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Man who fatally shot Guyanese teen turns self in
In custody: Taariq Stephens (NY Daily News photo) New York (New York Daily News) - The dangerous fugitive wanted for killing a teenage Brooklyn babysitter turned himself in yesterday. Taariq Stephens, a 24year-old man with a halfdozen prior arrests and a .40caliber submachine gun, was identified two days after the cold-blooded shooting of 16year-old Shemel Mercurius as her terrified 3-year-old nephew watched, said NYPD Chief of Detectives Robert Boyce. He was being questioned at the 67th Precinct after surrendering to police last evening, sources said. The victim, with her dying breath, shared Stephens’ first name with cops inside the apartment. A video camera caught the armed killer forcing his way inside the home after the teen initially rebuffed his efforts. The motive in the brutal killing remained unclear, and Boyce said initial reports that the killer was Mercurius’ boyfriend proved inaccurate.
Friday June 03, 2016
Kaieteur News
Killed: Shemel Mercurius (NY Daily News photo) “From what we can read of the texts, it is not a romantic relationship,” Boyce said. “There’s a lot more to go in this case ... to figure out.” Stephens was carrying a powerful Keltec submachine gun when he forced his way into Mercurius’ Brooklyn Ave. apartment on Tuesday evening. “He pulls out the stock of the gun before he shoots this young lady,” Boyce said. “He racks three times, leaving three full rounds outside on the hallway.” One of the bullets tore through the teen’s arm and into her chest, leaving her with a fatal wound. The tot was not injured, although his mother said the child was terrified by what he saw. Stephens’ lawyer contacted cops Thursday after his name was released and said the ex-con was ready to turn himself in, sources said. He later surrendered at the 67th stationhouse. The slain girl’s weepy mother, Lavern Williams-
Oliver, was scrambling in their native Guyana for a visitor’s visa to attend her daughter’s funeral. The two last spoke only two days before the Tuesday night killing. “She is my first baby,” said the mom as she fought back tears. “I don’t know how something like this can happen to my baby. She was peaceful, loving and inspirational.” Four of her Edward R. Murrow High School classmates collected $137 toward paying for Shemel’s funeral. “It just touched our hearts that her life ended so abruptly,” said Ebony Campbell, 15. “We felt like we had to do something.” The family was still in the process of finalizing funeral plans for the girl. “We went to the morgue this morning to identify the body,” said her grandmother Joan. “We don’t have a date yet, but we’re starting to put things together.” The grandma said no one in the family had ever heard the name Taariq when cops asked about the suspect. The slain girl’s classmates observed a moment of silence yesterday after her death was announced by Principal Allen Barge. “She was such a nice person, sweet person,” said junior Kindersly Louis, 17. “When I saw her picture on the news, I started freaking out. I was crying and crying.”
Clinton casts Trump as dangerous clown in caustic speech on foreign policy Reuters - U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton lambasted Donald Trump’s foreign policy platform as “dangerously incoherent” in a speech yesterday that cast her Republican rival as both a frightening and laughable figure. In remarks that at times resembled a comedy roast, Clinton unleashed a torrent of polished zingers and one-liners to attack Trump’s policies and character, suggesting Trump might start a nuclear war if elected to the White House simply because “somebody got under his very thin skin.” “Donald Trump’s ideas are not just different, they are dangerously incoherent,” she said to a room of supporters in San Diego, California. “They’re not even really ideas, just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds and outright lies.” Clinton, the front-runner in the race to become the Democratic presidential nominee, delivered her speech as she seeks to shift her attention to the Nov. 8 election against likely rival Trump and away from Bernie Sanders, a U.S. senator from Vermont, who is continuing his longshot bid for the nomination. Clinton was speaking in San Diego ahead of California’s June 7 primary election. Democratic Party leaders have fretted about how to best oppose Trump, who managed to knock out all 16 rivals for the Republican nomination in part with his uninhibited style of assailing them with personal insults. Trump revels in referring to Clinton as “Crooked Hillary” and dredging up the infidelities of her husband, Bill Clinton, the former president. Clinton’s remarks were intended in part to show she would not be cowed and that
Hillary Clinton she could go toe-to-toe with him in scornful put-downs. “He says he has foreign policy experience because he ran the Miss Universe pageant in Russia,” she said as the crowd guffawed, and she suggested Trump would run the U.S. economy “like one of his casinos.” During her speech, Clinton predicted Trump, who has been deeply critical of Clinton’s foreign policy record, would take to his Twitter account to insult her, and he did. “Bad performance by Crooked Hillary Clinton!” ran
one posting during the speech, which included a typo. “Reading poorly from the telepromter! She doesn’t even look presidential!” Trump has said previously that Clinton is distorting his actual policies. Amid the laugh lines, Clinton cited her own experience as secretary of state, in particular her role advising President Barack Obama during the mission to kill al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, to suggest her approach to foreign policy was the more serious. “He praises dictators like Vladimir Putin and picks fights with our friends, including the British prime minister, the mayor of London, the German chancellor, the president of Mexico and the pope,” Clinton said, listing some of the allies with whom Trump has verbally sparred in the last year. Obama, who has also been repeatedly mocked by Trump, has criticized Trump as being ignorant or cavalier about world affairs and has said that Trump’s rise has “rattled” foreign leaders.
Militants launch attacks in Niger Delta as Buhari cancels visit Reuters - Militants launched new attacks in the Niger Delta yesterday, vowing to bring Nigeria’s struggling oil industry to a total halt, and the president cancelled a long-awaited visit to the region. The army said militants killed six people on Wednesday when they ambushed a boat belonging to state oil firm NNPC in the Warri area. Separately, the Niger Delta Avengers group said it had attacked two crude pipelines operated by Italy’s ENI. “At about 2:00 am today @NDAvengers blew up the
Ogboinbiri to Tebidaba and Clough Creek to Tebidaba Crude Oil pipelines in Bayelsa State,” the group said on Twitter. “This is in line with our promise to all international oil companies and indigenous oil companies that Nigeria oil production will be zero.” But the NDA said in a statement late yesterday that it was not responsible for the boat attack. “Killing of sleeping soldiers is not our style,” the NDA said in an emailed statement.