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HELSINKI (AP) â€" A Finnish couple has narrowly won the 19th World Wife Carrying Championships â€" a quirky competition in which men race to be the fastest while carrying a female teammate.

Ville Parviainen and Janette Oksman cleared the grueling 253.5 meter (278-yard) obstacle course in 63.75 seconds on Saturday, less than a second ahead of Britain's Rich Blake Smith and Anna Marguerite Smith.

Thirty-six couples from a dozen countries including Australia, Japan, and the United States took part in the race, which was held in the central Finnish municipality of Sonkajarvi, north of the capital, Helsinki.

The rules stipulate that the woman must be over 17 years of age and weigh at least 49 kilograms (108 lb). Despite the event's name couples don't have to be married, and organizers say male contestants could "borrow a neighbor's wife" if they didn't have a female companion.

The men can carry their teammate in various ways, though a popular method is for the woman to hang upside-down with her legs around the male contestant's shoulders.

Finland has established itself as a prime venue for unusual events including international air guitar, swamp soccer and mobile phone throwing competitions.

Typhoon Florita enters PAR
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/
Sunday, July 6, 2014


MANILA -- Typhoon "Florita" (international name: Neoguri) has entered the Philippine Area of Responsibility (PAR), said the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) on Sunday.

Pagasa weather forecaster Connie Dadivas said that as of 6 a.m. Sunday, the eye of the typhoon -- the sixth tropical cyclone to affect the country this year -- was located based on all available data at 1,150 kilometers east of Tuguegarao City, Cagayan.

Florita was packing maximum winds of 165 kilometers per hour (kph) and gustiness of up to 200 kph. It was forecast to move west-northwest at 24 kph, but was not expected to hit landmass.

Dadivas said that with its speed, Florita is expected to be out of PAR by Tuesday. It will head toward Taiwan as it moves northward.

Florita, though, will enhance the southwest monsoon that will induce light to moderate rains over the Visayas, the Bicol region, Mimaropa (Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon and Palawan), Caraga and Northern Mindanao.

Pagasa said that as the typhoon will enhance the "habagat," rough sea conditions can be expected and a gale warning may be issued later in the day.

For Sunday forecast, Metro Manila and the rest of Luzon will have cloudy skies with occasional rains while the rest of the country will be partly cloudy to cloudy with isolated rainshowers or thunderstorms.

Moderate to strong winds coming from the southwest will prevail over Southern Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao and the coastal waters along these areas will be moderate to rough, the weather bureau said.

Light to moderate winds blowing from the southwest will prevail over the rest of the country with slight to moderate seas, it added. (PNA/Sunnex)

Quote from: taga tigbao on July 04, 2014, 01:51:46 AM
Nanimpad kos halajong lugar Bay Hubs. Mao nang dugay jamo ko nakabalig. Whew

Hmm, nganong "Whew" man?

He he, not only standing by, but also barking with...

FORGOTTEN ANNIVERSARIES

At the start of the CICA summit, China turned on the pomp, with live television showing Red Flag limousines delivering leaders one by one to a Shanghai conference centre where they walked down a red carpet to shake hands with Xi.

Most recently, Xi feted suspicious neighbours India and Myanmar last Saturday to celebrate the 1954 signing of almost forgotten principles of peaceful coexistence.

He cited Indian Nobel Literature laureate Rabindranath Tagore in a speech to India's vice president on the 60th anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, an early Cold War pledge of peace between China, India and the country then known as Burma.

Xi has gone out of his way to court India, a country which hosts exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama and with which China has a festering border dispute.

Still, China's messages of peace can come across as ham-fisted to those it's trying to court.

"China has long engaged in a kind of smile diplomacy in the region but the challenge for China is that many of its neighbours can see the glint of steel beneath the robe," said Goodman from the CSIS think tank.

(Additional reporting by Michael Martina in BEIJING, John Ruwitch in SHANGHAI and Matt Spetalnick and David Brunnstrom in WASHINGTON; Editing by Dean Yates)

WASHINGTON WATCHING

China's foreign policy since the country began economic reforms three decades ago has traditionally followed the maxim of late paramount leader Deng Xiaoping of "hiding ones' strength and biding ones' time", or keeping a low profile.

Foreign Minister Wang Yi earlier this year flagged China's more assertive regional foreign policy at his annual press conference and in a newspaper article.

"We must accept the role of a responsible major country in international affairs," Wang wrote.

Asked this week whether China was carrying out its own pivot, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said China was pursing a policy of good neighbourliness.

A senior Obama administration official said Washington was paying close attention to Xi's approach to Asia.

"We noted his statement at the CICA conference about Asia for Asians, the growing criticism of U.S. alliances and the Asian infrastructure bank," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

"It's raising serious questions about whether the U.S. vision and the Chinese vision are fully compatible."

A second senior U.S. official said Washington had not been assured that the infrastructure bank would adopt the high governance and other standards of institutions such as the World Bank and the ADB. He said the administration did not see how such an entity would "add value" for the region and that Washington would be making this point to Asian allies.

While they were not members, the United States and Japan were welcome to join the bank, Lou said.

Top Chinese and U.S. officials will get the chance to discuss the bank and many other issues during annual talks in Beijing on July 9-10, a meeting known as the Strategic and Economic Dialogue.

On top of that, China has dangled financial and trade incentives to Central Asia, backing efforts to resurrect the old Silk Road that once carried treasures between China and the Mediterranean.

China is also pushing ahead with various trade pacts in the region, but is not part of negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a 12-nation bloc whose two biggest economies are the United States and Japan.

Not everyone is convinced China's initiatives will amount to much.

"Some of those things are more about the optics of these issues rather than the realities of a Chinese-led order," said Matthew Goodman, senior adviser for Asian Economics at the Center for Security and International Studies in Washington.

A RIVAL BANK?

Another Chinese initiative is the $50 billion Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, which Xi first proposed in October during a visit to Southeast Asia.

Finance Minister Lou Jiwei said this week Beijing would likely have a 50 percent stake in the bank, which diplomats see as a possible rival to the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, though China says its role is a complementary one, not competitive.

Washington and Tokyo have the biggest voting rights in both the decades-old institutions.

China sees the infrastructure bank as a way to spread the message of its benign intentions in Asia, where developing countries such as the Philippines and Vietnam accuse Beijing of being the aggressor over territorial claims.

"China upholds a basic guiding principle in regional diplomacy - being friends and partners with our neighbours," Lou said.

President Barack Obama's pivot - as the White House initially dubbed it - represented a strategy to refocus on Asia's dynamic economies as the United States disentangled itself from costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

China sees the pivot as an attempt to contain its growing influence, especially given the United States is strengthening its ties with Asian security allies such as Japan and the Philippines, which have bitter territorial disputes with Beijing in the region's waters. Washington denies this.

One key part of China's diplomatic outreach has been to breath life into the little-known Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia, or CICA, which has languished since Kazakhstan proposed it in 1992 to promote peace and security.

CICA comprises two dozen mostly Asian nations, as well as Russia and some Middle Eastern countries. The United States, Japan and the Philippines are not members.

China took over chairmanship of CICA at a summit in Shanghai in May for three years. There, President Xi Jinping spoke about a new "Asian security concept", saying China would explore the formulation of a code of conduct for regional security and an Asian security partnership programme.

While Xi gave few details and made no direct mention of disputes such as in the South China Sea, he warned Asian nations about strengthening military alliances to counter China, an oblique reference to the U.S. pivot.

"Asian problems must be resolved by Asian people, and Asian security must be protected by Asian people," Xi said.

http://www.thestar.com.my/
Published: Friday July 4, 2014 MYT 6:40:02 AM
Updated: Friday July 4, 2014 MYT 6:41:21 AM
BY BEN BLANCHARD



Sailors aboard the aircraft carrier USS George Washington man the rails as the ship pulls out of Hong Kong after a five-day port visit, in this U.S. Navy handout file photo from November 14, 2011. REUTERS/U.S. Navy/Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Erin Devenberg/Handout via Reuters
   

BEIJING (Reuters) - The Silk Road, an obscure Kazakh-inspired security forum and a $50 billion (£29.1 billion) Asian infrastructure bank are just some of the disparate elements in an evolving Chinese strategy to try to counter Washington's "pivot" to the region.

