The unspeakable tragedy at a Connecticut elementary school last month has inspired renewed calls for gun control in the United States.

It's hard to ignore the slaughter of 20 first-graders and six teachers, especially since they died months after a mass murder at a Colorado movie theater.

At a meeting of the Senate Judiciary Committee today, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, ticked off several recent mass murders, noting that "America abhors the recent tragedies."

In response to these tragedies, President Obama has called on Congress to reinstate the expired ban on assault weapons frequently used by mass killers and to take steps to ensure mentally ill people like Adam Lanza can't get guns.

But most people who get shot to death in this country don't die in a movie theater or at a shopping mall at the hands of a crazed gunman. Most are killed by somebody they know.

Mass shootings are relatively rare, as The New York Times has pointed out.

Roughly 75 percent of homicides in 2011 were committed by a family member or acquaintance of some type, according to FBI statistics.

Nearly 68 percent of those deaths involved firearms, but most of those victims don't make national headlines and aren't the subject of Senate hearings.

Even more invisible are the people who kill themselves with guns. According to a 2009 report cited by the CDC, roughly half of suicides were committed by firearms.

Since suicide can be impulsive, at least some of those people wouldn't have died if it weren't for firearms.

There's no easy way to make sure fewer people get killed by their loved ones or kill themselves with guns.

But focusing the debate almost entirely on the mass shootings that grab headlines ignores the biggest casualties of gun violence.

SEE ALSO: The Number Of Americans Who Have Been Killed By Guns Since Dec. 14 Is Horrifying

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Rodrigo Abad Diaz, a 22-year-old man, was recently shot and killed after he pulled into the wrong driveway in Lilburn, Ga., Diaz's friends allege. 

Diaz's friends, who were passengers in the car, say they were trying to pick up another friend to go ice skating but GPS brought them to the wrong house, The Huffington Post's Cavan Sieczkowski reports.

As they were waiting in the driveway, the friends say, the homeowner came out with a gun and "just started shooting."

The friends say that after 69-year-old Phillip Sailors, the homeowner, fired the first shot, Diaz tried to turn the car around. But that's when Sailors allegedly fired the second shot, which ended up killing Diaz.

Sailors' attorney, Michael Puglise, says that since it was late at night, Sailors thought Diaz and his friends were going to invade his home, NBC Latino's Adrian Carrasquillo reports.

Police arrested Sailors and charged him for murder, but according to Puglise, Sailors was released on a $10,000 bond yesterday. 

Puglise told NBC Latino that Sailors is a Vietnam veteran, with no prior criminal history. 

"You have to understand this is a 69-year-old man who is a military veteran who has been honorably discharged," Puglise told NBC Latino. "He dedicated his life to community service, specifically the Christian Lay Ministry in Latin America."

SEE ALSO: A Woman Drove 900 Miles Instead Of 50 Because Of Bad GPS Directions

Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Malaysian authorities have a possible elephant murder mystery on their hands after three more pygmy elephants reportedly were found dead on the island of Borneo Wednesday (Jan. 30).

The grim discovery brings the death toll to 13 this month, and according to the AP, authorities are investigating suspicions that the diminutive elephants were poisoned.

Also called Bornean elephants, these creatures are the most endangered subspecies of Asian elephant. While other male Asian elephants can grow up to 9.8 feet (3 meters), male Bornean elephants grow to less than 8.2 feet (2.5 meters) and they have bigger ears and rounder bellies, according to the conservation organization World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Researchers initially believed the babyish-looking mammals were the descendants of captive elephants brought to the island a few centuries ago. Other evidence, however, suggests that the pygmy elephants are a genetically distinct subspecies that arrived thousands of years ago during the Pleistocene Epoch by way of a land bridge. There are thought to be just 1,200 of them in Borneo today, mostly concentrated in Sabah, the Malaysian state at the northeastern corner of the island. [Gallery: The Pygmy Elephants of Borneo]

Though it's still unclear who or what might be responsible for the recent spate of elephant deaths, WWF officials noted that the population has been increasingly threatened by habitat fragmentation, and all the corpses reportedly have been found in areas where forests are being transformed into plantations within the Gunung Rara reserve in Sabah. 

"Conversions result in fragmentation of the forests, which in turn results in loss of natural habitat for elephant herds, thus forcing them to find alternative food and space, putting humans and wildlife in direct conflict," environmentalist Dato' Dr Dionysius S K Sharma, executive director of the WWF's Malaysia division, said in a statement. "All conversion approvals need to be reviewed by the Sabah Forestry Department and assessed not purely from commercial, but the endangered species and landscape ecology perspectives."

