​NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!. The four astronauts on the Artemis II mission are nearly halfway to the moon since launching on Wednesday from the Kennedy Space Center.. “Since [Thursday’s] trans-lunar injection burn to send the crew around the moon, the mission continues to perform well overall, and the crew is in great spirits,” Lakiesha Hawkins, acting deputy associate administrator for NASA’s exploration systems said in a news conference on Friday.. “Currently, the crew is more than 100,000 miles from Earth and about 150,000 miles to go away from the moon.. “We call amazing things that humans do moonshots for a reason, and indeed, this is literally and symbolically our moonshot that we are in the middle of.”. NASA RACES TO BUILD MOON BASE AS US CHALLENGES CHINA IN NEW SPACE RACE. Hawkins also shared two photos taken by astronaut Cmdr. Reid Wiseman from the Orion spacecraft.. The first image, Hawkins said, shows a “backlit Earth revealing auroras as the crew heads toward the moon.”. She said it was taken by astronaut Wiseman out of a window on the Orion spacecraft, and it features two auroras and zodiacal light “at the bottom right. It’s visible as the Earth eclipses to sun.”. “It’s great to think — with the exception of our four friends — all of us are represented in this image,” Hawkins said.. NASA RETURNS HUMANS TO DEEP SPACE AFTER OVER 50 YEARS WITH FEBRUARY ARTEMIS II MOON MISSION. A second photo taken by Wiseman after the trans-lunar injection burn, which propels a spacecraft out of the Earth’s orbit, on Thursday shows the terminator line, separating day from night on Earth.. “So, we continue to learn about our spacecraft as we operate it in deep space with crew for the first time and it’s important to remind ourselves of that as we learn a little bit more day-by-day,” Hawkins said.. ARTEMIS II CREW DESCRIBES LIFE ABOARD ORION SPACECRAFT ON HISTORIC JOURNEY TO THE MOON AND BACK. Artemis II Ascent Flight Director Judd Frieling said after the translunar injection burn on Thursday that the crew did an inspection of their windows, had planned medical conferences, and while they were asleep, the ground crew checked to see how the spacecraft was functioning.. And after the astronauts woke up Friday morning, they were able to talk to their families.. “We had planned a trajectory correction burn,” Frieling said. “The systems are doing so well now — navigation and propulsion systems together — that that was not needed. So, we’ll roll that into the next planned correction trajectory burn tomorrow.”. THE RACE TO THE MOON IS BACK — NASA NEEDS TO GET SERIOUS TO BEAT THE CHINESE. Howard Hu, Orion’s program manager, said that the subsystems on the spacecraft continue to perform well, the air revitalization system is “doing very well” and the propellant usage was within 5% of their predicated usage limits.. He said they are working through one pressurization issue that relates to helium that pressurizes propellant  

​NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!. A “repeat offender” coyote has been captured and euthanized after being caught on camera biting and attempting to drag away a four-year-old boy standing in his grandparents’ driveway in Southern California earlier this week.. Four-year-old Solomon suffered seven puncture wounds on his legs and torso after the coyote bit and attempted to drag the young boy away in heart-stopping video caught on surveillance camera.. “I just hear him screaming and I turn around and I scream as well because I see the coyote on top of him,” Solomon’s mother Sarina Donohoo told FOX 11 Los Angeles.. TODDLER FLEES IN TERROR AS COYOTE CHASES HIM OUTSIDE CALIFORNIA FAMILY HOME IN BROAD DAYLIGHT. “He bit me,” Solomon said. “He tried to drag me.”. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife believes the animal may be responsible for even more attacks than initially believed, according to reporting from FOX 11 Los Angeles. The coyote may have been a “repeat offender,” with the animal linked to two additional victims reporting attacks on March 26 and March 30. According to FOX 11, DNA testing linked the coyote to a separate attack on a child on Feb. 11 near an elementary school.. Wildlife authorities confirmed with FOX 11 that the coyote was “humanely euthanized” on Thursday per “standard protocol” for animals that attack humans.. OREGON CHILD ATTACKED BY COYOTE DURING GAME OF HIDE-AND-SEEK IN BACKYARD; STATE OFFICIALS SOUND ALARM. “For a wild animal to walk up into your yard and try to snatch your grandchild, it’s like the most horrific thing in the world,” Solomon’s grandmother and property owner Stephanie Fields added.. The terrifying incident happened early in the morning, just before 9 a.m., as his mother was unloading groceries from her vehicle.. “I was so scared because I know how bad it could have been,” Sarina said, recalling the chilling incident. “My initial response was just, I need to get him away.”. Grandfather Stanley Fields shared that little Solomon is now undergoing a series of rabies treatments.. “He got nipped three times, and now he’s going through rabies protocol,” Stanley said. “He’s four years old, and I just think it was a little much for a young child to experience.”. A neighbor who operates a nearby daycare told FOX 11 she now carries an air horn and a golf club for protection in the area.. Authorities have urged residents in the neighborhood to “remain vigilant” as officials confirm whether other aggressive coyotes remain in the area, according to FOX 11.. CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP. Other recommendations for residents include supervising small children, especially outdoors, and using loud noises like air horns to deter wild animals. Residents are also encouraged to secure any food waste and trash bins.. Authorities encourage witnesses to call the Carson Sheriff’s Station at 310-830-1123 for coyote attacks or California Fish & Wildlife at 858-467-4257 for coyote sightings.  

​NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!. A 25-year-old man has been charged with murder after authorities say he randomly stabbed a woman to death in a quiet South Florida neighborhood, according to the Martin County Sheriff’s Office.. Kersten Francilus, who lives in a nearby community, is accused of attacking a woman in her 70s as she walked her dog Friday in the Southwood neighborhood in Stuart, Sheriff John Budensiek said.. Neighbors had called deputies shortly before the attack to report a suspicious man going door to door and asking unusual questions.. “We receive multiple calls in this community. The Southwood community, which is a quiet, higher end community here in Martin County. Multiple calls of a suspicious male walking door to door and interacting with different people,” Budensiek said during a news conference.. GOT A TIP?. “He asked several times, several different people where the new bank was. There’s no bank around here,” he said.. Witnesses described the man as calm and nonconfrontational during those encounters, the sheriff said.. A short time later, authorities received additional calls reporting that the same man was attacking a woman in a cul-de-sac.. A deputy who was already en route to investigate the suspicious activity arrived to find the suspect “actively stabbing” the victim while she lay on the ground, Budensiek said.. “Our suspect was on top of her, actually actively stabbing her,” he said.. A brave good Samaritan attempted to intervene but was unable to stop the attack before deputies arrived, officials said.. When confronted by the deputy, Francilus immediately dropped the knife and surrendered.. The victim suffered stab wounds to the upper torso and was transported to Cleveland Clinic Martin South, where she died, authorities said.. “This was a violent, vile homicide,” Budensiek said.. Police said there is no known connection between Francilus and the victim, and no clear motive has been identified.. “At this point, this appears like an extremely violent, random act of violence,” Budensiek said.. FOLLOW US ON X. Francilus was taken into custody at the scene and later booked into the Martin County Jail. Authorities said the knife used in the attack was a steak knife believed to have come from his home.. GET BREAKING NEWS BY EMAIL. The sheriff’s office said Francilus has no known criminal history, though deputies had previously responded to a call involving him acting strangely at his residence.. CLICK HERE FOR MORE US NEWS. Budensiek said residents were wise to report the man’s peculiar behavior.. CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP. “The community did what they needed to do. They saw something that wasn’t right. They called the Martin County Sheriff’s Office,” he said.. Authorities have not released the victim’s name.  

​A sweeping federal takedown in Los Angeles has exposed what prosecutors say is a brazen, multimillion-dollar scheme that turned end-of-life care into a cash grab, allegedly using people who weren’t even dying to rip off taxpayers by more than $50 million. Eight defendants, including nurses, a chiropractor and a purported psychologist, were arrested in a crackdown targeting sham hospice operations and fraudulent medical billing schemes, according to the Justice Department. At the center of the case, hospice companies are accused of enrolling healthy patients, paying kickbacks and pocketing millions from Medicare for treatment that was never needed or never provided.

“We are enforcing a zero-tolerance policy for criminals who defraud American taxpayers,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said. “The defendants arrested this morning who are charged with stealing millions of dollars of health care benefits got caught and now face years in federal prison.”

Investigators say the pattern was repeated across multiple cases. Patients who weren’t dying were enrolled in hospice, marketers were paid illegal kickbacks and providers cashed in while delivering little or no legitimate care.

In Anaheim, Lolita Minerd, a nurse, allegedly ran a hospice business that recruited patients at a market, promising them free services and $300 a month in cash to enroll. Some of the couples who signed up were not terminally ill, a doctor confirmed, yet they were paid $600 a month in envelopes of cash while Medicare was billed for end-of-life care. Minerd’s company alone submitted more than $9.1 million in claims, collecting roughly $8.5 million from taxpayers, authorities said.

“More than $50 million in losses to taxpayers” across the scheme were noted by HHS Inspector General T. March Bell, who said anyone who weaponizes hospice care to bilk Medicare should expect to be held accountable.

In another case, a Covina couple, a nurse and a self-described psychologist, allegedly pulled in more than $4 million from Medicare and spent it on mortgages, international travel, restaurants and personal bills.

Federal prosecutors say one repeat offender went even further, allegedly running multiple fraudulent hospice companies while already facing charges in a separate case and being legally barred from operating such businesses.

Beyond hospice fraud, authorities say the takedown uncovered a $19 million scheme targeting a labor union’s health plan that the defendants allegedly billed for fake or unnecessary chiropractic and therapy services.  

​NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently lodged a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainer pleading with Texas authorities not to release an illegal immigrant accused of fatally slitting his wife’s throat with a pocketknife in Dallas.. Francisco Mendez-Marin, a 24-year-old illegal immigrant from Mexico, was arrested March 18 by the Carrolton Police Department and is charged with felony homicide after he allegedly killed his wife, 20-year-old Karla Rangel, during a domestic dispute.. The couple had been married for less than a month, FOX 4 Dallas reported.. When police arrived at the scene, Mendez-Marin had blood on his clothes and a bloody pocketknife on him, officials said.. ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT CONFESSES TO 2 COLD-BLOODED MURDERS MONTHS APART: REPORT. Body camera footage shows Mendez-Marin telling officers, “I didn’t do anything bad” and “I was obligated to do it” in Spanish, according to the arrest affidavit.. “This depraved animal murdered his own wife just one month after they were married by brutally slitting her throat with a pocketknife,” DHS Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis wrote in a statement. “This illegal alien should have never been allowed into our country to commit this heinous murder.”. “ICE requested authorities in Dallas to not release this cold-blooded killer onto the streets,” she continued. “Thankfully, Dallas politicians cooperate with ICE, so together we can ensure this murderer is NEVER loose in American communities.”. CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP. Mendez-Marin is currently in Dallas County Sheriff’s Office custody and being held in the Dallas County Jail, according to DHS.