| Teen girl bitten by shark while boogie boarding Posted: 14 Jul 2019 01:14 PM PDT  A 16-year-old girl has been bitten by a shark while boogie boarding in Florida, police say.
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| Race is 'America's Achilles' heel,' Harris tells African-American group Posted: 13 Jul 2019 03:31 PM PDT  Speaking to an African-American fraternity's annual conference Saturday, Democratic presidential hopeful Kamala Harris warned that Russia is seeking to divide Americans along racial lines.
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| Vatican mystery over missing girl deepens as bones are found Posted: 13 Jul 2019 10:17 AM PDT  The mystery of the 1983 disappearance of the 15-year-old daughter of a Vatican employee took yet another twist Saturday following excavations this week at a Vatican City cemetery. The Vatican said it had discovered two sets of bones under a stone slab that will be formally opened next week. The new discovery came after Vatican on Thursday pried open the tombs of two 19th-century German princesses in the cemetery of the Pontifical Teutonic College in hopes of finding the remains of Emanuela Orlandi.
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| Teacher jailed for 20 years after having sex with 13-year-old boy Posted: 14 Jul 2019 07:40 AM PDT  A teacher has been jailed for 20 years after she admitted having sex with a 13-year-old boy multiple times.But Brittany Zamora, 28, insists she's a "good and genuine person" who is "not a threat to society".Police say she had sex with the boy multiple times, both in her car and her classroom, including one occasion when an 11-year-old pupil was in the room acting as lookout.She admitted 10 counts of sexual misconduct with a minor, two counts of molestation, two of furnishing sexually explicit material to a minor and one of public sexual indecency.She cannot be released early for good behaviour and must serve the entire two-decade term behind bars.The former sixth-grade at Las Brisas Academy in Arizona was caught when the victim's parents noticed he was acting unusually, and installed monitoring software on his phone.The boy's mother told the court: "Before, he was an innocent child, and now she stole his innocence from him. I hate Brittany Zamora for what she did to my son and family."Now you'll spend the rest of your youth and most of your adulthood in jail... I will not allow you to interfere in my son's life further."When she was arrested, Zamora told police she feared she would not survive behind in jail, saying: "I'm little. They're gonna tear me apart."Zamora and her husband Daniel appear to still be on good terms, he told the court: "She is the best person I've ever known."
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| New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio criticized for his absence during the city's partial blackout Saturday night: 'You have to be on site' Posted: 14 Jul 2019 12:34 PM PDT  Governor Andrew Cuomo and other New Yorkers were annoyed de Blasio was campaigning for his long-shot presidential campaign, and not in the city.
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| UK says Iran tanker will be freed after guarantees on destination Posted: 13 Jul 2019 12:20 PM PDT  British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt sought to ease tensions with Iran on Saturday, saying a tanker held by Gibraltar would be released if Tehran guaranteed it was not heading to Syria. "I reassured him our concern was destination not origin of the oil on Grace One," a tanker seized off the coast of the tiny British territory of Gibraltar on July 4, Hunt tweeted.
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| Chevron spills 800,000 gallons of oil, water in California Posted: 13 Jul 2019 10:28 AM PDT  Officials began to clean up a massive oil spill Friday that dumped nearly 800,000 gallons of oil and water into a California canyon, making it larger — if less devastating — than the state's last two major oil spills.
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| A US congressman wants better food and drink standards in the Dominican Republic after several US tourist deaths Posted: 13 Jul 2019 09:00 AM PDT  US Rep. Adriano Espaillat, who was born in the Dominican Republic, visited the country from July 1 to July 6 to evaluate its tourism situation.
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| See How the Army's Would-Be Stealth Helicopter Borrowed from the F-35 Posted: 12 Jul 2019 10:00 PM PDT  The Comanche, in theory, might have been an awesome-looking helicopter—but that did not make it any less of a poorly managed defense program.Pop quiz: what prominent U.S. military aircraft has a stealthy radar cross section and advanced networked sensors but has gone billions over budget and has fallen years behind schedule?While the F-35 stealth fighter might come to mind today, in 2004 the most timely answer might have been the RAH-66 Comanche. The slick-looking stealth helicopter spent twenty-two years in development, consuming over $7 billion dollars before being abruptly canceled with only two flying prototypes to show for it.The Comanche sprang of by the Army's Light Helicopter Experimental program conceived during the defending spending glut of the 1980s. Among other objectives, this program sought a replacement for the Army's OH-58 Kiowa and OH-6 Cayuse scout helicopters, which were derived from the civilian Bell 206 JetRanger and Hughes 500 choppers.(This first appeared in June 2019.)Scout helicopters were primarily tasked with spying out enemy positions and designating them for attack by friendly forces. However, they also were suitable for attacking lightly defended targets with rocket pods, miniguns, and even tank-busting TOW or Hellfire missiles, while armored Apache gunships tackled heavier foes.
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| 16 people arrested in Friday night ICE protests in Phoenix Posted: 13 Jul 2019 11:45 AM PDT  Police arrested 16 people who protested outside outside the Phoenix ICE office on Friday evening, days ahead of immigration raids planned for Sunday.
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| Erdogan says Trump can waive sanctions on Turkey Posted: 14 Jul 2019 08:50 AM PDT  U.S. President Donald Trump has the authority to waive sanctions on Turkey for its purchase of Russian air defense systems and should find a "middle ground" in the dispute, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Sunday. Erdogan's comments came two days after NATO member Turkey took delivery of the first consignment of advanced Russian S-400 missile defense system parts, despite warnings from Washington that the move would trigger U.S. sanctions.
