Bloody Cricket Bat Surfaces in Pistorius Case

Police in South Africa investigating the shooting death of model Reeva Steenkamp, allegedly by boyfriend and Paralympics champion Oscar Pistorius, consider a bloody cricket bat to be a central piece of evidence, according to South Africa's City Press newspaper.

Pistorius, 26, was arrested Thursday and charged with killing Steenkamp, 29, at his home in the South African capitol of Pretoria. His family says the shooting was an accident. He is in jail awaiting a bail hearing Tuesday.

PHOTOS: Paralympic Champion Charged in Killing

The City Press reported Sunday that police are investigating different scenarios involving the bat. Among them is the possibility that the flat-fronted bat was used in a violent argument before the shooting.

The paper also reported that Pistorius might have first shot Steenkamp in the bedroom, and that she possibly fled to the bathroom where she was shot three more times through the door.

When Pistorius' family arrived at the scene before paramedics, they saw him carrying Steenkamp down the stairs and performing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on her, City Press reported.

Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images; Mike Holmes/The Herald/Gallo Images/Getty Images

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Pistorius, who is nicknamed the "blade runner" because of the carbon-fiber blades on which he runs, has canceled all his upcoming racing appearances, his agent said Sunday night.

The decision was made to "allow Oscar to concentrate on the upcoming legal proceedings and to help and support all those involved as they try to come to terms with this very difficult and distressing situation," Peet Van Zyl of In Site Athlete Management said in a statement.

Pistorius' father was quoted overnight in the South African paper The Sunday Times saying his countrymen are destroying a national icon.

"There is something fundamentally wrong with our society," Henke Pistorius said. "We build people up into heroes, who overcome immense challenges, only to take great glee in breaking them down."

Family and friends rallied to Pistorius' defense, saying they believe the Paralympic gold medalist shot the South African model by accident after he mistook her for an intruder.

"We have no doubt here that there's no substance for the allegations," uncle Arnold Pistorius said.

Pistorius' best friend, Justin Divaris, told reporters that he received a call from a distraught Pistorius just before 4 a.m. Feb. 14 in which he said there had been a terrible accident, and that he shot Steenkamp.

If convicted, Pistorius could face at least 25 years in jail.
A memorial service for Steenkamp will be held in Port Elizabeth Tuesday evening. Her body has been flown back for the service before being cremated, her family told local media.

Speaking with the media for the first time since her daughter's death in a phone interview with The Sunday Times from her home in Seaview, Port Elizabeth, June Steenkamp said,
"Why? Why my little girl? Why did this happen? Why did he do this? What for?"

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Hugh Grant uses Twitter to announce new baby

LONDON: Hugh Grant, the British actor and campaigner for tighter press regulation, has announced on Twitter that he has become a father for a second time after a newspaper obtained his new son's birth certificate.

Grant said he was "thrilled" to become a father again, reportedly with Chinese actress Tinglan Hong, but urged the press to leave his family in peace.

The 52-year-old star of "Notting Hill" was one of the most high-profile victims of phone-hacking by the former British tabloid the News of the World, and has since become a campaigner for a more responsible press.

"In answer to some journos. Am thrilled my daughter now has a brother. Adore them both to an uncool degree. They have a fab mum," Grant said in a Twitter message on Saturday evening.

He later added: "And to be crystal clear. I am the Daddy."

His announcement was in response to a story in Britain's Mail on Sunday reporting that the child, Felix Chang, was born in a west London hospital on December 29. The tabloid cited the birth certificate, issued on February 14.

Grant tweeted: "Thanks for v kind messages. Now I've confirmed (press somehow got birth certificate & were calling), hoping my family will be left in peace."

The couple's first daughter, Tabitha, was born in 2011. At the time, the actor's publicist said the couple had a "fleeting affair" and although the pregnancy was not planned, Grant "could not be happier or more supportive".

- AFP/xq

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Chopper scam: 'Middleman' Haschke 'cleaned up' documents

NEW DELHI: Alleged middleman Guido Haschke had "cleaned up" all the documents from his computer related to the VVIP chopper deal mired in allegations of kickbacks, it was revealed on Sunday, as an Indian team was set to leave for Italy tomorrow to gather evidence in the bribery case.

