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Monday, November 26, 2012

An 18-year-old man, Travis Hawkins Jr., was charged yesterday by police in Mobile County, Alabama, for allegedly beating a woman who is romantically involved with his sister. Hawkins was bailed following a charge for second-degree assault.

Mallory Owens, 23, the victim of the attack, is in the USA Medical Center in Mobile, recovering from the injuries. Owens has had to have facial reconstructive surgery and had a broken nose from the assault during Thanksgiving. Owens’ family have told reporters they believe it to be a hate crime and called for the prosecutors to upgrade the charges against Hawkins.

The father of the arrested man, Travis Hawkins Sr., has said they have hired a lawyer for his son, Hawkins Jr.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

The name Robert Cailliau may not ring a bell to the general public, but his invention is the reason why you are reading this: Dr. Cailliau together with his colleague Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web, making the internet accessible so it could grow from an academic tool to a mass communication medium. Last January Dr. Cailliau retired from CERN, the European particle physics lab where the WWW emerged.

Wikinews offered the engineer a virtual beer from his native country Belgium, and conducted an e-mail interview with him (which started about three weeks ago) about the history and the future of the web and his life and work.

Wikinews: At the start of this interview, we would like to offer you a fresh pint on a terrace, but since this is an e-mail interview, we will limit ourselves to a virtual beer, which you can enjoy here.

Robert Cailliau: Yes, I myself once (at the 2nd international WWW Conference, Chicago) said that there is no such thing as a virtual beer: people will still want to sit together. Anyway, here we go.

Friday, November 3, 2006

On November 13, Torontonians will be heading to the polls to vote for their ward’s councillor and for mayor. Among Toronto’s ridings is Don Valley West (Ward 26). Four candidates responded to Wikinews’ requests for an interview. This ward’s candidates include Muhammad Alam, Bahar Aminvaziri, Orhan Aybars, Michele Carroll-Smith, Mohamed Dhanani, Abdul Ingar, Geoff Kettel, Debbie Lechter, Natalie Maniates, John Masterson, John Parker, David Thomas, Csaba Vegh, and Fred Williams.

For more information on the election, read Toronto municipal election, 2006.

Wednesday, September 7, 2005

The Primetime Emmy Awards will have a unique twist for 2005, as television celebrities will sing the themes of classic series. Similar to the format of reality shows like American Idol and Rock Star: INXS, the audience will be able to vote on their favorite performance during the initial broadcast of the show.

The ceremony’s executive producer, Ken Ehrlich, said to the press that “There are certain television theme songs that are nearly as memorable as the shows connected to them.”

Billionaire American business executive Donald Trump, of reality show The Apprentice, will accompany the high-pitched voice of actress Megan Mullally, singing the Green Acres theme. R&B singer Macy Gray will be joined by Gary Dourdan of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, as they sing “Movin’ On Up”, the theme to All in the Family spin-off sitcom The Jeffersons.

William Shatner of Star Trek: The Original Series and opera singer Frederica von Stade will perform the theme from Star Trek. Shatner is notorious for his musical recordings, which many criticize, as he typically speaks the lyrics instead of singing them, typically as an exaggerated interpretive reading. However, the Star Trek theme does not require any singing other than that of the female opera singer.

Kristen Bell of the series Veronica Mars will perform the theme to Fame, solo.

The show will be again hosted by talk show host and comedienne Ellen DeGeneres. In honor of the victims of Hurricane Katrina, all Emmy presenters and performers will be given magnolias, the state flower of both Louisiana and Mississippi. Information will be given out during the broadcast on how viewers can donate to relief efforts.

The Emmys will be broadcast September 18th, 2005.

Thursday, August 27, 2015

Austrian police today found an estimated 20–50 decomposing corpses in an apparently abandoned lorry.

Roadworkers who spotted the vehicle, which had been there since yesterday at least, alerted police. Responding officers found it full of corpses. The lorry is on the so-called “Eastern Motorway”, the A4, close to the Hungarian border. It was on the hard shoulder between Neusiedl and Parndorf, closer to Parndorf.

The victims are thought to have suffocated. Police are seeking the driver. The Krone published an image of a non-articulated food lorry on the hard shoulder, which they report is the vehicle in question. The photo shows a pool of dark liquid on the ground beside the vehicle.

