Latest news with #U.S.MarshalsService
Yahoo
2 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
West Plains man arrested for federal drug trafficking crimes
WEST PLAINS, Mo. — Howell County deputies, U.S. Marshals Service agents and Operation Relentless Pursuit Investigators teamed up on Thursday, May 29, in an operation to arrest a man with a federal indictment for drug and firearm charges. According to the Howell County Sheriff's Office (HCSO), law enforcement located and arrested 25-year-old Trevan D. Andrews from West Plains without incident. Carroll County, Arkansas deputies arrest man accused of $30K scam on senior citizen HCSO says Andrews was indicted for possessing and intending to distribute more than 500 grams of cocaine while also having a firearm to further a drug trafficking crime in an incident from March 2024. Andrews was taken to the Greene County Sheriff's Office and is being held with no bond. He is being held for the U.S. Marshals Service and set to appear in U.S. District Court in Springfield. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Salem man gets 9 years in prison after 20K fentanyl pills, 28 pounds of meth found at home
PORTLAND, Ore. () — A Salem man was sentenced to nine years in prison for drug trafficking charges related to an investigation that began back in 2021. Rico Anthony Russell Rigutto was sentenced after investigators discovered thousands of fentanyl pills, dozens of pounds of methamphetamines and other drugs in his possession, the U.S. Department of Justice said. Armed man arrested after standoff at Papa Murphy's It all began on December 14, 2021, when investigators arranged to buy counterfeit oxycodone pills from Rigutto as part of a drug trafficking sting, court documents say. 'Investigators observed him arrive and depart the meeting location, after which they conducted a traffic stop on Rigutto,' the U.S. DOJ said. During a search of Rigutto's car, investigators found and took possession of about 3,000 counterfeit pills with fentanyl in them and a gun with a conversion switch attachment to convert it from a semi-automatic to a fully automatic weapon. Investigators later searched Rigutto's home using a search warrant they obtained and seized 20,000 additional counterfeit pills containing fentanyl, 28 pounds of meth, six pounds of heroin and $100,000 in cash. They also found and took possession of 15 guns, including an AR-15 rifle and another handgun with a conversion switch. A grand jury in Portland indicted Rigutto on drug and gun possession charges in 2022. In 2023, he pleaded guilty to possessing fentanyl with the intent to distribute but subsequently failed to appear in court for his sentencing less than a year later. Kotek, Wilson plan to build more Portland housing The U.S. Marshals Service found and arrested Rigutto for failing to appear after a warrant was issued for his arrest. They also found another gun during the arrest. In addition to Rigutto's nine years in prison, he was sentenced to five years of supervised release. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Boston Globe
3 days ago
- Boston Globe
N.H. mother who fled with four children arrested in Los Angeles
Hall, who was apprehended without incident at a facility on Valley Vista Boulevard, is currently detained at Van Nuys Jail on federal fugitive charges, pending extradition to New Hampshire, according to the statement. '[Today] marks the end to a months-long investigation that spanned thousands of miles, multiple jurisdictions, and required the undivided attention of many dedicated law enforcement professionals that I am proud to work among,' said William R. Hart, Jr., U.S. Marshal for the District of New Hampshire, in the statement. Get N.H. Morning Report A weekday newsletter delivering the N.H. news you need to know right to your inbox. Enter Email Sign Up Hall lost custody of her children to Cormier on February 4 in Rochester Family Court and was ordered to surrender them after school on February 10. Instead of complying, she fled the state with all four children, according to the statement. Advertisement On May 13, after 'credible leads' placed Hall and the children in Murrieta, Calif., the Rochester Police Department asked the U.S. Marshals Service in New Hampshire for assistance, the statement said. Murrieta is about 50 miles from Ontario and about 95 miles from the site of Hall's arrest in Los Angeles, according Google Maps. Advertisement Officers from the U.S. Marshals Service's District of California, assisted by the Los Angeles Police Department and other local agencies, found the children and arrested Hall. 'This case highlights the vital role that interagency cooperation plays in safeguarding at-risk children,' said a U.S. Marshals Service spokesperson in a statement last week, following the children's recovery. 'We are grateful for the swift actions of our law enforcement partners in California and commend the Rochester Police Department for their persistence and dedication to this case,' the spokesperson said. Rita Chandler can be reached at
San Francisco Chronicle
4 days ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Judge: Harvard researcher charged with smuggling frog embryos was unlawfully detained by ICE
