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Egypt Soccer Riot Kills at Least 20 | (Feb 8, 2015 3:13 PM) A riot broke out today outside of a major soccer game in Egypt, with fighting between police and fans killing at least 20 people, security officials said. The riot, only three years after similar violence killed 74 people, began ahead of a match between Egyptian Premier League clubs Zamalek and ENPPI at Air Defense Stadium east of Cairo. Such attacks in the past have sparked days of violent protests pitting the country's hard-core fans against police officers in a nation already on edge after years of revolt and turmoil. Three security officials said some people died during a stampede, while others died in clashes with police. They spoke on condition of anonymity as they weren't authorized to speak to journalists. What caused the violence wasn't immediately clear. Security officials said Zamalek fans tried to force their way into the match without tickets, sparking clashes. Zamalek fans, known as White Knights, posted on their group's official Facebook page that the violence began because authorities only opened one narrow, barbed-wire door to let them in. They said that sparked pushing and shoving that later saw police officers fire tear gas and birdshot. The group later posted pictures on Facebook it claimed were of dead fans, including the names of 22 people it said had been killed. The AP could not immediately verify the images, nor their casualty count. |
Suicide Law Sees 63 Apply, 36 Die in 9 Months | (Mar 5, 2010 9:12 AM) Washington State’s Death with Dignity medical suicide law was enacted a year ago today, and in the first 9 months 63 terminally ill patients were prescribed fatal medication and 36 used it to end their lives. Three people attempted to use the drugs but failed; one vomited them back up, and two reawakened after ingesting the powerful barbiturates. To be eligible, a doctor must determine a patient has no more than 6 months to live. A government report on the use of the law covers only 2009, but the Seattle Post-Intelligencer estimates that 82 people have obtained the drugs—a process that can take a month or more—since its inception, and 52 of them have died either from the medication or natural causes. Proponents note the disconnect. A significant number of people are using the law for peace of mind and control, sort of like insurance, says one. One doesn't run out and burn one's home down just because you get fire insurance. |
Barney's Coughs Up $525K Over Racial Profiling | (Aug 12, 2014 2:12 PM CDT) Barney’s will shell out $525,000 to settle accusations that it racially profiled black and Hispanic shoppers at its Madison Avenue Store, the New York Times reports. Reached Friday, the agreement concludes a state investigation into complaints against Barney’s; state AG Eric Schneiderman continues a similar probe at Macy’s, the New York Daily News adds. The investigation began when Barney’s accused two black shoppers of credit card fraud—Trayon Christian, 19, who was detained after buying a $349 belt, and Kayla Phillips, 21, who bought a $2,500 purse. The state uncovered other incidents—learning that Barney’s security guards exclusively identified minority customers as warranting surveillance to help the store stem a jump in shoplifting and credit card fraud. Barney’s CEO Mark Lee tells the Times that the terms of the agreement will make the store stronger, insisting the retailer is a truly progressive company that has absolutely no tolerance for discrimination. The state has ordered Barney’s to hire an anti-profiling consultant, improve its recordkeeping, change how it deals with shoplifters, and limit access to surveillance video. Al Sharpton intends to hold Barney’s accountable with his own test shoppers, the AP adds. A year after the incident, Christian tells Pix 11 that the agreement made me feel much better, like [they're] actually on top of them about something. |
'West Memphis Three' Go Free After 18 Years | (Aug 19, 2011 12:38 PM CDT) Three men in Arkansas imprisoned 18 years for murders they insist they didn't commit struck a deal with prosecutors today and will walk out of jail, reports the Commercial Appeal. The West Memphis Three—Damien Echols, 36, Jason Baldwin, 34, and Jessie Misskelley, 36—actually pleaded guilty to the killings and will get out based on time served. A rarely-used law allowed them to maintain their innocence in the high-profile case, which drew supporters such as Johnny Depp, Eddie Vedder, and Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks to their side. Echols had been on death row. The men say they were convicted of murdering three 8-year-old boys in 1993 as part of a satanic ritual because police coerced a confession out of Misskelley, who the Appeal says is thought to be mentally challenged. If you go through with this, you're going to open Pandora's Box, the father of one of the young victims shouted to the judge as the deal was being read. You're wrong, Your Honor. You can stop it right now before you do it. Police escorted him from the courtroom. NPR notes that new DNA evidence had raised questions about the men's guilt. |
Derby-Winning Filly Dead at 31 | (Aug 18, 2008 4:42 PM CDT) Genuine Risk, one of only three fillies to win the Kentucky Derby, died this morning in Virginia. She was 31. The 1980 Derby winner died peacefully after eating a hearty breakfast and being turned out in her paddock, said an administrator at Newstead Farm, adding that the chestnut mare had not been ill. Genuine Risk was the only filly to finish in the top three in each of the Triple Crown races. Genuine Risk was the oldest living Derby winner. Ridden by Jacinto Vasquez, she captured the Derby, was second to Codex in a controversial Preakness, and ran second in the Belmont. Genuine Risk was an amazing horse with tremendous heart that lived a life befitting a champion, owners Bertram and Diane Firestone said in a statement. We are truly blessed that she was a part of our life. |
Annette Funicello Dead at 70 | (Apr 8, 2013 12:41 PM CDT) Annette Funicello, who shot to fame at age 12 as a Disney Mouseketeer, has died from complications of multiple sclerosis at age 70, her family confirms to Extra. Funicello parlayed her Disney fame into a successful singing and acting career perhaps most noted for her Beach Party movies with Frankie Avalon in the 1960s. You knew she was very attractive, very pretty and voluptuous, but Annette never flaunted it, Avalon, now 75, told People in 1998. She underplayed everything. She never tried to be sexy. People said to themselves, 'I could date that girl if I ever met her.' She wasn't untouchable. Funicello had reportedly been in an MS coma for years, and had just been taken off life support. She's on her toes dancing in heaven ... no more MS, said daughter Gina Gilardi in a statement. My brothers and I were there, holding her sweet hands when she left us. Funicello announced her MS in 1992, having hidden the disease for years. |
1,500 Birds Crash, Die in Utah | (Dec 15, 2011 2:23 PM) Storm clouds gathered over Utah on Monday, but what wound up raining down from the sky were birds. Thousands of eared grebes dived into roads and parking lots across Cedar City and St. George, apparently mistaking the flat surfaces for water, the LA Times reports. About 1,500 birds died in the incident, but many more survived the plunge—officials have so far rescued more than 3,000 of the duck-like birds, and released them into the water. It's not unheard of for birds to occasionally take such fatal plunges, but this is by far the largest we've had, a spokesman for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources said. She added that rescuing the survivors was necessary, because while they're good at swimming and flying, eared grebes are essentially useless for getting around on land. |
Gustav Downgraded to Cat. 1 | (Sep 1, 2008 3:14 PM CDT) Hurricane Gustav has been downgraded to a Category 1 storm, Weather.com reports, with its top winds diminishing to 90 mph as it moves west across Louisiana. The storm was at Category 2 when it made landfall earlier today near Cocodrie, La. Gustav, with the potential for continued heavy rain and winds, is moving northwest at approximately 15 mph. |
New South Sudan Death Estimate 10 Times Higher | (Jan 10, 2014 9:55 AM) The three-week-long conflict in South Sudan has been a heck of a lot bloodier than previously believed, at least according to one group's estimate. Around 10,000 people have likely died in the conflict, the International Crisis Group said yesterday—a far cry from the 1,000 estimate that the UN's special representative for South Sudan gave two weeks ago, the New York Times reports. A UN official yesterday agreed that the actual number was very substantially in excess of the 1,000 figure. Prospects for a ceasefire may have brightened, however. Rebels today dropped their demand that the government release 11 political prisoners as a precondition for a ceasefire, the Wall Street Journal reports. We don't think it is fair for our people on the ground to suffer because of the suffering of 11 people, said the son of one of the captives. A senior US State Department official had backed that demand yesterday, saying that the US strongly believes the prisoners should be freed. She also challenged President Salva Kiir's official story that a coup plot kicked off the conflict, saying they'd seen no evidence of such a plot. |
Plastic in Pacific Has Grown 100-Fold Since 1970s | (May 9, 2012 6:00 AM CDT) Humanity has tossed a lot of plastic into the Pacific Ocean in the last 40 years. The level of small plastic pieces in the so-called Great Pacific Garbage Patch has increased 100-fold over that span, the Scripps Institution of Oceanography found in a new study. We did not expect to find this, one researcher tells the BBC. To find such a clear pattern and such a large increase was very surprising. Leave plastic in the ocean long enough and it'll break down into small easy-to-swallow pieces—an earlier study indicated that 9% of fish have plastic in their stomachs. There's another environmental consequence, too: Marine insects called Halobates sericeus, or sea skaters, have been using the plastic as a place to lay eggs, so their population is exploding in the region and could impact plankton and fish eggs, which they feed on. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a Texas-sized area, born from ocean currents that conspire to assemble trash and detritus, MSNBC explains. |
Just How Close Was NPR to Taking That $5M? | (Mar 11, 2011 10:02 AM) NPR may have been embarrassed by its ex-fundraiser’s comments on the Tea Party—but at least it refused to accept the $5 million offered by phony donors, right? That original claim had been poked at by the Daily Caller, which yesterday said that emails showed NPR execs were awaiting a draft of a gift agreement from their legal counsel, indicating that they might have been closer to taking than they had admitted. But NPR rep Anna Christopher tells TPM the agreement never got beyond the internal drafting stage—and was never sent. Period. She offers internal emails as evidence. In one, then-CEO Vivian Schiller says the donors are acting strangely, and that she needs more info on their status. But the drama doesn't stop there. In a recording released yesterday, one of the donors asks an exec if she is saying that NPR would be able to shield us from a government audit. The exec responds that she thinks that is the case, especially if you were anonymous, reports the Washington Post, which notes that keeping donors anonymous isn't illegal—the question, it writes, is how far NPR would go to keep a potentially unsavory donor's identity hidden. NPR last night released the following: The statement ... regarding the possibility of making an anonymous gift that would remain invisible to tax authorities is factually inaccurate and not reflective of NPR's gift practices. |
Sony Recalls 440K Vaios | (Sep 4, 2008 8:55 AM CDT) Sony is recalling 440,000 Vaio laptops worldwide due to a wiring flaw that could cause overheating in 19 models of its TZ series manufactured between May 2007 and July 2008. The company said today that improperly placed wires near the hinge connecting the body of the laptop and its display could wear quickly, causing a short circuit and overheating. The Tokyo-based electronics manufacturer said it has received reports of overheating, including some cases in which people received minor burns. |
