Dad to face court over daughter's rape, murder A 39-year-old man is to appear in the Brisbane Magistrates Court this morning charged over the rape and murder of his 10-year-old daughter at Bribie Island, north of Brisbane.
The alarm was raised after the girl's siblings found her body in a bedroom at a house at Bongaree early yesterday morning.
Police arrived soon after but could not find the girl's father or his seven-year-old son.
Police and the SES searched the area unsuccessfully but after a public appeal for help, the pair were found at Mount Glorious just north-west of Brisbane.
The seven-year-old boy was not hurt and is now in protective custody with his other siblings.
Their 39-year-old father has been charged with rape, murder and indecent treatment of a child under 12 years of age.
He has been remanded in custody and is to appear in court today.
The holiday house on Bribie Island remains a crime scene and a crime scene has also been established at the family's home at Bardon in Brisbane's inner north-west.
Meanwhile, investigations are continuing this morning into the girl's death and police are waiting for the results of a post mortem examination to determine how she died.
Officers from the Department of Child Safety are assisting police in the investigation.
Children left with dead sister's body January 02, 2008 12:10am
A MAN was charged with murder and rape last night after earlier fleeing a Bribie Island holiday home where his 10-year-old daughter lay dead.
The 39-year-old man from Bardon was apprehended last night at Mt Glorious, west of Brisbane. He was with his seven-year-old son.
The man had apparently left his two other children, a teenage girl and a nine-year-old boy, in the holiday home with their dead sister.
The Courier-Mail understands that the family was known to the Department of Child Safety, having been the subject of "a small number" of low-level, "child concern" reports in the past three years. It is believed the children had been in the custody of their father for several years.
The girl's body was found at a residence in Webster St, Bongaree, on Bribie Island, across the road from a church.
The family had rented the holiday home last Saturday for one week.
Police were last night questioning the father after his Bardon home was cordoned off.
They also cordoned off the Bribie Island Uniting Church, where a blue plastic bag was seized.
The handle of what appeared to be a hammer was seen protruding from the top of the bag.
Neighbours described the area as quiet and the type of place where some people still did not lock doors.
Naturopath Janine Williams – who lives two doors away from where the girl's body was found – celebrated New Year on her balcony, oblivious to what had happened.
"I feel quite sick, actually, that a little girl died and we didn't even know," she said.
"We didn't hear anything. It's a very quiet neighborhood. We're just creeped out by it all. Sleepy little Bribie Island. It's shocking, the first day of the year. It's gruesome."
Another neighbour, Michelle King, said she was frightened a child could be killed in her neighbourhood. "I am really scared now because I'm a single mother and walk around here all the time," she said.
One neighbour said he saw a man standing outside the house at 12.45am yesterday. Police said they were not sure when the girl died.
A spokesperson for the Department of Child Safety said the agency was "working closely with police who are investigating this incident to ensure the safety and wellbeing of the child's siblings".
It is understood that three children have been taken into care.
The family had been the subject of child concern reports. Such reports are usually dealt with by way of advice or referral to support services or other appropriate agencies.
It is not known yet whether the low-level contact history will trigger the department's child-death review process, which involves an internal case-management review, followed by an external review by a committee headed by the Commissioner for Children and Young People, Elizabeth Fraser.
You can thank the Oz government for their 1975 decision to give single Mums a pension so they would not be forced into bad relationships (marriages). Now they have parasite 'boyfriends' who live off them and their subsidised housing/energy bills/child welfare instead. Out of the pot and into the frypan...
I wonder.... perhaps this little girl would have fared better with a mother's 'parasite boyfriend'.
A P-plate driver has been caught allegedly street racing while two children sat in the back seat at Drummoyne, in Sydney's inner west, last night.
Officers were conducting speed checks on Victoria Road about 10:10pm (AEDT) when they spotted a car and a motorbike travelling side-by-side.
Police say the 29-year-old woman was recorded travelling at speeds of up to 109 kilometres an hour in a 60 kilometre zone.
They say both the driver and the motorcyclist failed to stop when approached by police at a red light and accelerated to continue racing when the traffic light turned green.
Police managed to stop the woman a short time later, and found a 10-year-old girl and six-year-old boy were passengers in the car.
