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Covid-19 effect: Benelli India launch plans on the backburner

The Benelli TNT 600i might be the only refreshed model that will be coming in this year, with all other all-new two-wheeler launches deferred.




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Audi A5 Sportback Road Test Review: Stroke of genius by design

The Audi A5 is one of the best looking and also one of the best driving cars money can buy in India. And here’s why!




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Marathon Nextgen Realty to buy back Rs 149-cr shares

The offer at `275 per share is 17.6% less than its closing price of `334 on Monday.




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Corporation Bank swings back in black as provisions decrease sharp 73 per cent

NII is the difference between interest earned and interest paid by a bank. The lender’s asset quality improved q-o-q with gross non-performing assets (NPA) of 17.36%, down 10 basis points over Q2FY19.




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India’s bumpy road back to work

With the lockdown gradually easing, mobility data has begun to tick higher. But, a sudden rise in the Covid-19 proliferation rate, and working capital requirements, may add more road bumps ahead




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Flashback: Nokia's Touch and Type blurred the lines between smart and feature phones

The division between smartphones and feature phones has often been murky. In the past, it used to be about how well the device ran user-installed apps and games, these days it's mostly touch screen vs. keypad. But there always were devices that straddled the line between those two categories. Nokia X3-02 Touch and Type official photos Before Nokia released the no-quite-smartphone Asha phones, there were the two Touch and Type models. As we said, these phones tried to have it both ways. The Nokia X3-02 and C3-01 both came out in late 2010. What made them special was that...




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Infographic: Even Back-to-School Marketing is Increasingly Digital

Back-to-school serves as a reminder that digital channels not only drive digital purchases, but in-store purchases too




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Petrol, diesel sales recover as govt eases lockdown restrictions; demand back to normal by June

As most of the small and medium scale industries have started operations from 20th April, the normal consumption level of petrol and diesel is likely to be achieved by July 2020.




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Jobs crisis: Unemployment soars; no work for migrant workers coming back to job market

The spike in the unemployment rate shows that a growing number of job seekers were left disappointed as they could not find jobs and their addition to the labour force merely raised the unemployment rate.




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Tamil Nadu forms panel under ex-RBI Guv Rangarajan to advise measures to bring economy back on track

The committee will include industry veterans like Venu Srinivasan, chairman, TVS motor company, N Srinivasan, vice-chairman & MD, India cements and A Vellayan, former chairman of Murugappa group.









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Increased Study Requirements, Loss of DOE Backing End Admiralty Inlet Tidal Pilot Project

Snohomish County Public Utility District announced it is abandoning plans to develop the 600-kW Admiralty Inlet Pilot tidal project in Washington's Puget Sound.




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Republican Texas Bows to California and Backs Energy Finance Plan

Jim Keffer is Republican state lawmaker in Texas with a permit to carry a concealed weapon and doubts about whether human activity is causing global warming.




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Marine Energy Sector Continues Growing Worldwide, Despite Economic Setbacks

A report released recently by the International Energy Agency's Ocean Energy Systems shows that the marine and hydrokinetic sector moved closer to commercial viability through 2014.




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India to Sart Construction on German-backed $8 Billion Renewable Grid Project

India will begin construction this year on an $8 billion project backed by Germany’s development bank to upgrade its grid to handle a more than doubling of renewable power capacity by 2022.




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Republican Texas Bows to California and Backs Energy Finance Plan

Jim Keffer is Republican state lawmaker in Texas with a permit to carry a concealed weapon and doubts about whether human activity is causing global warming.




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Covid 19 coronavirus: Many parents won't send their kids back to school in level 2

Many parents say they will keep their children at home when schools reopen at alert level 2.The more than 900 parents who responded to a question on the New Zealand Herald's Facebook page over the weekend were evenly split on whether...




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Carlyle, GIC back away from AmEx travel deal - WSJ




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PSA concerned about Covid-19 as public servants told to go back to work

Safety preparations for public service employees to return to work under the Covid-19 level four regulations should have been made long before workers were recalled for duty, the Public Servants Association said on Saturday.




