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Will Utah State or Boise State forfeit vs. San Jose State in the Mountain West semifinals?NEW YORK (AP) — A judge on Wednesday found New York City in contempt for failing to staunch violence and brutality at its jails, a scathing ruling that puts the troubled Rikers Island jail complex on the verge of a federal takeover. In a written decision, U.S. District Judge Laura Taylor Swain in Manhattan said the city had placed incarcerated people in “unconstitutional danger” by failing to comply with 18 separate provisions of court orders pertaining to security, staffing, supervision, use of force and the safety of young detainees. The long-squalid conditions have worsened significantly in the nine years since the city settled abuse and violence claims, she wrote, exacerbated by jail leadership's “unwillingness or inability” to implement ordered reforms. As a result, Swain ordered the city and lawyers suing on behalf of detainees to confer with a court-appointed monitor on a proposed framework for a federal receivership — an extraordinary intervention that would cede city control of one of the nation’s largest, most notorious jail systems. Mayor Eric Adams, who has vehemently opposed a federal takeover, said on Wednesday that the city had made “significant progress towards addressing the decades-long neglect and issues on Rikers Island.” “We are proud of our work, but recognize there is more to be done and look forward to working with the federal monitoring team on our shared goal of continuing to improve the safety of everyone in our jails,” his statement continued. But in her ruling, Swain found the administration's efforts were “insufficient to turn the tide within a reasonable period.” The city appears to have acted in bad faith at times in its failure to comply with court-ordered reforms, repeatedly “withholding essential information” from the monitor, she wrote. “The Court is inclined to impose a receivership: namely, a remedy that will make the management of the use of force and safety aspects of the Rikers Island jails ultimately answerable directly to the Court,” Swain wrote, ordering the sides to provide her by Jan. 14 a plan for an “efficient, effective receivership.” Under a federal receivership, control of some or all city jail functions would shift to a court-appointed receiver, streamlining decision making on things like staffing, contracts and policies while working to improve safety and compliance with ordered reforms. It would not involve a takeover by the Justice Department, nor would the city’s jails become part of the federal Bureau of Prisons. Swain's 65-page ruling stemmed from litigation that started more than a decade ago with allegations by a public defender organization, the Legal Aid Society, and others that the city’s Department of Correction had engaged in a pattern of excessive and unnecessary force. The Legal Aid Society and law firm Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP hailed the “historic decision” and said it “will finally create a pathway for reform that can protect those who have been failed" by jail leadership. "The court’s recognition that the current structure has failed, and that receivership free from political and other external influences is the path forward, can ensure that all New Yorkers, regardless of incarceration status, are treated with the respect and dignity guaranteed to them under the law,” they said. In a separate statement, Benny Boscio, the president of the union representing correction officers, claimed the ruling was based on an “erroneous narrative," adding that jail staff had been “defunded, short staffed, scapegoated and handcuffed” by city lawmakers and the federal monitor. For now, barring further action from Swain, the city remains in control of its jails. The jail complex, which is housed on a hard-to-reach island in the East River, has long suffered from rampant disorder and neglect. But rates of violence, use of force, self-harm, and deaths in custody in city jails have gotten “demonstrably worse” since the city and parties agreed in October 2015 to a settlement, consent decree and the appointment of a federal monitor, Swain said. “Worse still, the unsafe and dangerous conditions in the jails, which are characterized by unprecedented rates of use of force and violence, have become normalized despite the fact that they are clearly abnormal and unacceptable,” the judge wrote. Nineteen people died in custody at Rikers Island in 2022. Nine more died in 2023, and five died in the first eight months of this year. At the same time, rates of stabbings and slashings, fights, assaults on staff “remain extraordinarily high,” Swain said. There has been “no substantial reduction in the risk of harm currently facing those who live and work in the Rikers Island jails,” the judge wrote. Under a plan approved by the city council in 2019, New York City is legally required to shutter Rikers Island and replace it with four smaller and more modern jails by 2027. But as the jail population has grown in recent years, Adams, a Democrat, has voiced resistance to the closure, urging lawmakers to come up with a “Plan B.” Earlier this year, the city’s budget director acknowledged that officials would likely not meet the mandated deadline.