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| Toxic lake in Russia's Siberia becomes selfie sensation Posted: 13 Jul 2019 05:37 AM PDT  Residents of a city in Siberia don't need to fly off to tropical locales for picturesque selfies taken by pristine turquoise waters. The lake is blue, however, due to a chemical reaction between toxic waste elements from a local power station. "We can compare it only with photos of the Maldives," said Sergey Griva, a local who visited the lake, adding he's never been to the Maldives and couldn't find it on a map.
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| Tennessee man dies after contracting flesh-eating bacteria Posted: 14 Jul 2019 08:51 AM PDT  A Tennessee man died last week after contracting Vibrio vulnificus, a flesh-eating bacteria, while swimming in Florida.
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| The former prime minister of Israel defended his business dealings with Jeffrey Epstein: 'You expect me to have noticed?' Posted: 14 Jul 2019 11:10 AM PDT  Former Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Barak defended business dealings with Jeffrey Epstein, saying he had no idea Epstein allegedly solicited underage girls.
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| Why Canada Must Protect its 5G Networks from Huawei Posted: 13 Jul 2019 02:02 PM PDT  The introduction of 5G technology, along with its promise and challenges, has led to a transformational debate in Canada—as it has amongst many of Ottawa's partners and allies around the world. Front and centre for Canada is the potential role of Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei in such a next generation network. In order to address this question, the government of Canada has been conducting an intensive security review—which remains ongoing—on the implications of potentially including Huawei in its 5G networks.Magnifying the stakes of the looming verdict on Huawei, is an increasingly troubled relationship between China and Canada. Two Canadian citizens—Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor—remain arbitrarily detained in China since last December. Beijing accuses the two of stealing state secrets and guilty of espionage, but fails to produce any evidence to support such a claim. Kovrig and Spavor were arrested nine days after Canada's arrest, on extradition request from the United States, of Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou. Despite China's attempts to downplay any linkage, it is clear that this was no coincidence and unfortunately the fates of Kovrig and Spavor have been unfairly tied to the extradition case of Meng. They have also rebuffed high-level Canadian efforts to have a dialogue on the matter.
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| Police clashes as Hong Kong protest sweeps into neighbourhood popular with Chinese shoppers Posted: 14 Jul 2019 09:23 AM PDT  Riot police and protesters fought running battles in a Hong Kong shopping mall Sunday night as unrest caused by a widely loathed plan to allow extraditions to mainland China showed no sign of abating. Police used pepper spray and batons against small groups of protesters, who responded by hurling bottles and other projectiles, in a night of fresh violence in the international hub. Sunday's clashes took place at the end of another huge rally - this time in Sha Tin a district that lies between the main urban sprawl around the harbour and the Chinese border. Violence broke out briefly in the afternoon after the rally as protesters seized a junction and built barricades, causing an hours-long stand-off with riot police. But the worst clashes happened late evening inside a shopping mall where hundreds of protesters fled after police moved on the barricades and then charged into the shopping complex, AFP reporters on the scene said. Once inside, chaos erupted as police found themselves pelted from above. At least one officer was seen knocked unconscious and there was blood on the floor of the mall. Police with shields and batons charged up to higher floors and made multiple arrests in a building filled with luxury fashion stores. Volunteer medics were also seen to be giving aid to a protester who collapsed. By 10:00 pm (1400 GMT) most protesters had left the area. Hong Kong has been rocked by more than a month of huge largely peaceful protests - as well as a series of separate violent confrontations with police - sparked by a law that would have allowed extraditions to mainland China and other countries. Last month, parliament was trashed by hundreds of masked, youth-led protesters in unprecedented scenes. The bill has since been suspended, but that has done little to quell public anger which has evolved into a wider movement calling for democratic reforms, universal suffrage and a halt to sliding freedoms in the semi-autonomous hub. Protesters are also demanding the bill be scrapped entirely, an independent inquiry into police use of tear gas and rubber bullets, an amnesty for those arrested, and for the city's unelected leader Carrie Lam to step down. Tens of thousands marched through Sha Tin on Sunday, the fifth week in a row that Hong Kong has seen such huge rallies. Almost all have ended with violence between police and a minority of hardcore protesters. "We have marched so many times but the government still didn't listen, forcing everyone to take to the street," Tony Wong, a 24-year-old protester on the Sha Tin march, told AFP. Hong Kong protests: riot police baton charge and fire tear gas to clear demonstrations at parliament, in pictures Many protesters see the rallies as part of an existential fight against an increasingly assertive Beijing. "This is a dangerous moment. Hong Kongers can choose to die or they can live. We're on the edge, but fortunately we haven't died-off yet," said JoJo So, a woman in her fifties who was attending the rally. On Saturday there were also violent clashes between police and protesters in a town near the border which is popular with mainland traders who buy Hong Kong goods at duty-free prices. Locals have long complained about over-crowding and spiralling rents caused by the trade. Beijing has thrown its full support behind Lam, calling on Hong Kong police to pursue anyone involved in the parliament storming and other clashes. Hong Kong's government late Sunday said it "strongly condemns these illegal acts" by protesters, saying roads were blocked and officers assaulted. Under the 1997 handover deal with the British, China promised to allow Hong Kong to keep key liberties such as its independent judiciary and rights like freedom of speech. But many say that 50-year deal is already being reneged on, citing the disappearance into mainland custody of dissident booksellers, the disqualification of prominent politicians and the jailing of democracy protest leaders. Authorities have also resisted calls for the city's leader to be directly elected by the people.
