Four police officers shot dead in home standoff | X8Y054R | 2024-05-01 11:08:01
The four officers killed have been identified as US Marshals Deputy Thomas Weeks Jr, Special Operations and Intelligence Unit Officer Samuel 'Sam' Poloche, Special Operations and Intelligence Unit Officer William 'Alden' Elliott and Charlotte Mecklenburg police Officer Joshua Eyer (left to right) (Pictures: AP/Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department/North Carolina Department of Adult Correction)
Four police officers were killed in a three-hour standoff at a home in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Gunfire erupted as law enforcement officers served an arrest warrant at the barricaded home on the 5000 block of Galway Drive around 1.30pm on Monday, according to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department.
An armed suspect opened fire and shot four cops with the police department, including one who died of the injuries.
Four more officers from the US Marshals Fugitive Task Force were also shot – three of them fatally.
The crime scene at 5525 Galway Dr where law enforcement officers were serving a warrant for possession of a firearm by a felon (Picture: Getty Images)The suspect, Terry Clark Hughes Jr, was shot dead in the front yard of the home (Picture: X/@oeBrunoWSOC9)
It is one of the deadliest attacks on American law enforcement officers in recent years.
'As officers approached, the male subject discharged his firearm striking multiple officers. These officers requested immediate response from other officers,' stated the police department. 'As officers responded, the gunfire continued, striking additional officers.'
The suspect fled the home with a firearm and officers shot him in the front yard, where he was pronounced dead. He has been identified as Terry Clark Hughes Jr, 39, who was wanted for possession of a firearm by a convicted felon as well as two counts of fleeing to elude.
Cops proceeded to start negotiating with two other individuals inside the home and then carried out a siege with armored vehicles. Two women who exited the property were taken in for questioning.
Special Operations and Intelligence Unit Officer William 'Alden' Elliott was married and had one child (Picture: North Carolina Department of Adult Correction)Special Operations and Intelligence Unit Officer Samuel 'Sam' Poloche was a husband and father-of-two (Picture: North Carolina Department of Adult Correction)
The officers were rushed to nearby hospitals.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg police Officer Joshua Eyer, who served the force for six years, died after hours at a hospital. He was a husband and father of a three-year-old son.
Charlotte Mecklenburg police Officer Joshua Eyer was a husband and father of a three-year-old son (Picture: Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department)US Marshals Deputy Thomas Weeks Jr was a husband and father-of-four (Picture: AP)
'I am truly grateful for his bravery, service and ultimate sacrifice. He will never be forgotten, and we are forever indebted.'
Two of the task force members who were pronounced dead at a hospital were Alden Elliott and Sam Poloche, who worked for the state's Department of Adult Correction for 14 years. Poloche was a husband and father-of-two, and Elliot was married and had a child.
'They loved their work and were passionate about their roles in protecting our communities,' stated the US Marshals Service. 'These officers died as heroes and made the ultimate sacrifice in their service to our state.'
Four members of law enforcement, including three US Marshalls, were shot and killed and four others were wounded (Picture: Getty Images)Flowers in memory of fallen law enforcement officers accumulate at the base of a flag pole outside the Federal Courthouse in Charlotte, North Carolina (Picture: Getty Images)
US Marshals Deputy Thomas Weeks Jr, 48, of Mooresville, who was killed in the shooting, had served for 13 years and was a husband and father-of-four.
President Joe Biden said the officers were 'heroes who made the ultimate sacrifice, rushing into harm's way to protect us'.
'We mourn for them and their loved ones,' stated Biden. 'And we pray for the recoveries of the courageous officers who were wounded.'
Girl said she heard 'monsters' in her bedroom wall – it turned out to be something much worse | X8Y054R | 2024-05-01 11:08:01
The discovery was truly shocking (Picture: TikTok/@classashley)
A little girl made a horrifying discovery in her bedroom wall which is truly the stuff of nightmares.
Mum Ashley Class had been trying to help her daughter sleep, as the little girl kept complaining of hearing 'monsters' moving around in her walls.
But as the noise persisted, she investigated with a thermal imaging camera which revealed a huge swarm of bees living in her walls.
