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Teen breaks silence over harrowing upbringing among family she believed was her own

Two weeks ago the horrific story of a girl who was trafficked to Britain for a life of domestic slavery at the age of five came to light.

Speaking exclusively to Mail Online the girl, now 18, gives a heart-rending account of her lonely violence-fuelled upbringing in the North London home where she lived as a prisoner and was forced to endure almost daily beatings.

She was so young when she was brought from Nigeria to the UK that she was convinced the couple who set her to work in their house were her parents.

The extraordinary ordeal suffered by the girl, known in court as ‘Y’, emerged during a hearing to decide whether she should have been entitled to benefits and support when she finally escaped her life of slavery.

*Names have been changed
I was born in Nigeria. I don’t know where – I can’t remember and nobody told me. I can’t remember anything about life in Nigeria. I don’t know who my parents are or whether I have any brothers or sisters. No one has ever told me about my family. I only know my date of birth because I found it written down in the house where I grew up in England.

The first things I remember all happened in the United Kingdom. I lived with a family in London. The family was made up of a woman, her husband, their daughter and their son. There was also a boy who I believe was a cousin of the mother. He didn’t live with us the whole time, but he did live in the family for long periods of time.

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A schoolboy has described how he was urged to look at the face of murdered teenager Rebecca Aylward by his best friend, who is accused of killing her.

The boy told Swansea Crown Court he was taken into woods near Bridgend by his friend to see her body.

Rebecca, 15, of Maesteg, was found dead in the woods in Aberkenfig last year.

The 16-year-old accused, Rebecca’s ex-boyfriend, denies murder, and claims the friend who was with him in the woods is guilty. The case continues.

The teenager on trial is accused of battering Rebecca to death with a rock. After the two boys met the accused is said to have urged his friend: “Look at her face”.

Neither boy can be named.

The court heard that Rebecca, of Maesteg, in Bridgend county, was murdered after going to meet her ex-boyfriend in the hope of rekindling their relationship.

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A private education tutor accused of 45 sex crimes against children has been found hanged in his prison cell.

Steven Heatman, 50, was found by HMP Liverpool guards at 5.15am on Saturday. Prison staff tried to administer first aid but he was pronounced dead by paramedics.

Police today said the investigation into Heatman’s alleged crimes had closed with his death. His alleged victims have all been told and are being offered support.

Heatman, a partner in Maghull-based Tuition Express and a private tutor for more than 25 years, was arrested and charged with three counts of engaging in sexual activity with a child earlier this month.

He appeared at South Sefton Magistrates’ Court and was bailed.

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She is the mother of fourteen children, who gave birth to the longest surviving octuplets in U.S history.

But in disturbing comments sure to alarm social services, Octomom’s Nadya Suleman has said she ‘hates’ her eight babies.

The 36-year-old single mother also calls her six older children ‘animals’.

‘I hate the babies, they disgust me,’ she told InTouch magazine. ‘My older six are animals, getting more and more out of control, because I have no time to properly discipline them.’

In a picture taken by the magazine, one child is seen eating dry-wall in her run-down home.

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Boy, 17, lucky to be alive after crossbow fires bolt into his face in freak accident

A teenage boy is lucky to be alive after accidentally being shot in the face with an eight-inch crossbow bolt.

Lewis Tavernier, 17, had taken his crossbow to a friend’s house in Stevenage, Hertfordshire, and put the safety catch on before carefully placing it on a nearby desk.

But as the pair chatted, the weapon suddenly and inexplicably discharged and fired into the teenager’s face from less than three feet away – leaving it buried three inches deep into his right cheek.

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A 15-year-old boy and a man have pled guilty to killing a young mother during a gang attack in West Lothian.

The teenager, who can’t be named for legal reasons, and George Stewart, 34, admitted the culpable homicide of Nattalie Muir, 21, in Whitburn.

They are due to be sentenced at the High Court in Glasgow on 23 August.

Emma Merrilees, 20, has already admitted murdering Ms Muir, from Bathgate, by stabbing her in the heart on 11 December 2010.

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Key agencies involved in child protection have failed to put in place “basic processes” to stop sexual abuse, a report has found.

A study by the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (Ceop) found two-thirds of Local Safeguarding Children Boards are not meeting national guidelines.

