News 26/06/26

Nicholas Rossi, who fled the US for Scotland after faking his own death to escape rape charges, has died in hospital.

The thirty-eight-year-old, originally from Rhode Island, was jailed last year for raping two women in Utah in 2008. The Utah Department of Corrections confirmed his death, stating it was due to complications from an existing medical condition after Rossi chose to discontinue treatment.

Donald Trump has accused Iran of a foolish violation of their ceasefire agreement on his Truth Social platform.

The United States president claimed Iran fired at least four drones at ships in the Strait of Hormuz, with one striking the upper deck of a large cargo vessel. Trump added that the ship proceeded on its way and three other drones were shot down.

A man has been sentenced to three-and-a-half years in jail after assaulting two female police officers at Manchester Airport.

Twenty-one-year-old Mohammed Fahir Amaaz punched PC Lydia Ward in the face, breaking her nose, and assaulted PC Ellie Cook. Amaaz was also convicted of an earlier assault on a member of the public at an airport Starbucks.

Donald Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton has pleaded guilty to mishandling classified documents.

Bolton pleaded guilty in Maryland to a single count of illegally retaining classified information. His plea agreement with the Justice Department may enable him to avoid jail time, which will be decided by a district judge at sentencing on October twenty-eighth.

A plane has crashed into Beijing’s tallest building, according to witnesses.

The skyscraper, known as CITIC Tower, comprises over one hundred storeys and stands in the central business district. Roads around the building, which serves as the headquarters of the state-owned CITIC Group, have been closed off. Bystanders reported the aircraft was the size of a car.

June’s temperature record has been broken for the fourth time today, with the mercury reaching 37.3 degrees at Santon Downham.

The UK heat record had already been surpassed three times earlier across Suffolk. Today’s extreme heat follows consecutive record-breaking days on Wednesday and Thursday, where temperatures peaked at 36.1 and 36.7 degrees.

June’s temperature record has been broken for the second time today, with the mercury rising to thirty-seven degrees in Santon Downham, West Suffolk.

The UK heat record for the month had already fallen earlier when temperatures reached thirty-six point nine degrees in Wattisham. It marks the third day in a row that June records have been smashed.

The number of people killed in the double earthquake in Venezuela has risen significantly to five hundred and eighty-nine.

The country’s acting president, Delcy Rodriguez, confirmed the new figure, which is a major increase on the two hundred and thirty-five deaths reported yesterday. She added that nearly three thousand others have been injured.

A major sentencing hearing for an underworld gun supply gang has been abandoned after a newly rebuilt court building failed to cope with the extreme heat.

The proceedings at Harrow Crown Court in North London involved six individuals, including Faisal Razzaq, a former getaway driver convicted over the killing of PC Sharon Beshenivsky in 2005.

Police divers have recovered the body of a teenage boy who entered a lake in Leicestershire yesterday afternoon.

Emergency services, including the fire and ambulance services, were called to Meynell Lake on Fosse Way in Syston just after half past one, Leicestershire Police said. Initial searches were carried out before specialist divers recovered the body.

Fourteen men, including a former football club boss and a senior paramedic, have been charged over an alleged plot to rape and sexually assault a drugged woman.

Her husband, from the Stockport area, faces forty-eight offences for allegedly drugging and assaulting his wife over two decades since 2004. He is also accused of inviting other men to carry out attacks on her while she was unconscious.

The Met Office has extended its yellow thunderstorm warnings across parts of England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.

Scotland’s alert remains active until three o’clock tomorrow morning, while Northern Ireland’s warning expires at ten o’clock tonight. The warning for northern England, which includes Leeds, York, Sheffield, Newcastle, and Carlisle, comes into effect at two o’clock this afternoon and will last until nine tonight.

Councillors have unanimously approved the next stage of the Queensmere Shopping Centre regeneration plans, welcoming real change in Slough.

Further details of the major redevelopment scheme were presented to the planning committee on Wednesday. It follows approval for developer Berkeley Homes last August, with the shopping centre having closed its doors in January to prepare for the massive transformation.

The backlog of criminal court cases could take nearly three hundred years to clear to pre-pandemic levels without reforms to cut jury trials, a justice minister has warned.

Although the Ministry of Justice reported a marginal drop of thirty-seven outstanding crown court cases last quarter, the backlog is still up five per cent on the previous year. Record numbers of victims are waiting over a year for their cases to be heard.

Rescuers are searching through rubble in a rush to save lives after two powerful earthquakes struck Venezuela near the capital, killing at least 235 people and injuring at least 4,300 others.

In Caracas and the coastal city of La Guaira, people could be heard calling for help from under the debris of collapsed buildings. The first 7.2 magnitude quake was followed seconds later by an even stronger 7.5 magnitude one.

King Charles has disclosed he paid£12.9m in tax for 24/25, becoming the first British monarch to reveal his personal tax bill.

The level of tax paid puts him in the top 100 of UK taxpayers. Meanwhile, the Prince of Wales declared he paid £7.76m over the same period.

A fourteen-year-old boy from the Blaenau Gwent area has been charged with murder after a female body was discovered during the search for a missing teenager.

Gwent Police made the arrest after the body was found in the Duffryn Park area of Blaina on Monday. Officers believe the body to be that of a fourteen-year-old girl, named only as Lilly, who was reported missing.

A moped rider who tried to flee from police in Slough has been charged with a weapons offence.

Twenty-one-year-old Kamran Mullen, of Faraday Road, was arrested in Britwell on Monday after officers on patrol stopped and detained him. He is due to appear in court on October sixth.