Follow LiveScience on Twitter @livescience. We're also on Facebook & Google+.

• World's Cutest Baby Wild Animals
• The 10 Weirdest Animal Discoveries of 2012
• Elephant Images: The Biggest Beasts on Land

Please follow Science on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Last week, Hadiya Pendleton, a 15-year-old girl from Chicago, was performing with her high school band at President Obama's inauguration.

On Tuesday, she was gunned down as she sought shelter from the rain under a canopy in a park near her well-regarded prep school — and less than a mile from Obama's Chicago home.

Instantly, the teen — an honors student, volleyball player, and majorette at Kings College Prep School — became the face of Chicago's high, and possibly rising, murder rate.

She also became part of the debate over gun violence that has erupted since the December massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., as Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) cited her death as the latest evidence of the need for more strict gun control.

Gun-control advocates, however, note that Hadiya Pendleton was the 44th person to die in Chicago this year.

"That puts Chicago on pace to surpass last year's total of more than 500 murders,"says the Washington Examiner in an editorial. Is that because the city has lenient gun laws? Quite the opposite, according to the Examiner. If anything, the paper says, Chicago is a laboratory that is proving that "feel-good laws" really "do nothing to decrease gun violence."

Chicago has the strongest gun control regime in the nation. Both assault weapons and high-capacity magazines are completely banned in the city. And up until the 2010 Supreme Court decision that legalized them, handguns were banned too.

You can now get a permit to own a firearm in Chicago, but it requires firearms training, two separate background checks and a firearm owner's identification card.

As a result of these burdensome and punitive measures, only 7,640 people currently hold a firearms permit in Chicago. But criminals couldn't care less about Chicago's gun laws. Chicago police seized 7,400 guns used in crimes in 2012 alone. [Washington Examiner]

Some law-enforcement experts in Chicago aren't impressed by that logic because, they say, Chicago's gun laws aren't as tight as many people think since the penalties for violating them are pretty lax. A common sentence for gun possession, if the offender has no other felonies, is a year in prison.

In practice, the person might get out after six months, which is not much of a deterrent to a seasoned criminal. "Chicago may have comprehensive gun laws," Garry F. McCarthy, Chicago police superintendent, tells The New York Times, "but they are not strict because the sanctions don't exist."

The bottom line, says Hannah Kappe-Klote at PolicyMic, is that it's simply wrong to blame Hadiya Pendleton's death on "failed gun laws." Chicago's violence has a far more complex set of causes.

Most of the guns that come into Chicago are from out of state or from parts of Illinois where gun control laws are not so strict. More than 400 guns were traced to Mississippi, where many of those whose families immigrated to Chicago in the early 20th century may remain.

Rather than serving as an argument against gun control (one that could certainly be countered by the murder rate in Louisiana), Chicago serves as a call to a national, regulated gun control policy. [PolicyMic]

Please follow Politics on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

A former Marine has been arraigned on two charges of capital murder for the shooting deaths of legendary Navy SEAL sniper Chris Kyle and another man.

Eddie Ray Routh, 25, is accused of turning his weapon on Kyle, 38, and Kyle's neighbor Chad Littlefield, 35, when they were at a shooting range at Rough Creek Lodge, Reuters reports. Kyle and Littlefield had reportedly taken Routh to the range as a part of a Post Traumatic Stress Disorder outreach and mentoring program.

From Reuters:

Routh, described in local media reports as a former Marine who suffered from post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD), was arrested at his Lancaster, Texas home several hours after the shooting, having led police on a chase in his pickup truck.

He was arraigned at the Lancaster municipal jail on Saturday on two counts of capital murder, a spokesman for the department of public safety said. The Erath County Sheriff's Office planned a news conference later on Sunday.

Releasable information obtained by Business Insider from the Marine Corps shows that Routh left the Marines in 2010 having served one tour of duty in Iraq from 2007 to 2008 and another with the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit. Routh also deployed in Operation Unified Response in Haiti from January to April of 2010, a month prior to his end of active service.

SEE ALSO: THE BONEYARD: Where Air Force birds go to die >

SEE ALSO:  The Military & Defense Facebook page for updates >

Please follow Military & Defense on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

A defamed Navy SEAL impostor was found dead on a beach in Northern California with a gunshot wound to the head.