She immediately had her licence suspended and her car confiscated. She is due to appear at Burwood Local Court at the end of this month.
Police are still trying to find the motorcyclist.
Anyone with information is urged to contact Burwood Police on (02) 9745 8499 or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
On the girl aged 10 being murdered by her father at Bribie Island. Bribie is just 'down the road' from me and a very sleepy little settlement. Horrific news. What will now happen to the remaining girl and two boys? Since the father had custody of them, after this horrific trauma what will happen to them? Local news last night said he claimed 'God told him to do it'. This is when I am all for capitol punishment.
Regarding the woman street racing with the kids in the backseat. IDIOT! Everyone knows a car cannot beat a motorcycle. Throw the book at her and take not just the car from her but her kids as well.
I have to agree with you Suzi on the capital punishment issue.
What a terrible trauma these remaining children have to live with and try to overcome, and its not over for them its only just begining. Media exposure, court cases, medical examinations (to ascertain if they have been abused) and goodness how many years of counselling ahead.
As far the father, well he will get away with it the case is already being set up for a mental incompetancy.
Regards Bluezphere
Never meddle in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup
The man's solicitor Neil Lawler told the court his client had been under an involuntary treatment for mental illness.
Outside court, Mr Lawler said his client had been released from the Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital on December 22.
Involuntary treatment, meaning he did not want treatment for his medical/mental condition. He was released on the 22nd December.... just in time to take 4 kids to Bribie to celebrate Christmas and kill the 10 year old. How does someone get custody of 4 children when there is a history of abuse and mental illness??? Bloody Hell!
Spotted this today ... bit of a fishy tale if you ask me ... but makes for a nice story! What do people think?
Cheers -
Lost stud turns up in fish [news.com.au] IT is a tale some would say smells a bit fishy, but Kristy Brittain swears it is true.
Last Friday she was kneeboarding behind a boat off Slopen Main on the Tasman Peninsula, east of Hobart, when she was tossed from her board in rough conditions.
In the fall she lost a nose stud from a piercing she had done only a week before Christmas.
Miss Brittain, 25, of Magra, never expected to see the tiny stud again.
Enter a hungry flathead.
The stud turned up in a fish caught by her fiance Darren Triffett when fishing with his friend Tim Hall three days later, Hobart's Mercury has reported.
Mr Triffett and Mr Hall were in roughly the same area where the stud was lost on Monday. When filleting one flathead they found a tiny nail-like object inside.
"They thought it was a little tack or nail," Miss Brittain said. "I was standing near them talking to them and realised it was the nose stud I had lost in the ocean.
"How could it have ended in the fish? I suppose it would have sparkled and they (flathead) eat pretty much anything.
"But you think how many fish are in the sea . . . and to catch this one."
It is no surprise that Miss Brittain regards the stud as lucky. And it won't be lost again.
"I have put it in a sachet so I don't lose it again," she said.
"I will go and buy a Tattslotto ticket and put this on it."
Australia's John Howard Receives 2008 Irving Kristol Award Print Mail
Posted: Thursday, January 3, 2008
PRESS RELEASES AEI Online Publication Date: January 3, 2008
American Enterprise Institute president Christopher DeMuth announced today that former Australian prime minister John Winston Howard is the recipient of AEI's Irving Kristol Award for 2008. The annual award, selected by the Institute's Council of Academic Advisers, is given to individuals who have made exceptional intellectual or practical contributions to improved government policy, social welfare, or political understanding. Mr. Howard will receive the award and deliver the Irving Kristol Lecture at the Institute's annual dinner on March 5, 2008, at the Washington Hilton Hotel in Washington, D.C.
John Howard is one of the world's most successful democratic politicians. Chosen as Australia's twenty-fifth prime minister in March 1996, Howard and his party were reelected in 1998, 2001, and 2004--making him his nation's second-longest-serving prime minister at the time of his retirement by the voters in last November's national elections. After September 11, 2001, Prime Minister Howard forged a strong alliance with the United States and Great Britain in the global war on terror, sending Australian troops to Afghanistan and later to Iraq.
