Skip to content
Newsletters
Link copied to clipboard

Deaths from kratom supplement rising, 9 accused priests linked to Philly | Morning Newsletter

All the local news you need to know to start your day, delivered straight to your email.

The family of Caleb Sturgis found these Kratom products after he died.
The family of Caleb Sturgis found these Kratom products after he died.Read moreSturgis family

I had never heard of kratom until reading my colleagues' reporting on the controversial substance linked to local deaths. But our latest report on how poisonings related to the unregulated herbal supplement are not being tracked certainly caught my attention. Another attention-grabber you'll see this morning is a message from the Inquirer Editorial Board on the need for a free press, joining hundreds of newsrooms around the country to call for its support. It's on the front page of our print edition, too.

Reading this online? Sign up here to get this newsletter delivered to your inbox every morning.

— Aubrey Nagle (@aubsn, morningnewsletter@philly.com)

» READ MORE: Deaths from kratom are rising, but no one knows how much

Kratom is an unregulated herbal product derived from the leaves of a Southeast Asian tree that's part of the coffee family.

Advocates say it can relieve pain and help with opioid withdrawal. The FDA claims it's a dangerous opioid.

Kratom has been linked to at least four deaths in our region and numbers could be rising — but authorities are struggling to track the poisonings.

» READ MORE: Nine priests accused in grand jury report had postings around Philly

On Tuesday, a long-awaited grand jury report revealed widespread and decades-long child sex abuse involving 300 priests and more than 1,000 victims across six Pennsylvania dioceses.

Though it didn't focus on Philadelphia, the report accused nine priests who had postings in the region of abuse.

Reaction to the report was swift. Faith leaders around the country expressed their anguish over the report, while others questioned their faith. Will policy changes follow? In the past, lobbyists for the Catholic church and the insurance industry have fought loosening the statute of limitations for claims against the church.

» READ MORE: Inquirer Editorial Board: Stop the war on a free press

This morning the Inquirer Editorial Board joined over 200 other news organizations around the country by publishing an editorial calling for an end to what it calls the war on a free press.

The coordinated effort was formed in response to President Trump's declaration that the American press is the "enemy of the people" and "dangerous and sick."

With its publication, the Editorial Board aims to "alert the American people to the dangers inherent in the president's actions, which are intended to undermine the ability of the press to question, examine, and investigate on behalf of all citizens." Read the full editorial.

What you need to know today

  1. A Philadelphia man has been charged with aggravated assault and attempted murder after police say he "indiscriminately" fired a handgun inside a crowded Cheltenham Walmart Tuesday night. Authorities say the gun was his sister's, who was legally licensed to carry it.

  2. Kristian Marche of West Oak Lane, a local track and football standout, was shot dead in Philadelphia Tuesday. He was set to start his freshman year at Penn State this week.

  3. A crowd of 2,000 or so turned out for a labor protest at Penn's Landing last night. They were there to support immigrant families who have been detained or separated at U.S. borders.

  4. The Phillies beat the Boston Red Sox, the best team in baseball, at home last night in a much-needed victory columnist Bob Brookover calls "the biggest win of the season."

  5. New area code alert: "the 609" in South Jersey is about to become "the 640," too.

  6. School is almost back in session and teachers have been doing their homework. This summer, Philadelphia educators have been training to recognize and respond to students affected by trauma.

Through Your Eyes | #OurPhilly

I mean the food is the main point of a baseball game, right @roland_gruszewski? (Kidding, kidding.)

Tag your Instagram posts or tweets with #OurPhilly and we'll pick our favorite each day to feature in this newsletter and give you a shout out!

That’s Interesting

  1. Parents are feeling the pressure to "redshirt" children with summer birthdays by keeping them out of kindergarten an extra year. But research shows it may do more harm than good.

  2. Happy ending alert: a group of valets who park cars at a Philly hospital got their jobs back after they said they lost them for trying to start a union.

  3. After knocking down most of the historic structure earlier this year, developer Ori Feibush is now looking to raze the former Frankford Chocolate Factory's smokestack, too. He says saving it would be cost prohibitive.

  4. Tonight the Eagles gear up for a preseason game against New England. Patriot-turned-Eagle Lane Johnson has been…outspoken about his former team, so he isn't expecting a warm welcome. And that's the way he likes it.

  5. If you've ever worried about what an ambulance might cost should you need one, there's now a Netflix-like solution: annual subscriptions.

  6. For nature lovers who seek social camaraderie and an escape from the hustle and bustle of city life, there is one ultimate sport to play in Philly: disc golf. 

Opinions

"It's environmentally destructive, consuming huge amounts of energy and heating the atmosphere. And it doesn't actually deliver on the comfort it promises; instead, it makes us shiver in our offices on sizzling summer days. Meanwhile, the polar ice caps continue to melt."
— —
  1. By delaying the move of the Frank Rizzo statue from the steps of the Municipal Services Building, Mayor Kenney is risking losing black voters, writes columnist Solomon Jones.

  2. Columnist Maria Panaritis offers thanks to criminal investigators, prosecutors, and grand jury subpoenas in light of the mammoth report detailing decades of abuse in Pennsylvania Catholic churches.

What we’re reading

  1. North Philly chef Deron Mahoney hit upon a winning formula for writing popular tweets about his catering company and, as Billy Penn reports, it revolutionized his business.

  2. A new PlanPhilly story on the Free Library's Center for Public Life is an optimistic look at the unit's ambitious and heartwarming mandate to connect Philadelphians.

  3. You may have noticed the city's website, phila.gov, has had a much-needed makeover. Technical.ly Philly went behind the scenes to find out how it was done and why.

  4. Millennial women are expected to become the country's most powerful group of voters, so Refinery29 and CBS News conducted a detailed poll of women ahead of the November midterm elections. Infographics galore help break down the trends.

  5. For all the exclamation point haters out there: a funny essay over at Slate proposes a "solution" for our collective overuse of excitable punctuation.

Your Daily Dose of | Nudity (Maybe)

New Jersey's secluded Higbee Beach in Cape May used to be a nude beach. Today it's…still kind of a nude beach. And a dog beach. And a maybe haunted beach.

Correction: this story previously stated Eagle Lane Johnson previously played for the New England Patriots. He did not; he has always played for the Eagles.