Arias Had No Remorse: Prosecutor

Prosecutor Juan Martinez hammered alleged murderer Jodi Arias today with accusations that she felt no remorse when she lied over and over again about killing her ex-boyfriend, Travis Alexander.

"Ma'am you have a problem with telling the truth don't you?" Martinez asked as his first question today, the 11th day Arias has been on the stand explaining her role in Alexander's death.

"Not typically," Arias responded.

Martinez then took Arias through a series of lies she admittedly told in the days after she stabbed and shot Alexander to death on June 4, 2008, lying to friends, investigators and even Alexander's grandmother, going so far as to send a dozen irises to his grandmother expressing her sympathy.

See the Evidence in the Jodi Arias Murder Trial

Arias, 32, has testified that she killed Alexander in self-defense during a violent argument and lied about it out of "shame."

But prosecutors say that the 27 stab wounds, a slashed throat, and two bullets she fired at Alexander's head prove that she murdered him. She could face the death penalty if convicted.

Catching Up on the Trial? Check Out ABC News' Jodi Arias Trial Coverage

Today Martinez tried to raise doubts about Arias' earlier testimony in which she depicted Alexander as an increasingly menacing and sexually demanding lover by grilling her about the lies she told after she killed Alexander.

Martinez pointed out that Arias lied to Detective Esteban Flores of the Mesa, Ariz., police department as he investigated Alexander's death. She initially denied to the detective that she was at Alexander's Mesa, Ariz., home when he was killed, and later said he was murdered by a pair of masked intruders.

Jodi Arias Testimony: Prosecution's Cross-Examination Watch Video

Jodi Arias Remains Calm Under Cross-Examination Watch Video

Jodi Arias Doesn't Remember Stabbing Ex-Boyfriend Watch Video

"You told (Flores) you would help him, but that was a lie right? You weren't there to tell the truth. You were there for another purpose: to make sure he didn't get the truth.... You were hoping, ma'am, that (Flores) would believe what you were saying so you could walk out of jail," Martinez said.

Arias argued with Martinez, claiming that she lied to investigators out of shame, and lied to friends immediately after the death out of confusion.

"My mind wasn't right during all that period," Arias said referring to the hours immediately following the killing when she drove through the Arizona desert and made phone calls to ex-boyfriend Matthew McCartney and new love interest Ryan Burns.

"It's like I wasn't accepting it in my mind... because I never killed anyone before," she said.

Martinez also suggested that Arias tried to find out the status of the investigation into Alexander's death so that she could know if she were about to be arrested. When a friend of Alexander's called her to report the news about Alexander's death, Arias asked about details into the investigation, the prosecutor said. She also called Alexander's Mormon bishop and asked him what he knew about the case, and then asked friends and family members what they knew, according to Martinez.

"You needed to see what you needed to know to make sure you weren't charged. What purpose would there be for that information other than to benefit you?" Martinez asked. "You called [the bishop] at 3 a.m. You call him and spoke to him because you wanted to get the information about what he knew about the investigation. That was going to help you."

Timeline of the Jodi Arias Trial

Martinez also went over lies that Arias told to her friend, Leslie Udy, and Ryan Burns, both of whom she saw in Utah the day after killing Alexander. She talked to both about Alexander as if he were still alive. Martinez pointed out that Arias even made out with Burns in his bedroom during their visit.

But Arias claimed that it was Burns who lied about their encounter.

"And with Mr. Burns, didn't you get on top of him and grind on him?" Martinez asked.

Arias said she was on top of Burns at one point, but they did not "grind."

"Well, when you were romantic kissing, he did put his hand between your legs, didn't he?" Martinez said, referring to Burns' own testimony in court weeks earlier.

"No," Arias said. "It could be that he's full of crap...when he says he got near my vaginal area."

"This is the person who lied to him, to (friends), to Detective Flores, and yet you're telling us someone else is full of crap," Martinez asked incredulously.

"When it comes to that, yes," she said.

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Ancient continent hides beneath Indian Ocean

The sands of Mauritius are hiding a secret: deep beneath them lurks an ancient continent.

Trond Torsvik and colleagues at the University of Oslo, Norway, analysed grains of zircon found on the island's beaches, measuring the balance of lead and uranium isotopes to work out their age. This showed some formed almost 2 billion years ago – although the volcanic island is no more than 65 million years old.

So where did the grains come from? Torsvik thinks they are from fragments of continental crust beneath Mauritius that melted as the volcanic island formed. The team have named the proposed continent Mauritia.

It's a reasonable idea, says Michael Wysession at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. "It's hard to imagine how zircons could be there any other way."

