Tag Archives: Indiana

Historic flood disaster leaves at least 25 dead

Important Takeaways:

  • A deadly barrage of severe weather, tornadoes and torrential rain has come to an end, but the danger is far from over in communities across the Midwest and South as angry rivers continue to rise, forcing families from their homes.
  • At least 25 people in seven states have been killed due to the severe weather, including deaths from tornadoes and extreme weather in Tennessee, Missouri, Indiana, Arkansas and Mississippi, and fatalities from flooding in Kentucky.
  • One of those monster tornadoes was captured live on FOX Weather on Wednesday, April 2, by FOX Weather Exclusive Storm Tracker Brandon Copic.
  • That tornado that touched down in northwestern Arkansas prompted forecasters to issue a rare Tornado Emergency as the supercell thunderstorm passed through communities such as Lake City and Blytheville.
  • Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said at a news conference on Monday. “Remember, this event is not over until the waters have receded. Until the areas that are flooded are fully dry. Until we don’t have saturated ground that could create mudslides over roads and bridges.”
  • Beshear said on Monday that more than 500 roads across the state were closed due to historic flooding, mudslides and landslides.
  • Tennessee flooding leads to mandatory evacuations
  • The order also had a dire warning – those who don’t comply with the evacuation order may not be able to receive help from first responders. In addition, residents may be held personally liable for any damage or injuries sustained.
  • Meteorologist-in-Charge at the National Weather Service office in Memphis, Tennessee, Darone Jones, joined FOX Weather on Tuesday morning and said there’s still a lot of recovery ahead for waterlogged communities.
  • “It’s very hard to contextualize this,” Jones continued. “You know, you mentioned the 223 warnings. Just in comparison to last year, 2024, we issued 262 warnings for the entire year. So, we did all of that in like a four-day span.”
  • Jones went on to say that the event is still unfolding.
  • “The worst is yet to come for a lot of areas,” he said. So, you know, it’s not over. So, it’s hard to talk about the uniqueness from a historical perspective at this time.”

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NWS confirmed 3 more tornadoes from Monday’s derecho hit Chicago making total of 22

Important Takeaways:

  • The severe weather system swept through northern Illinois and Indiana, bringing the total count of tornadoes to 22.
  • A 44-year-old woman from Cedar Lake, Ind., died following the storms, according to the Lake County Coroner’s Office.
  • The storms also led to dozens of flight cancelations at O’Hare International Airport and Midway International Airport, thousands of power outages and several reports of storm damage.
  • So far, the NWS has confirmed the following tornadoes:
  • EF-0: Glen Ellyn to Lombard
  • EF-0: Villa Park
  • EF-1: Grant Park
  • EF-1: Sugar Grove to Aurora EF-1
  • EF-0: Crestwood to Blue Island
  • EF-1 Flossmoor to Thornton
  • EF-0: West Town (Chicago)
  • EF-0: Shelby to Wheatfield Township
  • EF-0: Peotone (track TBD)
  • EF-0: Manteno (track TBD)
  • EF-0: Southern Winnebago County EF-0 (exact track still TBD)
  • EF-0: Byron
  • EF-0: Davis Junction
  • EF-0: Sugar Grove to North Aurora
  • EF-1: Yorkville to Naperville
  • EF-2: Channahon-Manhattan-Frankfort-Matteson
  • EF-0: Crest Hill to Lockport
  • EF-1 Justice
  • EF-1: Chicago; Near West Side to west side of The Loop
  • EF-1: Chicago; Chicago Lawn to West Englewood
  • EF-1: Cedar Lake to Crown Point
  • EF-1: Minooka-Shorewood-Joliet

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China seeking to buy more farmland in Indiana

Chinese-Farmland-owned-in-Indiana-map

Important Takeaways:

  • Indiana farmers raise national security fears as China buys up over 600 acres, as lawmakers try to ban purchases near military bases amid spying threat
  • Indiana lawmakers propose a law banning certain land ownership by China
  • Purchases near military bases or national guard armories would be barred
  • 24 states have passed similar laws including Alabama, Idaho and Virginia
  • The Indiana bill does not ban specific countries, but defers to the US Commerce Department’s list of adversaries, which currently includes China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela and Cuba.
  • At least 24 other US states have passed similar laws restriction certain forms of foreign land ownership.
  • Federal data show that Chinese firms and investors own just over 383,934 acres in the US as of 2021, making it the 18th largest foreign investor.
  • That’s far less than the land owned by the top foreign land owners: Canada, Netherlands, Italy, the UK and Germany.

