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All's Not So Quiet On Any Front

CD Media
11 hours 59 minutes ago
"CENTCOM confirms Iran has NOT successfully struck ANY Navy ships this morning, despite claiming they’ve done so." —Eric Daugherty on X
James Kunstler

Conservative SCOTUS justice restores access to abortion drug — for now

The Blaze
12 hours 8 minutes ago


Pro-life advocates were handed a minor blow by the Supreme Court after access to an abortion drug was restored by a conservative justice.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals originally ordered a halt to the sale of mifepristone, but on Monday Justice Samuel Alito blocked the order and restored access.

'This is NOT a reversal of Friday's decision. Rather, it's the run-of-the-mill pause that the Justices typically use to consider the issues.'

Pro-life activists have sought the restriction of the drug based on safety concerns and claim the U.S. Food and Drug Administration rushed its approval in 2000 and then proceeded to relax restrictions on it.

Alito halted the ban through May 11 so the court can consider the issue fully. Alito's intervention restores access to the drug by mail after a telehealth appointment.

The Fifth Circuit panel had found that the drug "injures Louisiana by undermining its laws protecting unborn human life and also by causing it to spend Medicaid funds on emergency care for women harmed by mifepristone."

"Mifepristone sends 1 in 10 women who use it to the emergency room with life threatening conditions. Now it’s time for Congress to ban it completely for use in abortion," Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) said in a post on social media on Monday.

Critics say the 1 in 10 figure comes from a conservative think tank and misrepresents the full data available on mifepristone.

"To be clear: This is NOT a reversal of Friday's decision. Rather, it's the run-of-the-mill pause that the Justices typically use to consider the issues raised in an emergency application," reads a statement from the Alliance Defending Freedom, a religious freedom legal nonprofit.

"We respect the Court's desire to have time to consider the issues and will continue our fight to uphold this victory that protects women and babies across the country from FDA's unlawful and destructive mail-order abortion-drug scheme," the nonprofit added.

RELATED: Pro-life activists celebrate victory after Costco announces policy on abortion drug

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously in 2024 against a lawsuit intending to block mifepristone access on the basis that the plaintiffs lacked standing to sue the FDA.

Alito had also previously dissented against the majority ruling in 2023 to allow access to mifepristone while the case continued.

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Carlos Garcia

Exclusive: Trump administration claims another scalp in war on fraud — this time, a Texas pill-pusher

The Blaze
12 hours 23 minutes ago


Scores of individuals were indicted during the first Trump administration for their involvement in a network of "pill mill" clinics — operations that diverted millions of oxycodone, hydrocodone, and carisoprodol pills with the help of health care professionals evidently eager to endanger public health to make a quick buck.

The current administration, which has significantly ramped up its fraud crackdown, has delivered one of the participants in this scheme to justice.

The Justice Department revealed in an exclusive to Blaze News on Monday that three days earlier, a federal jury in the Southern District of Texas convicted Barbara Marino — a 65-year-old resident of Tomball who served as the sole prescribing physician at Angels Clinica in Houston — of one count of conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance and four counts of distributing a controlled substance.

Marino faces more than 20 years in prison for each of the five counts.

"Medical physicians who exploit their prescribing authority for profit over patient care break an inherent trust with their patients, and we will hold them accountable," said Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald of the DOJ's National Fraud Enforcement Division in a statement. "The Department of Justice remains committed to protecting the public from dangerous and unlawful distribution of controlled substances, especially when the drug dealer is a doctor."

Marino, who was first licensed to practice medicine in the Lone Star State in 1990, was found to have unlawfully distributed over 1 million pills of opioids and other controlled substances through the strip-mall clinic in Houston where her practice was based.

Angels Clinica in Houston has since permanently closed. Angels Medical, which is linked to the now-defunct Houston clinic, did not immediately respond to Blaze News' request for comment.

RELATED: James Comey indictment goes beyond infamous '86 47' seashell post, covers full 'body of evidence,' Blanche says

John Moore/Getty Images

The original indictment against Marino said that of the roughly 1.06 million controlled-substance pills for which she issued prescriptions between September 2018 and August 2019, 518,000 were hydrocodone pills, 65,000 were oxycodone pills, and approximately 416,000 were carisoprodol pills.

Many of the purported patients who obtained prescriptions from Marino's cash-only clinic were effectively drug mules sent her way by traffickers who subsequently peddled the drugs on the street, according to court documents and evidence presented at trial.

This grift proved lucrative.

The Justice Department claimed that Marino — who is supposedly an addiction specialist — received over $400,000 from Angels Clinica's owners both for writing prescriptions that lacked a legitimate medical purpose and for doing so outside the usual course of professional practice.

