Stories related to: murder

The 73-year-old Austrian man who has confessed to fathering seven children by his imprisoned daughter is being investigated in connection with a 20-year-old murder case. Police say that a teenager assaulted and killed in 1986—near property owned by Fritzl's wife—bore an "incredible" resemblance to his daughter, reports the UK Times . More »

A hit-making Nashville songwriter was charged yesterday in the pocketknife murder of his producing partner, who—in a headline-grabbing twist out of an old country ballad—is the father of former Saturday Night Live comedienne Cheri Oteri, TMZ reports. Nashville police said Oteri’s father had a "significant laceration” to his wrist, the AP reports. More »

A brilliant California computer programmer was found guilty of murdering his estranged wife yesterday—despite the fact that her body was never found. "I've been the best father that I know how," shouted Hans Reiser, 44, after the verdict, reports the San Francisco Chronicle . His wife's blood was found in Reiser's car and home. "We have a body. We just don't know where it is," the prosecutor told the jury. More »

Iraqi authorities will not press charges against a father who murdered his 17-year-old daughter for falling in love with a British soldier because it was an "honor killing," reports the Guardian . The father stood on the girl's neck and stabbed her last month after he learned she was attracted to a soldier distributing relief supplies in Basra. The father was arrested, but later released. "Not much can be done when we have an honor killing," explained a police sergeant. More »

Law-enforcement agencies are using DNA of family members—often without their consent—to identify and convict criminals, the Washington Post reports. Privacy advocates object that it turns family members into unwitting informants, and subjects innocent relatives to “lifelong genetic surveillance” because someone in their family committed a crime. But investigators say it could increase DNA-solved cases by as much as 40%. More »

A judge yesterday replaced the executors for the estate of murder suspect Drew Peterson's third wife, paving the way for a wrongful death suit against the ex-cop. The judge cited recent autopsy findings saying Kathleen Savio was murdered. Her family now plans to file a wrongful death suit within weeks, their attorney told the Chicago Tribune . More »

Two elderly women known as the "Black Widows" have been convicted in a murder plot to obtain life insurance benefits from two homeless men they put up in apartments before killing them. Helen Golay, 77, and Olga Rutterschmidt, 75, took out a total of $2.8 million in life insurance policies on the two men, who were mowed down by cars six years apart.  More »

The shooting death of an 18-year-old mom and wounding of her boyfriend as they sat with their baby son in a car was set up by the beau, cops now say. The boyfriend initially insisted the two had been shot by a robber in the Bronx, but now he and his cousin have been charged with murder, reports the New York Times reports. More »

The Supreme Court refused today to let a teenage boy appeal his 30-year sentence for double-murder, CNN reports. Christopher Pittman, who was tried as an adult in South Carolina 3 years ago, is serving the longest sentence ever for someone his age—and blames antidepressants for inspiring him to kill his grandparents and set their house ablaze at the age of 12. More »

Amanda Knox , the 20-year-old University of Washington student who's been held by Italian police since November as a suspect in her British roommate's murder, is the victim of a “railroad job from hell,”  an investigator hired by the “48 Hours Mystery” to review the case concluded. "They've put so much into Amanda Knox, they have to convict her now or they look like fools," he says on the show, broadcast last night. More »

Drew Peterson, suspected in the disappearance of his fourth wife while police investigate the death of his third, will field viewers’ questions on "Larry King Live" tonight, the Chicago Tribune reports. The show offers the first chance for the public to question the ex-cop, who says he's been convicted by the media. “There's no rules. Larry King's people tell me that they screen out the nuts,” his lawyer said. More »

Last summer's murder of a California journalist has prompted dozens of colleagues to join in finishing what he started, the Los Angeles Times reports. Chauncey Bailey was shot in August, police believe, over his investigation of an Oakland black Muslim bakery. "You have to let the community know you can't kill a story by killing a reporter," one member of the Chauncey Bailey Project said. More »

Police have stepped up campus patrols after a University of Wisconsin-Madison student was found apparently stabbed to death in her apartment Wednesday. The 21-year-old pre-med junior is the first Madison student murdered since 1996, reports ABC News. But police are investigating possible links to an unsolved murder in the city earlier this year, according to the Capital Times . More »

Japanese police arrested a US sailor today on suspicion of stabbing a taxi driver to death and then robbing him, Reuters reports. The 22-year-old Nigerian national serving in the American Navy was already in US custody on charges of desertion. The American ambassador to Japan was forced to apologize for yet another US serviceman implicated in a crime in recent months. More »

Two British police officers accused of failing to stop a young woman's "honor killing" are now facing a disciplinary hearing, the Guardian reports. After falling in love with a man not approved by her family, the Kurdish woman repeatedly told police of threats to her life and pleaded for help. Police dismissed her fears as melodramatic. She vanished soon after and her body was found stuffed in a suitcase. More »

A man involved in a bitter custody battle murdered his three children in a Baltimore hotel yesterday afternoon, then called the front desk to report it, the Baltimore Sun reports. Police still aren’t sure how Mark Castillo killed the children, aged 6, 4, and 2; there was no evidence of stabbing or gunshot wounds. More »

In the wake of shootings on college campuses, administrators around the nation are forming threat-assessment groups and rethinking policies about sharing information on troubled students, the AP reports. "If a student is a danger to himself or others, all the privacy concerns go out the window,” said an administrator at the University of Kentucky, whose panel of administrators, police, and mental health officials meets twice a month. More »

Famed death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal earned some measure of triumph today as a US appeals court refused to reinstate his death sentence, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. Abu-Jamal was convicted in 1982 of killing a Philly cop, and has fought for retrial. The court upheld the conviction but said Abu-Jamal should face life in prison or get a new sentence hearing. More »

A French carpenter dubbed the "Ogre of the Ardennes" is on trial in France, accused of tracking down, raping and murdering seven virgins with the help of his wife in one of the nation's worst murder sprees in decades. Prosecutors say Michel Fourniret hunted victims from 1987 until 2003, the BBC reports. The victims ranged in age from 12 to 22 years old. More »

An Iowa man left a note in his kitchen and voice mail messages for friends and ex-colleagues apologizing before killing his wife and four young children, the Chicago Tribune reports. Steven Sueppel then killed himself in a fiery highway crash. The former bank executive was facing trial on embezzlement charges, and had admitted using half of the cash for cocaine. His messages said the shame was too much to bear. More »