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Ireland vs France player ratings as hosts make statement in Paris

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Belfast Live

Here’s how we rated the Ireland players after their Six Nations opener against France in Paris

Jamie Osborne – Found himself manning the last line of defence frequently during an uneasy debut appearance in the opening period. 5.

Tommy O’Brien – Despite being Leinster and Ireland’s standout performer throughout the season, the increased intensity on the flank proved challenging. 4.

Garry Ringrose – Combined effectively with McCloskey though attacking chances proved scarce. 6.

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Stuart McCloskey – Demonstrated his defensive credentials during his 50-minute stint, forming a robust midfield barrier with eight successful tackles and only one miss. 7.

Jacob Stockdale – Showed determination and remained committed at the breakdown, displaying quality moments when he had the ball. 6

Sam Prendergast – Presented plenty for observers to assess. Looked assured with ball in hand and going forward, though he missed seven tackles. 5.

Jamison Gibson-Park – Struggles when compared to his counterpart. Made a brave attempt to bring order to the disorder. 5.

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Jeremy Loughman – Fulfilled his core scrummaging duties well. Completed 12 tackles with just two misses, exceptional. 7.

Dan Sheehan – A relatively subdued performance by his usual standards, managing five carries over 17 minutes during his hour-long appearance. 5.

Thomas Clarkson – Provided adequate stability at scrum time, contributing four carries and six tackles, whilst giving away two penalties. 5.

Joe McCarthy – Will face questions from Andy Farrell regarding one of his first-half infringements. Made 10 tackles with two misses. 5.

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Tadhg Beirne – Has required considerable time to regain form following the Lions tour. Accumulated 13 carries and 14 tackles alongside two misses. 6.

Cian Prendergast – Making his Paris debut and getting stuck into the action. Completed a dozen tackles, proving his value. .

Josh van der Flier – Delivered solid defensive contributions during the opening period, completing 11 tackles without missing any throughout his 50-minute appearance. 7.

Caelan Doris – Proved instrumental in both Ireland’s attacking and defensive efforts. Made 13 carries covering 341 metres, completed 15 tackles with just one miss. 8.

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Replacements: Rónan Kelleher 5, Michael Milne 6, Finlay Bealham 5, James Ryan 5, Jack Conan 5, Nick Timoney 6, Craig Casey n/a, Crowley 5.

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Man survives 48 hours in morgue ice box after doctors claimed he was dead

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Daily Mirror

Sipho William Mdletshe, from South Africa, was in his 20s when he ended up in a serious car crash alongside his partner and knocked unconscious, only to wake up in a mortuary

A fiancée was left grieving for her partner after the couple were in an apparently fatal car crash – only he was still alive.

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Sipho William Mdletshe was declared dead after a serious car crash in 1993, but just 48 hours later he was screaming to be let out of the freezing cold morgue he suddenly found himself in. The man in his 20s, from the township of Sebokeng south of Johannesburg in South Africa, was soon taken to a mortuary.

He was then placed in storage, as is routine following such declarations. But the story took a chilling twist two days later when workers at the morgue heard creepy noises coming from inside one of the metal drawers.

Realising something was terribly wrong, staff opened the compartment and to their shock Mdletshe was alive, having regained consciousness and called out for help from inside.

His survival was nothing short of extraordinary and, according to published reports, he slowly awoke after the crash, became alert enough to realise where he was, and then began shouting. This act ultimately saved his life.

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However, the ordeal didn’t end there for unlucky Mdletshe, reports Unilad. When he later tried to reconnect with his fiancée – who herself suffered a few injuries in the crash – she reportedly recoiled, believing he was something other than human after being told he had died. She even thought he was a zombie back from the dead.

In a separate tale of someone returning from the dead, the loved ones of Essie Dunbar were devastated when she died aged just 30 after suffering an epileptic seizure.

Her funeral was quickly arranged and she was buried six feet under the ground inside a wooden coffin in South Carolina, US in 1915. However, her grieving sister was late for the service and asked for the coffin to be dug back up so she could see her sibling one last time.

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What happened next beggars belief. After prizing open the lid, Essie was very much alive and smiling back at the world. The ministers conducting the service panicked and they all fell into the grave, with one of them breaking some ribs, according to ‘Buried Alive’, published in 2002.

