Wednesday 3 August 2005

By Maria Ahmed, Derren Hayes and Clare Jerrom

Anthony baseball bat attack

Murder victim Anthony Walker was hit with a
baseball bat in an earlier racist attack, it emerged
yesterday.

The 18-year-old black student was attacked in May by white men who
branded him a “n*****”. On Friday, Walker was axed to
death by racists in his home city of Liverpool.

Source:- The Daily Mirror Wednesday 3 August 2005 page
1

Pub girls groomed

A man of 64 who took two girls of 12 and 13 out to pub meals and
the theatre was in court yesterday.

Businessman Dr Alec Wortley got a community rehabilitation order
after admitting abduction. Wortley can now have no unsupervised
contact with under-18s, including his grandchildren.

Source:- The Daily Mirror Wednesday 3 August 2005 page
15

Why won’t kids play outside anymore?

Today’s youngsters would now rather be indoors watching
television or playing on their PlayStations – and parents
fear their kids could come to harm if they venture out.

A poll of 670 children by the Children’s Society and the
Children’s Play Council reveals that 40 per cent of children
don’t go out as much as they would like, with 20 per cent
admitting that they spend less than an hour a week outdoors.

Source:- The Daily Mirror Wednesday 3 August 2005 page
23

Religious hate crimes on rise since
bombings

Crimes prompted by religious hatred have risen nearly sevenfold
in London in the three and a half weeks since the July 7 attacks,
police said yesterday. Scotland Yard has recorded 269 incidents,
mostly low-level abuse, minor assaults and damage to property,
including mosques, compared with 40 in the same period last
year.

Source:- The Financial Times Wednesday 3 August page
2

£44m reserved for ‘slop out’
prisoners

The amount of money set aside to compensate prisoners who have
been forced to “slop out” in Scottish jails has risen
by 70 per cent to £44 million since last year, according to
the latest annual report of the Scottish prison service.

More than 1,000 prisoners have lodged similar claims after a High
Court judge ruled that the continued use of chamber pots instead of
toilets by one prisoner amounted to degrading treatment under human
rights law.

Source:- The Financial Times Wednesday 3 August page
4

U-turn over jackets of shame

Criminals will be forced to wear fluorescent uniforms so the
public can see them carrying out community punishments.

The ‘shaming’ policy has been forced through despite
warnings, repeated last night, that it will make offenders
resentful and less likely to complete their sentence. The jackets
are already being worn on Durham and will be issued nationwide in
November.

Source:- The Daily Mail Wednesday 3 August page 4

The student whose suicide note said: Life is not for
me

Alice McGovern, and 18-year-old student was found dead near the
foot of Beachy Head after leaving a note saying: “Life is not
for me,” an inquest heard. She was due to leave home for
Oxford University on the day she died.

Source:- The Daily Mail Wednesday 3 August page 11

Children of the death garden

Police dug up a garden yesterday to find the remains of nine
newborn babies apparently murdered by their mother.

Sabine Hischeinz, a 39-year-old dental assistant, is thought to
have secretly given birth to some of the children in a caravan and
others at her rented flat in Frankfurt an der Oder, near
Germany’s Polish border.

Source:- The Daily Mail Wednesday 3 August page 29

Inquiry into firm’s asylum contracts

The Home Office is investigating allegations of financial
irregularities by a private property company which earned millions
of pounds annually through government contracts for housing asylum
seekers around the country.

Company records, internal emails and testimony from former
employers of the London-based Angel Group suggest the company was
paid for accommodation that was unfit for habitation.

Source:- The Guardian Wednesday 3 August page 1 and
page 4

New law ‘to split’ family denied refugee
status

A mother who claims she fled persecution in Africa but has been
denied asylum in Britain may be parted from five of her six
children when the Home Office withdraws her benefits. 

Ngidei Lusukumu, who escaped from the Democratic Republic of Congo
in 2001, is among the first asylum seekers to be caught by tough
new immigration legislation introduced late last year.

