A Philadelphia judge accused of attempting to influence a colleague’s sentencing decision with a hastily written note is asking for leniency as he fights to preserve his career.

Common Pleas Court Judge Scott DiClaudio, 62, is awaiting a ruling on his future after Pennsylvania’s Judicial Conduct Board urged a disciplinary court Thursday to remove him from office permanently, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

DiClaudio, who has a close relationship with rapper Meek Mill, is accused of trying to affect the sentencing of Dwayne Jones, whom prosecutors said also had connections to the hip-hop star.

The case centers on an incident last year in which DiClaudio allegedly called Common Pleas Court Judge Zachary Shaffer to meet with him and handed him a lined sheet of paper bearing the words: “Dwayne Jones, courtroom 905, and Monday’s date.”

DiClaudio allegedly ripped the note into pieces and threw it away. As he left, he reportedly told Shaffer: “You probably would have done the right thing anyway.”

Shaffer was scheduled to sentence Jones only days later. He reported the encounter to his supervisors the following day and removed himself from the case.

Jones had pleaded guilty to three firearms charges: felony possession of a firearm while prohibited, carrying a firearm without a license and carrying a firearm in Philadelphia.

In September 2025, the board charged DiClaudio with several violations, including breaking the law, undermining confidence in the judiciary, allowing personal relationships to influence his conduct and making statements intended to affect a case’s outcome.

The board also accused him of violating Article V of the Pennsylvania Constitution, which governs judicial conduct. He was later suspended without pay.

At Thursday’s hearing, DiClaudio became emotional while discussing his children. He defended his integrity and career, arguing that the incident was a misunderstanding and not an effort to sway the administration of justice.

“It was improper and wrong. There was no good reason to say that even though it wasn’t my intention to influence the case,” the senior judge said.

“I never wanted him to do anything with that statement other than to say thank you,” he added. “I wish I never said it. I regret ever saying it. I wasn’t thinking.”

He pleaded with the court to allow him to remain on the bench for the few weeks needed to secure his pension and lifetime health insurance for his wife and two young children before retiring.

But Elizabeth Hoffheins, deputy counsel for the Judicial Conduct Board, said the panel continued to believe DiClaudio was attempting to steer the case because Jones was a friend of Meek Mill.

“This remark was not simply a compliment, not simply an off-the-cuff remark. It was calculated to occur three days prior to this man’s sentencing,” she said.

Hoffheins accused DiClaudio of showing “little respect for the court and little respect for the rules of the court.” She also cited what she described as a yearslong pattern of “boorish” and improper conduct, saying he had not yet accepted responsibility for it.

“Anything less than removal would fall short of restoring the public’s trust,” she said.

Both DiClaudio and Shaffer gave starkly different accounts of the incident that unfolded on June 12, 2025, inside The Justice Juanita Kidd Stout Center for Criminal Justice. 

Last October, Shaffer testified that he was on the bench in his courtroom when DiClaudio’s personal assistant, Gary Silver, walked in and told him his colleague wanted to see him, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

He said his clerk had been in touch with DiClaudio that week about buying T-shirts promoting a business owned by DiClaudio’s wife, and they assumed Silver’s request was for them to go pick them up.

Several people gathered in DiClaudio’s robing room before he allegedly asked them to step out, leaving him and Shaffer alone. 

It was then that the senior judge allegedly pulled out a piece of paper bearing the cryptic message, held it at his side, looked at Shaffer and said, ‘OK?’ Shaffer testified.

Shaffer said he hesitantly replied, ‘OK,’ before DiClaudio ripped up the paper and threw it away, leaving him to believe his colleague was suggesting he give Jones a favorable sentence. 

Shaffer reported the incident to his higher-ups, who then referred it to the Judicial Conduct Board. 

‘It was dead clear to me what he wanted,’ Shaffer testified during a hearing last fall, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

‘That’s law and Ethics 101,’ he added. ‘That’s putting your thumb on the scale of justice. You’re not allowed to do that.’

Meanwhile, DiClaudio testified that he was merely repeating to Shaffer what he had told Jones: that his colleague was ‘a good judge who would do the right thing.’

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‘I was relating the story to Judge Shaffer to give him a compliment. I wasn’t trying to influence a case,’ he argued. ‘It was made to give a compliment to a friend.’

In DiClaudio’s account, it all started when Jones approached him at the Roots Picnic earlier that month while he was hanging out backstage with Meek Mill. 

