Death of student gang-raped by six men and thrown from a moving bus in Delhi two weeks ago prompts mass protests

Indian police have charged six men with murder, hours after a woman who was gang-raped and thrown from a moving bus in Delhi nearly two weeks ago died in a Singapore hospital.

Police spokesman Rajan Bhagat said the men could face the death penalty if convicted. Officials said that authorities would press for the harshest possible punishment.

The announcement came as thousands of Indians gathered to mourn and protest the death of the 23-year-old medical student. The woman, who has not been named, sustained serious internal injuries after being violated with an iron bar during the attack, which took place on 16 December and triggered mass demonstrations calling for better protection for women against sexual violence.

She died late on Friday in the Singapore hospital where she was being treated.

Her family had been keeping a bedside vigil after she suffered severe organ failure. She was flown to Singapore from India two days ago as her condition worsened.

Authorities in India reacted with statements of grief, calls for calm and a huge security operation.

Police suspect that a casino worker killed a 10-year-girl before going to a Las Vegas resort and allegedly slashing the face of a co-worker with razor blades.

The search for Jade Morris ended Friday afternoon when officials confirmed that it was her body that was found a day earlier in an undeveloped housing tract.

The Clark County coroner's office said she died of multiple stab wounds,

Jade was last seen Dec. 21 with family friend Brenda Stokes Wilson, who picked her up to go Christmas shopping.

Wilson, 50, returned the car she had borrowed for the outing to a friend two hours later. Jade never came back. Investigators later found blood on the driver's door and steering wheel of the 2007 Saab sedan.

Later that night, Wilson was wrestled to the ground with razors in each hand after allegedly slashing the face of a female co-worker at the Bellagio casino.

A judge raised her bail to $60,000 from $600,000 Friday morning after she was identified as the prime suspect in the child's killing.

"It's no secret the defendant is the suspect in the murder of 10-year-old Jade Morris," prosecutor Robert Daskas told Senior Clark County District Court Judge Joseph Bonaventure at the hearing.

After a long lasting legal battle Belgium prosecutors demand to label the Church of Scientology as a criminal organization and charge it and its leaders with extortion, fraud, privacy breaches, and the illegal practice of medicine.

The subpoenas have been sent to the scientologists, the local financial newspaper De Tijd reported.

The charges against the Church of Scientology stem from employment contracts issued to recruit volunteers and members allegedly breaching the country's strict employment laws. In Belgium as in some other countries Scientology is not recognized as a faith.

In 2008 the Belgium Labor Mediation Service complained about number of labor contracts, prompting an investigation.

A judge then ordered raids on Scientology premises where police allegedly "managed to seize a wealth of evidence," that the organization had spied on and extorted money from its members, the Flanders News reported.

Police in Mutare last week arrested a self-proclaimed prophet of the Johane Masowe Apostolic sect who allegedly raped a city woman once under the pretext of exorcising demons.

Alfred Makurumidze (40) of 2514 Chikanga 2 had claimed that the victim, Cecilia Mangwarara (23) had so many demons and other spiritual complications that she needed all night cleansing.

Police confirmed the rape which happened around 6 pm and have urged members of the public to be wary of bogus prophets.

"A rising number of fake prophets raping unsuspecting women are becoming a cause of concern. Women should be very careful when dealing with these people. They should avoid getting into secluded places because they end up being vulnerable. As police we are leaving no stone unturned in thwarting those shameful acts. This is unacceptable," said Manicaland provincial police spokesman, Inspector Enock Chishiri.

On December 17, Mangwarara of 10 Azalia Street in Palmerstone was walking along Magamba road from Chikanga Phase 1 looking for transport to town at around 6 pm.

She met Makurumidze who was clad in Johane Masowe Apostolic church regalia. He told Mangwarara that the spirit had told him that she was having spiritual problems and demons which needed to be "exorcised". He said that he needed all night to cleanse her and make her spiritually pure. He asked the woman to accompany him to his house. She complied and went with him.

Las Vegas - Blood was found inside a car borrowed by a Las Vegas Strip card dealer last seen with a missing 10-year-old girl and later arrested in the razor blade slashing of a co-worker at the posh Bellagio resort, a prosecutor said Friday.

Brenda Stokes Wilson was identified in court Friday as the prime suspect in the slaying, although prosecutor Robert Daskas told a judge that authorities haven't positively identified the girl found dead Thursday in an undeveloped housing tract in North Las Vegas.

"It's no secret the defendant is the suspect in the murder of 10-year-old Jade Morris," Daskas said as he convinced Senior Clark County District Court Judge Joseph Bonaventure to increase Wilson's bail from $60,000 to $600,000 pending the filing of kidnapping and murder charges.

Daskas said a weapon was used in the slaying, but he didn't elaborate.

Clark County Coroner Michael Murphy said it could be Friday afternoon before DNA testing is complete and he can positively say the body is Jade Morris. The girl was last seen by her family Dec. 21, when Wilson picked her up to go Christmas shopping. She never returned.

Wilson, 50, was arrested later that night after she was wrestled to the ground with razors in each hand following a face-slashing attack on a female co-worker, Joyce Rhone, at the Bellagio.

Wilson has been jailed on felony battery with a weapon, burglary and mayhem charges that could get her decades in prison. Police said she has offered no help in the search for the missing girl. Murder and kidnapping charges could get her life in prison without parole or the death penalty.

