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FBI: Hammers, clubs kill more people than rifles, shotguns


CBS DC
Sun, 06 Jan 2013 11:09 UTC
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© Photo by Scott Olson/Getty ImagesHammers, clubs and other blunt objects are linked in more murders than rifles or shotguns, according to annual FBI statistics.
Annual FBI crime statistics show that more people are killed with clubs and hammers each year than by rifles or shotguns.

In 2011, there were 323 murders committed with a rifle but 496 murders committed with hammers and clubs. There were 356 murders in which a shotgun was the deadly weapon of choice.

The national debate on guns has grown more intense since Dec. 14, when Adam Lanza forced his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., and killed 20 children and six adults before committing suicide in one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history.

Gun vendors told news outlets that the hottest items were such weapons as the AR-15, a semiautomatic rifle that Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., has proposed banning as part of a package of gun regulations. The AR-15 rifle is the same weapon used by Lanza during the elementary school shooting.
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Pistol

Police kill gunman, find 3 more dead in Aurora, Colorado, home, 4 miles from July 2012 movie theater mass shooting

P. Solomon Banda
Huffington Post
Sun, 06 Jan 2013 06:22 UTC
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© REUTERS/Evan SemonPolice continue their investigation outside a townhouse complex following an overnight hostage-taking incident in Aurora, Colorado January 5, 2013.
Aurora, Colorado - SWAT officers who stormed a Colorado home where a gunman had holed up found a horrific scene - four dead bodies including that of the gunman.

Police said the armed man fired shots at officers Saturday from a second-story window before officers killed him. Once inside, they found the bodies of three other adults.

The suspect, whose name was withheld by police, held officers at bay for nearly six hours after neighbors reported gunfire at 3 a.m. inside the modest townhome in the Denver suburb of Aurora, said police Sgt. Cassidee Carlson.

It wasn't known if officers shot the suspect or if he shot himself.
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Cell Phone

2 Greensburg teens charged under new law regulating sexting


CBS News Pittsburgh
Thu, 03 Jan 2013 08:32 UTC
texting
© Unknown
Greensburg - Two Greensburg Salem Middle School students are among the first to be charged under a new state law that regulates sexting among teens.

"A 13-year-old girl took a photo; she was naked from the waist up, took a picture of herself and sent it to a 14-year-old boy at his request," said Detective Sgt. Henry Fontana, of Greensburg Police.

The boy deleted the photo and did not forward it to friends. It was the girl's mother who later found the photo on her phone and called police.

"Under the new law that just went into effect on Christmas Eve, that is a summary offense," said Detective Sgt. Fontana.

The new law creates a tiered system for adjudicating sexting cases that differentiates between those who make bad decisions and those who have bad intentions.

Under the new law, minors over the age of 12 charged for the first time will get a summary citation. A second offense will result in a misdemeanor charge.
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Apple Red

Federal food stamp program spent record $80.4B in FY 2012

Patrick Burke
cnsnews.com
Fri, 04 Jan 2013 00:00 UTC
food stamps
© The Associated Press
During fiscal year 2012, the U.S. government spent a record $80.4 billion on food stamps, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), a $2.7 billion increase from FY 2011. (Fiscal year 2012 ran from Oct. 1, 2011 through Sept. 30, 2012.)

According to the Monthly Treasury Statement that summarizes the receipts and outlays of the federal government, $80,401,000,000 went towards SNAP during FY 2012, which was a $2.7 billion increase from $77,637,000,000 in FY 2011.

The SNAP program is administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which also runs other food assistance programs under the auspices of the Food and Nutrition Service Agency.

In total, nearly $106 billion was spent on food assistance in 2012, with $18.3 billion that went to "Child Nutrition Programs."
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Penis Pump

Honduran ambassador sacked over Christmas orgy


RT
Sun, 06 Jan 2013 03:18 UTC
scandal
© AFP/Olivier Laban-Mattei
Following a wild Christmas orgy with prostitutes, the Honduran ambassador to Colombia has lost his job. Sensitive documents are believed to have been compromised after the women and other guests looted the embassy in Bogota.

­The embassy was robbed while party-goers were entertained by prostitutes. The incident was so extreme that excrement was found in the ambassador's office.

Ambassador Carlos Humberto Rodriguez was allegedly not present at the celebration held on 20 December.

Local media reports that the ambassador's personal aid organized the party which resulted in computers and telephones being stolen. Evidence of an orgy was found in the building.
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People

Euros discarded as impoverished Greeks resort to bartering

Helena Smith
Guardian
Wed, 02 Jan 2013 09:43 UTC
bartering market
© Despoina Vafeidou /AFP/Getty ImagesStall-holders at a bartering market in the central Greek city of Volos, where shoppers use Tem coupons to exchange services or products.
Communities set up local currencies and exchange networks in attempt to beat the economic crisis

It's been a busy day at the market in downtown Volos. Angeliki Ioanitou has sold a decent quantity of olive oil and soap, while her friend Maria has done good business with her fresh pies.

But not a single euro has changed hands - none of the customers on this drizzly Saturday morning has bothered carrying money at all. For many, browsing through the racks of second-hand clothes, electrical appliances and homemade jams, the need to survive means money has been usurped.

