pileofcrapola

Adam Savage, of Mythbusters fame and now at Tested, needed a car seat for his dogs that could go right in the back of his brand new car—one that would protect the leather interior, but still be thick and sturdy enough not to move around when they get boisterous. He made this, and it works like a charm.

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Snapchat may not be as good at keeping your secrets as it wants you to think, but it’s getting better at being a messaging platform. Snapchat’s new Chat 2.0 brings a ton of new features that make it comparable to other chat apps.

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Meet KB, a senior Collie who needs a new home and is this week’s Pet of the Week.

Here is what the people at Collie Rescue Inc. have to say about him:

KB is looking for a permanent foster home through the Collie Companions Care Program at Collie Rescue Inc.

KB is a handsome guy looking for a new place to call home. CRI recently rescued him, and we believe he is about 10 years old or more, but he still has plenty of energy and a healthy appetite.

Because of his older age, he is a bit hard of hearing. But that doesn’t stop him from finding ways to understand you. When he sees the leash come out, he gets a big smile on his face and know it’s time for a w-a-l-k!

He’s currently in a foster home where he is settling in and checking things out. KB has lots of curiosity and loves to investigate everything around the house, including the other dogs who live at his foster home. He gets along with both dogs and cats.

KB is very well house-trained and sleeps through the night, especially when a comfortable dog bed is involved.

There are two things we know KB loves. First, he loves butt scratches! He likes them so much that he almost falls over when he leans into them. Second, he loves feeling the breeze in his hair! When driving, he likes to stick his face out the window and smell the air whipping by.

This old man may have some years on him, but he is adorable and full of gratitude. He just needs a family who can provide him with tons of love back! Could you be the one? Contact us at Collie Rescue, Inc. to learn more about the requirements of adopting.

Are you and KB a match? If so, let us know and our sponsor, Becky’s Pet Care, will send you $100 in Becky’s Bucks, as well as some treats.

Want your pet to be considered for the Reston Pet of the Week?

Email news@Restonnow.com with a 2-3 paragraph bio and at least 3-4 horizontally-oriented photos of your pet.

Each week’s winner receives a sample of dog or cat treats from our sponsor, Becky’s Pet Care, along with $100 in Becky’s Bucks.

Becky’s Pet Care, the winner of three Angie’s List Super Service Awards and the National Association of Professional Pet Sitters’ 2013 Business of the Year, provides professional dog walking and pet sitting services in Reston and Northern Virginia.

The post Reston Pet of the Week: KB appeared first on WTOP.

HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — Police in Hagerstown say a girl gave birth to a daughter, and then told authorities she found the infant on the back porch.

Officer Heather Aleshire says police don’t plan to charge the girl in connection with the incident Wednesday morning.

Aleshire says the mother is a juvenile but she refuses to release the girl’s age, citing privacy concerns. She says police have reported the case to the county’s Department of Social Services.

Aleshire says police were called to the home shortly after 7 a.m. after the mother reported she had found a newborn on the porch, wrapped in a plastic bag, in near-freezing temperatures.

Aleshire says the baby was in stable condition and was flown to Children’s National Medical Center in Washington.

The post Police: Girl gave birth, then faked finding baby on porch appeared first on WTOP.

MANASSAS, Va. (AP) — After 15 years of denial, a northern Virginia drug dealer admitted his role in a 2001 murder as part of a plea bargain that spares him a possible death sentence.

Justin Wolfe’s guilty plea Tuesday in Prince William Circuit Court ends a long-running saga which at one point left him only five days away from a scheduled execution. At another point, he was only hours from being set free by a judge who accused prosecutors of misconduct.

Wolfe’s plea will result in 29 to 41 years behind bars when he is sentenced in July, the Washington Post reported (http://wapo.st/1ROnbeq). He will get credit for the 15 years he has already served.

Wolfe, and an associate, Owen Barber, were still in their teens when they ran a large-scale drug operation selling high-grade marijuana throughout northern Virginia, frequently to high school students. Wolfe was convicted and sent to death row in 2002 for the murder of his supplier, Daniel Petrole. Barber was key witness at that trial, saying he pulled the trigger after conspiring with Wolfe because of a large debt owed to Petrole.

Barber’s testimony came as part of a plea bargain that resulted in a 38-year prison sentence for him.

Barber later recanted his testimony, and eventually flip-flopped multiple times on whether Wolfe was involved in the killing. In a recorded conversation with prosecutors, Barber indicated he was unhappy that he ended up with such a lengthy sentence.

While Wolfe was on death row, U.S. District Judge Raymond A. Jackson in Norfolk heard an appeal of Wolfe’s case. Jackson accused prosecutors of withholding evidence from Wolfe’s lawyers, and overturned his convictions. Jackson said the misconduct was so bad that Wolfe could not get a fair trial, and he ordered that Wolfe be set free.

