A Georgia man was arrested Wednesday in connection with a plot to attack the White House with an armor-piercing rocket and explosive devices, US Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia BJay Pak said.

Pak told reporters at a media briefing that Hasher Jallal Taheb, 21, planned to attack the White House using devices that included homemade explosives and an "anti-tank rocket."

According to a criminal complaint, Taheb said the plan was to blow a hole in the White House with an AT4 then attack inside the building with semi-automatic rifles. He was going to wear a backpack with a homemade bomb in it and expected to become a martyr, the court document alleges. He expected two other people, who were actually an FBI undercover agent and an FBI confidential source, would join him in the attack, prosecutors said.

Several gas explosions rocked a university science library in eastern France as a massive construction fire broke out on its roof. Three people received minor injuries and students and staff were evacuated from campus buildings.

A large fire broke out on Thursday morning at one of the Claude Bernard University Lyon 1 campuses in Villeurbanne, a suburb of Lyon in eastern France. Video from the scene shows the building's roof engulfed in flames. Several explosions can be seen bursting through the fire.

The fire erupted on the roof terrace when the building, which hosts the university's science library, was undergoing construction work, the university tweeted.

St. Petersburg police say that, over 11 months in a filthy mobile home, the boy was introduced to sadomasochism and used as a sex slave.

St. Petersburg police say a 16-year-old Marion County boy and another teen have been rescued from a den of human traffickers and sex abusers.

Six men and a woman were arrested this week on human trafficking and interference with child custody charges, according to the St. Petersburg Police Department. Four of the men also face charges of sexual battery on a child under 16.

The announcement of their arrests Monday followed an eight-month investigation into human trafficking of teenage victims. Police say the suspects used an online gaming app to lure teenagers.

The investigation began May 9 when a Louisiana law enforcement agency contacted St. Petersburg police about a missing 17-year-old boy at a mobile home at 4000 24th St. in North St. Petersburg. Investigators believe the teenage boy was lured through an online gaming app call Discord, which allows users to communicate with each other. St. Petersburg officials said the app was used to coordinate picking up the boy and driving him to their area.

Officers found that missing teen as well as a 16-year-old Marion County boy. They were living in the same mobile home as four men: Mark Earl Dennis, Andrew Barry Dennis, Curtis Lee Gruwell and Michael Wayne Schwartz. Police say Dennis falsely claimed to be the Marion County boy's father, but had no documentation.

Eleven months earlier, police said, family acquaintance Eleanor Faye McGlamory had befriended the boy and introduced him to Mark Dennis and Andrew Dennis, who lived in St. Petersburg.

"In May 2017, the teen's mother found a note from her son saying not to look for him," St. Petersburg police said in a post on Facebook.

"While the 15-year-old teen was lured with the promise of a better life, instead he was moved into a filthy trailer and lived with four men. For the next year, he was introduced to sadomasochism and used as a sex slave by Mark and Andrew Dennis, Gruwell, Schwartz, and their associates Michael Ray Blasdel and JR Gauthier," the post states.

The boy did not go to school or receive medical care.

"Today the victim is receiving specialized trauma-informed care designed for victims of human trafficking and is thriving," the Facebook post states.

Several of the suspects later moved to Lehigh Acres in Lee County. Six of the suspects were arrested on Monday, and the final one turned himself in on Tuesday morning.

Here are the suspects and their charges:

- Mark Earl Dennis, 52, of 1617 Moore Ave., Lehigh Acres: Conspiracy to commit human trafficking, interference with custody and sexual battery (with a child under age 16).

- Andrew Barry Dennis, 42, of 1617 Moore Ave., Lehigh Acres: Conspiracy to commit human trafficking, interference with custody and sexual battery (with a child under age 16).

- Curtis Lee Gruwell, 34, of 1617 Moore Ave., Lehigh Acres: Conspiracy to commit human trafficking and interference with custody.

- Michael Wayne Schwartz, 51, of 1617 Moore Ave., Lehigh Acres: Conspiracy to commit human trafficking and interference with custody.

- Michael Ray Blasdel, 36, of 4428 Fourth Ave. South, St. Petersburg: Conspiracy to commit human trafficking, interference with custody, transmission of material harmful to minors to a minor, and two counts of sexual battery (with a child under age 16).

- JR Gauthier, 29, of 4428 Fourth Ave. South, St. Petersburg: Conspiracy to commit human trafficking, interference with custody and sexual battery (with a child under age 16).

- Eleanor Faye McGlamory, 56, of 535 NE 170th Court, Silver Springs: Conspiracy to commit human trafficking and interference with custody.

McGlamory was arrested by a Marion County Sheriff's Office deputy.

Marion County Jail officials said Tuesday that McGlamory declined a Star-Banner request for an interview. Officials said that if she does not post bond, authorities from St. Petersburg will transfer her from the Ocala jail to their facility.

A spokesperson at the Office of the Attorney General Office told the Star-Banner that the affidavits for those who were arrested are under seal and are exempt from public disclosure.