Swarms of bees spilled out as a hole was cut into the wall, revealing a massive bee colony thought to be made up of about 50,000 of the insects, as well as huge swathes of honeycomb.
Sharing the journey of discovering and removing the bee colony on TikTok, Ashley described the find as 'what nightmares are made of'.
Describing the first day of removal, she said: 'Day 1: Beekeeper removed 20,000 bees and 45kg of honeycomb from the wall.
'He found the queen and is able to safely take the hive to a new home.'
Usually, when a queen is found and taken from a hive, the rest of the bees follow in order to protect her, meaning this is the key part of removing bees from somewhere they don't belong.
Another 20,000 bees were removed from the walls on the second day, and explaining why she and her family didn't notice the bees before, she explained: 'It only takes a couple of bees and a swarm that you might not be able to see to become a colony of 50,000 bees.
'The beekeeper didn't know how many bees were inside the wall when he decided to open it up, even when the thermal imaging showed there was a lot of activity.
'He had greatly underestimated, but it's not his fault as it's not usual that bees bury downwards.
'They had got into a dime sized hole in our chimney, and there's an old clay pipe where it used to heat all the different rooms 100 years ago, and they got into it and buried down next to my daughter's room.'
In total the beekeeper has removed more than 45kg of honeycomb from the walls – and it had to be 'triple bagged' in order to remove it due to the sheer weight of the wax and honey.
But the family's insect woes didn't end there, as they later found a second colony with even more bees hidden inside the walls.
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A murder suspect remains in hospital after a 14-year-old boy was fatally stabbed and four others injured in a sword attack in London.
Footage shows the moment before chaos in Hainault, northeast London, when a man went on a sword rampage on a residential road.
A 36-year-old man was tasered and arrested on Tuesday morning and taken to hospital after sustaining injuries when his van crashed into a house.
The suspect remains in hospital and officers have not been able to interview him because of his injuries, the Metropolitan Police said.
Four others, including two police officers, were injured and taken to hospital where they remain.
Moments before a van struck a man in HainaultThe van after it crashed (Picture: Leon McGowran/TikTok)Doorbell footage shows the suspect being tasered (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)An officer approached the man in the garden of a house in Hainault (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)The suspect turned to the officer brandishing a large knife (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)The suspect was pinned to the ground (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)
Two officers suffered wounds that required surgery but are not life-threatening. The injuries of the two people are not thought to be life-threatening.
A 14-year-old boy tragically died from his injuries.
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Chief Superintendent Stuart Bell said: 'He was taken to hospital after being stabbed and sadly died a short while after. The child's family are being supported firstly by my local officers and now with some specialist officers.'
The attack is not believed to be targeted or terror-related, the police said.
The Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley spoke to LBC's Nick Ferrari today, saying one of the officers injured in the attack suffered 'really horrifically serious injuries' to her arm.
He said officers arrived at the scene in 12 minutes.
Witnesses have described the terrifying moment they spotted a man armed with a huge sword walking from house to house after crashing his van into a building.
Footage shows police approaching him as he brandishes his weapon.
Mr Bell said the suspect was tasered at the scene and arrested 22 minutes after the first call to the police was made shortly before 7am.
Footage shows how officers shout at the suspect after he was cornered and tasered, saying "don't move, don't f****** move" after he is lying on the ground following three taser discharges.
Manpreet Sing, manager of Redbridge Radio Cars, told Metro.co.uk what he saw outside the taxi firm's office at Hainault Tube station: 'I saw about six or seven people going in and out of Franklyn Gardens and people coming up to the train station saying there was a guy with a machete.'
'It looked like there was one man who had stabbed someone and the other people in the street were bystanders on their way to work who had tried to fight him off.
'A guy walked up the road who had been stabbed in his neck. He was saying "I've been stabbed, I've been stabbed" and walking towards the police.'
He said it looked like 'they tried to intervene but not been able to fight him off' because of the 'size of the weapon.'
Police tape around a van on Laing Close in Hainault, London (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)Forensic investigators on Laing Close in Hainault, London (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)(Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)Police cordon in Hainault after the fatal incident (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)
He continued: 'When we came out the police cars were there and the guy came running from Franklyn Gardens towards Thurlow Gardens. He tried to get into a house but there was a dog there.
