A 44-year-old Bluffdale woman was arrested after a fight with her husband — because she reported he had shot and killed her.

At 2:05 a.m. on Tuesday, Bluffdale police were contacted by another woman who said she had received texts from the husband’s cell phone number “stating he had shot his wife and didn’t know what to do,” according to a probable cause statement. The woman asked if he was serious, and “she received more text messages … confirming it wasn’t a joke” — that his wife was dead in their Bluffdale home.

Officers from the Saratoga Spring, Bluffdale, Herriman and Unified Police departments went to the home, surrounded it and called for the husband to come outside. As they were attempting to contact him, the wife — “who was believed to be the one [the husband] shot” — walked up to officers and identified herself.

According to police, the husband told them he and his wife had been arguing; she took his cellphone and left their residence. She returned a short time later and the arguing continued; she threw his laptop on the ground, breaking it.

Police said the wife admitted she sent the false text messages about her own death because she “wanted to see how the [other woman] would respond” — if she would help her husband “covering up the crime.”

The wife was arrested for investigation of making a false emergency report and criminal mischief.

One person died in an Ogden house fire on Thursday night.

According to a news release from the Ogden City Fire Department, the person — whose name, age and gender have not been released — was found inside the home, 2016 Monroe Blvd., and transported to a local hospital, where he/she later died.

Crews arrived at the fire — which was confined to one room in the home — shortly after 11 p.m., and extinguished it within several minutes. The damage is estimated at $40,000.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

The Utah Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control has released its latest informational video that takes consumers inside the giant Salt Lake City liquor warehouse.

At any one time, the white building — which stands 110 feet tall and is located at 1625 S. 900 West — is filled with $40 million worth of wine, beer and spirits.

In the 6-minute video, posted on YouTube, warehouse general manager James Mangun explains how the liquor agency receives, stores and distributes liquor using a high-tech robotic system.

Mangun said employees typically pull 12,000 cases of liquor a day. which are then shipped to restaurants, bars and liquor stores around the state. During the busy holiday months, he added, that number can jump to 22,000 cases a day.

The liquor agency launched its video series in 2018, called “Meet the DABC," to let the general public know how it operates and answer common questions customers ask.

DABC spokesman Terry Wood uses his background as a former television journalist to interview various employees. Previous videos have discussed how products are selected, new stores being constructed and how consumers can special order liquor products.

Update: As of June 25, police are still searching for missing University of Utah student MacKenzie Lueck.

Close friends of MacKenzie Lueck, the University of Utah student who hasn’t been seen in nearly a week, are convinced she is in danger. She is not the kind of person who would let her cat starve, miss a wedding, blow off work or skip midterm exams.

Those are some of the commitments Lueck, 23, hasn’t met this week, according to Kennedy Stoner, a sorority sister who counts Lueck as a best friend.

“For her to not reach out to me is very unlike her. She is usually in touch with me every day,” Stoner said Sunday afternoon at a news conference in front of Salt Lake City police headquarters. “We don’t believe she would miss a midterm because she was stressed. I am positive something is wrong. ... I don’t believe she would go off and not contact one person.”

At the time of her disappearance, Lueck was returning from a trip to Southern California, where she attended her grandmother’s funeral. Lueck, who goes by Kenzie, landed at Salt Lake City International Airport about 1 a.m. Monday, June 17. She texted her parents to let them know she made it safe, then got into a Lyft. The driver dropped her off in North Salt Lake. And she hasn’t been heard from since.

Police have released no details about the location where Lueck was dropped off, which is a 20-minute drive northwest of her home in Salt Lake City.

What’s the status of the search?

Salt Lake City police issued a news release Saturday urging the public to help find Lueck, saying “detectives are concerned for MacKenzie’s welfare.” But in that same release, they said investigators have not “discovered any information that would lead us to believe that MacKenzie has been harmed or is in danger at this time.”

There is no formal search party.

“We don’t have anyone searching any particular area right now,” Salt Lake City police Sgt. Brandon Shearer said Saturday, “because we don’t have any credible evidence of where she might be.”

Lueck’s friends spent Saturday handing out missing person fliers around Liberty Park in Salt Lake City.

She was supposed to fly back to Los Angeles on Sunday to attend an upcoming wedding, but she did not make the flight, according to friend Ashley Fine.

“She threw a birthday party for her cat, so for her not to come home to her cat is not adding up,” Fine said Sunday standing side by side with Stoner.

Police posted on Facebook that detectives have worked throughout the weekend and are following any and all leads, though declined to answer any questions from reporters.

“We are working diligently to maintain the integrity of this case and ask that anyone with information on MacKenzie or her possible location please contact us,” the police statement reads, offering the nonemergency phone number 801-799-3000.

What about the Lyft driver?

Police have talked to the Lyft driver and have been in contact with the ride-hailing company.

“We’ve confirmed with Lyft, the app, that’s where she requested to go, and with the driver that that’s where she did go,” Shearer said.

Shearer said the driver and Lyft have been cooperative. Lyft, in a statement to FOX 13, said the car’s route showed no irregularities and the driver picked up more app users immediately after making Lueck’s stop.

What do we know about Lueck?

She lives near Trolley Square in Salt Lake City and is a member of the Alpha Chi Omega sorority. Fine, one of Lueck’s sorority sisters, has been organizing volunteers to help in the informal search. Lueck has straight blond hair and a thin, athletic build and wears eyelash extensions. An image of a dreamcatcher is tattooed on the middle of her back.

Fine said Sunday that Lueck’s phone has been off since she went missing on Monday and she hasn’t posted on social media. Her car is still at her home and her luggage hasn’t been found.

Fine said Lueck doesn’t have a significant other and she didn’t know why she would take a ride to North Salt Lake, instead of going directly to her home. Fine suspects Lueck went there to meet someone because she would have no other known reason to head to the industrial town with few businesses open in the middle of the night.

“Kenzie, if you can hear this, we are all worried and we are looking out for you 24/7,” Stoner said into a bank of television cameras Sunday. “We are not able to sleep. I cannot sleep at night knowing you are out there. Please let us know if you are safe.”

How to help?

Anyone with information about Lueck’s whereabouts can contact Salt Lake City Police at 801-799-3000 and reference case No. 19-111129.

And there’s a Facebook page devoted to the search for Lueck.

Members of the Utah County Commission voted unanimously Tuesday for a resolution stating that life begins at the moment of conception and opposing the loosening of restrictions on abortion and euthanasia.

“Utah County declares itself a safe haven for all of its citizens,” the resolution states, “including the unborn, the elderly, and the mentally and physically impaired.”

The nonbinding resolution sponsored by Commission Chairman Bill Lee, comes one month after the passage of a similar resolution in Riverton City, and one week after the launch of a campaign to end elective abortions in the state.

Several members of that campaign, called Abortion-Free Utah, were present at Tuesday’s commission meeting and spoke in support of the Utah County resolution.

“Some people say that it’s the law of the land and there’s nothing we can do about it,” said Merrilee Boyack, Abortion-Free Utah chairwoman. “But courageous people change laws. In fact, there was a day when slavery was the law of the land, and I don’t think anyone today would say ‘too bad, that’s the law’.”

No abortion providers are currently located in Utah County, and abortion clinics are governed by state and federal law.

Lee said it’s common for commissioners to get questions on topics that are irrelevant to their positions — he gave the example of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea — but said the issue of abortion is “boiling up” and pertinent to local government.

“Mark this day in Utah County,” Lee said, “that the commissioners in Utah County are standing for all human life.”

Commissioners Tanner Ainge and Nathan Ivie also spoke in support of the resolution before joining in a 3-0 vote, with Ivie remarking that his mother was placed in a loving home by a courageous biological mother.

“There are wonderful people and families in this world who are anxious and eager to help, to love and to cherish and raise life when given the opportunity,” Ivie said.