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Indiana and Michigan hit by deadly storms

Revelation 16:9 “They were scorched by the fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God who had power over these plagues. They did not repent and give him glory.”

Important Takeaways:

  • Deadly storms unleash damaging winds, trigger mass power outages
  • A line of storms that produced a windy start to the week in the Midwest was responsible for at least two deaths Monday night and more than half a million power outages in Michigan and four other states, with wind gusts topping out at alarming speeds in several other locales.
  • Both Indiana and Michigan dealt with dangerous wind gusts due to the storms, including 81-mph gusts in Lowell, Indiana, 70-mph gusts at Detroit’s City Airport and a 66-mph gust reported in Holland, Michigan, according to AccuWeather data.

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Indiana governor meets with Taiwan president defying the CCP’s wishes

Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.

Important Takeaways:

  • China sends four military aircraft towards Taiwan airspace hours after Indiana’s governor met nation’s president in another show of defiance against the CCP
  • The four aircraft crossed the median line, an unofficial barrier in the Taiwan strait
  • Eric Holcomb, the Republican governor of Indiana, landed in Taiwan on Sunday
  • He then met with Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen on Monday in Taipei
  • Holcomb emphasized the economic nature of his visit, mentioning that the state is among the top in the U.S. for direct foreign investment
  • US-China tensions have risen since Beijing staged huge military drills in retaliation for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan earlier this month

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Indiana Mall shooter taken out by armed Good Samaritan

Matthew 5:10 ““Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Important Takeaways:

  • Report: Armed Citizen Foils Mass Shooting, Kills Indiana Mall Attacker
  • WTHR notes that witnesses heard about 20 shots ring out in the food court during the attack.
  • Greenwood Chief James Ison indicated that “a good Samaritan witnessed the shooting and shot and killed the shooter.”
  • Two other individuals were injured.
  • Police indicated that the attacker was an adult male but provided no greater detail.

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Concerned Citizens and Parents cheer School Board over blocking Satan Club

Ephesians 6:13 “Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.”

Important Takeaways:

  • Applause Erupts as Hundreds of Parents Cheer School Board for Blocking After-School Satan Club
  • The Northern York County School District board voted 8-1 against a parent’s request for the satanic club at Northern Elementary School in Dillsburg, the York Daily Record reports.
  • Hundreds of people attended the meeting and erupted in applause when the board vote was taken.
  • “Look at the range of our students the children suffering from mental health issues, suicide, anxiety, depression all these things are off the chart and my heart goes out to these kids,” one resident at the meeting said. “More than ever we need a God in this world and this proposal in the opposite direction (of God).”
  • There are currently four After School Satan Clubs currently in operation in the U.S.  Those chapters are in Indiana and Ohio.

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Department of Agriculture confirmed first case of Avian flu since 2020

Luke 21:11 There will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences. And there will be terrors and great signs from heaven.

Important Takeaways:

  • Avian flu has been detected in Indiana turkey flock, officials say
  • This is not the first time bird flu has struck the area: an outbreak tore through 11 farms in the county in January 2016, leading to the death of more than 400,000 birds, the State Board of Animal Health told The Associated Press.
  • Denise Derrer Spears, a spokeswoman for the Indiana State Board of Animal Health, confirmed to CBS News that approximately 29,000 turkeys would be killed to ensure the disease does not spread.
  • The USDA stressed that no cases of the virus have since been detected in humans and said there is no immediate public health concern

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U.S. to carry out fifth federal execution after 17-year pause

By Jonathan Allen

(Reuters) – The U.S. government was due to execute Keith Nelson, a convicted child murderer, on Friday afternoon in what would be its fifth execution since it resumed carrying out capital punishment this summer after a 17-year hiatus.