Chicago Protesters Chant '16' After Video's Release | (Nov 25, 2015 3:29 AM) Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Chicago Tuesday night soon after police released disturbing video of a white police officer fatally shooting a black teenager, and the Chicago Sun-Times reports that they chanted 16 —the number of times Officer Jason Van Dyke allegedly shot 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. One tense moment occurred when protesters and police engaged in a full-on pushing match for about 15 minutes at one barricade, which resulted in three people taken away in a police wagon. But pleas for restraint were generally heeded throughout the night, reports AP. More demonstrations were planned in the days ahead, including one at City Hall on Wednesday and one designed to block Michigan Avenue on Friday's busy shopping day. Van Dyke was charged with murder on Tuesday, hours before police released video of the Oct. 20, 2014, shooting. Protesters say they're angered not just by the shooting, but by the police department's failure to release the video until a judge ordered it to—and by Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy telling the community that the video should start a healing process, after they had spent so long trying to block its release. People are mad as hell, organizer Page May with the We Charge Genocide anti-police violence group tells the Chicago Tribune. It still feels so unnecessary. |
Failed Politician Kills 8 in Philippines Rampage | (Jan 4, 2013 11:29 AM) A man who was apparently intoxicated fatally shot eight people today, including a pregnant woman and a 7-year-old girl, before he was shot dead by police near the Philippine capital, officials said. At least eight other people were wounded in the shooting rampage in Kawit township, about 10 miles south of Manila, said Cavite provincial Gov. Jonvic Remulla. He identified the gunman as Ronald Bae, a man in his 30s or 40s. He just shot at anyone he saw, Rumella said. He even killed the dog. According to the governor, Bae left his Kawit neighborhood about a year ago after he lost an election for village chairman, and returned Monday due to a marital problem with his wife, whom he had left in northern Pampanga province before New Year's. He'd been on a drug and alcohol binge since his arrival, and today returned to a store where he and his friends had been drinking and began shooting up the surrounding neighborhood, Remulla said. Police are now looking for the caretaker of Bae's Kawit home, who was allegedly seen reloading Bae's gun. |
500-Year-Old Design Used to Build World's Longest Ice Bridge | (Dec 29, 2015 5:45 PM) In a move Leonardo da Vinci would definitely think is pretty cool, 150 students and volunteers will be using one of the Renaissance master's old designs to create the world's longest ice bridge, Discovery News reports. Construction on the project—helmed by Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands—started Monday, and the 213-foot-long bridge is scheduled to be completed Feb. 13. The team is using da Vinci's 500-year-old plans for a never-built bridge in Turkey. The ice bridge has the same construction principle as that of da Vinci’s: The only load on the whole structure is compression, according to a university press release. Once the bridge is completed, it is expected to be strong enough to hold a 2-ton car. It will be used by pedestrians until the ice melts. The team will be using 900 tons of pykrete to create the bridge, Gizmag reports. According to the press release, pykrete is water mixed with 2% paper fiber and is stronger and tougher than normal ice when frozen. The team will be spraying the pykrete onto a giant balloon acting as a mold, which will ultimately be removed. The bridge is being built in Juuka, Finland, under what the press release calls severe conditions. (The high temperature in Juuka on Tuesday was approximately 12 degrees Fahrenheit.) This will not only be a test of teamwork and perseverance, but also a race against time, Discovery News states. Stopping the work at any time will cause the equipment to freeze. Students and volunteers will be on staggered shifts to keep work going 24 hours a day. (A scientist recently made a shocking discovery about da Vinci's most famous work.) |
McNamee: I Gave Clemens Steroids in '98 | (May 14, 2012 3:21 PM CDT) Brian McNamee has testified that he first injected Roger Clemens with steroids when they were with the Toronto Blue Jays in 1998. McNamee said today he injected Clemens in the buttocks in Clemens' apartment at the pitcher's request. McNamee is the chief witness for the prosecution in the perjury trial of the seven-time Cy Young Award winner. He is the only person who will testify with firsthand knowledge of Clemens using performance-enhancing drugs. McNamee, wearing a tan suit and speaking softly in a thick New York accent, says he saved items that he used while injecting Clemens with performance-enhancing drugs, including gauze, tissues, syringes, cotton balls and needles. Prosecutors say they have evidence that some of the materials tested positive for the drugs as well as Clemens' DNA. Clemens' lawyers have said they will contend that the items saved by McNamee have been tainted because they were stored so haphazardly. They refer to the collection as a hodgepodge of garbage. Clemens' team won a few small victories today, over how much of McNamee's checkered past it could present to jurors in an attempt to diminish his credibility. |
2 Teens Charged in Case of Girl Who Hanged Herself | (Aug 9, 2013 10:12 AM CDT) It took nearly two years, but charges have been filed in Canada in the high-profile case of a teenage girl who hanged herself after an alleged sexual assault and subsequent cyberbullying. Police in Nova Scotia arrested two 18-year-old males on child pornography charges, reports CNN. The family of Rehtaeh Parsons says the then-15-year-old went to a booze-filled party in Halifax in November 2011 and was sexually assaulted by four teen boys. One took a photo, and the image soon was in wide circulation at Rehtaeh's school. She hanged herself this April. The local police chief says no sexual assault charges were filed because the available evidence did not meet the threshold, reports the Toronto Star. But he said cops had enough to charge one of the teens with creating child pornography and the other with distributing it. The case is reminiscent of the one involving high school football players in Steubenville, Ohio, in that the hive mind of the Internet played an indispensable role here, writes Emily Bazelon at Slate. But considering that Rehtaeh's death resulted in child porn charges for non-consensual texting almost two years after the fact, this case will be its own kind of watershed. Click for her full post. |
2 San Bernardino Suspects Named | (Dec 2, 2015 11:53 PM) Still no word on a motive in Wednesday's mass shooting in San Bernardino, but law enforcement sources have now identified two of the shooters as Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and Tashfeen Malik, 27. The San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department tweeted that Farook and Malik were the man and woman shot dead after police chased a black SUV. The Los Angeles Times reports that Farook is listed as an environmental specialist with the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health, which was hosting the holiday party that came under attack at the Inland Regional Center. Mediaite reported earlier that Qatari national Tayyeep Bin Ardogan had been identified as a suspect, but that turned out to be a hoax. Farook is listed as a resident of the Redlands home police chased the SUV from, reports NBC News, which notes that with 14 dead, the incident is America's deadliest mass shooting since the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre. Another 17 people were injured, and authorities say 10 of them are in critical condition. There have been reports that an argument at the party preceded the mass shooting, though the Times reports that Farook's brother-in-law had no explanation for the incident when he spoke at a Wednesday night Council on American-Islamic Relations press conference. Why would he do something like that? he said. I have no idea. I'm in shock myself. The AP reports that authorities say that from what they can piece together, the shooters appeared to be highly organized and on a mission. |
Mummified Detroit Woman Somehow Voted in 2010 | (Mar 11, 2014 9:47 AM CDT) It's unclear how she managed it, but a woman who is thought to have died in 2008 apparently voted in the 2010 midterm elections. That woman: Pia Farrenkopf, believed to be the identity of the person found mummified in a garage in Pontiac, Mich. Voting records show Farrenkopf voted in 2010, the Detroit Free Press reports, but it's possible that there was a clerical error, officials say. It's just part of the continuing mystery. Authorities are still working to positively identify the body and figure out how she died. They're treating the case as a homicide, MLive.com reports. A sister of Farrenkopf has provided DNA to investigators, who are still trying to find dental records for comparison. Meanwhile, a person who says she's Farrenkopf's niece and godchild has created a Facebook page for Farrenkopf. We believe this was murder and we want answers, the page says, adding that Farrenkopf had nine siblings. She was well loved by all of her family and though we lost contact, that was due to the amount of traveling she had to do for work and the fact that she liked her privacy. The last known contact with Farrenkopf was in late 2008, when she was pulled over for expired license plates. |
High Traffic Delays Windows 7 Beta Rollout | (Jan 9, 2009 5:09 PM) After promising the world Windows 7 Beta on Wednesday, Microsoft had to pull the plug on its download site due to cripplingly high traffic, CNET reports today. We are adding some additional infrastructure support, Microsoft said, before we post the public beta. Microsoft hopes to have millions of testers for the new operating system, and release the consumer version by the next holiday season. Microsoft, in a blog post, seemed downright thrilled by its sites’ failure as a result of interest in the Windows 7 Beta. Stay tuned! the company told prospective testers. We are excited that you are excited! Microsoft gave no clue as to when the download would be up, and would not confirm when exactly the OS would ship. |
Mountains Reveal Worst Water News in 500 Years | (Sep 14, 2015 6:21 PM CDT) As if California doesn't have enough water problems. Now scientists say the Sierra Nevada snowpack—which gives the state nearly a third of its surface water—is at a shocking 500-year low, the Guardian reports. That means California, now in its fourth year of drought, can't rely as much on winter snow accumulation in the mountains to fill streams and reservoirs during the hot summers. It was unprecedented, says Valerie Trouet, who led the study published in Nature Climate Change. When you are a climate scientist, first you get excited by the result. Then you realise the extreme level of the snowpack is not something to get excited about. Trouet's team reached their conclusion by analyzing rings in the trunks of 1,500 blue oak trees in the region, CNBC reports. Winter precipitation plays a big role in the trees' growth, she says, which can be measured by the width of each year's ring—and last year's was pretty darn thin. So how did it get this bad? Seems that last winter's record-high temperatures and lack of rain led to the dismally low snow accumulation. Trouet also warns that California's uncontrollable wildfires can be linked to the lack of Sierra Nevada snowmelt, which scientists had already figured was at a 100-year low. If the climate keeps warning, she adds, chances of this happening again in the future are much higher than they were in the past. (See how LA is fighting drought with 96 million black plastic balls.) |
