Late last night, Georgia executed inmate Troy Davis for the murder of Mark McPhail in 1989. MacPhail, who was working as a security guard at the time, rushed to help a homeless man who prosecutors said Davis was hitting with a gun. When MacPhail came to the homeless man's aid, Davis shot MacPhail to death. Davis's case sparked controversy around the world, with many declaring Davis was innocent due to the lack of strong physical evidence, despite a number of eyewitness testimonies. Davis's exeuction has previously been stopped three times since 2007, but he ran out of legal options yesterday when the pardons board and the Supreme Court both rejected his offer to take a polygraph test. Do you think the media covered the execution of Troy Davis fairly? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. According to columnist Ann Coulter , It's nearly impossible to receive a death sentence these days — unless you do something completely crazy like shoot a cop in full view of dozens of witnesses in a Burger King parking lot, only a few hours after shooting at a passing car while exiting a party. That's what Troy Davis did in August 1989. Davis is the media's current baby seal of death row. After a two-week trial with 34 witnesses for the state and six witnesses for the defense, the jury of seven blacks and five whites took less than two hours to convict Davis of Officer Mark MacPhail's murder, as well as various other crimes. Two days later, the jury sentenced Davis to death. Many are still upset with the outcome of the trial, though. According to Fox News , Hundreds of thousands of people signed petitions on Davis' behalf, and prominent supporters included an ex-president and an ex-FBI director, liberals and conservatives. His attorneys said seven of nine key witnesses against him disputed all or parts of their testimony, but state and federal judges repeatedly ruled against him — three times on Wednesday alone. Davis' supporters include former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI, a former FBI director, the NAACP, several conservative figures and many celebrities, including hip-hop star Sean “P. Diddy” Combs. However, with the broader anti-death penalty messages many Davis supporters were chanting yesterday, it is also important to note that he was not Wednesday's only execution. Davis was not the only U.S. inmate put to death Wednesday evening. In Texas, white supremacist gang member Lawrence Russell Brewer was put to death for the 1998 dragging death of a black man, James Byrd Jr., one of the most notorious hate crime murders in recent U.S. history. Do you think the media coverage of Davis's execution was fair?
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The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) is likely to fall to Earth between 5pm on Friday and 5am on Saturday UK time A dead spacecraft that is tumbling to Earth will re-enter the atmosphere on Friday evening or Saturday morning UK time, according to Nasa’s latest analysis. Most of the bus-sized Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) will burn up in the atmosphere, but more than half a tonne of debris is predicted to get through. The falling spacecraft is expected to begin its final descent to Earth sometime between the hours of noon and midnight US Eastern time on Friday (between 5pm Friday and 5am Saturday British Summer Time), according to an update released by the US space agency on Wednesday . The satellite will not be passing over North America at the time of re-entry, but Nasa said it was too early to predict the time and location with more certainty. Further updates will be released by Nasa later on Thursday, and then 12, six and two hours before re-entry. The space agency anticipates that 26 potentially hazardous parts , weighing a total of 532kg, could remain intact and hit the Earth. The debris will spread along an estimated 500-mile corridor of the Earth’s surface. Among the parts expected to survive the fiery re-entry are four titanium fuel tanks, four steel flywheel rims and an aluminium structure that alone weighs 158kg. Depending on their size and shape, the components will strike at speeds of between 55mph (90kph) and 240mph (385kph). Radar stations around the world, including RAF Fylingdales in north Yorkshire, are tracking the object, but there is little chance of predicting with any accuracy where the debris will fall. The spacecraft’s orbit puts a great swathe of the planet in its path between the latitudes of 57 degrees north and south. Mainland Britain lies between 50 and 60 degrees north. The satellite spends more time at higher latitudes, so there is a slightly higher risk in those regions. Most likely by far is that the remains of the satellite will drop into the ocean, or be strewn across one of the planet’s most desolate regions, such as Siberia, the Australian outback or the Canadian tundra. Nasa put the odds of anyone being struck by a falling part of the spacecraft at one in 3,200. The individual risk to a particular person is much less – one in 3,200 multiplied by the billions that live under the satellite’s flight path. There are no confirmed injuries from manmade space debris and no record of significant property damage from