Latest news with #Prichard
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Alabama legislators celebrate end of session with ‘Napoleon Bracy Bow Tie Day'
PRICHARD, Ala. (WKRG) — Members of the Alabama House of Representatives celebrated the final day of the legislative session with a day named for a Prichard representative. Foley's Rose Trail gets a new sculpture (look) Representatives wore bow ties on the final day to celebrate the 13th annual 'Napoleon Bracy Bow Tie Day.' 'The tradition began with Representative Napoleon Bracy Jr. (D-Prichard), who is the only representative who wears bow ties every day in the State House, to encourage unity within the body and to ensure that each session concludes on an upbeat and bipartisan note,' read an Alabama House Democratic Caucus news release. According to the release, some of the bow ties the other representatives wear belong to Bracy, who brings them to the house. 2 Okaloosa County roads to close for Eglin Air Force mission 'Especially during this time when there seems to be so much political partisanship and extremism, Bow Tie Day is more important than ever,' Bracy said. 'It helps remind legislators on both sides of the aisle that we're here to serve all of the people of Alabama, regardless of their political affiliation or ideology.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Daily Mail
08-05-2025
- Health
- Daily Mail
Awful photo shows what happened to adorable Alabama girl, 5, who drank ETHANOL at school
The parents of a 5-year-old Alabama girl are desperate for answers after she was was found to have ingested a large amount of alcohol commonly found in cleaning products after being picked up from school. Little Algeria Singleton was limp and 'slobbering at the mouth' when her parents arrived at Collins-Rhodes Elementary School in Prichard outside Mobile on April 28. Her mother, Mary Singleton, said neither she nor her husband, Albert, 47, had been contacted by the school, despite their daughter's alarming condition. 'The school teachers came out to the van with her, but they was carrying her instead of her walking,' Mary told WKRG. 'The nurse, she broke it down as to where she probably felt like it was like an ear infection. But it was nothing of that nature.' The teacher then handed the child to her parents, urging them to seek emergency care. 'She was slobbering at the mouth, she was heavy, and the teacher handed her to me, saying we probably needed to take her to the ER,' Mary told WALA. Algeria was rushed to Children's and Women's Hospital in Mobile, where she spent two days in the ICU. Doctors found she had consumed a large amount of ethanol, also known as ethyl alcohol, which is commonly found in products like hand sanitizers, skincare items, perfumes, and some food packaging materials, according to the Chemical Safety Facts Organization. The girl's blood-alcohol content was recorded at 0.29 percent - more than four times the legal driving limit of 0.08 percent for adults in Alabama. 'How is this even possible?' Albert asked. 'Where was the supervision?' A toxicology report confirmed the presence of ethanol, though how Algeria accessed it remains unclear. Albert said his daughter was unresponsive from about 3 pm, when they picked her up at school, until around 3 am the next morning. Algeria was discharged from the hospital on April 30 and is recovering slowly, reported. The family said they did not plan to send her back to the school for the rest of the year. The Singletons are now desperate for answers as to what happened that day and how their little girl may have accessed the substance. Doctors found she had ingested a large amount of ethanol, also known as ethyl alcohol, which is commonly found in products like hand sanitizers, skincare items, perfumes, and some food packaging materials The Singletons (pictured with family) are now desperate for answers as to what happened that day and how their little girl may have accessed the toxic substance 'It's hard to deal with when you see your child walking into school and being carried out, you know, and you don't have any idea what's going on,' Albert told WALA. 'We feel betrayed,' Mary added to WKRG. 'Because of the way the whole situation was handled. Bad. You know, and they know us personally… and they could have did a better job reaching out.' The Mobile County Public Schools System did not respond to several news outlets' requests for comment. Albert said the incident is being investigated by the Prichard Police Department, Mobile County Sheriff's Office and the Mobile County District Attorney's Office.