'He tried to get into another house but the police got him under control by tasering him.'
James Fernando, 39, claimed the suspect had asked one of his neighbours to "take the telephone from him to tell whoever was on the phone his location."'
He told PA how the suspect pulled a samurai sword from the back of his trousers.
He said: 'Within two seconds after that she's realised something isn't right, started running and he's pulled a samurai sword from the back of his trouser.
'She's shouted to the other neighbour – a Nigerian boy who was on his way to school.'
Where the Hainault attack happened (Credit: Metro graphics)
The suspect was still 'running around' with a sword in his hand even after the police came, he claimed.
Footage shows a man dressed in a yellow hooded jumper carrying a large knife.
Other footage shows the suspect being chased by police as an officer is heard shouting "lock your doors" as the man entered residential gardens, the news agency reports.
Officers are heard shouting "come here", "come this way" and "drop the sword" at the suspect who climbed on top of an outbuilding and dropped into a garden.
Amir, 36, said the commotion outside his bedroom window woke him up.
He told Metro: 'I saw several police cars going up and down the road, taped off the road and blocked people from going to the station.
'I saw it from my bedroom window, several ambulances and police cars go by every couple of minutes as fast as they could.
'I ended up going out of the building and saw that it was mayhem, really. Police cars everywhere, commuters not knowing what to do, how to get to work, not knowing where this guy had been.'
Forensic investigators at the scene of the attack in Hainault (Picture: Adrian Dennis/AFP)Investigation continues after the fatal stabbing (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)The van on Laing Close, Hainault, after it crashed (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)
Another witness said he heard shrieking at about 7am before witnessing a man dressed in yellow climbing over fences.
He told Metro.co.uk: 'I heard shouting, I heard shrieking – I thought "who would be shrieking at this time in the morning?"
'I looked out the back window because the noise was coming from back there, I saw a bloke dressed in yellow jumping over some fences…then he went down an alley like he was going back onto the street again.'
A witness, who asked not to be named, said: 'He disappeared down an alley and then he was out of sight.
'The police went into the alley and there seemed to be some sort of a stand-off there where I heard this huge commotion, then I heard a scream.
'From that commotion, at least one person was knifed – I think it might have been a woman because I heard a woman scream and then some sort of sobbing sounds.
The suspect was arrested and taken to hospital (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)The incident led to a major emergency response (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)Chief Superintendent Stuart Bell reads a statement to the media near the scene in Hainault (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)
'I then heard a voice say something like "she's been stabbed in the face" or "we need assistance" – you know, calling for medical back-up.'
The Metropolitan Police said yesterday: 'Police and other emergency services are in Hainault, east London, at a serious incident in which a man with a sword has been arrested.
'We were called shortly before 7am to reports of a vehicle being driven into a house in the Thurlow Gardens area. There were reports people have been stabbed.
'At this time we understand the suspect went on to attack other members of the public and two police officers.'
Footage seen by PA shows a man in a yellow jumper chasing after an ambulance while holding a sword as a body lies motionless on the ground.
The home security video shows an ambulance parked next to the body lying on the road in Laing Close before the ambulance quickly drives away from the scene and the man runs after it, shouting.
In another video clip, sent by an anonymous resident, a police car arrives before the man verbally confronts the police and shouts "Is there anybody here who believes in God?" while standing next to the motionless body.
A voice is heard shouting "Drop the sword" before a police officer approaches the man and sprays a substance in his direction before he retreats.
A Buckingham Palace spokesperson said King Charles's 'thoughts and prayers are with all those affected' by the 'horrific' stabbings.
He added: 'In particular, the family of the young victim who has lost his life.'
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said on X (formerly Twitter): 'This is a shocking incident. My thoughts are with those affected and their families.
'I'd like to thank the emergency services for their ongoing response, and pay tribute to the extraordinary bravery shown by police on the scene. Such violence has no place on our streets.'
Lab mice are getting their own back by deliberately messing up experiments | X8Y054R | 2024-05-01 11:08:01
Who is experimenting on whom? (Picture: Getty)
Laboratory mice are deliberately making mistakes during experiments and annoying the scientists watching them.
