Matthew Ammel, a former bodyguard and romantic partner of ex-Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, has been arrested after allegedly threatening to “take down” the former politician. The arrest came about a month after he was accused of causing roughly $200,000 in damage to her home.

Ammel, 39, was taken into custody Tuesday in a Cheesecake Factory parking lot in Phoenix after police were alerted by his GPS monitoring device, The Arizona Republic reported.

Officers arrested him near a gun shop after he dropped off a knife described by authorities as a “large, military style” blade. He had reportedly brought it in to be engraved as a gift for his nephew’s Marine Corps boot camp graduation.

Court documents reviewed by KPHO allege that Ammel, who is involved in a custody battle with his former wife, attempted to buy a firearm, threatened to kill a judge in North Carolina and warned that he would “take down” Sinema, the former independent senator.

Ammel served in the Army in Iraq and Afghanistan before joining Sinema’s security detail in 2022. After his Sept. 17 arrest over the alleged destruction of Sinema’s Cave Creek property, he was released under a no-contact order.

Authorities say he violated that order just two days later by attempting to have an acquaintance contact the former senator on his behalf.

Sinema, 50, reported the alleged violation to police on Sept. 22, but Maricopa County prosecutors said she declined to assist with the case.

A judge initially set Ammel’s bond at $25,000. Prosecutors are seeking to raise it to $100,000 in cash, citing the alleged death threats.

“The state fears [Ammel] will escalate his retaliation if released,” Maricopa County Deputy Attorney Bryn Barasha wrote in a court filing.

Prosecutors also alleged that Ammel contacted military acquaintances to build a rifle, bought tactical equipment and discussed funeral arrangements. The filing did not provide additional context about those claims.

Ammel declined to appear in court for his arraignment Thursday. The hearing has been rescheduled for Oct. 15.

He also faces a felony criminal-damage charge stemming from the alleged destruction of Sinema’s Cave Creek home on Aug. 30. Authorities estimate the damage at approximately $200,000.

Ammel has said he vandalized the property because he had become disillusioned with the state of American politics.

“I was p—-d at the system,” he told The Arizona Republic. “I took it out on her art.”

“The American people have no idea how [f–ked] up our government is, and, like what our politicians spend their time doing.”

DON’T MISS: France Rocked by Student Riot as Videos Show Women Attacked

Ammel, who says he is dealing with the effects of brain injuries, insisted that he is not dangerous.

“I’m not crazy. I’m just really smart, and I have seen behind the curtains,” he said.

He claimed he damaged Sinema’s home after she refused to share a video showing soldiers assisting a wounded man in Iraq.

Ammel said he wanted Sinema to use her connections at the Pentagon to investigate why his military unit had not received the Presidential Unit Citation.

He also alleged, without identifying any companies, that Sinema “works for some of the companies that financially benefit from the genocide in Gaza.”

Ammel, who admitted he had been drinking, allegedly threatened to destroy a piece of her artwork every 10 minutes if she didn’t comply.

She refused, and he allegedly threw 22 paintings into her swimming pool, with the estimated damage coming to around $123,000.

Ammel also allegedly shattered several expensive alcohol bottles and destroyed one mirror, bringing damages to more than $200,000.

Sinema’s relationship with her former bodyguard became public after Ammel’s ex-wife of 14 years sued the former politician under North Carolina’s “homewrecker law.”

Heather Ammel accused Sinema of destroying her marriage with her ex-husband by sustaining an affair with him during their trips together around the world.

The affair broke out a little over a year after Ammel was hired to Sinema’s protection detail in 2022.

Sinema allegedly bought Ammel gifts and paid for him to receive psychedelic treatment during the home-wrecking relationship.

She invited him as a guest to a wedding and a Taylor Swift concert.

Sinema, the first openly bisexual person elected to Congress, admitted to having repeated sex with Ammel in cities across America beginning around Memorial Day 2024.

Sinema didn’t seek election in 2024.

Tennessee’s failed attempt to lethally inject Christa Pike, a 30-year death row inmate, on Wednesday evening has placed her execution in doubt and could ultimately prompt the state to abandon capital punishment, according to the former Knoxville police chief who supervised her arrest in the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer.

“I’ll be surprised if there are any executions in Tennessee in the near term, if again, ever,” Phil Keith, who headed the Knoxville Police Department from 1988 to 2004, told News Media.

Pike drew national attention in the days leading up to her scheduled Sept. 30 execution after filing a last-minute appeal, seeking clemency and requesting alternative execution methods, including a team of all-female executioners. The failed attempts to administer the lethal injection soon overshadowed everything else.

That focus, Keith said, also diverted attention from Slemmer, the teenager who was killed.

“Why don’t we talk about Colleen’s potential future, about her life, you know, do a deep dive on her family, talk about what she was trying to do?” he asked in an interview with News Media on Thursday.

Pike and Slemmer met at the Job Corps Center, a vocational school serving young people from difficult backgrounds, Keith said. While Pike displayed signs of what he described as a developing criminal career, Slemmer was a teenager who avoided trouble and was working to improve her life.

