Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, wader, Man Oh Man, rfall, and JML9999. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse, ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Interceptor7, BentLiberal, Oke and jlms qkw. The guest editors are Doctor RJ and annetteboardman.
Special thanks to JekyllnHyde for the new OND banner.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
DW
The trial of the man suspected of carrying out the Boston Marathon bombing almost two years ago has begun with selecting the jury. Some 1,200 candidates are being considered as potential jurors.
Jury selection began on Monday in the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the man suspected of carrying out a bomb attack at the 2013 Boston Marathon that killed three people and wounded 260 others.
In the first, three-day phase of the trial in Boston, in the US state of Massachusetts, some 1,200 people will be called to the court to be considered as potential jurors. Altogether 12 jury members and six alternates will be selected to decide the fate of Tsarnaev, who, if convicted, could face the death penalty.
The Guardian
Bright winter sunshine drenched the John Joseph Moakley district court building in Boston as the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, accused of involvement in the Boston Marathon bombing in April 2013 that killed three people and injured more than 260 others, began on Monday morning.
Tsarnaev, who is now 21, entered the courtroom awkwardly, in white jeans and a dark sweater. Wearing no handcuffs, he reclined, his legs splayed wide beneath the table. For most of the judge’s address, he leaned on his elbows or clasped his hands tightly in front of him.
His face remained impassive throughout the proceedings; it was impossible to detect in his bearing either remorse or its absence. When called upon to stand up, he did so slowly and awkwardly.
Tsarnaev faces 30 federal charges including “conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death”. Crucially, 17 of those carry a potential death sentence.
Reuters
A U.S. federal judge on Monday began the process of selecting the jury that will hear the trial of accused Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, telling the first of some 1,200 prospects to read no more news accounts about the deadly blasts.Tsarnaev could get the death penalty if convicted of killing three people and injuring more than 260 others by detonating a pair of homemade bombs placed amid a crowd of thousands of spectators at the race's finish line on April 15, 2013.
The 21-year-old ethnic Chechen and naturalized U.S. citizen has pleaded not guilty to all 30 charges against him.
Tsarnaev, with bushy hair and a light beard, sat quietly between his lawyers during Monday's proceedings, looking down and fidgeting. He did not speak but nodded curtly at jurors when the judge pointed him out.
NPR
Jury selection begins today in the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who is accused of planting a bomb near the finish line of the Boston Marathon in 2013 that killed three people and injured more than 260.
Tsarnaev is facing 30 charges, including using a weapon of mass destruction. More than half those counts could result in the death penalty.
With that, here are five things you should know about the trial:
BBC
Jury selection has begun in the US trial of Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who is accused of killing three people and injuring more than 260 in April 2013.
Mr Tsarnaev faces the possibility of the death penalty if he is convicted of detonating a pair of homemade bombs.
The attack near the marathon's finish line was the largest on American soil since 9/11.
Mr Tsarnaev has pleaded not guilty to all 30 charges against him.
His trial is expected to last at least three months.
McClatchy
WASHINGTON — The CIA could hold prisoners only on a short-term basis and would be restricted to using U.S. Army interrogation methods under legislation that former Senate Intelligence Committee chairwoman Dianne Feinstein says she’ll sponsor to ensure that detainees are never again tortured.
Feinstein, D-Calif., outlined a series of recommendations for legislative and administrative reforms in a letter that she wrote last week to President Barack Obama seeking his support.
“These recommendations are intended to make sure that the United States never again engages in actions that you have acknowledged were torture,” Feinstein wrote to Obama in the letter, a copy of which was released by her office Monday.
Her proposals stem from a four-year, $40 million investigation into the CIA’s use of simulated drowning, known as waterboarding, and other brutal interrogation techniques on suspected terrorists who were abducted or captured and held in secret overseas prisons under the Bush administration between 2002 and 2007.
Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/...
The Guardian
Lesbian and gay couples were married in Miami on Monday by the same judge who said she saw no reason why they couldn’t immediately get their licenses ahead of Florida’s coming-out party as the nation’s 36th state where same-sex marriages are legal statewide.
The addition of Florida’s 19.9 million people means 70% of Americans will now live in states where gay marriage is legal.