Ceop head Peter Davies said he was “shocked, surprised and disappointed” at the lack of action.

Mr Davies said of some Local Safeguarding Children Boards (LSCBs): “They do not appear to have set up the basic processes that are expected in the national guidelines to tackle child sexual exploitation.”

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A drunk teenager plunges 20-foot off an escalator in the United States after pitching over handrail.

Shane O’Malley, 18, climbed on to the handrail of an escalator at an underground station in Cambridge, Massachusetts before losing his balance moments from the top.
CCTV footage captured the moment the teenager plunged 20 feet to the concrete floor below. The boy can be seen lying motionless as friends gather around him.
Mr O’Malley was taken to a nearby hospital but remarkably only required treatment for a fractured elbow, according to his family.
The teenager has admitted to drinking but told police he could not remember exactly what happened.

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What happened when an exhausted mum invited a parenting guru to move in

By SHONA SIBARY

As I walked down the aisle on my wedding day, full of hope for the future with the man I loved, I had no idea we would one day be engaged in daily slanging matches about the thing we hold dearest to our hearts.

Back then, I felt sure we were compatible. After all, we both enjoyed skiing, country weekends away and Chinese food — admittedly not fundamentals in terms of marital bliss, but at least that gave us some common ground.

In the early days, we barely argued. Now I know this is because our lives were so uncomplicated then that there just wasn’t that much to disagree over.

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Plans to tackle the problem of children being groomed for sex in the UK are to be published.

The findings of the six-month inquiry by the Child Exploitation and Online Protection (Ceop) centre into localised grooming will be released along with recommendations for the future.

Last week it emerged that more than 2,000 young victims of grooming have been identified since January 2008, but the problem is a “hidden issue” and likely to be seriously underestimated by police, social services and charities.

Peter Davies, Ceop’s chief executive, launched the investigation after former home secretary Jack Straw accused some Pakistani men in Britain of seeing white girls as “easy meat” for sexual abuse.

Last week, reports said the inquiry found that one in five perpetrators of grooming were of Asian origin, but the problem cannot be pinned on a particular ethnic group.

Children who go missing or run away were found to be particularly vulnerable to grooming.

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How your teenage daughter dictates the family spending

By STEVE DOUGHTY

It may not be news to parents of teenage girls but researchers confirmed it yesterday: no-one can stop their 16-year-old daughter from deciding how the family spends its money.

The willpower and determination of teenage girls gives them a big say in how a family’s spending money goes on everything from food and meals out to mobile phones and, of course, clothes.

Teenage boys do not show up at all in the analysis that tried to trace the influence of young people on household spending.

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Q We are thinking of buying a property to let to students, one of which would be our daughter.

Q We are thinking of buying a property to let to students, one of which would be our daughter. Can we let her live rent free, because if we had to give her money so she could pay the rent our own money would effectively be classed as income. What is the most tax efficient way to deal with this while not incurring the interest of the tax man? AG

A Yes, you can let your daughter live rent free, but there are tax implications. Allowing her to not pay rent but, presumably, charging the other inhabitants would mean you would be receiving below-market rent for the property. In the eyes of HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) this would come under the heading of property let uncommercially, which affects the expenses you can deduct from the rental income.

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A book to help teenagers spot when a friend is being forced to marry against their will is to be launched tomorrow in Parliament.

By Martin Bentham, Home Affairs Editor

Written by London magistrate Aneeta Prem, it tells the fictional story of an Indian girl who is pressed by her family into marriage.

The aim is to enable classmates and friends – who are often the most likely to identify victims’ problems – to seek help and tip off the authorities before the weddings can go ahead.

Forcing a person to marry is illegal and can result in charges ranging from kidnap to blackmail and harassment. A 24-hour helpline, offering advice and assistance to victims and their friends, will also be launched at the same time in a joint move intended to save dozens of young women and men each year being forced into marriage.

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Two teenage girls are being hunted by police for violent muggings.

By Justin Davenport, Crime Editor

The girls, who were with three youths, were caught on CCTV attacking three men at Aldgate bus station in the City.

The gang tried to snatch two iPhones and turned violent when their victims resisted. Police say the girls are clearly seen as the first suspects to approach two victims and demand their phones.

Detectives today appealed for the public’s help in identifying the suspects in the attacks, which took place early on Saturday 14 May.

