Five Mexican children detained over six-year-old's murder

© Daniel Acosta, AFP
Relatives of Cristopher Raymundo Marquez Mora, 6, mourn during his funeral service in Chihuahua, Mexico on May 17, 2015.

    

Mexico sought answers Monday after five children aged 11 to 15 stoned, stabbed and buried a six-year-old boy, a shocking case that raised questions about the influence of drug violence on kids.

The boy was found in a shallow grave by a stream on Saturday, two days after he was last seen with a group of children on the outskirts of the Chihuahua state capital, the regional prosecutor's office said.

Cristopher Raymundo Marquez Mora was found after investigators interrogated the children, who include two 13-year-old girls, one 11-year-old boy and two 15-year-old boys.

The five were detained as "probable culprits in an act that reflects a problem of social decay," the prosecutor's office said in a statement.

The victim disappeared late Thursday and his mother reported his disappearance the next morning, sparking a search.

The boy and the other children are neighbors who knew each other.

© Daniel Acosta, AFP/File
Police and forensic personnel carry the body of Cristopher Raymundo Marquez Mora in Chihuahua on May 16, 2015.

    

"They were playing, they tied him up and they put a stick on his neck that semi-asphyxiated him," the statement said.

"When the boy fell to the ground, they hurled rocks at him, they stuck a knife in his back and once dead, they dragged him where they deposited the body, in a shallow dig," it said.

"They covered the body with dirt and put plants and a dead animal on the surface" in a bid to hide him, the statement said.

The two 15-year-old boys could be jailed if found guilty but the other three other minors face "other types of sanctions," prosecutors said.

The murder took place in a state that has endured some of the worst bloodshed in Mexico's drug war, with thousands of people killed in turf wars between cartels.

'Generation of psychopaths'

© Daniel Acosta, AFP
Relatives of Cristopher Raymundo Marquez Mora during his funeral service in Chihuahua on May 17, 2015.

    

Chihuahua, which borders Texas, is home to Ciudad Juarez, which was once considered the world's murder capital outside a warzone as the Juarez and Sinaloa drug cartels fought for the territory.

The city's murder rate has dramatically dropped in the past four years but the state continues to witness murders, torture, kidnappings and extortion.

The five children accused of murder "are victims of an environment of extreme violence," said Juan Martin Perez, executive director of the Children's Rights Network, a non-governmental organization.

"There's a strong presence and culture of organized crime and a lack of culture of rule of law," he said. "The children reflect what they experience every day."

Carlos Ochoa, a forensic and criminology expert, said cases like the six-year-old's killing mark "the start of a generation of psychopaths, who are getting younger."

© Jesus Alcazar, AFP/File
Police officers take part in a security operation on February 12, 2013 in a street of Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua state.

    

Ochoa recalled the 2013 case of a 17-year-old girl from Chihuahua who poisoned and burned her adoptive parents.

The mother of Cristopher, Concepcion Mora, angrily rejected the explanation that the children killed her son during a game.

"It's illogical for it to be a game," she said Sunday as relatives and neighbors joined her in a protest. "They should pay for my son's life."

One of the boy's aunts warned: "We want vengeance. If they don't give us justice, we will take revenge."

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Saudi Arabia advertises for executioners as beheading rates rise

© BroadAarow
Deera Square, central Riyadh. Known locally as "Chop-chop square", it is the location of public beheadings.

    

Riyadh - Because of the increase in public executions this year, the Saudi Arabian government is in need of an additional eight "religious functionaries" to carry out the beheadings of people condemned to death by public execution.

The job description states there are no special qualifications needed, but besides beheading an individual, the applicant will also be required to do the occasional limb amputation for those convicted of lesser crimes.

The position is a Civil Service job and a downloadable PDF application is available on the website that carries today's date. The job is classified as a "religious Functionary," and is at the lower end of the Civil Service pay scale.

Saudi Arabia is just one of the top five countries in the world in putting people to death. The Islamic country, with 90 deaths, was ranked number three in 2014, after China and Iran, with 289 executions, but ahead of Iraq, with 81 deaths, and the United States with 35 executions. China carries out more executions that any other country in the world, but the actual numbers are a closely guarded state secret.

According to the official Saudi Press Agency, a man beheaded on Sunday was the 85th execution this year, compared to 90 for all of 2014. While most of those executed this year were convicted of murder, there were 38 people executed because of drug offenses. Half were from Saudi Arabia and the rest were from Pakistan, Yemen, Syria, Jordan, India, Indonesia, Burma, Chad, Eritrea the Philippines and Sudan, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).

