Terry Thompson, Muskingum County Animal Farm Owner, Allegedly Killed Self After Freeing Exotic Animals
October 21, 2011 No Comment
ZANESVILLE, Ohio — Sheriff’s deputies shot nearly 50 wild animals – including 18 rare Bengal tigers and 17 lions – in a big-game hunt across the state’s countryside Wednesday after the owner of an exotic-animal park threw their cages open and committed suicide in what may have been one last act of spite against his neighbors and police. As homeowners nervously hid indoors, officers armed with high-powered rifles and shoot-to-kill orders fanned out through fields and woods to hunt down 56 animals that had been turned loose from the Muskingum County Animal Farm by owner Terry Thompson before he shot himself to death Tuesday. After an all-night hunt that extended into Wednesday afternoon, 48 animals were killed. Six others – three leopards, a grizzly bear and two monkeys – were captured and taken to the Columbus Zoo. A wolf was later found dead, leaving a monkey as the only animal still on the loose. Those destroyed included six black bears, two grizzlies, a wolf, a baboon and three mountain lions. Dead animals were being buried on Thompson’s farm, officials said. “It’s like Noah’s Ark wrecking right here in Zanesville, Ohio,” lamented Jack Hanna, TV personality and former director of the Columbus Zoo. Hanna defended the sheriff’s decision to kill the animals but said the deaths of the Bengal tigers were especially tragic. There are only about 1,400 of the endangered cats left in the world, he said. “When I heard 18, I was still in disbelief,” he said. “The most magnificent creature in the entire world, the tiger is.” As the hunt dragged on outside of Zanesville, population 25,000, schools closed in the mostly rural area of farms and widely spaced homes 55 miles east of Columbus. Parents were warned to keep children and pets indoors. And flashing signs along highways told motorists, “Caution exotic animals” and “Stay in vehicle.” Officers were ordered to kill the animals instead of trying to bring them down with tranquilizers for fear that those hit with darts would escape in the darkness before they dropped and would later regain consciousness. “These animals were on the move, they were showing aggressive behavior,” Sheriff Matt Lutz said. “Once the nightfall hit, our biggest concern was having these animals roaming.” The sheriff would not speculate why Thompson killed himself and why he left open the cages and fences at his 73-acre preserve, dooming the animals he seemed to love so much. Thompson, 62, had had repeated run-ins with the law and his neighbors. Lutz said that the sheriff’s office had received numerous complaints since 2004 about animals escaping onto neighbors’ property. The sheriff’s office also said that Thompson had been charged over the years with animal cruelty, animal neglect and allowing animals to roam. He had gotten out of federal prison just last month after serving a year for possessing unregistered guns. John Ellenberger, a neighbor, speculated that Thompson freed the animals to get back at neighbors and police. “Nobody much cared for him,” Ellenberger said. Angie McElfresh, who lives in an apartment near the farm and hunkered down with her family in fear, said “it could have been an `f-you’ to everybody around him.” Thompson had rescued some of the animals at his preserve and purchased many others, said Columbus Zoo spokeswoman Patty Peters. It was not immediately clear how Thompson managed to support the preserve and for what purpose it was operated, since it was not open to the public. But Thompson had appeared on the “Rachael Ray Show” in 2008 as an animal handler for a zoologist guest, said show spokeswoman Lauren Nowell. The sheriff’s office started getting calls Tuesday evening that wild animals were loose just west of Zanesville. Deputies went to the animal preserve and found Thompson dead and all the cages open. Several aggressive animals were near his body and had to be shot, the sheriff said. Sheriff’s Deputy Jonathan Merry was among the first to respond Tuesday. He said he shot a number of animals, including a gray wolf and a black bear. He said the bear charged him and he fired his pistol, killing it with one shot when it was about 7 feet away. “All these animals have the ability to take a human out in the length of a second,” said Merry, who called himself an animal lover but said he knew he was protecting the community. “What a tragedy,” said Barb Wolfe, a veterinarian with The Wilds, a nearby zoo-sponsored wild animal preserve. She said she managed to hit a tiger with a tranquilizer dart, but the animal charged toward her and then turned and began to flee before the drug could take effect, and deputies shot the big cat. At an afternoon news conference, the sheriff said that the danger had passed and that people could move around freely again, but that the monkey would probably be shot because it was believed to be carrying a herpes disease. “It was like a war zone with all the shooting and so forth with the animals,” said Sam Kopchak, who was outside Tuesday afternoon when he saw Thompson’s horses acting up. Kopchak said he turned and saw a male lion lying down on the other side of a fence. “The fence is not going to be a fence that’s going to hold an African lion,” Kopchak said. Danielle Berkheimer said she was nervous as she drove home Tuesday night and afraid to let her two dogs out in the yard. “When it’s 300-pound cats, that’s