Shot grandmother, acted alone: police profile Texas gunman

UVALDE, United States — Before he opened fire in a Texas elementary school -- killing 19 small children -- teenager Salvador Ramos first shot his grandmother, officials said.

The 18-year-old, who died when police tried to arrest him, was a US citizen and a student in Uvalde, a small community near the Mexican border where the tragedy took place.

A mugshot of Ramos that circulated in local media showed a young man with brown hair, looking in front of him with an expressionless gaze.

"The first incident was at their grandmother's residence where he shot the grandmother," said Erick Estrada of the Texas Department of Public Safety, adding she was later airlifted to a medical facility.

A 66-year-old woman was admitted to a hospital in San Antonio in critical condition following the shooting, according to health-care officials, who did not provide any further details.

After firing at his grandmother, Ramos fled the scene in a car wearing a bulletproof vest and armed with a rifle, Estrada said.

He then crashed near a ditch outside Robb Elementary School, got out, and headed for the school, where law enforcement officers tried, but failed, to stop him.

At around 11:30 a.m. local time (1630 GMT) Ramos burst into the school and opened fire.

"And then from there, that's when he went on and entered several classrooms and started shooting his firearm," Estrada said on CNN. 

END OF SCHOOL YEAR

Thursday was meant to be the last day of the school year for the 500 students at Robb Elementary, who are aged 5 to 11 and mostly Hispanic.

Estrada said no car chases had been reported in the area, suggesting that the traffic accident was unprovoked.

Two police officers suffered minor injuries in the shootout, Abbott said. 

Investigators were working to obtain "detailed background information on the subject, his motive, the types of weapons used, the legal authority to possess them, and conduct a comprehensive crime-scene investigation and reconstruction," Abbot said.

It is unclear whether Ramos had previous run-ins with law enforcement, according to Estrada.

Pete Arredondo, the Uvalde School District Police Chief in charge of the investigation, said Ramos acted alone.

An Instagram account associated with the suspect, which has since been taken down, showed several photos of the young man.

In two black and white selfies he is wearing what looks like a hoodie, with his hair down to his shoulders.

Other photos showed a magazine and semi-automatic rifles.

Agence France-Presse

Gunman in US shopping mall shooting spree dies of injuries

LOS ANGELES— A man who opened fire with a handgun at a shopping mall in Boise, Idaho, killing 2 people and injuring several others, including a police officer, died on Tuesday from wounds sustained during the violence a day earlier, authorities said.

Investigators have yet to determine whether the fatal injuries resulted from an exchange of gunfire with police at the scene, or from a self-inflicted gunshot before he was taken into custody, according to Boise Police Chief Ryan Lee.

The motive for Monday's midday bloodshed remained under investigation, Lee told reporters in a briefing a day after the attack at Boise Towne Square mall on the west end of Idaho's capital.

The suspect was publicly identified on Tuesday as 27-year-old Jacob Bergquist, a Boise resident. Police Chief Lee described him as having had previous run-ins with mall security and police for "disruptive behavior."

"We have had contact with him in the past, we did not have any reason to arrest him," Lee said, adding that Bergquist was not believed to have had any employment history at the mall.

Police also disclosed new details about the incident, saying that the suspect, dressed in black, fired multiple shots inside the mall before he fled the building and was confronted by officers arriving on the scene within 2 1/2 minutes.

He credited the swift response by law enforcement with preventing a "more grave tragedy."

The slain victims were identified by the county coroner as Joseph Acker, 26, a mall security officer who was the first person shot, and Roberto Arguelles, 49, who was gunned down near an elevator and died at a hospital.

Two women, aged 52 and 23, were injured as the suspect proceeded through the mall firing rounds into the floor, and a third woman, 68, was injured in her vehicle outside the building, apparently caught in the crossfire between police and the gunman, authorities said.

A Boise police officer called to the scene was shot at through the window of his vehicle and was injured by shards of broken glass, though evidence shows that gunfire struck the hat he was wearing, police said.

Another man was taken by private vehicle to a hospital and treated for injuries suffered in a fall while fleeing the mall, police said.

None of the wounded people's injuries were considered life-threatening, authorities said.

Lee said the suspect did all his shooting with a handgun, but a police statement online said he was carrying multiple firearms.

-reuters-

UK coronavirus toll over 40,000; 10,000 deaths in care homes

LONDON - Britain's official coronavirus death toll is now over 40,000 with almost 10,000 dead in care homes in England and Wales alone, according to a statistical update released on Tuesday.

