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Ex-NFL star Shawne Merriman reacts as Patriots’ Mike Vrabel caught in scandal
New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel has been raked over the coals due to the most recent photos that were released of him and NFL reporter Dianna Russini.
Vrabel said he will be stepping away from the team to seek counseling. However, he’s put the Patriots into a PR disaster that began when he fervently denied that the first photo dump of him and Russini at an Arizona resort showed anything nefarious. He brushed it off as “a completely innocent interaction.”
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Former San Diego Chargers linebacker Shawne Merriman weighed in with his reaction in an interview with Fox News Digital on Thursday. He said that he didn’t think the dark cloud around Vrabel would affect the team football-wise, but his job depended on what message the organization wants to send.
“This is my thing when it comes to that,” Merriman said. “He didn’t break any laws first and foremost, right? This is something morally maybe wrong. Something he’ll have to deal with when it comes to that. I do not believe, in my opinion, I do not believe this will be a football distraction. This will have to be, internally, that, we don’t want to deal with it because what it sends a message for, but it’s not going to affect the players in the locker room and how he’s coaching, how they’re coached, how they listen to and follow him, and how Vrabel leads.
“Football wise, I don’t think it does anything at all. It just really depends on what message do you want to send by keep going forward with him. That’s what I would say.”
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Page Six and TMZ published new rounds of Vrabel-Russini photos earlier Thursday. It sparked a pre-draft news conference from Vrabel.
“My previous actions don’t meet the standard that I hold myself to,” Vrabel said. “My priorities are my family and this football team, in that order. And there is a balance there that I am going to create.”
At the end of the news conference, Vrabel was asked to explain why he initially made a statement calling photos of him and Russini at an Arizona resort “laughable” after they were published by the New York Post earlier in April.
“That’s a private and personal matter. I don’t think that those comments … it was an attempt to protect your family,” Vrabel said.
It was the last question Vrabel answered before storming off the podium and out of the room.
Fox News’ Jackson Thompson contributed to this report.
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USA’s next Ryder Cup captain decided after Tiger Woods turns down offer: report
Jim Furyk is returning as the captain for the United States’ Ryder Cup team next year, The Associated Press reported Friday.
It’s a blast from the past, although not necessarily a positive past – Furyk captained the 2018 team that was shellacked in France, with his captain’s picks combining to go 2-10.
Keegan Bradley captained last year’s team at Bethpage Black, which had an embarrassing first two days but gave a valiant effort at an unprecedented comeback in Sunday singles. They fell just short, 15-13, after entering the day trailing by seven points.
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Members of that USA team backed Bradley after their loss, but it appears to be for naught.
Furyk led the Americans to victory as Presidents Cup captain in 2024, and he was said to be a reliable voice as an assistant to Bradley at Bethpage.
Furyk’s 2018 team had issues behind the scenes, too, as Patrick Reed was not happy with being benched twice. He also blamed Jordan Spieth for the two not playing together, which Reed felt could have been successful.
Furyk would be the fourth U.S. captain to get a second chance dating to 1979, considered the modern era of the Ryder Cup, when continental Europe became part of it, along with Davis Love III (2012 and 2016), Tom Watson (1993 and 2014) and Jack Nicklaus (1983 and 1987).
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Tiger Woods’ name was floated around for the tournament in Ireland, but he took himself out of consideration shortly following his arrest on March 27. It was not known which way Woods was leaning when his SUV clipped the back of a trailer being pulled by a pickup truck on a residential road in Florida, turning his SUV on its side. Woods was arrested and briefly jailed after Florida authorities determined he was impaired.
Europe has won 11 of the last 15 matches dating to Oak Hill in 1995. Last year, they became the first team to win back-to-back events since they won three straight from 2010 to 2014. It was also the first time a team won on foreign soil since Europe’s Miracle at Medinah in 2012.
Luke Donald will try to become the first captain to win three straight times in September 2027 at Adare Manor. Europe returned all but one player from the 2023 squad to Bethpage, the lone difference between an identical twin brother.
Furyk played in all nine Ryder Cups from 1997 to 2014 before becoming an assistant for the first time in 2016. He’s remained an assistant since 2021.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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American journalist Ahmed Shihab-Eldin acquitted on all charges after 52 days detained in Kuwait, family says
Kuwaiti-American journalist Ahmed Shihab-Eldin, who was detained in Kuwait under new security and misinformation laws, has been acquitted on all charges, his family announced on Thursday.