It also reflects how much the nation’s third-largest state has changed since the days of Anita Bryant, the former beauty queen and orange juice spokeswoman who started her national campaign against gay rights in Miami in the 1970s.
The courtroom erupted in cheers when the Miami-Dade circuit judge Sarah Zabel cleared the way for a gay couple and a lesbian couple to marry. The judge said she would perform the ceremonies herself later on Monday, according to their attorney, Jeffrey Cohen.
The Guardian
A lawsuit filed by a member of the grand jury that declined to bring charges in the killing of Michael Brown last August implies that the decision not to indict police officer Darren Wilson was not unanimous.
No suggestion of dissent inside the jury has previously come to light. The decision not to indict Wilson sparked rioting in Ferguson, Missouri, and intensified a national movement to protest police violence.
The lawsuit, filed on Monday in the US district court eastern district of Missouri, charges that St Louis County prosecutor Robert McCulloch mischaracterized the grand jury proceedings and asks that the plaintiff, identified only as Juror Doe, be allowed to speak about the case.
“In [the] plaintiff’s view, the current information available about the grand jurors’ views is not entirely accurate – especially the implication that all grand jurors believed that there was no support for any charges,” the lawsuit reads.
McCulloch had described a “collective decision” on the jury’s part.
Reuters
A New York judge will hear arguments later this month whether to publicly release the records of a grand jury hearing in the case of an unarmed black man killed after a policeman put him in a chokehold while arresting him for peddling loose cigarettes.
After an unusually lengthy session lasting nine weeks, the grand jury voted in December not to indict the police officer, Daniel Pantaleo, for his role in the asphyxiation death of Eric Garner on a Staten Island sidewalk last summer.
Captured on video, Garner's repeated cries of "I can't breathe!" as Pantaleo holds him by his neck have become a slogan for protesters at rallies across the United States who accuse police forces of being hostile towards black citizens.
Reuters
Democrat Jerry Brown, who turned around California's finances after years of deficits, vowed to keep a tight rein on spending as he was sworn in on Monday for a record fourth term at the helm of the nation's most populous state.
Brown, currently serving a second stint as governor, first served two terms from 1975 to 1983 and then returned to the governorship in 2011. He easily defeated Republican challenger Neel Kashkari to win re-election in November.
Brown, the 76-year-old son of the late California Governor Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, has forcefully steered the heavily Democratic state on a centrist path since voters returned him to the governorship.
NPR
Six years ago, homebuilders and Realtors were facing brutal business conditions: millions of Americans were losing their jobs and homes.
As 2015 begins, hiring is strong and economic indicators are pointing up. Could this be the year when the housing market finally breaks out of its tepid recovery and takes off?
Economists see several reasons why 2015 might be a banner year for homebuying — and not just in San Francisco and Miami.
They also see One Big Factor that potentially could block a buying binge.
Before considering that possible downer, let's first look at the upside:
NPR
You may have seen a minor headline last week, saying the United States denied any involvement in a failed coup attempt in The Gambia.
Today, we're getting a bit of insight into what actually happened there.
The Justice Department said it arrested and charged two Americans who allegedly planned and then unsuccessfully tried to carry out a coup against President Yahya Jammeh.
Cherno Njie, a 57-year-old Gambian-American from Texas, and Papa Faal, a 46-year-old Gambian-American from Minnesota, are charged with conspiracy to violate the Neutrality Act, which makes it illegal for a U.S. citizen to take up arms against a nation friendly to the United States.
NPR
If you get caught drinking and driving in Wisconsin, and it's your first offense, you lose your license for nine months. For a hit-and-run, the punishment is suspension for one year.
But if you don't pay a ticket for a minor driving offense, such as driving with a broken tail light, you can lose your license for two years.
"It's an incredible policy," says John Pawasarat of the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. It's "a policy of punishing people who can't pay their fines."
The practice — repeated in states across the country — is mostly affecting the poor and creating a spiral of bad consequences.
BBC
Two American skiers have been killed in an avalanche in the Austrian Alps while skiing near their training base.
Ronnie Berlack, 20, and Bryce Astle, 19, were junior members of the US team.
They were part of a group of six who were descending from a mountain near the Rettenbach glacier, the venue for the races that will open the 2015 Alpine Skiing World Cup.