He testified that Jones told him he had recently pleaded guilty to the gun charges and would soon be sentenced by Shaffer, to which DiClaudio responded that he was a good judge who would do the right thing.

Jones handed him a business card, which DiClaudio said he pocketed to avoid being rude, before claiming he forgot about the entire encounter until he saw Shaffer 11 days later, according to the outlet.

The judge said he remembered the card as Shaffer was leaving, took it out and relayed his brief conversation with Jones before throwing it away, arguing that there was not even anything written on it.

He also claimed he asked for Shaffer only because he had just handled a case involving a defense attorney the judge was dating who failed to appear in court, and he wanted to ask why she had not shown up. 

Courtroom audio, however, confirmed that DiClaudio addressed the woman’s case immediately before asking whether Shaffer was still on the bench. 

Since taking the bench in 2016, he became known for his long hours, efficiency in moving cases through the system and detailed explanations of his decisions to both victims’ families and defendants. 

But he also became known for his blunt, sometimes brash communication style from the bench, with his own attorneys previously describing him as ‘tough to control,’ according to the outlet.

They told the court that he ‘talks in a stream of consciousness and talks without regard to understanding the entire context of what’s going on as being perceived by people around him.’

The unconventional behavior was on display again Thursday, when the board called for his permanent removal after two grueling days of testimony before the Court of Judicial Discipline. 

On the stand, he bounced between accepting responsibility, challenging Shaffer’s testimony and airing details about his colleague’s dating history.

His attorneys, Samuel Stretton and George Bochetto, even struggled to rein him in, with Stretton repeatedly cutting him off: ‘Just stop.’

At one point, DiClaudio acknowledged: ‘I talk a lot, but it’s my greatest strength and my greatest weakness.’

He also admitted that he might be a ‘crazier judge,’ but maintained that he was ‘a judge who makes the right decisions.’

‘That may be an explanation, but frankly, I’m not sure that’s a defense,’ Judge Charles L Becker, of the disciplinary panel, responded, according to the outlet.

Meanwhile, Hoffheins pointed to DiClaudio’s unpredictable behavior and previous disciplinary record as evidence of a pattern of misconduct, arguing that the board did not need to prove a motive in its case. 

Judge Carolyn Nichols also described it as a ‘painful trail of incidents,’ with the case marking the third ethics complaint filed against him. 

In 2020, the Court of Judicial Discipline found that DiClaudio had violated the judicial code of conduct, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

The case involved undisclosed debts on his annual financial forms and repeated failures to pay thousands of dollars owed to a Bala Cynwyd fitness club, for which he received a two-week suspension and probation through 2026. 

Last April, the board accused him of using his position as a judge to promote his wife’s cheesesteak shop Shay’s Steaks, saying he had eroded public trust in the judiciary and abused the prestige of his office for personal gain.

DiClaudio denied the allegations, and the case remains ongoing.

‘What I am hearing, what I am feeling, is a persistent theme of your doing things and saying things that are not wise,’ Judge Becker said.

In his closing remarks, DiClaudio’s attorney pleaded with the panel for mercy, admitting: ‘Yes, he did something bad. And some of his conduct here can get a little rambunctious.’

‘But I see a great, decent judge. He’s done a lot of good in the community and on the bench. He’s well-respected,’ he added.

Before his suspension last year, DiClaudio mostly heard cases involving people seeking to overturn murder convictions and presided over several high-profile exoneration and wrongful-conviction cases.

He also approved the release or resentencing of dozens of people serving life behind bars.

DiClaudio’s fate now rests with the tribunal, which could take months to reach a decision. 

More than 25 Jewish community organizations based in New York City are criticizing Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s newly released strategy for combating antisemitism, arguing that it overlooks hostility directed at Jews and Israel.

The coalition, which includes the New York City Public School Alliance and Bridgebuilders Grassroots Coalition, said the mayor’s 33-page plan to address rising antisemitic crime “falls dangerously short.” In a statement, the groups argued that it largely avoids what they described as the most serious threat facing Jewish New Yorkers: anti-Jewish harassment and “violence cloaked as anti-Israel activism.”

“That omission isn’t incidental. It’s the central failure of the report,” the organizations wrote in a Friday letter to Phylisa Wisdom, executive director of the Mayor’s Office to Combat Antisemitism. They urged the Mamdani administration to produce a revised strategy that clearly defines antisemitism and addresses anti-Zionist hostility.

Mamdani’s plan is largely a scaled-back version of a policy framework unveiled last year by former Mayor Eric Adams.

