Delaware
Delaware replaces Trump’s U.S. attorney without legal drama seen in Jersey, Virginia
Sens. Coons, Blunt Rochester deemed Murray unqualified
Murray also acknowledged that she could not have obtained the post by the process outlined in the U.S. Constitution, in which a president makes a formal nomination and U.S. Senate confirmation is required.
That’s because part of that process is a longstanding tradition that requires the nominee to receive so-called “blue slip” endorsements by their state’s two U.S. senators.
Delaware’s two U.S. senators, Chris Coons and Lisa Blunt Rochester, are Democrats who interviewed Murray for the post. Coons said the duo decided Murray, who has done criminal defense work, didn’t have the prosecutorial experience to qualify as the state’s chief federal law enforcement official.
Although Murray accused the senators of playing politics with her unconventional appointment, Coons and Blunt Rochester disagreed.
“Any suggestion of political partiality throughout this process is misleading and blatantly false, said Taj Magruder, a spokesman for Blunt Rochester.
Coons, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that considers nominees before they are considered by the full Senate, told WHYY News last month that Murray’s acting status was “probably illegal.”
After Colm Connolly, Delaware’s chief federal judge, issued the order naming Wallace, Coons said he’s pleased the judges exercised their lawful “power to appoint a U.S. attorney in the absence of a presidential nomination.”
Coons said he’s also relieved that the transition occurred without the rancor seen in New Jersey and the Eastern District of Virginia.
In Virginia, former Trump insurance lawyer Lindsay Halligan was ruled ineligible by a federal judge in her district because Bondi named her interim boss after the 120-day period to do so under federal law had expired.
Perhaps more importantly, the indictments Halligan obtained days after taking office against former FBI director James Comey and New York Attorney General Latisha James were dismissed. Bondi has pledged to appeal but has not yet done so.
Though Habba resigned after the adverse ruling in New Jersey, Halligan remains in her post in Virginia.
Other end-around maneuvers by Trump and Bondi have been deemed unlawful in Nevada, New Mexico and California, but those three remain under appeal.
“I’m just glad that we’ve avoided that level of drama here and that in Ben Wallace, we’ve got a court-appointed U.S. attorney who can keep the office moving forward in a constructive way,” Coons said.
Besides handling major crimes, “the district of Delaware handles some of our country’s most important patent litigation, corporate litigation, bankruptcy litigation,” Coons said.
“So it’s important for Delawareans and our constituents that we have a well-managed, disciplined, appropriate respect for the rule of law in how the federal courts here are handled and how the U.S. attorney’s office is led. And I’m relieved that we seem to have a path forward here that is appropriate.”
Law prof says Judge Connolly ‘navigated it as best he could’
Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond who tracks appointments of U.S. attorneys and federal judges, praised Connolly, a Republican and former U.S. attorney for Delaware, for his deft handling of the potentially volatile situation.
“He navigated it as best he could. He didn’t provoke a confrontation,” Tobias said of Connolly, who Trump appointed as a judge during his first presidential term, with the Senate’s approval. “And he deserves a lot of credit for keeping the courts moving.”
Prior to Friday’s order, Connolly had publicly sought applications for the post, writing that “the court would only appoint a person the court deems qualified for the position.”
That clearly wasn’t Murray. In his previous order in November, Connolly wrote that judges had decided not to name anyone to the post after Murray’s interim status expired Nov. 12.
That prompted Bondi to name her “acting” U.S. attorney and led U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, himself a former Trump personal attorney, to publicly rebuke Connolly on social media.
Humpback whale beaches and dies at Delaware Seashore State Park
The Marine Education, Research and Rehabilitation Institute will perform a necropsy.
A dead humpback whale washed up near Bethany Beach on Jan. 8, according to the nonprofit Marine Education Research and Rehabilitation Institute.