Officials in Tyrol say avalanche alerts had been declared following days of heavy snowfall and mild temperatures.
The four other skiers with Mr Berlack and Mr Astle managed to escape the avalanche unhurt.
New York Times
For a second straight week, New York City police officers sharply cut back on their actions in the street, arresting less than half as many people and writing more than 90 percent fewer summonses than in the same period a year ago.
The slowdown built on a drastic drop in activity that began shortly after the murder of two uniformed patrol officers in Brooklyn on Dec. 20, and continued across all 77 precincts in the city.
Reuters
CIA inspector general David Buckley, who investigated a dispute between the agency and Congress over the handling of records of the CIA's detention and interrogation activities, is resigning effective Jan. 31, the CIA said on Monday.
The agency said in a statement that Buckley, who has served as the agency's internal watchdog for more than four years, was leaving the agency to "pursue an opportunity in the private sector."
Officials at both the CIA and on Capitol Hill said his departure was unrelated to politics or anything he had investigated.
Los Angeles Times
Bit by bit, the federal judiciary is tearing out the legal ground from under “America’s toughest sheriff.”
First, a federal appeals court said it was illegal to deny bail to immigrants in the country illegally. Then, on Monday, an Arizona federal judge blasted a state law that stretched the crime of identity theft to include everyone from forgers to people simply seeking employment without valid documentation.
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio was using that law to justify workplace raids, more than 80 since the Arizona Legislature passed the law in 2008. Those raids rolled up nearly 800 men and women, charged with felonies for seeking employment while they were in the country illegally. It was unclear how many of them were convicted or deported.
DW
German citizens gathered by the thousands in several demonstrations against the anti-Islam movement "Pegida." Politicians said they were proud of the large numbers of people supporting immigrants.
Citizens thronged to streets in German cities to protest the anti-Islam movement "PEGIDA," members of which gather nearly every Monday to rally against a perceived Islamization of Western countries.
The Mayor of Stuttgart in Germany's southern state of Baden Württemberg, Fritz Kuhn, expressed "pride and joy" at the large numbers of anti-PEGIDA demonstrators, saying it was a clear statement against the marginalization of immigrants and for integrating refugees into German culture.
Al Jazeera America
BEIRUT — A mixture of confusion and fear have struck the Syrian population currently in Lebanon after a recent announcement made by General Security over new visa measures.
Huddled under the pouring rain in a rundown neighborhood in Beirut, a number of Syrians who have been living in Lebanon for several years kept repeating the same question, "What does this mean for us?"
The move by the Lebanese government is unprecedented. As of Monday, Syrians entering Lebanon must provide documentation identifying their reason for being in the country, highlighting stricter entry procedures for people who, since Lebanon gained its independence in 1943, had been able to move freely across the border.
Categories of visas Syrians can apply for include tourism, business, medical treatment and work. Applicants who own property in Lebanon will also be granted visas.
The Guardian
Ian Black, Middle East editor
Monday 5 January 2015 10.45 EST
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Saudi Arabia is on alert for jihadi attacks after a general and two other soldiers were killed by a suicide bomber in the first deadly assault along the country’s border with Iraq since it joined the US-led coalition fighting Islamic State.
The interior ministry in Riyadh blamed “terrorist elements” for the incident early , but did not name any group, though it is thought likely to be Isis, which controls large areas of Iraq as well as Syria.
The ministry said in a statement that a border patrol at al-Suwaif, near the city of Arar, was fired on. Border guards returned fire and killed two of four attackers. But during attempts to persuade another two to surrender, one detonated an explosive belt and killed himself and three of the border guards – one of whom was the commander of northern border forces, General Oudah al-Belawi.
Al Jazeera America
ATIZAPAN DE ZARAGOZA, Mexico — José Diego Suárez Padilla has converted his home into a shrine to his daughter, Rosa Diana. Windows fashioned after her blue eyes stare out on the street. A painting of the girl in a white party dress covers a living room wall, overlooking an altar with offerings of chicken and chewing gum. The food has lain there so long that the red chili sauce has congealed.
