A Soapy Mess News Stories

  British forensic scientists announce that they have positively identified the remains of Russia’s last czar, Nicholas II; his wife, Czarina Alexandra; and three of their daughters. The scientists used mitochondria DNA fingerprinting to identify the bones, which had been excavated from a mass grave near Yekaterinburg in 1991. On the night of July 16, 1918, three centuries of the Romanov dynasty came to an end when Bolshevik troops executed Nicholas and his family. The details of the execution and the location of their final resting place remained a Soviet secret for more than six decades. Lacking physical evidence, rumors spread through Europe in the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution, telling of a Romanov child, usually the youngest daughter, Anastasia, who had survived the carnage. In the 1920s, there were several claimants to the title of Grand Duchess Anastasia. The most convincing was Anna Anderson, who turned up in Berlin in 1922 claiming to be Anastasia. In 1968, Ande...

 A Vietnamese immigrant and his business partner are fighting to get back more than $100,000 seized by Oklahoma police who allege that it was drug money. By Rich Schapiro A pair of New Mexico businessmen were driving along Interstate 40 in Oklahoma late one night in April when a sheriff's deputy flipped on his lights and sirens and pulled over their BMW sedan. The two men, Nang Thai and Weichuan Liu, were on their way to a hotel in Oklahoma City. They planned to catch some sleep before heading out in the morning to close on a 10-acre plot of farmland they'd agreed to buy for $100,000. But now, at about 2 a.m. on April 19, a Canadian County sheriff's deputy was peering into their car. "We didn't understand why he pulled us over," said Thai, 51, a Vietnamese immigrant and father of two from Albuquerque. "I was driving under the speed limit." They had no way of knowing at the time but Thai and Liu were about to begin an hours-long ordeal that would leav...

 By Elliott Ramos - September 29, 2021 Early this month, Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta delayed elective surgeries and procedures. The reason: There were so many Covid-19 patients in the hospital's intensive care unit that there was just no room for anyone who isn't seriously ill. "We have had to postpone some nonessential surgical procedures because we did not have an inpatient bed for them after they had their surgery," said Dr. Robert Jansen, the Grady Health System chief medical officer. While the state of Georgia -- and the United States as a whole -- have been dealing with another surge of Covid cases since August, data from the Department of Health and Human Services shows that Grady's ICU has been full for much longer. Every week, for the past 12 months, it has been 100 percent full. Before the pandemic, Jansen estimated it was full 70 percent of the time. "ICU capacity is always a challenge," Jansen said. "What we are now facing is that...

 By Teaganne Finn and Sahil Kapur WASHINGTON -- President Biden signed the government funding bill on Thursday, hours after congressional lawmakers rushed to pass the measure before the shutdown deadline. The House and Senate passed a stopgap government funding measure earlier on Thursday before the midnight cutoff. The House voted 254-175 to advance the measure. Just hours earlier, the Senate voted 65-35 -- a display of bipartisanship in both chambers. "We are very, very proud of this legislation," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, said. "It's just a remarkable thing to think of all the things that we can do working together for the people." Earlier int he day, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called the Senate vote a "glimmer of hope." "For this moment, this is one of the biggest problems that has faced us in the last while, making sure the government stays open, and now we can be sure it will," Schumer said on the floo...

 By Pete Williams WASHINGTON -- Justice Brett Kavanaugh has tested positive for Covid-19 but has no symptoms, the Supreme Court said Friday. Kavanaugh, 56, who has been fully vaccinated since January, received a test Monday morning before the justices met for a closed-door conference, and the result was negative. But a second test administered Thursday yielded a positive test, the court said. "Justice Kavanaugh's wife and daughters are also fully vaccinated, and they tested negative on Thursday," the court statement said. The justices were tested Thursday because they planned to be in the courtroom Friday for the formal investiture ceremony for the court's newest justice, Amy Coney Barrett. The ceremony had been postponed because of the pandemic. As a precaution, Kavanaugh and his wife, Ashley, will not attend the ceremony, the court said.

 By Erin Einhorn DETROIT -- When a staffing crisis at Eastpointe Middle School outside Detroit forced administration to close the school last month for more than a week, moving classes online, it wasn't because of a Covid-19 outbreak. And it wasn't because the district's teachers had fled the profession after a year and a half of disruptions to instruction and tensions over Covid safety. The problem, Eastpointe Community Schools Superintendent Ryan McLeod said, is that they could get better teaching jobs -- and did. Of the 10 teachers who resigned from his district since August 9th, at least seven landed in other districts, he said. "We are one of the lower paying districts in the area," said McLeod, who decided September 16th to temporarily move school classes online after three teachers quit. "There's been an increase in hiring, an increase in the number of positions in different districts and our staff used that as an opportunity to make a jump." ...

 By Dartunorro Clark and Rebecca Shabad WASHINGTON -- House Democratic leaders appeared to have failed to wrangle enough support Friday to pass the $550 billion infrastructure package after intraparty fighting delayed a planned vote -- further stalling one of President Joe Biden's top legislative priorities. House Democrats huddled behind closed doors at the Capitol in caucus meeting since Thursday morning to haggle over the $550 billion infrastructure deal and the $3.5 trillion social spending plan but emerged without a resolution. Both measures have the support of Democrats and remain likely to pass in some form. But the size of the social safety net bill remains a sticking point among Democrats, with moderate pushing for a pared-down version while progressive insist that the bill's price tag will boost an economy upended by the pandemic. Late Friday, Democratic House leadership conceded they would not hold an infrastructure vote before heading home for the weekend. Instead, ...