Journal reference: Nature Geoscience, DOI: 10.1038/ngeo1736

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Football: Inter - Milan share spoils as Balotelli returns to derby

MILAN: AC Milan striker Mario Balotelli missed a handful of chances in his first derby in over three years as the Rossoneri shared the spoils in a 1-1 derby draw with hosts Inter Milan here Sunday.

Milan took a 21st minute lead through striker Stephan El Shaarawy and dominated throughout before ultimately lamenting their earlier misses when Inter midfielder Ezequiel Schelotto levelled in the 71st minute.

Inter were given a pre-match boost with the inclusion of central defender Andrea Ranocchia, who had been an injury doubt all week.

Yet despite Milan's 1-0 defeat to the Nerazzurri at the San Siro earlier in the campaign, the visitors started the second 'Derby della Madonnina' as firm favourites having stunned Barcelona 2-0 in their Champions League first leg here last week and climbed up to third place in the table.

Milan enjoyed the share of the early chances with Sulley Muntari and Mattia De Sciglio testing Samir Handanovic, while Inter striker Antonio Cassano saw a lame shot easily collected by Christian Abbiati.

However, the visitors spurned the first of several clear chances, Balotelli slipping in front of goal after Kevin Prince Boateng had left Mattia De Sciglio's cross from the left wing at his feet.

At the other end forward Rodrigo Palacio should have done better with an angled strike that went well side of Abbiati's far post.

Milan began to dictate play and were finding options down the left where De Sciglio's long runs were giving the hosts trouble.

When former Milan striker Cassano lost possession in midfield, Boateng collected and coolly sent El Shaarawy through to beat Handanvoic with an angled shot with the outside of his boot.

Milan threatened again when Balotelli rose to meet a corner from the right which had Handanovic scrambling for the ball on the goalline.

Balotelli's third clear chance followed moments later when he toe-poked a probing ball into the box only for it to be cleared.

Handanovic easily collected Balotelli's header from Ignazio Abbate's cross from the right but on 40 minutes the 'keeper was at full stretch to parry when Balotelli thumped a freekick from 30 metres out.

Milan threatened from the outset of the second half, Boateng flashing a header wide from Montolivo's freekick on the right after El Shaarawy had been hauled down.

Freddy Guarin gave Inter's fans hope when he first-timed Palacio's whipped cross in from the right only for Abbiati to pull off a superb save at full stretch.

On 57 minutes Balotelli flashed a header wide from a freekick but was left far more frustrated when Handanovic bravely blocked as the striker got in close to try and prod the ball home from a cross on the right.

Milan were still dominating, but the visitors were stunned in the 71st minute when Schelotto got on the end of Yuto Nagatomo's cross to stun Abbiati only two minutes after replacing Cambiasso.

Inter had the momentum and moments later Palacio's header to the right of Abbiati's goal had the keeper scrambling, although at the other end Muntari sent a looping shot just to the right of an outstretched Handanovic.

Milan regrouped to dominate the final quarter hour, with El Shaarawy's ambitious bicycle kick blocked and then M'Baye Niang, who replaced Boateng with 10 minutes to go, seeing his low strike meet traffic in the area.

However the Rossoneri were lucky not to suffer a late Inter goal against the run of play when Palacio saw a header go close.

- AFP/jc

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YouTube code refers to paid channel subscriptions

Paid channel subscriptions on YouTube may be closer than previously thought.

After reports last month that YouTube was considering offering channels that would require a fee to access, code has now appeared that suggests Google is already laying the software foundation for subscription channels.

According to Android Police, the latest version of YouTube for
Android includes two lines of code that refer to paid channel subscriptions. The code, apparently intended to generate messages on users' screens, say:

You can only subscribe to this paid channel on your computer.

You can only unsubscribe from this paid channel on your computer.

YouTube had approached a handful of producers about developing content for a subscription platform that might the Google-owned video-sharing site hoped to launch this year, according to an AdAge report in January. YouTube was also mulling a plan to charge for other items, such as entire libraries of videos, live events, and even self-help or financial advice shows, AdAge reported.

A paid content platform would offer viewers an alternative to traditional TV, as well as deliver new revenue streams through subscriptions and ads placed in the channels.

YouTube has floated the idea of launching subscription services in the past but has so far balked at the idea. YouTube CEO Salar Kamangar said in February 2012 that his company was considering allowing content providers to create their own, unique subscription-based video service on the site.

CNET has contacted YouTube for comment on the code and will update this report when we learn more.