None'Dancing with the Stars' winner Joey Graziadei 'blacked out' when he got the MirrorballRobert Eggers ’ spectacular “ Nosferatu ” opens with several pronounced seconds of perfect, crypt-like blackness, as if the director were adjusting his audience’s eyes to see in the dark. But the film that follows — luminously ashen where too many recent movies and TV shows have just been irritatingly dim — is flooded with a moonlight so lucid and alive that even the story’s most stygian moments might as well have been set at high noon. For all of its exquisite darkness, this “ Nosferatu ” is never the least bit difficult to see. The reason for that is simple: Eggers doesn’t want us to see in the darkness, he wants us to see the darkness itself. To recognize it not as the absence of light, but rather as a feral and undying force all its own — one that we carry within ourselves like a secret corseted in virtue. Faithful as it might seem to F.W. Murnau’s 1922 “Nosferatu,” Eggers’ lush and rapturously psychosexual riff on the same material isn’t a simple remake so much as a seductive reverse shot. Where the earlier film climaxes by casting the silhouette of a vampire against a solid wall, this new one starts by projecting the same image across the soft white curtains of its heroine’s bedroom window, as young Ellen Hutter’s ( Lily-Rose Depp ) midnight prayer for “a spirit of comfort” is answered by a hunger so close at hand that its appetite seems to be rooted within her own heart. Or perhaps the call is emanating from somewhere else in her body, as Ellen comes to the voice as much as it comes to her. The prologue might end with a paroxysm of violence, but first there are a few timid whimpers of nascent pleasure; Bill Skarsgård’s base and primal Count Orlok is a nightmare who arrives on the wings of a nocturnal emission. Despite Orlok’s prosthetic decrepitude and the plague-like toxicity of his love, what truly horrifies Ellen about him is that some unknown part of her nature craves his touch. Ellen’s special friend will come to assume increasingly corporeal form as the movie goes on, and Eggers won’t be able to stop himself from paying more literal homage to Murnau’s most famous shot by the time it’s over, but it’s the human woman — not the slumbering monstrosity she awakens from afar — whose silhouette will consume this film’s attention. As compelled by the fear of the self as Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” (and Murnau’s unauthorized adaptation of it) was by the fear of the other, this Jungian twist on the formative vampire story keeps its villain shrouded in shade in order to illustrate how its heroine is merely shrouded in light; she’s a living shadow play whose true curse is belonging to a pre-Victorian society that sees female desire as its own form of darkness. Ellen’s only salvation, such as it is, is that she was born into a “Nosferatu” capable of seeing her darkness so clearly. Modern in its perspective yet fetishistically accurate to its time, Eggers’ horny-as-hell but highly repressed “Nosferatu” is nothing if not the version of this story you would expect him to make. Like “The Witch” before it, the film renders sin with a puritanical sense of mortal danger. Like “The Northman,” this ultra-sincere “Nosferatu” is a stylized fable that shirks off the simplicity of its plot with a visceral physicality. Like “The Lighthouse,” it features a deliriously happy Willem Dafoe as a pipe-smoking kook who says things like “The night demon has supped your good wife’s blood” with the enthusiasm of a character all too happy to have that chance. And like all of Eggers’ films, of which “Nosferatu” is the richest and most fully realized, it draws a spellbinding power from the friction it finds between historical social mores and the eternal human thirsts they exist to keep in check. If “Nosferatu” sinks its fangs a tiny bit deeper than any of the director’s previous work, perhaps that’s because it’s tinged with a degree of tragic cruelty that Eggers has yet to allow in his “original” material. In stark contrast to the settler heroine of “The Witch,” who takes at least some joy in accepting the devil’s bargain to live deliciously, Ellen yearns to find her peace within the patriarchy. Her first thought after signing a covenant with Orlok’s disembodied voice isn’t to seek out his crypt across the Carpathian Mountains, but rather to settle down with the most basic man in Wisborg, Germany circa 1838: middle-class estate agent Thomas Hutter (Nicholas Hoult), a handsome nobody whose cheekbones are higher than his wages. Ellen hopes that marrying Thomas will stop Orlok from calling out to her in the night, but her dear husband is equally seducible to his own simplest instincts. It’s Thomas whose ambition leads the vampire right to the Hutters’ front door, as his new boss — the bestial Herr Knock, played by a scenery and cast-chewing Simon McBurney — tasks him with journeying to Transylvania in order to finalize a real estate deal with a mysterious count from “an eccentric bloodline.” Providence? Ellen is the only person who seems to know better. “But he already has the job,” she whispers to the heavens after learning of Thomas’ audition-like first assignment, a throwaway moment that speaks volumes to what’s said and unsaid in their relationship. On the subject of that relationship, all we really know about it is that Ellen and Thomas