Amazon To Improve Delivery Amid Race Concerns

Amazon says it will improve its same-day delivery service following claims that some black and minority neighbourhoods are excluded.

Bloomberg said its analysis of the areas eligible for same-day delivery in 27 US cities was biased in favoured of white residents.

For example in Boston, most of the city was eligible for the service - apart from the predominantly black neighbourhood of Roxbury in the centre.

But Amazon has denied that race played a role in determining delivery boundaries.

Now an internal Amazon document obtained by the Congressional Black Caucus, which represents black members of Congress, lays out Amazon's plans to allay concerns.

The letter says same-day delivery will not be launched in any new cities regions until 100% coverage is provided in existing cities.

It said: "Very shortly, we will be expanding Prime Same Day Service to every zip code of the 27 cities where Prime Same Day delivery is currently launched.

"We will further not launch the service in any new regions, until we are able to secure a carrier for every zip code.

"We are still figuring out the details and procuring last mile delivery for each of these zips, but we should have 100 percent coverage shortly."

Congressman Bobby Rush of Illinois has demanded a Federal Trade Commission investigation.

Free same-day delivery was launched last year, and is available to eligible Amazon Prime members.

Amazon has said that it determines delivery areas based on the concentration of Prime members in an area, distance to warehouses, and the ability to find delivery workers in an area.

Facebook Exec's Touching Post On Husband's Death

Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg - whose husband died in a treadmill accident last year - says she did not realise how hard it would be to succeed at work as a single mother.

In a post marking the one-year anniversary of David Goldberg's death, she said she had entered a "new and unfamiliar world".

"I did not understand how often I would look at my son’s or daughter’s crying face and not know how to stop the tears.

"I did not really get how hard it is to succeed at work when you are overwhelmed at home."

Mr Goldberg was exercising at a Mexican resort last May when he collapsed, and hit his head as he fell off the treadmill.

The couple - both key figures in the tech world - married in 2004

Resort workers found him lying in a pool of blood next to the exercise machine, with an injury to the back of his head.

He later died at a hospital in Nuevo Vallarta.

The businessman had worked for firms including Yahoo, and ran online survey provider SurveyMonkey.

He married Ms Sandberg - Facebook's Chief Operating Officer - in 2004.

Her post continued: "I never understood how often the world would remind my children and me of what we don't have - from father-daughter dances to Parent Night at school.

"Until we lost Dave, my brother said that he too did not realise how many 'father' events there were at their public school in Houston and how hard they must be for the many children without fathers."

Ms Sandberg, 46, is worth around $1bn, and added: "I realise how extremely fortunate I am not to face the financial burdens so many single mothers and widows face.

"Poverty is one of the hidden and devastating aftereffects of loss for women."

The Osbournes: Ozzy And Sharon Split Fears

Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne may have split up after more than 33 years of marriage.

A spokesman for the couple told the Press Association: "At this time Ozzy is not at the marital home."

The Black Sabbath frontman, 67, has been fighting a public battle with drug and alcohol addiction for decades.

The couple have been rumoured to have temporarily split up before, however this time reports suggest the singer's addictions are not to blame.

In 2013, Mrs Osbourne, 63, a former judge on The X factor, denied claims the pair were getting divorced after her husband relapsed.

She insisted their marriage was not in trouble and that they were working hard to resolve their problems.

The couple married in 1982 and found themselves enjoying a fresh wave of fame 20 years later when their family became the subject of hit MTV documentary The Osbournes.

Hundreds On British Cruise Ship Have Norovirus

A British cruise ship has docked in the US with more than 250 passengers on board sick with norovirus.

The Balmoral was carrying 919 mainly British passengers on a five-week "Old England to New England" cruise from the UK to the US.

It docked in Portland, Maine, on Sunday and passengers suffering the stomach virus were quarantined in their cabins.

Eight members of the 520-strong crew were also reportedly sick with norovirus.

Its symptoms include nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea.