scary,” she said. She said it had been odd Tuesday night to see no one out around town, and the signs warning drivers to stay in their cars were “surreal.” Some townspeople were saddened by the deaths. At a nearby Moose Lodge, Bill Weiser said: “It’s breaking my heart, them shooting those animals.” Ohio has some of the nation’s weakest restrictions on exotic pets and among the highest number of injuries and deaths caused by them. At least nine people have been injured since 2005 and one person was killed, according to Born Free USA, an animal advocacy group. On Wednesday, the Humane Society of the United States criticized Gov. John Kasich for allowing a statewide ban on the buying and selling of exotic pets to expire in April. The organization urged the state to immediately issue emergency restrictions. “How many incidents must we catalog before the state takes action to crack down on private ownership of dangerous exotic animals?” Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO, said in a statement. Kasich said Wednesday during a meeting of Dix Communications editors: “Clearly, we need tougher laws. We haven’t had them in this state. Nobody’s dealt with this, and we will. And we’ll deal with it in a comprehensive way.” Barney Long, an expert at the World Wildlife Fund, noted that tigers in general are endangered. He said there appear to be fewer of them living in the wild than there are in captivity in the U.S. alone. Over the last century, the worldwide population has plunged from about 100,000 in the wild to as few as 3,200, he said. More than half are Bengal tigers, which live in isolated pockets across Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, India and Bangladesh, he said in a telephone interview “The tragic shooting of 18 tigers in Ohio really highlights what is happening on a daily basis to tigers in the wild throughout Asia,” Long added in an email. “Their numbers are being decimated by poaching and habitat loss, and that is the real travesty here.” ___ Associated Press writers Ann Sanner and Doug Whiteman contributed to this report.
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Most Americans eat more salt than federal guidelines call for, increasing their risk of high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke, a new CDC report shows.
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Most Americans eat more salt than federal guidelines call for, increasing their risk of high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke, a new CDC report shows.
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Independent investigation of the key issues sceptics claim can skew global warming figures reports that they have no real effect The world is getting warmer, countering the doubts of climate change sceptics about the validity of some of the scientific evidence, according to the most comprehensive independent review of historical temperature records to date. Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, found several key issues that sceptics claim can skew global warming figures had no meaningful effect. The Berkeley Earth project compiled more than a billion temperature records dating back to the 1800s from 15 sources around the world and found that the average global land temperature has risen by around 1C since the mid-1950s. This figure agrees with the estimate arrived at by major groups that maintain official records on the world’s climate, including Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), and the Met Office’s Hadley Centre , with the University of East Anglia , in the UK. “My hope is that this will win over those people who are properly sceptical,” Richard Muller , a physicist and head of the project, said. “Some people lump the properly sceptical in with the deniers and that makes it easy to dismiss them, because the deniers pay no attention to science. But there have been people out there who have raised legitimate issues.” Muller sought to cool the debate over climate change by creating the largest open database of temperature records, with the aim of producing a transparent and independent assessment of global warming. The initial reluctance of government groups to release all their methods and data, and the fiasco over emails from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit in 2009, gave the project added impetus. The team, which includes Saul Perlmutter , joint winner of this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery that the universe is expanding at an increasing rate, has submitted four papers to the journal Geophysical Research Letters that describe their work to date. Going public with results before they are peer-reviewed is not standard practice, but Muller said the decision to circulate the papers before publication was part a long-standing academic tradition of sanity-checking results with colleagues. “We will get much more feedback from making these papers public before publication,” he said. Climate sceptics have criticised official global warming figures on the grounds that many temperature stations are poor quality and that data are tweaked by hand. However, the Berkeley study found that the so-called urban heat island effect, which makes cities warmer than surrounding rural areas, is locally large and real, but does not contribute significantly to average land temperature rises. This is because urban regions make up less than 1% of the Earth’s land area. And while stations