Society's Child
Passengers have spoken of their shock after a man set himself alight at Rome's main airport.
The 19-year-old man, from the Ivory Coast, doused himself in petrol and set himself on fire in front of dozens of travellers and workers at Fiumicino airport, 10 miles west of the Italian capital.
Police said he arrived at the departures area of the airport's terminal three with a deportation order, and had been due to leave Italy.
But as he spoke to police he suddenly pulled out a plastic bottle of petrol, tipped it over himself and ran off through the terminal.
Officers gave chase, but he then used a lighter to ignite the fuel in front of stunned passengers.
In the first three quarters of 2012, more than 1,100 Americans renounced their citizenship and made their homes elsewhere, according to the Federal Register. Available data does not yet include those who left in the fourth quarter, but it is on track to surpass the 1,781 Americans who relinquished their passports in 2011. And the number of Americans who ditched the US in 2011 was seven times higher than those who left in 2008.
With 6 million US citizens living abroad and continuing to pay US taxes, expatriates increasingly abandon their citizenship for the sake of saving cash. The US is the only industrialized country that requires its overseas citizens to pay income taxes - even if their income is generated abroad.
And for wealthy expatriates, the financial consequences of remaining a US citizen are most severe. Individuals earning more than $400,000 a year and married couples earning more than $450,000 a year will be paying an income tax rate of 39.6 percent - which is up from last year's rate of 35 percent.
Russia's RIA Novosti citing pan-Arab Al Mayadeen TV reported earlier that 45 people have been kidnapped.
At the same time RT's Arabic correspondent reports from Syria that there were 48 people in the vehicle. He also denied reports that appeared hours after the attack that all people involved have been freed.
© Reutrers / Thomas Peter
Eleven suspects were detained in an operation by Europol and Spanish police, police reported on Wednesday. A 27-year-old Russian who allegedly created and distributed the virus was detained in the United Arab Emirates in December, while on vacation. Ten others were detained in Spain last week, including Russians, Ukrainians and Georgians, Spanish police said.
"This is the first major success of its kind against a very new phenomenon that we have only identified in the last two years," Europol Director Rob Wainwright said at a news conference at the Spanish Interior Ministry in Madrid.
The cyber-gang used so-called 'ransomware,' a type of malware that locks down an infected computer until a ransom is paid. This particular operation targeted users with false accusations from national and international police forces, and occasionally organizations defending copyright holders. A message would demand payment of a fine of 100 euro ($134) over alleged wrongdoings, including searching for child pornography, visiting terrorist websites and illegal file-sharing.
© RIA Novosti/NewsTeam/Abdula Magomedov
The initial blast killed three policemen, while the fourth died from his injuries in a hospital hours later. One person remains unaccounted for. The body of the suicide bomber was so badly damaged by the explosion that "nothing's left of him," a source told Interfax news agency.
Police estimated the yield of the explosive device to be about 100 kilograms of TNT. The blast left a crater 1.5 meters deep and 4 meters in diameter, and badly damaged a checkpoint building.
Hours after the explosion, local security forces spotted a gang of militants that may have been connected to the suicide bombing. The gang was cornered near a local village.
Six militants were eliminated following the attack, RIA Novosti reported.
© J. MILES CARY
Shell casings are marked in front of 3941 Porter Ave. after a shooting Wednesday in East Knoxville.
Shell casings are marked in front of 3941 Porter Ave. after a shooting Wednesday in East Knoxville.
Marcia Crider of Washington Avenue in Knoxville died Wednesday at the University of Tennessee Medical Center, according to Knoxville Police Department spokesman Darrell DeBusk.
Crider was 13 weeks pregnant, DeBusk said.
"The District Attorney's office said 13 weeks would not represent a viable fetus and would not support a second murder charge," DeBusk said this morning.
Crider's mother drove her to a nearby pay phone to call E-911 immediately after the attack, which was reported shortly before 11 a.m.
© AFP Photo
With the ship and its passengers still at sea being towed to safety, news of the Carnival Triumph's previous woes will increase pressure on the company, but a spokesman insisted the two sets of problems were unrelated.
"Carnival Triumph previously experienced an electrical issue with one of the ship's alternators," spokesman Vance Gulliksen told AFP.
"Repairs were conducted by the alternator supplier and were fully completed on February 2. There is no evidence at this time of any relationship between this previous issue and the fire that occurred on February 10."
Carnival said it has canceled several upcoming sailings of the stricken Triumph, which is being towed to a US port three days after finding itself adrift following Sunday's mishap.
© Photo: Johannes Eisele, AFP/Getty Images
Oscar Pistorius competes in the London 2012 Olympic Games. He was charged with murder on Tursday for allegedly shooting his girlfriend at his home.
Oscar Pistorius competes in the London 2012 Olympic Games. He was charged with murder on Tursday for allegedly shooting his girlfriend at his home.
Representatives for Pistorius in South Africa and the United Kingdom could not immediately be reached for comment by USA TODAY Sports.
Earlier, multiple media outlets in the country, including the Mail & Guardian and the South African Press Agency, citing local police, said the woman, 30, died at the scene at the athlete's house in Pretoria. The original source of the report appears to be Beeld, an Afrikaans-language daily newspaper. Local radio also reported on the fatal shooting.
23-year-old Robert Kresky was killed on December 4th. Police said they saw Kresky driving a stolen vehicle near Powers Boulevard and Astrozon Drive and he refused to pull over. Officers chased him for about five miles, and the pursuit ended when Kresky crashed with a police car. Police said Kresky was shot during a foot chase after he got out of the car and started running.
Kresky's family told KRDO NewsChannel 13 on Wednesday that they still have many unanswered questions. The family said they've been told police thought Kresky was armed, but no weapon was found.
Controversial conservative Christian leader Pat Robertson told viewers on Tuesday that Islam is not a religion but a demonic political and economic system with only a religious veneer.
Right Wing Watch reports that Pat Robertson, an influential leader in the US right-wing evangelical movement, passed judgement on Islam during an episode of his TV program "The 700 Club," in which he was responding to a news story about the war in Mali.
According to Right Wing Watch, Robertson, referring to Islam as religion of chaos, said:
"Every time you look up - these are angry people, it's almost like it's demonic that is driving them to kill and to maim and to destroy and to blow themselves up," Robertson said of Islam. "It's a religion of chaos... I hardly think to call it a religion, it's more of - well, it's an economic and political system with a religious veneer."
