The Jim Bakker Show

Russian envoy to United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, dies in New York

Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin addresses members of the U.N. Security Council during a meeting about the Ukraine situation, at the U.N. headquarters in New York

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, died suddenly at work in New York on Monday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

The ministry gave no details on the circumstances of his death but offered condolences to his relatives and said the diplomat had died one day before his 65th birthday.

“The outstanding Russian diplomat passed away at his work post,” it said.

Farhan Haq, deputy spokesman for the U.N. secretary-general’s office, said: “He has been such a regular presence here that I am actually quite stunned. Our thoughts go to his family, to his friends and to his government.”

Churkin was a pugnacious defender of Russian policy, notably its intensive bombing of the Syrian city of Aleppo last year to crush rebels opposed to President Bashar al-Assad.

When then-U.S. envoy to the U.N. Samantha Power accused Syria, Russia and Iran last year of bearing responsibility for atrocities there, Churkin said she was acting like Mother Teresa and forgetting her own country’s track record in the Middle East.

(Reporting by Jack Stubbs; Editing by Gareth Jones and Mark Trevelyan)

New York City mayor says ‘affordability crisis’ threatens city

By Hilary Russ

NEW YORK (Reuters) – New York City is threatened by an “affordability crisis” because rising housing prices have significantly outpaced wage growth, Mayor Bill de Blasio said on Monday.

De Blasio used his state of the city address to speak broadly about New Yorkers’ struggles to pay rent and make ends meet and discussed recent proposals, rather than lay out many new proposals.

De Blasio, a Democrat who took office in January 2014, is up for reelection in November.

Held at the historic Apollo Theater in Harlem, home to numerous American musical legends including Billie Holiday, the program featured at least 45 minutes of introductory remarks that were a mostly a love story to the city’s diversity.

“So many people in this city are afraid they cannot stay in the city that they love,” because of high costs, de Blasio said.

De Blasio cited a long list of what he considers some of his biggest accomplishments, including the implementation of neighborhood policing and the highest ever four-year high-school graduation rate of 72.6 percent in 2016.

He said residents would hear in coming weeks more details of forthcoming proposals about homelessness, opioid addiction and the creation of more higher paying jobs, which he called the “next frontline.”

He said the city would strive to create 100,000 more permanent good jobs that pay at least $50,000 a year.

Last week, de Blasio released information about other proposals that he touched on in his speech, including ways to help seniors and low-income people afford housing by adding new units and providing more rental assistance.

He said previously that he would seek to add 10,000 apartments for households earning less than $40,000 a year, half of which would be reserved for seniors, while another 500 would be for veterans.

De Blasio referenced another element of the plan announced last week to help more than 25,000 older residents with rent of up to $1,300 a month through the city’s “mansion tax,” which he has proposed before.

“You will hear people say it cannot be done,” de Blasio said of the tax. “They will say you cannot get it through Albany,” using the state capital to refer to the state government, whose approval would be required for the tax.

The mansion tax would bring in $336 million on the sale of homes over $2 million, he said.

“We’re not going to give tax breaks to people doing well,” de Blasio said. “We’re going to ask them to do more.”

(Reporting by Hilary Russ; Editing by Leslie Adler)

New York City police to wear body cameras under labor settlement

By Hilary Russ

NEW YORK (Reuters) – New York City and its largest police union settled on a tentative five-year labor contract on Tuesday that includes salary increases while also agreeing that all patrol officers will wear body cameras by the end of 2019.

The agreement “is a big step forward for a vision of safety in which police and the community are true partners,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said at a press conference with union and police officials.

The New York Police Department, the nation’s largest, already has a pilot program with cameras for 1,000 officers. But further rollout was stymied by a lawsuit, which the union agreed to drop as part of the deal.

New York will join other cities requiring their police forces to wear body cameras amid nationwide concerns over use of excessive force by police. Chicago aims to have the devices on all officers by the end of this year.