However, to Haschke's misfortune the documents were retrieved from his computer hard drive along with other papers he had hidden at his mother's home.

According to reports in the Italian media, the investigators termed the information found in his computer drives as a "Pandora's box" where he has noted details of his appointments, his meetings with Indian intermediaries, in Italy and Lugano and several international transactions including that of Finmeccanica.

These documents are being used by the prosecutors in the Italian court tribunale de Busto Arsizio to build their case in fixing responsibilities of several accused including former Finmeccanica chief Giuseppe Orsi for allegedly paying Rs 360 crore in kickbacks to bag the Rs 3,600 crore deal, reports in Italian daily Republica suggested.

"He thought he had deleted everything, buried every track on the big business on behalf of Finmeccanica. He had 'cleaned up' all his computer and he felt calm," the daily said quoting the Italian investigators' report.

It said the prosecutors in the court Busto Arsizio recovered the "computer hard drives of Haschke where the intermediary had recorded the whole story about the sale of helicopters and other business".

"Documents and files that are now on the table of the prosecutor of Busto Arsizio, Eugenio Fusco, who is trying to rebuild any responsibilities and roles of the protagonists of this 'affair'," it said.

The report said the "fate of Orsi is entrusted to its reading of the documents found in a suitcase that Haschke had hidden in his mother's house and found those files in his computer that he thought he had cleared and reset."

Haschke is alleged to have been appointed by former Finmeccanica CEO Giuseppe Orsi, who has been arrested, for clinching the deal for AgustaWestland in which 51 million euros were allegedly paid as kickbacks. Orsi has denied any kind of involvement in paying bribes for bagging the deal.

Indian team going to Italy

A team of CBI and defence ministry officials is leaving for Italy on Monday to verify allegations of kickbacks.

Official sources said the team comprises a CBI DIG, a law officer of the agency, a joint secretary-level officer of defence ministry and an official of the external affairs ministry.

The team's departure was delayed by a day due to some last-minute formalities which required to be fulfilled before travelling abroad for the purpose of investigation, they said, adding the team would try to meet Italian prosecutors to ascertain the details of the case.

The CBI's decision came after it virtually drew a blank from the defence ministry in getting some official inputs regarding alleged kickbacks of Rs 362 crore in the case.

The CBI also engaged a lawyer in Italy to represent India's case with the Italian government and the local courts to find out the role of Indians in the alleged kickbacks in the Rs 3,600 crore VVIP helicopter deal.

Official sources said the assistance of a lawyer was taken to help understand the Italian law and expedite getting documents from the helicopter company.

Engaging lawyer

The lawyer, if necessary, would be approaching the court in Italy for procurement of documents, they said.

The CBI was handed over a letter from the defence ministry seeking a probe by it in the case which has triggered a storm in the country. Attached with the letter were some Indian and Italian press clippings, which the CBI said, could not form the basis for registering a case.

CBI had sought help of Indian Mission in Rome which too has not been able to provide any authenticated court documents to the agency, the sources said.

This was followed by CBI seeking help of Interpol which also expressed inability to provide any help in the absence of any regular case not having been registered by the agency, they said.

The defence ministry had on Saturday sent a team led by joint secretary and an air commodore of Indian Air Force, who gave a presentation to the CBI about the tendering procedures and various stages while finalizing the helicopter deal with AgustaWestland.

However, when pressed by the CBI officials about the kickback allegations, the team could not provide any answers to the sleuths, the sources said.

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Pictures: What the Presidents Brought Home

Photograph by Bill Ray, Time Life Pictures/Getty Images

When paleontologist Paul Olsen (pictured left, in 1970 at 17 years old) first started looking for dinosaurs in 1967, he never dreamed that he'd end up the subject of White House memos between President Richard Nixon and his senior advisers.

Or that one of the dinosaur footprints he discovered would find its way into a presidential collection.

But that's exactly what happened when Olsen and his friend Tony Lessa (right) successfully lobbied for the creation of a park in 1970 near Livingston, New Jersey (map).

