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Lawyer’s daughter who proudly identified as con artist gets sentenced for bank fraud after using taxpayer cash to rent Miami mega-mansion

A former social media influencer who once proudly called herself a ‘con artist’ after scamming the federal government out of $1.5 million in COVID-related disaster loans will now be locked up for even longer.

Danielle Miller, the daughter of lawyer and former New York State Bar Association president Michael Miller, was sentenced Monday to 16 years in Florida state prison, after pleading guilty to 38 counts of fraudulently using personal identification information.

Prosecutors have said Miller came to Florida during the COVID pandemic, traveling to Sarasota with her was Ciera Blas, whom she met while locked up at New York City‘s infamous Rikers Island for using stolen credit card information to book appointments at a luxurious spa in the Upper West Side.

Miller then used others’ identification information to defraud banks throughout the Sunshine State.

The scam finally unraveled when an alert manager notified the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office, who arrested her.

But this was not the first time Miller faced jail for bank fraud in the state, even going as far as proudly characterizing herself as a ‘con artist’ in a 2022 New York Magazine article.

That year, she was sentenced to five years in a Florida prison, after she attempted to use a California woman’s passport to obtain more than $8,000 at a Chase bank drive-through window in 2020, according to the Bradenton Herald.

By 2023, federal authorities accused Miller of stealing the identities of more than 10 people to set up bank accounts and obtain loans – which she then used for travel and for lavish purchases, including $27,000-a-month rent at a waterside villa in Miami.

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Taliban to jail barbers who shave men’s beards for up to 15 months under radical Islamic law

Barbers who cut off men’s beards in Afghanistan are set to be jailed under the Taliban‘s increasingly radical regime.

Some young men are also reportedly being beaten up and ‘humiliated’ for defying strict cultural laws by daring to pick a Western-style haircut.

Offending hairdressers will be referred to the Taliban’s feared judicial authorities and could face up for 15 months in prison.

The totalitarian regime claims it is merely laying down Islamic law.

Beard removal was already illegal under its dystopian-sounding Law on the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, but did not carry a prison sentence.

Some accused of crafting non-traditional styles have already faced temporary detention, however, meaning their businesses have ground to a halt for days.

Esmatullah, from the Balkh province, told the Telegraph: ‘We are branded as agents of the former government if we trim our beards or keep what they call a Western hairstyle. 

‘The Taliban interrogate and beat people simply for how they look.’

He said a local college student was beaten up by Taliban members who also lopped off his hair with scissors, because he had decided to shave the sides of this head.

Another barber in Balkh said that many of his customers now ask him to visit them at their homes for haircut or grooming sessions, because it is too risky to do in public.

Many have also seen a steep decline in business since the Taliban reestablished in August 2021.

Last week, Taliban morality enforcers detained eight barbers in Afghanistan’s Parwan province for shaving or styling beards.

Their shops were shuttered, and their have been families told they will be detained for a month.

Taliban officials summoned male barbers in the Balkh province on Friday to the drum home the message that the crackdown is on.

Another Balkh barber told the newspaper: ‘If people are not allowed to shave their beards or cut their hair as per their choice, who will come to our shops?

‘We live hand to mouth, and these edicts will leave us without enough food on our plates.’

Since sweeping back to power in the wake of the Western withdrawal, the Taliban has steadily tightened its grip on the people of Afghanistan and stripped away their freedoms.

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An Antifa-Linked Portland Bail Fund Freed This Somali — Five Days Later, He Killed a Mother of Three

A judge on Dec. 30 handed down a life sentence to a Somali-American man who brutally murdered a woman who had a protective order against him after an Antifa-linked bail fund paid for his release.

Multnomah County Circuit Court Judge Jenna Plank sentenced Mohamed Osman Adan, 36, to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years for the 2022 strangulation and stabbing murder of Racheal Angel Abraham. She was the mother of three children, including two who Adan fathered. The murder occurred when the children were in her home.

The Portland Freedom Fund, infamous for bailing out violent BLM-Antifa rioters in 2020, posted bail for Adan shortly before the fatal attack. The group advocates for the abolishment of law enforcement and prisons.

