Police move in to enforce Occupy LA eviction order

A Los Angeles police officer (L) points his weapon at a protester up on a tree at the Occupy LA encampment outside City Hall in Los Angeles on November 30

Police in riot gear closed in on anti-Wall Street activists in Los Angeles early today to enforce the mayor’s order to evict protesters who have camped outside City Hall for the past eight weeks.

Hundreds of Occupy LA activists, joined by supporters streaming into the area in a show of solidarity, crowded the lawn, sidewalks and streets around City Hall as helmeted officers moved into the encampment.

Burglary victim remotely controls his stolen laptop to photograph thief - and then hands image to police who arrest him

A designer who had his laptop stolen helped police by using a spy camera programme to take pictures and catch the thief red-handed.

Joshua Kaufman thought he had lost his Apple MacBook when a thief broke into his apartment and stole the computer in March.

And with police giving his burglary report a low priority, he was resigned to never recovering the expensive laptop until he remembered the software he had installed on his MacBook.


Using 'Hidden' software, he remotely took pictures of the thief using his stolen computer - before handing the evidence to police to make an arrest.

Mr Kaufman captured the thief in a variety of bizarre locations - including using the stolen MacBook in bed, and in his car.

'Hidden' also provided him with location information, which police in Oakland, California, used to identify the thief as a taxi driver.

 Caught in the act: The hapless thief, who police later arrested, stares unwittingly into the camera of the stolen Macbook

Out and about: The thief was even captured using the stolen Apple computer while driving his car

Evidence: The 'Hidden' software even takes screenshots once your laptop has been stolen showing the activity of the user

None the wiser: The same man's mugshot is snapped as he uses the computer while sitting in bed

Always watching: Another covert snap shows the thief sleeping on his sofa

Two US Marshals and One Cop Wounded in Shootout

A US marshal is hospitalized in critical condition after receiving a gunshot wound to the head following a shootout with a suspect in St. Louis during the execution of an arrest warrant.

Police snipers take down armed bank robber as he holds gun to hostage's head

Gun pressed to his female hostage's head and surrounded by armed police, these are the final moments of a three-hour bank siege which ended in a shootout.

The bank robber was eventually shot dead by police snipers as he led the terrified woman through the parking lot of the Wachovia bank in Cary, near Raleigh, North Carolina.

Television stations had been following the siege live viewers saw the man crumple to the ground as he five officers opened fire.

Dead: After the three-hour stand-off the robber lies dead on the pavement as the hostage bolts to safety

Down: The unnamed gunman slumps back having been shot, as the female hostage makes a run for it

Shot: An officer fires his gun at the armed robber, who is pressing a gun to the head of a hostage outside the Wachovia Bank in Cary

'This is not how we wanted this to end,' Cary Police Chief Pat Bazemore said.

None of the seven hostages, including one who stayed hidden from the gunman and relayed information to police, nor the dozens of officers who surrounded the bank were injured.

The stand-off started at around 3pm yesterday when the gunman came entered the Wachovia bank and attempted to hold it up, authorities said.

When the police arrived two minutes later, the robber took hostages.

Two women were released shortly after police intervened, and two more people were released an hour later.

About two hours later, the suspect slowly walked out of the bank with the last remaining hostage, pointing a gun at her. He was shot after the woman went to her knees in the parking lot.

'I'm shaken - I hope I don't have to see something like that again,' said Zackery Marvel, 16.

He had watched the dramatic conclusion from his apartment several hundred yards away.

'It is a very sad situation that we did end up shooting the suspect.'

Hostages were talking to police and being united with their families, she said.

The gunman's next of kin were being notified, but his name has not yet been released.

The hostage drama shook the normally quiet town of Cary, which has a population of only 137,000.

The bank was not far from the Kids R Kids daycare, where officers helped evacuate about 100 children to safety. Four schools near the bank were also locked down.

Sledgehammer gang's daring daylight jewellery raid foiled by 50 angry shoppers

A daylight jewellery store raid was foiled yesterday when members of the public wrestled a masked robber to the ground.

Five sledgehammer-wielding thieves arrived on motorbikes and smashed their way into the shop on a busy London street, grabbing armfuls of watches from the front window.

But as they made their getaway, passers-by pulled one from his bike and pinned him down until police arrived.

The four remaining robbers, who wore dark clothing and balaclavas, fled the scene and tried to hide in a nearby park, but three were caught.

Among the heroes outside the Ernest Jones jewellery store in High Street Kensington was Charlie Masud Riyahi, 51, who wrestles as a hobby.

 

Got him: The robber is pinned down by the crowd after smashing into the jewellery store in central London

Daylight robbery: A gang armed with sledgehammers smashed the windows of the Ernest Jones jewellery store in High Street Kensington before grabbing armfuls of watches worth around £400,000

Eye-witnesses told how a mob of more than 50 people tackled one robber as he tried to make his getaway in scenes of 'mayhem' similar to a medieval 'hue and cry' or a Hollywood film

‘When one of them tried to get away a group of people surrounded him and closed his way,’ he said.

