BRAZIL
Victim, killer roommates
A woman hospitalized in a Sao Paulo suburb with gunshot wounds inflicted by a man who killed her daughter and husband woke up to find herself next to her assailant. “This is soap opera material,” the news Web site G1 quoted police inspector Luiz Roberto Bilo in the town of Mogi das Cruzes as saying. The murder was recorded by security cameras aboard a bus. Outside the vehicle, security guard Jose Cosme Barros was gunned down. His wife and their five-year-old daughter tried to escape by getting aboard, but were also hit by the shooter. Barros and his daughter were fatally shot, while the wife, 28-year-old Naircleide Duarte, was rushed to a local hospital in serious condition. A few hours later, the assailant, identified as 27-year-old Lucas Ribeiro do Nascimento, was shot during a brawl outside a nightclub and ended up hospitalized in the same facility and room as Duarte.
UNITED STATES
Heroin dealer appeals term
The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to pay legal fees for a drug dealer appealing his doubled jail term, imposed for selling heroin to a man who died of an overdose. Listening to arguments, the top court’s nine justices debated whether the heroin that Marcus Burrage sold was the cause of death for Joshua Banka, who took it with a cocktail of other drugs. A 1986 federal law imposes heavier penalties for drug traffickers and dealers if the person who uses the drugs dies. Burrage, who is serving two concurrent 20-year sentences in the Midwestern state of Iowa, is appealing the second conviction, for distributing heroin causing death. His lawyer, Angela Campbell, argued the dose of heroin was “not the primary cause of death” for Banka, and she asked for the second sentence to be overturned.
UNITED STATES
Pirates’ hostages released
The Department of State on Tuesday announced the release of two Americans kidnapped by pirates off southern Nigeria last month. “We welcome the release of the two US citizens who were kidnapped from the Retriever,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said. Pirates stormed an oil supply vessel off southern Nigeria and kidnapped two US crew members.
UNITED STATES
Hawaii gay union bill passed
The state Senate passed a bill on Tuesday legalizing gay marriage, putting Hawaii a signature away from becoming a same-sex wedding destination. Hawaiian Governor Neil Abercrombie, who called lawmakers to a special session for the bill and has vocally supported gay marriage, said in a statement he would sign the measure in a special ceremony yesterday. It will allow thousands of gay couples living in Hawaii and even more tourists to marry in the state starting on Dec. 2.
UNITED STATES
Bacon work fetches record
Francis Bacon’s painting Three Studies of Lucian Freud became the most expensive work of art ever sold when it fetched US$142.4 million in one of the biggest auctions in history, at which Christie’s sold more than US$691 million worth of art. Bacon’s 1969 triptych, never before offered at auction and which carried a pre-sale estimate of about US$85 million, easily eclipsed the US$119.9 million price of Edvard Munch’s The Scream, achieved in May last year at Sotheby’s. The auction of 69 works of post-war and contemporary art took in almost US$691.6 million including commission, far above the estimated US$480 million to US$670 million.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of