seem to genuinely love each other — and that the children they intend to have one day would be born with jawlines sharper than any stake. There’s never any reason to think that a better husband would solve Ellen’s problems, in part because they share a palpably mutual attraction, even going so far as to make out on the floor of their rich friends’ mansion after a dinner party one evening (which seems like some pretty egregious PDA for the time period). Not that shipping magnate Friedrich Harding (a fantastically imperious Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and his wife Anna (Emma Corrin) would think twice if they caught their houseguests snogging in semi-public; Friedrich is a “rutting goat” of a man, and Anna seems to have accepted a nearly permanent state of pregnancy as the only affordable price for her pleasure. Ellen has a more complicated relationship with her unarticulated lust, which is really just the expression of all that she wants but lacks permission to ask from life. Eggers’ broadly suggestive script doesn’t put too fine a point on the specifics of Ellen’s repression (she identifies Orlok as the manifestation of her shame, and insists that she has no need for salvation), but Depp’s revelatory performance ensures that the rest of the movie doesn’t have to. Pouty but headstrong, possessed but clinging to what’s left of her power, Depp plays Ellen as a young woman so at war with the foreignness of her own unconscious that at one point her tongue threatens to detach itself from the rest of her face, as though the muscles of her body were attempting to escape through her mouth. Orlok’s influence overcomes Ellen in a series of Butoh-inspired seizures equal parts Linda Blair and Kazuo Ôno, and there’s no small irony to the remarkable self-control Depp has to display in order to so convincingly wrestle with her character’s darkness, which concentrates inside of the poor newlywed like a blood clot. Alas, Baltic Germany’s medical establishment (embodied here by Ralph Ineson’s Dr. Wilhelm Sievers) only knows to treat repression with repression. At one point he prescribes his increasingly “hysterical” patient an even tighter sleeping corset, as though a few bits of firm lace might be enough to suffocate the devil inside of her. Dafoe’s Professor Albin Eberhart Von Franz has other, more progressive ideas, but his stranger methods trend more towards the occult than they do to modernity. And what good would modernity really do for a woman whose lifeforce so violently chafes against patriarchal control? Needless to say, Orlok will make the trip to Wisborg — arriving in Germany like a plague, with Thomas all but crawling back home to his wife behind him — long before Western society will learn to accept that denying human desire is less a collective victory than a personal self-defeat. There isn’t time enough for that to happen in this movie, though Eggers certainly holds out for as long as he can. The filmmaker smears this wet pinprick of a story across 132 lavishly illustrated minutes, its plot spread thin but its atmosphere suffused with fresh details. Like any great fairy tale, “Nosferatu” demands a certain degree of surrender. Like too few of the films adapted from them, it earns that surrender with the strength of its craft. The morbidly enchanting sequence where Hutter arrives at the foot of Orlok’s castle — the weary traveler rescued by a self-driving carriage — is the best kind of indulgence, as Jarin Blaschke’s ultra-desaturated 35mm cinematography steeps us in the pallid splendor of this twilight world until death itself seems like a beauty worth savoring. I don’t get the impression that Eggers is much of a gamer, but few movies have ever come so close to capturing the feel of “Bloodborne” on the big screen. Wisborg isn’t especially vast, but the four city blocks that Eggers’ team created on a Prague soundstage are as evocative as a snow globe, and only seem to become more so whenever Ellen begins to shake. Eggers allows himself a handful of conventional horror scenes, but all of them — save for a few tedious bits highlighting Knock’s use to Orlok, and a “Last Voyage of the Demeter” sequence that’s short on fresh ideas — are enhanced by their extraordinary manipulation of shadow, which elevates standard jolts into a vivid dance between id and ego. (I can’t remember the last time a fake-out scare was so rewarding.) There’s hardly a millisecond of this movie that isn’t measuring the distance between people and the darkness they disavow within themselves, an effect so palpable that Orlok himself comes to feel somewhat irrelevant to the story he sets into motion. Eggers certainly loves the guy, and Skarsgård’s ultra-committed performance allows the film to enjoy a contagious pleasure in returning the vampire archetype to its more bestial origins. It also allows Eggers’ “Nosferatu” — a film more interested in psychic anxiety than sociopolitical prejudice — to untether its vampire from the anti-semitic tropes that Murnau’s version was forced to contend with. This Orlok is a more carnal force than ever before (it’s rare that we get to see Dracula’s flaccid dick), but whatever sex appeal his raw animalism and thick mustache might hold for certain audiences is offset by rotting back flesh and a general rejection of aristocratic charm. If the makeup is impressive, Skarsgård’s