![Image]( "Patients angry at 'greedy' MS medic")
Multiple sclerosis patients have spoken of their anger and fear for the future after receiving pointless treatment costing thousands of pounds at the hands of Dr Robert Trossel, who has been struck off by the General Medical Council.
Dr Trossel, 56, was told his actions had done "lasting harm" after a long-running GMC disciplinary hearing into his involvement with nine MS patients who sought his help in "desperation" to find a cure for the disease.
Brian Gomes da Costa, chairman of the GMC fitness to practise panel, told Dr Trossel: "You have exploited vulnerable patients and their families.
"You have given false hope and made unsubstantiated and exaggerated claims to patients suffering from degenerative and devastating illnesses. Your conduct has unquestionably done lasting harm, if not physically, then mentally and financially, to these patients and also to their families and supporters."
Some underwent painful and expensive removal of mercury fillings before travelling to his Rotterdam clinic as he had told them this would make stem cell treatment more effective.
They were united in accusing the Dutch-trained doctor of exploiting their vulnerability and desperation as sufferers from a disabling and incurable neurological disease.
Stephen Murphy, 42, from Timperley, Greater Manchester, was injected by Dr Trossel without his knowledge with a substance containing bovine brain and spinal cord live cells in February 2006. Mr Murphy, who paid £7,000 for his treatment, said: "There is no cure for MS, that is the bottom line. It is malign and insidious."
Trossel, he said, had been "firmly of the belief" that there was some "validity" to stem cell therapy and it would have beneficial effects.
Karen Galley, 45, a former City worker, from Hadleigh, Essex, visited Trossel's clinic in August 2006 in the hope that her son Sam, now aged 10, might see her walk.
She was charged around £10,500 for the treatment, receiving one injection in the arm and six in the neck. She too, it later emerged, had been injected without her knowledge with a substance containing bovine brain and spinal cord live cells.
Hi-tech crime police are questioning 19 people suspected of orchestrating a multimillion-pound attack on British bank accounts.
Up to £6 million has been taken from online accounts in just three months by a gang of computer hackers.
They used a virus known as "zeus" to infect computers and capture the passwords and other sensitive details of banking customers.
Their money was then transferred into bogus accounts created by the crooks to help them launder the profits.
Detective Chief Inspector Terry Wilson, of the Metropolitan Police, said the amount of money stolen is likely to "increase considerably" as the investigation continues.
He said: "We believe we have disrupted a highly organised criminal network, which has used sophisticated methods to siphon large amounts of cash from many innocent peoples' accounts, causing immense personal anxiety and significant financial harm - which of course banks have had to repay at considerable cost to the economy.
"Online banking customers must make sure their security systems are up to date and be alert to any unusual or additional security features requested which is at variance with their normal log-on experience.
"Greater public awareness and education will make it harder for personal details to be compromised and for this type of fraud to be carried out."
Officers from the Met's Central E-Crime Unit arrested 15 men and four women aged between 23 and 47 at addresses across London in dawn raids on Tuesday.
They were questioned on suspicion of fraud, offences under the Computer Misuse Act and money laundering.
The controversial pull-out of British forces from Basra in southern Iraq has come under fresh criticism from UK and US generals.
Retired American commanders said the withdrawal of troops from central Basra Palace to a large military base at the airport outside the city was a "defeat" that left local people to be "terrorised" by militias.
One of the most senior UK officers to serve in Iraq, former Lieutenant General Sir Robert Fry, said: "The Americans decided to win. We decided to leave."
The comments, made in a new BBC Two documentary, revive debate about whether the British pull-out from Basra city in September 2007 was a prudent tactical move or a humiliating retreat.
The UK general who paved the way for the withdrawal said he was constrained by the conflicting approaches to the war coming out of London and Washington.
Major General Jonathan Shaw, who commanded coalition forces in southern Iraq from January to August 2007, told the programme: "I think the biggest problem was the political problem.
"There was America surging, there was Britain reducing force levels. Our political leaderships were moving in different directions and that was extremely awkward."
He also referred to the secret negotiations he held with leaders of the Mahdi Army militia in Basra, which critics say led to the city being handed over to militants in exchange for the safe passage of UK troops back to the base at the airport.
Basra Palace was coming under more mortar and rocket attacks than anywhere else in Iraq by the time the 550 British soldiers based there were pulled out.