Even Essie’s own family fled in terror, believing they were witnessing something supernatural as the undead woman climbed out of the coffin and tried to follow them. Remarkably, after her horrifying ordeal, Essie returned to her quiet life. Reports from decades later describe her working in the fields, picking cotton and living independently.

More recently, a woman who was declared dead at a hospital horrifyingly ‘came back to life’ en route to her own funeral last year. After taking a turn for the worse, she was found to have died and was moved from the mortuary to the funeral parlour in preparation for her burial.

But staff were reportedly horrified when they discovered that the elderly woman actually had a pulse. Compounding their panic, she is said to have moved her fingers.

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Paramedics at the funeral home in Son Valenti funeral parlour in Palma, Majorca confirmed she was alive and rushed her back to the city’s Juan March de Bunyola Hospital.

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Six Nations 2026: How to watch every match for FREE on TV and online

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Six Nations 2026: How to watch every match for FREE on TV and online

The 2026 Six Nations is underway at last, and a new multimillion pound broadcasting deal has ensured the tournament remains free-to-air in the UK.

However, a power reshuffle between its co-broadcasters has changed where fans must go to find each game.

Indeed, ITV is showing the majority of Men’s Six Nations games live throughout the duration of its deal, in place from 2026 to 2029, as well as broadcasting the brand new Nations Championships, a 12-team tournament which launches its first edition this summer.

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As far as the rest of the action, one out of three matches in each round of the Six Nations will be broadcast on BBC One and streamed on BBC iPlayer as well as the BBC Sport website and app.

They include potential dark horses Scotland’s enticing trip to Italy in round one, the visit of holders France to new-look Wales in round two followed by Murrayfield in round four, plus round three’s showdown between the Scots and the Welsh in Cardiff.

How to watch Six Nations 2026 live

Ireland vs Italy (2:10pm, Aviva Stadium, ITV1)

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Scotland vs England (4:40pm, Murrayfield, ITV1)

Wales vs France (3:10pm, Principality Stadium, BBC One)

England vs Ireland (2:10pm, Allianz Stadium, ITV1)

Wales vs Scotland (4:40pm, Principality Stadium, BBC One)

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France vs Italy (3:10pm, Stade Pierre Mauroy, ITV1)

Ireland vs Wales (8:10pm, Aviva Stadium, ITV1)

Scotland vs France (2:10pm, Murrayfield, BBC One)

Italy vs England (4:40pm, Stadio Olimpico, ITV1)

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Ireland vs Scotland (2:10pm, Aviva Stadium, ITV1)

Wales vs Italy (4:40pm, Principality Stadium, BBC One)

France vs England (8:10pm, Stade de France, ITV1)

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Tesco F&F releases trendy gilet perfect for the springtime

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Cambridgeshire Live

The gilet can easily be thrown over any outfit for some extra warmth.

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The end of winter is in sight, which means the weather will soon be getting sunnier. It can be hard to style chic outfits in between seasons when the weather is likely to be more unpredictable.

If you are looking for some new spring clothing to add to your wardrobe, you might want to visit a Tesco store to check out its clothing brand F&F. The brand has just launched the F&F Edit Sleeveless Gilet in Khaki that is a “cool and comfortable layer” for throwing on over a jumper.

The gilet has “two flap pockets and a concealed zip fastening” and has a “loose fit style” that is great for layering over long sleeved tops. The gilet is currently being sold for £29.50 and will be a staple piece to have in your springtime wardrobe.

The gilet was posted to the Tesco F&F Instagram page, which currently has 886K followers, in a video with a few of the brand’s other spring pieces. The video was captioned: “Outfits of the week with @debbielegrainger. Which one is your fave?”

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Fans of the clothing brand have already taken to social media to share their opinions on the new springtime items. One commenter said: “So many gorgeous pieces,” and another said: “Love the blazer suit.”

If you want to get the gilet or any of the new pieces, you can go to the Tesco website to browse all of its clothes. You could also go to a Tesco store with a clothing department.

If this gilet is not quite in line with your style, you might want to check out Boden instead. There is this Gloucester Mac, which would be a trendy addition to your wardrobe, or this Linen Scoop Neck Waistcoat that can be worn with the matching Kensington Linen Trousers.

New Look also has plenty of options to look through. There is this Brown Double Pocket Belted Short Belted Mac that is great for throwing over a nice outfit when going out or this Blue Mid Wash Denim Jacket, which is a staple to have in spring.

