Montana to defy birth-certificate ruling
BILLINGS, Mont. -- Just hours after a Montana judge blocked health officials from enforcing a state rule that would prevent transgender people from changing the gender on their birth certificate, the Republican-run state on Thursday said it would defy the order.
District Court Judge Michael Moses chided attorneys for the state during a hearing in Billings for circumventing his April order that temporarily blocked a 2021 Montana law that made it harder to change birth certificates.
Moses said there was no question that state officials violated his earlier order by creating the new rule. Moses said his order reinstates a 2017 Department of Public Health and Human Services rule that allowed people to update the gender on their birth certificate by filing an affidavit with the department.
However, the state said it would disregard the ruling.
"The Department thoroughly evaluated the judge's vague April 2022 decision and crafted our final rule to be consistent with the decision. It's unfortunate that the judge's ruling today does not square with his vague April decision," said Charlie Brereton, director of the Department of Public Health and Human Services.
Brereton said the agency was keeping the rule it issued last week in place and an agency spokesperson said the department is waiting to see the judge's written order before considering its next steps.
Murder suspect pleads innocent in rape
MEMPHIS -- A Tennessee man pleaded innocent Thursday to raping a woman about a year before he was charged with kidnapping a kindergarten teacher during a pre-dawn run and killing her.
A court-appointed public defender representing Cleotha Henderson entered the plea in a Memphis courtroom on charges of aggravated rape, especially aggravated kidnapping and unlawful carrying of a weapon. Henderson told Shelby County Judge Lee Coffee that he could not afford bond, and the judge said he will remain in jail.
Henderson was charged earlier this month with abducting Eliza Fletcher, 34, who disappeared while running near the University of Memphis on Sept. 2. Her remains were found near an abandoned house after a search of more than three days. Henderson is being held without bond on kidnapping and murder charges in that case.
The rape case and the Fletcher murder case will proceed separately. Henderson has not entered a plea in the Fletcher case.
Henderson, 38, previously served 20 years in prison for a kidnapping he committed at age 16.
Activists banned from clinic interference
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- A group of anti-abortion activists will continue to be banned from interfering with patients and providers at a reproductive health clinic outside Nashville, a federal judge has ruled.
In July, protesters attempted to enter the clinic operated by the nonprofit carafem organization twice during a national conference of Operation Save America -- formerly Operation Rescue, according to court documents.
Tennessee's trigger law was not yet in effect. Instead, abortion was banned at around six weeks into pregnancy due to the U.S. Supreme Court decision to overturn the constitutional right to an abortion.
Video footage shows the group falsely believed carafem was violating state law because trigger laws in other states took effect immediately when the Roe ruling was issued in June. However, Tennessee was among the small handful of states that would not be allowed to enforce the trigger law until Aug. 25.
During the July 28 event, law enforcement officers said they would handle any legal violations. A speaker then responded, "We're going to be obedient to God's law, not man's." Video shows protesters saying they had men willing to go inside and stop the clinic from performing abortions.
Shortly after the interaction, the clinic filed for a temporary restraining order, claiming the protesters violated the federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act. That order was granted and extended several times.
"Defendants have clearly expressed a willingness to take the law into their own hands if, in their view, law enforcement is not taking appropriate action," U.S. District Judge William Campbell wrote in Wednesday's decision. "Concerningly, Defendants have stated that they do not consider themselves bound to the laws of man."
Caribbean threatened by tropical storm
MIAMI -- Tropical Storm Fiona is on a path to threaten the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico this weekend.
The Atlantic Hurricane season's sixth named storm formed Wednesday evening, and the U.S. National Hurricane Center issued tropical storm watches for the Caribbean's easternmost islands.
"Interests in the Leeward Islands, the Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico should monitor the progress of this system," the center said.
On Thursday, Fiona was moving at 13 mph with maximum sustained winds of about 50 mph, forecasters said. Little change in strength is forecast over the next few days.