‘It wasn’t a big deal’: secret deposition reveals how a child molester priest was shielded by his church

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Lawrence Hecker pleaded the fifth 117 times as he detailed how the Catholic church protected him for more than two decades after he admitted to molesting children

Longtime New Orleans Catholic priest Lawrence Hecker received a special honor from the Vatican nearly 25 years ago despite having confessed to molesting children. Then, for another two decades, church leaders in the city strategically shielded him from law enforcement and media exposure – while also providing him with financial support ranging from paid limousine rides and therapeutic massages to full retirement benefits, according to his own, previously unreported testimony.

A sworn deposition Hecker gave in private in 2020 shows exactly how high-placed Catholic church officials in New Orleans let him keep his elevated position for years, even after they had been advised to oust him from the clergy and – much later – publicly acknowledged that he was a child predator.

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Rafah: UN says 80,000 have fled Gaza city as Israeli strikes intensify – BBC.com

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  1. Rafah: UN says 80,000 have fled Gaza city as Israeli strikes intensify  BBC.com
  2. Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, looming Rafah invasion, Gaza devastation  CNN
  3. Palestinian Kids in Rafah Can't “Evacuate” Safely: UNICEF  The Intercept
  4. Palestinians flee chaos and panic in Rafah after Israel's seizure of border crossing  Yahoo! Voices
  5. Israel’s war on Gaza live: Aid operation ‘completely crippled’ amid attacks | Israel War on Gaza News  Al Jazeera English
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‘We were encouraged to be with younger boys’: breaking down a child molester priest’s secret testimony

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In unearthed deposition, Lawrence Hecker pleaded the fifth 117 times, but still provided damning details of decades-long predatory behavior

The Guardian and CBS affiliate WWL Louisiana have obtained a long suppressed, eight-and-a-half-hour deposition of a 92-year-old Catholic priest charged with physically overpowering and raping a boy in a New Orleans church in 1975.

Taken in 2020 as part of a civil lawsuit demanding damages from him and the church, clergyman Lawrence Hecker provides in the deposition the most complete account yet of how the US’s second-oldest archdiocese spent much of its recent history taking extreme measures to keep the public from finding out about his abusive past. The questioning – which the church has fought in court for years to keep hidden – also reveals steps the city’s last four archbishops took to help him avoid accountability for decades.

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Jim Chalmers flags cost of living help for job seekers in federal budget

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‘There is more than one way to help people who are on income support,’ treasurer says when suggesting rebates and concessions could be boosted

The federal government is poised to expand rebates and concessions available to job seekers in next week’s federal budget, which is also expected to increase rent assistance.

The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, has confirmed that Tuesday’s budget will not increase the jobseeker payment but suggested it would boost concessions linked to social security payments, among a suite of measures designed to offer cost-of-living relief without pushing up inflation.

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Taylor Swift debuts new tracks as she returns to The Eras Tour

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Pop star thrills Paris crowds with songs from newest album The Tortured Poets Department

Taylor Swift has added her newest album, The Tortured Poets Department, to an already packed setlist as she returned to The Eras Tour after a two-month break.

Swift had described TTPD as “new works reflecting events, opinions and sentiments from a fleeting and fatalistic moment in time – one that was both sensational and sorrowful in equal measure”. In Paris on Thursday night she put it more succinctly: “Female rage, the musical.”

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FBI warns of efforts by China, Russia, Iran to influence election – The Hill

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  1. FBI warns of efforts by China, Russia, Iran to influence election  The Hill
  2. In Arizona, election workers trained with deepfakes to prepare for 2024  The Washington Post
  3. FBI warns that foreign adversaries could use AI to spread disinformation about US elections  Detroit News
  4. AI's Capacity to Spoil Elections Could Be Harder to Detect  Bloomberg
  5. How Arizona election workers are preparing for November  CBS News
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Starmer to rip up Rwanda scheme and fund new anti-smuggling unit

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Labour leader to promise to divert £75m to fund specialist force against smugglers using counter-terror powers

Keir Starmer will promise to rip up the government’s Rwanda scheme and divert £75m to fund hundreds of new specialist officers to tackle people-smuggling with new counter-terror powers.

