Headline

38-year-old American Kills 8-yr-old Boy, 5 Others, Police Begin Manhunt

Published

2 years ago

April 29, 2023

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A 38-year-old American male, Francisco Oropeza with an AR-15-style assault weapon has shot and killed five people yesterday, including an 8-year-old, authorities said Saturday.

The gunman fled the crime scene, prompting an ongoing manhunt, According to Washington Post.

Authorities charged Francisco Oropeza, 38, with five counts of murder and were searching for him Saturday morning, San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers told The Washington Post.

Washington Post reported that ten people were in the home during the shooting. Three women, a man and an 8-year-old boy were killed, a source said.

The suspect was the victim’s neighbour and went to their home Friday night after they asked him to stop shooting an AR-15-style rifle in his front yard because of the noise, Capers said.

Oropeza frequently shot the rifle in his yard, Capers said and allegedly became angry when the neighbours said their baby was trying to sleep around or after 11 p.m. Authorities saw video footage of Oropeza walking up to the victim’s front door before going inside.

“The neighbours walked over and said … ‘Hey man, can you not do that, we’ve got an infant in here trying to sleep’ or whatever,” Capers said. “They went back in their house and then we have a video of him walking up their driveway with his AR-15.”

Law enforcement officers responded to the Cleveland home after a report of “harassment” at about 11:30 p.m. Friday, Capers told reporters early Saturday morning.

The adults were declared dead at the scene, and the 8-year-old died at a hospital, according to the San Jacinto County Sheriff’s Office. The people in the house were family members, Capers said.

Three children survived the shooting. Two of the women who were killed were found lying on top of the young children in a bedroom, “trying to protect them,” Capers told The Post by phone from the scene.

“It’s horrific,” Capers said. “No one should ever have to look at this scene, the blood, the trauma that went on in that house.”

The children were taken to a hospital and were not injured, Capers said.

Cleveland is about 40 miles northeast of downtown Houston. All of the victims were from Honduras and the suspect was from Mexico, Capers said.

The victims had moved to Cleveland from Harris County, where Houston is located. They lived in a “regular country neighbourhood” known as Trails End, Capers said, estimating that their house was between 1,500 and 1,800 square feet.

The shooter fled after the killings but was believed to be about 2 miles away from the home Saturday morning, Capers said. Authorities issued a warrant for Oropeza’s arrest Saturday, the news release said.

“We’re searching for him,” Capers told KHOU. “We don’t believe him to be in the area.”

This killing makes it the 19th in the U.S.

The killings add to a growing list of recent shootings carried out by armed Americans who have shot people in response to what should have been normal, everyday interactions.

This month, an Illinois man was fatally shot by a neighbour angry about his leaf blower; a 20-year-old woman was shot and killed by a New York homeowner after accidentally pulling into the wrong driveway; a 6-year-old and her father were shot by a neighbour in North Carolina after the child’s basketball rolled into his yard.

Those violent confrontations followed the April 13 shooting of Ralph Yarl, a Black teenager who was picking up his siblings and was shot by a White man when he accidentally rang the doorbell of the wrong home.

Headline

US Lifts Restrictions On Visa Validity For Ghanaians, Leaves Nigeria’s Unchanged

Published

4 hours ago

September 27, 2025

Editor

The United States has restored the maximum validity periods for all categories of nonimmigrant visas for Ghanaian nationals following Ghana’s agreement to accept West African deportees, but similar restrictions for Nigerians remain in place.

The B1/B2 visitor visa is now valid for up to five years, with multiple entries allowed, while the F1 student visa’s maximum validity has been restored to four years, with multiple entries permitted.

“The U.S. Embassy is pleased to announce that the maximum validity periods for all categories of nonimmigrant visas for Ghanaians have been restored to their previous lengths. The maximum validity allowed for the B1/B2 visitor visa is again five years, multiple entry. The maximum validity for the F1 student visa is again four years, multiple entry,” the U.S. Embassy announced in a tweet on Saturday.”

Ghana’s Foreign Minister, Samuel Ablakwa, also announced in a tweet that the new policy now allows citizens to apply for five-year multiple-entry visas.

Ablakwa also stated that the reversal of the restriction comes with other enhanced consular privileges, adding that the development was the result of months of diplomatic engagement.

“The U.S. visa restriction imposed on Ghana has been reversed. Ghanaians can now be eligible for five-year multiple-entry visas and other enhanced consular privileges,” Ablakwa stated.