Lorraine Devon Wilke of the site Addicting Info reports the story about Ike Densmore's obsession with being a SEAL and the real SEAL, Don Shipley, whose investigation led to Densmore's outing.

From Addicting Info:

Ike Densmore, 48, had a big dream. He wanted to be a Navy SEAL. He wanted it so bad that even after spending time in the Army he dismissed that less exotic service to, instead, concoct a story about actually being a member of the elite Navy SEAL Team One. He created a public profile that detailed his impressive “history,” inclusive of a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, three Purple Hearts, two Presidential Unit Citationsand six Navy “accommodations,” and posted that profile to his various social media sites. By fall of 2012, his story took a hit when journalists and a SEAL activist began to investigate his claims. By the end of January 2013, the jig was up… literally.

Wilke notes that the Humboldt County Sheriff described the death as "self-inflicted but suspicious," probably taking into account that Densmore's actions raised the ire of America's most lethal killers (though to this writer's knowledge there haven't been any reports of actual violence committed against those who "steal valor"). 

Shipley seemed shaken up and saddened, reports Wilke, when he found out about Densmore's death. Densmore's passport and identification lay on the steps of city hall, and beside him on the beach was a gun.

Perpetrators of stolen valor tend to go so overboard that their stories are hardly believable in the eyes of seasoned veterans. Just last month, we covered how a "Marine" sergeant standing guard outside a school was himself an impostor. (Instead of multiple tours of duty to Afghanistan, a Purple Heart, and a missing leg, "Sgt." Craig Pusley was actually never more than a private, who was subsequently kicked out of the Marine Corps for unauthorized absence within a few months of active duty service.)

The prevalence of stolen valor has become such a problem that veteran activists have pushed Congress to make it illegal.

Congress ruled that though it was dishonest, it would abridge 1st Amendment rights to free speech — unless Stolen Valor became a means to personal profit, kind of like fraud charges. If a jury finds a person guilty for lying about military service for personal profit, they could be fined up to $10,000 and imprisoned for six months.

SEE ALSO: The 25 most effective weapons in the US Arsenal >

SEE ALSO: America is setting a dangerous precedent for the drone age >

SEE ALSO: Check out the Military & Defense Facebook page for updates >

Please follow Military & Defense on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

A guard at a federal jail in Brooklyn has been charged with sexually abusing an inmate whose child she's carrying.

Nancy Gonzalez was expected to appear before a judge Tuesday after authorities accused her of having a four-month affair with convicted cop killer Ronell Wilson, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

She's now eight months pregnant with his child, authorities say.

Wilson was convicted in 2006 of killing two New York City police officers and was sentenced to death in 2007, The Associated Press reported in September 2012.

A federal appeals court tossed the sentence in 2010, leaving his fate up to a new jury, which isn't expected to make a decision any time soon.

Meanwhile, police allege Gonzalez told another inmate in a recorded call that getting pregnant with Wilson's child could give him "some kind of hope," according to the Times.

“I took a chance because I was so vulnerable and wanted to be loved and now I am carrying his child,” Gonzalez allegedly said in one of the recorded calls.

That hope might come in the form of a more lenient sentence.

The New Daily New speculated that Wilson was trying to avoid the death penalty by getting Gonzalez pregnant.

DON'T MISS: California Preschool To Close After Students Allegedly Engaged In Sex Acts With Each Other >

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

South African Olympic sprinter and double-amputee Oscar Pistorius was charged with murder in the shooting of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp at his house in Pretoria this morning.

There were initial rumors that Pistorius mistook her as a burglar when she was surprising him for Valentine's Day. But a police spokesperson said that rumor didn't come from them, and they plan to hold Pistorius overnight.

In the wake of the alleged murder, this January 2012 New York Times profile of Pistorius is getting passed around on Twitter.

In the article, Pistorius spoke enthusiastically about his gun ownership. He told reporter Michael Sokolove about an incident where "he grabbed his gun and tiptoed downstairs" when he thought his home was being broken in to. He also took Sokolove to a gun range, and said he goes there when he can't sleep.

These passage are incredibly eerie in retrospect.

Here's the section on the home invasion:

As he put together lunch for all of us — fruit smoothies, breaded chicken fillets he pulled from the refrigerator — he mentioned that a security alarm in the house had gone off the previous night, and he had grabbed his gun and tiptoed downstairs. (It turned out to be nothing.)