At 83, Barbara Walters Gets Chickenpox | (Jan 28, 2013 1:40 PM) Barbara Walters would probably like to hit the reset button on 2013. She's got the chickenpox and remains hospitalized more than a week after going in after falling and hitting her head at a pre-inaugural party in Washington on Jan. 19, Whoopi Goldberg revealed this morning on The View. She's been told to rest. She's not allowed any visitors, Goldberg said. And we're telling you, Barbara, no scratching! Goldberg said Walters, who is 83, has been transferred to a New York hospital and hopes to go home soon. Even after concern about her fall had subsided, Walters had been kept hospitalized last week because of a lingering fever, and doctors found the unexpected cause. It turned out to be the pox, which can be serious in older people because of the possibility of complications like pneumonia. We love you, we miss you, Goldberg said. We just don't want to hug you. |
Tiger 10 Back, Weir Shoots 64 at US Open | (Jun 19, 2009 8:00 PM CDT) Tiger Woods couldn't get off the course fast enough. Mike Weir, Lucas Glover, Ricky Barnes, and Phil Mickelson were among those at the US Open and thrilled they didn't have to leave until it was too dark to continue. Despite a double bogey on his back nine, Weir closed with back-to-back birdies for a 6-under 64, giving him a two-shot lead over Peter Hanson of Sweden and the lowest score in the US Open in 6 years. When a day that lasted just under 13 hours finally ended, Glover was atop the leaderboard at 6-under par through 13 holes, one shot ahead of Barnes, and 10 shots clear of Woods, who completed a 74 in the sloppy morning for his worst start in a major in 3 years. Sunshine made a cameo today at Bethpage Black, enough to dry the fairways and keep the greens soft. Periods of rain are forecast again for tomorrow. |
Israeli Assault Could Last Weeks; 230 Dead | (Dec 27, 2008 11:23 PM) Israel's bombardment of Hamas posts in the Gaza Strip is the start of a military operation likely to last several weeks, the Jerusalem Post reports. The assault—one of the deadliest in the 60-year conflict—has killed 230 Palestinians, including at least three senior Hamas officers, notes Haaretz. Hamas vowed revenge, calling for a new uprising and more suicide attacks in Israel. The number of wounded is about 400 on the low end of estimates, and hospitals are strained to the breaking point. Despite the heavy assault on its military sites, Hamas launched more than 100 rockets into southern Israel, killing at least one. Meanwhile, Israeli troops were massing by the Gaza border, and civilians on both sides braced for days of heavy fighting, the Los Angeles Times reports. |
Mom of 2, Age 40, Makes NFL Cheerleader | (Jul 17, 2014 9:48 AM CDT) Finally, a nice story about cheerleading in the NFL: Kriste Lewis is a 40-year-old mother of two who has a debilitating kidney disease that will ultimately require dialysis and a kidney transplant ... and she's also one of the newest cheerleaders for the New Orleans Saints. Her diagnosis inspired Lewis to make the most of every day, because I know my time is limited, she says. So, with her doctor's permission, she set a goal: Try out for the Saintsations. Honestly, I really did not think I was going to make the cut, she tells the AP. But, the squad's director tells the Sun-Herald, it was a unanimous decision to put her on the team. ... When she needed to blend with the others, she did, and when she needed to stand out, she did. She was the oldest person ever to audition for the team, and her competition was made up mostly of women ages 18 to 28. Because the applications weren't processed before the dance auditions started, the judges didn't even know Kriste was 40 until she had made it through three rounds of cuts and revealed her age in the interview round, the director says. Lewis, who was a high school cheerleader and is currently a dance instructor, is one of just two NFL cheerleaders in her 40s; the other, Laura Vikmanis, is 45 and has been dancing with the Cincinnati Bengals Ben-Gals since age 40. Lewis' first time performing with the 36-member squad will be Aug. 15 at an exhibition game. It's a family, Lewis says. It's like I have 35 little sisters. (In less heartwarming news, click to see why one columnist thinks NFL cheerleaders really do have it bad.) |
Uncle Sam Pays Dead People $120M a Year | (Sep 23, 2011 11:24 AM CDT) The government has been paying retirement benefits for a whole lot of dead federal workers, according to a new report from the Office of Personnel Management’s inspector general. Over the past five years, the amount accidentally paid to the dearly departed has jumped a whopping 70%, with $601 million given in total, the Washington Post reports; the exact figures ranged from $100 million to $150 million annually. The inspector general says the problem is that the OPM has done a poor job of stopping individual cheats. One man for example, managed to keep collecting his dead father’s annuity payments for 37 years—and the office didn’t notice until the son died in turn, $515,000 later. The OPM has taken some measures, like checking its data against Social Security death records and occasionally checking on anyone 90 or older to verify they're still alive, but the inspector general called those partial remedies, at best. |
Cockfighting Raid Nabs 73 in NC | (Feb 3, 2009 12:39 PM) North Carolina police arrested 73 people in an unexpectedly huge cockfighting raid over the weekend, crashing a barbaric $40,000 tournament in which a combatant rooster bloodied the search warrant, the AP reports. I had no idea it would be this large, the sheriff said. I've raided these things before, and you get 20 or 25 people, you've got a big crowd. I thought that this was unreal. About 20 birds were dead when police arrived at three chicken houses, which had been cleared to accommodate the ring and covert parking spaces for spectators. A fight was in progress, and a rooster leaped onto the betting table, spraying blood on the investigators’ warrant. All 73 people, who ranged in age from 16 to 79, were charged with cockfighting and cruelty to animals, both felonies. |
BofA Will Lay Off 35K | (Dec 11, 2008 4:59 PM) Bank of America said today it will cut between 30,000 and 35,000 jobs in the next 3 years, the AP reports; the move is spurred by the continuing economic downturn and the bank’s recent purchase of Merrill Lynch. Cuts will be broad and will affect both the parent company and its new acquisition. Final plans for the downsizing are expected in early 2009. The deal between the two companies was approved by Bank of America shareholders last week. Merrill Lynch was valued at $50 billion at the outset of negotiations, but the continuing economic crisis may have cheapened the company, leading to BofA’s layoffs. Bank of America will complete an analysis of proposed cost-saving measures; the final layoff toll will not be known until next year. |
'Tennessee Waltz' Singer Patti Page Dead at 85 | (Jan 2, 2013 3:18 PM) Tennessee Waltz singer Patti Page has died at age 85, reports the Tennessean. Page was a huge star in the 1950s with hits such as (How Much Is That) Doggy in the Window, but Waltz turned into her signature hit and became one of the best-selling records of all time, reports AP. It was also an afterthought: Mercury Records made it the B-side of a Christmas song called Boogie Woogie Santa Claus. I was a kid from Oklahoma who never wanted to be a singer, but was told I could sing, Page said in 1999. And things snowballed. |
MoveOn, 2 Top Unions Tap Obama | (Feb 1, 2008 5:09 PM) Barack Obama scored three major endorsements today, winning the support of the liberal activist group MoveOn and two influential unions that had backed John Edwards. MoveOn’s members voted for Obama over Hillary Clinton, 70.4% to 29.6%. The candidate crowed that the group has demonstrated that real change comes not from the top down, but from the bottom up, MSNBC reports. The union nods came from California’s 650,000-member SEIU branch, which has a large Latino contingent, and New York City's Transport Workers Union, which represents bus and subway workers, the New York Times reports. Meanwhile, Bill Richardson has not yet delivered his coveted endorsement, but the ex-candidate will watch the Super Bowl with Bill Clinton. |
Songwriter Who Wrote 'Thriller' Dead at 66 | (Oct 5, 2016 11:06 AM CDT) Anyone who's ever joyously sung, 'Cause this is THRILLER! at a Halloween party was singing the work of Rod Temperton, though they may not have known it. And now the songwriter behind Michael Jackson's Thriller and more of his big hits, including Off the Wall and Rock With You, has died. His family says Temperton died of cancer at age 66 in London last week, the AP reports. In addition to Jackson, Temperton had worked with Aretha Franklin, Herbie Hancock, Anita Baker, and producer Quincy Jones, and was sometimes called the invisible man because of his work behind the scenes. |
Bank of America Posts 77% Dive on $6B in Writedowns | (Apr 21, 2008 8:00 AM CDT) More than $6 billion in subprime writedowns sent Bank of America profits skidding for the third straight quarter today, as the nation's second-largest bank posted a 77% decline in net income for the first quarter. Earnings were $1.21 billion, down from $5.26 billion a year ago, reports Bloomberg. The losses exceeded analysts’ expectations by some 44% and sent market futures into a slide this morning. BofA—in the process of acquiring troubled home lender Countrywide Financial—said revenue slipped 6%. |
Artificial Brain Could Be Just 10 Years Away | (Jul 23, 2009 2:07 AM CDT) A functional artificial brain could be built within the next decade, leading scientist and brain-builder Henry Markram told a tech conference. Markram, who leads a project seeking to reverse engineer the mammalian brain from lab data, says his team has already duplicated parts of the rat brain, the BBC reports. The synthetic brain will be key to understanding mental disorders, according to Markam. His project is focusing on the neocortex, a part of the brain that arose with the earliest mammals and evolved into the almost frightening organ we have today, Markham says. The team's brain model already has thousands of working synthetic neurons, each of which takes up computing power equivalent to a laptop. Even a small model of the brain would need the power of 10,000 laptops, but with the IBM supercomputer, we can take the magic carpet for a ride, he quipped. |
Daniel Craig: I'd Rather Slit My Wrists Than Play 007 Again | (Oct 8, 2015 12:35 PM CDT) Daniel Craig has said he wants to move on from the James Bond franchise and that, for now, he would rather slit his wrists than do another Bond movie. In an interview with Time Out magazine, in which he was asked whether he could imagine doing another Bond film, Craig said: Now? I'd rather break this glass and slash my wrists. ... I'm over it at the moment. We're done. All I want to do is move on. The 47-year-old is reprising his role as the British spy for the fourth time in the upcoming Spectre. He added that he doesn't know and does not want to think about his next step, and that if he were to do another 007 movie, it would only be for the money. |
Groupon Expects $480M From IPO | (Oct 21, 2011 7:20 AM CDT) Early this summer, Groupon was aiming to raise $750 million in its initial public offering; now, it expects to raise no less than $480 million but no more than $540 million from the sale of 30 million shares, the AP reports. In a tough market for stock offerings, the firm has faced questions over accounting practices. Shares will be priced between $16 and $18 each, the company says in a regulatory filing today, with proceeds going to working capital as well as possible acquisitions. |
Hilarious Glitch: Linebacker Shrinks to 1'2" in Madden 15 | (Sep 3, 2014 12:04 PM CDT) The Tennessee Titans have a secret weapon this season: a 1-foot, 2-inch linebacker. At least, that's what players of the just-released Madden NFL 15 video game have found in an apparent glitch, which features the diminutive athlete dodging in between the legs of his relatively gigantic opponents. The identity of the pint-sized player is no secret: It's rookie Christian Kirksey, a linebacker for the Cleveland Browns, reports ABC News. Why he's been shrunk down to AstroTurf level or suited up in a Titans uniform is anyone's guess—Electronic Arts didn't answer ABC News' request for comment. The real-life 6-foot, 2-inch Kirksey doesn't seem to mind the attention. No matter how small you are, have big dreams, and live big! he tweeted, followed by the hashtags #reallyLOL, #glitch, and #goodmessagetho. Kirksey also said during an ESPN interview that his first reaction when he found out about the glitch was Where am I [in] the game? I couldn't even find myself. |