Among the members of the public who spoke in favor of the resolution were Rep. Kay Christofferson, R-Lehi, Highland Mayor Rod Mann and his wife, Suzanne Mann.

Suzanne Mann spoke about her own experience as an adopted child, and said she hopes the word “abortion” will eventually be removed from the dictionary.

“I wasn’t killed as a baby in my mother’s womb,” Mann said. “She chose life and placed me in a loving home where i was adopted and have lived a great life.”

Several of the speakers focused on adoption as an alternative to abortion. Maryann Christensen, executive director of the Utah Eagle Forum, said legal abortions have worsened the heartache of childless couples by making it harder to adopt.

“A family doesn’t really start until they’re able to have children,” Christensen said.

Other speakers objected to the potential for physical, emotional and spiritual harm related to abortions, citing their own personal experiences or those of other women. Deanna Holland, vice president of Pro-Life Utah, said women seek out abortions because they are scared and alone.

“I personally have stood outside the abortion clinic in Salt Lake County,” Holland said. “I see them come out. They are not empowered, they are broken.”

And Mike Brown, a father of five, encouraged the Utah County commissioners to not deny science.

“Science shows that is a baby, obviously, in the womb,” he said. “It is a developing human and it’s not going to, all of the sudden, come out as a stapler or some random object. No, it’s a baby, no matter how small."

While most of the individuals who spoke during the hearing supported the resolution, two women whose names could not be verified by The Tribune objected to the resolution and spoke in support of abortion rights.

“We have an obligation to protect everybody,” said one woman. “And that includes women whose options are extremely limited.”

During the most recent legislative session, Utah lawmakers approved two bills aimed at restricting access to abortion. One of those bills, prohibiting abortion based on a pre-natal diagnosis of Down syndrome, will take effect only and if a court with jurisdiction over Utah rules favorably on similar laws in other states. The other bill, limiting legal abortion to 18 weeks of fetal development, is currently under court injunction pending the outcome of litigation.

Investigators say missing University of Utah student MacKenzie Lueck has been murdered — and police have arrested a Salt Lake City man they say killed her and burned her body.

Ayoola Ajayi, 31, has been booked into jail on suspicion of aggravated murder, aggravated kidnapping, desecration of a body and obstruction of justice after a SWAT team took him into custody Friday morning at a West Temple apartment complex, said Salt Lake City Police Chief Mike Brown.

“I will not be saying the killer’s name again,” Brown said.

A judge later Friday ordered Ajayi held without bail. As of midafternoon, he had not yet been formally charged.

A man identified only as Lueck’s uncle appeared at Friday’s news conference. He read a brief statement thanking police and others who helped with the investigation.

Lueck, a 23-year-old University of Utah student, has been missing since June 17, when she arrived back in Salt Lake City from California, where she was attending her grandmother’s funeral. She texted her mother when her flight landed about 1:30 a.m. and then ordered a Lyft to Hatch Park in North Salt Lake, nearly 9 miles from her home near Trolley Square, Brown said.

Her parents reported her missing June 20, and the search since then has drawn national attention.

High-tech investigation

Nearly 24 hours before announcing the arrest, Brown had said there was no evidence of foul play in Lueck’s disappearance. Then, on Friday, Brown said breaks came when the Utah State Crime Lab confirmed tissue found at Ajayi’s home belonged to Lueck.

“This was outstanding detective work and cutting-edge technology,” the chief said.

Phone records showed Ajayi was the last person Lueck communicated with before she disappeared, Brown said. They also show Ajayi’s and Lueck’s phones were in Hatch Park within a minute of each other. The park is also the last place Lueck’s phone transmitted data, the chief said.

In a police interview with Ajayi, Brown said, the suspect asserted he texted Lueck about 6 p.m. June 16, but had no further contact with her. He said he didn’t know what Lueck looked like and said he hadn’t seen her photos or online profile, Brown said, but he had several photos of her, including an image from an online profile. Brown did not disclose which website the profile was on.

On Wednesday, investigators began an all-night search of Ajayi’s home in Fairpark. Neighbors reported seeing Ajayi using gasoline to burn something June 17 and 18 in his backyard, Brown said, and police found a “fresh dig area" in the same spot in the yard. They conducted a “forensic excavation” of that part of the yard and found several charred items matching the description of Lueck’s personal belongings, Brown said.

Police also found charred human tissue, Brown said. DNA testing showed a match for Lueck.

Police announced Friday evening on Twitter that they had located a mattress that had been taken from Ajayi’s home last week. Ajayi had used a social media app to give away the mattress and box spring last week.

There were several questions Brown declined to answer or said he didn’t know the answer to on Friday. The chief didn’t know if the June 16 texting was the first contact Lueck and Ajayi had.

Brown said he did not know the nature of any relationship Ajayi and Lueck had or why they met in Hatch Park — though address records show Ajayi had previously lived in an apartment about 0.2 miles from the park. Brown said he didn’t know where or when Lueck was killed. Other than saying “tissue” belonging to Lueck had been found, the chief declined to say what remains have been recovered.

Ajayi has no criminal history in Utah apart from some traffic citations. North Park police investigated a rape complaint against Ajayi in 2014, but didn’t pursue the case after the female victim said she didn’t want to press charges, according to a news release the North Park Police Department issued Friday.

Image builder

A friend of Ajayi who lived with him in the house for a few months in 2018 said the allegations are stunning for a man who tended carefully to his image as an educated, cultured professional. According to Ajayi’s LinkedIn profile, he has worked in information technology for Dell, Goldman Sachs, Microsoft and Comcast. He also modeled for fine art photographs.

“He's definitely a guy that likes to maintain an appearance,” said Sakari Moore, who said he first met Ajayi when they were in basic training together with the U.S. Army in Fort Jackson, S.C. In January 2018, Moore relocated to Utah and temporarily moved into downstairs rooms that Ajayi has advertised for rent on Airbnb.

“A.J. was a very bright guy, he knew his material. This is why it comes as a bit of a shock. To maintain his rapport of being well-read, with computers, with clients, and then to just flip a switch — I can’t really imagine it,” Moore said. “A.J. would be the kind of guy that’s, ‘Hey, let’s go to the Asian supermarket and buy a couple of crabs and go back to my house and eat.’”

As a roommate, Ajayi also “tends to have some anger issues,” Moore said. He would suddenly become “irate and disruptive” over small matters, Moore said, like disagreements over how furniture was arranged or the heat level used in cooking.

“He doesn't like to be told anything other than his way,” Moore said. “He snaps or loses his temper, [then] he comes back to his sweet self.”

Moore said he moved out because the tension was too persistent.

“I was nervous," he said, “because the polarity in his emotions [was] just switching very quickly.”

Moore said he never saw Ajayi act violently, toward him or anyone else. “I can’t really get a picture or a visual of him being this malignant person."

Moore said he wasn’t sure how Ajayi might behave in a dating relationship. Ajayi entertained a lot of different women while Moore lived there, Moore said, but he didn’t have any long-term romantic relationships.

In fact, Moore said he didn’t even know that Ajayi had been married. Ajayi and his ex-wife married in 2011 in Texas, and they separated in 2017; their divorce was finalized in January, according to court records.

It’s not clear that Ajayi accurately represented his military experience. His resume states he worked for the U.S. Army from 2014 to 2016, but Maj. David Gibbs of the Utah National Guard said he was a member for just six months in 2015 and 2016, and was discharged without completing his initial training requirements — either basic training or individual advanced training for specialized work.

“It doesn’t say good or bad performance, just [that he] couldn’t complete the initial training requirements to stay in he military ... for whatever reason,” Gibbs said.

Crime author

In 2018, Ajayi wrote a crime novel titled “Forge Identity.” According to the author’s biography, he was born and raised in Africa; his national origin is not identified, but the characters in the book live in Nigeria.

