Daily News Round-up

 

MONDAY, January 24

Former TV host Andrew O’Keefe has been arrested over the alleged assault of a woman, reports news.com.

The violent incident allegedly took place at an apartment in Kent Street, Sydney on Tuesday afternoon.

Police said the ex-White Ribbon ambassador allegedly grabbed a 38-year-old woman by the throat, pushed her to the ground and punched her.

“A verbal argument ensued between the pair, before the man allegedly assaulted the woman – grabbing her by the throat, pushing her to the ground and punching her,” a spokesperson said.

“The man allegedly assaulted the woman a second time – punching and kicking her – before she left the unit.”

The alleged incident happened on Tuesday in a unit on Kent Street in Sydney’s CBD.

Police were told of what happened the following day and Sydney City Police Area Command officers opened an investigation.

The 50-year-old was arrested early Thursday morning at Kent Street in Sydney, where he is expected to be charged.

He is expected to appear in court later on Thursday.

The former Weekend Sunrise host left Channel 7 in February last year.

His contract had expired the previous year, and there were no plans to renew it.

White Ribbon, an anti-domestic violence organisation, said last year it had gone into liquidation in 2019 and that O’Keefe has had no role with the group after it relaunched in 2020.

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Prince Andrew wants a jury to decide a lawsuit by a sexual assault accuser if he cannot get the case dismissed altogether, his lawyers said in court papers on Wednesday.

Virginia Roberts Giuffre, an American, has accused the British royal of sexually abusing her when she was 17 years old, while she travelled with financier Jeffrey Epstein.

The request from Prince Andrew’s lawyers was inside a line-by-line formal response to the lawsuit that Ms Giuffre filed against him in August in the Manhattan Federal Court.

Prince Andrew has strenuously denied Ms Giuffre’s allegations, and has attempted to have the lawsuit dismissed.

Earlier this month, Judge Lewis A Kaplan rejected his attempt to win an early dismissal, allowing depositions and other evidence-gathering by both parties to proceed.

Wednesday’s response was filed on behalf of the prince by Los Angeles attorneys Andrew Brettler and Melissa Lerner.

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Queensland has recorded another 15 deaths with COVID-19, all of them people aged from their 60s to their 90s.

There were 11,600 new coronavirus cases detected in the state in the latest reporting period.

People with COVID account for 829 patients in hospital, with 49 of those in intensive care. Fifteen of those are on ventilators.

Chief Health Officer John Gerrard said the hospitalisation rate in the state was improving.

“Again, a very significant fall,” he said.

“Now most of that fall has been on the Gold Coast as expected.

“The Gold Coast again is very clearly peaking and is on its way down.

“We believe the Greater Brisbane area is approaching its peak right now.”

Ms D’Ath said that was positive news.

“We are seeing some stabilisation of hospitalisation across our Brisbane hospitals, particularly Ipswich and Logan I believe, so that’s a good sign,” she said.

“[It] doesn’t mean the peak’s over.”

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The United States has delivered written replies to sweeping Russian security demands, a key step in a fragile diplomatic process, as Ukraine played down fears of a Russian invasion. 

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the document, handed over in person by US ambassador to Moscow John Sullivan, addressed Russia’s concerns and raised those of the United States and its allies.

He told reporters the response set out a serious diplomatic path forward, should Russia choose it, and had a principled and pragmatic evaluation of Moscow’s concerns.

He added that the United States was open to dialogue.

“Putting things in writing is… a good way to make sure we’re as precise as possible, and the Russians understand our positions, our ideas, as clearly as possible. Right now, the document is with them and the ball is in their court,” he said.

Washington has made clear that Russia’s demands that NATO pull back troops and weapons from eastern Europe and bar Ukraine from ever joining are non-starters, but says it is ready to discuss other topics such as arms control and confidence-building measures.

Whether Russian President Vladimir Putin is prepared to accept that limited agenda will determine the next phase of the crisis, in which Moscow has massed around 100,000 troops near the border with Ukraine while denying it plans to invade.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko told Interfax news agency, when asked how much time Russia would need to study NATO’s response: “We will read it. Study it. The partners studied our project for almost a month and a half.”

The Kremlin has repeatedly denied it has plans to attack Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Russia staged new military drills on land and on the Black Sea and moved more paratroopers and fighter jets to Belarus, north of Ukraine, for what it describes as joint exercises there next month.

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A toddler accidentally spent nearly $3000 on furniture while playing with his mother’s iPhone – and the packages are still arriving, according to news.com.

Ayaansh Kumar’s parents first discovered his huge order when a stream of deliveries from Walmart began arriving at their US home.

When the parcels continued to arrive, his mum Madhu realised the toddler had managed to click on the cart she had created from the store but never checked out while he was playing with her phone.

The 22-month-old bought chairs, flower stands and other household items from the budget retailer totalling $2839 with packages still arriving at the front door, The Sun reports.

Ayaansh Kumar left his parents stunned when $3000 of furniture turned up on their doorstep. Picture: Pramod Kumar

At first it was a mystery as to why the furniture kept arriving at the family’s New Jersey home, but Ayaansh’s parents eventually put two and two together.

His mother was able to see the funny side though, telling NBC: “He’s so little, he’s so cute, we were laughing that he ordered all this stuff.”

Dad Pramod said “we’re still getting packages” after Ayaansh’s iPhone adventure.

“My wife does online shopping, so at the time, she was checking some things on Walmart and she added them to a cart,” he told Today.

“She was not intending to purchase those, she just added them to a cart and said, ‘OK, we’ll come back later.’

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Liberal Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer is retiring, giving President Joe Biden an opening he has pledged to fill by naming the first Black woman to the high court.

Two sources confirmed the news to The Associated Press on Wednesday, speaking on condition of anonymity so as not to pre-empt Justice Breyer’s formal announcement.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Mr Biden “stands by” his commitment to diversify the bench, even as she declined to confirm media reports of Justice Breyer’s retirement.

Among the names being circulated as potential nominees are California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger, US Circuit Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, prominent civil rights lawyer Sherrilyn Ifill and US District Judge Michelle Childs, whom Mr Biden has nominated to be an Appeals Court judge.

Justice Jackson, 51, was nominated by then-president Barack Obama to be a District Court judge. Mr Biden elevated her to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Early in her career, she was also a law clerk for Justice Breyer.

Justice Childs, a federal judge in South Carolina, has been nominated but not yet confirmed to serve on the same circuit court. She is a favourite among some high-profile lawmakers, including Democrat Represenative James Clyburn, and has received Republican support.

Ms Kruger, a graduate of Harvard and Yale’s law schools, was a Supreme Court clerk and has argued a dozen cases before the justices as a lawyer for the federal government.

Mr Biden has been focused on filling federal judicial nominations with a more diverse group of judges, and the Supreme Court has not been top of mind during his first year in office, according to White House aides and allies.

A decision on a nominee has not been made yet, they said, and was expected to take a few weeks. But Mr Biden has expanded his pool of applicants by naming more black women to the bench.

ENDS