AI in the Courtroom, a Plague Outbreak in Siberia, and Trump’s Daylight Saving Push

The most unsettling story this week comes from an Arizona courtroom, where an AI-generated video of a murder victim addressing the judge was used at sentencing — and then thrown out on appeal. Meanwhile, a suspected lab accident in Siberia has triggered quarantines and raised fears about engineered pathogens. And Donald Trump, in the middle of escalating tensions with Iran, decided to wade into the daylight saving time debate by publicly pressuring Senator Tom Cotton to pass the Sunshine Protection Act.

The First AI Victim Impact Statement Gets Overturned

The Arizona Court of Appeals vacated a 10-year manslaughter sentence for Gabriel Paul Horta-Sasitas, ruling that an AI-generated video of the victim, Christopher Pelkey, was unreliable and violated due process. The video, created by Pelkey’s sister, showed a digital recreation of Pelkey speaking directly to the judge — talking about missing his loved ones, believing in forgiveness, and suggesting he and his killer “probably could have been friends” under different circumstances. It did not request a specific sentence.