While Chinese leaders have not given the government's growing list of initiatives a label or said they had an overall purpose, Chinese experts and diplomats said Beijing appeared set on shaping Asia's security and financial architecture more to its liking.

"China is trying to work out its own counterbalance strategy," said Sun Zhe, director of the Centre for U.S.-China Relations at Beijing's Tsinghua University and who has advised China's government on its foreign policy.

Added one Beijing-based Western diplomat who follows China's international relations: "This is all clearly aimed at the United States."

Hahay, kawalay hinungdan hitaboa...

July 4, 2014 7:30am

 
A Filipina was fined Dh2,000 (P23,748) by a United Arab Emirates court for throwing her shoe at a taxi driver who she saw urinating near her house last February.

But the Dubai Misdemeanors Court also sentenced the taxi driver to nine months in jail for peeing in public and for assaulting the Filipina's roommates, UAE news site Gulf News reported.

It added Thursday’s ruling is subject to appeal within 15 days.

The report cited prosecution records showing the Pakistani taxi driver allegedly parked his taxi under the building and stepped out to urinate when the Filipina saw him from the balcony.

She threw her shoe at the driver when he refused to stop peeing. The shoe hit the taxi windshield and shattered the glass. The cabbie got angry and scolded the Filipina.

He then asked his friends to go up with him to the flat to assault the Filipina. When they bumped into her two Moroccan roommates, they attacked them with a pocketknife and a screwdriver.

This prompted prosecutors to accuse the driver of committing a lewd act in public and for assaulting the Filipina's roommates. They also charged the Filipina with wrecking the glass.

The Dubai Misdemeanors Court sentenced the the taxi driver to six months in jail for urinating in public, and three months and a Dh2,000 fine for assaulting the roommates.

Also, the Pakistani will be deported following the completion of his punishment.

When the driver showed up in court, he admitted urinating in public but denied the charge of assaulting the roommates.

For her part, the Filipina confessed she hurled her shoe at the driver because he refused to stop peeing and shouted at her. â€" Joel Locsin /LBG, GMA News

Quote from: hubag bohol on July 05, 2014, 03:56:31 PM
Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile yesterday invoked the Constitution to prevent the Philippine National Police (PNP) from releasing his mug shots.

Hmm, reminds me of the movie 'Hook' when in the climactic sword fight Peter Pan unhooked the captain's wig, and Hook said: "Good form, Peter. I’m fallen. Give me my dignity, you took my hand. You owe me something."

His lawyer Joseph Sagandoy said there is no need to take or publicize mug shots if the subject is not yet convicted and therefore presumed innocent, if the subject’s identity is established or well recognized, and if there is no related public safety concern.

“Absent these requirements, as would be in the case of Sen. Enrile, the taking of mug shots or worse, their publication would be entirely unnecessary, and would just expose the subject to cruel, degrading or inhuman punishment as prescribed by Sec. 9 Article II of the Constitution,” Sagandoy said in a three-page letter.

The letter was addressed to Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) chief Director Benjamin Magalong, copies of which were sent to PNP chief Director General Alan Purisima and public information office director Chief Superintendent Reuben Theodore Sindac.

The letter also stated that during the booking procedures of Senators Jinggoy Estrada and Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr., Enrile’s co-accused in the pork barrel fund scam, their mug shots were taken and released to the media.

“The following days, their mug shots were splashed all over the front pages of the major newspapers and televised over major networks,” he said.

Enrile was taken to a room at the specialty ward or officers’ room of the PNP General Hospital. â€" Cecille Suerte Felipe

(The Philippine Star) | Updated July 5, 2014 - 12:00am





MANILA, Philippines - Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile yesterday invoked the Constitution to prevent the Philippine National Police (PNP) from releasing his mug shots.

Enrile said the mug shots or photographs of the booking process must be kept confidential.

Perhaps. And perhaps wifey just stood by doggy.

Hmm, affinity suspected...

SuperBalita Davao
Wednesday, July 2, 2014


DAVAO CITY - Patay na nga naabtan sa kapulisan ang usa ka lalaki human nagdunggab sa dughan gumikan giingong gustong makig-sex sa tagbalay nga iyang gisudlan.

Ang insidente nahitabo alas 3:00 sa hapon, Martes, didto sa Purok Salvacion, Barangay Agdao Proper, Agdao District.

Ang lalaki nailhang si Wilfredo Diaz Paghubasan, 51, ulitawo, ug residente sab sa naasoy nga dapit.

Subay sa spot report sa Sta. Ana Police Station, usa ka silingan sa maong lalaki ang mitawag sa kapulisan aron ipahibalo ang panghitabo sud sa panimalay ni Lyn Lyn (bansagon gitago), 29, molupyo sab sa dapit.

Sumala ni Lyn Lyn nga pagsaka niya sa iyang balay sa ikaduhang andana, iyang nakita nga abli og diyutay ang pultahan sa kuwarto.

Dihang iyang giablihan, gilayon siyang gitionan og kutsilyo sa suspek apan nakadagan siya ug daling gikuha ang iyang duha ka tuig nga bata nga anaa sa ubos ug nangayo og panabang sa mga silingan.

Pag-abot sa mga pulis, patay na ang maong lalaki nga dunay samad dinunggaban sa liog ug dughan.

Dugang impormasyon nga nakalap sa Superbalita nasayrang naka-brief na lang ang suspek ug buot untang makig-sex sa biktima gumikan dugay na kining nanguyab apan wa siya gisugot sa babaye.

Duna say reklamo ang mga silingan sa suspek sa mga nanglabay nga bulan sa pagpamaklad niini.

Ang patay'ng lawas sa lalaki anaa na gihaya sa kapilya sa Purok Salvacion sa nasampit nga dapit. (Jeepy P. Compio)

BJMP spokesman Superintendent Carol Borinaga told The STAR the five-story building in Bicutan is almost like a US jail with computerized locks and close circuit television camera for systematic monitoring.

“The construction is now at 25 percent completion,” she said.

“The building for high-risk detainees will have two courtrooms, one administration office and a warden’s office.”

Borinaga said the building will have a total of 88 detention cells and each could accommodate three detainees.

“Each detention cell will have a triple-deck bed, three chairs, a table and three lockers,” she said.

Borinaga said hearings of cases of detainees will be held in courtrooms in the facility to address security concerns and for practical reasons.

Construction of the facility started about a month ago, not necessarily for the three senators and other accused in the pork barrel, she added.

Earlier, Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II said the detention of the three senators in the Custodial Center in Camp Crame will be temporary.

“Respondents in the PDAF scam could be transferred to the facilities being constructed in Bicutan, Taguig,” he said.

Jails in Bicutan presently house the accused in the Maguindanao massacre and Abu Sayyaf commanders and members involved in serial bombings and kidnappings. â€" Michael Punongbayan, Cecille Suerte Felipe

(The Philippine Star) | Updated July 5, 2014 - 12:00am



Photo shows former JPE chief of staff Gigi Reyes arriving at the Sandiganbayan after a warrant for her arrest was issued. BOY SANTOS       
           

MANILA, Philippines - The thought of spending time in a crowded, dirty and poorly ventilated cell may have been too horrifying for Jessica “Gigi” Reyes, who wept unabashedly when told of the prospect of being confined in a Quezon City jail while on trial for plunder.

Reyes, former chief of staff of co-accused Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, need not endure such discomfort â€" at least for now.

The Sandiganbayan has allowed her temporary detention in a newly refurbished cell at the basement of the anti-graft court’s building in Quezon City.

The “gender-sensitive” detention facility will have Reyes as its first occupant. While the facility is not air-conditioned, Reyes’ cell shares a small window with an adjacent air-conditioned office, from where cold air may flow to keep her cool.

Officials said she can stay in her relatively comfortable cell until the court issues a commitment order for her transfer to another jail.

Senators Enrile, Jinggoy Estrada and Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr. may also soon be moved to a state-of-the-art facility of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) in Taguig City.

SuperBalita Davao
Ni Jeepy P. Compio
Friday, July 4, 2014


USA ka lalaki ang gipaslak sa selda sa San Pedro Police Station ning siyudad sa Davao human niya gitaban ang usa ka menor de edad nga dalagita nga giingo’ng iyang gilumay.

