Tag Archives: Death

Aurora, Colorado marks five-year anniversary of theater massacre

Lt. Jad Lanigan of the Aurora police department looks over crosses for those killed in the Aurora theater shooting, at a vigil on the 5-year anniversary of the tragedy in Aurora, Colorado July 20, 2017. REUTERS/Rick Wilking

By Keith Coffman

AURORA, Col. (Reuters) – A somber crowd marked the fifth anniversary early on Thursday of a shooting rampage at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado that left 12 people dead and 70 injured.

About 100 family and community members and friends gathered outside Aurora’s city hall to remember the victims and first responders with a solemn candlelight vigil and procession. Many wept softly as they released white balloons into the night sky or wrote tributes on small wooden crosses.

“The thing I see after five years is the resilience of this community,” said Aurora Police Department’s Jad Lanigan, who was the incident commander at the scene of the July 20, 2012 shooting. “In Colorado we’ve had our fair share of tragedies but we always bounce back.”

Some 400 exuberant moviegoers had packed into the Century 16 movie theater in the Denver suburb for a midnight screening of Batman film “The Dark Knight Rises” that quickly turned to horror when a gunman opened fire on the crowd.

Twelve moviegoers were killed and 70 others either wounded by gunfire or injured fleeing the theater.

The 7/20 Memorial Foundation, a group of survivors, victims and their families, sponsored Thursday’s event. The organization is raising funds to build a permanent memorial to the tragedy.

“We are part of a family, we never have to say anything about it. It’s just there,” said Jansen Young, whose boyfriend Jonathan Bunk was killed protecting her during the shooting.

A moment of silence was observed at 12:38 a.m., the time at which James Holmes sprayed the crowded theater with bullets. He later surrendered to police in the theater parking lot.

The then-24-year-old California native pleaded not guilty of murder charges by reason of insanity in April 2015. A jury convicted him on all counts and he is currently serving his multiple life sentences at an undisclosed prison.

George Brauchler, the district attorney who prosecuted Holmes, said in an interview before the event that his thoughts are often with the victims and their families.

Brauchler also said the police officers who responded to the theater saved many lives when they grabbed mortally wounded victims and turned their patrol cars into makeshift ambulances.

“I still see those guys and they are changed forever — much like Aurora itself,” he said.

(Reporting by Keith Coffman, additional reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Editing by Catherine Evans)

Search for Arizona man after flash flood kills 9 of his family

By David Schwartz

PHOENIX (Reuters) – Authorities searched on Monday for a missing man after a flash flood crashed down an Arizona canyon, law enforcement officials said, reportedly killing his wife and eight other family members at a popular swimming spot north of Phoenix.

Searchers scoured an area of the Tonto National Forest for an unidentified 27-year-old man who officials said was among 14 members of an extended family hit by a wall of flood water on Saturday afternoon.

Nine of the family, ranging in age from 2 to 57, died in the floodwaters on Saturday afternoon, according to a statement on Monday from the Gila County Sheriff’s Department.Four others from the Phoenix family, aged between 1 and 29, were rescued and survived the incident.

The Arizona Republic newspaper identified the missing man as Hector Miguel Garnica and said that the dead included Garnica’s wife, Maria Raya, 25, and her three children, Emily, 3, Mia, 5, and Hector Daniel, 7. Also killed was Selia Garcia, who authorities said was 57 and whom the Republic identified as Raya’s mother.

The group of 14 was swept down the creek after a thunderstorm hit about eight miles away in an area that had been burned by a nearly 7,200-acre wildfire last month, according to authorities.

Officials with the National Weather Service said one to 1.5 inches fell in 20 to 30 minutes in the area near Payson, about 90 miles (145 km) northeast of Phoenix.

A video posted on social media showed a muddy, debris-filled torrent that hit Ellison Creek, rushing down a narrow canyon where the swimmers were taking in the cool waters at the popular spot.

Three bodies were recovered on Saturday, with the other six recovered on Sunday, officials said.

