Salvador Plasencia and Jasveen Sangha, nicknamed Hollywood’s “Ketamine Queen”, among the main defendants in the case of actor Matthew Perry’s tragic death in October 2023, have finally been granted a date for their trial concerning the death of the actor from Friends and several other films and series.
“Ketamine Queen” Jasveen Sangha and Dr. Salvador Plasencia's joint trial is set for March 4, 2025. https://t.co/MHnsTTzwdl
Plasencia and Sangha, who both deny the charges against them, are charged, after a months-long investigation, with distribution of ketamine.
A preliminary hearing is scheduled for February 19, with the trial set to begin on March 4, 2025.
Perry was discovered dead in his Pacific Palisades home, having succumbed to the “acute effects of ketamine”, which led to his accidental drowning.
Dr. Salvador Plasencia is charged primarily with conspiracy to distribute ketamine. The prosecution also alleges that he falsified records and distributed ketamine outside normal medical practice and without medical justification.
According to the indictment, Plasencia sold vials of ketamine to Matthew Perry and even showed the actor’s long-time personal assistant Kenny Iwamasa, also charged, how to administer the drug.
Sangha, meanwhile, allegedly ran a drug-dealing ring from her home in North Hollywood, specializing in transactions with celebrities and high-end clients…
She faces charges of conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine, as well as several ketamine-related charges.
Plasencia could face a hefty sentence of up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
Starlink, Elon Musk’s satellite Internet service, has announced that it will comply with the Brazilian Supreme Court’s decision to block access to social media platform X (formerly Twitter). The decision comes as Elon Musk has been embroiled in a legal dispute with the Brazilian government for several months.
Starlink, the satellite internet service owned and operated by SpaceX, says it will block the social network X in Brazil to continue operations there without the threat of losing its license. https://t.co/FVdxPDdTT4
A judge had ordered Elon Musk and X to appoint a legal representative in Brazil to receive judicial notifications and facilitate the deletion of certain accounts spreading disinformation.
After several weeks of refusal on Elon Musk’s part, the judge finally ordered that X be blocked throughout Brazil by all ISPs, including Starlink.
This comes after X closed its office in Brazil and fired its legal representative in response to the Brazilian government’s request to remove political content containing disinformation from its platform.
Initially, Elon Musk, through Starlink, had announced that he would refuse to comply with the Supreme Court order.
However, Starlink then changed its position and decided to block X.
This will no doubt bring relief to around 250,000 Starlink customers in Brazil…
In a message on X, Starlink indicated that it would use all possible legal means to challenge the decision while respecting the Brazilian order to block the social media platform.
Stephen A. Weiss, a protester, was arrested last week at a Donald Trump event in Pennsylvania after attempting to unfurl a protest banner against the former president during the rally.
A man arrested last week at a Trump rally in Pennsylvania had hoped to hang a banner to protest the former president's policies, local police say. https://t.co/7DSp3GuyUD
At Donald Trump’s campaign rally, Weiss, 36, allegedly faked a foot injury to hide a tube of glue, presumably intended to hang a banner with an anti-Trump message he had written.
The exact content of the message remains unknown, as event staff reportedly discarded the banner after the altercation.
Stephen A. Weiss is charged with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest and disrupting a meeting after being arrested while running across the arena floor, jumping over the barrier in the media area and shouting in the direction of the stage where Trump was speaking. He was then quickly subdued by police and security guards on the scene.
Weiss, who was accompanied by a second man at the event, who denied any knowledge of the planned protest, was questioned by the Secret Service and released that evening.
Questions are being raised about security measures at Trump rallies, especially given that this is already the second incident in Pennsylvania.
The first incident, with much more serious consequences, occurred on July 13 in Butler, when gunfire erupted in the direction of the outdoor stage at Trump’s rally. This event resulted in minor injuries to Trump and several casualties, including one death, among the crowd.
After this event, Trump campaign officials had promised that security measures for the former president’s rallies would be significantly stepped up.
Fortunately, Weiss’ intentions seemed to be rather peaceful.
His first court appearance is scheduled for October 9.
Linkin Park is back in the spotlight seven years after the tragic loss of singer Chester Bennington, unveiling a new line-up with the integration of two new official members!