In a reference to the 1836 siege of the Alamo in Texas, which ended in the defenders being overrun, Maj Gen Shaw said: "You play the cards you get at the time. We knew we had to somehow get out."
Labour leader Ed Miliband has said his older brother David will "be around in one way or another" even if he announces a decision to step down from frontbench politics.
The shadow foreign secretary is widely expected to end his top-level political career by confirming he will not seek election to serve in his brother's first frontbench team.
The elder Miliband's fate was effectively sealed after footage emerged of him criticising his brother's speech at the party conference in Manchester on Tuesday.
The Labour leader said the decision on his future was a matter for his brother but told the Press Association: "I think he has an extraordinary amount to offer British politics.
"But he makes his own decisions about that and I know he will do the right thing."
He added: "The party will always want to use his talents but he makes his own decisions about what is right for him and what he wants to do and I very much respect whatever decisions he comes to.
"I will be working very closely with him whatever he decides to do.
"He will be around in one way or another and I will certainly be using his expertise either inside the shadow cabinet or outside the shadow cabinet."
Israeli authorities detained two Britons who were on a yacht attempting to break the blockade of Gaza.
The British-flagged catamaran Irene was seized on Tuesday around 20 miles from the territory by Israeli naval forces, with nine people and aid for the territory on board.
According to a spokeswoman for the activists, the non-Israelis on board, including Irene's British captain Glyn Secker, were transported to an immigration centre in Israel and are being deported.
The other Briton is thought to be freelance photographer Vish Vishvanath, with five Israelis, one US and one German citizen also on the boat.
They set sail earlier this week from Turkish-controlled Northern Cyprus, with a consignment of medicines, toys and water purifiers.
The incident comes four months after a deadly Israeli raid on a Turkish-led international flotilla aiming to break the blockade. Israeli commandos killed nine Turkish activists sparking a major international incident.
Israeli military officials said Irene was taken over after the captain ignored two warnings to turn back. "No violence of any kind was used," they said.
London-based activist group Jews for Justice for Palestinians organised the mission - called Jewish Boat To Gaza - and said its last contact with Mr Secker was at 10.37am British time on Tuesday.
The organisation said Mr Vishvanath and Mr Secker were in police custody at Israel's Ben Gurion Airport, and were due to fly back into the UK.
The UK Foreign Office said the catamaran was escorted to Ashdod port in Israel.
Confidence in the financial position of UK charities has been hit amid anxiety over swingeing spending cuts, a survey of voluntary sector bosses suggests.
The National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) found 63% of respondents felt their organisation's balance sheet would worsen over the next 12 months.
And 91% said economic conditions in the voluntary sector overall would be negative during the period, suggesting pessimism over the impact of planned cuts.
More than 120 chief executives, trustees and senior managers from UK charities took part in the survey.
A fifth said they planned to lay off staff over the next three months and around half said they expected expenditure to slip over the coming year.
Sir Stuart Etherington, chief executive of NCVO, said: "This latest survey really hits home the widespread concern the sector is feeling about its future prospects.
"It is crucial that the Government listens to the sector's concerns. Spending cuts must be managed intelligently, otherwise they will compromise the sector's ability to deliver vital services to the individuals and communities who need them most."
Smokers may soon be filtered out of the workplace because employing them is "too much trouble", a lobby group has warned.
Forest, which campaigns for people's right to smoke, said more and more employers were making life unreasonably difficult for smokers.
Director Simon Clark spoke out as Breckland Council, which is based in Dereham, Norfolk, became the latest local authority to consider making workers clock off while they take a cigarette break.
"Breckland are the latest council to consider - or impose - this clocking off and back on policy. Some have even gone further by imposing smoking bans." said Mr Clark.
"We don't have figures but there are quite a few which either having some sort of 'clocking off' policy or a complete no-smoking policy.
"Our concern is that soon smokers will be losing out on jobs because their lives at work will be so complicated that employers will decide it's too much trouble to employ them."
He added: "This idea of 'clocking off' to smoke isn't a health issue. It's unreasonable. Will they make people 'clock off' if they have a coffee break?
"If some people are taking too many smoking breaks than they should and taking advantage that's an issue for managers, not a health issue."
Mr Clark said Forest had already objected to job advertisements asking for "non-smokers".
