Families of eight women killed confront the Gilgo Beach serial killer: ‘Save a spot in hell’

New York judge imposes life without parole after emotional statements at Rex Heuermann’s sentencing

The families of eight women killed by Rex Heuermann spoke at the Gilgo Beach killer’s sentencing in Riverhead, New York, on Wednesday, more than three decades after the 62-year-old Manhattan architect began his killing spree.

Heuermann pleaded guilty to murdering seven women and admitted to the killing of an eighth victim in April. Just before being sentenced to life in prison without parole on Wednesday for his admitted crimes, Heuermann offered a weak, generalized apology for his actions.

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One-year-old killed and woman injured after Mississippi police shoot at car

Child was fatally shot and his mother’s friend is wounded after Senatobia police responded to shoplifting call

A one-year-old boy is dead and another person wounded after a northern Mississippi police officer shot at a vehicle while responding to a shoplifting call, according to authorities and the child’s grandfather.

Kohen Wiley, the slain child, was in the car at the center of the shooting on Sunday alongside his mother and her friend, said Marquell Bridges, a local community advocate.

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NetJets aircraft crashes on Texas highway, killing one and injuring five

The jet, owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, lost contact with air traffic control and crashed in Laredo

A private jet carrying six people crashed on a highway in Laredo, Texas on Tuesday night, killing one person, local police said.

Videos shared online by the Laredo police department showed the wreckage of the aircraft and firefighters working at the scene. Other footage, shared by the Associated Press, captured the immediate aftermath of the crash, with flames rising from the plane as police and others worked to pull people from it.

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Trump’s Department of Labor claims without data that states defrauded government

Keith Sonderling, acting head of the agency, threatens to withhold administrative funds from states for first time in history

Keith Sonderling sent letters to 53 states and US territories demanding action to “combat waste, fraud, and abuse” within the unemployment insurance program, threatening to withhold administrative funds from states for the first time history.

“We are officially putting governors on notice,” said the acting US secretary of labor. “The American people will no longer tolerate the blatant waste, fraud, and abuse of their hard-earned tax dollars – no state should allow it either. If states allow it, they will suffer the consequences. This department is no longer afraid to use every lever available to ensure taxpayer money is protected.”

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Los Angeles police fatally shoot pet dog of family celebrating Knicks win

Video taken after the shooting shows a woman sobbing over the pet with nearly a dozen officers standing around

Police in California shot and killed a family’s pet dog wearing a New York Knicks jersey after they were called to a report of a screaming woman who turned out to be celebrating the basketball team’s championship win.

Video of the aftermath of Saturday’s shooting of the two-year-old doodle named Jameson, “the sweetest boy in the world”, according to the dog’s owner, received millions of views on TikTok on Tuesday.

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Six people injured in New Jersey acid attack involving suspects on a moped

One minor has been arrested in connection to Monday attack that Jersey City police said ‘appears to be targeted’

Six people in New Jersey were injured in an acid attack involving suspects on a moped.

Jersey City police responded to reports that two suspects riding a moped drove past a group and threw an acidic substance at them on Monday evening, initially injuring five people.

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California’s tectonic systems at highest levels of stress in 1,000 years – study

San Andreas and San Jacinto fault systems in ‘critically loaded state’, increasing chance of ‘big one’ quake in future

Southern California’s San Andreas and San Jacinto fault systems are at their highest levels of tectonic stress in 1,000 years in what scientists describe as a “critically loaded state”, according to a study published earlier this month.

“Our results show that stress levels on multiple fault segments are now at or above the highest values seen in the past millennium and that the region may be capable of a large through-going rupture involving both fault systems,” Liliane Burkhard, the lead author of the study published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, said in a statement.

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US-Iran deal may get oil flowing again, but region’s root problems are unsolved

Few analysts believe final settlement can be reached in 60 days – and even if it is, war and instability could soon return

In much of the Middle East, news that the US and Iran had come to a fragile agreement was greeted with relief tempered with doubt that any deal would resolve the turbulent region’s deep problems or even prevent a future return to war.

In Kuwait, a frequent target of Iranian drone strikes during the 15-week conflict, Iyad Joumma, a 37-year-old Jordanian engineer, spoke for many.

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Eight presumed dead after B-52 bomber crashes at California air force base

B-52 crashed shortly after takeoff at Edwards air force base in southern California’s Mojave Desert, officials say

Eight people are presumed dead after a B-52 bomber crashed shortly after takeoff on Monday morning at a US air force base in California’s Mojave Desert, officials said.

“An Air Force B-52 Stratofortress carrying eight people on a routine test mission crashed today shortly after take-off at 11:20 a.m,” Edwards air force base said in a statement Monday afternoon. “Initial indications are that the crash was not survivable. Emergency response personnel are on scene, and officials are working to account for all personnel.”

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Duck, duck, goal: bird dressed in Mexico’s World Cup jersey scores on social media

Images of Merlin, a two-year-old duck, parading on the streets of Mexico City celebrated by fans on social media

Julián Quiñones and Raúl Jiménez may have scored the goals, but a duck stole the show.

As Mexico celebrated its World Cup-opening victory over South Africa on Thursday, Merlin, a two-year-old duck dressed in the national team’s colors, became an unlikely internet sensation and the tournament’s first unofficial mascot.

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Alaska rules Dan Sullivan cannot run against Dan Sullivan in key Senate race

Elections chief says bid by ex-teacher to challenge senator with same name was filed ‘to confuse or mislead’ voters

There will still be one Dan Sullivan on the ballot, but election officials in Alaska determined a second man by the same name cannot run against him in the high-stakes Senate race.

