Church apologizes after pastor asks students to spit on him and cut him as part of Easter lesson
(CNN) — An Ohio church is apologizing for an “inappropriate” Easter lesson in which a pastor urged students to spit on him, slap him and cut him with a steak knife.
Impact City Church lead pastor Justin Ross and part-time associate pastor Jaddeus Dempsey went on Facebook this week to publicly apologize to students who were part of the unusual after-school activity Monday.
Dempsey was leading a group of middle and high school students who were part of the church’s weekly “After School Student Hangouts.” The program includes food and activities, Ross said.
That’s when Dempsey decided to share his message with students about Easter, in a way which he later said, “crossed the line.”
‘I thought it was OK’
“Jaddeus got up in front of the students and he said, ‘I’m going to ask you to do something that might seem a little crazy, but if there’s anyone here that would like to spit in my face, you can do so without any repercussions,’ ” Ross said on social media, describing the event.
Some students took him up on his offer. Then, he told them they could slap him. Several did.
Finally, Dempsey pulled out a steak knife and set the same conditions.
One student took the knife and sliced his back.
Students pulled out their phones and began posting on social media. Videos of that day show the students lining up before the pastor and taking turns spitting on his face while others laugh.
One student is heard saying “I’m doing it,” while others respond, “Do it.”
“Can I do it again?” another asks.
Another video shows students attempting to cut the pastor’s back, before the pastor seems to say, “Make me bleed.”
Ai’Janae Parker, 12, took part in the activity.
“I thought it was very weird and awkward,” she told CNN affiliate WBNS. “I took part because I thought it was OK because it was coming from an adult.”
The affiliate also reported the Licking County Sheriff’s Office opened an investigation.
Intent was ‘honorable’, pastor says
The illustration went too far, Ross said in a video the Pataskala church later uploaded. But, he said, it was used to explain a “very important topic about the crucifixion.”
“The reactions are appropriate,” Ross said. “Many of you were disgusted, many of you were hurt by this, many of you were very confused.” Even though the activity was inappropriate, he said, the “intent was honorable.”
After letting them spit, slap and cut him, Dempsey sat students down and talked to them about Jesus, his trial and crucifixion and how he was “beaten, he was broken, he was whipped, he was crucified and he died as an innocent man,” Ross said.
“[Jesus] chose to allow them to spit on him and beat him and crucify him in order to take the payment of our debt that we call sin,” Ross said. “So Jaddeus, in an effort to share that message of love through the Gospel and the story of Jesus’ crucifixion, he shared this illustration and tried to share some of the pain that Jesus took on that day.”
Ross said the church does not condone that students or anyone should spit or slap others, or “use a weapon to harm anyone or to harm themselves.”
Dempsey says no one knew about the activity
In the same Facebook video by the church, Dempsey said it was completely his idea and no one else knew about his plans.
It was over the top and bad judgment, he said.
“I am so sorry for misrepresenting the community, the church, the parents, the students and anybody that I hurt,” Dempsey said. “It was not my intention. My intention was just to show them how much Jesus loves them and I love them.”
Dempsey said he has been a student leader for almost four years and that Monday’s activity was “an anomaly and is not normally what happens.”
Many Facebook users came to Dempsey’s defense after the incident.
The church said its board of directors will conduct a formal review and investigation.
Oklahoma woman accused of starving kids, feeding them feces
JAY, Okla. (AP) — An Oklahoma mother has been charged with child neglect, accused of starving her children and feeding them dog feces.
The Tulsa World reports that 34-year-old Mary Elizabeth Moore was charged in Delaware County court this month.
The children, aged 5 and 3, are severely malnourished and have been placed on a special diet with nasal feeding tubes. They are in state custody.
An affidavit says the older child told Department of Human Services workers that she ate dog feces. The arresting officer noted the child had parasitic pinworms.
The girl also told investigators that her mother’s boyfriend “throws bottles” at her younger sibling.