Eventually, a federal appeals court intervened, and in a split decision it allowed prosecutors to conduct a retrial.

Prince William County Commonwealth’s Attorney Paul Ebert, who has served in that office for nearly 50 years, recused himself in the retrial, given the accusations of misconduct. Fairfax County prosecutor Raymond Morrogh agreed to prosecute the retrial, and also decided to file capital murder charges.

It was Morrogh who agreed to Tuesday’s plea bargain, saying he did so after consulting with Petrole’s family and obtaining a four-page confession from Wolfe.

The Petroles “were interested in bringing the case to a conclusion. They were really interested in him admitting what he did,” Morrogh told the Post.

Wolfe’s case attracted the support of The Innocence Project at The University of Virginia School of Law and others who rallied to his cause. He wrote in his confession that acknowledging the murder is “the hardest thing I have ever done because it means I have to admit what I did which contradicts what I said at trial and the position that I have taken for all of my appeals and I am very afraid that I will let the people I love down.”

___

Information from: The Washington Post, http://www.washingtonpost.com

The post Drug dealer ends 15 years of denial, admits to 2001 murder appeared first on WTOP.

At first, it seemed like Amazon Home Services, the Everything Store’s site where you can hire anyone from a car mechanic to a guitar instructor to a dog groomer, was just a money-making opportunity to connect customers and local providers. That wasn’t Amazon’s plan all along, though: now that the marketplace exists, it means customers buying large appliances or other heavy and complex items can hire someone to install or assemble it with one click.

The Home Services site is celebrating its first anniversary, and Bloomberg News is celebrating with an article about what the site’s real purpose is. While you can hire someone to do installations or repairs separately, not tied to buying a large item through Amazon, most transactions in Home Services are add-ons to a purchase.

You can, for example, hire someone to set up a large trampoline or mount a TV on your wall right along with buying the item. That provider may not necessarily be the cheapest in your area, but they do come with an Amazon stamp of approval, and are easy to add to your purchase.

Eventually, as customers become more comfortable with the idea of ordering things and the people who deliver and install them directly through Amazon, maybe we’ll be comfortable with the idea of ordering our major home appliances on Amazon.

Amazon Assembly, Installation Services Bolster Big-Product Sales [Bloomberg]

The high-profile legal standoff between Apple and the FBI recently came to an end when the government unlocked a terrorist’s iPhone without Apple’s assistance, but new data confirms that this single showdown is just one of dozens of cases where the federal government has successfully used a more than 225-year-old law to compel Apple or Google to aid authorities in bypassing smartphone security measures.

At the center of the recently concluded Apple vs. FBI dispute is the All Writs Act, which allows a judge to compel a person or group to assist in the enforcement of a court order — but only if that assistance is both necessary and “agreeable to the usages and principles of law.”

In February, the federal government successfully sought a court order under the All Writs Act, compelling Apple to aid the FBI in unlocking an iPhone that had belonged to Syed Farook, one of the shooters who killed 14 people in San Bernardino, CA, on Dec. 2, 2015.

Apple fought back against the court order, arguing that this use of the All Writs Act was unprecedented, and the government’s request was not “about one isolated iPhone,” but instead a case of “the Department of Justice and the FBI seeking through the courts a dangerous power that Congress and the American people have withheld: the ability to force companies like Apple to undermine the basic security and privacy interests of hundreds of millions of individuals around the globe.”

However, in another Apple-related case in a New York federal court (one in which the judge sided with Apple), the DOJ told the court that it had previously used the All Writs Act dozens of times to compel Apple’s assistance and that the company had not balked.

This assertion led the American Civil Liberties Union to root around to see just how widespread the government’s use of the All Writs Act had been in recent years.

According to data released today by the ACLU, the group turned up court documents for 63 cases — plus at least another 13 without docket numbers — in 22 states since 2008 where the government applied for a court order under the Act to compel the assistance of either Apple or Google.

Most of the court orders involve either password resets or lock-screen bypasses, and many of them occurred before Apple and Google updated their operating systems in 2014 to remove previously existing backdoors.

Even those court orders coming after the security upgrades seem to involve phones seized before those changes went into place. For example, in 2015 the Department of Homeland Security sought a court order for Google’s assistance in resetting the password for a Samsung smartphone belonging to a man arrested on child pornography charges. However, that phone had been seized in 2012, long before Google made it more difficult to assist in unlocking devices.

Similarly, a 2015 court order obtained by the FBI is for an Android device seized in a drug-related case a year earlier.

Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, a rep for Google acknowledges that the company has obliged court orders, but that it has “never received an All Writs Act order like the one Apple recently fought that demands we build new tools that actively compromise our products’ security.”

