CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — Hercules and Ned have quite the spacious office at West Virginia’s busiest airport. The border collies and their handler make daily patrols along the milelong airfield to ensure birds and other wildlife stay away from planes and keep passengers and crew safe. Hercules is also the chief ambassador, soaking in affection from passengers inside the terminal while calming some nervously waiting to board a flight at West Virginia International Yeager Airport. Chris Keyser, the dogs’ handler and the airport’s wildlife specialist, said preventing a bird from hitting a plane “can make a difference for someone’s life.” Collisions between wildlife and planes are common at airports nationwide. With that in mind, Yeager management in 2018 bought Hercules at the recommendation of a wildlife biologist. Hercules spent the first 18 months of his life training to herd geese and sheep around his birthplace at Charlotte, North Carolina-based Flyaway Geese, which teaches border collies to help businesses address nuisance wildlife problems. When Hercules stepped onto Charleston’s airfield for the first time, “I held my breath,” Flyaway Geese owner Rebecca Gibson said. “But boy, he took hold of the reins. It was his place. “He’s done an amazing job and has just been a great dog for them. We’re very proud of him.” Along the way, Hercules became a local celebrity. He has his own Instagram and TikTok accounts and regularly hosts groups of schoolchildren. Now 8, Hercules has some help. Ned was 2 when he was welcomed into the fold last year from another kennel where he trained to herd goats and geese. Ned has shadowed Hercules, following commands from Keyser and learning safety issues such as not venturing onto the runway. “Ned’s ready to go,” Keyser said. “He’s picked up on all that. He’s doing fantastic, running birds off.” Inside the airport operations center, Hercules is laid back until he’s told it’s time to work, barking at the door in anticipation. Ned, on the other hand, is always moving. When not outside, he’ll bring his blue bouncy ball to anyone willing to play fetch. Charleston’s airport is on top of a mountain and has a menagerie of wildlife, including Canada geese, hawks, ducks, songbirds and bats. After it rains, worms come to the surface and cause an increase in bird activity, Keyser said. In addition to taking the dogs on their regular rounds, Keyser is in constant contact with the airport tower, which looks for birds on the field or relays reports from airplanes that see wildlife nearby. “We get plenty of exercise,” Keyser said. “You don’t gain no weight in this job. It’s an all-day job. You’re always got your eyes on the field, you’ve got your ears open listening to the radio.” Border collies are among the most energetic dog breeds. They’ve been used for decades to shoo Canada geese off golf courses. They’ve also scared away birds at other airports, military bases, and locks and dams. The dogs’ instincts are to herd, not to kill. “But in the mind of the bird, they’re no different than a coyote or a fox, which is a natural predator for the bird,” Gibson said. About 19,000 strikes involving planes and wildlife occurred at U.S. airports in 2023, of which 95% involved birds, according to a Federal Aviation Administration database. From 1988 to 2023, wildlife collisions in the U.S. killed 76 people and destroyed 126 aircraft. Perhaps the most famous bird-plane strike occurred in January 2009 when a flight from New York’s LaGuardia Airport almost immediately flew into a flock of Canada geese, knocking out both engines. Pilot Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger guided the powerless jet into the frigid Hudson River. All 155 people on board survived the incident, which was captured in the 2016 movie “Sully,” starring Tom Hanks. At the Charleston airport, wildlife-plane incidents vary each year from a few to a couple dozen. “Anytime a plane hits a bird, it has to be inspected, and it causes a delay in the flight,” Keyser said. “And sometimes you don’t make your connecting flights. So that’s how important it is to keep everything going smooth.” In 2022 alone, there were five airplane strikes at the airport involving bats. In December 2000, a plane collided with two deer after landing. The tip of the right engine propeller blade separated and punctured the plane’s fuselage, seriously injuring a passenger, according to the FAA. Inside the terminal, Hercules wags his tail as he moves about greeting passengers. Among them was Janet Spry, a Scott Depot, West Virginia, resident waiting to board a flight to visit her daughter and grandchildren in San Antonio. Spry needed a bit of cheering up. In addition to having a fear of flying, Spry’s 15-year-old cat was euthanized the previous day after being diagnosed with an inoperable condition. An impromptu visit from Hercules brought a smile — and more. Hercules placed a paw on Spry’s arm and delivered plenty of wet kisses. “He’s making my day better,” Spry said. She also joked whether the airport might want to let Hercules stay with her a while longer. “I think there was an empty seat on the plane beside me,” Spry said. