How social media started and ended rich kid ‘gang’ accused in teen’s murder
Arizona officials are working to curb youth violence after a group of teenagers and young adults became friends in middle and elementary school and evolved into a suburban “hybrid gang” tied to various assaults and, now, a murder.
Seven members of the group are accused of murdering their 16-year-old peer, Preston Lord, on Halloween weekend last year in Queen Creek, Arizona, a wealthy suburb southeast of Phoenix.
Treston Billey, 18, Jacob Meisner, 17, Taylor Sherman, 19, Talan Renner, 17, Dominic Turner, 20, William Owen Hines, 18, and Talyn Vigil, 17, have all been charged in Lord’s murder.
“How did a group of well-taken-care-of suburban boys — well-connected in the community, some of them who had great grades, played sports, went to church, had everything going from them — how did those boys end up in this hybrid gang?” Billie Tarascio, a Gilbert-based attorney with Modern Law, unaffiliated with the Gilbert Goons case, told Fox News Digital. “It’s largely, I think, influenced by social media, specifically Snapchat.”
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Before the murder, various teens affiliated with the group had been accused of assaults across Maricopa County and general mischief in public places, including parking garages and fast-food restaurants, starting in about 2022.
The “Goons” are known for recording videos of assaults and underage drinking, some of which ended up on social media apps like Snapchat, which allows users to send photos that disappear immediately after they have been opened by the recipient. Some of the members fought with “brass knuckles,” according to various witness accounts.
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In screenshots of messages between an alleged assault victim and two “Goons,” the victim wrote, “[Y]’all jumped me w 20 people last time 2 [vs.] 20. I left with scratch … marks on my face,” describing the Goons as “rich a– white kids big a– house w a car that ya daddy paid for.”
Efforts to curb teen violence in Gilbert
“This case — like every case submitted to us — is a unique set of facts. That makes it difficult if not impossible to compare it to previous cases,” a Maricopa County Attorney’s Office spokesperson told Fox News Digital when asked if the prosecutor’s office has ever seen a case like the Preston Lord murder.
On Wednesday, the county attorney’s office launched a new “Report! Don’t Repost” campaign, encouraging “parents and children — who see video of violent attacks in their social media — to report the videos AND the attacks to their local police department.”
“Our message is a simple one: reposting videos like these exacerbates the problem. We want police to have this kind of information so they can develop cases that would ultimately be submitted to us for potential prosecution,” the county attorney’s office said.
How the Gilbert Goons formed
Thousands of Queen Creek Police Department records obtained by Fox News Digital through a records request paint a bigger picture of how the “Goons” formed in Gilbert and how social media fueled that formation.
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A witness who grew up with some of the members told police in an interview after Lord’s death that the “Goons” began a long time ago “when this friend group was in elementary and middle school.”
She specifically mentioned Meisner, Renner and a third “Goon” who is not charged in Lord’s murder as members of the group who became best friends in 6th grade.
“She stated the group calls themselves the ‘Goonies’ or the ‘G’S.’ She described it as more of a large friend group that hang[s] out. [The witness] stated she was called a Goon up until recently,” a police report states.
“She confirmed she has recorded some of the past fights involving the goons. She stated the girls’ job was to ‘stay out of the way while their boyfriend…took the job. [She] said what made her [a] Gilbert Goon is just by hanging out and drinking.”
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Another female witness called police to report that her son had been “followed by” the Gilbert Goons, who “have been terrorizing the community and many don’t feel safe,” the report states.
“She advised the Gilbert Goons go around and look at attacking people in different places. She advised her son’s roommate was hospitalized after being beat up by the Gilbert Goons, and now many kids are possessing firearms to protect themselves,” the witness report alleges.
Preston Lord’s murder
The Gilbert Goons began making headlines last fall, when they were accused of murdering Lord at a rambunctious Halloween party at a teenager’s home that went horribly wrong over the course of just four hours.