Adan pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and also to several other felony counts, including felony strangulation constituting domestic violence, contempt of court, felon in possession of a firearm, driving under the influence and attempting to elude police.

Despite being repeatedly arrested on domestic violence accusations, Adan was granted bail and released from custody days before the 2022 murder. After Judge Jerry Hodson set bail at $20,000, the Portland Freedom Fund covered Adan’s bond.

Five days after his release, Adan cut off his GPS monitor on Aug. 27, 2022 and returned to Abraham’s apartment, where he stabbed and strangled her to death.

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Finnish police seize vessel suspected of damaging undersea telecoms cable in Baltic Sea

Finnish police have seized and searched a vessel suspected of damaging undersea telecoms cables in the Baltic Sea.

The cable was damaged in the Gulf of Finland between the capital cities of Helsinki and Tallin in Estonia early this morning.

The ship had been dragging its anchor for hours along the sea bed when it was discovered by police in Finland’s exclusive economic zone.

Its crew of 14 – hailing from Russia, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan – was detained by Finnish police, local media said.

The ship, named the Fitburg, was flagged in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. It had been travelling from Russia to Israel.

Experts and political leaders have viewed the incidents as part of a ‘hybrid war’ carried out by Russia against the West – sabotaging vital infrastructure.

It has been flagged as an issue increasingly since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. 

Helsinki police have opened an investigation into ‘aggravated disruption of telecommunications’ and ‘aggravated sabotage and attempted aggravated sabotage’.

The damage happened in Estonia’s exclusive economic zone, police said. 

The cable, owned by Finnish telecommunications company Elisa, is critical to Finland’s underwater infrastructure, providing power and communication for thousands of Europeans.

Finnish National Police Commissioner Ilkka Koskimäki told local media that investigators are not speculating on whether a state-level actor was behind the damage.

‘Finland is prepared for security challenges of various kinds, and we respond to them as necessary,’ Finnish President Alexander Stubb wrote on social platform X.

Earlier this year, a captain and and two senior officers of a Russia-linked vessel were charged after their vessel damaged undersea cables between Finland and Estonia on Christmas Day 2024.

Charges of aggravated criminal mischief and aggravated interference with communications were filed against the captain and first and second officers of the Eagle S oil tanker, the Finnish deputy prosecutor general said in August.

Their names were not made public. The statement said they denied the allegations.

The Kremlin also previously denied allegations that they were involved in the damaging of the cables.

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State Cannabis Legalization and Psychosis-Related Health Care Utilization

Key Points

Question  Is state cannabis legalization or commercialization associated with increased rates of psychosis-related health care claims?

Findings  In this cohort study of claims data from 63 680 589 beneficiaries from 2003 to 2017, there was no statistically significant difference in the rates of psychosis-related diagnoses or prescribed antipsychotics in states with medical or recreational cannabis policies compared with states with no such policy.

Meaning  The findings of this study do not support an association between state policies legalizing cannabis and psychosis-related outcomes; further research into this topic may be informative.

Abstract

Importance  Psychosis is a hypothesized consequence of cannabis use. Legalization of cannabis could therefore be associated with an increase in rates of health care utilization for psychosis.

Objective  To evaluate the association of state medical and recreational cannabis laws and commercialization with rates of psychosis-related health care utilization.

Design, Setting, and Participants  Retrospective cohort design using state-level panel fixed effects to model within-state changes in monthly rates of psychosis-related health care claims as a function of state cannabis policy level, adjusting for time-varying state-level characteristics and state, year, and month fixed effects. Commercial and Medicare Advantage claims data for beneficiaries aged 16 years and older in all 50 US states and the District of Columbia, 2003 to 2017 were used. Data were analyzed from April 2021 to October 2022.

Exposure  State cannabis legalization policies were measured for each state and month based on law type (medical or recreational) and degree of commercialization (presence or absence of retail outlets).

Main Outcomes and Measures  Outcomes were rates of psychosis-related diagnoses and prescribed antipsychotics.