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Six Nations 2026 table, fixtures, schedule and results as tournament begins

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Six Nations 2026 table, fixtures, schedule and results as tournament begins

France have stormed to an early lead in the 2026 Six Nations, dispatching Ireland with ease in the curtain-raiser to lay down the gauntlet for title hopefuls England.

They nipped out to an early lead through Louis Bielle-Barrey and scarcely looked back, though it was not quite a perfect outing. The reigning champions shipped two second-half tries to take the final score to 36-14 in their favour.

Steve Borthwick’s men arrive in fine form, though, having pieced together 11 straight wins last year, and will fancy their chances of breaking the recent stranglehold held on this tournament by Ireland and current holders France, who meet in Paris for a star-studded opener on Thursday.

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It is new-look Wales up first for England and while Super Saturday features two potential title deciders, the early rounds of this year’s condensed competition also bring their fair share of eye-catching match-ups.

Scotland head coach Gregor Townsend has high hopes for his side, too, and the fixtures have aligned well for a talented group desperate to hoist the Six Nations trophy for the first time.

Position

Team

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P

W

D

L

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PF

PA

PD

B

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Pts

1

France

1

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1

0

0

36

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14

+22

1

4

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2

England

0

0

0

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0

0

0

0

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0

0

3

Italy

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0

0

0

0

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0

0

0

0

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0

4

Scotland

0

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0

0

0

0

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0

0

0

0

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5

Wales

0

0

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0

0

0

0

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0

0

0

6

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Ireland

1

0

0

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1

14

36

-22

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0

0

Six Nations fixtures and results

England vs Wales (4:40pm, Allianz Stadium, ITV1)

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Ireland vs Italy (2:10pm, Aviva Stadium, ITV1)

Scotland vs England (4:40pm, Murrayfield, ITV1)

Wales vs France (3:10pm, Principality Stadium, BBC One)

England vs Ireland (2:10pm, Allianz Stadium, ITV1)

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Wales vs Scotland (4:40pm, Principality Stadium, BBC One)

France vs Italy (3:10pm, Stade Pierre Mauroy, ITV1)

Ireland vs Wales (8:10pm, Aviva Stadium, ITV1)

Scotland vs France (2:10pm, Murrayfield, BBC One)

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Italy vs England (4:40pm, Stadio Olimpico, ITV1)

Ireland vs Scotland (2:10pm, Aviva Stadium, ITV1)

Wales vs Italy (4:40pm, Principality Stadium, BBC One)

France vs England (8:10pm, Stade de France, ITV1)

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Gossip Girl to return with ‘sequel’ about Blair Waldorf’s life as an adult in NYC 14 years after show’s end

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Gossip Girl to return with 'sequel' about Blair Waldorf's life as an adult in NYC 14 years after show's end

GOSSIP Girl is making a comeback with a “sequel” novel centered around Blair Waldorf as an adult in New York City, over a decade after the show’s end.

The series, which was adapted from the book of the same name by Cecily von Ziegesar, aired on The CW for six seasons from 2007 to 2012.

Gossip Girl is returning with a ‘sequel’ novel, over a decade since the show’s endCredit: Alamy
The new book centers around Blair Waldorf, played on TV series by Leighton Meester, 20 years after the original novelCredit: Alamy

According to Deadline, the author is revisiting the character’s story, portrayed by Leighton Meester on-screen, for a new standalone novel titled Blair.

Alloy Entertainment sold the novel to Karen Kosztolnyik, VP, Executive Editorial Director of Fiction at Grand Central Publishing, in a major book deal, per the outlet.

The book will be published in the U.S. and through Charlotte Mursell, Publisher of Orion Fiction at Orion, a division of Hachette UK, for a global English-language release.

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Blair will reportedly take place 20 years after the original Gossip Girl series was released, with the former snobby overachiever in her 40s, returning to the Upper East Side to regain her dominance in the food chain.

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Real-life Gossip Girl was ‘blackmailing entire city by posting shock claims’

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The novel’s tentative release date is Summer 2027.

It’s unknown if the book could make its way to the small screen, but Alloy Entertainment – which is also behind other successful book-to-series favorites including The Vampire Diaries, You, and Pretty Little Liars – has obtained film and television rights if it drums up interest.