The contract agreement also removes a potentially expensive uncertainty that was a hold-over from former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who left office at the end of 2013 with every public-sector labor contract long-expired.

Since taking office, Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration has chipped away at negotiations with teachers and other unions, but the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association contract was still a major sticking point.

Reached at about 4 a.m. on Tuesday, the agreement will cost the city $530.4 million altogether, most of which will be covered by a labor reserve fund. Including healthcare savings, the net cost to the city is $336.7 million.

The deal, covering nearly 24,000 police officers, includes a 2.25 percent bump in base salary for patrol officers as they shift to a new method of neighborhood policing which focuses more on beat patrols and community interaction.

The increase that patrol officers get will be offset in part by lower starting salaries for new hires, although their maximum salaries will rise. Upon approval by union members, the new contract would go into effect March 15.

The city will also support the union’s efforts to get state lawmakers to provide disability benefits at three-quarters of salary, while the union agreed to drop other lawsuits against the city.

(Reporting by Hilary Russ; Editing by Daniel Bases and Andrew Hay)

Hundreds of cats quarantined in New York City bird flu outbreak

By Gina Cherelus

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Hundreds of domestic cats have been quarantined in New York City after contracting a strain of highly contagious avian flu at shelters operated by a major animal rescue organization, and the virus also infected at least one veterinarian, officials said.

It is the first time the H7N2 strain of the virus, commonly found in birds, has infected domestic cats, according to the New York City Health Department.

Symptoms are generally mild, and include sneezing, coughing and runny eyes and noses.

The virus was first detected last month in 45 cats housed at a Manhattan shelter run by Animal Care Center of NYC, and later turned up in cats at shelters in the boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn. It was not immediately clear how the cats contracted the virus or how it spread so quickly, the city’s health department said in a statement on Thursday.

“We continue to urge New Yorkers who have adopted cats from ACC shelters to be on alert for symptoms in their pets and take proper precautions,” Health Commissioner Mary Bassett said in a statement.

She said the risk to human health from H7N2 is low.

H7N2 is a type of avian influenza virus, also known as the bird flu, that can mutate and transfer onto mammals such as cats. It could infect other mammals as well, including humans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) website. The CDC provides guidance on bird flu in cats on its website. (https://www.cdc.gov/flu/spotlights/avian-influenza-cats.htm)

More than 450 cats will remain at a temporary shelter for up to 90 days until a University of Wisconsin lab confirms they are no longer contagious, the city’s health department said. ACC, the New York Health Department and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals are monitoring the animals together.

In December, the city’s health department and the CDC confirmed that a veterinarian had been infected at the ACC’s Manhattan shelter. It was the first case of cat-to-human-transmission of the flu, the city’s health department said. The illness was mild and short-lived.

The health department screened more than 160 ACC employees for the virus and contacted more than 80 percent of pet adopters from the Manhattan shelter, but no other cases have been found.

Residents who adopted a cat from an ACC shelter between Nov. 12 and Dec. 15 should monitor their pets for signs of sickness, officials said.

(Editing by Frank McGurty and Matthew Lewis)

New York train crash injures more than 100 commuters

Emergency Vehicles gathered around train crash in NYC

By Jonathan Oatis

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A New York City train derailed at a downtown Brooklyn terminal during Wednesday’s morning rush hour, injuring more than 100 commuters in the metropolitan area’s second major rail accident since late September.

Emergency crews swarmed Atlantic Terminal after the Long Island Rail Road train went off the tracks inside the busy transportation hub at 8:20 a.m. local time, the New York City Fire Department said.

While none of the injuries were life-threatening, at least 11 people were sent to the hospital, Deputy Assistant Chief Dan Donoghue said at a briefing at the crash site. Between 600 and 700 people were on the train, he said.

The train, arriving from the Queens neighborhood of Far Rockaway, failed to stop on time. Traveling at a fairly slow speed, it derailed after striking a bumping block, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said at the briefing.

