Rio hit with £500k bill after losing court battle

The England and Manchester United star will now be saddled with paying the estimated £500,000 legal bills incurred by the Sunday Mirror in defence of the lawsuit.

Ferdinand sued the newspaper for misuse of private information after they published details of his 13-year relationship with interior designer Carly Storey, who accepted £16,000 for telling the tale of her liaisons with the defender.

But Mr Justice Nicol dismissed the case at London's high court on Thursday, and refused Ferdinand's legal team permission to appeal.

"Overall, in my judgment, the balancing exercise favours the defendant's right of freedom of expression over the claimant's right of privacy," he said.

The judge was not swayed by Ferdinand's claims that he had not tried to meet Storey after being made England captain, despite claims in the newspaper that he had snuck Storey into the team hotel.

"I did not find this answer persuasive. In his evidence the claimant said that (Fabio) Capello had told him to be professional, not only on the pitch but 'around the hotel'," the judge said.

"In the past, the Claimant (Ferdinand) had not behaved in a professional manner around the hotels into which he had tried to sneak Ms Storey.

"Whether or not he had done that in the few weeks since he had been made the permanent captain of England, his relative recent past failings could legitimately be used to call into question his suitability for the role."

Former England captain Ferdinand, who has three children with wife Rebecca, had told the judge at an earlier hearing that, "I do not see why I should not be entitled to a private life just because I am a famous footballer."

Sunday Mirror editor Tina Weaver hailed the judge's decision.

"The Sunday Mirror is very pleased that the court has rejected Rio Ferdinand's privacy claim," she said.

"The judge found that there was a justified public interest in reporting the off-pitch behaviour of the then England captain and discussion of his suitability for such an important and ambassadorial role representing the country.

"We are pleased the judge ruled that Mr Ferdinand had perpetuated a misleading public image and the Sunday Mirror was entitled to correct this impression.

"There has never been greater scrutiny of the media than now, and we applaud this ruling in recognising the important role a free press has to play in a democratic society."

Paramedics Who Tried To Save Singer's Life Give Evidence

 

Alberto Alvarez was in charge of back stage during Jackson's final rehearsal on June 24, 2009. He described Jackson as "happy and in good spirits" during the performance. "He was doing very well for the most part," he told the Los Angeles court. He explained that he later drove Jackson back to his rented Holmby Hills home and saw Dr Murray's car parked there. He said the last time he saw Jackson alive was when he said "good night" to the singer. Mr Alvarez was the first person who went into Jackson's bedroom after Dr Murray telephoned for help as he was trying to resuscitate the singer. He said Jackson was lying on his back, with his hands extended out to his side, and his eyes and mouth open. "When I came into the room, Dr Murray said 'Alberto, hurry, we have to get to hospital, we have to get an ambulance'." Jackson's logistics director Alberto Alvarez He then described how Jackson's children Paris and Prince entered the room behind him. "Paris screamed out 'Daddy' and she was crying. "Dr Murray said to me 'Don't let them see their dad like this see'. "I ushered the children out and told them 'Don't worry, we will take care of it, everything is going to be OK'." Mr Alvarez asked what had happened, to which Dr Murray replied: "He had a bad reaction". Two paramedics who tried to save Jackson's life are also due to give evidence on day three of the trial. Martin Blount and Richard Senneff are expected to say that Jackson already appeared to be dead when they arrived at his home on June 25, 2009. The court will also hear from another key witness - Jackson's personal chef Kai Chase. Sky's US correspondent Greg Milam, who is at the court, said: "There are fewer demonstrators, fans of Michael Jackson, and supporters of Dr Murray here today - but they are still being very vocal in their support of both sides in the case." On Wednesday, Jackson's security chief revealed how the star's children crumpled in shock, as they saw their apparently dead father being given heart massage in his bedroom. The court also heard that Dr Conrad Murray, accused of involuntary manslaughter over Jackson's death two years ago, asked aides if any of them knew how to do cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). "Paris was on the ground balled up crying, and Prince was standing there, and he just had a real shocked, you know just slowly crying type of look on his face," bodyguard Faheem Muhammad, referring to two of Jackson's three children, said. "I went and gathered them together, and I kind of talked to them for a second, got the nanny... and we walked downstairs and put them in a different location," he said. He was describing the scene after he was called up to the master bedroom of Jackson's rented Los Angeles mansion where the star died after an overdose of a powerful sedative. The defence team for the doctor insists Jackson self-administered other sedatives, prompting the overdose while his physician was outside the bedroom. Dr Murray, 58, faces up to four years in jail if convicted of involuntary manslaughter for administering the overdose of Propofol.