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| Police investigate after US flag removed during protest Posted: 14 Jul 2019 02:05 PM PDT ![Police investigate after US flag removed during protest]( "Police investigate after US flag removed during protest") Police say they will be reviewing any available video to help them identify protesters who trespassed and pulled down the American flag in front of an immigration detention center in suburban Denver, tried to burn it and replaced it with a Mexican flag. Friday night's protest in Aurora, one of many coordinated across the country, drew about 2,000 people and was mostly peaceful. Cristian Solano-Cordova, a spokesman for the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, told The Denver Post that those who pulled down the flags weren't affiliated with mainstream immigrants' rights groups but had coordinated with them to be there.
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| Billionaire Tom Steyer's entrance into the 2020 Democratic race is the perfect example of the rot at the core of the US political system Posted: 14 Jul 2019 08:32 AM PDT  Tom Steyer's entered the 2020 presidential race with a promise to spend $100 million on his campaign, but he should use that money elsewhere.
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| Canada says another citizen detained in China amid row Posted: 13 Jul 2019 05:00 PM PDT  China detained another Canadian citizen amid sour relations between the two countries, Canada's foreign ministry said on Saturday, though the reason for the jailing remains unclear. "Global Affairs Canada is aware of the detention of a Canadian citizen in Yantai, China," a spokesman told AFP. The detention follows Beijing's jailing of two Canadians earlier this year after Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer for Chinese tech giant Huawei, was taken into custody in Vancouver on a warrant from the United States.
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| Malaysia seizes $240 mln from Chinese state firm's bank account -paper Posted: 14 Jul 2019 12:38 AM PDT ![Malaysia seizes $240 mln from Chinese state firm's bank account -paper]( "Malaysia seizes $240 mln from Chinese state firm's bank account -paper") Malaysia has seized more than 1 billion ringgit ($243.25 million) from a bank account of state-owned China Petroleum Pipeline Engineering Ltd (CPP), the Straits Times newspaper said on Saturday. The seizure comes nearly a year after Malaysia suspended two pipeline projects, valued at $2.3 billion, on which CPP was the lead contractor. The Malaysian government this month ordered HSBC to transfer the funds held in the Chinese firm's account to Suria Strategic Energy Resources, which is wholly owned by the Malaysian finance ministry, the Singapore-based newspaper said.
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| Former students at an elite school where Jeffrey Epstein taught recall him giving attention to girls in the hallway Posted: 13 Jul 2019 07:05 AM PDT  Jeffrey Epstein, who was charged with sex trafficking on Monday, taught at The Dalton School in New York's Upper East Side for two years in the 1970s.
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| Hurricane Barry sweeps through the Gulf Coast, makes landfall Posted: 13 Jul 2019 10:52 AM PDT  National Hurricane Center Director Ken Graham tracks Hurricane Barry bringing you the latest updates.
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| A Texas grandmother fell three years ago. Her daughter let her decay on the floor, police say Posted: 14 Jul 2019 02:42 PM PDT  Delissa Crayton lived with her mother's decaying remains for three years after she fell in their shared residence, police in Seguin, Texas said.
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| In 1981, A British Submarine Smashed Into a Russian Sub (Armed with Nuclear Weapons) Posted: 13 Jul 2019 08:30 PM PDT ![In 1981, A British Submarine Smashed Into a Russian Sub (Armed with Nuclear Weapons)]( "In 1981, A British Submarine Smashed Into a Russian Sub (Armed with Nuclear Weapons)") On May 23, 1981 the Soviet submarine K-211 Petropavlovsk cruised quietly at nine knots, one hundred and fifty feet below the surface of the Arctic Barents Sea. The huge 155-meter-long Delta III (or Kalmar)-class submarine was distinguished by the large boxy compartment on its spine which accommodated the towering launch tubes for sixteen R-29R ballistic missiles, each carrying three independent nuclear warheads. K-211's mission was hair-raisingly straightforward: to cruise undetected for weeks or months at a time, awaiting only the signal that a nuclear war had broken out to unleash its apocalyptic payload from underwater on Western cities and military bases up to four thousand miles away.British and American nuclear-power attack submarines (SSNs), or "hunter-killers," were routinely dispatched to detect Soviet ballistic missiles subs (SSBNs) leaving from base to discreetly stalk them. The quieter SSNs also awaited only a signal of war, an event in which they would attempt to torpedo the Soviet subs before they could unleash their city-destroying weapons.Mindful of this threat, at half past seven that evening K-211's commander halted his sub and pivoted it around so that its MGK-400 Rubikon bow sonar array could attempt to pick up any submarines sneaking behind it in the 'blind spot' of its wake—a maneuver known as "clearing the baffles." However, the SSBN's hydrophones did not report any contact.
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| Israeli minister's remarks on gays widely condemned Posted: 14 Jul 2019 10:43 AM PDT  Israel's new education minister's remarks in favor of "conversion therapy," a controversial technique that seeks to turn gays into heterosexuals, came under widespread criticism and led hundreds to protest Sunday. Rafi Peretz, who leads a small religious nationalist party, said in a televised interview over the weekend that he supports conversion therapy and has performed it. It was Peretz's second major controversy in just a month on the job.
