US Domestic News Roundup: Butina pleads guilty in U.S. to conspiracy; More Americans view climate change as 'imminent' threat

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

More Americans view climate change as 'imminent' threat: Reuters/Ipsos Poll

A growing percentage of Americans see climate change as an "imminent" threat driven mainly by human activity, and more than two-thirds want Washington to work with other nations to combat it, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Thursday. The public concern over global warming in the United States clashes with President Donald Trump's policies aimed at maximizing fossil fuels production and dismantling climate protections he views as too onerous and costly for industry.

Butina admits being Russian agent, pleads guilty in U.S. to conspiracy

A Russian woman pleaded guilty in a U.S. court on Thursday to a single conspiracy charge in a deal with prosecutors and admitted to working with a top Russian official to infiltrate a powerful gun rights group and make inroads with American conservative activists and the Republican Party as an agent for Moscow. Maria Butina, a former graduate student at American University in Washington who publicly advocated for gun rights, entered the plea to a charge of conspiracy to act as a foreign agent at a hearing in Washington. She became the first Russian to be convicted of working to influence U.S. policy during the 2016 presidential race and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

New York sues Target, Walmart for sale of lead-contaminated toys

New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood said on Thursday that she had filed a lawsuit against Target Corp, Walmart Inc and toy importer LaRose Industries over the sale of lead-contaminated children's toys. Underwood said her office conducted tests in New York City, Long Island, and the Syracuse and Buffalo areas on "Cra-Z-Jewelz" jewelry-making kits that were imported by LaRose and found levels up to 10 times higher than the federal limit.

Bomb threats demanding bitcoin sweep U.S., Canada, none found credible

A rash of bomb threats were emailed on Thursday to hundreds of businesses, public offices and schools across the United States and Canada demanding payment in cryptocurrency, but none of the threats appeared credible, law enforcement officials said. One email targeting a St. Louis-area middle school was traced by local investigators to an internet protocol, or IP, address in Moscow, the sheriff's office in Lincoln County, Missouri said.

Jury convicts ex-employees of pharmacy in U.S. meningitis outbreak

A co-owner and four ex-employees of a Massachusetts compounding pharmacy were convicted on Thursday of committing frauds and other illegal activities that helped boost its business before a deadly 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak linked to drugs it made. The verdict by a federal jury in Boston came in the latest criminal trial involving former executives and employees of New England Compounding Center, which produced mold-tainted steroids that prosecutors said sickened hundreds of people and killed more than 100.

Florida set to execute man convicted of killing woman during burglary

Florida is scheduled on Thursday to execute a man who was convicted of beating and stabbing a 63-year-old North Miami woman to death during a burglary more than two decades ago. Jose Jimenez, 55, is set to die by lethal injection at the Florida's execution chamber in Raiford at 6 p.m. EST (2300 GMT), the state's department of corrections said.

Curry agrees to lunar lab visit: NASA

Three-time NBA champion Stephen Curry will take space agency NASA up on its offer to tour its lunar lab after he sparked controversy by saying he did not believe humans had ever been to the Moon, comments he later called a joke. Allard Beutel, a spokesman for the agency who this week invited Curry to tour the Johnson Space Center in Houston, told science publication Inverse on Thursday the Golden State guard said he would be willing to make the trip.

Chirp perp: Finches found in luggage at NY airport

A man was caught at New York's JFK airport last weekend trying to smuggle dozens of South American finches into the country, a bird that Guyanese immigrants covet for chirping but officials fear could spread disease, officials said on Thursday. About 70 finches were found hidden inside a shipment of hair rollers at John F. Kennedy International Airport on Saturday when a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agriculture specialist inspected the unidentified male passenger's luggage. Some of the birds had died enroute.

Alabama attorney general takes over probe of police shooting at mall

Alabama's attorney general said on Thursday he will take over the investigation into the killing of a black man by a police officer who mistook him as a suspect in a shooting at a shopping mall on Thanksgiving night. In a letter to Jefferson County District Attorney Danny Carr, Attorney General Steve Marshall said he made the decision after Carr admitted the presence of potential conflicts and biases between him and other parties in the case.

U.S. appeals court narrows Trump birth control ruling

A U.S. appeals court on Thursday narrowed an order that had blocked President Donald Trump's administration from enforcing new rules that undermine an Obamacare requirement for employers to provide insurance that covers women's birth control. Last year two federal judges, one in Philadelphia and one in Oakland, California, had blocked the government from enforcing rules allowing businesses or nonprofits to obtain exemptions from the contraception policy on moral or religious grounds. The Justice Department appealed both rulings.

(With inputs from Reuters)