A man named Dan Sullivan, or Daniel J Sullivan Jr, filed to run as a Republican against incumbent Alaska senator Dan S Sullivan, also a Republican. Republicans filed complaints against the other Dan Sullivan, saying the candidate had coordinated with a Democratic campaign to confuse voters.

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Trump hails Iran deal that fixes nothing except a problem his war caused

Deal will leave things almost exactly as they were before feckless war of choice started

If we get to a Friday signing ceremony without this uncertain new US-Iran deal being derailed by any of its inherent ambiguities, then nuclear talks can finally restart in the same place – and at almost exactly the same point they were before this conflict started.

The world will have irrevocably been changed in other ways. There is no going back for the 120 Iranian children in Minab killed in their primary school in the war’s first hours, nor for their bereaved parents, or any of the thousands in Iran, Lebanon and around the region whose lives were erased or blighted by a feckless war of choice.

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ICE agent shoots at vehicle after being struck by car, officials in New Jersey say

Agent opened fire at car, striking it, as suspect fled scene and has not been located, Stafford Township police say

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent in New Jersey was reportedly struck by a vehicle and shot at the car as it fled the scene on Monday morning, according to local authorities.

The police department of Stafford Township said in a statement that it had been provided with information that ICE “was attempting to apprehend a suspect when the suspect fled from the scene in a vehicle, striking [an ICE agent]”.

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Missouri community mourns death of 11 skydivers in plane crash: ‘It shocked everybody’

Eleven skydivers and a pilot were killed in Sunday crash as aircraft for Skydive Kansas City was taking off in Butler

The Missouri skydiving community is mourning the loss of several of its members after a plane crash south of Kansas City killed 11 skydivers and a pilot.

The crash occurred around noon on Sunday in Butler, Missouri, as an aircraft supporting operations for Skydive Kansas City was taking off, the company said in a statement on Monday, as reported by the local news outlet KCTV.

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US-Iran peace deal hinges on shipping, sanctions relief and deferred nuclear talks

Agreement contains no restrictions on Iran’s ballistic missiles, nor does it call for regime change or surrender

The basic structure of the US-Iran deal reached late on Sunday – a return to the prewar status quo – has been on offer from Iran for more than a month. So has the specific architecture: an immediate unwinding of the consequences of the US-Israeli war through the reopening of the strait of Hormuz and a deferral of the actual negotiations on Iran’s nuclear programme, the ostensible cause of the war. The concept of a 60-day ceasefire to resolve these issues has also been a fixture for more than a month.

But it has taken the mounting pressure on the US and Iranian economies for both sides to recognise politically that a return to all-out war was unlikely to resolve the impasse, and if so, compromises would have to be struck.

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Oil and gas unlikely to return to prewar prices for months even if Hormuz reopens

Markets welcome US-Iran peace deal but prices may stay high as buyers race to refill depleted emergency crude stockpiles

After more than 100 days of the greatest recorded disruption to the world’s energy supplies, the global oil and gas markets have breathed a sigh of relief.

Hours after Donald Trump confirmed that a US-Iran peace deal would lead to the reopening of the strait of Hormuz for tankers carrying millions of barrels of oil and gas, the price of Brent crude tumbled to lows of $82 a barrel. Wholesale gas prices fell about 6%.

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Protesters seek to stop plan to cull hundreds of geese in Alabama

Homeowners association in Madison incites protests and calls for humane solutions after voting to kill geese

A homeowners association in Madison, Alabama, has incited protests and calls for humane wildlife management solutions after voting to kill off hundreds of local geese.

Dozens of people gathered in the city’s Edgewater neighborhood to protest against the non-unanimous plan by the homeowners association (HOA) there to euthanize the Canada geese at Lady Ann Lake by fatally gassing them in a chamber. They called for more humane alternatives such as using horns to scare off the geese or relocating the birds.

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Netanyahu declares victory over Iran – and rules out withdrawal from Lebanon

Preliminary agreement between Washington and Tehran has prompted anger in Israel, and criticism of Netanyahu

Benjamin Netanyahu has hailed a historic victory over Iran and ruled out any immediate withdrawal from Lebanon, saying that Israel’s forces would remain there “for as long as necessary”.

“We established deep security zones around the state of Israel. We did this in Gaza, in Lebanon and in Syria,” the Israeli prime minister said in a televised press conference on Monday. “And I want to make it clear: we will remain in these security zones … to protect our country.”

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Indian outrage over US killing of sailors mounts as leaders attend G7 summit

Relations at lowest ebb in years after Washington refuses to apologise for deaths in strait of Hormuz

Fury has continued to mount in India over the US’s refusal to apologise for the deaths of Indian sailors killed in strikes in the strait of Hormuz, further straining relations between the two countries as their leaders meet at the G7 summit in France this week.

Last week, three Indian seafarers, who were working on board commercial oil tankers, were killed when the US launched missile strikes on the vessel as it sailed through the strait of Hormuz.

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Peace deal between US and Iran announced, with strait of Hormuz expected to reopen

Exact terms of the deal not clear amid differing claims from both sides on when access to the global shipping route would be restored

A peace deal between the US and Iran has been reached following nearly four months of fighting in the region, Donald Trump and senior Iranian officials have said.

Iranian deputy foreign minister Kazem Gharibabadi confirmed the agreement in televised comments in the early hours of Monday, saying it puts an “immediate end” to the countries’ war, and that it included Lebanon.

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