A federal judge in Vermont on Wednesday released a Russian-born scientist and Harvard University researcher from immigration custody as she deals with a criminal charge of smuggling frog embryos into the United States. Colleagues and academics also testified on Kseniia Petrova's behalf, saying she is doing valuable research to advance cures for cancer. 'It is excellent science,' Michael West, a scientist and entrepreneur in the biotech industry, testified on Petrova's research papers. He said he does not know Petrova, but has become acquainted with her published work, citing one in which she explains that 'by mapping embryonic development, novel ways of intervening in the biology of regeneration and aging.' West said that Petrova's medical research skills are highly sought after and that he himself would hire her 'in a heartbeat.' Petrova, 30, is currently in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service in Louisiana. She is expected to be brought to Massachusetts as early as Friday in preparation for a bail hearing next week on the smuggling charge, lawyers said in court. 'We are gratified that today's hearing gave us the opportunity to present clear and convincing evidence that Kseniia Petrova was not carrying anything dangerous or unlawful, and that customs officers at Logan International Airport had no legal authority to revoke her visa or detain her," Petrova's lawyer Gregory Romanovsky said in a statement. "At today's hearing, we demonstrated that Kseniia is neither a danger to the community nor a flight risk, and does not belong in immigration detention.' Petrova had been vacationing in France, where she stopped at a lab specializing in splicing superfine sections of frog embryos and obtained a package of samples to be used for research. As she passed through a U.S. Customs and Border Protection checkpoint in Boston Logan International Airport in February, Petrova was questioned about the samples. She told The Associated Press in an interview last month that she did not realize the items needed to be declared and was not trying to sneak anything into the country. After an interrogation, Petrova was told her visa was being canceled. After being detained by immigration officials, she filed a petition in Vermont seeking her release. She was briefly detained in Vermont before she was brought to Louisiana. Petrova was charged with smuggling earlier this month as U.S. District Judge Christina Reiss in Burlington set the hearing date on her petition. Reiss ruled Wednesday that the immigration officers' actions were unlawful, that Petrova didn't present a danger, and that the embryos were non-living, non-hazardous and 'posed a threat to no one.' Petrova's lawyer, Gregory Romanovsky, had asked Reiss to issue an order to stop the possibility of ICE re-detaining her if she is also released from detention in Massachusetts. Reiss said she was reluctant "to enjoin an executive agency from undertaking future actions which are uncertain' and would rely on U.S. Department of Justice attorney Jeffrey Hartman's comments that the government has no intention at this time to re-arrest Petrova. The Department of Homeland Security had said in a statement on the social media platform X that Petrova was detained after 'lying to federal officers about carrying substances into the country.' They allege that messages on her phone 'revealed she planned to smuggle the materials through customs without declaring them.'
Yahoo
4 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
US judge grants Russian-born Harvard scientist bail in immigration case
By Nate Raymond (Reuters) -A federal judge in Vermont on Wednesday ruled that the continued detention by immigration authorities of a Russian-born scientist at Harvard University was unjustified, removing a key hurdle to the researcher being released from U.S. custody more than three months after she was detained at an airport in Boston. U.S. District Judge Christina Reiss said during a hearing in Burlington, Vermont that it appeared immigration authorities had detained Kseniia Petrova in February and canceled her visa without any factual or legal basis for doing so after discovering frog embryo samples in her luggage. "What happened in this case was extraordinary and novel," Reiss said. Reiss was not able to order Petrova's full release from government custody, as federal prosecutors in Boston earlier this month criminally charged her with illegally attempting to smuggle the frog embryo samples into the country. She is now being held by the U.S. Marshals Service, and a judge in her criminal case would need to decide whether to grant her bail as well when she goes before the court as soon as next week. But Reiss said bail in her related immigration case was appropriate as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has indicated that it intends to re-detain Petrova if a judge in her criminal case grants her bail. "At today's hearing, we demonstrated that Kseniia is neither a danger to the community nor a flight risk, and does not belong in immigration detention," her lawyer, Gregory Romanovsky, said in a statement. The Justice Department declined to comment. Petrova, 31, was detained at Logan International Airport in Boston on February 16 on her return from a trip to France. Petrova, who works at Harvard Medical School, has said her boss asked her to bring back frog embryo samples for ongoing experiments. Petrova's detention comes amid efforts by Republican President Donald Trump's administration to ramp up deportations and revoke student visas as part of its wide-ranging efforts to fulfill his hardline immigration agenda. Federal judges in Vermont have similarly ordered immigration authorities to release from custody students at Tufts University and Columbia University who were arrested after engaging in pro-Palestinian advocacy on campus. Reiss, who is presiding over a lawsuit Petrova filed challenging her immigration detention, said Petrova raised a substantial claim that "her current detention is the product of a process that has nothing to do with the merits of this case." Reiss said the embryos were "non-hazardous, non-toxic, non-living, and posed a threat to no one," and that Petrova had established a likelihood of proving they did not qualify as the type of biological material she needed to declare to customs. Reiss said that while Petrova asked at the airport to be allowed to return to France, the government instead detained her with the intent to deport her to Russia, a prospect Petrova has said she fears after protesting Russia's war in Ukraine.