Forecasters said they were concerned about additional possible flash flooding projected for central and southern Arizona.

The National Weather Service in Phoenix said that most of Arizona was under flash flood watch until Monday evening, warning that the monsoon air mass over the region was very wet and conducive to heavy thunderstorm rain that could lead to flood or flash flooding.

(Reporting by David Schwartz, additional reporting by Taylor Harris; Editing by Andrew Hay and Patrick Enright)

Flood-hit Indian state puts rescuers on “war footing”; toll to 83

floods in India; flood-hit; 83 people dead

By Zarir Hussain

GUWAHATI, India (Reuters) – Floods in India’s northeast have killed at least 83 people and led to the death of three rare one-horned rhinoceros at a national park that has the world’s largest concentration of the species.

The floods caused by torrential rains across the hilly states of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Manipur over the past two weeks, have also triggered landslides. In all more than 2 million people have been displaced, authorities say.

“Assam is the worst hit with 53 lives lost so far in floods and landslides with some 2 million people displaced,” Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal told Reuters.

“Relief and rescue operations are going on a war footing.”

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has sent a team of federal government officials, led by junior home minister Kiren Rijiju, to assess the damage.

The overflowing Brahmaputra River has also completely marooned the Kaziranga wildlife sanctuary in Assam, forcing animals to flee to safer areas.

A one-horned rhinoceros drowned on Friday, taking the toll of the endangered animals in the flooding to three, Assam’s forest minister, Pramila Rani Brahma, told Reuters.

The Kaziranga National Park, a UNESCO world heritage site, is home to an estimated 2,500 rhinos out of a world population of some 3,000.

Nearly 60 other animals, mostly deer and wild boars, have been killed in the floods, she said.

(Writing by Rupam Jain; Editing by Robert Birsel)

A dozen killed, over 40 wounded in Cameroon suicide bomb attack

DOUALA (Reuters) – Two suicide bombers killed at least 12 people and wounded over 40 others in a small town in northern Cameroon near the Nigerian border late on Wednesday, a senior army source and a local official told Reuters.

“There were 14 deaths, including the two suicide bombers, and 42 wounded,” said an army colonel responsible for evacuating the wounded who asked to remain anonymous. “The attack was perpetrated by one suicide bomber, and the other was shot dead.”

The attack was carried out by two women who walked into a busy area in the center of Waza, five miles (8 km) from the Nigerian border, said Midjiyawa Bakari, the governor for the Far North region where the attack took place. He said that 13 had been killed and 43 wounded. A baby was among the dead, he said.

Many were seriously wounded and were flown to nearby hospitals, he said.

No group claimed responsibility for the attack, but the region has been a frequent target of Boko Haram militants in their eight-year bid to carve out an Islamic caliphate beyond Nigeria.

Last month, nine were killed in the town of Kolofata when two children carrying explosives blew themselves up near a camp housing people displaced by Boko Haram violence.

In eight years, Boko Haram attacks have killed more than 20,000 people in the Lake Chad region, including Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger and, according to the latest U.N. refugee agency figures, displaced 2.7 million.

(Reporting By Josiane Kouagheu, writing by Edward McAllister; Editing by Toby Chopra)

Two Israeli policemen shot dead near Jerusalem holy site, gunmen killed: police

Israeli border policemen secure the area near the scene of the shooting attack, in Jerusalem's Old City July 14, 2017. REUTERS/Ammar Awad

By Maayan Lubell

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Three Arab-Israeli gunmen opened fire at police near Jerusalem’s holiest site on Friday, killing two Israeli policemen, before security forces killed the attackers, police said.

Israeli authorities shut the area after the attacks – the most serious incident in years close to the highly sensitive compound, which is holy to both Muslims and Jews.

The closure stopped Muslims gathering there for Friday prayers, drawing a call for resistance from Palestinian leaders.

The gunmen arrived at the sacred site, known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as Temple Mount, and walked towards one of the Old City gates nearby, police spokeswoman Luba Simri said.

