Toddler Murder: Teenager Charged Over Death

A man will appear in court today charged with the murder of a two-year-old girl.

Dean Harris, 19, of Yaxley in Cambridgeshire, will appear before Peterborough Magistrates' Court.

The toddler, who has been named as Amina Agboola, died on Thursday after being taken to Peterborough City Hospital suffering serious injuries.

A 28-year-old woman, believed to be the girl's mother, was also arrested and has been released on police bail.

Harris is understood to be the mother's partner.

The couple were arrested after taking the girl to hospital themselves.

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Grieve Warns Of 'Ethnic Corruption' In UK

Politicians need to "wake up" to the problem of corruption in ethnic minority communities, the Government's senior law officer has warned.

Attorney General Dominic Grieve said he was referring "mainly to the Pakistani community" in his comments.

In an interview with the Daily Telegraph the Tory MP pointed out that it could also be found in the "white Anglo-Saxon" community but he said it was a growing problem "because we have minority communities in this country which come from backgrounds where corruption is endemic".

"It is something as politicians we have to wake up to," he added

The MP for Beaconsfield said: "I can see many of them have come because of the opportunities that they get. But they also come from societies where they have been brought up to believe you can only get certain things through a favour culture.

"One of the things you have to make absolutely clear is that that is not the case and it's not acceptable."

Baroness Warsi said electoral fraud also affects the Asian community

Asked if he was referring to the Pakistani community in his remarks, Mr Grieve told the newspaper: "Yes, it's mainly the Pakistani community, not the Indian community. I wouldn't draw it down to one. I'd be wary of saying it's just a Pakistani problem."

He added: "I happen to be very optimistic about the future of the UK. We have managed integration of minority communities better than most countries in Europe."

Mr Grieve highlighted electoral fraud as an area of concern, echoing comments made in 2010 by senior Tory Baroness Warsi.

Lady Warsi told the New Statesman magazine there were "at least three seats where we lost, where we didn't gain the seat, based on electoral fraud" and said the problems were "predominantly within the Asian community".

Mr Grieve also said that the UK's infrastructure could be put under strain if significant numbers of Bulgarians and Romanians come to the UK when controls expire in January.

He acknowledged that "the volume of immigrants may pose serious infrastructure issues".

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Debenhams Rape: Jail Term Cut For Sex Attacker

One of two men jailed for a "disturbing and shocking" sex attack on a 14-year-old boy in the toilets of a Debenhams has had his jail term cut.

Alex Wilson-Fletcher, 42, of Manchester, was originally sentenced to 15 years but that has been reduced to 13 by three judges at the Court of Appeal.

"Ringleader" Abdelkader El-Janabi, 55, was also jailed for 15 years in June over the same attack.

The former intelligence officer in Saddam Hussein's Iraqi regime appealed his sentence but the judges rejected the challenge.

The pair were found guilty by a jury at Manchester Crown Court in April of two counts of rape and two counts of sexual assault against the young victim.

El-Janabi physically raped the boy but Wilson-Fletcher was convicted of taking part in the attack.

The teenager was abducted when he went to the toilets in Manchester's Arndale Centre on a Saturday afternoon last summer.

He was then taken to the toilets of a nearby Debenhams where the attack took place.

Abdelkader El-Janabi's challenge to his sentence was rejected

El-Janabi and Wilson-Fletcher were tracked down after images from CCTV were circulated around the UK by police.

When sentencing the pair in June Judge Michael Leeming told Wilson-Fletcher he was "at least a look-out" and encouraged the other defendant.

His sentence was cut by Lord Justice Davis, Mr Justice Nicol and the Recorder of Chester, Judge Elgan Edwards as both men watched the proceedings via video-link from prison.

Giving the decision of the court in Wilson-Fletcher's case, Mr Justice Nicol described what had happened as an "appalling" string of offences, stating that Wilson-Fletcher's role merited a severe sentence.

Describing the roles of each of the men, the judge said El-Janabi was the "ringleader" and it was he who "took the physical part in the counts of rape, not Wilson-Fletcher".

The judge said the court considered that while Wilson-Fletcher deserved a "condign" sentence, "his crimes did not merit one that was as long" as El-Janabi's.

Dismissing the appeal by El-Janabi, Mr Justice Nicol said the court was satisfied that the sentence imposed in his case was "amply justified".

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Teenager Killed Stranger With Single Punch

A teenager who killed a man with a single punch before going to a friend's house to play computer games has been convicted of murder.