“[Ajayi] has survived a tyrannical dictatorship [and] escaped a real life crime,” the bio states. “He has been a salesman, an entrepreneur, and a writer.”

A plot summary on Goodreads.com states that “Forge Identity” is about a character named Ezekiel, who is 15 when he witnesses two murders and, in his trauma, is enticed to a life of crime.

“Ezekiel must decide if he will join the ranks of a criminal mastermind, or fight to escape the tyranny that has surrounded his young life. Or even beat them at their own game,” the summary states. “When trust is lost, can he even trust himself?”

Moore said he did not know when Ajayi moved to the United States. On his LinkedIn profile, Ajayi writes that he studied computer science at Utah State University from 2009 to 2017; Utah State University officials said he attended off and on between 2009 and 2016, with a break in attendance between 2011 and 2015. He did not obtain a degree, university officials said. A resume attached to his LinkedIn account states that he studied at London South Bank University in England from 2011 to 2015.

Court records show he received unemployment benefits at some point in 2017, and, in 2016, he was a defendant in eviction proceedings in Davis County. According to the LinkedIn profile, he has been employed in IT since 2017.

Airbnb reviews for Ajayi’s home date back to September 2018 and describe him as a “great responsive host” and “the kindest person.”

Moore said Ajayi did not rigorously screen guests, and there were some “who looked like they were homeless, who never cleaned up after themselves,” Moore said. He wondered whether any of them were involved in Lueck’s disappearance.

“I’m not sure what characters he’s allowed to live in his house who may have done this thing,” Moore said.

Remembering ‘Kenzie’

Lueck was from El Segundo, Calif., and long went by the nickname “Kenzie.” After graduating from El Segundo High School in 2014, she enrolled at the U.

She joined Alpha Chi Omega sorority. At the time of her death, Lueck was a senior majoring in kinesiology and prenursing, according to information provided by the university. While attending school, she also held jobs, most recently at a medical testing laboratory.

By Friday evening, the crime-scene tape had been removed from Ajayi’s house. Mourners left a line of sunflowers at the edge of the driveway, along with bouquets of flowers and two blue star-shaped Mylar balloons.

Friends of Lueck posted a fundraising page for her funeral expenses.

“We are all mourning Mackenzie’s death,” wrote her friend Kennedy Stoner. “We only feel it’s right that we start a gofundme page in honor of her, and any expenses that her family endures. We have come this far with Kenzie and won’t stop advocating for her. Our hearts are hurting and we are all experiencing anger, frustration, sadness, and loss.”

Stoner was one of Lueck’s sisters in the Alpha Chi Omegas sorority. The chapter remembered Lueck on social media Friday.

“We hope that our Alpha Chi Omega sisters who knew Mackenzie best can find peace and comfort as they reflect on the lasting impact she made not he lives of her family members, friends and sisters.”

Gov. Gary Herbert, saying he was “horrified and sickened” by the news, expressed his condolences to the Lueck family Friday.

Our hearts go out to the family and friends of Mackenzie Lueck at this very difficult time. I was horrified and sickened by today’s news. I appreciate the work of our public safety officials and their professional and timely efforts as they work this case to its conclusion. https://t.co/70eswbeGhv

— Gov. Gary Herbert (@GovHerbert) June 28, 2019

As did U. President Ruth Watkins, who issued a statement.

“The death of MacKenzie Lueck is devastating news,” Watkins said. “On behalf of the university, I express our heartfelt sympathy to the family, friends and classmates of MacKenzie during this very difficult time.”

Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski issued a statement complimenting Brown and his detectives and staff and offering sympathies to the Luecks.

“As a mother and a mayor, my heart breaks for the Lueck family," the statement reads. “Today, all of Salt Lake City mourns for them and stands ready to offer our support.”

Tribune reporter Sean P. Means contributed to this report.

Kearns • The sudden rustling of bags of fast food awaken this once-silent home. Doors start to swing open, because everyone is ready to eat. The new elongated dining table, now a few steps away from the original near the kitchen, has seats occupied all around it. It’s about 3:30 p.m. on a weekday afternoon and the smell of McDonald’s fries and burgers instantly overtake the Afatasi household. The other kids are worn out, drained from early morning summer football workouts, or football practice, or basketball practice.

When the sound of the garage door opening rings nearly every afternoon, it means Audrick is home. And like his siblings, cousins and friends inside, he’s totally exhausted, too. Unlike them, though, he hasn’t been able to rest his eyes. They’ve all napped. The McDonald’s isn’t a celebration as much as it is a reward for another day of pushing himself to a limit he can’t really identify anymore. Physical therapy is the one place where, if he’s in a sour mood or questioning why just a few months ago, his life was forever changed, he can put aside the past and zero in on the now.

Some call him Audrick, others call him “Stak,” his middle name. It’s in honor of one of his uncles. It’s what the occupational and physical therapists call the 18-year-old recent high school graduate, onetime Kearns High football star, last year’s Homecoming King. When they need him to explode off a mat, contorting his shoulders as swiftly as he can, they tell Stak that next time he needs a little more power to sit up on his own and hold that position for more control. Those two-hour shifts in therapy four or five days a week are where Stak can envision everything that might be — that maybe, possibly, somewhere down the line, he’ll be able to walk out on his own.

One day last week, in the wake of another grueling session, he came home and took a seven-hour nap. He gave everything he had that day. There was nothing left. So much so that after he woke from his nap, he ate some food and slept another 10 hours, only to feel refreshed the following morning, looking forward to that two-hour time block the next day.

“If you put 100 percent in, you’ll get 100 percent out,” Stak says between bites of his burger. “I work as hard as I can.”

As the family is huddled around the table, downing their respective late lunches, Stak takes a sip from his soda. But he didn’t order fries for himself. Fries, he said, aren’t that satisfying anymore. Not when you have to eat them one at a time. He’s still fine-tuning his motor skills with his fingers. Fries used to be downed in bunches. At a trampoline park on March 15, Stak flung his body high into the air, determined to land a double back-flip. Every attempt prior, he landed flat on his face. This time, he just spun too fast, and when he came back down, nothing would ever be the same.

Rolling with the punches

There’s a saying on a wall in the kitchen inside the Afatasi home. It reads, “We do not remember days, we remember moments.”

Stak still hates thinking about that day. But he says so with a big smile. He’s not pouting. He rarely does. The moment will always be him motionless on the trampoline thinking he was still tucked when in reality he lay flat and just couldn’t move. Stak came directly down on his neck on the soft part of the trampoline, suffering a major C2 spinal cord injury. The fall paralyzed him. At first, doctors believed it was a complete injury, but eventually sensation and feeling returned to Stak’s legs. It’s now an incomplete C2 spinal cord injury.

They had to drill pins into his head and hang weights from the back of his head to realign the damaged area of the spinal cord. Stak’s father, Skee, said they eventually got to about 80 pounds of pressure. Surgery was also necessary, so they used donated pieces of bone to fix the break and inserted a metal disc in his neck.

From March 15 to April 30, the Afatasi family waited at the Intermountain Medical Center in Murray. Stak waited, too. He binged Netflix to the point where he ran out of shows. Like so many, he also was disappointed in the “Game of Thrones” series finale. The Kearns community — and youth football in Utah — rallied for Stak. A hashtag, “#STAKSTRONG,” took off in the football community statewide. There were T-shirts, magnets, stickers and bracelets.

Skee’s phone cover has a large white #STAKSTRONG sticker on the back. There’s a Kearns Cougar magnet on the fridge of the Afatasi house with the words beneath it, too. A GoFundMe page started on March 18 has raised over $15,800 and counting. Donations still roll in periodically. It’s helped with the massive amount of medical bills.

“It’s a big deal to us,” said Grace Afatasi, Stak’s mother.