a falling satellite. An organisation of major space agencies known as the Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee (IADC) takes a lead role in monitoring threats from falling space junk and is running back-to-back simulations to work out when, and roughly where, the spacecraft’s remains will impact. If the IADC or the Ministry of Defence, via RAF Fylingdales, found that the UK was at risk, they would inform the Cabinet Office civil contingencies committee, which is responsible for alerting the emergency services. When Nasa’s Skylab fell to Earth in 1979, the space agency put the risk of human injury at 1 in 152, because the odds of the defunct space station striking a city were much higher. The partially controlled Skylab missed its expected impact site in South Africa and crash-landed in Australia. Predicting where the debris will land is difficult for two main reasons. Unpredictable rises in the sun’s activity warm the atmosphere and make it expand, which causes the spacecraft to experience more drag and re-enter more quickly. Another problem comes from uncertainties in the tracking of how the spacecraft disintegrates, which means that even just a few hours before impact, the corridor of the Earth’s surface at risk will be several thousand kilometres long. Under an international treaty, governments are obliged to return any parts of a satellite that are found to the owner, in this case Nasa. The space agency urged anyone who suspected they had found debris from the spacecraft not to touch it and inform the local police. The satellite was launched in 1991 aboard the space shuttle Discovery and decommissioned in 2005. Satellites Space Nasa United States Ian Sample guardian.co.uk
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UBS trader charged with fraud relating to activities between 2008 and 2010, in addition to two allegations of false accounting and one of fraud in 2011 Kweku Adoboli , the 31-year-old charged with fraud and false accounting at UBS, was remanded in custody until 20 October on Thursday after learning he also faced a second fraud charge. Lawyers for Adoboli, who holds a Ghanaian passport, did not make an application for bail at the hearing in the City of London magistrates’ court that followed the three charges police brought against him on Friday . The alleged “unauthorised trading” announced by the Swiss bank has caused turmoil at the bank, which has raised the estimate of losses from the incident to $2.3bn from $2bn. The trader spoke only to confirm his name, birth date and address at the hearing. He did not enter a plea. He originally faced three charges. Two claim that Adoboli falsified records of exchange traded funds – complex financial instruments – between October 2008 and December 2009 and then in January 2010 and September 2011. The third charge alleges that he committed fraud between January 2011 and September 2011 while senior trader in global synthetic equities. The fourth charge, of fraud, was made on Thursday, relating to activity between 1 October 2008 and 31 December 2010. Adoboli is represented by the law firm Kingsley Napley, which also advised Nick Leeson, the rogue trader who brought down Barings in 1995. A committal hearing originally set for 22 October will now take place on 20 October. The Swiss bank is now under intense pressure to restore confidence in its investment banking arm. The Zurich-based bank’s board is meeting on Thursday and Friday in Singapore where chief executive Oswald Grübel, parachuted in to the bank in 2009 when UBS was on the brink of collapse, is determined to secure his future. The head of UBS’s investment banking arm, Carsten Kengeter, has urged staff to work hard to repair the “financial damage” caused by the alleged incident, which the bank has admitted will tip it to a loss in the third quarter. An update on the bank’s strategy is expected on 17 November at a previously arranged investor meeting in New York. Kweku Adoboli UBS Banking European banks Sam Jones Jill Treanor guardian.co.uk
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National Association of Head Teachers to hold ballot on whether to take industrial action over cuts to pensions Teachers stepped closer to mounting their biggest strike in a generation this autumn after a headteachers’ union decided it would ballot members to take industrial action over pension reforms. The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) , which represents more than 28,000 heads and their deputies, will hold its first strike ballot of its 114-year history from 29 September. If members vote in favour of industrial action, a co-ordinated strike with several other classroom unions could take place on 30 November and would be likely to shut the majority of schools in England and Wales. The National Union of Teachers and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers have already voted to carry out rolling strikes, while another teachers’ union, the NASUWT, has proposed industrial action. The Public and Commercial Services Union has already said it is planning a strike in November. A government-commissioned report in March by the former Labour minister Lord Hutton called for final salary pension schemes to be scrapped