‘Pro wrestler Chris Benoit suffered brain damage from his years in the ring that could help explain why he killed his wife, son and himself, a doctor who studied Benoit’s brain said Wednesday.
The analysis by doctors affiliated with the Sports Legacy Institute suggests repeated concussions could have contributed to the killings at Benoit’s suburban Atlanta home. [..]
The level of brain damage Benoit had can cause depression and irrational behavior, Cantu said.
Benoit’s brain showed the same degenerative processes that doctors working for the institute found in the brains of three men who had played pro football and committed suicide, Cantu said. There were abnormal protein deposits caused by trauma to Benoit’s brain, Cantu said.
There’s no evidence that steroid use causes such protein deposits, Cantu said, though he noted the issue has not been exhaustively studied.’
Followup to Benoit wrestle hold killed son.
‘A 10-year-old boy who died after contracting amoebic encephalitis while swimming in a Central Florida lake is the second reported case in the area since August.
The Orange County Health Department did not identify the child or the lake where he contracted the amoeba.
However, the owner of the Orlando Water Sports Complex said he was contacted by the Orange County Health Department and told to post signs warning of the deadly amoeba. The victim was believed to have visited the popular park.
“It now has happened twice in Central Florida this year,” a health official said. “And therefore, we need to ramp up the precautions for using nose plugs and taking all precautions when swimming in the lakes and doing water sports.”‘
Followup to Apparent Amoeba-Related Death Prompts Central Fla. Water Warning.
‘He survived landmines and the best efforts of the Taliban’s bomb makers – but could not dodge an accident at the hands of his own side.
Today it emerged that an Australian army explosive detection dog, Merlin ,has been killed while on active service in Afghanistan.
The Australian Defence Force said today the dog died when accidentally run over by an Australian Light Armoured Vehicle (ASLAV) at the Australian Reconstruction Task Force (RTF) base at Tarin Kowt earlier this month.
Merlin had been lying in the shade of the ASLAV when the vehicle drove off, inadvertently running the dog over.’
‘A Wyoming teenager is dead after being caught in machinery at a car wash. Ricardo Martinez, 18, was an employee at the “Goo Goo 3-minute Car Wash” on 28th street.
Martinez was cleaning the brushes, preparing to close for the night, when he let one more customer go through Friday night. Somehow he got tangled in hoses, crushed in the machinery, and was found by another customer who saw the lights on, and came in for a car wash.
Police aren’t discussing the graphic details of how it happened, but they’re sure it was a terrible accident, because it was captured on tape from a security camera.
Lt. Scott Gardner, with the Wyoming Police Department said, “Had it not been for the video there would certainly have been a lot more questions about how this actually happened because it’s so different and unusual.”‘
‘ A mother wept in court yesterday as she told a judge how she wakes each day to the horrific reality that her mentally handicapped daughter was tortured to death with a blowtorch.
“You have left horrible images in my mind,” Deborah Laramey said in a hushed courtroom as she looked at the man convicted of killing her daughter, Katlin Cousineau, on Nov. 12, 2005.
Sitting in the prisoner’s box, Matthew Sitte, 25, of Midland, darted his eyes away from the mother as he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. [..]
Throughout the torture, Sitte would throw rubbing alcohol onto her body.
“The torching was persistent and prolonged,” said Williams. “It is horrific.”‘
‘The two planes careered into each other in mid air with devastating consequences – the aicrcraft were completely blown apart by the force of the collsion.
Debris was blasted across the sky as smoke billowed from the cockpits.
Spectators at the airshow, 60 miles from Warsaw, were horrified as they looked up and saw the killer smash.
It is understood that both pilots died in the collision.’
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‘The man who threw a rock over a cliff that hit and killed a Wyoming climber expressed guilt and remorse in his first public comments since the Aug. 11 incident.
Luke Rodolph, a 23-year-old Iraq war veteran from Casper, said that he has spent a lot of time praying and reading the Bible and that he accepts responsibility for what happened and won’t try to justify his actions.
“I’d do anything to change it,” Rodolph said Tuesday with tears in his eyes.
