Carlee Russell’s story about being abducted after stopping at the side of a road to help a distressed toddler was a lie, her lawyer has said in a statement. The 25-year-old from Alabama told police she was kidnapped after stopping to help a toddler in diapers who was walking alone on Interstate 459 on the evening of 13 July. She came back home two days after the alleged abduction. Her family had stuck by her story, even after police publicly expressed scepticism. However, Hoover Police Department Chief Nicholas Derzis on Monday said Ms Russell’s attorney, Emory Anthony, had now provided a statement on Monday saying there was no kidnapping The statement in part read: “There was no kidnapping on Thursday July 13. My client did not see a baby on the side on the road.” Earlier CrimeStoppers walked back a pledge to return almost $63,000 in donations to help find Carlee Russell after the 25-year-old’s kidnapping story fell under suspicion. More than $63,000 was raised during the two-day search for the Alabama woman. But the organisation that offers anonymous tips about criminal activity now said the money will not be returned after initially making the promise. Read More Carlee Russell sent several bizarre tweets before disappearing Alabama lawyer says police is using ‘every other synonym for lie except saying she lied’ in Carlee Russell case Boyfriend of Carlee Russell deletes social media posts after police cast doubt over her kidnapping story Police doubt Carlee Russell’s kidnapping claims. Could she face consequences?

Israel's pain over some 200 people kidnapped by Hamas overshadows the years of waiting for two hostages and soldiers' remains.

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The event, marking Israel's capture of East Jerusalem, is seen by Palestinians as highly provocative.

Help-wanted advertisements in New York will have to disclose how much jobs pay under a new salary transparency law

Standing amid a terrain of rugged red craters that looks like something from Mars, Brazilian farmer Ubiratan Lemos Abade extends his arms, pointing to two possible futures for...

Asian stock markets have followed Wall Street higher on hopes U.S. political leaders can reach agreement to avoid a potentially disastrous default on government debt

Astronomers have discovered a new way that stars can die. In a study published in the journal Nature Astronomy, experts have worked out that a minute-long gamma-ray burst of light, which occured in 2019 and evidence a star dying, happened because stars collided within the densely crowded environment near the supermassive black hole at the centre of an ancient galaxy. Normally gamma-ray bursts (GRB) last around two seconds and happen when stars collapse. “For every hundred events that fit into the traditional classification scheme of gamma-ray bursts, there is at least one oddball that throws us for a loop,” said study coauthor Wen-fai Fong, assistant professor of physics and astronomy at Northwestern University’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, in a statement. “However, it is these oddballs that tell us the most about the spectacular diversity of explosions that the universe is capable of.” Over time, astronomers have observed three main ways that stars can die, depending on their size. Lower mass stars like our sun shed their outer layers as they age, eventually becoming dead white dwarf stars. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Massive stars burn through the fuel-like elements at their core and shatter in explosions called supernovas. Doing so can leave behind dense remnants like neutron stars or result in the creation of black holes. A third form of star death results when neutron stars or black holes begin to orbit one another in a binary system and spiral closer to one another until they collide and explode. But the new observation suggests a fourth type of death. “Our results show that stars can meet their demise in some of the densest regions of the universe, where they can be driven to collide,” said lead study author Andrew Levan, an astrophysics professor at Radboud University in Nijmegen, Netherlands, in a statement. “This is exciting for understanding how stars die and for answering other questions, such as what unexpected sources might create gravitational waves that we could detect on Earth.” “The lack of a supernova accompanying the long GRB 191019A tells us that this burst is not a typical massive star collapse,” said study coauthor Jillian Rastinejad, a doctoral student of astronomy at Northwestern, in a statement. “The location of GRB 191019A, embedded in the nucleus of the host galaxy, teases a predicted but not yet evidenced theory for how gravitational-wave emitting sources might form.” “While this event is the first of its kind to be discovered, it’s possible there are more out there that are hidden by the large amounts of dust close to their galaxies,” said Fong, who is also a member of the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics at Northwestern. “Indeed, if this long-duration event came from merging compact objects, it contributes to the growing population of GRBs that defies our traditional classifications.” You learn something new every day. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

The suspect in the stabbing death of CashApp founder Bob Lee was also accused of stabbing two teenagers in 2005, according to documents uncovered by the San Francisco Chronicle.

Several floors of a three-storey building were destroyed after Russian strikes hit the Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv overnight, officials said on 20 July. The attack caused a fire in the building that affected an area of 450 square meters and burned for several hours. In footage released by Ukraine’s emergency services, firefighters were seen battling the flames throughout the early hours of the morning and removing people from the area. In a statement released on Telegram, the region’s Governor Vitalii Kim said at least 19 people had been injured following the strikes.

The White House says President Joe Biden will observe next month's 22nd anniversary of the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil at an Alaska military base with service members and their families

As a man on his honeymoon received life support in Hawaii, thieves stole his car and belongings.