“She was a bright young woman,” Keith said. “She had interest in computers. She was applying herself there. She was clearly an innocent party in this; she was not involved in any of the violence that went on at Job Corps.”

Keith described Slemmer as shy and committed to her education.

“She was just a child that was trying to, that had been through a troubled early life and was trying to get her life on track,” the former chief said. “Her mom was, was clearly a big supporter of her, but there were some limitations there.”

Slemmer’s mother, May Martinez, did not respond to News Media’s requests for comment Thursday.

Pike and two others — her boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, and a friend, Shadolla Peterson — lured Slemmer to a park, where they beat, slashed and tortured her for as long as an hour.

“Pike was the catalyst,” Keith said. “She was the one that was planning out all the events, the luring, all that sort of thing.”

Keith said Pike showed “no remorse” during police questioning after the attack, which a psychiatrist later testified at trial had involved “satanic elements.”

Pike kept a fragment of Slemmer’s fractured skull as a trophy and showed it to other classmates before her arrest. Shipp, who prevented Slemmer from escaping and held her down, later carved pentagrams into the victim’s chest and face.

“She represents pure evil,” Keith said of Pike.

Disgraced former Team USA gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar has been removed from Michigan’s sex offender registry.

Nassar served as the national gymnastics team’s doctor from 1996 to 2014, using his position to sexually abuse hundreds of young athletes, including Olympic medalists Simone Biles and Aly Raisman.

He is serving multiple decades-long prison sentences after convictions in federal and state courts for sexual abuse and possessing child pornography.

The 63-year-old is among more than 20,000 people removed from Michigan’s sex offender registry after the Michigan State Police purged individuals whose offenses occurred before July 1, 2011, according to the Eaton County Prosecutor’s Office.

The removal followed a September 9 ruling by the Michigan Supreme Court, which found that amendments to the Sex Offender Registration Act enacted in 2021 could not be applied retroactively to crimes committed before that date. The decision prompted a large-scale purge of the registry.

The Eaton County Prosecutor’s Office criticized the ruling in a social media statement, saying: “The Michigan Supreme Court’s decision to eliminate SORA requirements for these offenders is deeply concerning. Our community, along with the victims of these crimes, expected the registry to provide a measure of protection and awareness—assurances that have now been removed by the Court’s ruling.”

Michigan State Police says the registry is intended to “assist the public” in preventing future criminal sexual acts by convicted sex offenders. It generally includes a person’s legal name, photograph, primary and work addresses, age, physical description, court information and records related to the conviction.

“His conduct occurred before 2011 despite his convictions coming after,” the Eaton County Prosecutor’s Office said in confirming Nassar’s removal, according to CBS News.

The prosecutor’s office said the Supreme Court could have adopted a different interpretation that would have allowed certain sex offenders to remain on the registry.

More than 150 gymnasts were abused by Nassar during his three-decade career. He admitted sexually assaulting athletes while working at Michigan State University and USA Gymnastics.

YOU MAY ALSO READ: Hawaii’s 500-Year-Old Hōlei Sea Arch Collapses Into the Ocean

Nassar also admitted possessing child pornography. More than 100 women later sought more than $1 billion from the federal government, alleging that the FBI failed to act on allegations against him.

In 2017, a federal court sentenced Nassar to 60 years in prison for possessing child sexual abuse material. The following year, two Michigan courts sentenced him to up to 175 years and up to 125 years, respectively, for molesting female gymnasts under his care.

After the federal sentencing, U.S. Attorney Birge said: “Today was a day of reckoning for Larry Nassar. He more than deserves this punishment for what he did.

“He consumed child pornography on a massive scale. We found 37,000 images of child pornography on his computers. Insatiable hunger of that nature simply encourages those who produce such images to continue to sexually exploit children. Compounding his danger to the public,

“Nassar was an insidious hands-on child predator in his own right. He took advantage of family friendships. And he treated his license to practice medicine as a license to sexually molest children. Thanks to the brave victims who came forward, we learned the full scope of his depravity. The breadth and dark depth of his heinous acts are extraordinary.”

In April 2024, the U.S. Justice Department announced a $138.7 million settlement with more than 100 people who accused the FBI of grossly mishandling sexual assault allegations against Nassar in 2015 and 2016. The delay allowed the sports doctor to continue abusing victims before his arrest.

When combined with other settlements, $1billion now has been set aside by various organizations to compensate hundreds of women who said Nassar assaulted them under the guise of treatment for sports injuries. 

Simone Biles publicly broke her silence in January 2018, revealing in a powerful tweet that she was one of Nassar’s victims.

‘It took me a long time to write that, probably a couple of days, because every time I would go to write, I would start balling, and I couldn’t get through it,’ she said.

Biles also noted that she was heartbroken over having to continue to train at the ranch, the former USA Gymnastics national training center where she and her teammates were abused by the disgraced doctor.

Hawaii’s iconic Hōlei Sea Arch has collapsed into the Pacific Ocean, vanishing just days after visitors photographed the landmark still standing.

The 90-foot arch at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island was intact on Wednesday, Sept. 23, but had disappeared by Sunday night, the National Park Service said.