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Zimbabwe: Chamisa Vows to Fight Back After Legislators' Recall

[Zimbabwe Standard] MDC Alliance leader, Nelson Chamisa has vowed to fight back after his rivals recalled four of his legislators from Parliament on Tuesday, in a development that poses a threat to the future of Zimbabwe's largest opposition party.




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Opacity persists as Pakistan rolls back lockdown

Ag AgenciesMurad says Sindh entering ‘phase-II’ of curbs with strict controls at virus hotspots; Chohan says Punjab to impose ‘complete’ lockdown three days a week; cases hit 28,554 with 622 deaths; PTI MPA claims Sindh exaggerating virus numbers; doctors once again urge...




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Covid-19: Homa Bay's 2nd patient sneaked into Tanzania and back

The patient earlier sneaked into Tanzania to bury her step-father, health official says.




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Two 'RAW-backed MQM-London' men remanded to FIA custody

The administrative judge of the anti-terrorism courts on Saturday remanded two suspects to the custody of the Federal Investigation Agency for investigation into their alleged links with India’s Research & Analysis Wing and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-London .The FIA’s investigating...




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Jeep Grand Cherokee drivers sit back and enjoy – with new HARMAN infotainment and audio systems

Sciacca, Italy, May 2013 – A brand new connectivity experience is awaiting drivers of the new Jeep Grand Cherokee: The new Uconnect™ infotainment system by HARMAN will help drivers stay connected to their vehicles and the world around them, featuring increased voice recognition capabilities and more realistic navigation. They can even stream off-board entertainment and other content through the Connected Media Center (CMC).




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Trudeau warns premature reopening could send Canada 'back into confinement'

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau warned on Saturday that if provinces move too quickly to reopen their economies, a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic could send Canada "back into confinement this summer."




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UPDATE 3-Trudeau warns premature reopening could send Canada 'back into confinement'

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau warned on Saturday that if provinces move too quickly to reopen their economies, a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic could send Canada "back into confinement this summer."




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Keep Your Data Backed up and Secure Wtih the Best NAS Devices

Ever wanted a hard drive you could access from anywhere? Well Network-Attached Storage might be just right for you!




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Imagine Being Pulled Off Death Row and Then Being Put Back on It

In 1994, Marcus Robinson, who is black, was convicted of murder and sentenced to death for the 1991 killing of Erik Tornblom, a white teenager, in Cumberland County, North Carolina. He spent nearly 20 years on death row, but in 2012 his sentence was changed to life without a chance of parole. He was one of four death row inmates whose sentences were commuted by a judge who found that racial discrimination had played a role in their trials.

The reason their cases were reviewed at all was because of a 2009 North Carolina law known as the Racial Justice Act, which allowed judges to reduce death sentences to life in prison without parole when defendants were able to prove racial bias in their charge, jury selection, or sentence.

"The Racial Justice Act ensures that when North Carolina hands down our state's harshest punishment to our most heinous criminals," former Gov. Bev Perdue said when she signed the bill into law, "the decision is based on the facts and the law, not racial prejudice."

At 21, Robinson was the youngest person sentenced to death in North Carolina. When he was three, he was hospitalized with severe seizures after being physically abused by his father and was diagnosed with permanent brain dysfunction. However, those weren't the only troubling aspects of his case.

Racial discrimination in jury selection has been prohibited since it was banned by the Supreme Court in its 1986 Supreme Court decision Batson v. Kentucky, but Robinson's trial was infected with it. The prosecutor in the case, John Dickson, disproportionately refused eligible black potential jurors. For example, he struck one black potential juror because the man had been once charged with public drunkenness. However, he accepted two "nonblack" people with DWI convictions. Of the eligible members of the pool, he struck half the black people and only 14 percent of the nonblack members. In the end, Robinson was tried by a 12-person jury that included only three people of color—one Native American individual and two black people.

