`Two people have been killed and 13 injured after a giant, inflatable sculpture blew free from its moorings.
Many were inside the artwork, which consists of connected rooms, when it lifted 30ft into the air at Riverside Park, Chester-le-Street, County Durham. [..]
The sculpture – called Dreamspace – is thought to have drifted for up to 40m before catching on a CCTV camera post and coming down near a children’s playground.
About 500 people were in the vicinity of the sculpture, which is half the size of a football pitch, when it came loose.’
`A man who is legally blind accidentally shot and killed his wife while trying to balance a plate of fried chicken and a pistol, authorities said.
Kelly Honeycutt, of Morganton, was moving into a new home with his wife, Norita, on Monday night.
Honeycutt, who found the .38-caliber pistol in a box, shot his wife in the head after she handed him the food, Burke County Sheriff’s Sgt. Robert Beall said.’
`A doctor and two nurses who worked through the chaos that followed Hurricane Katrina were arrested overnight Monday on suspicion of murder, accused of giving four patients stranded at their flooded hospital lethal doses of morphine and a sedative.
“This is not euthanasia. This is homicide,” Louisiana Attorney General Charles C. Foti said. [..]
The arrest warrants said Pou and the two nurses intentionally killed four patients “by administering or causing to be administered lethal doses of morphine sulphate (morphine) and midazolam (Versed).”‘
‘New South Wales Labor MP Peter Breen has penned a sickening tribute to the killers of Janine Balding in which he talks about his realisation one night “under the stars” that he loved two of them. [..]
He declares the oldest of the three killers – “Shorty” Jamieson – to be innocent of the murder. Mr Breen calls “blue-eyed” Jamieson by his nickname Jamo. He bought him a television for his cell.
“Jamieson is gazing out the high-barred window behind me, his eyes reflecting blue sky,” Breen describes one jail meeting in his bizarre paperback, researched mainly in parliamentary time.
“I love Shorty Jamieson and I’m not afraid to say so.”‘
Update: Killer love remarks: MP resigns
‘A NSW upper house state MP who said he loved two of the killers of Janine Balding has resigned from the Labor Party, Premier Morris Iemma says.’
`Syd Barrett, the troubled Pink Floyd co-founder who spent his last years in reclusive anonymity, has died, the band said Tuesday. He was 60.
A spokeswoman for the band said Barrett died several days ago, but she did not disclose the cause of death. [..]
He reverted to his real name, Roger Barrett, and spent much of the rest of his life living quietly in his hometown of Cambridge, England. Moving into his mother’s suburban house, he passed the time painting and tending the garden. His former bandmates made sure Barrett continued to receive royalties from his work with Pink Floyd.’
`A dog that was removed from an assisted-living home after it was found licking flesh off an elderly woman’s arm has been found suitable for adoption. [..]
Ninety-one-year-old Nina Borseth, died May 24, four days after Cosita caused the wounds that a Pima County Medical Examiner’s report said contributed to her death.
Borseth’s death was mainly due to Alzheimer’s disease. [..]
Investigators say Cosita was likely licking Borseth’s arm as a way of being sociable.’
`The Manhattan building collapse that injured 11 people, including 5 firefighters, and snarled New York City’s morning rush hour was linked to a man’s attempt to commit suicide, police officials said to ABC News.
Nicholas Bartha blew up his Manhattan townhouse today as part of a suicide attempt that he had engineered in order to also prevent his estranged wife from obtaining the proceeds from the sale of the multimillion-dollar building.’
`A policeman stabbed his son through the heart while demonstrating a tribal killing, an inquest heard today.
Conor Johnson, 11, of Littlehampton, West Sussex, died from a single thrust of the knife by his father, Pc Ian Johnson.
[..] “He was describing some sort of tribal killing that occurred to someone. He was holding a knife to him. He said his son didn’t like it and his son slipped forward on to the knife.”‘
`The U.S. Army will investigate charges that American soldiers were involved in the killings of four Iraqi relatives, including a woman who had been raped, military officials said Friday. It’s the sixth current inquiry into the alleged slayings of Iraqi civilians by American troops.
Some of the five soldiers also allegedly burned the body of the woman they are accused of assaulting in the March incident, a U.S. military official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.’
