Old lady dies in freezing shipping container

At first glance, this story reeks of neglect of an elderly woman, but when you read all the facts, it isn't quite as bad as it sounds.

Jassy Anglin and her husband Michael Anglin were charged with the manslaughter of Jassy's mother, 78 year old Janet Mackozdi.

Ms Mackozdi came to live with her daughter's family on their property in Tasmania. She was very sick and needed constant care and help with eating, showering and using the toilet. She died one night of hypothermia in a shipping container when temperatures plunged to -3C.

On the night before she died, Ms Mackozdi had slept in the property's main four-room cabin with the Anglin family but on the night of her death, the couple put the old lady to bed in a shipping container, adjacent to the house, where two of their children also spent the night. But when temperatures dropped during that night, the grandmother passed away.

Her daughter was shocked and ashamed and thought the circumstances of her death would point to her mother's neglect, so instead of ringing an ambulance, the couple dressed her in a tracksuit, ugg boots, scarves and jacket and drove to the New Norfolk Hospital. But instead of telling the truth, they concocted a story that nobody believed -  that they had taken her on a trip to the National Park and she died sometime later.  But the autopsy proved that she died of hypothermia.

The couple relocated to Queensland and on 29th April 2014, faced Cairns Court. At the hearing, they were denied bail and flown back to Tasmania under police escort.  The Magistrate said they posed an unacceptable flight risk due to the seriousness of the charges and the evidence stacked against them.

Last Friday in Hobart Supreme Court Sassy Anglin 53 and her husband 56 year old Michael Anglin pleaded guilty to manslaughter.  Jassy finally admitted her mother had in fact died in the shipping container.

Crown Prosecutor Darryl Coates said the Crown was not suggesting the couple intended to harm Ms Mackozdi, in fact he said the case was a tragedy.

"A tragedy for the deceased, but I accept it's a tragedy for both accused" he said. "They've lost their mother, their children have lost their grandmother and on top of that they are facing a serious charge."

Michael Anglin cried as the couple's lawyer Tamara Jago told the court Ms Mackozdi's death was a consequence of one episode of gross misjudgment, but this was not a case of abuse.

Ms Jago said the couple were in the process of moving and because possessions were stacked up everywhere in the main building, it was thought for one night, Ms Mackozdi could sleep in the shipping container, adjacent to the house.  It would be for one night only.

Jassy Anglin dressed her mother in a beanie, socks, dressing gown, gave her a blanket and a doona and had a 3 bar heater on in the container.

"There was nothing sinister about the behavour of either of the accused" Ms Jago said and suggested to Justice Shan Tennent that a wholly suspended sentence would be appropriate.

The couple were released on bail and will face sentencing in April.

Peta Credlin has to go

Peta Credlin is the Prime Minister's Chief of Staff and her husband Brian Loughnane is the party's Federal Director.

The trouble with Peta Credlin began at a meeting last year when she told MPs that she and the Prime Minister's Office knew someone was talking to the media.  She threatened that if people did not like their jobs and were found guilty of gossiping, word would get back to the PM and they would end up on the back bench.

"It's created a culture where people dob in one another" one minister said. 

As if that wasn't bad enough, Credin chided MPs for absenteeism. She said it was rife and wouldn't be tolerated.

Brian Loughnane

Fast forward to February 2015.  The animosity is still there but now in spades and the leaks are coming fast and furious.

This week, Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said in Question Time "Does the Prime Minister agree that the leaks that we are now seeing from inside the government is a sign of just how betrayed by this government even good Liberal people feel?"

He got the same old, same old, numbingly boring reply.  "They are welcome to their insider fixations but what the Australian people want is a government focused on the people of Australia."

The Liberal Party's honorary treasurer Philip Higginson, a long time friend of Tony Abbott, is fed up and resigned his position.

Last weekend he wrote two letters, one outlining why he's resigning as honorary treasurer and another sent to 27 people within the party's executive outlining why he thought Credlin and her husband posed a destructive conflict of interest.

It said in part ".....how the party ever let a husband and wife team into those two key roles......is a complete mystery and those who allowed it to happen should hang their heads in shame."

So our PM continues down the road of trying to ride out this ridiculous situation, ignoring good advice from everyone except Peta and her husband.

Someone should explain to Ms Credlin that MPs don't like to be talked down to and treated like children, they have huge egos and buckets full of pride.