considered “poor” might be less accurate, they recorded the same average warming trend. “We have looked at these issues in a straightforward, transparent way, and based on that, I would expect legitimate sceptics to feel their issues have been addressed,” Muller said. Nevertheless, one prominent US climate sceptic, Anthony Watts , claimed to have identified a “basic procedural error” concerning time periods used in the research, and urged the authors to revise the paper. Jim Hansen, head of Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies , said he had not read the research papers but was glad Muller was looking at the issue, describing him as “a top-notch physicist”. “It should help inform those who have honest scepticism about global warming. “Of course, presuming that he basically confirms what we have been reporting, the deniers will then decide that he is a crook or has some ulterior motive. “As I have discussed in the past, the deniers, or contrarians, if you will, do not act as scientists, but rather as lawyers.” “As soon as they see evidence against their client (the fossil fuel industry and those people making money off business-as-usual), they trash that evidence and bring forth whatever tidbits they can find to confuse the judge and jury.” Peter Thorne at the Cooperative Institute for Climate and Satellites in North Carolina and chair of the International Surface Temperature Initiative , said: “This takes a very distinct approach to the problem and comes up with the same answer, and that builds confidence that pre-existing estimates are in the right ballpark. There is very substantial value in having multiple groups looking at the same problem in different ways. “Openness and transparency is a must, particularly now with climate change being so politicised, but more to the point, with the huge socioeconomic decisions that rest on it.” Phil Jones, the director of the Climatic Research Unit at UEA who was at the centre of the Climategate incident, said: “I look forward to reading the finalised paper once it has been reviewed and published. These initial findings are very encouraging and echo our own results and our conclusion that the impact of urban heat islands on the overall global temperature is minimal.” The Berkeley Earth project has been attacked by some climate bloggers, who point out that one of the funders runs Koch Industries, a company Greenpeace called a ” financial kingpin of climate science denial “. Muller points out the project is organised under the auspices of Novim, a Santa Barbara-based nonprofit organisation that uses science to find answers to the most pressing issues facing society and to publish them “without advocacy or agenda”. Other donors include the Fund for Innovative Climate and Energy Research (funded by Bill Gates), and the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley Lab. The next phase of the project will focus on warming trends in the oceans. Some scientists were critical of the project and Muller’s decision to release the papers before they had been peer reviewed. Peter Cox, professor of climate system dynamics at Exeter University said: “These studies seem to confirm the global warming estimated from the existing datasets, which is pleasing but not exactly a surprise to those of us who know how carefully the existing datasets are put together. “It is surprising, however, that the authors believe that this news is so significant that they can’t wait for peer review, especially when their conclusions aren’t exactly revolutionary.” Climate change scepticism Climate change Climate change Controversies in science Ian Sample guardian.co.uk
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Defendant denies there was sexual element to case but says he strangled 25-year-old in panic after she rebuffed his kiss More than 10 months after killing his next door neighbour, Joanna Yeates, Vincent Tabak has given his first full public account of the moment he attacked her. Tabak said he tried to kiss Yeates after she invited him into her flat and made a flirtatious remark. He insisted he had not meant to kill or seriously harm her, adding that he had only wanted to kiss her and was not planning to try to have sex with her. The 33-year-old Dutch engineer denied that he had lifted Yeates’s top or touched her breasts. He also said he had not been spying on her before the attack, which happened on 17 December last year. He apologised for hiding Yeates’s body on a country lane three miles from her flat, where it was found eight days later, on Christmas morning, and said he was sorry for putting Yeates’s parents and her boyfriend, Greg Reardon, through “hell”. Tabak was asked in court to demonstrate how he put an arm around Yeates and how he put his right hand around her neck. Her parents, David and Teresa, sat in the front row, five metres from Tabak, as he did so. They did not appear to look at him once as he gave evidence. Tabak – who admits manslaughter but denies murder – began by answering questions from his barrister, William Clegg QC. He spoke of his childhood and education in Holland, saying he grew up in a small town, went to university and became an expert in the flow of people through buildings and public areas. He said he studied until he was 29, when he came to England and got his first job at a design and engineering company in Bath. He had no girlfriends in Holland but met Tanja Morson online via Guardian Soulmates and they began living together