New York
Federal judge sentences man to 10 years in plot to kill Iranian American writer
NEW YORK (AP) — A former truck and bus driver charged in an assassination plot against an Iranian American writer who authorities said was targeted for death by the Iranian government was given a 10-year prison sentence on Wednesday by a federal judge.
The judge, Lewis J. Liman, sentenced Jonathan Loadholt, 37, of Staten Island, in Manhattan federal court after he pleaded guilty to conspiracies to commit stalking and launder money in an attack plot that targeted Masih Alinejad in Brooklyn in 2024.
James Barnacle, head of New York’s FBI office, said in a release that Loadholt was tasked by the government of Iran to surveil Alinejad and eventually assassinate her, but the FBI arrested him first.
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said Loadholt was a U.S. citizen driven by greed to kill Alinejad.
Clayton said the government of Iran “tried to silence Ms. Alinejad because of her efforts to stand up to the Iranian regime and expose its discriminatory treatment of women, corruption, and human rights abuses.”
In court papers, lawyers for Loadholt requested leniency, saying “a reckless and senseless decision made at the behest of a friend cost him his job, his freedom, and years with his family he will never get back.”
They also wrote that Loadholt was never asked to commit murder and was largely kept in the dark about the true plan for the surveillance he was asked to carry out, although they acknowledged that he “clearly understood the potential for serious violence.”
In a letter to the judge, Loadholt said he was “very ashamed.”
“It was wrong on every level,” he said.
In January, Loadholt’s friend, Carlisle Rivera, apologized in court before he was sentenced to 15 years in prison in the plot.
Alinejad left Iran in 2009 following the country’s disputed presidential election and moved to the United States, where she launched online campaigns to encourage Iranian women to pose for pictures and videos showing their hair in defiance of a religious rule requiring headscarves.
An author and contributor to the Voice of America and CBS News, Alinejad became a citizen in 2019. She has traveled the world speaking to women and encouraging others to join her movement for women’s freedom of expression, particularly those in Iran.
Last year she testified at the trial of two men charged with plotting to kidnap her from her Brooklyn home and kill her in 2022. A prosecutor said Iran put a $500,000 bounty on her head. The defendants, both natives of Azerbaijan, were convicted and sentenced to 25 years.
Wisconsin
Packers’ running back released from jail as prosecutors weigh filing charges
GREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) — Green Bay Packers running back Josh Jacobs was released from a Wisconsin jail on Wednesday while authorities further investigate allegations of domestic abuse.
Jacobs was arrested Tuesday in Brown County on allegations of strangulation and suffocation and other offenses over the weekend. His lawyers said he denies wrongdoing.
District Attorney David Lasee said it’s too soon to make a formal charging decision.
“Our office has requested additional investigation, as there is reason to believe that additional evidence may exist that would impact whether criminal charges are appropriate, and what charges would be issued. ... The investigation remains open and is ongoing,” Lasee said.
Jacobs’ lawyers — David Chesnoff, Richard Schonfeld and Clarence Duchac — said they’re pleased that he’s out of jail.
“We encourage everyone to keep an open mind while the matter is fully reviewed. We remain confident that, once all of the evidence is gathered and evaluated, it will confirm that no charges should be brought against Josh in the future,” they said.
Hobart/Lawrence Police Chief Michael Renkas said police responded to a complaint about Jacobs around 8:30 a.m. Saturday.
Jacobs is the Packers’ top returning rusher after running for 929 yards and 13 touchdowns in 2025. That followed a 2024 season in which he ran for 1,329 yards and 15 touchdowns while earning his third Pro Bowl selection.
The Packers, who started organized team activities this week, had issued a statement Tuesday saying that they were aware of the matter and that “as it is an ongoing legal situation, we will withhold further comment.”
“I know there’s going to be a lot of questions about Josh,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said before the Packers’ practice on Wednesday. “I’m going to stick with the statement that we put out as an organization and just let the process play out.”
LaFleur declined comment on his reaction to the arrest, how he addressed the matter with the team and whether the Packers had communicated at all with Jacobs over the past few days. He also was asked about whether he has to prepare for the possibility the Packers might have to play part of the season without Jacobs.
“I think a lot’s going to happen between now and then,” LaFleur said.
The Packers canceled a scheduled post-practice availability for reporters with players Wednesday.
Jacobs, 28, has rushed for 7,803 yards and 74 touchdowns in his seven-year career, which included five seasons with the Raiders. He earned All-Pro honors and had an NFL-leading 1,653 yards rushing with Las Vegas in 2022.
The only active players with more career touchdown runs are Baltimore’s Derrick Henry (122) and Buffalo’s Josh Allen (79).
Green Bay lacks proven running backs aside from Jacobs.
