Tennessee
Man jailed over Charlie Kirk post wins $835,000 settlement
Tennessee officials will pay $835,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by a man who was jailed for more than a month over a Facebook post he made about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
While many people across the U.S. lost their jobs over social media comments about Kirk’s death, Larry Bushart’s case stood out as a rare instance in which such online speech led to criminal prosecution. The 61-year-old retired police officer spent 37 days behind bars before authorities dropped the felony charge against him in October.
During his time in jail, Bushart lost his postretirement job and missed his wedding anniversary and the birth of his granddaughter, according to a federal lawsuit Bushart filed in December against Perry County, its sheriff and the investigator who obtained the arrest warrant.
“I am pleased my First Amendment rights have been vindicated,” Bushart said in a statement announcing the settlement Wednesday. “The people’s freedom to participate in civil discourse is crucial to a healthy democracy. I am looking forward to moving on and spending time with my family.”
Bushart was arrested in September after he refused to take down Facebook memes that joked about Kirk’s killing, which had prompted an outpouring of grief among conservatives, including in Perry County, which is near Bushart’s home and which held a candlelight vigil.
The meme Bushart posted that prompted his arrest read: “This seems relevant today...” and featured President Donald Trump and the words, “We have to get over it.” That quote, the meme explained, was said by Trump in 2024 after a school shooting at Iowa’s Perry High School.
Perry County Sheriff Nick Weems told news outlets that most of Bushart’s “hate memes” were lawful free speech, but residents were alarmed by the school shooting post, fearing Bushart was threatening a local school, also called Perry County High School, even though Weems said he knew the meme referred to a school in Iowa.
“Investigators believe Bushart was fully aware of the fear his post would cause and intentionally sought to create hysteria within the community,” Weems said in a statement to The Tennessean last year.
Bushart’s bail was set at $2 million before he was released as the case drew national attention.
“It’s in times of turmoil and heightened tensions that our national commitment to free speech is tested the most,” said Cary Davis, an attorney for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which helped represent Bushart. “When government officials fail that test, the Constitution exists to hold them accountable. Our hope is that Larry’s settlement sends a message to law enforcement across the country: Respect the First Amendment today, or be prepared to pay the price tomorrow.”
California
Judge orders mental health evaluation for the woman accused of attempting to murder Rihanna
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A judge on Tuesday paused the prosecution of a woman charged with the attempted murder of Rihanna and more than a dozen other felonies and sent the case to a mental health court that will determine whether she is competent to stand trial.
At a Los Angeles meeting held in a judge’s chambers, Deputy Public Defender Derek Dillman said he had doubts over the mental competence of his client, 35-year-old Ivanna Lisette Ortiz of Orlando, Florida, court documents showed. Ortiz has pleaded not guilty to firing at the house of Rihanna, her partner A$AP Rocky and their children while all of them were home.
Judge Shannon K. Cooley ordered psychiatric evaluations and temporarily transferred the case to a Hollywood mental health court that specializes in determining whether defendants can understand the proceedings and go through a trial.
“It is the ethical obligation of counsel and the court to ensure that Ms. Ortiz’s rights are protected, including being able to assist counsel in conducting a defense in a rational manner,” Dillman said in an email to The Associated Press.
Prosecutors declined comment.
If she is found incompetent, she could be held indefinitely in a state hospital until she is able to face the charges. She is set to appear June 2 in the same courtroom where a judge recently found that a man accused of stalking Jennifer Aniston was incompetent to stand trial.
At a hearing a week earlier, Cooley had declined to pause the process for mental health evaluation, and Ortiz objected, saying she wanted the case to proceed on the path to trial. She did not appear in court on Tuesday. Cooley ordered that she should continue to be held on nearly $2 million bail.
Police and prosecutors allege that on March 8, Ortiz pulled up in a Tesla to the Beverly Hills-area property of the singing superstar Rihanna and her rapper partner A$AP Rocky, pointed an AR-15 style rifle out the window and sprayed at least 20 bullets toward the property and a neighboring house. No one was injured.
Shots hit an Airstream trailer that Rihanna and Rocky were inside, according to police interviews with the couple. Investigators found bullet holes in the trailer and on the exterior wall of the home’s second-floor nursery, where the three kids were with their nanny.
Investigators said that after her arrest later that day, Ortiz told them “I wasn’t attempting murder,” according to a police report.
Ortiz is charged with 10 counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm, one for each of the people on the two properties. She’s also charged with three counts of shooting at an occupied vehicle or dwelling.
Ortiz had no prior police record, authorities said. Public records show she had been a licensed speech pathologist for more than a decade.