undead baritone is what most brings the undead character to life, his every word of dialogue sounding as though it’s just been rolled across the river Styx. If Skarsgård doesn’t make the same impression as Max Schreck, that’s largely because Eggers’ adaptation doesn’t give him much of a chance to emerge from the periphery. While reducing Orlok to an appetite is what allows “Nosferatu” to focus its energy on Ellen, the vampire is such a fantastic representation of Mrs. Hutter’s shadow that he struggles to take shape in her absence. Of course, that’s not the fatal flaw it might seem — not in a film so wholly enthralled by the question of where “evil” comes from, nor one so gloriously capable of illustrating why feeding our darkness is the best method we have of bringing it to light. Focus Features will release “Nosferatu” in theaters on Christmas Day . Want to stay up to date on IndieWire’s film reviews and critical thoughts? 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NEWARK, N.J. — Thirty-four days. In case anyone asks how long it takes to destroy a Stanley Cup contender, there’s your answer. It was 34 days ago that the New York Rangers beat the host Vancouver Canucks to improve to 12-4-1. Sure, they were flawed. Sure, they were relying on goaltending and special teams a bit too much. But they were still a contender. Advertisement A little over a month later, the visitors’ room at Prudential Center felt more funereal than it did after the Game 7 loss here in 2023, when the Rangers were shut out and bounced from the first round of the playoffs after a good season. “We gotta show more heart,” Vincent Trocheck said after Monday’s shutout, a 5-0 shelling from the Devils in which the Rangers mustered 12 shots on goal, gave up three power-play goals and scratched Chris Kreider , the closest thing this organization has to a Mr. Ranger. It’s a shocking thing to hear a player say about his team at any point in the season. It somehow feels more shocking given how the past month has gone. The Rangers hit the three-day holiday break losers of 14 of their past 18, and they’ve been uncompetitive in about six of them. “I think of the times we’ve lost by multiple goals, left our goalies out to dry,” Trocheck said. So does everyone else. Even the flawed 12-4-1 team played with some fire in the belly, hungry for goals on a talented team even if many of the players weren’t quite so committed to defending. Now the goals have dried up and the commitment to, well, anything, is just gone. The Rangers came into this one still leading the league on the penalty kill, so they went out and gave up three PPGs on four opportunities, two of them off too-many-men penalties in the second period. The Rangers’ once-vaunted power play went 0-for-4 to drop to 6-for-49 since early November. It’s all gone. Every last bit of it. Good play, fire, heart, dignity, togetherness — poof. In just over a month, the Rangers have become a team that’s easy to play against, even after a feisty first period in which Trocheck and Sam Carrick fought. They’re pushovers. And that’s all without addressing the Kreider situation. Watching him play Sunday, it sure looked like Kreider’s back, which caused him to miss three games back when general manager Chris Drury threw his name onto the NHL GMs group chat — you know, all the way back at Thanksgiving — is bothering him more than he or the Rangers are letting on. He was completely out of sorts, physically and mentally, in that loss to the Carolina Hurricanes. Advertisement But the Rangers said this was a coach’s decision, not injury-related. Whether that means Kreider is the next veteran out the door when the holiday roster freeze is lifted Friday remains to be seen. What doesn’t remain to be seen is how yet another long-serving Ranger is no longer an essential member of the team’s fraying core. “We need more,” coach Peter Laviolette said. “We’re not playing a brand of hockey we need to play in order to be successful, and he’s a guy we count on to help deliver that.” Kreider isn’t alone, of course. Mika Zibanejad went without a point for a seventh straight game and got 9:44 of five-on-five ice time, or just 10 seconds more than Adam Edström . Filip Chytil has three points in 11 games since he returned from a two-week absence. Alexis Lafrenière has one point in eight games and turned away from a scrum in the second period when you maybe wanted to see him engage more and show he wants to be part of the solution going forward. The next three days may bring some quiet, but it won’t last long. Laviolette’s job has seemed secure despite the month-long free fall, but that has to change at some point — each game seems to bring another way in which Laviolette’s players look like they’ve never played a game together. Monday’s was the pair of too-many-men penalties 7:42 apart, both of which turned into Devils power-play goals. Drury can shoulder plenty of the responsibility, too. It was his desire to break up the band barely 20 games into the season that kicked all this off. The players’ continued lack of fire and desire is surely front and center, too, as we’ve learned a bit too much about their collective mental state. But two things can be true: The Rangers’ players deserve to have their desire questioned, and the Rangers’ brass went about this hunger for change in a decidedly wrong