A dog nicknamed “Scooby” has become the first animal in the world to appear as a witness in a murder trial. During a preliminary hearing the pet was led into the witness box by a vet to see how it reacted to a suspect. It is said to have “barked furiously”.

The 23-year-old employee of a private postal firm told authorities he was overworked and opted to collect the envelopes in his flat or throw them away rather than bring them to their addressees, authorities said in a statement.

A man in the back seat next to the victim laid his handgun in his lap while he typed a text message. The victim grabbed the gun and shot that person, then shot one of the people in the front seat.

Often the greatest tech crimes in history have little more reason behind them than “because it was there.” More often than not, a hacker sees an open window—a hole in system’s security, a backdoor, etc.—and climbs on through. And they don’t do it for any real worldly gain, but merely to prove that they can.

A burglar who broke into a home just east of Fresno rubbed spices over the body of one of two men as they slept in their rooms and then used an 8-inch sausage to whack the other man in the face and head before he ran out the house, Fresno County sheriff’s deputies said Saturday.

The Western Australian Labor Party received $2000 four years ago from a Sydney businessman and property developer convicted of conspiring to supply over $100,000 worth of drugs - raising fresh questions about political donations. Electoral records show the donation was made to the WA Labor Party in the 2004-05 financial year.

Jack Abramoff, who came to symbolize an out-of-control, even brazen style of courting government officials, told the judge he had since realized how far he had stepped over the bounds of what was permissible. Wearing plain clothes and a Jewish skullcap, he apologized profusely and said he was begging for mercy.

A spokeswoman for Police Minister Bob Cameron yesterday defended the system introduced by the Government to fight police corruption, but refused to say whether the laws would need to be amended. “Any legal technicalities which may arise … will be addressed appropriately,” she told reporters.

The prosecuting authorities yesterday found that there was insufficient evidence to support any criminal charges against the Member for Robertson and her husband, senior New South Wales Labor MP John Della Bosca, over an altercation at the NSW Central Coast restaurant Iguanas on June 6.

A handcuffed woman sitting in the back of a Canadian police car slipped her cuffs yesterday, wiggled into the front and took off in the cruiser, only to crash kilometres away along the Highway 401, east of Woodstock.