Pioneering rock writer Paul Williams dies

PAUL Williams, a pioneering rock music journalist whose Crawdaddy! magazine is considered the first US publication to write seriously about rock 'n roll, has died in California aged 64.

The Union-Tribune of San Diego says Williams died in an Encinitas care facility on Wednesday.

His wife, Cindy Lee Berryhill, tells the Los Angeles Times that Williams died of complications of dementia triggered by head injuries from a 1995 bicycle accident.

Williams was a teenager when he began publishing Crawdaddy! in 1966. It appeared 18 months before Rolling Stone.

Williams also wrote more than 30 books and helped introduce readers to the work of science fiction writer Philip K Dick. He was Dick's literary executor.

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Man dies in hospital after crash in NSW

A MAN has died in hospital, four days after being critically injured in a collision in northern NSW.

The crash happened on the Pacific Highway at midday (AEDT) on Wednesday at Tabbimoble, about 60km south of Ballina, when a southbound VW Passat and a northbound truck collided.

The truck pushed the car almost 80m before stopping, a police statement said.

The car driver, a 62-year-old man from Frenchs Forest, suffered critical head injuries and was airlifted to Gold Coast Hospital where he died on Sunday morning.

The man's 61-year-old wife was taken to Lismore Base Hospital with spinal injuries.

The driver of the truck, a 41-year-old man from Punchbowl, breath-tested negative at the scene.

Investigations are continuing.

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Prosecutors seek death in cinema shooting

PROSECUTORS in the US state of Colorado say they will seek the death penalty against the man accused of killing 12 people in a crowded cinema in July last year.

"For James Holmes in this case, justice is death," district attorney George Brauchler told a court in Centennial, where the 25-year-old Holmes is expected to go on trial in August.

Holmes is accused over the July 20 massacre at a midnight screening of the Batman movie The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado, which revived America's long-running debate about gun control.

Witnesses said Holmes threw smoke bomb-type devices before opening fire randomly with weapons, including an AR-15 military-style rifle, a 12-gauge shotgun and a .40-calibre pistol.

Last week defence lawyers filed an unexpected motion offering that Holmes would plead guilty, in return for the prosecution not pressing for the death penalty, but agreeing to a sentence of life in prison without parole.

But prosecutors shot back within 24 hours, accusing the defence of trying to negotiate a plea deal in public, in violation of a gag order on the horrific case.

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Driver disqualified until 2062 caught

A WOMAN who has been disqualified from driving for almost 50 years faces a NSW court on driving and other charges.

Police say highway patrol officers approached a 37-year-old woman near a random breath test site on Campbelltown Road at Woodbine, southwest of Sydney, shortly after midday (AEDT) on Monday, after she allegedly stopped her car about 300 metres from the site.

Officers questioned the driver about her licence and identity and allege she provided false details.

A field fingerprinting identification device was used and further inquiries revealed she was disqualified from driving until 2062, a police statement said.

The woman was arrested and charged at Campbelltown Police Station with driving while disqualified and giving false particulars and she was refused bail to appear in Campbelltown Local Court on Tuesday.

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Two dead and two injured in Vic crash

TWO people have died and two others have been airlifted to hospital with life-threatening injuries following a single vehicle accident in central Victoria.

Police say a people mover was headed south on the Hume Freeway near Winton about 11pm (AEDT) on Monday when the driver lost control of the vehicle, which rolled several times.

Emergency services arrived at the scene and discovered the bodies of two men, believed to be aged in their 30s and believed to have been passengers in the vehicle.

Two other passengers have been airlifted to hospital with life-threatening injuries.

The driver of the vehicle and another passenger were taken to local hospitals for treatment and are assisting police with their investigation.

Police said the deaths bring this year's road toll to 66, 11 fewer than at the same time last year.

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Missing Vic teenager returns home

VICTORIAN teenager Sherridyn Rutland has returned home safe and well after being reported missing for more than a week.

The Brookfield 16-year-old had not been seen since leaving her Burrawang Close home about 11am (AEDT) on Sunday, March 24.

The girl's mobile phone had been switched on and off and it was understood she had no money, but a police statement said Sherridyn returned home about 7pm on Monday.

Police have thanked the public and media for their assistance.

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Korea leader vows to strike back at North

SOUTH Korea's new president has promised a strong military response to any North Korean provocation after Pyongyang announced the two countries are now in a state of war.

President Park Geun-Hye's warning came as North Korea's rubber-stamp parliament formalised the country's status as a nuclear weapons state and appointed a sacked economic reformer for a fresh term as prime minister.

It also coincided with a US announcement that it had deployed stealth fighters to South Korea as part of an ongoing joint military exercise.

At a meeting with senior military officials and Defence Minister Kim Kwan-Jin, Park said she took the nearly daily stream of bellicose threats emanating from the North over the past month "very seriously".

"I believe that we should make a strong and immediate retaliation without any other political considerations if (the North) stages any provocation against our people," she said.

Her defence minister made it clear that the South would carry out pre-emptive strikes against the North's nuclear and missile facilities in the event of hostilities breaking out.

"We will ... establish a so-called 'active deterrence' aimed at neutralising the North's nuclear and missile threats quickly," Kim said.

The US military said on Monday it had deployed F-22 Raptor stealth fighters to South Korea as part of the ongoing Foal Eagle military exercise.

"The F-22s are advanced fighter aircraft and they're an important display of our commitment to the South Korean alliance," Pentagon spokesman George Little told reporters in Washington.

North Korea has already threatened to strike the US mainland and US bases in the Pacific in response to the participation of nuclear-capable US B-52 and B-2 stealth bombers in the exercise.

Monday's gathering of the North's Supreme People's Assembly, or parliament, was notable for the promotion of a former prime minister who was sacked in a reported backlash against his pursuit of economic reforms.

Pak Pong-Ju, 74, was unanimously returned to the post of prime minister, which he had previously held from 2003-2007, when he spearheaded modest economic reforms of state enterprises.

An apparent backlash from the party and the military saw him suspended from duty in June 2006 and sacked the following year.

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