Reuters US Domestic News Summary

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs. California couple sentenced to life in prison in severe child abuse case

A Southern California couple was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison on Friday after the pair pleaded guilty to charges stemming from grim, headline-making accusations they beat, starved and shackled their 13 children in the family's home, prosecutors said. David Turpin, 57, and his wife Louise Turpin, 50, had agreed to be sentenced to 25 years to life in prison as part of an agreement with Riverside County prosecutors that saw them plead guilty in February to torture, child abuse and false imprisonment charges. Elon Musk's SpaceX suffers capsule anomaly during Florida tests

Elon Musk's SpaceX suffered an anomaly in one of its Crew Dragon capsules while conducting engine tests at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Saturday, the company said. "The initial tests completed successfully but the final test resulted in an anomaly on the test stand," the company said in a statement. Doves, heartbreak and hope on 20th anniversary of Columbine High massacre

A week-long series of events commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre culminated on Saturday with a remembrance ceremony celebrating the lives of the 13 victims slain in the rampage. On April 20, 1999, two Columbine students, just three weeks shy of graduation, stormed the suburban Denver school armed with shotguns and semiautomatic weapons, fatally shooting 12 students and a teacher before committing suicide. U.S. service member dies in non-combat incident in Iraq: statement

An American service member died in a "non-combat incident" on Saturday in Ninawa Province, Iraq, the U.S.-led coalition fighting Islamic State said in a statement. The statement did not identify the service member, nor give details of the incident, and said further information would be released "as appropriate." Seagram heiress Clare Bronfman pleads guilty in New York sex cult case

Seagram liquor heiress Clare Bronfman pleaded guilty on Friday to harboring an illegal immigrant and enabling credit card fraud as part of an alleged sex cult based in upstate New York. Bronfman, 40, entered her plea to the two criminal counts before U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis in federal court in Brooklyn, New York. She is one of several people charged in connection with a secretive organization called Nxivm, which federal prosecutors have described as a racketeering organization. Trump approval drops 3 points to 2019 low after release of Mueller report: Reuters/Ipsos poll

The number of Americans who approve of President Donald Trump dropped by 3 percentage points to the lowest level of the year following the release of a special counsel report detailing Russian interference in the last U.S. presidential election, according to an exclusive Reuters/Ipsos public opinion poll. The poll, conducted Thursday afternoon to Friday morning, is the first national survey to measure the response from the American public after the U.S. Justice Department released Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s 448-page report that recounted numerous occasions in which Trump may have interfered with the investigation. Tiger attacks Kansas zoo keeper after 'error' brought two together

A rare Sumatran tiger attacked a worker at the Topeka Zoo in Kansas on Saturday, wounding the back of her head and neck before other staff members were able to coax the animal away with food, officials said. The zoo keeper was alert and awake when she was rushed to a hospital, where she was listed in stable condition, city of Topeka spokeswoman Molly Hadfield said by phone. Admitted Russian agent Butina asks U.S. court to be lenient

Maria Butina, who has admitted to working as a Russian agent to infiltrate an influential U.S. gun rights group and make inroads with conservative activists and Republicans, asked the court to sentence her to time served ahead of her April 26 sentencing, according to court documents. Butina, 30, a former graduate student at American University who publicly advocated for gun rights, pleaded guilty in December to one count of conspiring to act as a foreign agent for Russia. She has remained in custody since her arrest in July 2018. Mexico warns of 'deep concern' over armed groups on U.S. border

Mexico said on Saturday it had "deep concern" about armed groups that intimidate and extort migrants on the border, shortly after the ACLU and Democratic senators called for a probe into such citizen efforts to block migrants from crossing. "These types of practices can drive human rights abuses of people who migrate or request asylum or refuge in the United States," Mexico's Foreign Relations Ministry said in a statement, referring to "militia groups" in New Mexico. FBI arrests leader of armed group stopping migrants in New Mexico

The FBI on Saturday said it had arrested Larry Hopkins, the leader of an armed group that is stopping undocumented migrants after they cross the U.S.-Mexico border into New Mexico. The arrest came two days after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) accused the group of illegally detaining migrants and New Mexico's Democratic Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham ordered an investigation.