SEC Dropping Bribery Case Against Former Cognizant Executives
The regulator and the two former executives — Gordon Coburn and Steven Schwartz — filed a joint motion Tuesday in New Jersey federal court to drop the case. The filing calls for dismissing the case with prejudice, meaning it can't be refiled.
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DOJ shuts down dark web child abuse sites that had 120,000 members
When FBI agents arrived outside William Spearman's home in the quiet suburb of Madison, Alabama, in November 2022, they were prepared for danger. Their search warrant was so important to the bureau that it was approved by the FBI director himself. When the agents breached Spearman's door with tactical explosives, Spearman fought back, tussling with the agents as three of his handguns remained barely out of reach. The FBI managed to handcuff and arrest Spearman, a high-value arrest, in what a top Justice Department official called "one of the most successful" prosecutions of its kind. Spearman went by the nickname "Boss" and was labeled by the Justice Department as "one of the most significant" purveyors of child sex abuse material in the world. His arrest in 2022, his guilty plea a year later and his eventual life sentence were part of an unprecedented takedown of a prodigious child abuse network. Spearman is one of at least 18 people convicted so far of leading and utilizing the dark web to share hundreds of thousands of unlawful sexually exploitative images of children. The Justice Department calls the investigation and prosecutions Operation Grayskull; it helped secure those arrests and shutter four heavily trafficked dark web sites where violent and horrific images of child sexual abuse were traded and housed. The Operation Grayskull investigation launched in 2020, when law enforcement agents noticed a spike in traffic to a dark web site suspected of hosting child abuse material. The dark web child abuse sites eventually attracted more than 120,000 members, millions of files and at least 100,000 visits in a single day, according to an FBI official who spoke with CBS News. "Even for prosecutors, it is difficult to understand how pervasive this is," said Matthew Galeotti, head of the Justice Department Criminal Division. "Because it happens on the dark web, people aren't aware of it. It's extremely troubling," he told CBS News. Spearman's case has parallels to many of the others unearthed by Operation Grayskull. Spearman was accused of helping lead a dark web site with thousands of users and members. A sentencing memo submitted to the court said it was "no wonder" that he had tried to resist the FBI, rather than surrendering. "The devices at his desk contained massive quantities of evidence proving that he was the lead administrator of Website A," the memo said. "Unsurprisingly, the defendant's devices also contained an enormous collection of images and videos depicting the rape and abuse of children." Selwyn Rosenstein was sentenced to 28 years in prison in 2022, for operating a dark website for unlawful exploitative images. Prosecutors said the platform "was not simply a website; it was a large, active community of pedophiles and (abuse material) enthusiasts. And it existed in part because of the Defendant's criminal acts." Rosenstein possessed such a large quantity of abusive images, he needed to store some on a server he used to run his business, according to the Justice Department. Speaking from a second floor conference room at Justice Department headquarters in Washington last week, Galeotti told CBS News the members of these dark web child abuse sites often "earn" membership by paying a fee, "helping moderate the site" or contributing child abuse images or material. Galeotti said, "We luckily have very sophisticated prosecutors and agents who work specifically on this kind of thing. These are people who have a more of a technical understanding." "The defendants in this case, as sadistic as they may be, are somewhat sophisticated," and make use of encryption, he added. Operation Grayskull also secured the conviction of Matthew Garrell of Raleigh, North Carolina, who was sentenced to 20 years in prison for operating on a dark web site for abuse material. "Garrell engaged in an extremely complex and technologically sophisticated conspiracy that far exceeds the typical child-exploitation offenses," prosecutors said. They argued in a court filing that Garrell possessed a predator's "handbook," with "detailed instructions" for grooming children for future abuse. The takedown of dark web leaders and users also included the convictions of men from Virginia, Maryland, Indiana, Texas, Washington, Arkansas, Michigan and Oklahoma. "They were part of an online community of hundreds of thousands of people, with leadership roles rules and a common dedicated purpose" said Chris Delzotto, an acting FBI deputy assistant director. Delzotto told CBS News, "Few people would have envisioned how (child abuse materials) would permeate the internet, the way it has today." The federal investigation which uncovered and shuttered the first dark web site, also led to the closure of three others. Abbigail Beccaccio, an FBI unit chief, told CBS News. "The leadership team that operated one of the sites also operated several of the others." The Justice Department is touting the shutdown of those sites as a victory to help deter future abuse or production of unlawful images. "This is one of the most successful of all time," Galeotti said. "We dismantled four websites that have not regenerated." "The Wizard of Oz" as you've never seen it before Tadej Pogačar wins his fourth Tour de France Ichiro Suzuki, CC Sabathia and Billy Wagner inducted into Baseball Hall of Fame
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A Drunk Driver Crashed Into Me. When I Woke Up, I Was A Completely Different Person.