in Clifton, Bristol. Yeates and Reardon moved in next door in October 2010, but Tabak was soon sent to California for work. He said he may only have seen his neighbours once. On the night of the killing, Morson was out at a staff party. Tabak said he had pizza and a beer then decided to go to Asda. “I felt a bit lonely,” he said. “I didn’t want to stay home alone.” As he walked down his path, Tabak said Yeates, a 25-year-old landscape architect, waved and indicated that he should come into her flat. He said he told her he was “a bit lonely and a bit bored” because his girlfriend was away. Yeates said she was also “bored at home” because Reardon was not there. The defendant said they talked about Yeates and Reardon’s cat, which used to find its way into Tabak and Morson’s flat. Tabak said Yeates had told him the cat sometimes went into places “that it shouldn’t go. A bit like me … ” He told his barrister: “I got he impression that she wanted to kiss me. She had been friendly. I leaned forward and I think I put one of my hands on her back and tried to kiss her. She started to scream quite loudly.” Tabak’s voice broke as he described how he “panicked”. He said he put his hand over her mouth, said he was sorry and asked her to stop screaming. He said he took his hand away and she began to scream again. “I put my hand over her mouth and the other hand on her neck,” he said. “I was panicking. I wanted to stop her screams. I wanted to calm her down.” “Did you intend to kill her?” Clegg asked. “No definitely not,” Tabak said. He was then asked: “Did you intend to cause her serious harm?” “No, definitely not,” he replied. Clegg asked how long Tabak had kept his hand around her neck. “For a short, short time, I think less than a minute,” he said. The barrister asked him to “relive” the moment in court, close his eyes and estimate how long he held her for. Tabak held his eyes shut for 15 seconds. Tabak said Yeates “went limp”. “She fell to the floor. I was in a state of panic, shock,” he said. “I still can’t understand what happened.” He claimed the attack took place in the kitchen. He carried Yeates’s body into the bedroom, where he placed it on the bed. He then carried it into his own flat. Tabak said he went back to Yeates’s flat, switched off the oven and television and picked up a pizza that she had bought on the way home that night and one of her socks that had fallen off. He took those items to his flat. He then put the body into a bicycle bag and put it in his car boot before driving to Asda. Asked why he had done so, he said: “I can’t believe I did that. I wasn’t thinking straight.” Tabak drove towards Bristol airport and stopped at Longwood Lane. He said: “I did something horrendous. I decided to leave her body there.” He said he tried to heave the body over a wall but could not, so he covered it with leaves. Clegg asked him about Yeates’s clothing being “rucked up”, exposing part of one breast. Tabak said it must have happened when he moved the body. He said traces of his DNA found on the outside of Yeates’s jeans and on her breast area must also be the result of him moving the body. He removed his spectacles and seemed to wipe away a tear when he apologised for dumping the body, saying: “I’m so sorry for doing that. I know I put Joanna’s parents and Greg though hell for a week. I still can’t believe I did it.” Tabak said he returned to his flat after dumping Yeates’s body. He collected the bicycle bag, pizza and sock and dumped them at a recycling centre. Later, he went and picked his girlfriend up and tried to carry on with life as normal. He said he expected the police to come for him at any moment. He began to drink and take sleeping pills. He told the court that before he was arrested on 20 January, he considered killing himself by jumping off Clifton suspension bridge. Even after his arrest, he admitted he lied to police, saying he “stupidly” hoped they would not find the evidence to convict him. Clegg concluded by again asking Tabak if he had meant to kill Yeates or cause her serious harm. “Definitely not,” he said. Nigel Lickley QC, for the prosecution, began by asking Tabak if he was “calculating, dishonest and manipulative”. Tabak accepted that he had been after killing Yeates. Lickley put it to him that if he was like that after the event, he was probably like it before, but Tabak disagreed. Lickley accused him of being “calculating, dishonest and manipulative” in the witness box. The defendant insisted he was not. The prosecutor suggested there was a “sexual element” to the case. Tabak had said he wanted to kiss Yeates. “Were you thinking of having sex with Joanna?” Lickley asked. “No,” Tabak replied. Lickley asked if Tabak was attracted to Yeates. He accepted he liked her face and may have been attracted by her hair and clothes. The prosecutor asked Tabak to demonstrate how Yeates had “waved” to him as he left for Asda. Tabak did so. He said he could not remember the gesture she had used to “beckon” him in. Tabak repeated that he believed she had flirted with him in the flat. Lickley then asked him to demonstrate how he had put his hand on Yeates’s back. Tabak did so. The prosecutor asked Tabak how and why he had put his hands on Yeates’s mouth and neck. He repeatedly asked him how Yeates had reacted. Tabak repeatedly replied: “I can’t remember.” He said he could not remember whether she was frightened, adding that she was “definitely not struggling”. Lickley asked Tabak to demonstrate