Eight face charges after Irish raid
Eight men were charged last night in connection with an Irish police surveillance operation in a wooded area of Co Waterford. At Dublin’s Special Criminal Court, Patrick Deery, 51, of Stradbelly, Co Waterford; Joseph Mooney, 35, of Ozzier Court, Co Waterford; John O’Halloran, 33, of Limerick; Mark McMahon, 35, and Patrick J. Kelly, 36, both of Wexford and Brian Galvin, 37, of Ballybeg, Co Waterford, were charged with membership of the IRA. Two other men faced firearms charges. All are to appear on Friday for bail applications.
Britons jailed
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A court in Boulogne sentenced two Britons to nine months in jail for trying to smuggle Indian immigrants into Britain. Tammy Stickells, 24, and Terry Stephens, 23, of Kent, tried to board a ferry in Calais with a car and trailer. Agents found 12 immigrants in it; the Britons denied knowledge of them. (AFP)
Fire deaths rise
Fire-related deaths in the UK increased from 578 in 2001 to 612 in 2002. The Fire Service attended more than 1 million calls to September 2002, a 2 per cent rise. The number of fires rose by 3 per cent to 529,400, largely due to deliberately started car fires. There was a 1 per cent rise in false alarms, to 292,900.
‘Martin’ pistol
A First World War pistol allegedly owned four years ago by the Norfolk farmer Tony Martin, who was freed from jail last week after his sentence for manslaughter, was disabled and could not be fired, police said. They seized the gun last week after claims that Martin had given it to a friend before his arrest.
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Top-rank women
A record number of chief constables are women following the appointment of Barbara Wilding, 52, as head of South Wales Police. Five of the 43 chief constables in England and Wales are now female. Ms Wilding, a deputy assistant commissioner at Scotland Yard, will take up her new post in January.
Ale to the Scots
“Bitter and Twisted”, brewed by Harviestoun of Dollar, Clackmannanshire, and described as “refreshingly hoppy with fruit throughout”, has been named the best beer of 2003 at the Great British Beer Festival at Olympia. It is the second successive year that the prize has gone to a Scottish brewery.
De Savary plan
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Plans by the entrepreneur Peter de Savary to transform the Manor House Hotel, an Edwardian mansion on Dartmoor, into a sporting and leisure centre with a golf course, 17 lodges, a golf school, stables, and falconry and clay pigeon shooting centres, have been criticised as inappropriate by conservationists.
Woman killed
Linda-Anne Winnik, 21, of Gorebridge, Midlothian, who was pregnant, died when thrown from a minibus that was in collision with a Transit van on Monday afternoon between Chirnside and Grantshouse in Berwickshire. Five of the nine people in the minibus were taken to Borders General Hospital.
Victim named
A man crushed to death after being hit by a car while unloading the boot of his BMW was named by police as Wallace Kidd, 53, of Knightswood, Glasgow. He died at Victoria Infirmary. The driver, 54, of the car involved in the incident, on Friday in Giffnock, was shaken but unhurt.
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Loaded sweets
A drink-driver was banned for only a year after saying Jelly Kicks led to his being three times the limit. Steven Rose, 21, of Kiltarlity, Inverness, had not known the “sweets”, bought in an off-licence and given to him by a friend, contained vodka, Inverness Sheriff Court was told. He was also fined £300.
Childcare fears
Fiona Hyslop, the SNP’s Shadow Education Minister, urged the Scottish Executive to act after a survey showed nearly 80 per cent of childminders in Scotland — 4,810 people — lack childcare qualifications. Registered minders have fallen by more than a fifth since 1998 to 6,211.