Suárez Padilla explains to a visitor that he normally puts out fresh food but lately hasn’t had time. That’s because he’s busy all day consulting with lawyers and politicians to seek justice for her death.
Four years ago on New Year’s Eve, a jealous ex-boyfriend stabbed to death the 22-year-old secretarial student and bashed her face into a purple pulp. Suárez Padilla spent 10 months hunting down the youth when he went on the lam — authorities would not make the effort. Even though the young man confessed, he has not been sentenced. Suárez Padilla wants to see him behind bars, alongside the police who denied a restraining order two months before the murder when the youth burst into the house, stole her cell phone and threatened to kill her.
Al Jazeera America
Firefighters in South Australia raced Monday to contain a major bushfire — the region's worst in three decades — ahead of predicted strong winds and a heat wave later this week that could further fuel a blaze that has destroyed dozens of homes and injured almost 30 people.
About 700 emergency responders have been involved in the operation, which included the use of more than a dozen aircraft to dump water on the flames in the hills northwest of the South Australia state capital Adelaide. The fires have already burned through 31,000 acres of countryside, State Premier Jay Weatherill said Monday.
On Friday and Saturday, hot and windy conditions that had fanned the destructive wildfires, which are common across much of Australia during the summer months spanning December through February, forced thousands of residents to evacuate their homes.
While fire crews were working to take advantage of conditions that have eased since Sunday, the state fire service warned that properties were still at risk, with temperatures in the Adelaide Hills — which has a population of 40,000 and features scenic villages known for farming produce and wineries — forecast to soar above 100 degrees Fahrenheit later this week.
Spiegel Online
At midnight, Lithuania's days without the euro came to an end. As the calendar flipped to 2015, the countdown clock hanging over the entrance to the country's central bank hit zero and fireworks shot into the air above the city palace in Vilnius. People celebrated in the streets and in the bars of the Lithuanian capital as a euro symbol was projected onto the facade of the city's neoclassical cathedral. Not long later, Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius withdrew a 10-euro note from a cash machine decorated especially for the occasion.
...
In Greece, meanwhile, 2,000 kilometers (1,243 miles) to the south, a different kind of countdown is proceeding apace. In contrast to Lithuania, however, the days being counted could be the final ones in the country's participation in the euro zone. On Jan. 25, Greek voters will be heading to the polls for parliamentary elections. Should the leftist alliance Syriza win, as polls show it might, the euro could soon be history in the country.
nPR
Cuba has promised its citizens better Internet access in this New Year. The few Cubans who now manage to get online find it expensive and slow.
Warming ties with the U.S. have stirred hope for improved telecommunications. But until then, many residents have devised an ingenious work-around, or should we say walk-around.
On Havana's Malecon, roaming guitarists play for the crowds resting against the iconic sea wall. In this nightly gathering spot, it's old fashioned interacting. No one is on a cell, no eyes glued to smart phones.
While Cubans tout their revolution's free health care and education, they've missed out on the digital one. Less than a fifth of the population owns a mobile device; internet access is even lower and cable and satellite TV is banned in private homes.
But surprisingly, Cubans are plugged in. During a lull in the nightly music the conversation turns to this week's latest installment of some of the U.S.'s most popular television shows.
The Guardian
Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny said on Monday he would no longer comply with the terms of his house arrest and had cut off his monitoring tag.
Navalny, who led mass protests against Vladimir Putin three years ago, was handed a suspended sentence on 30 December after being found guilty of embezzling money in a trial that led to his brother being jailed on similar charges.
He was placed under house arrest almost a year ago during the investigation but said in a blog that he was perhaps the only person in Russian legal history to be kept under house arrest after being sentenced.
He said he should have been released after sentencing in late December but instead was being held pending the publication of the verdict on 15 January – a situation that even the police did not know how to deal with.
“It is stupid to brag, but I am the first person in the history of Russian courts to be sitting under house arrest after the verdict,” he said on his blog.
THE ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE, HEALTH AND TECHNOLOGY
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The Guardian
Mining conjures up an ugly environmental image. Companies dig deep into the earth and use large amounts of energy and water to extract, process and transport minerals, leaving behind a devastating impact.
That image has come to define the mining industry, and it’s increasingly hurting its ability to make money. Now a new group is working to remake that reputation by changing some of the industry’s practices.