The evening of Oct. 28 began at one house at 5 p.m., where some teens showed up to a party that they described as “Mormon kids that were, like, pretty sober,” so they opted for a change of scenery and went to another location. Many teens made stops at several parties throughout the night.
A Snapchat post circulating that day advertised a “Halloween costume rager” with the address of the home that became the scene of the crime. The post also advertised free alcohol at the party, according to police documents.
Police later questioned the parents who own the home, identified as Roberto and Emily, who said they did not know about the flyer offering free booze at their house. They also told police there was no way the teenagers could have accessed alcohol at their home.
“It should be noted, that when speaking with Roberto and Emily, I noticed that they both appeared to be drinking. Emily would look at me but was not speaking much during the interaction. She appeared to have a slight sway to her stance. Emily also had watery and bloodshot eyes. I then also noticed that Roberto had watery and bloodshot eyes. They had slurred speech and there was an odor of alcohol coming from their person,” a police officer wrote.
The Oct. 28 party at their house attracted a crowd of more than 200 teenagers from over a dozen local high schools wearing Halloween costumes. One teenager’s parents hosted the teens in their yard while they apparently drank inside, police reports show.
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Murder victim Preston Lord, a sophomore, was at the party that night with members of his basketball team. At one point, Lord’s friend took a video of a fight that ensued at the party. Suspect Preston Billey apparently asked him to delete the video, police records state.
After that moment, Billey and a group of older boys allegedly started following Lord and his friends, at one point coming up behind one of them and pulling a cheap gold chain he was wearing right off his neck.
Lord and his friends began to run away from the group of perpetrators and hid behind some bushes, but the group caught up with them, and Renner allegedly punched Lord, knocking him out. Others allegedly kicked and beat the victim until someone finally said, “He’s out,” and the group of attackers ran away, police wrote.
One witness saw “someone” climb over Lord and “dance on top of him” as he lay in the street. Other witnesses who found Lord in the road “dragged him” out of the road and onto someone’s property.
Police initially responded to reports of an assault in the area of 194th Street and Via Del Rancho in Queen Creek at 9:49 p.m. Oct. 28, 2023. Authorities later located Lord “in the roadway” and transported him to a nearby hospital to be treated for “life-threatening injuries.”
He was pronounced dead two days later.
How social media fanned the flames
A large part of the Gilbert Goons’ criminal activity stems from — and was highlighted on — social media. Apps like Snapchat and Instagram allegedly helped the Goons document their assaults and illegal possessions, including weapons, drugs and alcohol, according to police records.
The group also reportedly came up with the name Gilbert Goons on Snapchat, according to The Arizona Republic.
After Lord’s murder and before any charges were filed, the group members allegedly communicated with each other about his death, leading to some online “vigilantism,” Tarascio said.
On Oct. 28, Renner allegedly said in a message shared around midnight, “I got in a fight, a big group fight, and killed a kid.”
“I guess I’m just too strong.”
Police received multiple tips showing screenshots of a Snapchat message Vigil allegedly sent to a friend, stating, “I hit a kid and this kid … hit his head and then they kicked his head in the ground then I got word he died so idk.”
Screenshots of the message made rounds on social media pages before locals notified police about it, which is part of the reason the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office just launched its “report don’t repost” campaign this week.
Rumors spread through local high schools in text messages and on social media as days, weeks and months went by without arrests in Lord’s murder. Some parents wrongly accused other parents and their children who were not involved in Lord’s murder.
In text messages Oct. 30, one of the Goons sent a message that said, “BRO THAT KID DIED.”
The next day, another message involving the Goons said, “Tresty or Talen might be getting charged with murder.”
“It’s not just these boys and the Gilbert Goons. We’re watching that same behavior with groups of boys in our community and in every community,” Tarascio said. “So, what happens is, kids are using Snapchat.
“They are underdeveloped. They make dumb decisions. Those dumb decisions might include taking naked pictures of themselves, sending naked pictures … to people, harassing people, threatening people, getting in fights, recording it and sharing it.
“They’re getting more and more positive attention from social media. And they’re hearing nothing from their parents and law enforcement, so their behavior escalates.”