The strategy allocates $29 million a year to hate-crime prevention, a $3 million increase. The funding will support enhanced security at synagogues and other Jewish cultural institutions.

The report refers to Israel only once, stating that “New York is home to the largest Jewish community of any city in the world outside of Israel.” It does not mention Zionism.

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“The Mayor’s report explicitly declines to adopt a definition of antisemitism and provides little concrete guidance for perhaps the hardest and most pertinent questions institutions are confronting: When is conduct framed as antizionist political expression simply anti-Jewish targeting or discrimination?” the coalition said.

“How can we solve a problem if we refuse to even acknowledge the cause? A strategy to combat antisemitism in New York City must address antisemitism as Jewish New Yorkers are experiencing it today and must not deny their [ability] to identify and define the hate they encounter.”

Ramon Maislen, co-founder of Bridgebuilders Grassroots Coalition, separately emailed Wisdom on Friday. He said representatives of the 25-plus organizations “would welcome” a meeting with her team to discuss their concerns and recommendations.

Wisdom did not respond to messages from The Post. Mamdani spokesman Sam Raskin, however, said the administration continues to support the mayor’s antisemitism strategy.

“This strategy reflects the Mamdani administration’s commitment to rooting out antisemitism in all its forms and ensuring every Jewish New Yorker can live safely and proudly in our city, regardless of their political views,” he said.

“Antisemitism is a scourge, and our responsibility is to address it wherever it appears and whoever perpetuates it. The Mamdani administration is laser-focused on using the many tools available to municipal government to root out antisemitism and ensure Jewish life across the five boroughs continues to thrive.”

Eliran Almog, a former Israeli helicopter pilot who now leads an aviation cybersecurity company, said it was “crazy” that FlyDubai Flight 1073 reached the ground safely after a violent attack in the air.

“You can’t imagine what it is like to be in that situation. You see the videos, you hear children screaming, and passengers may not even understand what is happening,” the former Israeli Air Force pilot told News Media.

The aircraft plunged more than 14,000 feet in roughly 30 seconds after its Omani co-pilot, identified as 29-year-old Hamam al-Hammami, allegedly stabbed the pilot, Capt. Smit Machchhar, during the flight.

“The forces acting on the aircraft were enormous, and you essentially believe you are going to die,” Almog said. He added that it was remarkable the plane stayed intact and managed to land despite the damage to its tail.

Although Machchhar suffered serious injuries, officials said he managed to press a button that opened the cockpit door. Israeli passengers then entered the flight deck and restrained al-Hammami. A second FlyDubai crew that was aboard the aircraft took control of the situation and completed an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia.

“As a pilot, I’m not sure I could have landed that aircraft under those circumstances,” Almog said. He noted that every commercial plane has different controls, landing procedures and operating limits.

Almog, who advises airlines and related businesses on cybersecurity, said the incident underscored the need for rigorous pilot screening that examines both psychological stability and possible political risks.

“We place significant emphasis on a pilot’s personal characteristics. Technical ability and cognitive skills matter, but we also want to know that the pilot is balanced and capable of remaining resilient in extreme circumstances,” he said.

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“Aviation is critical infrastructure, so we need to rethink how pilots are evaluated—not only when they are hired, but throughout their careers. Even experienced pilots need to be assessed with tools that can identify family problems, psychological distress or the development of extreme beliefs that might create a threat. The industry must adopt these practices, and governments and regulators need to act,” he continued.

Several countries, including Israel and Saudi Arabia, are investigating al-Hammami and the FlyDubai episode. In a Thursday interview with Fox & Friends, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the co-pilot had been subjected to “Islamist radical indoctrination.”

President Donald Trump, for his part, suggested that the pilot may have been trained or influenced by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC.

Almog said broader geopolitical tensions, including the wars continuing across the Middle East, have become one of the aviation industry’s leading security concerns.

“If you ask airlines today about the risks they are most focused on, geopolitical threats are at the top of the list,” he said. “We monitor GNSS and GPS jamming and spoofing, and the activity maps make it possible to see where the conflicts are taking place.”

He also stressed that airlines cannot limit security screening and monitoring to pilots.

“Pilots are not the only people capable of bringing down an aircraft. More than 80% of cybersecurity threats come from insiders, many of whom may not even recognize that their actions create a risk,” Almog said. “That includes cabin crew and maintenance workers. A plane can be endangered by an incorrect fuel balance or faulty maintenance settings. Aviation depends on an intricate supply chain, and psychological screening and background checks should extend to everyone involved in flight operations—not just pilots.”

