Sugababes star Berrabah is arrested & other

Thursday, 19 June 2008

Dynamic

Artist: Dynamic

   Genre(s):
Trance: Psychedelic

Discography:

Dynamic Sound

Year: 2006
Tracks: 8

Dynamix

Year: 2003
Tracks: 10

Dallas museum exhibit features life of stylish couple Sara and Gerald Murphy

Thursday, 12 June 2008

Mole defence takes hits at Kelly child porn trial

CHICAGO - It was R. Kelly's own lawyer who raised the issue at the start of the R&B superstar's child pornography trial: If you don't see a fingernail-sized mole on the lower back of the man in the sex tape at the centre of the case, then that man isn't Kelly.

Jurors last week watched a 1.2-by-1.2 metre monitor where freeze frames of the man's back were shown. And there, just above his waistline, was a mark that forensic's expert Grant Fredericks said appeared to be a mole. He compared the frames with 2002 police photos of Kelly's back, concluding the spots were "in the exact same position."

The testimony was among the most dramatic yet in the three-week-old trial and potentially the most damaging for Kelly. It seemed the defence had been caught in a trap they'd set themselves, and Kelly and his lawyers appeared disheartened as they looked on.

Kelly, 41, frequently appeared bored during hours of technical testimony about the 27-minute video last week. But he looked more attentive, if stressed, on Thursday when Fredericks addressed the mole issue.

Kelly, who won a Grammy Award in 1997 for the song "I Believe I Can Fly" and whose biggest hits are raunchy ballads like "Ignition," is charged with child pornography for allegedly videotaping himself having sex with a female who prosecutors say was as young as 13. He's pleaded not guilty and faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted.

Both Kelly and the alleged victim, who is now 23, deny it's them in the video.

There was no testimony Friday or over the weekend, and the trial was set to resume Monday.

Kelly's lawyers still have a chance to try to revive their mole defence when they start calling their own witnesses.

During May 20 opening statements, defence lawyer Sam Adam Jr. was emphatic on the question of the mole.

"Either Robert isn't the man on that tape or he's a magician - because there's no mole," Adam had said, referring to Kelly by his birth name.

Adam, pacing before jurors, his voice booming, instructed jurors to look for the mole on the graphic video, which was entered into evidence by prosecutors as "People's Exhibit No. 1" and played in open court after opening statements.

Defence lawyer Ed Genson grilled Fredericks in cross-examination Thursday, suggesting that the spot in the video faded in and out of view and arguing that it could have been a technical imperfection on the tape.

"The spot - it's there, it's not there. It's there, it's not there," Genson said, pointing to a monitor as it played successive frames of the tape where a man turns his back to the camera and begins taking off his pants.

The mole wasn't the only focus of scrutiny.

Witnesses for the prosecution last week also countered claims by the defence that Kelly's likeness could have been computer generated - in the same way Hollywood technicians create realistic-looking characters in movies.

Fredericks and another forensics expert testified that digitally altering the nearly half-hour video - 100,000 frames on the entire footage - would be practically impossible, requiring that someone to go through each frame to calibrate everything from shadows to blinks of an eye so that they all move in perfect sync.

Fredericks estimated that fabricating such a film would take 44 years to complete - meaning someone would have had to start the project before Kelly was born.

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Friday, 6 June 2008

Morrissey Names Years Of Refusal Album

Morrissey havs provided a title for his next studio album, 'Years Of Refusal'.

The record is tentatively set for a September release date and is said to feature 12 new tracks. Producer Jerry Finn worked on the album.

In other news, Morrissey's 1995 long-player 'Southpaw Grammar' will be reissued in July as a remastered version, including new artwork and three formerly unreleased songs.

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Thursday, 29 May 2008

Transformers cameo for Office star

Rainn Wilson, one of the stars of the US version of 'The Office', will have a cameo role in the 'Transformers' sequel.
Speaking to MTV, the actor said that he would play a professor in the blockbuster.
'Transformers 2' is due in cinemas in June 2009.
Among Wilson's other film credits are 'Juno', 'The Last Mimzy' and 'My Super Ex-Girlfriend'.

Saturday, 24 May 2008

Boy band mogul Pearlman sentenced to 25 years

ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) - Boy band mogul Lou Pearlman, who launched the Backstreet Boys and 'N Sync, was sentenced on Wednesday to 25 years in prison for swindling investors and major U.S. banks out of more than $300 million.

In an audacious two-decade-long scam, Pearlman enticed individuals and banks to invest millions of dollars in two companies that existed only on paper and won the confidence of investors with strong but fake financial statements created by a fictitious accounting firm, according to his plea agreement.

U.S. Judge G. Kendall Sharp held up a book with letters from Pearlman's victims, saying they included "his family, his close friends and people in their 70s and 80s who have lost their life savings."

"So the sympathy factor doesn't run high with the court," Sharp said.

Pearlman, 53, unsuccessfully sought to delay his sentencing to allow time to launch his latest creation, European pop band US 5, in the United States and Asia.

Pearlman said he was developing US 5 at the time of his arrest and the bankruptcy trustees for his companies agreed he had the potential to earn "significant profits" on the band -- money that could be used to pay restitution to his victims.

Pearlman proposed a plan for him to have supervised access to a telephone and Internet connection while in custody to pursue the business plan.

Federal prosecutors opposed the plan, noting that Pearlman's fraud proved he could not be trusted in conducting business by phone or Internet.

(Editing by Jim Loney and John O'Callaghan)

Muppet creator's life screen bound

A new biopic about the life and work of 'The Muppets' creator Jim Henson is to be made.
Empire Film Group, Inc has acquired the motion picture production and distribution rights to Robert D Slane's screenplay 'Henson'.
The film is due to begin production in the late summer with a budget of $30m.
Commenting, Empire Home Entertainment President Eric Parkinson said: "Jim Henson is one of the best known and most beloved entertainers of all time. His story is inspiring, tragic, heartwarming and epic, and will make for an important and entertaining motion picture."