Breckland councillors are due to decide whether to impose the "clocking off" policy after considering a report.
Intelligence officials have intercepted a credible Islamist-linked terror plot against Britain.
The threat is one of "a succession" of terror operations the country has been dealing with over the past weeks, a government official said, although the UK's terror alert status has not been raised from "severe".
The planned attack would have reportedly been similar to the deadly commando-style raids in Mumbai, India, two years ago, with other European cities, in France and Germany, also targeted.
On Tuesday night the Eiffel Tower in Paris was evacuated following a bomb threat called in from a telephone booth. It was the second such alert at the monument in two weeks.
One UK government official said: "There have been a succession of terror operations we've been dealing with over recent weeks but one to two that have preoccupied us. Still, it hasn't been to the degree that we have raised the threat level."
Another British official would not confirm the plot was "al Qaida inspired" but said there was an "Islamist connection" and that the plots were in an early stage. No other details were given.
On Tuesday French police closed off surroundings to the Eiffel Tower, France's most visited monument. Officers pulled red-and-white police tape across a bridge leading over the Seine River, and stood guard.
Bomb experts combed through the 324m (1,063ft) tower and found nothing unusual, Paris police headquarters said. Tourists were let back inside about two hours after the structure was emptied.
German officials denied they had intercepted threats, saying there had been no change to the country's threat level.
More than 170 people were killed during a 24-hour co-ordinated attack on Mumbai by 10 gunmen in November 2008. It has been blamed on Pakistani militants. Since the 9/11 terror attacks in the US nine years ago, terror group al Qaida is believed to have moved outside Afghanistan and Pakistan to other countries such as Somalia and Yemen.
A huge mudslide first thought to have buried hundreds of people has left only 11 missing with no confirmed dead, according to authorities.
Earlier reports had predicted a catastrophe in Mexico's rain-soaked southern state of Oaxaca.
Interior minister Francisco Blake and Oaxaca governor Ulises Ruiz confirmed the drastically-reduced toll from the slide that hit the town of Santa Maria de Tlahuitoltepec on Tuesday.
"So far no one is confirmed dead. Eleven are missing," Mr Ruiz said. "We hope that this type of information will continue and they (the missing) will be found."
Initial reports from Santa Maria de Tlahuitoltepec, a rural mountain town 373 miles south east of Mexico City, said a hillside collapsed on hundreds of sleeping residents after several days of heavy rains in the aftermath of a hurricane and tropical storm that hit Mexico and Central America. Civil protection authorities first reported seven people killed and at least 100 missing.
Communications with the town were difficult after the pre-dawn slide. Soldiers and civil protection and Red Cross workers could not reach the area for nearly 10 hours because mud and rocks blocked roads and a bridge was damaged, while bad weather prevented helicopters from being used.
President Felipe Calderon reported on his Twitter account that an army commander and 30 soldiers had reached the town by foot and that there was a lot of damage, but "perhaps not of the magnitude initially reported".
Donato Vargas, an official in Santa Maria de Tlahuitoltepec reached by a satellite telephone, had said as many as 300 homes were believed to have been buried and residents who made it out early in the morning said they had no success digging out neighbours.
He said the slide dragged houses packed with sleeping families some 1,300 feet down the hillside along with cars, livestock and light poles. "We were all sleeping and all I heard was a loud noise and when I left the house I saw that the hill had fallen," he said. "We were left without electricity, without telephone and we couldn't help them. There was no way to move the mud."
One person was reported killed in a mudslide in another Oaxaca community, Villa Hidalgo, and 30 people were killed on Monday in a slide in Colombia.
A hero pilot who saved a British Airways plane from disaster but then quit over rumours about his handling of the incident is rejoining the airline.
Captain Peter Burkill, 45, and his co-pilot John Coward avoided catastrophe by safely crash-landing a 152-passenger BA Boeing 777 at Heathrow airport in January 2008 after the aircraft lost power.
Reports into the incident cleared father-of-three Mr Burkill but he took voluntary redundancy from BA last year.
Earlier this year, Mr Burkill said he felt he had been forced out by a whispering campaign within the company and that BA management allowed false rumours that he had "frozen" at the controls of the 777, leaving Mr Coward to land the aircraft, to fester.