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| Curiosity rover is seen creeping up a rugged Martian mountain Posted: 13 Jul 2019 12:27 PM PDT  A satellite zooming around Mars spotted a lone machine, the Curiosity Rover, exploring the rugged Martian terrain. The car-sized rover, which has traveled almost 13 miles on Mars over the last seven years, is now carefully inching up the base of Mount Sharp, a 3.5-mile tall mountain sitting in the middle of the sprawling Gale Crater. The rover has been busy scouring rock samples in an area that planetary scientists suspect was once blanketed in wet clay."It's just one of many stops the rover has made in an area referred to as the "clay-bearing unit" on the side of Mount Sharp," NASA wrote on Friday.The Curiosity Rover on Mars.Image: NASA / JPL-CaltechA prominent ridge, called the Vera Rubin Ridge, can be seen cutting to the left (or northwest) of the rover, while ripples of dark sand are on found the right of the six-wheeled robot. The rover looks like a shiny speck because the sun glinted off Curiosity at just the right angle as NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter swooped overhead.SEE ALSO: The secretive lab that built 'the bomb' now scours Mars for signs of lifeNASA plans for the nuclear-powered machine to inch up Mt. Sharp over the coming years to investigate the landscape and improve our understanding of what the now-desert terrain was like billions of years ago, when the Martian planet was a wetter, bluer place. In 2020, a more advanced car-sized rover will join Curiosity on the Martian ground. The new rover will scour the Jezero Crater, a 30 mile-wide bowl about 1,640 feet deep. It's believed to have once held an 800-foot deep lake some 3.5 billion years ago. WATCH: Meet Katie Bouman, one of the scientists who helped capture the first black hole image
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| Alaska man charged with illegally killing polar bear Posted: 14 Jul 2019 04:17 PM PDT ![Alaska man charged with illegally killing polar bear]( "Alaska man charged with illegally killing polar bear") An Alaska man has been charged with the illegal killing of a polar bear in violation of federal law. Chris Gordon of Kaktovik shot the bear outside his home, leaving the carcass there for five months without salvaging any part of it, according to federal prosecutors. "Mr. Gordon allegedly left butchered whale meat outside in front of his yard of his residence for a substantial period of time, which attracted polar bear, as well as other animals," said Ryan Tansey, a Fairbanks-based federal prosecutor.
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| Former Bangladesh military dictator Ershad dies at 89 Posted: 13 Jul 2019 10:08 PM PDT  Former Bangladesh military dictator Hussain Muhammad Ershad died Sunday aged 89, after weeks in a Dhaka hospital, officials said. General Ershad ruled Bangladesh for nearly a decade before being ousted from power in a pro-democracy upsurge in 1990 and was jailed for years on corruption charges. Armed forces spokesman Abdullah bin Zaid confirmed the death.
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| Healthy living may help offset genetic risk of dementia -study Posted: 14 Jul 2019 08:00 AM PDT ![Healthy living may help offset genetic risk of dementia -study]( "Healthy living may help offset genetic risk of dementia -study") Living healthily with a good diet and regular exercise may help people with a higher genetic susceptibility to dementia to offset the risk of developing it, according to recent research. The risk of dementia was reduced by 32% in people with a high genetic risk if they had followed a healthy lifestyle, compared to those who had an unhealthy lifestyle, the study, published in the medical journal JAMA on Sunday, found. People with high genetic risk and an unhealthy lifestyle were almost three times more likely to develop dementia than those with low genetic risk who also lived healthily.
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| Vice President Pence Tours Border Patrol Facility With Almost 400 Men in ‘Crowded’ Cages, ‘Horrendous Stench’ Posted: 12 Jul 2019 06:05 PM PDT  Office of Inspector General/Department of Homeland Security via GettyVice President Mike Pence toured a Border Patrol facility in Texas on Friday where he reportedly saw hundreds of men standing in crowded cages who later yelled to tell reporters they were hungry."The stench was horrendous," White House pool reporter Josh Dawsey wrote of the brief visit to an outdoor portal at the McAllen Border Station.Nearly 400 men "were in caged fences with no cots," Dawsey wrote, adding that it was so crowded the men would not have been able to lie down even on the concrete. Pence and the reporters accompanying him saw the outdoor portal full of migrants who had allegedly crossed the U.S. border illegally. The reporters saw the migrants for all of 90 seconds before they were escorted away, and the vice president "briefly" went into the room. The men inside the cages reportedly shouted to tell reporters they had been there for longer than 40 days and wanted to brush their teeth. There were no mats or pillows, according to Dawsey, and water was only accessible outside the cages, which Border Patrol agents said was made available to the detainees when the press was not there. Agents guarding the cages were wearing face masks. A White House official said the Secret Service had opposed Pence entering the area once the press left, but the vice president entered the room, Dawsey reported. The vice president later told reporters he had expected to see similar conditions at the facility. "I was not surprised by what I saw," Pence told reporters. "I knew we'd see a system that was overwhelmed.""This is tough stuff," Pence was quoted as saying, adding that he was calling for Democrats to fund more beds for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and more spending from the Department of Homeland Security.Earlier Friday, Pence and reporters also toured a facility in Donna, Texas, that holds families, adults, and children. There, Dawsey described seeing detainees lying on "kindergarten-like napping mats" on the floor with a "thin tinfoil-like blanket." Officials said it was one of the "nicest facilities because it was new and relatively clean."Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| JetBlue flight evacuated at Newark Airport after suicide vest photo AirDropped to passenger iPhones Posted: 14 Jul 2019 06:32 AM PDT  A plane was evacuated after someone sent a photograph of a suicide vest to passengers and flight attendants on board.The unknown sender used Apple's AirDrop feature, which allows users to easily and anonymously transfer files to other iOS devices using Bluetooth.Authorities say the Florida-bound plane was about to take off from Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey when the image was widely shared on board.A member of the crew on JetBlue flight 573 alerted the captain, who informed authorities at about 7.45am on Saturday.The plane returned to the gate and the 150 people on board were asked to leave the aircraft, and their luggage was re-screened and examined by police bomb-sniffing K-9 dogs."We pull up to the gate and then we pull away and the captain comes on and says there's been a security threat," Thomas Desmond told NBC News."It was nervous when you see Port Authority police officers coming onto your plane and you just have no idea what's going on."The culprit was likely one of those on board, as AirDrop only works with those in close proximity to the sender. However, they were not traced.JetBlue said the additional security screening was carried out due to "an abundance of caution."The flight eventually departed just before 11.30am, with no knock-on effects to other flights departing or arriving at Newark.
