A judge agreed Friday to dismiss murder charges against a man suspected of killing 10 homeless men in Los Angeles in the 1970s because he only has six months to live.
At a hearing Friday morning, Bobby Joe Maxwell's sister Rosie Harmon burst into tears when the Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Larry Fidler dismissed Maxwell's case following a request from prosecutors.
Harmon called her mother right after the hearing, sharing authorities' decision that came nearly four decades after Maxwell was jailed in 1979.
"While Mr. Maxwell was hospitalized, there were sheriffs sitting with him 24/7 and she had to get permission as to when she could come and visit from the sheriff," Maxwell's attorney Pierpont Laidley said.
"Now he is a free man, she'll be able to visit just like any other visitors," Laidley said.
The 68-year-old has been comatose since last December when he suffered a heart attack and will likely never recover, Deputy District Attorney Robert Grace said.
Maxwell was convicted in the 1980s of two killings. The appeals court overturned Maxwell's convictions decades later after it found that he was the victim of a notorious jailhouse snitch who committed perjury in his two convictions.
Court documents show the appeals court called the case's jailhouse informant, Sidney Storch, a "habitual liar."
The case against Maxwell appeared thin until Storch emerged. The only physical evidence, the appeals court said, was a palm print found on a bench in an area Maxwell frequented. Storch, who was Maxwell's cellmate for three weeks, read about the print in news accounts and said he asked Maxwell about it.
He claimed that Maxwell confessed he had made a mistake failing to wear gloves during the stabbings. Maxwell denied making the comment.
In 2013, prosecutors refiled five murder charges against him.
Grace said prosecutors moved expeditiously to make a decision once they confirmed that Maxwell is unlikely to regain health and that he would continue to receive acute medical care at the hospital once he's released from custody.
Grace called the dismissal a "compassionate release" and stressed there was no finding of Maxwell's guilt or innocence. Prosecutors will seek to refile the charges if Maxwell recovers.
Maxwell's attorneys said they are absolutely ready to prove his innocence.
"Mr. Maxwell has always insisted that he was innocent, and has fought to prove his innocence for forty years," another of Maxwell's lawyers, Frederick Alschuler, said.
DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — President Donald Trump said Saturday that “there will be very serious retaliation” after two U.S. service members and one American civilian were killed in an attack in Syria that the United States blames on the Islamic State group.
“This was an ISIS attack against the U.S., and Syria, in a very dangerous part of Syria, that is not fully controlled by them,” he said in a social media post.
The American president told reporters at the White House that Syria's president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, was “devastated by what happened” and stressed that Syria was fighting alongside U.S. troops. Trump, in his post, said al-Sharaa was “extremely angry and disturbed by this attack.”
Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa said the soldiers were members of the Iowa National Guard -- where she, too, once served. “Our Iowa National Guard family is hurting as we mourn the loss of two of our own and pray for the recovery of the three soldiers wounded,” she said.
U.S. Central Command said three service members were also wounded in the ambush Saturday by a lone IS member in central Syria. Trump said the three “seem to be doing pretty well.” The U.S. military said the gunman was killed in the attack. Syrian officials said the attack wounded members of Syria's security forces as well.
The attack on U.S. troops in Syria was the first with fatalities since the fall of President Bashar Assad a year ago.
“There will be very serious retaliation,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.
The Pentagon's chief spokesman, Sean Parnell, said the civilian killed was a U.S. interpreter. Parnell said the attack targeted soldiers involved in the ongoing counter-terrorism operations in the region and is under active investigation.
The shooting took place near historic Palmyra, according to the state-run SANA news agency, which earlier said two members of Syria’s security force and several U.S. service members had been wounded. The casualties were taken by helicopter to the al-Tanf garrison near the border with Iraq and Jordan.
Syria's Interior Ministry spokesman Nour al-Din al-Baba said a gunman linked to IS opened fire at the gate of a military post. He added that Syrian authorities are looking into whether the gunman was an IS member or only carried its extreme ideology.
Later al-Baba said that the attacker was a member of the Internal Security force in the desert adding that he “did not have any command post" within the forces nor was he a bodyguard for the force commander.
Al-Baba added in an interview with state TV that some 5,000 members have joined Internal Security forces in the desert and they get evaluated on weekly basis. He added that three days ago, an evaluation was made for the attacker that concluded he might have extreme ideology and a decision was expected to be issued regarding his case on Sunday but “the attack occurred on a Saturday which is a day off for state institutions.”
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted on X: “Let it be known, if you target Americans — anywhere in the world — you will spend the rest of your brief, anxious life knowing the United States will hunt you, find you, and ruthlessly kill you.”
U.S. officials made no reference in their statements to the gunman being a member of the Syrian security forces. When asked about the matter, a Pentagon official did not directly respond to the question but said, “This attack took place in an area where the Syrian President does not have control.”
The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military issues.
The U.S. has hundreds of troops deployed in eastern Syria as part of a coalition fighting IS.
The U.S. had no diplomatic relations with Syria under Assad, but ties have warmed since the fall of the five-decade Assad family rule. Al-Sharaa, made a historic visit to Washington last month where he held talks with Trump. It was the first White House visit by a Syrian head of state since the Middle Eastern country gained independence from France in 1946 and came after the U.S. lifted sanctions imposed on Syria during the Assads’ rule.
Al-Sharaa led the rebel forces that toppled Bashar Assad in December 2024 and was named the country’s interim leader in January. Al-Sharaa once had ties to al-Qaida and had a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head.
Last month, Syria joined the international coalition fighting against the IS as Damascus improves its relations with Western countries following the ouster of Assad when insurgents captured his seat of power in Damascus.
IS was defeated on the battlefield in Syria in 2019 but the group’s sleeper cells still carry out deadly attacks in the country. The United Nations says the group still has between 5,000 and 7,000 fighters in Syria and Iraq.
U.S. troops have maintained a presence in different parts of Syria — including Al-Tanf garrison in the southeast — to train other forces as part of a broad campaign against IS, and have been targeted in the past. One of the deadliest attacks occurred in 2019 in the northern town of Manbij when a blast killed two U.S. service members and two American civilians as well as others from Syria while conducting a patrol.
Mroue reported from Beirut and Seung Min Kim from Washington. Associated Press writer Ben Finley in Washington contributed.
An earlier version of this story gave an incorrect reference to Iraq.
President Donald Trump talks to reporters as he departs from the South Lawn of the White House, Saturday, Dec. 13, 2025, in Washington, en route to Baltimore to attend the Army-Navy football game. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
