INDIANAPOLIS — Adam Vinatieri, the NFL’s career scoring leader who was also widely considered the best clutch kicker in league history, will have one more celebration on the Indianapolis Colts’ home turf this season when he’s inducted into the team’s Ring of Honor.

Team officials announced Wednesday that Vinatieri would be honored during the Colts’ game against the Tennessee Titans on Oct. 18, a little more than two months after his induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

Vinatieri will become the Colts’ 21st Ring of Honor honoree five years after he officially retired.

He’ll join a group that includes former teammates and fellow Hall of Famers Peyton Manning, Marvin Harrison and Dwight Freeney, as well as Robert Mathis, Jeff Saturday and Reggie Wayne. Tony Dungy, the Hall of Fame coach for whom Vinatieri played; Hall of Fame executive Bill Polian, who signed Vinatieri as a free agent before the 2006 season; and late team owner Jim Irsay are also in the Colts’ ring.

The four-time Super Bowl champion shocked many when he left New England as the franchise’s career scoring leader after 10 seasons and wound up with longtime rival Indianapolis. But Vinatieri was far from finished and went on to break the Colts’ career scoring mark, too.

Though Vinatieri’s stats tell one tale: He finished his career with 2,673 points and as the league’s all-time leader in field goals made (599), field goal attempts (715), consecutive field goals made (44) and 100-plus point seasons (21). But it was his penchant for making kicks in the toughest conditions and most crucial moments that stuck with him.

His 45-yard field goal into swirling winds amid snowy conditions for New England in a January 2002 AFC divisional round game tied it and sent the Patriots into overtime against the then-Oakland Raiders. He then kicked a 23-yarder to start New England’s trek to coach Bill Belichick’s first Super Bowl.

Two weeks later, Vinatieri did it again by making a 43-yarder in the waning seconds to give the Patriots their first Super Bowl title with a 20-17 victory over the then-St. Louis Rams in much more ideal conditions.

Vinatieri 41-yarder with 4 seconds left broke a 29-29 tie with the Carolina Panthers for New England’s second Super Bowl title two years later.

Vinatieri continued to excel in Indy, where he first played inside a dome stadium and later a retractable roof stadium.

In January 2007, the South Dakota State alum made five field goals in a divisional round game that featured no touchdowns at Baltimore. The 15-6 victory set up an AFC title game rematch between the Colts and Patriots, this time in Indy with Vinatieri on the opposite sideline from Tom Brady and his ex-teammates. Vinatieri’s playoff run continued as the Colts reached their first Super Bowl since the franchise moved to Indianapolis.

Vinatieri made three more field goals and captured yet another ring while finishing that postseason with 49 points and 14 field goals, both one-season playoff records, while becoming the first player to make three or more field goals in four consecutive postseason games.

Vinatieri ranks second all-time in NFL victories (242), regular-season wins (221) and postseason wins (21) and is one of five players who appeared in a game at age 46. He’s the only player in league history to make 250 or more field goals and scored 1,000 points for two teams.

The three-time All-Pro also was a three-time Pro Bowl selection and a member of the NFL’s 100th Anniversary All-Time Team.

The defendants, ages 20 – 63, engaged in sexually explicit online conversations with undercover officers posing as children. Contact was initiated through popular social media applications. The defendants expressed an interest in engaging in sexual activity with the purported children. Some of the defendants disseminated images of their genitals and others offered to pay for sexual activity during the online conversations.

Initial charges – ranging from third-degree to fifth-degree felonies – were filed against the defendants, which include:

• Compelling Prostitution
• Attempted Unlawful Sexual Conduct With A Minor
• Disseminating Matter Harmful To Juveniles
• Importuning
• Possessing Criminal Tools

The arrested individuals include:

• Brian Ferguson, 38, Cleveland
• Andre Johnson, 37, Maple Heights
• Luca Ascione, 31, Strongsville
• Doug Matheson, 51, Berne, New York
• Timothy Rankin, 37, Elyria
• Glen Martin, 52, Eastlake
• Christopher Docy, 28, North Ridgeville
• Dominick Craig, 37, Logan
• Gerald Rhome, 51, East Cleveland
• Deandre Anderson, 24, Warrensville Heights
• Tai’rez Jackson, 24, Cleveland
• Esteban Baltazar, 63, Springfield, Tennessee
• Oscar Aparicio, 24, Houston, Texas
• Mohammad Mabrouk, 29, Cleveland
• Michael Sullivan, 20, Cleveland
• Brett Musselman, 33, Kent
• David Whitfield, 35, Geneva,
• Delwin Ortiz, 29, Cleveland
• Samuel Kanyaruginga, 35, Cleveland
• Domonic Delvalle, 35, Cleveland
• Clyde Sweeney, 46, Fairlawn
• Jason Kopco, 27, Westlake
• Zachary Brodeur, 37, Flynn, Massachusetts
• Vishwatej Nath, 45, Berea (charges will be filed in Lake County)
• Klajdi Vrapi, 27, Fairview Park

“Operation Guardians’ Watch was coordinated by the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office and the Ohio ICAC Task Force with the assistance of the Newburgh Heights Police Department, Cuyahoga County Sheriff’s Office, Parma Police Department, Sheffield Village Police Department, Homeland Security Investigations Cleveland, U.S Secret Service, Federal Bureau of Investigation Cleveland, Ohio Attorney General’s Bureau of Criminal Investigation, Van Wert County Sheriff’s Office, Kirtland Police Department, Lyndhurst Police Department, Amherst Police Department, Warren Police Department, Perrysburg Police Department, Kelleys Island Police Department, Ottawa County Sheriff’s Department, and Portage County Sheriff’s Department.

This is the seventh undercover operation the Task Force has led since 2018. The total number of arrests from the Task Force’s operations stands at 160 offenders arrested.

*Ohio ICAC Task Force:

The Ohio Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force is run under the direction of the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office and funded in part by a grant from the Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. The task force conducts proactive and reactive investigations dealing with the online exploitation of children and provides training and technical assistance to more than 385 local, state, and federal criminal justice-affiliated agencies throughout the state of Ohio.

Illinois will get $1.1 million of a $45 million, 45-state settlement with money transfer app Cash App’s parent company, which was accused of misleading customers about the app’s security.

Block Inc. will face $55 million in civil penalties and also have to pay customers nationwide somewhere from $75 million to $120 million as part of the settlement, which includes the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

In a statement, Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul said the settlement holds the company accountable and requires it to “change its harmful practices.”

“Block told Cash App users their money was safe and falsely implied that the app worked like a bank, with the same protections,” Raoul said. “Block was aware that fraud on its platform was rising sharply and failed to warn users, strengthen protections or provide real help to users when things went wrong.”

A company spokesperson confirmed the settlement and said the company has made “significant investments in consumer protection, customer service, and compliance.”

“We share the commitment of the attorneys general to addressing industry challenges and continue to invest in operations and technology to promote a safe and healthy financial ecosystem,” the spokesperson said in a statement provided to the Sun-Times Wednesday night.

The lawsuit accused the company of not preventing fraud, and even of having systems that made it easier to commit that fraud. Minimal identity verification allowed someone to create fake or multiple accounts, and the company had no phone support line. Instead, customers who had been defrauded often were provided by those fraudsters with fake online customer support phone numbers, the suit alleged.

As part of the agreement, the company must offer at least 13.5 hours of human-staffed phone lines per day as part of 24-hour support, as well as reimburse customers for fraudulent transactions, stop marketing the app as safe and educate users about the dangers of fraud.