Peter Absolon, 47, of Lander, was killed instantly when he was struck in the head by the rock, which was about the size of a bowling ball, while climbing a new route up the cliff face of Leg Lake Cirque in the Wind River Mountains near Lander.’
‘Authorities in North Korea are intensifying a crackdown on imports of South Korean popular culture, especially television dramas, but the South’s “Korean Wave” may already have taken a strong hold in the isolated Stalinist state.
South Korean music, soap operas, and movies have already taken the rest of East Asia by storm, and, according to North Koreans now living in the South, the South’s arch-rival North Korea is no exception. [..]
“There have been two or three reports of public executions of North Korean young people in major cities including Chungjin, as punishment for having illegally copied and distributed South Korean visual material,” said Kang Chul Hwan, vice-chairman of the Seoul-based Committee for the Democratization of North Korea.
“It is not an overstatement to say that the Kim Jong Il regime is waging war on the South Korean TV drama,” he said, adding that the North Korean authorities have intensified surveillance and searches to prevent South Korean videos from entering North Korea.’
‘Like a novel written in the first-person voice of an unreliable narrator, If I Did It is not meant—by the publisher, anyway—to be taken at face value. It’s the self-portrait of a wife-abuser who somehow worked himself up into thinking he was a victim. To take O.J. Simpson at his word when he writes that “Nicole was on the fast track to hell, and she was determined to take me and the kids with her,” is like taking Humbert Humbert at his word when he describes as a romantic idyll his molestation of 12-year-old Dolores Haze. As Simpson relates the tale of how his wife gradually lost control and evolved into a menace, clues drop here and there that it is really Simpson himself who was losing control.’
‘SOME AIDS victims were being buried alive in Papua New Guinea by relatives who could look after them and fear becoming infected themselves, a health worker said today.
Margaret Marabe, who spent five months carrying out an AIDS awareness campaign in the remote Southern Highlands of the South Pacific nation, said she had seen five people buried alive.
One was calling out “Mama, Mama” as the soil was shovelled over his head, said Ms Marabe, who works for a volunteer organisation called Igat Hope, Pidgin English for I’ve Got Hope. [..]
“I said, ‘Why are they doing that?’ And they said, ‘If we let them live, stay in the same house, eat together and use or share utensils, we will contract the disease and we too might die’.”’
‘Three boarding school students are accused of strangling two small boys in the hope that classes would be suspended after the deaths, police said Saturday.
The three students, ages 12 and 13, confessed to strangling an 8-year-old boy and his 5-year-old brother so that their school would close down, said S. Sethi, a police officer in the Jalna district, about 200 miles east of Mumbai.
“When questioned, the boys said they knew this school gave a holiday when a child had died last year and thought they could get another holiday this year,” Sethi said.’
‘A Burning Man participant was found dead this morning, hanging from the inside of a two-story high tent, according to Mark Pirtle, special agent in charge for the Bureau of Land Management.
The apparent suicide would be the festival’s first in its 21 year history, Pirtle said.
Pershing County coroners are investigating the scene and preparing to remove the body. Pirtle said the man was hanging for two hours before anyone in the large tent thought to bring him down. “His friends thought he was doing an art piece,” Pirtle said.’
‘Actor Owen Wilson was taken to a hospital in Santa Monica, Calif., Sunday, reportedly after attempting suicide.
Wilson was transported to St. John’s Hospital. Citing sources, The National Enquirer and Star magazine said the star of “Wedding Crashers” and “Starsky & Hutch” had cut his left wrist and taken an undetermined amount of pills.
He was found by a family member who called for help.
Santa Monica police confirmed only that the actor had been taken to a hospital, TMZ.com reported.’
‘A man who shows snakes and other reptiles at schools, festivals and libraries says a boy who told the man he hated snakes stomped and killed the man’s 10-foot-long python.
Scott Braunstein said he was showing Popcorn, a nonpoisonous albino Burmese python, Sunday at the St. Bernadette Festival near Cincinnati.
“The next thing I know … the kid raises his leg and stomps down on the snake’s head,” Braunstein said. “The snake started convulsing.”
