Acid monster 'wants new life'

ONE of Scotland's most notorious criminals, branded the 'acid monster' for organising a horrific attack which left his ex-wife disfigured, sits in his mother's Leith flat, pleading for a future.

'I only want to get on with my life,' complains Gordon Modiak, the jealous husband who paid an accomplice £3000 to callously wreck his wife's life, permanently blinding her and leaving her with shocking facial injuries.

'I'm out of prison now, but I'm still trapped. I'm made out as this monster, I've been portrayed as a nasty person - it's not true.

'I want to leave it behind. I got time for a horrific thing, but it's in the past.'

boo bloody hoo!

Just a few miles across the city, what happened 15 years ago is still deeply etched in the memory of his ex-wife Louise Duddy.

She is slim and tanned, with shining long auburn hair and elegant, manicured hands. Her face, however, has been almost destroyed. Where her left eye should be is the outline of its socket covered by a sliver of skin and a tiny, watery drop - like a permanent tear - which has settled in one corner. The eyelids of her right eye are fused together, her eyebrows are missing, part of her nose has melted away and her lips are burned, dry and sore.

The pint of sulphuric acid, which her husband's hired hitman, Kelvin Greenhalghse, threw into her face as she ushered her two terrified young children into her car during a shopping trip in February 1991, even burned the enamel off her teeth and scarred her legs where it dripped through her clothes. Worst of all, it robbed her of the chance to see her sons grow into fine young men.

She is blind, a virtual prisoner in her home and still frightened. She's also angry.

"He feels trapped!" She spits out the words. "He wants to have a future! What makes him think he deserves a future? Look at what I have to live with every day . . . he's wrecked my life.

He should never have been allowed out of jail. Perhaps justice will catch up with him eventually?

Beheading video man sent to jail

A man who used his mobile phone to replay footage of a beheading in Iraq to a hotel shop worker has been jailed for 60 days.

Subhaan Younis, 23, played the images to shocked Charlotte McClay last September at a hotel in Glasgow.

Sentencing him at the city's district court, the stipendiary magistrate said he could not understand why Younis had the images on his phone.

The magistrate told Younis: "I struggle to understand why you had images on your phone entailing the death and degradation of another human being, regardless of their religion or race."

Good for the magistrate! Those videos are bad enough if you want to watch them.

Anti-depressants 'not for young'

Medication should not be readily dished out to children and young people with depression, say experts.

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has ruled drugs should be considered only in moderate or severe cases.

The NHS drug watchdog said young people should first be offered a course of psychological therapy lasting for at least three months.

Campaigners say this is not happening as therapists are in short supply.

Research by the charity Sane found over 80% of young people with depression are given medication and only 6% any form of psychiatric therapy.

Interestingly, 8 of 13 high school shooters were on anti-depressants when they went on their rampages in the US

Croc snacks at Picnic Beach

A British mine worker is thought to have been killed by a crocodile while snorkelling in Australia, police said.

The body of Russell Harris, 37, from Eastwood, near Nottingham, was found in a river on Groote Eylandt island off Australia's northern coast.

The mines supervisor, who was snorkelling with a friend, disappeared off Picnic Beach on Saturday. His body was found on Sunday.

Picnic Beach ... heh

Meth Head

You take your first hit and someone asks you to go clean the port-a-potty, and it sounds like fun—any menial task becomes appealing. You feel like king of the world.

One day the guilt and paranoia got to be too much, and Parnell bottomed out. He was lying in bed with Amy, arguing. He grabbed the gun beside the bed, put it under his chin, and squeezed the trigger.

“The bullet went through my chin, blew my nose off, blew my teeth out. Every bone in my face was broken, and my face was split open, but I was alive. I was still conscious, I think because the drug is such a stimulant.” Some of his teeth had to be removed surgically from Amy’s arm, as they lodged themselves on impact.

Full article (Metro Pulse)

Mexico drugs minister dies in air crash

The man leading the fight against the Mexican drug trade, Public security Minister Ramon Martin Huerta, has been killed in a helicopter crash.

He was among nine people who died when their aircraft went down in mountains near Mexico city, President Vicente Fox has confirmed.

The head of the federal police, Tomas Valencia, was also among the dead.

Mr Huerta, a close friend of Mr Fox, was on his way to visit a maximum security jail when the crash happened.

The cause is unclear, but the weather in the area was poor.

The BBC's Franc Contreras in Mexico city says the loss of such senior security officials will deliver a serious blow to the government's efforts to stop the drug cartels.

Helicopters ... great for tidying things up ...

Glowing green sperm to aid fertility work

A technique to make sperm glow green could aid research into infertility, say scientists.

The fluorescent green protein only shows up in the mid-section of the sperm between the head and the tail.

The possible puns are endless ... "see you coming" ... "shot in the dark" ...

'Shock' over prison suicide rates

Men in prison are five times more likely to commit suicide than those in the general population, a Lancet online study has found.

Mental illness and overcrowding are possible explanations, the University of Oxford researchers suggested.

The analysis of suicide rates in England and Wales from 1978 to 2003 found the difference was particularly striking in 15- to 17-year olds.

Prisoners in that age group were 18 times more likely to kill themselves.

"The higher rate amongst teenagers might be caused by these boys having high rates of mental illness which are not being picked up, and their not receiving the detox they need for drug problems."

Nothing to do with them getting raped, buggered and violently sexually assualted by their fellow inmates then?

