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Young man linked to 79 killings in Mexico

Source: CNN

(CNN) -- The most shocking thing about the arrest of a man linked to 79 killings may be that authorities don't find it shocking.

At 20 years old, Juan Pablo Vazquez is accused of killing rivals, a policeman, a stripper and other innocent bystanders.

But you won't find authorities in the northern economic hub of Monterrey, Mexico, using any superlatives to describe the alleged killer. Not the worst they've ever seen, not the most ruthless, not the youngest or most prolific.

That's because Monterrey and its surroundings are an area disputed by rival drug cartels. From 2010 to the present, an average of 108 people have been killed each month in the state of Nuevo Leon, according to official statistics. Monterrey, the capital, has recorded 223 homicides so far this year.

Vazquez's arrest, then, merited a press conference, but no celebration as if an alleged serial killer had been brought down.

"We are witnessing a very severe crisis because of the war between cartels," one Mexican official said.


Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/25/world/americas/mexico-killings-arrest/index.html

Australia pensioners 'used as drug mules' to Canada

An elderly Australian couple were unwittingly used as drug mules in a ruse involving a free trip to Canada, Australian police have revealed.

The couple, from Perth, were told they had won a week-long trip, with flights, hotel and new luggage included. But when they landed back in Perth, they told customs officials they feared something was wrong with their luggage.

Officials subsequently found 3.5kg (8 pounds) of methamphetamine in the lining of each bag. The incident happened on 13 October. A 38-year-old man was arrested later that day at Perth airport and has since been charged with drug-related offences.

Local reports put the value of the drugs at A$7m ($6.7m, £4.1m) and said police believed the suitcases were swapped while the couple, aged 72 and 64, were in Canada.

In a statement, police said the subsequent investigation had revealed "a complex and highly-organised scam in which older Australians appear to be targeted by a bogus Canadian-based tour company identifying itself as 'AUSCAN Tours'".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-24668072

Space Shuttle Endeavour Exclusive: A Timelapse of the Final Ride

Anti-bullying video may have played a role in fatal Nevada school shooting

A student at the Nevada middle school where a 7th grader allegedly went on a shooting spree on Monday said that she remembered the suspect as friendly, and said he might have gotten the idea from an anti-bullying video.

Police say the 12-year-old student, who has not been identified, brought a 9mm Ruger handgun to school in Monday and used it to kill a math teacher and wound two classmates before he fatally shot himself in the head. While investigators worked on Tuesday to trace the origin of the gun, the boy was thought to have brought it from home, and there was the "potential" that his parents could face charges, police said.

Sparks Middle School eighth-grader Amaya Newton remembered the suspected shooter as a nice kid who got pushed around by some of his schoolmates, according to local NBC News affiliate KRNV. She remembers other students "tripping him in the hallways" and "bugging him for money," Newton told the station.

Newton also recalled an anti-bullying video that was shown at the school on Oct. 11, just before the students went on their fall break. The video showed a girl bringing a gun onto a school bus to frighten bullies, Newton told KRNV.

"It was an anti-bullying movie, but it could have gotten into his head about the girl scaring the bullies with the gun," Newton said, according to the station. "She brought a gun on the bus to scare them and threatened to kill them."

The video might suggest to students "that maybe it's easier to scare your bullies than just to tell a teacher," Newton said. KRNV spoke with another student who described the anti-bullying video in the same way. A spokesperson for the Washoe County School District told the station they were not aware of the particular video but would look into it.

http://www.12newsnow.com/story/23771344/anti-bullying-video-may-have-played-a-role-in-fatal-nevada-school-shooting-student

So far the contents of the video haven't been officially confirmed, but if true; holy damn....

I swear to GOD my real name is not Aryn Leroux and I don't live in Conn.

A 42-year-old Connecticut man was arrested Wednesday after making threats to the New York Mets organization.

According to NBC, Aryn Leroux made threats via Twitter to specific Mets players, coaches and executives, as well as to Citi Field. In a screenshot of some of the threats, posted below, Leroux said “there will be a blood-bath at Citi-Field tomorrow night.” It’s not clear which specific game he intended to act out the threats, but based on the screenshot, he does make mention of carrying out a threat on a game held on Friday, the 13th; the Mets won 4-3 at home against the Miami Marlins on Friday, Sept. 13.

LeRoux was arrested on an outstanding warrant after authorities acted on a joint investigation by the NYPD, the Queen’s (N.Y). District Attorney’s office and a detective from the West Haven (Conn.) police department. He is charged with threatening in the second degree and breach of peace and is being held on a $2,500 bond as he awaits arraignment at Milford (Conn.) Superior Court.



http://tracking.si.com/2013/10/23/mets-death-threats-connecticut-arrested-citi-field-mlb/?sct=mlb_t2_a10

I'm SO jelly: Man buys World Series Game 1 ticket for $6

Deadspin has a story which should impress upon all of you the importance of good keyboarding skills and/or math and/or calendar awareness: It seems one of their readers hopped on StubHub looking for World Series tickets and found one for $3. He bought it, and after the service charges he has a ticket to Game 1 tomorrow night for six whole dollars.