Some 40,902 deaths from coronavirus were registered by May 8, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), meaning the true toll will be even higher when deaths registered over the last 10 days are taken into account.

The ONS figures include deaths where COVID-19 is suspected or mentioned on the death certificate.

The government's official rolling tally, which was 34,796 as of Monday, only records deaths after positive tests.

Either way, Britain is the worst-hit country in Europe, and the government has been criticized heavily for its response to the outbreak.

The ONS figures show a sharp fall in coronavirus deaths in the week up to May 8, reinforcing ministers' claims that the country is past the peak.

Numbers in England and Wales fell from 6,035 to 3,930. Care home deaths accounted for 42.4 percent of the total -- up from 40.4 percent the week before.

Deaths in care homes fell at a slower rate than the population at large, and the total number of deaths in care homes in England and Wales now stands at 9,975.

A cross-party parliamentary committee looking into the government's handling of the crisis on Tuesday said testing had been "inadequate" in a letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

"The decision to pursue an approach of initially concentrating testing in a limited number of laboratories and to expand them gradually... is one of the most consequential made during this crisis," they said.

"From it followed the decision on March 12 to cease testing in the community and retreat to testing principally within hospitals."

The decision meant residents in care homes could not get tests when the virus was at its most potent stage, they added.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock told parliament he was encouraged that care home deaths were falling.

A total of 62 percent of care homes in England had no reported cases of COVID-19 at all, he added.

Just over a quarter (27 percent) of all deaths in England from the virus were in such places, compared with a European average of about half, he told MPs.

"We will not rest from doing whatever is humanly possible to protect our care homes from this appalling virus," he said. 

Agence France-Presse

Spain death toll hits 9,053 as coronavirus cases pass 100,000

MADRID - The coronavirus death toll in Spain surged over 9,000 on Wednesday after a record 864 deaths in 24 hours, with the number of confirmed cases passing the 100,000 mark, the government said. 

Spain has the world's second-highest death toll after Italy, with the virus so far claiming 9,053 lives and the number of confirmed cases reaching 102,136.

But on a day-to-day basis, the rate of new infections continued its downward trend, showing an increase of just over 8 percent, compared with nearly 11 percent on Tuesday, health ministry figures showed. 

And the death rate has also slowed, from 27 percent a week ago to 10.5 percent on Wednesday, with officials saying the data appear to show the epidemic is reaching its peak. 

But officials have warned that even if the epidemic is peaking, the pressure on the intensive care system would be subject to a lag of at least a week or longer, with hospitals likely to reach crisis point by the end of this week or early next.

Madrid remains the worst-hit region, with 3,865 deaths and nearly 30,000 cases, leaving hospitals and mortuaries overwhelmed.

Agence France-Presse

Families of COVID-19 fatalities can claim memorial benefits: insurance body

MANILA - Families of COVID-19 fatalities who have memorial plans can still claim benefits, even if burials are shortened and managed by authorities, the head of the Philippine Insurance Commission said Friday.

The bereaved can get the cash value of the plan or transfer the benefit to another beneficiary depending on the plan holder's "insurability," Philippine Insurance Commissioner Dennis Funa said in a statement.

Insurability is based on time of the plan purchase, health condition of the holder upon purchase and the time of death, he said.

"If plan is already fully paid, a fully paid plan will be provided to an identified beneficiary... If a planholder is insurable, an insurance benefit equivalent to the contract price of the plan will be provided to the beneficiaries," Funa said.

Patients who died of the coronavirus disease are isolated and cremated within 12 hours without a funeral, based on guidelines set by the Department of Health.

Under the measure, local government units are tasked to designate funeral service facilities that can handle the remains of COVID-19 fatalities, and to provide financial aid to families of the deceased, Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles earlier said.

Funeral homes that refuse to service COVID-19 fatalities will be penalized.

The Philippines tallied 45 deaths as of 4 p.m. Friday with 707 confirmed cases, according to official data from the DOH.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Spain virus death toll tops 4,000

MADRID - The coronavirus death toll in Spain surged to 4,089 after 655 people died within 24 hours, the health ministry said on Thursday.

It was a 19-percent increase in figures released Wednesday by the authorities in Spain, which has the world's second highest death toll from the disease after Italy.

The number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 rose to 56,188, the ministry said.

Despite a national lockdown imposed on March 14, which parliament on Thursday agreed to extend until April 11, both deaths and infections have continued to mount, with officials warning this week would be particularly bad. 