Here's their initial the exchange about guns:

I asked what kind of gun he owned, which he seemed to take as an indication of my broader interest in firearms. I had to tell him I didn’t own any. “But you’ve shot one, right?” Actually, I hadn’t. Suddenly, I felt like one of those characters in a movie who must be schooled on how to be more manly.

After that Pistorius took him to a gun range:

“We should go to the range,” he said. He fetched his 9-millimeter handgun and two boxes of ammunition. We got back in the car and drove to a nearby firing range, where he instructed me on proper technique. Pistorius was a good coach. A couple of my shots got close to the bull’s-eye, which delighted him. “Maybe you should do this more,” he said. “If you practiced, I think you could be pretty deadly.” I asked him how often he came to the range. “Just sometimes when I can’t sleep,” he said.

There's nothing criminal here.

But it's clear that Pistorius was an avid gun owner who knew how to fire his weapon and had been ready to use it before.

Read the entire NYT profile of Pistorius here >

Please follow Sports Page on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

After they say they were stalked, bound, gagged, and tied up by the most wanted man in America, Jim and Karen Reynolds, a couple married for over 36 years, seem to be doing ... fine. 

ABC News has video footage of the couple's late-night press conference, in which they appeared pretty nonchalant about the whole ordeal but revealed a lot about Christopher Dorner's last days:

Jim, 66, and Karen, 56, were some of the only people who came into contact with Chris Dorner in the past few days and lived to tell about it. And their insight gives us a glimpse into Dorner's mindset in the moments leading up to his fiery, still controversial death in the cabin where he had them held hostage for all of 15 minutes. One of the biggest takeaways from the Reynolds, per the L.A. Times, was Dorner's reassurance that he wasn't going to harm them:

"I don’t have a problem with you. I just want to clear my name," they recalled him saying. 

And:

"He tried to calm us down, saying very frequently, he would not kill us,” said Jim Reynolds, 66, who has owned the condo with his wife for 12 years. "He huddled down beside me and said 'you're going to be quiet, right? Not make a fuss and let me get away?' "

That surely doesn't mitigate the murders Dorner is wanted for, but all that stuff about clearing his name sounds like what Dorner said in his rambling, confessing Facebook manifesto — that he believes he was denied the opportunity to clear his name. Dorner wrote:

"I know most of you who personally know me are in disbelief to hear from media reports that I am suspected of committing such horrendous murders and have taken drastic and shocking actions in the last couple of days. You are saying to yourself that this is completely out of character of the man you knew who always wore a smile wherever he was seen. I know I will be villified by the LAPD and the media."

Karen eventually broke loose and made the 911 call that alerted police that Dorner was driving their purple Nissan and setting off the chain of events that ended with a gunfight and Dorner apparently dying in the cabin.

Now that we know Karen and Jim are fine, and that Karen's phone call was integral in the manhunt, one of the next questions is if either of them is entitled to the $1 million reward that was placed on Dorner's head. The Los Angeles Times's writes:

Asked if they expected a share of the more than $1-million reward offered in the case, the couple said they didn't expect to receive anything.

"We heard nobody was getting that because he needed to be captured and convicted," Karen Reynolds said.

SEE ALSO: California Police Deny Intentionally Burning Down Cabin Where Fugitive Ex-Cop Apparently Died

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Former "Melrose Place" actress Amy Locane-Bovenizer was sentenced to three years in prison Thursday after killing a New Jersey woman while drunk driving in 2010.

In November, the 41-year-old actress was found guilty of vehicular homicide in the death of 60-year-old Helene Seeman after her blood-alcohol level was almost three times the legal limit when her SUV hit a car carrying Seeman and her husband, who was injured in the crash.

The actress had previously faced up to ten years in prison, but the judge lowered the maximum sentence because of the hardship on teh actress' two children, one of whom has a medical and mental disability.

The victim's husband, Fred Seeman, reportedly yelled, "What a travesty!" at the judge after the verdict was announced.

SEE ALSO: Bruce Willis was completely disoriented in awkward BBC interview >

Please follow The Wire on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Details are emerging about the character of sprinter Oscar Pistorius, the double-amputee Olympian who has been charged with premeditated murder in the death of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.

Michael Sokolove, who profiled Pistorius for The New York Times in November, went on the PBS Newshour to provide some perspective on the enigmatic South African icon.