"It's all about exchange and solidarity, helping one another out in these very hard times," enthused Ioanitou, her hair tucked under a floppy felt cap. "You could say a lot of us have dreams of a utopia without the euro."
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Video

Ohio police press public for details on teen rape


Voice of America
Sat, 05 Jan 2013 04:25 UTC
Police probing rape accusations against two teenage American football players have launched a website aimed at gaining information about an unverified video that purports to show the rape of an adolescent girl.

The site, sponsored by city officials in Steubenville, Ohio, was unveiled Saturday, just days after an online video surfaced that purportedly shows a third young male joking about the crime and the victim.

The video, which has inflamed the community and drawn national attention, appears to have been released by hackers who allege more suspects were involved in the crime who should face prosecution.

Two members of the local high school football team face trial as juveniles in the case, which is set to open February 13. It is not yet clear whether others will also face charges.
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Airplane

3 dead as plane crashes into Florida house; homeowner OK

Michael Winter
USA Today
Fri, 04 Jan 2013 10:24 UTC
Pilot of Knoxville-bound aircraft reported plane was shaking.


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© The Associated Press / Bob Self/The Florida Times-UnionA pilot and two passengers died Friday afternoon when their Beechcraft crashed into a home in Palm Coast, Fla., while trying to make an emergency landing at the Flagler County Airport. The homeowner escaped unharmed.
Three people aboard a Tennessee-bound plane died Friday afternoon when their crippled aircraft plunged into a home on Florida's northeast coast, federal authorities said. The homeowner escaped unharmed.

The single-engine Beechcraft Bonanza BE35, built in 1957, was headed to Downtown Island Airport in Knoxville, Tenn., when the pilot reported a mechanical problem about 2:10 p.m. ET, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement. The pilot was attempting to land at the Flagler County Airport but crashed minutes later into the home, in a wooded subdivision of Palm Coast, less than a mile from the runway.

The plane's silver tail was visible through the burned wreckage of the ranch-style house.

Fire engines had been dispatched to the airport for what was expected to be an emergency landing, Flagler County Fire Chief Don Petito told The Daytona Beach News-Journal.

The Florida Highway Patrol told FlaglerLive, which broke the news, that the pilot had reported that the plane's engine was "shaking violently" and that his last transmission mentioned smoke. FlaglerLive has a photo of the crash and what it says is the plane under a previous owner.

The identities of the pilot and two passenger have not been released.
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Pistol

Update: Four dead in townhouse shooting in Aurora, Colorado

Keith Coffman
Reuters
Sat, 05 Jan 2013 04:26 UTC
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© Reuters/Evan SemonAn unidentified woman reacts outside a townhouse complex following an overnight hostage-taking incident in Aurora, Colorado January 5, 2013.
A gunman who barricaded himself inside a townhouse after killing three people in the home was shot to death by police on Saturday in Aurora, Colorado, the same Denver suburb where 12 people were slain in a movie house massacre last July, police said.

The gunman and his three victims, as well as a woman who fled safely from the home at the outset of the violence and alerted authorities, were all believed to be related to one another, police spokeswoman Cassidee Carlson said.

But the motive for the killings was not immediately understood.

"We're trying to find out what set this guy off," she told Reuters.

A hostage-negotiation team called to the scene had sought to talk the suspect into surrendering for about five hours before police moved to shoot tear gas into the home at about 8:00 a.m. (10:00 a.m. EST/1500 GMT), prompting the gunman to open fire on officers from inside, police said.

About an hour later, the gunman began firing at police again from a second-floor window, and police returned fire, killing the suspect, according to a police statement following the incident. No police were wounded.

Officers entering the townhouse found the bodies of the gunman and three other people - two men and a woman - who were presumed to have been shot hours earlier before police were called to the scene.

"None of the officers heard gunshots until they were directed at us at about 8 o'clock," Carlson said. The woman who escaped the home also told police the victims were shot before she fled.

The names of the gunman and his three victims were being withheld until the coroner could confirm their identities and notify next of kin, authorities said.
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Arrow Down

Home sellers can keep murders, suicides secret

Sam Wood
Philly.com
Thu, 03 Jan 2013 13:42 UTC
Amityville House
© Philly.comThis Dutch Colonial in Amityville,on the South Shore of Long Island, better known as the Amityville Horror house. Ronald DeFeo, Jr. shot and killed six members of his family at the house.
Planning on buying a house this year?

If you're even slightly squeamish, get ready to do some extra detective work.

If the property was the site of bloody crime, the seller does not have to divulge that scrap of information.

In a decision handed up in Pennsylvania last week, a panel of Superior Court judges reaffirmed that the sordid reputation of a home - no matter how gruesome - does not count as "material defect" and does not have to be disclosed to the buyer.

"The fact that a murder once occurred in a house falls into that category of homebuyer concerns best left to caveat emptor" - let the buyer beware, the court wrote.

For those of you shopping on the other side of the Delaware River, the same rules apply in New Jersey.

Janet S. Milliken bought a 14-year-old Delaware County McMansion in 2007 from Kathleen and Joseph Jacono. The Jaconos had spent $450,000 to buy the Thornton property at auction in April and flipped it, selling it to Milliken in August for $610,000, according to court records.

In September, Milliken learned her new home had been the site of a murder-suicide the previous year.
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