On a Tuesday morning in 2006 in Dutchess County, New York, a woman ran out of beer. She was drunk at 10 a.m. but not as drunk as she wanted to be, so she stole a truck, procured a case of Bud, then crushed a parked car. I was in the parked car. EMTs pried me out. I woke up in a freezing room where techs were extracting sharp things from my skin. It was a Code 4 emergency, which means my life was threatened. Then it wasn't my life. The good news was that I survived. The bad news was brain damage. Years later, a neurologist said I suffered the same type of injury that former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords suffered when she was shot in the head. ,So were my legs and my arms and my feet. Post-truck, I was parked with trauma patients, rolling Play-Doh balls and pounding pegs in boards. We included a former physician, a former professor of psycholinguistics, a former custodian and a former owner of a kebab café. There's not much demand for brain-damaged writers. Since I couldn't comprehend — leave alone manage — business affairs, an attorney completed my last career financial transaction which was refunding a five-figure advance to a client known from Burundi to Beverly Hills. To pay mounting bills, he was forced to sell our home. This was all far above my new head. Movers I can't recall packed boxes I can't recall for a trip I could not wrap my head around. I landed in a sleepy southern town east of somewhere and west of somewhere else in a rambling wooden farmhouse peering out from tangled brush. It was nine hours south of my old life and my child. No trace of the move remains in my mind — it's like it didn't happen or I wasn't there. I rarely recalled I'd been moved to Virginia. This means I wondered if I should move to a place I already lived in, or leave a place I already left. My child stayed in college in New York while I spent one year in outpatient therapy. I relearned how to walk, how to talk, how to place my hands on a keyboard, how to read, how to write, how to make a cup of tea. Three years post-truck, the Social Security Disability Administration ruled my injuries were 'permanent and incurable.' Still, my daughter's 'diagnosis' was by far the worst. She said her mom disappeared. In my first life, I made sense of thousands of stories on global warming and lip gloss and sports bras and organized closets and candidates. Normal people do things like that, plus wake up, brush teeth, get dressed, eat breakfast, get kids to school, keep clients happy and clean dryer lint. It felt like I had been thrown from a plane. Then it felt like trying to piece together any remnants of the person I was before I was thrown out of the plane. And then? It kept feeling that way. Most of us lose people we love. I lost the person I was. Related: The author several years after the accident. Related: The new 'me' had never read books I loved, never shared favorite times with my child. They tested my brain hundreds of times and found lots of things bit the dust, like the file that encodes new memories, and the file that integrates physical movements so you don't fly down the steps or fall out of your chair. I lost what happened a minute ago, a page ago, a lifetime ago. This is called amnesia. Amnesia can take anything and make it disappear. Your child's first words. Your mom's last words. Mine came with a side of aphasia. That means I couldn't find the words I needed or put them together so they made sense. I said stuff like 'white stuff sky,' which meant snow, or 'cow thing pants' which meant belt or 'green thing dirt,' which meant plant. Words often seemed to start mid-sentence — and end there, too. There are three stages of making a memory: encoding (which means you learn something), consolidation (which means you store it), and recall (which means you can find it again). Learning was hard. Storing was hard. Recall was almost impossible. I was impaired and could not be repaired. A doctor told me so. There's an irony: The drunk woman who hit me was impaired, too. You may wonder if 'insurers' covered health care bills or compensated me for pain and suffering. The answer is no. The drunk driver had three prior DUIs and no longer had a license or insurance. Because she had stolen the truck she was driving, the owner's insurance didn't pay either. The car I was in was parked and I was waiting for the woman who owned it to return, so she was not at fault and her insurer didn't pay. As a result, most of the massive medical bills were paid by me, or rather the power of attorney on my behalf. Health insurance did not/does not cover motor vehicle accidents. I encountered a Catch-22 that removed me from outpatient rehab at the end of year one, which may or may not have been linked to insurance, too. Or, rather, lack of it. The head guy (pun intended) in neuro rehab decided I was both too screwed-up and not screwed-up enough to keep receiving help. If I were more screwed up, they could do something. If I were less screwed-up, they could do something. But I wasn't, so they couldn't. And, so, I relearned to read under the patient care of no one at all. I achieved mixed results. In year two post-accident, I began trying to read a book. I read the same pages for two years. At first, they meant nothing. Then they