In Oklahoma couples have to marry within 10 days from the date the license is filed. Sources say the wedding is happening tomorrow in an outdoor chapel on Blake’s Oklahoma ranch.
And it sounds like it’s going to be quite a bash with the sources saying the couple has lots of activities and celebrations planned for the weekend. Blake, Gwen and her sons reportedly flew to Oklahoma last wek, and the couple had a private plane bring the rest of the guests to Oklahoma yesterday.
Source: TMZ
This week’s H & S Feed & Country Store Pet of the Week is “Red”. Red is a 3 year old medium sized hound mix. Red has all of his shots, has been dewormed, and is fully vetted. He’s a pretty laid-back guy, and seems to get along with other dogs and even cats.
If you’d like to set up an appointment to meet Red or any of the pets at Stephen Memorial Animal Shelter, visit https://www.stephenmemorial.org/ and fill out an adoption application.
Check out our visit about Red with Terry Gott from Stephen Memorial Animal Shelter here:
By MICHAEL R. SISAK
AP – Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg surrendered to authorities early Thursday ahead of expected charges against him and former President Donald Trump’s company, according to multiple news outlets.
Weisselberg was seen walking into the the courthouse in lower Manhattan around 6:20 a.m. with his lawyer.
New York prosecutors are expected to announce the first criminal indictment Thursday in a two-year investigation into Trump’s business practices, accusing his namesake company and Weisselberg of tax crimes related to fringe benefits for employees.
The charges against the Trump Organization and its chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, remained sealed Wednesday night but were to be unveiled ahead of an afternoon arraignment at a state court in Manhattan, according to two people familiar with the matter.
The people were not authorized to speak about an ongoing investigation and did so on condition of anonymity.
There was no indication Trump himself would be charged at this stage of the investigation, jointly pursued by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. and New York Attorney General Letitia James, both Democrats.
Trump did not respond to reporters’ shouted questions about the New York case as he visited Texas on Wednesday, but earlier in the week, the Republican had blasted the New York prosecutors as “rude, nasty, and totally biased” and said his company’s actions were “standard practice throughout the U.S. business community, and in no way a crime.”
The planned charges were said to be linked to benefits the company gave to top executives, like the use of apartments, cars and school tuition, the people familiar with the matter told the AP.
Messages seeking comment were left with a spokesperson and lawyers for the Trump Organization. Weisselberg’s lawyer, Mary Mulligan, declined to comment. The Manhattan district attorney’s office declined to comment.
Vance, who leaves office at the end of the year, has been conducting a wide-ranging investigation into a variety of matters involving Trump and the Trump Organization.
His office has looked into hush-money payments paid to women on Trump’s behalf and truthfulness in the company’s property valuations and tax assessments, among other matters.
Vance fought a long battle to get Trump’s tax records and has been subpoenaing documents and interviewing company executives and other Trump insiders.
James assigned two lawyers from her office to work with Vance’s team after her office found evidence of possible criminal wrongdoing while conducting a separate civil investigation of Trump.
Weisselberg, 73, had come under scrutiny, in part, because of questions about his son’s use of a Trump apartment at little or no cost.
Barry Weisselberg, who managed a Trump-operated ice rink in Central Park, testified in a 2018 divorce deposition that Trump Parc East apartment was a “corporate apartment, so we didn’t have rent.”
Barry’s ex-wife, Jen Weisselberg, has been cooperating with both inquiries and given investigators reams of tax records and other documents.
The case against Allen Weisselberg — a loyal lieutenant to Trump and his real estate-developer father, Fred — could give prosecutors the means to pressure the executive into cooperating and telling them what he knows about Trump’s business dealings.
The Trump Organization is the business entity through which the former president manages his many entrepreneurial affairs, including his investments in office towers, hotels and golf courses, his many marketing deals and his television pursuits. Trump sons, Donald Jr. and Eric, have been in charge of the company’s day-to-day operations since he became president.
Although Trump isn’t expected to be charged Thursday, allegations against the company bearing his name raise questions about his knowledge of — or involvement in — business that practices prosecutors suspect were illegal.
James Repetti, a tax lawyer and professor at Boston College Law School, said a company like the Trump Organization would generally have a responsibility to withhold taxes not just on salary, but other forms of compensation — like the use of an apartment or automobile.
Such perks wouldn’t be considered taxable income if they were required as a condition of employment, Repetti said, such as providing an apartment for the convenience of an employee who is required to be at the office or worksite at odd or frequent hours, or allowing the use of a car for business purposes.
Another prominent New York City real estate figure, the late Leona Helmsley, was convicted of tax fraud in a federal case that arose from her company paying to remodel her home without her reporting that as income.
The Trump Organization case involves possible violations of New York state tax laws.
“The IRS routinely looks for abuse of fringe benefits when auditing closely held businesses,” Repetti said. “The temptation for the business is that it claims a tax deduction for the expense, while the recipient does not report it in income.”
