The Crime Ledger: September 30, 2026

Staškov: Pupil Held in Detention Unit as Inspectors Review Police

Interior Minister Matúš Šutaj Eštok said Wednesday, before the Slovak government’s away session in Uhrovec, that the 13-year-old accused in Tuesday’s knife attack at the Staškov primary school has been placed in a psychological detention institution. The Police Inspection Service is examining how officers in the Turzovka district handled a criminal complaint the school filed five days before the attack, about an incident the week before. Inspection spokesperson Andrea Dobiášová confirmed the review. Investigators from the police Office for Combating Organised Crime searched the pupil’s home and questioned several witnesses. The case is being handled as premeditated murder. The attack was first reported in The Crime Ledger: September 29, 2026.

Health Minister Kamil Šaško said the injured schoolgirl remains in intensive care in extremely serious condition. The teacher killed was 61. A second teacher, 44, survived. The cabinet agreed to fast-track a bill on protection against radicalization, and the interior minister raised a debate on the age of criminal responsibility. Slovakia’s crisis line is 0800 500 333. No one involved has been named.

Hong Kong: Abby Choi’s Ex-Husband and In-Laws Go on Trial

Alex Kwong, his father, Kwong Kau, and his brother Anthony Kwong pleaded not guilty Wednesday to murdering model and influencer Abby Choi, 28, as their trial opened before Judge Brian Keith and a nine-person jury. Police found parts of Choi’s body at a suburban house in 2023. Alex and Anthony Kwong pleaded guilty to preventing the lawful burial of a body. The three face life in prison if convicted of murder.

Prosecutor Charlotte Draycott said the relationship soured in 2022 after Choi tried to sell a luxury flat she had bought for HK$60 million and registered in her former father-in-law’s name. Kwong Kau, 68, a retired police sergeant, became “extremely resentful and angry,” she said, and the prosecution alleges the three “decided they would do it together.” All three are presumed innocent of murder.

Update, Oct. 11, 2026: Choi’s mother gave evidence in the first week. On Friday, Oct. 9, the judge told the jury that legal issues had to be dealt with before evidence could continue, and adjourned the trial to Monday, Oct. 12, Dimsum Daily reports. The trial is expected to run about 45 days. Kwong Kau denies both the murder and the burial counts.

Kobe: Former Gang Boss, 79, Arrested After Two Shootings

Masayuki Akata, 58, who ran a company and lived in Kobe’s Higashinada Ward, was shot in the abdomen at about 1:15 p.m. Wednesday on a street in Sakaguchi-dori, Chuo Ward, and died in hospital. Shortly afterward, southwest of the first scene in Arata-cho, Hyogo Ward, a 54-year-old man was shot from behind in the right side inside a car parked on private property. He was seriously injured. An acquaintance of Akata’s told the Kobe Shimbun the man worked for Akata’s company.

Hyogo Ward officers made an emergency arrest of Naoto Kametani, 79, unemployed, of Kumochi-cho in Chuo Ward, just after 2 p.m. about 20 metres from the second scene, on suspicion of the attempted murder of the 54-year-old. Investigative sources say he once led a group affiliated with the Yamaguchi-gumi. Police say he admits the allegation and has suggested he was involved in the Chuo Ward shooting. They believe he shot Akata, then rode to Hyogo Ward with the second man. A handgun was seized at the Hyogo Ward scene. The prefectural police’s organized-crime division says it has no information pointing to a gang conflict and believes he acted alone. Kametani hasn’t been charged, and the allegation is unproven.

Starke: Florida Executes Curtis Beasley, 77

Florida executed Curtis Wilkie Beasley, 77, by lethal injection Tuesday at Florida State Prison near Starke. He was pronounced dead at 6:12 p.m. Beasley was convicted in 1998 of first-degree murder, robbery and grand theft of a motor vehicle in the 1995 hammer killing of Carolyn Monfort, 62, at her home in Dundee, Polk County. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene Tuesday. He had maintained his innocence, and his lawyers had argued cognitive decline.

It was Florida’s 16th execution this year and the 29th in the United States, AP reports. Florida has two more scheduled in October. William Lee Thompson, 74, is set for Oct. 13; after a doctor said he may have dementia, Gov. Ron DeSantis ordered three psychiatrists to examine him. William Reaves is set for Oct. 20.

In its final ruling, the Florida Supreme Court rejected claims that executing a 77-year-old man in cognitive decline was unconstitutional, that the timing of his death warrant was improper, and that his death sentence was invalid because his jury had not been unanimous.