Evidence shown at trial suggested that Marino rarely if ever encountered a patient for whom she wouldn't prescribe dangerous and addictive drugs.

In one instance, she reportedly prescribed what the DOJ characterized as a "dangerous cocktail of hydrocodone and carisoprodol" — apparently one ingredient short of the so-called "Houston Cocktail" — to a pregnant woman in her third trimester. The woman's OB-GYN testified that the drugs had threatened the well-being of both the mother and her unborn child.

The DOJ highlighted another case exemplifying Marino's willingness to give practically anyone hard drugs, specifically a mentally compromised patient — a diagnosed bipolar schizophrenic who suffered from the chronic delusion that he was President Richard Nixon — to whom she allegedly prescribed her dangerous cocktail on at least three occasions.

Drug Enforcement Administration Assistant Administrator Cheri Oz, whose agency investigated this case, stated, "Patients put their trust and their lives into the hands of our medical and health care professionals.

"The highly addictive, dangerous misused drugs in this case — oxycodone and hydrocodone — are meant to treat pain, not cause it," continued Oz. "DEA remains relentless in our pursuit of those who poison our communities and exploit our health care system, all to line their own pockets with the profit from others' pain."

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Joseph MacKinnon

Middle school teacher accused of creating 100+ child sex abuse images with AI and masturbating to them at work: Court docs

The Blaze
12 hours 38 minutes ago


A Nebraska middle school teacher is accused of utilizing artificial intelligence to create more than a hundred child sexual abuse images — and the teacher allegedly masturbated to the disturbing child pornography while at a school, according to multiple reports.

The Nebraska State Patrol said in a statement that 47-year-old Matthew Lund was arrested at his Omaha home at approximately 6:15 a.m. April 22.

'He made a lot of kids uncomfortable, including my son, but he couldn't quite say why.'

Lund was booked into Douglas County Corrections and charged with possession of child sexual abuse material and distribution of child sexual abuse material.

A judge set Lund's bond at $1 million during an April 23 court appearance, KETV-TV reported. Lund was ordered not to have contact with anyone under 19 years old and to wear a GPS monitor.

Lund had been a Millard Public Schools teacher.

Lund is currently not listed on the staff directory on the Andersen Middle School website. However, an archived version of the staff directory shows Matthew Lund as a "science and STEM teacher."

Police stated that "at this point, there is no indication that any students are victims in this case."

WOWT-TV obtained court documents showing that authorities launched an investigation on Feb. 23 after the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children provided a tip.

"On February 23, 2026, Nebraska State Patrol received a cyber tip regarding sexual abuse of children material being uploaded to a Google account associated with the defendant from the Millard Public Schools," a prosecutor said, according to WOWT.

According to court documents, investigators discovered 423 images that were generated through artificial intelligence on the Google account.

Court documents say the images depicted children younger than 12 years old, including an infant.

One of the files apparently depicts a nude child around the age of 3 to 5 facing an adult.

Court records state another image shows a child of a similar age performing oral sex on a man.

There was also an image of two nude children, around the ages of 8 to 10.

"A search warrant was done on the defendant’s Google account," the prosecutor said in court. "104 files consistent with child sexual assault material were located, ranging from infant to approximately 12 years old."

Lund allegedly masturbated to the images while at the school.

"The defendant then admitted to generating the child sexual assault material of prepubescent children and masturbating to them while at work at which he is a middle school science teacher," the prosecutor said.

RELATED: Ex-teacher and boyfriend indicted on 39 child sex charges; she confessed to abusing 5-year-old at his direction, cops say

Brenda Beadle, deputy Douglas County attorney, stated that this case may be the first her office has charged under a law addressing AI-generated child pornography.

Beadle noted, "It is illegal even though it’s AI-generated."

The bill to prohibit conduct involving computer-generated child pornography was signed into law in May 2025.

KETV reported that Millard Public Schools said Lund has been "removed, and we are proceeding with termination and cancellation of his contract.”

Millard Public Schools told KETV:

All staff go through a thorough background check during the hiring process. Millard maintains open communication with law enforcement and regulatory agencies that alert us to any ongoing concern. Additionally, Millard is diligent about investigating all concerns brought to us.

A parent told KETV, "He was hiding in plain sight."

The parent said her son "can't believe that someone he trusted to keep him safe would do something like this."

"He made a lot of kids uncomfortable, including my son, but he couldn't quite say why," the parent added. "It, just, something was off."

The parent also said, "You think you're dropping your kids off, and those teachers are going to protect your kids."

Millard Public Schools did not immediately respond to Blaze News' request for comment.

Those with information about this case are urged to contact the Nebraska State Patrol at 402-479-4049.

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Paul Sacca