1. A woman identified as a “vegan activist” opened fire at YouTube headquarters yesterday, killing herself and injuring three others.
The woman identified by police as the attacker who wounded three people at YouTube’s headquarters in California was a vegan blogger who accused the video-sharing service of discriminating against her, according to her online profile.
WATCH: YouTube employee Zach Vorhies speaks to KRON 4 News about the shooting.
Police said 39-year-old Nasim Najafi Aghdam from San Diego was behind Tuesday’s shooting at YouTube’s offices in Silicon Valley, south of San Francisco, where the company owned by Alphabet Inc’s Google employs nearly 2000 people.
A man was in critical condition and two women were seriously wounded in the attack, which ended when Aghdam shot and killed herself.
“The San Bruno Police Department is investigating a motive for this shooting. At this time there is no evidence that the shooter knew the victims of this shooting or that individuals were specifically targeted,” police said in a statement.
According to a press conference today, as reported by CNN, police spoke with Aghdam in the early hours of Tuesday morning, but she did not appear to be risk to herself or others.
“At no point during our roughly 20 minute interaction with her did she mention anything about YouTube, if she was upset with them, or that she had planned to harm herself or others,” Mountain View police said, CNN reports.
“Throughout our entire interaction with her, she was calm and cooperative.”
The 39-year-old’s family had reported her missing on March 31 to San Diego police, with her brother (who has remained unidentified) saying “she had a problem with YouTube” and he was “worried she’d do something”.
It’s unclear if San Bruno police knew of the brother’s concerns at the time they met her on Tuesday morning.
“We know that she was reported missing by her family in San Diego on the 31st of March, and that she was located in a community about 30 miles south of us early Tuesday morning,” San Bruno police Chief Ed Barberini told ABC’s Good Morning America on Wednesday.
“I don’t know what concerns were conveyed to that police department, or how or where those concerns were relayed to. So that is something we’re looking into.”
Aghdam’s online profile shows she was a vegan activist who ran a website called NasimeSabz.com, meaning “Green Breeze” in Persian, where she posted about Persian culture and veganism, as well as long passages critical of YouTube.
A screenshot of a video posted on Aghnam’s YouTube channel before it was taken down on Tuesday, showed her complaining that “YouTube filtered my channels to keep them from getting views!”
YouTube spokeswoman Jessica Mason could not immediately be reached for comment.
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2. Protesters, a huge white whale, and a distracted Camilla mark the opening of the the 2018 Commonwealth Games.
Migaloo the white whale was the star of the show as the 21st Commonwealth Games kicked off with an opening ceremony on the Gold Coast last night.
The theme of the event was designed to showcase the host city's laid-back lifestyle, and the huge inflatable whale, which floated above the stadium as the ceremony drew to a close, was to represent the white humpback 'Migaloo' whose migration up the east coast of Australia is eagerly awaited every year.
Australia's indigenous culture - which dates back at least 65,000 years - was also a key component of Wednesday night's extravaganza at Carrara Stadium.
"The ancient stories told by the Indigenous people of Australia remind us that even though we may be half a world away, we are all connected," Prince Charles said as he officially opened the games, alongside his wife Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall.
"Over the years these friendly Games have shown the potential of the Commonwealth to connect people of different backgrounds and nationalities."
But, while the mood inside the venue was one of acknowledgement and understanding, Indigenous protesters clashed with police outside over the presence of Commonwealth officials.
Former Northern Territory youth detainee Dylan Voller, 20, was among the three Indigenous people arrested after the group of demonstrators allegedly stormed the stadium, News Corp reports.
He and two women were charged with public nuisance and are due to appear in court on May 3. They were a part of a group chanting "no justice, no games"
Undeterred by the commotion outside, Prince Charles, who was delivering the speech on behalf of his mother, Queen Elizabeth, got down to business.
"Your excellencies, ladies and gentlemen," he said, "it now gives me the greatest pleasure to declare the 21st Commonwealth Games open."
As the night wore on, however, Camilla became a viral sensation with many viewers pointing out on social media, the Duchess looked a little... distracted.
3. "You came looking for help." Woman faces the man who kidnapped and raped her after she met him volunteering at a soup kitchen.
A Victorian soup kitchen volunteer may never fully recover after she was kidnapped, raped and left tied up in a motel wardrobe by a man she had offered to help.
But the defiant woman has vowed to press on from the three-day ordeal as best she can, for her own sake and that of her children, AAP reports.
Her attacker Darin Wheeldon, 42, was living in a granny flat at her Melbourne home when he abducted her in July 2011.
"You came looking for help. For a fresh start," the woman told the County Court on Wednesday.
"Little did I know your intentions were not to change but to prey on me."
She met Wheeldon at a soup kitchen and offered him a spare room in her home out of kindness.
But he tied her up, whipped her and raped her before bundling her into a car and setting off for rural NSW.
He drove 600km to the town of Young, stopping at a caravan park for a night on the way.
The woman was paralysed with fear and repeatedly forced to perform sex acts throughout the ordeal.
