Court Digest

Minnesota
Minneapolis will pay $600,000 to settle with woman who says ex-Officer Chauvin knelt on her back
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The city of Minneapolis has agreed to pay $600,000 to settle a lawsuit by a woman who alleged that ex-Officer Derek Chauvin hauled her from her minivan and pinned her to the ground with his knee in January 2020, just as he did four months later when he killed George Floyd.
Patty Day, formerly employed by the Public Works Department, claimed in a lawsuit filed last May that she was the victim of excessive force and a wrongful arrest. She acknowledged that she was drunk on the evening of Jan. 17, 2020, and depressed over her impending divorce and other difficulties when she got stuck in the snow for several hours.
Chauvin and his partner that night, Officer Ellen Jensen, eventually arrived on the scene. The lawsuit alleged that the officers “violently yanked” Day from her vehicle and threw her to the pavement, causing several injuries.
“Chauvin then assumed his signature pose, pressing his knee into the subdued and handcuffed Patty’s back — just as he would later do to snuff the life out of George Floyd — and remaining that way well after Patty was controlled,” the complaint alleged. A drunken driving charge was later dropped after a judge ruled that the officers lacked probable cause to arrest her and suppressed the blood alcohol test evidence.
The Minneapolis City Council unanimously approved the $600,000 settlement Thursday. Council member LaTrisha Vetaw told her colleagues that $175,000 will go to Day while her attorneys will get $425,000.
The city has now paid over $36 million to settle police misconduct cases involving Chauvin, including $27 million to the Floyd family.
“While no settlement can undo what Patty endured, we are grateful to have reached an agreement that holds the officers accountable for their actions,” Day’s attorney, Katie Bennett, said in a statement. “This case is yet another example of the critical need for justice and reform in policing.”
Chauvin, who is white, remains incarcerated at a federal prison in Texas for his conviction in state court of murdering Floyd and a federal conviction for violating Floyd’s civil rights. The Black man’s murder sparked a national reckoning with racial injustice.

Illinois
McDonald’s settles lawsuit over Latino scholarship program
McDonald’s said Friday it is changing — but not eliminating — a scholarship program for Latino students after it was sued by a group that opposes affirmative action.
McDonald’s HACER National Scholarship Program, which was founded in 1985, awards college scholarships to students with at least one Latino parent. The program has awarded more than $33 million in scholarships to more than 17,000 students.
On Jan. 12, the American Alliance for Equal Rights sued McDonald’s over the HACER program. The alliance, which challenges programs that use race or ethnicity as a factor in their decisions, is run by Edward Blum, the conservative activist who also successfully challenged affirmative action programs in college admissions.
On Friday, McDonald’s said it reached a settlement with the American Alliance for Equal Rights that will allow it to consider this year’s applicants. The Chicago company said more than 3,000 students have already applied for this year’s scholarships.
McDonald’s said the program will now be open to any student who can demonstrate an impact on or commitment to the Latino community. Applicants no longer need to have at least one Latino parent.
McDonald’s said it will extend the deadline for this year’s scholarships from Feb. 6 to March 6 to accommodate any new applicants.
Blum applauded the settlement Friday.
“McDonald’s has wisely agreed to end this discriminatory scholarship program,” Blum said. “It is a shame that over many years thousands of students were shut out of this program because they were not the preferred ethnicity.”
McDonald’s is one of many companies that have halted some diversity efforts in the wake of the 2023 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that banned race as a factor in college admissions.
Earlier in January, McDonald’s said it would retire specific goals for achieving diversity at senior leadership levels. It also ended a program that encouraged its suppliers to develop diversity training and to increase the number of minority group members represented within their own leadership ranks.
But in an open letter to employees and franchisees, McDonald’s senior leadership team said it remains committed to inclusion and believes a diverse workforce is a competitive advantage.
McDonald’s said it would continue to support efforts that ensure a diverse base of employees, suppliers and franchisees, but its diversity team will now be referred to as the Global Inclusion Team. The company said it would also continue to report its demographic information.

Washington
Former Fed adviser indicted and arrested for espionage in dealings with China

Federal authorities have arrested a former Federal Reserve senior adviser for allegedly giving inside economic information to China.

A grand jury indictment accuses John Harold Rogers, 63, of Vienna, Virginia, of stealing Federal Reserve trade secrets and selling them to Chinese intelligence officials for at least $450,000 by posing as a university professor in China. He is also accused of lying to Federal Reserve investigators and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau officials.

The Department of Justice announced Rogers’ indictment and arrest on Friday, the same day he made his first appearance before a Washington court. Rogers is being held without bond and is scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday, according to court records.

Jonathan Gitlen, an attorney for Rogers, said via email Saturday that “Dr. Rogers denies the allegations as set forth in the indictment.” Rogers will say more “at a later date,” Gitlen said.

