Morning, y’all! New pope just dropped. Robert Prevost became the first American to assume the highest office of the Roman Catholic Church and took the name Leo XIV. When I first read that, I mistook it as “Louis XIV,” which would be a really unfortunate name for a pope.
Let’s get to it.
HER FATHER WAS DETAINED BY ICE. SHE RAN A RED LIGHT AND FACES THE SAME FATE
Credit: GoFundMe/Hannah Jones
Credit: GoFundMe/Hannah Jones
Ximena Arias-Cristobal, a 19-year-old student at Dalton College, has lived in Whitfield County since she was 4 years old. Last month, her father, Jose Francisco Arias-Tovar, was pulled over for speeding and detained by ICE. He’s being held at Stewart Detention Center in South Georgia awaiting possible deportation to Mexico.
Now, she faces the same fate.
- Arias-Cristobal was pulled over for ignoring a “no turn on red” sign. Police say she didn’t have a driver’s license on her. She was taken to jail and transferred to Stewart.
- Her mother confirmed to local media that the family entered the U.S. illegally in 2010.
- Whitfield County is one of the jurisdictions where police partner with ICE under the controversial 287(g) agreement to detain and deport what ICE calls “removable aliens.”
- An immigration lawyer told the AJC that traffic violation stops are now a common tool for local authorities to apprehend and detain immigrants.
READ MORE: What the back-to-back arrests signify to Georgia immigrants
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PONZI SCHEME INVESTORS OUT OF LUCK
Credit: Bob Andres/AJC
Credit: Bob Andres/AJC
Retirees who lost millions to a Marietta man’s Ponzi scheme can’t hold his former investment bank and brokerage accountable for their losses, the Georgia Court of Appeals ruled. Here’s how the scheme went down and why victims pressed for the case:
- Investment adviser John Woods was sentenced in 2024 to eight years in prison for running an unlawful investment scheme beginning in 2008 that cost its victims a collective $110 million.
- The investors involved in the suit bought into the scheme in 2017. They say Oppenheimer, Woods’ employer until 2016, was aware of his unlawful actions and profited from fees and interest generated from the scheme.
- The appeals court, however, said the plaintiffs didn’t show their losses were a direct result of Oppenheimer’s actions.
- The group plans to take the case to the Georgia Supreme Court.
ENOUGH WITH THE DATA CENTERS
As more enormous data centers creep through Georgia, local governments are putting their foot down on future plans.
Coweta County adopted a 180-day moratorium to evaluate its data center policies and zoning codes. Douglas County made a similar move in March.
While data centers ostensibly attract business and investments to the state, projects are piling up at an alarming rate. The cavernous computing centers also eat into power grids and water supplies.
🤖 What are they doing in there, anyway? I asked the AJC’s Zach Hansen, who covers the data center beat, what it’s like inside these mysterious facilities. He told me they’re so secretive and secure it’s nearly impossible to get clearance to look inside.
“The data centers I’ve been inside usually have several security checkpoints, including multiple biometric scans and clearance from either the data center or the client leasing the space,” he told me. “Security is paramount within these facilities since their clients want to protect their data and intellectual property.”
MUST-KNOW POLITICS AND BUSINESS
🗳️ Gov. Brian Kemp isn’t running for Senate in 2026, but he wants to work with President Donald Trump to find a good Republican candidate to face Sen. Jon Ossoff.
🐘 Speaking of, GOP contenders are already lining up. First out of the gate: U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter, a self-proclaimed “MAGA Warrior” who introduced a House bill that would allow Trump to acquire Greenland and rename it “Red, White and Blueland.”
🍺 The U.S. beer market is faltering, but the water’s fine at Atlanta’s own Sweetwater Brewing Co. Its parent company Tilray Brands recently placed fourth in the Brewers Association’s top 50 craft breweries in the U.S. Tilray’s top brass say specialty craft beers like Sweetwater are faring better than other spaces in the industry. Another popular beer niche? Nonalcoholic offerings.
⚽ Goodbye, Dome/GWCC/Phillips Arena/CNN Center MARTA station. Hello, SEC — Sports Entertainment and Convention District — station. More than seven years after the Georgia Dome imploded, and long after Phillips Arena and the CNN Center changed names, MARTA is renaming the downtown station.
WEEKEND PLANS
Credit: Courtesy of Atlanta Botanical Garden
Credit: Courtesy of Atlanta Botanical Garden
💐 Celebrate Mom: Brunch is great, but cap off Mother’s Day with a nice stroll through a festival, like the Alpharetta Moonlit Market or the Dolly Parton-themed Dolly Days in Ringgold, Georgia. The Atlanta Zoo is also offering free admission to moms with a paying guest.
🎤 Catch a show: Post Malone and Billy Idol are both in town this weekend. Not together, although that would be quite a collab.
🎼 Scream at God: The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s Beethoven Project continues with the powerful “Missa Solemnis,” featuring the wonderful Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus. As an ASOC alum myself, I hope it’s half as cathartic to listen to as it is to sing.
🪁 More fun things to do around Atlanta this weekend, including art festivals, special museum exhibits and more.
A MOTHER, A DAUGHTER AND A DELICIOUS ATL LEGACY
Credit: Miguel Martinez/AJC
Credit: Miguel Martinez/AJC
If you want good Thai food in Atlanta, Nan Thai Fine Dining has been a go-to for more than 20 years. It’s also a labor of love carried down from mother to daughter for three generations.
Restauranteur Nan Niyomkul, who founded Nan Thai with her husband Charlie, started her career helping her mother operate a food cart in Bangkok.
She passed her appreciation and mastery of Thai cuisine on to her own daughter, DeeDee, who owns Tuk Tuk Thai Food Loft, a Thai street food restaurant in Brookwood Hills, and Chai Yo in Buckhead, now called Nan Thai Buckhead to continue the family legacy.
Now that DeeDee Niyomkul is a mom, the passion her mother has put into their businesses means even more.
“As a mother now, I want my child to be a better version of me. And that’s what she’s always pushing me to do,” DeeDee said.
🍲 READ MORE: The Niyomkul’s story is one of love, loss, risks, triumphs and really good curry
NEWS BITES
World Video Game Hall of Fame inducts Tamagotchi, GoldenEye 007 and more
Tamagotchis: traumatizing children with the stark realities of death and neglect since 1996!
Eggs are less likely to crack when dropped on their side, according to science
I’ll be sure to drop my eggs more carefully next time.
Yes, the name gives it away. They literally create their own protective bubbles from tree sap!
Pepsi brought the ‘Pepsi Challenge,’ a blind taste test, back to Atlanta on National Have a Coke Day
You know, some would consider that an act of war.
ON THIS DATE
May 9, 1972
Credit: AJC
Credit: AJC
From the front page of The Atlanta Journal: ATLANTA ... 1990. Of time and the rivers: Water too dirty to drink.
In 1972, The Atlanta Journal ran a series of research-backed essays predicting what Atlanta would be like in 1990. In this essay, imaginary figures discuss a pipeline under construction to bring water from Lake Lanier to metro Atlanta as closer water sources become more polluted.
That did happen, and Georgia and Alabama fight over the reservoir’s water supply to this day. (Also, nice to know water anxiety is a well-established Atlanta tradition.)
ONE MORE THING
I worry about the contamination of local waterways a lot, except for the once or twice a year my husband and I Shoot the Hooch. On those days, what’s in the Chattahoochee is none of my business. I don’t want to know.
Thanks for reading to the very bottom of A.M. ATL. Questions, comments, ideas? Contact me at AMATL@ajc.com.
Until next time.
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