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Religious services, concerts and vigils are set to mark Sunday’s fifth anniversary of George Floyd’s murder by a Minneapolis police officer even as police reform and civil rights activists face what they see as a backlash from the Trump administration. Events in Minneapolis center around George Floyd Square, the intersection where police Officer Derek Chauvin used his knee to pin Floyd’s neck to the pavement for 9 1/2 minutes, even as the 46-year-old Black man’s cried “I can’t breathe.” The events started Friday with concerts, a street festival and a “self-care fair,” and culminate with a worship service, gospel music concert and candlelight vigil on Sunday. In Houston, where Floyd grew up, family members planned to gather Sunday at his gravesite for a memorial service led by the Rev. Al Sharpton. In a park about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) away, a memorial service will take place, followed by five hours of music, preaching and poetry readings and a balloon release. The remembrances come at a fraught moment for activists, who had hoped the worldwide protests that followed Floyd’s murder on May 25, 2020, would lead to permanent police reform across the U.S. and a continued focus on racial justice issues. Even with Minneapolis officials’ promises to remake the police department, some activists contend the progress has come at a glacial pace. “We understand that change takes time,” Michelle Gross, president of Communities United Against Police Brutality, said in a statement last week. “However, the progress being claimed by the city is not being felt in the streets.” President Donald Trump’s administration moved Wednesday to cancel settlements with Minneapolis and Louisville that called for an overhaul of their police departments following the Floyd’s murder and the killing of Breonna Taylor. Under Democratic President Joe Biden, the U.S. Justice Department had aggressively pushed for aggressive oversight of local police it had accused of widespread abuses. Trump also declared an end to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives within the federal government and his administration is using federal funds as leverage to force local governments, universities and public school districts to do the same. Republican-led states also have accelerated their efforts to stamp out DEI initiatives. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

JUNO BEACH, Fla. (AP) — A massive loggerhead sea turtle hit by a boat off Florida’s Atlantic coast arrived at a turtle hospital needing medical care, but at 302 pounds (137 kilograms), Pennywise was too large to fit their equipment. So the veterinary team at the Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach took her to nearby Jupiter Medical Center, hoping she could get a CT scan on a human machine. She was too big for that, as well. They quickly came up with another plan: taking Pennywise to Palm Beach Equine Clinic in Wellington, where the scan was performed on equipment designed for horses. “And, luckily, the horse-sized machine was big enough to fit this lady through,” Heather Barron, the chief science officer and veterinarian at Loggerhead, told The Associated Press. Turns out, they also got a nice surprise: Images showed that Pennywise is carrying eggs. “We hope we’ll be able to get her back out there into the wild as soon as possible so that she can lay those eggs,” Barron said. Loggerheads, an endangered species, often lay multiple clutches during a season, she said. Pennywise arrived at the center Monday, after a crew from Inwater Research Group found her floating in the Atlantic with significant blunt force trauma to her shell that had already started to heal. The staff at the Juno Beach turtle center estimated that Pennywise’s injuries were about a month old. Barron said the imaging showed some damage to bones that surround the spinal cord. They have the turtle on high-powered antibiotics. “Luckily, right now, her neurologic exam shows that all those nerves are intact. And that is a great sign for her. We’re very excited about that and we’ll just be rechecking to make sure that we have no progression of the disease, and as soon as we feel like that wound is healed well enough, she can go back out into the wild.” Even so, Barron said, Pennywise’s story is a “textbook case of a turtle returning to the area for mating and nesting season, only to fall victim to an entirely preventable boat-strike injury.” Because nesting season in Florida runs from March 1 to Oct. 31, officials at the sea turtle center are encouraging boaters to slow down and to be especially mindful in what they refer to as the Sea Turtle Protection Zone, which extends a mile (1.6 kilometers) off the coast. ___ Frisaro reported from Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

