On the afternoon of December 21, 2007, twelve jurors filed into a Boulder courtroom, ready to issue their verdict for the city's most sensational trial in years.

Over the previous two weeks, these jurors and everyone else in the packed courtroom had heard all about the very short life of Jason Jay Midyette. On February 24, 2006, the eleven-week-old had been rushed to Children's Hospital in Denver, where doctors had found him damaged almost beyond comprehension, with dozens of broken bones and a massive head injury that had left him comatose. Jason never regained consciousness; he died a week later, the victim of what the county coroner would rule a homicide.

Jason's death captured headlines in Colorado and beyond - not just because of the horrific nature of his passing, but because of his parents: Alex and Molly Midyette, the son and daughter-in-law of J. Nold Midyette, a wealthy architect and Boulder real-estate mogul. And as more than a year passed without any charges being filed, without any new details emerging, people began to wonder if in Boulder, a city still haunted by the ghost of JonBenét Ramsey, justice could be bought and sold.

But in May 2007, a Boulder grand jury indicted both Alex and Molly for child abuse resulting in death. Molly was the first to go to trial. She'd sat in the courtroom as doctors testified that they were struck by how long Jason's parents waited before they sought help, as social workers and police officers described an uncooperative family that seemed to care more about its own well-being than the child's.

Finally, Molly had taken the stand - the only witness called by her lawyer, superstar Denver defense attorney Craig Truman. She didn't know anything was wrong with Jason until it was apparently too late, she told the court. She didn't know how to explain all the damage inflicted on her baby, the brain contusion and the broken bones. "I have no idea," the emotional 29-year-old law-school graduate said. "I can't explain any of them."

A bomb squad recovered the bodies of two more people Saturday who had been missing after a fireworks storage bunker blast in Hawaii, bringing the death toll to five, officials said.

The blast near the Waikele Business Center at a former military bunker where fireworks were warehoused occurred Friday, killing three people and leaving two the others missing.

The bodies of the two missing men were found Saturday, Honolulu Fire Department Capt. Gary Lum told The Associated Press.

Officials said the bunker burned throughout the day Friday and had been too hot and unstable to enter.

A police robot searched the facility Saturday to see whether explosions had stopped and whether the temperature had dropped low enough for rescuers to risk going in, Lum said.

"It wasn't as hot as yesterday but it was still warm. The bomb team went in ... in protective equipment and they were able to retrieve one victim at a time," he said.

Highly radioactive water filling an underground trench at the troubled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant are expected on Sunday to be moved to a nearby storage inside the No. 2 reactor turbine building, local media reported.

The water inside the basement of the No. 2 reactor turbine building and the trench connected to it is highly contaminated because it is believed to be originating from the No. 2 reactor core, where fuel rods have partially melted, Kyodo News reported.

The water in the trench is planned to be moved to a "condenser" inside the No. 2 reactor turbine building. The condenser has a capacity to store 3,000 tons of liquid.

Shots rang out in a suburban Philadelphia social hall where a teenage party was being held, killing two people and sending eight others to hospitals, authorities said Saturday.

Police in Chester, where a state of emergency was declared last summer because of crime concerns, said a suspect was taken into custody after officers were called to the Minaret Temple No. 174 around 11:30 p.m. Friday and found "numerous victims."

Police said nine people were transported to Crozer Chester Medical Center, where a spokesman said one died soon afterward and another died Saturday afternoon. Four other victims remained in stable condition, and three had been discharged, the spokesman said. A 10th person was treated at Taylor Hospital and was released.

The social hall had been rented for a party, and many teenagers were present when the shots were fired, police said. Detectives were investigating the cause of the shooting and declined to release further information. A man answering the phone at the hall said he had come in to see the condition of the building but declined to comment further.

The Delaware County Daily Times newspaper said neighbors and community leaders planned a candlelight vigil at the scene Saturday night.

The RCMP has confirmed that one of its officers used a Taser to subdue an 11-year-old boy after a stabbing in Prince George, B.C.

Police used the electrical stun weapon after responding to a 911 call about an incident at a home in the city at about 5:30 p.m. PT Thursday.

After officers arrived at the residence, "police confirmed that a 37-year-old male had been allegedly stabbed by an 11-year-old male," RCMP Supt. Brenda Butterworth-Carr, commander of the Prince George detachment, said in a statement Friday.

Butterworth-Carr said officers located the young suspect at a nearby property.