Racial discrimination in jury selection was not uncommon in the North Carolina criminal justice system. A comprehensive Michigan State University study looked at more than 7,400 potential jurors in 173 cases from 1990 to 2010. Researchers found that statewide prosecutors struck 52.6 percent of eligible potential black jurors and only 25.7 percent of all other potential jurors. This bias was reflected on death row. Of the 147 people on North Carolina's death row, 35 inmates were sentenced by all-white juries; 38 by juries with just one black member.

Under the Racial Justice Act, death row inmates had one year from when the bill became law to file a motion. Nearly all the state's 145 death row inmates filed claims, but only Robison and three others—Quintel Augustine, Tilmon Golphin, and Christina Walters—obtained hearings. In 2012, Robinson's was the first. At the Superior Court of Cumberland County, Judge Gregory Weeks ruled that race had played a significant role in the trial and Robinson was resentenced to life without parole. North Carolina appealed the decision to the state's Supreme Court.

An immediate outcry followed the decision. The North Carolina Conference of District Attorneys issued a statement saying, "Capital cases reflect the most brutal and heinous offenders in our society. Whether the death penalty is an appropriate sentence for murderers should be addressed by our lawmakers in the General Assembly, not masked as claims (of) racism in our courts."  

The ruling attracted lots of publicity from across the country and North Carolina lawmakers were outraged. "There are definitely signs in the legislative record that there were some [lawmakers] that really wanted to see executions move forward," Cassandra Stubbs, the director of the ACLU Capital Punishment Project who also represents Robinson, says. Legislative staffers circulated talking points for lawmakers with arguments that the RJA turns "district attorneys into racists and convicted murderers into victims," describing the law as "an end-run around the death penalty and an indefinite moratorium on capital punishment."

The day Judge Weeks resentenced Robinson, the Senate president pro tempore for the state Legislature, Phillip Berger, expressed concern that Robinson could be eligible for parole. He suggested Robinson—who had just turned 18 when he committed the crime and would not have been considered a juvenile—would be ineligible for life in prison without a chance of parole, citing a US Supreme Court ruling that prohibited juveniles from receiving life sentences without parole. "We cannot allow cold-blooded killers to be released into our community, and I expect the state to appeal this decision," he said. "Regardless of the outcome, we continue to believe the Racial Justice Act is an ill-conceived law that has very little to do with race and absolutely nothing to do with justice."

The state Legislature took on the challenge and voted to repeal the Racial Justice Act in 2013. This made it impossible for those on death row to even attempt to have their sentences reviewed for racial bias, but it left the fates of the four who had been moved to life imprisonment unclear. "The state's district attorneys are nearly unanimous in their bipartisan conclusion that the Racial Justice Act created a judicial loophole to avoid the death penalty and not a path to justice," Gov. Pat McCrory said in a statement at the time.

Even though the law was still in effect when the four inmates' sentences were reduced, they weren't safe from death row just yet. Robinson's sentenced had been legally reduced, but the legal battle was just beginning.

In 2015, after nearly two years from the initial hearing, the North Carolina Supreme Court ordered the Superior Court to reconsider the reduced sentences for Robinson, Augustine, Golphin, and Walters, saying the judge failed to give the state enough time to prepare for the "complex" proceedings.

This past January, Superior Court Judge Erwin Spainhour ruled that because the RJA had been repealed, the four defendants could no longer use the law to reduce their sentences. "North Carolina vowed to undertake an unprecedented look at the role of racial bias in capital sentencing," says Stubbs. But now, "the state Legislature explicitly turned from its commitment and repealed the law."

Robinson is back on death row at Central Prison in the state's capital of Raleigh. In the petition to the state Supreme Court, Robinson's lawyers point out that the Double Jeopardy Clause—the law that prevents someone from being tried twice for the same crime—bars North Carolina from trying to reimpose the death penalty because the 2012 RJA hearing acquitted him of capital punishment.