(Via The Verge)

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Picture Archive: Dorothy Lamour and Jiggs, Circa 1938

Dorothy Lamour, most famous for her Road to ... series of movies with Bing Crosby and Bob Hope, never won an Oscar. In her 50-plus-year career as an actress, she never even got nominated.

Neither did Jiggs the chimpanzee, pictured here with Lamour on the set of Her Jungle Love in a photo published in the 1938 National Geographic story "Monkey Folk."

No animal has ever been nominated for an Oscar. According to Academy Award rules, only actors and actresses are eligible.

Uggie, the Jack Russell terrier from last year's best picture winner, The Artist, didn't rate a nod. The equines that portrayed Seabiscuit and War Horse, movies that were best picture contenders in their respective years, were also snubbed.

Even the seven piglets that played Babe, the eponymous star of the best picture nominee in 1998, didn't rate. And the outlook seems to be worsening for the animal kingdom's odds of ever getting its paws on that golden statuette.

This year, two movies nominated in the best picture category had creatures that were storyline drivers with significant on-screen time. Neither Beasts of the Southern Wild (which featured extinct aurochs) or Life of Pi (which featured a CGI Bengal tiger named Richard Parker) used real animals.

An Oscar's not the only way for animals to get ahead, though. Two years after this photo was published, the American Humane Association's Los Angeles Film & TV Unit was established to monitor and protect animals working on show business sets. The group's creation was spurred by the death of a horse during the filming of 1939's Jessie James.

Today, it's still the only organization that stamps "No Animals Were Harmed" onto a movie's closing credits.

Editor's note: This is part of a series of pieces that looks at the news through the lens of the National Geographic photo archives.

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Pistorius' Brother Facing Own Homicide Trial

The attorney for Oscar Pistorius' family said today that the Olympian's brother is facing a culpable homicide charge relating to a 2008 road accident in which a motorcyclist was killed.

Carl Pistorius, who sat behind his younger brother, Oscar, every day at his bail hearing, will now face his own homicide trial for the accident five years ago, which his attorney, Kenny Oldwage, said he "deeply regrets."

Carl Pistorius is charged with culpable homicide, which refers to the unlawful negligent killing of another person. The charges were initially dropped, but were later reinstated, Oldwage said in a statement.

Full Coverage: Oscar Pistorius Case

Pistorius quietly appeared in court on Thursday, one day before his Paralympic gold-medalist brother was released on bail, Oldwage said. His next appearance is scheduled for the end of March.

Liza van Deventer/Foto24/Gallo Images/Getty Images

'Blade Runner' Murder Charges: Oscar Pistorius Out on Bail Watch Video

Oscar Pistorius Granted Bail in Murder Case Watch Video

It was the latest twist in a case that has drawn international attention, after 26-year-old Oscar Pistorius, a double amputee who ran in both the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic games, was charged with the premeditated murder of his model girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.

On Saturday, Carl Pistorius' Twitter handle was hacked, according to a family spokeswoman, prompting the Pistorius family to cancel their social media accounts.

Steenkamp's parents speak about the Valentine's Day shooting that ended their daughter's life in a sit-down interview on South African television tonight.

On Saturday, the model's father, Barry Steenkamp, told the Afrikaans-language Beeld newspaper that Pistorius will have to "live with his conscience" and will "suffer" if his story that he shot Steenkamp because he believed she was an intruder is false.

RELATED: Oscar Pistorius Case: Key Elements to the Murder Investigation

After a four-day long bail hearing, Pistorius was granted bail Friday by a South African magistrate.

The court set bail at about $113,000 (1 million rand) and June 4 as the date for Pistorius' next court appearance.

Pistoriuis is believed to be staying at his uncle's house as he awaits trial. As part of his bail conditions, Pistorius must give up all his guns, he cannot drink alcohol or return to the home where the shooting occurred, and he must check in with a police department twice a week.

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Amazon to open market in second-hand MP3s and e-books

A new market for second-hand digital downloads could let us hold virtual yard sales of our ever-growing piles of intangible possessions

WHY buy second-hand? For physical goods, the appeal is in the price – you don't mind the creases in a book or rust spots on a car if it's a bargain. Although digital objects never lose their good-as-new lustre, their very nature means there is still uncertainty about whether we actually own them in the first place, making it tricky to set up a second-hand market. Now an Amazon patent for a system to support reselling digital purchases could change that.

Amazon's move comes after last year's European Union ruling that software vendors cannot stop customers from reselling their products. But without technical support, the ruling has had no impact. In Amazon's system, customers will keep their digital purchases – such as e-books or music – in a personal data store in the cloud that only they can access, allowing them to stream or download the content.