The affidavit says Moore denied starving her children and feeding them dog feces. Her court-appointed attorney, Lee Griffin, didn’t immediately return a phone call Saturday seeking comment.
Woman caught on video tossing a plastic bag full of puppies near a trash bin
(CNN) — Seven puppies were found next to a dumpster in Coachella, California, and authorities say they are looking for the woman caught on camera leaving them.
The woman is accused of leaving the newborn puppies in a plastic bag near a dumpster behind a NAPA Auto Parts store on Thursday afternoon, according to Riverside County Animal Services.
Commander Chris Mayer with animal services said he is building an animal cruelty case against the woman with the help of the Riverside Sheriff’s office and the District Attorney’s office.
A passerby discovered the bag, and a store employee then contacted animal services. The puppies were about three days old and believed to be terrier mixes, animal services said.
“If not for the Good Samaritan’s actions, the puppies may not have survived much longer,” said the Riverside County Animal Services in a release. “The mid-day temperatures in Coachella on Thursday were in the mid-90s range.”
Animal Service’s veterinary team members cared for the puppies and found a rescue group to accept and bottle feed them, according to the release.
“There is no excuse for dumping puppies,” Mayer said. “Especially in today’s age when we or other shelters would be willing to get these animals to foster parents or rescue partners. This was a shameful act.”
via: https://www.kmov.com/news/woman-caught-on-video-tossing-a-plastic-bag-full-of/article_952329c0-e2a5-5cec-adbf-4f7b98c81f3d.html
CNN’s Hollie Silverman contributed to this report
‘Drive high, get a DUI’: Police are cracking down on drivers celebrating 4/20 behind the wheel
ST. LOUIS (KMOV.com) — Police are cracking down on drivers getting behind the wheel while high this weekend.
MoDOT is launching its campaign “Drive high, get a DUI” for April 20, or 4/20 by cannabis enthusiasts.
All weekend, law enforcement and drug recognition experts will be on lookout for what they say is a growing problem in Missouri. In 2018, 78 people were killed and 142 seriously injured in crashes involving a drug-impaired driver.
Police say while medical marijuana is legal in many states, it’s still illegal to drive under the influence of it in all states.
Student Set on Fire After Reporting Sex Harassment
“The teacher touched me, I will fight this crime ’til my last breath,” Nusrat Jahan Rafi spoke into a cellphone as she was taken to a Bangladeshi hospital with burns covering 80% of her body.
She would die four days later, and now her case has gained international attention. In late March, Nusrat told police the headmaster of her school in the small town of Feni had called her into his office and touched her inappropriately, reports the BBC.
He was arrested, but a police video of Nusrat making her complaint surfaced, and soon she became a target of harassment. When she returned to school for her final exams on April 6, authorities say a female student lured her to the roof on a false pretext.
There, a small group confronted Nusrat and demanded she clear the headmaster. When she refused, they set her on fire, per the Guardian.
“None
of the culprits will be spared from legal action,” Prime Minister
Sheikh Hasina says, per the BBC, which notes 15 people have been
arrested along with the headmaster.
The Dhaka Tribune reports he had a known “history of condemnable behavior.” In the police video, Nusrat, who was 18 or 19, can be seen trying to keep her face covered as the officer orders her to remove her hands from her face and tells her the allegation is “no big deal.” The case “shows how badly the Bangladesh government has failed victims of sexual assault,” a rep for Human Rights Watch says, per Sky News.
“It leads the victim to give up on seeking justice,” a human rights lawyer adds. (Gay people aren’t safe in Bangladesh, either.)
Woman avoids $85 overweight baggage fee by wearing 9 pounds of clothing on plane
MANCHESTER, England — How far would you go to avoid paying an overweight baggage fee?
One woman decided to layer up after being told her suitcase was too heavy.
She wore 9 pounds of clothing on a plane instead of forking over the $85 overweight baggage fee at an airport in England, according to The Sun.