`A young Johns Hopkins University graduate smashed through a double-pane window early yesterday and plunged to his death from a millionaire family’s posh midtown apartment after night of partying, police and relatives said.
Just before hurtling out the eighth-floor window, Seth Pitman, 23, told friends he “wanted to enter the afterlife” and knew he could “fly,” police sources and pals said.
“He was talking to himself, he was praying, he was uncontrollable, I didn’t recognize him,” his girlfriend Elektra Carras said. [..]
Falling six stories, he slammed against an air conditioning unit before landing on a second-floor scaffolding, where he was found dead about 1 a.m.’
`On April 8, 2005, Buckalew went to a cemetery on the Washington highway in Morrisville and broke into an above-ground tomb, opened the lid of a casket and cut off the head of a corpse. He wrapped the head in plastic bags and took it home. He also stole eyeglasses and a bow tie from the corpse.
Buckalew told witnesses he intended to leave the severed head out and would then bleach it, according to the affidavit of Senior Patrolman Ryan Bjerke of the Morristown Police Department. He told witnesses he intended to turn the skull into a bong, which is a type of pipe used to smoke marijuana or other drugs.’
`A man who committed suicide at a party also killed a 16-year-old girl when the bullet traveled through his head and struck her in the chest, authorities said.
Jacob R. Lee, 19, and Lorena Mocko, 16, were found shot to death at around 1 a.m. Saturday, Lincoln County authorities said.’
`A man made a mockery of the justice system when he tried to get removed from a jury pool in a death penalty case by claiming he is a heroin addict and a killer, a judge said.
Benjamin Ratliffe, 21, of Columbus, was charged with contempt of court and obstruction of justice and ordered to spend a night jail.
Ratliffe filled out a questionnaire form for potential jurors and professed to having a “bad jonesin’ for heroin.” When asked if he had ever fired a weapon, he wrote, “Yes. I killed someone with it, of course. Right.”‘
`An Indonesian who died after catching the A(H5N1) bird flu virus from his 10-year-old son represents the first confirmed case of human-to-human transmission of the disease, a World Health Organization investigation of an unusual family cluster has concluded, the agency said Friday.
The W.H.O. investigators also discovered that the virus had mutated slightly when the son had the disease, although not in any way that would allow the virus to pass more readily among people.’
`A man trying to hang himself from the Adams Avenue Bridge fell and died early today, and a bicyclist who later hit the body was injured, police reported. [..]
“The rope broke and he fell” to the riverbed about 30 feet below, Ginther said.
The man then slit his wrists, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department reported, and the bicyclist later hit the body and fell off the bike.’
`German police have arrested a man on suspicion of murdering a woman with a sausage.
Prosecutors and police said the 50-year-old was arrested after the woman’s body was discovered in an apartment in Zwickau, eastern Germany. They said she had choked on a Bockwurst, a popular large German sausage.
The prosecutors said the man had given a patchy account of events, acknowledging that he may have “administered” a Bockwurst to the woman.’
`A Missouri woman has been arrested for breaking into a dog breeder’s home and beating her repeatedly over the head with a dead Chihuahua, local media reported.
She woman was upset because the puppy had died, police told the St Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper.’
`Two men from Saudi Arabia and one from Yemen were found dead shortly after midnight today in separate cells, said the Miami-based US Southern Command, which has jurisdiction over the prison. Attempts were made to revive them, but they failed.
“They hung themselves with fabricated nooses made out of clothes and bed sheets,” base commander Navy Rear Adm. Harry Harris told reporters in a conference call from the US base in southeastern Cuba.
“They have no regard for human life,” he said. “Neither ours nor their own. I believe this was not an act of desperation but an act of asymmetric warfare against us.”‘
Also Guantanamo suicides a ‘PR move’:
`A top US official has described the suicides of three detainees at the US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as a “good PR move to draw attention”.’
`A former funeral home worker who pleaded no contest to hiding a baby’s body in the pants of a man’s corpse slated for cremation – apparently to avoid paying an extra $50 fee – faces the permanent loss of her funeral director’s license.
The Texas Funeral Service Commission voted unanimously Tuesday to find that Stephanie Barkley engaged in unethical and unprofessional conduct.’
`There’s a time and place for everything, local Australian governments have ruled as they move to stop brothels opening near cemeteries. [..]