This part is like any cloud-based digital locker except that the customer can resell previous purchases by passing the access rights to another person. Once the transaction is complete, the seller will lose access to the content. Any system for reselling an e-book, for example, would have to ensure that it is not duplicated in the transaction. That means deleting any copies the seller may have lying around on hard drives, e-book readers, and other cloud services, since that would violate copyright.

Amazon may be the biggest company to consider a second-hand market, but it is not the first. ReDigi, based in Boston, has been running a resale market for digital goods since 2011. After downloading an app, users can buy a song on ReDigi for as little as 49 cents that would costs 99 cents new on iTunes.

When users want to sell an item, they upload it to ReDigi's servers via a mechanism that ensures no copy is made during the transfer. Software checks that the seller does not retain a copy. Once transferred, the item can be bought and downloaded by another customer. ReDigi is set to launch in Europe in a few months.

Digital items on ReDigi are cheaper because they are one-offs. If your hard drive crashes and you lose your iTunes collection you can download it again. But you can only download an item from ReDigi once – there is no other copy. That is the trade-off that makes a second-hand digital market work: the risk justifies the price. The idea has ruffled a few feathers – last year EMI sued ReDigi for infringement of copyright. A judge denied the claim, but the case continues.

Used digital goods can also come with added charm. ReDigi tracks the history of the items traded so when you buy something, you can see who has owned it and when. ReDigi's second-hand marketplace has grown into a social network. According to ReDigi founder John Ossenmacher, customers like seeing who has previously listened to a song. "It's got soul like an old guitar," he says. "We've introduced this whole feeling of connectedness."

It could be good for business too if the original vendors, such as iTunes, were to support resale and take a cut of the resell price. Nevertheless, Amazon's move bucks the industry trend. Microsoft's new Xbox, for example, is expected not to work with second-hand games.

But the market could change rapidly now that Amazon's weight is behind this, says Ossenmacher. "The industry is waking up."

This article appeared in print under the headline "Old MP3, one careful owner"

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Ecuador president vows to push large-scale mining

QUITO: Ecuador's re-elected President Rafael Correa said Saturday he will push large-scale mining projects during his next four years in office, despite opposition from some indigenous groups.

"The Ecuadoran people have voted to responsibly take advantage of non-renewable resources," said in a weekly address on his administration's activities.

Correa, a socialist, said his goal was to use the country's mining and oil wealth to eliminate poverty and said he was committed to "the Amazonian people and all the areas where there is mining or oil."

A year ago, Correa's government signed a contract with the Chinese company Ecuacorriente to mine copper in the Amazon basin province of Zamora-Chinchipe, in a major move to open the country to large-scale mining.

The country's largest indigenous organisation opposed the deal, however, and with the backing of opposition groups led a two-week-long protest march from the Amazon to Quito.

But Correa, who has been in power since 2007, won re-election last week in a landslide, with 56.77 per cent of the vote, and he used his speech Saturday to criticise opponents of big mining.

"To hurt the government, they are hurting the country, the poor, that Amazonian region," Correa said, adding that "we are not with the multinationals, we are with the poor."

"We cannot be beggars sitting in front of a bag of gold," he said.

- AFP/jc

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Google laptop shows Apple a thing or two

The 3.3-pound Google Chromebook Pixel sports a 12.85-inch, 2,560x1,700-pixel display and an Intel Core i5 processor.

(Credit:
Stephen Shankland/CNET)

Thank you, Google. For obsoleting my MacBook.

Question: What two killer hardware features are missing on MacBooks? My answer: a touch screen and 4G.

What a coincidence. Just what Google is offering on the Chromebook Pixel. And in a package that comes close to matching the MacBook's aesthetics. (I'm focusing strictly on the hardware for the moment.)

Google is saying, at least in the case of touch, hey Apple, you don't get it.

Not everyone may agree with that. Take the laptop flat-earthers. They will say touch is stupid (or "pointless" as one columnist said) on a laptop. Yeah right, just like the mouse was a stupid idea.

Then there's Apple's your-arm-wants-to-fall-off on vertical touch surfaces excuse. That will eventually give way to a touch-screen MacBook of some sort. You heard it here first.

The point is, Google knows (they're not stupid) that touch is important on a laptop. As does Microsoft (Windows 8 and Surface). That leaves Apple in Luddite land.

4G: And some might say that a Chromebook needs 4G more than a MacBook because the Chromebook is so immersed in the cloud. Hmm, my MacBook spends lots of time in the cloud too. And the last time I used it on the road, I was constantly hauling out my Verizon MiFi or running down my iPhone's battery with the Personal Hotspot. Come on, LTE belongs in a laptop.

