RUSH HOUR: The stories you need to know today
A TOP executive who inspired a character in The Wolf of Wall Street may be in hot water again after an FBI raid.
Good morning, and welcome to our morning news coverage. We will be bringing you the best of what’s happening this morning, so you can get across the news quickly.
9.55am
French security services have reportedly identified a suspected accomplice in the attack on a kosher grocery store in Paris, according to the French newspaper Le Parisien.
The accomplice, a man from a Paris suburb, may have driven gunman Amedy Coulibaly to the kosher supermarket where Coulibaly later shot dead four people.
9.25am
A woman has spoken about being raped more than 300 times by her husband while she slept.
The extent of the abuse was only revealed after Sarah Tetley woke one morning to find her husband Charlie molesting her, she told ITV’s This Morning program.
“I woke up in the morning in that sort of drowsy just waking up stage and realised that he was molesting me in my sleep,” she said.
She said she decided to call the police and they eventually found 316 videos her husband had recorded of the abuse.
“A couple of the videos I watched you couldn’t hear me breathing and I didn’t really appear to be moving at all ... I did look like I was dead in some of them,” she said.
“A lot of the videos weren’t just of him but of household objects and things he would decide to do with those. It was quite disturbing.”
Mr Tetley last year pleaded guilty to 26 counts of rape taking place between January 2011 and October 2013 and is currently serving a 12-year prison sentence.
9.10am
Charlie Hebdo made a defiant return on Wednesday with a new issue that sold out across France in record time, as Al-Qaeda posted a video claiming last week’s deadly attack on its cartoonists.
Around 700,000 copies were released and sold on Wednesday as part of a print run that will eventually total five million.
Meanwhile, Al-Qaeda’s Yemen branch (AQAP) has claimed responsibility for the attack by Islamist gunmen on the Paris offices of the weekly last Wednesday that left 12 people dead including some of the country’s best-loved cartoonists.
“(AQAP) was the party that chose the target and plotted and financed the plan... It was following orders by our general chief Ayman al-Zawahiri,” said one of its leaders in the video, adding it was “vengeance” for the weekly’s cartoons of the prophet.
8.40am
Australia’s most recent ambassador to Spain has returned early from her posting after her husband was charged with child sex offences which allegedly occurred at the Madrid embassy.
A spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade told The Australian that Jane Hardy had completed her assignment on November 3, “by mutual agreement with the department”.
Her term was due to end in December next year.
On September 20, Australian Federal Police officers met, interviewed and arrested Ms Hardy’s husband, artist Vytas Kapociunas, 71, at Canberra airport, charging him with one count of sexual intercourse with a child outside Australia. He appeared in the ACT Magistrates Court on October 3. Last month, police laid two further charges of sexual intercourse with a child outside Australia. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
8.10am
The federal government could face its first major setback of 2015 if pressure increases to reverse changes to Medicare rebates which could see patients paying up to $20 more to see a doctor.
Doctors have been campaigning to end the Abbott government’s plan to cut the Medicare rebate for short consultations by $20.10 from next week, and their cause has gathered vital support.
The Greens and Labor have vowed that when the Senate returns in February, they will disallow the change to the rebate system for GP visits under 10 minutes.
The motion already has support from independent senators Jacqui Lambie and Nick Xenophon. Motoring Enthusiast senator Ricky Muir is likely to support the motion which also reportedly has support from Palmer United Party senator Glenn Lazarus.
7.40am
A lawyer for one of the hostages caught up in last month’s Sydney siege is offering to sell her story in return for a “six-figure sum”, with her lawyer saying they “don’t want to be insulted” by anything less.
According to The Australian, Marcia Mikhael, a Westpac executive who was among the few remaining hostages still held by gunman Man Haron Monis when police stormed the Lindt cafe in Martin Place.
She has already recorded a paid-for television interview, due to air next month and her lawyer Jason Arraj offering an interview to The Australian in return for a fee that he said would be paid to a foundation. “It’s got to be a win-win business transaction … so when I say I don’t want to be insulted, I’m saying I don’t want a figure of $10,000 — that’s not going to cut it at all,” Mr Arraj said.
Mr Arraj added that Ms Mikhael had “a wonderful story to tell” and payment “is not for the purpose of making a dollar for the benefit of Marcia herself” but would instead benefit her foundation, Mr Arraj said.
