PUNXSUTAWNEY, Pa. (AP) — A furry critter in a western Pennsylvania town has predicted six more weeks of winter during an annual Groundhog Day celebration. People gathered Thursday at Gobbler’s Knob as members of Punxsutawney Phil’s “inner circle” summoned the groundhog from his tree stump at dawn to learn if he has seen his shadow — and they say he did. According to folklore, if he sees his shadow there will be six more weeks of winter. If he doesn’t, spring comes early.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Tyre Nichols ’ family and friends gathered Wednesday for a funeral intended to celebrate his life three weeks after he died following a brutal beating by Memphis police that has sparked a new round of calls for police reform. As the service began, a group of singers and drummers beating African instruments proceeded to the front of the church where Nichols' black casket was draped in a large white bouquet of flowers.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Bands of sleet and snow that brought traffic to a standstill across the nation's midsection, canceled thousands of flights and were blamed for six deaths caused dangerous conditions for a third day Wednesday in several Southern states. Watches and warnings stretched from Texas to West Virginia. Several rounds of mixed precipitation, including freezing rain and sleet, were in store for many areas throughout the day, meaning some regions could be hit multiple times, forecasters said.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A man with an AR-15-style rifle and more than a dozen ammunition magazines opened fire inside a Target store in Omaha, sending panicked shoppers and employees scrambling for safety before he was fatally shot by police Tuesday afternoon, authorities said. No injuries were reported. The man in his 30s, who has not been identified, fired multiple rounds as he entered the store but it wasn’t clear if he fired at anyone, Omaha Police Chief Todd Schmaderer said.

SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — Actor Alec Baldwin and a weapons specialist have been formally charged with involuntary manslaughter in the fatal shooting of a cinematographer on a New Mexico movie set, according to court documents filed by prosecutors Tuesday. Santa Fe District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies filed the charging documents naming Baldwin and Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, who supervised weapons on the set of the Western “Rust.”

DALLAS (AP) — Winter weather brought ice to a wide swath of the United States on Tuesday, causing the cancellation of more than 1,500 flights nationwide, bringing traffic to a standstill on an interstate through Arkansas and knocking out power to thousands of Texans. Numerous auto collisions were reported in Austin, Texas, with at least one fatality according to the Austin Fire Department. In Travis County, Texas, which includes Austin, police and sheriff’s deputies have been responding to new crashes about every three minutes since 8 a.m., according to the Austin-Travis County Traffic Report Page.

LAKELAND, Fla. (AP) — Ten people were injured during a drive-by shooting in a central Florida neighborhood, police said. Lakeland Police Chief Sam Taylor said during a news conference that two of the victims were critically injured Monday afternoon, while the wounds of the other eight victims weren't considered life-threatening. The victims were males between the ages of 20 and 35.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Two more Memphis police officers have been disciplined and three emergency responders fired in connection with the death of Tyre Nichols, officials said Monday, widening the circle of punishment for the shocking display of police brutality after video showed many more people failed to help him beyond the five officers accused of beating him to death. Officer Preston Hemphill, who is white, was relieved of duty shortly after Nichols’ Jan. 7 arrest, the police department announced. Later in the day it said another officer had also been relieved, but without naming the person or specifying what role they played in the incident.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Members of Mt. Olive Cathedral Church in Memphis gathered for worship on Sunday, two days after Tyre Nichols’ parents spoke from the sanctuary and called for peace following the release of video showing their son's fatal beating at the hands of police. “We’ve had calm so far, which is what we have been praying for," Pastor Kenneth Thomas said before the service. "And, of course, we hope that continues.”

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — The Memphis police chief disbanded the city's so-called Scorpion unit on Saturday, citing a “cloud of dishonor” from newly released video that showed some of its officers beating Tyre Nichols to death after stopping the Black motorist. Police Director Cerelyn “CJ” Davis acted a day after the harrowing video emerged, saying she listened to Nichols' relatives, community leaders and uninvolved officers in making the decision.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Authorities announced the Friday release of police video depicting five Black officers beating a Black man whose death prompted murder charges against them and provoked outrage at the country’s latest instance of police brutality. Family members of Tyre Nichols pleaded for any protests to remain peaceful. The officers were charged Thursday with murder and other crimes in the killing of Nichols, a motorist who died three days after a confrontation with the officers during a traffic stop on Jan. 7.

