The former policeman accused of killing Australian Justine Damond has had charges against him upgraded to include second degree intentional murder.
Mohamed Noor, 33, will now go to trial in April on that charge on top of third degree murder and and second degree manslaughter in the shooting death of Justine Damond Ruszcyzk.
A Hennepin County District Judge in the Minnesota capital granted prosecutors the additional charge against the former Minneapolis officer on Friday.
This follows a November 29 motion filed arguing there was evidence Noor intended to kill Ms Damond when he aimed and fired at her.
Justine Damond was an Australian-born healer and medititation coach living in Minneapolis with her American fiancee when she was killed on the evening July 15 last year.
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Ex-tropical cyclone Owen could reform later in the week, bringing heavy rain to parts of Queensland after the system crossed the coast at Port Douglas early on Monday bringing winds up to 100 kilometres per hour and dumping hundreds of millimetres of rain.
Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) forecaster Bill O’Connor said the ex-cyclone would continue west into the Gulf of Carpentaria but may reform late on Tuesday.
“It has the potential to wind up into a tropical cyclone and is something that as we track through the week, have to keep a really close eye on, ” Mr O’Connor said.
“Under the current model we will see it deepen out through Morning Island and Groote Eylandt and develop into a cyclone late Tuesday and will then head back towards the east coast.”
The weather bureau has warned if the system develops back into a cyclone and moves back towards the east coast it could bring showers to central and western Queensland from Thursday and showers and thunderstorms to the northern tropics and Gulf, throughout the week.
However, Mr O’Connor said it was too early to tell exactly where the cyclone could hit if it reformed.
It is expected temperatures will also drop in central and western Queensland later in the week.
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A multi-billion-dollar contract to build new trains for Queensland was flawed from the start, leaving all 75 new trains not complying with disability access laws, an inquiry has found.
Retired District Court judge Michael Forde conducted the inquiry into the procurement of the 75 trains, and their failure to comply.
Mr Forde found the initial design, signed off by the Newman Government in 2013, broke the law, but was still approved for construction.
The $4.4 billion New Generation Rollingstock (NGR) project was manufactured in India by a consortium led by the company, Bombardier.
But the NGR trains failed disability access tests, including having space for wheelchairs to move into the aisle.
Mr Forde found the delivery of the trains was doomed “from day one” and problems were known “when the contract was signed”.
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