If she cares at all about what's good for the country, she and her husband should move on.

My Kitchen Rules integrity on the line

It was only a matter of time before My Kitchen Rules - the most popular reality show in Australia - was shown up for what it is.  It's not a group of ordinary Aussies trying to win a cooking show but a contrived production piece, made up of people with personality, capable of acting a part.

New wife Carol Molloy

And there was no one better at it than Adam Andersen, who came on with his wife and went straight to the top of the leader board.

ex-wife Cindy

Suddenly the tennis coach's past came back to haunt him and thanks to A Current Affair  his ex-wife Cindy told us what type of man he really is.

He and Cindy have five children aged between 8 and 15, and he owes her $36,000 in child support payments.

He seems to have forgotten all about them since marrying his MKR partner Carol Molloy.  He never asks to see them, never rings them and doesn't even send a birthday card.  They suddenly ceased to exist.

The former tennis pro made a statement the day after the show went to air. "Obviously I would like to spend more time with them" he said.  Oh, really?

He went on.  "Any split from a former wife is going to be tough and yeah, it is tough. Things end because both parties are unhappy, if everything was great, we'd still be together."  But he made no mention of the $36,000 he owes his children.

Then it was revealed that Andersen has personal dealings with Pete Evans.  Cindy claims he coached Evans and later the chef employed him at his former restaurant, Hugo's at Kings Cross.

This revelation puts MKR's integrity in serious doubt. 

It seems that Andersen's efforts to evade capture by the Child Support Agency have been successful, even though he boasts about being tennis coach at private elite schools.

When his ex-wife read on the MKR website about his happy relationship with his new wife and that his children "visited as often as they can", she snapped.

She wrote to Channel 7 asking for confirmation that Andersen was being paid by the network so she could make arrangements to have his child support "garnished" from his TV wages.

A Channel 7 spokesperson said "Production did not received the letter."  His ex-wife has a copy of it. 

"This is a private matter between the parties involved, therefore Channel 7 has no further comment."

Glen McGrath, elephant killer

What does it say about a man who likes to shoot elephants and other wild African animals just for fun?

Photographer Christopher Rimmer must have known what the reaction would be if he released pictures of Glenn McGrath prouding posing in front of a dead elephant and other wild animals he'd killed on an African safari.

Rimmer, born in South Africa and now based in Melbourne, received death threats for trying to ruin the reputation of an Australian sportsman, a man  known for the good work he does heading the foundation he and his wife Jane founded for women with breast cancer.

But most of the outrage isn't towards Rimmer, but McGrath. How can an educated person justify killing a magnificent animal like the elephant for pleasure?  It's obscene.  It's a rich man's pastime simply to enhance his ego.

McGrath issued a statement on Twitter soon after the pictures appeared on Saturday.  He said he "deeply regretted" the experience.

"In 2008, I participated in a hunting safari in Zimbabwe that was licensed and legal but in hindsight highly inappropriate" McGrath wrote. "It was an extremely difficult time in my life and looking back, I deeply regret being involved."

The difficult time McGrath referred to is understood to to be a reference to the death of his wife Jane who died of breast cancer in June 2008. She died 11 years after being diagnosed and co-founded the McGrath Foundation with her husband.

The backlash could effect the charity.  One Twitter user pointed out that cancer patients would suffer if the charity was targeted .........."don't kill Jane's dream."

Glenn McGrath is a Planet Ark ambassador. "We are deeply saddened by the deaths of these animals and in no way endorse or support this activity.  Planet Ark does not have an ongoing association with Glenn McGrath."

Royal Homeopathy

If you are a devotee of fish oil, believing it will enhance your health or if you take daily glucosomine for your joints, you are in good company. Prince Charles thinks they work but science says you are wasting your money.

I took fish oil for years until my doctor told me 12 months ago I was wasting my money.  So I stopped and guess what happened? Absolutely nothing but for some reason, I still persist with the glucosamine and most people I know do too.

In 1982, Prince Charles was appointed President of the British Medical Association, even though he was a strong believer in alternative medicine.

In his inaugural speech to the medicos, he said faith healers had been using alternative medicine successfully for centuries and suggested the British health system should be overhauled.  Later he went even further and said he would like to see homeopathy introduced into the National Health Service.

We can only imagine what the doctors thought about this, but rather than laugh in his face, they organised an enquiry into the efficacy of alternative medicine and the conclusion drawn was that these remedies were "unscientific" and that "Homeopathy is witchcraft."

