Tag: st louis

St. Louis Man Who Gunned Down Police Officer Demond Taylor Is Released on $5,000 Bond

St. Louis officials charged 46-year-old Brandon Levy with first degree murder in the shooting death of off-duty Police Officer Demond Taylor 17 years ago in the Academy neighborhood in St. Louis. Taylor was gunned down when he was driving to pick up one of his sons along Page Boulevard.

Three witnesses identified Levy as the man who shot and killed Officer Levy.

FBI Special Agent Chris Crocker released a statement on X following the arrest of Levy this weekend.

The FBI had been working hand-in-hand with local St. Louis homicide detectives for years to solve the case.

Levy was later released on $5,000 bond for killing a St. Louis cop.

$5,000!

FOX 2 reported:

Authorities noted that officer Taylor would have turned 52 this past Sunday.

Levy was charged with one count of first-degree murder, but he has now been released, posting a $5,000 cash-only bond.

“After a confined docket hearing on August 25, 2025, Associate Circuit Judge Michael Colona modified the defendant’s bond to $50,000 cash-only, requiring 10 percent to be posted. The State requested that the bond conditions imposed on August 23, 2025, remain in place. The defendant posted bond, and the court released him under court-ordered conditions.

Associate Circuit Judge Michael Colona served as a Democrat in the Missouri legislature before his appointment to the Circuit Attorney’s office.

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DOJ Drops DEI Case Against St Louis Brothers After TGP Reporting

The DOJ has dropped its case against two brothers who were targeted by the Biden regime based on a DEI program ran out of the City of St. Louis. 

TGP reported 10 days ago on a case involving DEI in St. Louis.

Under the watch of pro-BLM radical mayor Tishaura Jones, St. Louis incurred the highest murder rate in the country, and the steepest population loss as families left the city by the thousands to escape the war zone atmosphere. Things were so bad that the state had to step in and take control of the city’s police force.

But what were Mayor Jones and the Democrats who ran the city focused on? Not crime, or development, or quality of life – They focused on pushing Reparations, Closing prisons, Installing a “Deputy Mayor for Racial Equity”, and creating a Rube-Goldberg-machine DEI program that encourages graft and grinds development to a halt.

Even though Jones was tossed on her ear in a historic landslide defeat in April—losing by 30 points—progressive prosecutor Hal Goldsmith is still pushing to send minority builders to jail for the “crime” of trying to navigate the city’s ridiculous DEI maze.

The Case Against Brothers Sid Chakraverty and Vic Alston

A building company owned by brothers Sid Chakraverty and Vic Alston stepped up to develop housing in blighted areas of St. Louis.  Even though the brothers are themselves racial minorities and worked with a number of minority- and women-owned subcontractors on the buildings, progressive crusader Goldsmith and the DOJ indicted them on fraud charges for the alleged “crime” of not filling out their DEI reports accurately.

Let’s be clear: the city got what they wanted. Brand-new quality buildings in blighted areas. No money misused. No investors robbed. The only “victim” even alleged is the DEI bureaucracy—the St. Louis Development Corporation—charged with administering the racial quota system.

However, progressive prosecutor Goldsmith (below), and former mayor Tishaura Jones were obsessed with “racial justice” at the expense of real justice. In a similar prosecution from a few years back Goldsmith, described the DEI program as intended “to right the wrong … of years and years of racism” and that the City should be “merciless” in enforcing it.

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Man Kicked Out Of Major League Soccer Game For Wearing Trump MAGA Hat

In a video going viral online, a Trump supporter filmed the moment he was kicked out of a St. Louis City Soccer Club match this week for wearing a Make America Great Again hat.

One of the security guards kicking the man out of the stadium even said he was also a Trump supporter but that the team didn’t allow “political” paraphernalia.

The MAGA hat-wearing individual pointed out there were several fans waving gay pride and trans flags, which he argued were political statements.

Security threatened to take the Trump supporter out “in handcuffs” if he did not voluntarily exit the facility as police officers arrived on the scene.

“Trump is no welcome in St. Louis City SC Club,” the man said as he was escorted from the premises.

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Judge Awards $4 Million to St. Louis Public School Employees Who Sued Over Vaccine Mandate

A jury ruled on Thursday in favor of 13 employees with the St. Louis Public Schools System who were forced to take the COVID vaccine despite religious objections.

The court awarded the 13 employees $4 million for the injustice.

According to Schrag on Law, the plaintiffs Wanda Brandon and over a dozen other current and former employees in the St. Louis Public Schools system,  sued the Board of Education of the City of St. Louis, Superintendent Kelvin Adams, and Chief Human Resources Officer Charles Burton in the Eastern District of Missouri raising claims of violations of the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause, the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, Title VII religious discrimination, and the Missouri Human Rights Act.

In fall of 2021 during the height of the COVID pandemic, the St. Louis Board of Education adopted Policy 4624, requiring all employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 by October 15, 2021, or obtain an approved exemption.

The sixteen original plaintiffs submitted religious exemption forms to their employer. The employees cited their Christian, Islamic and Pentacostal beliefs that conflicted with the vaccine that was developed from fetal cell lines.