If Google were to receive this sort of demand — compelling the company to weaken the security of the operating system it creates — the rep says, “We would strongly object to such an order.”

FBI’s success in getting through iPhone security without Apple’s assistance is only going to make Apple, Google, and others tighten their privacy measures further, both to prevent any third parties from using the FBI’s work-around and to ensure security-minded customers that their data is protected.

The iPhone maker is reportedly already working on a device that would prevent the company from pushing software updates to locked iPhones, meaning Apple would not be able to help law enforcement by replacing a secure operating system with a less-secure version.

Last May, an investigation involving federal regulators and prosecutors from all 50 states led to four national cancer charities being charged with swindling consumers out of $187 million in charitable donations. Today, two of those bogus charities — responsible for $75 million in bilked donations — have agreed to close up shop and provide refunds to donors.

The Federal Trade Commission, along with all 50 states and the District of Columbia, announced today that Cancer Fund of America (CFA), Cancer Support Services Inc. (CSS), and James Reynolds, Sr. — the man behind both groups — will settle  will settle charges that the organizations claimed to help cancer patients, but instead, spent the overwhelming majority of donations on their operators, families and friends, and fundraisers.

According to the original complaint [PDF], the two charities, along with the Children’s Cancer Fund of America Inc. (CCFOA) and The Breast Cancer Society Inc. (BCS), used telemarketing calls, websites, direct mail and materials distributed by the Combined Federal Campaign – which raises money from federal employees for non-profit organizations – to solicit donations from consumers in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

The complaint purports that the deceptive scheme was set in motion by James Reynolds Sr. in 1987 and since then has regularly duped consumers into believing they supported a genuine charity.

From 2008 to 2012, the organizations deceptively raised $187 million in donations by portraying themselves as legitimate charities and told prospective donors that funds would be used for help cancer patients by providing direct support and needed medical assistance.

“These were lies,” the complaint states. “Not one of the Defendants has operated a program that provides cancer patients with pain medication to alleviate their suffering, transports cancer patients to chemotherapy appointments, or pays for hospice care. Moreover, the vast majority of donors’ contributions have not directly assisted cancer patients in the United States or otherwise benefitted any charitable purpose.”

In reality, the FTC and state officials, claim the four charities spent just 3% of the donations on actual cancer patients.

The rest of the money was spent on inflated salaries, cars, trips, luxury cruises, college tuition, gym memberships, jet ski outings, sporting event and concert tickets, and dating site memberships for the company operators, their family members, and friends.

The charities “operated as personal fiefdoms characterized by rampant nepotism, flagrant conflicts of interest, and excessive insider compensation, with none of the financial and governance controls that any bona fide charity would have adopted,” according to the complaint.

The organizations were more generous with friends and family members, providing salaries nearly five times what they actually provided in aid to patients.

In addition to lining their own pockets, the charity operators allegedly padded the wallets of professional fundraisers who were hired and often received 85% or more of every donation.

To hide the high administrative and fundraising costs from donors and regulators, the complaint alleges the organizations falsely inflated their revenues by reporting in publicly filed financial documents more than $223 million donated “gifts in kind” distributed to international recipients.

Children’s Cancer Fund of America Inc. and The Breast Cancer Society Inc. agreed to settle with the FTC and states in May 2015.

According to the settlement order [PDF] with CFA and CSS, the charities will be dissolved and their assets will be liquidated. Any funds from the liquidation will go toward satisfying a $75 million judgement. Those funds will then be returned to the consumers who donated to the organizations between 2008 and 2012.

Reynolds’ portion of the judgement is suspended following the surrender of certain personal assets, including art, statues, a boat, and guns. In addition to contributing to consumer refunds, the order bans Reynolds from working for, managing, or receiving payments from non-profits in the future.

“The FTC and our state enforcement partners have ended a pernicious charity fraud that syphoned hundreds of millions of dollars away from well-meaning consumers, legitimate charities, and people with cancer who needed the services the defendants falsely promised,” Jessica Rich, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said in a statement Wednesday. “Today’s settlement, along with those announced earlier, shut down the sham charities once and for all and banned the individual perpetrators for life.”

If you’ve been jonesing for a new kind of Gatorade, you’ll have a while longer to wait: after announcing last year that it was working on an organic version of Gatorade that it would unleash upon the masses in 2016, PepsiCo now says it’s pushing back the release date for that planned beverage to sometime in 2017.

“It’s in our road map to do Gatorade with less artificial [flavors], and we are developing a G organic that we are planning to launch next year, and then we plan to evaluate the rest of the portfolio to have better choices for athletes,” Xavi Cortadellas, Head of Innovation at Gatorade told TheStreet.

As for why it’s making a move to the organic side, Al Carey, the CEO of PepsiCo Americas Beverages, said last year that it’s what customers want.