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| Pregnant woman, 9-year-old son killed by floodwaters in Pennsylvania Posted: 14 Jul 2019 09:25 AM PDT  Police in Pennsylvania say rising floodwaters killed a pregnant mother and her son Thursday.
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| Meet Sturmgewehr 57: Sig Sauer's Very First 'Battle' Rifle Posted: 13 Jul 2019 06:00 AM PDT  While Sig Sauer, Inc. may have entered the battle rifle market recently, the original company—SIG, Schweizer Industrie Gesellschaft—produced a variety of them. SIG's most famous was the SIG SG 510, otherwise known as the Sturmgewehr 57.Though the Sturmgewehr 57 was a very early battle rifle that retained many vestiges of Swiss bolt action rifles before it, it also featured many thoughtful features and is considered to be among the best battle rifles in the world.More than anything else, the Sturmgewehr 57 was built for accuracy. The standard Sturmgewehr 57 features a 23-inch long barrel, 3 inches longer than an M16. While this makes it rather unwieldy for close quarters combat or for mechanized troops that might need to enter and exit a vehicle, it suits the light infantry role most Swiss units were set up for at the time. The rifle also featured an integrated bipod, rifle grenade launcher, and excellent diopter sights.Unlike most rifles where sight adjustment increments remain the same across the range of adjustment, the Sturmgewehr 57 features finer range adjustment increments at extended ranges, where precise ranging matters far more because a fired bullet drops more rapidly the further it goes. Of course, the Sturmgewehr 57's sights are still reliant on the soldiers knowing precise ranges to targets, but in the Swiss case, most infantry would likely be defending from positions with existing range tables, which would allow them to dial in their sights with great accuracy.
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| Police: 69-year-old man dies after attacking migrant jail Posted: 13 Jul 2019 09:11 PM PDT  A 69-year-old man armed with a rifle threw incendiary devices at an immigration jail in Washington state early Saturday morning, then was found dead after four police officers arrived and opened fire, authorities said. The Tacoma Police Department said the officers responded about 4 a.m. to the privately run Tacoma Northwest Detention Center, a U.S. Department of Homeland Security detention facility that holds migrants pending deportation proceedings. The detention center has also held immigration-seeking parents separated from their children under President Donald Trump's "zero tolerance" policy, an effort meant to deter illegal immigration.
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| We compared Apple and Microsoft's flagship stores in London — and the winner was clear Posted: 13 Jul 2019 01:00 AM PDT  Microsoft opened its first European store on Thursday and it's a block away from Apple's London flagship.
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| Hong Kong police fight with protesters amid rising tensions Posted: 14 Jul 2019 09:08 AM PDT  Police in Hong Kong fought with protesters on Sunday as they broke up a demonstration by thousands of people demanding the resignation of the semi-autonomous Chinese territory's chief executive and an investigation into complaints of police violence. Some protesters retreated into a shopping complex where they and police hit each other with clubs and umbrellas. The violence wound down toward midnight as the remaining protesters left the area.
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| Guatemala president calls off US meeting with Trump Posted: 14 Jul 2019 12:57 PM PDT  Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales, who is under pressure at home not to seal a migration deal with the United States, on Sunday called off White House talks with Donald Trump with just a day to spare, his office announced. The meeting scheduled for Monday in Washington has been pushed back over "speculation" about the signing of a possible deal, the Guatemalan government said in a statement. Such a deal would make Guatemala a "safe third country" -- and mean that it would be obliged to offer asylum to any migrants entering its territory on the way to the United States.
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| Healthy living may help offset genetic risk of dementia: study Posted: 14 Jul 2019 08:08 AM PDT ![Healthy living may help offset genetic risk of dementia: study]( "Healthy living may help offset genetic risk of dementia: study") Living healthily with a good diet and regular exercise may help people with a higher genetic susceptibility to dementia to offset the risk of developing it, according to recent research. The risk of dementia was reduced by 32% in people with a high genetic risk if they had followed a healthy lifestyle, compared to those who had an unhealthy lifestyle, the study, published in the medical journal JAMA on Sunday, found. People with high genetic risk and an unhealthy lifestyle were almost three times more likely to develop dementia than those with low genetic risk who also lived healthily.