CERN Wants New Collider, 62 Miles Long | (Feb 19, 2014 9:04 AM) The Large Hadron Collider has only been in full swing for three years, notes a leading CERN physicist—but since planning for it began in 1983, it's already time to start thinking about what's next. In the case of the European particle physics organization, that means considering an even bigger collider—one housed in a tunnel 62 miles long. Four times the size of the LHC, the new collider could surround Geneva, though it might be built elsewhere, the BBC reports. Like its predecessor, the new system could smash protons together. Researchers are looking to conduct experiments at energies eight times higher than those achieved in the LHC. Another option would be colliding electrons, whose activities are easier to read, the BBC explains. Why now? We have very long lead times, says CERN head Rolf Heuer, noting those long-ago discussions in 1983 that led to the first data ... taken in 2009. Indeed, a future collider might not be finished until 2040, says a British physicist, per LiveScience. |
Cops: Man Freed After 15 Years Robs Same Store | (Mar 25, 2014 3:54 PM CDT) Christopher Miller robbed the Stride Rite shoe store in Toms River, NJ, in 1999, got caught, and served 15 years in state prison. Police say he became a free man on Friday and celebrated by catching a bus to Toms River and, yes, robbing the same Stride Rite shoe store, reports the Star-Ledger. Though he had 15 years to stew over what went wrong the first time, authorities say this robbery didn't go so well, either. Two employees were so slow in handing over cash that the agitated robber grabbed the register drawer himself and fled on foot, reports the Ocean County Signal. (The employees refused to hand over their keys, scotching any hopes for a getaway vehicle. They called the cops—the apparent plan was to tie them up in a storage room, as happened in the 1999 robbery, but the employees refused to go—and within minutes, a police K-9 unit tracked down Williams and recovered the stolen $389, reports the Daily Record. Miller is charged with robbery and is being held on $100,000 bond. The 40-year-old is from Tulsa, Okla., and police aren't sure what his connection is to Toms River, besides maybe nostalgia. |
Battle Over Prop 8 Moves to Federal Court | (May 27, 2009 1:11 PM CDT) California’s gay marriage battle continued today as lawyers for the American Foundation for Equal Rights announced a lawsuit challenging Proposition 8 and called for the restitution of marriage rights while the suit is decided, the Los Angeles Times reports. The lawyers—Theodore Olson, then the solicitor general, and David Boies—were on opposing sides of Bush v. Gore in 2000. They plan to file suit on behalf of two same-sex couples denied marriage licenses because of Prop 8. |
Feds Nab 11 Cybercrime Masterminds | (Aug 5, 2008 3:49 PM CDT) An international crew of hackers who reportedly stole more than 40 million credit and debit card numbers from nine US companies were indicted today in what Attorney General Michael Mukasey is calling the single largest and most complex identity theft case that's ever charged in this country. The ring grabbed hundreds of millions of dollars, officials told the Boston Globe. The 11 accused hackers found and broke into unprotected wireless networks used by businesses including OfficeMax, Barnes & Noble and Boston Market, then set up a program that would record financial information. They then sold the card numbers or emptied the accounts of cash through ATMs. The defendants hail from the US, Ukraine, Belarus, China and Estonia. |
EU Slaps Gas Firms With $1.5B Fine for Price-Fixing | (Jul 8, 2009 5:48 AM CDT) The European Union's powerful competition commissioner slapped two energy companies with record fines of $1.53 billion today for cartel misbehavior. GDF Suez and E.ON, two of the world's biggest gas producers, colluded to avoid competition in French and German energy markets and drive up prices. It's the first time that the commission has imposed antitrust fines on an energy company, reports the Wall Street Journal. Market sharing is one of the worst types of antitrust infringement, said commissioner Neelie Kroes. This agreement deprived customers of more price competition and more choice of supplier in two of the largest gas markets in the European Union. GDF Suez plans to appeal the fine. |
5 Guilty in Russian Journo's 2006 Murder | (May 21, 2014 1:50 PM CDT) Five men have been found guilty in the 2006 slaying of 48-year-old Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, whose investigative reporting criticized President Vladimir Putin, the war in Chechnya, and Chechen leadership. Three of the men are brothers from Chechnya, one of whom has been found guilty of the shooting itself, which NBC News reports took place execution-style in the elevator of her apartment building. The other two brothers were found guilty of tracking Politkovskaya and acting as getaway drivers, and their uncle and a retired police officer were found to have organized and prepared for the murder, respectively. All face life in prison. Three of the conspirators now convicted were acquitted in 2009, but a retrial was ordered. Another ex-cop was convicted of supplying the murder weapon last year, the BBC reports. The defendants' lawyers plan to appeal the convictions, Reuters reports. Politkovskaya’s family is disappointed that it's still not clear who ordered the killing, saying in a statement that the men convicted are only a few of the people who should be brought to justice. Though an investigation into the murder continues, critics suggest the mastermind will never be found because, as Reuters puts it, the trail could lead too close to the government —Politkovskaya's work angered quite a few important people. |
How a Man Got 1M Free Miles on United Airlines | (Jul 16, 2015 5:55 AM CDT) A security researcher has earned the equivalent of a first-class, round-the-world trip after he submitted what he thought were a couple of lame bugs to United's new bug bounty program. In an industry first, United announced a bounty in May that rewards miles to anyone who identifies a bug on its website. There are 10 bug classes eligible: Cross-site scripting bugs, for example, are worth 50,000 miles, while authentication bypass bugs earn 250,000. While passively poking the site, Jordan Wiens, founder of a Florida security company, says he found what he thought were two remote code execution bugs, which allow a hacker to run their own potentially dangerous code on a site. I also thought they were lame and wasn't sure if they were on parts of the infrastructure that qualified, he tells Threatpost. I figured they'd award me 50,000 miles or something smaller. It turns out RCE bugs earn the highest payout: a maximum 1 million miles. After making his submission to United—his first to a bounty program, he says—Wiens got an email asking for confirmation that he was a US citizen and that his six hours of research was completed in the US. Two hours later, I got a message to check my account that I had gotten my million miles, he says. Wiens, who can't share details of the bug, says the miles are worth $25,000 and could take him on a first-class trip around the world or on 40 domestic round-trip flights in coach. His plan is to use the miles on coach trips for his family, plus one luxurious flight with his wife, he tells Fox 13. Wired reports Wiens' award is the program's first major payout. Other security researchers have since shared their awards on Twitter. One says he nabbed 500,000 miles. (Speaking of planes, a horrible and evil new seat design has been revealed.) |
Coleman Claims 150 Ballots Were Double-Counted | (Dec 18, 2008 9:25 AM) The Minnesota Senate recount is moving at a one-step-forward, two-steps-back pace, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune reports, with Republican Norm Coleman’s campaign saying 150 ballots were double-counted, and that the total tally needs to be adjusted by the Canvassing Board. The board, which is in the process of evaluating disputed ballots, says it doesn’t necessarily have the authority to judge Coleman’s claim. We have a very narrow function here, says one board member. Challenger Al Franken’s campaign accuses Coleman of getting desperate as various rulings have cut into his lead. And board chairman Mark Ritchie just wants to move on quickly; the board will have to work 20 hours between this morning and its self-imposed deadline tomorrow for judging all challenged ballots. |
Couple Trapped in US Escapes $200K Bill After Early Birth | (Jan 3, 2015 3:38 PM) When a British couple vacationing in New York had a baby 11 weeks earlier than expected, they were told they couldn't go home until March because the baby wasn't ready to fly—and that meant a $200,000 medical bill. Good news for Kate Amos and Lee Johnston: It now appears they won't have to pay, the Telegraph reports. Lenox Hill Hospital says it's working with insurers on payment for the care involved. We will ensure that there will be no financial impact to the family, the hospital says. A friend raising money for the family says insurer Allianz will pay all medical bills. As for the more than $14,000 he has raised online for the family: Lee and Katie will still be faced with some large costs, from having to pay bills back in the UK to leading a life over in the States, Richard Crow says at GoGetFunding.com. Your donations will go a huge way to cover these. Crow tells the Daily Mail that baby Dax is fine, thankfully. He's 11 weeks early but fine. He also offers more details of their experience: They were walking through Central Park and she got some real bad pains, Richard Crow says. They had a bit of rest but it got worse and worse, and then Lee said 'We need to get you to a hospital' … Within about an hour and a half, he was born. (A woman treated at the wrong hospital recently faced a $50,000 bill.) |
These 13 Shows Are Being Axed | (May 13, 2016 2:36 AM CDT) It wasn't quite the Red Wedding, but Thursday brought viewers news of more than a dozen prime-time shows being axed to make room for new programs next season, the AP reports. ABC took the sword to seven series—including country music drama Nashville and veteran whodunit Castle—while Fox is sacrificing five freshman shows, including comedies starring aging pretty boys Rob Lowe and John Stamos. Meanwhile, CBS is deleting CSI: Cyber after its sophomore season, thus laying to rest the CSI dynasty that encompassed four series during a 16-year span. The official body count—as well as new programming blood for the 2016-2017 season—will be rolled out next week at the networks' upfront sessions for advertisers. But through a combination of network leaks and networks jumping the gun, a flood of announcements got early exposure Thursday. Perhaps the sourest note came from ABC with word that it's canceling Nashville after four seasons. Never a ratings hit, that series enjoyed a loyal following, especially in Music City, where the show was filmed. In addition, Castle, which debuted in 2009, and sophomore series Agent Carter and Galavant won't be back. Freshman series Blood & Oil and The Family have also been yanked, as has The Muppets, for which longtime affection for Miss Piggy and its other characters failed to translate into viewership. Fox is dumping comedies Grandfathered (starring Stamos) and The Grinder (starring Lowe), as well as midseason entries Bordertown, Minority Report, and Cooper Barrett's Guide to Surviving Life. New series in the works include an ABC period drama from Scandal producer Shonda Rhimes about the aftermath of the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. (If you need cheering up, here are 10 shows you can binge-watch on Netflix.) |
22-Year-Old Sues: Four Loko Damaged My Heart | (Mar 22, 2011 3:02 AM CDT) A 22-year-old New Jersey man is suing the company that produces Four Loko, arguing the caffeinated alcoholic drink permanently damaged his heart. Michael Mustica was rushed to a hospital after suffering heart arrhythmia when he drank more than two cans of Four Loko last year. Doctors told him he suffered heart damage from consuming the drink, according to court documents filed against drink manufacturer Phusion Projects. He was a victim of people who tried to make money off a product without worrying about the health consequences, Mustica's attorney told the Star Ledger. The drink touted as blackout in a can has been banned in a number of states following hospital emergency room visits by several drinkers. Alcoholic energy drinks have been declared unsafe by the FDA. Four Loko was replaced late last year with a caffeine-free version. A Phusion spokesman refused to comment on the New Jersey case, but added: We still believe that combining caffeine and alcohol is safe. |