With a new lineup, tour, album and collective outlook, @linkinpark is BACK — prepping its first album in eight years 'From Zero' with newcomers Emily Armstrong & Colin Brittain.
Emily Armstrong, Dead Sara’s co-vocalist, has been chosen as lead singer, while Colin Brittain, producer and songwriter, has been selected for the position of drummer. This new adventure promises to be an emotional one for fans.
The band made this major announcement simultaneously with the release of The Emptiness Machine, the first single from their forthcoming album, From Zero, due for release in November.
The single is their first original track since 2017’s One More Light , which was tragically released just two months before Chester Bennington passed away.
In addition to the two new recruits, two of Linkin Park’s three original co-founders, Mike Shinoda and Brad Delson, return to the band, alongside bassist Dave Phoenix Farrell and DJ Joe Hahn.
In parallel with the release of its album, Linkin Park has announced a mini-tour, From Zero World Tour, to mark this new beginning celebrating the band’s past, present and future.
The tour will include six concerts, scheduled in Los Angeles, New York, Hamburg, London, Seoul and Bogota, between September 11 and November 11.
The From Zero album is scheduled for release on November 15.
Donald Trump’s entry into social media via Trump Media & Technology Group and Truth Social has taken a tumultuous turn. Trump, who owns 60% of the shares, has seen the value of his stake plummet.
The stock price of Donald Trump’s once-high-flying media company is sinking just as the lockup period from its blank-check deal is about to end https://t.co/ZEEgyKxnSN
The value of his shares in Trump Media & Technology Group fell from $4.9 billion to just $2 billion in a short space of time.
What’s more, TMTG’s share price fell below $17, before rising just above it this morning (September 6), wiping out virtually all the gains made.
Truth Social’s core platform seems to be struggling to attract a wider audience, raising concerns about its long-term viability in an extremely competitive social media sector.
The share lock-up agreement in place for TMTG, designed to stabilize prices after the IPO, will expire on September 19. This suggests that Trump could liquidate his shares immediately thereafter, putting the stock’s future in an uncertain position.
Donald Trump’s recent return to X (formerly Twitter) is also unlikely to improve Truth Social’s popularity.
A 12-person jury in Colorado has found Republican election official Tina Peters guilty of seven criminal counts, including attempting to influence a public official.
This case is directly associated with the conspiracy theories about the 2020 elections promoted by Mike Lindell concerning Dominion Voting Systems.
According to a statement from Jena Griswold, Colorado Secretary of State Tina Peters deliberately compromised her own election materials in order to support Trump’s false claims. Griswold added that the jury’s verdict was unequivocal: no effort to compromise the security of our elections will be tolerated.
After a nearly two-week trial, Peters was found guilty of three misdemeanors, including attempting to influence a public official and conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation. The offenses include gross official misconduct, refusal to obey an order of the Secretary of State and dereliction of duty. However, she was acquitted of the charges of criminal impersonation and conspiracy to impersonate.
It is important to note that Tina Peters pleaded not guilty after her indictment in March 2022. She is accused of facilitating unauthorized access to voting system files and passwords, which were subsequently leaked online, seriously jeopardizing the security of election systems.
During the trial, the prosecution claimed that Peters had used an employee’s security badge to facilitate access to a person linked to Mike Lindell. With this action she had allowed someone, posing as an employee, to manipulate a Dominion Voting Systems hard drive.
Prosecutors claim that Peters was aware of the seriousness of her actions and had adopted discreet measures, such as turning off surveillance cameras and using disposable cell phones. She also communicated via Signal, an encrypted messaging app, and had expressed fears of imprisonment when she learned of the investigation.
Peters could face more than 20 years in prison when she is sentenced on October 3.
As President Biden nears the end of his term in office, and his political career, he is fully committed to a project close to his heart: the fight against cancer.
President Biden and the first lady, Jill Biden, announced eight research centers, including one at Tulane University, that will collectively receive $150 million in research awards aimed at pioneering new methods of precision cancer surgery. https://t.co/hlPltuFwLJ
Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden visited New Orleans to announce $150 million in grants to advance cancer research.
This financial support underscores their deep commitment to revolutionizing cancer treatments and reducing mortality.