“It’s a consumer interest,” Carey said then. “I think they’re very interested in non-GMO [genetically modified organisms] and organic, and to the degree you can make it meaningful to the consumer — do it.”

Of course, Pepsi isn’t alone on the organic bandwagon: companies like Papa John’s, Hershey’s, Panera, Campbell’s, Schwan, Subway, Aldi, Mondelez, and more all removed or have promised to stop using artificial flavors and additives in some of their products in response to consumer demand for less processed foods.

Late last year, Pepsi prepared to introduce a new beverage, the old-timey and upscale 1893, or as its trademark application called it, “1893 From the Makers of Pepsi-Cola.” It’s just one of many products taking advantage of a strange trend in soft drinks right now: making products with real sugar is a selling point, something that the industry might not have expected just a few years ago.

Wait…isn’t sugar bad for us? Why are health-conscious consumers turning to more calorific beverages? Even the CEO of PepsiCo, Indira Nooyi, seems to find current consumer preferences a little confusing.

“They are willing to go to organic non-GMO products even if it has high salt, high sugar, high fat,” she told investors on a conference call last year. Nooyi would have expected diet soft drink sales to go up as Americans became interested in “clean” eating,” not full-sugar drinks.

The appeal, though, is that sugar is something that we think of as natural, coming from a plant. There’s a reason why drinks labels take the trouble to say they’re made from cane sugar. Corn sugar High-fructose corn syrup originates in a plant, too, but isn’t something that we routinely cook with.

“The number one fixation on food companies’ minds is ‘clean label,'” a food market expert explained to the Wall Street Journal. Companies are trying to make products in factories in massive quantities, but with “natural ingredients and shorter ingredient lists that look like you made it at home.” Do you have a high-fructose corn syrup bowl sitting on your counter next to the coffee machine? Neither does anyone else.

Products that call themselves “natural,” a label that’s meaningless under current regulations, are popular right now, and attempts to market sweeteners like stevia as plant-derived aren’t taking off. As soft drink sales fall, then, companies want to sell us smaller containers of slightly more expensive sugar-water, at a higher profit.

Soft-Drink Makers Have New Secret Ingredient: Sugar! [Wall Street Journal]

Contrary to what you may have believed your entire life, it turns out that the Hamburglar is not a character limited solely to pilfering beef patties from McDonald’s. How else might one explain how 33 cases of Burger King Whoppers went missing from the back of a truck recently?

Warren, MI police are investigating the crime, which happened while the driver of a semi-truck that was carrying the burgers ended up taking a nap on the job, the Detroit Free Press reports.

“It’s a whopper of a theft,” the city’s mayor, Jim Fouts, told the newspaper.

Here’s how the mystery of the disappearing Whoppers went down: on Thursday night, the driver tasked with transporting the Burger King products attempted to deliver several cases of burgers to the distribution center, but for some reason, he ended up having to wait several hours to complete the delivery.

He fell asleep in the truck and woke up at 2 a.m. to find that his truck’s shipping seal was busted and a few boxes of Whoppers were missing. So he locked the truck with a padlock and went back to sleep, officials said. But when he woke up again at 8:30 a.m., at least one thief had struck his cargo, stealing 33 cases of burgers this time.

Police are now on the case of the hamburglars, though they need help with leads and are asking the public to pitch in — after all, “They probably consumed the evidence,” Fouts noted.

‘Hamburglar’ in Warren stole 33 cases of Whoppers [Detroit Free Press]

Would you eat a burger from Chipotle? No, not at Chipotle, but a fast-casual burger restsaurant that uses the same food-sourcing and cooking methods, and has a similar vibe and a GMO-free menu? The company, which also runs pizza and pan-Asian noodle restaurants modeled on its main brand, trademarked the phrase “Better Burger,” which sounds like a nice name for a burger place.

The Chipotle brand name might be a bit tainted right now, which might make the idea of expanding their business under a familiar model but a new brand name an appealing idea. The company’s other brands, ShopHouse Southeast Asian Kitchen and Pizzeria Locale, are relatively small now, with fewer than ten outlets of each open now.

In an e-mail to Bloomberg, which noticed the original trademark application, a Chipotle spokesperson said that the company is “exploring” the burger idea, describing it as a “growth seed” alongside the other two chains. Their business model could extend to more than pizzas and ramen, he points out: company executives and representatives “have noted before that the Chipotle model could be applied to a wide variety of foods,” he e-mailed.

In a strange parallel, McDonald’s, which at one point owned 90% of Chipotle, recently trademarked what could be a new slogan, “The simpler the better,” which suggests that it may continue its strange marketing of itself as a restaurant serving artisanal, almost-homemade food.

Chipotle Considers Opening Chain Under ‘Better Burger’ Name [Bloomberg]

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — The public is getting its first glimpse of a baby Masai giraffe born over the weekend at the Santa Barbara Zoo.