In an interview before becoming prime minister, Howard described himself as a quintessential Australian: "I'm direct, unpretentious, and pretty dogged and I hope I've got a capacity to laugh at myself and not take myself too seriously." Those qualities served him well over a long career in Liberal Party politics that began when, at age eighteen, he joined the Young Liberal Movement. He was first elected to parliament in 1974 at the age of thirty-four, and eighteen months later he was named minister for business and consumer affairs by then-prime minister Malcolm Fraser, later serving as minister for special trade negotiations and then as federal treasurer from 1977 to 1983. He was leader of the Liberal Party and the Liberal-National Coalition Opposition in 1985-1989 and, following a period of intra-party turmoil, was unanimously elected opposition leader in 1995. The opposition's 1996 election victory ended an unprecedented thirteen-year incumbency by the Australian Labor Party.
As prime minister, Howard affirmed the independence of Australia's central bank, continued the deregulatory policies of his predecessor, balanced the budget, reorganized the country's welfare system, privatized the Australian telecommunications giant Telstra, reformed labor laws, and cut taxes. Australia's economy soared, even during the Asian financial crisis that devastated so many of its neighbors, growing every year for the past sixteen years. As the editorial page editor of the Australian and former AEI staff member Tom Switzer has written, "[Howard] presided over the longest economic boom since the gold rushes of the nineteenth century."
In foreign policy, Howard was a steadfast friend of the United States. When asked by an interviewer about the Iraq war, he said, "I am not going to be part of a policy which leaves the job unfinished and leaves behind [to] one or two other countries the responsibility of completing the job; that is not the Australian way of doing things." His government took a leadership role in dealing with security and economic problems in small Pacific countries such as the Solomon Islands, as well as in East Timor, where Australian troops are the mainstay of the country's current stability.
Born on July 26, 1939, John Howard attended the University of Sydney, receiving a bachelor of laws in 1961 and being admitted as a solicitor of the New South Wales Supreme Court in July 1962. He met his wife, Janette, a teacher, at a political rally.
Howard's parents chose "Winston" as his middle name in honor of Winston Churchill. Howard's political defeat in 2007 after a long and successful service was reminiscent of the great British leader's defeat after World War II. Like Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan before him, Howard has a strong commitment to the Anglosphere alliance.
In his interview before assuming his post as prime minister, Mr. Howard was asked what he would like to see for his country by the year 2000. He said he would like to see his nation "comfortable and relaxed" about its history, the present, and the future. He said he wanted to position Australia at a unique intersection of Europe, North America, and Asia, to carve a "special niche for ourselves . . . in the history of the next century." His record of accomplishment suggests that has been done.
Further information about the Irving Kristol Award and Lecture, including past recipients and the texts of their lectures, is posted at http://www.aei.org/kristolaward/
Regards Bluezphere
Never meddle in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup
People who eat a lot of red meat and processed meats have a higher risk of several types of cancer, including lung cancer and colorectal cancer, US researchers say.
The work is the first big study to show a link between meat and lung cancer.
It also shows that people who eat a lot of meat have a higher risk of liver and esophageal cancer and that men raise their risk of pancreatic cancer by eating red meat.
"A decrease in the consumption of red and processed meat could reduce the incidence of cancer at multiple sites," Dr Amanda Cross and colleagues at the US National Cancer Institute wrote in their report, published in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine.
The researchers studied 500,000 people aged 50 to 71 who took part in a diet and health study done in conjunction with the AARP, formerly the American Association for Retired Persons.
After eight years, 53,396 cases of cancer were diagnosed.
"Statistically significant elevated risks [ranging from 20 per cent to 60 per cent] were evident for esophageal, colorectal, liver, and lung cancer, comparing individuals in the highest with those in the lowest quintile of red meat intake," the researchers wrote.
The people in the top 20 per cent of eating processed meat had a 20 per cent higher risk of colorectal cancer - mostly rectal cancer - and a 16 per cent higher risk for lung cancer.
"Furthermore, red meat intake was associated with an elevated risk for cancers of the esophagus and liver," the researchers wrote.
These differences held even when smoking was accounted for.
"Red meat intake was not associated with gastric or bladder cancer, leukemia, lymphoma, or melanoma," added the researchers.
Red meat was defined as all types of beef, pork and lamb.
Processed meat included bacon, red meat sausage, poultry sausage, luncheon meats, cold cuts, ham and most types of hot dogs including turkey dogs.
