Mississippi attorney general calls police shooting of one-year-old justified

Released footage showed five officers with guns drawn descending on a car

The Mississippi attorney general announced that the police shooting of one-year-old Kohen Wiley “was justified,” The Guardian reported on October 23. Wiley’s maternal grandmother, Veronica Roberson, said, “The word ‘justified’ has haunted me since Monday.” Family attorney Ben Crump called the leaked videos “slaps in the face.”

Footage of the shooting was made public. The video showed five officers with guns drawn descending on a car; two women were allegedly stealing a pack of diapers. Crump said, “We’re the most prosperous nation in the world and we’re going to draw guns to shoot people over misdemeanor allegations of baby diapers?”

The Guardian also reported that flu cases on the West Coast were rising months earlier than normal, prompting US health experts to stress the importance of the annual vaccine. Flu activity typically ramps up in December and hits its peak in February, but the season had kicked into action earlier this year. The American Medical Association said influenza vaccines can reduce severe illness and hospitalization and recommended flu shots for all people aged six months and older.

Looksmaxxing livestreamer Braden Peters, better known by the stage name Clavicular, pleaded not guilty the day before publication to charges that he raped a 17-year-old girl at his family’s Massachusetts home. Peters, 20, is known for promoting an extreme devotion to male beauty. He is accused of giving the girl alcohol until she was drunk and then sexually assaulting her, and Peters has denied the allegations.

A priceless pre-Second World War globe that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth coveted for his office in the Pentagon was damaged by his staff in a botched attempt to relocate it, The Guardian reported. Separately, a Florida police officer has been accused of stealing the house and identity of a man he found dead during a welfare check. The officer appeared in court on charges including official misconduct and criminal use of a deceased person’s identification.

The Guardian reported that research suggests heat killed a record 50,000 people in European cities this summer, with scientists blaming climate breakdown for two in every three deaths.

A study cited by The Guardian found that marine life in the Gulf of Mexico plummeted by about 60% after BP’s 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill and has still not fully recovered. An assessment by UN nature advisers found that almost every shallow-water coral reef on the planet faces a high risk of ecosystem collapse before 2075 because of global heating.

Donald Trump has said Google rejected his request to rename the Atlantic Ocean after himself or America, The Guardian reported. The outlet said Google had previously acceded to Trump’s demands, with locations labeled “Gulf of America” and “Lake America” for US users at the president’s request.

Mary Peltola, a Democratic Senate candidate, is the subject of a Guardian profile by Chris Stein, who has been in Anchorage, Alaska, to find out why. The profile noted that Alaska became the 49th state in 1959 and has supported a Democratic candidate in a presidential election only once since statehood. It said Democrats believe circumstances have aligned this year for them to win a slew of competitive elections in the state.

An appeal urged King Charles, described as a “human brother” whose family had benefited from slavery, to support reparations talks at a Caribbean summit, The Guardian reported. Separately, a select group of actors will screen-test this weekend to become the next James Bond, and Dune filmmaker Denis Villeneuve is set to direct the next installment of the 007 franchise for Amazon MGM Studios.

Tom Cruise appears as Digger Rockwell in a film Oliver Milman argued was bombastic and misanthropic but also the near-perfect climate change film for our era. Milman said the epic may have bombed at the box office. Danny Leigh interviewed Sandra Hüller, who is turning out to be the star of four – or, possibly, five – of the year’s biggest films, The Guardian reported.

Keith Stuart reviewed the latest installment of the blockbuster first-person shooter Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, finding that scenes in Manhattan, Paris and a North Korean airbase show that the developers had thrown everything at the game. He also gave a glowing review to Chappell Roan’s “gloriously gay mini-festival,” The Guardian reported.

LeBron James dismissed criticism from Donald Trump after the NBA superstar was filmed making apparent warm-up movements while lined up for the national anthem. Trump posted: “He’s no good, a TOTAL DISGRACE.” James’s response was: “It must be a slow news day at the office.”

In other legal reporting, a federal judge in California ordered the Trump administration to halt investigations in nine states into whether noncitizens are registered to vote. The judge found that the government’s effort was relying on data full of errors and was leading to intimidation of groups performing voter-assistance work, and said it should be halted until polls close on election day, 3 November. The Guardian said the order came as the administration searched for noncitizen voters throughout the country; the administration had signaled that the issue was widespread even as its own investigations showed the practice was rare.

Corey Lewandowski, a former political adviser to Donald Trump and top aide at the Department of Homeland Security, is under criminal investigation over allegations that he profited from his government role, The Guardian reported. The Justice Department has not yet issued subpoenas or other legal demands, and a lawyer for Lewandowski did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Guardian characterized the inquiry as a rare move against an ally of Trump, while noting that the Justice Department under Trump has investigated several prominent critics of the president, while investigations of people close to Trump have been rare.

Lewandowski served as a top aide to Kristi Noem during her tenure as homeland security secretary, The Guardian reported. One DHS official said Lewandowski allegedly signed some DHS contracts despite having questionable legal authority as a special government employee. Two other sources said certain grants and contracts, including those involving the Federal Emergency Management Agency, were put on hold at Lewandowski’s direction.

Donald Trump has been ordered by a US judge to cooperate with the discovery process mandated for his $10bn lawsuit against the BBC and to sit for a deposition by 11 December, The Guardian reported. Failure to comply could bring sanctions, including possible dismissal of the $10bn lawsuit.