The Afatasis have had to account for such a dramatic lifestyle change, too. The second-oldest of six, Stak now relies on his younger siblings to help him out on a daily basis around the house. Younger brother Exodus, already a proud 9-year-old offensive lineman, is his go-to guy. At least four days a week, Skee, Grace or one of his siblings drive Stak to Neuroworx in Sandy, a nonprofit therapy center that specializes in outpatient paralysis care. There it’s an hour of occupational therapy and physical therapy to help Stak progress.

“We’re just rolling with the punches,” says Skee.

After various strenuous workouts during one session last week, physical therapists hooked Stak up to a machine overhead that helps lift him from a seated position to a standing one. And there he holds it. He holds for as long as he can until he gets lightheaded and has to sit back down. Skee is right there rooting him on, even broadcasting it on Facebook Live. As Stak stands over and over again, he does his absolute best to hold that position a little while longer than the last. More digital hearts from those tuning in continue to fill up the screen of Skee’s iPhone.

Stak’s staying strong

He’s already been approached about sharing his story, about potentially one day becoming a motivational speaker of sorts. Those who know Stak say only Stak could handle such a brutal life-altering situation the way he is: staring it straight down and working tirelessly with every opportunity he’s given.

“He’s a special type of kid,” said Kearns football coach Matt Rickards, who had Stak as a team captain. “If anybody could find a way to be positive with what he’s going through, it’s him.”

As he’s lying flat on a table, working on his core and flinging all his energy to one side in order to try and sit up, Ashlyn Rittmanic is helping Stak improve, albeit incrementally. She’s one of the many physical therapists who work with Stak on mobility, transitions from lying down to seated, moving from a seated position to his chair. They’re called pop-ups. Stak isn’t a fan. His favorite part about Neuroworx? “Standing,” he said with a grin.

“We’re seeing more progress right now from him,” Rittmanic said. “For his injury-level, he has a lot more function than other people with that same injury. He’s got a lot of return in his core and arms, so we’re trying to maximize his abilities right now.”

There are no specific goals or outlined markers he needs to hit. Stak goes until he’s tired and tells them he needs a break. He doesn’t like to admit it, but he has to. Each day, he efforts to regain movement and function in his lower body. With his injury, he can’t tell when his body is being overworked, can’t tell when his body temperature rises. He doesn’t sweat anymore. In the hospital, Skee and Grace were told to carry around a water bottle to spritz Stak with if he ever looks like he’s overloading himself to help cool him down.

Stak does having something in mind down the line. It’s not too far away. He wants to be able to go on a pioneer trek in August with members of his ward. In the aftermath of his accident, he admits he doesn’t love the attention, but doesn’t see it as harmful in any way. He just wants to be himself. He misses video games and grabbing handfuls of fries. But when he’s nearly done with his burger, he volunteers some inspirational info himself.

“There’s a lot of walking quadriplegics,” he said. He’s met some who have been paralyzed briefly for one time or another and have eventually been able to walk out a door. That gives Stak hope. That’s what he’s striving for. He’s a high school graduate now, and obviously he has more important things to focus on at the moment, but he’s even floated the idea of pursuing a career in physical therapy down the line.

But each night, when Stak Afatasi is in bed, depleted from another day’s work, he shuts his eyes and meditates. He thinks about his feet moving, about the muscles in the legs that used to carry him to crunching tackles moving. He asks them to move with his mind. He does again and again every night until his mind is worn out enough that he slips into a deep sleep.

“Even if it’s in the middle of the night and I wake up, I do it again,” he said. “I do it to fall back asleep.”

Sen. Kamala Harris of California went all in on every level Thursday night, taking a Democratic presidential contest that has been relatively well-mannered and turning it electric and confrontational. She already had the best performance of the night with a series of fluent and passionate statements before she took on former vice president Joe Biden on racial issues. Having underperformed after a strong start to her campaign, she gambled that pressing her advantage by attacking the front-runner would move her toward the front of the pack.

In the short run, her gambit will work. She is likely to be the center of attention for at least the next week, and, having been running mostly in single digits, she put herself on the same level as the front-runner.

Much will depend over the longer run on how Biden treats the episode. Can he find a way to get by the issue of race that he opened by reminiscing about two segregationist senators as part of his argument that he can work with anyone? How much time will he have to spend defending his past position opposing school busing? And will any of this undercut his polling strength among African Americans?

On the other side, will there be any reaction among Democratic voters against the first candidate in either debate to engage in serious verbal aggression against one of their party's own?

Biden bristled at Harris’s attack, raised his voice and pushed back hard but somewhat impatiently. His answer on school busing seemed to be an endorsement of states’ rights. In replying to Harris, he got stronger as he went on, but then seemed to throw in the towel by ending an answer saying he had run out of time — when no one had yet called time.

For Harris, the attack on Biden served two particular purposes. Biden's polling strength depends upon African American voters, the same voters Harris needs to prevail in the pivotal South Carolina contest. And if the race ever comes down to a more progressive candidate (presumably Sen. Elizabeth Warren or Sen. Bernie Sanders) against a more moderate candidate, Harris needs to nudge Biden aside to emerge as the middle-of-the-road choice.

She will also need to pass South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who also had a strong — if less explosive — evening. He forthrightly took responsibility for his failure to expand the share of his city's police force that is African American and spoke in earnest tones about the fatal shooting by police of an African American resident in his city. And on issue after issue, from guns to China's use of technology to strengthen its dictatorship, he was clear, fluent and forceful.

He also offered two of the night's more interesting lines: "If more guns made us safer, we would be the safest country on earth." And, unpredictably during a conversation of college affordability, he said: "It also needs to be more affordable in this country to not go to college," by way of arguing that those without higher education should have access to good jobs and good pay.

And he once again spoke as a Christian, accusing the Republicans of hypocrisy: "For a party that associates itself with Christianity, to say that ... God would smile on the divisions of families at the hands of federal agents, that God would condone putting children in cages has lost all claim to ever use religious language again."

It was striking that Sanders simply seemed to pick up from wherever he had left off in the last debate of 2016. He made the same arguments with the same affect and same list of villains. He spoke to the faithful. It was not clear that he gained any new ground. His support for Medicare-for-all dominated the debate for so long in the early going that what was supposed to be an encounter among potential presidents seemed to be a seminar on health care. Over both nights of debating, single-payer insurance proved itself to be the issue that will divide these candidates again and again.

Two other candidates — Sens. Michael Bennet of Colorado and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York — clearly made their presence felt, but their efforts were largely lost in the Harris-Biden fireworks.

The contrast between Wednesday and Thursday's debate could not have been sharper. With Warren the only leading contender on the stage, Wednesday was a serious, substantive and relatively subtle struggle for attention, with Warren maintaining her leading position and former HUD secretary Julián Castro, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey strengthening their positions. But consensus and comity disappeared on Thursday — the debate that will be remembered as Biden's first hard test and Harris's prosecutorial moment.

E.J. Dionne is on Twitter: @EJDionne.

Kathleen Anderson, a Republican activist, on Friday announced her bid to reclaim the 4th Congressional District for the GOP.

"I'm not a politician. I'm a conservative. I'm an outsider. And I'm ready to be a voice for those who are not being heard," Anderson said in YouTube video introducing her candidacy.

The congressional district is currently represented by U.S. Rep. Ben McAdams, a Democrat who unseated Republican Mia Love last year. Anderson, who has lived in Utah for 34 years, said in a news release that McAdams does not represent the state’s “traditional values” in D.C.

Her video is a bit more pointed, characterizing McAdams as a politician who "blindly follows an extreme liberal agenda."

Anderson, 51, wife of former state GOP party Chairman Rob Anderson, has never held elected office and calls herself a “conservative outsider.” As a Bountiful resident, she’s also an outsider to the 4th Congressional District, which follows Interstate 15 from Millcreek to just south of Nephi. (McAdams also lives outside the district.)