how he had put his hand around Yeates’s neck. He did so using his right hand. The prosecutor then asked Tabak if he had pulled her top up. “No,” Tabak replied. Tabak was then asked whether he had touched her breasts, and whether that was what made her scream. “No, definitely not,” Tabak said. He asked Tabak twice whether he had eaten Yeates’s pizza. Tabak denied that he had. Lickley said: “All you had to do, Vincent Tabak, was walk out of the house. Correct?” Tabak said: “Yes, but I didn’t”. The trial continues. Joanna Yeates Crime Steven Morris guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Defendant denies there was sexual element to case but says he strangled 25-year-old in panic after she rebuffed his kiss More than 10 months after killing his next door neighbour, Joanna Yeates, Vincent Tabak has given his first full public account of the moment he attacked her. Tabak said he tried to kiss Yeates after she invited him into her flat and made a flirtatious remark. He insisted he had not meant to kill or seriously harm her, adding that he had only wanted to kiss her and was not planning to try to have sex with her. The 33-year-old Dutch engineer denied that he had lifted Yeates’s top or touched her breasts. He also said he had not been spying on her before the attack, which happened on 17 December last year. He apologised for hiding Yeates’s body on a country lane three miles from her flat, where it was found eight days later, on Christmas morning, and said he was sorry for putting Yeates’s parents and her boyfriend, Greg Reardon, through “hell”. Tabak was asked in court to demonstrate how he put an arm around Yeates and how he put his right hand around her neck. Her parents, David and Teresa, sat in the front row, five metres from Tabak, as he did so. They did not appear to look at him once as he gave evidence. Tabak – who admits manslaughter but denies murder – began by answering questions from his barrister, William Clegg QC. He spoke of his childhood and education in Holland, saying he grew up in a small town, went to university and became an expert in the flow of people through buildings and public areas. He said he studied until he was 29, when he came to England and got his first job at a design and engineering company in Bath. He had no girlfriends in Holland but met Tanja Morson online via Guardian Soulmates and they began living together in Clifton, Bristol. Yeates and Reardon moved in next door in October 2010, but Tabak was soon sent to California for work. He said he may only have seen his neighbours once. On the night of the killing, Morson was out at a staff party. Tabak said he had pizza and a beer then decided to go to Asda. “I felt a bit lonely,” he said. “I didn’t want to stay home alone.” As he walked down his path, Tabak said Yeates, a 25-year-old landscape architect, waved and indicated that he should come into her flat. He said he told her he was “a bit lonely and a bit bored” because his girlfriend was away. Yeates said she was also “bored at home” because Reardon was not there. The defendant said they talked about Yeates and Reardon’s cat, which used to find its way into Tabak and Morson’s flat. Tabak said Yeates had told him the cat sometimes went into places “that it shouldn’t go. A bit like me … ” He told his barrister: “I got he impression that she wanted to kiss me. She had been friendly. I leaned forward and I think I put one of my hands on her back and tried to kiss her. She started to scream quite loudly.” Tabak’s voice broke as he described how he “panicked”. He said he put his hand over her mouth, said he was sorry and asked her to stop screaming. He said he took his hand away and she began to scream again. “I put my hand over her mouth and the other hand on her neck,” he said. “I was panicking. I wanted to stop her screams. I wanted to calm her down.” “Did you intend to kill her?” Clegg asked. “No definitely not,” Tabak said. He was then asked: “Did you intend to cause her serious harm?” “No, definitely not,” he replied. Clegg asked how long Tabak had kept his hand around her neck. “For a short, short time, I think less than a minute,” he said. The barrister asked him to “relive” the moment in court, close his eyes and estimate how long he held her for. Tabak held his eyes shut for 15 seconds. Tabak said Yeates “went limp”. “She fell to the floor. I was in a state of panic, shock,” he said. “I still can’t understand what happened.” He claimed the attack took place in the kitchen. He carried Yeates’s body into the bedroom, where he placed it on the bed. He then carried it into his own flat. Tabak said he went back to Yeates’s flat, switched off the oven and television and picked up a pizza that she had bought on the way home that night and one of her socks that had fallen off. He took those items to his flat. He then put the body into a bicycle bag and put it in his car boot before driving to Asda. Asked why he had done so, he said: “I can’t believe I did that. I wasn’t thinking straight.” Tabak drove towards Bristol airport and stopped at Longwood Lane. He said: “I did something horrendous. I decided to leave her body there.” He said he tried to heave the body over a wall but could not, so he covered it with leaves. Clegg asked him about Yeates’s clothing being “rucked up”, exposing part of one breast. Tabak said it must have happened when he moved the body. He said traces of his DNA found on the outside of Yeates’s jeans and on her breast area must also