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School’s warning to girl, 15, for copying singer’s bright-red hairdo

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER

A schoolgirl who dyed her hair bright red to emulate the pop star Rihanna was told to turn round and go back home to wash it out.

Millie Foley had turned up for lessons at All Saints High School in Kirkby, Merseyside, with the new hairdo.

When she refused, her parents were also called in for a meeting with the headteacher to discuss the colouring of the 15-year-old’s hair.

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Boy, 13, knocked unconscious after being hit by giant sea creature’s tail

By RICHARD SHEARS

When 13-year-old Drew Hall set out on a fishing boat with his parents he didn’t expect to end up in hospital after being knocked unconscious – by a whale’s tail.

The family had set out in their small from Brooms Head, in northern New South Wales, and spent a short time watching whales further out to sea blowing air from their blowholes.

As they cruised along looking for a better fishing spot a whale’s tail suddenly emerged from the water and swept along the top of the boat from bow to stern.

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Mother and sister survives after leaping to safety

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER

A six-year-old boy died in a house fire after being too scared to jump to safety.

Onlookers last saw Aiden Owens screaming from a bedroom window before the floors collapsed underneath him at his end-terrace home in Milton, near Invergordon, in the Scottish Highlands.

Despite neighbours throwing a mattress to the ground outside the window, the boy would not jump to safety after being trapped upstairs.

Firefighters recovered his body from the kitchen below the bedroom, while his mother and 11-year-old sister managed to escape the huge blaze.

Aiden’s sister Chloe had escaped the fire from a first floor window at the back of the house following the fire which started at 2.30am on Sunday mornin.

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Disney-Pixar’s latest animation caper looks critic-proof as box office sales overtake those of its rivals

By Jeremy Kay Monday

That’s a clean bill of 12 No 1 launches for Pixar, the animation hit factory whose Cars 2 was way too strong for the US competition over the weekend. The estimated $68m debut was above Disney’s projections, which themselves may have been influenced by the lukewarm reviews. Yes that’s right: a Pixar movie actually elicited a less-than-rapturous response from the critics. Mainstream audiences could not care less what critics think, however, and I reckon Cars 2, which was also the top film in the international arena, should prove itself to be critic-proof.

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The teenager accused of a cyber attack on the UK’s Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) website won bail this afternoon after an impassioned plea from his mother.

By Paul Cheston, Courts Correspondent

Rita Cleary described her son Ryan, 19, as “my life”, adding, “I’m aware that I’m his best friend as well as his mother because he is so reclusive.”

Cleary had been granted conditional bail on Saturday but Crown prosecutors appealed and he has remained in custody pending today’s hearing.

At Southwark Crown Court the judge Nicholas Lorraine-Smith agreed bail but added new conditions of a 9pm to 7am curfew and an electronic tag.

The judge renewed the original bail conditions that Cleary remains at home in Wickford, Essex, and all equipment which could enable him to access the internet be stripped out of the house

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New research shows that children who are slapped or yelled at by their parents are more likely to bully their brothers or sisters – and middle children are most likely to be the bullies.

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER

One shocking statistic to come from the research is that half of all the children studied said they had experienced bullying in their own home.

But, unlike bullying at school, there was no link with whether the family was poor or wealthy, badly or well-educated. Bullying was purely linked to the behaviour of the parents.

And despite widespread belief that the oldest child was usually the culprit for bullying younger siblings, the survey found that middle children were in fact more likely to bully.

The sample of 2,146 young people aged 11 to 15, found that among children who had been slapped, 42 per cent admitted bullying their siblings, while only 32 per cent of children who had not been hit had done so

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A 14-year-old girl tragically died at a sailing camp after her boat capsized and she got tangled beneath it.

By PAUL BENTLEY

Olivia Constants was wearing a trapeze harness when she got caught and held under the boat on the Severn River in Annapolis, Maryland, on Thursday, investigators said.

The awful accident happened as students practised manoeuvring their sailing boats near the local U.S. Naval Academy.

Sailors use trapeze harnesses to use their body weight to lean out over the water as the wind pushes the boat the other way to stop it from tipping over.

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A 13-year-old boy has been charged with murdering 34-year-old nursery worker Dawn McKenzie in Hamilton, Lanarkshire.