The zoo posted online video Monday of the still-unnamed calf bonding with its mother, Audrey, behind the scenes in their barn.

The calf, born Saturday, is already 191 pounds and over 6 feet tall.

There’s no word on when the newborn will be introduced into the giraffe exhibit for viewing by zoo visitors.

The Ventura County Star newspaper reports (http://bit.ly/1Uzmvdr ) that it’s the fourth birth for Audrey at the zoo. Her last calf, Buttercup, was born in November 2014.

The zoo’s other female giraffe, Betty Lou, is in her third pregnancy and is expected to give birth in July.

The post Baby giraffe born at Santa Barbara Zoo seen on video appeared first on WTOP.

WASHINGTON — The burger chain that got its start in Arlington in 1986 just ranked as the favorite fast-food chain in the U.K.

Market researcher Market Force Information surveyed about 4,600 U.K. consumers in a brand loyalty study, and says Five Guys, which opened its first U.K. restaurant in 2013, beat out last year’s  No. 1, Nando’s Peri Peri.

The Market Force survey asked consumers to rate fast-food restaurants on a range of attributes.  Nando’s scored the highest percentage of top marks for five out of eight attributes, but Five Guys’ ratings on food quality, cleanliness and staff friendliness were high enough to give it the overall top ranking.

Five Guys grew in Washington slowly at first, with five locations by 2001. It began franchising in 2003 and grew to more than 300 locations in 18 months. It has more than 1,400 locations worldwide now, including close to 90 in the Washington-Baltimore region.

Five Guys fact: There are more than 250,000 possible ways to order a burger at Five Guys.

H/T Washingtonian

The post Five Guys crowned the UK’s favorite fast-food restaurant appeared first on WTOP.

Speedo swimwear, protein powder, and an ultra-cheap LED desk lamp kick off Wednesday’s best deals.

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Popular messaging service Snapchat has had a binding arbitration clause — which takes away a user’s right to sue the company — in its user agreement since 2014. Yesterday, Snapchat updated its terms to give users 30 days to opt out of this anti-consumer restriction on their legal rights.

A Consumerist reader noticed that in Snapchat’s description of “What’s New” in this updated user agreement, the company buries details of the new opt-out feature at the bottom.

“We’ve given you more choice about how to resolve issues in the (hopefully unlikely) event you and Snapchat have a dispute,” reads the notice. “You can now take steps to opt out of the arbitration agreement.”

A scan of the new agreement itself finds the relevant section:

So that gives new Snapchat users 30 days from whenever they sign up, and current members presumably have 29 days (including today) to tell Snapchat they don’t want their rights taken from them.

To tell Snapchat you want to opt out of the arbitration agreement, you must send the company a written notice that includes the following:

• Your name
• Your address
• Snapchat username
• Email address used to set up the account
• An “unequivocal” statement that you desire to opt out of the arbitration agreement

This all must be sent to:
Snapchat, Inc.
ATTN: Arbitration Opt-out
63 Market Street
Venice, CA 90291

Before the end of the remaining 29 days.

Of course, even if you do opt out of this clause, Snapchat will not make it easy to sue the company if it does screw you over. The very next part of the user agreement states that any lawsuits bought by you or Snapchat “will be litigated exclusively in the United States District Court for the Central District of California” or “the Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles.”

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — The Latest on a new law in North Carolina that critics have called discriminatory (all times local):

1:30 p.m.

A statewide organization that worked to get Charlotte’s nondiscrimination ordinance overturned by the state legislature says hundreds of North Carolina businesses support the new state law but that some are afraid of retaliation if they make that support public.

In a press release Tuesday, the NC Values Coalition said bullying from the LGBT community has some business owners afraid for the well-being of their businesses and families if they speak out. The release did not offer any examples to back up that claim.

Spokeswoman Kami Mueller said that precedent has been set in other states for businesses owners to have reasonable fear if they speak in support of the state law.

The release did have the names of 17 businesses that were willing to be identified as supporting the new law.

___

11:45 a.m.

A top legislative Republican says North Carolina’s Democratic attorney general should resign if he won’t defend a far-reaching new state law that in part voids Charlotte’s anti-discrimination ordinance.

Senate Leader Phil Berger said Tuesday that Attorney General Roy Cooper appears to be pandering to left-wing backers as he runs for governor against incumbent Republican Gov. Pat McCrory. Berger says Cooper’s campaigning is making it impossible for him to fulfill his duties as attorney general.

Berger issued a statement after Cooper said he won’t defend in court the new state law that prevents local governments from adopting anti-discrimination measures for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

Cooper says in response to Berger’s comments that he’s doing his job and will keep doing it.

___

11:15 a.m.