Results  This study included 63 680 589 beneficiaries followed for 2 015 189 706 person-months. Women accounted for 51.8% of follow-up time with the majority of person-months recorded for those aged 65 years and older (77.3%) and among White beneficiaries (64.6%). Results from fully-adjusted models showed that, compared with no legalization policy, states with legalization policies experienced no statistically significant increase in rates of psychosis-related diagnoses (medical, no retail outlets: rate ratio [RR], 1.13; 95% CI, 0.97-1.36; medical, retail outlets: RR, 1.24; 95% CI, 0.96-1.61; recreational, no retail outlets: RR, 1.38; 95% CI, 0.93-2.04; recreational, retail outlets: RR, 1.39; 95% CI, 0.98-1.97) or prescribed antipsychotics (medical, no retail outlets RR, 1.00; 95% CI, 0.88-1.13; medical, retail outlets: RR, 1.01; 95% CI, 0.87-1.19; recreational, no retail outlets: RR, 1.13; 95% CI, 0.84-1.51; recreational, retail outlets: RR, 1.14; 95% CI, 0.89-1.45). In exploratory secondary analyses, rates of psychosis-related diagnoses increased significantly among men, people aged 55 to 64 years, and Asian beneficiaries in states with recreational policies compared with no policy.

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Investors Scoop Up 40% Of Vacant Lots Sold After Los Angeles Fires: Report

Almost a year after January’s devastating California wildfires, real estate investors have been buying up nearly 40 percent of the land sold in the areas impacted by the fires.

A Dec. 30 report from Redfin stated that many of these now-empty lots once retained some of the nation’s most expensive homes, before they were reduced to rubble when the fire ripped through over 40,000 acres and destroyed more than 11,000 single-family homes in the Los Angeles suburbs.

A Zillow analysis—also released on Dec. 30—indicates the total residential housing value of the 19,605 homes in the affected regions was $46 billion prior to the fires.

More than 11,000 of those homes were destroyed.

The median home value in Los Angeles suburbs was listed at $1.95 million as of December 2024, prior to the fires.

Zillow’s report shows that for-sale housing supply near the fire zones escalated soon after the fires ended. In addition, new listings within five miles of the fire regions continued to grow from December 2024 to January 2025.

“While home values nearby have dipped a bit, in line with broader Los Angeles trends, the most evident impact was on supply,” Orphe Divounguy, a Zillow senior economist, said in the report.

“The sharp increase in listings just outside the burn zones likely reflects a mix of homeowners accelerating planned sales or owners of second homes deciding to list in response to the sudden shift in local demand.”

According to Redfin, investors were responsible for buying 48 of the 119 lots for sale in the Pacific Palisades area during the third quarter. In nearby Altadena, investors purchased 27 of the 61 lots available, and in Malibu, 19 of the 43 lots for sale were bought by investors.

Redfin’s analysis indicates that many investors made lowball offers for lots in Altadena, where some of the destroyed homes had been built in the 1940s and 1950s. These lots have been selling in the $500,000 to $600,000 range. The report noted that while some owners rejected these offers, others were forced to sell as they lacked the money to rebuild.

By comparison, a typical empty lot sold for $1.6 million in Pacific Palisades, and for $1.3 million in Malibu.

“It’s not uncommon for investors to buy and develop land after natural disasters,” the report stated.

However, while investors have been making inroads in getting vacant land off the market, Redfin agents say there is so much vacant land for sale that much of it remains unsold.

Meanwhile, those homes left standing in the fire zones are attracting offers if they’re reasonably priced, with owners usually handling the ash and smoke damage remediation.

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Court orders Kentucky to release records in driver’s license fraud investigation

A court ruled the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet violated the state’s open records laws by withholding documents tied to an investigation into immigrants illegally obtaining Kentucky driver’s licenses in Louisville, ordering more than 2,300 records released to WDRB.

The ruling marks a major development in WDRB’s ongoing investigation into claims that non-citizens were able to buy Kentucky driver’s licenses under the table, often without proper documentation, Homeland Security screening or required driving tests.

