Eight primary school pupils stabbed in China: report

6 days ago By AFP

A knife-wielding attacker went on a rampage at a Chinese primary school on Tuesday, wounding eight schoolchildren with one seriously hurt, state media reported.

The 35-year-old suspect, a man surnamed Chen, rushed into the school in Macheng in the central province of Hubei and began slashing at students with a kitchen knife, the official Xinhua news agency reported, citing the local government.
Police apprehended Chen at the scene, the report added, and the eight injured pupils were hospitalised.
China has seen several violent attacks against children in recent years, including a spate of five incidents in 2010 which killed 17 people -- 15 of them children -- and wounded more than 80.
Last March, a man killed two relatives and then slashed 11 people, including six children, outside a school in China's commercial hub Shanghai.

Police: Driver in chase kills girl on Ga. sidewalk

Cobb County Sheriff

Tansu Kanlica, left, and Garrett Kyle Anderson.

1 hr ago By Associated Press

KENNESAW, Ga. (AP) — A locksmith who police say was chasing a 23-year-old who drove away before paying for a lockout service lost control of his car and hit three teenage girls on a sidewalk in northern Georgia, killing one and injuring the other two.

Both men have been arrested.
Cobb County police spokesman Mike Bowman says the locksmith, 27-year-old Tansu Kanlica, of Atlanta, is facing several charges including vehicular homicide and reckless driving. Bowman says he was chasing 23-year-old Garrett Anderson in Kennesaw Sunday night.
Bowman says one girl was pronounced dead at the scene and a second suffered life-threatening injuries. The third girl is hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries.
Anderson, of Kennesaw, faces similar charges as Kanlica and is also charged with theft of services.
It's unclear if the men have attorneys.

Pope to Hold First Meeting With Sex Abuse Victims

ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE — Pope Francis said on Monday that he will have his first meeting with a group of sex abuse victims at the Vatican early next month and said he would show zero tolerance for anyone in the Catholic Church who abused children, including bishops.

"Sexual abuse is such an ugly crime ... because a priest who does this betrays the body of the Lord. It is like a satanic Mass," he said in some of the toughest language he has used on a crisis that has rocked the Church for more than a decade.

"We must go ahead with zero tolerance," he said, adding that three bishops were currently under investigation.

Pope Francis Returns from Three-Day Trip to Holy Land

Nightly News

Francis said he would meet with eight victims and Cardinal Sean Patrick O'Malley of Boston, who is head of a commission set up to study ways of dealing with the crisis.

Speaking to reporters for nearly an hour on the plane taking him back from a visit to the Middle East, the pope looked alert despite the grueling three-day trip and overruled his spokesman who suggested the airborne news conference should be cut short to all him to rest.

But the 77-year-old pontiff fielded questions on a range of topics, including Vatican finances, priestly celibacy, his concern for the environment, and whether he himself would one day retire like his predecessor Benedict XVI instead of serving for life.

Francis said the victims, several from Europe, would attend his morning Mass and then he would meet with them. It will be the first time for Francis to meet sexual abuse victims since his election in March 2013.

It was not clear, however, if the pope also meant zero tolerance for bishops who are not accused of being abusers themselves but who are accused of having turned a blind eye to abuse by priests in their dioceses or who may have covered up abuse scandals.

O'Malley said last month in Rome that the commission he heads will recommend that negligent clerics be held accountable regardless of their rank in the Church.

In many cases of abuse, most of which took place decades ago but surfaced in the past 15 years or so, bishops seeking to protect the Church's reputation moved priests from parish to parish instead of defrocking them or handing them over to police.

Andrew Medichini / AP

Pope Francis talks to journalists during a press conference he held aboard the papal flight on his way back to Rome at the end of a three day trip to the Middle East, Monday, May 26, 2014.

Victims' groups have pressed the Vatican to hold bishops who either shielded abusers or were negligent in protecting children to account, along with abusers themselves.

In February, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child accused the Vatican of systematically turning a blind eye to decades of abuse and attempting to cover up sex crimes.

The Vatican called the report unfair and ideologically slanted.

— The Associated Press

Pope to Hold First Meeting With Sex Abuse Victims

First published May 26th 2014, 8:04 pm