HOUSTON (AP) — Years before a bystander’s video of George Floyd’s last moments turned his name into a global cry for justice, Floyd trained a camera on himself. “I just want to speak to you all real quick,” Floyd says in one video, addressing the young men in his neighborhood who looked up to him. His 6-foot-7 frame crowds the picture. “I’ve got my shortcomings and my flaws and I ain’t better than nobody else,” he says. “But, man, the shootings that’s going on, I don’t care what ‘hood you’re from, where you’re at, man. I love you and God loves you. Put them guns down.” ___ EDITOR’S NOTE: The Associated Press initially published this profile of George Floyd on June 10, 2020. The fifth anniversary of George Floyd’s murder is May 25, 2025. ___ At the time, Floyd was respected as a man who spoke from hard, but hardly extraordinary, experience. He had nothing remotely like the stature he has gained in death, embraced as a universal symbol of the need to overhaul policing and held up as a heroic everyman. But the reality of his 46 years on Earth, including sharp edges and setbacks Floyd himself acknowledged, was both much fuller and more complicated. Once a star athlete with dreams of turning pro and enough talent to win a partial scholarship, Floyd returned home only to bounce between jobs before serving nearly five years in prison. Intensely proud of his roots in Houston’s Third Ward and admired as a mentor in a public housing project beset by poverty, he decided the only way forward was to leave it behind. “He had made some mistakes that cost him some years of his life,” said Ronnie Lillard, a friend and rapper who performs under the name Reconcile. “And when he got out of that, I think the Lord greatly impacted his heart.” ___ Floyd was born in North Carolina. But his mother, a single parent, moved the family to Houston when he was 2, to search for work. They settled in the Cuney Homes, a low-slung warren of more than 500 apartments south of downtown nicknamed “The Bricks.” The neighborhood, for decades a cornerstone of Houston’s Black community, has gentrified in recent years. Texas Southern University, a historically Black campus directly across the street from the projects, has long held itself out as a launchpad for those willing to strive. But many residents struggle, with incomes about half the city average and unemployment nearly four times higher, even before the recent economic collapse. Yeura Hall, who grew up next door to Floyd, said even in the Third Ward other kids looked down on those who lived in public housing. To deflect the teasing, he, Floyd and other boys made up a song about themselves: “I don’t want to grow up, I’m a Cuney Homes kid. They got so many rats and roaches I can play with.” Larcenia Floyd invested her hopes in her son, who as a second-grader wrote that he dreamed of being a U.S. Supreme Court justice. “She thought that he would be the one that would bring them out of poverty and struggle,” said Travis Cains, a longtime friend. Floyd was a star tight end for the football team at Jack Yates High School, playing for the losing side in the 1992 state championship game at Texas Memorial Stadium in Austin. He was an atypical football player. “We used to call him ‘Big Friendly,’” said Cervaanz Williams, a former teammate. “If you said something to him, his head would drop,” said Maurice McGowan, his football coach. “He just wasn’t going to ball up and act like he wanted to fight you.” On the basketball court, Floyd’s height and strength won attention from George Walker, a former assistant coach at the University of Houston hired for the head job at what is now South Florida State College. The school was a 17-hour drive away, in a small town, but high school administrators and Floyd’s mother urged him to go, Walker said. “They wanted George to really get out of the neighborhood, to do something, be something,” Walker said. In Avon Park, Florida, Floyd and a few other players from Houston stood out for their size, accents and city cool. They lived in the Jacaranda Hotel, a historic lodge used as a dormitory, and were known as the “Jac Boys.” “He was always telling me about the Third Ward of Houston, how rough it was, but how much he loved it,” said Robert Caldwell, a friend and fellow student who frequently traveled with