Midday Roundup: Kalamazoo shooter's family clueless during spree

Still no answers. The family of Uber driver Jason Dalton is providing details about the days and hours leading up to last weekend’s shooting spree, which left six people dead and two others injured. Dalton, 45, worked as an insurance adjuster and had only been driving for Uber for a few weeks. Through their lawyer, the family denied having financial trouble. Although Dalton was normally gregarious and was well-liked and known in the community, he’d been “depressed and down” for several days the week before the attack, according to his wife, Carol. On Saturday, about half way through his night of violence, Dalton asked his wife to meet him at his parents’ house. He told the family his car had been sideswiped by another vehicle, and he took his parents’ car when he left. He told Carol, and their two children, a 15-year-old boy and a 10-year-old daughter, to stay at his parents’ house, where police eventually found them. They had no idea what he’d been doing. Dalton has admitted to the shootings but has not offered any motive.

Detained in Iran. As Iranians go to the polls Friday in an important parliamentary election, the government added another American inmate to the infamous Evin prison. Security officials detained 80-year-old Baquer Namazi, a former United Nations Children’s Fund official, on Monday, according to his wife. Namazi is the father of Siamak Namazi, a businessman detained in Tehran last fall. Both men are U.S. citizens. It’s not clear why either man was detained, and the U.S. State Department is not releasing any details. But Secretary of State John Kerry told a Senate panel Wednesday he was directly involved in talks with Iran about the arrests. Siamak Namazi was the only American detainee not released last month as part of the prisoner exchange negotiated during the nuclear talks between Iran the West. He had been working as a business consultant for foreign companies and lived in Dubai.

Mutual appreciation. Planned Parenthood is thanking Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump for repeatedly praising the group for its non-abortion related services. “Well, this one thing I agree with Donald Trump on—that Planned Parenthood does amazing work for 2.5 million patients every year,” Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards said during a recent interview on MSNBC. “That’s what’s really at stake here, and so I appreciate his kind words.” In a Fox News interview last year, Trump seemed to waiver on completely cutting off taxpayer dollars from the abortion giant. But after taking fire from pro-life groups, Trump on Sunday told NBC’s Meet the Press he would sign a bill that defunds the group because of its abortion business: “Planned Parenthood does a really good job in a lot of different areas, but not on abortion. So I’m not gonna fund it if it’s doing the abortion. But Planned Parenthood does some very good work.” Trump and his four remaining rivals in the presidential race—all of whom have denounced Planned Parenthood—will take the debate stage tonight in Texas for the last time before next week’s “Super Tuesday” primaries.

Dangerous ideology. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and former U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta are launching a commissionto combat terrorism. The group will study the most effective military and security measures, taking lessons from recent campaigns against Islamic extremism. But it also will focus on ways to combat radicalization in the Muslim community. “My real passion is to persuade people that the problem here is not tens of thousands of fanatics that go and kill people, that is a problem and we need to deal with it, but it’s tens of millions who follow an ideology that is deeply hostile to the West, that’s based on what I would say is a perversion of Islam,” Blair said. “But [it’s] being incubated in education systems around the world where millions of these young kids are taught a view of religion that is essentially hostile to the modern world.” The commission plans to issue a report sometime in July, strategically timed to coincide with Republican and Democratic party conventions.

Pricy pasta. A woman enjoying a clam dinner with her husband several weeks ago nearly cracked a tooth on a rare purple pearl nestled among her mollusks. Lindsay Hasz said the dim lighting in the restaurant made it hard at first to figure out what she’d chomped down on, but a closer inspection revealed a gleaming, perfectly round object. The Quahog pearl weighed in at just over one carat and is valued at about $600. The rare pearls are only found in Mercenaria Mercenaria clams, which are only found between the gulfs of St. Lawrence and Mexico. Another Quahog pearl found in 2007 during a similar dining experience is valued at $25,000. Hasz said she’s keeping her pearl and plans to put it on display around her neck.

WORLD Radio’s Mary Reichard contributed to this report.