BA said it refuted any suggestions that there had been a campaign against Mr Burkill and said he would be returning in November as a Boeing 777 captain.
A BA spokesman said: "He was not forced out. He was among a number of pilots who took voluntary redundancy but we are now taking him back again. He will be a captain and he will fly Boeing 777s."
Mr Burkill said earlier this year that he had unsuccessfully applied for other pilots' jobs and he was having to sell his home in Worcester.
He said: "I have lost everything and none of it is my fault. I am a broken man. I feel hung out to dry."
It was Mr Burkill's action in adjusting the plane's flaps that averted disaster in the January 2008 incident.
Air passengers are facing severe disruption on flights to and from Spain because of a 24-hour general strike by Spanish workers.
Budget airline Ryanair scrapped most of its flights to Spain and all of its internal ones in the country, while easyJet cancelled around half its Spanish flights.
British Airways cancelled a number of flights to and from Spain and BA and other carriers also had to axe some services to and from Brussels because of separate industrial action in Belgium.
Flights to Barcelona, Madrid and Malaga were among the early-morning services BA had to cancel.
Ryanair was also hit by the Belgian strike, with the Irish airline having to axe a number of services to and from Charleroi near Brussels.
EasyJet said it had written some days ago to passengers planning on flying to Spain, offering them the opportunity to change their travel plans.
Ryanair, which last week was forced to axe 250 flights due to strike action by French air traffic controllers, called on EU leaders to act against those disrupting flights.
Madrid's Barajas Airport was free of protesters, although unions have said they want to severely limit domestic and international flights. The national aviation authority AENA said 70% of the country's air traffic controllers are expected to show up for work.
In other strikes, picketers hurled eggs at buses and blocked trucks from delivering produce to wholesale markets in Spain.
Striking workers braving a pre-dawn chill staged a sit-in outside a garage housing buses in the capital Madrid, screaming "scabs" at drivers trying to get out on to the road in the country's first general strike since 2002. Some strikers scuffled with police, and Spanish National Radio reported 11 people injured nationwide.
The owners of a hotel where three people died in a blaze are to be prosecuted for breaching fire regulations, it has been announced.
Cornwall Council said the owners of the Penhallow Hotel in Newquay and three other people face prosecution for alleged breaches of the Regulatory Reform Order (Fire Safety) 2005.
Holidaymakers Joan Harper, 80, Peter Hughes, 43, and his mother, Monica Hughes, 86, all died in the fire that ripped through the seafront hotel more than three years ago.
The blaze, in August 2007, was Britain's worst hotel fire for nearly 40 years.
Last year, an inquest jury returned an open verdict and ruled that no one was to blame despite evidence that the blaze was started deliberately.
A spokeswoman for Cornwall Council said: "Following a comprehensive investigation into the fire precautions at the Penhallow Hotel, Cornwall Council and Cornwall Fire and Rescue Service have confirmed they are taking out a prosecution against the owners of the hotel and three other individuals for breaches of fire precautions under the Regulatory Reform Order (Fire Safety) 2005.
"Summonses have now been issued on both the owners of the hotel and three individuals employed by the company.
"As legal proceedings are now under way, the council and the fire and rescue service are unable to make any further comments at this time."
They will appear before magistrates next month.
Multiple sclerosis patients have spoken of their anger and fear for the future after receiving pointless treatment costing thousands of pounds at the hands of Dr Robert Trossel, who has been struck off by the General Medical Council.
Dr Trossel, 56, was told his actions had done "lasting harm" after a long-running GMC disciplinary hearing into his involvement with nine MS patients who sought his help in "desperation" to find a cure for the disease.
Brian Gomes da Costa, chairman of the GMC fitness to practise panel, told Dr Trossel: "You have exploited vulnerable patients and their families.
"You have given false hope and made unsubstantiated and exaggerated claims to patients suffering from degenerative and devastating illnesses. Your conduct has unquestionably done lasting harm, if not physically, then mentally and financially, to these patients and also to their families and supporters."
Some underwent painful and expensive removal of mercury fillings before travelling to his Rotterdam clinic as he had told them this would make stem cell treatment more effective.
They were united in accusing the Dutch-trained doctor of exploiting their vulnerability and desperation as sufferers from a disabling and incurable neurological disease.