“And then what happens is they watch the popularity that comes from these videos. They’re sensational, and they’re getting all this feedback that says, ‘Yes, yes, keep sharing’ … and they do, and they keep amping it up. And now they’re flashing guns, and they’re flashing drugs,” the family law attorney said.
The seven suspects were not charged until March. Each defendant is facing a first-degree murder charge, and they have all pleaded not guilty. Fox News Digital reached out to the defendants’ attorneys.
Attorney Eric Crocker, who is representing Treston Billey, called the case “troubling” because prosecutors are calling the Gilbert Goons a “hybrid gang,” which is not defined under Arizona law.
“[T]here’s concern whether my client can even get a fair trial,” he told Fox News Digital, calling the “hybrid gang” term “highly prejudicial.”
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Crocker added that Billey is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. The other attorneys did not immediately respond.
All seven defendants appeared in court together for the first time Aug. 8. Their trial is not scheduled to begin until July 2025, but Renner’s attorney reportedly thinks that time frame is unreasonable given the mounds of electronic and physical evidence to sort through in the case, according to ABC 15.
Snap Inc., the parent company of Snapchat, and Meta, which owns Instagram, did not respond to Fox News Digital. Both companies complied with law enforcement requests for information, according to police documents.
SCOTUS rules on Biden-Harris request to allow biological men in women’s locker rooms
The Supreme Court voted 5-4 Friday to reject a Biden administration emergency request to enforce portions of a new rule that includes protections from discrimination for transgender students under Title IX.
The request would have permitted biological men in women’s bathrooms, locker rooms and dorms in 10 states where there are state-level and local-level rules in place to prevent it.
The sweeping rule was issued in April and clarified that Title IX’s ban on “sex” discrimination in schools covers discrimination based on gender identity, sexual orientation and “pregnancy or related conditions.”
The rule took effect Aug. 1, and, for the first time, the law stated that discrimination based on sex includes conduct related to a person’s gender identity.
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More than two dozen Republican attorneys general sued over the rule and argued it would conflict with some of their state laws that block transgender students from participating in women’s sports.
The Biden administration insisted the regulation does not address athletic eligibility. However, multiple experts presented evidence to Fox News Digital in June that Biden’s claims it would not result in biological men participating in women’s sports weren’t true and that the proposal would ultimately put more biological men in women’s sports.
The court’s decision Friday struck a blow to the Biden administration’s ongoing efforts to protect transgender inclusion.
“On this limited record and in its emergency applications, the Government has not provided this Court a sufficient basis to disturb the lower courts’ interim conclusions that the three provisions found likely to be unlawful are intertwined with and affect other provisions of the rule,” the court’s unsigned order states.
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Conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch, dissented, agreeing with the three liberal justices and the Biden administration that the lower court rulings were “overbroad.”
Earlier this week, a group of 102 female athletes and 26 states petitioned the Supreme Court to take up a challenge over state laws that ban transgender women from competing against biological female athletes, according to a filing obtained by The Washington Times.
The petitioners argued that physical fitness tests demonstrate that there is a difference between men and women at every age.
“A growing number of women and girls have been facing the humiliating and damaging experience of being forced to compete against males who identify as transgender in the women’s sports category,” the athletes’ filing states.
“It is hard to express the pain, humiliation, frustration and shame women experience when they are forced to compete against males in sport. It is public shaming and suffering, an exclusion from women’s own category.”
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ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit explained Tuesday in an interview on OutKick’s “Don’t @ Me with Dan Dakich” that he “of course” didn’t believe men belonged in women’s sports.
“I’m done giving any s—s at all about any of it. It’s almost like there are two different sets of rules, and if you have a view that’s a little more traditional, or I’m a Christian guy, it’s like there is a different set of rules for that viewpoint,” Herbstreit said. “It’s hard to just turn the other cheek time after time after time.”
OutKick host Riley Gaines spoke in favor of the ruling on her Gaines for Girls podcast.
