Australia's Approach to Serial Child Sex Offenders: A serial sex offender already jailed indefinitely for previous sexual crimes, has been sentenced to another 12 months' imprisonment according to a story written by Christine Flatley from The Australian. In the District Court in Brisbane, 66-year-old Keith Albert Beattie pleaded guilty today to the indecent treatment and unlawful sodomy of a 15-year-old boy in Brisbane between November 1995 and February 1996. The court was told the charges against Beattie were made after the complaintant saw him in the prison system last year. Beattie has been in jail since July 1996 for child sex offenses and today marked his ninth appearance before a court for sexual offences against a minor. Judge Michael Shanahan today sentenced Beattie to an additional 12 months jail for the latest offenses.

Death Penalty Upheld for Killer In Hate Crime: A story, written by Mike Anton from The Los Angeles Times reports that the California Supreme Court upheld the conviction and death sentence of Gunner Lindberg. Lindberg, 33, was convicted in the 1996 slaying of Thien Minh Ly, 24, who was stabbed more than 50 times and had his throat slashed. Lindberg was convicted in Orange County Superior Court of first-degree murder with a special circumstance that the crime was based on the victim's race and is the first person in the state condemned to die for a racially motivated murder. Ly, who was a graduate of UCLA and Georgetown University wanted to become the United States ambassador to Vietnam.

Bay Area Robberies Indicate A National Trend: According to a story from today's San Francisco Chronicle, written by Erin McCormick, the bay area robberies follow a national surge. The Chronicle examined location records in San Francisco and Oakland since 2004, as well as statistics for other Bay Area cities, and found that robberies spiked in the region, going from 11,264 a year to 15,698. "More than 40 robberies occur everyday in the Bay Area," states the article. Furthermore, the steep national economic downturn of 2007 and 2008 indicates a crime increase, according to University Missouri-St. Louis criminologists Richard Rosenfeld and Brian Oliver. Local communities are warned of a new crime increase in the years ahead.