The symptoms appear one to two days after you become infected and usually last for up to three days.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the ship owners, Fred Olsen Cruises, had increased cleaning and disinfection procedures on board.

The Balmoral set sail from Southampton on 16 April and is due to return home on May 20.

It has now left Portland and is heading for Saint John, in the Canadian province of New Brunswick.

A statement from Fred Olsen Cruises said: "Fred.Olsen has been undertaking extensive sanitisation measures and cleaning of the ship, in accordance with its strict illness containment and prevention plan.

"Commonly, the illness abates within one or two days. Those guests who are affected are asked to remain in their rooms during this time – with complimentary room service and in-room entertainment.

"Fred.Olsen is co-operating fully with all the necessary maritime agencies and authorities,‎ as Balmoral continues on her cruise, and will continue to make e‎very effort possible to ensure the safety and well-being of all its guests and crew on board, which is of paramount importance."

In May last year the Balmoral was forced to cut short a cruise after a number of passengers fell ill with a stomach bug.

:: If you are on board the ship, or know someone who is, you can get in touch and share your views and experiences at news@sky.com

Man Gets Life For 1984 Melanie Road Murder

A 64-year-old father-of-four has been jailed for life after pleading guilty to the murder of 17-year-old Melanie Road in Bath 32 years ago.

Christopher Hampton will serve a minimum of 22 years after he admitted killing the teenager in the early hours of 9 June, 1984, as she made a 20-minute walk home alone following a night out with friends. 

Melanie was sexually assaulted and died from multiple stab wounds to her chest and back.

Her body was discovered at 5.30am by a milkman and his son, near a block of garages a short distance from her home.

Melanie's family said she was 'caring, kind, sensible and intelligent'

Hampton, from Staple Hill Road, Fishponds, Bristol, had been due to stand trial at Bristol Crown Court on Monday after denying the charge, but changed his plea at the last minute.

Members of Melanie's family, including her 81-year-old mother Jean, sat in the public gallery of court room one to hear Hampton admit his guilt.

Grey-haired Hampton, wearing glasses and a black suit and shirt, stood up and clearly replied "Guilty" as the murder charge was put to him.

The painter and decorator was caught only after his 41-year-old daughter was arrested over a minor incident in 2014 and her DNA profile was put on the national database.

Christopher Hampton was caught after his daughter's DNA was taken

A familial match was identified with DNA taken from Melanie's body and clothing in 1984 - prompting police to request a mouth swab from Hampton. 

His DNA was found to match the sample taken from staining on Melanie's trousers.

Hampton had refused to answer questions in police interviews, referring to a statement read by his lawyer that merely said: "I did not kill or rape Melanie Road."

After Hampton's guilty plea, Melanie's mother described what it had been like to see the man who had evaded justice for her daughter's murder for so long.

She said: "When we finally went to the court in Bath and I saw this man standing there I thought 'it's not a man, he's a monster,' how could he do that?

Melanie with her friend Suzy Heap

"And then I realised that his wife and his daughter were sitting behind me - both blonde hair, the same as Melanie.

"How could he do that to somebody and then live with people like that and them not knowing?

"It hurts beyond repair. I always said if I got hold of him I'd strangle him or stick a knife into him, but I wouldn't even use my energy up on him.

"I feel he should be shut up in a dungeon...and left to rot, because he's not worth looking after."

Weeping as she read a victim impact statement in court, Melanie's sister Karen said she felt like she had been "living in a horror film" and her sister's death had affected every aspect of her life.

She said: "For me and my family, nothing has ever felt safe again. This is a nightmare I can't ever wake up from."

She said Melanie was "caring, kind, sensible and intelligent" about life and going travelling, but "her future was brutally taken".

Melanie's brother Adrian said: "I have spent the last 32 years worrying about every man that ever walked down the street, asking myself, 'did you kill our little sister Melanie?'."

How To See Mercury Passing The Sun

Mercury only passes in front of the Sun a few times every century, and the last time was a decade ago.