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| Jeffrey Epstein Dodged Questions About Sex With His Dalton Prep-School Students Posted: 13 Jul 2019 09:05 AM PDT  Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/Photos Police Handouts"I'm teaching a bunch of little brats next year."—Jeffrey Epstein, 1974-75 Dalton School YearbookIt took a clandestine FBI-NYPD joint sting operation to arrest the elusive convicted sex offender Jeffrey E. Epstein on Saturday July 6th on the tarmac of Teterboro airport in New Jersey (a story first broken by The Daily Beast). Simultaneously, a sledgehammer was used to break the entry to his massive $77 million New York City townhouse on East 71st Street. Police recovered hundreds, possibly thousands, of nude images of young women and girls—an automatic legal problem for a man who is on multiple sex offender registries. Epstein's case may be one of the most extreme cases of organized child abuse in modern history.Epstein is without doubt the wealthiest individual on any sex offender registry in the United States (and he is at Level 3—at greatest risk of abusing more children). On his registry entry, the following residences are listed: his $7.8 million 70-acre private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands (his primary residence owned by his Delaware-based LLC, L.S.J.), his Paris apartment on Avenue Foch (one of the most expensive addresses in the world), his $15.5 million Palm Beach estate, his $77 million New York City townhouse (a gift from Victoria's Secret founder Leslie Wexner), and his $10 million castle/ranch in New Mexico. At the bottom of his residences is another island in the Virgin Islands, Great St. James. Epstein purchased it in 2016 for $18 million and was actively (and without permit) developing an even larger compound on its 165 acres—that is, until his arrest this past Saturday.As far as vehicles, his offender registry entries list two Gulfstream jets (though his lawyers say he sold one of them in June), two helicopters, nine Mercedes-Benzes, nine Chevy Suburbans, three Cadillac Escalades, three Harley-Davidsons, one $375k Bentley Mulsanne, a jet-ski, and other assorted items. He has wined and dined American presidents, princes, elite academics, socialites, corporate CEOs and other VIPs. His alleged victims were little girls, often economically destitute or runaways or orphans—from sixth graders to high-school sophomores. Because his alleged crimes span multiple decades, his victims likely number in the hundreds—or more.* * *"Unnoticed by almost everybody, travelling with her was a greying, plumpish, middle-aged American businessman who managed to avoid the photographers." —Mail on Sunday, Nov. 15, 1992 (London edition)That businessman was Jeffrey Epstein. In the early 1990s, British newspapers that followed British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell (alleged to be Epstein's chief procurer of victims) tried to figure out who Epstein was. The Mail on Sunday asked in 1992: "But what is he—property developer, concert pianist, math teacher, corporate treasure hunter, stockbroker, merchant banker or globe-trotting businessman?" No one seemed to know.Given Epstein's apparent mystique, I checked New York City's birth, census, and marriage records to be certain about the facts. Epstein was born Jan. 20 1953 in Brooklyn, NY. His parents were Paula (nee Stolofsky, 1918-2004) and Seymour G. Epstein (1916-1991) and they were married in Brooklyn in 1952—shortly before Jeffrey Epstein's birth.Epstein grew up during the 1950s and 1960s in the Lafayette neighborhood around Coney Island, as documented by James Patterson, John Connolly, and Tim Malloy in their 2016 book on Epstein, Filthy Rich. Epstein attended the now-shuttered Lafayette High School, a working-class high school that produced a significant number of professional baseball players. Epstein's mother, Paula, was a homemaker while his father, Seymour, worked for the New York City Parks Department as a groundskeeper and gardener. During their retirement years, Epstein's parents (as well as several maternal aunts) resided in nearby properties he purchased in West Palm Beach. In 1991, Epstein's father passed away at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio at the age of 75. His mother passed away in 2004 at age 85 in Palm Beach.Epstein has a younger brother, Mark ("Puggy"), who has joined him in real-estate deals throughout the years. Mark operates a real-estate business, OSSA Properties, which owns some of the properties—including the apartments in the 301 East 66th Street building—where Jeffrey Epstein's alleged sex slaves and other employees were housed (real-estate ownership between the brothers may have commingled).Jeffrey Epstein graduated from Lafayette High School in 1969 at age 16, having skipped two grades. He was "chubby with curly hair and a high, 'hee-hee' kind of laugh," according to Filthy Rich. In the fall of 1969, Epstein started at Cooper Union and studied there for two years until the spring semester of 1971. Many writers say he attended New York University (NYU) after Cooper Union, but they rarely give specific dates. I decided to verify through National Student Clearinghouse records exactly when Epstein went to college and where. Cooper Union does not participate in the National Clearinghouse, but NYU does. It turned out that Epstein was enrolled at NYU between September of 1971 and June of 1974. Thus, most of Epstein's college study years were spent at NYU. I verified that he did not graduate from NYU with their registrar.In a 2002 profile in New York magazine, Thomas Landon reported that Epstein studied at NYU's Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. It is not clear why Epstein attended two institutions of higher education but did not graduate from either. When Epstein joined the board of Rockefeller University, he misrepresented his educational and employment background; a press release stated that he had "studied physics at Cooper Union in New York and then joined Bear Stearns, becoming a Limited Partner until 1981." Between Cooper Union and Bear Stearns, Epstein studied at NYU and was a teacher for two years (two unreported and significant events). When a convicted sex offender facing sex-trafficking charges was first employed as a teacher, it bears at least some scrutiny.