Free Republic

Ricky Martin's alleged domestic violence accuser is one of his own family members ... and now the pop star's reportedly staring down the possibility of a half-century behind bars. A new report Friday from Spanish news website Marca identifies Ricky's accuser as his 21-year-old nephew, Dennis Yadiel Sanchez, which would introduce incest into the case in Puerto Rico. The singer's brother, Eric Martin, reportedly identified the alleged victim ... and Ricky is going to court July 21. Under Puerto Rican law, there are harsher penalties for certain sexual crimes when the alleged victim is related to the accused, but it...

According to Fox News, one reporter said Jean-Pierre can act “uniformed” at times and ill-prepared to discuss the issues of the day. “If your M.O. is going to be reading prepared answers, you should have a lot of prepared answers so that you're not just deferring to reporters constantly,” the reporter said. Another said Jean-Pierre doesn’t take the time to answer reporter’s questions throughly, frequently admitting that she just doesn’t have an answer for them. “She is poorly received as she isn’t taking time to answer questions or banter with reporters on the issues of the day… a press secretary...

“Jesus stretched out His hand and touched him, saying, ‘I am willing; be cleansed.’ And immediately his leprosy was cleansed” (Matthew 8:3). The Mosaic law forbade the Jews from touching lepers, because they were unclean (Lev. 5:3) and would expose healthy people to ceremonial and physical contamination. But lepers, in their social ostracism, yearned for even a brief, up-close contact with another person besides a fellow leper. Jesus could have healed this man with just a single word, but He made a point of touching him. This action was truly amazing—not in a spectacular, sensational manner, but simply because the...

In the gospel of Luke, we read the story of a Pharisee named Simon who invited Jesus to his house to have a meal. I’m not sure why any Pharisee would invite Jesus for dinner, let alone bring in other strict religious men to eat with him. A likely reason for the invitation was that Simon and his friends wanted to determine whether Jesus was a prophet or, really, to discount him as one. The passage makes clear that Simon knew of Jesus’ reputation as a prophet (see Luke 7:39). Scripture doesn’t tell us what this group discussed around that...

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ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — A plan by Florida health officials that likely would restrict Medicaid insurance coverage for gender dysphoria treatments for transgender people lacks sound medical justification and may be politically motivated, according to a group of academics from Yale University and other schools. The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration said puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and sex reassignment surgery have not been proven safe or effective in treating gender dysphoria. But a group of seven scientists and a law professor from Yale and other schools said in a report last week that the Florida’s agency’s conclusions are “incorrect...

Los Angeles County reached a “high” level of COVID-19 infections on Thursday, according to public health officials, meaning a mask mandate could be imposed in two weeks as the highly transmissible Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 make waves across the country. The health department bases its decision on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s three-tier criteria of community high, medium or low levels of COVID-19 rates. L.A. County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer expressed concern to reporters Thursday about the new infections, saying “we have a ton of transmission right now,” and stressed her position on masking up.

LIMA, Peru (AP) — A dispute over a gender-neutral bathroom has endangered Peru’s plan to host the next gathering of the Organization of American States’ top decision-making body. The OAS had requested at least one gender-neutral bathroom be available and Peru did permit bathrooms open to people of any sex during the 2018 Summit of the Americas in Lima. But Congressman Ernesto Bustamante of the conservative Popular Front party — who heads the Foreign Relations Commission — said allowing a gender-neutral bathroom would inevitably “introduce the existence of trans bathrooms and neutral bathrooms and common bathrooms in Peru’s internal law.”...

In one traffic stop, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers at the Otay Mesa LPOE in San Diego County confiscated enough fentanyl to kill more than 23 million people. Otay Mesa is the busiest commercial port in California. In FY21, CBP agents processed 5 million vehicles, 1 million trucks, and 2.1 million pedestrians. On July 3, they confiscated more than 100 pounds of fentanyl hidden in food products smuggled in by two men entering California from Mexico. They confiscated 42.46 pounds of powder and 59.08 pounds of pills, with an estimated street value of more than $1.2 million. Roughly two...

A popular female DJ in Houston, Texas plummeted to her death in the early hours of July 4. Her girlfriend claims she watched her climb onto a chair on the 13th floor balcony and accidentally fall over the railing. Darian Lewis, 23, also known as DJ D Baby, died more than a week after being hospitalized from the devastating fall. 'There’s no way I could have pushed her over, she was only able to get over because she climbed onto the furniture. I would have literally had to pick her up & throw her over which is absolutely absurd! WE...