“We are relieved that Ahmed Shihab-Eldin has been found innocent after 52 days in detention,” Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) CEO Jodie Ginsberg said in a statement.
“Ahmed’s freedom and safety remain our topmost priority and we will continue to closely monitor his case,” Ginsberg added.
COMMITTEE TO PROTECT JOURNALISTS DEMANDS KUWAIT RELEASE AMERICAN REPORTER AHMED SHIHAB-ELDIN
Shihab-Eldin was arrested on March 3 in Kuwait, where he was visiting family, and faced charges related to “spreading false information, harming national security, and misusing his mobile phone” – which the CPJ designed to promote press freedoms called “vague and overly broad accusations that are routinely used to silence independent journalists.”
A spokesperson for Shihab-Eldin’s family confirmed Shihab-Eldin was acquitted but declined additional comment until further information is known. He is expected to be released immediately.
On March 2, Kuwait’s Ministry of Interior posted a chilling message warning against photographs or information related to missiles or relevant locations. Khalid Ibrahim, Executive Director of the Gulf Centre for Human Rights, told CPJ that dozens have been arrested since the war began in cases related to freedom of expression.
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Kuwait then issued a decree stipulating up to 10 years in jail for anyone who undermines “the prestige of the military or deliberately works toward eroding public trust in them,” according to the Kuwait Times.
Shihab-Eldin, who is known for work at The New York Times, HuffPost, BBC, Al Jazeera, Vice News and other outlets, posted video of a U.S. fighter jet crash near a U.S. base in Kuwait shortly before he was detained.
The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A State Department spokesperson previously told Fox News Digital that the Trump administration “has no higher priority than the safety and security of Americans” and they were aware of reports of Shihab-Eldin’s detention.
“Whenever an American is detained abroad, the Department works to provide consular assistance in accordance with our authorities under U.S. and international law,” the State Department spokesperson added.
The CPJ asked Americans to keep Shihab-Eldin’s situation visible by signing a petition and posting about his detention with the hashtags #freeahmed and #freeahmedeldin and #journalismisnotacrime.
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Forensic genealogy unmasks cold case suspect as strangler, sexual predator decades later: officials
Years after DNA evidence linked a 1991 killing and a 1993 rape in Massachusetts, forensic genetic genealogy helped investigators identify the man authorities say was responsible for both cold cases.
Evidence from the killing of Cherie Bishop in 1991 and the rape of Donna Bell in 1993 was uploaded to the Combined DNA Index System, Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz said Thursday.
“For decades, the Bishop and Bell families were deprived of the full story of what happened to their loved ones,” Cruz said. “They carried these tragedies across lifetimes.”
Investigators said Bishop, 28, was found strangled in a wooded area near her Brockton apartment in June 1991. Bell was raped in Brockton in 1993.
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Bishop was found dead in nearby Mulberry Park, wearing only socks and a diamond earring, Cruz said. Her cause of death was ruled to be mechanical asphyxiation, and the manner of death was homicide.
Investigators collected DNA evidence through a rape kit and analyzed it at the time, but no suspect was identified. The evidence was later retested as forensic genealogy techniques continued to advance.
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A rape kit was also collected in Bell’s case.
Cruz said Bell was abducted from the street and sexually assaulted by a man in a vehicle, who threatened to strangle her if she resisted.
She managed to escape after, authorities said, she seized a sharp object. Bell died in 2021.
Cruz said investigators had known since 2016 that the cases were connected, but available DNA evidence did not identify a suspect until advances in forensic genetic genealogy provided a breakthrough.
“Their exhaustive investigative work, combined with a DNA sample match, identified Robert Carey as the perpetrator,” Cruz said.
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The district attorney’s office said Othram, a Texas forensic genealogy lab, identified a likely relative of the suspect, helping investigators ultimately identify Carey.
Carey, who died of natural causes in June 2025 at 64, lived at the Brockton Veterans Administration Medical Center, about 1.5 miles from both crime scenes, the district attorney’s office said.
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“None of this would have been possible without the tremendous effort and devoted work of the Massachusetts State Police, Brockton Police, the State Police Crime Lab, Trooper Joe Collett, Assistant District Attorneys Samantha Mullin and Jennifer Sprague, as well as Forensic Scientist Krista Lundgren,” Cruz said.
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