and replaced with career averages for public sector workers. He recommended that public sector staff should pay higher monthly contributions and called for a rise in the retirement age to 68 – most headteachers now retire aged 60 to 65. The government has said changes are needed because the cost of teachers’ pensions will rise from about £5bn in 2005 to almost £10bn by 2015 as more staff retire and life expectancy increases. Russell Hobby, general secretary of the NAHT, said the decision to ballot members was taken with “great reluctance”. “Faced with a refusal by the government to negotiate on the basis of a proper valuation of the scheme, we feel we have no option but to demonstrate our anger at this attack on the teaching profession,” he said. “We fear for the future of a system with a demoralised and devalued profession. We fear that we will not be able to attract people to become heads at a time when targets and workloads are rising.” He said many headteachers believed an attack on pensions was a threat to the future of education itself. “Teaching is a vocation and no one entered the profession to get rich. However, we do need to ensure that teaching is an attractive career choice for the most talented graduates. Future pupils deserve nothing less.” In June, teachers staged the biggest school strikes since the 1980s over the pension reforms. More than 2 million pupils missed classes and thousands of parents were forced to take a day off work with nearly 6,000 schools closed and 5,000 partially closed. In total, half of schools were affected. A Cabinet Office spokesman said there was “genuine engagement” with trade unions over pensions. “We have a lot to talk about and there are proposals on the table for discussion.” Schools Public sector pay Teaching Trade unions Pensions Public sector cuts Public sector pensions Jessica Shepherd guardian.co.uk
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Scotland Yard gains hours of unbroadcast material of August riots after serving court orders The BBC, ITN and Sky News have handed hundreds of hours of unbroadcast footage of the August riots to police after being served with court orders by Scotland Yard. The broadcasters were forced to hand over raw footage of the riots after the Metropolitan police obtained a production order earlier this month under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. The Daily Telegraph is also understood to have disclosed material to the police after being served with a production order. Scotland Yard has put sustained pressure on all media groups to reveal video and picture evidence of the riots since the disorder across England seven weeks ago. “It is very very rare that we are served with a court order to hand over footage like this,” said a senior insider at one of the broadcasters. “We don’t hand over material willy-nilly because it compromises the security of our journalists on the streets. Clearly we don’t want them being seen as an evidence-gathering arm of the police.” The major news broadcasters are in the process of handing over hundreds of hours of footage to the police. The BBC, ITN and Sky News were issued with a wide-ranging order that forced the disclosure of “any broadcast or unbroadcast video or still pictures of the recent unrest in London”. Police are understood to have temporarily halted attempts to obtain footage from newspapers, except the Daily Telegraph, which is understood to have complied with a court order in early September. “Police requests for BBC untransmitted material are dealt through our legal department, regardless of the subject matter,” said a spokeswoman for the BBC. “We require requests for untransmitted material to be made through the courts. A production order requiring footage of the riots was served on the BBC and a court agreed that the material should be supplied.” In deciding whether to grant a production order, judges are supposed to weigh the interest of the police in obtaining evidence with the public interest in a free press. An ITN spokesman said: “ITN’s policy is that we do not release unbroadcast material to police. On some occasions when the police apply to a judge for a court order to force the release of such material, we have challenged the police’s application.” Hundreds of police officers are working through about 40,000 hours of CCTV footage in stations across the country. In London, Met officers are believed to be studying more than 20,000 hours of video at 30 viewing facilities. A spokeswoman for the Metropolitan police said: “The police are identifying people through pictures, CCTV and through the media to ensure that people are brought to justice. We would ask the media to work with the police to ensure that happens.” Sky News had not returned a request for comment at the time of publication. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”. • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook . TV news BBC ITN Television industry Daily Telegraph Newspapers & magazines National newspapers Newspapers UK riots Police Josh Halliday guardian.co.uk