Raids in 7 countries in $200M investment fraud

 

Dutch authorities say raids have been conducted in seven countries in connection with an alleged $200 million investment fraud scheme, and four men have been arrested. The country's financial crime prosecutors say they suspect hundreds of investors were conned into fraudulent investments in U.S. life insurance policies by a firm called Quality Investments BV. Prosecutors said Wednesday four Dutch men have been arrested, two in the Netherlands and one each in Switzerland and Turkey. Raids were also conducted in Spain, Dubai, England and the United States, in which millions of euros in assets were seized in hopes of recovering some money for duped investors.

Hawi trial nears end

 

THE four-month trial of former bikie leader Mahmoud "Mick" Hawi, who is charged with murdering a man at Sydney Airport in 2009, entered its closing phase on Wednesday. Mr Justice Robert Allan Hulme began summing up the case to the jury in Sydney West Trial Courts, Parramatta. Hawi, 31, of Bexley, once one of the heads of this area's Comanchero Motorcycle Club, has pleaded not guilty to murdering Anthony Zervas, whose brother was a Hells Angels member. Justice Hulme was expected to continue his summation of the case until Friday, after which the jury will retire to consider its verdict. Five other Comanchero members or associates are also standing trial co-accused of the same murder. During the trial, medical experts gave evidence that bollards, a pair of scissors and a knife found in a drain might have played a part in the death of Mr Zervas. The court heard the injuries he suffered included internal bleeding, stab wounds and a fractured skull and that his head might have been stomped on or hit by a bollard. Justice Hulme said most of the available closed-circuit video footage of the attack was "average" and "quite poor". The jury should not draw any inference from the fact that a particular camera was not working during crucial moments, he said. Justice Hulme said part of the Crown case was that the Comancheros intended to inflict grievous bodily harm on Mr Zervas, who was one of five Hells Angels or associates at the airport. The jury had to decide if there was a joint criminal enterprise. The trial continues. Hire-car driver was drunk A CRONULLA father-of-six who pleaded guilty to a mid-range drink-driving offence allegedly told police who pulled him over for a random breath-test he knew he had had too much to drink. Graeme John Purcell, 58, of Cronulla, was stopped by police in August after attending Cronulla Bowling Club with his wife. His solicitor said the couple had four children still at home and his client relied on the success of a Cronulla car hire business to get "the whole family out of a financial quagmire".

UBS Has $2 Billion Trading Loss; Police Arrest Man in London

 