Meats can cause cancer by several routes, the researchers wrote.
"For example, they are both sources of saturated fat and iron, which have independently been associated with carcinogenesis," the researchers wrote.
Meat is also a source of several chemicals known to cause DNA mutations, including N-nitroso compounds (NOCs), heterocyclic amines (HCAs) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs).
Jeanine Genkinger of Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and Anita Koushik of the University of Montreal in Canada said the findings fitted in with other research.
"Meat consumption in relation to cancer risk has been reported in over a hundred epidemiological studies from many countries with diverse diets," they wrote in a commentary.
Reuters
Regards Bluezphere
Never meddle in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup
SOUTH Australia will receive only temporary relief from extreme summer heat, with scorching 40C temperatures forecast to return later in the week.
Yesterday Adelaide was again hit by sweltering conditions, with the mercury rising to a top of 40.6C at 2.30pm.
While the forecast today is for 28C, the milder weather will provide only fleeting relief for Adelaide, with the maximum set to top 40C again on Thursday.
While tennis players at the Adelaide International sweltered their way through semi-finals yesterday, swarms of residents tried to keep cool at beaches and in shopping centres.
Despite a high fire danger day across the state, firefighters were able to quickly contain the only blaze which broke out, at Kangarilla, stopping it entering the nearby Kuitpo Forest.
"That's a high risk area for us so we sent 70 firefighters and two water bombing aircraft and were able to contain it to one hectare," a Country Fire Service spokeswoman said.
Despite the hot spell, South Australians have continued to conserve water, with SA Water figures showing water consumption is down over similar heat-affected periods.
Water consumption varied between 634ML on December 30 and 471ML on January 2, during a four-day heatwave in which the lowest temperature was 39.9C.
An SA Water spokeswoman said this compared very favourably with usage in previous years.
"To put this in perspective, in the past couple of years when the temperature has risen above 40, the consumption has been up in the high 700ML to 900ML realm," she said.
Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Mike Bassanelli said an overnight cool change would drop temperatures to the high 20s for the next couple of days, but the respite would be short-lived.
"We've got a couple of cooler days ahead before it warms up again towards the end of the week," he said.
After an expected maximum of 41C on Thursday, Mr Basanelli said some cooler air would come through late in the evening, just in time for next weekend.
"This is very typical of summer, the warmer months of the year," he said.
"This time of the year, it's not out of the question to get a maximum range of up to 25 degrees."
Mr Basanelli said there was no rain in sight for most of SA, but some showers were likely in the far northeast of the state.
Rising fuel prices have slashed the savings that airlines were passing on to passengers. Clive Dorman reports.
The low-cost revolution in Australian air travel has hit the wall: despite the emergence of Virgin Blue in 2000 and Jetstar in 2004, airfares in real terms are as high as they've been this decade.
This is the finding of research conducted by the Federal Government's Bureau of Transport Regional Economics.
The bureau began measuring airfares - not just full fares but also the best available discounts on the most-travelled routes - in July 2003, just under a year before Jetstar began deep discounting on the country's most popular holiday routes.
For a while, things looked promising, with the fares we'd been paying in the national network steadily falling. But in the past few months, the trend has been steeply upwards.
In December, according to the bureau's figures, you shouldn't have been in the market for anything but essential travel. The best available discount was 15 per cent dearer than it was four years ago, when the survey started, and the so-called rolling average of best discount fares had also passed the 2003 mark.
There's no doubt about what's driving the hike: the price of aviation fuel has quadrupled in the past five years. The kerosene that runs jet engines is now more than $1 a litre on the open market. It used to be 25 cents.
In other words, the massive gains made by the airline business in the past five years in increasing efficiency and lowering costs - which were being passed on to consumers as lower fares - are being sucked out of the industry as profits for the oil companies.
But there are also new trends emerging about how airfares fluctuate. The research suggests, for example, that the days of super-high prices around the major holiday periods have returned with a vengeance.
JAMES CASTRISSION and Justin Jones, the two Sydney kayakers who rowed into New Zealand and the record books yesterday, were super-conscious that they were paddling in the wake of Andrew McAuley throughout their historic 62-day crossing of the Tasman Sea.
"We have only got a small, small idea of what Andrew went through out there," James Castrission said of McAuley, who disappeared last February while attempting the same crossing solo after sighting the New Zealand coast.