Asked what the foundation would be set up to do, he replied: “We haven’t come up with precisely what the foundation is and what it represents. It’s not something we want to go into on a wing and a prayer. We’re trying to give it the consideration it deserves.”
7.25am
Newcastle beaches could remain closed for a record six days with repeated sightings of a large great white shark again keeping swimmers out of the water.
The five-metre shark, first spotted on Saturday afternoon at Merewether Beach, could bite a person in half, Nobbys Beach inspector Paul Bernard told AAP.
“You don’t get a second chance with these things,” he said. Despite the warnings, some swimmers have continued to enter the water.
The shark was last seen by water police early Tuesday afternoon at Burwood Beach and has been sighted in an area stretching 10 to 12 kilometres.
Helicopters have also been combing waters off Newcastle but didn’t spot the shark during a search late that same afternoon. Overcast and warm weather combined with increased marine activity could be responsible for the shark’s prolonged presence.
7.15am
UPDATE: Police have now charged a man wanted over the Sydney police pursuit, which led to the death of a 17-month-old girl.
Christopher Chandler, 22, had been on the run since he allegedly crashed a stolen Audi through the fence of a Constitution Hill property into a backyard where kids were playing last Thursday night. He will face Wyong court on Thursday, police said. More details below.
7.10am
In a rare scare, astronauts fled the American side of the International Space Station on Wednesday after an alarm indicated a possible toxic leak. NASA later said a computer problem likely set off the alarm, rather than escaping ammonia coolant.
“No signs of a leak,” NASA reported via Twitter.
In the meantime, the six crew members huddled safely on the Russian side of the orbiting outpost, as Mission Control analysed the data.
The astronauts had to rush over to the Russian segment twice: the first time when the alarm sounded, the second after another alarm went off following an initial all-clear.
The crew - three Russians, two Americans and the Italian Cristoforetti - remained in the three, relatively small Russian compartments, but controllers have just given them the all-clear.
After false alarm evaluation, @Space_Station managers allow crew back in US segment. Details: https://t.co/exboMmW7vn pic.twitter.com/Ihzk4YzvcA
— NASA (@NASA) January 14, 2015
6.40am
The man who wants to be the next NSW Premier has confessed to two drink driving convictions.
Labor leader Luke Foley made the admission to The Daily Telegraph in the hope of avoiding the appearance of skeletons from his past in the lead-up to the March 28 election.
The most recent offence was just before the 2007 state election when Mr Foley, then Labor’s Left Assistant Secretary, said he was going home from a Labor Party fundraiser and blew 0.085 on Parramatta Rd. His licence was suspended for nine months.
He said his first offence occurred when he was 23 and he was busted in Goulburn when he blew about 0.07 after leaving a party to stay at a hotel in the town.
6.30am
Police have caught up with a man who ploughed through a fence during a car chase with police, which led to the death of a 17-month-old girl.
Tateolena Tauaifaga was killed as she was playing in her backyard at Constitution Hill on Thursday night when Christopher Chandler, driving a stolen Audi, allegedly ploughed through a fence.
According to The Daily Telegraph, Chandler was out on bail after being charged last year for an alleged violent home invasion, robbery, car theft and drug possession. He was released after the state government relaxed the bail laws.
Police late yesterday arrested Chandler on the Central Coast. He will appear in court today but has not yet charged the man in relation to the girl’s death. Investigations were continuing.
6.10am
A top executive who inspired a character in The Wolf of Wall Street may be in hot water again after FBI agents raided the offices of a medical supplies company in Florida.
According to Reuters, two witnesses saw dozens of agents from the FBI, Florida fraud department and police close to entrances to the building where Med-Care Diabetic & Medical Supplies is located. They removed boxes of files.
One of the company’s top executives Danny Porush inspired the character Donnie Azoff played by Jonah Hill in the film The Wolf of Wall Street. He was one of a number rogue dealers who cheated Wall Street investors out of $200 million in the mid-’90s and was jailed for three years.
An FBI spokesman said the agency was conducting “law enforcement activity in the vicinity” but declined to comment further.
Warning Sydney is ‘without a future’
NSW Premier Chris Minns has told business leaders Sydney is ‘without a future’ if one important issue isn’t addressed.
‘Like a toilet’: Sewage blankets suburbs
Australia’s longest city may have just taken a long drop down the rankings to become the county’s worst-smelling, as authorities scramble to stem a massive sewage leak.
Aussie journo’s defiant response to shooting
An Australian reporter has responded defiantly after being shot on camera while covering violent protests in the US.