Authorities have not discussed a motive or described any connection between her and Rihanna.
A nine-time Grammy Award winner, Rihanna has 14 No. 1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including “We Found Love,” “Work,” “Umbrella” and “Disturbia.”
Colorado
High court orders children’s hospital to resume gender-affirming care for young people
DENVER (AP) — The Colorado Supreme Court has ordered Colorado’s largest provider of gender-affirming care for young people to resume medical treatments like puberty blockers and hormone therapy despite threats that providing the care could lead to losing federal funding.
Children’s Hospital Colorado suspended medical treatments for transgender patients under 18 in January after it said the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services opened an investigation into its treatments following a series of clashes between President Donald Trump’s administration and advocates over transgender health care for children.
The hospital said in a statement that it is reviewing Monday’s court ruling and considering its next steps. It previously said it would continue to provide mental health treatment for minors and also medical treatment for patients aged 18 to 21.
Four transgender girls, ranging from age 10 to 17, sued the hospital, through their parents, alleging that the hospital was violating the state’s antidiscrimination law by refusing to provide them treatment both because of their gender identity and their disability, gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria is the distress caused when someone’s gender expression doesn’t match their sex assigned at birth.
The girls said they feared not being able to get medication and monitoring to prevent them from undergoing puberty and developing male traits. And they cited mental health fallout, including depression and suicidal ideation.
The court sided with the girls in a 5-2 ruling, finding that the decision to shutter the services for minors violated a state antidiscrimination law. In the majority opinion, Justice William Wood III said, “We conclude that the actual immediate and irreparable harm to petitioners outweighs the speculative harm CHC may face if the federal government further acts against it.”
In a dissent, Justice Brian Boatright said the hospital didn’t make its decision to stop the case because of the gender identity of the patients. Rather, he wrote, “It was a decision driven by the direct threat to the viability of the entire hospital.”
A Kansas judge also sided with transgender minors in a ruling last week.
The Colorado hospital’s TRUE Center, which focuses on gender-affirming care, is one of the largest programs in the country and the only comprehensive care center in the Rocky Mountain region, according to the lawsuit.
Children’s Hospital Colorado said the HHS opened the investigation of the hospital after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. issued a declaration that called treatments like puberty blockers, hormone therapy and surgeries unsafe and ineffective for children and adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria, or the distress when someone’s gender expression doesn’t match their sex assigned at birth.
An Oregon-based federal judge ruled in March for Colorado and 20 other states that Kennedy’s declaration went too far.
Washington
Jury acquits 2 business execs of bribing Navy admiral for government contract
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal jury has acquitted two business executives of charges that they conspired to bribe a retired four-star U.S. Navy admiral, who is now serving a six-year prison sentence for his conviction on corruption charges.
An earlier trial for Next Jump co-CEOs Yongchul “Charlie” Kim and Meghan Messenger ended last year with a hung jury and a mistrial. Their retrial in Washington, D.C., ended Monday with a jury acquitting them of all charges, including conspiracy and bribery, court records show.
Prosecutors accused Kim and Messenger of bribing retired Adm. Robert P. Burke for a military contract in exchange for a lucrative postretirement job. Burke — once the second-highest uniformed officer in the Navy — was commanding its forces in Europe and Africa when he engaged in the alleged plot.
Prosecutors claimed Kim and Messenger agreed to pay Burke a $500,000 salary with stock options projected to be worth millions of dollars. In exchange, they alleged, Burke ordered his staff to give a contract to Next Jump and promoted the company’s product to other senior Navy commanders.
In 2018, Next Jump had a multimillion-dollar Navy contract to provide workforce training to an office under Burke’s command. But the Navy terminated the “poorly received” pilot program after approximately one year, prosecutors said.
After a separate trial last year, a jury convicted Burke on four counts, including conspiracy and accepting a bribe. Burke, 64, is serving his prison sentence at a federal prison in West Virginia and is due to be released in November 2029, according to Bureau of Prisons records.
Burke joined Next Jump in October 2022 after retiring from the Navy. Reed Brodsky, one of Messenger’s attorneys, has argued that there was no link between Burke’s job offer and the contract. Brodsky said the acquittals are “a testament to the power of truth and the integrity of the American justice system.”
“We are grateful to the jury for their careful, conscientious deliberations, and to all who stood by Meghan during this difficult chapter,” the defense attorney said in a statement.
William Burck, one of Kim’s attorneys, said “justice prevailed.”
“In the end, the jury didn’t believe that Charlie Kim and Meghan Messenger bribed anyone,” Burck said in a statement.