By Alastair Jamieson

The woman died from stab wounds at her home in Deveron Crescent on Friday at around 8pm.
Neighbours rushed to the family home after hearing a ”commotion” and administered first aid to Mrs McKenzie, who is married to Bryan.
However, she died later at Hairmyres Hospital, East Kilbride, Lanarkshire.

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A 13-year-old boy has been detained by police following the death of a woman who was injured at a house.

Strathclyde Police were called to an address in Devaron Crescent in Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, at around 8pm on Friday, where they found a 37-year-old woman seriously injured

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A teenager accused of carrying out a hacking attack against the website of the UK’s Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) has been diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, a form of autism, since his arrest, a court has heard.

Ryan Cleary, 19, of South Beech Avenue, Wickford, Essex, was granted bail but prosecutors immediately objected, meaning that he will remain in custody until Monday when an appeal will be heard.

The case draws parallels with that of Gary McKinnon, who also has Asperger’s, and is fighting extradition to America over allegations of hacking into US military computers. He admits breaking into systems including those of Nasa and the Pentagon but says he was seeking UFO evidence.

District judge Nicholas Evans, sitting at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court, heard that Cleary’s condition was diagnosed by a psychologist

Source: London Evening Standard>> Read full article and comment

A teenager accused of carrying out a hacking attack against the website of the UK’s Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) is due to appear in court.

Ryan Cleary, 19, from Wickford, Essex, is also accused of launching attacks on the websites of music bodies the British Phonographic Industry and the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.

He will appear from custody at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court for the second time in three days.

On Thursday he was remanded in police custody to be detained at London’s Charing Cross police station for further questioning. He did not enter any plea to five offences under the Criminal Law and Computer Misuse Act.

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Fourteen separate child protection agencies and council departments missed opportunities to save the life of a three-year-old boy who was beaten to death by his carers, a report has found.

Council departments, care agencies, probation services, police and NHS Trusts failed to prevent the death of Ryan Lovell-Hancox who was mercilessly tortured and then murdered.

The youngster received 70 separate injuries at the hands of his mother’s cousin, Kayley Boleyn, and her boyfriend, Christopher Taylor.

He collapsed and died on Christmas Eve 2008 after a final blow led to a severe brain injury.

Hours before Ryan died, a care worker visited the flat and even heard him moaning under bedcovers, but presumed he was just waking up when in fact, he was lying in agony.

A report published by Wolverhampton Safeguarding Children Board yesterday found that several agencies had failed to effectively intervene to help Ryan and that there was “no evidence of effective communication or liaison” between them.

Police had lost records of a previous incident where Boleyn had been accused of assaulting a child, whilst Taylor’s addiction to drink and drugs had not been flagged up by the probation service.

Taylor even visited a probation officer with Ryan, but despite being declared a ‘medium risk’ to children, details had been ‘lost’ in the transfer of data to a new computer system the previous year. If it had been highlighted, it could have resulted in the authorities taking Ryan off them.

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Temporary classrooms may have to be built in outer London schools to cope with thousands of children forced to leave the city centre because of housing benefit cuts.

By Nicholas Cecil, Chief Political Correspondent

The Government has admitted that schools in outer London may also have to expand permanently with the population shift.

Schools in Westminster and other central London boroughs could find themselves with surplus places, especially in areas such as Maida Vale where nearly half of primary school age pupils may have to move.

Shadow work and pensions minister Karen Buck, MP for Westminster North, said: “Not only will this cause huge disruption to thousands of families, it will increase pressure on school places in outer London and risks leaving schools in inner London struggling with a rapid loss of pupils and even of the grant funding which follows the student.”

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The teenager accused of hacking into the CIA and Britain’s Serious and Organised Crime Agency was appearing in court today.

By Justin Davenport and Oliver Poole

Ryan Cleary, 19, attended Westminster magistrates’ court where he faced five charges relating to computer offences.

Cleary was arrested at his family’s home in Wickford, Essex, on Monday night as part of a joint Scotland Yard and FBI probe into LulzSec, a group which has claimed responsibility for hacking attempts on Soca, the US Senate and the CIA.

