Author: Darren Smith

Andrew and Tristan Tate have lost a High Court challenge aimed at forcing the Crown Prosecution Service to disclose the names of the women who have made criminal allegations against them in the UK, with a judge ruling the claim was not arguable. Mr Justice Chamberlain dismissed the brothers’ legal challenge on Friday, finding that the CPS’s decision to withhold the names of alleged victims until proceedings begin formally in a British court was “coherent and rational.” The ruling is a significant setback for the brothers, who had argued the CPS position was unlawful and breached their right to a…

A 19-year-old woman has mysteriously disappeared from a Kentucky lake after getting off a pontoon boat with friends to use the toilet, with a massive search operation now spanning its third day across a 1,500-acre reservoir. Marly Kinney was last seen on Wednesday afternoon after stepping off the boat at the side of Grayson Lake with her group of at least ten friends. The party only realised she was missing once they were already back out on the water — and in a detail that has complicated the search significantly, none of them can remember exactly where on the lake…

Police divers have recovered the body of a teenage boy who entered a lake in Leicestershire yesterday afternoon, as the dangers of open water swimming during the heatwave claimed another young life. Officers were called to Meynell Lake on Fosse Way in Syston just after 1.30pm, alongside Leicestershire Fire and Rescue Service and East Midlands Ambulance Service. Initial searches were carried out before police divers were deployed to recover the boy’s body. Leicestershire Police confirmed there are no suspicious circumstances surrounding the death. The tragedy adds to a growing toll of open water deaths during the current heatwave, with emergency…

Thousands of Shiite Muslims marked the holy Day of Ashura on Friday with ceremonies of ritual self-flagellation across Iraq, Lebanon, Iran and beyond, as this year’s commemoration carried an additional layer of grief for communities still reeling from the devastation of recent wars. In Iraq, pilgrims converged on the holy city of Karbala, the site of the seventh-century Battle of Karbala and home to a shrine dedicated to Imam Hussein, dressed in white robes quickly stained red as worshippers cut themselves across the scalp or whipped their bodies with blades attached to chains in acts of mourning. In Baghdad, thousands…

Elon Musk’s Starlink has announced it will provide free satellite internet across Venezuela for a month following two devastating back-to-back earthquakes that killed at least 188 people, injured more than 1,500 and caused widespread destruction across the country. The announcement came on 25 June, a day after a magnitude 7.2 foreshock struck near Morón on the Caribbean coast, followed just 39 seconds later by a 7.5 magnitude mainshock — the strongest earthquake to hit Venezuela in more than a century. The twin quakes triggered the collapse of buildings in Caracas and other major population centres, knocked out power and telecommunications…

Six members of a drugs gang have been sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a woman who was shot dead at her door in Talbot Green after being caught in the crossfire of a turf war between two rival organised crime groups. Joanne Penney was killed on 9 March 2025 when Marcus Huntley, 21, shot her as she answered the door of a property in Talbot Green that was being used by both gangs to deal drugs. Joanne herself had no connection to either criminal group. Melissa Quailey-Dashper, 40, had been instructed to knock on the door to…

A 16-year-old boy has been found not guilty of the murder and manslaughter of nine-year-old Aria Thorpe, who died after being stabbed through the heart at her home in Weston-super-Mare last December. The jury at Bristol Crown Court returned its not guilty verdict after hearing harrowing evidence about the death of Aria, who was stabbed in the chest on 15 December last year while sitting on the sofa eating pizza and watching YouTube at her home in North Somerset. In a statement read to the jury, Aria’s mother Victoria Hull described the ordinary family evening that ended in tragedy. She…

A short video showing a young man blocking an elderly woman’s path on a London Overground staircase while she struggled to ascend has gone viral, drawing more than 400,000 views and sparking widespread anger over what many described as a failure of basic public decency. The 31-second clip, posted to X by user @TheNorfolkLion, shows an elderly woman in a pink top, light trousers and sandals making her way up a station staircase while holding the handrail for support. A younger man in shorts and white Nike trainers is positioned directly in her path near the rail, appearing to be…

Police made multiple arrests and dispersed crowds after fights broke out on beaches in Broadstairs and Margate on Wednesday as large numbers of people descended on the Kent coast during the heatwave. The trouble began at around 5.35pm when officers were called to a fight on the beach at Viking Bay in Broadstairs involving a small group that had attracted a crowd of onlookers. An 18-year-old man from London, an 18-year-old man from Swanley and a 16-year-old boy from Dartford were all arrested on suspicion of assault. A man in his 20s suffered a cut to his head in the…

Magnitude 6.9 Earthquake Strikes Off Japan’s Iwate Prefecture A powerful magnitude 6.9 earthquake has struck off the coast of Iwate Prefecture in northern Japan, with strong shaking reported across parts of Aomori and Iwate as emergency alerts were broadcast across the region. The Japan Meteorological Agency recorded the quake at approximately 7.30am local time on Wednesday 25 June, with the epicentre located off the Iwate coast at a depth of around 50 kilometres. The JMA recorded shaking of upper 6 — described as “6-strong” on Japan’s seismic intensity scale — in parts of Aomori Prefecture, including the Sanpachi-Kamikita region, while…