Eden Lomax, 17, of Dean, Bolton, punched Simon Mitchell, 43, with such force that a witness described him falling over "like the minute hand moving from 12 o'clock to three o'clock".

He delivered the killer blow at the moment the victim stretched his arm out to shake his hand.

Lomax was found guilty of murder following a trial at Manchester Crown Court. He will be sentenced on December 9 and faces a mandatory life sentence.

The fatal attack came days after Lomax punched two other men unconscious in unprovoked attacks which were caught on CCTV in Bolton, Greater Manchester. He had already pleaded guilty to those assaults.

In the first incident, on the night of Friday, June 7, seven days before Mr Mitchell died, Lomax punched a 31-year-old man with learning difficulties in the face as he stood at a bus stop.

He struck again four days later, this time punching a drunken 41-year-old man without warning after they struck up a conversation.

The victim fell backwards through the open doors of a waiting bus, leaving him dazed and incapacitated on the floor.

Lomax then joked to the bus driver: "I think he wants an Adult Day Saver?" before running off.

Mr Mitchell had recently been made redundant and was given £200 cash by his brother who felt sorry for him and he had gone out to drink in pubs in Bolton town centre on the evening of June 14.

He began talking to the group Lomax was in, opening up about his life and his troubles.

Lomax became aggressive and his friends tried to restrain him but the teenager told the older man he would "bomb him" if he didn't go away.

When Mr Mitchell went to shake the youngster's hand and asked: "What's a bomb?" Lomax punched him in the face with such force that it fractured his jaw. He fell backwards, hitting his head on the pavement.

An ambulance was called and Mr Mitchell was pronounced dead at the scene from head injuries.

Lomax, meanwhile, left for a friend's house to play computer games.

In court he claimed he acted in self defence - but the jury did not believe him.

Detective Chief Inspector Pete Jackson, from Greater Manchester Police, said: "Like all cowards and bullies he (Lomax)  targeted people who he knew could not defend themselves or fight back."

He added: "It is was a tragic way for Simon's evening to end. It has left his father and family devastated. My thoughts are with them and I hope that the justice delivered today will provide some comfort to them."

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Bus Crash Injured Freed By Emergency Crews

Firefighters have released a teenage girl and a bus driver after they were left trapped following a crash involving two buses.

The pair were taken to hospital with "serious injuries", according to Essex Police.

Crews used specialist cutting equipment to release the pair after the collision near Epping.

Around 20 walking wounded were checked over at a nearby hospital, according to Essex Fire and Rescue Service.

Police said they were called to Epping Road at 4.27pm following reports of a crash between a school bus and local bus near the junction with Coopersale Common Road.

The road was closed at The Plain, Epping and at Woodside, and traffic was being diverted through Thornwood.

Police asked witnesses to call the Serious Collision Unit on 101.

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Daniel Radcliffe Warns Social Media Celebrities

By Richard Suchet, Sky Arts and Entertainment Correspondent

Celebrities who tell fans what they are doing "moment to moment" on social media sites cannot expect to have a private life, according to Daniel Radcliffe.

In an exclusive interview with Sky News, the Harry Potter star said he tries to avoid the limelight.

"There's certain things you can do to make it a lot easier on yourself," the 24-year-old said. 

"If you don't, for instance, go to premieres that aren't for a film you're in, or don't just turn up at other events and stuff like that, then that's going to help to not fuel the interest.

"Also, I don't have Twitter and I don't have Facebook and I think that makes things a lot easier because if you go on Twitter and tell everybody what you're doing moment to moment and then claim you want a private life, then no one is going to take that request seriously."

Radcliffe says he has a 'chip on his shoulder'

Speaking ahead of the launch of the second series of A Young Doctor's Notebook on Sky Arts 1 (Thursday, 9pm), he said that when he was younger he resented the attention that his success as a young actor had brought but that he has no regrets.

"When I was 18 or 19 there was definitely a level of frustration around... I did have to think where I went more than a lot of my friends and you do get a little frustrated around that age, but ultimately it's childish, petulant - oh I want that too.

"People always say to me, 'Do you feel like you missed out on a childhood? Do you feel like you had your childhood taken away?' And I'm like: 'No, what a ridiculous, like, kids who are abused have their childhoods taken away from them.'"

However, he admitted he now has a "chip on his shoulder" that people might think he was fortunate to win the Harry Potter role and now feels he needs to prove himself again.

Radcliffe stars with Mad Men actor John Hamm in A Young Doctor's Notebook

"It's as much to myself, as to anyone else. People always say 'oh he's got a chip on his shoulder' like it's a bad thing. I think it's a perfectly good thing if you let it motivate you.