Yahoo
03-05-2025
- Yahoo
Man convicted of assaulting officer given deferred sentence
May 2—A man accused of punching a Kalispell Police officer during his arrest near a city park in 2023 later received a deferred sentence in Flathead County District Court. Prosecutors charged Dennis Wayne Prichard, 56, of Kalispell with felony assault on a peace officer and misdemeanor counts of assault and criminal mischief after an alleged string of confrontations near Woodland Park on June 18, 2023. Though he pleaded not guilty, Prichard accepted a plea deal in June 2024. In exchange for him pleading guilty to the felony charge, prosecutors agreed to dismiss the two misdemeanors. They also agreed to recommend Prichard receive a deferred three-year sentence and pay restitution. Judge Dan Wilson stuck to the terms of the agreement when handing down the sentence in July of that year. Wilson gave Prichard credit for 111 days of time served and ordered him to pay a combined $1,357.92 in restitution. Authorities began searching for Prichard after he allegedly attacked an employee of a Woodland Park Drive bar June 18, 2023. During the fight, Prichard broke the window of a parked car, court documents said. He was previously barred from the bar's premises, according to court documents. Witnesses told authorities that Prichard had headed off in the direction of Woodland Park. Officers found him nearby with several other men. When Prichard ignored an order to get onto his knees, officers deployed a Taser, court documents said. But it failed to stop Prichard, who allegedly punched the officer. During the ensuing brawl, Prichard allegedly landed several blows to the officer's face, causing pain, swelling and soreness. Other officers eventually arrived to provide backup and they cuffed Prichard, according to court documents. News Editor Derrick Perkins can be reached at 758-4430 or dperkins@
Yahoo
02-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Millions of visitors traveled to Mobile in 2024: Alabama Tourism Department
MOBILE, Ala. (WKRG) — The city of Mobile saw a 2.2% increase in visitors from 2023 to 2024, according to the Alabama Tourism Department. Springhill Medical Center employee arrested following bomb threat A Visit Mobile news release said 3.5 million people visited Mobile in 2024 — the largest growth in the state. 'These visitors accounted for $1.9 billion in travel-related spending in Mobile,' read the release. From May 4 to May 10, the city will be celebrating National Travel & Tourism Week, which highlights the travel community and tourism's role in economic growth. 'Destination development is rapidly producing positive changes in Mobile, and travel andtourism commerce is crucial to the success of these investments,' said David Clark, president &CEO of Visit Mobile. 'Mobile's economic impact from tourism continues to increase in multiplecategories yearly, further validating the city's consistent focus on tourism.' 2020 Prichard mayoral candidate announces run for mayor again Clarke said the development of the new downtown airport, civic center arena complex and approval of the Tourism Improvement District will continue to support the tourism metrics. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Telegraph
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
How to write a crime thriller – with help from AI-gatha Christie
Agatha Christie is the world's best-selling author, so if you wanted to learn how to write a crime novel she's the first person you'd ask. Unfortunately, she died in 1976. But in the age of AI, with a plot twist that would assuredly have had Christie herself itching to incorporate it in a book, death need not be the end. A new BBC Maestro course of online video lessons, made in conjunction with Christie's estate, brings the queen of crime back to life. 'First and foremost, for me, this project is about looking at her process as a writer and paying homage to that,' says James Prichard, Christie's great-grandson and the Chairman and CEO of Agatha Christie Limited. 'One of the things I am proudest of that has happened over the last however many years is how seriously Agatha Christie is taken, which I don't think was always the case. She is now held in the regard and esteem that she should be as a writer.' It's that esteem that will encourage wannabe Christies – in this case, myself – to pay their £120 for a Maestro subscription (which gets you a year's access to all manner of courses from Stephen Bartlett to JoJo Moyes to Jo Malone). The new Agatha series is a short lecture course given by a recreation of the writer herself, with Christie's face and voice somehow grafted on to a (brilliant) performance from the actor Vivien Keene. Delivered across 11 videos, all of less than 20 minutes, you sit and are spoken to – nothing interactive here – as Agatha takes you through plotting, structure, detectives and satisfying resolutions. The difference to all the other BBC Maestro courses is that Christie's writing advice is only sort-of delivered by Christie. But the message does come from the horse's mouth, so to speak – it was one of the stipulations of the Christie estate that every one of the words that Keene speaks should have come from Christie's pen. 'It had to be her lessons; it couldn't be some made up thing,' says Prichard. 'So we had a team of academics under Dr Mark Aldridge [an acknowledged Christie expert] to see to that.' In order to fit with the BBC Maestro credo – 'Let the greatest be your teacher' – 'It had to look and sound like her,' says Prichard. 'And what they have done is extraordinary. The final thing was that it had to be of value to both aspiring writers and fans. And I think it does that. All I can say is I was speaking to my father on Friday and both of us agreed that we'd learned a hell of a lot from her that we didn't know.' If AI-gatha's Maestro course could teach her own relatives a thing or two – Prichard said that he learned from the course that Christie's books work because 'they're actually about people, and people never really change' — then surely it could help me? I was lucky enough to get an early view of the Christie course and can report that watching Agatha, or 'Agatha,' dole out aperçus on story structure, cast creation, plot twists, red herrings, and the art of suspense, was most of all… unnerving. A half-smiling Christie-bot stares barrel-straight down the camera with schoolmarm-ish supremacy. She seemed to sense my self-doubt, my daft plot ideas, my general unease. There is also some mild unease at having AI involved at all. To authors, AI is perceived as a threat more than a boon. 