Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Head of Colorado's Prisons Assassinated

Fifty-eight year old Tom Clements, the Executive Director of the Colorado Department of Corrections was assassinated, Tuesday night.

According to a 911 call, he said he had been shot after answering his door bell.

When El Paso County Sheriff Deputies arrived, at his Monument home, they found he had died from his wound.

Police described the home as secluded, and that there was no sign of a robbery attempt.

Due to this they believe that it was a purposeful targeting of Clements.

A neighbor witnessed a "two door, boxy vehicle" near the property, before the time of the shooting and then leaving afterwards.

At this time, police have no suspects, but the investigation is going off of what leads they have.

Hickenlooper Signs Gun Bill Laws

Colorado's Governor Hickenlooper signed into law two controversial gun bills, on Wednesday.

One of the new laws guns can not hold more than fifteen rounds of ammunition.

The other requires background checks for online gun sales and private transactions.

They will go into effect in July.

His signatures come just days after the US Senate gave up on an attempt to put further restrictions on guns.

Opponents of the bills state their unconstitutional nature.

Several county sheriffs have state that they will not enforce the laws.

Challenges against the bills are already being planned for the 2014 Colorado elections.

Police Attempt to Raid Home Over Picture of 11 Year Old With Rifle

A picture of an eleven year old holding a rifle led to an attempted raid by New Jersey Police and child welfare services.

Josh Moore received the rifle for his birthday and took pictures holding it.

When one of the pictures ended up on Facebook, someone called the state's child services.

They showed up at the family's door with police, demanding to enter and see the family's guns.

Shawn Moore, Josh's father, called his lawyer and put him on speaker phone, so that lawyer could act as a witness and interact during the situation.

As police had no warrant, they eventually gave up on their attempts.

The family regularly hunts and Josh has been trained how to correctly handle rifles, since he was five.

Volkswagen Recalling 384,181 Vehicles From China

Volkswagen has announced a recall of nearly four hundred thousand vehicles from China.

The recall was announced due to a problem where the car loses power.

An issue with the gearshift box causes the power loss, but does not cause control difficulties.

China is Volkswagen's largest market, but they hope that the recall will not hurt their sales.

Greeks Demand Their Government Follow The Lead of Cyprus

Greeks protested in the streets on Wednesday, demanding that their government say no to the EU, just as Cyprus did on Tuesday.

Cyprus' government rejected EU terms and then turned to Russia asking for better ones, to avoid strict austerity measures.

However, it is unclear if Greece could gain favor with Russia, as Russia does not have the same level of investment in Greece that they do in Cyprus.

Violent protests have become a regular occurrence in Greece as the country struggles with extremely unpopular austerity measures, put in place by the government.

Austerity measures were added as conditions which Greece needed to meet to gain bailouts from the European Union.

Greece's economy has been in desperate straits for quite awhile now, leading to one of the highest unemployment rates in the world.

The government hopes that the bailouts will see them eventually able to recover, without a complete collapses.

Cyprus Rejects EU Turns to Russia

Cyprus shook things up on Tuesday when they rejected a bailout offer from the European Union.

They then doubled the shake up when they turned to Russia, and asked them for help.

Russia is expected to meet the Cypriot terms, as many Russians have investments in the island nation's economy.

The EU responded to the switch, by threatening to pull out their current financial aids to the troubled country.

Banks in Cyprus have been closed all week, and will remain so til next week, while the country tries to prevent a threatened run on the banks.

The closure and uncertain economic future is only increasing the difficulties that are faced.