The future park, located in a quarry owned by Walter Kidde Precision Instruments, was a budding paleontologist's dream.

The area was covered in dinosaur footprints, such as ones made by Eubrontes gigantis (pictured), and some of them were more than 200 million years old.

"The footprints are very well preserved in that particular spot," said Olsen, now at Columbia University in New York. And the arrangement of some of them—many small footprints associated with one larger set—indicated behaviors that included parental care, he said.

It took Olsen and Lessa two and a half years to get the area designated as a park, but once they did, an Olsen family friend started writing letters to the White House to see if the boys could meet the President.

"[Presidential speechwriter] William Safire said he didn't want President Nixon to be associated with the concept of a dinosaur," said Olsen. The White House staff discussed this while dealing with the Vietnam War, going so far as to write memos on the situation, he said.

Olsen and Lessa never got their meeting with the President. But Nixon ended up sending the teenagers presidential commendations.

Olsen sent the President a cast of the E. gigantis footprint as a thank you. The cast now resides at the Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda, California.

The actual footprint fossils, stored in a shed at the park, have walked off. "No one knows what happened to them," Olsen said.

February 17, 2013

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WH Chief of Staff on Leaked Immigration Plan: Let's Make Sure It Doesn't Have to Be Proposed

Feb 17, 2013 9:06am

Responding to sharp criticism from Sen. Marco Rubio over the leaked White House immigration proposal, President Obama’s chief of staff Denis McDonough pushed back this morning on “This Week,” in an interview with ABC’s Chief White House Correspondent Jonathan Karl, saying it was up to those in Congress to ensure the president’s proposal would not be sent to Congress.

“He [Marco Rubio] says its ‘dead on arrival’ if it’s proposed. Well let’s make sure that it doesn’t have to be proposed,” McDonough said. “Let’s make sure that that group up there, the gang of eight, makes the good progress on these efforts as much as they say they want to.”

After the White House proposal was leaked, Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, who is currently part of a bipartisan group at work on legislation to overhaul the immigration system of the United States, issued a statement saying “President Obama’s leaked immigration proposal is disappointing to those of us working on a serious solution. The President’s bill repeats the failures of past legislation.” He went on to say that if it was actually proposed, it would be “dead on arrival” in Congress.

Karl asked McDonough for a response, but said he was not interested in engaging in a political “scrum” with Rubio.

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Experts urge community to help boost mental resilience in youths

SINGAPORE: Every month, about 20 youths are identified as having early signs of psychosis -- a serious mental illness that causes hallucinations and delusions.

This is according to the Community Health Assessment Team (CHAT), that conducts free mental health assessment at a youth centre.

The youths are then referred for treatment.

In conjunction with Total Defence Day commemorated this week, the centre is urging the community to help beef up the country's psychological defence by strengthening the mental resilience among youths.

Some common concerns which youths shared with counsellors at the centre are anxiety and conflict with family members and peers.

On average, the centre at SCAPE sees about 60 youths a month. About 30 per cent of them show signs of psychosis.

Around one in 50 people will experience a psychotic episode in his or her lifetime.

Dr Swapna Verma, chief of Early Psychosis Intervention Programme at Institute of Mental Health, said: "Psychosis is not that uncommon. About two or three out of every hundred young people will have a psychotic breakdown between the late teens and early twenties and because of the stigma, they don't seek help readily so having services like this would encourage them to seek help."

CHAT was set up in 2009 to address mental health issues among those aged between 16 and 30.

The Singapore Mental Health Study conducted in 2010 showed 90 per cent of mental health issues emerged before the age of 29.

Chan Lishan, 30, said: "I went through a period of sensory deprivation. I took an enormous blanket and covered the window with it, to make it really dark. And then I took ear plugs and I wore it, and refused to hear anything. I was really paranoid and afraid of people and I just hid in my room all day. I got really compulsive in a way. Obsessive over things. I would continuously write statements - the same statements over and over again."

She has written a book about schizophrenia.

In 2007, Ms Chan was about to start her research scholarship.

She had rented a room from a family, as her parents were based overseas. But when her symptoms worsened, her landlord kicked her out.

