Craigslist murder suspect held without bail

BOSTON – A Boston medical student accused of targeting women who advertised exotic services on Craigslist was ordered held without bail Tuesday on charges that he sought to rob a masseuse, but bashed her in the head and shot her through the heart when she fought back.

Philip Markoff, 22, a second-year medical student at Boston University, said nothing during a brief appearance Tuesday in Boston Municipal Court where he was ordered held on charges including murder, armed robbery and kidnapping.

“Philip Markoff is not guilty of the charges. He has his family’s support,” said defense attorney John Salsberg. “Philip is bearing up. It’s obviously a difficult time for anybody facing these charges.”

Prosecutors say they traced an e-mail address used to set up an appointment with masseuse Julissa Brisman of New York City to Markoff, who was on his way to Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut with his fiancee when he was arrested Monday afternoon.

Brisman was found dead April 14 in a Boston luxury hotel. Markoff is also charged with robbing and tying up another woman who advertised massages on Craigslist on April 10.

‘Brutal, vicious crime’
The slain woman’s father, Hector Brisman, was in court but left without commenting.

Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel Conley said authorities searching Markoff’s home in Quincy found a semiautomatic weapon, restraints and duct tape — evidence he called “critical, powerful.”

“This was a brutal, vicious crime — savage, and it shows Philip Markoff is a man who is willing to take advantage of women, to hurt them, to beat them, to rob them,” Conley said. “He probably thought he was going to get away with it. He thought he was too smart for us.”

Prosecutor Jennifer Hickman said in court that Brisman had been bashed in the head and shot three times at close range, including once through the heart. She said Markoff and Brisman had been in contact by cell phone and on the Internet to set up an appointment.

Conley said he believes Markoff’s original motive was robbery.

“It’s hard for me to get into his mind. The evidence that we have is Julissa put up a pretty tough struggle and it’s in the context of that struggle that she lost her life,” he said.

“There may be other victims out there, and if you are, we want you to come forward,” Conley added. “Our top priority is holding Philip Markoff accountable. He’s a predator.”

 

Hickman said Markoff and the woman he allegedly robbed on April 10 also initiated contact on Craigslist and set up a meeting after midnight. The woman told investigators she met Markoff and then let him into her room at the Westin. When she shut the door and turned around, he was pointing a gun at her stomach. He bound her hands and mouth.

“The individual went though her purse, went through her wallet and took over $800″ and other personal items, Hickman said.

‘Philip is a beautiful person’
Markoff lives with his fiancee, who claims police have the wrong man. Markoff has no previous criminal record.

“He could not hurt a fly,” Megan McAllister said in an e-mail to ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “All I have to say is Philip is a beautiful person, inside and out,” she said in the e-mail read on Tuesday’s program.

McAllister said she and Markoff expect to be married in August “and share a wonderful, meaningful life together.”

James Kehoe, one of Markoff’s best friends during his first two years as an undergrad at the University at Albany, described the suspect as “a great guy.”

“He was one of my best friends in my dorm,” Kehoe told TODAY’s Meredith Vieira. “He was one of the people that I felt I could really get along with. I felt like he was smart, an intellectual, nice, friendly guy.”

All 16 passengers die after helicopter crashes in North Sea: Police

EDINBURGH, Scotland – Police said Thursday 16 people were killed when a helicopter went down off Scotland’s northeast coast, announcing that the search for eight people still missing was now a recovery rather than a rescue operation.

Eight bodies recovered from the sea were brought ashore Thursday morning.

“The grim reality is that the crew of 16 on board has been lost,” said Colin Menzies, assistant chief constable of Grampian Police.

The Super Puma helicopter was returning to Aberdeen from a North Sea oil platform when it crashed Wednesday afternoon in calm and sunny conditions, 22 kilometres off Peterhead in northeast Scotland.

BP said the helicopter, carrying 14 oil workers and two helicopter crew, was coming back from the company’s Miller oil field.

Operator Bond Offshore Helicopters rejected calls by a trade union for all its Super Pumas to be grounded. The company said it had “every confidence in the Super Puma.”

The Maritime and Coastguard Agency said two lifeboats and seven other vessels, including ferries and fishing boats, were searching for the missing. Experts from the Air Accidents Investigation Branch were traveling to the scene of the crash on Thursday.