Video from a passing motorist shows at least one helicopter on-scene. The truck, which has pictures of meat on the side, shows branding for Slovakian food firm Hyza. Earlier today the company’s website sported an apparent anti-immigration graphic, which has since been removed.

Wikinews got in touch with Hyza. “We are truly sorry about [the] tragedy” they told us in a statement. They said they have checked GPS trackers on their fleet and all their vehicles remain in Slovakia. The statement says the lorry in question was one of 21 Hyza vehicles sold on last year. It was then sold again and exported to Hungary, where it is now registered. Hyza told us the new owners have not changed the branding on the vehicle. According to the Bild newspaper, Agrofert — the parent company of Hyza — said in a statement the new owners were required to do so.

Hyza says they will “actively cooperate with Slovak police”, and “express [their] sincere condolences to the bereaved families.”

Interior Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner called it “a dark day” and called for European Union-wide measures to protect immigrant refugees and tackle human traffickers. Neighbouring Hungary is constructing a border fence across its entire frontier with Serbia. Yesterday alone saw a record 3,241 attempts to enter Hungary illegally, according to authorities there.

Conflict in Syria and other parts of the world has led refugees to Europe. Once inside, they can move freely inside the Schengen Area, which covers most of the EU.

Austrian police earlier this week arrested three motorists suspected of people smuggling. One driver is accused of moving 34 people, ten of them children, into Austria from Serbia. The group were left by the roadside near Bruck an der Leitha and reported struggling to breathe in the van.

Wednesday, June 16, 2021

In early May, Wikinews extended an invitation to Vitaly Filipchenko, an independent candidate in the 2021 New York City mayoral election, set to take place November 2nd, alongside other candidates. Filipchenko answered some questions about his policies and campaign during a phone interview.

Filipchenko, registered on the New York City Campaign Finance Board as Vitaly A. Filipchenko, is the first Russian candidate for New York City mayor, being born in Tomsk, Siberia in 1973, according to news agency Sputnik. He has since naturalised as a United States citizen. According to the web site, Filipchenko has been educated in road construction and maintenance and owns a moving services company; he describes himself on his web site as a “small business owner”. On his web site’s platform page, he says that “[m]y English may not be perfect – but my platform is.”

Incumbent Democrat mayor Bill de Blasio, who won re-election in the 2017 New York City mayoral election by 66.5%, cannot run for a third term under term limits. As of April 28, 22 candidates are currently running, the majority of whom are also Democrats. Ahead of the June Democratic primary for New York City mayor, a poll conducted May 23 and 24 by WPIX and Emerson College of 12 Democratic candidates with a margin of error of 3.2 per cent has former commissioner for the New York City Department of Sanitation Kathryn Garcia and Borough President of Brooklyn Eric Adams leading with 21.1% and 20.1%, respectively.

Thursday, June 9, 2005

The Globe and Mail (Toronto, ON), citing sources close to both sides in the dispute, reported Wednesday that the National Hockey League and the NHLPA have agreed to a salary cap structure, arguably the most contentious issue in the continuing lockout that led to the cancellation of the 2004-05 NHL season on 16 February, 2005.

The Globe and Mail is reporting that the deal, providing the “cost certainty” that the NHL has been seeking, will consist of a floating, team-by-team salary cap and floor based on a percentage of each team’s revenue projections. What is being reported as a six-year deal has a salary cap range of $34-36 million and a salary floor of $22-24 million, both hard caps. The new deal will also reportedly include the across-the-board 24% decrease in salary offered by the NHLPA in February. A dollar-for-dollar Luxury tax will also take effect at the halfway point between the lowest salary floor and the highest salary cap (slated to be $29 million for the first year of the deal). Details about what will be done with this money have not been completely worked out, but it is thought that this money will be distributed to teams below the halfway point in such a way as to make sure they remain above the salary hard minimum.

While this is one of the most contentious issues in the labor dispute, there are several other issues that may delay the signing of a new Collective Bargaining Agreement. These include deciding how high-payroll teams will drop to the new maximum, working on new systems for salary arbitration, free agency, Olympic participation, and drug testing, and to design a complete revenue-sharing system.