He was trying to scare us with the sledgehammer. But when he got on the motorbike, someone knocked him off.

‘I jumped on his back and pinned him down to the ground. It was all over in a fraction of a second.

‘I used to do wrestling so it was really easy. I wasn’t scared of him at all and after that other people came to help me.’

Sam Dolling, 20, an electrician who saw the incident unfold, said: ‘It was like something from a film.

It was great how everyone went to help the guy who tackled him. He was so brave.

‘You don’t expect to see that nowadays. Most people would have just let them get on with it.’

Police also seized a bag of loot, although some items are still missing and the total value of what was stolen is unknown.

The gang had not reckoned with several brave members of the public who intervened to try and stop the heist

After the attack, one witness said she was almost knocked over in the street by a man running from the scene

One man was arrested at the scene after being detained by members of the public. Three other suspects were seized by police a short while later and a fifth suspect remains at large

'Depraved' gang leader who forced 91-year-old woman to perform sex act on her elderly carer is jailed indefinitely

A depraved gang leader who filmed himself humiliating a 91-year-old woman and her carer at knife-point has been jailed indefinitely for an attack that filled a judge with 'utter revulsion'.

Michael Lewis, 21, who led the Brixton Hill Blood gang in south London, is believed to have made the film as a 'trophy' to show other members.

The fiend broke into the 91-year-old woman's flat and filmed her carrying out sex acts with her elderly carer before cutting the phone line and threatening to return if they called the police.

Lewis, known as 'Joker 187 General' - 187 being the code for murder in the US - will serve at least eight years before he can be considered for parole after being branded a 'danger to the public'.

Sentencing him at Inner London Crown Court, Judge Roger Chapple described the case as one of the most 'sickening and harrowing' he had ever heard.

He said: 'It demonstrates that there are no limits to the depths of depravity that some will descend to.

'The reasons for your behaviour are to me entirely unfathomable.

'The ordeal suffered at your hands by these two women has properly been described as horrific.

'The emotional scars you have inflicted upon them are deep and permanent.

'I am faced with a defendant who, for no reason I can begin to understand, has committed behaviour of the utmost gravity.

'You were not affected by drink or drugs and have no disability.

'What you did fills me with utter revulsion.

'Having behaved in this way, there is a significant risk you will do so again and do serious harm to your next victim.'
Earlier Gillian Etherton, prosecuting, told Inner London Crown Court he had caused 'shock, terror and humiliation'.

'Through physical force, controlled aggression and at knifepoint he forced the younger woman to perform a number of degrading and humiliating sexual acts,' she said.

'He further terrified the two women by cutting the phone line and threatening to kill them a number of times.'

She said the carer had tried to fend Lewis off when he first barged in.

'She tried to push the door shut but he was too strong,' she said. 'He got behind her, grabbed her shoulders and as if he knew where she was going, forced her towards her friend's front door.'

He ordered: 'Don't scream. Open the door.'

They went into the resident's room and found her sitting on her bed. She told him to get out but Lewis growled: 'Tell her to be quiet, or I'll hurt you.'

The carer did as she was told and he assaulted her as the older woman continued to scream.

He warned: 'Tell her to stop, because for me killing is no fear.'

The carer led him to a jar containing £100 hoping to end their ordeal but Lewis, who continues to deny his involvement, kept going.

The attacks - captured on his phone - continued for several more minutes while the courageous older woman tried to fight him off with her walking stick.

'Her carer was shaking so much she could not stand,' Miss Etherton added.

He eventually returned his blade to his waistband and fled, warning: 'No police or I'll be back.' He stole money and the carer's mobile phone.

The shell-shocked carer began writing down an account of what had happened, before finishing her chores and handing over to the next helper.

She went home and took two baths but said nothing to her husband and continued with her own household duties.

The following day she went to the police but only to try and stop an attack on someone else.

She described Lewis' hunched stance and DNA tests on a body hair found stuck to some carpet tape led officers to him.

Mobile cell site evidence and CCTV from a nearby takeaway also suggested he had been very near the scene that night.

Paul Raudnitz, defending, said Lewis had a 'troubled and difficult' upbringing with a 'violent' father and a mother jailed for 12 years for drug trafficking when he was just 12. He worked occasionally as a security guard at music festivals.

Lewis, of Vauxhall, south-west London, was found guilty of false imprisonment, false imprisonment with intent to commit a sexual offence, robbery, sexual assault, causing a person to engage in sexual activity without consent, assault by penetration and making threats to kill.

The women have not been named.

Male escort who visited Saudi prince's hotel room stripped to give him a massage and was paid in £50 notes, court told

A male escort told the Saudi Prince Old Bailey murder trial today that he stripped to give the prince a massage but could not be sure there was a 'sexual element' to it.

Student Pablo Silva said he had visited the hotel room of Saud Abdulaziz bin Nasser al Saud two weeks before he allegedly murdered Bandar Abdulaziz, 32, during a ferocious attack with a 'sexual element' on February 15.

The 34-year-old denies murder and a second count of grievous bodily harm with intent in relation to an alleged assault on Mr Abdulaziz in a lift on January 22.

