Teen kills 4 at Oregon school. And, DOJ sues California over alleged noncitizens

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Today's top stories

A teenager opened fire at an elementary school in Bend, Ore., killing three children — ages 5, 8, and 11 — and a teacher, officials confirmed. A 7-year-old and a 54-year-old were hospitalized. A bystander killed the 16-year-old suspected shooter after following him into Silver Rail Elementary School, according to local officials. The suspected shooter has not been identified. Officials say he was a resident of Bend. He used a "long gun," which is similar to a rifle or shotgun, during the attack. His connection to the school — if any — remains unclear.

• 🎧 The teenage suspected shooter was able to enter the school by firing at locked doors, according to the Bend Police Department. NPR's Arezou Rezvani tells Up First that something she found interesting on the Bend-La Pine Schools website was its emphasis on security protocols. They said they have secure vestibules for sign-in, ID checks for visitors and electronic buzz-in systems, but none of these measures stopped the gunman. Rezvani says police arrived at the school within minutes after the shooting started, but an unidentified community member shot the alleged shooter soon after the officer arrived.

The Justice Department is suing California to stop the state from counting ballots that the government claims are from noncitizens. Three weeks before Election Day, the DOJ provided a flash drive containing the names of 20,000 people it suspected of being noncitizens on California's voter rolls to Los Angeles County's top voting official. The DOJ gave him 48 hours to investigate the names or face a lawsuit, which was filed yesterday.

• 🎧 California and many election experts doubt the administration's noncitizen voting claims, citing President Trump's history of misinformation around the topic and flawed data analysis that can produce false positives, NPR's Miles Parks says. With vote-by-mail ballots already sent out for upcoming elections, the DOJ is seeking to segregate ballots linked to these claims for investigation so they don't get counted. Parks says it would be surprising if the DOJ succeeds in this lawsuit, as the Constitution clearly states that states manage elections.

Trump administration lawyers will argue today at a federal appeals court that White House papers belong to Trump rather than the American people. The case could end up in front of the conservative-leaning Supreme Court. The White House's claim comes after a series of actions during Trump's second term that challenged the limits put on the president after the Watergate scandal. For some 200 years, presidents could personally decide what to do with the papers they created in office. Then, Congress established the Presidential Records Act following disputes with Richard Nixon. Until this year, every president has followed this records law. Six months ago, the Trump administration moved to invalidate it. The move came after Trump was indicted on obstruction-of-justice charges for allegedly possessing classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, although a federal judge dismissed the case for technical reasons and the Justice Department later dropped it after Trump won reelection.

Behind the story

by Monika Evstatieva, senior producer on NPR's Investigations team

It all began with a tip. A colleague of mine had a friend in Ann Arbor who needed help. When I called her, she told me her elderly mom had been walking through a mall when a salesperson approached her with an eye cream sample. She went into a store called Beauty Essentials in Ann Arbor, Mich., and came out with $5,000 in skincare products she didn't want, tried to refuse, and couldn't return. But, she said, it wasn't an isolated incident. She posted on Facebook and connected with more than 30 people with complaints about the store. She asked me to look into it.

And so began an investigation that took place over more than a year. My reporting partner, Caley Fox Shannon, and I found similar complaints all over the country. We followed the trail, and found a network of mall skincare stores that systematically targeted older adults and people with disabilities across the United States. There was a link between them: one company, the California-based Mazal Group.

Over the past year, we spoke with more than 50 people, including customers who say they were taken advantage of, their family members and former employees. We looked at state and federal court lawsuits, hundreds of online reviews and nearly 500 consumer complaints we got through Freedom of Information Act requests. We went to stores selling products from Mazal Group in Virginia, Maryland and California, as well as the company's Chatsworth, Calif., headquarters.

You can read about what we found in NPR Investigations' whole report here, watch our documentary or listen on Consider This.

Weekend picks

Check out what NPR is watching, reading and listening to this weekend:

🍿 Movies: Other Mommy, starring Jessica Chastain, follows a 7-year-old who is visited by a mysterious entity that takes the form of her mother. Pop Culture Happy Hour describes it as an intense horror film filled with dark family secrets.

📺 TV: The Lowdown is back for its second season, featuring Ethan Hawke as a freelance investigative reporter entangled with a prominent Tulsa family.

📚 Books: The Two Saddest Kitchens is a comic conversation between cartoonists Roz Chast and Jason Adam Katzenstein about their fear and shame over their apartment kitchens and their disinterest in cooking.

🎵 Music: Remi Wolf's new album, Mud, emerged from a period of significant personal change, including a breakup and becoming sober. Watch her talk about it and perform some songs on World Cafe.

🎮 Gaming: NPR's James Perkins Mastromarino got to play The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time early, ahead of its Nov. 5 release. He says, "The game's poised to ensnare old fans and entice new players."

❓ Quiz: This week featured changes at the White House, a child reality star's comeback and Elon Musk. If you kept up, you might score perfectly.

3 things to know before you go

1. The FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service are investigating suspicious mailings, some of which contained a white powdery substance, to state election officials and congressional offices.
2. Trump has canceled the livestream of Nidal Hasan's execution. The former Army psychiatrist killed 13 people and wounded 32 at Fort Hood, Texas.
3. The Smithsonian National Zoo welcomed five cheetah cubs this month. You can watch them grow and snuggle with their mom on a 24-hour livestream cheetah cam.

This newsletter was edited by Suzanne Nuyen.