For former licensing clerk Melissa Moorman, the court order brings both validation and frustration.

“I would just like this to be resolved and over so this dark cloud can be removed from my head,” Moorman said.

Moorman said she reported what she believed was widespread fraud at the Nia Center driver’s license branch in west Louisville, only to lose her job after sounding the alarm. She worked as a clerk at the branch through Quantum Solutions, a staffing service contracted by the commonwealth to supplement personnel at regional offices.

She said she was training for a supervisor position, which would have made her a state employee.

“It really did destroy my life,” she said.

Moorman told investigators and WDRB fraudulent documents were accepted, required screenings — including the drivers’ tests — were bypassed, and customers paid about $200 in cash per license under the table.

“There were documents that were being provided that weren’t legit,” Moorman said. “There were employees that were using my login as part of this scam.”

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Dem lawmaker moves to conceal WA state daycare provider info amid Somali fraud allegations

As independent journalists continue digging into alleged fraud inside Washington’s daycare subsidy system, Democratic State Senator Lisa Wellman has pre-filed legislation that critics say could make it significantly harder for the public to verify whether taxpayer-funded childcare operations even exist.

The proposal, Senate Bill 5926, was pre-filed on December 22 and expands public records exemptions for childcare providers, shielding a broad range of identifying information from disclosure. Supporters frame the measure as a safety tool designed to protect providers from harassment or threats. Opponents argue it is arriving just as journalists are using public data to uncover suspicious daycare listings tied to large sums of taxpayer funding.

SB 5926 comes as independent journalists, inspired by Nick Shirley’s exposure of daycare fraud in Minnesota, have been scouring government websites to find similar fraud across the US. Additionally, Wellman was one of the primary sponsors of the Keep Washington Working Act, the bill that made Washington a so-called “sanctuary state,” and critics of the bill suggest her new legislation is an attempt to shield illegal immigrants from federal authorities.

In the bill’s legislative findings, lawmakers acknowledge that existing confidentiality provisions apply most clearly to licensed family home childcare providers but argue that the same risks now extend to childcare workers in centers and other settings. The bill seeks to widen protections statewide by restricting the disclosure of “personal information” for anyone licensed or certified by the Department of Children, Youth, and Families to provide childcare.

Under the legislation, exempt information would include a wide range of details that could identify a provider or location, such as a person’s name, home address, GPS coordinates, personal phone number, personal email address, date of birth, emergency contact information, and other personally identifying information. It also covers sensitive identifiers like Social Security and taxpayer identification numbers, driver’s license numbers, and financial information such as bank account and direct deposit details. The bill does not limit these protections to home daycare operators; instead, it extends them to licensed family home providers, licensed childcare centers, school-age or out-of-school-time programs, and essentially any location licensed or certified through DCYF.

The bill contains language specifying that certain program-level information must remain public, such as business addresses, program capacity, licensing status, inspection results, and public safety findings required by state or federal law. Yet critics say this limitation provides little comfort, because the current dispute centers on whether state records and publicly available listings are reliable enough to begin with. Watchdogs argue that if the government database contains discrepancies, missing location details, or inconsistent licensing information, the only way for journalists and taxpayers to validate the entries is through independent verification, and restricting identifying information could make those efforts far more difficult.

The bill is also landing amid an intensifying political confrontation between Washington officials and independent journalists who say they are uncovering early warning signs of a subsidy scandal similar to one previously exposed in Minnesota. This week, Washington Attorney General Nick Brown issued a warning aimed squarely at independent journalists, accusing them of harassing daycare providers and engaging in unsafe conduct. Brown said his office had received outreach from members of the Somali community after reports of home-based daycare providers being “harassed and accused of fraud with little to no fact-checking.” He said his office is coordinating with DCYF to evaluate the fraud claims circulating online as well as the reported harassment, and urged anyone contacted by journalists to contact local law enforcement or report incidents to state hotlines and reporting websites.

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Newsom’s Massive Fraud Scandal No One Is Talking About

Everybody’s buzzing about that Minnesota Medicaid mess with Gov. Tim Walz. Some are even calling it the largest fraud scandal ever. If only.