Assistant Director Kevin Vorndran of the FBI Counterintelligence Division said in a statement that Rogers “betrayed his country while employed at the Federal Reserve by providing restricted U.S. financial and economic information to Chinese government intelligence officers.” The information, Vorndran continued, “could allow adversaries to illegally gain a strategic economic advantage at the expense of the U.S.”

The Justice Department said the information “could allow China to manipulate the U.S. market” in a manner similar to insider trading. The department noted that China, as of October 2024, held about $816 billion in U.S. foreign debt and that Chinese financial players could benefit from inside knowledge of U.S. economic policy, such as advance notice of federal funds rate changes, when making decisions about buying and selling U.S. debt instruments.

Rogers, a U.S. citizen with a doctorate in economics, worked for the Federal Reserve from 2010 until 2021, according to the indictment.

According to the indictment, Rogers, a U.S. citizen with a Ph.D. in economics, worked as a Senior Adviser in FRB’s Division of International Finance of the FRB from 2010 until 2021, where he would have had access to a range of classified information.

Prosecutors allege that Rogers and two Chinese co-conspirators began communicating as early as 2013. The indictment asserts that Rogers later forwarded protected information to his personal email or made print copies to pass along to his co-conspirators. The cache allegedly included proprietary economic data and analysis, briefing books written for Federal Reserve governors, details of Federal Open Market Committee deliberations and future announcements, and accounts of conversations about tariffs targeted at China, according to the indictment.

Rogers is accused of meeting co-conspirators in China for multiple visits, under the guise of him being an academic instructor teaching them as students. The indictment alleges that in 2023, Rogers received $450,000 as a part-time professor at a Chinese university.

California
Man agrees to plead guilty for flying drone that damaged aircraft in LA?wildfire

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The pilot of a drone that crashed into a firefighting plane, leaving a gaping hole and grounding the aircraft during the deadly Palisades Fire in Los Angeles, has agreed to plead guilty to a misdemeanor count of unsafely operating a drone, federal authorities said Friday.

Peter Tripp Akemann faces up to one year in prison, and a judge will determine his sentence, acting U.S. attorney Joseph McNally said. As part of the plea agreement, he will have to complete 150 hours of wildfire-related community service and pay $65,000 in restitution for the damage to the plane, McNally said.

Akemann appeared in court Friday and will remain out of jail under court supervision during his case. He has not yet entered his plea.

Authorities say Akemann launched the drone from the top of a parking structure in Santa Monica on Jan. 9 and flew it more than 1.5 miles toward the Palisades Fire before losing sight of it. It then crashed with the Super Scooper that was carrying two firefighters. The planes can scoop 1,500 gallons (6,000 liters) of water in just seconds.

The wind-driven blaze in the upscale Pacific Palisades began Jan. 7, destroying or damaging nearly 8,000 homes, businesses and other structures and killing at least 12 people. Drone operations were prohibited in the area at the time due to the firefight. The conflagration was fueled by dry Santa Ana winds and has scorched at least 36 square miles (94 square kilometers) of land. It was 98% contained as of Friday.

In a statement handed out to the media, defense attorney Glen Jonas said Akemann was “deeply sorry for the mistake he made” and “accepts responsibility for his grave error in judgment.”

Federal authorities emphasized Friday it was the responsibility of drone owners to know the rules, and there would be consequences for breaking them, especially as Los Angeles gears up to host several major events in coming years, including the World Cup, the Super Bowl and the Olympics.

“The FAA has very strict guidelines about registering drones and where drones can be flown. The onus is on the pilot, if firefighters are putting out a fire with aircraft that should be a clue,” said Akil Davis, the assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office.

The Super Scooper, which was owned by the government of Quebec, was grounded for several days. The pilot was able to land the aircraft despite a hole in the left wing caused by the collision with the drone.

Davis said there was no evidence Akemann intentionally caused the collision.

“Lack of common sense and ignorance of your duty as a drone pilot will not shield you from criminal charges,” he said.
The fire in the hilly Los Angeles neighborhood, home to Hollywood stars like Jamie Lee Curtis and Billy Crystal who lost houses in the fire, forced thousands of people from their homes, and knocked out power to tens of thousands.

Investigators are still trying to determine what caused the fire. Officials have placed the origin of blaze behind a home on Piedra Morada Drive, which sits above a densely wooded arroyo.
Another wind-whipped fire that started the same day in Altadena, a community about 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Pacific Palisades, killed at least 17 people and destroyed or damaged more than 10,000 homes and other buildings.

The Santa Ana winds have turned seasonal wildfires into infernos that have leveled neighborhoods in and around Los Angeles, where there has been no significant rainfall in more than eight months.