The execution was scheduled to take place at 4 p.m. (2000 GMT) at the U.S. Department of Justice’s execution chamber in Terre Haute, Indiana, using lethal injections of pentobarbital, a powerful barbiturate.

On Thursday, a federal judge overseeing legal challenges to the execution protocol by Nelson and other death row inmates ruled that the Justice Department’s protocol violated drug safety laws.

Judge Tanya Chutkan of the U.S. District Court in Washington ordered Nelson’s execution be delayed until the Justice Department revised its protocol to comply with the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, including a requirement that a drug can only be issued on a clinician’s prescription.

The Justice Department challenged the injunction delaying the execution in the U.S. Appeals Court for the District of Columbia Circuit. The appeals court overturned the injunction on Thursday evening, ruling that Chutkan had not established that violations of the act constituted “irreparable harm.”

Chutkan spoke with lawyers representing Nelson and the Justice Department in a telephone conference on Friday as she considered a request by Nelson’s lawyers to revise her order or issue a new one blocking Friday’s execution.

Nelson, who was convicted of raping and murdering 10-year-old Pamela Butler in Kansas in 1999, is one of more than a dozen inmates on federal death row in Terre Haute, Indiana, who sued the Justice Department over its lethal injection protocol, which was announced in 2019, replacing the old three-drug protocol last used in 2003.

Three of those plaintiffs have since been executed by the Justice Department after the U.S. Supreme Court swiftly dismissed earlier injunctions issued by Chutkan delaying the executions to allow the litigation to proceed.

U.S. to execute only Native American on federal death row

By Jonathan Allen

(Reuters) – The United States is set to execute Lezmond Mitchell, a convicted murderer and the only Native American on federal death row, on Wednesday, despite opposition from the Navajo Nation, which says the government is infringing tribal sovereignty.

Mitchell, a Navajo, is set to be killed with lethal injections of pentobarbital, a powerful barbiturate, at 6 p.m. in the Department of Justice’s execution chamber in Terre Haute, Indiana.

His lawyers and Jonathan Nez, the Navajo Nation president, have asked U.S. President Donald Trump for clemency, and Mitchell has asked the U.S. District Court in Washington to delay the execution while this is considered.

On Tuesday night, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected his bid for a stay based on his lawyers’ argument that racial bias may have tainted the jury at his trial.

Absent intervention, Mitchell, 38, will become the fourth man to be executed by the U.S. government this summer after an informal 17-year hiatus, which was caused in part by legal challenges to lethal injection protocols and difficulties obtaining deadly drugs.

Mitchell and an accomplice, Johnny Oslinger, were convicted of murdering a 9-year-old Navajo girl, Tiffany Lee, and her grandmother Alyce Slim in 2001 on the tribe’s territory, which spans four states in the U.S. Southwest.

According to prosecutors, the men stabbed Slim more than 30 times, put the body in the backseat of her car alongside the granddaughter as they drove elsewhere before killing the girl later and decapitating both bodies.

Mitchell was sentenced to death in an Arizona federal court over the objection of Navajo officials, who said the tribe’s cultural values prohibited taking human life “for vengeance.” At least 13 other tribes joined the Navajo Nation in urging Trump this month to commute Mitchell’s sentence to life in prison.

Oslinger was a teenager at the time and ineligible for the death sentence.

Under the Major Crimes Act, the federal government has jurisdiction over certain major crimes occurring on Indian territory, including murder but usually cannot pursue capital punishment for a Native American for a crime on tribal land without the tribe’s consent.

Navajo officials, along with other leaders of other tribes, have opposed the death penalty, including in Mitchell’s case. But John Ashcroft, attorney general under then-President George W. Bush, overrode federal prosecutors in Arizona who said they would defer to the tribe’s position against pursuing a capital case.

In what Mitchell’s lawyers deride as a legal loophole, federal prosecutors successfully pursued a capital case against Mitchell for carjacking, a capital crime that is not among those listed in the Major Crimes Act.

(Reporting by Jonathan Allen; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)