Texas coronavirus cases include more than 80 infants

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A health official on the Texas Gulf Coast said 85 infants have tested positive for the coronavirus.

Corpus Christi Nueces County Public Health Director Annette Rodriguez said Friday that the 85 infants are each younger than 1, but offered no other details, including how the children are suspected to have become infected.

“These babies have not even had their first birthday yet. Please help us to stop the spread of this disease” by staying home except for necessary trips, socially distancing and wearing masks in public, Rodriguez said during a public health update in Corpus Christi.

Rodriguez did not return messages for comment Saturday from The Associated Press.

Republican Gov. Greg Abbott is also stressing that the widespread use of face coverings could avoid another lockdown, which he hasn’t ruled out.

Texas health officials reported more than 10,000 new cases for a fifth consecutive day on Saturday and said 130 more people have died due to COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, bringing the number of reported cases to 317,730 and the number of deaths to 3,865.

The true number of cases is likely higher because many people have not been tested, and studies suggest people can be infected and not feel sick.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear up within weeks. But for others, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, the highly contagious virus can cause severe symptoms and be fatal.

Associated Press

Texas shooting toll rises to seven

WASHINGTON - The death toll in a chaotic mass shooting in Texas has risen to seven, the local police chief confirmed Sunday, adding that it might have been far worse had the shooter not been stopped before entering a crowded movie theater.

On Sunday, police identified the shooter as a local man named Seth Aaron Ator, age 36. 

Police had said Saturday that five people died in the frantic shootout spread out over several miles on roads between the cities of Midland and Odessa in the west of the state. 

They said Sunday that two more people had died. The dead ranged in age from 15 to 57, and the 22 injured included three police officers and a 17-month-old girl who was shot in the mouth but was recovering. 

At the end of the shooting spree, the assailant -- whose identity police said they were not ready to release -- died in a shootout with police outside an Odessa movie theater.

Odessa Police Chief Michael Gerke told reporters Sunday that he could not be absolutely certain of the suspect's intent, but then added, "He showed up at a movie theater, which would tend to show his motives."

Gerke said that on a Saturday afternoon in Odessa, the theater would have been one of the most crowded venues.

At the time, the chief refused to publicly name the shooter so as not to give him notoriety. He said there was "some criminal record attached to his driver's license," but no active warrants. 

On Sunday afternoon Odessa police, on their Facebook page, named the shooter as Ator and said he was from Odessa.

Gerke said the shooter used an "AR-type" weapon -- an assault-style arm such as has been used in several other mass shootings.

Reports said Ator is a white man in his mid-30s. Police gave no details, only his name and age.

Firing at random 

FBI special agent Christopher Combs said at the briefing that authorities did not believe there was any connection to domestic or international terrorism.

The incident began when troopers tried to pull over a gold-colored passenger vehicle on the Interstate 20 highway. Gerke said the driver had failed to signal a left turn.

Before the vehicle stopped, "the male driver (and only occupant in the vehicle) pointed a rifle toward the rear window of his car and fired several shots toward the DPS patrol unit," the Texas Department of Public Safety said in a statement.

One trooper was wounded, and the suspect fled, leading police on a wild chase during which he hijacked a US postal truck and opened fire at random.

Coming less than a month after a gunman killed 22 people in the Texas city of El Paso -- less than 300 miles (480 kilometers) west of Odessa -- the latest bloodshed has ignited fresh calls for steps to stem the US scourge of mass shootings.

'Tired of the dying'

Texas Governor Greg Abbott spoke repeatedly at the briefing about what he said were urgent legislative efforts to reduce gun violence. 

"I have been to too many of these events," he said, listing four mass shootings in the state. "I'm tired of the dying... too many Texans are mourning."

US President Donald Trump, in a tweet Sunday, congratulated law enforcement and first responders for their response to "the terrible shooting tragedy yesterday."

But later, speaking to reporters on the White House lawn, he said that while discussions on curbing gun violence were underway with lawmakers, "This really hasn't changed anything."