be the result of him moving the body. He removed his spectacles and seemed to wipe away a tear when he apologised for dumping the body, saying: “I’m so sorry for doing that. I know I put Joanna’s parents and Greg though hell for a week. I still can’t believe I did it.” Tabak said he returned to his flat after dumping Yeates’s body. He collected the bicycle bag, pizza and sock and dumped them at a recycling centre. Later, he went and picked his girlfriend up and tried to carry on with life as normal. He said he expected the police to come for him at any moment. He began to drink and take sleeping pills. He told the court that before he was arrested on 20 January, he considered killing himself by jumping off Clifton suspension bridge. Even after his arrest, he admitted he lied to police, saying he “stupidly” hoped they would not find the evidence to convict him. Clegg concluded by again asking Tabak if he had meant to kill Yeates or cause her serious harm. “Definitely not,” he said. Nigel Lickley QC, for the prosecution, began by asking Tabak if he was “calculating, dishonest and manipulative”. Tabak accepted that he had been after killing Yeates. Lickley put it to him that if he was like that after the event, he was probably like it before, but Tabak disagreed. Lickley accused him of being “calculating, dishonest and manipulative” in the witness box. The defendant insisted he was not. The prosecutor suggested there was a “sexual element” to the case. Tabak had said he wanted to kiss Yeates. “Were you thinking of having sex with Joanna?” Lickley asked. “No,” Tabak replied. Lickley asked if Tabak was attracted to Yeates. He accepted he liked her face and may have been attracted by her hair and clothes. The prosecutor asked Tabak to demonstrate how Yeates had “waved” to him as he left for Asda. Tabak did so. He said he could not remember the gesture she had used to “beckon” him in. Tabak repeated that he believed she had flirted with him in the flat. Lickley then asked him to demonstrate how he had put his hand on Yeates’s back. Tabak did so. The prosecutor asked Tabak how and why he had put his hands on Yeates’s mouth and neck. He repeatedly asked him how Yeates had reacted. Tabak repeatedly replied: “I can’t remember.” He said he could not remember whether she was frightened, adding that she was “definitely not struggling”. Lickley asked Tabak to demonstrate how he had put his hand around Yeates’s neck. He did so using his right hand. The prosecutor then asked Tabak if he had pulled her top up. “No,” Tabak replied. Tabak was then asked whether he had touched her breasts, and whether that was what made her scream. “No, definitely not,” Tabak said. He asked Tabak twice whether he had eaten Yeates’s pizza. Tabak denied that he had. Lickley said: “All you had to do, Vincent Tabak, was walk out of the house. Correct?” Tabak said: “Yes, but I didn’t”. The trial continues. Joanna Yeates Crime Steven Morris guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Defendant denies there was sexual element to case but says he strangled 25-year-old in panic after she rebuffed his kiss More than 10 months after killing his next door neighbour, Joanna Yeates, Vincent Tabak has given his first full public account of the moment he attacked her. Tabak said he tried to kiss Yeates after she invited him into her flat and made a flirtatious remark. He insisted he had not meant to kill or seriously harm her, adding that he had only wanted to kiss her and was not planning to try to have sex with her. The 33-year-old Dutch engineer denied that he had lifted Yeates’s top or touched her breasts. He also said he had not been spying on her before the attack, which happened on 17 December last year. He apologised for hiding Yeates’s body on a country lane three miles from her flat, where it was found eight days later, on Christmas morning, and said he was sorry for putting Yeates’s parents and her boyfriend, Greg Reardon, through “hell”. Tabak was asked in court to demonstrate how he put an arm around Yeates and how he put his right hand around her neck. Her parents, David and Teresa, sat in the front row, five metres from Tabak, as he did so. They did not appear to look at him once as he gave evidence. Tabak – who admits manslaughter but denies murder – began by answering questions from his barrister, William Clegg QC. He spoke of his childhood and education in Holland, saying he grew up in a small town, went to university and became an expert in the flow of people through buildings and public areas. He said he studied until he was 29, when he came to England and got his first job at a design and engineering company in Bath. He had no girlfriends in Holland but met Tanja Morson online via Guardian Soulmates and they began living together in Clifton, Bristol. Yeates and Reardon moved in next door in October 2010, but Tabak was soon sent to California for work. He said he may only have seen his neighbours once. On the night of the killing, Morson was out at a staff party. Tabak said he had pizza and a beer then decided to go to Asda. “I felt a bit lonely,” he said. “I didn’t want to stay home alone.” As he walked down his path, Tabak said Yeates, a 25-year-old landscape architect, waved and indicated that he should come into her flat. He said he told her he was “a bit lonely and a bit bored” because his girlfriend was away. Yeates said she was also “bored at home” because Reardon was not there. The defendant said they talked about