He explains how Pistorius is "an adrenaline junkie" who likes to race cars, speedboats, guns, and exotic pets but seems measured enough that Sokolove never thought the sprinter"was going to hurt someone else."

However he also said that Pistorius was "paranoid" and "on a hair-trigger" given South Africa's gun-soaked society and the sprinter's intensity.

"I didn't see malice from Oscar," Sokolove said. "I didn't see him as a violent person. I did see him as a man of action, coiled, and on a hair-trigger. And that has its own dangers."

Here's the video:

SEE ALSO: Here Is The Gated Community Where Oscar Pistorius Allegedly Killed His Girlfriend

Please follow Sports Page on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Rumors surfaced in South Africa yesterday that Oscar Pistorius may have killed his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in a tragic case of mistaken identity.

Steenkamp hinted that she was going to give Pistorius a Valentine's Day surprise, and one report speculated that Pistorius shot and killed her when he mistook her for a home burglar.

But in the past 24 hours evidence has emerged that draws this theory into question.

Yesterday, police said they had no idea where the mistaken identity rumors came from. They charged Pistorius with murder, and today in court announced that they would argue that he committed "premeditated murder."

The gruesome details of the shooting raise doubts about the plausibility of the mistaken identity theory. Steenkamp was shot four times in the head, hand, chest, and pelvis, police say. Beeld reports that she was shot through a bathroom door.

In addition, the newspaper Beeld reports that police were called to the house two hours before the shooting as neighbors heard an argument. That seems to indicate that Steenkamp was at the home prior to the shooting.

Details of the shooting have been sparse. We should know more when police begin making their case against Pistorius in court.

Please follow Sports Page on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

A celebrity reality show featuring the murdered girlfriend of Oscar Pistorius will still be broadcast on South African television despite her death, the producers said Friday.

The pre-recorded show filmed in an exotic location in Jamaica features the blonde model Reeva Steenkamp and several local personalities competing for one million rand ($113,500) prize money.

Producers of "Tropika Island of Treasure" said they had decided not to shelve the show, which will premiere on Saturday, two days after she was shot dead at Pistorius's home on Valentine's Day.

"As we grieve today with Reeva's family and friends and struggle to make sense of this shocking tragedy, it has taken much deliberation to come to the decision to continue screening Tropika Island of Treasure 5 as planned," executive producer Samantha Moon said in a statement.

"This week's episode will be dedicated to Reeva's memory."

A weeping Pistorius appeared in a Pretoria court on Friday charged with murder over the killing of his 29-year-old girlfriend.

A special tribute will be broadcast ahead of Saturday's show at 6:30 pm (1630 GMT).

Online advertisements for the series shows a beaming Steenkamp clad in a bikini and other skimpy clothing.

The show's website carries a picture of burning candle with a message: "We are deeply saddened and extend our condolences to Reeva's family and friends."

The series, now in its fifth season, is popular with local viewers.

The hour-long show, screened on Saturday evenings is described as "pure adrenaline-fuelled drama... Whether diving off 75-foot Jamaican cliffs into the ocean, recreating cool runnings or meeting Jamaican celebrities".

Born in the southern city of Port Elizabeth, Steenkamp moved to Johannesburg six years ago to pursue her modelling career.

The model, who had been dating the double amputee sprinter, was shot dead inside Pistorius's Pretoria home on Thursday. The pair had been dating since late last year.

On her Twitter profile Steenkamp described herself as a "Law Graduate, Child of God" and, regularly mentioned Pistorius, 26, in her posts, referring to him as her "boo" and "an amazing person".

Please follow Sports Page on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

A former LAPD officer literally waged war on his former employer last week, and days later an Olympic athlete was charged with killing his girlfriend– on Valentine's Day.

High-profile killings like these make you wonder what drives somebody to take another person's life. Some people  think killers are pure evil; others think they're insane.

It turns out the urge to kill is just human nature, evolutionary psychologist David Buss says.

Buss wrote the book "The Murderer Next Door: Why the Mind is Designed to Kill," and he revealed the inspiration for that book last year in a creepy episode of Radiolab.

Buss, who's a psychology professor, went to a party at another professor's house one day and found his friend enraged because his wife had criticized his shirt in front of other people.

"I'm going to kill her," the ordinarily mild-mannered professor friend said through his teeth.

Later that night, Buss' professor friend called him and said he had to get out of house.

"If I don't leave my house right now, I'm going to kill her," the friend said, according to Buss.

