Author: Darren Smith

The man believed to be responsible for organising a significant proportion of illegal Channel crossings in recent years has been identified as a 28-year-old Iraqi Kurd who charges migrants up to £15,000 a crossing and has evaded arrest for years by operating under false identities, a BBC investigation has revealed. Kardo Jaf, who uses the alias Ranya — taken from the town of Ranya in Iraqi Kurdistan where he is believed to originate — runs a smuggling network with routes stretching from Afghanistan to the United Kingdom. Despite keeping his true identity carefully concealed, he has openly advertised his services…

Archaeologists believe they have solved one of biblical history’s most enduring mysteries, announcing that a site on the northeastern shore of the Sea of Galilee is almost certainly the lost town of Bethsaida — where the Gospels record Jesus healing a blind man and where several of his closest disciples were born. Excavation director Steven Notley told an audience in Washington DC on 5 May that the accumulated evidence from years of digging at El-Araj has “essentially confirmed” its identity as the ancient settlement, ending decades of uncertainty that has divided archaeologists and biblical scholars alike. The case rests on…

A Brazilian rodeo rider was stamped to death by a bull in front of his horrified wife — just one month after their wedding — in footage that has gone viral after being livestreamed to thousands of online viewers. Rafael Silvio Oliveira, 32 and a father of two, was competing at the Votu International Rodeo in São Paulo, Brazil, when the fatal accident occurred on Sunday night. Footage shows him clinging desperately to the back of a raging bull before being violently bucked through the air and hurled headfirst toward the ground. The animal then stamps directly onto his torso.…

Ukrainian police and state officials have forcibly removed monks, clergy and worshippers from the St Michael’s Monastery in Pereyaslav, dragging the abbot from the church doors as officers pushed through crowds of faithful to hand the 18th-century site to state control — images that have shocked Orthodox communities worldwide and reignited debate about religious freedom in wartime Ukraine. Video footage of the incident, which took place on Sunday 11 May and was widely shared across X and Orthodox media channels including the Union of Orthodox Journalists, shows officers in tactical gear forcing their way through a crowd at the monastery…

A British-Nigerian father jailed for abducting his five-year-old son likely escaped to Spain in the three days it took prison staff to inform the Metropolitan Police that they had mistakenly released him — a delay a High Court judge has condemned as showing “an alarming lack of urgency” and a failure of the state. Ifedayo Adeyeye, 58, was wrongly released from HMP Pentonville in London on 21 April, just one day after being sentenced to a further 12 months for contempt of court — on top of an earlier six-month sentence — over his abduction of five-year-old Laurys N’Djosse Adeyeye…

A man has pleaded guilty to a series of religiously aggravated offences against three Jewish people in north London, including assault, threats and behaviour intended to cause fear of immediate violence. Dylan Ossei, 34, of Hornchurch, east London, appeared at Highbury Corner Magistrates’ Court on Monday where he admitted three charges following an incident in Southbury Road in Enfield in the early hours of Saturday morning. Two men aged 58 and 26, and a 53-year-old woman were injured in the attack, though none required further medical treatment, the Metropolitan Police confirmed. Ossei pleaded guilty to the religiously aggravated assault of…

A British anti-Zionist activist is under police investigation for alleged Holocaust denial after a fellow train passenger reported her to officers by text message — sparking a fierce debate about free speech, citizen surveillance and where the line falls between political criticism and hate speech in modern Britain. Fiona Rose Diamond was approached by British Transport Police at a train station after returning from an oncology appointment in London when officers informed her she was under investigation for a “racially aggravated public order” offence. The complaint had been triggered by a single text message from another passenger on the train…

The Sikh owner of a west London restaurant who says he was arrested for defending his family after an attack on his wife and daughter has been released without charge — and is now threatening legal action against the Metropolitan Police and Mayor Sadiq Khan, as a long-running dispute over his restaurant’s non-halal policy erupts once more. Harman Singh Kapoor, 44, who runs Rangrez Indian restaurant on Fulham Palace Road in Hammersmith, was detained for nearly 24 hours before being released on 10 May without any charges being brought against him. In a post on X that has since accumulated…

Two men have been arrested after a woman was raped on a high street in a South Yorkshire town centre in the early hours of the morning, police have confirmed. The incident took place on Bank Street in Mexborough, Doncaster, at 2.09am on 2 May. South Yorkshire Police were called to reports of a rape and launched an investigation, arresting two men the following day. A 48-year-old man was detained on suspicion of rape and a 45-year-old man on suspicion of sexual assault. Both have since been released on bail pending further enquiries. Police have released descriptions of the two…

A man has been arrested on suspicion of murder after the body of Anthony Clemmings was discovered in a rooftop garden at a block of flats in Bristol earlier this week. Mr Clemmings, known as Tony, was found by a member of the public at the Redcliff Street development at around 8.20am on Tuesday. Avon and Somerset Police confirmed on Friday that a 50-year-old man had been arrested in the West Midlands in connection with the death and remains in custody. The force said forensic and CCTV enquiries had been carried out following the discovery, with additional patrols deployed in…