One of the deceased in the crash that killed 15 people en route to a hockey playoff game in western Canada was misidentified, Saskatchewan’s Ministry of Justice said Monday, partly because the players all had blond-dyed hair and similar builds.

The province’s ministry of justice said the body of Parker Tobin was mistaken for that of Xavier Labelle.

It said Labelle is injured but alive, and Tobin is among the deceased. The accident occurred Friday. Drew Wilby, spokesman for the ministry, said the error wasn’t discovered until Sunday.

“The new information came to light last night that raised questions with the health care professionals. In turn they were able to identify Xavier Labelle as Xavier Labelle who of course we had previously said was Parker Tobin,” Wilby said.

“A lot of these boys looked alike.”

Wilby and the Office of the Chief Coroner apologized for the misidentification.

“To find who they had thought was their loved one wasn’t their loved one I can’t even fathom,” Wilby said. “I don’t know enough could ever be said. All I could do is offer our sincerest apologies.”

The news comes as this shattered town mourned its revered local youth hockey team, trying to come to grips with a devastating highway accident Friday that also injured the other 14 people on their bus.

Over the weekend, Tobin’s family had tweeted that…

Lawyers representing U.S. President Donald Trump’s family hotel business appealed to Panama’s president for help days before an emergency arbitrator declined to reinstate the Trump management team to a luxury waterfront hotel.

The Britton & Iglesias firm, which has represented the Trump Organization in its fight to continue running the hotel, addressed a letter dated March 22 to President Juan Carlos Varela.

A copy of the letter was provided to The Associated Press by contacts who have worked as a liaison to the building’s owners in Panama.

The letter asks Varela to intervene, complaining that Panama’s courts denied the organization due process in violation of a bilateral treaty and warning there could be consequences for the country.

The letter written to Varela says it seeks to “URGENTLY request your influence in relation to a commercial dispute involving Trump Hotel aired before Panama’s judiciary.”

In February, Orestes Fintiklis, the hotel’s majority owner, tried to fire Trump’s hotel management and take control of the property for the owners’ association. Trump’s family company beefed up security, but on March 5, judicial officials sided with Fintiklis. Police officers ordered the Trump management team out of the building.

On March 27, an arbitrator in the U.S. ruled that Trump’s company should not have been evicted while arbitration was ongoing with the hotel owners, but said he would not reinstate the previous management.

On Monday, Panama’s foreign secretary Isabel de Saint Malo said her office had also been copied on the letter.

“It is a…

International condemnation grew over a suspected poison gas attack in a rebel-held town near Damascus said to have been carried out by the Syrian government, while Syria and its main ally, Russia, blamed Israel for airstrikes on a Syrian air base Monday that reportedly killed 14 people, including four Iranians.

The timing of the airstrikes in central Homs province, hours after President Donald Trump said there would be “a big price to pay” for the chemical weapons attack, raised questions about whether Israel was acting alone or as a proxy for the United States.

Israel did not comment on Monday’s missile strike. The Jewish State typically does not comment on its airstrikes in Syria, which have been numerous in Syria’s civil war.

The fast-paced developments threatened to further hike tensions between the U.S. and Russia, which has in the past warned against any U.S. military action against President Bashar Assad’s government. Iran, a key ally of Assad, condemned the airstrikes, which it said killed four Iranians, including a colonel and a member of the Revolutionary Guard’s aerospace force.

Opposition activists said 40 people died in Saturday night’s chemical attack in the town of Douma, the last remaining rebel bastion in the eastern suburbs of Damascus, blaming Assad’s forces. The attack killed entire families in their homes and underground shelters, opposition activists and local rescuers said.

The Syrian government strongly denied it carried out a chemical weapons attack and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said it has opened an…

President Donald Trump said Monday he will decide “probably by the end of today” on a U.S. response to the apparent chemical weapons attack on Syrian civilians. He suggested Syria’s main military ally, Russia, would “pay a price.”

Speaking during a Cabinet meeting, Trump condemned the “heinous attack” Saturday that killed at least 40 people, including children. Asked by a reporter whether President Vladimir Putin bears responsibility, Trump said, “He may, yeah, he may. And if he does it’s going to be very tough, very tough.” He added, “Everybody’s gonna pay a price. He will, everybody will.”

Amid the tough talk in the White House, the U.S. military appeared to be in position to carry out any attack order. A Navy destroyer, the USS Donald Cook, was underway in the eastern Mediterranean on Monday after completing a port call at Larnaca, Cyprus. The ship is armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles, the weapon of choice in a U.S. attack one year ago on an airfield in Syria after an alleged sarin gas attack on civilians at Khan Sheikhoun. The U.S. said the 2017 strike was intended to deter Syria from further use of chemical weapons.

Trump was to meet later Monday with senior national security aides. “Nothing’s off the table,” he said after condemning Saturday’s suspected use of toxic gas. “It was an atrocious attack,” he said. “It was horrible.”

Trump said the U.S. is…

A female brothel keeper who forced teenage girls to suffer rape, torture, and have abortions has been sentenced to 10 years in prison in India, according to a Christian nonprofit fighting human trafficking.

International Justice Mission announced in an update earlier this week that the brothel keeper, who wasn’t named, masterminded a cross-border trafficking network where teenage girls were lured from Bangladesh and forced into sex work in Kolkata.

“The victims were lured to migrate to India because of their impoverished conditions,” said IJM’s Saptarshi Biswas. “They were trafficked into India under the promise of jobs.”

The nonprofit helped police rescue two girls in January 2012 who shared their horrific stories.

“Both victims underwent intense conditioning periods, which includes brutal psychical violence, torture and rape until they obliged to be active sex workers. One of the victims was forced to have an abortion and take steroids to gain weight,” Biswas explained.

The brothel keeper was sentenced on Monday to 10 years in prison, which is the harshest punishment for such crimes under India’s penal code, and fined the equivalent of $1,500.

IJM noted that it helped the girls return to Bangladesh in 2014, and supported them with rehabilitation and healing.

Sex trafficking remains a huge problem in India, with both Christian and secular nonprofits calling for greater attention on the widespread problem.

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Source: Christian Post

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