At a speech on Friday in Dover – the home of Natalie Elphicke, who defected to Labour this week after criticising Tory failures on border security – the Labour leader will call the government’s plan “an insult to anyone’s intelligence” and say “the gangs that run this sick trade are not easily fooled”.

Create a new post of border security commander to oversee the unit, working across Europe and with multiple agencies on enforcement and intelligence.

Recruit hundreds of additional special investigators, intelligence agents and cross-border police officers.

Expand stop and search powers for use against those suspected of people-smuggling.

Use Serious Crime Prevention Orders, enforced on terrorists pre-conviction, to shut off the bank accounts and internet access of suspected smugglers.

Extend seizure warrant powers normally reserved for terrorism to include organised immigration crime.

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Starmer’s Home Office immigration plan does not answer call for safe routes

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Plans for head of border security with access to home secretary will not satisfy all critics of Labour’s immigration policies

Keir Starmer’s border plans, announced after a giddy week of political triumphs, attempt to address some of the deep structural problems within the Home Office.

Paid for with £75m from the existing budget for the Rwanda scheme, the plans echo recommendations handed to Priti Patel two years ago: employ a single border security head who is given direct access to the home secretary.

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Biden officials propose denying some migrants earlier in asylum process

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New rule would restrict access sooner for people deemed to pose ‘national security or public safety risk’

The Biden administration on Thursday proposed a new rule that it said would streamline asylum processing at the southern border by quickly denying certain migrants deemed to “pose a national security or public safety risk”.

The proposed rule would allow immigration officials to reject and deport migrants who are already ineligible for asylum at an earlier stage in the process, a change administration officials said would enhance national security and save taxpayer dollars.

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Talk to the hand: Hawaii makes shaka state’s official gesture

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Made by extending the thumb and little finger, while curling down the three middle fingers the sign is also known as ‘hang loose’

The shaka is poised to become Hawaii’s official hand gesture.

Last week, Hawaiian lawmakers passed a bill that would officially enshrine the gesture in the state’s culture. The shaka, also popular in surf culture and commonly known as “hang loose” is a friendly hand signal made by extending the thumb and little finger while curling the three middle fingers.

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A Ukrainian Sport Plane Drone Just Flew 800 Miles Into Russia To Blow Up An Oil Refinery – Forbes

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  1. A Ukrainian Sport Plane Drone Just Flew 800 Miles Into Russia To Blow Up An Oil Refinery  Forbes
  2. Why Ukraine Should Keep Striking Russian Oil Refineries  Foreign Affairs Magazine
  3. Ukraine updates: Oil facility hit 1,200 km inside Russia – DW – 05/09/2024  DW (English)
  4. Ukraine Strikes Russian Oil Facilities, Including One Far Over the Border  The New York Times
  5. Ukraine-Russia war live: Ukraine strikes refinery 746 miles inside Russia  The Telegraph
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A Foiled Assassination Plot in Ukraine; Russia Marks World War II Victory : State of the World from NPR – NPR

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  1. A Foiled Assassination Plot in Ukraine; Russia Marks World War II Victory : State of the World from NPR  NPR
  2. Ukraine’s Zelenskyy fires head of state guard over assassination plot  Al Jazeera English
  3. Ukraine Says It Foiled Russian Plot to Kill Zelensky  The New York Times
  4. Zelenskiy dismisses head of state guard after two members accused of assassination plot  Reuters
  5. Ukraine detains two over alleged Zelenskyy assassination plot  Semafor
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Brazil floods: horse stranded on roof is rescued as death toll rises to 107 people

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Animal dubbed ‘Caramelo’ was trapped for days, balancing on two strips of slippery asbestos after flooding hit the Porto Alegre area

Emergency workers have rescued a horse that had been trapped for days on a rooftop after severe floods in southern Brazil, as the death toll from the disaster rose to 107 people.

The animal, dubbed Caramelo on social media, had been balancing on two narrow strips of slippery asbestos in Canoas, a city in the Porto Alegre metropolitan area that is one of the hardest-hit areas in the state, much of which has been isolated by floodwaters.

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