“When they saw policemen they shot towards them and then escaped towards one of the mosques in the Temple Mount compound,” Simri said. “A chase ensued and the three terrorists were killed by police.”

She said three firearms were found on their bodies. The Shin Bet Israeli internal security service said the three gunmen were Arab citizens of Israel.

There was no immediate comment from the Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank. No group claimed responsibility, though the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, praised the attack.

“Hamas lauds the heroic operation in Jerusalem,” Hamas spokesman Abdel-Latif al-Qanoua said in a statement.

Mobile phone video footage aired by Israeli media showed several policemen chasing a man and shooting him down at the site, which is a popular place for foreign tourists to visit. Israeli authorities are still working to identify the attackers, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

The Israeli ambulance service Magen David Adom said a third policeman was lightly wounded in the incident.

Tensions are often high around the marble-and-stone compound that houses the Aqsa Mosque and the golden Dome of the Rock. It is managed by Jordanian religious authorities and is adjacent to the Western Wall, the holiest site where Jews are permitted to pray.

PRAYERS CANCELED

Police said Friday prayers for Muslims would not be held at the site following the attack for security reasons, while forces scanned the area for weapons and investigated the incident.

Authorities have often restricted access to the Aqsa mosque when concerned about possible violence there, but a total shutdown is rare.

The Palestinian Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Mohammad Hussein, called on Palestinians to defy the shutdown.

“We completely reject the ban by Israeli authorities,” Hussein told Reuters by telephone. “We have urged our Palestinian people to rush to al Aqsa today and every day to hold their prayers.”

His call was later echoed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement.

In an apparent effort to ease tensions, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement there would be no change to the agreement on shared use.

The compound is a tinder-box for the Israeli Palestinian conflict. Under a delicate agreement, Jews are allowed into the compound but are not permitted to pray.

A wave of Palestinian street attacks that began in 2015 has slowed but not stopped. At least 257 Palestinians and one Jordanian citizen have been killed since the violence began. A few of the attacks were carried out by Arab Israeli citizens.

Israel says at least 176 of those killed were carrying out attacks while others died in clashes and protests. Forty Israelis, two U.S. tourists and a British student have been killed in stabbings, shootings and car-rammings.

Israel annexed East Jerusalem, where the Old City and the holy compound are located, after the 1967 Middle East war and regards all of Jerusalem as its capital, a move that is not recognized internationally.

Palestinians want East Jerusalem as the capital of the state they want to establish in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Israel blames the wave of violence on incitement by the Palestinian leadership. The Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank, says desperation over the occupation is the main driver.

(Writing by Maayan Lubell; Editing by Luke Baker and Andrew Heavens)

Gunmen kill four police in Pakistani city of Quetta

Relatives react outside the hospital after policemen were shot dead in Quetta, Pakistan July 13, 2017. REUTERS/Naseer Ahmed

By Gul Yousafzai

QUETTA, Pakistan (Reuters) – Islamist gunmen on Thursday killed a senior police official and three other policemen guarding him in the Pakistani city of Quetta, police said, in an attack claimed by both the Pakistani Taliban and Islamic State.

Superintendent of Police Mubarak Shah, 56, was killed en route to his office when four gunmen riding on motorcycles attacked his vehicle, said city police officer Muhammad Sultan.

“The head and upper parts of all the four victims were targeted,” said Sultan, adding that one policeman was critically wounded.

A faction of the Pakistani Taliban, known as Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, carried out the attack, according to the faction’s spokesman, Asad Mansur.

Islamic State (IS) also claimed the attack on it Amaq News Agency website. Jamaat ur Ahrar and IS have in the past jointly claimed responsibility for attacks in Pakistan.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the attack, his office said.

It was second such attack in a week targeting senior police officers in the volatile Baluchistan province, which borders Afghanistan and Iran. Quetta is the provincial capital.

A suicide bomber on Monday killed a district police chief and his guard in the town of Chaman on the Afghan border. The Pakistani Taliban claimed that bombing in text messages and emails to media.