The original novel surely did, having sold over 6 million copies and spent more than 100 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list after its 2002 release.

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There have been no reports on whether anyone else in Blair’s former inner circle will appear in the book, although her relationships with many of them translated differently in the TV series.

Serena van der Woodsen was the other main character in the book and in the show, as Blair’s BFF and sometimes nemesis, played by Blake Lively.

Penn Badgley, Chase Crawford, Ed Westwick, Kelly Rutherford, Matthew Settle, Taylor Momsen, and Jessica Szohr also portrayed prominent characters in the TV adaptation.

Gossip Girl got a reboot on HBO Max in 2021, featuring an all-new cast, with Kristen Bell returning as the narrator.

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However, the show didn’t hit like the original and was cancelled after two seasons.

Many complained that the show’s teachers’ actions were “predatory,” and the overall allure was nowhere near that of the original namesake.

The revival also didn’t seem to thrust its cast into the same level of stardom as the former series did for stars such as Blake, Leighton, and Penn.

Blake has starred in a number of films since her Gossip Girl run ended, including the romance, It Ends with Us, which was the matchbox that sparked her ongoing legal war with her co-star and director, Justin Baldoni.

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Meanwhile, Leighton has had fans swooning over her since joining the cast of the Netflix series Nobody Wants This, alongside fellow Gossip Girl alum Kristen Bell and her husband, Adam Brody.

Penn also cemented his place in another TV series, playing a vastly different character than the “Lonely Boy” from Brooklyn, Dan Humphrey.

The actor portrayed obsessive stalker and serial killer Joe Goldberg in the Netflix series, You, for five seasons from 2018 to 2025.

Gossip Girl is available to stream on multiple platforms, including HBO Max, Netflix, and Hulu.

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The book will follow Blair’s life in her 40s as she returns to New York City and regains her dominance in the food chainCredit: Alamy
Cecily von Ziegesar, the author of the original bestselling novel, is the writer behind the next installmentCredit: Little, Brown and Company
The original book and show also featured Blair’s BFF, Serena van der Woodsen, played by Blake LivelyCredit: Alamy

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Norway investigates former PM Jagland over alleged Epstein links

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Norway investigates former PM Jagland over alleged Epstein links

Pål K. Lønseth, head of Økokrim – the economic crime unit investigating Jagland – said: “We consider there are reasonable grounds for investigation, given that he held the positions of chair of the Nobel Committee and Secretary General of the Council of Europe during the period covered by the released documents.

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Campaigners launch legal action in bid to stop puberty blocker trial

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Campaigners launch legal action in bid to stop puberty blocker trial

Baroness Hilary Cass, who led that review, has previously said her report “uncovered a very weak evidence base” for the benefits of puberty blockers for children and young people with gender dysphoria, but that “given that there are clinicians, children and families who believe passionately in the beneficial effects, a trial was the only way forward to make sense of this”.

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A man whose mother’s body was among 189 corpses stashed in a Colorado funeral home speaks out

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A man whose mother's body was among 189 corpses stashed in a Colorado funeral home speaks out

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) — Derrick Johnson buried his mother’s ashes beneath a golden dewdrop tree with purple blossoms at his home on Maui’s Haleakalā Volcano, fulfilling her wish of a final resting place looking over her grandchildren.

Then the FBI called.

It was Feb. 4, 2024, and Johnson was teaching an eighth-grade gym class.

“‘Are you the son of Ellen Lopes?’” a woman asked, Johnson recalled in an interview with The Associated Press.

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There had been an incident, and an FBI agent would fly out to explain, the caller said. Then she asked: “‘Did you use Return to Nature for a funeral home?’”

“‘You should probably google them,’” she added.

In the clatter of the weight room, Johnson typed “Return to Nature” into his cellphone. Dozens of news reports appeared, details popping out in a blur.

Hundreds of bodies stacked on top of each other. Inches of body decomposition fluid. Swarms of bugs. Investigators traumatized. Governor declares state of emergency.

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Johnson felt nauseated and his chest constricted, forcing the breath from his lungs. He pushed himself out of the building as another teacher heard his cries and came running.

Two FBI agents visited Johnson the following week, confirming his mother’s body was among 189 that Return to Nature’s owners, Jon and Carie Hallford, had stashed in a Colorado building between 2019 and Oct. 4, 2023, when the bodies were found.