He is accused of launching a distributed denial-of-service attack on Soca’s website on 20 June.
The teenager is also alleged to have carried out similar attacks against the British Phonographic Industry’s website in October last year and the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s website in November last year

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A teenager has been charged with trespassing on the railway after a picture was posted on the internet of him apparently ‘planking’ on train tracks

By DAMIEN GAYLE

The photo of a teenager lying across railway tracks at an unknown location appeared on a planking fan page on Facebook.

The shot of the youngster with his head on one rail and his feet on the other is one of hundreds which have featured on the group’s page. Now a 14-year-old boy is set to appear at York Youth Court on July 5 in connection with the photo, according to a spokesman for the British Transport Police.

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Cutting the pastry into shapes for these biscuits gave Coco hours of fun when she was very young.

By Anna Del Conte

When Coco was very young I made the pastry, rolled it out and then put it in front of her with all the different-shaped cutters we had: dogs, pigs, elephants, stars, hearts – whatever. She was in heaven for an hour or so, while I could get on with cooking something else knowing that she was occupied and happy. For the flavouring you can use the grated rind of a lemon, or half a teaspoon of vanilla extract, ground cinnamon or ground ginger; whatever your Coco prefers. My Coco always chose vanilla, while I tried to persuade her that lemon was better, simply because I prefer it.

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Fourteen agencies missed opportunities to save a three-year-old boy who was killed by a couple who were meant to be caring for him, a report has found.

Ryan Lovell-Hancox died on 24 December 2008 from a brain injury he received at Christopher Taylor and Kayley Boleyn’s home in Bilston, near Wolverhampton.

They were jailed for murder and child cruelty in July 2010.

A serious case review by Wolverhampton Safeguarding Children Board said staff may have been “overburdened”.

Ryan received more than 70 injuries from the defendants who blamed each other for his death.

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A British teenager was today charged with carrying out a hacking attack against the website of the UK’s Serious Organised Crime Agency.

Ryan Cleary, 19, is also accused of launching attacks on the websites of music bodies the British Phonographic Industry and the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.

He will appear in custody at City of Westminster Magistrates Court tomorrow charged with a total of five offences under the Criminal Law and Computer Misuse Acts, Scotland Yard said.

Cleary, was arrested at his family’s home in South Beech Avenue, Wickford, Essex, yesterday as part of a Scotland Yard and FBI probe into LulzSec, a group which has claimed responsibility for hacking attempts on the Serious Organised Crime Agency, the US Senate and the CIA.

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Police give chase to boy in pyjamas who reached 50mph in car taken from his mother’s house

A barefoot seven-year-old boy wearing pyjamas hit speeds of 50mph while driving a car for 20 miles before Michigan police eventually forced him to stop.

The boy was stopped in a 55mph zone in Caseville Township only after two police cars gave chase and forced him to slow down. He had set off from his mother’s house in the Pontiac Sunfire with the intention of driving to his father’s house 15 miles away.

“He was crying and just kept saying he wanted to go to his dad’s,” said the Caseville police chief, Jamie Learman.

Police began looking for the car at 10.15am

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A Labour MP has called for a ban on adults smoking in cars where children are present, saying it would bring “tremendous” health benefits.

Alex Cunningham said children were particularly vulnerable to the effects of passive smoking and could not “remove” themselves from cars where cigarette smoke was circulating.

Parents simply exercising restraint was “not good enough”, he told MPs.

But one Tory MP called the plan “over the top” and “ludicrous”.

Mr Cunningham said the “science was clear” about the dangers of passive smoking and that societal attitudes had changed on the issue in the past decade – reflected by the ban on smoking in public transport, planes and taxis.

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A teenager has been charged over the death of a kitten which he allegedly drop-kicked ‘like a rugby ball’ – a distance of 40ft.

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER

The 16-year-old is accused of causing criminal damage to the four-month-old black kitten.

Devastated owner Julie Duke, 45, said her daughter Tia, seven, had been in floods of tears since the incident.

She told how a horrified neighbour saw a teenage boy handling the beloved pet, called Tasmin, before he apparently took a running punt and booted her into the air.

The neighbour then alerted Julie who then found the stricken animal lying in a crumpled heap in the gutter.

Little Tia of Plymouth, Devon, said: ‘I know that Tasmin is dead and it’s too late for her but I just want these people to be caught so they won’t do it to any other animals.’

