviation Administration said. According to a statement from United Airlines spokeswoman Maddie King, the ground stop was issued at 3:30 p.m. due an IT issue. "We are working as quickly as possible to resolve this issue and...

KILAUEA, KAUAI—In 2014, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg bought 700 acres of land on the North Shore of Kauai, Hawaii for $100 million. According to reports, nearly a dozen components of his acquired property are currently being held by locals on the island. At the end of December, Zuckerberg filed lawsuits through his companies Pilaa International LLC, Northshore Kalo LLC, and High Flyer...

HOUSTON, TX—NASA has announced that Eugene Andrew Cernan, commander of the Apollo 17 lunar-landing mission in 1972 and the last human to walk on the moon, has died at the age of 82. Three and a half years after the first ever lunar steps by Neil A. Armstrong in 1969, Cernan and a geologist-astronaut landed on the moon in order...

CHICAGO, IL—Chicago Police Officer Eugene Ciardullo was charged with felony criminal sexual assault after being accused of having sexual contact with an underage girl, according to reports. Ciardullo, 51, was arrested at his home Saturday, January 14, reported department spokesperson Officer Jose Estrada. The following day, Ciardullo was ordered to be held on a $75,000 bail by Cook County Judge...

FREDERICK, MD—A social media manager with a Maryland school district was fired last week after a tweet she sent to a student. On January 5, a Frederick County Public Schools student posted to Twitter, asking the school district to “close school tammarow PLEASE,” as a large storm was approaching the area. As a reply, the school district's social media manager, Katie...

SAN FRANCISCO—Former San Francisco Giants first baseman and 1986 MLB Hall of Famer Willie McCovey, 79, has been absolved by President Obama for tax evasions he faced in 1995. McCovey, the Giants senior adviser who hit 521 home runs over the course of his 22-year MLB career, is one of 273 sentence commutations and pardons established by President Obama on Tuesday,...

UNITED STATES—The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey circus is closing down after 146 years of operation. It was announced in a press release from Feld Entertainment, on Monday, January 16. The company has owned the circus for the past 50 years.   High operating costs and a drop in ticket sales “made the circus an unsustainable business for the company,” said...

UNITED STATES—Stockton native Samuel "Sam" Maxwell, 32, a survivor of the Ghost Ship Warehouse fire in Oakland is still recuperating from critical injuries at Saint Francis Hospital's Bothin Burn Center. Maxwell, an Oakland-based bookseller often referred to as "Peaches" by friends, was reportedly the last person to exit the warehouse after it caught fire. His father, Bill Maxwell, shared with KTVU...

SAN FRANCISCO—The FBI arrested the wife of the Pulse nightclub shooter in San Francisco on Monday, January 16, according to reports. Noor Salman, 30, was taken into custody Monday morning and is due in court on Tuesday for her first appearance, Salman's lawyer told ABC. Salman’ s husband, Omar Mateen, killed 49 people and wounded dozens in a terrorist attack at Pulse,...