The St. Louis Board denied all 189 of the religious exemption requests and forced the employees to take the experimental vaccine.

The Board then suspended or terminated the employees who refused to take the COVID vaccine.

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St. Louis SUSPENDS emergency boss for failing to deploy tornado siren before twisters that killed FIVE

A city official has been suspended and residents are still reeling after a deadly tornado tore through St. Louis, killing five people and exposing critical failures in the city’s emergency response.

Ahead of the devastating Friday evening storm, the city’s Emergency Management Director, Sarah Russell, failed to activate tornado sirens, leaving residents unprepared and vulnerable.

The City Emergency Management Agency (CEMA) director has since been placed on paid administrative leave, Mayor Cara Spencer announced on Tuesday, saying she wanted to ‘provide accountability’ after the life-saving alerts weren’t deployed.

In a statement, Spencer said CEMA failed to ‘alert the public to dangers.’

‘Commissioner Russell has served our city for years and is a person of goodwill, but I cannot move on from this without providing accountability and ensuring that our emergency management is in trusted hands,’ the mayor said.

Spencer said an internal investigation into the siren failure revealed ‘multiple’ issues, prompting her decision to seek an external investigation of CEMA.

She pointed to various details in the Tuesday release, including a malfunctioning button in the Fire Department to set off sirens.

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I Thought I Was Saving Trans Kids. Now I’m Blowing the Whistle.

I am a 42-year-old St. Louis native, a queer woman, and politically to the left of Bernie Sanders. My worldview has deeply shaped my career. I have spent my professional life providing counseling to vulnerable populations: children in foster care, sexual minorities, the poor. 

For almost four years, I worked at The Washington University School of Medicine Division of Infectious Diseases with teens and young adults who were HIV positive. Many of them were trans or otherwise gender nonconforming, and I could relate: Through childhood and adolescence, I did a lot of gender questioning myself. I’m now married to a transman, and together we are raising my two biological children from a previous marriage and three foster children we hope to adopt. 

All that led me to a job in 2018 as a case manager at The Washington University Transgender Center at St. Louis Children’s Hospital, which had been established a year earlier. 

The center’s working assumption was that the earlier you treat kids with gender dysphoria, the more anguish you can prevent later on. This premise was shared by the center’s doctors and therapists. Given their expertise, I assumed that abundant evidence backed this consensus. 

During the four years I worked at the clinic as a case manager—I was responsible for patient intake and oversight—around a thousand distressed young people came through our doors. The majority of them received hormone prescriptions that can have life-altering consequences—including sterility. 

I left the clinic in November of last year because I could no longer participate in what was happening there. By the time I departed, I was certain that the way the American medical system is treating these patients is the opposite of the promise we make to “do no harm.” Instead, we are permanently harming the vulnerable patients in our care.

Today I am speaking out. I am doing so knowing how toxic the public conversation is around this highly contentious issue—and the ways that my testimony might be misused. I am doing so knowing that I am putting myself at serious personal and professional risk.

Almost everyone in my life advised me to keep my head down. But I cannot in good conscience do so. Because what is happening to scores of children is far more important than my comfort. And what is happening to them is morally and medically appalling.

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St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones to Get Tough on VICTIMS – Wants to Hold Business Owners Responsible for Crimes Near Their Stores

St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones wants to get tough on crime – VICTIMS.

The far left mayor wants to hold businesses responsible for crime committed near their stores.

St. Louis previously had one of the highest homicide rates in the country. Repeat offenders are let out of confinement and back on the street.

The Missouri House voted on Thursday to approve “state control” of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police as leaders like Jones have failed to fight the crime epidemic in the city. According to local KTVI, a force of nearly 1,400 officers has shrunk by more than a third, with officers unable to address the lawlessness, including rampant public gunfire

ABC 13 News reported:

St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones plans to hold local businesses accountable for violent crime outside their establishments, she told Action News 5.

Her comments came while attending a meeting of the Black Mayors’ Coalition on Crime. The group, launched this week by Memphis, Tennessee Mayor Paul Young, aims to “harness the collective power of black mayors across the nation to fight crime” and includes 21 leaders of cities across the country.

We have a lot of violence around convenience stores and gas stations,” Jones said of St. Louis. “So how can we hold those business owners accountable and also bring down crime? Some of the things we’re already doing, we’re finding that other mayors are doing as well.”

Her statement comes as the area is currently embroiled in controversy following the brutal attack of a 15-year-old girl. Kaylee Gain could be seen on video convulsing on the ground after being battered and having her head slammed against the pavement by another girl. Family lawyer Bryan Kaemmerer told TND Gain suffered a fractured skull, brain bleeding and brain swelling as a result of the attack.

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St. Louis Officials Condemn South City Swahili-Speaking Church that Caters to African Migrants After Woman Is Found Beaten, Bloody, and Tied with Ropes

A South St. Louis Church that caters to African refugees and migrants was shut down this week. City officials closed the church after a young woman was found beaten, bloody, and tied up with ropes. The victim said she was kidnapped by church officials.

The church caters to Africans who have resettled in St. Louis. Many of the congregants do not speak English but still speak Swahili.