She has chaired the Davis County Republican Party and, according to her LinkedIn page, has worked as the communications director for the Utah Republican Party. A short biography provided by her campaign said she attended Brigham Young University and then worked for about a decade in the insurance industry before leaving the private sector to raise her four children.

She’s the first Republican to enter the race for the hotly contested congressional seat. Utah Rep. Kim Coleman, a Republican from West Jordan, has also said she’s exploring a run.

Love, who served two terms before McAdams knocked her out by the thinnest of margins last year, has shown no indication of running for her old seat.

“She is presently not looking at the race but has not totally ruled out anything,” said Dave Hansen, a top adviser who helped run Love’s campaigns.

Anderson’s campaign staff said she is not ready to be interviewed and that the announcement video and news release “stand for themselves.” The authority line on the video indicates it was paid for by “Kathleen for Utah," but a search of that name on the Federal Election Commission website turned up no results.

An email from her campaign said she intends to open a campaign committee shortly in accordance with campaign finance regulations.

The only candidate currently registered with the FEC is McAdams, who reported $283,434 in his campaign account as of the last report, March 31.

Washington • The biggest impact of this week’s two-night, 20-candidate Democratic extravaganza is that a new star has emerged: Sen. Kamala Harris of California turned in one of the best debate performances I’ve ever seen. She earned herself a place in the upper tier of the crowded field. Now we’ll see if she has what it takes to climb all the way to the top — and stay there.

Harris’ ascent came at the expense of front-runner Joe Biden, who had such a disappointing outing that all he can do is make sure he does better next time. He still leads all comers, and one debate didn’t change that. But he showed vulnerabilities that have to make Democratic voters nervous about his prospects in a general election race against President Trump.

That, after all, is by far the biggest question for many Democrats: Who is the surest bet to beat Trump? The answer, according to polls thus far, is Biden. But his performance Thursday night has to make never-Trump voters nervous.

With what was clearly a pre-planned assault on Biden — on his fond reminiscences of white-supremacist Senate colleagues and his late-1970s stance against federally mandated school busing to achieve racial integration — Harris accomplished three important things. The former California attorney general displayed her world-class skills as a prosecutor, treating Biden like a defendant on the witness stand. She made Biden look defensive and flustered and, frankly, old. And she introduced her personal history as a young black girl in Berkeley who rode a bus to school.

Her attack on Biden wasn't nice, but it wasn't unfair — his stance on busing is a matter of public record. She was careful to begin by making clear she was not accusing Biden of being a racist. But what she did imply was that he was a man of yesterday, not tomorrow.

It was easy to imagine her utterly demolishing Trump on a debate stage. It was possible to imagine Biden doing the same thing, but you had to wonder.

So Harris got everybody's attention. Now begins the serious vetting — of her record, her background, her temperament, her positions on the issues. She indicated during the debate that her Medicare-for-all health care plan involves eliminating private health insurance, but her campaign said Friday that she misunderstood the question. So which is it? Biden has vast experience in foreign affairs; Harris doesn't. Is she the one to repair the damage Trump is doing to the nation's standing in the world? She denounces and rejects Trump's immigration policy. What's hers?

If Harris' debate triumph was a revelation, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' performance was familiar. Nobody stays on-message better than Bernie. But unlike four years ago, when he had the progressive wing of the party to himself, this year he has to share it with Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who dominated Wednesday night's first half of the debate. We'll have to wait until next time, perhaps, to see how her detailed plans for addressing problems and issues compete on a debate stage with Sanders' general call for a political "revolution."

Pete Buttigieg created a moment when he forthrightly took responsibility for not doing more to diversify the police department of South Bend, Indiana, during his time as mayor. Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado and former housing secretary Julian Castro really helped themselves this week; New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York showed that breaking the debate rules and interrupting constantly gets you noticed, not punished. And God bless Marianne Williamson, because yes, we do need love.

Bottom line: Harris won the two-night debate by a wide margin. And Biden needs to do better next time if he wants to keep his lead.

Eugene Robinson’s email address is eugenerobinson@washpost.com.

Replacement of some 20-year old rail in downtown Salt Lake City will disrupt commuting for the next nine days on TRAX light rail trains, and complicate car travel on South Temple.

The Utah Transit Authority is replacing the track between its Temple Square and Arena TRAX stations, with work scheduled to begin on Saturday and end July 7.

During that time, UTA will provide “bus bridges” between the stations, or passengers may choose to walk the block or so between them. A bus bridge also will provide service directly between the Temple Square station and FrontRunner trains at the North Temple station.

The tracks serve both the Green Line (between West Valley City and Salt Lake City International Airport) and the Blue Line (between Draper and the Salt Lake Central Station).

UTA will have volunteers at the City Center, Temple Square, Arena and North Temple Stations to help riders get to their destination.

Construction will reduce car traffic on South Temple to a single lane between 400 West and West Temple. UTA suggests using North Temple or 100 South as alternates.

Herriman • Real Salt Lake and Sporting Kansas City know each other very well. The two teams teams faced off four times last season, the last two being the two legs of the Western Conference semifinals of the MLS Cup playoffs.

SKC eliminated RSL in that playoff round last year. And who can forget the 2013 MLS Cup final where the two teams made it all the way to penalty kicks only for Salt Lake to fall?

Over the years, the rivalry between Sporting and Real has been exciting, memorable and, at time, contentious. But going into the first matchup of 2019 between the two teams, it’s one of the only times in recent memory that both have been below the playoff line. RSL (20 points) sits in eighth place in the Western Conference, while SKC (19 points) is 10th.

The reasons for RSL’s current position have been discussed by the team ad nauseam: road-heavy first half the season and inconsistency at home have the main culprits. Sporting, on the other hand, have been marred by injuries to some key players, and also played a lot of soccer in the beginning of year because it competed in the CONCACAF Champions League.

But despite how different the two teams feel this season compared to last, some with RSL say the matchup between these two rivals won’t look very different compared to years past.

“It’s close again,” Nedum Onuoha said Thursday after training. “I think it’s a good matchup. Obviously the score might be whatever the score is, but there shouldn’t really be that much between both sides.”

Kansas City lost in the conference finals to Portland in last year’s MLS Cup playoffs after finishing with the best record in the West during the regular season. But in 2019, Sporting’s season has been up and down to say the least. Just a few days ago, they won their first road game of the season after winning eight last year.

Regardless of SKC’s position, however, there is still plenty of reason for RSL to have a healthy respect for the visitors going into Saturday.

“They’re one of the best teams in the league,” midfielder Kyle Beckerman said. “They’re consistently at the top. Where they are in the rankings right now, for me, it doesn’t show who they really are.”

RSL has also changed since last season, particularly with the additions of Sam Johnson and Everton Luiz. Onuoha said that while SKC is a team that has plenty of experience winning when it matters most, Real has also added experience to its roster. That’s part of the reason why he feels not much separates the two sides this year.

“We feel like we’ve progressed,” Onuoha said. “They obviously feel like they have, even though their position doesn’t necessarily say that.”

RSL coach Mike Petke attributed SKC’s struggles this season to the myriad injures its players have suffered, calling it the “main reason” Sporting are where they are.

“It’s not that they’re doing anything differently,” Petke said. “I just think that the injuries along with maybe just a little rut based around the injuries has kicked in for them.”

But regardless of conference standings or recent wins and losses, when RSL and SKC face off, the games tend to be anything but lackluster or soporific. Even SKC coach Peter Vermes thinks so.

“It’s always a difficult match and I don’t suspect it’ll be any different this game,” Vermes told Kansas City media this week.

Thursday's Democratic debate was superior in every respect to Wednesday's. It seems there is an advantage to being on the panel on the second evening: a significant opportunity to scout out the journalists asking questions, to survey the audience and to gauge the look and feel of the venue.