This cause is particularly dear to the president, who lost his son Beau in 2015 to brain cancer, an event that deeply affected the president as well as the first lady.
These multi-million dollar grants for advanced cancer treatments, aim to boost research across the country, including at Tulane University, where the announcement was made.
Biden’s involvement in the “Cancer Moonshot” initiative is motivated not only by his personal family tragedy, but also by a sense of public duty, given that cancer is the second leading cause of death in the United States. He hopes to see cancer deaths halved over the next twenty-five years.
Joe Biden hopes that the commitment to the fight against cancer will extend well beyond his term of office, stressing the importance of continuing to support advances in cancer treatment and research.
Merrick Garland, the US Attorney General, revealed in an official announcement the details of a covert operation as the US discovered that Russia had set up a sophisticated pro-Russian propaganda plan by transferring millions of dollars to Tenet Media, a US media company, which employed influencers with several million subscribers.
According to Garland, this company paid thousands of dollars to far-right influencers to spread pro-Russian propaganda and influence the 2024 presidential elections on social networks and YouTube.
The Justice Department has indicted two individuals, imposed sanctions on 10 individuals and entities, and seized 32 Internet domains linked to these harmful activities, which the department claims were orchestrated at the request of the Russian government.
The indictment revealed in New York accuses two employees of RT, the Kremlin’s media arm, of transferring $10 million to an unidentified company, listed as “Company 1” in the court documents.
However, according to CNN, it would appear that this company is actually Tenet Media.
The Justice Department alleges Russia funded a US media company linked to right-wing commentators with millions of social media subscribers https://t.co/WGXxPr7vtd
On its website, Tenet Media describes itself as a network of commentators focused on Western political and cultural issues. Its mission is to support creators who challenge institutions, and to promote rigorous and honest debate on current issues.
Lauren Southern
Tenet Media features several influencers, including Lauren Southern, described as a Canadian journalist, documentary filmmaker, author and mother who has appeared on Fox News and Sky News.
Southern, who previously worked for Rebel Media, a right-wing Canadian media outlet, has 147,000 followers on Instagram, 562,000 followers on X (formerly Twitter) and 712,000 subscribers on YouTube.
She has generally tackled Canadian propaganda topics, but in the Tenet Media category of her YouTube account, she asserts that the justice system has failed Derek Chauvin (the police officer who took George Floyd’s life) and criticizes the 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote, among other things.
Also according to the Tenet Media website, Tim Pool, a podcast host based in West Virginia, is considered a credible journalist and has, according to his description, collaborated with Fox News, NBC, Reuters, MSNBC, Al Jazeera and BBC News.
Tim Pool has over 400,000 followers on Instagram, 1.37 million subscribers on YouTube and 2.1 million followers on X (Twitter) and focuses mainly on American politics with right-wing positions.
He claims in a statement to have been unaware of Tenet Media’s ties to Russia, but through his videos he proves to be a strong critic of aid to Ukraine.
Tim Pool was also recently targeted by the Kamala Harris campaign, which broadcast one of his videos in which he claimed that Trump had every right to imprison elected Democrats. Pool has said he will defend himself in court.
Also on Tenet Media, Tayler Hansen is presented as a field journalist.
He has 173,000 followers on X (formerly Twitter) and, through his right-wing content, shares Tenet Media posts illustrating altercations and civil protests in the US on social networks.
Matt Christiansen is a political commentator from Montana. He first gained popularity in 2016 through his YouTube channel, where he offers analysis of current events, with a particular focus on constitutional philosophy, according to Tenet Media.
With 215,000 subscribers on YouTube, he very often covers topics involving Democratic elected officials, January 6 prosecutors, the Black Lives Matter movement, Dr. Anthony Fauci, as well as various other topics related to popular conspiracy theories.
This week, video showed an armed Venezuelan migrant gang taking over a Colorado apartment building. The governor dismissed the concern as ‘imaginary,’ but now the gang leader has been arrested. New video on @watchTENETnow breaks down the propaganda: https://t.co/vSZFc8oL0Jpic.twitter.com/CNjKkPzIsO
Tenet Media also features Dave Rubin, a New York Times bestselling author, humorist and television personality best known for his political commentary. He is the host of The Rubin Report on YouTube.