Yeates and Reardon’s cat, which used to find its way into Tabak and Morson’s flat. Tabak said Yeates had told him the cat sometimes went into places “that it shouldn’t go. A bit like me … ” He told his barrister: “I got he impression that she wanted to kiss me. She had been friendly. I leaned forward and I think I put one of my hands on her back and tried to kiss her. She started to scream quite loudly.” Tabak’s voice broke as he described how he “panicked”. He said he put his hand over her mouth, said he was sorry and asked her to stop screaming. He said he took his hand away and she began to scream again. “I put my hand over her mouth and the other hand on her neck,” he said. “I was panicking. I wanted to stop her screams. I wanted to calm her down.” “Did you intend to kill her?” Clegg asked. “No definitely not,” Tabak said. He was then asked: “Did you intend to cause her serious harm?” “No, definitely not,” he replied. Clegg asked how long Tabak had kept his hand around her neck. “For a short, short time, I think less than a minute,” he said. The barrister asked him to “relive” the moment in court, close his eyes and estimate how long he held her for. Tabak held his eyes shut for 15 seconds. Tabak said Yeates “went limp”. “She fell to the floor. I was in a state of panic, shock,” he said. “I still can’t understand what happened.” He claimed the attack took place in the kitchen. He carried Yeates’s body into the bedroom, where he placed it on the bed. He then carried it into his own flat. Tabak said he went back to Yeates’s flat, switched off the oven and television and picked up a pizza that she had bought on the way home that night and one of her socks that had fallen off. He took those items to his flat. He then put the body into a bicycle bag and put it in his car boot before driving to Asda. Asked why he had done so, he said: “I can’t believe I did that. I wasn’t thinking straight.” Tabak drove towards Bristol airport and stopped at Longwood Lane. He said: “I did something horrendous. I decided to leave her body there.” He said he tried to heave the body over a wall but could not, so he covered it with leaves. Clegg asked him about Yeates’s clothing being “rucked up”, exposing part of one breast. Tabak said it must have happened when he moved the body. He said traces of his DNA found on the outside of Yeates’s jeans and on her breast area must also be the result of him moving the body. He removed his spectacles and seemed to wipe away a tear when he apologised for dumping the body, saying: “I’m so sorry for doing that. I know I put Joanna’s parents and Greg though hell for a week. I still can’t believe I did it.” Tabak said he returned to his flat after dumping Yeates’s body. He collected the bicycle bag, pizza and sock and dumped them at a recycling centre. Later, he went and picked his girlfriend up and tried to carry on with life as normal. He said he expected the police to come for him at any moment. He began to drink and take sleeping pills. He told the court that before he was arrested on 20 January, he considered killing himself by jumping off Clifton suspension bridge. Even after his arrest, he admitted he lied to police, saying he “stupidly” hoped they would not find the evidence to convict him. Clegg concluded by again asking Tabak if he had meant to kill Yeates or cause her serious harm. “Definitely not,” he said. Nigel Lickley QC, for the prosecution, began by asking Tabak if he was “calculating, dishonest and manipulative”. Tabak accepted that he had been after killing Yeates. Lickley put it to him that if he was like that after the event, he was probably like it before, but Tabak disagreed. Lickley accused him of being “calculating, dishonest and manipulative” in the witness box. The defendant insisted he was not. The prosecutor suggested there was a “sexual element” to the case. Tabak had said he wanted to kiss Yeates. “Were you thinking of having sex with Joanna?” Lickley asked. “No,” Tabak replied. Lickley asked if Tabak was attracted to Yeates. He accepted he liked her face and may have been attracted by her hair and clothes. The prosecutor asked Tabak to demonstrate how Yeates had “waved” to him as he left for Asda. Tabak did so. He said he could not remember the gesture she had used to “beckon” him in. Tabak repeated that he believed she had flirted with him in the flat. Lickley then asked him to demonstrate how he had put his hand on Yeates’s back. Tabak did so. The prosecutor asked Tabak how and why he had put his hands on Yeates’s mouth and neck. He repeatedly asked him how Yeates had reacted. Tabak repeatedly replied: “I can’t remember.” He said he could not remember whether she was frightened, adding that she was “definitely not struggling”. Lickley asked Tabak to demonstrate how he had put his hand around Yeates’s neck. He did so using his right hand. The prosecutor then asked Tabak if he had pulled her top up. “No,” Tabak replied. Tabak was then asked whether he had touched her breasts, and whether that was what made her scream. “No, definitely not,” Tabak said. He asked Tabak twice whether he had eaten Yeates’s pizza. Tabak denied that he had. Lickley said: “All you had to do, Vincent Tabak, was walk out of the house. Correct?” Tabak said: “Yes, but I didn’t”. The trial continues. Joanna Yeates Crime Steven Morris guardian.co.uk