“Not all Supreme Court justices know what a woman is, but today enough did, and that’s a win worth celebrating. This is a win for women, free speech, the rule of law and common sense. Onward,” Gaines said.
Thieves ransack 3 stores in 20 minutes — just hours after gov signs ‘smash-and-grab’ bills
Just hours after Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a sweeping package of bills into law to combat smash-and-grab robberies in the crime-ridden state, a large group of thieves stormed three separate 7-Eleven stores in Los Angeles, swiping food and drink items before fleeing on bicycles, according to NBC.
The group of up to 30 “kids and teenagers” began their rampage at the 7-Eleven located at 7040 West Sunset Boulevard just after 8 p.m. where they smashed a window and stole items.
They then moved onto a store near Hollywood Blvd and Highland Ave. about 15 minutes later where a worker there was allegedly assaulted, the outlet reported.
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A third store on Santa Monica Boulevard was hit at around 8:22 p.m., the outlet reports, where they broke a front window and took more than $2,000 worth of items including a box of chargers, the outlet reports, citing a store manager.
One store manager told the outlet that the teens caught on video surveillance cameras on Friday, appear to be the same group that struck two other 7-Eleven locations in the area last week. Footage from one of the robberies shows the teens ransacking a store with their faces left uncovered and clearly visible.
Fox News Digital reached out to the Los Angeles Police Department for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
Friday’s string of smash and grabs come after Newsom hailed his new bills as a turning point in the Golden State’s bid to tackle the lawless behavior which has plagued California and other states in recent years. The incidents in many cases have been captured on video and posted online, bringing national attention to the rise of retail theft in the Golden State.
The bipartisan package of 10 bills creates stricter penalties for repeat offenders and people running professional reselling schemes.
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The legislation allows prosecutors to combine the value of items stolen from different victims across various counties to help meet the threshold for felony grand theft and enforce harsher penalties for smash-and-grabs and large-scale reselling operations.
“This goes to the heart of the issue, and it does it in a thoughtful and judicious way,” Newsom said of the package. “This is the real deal.”
While the package received bipartisan support from the California Legislature, some progressive Democrats did not vote for it over concerns that some of it was too punitive.
The legislation also aims to address cargo thefts and to close a legal loophole to make it easier to prosecute auto thefts regardless of whether the vehicle was locked and requires marketplaces like eBay to begin gathering bank account and tax identification numbers from high-volume sellers.
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This comes as Democratic leadership works to show they are tough on crime while at the same time urging voters to reject Proposition 36, a ballot measure that would impose felony charges for repeat shoplifters and some drug charges and create harsher sentences for these crimes.
Newsom and fellow state Democrats worked for months on an unsuccessful effort to keep Proposition 36 off the ballot for November’s election. Democrats feared the measure would disproportionately criminalize low-income people and those with substance issues instead of targeting ringleaders who hire large groups of people to steal goods for them to resell online.
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Liberal outlet’s editorial board savages VP Harris’ economic plan
The Washington Post editorial board rejected Vice President Kamala Harris‘ economic proposals, telling readers instead of offering a substantive plan, she “squandered the moment on populist gimmicks.”
In a scathing piece published Friday, the Post editorial board accused Harris of being “less forthright” with voters about the reasons why prices remain high despite the cooling rate of inflation by “blaming big business.”
“Ms. Harris says she’ll target companies that make ‘excessive’ profits, whatever that means,” the editorial board scoffed. “Thankfully, this gambit by Ms. Harris has been met with almost instant skepticism, with many critics citing President Richard M. Nixon’s failed price controls from the 1970s. Whether the Harris proposal wins over voters remains to be seen, but if sound economic analysis still matters, it won’t.”
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The editorial board was more charitable on Harris’ housing plan, saying it is “built on a slightly firmer foundation” and calling her tax incentives “clever” but took a sledgehammer to her $25,000 offer to new homeowners, which the paper noted “risks putting upward pressure on prices.”