About 103 people were injured, the fire department said in a Twitter message. The front two cars of the six-carriage train were severely damaged. The station’s partitions and bumping block, which prevents railway vehicles from going past the end of a section of track, were also damaged.

Passengers said the blood and chaos following the derailment was frightening.

“There were people crying,” said Aaron Neufeld, a 26-year-old paralegal who commutes on the rail line daily. “I saw some bloody faces.”

Neufeld, who was riding in the second car, said the train appeared to be approaching normally until it crashed, knocking passengers on top of one another and shattering glass windows.

“Bags went flying,” he said. “People were thrown to the ground.”

The engineer was probably responsible for failing to stop the train before it hit the bumper, said Tom Prendergast, chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the agency that runs the railroad.

The train was traveling between 10 and 15 miles per hour as it approached the bumper, he said, which is standard.

“At that speed, it’s pretty much the locomotive engineer’s responsibility to stop the train,” Prendergast said as he stood beside Cuomo at the briefing. Investigators will interview the engineer, the conductor and brakeman to determine the cause of the accident, he said.

There were no major service disruptions for other Long Island Rail Road lines at the terminal, an MTA official said.

Earlier, officials said crews were working to restore service at the terminal by the evening rush hour.

In late September, a New Jersey Transit train crashed into a terminal in Hoboken, New Jersey, killing one woman and injuring 114 people, including the engineer.

Cuomo, who has made infrastructure improvements a centerpiece of his agenda, said Wednesday’s incident was minor in comparison. The most serious injury in the crash was a broken leg, he said.

“There was extensive damage in Hoboken,” Cuomo said. “That train was coming in much faster, did much more damage.”

The U.S. Federal Railroad Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board said they were sending investigators to the scene.

The Long Island Rail Road is the United State’s largest commuter rail system, serving more than 330,000 passengers a day, according to the American Public Transportation Association.

Atlantic Terminal, which also connects commuters to nine city subway lines, is one of the busiest New York stations.

(Additional reporting by Gina Cherelus, David Shepardson and David Ingram; Writing by Laila Kearney; Editing by Frank McGurty and Lisa Von Ahn)

New York City crime fell to historic low in 2016

By David Ingram

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Crime in New York City fell to a historic low last year, the police said on Wednesday in a report showing that the largest U.S. city avoided the spike in murders that has battered other major American cities, including Chicago.

Overall, there were 101,606 crimes that police said they knew about during 2016, down 4 percent from 2015, police said.

There were 335 murders reported last year, down 5 percent from the 352 murders a year earlier, police said. The record for the fewest since the city started keeping reliable numbers in 1963 was 328 murders in 2014.

By way of comparison, Chicago, which has about one-third as many residents as New York’s 8.6 million people, recorded 762 murders last year, more than twice as many killings as in New York.

That spike prompted President-elect Donald Trump to suggest on Monday that the city needed federal help.

The trendlines in New York pointed downward in nearly all categories of reported crime, as shootings fell 12 percent, rapes fell 1 percent, robberies fell 9 percent and burglaries fell 15 percent.

Reports of felony-level assaults were up 2 percent, while reports of grand larcenies were flat, according to police numbers.

Police, politicians and criminologists have hotly debated the reasons behind the sharp drop in U.S. crime since the early 1990s, when New York City had more than 2,000 murders a year.

They have put forward explanations such as changing tactics, better data collection or even a reduction in lead poisoning.

New York City Police Commissioner James O’Neill credited last year’s reductions to a “laser-like precision” on gangs and to the department’s neighborhood policing program, which is aimed at improving relations between officers and the communities they patrol.

In a statement, O’Neil said, “2016 was the safest year ever in the history of New York City.”