Gipriso mao si Junry (bansagon gitago), 25, lumad nga taga Surigao del Sur.

Si Police Officer 3 (PO3) Rechelyn Bahan sa Women and Children's Protection Desk (WCPD) sa presinto dos nagbutyag nga nangayo'g tabang sa kapulisan ang ginikanan ni Ivy (bansagon gitago), 13, taga El Rio Vista, Barangay 19-B Poblacion, siyudad sa Davao, kay gitaban ang iyang anak sa suspek niadtong Hulyo 1, 2014.

Hilabihan ang kaguol sa ginikanan sanglit estudyante ang ilang anak kinsa tulo na ka adlaw nga wa miuli sa ilang balay.

Ang suspek nagbutyag nga upat na ka bulan ang ilang relasyon pinaagi sa text.

Nagkita sila niadtong Hunyo 30, 2014 nga mao ang adlaw nga nagkasabot sila ni Ivy nga moadto sa Surigao.

Giangkon sa suspek nga bisan di siya guwapong tawo, apan dihang nagkita sila sa dalagita, wa na mobuwag kaniya si Ivy.

Gipasiatab niya ang lumay nga iyang gihimo didto sa Surigao del Sur nga ginama sa lima ka dahon sa kamunggay nga giputos sa itom nga panapton.

"Nagkauyab mi sud sa upat ka bulan namo nga panag-text. Mao to nga nagpakita ko niya atong June 30. Miuban siya nako tungod sa power sa akong lumay," sulti ni Junry sa Superbalita kagahapon sud sa selda diin iyang gipakita ang lumay.

Giingon sab sa suspek nga human niya makuha ang pagkababaye sa biktima sud sa tulo ka adlaw didto sa Surigao, iya kining gibalik sa panimalay sa babaye alas 7:25 sa gabii, Huwebes, dala sa pagpamalaye kay buot niya kining minyoan.

"Nakuha gyud nako siya kada gabii, mao tong nadesisyonan namo nga magminyo mi, pero nasuko iyang ginikanan kay pangit daw kaayo ko, tapos bata pa iyang anak," saysay sa suspek.

"Wala gyud diay ayo ang lumay kay dali ra nahupas, kay pag-abot namo sa ilang balay, nilaban naman siya sa iyang papa," dugang sa suspek.

Ang suspek daling gipasakay sa mobile patrol sa presinto dos ug giandam ang kasong paglapas sa Republic Act 8353 kun Anti-Rape Law of 1997 ug Republic Act 7610 kun Child Abuse Law.

Quote from: islander on July 04, 2014, 09:27:35 PM
the view from our window, world cup 2014 time. 



deutschland!  deutschland!  deutschland!

Botoy's (car) window flag...

ANC â€" Thu, Jul 3, 2014


A third year high school student of Rizal High School in Pasig died after she fell down the stairs while posing for a selfie last Monday, June 30.

The 14-year-old girl was said to be near the stairs with a friend and in the middle of taking a selfie when she allegedly fell. It has been said that she had gotten dizzy.

According to the girl’s uncle, Arthuro de Leon, he got a call from the adviser of his niece Monday morning.

"Yung adviser, tumawag. Nahilo daw. Nasa ospital na daw, so medyo kampante pa ako kasi akala ko minor lang, itinawag. Pagdating namin sa ospital, sini-CPR na siya. Yung doctor sabi sa akin, yung bata dinala sa ospital dead on arrival (The adviser called me saying she got dizzy. They said she was already in the hospital so I got complacent because they say it's just minor [injury]. When we got to the hospital, they were already giving her CPR. The doctor told me that when the child was brought to the hospital, she was already dead on arrival)," De Leon said.

Bwahaha!

Quote from: islander on July 03, 2014, 11:03:47 PM
this needs an ear car for a wife.

Here she is...

Relax una kay ugma pa sugod ang quarterfinals...

For the testicularly curious out there: here's a link that is not for the faint-hearted...


http://www.thctalk.com/gallery/data/500/testicles-eleph-rear.gif

"The case is considered solved dahil nahuli na yung gumawa ng krimen, but it is not yet closed dahil ongoing pa ang investigation. The SITG members, particularly the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) 11 are already digging deeper into their investigation," Aquino said.

Aquino said the SITG also tapped the Anti-Cyber Crime operatives to also check the four cellular phones of the victim, and the cellular phones of some persons of interest, "which in due time we will inform you everything after we gathered all the information we needed and arrest the mastermind."

"The three suspects can be called members of the gun for hire dahil pumayag sila sa utos ni Felonia pero hindi masabi if they are experts sa trabaho nila, kasi hindi sila sanay. Napasubo lang daw sila kasi itong si Felonia laging nasa Laud Fire Range, which duon sila nagkakilala," he added.

When asked if Felonia and the other three suspects can be placed under a Witness Protection Program, Aquino said never for the police officer and Labang. He added that the dela Cerna brothers could be, but they still need to think about it.

He added that while the other three suspects are now detained, the task group is still closely monitoring persons of interest, of which two are women, another police officer, and a retired policeman, who might be the real brains in the murder case. “These persons of interest are King’s friends,” Aquino said.

Paul Dave Molina Labang, 24, the triggerman, resident of Daliao Toril, was arrested Sunday at 10:30 p.m. at Laud Firing Range in Maa, Davao City, while the brothers Rommel and Rodel dela Cerna, a self-confessed suspects, surrendered Monday to the authorities.

Aside from monitoring the person of interest, Aquino added that the .45 caliber pistol loaded with 14 live ammunitions will again be subjected to a ballistic test, after the results of the first test showed that the bullet recovered from the scene did not match the bullet fired from the gun. They are also looking for another gun.

Felonia was placed under the restrictive custody last Monday. "We're just now waiting for the release of the order,” he said.

“To make it clear, the lookout bulletin order isn’t an assurance na hindi na makakalabas ng bansa si Colonel Felonia but he is not allowed to go out even from Camp Crame unless the Philippine National Police (PNP) chief director authorized him so," Aquino added.

The purpose of the lookout bulletin order is to monitor an individual and not necessarily restrict him/her from leaving the country, while a hold departure order is needed to prevent an individual from flying out the country, which Aquino said only the court can issue such order.

Aquino said he is also coordinating with the former Davao City Police Office (DCPO) director Senior Superintendent Ronald dela Rosa, who is now the deputy chief for the Operations of the PNP's Intelligence Group, to ensure that Felonia is being watched 24 hours.

‘Lookout’ for Felonia requested
By Ivy C. Tejano
Sun.Star Davao
Thursday, July 3, 2014


THE Police Regional Office (PRO) in Davao Region requested a lookout bulletin order from the Bureau of Immigration Davao against Senior Superintendent Leonardo Felonia, who stands accused in the murder case of the Cebu-based businessman Richard Lim King.

PRO deputy director for Operations Senior Superintendent Aaron Aquino said the Special Investigation Task Group (SITG) filed the request Monday, after they learned that Felonia is planning to travel outside the country.

Aquino added that the lookout order is important for them to closely monitor Felonia, who is now under the restrictive custody of the Regional Intelligence Unit in Camp Crame.

He also said that Felonia, a Regional Intelligence Unit (RIU) director who was relieved after his alleged involvement in King’s murder, will be escorted if he has something very important to attend to outside the unit.

Bwahaha!

"I'm just being truthful," he told the judge. "I'm sorry, I'm not trying to be rude - I just want to be free. I want freedom or death."

On August 4, 2004, four years to the day that the last victims were killed, Justin Helzer was sentenced to death for three of the murders he committed and life in prison for his role in the other two. The jurors cried openly as the court clerk read the sentence and the family members of the victims shouted an emphatic "Yes!" each time the clerk read the death verdict.

On December 15, 2004, another jury handed down five death sentences for Taylor Helzer. He comforted his attorney as the first verdict was read, according to the Chronicle, telling her, "It's okay."

Outside the courtroom, family members of the victims greeted the jurors with long hugs.

"[Taylor Helzer] is the second coming of Manson, not Christ," Olga Land, Villarin's sister, told reporters.