'I'd be lying if I said there weren't worries [about using AI],' says James Prichard. 'But I believe and I hope that this is using AI in both a helpful and ethical way. The AI model of Agatha doesn't work without the performance of Vivien Keene. This was not written by AI. It is a leading academic unearthing everything that she said about writing. And I believe that what we are delivering here in terms of her message is better presented and will reach more people as a result of being presented, if I can use inverted commas, 'by her.'' What kind of tutor is AI-gatha? The course shows that Christie plainly studied her craft and while she opens up saying, 'I don't feel I have any particular method when it comes to writing,' which is disappointing, she does in fact adhere to a broad methodology founded in meticulous planning. 'And I take it seriously,' she says, looking serious. The importance of saying something – not preaching but there being some form of moral backbone to your story — is emphasised throughout. Readers like to see justice served, she says. 'I write to entertain but there is a dash of the old morality play in my work – hunting down the guilty to protect the innocent.' But where to even start? That's my problem. Agatha recommends - glory be! – idleness (but not sloth) as a fallow field where ideas can take seed. She encourages eavesdropping on conversations on buses as a source of characters and dialogue, and so I head to that virtual bus that is the Internet and find that Telegraph readers are particularly interested in Air Fryers (see below). I open with a blood-spattered, Grand Guignol set piece, only to remember that Agatha 'doesn't like violence;' she likes puzzles with realistic characters in well-defined settings. And so I concoct a well-defined village and open up with what I hope is a well-defined, air-fryer related teaser. Most of all, she says, in a computer-generated voice that somehow defies all dissent, you 'must play fair' with your reader. Set that puzzle, ask the questions, but don't expect them to use their own little grey cells to unpick mysteries that can't be unpicked. So I make sure to introduce the detective, a sidekick (the reader's eyes and ears) and the murderer in the first few pages. And so with all that in mind, I present to you my first attempt at a crime thriller. No AI was involved in its writing. Perhaps that would have helped… For more details on BBC Maestro's Agatha Christie course, see here The Air Fryer Cracked From Side to Side By a student of AI-gatha Christie The air fryer started shaking on the worktop. The chicken wings within were crisp and crumbly, cooked at least 33 seconds quicker than they would have been in a conventional oven, but that meant nothing to Mrs Veronica Dime. She just stood there, staring at the silicon-lined basket, mouthing, 'Surely…' She didn't have time to add, 'not.' The air fryer exploded, sending chicken wings to the ceiling and Mrs Veronica Dime to the floor. As the first flames danced down the kitchen island, there she remained. Baked to perfection. 'Hold on, just a minute, I'm coming!' said Roger Cairns as he ran down the hall. Packages, deliveries, sorry we missed you… this was the scourge of so-called convenience. Everything the next day, but never a moment's rest (now that his wife Penelope had discovered Amazon Prime). He looked through the peephole to see a man in a motorcycle helmet holding a large cardboard box. It wasn't the usual delivery man, but then these days there was no usual delivery man – anyone and everyone could turn up unannounced with a 'parcel for you.' Roger opened the door, said hello and reached for the package. The man seemed reluctant to hand it over. 'Are you Roger Cairns?' he said, voice muffled through his visor. He didn't have a motorbike parked outside like they normally did. 'Why yes I am. How are you today?' said Roger. The delivery man didn't answer. He handed over the package and scurried off, leaving Roger on the doorstep. The parcel was addressed to him, but he didn't recall ordering it. Dodging a Labrador and the umbrella rack on his way back to the kitchen – why was the godforsaken umbrella rack always in the way? – he set to the packing tape with a kitchen knife. It was an 'Air Fryer,' whatever that was, and it came with an anonymous note: 'This is for you.' 'To lose one parish councillor to a freak air fryer explosion may be regarded as misfortune,' said Lt Col. Bennett. 'To lose two looks like carelessness. I think it was Richard Osman who first said that.' Monique Van Dingus put down her cello. 'Don't tell the police. They won't know what to do and anyway, there's nothing to tell yet.' Bennett poured the tea. 'But don't you think it's strange – two new air fryers, both delivered when no one actually ordered them, to people who wouldn't know an air fryer from a kumquat, both of whom are now dead?' 'It's only strange if you think guilt is strange, or greed, or retribution,' said Monique. 'Are you saying what I think you're saying? 'What do you think I'm saying?' 'I don't know. I was hoping you'd say it and then I wouldn't have to ask.' 'Well then yes. This looks like murder.' Bennett had known Van Dingus long enough to know that she would not say such a thing lightly. Ever since she had moved in to Chiply Wensdale, taking the old railwayman's cottage that had once belonged to Roger and Penelope Cairns' errant son Wrongun, she had brought energy and no little gumption to the proceedings of the Parish Council. She was, Bennett had come to learn, the daughter of a once-famed German detective who had grown up in the suburbs of Aachen — to her, there were no mysteries, just an absence of evidence. That of course never explained the mystery of why she had come to Chiply in the first place. Some said she had arrived to start up a garden business called, 'Convenient Plotting.' But even Van Dingus confessed that she had never seen anything like the Air Fryer Murders. No one had. They were in many ways, Van Dingus would come to say years later, the perfect crime. Everyone was buying Air Fryers. They were just so convenient and took up remarkably little space on the worktop. So the sight of a Ninja Foodie XL Two-Tier being delivered to a Chiply Wensdale front door had become part of village life. No more remarkable, you might say, than Roger Cairns popping round to Veronica Dime's each Wednesday morning. Where if you looked at the upstairs window, shortly afterwards the bedroom curtains would be hurriedly closed…