Almog also commended the passengers’ determination and described Capt. Machchhar’s actions as heroic.

“In the end, a series of circumstances prevented a catastrophe,” he said. “It required extraordinary personal resilience, the bravery of the off-duty Indian pilot who opened the cockpit door, and the presence of two additional FlyDubai pilots who were able to bring the aircraft down safely.”

“As a pilot, I can tell you that isn’t easy. Landing an unfamiliar commercial aircraft type under extreme stress requires specialized training, which is why rigorous screening and continuous support for flight crews are so vital,” he added.

Ken Urker’s sister has launched a furious attack on his former fiancée, Gypsy-Rose Blanchard, after he was found dead at his Louisiana home on his 34th birthday.

Urker and Blanchard began their relationship in 2017, while Blanchard was serving a seven-year prison sentence for her role in the murder of her abusive mother, Claudine “Dee Dee” Blanchard.

Following Urker’s death on Thursday, Blanchard publicly suggested that he may have overdosed and said he had been “relentlessly cyberbullied” before his passing.

But in an exclusive interview with the Daily Mail on Friday, Urker’s sister Autumn criticized Blanchard, accusing her of focusing on her public image and the media instead of supporting the grieving family.

“We are disgusted with her statements! She hasn’t even called my mother or any of us yet,” Autumn said.

Urker first contacted Blanchard in 2017 after watching an HBO documentary about her crime, later writing to her in prison.

Urker proposed to Blanchard in 2018 while she remained behind bars, but they ended their relationship several months later. After Blanchard was released on early parole in December 2023, the pair reunited in 2024.

They welcomed their daughter, Aurora Raina, in December 2024, before officially separating again earlier this year.

Their relationship attracted intense scrutiny online, which Autumn said had a damaging effect on her brother.

She alleged that Blanchard was “to blame for his death because all of this started because of her.”

“She had to be in the limelight. She had to be that girl. She didn’t care what it cost other people around her,” Autumn said. “She loved all the attention at the expense of everybody around her.”

“As much hate as she received, she would receive about two times more support and happy comments telling her to keep doing her and ignore the haters,” Autumn alleged. “Except ignoring the haters caused everybody around her to receive death threats and feel uncomfortable.”

Autumn also claimed that Urker told her during their final phone call that he was “terrified” Blanchard would not keep their daughter Aurora, now 21 months old, “safe.” She said he also alleged that Blanchard had “humiliated him.”

According to Autumn, Urker hoped to bring his daughter “back home” to his mother and felt that he had “failed Aurora because of Gypsy.”

Autumn further alleged that Blanchard insisted on having things her way and would scream at Urker when he tried to control her, comparing the behavior to her mother. “Gypsy is not this sweet person,” she said.

By contrast, Autumn described her brother as a “great man” who would love and support people regardless of their struggles. She said he had tried especially hard for Blanchard because that was the kind of person he was.

“My brother was a good father. A good brother. A good son and a good friend. And we were all lucky and blessed to have known him,” she said.

The Daily Mail has contacted representatives for Blanchard but has yet to hear back.  

Her remarks come after police revealed earlier on Friday that Urker was found dead with syringes, a spoon, a handgun and a ‘brown powdery substance’ nearby.

According to an incident report obtained by The Daily Mail, police discovered him on Thursday ‘cold to the touch,’ lying on his back in bed with ‘what appeared to be’ a blood-splotched paper towel on his left arm.

The handgun was sitting in its holster on Urker’s bedside table beside one syringe and two shot glasses, the document clarified.

Blanchard’s sister-in-law Anita went to church this past Wednesday with Urker. She later informed police that he ‘made comments of being depressed and upset.’

Anita and her husband arrived at Urker’s residence the following day, and called police for a welfare check when Urker failed to open the door. 

Police responded to Anita’s call at Urker’s residence, which is located in the town of Raceland on Bayou Lafourche, about an hour’s drive from New Orleans. They discovered his body on a bed inside. 

Urker’s arms and face were blue when he was found in bed, where he had evidently been ‘for extended period of time,’ according to the incident report. 

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Nothing in the bedroom ‘appeared to be disturbed or moved’ other than the items on the nightstand – the holstered gun, the shot glasses and another syringe.

Anita noted that Urker had gone live on TikTok at around 11pm Wednesday but ‘just had the video going while he was driving without him saying anything.’ 