Iowa’s high court said Wednesday (6/30) that the state may refuse to allow Planned Parenthood to conduct sex education programs funded by federal grants, reversing a judge’s ruling last year that found the law unconstitutional.
The Iowa Supreme Court found the 2019 law passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature is constitutional, rejecting Planned Parenthood of the Heartland’s complaint that the law violated its right to equal protection and that the law served no rational legitimate government interest.
State court Judge Paul Scott ruled in May 2020 that Planned Parenthood would likely prevail at trial on its equal protection claim and he blocked the law’s implementation. The state appealed.
The six justices appointed by Republican governors agreed that the Iowa Legislature could have reasonable concerns that allowing an abortion provider to teach sex education could undermine its goals of promoting abstinence and reducing teenage pregnancy.
“The state could also be concerned that using abortion providers to deliver sex education programs to teenage students would create relationships between the abortion provider and the students the state does not wish to foster in light of its policy preference for childbirth over abortion,” the majority of justices said in an opinion written by Justice Dana Oxley, an appointee of Gov. Kim Reynolds, who signed the bill into law.
The court concluded that Planned Parenthood’s practice of providing abortions would not be affected by the state’s refusal to give it grant money for sex education programs.
The court’s lone Democratic appointee, Justice Brent Appel, disagreed in a dissenting opinion that said the Legislature “through unconstitutional conditions in these statutes is trying to accomplish indirectly what it cannot do directly: namely, attack abortion rights.”
The law expressly prohibited for the first time an abortion provider from receiving the grant money to teach sex education in the Community Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Program administered by the Iowa Department of Human Services and the Personal Responsibility Education Program administered by the Iowa Department of Public Health.
Planned Parenthood had received the funding for years. As a condition of the grants, recipients must use state-selected educational materials that do not allow discussion of abortion. The funds for the programs are prohibited from being used to support abortion-related services. In the case, the state had agreed that Planned Parenthood has neither used grant funding for abortion-related services nor discussed abortion as part of the educational programming.
Regardless, the court concluded that the Legislature could have passed the law “out of concern that its message could be diluted if PPH, the primary abortion provider in the state, delivered the state-sponsored sexual education programs.”
Planned Parenthood said in a statement that it has received the funding since 2005 and has used Iowa’s state-approved curriculum to provide sex education to tens of thousands of Iowa youth. The organization currently provides sex education at more than 30 schools and 15 community-based youth-serving organizations across Iowa.
“We are disappointed that the law was upheld because we understand the harm to young Iowans that will result from this decision. We were privileged to support Planned Parenthood in the vital work they do every day to empower Iowans with sex education and teen pregnancy prevention programming,” said Rita Bettis Austen, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa, which provided legal support in the case.
Reynolds, in a statement, called the ruling “a strong statement in support of the idea that taxpayer dollars should not fund abortion.” She said she is “proud to be a pro-life governor who will protect all innocent life.”
A Des Moines woman has been sentenced to eight years in federal prison for conspiring to damage the Dakota Access Pipeline in Mahaska and Wapello Counties. 39-year-old Jessica Rae Reznicek was also ordered to pay over three million dollars in restitution and will serve three years supervised release when she gets out of prison. According to court documents, Reznicek conspired with others between November 2016 and May 2017 to damage the pipeline in several places in Iowa and South Dakota. Specifically, Reznicek admitted to damaging and trying to damage the pipeline using an acetylene torch and fires near pipeline equipment in Mahaska, Wapello and Boone Counties. Acting US Attorney Richard Westphal calls Reznicek’s actions “a federal crime of terrorism.” Reznicek’s co-defendant, Ruby Montoya, will be sentenced at a later date.
An Ottumwa man has been sentenced to 19 years in prison for dealing meth, possession with intent to deal meth, possession of a firearm for use in drug trafficking and possessing a firearm when not allowed to do so. According to court documents, 35-year-old Hector Ramon Iglesias Tovar of Ottumwa was involved in distributing one and a half kilos of meth. Because he is in the US illegally, Tovar’s possession of an AR-15 rifle and a .45 caliber handgun violated federal law. This past May, Tovar’s co-defendant, David Lemley of Ottumwa, was sentenced to seven years in prison for pleading guilty to distributing meth.
The iconic instrument was found and given to Acuff by American soldiers stationed in Germany at the end of World War II. It is now on display in a spotlight exhibit in the museum’s upper-level galleries.
“It felt important to me that the great Roy Acuff’s fiddle join the ranks of other revered instruments in the museum’s permanent collection—including Maybelle Carter’s 1928 Gibson L-5 guitar and Bill Monroe’s 1923 Gibson F-5 mandolin,” Vince shares. “The fiddle was given to Acuff by soldiers during a time of war because of how much he meant to them. He meant a lot to me, too.”
Source: Country Music Hall of Fame
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