Gunman Kills 2, Self at Calif. Medical Center | (Apr 17, 2009 4:08 AM CDT) A worker at the Long Beach Medical Center shot and killed his boss and another manager before taking his own life yesterday, reports the Los Angeles Times. Witnesses said pharmacy technician Mario Ramirez, 50, showed up for work brandishing a pair of handguns and deliberately sought out his victims. Friends say he had heard rumors of impending layoffs. Ramirez, described by colleagues as a funny, humble, nice man with a wife and children, had never had any personnel problems at the center, said a hospital spokeswoman who added that layoffs had been made last month but no further job reductions were planned. There were no signs or indication that something like this could happen, she said. I don't believe there was anything we could have done. |
17th Youth Dies in Welsh 'Suicide Borough' | (Feb 20, 2008 10:15 AM) A 16-year-old schoolgirl found hanged in the woods yesterday became the 17th youth suicide in the area of Bridgend, Wales, since early 2007. The rash of suicides has focused intense scrutiny on the town of 39,000 and its surrounding borough, where baffled police have so far failed to unearth any common motive linking the victims, the Guardian reports. Victims have ranged in age from 15 to 26. Parents and police deny speculation that social networking websites are to blame for the suicides; some parents chalked up the deaths to media coverage that has glamorized suicide as a way of getting attention. Bridgend officials plan to send suicide prevention experts into every school in hopes of ending the trend, reports the Times of London. |
Marc Jacobs Sends Girls, 14, Down Runway | (Feb 17, 2012 1:26 AM) Designer Marc Jacobs is flouting fashion industry recommendations by sending 14-year-old models down his catwalk. I do the show the way I think it should be, not the way somebody tells me it should be, Jacobs told the New York Times after his Manhattan presentation. There is no controversy. Health initiative guidelines set by the Council of Fashion Designers of America—which includes Jacobs on its board—recommend that runway models be at least 16 years old. The age limit has been touted as a sign of progress in an industry plagued by anorexia. The industry's hiring of prepubescent-appearing teenage girls as models of adult clothing sets an unrealistic standard; the curves that define the female figure are absent, said council president Diane von Furstenburg. Models who attempt to maintain a child's body into adulthood run the risk of eating disorders, she warned. The girls in Jacobs' show, Thairine Garcia and Ondria Hardin, are represented by Ford Models, which apparently also ignores the council's recommendations. While Ford supports the idea of health initiatives, it hasn't agreed to an age limit, reports ABC. Even the council itself said it's ultimately up to a designer. What's curious is why Jacobs decided to use the girls in designs that largely covered them up, and shadowed them with large hats. Maybe it's because the hats, as the Times points out, were Dr.Seuss-style. The cleaning staff could have been under those hats, and nobody would have been the wiser, quips writer Eric Wilson. |
Curtis Allina, Father of PEZ Dispenser, Dead at 87 | (Jan 5, 2010 1:29 PM) Curtis Allina, the man most credited with popularizing the modern PEZ dispenser, is dead at 87. His family says the cause was heart failure. Allina, born in Prague in 1922, was the only member of his Sephardic Jewish family to survive the Holocaust. After the war, he traveled to New York, and began working for Pez-Haas, an Austrian company that made mints packaged in dispensers resembling cigarette lighters, and marketed as an alternative to smoking. In 1955, Allina had an idea. The new generation of PEZ dispensers, with the candy reformulated in fruit flavors to appeal to children, were fully-molded, unlike the separate head-and-feet model we know today. It must have been a hard sell to his bosses in Austria, the New York Times notes, but Allina got the product on the street, and the rest is history. Did he invent the anthropomorphic heads that tilt back and dispense the sweet treat? Who the hell knows, a Pez historian says. Who was more important in getting it done? Allina. |
U2 Plays Surprise Rooftop Gig | (Feb 28, 2009 8:56 AM) U2 treated London fans to a surprise concert from the rooftop of BBC headquarters last night. The band, promoting the launch of new album No Line on the Horizon, played two new songs and two old ones as thousands of fans filled the street below. This is the first time we've played these songs to people, so we hope we don't screw it up, Bono told the audience. Some people tried to crowd on to traffic islands to see them, a BBC reporter at the scene said. The crowd was screaming and cheering. Others were spilling out of pubs and shops to see it, and looking out of windows. It was a good-natured crowd and people really seemed to be enjoying it. The band plans a tour with recession-friendly ticket prices later this year. |
Confidence Sags; Dow Off 82 | (Jun 30, 2009 3:23 PM CDT) Stocks fell today on an unexpected decline in consumer confidence, the Wall Street Journal reports, after investors held steady at the open despite data that delinquencies on prime mortgages had increased. The consumer-confidence drop came after two months of positive readings. The Dow closed down 82.38 at 8,447.00. The Nasdaq fell 9.02, closing at 1,835.04, and the S&P 500 lost 7.91, settling at 919.32. Today marked the end of the second quarter, for which the Dow gained 11%, the Nasdaq increased by 20%, and the S&P 500 added 15%. |
N. Korea to Get 100K Copies of The Interview—by Balloon | (Dec 31, 2014 8:49 AM) A South Korean activist said today that he will launch balloons carrying DVDs of The Interview toward North Korea to try to break down a personality cult built around dictator Kim Jong Un. Activist Park Sang-hak said he will start dropping 100,000 DVDs and USBs with the movie as early as late January. Park, a North Korean defector, said he's partnering with the US-based nonprofit Human Rights Foundation, which is financing the making of the DVDs and USB memory sticks of the movie with Korean subtitles. Park said foundation officials plan to visit South Korea around Jan. 20 to hand over the DVDs and USBs, and that he and the officials will then try to float the first batch of the balloons if weather conditions allow. North Korea's absolute leadership will crumble if the idolization of leader Kim breaks down, Park said by telephone. The move was expected to further enrage North Korea, which was already pretty angry over the movie. In October, the country opened fire at giant balloons carrying anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets floated across the border by South Korean activists, triggering an exchange of gunfire with South Korean troops. But it is not clear how effective Park's plan will be, as only a small number of ordinary North Korean citizens are believed to own computers or DVD players. Many North Koreans would not probably risk watching the movie as they know they would get into trouble if caught. |
How a US Murder Suspect Became a 9/11 Truther Abroad | (Jun 29, 2016 11:58 AM CDT) On its own, the suspicious death of Kurt Sonnenfeld's wife would be worthy of a magazine article. On Jan. 1, 2002, his 36-year-old spouse was found shot to death in their upscale Denver home. Sonnenfeld insisted she killed herself, but prosecutors filed murder charges against him—only to drop them five months later. Then they charged him again in 2003, before discovering that he had moved to Argentina. The case involves the intricacies of forensics, theories about gun angles, a possible suicide note, and now international borders. But as a lengthy piece in GQ explains, that's only the half of it. It was only in Argentina that Sonnenfeld's work as an official videographer at Ground Zero for the federal government entered the picture. Sonnenfeld, with the help of his new wife in Argentina, has over the years become a media superstar in the country by championing the idea that the US knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance. Among other things, he argues that he was summoned by FEMA suspiciously fast, and he speculates about why a vault found in the wreckage was empty—FEMA must have emptied it in advance. So, sure, he sounds like a crackpot. But his advocates say that the US government wants to have him extradited on the murder charges so he can be silenced through execution. If the truther-ism is a ploy, it seems to be working: The Argentine government refuses to extradite him, even though Denver authorities say they're not interested in the death penalty. One camp in this affair portrays Sonnenfeld as a devious murderer, while the other paints him as a persecuted whistle-blower, writes Evan Hughes at GQ. But it is possible that neither is true: Even if you believe that Sonnenfeld made up a lunatic story in a desperate plea for Argentine protection, you can still believe that he's innocent of the crime. Click for the full story. |
Acupuncture Needle Pulled From Guy's Stomach After 40 Years | (Oct 4, 2014 4:35 PM CDT) It was 40 years ago that Xu Long had acupuncture to relieve stomach pain, and the pain stopped immediately, he tells Central European News. But the treatment appears to have come with some serious complications. Xu had more recently been suffering from new pains in his back and chest, Fox News reports. Every time I went to a doctor, they said it was just old age, Xu says. The real culprit, it seems: an inch-long needle left over from the treatment. Doctors in China found the needle through X-rays. They told me there was a foreign body in my stomach, and I just panicked, thinking it was cancer, Xu says. You can imagine my shock and relief when they told me it was the acupuncture needle. Health workers think the thing was traveling through his body as he moved over the years, the Daily Mail reports. A doctor says it ended up in his intestines, and it had turned black and was very thick because of decades of oxidation. Now, the 60-year-old says he's cured. My pains have completely gone, and I don't have cancer, so I'm a winner all round. (A more recent acupuncture recipient is a Brazilian alligator.) |
FEMA Scraps 9/11 Coloring Book | (Apr 29, 2009 12:59 PM CDT) After touting it for six years, FEMA has pulled a downloadable coloring book that depicts a plane flying towards the burning Twin Towers from its website. A Scary Thing Happened has been disseminated to thousands of children worldwide and no one has complained about it—or its potential to traumatize kids—until now, a public official tells the New York Daily News. FEMA has yet to offer an explanation for the move. I have a letter from FEMA in 2003 applauding us for the coloring book, says the Minnesota official, whose county developed the disaster guide after a tornado. I feel like it was happening in the world and kids saw it, defends the 68-year-old grandmother who drew the 9/11 images. It is life. |
Judge: Gawker Still Has to Pay Hulk Hogan $140M | (May 25, 2016 1:40 PM CDT) Well, it looks like Gawker still owes Hulk Hogan $140 million. On Wednesday, a Florida circuit court judge declined to order a new trial or change the jury's verdict in Hogan's lawsuit against the media company, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Gawker's attorney had asked the judge to reduce the jury's verdict or toss it completely. In March, Hogan was awarded $55 million in economic damages, $60 million for emotional distress, and $25 million in extra punitive damages after Gawker published a portion of his sex tape in 2012, according to ABC News. Gawker has said paying that amount would be ruinous for the company, the Wall Street Journal reports. A lawyer for the company calls the verdict grossly excessive compared to the conduct at issue. Hogan's team disagrees. Gawker has failed and continues to fail in recognizing their obligation to [Hogan] for their reprehensible behavior and method of doing what they call journalism, ABC quotes Hogan’s legal team as saying Wednesday. The judge's decision sends the case to a Florida appeals court, where Gawker plans to cite the First Amendment. It was reported Tuesday that the billionaire founder of PayPal, who has beef with Gawker, has been funding Hogan's lawsuit. |