Stephen Murphy, 42, from Timperley, Greater Manchester, was injected by Dr Trossel without his knowledge with a substance containing bovine brain and spinal cord live cells in February 2006. Mr Murphy, who paid £7,000 for his treatment, said: "There is no cure for MS, that is the bottom line. It is malign and insidious."
Trossel, he said, had been "firmly of the belief" that there was some "validity" to stem cell therapy and it would have beneficial effects.
Karen Galley, 45, a former City worker, from Hadleigh, Essex, visited Trossel's clinic in August 2006 in the hope that her son Sam, now aged 10, might see her walk.
She was charged around £10,500 for the treatment, receiving one injection in the arm and six in the neck. She too, it later emerged, had been injected without her knowledge with a substance containing bovine brain and spinal cord live cells.
The number of mortgages approved for house purchase fell to a six-month low during August as activity in the property market continued to falter, figures have shown.
A total of 47,372 loans were approved for house purchase during the month, down from 48,346 in July and the fourth consecutive monthly decline, according to the Bank of England.
The level of mortgage approvals seen this year has consistently failed to match the numbers reported for the second half of 2009, prompting economists to warn that the housing market is heading for a second round of price falls.
A second strike by London Underground workers is set to go ahead from Sunday evening, causing travel chaos for workers and other passengers, union leaders have warned.
Members of the Rail Maritime and Transport union (RMT) and the Transport Salaried Staffs Association (TSSA) are due to walk out from 7pm for 24 hours in a row over plans to axe 800 jobs.
Tube workers went on strike earlier this month and are due to take two further days of action in November unless the deadlock is broken.
TSSA leader Gerry Doherty has said that London Mayor Boris Johnson seems determined to "grandstand" at the Conservative Party conference next week rather than sitting down with the unions to try to resolve the dispute.
"He seems more interested in winning cheap applause, and furthering his political career, than solving a dispute which centres on his insistence that 800 ticket office jobs must go immediately.
"He was elected after opposing Ken Livingstone's plans to close 40 ticket officers. He now wants cuts at more than 250 and wonders why we are angry. No one likes a hypocrite and that is what Boris is being on this issue."
RMT general secretary Bob Crow said: "RMT remains totally opposed to the planned Tube cuts which will have devastating consequences for passenger and staff safety.
"We now have the ludicrous situation where passenger groups are being consulted after London Underground have already begun bulldozing through their plans. That makes a mockery of the process and reinforces the union position that the cuts be halted to allow proper discussions and negotiations to take place with our representatives.
"RMT and TSSA members have been faced with a stark choice - either sit back and accept the undermining of safety and safe staffing levels and wait for a disaster, or stand up and fight on this issue in the interests of Londoners. We have opted to stand up and fight for a safe and secure future for the Tube network."
In a separate dispute over pay, maintenance staff employed by engineering firm Alstom will stage a 24-hour strike from 7pm next Monday. LU has pledged there will be no compulsory redundancies and said changes to ticket office staffing levels are needed after the success of the Oyster pre-paid card system.
A doctor struck off by the General Medical Council for exploiting vulnerable multiple sclerosis sufferers could be facing legal action by hundreds of patients throughout the UK.
Solicitors Leigh Day & Co said it was looking into the possibility of seeking compensation for potentially "hundreds" of MS and spinal cord injury patients who travelled to Rotterdam to receive stem cell treatment from Dr Robert Trossel.
Jill Paterson, solicitor at the firm, said: "We support the GMC's findings that Dr Trossel is no longer fit to practise in the UK.
"We are actively investigating the pursuit of legal proceedings against him to right the wrongs caused to these vulnerable people."
The news of the possible legal action comes after Dr Trossel, 56, was struck off the medical register at the conclusion a long-running disciplinary hearing in central London into his involvement with MS sufferers.
The Dutch-trained doctor was found to have given false hope to vulnerable patients desperate for a cure, charging them thousands of pounds for "pointless" and "unjustifiable" stem cell treatments.
Prof Brian Gomes da Costa, chairman of the GMC fitness to practise panel, told Dr Trossel he had done "lasting harm" to patients and had "abused the position of trust" afforded to him as a doctor
He said: "You have exploited vulnerable patients and their families. You have given false hope and made unsubstantiated and exaggerated claims to patients suffering from degenerative and devastating illnesses."