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Researchers follow whole Danish population aged over 30 and find incidence of brain cancer in mobile users is no higher There is no link between the long-term use of a mobile phone and brain cancer, research suggests. In what has been described as the largest study on the subject, researchers found that cancer rates in the central nervous system were almost the same in both long-term mobile phone users and people who do not use the handsets, the study published on bmj.com found. There are more than 5bn mobile phone subscribers worldwide and people have expressed fears that the electromagnetic fields emitted by holding a handset to the ear may cause adverse health affects. Researchers from the Institute of Cancer Epidemiology in Copenhagen studied the whole Danish population aged over 30 and born in Denmark after 1925 by gathering information from the Danish phone network operators and the Danish Cancer Register. They analysed data of 10,729 central nervous system tumours between 1990 and 2007 and found that people who had used mobiles for 13 years or more had similar cancer rates to non-users. The researchers said they observed no overall increased risk for tumours of the central nervous system or for all cancers combined in mobile phone users. The authors said: “The extended follow-up allowed us to investigate effects in people who had used mobile phones for 10 years or more, and this long-term use was not associated with higher risks of cancer. “However, as a small to moderate increase in risk for subgroups of heavy users or after even longer induction periods than 10-15 years cannot be ruled out, further studies with large study populations, where the potential for misclassification of exposure and selection bias is minimised, are warranted.” Mobile phones Cancer Cancer guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Researchers follow whole Danish population aged over 30 and find incidence of brain cancer in mobile users is no higher There is no link between the long-term use of a mobile phone and brain cancer, research suggests. In what has been described as the largest study on the subject, researchers found that cancer rates in the central nervous system were almost the same in both long-term mobile phone users and people who do not use the handsets, the study published on bmj.com found. There are more than 5bn mobile phone subscribers worldwide and people have expressed fears that the electromagnetic fields emitted by holding a handset to the ear may cause adverse health affects. Researchers from the Institute of Cancer Epidemiology in Copenhagen studied the whole Danish population aged over 30 and born in Denmark after 1925 by gathering information from the Danish phone network operators and the Danish Cancer Register. They analysed data of 10,729 central nervous system tumours between 1990 and 2007 and found that people who had used mobiles for 13 years or more had similar cancer rates to non-users. The researchers said they observed no overall increased risk for tumours of the central nervous system or for all cancers combined in mobile phone users. The authors said: “The extended follow-up allowed us to investigate effects in people who had used mobile phones for 10 years or more, and this long-term use was not associated with higher risks of cancer. “However, as a small to moderate increase in risk for subgroups of heavy users or after even longer induction periods than 10-15 years cannot be ruled out, further studies with large study populations, where the potential for misclassification of exposure and selection bias is minimised, are warranted.” Mobile phones Cancer Cancer guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Researchers follow whole Danish population aged over 30 and find incidence of brain cancer in mobile users is no higher There is no link between the long-term use of a mobile phone and brain cancer, research suggests. In what has been described as the largest study on the subject, researchers found that cancer rates in the central nervous system were almost the same in both long-term mobile phone users and people who do not use the handsets, the study published on bmj.com found. There are more than 5bn mobile phone subscribers worldwide and people have expressed fears that the electromagnetic fields emitted by holding a handset to the ear may cause adverse health affects. Researchers from the Institute of Cancer Epidemiology in Copenhagen studied the whole Danish population aged over 30 and born in Denmark after 1925 by gathering information from the Danish phone network operators and the Danish Cancer Register. They analysed data of 10,729 central nervous system tumours between 1990 and 2007 and found that people who had used mobiles for 13 years or more had similar cancer rates to non-users. The researchers said they observed no overall increased risk for tumours of the central nervous system or for all cancers combined in mobile phone users. The authors said: “The extended follow-up allowed us to investigate effects in people who had used mobile phones for 10 years or more, and this long-term use was not associated with higher risks of cancer. “However, as a small to moderate increase in risk for subgroups of heavy users or after even longer induction periods than 10-15 years cannot be ruled out, further studies with large study populations, where the potential for misclassification of exposure and selection bias is minimised, are warranted.” Mobile phones Cancer Cancer guardian.co.uk
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