Helicopters have been used to ferry workers to and from the oil and gas fields off the Scottish coast since the construction of platforms there in the 1970s.

Wednesday’s crash was the second such incident in the North Sea this year, both involving the Super Puma. A Super Puma ditched in the North Sea in February, but all 18 people on board were rescued.

In Canada, 17 people died March 12 when a Sikorsky S-92A helicopter ditched in the Atlantic after declaring a mechanical problem. The chopper was carrying workers to two offshore oil platforms.

Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond said a death toll of 16 would make this Britain’s second-deadliest helicopter disaster.

The worst was in 1986 when 45 people died after a Chinook crashed into the sea off the Shetland Islands north of Scotland.

Safety was improved after the Chinook crash, and all offshore workers in the North Sea now have to complete tough training in a crash simulator. All wear survival immersion suits and are equipped with personal beacons and floatation devices.

The Super Puma is fitted with air bags, similar to those in cars, that deploy on contact with the water.

London police report 86 arrests made after G-20 protests

 LONDON – Police in London say 86 people were arrested in sometimes violent clashes with protesters who vandalized property in the city’s financial district ahead of the G-20 summit.

Metropolitan police say 16 people were arrested by 3 a.m. Thursday for violent disorder, 11 were arrested for possessing police uniforms, and 13 for public order offenses.

Two people were arrested for having offensive weapons, two for aggravated burglary at a Royal Bank of Scotland branch and one for arson at the same branch.

Other suspected offenses included assault on police, theft and drug possession.

Police say one man in the crowd of demonstrators collapsed and later died at a hospital.

He has not yet been publicly identified.

Woman charged with shooting care home administrator in Gibsons, BC

GIBSONS, B.C. – A man shot and wounded at a B.C. assisted-living home is a kind and generous person who did everything he could to help the elderly and ill residents who call it home, say friends and acquaintances.

His alleged assailant, who police say lay in wait for him with a rifle in her hand, is being described by fellow residents as an “odd” person who perhaps shouldn’t have been resident at the Good Samaritan Christenson Village in Gibsons, B.C.

And police say that is what led to a bloody confrontation that ended with an RCMP officer shooting the female suspect.

On Wednesday, RCMP laid 10 charges against Linda Howe, including three counts of attempted murder, one count of robbery and three counts of pointing a firearm.

Howe also faces a charge of possession of a weapon without a licence and several other firearms-related charges.
Police said Wednesday the victim, the facility’s manager, arrived with three other staff at the suspect’s front door around 4 p.m. Tuesday. They were going to transfer her to another facility.

Police said she was waiting behind the door.

“Immediately after opening the door, one of the male employees was shot by the suspect, who was in possession of a long-barreled firearm,” Assistant RCMP Commissioner Peter German told reporters in the small community on the Sunshine Coast, north of Vancouver.

German described employees fleeing in fear of their lives.

“As two of the employees fled outside through an adjacent exit door, the suspect followed and shot once in their direction, narrowly missing them,” he said.

The female suspect then left the building, pushing a wheelchair containing the firearm and her personal effects. She was not in the wheelchair, as some reports have suggested.

Mounties responded to a call of shots fired. They said they arrived in the parking lot as she attempted to carjack a vehicle and that she forced the driver out at gunpoint.

Officers ordered her not to get into the vehicle but she ignored the order, German said.

He said a male officer shot the woman after spotting a second weapon. She was struck at least once.

The woman’s father, Gibsons resident Ken Howe, said his daughter moved to the town almost two decades ago and worked as a painter and carpenter.

But Howe said a car accident three winters ago left the woman with a serious brain injury.

“It slowed her down. She was a real go-getter before,” said the father, who was shocked to learn of the shooting from a friend who saw it on the news.

“It takes her that much longer. She was clever with her hands. She could paint or nail or do anything. But after that, it takes her a long time to get it together.”

Howe said his daughter, who he called a “positive kid” growing up, had run-ins with facility staff in the past.

“She’s had problems . . . down there before so it was no big deal. But I didn’t think it would come to this,” he said.

Joy Maxwell lived in the Good Samaritan Christenson Village with the 40-year-old female suspect and said the rampage was the last thing she would have expected from the kind woman.

She described her as clever, “with a knack for fixing things.”