“This good news was directly communicated to me by U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Allison Hooker, at a bilateral meeting earlier today, in the margins of the UN General Assembly. I am really pleased that months of high-level diplomatic negotiations have led to a successful outcome.”

These changes reverse earlier restrictions imposed under the Trump administration, which had limited most visas to single-entry and a three-month validity period.

The restrictions affected several African countries, including Ghana and Nigeria, and were based on concerns over visa reciprocity and the acceptance of deported migrants.

In July, the U.S. Consulate in Nigeria announced updates to its reciprocal nonimmigrant visa policy, stating: “The United States Department of State has announced updates to its reciprocal non-immigrant visa policy, impacting several countries, including Nigeria. Effective immediately, most non-immigrant and non-diplomatic visas issued to citizens of Nigeria will be single-entry visas with a three-month validity period.

“Those U.S. non-immigrant visas issued prior to July 8, 2025, will retain their status and validity. We wish to underscore that, as is standard globally, visa reciprocity is a continuous process and is subject to review and change at any time, such as increasing or decreasing permitted entries and duration of validity. You can view the latest information on visa reciprocity schedules for all countries at travel.state.gov.”

Reports indicate that the U.S. pressured some African nations to accept deported migrants, including Venezuelan detainees from U.S. prisons.

Nigerian Foreign Minister Yusuf Tuggar rejected these pressures, stating that Nigeria would not serve as a “dumping ground” for deportees.

“It would be difficult for countries like Nigeria to accept Venezuelan prisoners into Nigeria,” Tuggar said during a televised interview.

“We have enough problems of our own; we cannot accept Venezuelan deportees to Nigeria. We already have 230 million people.”

Meanwhile, Ghanaian President John Mahama confirmed that Ghana had begun accepting deported West African nationals after U.S. requests.

“We were approached by the U.S. to accept third-party nationals who were being removed from the U.S., and we agreed with them that West African nationals were acceptable,” Mahama said.

“All our fellow West African nationals don’t need visas to come to our country.”

Headline

UK Nursery Worker Jailed For Abusing 21 Babies

Published

1 day ago

September 26, 2025

Editor

A judge on Friday jailed a nursery worker for eight years for a string of “gratuitous” and “sadistic” attacks on babies.

In one incident, Londoner Roksana Lecka, 22, kicked a little boy in the face several times.

Lecka, who blamed cannabis for her crimes, admitted seven counts of cruelty to a person under the age of 16 and was convicted after a trial of another 14 counts.

Sentencing her for attacks on 21 babies, Judge Sarah Plaschkes said she had committed “multiple acts of gratuitous violence” at two London nurseries where she worked.

“You pinched, slapped, punched, smacked and kicked them. You pulled their ears, hair and their toes. You toppled children headfirst into cots,” she said.

“Often the child would be quietly and happily minding its own business before you deliberately inflicted pain… Your criminal conduct can properly be characterised as sadistic,” she added.

Lecka’s cruelty was revealed in June 2024 after she was seen pinching a number of children.
Police were called in and found multiple incidents recorded on the nursery CCTV.

Victim impact statements submitted to London’s Kingston Crown Court from parents of Lecka’s victims told how they were left heartbroken and guilt-stricken by the attacks.

“These children were so innocent and vulnerable,” one mother told the court.

“They couldn’t speak, they couldn’t defend themselves and they couldn’t tell us as parents that something had happened to them,” she added.

“They were totally helpless and Roksana preyed upon them.”

The hearing was told that she had apologised to the parents in a letter to the court in which she said cannabis had turned her into a different person.

She had been addicted to the drug around the time of the offences, but had not told the nursery.
She was found not guilty of three further counts of child cruelty.

Headline

Italy Fines Six Oil Firms $1bn Fine For Restricting Competition

Published

1 day ago

September 26, 2025

Editor

Italy’s antitrust regulator said Friday it has slapped Italian energy giant Eni and five other companies with fines totalling more than 936 million euros ($1.1 billion) for “restricting competition” in the sale of fuel.

The authority said in a statement that Eni, Esso, Ip, Q8, Saras and Tamoil “coordinated to set the value of the bio component factored into fuel prices”, which tripled between 2019 and 2023.

A probe following a whistleblower’s complaint revealed that “the companies implemented parallel price increases — largely coinciding — which were driven by direct or indirect information exchanges among them”, the authority said.

“The cartel began on 1 January 2020 and continued until 30 June 2023,” it added.

AFP