But the rise in the number of new deaths was smaller than that recorded on Wednesday when the figure rose by 738 or 27 percent.

Health authorities are hoping it will soon become clear whether the lockdown is having the desired effect.

The Madrid region has suffered the brunt of the epidemic with 17,166 infections -- just under a third of the total -- and 2,090 deaths, or 51 percent of the national figure. 

Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, whose wife is infected with the virus, has said this is the country's most difficult moment since its 1936-39 civil war.

"Only the oldest, who knew the hardships of the civil war and its aftermath, can remember collective situations that were harsher than the current one. The other generations in Spain have never, ever had to face as a collective something so hard,” he said when he imposed the state of emergency on March 14.

Spain's demographics partly explain why it has been one of the worst-affected nations. 

The country has one of the longest life expectancies in Europe and the pandemic has taken a high toll on its large elderly population, who are especially vulnerable to the disease.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

4 killed in Cambodia building collapse

KEP, Cambodia—Four people were killed and more than a dozen injured when a 7-storey building under construction collapsed in southern Cambodia on Friday trapping workers under the rubble, an official told AFP, as the search for more victims went into the night.

The building in coastal Kep province was meant to be a hotel but crumpled at around 4:30 p.m., with photos showing concrete floors sandwiched together as heavy machinery moved in to help clear the wreckage.

Cambodian leader Hun Sen said in a Facebook post he was traveling to the site and he arrived late Friday evening.

Sixteen people were injured in addition to the 4 who died, Ros Udong, spokesman for the Kep provincial administration, told AFP by phone.

Deadly accidents plague the kingdom's poorly regulated building sector even as the country has enjoyed a construction boom.

In June, nearly 30 people died after the collapse of a building under construction in Sihanoukville, a beach town undergoing a Chinese investment bonanza.

Last month at least 3 workers died and more than a dozen others were seriously injured after an under-construction dining hall at a temple collapsed in the tourist town of Siem Reap.

There are an estimated 200,000 construction workers in Cambodia, most unskilled, reliant on day wages and not protected by union rules, according to the International Labor Organization.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Motive unclear in deadly New Jersey kosher grocery rampage - officials

NEW YORK—Investigators are not sure why 2 people launched a deadly attack at a New Jersey kosher grocery store, state officials said on Wednesday, but a federal law enforcement source said the incident did not appear to be an act of organized terrorism.

Six people, including the 2 shooters, 3 civilians and a police officer, died in a series of events that ended in a police shootout on Tuesday in Jersey City, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from New York City.

The 4-hour gun battle at the Jewish JC Kosher Supermarket erupted after the pair shot the police officer at a nearby cemetery and then fled in a white van. It ended after police crashed an armored vehicle through the wall of the market.

"We are not in the position at this time to say definitively why the suspects stopped in front of the supermarket and began firing," New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal told a news conference.

Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop ordered police to be on high alert to protect Jewish neighborhoods following the attack.

The federal law enforcement source said investigators believe mental illness and drug use may have been the primary factors in the attack. He said investigators now view an anti-Semitic message posted online by one of the shooters as a secondary factor.

Officials identified the shooters as David Anderson, 47, and Francine Graham, 50. The 3 civilian victims inside the market were Mindy Ferenz, 32, Miguel Douglas, 49, and Moshe Deutsch, 24, they said.

A fourth person who was in the market when the shooters entered escaped. Officials declined to identify that person.

Police found a homemade pipe bomb in the rented van that the shooters drove to the market.

Some local media reported the initial confrontation between the suspects and police near the Jersey City cemetery, about a mile (1.6 km) from the supermarket, was linked to a previous homicide investigation. The 2 shooters also are suspects in that earlier murder, officials said.

The dead police officer, identified as Joseph Seals, a 15-year veteran of the force and father of 5, was shot at the cemetery shortly before the shootout around the grocery began.

"We are deeply shocked and saddened by the antisemitic attack in #JerseyCity yesterday," the Israeli embassy in Washington said on Twitter.

"This remains a very fluid and fast-moving investigation," said New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy. "Based on everything we know, there is no ongoing security concern related to the events of yesterday."

source: news.abs-cbn.com 

Measles killed more than 140,000 amid stagnating vaccine rates

WASHINGTON—More than 140,000 people died from measles worldwide in 2018, the World Health Organization (WHO) and US authorities said Thursday, the result of global vaccination rates that have stagnated for almost a decade.

Poorer countries were hardest hit, with the vast majority of measles cases and deaths in sub-Saharan Africa. 