With 1.5 million followers on X (twitter) and 2.4 million subscribers on YouTube, Rubin’s interviews include such staunch Trump supporters and Democratic critics as Dennis Quaid, Roseanne Barr and Russell Brand.
That’s a wrap on season 11 of The Rubin Report.
I’m now heading off the grid for August with no phone, computer, news or current events.
We already crushed every view record this year with 5 months still to go.
Finally, the last influencer highlighted by Tenet Media, Florida-born Benny Johnson, is known for his podcast The Benny Show. He broadcasts live every day to his millions of subscribers.
Johnson has 2.7 million subscribers on X (formerly Twitter) and 2.4 million subscribers on YouTube, where he tackles various topics related to American politics, including pro-Trump and anti-Kamala Harris positions.
Kamala Harris is an empty vessel who will do ANYTHING for public approval. It just shows she has never experienced the true power of Jesus Christ.
Of these influencers singled out by the DOJ, several have already commented on the situation and present themselves as victims of this Russian plot… but they were paid by Tenet Media, which, for its part, received nearly $10 million for this operation.
In response to these accusations, Vladimir Putin has declared… his support for Kamala Harris.
A grinning Russian President Vladimir Putin said that he supported Vice President Kamala Harris over former President Donald Trump in the upcoming U.S. presidential election. https://t.co/jE2EOvYCdi
Former President Donald Trump sparked controversy with a clearly unfounded claim that Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign was using artificial intelligence to increase the size of crowds in photos of their rallies.
Trump seems perturbed by the dynamism of his rival Kamala Harris, reacting to images that show huge crowds at his political rallies.
He now makes the unfounded claim that the people in these photos are generated by artificial intelligence!
Trump specifically targeted Kamala Harris’s rally in Romulus, Michigan, on August 7, where organizers had to change the venue due to high registration numbers.
The space originally planned was no longer sufficient to accommodate all the participants, so Kamala Harris’s campaign team had to hold the rally inside a crowded airplane hangar, with a crowd that stretched all the way to the tarmac.
Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz gathered around 27,000 people, according to Reuters, at the rally, an influx that visibly surprised Trump.
Trump said on Truth Social, that the images of Harris greeting supporters at the Michigan airport after getting off Air Force Two were faked.
In response, the Kamala Harris campaign posted a video on its platform showing Harris and Walz facing throngs of enthusiastic supporters at their rally, accompanied by the caption: “While Trump sits at Mar-a-Lago…”.
The Democratic campaign seems to be having fun at the expense of Trump and his obsession with crowd size, especially now that Kamala Harris has given them a new boost.
At a rally in Arizona, in front of more than 15,000 people, Tim Walz quipped about Trump’s obsession…
The many photos and videos from the event demonstrate, much to Trump’s dismay, that the crowds gathered around the Democrats are real!
While a Brazilian judge had ordered the suspension of social network X (Twitter) due to non-compliance with local legislation, the Brazilian Supreme Court unanimously upheld this decision.
As a result, Elon Musk’s social network has been blocked throughout the country.
A panel of Brazil’s federal supreme court justices voted unanimously to uphold orders suspending the use of Elon Musk’s social network X nationwide. https://t.co/vdpwOVmUKP
The suspension of social network X in Brazil was implemented on Saturday, following an order issued when Elon Musk, despite multiple requests from a judge, had refused to appoint a legal representative for the company in Brazil.
Under Brazilian law, any company operating in the country must have a local legal representative.
Misinformation is at the heart of this legal dispute between Elon Musk and the judge, which began last April, when the latter ordered the suspension of several accounts accused of spreading misinformation in Brazil.
Recall that the situation deteriorated last month, when X closed its office in Brazil after refusing to comply with what Musk considers censorship.
The judge harshly criticized X and Elon Musk, saying the latter saw himself as above the law. He ordered him to find a local representative or risk being blocked, a threat he was eventually forced to carry out.
Elon Musk described the ban on his platform as an attack on freedom of expression, and stepped up his criticism of Brazil’s Supreme Court and the government.
Starlink, Musk’s satellite internet company, has also reportedly refused to comply with the Brazilian court order to block X. This could result in similar sanctions for Starlink to those imposed on X.