Police warn they may not be able to afford Tesco's £3m riot compensation bill

 In total, the retailer has asked for nearly £3m in compensation from police forces around the country, following the riots that tore through some high streets in August. It is likely that this is the biggest request from a single retailer. The company is claiming under the Riot Damages Act, a piece of Victorian legislation that allows businesses and individuals affected by riot damage to claim...

Brussels threatens to sue Britain to let in 'benefit tourists'

 Ministers fear the move could leave taxpayers handing out as much as £2.5  billion to EU nationals, including out-of-work “benefit tourists”, a new cost that could wreck Coalition plans for welfare reform. The commission’s threat, on the eve of the Conservative Party conference, has raised the political temperature on Europe still further. In an outspoken attack today, Iain Duncan Smith, the...

Legal warning to UK over benefits for EU nationals

 The European Commission has threatened legal action against the UK, saying a test of eligibility for benefits discriminates against foreigners. It says it is easier for UK citizens to prove their "right to reside" - a test imposed by the UK for certain benefits - than EU nationals. The commission says it may refer the case to the European Court of Justice. Ministers say it is a "fundamental...

Motorway speed limit to be raised

 The speed limit on Britain’s motorways is set to rise to 80mph but with a big expansion in the number 20mph zones in cities and towns, The Independent has learnt. As part of a deal negotiated with the Liberal Democrats the Transport Secretary Phillip Hammond is expected to announce the Government’s intention to bring in the new speed limit at the Conservative conference. Ministers will then...

Ferdinand loses privacy action

 Rio Ferdinand has lost his privacy action over a "kiss and tell" story. The England and Manchester United centre back was not at London's High Court to hear Mr Justice Nicol dismiss his claim against MGN Ltd. Ferdinand, 32, brought his case for misuse of private information over an April 2010 Sunday Mirror article in which interior designer Carly Storey gave her account of their 13-year relationship...

FALKLANDS war veteran went on a lavish £1million spending spree after ripping off two gangsters

 FALKLANDS war veteran went on a lavish £1million spending spree after ripping off two gangsters. Ex-Royal Navy officer Dean Priestley had been asked by the crooks to drive the used notes across the Channel to Spain. But instead of sticking to the plan the 47-year-old went on the run and set about leading a life of luxury for six months. Advertisement >> Priestley splashed out on holidays,...

Dowler lawyer pursues US legal action against News Corp

 The solicitor who represented the family of Milly Dowler in their phone-hacking claims against News Corporation on Friday announced he has teamed up with US lawyers with a view to initiating proceedings targetting Rupert Murdoch and his son James. Mark Lewis of Taylor Hampton has instructed Norman Siegel, a New York-based lawyer who represents 20 9/11 families to seek witness statements from...

Scottish supermarkets face extra tax on selling alcohol

 Plans to hike business rates for major retailers of alcohol and tobacco in Scotland could see supermarkets pay around £110 million in tax over the next three years.   Finance Secretary John Swinney announced the new levy yesterday, as part of the Scottish government’s Spending Review.   Swinney said the review contained “tough choices, because of the cuts from Westminster that go too...

Bloody Sunday family rejects payout

 Relatives of one of the Bloody Sunday victims have firmly rejected any offer of Government compensation. Sisters Linda and Kate Nash, whose teenage brother William was among 14 men who died after paratroopers opened fire on civil rights protesters in Londonderry in January 1972, said: "I find it repulsive." The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that moves are under way to compensate the families...

Troy Davis execution goes ahead despite serious doubts about his guilt

 Moments before he was put to death, Troy Davis lifted his head from the gurney to which he was strapped and looked the family of Mark MacPhail, the police officer for whose murder he was convicted, directly in the eyes. "I want to talk to the MacPhail family," he said. "I was not responsible for what happened that night. I did not have a gun. I was not the one who took the life of your father,...

Scotland Yard drops Official Secrets Act bid against Guardian

 Scotland Yard had intended to take the Guardian newspaper to court on Friday in an attempt to force the newspaper into revealing how it obtained information that missing schoolgirl Milly Dowler’s mobile phone had been hacked. However, following discussions with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), the force has abandoned its application for production orders against the newspaper. The decision...

Charlie Sheen to pocket $25 million from settlement over ‘Men’ firing

Washington: Looks like Charlie Sheen is close to settling his 100-million-dollars legal dispute with Warner Bros. over his firing from the hit sitcom ‘Two and a Half Men’.   A person familiar with the talks, has revealed that the studio is wrapping up a deal to end the litigation.According to The Los Angeles Times,...

NAVY recruit flipped and killed an officer in a gun rampage on a nuclear sub after he was told off for his cleaning work.

Ryan Donovan, 23, fired his SA80 semi-automatic rifle after his hopes of a voyage on a surface ship were dashed as punishment for his shoddy work.He was also obsessed with violent video games and told a friend he wanted to carry out a Grand Theft Auto-style "kill frenzy".Yesterday the HMS Astute able seaman was jailed for life...

Clegg condemns 'grotesque' hacking

 No amount of money can absolve News International from hacking in to the phone of Surrey murder victim Milly Dowler, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has said , following the disclosure that the company was about to settle its case with the teenager's family. Rupert Murdoch is set to donate £1 million to charity...