UBS AG, Switzerland’s biggest bank, may be unprofitable in the third quarter after a $2 billion loss from unauthorized trading at its investment bank. London police arrested a 31-year-old man on suspicion of fraud. UBS management aims to “get to the bottom of the matter as quickly as possible, and will spare no effort to establish exactly what has happened,” the bank’s group executive board, led by Chief Executive Officer Oswald Gruebel, said in a memo to employees today. “While the news is distressing, it will not change the fundamental strength of our firm.” The bank tumbled as much as 9.6 percent in Swiss trading following the announcement, which deals a blow to Gruebel’s attempts to revive the investment bank after the division recorded 57.1 billion Swiss francs ($65 billion) in cumulative pretax losses in three years through 2009. The trading loss may revive calls for Gruebel to shrink or shut the unit. “How many times do we have to see huge UBS losses?” said Simon Maughan, head of sales and distribution at MF Global Ltd. in London. “It looks unreformed, unwieldy and ultimately unsustainable. This could be a critical tipping point for UBS’s strategy.” UBS fell 79 centimes, or 7.2 percent, to 10.14 francs by 11:43 a.m. in Zurich, bringing the drop this year to 34 percent. UBS said in a statement the matter is still under investigation, and that the “current estimate of the loss on the trades is in the range of $2 billion.” No client positions were affected, UBS said, declining to comment further. Arrest in London An unidentified 31-year-old man was arrested in central London at 3:30 a.m. on “suspicion of fraud by abuse of position,” the police said in a statement. The man remains in custody and an investigation has been started, the statement said. Switzerland’s Neue Zuercher Zeitung newspaper, citing the bank, reported that the trading loss took place in the equities unit in London, and was discovered yesterday afternoon. UBS spokeswoman Tatiana Togni declined to confirm or deny the report. UBS had to raise more than $46 billion in capital from investors, including the Swiss state, to make up for the record losses during the credit crisis. The investment-banking unit had pretax earnings of 1.21 billion francs in the first half of 2011, while UBS as a whole had net income of 2.82 billion francs in the period. The bank’s tier 1 capital at the end of the second quarter was 37.39 billion francs, giving it a tier 1 capital ratio of 18.1 percent, compared with 14 percent at Deutsche Bank AG, Germany’s biggest bank. Risk Management While the loss is “manageable” for UBS, it’s “obviously not helpful for sentiment and confidence in the bank’s risk management following the near-death experience of 2008-2009,” said Andrew Lim, a London-based analyst at Espirito Santo Investment Bank, in a note. Lim had estimated third-quarter net income of 1.1 billion francs for UBS. UBS last month said it will eliminate about 3,500 jobs, with about 45 percent of the reductions coming from the investment bank, as stricter capital requirements and market turmoil hurt the earnings outlook. The bank in July scrapped the target of doubling pretax profit from last year’s level to 15 billion francs by 2014. Gruebel, 67, and Carsten Kengeter, 44, who runs the investment bank, have been trying to revive earnings at the division for two years. They hired more than 1,700 people across the investment bank and brought in new business heads to replace those that left or were fired. They’ve also increased risk- taking to improve earnings opportunities. Kerviel, Leeson The investment bank last had a pretax loss in the third quarter of 2010 when what Gruebel called “very low levels of client activity” and a charge related to the bank’s own debt hurt revenue at the division. Gruebel, who formerly ran Credit Suisse Group AG, was brought out of retirement by UBS in February 2009 to take over from Marcel Rohner after the company posted the biggest annual loss in Swiss corporate history. A former bond trader, Gruebel doubled profit at Credit Suisse between 2004 and 2006. UBS isn’t alone in suffering from unauthorized trading. Societe Generale SA of Paris said in January 2008 that the bank lost 4.9 billion euros ($6.7 billion) after trader Jerome Kerviel took unauthorized positions on European stock index futures. Credit Suisse, Switzerland’s second-biggest bank, had a loss in the first quarter of 2008 in part because of writedowns on debt securities that were intentionally mispriced by a group of traders. Nick Leeson piled up $1.4 billion of losses that brought down Barings Plc in 1995. --With assistance from Paul Verschuur and Carolyn Bandel in Zurich and Gavin Finch in London. Editors: Frank Connelly, Stephen Taylor

Spanish police said their criminal assets agency was investigating properties worth millions including a holiday resort in Brazil.

 

Dissident republican crime gangs in Dublin have split and are feuding in ways similar to the bloody factionalising of the remnants of the terror group the Irish National Liberation Amy (INLA) in the late Eighties and Nineties. Since former Real IRA man Liam Kenny, 53, was shot dead at his home in Chapelizod, Dublin, in June a series of serious incidents including several attempted murders have taken place. Kenny, a former Provisional IRA member had been a member of the Real IRA in Dublin but fell out with other members after it split acrimoniously into two factions in the city. Last Wednesday, an associate of Kenny's, Frank Nolan, 49, was shot and seriously injured when a teenager on a bicycle pulled up beside him at Oranmore Road in Ballyfermot and shot him at close range. There had been a pipe bomb attack on Nolan's home in July. Nolan, who served a term of imprisonment for reckless endangerment in an incident in which a man was shot in the thigh in a Ballyfermot pub in 2000, is recovering in hospital. The incident has created more tension and gardai expect there were will be more attacks. The reasons for the attack were not clear but gardai say there had been a public meeting of republicans last weekend and threats had apparently been exchanged afterwards. It is believed that after his row with his former dissident republican associates, Liam Kenny left the Real IRA faction and moved to the group styling itself as the Continuity IRA. This group has now split in two as well, with one group led by a Limerick man in his late fifties but with support in Dublin and which is opposed to another faction also still styling itself with the same name based in Dublin. In traditional republican style, the various groups send coded claims to newspapers making allegations and threats against each other, followed by counter-claims that the initial statements were from "gangsters" or "drug dealers" and not republicans. This is exactly what went on when the INLA went into its finally destructive round of feuding in the late Eighties. All the Dublin dissident groups are aligned in one way or another with the city's drug gangs and gardai are concerned that they are adding an extra dimension to the already violent state of organised crime in the city. The investigation into Kenny's murder has become highly complicated with detectives trying to work out the reasons behind the killing as Kenny was at odds with not only his former dissident associates but also with drug dealers in the west of the city. There was initially suspicion last week that there might be a dissident link to the murder of Thomas McDonagh, 49, a traveller shot dead at his caravan in Ballymun last Saturday night. Gardai have known for some time of tensions between Traveller and settled gangs in north Dublin and believe that Travellers have been selling pipe bombs to both ordinary criminal and dissident republican gangs. However, Mr McDonagh was not involved in these activities and is believed to have been murdered by a Finglas-based gang of settled criminals involved in the drugs trade and in armed robberies including tiger kidnappings. It is believed he had been involved in drug dealing and had a heroin problem and was shot because of an unpaid debt of €15,000. One of the main current concerns among gardai in Dublin is the re-emergence of the gangland figure Freddie Thompson following a fire-bomb attack on his mother's house in the Coombe area. Gardai in the Dublin South Central Division have been on high alert since the attack on the home of Lisa Thompson, who has no involvement in criminal activity, but is believed to have been targeted by her son's rivals. Freddie Thompson had spent most of the previous 15 months in England, returning only for brief visits to Dublin and the gang violence in the south city had reduced. It is believed he was concerned that he would be arrested and extradited to Spain after Spanish police said they had issued a warrant for his arrest and extradition at the time of a series of high- profile raids in May last year on the mainly Irish gang led by Dubliner Christy Kinahan, who has been living in Estepona, Spain. However, the warrant has not been sent to gardai even though they have informed the Spanish authorities of his presence here. Thompson had been staying in Estepona up until shortly before the launching of Europe-wide raids aimed at the organisation, which Spanish, British and Europol police said was headed by Kinahan. There were 78 raids including 45 here, 21 in Spain and 12 in Britain. Some 34 people were arrested and €1m in cash seized. Spanish police said their criminal assets agency was investigating properties worth millions including a holiday resort in Brazil. Thompson was questioned in February 2007 when his associate, Paddy Doyle, 27, from Dublin was shot dead in Estepona but Thompson was not at the scene and it is thought the murder was carried out by Turkish mafia

