Role

Lauren Ashley Mastrosa given 18-month community corrections order after book was read by handful of advance readersThe author behind an offensive novel depicting toddler role-play has been convicted but spared jail for penning child abuse material.Lauren Ashley Mastrosa, a 34-year-old former marketing executive for a Christian charity, wrote Daddy’s Little Toy under the pen name Tori Woods and published it through an online pre-release in March 2025. Continue reading...

Jay Bryant’s admission came more than two decades after the rapper’s killing, but he didn’t name others involvedSign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inboxNearly a quarter century after rap star Jam Master Jay of Run-DMC was shot to death, a man admitted in court Monday to a role in a killing that stymied investigators for decades.Jay Bryant pleaded guilty to a federal murder charge, telling a judge that he helped other people get into a recording studio to ambush the DJ, born Jason Mizell. Continue reading...

Not using capital punishment ‘really a requirement’ for Council of Europe’s parliamentary assembly, says presidentIsrael’s observer status at the Council of Europe’s parliamentary assembly could be suspended over the country’s new law mandating the death penalty for Palestinians convicted of some offences, the president of the body has said.Petra Bayr, an Austrian Social Democrat and president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (Pace), said not using the death penalty was “really a requirement” of having observer status at the pan-European human rights body, which has no connection to the EU. Continue reading...

Ex-civil servant testifying about Peter Mandelson says there was a ‘creep’ of senior diplomatic roles going to political figuresUK politics live – latest updatesDowning Street asked the Foreign Office to find a senior diplomatic role for Keir Starmer’s then communications chief, Matthew Doyle, the department’s former lead civil servant revealed on Tuesday.Testifying to MPs at parliament’s foreign affairs select committee, Olly Robbins said he had had several conversations with No 10 about finding a role for Doyle, who was later suspended as a Labour peer after it emerged he had campaigned for a friend charged with possessing indecent images of children. Continue reading...

Exclusive: deputy prime minister says it is ‘inexplicable’ top civil servant kept Downing Street in darkKeir Starmer would have blocked Peter Mandelson from serving as the UK’s ambassador to Washington had he known he failed security vetting, David Lammy has said, as he attempted to shore up the prime minister amid damaging fallout from the row.In his first public comments on the vetting affair, Lammy said it was “inexplicable” that Oliver Robbins, the former top civil servant who was forced out of the Foreign Office this week, had opted to leave Downing Street in the dark over the outcome. Continue reading...

Exit of former Newsnight editor after eight years comes after appointment of new chief executive Priya DograChannel 4’s content chief, Ian Katz, who holds responsibility for the broadcaster’s £650m annual programming budget and output, is to leave after almost nine years in the post.Katz, a former senior executive at the Guardian, became the channel’s director of programmes in January 2018, having moved from being the editor of BBC’s Newsnight. Continue reading...

Report finds there were dozens of warning signs about Axel Rudakubana as far back as 2019 and identifies five main failures of those involvedSouthport attack blamed on ‘catastrophic’ failures by agencies and killer’s ‘irresponsible’ parentsIt took seconds for Axel Rudakubana to carry out one of the most barbaric attacks on children in modern British history.Yet by the time he entered that joy-filled holiday club, where young girls sat making Taylor Swift bracelets, his deadly intentions had been known for years. Continue reading...