Convicted

On June 16, a jury convicted Justin Helzer of 11 counts, including murder, extortion and kidnapping for his role in the killings. He pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.

His defense lawyer tried to portray him as the mentally ill follower of a domineering old brother, according to the Chronicle. A psychiatrist who interviewed Justin in jail told the court that Justin sincerely believed his brother Taylor was a prophet of God and that Justin "was not able to comprehend that the homicides he committed were morally wrong."

The ploy failed. In July, just before the penalty phase of his case began, Justin had an outburst in the courtroom. "I want this life to be over," he said after jurors had taken their seats. "I want to die."

His mother started weeping loudly and Judge Mary Ann O'Malley tried to talk over the outburst as the jurors were escorted from the room, according to the Contra Costa Times.

She told the court that he told her his plan to "involve some girl, make her feel like he was the love of her life."

A long-time friend of Selina Bishop read aloud from an unfinished letter Bishop was writing her a few days before her death; it was recovered by investigators.

"I have everything I need right here," Bishop wrote. "I don't know when I've ever been happier in my life."

At certain points during the testimony, family members of the murder victims passed tissues down to members of Helzer's family so they could dry their tears. As an emotional recounting of his life played out in the witness stand, Taylor stared stony-faced down at the table he sat at, refusing to make eye contact with anyone.

In March 2004, Taylor Helzer entered a surprise guilty plea, and his attorney relayed Taylor's impromptu confession to a stunned courtroom.

After realizing what horrible deeds the trio had committed, she told police the truth. She gave investigators a safe they'd stored in her apartment containing a 9-mm handgun, as well as drugs and personal property of the Stineman's. She lied out of "loyalty, fear, love, disbelief, denial" she told the court, according to the Contra Costa Times.

Faced with irrefutable evidence, Godman struck a deal with prosecutors. In exchange for pleading guilty to five counts of murder and testifying against the Helzer brothers, she'd avoid the death penalty and get a sentence of 38 years to life in prison.

People who knew them before they became murderers sobbed as they remembered the Helzers as boys. Family members recounted a history of mental illness that plagued the Helzer gene pool. Several cousins and aunts had been interned in psychiatric wards.

A woman whose boyfriend lived with the Helzers in the spring of 2000 said she once found Justin on his hands and knees on the kitchen floor eating from a plate without utensils and grunting, according to the Contra Costa Times.

Taylor's ex-girlfriend Keri Mendoza, whom Taylor had convinced to get the breast implants that eventually landed her a spread in Playboy magazine using the name Kerissa Fare, testified that she drove to Tijuana, Mexico, with Taylor in November 1999, to buy Rohypnol.

Shackles, Ski Masks and a Power Saw

At a two-week preliminary hearing in December 2001 in the Contra Costa County Superior Court, prosecutors carefully laid out their case. The physical evidence included receipts for a hand-held power saw, shackles bought at a sex shop, and ski masks from a sporting goods store, as well as several "plans of action" written by Taylor Helzer that detailed the extortion scheme, according to the Point Reyes Light.

They charged all three roommates with 18 felonies, including murder, extortion, and kidnapping.

A self-described witch and former Mormon, Debra McClanahan, 40, testified that she'd provided an alibi for the trio the night the Stinemans were abducted from their home.

McClanahan had met Godman at a church dance in December 1997 and had taught the younger woman to cast Wiccan spells. On the night of July 30, she bought four tickets to the film X-Men at Taylor's bidding and initially told investigators that the four of them had gone for dinner and a movie.

Later that day, the first two duffel bags - one containing a human head, the other a torso - floated to the surface of the Mokelumne River. After the rest of the bags were recovered, experts at the Contra Costa County Crime Lab used DNA analysis to identify the victims, which confirmed preliminary findings made using dental records.

Sorting through the remains took a high emotional toll on the law enforcement officials in the largely agricultural Sacramento County where such ghastly crimes are extremely rare.

"The remains we have found have been dismembered and commingled in the bags," county coroner Paul Smith told the Chronicle. "It's pretty horrific."

Smith speculated that the remains had been mixed together to make it harder to identify the victims.

A few weeks later as he sat in jail awaiting his court date, Taylor tried to sell the story of his murder spree for $400,000 to several magazines. No one wanted to touch it.

The Raid

Early the next morning, a Monday, sheriffs deputies drove to the house on Saddlewood Court with a search warrant. They wanted to look for the gun that was used to kill Villarin and Gamble. Bishop's co-workers had told them about the mysterious "Jordan" and they wanted to question him.

All the tenants were home when they knocked on the door. When the deputies swept through the house, they found ecstasy, hallucinogenic mushrooms, and drug paraphernalia, but no gun, according to the police report. The cops arrested the trio on drug possession charges.

Taylor bolted when investigators werent looking, escaping from the back of the house and leaping over backyard fences. He forced his way into a neighbor's house. The resident, Mary Mizzocchi, quickly complied when the frantic Taylor demanded a weapon and threatened to kill her if she called the cops.

She gave him a steak knife and a pair of sewing scissors. He cut off his ponytail, changed into her husband's clothes and ran into the backyard, according to the Contra Costa Times. When the deputies caught up with him a few blocks away and forced him into the squad car, he dove through the back window and they had to chase him down again.

Investigators found videotaped newscasts about Bishop's disappearance in the Helzer home, as well as evidence linking the trio to the Stinemans disappearance. They also found handcuffs and leg irons in Justin's pickup.

A surveillance camera filmed a vehicle similar to Justin Helzer's truck crossing a bridge over the San Joaquin River. The truck was towing a trailer with Jet-skis. Prosecutors maintained that the camera caught the brothers on their way to dump the duffel bags in the river.

On Sunday, August 6, the Stinemans' Chevrolet Lumina minivan was found in an industrial neighborhood in Oakland. A chainsaw and a sawhorse were found inside, and police lifted the fingerprints of Justin Helzer and Godman from the vehicle.

Later that day, a professional carpet cleaner was summoned to the Helzer house to clean a stain in the living room, according to court testimony.

As the man labored to get the large red blotch out of the carpet, Justin and Godman sat in the kitchen, calmly eating a snack and watching him work.

"Maybe it's Kool-Aid," Hazem Belal said as he examined the stain, according to the Chronicle.

"Yeah, it's Kool-Aid," Justin replied. "We spilled some drinks."

"It's Kool-aid"

The next day, August 4, the Stinemans' daughter reported her parents missing after her persistent phone calls to their home went unanswered. Neighbors had noticed newspapers piling up on their doorstep.

A few hours later, when Bishop failed to show up for her shift at the Two Bird Cafe, her friends contacted the Marin County Sheriff's Department to issue a missing person's report for her, as well.

That same day, neighbor Kaye Shaman testified in court, she returned home and saw her mysterious neighbors in a truck that was towing a trailer with Jet-skis. There were duffel bags in the truck bed and another on the lap of the man sitting in the passenger seat, she said, as the courtroom gasped.

Shaman avoided looking at the Helzer boys until the prosecutor told her to point at her neighbors if they were in the courtroom. She then glanced in their direction and raised an accusatory finger.

The Mother Who Knew Too Much

Bishop had made the mistake of introducing her boyfriend to her mother, and for that, Jennifer Villarin, 45, would be killed. Taylor was worried that Villarin knew his home address and about the bank accounts Bishop opened for him, and would identify him as Bishop's killer.

He also knew that Bishop had asked Villarin to housesit for her while they were in Yosemite. In the pre-dawn hours of August 4, Taylor drove to Bishop's studio apartment. But Villarin wasn't alone that night. James Gamble, 54, a patron at the Papermill Creek Saloon, where Villarin worked as a bartender, was there with her. He also would end up a wayward victim of Taylor's lunatic rampage.

Taylor let himself into the studio apartment with the key Selina had given him. He crept toward the bed that he'd helped Bishop assemble and where they'd slept together on many occasions.

He stood over Gamble and Villarin - who once remarked that her daughter's boyfriend seemed like a "real nice kid" - raised a Beretta 9-mm and shot them both at point-blank range.