Five of the patients in the GMC case were injected between August 2004 and August 2006 at his Rotterdam clinic with a substance said to contain stem cells, in a move described as medically unjustifiable, "inappropriate" and exploitative of vulnerable patients.
The GMC heard that Dr Trossel had no background in neurology or haematology and that he was not an expert in stem cell research. He was also found to have used stem cells that were not designed for human use.
A teenager told a friend she had stabbed a suspected paedophile because he had touched her again, the Old Bailey heard.
The 14-year-old girl then allegedly asked the 15-year-old boy if he could take the the knife.
The boy told police in a video interview: "She looked nervous. She told me she had stabbed him. I didn't believe her. Then she asked me to hold the knife. I said no."
The boy said he met the girl after school on April 23, shortly after Robert Daley, 45, was stabbed to death at his flat in Brixton, south London.
The court has heard that Mr Daley was stabbed to death after the girl and another youth, her older sister's boyfriend, went to the flat.
The defendants, both now aged 15 and who cannot be identified because of their ages, deny murder.
The court has been told that the sisters and a woman made allegations that Mr Daley sexually abused them to police.
The Crown Prosecution Service decided to drop the case and Mr Daley let the older sister know on the day of his death.
Earlier, a woman told the court she was raped by Mr Daley after he pestered her for sex. But she said that, after making a rape complaint to police, she decided she did not want to pursue the allegations and the case was dropped.
"He was horrible when he was drunk," she said. The trial was adjourned.
The battle for jobs in Ed Miliband's top team has kicked off in earnest with 49 Labour MPs putting themselves forward.
Those seeking election to the shadow cabinet range from household names such as Alan Johnson and Ed Balls to relatively obscure backbenchers.
Details released by Labour also disclosed that Rosie Winterton was the only candidate for party chief whip after Mr Miliband exerted his new authority by suggesting other contenders withdraw.
The departure of some of Labour's biggest beasts - including David Miliband, Lord Mandelson, Alistair Darling and Jack Straw - has left opportunities for fresh faces.
But with just 19 spaces available, the majority of applicants will end up disappointed.
Under Labour rules, its MPs vote to decide who should be in the shadow cabinet when the party is in opposition. A minimum quota of six women has been imposed as part of efforts to promote equality.
However, the leader can still choose which specific jobs individuals receive.
Close allies of Ed Miliband are expected to be the biggest winners in the process, with his leadership campaign manager and former transport minister Sadiq Khan tipped for a bigger role.
Former ministers Caroline Flint and sisters Angela and Maria Eagle are among the women nominated - while left-winger Diane Abbott is a wild-card entrant after her leadership bid.
As the elected deputy leader, Harriet Harman does not need any further endorsement from her colleagues, but there are suggestions she could be rewarded with a major brief such as health after a solid stint covering in the top job.
A headteacher has been found guilty of failing to take reasonable care for the safety of his students after a pupil fell through a skylight.
John Summerfield, 64, took a group of "slightly inebriated" sixth-formers on to the roof of their school when Joel Murray, then 18, tumbled 8ft (2.4m) into a corridor and fractured his skull.
The teenager also broke his ribs, perforated an eardrum and suffered permanent damage to his eye in the fall at Sacred Heart Catholic College in Crosby, Merseyside, Liverpool Crown Court heard.
It took the jury of six men and six women less than two hours to reach its decision and Summerfield bowed his head as the guilty verdict was read out to the court.
The accident happened in August 2008 during an evening party the school had thrown to celebrate the students' A-level results which had been released that day.
Summerfield warned the students not to walk near the roof light, but the jury agreed with the prosecution that he should never have taken them there at all.
He was one of the only keyholders for a locked door which he opened to allow around 10 of his pupils through to gain access to the roof. The prosecution argued that the locked door was an appropriate safety measure and, when that was opened, the principal no longer demonstrated "reasonable care".
Summerfield wanted to show them the results of some renovations to the building, and one witness told investigating officers he told her he wanted to give them "a once-in-a-lifetime experience" that they would be able to "talk about with their grandchildren".
Judge Gilmour QC told the panel: "He is a very caring teacher. He was doing what he thought would increase the enjoyment of the evening for some of the pupils and, in doing that, he didn't really think about the safety aspects of taking them on to the roof."
Summerfield will receive a fine when he is sentenced on October 29 at Liverpool Crown Court.