“She had such a talent. She could take a wheelchair apart and put it back together. Another friend of mine had jewelry that needed to be repaired and (the suspect) did that. She was very, very capable,” Maxwell said.

Maxwell said the woman’s mental state might have rubbed others in the facility the wrong way.

“She was kind but I guess her problems made her perhaps appear odd,” she said.

Mary Neil spoke to the suspect on a few occasions. That was enough for her.

“She used to fly up and down the hallway in a wheelchair and I would just pass her,” Neil said. “I didn’t want to talk to her because she seemed strange.”

Neil said the assisted-living facility wasn’t the right type of place for someone in the female’s mental state.

“I don’t understand how the person who passed her to get in here couldn’t see,” she said. “I only spoke to her a few times and I knew.”

Police said the suspect and the 47-year-old man she allegedly shot are both in hospital in Vancouver in serious but stable condition.

German would not say whether the woman was known to police, if her firearms were registered or how they were obtained.

Carla Gregor, president and chief executive officer of the Good Samaritan Society, which runs the 140-bed assisted-living complex, said the organization screens for weapons only when residents first arrive.

“We don’t monitor their movements,” Gregor said. “This is their private home and we respect that.”

Gregor stressed that the woman was being moved to another facility.

“We had plans. We didn’t intend to put her out on the street,” she said.

Gregor called the shooting a “pretty extraordinary set of circumstances,” and Gibsons Mayor Barry Janyk agreed.

Janyk seemed to fight back tears as he described meeting with the shooting victim, identified by residents as Ken Perrier, last week.

He said “Ken” is highly regarded among staff and residents.

“The people at the facility just love him,” Janyk said.

Maxwell said the manager was “always there to help you out.”

RCMP said an officer from the Victoria Police Department is observing the investigation into the police-involved shooting, along with an independent observer appointed by the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP.

Police seek four suspects in Billings Bridge swarming

Ottawa police are seeking assistance in identifying suspects in relation to a robbery at the Billings Bridge OC Transpo station last Wednesday.

At around 12:50 a.m. on March 25, four men each around 20 years old — one armed with a knife — swarmed another man and stole his personal belongings.

One suspect is described as a white male with a stocky build about 5-10. He was wearing a black baseball cap, black coat with fur around the collar and baggy beige pants with white sneakers.

The second suspect was a black male who was wearing a white jacket and construction style boots.

The third suspect had a dark complexion and dark hair and was wearing a white T-shirt, and a black coat with a collar.

The fourth suspect is a black male wearing dark pants with a black coat that had a white logo on the right shoulder. The black coat also had two different kinds of white designs in the chest area.

AIDS expert to speak at Carlton

More than 25 years after the disease was discovered, an international AIDS expert will be speaking about the future of the disease at a public lecture at Carleton University Thursday.

HIV-AIDS is cannot be treated as just another disease, said Alan Whiteside.

“We have to reposition HIV/AIDS,” said Whiteside, who is a professor of economics and director of the Health Economics and HIV-AIDS research division at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban, South Africa. “It’s been around for 25 years and we have to look at where it’s going.”

This is an important topic to discuss now because “in the face of financial crisis, there are going to be fewer resources for health,” Whiteside said.

AIDS is an exceptional disease in many settings, said Whiteside — while it affect tens of thousands of young people in hyper-epidemic countries, it also affects people in Canada “who tend to be on the margins with less access and care.”

“Even 25 years after the start of the epidemic, there is no cure for the illness,” said Whiteside.

The talk, which is expected to attract people who deal with the epidemic, policymakers, academics and students, begins at Carleton’s Azrieli Theatre on Thursday at 7 p.m.

Police caution Internet users about identity fraud on Facebook, Twitter

As the use of social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook rises, so does identity theft and online fraud, Ottawa police said.

People are putting their personal information — including their phone numbers and addresses — out there, which makes it easy for information to fall into the wrong hands, said Staff Sgt. Bill Sullivan.

Identity theft is a growing offence, said Sullivan, and the Internet makes it easy.

“With the Internet, you don’t know who you’re dealing with,” he said. “You really have to be conscious. You have to be careful because you don’t know who you’re talking to.

“Once you put information out there, how do you get it back? It never really leaves, so don’t put it out there.”

