Latest news with #Mayville
Free Malaysia Today
20-05-2025
- Free Malaysia Today
Salman Rushdie assailant sentenced to 25 years in prison
American-Lebanese Hadi Matar was convicted in February of attempted murder and assault. (AP pic) MAYVILLE : An American-Lebanese man was sentenced to 25 years in prison today for trying to kill novelist Salman Rushdie in a 2022 knife attack at a New York cultural centre. Hadi Matar, 27, was convicted in February of attempted murder and assault for the stabbing, which left Rushdie blind in one eye. Matar received the maximum sentence of 25 years for the attack on Rushdie and seven years for assault on another attendee at the speaking event. The sentences are to run concurrently. Rushdie, a British-American, told jurors during the trial about Matar 'stabbing and slashing' him at the upscale cultural centre. 'It was a stab wound in my eye, intensely painful, after that I was screaming because of the pain,' Rushdie said, adding that he was left in a 'lake of blood'. Matar – who shouted pro-Palestinian slogans on several occasions during the trial – stabbed Rushdie about 10 times with a 6in blade. He previously told media he had only read two pages of Rushdie's 'The Satanic Verses', but believed the author had 'attacked Islam'. Matar's lawyers had sought to prevent witnesses from characterising Rushdie as a victim of persecution following Iran's 1989 fatwa calling for his murder over supposed blasphemy in the novel. Iran has denied any link to the attacker and said only Rushdie was to blame for the incident. The optical nerve of Rushdie's right eye was severed in the attack. His Adam's apple was lacerated, his liver and small bowel penetrated, and he became paralysed in one hand after suffering severe nerve damage to his arm. Rushdie was rescued from Matar by bystanders. Last year, he published a memoir called 'Knife' in which he recounted the near-death experience. Rushdie, who was born in Mumbai but moved to England as a boy, was propelled into the spotlight with his second novel 'Midnight's Children' (1981), which won Britain's prestigious Booker Prize for its portrayal of post-independence India. But 'The Satanic Verses' brought him far greater, mostly unwelcome, attention. Rushdie became the centre of a fierce tug-of-war between free speech advocates and those who insisted that insulting religion, particularly Islam, was unacceptable under any circumstance. Books and bookshops were torched, his Japanese translator was murdered and his Norwegian publisher was shot several times. Rushdie lived in seclusion in London for a decade after the 1989 fatwa, but for the past 20 years – until the attack – he lived relatively normally in New York.
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
‘Overwhelming looking at the mess': Mayville community working through aftermath of tornado
MAYVILLE, Wis. (WFRV) – With even more high winds and rain following Thursday evening's tornado, Mayville community members are working around the clock to get things back into place, or working order, as best they can. 'It's overwhelming looking at the mess,' Mayville Engineering Company employee Brad Lagerman said, who has worked on the maintenance team for 35 years. 'It's a lot, we have a full crew in here and they were really good at getting the crew needed here to get all of this work done.' An entire wall of the engineering company is gone, just a pile of rubble remains. A giant air conditioning unit also was stripped from the roof, tearing a large hole, before being smashed into the ground. Crews worked on the roof and the side of the building throughout Friday, working to get some patching in place and also to quickly restore power. Power had been restored to Mayville earlier on Friday, but individual homes or businesses that had their lines snapped may still be waiting. How long will it take MEC to return to normal? And when you lose an entire wall, what does 'normal' even look like? 'I'm not sure. Hoping maybe we can run on Monday,' Lagerman said, although the repairs will take weeks to complete. Employees are hopeful to begin distributing product again as soon as possible. And just across Clark St., the Gleason Reel building might even be worse off, with an entire corner, wall and roof, demolished. Heavy cinder blocks fell and cracked onto parked cars below, leaving them warped with dents and smashed windshields. The City of Mayville administration is asking those interested in volunteering during the cleanup to contact city hall in order to be added to a volunteer list. Mayville High School did not have class, and is instead being used by the Red Cross to provide shelter and relief efforts. Students from neighboring Lomira High School did have class, but some left early to help with the cleanup. 'I was in school but I couldn't just sit around,' Keagen Fleischer said. 'It's just not the kind of person I am.' 'I'm here cleaning up, because when I'm older and have something like this happen I'd love to have some kids out here helping,' Logan Keacker said. Utility crews, company employees, students and neighbors, all pooling their best effort. At least by the end of the day, the sun that had been obscured by rain clouds for much of the day was able to shine through before setting, perhaps a small signal of the better days ahead with everyone working together. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Wisconsin storm damage: Mayville, Juneau face long road ahead