Pro Skateboarder and Model Dylan Rieder Dead at 28 | (Oct 13, 2016 8:33 AM CDT) The skateboarding world is mourning the loss of 28-year-old Dylan Rieder, who died of leukemia on Wednesday. Rieder grew up in Westminster, Calif., and began skating at age 9, reports People. He went pro for Alien Workshop at age 18 before nabbing sponsorships with Birdhouse, Osiris, and Quiksilver. A favorite son in the industry, per Rolling Stone, Rieder later took up modeling, appearing in the pages of Vogue in 2013 and in a DKNY ad campaign in 2014. Thank you for making skateboarding so much better while you were here, Dylan, wrote Tony Hawk on Facebook. Transworld Skateboarding, meanwhile, says Rieder's flawless style, explosive power, and epic video parts influenced an entire generation. In short, he was one of the best to ever step on a skateboard. Celebs also are weighing in: He was one of the kindest, most down to down, incredible human beings I have ever encountered, actress and model Cara Delevingne writes on Instagram. And Ozzy Osbourne describes Rieder as one of the most [talented] and brave men in a tweet. (See some of his skateboarding skills in this video.) |
Merrill Lynch Posts Steep Q1 Loss | (Apr 17, 2008 7:25 AM CDT) Merrill Lynch today posted nearly $2 billion in losses in the first quarter, after taking another $9 billion in writeoffs, the Wall Street Journal reports. In its third straight quarterly loss, Merrill was in the red $1.96 billion, or $2.19 a share, compared to earning $2.16 billion, or $2.26 a share a year ago. The company said it will cut about 3,000 jobs. The new round of Merrill writeoffs includes $1.5 billion in CDOs, $3.5 billion in residential mortgage-backed securities, $925 million on leveraged loans and $3 billion on hedges with financial guarantors. Citi, BofA and Countrywide are up next. |
2 Teachers Make Mission's Final Walk | (Mar 23, 2009 4:58 PM CDT) Two astronauts who were teaching math and science to middle school students just 5 years ago went on a spacewalk together today, their path cleared of dangerous orbiting junk that had threatened the space station and shuttle. It's the first time two former schoolteachers have been on a spacewalk together, and is the third and final spacewalk for shuttle Discovery's mission. Astronauts Joseph Acaba and Richard Arnold II had no luck trying to free up a jammed equipment storage shelf at the international space station, one of their main tasks. Using a hammer, they managed to loosen a pin that Acaba and another astronaut accidentally inserted upside down on the platform during Saturday's spacewalk. But the shelf mechanism would not extend into the proper position, despite repeated efforts. |
Republican Hopefuls for 2012 Taking It Slow | (Dec 10, 2010 12:38 PM) Five Republicans had filed to run for the presidential nomination at this time four years ago; right now, there isn’t one. We can’t expect any formal declarations until February at the earliest, reports the Wall Street Journal. Why? For one thing, the first primaries won’t happen until a month later than they did in 2008. Plus, an RNC ruling requires any winner-take-all contests to take place later in the calendar year, possibly April. But political concerns are also slowing things down: for Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee, there are Fox News contracts, for example. There’s also a feeling that everything just dragged on too long last time, said a top aide to Mitt Romney’s 2008 campaign. Furthermore, no one potential candidate has a clear lead—and those in the running are taking time to study the battle between congressional Republicans and the president. |
Woman Shot 4 Times in 'Extreme Case of Road Rage' | (Apr 7, 2016 12:33 PM CDT) A woman was shot four times in what police are calling an extreme case of road rage Tuesday in Minneapolis, Minnesota Public Radio reports. The 39-year-old victim is expected to recover. According to the St. Paul Pioneer Press, the victim honked at a tan Jeep Cherokee with tinted windows that cut her off during the evening rush hour. The Jeep changed lanes again and slowed down so that it was driving next to the victim's car. That's when the Jeep's passenger opened fire. The victim was struck three times in the arm and once in the abdomen. Despite her injuries and a shattered windshield, the victim continued to drive in order to find help, NBC News reports. She eventually ended up at a nearby business, where she called 911, according to KARE. Police, who say there were likely multiple witnesses to the shooting due to heavy traffic, are angry over the incident. Stop the violence, NBC quotes a Minneapolis police rep as saying. Put the guns down. |
40 Migrants Suffocate in Ship Bound for Italy | (Aug 15, 2015 8:39 AM CDT) At least 40 migrants died today in the hold of an overcrowded smuggling boat in the Mediterranean Sea north of Libya, but some 320 others on the same boat were saved by the Italian navy. The survivors included 45 women and three children. Migrants by the tens of thousands are braving the perilous journey across the Mediterranean this year, hoping to reach Europe and be granted asylum. They are fleeing war, persecution, and poverty in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. Prior to today's disaster, at least 2,100 migrants had died at sea this year trying to make the crossing from the shores of Libya, where human traffickers are based, to Italy. The dead were found in the hold, said Cmdr. Massimo Tosi, speaking from the navy ship Cigala Fulgosi. Asked by RaiNews24 how the migrants died, Tosi said it appears to be from inhaling exhaust fumes. When rescuers stepped aboard, the bodies of migrants were lying in water, fuel, human excrement in the hold, he said, adding that among the survivors, women were crying for their husbands (and) their children who died in the crossing. |
Calif. '3 Strikes' Convict Freed | (Aug 17, 2010 4:35 AM CDT) A homeless man sentenced to 25 years to life for trying to break into a church soup kitchen to find food has been freed by a Los Angeles judge. Gregory Taylor received the stiff sentence under California's 'three strikes law in 1997 because he had two felony convictions for a purse-snatching and an attempted unarmed robbery in the mid-'80s, the Los Angeles Times reports. Today we are able to correct the past and strike his third strike, the judge said. The original sentence falls outside the spirit of the three-strikes law, the judge said, giving Taylor a new sentence shorter than the time he has already served. Law students taking part in a project to overturn life sentences for minor convictions presented new evidence about Taylor's character and mental health. I just want to thank you for giving me another chance, Taylor—whose case has been at the center of debates over the law—said at the end of the hearing. |
Auto Sales Off Again: GM 49%, Ford 40%, Toyota 32% | (Feb 3, 2009 12:48 PM) Three automakers said today their US light-vehicle sales plummeted again in January: General Motors fell 49%, Ford 40% and Toyota 32%. It’s an abysmal start to 2009 for the industry as sales to fleet buyers like rental car companies weighed down the results. Chrysler and other automakers also are expected to report lower sales when they release their figures later today. |
19 Levees Now Breached | (Jun 18, 2008 1:20 PM CDT) More levee breaks in Missouri and Illinois today put at 19 the number that have failed along the cresting Mississippi, Reuters reports, further swamping farmland. They were lower level agricultural levees, said an Army Corps of Engineers spokesman. We're also watching another seven levees that may overtop in the next couple of days … all agricultural levees. |
Madonna's $15M School Ousts 200 Malawi Villagers | (Feb 12, 2010 8:19 AM) Madonna wants to help Malawi with her $15 million girls’ school so much that she’s ejecting villagers to make it happen. Residents didn’t want to leave the school site just outside the capital, but the government handed the land over to Madonna and told 200 Malawians they must move to another government site. Madonna did, at least, pay the villagers about $115,000 for their houses, the future principal of her school tells the AP. |
Cops: Fortune Teller Scammed Woman for $217K | (Mar 6, 2014 6:12 PM) The going rate to have a curse removed is apparently $217,040. That's how much a 22-year-old woman in Manhattan paid a fortune teller over the course of about a year to be officially de-cursed, the New York Post reports. The woman finally wised up and went to police, who charged Amanda Ufie with grand larceny and scheme to defraud. Victim Jiawei Li is now one curse lighter, though it's not clear whether she will get her money back. Cops say Ufie had at least one other scam victim, though for considerably less money. (This is not the first such case. |
You Threw Away $960 Sitting in Traffic Last Year | (Aug 26, 2015 10:37 AM CDT) If you're stuck in traffic for a few minutes today, look on the bright side: Those few minutes are nothing compared to the 42 hours the average rush-hour commuter spent in traffic last year—or the 6.9 billion hours American drivers squandered while bumper-to-bumper—at a cost of $960 in wasted fuel. A new study from Texas A&M Transportation Institute and INRIX finds drivers are spending more time in traffic than ever before. In 2009, drivers wasted about 6.3 billion hours on the road, reports ABC News. The average delay has actually doubled since 1985 and it's only going to get worse: By 2020, the study authors predict the average driver will face 47 hours of delays for a combined 8.3 billion hours nationwide, reports USA Today. That number will probably look good to anyone who drives in Washington, DC, though. The capital had the worst traffic in the country, with drivers wasting 82 hours of their time. Los Angeles (80), San Francisco (78), New York (74), and San Jose (67) rounded out the top five. The study notes Cleveland, Pittsburgh, San Diego, and Tampa fared well for their size, but Baton Rouge and Austin had worse traffic than some much larger cities. More roads can ease congestion but that strategy alone isn't enough. This problem calls for a classic all-hands-on-deck approach, a co-author says. Businesses can give their employees more flexibility in where, when, and how they work, individual workers can adjust their commuting patterns, and we can have better thinking when it comes to long-term land use planning. |
5 US Troops Among 18 Dead in Kabul Blast | (May 18, 2010 5:24 AM CDT) A Taliban suicide car bomber struck a NATO convoy in Kabul today, killing six of its servicemembers, five of them American, officials said. Twelve Afghan civilians also died—many in a gruesome scene as a public bus in rush hour traffic was ripped apart. I got to the scene right afterward, and people were calling, ‘Help me, help me,’ an ambulance driver tells the New York Times. There were body parts everywhere. Forty-seven others were wounded in the first major attack on Kabul since February when suicide bombers struck two small hotels. Police have publicized a number of arrests of would-be bombers since then, but today's bombing was a reminder that the city's defenses can still be penetrated. Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid told the AP that the bomber was a man from Kabul and his car was packed with 1,650 pounds of explosive. |
21 Beats the House Again | (Apr 6, 2008 5:00 PM CDT) 21 beat the odds for a second straight week and held off George Clooney’s Leatherheads, Variety reports. The gambling pic garnered $15.1 million, while the old-school football laffer, tripped up by poor reviews, tied with family flick Nim’s Island for second spot, each banking about $13.5 million. Hit Horton took fourth place with $9.1 million, while The Ruins opened in fifth with $7.84 million and Superhero Movie banked $5.4 million in sixth. Tyler Perry’s Meet the Browns earned $3.51 million in seventh and Drillbit Taylor made $3.49 million in eighth. Ticket sales kept slumping overall, down 27% among the top 12 films compared to this frame last year, Bloomberg reports. |
