Wrap your head around this latest State Department directive

The Trump administration has ordered State Department employees to report on any instances of coworkers displaying “anti-Christian bias” 

The directive is part of the State Department's effort to implement a sweeping new executive order on supporting employees of Christian faith working in the federal government, reported POLITICO.

The department, according to a copy of an internal cable obtained by POLITICO, will work with an administration-wide task force to collect information “involving anti-religious bias during the last presidential administration” and will collect examples of anti-Christian bias through anonymous employee report forms.

We would do well at times like these to remember Sir Winston Churchill's words to the English people during the Second World War, "You see these dictators . . . They're afraid of words and thought . . .  A state of society where men may not speak their mind . . . where a businessman or small shopkeeper ruins his competitor by telling tales about his private opinion. Such a state of society cannot long endure . . ." 

The cable was sent out to embassies around the world under Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s name. The instructions also were released in a department-wide notice.

The document says the task force, which was established by the executive order, will meet around April 22 to discuss its initial findings.

The cable encourages State Department employees to report on one another through a tip form that can be anonymous. “Reports should be as detailed as possible, including names, dates, locations (e.g. post or domestic office where the incident occurred,” the cable reads.

Some State Department officials reacted to the cable with shock and alarm, saying that even if well-intentioned, it is based on the flawed premise that the department harbors anti-Christian bias to begin with, and warning it could create a culture of fear as the administration pushes employees to report on one another.

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Mangino on Law and Crime to discuss murder of 4-month old

Join me and Kennedi Walker on Law and Crime Network as we discuss a Pennsylvania Mom who covered for boy friend who beat 4-month old to death.

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Mangino joins Nancy Grace to talk about missing Houston woman

Listen in as I discuss with Nancy Grace the the alarming disappearance of a young Houston woman on Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.

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Michigan Supreme Court bans mandatory LWOP for 19-and 20-year-olds

The Michigan Supreme Court ruled that automatic life sentences without the possibility of parole for 19- and 20-year-old individuals convicted of murder are unconstitutional under state law, reported The Detroit Free Press. The ruling builds off a 2022 decision by the court to ban such sentences for 18-year-olds.

In a 5-2 majority opinion, Justice Elizabeth Welch wrote automatic sentences of life without parole for 19- and 20-year-olds with murder convictions violates the Michigan Constitution's ban against cruel and unusual punishment. Welch noted a 2022 Michigan Supreme Court ruling found similar sentences unconstitutional for 18-year-olds because late-adolescence cognitive development can still be taking place.

The ruling issued Thursday applied the interpretation to sentences of life without parole to 19- and 20-year-olds, who also similarly could still be experiencing cognitive development, Welch wrote. It also retroactively applies "to all relevant criminal cases," meaning a prisoner facing a sentence of life without parole for a murder that took place when they were 19 or 20 could ask a judge for a new sentence.

"Late adolescents who are 19- or 20-years-old, as a class, share with 18-year-olds the same mitigating characteristics of late-adolescent brain development," Welch wrote. She later added a sentence of life without parole "that does not allow for consideration of the mitigating factors of youth or the potential for rehabilitation is a grossly disproportionate punishment in violation."

A sentence of life without parole could still be possible, but 19- and 20-year-olds convicted of murder will now receive the same right to a hearing to determine if they can be sentenced to life without parole, currently in place for those 18 and younger.

Joining Welch in the majority were Justices Megan Cavanagh, Richard Bernstein, Kyra Harris Bolden and Kimberly Thomas. All five justices in the majority opinion were nominated by Democrats.

The court's two Republican-nominated justices, Chief Justice Elizabeth Clement and Justice Brian Zahra, dissented. In the dissent, Clement argued the severity of a first-degree murder conviction could be met with the most severe sentence possible.

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Mangino discusses student visas on WFMJ-TV

Watch my interview with Derek Steyer of WFMJ-TV regarding the revocation of student visas across the country.

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Idaho police shot nonverbal, autistic, intellectually disabled juvenile with cerebral palsy nine-times resulting in leg amputation

Dozens of protestors gathered outside the Pocatello Police Department following an officer-involved shooting, according to EastIdahoNews.com.

Their signs read “Bloody Hands, Dirty Cowards,” “Do Better PPD,” “Hold PPD accountable” and “What are Tasers for?”

The protest comes after a teen identified as 17-year-old Victor Perez was repeatedly shot by multiple police officers April 5, 2025 near the 700 block of North Harrison Avenue. Video of the shooting was widely circulated on social media.

The family tells EastIdahoNews.com that Perez has cerebral palsy.

Idaho police officers opened fire from behind a chain-link fence just seconds after exiting their patrol cars and critically wounded a teenage boy — described by his family as nonverbal, autistic and intellectually disabled — as he stepped toward them with a knife, video from a witness shows.

Seventeen-year-old Perez, remained hospitalized in critical condition after having nine bullets removed from his body and having his leg amputated, Ana Vazquez, his aunt, told The Associated Press. Doctors were planning tests on his brain activity.

