Author: Manuel Osborn

A new court filing shows that the office of the judge presiding over the civil fraud trial of former President Donald Trump in New York has received “hundreds of threatening, harassing, disparaging and antisemitic” threats. The threats were made to the office of Judge Arthur Engoron, according to an affidavit that was attached to a Nov. 22 court filing, which states that there’s been a “deluge” of threatening messages to the court’s chambers phone and the personal cell phone as well as email and social media accounts of Judge Engoron’s chief law clerk, Allison Greenfield. The filing, registered with the New…

The Town of Mount Hope, New York, moved to shelve a proposed warehouse zoning change at a town board meeting on Nov. 20 in the face of strong public reaction. The proposed change would increase the maximum warehouse size allowed in the B-1 district fivefold, to 250,000 square feet from 50,000 square feet. The town’s main B-1 district, or business district, anchors around the State Route 211 corridor between White Bridge Road and the Dollar General store. A local landowner requested the zoning change to make way for a potential 400,000-square-foot warehousing development on his property at the intersection of Route 211…

‘Supreme Court has ignored with impunity clear, and troubling, evidence of partisan political bias,’ the court filing reads. Attorneys for former President Donald Trump in a civil fraud case against him in New York state filed a 1,902-page brief on Nov. 27 arguing that a gag order issued in the case should be lifted because of the judge’s allegedly unlawful conduct. The lengthy document references a motion requesting a mistrial and the judge’s and state attorneys’ responses to it. “The Gag Orders shield Justice Engoron and his openly partisan clerk from the precise scrutiny essential to maintaining public confidence in the judiciary…

Record numbers of New York City Department (NYPD) police officers have handed in their badges, raising concerns that residents of the nation’s largest city could see already sky-high crime rates spiral further out of control. A total of 2,516 officers have resigned from the department in 2023, according to police pension data obtained by The Epoch Times. It is the fourth largest number in the past decade and 43 percent more than the 1,750 who resigned their positions in 2018. Further, the data show that the number of cops quitting before they reach the 20 years required to receive their…

Former President Donald Trump will close out the New York civil fraud trial against him by taking the witness stand again on Dec. 11. His attorney, Chris Kise, told reporters on Nov. 27 that Eric Trump, the former president’s son and executive vice president at the Trump Organization, will testify on Dec. 6, and that the former president will close out the trial. Donald Trump Jr. was the first witness called by the defense on Nov. 13. Since then expert witnesses and Trump Organization personnel have been called on to testify against fraud claims made by New York Attorney General…

Five locations in Orange County, New York, are suitable to be developed into the county’s first-ever conference center, according to a recently released third-party feasibility study. The five sites are the former Tuxedo Ridge Ski Center property in the Town of Tuxedo, a former railroad site along Interstate Highway 84 in the Village of Maybrook, a large piece of farmland near the county jail in the Town of Goshen, the Orange County Fairgrounds in the Town of Wallkill, and the former New York City homeless shelter Camp La Guardia in the town of Chester. The first three locations are considered…

Christmas tree prices have hit record highs this year in another financial blow to cash-crunched consumers this holiday season, according to industry experts. The average price of a Christmas tree has surged 10 percent from the past year, with shoppers likely to spend on average between $80 and $100, according to the American Christmas Tree Association (ACTA). Joanne Bond, who works at the Maine Christmas Tree Association (MCTA), told The Epoch Times that an across-the-board increase in expenses forced her to raise prices by 10 percent at her Bond Mountain Christmas Tree Farm in West Newfield. “I’ve been bracing myself…

ALBANY, N.Y.—New York drivers who renewed their licenses during part of the coronavirus pandemic face license suspensions on Friday if they don’t submit vision tests, the state Department of Motor Vehicles warned. About 49,500 drivers statewide could have their licenses suspended because they failed to send in their tests, according to the DMV’s most recent estimate, an agency spokesperson said. The DMV urged drivers to submit the tests by Dec. 1 to avoid ramifications. Suspensions would affect drivers whose licenses expired between March 1, 2020, and Aug. 31, 2021. A pandemic-era rule allowed drivers to renew their licenses online by…

Former President Donald Trump offered rare support to two Democrats in a social media post on Wednesday, urging New York City Mayor Eric Adams and former Gov. Andrew Cuomo to fight back against new lawsuits brought against them under the state’s Adult Survivors Act. The law waived the statute of limitations for sexual offense lawsuits for one year. It went into effect in 2022, and the window to bring forth civil petitions ended this month, seeing some 3,700 lawsuits filed for sexual offenses that occurred at any time. Among those sued were several celebrities and politicians. “I hope that Mayor…

The Port Jervis City Council on Nov. 27 adopted a property tax levy of $7.6 million for 2024, which is 4.16 percent, or $305,552, more than that of the current year. The total budget stands at $17.4 million, which is about $1 million more than 2023’s. The tax levy hike almost doubled the maximum amount the state tax cap allowed. Mayor Kelly Decker told The Epoch Times that the hike was necessary to fund basic city functions amid financial challenges such as inflation and rising employee benefit costs. “There are no frills to it, and it keeps the city operational,”…