"Some nights when we were out there, we had each other to hold through the difficult moments."
Escorted into Port Taranaki by Maori canoes, the pair jumped into the water at Ngamotu Beach on New Zealand's west coast about 8.20am and started to wade ashore as the 5000-strong welcoming crowd cheered and clapped. A band started playing Waltzing Matilda.
After so long sitting at sea, the kayakers found it hard to find their land legs, and they leaned on one another for support as they staggered the last few steps through the shallows to ensure they completed the crossing unassisted. Then one of the locals handed them a beer.
"NZ, thank you, thank you, you guys rock," Jones said as he downed the beer. "This is bloody strange, but I am liking this feeling."
Study reinforces cancer danger of solariums Article from: The Courier-Mail By Neil Hickey January 14, 2008 12:05pm
A NEW Queensland study has raised more concerns about the links between cancer and using solariums.
The Queensland Institute of Medical Research says solarium users under 35 years old have a 98 per cent increased risk of contracting skin cancer.
The report comes less than six months after the death of Melbourne woman Clare Oliver.
The former television journalist died just after her 26th birthday in September after contracting melanoma, which she blamed on sustained use of tanning beds.
Dr Louisa Gordon said 21 studies investigating solariums clearly showed links to skin cancer among young people.
"Australia has the highest rates of skin cancer in the world. (We) estimated the new number of cases of melanoma attributable to indoor tanning devices is in the range of 12 to 62 a year," she said.
Dr Gordon said the institute was calling for more stringent industry regulations.
In addition to the human cost, she said tougher laws could save Medicare about $300,000 for every 100,000 people.
The announcements came at the launch of the 2008 Suncorp SunWise campaign, which will publicise the dangers of sun exposure.
More than 2300 melanomas are diagnosed among Queenslanders every year.
Couple die of thirst in outback Article from: AAP Tara Ravens January 14, 2008 05:09pm
A MARRIED couple who died in the Central Australian outback used the last of their water on a leaking car radiator, the sole survivor of the tragedy has told police.
The elderly man was found last night wandering alongside a remote road about 100km from Nyrippi, west of Alice Springs.
A ground search had been mounted to find the man and his two companions after a report was made to police about 9pm (CST) on Sunday that an overdue party was missing after setting off from the Aboriginal community of Kintore.
The man, believed to be aged between 60 and 70, told police that the Pajero station wagon they had been travelling in broke down 116km from Nyirripi two days earlier.
The group then ran out of water after using it to fill up a leaking radiator, he said.
Last night police found the car a few kilometres further along the road but there was no sign of the couple.
Lights and sirens were used to try to attract the missing pair as the search team slowly travelled back to the community, leaving water bottles along the way.
Police said they resumed their search at first light today and eventually came across the 31-year-old woman, barely alive, by the side of the road.
Her tracks led to the body of her 34-year-old husband who had died about 90 metres from a dry waterhole.
The woman was taken to the Nyrippi Health Clinic where she was pronounced dead at 11.30am (CST) today.
Detectives were preparing a report for the coroner and a post mortem examination on the couple will be conducted in Alice Springs tomorrow.
Study reinforces cancer danger of solariums Article from: The Courier-Mail By Neil Hickey January 14, 2008 12:05pm
A NEW Queensland study has raised more concerns about the links between cancer and using solariums.
Damn my weak, pasty, celtic skin. I think I might be giving the solarium's a miss. I start to burn by just thinking about going in the sun.
“Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.” ~ Winston Churchill
I love my pale skin. Alabaster they call it. Nicole Kidman has beautiful skin as does Cate Blanchett. Give me pale skin especially on a woman any day. If anyone really wants a tanned look they can use one of the new fake tans which are vastly improved even from 5 years ago. Spray tanning, with natural and skin friendly inks, like my daughter uses, give you a tanned, even look that lasts at least a week and you don't look like you belong on stage with the colour. I have hardly any wrinkles because of my aversion to the sun, though it's recommended you get around 10 minutes sun per day for your Vitamin D and bones. I see elderly (and the not so elderly) men and women here on the sunny coast who look like dried up old prunes. Their skin looks like leather, OMG
child's siblings". 
Logged