"When you fall into a position when you're 11-years-old, you do tend to think that, you know, everyone, you were lucky to get there. And I was lucky to get there. And I think there's a sense that you just fell into it and that you rode the wave and carried on.

"And that's not what I'm about. I don't know how many people think like that - there may be none, there may be millions but it doesn't matter. It fires you up."

Radcliffe, who stars in the show with Mad Men actor John Hamm, also reveals that despite being worth an estimated £50m, his biggest indulgence is books.

"The only time I will spend a wad of cash in one go - and this is going to sound so nerdy - is in bookshops.  I've gone out of bookshops with a pile of 15 to 20 books before. It's excessive.

"I have this thing in bookshops where if I see this thing that there's a good chance I may never ever see again or sounds interesting then I have to get it.

"So that's a way of bleeding your money. The only slightly lavish thing that I do sometimes is that I might take all my friends out for a night out. And that's, like, once a year. I'm refreshingly boring."

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Supermarket Offers Cited By Consumer Group

By Poppy Trowbridge, Business And Economics Correspondent

Some of Britain's biggest supermarkets have been accused of running so-called special offers that often see customers "paying over the odds".

Consumer group Which? analysed more than 70,000 grocery prices and found examples of what they call misleading multibuys and dodgy discounts.

Richard Lloyd, executive director, told Sky News: "People are at best paying what they would have done, or often we have found paying over the odds, paying extra when they think they are getting a discount. That can't be fair.

"These special offers simply aren't special at all. That is why we need to see the rules change to force the supermarkets to play fair."

Rising food prices are one of the top worries for consumers as inflation has outpaced average wage growth for about five years.

Which? is wants the Government to make the rules for special offers simpler, clearer and stricter.

The consumer group says if these changes are not made swiftly, it will consider using its formal legal powers to ensure the practice is tackled.

In the meantime shoppers should look carefully at the special offers, Richard Lloyd added.

"Make sure that you are not getting misled into buying something that you think is a good deal when that is just not the case."

The British Retail Consortium, which represents the supermarket industry, said in a statement: "Across the tens of thousands of promotions available every day, regrettably, occasional errors do slip through.

"Retailers work very quickly to rectify these mistakes whenever they are found."

Both Asda and Sainsbury also issued statements apologising for what they called pricing errors.

Sainsbury's said: "We are absolutely committed to fair and transparent promotions and carry out regular audits and thorough training on this."

Asda's statement said: "We take pricing seriously, and we've recently employed a new team within the business that looks at all aspects of our pricing process and pricing practices in store and online.

"Sometimes mistakes can happen, but we would never deliberately mislead our customers ... "

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Stafford Inquiry: 'Nurse Count' To Boost Safety

By Thomas Moore, Health & Science Correspondent

Hospitals will have to make public the number of nurses on their wards under a series of measures to improve patient safety.

The Department of Health said the monthly reports will be mandatory from next April.

Hospitals in England will also have to disclose the percentage of shifts that meet safe staffing guidelines independently approved by the health watchdog NICE.

The plans are part of the Government's response to the inquiry into the scandal at Stafford Hospital, in which several hundred patients are thought to have died as a result of poor care.

NHS England will also set up a national patient safety programme to spread best practice and learn from mistakes.

Health minister Norman Lamb said: "We are determined to see the NHS become a world leader in patient safety, with a safety ethos and level of transparency that matches the airline industry.

"We need transparency on staffing levels, backed up by a strong inspection regime to get better, safer care."

Figures from NHS England show that hospitals expect to recruit an extra 3,700 nurses by the end of the financial year.

Frank Robinson's son John died after misdiagnosis at Stafford Hospital

In February the Mid Staffordshire Inquiry by Sir Robert Francis QC made more than 200 recommendations to change the culture in the NHS and put compassion back at the heart of patient care.

The report had recommended that hospitals should have a duty of candour, a legal responsibility to tell patients if something has gone wrong in their care.

But the Department of Health has so far refused to fully introduce the policy.

Peter Walsh, the head of the patient safety campaign group Action Against Medical Accidents, told Sky News: "The current plans are that this is limited to fatal cases and the most severe cases of permanent disability.

"That would be a disaster. In effect, it would legitimise the vast majority of serious harm caused to patients being covered up. That would take us in exactly the opposite direction from the one we need to go in."