She recounted: "I got lost, and I wandered into an old folks' home and they called the police because I was trespassing. Then when they spoke to me they realised that something was strange and they decided to put me in the lockup for the night and send me to hospital for the next day.

"I lost a lot. I lost a scholarship, I was homeless. I lost a lot of friends because I quarrelled with them for no good reason. I lost my mind because I couldn't focus very well."

Ms Chan has fully recovered and now spends her time writing and giving talks on her experience.

Experts say a multi-pronged approach is needed to help solve mental health issues among youths. This includes positive support from peers, families and the community.

- CNA/xq

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Supreme Court refuses to hear Veerappan's aides' plea urgently

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Saturday refused urgent hearing on the plea of four aides of sandalwood smuggler Veerappan seeking stay of execution of their death penalty reportedly fixed for Sunday, saying there was no proof about it.

The matter was mentioned before Chief Justice of India Altamas Kabir but he did not give a hearing to it, said a staff from his office when contacted.

Senior advocate Colin Gonsalves, who had mentioned the matter at the CJI's residence, said the Chief Justice did not hear the matter this evening on the ground that there was no proof that execution will take place tomorrow.

He said the CJI told him that the matter will be taken up for hearing in due course.

Gonsalves and his associate advocate Samik Narain said they approached the apex court after getting information that the execution of death penalty will take place tomorrow.

"Now we are hoping that the execution will not take place tomorrow," they said, adding that they will again mention the matter before the court on Monday.

Veerappan's elder brother Gnanaprakash, Simon, Meesekar Madaiah and Bilavendran were awarded death sentence in 2004 in connection with a landmine blast at Palar in Karnataka in 1993 in which 22 police personnel were killed.

Their mercy petition was rejected by President Pranab Mukherjee on February 13.

The four convicts are lodged in a jail in Belgaum in Karnataka.

A TADA court in Mysore had in 2001 sentenced them to life term which was enhanced to death sentence by the apex court.

Gang leader Veerappan was killed in an encounter with the Tamil Nadu police in October 2004.

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Picture Archive: Making Mount Rushmore, 1935-1941

Photograph from Rapid City Chamber of Commerce/National Geographic

There's no such thing as Presidents' Day.

According to United States federal government code, the holiday is named Washington's Birthday, and has been since it went nationwide in 1885.

But common practice is more inclusive. The holiday expanded to add in other U.S. presidents in the 1960s, and the moniker Presidents' Day became popular in the 1980s and stuck. It may be that George Washington (b. February 22, 1732) andAbraham Lincoln (b. February 12, 1809) still get the lion's share of attention—and appear in all the retail sale ads—on the third Monday in February, but the popular idea is that all 44 presidents get feted.

Mount Rushmore is a lot like that one day a year writ large—and in granite. It's carved 60 feet (18 meters) tall and 185 feet (56 meters) wide, from Washington's right ear to Lincoln's left.

The monument's sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, grew up in Idaho, a first-generation American born to Danish parents. He studied art in France and became good friends with Auguste Rodin. Borglum mostly worked in bronze, but in the early 1910s he was hired to carve the likenesses of Confederate leaders into Stone Mountain in Georgia.

He was about to be fired from that job for creative differences about the same time that a South Dakota historian named Doane Robinson had an idea. Robinson wanted to have a monument carved into the Black Hills of South Dakota, maybe Western historical figures like Chief Red Cloud and Lewis and Clark, each on their own granite spire. (Plan a road trip in the Black Hills.)

Robinson hired Borglum and gave him carte blanche. Borglum was looking for something with national appeal, so he chose to depict four presidents: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln.

Borglum wanted to represent the first 150 years of the nation's history, choosing four presidents as symbols of their respective time periods. He took a tour of western South Dakota, searching for an ideal canvas.

The sculptor was looking for three things: a surface strong enough to sculpt, a mountain big enough to hold several figures, and a mountain face that received morning sunlight. Mount Rushmore fit the bill and was already part of a national forest, so it was easy to set aside as a national memorial.

Work started in 1927. Calvin Coolidge attended the dedication ceremony. It took 14 years to finish the carving, conducted mostly in summertime because of the area's harsh winters.