We don’t have video of the resourceful passenger, so we are getting creative with a re-enactment.
The woman had booked an all-inclusive vacation and did not bring along enough money.
“I didn’t want to be using the little amount I had just so I could get my bag on the plane,” Natalie Wynn told The Sun. “I literally said, ‘I’m not paying it’, and started putting my clothes on…I was boiling, absolutely boiling.”
She ended up wearing nearly half of the clothes she had packed including seven dresses, a skirt, two pairs of shoes, two pairs of shorts and a cardigan.
Ventura Music Teacher Suspected of Giving Flutes Tainted With Semen to Children Indicted Again
State prosecutors have indicted a music instructor from Ventura accused of distributing flutes contaminated with bodily fluids to Southern California school children, following a federal indictment alleging child molestation last year, officials announced Thursday.
John Edward Zeretzke, 60, was arrested Tuesday and booked into jail in Orange County on Tuesday, county booking records show.
He faces six charges of committing lewd acts on children under 14 years old, the California Attorney General’s Office said in a written statement.
The state charges are separate from a five-count federal indictment filed against Zeretzke in September alleging he coerced a minor to produce child pornography, attempted to entice a minor to send him sexually explicit images, received child pornography online and travelled to the Philippines with intent to engage in sex with minors, U.S. Attorney’s Office Thom Mrozek said at the time.
But allegations that flutes distributed to area students through his organization, “Flutes Across the World,” had been tainted with semen by Zeretke, were not part of the federal case, authorities said. That investigation is being handled by by the California Attorney General’s Office and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.
The California Attorney General’s office obtained an indictment last month charging Zeretzke with a half-dozen counts of child molestation.
“Attorney General Becerra’s indictment alleges that between January 1, 2017 and April 30, 2017, Zeretzke targeted five victims under the age of 14,” the California DOJ said in a written statement. “The charges against Zeretzke are not based upon allegations that he personally had physical contact with any child.”
Through his organization, Zeretke worked with school districts including the Los Angeles Unified, Saugus Union, Capistrano Unified, Fountain Valley, Culver City, Newport-Mesa and Fullerton, the L.A. Times reported.
He would make two flutes with students out of PVC pipe. The students would keep one, and the other was to be donated to children in need, according to the organization’s website, which has since been pulled offline. Many of the flutes were sent to the Philippines, where the organization maintained a presence.
Schools dropped the program once allegations began to emerge that some of the student’s flutes had been contaminated with semen.
Zeretzke was released from custody on bond five days after his Sept. 13 arrest in the federal case, federal booking records show.
Bail was set at at $600,000 following his arrest Tuesday in connection with the state-level indictment, according to county records.
“Crimes against children are despicable,” Becerra said in a written statement. “Schools must represent a safe environment for our students. No parent should fear for the safety and security of their child at school. We will work relentlessly to hold people who exploit our children criminally accountable to the fullest extent of the law.”
Mom left ‘unrecognizable’ by attack as cops hunt ex-boyfriend
A mother in England was left gravely wounded and “unrecognizable” after being beaten in bed – and cops are now on the hunt for her ex-boyfriend, according to reports.
Britney Salim, 23, suffered internal bleeding, a broken jaw, fractures on her face and a collapsed lung from the heinous assault at her home in the South Yorkshire city of Sheffield on April 12, The Sun reported.
Salim remains in critical, but stable condition in the intensive-care unit at a local hospital.
Police believe that Salim’s attacker climbed up the balcony to her home and busted in through French doors before going after the mother-of-one.
Salim was found unconscious in bed by a family member and was rushed to the hospital.
Authorities are now trying to track down Salim’s ex-boyfriend, 31-year-old Shaka Williams, who is reportedly the father of Salim’s 9-month-old daughter, Priya.
“We have got a big family, and we are all distraught,” said a cousin, who did not want to be named, according to The Sun.