The officer in charge of organized fraud with the Ottawa police, Sullivan is one of the presenters teaching city residents how to safeguard their identities at a public information session at city hall Monday evening.

Topics covered will include social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, as well as risks in the cyber world, including Internet scams.

The seminar will also cover viruses, worms and Trojans that can infect computers, as well as the importance of securing wireless networks.

The seminar is targeted to people of all ages, including teens, parents and seniors, but parents in particular “have got to be concerned about what their children are doing on the Internet, as well as who their friends are,” Sullivan said.

Elderly man in critical condition after apartment blaze

A 73-year-old man is in critical condition after a two-alarm blaze at an apartment complex at 278 Montreal Rd. Wednesday.

The fire was promptly extinguished by the 35 firefighters and 13 vehicles responding to the call at 10:53 a.m.

The man was found unconscious in an apartment by firefighters. Paramedics treated him for third-degree burns to his chest, neck, face and arms, in addition to smoke inhalation. Paramedics also treated a male in his late teens or early 20s for smoke inhalation.

When firefighters arrived on the scene, the kitchen was engulfed in flames. The fire was contained to the apartment, with some minor smoke damage elsewhere in the building.

According to fire platoon leader Dennis Gobey, the fire doesn’t seem to be suspicious, and “could be a malfunction of the stove or maybe it was left unattended.”

Melissa Marshall, 24, a tenant in the apartment above the fire, said that her son “saw smoke coming out of the radiators.” After sending a family member to check the hallway, Marshall escaped from the blaze with her visiting family, including a three-month-old baby, her six-year-old son and her Rottweiler, who recently had a litter of nine.

“The fire alarm didn’t even go off for a while,” said Marshall. “We didn’t hear one until our own alarm went off.”

Neighbours have identified the man in critical condition as Peter Belanger.

Teen Tries to Kill Mother for Breast Implants

FOUNTAIN, Colorado (AP) — A Colorado teenager hired men to kill his mother so he could use her money to get breast implants for his girlfriend, police said.

Nikita Lee Weis, 18, was arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, said Fountain Deputy Police Chief Mike Barnett.

Weis’ mother, Hyun Weis, was attacked Thursday with a small wooden baseball bat at her home but escaped, authorities said. She was released Friday from a hospital.

His girlfriend, Sophia Nicole Alsept, and two men police said he hired, Juan Antonio Velez Gonzalez, 18, and Brandon Michael Soroka, 19, were also arrested on the charge of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.

Barnett said Weis wanted to sell his mother’s car and use money in her bank accounts to pay for breast implants for Alsept, 21.

Barnett also said the suspects discussed wrapping Hyun Weis’ body in plastic and dumping it in the desert in New Mexico or Arizona.

All were being held on $50,000 bail. Officials did not know whether they had attorneys and said they couldn’t get messages to them.

Fountain is about 10 miles south of Colorado Springs.

World’s Tallest Man Now World’s Tallest Dad

BEIJING – The world’s tallest man, China’s Bao Xishun, became the world’s tallest father this week with the birth of his first child, a boy whose initial height seems a compromise between his gigantic dad and average-sized mum.

Bao’s son measured 22 inches long at birth, the senior doctor at Zunhua Hospital in Hebei province told Reuters.

Although slightly taller than average for newborn children, Bao’s boy came up well short of the 29.5 inches claimed as a record birth length last year, also in China.

“Bao is quite happy. The baby is healthy and a normal size,” the hospital’s senior doctor Zhang told Reuters.

Bao, a 7-foot-9-inch herdsman from Inner Mongolia, last year married Xia Shujuan, a pygmy by contrast at 5-foot-6 inches.

“I hope he or she can be about 2 meters tall,” Bao, 57, said last year about his wishes for a child. “Then he or she can play basketball.”

His son weighed 4.2 kilograms at birth, a touch heavier than average.

Bao briefly lost his Guinness World Records title as the tallest man to Ukrainian Leonid Stadnyk but regained it in August when Stadnyk refused to be measured under new guidelines.

Bao’s son was born on Thursday but news of the birth only spread widely on Saturday, with the Chinese press according the newborn a level of privacy that is rare for the world’s tallest man.

The former goat herder hires himself out for publicity stunts and his wedding last year was sponsored by at least 15 companies.