The Packers’ second-leading rusher last season was Emanuel Wilson, who has since signed with the Seattle Seahawks. The Packers didn’t draft any running backs this year.
Green Bay’s second-leading returning rusher is quarterback Jordan Love, who ran for 199 yards last season. The Packers did re-sign running back Chris Brooks, who rushed for 106 yards on 27 carries last season and ran for 183 yards and a touchdown on 36 attempts in 2024.
MarShawn Lloyd, a 2024 third-round pick from Southern California, didn’t play at all last year and appeared in only one game as a rookie because of injuries.
“I think he’s done everything he can in his power to put him in the best possible position,” LaFleur said of Lloyd. “He’s just going to have to go out there and prove it.”
Other running backs on Green Bay’s roster include Damien Martinez, Pierre Strong and rookie undrafted free agent Jaden Nixon.
Minnesota
Don Lemon seeks grand jury transcripts in civil rights case, citing misconduct
Attorneys for former CNN host turned independent journalist Don Lemon argued in a court filing Wednesday that recent examples of grand jury misconduct by the U.S. Department of Justice across the country warrant the release of transcripts from the normally secretive proceedings in his case.
Lemon pleaded not guilty in February to federal civil rights charges, following a protest at a Minnesota church where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor. He is one of 39 people charged in the January incident.
Lemon insists he was at the Cities Church in St. Paul to chronicle the Jan. 18 protest but was not a participant.
Lemon and another independent journalist, Georgia Fort, filed a motion in February seeking transcripts of the grand jury proceedings that resulted in the indictments against them and seven others.
In the latest filing in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis, Lemon’s attorneys argue that “the past 15 months have seen an unprecedented and growing distrust in the Justice Department’s use of the grand jury process.” For that reason, the transcripts from Lemon’s grand jury should be released, his attorneys said.
“In the past two weeks alone, several courts have chastised Justice Department prosecutors for irregularities in the grand jury process and gone so far as to dismiss indictments for grand jury misconduct,” Lemon’s attorneys said in the Wednesday filing.
A spokesperson for the Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Lemon cites the May 21 dismissal of all pending charges against four remaining activists who protested outside a federal building during last year’s immigration crackdown in Chicago. The dismissal came after a judge scrutinized allegations of grand jury misconduct by the prosecutor’s office.
Lemon also cites the May 15 dismissal of nine felony grand jury indictments by three federal judges in Wyoming. The judges cited misconduct by the interim U.S. attorney that could have prejudiced the jurors, including comments he made to the grand jurors.
Lemon cites a third case out of Rhode Island where a federal judge on May 13 blocked the Trump administration’s sweeping demands for confidential transgender patient information from the state’s largest hospital that provides gender-affirming care to minors.
In that case, the judge rebuked actions by prosecutors, saying the Justice Department can no longer be trusted to enforce its power fairly and honestly.
Finally, Lemon’s attorneys referenced the denial of search warrants sought by the Justice Department related to Lemon’s YouTube channel and YouTube account and cellphone information related to four other defendants. The magistrate judge held that the government did not establish probable cause to believe that evidence of a crime would be found in what the Justice Department wanted to search.
The search warrants were rejected in February, but the court record was unsealed on Tuesday.
Several judges — including the chief federal judge for Minnesota — found no probable cause to support the complaints that prosecutors first tried to file against the two journalists, so they refused to sign arrest warrants for Lemon or Fort before the government turned to the grand jury.
Lemon’s attorneys argue they should be allowed to see the grand jury records because of the “checkered history of this case” and “numerous examples of grand jury misconduct by DOJ around the country.”
Lemon is “entitled to see whether the government allowed the grand jury to serve its role or whether, as elsewhere, the government interfered with the proper function of the grand jury,” his attorneys argued.
Austria
Court finds man guilty in plot to attack Taylor Swift concert in Austria
WIENER NEUSTADT, Austria (AP) — An Austrian court on Thursday convicted a man of planning to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna nearly two years ago.
The state court in Wiener Neustadt found the 21-year-old defendant, an Austrian citizen known only as Beran A. in line with Austrian privacy rules, guilty on charges including those related to the concert, the Austria Press Agency reported.
The concert plot was thwarted, but Austrian authorities still canceled Swift’s three performances in August 2024.
Beran A. allegedly planned to target people outside the Ernst Happel Stadium with knives or homemade explosives. Tens of thousands of Taylor Swift fans, known as Swifties, had traveled to Austria to attend the performances of the American singer’s record-setting Eras Tour.
Beran A. also allegedly networked with other members of the Islamic State group ahead of the planned attack. Prosecutors have said they discussed purchasing weapons and making bombs, and that the defendant also sought to illegally buy weapons in the days ahead of the performance, as well as swearing allegiance to the militant group.