It was one of the largest discoveries of decaying bodies at a funeral home in the U.S. Lawmakers overhauled the state’s lax funeral home regulations. And besides handing over fake ashes to grieving families, the Hallfords also admitted to defrauding the federal government out of nearly $900,000 in pandemic-era aid for small businesses.

Even as the Hallfords’ bills went unpaid, authorities said they spent lavishly on Tiffany jewelry, luxury cars and laser-body sculpting, pocketing about $130,000 clients paid for cremations.

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They were arrested in Oklahoma in November 2023 and charged with abusing nearly 200 corpses.

Hundreds of families learned from officials that the ashes they ceremonially spread or kept close weren’t actually their loved ones’ remains. The bodies of their mothers, fathers, grandparents, children and babies had moldered in a room-temperature building in Colorado.

Jon Hallford will be sentenced Friday, facing between 30 to 50 years in prison, and Carie Hallford in April after a judge accepted their plea agreements in December. Attorneys for Jon and Carie Hallford did not respond to an AP request for comment.

Johnson, 45, who’s suffered panic attacks since the FBI called, promised himself that he would speak at Hallford’s sentencing and ask for the maximum penalty.

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“When the judge passes out how long you’re going to jail, and you walk away in cuffs,” he said, “you’re gonna hear me.”

“She lied”

Jon and Carie Hallford were a husband-and-wife team who advertised “green burials” without embalming as well as cremation at their Return to Nature funeral home in Colorado Springs.

She would greet grieving families, guiding them through their loved ones’ final journey. He was less seen.

Johnson called the funeral home in early February 2023, the week his mother died. Carie Hallford assured him she would take good care of his mother, Johnson said.

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Days later, she handed Johnson a blue box containing a zip-tied plastic bag with gray powder, saying those were his mother’s ashes.

“She lied to me over the phone. She lied to me through email. She lied to me in person,” Johnson told the AP.

The following day, the box lay surrounded by flowers and photos of Ellen Marie Shriver-Lopes at a memorial service at a Holiday Inn in Colorado Springs.

Johnson sprinkled rose petals over it as a preacher said: “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”

Caught on video

On Sept. 9, 2023, surveillance footage showed a man appearing to be Jon Hallford walk inside a building owned by Return to Nature in the town of Penrose, outside Colorado Springs, according to an arrest affidavit.

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Camera footage inside showed a body laying on a gurney wearing a diaper and hospital socks. The man flipped it onto the floor.

Then he “appeared to wipe the remaining decomposition from the gurney onto other bodies in the room,” before wheeling what appeared to be two more bodies into the building, the affidavit said.

In a text to his wife, Hallford said, “while I was making the transfer, I got people juice on me,” according to court testimony.

The neighborhood mom

Johnson grew up with his mother in an affordable-housing complex in Colorado Springs, where she knew everyone.

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Johnson’s father wasn’t around much; at 5 years old, Johnson remembers seeing him punch his mom, sending her careening into a table, then onto a guitar, breaking it.

It was Lopes who taught Johnson to shave and hollered from the bleachers at his football games.

Neighborhood kids called her “mom,” some sleeping on the couch when they needed a place to stay and a warm meal. She would chat with Jehovah’s Witnesses because she didn’t want to be rude. With a life spent in social work, Lopes would say: “If you have the ability and you have the voice to help: Help.”

Johnson spoke with his mother nearly everyday. After diabetes left her blind and bedridden at age 65, she’d ask Johnson to describe what her grandchildren looked like over the phone.

It was Super Bowl Sunday in 2023 when her heart stopped.

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Johnson, who had flown in from Hawaii to be at her bedside, clutched her warm hand and held it until it was cold.

A gruesome discovery

Detective Sgt. Michael Jolliffe and Laura Allen, the county’s deputy coroner, stood outside the Penrose building on Oct. 3, 2023, according to the 50-page arrest affidavit.

A sign on the door read “Return to Nature Funeral Home” and listed a phone number. When Jolliffe called it, it was disconnected. Cracked concrete and yellow stalks of grass encircled the building. At back was a shabby hearse with expired registration. A window air-conditioner hummed.

Someone had told Jolliffe of a rank smell coming from the building the day before, the affidavit said.

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One neighbor told an AP reporter they thought it came from a septic tank; another said her daughter’s dog always headed to the building whenever it got off-leash.