Blue-state fraud is undoubtedly a problem, and Walz should be held accountable if he did indeed look the other way. But what happened in the land of 10,000 lakes is tiny compared to the fraud in California under Gavin Newsom.

Heck, it makes Minnesota look like pocket change.

A fresh 92-page bombshell from the California State Auditor lays it all out.

“This latest report was issued by the state auditor, and that’s a nonpartisan position; that state auditor now puts eight state agencies on the high-risk list of agencies to watch out for, for things like fraud and mismanagement as well as waste,” Newsmax correspondent Heather Myers revealed last week.

“Here’s a look at that 92-page report. Newly added to the high-risk list is California’s food stamp program. If the state doesn’t get the improper payments under control, it could cost an extra $2.5 billion. Also on there is the Department of Finance, which was tasked with giving out COVID relief funds. Critics say $32 billion of that was taken by fraudsters. Then there are infrastructure issues like California’s deteriorating dams, and also the high-speed train that’s already cost taxpayers 18 billion without a single section of track complete.”

But wait, there’s more!

“Other reports cite $24 billion spent on the homeless issue that critics claim the state lost track of. More recently, there’s a report that says California cell phone users paid a surcharge for years to upgrade the state’s 911 system,” she added.

Tallied all up, California taxpayers lost $70 billion to fraud.

But here’s where things get really interesting. While pressure is on in Minnesota to get to the bottom of the state’s fraud, California seems to be under the radar.

Now get this. Right in the middle of the fraud apocalypse, a new ballot initiative seeks to impose a one-time 10% wealth tax on billionaires’ assets.

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Archaeologists Have Discovered a Massive Ancient Structure in Ireland—It Could Be the Largest Prehistoric Site of Its Kind

Compelling evidence of a massive ancient structure has surfaced in Ireland, where archaeologists working in the country’s Baltinglass hillfort landscape have discovered one of the largest settlements ever identified in the region.

The discovery of a massive enclosure at Brusselstown Ring may represent the most extensive prehistoric nucleated settlement ever identified in Ireland or Britain, according to new research that appeared in the journal Antiquity.

Drawing on data from several recent surveys and test excavations, archaeologists report the discovery of hundreds of roundhouse platforms clustered within the remains of a monumental hillfort. The findings, they say, point to an unprecedented level of population density and social organization among the site’s builders during the late Bronze Age.

A Prehistoric Settlement of an Unprecedented Scale

Located in County Wicklow, Brusselstown Ring comprises a large area spanning more than 40 hectares, with portions that extend outward toward a larger contour fort that extends to nearly three times this size.

“The Baltinglass hillfort cluster in County Wicklow stands out as one of the most complex prehistoric landscapes in Ireland, sometimes referred to as ‘Ireland’s Hillfort Capital’ due to its exceptional concentration and diversity of monuments,” the study’s authors write.

Spread out across more than a dozen hilltop enclosures along the southwestern Wicklow Mountains, archaeologists have already discovered seven major fortifications and other features in the area, which reveal ongoing use and construction efforts that ran from the early Neolithic up until the Bronze Age.

In the past, surveys conducted in the area had already identified as many as 300 possible sites that would have served as temporary shelters. Now, drawing on recent analysis of aerial imagery of the landscape, more than 600 minute topographical anomalies were revealed, which the archaeological team says is consistent with prehistoric roundhouse platform construction of the period.

Of these features, just under 100 appear within the inner enclosure, while the remaining 500 or so exist between the inner and outer ramparts.

Hillforts of this size—particularly those extending across multiple summits—are exceptionally rare not only in Ireland and Britain, but even among the great oppida of continental Europe. If the discovery is confirmed to be what archaeologists now believe it represents, it will mark the largest known prehistoric settlement ever found in the Atlantic Archipelago, vastly outsizing past roundhouse concentrations at sites that include Turlough Hill in County Clare, as well as the Mullaghfarna site in County Sligo, each of which contains as many as 150 dwellings but lacks enclosure features.

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