Federal judge sentences man to 10 years in plot to kill Iranian American writer
NEW YORK (AP) — A former truck and bus driver charged in an assassination plot against an Iranian American writer who authorities said was targeted for death by the Iranian government was given a 10-year prison sentence on Wednesday by a federal judge.
The judge, Lewis J. Liman, sentenced Jonathan Loadholt, 37, of Staten Island, in Manhattan federal court after he pleaded guilty to conspiracies to commit stalking and launder money in an attack plot that targeted Masih Alinejad in Brooklyn in 2024.
James Barnacle, head of New York’s FBI office, said in a release that Loadholt was tasked by the government of Iran to surveil Alinejad and eventually assassinate her, but the FBI arrested him first.
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said Loadholt was a U.S. citizen driven by greed to kill Alinejad.
Clayton said the government of Iran “tried to silence Ms. Alinejad because of her efforts to stand up to the Iranian regime and expose its discriminatory treatment of women, corruption, and human rights abuses.”
In court papers, lawyers for Loadholt requested leniency, saying “a reckless and senseless decision made at the behest of a friend cost him his job, his freedom, and years with his family he will never get back.”
They also wrote that Loadholt was never asked to commit murder and was largely kept in the dark about the true plan for the surveillance he was asked to carry out, although they acknowledged that he “clearly understood the potential for serious violence.”
In a letter to the judge, Loadholt said he was “very ashamed.”
“It was wrong on every level,” he said.
In January, Loadholt’s friend, Carlisle Rivera, apologized in court before he was sentenced to 15 years in prison in the plot.
Alinejad left Iran in 2009 following the country’s disputed presidential election and moved to the United States, where she launched online campaigns to encourage Iranian women to pose for pictures and videos showing their hair in defiance of a religious rule requiring headscarves.
An author and contributor to the Voice of America and CBS News, Alinejad became a citizen in 2019. She has traveled the world speaking to women and encouraging others to join her movement for women’s freedom of expression, particularly those in Iran.
Last year she testified at the trial of two men charged with plotting to kidnap her from her Brooklyn home and kill her in 2022. A prosecutor said Iran put a $500,000 bounty on her head. The defendants, both natives of Azerbaijan, were convicted and sentenced to 25 years.
Wisconsin
Packers’ running back released from jail as prosecutors weigh filing charges
GREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) — Green Bay Packers running back Josh Jacobs was released from a Wisconsin jail on Wednesday while authorities further investigate allegations of domestic abuse.
Jacobs was arrested Tuesday in Brown County on allegations of strangulation and suffocation and other offenses over the weekend. His lawyers said he denies wrongdoing.
District Attorney David Lasee said it’s too soon to make a formal charging decision.
“Our office has requested additional investigation, as there is reason to believe that additional evidence may exist that would impact whether criminal charges are appropriate, and what charges would be issued. ... The investigation remains open and is ongoing,” Lasee said.
Jacobs’ lawyers — David Chesnoff, Richard Schonfeld and Clarence Duchac — said they’re pleased that he’s out of jail.
“We encourage everyone to keep an open mind while the matter is fully reviewed. We remain confident that, once all of the evidence is gathered and evaluated, it will confirm that no charges should be brought against Josh in the future,” they said.
Hobart/Lawrence Police Chief Michael Renkas said police responded to a complaint about Jacobs around 8:30 a.m. Saturday.
Jacobs is the Packers’ top returning rusher after running for 929 yards and 13 touchdowns in 2025. That followed a 2024 season in which he ran for 1,329 yards and 15 touchdowns while earning his third Pro Bowl selection.
The Packers, who started organized team activities this week, had issued a statement Tuesday saying that they were aware of the matter and that “as it is an ongoing legal situation, we will withhold further comment.”
“I know there’s going to be a lot of questions about Josh,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said before the Packers’ practice on Wednesday. “I’m going to stick with the statement that we put out as an organization and just let the process play out.”
LaFleur declined comment on his reaction to the arrest, how he addressed the matter with the team and whether the Packers had communicated at all with Jacobs over the past few days. He also was asked about whether he has to prepare for the possibility the Packers might have to play part of the season without Jacobs.
“I think a lot’s going to happen between now and then,” LaFleur said.
The Packers canceled a scheduled post-practice availability for reporters with players Wednesday.
Jacobs, 28, has rushed for 7,803 yards and 74 touchdowns in his seven-year career, which included five seasons with the Raiders. He earned All-Pro honors and had an NFL-leading 1,653 yards rushing with Las Vegas in 2022.
The only active players with more career touchdown runs are Baltimore’s Derrick Henry (122) and Buffalo’s Josh Allen (79).
Green Bay lacks proven running backs aside from Jacobs.