way. Advertisement If it was the right move to throw Jacob Trouba ’s and Kreider’s names out there, wouldn’t they be playing better by now? And how can you keep altering the roster when the players you want to move are playing this poorly? Zibanejad needs a reset. Adam Fox played 26:09 and had three shots on goal, looking more like himself than he has for weeks, but he’s still not doing enough — Bobby Orr might not be able to light a fire under this offense. Trocheck, Will Cuylle , Ryan Lindgren , Braden Schneider — players who have had plenty of heart over their Ranger runs — have run out of gas lately. Artemi Panarin got in a wrestling match with Timo Meier in the first period and stepped in when Lafrenière tussled with Jonathan Kovacevic and said a “reload” is necessary for this group. “It feels like we have extra weight in our skates right now,” Panarin said. “I can’t say no one’s not trying, it’s just like everything feels much harder than (for) other teams.” There’s no path to it getting any easier. After the break, the Rangers face the Tampa Bay Lightning and Florida Panthers on the road, host the Boston Bruins , play the Washington Capitals on the road, come back home for the Dallas Stars and Devils, then head back out to face the Vegas Golden Knights and Colorado Avalanche . More games like Monday’s in the next month and Long Island native James Hagens, the projected No. 1 pick, suddenly could be on the Rangers’ radar. Thirty-four days. Way back then, Ranger players and their coach and their fans were talking about whether the team could get over the hump finally and reach a Stanley Cup Final. Now everyone’s wondering who gets moved next and how many spins you get on Tankathon to see if they can win the draft lottery. Never has an NHL team fallen this far this fast. And after the break, there’s still such a long way to go. (Top photo: Ed Mulholland / USA Today)
INVESCO Ltd. stock rises Friday, still underperforms marketSaquon Barkley is the NFL's version of Shohei Ohtani: AnalysisThree long days of counting in the General Election finished late on Monday night when the final two seats were declared in the constituency of Cavan-Monaghan. Fianna Fail was the clear winner of the election, securing 48 of the Dail parliament’s 174 seats. Sinn Fein took 39 and Fine Gael 38. Labour and the Social Democrats both won 11 seats; People Before Profit-Solidarity took three; Aontu secured two; and the Green Party retained only one of its 12 seats. Independents and others accounted for 21 seats. The return of a Fianna Fail/Fine Gael-led coalition is now highly likely. However, their combined seat total of 86 leaves them just short of the 88 needed for a majority in the Dail. While the two centrist parties that have dominated Irish politics for a century could look to strike a deal with one of the Dail’s smaller centre-left parties, such as the Social Democrats or Labour, a more straightforward route to a majority could be achieved by securing the support of several independent TDs. For Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin and current taoiseach and Fine Gael leader Simon Harris, wooing like-minded independents would be likely to involve fewer policy concessions, and financial commitments, than would be required to convince another party to join the government benches. Longford-Westmeath independent TD Kevin “Boxer” Moran, who served in a Fine Gael-led minority government between 2017 and 2020, expressed his willingness to listen to offers to join the new coalition in Dublin. “Look, my door’s open,” he told RTE. “Someone knocks, I’m always there to open it.” Marian Harkin, an independent TD for Sligo-Leitrim, expressed her desire to participate in government as she noted that Fianna Fail and Fine Gael were within “shouting distance” of an overall majority. “That means they will be looking for support, and I certainly will be one of those people who will be speaking to them and talking to them and negotiating with them, and I’m looking forward to doing that, because that was the reason that I ran in the first place,” she said. Meanwhile, the Social Democrats and Irish Labour Party both appear cautious about the prospect of an alliance with Fianna Fail and Fine Gael. They will no doubt be mindful of the experience of the Green Party, the junior partner in the last mandate. The Greens experienced near wipeout in the election, retaining only one of their 12 seats. Sinn Fein appears to currently have no realistic route to government, given Fianna Fail and Fine Gael’s ongoing refusal to share power with the party. Despite the odds being stacked against her party, Sinn Fein president Mary Lou McDonald contacted the leaders of the Social Democrats and Labour on Monday to discuss options. Earlier, Fianna Fail deputy leader and outgoing Finance Minister Jack Chambers predicted that a new coalition government would not be in place before Christmas. Mr Chambers said planned talks about forming an administration required “time and space” to ensure that any new government will be “coherent and stable”. After an inconclusive outcome to the 2020 election, it took five months for Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and the Greens to strike the last coalition deal. Mr Chambers said he did not believe it would take that long this time, as he noted the Covid-19 pandemic was a