"The teenage victim in this case was lured away from his family with promises of a better life," Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody said in a news release. "Instead, he was moved into a filthy trailer and used as a slave for nearly a year. As a mother, I cannot even begin to express how disturbing the facts of this case are to me."

St. Petersburg officials said the investigation is ongoing and and that they have more interviews to do as they work to learn if anyone else might have been involved or if any other children were being abused or used for trafficking.

A house cat in Wyoming was recently diagnosed with bubonic plague; it is now the third feline in the state found to have contracted the deadly disease in the past six months.

While the word "plague" conjures images of epidemics wiping out medieval communities in their entirety, the bacterial infection actually occurs naturally in wild rodents (and their fleas) in the western U.S. and rarely affects people, according to local health officials. Prairie dogs are common carriers of the disease.

The cat, named Kaycee, was "known to wander outdoors," representatives with the Wyoming Department of Health (WDH) said in a statement on Jan. 4. Kaycee's roaming habits likely exposed it to an animal that was already infected with the plague-causing bacterium Yersinia pestis, which is typically transmitted between animals through flea bites, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Once called "the Black Death" and "the great pestilence," plague emerged from Asia and decimated Europe during the 14th century, wiping out an estimated 33 percent to 50 percent of the population. Plague then traveled to North America and Australia in 1900, and today, plague is found on every continent except Antarctica, Live Science previously reported.

Canada urged Beijing on Tuesday to grant clemency to a Canadian sentenced to death for drug trafficking, after his sentence reignited a diplomatic dispute that began last month.

Ottawa has warned its citizens about the risk of "arbitrary enforcement" of laws in China following a court's sentencing of Robert Lloyd Schellenberg, 36, to death on Monday, in a retrial after he was previously handed a 15-year prison term.

The new sentence came during a clash between Ottawa and Beijing over Canada's arrest in December of Sabrina Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer of Chinese telecoms giant Huawei, on an extradition request from the United States related to alleged violation of sanctions on Iran.

"We have already spoken with China's ambassador to Canada and requested clemency [for Schellenberg]," Canada's foreign minister Chrystia Freeland told reporters in Sainte-Hyacinthe, Quebec.

Deforestation has left elephants' habitats smaller and more fractured

A mob of people in an Indian village have brutally attacked an elephant and her calf, hurling firebombs at the pair after they wandered onto farmland.

Photographs show the two elephants crossing a road fleeing a group of men who are launching flaming missiles at them.

The incident, in the village of Bishnupur - a remote settlement in West Bengal - appears to be part of an increasingly common phenomenon in the country where elephants were previously been regarded as a cultural icon.

Sunderland's MPs have vowed to vote against PM Theresa May's Brexit plan, amid an Echo readers' poll showing overwhelming public support to quit the EU - even without a deal.

Labour members Bridget Phillipson, Julie Elliott and Sharon Hodgson insisted they would not back Mrs May's proposals, being put to Parliament tomorrow. They said they had received clear messages from both Remain and Leave supporting constituents against supporting the PM's much-maligned plan.

It was originally due to be put before the Commons in December, but was postponed at the last minute over fears the Government would lose.

The Florida Board of Health has suspended thousands of healthcare licenses over defaults on student loans many used to earn their licenses. But many are concerned that the new crackdown may only worsen the student loan crisis.

The revocation of licenses came after the student loan industry lobbied the government to enact punishments for those who can't or won't repay the money they borrowed. According to ABC Action News, only Florida is enforcing this law as of right now. The state also has the power to garnish up to 100% of a worker's wages until the loan is repaid and the license is reinstated. Under Florida law, once the state suspends a license for student loan default, the only way to get it back is to pay a fine equal to 10 percent of the balance, plus other costs.

Flagstaff, Arizona turned into Willy Wonka's chocolate factory on Monday when a tanker truck spilled 3,500 gallons of it across Interstate 40.

The "river of chocolate" flowed onto the highway's westbound lanes east of Flagstaff near the 211-mile marker, the state's Department of Public Safety tweeted.

A Texan who says he offered to work as an English teacher for the Islamic State and was captured earlier this month in Syria by U.S.-backed forces said he witnessed executions and crucifixions during the more than three years he spent with the terrorist group.

But 34-year-old Warren Christopher Clark, who is being held in Kurdish custody, told NBC News in an exclusive interview that he does not regret throwing in his lot with ISIS. No Kurdish security were present during the interview.

"I wanted to go see exactly what the group was about, and what they were doing," he said. "Of course I saw the videos. I think with the beheadings, that's execution. I'm from the United States, from Texas. They like to execute people, too. So I really don't see any difference. They might do it off camera, but it's the same."


A Muslim convert, Clark was being held in northern Syria after being captured during the campaign to liberate the last pockets occupied by ISIS in Syria, the coalition of militias known as the Syrian Democratic Forces said. (For security reasons, NBC News is not identifying the town where Clark was interviewed.)