* * *After the summer of 1974, Epstein began working as a teacher of mathematics and physics at the Dalton School in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. It has been reported that he began there in 1973, but this is incorrect. I searched the 1973-74 Dalton yearbook and there is no mention of Jeffrey Epstein. I then searched Dalton's school newspaper and found in the September 1974 issue that "... Mr. Epstein, who will also teach physics, [has] also joined the department this year." Epstein also confirmed that he taught there between 1974 and 1976 in a deposition.In the United States, there are various schools that educate children from the social upper classes—Kent School, Horace Mann, Miss Porter's. Dalton is among that set. These schools are often restricted to children from the "old money" stratum in society, with a small number of scholarship students or athletes from non-elite backgrounds.In 1974, Dalton was run by headmaster Donald Barr—father of Attorney General William Barr, whose Justice Department recently began a review of Epstein's 2007 non-prosecution agreement for the Palm Beach child sexual assault charges. Writers have noted the interesting coincidence. However, Donald Barr resigned in turmoil in February of 1974 (according to the March 14, 1974 issue of The Daltonian) which was seven months before Jeffrey Epstein began teaching there that fall. While it is possible that Donald Barr may have hired Epstein, if he made personnel decisions long in advance, the Dalton School lost four math teachers (according to The Daltonian) prior to the 1974-75 school year. Therefore the school may have hired Epstein, in part, out of an urgent need to fill vacant positions—even though Epstein did not have a college degree.Peter Branch was the acting headmaster after Barr's departure and he may have hired Epstein. Full verification would require access to Dalton's personnel records, if they still retain them. I put a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request into the State of New York Department of Education and they reported having no teaching license on file for Epstein—this may suggest that he was not planning on a career in teaching. Unlike public schools, it should be noted, a private school like Dalton does not require its teachers to possess a state teaching license or certificate.While at the Dalton School, Epstein was the coach of the math team. In competitions with several local schools, Epstein led the students to victory in one instance and to second place in another. At a February 1976 math meet, the Dalton team competed against Ramaz and the Manhattan Talmudic Academy with "Boss Epstein watching from the sidelines…" (The Daltonian March 5, 1976). At another match up in April 1976, Epstein told his team "a victory would be as easy as Pi." The paper reported Epstein would be starting a "math-track team" the following year due to his "unique philosophy of integrating physical exercise with spiritual and mathematical stimulation." The Dalton School students and families are comprised of some of the wealthiest families in the United States—unlike Epstein's own. But this access may have created an opening for him.As a young man from a working-class neighborhood in Brooklyn (equipped with a deep Brooklyn accent), Jeffrey Epstein at Dalton likely had to be a "quick study" to gracefully flow among the social upper class. Vicky Ward's 2003 Vanity Fair profile of Epstein deemed him "The Talented Mr. Epstein"—drawing a parallel to Matt Damon's character in the 1999 film The Talented Mr. Ripley, where Tom Ripley cons his way into the upper class through fraud and misrepresentation (and plenty of piano playing). To wit, the April 1975 issue of The Daltonian covered a Parent-Teacher Association event, "the first parent-faculty musical in recent memory," noting that "Mr. Epstein proved himself to be the ivory show man on the piano." Was Epstein wooing and dazzling the parents as a means of gaining access to their rarefied world? It seems to have worked because a parent wondered what he was doing there and put him in touch with the chairman of Bear Stearns, Ace Greenberg (whose children also attended Dalton; Epstein may have tutored them). After the 1975-1976 school year was finished, Epstein informed the school he was not returning and began his career on Wall Street at Bear Stearns.After just four years, on August 1, 1980, Bear Stearns published an advert in The Wall Street Journal listing all the people who had made limited partner, including Jeffrey E. Epstein (along with people such as Larry Kudlow, former CNBC commentator and current director of the National Economic Council). Epstein, it seemed, was on the path, to accumulating the economic riches necessary for entry into the one percent. Obtaining the social graces required for acceptance by the social upper class would come much later with the help of several socialites, but mostly Ghislaine Maxwell.* * *Epstein was permitted to plead guilty to charges of soliciting prostitution in 2008 in the State of Florida. However, his victims were children, and it has been widely pointed out, cannot give consent, and therefore cannot be prostitutes. (Epstein's lawyers tried to tarnish and humiliate the victims at the time by calling them "prostitutes," and, as Vanity Fair revealed, Epstein reportedly smeared the underage girls in private as "prostitutes and strippers who'd already been indoctrinated into the sex world.") Such lax charges in the Florida case, compared to what he is now facing, were hashed out in a deal with Florida State Attorney Barry Krischer, in conjunction with Alexander Acosta (who just stepped down as President Trump's labor secretary over his role in the Epstein saga). The deal was protested by the highly professional Palm Beach police led by Chief Michael Reiter and the late Detective Joseph Recarey. Epstein's 2019 charges are for crimes committed in New York and Florida between 2002 and 2005. However, there are allegations against Epstein from earlier time periods (such as Maria Farmer's 2019 sworn affidavit that she and her 15-year old sibling were assaulted by Epstein and Maxwell in various locations in 1996—allegations that were reportedly nixed by an editor from Vicky Ward's 2003 profile of Epstein). One thing to keep in mind is Epstein was a school teacher and would have had possible access to victims there as well. There are no reports that he did anything at Dalton school, but he was asked about his relations with students in a deposition in 2009 and here is what he said:Deposition His answer about the ages of his students is noteworthy. He replies "Mostly old—mostly 17 and 18." This tells us that Epstein thinks that the ages of 17 and 18 are "old." He is asked what subject he was teaching, and he answers truthfully, physics and mathematics. The attorney asks if any of the girls he was teaching were under age 17 at the time, and Epstein answers that he does not know—this sounds genuine. Things take a turn when the attorney asks Epstein if he had any sexual contact with any students at Dalton. Epstein answers the first time with a question, "Again?" He is asked a second time and again answers with a question, "While I was a teacher?" The attorney says yes, let's start with that question and Epstein gives a solid "no." The attorney presses "How about after?" and Epstein says "Not that I remember."In summary, Epstein revealed that he feels high-school students aged 17 to 18 years are "old" and he that he does not remember if he had sexual contact with Dalton students after he was a teacher there. The final time he is asked, he reads from a statement in which he claims that the attorney's law firm is engaged in fraud and then pleads his Fifth Amendment rights. Questions about sexual contact with Dalton students appear to be sensitive for him. Epstein depositions are extremely difficult to read because he pleads the Fifth to almost every question—as he eventually does here.