All Blog Posts from Crimesider

WASHINGTON - They are unusual bedfellows.

Homosexuals and religious groups, who are often at loggerheads over gay marriage, seem to have at least one thing in common. Reports of hate crimes against both groups were up sharply in 2008, according to an annual FBI statistics report released on Monday.

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SAN FERNANDO, Calif. - Authorities are searching for a man suspected of robbing a nun in the parking lot of a grocery store in San Fernando, Calif., and the heist was caught on surveillance tape.

A pair of sisters dressed in full religious dress were putting their groceries away in their vehicle in the parking lot of a Food 4 Less store on Glen Oaks Boulevard, when police said a man in a white t-shirt approached them and asked a question.

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OKLAHOMA CITY - Former Marine David Allen Tyner has been arraigned on six counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of four people whose bodies were found in a burning home, including prostitute Brooke Phillips featured on the HBO reality series "Cathouse."

According to the Oklahoman, prosecutors believe that Tyner, a member of a Native American gang called the Native Brotherhood, was gunning for his old boss, Casey Mark Barrientos, 32, a Hispanic man with a history of drug offenses. Tyner once worked for Barrientos as a body guard, the paper said.

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LOS ANGELES - Erin Andrews' alleged peephole stalker is definitely sorry he got charged with a crime. But Michael David Barrett also says he's not guilty.

Barrett entered that plea Monday in Los Angeles, on one count of interstate stalking, for allegedly shooting secret nude videos of ESPN reporter Andrews.

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PERUGIA, Italy - The murder charges against Amanda Knox are "pure fantasy" according to the American student, who addressed an Italian court over the weekend.

Knox, along with two others, is accused in the fatal stabbing of her British roommate Meredith Kercher.

Italian prosecutors, in their closing arguments, said Knox and her Italian boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, should be convicted on charges of murder and sexual violence for the 2007 slaying.

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ATLANTA - Was it murder, or sickle-cell anemia that caused the death of "A.J." Jewel, the on-again-off-again fiancé of "Real Housewives of Atlanta" cast member Kandi Burruss?

A preliminary report on Jewell's autopsy is labeling the death a "homicide," saying it was the fight Ashley "A.J." Jewel had in the parking lot of a strip club that caused his rare sickle-cell anemia condition to be fatal.

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NEW YORK - In an exclusive interview with CBS News Crimesider, one of Alyssa Bustamante's closest friends said that the alleged killer of Missouri 9-year-old Elizabeth Olten had talked about murdering before, and had a psychologically troubled past that may have been overlooked by professionals.

Jennifer Meyer, 15, who spoke exclusively with Crimesider, said that Bustamante had once told her, "I wonder what it would be like to kill somebody."

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BOSTON - Convicted killer Michelle Kosilek has hairy legs and wants you to pay for the electrolysis treatments needed to make them as smooth as a baby's behind.

Born as Robert Kosilek, Michelle Kosilek has been waiting for years for a judge in Boston to rule on a request for a taxpayer-funded sex-change operation in order to complete the prisoner's transformation into a woman.

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NEW YORK - Ann Summers, grandmother of murdered 5-year-old Shaniya Davis, is strongly defending her daughter, who is accused of selling Shaniya as a sex slave to the man that, police, say, eventually killed her.

"She did not harm her kids. I was there, I should know," Summers said of her daughter Antoinette Davis.

Summers had more choice words for Mario Andrette McNeill, the man accused of raping and killing Shaniya on the same day her mother reported her missing.

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NEW YORK - Crimesider has obtained exclusive photos of Alyssa Bustamante, the 15-year-old alleged killer of Elizabeth Olten, 9.

The collection of Facebook and MySpace photos reveals a multi-faceted teenage girl who appears troubled and typical at the same time — smiling, seemingly carefree in one photo, holding her hand as a gun to her head in the next.

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