"He's never been resentenced to death," Stubbs says. "They have no basis to hold him on death row."



  • Politics
  • Crime and Justice
  • Race and Ethnicity

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Back to Work: Wearables Track Social Distancing and Sick Employees in the Workplace

As companies re-open, employees may don wearable tech to prevent the spread of COVID-19




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Team Sonnenwagen Prep for Race Across the Outback

Team Sonnenwagen from RWTH Aachen University race in the Bridgestone World Solar Challenge, in Australia.




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Indian Moms Are Now Back To School For Their Kids, And It’s Not Always Fun

Are online classes and assignments proving to be the last stubby pencil on the camel’s back?





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Writers Guild Contract Negotiations With Studios Pushed Back a Week

With no fanfare, Hollywood studios and leaders of the Writers Guild of America have moved back the start of masters contract negotiations a week to May 18. Representatives of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers were not immediately available for comment about the change, which was revealed Saturday. A WGA spokesman said, “It’s […]



  • News
  • Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers
  • Writers Guild Of America

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Chhattisgarh demands Rs 4,140.21 crore coal levy back from Centre

Baghel’s Congress government had recently also demanded that the steel ministry undertaking, NMDC, pay up its remaining Rs 1000 crore due. The CM has been very vocal about his displeasure with companies operating in his state being asked to donate to the newly funded PM Cares Fund instead of the Chief Minister’s fund.




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US president Donald Trump congratulates UFC for restart, says 'we want our sports back'

UFC 249 served as the first major sporting event to take place since the global pandemic shut down much of the country nearly eight weeks ago. It was originally scheduled for 18 April in New York, but was postponed in hopes of helping slow the spread of COVID-19.





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'I will be surprised if he doesn't win a trophy' - Poyet backs Mourinho to justify Pochettino dismissal

The Uruguayan is confident the manager will bring success to Tottenham, who made the bold decision to dismiss Mauricio Pochettino this season





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These Japanese Kids Serve Backhands Just Like Tennis Stars Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic

Six-year-old Yunosuke and four-year-old Koujirou can be seen training on the Swedish and Serbian legends in a viral video.





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Coronavirus: Hasty re-opening could send Canadians ‘back into confinement,’ Trudeau says

Although health officials have pointed to a flattening rate of daily cases in many provinces, Trudeau said Canada was "not in the recovery phase yet."





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French parents anguish over sending children back to school

As France prepares to start letting public life resume after eight weeks under a coronavirus lockdown, many parents are deeply torn over a question without a clear or correct answer: Should I send my child back to school? The French government is easing some of the closure and home-confinement orders it imposed March 17 to curb infections, with businesses permitted to reopen, residents cleared to return to workplaces and schools welcoming some students again starting Monday. Only preschools and elementary schools are set to start up at first, and classes will be capped at 10 students at preschools and 15 elsewhere.






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Author Alison Roman Apologizes to Chrissy Teigen After Receiving Major Backlash

Cookbook author and New York Times cooking columnist Alison Roman has publicly apologized to Chrissy Teigen after receiving backlash for comments she made about her fellow culinary...




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Psalm West Turns 1! Look Back At All of His Sweetest Pics

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Author Alison Roman Apologizes to Chrissy Teigen After Receiving Major Backlash

Cookbook author and New York Times cooking columnist Alison Roman has publicly apologized to Chrissy Teigen after receiving backlash for comments she made about her fellow culinary...




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Psalm West Turns 1! Look Back At All of His Sweetest Pics

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Arsenal midfielder Dani Ceballos backed to shine when football returns by former boss Unai Emery

Former Arsenal boss Unai Emery has backed Dani Ceballos to play a key part for the Gunners in their push for Europe if the football season resumes.




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Jose Mourinho backed to win trophies at Tottenham by former Spurs midfielder Gustavo Poyet

Former Spurs midfielder Gustavo Poyet says he will be 'very surprised' if Jose Mourinho does not win trophies during his time at Tottenham.