“Such a measure might make sense if Ms. Harris paid for it by eliminating other demand-side housing subsidies, such as the mortgage interest deduction, a roughly $30 billion annual drain on federal revenue that benefits many wealthy Americans — but she does not,” the paper wrote.
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The piece insisted Harris’ “firmest ground” was with her proposal on increasing the child tax credit from $2,000 per child to $3,600 among other tax breaks.
“Her ideas would cost money, yet she insisted in her speech that she would hold to President Joe Biden’s pledge not to raise taxes on any household earning $400,000 or less annually. That excludes 80 percent of taxable income, and does not take into account the recent surge in families earning over $400,000,” the skeptical editorial board wrote. “The Harris campaign says it plans to raise revenue to cover these costs but did not provide specific offsets in its economic plan rollout. Without them, Ms. Harris’s full plan would add $1.7 trillion to federal deficits over a decade, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan budget watchdog.”
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The editorial board continued, “To be sure, every campaign makes expensive promises that will never come to pass, especially with a divided Congress. Remember Mr. Biden’s pledge to make community college free? Even adjusted for the pandering standards of campaign economics, however, Ms. Harris’s speech Friday ranks as a disappointment.”
The Harris campaign did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital‘s request for comment.
The Harris campaign rolled out a first-ever federal price-fixing plan for corporations as part of a sweeping initiative intended to reduce grocery prices and other everyday expenses.
“There’s a big difference between fair pricing in competitive markets and excessive prices unrelated to the costs of doing business,” the Harris campaign said in a statement. “Americans can see that difference in their grocery bills.”
The proposal would give authority to the Federal Trade Commission and state attorneys general to impose harsh penalties on companies for setting excessively high prices.
However, some economists and financial experts have cast doubt on Harris’ plan, arguing that corporations don’t play a huge role in rising grocery prices.
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Washington Post columnist Catherine Rampell criticized the plan, writing “It’s hard to exaggerate how bad this policy is.”
“If your opponent claims you’re a ‘communist,’ maybe don’t start with an economic agenda that can (accurately) be labeled as federal price controls,” Rampell wrote Thursday.
Couple with six-figure salary facing a millennial problem they can’t afford
Despite their combined six-figure income, the homeownership dream has soured for young Americans Laura and Samuel Graves, who are left with little choice but to build their family in a suburban Portland apartment as they patiently search for a home that suits their budget.
“We refuse to become ‘house-poor’ and, like many others, are choosing to sit it out until the housing market is reasonable again,” Laura, who works as a financial analyst, told Business Insider in an article published Sunday.
Combined with her husband’s salary as an electrician, the couple pull in approximately $250,000 a year. According to the report, they’re hoping to keep their monthly mortgage payment around $3,000, but most homes they’re eyeing exceed that by approximately $2,000 on average. They’ve also claimed to stifle retirement savings and childcare costs to help their situation.
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Add this millennial couple to the massive number who refuse to become financially burdened by housing-related costs in today’s market and have opted for alternative living situations to mitigate those expenses.
In Laura and Samuel’s case, they are setting aside only 3% of their income for retirement, instead of the ideal 15% and, instead of sending their children to full-time summer camp, have opted for a part-time camp instead, the report stated.
With prices and interest rates high, the idea of saving enough to move into a dream home seems far away for the couple.
“Our children have begun talking about how they want a house so badly and their own rooms,” Laura told the outlet. “We’ll never get these years back. By the time we buy, we won’t even need room for a play set.”
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But there’s some positive news on the horizon for wouold-be homebuyers. A Realtor.com report published earlier this month found that home prices dipped in July as sellers tried to lure in would-be buyers, with the median reaching $439,950 from $445,000 the month prior.
“First, rates remain higher than expected, which means there is less buyer activity,” Ralph McLaughlin, Realtor.com senior economist, said. “Second, the prospect of lower mortgage rates coming this fall may have induced some buyers to wait. This combo has led sellers to lower their prices in order to attract more buyers.”
A Zillow estimate found that, in the Portland area where the Graves family is browsing for a home, the average home value is $541,000 and $642,000 in the Wilsonville suburb where they currently reside, Business Insider said.