"I felt defiled, violated and helpless," she said in her victim impact statement during Wheeldon's pre-sentence hearing.
She now suffers post-traumatic stress, anxiety attacks, nightmares, paranoia, adrenal fatigue and other difficulties.
But she said her spirit remains unbroken.
"I will never forget the pain and hurt you caused me," she said.
"But I forgive you for my own sake, so I can move on.
"I pray I will never see you again, and I will build my life back to what it was."
Wheeldon checked into a motel room in Young where he left the woman tied up in a wardrobe before driving away.
She managed to loosen the duct tape and escape, calling for help from motel staff.
Wheeldon crashed on a highway near Lithgow, about 200km away from Young, and was arrested.
The victim broke down in tears throughout her heart-wrenching victim impact statement on Wednesday.
Wheeldon has been jailed for 11 years for the crimes in NSW and he stands to have more time added for those committed in Victoria.
He pleaded guilty to multiple counts of rape as well as false imprisonment, intentionally causing injury and theft.
4. David Warner will decide today whether or not to challenge the 12-month ban handed to him from Cricket Australia.
Cricket Australia are hopeful David Warner will confirm on Thursday whether he will fight the 12-month ban handed down to him following last month's ball-tampering fiasco.
Both Steve Smith and Cameron Bancroft announced they had accepted their fate on Wednesday, opting not to challenge the respective 12 and nine-month suspensions handed down by CA last week.
Their decisions shifted all focus to Warner, who has not made public comment since he took to social media after Saturday morning's press conference to confirm he was seeking advice on the matter.
The opener has the most at stake, after he admitted on Saturday he was "resigned to the fact" he may never play for Australia again after being identified as the mastermind of the tampering plans.
CA's code of conduct - under which the banned trio were found to have brought the game into disrepute - outlines Warner has until the day before next Wednesday's potential hearing to confirm his position.
However it is understood there is a sense it will be better if the matter is dealt with quickly, and CA therefore requested earlier-than-required submissions by the end of Thursday.
Even so, Smith's response came earlier than expected. It will do much to maintain the swell of public support he won following his gut-wrenching press conference on arrival back in Sydney last Thursday.
"I would give anything to have this behind me and be back representing my country," he tweeted on Wednesday.
"But I meant what I said about taking full responsibility as Captain of the team. I won't be challenging the sanctions.
"They've been imposed by CA to send a strong message and I have accepted them."
5. Deputy school principal at Melbourne college charged with possessing child abuse images involving torture.
Thirteen men, including a deputy school principal, have been charged following raids across Victoria that allegedly uncovered "abhorrent" and "disgusting" child abuse material featuring victims as young as newborns.
Victoria Police and the Australia Federal Police raided homes across 19 suburbs and one country town over several days in March in the major joint operation.
They discovered thousands of videos and images of child abuse material, child sex dolls, weapons, illegal fireworks and drugs.
"The material that we're talking about here that's been seized relates to images of children as young as newborn children to the age of 17 years," Deputy Commissioner Shane Patton told reporters on Wednesday.
All those charged have been bailed, including St John's Regional College deputy principal Quentin Paul Smith.
The 48-year-old from Richmond has been charged with accessing and possessing child abuse material as well as drug possession.
He will reappear in Melbourne Magistrates Court on July 6 and has been suspended from teaching.
"The staff member has had no contact with students since the school was made aware of the allegations," principal Tim Hogan said in a statement.
Patton said the material is "horrendous", and said the force is hoping to gain intelligence from the men in order to save the children involved.
"[The material] involves them in sexually provocative poses, it involves them being subject to violence, it involves them being in degraded acts and it also involves torture," he said.
"We needed to target these people to gain intelligence, to gain evidence and to disrupt the criminal activities and also to see whether any children needed to be rescued throughout this."
The men face up to 10 years in jail.
6. There are more stay-at-home dads in Australia than ever before and, mums, they "don't know how you manage".
Australia has a record number of stay-at-home dads, with more fathers caring for children after quitting the workforce or losing their job, AAP reports.
But an expert doesn't see any great rise in the future with more fathers reducing, rather than relinquishing, their employment.
About 80,000 stay-at-home fathers were in Australia in 2016, the report from the Australian Institute of Family Studies has found.
Representing about 4.6 per cent of all two-parent families, the number is 11,500 higher than the 2011 figures.
However: "My reading of the numbers is that we're not likely to see this number go up in any great way in the future," senior research fellow at AIFS Jennifer Baxter said.
Sydney father Gordon Dracup left the workforce eight years ago to ensure someone was around when his youngest was in preschool.
While he says the stay-at-home dad role offers him to be involved in his community and to do some online university courses, he's often running around like a headless chicken ferrying kids to various activities.
"I don't know how people manage it unless they have really good parental support and really good friends that can help them out," he said.
Top Comments
Should be '4. David Warner will decide today whether or not to do the right thing and accept 12 month ban handed to him for cheating while representing his country.'