This event got Buss thinking about whether regular people fantasize about murder.

A few years later, he surveyed members of an introduction to psychology class about whether they had ever fantasized about murder. He was shocked when the vast majority of his class – roughly 75 percent – said they did have homicidal fantasies.

Buss then surveyed 5,000 people around the world, finding 91 percent of men and 84 percent of women thought about ending somebody else's life. He also analyzed FBI files of more than 400,000 murders.

So, why does the thought of murder enter people's minds so easily? 

"Killing is fundamentally in our nature because over the eons of human evolution murder was so surprisingly beneficial in the intense game of reproductive competition,” Buss told the University of Texas at Austin, where he's a professor.

Men in particular are more likely to kill if they're humiliated, which could hurt their ability to attract a mate, according to Buss. 

For instance, ex-LAPD officer Christopher Dorner was fired from his job as a police officer and honorably discharged from the U.S. Navy just days before his alleged rampage. It's unclear what kind of impression he made on those who knew him.

But in most pictures, he has a huge smile on his face, and a former LAPD captain called Dorner's firing "very, very ugly."

Dorner died during his standoff with authorities, so we'll never know why he killed. Some psychologists believe he was a narcissist. Regardless, it's clear that he seemed totally normal before he murdered people.

"Though we might like to think that murderers are either pathological misfits or hardened criminals who," Buss told UT, "the vast majority of murders are committed by people who until the day they kill, seem perfectly normal."

SEE ALSO: 20 Signs You Are A Psychopath >

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

South African sprinter Oscar Pistorius says he thought his girlfriend was an intruder when he shot her four times through their bathroom door, because he has "been a victim of violence and of burglaries before," according to his defense affidavit published in the London Evening Standard.

The Olympic athlete claims he kept a 9 mm pistol under his bed and pulled it out when he thought someone had climbed in through an open window in his bathroom.

He assumed his girlfriend, model Reeva Steenkamp, was in still in their bed when he shot through their locked bathroom door.  

South African authorities have charged Pistorius with premeditated murder, which means he must show "exceptional circumstances" as to why he should be released on bail, the LA Times reports. 

"We submit it's not even a murder," Pistorius' defense attorney Barry Roux said in court on Tuesday, the Telegraph reports. "There's no concession that it's murder."

Meanwhile, prosecutor Gerrie Nel argues there is no doubt that Pistorius committed a premeditated murder: "The door is closed. There is no doubt. I walk seven metres and I kill. The motive is 'I want to kill'. That's it."

Here's his full affidavit from the Evening Standard:

SEE ALSO: Oscar Pistorius Tells His Story About What Happened The Night He Shot And Killed His Girlfriend

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

TUSTIN, Calif. (AP) — Authorities say a shooting spree through Orange County, Calif., left four people dead, including the shooter, and several others injured.

Orange County sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino said Tuesday the shootings began at 4:45 a.m. when deputies responding to a call found a female shot multiple times in a house in Ladera Ranch.

Three more people were fatally shot in the next 25 minutes after carjackings in Tustin and Santa Ana.

Amormino says the suspect shot himself at an intersection in Tustin.

The motive for the shootings is still unclear and it's also unclear if the victims knew each other or the shooter.

SEE ALSO: Newtown Shooter Adam Lanza Allegedly Wanted To Kill More People Than Norway Mass Murderer Anders Breivik

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Oscar Pistorius accidentally shot a gun in a Johanessburg restaurant in January and tried to get a companion to take the blame for it, police investigator Hilton Botha alleged at the runner's bail hearing today.

Pistorius' lawyer acknowledged that a shot went off, but said there's no evidence that his client pulled the trigger because it went off under the table.

This story first surfaced in the South African paper Beeld on Sunday. 

Boxer Kevin Lerena told the paper that he was at the restaurant with Pistorius when he almost shot him in the foot. Saying (as translated by Yahoo! South Africa):

"I got a huge fright, because the bullet hit the ground just centimeters from my foot... but it really was just a freak accident."

He gave further details to Beeld:

"I must emphasise that the gun belonged to one of Pistorius' friends — I'm not going to mention his name. Oscar just wanted to look at the gun, and it sort of snagged on his pants, releasing the safety catch. A shot went off. I wouldn't call him negligent, it was just an accident. He apologised to me for days afterwards."

The restaurant didn't report it to police.

