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Student released after visa row 08jan03 AN Australian student jailed in the US for almost two weeks over an alleged visa breach has contacted her family to say she is heading home. Megan Stapleton, a 20-year-old Sydney TAFE student, today phoned her family home on the NSW south coast and spoke to her 18-year-old brother. Her mother Antoinette Stapleton, who has been staying in Sydney as she battled authorities for her daughter's release, said she was yet to speak to Megan but was looking forward to her return. "She rang home and spoke to her brother Alex but I'll wait...

Acrobat files ... Suit Subpoena

TUSCALOOSA Reaction to the departure of Alabama football coach Dennis Franchione to Texas A&M, from university trustees to Crimson Tide supporters, was bitter and pointed on Thursday. "My reaction would not be appropriate for a publication read by women and children," trustee John McMahon of Birmingham said. Peter Lowe, a trustee from Huntsville, said: "Let him go on. If someone doesn't care as much about us as we care about them, I'd just as soon they leave. I can't imagine there being a better coaching job in America. I think he didn't make the right decision." One longtime Alabama fan,...

Yeah, I know this has been posted, but you haven't see her pic ... Françoise Ducros, the federal official who caused a firestorm by reportedly calling U.S. President George W. Bush a "moron" offered to quit on Friday, but Prime Minister Jean Chrétien refused to accept her resignation. "So as not to have this matter overshadow the Prime Minister's important work here at the summit, I have offered my resignation," Ms. Ducros said in a statement, read aloud in the House of Commons Friday by Transport Minister David Collenette. She added that "the Prime Minister has refused to accept the...

Point Reyes Light - November 14, 2002 West Marin women strip for peace By Ivan Gale West Marin women bared their bodies on Tuesday in Point Reyes Station for a photo protesting America's plans for armed conflict with Iraq. Participants using solely their bodies spelled out ‘PEACE" as a light rain fell. Portrait photographer and Light correspondent Art Rogers captured the moment from high atop a ladder using a homemade tripod standing about 15-feet above Love Field near the Green Bridge.Click on photo for larger image Participant Cynthia Clarkson of Point Reyes Station told The Light she hoped the...

LIVINGSTON, Tex. - With a single gunshot in 1994, Ron Scott Shamburger went from a college senior to a capital murderer. Now he is within days of being executed. The East Texas native with boy-next-door looks shocked the Texas A&M University community when he murdered fellow Aggie Lori Ann Baker, 20, during what he says was a botched burglary at her College Station duplex. But others believe that Shamburger had an obsession with Baker, stalked her and intended to kill her all along. Whatever the reason, Texas plans to execute him in Huntsville on September 18. Shamburger says he is...

TOM WALSH: SUVs unsafe at all times, author says Builders and buyers are in for a bashing September 17, 2002 BY TOM WALSH DETROIT FREE PRESS COLUMNIST Detroit's top auto executives, plus legions of Explorer, Grand Cherokee, Durango, Navigator and Tahoe owners, will be squirming -- and probably fuming -- over publication today of a provocative book, "High and Mighty: SUVs, the World's Most Dangerous Vehicles and How They Got That Way." This book assaults sport-utility vehicles with a gusto recalling Ralph Nader's 1965 broadside against the Corvair in "Unsafe at Any Speed." Written by New York Times correspondent Keith...

Alabama Special Forces The latest ploy to drive the Taliban and Al Queda out of the mountains of Afghanistan is to send in a team of Alabama Special Forces. ... Billy Bob, Bubba, Boo, Scooter, and Cooter are being sent in with the following info about the Taliban: ... 1. There is no limit. 2. The season opened last weekend. 3. They taste just like chicken. 4. They don't like beer, pickup trucks, country music, or Jesus. 5. Some are queer. 6. They don't like barbeque. 7. They were responsible for Dale Earnhardt's death. ... Should be over in just...

Texas Department of Criminal Justice Return to Death Row Page Name TDCJ Number Date of Birth Tommy Lynn Sells 999367 6/28/1964 Date Received Age (when Received) Education Level (Highest Grade Completed) 11/8/2000 36 8 Date of Offense Age (at the time of Offense) County 12/31/1999 35 Val Verde Race Gender Hair Color White Male Brown Height Weight Eye Color 5 ft 9 in 195 Hazel Native County Native State Prior Occupation Alameda California barber, mechanic, laborer Prior Prison Record Missouri Department of Corrections on a 2 year sentence for felony theft.  Confined 8 months and released on parole on...

A weekly look at death row predators beloved by liberals. Here's a sweet bedtime story to comfort any liberal - he stabbed the mother to death, then buried the sixteen month old baby alive. Obviously, this poor, misguided young man is a victim of the capitalist system.

Up together for the Cup Britain is captivated by the beautiful game and celebrating it collectively. How lucky to be able to care so much Jonathan Freedland Wednesday June 12, 2002 The Guardian By the time you read this, there's a good chance you'll already know. Your street will either have erupted in a roar of relief and jubilation at around 9.15am or the faces on the bus to work will have told their own glum story. Just as you needed no radio or TV or text message to know the result from the Sapporo stadium on Friday afternoon -...

