South African police say gunmen killed national soccer team captain Senzo Meyiwa
JOHANNESBURG — The captain of South Africa’s national soccer team was fatally shot when armed men broke into the house where he was staying, police said.
Goalkeeper Senzo Meyiwa was killed around 8 p.m. Sunday after two gunmen entered a house in Vosloorus township near Johannesburg while an accomplice waited outside, the national police force said on its Twitter account. The three assailants then fled on foot, according to the police service, which offered a reward of nearly $14,000 for information leading to arrests in the case.
Police said there were seven people in the house during the attack, and that the shooting followed an “altercation.”
Authorities said they would do everything possible to find the killers.
South Africa has a high rate of violent crime, but it was not immediately clear whether the house where Meyiwa was staying was targeted by thieves or gunmen with another motive. Solomon Makgale, a South African police spokesman, declined to comment, referring The Associated Press to updates on the police Twitter account.
Tattoos and scars: Sour US-Cuba relations make identifying bodies found at sea difficult
MIAMI — The bodies surfaced 20 miles out from a popular South Florida beach: Four men, still youthful. Their remains were badly deteriorated, bitten by sharks, their faces unrecognizable.
One had a horseshoe-shaped scar on his head. Two bore tattoos: One of a spider, the other of a tiger with a flower. The fourth wore a pair of orange briefs and a gold-colored watch.
The Coast Guard delivered them to the Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office, where they remained for days, four more among the thousands who have died trying to cross the turbulent Florida Straits.
The remains of rafters that surface near the U.S. are often in such poor condition they cannot be visually identified. Politics makes the process even more difficult with Cuban migrants: Because of the five-decade diplomatic stalemate between the U.S. and Cuba, pathologists can’t get matching dental records and DNA from relatives on the island.
“The standard means of identification aren’t going to work,” said Larry Cameron, operations director for the Miami-Dade County Medical Examiner Department.
Maine bear bait referendum sparks interest among hunters, animal advocates in US
WILTON, Maine — In Maine, a hunter can shoot a bear while it’s nose-deep in a barrel of doughnuts, after it’s been chased up a tree by dogs, or when it’s snared in a cable trap — but that could change in just a few days.
Hunters and animal rights advocates around the country are watching the fight over bear hunting tactics in Maine, the only one of 32 states that allows all three methods — bait, dogs and traps — targeted by a Nov. 4 ballot proposal.
National hunting groups oppose the ban because they believe it could set a precedent that prompts other states to try to roll back hunting rights. Some animal rights activists see it as a dress rehearsal for referendums in other states that allow hunting methods they perceive as cruel.
The referendum has prompted a spirited fight within the state, where proponents of the ban say the food habituates bears to humans, which can lead to dangerous encounters. They also decry the three methods as unsportsmanlike. But opponents say the methods are necessary to control Maine’s growing bear population, which has risen to about 30,000, up about 30 percent from ten years ago.
Campaigns supporting and opposing the ban have both raised more than $1 million. The Ohio-based U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance has donated more than $100,000 to Save Maine’s Bear Hunt, which seeks to defeat the referendum, said Evan Heusinkveld, a spokesman for the group.
By wire sources