(Reporting by David Ingram; Editing by Scott Malone and Lisa Shumaker)

New York, wary after Europe attacks, tightens security for New Year’s Eve

Members of the New York Police Department's Counterterrorism Bureau patrol Times Square in the lead up to New Year's celebrations in Manhattan, New York City, U.S. December 29, 2016

By Hilary Russ

NEW YORK (Reuters) – New York City will deploy sand-filled trucks and thousands of police officers as part of a beefed-up plan to protect revelers at this year’s New Year’s Eve celebrations in Times Square, mindful of two deadly truck attacks in Europe this year.

As many as 2 million people are expected to gather on Saturday to welcome the new year and authorities said on Thursday they were aware of no credible threat to the annual festivities at the famed Manhattan crossroads.

Even so, officials have redoubled efforts to prevent attacks like those in Germany and France this year in which suspected Islamic militants intentionally drove trucks into holiday crowds, killing dozens of civilians.

“People will be safe,” New York City Police Commissioner James O’Neill said at a news conference, aiming to allay any security concerns about the Times Square celebration, where a giant crystal ball will descend from a tower to mark the start of 2017.

“We’re going to have one of the most well-policed, best-protected events in one of the safest venues in the entire world given all the assets that we deploy here,” he said.

New York Police Chief of Department Carlos Gomez said the truck attacks in Europe were taken into consideration in planning New York’s security plan.

A truck attack at a holiday market in Berlin days before Christmas killed a dozen people and injured 56, while a similar incident in Nice, France, on Bastille Day this summer killed 86 people and injured more than 400.

Revelers in New York City on Saturday will find 65 large sanitation trucks filled with sand placed in strategic positions to block potential truck attacks, as well as about 100 other smaller “blocker” vehicles, officials said.

More than 80 sand trucks were used to protect the Macy’s 90th Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York after Islamic State militants abroad encouraged their followers to target the event, which drew an estimated 3.5 million people to the streets of the largest U.S. city.

For New Year’s Eve, the nearly 2 million visitors expected to gather in the hours before midnight may notice heavily armed police teams, bomb-sniffing dogs, helicopters and bag searches in subways. Coast Guard and police vessels will patrol the waterways surrounding Manhattan.

Officers also will make sweeps of area hotels, theaters and parking garages and monitor checkpoints where they scan for radiation and weapons, police said.

Other less visible layers of security include plainclothes officers, hundreds of security cameras, the removal of trash cans, sealed manhole covers and rooftop observation points.

All told, the New York Police Department has assigned nearly 7,000 police to Times Square and throughout the rest of the city on Saturday, officials said.

Umbrellas, large bags and alcohol are banned and portions of 57th and 59th streets will be closed to traffic.

(Reporting by Hilary Russ in New York; Editing by Frank McGurty and Bill Trott)

U.S. cities enlist public’s help in wake of deadly Oakland fire

Two children place flowers at a makeshift memorial near the scene of the fatal warehouse fire in Oakland, California

By Rory Carroll and Dan Levine

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – In the days since a warehouse fire in Oakland, California, killed at least 36 people attending a party, cities across the United States have vowed to find ways to prevent such tragedies.

In Portland, Oregon, an elected leader wants to require sprinklers before a building can host a special event. In Los Angeles, a councilmember is calling on citizens to report unsafe buildings.

In Baltimore, officials reacted swiftly on Monday to a citizen complaint about an art space called the Bell Foundry, condemning the building and ousting its tenants after finding violations that included a lack of permits, use of flammables and removal of ceiling beams, said Chief Roman Clark, a fire department spokesman.

The two-story California building where at least 36 people died lacked both sprinklers and smoke alarms. Oakland officials had issued multiple violation notices on the warehouse property over the past several years for trash, debris and rodents, according to city building department records. It was unclear if the city was aware of more serious violations such as just two exterior doors and wooden pallets partially forming a makeshift stairway.

A crane removes debris from the site of a fatal warehouse fire in Oakland, California, U.S. December 6, 2016. REUTERS/Stephen Lam

New York stepped up its enforcement of building safety codes following the 1990 Happy Land fire, which killed 87 people in an unlicensed dance club, said City Councilwoman Elizabeth Crowley, who represents Queens and chairs the council’s fire committee.