Next month the Prince is going to the US to speak about links between health and the natural environment.  Hopefully, he won't make the same mistake again.

Prince Charles was accused of gagging one of Britain's leading critics of alternative medicine.  Professor Edzard Ernst said he was treated "like shit" by the University of Exeter after a complaint from the office of Prince Charles.  "Prince Charles' attempt to silence me has been successful" Ernst wrote, who described the Royal's medical views as "quackery."

Ernst would ultimately take early retirement and his department closed down in 2011.

 Dutchy Originals currently available today

The Prince believed so strongly in alternative therapies that he marketed his own.  His Dutchy Originals company was criticized for making misleading claims and was forced to pull advertising in 2009 because there was no evidence the remedies had any effect.

But it's not all bad news.  Twenty one years ago, a biscuit baked from the oats of the Duchy Home Farm in Tetbury made its debut. Today that biscuit is part of a wide range of organic products from the Duchy Originals brand that has over the past two decades raised 11 million pounds for charity.


Charles and Camilla will visit Washington next month to receive an award for his conservation activism, a much more worthy pursuit in my opinion.  

The couple will also visit Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington, the first US Preident who overthrew British rule as commander of the American Army during the War of Independence.

David Hicks wants government to pay medical bills

David Hicks

David Hicks was detained in the US detention facility Guantanamo Bay in Cuba from 2001 until 2007 and was convicted of supporting terrorism.

This week, Hicks said he wants and apology from the Australian government and for them to pay his medical bills because torture in Gitmo has left him with ongoing health problems.

A US military court recently quashed a terrorism conviction against him on a technicality because his actions were not a crime under US or Australian law at the time.  But John Howard who was Prime Minister at the time said the US decision to quash the conviction did not alter the fact that Hicks was involved with al-Qaeda.

When al-Qaeda's number three man Mohammed Atef met David Hicks, he spoke to him about becoming a martyr but Hicks said he wasn't prepared to die for the cause.  So says WikiLeaks who released 800 secret US documents in 2011 which included David Hicks profile.  In it, they said that Hicks was a combat-hardened al-Qaeda fighter who showed great promise for leadership and if released, would seek a career as a mercenary.

Three years after his capture, his profile reads "The detainee's truthfulness is low and he is likely to have information regarding terrorist operations and tactics" and "his involvement and training....make him a highly skilled combatant, as well as a valuable asset and possible leader." 

The profile gave several reasons why he should not be released including his knowledge of entry and exit points in Afghanistan, his involvement with al-Qaeda leadership and the fact he actively sought out extremist organisations to serve with.

After negotiations between US and Australian governments, Hicks was returned to Australia in 2007 and allowed to serve out the final nine months of a seven year sentence imposed by the US for providing material support for terrorism.

Labor Opposition leader Bill Shorten

Yesterday Labor leader Bill Shorten said "David Hicks was probably foolish to get caught up in that Afghanistan conflict, but clearly, there has been an injustice done to him."

Oh really?

By his own admission, David Hicks trained and fought with al-Qaeda.

Attorney General George Brandis said if Hicks had gone over to the other side today, and went to join ISIS, he would be arrested because he would "fall within the scope" of new terror laws.

David Hicks once described Bin Laden as a "brother" and he revelled in jihad.  He is not owed an apology or anything else from the Australian government and Bill Shorten should be ashamed. 

How Aussie ISIS member got welfare

Khalid Sharrouf

It was a mystery.  How did able-bodied Muslim youths, who have never had a job, manage to get the Disability Pension?  Now we know. Police call it the Disability Pension scam.

Psychiatrist Ishrat Ali treated Islamic State terrorist Khalid Sharrouf before he went to Syria and started cutting heads off. He even posted pictures of his 7 year old son holding up severed head.

Dr Ali was the man who enabled this brutal killer to get the Australian Disability Pension and his office was raided by AFP who took all his files.

Sharouff was still drawing his fortnightly $766 disability pension cheque when he left Australia.

Dr Ali claims he signed off on reports that Sharrouf was mentally disabled based on an assessment by psychologist Dr Joseph D'Silva, whose office was also raided.

Sharrouf paid D'Silva $500 that falsely supported him receiving the pension.  But surveillance cameras caught him busily running his store in a shopping centre, perfectly healthy, without assistance. Then it was discovered he was a company director.