North Carolina’s Democratic attorney general is commending Georgia’s Republican governor for vetoing a piece of legislation that critics have called discriminatory.

Attorney General Roy Cooper said at a news conference Tuesday that Gov. Nathan Deal “stepped up” on Monday when he rejected a “religious freedom” bill. Cooper said Deal recognized the negative economic impact it would have Georgia if he signed the legislation.

Many corporations have spoken out against the bill in Georgia and the new law in North Carolina. The North Carolina bill prevents Charlotte and other local governments from approving protections for LGBT people.

The Georgia bill was modeled on the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act. People claiming their religious freedoms are burdened could force state and local governments to prove a “compelling” interest in enforcing laws that conflict with their beliefs.

___

11:05 a.m.

North Carolina’s attorney general says he won’t defend in court a new state law preventing Charlotte and other local governments from approving protections for LGBT citizens at restaurants, hotels and stores.

Democrat Roy Cooper made the announcement Tuesday, a day after gay rights advocates sued the state to seek to overturn the law. The federal lawsuit lists Cooper among the defendants because of his official position, but he opposes the law and wants it repealed.

The Republican-led legislature and GOP Gov. Pat McCrory approved the law last week. They say Charlotte went too far with a local ordinance allowing transgender people to use the restroom of their preference. The law also addresses bathroom use in schools and state agencies.

Cooper is challenging McCrory for governor this fall.

The post The Latest: Group says fear stops some from supporting law appeared first on WTOP.

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Four Salt Lake City firefighters say one of their own stations caught fire because the city ignored codes on storing oily rags and the blaze endangered lives because officials failed to install enough smoke detectors.

The men have filed notice of a potential lawsuit against the city over the March 2015 fire.

They say officials didn’t bring the downtown fire station up to code when it was renovated in 2011, and didn’t put any smoke detectors on the floor where firefighters were sleeping when it started.

City officials question the accuracy of the claims, but Mayor Jackie Biskupski is willing to listen to the firefighters’ concerns, said spokesman Matthew Rojas.

The four were among nine emergency workers at the station, one of the oldest in the city, when the fire started. It caused extensive damage and the building remains closed more than a year later.

One of the firefighters, Steve Hoffman, says four fires have been sparked by oily rags at city stations since 2011.

Hoffman said his request for air-tight containers to safely store the flammable material at the station was refused.

Salt Lake City Chief Brian Dale denied that, but said that each fire station has now been equipped with proper storage.

Hoffman and the other firefighters — Kyle Marston, Jim Williams and Gregory Holmes — also claim that there were no smoke detectors in their sleeping quarters and many people were awakened by their co-workers rather than alarms.

Some firefighters suffered smoke inhalation in the blaze.

The fire chief said in a statement that the station’s smoke detectors were up to code, though Dale couldn’t say exactly how many alarms there were or where they were located.

The firefighters’ claims were first reported by the Salt Lake Tribune.

The post Firefighters say city to blame for fire at station appeared first on WTOP.

Your daily look at late-breaking news, upcoming events and the stories that will be talked about Thursday:

1. TRUMP’S ABORTION COMMENTS SPARK UPROAR

The candidate tries to take back his remarks that if abortions are banned, women who get them should receive “some form of punishment.”

2. AFTER BRUSSELS, LEADERS TACKLING THREAT OF NUCLEAR TERROR

Preventing terrorists from obtaining nuclear materials is the focus as Obama hosts leaders from roughly 50 countries for a nuclear security summit.

3. TENSION EBBED AS EGYPTAIR HIJACKING UNFOLDED

The atmosphere aboard the aircraft grew so relaxed that a passenger posed for a wide-grinning selfie alongside the self-billed bomber, whose explosives belt turned out to be fake.

4. TWO WHITE MINNEAPOLIS POLICE OFFICERS WON’T BE CHARGED IN FATAL SHOOTING

Evidence shows the black suspect before he was killed tried to grab the weapon of one of the officers, which made them believe they were in mortal danger, the prosecutor says.

5. HOW DISPUTE OVER NORTH CAROLINA’S NEW BATHROOM LAW COULD BE SETTLED

The law’s fate could be determined by a coming federal court ruling in the case of a Virginia teen denied use of his school’s boys’ room.

6. SYRIA’S ASSAD CALLS FOR UNITY GOVERNMENT

He also rejects a key opposition demand for a transitional ruling body — a stance that could complicate international peace efforts.

7. WHERE SMOG IS REACHING ALARMING LEVELS

Mexico City temporarily orders all cars to remain idle one day a week in response to its worst air-quality crisis in over a decade

8. NEW OPTION FOR PATIENTS WITH AIDS VIRUS AND FAILING ORGANS

Surgeons in Baltimore for the first time transplant organs between an HIV-positive donor and HIV-positive recipients.