Although government officials are not saying, there is speculation about the reason for the increase in executions this year. Diplomatic sources say it may be because more judges have been appointed recently to handle a backlog of appeals cases. Political analysts think the increase in executions is more likely a tougher response to increasing turbulence in the region.

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Hawaiian volcano on brink of eruption

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Kilauea, on the Big Island of Hawaii, is one of the more active shield volcanoes in the Aloha State and observers at the United States Geological Survey are saying that the odds of a major eruption have increased significantly in recent days.

"Activity at the summit of Kīlauea Volcano continues to change, as shown by a pronounced drop in the level of the lava lake within Halemaʻumaʻu Crater, a change in the summit area deformation pattern, and the concentrated earthquake activity in the southern part of the caldera and upper Southwest Rift Zone," a recent statement from the USGS said.

A lake of molten rock near the summit of the volcano had risen to record-high levels, but, as the USGS statement pointed out, the lava level has subsided, dropping almost 500 feet. As lava levels have been rising and falling, a series of earthquakes have radiated out from Kilauea.

These eruptions are impending

USGS scientists also said deformations of the ground could point to impending eruptions.

"Clearly the lava, by dropping out of sight, it has to be going somewhere," said Steven Brantley, deputy scientist at the USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory told the AP.

According to reports, two minor volcanic activities are already taking place on Kilauea. First, lava has been flowing into Halemaumau Crater, which is located in the much larger summit caldera of Kilauea. Second, is the eruption at Puu Oo vent, a feature in the volcano's east rift zone that streamed lava toward the town of Pahoa last year. Lava flows stopped just outside a shopping center.

In their statement, USGS researchers said earthquakes have been centered on the southern part of the volcano, and this could mean that an eruption is coming from southwest of the Halemaumau Crater. An eruption in the volcano's upper Southwest Rift Zone would be the first in more than 40 years.

Researchers also conceded that all this activity could lead to nothing.

"We don't know what the outcome of this activity might be," Brantley said. "That is the challenge. [We are] trying to interpret what this activity really means in terms of the next step for Kilauea."

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Nature or nuture? Twins hold the answer

© shironosov/iStockphoto

    

The degree to which we are a product of our genes or the environment has been calculated by an analysis of 50 years of twin studies.

In a study published today, an international team including Australian researchers shows an almost 50-50 split in the influence of genes or the environment on the development of various human traits.

The finding, published in Nature Genetics, is based on a review of 2748 studies involving 14 million twin pairs from across 39 countries.

The twins involved in the various studies ranged in age from 18 to 64 years.

Co-first author Dr Beben Benyamin, at the Queensland Brain Institute, says it has long been established that genetics influence almost all human traits.

"But there is still some controversy and differences in terms of how much of the variation [in traits] is due to genetics and how much is due to environment," Benyamin says.

He says the team, including Dutch and American researchers, looked at all published twin studies to answer this puzzle.

Benyamin says while identical twins are genetically the same, non-identical twins share 50 per cent of their DNA.

The researchers were able to determine the contribution of genetics and the environment on the trait by measuring how similar various traits are between identical twins and non-identical twins.

"If the trait is genetic then you would expect identical twins will be more similar than the non-identical twin. The more similar an identical twin to a non-identical twin then we can infer the trait is largely due to the genetic factor," says Benyamin.

Genes or environment

For all traits, the average genetic influence was 49 per cent while the environment accounted for 51 per cent.

"We were amazed the number was so close to half," admits Benyamin.

However, he says, this is an average figure and some traits are more or less influenced by genes.

For example, schizophrenia is 70 per cent the result of genetic influences and 30 per cent environmental.

Whereas social values are shaped by around 30 per cent genetics, and 70 per cent socio-economic factors such as education and where people live.

Across the more than 2000 studies, the 10 most investigated traits were temperament and personality functions, weight maintenance functions, general metabolic function, depressive episode, higher-level cognitive function, conduct disorders, mental and behavioural disorders due to alcohol, anxiety disorders, height and mental and behavioural disorders due to use of tobacco.

The researchers also found almost 70 per cent of the effect of genes on a trait is additive.

This means that where hundreds of genes are involved in a trait, such as height, each gene has a tiny cumulative impact.

"So for example in height one gene might add one centimetre, the next gene a half a centimetre," Benyamin says.

This finding has implications on the design of gene mapping studies, says Benyamin, as it enables researchers to adopt the correct modelling.

While some of the findings have been reported before, the "difference with our study is the scale," says Benyamin.

"We comprehensively reviewed everything in the literature of twin studies — and we found everything is inherited, but the degree to how much the genetics contributed varies between traits and phenotype."

