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A famed NYC museum is closing 2 Native American halls, and others have taken similar steps
New York’s American Museum of Natural History is closing two halls featuring Native American objects starting Saturday, acknowledging the exhibits are “severely outdated” and contain culturally sensitive items.
The mammoth complex across from Central Park on Manhattan’s Upper West Side is the latest U.S. institution to cover up or remove Native American exhibits to comply with recently revamped federal regulations dealing with the display of Indigenous human remains and cultural items.
The museum said in October that it would pull all human remains from public display, with the aim of eventually repatriating as much as it could to Native American tribes and other rightful owners.
Sean Decatur, the museum’s president, said in a letter to staff Friday that the latest move reflects the “growing urgency” among museums to change their relationships with tribes and how they exhibit Indigenous cultures.
AP Photo/Richard Drew
“The halls we are closing are vestiges of an era when museums such as ours did not respect the values, perspectives, and indeed shared humanity of Indigenous peoples,” he wrote. “Actions that may feel sudden to some may seem long overdue to others.”
Earlier this month, Chicago’s Field Museum covered several displays containing Native American items. Harvard University’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology has said it would remove all Native American funerary items from its exhibits. The Cleveland Museum of Art is another institution that has taken similar steps.
Shannon O’Loughlin, head of the Association on American Indian Affairs, a national group that has long called for museums to comply with the federal requirements, welcomed such developments but said the true test is what ultimately becomes of the removed items.
“Covering displays or taking things down isn’t the goal,” she said. “It’s about repatriation — returning objects back to tribes. So this is just one part of a much bigger process.”
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Todd Mesek, a Cleveland Museum of Art spokesperson, said the institution is consulting with Native American groups to secure their consent to display certain items as well as reviewing archival records to determine if there is already some agreement on record.
Jason Newton, a Harvard spokesperson, said the Peabody is committed to returning all ancestral remains and funerary items and has more than doubled the number of staffers working toward that end in recent months. The museum also announced this month that it would cover the expenses of tribal members traveling to campus as part of the repatriation process.
The revised regulations released in December by the U.S. Department of the Interior are related to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990. The changes include expanded requirements for consulting with and receiving tribes’ consent to exhibit and conduct research on Indigenous artifacts, including human remains and funerary, sacred and cultural objects.
Native American groups have long complained that museums, colleges and other institutions dragged out the process of returning hundreds of thousands of culturally significant items.
“The only exception to repatriation is if a museum or institution can prove they received consent at the time the item was taken,” O’Loughlin said. “But most institutions can’t do that, of course, because these items and bodies were usually taken through violence, theft and looting.”
Decatur said in the letter that rather than simply covering up or removing items in the Eastern Woodlands and Great Plains Halls, the ones closing this weekend, the decision was made to shutter them entirely because they are “severely outdated.”
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Meanwhile, some displays elsewhere in the museum, including ones showcasing Native Hawaiian items, will be covered, he added.
Decatur acknowledged one consequence of the closures will be the suspension of visits to them by school field trips. The Eastern Woodlands Hall, in particular, has been a mainstay for New York-area students learning about Native American life in the Northeast.
The museum remains committed to supporting the teaching of Indigenous cultures, Decatur said, and officials are reviewing the new federal regulations to understand their implications.
O’Loughlin of the Association on American Indian Affairs said there isn’t as much gray area as museum officials might suggest.
“The new regulations make it crystal clear,” she said. “It doesn’t prohibit research. It doesn’t prohibit exhibiting native cultural heritage. It only requires prior and informed consent before doing so.”
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Tennessee DA accused of firing multiple times at fugitive, hitting home with woman and her 3 children inside
A district attorney in Tennessee is facing a reckless endangerment charge after shooting at a fugitive several times and hitting a home that had a woman and her three children inside.
The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation announced the grand jury charge Monday against District Attorney Chris Stanford. His district covers Van Buren and Warren counties.
The indictment says that as the incident unfolded in Smithville on Nov. 21, a bullet Stanford shot from his handgun went through a front porch patio chair, through an exterior wall and into the living room wall of the home. The woman and children weren’t hurt.
Smithville is about 60 miles southeast of Nashville.
The indictment says that Stanford fired the shot “unlawfully, intentionally and recklessly.” There was no immediate threat to him or others, he wasn’t aiming the handgun, and “just held it out and shot” without using the gun’s sights, the indictment adds.
Following his indictment, Stanford surrendered at the DeKalb County Jail and was released after posting a $10,000 bond, TBI said. A message left with Stanton’s office was not immediately returned Tuesday.
The Warren County Sheriff’s Office described the circumstances leading to the incident last month. In a social media post, it said authorities were pursuing suspects after finding three dead bodies at a house and at an adjacent building.
The suspects were sighted in DeKalb County, the sheriff’s office said. One of them was taken into custody without incident. Stanford and other law enforcement officials chased the other suspect, who was a passenger in a car, the office said.
While trying to help the suspect flee, the driver struck a homeland security officer with the car, the sheriff’s office said.
In a statement last month to CBS affiliate WTVF-TV, Stanford said he fired shots in response to the homeland security agent being hit. No one was shot when Stanford fired his gun. The homeland security officer was injured and taken to the hospital, according to a social media post by District Attorney Bryant Dunaway.