And the operating system? I believe that cool hardware is the first step in luring consumers to a new operating environment.

While Chrome OS is still a work in progress (and lacks key features that many users need), with the success of
Android, I do think it's possible that an improved Chrome OS combined with a second-generation Chromebook Pixel could reel in more consumers.

Google certainly has my attention.

Google Chromebook Pixel.

(Credit:
CNET)

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Elderly Abandoned at World's Largest Religious Festival

Every 12 years, the northern Indian city of Allahabad plays host to a vast gathering of Hindu pilgrims called the Maha Kumbh Mela. This year, Allahabad is expected to host an estimated 80 million pilgrims between January and March. (See Kumbh Mela: Pictures From the Hindu Holy Festival)

People come to Allahabad to wash away their sins in the sacred River Ganges. For many it's the realization of their life's goal, and they emerge feeling joyful and rejuvenated. But there is also a darker side to the world's largest religious gathering, as some take advantage of the swirling crowds to abandon elderly relatives.

"They wait for this Maha Kumbh because many people are there so nobody will know," said one human rights activist who has helped people in this predicament and who wished to remain anonymous. "Old people have become useless, they don't want to look after them, so they leave them and go."

Anshu Malviya, an Allahabad-based social worker, confirmed that both men and women have been abandoned during the religious event, though it has happened more often to elderly widows. Numbers are hard to come by, since many people genuinely become separated from their groups in the crowd, and those who have been abandoned may not admit it. But Malviya estimates that dozens of people are deliberately abandoned during a Maha Kumbh Mela, at a very rough guess.

To a foreigner, it seems puzzling that these people are not capable of finding their own way home. Malviya smiles. "If you were Indian," he said, "you wouldn't be puzzled. Often they have never left their homes. They are not educated, they don't work. A lot of the time they don't even know which district their village is in."

Once the crowd disperses and the volunteer-run lost-and-found camps that provide temporary respite have packed away their tents, the abandoned elderly may have the option of entering a government-run shelter. Conditions are notoriously bad in these homes, however, and many prefer to remain on the streets, begging. Some gravitate to other holy cities such as Varanasi or Vrindavan where, if they're lucky, they are taken in by temples or charity-funded shelters.

In these cities, they join a much larger population, predominantly women, whose families no longer wish to support them, and who have been brought there because, in the Hindu religion, to die in these holy cities is to achieve moksha or Nirvana. Mohini Giri, a Delhi-based campaigner for women's rights and former chair of India's National Commission for Women, estimates that there are 10,000 such women in Varanasi and 16,000 in Vrindavan.

But even these women are just the tip of the iceberg, says economist Jean Drèze of the University of Allahabad, who has campaigned on social issues in India since 1979. "For one woman who has been explicitly parked in Vrindavan or Varanasi, there are a thousand or ten thousand who are living next door to their sons and are as good as abandoned, literally kept on a starvation diet," he said.

According to the Hindu ideal, a woman should be looked after until the end of her life by her male relatives—with responsibility for her shifting from her father to her husband to her son. But Martha Chen, a lecturer in public policy at Harvard University who published a study of widows in India in 2001, found that the reality was often very different.

Chen's survey of 562 widows of different ages revealed that about half of them were supporting themselves in households that did not include an adult male—either living alone, or with young children or other single women. Many of those who did live with their families reported harassment or even violence.

According to Drèze, the situation hasn't changed since Chen's study, despite the economic growth that has taken place in India, because widows remain vulnerable due to their lack of education and employment. In 2010, the World Bank reported that only 29 percent of the Indian workforce was female. Moreover, despite changes in the law designed to protect women's rights to property, in practice sons predominantly inherit from their parents—leaving women eternally dependent on men. In a country where 37 percent of the population still lives below the poverty line, elderly dependent relatives fall low on many people's lists of priorities.

This bleak picture is all too familiar to Devshran Singh, who oversees the Durga Kund old people's home in Varanasi. People don't pay toward the upkeep of their relatives, he said, and they rarely visit. In one case, a doctor brought an old woman to Durga Kund claiming she had been abandoned. After he had gone, the woman revealed that the doctor was her son. "In modern life," said Singh, "people don't have time for their elderly."

Drèze is currently campaigning for pensions for the elderly, including widows. Giri is working to make more women aware of their rights. And most experts agree that education, which is increasingly accessible to girls in India, will help improve women's plight. "Education is a big force of social change," said Drèze. "There's no doubt about that."

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