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• Stockpile of mustard gas found in southern desert • Rebels say they have now taken most of Sebha • Gaddafi loyalists still holding out in Sirte Libyan rebel forces claim to have discovered banned chemical weapons stockpiles in southern desert areas captured from diehard Gaddafi regime loyalists in the last few days. Spokesmen for the National Transitional Council (NTC) said a depot had been found in the Jufra area, 435 miles (700km) south of Tripoli, part of an offensive against regime strongholds in the remote south of the country. The rebels also say they have now taken most of Sebha, the largest town in the area whose tribes were long seen as loyal to Gaddafi and is an important staging post for travel to Niger, where some former regime figures have fled. Libyan officials have confirmed that a senior intelligence officer was captured there two days ago. It had been thought that Gaddafi himself might have been hiding in Sebha along with his fugitive second son, Saif al-Islam, but NTC fighters found no trace of them. CNN reported from Sebha that Gaddafi’s Gaddadfa tribe in the town is ready to surrender its weapons and wants to negotiate an agreement with the NTC. Correspondent Ben Wedeman also described walking through Gaddafi’s palace in the town. Libya was supposed to have destroyed its entire stockpile of chemical weapons in early 2004 as part of a British-engineered rapprochement with the west. It also abandoned a rudimentary nuclear programme. But the international watchdog, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, had stated it believed that Libya had kept 9.5 tonnes of mustard gas at a secret location: it is that which appears to have now been captured and secured. In 2010 Libya destroyed nearly 15 tonnes of sulphur mustard, representing about half of its stockpile. It received an extension to eliminate the rest by 15 May. Twice-yearly inspections have found no evidence of Libya reviving the chemical weapons programme. The recent rebel advances in the south have not been matched by parallel progress on two other fronts. Loyalists are still holding out in Gaddafi’s birthplace of Sirte on the Mediterranean coast, though there are signs a new offensive may be looming there. The capture of Sirte would clear the way for an unbroken link between Tripoli and Benghazi, where the Libyan uprising began in February. Little progress has been seen in Bani Walid, 100 miles south of Tripoli, with chaotic scenes amongst poorly disorganised and often squabbling rebels and worries about inflaming tribal tensions if there is large-scale bloodshed. The persistence of these significant pockets of Gaddafi resistance are delaying plans by the NTC to declare the whole country liberated – a necessary step before the start of ambitious reforms to create a free and democratic Libya. Libya Middle East Arab and Middle East unrest Africa Saif al-Islam Gaddafi Muammar Gaddafi Ian Black guardian.co.uk
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Health secretary says he has been contacted by 22 trusts struggling to cope with growing burden of private finance contracts The rising costs of paying for hospitals under private finance initiative schemes is bringing NHS trusts to the “brink of financial collapse” and putting patient care at risk, the health secretary has warned. Andrew Lansley said he had been contacted by 22 trusts that are struggling to cope with the growing burden of the PFI contracts, a policy of the former Labour government under which private capital is used to build hospitals and the NHS is left with an annual fee or “mortgage”. Between them, the trusts run more than 60 hospitals. Speaking on BBC Radio 4′s Today programme , Lansley said: “We’re not going to let hospitals collapse financially. “But if we were simply to carry on as the Labour party did in government, we would be seeing hundreds of millions of pounds every year being taken from what could provide improving services for patients in order to pay for PFI projects that roll forward for decades.” He added that patient care could be jeopardised in the areas covered by the 22 trusts, saying: “We’re looking at a risk to services in their areas.” Buckinghamshire, Oxford Radcliffe, North Bristol and Portsmouth are understood to be among the trusts in difficulty. The Department of Health has said there are £12.6bn of PFI contracts in the NHS, with some trusts paying off the scheme until 2050. Annual bills are forecast to rise by 75% to more than £2.5bn in the next 18 years after the recession took its toll on the repayments. In comments to the Telegraph , Lansley said: “Like the economy, Labour has brought some parts of the NHS to the brink of financial collapse. Tough solutions may be needed for these problems, but we’ll help the NHS overcome them.” The Department of Health has said the government is making an independent assessment of PFI schemes. Proposals designed to ease the burden on struggling trusts could include the renegotiation of PFI contracts. David Stout, the deputy chief executive of the NHS Confederation , which represents health service commissioners and providers, said that there had been “few realistic alternatives” to PFI projects in the NHS at the time of their introduction under Labour. But he warned that the economic climate had changed and that, as PFI payments ate further into