Braunstein said he saw a man grab the child and say, “This is why I don’t take you anywhere,” before disappearing.’
‘Unscrupulous vendors in Thailand have been selling the flesh of the deadly puffer fish disguised as salmon, causing the deaths of more than 15 people over the past three years, a doctor said today.
Although banned since 2002, puffer fish continue to be sold in large quantities at local markets and restaurants, said Narin Hiransuthikul of Bangkok’s Chulalonkorn University Hospital.
“Some sellers dye the meat of puffer fish and make it look like salmon, which is very dangerous,” Dr Narin said.
Dr Narin said that over the past three years, more than 15 people have died and about 115 were hospitalised from eating the fish.’
‘Taliban fanatics terrorised the wife of an RAF officer by phoning her and saying: “You’ll never see your husband alive — we have just killed him.”
Rebels in Afghanistan are targeting British forces’ families with hate calls after tapping into Our Boys’ mobile phones.
The tearful wife rang the RAF fearing the worst after receiving the midnight call — and was told her husband was safe and well.
But the Taliban calls are a sick new plot to destroy morale, and British forces in Afghanistan have now been BANNED from using mobiles.
Army chiefs believe extremists are using sophisticated eavesdropping equipment to trace home numbers when forces call their loved ones in Britain.’
‘As a hot-air balloon burst into flames and plummeted into an RV park, killing two people, a horrific scene of chaos and a raging inferno ensued, witnesses said.
“I saw the balloon coming down on the front of the trailer and when it hit, it exploded,” said Karen Ashby.
“There were flames and fire, people running. Everybody was in a panic. It was a shock. It was like a war zone here.”
Family members of the two victims were among those who stood powerless on the ground Friday evening, watching as the flaming balloon crashed directly into a trailer.’
‘A lightweight enemy could have helped speed up rusting on the collapsed Minneapolis bridge: pigeons.
Experts say corrosive pigeon droppings caked on the bridge could have made steel beams rust faster. Investigators still haven’t pinpointed what caused the collapse, and haven’t said whether the birds had a part in the disaster that killed at least 13 people.
But inspectors in a late 1980s report noted a “coating of pigeon dung” on the bridge. Pigeons have long been a structural pest, because their dung can eat through concrete.’
Followup to Divers suspend Minneapolis search.
‘A 23-year old Serb was found dead and half-eaten in the bear cage of Belgrade Zoo at the weekend during the annual beer festival.
The man was found naked, with his clothes lying intact inside the cage. Two adult bears, Masha and Misha, had dragged the body to their feeding corner and reacted angrily when keepers tried to recover it.
“There’s a good chance he was drunk or drugged. Only an idiot would jump into the bear cage,” zoo director Vuk Bojovic told Reuters.’
‘A man threw his seriously ill wife four stories to her death because he could no longer afford to pay for her medical care, prosecutors said in charging him with second-degree murder.
According to court documents filed Wednesday in Jackson County Circuit Court, Stanley Reimer walked his wife to the balcony of their apartment and kissed her before throwing her over. [..]
In the probable cause statement filed with the charges, police said Reimer was desperate because he could not pay the bills for his wife’s treatment for neurological problems and uterine cancer.
‘She Didn’t Jump’ Investigators said that Reimer was in the apartment when they arrived. He told them, “She didn’t jump,” but did not elaborate.’
‘The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday issued a public health advisory warning that breastfeeding mothers’ taking codeine could in rare cases kill their babies due to an overdose of morphine released to the breast milk.
The risk is associated with morphine, a metabolite of codeine. Some women who can rapidly metabolize codeine and release high levels of it into their breast milk, which could poison their babies.
The FDA advisory was issued after the federal agency noticed a fatal case of codeine-derived morphine poisoning in a 13-day old breastfed baby, which was reported last year in the August 2006 issue of Lancet, a British medical journal.’
‘An Australian woman was killed by a pet camel given to her as a 60th birthday present after the animal apparently tried to have sex, police said Sunday.