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Officials criticised breastfeeding on demand by mother of child who was taken into care

By Giles Tremlett in Madrid

Childcare experts are backing an international campaign to reunite a woman with her child after the infant was removed by Spanish authorities concerned about her “chaotic” breastfeeding patterns.

Madrid’s social services department insisted there were more serious reasons for taking the 15-month-old girl into care, but an official report criticises the mother’s habit of breastfeeding on demand and letting the child sleep in bed with her.

“She uses breastfeeding as a pacifier and a toy , offering her breast any time the girl cries and letting her take it anywhere, no matter the time and context,” says an edited version of the report produced by supporters of the 21-year-old mother, known as Habiba.

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Almost half of teenagers are less likely to apply to university because of the tuition fee increase, with many considering other education options, a poll suggests

Nearly a third of those questioned (29 per cent) are looking at training such as vocational qualifications (VQ) or apprenticeships, rather than a degree, according to a survey by City & Guilds.

One in four (24 per cent) plan to go straight into a job, with 16 per cent looking for an internship or work experience and 16 per cent considering a gap year.

The poll, released to mark VQ Day, questioned more than 1,000 14-19 year olds about their attitudes to qualifications and university.

The findings show that 49 per cent will be less likely to apply for degree courses because of the Government’s plans to raise tuition fees to a maximum of £9,000 from next year.

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A teenage girl who was desperate for a cure for her sweaty palms has ended up with frozen thumbs after having Botox injections in her hands.

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER

The 17-year-old was left unable to send texts on her mobile phone according to doctors, who outlined her case in the Archives of Dermatology.

She sought help after suffering for years with primary focal hyperhidrosis – a condition that causes excessively sweaty palms.

The first line of treatment is a strong anti-perspirant called Drysol.

However, the teenager saw no improvement in her condition after applying it to her skin every night for three months.

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Critics warn constant surveillance is a ‘step too far’

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER

It’s maybe more ‘Big Mother’ than ‘Big Brother’.

A nursery school is believed to be the first in the country to install internet-linked CCTV cameras to allow parents to keep an eye on their little ones.

Seven cameras at the Bright Futures Day Nursery in Clitheroe, Lancashire, will stream real-time moving pictures from playrooms and the garden. The video streams will be encrypted, protected by ‘multi-layered security measures’ and can only be accessed by parents with the correct passwords.

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Police question 19-year-old Ryan Cleary over claimed wave of attacks hitting Soca, the US Senate, the CIA, Nintendo and Sony

By Vikram Dodd and Josh Halliday

The international hunt for hackers believed to have staged high-profile attacks on websites ranging from law enforcement bodies to Sony has led to the arrest of a teenager based in Essex, police say.

The hackers known as LulzSec claim to have been behind attacks on websites around the world, including the UK’s Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca), the US Senate and the CIA, as well as the games firms Nintendo and Sony.

British police said intelligence led them to arrest the 19-year-old at a home in Wickford, Essex, over the distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

The teenager is Ryan Cleary, who lived at his family home. Investigators believe the arrest is significant and linked to the attacks based mainly at websites belonging to US institutions and organisations.

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Myleene Klass has got no time for the best-selling parenting author Gina Ford.

By Tim Walker. Edited by Claire Fox

Myleene Klass, the normally refined M&S model and presenter, has a bone to pick with Gina Ford, the author of the best-selling Contented Little Baby Book. “Since having my babies I’ve stopped listening to everybody because how the hell does anyone else know what’s good for my family?” asks Klass, 33.
“B—– Gina Ford, who the —- asked you? You with no babies,” she rants in an interview in new! magazine.

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An eight-year-old Pakistani girl was kidnapped by Islamist militants who forced her to wear a suicide vest to attack security forces, police said yesterday.

By Michael Georgy, Reuters

Police produced the girl, identified as Sohana Javaid, before a news conference broadcast on Pakistani television channels. The girl recalled how she was kidnapped from her hometown of Peshawar and brought to the Lower Dir district in the northwest.

“There were two men and two women sitting in a car. They kidnapped me,” she told reporters in Dir.

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A 15-year-old boy has been suspended from school for wearing a dress and high heels to class – after his mother bet him he couldn’t cope with wearing stilettos all day.