“We’re seeing what’s happening there and it’s unbelievable. We want to make sure it doesn’t happen here or anywhere,” she said. “We should take this as a lesson and do our best as a country to make sure all of our cities are abiding by fire and safety regulations,” she said.

In Los Angeles, Councilmember Marqueece Harris-Dawson on Tuesday asked the public to report potential problem residences. “Some people simply aren’t aware that they are living in a place that is as unsafe as it is,” he said.

Los Angeles, he said has many empty warehouses and abandoned buildings that are used for parties and concerts and by the homeless seeking shelter.

Portland Commissioner Dan Saltzman said he wants more buildings to have sprinklers before holding gatherings. He also wants the public to tell the city about problems, as soaring rents have pushed people to live in unsafe conditions.

“We need to deputize the public as our inspectors too,” he said.

Arts organizations have also stepped up.

In Oakland, a group called Omni Commons will meet on Wednesday to see how they can help residents of makeshift spaces improve safety given an expected crackdown on building code violations, according to the group’s Facebook page.

A dance and circus art space called House of Yes in New York City will hold a fundraiser for Oakland victims, during which it will offer a fire-safety class.

In 2008, a non-fatal blaze destroyed the group’s former location, where 10 artists lived.

(Editing by Sue Horton and Lisa Shumaker)

NY blast kills highest ranking firefighter since Sept. 11 attacks

A New York City firefighter walks through debris after an explosion ripped through a home in the New York City borough of the Bronx, New York

By Laila Kearney

NEW YORK (Reuters) – An explosion at a home in the New York City borough of the Bronx on Tuesday killed a battalion chief, the city’s highest ranking fire official to die in the line of duty since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, officials said.

Michael Fahy, a 17-year veteran of the fire department, died after he was struck in the head by building debris sent flying to the street, Fire Department Commissioner Daniel Nigro told reporters at New York-Presbyterian/Allen Hospital.

“We lost a hero today and our members are all saddened,” said Nigro, who was visibly emotional. “He was a star, a brave man.”

FDNY Battalion Chief Michael J. Fahy, who died September 27, 2016 after an explosion ripped through a house in the Bronx section of New York City, is seen in an undated picture released by the New York City Fire Department. New York City Fire Department/Handout via Reuters

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said Fahy, whose father was a fire battalion chief with the city and a contemporary of Nigro’s, leaves behind three children, ages 6, 8 and 11.

The Uniformed Firefighters Association of Greater New York said he was the highest-ranking New York fire official to die in the line of duty since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

The blast just after 7 a.m. EDT also injured 20 people, including nine firefighters and six police officers, many of whom were transported to the hospital, fire officials said. Their conditions were not immediately disclosed, and investigators have not determined the cause of the blast.

Without elaborating, Police Commissioner James O’Neill said detectives were investigating reports of a marijuana “grow home” in the area.

Firefighters investigated reports of a possible gas leak in the area for about an hour before the explosion tore the roof off the two-story home, Nigro said.

Fahy was directing operations, including evacuating nearby buildings, when he was struck in the head and elsewhere by the debris, the commissioner said.

Police rushed the battalion chief to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead. All of the victims were injured while in the street, Nigro said.

(Additional reporting by David Ingram and Daniel Wallis; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)

Investigators try to determine if accused New York bomber had help

By David Ingram and Nate Raymond

NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. authorities on Wednesday were looking into whether an Afghan-born American citizen charged with carrying out bombings in New York and New Jersey acted alone or had help as the city’s top federal public defender sought access to the suspect.

Police in New York City said they had not yet been permitted by doctors to speak to Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, who was arrested on Monday after being wounded in a gunfight with police in Linden, New Jersey.

Rahami has been charged with wounding 31 people in a bombing in New York on Saturday that authorities called a “terrorist act.”

