The Latest on the skiing world championships (all times local):
6:50 p.m.
Henrik Kristoffersen captured his first skiing world championships gold medal by winning the giant slalom thanks to a brilliant second run.
Norway's Henrik Kristoffersen , center, winner of the men's giant slalom, poses with second placed Austria's Marcel Hirscher , left, and third placed France's Alexis Pinturault, at the alpine ski World Championships in Are, Sweden, Friday, Feb. 15, 2019. (AP PhotoMarco Trovati)
The Norwegian was in third place after the first leg but toppled leader Alexis Pinturault and favorite Marcel Hirscher to win by 0.20 seconds.
Hirscher took silver and Pinturault won bronze, 0.42 seconds behind Kristoffersen.
Kristoffersen had finished fourth in his last three races at the world championships — the giant slalom and slalom in 2017 and the slalom in 2015.
Austria's Marcel Hirscher competes during the men's giant slalom, at the alpine ski World Championships in Are, Sweden, Friday, Feb. 15, 2019. (AP PhotoAlessandro Trovati)
3:15 p.m.
Fresh off winning the Alpine combined, French skier Alexis Pinturault took a 0.10-second lead over Marcel Hirscher after the first run in the giant slalom at the world championships.
Hirscher, the defending world and Olympic giant slalom champion from Austria, was in an ideal attacking position going into the second run after shrugging off flu-like symptoms to ski.
Henrik Kristoffersen of Norway was in third place, 0.18 seconds off the lead. The only other skier within a half-second of Pinturault was Thomas Fanara of France, who was 0.42 behind.
Leif Kristian Nestvold-Haugen led by 0.07 after the first checkpoint, but slipped at a turn moments later and wound up in eighth place.
Results weren't official as there were lower-ranked skiers yet to finish.
Pinturault won the combined on Monday for his first individual gold medal at a worlds or Olympics.
2 p.m.
After rain and strong gusts for the past two days, a blue sky and calmer conditions will greet the skiers in the giant slalom.
For only the second time in an individual event at these world championships, the course has not been shortened and the ski racers will set out from the original start.
1:40 p.m.
Marcel Hirscher looks to have shrugged off illness and is slated to compete in the giant slalom at the world championships.
The seven-time overall World Cup champion from Austria will be the fifth skier on the course in the first leg.
Hirscher has been dealing with flu-like symptoms that forced him to cancel a news conference on Wednesday. On Thursday, he hit the slopes for a few practice runs but also spent time in bed, saying he had a "sore throat and a runny nose."
Hirscher is the reigning world and Olympic champion at giant slalom. He is also scheduled to compete in the slalom on Sunday.
The first run begins at 2:15 p.m. local time (1315 GMT). The second run starts at 5:45 p.m. local time (1645 GMT).
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The state of Vermont did not provide adequate oversight to prevent the massive fraud that occurred in ski area and other development projects funded by foreign investors' money through a special visa program, a state audit has found.
The financial scandal first revealed in 2016, which became the state's largest fraud case, shook Vermont and the economically depressed region called the Northeast Kingdom.
In 2018, Vermont's former attorney general asked for an audit of the state's involvement in the projects at Jay Peak and Burke resorts to address the loss of trust in state government from the fraud, State Auditor Doug Hoffer wrote in the report released on Thursday. The audit was completed after the legal proceedings concluded, he wrote.
The findings should not be entirely surprising, Hoffer wrote.
“In short, we found a pattern of misplaced trust, unfortunate decision-making, lengthy delays, and missed opportunities to prevent or minimize fraud,” Hoffer wrote.
Ariel Quiros, a Miami businessman and former owner of two Vermont ski resorts, was sentenced in 2022 to five years in prison for his role in a failed plan to build a biotechnology plant in Newport using tens of millions of dollars raised through the EB-5 visa program. Under the program, foreigners invest $500,000 in U.S. a project that creates at least 10 jobs in exchange for a chance to earn permanent U.S. residency. William Stenger, the former president of Jay Peak, and William Kelly, an advisor to Quiros, each got sentences of 18 months.
But the fraud encompassed seven other projects at Jay Peak and Burke resorts.
In 2016, the federal Securities and Exchange Commission and the state of Vermont alleged that Quiros and Stenger took part in a “massive eight-year fraudulent scheme.” The civil allegations involved misusing more than $200 million of about $400 million raised from foreign investors for various ski area developments through the EB-5 visa program “in Ponzi-like fashion.”
In a Ponzi scheme, money provided by new investors is used to pay high returns to early-stage investors to suggest the enterprise is prosperous. The scheme collapses when required redemptions exceed new investments.
Quiros and Stenger settled civil charges with the SEC, with Quiros surrendering more than $80 million in assets, including the two resorts. In the seven projects at Jay Peak and Burke, “construction was done but not always to the specifications or at the costs told to the investors. Significant funds were simply misused,” the report said.
Under the EB-5 program, the federal government designates regional centers to promote economic growth and oversee and monitor sponsored projects, the report states. Most regional centers are privately owned but the Vermont Regional Center was state government-run.
The center, which was the EB-5 office within the Agency of Commerce and Community Development, had competing duties: to market and promote EB-5 projects and to regulate them, the auditor's report states.
"Experts and policymakers have long warned against such arrangements for fear that an agency relied upon to help a project succeed may be reluctant to exercise its regulatory powers. In addition, a marketing office may not have the skill sets needed to properly regulate complex financial arrangements such as EB-5. Unfortunately, this proved all too true at ACCD,” the report states.
Last July, the state of Vermont agreed to pay $16.5 million to settle all pending and potential lawsuits from foreign investors in the development projects.
The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services is still determining the immigration status of the Jay Peak and Burke investors, Goldstein wrote. At least 424 of 564 Jay Peak investors have already received green cards and the state is working to increase the chances that many more do, she wrote.
FILE - The water park at Jay Peak resort in Jay, Vt., April 18, 2016. A state audit has concluded Thursday, March 28, 2024, that Vermont did not provide adequate oversight to prevent the massive fraud that occurred in ski area and other development projects funded by foreign investors' money through a special visa program. (AP Photo/Lisa Rathke, File)
