N.J. man uses nail gun to kill wife and himself

N.J. man uses nail gun
to kill wife and himself

STAFFORD TOWNSHIP, N.J. — A 77-year-old man killed his wife and then himself with a commercial-grade nail gun, police said Tuesday. Police said they don’t yet know why James B. Tompkinson, a retired teacher, would kill his 76-year-old wife, Susan. A relative who went to their home Monday evening found them and called 911. When police arrived, Susan Tompkinson was dead of head and chest trauma and her husband was badly injured. He died Tuesday morning. Police Lt. Thomas Dellane said there was no history of police calls to the couple’s home.

Israel evicts settlers

HEBRON, West Bank — Israeli security forces armed with sledge hammers, chain saws and power clippers smashed through the fortified doors of a building in the holy city of Hebron on Tuesday to evict two Jewish settler families and hundreds of supporters. The military operation was meant to reduce conflict between settlers and Palestinians in the volatile West Bank town, but it also highlighted the growing schism between some religious soldiers and an army command that orders them to carry out evacuations they deplore. Settlers spit and hurled stones, water and oil as police, backed by soldiers, broke through the reinforced doors and dragged the squatters out one by one. Three settlers had sealed themselves inside a concrete bunker, and it took three hours to drill through a wall to get them out.

Outbreak likely from lab

NORMANDY, England — Britain’s health and safety agency said Tuesday there was a strong probability that a foot-and-mouth outbreak in southern England originated at a vaccine lab and was spread by human movement. The outbreak was discovered on a farm just four miles from the Pirbright vaccine laboratory, which is shared by the government’s Institute for Animal Health, or IAH, and a private pharmaceutical company, Merial Animal Health, the British arm of Duluth, Ga.-based Merial Ltd. There is a “real possibility” the disease was spread by human movement, and the possibility it was transmitted by air or floodwaters was “negligible,” the government’s Health and Safety Executive said in the report.

Campus warning system

YPSILANTI, Mich. — Eastern Michigan University will establish a campus warning system and make sure crime statistics are accurate in response to a federal report that found it covered up the rape and killing of a student. Planned improvements include implementing a timely warning system to alert the campus of safety threats, safety training for 50 employees and independently verifying the accuracy of campus crime statistics during the past three years, the school said in a response released Monday. The U.S. Department of Education, which issued its report in July, has 45 days to issue a final report. The university could be suspended from federal financial aid programs, and violations are punishable by fines up to $27,500 each.

Lax seafood oversight

At least 1 million pounds of suspect Chinese seafood landed on American store shelves and dinner plates despite a Food and Drug Administration order that the shipments first be screened for banned drugs or chemicals, an Associated Press investigation found. The frozen shrimp, catfish and eel arrived at U.S. ports under an “import alert,” which meant the FDA was supposed to hold every shipment until it had passed a laboratory test. But one of every four shipments the AP reviewed last fall got through without being stopped and tested. The seafood, valued at $2.5 million, was equal to the amount 66,000 Americans eat in a year.

Associated Press