factor in 2020, but he also made clear it would not be a swift process. He said he agreed with analysis that there was no prospect of a deal before Christmas. “I don’t expect a government to be formed in mid-December, when the Dail is due to meet on December 18, probably a Ceann Comhairle (speaker) can be elected, and there’ll have to be time and space taken to make sure we can form a coherent, stable government,” he told RTE. “I don’t think it should take five months like it did the last time – Covid obviously complicated that. But I think all political parties need to take the time to see what’s possible and try and form a stable government for the Irish people.” Fine Gael minister of state Peter Burke said members of his parliamentary party would have to meet to consider their options before giving Mr Harris a mandate to negotiate a new programme for government with Fianna Fail. “It’s important that we have a strong, stable, viable government, whatever form that may be, to ensure that we can meet the challenges of our society, meet the challenges in terms of the economic changes that are potentially going to happen,” he told RTE. Despite being set to emerge with the most seats, it has not been all good news for Fianna Fail. The party’s outgoing Health Minister Stephen Donnelly became one of the biggest casualties of the election when he lost his seat in Wicklow in the early hours of Monday morning. Mr Donnelly was always predicted to face a fight in the constituency after boundary changes saw it reduced from five to four seats. If it is to be a reprise of the Fianna Fail/Fine Gael governing partnership of the last mandate, one of the major questions is around the position of taoiseach and whether the parties will once again take turns to hold the Irish premiership during the lifetime of the new government. The outcome in 2020 saw the parties enter a coalition on the basis that the holder of the premier position would be exchanged midway through the term. Fianna Fail leader Mr Martin took the role for the first half of the mandate, with Leo Varadkar taking over in December 2022. Current Fine Gael leader Mr Harris succeeded Mr Varadkar as taoiseach when he resigned from the role earlier this year. However, this time Fianna Fail has significantly increased its seat lead over Fine Gael, compared with the last election when there were only three seats between the parties. The size of the disparity in party numbers is likely to draw focus on the rotating taoiseach arrangement, raising questions as to whether it will be re-run in the next coalition and, if it is, on what terms. On Sunday, Simon Coveney, a former deputy leader of Fine Gael, said a coalition that did not repeat the rotating taoiseach arrangement in some fashion would be a “difficult proposition” for his party. Meanwhile, Fine Gael minister Paschal Donohoe said he would be making the case for Mr Harris to have another opportunity to serve as taoiseach. On Monday, Mr Chambers said while his party would expect to lead the government it would approach the issue of rotating the taoiseach’s role on the basis of “mutual respect” with Fine Gael. “I think the context of discussions and negotiations will be driven by mutual respect, and that’s the glue that will drive a programme for government and that’s the context in which we’ll engage,” he said. On Monday, Labour leader Ivana Bacik reiterated her party’s determination to forge an alliance with fellow centre-left parties with the intention of having a unified approach to the prospect of entering government. Asked if Labour was prepared to go into government with Fianna Fail and Fine Gael on its own, she told RTE: “No, not at this stage. We are absolutely not willing to do that. “We want to ensure there’s the largest number of TDs who share our vision and our values who want to deliver change on the same basis that we do.” The Social Democrats have been non-committal about any potential arrangement with Fianna Fail and Fine Gael, and have restated a series of red lines they would need to achieve before considering taking a place in government. Leader Holly Cairns, who gave birth to a daughter on polling day on Friday, said in a statement: “The party is in a very strong position to play an important role in the next Dail. In what position, government or opposition, remains to be seen.” Fianna Fail secured the most first preference votes in Friday’s proportional representation election, taking 21.9% to Fine Gael’s 20.8%. Sinn Fein came in third on 19%. While Sinn Fein’s vote share represented a marked improvement on its disappointing showing in June’s local elections in Ireland, it is still significantly down on the 24.5% poll-topping share it secured in the 2020 general election. The final breakdown of first preferences also flipped the result of Friday night’s exit poll, which suggested Sinn Fein was in front on 21.1%, with Fine Gael on 21% and Fianna Fail on 19.5%.