There were approximately 30 workers on the mountain at any give time. In total about 400 had worked on it by the time the monument was finished. Though the project involved thousands of pounds of dynamite and perilous climbs, not a single person died during the work.

Borglum himself died of natural causes in 1941, though, just six months before the project was declared "closed as is" by Congress that Halloween. His son Lincoln—named for his father's favorite president—took over.

In the photo above, a worker refines the details of Washington's left nostril.

About 90 percent of the mountain was carved using dynamite, which could get within 3 to 5 inches (8 to 13 centimeters) of the final facial features. For those last few inches, workers used what was known as the honeycomb method: Jackhammer workers pounded a series of three-inch-deep holes followed up by chiselers who knocked off the honeycomb pieces to get the final shape. Then carvers smoothed the "skin's" surface.

—Johnna Rizzo

February 16, 2013

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Vatican Raises Possibility of Early March Conclave

The Vatican raised the possibility Saturday that the conclave to elect the next pope might start sooner than March 15, the earliest date possible under current rules that require a 15-20 day waiting period after the papacy becomes vacant.

Vatican spokesman The Rev. Federico Lombardi said that the Vatican rules on papal succession are open to interpretation and that "this is a question that people are discussing."

"It is possible that church authorities can prepare a proposal to be taken up by the cardinals on the first day after the papal vacancy" to move up the start of conclave, Lombardi said.

He explained that the 15-20 day rule is in place to allow time for the arrival of "all those (cardinals) who are absent" to take part in the conclave in the usual circumstances of convening after a pope dies. But in this case, the cardinals already know that this pontificate will end on Feb. 28 with the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, and therefore can get to Rome in plenty of time to take part in the conclave, Lombardi said.

L'Osservatore Romano Vatican Pool/Getty Images

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The date of the conclave's start is important because Holy Week begins March 24, with Palm Sunday Mass followed by Easter Sunday on March 31. In order to have a new pope in place in time for the most solemn liturgical period on the church calendar, he would need to be installed as pope by Sunday, March 17. Given the tight time-frame, speculation has mounted that some sort of arrangement would be made to start the conclave earlier than a strict reading of the law would allow.

Questions about the start of the conclave have swirled ever since Benedict announced on Feb. 11 that he would retire, the first pontiff in 600 years to abdicate rather than stay in office until death. As a result, his decision has created a host of questions about how the Vatican will proceed, given that its procedures for the so-called "sede vacante" — or vacant seat — period between papacies won't begin with a pope's death.

Lombardi also gave more details about Benedict's final audiences and plans for retirement, saying already 35,000 people have requested tickets for his final general audience to be held in St. Peter's Square on Feb. 27. He said Benedict would spend about two months in the papal summer retreat at Castel Gandolfo south of Rome immediately after his abdication, to allow enough time for renovations to be completed on his retirement home — a converted monastery inside the Vatican walls.

That means Benedict would be expected to return to the Vatican, no longer as pope, around the end of April or beginning of May, Lombardi said.

He was asked if and when the pope would meet with his successor and whether he would participate in his installation Mass; like many open questions about the end of Benedict's papacy, both issues simply haven't yet been resolved, Lombardi said.

———

Follow Nicole Winfield at www.twitter.com/nwinfield

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US Q4 industrial output stronger than thought: Fed

WASHINGTON: US industrial production fell in January but the final quarter of last year was much stronger than originally thought, the Federal Reserve reported on Friday.

January's production contracted 0.1 per cent, and manufacturing output fell 0.4 per cent.

But industrial production as a whole expanded at a 2.6 per cent annual pace in the October-December 2012 quarter, compared to the previous estimate of just 1.0 per cent, and manufacturing expanded 1.9 per cent, compared to the previous estimate of 0.2 per cent.

That suggested that the initial government estimate of an 0.1 per cent contraction in the economy last quarter could be revised upward.

Manufacturing output in December was revised up to 1.1 per cent and November 1.7 per cent.

January's production was hit mainly by a 3.9 per cent contraction in automotive products, while energy production surged 3.1 per cent.

- AFP/xq

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