Dolce & Gabbana designers currently embroiled in a €400 million tax evasion suit

Going from rubbing shoulders with Anna Wintour to navigating prison life might seem like a strange path, but Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana could do just that.

The Dolce & Gabbana designers are currently embroiled in a €400 million tax evasion suit, and they could face up to five years in jail. Women's Wear Daily reports that, in his closing speech, Prosecutor Gaetano Ruta specifically requested that Dolce and Gabbana each receive a sentence of two-and-a-half years imprisonment. They'd certainly miss quite a few of the brand's show-stopping runway shows if that comes to pass...

But fashion must be the least of the pair's problems. Each designer is accused ofevading around €200 million in taxes(€400 million altogether) after the 2004 sale of the D&G and Dolce & Gabbana brands to Gado, a holding company in Luxembourg. These alleged actions are said to have been carried out along with board member Cristiana Ruella and accountant Luciano Patelli, both of whom received their own prison sentence suggestions from the prosecutor at the Milan courthouse (the latter received the "harshest" at three years).

The idea of such high-profile fashion designers serving time certainly chips away at the glamorous image that the brand has built. If they're sentenced, would your view of Dolce & Gabbana be altered?

Huffingtonpost

Photos/Video: Miracle baby plucked ALIVE from a toilet pipe after being flushed away by parents

Firefighters in eastern China rescued a newborn baby boy who was flushed down a sewage pipe. Residents in the building in Jinhua raised the alarm after hearing a child crying and rescue workers eventually found him directly beneath the toilet commode. They cut away a section of the pipe and then took the infant to the Pujiang County People’s Hospital where medics were able to carefully remove the baby, pictured left. The child, who was said to be in a critical condition when he arrived at the hospital, is now stable and being nursed back to health, pictured centre. Though there are frequent reports of babies being abandoned in China, the case has sparked fury on social media websites.

The infant was heard crying in a section of the pipe directly beneath a toilet commode, the country’s state television reported earlier today.
Firefighters had to remove the pipe and take it to a nearby hospital where doctors carefully used saws to rescue the baby boy.
Scroll down for video. Warning graphic content

Being nursed back to health: The abandoned baby boy is pictured being fed in hospital after firefighters rescued him from a sewage pipe after he was apparently flushed down a toilet in Jinhua, Zhejiang Province

Reunited: The baby boy's mother - believed to be a 22-year-old single woman - has been found and is said to be with her baby in hospital

The infant- named Baby No. 59 from the number of his hospital incubator - was in a critical condition when he arrived at the hospital with an apparent fracture to his skull

Injured: A nurse said the baby boy - who weighs 6.2 pounds - suffered a fracture to his skull but is now in a stable condition

CLICK BELOW TO SEE VIDEO OF THE RESCUE:

 

Staff at the Pujiang County People's Hospital in Jinhua, Zhejiang Province, said well-wishers have visited the hospital with diapers, baby clothes and powered milk for the child

Recovering: The baby boy has been nicknamed number 59 after the number of his incubator

#dailymail

Boko Haram’s Failed Plan To Hijack Commercial Aircraft and Crash It Into Aso Rock

President Goodluck Jonathan has said the State of Emergency declared in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states may not last six months as prescribed by the constitution in view of the successes recorded even as it has been gathered that before the deployment of troops, Boko Haram sect had planned to hijack a commercial plane and crash it into the Presidential Villa or other national monuments.

President Jonathan who met with the Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr Ban Ki Moon on the sideline of the Africa Union conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, said the military operation in the troubled states was going very well and the military has strictly adhered to the rules of engagement.

He explained that the successes recorded by the military was exemplified by the lack of collateral civilian casualties, noting that the operation has helped in creating a better relationship between the civilian population and members of the armed forces.

The president told the Secretary General of the United Nations that the government would do everything possible to ensure that the civilian population was not put through hardship, adding that the governments’s decision to release women and children members of the Boko Haram was in the spirit of the rules of engagement of the operation.
The Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr Ban Ki Moon, sympathized with the government and people of Nigeria over activities of Boko Haram, saying that terrorism was a global phenomenon that must be confronted by the international community.

He reiterated his call on the Nigerian military engaged in operations in the affected states where state of emergency has been declared to be prudent and cautious in protecting the civilian population in the areas of operation.

Mr Moon also thanked President Jonathan for Nigeria’s contributions to peace keeping operations of the United Nations.