The Brief The NWS surveyed storm damage in Juneau and Mayville on Friday. Officials said likely tornadoes tore through the communities the previous day. Gov. Evers said they're in the process of determining whether there will be a disaster declaration. MAYVILLE, Wis. - Editor's note: The National Weather Service has since confirmed four tornadoes touched down in Dodge County on Thursday. The original report can be watched above or read below. The National Weather Service surveyed storm damage in Juneau and Mayville on Friday after officials said likely tornadoes tore through the communities the previous day. The backstory Due to the amount of damage. Deputies asked the public to avoid the area unless absolutely necessary. FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX LOCAL Mobile app for iOS or Android "There's a big difference when you just see tree damage versus structures losing their roofs, their walls," said Tim Halbach with the National Weather Service. "When things like that happen, it's a little bit more of an issue with people possibly getting injured, things like that, so that's one of the main concerns when you see that level of damage." What they're saying While no one was seriously hurt, the Mayville community has a long road ahead. West of the city, a farmhouse is without a back wall. In town, there are downed power lines, toppled trees and damaged roofs. "The winds are coming past, and the rain is going horizontal on me," resident Mary Ritger said. "I never expected giant trees down all over," said resident Ingrid Justman. Justman said they're lucky their homes were virtually unscathed, but there is a lot of cleanup from the snapped hardwood trees around her home. FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX LOCAL Mobile app for iOS or Android "I got to admit, I had tears in my eyes. I said a prayer, and I said I can't believe it. We were lucky," said resident Mitch McKinnon. "I got a whole different outlook now on storms." As neighbors help neighbors, the three are still in awe of Thursday's powerful storm. Officials were also in Juneau on Friday, trying to determine how strong the likely tornado was. The Dodge County Sheriff's Office told FOX6 News that some residents lost their homes. Crews rushed one person to the hospital after a roof caved in, but deputies said that person was going to be OK. Only two people reported minor injuries. What you can do With a big cleanup effort underway, Mayville is asking for volunteers to sign up at city hall if they want to assist in recovery efforts. "It could be a lot worse. We thank the lord that no one was seriously injured," said Mayor Rob Boelk. School was canceled, and graduation practice has been postponed. Mayville Junior/Senior High School was turned into a Red Cross shelter to provide help to those who need it. The organization is offering food, water, emotional support and a place to charge cellphones. The Red Cross Northeast Chapter is also deploying an emergency response vehicle to distribute essential supplies such as blankets, tarps, water, snacks, mops, sponges, gloves, cleaning solution, trash bags and more. What's next Gov. Tony Evers toured the shelter along with Dodge County Emergency Management officials. Evers said they are still in the process of determining whether there will be a disaster declaration. "A lot of things need to be rebuilt. People are pulling together. That's the important thing," he said. The Source Information in this report is from the National Weather Service, Dodge County Sheriff's Office, Dodge County Emergency Management and FOX6 News interviews.
CTV News
16-05-2025
- CTV News
Man who stabbed author Salman Rushdie on stage sentenced to 25 years in prison
MAYVILLE, N.Y. — The man convicted of stabbing Salman Rushdie on a New York lecture stage in 2022, leaving the prizewinning author blind in one eye, was sentenced Friday to serve 25 years in prison. A jury found Hadi Matar, 27, guilty of attempted murder and assault in February. Rushdie did not return to court to the western New York courtroom for his assailant's sentencing but submitted a victim impact statement. During the trial, the 77-year-old author was the key witness, describing how he believed he was dying when a masked attacker plunged a knife into his head and body more than a dozen times as he was being introduced at the Chautauqua Institution to speak about writer safety. Before being sentenced, Matar stood and made a statement about freedom of speech in which he called Rushdie a hypocrite. Matar received the maximum 25-year sentence for the attempted murder of Rushdie and seven years for wounding a man who was on stage with him. The sentences must run concurrently because both victims were injured in the same event, District Attorney Jason Schmidt said. In requesting the maximum sentence, Schmidt told the judge that Matar 'chose this. He designed this attack so that he could inflict the most amount of damage, not just upon Mr. Rushdie, but upon this community, upon the 1,400 people who were there to watch it.' Public defender Nathaniel Barone pointed out that Matar had a otherwise clean criminal record and disputed that the people in the audience should be considered victims, suggesting that a sentence of 12 years would be appropriate. Rushdie spent 17 days at a Pennsylvania hospital and more than three weeks at a New York City rehabilitation center. The author of 'Midnight's Children,' 'The Moor's Last Sigh' and 'Victory City' detailed his recovery in his 2024 memoir, 'Knife.' Matar next faces a federal trial on terrorism-related charges. While the first trial focused mostly on the details of the knife attack itself, the next one is expected to delve into the more complicated issue of motive. Authorities said Matar, a U.S. citizen, was attempting to carry out a decades-old fatwa, or edict, calling for Rushdie's death when he travelled from his home in Fairview, New Jersey, to target Rushdie at the summer retreat about 70 miles (112.6 kilometres) southwest of Buffalo. Matar believed the fatwa, first issued in 1989, was backed by the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah and endorsed in a 2006 speech by the group's secretary-general, Hassan Nasrallah, according to federal prosecutors. Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued the fatwa after publication of Rushdie's novel, 'The Satanic Verses,' which some Muslims consider blasphemous. Rushdie spent years in hiding, but after Iran announced it would not enforce the decree he travelled freely over the past quarter century. Matar pleaded not guilty to a three-count indictment charging him with providing material to terrorists, attempting to provide material support to Hezbollah and engaging in terrorism transcending national boundaries. Video of the assault, captured by the venue's cameras and played at trial, show Matar approaching the seated Rushdie from behind and reaching around him to stab at his torso with a knife. As the audience gasps and screams, Rushdie is seen raising his arms and rising from his seat, walking and stumbling for a few steps with Matar hanging on, swinging and stabbing until they both fall and are surrounded by onlookers who rush in to separate them. Jurors in Matar's first trial delivered their verdict after less than two hours of deliberation. Carolyn Thompson, The Associated Press
Yahoo
30-01-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Two new Idaho bills would curtail path voter initiatives take to ballot — and after, too
On election night, Idaho Republican Party Chair Dorothy Moon watched an election reform ballot initiative fail and vowed to 'not ever' let the proponents bring another measure before voters again. Now, Republicans in the Legislature appear committed to helping her vision succeed. GOP lawmakers on Wednesday proposed limits on the ways that residents can enact laws outside of the legislative process. They presented a set of proposals to add additional obstacles for citizen-led initiatives, including for those that receive majority support from voters. House members already introduced a bill this month to raise the threshold for a ballot measure to pass from a simple majority to 60%. It has not had a public hearing. Two other proposals on Wednesday would allow the governor to veto successful initiatives and also widely expand the geographic area from which campaigns must gather signatures. The latter, proposed as an amendment to the Idaho Constitution, would increase the number of legislative districts where campaigners must obtain signatures from 18 — essentially half — to all 35 districts across the state. The Idaho Supreme Court previously ruled unconstitutional a 2021 law passed by the Republican-dominated Legislature that would have achieved the same change for its violation of residents' rights to bring forward their own proposals. Ballot measure advocates, including Luke Mayville, immediately denounced the efforts as an abuse of power. Mayville leads Reclaim Idaho, the group Moon specifically vowed to obstruct, which organized a successful ballot initiative in 2018 to pass Medicaid expansion. 'These bills are an extreme attack on the rights of Idaho citizens,' Mayville told the Idaho Statesman by text. 'Instead of listening to voters, legislators are trying to silence them.' The proposed amendment to the Idaho Constitution would add a requirement that voter initiatives must obtain signatures from 6% of the voters in every legislative district in the state before they can appear on the ballot. Sen. Doug Okuniewicz, R-Hayden, told a Senate committee Wednesday morning that his proposal was meant to ensure 'nobody gets ignored.' The sole Democrat on the committee, Sen. James Ruchti, D-Pocatello, opposed the amendment's introduction, which is expected to be scheduled for a future public hearing. The amendment proposes to make the same change as a 2021 bill, which the Legislature passed and Republican Gov. Brad Little signed into law. It was struck down by the the state's highest court. 'The effect of (the law) is to prevent a perceived, yet unsubstantiated fear of the 'tyranny of the majority,' by replacing it with an actual 'tyranny of the minority,' ' Justice Gregory Moeller wrote in the court's opinion. Also on Wednesday, Rep. Bruce Skaug, R-Nampa, introduced a proposal to allow the governor to veto any successful initiative, unless it received approval from two-thirds of voters. Okuniewicz is a co-sponsor. Skaug, who also introduced the bill earlier this month to raise the passage requirement to 60%, told a House committee on Wednesday that because ballot initiatives that succeed are considered to be the same as laws the Legislature passes, they should be subject to a governor's veto. 'That is the proposal, to level things up,' he said. Skaug suggested Idaho's electorate is often misinformed about ballot initiatives by 'millionaires from mostly out-of-state pushing one agenda or another.' Rep. Todd Achilles, D-Boise, who joined as part of the coalition that organized the failed initiative in November, said at the committee hearing that he did not understand what problem the bill tried to solve. 'Why, after 100-plus years and only 15 successful initiatives in Idaho history, do we think now is the time to assume that the constitution was inappropriately silent on the role of the governor in this?' he said. 'I'm very concerned that we're putting even more hurdles in front of a citizen's right in order to solve money in politics, when we should just address money in politics.' In November, the effort to reform state elections led by Mayville failed, despite raising $5.5 million. The ballot measure received just 30% of votes. 'Rep. Skaug's bill would give Idaho's governor extraordinary power,' Mayville said. 'There's no state in the nation where a single elected official has the power to overrule the majority of voters.'