While the celestial event is visible from most of Western Europe and North America on Monday 9 May between 12.12pm BST and 7.42pm BST, catching a glimpse of it is no easy task.

The first thing to know is that you should not look directly at the Sun, because it'll injure your eyes.

Special glasses used to view solar eclipses are also pretty useless - Mercury is so small that magnification is needed to see it.

A pair of binoculars or a telescope is likely to suffice, but the eye risk remains.

That means you'll need a special solar filter, or to project an image of the Sun on to a piece of paper.

If that sounds like too much fuss, there is a far easier way to see it: by watching one of the numerous online live streams.

Both the European Space Agency and NASA are broadcasting the event.

At one time the passing of Mercury in front of the Sun was a useful scientific opportunity because it allowed astronomers to measure distances in the solar system.

The Open University's David Rothery told the New Scientist: "When I was a lad in Birmingham I saw the 1973 transit.

"It's going to be especially important for me this time, because I’m now involved in the European Space Agency’s mission to Mercury."

The agency's spacecraft is due to blast off in two years and arrive at Mercury in 2024. Its mission is to study Mercury's surface and its magnetic field.

Last year NASA's Messenger spacecraft slammed into the surface of Mercury, ending a successful 11-year mission.

Top Nigeria Official named in #PanamaPapers

At least 110 Nigerian individuals and companies have so far been identified by PREMIUM TIMES in the leaked internal data of Panamanian law firm, Mossack Fonsecca, as operators of offshore shell companies in tax havens.

Prominent among the new names being revealed today, in addition to the several that were published in the past one month, are the founder of telecommunication company, Globacom, Mike Adenuga; Niger State Governor, Abubakar Sadiq Sani Bello and the late Ooni of Ife, Okunade Sijuwade, among others.

The list also contained names of Arik Chairman, Joseph Arumemi-Johnson and his wife, Mary, as well as two serving senators – Andy Uba (Anambra) and Ibrahim Gobir (Sokoto).

Other top business persons, politicians, and their family members were also found in the infamous database, including those currently holding public offices. See full list below.

The publication details names of companies, their owners and the particular tax havens the offshore firms are domiciled.

PREMIUM TIMES is the only Nigerian media organisation with exclusive access to the documents obtained by German newspaper, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and shared by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) with over 80 media organisations around the world.

Since April 3, 2016, when the news of the unprecedented leak broke worldwide, PREMIUM TIMES has published series of exclusive reports about the offshore assets of prominent Nigerians named in the database that is now globally referred to as #PanamaPapers. Some of them, who are public officer holders, held the assets in violation of Nigerian law, failing to declare them to the Code of Conduct Bureau.

The investigation revealed the assets of some of Nigeria’s most powerful individuals, including Africa’s richest man Aliko Dangote; President of the Nigerian Senate, Bukola Saraki; convicted former governor of Delta State, James Ibori; the boss of Oando, Nigeria’s biggest indigenous oil firm, Wale Tinubu, in tax havens such as the British Virgin Islands, Panama, and Seychelles.

The unprecedented year-long investigation involving 11.5 million secret documents – which stretch from 1977 to December 2015 – exposed the hidden underground of the world economy, a network of banks, law firms and other middlemen that utilize shell companies, sometimes using them to hide illegal wealth.

The 2.6 TB files, involving 214,488 entities, also revealed hundreds of details about how former gun-runners, contractors and other members of the spy world use offshore companies for personal and private gain.

The investigation unveiled the cloak of secrecy provided by Mossack Fonseca, a Panamanian law firm that specializes in creating offshore companies, some of which have been used by con men and women to hide Ponzi schemes, predatory lending scams, and other financial frauds from their victims and from the authorities.

The use of shell companies is not illegal and there are individuals and firms who incorporate them for purely legitimate purposes.

Below is a comprehensive list of other Nigerians named in the leak, although this may not be final as this newspaper will continue its investigation in the weeks and months ahead.