GOVERNMENT INVESTS £7M IN DNA PROFILING TOOL TO CATCH RAPISTS AND SEX OFFENDERS

A 19-year-old student who mistook meningitis for “freshers' flu” is warning others after losing both legs and all ten fingers. Ketia Moponda, from Wolverhampton, collapsed just eight days into university and was diagnosed with meningococcal septicaemia, a life-threatening infection spread through coughing and sneezing. Surgeons amputated her limbs in January to save her life. Now using prosthetic legs, Ketia is determined to return to the gym and pursue modelling, urging students: “Don’t mistake everything for a common cold.”

A 23-year-old prison worker, Megan Breen, has avoided jail after admitting to a sexual relationship with an inmate at HMP Prescoed, Monmouthshire. Breen travelled 175 miles to visit the prisoner, serving over four years for drug offences, during his home leave, and they exchanged over 500 messages. The relationship was exposed after she boasted to a colleague.

Ajibola Oduntan, 47, has been arrested by the FBI for allegedly running a ticketing scam that cost the Kentucky Performing Arts over $100,000 during the Broadway run of Wicked in late 2023. Prosecutors say Oduntan stole U.S. citizens’ credit card details to buy tickets, which he resold on StubHub, routing profits through PayPal and Irish bank accounts. Arrested in August, he has pleaded not guilty, with trial set for November 10.

A new Commons committee report reveals that Black women in England continue to suffer significantly worse maternity outcomes than white women because of structural racism, poor leadership and failing accountability together with inadequate data collection and pervasive bias, stereotyping and racist assumptions that leave their concerns ignored during pregnancy and childbirth, campaigners warn.

Sir Sadiq Khan has accepted a pay rise of £5,281, raising his annual salary from £165,001 to £170,282, a move that makes him the highest-paid politician in the UK. The increase of 3.2% follows the local government settlement, and is based on recommendations from an independent panel, ensuring impartiality in its determination.

A married doctor who abandoned a patient mid-surgery to engage in sexual activity with a nurse has been cleared to return to work after a tribunal deemed him at “very low risk” of repeating such behaviour. Consultant anaesthetist Dr. Suhail Anjum, 44, was caught in a “compromising position” with an unnamed nurse — referred to as Nurse C — at Tameside Hospital in Ashton-under-Lyne.‍

At the 77th Primetime Emmy Awards on Sunday evening, Lancashire-born actor Stephen Graham delivered one of the night’s most powerful moments. Accepting the award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series for his career-defining role in Netflix’s Adolescence, the 52-year-old described himself humbly as “just a mixed-race kid from Kirkby.”

More than 110,000 people flooded central London as Tommy Robinson led what he called the “biggest protest in British history.” The far-right rally triggered a massive counter-protest by anti-racism groups, prompting a heavy police presence and growing concern over public safety and community tensions.

A consultant anaesthetist at Tameside Hospital asked a nursing colleague to watch over a male patient under anaesthetic so he could take a comfort break, then left theatre and was later found having sex with a nurse in a different operating theatre, a medical tribunal has been told. The doctor admitted what happened and acknowledged it could have put the patient’s safety at risk while expressing remorse.