Sharouff's pension was cancelled and he was ordered to repay $18,757.49.  He tried to have the order reversed at the Appeals Tribunal last month but his case was dismissed.

Muslim mother brings son home from Syria

Jihadist's mother, known only as Linda

When a British mother discovered her son had gone to Syria to fight with ISIS, she went to Turkey and brought him back.  But now she warns authorities that Britain is at risk of terrorist attacks similar to those in Paris if help isn't forthcoming immediately to rehabilitate extremists.

While her son has now rejected terrorism, there are hundreds of Jihadists returning to the UK who have been scarred by their bloody participation with ISIS, she said.

She told BBC's Inside Out London programme last night that her son is traumatised and has not received any help from government agencies.

Linda is a 45 year old single mother from north London who converted to Islam with James two years ago.

Out of 300 jihadists who have returned to the UK, MI5 claims they pose the biggest threat to national security.  Crown Prosecution Service figures show that only six have been convicted of terrorism.

The government has a number of de-radicalization programmes in place but not all returning jihadists are offered places.  A spokesman for the Home Office said it could not comment on individual cases.

She told the programme:  "I have to be very careful around him about what I say and do, I don't want to upset him.  It's still a very sensitive subject.  At times, I have been left scared in my own home, I've had to be his friend, I've had to be his counsellor, since he's been back, he's needed a lot of care and attention and a lot of support."

"It's been difficult for him to get any empathy and understanding from anyone else."

Another Sydney terror plot discovered

Omar Al-Kutobi, nursing student

ASIO and police had no clue that Omar Al-Kutobi 24 and Mohammed Kiad 25, had knelt before an IS flag and promised before Allah to stab the kidneys and necks of Australians.  Just hours before the planned attack was about to happen, police received a tip off.

Police stormed their Sydney granny flat and found a video that left no doubt about what they intended to do on that same day.

Mohammad  Kiad

PM Tony Abbott told Parliament yesterday what was in the video. "I swear to almighty Allah we will carry out the first operation for the soldiers of the caliphate in Australia.  I swear to mighty Allah, blond people, there is no room for blame between you and us.  We only are you, stabbing the kidneys and striking the necks."

Al-Kutobi and Kiad appeared in court yesterday and their lawyer said they would apply for bail in four weeks. The way the judiciary has been acting lately, I wouldn't be surprised if they let them out.

Al-Kutobi arrived in Australia by plane in 2009 as an Iraqi national on a fake passport and was granted a protection visa soon after and citizenship in 2013.  The family fled Iraq after his father was shot while working as a translator for the US Army.

The other man Mohammed Kiad came to Australia in 2012 and was granted a visa under and family and spousal visa arrangements and was on welfare at the time of his arrest.

At the time of their arrival, the Labor Party, who were in government, decided to relax asylum seeker laws because they were too harsh. The new laws resulted in around 50,000 refugees arriving on leaky boats. Background checks were almost impossible as people smugglers told all the refugees to throw their ID papers overboard. And a large proportion of these boat people were followers of Islam.

Granny flat at the back of the Fairfield house

Al-Kutobi's father, who now lives in Germany, said he thought his son was lonely and once told him that Australia was the best country in the world.  He even applied to join the army but was rejected - they said he "needed more time" - but what that actually means isn't clear.

Kiad was granted a family and spousal visa in 2012 but the couple separated soon after.  His wife who remains anonymous, released a statement - "If they had managed to hurt someone, I would have felt guilty for the rest of my life because I brought this man to Australia."

After the separation, Kiad moved in with his friend Al-Kutobi, who was studying nursing. The pair worked together for a removalist company in Villawood but were recently let go after working over the summer.

Our security agencies were completely taken by surprise, they had never heard of these two men and if it wasn't for a tip off from the general public, who knows what would have happened.

New Indonesian President shows no mercy

Today, the new Indonesian President Joko Widodo is the man most hated by Australians after his no mercy decision to carry out the execution of two Australian drug mules.

When it became clear that all hope of a reprieve was gone, there has been an extraordinary outpouring of support for the two men in Australia and people in high places have condemned the Indonesian President for his lack of compassion.

The "Mr Big" behind the Bali 9 drug bust must be laughing his head off back in Sydney, living the high life, having escaped conviction. But for Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, their days are numbered.

The unnamed drug lord, who is well known to police but never caught, won the lottery around the time the Australian group were caught red handed with heroin strapped to their bodies.  But after his $5 million lotto win, he decided to opt out of drug trafficking.

Chan and Sukumaran have never named the people they were working for.  Their families blame the Australian Federal Police for their arrest after they tipped off Indonesian authorities.

But those same offficials today say that if they had their time over again, they would do exactly the same thing.

Does President Putin have Aspergers?

A study from a Pentagon think tank believes President Putin could have Aspergers Syndrome, "an autistic disorder which affects all his decisions."

There's an Asperger's test you can do online and it's amazing how many people (now in middle and old age) who have done the test, believe they have it.  And yet they have survived in the world thus far quite well.

If President putin has it, it could explain his crazy behaviour.

Pentegon researcher Brenda Connors wrote "Putin's neurological development was significantly interrupted in infancy" and "the Russian President carries a neurological abnormality."  

She sounds so positive but there's no way of knowing for sure without a brain scan.

The report cites Dr Stephen Porges who in 2008 wrote "Putin carries a form of autism" but Dr Porges, currently professor at the University of North Carolina, said he "would back off saying he has Asperers."

Instead, Porges said his analysis was that US officials needed to find quieter settings in which to deal with Putin, whose behaviour and facial expressions reveal someone who is defensive in large social settings. Although these features are seen in Aspergers, they can also be found in people who have difficulty staying calm in social settings.  "If you need to do things with him, you don't want to be in a big state affair but more of a one-on-one situation someplace somewhere quiet" he said.

Ms Connors program is called Body Leads - a study of Putin since his rise to power and they found "his primary form of compensation is extreme control which is reflected in his decision style and how he governs."

They speculate that in early life - perhaps even in utero, Putin suffered a damaging hemispheric event to the left temporal lobe of the prefrontal cortex which affects the nervous systems, body movements on his right side, facial expression, eye gaze, hearing and voice.

President Putin, Francoise Hollande and Angela Merkel met in Moscow a few hours ago. Hopefully it was just the three of them, on a one-to-one basis, somewhere quiet.

If he sees reason and removes the rebels from Ukraine, the world will breathe a sigh of relief.

Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran to face firing squad

All appeals and attempts to change the minds of Indonesians about drug smugglers Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran have failed. Even the last hope of a presidential pardon has been denied.

Chan and Sukumaran were sentenced to death in 2006 as leaders of a drug smuggling ring involving nine Australians who were caught trying to smuggle heroin out of Bali into Australia.

The Australian government has pleaded with the Indonesian government to relent but it is now clear there is nothing more they can do.

Both men have shown a willingness to change their lives by helping fellow inmates in the nine years since they have been locked up and insist they have been completely rehabilitated.  But the Indonesians will not be moved - they have to go.

The executions of five foreigners and an Indonesian woman were carried out last month.

A last minute personal appeal by Brazil and the Dutch government didn't help.  Dutch Foreign Minister Bert Koenders called the executions "a cruel and inhuman punishment that amounts to an unacceptable denial of human dignity and integrity."

Brazil and the Netherlands were so upset, they recalled their ambassadors home but I doubt Australia will do the same.  Most Australians have little sympathy for the pair, they were well aware of the Indonesian drug laws, yet they still went ahead.

Sadly, they threw the dice and lost.

Magna Carta on show at British Library

King John signing the Magna Carta at Runnymede on June 15, 1215 

For the first time in 800 years, the four surviving original versions of the Magna Carta have been brought together at the British Library in London.

No free man shall be seized or imprisoned or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing, in any way.....except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land.

It's incredible when you think that this document, which was signed in a paddock outside London eight hundred years ago, is still relevant today.

It meant that nobody was above the law, including a monarch, and even though King John signed it - under protest - he soon changed his mind and had it annulled by the Pope.  It wasn't until his successors revived it years after his death, that the document's importance became clear.

When war broke out in 1939, it was being exhibited at the World Fair in New York, but because it couldn't be returned safely to England across the Atlantic, it was kept at the Library of Congress for several years. And when America entered the war, it was moved into Fort Knox until 1946.

More than 43,000 people from across the world applied for tickets to the exhibition in London but only 1,215 got the chance to see the four charters over three days.

Academics and Magna Carta experts will get a unique chance to study the four documents side by side, looking at differences in text, handwriting, and condition for clues to their past.