Crimes by EU citizens treble but few are kicked out

 

27,000 crimes were committed by EU citizens in the UK last year and more than 30,000 are expected this year. And because of EU rules and human rights laws only a fraction of the criminals are removed from the country. It will fuel concerns over the impact of immigration on towns and cities, especially following the two most recent EU expansions in to Eastern Europe. Critics last night said the restrictive EU rules that prevent removals must be addressed as a matter of urgency. Dominic Raab, the Tory MP who unearthed the figures, said: “Far from helping us tackle crime, the current straitjacket EU arrangements for securing our borders, deportation and law enforcement are imposing a massive net burden on policing and prison cells.”

Businessman jailed over gang's £17m VAT fraud

 

Shabir Anwar Ahmed, 52, from Glasgow, was sentenced to four years in prison after admitting conspiracy to steal taxpayers' money between February and December 2005. He was also disqualified from being a company director for four years for his part in the multi-million pound operation which centred around the mobile phone industry. Ahmed, who was sentenced at London's Southwark Crown Court on Monday, was part of a group that used sham companies to import goods from Europe, including mobile phone accessories, which were exempt from VAT at the point of entry. Once imported, the goods would be sold on a number of times along a "contrived supply chain" at VAT-inclusive prices without VAT being paid to HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC). The fraud involved exporting the goods back to Europe and claiming VAT from HMRC for the tax paid on the purchase of the items, making a multi- million pound profit. Three other men were jailed after also pleading guilty to the charge of conspiracy to cheat the public revenue following a five-year investigation by HMRC which uncovered the organised crime gang's activities. Nine men were previously jailed for a total of 21 years in December 2010 and January this year. A further defendant has been charged and is due to stand trial next year. Gary Lampon, assistant director of criminal investigation for HMRC, said: "This was a complex and lengthy investigation, over five years, to unravel this multi-million pound fraud by an organised crime gang. "They used the money to fund extravagant lifestyles at the expense of the British taxpayer. We are determined to pursue and bring to justice the criminals behind this type of fraud."

