Frank Butler

Speedy swimmers and love hearts

A Rwandan peacekeeper in the Central African Republic has shot dead four colleagues before killing himself, Rwanda's Defence Ministry says.

Mali's security forces storm a hotel in the central town of Sevare, ending a deadly siege and freeing several hostages.

Five people are arrested in Sicily, accused of multiple homicide and human trafficking, following the drowning of more than 200 migrants in the Mediterranean.

How Cecil the lion is inspiring African dress design

SAN FRANCISCO – It's 3 p.m. on a late July day at the two-story Boys and Girls Club Mission Clubhouse here on Alabama Street, and shutting down of the activities in the rooms upstairs has begun. Director Melissa Gibson is...

A Sudanese national is charged after allegedly walking nearly the full length of the 50.5 km (31-mile) Channel Tunnel towards the UK.

Doctors in Ghana have now stopped providing emergency care, as a nationwide strike continues.

by Terry Parris Jr.

Some of the best #MuckReads we read this week. Want to receive these by email?  Sign up to get this briefing delivered to your inbox every weekend.

The new science of sentencing (The Marshall Project and FiveThirtyEight)

if it fair to be sentenced based on future crimes? soon it will be in PA https://t.co/aAH2eJcLXP w @FiveThirtyEight pic.twitter.com/caVu1yo7Jl

— gabriel dance (@gabrieldance) August 4, 2015

"Pennsylvania is on the verge of becoming one of the first states in the country to base criminal sentences not only on what crimes people have been convicted of, but also on whether they are deemed likely to commit additional crimes. As early as next year, judges there could receive statistically derived tools known as risk assessments to help them decide how much prison time — if any — to assign."

Chicago police detained thousands of black Americans at interrogation facility (The Guardian)

"Being a lawyer, I can definitely say that is a civil rights issue" http://t.co/KarPQo8nNK

— Spencer Ackerman (@attackerman) August 5, 2015

"Despite the quadruple-digit number of arrestees held at Homan Square, the Chicago police proffered only three arrestees receiving visits from lawyers between 3 September 2004 and 1 July 2015. Two of them occurred on the same day in January 2013. Unless approximately 3,500 people in custody waived their right to counsel, the revelation complicates – if not contradicts – the police's March statement that 'any individual who wishes to consult a lawyer will not be interrogated until they have an opportunity to do so'."

Thirty miles from Selma, a different kind of civil rights struggle (The Center for Public Integrity)

Residents of Uniontown, Alabama say the Dept. of Environmental Management is violating their civil rights #muckreads http://t.co/IlDGqykV20

— Talia Buford (@TaliaBuford) August 5, 2015

"A Center for Public Integrity investigation has found that the EPA's civil-rights program, championed under presidents from Clinton to Obama, almost always closes cases without action, either rejecting or dismissing nine out of every ten. Records show the agency has failed to exercise its authority to investigate claims even when it has reason to believe discrimination could be occurring."

589 days to justice? (The Florida Times-Union)

Great investigation .@ReporterTopher ! A #mustread 589 Days to Justicehttp://t.co/iHEcrjykJD#Muckreads

— Maria Ines Zamudio (@mizamudio) August 3, 2015

"Jerome started falling apart just a couple of months after his arrest. He had alibis for two of the crimes. He passed a polygraph. Key records connected to his brother's name. But it took 589 days before prosecutors released Jerome from jail."

Chicago and Los Angeles have used 'dirt box' surveillance for a decade (Reveal News)

#LAPD, #ChicagoPD have used #NSA-grade #DRTBox cellphone surveillance for a decade. My latest for @reveal #muckreads https://t.co/TD16Rde0D3

— Ali Winston (@awinston) August 7, 2015

"...if you put one of these on an airplane and fly them around, you can find all sorts of info about potentially thousands of people,' said Freddy Martinez, an activist who has sued the Chicago Police Department multiple times for records on its use of cell-site simulators. 'That includes voice content, who they're calling, what data they're sending. It's like a StingRay on steroids.'"

One year later: Ferguson is still pumping out arrest warrants (CNN Money)

One year later: Ferguson is still pumping out arrest warrants http://t.co/9Mq8IdEFvD via @CNNMoney Investigation #muckreads

— Ryan Sullivan (@rs_sully) August 6, 2015

"One sign of improvement: New arrest warrants issued this year are down from the same time last year, though five court dates -- where hundreds of individual cases would typically be heard -- were canceled during this time. But the city is ramping up again. In May and June alone, more than 1,000 people were hit with new arrest warrants -- making up almost half of all new warrants this year (as of June 30), according to figures provided by Ferguson."

Nigeria is to set up a domestic weapons factory in an effort to cut its dependence on imported arms, President Muhammadu Buhari says.