The humble lab mouse has been used in tests for hundreds of years, but it seems like the small rodents have been carrying out their own experiments, as they do not always perform as expected.
Now it seems this isn't just scientific anomaly, but a concerted effort by the mice to mess things up.
Dr Kishore Kuchibhotla, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University told the Times: 'It can be quite frustrating. You'll be doing an experiment and the [mice] just don't seem to be getting it. You've done everything correctly but they still seem to be making lots of errors.'
The researchers thought the mice were either becoming stressed, or they were deliberately trying to understand their environment and were testing their own knowledge.
Dr Kuchibhotla and his colleague Ziyi Zhu, a graduate neuroscience student, decided to test this theory.
They created an experiment where thirsty mice could hear one of two sounds. When one sound was played, they were supposed to turn a wheel to the left using their front legs, and for the other sound, they had to turn the wheel to the right.
How the task worked (Picture: Kuchibhotla/Zhu/John Hopkins University)
When the mice did this correctly, they were rewarded with a drink of water, and when they spun the wheel the wrong way, they were given nothing at all.
The researchers tracked mouse choice, response speed and accuracy, and noticed that over time the mice got better at the task, but at points, the mice would stop following the rules, and do things like spin the wheel in one direction, no matter what sound they heard.
The researchers then stopped rewarding the mice for their correct answers, and soon the rodents began responding to the sounds more accurately.
The researchers believed the mice knew what they were doing the whole time, and were purposefully giving up the reward to explore their environment by doing experiments of their own.
Mice have been used for experiments for hundreds of years (Picture: Getty/iStockphoto)
'Mice are more strategic than some might believe,' said Dr Kuchibhotla, speaking to the Times. 'It may look like the animal is making a ton of errors, but during those errors it's actually getting smarter.'
During the experiments, Dr Kuchibhotla said he became 'a little bit of a mouse psychologist' to interpret their behavior. Like working with a nonverbal infant, he and Mr Zhu had to guess the underlying mental processes from the behaviour alone.
'That's what was really fun in this project, trying to figure out what the mouse is thinking,' he said.
'You have to think about it from the perspective of the animal.'
Map shows parts of the UK set for a wet and windy bank holiday | X8Y054R | 2024-05-01 11:08:01
At least some parts of the country can expect a rainy weekend (Picture: North News & Pictures/WX Weather)
It's not long until the May Day bank holiday, traditionally the start of summer in the UK.
But is it actually going to be summery, or a washout?
With a few days still to go, models have been somewhat contradictory on exactly how the weather will look, but so far the indications aren't great.
At least some parts of the country can expect a rainy weekend, despite some warmer days this week.
The Met Office forecast for Friday to Sunday predicts weather will 'remain changeable with further spells of rain or showers, particularly in the south. In any drier and brighter interludes it will feel warm away from the east coast.'
There will be an 'uncertain period through the bank holiday weekend with the most likely result a warm but cloudy day Sunday with a few light showers, then increasingly cloudy with rain spreading from the west, though weakening as it does so'.
Morris dancer on the top of Eccles Pike in Derbyshire this morning (Picture: Getty)Torrential downpours on Westminster Bridge on April 19 (Picture Rex)A weather warning for thunderstorms in place todayTeeming rain in Sunderland on Sunday (Picture: North News)The village of Chalfont St Giles in Buckinghamshire flooded on April 28 (Picture: Shutterstock)How Monday might shape up, with all areas risking rain (Picture: WX Weather)How the Met Office predicted Sunday afternoon could look (Picture: Met Office)
'Into the new week all areas are likely to see a mixture of showery periods or spells of rain.'
At the moment, there is still some uncertainty about how the weather will pan out.
The gloomier latest forecasts come days after senior meteorologist at the Met Office Amy Bokota said: 'Temperatures have been below average for the last couple of weeks, so certainly by the time we get to Wednesday, and probably into next weekend, temperatures will be warmer.
'It might not be the sort of glorious sort of heatwave that we're hoping for … but there probably will be some more pleasant and warmer weather for some people as we head towards the end of the week.'
So it's possible people might get some use out of their barbecues and garden furniture… but more likely they'll need an umbrella.
