Police seize robot that groped 16-year-old girl, investigate whether young men were at the controls

Database issues cloud city homeless numbers

The head of End Homelessness Winnipeg says she has no confidence in data about the city’s homeless population due to problems with the federal system that tracks those numbers.

Jennifer Rattray, the organization’s chief executive officer, told the Free Press Thursday it continues to work with the federal government to resolve problems with the Homeless Individuals and Families Information System, which keeps tabs on people who access homelessness services.

CBC has reported it obtained an internal memo from EHW that shows that as of the end of March, the number of chronically homeless Winnipeggers had fallen to 436 from about 4,400, as a result of efforts to correct the database.

Earlier this year, the organization had reported more than 8,000 people were accessing services.

Police seize robot that groped 16-year-old girl, investigate whether young men were at the controls

COLOGNE, Germany (AP) — German authorities opened an investigation into possible sexual harassment after a robot controlled by two young men touched the buttocks of a 16-year-old girl and made thrusting movements toward her, police said.

Police in the western city of Cologne responded after the incident overnight Saturday to Sunday in which the robot's suspected 16-year-old owner and a 19-year-old companion were said to have filmed the alleged assault.

They were said to have streamed the incident and commentated on it online.

Cologne police spokesman Christoph Bermel said the two male teenagers have not been charged but are considered suspects, and investigators were examining whether the robot's movements were preprogrammed or controlled in real time.

Chief says minister offered money to remove highway checkstop

The chief of the Bloodvein River First Nation says a Manitoba cabinet minister offered up to $250,000 for economic development as he was trying to persuade her to remove a highway checkstop that has outraged hunters.

MPI still lacking brain injury expert

Manitoba Public Insurance has failed to hire an independent brain injury expert to probe how personal injury claims are handled, nearly two years after it was recommended.

Get to know your Jet: Neal Pionk

“Give it 110 per cent.” “Get pucks in deep.” “One shift at a time.” “Play our game.” “Keep it simple.”

Hockey has a language all its own. Unfortunately, after hearing the same phrases repeated often enough, that language can start to sound a lot like white noise.

So we’re going to try something different.

The Free Press will occasionally sit down with a Winnipeg Jets player at his locker-room stall for a wide-ranging conversation about the stuff you don’t always hear in a media scrum.

Group’s second LP made to get hearts racing

While a live performance is a moment in time that comes and goes, a record is something that, ostensibly, lives on.

Both are important, often complementary methods of artistic expression for any band of musicians, not the least independent local artists carving out names for themselves in the dark heart of the continent.

Claire Thérèse & the Lockdown are celebrating the vinyl release of Racing Heart, its second full-length LP, with a gig tonight at Public Domain. The group’s last full-length record, Villainy!, was released in 2022.

“For me, this seems like perfect timing,” says Thérèse, primary vocalist and songwriter in the group. “This album has been done for almost two years now. I don’t even know if I would call it procrastination, (but) there are just those steps that one needs to take to actually release something into the world, and that’s how long it has taken me.”