Meanwhile, as the military onslaught against Boko Haram terrorists continues, Vanguard has gathered that before May 14 when President Goodluck Jonathan declared a State of emergency, credible intelligence revealed plans by the sect to hijack commercial aircraft fully loaded with passengers and use it to attack one of three national monuments.

Boko Haram plans to attack national monuments
These are Aso Rock, the seat of the Federal Government, the Central Bank Headquarters, CBN, Glass house and the Four Towers headquarters of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC.

It was gathered that the terrorists would have carried out the attack on Aso Rock and NNPC Towers similar to the September 11 attack on the Twin Towers in the United States with all the passengers on board and send a message that they have taken over affairs of running Nigeria.

Aside the planned attack, Vanguard was told by very competent security sources that the acquisition of Anti-Aircraft Gun and Long Range Surface to air technical guns by the sect, was meant to shoot down aircraft that flew over the North Eastern parts of the country, especially as the terrorists had hoisted their flags in Yobe and Borno states.

According to the sources, “Consequent upon our discovery of their plot, security agencies warned the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, and other aviation agencies to stop local and international aircraft from over flying the North East airspace to avoid collateral damage.

“This warning was heeded and for about three weeks before the State of Emergence was declared, commercial aircraft, both local and international were diverted from over flying the North East areas except military aircraft”.

It was to unearthing the ammunition and heavy weapons capability of the Boko Haram sect that troops of the multi-national Joint Task Force on reconnaissance mission to the Mosque in Baga, where some of the anti-aircraft guns were to be mounted, were attacked and when reinforcement came, they fired the weapons at the soldiers.

“As I am talking to you, many people will not know that in one of the deadly Boko Haram attacks and coordinated bombings in Kano State, that resulted in the destruction of the headquarters of the Assistant Inspector General of Police, Zone 1, and the killing of over 120 people, including about 40 Policemen, over 15 Immigration, Customs and Federal Road Safety officers, the terrorists tried getting to the Kano Airport”, the source said.

Vanguard was further told that the terrorists shot at an Air Force Helicopter gunship from the dreaded Sambisa Forests where several camps for recruitment, training and IEDS construction were located, using anti-aircraft technical guns from mounted vehicles, confirmed that indeed the terrorists were on course to carry out that plot.

From Borno and Yobe states, the ultimate strategy of the terrorists was to launch a jihadist type of invasion of the entire Northern part of the country hence the gradual build up of arms depots and training/recruitment centres in several parts of Yobe, Borno and lately Adamawa states where several raids were carried out on banks, prisons and police stations

It would be recalled that Vanguard exclusively reported in April, during President Goodluck Jonathan’s official visit to Borno and Yobe states, that plans by Boko Haram terrorists to shoot at the Presidential Jet were uncovered hence the flooding of the two states with security operatives and deployment of technical equipment with ability to intercept signals of such attacks.

Following these deployments and raids by the Joint Task Force code named ‘Operation Restore Order’, two anti-aircraft guns, several anti-aircraft bombs, GPMG’s, AK 47 Rifles and other heavy weaponry were recovered in some houses in Maiduguri.

Source: Vanguard
 

Photos: Mama G's son weds in London

Here are some pictures from the wedding of nollywood actress, Patience Ozokwor's son. The successful wedding which took place on Saturday, May 25th 2013 in London, was filled with friends, family members and well wishers including the Aneke twins who flew in for the occasion.

Angelina Jolie’s aunt has died of chest cancer less than two weeks after Jolie had a double mastectomy to avoid the disease

Angelina Jolie’s aunt has died of chest cancer less than two weeks after Jolie had a preventative double mastectomy to avoid the disease.

Debbie Martin died at age 61 on Sunday in a San Diego hospital.

Debbie Martin was the younger sister of Jolie’s mother Marcheline Bertrand, whose own death from cancer in 2007 inspired the surgery that Jolie described in a May 14 New York Times article.

“I can tell my children they don’t need to fear they will lose me to chest cancer,” she wrote.

According to her husband Ron Martin, Debbie Martin had the same defective BRCA1 gene that Jolie does, but didn’t know it until after her 2004 cancer diagnosis.

He says had his wife known in advance of her genetic risk, “she would have done exactly what Angelina did.”

“Angelina did the smartest thing on earth,” he told People.com. “It takes a lot of courage to have your breasts removed.”

Jolie and her brother had visited Mrs Martin several times, Mr Martin said.

“Angelina has been sending her wishes,”he said.

“She and my wife texted each other. It was difficult for my wife, during the last few months, to communicate.”

Source – The Telegraph