Dems Want Health Reform Rollout By 2010, 2012 | (Oct 26, 2009 8:40 AM CDT) Democrats are pushing Senate leaders to rework their health care bills so that at least some benefits kick in by the 2010 and 2012 elections. As currently formulated, the bill would bring the pain immediately, in the form of $100 billion in industry fees, but its reforms mostly wouldn’t kick in until 2013. We want to have as much front-ended as possible, says Debbie Stabenow, even though we know all of it can’t be. Polls show that voters are largely unaware that the plan will take so long to start working. But Democrats believe it’s too complicated—and cost prohibitive—to implement immediately, so they’re looking for low-cost aspects to phase in early. Among the possibilities: discounts for seniors on brand-name drugs, tax credits for small businesses, and a $5 billion high-risk pool to cover people with preexisting conditions. |
New Sudan Fighting Kills More Than 100 | (Feb 11, 2011 2:05 PM) The Sudanese ceasefire has been broken, with more than 100 people killed in a series of clashes between the Sudanese army and rebels, al-Jazeera reports. The military says fighters loyal to rebel leader George Athor attacked an army base in Jonglei earlier this week, setting off the violence. In the ensuing clashes, roughly 50 fighters had been killed on each side, an army spokesman said, in addition to 39 civilians. The number of casualties is high because the attacks were a surprise, the spokesman was quoted as saying. This is something we were not expecting because we trusted the ceasefire that was signed. But Athor told the Sudan Radio Service that the Sudanese army was the first to break the truce. The fighting comes just days after Omar al-Bashir said he'd honor the south's vote to secede. |
6.5 Quake Hits Mexico | (Jun 30, 2010 4:20 AM CDT) A 6.5-magnitude quake in southern Mexico early this morning shook buildings as far away as Mexico City. The epicenter of the earthquake, which struck at 2:22 am local time, was 75 miles west-southwest of Oaxaca City. So far, no casualties, injuries or damaged buildings have been reported, but calls to hotels in the Oaxaca region are not being answered. In Mexico City, 220 miles away, people fled their houses in pajamas, MSNBC reports. |
Star Wars Trailer Is a 'Glorious' 88-Second Tease | (Nov 28, 2014 1:28 PM) There's been an awakening. Have you felt it? That's the ominous-sounding question posed by the newly released trailer for the much-anticipated Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the JJ Abrams-directed film set for release in December 2015, Wired reports. The clip—which blasts the familiar Star Wars theme music as droids and starfighters rush across the screen, offering glimpses of the characters that we'll soon see fighting for the dark side and the light —lasts barely 90 seconds, but it's enough to have riled up a good portion of the Internet today. I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out their takes based on 88 seconds of movie clips, Time columnist James Poniewozik tweets. The Guardian, which calls the trailer glorious, has compiled other notable comments, including a series of tweets by William Shatner that inform us he's learned some things from the trailer. Meanwhile, more than one commenter notes that the voiceover sounds suspiciously like Benedict Cumberbatch. |
$55M Another Record Month for Obama | (Mar 6, 2008 4:10 PM) Barack Obama has 55 million reasons to keep his chin up despite losses this week in Democratic primaries, the Chicago Tribune reports, with the Illinois senator taking in $55 million in February to shatter, again, records for political donations. About 750,000 people donated last month; $45 million came online—an amount that itself eclipses Obama's January haul of $36 million. Obama's campaign, which will officially release fundraising details later today, said more than 90% of the month's take came from donations of $100 or less. Rival Hillary Clinton, who's now riding a wave a momentum after victories in Texas and Ohio, raised $35 million last month, far better than her previous best. |
15 Hurt as JetBlue Flight Catches Fire | (Aug 27, 2010 1:22 AM CDT) Fifteen passengers were injured yesterday when a JetBlue flight caught on fire during a hard landing in Sacramento. Get out, get out, get out! flight attendants yelled as they deployed escape chutes, recounted a passenger. I looked back under the plane, and it was on fire, and all four tires were out, he said. Pilots reported braking trouble on the Airbus A320, said JetBlue airline officials. The NTSB is investigating. Injuries among the 87 passengers appeared to be minor but five people were taken to the hospital, reports CBS News. |
Here Are the 10 Most Popular Americans | (Mar 30, 2014 7:47 AM CDT) MIT researchers recently released Pantheon, which analyzes data (including Wikipedia page views, among other things) in order to determine the global popularity of historical characters. From that, the San Francisco Chronicle compiled the study's top 25 Americans. Here are the top 10, though Pantheon warns that data can be constantly revised and updated—and that small differences in ranking are not statistically meaningful. |
Gadhafi Demands $6B to Keep Europe White | (Dec 1, 2010 2:00 AM) Christian, white countries will end up being flooded with African migrants unless the European Union gives Libya another $6 billion to fight illegal immigration, Moammar Gadhafi warns. We should stop this illegal immigration. If we don't, Europe will become black, it will be overcome by people with different religions, it will change, said the Libyan leader. Libya has so far only received some $65 million in EU funds, and Sweden has refused to sell it surveillance planes, the Telegraph notes. Gadhafi made his comments while speaking as chair of the third annual African Union-European Union summit in Tripoli. The theme of this year's meeting was co-operation, but the Libyan leader spent most of the summit on the attack, Voice of America reports. He slammed international organizations, including the United Nations, World Bank, and the World Trade Organization, which he described as a tool of colonialism that should be abolished. |
Meet the 66M-Year-Old Ancestor of Mammals | (Feb 8, 2013 3:40 PM) Say hello to your great-great-great-great-great-grandparents (times a few million or so)—Protungulatum donnae, a rat-sized insect eater believed to have lived 66 million years ago. A new six-year study of the mammalian family tree, looking at DNA and anatomical evidence in greater detail than ever before, has identified Protungulatum donnae as the most likely common ancestor for all 5,400 placental mammal species, reports the New York Times. The critter, however, is only hypothetical, notes the LA Times, explaining that scientists used data to reverse-engineer it. The study examined 83 mammals and fossils for more than 4,500 traits, creating a database 10 times larger than any previous database. Because Protungulatum donnae would have emerged 200,000 to 400,000 years after the great extinction that ended the dinosaurs—about 36 million years later than previous estimates—scientists say this is a clear sign the rise of the mammals was tied to that mass extinction. The abstract to the original article is at Science magazine. |
Griffey Slams No. 609, Now 5th on HR List | (Aug 20, 2008 8:05 PM CDT) Ken Griffey Jr. slammed his 609th home run today to move into a tie with Sammy Sosa for fifth on the Major League Baseball career list. Only Barry Bonds (762), Hank Aaron (755), Babe Ruth (714), and Willie Mays (660) have hit more. Griffey's two-run drive helped his Chicago White Sox rout Seattle, 15-3. It was his first homer since Chicago acquired him from Cincinnati last month. |
1 Dead, 16 Missing in Canadian Helicopter Crash | (Mar 12, 2009 2:58 PM CDT) A helicopter ferrying workers to oil rigs off Canada’s Atlantic coast crashed into the ocean today, killing at least one, the Telegram of St. John’s, Newfoundland, reports. One passenger has been rescued, but 16 more remain lost. The chopper reported engine trouble prior to ditching about 40 miles offshore. The helicopter is not on the surface of the water any more, and the search effort is going on, an official said. |
Swedish Guy Eats 70-Year- Old Beef | (Aug 24, 2011 7:32 PM CDT) Ever wondered if beef ages like wine? Well a Swedish man ran something of an experiment on the matter yesterday, cracking open a jar of brisket that had been sealed for more than 70 years, The Local reports. Eskil Carlsson’s parents-in-law had sealed the beef away during World War II, when rationing was in force, and decided not to open it in case the bad times returned, he explains. By the time Carlsson encountered the jar 10 years later, the family had developed respect for the jar, that it had stayed sealed. We talked about it from time to time and it became like a member of the family, he says. But when his wife died, he decided the meat had waited long enough, and invited all his neighbors over to eat it. So how was it? It didn't smell much, he says. I shouldn't exaggerate though, it was no delicacy. |
Iran Activists Arrested as Death Toll Hits 10 | (Dec 28, 2009 3:52 AM) The death toll from yesterday's clashes between Iranian protesters and security forces has hit 10, as police today rounded up and arrested some 300 people, including three top aides to opposition leader Mir Hussein Moussavi. Hundreds of protesters were wounded in yesterday's confrontations across the country. Police opened fired directly into crowds of protesters, and photographs and videos of the violence and the victims are being widely circulated today. Some videos show protesters fighting back and some officers appear to abandon their posts. The decision by authorities to fire on protesters during yesterday's Ashura holiday infuriated many Iranians, and may have pushed more citizens into the activist camp, reports the New York Times. |
Obama Nominee Would Be 1st Openly Gay Service Chief | (Sep 18, 2015 3:48 PM CDT) President Barack Obama is nominating longtime Pentagon official Eric Fanning to be the Army's new secretary. If confirmed, Fanning would be the nation's first openly gay leader of a military service. Obama says Fanning brings years of experience and leadership to the role. He says in a statement that he's confident Fanning will lead US soldiers with distinction. Fanning is currently the Army's acting under secretary and has served as the Air Force's acting secretary and chief of staff to the Defense secretary. Fanning's nomination must be confirmed by the Senate. He would replace John McHugh, who has said he plans to step down no later than November 1. |
Wrong-Way Driver Kills 5 Teens in Vermont | (Oct 9, 2016 4:00 PM CDT) A man driving the wrong way on an interstate highway in Vermont spawned several crashes that left five teenagers dead, an unknown number injured, and at least two vehicles in flames, including a stolen police cruiser, state police said Sunday. A Vermont school principal said the five teenagers, who were all riding in the same vehicle, were high school juniors. Four were students at Harwood Union High School, co-Principal Amy Rex said, and a fifth student attended a different school, reports AP. Emergency dispatchers started getting calls about a vehicle traveling north in a southbound lane of the interstate late Saturday. State and local police officers tried to locate the vehicle, but soon began getting reports of the crash. A vehicle was in flames when a Williston officer arrived at the scene. He grabbed a fire extinguisher before pulling a female victim away from the burning vehicle, authorities said. As the officer tried to extinguish the fire, a man took the officer's police cruiser and began speeding away. When a Richmond police officer tried to stop it, the driver turned the cruiser around and began heading north in a southbound lane, back toward the crash scene, police said. The cruiser struck seven vehicles. The driver, identified by police as 36-year-old Steven Bourgoin, was thrown from the cruiser, which also burst into flames. Police had not determined whether Bourgoin was the driver who caused the initial crash. Bourgoin remains hospitalized in critical condition. |
