FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Four Florida police officers have been indicted in connection with a 2019 shootout on a busy street that left a UPS driver, the two robbers who hijacked him and a nearby driver dead, their union confirmed Tuesday. The South Florida Police Benevolent Association criticized the Broward County State Attorney's Office for seeking the grand jury indictment of the Miami-Dade County officers. The union did not say what the officers have been charged with and their names have not been released. They are expected to turn themselves in next week. "We're extremely disappointed that after almost five years, these officers are finding themselves indicted for something they had seconds to decide. It sends a chilling effect to officers in Broward County," union president Steadman Stahl said in a statement. "As the process moves forward, we will monitor it and defend our officers." Broward State Attorney Harold Pryor and his office declined Tuesday to comment on the indictment or confirm it has been issued. "Grand jury proceedings are secret under Florida law, and any proceedings or actions taken by a grand jury are not public until a judge makes them so," the statement said. The Miami-Dade Police Department said it would have a statement later Tuesday. The indictment was first reported by the Miami Herald. The tragedy began when 41-year-old cousins Lamar Alexander and Ronnie Jerome Hill robbed the Regent Jewelers store in the Miami suburb of Coral Gables. Police said shots were being fired inside the store when officers arrived, summoned by a silent alarm. A store worker was hit in the head by a ricocheting bullet. The robbers fled into a nearby neighborhood and hijacked Frank Ordonez, 27, who was delivering packages. They led officers from multiple agencies on a long chase into southern Broward County during rush-hour traffic, running red lights and narrowly avoiding crashes. The chase attracted television news helicopters, which began broadcasting it live nationally. A rear door of the UPS van was partly open, as well as the driver and passenger-side doors, enabling gunfire along the way. The van finally stopped in a middle lane at a busy intersection in the Fort Lauderdale suburb of Miramar, caught behind a wall of vehicles waiting for the light to turn green. Witnesses told The Associated Press then that gunfire suddenly erupted as officers ran between cars toward the van. Ordonez, Alexander and Hill were killed inside the van. Richard Cutshaw, 70, was fatally struck by a stray bullet as he drove nearby. Investigators have not said if Ordonez and Cutshaw were shot by police, the robbers or both. Policing experts told the AP in 2019 that the officers were in a tough spot. It appeared the robbers were firing from the van, endangering the officers, Ordonez, nearby drivers and their passengers. The officers needed to contain the robbers in the van so that they couldn't run to another vehicle and take new hostages, the experts said. It is highly unusual for Florida law enforcement officers to be charged for an on-duty killing — it has only happened three times in the last 40 years. Even then, only one of those officers has been convicted. Three police officers in the Panhandle town of Crestview are awaiting trial on manslaughter charges for the 2021 death of Calvin Wilks Jr., who died after they allegedly jolted him with a stun gun. Those officers, who have pleaded not guilty, are awaiting trial. Former Palm Beach Gardens officer Nouman Raja is serving a 25-year prison sentence after being convicted of manslaughter and attempted murder for the 2015 shooting of Corey Jones, whose SUV had broken down on an interstate highway off-ramp. Raja, working undercover and in plain clothes, never identified himself as a police officer when he approached Jones and began yelling at him, an audio recording showed. Jones, fearing he was being robbed, pulled his licensed handgun and tried to flee. Raja pursued and killed him, trial testimony showed. A Broward sheriff's deputy was charged with manslaughter for the 2014 fatal shooting of a man who was carrying a air rifle he had just purchased. Deputies yelled at Jermaine McBean, who spun around and was shot by Deputy Peter Peraza. A judge later threw out the manslaughter charge.

NEW YORK — The wife of Sen. Bob Menendez was excused Wednesday from appearing in court next week after her lawyer said she's experiencing intense and chronic pain after surgery to treat cancer. Nadine Menendez was supposed to be on trial with the Democrat for the past month, but her trial was delayed until at least July after she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She was scheduled to attend a pretrial hearing next Wednesday in Manhattan federal court before her lawyer, Barry Coburn, asked that her appearance be waived after the recent "invasive cancer surgery." Coburn wrote that she has "medical equipment implanted in her body and is in intense, chronic pain." In an order late in the day, Judge Sidney H. Stein said she can skip the hearing. Menendez, 70, and his wife, 57, have pleaded not guilty to aiding three New Jersey businessmen in return for bribes of gold bars, hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and a car. Much of the evidence shown to jurors since the trial began four weeks ago has focused on Nadine Menendez's communications with the businessmen and the senator through hundreds of emails, text messages and telephone calls. Prosecutors on Wednesday showed that her communications with different individuals were often seconds or minutes apart as she juggled conversations with the businessmen and Menendez, such as when money was provided by one of the businessmen to finance a Mercedes-Benz in 2019. Two of the businessmen, Wael Hana and Fred Daibes, are on trial with the senator while a third businessman has pleaded guilty and has been scheduled to testify later in the trial. The Menendez couple began dating in early 2018 and married in 2020, when the senator moved into his wife's Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, home. On Monday, Menendez filed to run for reelection as an independent. If victorious, it would be his fourth term as a senator. He has insisted that anything he did on behalf of the businessmen was part of the work that any elected official carries out on behalf of constituents. Prosecutors, though, have told a jury that Menendez sought to sell his office to enrich himself, helping Hana get a lucrative monopoly on certifying meat exports to Egypt as meeting Islamic guidelines, and assisting Daibes with investments linked to a member of the Qatari royal family.

AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas governor's pardon of a former Army sergeant who fatally shot a Black Lives Matter demonstrator undermines the state's legal system and constitution and should be reversed, a prosecutor said Tuesday. Travis County District Attorney José Garza said he is filing request with the Court of Criminal Appeals — the state's highest criminal court — to review the pardon issued by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, which he said made a mockery of the legal system and put politics ahead of justice. "We will continue to use the legal process to seek justice," Garza said during a news conference in Austin. Daniel Perry shot and killed Garrett Foster during a protest in downtown Austin in July 2020. Perry was convicted and sentenced to 25 years in prison in May 2023, prompting immediate calls for a pardon from conservative figures. Abbott issued the pardon last month and Perry was quickly released from prison. The quick pardon undermined an established appeals process that was available to Perry, and violated state constitutional separation of powers, Garza said. Abbott's office did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment. All nine elected judges on the court are Republican. Garza said he believes the case is unique in state history, from the rapid request for a pardon and its approval, to his request for the appeals court to intervene. "All of this is new ground," he said. Perry's legal team called the pardon and the process kickstarted by Abbott "fully appropriate" under the state constitution and said it was Garza, a Democrat, who was driven by politics in prosecuting the case. The governor, following the recommendation of the state Board of Pardons and Paroles, "has the absolute power to pardon a person on any grounds, including the grounds of actual innocence," Perry attorney Clint Broden said. Foster's mother, Sheila Foster, described the pardon as "absolutely unacceptable to our family." "We will fight this until we get justice for Garrett," Foster said at the news conference, her voice trembling with emotion. "My own child was killed on American soil for doing nothing but practicing his First and Second Amendment rights. And our governor just said, 'That's OK. That's acceptable.'" Perry, a white ride-share driver, claimed he was trying to drive past the crowd and fired his pistol when Foster pointed a rifle at him. Witnesses said Foster, a white Air Force veteran, never raised his gun. Prosecutors argued that Perry could have driven away without shooting. Even though Perry was convicted of murder, Abbott called the shooting self-defense, noting Texas' "stand-your-ground" law. Last month, 14 Democrat attorneys general said the U.S. Justice Department should investigate whether Perry denied Foster his right to free speech and peaceful protest. A federal probe could open Perry to federal charges. The "DOJ has historically used federal civil-rights laws to prosecute acts of hate, especially when states refuse or fail to hold people accountable for violating their fellow Americans' civil rights," the coalition of attorneys general said. Garza said he will pursue what action he can in the state legal system, but that he would welcome federal scrutiny of the case. "People all across the country are outraged about what happened to Garrett, what happened to his family," Garza said. "We're grateful for their request and would echo their request." Foster was killed amid the widespread demonstrations against police killings and racial injustice that followed the murder of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white Minneapolis police officer. "Throughout American history, our freedom of speech and right to peaceful protest have been two of the most powerful tools used to combat injustice and oppression," Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said last week. "Vigilante violence is unacceptable, particularly when that violence is used to deprive Americans of their lives and most fundamental liberties." Abbott's rush to wipe away the conviction also raised questions about how a governor might try to overturn a jury's verdict in the future. After the verdict but before Perry was sentenced, the court unsealed dozens of pages of text messages and social media posts that showed he had hostile views toward Black Lives Matter protests. In a comment on Facebook a month before the shooting, Perry wrote, "It is official I am a racist because I do not agree with people acting like animals at the zoo."   Texas, governor, pardon, Black Lives Matter, demonstration, prosecutor, Travis County, district attorney, José Garza, Court of Criminal Appeals, governor, Greg Abbott, mockery, politics Austin, Daniel Perry, Garrett Foster, protest, separation of powers, Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, actual innocence, First Amendment, Second Amendment, self-defense, stand your ground law, U.S. Justice Department, George Floyd, Minnesota,