The Federal Bureau of Investigation released a photo of two men who found a second, unexploded pressure cooker device they say Rahami left in a piece of luggage in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood on Saturday night.

The two men, who took the bag but left the improvised bomb on the street are not suspects, officials said, but investigators want to interview them as witnesses.

“As far as whether he’s a lone actor, that’s still the path we are following, but we are keeping all the options open,” William Sweeney, the FBI’s assistant director in New York, told reporters.

Rahami is also charged with planting a bomb that exploded in Seaside Park, New Jersey, but did not injure anyone and planting explosive devices in his hometown of Elizabeth, New Jersey, which did not detonate. He faces charges from federal prosecutors in both states.

Federal prosecutors portray Rahami, who came to the United States at age 7 and became a naturalized citizen, as embracing militant Islamic views, begging for martyrdom and expressing outrage at the U.S. “slaughter” of Muslim fighters in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Palestine.

Investigators were also probing Rahami’s history of travel to Afghanistan and Pakistan, and looking for evidence that he may have picked up radical views or trained in bomb-making.

Both government and pro-Taliban sources in Pakistan on Wednesday said they had no knowledge of Rahami having met with prominent people connected to the Taliban or other religious groups.

Prosecutors plan to move Rahami to New York from the New Jersey hospital where he is being treated as soon as his medical condition allows, said Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan.

DEFENSE LAWYER DEMANDS COURT APPEARANCE

Rahami’s wife met with U.S. law enforcement officials while in the United Arab Emirates and voluntarily gave a statement, a law enforcement official said on Wednesday. She was not in custody.

A New Jersey U.S. congressman previously said Rahami had emailed his office in 2014 for help in getting her a visa to enter the United States from Pakistan when she was pregnant.

Rahami’s defense attorney, David Patton, on Wednesday demanded that his first court appearance to be scheduled as soon as possible, even if it occurs in his hospital bed, saying that the defendant had a constitutional right to a lawyer and a court appearance within two days of his arrest.

New York Police Commissioner James O’Neill told a news conference that investigators had not yet received doctors’ clearance to interview Rahami, adding, “That may happen in the next 24 hours, pending the doctors’ approval.”

Federal prosecutors in New York noted that while they had filed charges against Rahami, he remained in the custody of state officials in New Jersey, who initially arrested him after Monday’s gunfight. They said that makes Patton’s request for access premature.

Patton, in a subsequent filing, shot back that such delays were unacceptable.

“Mr. Rahami was arrested more than 48 hours ago. His bail in New Jersey was set without any appointment of counsel or court appearance. He still has not been provided counsel. He does not have a scheduled court appearance in New Jersey until next week,” Patton said.

The attacks in New York and New Jersey were the latest in a series in the United States inspired by Islamic militant groups including al Qaeda and Islamic State. A pair of ethnic Chechen brothers killed three people and injured more than 260 at the 2013 Boston Marathon with homemade pressure-cooker bombs similar to those used in this weekend’s attacks.

Rahami, in other parts of a journal that prosecutors said he was carrying when he was arrested, praised “Brother” Osama bin Laden, the al Qaeda leader slain in a 2011 U.S. raid in Pakistan; Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born Muslim cleric and leading al Qaeda propagandist who was killed in a 2011 U.S. drone strike in Yemen; and Nidal Hasan, the U.S. Army psychiatrist who shot dead 13 people and wounded 32 at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009.

Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, house Homeland Security Committee chairman, told CNN that Rahami’s writings in a journal showed that his actions had been inspired by Islamic State as “his guidance came from the lead ISIS spokesman.”

“What that tells me as a counterterrorism expert that now we can definitively say this was an ISIS-inspired terrorist attack.”

(Additional reporting by Doina Chiacu and Julia Edwards in Washington and Mehreen Zahra-Malik in Quetta, Pakistan; Writing by Scott Malone and Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Will Dunham and Alan Crosby)

Sign up for Jim Bakker Show