meant something, for a few seconds. If I began where I'd left off, say on page 5, and found a character was on a train, I had no idea why he was on it or where he was going. At the same time, I started scratching anything I could recall on any surface I could find — paper plates, paper cups, placemats, napkins, coffee stirrers and Popsicle sticks. I called them scraps. They were not in alphabetical order, not in numerical order, not in chronological order, but out of order, like me. I stuffed them in brown paper shopping bags and then stashed the bags in a closet. A few years ago, Google provided 115,000,000 ways to 'clear your mind.' These included clearing your mind of stress, clearing your mind of guilt, clearing your mind of clutter, clearing your mind of negative thoughts, clearing your cookies, clearing your cache, clearing your sinuses, and clearing your mind of all thought. I had. I also found 8,310,000 jokes about brain injury on Google. Plus, of course, in cartoons all over the planet, people like us are hilarious, especially when our skulls get smashed. Think baseball bats, rifle butts, and coconuts on craniums. The intact brain is amazing. The three-pound blob remembers the theme music for The Flintstones, the name of your fifth-grade French teacher, and your childhood phone number. But put it through a windshield at 70 miles an hour,r and then it's a crapshoot. You might remember something that happened a moment ago, or you might not. You might not walk or talk again. You might wake up as an entirely different person. Or you might never wake up. Seven years ago, I began attending a newly formed brain trauma group. One member, Daniel, 'came back' from two weeks in a coma. Daniel's counselor says that the 'old' Daniel is gone. The new Daniel has new frontal lobes and a new personality, as well as the wife of his former self and three kids he can't name. Another member, Mel, kept saying, 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry,' like he did something wrong. We were told most of us were in the program due to someone driving while drunk. A recent photo of the author. Brain trauma is not about the past: the successes, accomplishments, accolades. It's not even about losses. It's a muddy, rutty, hands and knees crawl up to the first rung of the ladder, and up each rung after that. There is no cure. I'm sharing this story not because I think it is exceptional, but because I know it is not. Many others with similar stories can't write because they're more disabled than I am or because they lost their lives. We all have plaque in our brain — some of us know it. Plaque can advance like armies in the night, taking more and more of us, leaving less and less. You take a detour when you see us coming, and think we don't notice, but we do. In 2021, the latest year for which there are numbers, the National Highway Safety Traffic Administration (NHSTA) reported 401,520 Americans were killed or injured due to someone driving while drunk. Also according to NHSTA, two out of three Americans will be impacted by drunk driving in their lifetime. Every day, lives of adults and kids are taken by impaired drivers who gain a few seconds, then take a few lives. Each statistic is a person. Each death is preventable, as is each injury. According to a recent article in The New York Times Magazine, 'From 2020 to 2021, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has since calculated, the number of crashes in the United States soared 16 percent, to more than six million, or roughly 16,500 wrecks a day.' The article goes on to point out that, 'For public-messaging reasons, vehicular wrecks are almost never referred to by experts as 'accidents,' wording that implies no culpability on the part of the participants.' The fatality figures were somehow even worse. In 2021, the latest year for which there are figures, 42,939 Americans died in car crashes, the highest toll in a decade and a half. 'Of those deaths, a sizable portion involved intoxicated or unrestrained drivers or vehicles traveling well in excess of local speed limits.' This would be a different story if I regained my former life, complete with my former mind. I didn't. Eighteen years post-accident. I still think with a stutter, speak with a limp, and have less usable space in my brain, so I run out of memory fast. Today I had two coins in my hand. One was a dime and one was a nickel, and I didn't know which was which. I can spackle all I want but underneath I'm still broken. I frustrate others by leaning on them and by not leaning on them, and baffle them when I seem normal and when I don't. It takes decades to build a life, and seconds to destroy it. The next time someone warns you to be careful when driving home from a night out, don't roll your eyes. Heed their warning. Disabled people are the single largest minority in the world, and likely the least heard from. We are also the only minority anyone can join at any time. Trust me, you won't want to be disabled — or to take someone's life. Judith Hannah Weiss freelanced for 25 years, writing print and broadcast promotion for New York, The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Vogue and other major media. In 2006, she was hit by a drunk driver, which put things on a long pause. Her post-accident work has appeared on NBC News and in The Washington Post, The Oldster, Iowa Review, The Rumpus, Dorothy Parker's Ashes, Memoir Monday and The Pulse. You can find her on Substack at and at This article originally appeared on HuffPost in April 2024. Also in Goodful: Also in Goodful: Also in Goodful:
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A More Affordable EV Won't Save Tesla
Key Points Tesla fell 5% after hours on its second-quarter earnings report. Some investors saw production of a new, more affordable vehicle as a positive sign. The company launched its robotaxi network in June. These 10 stocks could mint the next wave of millionaires › Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) issued another disappointing earnings report on Tuesday. Switch Auto Insurance and Save Today! Affordable Auto Insurance, Customized for You The Insurance Savings You Expect Great Rates and Award-Winning Service The leading electric vehicle (EV) maker finished the after-hours session down 5%, but the sell-off could have been worse. The company reported a decline in both sales and profit. Revenue was down 12% to $22.5 billion, and adjusted net income was down 23% to $1.39 billion, or $0.40 per share. Those numbers actually topped a muted revenue estimate at $22.13 billion, while the bottom-line consensus matched the results at $0.40. Tesla's problems have been well-documented at this point. CEO Elon Musk's turn in the political spotlight seemed to backfire after his relationship with President Donald Trump went sour. Due in part to Musk's involvement with politics, the brand has become unappealing in the eyes of some potential buyers, leading to a 16% decline in automotive revenue. Sales have plunged in Europe, and the company is losing ground to more affordable Chinese EVs. One seemingly bright spot Musk has a long history of overcoming weak results by telling investors what they want to hear on the earnings call, including making big promises about its robotaxi network and other initiatives in autonomy like its Optimus robot. He seemed to do that again on the latest earnings call, with some comments about the more affordable model he has long promised, which some have dubbed the Tesla Model 2. Musk said that the company started production of the vehicle in June and is ramping up production now. He added: "The goal with those products was not to negatively impact revenue or gross margin, but just to make a car that everyone loves and wants at a more affordable price." Musk has long argued that price competition was one of the biggest headwinds facing the company, but the brand crisis seems to have overshadowed that. By introducing its own lower-priced model, Tesla may end up cannibalizing its more expensive vehicles. Customers may be choosing between a more expensive Tesla and that lower-priced model, rather than another brand. The new vehicle is just a cheaper Model Y, rather than a brand-new vehicle model. The robotaxi initiative The biggest reason Tesla has maintained its premium valuation even as sales and profits have tumbled is that investors believe that Tesla's robotaxi network could go mainstream, fulfilling Musk's long-term vision. However, the robotaxi has gotten off to only a modest start after launching in June, and it seemed to get less attention on Tuesday's earnings call, though Musk reminded the audience: "As you can tell, autonomy is the story." Management said that robotaxis in Austin, Texas have topped 7,000 miles with no significant safety interventions. The company is aiming to launch the robotaxi in the San Francisco Bay Area next. Tesla needs growth in its core business Investors have bid up Tesla stock on hopes for its initiatives in robotaxis and more affordable vehicles, but the company needs to return to growth in selling EVs for the stock to be successful over the long term. The decline in EV sales is a reflection of a backlash against Tesla's brand. The company is also expected to struggle over the next few quarters due to the elimination of the EV tax credit and a change in other federal policies that supported EV adoption. The company also faces a $300 million effect from tariffs. Tesla could get back on track, especially if the robotaxi network takes off. But the current valuation in the stock leaves little room for upside if it does, especially given the persistent challenges in EV sales. While a more affordable vehicle might be a step in the right direction, it seems more likely to undercut demand for Tesla's more expensive vehicles, rather than competing with alternatives. Should you buy stock in Tesla right now? The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $636,628!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $1,063,471!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 1,041% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 183% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join Stock Advisor. See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of July 21, 2025 Jeremy Bowman has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Tesla. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. A More Affordable EV Won't Save Tesla was originally published by The Motley Fool Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