Pistorius appears to be a gun lover. He took a New York Times reporter to the gun range during a story last year, telling him that he once "tiptoed downstairs" with his 9mm when he thought an intruder was in the house.

He also tweeted this about mistaking his washing machine for an intruder and grabbing his gun:

So while all signs say the restaurant shooting was a total freak accident, it's a reflection of just how comfortable he was using guns.

Please follow Sports Page on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) — The prosecution case against Oscar Pistorius began to unravel Wednesday with revelations of a series of police blunders and the lead investigator's admission that authorities have no evidence challenging the double-amputee Olympian's claim he killed his girlfriend accidentally.

Detective Hilton Botha's often confused testimony left prosecutors rubbing their heads in frustration as he misjudged distances and said testosterone — banned for professional athletes in some cases — was found at the scene, only to be later contradicted by the prosecutor's office.

The second day of what was supposed to be a mere bail hearing almost resembled a full-blown trial for the 26-year-old runner, with his lawyer, Barry Roux, tearing into Botha's testimony step by step during cross examination.

Police, Botha acknowledged, left a 9 mm slug from the barrage that killed Reeva Steenkamp inside a toilet and lost track of illegal ammunition found inside the house. And the detective himself walked through the crime scene without wearing protective shoe covers, potentially contaminating the area.

Authorities, Roux asserted, were selectively taking "every piece of evidence to try to extract the most possibly negative connotation and present it to the court."

The case has riveted South Africa, with journalists and the curious crowding into the brick-walled courtroom where Pistorius, dubbed the Blade Runner for his prosthetic legs, faces a charge of premeditated murder in the Valentine's Day slaying.

Pistorius says he mistook Steenkamp for an intruder and shot her out of fear, while prosecutors say he planned the killing and attacked her as she cowered behind a locked bathroom door.

The day seemed to start out well for the prosecution, with Botha offering new details of the shooting that appeared to call into question Pistorius' account of the moments leading up to the 29-year-old model's death.

Ballistic evidence, he said, showed the bullets that killed her had been fired from a height, supporting the prosecution's assertion that Pistorius was wearing prosthetic legs when he took aim at the bathroom door. The athlete has maintained he was standing only on his stumps, and felt vulnerable and frightened as he opened fire from a low position.

Projecting a diagram of the bedroom and bathroom, prosecutor Gerrie Nel said it showed Pistorius had to walk past his bed to get to the bathroom and could not have done so without seeing that Steenkamp was not asleep there.

"There's no other way of getting there," Nel said in disputing Pistorius' claim that he had no idea Steenkamp was no longer in bed when he pumped four bullets into the bathroom door, striking her with three.

Botha backed the prosecutor up, saying the holster for Pistorius' 9 mm pistol was found under the left side of the bed, where Steenkamp slept, and it would have been impossible for Pistorius to get the gun without checking to see if she was there.

"I believe that he knew that Reeva was in the bathroom and he shot four shots through the door," the detective said.

Botha described how bullets struck Steenkamp in the head and shattered her right arm and hip, eliciting sobs from Pistorius, who held his head in hands.

However, when asked if Steenkamp's body showed "any pattern of defensive wounds" or bruising from an assault, Botha said "no." He again responded "no" when asked if investigators found anything inconsistent with Pistorius' version of events, though he later said nothing contradicted the police version either.

Testimony began with the prosecutor telling the court that before the shooting, a neighbor heard "nonstop" shouting between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. at Pistorius' upscale home in a gated community in the capital, Pretoria.

However, Botha later said under cross examination that the witness was in a house 600 yards (meters) away, possibly out of earshot. He cut that estimate in half when questioned again by the prosecutor, as confusion reigned for much of his testimony.

At one point, Botha told the court that police found syringes and two boxes of testosterone in Pistorius' bedroom — testimony the prosecution later withdrew, saying it was too early to identify the substance, which was still being tested.

"It is not certain (what it is) until the forensics" are completed, Medupe Simasiku, a spokesman for South Africa's National Prosecution Agency, told The Associated Press. It's not clear if it was "a legal or an illegal medication for now."

The defense also disputed the claim. "It is an herbal remedy," Roux said. "It is not ... a banned substance."

Still, Botha offered potentially damaging details about Pistorius' past, saying the athlete was once involved in an accidental shooting at a restaurant in Johannesburg and asked someone else "to take the wrap."

The runner also threatened men on two separate occasions, Botha said, allegedly telling one he'd "break his legs."