NEW YORK (AP) — An Islamic extremist who killed eight people with a speeding truck in a 2017 rampage on a popular New York City bike path was convicted Thursday of federal crimes and could face the death penalty. Sayfullo Saipov bowed his head as he heard the verdict in a Manhattan courtroom just a few blocks from where the attack ended. Prosecutors said the Halloween rampage was inspired by his reverence for the Islamic State militant group.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren's name is on the U.S. Navy's newest fuel ship. Justice Elena Kagan smashed a champagne bottle against its hull in a shipyard ceremony in San Diego last weekend. Two other justices soon will join Warren, who in 1954 wrote the Brown v. Board of Education decision that outlawed segregation in public schools, in a group of ships being named for civil rights leaders.

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. special operations forces have killed a senior Islamic State group official and 10 other terrorist operatives in remote northern Somalia, the Biden administration announced Thursday. The operation carried out on Wednesday targeted Bilal al-Sudani, a key financial facilitator for the global terrorist organization, in a mountainous cave complex.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — NASA marked the 20th anniversary of the space shuttle Columbia tragedy with somber ceremonies and remembrances during its annual tribute to fallen astronauts on Thursday. More than 100 people gathered under a gray sky at Kennedy Space Center to remember not only Columbia’s crew of seven, but the 18 other astronauts killed in the line of duty. NASA’s two shuttle accidents account for more than half of the names carved into the black granite of the Space Mirror Memorial; plane crashes are to blame for the rest.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Heavy, wet snow — part of a storm system that spawned tornadoes in the Houston area — has covered roads, vehicles, houses and buildings Wednesday from central and northern Indiana into much of southeastern Michigan. About six inches of snow was expected to fall on the Detroit area, while four inches was reported before noon in eastern Indiana, just southwest of Fort Wayne, said Maddi Johnson of the National Weather Service in northern Indiana.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Alaska’s statewide law enforcement agency is investigating after two troopers escorted one of the state's top school principals to a hospital for a mental health assessment based on a bogus court order, officials said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — In what would be a reversal, the Biden administration is poised to approve sending M1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, U.S. officials said Tuesday, as international reluctance to send tanks to the battlefront against the Russians begins to erode. A decision to send a bit more than 30 tanks could be announced as soon as Wednesday, though it could take months for the tanks to be delivered.

MONTEREY PARK, Calif. (AP) — Investigators searching for a motive Monday in the worst mass shooting in Los Angeles County history said the gunman was previously arrested for illegally owning a firearm, had a rifle at home, hundreds of rounds of ammunition and appeared to be manufacturing gun silencers. Los Angeles Sheriff Robert Luna said investigators had not yet established why 72-year-old Huu Can Tran gunned down patrons Saturday night at a ballroom dance hall he was said to frequent in Monterey Park, where tens of thousands attended Lunar New Year festivities earlier that evening.

HALF MOON BAY, Calif. (AP) — Seven people were killed in two related shootings Monday at a mushroom farm and a trucking firm in a coastal community south of San Francisco, and a suspect was in custody, officials said. San Mateo County Board of Supervisors President Dave Pine says four people were killed at the farm and three at the trucking business on the outskirts of Half Moon Bay, a city about 30 miles (48 kilometers) south of San Francisco. The police have arrested 67-year-old Chunli Zhao in connection with the shooting, Pine said.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — An 18-year-old man was charged with murder in Monday's killing of two teenagers at an alternative educational program for at-risk youth in Des Moines. Police said Preston Walls of Des Moines is charged with two counts of murder and one count of attempted murder in the Monday shooting at Starts Right Here. Two teenagers — an 18-year-old male and a 16-year-old male — were killed in the attack. The program’s founder, 49-year-old William Holmes — a rapper who goes by the stage name Will Keeps — was injured.

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — The U.S. government has denied a request from a group of environmental organizations to immediately apply proposed ship-speed restrictions in an effort to save a vanishing species of whale. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is considering new rules designed to stop large ships from colliding with North Atlantic right whales. The whales number less than 340, and they are vulnerable to ship strikes and entanglement in fishing gear.

MONTEREY PARK, Calif. (AP) — It was a joyful kickoff to the first Lunar New Year celebration in Monterey Park since before the pandemic, with large crowds filling the streets in the majority Chinese American city near Los Angeles for live entertainment, carnival rides and plenty of food. But the celebrations were marred by tragedy Saturday night after a gunman entered a ballroom dance hall and opened fire, killing 10 people, wounding 10 more and sending panicked revelers into the streets.

MONTEREY PARK, Calif. (AP) — A gunman killed 10 people and wounded 10 others at a Los Angeles-area ballroom dance club following a Lunar New Year celebration, setting off a manhunt for the suspect in the fifth mass killing in the U.S. this month.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Participants in the first March for Life since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade urged Congress to do nothing to impede laws curtailing abortions in individual states, including Georgia. Thousands of pro-life advocates spread across a section of the National Mall for the annual march for Life, the Capitol Building in sight from a distance.