Author: Darren Smith

A senior Metropolitan Police commander has been suspended after an artificial intelligence system found alleged sexual content on his work phone — as the force confirms more than 100 officers have been flagged by the same technology since its rollout last month, triggering a major internal inquiry. James Deller, a Special Constabulary Chief Officer responsible for overseeing 1,200 volunteer officers, is under investigation after being identified by software developed by US data firm Palantir. The system, which scans data held on officers’ work phones and laptops, flagged Deller for allegedly holding “sexualised content” on a force device. The civilian volunteer,…

China has launched three astronauts into orbit aboard its Tiangong space station as part of an accelerating programme designed to put Chinese boots on the Moon before the end of the decade — and for the first time in history, one of those astronauts comes from Hong Kong. A Long March 2-F rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan launch centre in China’s northwestern Gobi Desert at around 3pm GMT on Sunday, carrying the Shenzhou-23 crew to the orbiting station. Li Jiaying, 43, a former Hong Kong police officer, made history as the first person from the city to travel to…

Sixty firefighters are battling a large fire near Hackney Downs Station in east London, sending thick plumes of dark smoke into the sky and forcing a partial suspension of the Mildmay Overground line on Sunday evening. Eight fire engines have been deployed from stations across east London to tackle the blaze, which broke out on Cottrill Gardens. The London Fire Brigade confirmed that a static caravan and two cars have been engulfed by the fire, along with part of a grass embankment. Video footage circulating on social media shows heavy black smoke rising above the area as crews work to…

A 22-year-old man has been banned from every Tesco store in Derby until 2029 after stealing two cans of cider — with his custody photograph sparking a wave of Ed Sheeran jokes online after Derbyshire Police posted it on social media. Bailey Esmonde, of no fixed abode, was caught on camera entering a Tesco Express on St Peter’s Street and making off with two cans of cider. Two days after the theft on 30 March, he was arrested on suspicion of possessing cocaine. Charged with shop theft and possession of crack cocaine, Esmonde appeared at Southern Derbyshire Magistrates’ Court on…

The stepfather accused of abandoning two young boys blindfolded in a Portuguese forest had recorded a series of disturbing videos just days earlier in which he warned of an impending apocalypse, urged people to hide in nature and claimed a horse he encountered had been “hybridised with reptile DNA.” Marc Ballabriga, 55, a former police officer, is alleged to have filmed the videos on 15 May — just four days before he and his partner Marine Rousseau, 41, are accused of abandoning their sons Barthelemy, five, and Zacharie, three, on a remote rural road near Alcacer do Sal in southern…

Britain’s first official heatwave of the year brought chaos to Bournemouth beach over the Bank Holiday weekend, as tens of thousands of sun-seekers descended on the Dorset coast and scenes unfolded around the pier that kept police and paramedics busy throughout the afternoon. Youths were photographed inhaling nitrous oxide — commonly known as “hippy crack” — from balloons as crowds gathered in the sweltering heat. The smell of cannabis hung in the air as drum and bass music blared from loudspeakers along the seafront. A teenage girl, believed to have consumed too many vodka mixers, had to be carried from…

A former military officer with a history of mental health incidents has been shot dead by police after emerging from his home in suburban Brisbane armed with a rifle and wearing full tactical gear, in circumstances that the Queensland Police Union has described as a possible case of “suicide by cop.” Jordan Thomas Kirk, 48, was killed by two Queensland Police officers in the early hours of Sunday morning outside a property on Cavill Way in Narangba, in the Moreton Bay region of southeast Queensland. Officers had responded to a domestic violence call for help from inside the home and…

A world-record diver who descended 900 feet into one of South Africa’s most notorious underwater caves on a mission to recover a fellow diver’s body made a single catastrophic error that cost him his life — a tragedy whose haunting echoes have resurfaced following the deaths of five Italian divers in a cave system in the Maldives earlier this month. Australian diver Dave Shaw, a commercial pilot and celebrated cave explorer, first visited Bushman’s Hole in the Northern Cape in October 2004, setting a world record for the deepest dive using a rebreather device at 927 feet — a depth…

A Nigerian man convicted of three attempted rapes and kidnapping has finally been deported from Britain after almost a decade of legal wrangling, following a Court of Appeal ruling that previous judgments blocking his removal had stretched human rights law too far and were based on speculation too remote to justify keeping him in the country. The man, known only as OSB and granted anonymity by the immigration courts, had been fighting deportation since the Home Office issued a removal order in February 2017 — despite having had no legal right to be in Britain since his appeal rights were…

A government minister broke down in tears on live television after hearing a 15-year-old rape victim describe the decision to spare her attackers from jail as feeling like “a rock straight in my face” — as the Attorney General faces mounting pressure to refer the sentences to the Court of Appeal. The girl, one of two teenagers raped by a group of boys in Fordingbridge, Hampshire, gave a harrowing interview on the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme in which she questioned why she had put herself through the ordeal of a trial only to see her attackers walk free.…