But waiting out the market isn’t the only sacrifice buyers have been forced to make.
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Some social media trends indicate millennials have made sacrifices in other ways, even going as far as living in cost-effective vans to save up for their homebuying dream.
Cost has become a significant enough factor to make approximately one in five prospective homebuyers consider shopping around in a less safe neighborhood to find a more affordable home, according to Redfin.
Other young adults have had to turn to help from parents to help cover the cost of a down payment on a home, or have even opted to live with their parents longer to help ease some of their financial burden and put more money aside for the future.
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Late American icon still roams hallways of ritzy Vegas hotel, stepbrother says
Elvis Presley’s stepbrother, David Stanley, still feels a strong connection with the late icon, 47 years after his death.
In a conversation with Westgate Las Vegas Resort and Casino, formerly known as the International Hotel, where Presley performed his residency, Stanley addressed stories about people feeling his stepbrother’s presence on the premises.
“There haven’t been any confirmed ghost ‘sightings’ although there have been countless claims by guests and performers who say they have seen him,” Stanley said.
He continued, “Many others have spoken about feeling Elvis’ presence at various spots on the property. I often feel my brother’s presence and have had a few experiences where I’ve believed Elvis was communicating with me.”
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Stanley shares more memories of his late stepbrother’s life in Las Vegas during his show, “My Brother Elvis,” hosted at the Westgate Las Vegas Resort and Casino.
Speaking of his residency, Stanley said Presley would prepare for the show by using a “nasal douche. This would clear his throat and would help alleviate his concerns about getting ‘Vegas throat’ before or during a show,” referring to the city’s desert climate.
“I often feel my brother’s presence and have had a few experiences where I’ve believed Elvis was communicating with me.”
Stanley also recalled that Presley “loved martial arts,” and that when he wasn’t performing, he “would spend much of his spare time training in his suite.”
Stanley was one of three stepbrothers the “Heartbreak Hotel” singer gained after his father, Vernon Presley, remarried in 1960 following the death of his first wife and Presley’s mother, Gladys.
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Another stepbrother, Billy Stanley, spoke with Fox News Digital in 2022, recalling the last time he talked with the legendary entertainer before his death.
It was Aug. 14, 1977, two days before Presley’s death, and the stepsiblings had been sparring. Billy was mildly injured. As Presley helped him in the bathroom, Billy remembered Presley asking, “Do you believe God forgives us for all our sins?”
A stunned Stanley replied, “Well, yeah, I mean, we’ve talked about this for almost 17 years, Elvis.” Presley replied, “I just wanted to hear you say that, Billy.”
They also spoke about the future, with Presley sharing his plans to make major changes to his life, like getting rid of his manager, Colonel Tom Parker, as well as a desire to find love again. The conversation concluded with Presley saying he was going to read his Bible, and Billy promising to see him two days later, on Aug. 16.
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Presley replied, “OK, I love you.” As Stanley headed home, he thought about turning back to tell Presley he loved him back. He changed his mind, though, reminding himself they would meet again in a matter of days.
“I wish I had gone back,” he told Fox News Digital.
Presley died Aug. 16, 1977, at age 42, at his Graceland home in Memphis, Tennessee.
Born Jan. 8, 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi, Presley rose to fame in the 1950s and changed music history with his blend of rockabilly, rhythm and blues and country.
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Known for his stage presence and controversial hip-swivel dance moves, he became an icon of youth culture and rebellion.
Presley racked up chart-topping hits like “Hound Dog,” “Jailhouse Rock” and “Love Me Tender” with a distinct soulful voice.
“One thing that both surprised and impressed me was that Elvis didn’t read music, but he was a phenomenal musician,” Stanley said. “He played guitar, piano, drums, bass — he could pick up just about any instrument and play almost anything. He was just a natural musician. He even produced a number of his own records. The same was true for his acting.”