Unemployment Hits 8.5%, Highest in 25 Years | (Apr 3, 2009 8:21 AM CDT) Another punishing month of job losses in March has pushed unemployment to a 25-year-high of 8.5%, the Labor Department said today. Total job losses for the 16-month recession have now passed 5 million. Nonfarm payrolls fell 663,000 in March, which mostly matched analyst estimates, the Wall Street Journal reports. But January’s losses were revised upward to 741,000, making it the third-worst month ever recorded. Job losses were spread across all industries, the department said, but they were especially steep in manufacturing, construction, and temporary help services. The unemployment rate, which is determined by surveying households rather than companies, climbed to its highest level since 1983. |
26 Crazy Expensive Celeb Weddings | (Aug 4, 2013 11:16 AM CDT) Madonna's $1.5 million wedding to Guy Ritchie seems expensive ... until you compare it to Michael Jordan's recent nuptials, which cost $10 million. Those are just two examples of the 26 crazy expensive celebrity weddings Radar rounded up. Click through the gallery for a sampling, or check out Radar for the complete list, including one couple who had a six-tier carrot cake as their wedding cake. |
106 Indicted in Waco Biker Bloodbath | (Nov 11, 2015 5:51 AM) A grand jury in McLennan County, Texas, was asked to consider charges against 106 bikers arrested after the shootout in Waco that killed nine people in May—and it returned with 106 indictments. The busloads of bikers are charged with engaging in organized criminal activity, but there are no specific charges of murder or assault relating to individuals involved in the bloodbath in and around a Twin Peaks restaurant on May 17, the Houston Chronicle reports. The identical indictments accuse defendants of killing or injuring victims with a firearm and/or a knife or a sharp object and/or a club and/or an asp and/or a whip and/or brass knuckles and/or a chain, reports the Waco Tribune-Herald, which has a list of the indicted bikers, complete with mugshots. The Tribune-Herald reports that the grand jury will meet again later this month to consider indictments against another 80 bikers. The shootout is believed to have stemmed from a feud between the Bandidos and the Cossacks, though it isn't clear how many of those killed and injured were shot by police. Attorney Jay Norton tells the AP that six of his clients were indicted on Tuesday despite what seems to be a serious lack of evidence. This is amazing and truly scary, he says. We do not understand what the district attorney's office is doing, but it's not about reality. The AP notes that the last person arrested in connection with the shootout got out of jail last week on $50,000 bond. (Leaked surveillance video shows chaos at the scene.) |
Cops: 'Jealous' Cousin Killed NYC Mom, 4 Kids | (Oct 28, 2013 2:08 AM CDT) A drifter from China who had been struggling with life in America hacked his cousin's wife and four children to death out of jealousy, a police source tells the New York Daily News. Family members say Ming Dong Chen, who came to the US in 2004, had been unable to hold down a job and had been moving around the US for years, staying with the Brooklyn family on and off. He's crazy, a cousin of the murdered woman says. He came here illegally from China. He was living with them. He's not stable. Chen, 25, was arrested at the cousin's Brooklyn home after the wife called relatives to say he had been acting strangely. They arrived at the home to find Chen covered in blood. Inside, police found the bodies of Qiao Zhen Li, 37, and her children Linda, 9; Amy, 7; Kevin, 5; and William, 1. After his arrest, he made statements implicating himself, the police source says. He said other people are doing better than him. He was pretty much upset that his lot in life wasn't that great. |
Ohio's 'Senator No' Metzenbaum Dead at 90 | (Mar 13, 2008 3:20 AM CDT) Former Ohio senator Howard Metzenbaum has died at home at the age of 90, reports the Cleveland Plain Dealer. The Democrat, his views shaped by the Great Depression and FDR's policies, fought hard for the rights of workers during a political career that began in 1943. Colleagues nicknamed the self-made millionaire Senator No after he used his mastery of Senate rules to block special interest bills and save taxpayers billions. His tough stance against pork-barrel politics won the proudly liberal and often curmudgeonly Metzenbaum plenty of foes, but he gained their grudging respect as well. The Senate needs someone like Howard Metzenbaum—but only one, a Republican colleague once said. Metzenbaum, who stayed active fighting for consumer rights into his 80s, leaves behind a wife and four daughters. |
10th Suicide Strikes Apple Plant | (May 27, 2010 6:42 AM CDT) On the same day that Apple, Dell, and Hewlett-Packard promised to look into working conditions at China's Foxconn plant, a 10th worker committed suicide, PC World reports. The death of the 19-year-old male worker also came just after the company's billionaire founder took the media on a tour of the sprawling complex in response to accusations from labor groups that workers toiled in sweatshop-like conditions. The company has brought psychiatrists and Buddhists monks to the factory complex to support workers, and now plays soothing music along production lines, adds the Independent. It plans to install 10-foot-tall fences to stop workers jumping from buildings and may give workers a 20% pay rise, though a Foxconn rep maintains the increase would not be a response to the suicides, but is being considered because business has been good. |
2008 All Over Again: Obama to Base Campaign in Chicago | (Dec 28, 2010 7:51 AM) President Obama’s reelection campaign will likely be based in Chicago, not Washington—a rare move for a sitting president, and one that his advisers hope will help him rekindle the energy of 2008, Politico notes. Usually, campaigns are kept close to the president’s DC home, where they’re easily accessible, said a Democratic consultant: In modern presidential history, this is kind of revolutionary. For people who have been in the White House the past two years, it's probably a good idea to get outside the presidential bubble, the consultant added. It could also help prevent leaks, since staffers won’t be mixing with reporters so much. The tough part will be keeping the White House and the campaign staff in sync, said a former Carter administration official: A campaign is a full-time job and running a White House is a full-time job, and the people have to be compatible with each other because events mainly determine reelection. |
Keep Smoking, and There's a 67% Chance It'll Kill You | (Feb 24, 2015 1:24 PM) In case you weren't convinced of the dangers of smoking, a new study offers a stark figure: Up to two-thirds of those who continue smoking will die as a result, researchers say in a press release. The Australian study was a big one, based on assessments of the health of 200,000 people over four years; the men and women are part of the southern hemisphere's biggest longitudinal study on aging, the release notes. We found that smokers have around threefold the risk of premature death of those who have never smoked, says researcher Emily Banks. We also found smokers will die an estimated 10 years earlier than non-smokers. That was true for both men and women, Banks says, as the Sydney Morning Herald reports. The two-thirds figure supports similar results from the UK and US. The average smoker in the study kept up the habit for 38.5 years, and the majority smoked at least 15 cigarettes daily. That's particularly worrying given that mortality rates were about twice as high in those smoking around 10 cigarettes per day. A pack a day means death rates fourfold or fivefold what a nonsmoker experiences, the study finds. Our findings are an important reminder that the war on tobacco is not yet won, and tobacco control efforts must go on, Banks notes. Looking on the bright side, the study shows it's never too late to quit, no matter what your age or how much you smoke, says another expert, as HealthDay News reports. (Another recent study finds that smoking kills more people than we thought.) |
1873 Dime Sells for $1.6M | (Aug 10, 2012 6:14 PM CDT) A one-of-a-kind dime minted in 1873 sold for $1.6 million at a Philadelphia auction last night, reports AP. The coin depicts a seated Lady Liberty, and it is thought to be the lone survivor from a one-day minting of dimes at the renowned (in coin circles, anyway) mint in Carson City, Nevada. Another 110 coins also went up for auction, one of each coin minted in Carson City before its facility closed in 1893. Total haul: $10 million. Total face value of the coins: About $600, according to USA Today, which has more explanation on why collectors were so bowled over. |
Florida Politician's Deal: 1 Book, 1 Copy, $152K | (Mar 1, 2011 1:46 PM) Florida Democrats are having fun with an AP story noting that the Republican president of the state senate got the princely sum of $152,000 to write a book on politics for Brevard Community College. The kicker is that only one copy of Florida Legislative History and Processes exists—at the college's administration office. The AP also dug up emails suggesting a sweetheart deal: college administrators thought it would be wise to keep the well-connected senator, Mark Haridopolos, in its good graces. Haridopolos tells the Tampa Bay Times that his book is worthwhile and that it's easy to pull excerpts of any work to make it sound silly. (One widely commented upon snippet from his book advises that a cell phone will be essential for office-seekers.) I think as you read the whole book, you can see what it’s like to run for office and to be in office, he says. That’s the goal of the book, and to give some context to what committee chairman do, the process, and the political history of Florida. |
Redoubt Spews Ash 50K Feet High | (Mar 28, 2009 6:28 PM CDT) Alaska's Mount Redoubt has erupted again, spewing an ash cloud 50,000 feet up into the air. The Alaska Volcano Observatory in Anchorage says the volcano had a significant eruption after midnight today, and coughed up ash that is expected to move north toward the Alaska Range, missing Anchorage, which is about 100 miles from the volcano. The observatory says after the eruption, it detected strong seismic activity lasting 20 minutes or more followed by an hours-long low-level tremor. Since a series of eruptions began last weekend, the volcano has had about a dozen bursts. The last time the volcano erupted was during a four-month period in 1989-90. |
3 Dead After Plane Slams Into Maryland Home | (Dec 8, 2014 12:42 PM) A twin-engine Embraer jet that the FAA describes as on approach to Runway 14 at the Montgomery County Airpark in Gaithersburg, Maryland, crashed into a home this morning, engulfing that home in flames and setting two others on fire. Three people are dead, but the count could grow. A Montgomery County Fire rep says three fliers were killed in the crash, but notes the corporate plane may have had a fourth person on board, reports the AP. A relative of the owner of the home that was hit tells WUSA 9 that a mother with three children pre-school age and under should have been home at the time; there's no word on the family's whereabouts. The crash occurred around 11am on Drop Forge Lane, and the fire was extinguished within an hour. Crews are now searching the wreckage. A witness noted the plane appeared to wobble before the crash; the airport is no more than 3/4 mile from the crash scene. NTSB and FAA will investigate. |
US Has Delivered Zero on $1B Aid Pledged to Haiti | (Jul 15, 2010 7:46 AM CDT) Remember all that money the nations of the world generously pledged to help with Haiti’s earthquake relief efforts? It hasn’t materialized, CNN reports. Less than 2% of the $5.3 billion promised at an aid conference in March has actually been delivered to the UN, with only Brazil, Norway, Estonia, and Australia ponying up the cash. The US hasn’t given a dime of the $1.15 billion it pledged—Congress still hasn’t approved the money. Bill Clinton, the UN’s special envoy to Haiti, says he intends to pester nations that haven’t paid. I’m going to call all those governments, he said. I think they’re all having economic trouble, and they want to hold their money as long as possible. The pledges were for the 2010-11 fiscal year, so countries have a while before the money is actually overdue, but Clinton wants them to give him a hard schedule of when to expect it. |