The detective said police found two iPhones in Pistorius' bathroom and two BlackBerrys in his bedroom, and none had been used to phone for help. Guards at the gated community did call the athlete, Botha said, and all he said was: "I'm all right," as he wept uncontrollably.

Roux later suggested that a fifth phone, not collected by the police, was used by Pistorius to call for help.

The question now is whether Botha's troubled testimony will be enough to convince Chief Magistrate Desmond Nair to keep Pistorius in prison until trial. While Pistorius faces the harshest bail requirements under South African law, the magistrate has said he would consider loosening them based on testimony in the hearing. Final arguments were scheduled for Thursday.

___

Gerald Imray reported from Johannesburg. Associated Press writer Michelle Faul in Johannesburg contributed to this report.

___

Jon Gambrell can be reached at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP. Gerald Imray can be reached at www.twitter.com/geraldimrayAP.

Please follow Sports Page on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

South African police named its top detective to take over the Oscar Pistorius case Thursday after it emerged the officer who had been leading the investigation faces attempted murder charges.

"We recognise the significance, the importance and the severity of the matter," national police commissioner Riah Phiyeg said as she announced that detective Hilton Botha had been dropped from the case.

Phiyega, commissioner of the South African Police Service (SAPS), said she has assigned lieutenant general Vineshkumar Moonoo, who once worked as a police officer in Soweto under the apartheid regime, to take over from Botha.

"He is the most senior detective in the SAPS environment. This matter will receive attention at the national level," said Phiyega.

Given Moonoo's rank, the move is tantamount to sending an army general to frontline trenches.

The criminal charges against Botha as well as his admission about failings in the Pistorius investigation and contradictory evidence shone an unflattering light on the police force in a country that is ranked one of the most violent in the world.

The force was accused of brutality after the Marikana mine tragedy in August where they shot 34 striking workers in the space of just a few minutes in a crackdown that shocked the world.

The prosecution has accused the star Olympian and Paralympian of premeditated murder over the Valentine's Day killing of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, but Pistorius says he mistook her for an intruder at his luxury Pretoria home and did not intend to kill her.

Moonoo is a career police officer who was described by colleagues in a police blog in 2011 as "vastly experienced as a detective, both as an investigator".

He underwent initial police training in 1981, and according to police service records became a detective in 1984 in Soweto, the cradle of the anti-apartheid movement.

He spent the following 27 years working his way up through the ranks to become head of the detective service.

Moonoo will face a tough task to turn the case around after a series of missteps by the man he replaced.

Botha has to answer seven attempted murder charges for shooting at a minibus taxi in 2011.

Pistorius's lawyers tore into Botha's police work during the bail hearings for Pistorius, forcing him to agree that the Olympian's version of events fitted the crime scene.

Botha conceded he did not wear protective clothing when Pistorius's forensic team visited the athlete's luxury Pretoria home where the killing took place, which may have contaminated the scene.

He was further forced to admit that police had not seen a bullet which was subsequently discovered by the defence forensic team, and witness testimony he submitted was picked apart by Pistorius's lawyer.

"I'm sure it could have been handled better," Botha admitted on the witness stand.

His boss seemed to agree.

"I, as commissioner, am appointing a new team to take the long-haul process," Phiyega said. "And investigating officer Botha is not in the team."

SEE ALSO: Oscar Pistorius Won't Have The Option Of A Jury Trial

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

A New York man was charged Thursday with stabbing his mother, then chopping her into small pieces, prosecutors said.

Bashid McLean, 23, was charged with murder and attempting to cover up the crime by hiding his mother's body parts.

The remains of the woman, Tanya Byrd, were discovered near Yankee Stadium in the Bronx on Tuesday when they were sniffed out by a dog being taken for a walk.

There were "several body parts -- torso, head, legs, hands, feet," a police spokesman said.

Prosecutors also charged a second man with helping McLean to conceal the body parts after the murder. Police say the crimes took place between Sunday and Monday.

Officials have not yet publicly given a motive for the killing, but New York newspaper reports quoted sources as saying McLean had mental problems, was aggressive and had been in trouble with the law before.

The Daily News quoted Byrd's sister as saying that McLean held a grudge over being put into foster care while his mother fought a drug problem. The New York Post reported that McLean had been photographed posing with his mother's severed head.

SEE ALSO: Slain Girlfriend Spent The Night With Oscar Pistorius Because She Was 'Too Tired' To Drive Home

Please follow Law & Order on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »