cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/53758792

The early voting for the Midterms is now available in many places. You can early vote at a polling place or you can use mail-in voting.

Get organised today here: https://www.vote.org/

If you choose to vote in person, either now or on election day, be aware of your rights and course of actions: https://lemmy.world/post/53334632

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/53380715

The early voting for the Midterms is now available in many places. You can early vote at a polling place or you can use mail-in voting.

Get organised today here: https://www.vote.org/

If you choose to vote in person, either now or on election day, be aware of your rights and course of actions: https://lemmy.world/post/53334632

Cross posted from https://thelemmy.club/post/57471782

CHAINSAW MASSACRE: An Alabama man is accused of decapitating his 85-year-old grandmother and 65-year-old aunt inside their home.

Thomas Steele, 47, faces two counts of capital murder after police discovered Dora Boone (Not Pictured), 85, and Christy Deloach, 65, dead inside their Mobile residence on October 12.

According to court documents, both women had been decapitated with a chainsaw.

What makes this case even more disturbing is what happened before the killings.

Roughly two and a half hours earlier, Deloach had called 911 seeking help with Steele’s unusual behavior.

“He’s calm. He’s not violent,” she told dispatchers.

Deloach reportedly said Steele had stopped taking medication and had been giving away his belongings. She declined an ambulance and the dispatcher provided the police department’s phone number.

Hours later, both women were found dead, and Steele was detained at the scene.

During his first court appearance, Steele reportedly said “Kill him” after a public defender was appointed. A judge denied him bond and ordered a mental competency evaluation.

The 911 call raises an important unanswered question: what happened between Deloach’s request for help and the discovery of the two victims?

Steele remains jailed without bond.

Just as a jury was about to be selected, a 22-year-old Alabama man pleaded guilty Monday to murder in the May 2024 shooting death of 17-year-old transgender teenager Tayy Dior Thomas.

In a case the Mobile County District Attorney’s Office called a “senseless murder,” Carl Mitchell Washington Jr. was sentenced to 25 years in prison as part of a plea deal that resulted in Mobile County Circuit Judge Brandy Hambright dismissing a charge of shooting into an occupied vehicle, according to news station WALA.

The Alabama Public Library Service board recently adopted strict guidelines requiring public libraries to limit young people’s access to books containing material related to gender identity or transgender people.

Under the amended administrative code, books that discuss gender-transition procedures or “gender ideology,” or that “promote” the existence of more than two biological genders, must be removed from youth sections and relocated to sections for adults.

“Fishing is a popular sport in Alabama, and provides many benefits, such as recreation and procurement of healthy food,” the department said in its annual fish advisory guide. “Unfortunately, certain toxic chemicals have been found in some lakes and rivers in Alabama. Some of these chemicals can accumulate in fish.”

More info here: https://adem.alabama.gov/water/water-information-and-related-maps

This map has the advisories:

https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/cd4f9083235243e182e7155680bc30c2

[image alt text: Picture taken from just inside a tent looking out the open tent flap. A pair of sock clad feet stick out onto a rock ledge. The tent is only a few meters from the edge of a cliff. The view looks out over a wide river valley, and in the far distance are mountains. The river has been dammed and in the center of the image is Weiss Lake, which looks vaguely like an alien from the classic Space Invaders arcade game.]

The view is from Cherokee Rock Village, on top of Lookout Mountain. They have one of the best campgrounds in the state, highly recommend.

A group of LGBTQ+ baristas is working to unionize a Starbucks in Huntsville for what they hope will help create a more fair and equitable workplace for everyone.

If successful, the store on Memorial Parkway would be the third organized Starbucks outlet in Alabama, after stores in Scottsboro and Birmingham. The organizing team wants to join Starbucks Workers United (SBWU), the union that represents over 570 union Starbucks stores, out of about 15,000 outlets in total.

In a scathing opinion more than 570 pages long, a panel of three federal judges issued a final ruling on Thursday concluding that not only did the congressional map Alabama Republicans adopted in 2023 violate the civil rights of Black voters, but that lawmakers had also intentionally discriminated against that same group in passing their map.

The decision likely means that Alabama's congressional delegation will remain split between five Republicans and two Democrats for the rest of the decade, but a more serious consequence looms.

Because of the court's finding of deliberate discrimination, the state could be brought back under federal supervision to ensure that any future changes it makes to voting rules and procedures—which include anything from relocating a polling place to imposing new voter ID laws or redistricting plans—do not disadvantage minorities.

The Alabama Senate Wednesday gave final approval to a bill making Juneteenth a state holiday in Alabama.

HB 165, sponsored by Rep. Rick Rehm, R-Dothan, closes state government offices on June 19 for the holiday, which celebrates the end of slavery in the U.S. The bill passed on a 13-5 vote. Nearly half of the Senate body abstained from voting. 

The bill goes to Gov. Kay Ivey, who has made Juneteenth a state holiday for the last four years. A message seeking comment was left with Ivey’s office on Wednesday. Gina Maiola, a spokesperson for the governor, said in a text message Ivey plans to sign the legislation.

But there’s no need to argue the finer points of this, because Sells didn’t do this for serious consideration or because he’s a serious lawmaker looking to make a real difference in the state. He did it for attention, and because he watched Fox News a few times and saw the prison porn segments on El Salvador’s mega prison and the idea of treating humans terribly as a form of corrections was appealing.

Because 100 years of operating the absolute worst, most cruel prisons in America has apparently taught us absolutely nothing. Such as we can’t cruel our way out of crime.

The agreement, reached under the Biden Administration, required the state’s Department of Public Health to improve sanitation efforts in Alabama’s Black Belt. It’s unclear what the termination will mean on the ground.