As reported earlier – Three men were arrested this past weekend in St. Louis City after after a woman was found bound by ropes and bleeding from the head. The incident took place at Mount of Olives Ministry on Minnesota Avenue in the city.

The woman said she was held captive and was beaten by the men at the church. Inside the room police found a bottle of water and a bucket that had been used as a toilet.

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6 People Vanished from a Home Near St. Louis in August. Police Suspect They’re Involved in an Online Cult

Authorities are befuddled by the disappearance of six people — one man, three women and two young children — from a St. Louis-area home in August, which police believe to be related to the existence of a cult.

It’s been months since Naaman Williams, 29, Gerielle German, 26, her 3-year-old son Ashton Mitchell, Mikayla Thompson, 23, Ma’Kayla Wickerson, 25, and her 3-year daughter Malaiyah were last seen. The group had been living in a rented home in Berkeley, Mo., near St. Louis Lambert International airport.

Berkeley police Major Steve Runge tells PEOPLE that the four missing adults are believed to be part of a cult allegedly revolving around Rashad Jamal, who was convicted of child molestation charges in 2023 and is currently serving a prison sentence in Georgia.

Over the past few years, Jamal has amassed thousands of followers on social media with his spiritual teachings, operating what he calls the University of Cosmic Intelligence, which according to its website is “geared toward enlightening and illuminating minds” of Black and Latino people.

Speaking to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch from prison, Jamal denies being a cult leader and maintained his innocence in his child molestation case. 

Runge says some of Jamal’s followers, which he says includes three of the missing adults, have changed their names in honor of those they believe to be spiritual gods or goddesses. Williams is also known as Anubis Aramean, Thompson goes by Antu Anum Ahmat, while Wickerson is Intuahma Aquama Auntil, according to Berkeley police. 

According to police, the Berkeley quartet has now allegedly exhibited some of the other followers’ behaviors: total disconnection from family and loved ones, a desire to go off the grid, quitting their jobs and embracing sovereign citizenship, among other behaviors.

“It’s confusing, the internet is [the cult’s] home,” Runge says. “It’s not like ‘OK, we’re going to go to St. Louis.’ No, the internet is its home. [Jamal] has 90,000 followers.”

On Aug. 12, Runge says Wickerson’s mother, Cartisha Morgan, called police and said she was worried about her daughter, who she hadn’t heard from. Days later, detectives began investigating and searched the Berkeley home and found no signs of foul play. Runge says they discovered the group’s Facebook profiles, which contained references to Jamal and were once extremely active and public before the activity abruptly stopped.

Through further investigation, Runge says the group was last seen at a hotel on Aug. 13, in Florissant, Mo. No one has heard from them since. 

While Wickerson, who according to her LinkedIn profile once worked for JP Morgan & Chase, and Thompson are both from St. Louis, Williams is from Washington D.C., while German is originally from Lake Horn, Miss., near Memphis.

Thompson, like the other two women, is also the mother of a young child whom she left behind with her mother, according to Runge.

Runge believes the missing group will resurface eventually, most likely when they run out of money.

“I know we’re going to find them,” Runge says. “It’s just a matter of going through the motions … we are going to put in the work.”

Morgan spoke to PEOPLE and says she is worried about both her daughter and granddaughter, whom she hasn’t seen in months. She believes Wickerson had been suffering from depression following the birth of her daughter, and that she was preyed upon as a result.

“I’m not doing so well, but I’m just holding on by my faith,” Morgan tells PEOPLE. “I just wish that people are made aware of this.”

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2nd woman found dead inside a local firefighter’s home, 2 families want more answers

A 39-year-old woman was found dead in Frontenac Saturday in what investigators have called a sudden death.

Sarah Kathleen Sweeney was a local doctor. She was found inside a home belonging to a firefighter, a man who has connections to another story that First Alert 4 Investigates dug into two years ago.

In 2021, First Alert 4 Investigates exposed questions about Grace Holland’s death. She died from a single gunshot wound to the head. Creve Coeur police had ruled her death a suicide. But Grace’s family was—and still is—concerned by how the investigation was handled. In part, they say, because Grace’s fiancé is a captain in a neighboring fire department.

Now, Saturday, another death inside that same person’s home, this time on Conway in Frontenac.

Police told First Alert 4 Investigates that they were called at around 6:45 a.m. and found a 39-year-old female deceased inside. They’ve classified it as a sudden death only.

According to officials, there were no obvious signs of injury or struggle. The medical examiner’s office said they will need toxicology results and other investigation tools to determine the cause of death.

Grace’s family learned about it shortly afterward, raising many more questions.

An attorney for Grace Holland’s family, Javad Khazaeli, sent First Alert Four a statement saying: “We are saddened to learn of another death, especially of such a young person. We hope that the Frontenac Police do what the Creve Coeur Police and the County Medical Examiner didn’t do in the past and fully investigate this tragedy.”

First Alert 4 spoke with some of Sweeney’s family members, who said they were not aware of any life-threatening medical condition or any immediate reason for her sudden death. But they also said they had not spoken to her in two years, even though they said they had tried to raise their concerns about Grace’s death.

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