Violence in Baluchistan has raised concern about security for projects in the $57-billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor, a planned transport and energy link from western China to Pakistan’s southern deep-water port of Gwadar.

Resource-rich Baluchistan has long been plagued by insurgencies by separatists. Islamist groups such as the Taliban and Islamic State also carry out attacks in the region.

Islamist militants have killed thousands of people in Pakistan over the last decade or more, in their bid to impose hardline rule.

(Writing by Asif Shahzad; Editing by Drazen Jorgic, Robert Birsel)

Floods in India’s northeast kill 40; endanger rare one-horned rhinos

Villagers use a boat to cross a flooded road at Asigarh village in Morigaon district in Assam, India, July 4, 2017. REUTERS/Anuwar Hazarika

By Zarir Hussain

GUWAHATI, India (Reuters) – Floods in northeast India that have killed at least 40 people and displaced nearly 1.5 million have also inundated a national park that is home to the world’s largest concentration of one-horned rhinoceros.

The Brahmaputra river, which flows from China down to India and then through Bangladesh, has burst its banks after torrential monsoon rains, swamping more than 2,500 villages in India’s Assam state over the past two weeks.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has expressed his anguish over the human suffering, with thousands of people seeking shelter in more than 300 relief camps. Authorities have declared a “maximum health alert” to stop the spread of disease.

Efforts are also underway to help the rhinos and other wildlife put in danger when flood waters swamped the Kaziranga National Park, a UNESCO world heritage site.

“More than 90 percent of the Kaziranga National Park is under water,” Assam Forest Minister Pramila Rani Brahma told Reuters.

The 430 sq km park is home to the world’s largest number of the one-horned rhinoceros, with an estimated 2,500 out of a total population of some 3,000.

“Two rhino calves have drowned and up to 15 deer perished in the high floods,” Brahma said.

Animals are seeking refuge on high ground, including hills outside the park, she said.

But when the animals move to smaller areas of higher ground to escape the floods they become more vulnerable to poachers. They also face increasing danger of being hit by vehicles if they take refuge on roads that often run along embankments.

“Special barricades have been put along the highway and forest guards are asking drivers to drive under 40 km an hour,” a park warden said, adding that a few deer had been hit by speeding trucks.

The water level in the Brahmaputra is expected to keep rising until the end of this week and should then stabilize, provided there is no more heavy rain, the Central Water Commission said.

(Reporting by Zarir Hussain; Writing by Rupam Jain; Editing by Krishna N. Das, Robert Birsel)

U.S. probes cause of Marine Corps plane crash that killed 16

FILE PHOTO: Two U.S. Marine Corps CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters receive fuel from a KC-130 Hercules over the Gulf of Aden January 1, 2003. U.S. Marine Corps/Cpl. Paula M. Fitzgerald/Handout/File Photo via REUTERS

By Idrees Ali

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. officials on Tuesday were investigating the cause of a military transport plane crash that killed 16 service members including elite special operations forces a day earlier, leaving a miles-long trail of wreckage in rural northern Mississippi.

The KC-130 Hercules aircraft disappeared from air traffic control radar over Mississippi after taking off from Cherry Point, North Carolina. It plunged into a soybean field at about 4 p.m. CDT (5 p.m. EST) on Monday in Mississippi’s LeFlore County, about 100 miles (160 km) north of Jackson, the state capital.

Fifteen Marines and one Navy sailor were killed, the U.S. Marine Corps said. The names of the deceased were being withheld until family members were notified. Further details were not released. Gen. Robert Neller, Commandant of the Marine Corps, pledged “a thorough investigation into the cause of this tragedy.”

The aircraft was originally based out of New York’s Stewart Air National Guard Base, Marine Corps officials said.

It was transporting equipment and people to a Navy facility in El Centro, California. Equipment on board included small arms ammunition and personal weapons.

Seven of the 16 who perished, including the sailor, were based at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina and were members of the elite Special Operations Command of the Marine Corps.

The Poughkeepsie Journal in New York said Marine reservists from the nearby Stewart Air National Guard Base were also on the plane.