Ipswich Mayor Paul Pisasale told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio Tuesday that cemeteries were places for quiet reflection by families who should not have to put up with “a brothel going on next door.”
“It’s totally inappropriate. There’s a place for brothels and a place for cemeteries and we don’t believe the two mix,” he said.’
`Some high school criminology students in Fort Lauderdale got a taste of the real thing this morning.
Their teacher had set up a mock crime scene at Holiday Park for their class. The students were supposed to bag evidence, take pictures of the scene and try to solve the fake crime.
The students from St. Thomas Aquinas High School soon discovered a man’s body and began taking notes and pictures as they were taught. But at the time, they didn’t know it was a real dead person. One student even said he thought his teacher “planted it there.” Once they realized it was the real deal, they notified their teacher and the police.’
`A lion killed a man who climbed into its enclosure at the Kiev Zoo, police said Monday.
The lion attacked the 45-year-old Ukrainian late Sunday after he used a rope to climb down into an enclosure with four lions, said police spokesman Volodymyr Polishchuk.
Ukrainian TV channel NTN broadcast interviews with witnesses who said the man told them that he believed God would not allow the lions to hurt him.
According to Reuters, an official said, “The man shouted: ‘God will save me, if he exists,’ lowered himself by a rope into the enclosure, took his shoes off and went up to the lions.”‘
Also: Lioness in zoo kills man who invoked God
`”A lioness went straight for him, knocked him down and severed his carotid artery.”‘
`Two university students were found dead inside a large, deflated helium balloon after apparently pulling it down and crawling inside it, officials said.
The deaths of Jason Ackerman and Sara Rydman, both 21, appear to be accidental, Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Major Bob Schrader said.
Their bodies were found yesterday partially inside a deflated helium balloon at the entrance of a condominium complex a few kilometres north of Tampa. The 2.4-metre-diameter balloon was used to advertise the complex.’
`The BBC has uncovered new video evidence that US forces may have been responsible for the deliberate killing of 11 innocent Iraqi civilians. [..]
According to the Americans, the building collapsed under heavy fire killing four people – a suspect, two women and a child.
But a report filed by Iraqi police accused US troops of rounding up and deliberately shooting 11 people in the house, including five children and four women, before blowing up the building.’
`An 8-year-old boy was arrested after he sneaked onto a school bus and released its parking brake, causing it to roll forward and fatally strike a second-grader, police said Tuesday.
The boy was to be charged with criminally negligent homicide, Officer Doris Garcia said. Police were withholding his name because of his age, she said.’
`A Michigan woman is charged with involuntary manslaughter after prosecutors say her 5-month-old daughter died from drinking breast milk containing cocaine.
Sara Shelby was arraigned Thursday. If convicted, she faces up to 15 years in prison.
Prosecutors claim Shelby used cocaine and the drug was passed on to the baby through her breast milk.
Shelby’s lawyer said that he and his client disagree with the prosecution’s theory about what caused baby’s death last year.’
`Prisoners wielding improvised weapons clashed with guards trying to stop a detainee from committing suicide at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the military said Friday.
The fight occurred Thursday in a medium-security section of the camp as guards were responding to the fourth attempted suicide that day at the detention center on the U.S. Navy base, said Cmdr. Robert Durand.
Detainees used fans, light fixtures and other improvised weapons to attack the guards as they entered a communal living area to stop a prisoner who was trying to hang himself, Durand said.
Earlier in the day, three detainees in another part of the prison attempted suicide by swallowing prescription medicine they had been hoarding.’
`Eighty-year-old Mary Wohlford has informed family members of her wishes should she ever become incapacitated. She also has signed a living will that hangs on the side of her refrigerator.
But the retired nurse and great-grandmother now believes she has removed all potential for confusion.
She had the words “DO NOT RESUSCITATE” tattooed on her chest.
Really.
“People might think I’m crazy, but that’s OK,” Wohlford said. “Sometimes the nuttiest ideas are the most advanced.”‘
`More than 150 people have been killed in an explosion at a petrol pipeline near Nigeria’s largest city, Lagos.
Police and Red Cross officials at the scene of the blast, on Atlas Creek Island, said many of the bodies had been burnt beyond recognition.
Reports suggest the blast may have been caused by an attempt to tap illegally into the high pressure pipeline.
Almost 2,000 people have died in a number of similar incidents in the country in recent years.’