Source:- The Guardian Wednesday 3 August page 4

Suspicious mind

Lawyer Marilyn Stowe unearthed evidence that cleared Sally Clark
of killing her sons and brought down paediatrician Sir Roy Meadows.
The solicitor tells Mary O’Hara why she had to do it.

Source:- Society Guardian Wednesday 3 August page 6

Rich tapestry of life

Learning to flirt and speed date are part of an innovative
programme that helps people recovering from mental illness to
rebuild a social life

Source:- Society Guardian Wednesday 3 August page 7

Multicultural Britain is not working, says Tory
chief

Muslims must start integrating into mainstream British society,
says David Davis.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Wednesday 3 August page
1

Police log 1,000 racist incidents a week

Racist incidents recorded by police, a category that will
include the murder of Anthony Walker, are running at about 1,000 a
week, according to Home Office figures.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Wednesday 3 August page
4

Minister accused of failing to listen to views of Muslim
youth

Hazel Blears was accused of listening to the wrong people as she
began a tour of English towns and cities in a Government attempt to
improve community relations and root out extremists in the wake of
the London bombings.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Wednesday 3 August page
6

Charities in crisis

Small charities in Britain have suffered a devastating loss of
funding and some are even threatened with closure due to
high-profile appeals for international disasters. Public donations
have fallen as much as 30 per cent, some organisations say.

Source:- The Independent Wednesday 3 August page 1

Inmate found dead in cell

An inquiry has been launched after an inmate at a high-security
prison was found dead in his cell. Daniel Taylor, of Borehamwood,
Hertfordshire, is believed to have hanged himself at HMP Woodhill,
Milton Keynes.

Source:- The Independent Wednesday 3 August page 4

Read all about it…

A book about a teenage suicide bomber has become a surprise
bestseller, underlining how children’s books are at the
forefront of tackling some of the most controversial aspects of
modern life

Source:- The Independent Wednesday 3 August page
14-15

 Charitable value

Volunteers worked for a total of two million hours to support
victims of crime last year. To pay the 11,000 volunteers with the
Victim Support charity would have cost £27 million, according
to a report by Chantrey Vellacott, an accountancy firm.

Source:- The Times Wednesday 3 August page 2

Scottish news

Diagnosed HIV cases hit record high

The number of people being diagnosed with HIV in Scotland has
reached record levels, new figures show.

By June, 196 new cases of the virus had been discovered, putting
2005 on track to exceed annual infection rates recorded in every
year since testing began in 1985.

Most of the new cases are among gay men and immigrants from
sub-Saharan Africa, although better testing is thought to have
reduced the number of undetected cases.

Source:- The Herald Wednesday 3 August

Dramatic guilty plea to airgun killing of boy is
rejected

Mark Bonini, the man accused of murdering a two-year-old boy by
shooting him in the head with an airgun pellet in a Glasgow street
in March has offered to plead guilty to culpable homicide.

However, at the start of his trial, Sean Murphy, QC, the Crown
prosecutor, refused to accept the plea and the murder charge
stands.
It is claimed that just before the boy was shot, Bonini fired at
Alan Lambert, a firefighter who was on duty, and hit him repeatedly
on the body.

Source:- The Herald Wednesday 3 August

Welsh news

Children say they’re scared too play outdoors

Almost half of children claim they are too scared to play outside,
according to research by the Children’s Society and the
Children’s Play Council.

Traffic and strangers have driven children to play in their
bedrooms and now one in five children enjoy themselves outdoors
less than an hour each week.

Source:- Western Mail  Wednesday 3 August

‘Racist crime a problem that isn’t going
away’

Racist crime is not going away, according to the director of the
Commission for racial Equality Wales.

Chris Myant said there had been an increase in the number of racist
incidents reported to the police.

Source:- Western Mail  Wednesday 3 August

UK households spending more on booze

The amount of alcohol drinks purchased by UK households has risen
by 10 per cent according to the annual Family Food report.

Source:- Western Mail  Wednesday 3 August