9. WHAT SUMMER TRAVELERS WILL HAVE TO CONTEND WITH

Fliers can expect massive security lines across the U.S., with airlines already warning passengers to arrive at least two hours early or risk missing their flight.

10. UCONN WOMEN TAKING HITS FOR BEING TOO GOOD

Critics contend the team’s 73-game winning streak and continual blowouts have turned off casual fans because there’s little drama when the Huskies take the court.

The post 10 Things to Know for Thursday appeared first on WTOP.

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Two teenagers have been arrested in Florida after authorities say they were caught on Snapchat posing with guns at an Orlando high school.

Orange County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Jane Watrel tells news outlets the arrests came after a student saw images on the popular mobile app of a 15-year-old and a 17-year-old posing in a Cypress Creek High School bathroom with a handgun.

Watrel says one image showed the gun’s magazine and bullets.

A concerned parent saw the Snapchat video and contacted authorities, who worked to identify the suspects.

They face charges of possession of a firearm on school property and possession of a firearm by a minor.

Cypress Creek Principal John McHale says the teenagers didn’t pose a threat at any time to the school’s students.

The post Teens arrested after posing on Snapchat with guns at school appeared first on WTOP.

MANASSAS, Va. (AP) — Police and fire officials say a worker was killed and several others were hurt when a large rack collapsed at a food service warehouse in Prince William County.

County Police said in a news release the collapse occurred about 3:40 p.m. Tuesday at the Reinhart Food Services warehouse in Manassas.

Thomas Jarman, battalion chief of the county fire and rescue department, tells The Washington Post that the rack was about 30 feet high and 150 to 200 feet long. He says workers were trapped or pinned when it fell.

Police say one male employee was pronounced dead at the scene. Injured employees were taken to area hospitals.

Police and fire officials and investigators from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration are investigating the cause of the collapse.

The post Worker killed when large rack collapses at food warehouse appeared first on WTOP.

WASHINGTON — Prince William County Police are investigating after “what appeared to be human remains” were found in a retention pond Tuesday afternoon.

Officers responded to the pond in the 7300 block of Williamson Boulevard shortly after 4 p.m.

Police say officers with the Dive Team are working to recover the remains, which will be taken to the Medical Examiner’s Officer for analysis and identification.

Stay with WTOP.com for updates on this developing story.

Below is a map of the location of the pond:

The post Va. police: Human remains found in retention pond appeared first on WTOP.

A week after North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory signed into law a piece of legislation that overrides and prevents local governments from establishing anti-discrimination rules against gay and transgender people, the state’s Attorney General Roy Cooper has called the law a “national embarrassment” that he won’t defend in court.

McCrory signed HB2 [PDF] also dubbed the “Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act,” on March 23 at the end of a rushed meeting of state legislators in apparent response to a new Charlotte city ordinance that would have allowed transgender people to use bathrooms of the gender with which they identify.

The governor and other supporters of the bill have publicly presented the legislation as a simple measure to prevent gender confusion with regard to the use of restrooms and locker rooms.

However, the language of HB2 makes it clear that the bill provisions “supersede and preempt any ordinance, regulation, resolution, or policy adopted or imposed by a unit of local government or other political subdivision of the State,” meaning that it apparently guts any pending or current local rules prohibiting discrimination against the LGBT community.

In addition to Charlotte’s trans-friendly bathroom ordinance, cities like Raleigh and Carrboro, have banned municipal contractors from discriminating based on sexual orientation or gender identity. HB2, which goes into effect on April 1, would seem to override those local rules — taking away city governments’ ability to expand on state anti-discrimination laws.

Earlier this week, the ACLU and others sued McCrory and the Board of Governors for the University of North Carolina system, alleging that HB2 “violates the most basic guarantees of equal treatment and the U.S. Constitution.”

“In a process rife with procedural irregularities, the legislature introduced and passed H.B. 2 in a matter of hours, and the governor signed the bill into law that same day,” reads the complaint [PDF] filed in federal court. “Lawmakers made no attempt to cloak their actions in a veneer of neutrality, instead openly and virulently attacking transgender people, who were falsely portrayed as predatory and dangerous to others.”

The lawsuit says that — beyond the law’s stated purpose of clarifying which bathrooms transgender people should use — HB2 “wreaks far greater damage by also prohibiting local governments in North Carolina from enacting express anti-discrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity.”

In response to the lawsuit, state attorney general Cooper — who is, perhaps not coincidentally, making a run for the governor’s office — said this morning that neither he nor his office would defend HB2 in court.

Since the bill passed, a number of companies have expressed concerns about doing business with or in the state. Cooper contends that if HB2 is enforced, it “will set North Carolina’s economy back if we don’t repeal it.”

