The man who gunned down 11 people at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, nearly five years ago is eligible for the death penalty, a federal jury announced Thursday. 

The jury agreed with prosecutors who are seeking capital punishment for the shooter who targeted Jews after six months of planning and said he regretted not killing more people, the Associated Press reported. The shooting is considered by authorities to be the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in U.S. history. 

The shooter, whom The Daily Wire will not name in accordance with company policy, was found guilty last month of all 63 counts he was facing, including 11 counts of obstructing the free exercise of religious beliefs resulting in death and 11 counts of hate crimes resulting in death. 

After two hours of deliberations, the jurors’ verdict was read in front of survivors and the victims’ family members.

“It has been nearly five years since 11 people were taken from us. They were beloved and valued family members, friends and neighbors. They cannot speak for themselves, and so their family members will speak for them,” said Maggie Feinstein, the director of 10.27 Healing Partnership, a program dedicated to helping survivors of the shooting and those affected by the tragedy. 

Attorneys representing the shooter asked for a life sentence if he pleaded guilty, but prosecutors, with the support of most of the victims’ families, refused and took the case to trial to pursue the death penalty. The shooter’s lawyers also argued that he was impaired by mental illness and a “delusional belief system took over his thinking,” dictating that he had to kill Jews to stop a genocide of white people, the AP reported. 

The mass murderer killed 11 people from three Jewish congregations who gathered at the Tree of Life synagogue on October 27, 2018. Two other worshipers and five police officers were also wounded by the gunman who unloaded a Colt AR-15 semi-automatic rifle and three Glock .357 handguns during his attack. 

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Jurors are now expected to hear the gruesome details of how the shooter inflicted pain and trauma on his Jewish victims before they decide if his crime will ultimately result in capital punishment. After hearing arguments from the prosecution and the defense, including possible pleas from the shooter’s family members, the jury must be in unanimous agreement for the death penalty to be carried out.

Leif Le Mahieu contributed to this report. 

The Associated Press said Thursday it reached a two-year deal with artificial intelligence (AI) company OpenAI to share access to its news archive in return for technology and product expertise. 

The AP’s deal is one of the first between a major news agency and AI as the technology becomes more popular in businesses and corporations worldwide, Axios reported. As part of the deal, OpenAI will gain access to some of the AP’s text archives dating back to 1985, and the AP will receive expertise from the AI algorithm. A spokesperson told Axios that the two entities are still working through the details of the deal. 

The AP is hoping the deal will put it in a position to lead in developing standards for newsrooms using generative AI, which refers to a system that generates its own text or other media in response to prompts. 

“AP firmly supports a framework that will ensure intellectual property is protected and content creators are fairly compensated for their work,” said AP Senior Vice President and Chief Revenue Officer Kristin Heitmann. “News organizations must have a seat at the table to ensure this happens, so that newsrooms large and small can leverage this technology to benefit journalism.” 

OpenAI’s Chief Operating Officer Brad Lightcap said the AP’s “feedback—along with access to their high-quality, factual text archive—will help to improve the capabilities and usefulness of OpenAI’s systems.” 

OpenAI released its latest model, GPT-4, in March. During the new model’s release, the company showcased the software’s powerful problem-solving and image recognition, describing images, creating a working website, and even doing simulated taxes. The company says that GPT-4 “while less capable than humans in many real-world scenarios, exhibits human-level performance on various professional and academic benchmarks.”

The AP has used automated technology in its reporting for almost ten years, starting with automating corporate earnings reports before using the tech to report on college sports and even minor league baseball. The news agency is hoping the deal with OpenAI will help it understand how to potentially use generative AI in its news coverage. 

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