EXCLUSIVE Harrelson flees cops By MIKE SULLIVAN, DEREK BROWN and SARA NATHAN MOVIE wildman Woody Harrelson was wrestled to the ground and arrested by 14 cops who chased him yesterday after he allegedly went berserk in a London taxi. The actor, star of films including Natural Born Killers and Indecent Proposal, is said to have: KICKED glass in the cab before forcing his way out by breaking a door lock. HAILED another taxi, which was chased by the driver of the damaged cab, and FLED on foot after the second taxi was intercepted by police. Harrelson — who found fame...

It's late afternoon on the terrace of the Carlton Hotel in Cannes and Michael Moore is behind schedule. By the time he hoves into view, he is an hour late. An imposingly large figure in his trademark baseball cap and spectacles, he manoeuvres himself behind a table and orders lunch (soup, a club sandwich and a coke with no ice). He puts on his shades and then takes them off again when the photographer says he can't see Moore's eyes. "I'll put my real glasses on so you don't have to deal with this Hollywood stuff. You want to see...

Warning! Soccer moms and other weak-minded individuals should not read the following material. The Hard Truths About Liberals. 1. At the most basic level, the liberal is an adolescent forever in search of a world without moral consequence. 2. Freedom from moral consequence can only be secured by a collectivist, totalitarian state. 3. The liberal religion reveres the twin gods of genitals and government, and is overseen by a priesthood of psychologists. 4. "Freedom" to the liberal is strictly freedom of the genitals. 5. All non-sexual individual freedoms are despised by the liberal because they demand moral responsibility. 6. The...

Bond is $200,000 for accused teacher By Sheila Shelton/Staff Reporter Bond was set at $200,000 in Livingston County Circuit Court Thursday afternoon for Gerald Scott Huddleston, 35, of Fairbury. He has been charged with three counts of predatory criminal sexual assault of a child in connection with three of his art students in the Prairie Central School Community Unit School District. Huddleston was charged by Livingston County Sheriff's Police on Wednesday and taken to the Livingston County Jail. Formal charges were filed by the Livingston County State's Attorney's office on Thursday morning. Huddleston remained in jail this morning. The charges...

A suspected robber is recovering Monday after a police dog bit him in the crotch, severing his penis, according to a Local 6 News report. Authorities said that three men walked into the At Cost Liquor Store in Pinellas County, Fla., and allegedly stole a pack of cigarettes. A store worker reportedly chased the men outside and wrote down the license plate number of the suspects' car. After a brief chase, the men crashed their car and ran. Police said that a K-9 named "Scooby" caught up with one of the alleged suspects. The dog first bit the suspect on...

Flying the flag for hate AL Kennedy Friday March 29, 2002 The Guardian Well, here I am, back in the land of the axis of good, spending spring - as usual - with the raccoons and contemplating - as usual - a variety of attractive abuses of my status as a US-ordained minister. (You can stuff all that Robbie William marrying-your-mates-on-a-tropical-beach nonsense.) Out here in the New England countryside, little seems changed since my last visit - except for the flags. I've always found it slightly tautological to fly your country's flag while you're still in it. America is generally...

Principal, teacher removed from Pitcher Elementary while district investigates alleged strip search By JOE ROBERTSON and DEANN SMITH The Kansas City Star The principal and a teacher have been removed from Pitcher Elementary School while the Kansas City School District investigates allegations that third-graders were subjected to an improper search, district spokesman Edwin Birch said today. The principal is Jana Schwimmer. The teacher was not identified. Parents and students at Pitcher met this morning with a state investigator and school district attorneys to discuss the alleged strip search over $5 of missing money. "The district has to investigate these allegations,"...

When Disney Complains, Sack the Reporter Who's Afraid of Mickey Mouse? Last month, the New York Post fired entertainment reporter Nikki Finke, shortly after the Walt Disney Company complained about two stories that appeared in the Post under Finke's byline on January 29. But did she get the boot because her stories were inaccurate, as the Post and Disney say, or because the Post caved in to pressure from one of News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch's valued business partners, as Finke's lawyers are ready to argue in court? The offending stories dealt with a breach-of-contract lawsuit filed against Disney in...

No Santa for city school AMY SIVERSON, The Saratogian December 05, 2001 SARATOGA SPRINGS -- The holidays might have to go on without bells, bows and dreidles this year at Divison Street Elementary School after a third-grade holiday project was deemed inappropriate by Principal Thomas Mele. The class had adorned an oversized Christmas ornament with colored pictures of snowflakes and other winter designs. When Mele visited the class, he removed the decoration from the room. Mele will meet today with his faculty to review court cases and the Saratoga Springs School district's policy concerning school ceremonies and observances. The district's ...