Nation in brief: Terrorism case against pair grows
Chicago – Two Chicago men were indicted Thursday on charges they planned a violent attack on a Danish newspaper and helped lay the groundwork for the November 2008 terrorist rampage that killed 166 people in the Indian city of Mumbai.
Businessman Tahawwur Rana and his associate David Coleman Headley already had been charged with assistance to terrorism but the 12-count indictment expanded allegations against Rana to include the Mumbai attacks.
Retired Pakistani military officer Abdur Rehman Hashim Syed and reputed terrorist leader Ilyas Kashmiri also were charged in the new indictment.
Officials say the defendants were linked to the terrorist organization Lashkar-e-Taiba, which has long been involved in violent conflict with India over the disputed Kashmir territory. The Indian government has blamed the group for the Mumbai attacks.
Boy, 10, apologizes for two killings
St. Johns, Ariz. – A 10-year-old boy who pleaded guilty to fatally shooting his father’s friend in November 2008 apologized Thursday for hurting the man’s family and was ordered to a residential treatment program.
“He’s sorry,” said Ron Wood, who represented the St. Johns boy and addressed the court on his behalf. “He’s sorry that he hurt the Romans family, he’s sorry he hurt his own family, and he’s sorry he killed his dad.”
Defense attorneys and prosecutors had pushed for the boy to be placed in a private treatment facility in Maricopa County, but Judge Monica Stauffer also had the option of sending him to a county juvenile detention facility.
The boy left the Apache County courthouse with his mother and is expected to report to the treatment facility in a couple of weeks, where he will stay for an undetermined amount of time. The boy was 8 when he was charged with two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of his father, 29-year-old Vincent Romero, and his father’s friend, 39-year-old Timothy Romans. He pleaded guilty to shooting Romans and the charges related to his father’s death were dropped as part of a plea deal.
A motive never has been made clear, although the boy told investigators he kept a tally of spankings.