Wealthier countries however have also been battling their own outbreaks, with 4 European nations losing their "eliminated" status in 2018.

The announcement came as the Pacific island nation of Samoa was locked down in order to carry out a mass vaccination drive to cope with an epidemic that has killed 62 and, according to UN officials, was fuelled by anti-vaxxer conspiracy theories on the internet.

"The fact that any child dies from a vaccine-preventable disease like measles is frankly an outrage and a collective failure to protect the world's most vulnerable children," said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreysus, director-general of the World Health Organization.

"To save lives, we must ensure everyone can benefit from vaccines, which means investing in immunization and quality health care as a right for all."

Most of the deaths occurred among children under the age of 5. Babies and infants are at greatest risk of infection and of developing complications, including pneumonia and brain swelling that can lead to permanent damage, blindness or hearing loss.

About 142,300 people lost their lives to the disease in 2018—a quarter of the number of deaths in 2000, but up 15 percent compared to 2017. There were 9.7 million total cases.

The WHO and UNICEF estimated that 86 percent of children globally received the first dose of measles vaccine in 2018, but fewer than 70 percent received the second recommended dose.

That is far short of the recommended 95 percent vaccination coverage, with 2 doses of measles vaccine deemed necessary to protect populations from the disease.

The 5 worst affected countries, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Liberia, Madagascar, Somalia and Ukraine, accounted for half of all cases worldwide.

But the United States also saw its highest number of cases in 25 years, narrowly avoiding losing its status of having eliminated the disease. The status is lost if an outbreak is sustained continuously for more than a year.

Albania, the Czech Republic, Greece and the United Kingdom meanwhile all lost their eliminated status.

The rise comes as a growing anti-vaccine movement gains steam around the world, driven by fraudulent claims linking the MMR vaccine against measles, mumps and rubella to a risk of autism in children.

A recent study meanwhile showed that contracting the measles virus decimated the protective antibodies responsible for remembering previous encounters with disease: effectively wiping the host's immunity memory.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

More than 100 killed in air strike on Yemen prison: ICRC

More than 100 people are believed to have been killed in an air strike by the Saudi-led military coalition on a detention center in Yemen, the International Committee of the Red Cross said Sunday.

The coalition said it targeted a facility run by the Huthi rebels that "stores drones and missiles", but the rebels said the attack had leveled a building they used as a prison.

The United Nations said 52 detainees were among the dead, with a further 68 still missing.

"Casualties are most likely to increase as rescue efforts are still ongoing," it said.

The ICRC rushed to the scene in the city of Dhamar with medical teams and hundreds of body bags.

"The location that was hit has been visited by ICRC before," Franz Rauchenstein, its head of delegation for Yemen, told AFP from Dhamar. "It's a college building that has been empty and has been used as a detention facility for a while."

"What is most disturbing is that (the attack was) on a prison. To hit such a building is shocking and saddening – prisoners are protected by international law."

Rauchenstein said that over 100 people were estimated to be dead, and that at least 40 survivors were being treated for their injuries in hospitals in the city, south of the capital Sanaa.

ICRC teams collecting bodies were also "working relentlessly to find survivors under the rubble", he said, but cautioned that the chances of finding any were very slim.

Footage obtained by AFP showed heavy damage to the building and several bodies lying in the rubble, as bulldozers worked to clear away huge piles of debris.

The coalition intervened in 2015 to support the government after the Iran-aligned Huthis swept out of their northern stronghold to seize Sanaa and much of Yemen -- the Arab world's poorest nation.

Fighting since then has already claimed tens of thousands of lives and sparked what the United Nations calls the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

'STAGGERING' CASUALTIES 

The UN's humanitarian coordinator in Yemen called Sunday's air strike "horrific" and said aid groups had been forced to divert critical medical supplies, intended for treating cholera outbreak, to Dhamar hospitals.

"We have no choice," Lise Grande said. "The scale of the casualties is staggering."

Both sides stand accused of actions that could amount to war crimes.

The coalition has been blacklisted by the UN for the killing of children, while Saudi Arabia and its allies accuse the Huthis of using civilians as human shields in densely populated areas. 

Before the ICRC's comments, the coalition had insisted the strike was conducted against "a military compound which was a legitimate military target".

It said secondary explosions indicated the building was used to store weapons and that the Huthis were masking its identity by "claiming it was a secret prison".