Warren County, Ky.: State Police Detail Trooper Phillips’s Last Stop

Kentucky State Police released their first account of Monday’s killing of Trooper Hayden Phillips. The agency’s Critical Incident Response Team says Phillips stopped a vehicle northbound on Interstate 65 near mile marker 39 in Warren County just after 2 p.m. Witness statements and dash-camera and body-camera video identified the vehicle. It was found in Louisville shortly after 5 p.m., where Louisville Metro police stopped it with a grappler device on Dixie Highway near Burwell Avenue and arrested Emonnie Branch without incident. KSP spokesperson Katan Parker said Phillips’s own handcuffs were used in the arrest.

Visitation is Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Central at Living Hope Baptist Church in Bowling Green. The funeral is at noon Central on Sunday at Western Kentucky University’s Diddle Arena. Gov. Andy Beshear ordered flags to half-staff Sunday. Branch was denied bail Tuesday, as reported in The Crime Ledger: September 29, 2026, and is presumed innocent.

Johannesburg: Tshuma’s Local Case Stalls on Plea Deal

Ndodana Tshuma, wanted in Britain on three murder charges over the deaths of his wife, Nothabo Zandile Tshuma, and their two daughters, appeared briefly in Johannesburg Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday. His South African case was postponed to Oct. 21 because the State and the defence haven’t finished a plea and sentence agreement. Magistrate Sindisiwe Malindi had earlier pointed to discrepancies in the draft and said it had to be properly prepared before the court would accept it.

The local charges cover illegal entry and an unlicensed firearm found when he was arrested in Kensington, Johannesburg, in July. Tshuma has admitted those charges, eNCA reports. Britain’s formal extradition request is a separate proceeding before the same court, and Jacaranda FM reports it was expected to resume Thursday. He is presumed innocent of the murder charges.

The South African case and the British case are running on separate tracks: SABC News reported he was expected back before the same court on Oct. 2 for the extradition proceedings, while the plea agreement on the local charges returns on Oct. 21.

Glen Alpine: Accused in Marco Tapia’s Killing Named in Court

The men charged with murdering Marco Tapia, 23, are Vaifaalie Tuafuti, 22, and Omar Mohamed, 23, AAP reports. Neither applied for bail on Wednesday afternoon, and both return to Wagga Wagga Local Court in November. The 16-year-old charged with them was due in a children’s court and stays in custody until Nov. 13. Tapia, a biomedical engineering student, was shot in his bed at his family’s Glen Alpine home on Sept. 1. The charges ran on The Crime Ledger: September 29, 2026.

Homicide Squad commander Det. Supt. Joe Doueihi said the three came from Victoria and allegedly took up a criminal “contract,” possibly commissioned from overseas. “At this particular stage, we are not alleging any particular male pulled the trigger,” he said. Police believe Tapia was not the intended target. All three are presumed innocent.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports police believe the intended target was a neighbour, and that the three are alleged to be interstate “hired guns.” Tapia’s mother told AAP, “He had a future.”

Gurranang: Accused Named as Police Link Both Deaths

Police allege Nicholas Scott, 32, a neighbour, killed a 79-year-old man found inside a home on a property at Gurranang, about 25 km north of Grafton, two weeks ago, and then “set upon” the 59-year-old man found in a shed there on Monday. Homicide Squad commander Det. Supt. Joe Doueihi said Wednesday that the two dead men were related, and 7NEWS reports they were father and son. The younger man had come to NSW to help police and to sort out the older man’s estate.

Scott is charged with two counts of murder and stealing a motor vehicle. He appeared briefly in court Wednesday and didn’t apply for bail. The charges first ran, before police had named him, on The Crime Ledger: September 29, 2026. He is entitled to the presumption of innocence.

The Sydney Morning Herald names him as Nicholas Marsden Scott. The father was found on Sept. 13 and the son 15 days later, 7NEWS reports, and Scott was arrested at Grafton Hospital and refused bail.

Oshawa: Jury Hears Closings in Jennifer Polak’s Killing

Kyle Severin, 37, of Ajax, concedes he caused the death of his girlfriend, Jennifer Polak, in his Hillman Drive basement apartment in March 2024. The question for the jury at his second-degree murder trial in Oshawa is intent. Defence lawyer Krystal Manitius argued in her closing Tuesday that he was too intoxicated on cocaine and a sleeping pill to form the intent for murder, and that he woke to find Polak covered in blood and called 911.