Man jailed over Charlie Kirk post wins $835,000 settlement
Tennessee officials will pay $835,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by a man who was jailed for more than a month over a Facebook post he made about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
While many people across the U.S. lost their jobs over social media comments about Kirk’s death, Larry Bushart’s case stood out as a rare instance in which such online speech led to criminal prosecution. The 61-year-old retired police officer spent 37 days behind bars before authorities dropped the felony charge against him in October.
During his time in jail, Bushart lost his postretirement job and missed his wedding anniversary and the birth of his granddaughter, according to a federal lawsuit Bushart filed in December against Perry County, its sheriff and the investigator who obtained the arrest warrant.
“I am pleased my First Amendment rights have been vindicated,” Bushart said in a statement announcing the settlement Wednesday. “The people’s freedom to participate in civil discourse is crucial to a healthy democracy. I am looking forward to moving on and spending time with my family.”
Bushart was arrested in September after he refused to take down Facebook memes that joked about Kirk’s killing, which had prompted an outpouring of grief among conservatives, including in Perry County, which is near Bushart’s home and which held a candlelight vigil.
The meme Bushart posted that prompted his arrest read: “This seems relevant today...” and featured President Donald Trump and the words, “We have to get over it.” That quote, the meme explained, was said by Trump in 2024 after a school shooting at Iowa’s Perry High School.
Perry County Sheriff Nick Weems told news outlets that most of Bushart’s “hate memes” were lawful free speech, but residents were alarmed by the school shooting post, fearing Bushart was threatening a local school, also called Perry County High School, even though Weems said he knew the meme referred to a school in Iowa.
“Investigators believe Bushart was fully aware of the fear his post would cause and intentionally sought to create hysteria within the community,” Weems said in a statement to The Tennessean last year.
Bushart’s bail was set at $2 million before he was released as the case drew national attention.
“It’s in times of turmoil and heightened tensions that our national commitment to free speech is tested the most,” said Cary Davis, an attorney for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which helped represent Bushart. “When government officials fail that test, the Constitution exists to hold them accountable. Our hope is that Larry’s settlement sends a message to law enforcement across the country: Respect the First Amendment today, or be prepared to pay the price tomorrow.”
California
Judge orders mental health evaluation for the woman accused of attempting to murder Rihanna
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A judge on Tuesday paused the prosecution of a woman charged with the attempted murder of Rihanna and more than a dozen other felonies and sent the case to a mental health court that will determine whether she is competent to stand trial.
At a Los Angeles meeting held in a judge’s chambers, Deputy Public Defender Derek Dillman said he had doubts over the mental competence of his client, 35-year-old Ivanna Lisette Ortiz of Orlando, Florida, court documents showed. Ortiz has pleaded not guilty to firing at the house of Rihanna, her partner A$AP Rocky and their children while all of them were home.
Judge Shannon K. Cooley ordered psychiatric evaluations and temporarily transferred the case to a Hollywood mental health court that specializes in determining whether defendants can understand the proceedings and go through a trial.
“It is the ethical obligation of counsel and the court to ensure that Ms. Ortiz’s rights are protected, including being able to assist counsel in conducting a defense in a rational manner,” Dillman said in an email to The Associated Press.
Prosecutors declined comment.
If she is found incompetent, she could be held indefinitely in a state hospital until she is able to face the charges. She is set to appear June 2 in the same courtroom where a judge recently found that a man accused of stalking Jennifer Aniston was incompetent to stand trial.
At a hearing a week earlier, Cooley had declined to pause the process for mental health evaluation, and Ortiz objected, saying she wanted the case to proceed on the path to trial. She did not appear in court on Tuesday. Cooley ordered that she should continue to be held on nearly $2 million bail.
Police and prosecutors allege that on March 8, Ortiz pulled up in a Tesla to the Beverly Hills-area property of the singing superstar Rihanna and her rapper partner A$AP Rocky, pointed an AR-15 style rifle out the window and sprayed at least 20 bullets toward the property and a neighboring house. No one was injured.
Shots hit an Airstream trailer that Rihanna and Rocky were inside, according to police interviews with the couple. Investigators found bullet holes in the trailer and on the exterior wall of the home’s second-floor nursery, where the three kids were with their nanny.
Investigators said that after her arrest later that day, Ortiz told them “I wasn’t attempting murder,” according to a police report.
Ortiz is charged with 10 counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm, one for each of the people on the two properties. She’s also charged with three counts of shooting at an occupied vehicle or dwelling.
Ortiz had no prior police record, authorities said. Public records show she had been a licensed speech pathologist for more than a decade.