"Efforts were made to get the individual out of the house, and when he emerged from the home, a Conducted Energy Weapon was deployed by a member," Butterworth-Carr said.

The police statement provided no details about what led police to use the stun gun.

You may not have noticed it when you opened up your paycheck last month, but you just took a pay cut.

Wages in America are flattening as inflation surges, therefore real income growth is actually negative, according to the latest data from the Labor Department.

Average hourly earnings in March were flat compared to the previous month for the second time in a row. On an annual basis, income increased by just 1.7 percent.

Meanwhile, consumer price index data released two weeks from now could show a jump in prices of as much as 2.6 percent year-over-year, according to an estimate from the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ.

"Higher gas and food prices are being reflected in headline inflation and we have seen the end of growth in real earnings for some time," said Ellen Beeson Zentner, Senior U.S. Macro Economist at the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, in a note after the report release.

What in the world is going on over in Japan? The Japan nuclear crisis seems to get worse with each passing day. Right now environmental activists all over the world are beginning to have grave concerns about the lasting damage to the environment that is going to be caused by all of this radiation. Sadly, this crisis has already become worse than Chernobyl. Chernobyl was a nightmare, but it only burned for 10 days. The authorities in Japan are telling us that the nuclear crisis at Fukushima could go on for "weeks" or "months". There is no telling just how many millions of people will have serious health problems as a result of all this. Meanwhile, many environmentalists are seriously proposing that we should build more nuclear plants as a way to "save the environment". It is as if people simply cannot learn.

Now the Japanese authorities are telling us that 11,500 tons of "moderately radioactive" water is going to be purposely released into the Pacific Ocean.

Are they nuts?

Have they completely lost their minds?

Now that nearly a month has gone by since the horrific tsunami in Japan on March 11th, it is starting to become clear just how much economic damage has been done. The truth is that the Japanese economy is in much bigger trouble than most people think. This is almost certainly going to be the most expensive disaster in Japanese history. The tsunami that struck Japan on March 11th swept up to 6 miles inland, destroying virtually everything in the way. Thousands upon thousands of Japanese were killed and entire cities were wiped off the map. Yes, Japan is a resilient nation, but exactly how does a nation that is already drowning in debt replace dozens of cities and towns that are suddenly gone? The truth is that thousands of square miles have been more completely destroyed than if they had been bombed by a foreign military force. The loss of homes, cars, businesses and personal wealth is almost unimaginable. It is going to take many years to rebuild the roads, bridges, rail systems, ports, power lines and water systems that were lost. Nobody is quite sure when the rolling blackouts are going to end, and nobody is quite sure when all of the damaged manufacturing facilities are going to be fully brought back online.

On top of everything else, the nuclear crisis at Fukushima never seems to end. In fact, it seems to get worse with each passing day.

According to the Los Angeles Times, it has now been announced that seawater off the coast of Japan near the Fukushima facility was recently found to contain 7.5 million times the legal limit of radioactive iodine....

The operator of Japan's stricken Fukushima nuclear plant said Tuesday that it had found radioactive iodine at 7.5 million times the legal limit in a seawater sample taken near the facility, and government officials imposed a new health limit for radioactivity in fish.

Fukushima, Japan - The Japanese government has issued the evacuation order on March 12 for the residents living within the 20 kilometer radius of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.

Since then, residents have left their homes, and the "no man land" has been out of touch with the rest of the world.

A Japanese journalist, Tetsuo Jimbo, ventured through the evacuation zone last Sunday, and filed the following video report.

He says that, inside the evacuation zone, homes,building, roads and bridges, which were torn down by Tsunami, are left completely untouched, and the herd of cattle and pet dogs, left behind by the owners, wonders around the town while the radiation level remains far beyond legal limits.

A German deputy environment minister said the government would phase out all nuclear power in the country before 2020, taking a hard line stance that may not be reflective of the centre-right coalition.

"A decision has been taken to shut down eight plants before the end of this year and they definitely won't be reactivated. And the remaining nine will be shut down by the end of the decade," Juergen Becker told Reuters on Monday.

"Japan has shown that even if there is a miniscule occurrence, the residual risk is too high to justify the continuation of nuclear power (...) It is better to go for other energy services in a civilised country," he said.

A phase out could cost the four big utility companies RWE RWG.DE, E.ON (EONGn.DE: Quote), EnBW (EBKG.DE: Quote) and Vattenfall [VATN.UL] hundreds of millions of euros in lost profits every year.