Wilson stood in court flanked by eight police officers as her lawyer, Tony Liker, clutching a Bible and a copy of the charging documents, asked the judge to postpone arraignment until Wednesday to give him time to meet with Wilson.

Liker declined comment outside court.

Thousands of Canadians are being told that personal information about them held by the government has gone missing.

The federal privacy commissioner's office was notified earlier this month by Human Resources and Development Canada that the data had been lost.

About 5,000 people are believed to be affected and are receiving letters notifying them of the privacy breach and steps they need to take to protect themselves.

A spokeswoman for the privacy commissioner says it's too early to say whether a formal investigation into the incident will be launched.

But the commissioner's office is now working with HRSDC to try and figure out what happened.

The department handles a variety of files including pensions and old age security.

Source: The Canadian Press

The Indian gang-rape victim whose assault in New Delhi triggered nationwide protests died in hospital on Saturday of injuries suffered in the attack, a Singapore hospital treating her said.

The death of the 23-year-old medical student could spawn new protests and possibly fresh confrontations with the police, especially in the Indian capital, which has been the focus of the demonstrations.

"We are very sad to report that the patient passed away peacefully at 4:45 a.m. on Dec 29, 2012 (15:45 a.m. ET Friday). Her family and officials from the High Commission of India were by her side," Mount Elizabeth Hospital Chief Executive Officer Kelvin Loh said in a statement.

The woman, who was severely beaten, raped and thrown out of a moving bus in New Delhi, was flown to Singapore by the Indian government on Wednesday for specialist treatment.

Most rapes and other sex crimes in India go unreported and offenders are rarely punished, women's rights activists say. But the brutality of the assault on December 16 triggered public outrage and demands for better policing and harsher punishment for rapists.

The case has received blanket coverage on cable television news channels. The woman has not been identified but some Indian media have called her "Amanat", an Urdu word meaning "treasure".

When your body passes through the TSA's backscatter X-ray at the airport, dangly bits and all, it's hard not to imagine that somewhere in the backroom, a team of agents is sitting around with a bowl of popcorn and openly critiquing your physique.

"Could use a little more leg work at the gym," one agent cracks to another. "Definitely. And time to lay off the carbs," the other agent retorts as he stuffs a handful of popcorn in his mouth. And not just your body either. Everyone's shape is up for debate in that moving assembly line of radiated boobs and butts.

Of course, the truth is that TSA agents are trained to look for weapons, drugs and other things that should not be boarding a plane, and that's likely where their eyes are focused. After a while they probably stop noticing the bodies that may or may not be attached to these items in the first place.

In most cases anyway. Because as ABC News reports, an anonymous blogger claiming to be a former TSA screener says that while agents in private screening rooms tend to handle themselves professionally, the image operating room is pretty much the high school locker room of your worst nightmares.

Billionaire David Koch's prime political organization, Americans for Prosperity (AFP), having failed in its $125 million quest to oust President Barack Obama, is now aiming at a slightly less sophisticated political target: victims of Hurricane Sandy.

Hurricane Sandy was the second most costly in American history, leaving 100 lives lost, over $50 billion in devastation and tens of thousands of damaged or destroyed homes. Legislative efforts to help those who survived Hurricane Sandy's wrath will reach a major stumbling block.

Earlier this week, AFP, which is chaired by Koch and believed to be financed by several other plutocrats from the New York City region, released a letter warning members of Congress not to vote for the proposed federal aid package for victims of the storm that swept New Jersey, New York City and much of the surrounding area in October. An announcement on the group's website says that the vote next week for the Sandy aid package will be a "key vote" - meaning senators who support sending money for reconstruction could face an avalanche of attack ads in their next election. Already, opposition to the bill is growing, although it passed one procedural hurdle last night.

There is some legitimate criticism with aspects of the legislation, including the fact that some of the money will go to non-Sandy related reconstruction efforts in disaster areas. For AFP, however, the whole bill must die and victims of the storm deserve no help from the government.

Koch's top deputy in New Jersey, a surly gentleman named Steve Lonegan, who heads the local AFP state chapter, called the aid package a "disgrace." "This is not a federal government responsibility," Lonegan told reporters. "We need to suck it up and be responsible for taking care of ourselves."

As the gun-control debate rages in the US teachers are being given free weapons training by lobby groups - but the move has been condemned as a 'horrible, terrible, no-good, rotten idea'.

It is among the latest efforts to arm or train teachers to confront assailants after gunman Adam Lanza killed his mother and then went on a rampage through the elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, killing 20 children and six adults before killing himself.

Nearly 200 teachers in Utah took six hours of free gun training offered by the state's leading gun lobby.

Elementary school teacher Jessica Fiveash, who learned on Thursday how to use a 9 mm Ruger with a laser sight, said: 'If we have the ability to stop something, we should do it.'

In Ohio, a firearms group said it was launching a test program in tactical firearms training for 24 teachers. In Arizona, the attorney geeral is proposing a change to state law that would allow an educator in each school to carry a gun.

The moves to train teachers come after the National Rifle Association proposed placing an armed officer at each of the nation's schools, though some schools already have police officers. Parents and educators have questioned how safe the proposal would keep children and whether it would be economically feasible.