SPRING, Texas: A Texas man was charged with capital murder yesterday after appearing at the house of his estranged wife’s relatives disguised as a FedEx driver and gunning down a married couple and four of their children, authorities said. Ronald Lee Haskell, 33, was being held without bond since his arrest on Wednesday night after the shooting in the Houston suburb of Spring, they said. “Haskell was married to a relative of the victims,” said Mark Herman, the assistant chief deputy for the Harris County Constable Precinct 4 office said. The suspect was chased by police through the residential area of tree-lined streets about 40km north of Houston before he was trapped on a dead end and surrendered after a four-hour standoff. The children killed were two boys aged 4 and 14 and two girls ages 7 and 9, the sheriff’s office said. A 15-year-old girl was also shot and was hospitalised in critical condition. The Harris County District Clerk identified the adult victims as Katie Stay and Stephen Stay. Haskell was charged with capital murder and multiple murders. Capital murder can carry the death penalty in Texas.
Eastern push may last another month: Kiev
OLENIVKA: Ukraine warned yesterday that its offensive against pro-Russian insurgents may last another month and rejected calls for a ceasefire as it moved tanks to within striking distance of the rebels’ two remaining strongholds. Witnesses saw heavy armoured vehicles fan out across the rolling corn and sunflower fields of the economically-vital rustbelt. A vast column of tanks and military vehicles arrived in the area on Wednesday in an apparent push to surround Donetsk and the neighbouring city of Lugansk, also controlled by the separatists. The Ukrainian military said three servicemen had been killed and 27 wounded in the previous 24 hours. Two died when their armoured vehicle hit one of the numerous land mines the separatists have planted to ward off Kiev’s relentless advance. Fears of an all-out assault on the two densely populated centres have redoubled European efforts to force Kiev to negotiate truce terms that could help calm the most explosive East-West standoff in Europe since the Cold War. Kiev paints the insurgency as a proxy war being waged by Russian President Vladimir Putin in reprisal for the February ouster of an allied administration and the collapse of his dream to fold Ukraine into a powerful new post-Soviet bloc.
Agencies