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — The United Nations raised the death toll of a recent massacre in which dozens of older people and Vodou religious leaders were killed by a gang in Haiti, and called on officials to bring the perpetrators to justice. The U.N. Integrated Office in Haiti said in a report published on Monday that between Dec. 6 and 11 more than 207 people were killed by the Wharf Jeremie gang. The gang took people from their homes and from a place of worship, interrogated them and then executed them with bullets and machetes. Earlier this month, human rights groups in Haiti had estimated that more than 100 people were killed in the massacre, but the new U.N. investigation doubles the number of victims. “We cannot pretend that nothing happened” said María Isabel Salvador, the U.N. secretary-general’s special representative in Haiti. “I call on the Haitian justice system to thoroughly investigate these horrific crimes and arrest and punish the perpetrators, as well as those who support them," she said in a statement. Human rights groups in Haiti said the massacre began after the son of Micanor Altès, the leader of the Wharf Jeremie gang, died from an illness. The Cooperative for Peace and Development, a human rights group, said that according to information circulating in the community, Altès accused people in the neighborhood of causing his son’s illness. “He decided to cruelly punish all elderly people and (Vodou) practitioners who, in his imagination, would be capable of casting a bad spell on his son,” the group said in a statement released shortly after news of the massacre emerged. In Monday's report, the United Nations said that people were tracked down in their homes and in a place of worship by Altès’ gang, where they were first interrogated and then taken to an execution site. The United Nations said that the gang tried to erase evidence of the killings by burning bodies, or by dismembering them and throwing them into the sea. The massacre is the latest humanitarian tragedy in Haiti, where gang violence has intensified since the nation’s president was killed in a 2021 coup attempt . Haiti has struggled to organize an election that will fill the power vacuum and restore democratic rule. The Caribbean nation is currently governed by a transitional council that includes representatives from the business community, civil society and political parties, but its government has no control over many areas of the capital city, and gangs are constantly fighting over ports, highways and neighborhoods. According to the United Nations, more than 5,350 people have been killed in Haiti’s gang wars this year. The Haitian government acknowledged the massacre against older people in a statement issued earlier this month, and promised to persecute those responsible for this act of “unspeakable carnage.”To list your event here, email it to news@clintonherald.com or mail it to the Clinton Herald, P.O. Box 1243, Clinton, IA 52732. Additional events can be viewed at clintonherald.com/events Trivia , 6 p.m., AMVETS Club, 1317 South 17th St. $1 to play. Scalloped potatoes and ham served at a cost of $5, 5-6 p.m. Wa-Tan-Ye club meeting , social at 5:30 p.m., dinner at 6 p.m., meeting at 7 p.m., Sarah Harding Senior Living Community Room. Turkey, Turkey, Turkey Talk , 2 p.m., Camanche Public Library. Clinton County Conservation program all about turkeys and their unique characteristics. Presentation is for all ages. Friends of Rock Creek meeting , 6 p.m., Rock Creek. Volunteer group to help make a difference at Rock Creek! For more information, email hedfors@clintoncounty-ia.gov . The Victory Center's Great Thanksgiving Banquet , 6:30 p.m., Yourd Gymnasium, Clinton High School. CPKC Holiday Train , 3:15-3:45 p.m. Viewing on the west end of Main Avenue at Grant Street. Performances by American Authors and KT Tunstall. Arrive early to see flying elves. Non-perishable food or cash donations requested. Symphony of Lights Family Walk , $5 per person, 5:30-8 p.m., Eagle Point Park. Free community meal , 5:30-6:15 p.m., CrossView Church, 704 14th Ave., Fulton, Illinois. Menu includes creamy potato and chicken noodle soups, crackers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and pumpkin pie with Cool Whip. Symphony of Lights begins 6-9 p.m. Monday through Friday and 5-9 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays through Dec. 30. Funtime Friday: Getting ready for Santa , 10:30 a.m., Felix Adler Children's Discovery Center, 332 8th Ave. S., Clinton. Help needed to decorate trees and get the center ready for Santa's visit on Saturday Iowa Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame Showcase concert featuring Bowman, Pickney & Evans and Johnny Trash, 7 p.m., Wild Rose Casino & Resort. Tickets start at $10 in advance and will increase to $20 on the day of the show. Tickets may be purchased at the Iowa Store Box Office inside the casino or online at wildroseresorts.com . Cash bars will be available. Must be 21 years of age or older to attend. Small Business Saturday , Downtown Clinton, the Lyons District, and Fulton, Illinois, businesses. Milk & Cookies with Santa , 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Felix Adler Children's Discovery Center, 332 8th Ave. S., Clinton. Christmas-themed crafts can be made at the workshop. Miss Clinton County Autumn Fjeld and friends also to attend. Scott for Tots drive-up toy drop-off , noon until 4 p.m., After Hours Motorcycle Shop, 218 North Second St. Candle sale by MercyOne Auxiliary, 10 a.m. until sold out in the MercyOne lobby as well as in the MercyOne North Health Plaza lobby. "After Five" meets, 6:30 p.m., United Methodist Church, 502 First Ave., Albany, Illinois. All women are invited to sing Christmas carols