Trayvon Martin's mom calls for gun law review

The mother of an unarmed black Florida teen, who’s killing by a neighborhood watch volunteer set off a storm of protests, released a Mother's Day video calling for a review of lax US gun laws.

"Just like me, 30,000 mothers lost their children this year to senseless gun violence,".

"Nobody can bring our children back, but it would bring us comfort if we can help spare other mothers the pain we will feel on Mother's Day and every day for the rest of our lives."

Martin, 17, was shot to death February 26 in Sanford, Florida, by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, who claims he shot the unarmed youth in self-defense.

Fulton called on supporters to lobby against "Stand Your Ground" laws in several US states that allow civilians with weapons to fire if they feel threatened with death or with serious injury.

Local police did not arrest or bring charges against Zimmerman for weeks because of Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law, until public outrage led to an investigation by a special state prosecutor. He was arrested April 11 and charged with second degree murder.

Florida Governor Rick Scott announced the creation of a commission to review the self-defense law.

9/11 defendants ignore judge at Guantanamo hearing

They knelt in prayer, ignored the judge and wouldn't listen to Arabic translations as they confronted nearly 3,000 counts of murder. The self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks and four co-defendants defiantly disrupted an arraignment that ended late Saturday night in the opening act of the long-stalled effort to prosecute them in a military court.

In this photo of a sketch by courtroom artist Janet Hamlin and reviewed by the U.S. Department of Defense, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed reads a document during his military hearing at the Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base in Cuba, Saturday, May 5, 2012. The self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed repeatedly declined to respond to a judge's questions Saturday and his co-defendant Walid bin Attash was briefly restrained at a military hearing as five men charged with the worst terror attack in U.S. history appeared in public for the first time in more than three years.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the admitted architect of the attacks that sent hijacked jetliners into New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and the four men accused of aiding the 9/11 conspiracy put off entering pleas until a later date. Another hearing was set for June 12.

It wasn't until more than seven hours into the disrupted and prolonged hearing that prosecutors at the U.S. military base in Cuba even began reading the charges against the men, including 2,976 counts of murder and terrorism that carry the death penalty.

Earlier Saturday, Mohammed cast off his earphones providing Arabic translations of the proceeding and refused to answer Army Col. James Pohl's questions or acknowledge he understood them. All five men refused to participate in the hearing; two passed around a copy of The Economist magazine and leafed through the articles.

Walid bin Attash was confined to a restraint chair when he came into court, released only after he promised to behave.  CONTINUE .. . . .

Murder charge out in Trayvon Martin case

Amid furious public pressure to make an arrest in the killing of Trayvon Martin, the special prosecutor on the case went for the maximum Wednesday, bringing a second-degree murder charge against the neighborhood watch volunteer who shot the unarmed black teenager.

There's still no word on whether George Zimmerman will be charged in the death of Trayvon Martin -- but if he is, the charge won't be first-degree murder.

George Zimmerman, 28, was jailed in Sanford -- the site of the shooting Feb. 26 that set off a nationwide debate over racial profiling and self-defense -- on charges that carry a minimum of 25 years in prison and a maximum sentence that could put him in prison for life.

The special prosecutor who's deciding whether to file charges announced today that she's not going to take the case to a grand jury. That's a step that would only be required if a first-degree murder case. 

"We do not prosecute by public pressure or by petition. We prosecute based on the facts on any given case as well as the laws of the state of Florida," Corey said.

Martin's parents, who were in Washington when the announcement came, expressed relief over the decision to prosecute the killer of their 17-year-old son.

Angela Corey could still charge Zimmerman with a serious felony such as manslaughter, which can carry a lengthy prison sentence.

Zimmerman's new attorney, Mark O'Mara, said Zimmerman will plead not guilty and will invoke Florida's powerful "stands your ground" law, which gives people wide leeway to use deadly force without having to retreat in the face of danger.

One Florida defense attorney says the decision not to go to a grand jury means Corey won't have to rely on potentially-unpredictable jurors. David Hill says Corey may know that there isn't enough for a first-degree murder charge, but she wants to charge him with something else -- and she now can "maintain control" of that process.

Corey took over the case last month after the prosecutor who normally handles cases out of Sanford recused himself.

The death of the unarmed black teen at the hands of the neighborhood watch volunteer has led to protests across the nation. One of those protests today prompted the temporary closing of the Sanford Police Department offices to the public, as about a half-dozen student activists blocked the entrance.

Zimmerman, whose father is white and whose mother Hispanic, turned himself in earlier in the day and will make a court appearance as early as Thursday, when his lawyer plans to ask for bail.

U.S. Pays $50k Per Afghan Shooting Spree death Victim

The United States One- handed over a total of $860,000 to the families of those killed or draws blood or injured in Sgt. Robert Bales' shooting rampage: $50,000 for each person killed, and $10,000 for each human being or person wounded. Col. Gary Kolb, spokesperson for NATO's International Security Force, said the money was to help the victims and their families, and not compensation for Bales' actions.

Afghan villagers prays Saturday over the grave of The sixteen victims of a shooting the Panjwai district of Kandahar province south of Kabul, Afghanistan spree linked to U.S. soldier Robert Bales.

“The United States has paid $50,000 in compensation for each Afghan killed and $11,000 for each person wounded in the shooting spree attributed to a U.S. soldier that’s Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, above, in southern Afghanistan.” According to the AP,

The sums, much larger than typical payments made by the U.S. to families of civilians killed in military operations in Afghanistan, come as the U.S. tries to mend relations following the killing rampage that has threatened to undermine the international effort here.

The U.S. has paid compensation for the victims of the massacre in southern Afghanistan attributed to a U.S. soldier.

A U.S. official confirms that there have been payments but would not discuss amounts.

It was not immediately clear if the word used to describe the payment had legal significance in Afghanistan, where "blood money" can replace a trial or punishment of a killer.

The Afghan population is still clamoring to have Bales tried in Afghanistan, but military officials have said he will be tried in the U.S. If convicted of the 17 counts of murder he's charged with, Bales could face the death penalty or punishment.

Pakistani court :A paramilitary soldier guilty of murder.

Pakistan soldier to hang for murder

A paramilitary soldier guilty of murder that’s a Pakistani court today found and sentenced him to death for killing an unarmed man at point blank range in an incident caught on camera in a public park.

Lawyers said it marked the first time that a civilian court in Pakistan has sentenced to death a serving member of the military.

Although the Rangers paramilitary technically comes under the supervision of the interior ministry, it is considered part of the powerful armed forces, which has ruled the country for more than half its existence.

The June 8 killing of Sarfaraz Shah, 22, was filmed by a cameraman and broadcast on television, sparking a backlash over the brutality of trained officers in a country awash with violence blamed on the Taliban and al-Qaeda.

 

Judge Bashir Ahmed Khoso read out the verdict before an anti-terrorism court in Karachi, finding 35-year-old Shahid Zafar guilty of pulling the trigger, and sentenced him to death and a fine of $2224 "The crime of killing Sarfraz Shah has been proved against you and I announce the death sentence and also impose a fine of 200,000 rupees," said Khoso, addressing Zafar