Presley acted in 31 films, including “Blue Hawaii” and “Viva Las Vegas,” in addition to starring in TV specials, and later settled into his Las Vegas residency.
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Following his divorce from his wife Priscilla Presley, with whom he shared his only child, daughter Lisa Marie Presley, the “Burning Love” singer’s health began to deteriorate, in part due to a dependence on prescription drugs and weight gain.
Sally A. Hoedel, author of “Elvis: Destined to Die Young,” told Fox News Digital in 2022 he struggled with immense pain in his final months.
“It’s hard for us to imagine [that he was in physical pain] because he once appeared so perfect on the outside that he couldn’t have been flawed on the inside,” she said. “[Those health] issues become more difficult to live with the more he tours, and he toured a great deal in those last several years. That added a lot of strain to this health.”
Following his sudden and shocking death, Presley’s status as a pop culture icon was cemented, and he proved to have an enduring legacy.
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In 2022, Baz Luhrmann directed the biopic “Elvis,” starring Austin Butler as Presley and Tom Hanks as Parker. The film earned eight Oscar nominations, including best actor for Butler.
“It’s remarkable how much interest in Elvis there has always been, and it’s been even more so since Baz Luhrmann’s movie came out in 2022, specifically a large group of younger fans who were introduced to Elvis through the film,” Stanley said in his interview. “As they learn more about him and hear more of his music, they are creating a whole new generation of Elvis fans.”
“He was just a natural musician. … The same was true for his acting.”
Presley’s legacy can be viewed in physical form at Graceland, his mansion-turned-museum.
The estate almost went up for auction after apparently falling into foreclosure earlier this year, but it was halted at the last minute by authorities.
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Presley’s granddaughter, Riley Keough, said a fake company had produced forged documents stating that her late mother, Lisa Marie Presley, had taken out a multimillion-dollar loan that she never paid back. Graceland was allegedly part of the collateral in the fake documents via a signed deed of trust.
A woman named Lisa Jeanine Findley was charged with mail fraud and aggravated identity theft on Friday in relation to the case.
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Fans can still visit Graceland, which is now offering an exclusive new tour, titled “Presley for a Day.”
Limited to eight people per day, the website promises a “bespoke experience with unprecedented access to some of the Presley family’s most beloved places on the Graceland grounds” at a cost of $6,000 per guest.
Eerie ‘doomsday fish’ sighting may have been warning that a natural disaster was coming
While kayaking and snorkeling in La Jolla, California, a group spotted a very rare deep-sea fish that had died.
The oarfish, also known as a “doomsday fish,” stretched 12 feet in length.
Only 20 oarfish have been reported in California since 1901, according to the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego.
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Doomsday fish have long, slender bodies that can reach lengths of up to 36 feet, about the size of a school bus.
The oarfish is commonly referred to as the “doomsday fish,” as some believe it “foreshadows natural disasters, such as earthquakes or tsunamis,” according to the Ocean Conservancy.
The fish has been observed around Japan during major earthquakes, but scientists report that they have yet to establish a link between its appearances and events such as quakes and subsequent tsunamis, as FOX Weather reported.
Two days after the fish was discovered, Los Angeles was struck by a 4.6-magnitude earthquake on Aug. 12, according to the USGS.
Oarfish feed on plankton, crustaceans and squid by straining them from the water column using specially evolved gill rakes located in the mouth, according to the Florida Museum of Natural History located in Gainesville, Florida.
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“With help from NOAA Fisheries Service and California Sea Grant team members, the group was able to coordinate with lifeguards to transport the fish to the NOAA facility,” experts at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego, said.
“Scientists from NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center and Scripps Oceanography will perform a necropsy to see if they can determine a cause of death.”
After the necropsy, the fish will move to the Scripps Marine Vertebrate Collection at the University of California San Diego.
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The collection maintains approximately two million alcohol-preserved specimens in over 120,000 lots, representing more than 5,600 species of fish.