The woman, whose name was not released, was killed Saturday at her family’s sheep and cattle ranch near Mitchell, 600 kilometers (350 miles) west of the Queensland state capital Brisbane, state police Detective Senior Constable Craig Gregory said.
The 10-month-old male camel — weighing about 150 kilograms (330 pounds) — knocked the woman to the ground, lay on top of her, then exhibited what police suspect was mating behavior, Gregory said.’
‘About 40 percent of deaths worldwide are caused by water, air and soil pollution, concludes a Cornell researcher. Such environmental degradation, coupled with the growth in world population, are major causes behind the rapid increase in human diseases, which the World Health Organization has recently reported. Both factors contribute to the malnourishment and disease susceptibility of 3.7 billion people, he says. [..]
“We have serious environmental resource problems of water, land and energy, and these are now coming to bear on food production, malnutrition and the incidence of diseases,” said Pimentel.’
‘The legend was almost too good to be true.
For decades, a mysterious figure dressed in black, his features cloaked by a wide-brimmed hat and scarf, crept into a churchyard to lay three roses and a bottle of cognac at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe.
Now, a 92-year-old man who led the fight to preserve the historic site says the visitor was his creation.
“We did it, myself and my tour guides,” said Sam Porpora. “It was a promotional idea. We made it up, never dreaming it would go worldwide.”‘
‘A 12-year-old Indian girl was beaten and then hanged by her mother for demanding she be sent to school, the Hindustan Times newspaper reported today.
The girl was beaten unconscious with a rolling pin by her mother in a village in Jodhpur district in the western desert state of Rajasthan this month.
“The mother thought she had killed the girl and, in panic, decided to make it appear like a suicide,” a police officer was quoted as saying.
“She allegedly tied a rope around the girl’s neck and hung her from the ceiling.”
The woman has been arrested.
The girl’s father, a labourer, said he and his wife could not afford a bicycle to send their daughter to school a few miles away.’
‘The blood that stained the courtyard of the modest Thousand Oaks apartment complex had been washed away by Monday morning. In its place stood a makeshift memorial: A teddy bear and a few balloons. A Winnie-the-Pooh baby blanket. And a single rose for every year the young victim had lived.
Sev’n Molina, age 6, was hacked to death with a meat cleaver Sunday night, as his mother fought to save his life, terrified neighbors called 911 and the bravest among them tried to intervene in the grisly struggle. [..]
After the boy burst from the apartment into the communal courtyard, witnesses said, Sharp followed him, wielding the cleaver, and began hacking at the child’s head and shouting, “Die, die!”‘
‘The head of a Chinese toy manufacturing company whose products were the target of a massive recall in the U.S. because they contained lead-tainted paint has committed suicide.
Zhang Shuhong, who ran the Lee Der Industrial Co. Ltd., was found hanged in his warehouse Monday morning.
His death comes days after the Chinese government announced a temporary ban on exports by the company.
Earlier this month, Mattel subsidiary Fisher-Price said it was recalling 967,000 toys — including the popular Big Bird, Elmo, Dora and Diego characters — because their paint contained excessive amounts of lead. The Fisher-Price recall involved 83 types of plastic preschool toys made by the Chinese vendor and sold in the United States between May and August.’
‘Three hundred chickens died in panic early on Sunday when a drunken German teenager on a joyride crashed a van into their shed, police said.
“Apparently some of the chickens were so desperate to get away that they ran into the wall and died,” the spokesman said. “Others suffered heart attacks.”‘
‘A grandmother taking a leisurely swim in a Swedish river ended up in the hospital after a beaver attacked her with its tail, regional newspaper Nerikes Allehanda reported Wednesday.
Police sources said it was the second time a beaver had attacked humans at the beach on the banks of the Bottenaa River, around 150 kilometres (93 miles) west of Stockholm, the newspaper reported.
“The beaver attacked the grandmother. She was seriously hit by the animal’s tail and received a number of bites and scratches,” an officer told the newspaper.
The authorities have decided to kill the dozen or so beavers living near the beach to eliminate any further risk to local bathers.’
All sorts of stats about the world population.