His lawyer, John Kelsey-Fry QC, today denied the suggestion that the two men were in a gay relationship.

Prosecutors claim two male escorts had visited the prince at the Landmark Hotel in Marylebone, central London.

Trial: Al Saud, left, on his way to City of Westminster magistrates court in a prison van for his original hearing following the death of Bandar Abdulaziz, right

Silva, a Brazilian student, told the jury he was called to the 'swish' Landmark Hotel in Marylebone, central London, after advertising his services with agencies called Escort Guys and Men In The City.

Mr Silva, speaking through a Portuguese interpreter, said he arrived at about 1am to be greeted by a 'very polite' man.

There was a large bed and big bathroom and various shopping bags and a large piece of luggage in the room, he added.

'I believe he was alone. I made some very superficial questions about whether he liked London. I don't remember much conversation.

'I asked him whether he wanted a massage and I asked him to remove something which he had on so that I should be able to do the massage.'

Tall, dark-haired Mr Silva said he was studying in Portugal for a doctorate in mathematics but would visit England to improve his English and worked as an escort to pay for his stay.

He said: 'Generally I take off my shirt or my trousers to cause a little more provocation in my client.'

Jonathan Laidlaw QC, prosecuting, asked: 'Was there any sexual element to the massage?' Mr Silva replied: 'I am not sure but I know there was no penetration, also oral sex no.

Mr Laidlaw then asked: 'Was there any masturbation?' Mr Silva answered: 'I can't remember but I believe, but I am not 100 per cent certain. I believe I could go because he had ejaculated. I am not certain in relation to that.'

He said he could not recall how much he was paid, although received cash in £50 notes.

Earlier, a hotel porter told the jury the way Al Saud and his 'effeminate' manservant colour-coded their clothes in their wardrobe led him to believe they were gay.

Dobomir Dimitrov, himself a homosexual, went to the room of Saud Abdulazaziz bin Nasser al Saud at the Landmark Hotel in Marylebone, central London, to deliver hangers.

Mr Dimitrov said Al Saud and his manservant, Bandar Abdullah Abdulaziz, were not behaving like two heterosexual men in the way that they were hanging up their clothes in colour-coded order on hangers he had taken to the room.

He said of the taller of the two men, who was black: 'It was impossible not to notice that he was homosexual. I would describe them as a gay couple'.

Al Saud's barrister John Kelsey-Fry QC said: 'You had an effeminate gay man sharing a room with another man and colour coding their clothing?'

'Yes,' Mr Dimitrov replied.

'That is why you were led to the impression of them being a gay couple?" asked Mr Kelsey-Fry.

'Yes', the witness answered.

Mr Kelsey-Fry said in cross-examination: 'It is not accepted that this was in fact a gay couple - but I readily accept that you had the impression they were a gay couple'.

Another hotel porter George Konis told the court he had seen Mr Abdulaziz apparently injured and that he seemed to be treated 'like a slave'.

He said: 'The darker guy, he was battered, he was bruised up, beaten up, with sunglasses. He was all swollen.'

Mr Konis said he helped Al Saud and Mr Abdulaziz move their belongings when they transferred to a larger room at the hotel on January 28.

He said: 'He still looked like a mess but it looked like it was healing slowly, eyes were swollen, bruises. It looked like someone had pounded his face, given him a good few punches.

'I wanted to help with the moving. He kept picking up clothes and trying to help us. There was a big railing of clothing and he was trying to help me push it. The way things were he was just like a slave, of what I saw.'

He said during this time the prince was on his mobile phone and 'just giggling and talking and walking up and down'.

Mr Konis said he 'thought there was some form of relationship' between the men.

'There was something there definitely between them. They were both very camp. I suppose it is an assumption that they were gay.'

Jurors have heard that Al Saud, a grandson of Saudia Arabia's King Fahd, killed Mr Abdulaziz, 32, in the hotel room in February this year. Prosecutors allege that it was a ferocious attack which had a 'sexual element'.

The court heard further details of the two men's activities in the period leading up to the alleged murder.

They had come to Britain to stay one night at the Landmark hotel at the end of December before travelling to the Maldives.

The prince had travelled on a business class ticket costing £3,647.80 and Mr Abdulaziz in economy for a fare of £891.60.

The men had returned to stay at the hotel on January 20, dining that night at the Nobu restaurant in Berkeley Street, central London.

Michel Lengui, deputy manager at Scalini's restaurant where the two men dined with a third man on January 24, said: 'One of them looked a bit effeminate and therefore I assumed they might have been gay.'

The dinner took place two days after the alleged assault on Mr Abdulaziz captured on CCTV.

George Rodrigues, a barman at the restaurant, said one of the men was 'very quiet' and was wearing sunglasses which he found 'really strange', as well as a black woolly hat.

'He had swelling to his lips and he appeared to be having difficulty as he was eating his food. He kept his head down and never really looked at me directly in the face at any time', he said.

The trial was adjourned until tomorrow.

Dobromir Dimitrov arriving at the Old Bailey today: The hotel porter said he felt Al Saud and Abdulaziz were a gay couple