But even if the second part's actors hadn't had those built-in edges, they all benefited from an almost palpable uptick in intelligence and sincere passion, led by the two clear winners: Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana. Both displayed an almost effortless eloquence and command of rhetorical devices. They did not need gimmicks and appeared completely unrehearsed. They connected.

Former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., are — to be blunt — too old. Their ideas are old; their personas are old; their talking points are old. Biden might be unwilling to “pass the torch,” as Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., challenged him to do. But it slipped out of his hand when Harris delivered an emotionally devastating blow on his past record and recent comments on race — not just for Democratic primary voters but also for all Americans who have been on the side of civil rights from before Biden entered the Senate in 1973. Do people still like Biden? Of course. But they are asking themselves (many already were), “What don’t we remember about this guy?” He’s slipping, badly.

Sanders is out in far-left field, and as this primary is not a binary choice, he’s struggling. He was the only candidate over two nights who was hurt by having too much time. Extra-strength Bernie is too much Bernie, especially when Buttigieg — the war veteran and the tribune of generational change — is sharing the stage.

Eloquence still counts in politics. The temperament displayed by the young mayor was perhaps honed in Afghanistan, but he is astonishingly unflappable, direct and confident for a rookie on a national stage with 15 million or so people watching. His only error was in significantly distorting what Republicans or conservatives more broadly believe about God and the role of faith in politics.

Buttigieg is too smart not to know that he presented a caricature of center-right people of faith in the public square, and one that will be hard to put away should he improbably run the table. His was a high-risk pitch to the religious left, a not-insignificant slice of the electorate long ignored by the Democratic Party, but he might have overshot the mark. If so, it was his only mistake, even when he walked on to the stage burdened by a shooting in South Bend.

The race could, to the benefit of everyone, quickly narrow to five: Biden, Sanders, Harris, Buttigieg and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. There is simply no way for someone like Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., or former Colorado governor John Hickenlooper to change the fact that most people wouldn't know who they were if seated next to them on an airplane. There's no way for Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., to interrupt her way to significance. Swalwell and Andrew Yang, thanks for playing. Marianne Williamson, go back to books.

A debate among the five serious candidates about serious issues would be welcome. Many debates of five, in fact. But the Democratic National Committee will lack the nerve to cut fast and deep, even though delay gives President Trump more time to raise money and define the field — if not the individuals — and for the media to obsess over small things when it’s really already down to the old warhorses vs. the new faces.

Historian Jon Meacham commented on “Meet the Press” this month that Democrats have won the presidency when they hitched their fortunes to candidates from the next generation: John F. Kennedy, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama. You look back on the past two nights and ask: Who could be the fourth name in that sequence? Who would, in retrospect, be as inevitable a nominee as Obama was from the moment he gave the keynote at the Democratic National Convention in the Fleet Center in Boston in 2004? The safer bet would be Harris, who would be the first female African American president, but the truly big throw of the dice would be Buttigieg. Are Democrats in a mood to gamble?

Hugh Hewitt, a Washington Post contributing columnist, hosts a nationally syndicated radio show and is author of “The Fourth Way: The Conservative Playbook for a Lasting GOP Majority.”

Charlottesville, Va. • An avowed white supremacist who drove his car into a crowd of counterprotesters during a white nationalist rally in Virginia was sentenced to life in prison Friday on hate crime charges.

James Alex Fields Jr. of Maumee, Ohio, had pleaded guilty in March to the 2017 attack that killed one person and injured more than two dozen others. In exchange, prosecutors dropped their request for the death penalty. His attorneys asked for a sentence less than life. He will be sentenced next month on separate state charges.

Before the judge handed down his sentence, Fields, accompanied by one of his lawyers, walked to a podium in the courtroom and spoke.

"I apologize for the hurt and loss I've caused," he said, later adding, "Every day I think about how things could have gone differently and how I regret my actions. I'm sorry."

Fields' comment came after more than a dozen survivors of and witnesses to the attack delivered emotional testimony about the physical and psychological wounds they had received as a result of the events that day.

The “Unite the Right” rally on Aug. 12, 2017, drew hundreds of white nationalists to Charlottesville to protest the planned removal of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

The case stirred racial tensions around the country.

Fields was charged with 29 hate crime counts and one count of "racially motivated violent interference." He pleaded guilty to 29 of the counts.

In a sentencing memo filed in court last week, Fields' lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Michael Urbanski to consider a sentence of "less than life."

"No amount of punishment imposed on James can repair the damage he caused to dozens of innocent people. But this Court should find that retribution has limits," his attorneys wrote.

Fields faces sentencing in state court on July 15. A jury has recommended life plus 419 years.

The Salt Lake City Council voted swiftly Friday to override most of Mayor Jackie Biskupski’s first-ever vetoes, effectively leaving in place the council’s decision to move control of a $2.59 million loan fund for affordable housing to a different arm of city government.

With a 7-0 vote and no discussion, the council upheld its decision to transfer the city’s Housing Loan Trust fund away from the purview of the Housing and Neighborhood Development Division, or HAND, to the city’s Redevelopment Agency, which the City Council believes is more transparent.

But council members conceded to pleas from the Biskupski administration and freed up money for one crucial spending item among nearly $1.9 million for several housing pilot programs it had put on hold. That vote, also unanimous, released $125,000 for New House 20, a program run by The Road Home for the city’s heaviest users of emergency services.

Council members said they had been apprised that The Road Home program risked running out of money for existing clients by Sunday without the infusion.

“That was never the intent of the council,” Council Chairman Charlie Luke said, adding that the council’s ultimate intent in its changes to the budget proposed by the mayor in May had been “to create a more transparent and streamlined process.”

But council members overrode Biskupski line-item vetoes on a handful of other HAND spending items to expand existing homeless pilot programs — including ones for rental assistance, eviction prevention, services for residents with mental illness and for students facing homelessness, and down-payment stipends for teachers, police and other vital workers.

Those budget items, part of the city’s $331 million spending plan for 2019-2020, will remain sidetracked in a holding account, Luke said, pending a study of them in the coming weeks. He said he hoped the council and the mayor could work together in reviewing those programs, many of which the council members have said they support.

Biskupski was attending an annual U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting in Honolulu on Friday and was not immediately available for comment.

The mayor’s spokesman Matthew Rojas said the administration welcomed the council’s compromise on New House 20 funding. The council gave the program $125,000 for ongoing operations and kept another $125,000 — earmarked to expand New House 20 clientele — in a holding account.

But Rojas said Biskupski’s concerns persist over changes to the Housing Trust Fund, which, under HAND’s guidance, has successfully helped finance construction of 992 affordable housing units and preservation of 303 additional dwellings in Salt Lake City over the past three years.

Although the RDA maintains its own robust system of lending to developers, the mayor, who is not seeking a second term, had said shifting the trust fund threatened to slow down the city’s efforts to address an ongoing shortage of affordable housing in Utah’s capital city.

In her veto message, the mayor called the decision “last minute” and said it amounted to a significant shift in city policy “without appropriate public input.”

“The mayor continues to have deep reservations about changes to the successful model we’ve developed for affordable housing in the city,” Rojas said Friday. “We’re not sure how that’s going to work going forward.”

Moves with the city’s Housing Trust Fund have also been closely watched by some of Utah’s developers and low-income and housing advocates. The fund is a crucial tool in the city’s campaign to ease the housing squeeze, used to bridge gaps in financing for developers building affordable dwellings, particularly ones for the city’s poorest residents.

“Our streamlining effort reduces confusion and redundancy in a growing housing program that has been spread over two city agencies,” Luke said in a statement after the vote. “With our changes, no program is slowed down.”

“We all share the goal of increasing the supply of affordable housing,” Luke said.