Cooper explained that his decision is not just about disagreeing with the core tenets of HB2. There is also a conflict between his own agency’s anti-discrimination policies and the new statewide standard put in place by HB2. Since he has to defend the state DOJ’s policy against this new law, he can’t simultaneously represent the state in protecting the statute.

In his first public defense of the new law, McCrory maintained his position that HB2 did nothing to change existing laws throughout the state.

“We have not taken away any rights that have currently existed in any city in North Carolina, from Raleigh to Durham to Chapel Hill to Charlotte,” said the governor. “Every city and every corporation have the exact same nondiscrimination policy this week as they had two weeks ago.”

Georgia lawmakers recently tried to pass legislation that was similarly criticized by businesses and human rights groups for allowing discrimination against the LGBT community. Yesterday, Georgia Governor Nathan Deal vetoed the bill, which would have exempted faith-based groups from choosing to not hire or transact business with people whose lifestyles they find objectionable.

VIA:
NC attorney general refuses to defend state from HB2 legal challenge [Charlotte Observer]

McCrory blames ‘inaccurate’ news stories for backlash against NC LGBT law [Charlotte Observer]

It probably wasn’t the first time that one man in Pennsylvania has been accused of stealing a car. We’re guessing. That’s because when he took a Mercedes on a test drive at a dealership near Pittsburgh, the Lexus that he left behind the keys to was, um, also reported stolen. From another dealership.

The dealership employee who handed over the keys followed their normal procedures: they made a copy of the man’s license, and held on to the keys to the car he arrived in. He was testing an older Mercedes, explaining that he wanted something different from his Lexus because he needed a more comfortable car after undergoing back surgery.

All of that makes sense, and the employee handed over the keys to the Mercedes after going through the whole normal routine, including describing their normal test drive route. Then she let the man drive off by himself.

After half an hour passed, she noticed that he Lexus’s license plate and registration sticker weren’t from the same state. Police told her that the Lexus was, indeed, stolen. So was the Mercedes.

The dealership, needless to say, plans to change its test drive procedures, probably sending employees out with drivers so they don’t take off with the merchandise anymore.

Man Steals Car On Test Drive, After Using Stolen Car As Collateral [CBS Pittsburgh]

In the handful of markets where Google Fiber exists, it’s offered high-speed broadband and pay-TV service to compete with the existing cable companies. One thing Google hasn’t offered that the incumbent providers have is landline phone service, but that’s changing with the rollout of “Fiber Phone,” which will also let you field calls on your cellphone.

As the name implies, Fiber Phone is only available in those markets where Google Fiber is an option, and currently only in select areas. For those who can access the service, it’s a $10/month plan that offers unlimited nationwide calling (Google Voice rates apply for international calls). It also includes the standard features — call waiting, caller ID, 9-1-1 emergency calling — that traditional telecom providers offer.

Like some other VoIP services, Fiber Phone will let you use your cellphone to answer calls to your landline number, or use your laptop to make calls using the same number.

Google is also pushing its automatic transcription service — which can email or text you a transcription of your voicemails — as a plus, but anyone who has ever stared, baffled by the gibberish Google’s robot transcriptionists put out can tell you, you’re probably better off just listening to the message.

A law requiring calorie counts to be posted for most food items that people eat outside of their homes was part of the Affordable Care Act, which passed in 2010. Resistance from different parts of the food industry means that its implementation kept getting pushed back. Now, the newest delay pushes the deadline into 2017, and the calorie counts would be implemented under the next president.

The FDA originally approved the requirements back in 2014, and it covers all sorts of food consumed outside of our homes, ranging from movie theater popcorn to pizzas. As long as the eatery has more than 20 outlets, it’s required to post calorie counts. Only now, they don’t have to do it until next year.

One way to weaken the bill (other than just hitting the regulatory snooze button on the requirement, which is what happened again here) was a bill that passed the House a few weeks ago, which would allow food companies to define “serving” for themselves when posting calorie counts.

Pizzas are a good example, since pizzerias have fought these laws the most: the original rule would require the calorie count for an entire pizza to be posted, since consumers buy an entire pizza and decide for ourselves how many servings to cut it into. (Admit it, you’ve eaten an entire pizza by yourself before. At least a small one.)

Letting companies decide on an arbitrary “serving size” sort of makes sense for a pizza, but makes less sense for other food items. Are you really going to share an extra-large soda between three people?

Public health advocates are annoyed that menus still haven’t changed half a decade after the ACA passed. “Not only is it simple and straightforward but so many states and localities have already done this,” Margo Wootan of the Center for Science and the Public Interest told the Washington Post.

In some places, calorie counts are already a routine part of menus. In others, like California, they’re officially law but the law hasn’t been implemented while city or state governments wait for the federal version to be implemented.

Calorie labels on menus delayed again — to next year [Washington Post]