MILAN (AP) — A man grabbed a knife from a supermarket shelf and stabbed five people, killing one and wounding four others, including Spanish soccer player Pablo Mari, Italian authorities said.
Police arrested a 46-year-old Italian man suspected in the attack at a shopping center in Assago, a suburb of Milan.
A supermarket employee died en route to the hospital, according to the news agency ANSA, which said three other victims were in serious condition. Another person was treated for shock but not hospitalized, police said.
The motive for the attacks was unknown, but police said the man showed signs of being psychologically unstable. There were no elements to suggest terrorism.
Mari, who is on loan to the Serie A club Monza from Arsenal, was among the wounded. Arsenal said in a statement that Mari was at the hospital but was not seriously hurt.
Monza club CEO Adrian Galliano wished the soccer player a speedy recovery in a message posted on Twitter.
HONG KONG (AP) — Two Hong Kong residents, including a pastor, were found guilty of sedition and sentenced to jail for clapping and criticizing a judge during a previous trial over a banned vigil in the city.
The Rev. Garry Pang Moon-yuen and Chiu Mei-ying, a housewife, were arrested in April for disturbances during a court hearing in January in which a leader of a group that organized a vigil commemorating China’s 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square was sentenced for inciting others to join the prohibited event last year.
Hong Kong is undergoing a political crackdown following widespread anti-government protests in 2019 and the imposition of a sweeping National Security Law in 2020, with many prominent democracy activists arrested and jailed.
In addition to the National Security Law, a growing number of dissidents have been charged with sedition under a colonial-era law.
Instead of being charged with contempt of court, Pang and Chiu were accused of uttering seditious words. Pang reportedly told the judge “You have lost your conscience” and Chiu reportedly accused the magistrate of not complying with the law and deciding the case arbitrarily.
Magistrate Cheng Lim-chi convicted the two for attempting to make others feel hate and contempt toward the administration of justice, saying their comments were “definitely not a slip of tongue.”
Pang was also found guilty on an additional charge of acting with seditious intention for YouTube videos he published between 2020 and this year. In the videos he criticized how judges handled other cases, the court heard.
He was sentenced to one year in prison for his two convictions, while Chiu was ordered to serve a three-month jail term.
Sedition is punishable by up to two years in jail for a first offense and three years for a subsequent offense.
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Authorities said the massacre of 20 townspeople in southern Mexico appears to have been the work of a drug lord who used social media to try to blame a rival gang.
The new revelations illustrate how Mexican drug cartels are increasingly using social media to apportion blame for attacks and mislead authorities and the public.
Ricardo Mejia, Mexico’s Assistant Secretary of Public Safety, said that authorities had raided five properties belonging to the Hurtado brothers, who operate under the name Familia Michoacana cartel. Those raids found ranches, luxury homes and a menagerie including a tiger, a zebra, antelopes and stuffed wild animals.
The Oct. 5 attack in the town of Totolapan killed the town’s mayor, his father and 18 other men. Responsibility for the attack was originally claimed in a video attributed to a near-extinct gang known as the Tequileros. Men in the dark, shadowy video said they carried out the attack and were retaking Totolapan.
The Tequileros had long terrorized the town, but had been chased out years ago by a vigilante group believed to have been backed by the Familia Michoacana, which dominates the area.
José Alfredo Hurtado, who leads the Familia Michoacana along with his brother Johnny, posted a video several days later saying he was the intended target of the shooting and had narrowly escaped.