Bishop's upstairs neighbor and landlord, James Soladay, woke to the sound of gunshots. A second later, he heard the footsteps racing outside and the roar of the getaway car. With a pounding heart, he walked downstairs and through the door of Bishop's apartment. Two bloody and unmoving bodies were sprawled over the bed. He placed a panicked 911 call.

"I cannot believe this is happening," he told the operator. "I can't believe this happened in my home."

After Taylor carried Bishop to the same bathroom where the Stinemans were murdered, he noticed she was still alive, Godman testified in court. He pulled her long brown hair back to hold up her head so Godman could see Bishop's face.

"Spirit says you get to know this isn't a dream," Taylor said, before slitting Bishop's throat with a hunting knife.

Godman testified that Taylor had planned to kill Bishop all along, according to the Chronicle. All he wanted from her was a bank account to launder the Stinemans' money.

But the killing spree hadn't ended with Bishop's murder.

A neighbor of the Helzers, Kaye Shaman, testified that the next day, August 3, she saw a 1984 Honda Accord drive up to their house. Taylor and a woman with long brown hair got out and he kissed her lightly on the mouth before leading her inside the home, according to Contra Costa Times.

Godman filled in the blanks as to what happened after the couple entered the house of horrors. Taylor offered to give Bishop a massage, according to court testimony, and the two went into the family room.

As she lay face down on the carpet, contentedly yielding herself to her boyfriend's strong hands as he rubbed her back, Justin Helzer walked into the room with a hammer. Perhaps soft music was playing so she didn't hear him approach. Perhaps Taylor was crooning sweet nothings in her ear. She was young, in love, and about to go on a romantic vacation with her boyfriend. She was happy. She never imagined what Taylor was capable of. Whatever was going on, whatever she was thinking as she laid on that carpet, she didn't know what hit her as Justin slammed the hammer into her head several times, cracking her skull.

As King poured them draught beers - the chocolate stout and red ale the bar is famous for - he contemplated the pair. He thought their meetings were cute, but found Taylor somewhat aloof and distant in comparison to the bubbly Bishop. It seemed obvious that she was far more enamored of him than he of her.

Bishop was in an especially good mood that night. The next day, she and her boyfriend were planning to drive to Yosemite National Park for a camping trip. No doubt she hoped it would be an opportunity for them to get closer and for her boyfriend to finally divulge more information about himself.

After a short while, King saw Bishop take "Jordan's" hand and lead him out of the pub for the last time.

Lethal Date

Selina Bishop had her last date with "Jordan" on August 2, 2000, at a trendy bar in Berkeley that was midway between their homes. A bartender at the Bison Brewing Company said the couple often met there during the hot months, huddled at a table among the regular clientele - locals as well as students from the University of California who'd stayed the summer.

Taylor was late to their rendezvous as usual, and the brunette handed the bartender a dollar and asked for change to make a phone call, according the Contra Costa Times.

"I dont know why I go out with him," Bishop told Matt King, rolling her brown eyes in mock exasperation, before walking across the street to a pay phone.

Taylor arrived soon after and the couple sat near a window and leaned into each other to hear themselves talk over the juke box music.

Afterward, the trio knelt beside the body parts and Taylor thanked the Stinemans for "being willing to sacrifice their lives for a greater cause," Godman said, according to the Chronicle.

They tried to feed the Stinemans' remains to dogs they'd adopted from a pound for that purpose, but the plan didn't work. Instead, they stuffed the body parts into gym bags. They gathered rocks and stepping stones from the outside of the house to weigh down the bags.

The next day, according to the Chronicle, Godman rolled into Walnut Creek in a wheelchair wearing a flamboyant gold cowboy hat. She told the teller she wanted to deposit two checks totaling $100,000 into Bishop's bank account. Bishop was getting open heart surgery, Godman explained, and she needed to deposit the money from Bishop's "grandparents" into the account immediately so she could pay for the operation. She was doing the family a favor by agreeing to deposit the funds, she said.

Authorities said the checks were cashed, but didn't divulge who cashed them or when they did it. Sources close to the case theorized that Bishop cashed the checks for Taylor then got cold feet and threatened to report the scheme to police, prompting the brothers to murder her, as well.

As the victims' relatives gasped and cried, Godman told a court in May 2004 what happened to the Stinemans during their final hours at the Helzer residence.

Taylor thought the retirees would overdose on the Rohypnol and die, but they didn't. They nearly slipped into a coma, but kept breathing. The brothers lead the wobbly couple to the bathroom, where Justin bashed Ivan Stineman's head against the tile floor and Taylor slit Annette's throat with a hunting knife as Godman watched.

"I couldn't really believe that this was really happening," she told the court. "The only thing I could do was pray that [the couple] would die, so it would just be done with."

They next day, they hacked the bodies to pieces with a power saw. Taylor had his little brother do most of the dirty work.

"Taylor said he had more important things to do, like sit and meditate and listen to the spirit," Godman testified.

According to the criminal complaint, the Helzer brothers, wearing suits and carrying briefcases, knocked on the door as Godman waited in a white pickup nearby. They'd purchased shackles at an adult bookstore earlier in the day to immobilize their victims, and brought them back to their rental home.

The jurors heard testimony from a manager of the Concord branch of Morgan Stanley Dean Witter who said he received a phone call from a woman saying she was Annette Stineman who wanted to liquidate her investments.

"She sounded nervous," George Cahoun said. "There was a level of tension there that was obvious."

Although the request was unusual, he honored it. Prosecutors believe the trio then forced the Stinemans to drink Rohypnol, a sedative and known "date rape" drug, and made them write out two checks -- one for $33,000, the other for $67,000 -- to Selina Bishop.

The Stinemans

Annette Stineman, 78, and her husband Ivan, 85, had been married 55 years and were living out their golden years a few miles away from the Concord house rented by the Helzer boys and Dawn Godman that fatal August.

Taylor had been their stock broker at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, and the couple completely trusted the young man. He'd cultivated a friendship with them over the years, dropping in to visit them and even taking them river rafting one summer along with their adult daughter, Nancy Hall.

"I believe they were buddies," Hall testified at the murder trial. "My father didn't have a son, so he liked the idea."

The Stinemans weren't Taylors first choice. He'd written down the names of five former clients, prosecutors told the court, but the first man -- who lived in the nearby town of Walnut Creek -- was not home when the Helzer boys came calling on Sunday, July 30, so they moved on to the No. 2 slot on their list, the Stinemans.

"Well, he's cute," she told an acquaintance afterward. "He seems like a real nice kid."

Bishop told friends that Taylor was about to inherit money from his grandmother and that he needed to hide it from his ex-wife. She agreed to open four bank accounts in her name for him. It was a ruse; under California law, inherited money is not considered community property in a divorce. The real reason Taylor wanted Bishop to open the accounts was far more nefarious. But she trusted "Jordan" so much, that she gave him a key to her apartment as soon as she moved in.

In her final weeks of life, Bishop became more and more frustrated with her boyfriend's secretiveness, according to the Tri-Valley Herald. He'd be warm and affectionate to her one moment, and cold and distant the next. She wanted him to finalize his divorce from his estranged wife so they could move forward.

But Taylor had more pressing issues on his mind. He had no feelings for her. He had money to steal and people to kill. The reciprocating saw he'd use to cut up his girlfriend's body had already been purchased at the local Sears; the duffel bags that would hold her remains, at the local K-mart.

She told her co-workers all about her new boyfriend. She was completely besotted by him. But her friends and family were uneasy about the man of mystery who refused to tell Bishop his last name, home phone number or allow her to take pictures of him.

"He didnt want to meet any of us," Bishop's aunt, Olga Land, told the Contra Costa Times. "From the people I talked to who he met, he gave them the creeps."

But love blinded Bishop, and Taylor played her for a patsy.

In early July, Taylor helped Bishop move out of her mother's house into a studio apartment. Her mother, Jennifer Villarin, 45, had only met Taylor briefly and was very curious about the man her daughter had fallen so hard for -- he seemed to be avoiding meeting her family and friends. Villarin went so far as to drop in for an impromptu visit at Bishop's apartment when she knew Taylor would be there, pretending she needed to borrow a blouse from her daughter just to have the chance to talk to him.