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Twitter that the crash was heartbreaking. “Melania and I send our deepest condolences to all!” he wrote.

Stars and Stripes, which covers U.S. military affairs, reported that witnesses said bodies were found a mile from the wreckage.

Images posted online by local media showed the plane’s crumpled remains engulfed in flames in a field surrounded by tall vegetation, with a large plume of smoke in the sky.

The crash left a five-mile (8-km) trail of debris, the local Clarion-Ledger newspaper reported.

The KC-130 Hercules, manufactured by Lockheed Martin Corp <LMT.N>, conducts air-to-air refueling, carries cargo and performs tactical passenger missions. It is operated by three crew members and can carry 92 ground troops or 64 paratroopers, according to a Navy website.

Greenwood Fire Department Chief Marcus Banks told the Greenwood Commonwealth newspaper that firefighters were driven back by several “high-intensity explosions” that may have been caused by ammunition igniting.

It was the worst Marine Corps aviation crash since January 2005, when a CH-53E crashed in Iraq, killing 30 Marines and one sailor.

(Reporting by Gina Cherelus in New York, Idrees Ali in Washington D.C., Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee and Bernie Woodall in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; Editing by Bernard Orr, Letitia Stein and David Gregorio)

Suicide bombers in northeast Nigeria’s Maiduguri kill 17: police

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria (Reuters) – Suicide bombers killed 17 people and injured 21 in the northeast Nigerian city of Maiduguri, the police commissioner of Borno state said on Wednesday.

It is the latest in a spate of suicide bomb attacks on the city in the last few weeks. Borno, of which Maiduguri is the capital, is the Nigerian state worst affected by the eight-year-old insurgency by Islamist militant group Boko Haram.

Witnesses said four suicide bombers carried out attacks in the Molai district, which is around 5 kilometers from the city center, on Tuesday night at around 10:00 p.m. (2100 GMT). Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Damian Chukwu, the Borno state police commissioner said the suicide bombers were among the 17 killed.

Boko Haram, which has killed more than 20,000 people and forced some 2.7 million people to flee their homes in its bid to create an Islamic state.

The group has been pushed out of most of a swathe of land around the size of Belgium that it controlled in early 2015 by the Nigeria’s army and troops from neighboring countries in the northeast Nigeria.

But insurgents continue to carry out suicide bombings and raids in northeast Nigeria, as well as in Cameroon and Niger.

(Reporting by Ahmed Kingimi and Lanre Ola; Writing by Alexis Akwagyiram; Editing by Toby Chopra)

Israeli forces kill two Palestinians in West Bank clash: medical officials

Palestinian mourners attends the funeral of Saad Salah and Aws Salameh in the West Bank city of Jenin, July 12, 2017. REUTERS/Abed Omar Qusini

JENIN, West Bank (Reuters) – Israeli forces killed two Palestinians on Wednesday in a raid on a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian medical officials said, and the Israeli military said its troops had opened fire after coming under attack.

The incident took place before dawn in Jenin refugee camp, and no Israeli casualties were reported.

Israeli forces often carry out searches in the West Bank for suspected militants and weapons manufacturing facilities. .

“During an IDF (Israel Defence Forces) operation in the Jenin refugee camp, Palestinian gunmen opened fire at the forces and assailants hurled explosive devices at the forces,” the military said in a statement.

“In response to the immediate threat, forces shot towards the attackers.”

The Palestinian health ministry said the two Palestinians killed by the troops were aged 21 and 16, and that a third person was shot and wounded in the leg.

Camp residents made no mention of any Palestinian gunfire in their accounts of the raid in which they said rocks were thrown at the troops.

Mohammed Sadee, who lives in the camp, said he witnessed one of the Palestinians being shot.

“The military jeeps were driving in and this martyr was behind them on a motorbike. They shot him … and he fell to the ground,” he said.

(Reporting by Ali Samoudi in Jenin and Jeffrey Heller in Jerusalem; Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Gareth Jones)