In an open letter released Friday, Luke and Councilwoman Amy Fowler, who chairs the city’s RDA board, sought to reassure housing advocates that the budget steps would “eliminate duplication and uncertainty in the city’s current building and financing process.”

The letter touted the city’s spending of $34 million on affordable housing in recent years, saying it was among the largest outlays for that purpose in state history.

The city was creating a “one-stop” process for developers, the letter said, helping them to access the city’s full set of affordable housing incentives, including loans and land write-downs, at the same time to save money and time.

Beyond that change, Luke and Fowler said, “most other aspects of the city’s approach to affordable housing will remain the same.”

While on paper the City Council exercises equal degrees of control over budget matters at HAND and the RDA, members of the council also serve as members of the RDA board. Several council members have said they view RDA’s process for lending as more open.

The city department that encompasses HAND, meanwhile, has seen recent departures from its top administrative ranks, including the post of division director over HAND.

In their open letter, Luke and Fowler said putting the fund with the RDA would improve oversight of the money by allowing the public to have input at RDA hearings on each project the city considers for financing. The letter said the City Council would continue to be guided by “clear accounting and transparent decision-making” in its funding of new housing.

“For taxpayers, consumers and the business community, we believe this change in our housing loan process is best in the long run,” Fowler said in a statement.

In budget discussions completed last week, the council said moving the trust fund to the RDA was done on a yearlong trial basis, with potential to split it into two funds, one for housing programing, run by HAND, and another for housing development, operated by the RDA.

Biskupski had warned that because of the council’s move, the trust fund was in jeopardy of being drained once financing for a senior housing project, known as Lincoln Towers, was completed. Council members have said they do not expect any interruption to replenishing the fund, which draws on cash generated by the RDA.

Unrelated to housing, the council opted to let stand another of Biskupski’s vetoes — the first ones she has issued while in office. That dealt with a council decision to change how the city budgets for a handful of memberships in civic groups held by city employees.

Biskupski had contended the City Council’s decision to move the spending item to an account more directly under its control violated the separation of powers between the mayor and the council, a view that Rojas said had been backed up by the city’s lawyers.

Farmington • Having grown up about a half-mile from the Lagoon amusement park, Daniel Summerhays is familiar with the Whac-A-Mole arcade game.

His best description of the nature of golf, trying to master so many different aspects of the game, is a comparison to hammering the rodents that pop up randomly. Asked about his ball-striking after Friday’s second round of the Utah Championship presented by Zions Bank, Summerhays said, “I’d say I’ve hit it progressively better as the year’s gone on. But my putting is what’s finally starting to come around. I didn’t pay much attention to it for quite a while, because I was working so much on the ball-striking. Golf’s like Whac-A-Mole. That’s the best analogy I have. … You keep whacking these moles down. I feel like I have a decent handle on every part of the game now.”

His scores this week would say so, anyway. The former Davis High School and BYU golfer posted a 3-under-par 68 that moved him into a tie for second place at 8 under in the Korn Ferry Tour event at Oakridge Country Club. Tyrone Van Aswegen, a South African who's splitting his season between the PGA and Korn Ferry Tours, is the leader at 9 under after a second-round 65.

Zac Blair, from Fremont High and BYU, is tied for fifth at 6 under after shooting a 67. Having two Utahns in contention is pretty much all that the host Utah Sports Commission could have wanted as a setup for the weekend rounds. Blair made a tough 15-foot putt on No. 18 after a poor chip that left him muttering even after he finished the hole, but he figured the par save created more momentum.

“That's kind of the thing the first couple days, make sure you play well enough to get a late tee time going into the weekend,” Blair said.

Park City’s Steele DeWald, a Monday qualifier, easily made the cut by shooting a second-round 68, highlighted by an eagle on the par-5 No. 7. The only thing that could have completed the 36-hole story from a Utah perspective was if State Amateur champion Preston Summerhays, Daniel’s 16-year-old nephew, would have made the cut. But failing to birdie the par-5 No. 7 (his 16th hole of the day) basically ended his hopes, as he shot 73-71 and missed by two strokes, while being scouted by coaches from college golf powers Texas and Oklahoma State.

Daniel Summerhays made four birdies and one bogey Friday, giving himself a shot at a victory that would be monumental for multiple reasons. His own State Amateur title in 2000 is part of a remarkable family history at Oakridge, and the $131,500 winner's check would revive his career. Yet he said winning in front of his family and friends would mean more than any other rewards.

If that happens, “you'll probably see me cry,” he said. “A lot of emotion would pour out. … So I'm excited the next couple days to test my skill sets.”

Summerhays and Blair both hope the wind keeps blowing at uncharacteristic levels when they tee off in the mid-afternoon Saturday. “I pride myself in being able to stay patient [and] think my way around the golf course, so I'm really happy when the wind's up,” Summerhays said.

The wind's effect is significant. Last July at Oakridge, Cameron Champ (who's second in this week's PGA Tour event in Detroit) stood 17 under after two rounds on his way to the title. And the cut came at 5 under par. This year, golfers shooting even par advanced to the weekend rounds.

“Conditions always dictate what the scores are going to be like,” Van Aswegen said.

Van Aswegen's PGA Tour conditional status makes a schedule difficult to plan. “You just have to play well when you get in,” he said, “and I haven't done that.”

That’s true of his performances on both tours, but this week could be different, as he tries to spoil Summerhays’ homecoming game.

Come watch Danny tee off tomorrow at 2:30 pm as he heads into third rounds! #UtahChampionship https://t.co/8ZYzJl9hAR

— Utah Championship (@UTChampionship) June 28, 2019

Montgomery, Ala. • An Alabama district attorney’s office hasn’t decided whether to prosecute a woman indicted for manslaughter after she lost her fetus when she was shot during a fight.

Marshae Jones was five months pregnant when 23-year-old Ebony Jemison shot her in the stomach during a December altercation over the fetus's father, authorities said.

Jemison was initially charged with manslaughter, but a Jefferson County grand jury declined to indict her after police said an investigation determined Jones started the fight, and Jemison ultimately fired in self-defense. Jones, 28, was indicted by that same grand jury Wednesday.

The indictment stated Jones did "intentionally cause the death" of "Unborn Baby Jones by initiating a fight knowing she was five months pregnant."

However, the office of District Attorney Lynneice O. Washington said there has been no decision on whether to pursue the case against Jones.

With Washington out of the country, her chief assistant D.A. Valerie Hicks Powe put out a statement expressing "sympathy for all the families involved, including Mrs. Jones, who lost her unborn child." Both prosecutors are African American women; Washington took office in 2017 as the first black female district attorney to be elected in Alabama.

While the grand jury "had its say," Powe said the office has "not yet made a determination about whether to prosecute it as a manslaughter case, reduce it to a lesser charge or not to prosecute it." She promised a thorough review and "an outcome that is most just for all the parties involved."

"Foremost, it should be stated that this is a truly tragic case, resulting in the death of an unborn child," she said. "The fact that this tragedy was 100 percent avoidable makes this case even more disheartening."

A Birmingham law firm, White Arnold & Dowd, said in a statement Friday that it is representing Jones.

"Marshae has been subjected to extraordinary violence, trauma and loss over the past year," the statement reads, adding that Jones recently lost her home to a fire and lost her job. "Now, for reasons that defy imagination, she faces an unprecedented legal action that subjects this victim of violence to further distress and harm."

The law firm also noted that Jones has no criminal history and is raising a young daughter.

Pleasant Grove police Lt. Danny Reid had called the fetus "the only true victim," having been brought unnecessarily into a fight and "dependent on its mother to try to keep it from harm."

Advocates for women's rights expressed outrage over Jones' arrest.

Lynn Paltrow, executive director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women, said women across the country have been prosecuted for manslaughter or murder for having an abortion or experiencing a miscarriage.