A white paper issued by the Kellogg Innovation Network at Northwestern University last month outlines key issues and ways to tackle them. The white paper is meant to serve as a framework to inspire more mining companies to develop sustainable projects that could also boost their profits.
In particular, it focuses on building good relationships with local communities most heavily impacted by mining operations. But it also pinpoints some of the significant troubles the mining industry faces as it seek to expand into more remote areas of the map.
Reuters
The selloff in global oil markets showed little signs of slowing in the new year, falling as much as 6 percent on Monday to their lowest since spring 2009, as fears of a supply glut that vexed the market for the past six months deepened.
U.S crude crashed below $50 a barrel while benchmark Brent crude tumbled under $53 after data showed Russian oil output at post-Soviet era highs and Iraqi oil exports at near 35-year peaks.
U.S. driller ConocoPhillips (COP.N) added to the bearish sentiment, announcing it had struck first oil at a Norwegian North Sea project.
Top crude exporter Saudi Arabia revealed it had made deep cuts to its monthly oil prices for European buyers ARM-OSP-E, the sixth time in a row since June when it had slashed prices, corresponding with the rout in crude futures markets over the period.
NPR
The last thing my 11-year-old does before she goes to sleep is put her iPod on the nightstand. And that could mean less sleep for her, researchers say.
There's plenty of evidence that children who have televisions in their rooms get less sleep. This is one of the first studies to look at whether having a small screen like an iPod or smartphone in the room also affects rest.
The study, which was published Monday in Pediatrics, looked at 2,048 racially diverse fourth-graders and seventh-graders who were participating in a study on childhood obesity in Massachusetts. Lack of sleep is considered a risk factor for obesity, so the children were asked how long they slept and if they felt they needed more sleep.
They also were asked how often they slept with an iPod, smartphone or cellphone in their bed or next to the bed. More than half of the children, 57 percent, said they slept near a small screen.
NPR
It's a tradition as old as New Year's: making resolutions. We will not smoke, or sojourn with the bucket of mint chocolate chip. In fact, we will resist sweets generally, including the bowl of M&M's that our co-worker has helpfully positioned on the aisle corner of his desk. There will be exercise, and the learning of a new language.
It is resolved.
So what does science know about translating our resolve into actual changes in behavior? The answer to this question brings us — strangely enough — to a story about heroin use in Vietnam.
In May of 1971, two congressmen, Robert Steele from Connecticut and Morgan Murphy of Illinois, went to Vietnam for an official visit and returned with some extremely disturbing news: 15 percent of U.S. servicemen in Vietnam, they said, were actively addicted to heroin.
A map showing the forecast low temperatures.
National Weather Service
NPR
Winter has arrived in the United States: Over the next day or so, the jet stream will dip and bring some bone-chilling temperatures to a huge swath of the country.
Meteorologists at the Weather Channel say the winter storm will "bring a swath of snow more than 2,000 miles long from the Cascades and Northern Rockies across the Midwest and into the Northeast through Tuesday."
C/NET
At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Monday, the streaming video service announced its new "Netflix Recommended TV program," which is an evaluation program that will help consumers identify televisions built for "a superior Internet TV experience."
Netflix's chief of streaming and partnerships, Greg Peters, announced the new program on stage during a press conference with LG Electronics, which is one of several TV manufacturers to partner with Netflix in this program. He also said that Netflix intends to deliver HDR content to LG TVs this year. HDR stands for High Dynamic Range, which describes the ratio between light and dark picture quality to offer richer color and more realistic pictures.
Reuters
Morgan Stanley (MS.N) said on Monday it had fired a financial adviser who allegedly stole account information from about 350,000 of its wealth management clients and posted some of it online.
There is no evidence that clients lost money as a result of the latest breach of customer information at a financial firm, Morgan Stanley said in a statement.
A person familiar with the matter identified the former employee as Galen Marsh, a 30-year-old financial adviser from one of Morgan Stanley's New York branches.
Marsh appeared to be looking to sell the data, which pertained to about 10 percent of Morgan Stanley's 3.5 million clients, the person said. He published information on about 900 accounts as an apparent advertisement, the person said.