the basketball team. “He said people know how to grind, as hard as it is, people know how to love.” After two years in Avon Park, Floyd spent a year at Texas A&M University in Kingsville before returning to Houston and his mother’s apartment to find jobs in construction and security. Larcenia Floyd, known throughout the neighborhood as Ms. Cissy, welcomed her son’s friends from childhood, offering their apartment as a refuge when their lives grew stressful. When a neighbor went to prison on drug charges, Ms. Cissy took in the woman’s pre-teen son, Cal Wayne, deputizing George to play older brother for the next 2½ years. “We would steal his jerseys and put his jerseys on and run around the house, go outside, jerseys all the way down to our ankles because he was so big and we were little,” said Wayne, now a well-known rapper who credits Floyd with encouraging him to pursue music. George Floyd, he said, “was like a superhero.” ___ Floyd, too, dabbled in music, occasionally invited to rap with Robert Earl Davis Jr., better known as DJ Screw, whose mixtapes have since been recognized as influential in charting Houston’s place as a hotbed of hip-hop. But then, the man known throughout Cuney as “Big Floyd” started finding trouble. Between 1997 and 2005, Floyd was arrested several times on drug and theft charges, spending months in jail. Around that time, Wayne’s mother, Sheila Masters, recalled running into Floyd in the street and learning he was homeless. “He’s so tall he’d pat me on my head … and say, ‘Mama you know it’s going to be all right,’” Masters said. In August 2007, Floyd was arrested and charged with aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon. Investigators said he and five other men barged into a woman’s apartment, and Floyd pushed a pistol into her abdomen before searching for items to steal. Floyd pleaded guilty in 2009 and was sentenced to five years in prison. By the time he was paroled, in January 2013, he was nearing 40. “He came home with his head on right,” said friend Travis Cains. At a Christian rap concert in the Third Ward, Floyd met Lillard and pastor Patrick “PT” Ngwolo, whose ministry was looking for ways to reach residents in Cuney Homes. Floyd, who seemed to know everyone in the project, volunteered to be their guide. Soon Floyd was setting up a washtub on the Cuney basketball courts for baptisms by Ngwolo’s newly formed Resurrection Houston congregation. He joined three-on-three basketball tournaments and barbecues, organized by the ministry. He knocked on doors with Ngwolo, introducing residents as candidates for grocery deliveries or Bible study. Another pastor, Christopher Johnson, recalled Floyd stopping by his office while Johnson’s mother was visiting. Decades had passed since Johnson’s mother had been a teacher at Floyd’s high school. It didn’t matter. He wrapped her in a bear hug. “I don’t think he ever thought of himself as being big,” Johnson said. “There’s a lot of big dudes here, but he was a gentleman and a diplomat and I’m not putting any sauce on it.” On the streets of Cuney, Floyd was increasingly embraced as an O.G. — literally “original gangster,” bestowed as a title of respect for a mentor who had learned from life experience. In Tiffany Cofield’s classroom at a neighborhood charter school, some of her male students — many of whom had already had brushes with the law — told her to talk to “Big Floyd” if she wanted to understand. Floyd would listen patiently as she voiced her frustrations with students’ bad behavior, she said. And he would try to explain the life of a young man in the projects. After school, Floyd often met up with her students outside a corner store. “How’s school going?” he would ask. “Are you being respectful? How’s your mom? How’s your grandma?” ___ In 2014, Floyd began exploring the possibility of leaving the neighborhood. As the father of five children from several relationships, he had bills to pay. And despite his stature in Cuney, everyday life could be trying. More than once, Floyd ended up in handcuffs when police came through the projects and detained a large number of men, Cofield said. “He would show by example: ‘Yes, officer. No, officer.’ Very respectful. Very calm tone,” she said. A friend of Floyd’s had already moved to the Twin Cities as part of a church discipleship program that offered men a route to self-sufficiency by changing their environment and helping them find jobs. “He was looking to start over fresh, a new beginning,” said Christopher Harris, who preceded Floyd to Minneapolis. Friends provided Floyd with money and clothing to ease the transition. In Minneapolis, Floyd found a job as a security guard at the Salvation Army’s Harbor Light Center, the city’s largest homeless shelter. “He would regularly walk a couple of female co-workers out … at night and make sure they got to their cars safely and securely,” said Brian Molohon, director of development for the Army’s Minnesota office. “Just a big strong guy, but with a very tender side.” Floyd left after a little over a year, training to drive trucks while working as a bouncer at a club called Conga Latin Bistro. “He would dance badly to make people laugh,” said the owner, Jovanni Thunstrom. “I tried to teach him how to dance because he loved Latin music, but I couldn’t because he was too tall for me.” Floyd kept his connection to Houston, regularly returning to Cuney. When Houston hosted the Super Bowl in 2017, Floyd was back in town, hosting a party at the church with music and free AIDS testing. He came back again for his mother’s funeral the next year. And when Cains spoke with him last, a few weeks ago, Floyd was planning another trip for this summer. By then, Floyd was out of work. Early this spring, Thunstrom cut Floyd’s job when the COVID-19 pandemic forced the club to close. On the evening of Memorial Day, Floyd was with two others when convenience store employees accused him of paying for cigarettes with a counterfeit $20 bill, then called the police. Less than an hour later, Floyd breathed his last. Those who knew him search for meaning in his death. “I’ve come to the belief that he was chosen,” said Cofield, the teacher. “Only this could have happened to him because of who he was and the amount of love that he had for people, people had for him.” It’s a small comfort, she admits. But, then, in Big Floyd’s neighborhood, people have long made do with less. ___ Merchant and Lozano reported from Houston, Henao from Hershey, Pennsylvania, and Geller from New York. Associated Press writer Aaron Morrison in Minneapolis and videographer John Mone in Houston contributed to this report. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

NEW YORK (AP) — A cryptocurrency investor has been arrested and charged with kidnapping a man and keeping him locked up for weeks in an upscale Manhattan apartment, where authorities say he was beaten, shocked and led to believe that his family was in danger if he didn’t give up his Bitcoin password. John Woeltz, 37, was arrested Friday night after the victim escaped from the eight-bedroom town house and flagged down a traffic officer on the street for help, according to prosecutors. Woeltz was arraigned Saturday on charges of kidnapping, assault, unlawful imprisonment and criminal possession of a firearm, court records show. He was ordered held without bail, a spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney’s office confirmed Saturday. His lawyer, Wayne Gosnell, said Saturday in an email that he had no comment. The 28-year-old victim arrived in New York City from Italy in early May, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press. The official was not authorized to speak publicly about the ongoing investigation and did so on condition of anonymity. It’s not clear how or if the two knew each other, but the district attorney’s office said in an email that prosecutor Michael Mattson told a judge Saturday that the victim, whose name has not been released, was abducted on May 6. Mattson said others were involved in the scheme to empty the victim’s Bitcoin wallet. That includes a person referred to in court records as an “unapprehended male.” The victim said he was bound by the wrists and tortured for weeks inside the apartment. His captors, according to prosecutors, drugged him, used electric wires to shock him, hit him in the head with a firearm and, at one point, carried him to the top of a flight of stairs where they dangled him over a ledge and threatened to kill him if he didn’t share his Bitcoin password. Believing that he was about to be shot, the victim was able to escape Friday after agreeing to give up his password, which was stored on his laptop in another room. When the suspect turned his back, Mattson said, the victim ran out of the apartment. The victim was taken to a hospital and treated for injuries that Mattson said were consistent with his descriptions of being bound and assaulted. A search of the town house turned up a trove of evidence, Mattson said, including cocaine, a saw, chicken wire, body armor and night vision goggles, ammunition and polaroid photos of the victim with a gun pointed to his head. Woeltz was ordered Saturday to surrender his passport. Prosecutors said he has the means to flee, including a private jet and a helicopter. He is due back in Manhattan criminal court next week. ___ Yamat reported from Las Vegas. Associated Press writers Susan Haigh in Hartford, Connecticut, and Becky Bohrer in Juneau, Alaska, contributed to this report. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com