The video, sent to EastIdahoNews.com by multiple people, shows Perez lying on the ground outside of a home in the front yard. He appears to be holding a knife or some other object and is arguing with a woman, who attempts to get the item from the Perez’s hands.

A neighbor filming the incident is on the phone with a police dispatcher and says Perez, who was on the ground, was hit in the head by a log. Police arrived at the scene at 5:25 p.m., according to a police news release, and four officers get out of their vehicles with guns drawn.

Video shows them yelling at Perez and telling him to drop his weapon. The officers were in front of a chainlink fence and not in the yard. Perez appears to stand up and move toward the officers, who then fire multiple shots.

“Immediate life-saving measures” were performed before Perez was taken to Portneuf Medical Center, according to the news release.

It’s unclear what led to the situation in the front yard, but many say police were too aggressive in their response to the situation.

The Pocatello Police Department remained quiet Sunday and did not release any updates about the shooting. EastIdahoNews.com requested additional information from the department and the city’s public information officer, but our messages were not returned.

The shooting is under investigation by the East Idaho Critical Incident Task Force. Police have asked for public’s patience as the investigation unfolds.

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Florida executes man for 2000 abduction and murder

 The 11th Execution of 2025

Michael Tanzi convicted of killing a Miami Herald employee who was abducted on her lunch break was executed on April 8, 2025, reported The Associated Press.

Tanzi was pronounced dead at 6:12 p.m. following a three-drug injection at Florida State Prison for the April 2000 strangling of Janet Acosta, a production worker at the South Florida paper. The victim was attacked in her van, beaten, robbed, driven to the Florida Keys and then strangled before her body was left on an island.

In a final statement, his voice barely audible, Tanzi said, “I want to apologize to the family” and then recited a verse from the Bible before the drugs began flowing.

Tanzi’s chest heaved for about three minutes, then stopped. A corrections officer shook him by the shoulders and said his name loudly twice to determine if he was still conscious. There was no response shortly before Tanzi, 48, was declared dead.

He was the third person executed in Florida this year. Another lethal injection is scheduled May 1 under death warrants signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis.

After the execution, Acosta’s family members expressed relief that the ordeal was finally over. “It’s done. Basically, justice for Janet happened,” said her sister, Julie Andrew, who witnessed the execution. ”My heart felt lighter and I can breathe again.”

Acosta’s niece, Janet Vanderwier, noted it took nearly 25 years to find closure. “This is the culmination of more than two decades of work to get justice for Janet,” she said.

Court records show Acosta was on a break on April 25, 2000, when she was attacked. She was reading a book in her van when Tanzi approached, asked for a cigarette, and began punching her in the face, the records state.

“Holding her wrist and threatening her with a razor blade,” Tanzi drove to Homestead, south of Miami, where he bound and gagged Acosta. Prosecutors said he took $53 in cash from her, along with her bank card.

They then headed to the Florida Keys town of Tavernier. There, according to the records, Tanzi used Acosta’s bank card to steal money from her account before stopping at a hardware store to buy duct tape and razor blades.

“He drove to an isolated area in Cudjoe Key, told her he was going to kill her, and began to strangle her,” according to a summary by the state Commission on Capital Cases. “He stopped to place duct tape over her mouth, nose and eyes in an attempt to quiet her and then strangled her.”

Acosta’s friends and co-workers reported her missing after she failed to return from her break. That led police to her van, which Tanzi drove to Key West. Police said Tanzi confessed to the crime and showed investigators where he had left Acosta’s body on Cudjoe Key, more than 140 miles (225 kilometers) southwest of Miami.

“If I had let her go, I was gonna get caught quicker,” Tanzi told officers, according to the record. “I didn’t want to get caught. I was having too much fun ... I told her, I says, ‘I can’t let you go. If I let you go, then I’m gonna be in a lot of trouble.’ ”

Tanzi was convicted of first-degree murder, carjacking, kidnapping and armed robbery, drawing a 12-0 jury recommendation for the death penalty.

All of his subsequent appeals were unsuccessful, including a late request for a stay of execution rejected Tuesday afternoon by the U.S. Supreme Court. The Florida Supreme Court also recently rejected his claim he shouldn’t be executed because he was “morbidly obese” and had sciatica, raising the risk of unconstitutional levels of pain.

Two other executions were conducted earlier this year in Florida. Edward James, 63, received a lethal injection March 20 for killing an 8-year-old girl and her grandmother during a night of heavy drinking and drug use. James Dennis Ford, 64, was executed Feb. 13 for killing a husband and wife at a remote farm in an attack witnessed by the couple’s toddler, who was unharmed.

Eight other people have been executed elsewhere in the U.S. in 2025: two in South Carolina, two in Texas and one each in Alabama, Arizona, Louisiana and Oklahoma. One South Carolina execution was by firing squad, and another firing squad execution is scheduled Friday. About a dozen other executions are still scheduled nationwide.

The nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center said Florida’s lethal injection uses a sedative, a paralytic and a drug that stops the heart.

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