resources, there was “a real danger that we will be paying for hospitals that are not being fully used”. “PFI contracts are long term deals lasting up to 25 years but, in order to respond to the current unprecedented financial challenge, we will need to close some services or parts of hospitals in order to invest in more efficient services elsewhere that are better for patients,” Stout said. “With resources locked into PFI contracts, we will find it harder to make these vital changes.” John Appleby, the chief economist on health policy for charity the King’s Fund , told the BBC he was not persuaded by the argument that PFI had brought NHS trusts to the verge of collapse. “The reason that individual hospitals get into financial difficulties are often complex, and it’s not usually one single reason,” he said. “I have to say that, if PFI is seen to be the key problem, it doesn’t auger that well for the future when … the plan is under the new government’s reforms [that] the NHS will be doing deals with the private sector. “[These deals are] not just to build hospitals but to supply health care services, a much more complicated system and a much more complicated exercise.” While admitting that PFI had proved more expensive, Appleby added that some hospitals with the schemes had remained “perfectly healthy financially”. But Lansley insisted the government needed to act in order to tackle “Labour’s legacy of poor value for money”, which he said included the £12.7bn national programme for IT, which is being scrapped after years of delays. He said: “The truth is that we have inherited in the NHS … an enormous legacy of debt – not just PFI debt, but often hospitals that are carrying substantial debts.” Private finance initiative Health policy Andrew Lansley Liberal-Conservative coalition Labour NHS Health Lizzy Davies guardian.co.uk
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At least 16 dead or missing and transport system in chaos as floods and landslides strike central Japan Typhoon Roke has moved north across Japan, leaving at least 16 people dead or missing. Concerns had been raised that the powerful typhoon could threaten safety at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, which was sent into meltdown by an earthquake and tsunami on 11 March, but officials said the plant was unaffected. Hiroki Kawamata, a spokesman for the plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), said there had been no further leaks of radioactive water or material into the environment. “We are seeing no problems so far,” he said. The typhoon had reached the country’s northern island of Hokkaido by Thursday morning after weakening overnight, but there were no immediate reports of damage. The storm was generating winds of up to 78mph. It reached the city of Hamamatsu, about 125 miles (200km) west of Tokyo, on Wednesday before cutting a path to the north-east and through Tokyo. Up to 42cm of rain fell in some areas, triggering landslides and flooding. Police and local media reported 16 people dead or missing, most swept away by rivers swollen by rains in southern and central regions. One person died in a landslide in the northern Iwate prefecture, and two people were swept away in Sendai in the north-east. Hundreds of tsunami survivors in government shelters in the Miyagi prefecture town of Onagawa were forced to evacuate because of flooding risks. Strong winds brought down power lines in many areas and officials said more than 200,000 households in central Japan were without electricity on Wednesday. In Tokyo, rush hour trains were suspended and thousands of commuters were stuck at stations across the city. Long queues formed for buses and taxis. “The hotels in the vicinity are all booked up so I’m waiting for the bullet train to restart,” Hiromu Harada, a 60-year-old businessman, said at Tokyo station. The Kyodo news agency reported that 5,000 people had stayed inside Shinkansen bullet trains at Tokyo and Shizuoka stations overnight. The storm had triggered landslides in parts of Miyagi prefecture that had been affected by the March earthquake and tsunami. The local government requested help from the army, and dozens of schools were closed. An earthquake struck on Wednesday just south of Fukushima, in Ibaraki prefecture. Officials said it posed no danger to the Fukushima Daiichi plant and that it did not cause damage or injuries. Heavy rains sparked floods and caused road damage in Nagoya and other cities, the Aichi prefectural government said. More than 200 domestic flights were cancelled. Japan Natural disasters and extreme weather Flooding guardian.co.uk