I have to agree with Deadspin’s speculation: the seller screwed up when he entered the desired price of the ticket, either hitting enter too quickly, screwing up the decimals or something. Or maybe he’s suffering from some space-time phase-shift kind of situation and believes that the ticket was really for a weekday matinee against the Seattle Pilots in 1969. Seems like the most logical explanation, anyway.

So now we wait. For Deadspin or someone like them to find the huckleberry who just lost out on a chance to sell a World Series ticket for several hundred dollars.

http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/10/22/man-buys-world-series-for-6/

http://deadspin.com/man-buys-ticket-to-game-1-of-world-series-for-6-00-on-1449725376

China's Most Effective Whistleblowers? Mistresses

Hell hath no fury: 15 percent of whistleblowers who reported cases of Chinese government corruption via the internet over the past year were the unhappy mistresses of party officials. That figure, from an analysis by the Legal Daily, a publication run by China’s Ministry of Justice, comes with an important caveat: it’s based on a sample of what the publication deems 26 “typical cases” of real-name public reporting. But regardless of the methodology, the study underlines the role that China’s “other women,” (or “little third” as they’re commonly called) are playing in the country’s campaign to rein in graft. ”In China nothing is clear,” Zhu Ruifeng, a blogger whose anti-corruption website features some of the salacious testimonies of these women, told the BBC. “The public don’t know what officials are up to. But mistresses live with government officials, they spend their money, they know about everything that goes on.”

Because these often doomed relationships are so common among officials—they’re even fueling the country’s property bubble—it seems inevitable that ex-flames could turn into angry whistleblowers. A spate of officials have recently lost their jobs because of their extra-marital dalliances. In May, a government energy official was fired after his mistress told Chinese media he had embezzled $200 million from Chinese banks. Last year, a married district-level official in Chongqing stepped down after a sex tape was released that showed him with a young woman.

As much as mistresses symbolize the excess and sense of entitlement of China’s elites, they also represent a small group of Chinese citizens refusing be cast off by these powerful men. “The mistresses of officials have become a force of whistle-blowers that cannot be ignored,” the Legal Daily observed, forming a constituency with the potential to organize and protest. A forum for “little third” women features advice on how to get your “man to love you more” but also posts that say, “There’s unity in strength, we should act together and help each other.”

Take 26 year-old Ji Yingnan, who discovered her purported fiancee, an official with China’s state administration of archives, was married with a teenage son. In addition to posting hundreds of photos of the two online, she handed out CDs of the pictures in front of the gates of Zhongnanhai, the headquarters of China’s Communist Party, and detailed the extent of his lavish spending on her to Western and Chinese media. (He bought her an Audi and would stuff as much as $1,000 in her purse every day when they first met.) ”People’s awareness is becoming stronger,” she told the Washington Post. “People won’t believe what they’re told as easily. In the era of the Internet, the government cannot hide things from people.” The official was soon sacked.

http://www.theatlantic.com/china/archive/2013/10/chinas-most-effective-whistleblowers-mistresses/280647/

Where would sports be without the "voice of the fan"?

Conservative activist Ben Shapiro says George Zimmerman’s brother backs his Ritz Crackers boycott

Conservative activist Ben Shapiro breathlessly announced an endorsement Friday of his boycott of Ritz Crackers.

The Breitbart News editor and author called for the boycott because the snack food advertises during the MSNBC program hosted by the Rev. Al Sharpton, who Shapiro chides for referring to white people using the word “cracker” in a 1994 speech.

The boycott drew at least one semi-famous supporter in Robert Zimmerman Jr., brother of the Florida neighborhood watch volunteer acquitted in July of manslaughter in the fatal shooting 2012 of unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin.

“There is perhaps no one more undeserving of the title ‘Reverend’ in the world than Al Sharpton,” said Robert Zimmerman, brother of George Zimmerman.

Shapiro hyped the announcement by saying that Robert Zimmerman, who has appeared on cable news programs to suggest the 17-year-old killed by his brother was a drug dealer and had purchased guns illegally, spoke to him exclusively.

“It is clear to me that inciting and promoting racial discord have proven far too profitable vehicles of wealth for Sharpton to abandon on his own but we can force the hand of his sponsors and send a message that he can’t ignore by hurting him where he’s bound to feel it — his wallet,” Robert Zimmerman said.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/10/18/conservative-activist-ben-shapiro-says-george-zimmermans-brother-backs-his-ritz-crackers-boycott/

Anybody want to tell me again how great this family is??