Selina Bishop

A key element was missing from the plan: The trio needed a third person to launder the dirty money. Someone who would open a bank account, deposit and cash the extorted checks for them. Of course, they'd have to kill that person too, after they'd used them to hide the money.

Selina Bishop fit the bill perfectly. The 22-year-old was starry-eyed and looking for romance when she met Taylor Helzer at a rave in the spring of 2000.

Taylor was a clichee - tall, dark, handsome. A towering 6'5, he wore his shoulder-length brown hair pulled into a low pony tail and preferred all-black attire. He had an easy smile, but a secretive demeanor. He lied to Bishop from the moment he met her, beginning with his name. He told her to call him Jordan.

Bishop had spent two years at an art school in Pennsylvania before moving back to the Bay Area, according to the Contra Costa Times. She moved to Woodacre, one of several bucolic Marin County hamlets where there's no home mail delivery and everyone knows everyone else. She got a job waitressing down the road in San Geronimo at the Two Bird Cafe, a local hang-out known for its pan-fried trout and egg breakfast.

Another tawdry scheme called for importing underage girls from Brazil -- where Taylor had been a Mormon missionary -- to seduce married businessmen, whom the trio would later blackmail into giving them money.

Yet another scheme involved adopting Brazilian orphans whom they'd train as assassins to kill the15 leaders of the Mormon Church in Utah. Once the church leadership was dead, Taylor would take over the institution.

"He believed that by doing that, he was fulfilling a prophecy from the Book of Mormon," Godman testified in court.

Finally, they settled on a far more practical plan -- extorting money from one of Taylor's former clients, a wealthy senior citizen who was an easy mark. Someone who knew and trusted Taylor enough to let him into his or her home. Someone weak enough to be easily killed.

As a stock broker, Taylor managed the money of numerous retirees with posh portfolios; he had a long list of victims to choose from. It seemed like such a simple plan.

Revelations from God

At his murder trial, witnesses said Taylor frequently shushed other people so he could hear God speak.

He often began his sentences with "Spirit says," as his listeners leaned forward to catch the supposedly divine message. Once in May 2000, Taylor ran out into the rain and raised his hands skyward to receive a revelation, according to the Contra Costa Times. Afterward, he told his friends, "If people aren't loyal to me, I'm just going to have to kill them."

He scribbled a list of maxims -- 12 Principles of Magic -- on a scrap of paper and made his groupies -- his younger brother and Godman -- memorize them. Among the principles were "I am already perfect and therefore can do nothing wrong," and, "I gain control by losing control." They believed he was a prophet and obeyed his orders.

The self-help group would be called "Impact America" and Taylor came up with several criminal schemes to finance it. One involved setting up a subsidiary called Intimacy which would sell drugs and prostitutes to wealthy businessmen, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. The trio handed out fliers to women at raves -- all-night dance parties -- in an attempt to recruit call girls.

Taylor convinced Godman to sign up for a self-awareness seminar, according to the Chronicle. The group spent four days in a room without windows confronting their inner demons with a tough-talking facilitator whose badgering sometimes made people run sobbing from the room. When Godman had completed two of the three levels of the program, Taylor told her that he would take over her lessons.

He started to offer her spiritual guidance, and eventually convinced her that he was a prophet of God. In January 2000, he drove her to the Mormon temple in Oakland, where he told her his plans to defeat Satan by starting a self-help group. It was his destiny to take over the Mormon Church, he told her, by assassinating the church leaders, if necessary.

"Spirit's telling me it's time you get to know everything," Taylor allegedly told her as they sat in the parking lot, which offers sweeping views of the San Francisco Bay.

He told her his scheme to extort money from and kill an ex-client to obtain seed money for his self-help group. He asked Godman if she'd be willing to kill in God's name, and she told him she'd consider it a blessing, she testified later in court.

"He made you feel like you were the most important person in the world," Godman told jurors, when she testified against the brothers to avoid the death penalty.

Murder Mystery Dinner

Dawn Godman was as much an outcast as either of the Helzers, according to court documents and press accounts.

Raised in the shadow of the Sierra Mountains in the town of Sutter Creek, population 2,300, Godman was a loner in high school. She married at 18, bore a son who died soon after birth, had a second son who lived, and divorced a few years later. Her ex-husband was granted custody of her son when he revealed in court proceedings that she tried to overdose on pills and was living out of a car, according the San Francisco Chronicle.

She moved in with her relative who was living in Martinez and got a job at a grocery store. She started attending services at the Mormon Church, desperate to find direction in her life. Instead, she found Taylor and Justin Helzer.

The trio met at a fitting event, considering the horrific deeds they would commit: a murder mystery dinner held at a Mormon temple on Memorial Day 1999. At such events, the hosts give guests clues to a murder mystery, which they attempt to solve while they eat. The Helzer boys showed up dressed in black and stood out among the suburban, starched shirt and chinos crowd, Godman later recalled.

She started dating Justin Helzer, although press reports say she was fascinated by his charismatic older brother.

Taylor believed that "the majority of society was stuck in this primitive belief system that there's right and wrong, and good and evil," Hoffman testified, according to the Contra Costa Times.

Hoffman had been interned in a mental hospital on several occasions and Taylor wanted to know about his stays, he said.

"There was a few times where [Taylor] would act out really crazy, and then stop and ask, 'Was that how the people in the hospital acted?'" Hoffman testified.

Taylor eventually got a disability leave from his job after he reportedly suffered a nervous breakdown. With time, his belief system became more and more erratic. He believed he was a prophet and could receive messages directly from God.

At about the same time, Taylor started dating the woman who became his wife in 1993. The couple had two daughters, but separated three years later after Taylor decided he was tired of being a good husband and Mormon.

"He wanted to expand his life outside the church," his ex-wife, Ann Helzer, testified at Taylor's murder trial. "He began feeling the confines of his religion and wanted to try the normal life."

The "normal life" meant drinking, smoking and having sex with other women, she said, describing how Taylor started wearing black clothes and showering with less frequency. The church eventually excommunicated him for his profane behavior.

Heather Helzer told the court that her big brother started formulating his own belief system and argued with anyone who disagreed with him, according to the Tri-Valley Herald.

A cousin of the Helzers, Chi Hoffman, 30, told the court Taylor discussed his philosophy that good and evil do not exist when they were both high on drugs.

"Normal" kids

No one who knew the Helzer boys as children suspected they'd grow up to be such callous killers. Raised by devout Mormon parents in Martinez, a cozy town 50 minutes' drive northeast of San Francisco, the Helzers had a relatively normal childhood, according to family, friends and co-workers interviewed by the Contra Costa Times.

Glenn Helzer - who went by his middle name, Taylor - was the charming and gregarious older brother. Justin was more introverted, but he was a member of his high school wrestling team and youth group leader at his church.

Justin looked up to his older brother and actively sought his approval, said those who knew them well. Taylor encouraged these feelings in him, frequently telling him, "I'm No. 1, and you're No. 2."

After graduating high school, the boys fulfilled the Mormon requirement of completing two years in the mission field - Taylor went to Brazil and Justin to Texas. When they returned to California, Justin got work as a cable installer and Taylor as a stockbroker at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter in San Francisco.

Glenn Helzer, 30, his brother Justin, 28, and Justin's girlfriend, Dawn Godman, 26, were arrested the same day the first of the bags were discovered. It would take four more years for juries to sort through the tangled details of the case and sentence the last of the trio for crimes they'd committed.

Their victims were Selina Bishop, 22, the daughter of blues guitarist Elvin Bishop - best known for his 1976 hit "Fooled Around and Fell in Love", Bishop's mother, Jennifer Villarin; her companion James Gamble, and Ivan and Annette Stineman, who'd been married 55 years.

The Stinemans were killed first, after the trio extorted $100,000 from them to fund their self-help group. The other three victims were killed because they knew details of the extortion plan.

The trio called themselves the "Children of Thunder" and they believed their homicidal plan had God's stamp of approval.

Children of Thunder: The Helzer Brothers
By Julia Scheeres - TruTV.com


Bags of Bodies

One by one, the black duffel bags bubbled to the surface of the Mokelumne River in August 2000. The scenic river, winding through deep granite canyons and thick pine forests, is a popular site for Northern Californians seeking relief from the baking summer heat.