“[Salim] was found by our auntie because [Salim] was babysitting her daughter,” the family member saying, adding that the aunt “went to the house to take her daughter back and as she got there she found Britney practically on death’s door.”
“When her auntie went in, [Salim] was unrecognizable. Her face was black and blue,” the cousin said.
According to the cousin, Salim “has seven broken ribs, internal bleeding in her liver, swelling on her brain, a broken jaw, fractures on her face and a collapsed lung, and she has had to have a blood transfusion.”
“Doctors have said at the minute she isn’t getting any worse, but she is still in an out of consciousness and remains in intensive care,” the cousin said.
The family member noted that Salim has woken up several times and “had outbursts of screaming.”
“She is on morphine to deal with the pain. Her mom is just broken,” the cousin said. “Police have not been able to get a full statement from Britney yet because she isn’t able to speak.”
Police have asked locals if they see Williams or know where he is to get in touch with authorities.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/04/19/mom-left-unrecognizable-by-attack-as-cops-hunt-ex-boyfriend/
Elderly couple kill themselves so they don’t have to live without each other
A devoted elderly couple in Wales decided to take their own lives after learning that the terminally ill husband had only a short time to live, according to a report.
“Neither one of us wishes to live without the other,” Howard Titterton, 80, and his 78-year-old wife Jacqueline wrote in one of several jointly signed letters they left behind for friends, police and their lawyer, North Wales Live reported.
They said they had had “a great life” and agreed to end their lives without putting pressure on each other as they planned their suicides meticulously, an inquest heard in Ruthin.
The Tittertons left a key with their next-door neighbors for the police to enter their home and put labels on items with the names of the people whom they wanted to receive them.
Assistant Coroner David Pojur recorded the conclusions of the double suicide after hearing details about the couple, whose bodies were found in their home in St Asaph on Nov. 13.
Howard, a retired research and development officer with glass manufacturer Pilkington, had been suffering from bowel cancer and was receiving palliative care at home from his wife, a former nurse.
Their neighbor Andrew Thomas said in a statement that Titterton had begun looking frail but appeared “OK” a few days before his death.
His wife Susan Thomas described the elderly couple as “lovely people” and said the tragedy came as a shock – though she had thought it strange that Jacqueline had given her a park-and-ride ticket the previous day, telling her she would not be using it.
On the morning of Nov. 13, Andrew Thomas found an envelope through his door containing money and a note indicating that they had killed themselves and asked the neighbors to call authorities.
“I wondered if I was reading what I was,” he said.
Police found Howard lying in an empty bath covered by a blanket and a dressing gown. His wife was lying on the bed.
Dr. Brian Rodgers, a pathologist, said the couple died of suffocation.
The Tittertons, who had no children, enjoyed traveling and shared the same hobbies of music and photography.
Teacher allegedly took vodka shots during school
Police say a tipsy teacher was arrested in Kentucky for giving a class lesson after taking vodka shots.
Brook West, 32, was charged with public intoxication after she got drunk Monday morning at Royal Spring Middle School in Georgetown, news station WKYT reported.
Deputies were called to the campus that afternoon on reports the substitute teacher was demonstrating “erratic behavior,” the school district said.
Responding officers said West reeked of alcohol and had trouble keeping her balance when they arrived.
She allegedly admitted to taking four vodka shots while filling in at the school as a substitute teacher.
West took a breathalyzer test which revealed she had 0.317% blood alcohol content, authorities said.
Scott County Schools said West was removed from the premises and will no longer be employed there.
“School staff acted immediately upon learning of this behavior,” the district said in a statement. “Scott County Sheriff’s Department escorted the substitute off school grounds later charging her with alcohol intoxication. The individual is no longer employed by Scott County Schools in any capacity.”
She was booked into Scott County Detention Center, where she also faces charges for endangering the welfare of a minor, according to court records
via: https://nypost.com/2019/04/18/teacher-allegedly-took-vodka-shots-during-school/