The juvenile male was first seen Jan. 6, floating at sea about 2 miles off the Indian River Inlet, a MERR Facebook post said. The bloated 30-foot whale ultimately beached near a private community in the early afternoon of Jan. 8, the post said.
MERR is attempting to coordinate with the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control to get equipment to move the whale out of the water and onto the beach to perform a necropsy, the post said. Right now, there isn’t enough information to determine a cause of death.
Delaware saw at least three dead whales last year, in the Indian River Bay, at Delaware Seashore State Park and at Pigeon Point. The first two were humpbacks, while the Pigeon Point whale was a fin whale.
A necropsy on the Delaware Seashore whale found blunt force trauma across its back, indicating it may have been struck by a ship, MERR Director Suzanne Thurman said.
Recently, on Jan. 4, a dead fin whale was found on the bow of a ship at the Gloucester Marine Terminal in New Jersey, which is located in the Port of Philadelphia on the Delaware River.
Shannon Marvel McNaught reports on southern Delaware and beyond. Reach her at smcnaught@gannett.com or on Facebook.
A Pennsylvania man is accused of stealing more than 100 skeletons from a cemetery in Delaware County.
Jonathan Gerlach, 34, of Ephrata, Pennsylvania, is charged with abuse of corpse, criminal mischief, burglary and other related offenses, Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse revealed on Thursday, Jan. 8.
Léelo en español aquí
Between November 2025 and Jan. 6, 2026, 26 mausoleums and underground burial sites had been burglarized or desecrated at Mount Moriah Cemetery, which stretches from Yeadon Borough, Pennsylvania, to Philadelphia, investigators said.
As police investigated the thefts, they caught Gerlach desecrating a monument at the cemetery on Tuesday, Jan. 6, according to officials. Gerlach was taken into custody and investigators executed a search warrant at his home in Ephrata.
During the search, investigators recovered 100 human skeletons from Gerlach’s home as well as eight more human remains inside a storage locker, according to Rouse.
“Detectives walked into a horror movie come to life the other night guys,” Rouse said. “This is an unbelievable scene that no one involved – from myself to the detectives to the medical examiners that are now trying to piece together what they are looking at, quite literally – none of them have ever seen anything like this before.”
Rouse said some of the stolen skeletons are hundreds of years old.
“We are trying to figure out exactly what we are looking at,” Rouse said. “We quite simply at this juncture are not able to date and identify all of them.”
Rouse also said some of the skeletons are of infants and children.
“It is truly, in the most literal sense of the word, horrific,” Rouse said. “I grieve for those who are upset by this who are going through it who are trying to figure out if it is in fact their loved one or their child because we found remains that we believe to be months old infants among those that he had collected. Our hearts go out to every family that is impacted by this.”
Sources also told NBC10 the thefts are related to a similar case in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. Investigators said they are looking at Gerlach’s online community — including his social media groups and Facebook page — to determine if people were buying, selling, or trading the remains.
Gerlach is currently in custody at the Delaware County Prison after failing to post $1 million bail. Online court records don’t list an attorney who could speak on his behalf.
VENTNOR, N.J. (WPVI) — A Delaware woman is behind bars in connection with a hit-and-run crash in November at the Jersey shore.
(The video in the player above is from previous coverage.)
The incident happened around 6:16 p.m. on Nov. 20 in Ventnor, New Jersey.
READ MORE | Video shows Jersey shore hit-and-run crash that left 92-year-old injured
Police said the 92-year-old victim was struck at Ventnor and Newport avenues. He sustained serious injuries and was transported to an area hospital.
Investigators said the driver, Leslie Myers, 51, of Weldin Park, Delaware, fled the scene after the crash.
She was arrested Wednesday on charges of assault by auto, leaving the scene of an accident and other related offenses.
Myers is being held in the Allegheny County Jail in Pennsylvania, awaiting extradition to New Jersey.
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Man charged after over 100 human skeletal remains found in Pennsylvania home – National | Globalnews.ca
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