An illuminating paper on the subject of Sex, Sexual Violence and Coercion in Men's Prisons in South African jails by Sasha Gear

Stop Prison Rape Website (US)
Prison Rape Resources
Male Survivors

Nursing Home owners charged over Katrina deaths

The owners of a nursing home outside New Orleans have been charged with manslaughter over the deaths of 34 people during Hurricane Katrina.

The married couple who ran St Rita's home are accused of ignoring mandatory orders to evacuate residents, whose bodies were found last week.

These are believed to be the first criminal neglect charges laid in connection with the flood disaster.

On Sunday, 45 bodies were found at a flooded hospital in New Orleans. The owners said they had been critically ill patients who died in stifling heat after power was cut off, and insisted they could not have been evacuated in time.

Wouldn't like to be in their shoes!

forget-me-not panties - spy on your um, sweetheart

These panties will monitor the location of your daughter, wife or girlfriend 24 hours a day, and can even monitor their heart rate and body temperature.
Based on pioneering research developed by the U.S. military at DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), we have brought this revolutionary technology, previously only available to the military, to you!

These 'panties' can trace the exact location of your woman and send the information, via satellite, to your cell phone, PDA, and PC simultaneously! Use our patented mapping system, pantyMap�, to find the exact location of your loved one 24 hours a day.

The technology is embedded into a piece of fabric so seamlessly she will never know it's there!"

hee hee hee ...

'Miracle mouse' can grow back lost limbs

SCIENTISTS have created a “miracle mouse” that can regenerate amputated limbs or badly damaged organs, making it able to recover from injuries that would kill or permanently disable normal animals.

The experimental animal is unique among mammals in its ability to regrow its heart, toes, joints and tail.

The researchers have also found that when cells from the test mouse are injected into ordinary mice, they too acquire the ability to regenerate.

The discoveries raise the prospect that humans could one day be given the ability to regenerate lost or damaged organs, opening up a new era in medicine.

Details of the research will be presented next week at a scientific conference on ageing, Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence, at Cambridge University. Ellen Heber-Katz, professor of immunology at the Wistar Institute, an American biomedical research centre, says that the ability of mice at her laboratory to regenerate appears to be controlled by about a dozen genes.

She is still researching their exact functions, but it seems almost certain that humans have comparable genes.

“We have experimented with amputating or damaging several different organs, such as the heart, toes, tail and ears, and just watched them regrow,” she said. “It is quite remarkable. The only organ that did not grow back was the brain.

Cool or what?!

Bush seeks $50bn hurricane relief - Arnie prefers Bush

President Bush is to ask Congress for more than $50bn (£27bn) in extra emergency funding to deal with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

The money - on top of $10bn that has already been granted - is slated for rescue efforts, clean drinking water, and public health needs.

$2bn for Bush, $1bn for New Orleans, $2bn for Bush, $1bn for New Orleans, ...

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has confirmed he will veto a bill endorsing gay marriages.

State legislators voted on Tuesday to allow same-sex marriage in California, but the governor said the decision flew in the face of public opinion.

Five years ago Californians backed a proposition opposing the recognition of gay marriages in other states.

"We cannot have a system where the people vote and the legislature derails that vote," said the governor's office.

"Out of respect for the will of the people, the governor will veto," said Mr Schwarzenegger's press secretary, Margita Thompson.

Quite right, too.

Rules of Advertising

The rules of advertising ... A look at some of the ridiculous cliches we get fed by the advertising world.

Men are obsessed with sex but will forego sex in order to watch football or drink beer.

Career success is entirely based on your ability to impress your boss.

and here's part two of the installment, my favourite being;

Dogs in adverts never sniff your crotch.

or perhaps this one:

Shop staff always greet you with a smile and answers your questions in a professional manner.

Positive thinking a pain reliever

US experts say they have strong scientific proof that mind over matter works for relieving pain.

Positive thinking was as powerful as a shot of morphine for relieving pain and reduced activity in parts of the brain that process pain information.

The Wake Forest University researchers say their findings show that by merely expecting pain to be less it will be less.

Try thinking dystonia down a shade or two! From extreme agony to very, very, very painful agony. Hmmmm. Yes. I must remember this for future reference although I have to admit to a preference for really, really, really strong painkillers in such situations.

Key to why melanoma is so potent

Scientists have discovered why a form of skin cancer called melanoma can be so malignant.

If not caught early the disease can spread through the body with an efficiency few other tumours possess.

Latest research suggests that, unlike other cancer cells, melanoma does not have to learn how to spread - it has that ability innately.

Lead researcher Professor Robert Weinberg said: "Other cancers need to learn how to spread, but not melanoma.

Researchers have wondered why melanoma in particular is able to do this not only more efficiently than other cancers, but at a far earlier stage.

The latest study shows that as melanocytes - cells that protect the skin from sun damage by producing pigmentation - morph into cancer cells, they immediately reawaken a dormant cellular process that lets them travel swiftly throughout the body.

Brady objects to TV murders drama

Moors murderer Ian Brady has protested over plans for a television drama about his crimes of four decades ago.

The 67-year-old has written to the chairman of Granada Television, the company planning to film the story.

He says publicity about his crimes is 'now rivalling Coronation Street in longevity', and questions the show's impact on the families of his victims.

Except it isn't a soap opera!

In the mid-1960s, Brady - assisted by Hindley - tortured and killed four children, then buried their bodies on the moors above Manchester.

The two were caught after the body of a fifth victim was discovered at their home.

And he questions the impact the show will have on the families of the victims??! Man, it's a f*****-up world.