Thursday evening, as news circulated of his death, Blanchard went public with her suspicion that he had succumbed to an overdose.

‘I don’t know if it was intentional or not. He was not in a good state of mind lately,’ she told People. ‘I’m in disbelief. I can’t think. I’ve screamed until my throat burns.’

In a statement provided Thursday to TMZ, Blanchard said she texted her ex on the day of his death to wish him a happy birthday but never received a reply. 

‘Ken was an amazing father and a man who was deeply loved,’ she began, adding that Urker would ‘forever be my soulmate and my red string, a connection that time, distance, and even death can never erase.’ 

Blanchard said that he went through an ‘unimaginable level of public scrutiny’ while being with her and that the ‘cruelty directed toward him was something no human being should have to endure.’

She noted that the online harassment had a ‘profound impact’ on Urker.

Regarding their daughter, Blanchard vowed to ‘make sure she grows up knowing how deeply her father loved her.’

Blanchard said that she would also ensure her daughter knew ‘who [Urker] was beyond what strangers on the internet chose to say about him.’ 

Blanchard became a household name back in 2015 after she was arrested over her involvement in her mother Dee Dee’s death. 

Blanchard has been a victim of Munchausen’s syndrome by proxy, with Dee Dee forcing her to pose as an invalid by remaining in a wheelchair at all times in public.

Dee Dee shaved Blanchard’s head and kept her drugged to convince the world that her daughter had muscular dystrophy and was battling leukemia.

But the warped relationship  between mother and daughter came to an end when Blanchard’s boyfriend, Nicholas Godejohn, crept into their home in Springfield, Missouri, and stabbed Dee Dee to death on June 10, 2015. 

Blanchard pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and spent nearly 10 years in prison before being released in December 2023 after being granted an early parole. 

While in prison, she bonded with Urker after he sent her a letter, and they started corresponding. 

Things soon turned romantic, and he went on to propose in 2018.

But after the Hulu miniseries The Act, which starred Joey King as Gypsy and Patricia Arquette as her mother, premiered a few months later and put an intense spotlight on Gypsy’s story, she admitted in her memoir that Ken couldn’t handle the sudden wave of attention. 

Blanchard subsequently met and married another man, Ryan Anderson. They broke up after a short union and she reunited with Urker.  

Following their reunion, Urker looked back on how they reconnected while speaking to People.

‘The very first weekend of April [2024] is when I came to visit her for the first time after she had gotten out. We spent that weekend together and had an incredible time,’ he said.

Their renewed connection was strong enough that they made plans to meet again a month later to attend a jazz festival together.

‘Then shortly after that, we realized we were going to have a baby,’ Urker added. 

Terrifying video shows the moment gunfire broke out inside a crowded Los Angeles nightclub near a college campus, sending panicked partygoers rushing for safety. Two young people were killed in the shooting.

The footage, obtained by The California Post, captures revelers dancing to rap music beneath purple lights before two thunderous shots suddenly echo through the club.

The festive scene quickly descended into chaos as terrified guests sprinted toward the exits, scrambling out of the packed venue.

A man and a woman, both believed to be between 18 and 25 years old, died in the Friday night shooting at Artist Lounge, the Los Angeles Police Department told The Post.

The nightclub is in the University Plaza shopping center near California State University, Northridge, in Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley.

Police officers were already at the shopping center after responding to complaints about the loud party when the gunfire erupted.

Officers rushed into the club and found the two victims dead at the scene. Neither victim was conscious or breathing.

The motive remains unknown. Police described the suspected gunman as a Hispanic male but did not provide additional identifying information.

A witness told KTLA that the shooter appeared to deliberately aim at two people before accidentally hitting another person.

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“It all happened so fast,” the witness said. “This guy pulls out a gun from his waist and aims at one person – boom – then he turned around to get another guy, but he totally missed and got someone else in the back.”

After the shooting, numerous partygoers fled the building as police flooded the shopping plaza and secured the area.

Dozens of people were detained outside the complex, although it was not immediately clear why. Investigators may have been attempting to locate or identify the shooter.

Aerial video broadcast by KABC showed handcuffed individuals being questioned by officers inside an extensive crime scene spanning several businesses in the shopping center.

No arrests had been announced as of the latest update.

The LAPD’s investigation into the deadly Los Angeles nightclub shooting remains ongoing.

California State University, Northridge, a public university in the San Fernando Valley, has an enrollment of more than 35,000 students.