It was reminiscent of rancid manure or rotting fish, and struck anyone downwind of the building.

Jolliffe and Allen spotted a dark stain under the door and on the building’s stucco exterior. They thought it looked like fluids they had seen during investigations with decaying bodies, the affidavit said.

But the building’s windows were covered and they couldn’t see inside.

Allen contacted the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agency, which oversees funeral homes, which got in touch with Jon Hallford. Hallford agreed to show an inspector inside the next afternoon.

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Inspector Joseph Berry arrived, but Hallford didn’t show.

Berry found a small opening in one of the window coverings, the affidavit said. Peering through, he saw white plastic bags that looked like body bags on the floor.

A judge issued a search warrant that week.

Bodies stacked high

Donning protective suits, gloves, boots and respirators, investigators entered the 2,500-square-foot (232-square-meter) building on Oct. 5, 2023, according to the affidavit.

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Inside, they found a large bone grinder and next to it a bag of Quikrete that investigators suspected was used to mimic ashes. Bodies were stacked in nearly a dozen rooms, including the bathroom, sometimes so high they blocked doorways, the affidavit said.

There were 189.

Some had decayed for years, others several months, according to the affidavit. Many were in body bags, some wrapped in sheets and duct tape. Others were half-exposed, on gurneys or in plastic totes, or lay with no covering, it said.

Investigators believed the Hallfords were experimenting with water cremation, which can dissolve a body in several hours, the document said. There were swarms of bugs and maggots.

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Body bags were filled with fluid, according to the affidavit. Some had ripped. Five-gallon buckets had been placed to catch the leaks. Removal teams “trudged through layers of human decomposition on the floor,” it said.

Investigators identified bodies using fingerprints, hospital bracelets and medical implants, the affidavit said. It said one body was supposed to be buried in Pikes Peak National Cemetery.

Investigators exhumed the wooden casket at the burial site of the U.S. Army veteran, who served in Vietnam and the Persian Gulf. Inside was a woman’s deteriorated body, wrapped in duct tape and plastic sheets.

The veteran’s body was discovered in the Penrose building, covered in maggots.

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“Ashes to ashes”

Following the call from the FBI, Johnson promised himself he would speak at the Hallfords’ sentencing. But he struggled to talk about what had happened even with close friends, let alone in front of a judge and the Hallfords.

For months, Johnson obsessed over the case, reading dozens of news reports, often glued to his phone until one of his children would interrupt him to play.

When he shut his eyes, he said he imagined trudging through the building with “maggots, flies, centipedes. There’s rats, they’re feasting.” He asked a preacher if his mother’s soul had been trapped there. She reassured him it hadn’t. When an episode of the zombie show “The Walking Dead” came on, he broke down.

Johnson started seeing a therapist and was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. He joined Zoom meetings with other victims’ relatives as the number grew from dozens to hundreds.

After Lopes’ body was identified, Johnson flew in March 2024 to Colorado, where his mother’s remains lay in a brown box in a crematorium.

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“I don’t think you blame me, but I still want to tell you I’m sorry,” he recalled saying, placing his hand on the box.

Then Lopes’ body was loaded into the cremator and Johnson pushed the button.

Justice

Johnson has slowly improved with therapy, engaging more with his students and children. He practiced speaking at the Hallfords’ sentencings while in therapy. Closing his eyes, he envisioned standing in front of the judge — and the Hallfords.

“Justice is, it’s the part that is missing from this whole equation,” he said. “Maybe somehow this justice frees me.”

“And then there’s part of me that’s scared it won’t, because it probably won’t.”

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Twilight star buys historic Highland movie theater in LA: ‘Something for the community’

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Twilight star buys historic Highland movie theater in LA: ‘Something for the community’

Kristen Stewart has purchased the historic Highland Theater in Los Angeles, which was closed down in 2024, and will be restoring it into “something for the community”.

The Oscar-nominated actor confirmed the news to Architectural Digest, saying she was “fascinated by broken-down old theaters”.

“I didn’t realise I was looking for a theater until this place came to my attention. Then it was like a gunshot went off and the race was on. I ran toward it with everything I had,” she said.

The theater opened in 1925 and closed after nearly a century in operation. It was designed by Lewis Arthur Smith and began as a vaudeville and silent-film house before shifting to mainstream releases. It was eventually subdivided into a triplex in the 1980s.