and hear inspirational speaker Bea Ingersoll who presents "Finding Joy on Life's Journey. The cost of dinner is $14. Make reservations by Friday, Nov. 29, by calling Carolene Sterenberg at (563) 212-5528. Wolves and Wild Lands exhibit on display through Dec. 27 at the Mississippi River Eco Tourism Center, Camanche. The display from the International Wolf Center is composed of six preserved taxidermy specimens. Call the Conservation Office at (563) 847-7202 for viewing hours. Free community meal , 5:30-6:15 p.m., CrossView Church, 704 14th Ave., Fulton, Illinois. Menu includes chicken and noodles, rolls, green beans, Cuties oranges, and scotcheroos. The Gathering Place , for senior citizens, 1-4 p.m., First United Presbyterian Church, 400 Fifth Ave. South. Beverages and games are provided. There is no cost. Guests may come and go as they please. Enter from the rear parking lot on the north side of the building. Handicapped accessible. Fulton Christmas Walk , 5-7:30 p.m., Downtown Fulton, Illinois. Christmas Tree Lighting , 6 p.m., Downtown Clinton. Festival of Trees begins. Trees remain available for viewing through Dec. 15, 9-11 a.m. and 4-7 p.m. Monday through Friday, noon until 4 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays, Clinton County Historical Society Museum, 601 South First St. Brooke Bruggenwirth 2nd Annual Trivia , 5-9 p.m., Manny's Too, Fulton, Illinois. Think & Drink Entertainment will have questions on Home Alone and The Grinch. Sign up by contacting Scott Bailey at (563) 593-5242 or scottbailey84@gmail.com to reserve tables for teams of up to eight people at $10 per person. Live Window Walk , 5-7 p.m., Downtown DeWitt. Lighted parade , 5 p.m., starting North on South Sixth Ave. and ending at Lincoln Park for the lighting of the Christmas Tree, DeWitt. Symphony of Lights Craft & Vendor Fair , 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Eagle Point Park Lodge. Christmas in the Canyon , 12-6 p.m., Heritage Canyon, Fulton, Illinois. Lyons Winter Festival , including shopping deals, kids' activities, and Santa, 9-11 a.m., Lyons Business District. Bowling for Veterans , 3:30 p.m., Plaza Bowl. $25 per person in three-person teams for nine-pin bowling. All proceeds go toward benefiting veterans. Call (563) 243-3032 to reserve a spot. Painting for Peace , 11 a.m.-2 p.m., Rainbow Pottery, 231 Fifth Ave. South. Participants paint a ceramic piece. One item of $10 value is free for the first 20 attendees. The Bassment Band , 6-9 p.m., AMVETS Club, 1317 South 17th St. Symphony of Lights Craft & Vendor Fair , 11 a.m.-3 p.m., Eagle Point Park Lodge. Lyons Christmas Walk , 4-6 p.m., Lyons Business District. Pop-up Christmas item sale by MercyOne Auxiliary, 10 a.m., MercyOne North Health Plaza. Stonecroft Clinton Women's Connection invites all women to brunch, 9:30 a.m., Grace Community Church, formerly Community Reformed Church, 727 North 12th St. Music by The Clintones. Inspirational, non-denominational speaker Connie Beard speaks on "How to Handle the Unexpected." Cost is $13. Make reservations by calling Donna at (563) 357-6843 or Nancy at (563) 242-8819 or (563) 357-8859 by Friday, Dec. 6. Wild Winter Wednesday program in which Aaron Baker of the German American Heritage Center and Museum in downtown Davenport features Christmas celebrations and world myths of St. Nicholas. Event is free and open to the public. 9 a.m., Windmill Cultural Center, 111 10th Ave., Fulton, Illinois. The Gathering Place , for senior citizens, 1-4 p.m., First United Presbyterian Church, 400 Fifth Ave. South. Beverages and games are provided. There is no cost. Guests may come and go as they please. Enter from the rear parking lot on the north side of the building. Handicapped accessible. Holidays with the Symphony , 7:30 p.m., Zion Lutheran Church, 439 Third Ave. South. Breakfast served 8 a.m. until noon, AMVETS Club, 1317 South 17th St. Menu includes pancakes, biscuits and gravy, scrambled eggs, hash browns, bacon or sausage, cinnamon rolls, and juice, coffee, or a Bloody Mary bar for $9. The Gathering Place , for senior citizens, 1-4 p.m., First United Presbyterian Church, 400 Fifth Ave. South. Beverages and games are provided. There is no cost. Guests may come and go as they please. Enter from the rear parking lot on the north side of the building. Handicapped accessible. Breakfast with Santa , 8-10 a.m., Albany United Methodist Church, 502 First Ave., Albany, Illinois. No cost to attend for breakfast and take a photo with Santa, but donations accepted. All are welcome. Breakfast with Jesus , Albany United Methodist Church's Christmas Eve service beginning with a cooked breakfast in Fellowship Hall, followed by worship in the sanctuary, 9-10:30 a.m., 502 First Ave., Albany, Illinois. The Pork Tornadoes , 7:30 p.m., Wild Rose Casino & Resort. Standing tickets start at $15, seated tickets start at $20. Prices increase on the day of the show. Purchase tickets at the Iowa Store Gift Shop or online at wildroseresorts.com . Event is for 21 years old and older. Trivia , 6 p.m., AMVETS Club, 1317 South 17th St. $2 to play. Includes 50/50 drawing and drink specials. Brats or burgers with chips for $5 served 5-6 p.m. 37th MLK Celebration , 1:30-3 p.m., Clinton Community College. Clinton County Republican Central Committee meeting, 6 p.m., 513 South Third St. Non-members welcome to attend.