Assistant Crown Attorney Julie O’Connor told the jury he killed Polak because he was angry, not because he was intoxicated. She argued that the gap in his phone use between 7:30 and 11 p.m. was when the killing happened. Superior Court Justice Marcella Henschel will instruct the jury Thursday. Severin is presumed innocent of murder.

Update, Oct. 11, 2026: The jury found Severin guilty of second-degree murder, rejecting the intoxication defence, Global News reports. Second-degree murder carries an automatic life sentence in Canada; the judge will set parole ineligibility of 10 to 25 years at sentencing.

Cutro: Mother and Son Arrested Two Years After Man Vanished

Carabinieri in Crotone arrested a 60-year-old woman who was married to Salvatore Giglio, and their 28-year-old son. Giglio, 69, disappeared from Cutro in September 2024. A preliminary-investigations judge ordered both jailed on suspicion of murder and concealing a corpse. Investigators believe Giglio was killed at home on Sept. 21, 2024, the day she gave as the date he went missing. She reported him missing about a week later. His body hasn’t been found. Carabinieri suspect it was thrown into the Tacina river, and RIS forensic officers and divers from Messina have searched for it.

A neighbour’s security camera was central, Sky TG24 reports. It recorded raised voices in the family courtyard at noon that day and, two days later, the two loading a car. Prosecutors led by Domenico Guarascio say mother and son reported the disappearance late and agreed on their accounts. An economic motive is the leading theory. Mother and son are presumed innocent, and neither has been tried.

Amagasaki: Psychiatrist Arrested Over Wife’s Remains

Hyogo police arrested a 46-year-old doctor from Nishinomiya, who runs a psychiatric clinic in Amagasaki, on Wednesday on suspicion of dismembering and abandoning his wife’s body. Police allege that between Aug. 14 and late August last year, at the Amagasaki home the couple then shared, he cut up the body of his wife, then 41, and dumped it in the Kanzaki River. On Sept. 24 last year he had reported her missing, saying she left on Aug. 14 after an argument.

Police began questioning him voluntarily in August. Acting on his statements, they searched the river from Sept. 17 to Sept. 20. The Kobe Shimbun reports he admitted the allegation, telling investigators, “I did it alone.” Police are still working out how she died. He hasn’t been charged with killing her and is presumed innocent.

Police and Japanese media, including NHK and the Kobe Shimbun, named him as Kenji Shimomura. FNN reports he told investigators, “I threw the bones in the river,” and that police seized several knives believed to have been used to cut up the body. Colleagues described him as a “kind doctor,” FNN says.

Leeds: Man Admits Murdering Fiancée in Belle Isle Attack

Jack Johns, 52, of School Street, Tingley, pleaded guilty at Leeds Crown Court on Wednesday to the murder of Malgorzata “Gosia” Wiktor, 51. West Yorkshire Police said her son called 999 on the morning of June 11 when she failed to arrive at work and he couldn’t get into her house in Foster Square, Belle Isle. Officers forced entry and found Johns unconscious on top of her, with a claw hammer and a knife on the floor nearby. She was pronounced dead a short time later.

The couple had been together about six months and had recently become engaged. Police said her family and friends described him as controlling. The Yorkshire Post reports the court heard of previous convictions tied to the domestic abuse of two former partners. He is remanded in custody for sentencing on Nov. 9 and retains appeal rights.

BBC News reports that her family said he had “love bombed” her early in the relationship.

Piła: Grandson Charged in 2008 Killing After DNA Retest

Poznań’s cold-case team, Archiwum X, has charged a 44-year-old man, identified as Damian B., with murdering his 73-year-old grandmother in her flat on Bydgoska Street in Piła in June 2008. Her daughter asked a neighbour to check on her on June 3 that year. She was found dead in an armchair, gagged, her hands taped to the armrests, with head injuries from repeated blows with a blunt object, probably a hammer.

The case was closed unsolved and reopened in late 2023 with the Poznań regional prosecutor’s office. Wielkopolska police spokesman Andrzej Borowiak said a DNA profile from the tape pointed to the grandson, who was 26 at the time. He denied the charge, and a district court ordered him held in pretrial custody. He faces a possible life term and is presumed innocent.

Police called it “a crime from 18 years ago explained.” The evidence secured in 2008, including the tape used to bind her, was re-examined with DNA techniques not available at the time, TVN24 and the Poznań regional prosecutor’s office report.

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