A man on a Jet-ski spotted the first bag that washed up on the riverbank. Curious, he rode over, unzipped it, and found a human torso inside. A few hours later, a marina employee found another duffel bag floating under a dock a half mile away. This one contained a head. A marine biologist discovered a third during a survey of an island in the river. Nine bags were eventually recovered, some by dive teams.

They contained the co-mingled body parts of three people - an elderly couple, and an unrelated young woman. It took the Sacramento County coroner more than a week to sort through the parts and piece the victims back together.

The grisly discovery was the culmination of a murderous rampage by a trio of former Mormons who killed five people as part of a twisted scheme to start a group that would spread "joy, peace and love."

from Murderpedia



Glenn Taylor and Justin HELZER





A.K.A.: "The Children of Thunder"

Classification: Spree killers
Characteristics: Extortion plot - Dismemberment
Number of victims: 5
Date of murders: July 30 - August 4, 2000
Date of arrest: August 7, 2000
Date of birth: Glenn Taylor: 1970 / Justin: 1972
Victims profile: Ivan Stineman, 85, and his wife, Annette, 78 / Selina Bishop, 22 / Jennifer Villarin, 45 (Selina Bishop's mother), and her boyfriend James Gamble, 54
Method of murder: Beating - Stabbing - Shooting
Location: Contra Costa County, California, USA
Status: Sentenced to death on March 11, 2005. Justin committed suicide by hanging himself in his cell on April 14, 2013

Archaeologists are possibly the only group that get excited over finding other people’s poo. So Danish archaeologists were ecstatic when they pried open a treasure trove of old wooden barrels found near the city of Odenseâ€"only to find them full of partially fossilized feces. Normally, such barrels were used to transport perishables, but it appears they were later repurposed into cutting-edge medieval latrines.

The unexpected toilets were found in mint condition, allowing for forensic analysis of some really old poo and furthering our understanding of medieval dietary habits (raspberries appear to have been quite popular). Scraps of toilet paper were found as wellâ€"or at least the bits of leather, moss, and other soft materials that were used as toilet paper in those days.

Archaeologists confirmed that, even after all those years, the barrels still stank. -- http://listverse.com/

Quote from: hubag bohol on July 03, 2014, 01:31:32 PM
While the rest of the country wallowed in poverty and thousands of activists were killed or went missing, Imelda Marcos and her children enjoyed a jet-setting lifestyle.

Quote from: hubag bohol on July 03, 2014, 01:31:32 PM
The flamboyant matriarch became the symbol of excess during the brutal 20-year regime of her late husband, who was also accused of looting state coffers and whose martial law rule was marked by human rights abuses.

Looking the big C straight in the eye...

"I said 'Yes I got cancer!' Because now I am entering another dimension of human life," she said.

"I am not afraid of cancer. There is nothing I am afraid of," she also said.

Despite her condition, Santiago was still able to poke fun and take swipe at her political foes.

"I don't know what the reactions of my enemies are. Maybe they’ll be happy because on one hand I might die and then they could get rid of me but on the other hand, I might survive and I will get rid of them," Santiago said.

Santiago said she was also told that she can still perform her duties as a senator.

Last month, Santiago resigned from her post as judge of the International Criminal Court due to her chronic fatigue syndrome.

"For the past two or more years, I have had difficulty. I've always been short of breath particularly when I deliver privilege speeches or even commencement speeches," she said.

Santiago said her cancer is now in stage 4 but it is not spreading.

Like her chronic fatigue syndrome, Santiago said her doctors have no clue on what could have caused her cancer since she does not smoke.

"There's always a chance that I might croak," she said. "Nobody is sure of the results in cancer."

The senator said she is taking tablets that will give the benefits of chemotherapy without the side effects. She hopes to be fully cured of cancer in six weeks.

While it may worry some people, Santiago said she was "very excited" upon learning about her health condition.

By Louis Bacani (philstar.com) | Updated July 2, 2014 - 11:11am
 
     



MANILA, Philippines â€" (UPDATED) Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago announced on Wednesday that she has been diagnosed with lung cancer.

"Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce myself to you as the only senator who has been diagnosed with lung cancer as of last week," Santiago said in a televised press conference.

The 69-year-old senator said she has cancer of the left lung which makes it hard for her to breathe.

Quote from: taga tigbao on July 03, 2014, 06:57:28 AM
Hotdog nga gagmay, luto, ug gatas nga Bearbrand swak.

Payts para sa kakapuy gikan sa trabaho.

Payts jud tuod...





Pwede pud kini ang ipares, Bay Tigs...

Declaring herself the "mother of world peace", Imelda then hit out at plans by the Aquino government to auction off her jewellery collection.

She accused Aquino's mother, the late democracy hero Corazon Aquino who was installed as president after the Marcos family fled, of persecution.

"Her first act was to confiscate and sequester all Marcos wealth even before we were tried, and that was illegal," Marcos said.

She said she would prefer to have the jewels put on public display "because I want the Filipinos to know what is world-class and see that".

Marcos did not discuss her fragile health. She was rushed to hospital last year for extreme fatigue but later recovered.

Imelda Marcos and her three children were subsequently allowed to return home, and have since regained significant political clout in the late dictator's northern home province of Ilocos Norte.

Imelda Marcos won a second term as congresswoman representing Ilocos Norte last year, the same year her son was elected senator. He has hinted at joining the presidential race in 2016.

Her eldest daughter, Imee, is the provincial governor.

On Wednesday a regal but tired-looking Imelda dramatically planted a kiss on her husband's glass coffin as photographers jostled for position.

The dictator's wax-like remains are kept in an airconditioned crypt at the family compound which has become a macabre tourist attraction.

The flamboyant matriarch became the symbol of excess during the brutal 20-year regime of her late husband, who was also accused of looting state coffers and whose martial law rule was marked by human rights abuses.

While the rest of the country wallowed in poverty and thousands of activists were killed or went missing, Imelda Marcos and her children enjoyed a jet-setting lifestyle.

She amassed a jewellery collection valued in the tens of millions of dollars and acquired hundreds of paintings by international masters, including Monets and Picassos.

The government conservatively estimates that Marcos plundered government coffers of about $10 billion.
A military-backed "People Power" revolt in 1986 chased Marcos and his family into exile in Hawaii, where the dictator died three years later.

As the public stormed the abandoned presidential palace, they discovered Imelda's 3,000 pairs of shoes that came to symbolise the extent of her extravagance.

"My only wish is for God to give me a little more strength to prolong my life," Marcos told reporters who asked about her birthday wish.

She said she had seen "the best, best, best and the worst, worst worst" in life, but insisted she has no plans to ride into the sunset just yet.

"I still have a vision and hope to bring more help to the Filipino people," she said in a free-wheeling, often rambling, interview.

She insisted that Ferdinand Marcos Junior, her senator son and namesake of her late husband, was "qualified" to contest the presidency in May 2016 when incumbent Benigno Aquino, son of the Marcoses' top political foes, ends his six-year term.

"(Returning to) Malacanang would be a great help," in implementing her projects, said Marcos, referring to the presidential palace.

By Teodoro Aljibe
9 hours ago



Former Philippine first lady and Congresswoman Imelda Marcos speaks to her supporters after attending a mass during her 85th birthday celebration, in Batac.


Imelda Marcos, the Philippines' most famous political survivor, toasted her 85th birthday Wednesday as the former first lady made plans for a triumphal return to the presidential palace.

Wearing a flowing red gown and diamond rings, the self-declared "poverty-stricken" Marcos was serenaded by throngs of supporters as she emerged from her private chambers in the family mansion in their northern stronghold of Batac.

Ikay tudlo niya sa atong pinulongan, Bay Tigs...

Hi, Bay Tigs! Long time no see but now sinaw. Diin man diay ka mahipadpad nga karon pa man ka mitumaw human sa hataas nga panahon...

Bwahaha!

Gasalig kay way death penalty.

Ni Jojo C. Ugdol/EIM (Banat) | Updated July 2, 2014 - 12:00am


CEBU, Philippines - Gisikop sa kapulisan sa Fuente Police Station ang duha ka manag-agaw nga gitumbok sa usa ka 14-anyos nga batang babaye nga nagbanos-banos paglugos kaniya.

