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HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - Samoan police have charged a prominent playwright with the murder of retired UH professor Caroline Sinavaiana-Gabbard, former Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard’s aunt. Police say Samoan playwright Papalii Sia Figiel, 57, was charged with the murder at her home. She was initially arrested on manslaughter charges, but police upgraded the charge after finding “incriminating” evidence, including a small knife and hammer. A motive is still under investigation. Media outlets report the two women were colleagues and friends, and that Gabbard was Figiel’s mentor.

A former Horry County police officer sustained life-altering injuries while responding to a 2021 plane crash that was later blamed on faulty maintenance, according to a recently filed lawsuit. Kevin McLean was among the first responders to a May 21, 2021, plane crash just off Socastee Boulevard in which the pilot, 60-year-old James Marklin Harper, was killed.

Astronaut Mark Vande Hei, who holds the ongoing record for longest space flight, is set to end his 355 days in space in just three weeks. The plan is for him to land in Kazakhstan with two Russian cosmonauts on a Russian spacecraft. But unprecedented sanctions against Russia could put Vande Hei's return on hold.

A photo of a saint holding a Javelin, an anti-tank missile launcher, in her arms is going viral on social media. As Russia continues to wage war on Ukraine, the photo, being hailed as ‘St Javelin’, has become a symbol of Ukraine’s resistance. Snip Javelin is an anti-tank-guided munition that can be carried and launched by a single person. Designed by the US defence firms in the late 1980s, the Javelin weighs about 50 pounds. Javelin can be fired from the soldier and does not need any millie launcher. According to reports, Ukrainian defence is largely depending on the Javelin...

The decision not to require vaccinated players to receive a booster in order to remain “fully vaccinated” appears in a memo sent Saturday by Commissioner Roger Goodell to all teams.

The newest protocols, at their very simplest, pull back on many of the old testing rules for vaccinated players. While unvaccinated players will still be tested daily, vaccinated players will only be tested if they report symptoms.

Facebook is blocking anybody who has posted conservative thoughts until Jan 23rd. DC on lockdown. Parler gone, the ceo in hiding. Signal and Gab limited. Insane.

Does security camera video show a Fulton County, Georgia, election supervisor suspiciously pulling suitcases filled with ballots from under a table after telling poll workers to leave the room? And did that election official continue to illegally count ballots without required monitors in a manner that calls into question Joe Biden's narrow win over Donald Trump in Georgia? No, those claim are not true: Two high-level officials with the Georgia secretary of state's office and a state elections board monitor each told Lead Stories that their investigations revealed nothing suspicious in the video. The officials said the ballots seen in...

The "battle for the soul of the nation," as Joe Biden is calling the upcoming 2020 presidential election, will not be fought in the skies as the presumptive Democratic nominee for president will not be taking on a campaign plane, Axios reported.

"Help Asheville Bears" (HAB) is offering a $5,000 reward for anyone who can find out who put a 'Trump 2020' sticker on the bear’s collar.

Sorry for the vanity, but I want help from the hive. If you follow the link and click through the individual states something very impossibly odd stands out. Most all red states have positive test results for Covid around 20%. SC today reported 22.2%! Almost 1 in 4 test positive?! Contrast that to blue states like NY, NJ, MI, CT etc which are all reporting around a 2% positive rate. My conspiracy suspicious mind wonders if the tests in red states are "juiced" to show positive?

Minneapolis has elected two black transgender representatives to its City Council, adding to what advocacy groups have described as a banner election for transgender people in public office. Andrea Jenkins easily won the race Tuesday night for an open seat in South Minneapolis, with roughly 73 percent of the vote. Jenkins, a 56-year-old poet and historian who transitioned in her 30s, spent years as a policy aide to two previous council members in the same ward. Phillipe Cunningham’s victory took longer because of Minneapolis’ instant-runoff voting system. But by Wednesday afternoon, the city announced Cunningham — a 29-year old transgender...

McIlroy continued, unprompted, by saying Trump has tried to politicize the pandemic, using as an example Trump claiming the U.S. has administered the most tests for the new coronavirus than any other nation. “Like it’s a contest,” McIlroy said. “There’s some stuff that just is terrible. It’s not the way a leader should act. There is a bit of diplomacy that you need to show, and I just don’t think he’s showing that, especially in these times.” The hosts, Scottish golf journalists Lawrence Donegan and John Huggan, asked McIlroy if he would play with Trump again. “I don’t know if...

According to DHEC, the highest percentage of the state's COVID-19 victims are 81 years of age or older. That age group makes up about 35.8% of the state's COVID-19 deaths. The 71 to 80 years old age group accounts for the second-highest proportion of deaths, with 30.4%.

Hospitals on the Rochester campus are operating at 35 to 40 percent capacity, and surgical volume is at 25 to 30 percent of the level that was expected. About 60 percent of Mayo Clinic's business comes from elective procedures of the kind that are now on hold. This is latest step in Mayo Clinic's financial stabilization strategy to address an anticipated $3 billion loss due to the pandemic forcing a temporary halt in all elective procedures and average medical appointments.

MUSC Health, an eight-hospital system based in Charleston, S.C., is laying off about 900 employees and reducing pay for salaried workers to help offset financial damage caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Like many other health systems across the U.S., MUSC Health is facing financial pressure from canceling elective procedures and other nonemergent care. As a result, the health system has experienced a significant decline in surgical volumes, inpatient visits and ambulatory encounters.

So far, 16,000 people have died and 280,000 people have been hospitalized during the 2019-2020 flu season, according to preliminary estimates from the CDC. "The flu season began early this year and took off aggressively," added Schaffner. "It began prominently in the southeastern states but quickly spread. So far, there is no sign that the momentum of the annual epidemic is slowing." In total, the CDC estimates that 29 million people have gotten the flu so far this season.

In an unexpected morning vote Tuesday, Republicans in the North Carolina House of Representatives pushed through an override of Governor Roy Cooper’s veto of the state budget. Rep. Deb Butler (D-New Hanover/Brunswick) strongly protested the move with a speech that led a man to turn off her microphone. When she could not keep the microphone on, Butler shouted at House Speaker Tim Moore for “usurping” the process.

University leaders in Alaska are scrambling to prepare for a 41 percent cut in state funding and mobilizing a last-ditch lobbying effort to try to persuade legislators to overturn the governor’s decision. “Simply put, if not overridden, today’s veto will strike an institutional and reputational blow from which we may likely never recover,” University of Alaska System President James R. Johnsen said in a statement following a Board of Regents emergency meeting after Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R) used a line-item veto Friday.

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is making her first public appearance since undergoing lung cancer surgery in December. The justice sat in the back of the darkened auditorium at the National Museum of Women in the Arts. The National Constitution Center, which sponsored the concert, did not permit photography. James Ginsburg said before the concert that his mother is walking a mile a day and meeting with her personal trainer twice a week.