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Utah this week asked a state court to throw out a lawsuit challenging its ban on transgender kids who want to compete in youth sports, as the culture war flashpoint moves from statehouses to courtrooms throughout the country. In the Utah case, three transgender girls and their parents claim the outright ban passed by the Republican-majority Legislature this year wrongly keeps their children from participating in the sports. Their attorneys argue it violates provisions of the state constitution that prohibit discrimination and guarantee equal rights and due process. Utah’s attorneys in a motion Wednesday argued...

Former British finance minister Rishi Sunak won the most votes in the second round of voting to succeed Boris Johnson as leader of the Conservative Party and prime minister, as one candidate was eliminated.

Eating chocolate is typically discouraged by nutritionists, as it is can be high in calories, fat and sugar. Cocoa, however, chocolate's primary ingredient derived from the seed of the cacao plant, has been found to have numerous qualities that could be beneficial for both the body and mind. Most notably, pure cocoa is highly nutritious and is a powerful source of antioxidants, substances that can prevent or slow down cell damage caused by free radicals. Free radicals are unstable and highly reactive molecules produced by the body when responding to environmental stresses, which are associated with aging and disease. In...

Alaska police are investigating allegations of a woman who said she avoided a traffic citation after presenting officers with a “White Privilege” card during a traffic stop. Mimi Israelah was driving to a pizzeria in Anchorage after flying in from California for a Trump rally on Saturday when she was pulled over by police, according to a now-deleted Facebook post. However, when officers asked for her license, she said she couldn’t find it — instead offering a card that read “White Privilege Card Trumps Everything.” “When I saw my White Privilege card, I gave to him if it’s ok,” she...

A male fly trying to mate with a female corpse held in place by a dab of Vaseline. The fungus has grown out of the rear body segment and is visible as large white patches from which spores are ejected. Credit: Filippo Castelucci Entomophthora muscae is a widespread, pathogenic fungus that survives by infecting common houseflies with deadly spores. Now, research shows that the fungus has a unique tactic to ensure its survival. The fungus "bewitches" male houseflies and drives them to necrophilia with the fungal-infected corpses of dead females. After having infected a female fly with its spores, the...

> Striding Edge, Lake District, England The Lake District's famously changeable weather can make even the most bucolic of strolls a challenge. >The Maze, Canyonlands, Utah, United States It's the most remote part of Canyonlands, with visitors needing to negotiate long drives on dirt roads before setting out into the deep gullies, where rockfalls and flash floods are not uncommon and water from the area's few springs is hard to come by... >HuaShan, China This epic trail to the South Peak of HuaShan, one of China's Five Great Mountains, is often billed as the most dangerous hike in the world......

Under the cover of darkness, two wildlife officials raided an invasive python's nest in a South Florida swamp and successfully wrestled 19 wriggling hatchlings and their mother into a bag and out of the protected habitat. The next day, one of the officials captured a second breeding female — measuring an astounding 17.5 feet (5.3 meters) long — from the exact same spot. Burmese pythons (Python bivittatus) were first introduced to Florida in the 1970s and have since established large breeding populations in southern regions of the state. The humongous snakes usually grow to be about 6 to 9 feet...

Patrick Byrne met with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office on Dec. 18, 2020, to urge him to investigate allegations of election fraud. Byrne, the founder and former CEO of online retailer Overstock, is set to testify before the Jan. 6 House Select Committee on July 15. In an exclusive interview with The Epoch Times, Byrne recounted his meeting with Trump, which included former national security adviser Michael Flynn and Sidney Powell, former attorney to Trump’s campaign and former federal prosecutor, along with a number of White House officials. The roughly 4.5-hour meeting was “nothing like it has been...

' A cabin crew members has listed things travellers should be careful of during their flightA flight attendant has issued a warning to people who fall asleep on a plane. While many people like to relax during their travel and take a nap throughout their flight, a flight attendant warned those sitting by the window to be careful as some parts of the plane are dirtier than others. Tommy Cimato said: "Do not fall asleep or lean your head on the window. He warned that you never knew how many people had done the same and whether the window had...

Caption:When measuring a nucleus with a certain “magic” number of neutrons — 82 — the magnetic field of the nucleus exhibits a drastic change, and the properties of these very complex nuclei appear to be governed by just one of the protons of the nucleus. Credit: Adam Vernon ================================================================================================== A curious thing happened when MIT researchers Adam Vernon and Ronald Garcia Ruiz, along an international team of scientists, recently performed an experiment in which a sensitive laser spectroscopy technique was used to measure how the nuclear electromagnetic properties of indium isotopes evolve when an extreme number of neutrons are added...