Domestic helps’ accomplices prime suspects:

 

The two accomplices of the two domestic helps arrested for the murders of Juhu resident Kavita Suchak and her manager Prakash Bagwe on August 30 were the masterminds behind the murders said investigators, a day after arresting all four, two from Navi Mumbai and two from Nanded. Based on the investigations, police said the two domestic helps identified as Ram Singh Badaila and Tek Singh Badaila, also have a past crime record. According to Vishwas Nangre-Patil, Additional Commissioner (West region), the police are now compiling a database of domestic helps working in each society in the western region and their backgrounds would be checked. However, the victim had not verified the backgrounds of the two before hiring them, which made it difficult to trace them, said Nangre- Patil. The police arrested the Badailas and their accomplices from Navi Mumbai on Saturday. Nangre- Patil further said that the two Nepali nationals had been working for the Suchaks for the past five years. They had come in contact with two of their friends, Prem Bahadur Badaila and Bhim Bahadur Beek over the years. “The Suchaks owned a traditional safe in the house, apart from an electronic vault. The domestic helps hoped to find a large sum of money in the traditional safe. But the safe was empty as it was only maintained as a showpiece and as a object of faith. The gang bludgeoned Kavita with a crowbar when she returned home after dropping her kids to school a few minutes earlier than her usual schedule on August 30. Bagwe was strangled and gagged by the accused, as he had witnessed Kavita's murder and raised an alarm," Nangre-Patil added. The gang stole a laptop, three cellphones, jewellery and cash, collectively worth Rs 1.24 lakh. After leaving Kavita's house, the gang split up. Prem headed to Nerul in Navi Mumbai while the other three went to Pune. From Pune, they went to the house of a relative, Dev Bahadur, in Nanded. The police tracked down Prem first, by tracing the location of the stolen cellphones. “One of our teams went to Nepal and with the help of BSF kept a watch on the border to stop the accused from leaving the country. Another team went to Nanded with Prem,” said Pratap Dighavkar, Deputy Commissioner of Police (zone IX). Dressed in plainclothes, the policemen accompanied Prem to Dev Bahadur's house. “We did not want to reveal that Prem had been arrested, so we let him walk alone towards the house. Dev Bahadur came out of the house and Prem signaled to us that he was not a part of the gang. Prem then led us to Bhim who had sat in an autorickshaw and to Ram and Tek who were hiding in a water pipeline,” an official said. Bhim was arrested in the past for two cases of theft while Prem was booked for assaulting a government servant at MIDC. “The robbery at Suchak's residence was planned in detail. Bhim purchased a rope, crowbar, screwdriver and tape from Andheri. Tek who had keys to the vault was assigned the job of cleaning up the house while Ram kept watch. Prem and Bhim hid inside the house and struck after Kavita left for dropping her kids to school around 8.15 am,” an official said. So far, Rs 80,000 in cash has been recovered, besides some ornaments. The laptop was destroyed by the gang. “We are now trying to ascertain whether the Rs 80,000 is from the Suchak residence or elsewhere,” said Nangre-Patil.

70 stabbings in public view! Gruesome gang murders man in Ahmedabad

 

Yafizuddin Sheikh, a resident of Juhapura, was brutally killed when some people repeatedly ran a car over him and then stabbed him over 70 times on Friday night in Amraiwadi. Sheikh's assailants continued to stab him till he succumbed to his wounds on the spot. A murder complaint has been filed with the Amraiwadi police against members of the Daddu gang for the gruesome murder. Yafizuddin and another man Mohammad had gone to Bal Bhavan in Khokhra to meet his friend, one Harish Darbar alias Harry in their Maruti Esteem car.While the victim waited there to meet his friend, a group of people, in a Santro car, rammed into Yafizuddin. They then reversed the car and ran it over him again repeating the process thrice. They then came out and stabbed Yafizuddin so much so that he had around 70-odd stab wounds on his body when he died. The victim cried for help but a crowd that had gathered to make arrangements for the ongoing Ganesh Chaturthi did not bother to intervene. The people were allegedly afraid of the Daddu gang that is very notorious in the area for its anti-social activities. The attackers were identified as Daddu Vaghela, his nephew Divyaraj aka Montu along with Naresh Thakor alias Jigo, Rahul aka Chako, Suresh Thakor and Rakesh Bihola. Two more men on a motorcycle also accompanied them. They were identified as Prakash aka Kaaniyo and Rahul aka Kalu Bhil. Two others, who were also involved in the incident, remained unidentified. Daddu Vaghela is a notorious bootlegger of the city and along with his gang has around 21 cases registered against him. Vaghela is wanted by the cops in at least 11 cases from the same area. According to the complaint, the gang attacked the already injured Yafizuddin with their weapons and inflicted 70-odd wounds all over his body. The victim lay in a pool of blood before breathing his last. Police said that the incident was a fall out of a scuffle between Daddu gang and Harry. The victim had come to his friend Harry's rescue during the scuffle.Teams of detection of crime branch reached the scene to investigate the matter following direct orders from the city police commissioner.