The Packers’ second-leading rusher last season was Emanuel Wilson, who has since signed with the Seattle Seahawks. The Packers didn’t draft any running backs this year.
Green Bay’s second-leading returning rusher is quarterback Jordan Love, who ran for 199 yards last season. The Packers did re-sign running back Chris Brooks, who rushed for 106 yards on 27 carries last season and ran for 183 yards and a touchdown on 36 attempts in 2024.
MarShawn Lloyd, a 2024 third-round pick from Southern California, didn’t play at all last year and appeared in only one game as a rookie because of injuries.
“I think he’s done everything he can in his power to put him in the best possible position,” LaFleur said of Lloyd. “He’s just going to have to go out there and prove it.”
Other running backs on Green Bay’s roster include Damien Martinez, Pierre Strong and rookie undrafted free agent Jaden Nixon.
Minnesota
Don Lemon seeks grand jury transcripts in civil rights case, citing misconduct
Attorneys for former CNN host turned independent journalist Don Lemon argued in a court filing Wednesday that recent examples of grand jury misconduct by the U.S. Department of Justice across the country warrant the release of transcripts from the normally secretive proceedings in his case.
Lemon pleaded not guilty in February to federal civil rights charges, following a protest at a Minnesota church where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor. He is one of 39 people charged in the January incident.
Lemon insists he was at the Cities Church in St. Paul to chronicle the Jan. 18 protest but was not a participant.
Lemon and another independent journalist, Georgia Fort, filed a motion in February seeking transcripts of the grand jury proceedings that resulted in the indictments against them and seven others.
In the latest filing in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis, Lemon’s attorneys argue that “the past 15 months have seen an unprecedented and growing distrust in the Justice Department’s use of the grand jury process.” For that reason, the transcripts from Lemon’s grand jury should be released, his attorneys said.
“In the past two weeks alone, several courts have chastised Justice Department prosecutors for irregularities in the grand jury process and gone so far as to dismiss indictments for grand jury misconduct,” Lemon’s attorneys said in the Wednesday filing.
A spokesperson for the Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Lemon cites the May 21 dismissal of all pending charges against four remaining activists who protested outside a federal building during last year’s immigration crackdown in Chicago. The dismissal came after a judge scrutinized allegations of grand jury misconduct by the prosecutor’s office.
Lemon also cites the May 15 dismissal of nine felony grand jury indictments by three federal judges in Wyoming. The judges cited misconduct by the interim U.S. attorney that could have prejudiced the jurors, including comments he made to the grand jurors.
Lemon cites a third case out of Rhode Island where a federal judge on May 13 blocked the Trump administration’s sweeping demands for confidential transgender patient information from the state’s largest hospital that provides gender-affirming care to minors.
In that case, the judge rebuked actions by prosecutors, saying the Justice Department can no longer be trusted to enforce its power fairly and honestly.
Finally, Lemon’s attorneys referenced the denial of search warrants sought by the Justice Department related to Lemon’s YouTube channel and YouTube account and cellphone information related to four other defendants. The magistrate judge held that the government did not establish probable cause to believe that evidence of a crime would be found in what the Justice Department wanted to search.
The search warrants were rejected in February, but the court record was unsealed on Tuesday.
Several judges — including the chief federal judge for Minnesota — found no probable cause to support the complaints that prosecutors first tried to file against the two journalists, so they refused to sign arrest warrants for Lemon or Fort before the government turned to the grand jury.
Lemon’s attorneys argue they should be allowed to see the grand jury records because of the “checkered history of this case” and “numerous examples of grand jury misconduct by DOJ around the country.”
Lemon is “entitled to see whether the government allowed the grand jury to serve its role or whether, as elsewhere, the government interfered with the proper function of the grand jury,” his attorneys argued.
Austria
Court finds man guilty in plot to attack Taylor Swift concert in Austria
WIENER NEUSTADT, Austria (AP) — An Austrian court on Thursday convicted a man of planning to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna nearly two years ago.
The state court in Wiener Neustadt found the 21-year-old defendant, an Austrian citizen known only as Beran A. in line with Austrian privacy rules, guilty on charges including those related to the concert, the Austria Press Agency reported.
The concert plot was thwarted, but Austrian authorities still canceled Swift’s three performances in August 2024.
Beran A. allegedly planned to target people outside the Ernst Happel Stadium with knives or homemade explosives. Tens of thousands of Taylor Swift fans, known as Swifties, had traveled to Austria to attend the performances of the American singer’s record-setting Eras Tour.
Beran A. also allegedly networked with other members of the Islamic State group ahead of the planned attack. Prosecutors have said they discussed purchasing weapons and making bombs, and that the defendant also sought to illegally buy weapons in the days ahead of the performance, as well as swearing allegiance to the militant group.