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Two cold temperature records broken in Saskatchewan, Canada

© Neil Longmuir/Global News

    

Environment Canada says a couple of cold temperature records were established on the May long weekend in Saskatchewan. It released a weather summary early Monday morning.

An arctic high pressure ridge settled over southern areas of the province last night producing clear conditions and widespread frost.

A new record low temperature was set in North Battleford at -4.5°C. The previous mark was set in 1895 at -3.3°C.

Swift Current also broke a record at -5.9°C, beating out -5.6°C, which was set in 1923.

The federal agency says these figures may be preliminary and do not constitute a final report.

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Russia stops transit of NATO military cargo to Afghanistan through its territory

© AFP

    

Russian PM Dmitry Medvedev has revoked a decree that allowed delivery of NATO military equipment to Afghanistan through Russian territory.

According to the official document, signed by Medvedev and published on Monday, all previous decisions on NATO cargo transit to Afghanistan have now been revoked. This includes an act allowing delivery of military hardware and equipment via rail, motor vehicles, or through Russian airspace.

The Russian Foreign Ministry has been ordered to inform all the countries involved.

Transit of military cargo to Afghanistan through Russia was permitted after a 2001 UN Security Council resolution. The document established an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, and called on all countries to support the NATO-led security mission. In 2008 Russia signed a decree allowing ISAF cargo to pass through its territory.

In 2014, Washington announced that the military operation in Afghanistan was over. The US-led coalition has pulled out most of its forces and the Afghan military has assumed full responsibility for national security. However, while the 2001 resolution has been terminated, some 13,000 ISAF troops will remain in Afghanistan until the end of 2016 to oversee local forces and provide training on counter-terror operations.

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Multiple officers charged with possession of child porn, one accused of raping a child, still working in New Orleans

Police charged with crimes are rarely prosecuted, and even when they are, punishment or prison time are even more uncommon.

    

What happens to a citizen when hundreds of images of child pornography are found on their computer and phone? Well, if you are a law enforcement officer, the answer is, nothing. An investigation into the New Orleans Police Department has revealed a disturbing lack of discipline for individuals who've been caught and accused of despicable acts.

The residents of a Mandeville neighborhood felt safe knowing that a 16-year veteran of the NOPD, Sgt Bradley Wax lived down their street. However, that would quickly change after Wax was arrested and charged with 38 counts of possessing child pornography. The Louisiana Attorney General's office conducted a search on Wax's personal computer and other electronic devices and found them to be full of explicit photos of young children.

He was obviously fired immediately and not allowed to be a cop any longer, right? Or at the very least he was suspended until the trial, right? Wrong. WDSU, who carried out the independent investigation, found that Wax was initially suspended but has since returned to work as normal, working in fleet management at the NOPD headquarters.

"It's incredibly hard to imagine anyone in that capacity would be back working and being paid for it at taxpayer expense," said Dr. John Penny, criminologist at Southern University at New Orleans.

It is indeed hard to imagine how any morally sound establishment would continue to allow a man, who was found in possession of so much child pornography that he faces more than 500 years behind bars if convicted, to continue to draw a salary as a cop.

But to the NOPD, it's business as usual.

Wax's scenario is not an isolated incident either. WDSU found more than a half-dozen officers charged with everything from child porn to the state's most serious sexual assault charge, aggravated rape.

NOPD Officer Michael Thomassie was another one. Thomassie was accused and arrested on charges of aggravated rape over a year ago. However, when WDSU investigators went to New Orlean's 4th district, they found Thomassie currently still working as a cop.

While these officers were initially suspended, as soon as the spotlight moved on, they were silently allowed back across the blue line.

Naturally, the department has declined an interview about this situation, but they have released the following statement:

"An emergency suspension is generally used as a tool for emergency situations when an officer has been arrested and is physically unable to come to work and perform their duties. Once the officer is able to return to work, they are reassigned to administrative duties pending the outcome of an investigation. Based on civil service rules, officers are disciplined after an investigation is completed and a formal disciplinary hearing has been held."

Apparently it takes the NOPD more than a year to conduct an investigation and find guilt in a man whose iPhone was a pedophile's paradise. Of course, everyone, even the vilest of criminals deserves the right to due process. But the double standard here is where the issue arises.

These people claim the responsibility of upholding the law. When they are the ones suspected of violating that law, they should be held to a much higher standard, not a lower one.

"It sends a very dangerous message to the citizens of this community," said Dr. Penny. "The appropriate action was taken; now you step back from that and put them, back to work and pay them, and it sends an incredibly dangerous message."

The message it sends is that police are above the law.

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Meanwhile, as police collect child porn and rape the citizens, the school children are told to write letters to them.

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