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The unsettling truth that every American needs to know about illegal money in elections
Allegations have been raised by Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Republican Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares (among others) that millions of dollars may be being funneled into candidate campaign coffers through a process known as “smurfing.” We’re not talking about donations being made by small, blue comic-book characters—although we might as well be if the allegations are true.
What is campaign finance smurfing? It is a form of money laundering for campaign contributions. It involves breaking up large-scale donations in a way that disguises who the money is actually coming from, so the contribution limits on how much money can be donated to a particular candidate can be skirted. It may involve widespread mail and wire fraud and the fraudulent use of the identities of unwitting members of the public to violate federal and state campaign finance laws.
Several important rules apply to the funding of congressional and presidential campaigns under the Federal Election Campaign Act or FECA.
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First, federal law strictly prohibits corporations and unions from making any direct contributions to federal candidates. Second, the FECA bans foreign nationals foreign nationals from making contributions. Only U.S. citizens and permanent resident aliens can give money to the campaigns of individuals running for Congress and the presidency (as well as state and local offices).
Third, federal law limits the amount that an individual can contribute to a candidate. In the current 2023-24 election cycle, individuals cannot contribute more than $3,300 for the primary election and the same amount for the general election. Other limits apply for contributions to PACs and party organizations.
The Federal Election Commission, where I once served as a commissioner, has civil enforcement authority for FECA violations, while the U.S. Justice Department has criminal enforcement authority for intentional and knowing violations of the law. For an example of a criminal violation relevant to smurfing, consider a case I saw when I was a commissioner.
The senior partner of a law firm told his employees that if they made the maximum contribution to a presidential candidate, he would reimburse them. This is called a conduit contribution and was an attempt to get around the contribution limit by the lawyer – making a campaign contribution in the name of another person is illegal.
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One of the clues for the Justice Department was that the law firm staff had never made political contributions before. Yet they were all suddenly giving the maximum amount despite their much lower salaries than the firm’s senior partner.
So how does all of this apply to smurfing? Assume that an unknown perpetrator deposits a large sum of money into a bank account. He ties it to a corporate payment credit-card system, which is often used by companies to generate unique credit-card account numbers for their employees to use for transactions. He then generates credit-card account numbers for members of the public without their knowledge and uses those individuals as straw donors to make political contributions, perhaps through an aggregator like ActBlue, a Democratic fundraising website.
Where does this criminal get the names and addresses? There are all sorts of potential sources, including the lists of reported donors to campaigns listed on the FEC’s website. He can then generate thousands of donations, mostly small ones to avoid raising any red flags, to multiple candidates, using real names and addresses of individuals without their knowledge.
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Miyares’s letter to ActBlue claims that “hundreds of thousands of dollars” in contributions have been made through ActBlue in Virginia “that are facially implausible and appear suspicious.” “Virginia donors,” says Miyares, “are reported as making multiple daily contributions…amounting to tens of thousands of dollars in aggregate.” Yet many list their occupation as “not employed” or “retired,” and circumstances make it appear as if they “are being made from fictional donors or dummy accounts” and “without the reported donors’ consent or awareness.”
Sen. Rubio has also questioned these transactions in a complaint letter to the FEC; specifically, the fact that ActBlue does not “require CVV numbers as part of making an online transaction.” CVV numbers are the three-digit “card verification value” numbers we all have on the back side of our credit cards that are used to verify the legitimacy of credit-card transactions. Rubio says that not requiring a CVV number amounts to “an intentional lack of security engrained within” ActBlue’s donation process.
ActBlue has strenuously denied these charges both in a response to an investigation by the U.S. House Committee on Administration and to Jason Miyares, who ActBlue says is engaging is “a partisan attack and scare tactic” intended to undermine “small-dollar” Democrat donors.
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The only way to get to the truth is for these questionable donations to be investigated. That means both the FEC and the Justice Department – and state attorneys general under applicable state fraud laws – need to get busy, including talking to the donors listed in the filed reports to see if they actually made these donations and were not barred from making them.
All of these law-enforcement agencies have an obligation to determine if there are “Smurfs” out there using money laundering to illegally interfere in our elections.
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