Ang mga dinakpan nga nagtingkagol na karon sa Fuente Police detention cell, giila nga sila si Jose Ike Bacus Amance, alyas “Aki”, 45,  ug Rex Abelgas  Amance, 30, alyas “Mikol”, pulos taga Barangay Sambag 2 ning dakbayan. Sumala pa nga nahitabo ang paglugos sa miaging semana apan niadto lang Sabado kini nahibaw-an sa inahan dihang gitug-anan sa bata sa gibuhat sa mga suspek. Wa hinuon mobutyag ang kapolisan kun asa nahitabo ang paglugos. Tungod niini, gidakop sa kapolisan ang duha.

Matud pa ni Chief Inspector Wildemar Tiu ang hepe sa Police Station 2 ang bata gidala na sa tambalanan alang sa eksaminasyon. Ang duha pasakaan og kasong rape ug child abuse. (BANAT NEWS)

In the wake of Carpio’s exposé on China’s “historical lies,” the latter is now under great pressure to respond to and repudiate the Filipinos’ masterful historical research. And we don’t mean merely issuing more arrogant ex cathedra rejoinders that will insult our intelligence. Silence and indifference will not serve Beijing’s interest. If it takes this path, people will say: Absence of evidence is itself evidence of wrongdoing. A response of benign contempt will thus erode China’s prestige and whatever remains of its moral high ground. It will just be perceived by its small neighbors and the international community as another big bully, unworthy of its rising economic status.

Great power must be tempered with great responsibility. In 1974, at the UN General Assembly in New York, Deng Xiaoping, then China’s paramount leader and widely acknowledged as the architect of his country’s economic renaissance, warned against the poison of imperialism: “If one day China should change her color and turn into a superpower, a tyrant … and everywhere subject others to her bullying, aggression, and exploitation, then the people of the world should identify her as a social imperialist and work together with the Chinese people to overthrow her.” Prophetic words. Deng must be turning in his grave.

Consequently, in nine tiny strokes of a pen, China symbolically gobbled up 80 percent of the Philippines’ EEZ and virtually the entire continental shelf along her western flank.

Prior to Carpio’s scholarly work, no oneâ€"whether historian, sinologist, or punditâ€"could offer convincing evidence to refute China’s so-called historical claims. Sure, the Philippines and its neighbors, like Vietnam, contested China’s intrusions into their territorial waters, but none could show hard, irrefutable evidence that China was lying through its teeth. The gist of our government’s position is that anything within our EEZ is within our sovereign rights under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos), to which China and the Philippines are signatories. Not much more than that. We are not aware of a companion effort by the Department of Foreign Affairs to effectively discredit China’s own historical claims of ownership and sovereignty based on existing Chinese official records and maps. In this context, Carpio’s paper will serve our country well.

Why the big geopolitical scam? First, a short background to Carpio’s thesis: Geologists are certain untold riches in oil, natural gas, and strategic metals lie beneath the contested waters. Whoever controls the vital area also holds sway over one of the most important maritime region on Earth, accounting for almost half of the world’s total trade. Supertankers loaded with commercial goods and Middle East oil must pass through the Straits of Malacca and the seas China claims, on their way to countries like Japan which is heavily dependent on Arab oil. The return trip is just as lucrative, when the vessels carry the export products of the region’s booming economies.

Relying on its rising and dominant economic power that will soon surpass that of the United States, China’s leaders calculated that it was the right time for bullying and outright lies. In the blunt lecturing words of a ranking Chinese official, “We happen to be big while you are small.” Translation: Sorry, but life is unfair because size does matter.

So in 2009, the Chinese arbitrarily drew a crude 9-dash-line perimeter to mark China’s maritime boundary to its south, never mind if the mojones brazenly encroach on the 200-mile EEZ (exclusive economic zone) of countries like the Philippines.

• In contrast, Philippine historical records clearly prove, in maps, international agreements, and official statements, that Scarborough (or Panatag) Shoal, situated 123 miles west of Subic Bay (which is among the islands, reefs, atolls and rocks claimed by China) is an integral part of our territory. China seized the shoal in 2012 and has since prevented Filipino fishermen from operating in the area.

• Most telling of all is the fact that US and Philippine armed forces used Scarborough Shoal for aerial and naval gunnery from 1960 to 1980 without any hint of protest from Beijing. Hardly the behavior expected of a proud nation zealously defending its sovereignty.

http://opinion.inquirer.net/
By Narciso M. Reyes Jr. |1:21 am | Wednesday, July 2nd, 2014


China’s leaders may yet relive Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale about vanity, featuring an unclad emperor who couldn’t see his own nakedness, thanks to Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonio Carpio. In a diligently researched 62-page treatise titled “Historical facts, Historical Lies, and Historical Rights in the West Philippine Sea,” Carpio called China’s claim to the greater part of the South China Sea a “gigantic historical fraud,” with no ground to stand on.

Briefly, Carpio’s impressive research yielded the following historical insights:

• There are no Chinese documents in the form of maps, constitutions, treaties, and official pronouncementsâ€"from ancient times to 1932â€"that claim China’s southern perimeter extends farther than Hainan Island, some 19 miles from the mainland’s Guandong province. The exhaustive research included Chinese and foreign sources, with authoritative documents and 72 cartographic records, including that of the epic voyages of the eunuch admiral Zheng He during the Ming dynasty.

Ni Decemay P. Padilla/EIM (Banat) | Updated July 2, 2014 - 12:00am


CEBU, Philippines - Gipahibawo sa National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) nga nasulbad na nila ang problema sa transmission lines  sa probinsiya sa Bohol human  kini maapektuhi  sa pagtay-og sa 7.2 magnitude nga linog sa miaging tuig.

Gibutyag ni Engr. Abner Bardoquillo sa NGCP wala nay problema sa transmission ug power kay ilaha na kining napangitaan og solusyon,  apan ang pag-distribute niini mao na lang ang problema.

Si Engr. Bardoquillo miingon nga didto sa Bohol ilaha nang na-energized ang linya sa 138 kilovolts gikan sa Ubay paingon sa Corella.

Nasayran nga ang pag-distribute sa kuryente anaa na sa mga kooperatiba ug wala nay labot niini ang NGCP.

Kahinumduman nga sa miaging tuig ang lalawigan sa Bohol nakasinati og power crisis tungod sa mga kalamidad nga ilang nasinati sama sa kusog nga linog ug bagyo. (BANAT NEWS)

Humanly impossible...

By Ryan Chua, ABS-CBN News
Posted at 07/01/2014 10:51 AM | Updated as of 07/01/2014 10:52 AM


LONDON - It may have literally rained on their parade, but London's lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community made sure the gloomy weather won't ruin their day and dampen their spirits.

Some 30,000 people took part in this year's pride march through central London partying on the streets, flaunting either their colorful costumes or just their skin, proclaiming messages of freedom and equality, and showering the cheering crowd with their own rain.

Among them was a group of Filipino LGBTs working and living in Britain, who waved Philippine flags and caught the crowd's attention with their costumes.

"As a gay person dito sa Europe, mas maganda kasi may freedom. Di tulad sa Pilipinas na pag bakla ka nilalait ka. Pag nasa kalye ka sisigawan ka ng bakla, b***t!" said one of the participants.

Britain has policies protecting LGBTs against discrimination, and began same-sex marriages in England and Wales this year, after granting civil partnerships to same-sex couples years earlier.

"Ang message ko to everyone especially to the Filipino people and the Filipino government, that we always make sure that we have rights for everyone. We have to pass a law to look after the gay people, for us to have protections. And most especially, we're pushing to have gay weddings or gay marriages in the Philippines," said Joel Medina, chairman of the Filipino LGBT-UK.

Richard Ocampo from the same group added: "Ito siguro yung way to show to the Philippines na maging tanggap lahat sa lahat-lahat ng kung ano kami."

Same-sex couples and their children were also in the parade, as well as members of the UK's armed forces, firefighters, teachers and other professionals, and employees from some well-known multinational companies.

As in pride marches in previous years, Saturday's parade was a call to uphold LGBT rights all over the world and proof that after decades of repression, Britain's LGBT community is now standing tall and proud.