While he himself spoke after the El Paso shooting of requiring "strong background checks" to prevent unstable people from purchasing guns, Trump said Sunday that recent history showed that "as strong as you make your background checks, they would not have stopped any of it."

But former Texas congressman Beto O'Rourke, who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, bluntly disagreed, telling CNN that "if we're not able to act decisively, then we will continue to have this bloodshed."

Combs, the FBI agent, noted that this was not the first mass shooting his team had responded to.

Once the Odessa investigation concludes, he said, "We'll get ready (for) the next active shooter, which is an unfortunate statement to make -- but it seems like that's what we do.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Four police officers killed, seven wounded in Dallas shooting protest

DALLAS - Four police officers were fatally shot and seven wounded by snipers in Dallas, authorities said, during one of many demonstrations held in cities across the United States against the second fatal police shooting of a black man in two days.

Dallas Police Chief David Brown said in a statement two snipers in elevated positions shot 11 officers, killing three. Police said on Twitter later a fourth officer had died. At least one more was in surgery.

Brown also said later one suspect was cornered in a garage in downtown Dallas, although there was no word on the second reported sniper.

Television footage showed a heavy police presence, with officers taking cover behind vehicles on the street.

"Our thoughts and prayers are with the Dallas law enforcement community and the Dallas Area Rapid Transit officers killed and injured this evening," Governor Greg Abbott said in a statement.

The shooting happened as largely peaceful protests unfolded around the United States after the shooting of Philando Castile, 32, by police near St. Paul, Minnesota, late on Wednesday. His girlfriend posted live video on the internet of the bloody scene minutes afterward, which was widely viewed.

Castile's death occurred within a day of the shooting of Alton Sterling, 37, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Sterling was killed during an altercation with two white police officers. Graphic video of that incident caused an outcry on social media.

In Chicago, protesters shut down a stretch of the Dan Ryan Expressway - one of Chicago's main arteries - for about 10 minutes on Thursday.

In New York, several hundred protesters blocked traffic in Times Square in the heart of Manhattan, chanting "Hands up, don't shoot." More than a dozen arrests were made, the New York Police Department said.

In St. Paul, about a thousand people gathered outside the governor's mansion, chanting "Hey hey, ho ho, those killer cops have got to go," and other slogans.

Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton made a brief appearance in an attempt to quell the crowd. He said earlier a state investigation was already under way.

"Would this have happened if the driver and the passengers were white? I don't think it would have," Dayton told reporters, speaking of the Castile shooting.

"So I'm forced to confront that this kind of racism exists, and it's incumbent upon all of us to vow and ensure that it doesn't happen and doesn't continue to happen," he said.

State investigators later identified Minneapolis area police officer Jeronimo Yanez as the patrolman who fatally shot Castile during a traffic stop.

"RACIAL DISPARITIES" - OBAMA

U.S. President Barack Obama described the killings as tragedies.

"All of us as Americans should be troubled by these shootings, because these are not isolated incidents. They're symptomatic of a broader set of racial disparities that exist in our criminal justice system," he said after arriving in Poland for a NATO summit.

The use of force by police against African-Americans in cities from Ferguson, Missouri, to Baltimore and New York has sparked periodic and sometimes violent protests in the past two years and has spawned the Black Lives Matter movement.

Anger has intensified when the officers involved in such incidents have been acquitted in trials or not charged at all.

"I was already fuming when I woke up this morning over Baton Rouge, but for it to happen here again just pushed me right over the edge," said truck driver Thomas Michaels, 42, who was among the protesters in St. Paul.

"We live in a racist society where black lives don't matter, my kids lives don't matter and I'm sick of it. I don't even know if it can be fixed," he said.

Another protester, retail worker Tanya McDonald, 28, said: "What gets me is how many people are failing to see that this is happening almost every day. We're dying, we're being killed off by people hiding behind a badge and no one's doing anything to stop it."

The Washington Post said Castile was at least the 506th person and 123rd black American shot and killed by police so far in 2016, according to a database it has set up to track such deaths.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com