Authorities have not discussed a motive or described any connection between her and Rihanna.
A nine-time Grammy Award winner, Rihanna has 14 No. 1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including “We Found Love,” “Work,” “Umbrella” and “Disturbia.”
Colorado
High court orders children’s hospital to resume gender-affirming care for young people
DENVER (AP) — The Colorado Supreme Court has ordered Colorado’s largest provider of gender-affirming care for young people to resume medical treatments like puberty blockers and hormone therapy despite threats that providing the care could lead to losing federal funding.
Children’s Hospital Colorado suspended medical treatments for transgender patients under 18 in January after it said the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services opened an investigation into its treatments following a series of clashes between President Donald Trump’s administration and advocates over transgender health care for children.
The hospital said in a statement that it is reviewing Monday’s court ruling and considering its next steps. It previously said it would continue to provide mental health treatment for minors and also medical treatment for patients aged 18 to 21.
Four transgender girls, ranging from age 10 to 17, sued the hospital, through their parents, alleging that the hospital was violating the state’s antidiscrimination law by refusing to provide them treatment both because of their gender identity and their disability, gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria is the distress caused when someone’s gender expression doesn’t match their sex assigned at birth.
The girls said they feared not being able to get medication and monitoring to prevent them from undergoing puberty and developing male traits. And they cited mental health fallout, including depression and suicidal ideation.
The court sided with the girls in a 5-2 ruling, finding that the decision to shutter the services for minors violated a state antidiscrimination law. In the majority opinion, Justice William Wood III said, “We conclude that the actual immediate and irreparable harm to petitioners outweighs the speculative harm CHC may face if the federal government further acts against it.”
In a dissent, Justice Brian Boatright said the hospital didn’t make its decision to stop the case because of the gender identity of the patients. Rather, he wrote, “It was a decision driven by the direct threat to the viability of the entire hospital.”
A Kansas judge also sided with transgender minors in a ruling last week.
The Colorado hospital’s TRUE Center, which focuses on gender-affirming care, is one of the largest programs in the country and the only comprehensive care center in the Rocky Mountain region, according to the lawsuit.
Children’s Hospital Colorado said the HHS opened the investigation of the hospital after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. issued a declaration that called treatments like puberty blockers, hormone therapy and surgeries unsafe and ineffective for children and adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria, or the distress when someone’s gender expression doesn’t match their sex assigned at birth.
An Oregon-based federal judge ruled in March for Colorado and 20 other states that Kennedy’s declaration went too far.
Washington
Jury acquits 2 business execs of bribing Navy admiral for government contract
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal jury has acquitted two business executives of charges that they conspired to bribe a retired four-star U.S. Navy admiral, who is now serving a six-year prison sentence for his conviction on corruption charges.
An earlier trial for Next Jump co-CEOs Yongchul “Charlie” Kim and Meghan Messenger ended last year with a hung jury and a mistrial. Their retrial in Washington, D.C., ended Monday with a jury acquitting them of all charges, including conspiracy and bribery, court records show.
Prosecutors accused Kim and Messenger of bribing retired Adm. Robert P. Burke for a military contract in exchange for a lucrative postretirement job. Burke — once the second-highest uniformed officer in the Navy — was commanding its forces in Europe and Africa when he engaged in the alleged plot.
Prosecutors claimed Kim and Messenger agreed to pay Burke a $500,000 salary with stock options projected to be worth millions of dollars. In exchange, they alleged, Burke ordered his staff to give a contract to Next Jump and promoted the company’s product to other senior Navy commanders.
In 2018, Next Jump had a multimillion-dollar Navy contract to provide workforce training to an office under Burke’s command. But the Navy terminated the “poorly received” pilot program after approximately one year, prosecutors said.
After a separate trial last year, a jury convicted Burke on four counts, including conspiracy and accepting a bribe. Burke, 64, is serving his prison sentence at a federal prison in West Virginia and is due to be released in November 2029, according to Bureau of Prisons records.
Burke joined Next Jump in October 2022 after retiring from the Navy. Reed Brodsky, one of Messenger’s attorneys, has argued that there was no link between Burke’s job offer and the contract. Brodsky said the acquittals are “a testament to the power of truth and the integrity of the American justice system.”
“We are grateful to the jury for their careful, conscientious deliberations, and to all who stood by Meghan during this difficult chapter,” the defense attorney said in a statement.
William Burck, one of Kim’s attorneys, said “justice prevailed.”
“In the end, the jury didn’t believe that Charlie Kim and Meghan Messenger bribed anyone,” Burck said in a statement.