* * *Julie Brown of the Miami Herald has done a significant amount of research on the Epstein case with her and her colleagues' award-winning Perversion of Justice series. The extensive reporting in the Miami Herald, The Daily Beast, and by independent journalists like Ed Opperman, Pearse Redmond, William Ramsey and others has likely influenced law enforcement to consider the new evidence uncovered by the press—including possible new locations where recruitment or abuse might have occurred.Related to Epstein's deposition above, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who accused Epstein of sexually abusing her as an underage girl and loaning her out to his famous friends, claimed that Epstein "lost interest" as she got older and sent her to Thailand to bring him another victim, at which point she says she escaped from Epstein.Another alarming detail about Epstein is reported in Vicky Ward's 2003 Vanity Fair article. She noted that Epstein left a paperback copy of the Marquis de Sade's The Misfortunes of Virtue lying on a table at his 71st Street townhouse. Why would Epstein have left this book out in plain view? This obscene novel (even Napoleon ordered its author jailed) is about a 12-year-old French girl, Justine, who travels alone across France and winds up in a monastery and is forced to become the sex slave of monks where she endures repeated sexual assaults and is ordered to participate in orgies. She escapes but suffers similar abuses and encounters as the story follows her life until the age of 26.Justine may have been a pedophile's fantasy story in which the victim somehow learns "virtue" from what she endures. Justine almost parallels the life of some of Epstein's alleged victims. What is even more tragic is that in the course of her reporting, Ward found two of Epstein's victims and their mother. Ward says they detailed in 2003 how Epstein sexually assaulted them in the mid-1990s—including the time when one was allegedly held captive for 12 hours at mogul Leslie Wexner's Ohio property after she says Epstein and Maxwell assaulted her. (Wexner has not responded to the allegations.) Perhaps their stories might have been able to deter or expose Epstein earlier, if they had been published when the girls first came forward.We can expect a trove of information about Epstein to continue to emerge now that he is in jail. Indeed, the Miami Herald reports that at least a dozen new victims have come forward since his arrest. Epstein and his accomplices may have seen his victims as little girls—but now they are strong, brave women fighting back today.Thomas Volscho is a sociology professor at the City University of New York, College of Staten Island. He has been researching the case of Jeffrey Epstein for a book he is writing.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| 10 deals you don’t want to miss on Sunday: $20 off AirPods 2, SanDisk sale, $60 off Nest, $9 wireless charger, more Posted: 14 Jul 2019 04:29 AM PDT  Prime Day is less than 24 hours away and there are already early Prime Day deals that are live right now! Highlights from today's roundup include $15 off AirPods 2, $20 off AirPods 2 with Wireless Charging Case, $41 off the best-selling Instant Pot on Amazon, SanDisk 128GB microSD cards for $19, a wireless charging pad to charge those new AirPods (or anything else) for just $8.99, multicolor LED smart light bulbs just like $50 Philips Hues for just $9 each when you buy a 4-pack and use the coupon code TPTAYA22 at checkout, the top-selling Wi-Fi range extender on all of Amazon for only $13.99, a $250 Ring Video Doorbell Pro bundled with a $50 Echo Dot for just $169 combined, the lowest price ever for a Nest Learning Thermostat, deep discounts on SanDisk microSD cards like a 128GB card for $19 and change, and more! Check out all of Sunday's top daily deals below.
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| Americans support NASA but not a return to the moon, new poll says Posted: 14 Jul 2019 11:51 AM PDT  A new Ipsos poll shows that only 8% of Americans say a manned moon mission should be a top priority for NASA.
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| Russia's Real Reasons for Partnering with Iran Posted: 13 Jul 2019 02:01 PM PDT  Will Iran crack under American pressure? Don't count on it. Iran has grown accustomed to living under America's recent economic sanctions and continues to pursue its own policies at home and abroad despite the restrictions associated with the latest U.S.-Iranian crisis. Tehran can rely on substantial domestic support and has a large army—including auxiliary paramilitary Basij forces—with access to air fleet, heavy forces and undersea arms. It also has revolutionary guards trained in unconventional warfare. Despite the impact of U.S. sanctions on the Iranian economy and the discontent among the citizenry, there has been no legitimate challenge to the country's theocracy. In fact, the tension between the United States and Iran may drag on, which would require both regional and international players to permanently remain on alert. For example, due to Iran's proximity to its borders, Russia has a vested interest in the state of affairs in Western Asia; it has tried its best to contain the impact that the U.S.-Iranian crisis could have on its own national security. As a result, the foreign policy Russia has applied toward the crisis can be divided into three main areas of focus.
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| Heavy rain leaves scores dead in Nepal, India, Bangladesh Posted: 14 Jul 2019 04:35 AM PDT  Flooding and landslides triggered by heavy rainfall have killed at least 50 people in Nepal in the past few days, with more deaths reported across the border in India and Bangladesh, officials said Sunday. At least 30 other people were missing in Nepal, either swept away by swollen rivers or buried by mudslides since monsoon rains began pounding the region on Friday, Nepal's National Emergency Operation Center said.
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| T-Mobile is outpacing the rest of the Big Four US carriers on value, loyalty, and satisfaction — here's what consumers say is most important when selecting a mobile provider (TMUS, S, VZ, T) Posted: 12 Jul 2019 06:02 PM PDT  Business Insider Intelligence evaluates which features are most important to consumers when selecting a mobile provider.
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| Radical Democrats demonize Border Patrol and ICE Posted: 12 Jul 2019 07:43 PM PDT  The left plays politics at House Oversight Committee on immigration; reaction from immigration attorney Gunther Sanabria, former NYPD Commissioner Bernie Kerik and Republican Congressman Sean Duffy.
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