Frank Robinson, whose son John died after he was misdiagnosed and sent home from Stafford Hospital, also urged the Government to introduce the duty of candour as soon as possible.

Patient satisfaction at the Princess Alexandra Hospital has soared

He told Sky News: "So many lives have been lost through cover-ups and so many people have suffered. I just don't want that to happen to anyone else and this is a golden opportunity, and if the Government miss this opportunity, that's shameful."

The Mid Staffs Inquiry had strongly criticised managers for chasing government targets, rather than treating patients with compassion.

But there is evidence that the report is beginning to change the culture in the NHS.

The Princess Alexandra Hospital in Harlow, Essex, has increased the amount of consultant time on the unit, and made sure patients have a full assessment by a senior nurse within 15 minutes of arriving.

Patient satisfaction has soared as a result.

Dr Joud Abduljawad, clinical director of urgent care at the hospital said: "Targets are not our primary reason for looking after patients.

"If you give every patient a timely assessment and timely care you will achieve the target as a secondary point.

"It's not the target, it's what is best for the patient that we are focussing on."

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Man Found Dead In Well Had Suffered Injuries

A man whose body was found in a well in the front garden of a house in Surrey had been assaulted, police have said.

An initial post-mortem examination did not prove conclusive in providing a cause of death and further tests will be carried out, Scotland Yard said.

However, the examination did reveal injuries consistent with an assault, a spokesman added.

The body was discovered by two workmen doing clearing work in the garden of the large house in Audley Drive, Warlingham, on Friday.

It was found 7ft below ground in several feet of water and was recovered by specialist police officers.

Seven men aged between 21 and 27 who were arrested on suspicion of murder have been bailed to a date in late December, pending further investigation.

The post mortem, carried out at East Surrey Hospital mortuary, confirmed that the body is male.

Specialist police officers recovered the body

The Yard spokesman said inquiries continue to try to establish the victim's identity.

Detective Chief Inspector Cliff Lyons said: "This is an unusual case and I would appeal for anybody who has concerns about a missing person, or who believes they may know something about this individual or incident, to call my officers.

"The post-mortem examination has revealed this person, who we now know is a white male, suffered injuries before being placed into the well. We are treating the incident as a murder."

Mr Lyons said on Sunday that judging by the size of the body it was likely to be an adult.

He told reporters at the scene: "It's not been there for an extended period of time; it will be a matter of weeks at the most."

He was not prepared to discuss who lived in the house or a suggestion that the body was wrapped in carpet. He could not confirm whether the body was intact.

Asked about claims by local residents that there had been quite a bit of trouble in the past couple of years with the people who lived in the house, and that police had been called many times, he said: "The residents have expressed concern, there is intelligence to support that notion, yes."

Anyone with information is urged to call police on 020 8721 4961 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.

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Google Agrees To Block Child Abuse Images

Google has agreed to introduce measures backed by Prime Minister David Cameron to block child sex abuse content across its search engines.

The groundbreaking move will soon prevent illegal images and videos from appearing in more than 100,000 search terms associated with child sex abuse.

Google says it has also developed technology that will allow illegal videos to be 'tagged' so that all duplicate copies can be removed across the internet.

The changes will apply across the world in more than 150 languages.

Microsoft, which operates search engines Bing and powers Yahoo, will reportedly confirm at a Downing Street summit on online pornography today that it is introducing similar reforms.

Google chairman Eric Schmidt, writing in the Daily Mail ahead of the No 10 talks, says: "We've listened."

He added: "We've fine-tuned Google Search to prevent links to child sexual abuse material from appearing in our results."

Mr Cameron has welcomed the move as "a really significant step forward", but he threatened to bring forward new legislation if search engine companies failed to deliver on their promises.

Mr Cameron told the Daily Mail: "We learnt from cases like the murder of Tia Sharp and April Jones that people will often start accessing extreme material via a simple search in one of the mainstream search engines."

Senior figures from Google, Microsoft and BT were summoned to Parliament for a meeting with Culture Secretary Maria Miller in June where they told they must do more to crackdown on child porn.

The announcement comes Mr Cameron is set to reveal at today's summit that Britain's National Crime Agency is to join America's FBI to tackle online child abuse.

The UK's National Crime Agency is to join forces with America's FBI

The transatlantic taskforce is being established by the US assistant attorney general and the British to target criminals who use the internet to hide from the law, Downing Street says.

It will be specifically tasked with tracking down offenders who use the "dark web" - secret and encrypted networks that are increasingly being exploited by paedophiles and other criminals.