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Owner Dan Akarakian told the Los Angeles Times in March 2024 the theatre was unable to recover in the post-pandemic world and he was forced to shut it down.

It closed permanently on 29 February 2024, six days before its 99th anniversary, with the final films screened including Madame Web and Bob Marley: One Love.

Stewart said she intended to turn the theater into a community space.

“It’s an opportunity to make a space to gather and scheme and dream together. This project is about creating a new school and restructuring our processes, finding a better way forward,” the actor said.

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“We want to make it a family affair, something for the community. It’s not just for pretentious Hollywood cinephiles,” she added.

“I see it as an antidote to all the corporate bulls***, a place that takes movie culture away from just buying and selling. I think there’s a huge desire and craving for what this kind of space can offer.”

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Kristen Stewart says she will turn the historic Highland Theater in Los Angeles into ‘something for the community’
Kristen Stewart says she will turn the historic Highland Theater in Los Angeles into ‘something for the community’ (Getty)

The Spencer star acknowledged the challenge and scale of the restoration work. “There are so many beautiful details that need to be restored,” she said. “There’s a way to bring the building back to life in a way that embraces its history, but also brings something new to the neighborhood and something new to the whole LA film community.”

Stewart’s purchase of the theater puts her in the league of film figures who have taken an active role in preserving Los Angeles’ cinema heritage.

Quentin Tarantino bought the New Beverly Cinema in 2007 and the Vista Theater in 2021, telling Deadline in 2014 he bought the former theater to ensure it wouldn’t get turned into a commercial multiplex and remain dedicated to film screenings.

In 2022, the Village Theater in Westwood was bought by a group of investors that included Jason Reitman, Steven Spielberg, and Bradley Cooper after fears the site could be redeveloped.

Recently, while promoting her directorial debut The Chronology of Water, Stewart said “probably not” when asked if she thought she would stay in the US while Donald Trump was president.

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“Reality is breaking completely under Trump,” the actor, 35, told The Sunday Times. “But we should take a page out of his book and create the reality we want to live in.”

She called Trump’s threat of tariffs on films made outside the US “terrifying” for the industry and said she “can’t work freely” in the US.

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Husband watches mother-in-law get slapped by father-in-law and then shoots him dead in response, police say

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Husband watches mother-in-law get slapped by father-in-law and then shoots him dead in response, police say

A Florida man is facing first-degree premeditated murder charges after he allegedly shot dead his father-in-law after the man reportedly slapped his mother-in-law.

Shaun Simon, 42, has been arrested and jailed after he was accused of shooting dead Bill Toth in Seminole County.

The incident allegedly occurred on Tuesday around 11:30 p.m in the Markham Woods neighborhood where Simon lived with his father-in-law, mother-in-law, and his wife, according to WESH.

According to court records, Toth’s reportedly worsening dementia was causing friction inside the house. Making matters worse, Toth’s wife reportedly was suspicious that he was not being faithful.

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Toth’s daughter told deputies that on Tuesday night, her father and mother were arguing about their marriage. Toth allegedly slapped his wife in view of his daughter. She says she told her husband, Simon, about the incident, after which Simon confronted Toth, ClickOrlando reports.

Shaun Simon, 42, of Sanford, Florida, was arrested and charged with first-degree premeditated murder relating to the shooting death of his father-in-law, Bill Toth
Shaun Simon, 42, of Sanford, Florida, was arrested and charged with first-degree premeditated murder relating to the shooting death of his father-in-law, Bill Toth (Seminole County Sheriff’s Office)

When Seminole County Sheriff’s deputies arrived, Toth was reportedly lying on the floor with a gunshot wound in his chest.

Simon’s wife called 911 after the shooting.

Toth was taken for treatment at a local hospital in critical condition but died at the facility around 2:15 a.m.

According to Fox 35 Orlando, Simon reportedly told deputies that he shot Toth once in the chest. He also reportedly told investigators that Toth had made his “life miserable,” and called the man a narcissist.

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A neighbor, Jan Hall, told WESH that she thought Toth was a “nice guy” and said she believed he was afraid of Simon, who she described as a “violent man.”

A judge denied Simon bond during his court appearance on Wednesday. Simon is allowed to have contact with his wife but has been barred from contacting his mother-in-law.

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