Iran arrests six 'BBC Persian film-makers'

 The Iranian authorities have arrested a group of film-makers and accused them of working for the BBC Persian service, which is banned in the country. State TV reports that the group of six were paid to make secret reports for the Farsi-language service. The BBC says no-one works for the Persian service inside the country - either formally or informally. The arrests came a day after the service...

Two men took their friend's corpse on a night out with them to a strip club so they could use his ATM card to buy drinks

Two men took their friend's corpse on a night out with them to a strip club so they could use his ATM card to buy drinks, police claim.Robert Jeffrey Young, 43, and Mark Rubinson, 25, discovered their friend Jeffrey Jarrett dead but delayed reporting the find to police so they could first have a free night out.While keeping...

Gangland boss Carl Williams fingers cop Paul Dale from beyond grave

 ON April 24, 2007, deep inside the razor wire of Victoria's Barwon Prison, gangland killer Carl Williams finally decided to tell his story about crooked cops and Melbourne's underworld war. Williams is now dead, but his lurid tale echoed from the grave yesterday as his version of history, made in three statements over two years, was read out to a spellbound audience in the Victorian Supreme...

Fury over 'link' of drug arrests to Jodie's death

 SPANISH police investigating the circumstances surrounding Jodie Nieman's death made nine arrests last week. Although police are certain the Kenley beautician died from a heart attack, it is not clear whether her death was drug-related. ​ MISSED: Jodie Nieman An investigation has been launched into drugs supply in Ibiza and police announced last Thursday that they had arrested nine men after...

Three New Brunswick Smoke Shops Raided in "Bath Salts" Bust, Six People Arrested

 Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office has announced that three smoke shops in New Brunswick and a gas station in East Brunswick were raided and charged in the sale of illegal drugs. According to the Prosecutor's Office, the raids began on Aug. 2 after four months of investigative work and netted the following arrests:...

Two Mexicans Killed for Reporting Criminals on Social Web Sites

 Two young people were murdered and their bodies left hanging off a pedestrian bridge in Nuevo Laredo, a border city in the northeastern Mexican state of Tamaulipas, for presumably using social-networking Web sites to report criminals. The bodies of the young man and young woman showed signs of torture, and motorists were the ones who spotted the bodies and called police. Officials, however,...

Gale-force wind warnings issued

 Hurricane Katia could bring gale-force winds across the Atlantic to Scotland by Monday, forecasters have warned. The hurricane, which is moving from Bermuda, is expected to result in stormy weather and gusts of up to 75mph, although no official severe weather warnings have yet been issued. Forecasting provider Meteogroup said it is still too early to predict the effect the hurricane would have...

Millions of Hotmail users cut off by Microsoft 'cloud' failure

 As well as Hotmail, the outage affected Office 365 and the Skydrive online storage service. Microsoft said the cause appeared to be related to the Domain Name System, the computer network that ensures that web addresses are connected to websites. “Preliminary root cause suggests a DNS issue,” the firm said on its office 365 Twitter feed. The problems lasted for at least two-and-a-half hours,...

Mexican helicopters flying over Texas

 Mexican military helicopters have been flying over Texas, a staging ground for missions into Mexico to fight drug traffickers, a Mexican official said. The San Antonio Express-News reports Zapata County Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez Jr. said as many as 10 of the Mexican helicopters have been spotted flying over south Texas in daylight during the past 17 months. U.S. Federal and state agencies...

A Mexican death cult is fuelling America's anti-immigration backlash.

 In September 2008, 11 decapitated bodies were discovered in Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula. When police arrested the killers, they found an altar in their home dedicated to Santa Muerte – the patron saint of death for Mexican drug cartels. One year later, an illegal immigrant called Jorge Flores Rojas was arrested in North...

The new Libya won't trust Britain so easily now | News

 The documents revealing the cosy relationship between top British and Libyan intelligence officials are embarrassing not just because they confirm Britain's rendition of Islamist terror suspects, including Abdel Hakim Belhadj, the Transitional National Council's new security commander in Tripoli, but also because they...

former MP Margaret Moran, who is to face 21 charges in relation to claims she made for parliamentary expenses.

File photo of former MP Margaret Moran, who is to face 21 charges in relation to claims she made for parliamentary expenses. Photograph: Michael Stephens/PAThe former Labour MP who claimed for dry rot treatment on a home more than 100 miles from her constituency will be charged with fiddling her expenses by more than £60,000,...

police have released images of 28 suspects they want to question about serious street disorder that “wreaked havoc” across Northern Ireland

The police have released images of 28 suspects they want to question about serious street disorder that “wreaked havoc” across Northern Ireland.Detectives from a specialist public order inquiry team are hoping the public will help them identify the men in these images as part of their investigations into rioting in east Belfast...

TV cameras to be allowed into criminal trials

 David Cameron is expected to pave the way for the historic move in a long-awaited speech on crime planned for later this month. However, the televised coverage is expected to be limited and will not allow cameras to record witnesses giving evidence as occurs in America. Television cameras are currently banned from most courts in England and Wales although the proceedings of the new Supreme Court...