The NCA estimates that the number of UK daily users of secret or encrypted networks will have risen to 20,000 by the end of the year.

While some will be using them for legitimate purposes, UK law enforcement and intelligence agencies believe that paedophiles involved in distributing child abuse material are using them to hide their identities.

At the same time a group of industry experts is being set up to look at new technical solutions for removing child abuse material from the the internet.

Joanna Shields, the chief executive of Tech City UK, said it would be looking to spot the "threats of future" to protect the most vulnerable in society.

"It's vital that governments and industry work together to eradicate child abuse content from the internet, and that we mobilise the best and brightest in the technology industry to come up with innovative solutions to tackling this problem," she said.

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Antibiotics Warning: Resistance 'Growing'

By Enda Brady, Sky News Reporter

The world faces "unimaginable setbacks" unless it tackles the growing threat of resistance to antibiotics, according to an international group of experts.

The latest research by the 26-strong group predicts major problems unless governments work together immediately.

Antibiotic resistance happens when bacteria evolve mechanisms to withstand the drugs which are used to fight infection.

"The causes of antibiotic resistance are complex and include human behaviour at many levels of society," said lead author Professor Otto Cars, of Uppsala University in Sweden.

"The consequences affect everybody in the world. Within just a few years, we might be faced with unimaginable setbacks - medically, socially, and economically - unless real and unprecedented global co-ordinated actions to transform the way antibiotics are regulated and developed are taken immediately."

In September, the UK Government announced plans for a five-year strategy to tackle the problem, setting aside £4.5m.

In the UK, research is focusing on how plant chemicals keep insects at bay

Recent decades have seen vast increases in the use of antibiotics across medicine and agriculture, but the scientists argue that without adequate regulatory controls and better patient awareness, the huge global surge in antibiotic resistance will continue.

They say the problem is compounded by a desperate shortage of new drugs to treat multi-drug resistant bacterial infections.

Prof Cars added: "Antibiotic resistance is a complex ecological problem which doesn't just affect people, but is also intimately connected with agriculture and the environment.

"We need to move on from 'blaming and shaming' among the many stakeholders who have all contributed to the problem, towards concrete political action and commitment to address this threat. Consumers and providers of antibiotics alike need to be empowered to tackle antibiotic resistance, as well as ensuring that those in need benefit from affordable, effective antibiotics."

One of the British scientists who helped compile the report said that alarm bells have been ringing - and ignored - for many years.

Prof Laura Piddick says more funding is needed to develop new treatments

"For a long time there has been a sense of crying wolf over this," said Professor Laura Piddock, from the University of Birmingham.

"Science has been telling us about this problem for years. We need more academic research and funding. New treatments have been hampered by a lack of funding. It has always been viewed that this is something that the pharmaceutical industry should do."

At the John Innes Centre in Norwich scientists are going back to nature for the answers, studying how plants like eucalyptus trees producing chemicals to keep insects at bay.

"Plants have a distinct disadvantage in that they can't move out of the way of predators," Tony Maxwell, the centre's head of biological chemistry, told Sky News.

"And they have no end of predators, large and small animals, insects and bacteria. They have to produce a whole array of chemicals to defend themselves. What we are trying to work out is how we can use those chemicals for our own usage in antibiotics."

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Body Found In Well: Seven Held In Murder Probe

Seven men have been arrested on suspicion of murder after a body was found in a well 7ft below ground in several feet of water.

Police were called to the scene - in the front garden of a large house in Warlingham, Surrey - on Friday afternoon.

The body of the white adult was discovered by two gardeners who were doing clearing work at the property, which is in an acre of grounds in an affluent area.

It has now been removed from the well by specialist officers.

Earlier, detective Chief Inspector Cliff Lyons said: "The body presents a number of logistical challenges.

"The well is 2ft in diameter, it is 7ft deep to the water line, and the water is approximately 4ft deep.

"We need a police marine diving team, with breathing apparatus, and we need to recover the body intact to preserve forensic evidence.

Officers from the Underwater and Confined Space Search Team

DCI Lyons told Sky News: "It is clear to me the body has been placed in the well as opposed to falling in the well and therefore it is a murder investigation."

He added: "It is not possible to ascertain with accuracy the gender of the body but, judging by the size, it is most likely to be an adult, not a child. The person is white.

"It's not been there for an extended period of time, it will be a matter of weeks at the most."

He appealed for anyone who had concerns about a person who has gone missing, especially if they had connections to that area, to come forward.

Anyone with information is urged to call police on 020 8721 4961 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.

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