She said Alabama currently leads the nation in charging women for crimes related to their pregnancies. She said hundreds have been prosecuted for running afoul of the state's "chemical endangerment of a child" statute by exposing their embryo or fetus to controlled substances.

But this is the first time she's heard of a pregnant woman being charged after getting shot.

"This takes us to a new level of inhumanity and illegality towards pregnant women," Paltrow said. "I can't think of any other circumstance where a person who themselves is a victim of a crime is treated as the criminal."

The district attorney's office said it will decide how to proceed "only after all due diligence has been performed."

Alabama is one of dozens of states that have fetal homicide laws allowing criminal charges when fetuses are killed in violent acts, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Jones' arrest also drew criticism from the Yellowhammer Fund, which raises money to help women have access to abortions.

"The state of Alabama has proven yet again that the moment a person becomes pregnant their sole responsibility is to produce a live, healthy baby and that it considers any action a pregnant person takes that might impede in that live birth to be a criminal act," said Amanda Reyes, the group's director.

___

Associated Press reporters Jeff Martin in Atlanta and Kim Chandler in Montgomery, Alabama, contributed to this report.

Real Salt Lake has bought out the contract of Everton Luiz from his parent club, S.P.A.L., per multiple reports. The news was first reported by the Italian club on its website.

RSL acquired Luiz on loan in January. The club had the option the buy his contract at the end of the season, but appears to have done so earlier.

Luiz, who plays the attacking midfielder position, has fit in seamlessly with the club’s style of play. He quickly made regular appearances in the starting lineup before a hamstring injury sidelined him for about a month. Luiz has recently returned to the field.

The Brazil native has started nine of the 11 games in which he has appeared this season. He’s played 751 minutes and recorded an assist with five shots.

Before joining S.P.A.L., Luiz played with Ponte Preta, Palmeiras and CRB in Brazil, and FC Lugano and St. Gallen in Switzerland. He also played for a team in Serbia, where he was part of two Serbian Cup titles.

50th anniversary of the rebellion that catalyzed a movement for LGBTQ liberation, marking the milestone with celebrity performances, speeches and personal reflections.

People from New York and afar came to take photos and share in the legacy of the gay bar where patrons resisted a police raid, sparking protests and longer-term organizing that made the cause of LGBTQ rights considerably more visible.

"Fifty years ago, people stood up for their rights, and look where we're at now. We've got flags all over the city," said Richard Walker, 58, an airline worker from New York. "I'm getting goosebumps just really thinking about it."

With the modern incarnation of the Stonewall Inn as the focal point, the day's celebrations included music, speeches and an evening rally. Lady Gaga, Whoopi Goldberg, Alicia Keys, drag performers and other artists addressed a crowd that stretched for blocks on a nearly 90-degree afternoon.

"This community has fought and continued to fight a war of acceptance, a war of tolerance," Lady Gaga said. "You are the definition of courage."

Robert Beaird traveled from Dallas to attend the Stonewall anniversary events a couple of years after coming out in his 50s.

"I just kind of hid who I was for my whole life, and then within the last two years, I've been going through this kind of cathartic experience of accepting myself," said Beaird, 53, who had been married and fathered children. "Just to be here with all these people is pretty amazing."

Jocelyn Burrell isn't gay, but she made her way to the Stonewall Inn because she was struck by how welcoming it was when she stopped in there years ago, and she feels a sense of common cause with its place in history.

"Just like we fought — black people fought — for civil rights, I feel I should support other people who fight for civil rights," she said.

Friday's events were kicking off a big weekend of LGBTQ Pride festivities in New York and elsewhere. In New York, Sunday's huge WorldPride parade — and an alternative march intended as a less corporate commemoration of Stonewall — also will swing past the bar.

Cities around the world began celebrating Pride on Friday. Participants in a march in the Philippines went by the presidential palace in Manila, waving placards as they marked the 25th year since the first such gathering.

The Stonewall Inn is now a landmark and part of the Stonewall National Monument, but in 1969, it was part of a gay scene that was known, yet not open. At the time, showing same-sex affection or dressing in a way deemed gender-inappropriate could get people arrested, and bars had lost liquor licenses for serving LGBTQ customers.

The police raid on the bar began early the morning of June 28, 1969. The nightspot was unlicensed, and the officers had been assigned to stop any illegal alcohol sales.

Patrons and people who converged on the bar on Christopher Street resisted , hurling objects and at points scuffling with the officers.

Protests followed over several more days. A year later, LGBTQ New Yorkers marked the anniversary of the riot with the Christopher Street Liberation Day March. Thousands proudly paraded through a city where, at the time, LGBTQ people were largely expected to stay in the shadows.

The Stonewall Inn itself closed not long after the raid. The current Stonewall Inn dates to the early 1990s.

"We understand we're the innkeepers of history," said current co-owner Stacy Lentz. "We really feel like the fire that started at Stonewall in 1969 is not done. The battleground has just shifted."

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Associated Press videojournalist Ted Shaffrey contributed to this report.

Congress should move quickly to impose a so-called “carbon tax.” It’s an effective strategy for speeding up efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The problem is that those who push for the tax believe they have a better chance of success if they couple it with a promise to distribute money from carbon tax revenue to “the people.” That’s a prescription for failure. Money gained from a carbon tax would be better spent on repairing the infrastructure.

First, history tells us that government money supposedly intended for “the people” will inevitably end up in the pockets of the wealthy. You can be sure that the top 10% of us will end up with 90% of carbon tax money.

Second, history also tells us that Congress has trouble figuring out who “the people” might be. For example, does it include children? Does it include the millions who are in prison or jail? Does it include those who pay taxes but are not yet citizens? Does it include the homeless, many of whom do not have mailing addresses? Congress is likely to spend years trying to define “the people” ... while carbon products continue to flood the atmosphere, insulate the earth and warm the planet. Of course, Congress will be encouraged to drag its collective feet by powerful lobbyists who have already infiltrated lawmakers’ hearts, minds, pocketbooks and souls.

It would be easier for Congress to approve a carbon tax if the money were dedicated to infrastructure improvements. Everyone benefits from that approach. Well, almost everyone. The overall economy benefits, also. And lobbyists would be more likely to jump on board, as their employers are the business enterprises that will receive lucrative contracts to rebuild roads, bridges, railroad beds, water systems, transmission lines, waste disposal facilities and other components of vital infrastructure.

Citizens also benefit, not only from improvements in the public facilities they use every day, but also from the hundreds of thousands of new jobs infrastructure projects will provide. Equipment manufacturers will be on board. Banks will be on board. Labor unions will be on board. State legislatures will be on board. Small business owners who depend on the infrastructure — especially transportation — will be on board.

In other words, dedicating carbon tax revenue to infrastructure improvements will be a win-win situation for almost everyone. Under those circumstances, Congress will be less likely to drag its nether parts.

We should also think about the end game. If all goes as expected, both atmospheric carbon and the carbon tax will eventually disappear ... or at least trail off to near zero. That, too, makes returning the tax revenue to “the people” an ill-advised strategy.

Once people – especially wealthy people – get used to receiving monthly or annual carbon tax checks, it will be extremely difficult to reverse course. At least that’s what anti-government fanatics claim – those who grouse about so-called “government handouts.”

Devoting the carbon tax to infrastructure will avoid that inevitable shouting match — at both the beginning and the end of the program.

And so by all means, let’s help save the world by instituting a tax on carbon production. But let’s use the revenue to generate long-term benefits rather than for the sake of short-term expediency.

Don Gale is a long-time Utah journalist who remembers when thick black smoke hung over the valley during winter months, until regulators “encouraged” business and residential buildings to switch from coal heat to natural gas. Today’s world-wide pollution may not be as visible as yesterday’s black smoke, but it’s even more threatening to human life and our planet’s survival.