By By FIONA ROBERTS

Sam Saurs was summoned to the dean’s office because his outfit – a floaty black-and-white polka dot dress, make-up and a pair of patent high heels – was ‘distracting the other students.’

He was told he would miss the rest of the school year as well as the ninth-grade dance at John Sedwick Junior High in Port Orchard, Washington.

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A lucky three-year-old boy had a miraculous escape after he fell from a eighth floor balcony and became trapped in the building’s air-conditioning unit.

By Daily Mail Reporter

The toddler, who has not been named, had been left home alone in the apartment in Beijing, China, before he fell.

Neighbours, who heard him screaming in terror, called the police for help. But when they noticed he was starting to slip they decided to take the matter into their own hands.

Source: DAILYMAIL

Looking slightly terrified and bowing her head in shame, one slender, young girl hesitated before announcing to waiting media that she was a ‘hit woman.’

By Daily Mail Reporter

Maria Celeste Mendoza is only 16, but was among 10 suspected gang members, including three other teen girls and two young women, arrested this week by police after a shootout with authorities in central Mexico.

Sadly she is one of the growing ranks of young people working for the country’s drug cartels. With her face hidden, the girl from the northern border state of Tamaulipas, described how she had been trained to use Kalashnikov assault rifles and other weapons by the Zetas, one of Mexico’s most brutal gangs.

In a listless drawl, Mendoza said she was paid 12,000 pesos ($1,000) for two weeks’ work, more than three times the national average.

Source: DAILYMAIL

One half of the only twins in the world where one is a primordial dwarf

By Rachel Quigley

They say good things come in small packages, and you don’t need to tell that to the Bernal family.

Sienna ‘Sinny’ Bernal entered the world – as twins do – with her sister in December 1999.

But unlike most twins, Sinny, from Houston, weighed just over a pound and fit neatly into the palm of her mother’s hand while her sister Sierra was almost normal size – at least for a baby born three months premature.

Source: DAILYMAIL

Children’s gear left in cars overnight offers rich pickings

By Jo Thornhill

Parents and grandparents are being warned not to leave expensive baby equipment in their cars overnight because of the risk of theft.

As the cost of pushchairs, car seats and cots has soared, thieves are increasingly targeting such items. And they are apparently easy pickings. The ‘top five’ items left in cars overnightare pushchairs, toys, books, coats and travel cots, according to insurer Allianz.

Its research found that some parents regularly leave baby gear worth up to £500 unattended in their vehicles.

Source: DAILYMAIL

Mickaël Barzalona is already smiling when the question arrives. Two weeks on from his historic triumph in the Derby aboard Pour Moi, did he now feel sorry about his already enshrined moment of premature jockey elation? “Non!”, he laughs, his cherubic face betraying surprise that you are even bothering to ask. Ah, the Piaf of the saddle. The boy regrets nothing.

By Ian Chadband

We are sitting outside the weighing room where racing’s new superstar sparrow, in his suit, pink tie and name badge, could pass as a fifth form French exchange student enjoying a school day out to Ascot as he enthuses about his first taste of the Royal meeting being “magnifique”.

He looks so tiny and youthful, you almost have to pinch yourself that this really was the man who at Epsom wrote one of racing’s most fantastic tales, swooping with exquisite timing from last to first on Pour Moi and being so intoxicated by what he now thinks of as his “perfect race” that he was already standing bolt upright in the stirrups, whip hand thrust heavenwards, yards before victory seemed assured.

Source: TELEGRAPH

Our son and his girlfriend are going to different universities. We would like to give her a gift but don’t know what

Every week a Guardian Money reader submits a question, and it’s up to you to help him or her out – a selection of the best answers will appear in next Saturday’s paper.

Source: GUARDIAN

* Doctors discover he’s breathing well enough not to need a transplant

By Claire Bates

When two-year-old Owen Stark was airlifted to hospital suffering from heart and lung failure doctors knew they had almost no hope of saving him.

The youngster was suffering from idiopathic pulmonary hypertension – or high blood pressure in the lungs – a disease almost unheard of in children. His parents Tonya and Justin, a construction company owner, could only watch as doctors at at St Louis Children’s Hospital fought to keep him alive.

‘I believe he flat-lined several times when he first got there,’ Mr Stark said.

‘It’s the worst experience I could ever imagine going through.’

Source: TELEGRAPH