5 things to know today

Army veteran Michael Clift participates in a candlelight vigil for the victims of the Fort Hood shooting April 4 in Killeen, Texas. A spokesman for the family of the shooter said Lopez had been angry he had only been granted 24-hour leave for his mother
Army veteran Michael Clift participates in a candlelight vigil for the victims of the Fort Hood shooting April 4 in Killeen, Texas. A spokesman for the family of the shooter said Lopez had been angry he had only been granted 24-hour leave for his mother

1. Army: Fort Hood suspect had requested leave

FORT HOOD, Texas (AP) — The Fort Hood soldier suspected of killing three people and wounding 16 others last week began his eight-minute rampage on the sprawling Texas Army post after an argument related to taking leave, military investigators said Monday.

Army spokesman Chris Grey didn’t indicate during a brief news conference whether Spc. Ivan Lopez was granted leave for the circumstances behind the request. The shooting spree Wednesday ended when Lopez killed himself with his .45-caliber pistol after confronting a military police officer, who Grey said fired once at Lopez but didn’t strike him.

A spokesman for Lopez’s family said last week that Lopez was upset he was granted only a 24-hour leave to attend his mother’s funeral in November. That leave was then extended to two days.

Providing the most detail yet about the second mass shooting at Fort Hood in five years, Grey mapped out how Lopez opened fire in the building where the argument began before leaving and driving away. The three who died were gunned down in separate locations.


2. End of Windows XP support spells trouble for some

NEW YORK (AP) — Microsoft will end support for the persistently popular Windows XP today, and the move could put everything from the operations of heavy industry to the identities of everyday people in danger of hacking.

An estimated 30 percent of computers being used by businesses and consumers around the world are still running the 12-year-old operating system.

“What once was considered low-hanging fruit by hackers now has a big neon bull’s eye on it,” said Patrick Thomas, a security consultant at Neohapsis’s firm based in San Jose, Calif.

Microsoft has released a handful of Windows operating systems since 2001, but XP’s popularity and the durability of the computers system was installed on kept it around longer than expected. Analysts said if a PC is more than 5 years old, chances are it’s running XP.

While users can still run XP after today, Microsoft said it will no longer provide security updates, issue fixes to non-security related problems or offer online technical content updates. The company is discontinuing XP to focus on maintaining its newer operating systems, the core programs that run personal computers.


3. Airlines say cost to factor in tracking standards

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Tony Tyler, the director of the International Air Transport Association said Monday he wants to see a globally agreed tracking standard established by the end of this year, which also takes into consideration the cost on airlines in order to avoid another disappearance like that of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

Tyler told a small media gathering at the Global Aerospace Summit in Abu Dhabi that the cost of tracking will have to be examined in any decision. He said profit margins for the global industry this year are still very narrow and expected to be around $5.65 per passenger.

“Clearly, cost is one of the issues that will have to be considered when we are looking at what to do about it,” Tyler said. “And we have to make sure that what we do is something that the airlines can afford.”

IATA has 240 member airlines carrying 84 percent of all passengers and cargo worldwide.

He said the point of establishing a global standard for tracking is that “the traveling public has a right to expect that aircraft won’t disappear like this — can’t disappear like [the missing Malaysia flight].”

Tyler said regulation must be driven by the United Nations’ International Civil Aviation Organization.


4. Olympians say selfies were banned at White House

WASHINGTON, D.C. (AP) — A handshake? Sure. A selfie? No way.

Some American Olympic athletes say they were asked to keep their cellphones pocketed last week when they visited the White House and met with President Barack Obama.

The request came after the selfie Boston Red Sox slugger David Ortiz took with the president during his team’s visit to the White House. Many criticized it as a marketing ploy after the maker of Ortiz’s phone, Samsung, used the picture in an advertisement.

“I was a little bummed,” said Nick Goepper, a bronze medalist in slopestyle skiing. “I thought about trying to sneak one, but they were pretty adamant about it. I’m sure if they would’ve allowed it, there’d be 150 people with selfies with the president right now.”

The Olympians were visiting the White House after competing in Sochi, Russia.

The White House confirmed that the athletes were asked not to take personal photos with Obama. The White House said that in the interest of efficiency, it has been practice for years for an official White House photographer to take pictures for large groups instead. It insisted there was no outright prohibition of selfies.


5. Alleged Indianapolis brain thief faces new charges

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — A bloody fingerprint and stolen items sold online have led to additional charges being filed against an Indianapolis man who allegedly took human brain samples from a medical history museum, prosecutors said Monday.

Investigators were “able to determine the bloody fingerprint on (a) piece of paper found at the scene was consistent with the left pinkie finger of David Charles,” the prosecutor’s office said in a news release.

Also, stolen items that had been sold on eBay were recovered when the purchaser became suspicious after seeing reports of similar items that were determined stolen from the Indiana Medical History Museum, the news release said. Prosecutors did not disclose the nature of the items sold on eBay.

Charles, 21, initially was arrested Dec. 16 for theft and other charges. Court documents at the time alleged he broke into the museum several times, stole jars of preserved brain samples and other tissue from long-dead psychiatric patients, and sold them online. Investigators were tipped off by a San Diego man who became suspicious about six jars of brain tissue he’d bought on eBay for $600.

The museum’s director has said the tissues are from autopsies spanning from roughly the 1890s to the 1940s.

Comments

More from The Daily






This Week's Digital Issue


Loading Recent Classifieds...