Frenzied crowds greet Pope Francis in Brazil
RIO DE JANEIRO – Frenzied crowds of Roman Catholics mobbed the car carrying Pope Francis on Monday when he returned to his home continent for the first time as pontiff, embarking on a seven-day visit meant to fan the fervor of the faithful around the globe.
During the pope’s first minutes in Brazil, ecstatic believers forced the closed Fiat to stop several times as they swarmed around during the drive from the airport to an official opening ceremony in Rio’s center. A few security guards struggled mightily to push the crowd back in scenes that at times looked alarming.
Francis, however, looked calm. He rolled down the window on the back passenger-side of the car where he was sitting, waving to the crowd and touching those who reached inside. At one point, a woman handed the pontiff a dark-haired baby, whom he kissed before handing it back.
After finally making it past crowds and blocked traffic, Francis switched to an open-air popemobile as he toured around the main streets in downtown Rio through mobs of people who screamed wildly as he waved and smiled. Many in the crowd looked stunned, with some standing still and others sobbing loudly.
Idaclea Rangel, a 73-year-old Catholic, was pressed up against a wall and choking out words through her tears. “I can’t travel to Rome, but he came here to make my country better ... and to deepen our faith,” she said.
Netanyahu fast-tracking peace-referendum bill
JERUSALEM – Israel’s premier announced Monday he is fast-tracking legislation that would allow him to put any peace deal with the Palestinians to a national referendum – an apparent attempt to silence hard-liners in his party and coalition government.
Benjamin Netanyahu spoke three days after U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said progress has been made toward a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, stalled for five years.
Kerry has invited Israeli and Palestinian negotiators to Washington for preliminary talks, though wide gaps remain on the framework of the actual negotiations.
Netanyahu said Monday that a referendum is necessary to prevent a rift in Israeli society.
Cleveland sees 3rd case of missing women
EAST CLEVELAND, Ohio – The soul-searching has begun in and around Cleveland – again – as the chilling details emerge from the latest missing-women case to send a shiver through the metropolitan area.
A registered sex offender was charged Monday with murder and kidnapping in the slayings of three women whose bodies were found in plastic trash bags in a run-down East Cleveland neighborhood. It is the third major case in four years of multiple killings or abductions to haunt the Rust Belt metropolis.
“I do think we have to ask ourselves as a community the larger question: Why here, and what can we do to better understand the conditions that fostered this savage behavior?” said Dennis Eckert, a political and urban-policy consultant and former Cleveland-area congressman.
Some civic leaders say the explanation lies in the disintegration of neighborhoods and people’s connections to one another, plus a general mistrust of police – conditions that make it easier for a predator to kill without others noticing anything or reporting their suspicions.
Cleveland was a robust steel town for generations but has struggled for decades, ever since manufacturing went into a decline in the 1970s. Today, it regularly ranks among the poorest big cities in America.
Wis. man who shot teen gets life in prison
MILWAUKEE – A 76-year-old Milwaukee man who said he was seeking justice when he shot and killed his teen neighbor after accusing the boy of burglary was sentenced Monday to life in prison with no chance of parole.
John H. Spooner, who was convicted last week of first-degree intentional homicide, acknowledged shooting 13-year-old Darius Simmons in the chest last year while the teen’s mother watched.
The conviction carried a mandatory sentence of life in prison, although Judge Jeffrey Wagner had the option to allow for the possibility of parole. He rejected that option, meaning Spooner – who has lung cancer and other physical ailments – will die in prison.
Some of Spooner’s shotguns were stolen in a break-in at his home in May 2012, and he told the jury he suspected Darius as the thief. Footage from Spooner’s own surveillance cameras two days later showed him confronting Darius on the sidewalk, pointing a gun at the boy’s chest and firing from a few feet away. Darius turned and fled, and then collapsed and died in the street moments later as his mother cradled him in her arms.
Police searched the boy’s home later that day and didn’t find the weapons.
Associated Press