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Detectives at Stepping Hill hospital are investigating deaths of three patients who were given saline contaminated with insulin Police investigating the contamination of saline at Stepping Hill Hospital believe four more people were poisoned. Following the release of nurse Rebecca Leighton, Greater Manchester police said they were looking at around 40 potential victims who may have been harmed by the contaminated solution. It is understood they now believe that seven within that pool were poisoned – including Tracey Arden, 44, Arnold Lancaster, 71, and Alfred Derek Weaver, 83. Fifteen of those potential victims have been eliminated from the inquiry, while the cases of 20 others are still being assessed. Sources confirmed that a “Cracker”-style criminal profiler was brought in by police to help identify the mystery poisoner. The forensic clinical psychologist, who has assisted various police forces in several recent high-profile murder cases, was called in at the beginning of the major inquiry into who sabotaged saline at the Stockport hospital. He is not currently part of the investigation but initially aided detectives in drawing up the likely background of the saboteur. A police source said: “He was brought in at the early stages of the investigation and helped draw up a profile of the perpetrator. “He is currently not helping with our inquiries.” The source did not disclose how useful that information was or whether it played any role in the detention of Miss Leighton. Miss Leighton has spoken of her horror at being dubbed an “angel of death” and “killer nurse” by newspapers. She said she was “passionate” about her job and wanted to return to a “normal life” after charges that she tampered with saline solution with intent to endanger life were dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) earlier this month. The 27-year-old spent more than six weeks in custody but was freed on 2 September after proceedings against her were discontinued due to insufficient evidence. Last week she was cleared to return to work by the Nursing and Midwifery Council – subject to conditions, despite hearing claims that she had admitted to the theft of opiate-based drugs. But she remains suspended on full pay by Stepping Hill while inquiries continue into allegations that she stole medication. A spokeswoman for Stepping Hill said: “The internal review of Rebecca’s case has begun and will proceed in the normal way. “These investigations can take some time to complete. We cannot be more definitive in terms of timings at this stage.” Detectives are continuing to look at the suspicious deaths of patients Arden, Lancaster and Weaver. All three were unlawfully administered insulin but it has not yet been established whether that was a significant contributing factor to their deaths, police say. The alarm was first raised by hospital staff on 12 July when a higher than normal number of patients were reported to have “unexplained” low blood sugar levels amid fears that saline solution had been contaminated with insulin. Heightened security measures remain in place at Stepping Hill and will continue for the foreseeable future. No one is allowed to administer intravenous drips alone and all keys to medicine cabinets have to be signed for. Manchester NHS Health Nursing guardian.co.uk
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Ministry of Defence says it is in contact with lawyers of victims’ relatives and is preparing to make amends where required The British government is to pay compensation to families of those killed or wounded on Bloody Sunday, the Ministry of Defence announced on Thursday. More than a year after David Cameron apologised to the victims and described the 1972 Derry shootings as “unjustified and unjustifiable”, the Ministry of Defence has said it is in contact with the lawyers of victims’ relatives and is preparing to make amends where required. “We acknowledge the pain felt by these families for nearly 40 years, and that members of the armed forces acted wrongly. For that, the government is deeply sorry,” said an MoD spokesman. “We are in contact with the families’ solicitors and where there is a legal liability to pay compensation we will do so.” Thirteen unarmed civilians died in the Bloody Sunday shootings, when paratroopers opened fire during a civil rights protest in the Bogside area of Derry in January 1972. A 14th man died of his wounds several months later. An initial inquiry absolved the soldiers and the government of much of the blame, and in 1974 the MoD made a series of mostly small payments without accepting any responsibility. But last year’s Saville inquiry , which was 12 years in the making, came to the unequivocal conclusion that the killings had been unjustified. “We found no instances where it appeared to us that soldiers either were or might have been justified in firing,” it said. “Despite the contrary evidence given by soldiers, we have concluded that none of them fired in response to attacks or threatened attacks by nail or petrol bombers. No one threw or threatened to throw a nail or petrol bomb at the soldiers on Bloody Sunday.” According to the BBC, the move to pay compensation comes after lawyers for most of the families wrote to the prime minister asking what steps he would take to “fully compensate” them for “the loss of their loved ones, the wounding of others, and the shameful allegations which besmirched their good name for many years.” It is not yet clear who exactly will be compensated, and by how much, as many of those directly affected by the shootings have since died, and it is not known whether more distant relatives will make claims. Bloody Sunday Northern Ireland Ministry of Defence Military Ireland Lizzy Davies guardian.co.uk
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