“The vehicle then drove toward me and others, accelerating quickly. I fired my service weapon in defense of myself and others at the scene. Based upon my training and the circumstances that presented themselves, I believe my actions were necessary and justified,” Stanford said.
Stanford also told the news station he has a state law enforcement certification to carry his weapon at all times.
The two suspects in the three deaths were taken into custody and charged with criminal homicide, while the driver, also taken into custody, faces felony evading arrest and aggravated assault charged, according to the sheriff’s office.
Stanford will make an appearance in court on Jan. 7, WTVF reported. Since he showed up at the scene and fired his weapon, he is now a witness and cannot prosecute the triple murder in his own county, the station reported.
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Accused mastermind of journalist’s murder wanted by Mexico — but U.S. has called him a “protected witness”
Mexico has asked the United States to extradite the suspected mastermind behind the murder of journalist Javier Valdez after he was arrested on drug charges, the attorney general said.
Damaso Lopez Serrano — who the Justice Department says is known as “Mini Lic” — is accused of ordering the 2017 killing of Valdez, an award-winning journalist and AFP contributor who covered the narcotics trade.
The alleged former high-ranking member of the Sinaloa Cartel was arrested on Friday in Virginia on charges of trafficking fentanyl. Lopez Serrano is the son of Damaso Lopez Nunez, who launched a struggle for control of the cartel following the arrest of its leader, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.
Mexico’s Attorney General Alejandro Gertz described Lopez Serrano as the “mastermind” behind Valdez’s murder.
“We have already prosecuted the rest of the perpetrators and they are in jail,” he told a news conference.
Valdez was shot and killed in his car on May 15, 2017 in the Sinaloa state capital of Culiacan near the offices of his weekly newspaper Riodoce.
Enric Marti / AP
Investigators believe Lopez Serrano ordered the hit because he was angry about information published by Valdez about the Sinaloa Cartel’s internal power struggles.
Mexico has made several extradition requests for Lopez Serrano, who surrendered to U.S. authorities in July 2017 for drug trafficking and cooperated in exchange for a reduced sentence. At the time, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said Lopez Serrano was “believed to be the highest-ranking Mexican cartel leader ever to self-surrender in the United States.”
He was released from prison on parole in 2022.
Gertz said that Mexico had asked “on countless occasions” for Lopez Serrano to be handed over, but Washington declined because he had become a “protected witness” and “was giving them a lot of information.”
He voiced hope that with Lopez Serrano’s latest arrest “there are more than enough reasons” for the United States to finally grant Mexico’s request.
Rebecca Blackwell / AP
Wracked by violence related to drug trafficking, Mexico is one of the world’s most dangerous countries for journalists, news advocacy groups say.
Reporters Without Borders says more than 150 newspeople have been killed in Mexico since 1994 — and 2022 was one of the deadliest years ever for journalists in Mexico, with at least 15 killed.
Media workers are regularly targeted in Mexico, often in direct reprisal for their work covering topics like corruption and the country’s notoriously violent drug traffickers.
Most recently, in October, gunmen killed a journalist whose Facebook news page covered the violent western Mexico state of Michoacan. Then less than 24 hours later, an entertainment reporter in the western city of Colima was killed inside a restaurant she owned.
CHICAGO (CBS) — Two sisters have grateful hearts after they both received heart transplants at the same age—seven years apart.
Younger sister Meredith Everhart and older sister Abbey Cannon are now bonded by a genetic condition and a second chance at life.
“What’s ironic is that when she needed a heart transplant, was exactly the same age I needed a heart transplant,” said Cannon. “Seven years apart in age, seven years apart within 30 days of transplant, and our birthdays are within 30 days.”
The sisters share a special bond of getting a second chance at life, which they both received at the age of 38 years old.
Both sisters suffer from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy—otherwise known as HCM.
The genetic condition is a form of heart disease that causes the heart muscle to thicken.
In 2012, Cannon had chest pain. She was misdiagnosed in Nashville, Tennessee, and got a second opinion at Northwestern Medicine in 2016.
“Within six months, I was inpatient on an aortic balloon pump waiting for a heart,” Cannon said. “I ended up getting my heart 32 days later, So my date is February 27, 2017.”
Just months after Cannon’s transplant, Everhart was diagnosed with HCM too. She tried medication and participated in clinical trials, but her condition kept getting worse.”
“For me, it was, she’s right—I was in denial for a long time,” said Everhart, “and I didn’t want to be sick. I was in my 20s. I was in my early 30’s. I was like, this is not happening. I saw how bad she suffered.”
In May 2022, Everhart got COVID-19, and it sent her into heart failure.
She was added to the transplant list one year later.
“I got the call on January 29 of this year, 2024, and it’s been a journey,” Everhart said. “It’s been fantastic though. Northwestern has been great.”
Cannon said she can’t stress enough how important it is to become an organ donor.
“Had we not had someone that gave that most selfless gift, neither of us would be here,” she said.
Can Norm Coleman get Trump nominee Pete Hegseth over the finish line?
Tennessee DA accused of firing multiple times at fugitive, hitting home with woman and her 3 children inside
Accused mastermind of journalist’s murder wanted by Mexico — but U.S. has called him a “protected witness”
Can Norm Coleman get Trump nominee Pete Hegseth over the finish line?
Tennessee DA accused of firing multiple times at fugitive, hitting home with woman and her 3 children inside