Officials have not determined exactly when the formation fell. They believe the collapse may have occurred during the three-day temporary park closure prompted by Tropical Storm Nolo.

The storm brought heavy rain and strong winds to the Big Island, leading to flash flooding and road closures across the area.

Authorities had warned visitors to avoid the area near Hōlei Sea Arch, where cliffs plunge directly into the Pacific and can give way without warning.

Social media photos show people entering the closed zone near the arch’s former location, officials said. Doing so exposed them to the risk of falling into the ocean and placed first responders in danger.

“We were just there on Sept 23rd around 10 am and are probably some of the last few to see it still standing,” one visitor wrote on Facebook.

“Very sad to hear of the loss of the arch. It figured in many of our vacation photographs throughout the 1990s. But the natural world is indeed constantly changing,” another person posted.

“Was lucky enough to see it in both 2012 and in 2022 when I visited the park. The changes from 2012 to 2022 were substantial,” a third tourist wrote.

“What a beautiful and special place. We are so sad that it is gone,” another visitor added.

Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, located on the Big Island, is home to Kīlauea and Mauna Loa, two of the world’s most active volcanoes.

The park attracts large numbers of visitors drawn to its dramatic volcanic terrain, lava fields and other geological features.

Hōlei Sea Arch stood at the end of Chain of Craters Road. Waves carved the formation through an ancient lava flow roughly 550 years ago.

Its collapse came after years of cracking, earthquakes and relentless surf weakened the site.

Earthquakes linked to the 2018 Kilauea eruption and summit collapse also damaged the cliffs surrounding the arch.

After new cracks and signs of instability appeared, Hawaii Volcanoes National Park closed the original viewing area in January 2020.

A safer viewing point, set farther back from the cliff edge, opened in March 2020.

Later that year, powerful surf from Tropical Storm Darby broke away a section of rock from the arch’s lower portion.

FBI Director Kash Patel defended the agency’s Most Wanted fugitive statistics against mounting criticism, portraying the scrutiny as an effort to discredit front-line agents. He cited the sharp increases in arrests, weapons seizures and fentanyl seizures during the recently completed “Operation Summer Heat 2.0” as evidence of a more field-focused FBI.

Patel rejected reports that the FBI manipulated its Most Wanted captures, calling them attempts to “denigrate the work of the bureau.” He said career officials—not political appointees—independently oversee the list.

In September, Patel announced that the FBI had captured all 10 people on its Most Wanted list during President Donald Trump’s second term. On Wednesday, an MSNOW report published in May resurfaced, alleging that FBI officials had placed some fugitives on the list shortly before their expected arrests.

“Look, it’s really simple,” Patel told News Media. “The FBI’s Most Wanted list and any other campaign we’re putting on has been going on for at least 75 years. The career staff at the bureau manage that list. They look and say, ‘Who’s the target of opportunity? Who can we get? Who’s the worst perpetrator who’s been on the run?’ and then they announce it. I literally don’t have anything to do with it.”

“I just think that those critics out there are super unpleased with the fact that the Trump administration and this FBI delivered on what used to be an apolitical mission of keeping law enforcement at the top and protecting our American citizens,” he said.

Patel credited the FBI’s recent high-profile arrests, record fentanyl seizures and weapons recoveries to a broad reorganization. The changes permanently moved nearly 2,000 FBI employees to field offices nationwide while significantly reducing the agency’s Washington bureaucracy.

According to Patel, the FBI has moved beyond temporary crime “surges” and adopted a permanent, field-centered enforcement strategy intended to reduce violent crime throughout the year.

Operation Summer Heat 2.0 was the second campaign to use the name after the initiative began in 2025. The nationwide federal operation focused on violent crime, street gangs and drug-trafficking networks, with FBI agents working alongside local authorities in metropolitan areas from June through August.

“You have to talk to the American people. You have to show up in the field and you have to drive resources and permanently place people and technology in the field,” Patel said. “That was the sort of overarching approach to striking at the heart of violent crime.”

Authorities made more than 8,900 arrests during the operation, a 3% increase over last summer’s Summer Heat initiative.

The FBI also reported seizing 5,013 weapons, a 120% increase from last year. More than 1,400 children were identified or located, up 34%, while authorities carried out 687 fentanyl seizures, a 63% increase.

“So from last year to this year, we wanted to run that playbook for Summer Heat 2.0, and the only thing we did a little differently was we added even more bodies to the field,” Patel said. “So the enterprise-wide lift, shift, focus, and pivot was: we’re not on defense anymore. In order to catch violent criminals and defend the homeland, you have to go on offense.”

Patel said this year’s operation built on the previous campaign through expanded cooperation among agencies and other enforcement measures, producing what he described as significant public-safety gains in urban areas.

“Just to show you that it’s working in every single city and major metropolis across the country, last year for the first time, America saw 1.1 million fewer violent aggravated assaults, rapes, robberies, and homicides,” Patel said. “That’s 1.1 million fewer victims across the country because of what the federal government, the Bureau, and our partners were able to bring to bear across the country.”