"This is a traditional Huthi tactic and a violation of the laws of armed conflict. This site was not registered with the United Nations" and was not on the coalition's "no strike list" of sites provided by the UN and other agencies, coalition spokesman Turki Al-Malki said in a statement.

The coalition said it "took all precautionary measures to protect civilians".

But Huthi television channel Al-Masirah said dozens had been killed and wounded in seven air strikes that hit the building.

"The enemy targeted prisoners on purpose in Dhamar, many of whom were preparing to be released under a prison swap deal," Huthi rebel chief Abdelmalek al-Huthi said in a televised speech on Sunday.

The UN's Yemen envoy Martin Griffiths said Sunday's deaths were a "tragedy".

"The human cost of this war is unbearable," he said. "We need it to stop. Yemenis deserve a peaceful future."

The attack in Dhamar comes weeks after a new front opened in Yemen's complex war, pitting 2 of Riyadh's allies against each other in a struggle for control of the south.

The United Arab Emirates, a key member of the coalition backing the Yemeni government, has also trained and supported secessionists who seek an independent southern Yemen. 

The southern forces last month seized control of the interim capital Aden in the south, in a see-sawing battle with government troops that has drawn warnings that the country could break apart entirely.

The government has accused the UAE of backing a "coup".

Analysts say the fight for the south is a key test for Saudi Arabia, which hopes to mediate a ceasefire so it can focus on its main mission of battling the Huthis who are aligned with its arch foe Iran.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

6 die after plane hits house in Chile

SANTIAGO, Chile - Six people died on Tuesday after a light aircraft crashed into a house in southern Chile, authorities said.

The plane plummeted after getting entangled in power lines shortly after take-off from La Paloma airport in Puerto Montt, a port city 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) to the south of the capital Santiago, said Harry Jurgensen, the governor of the Los Lagos region.

Local television pictures showed the house, which caught fire after being hit by the plane, completely gutted.

The plane's tail could be seen on television images lying in the garden of the destroyed house.

Authorities did not reveal the identity of the victims but said the pilot was among the dead -- two women and four men.

No one was in the house when the plane hit.

The aircraft was owned by the "Archipielago" company, which operates commercial flights in a region that is difficult to access.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Mother and baby fall victim to Florence's wrath

WILMINGTON, United States – Taking cover as Hurricane Florence unleashed fury on the US port city of Wilmington, Adam Sparks heard "a loud pop."

He went to the door to see what had happened, but "it was still pitch black at that time," he said. Power had gone out just before the powerful storm's eye touched down in his state of North Carolina early Friday morning.

It was only an hour later, when fire trucks had taken over the street, that he realized the worst had happened: a mother and her infant had died after a tree struck the back of their house.

"Most of the neighborhood had evacuated," Sparks said. "Only myself, themselves and a few others decided to stay."

Their small home with red brick walls appeared intact from the street -- but the back offered a more grim view.

A section of wall had completely collapsed, with a few belongings in view bearing witness to the violence of the crash.

Later in the day, Wilmington Police confirmed the mother and child were the first fatalities resulting from Florence's onslaught, adding that the father was taken to the hospital with injuries.

"The tree line they have behind their home is very tall, very old trees," their neighbor said. "It's always a gamble with trees like that."

"Who could be prepared for this? It's the worst-case scenario."

- 'Heartbreaking' –

A yellow police cordon now encircles 24 Mercer Avenue, in a residential area of Wilmington.

According to firefighters, the area had not been in the zone under orders to evacuate as Florence began assaulting the US east coast with torrential rains and heavy winds.

Under the pummeling rain rescue workers spared no effort in attempting to save the victims trapped under the felled tree's branches.

Later in the day the firefighters gathered in a circle for a moment of meditation, knees on the ground, heads bowed, faces long.

"They are out here, they are under a lot of stress. They don't even know the conditions of their own homes or their own families," said fire chief Buddy Marinette. "It's a difficult situation for all of us."

"Right now, we are giving the guys a little bit of a break, they need it."

Since Florence slammed into the Carolinas, hundreds of people have needed rescuing after being trapped in their homes by monstrous storm surges and flooding, with four deaths officially confirmed, including the mother and child.

The storm's winds have weakened slightly and authorities now consider Florence a tropical storm -- but the danger remains. Forecasters warn of potentially "catastrophic freshwater flooding."

Franco Hendrickson, another neighbor of the victims, was at the scene when relatives arrived later in the morning.

"Seeing the devastation was just heartbreaking," he said. "Me and my girlfriend we were just really, really sad -- sad morning."

source: news.abs-cbn.com