Live election results: Harris calls Trump to congratulate him on election victory
Vice President Kamala Harris called Trump on Wednesday to congratulate him on his election victory.
A German court on Tuesday acquitted a man who is also under investigation in the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann in a trial on charges of unrelated sexual offences.
The Braunschweig state court acquitted the 47-year-old German national, who has been identified by local media as Christian Brueckner, of two counts of rape and two of sexual abuse.
However, Brueckner will remain in prison another year because he is still serving a seven-year sentence for rape in a different case, German news agency dpa reported.
Brueckner had been on trial since February over offences he is alleged to have committed in Portugal between 2000 and 2017. Defence lawyers had pointed to what they labelled a lack of evidence and witnesses who weren’t credible, and suggested he might not have been charged if he hadn’t also been a suspect in the McCann case.
Prosecutors had argued he should be given a 15-year prison sentence and kept in preventive detention once he has served it.
“The evidence we had was not enough to convict the defendant,” presiding judge Uta Engemann said, according to dpa, adding that “we were dealing with unreliable witnesses, some of whom deliberately lied to the court.”
Engemann argued that witnesses had been influenced in their statements by the media's reporting on Brueckner, who she said had been “stylized as a sex monster and child murderer."
Prosecutors said they would appeal the ruling.
“We believe that the decision is wrong, so we will appeal to the German supreme court so that the supreme court can check the verdict for mistakes,” prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters said.
Brueckner's lawyer, Friedrich Fülscher, told reporters after the ruling that “it was foreseeable, at least from the point of view of the defence, that there can only be one outcome that corresponds to the factual and legal situation and that is the acquittal.”
Brueckner has not been charged in the McCann case, in which he is under investigation on suspicion of murder. He spent many years in Portugal, including in the resort of Praia da Luz around the time of Madeleine’s disappearance there in 2007. He has denied any involvement in her disappearance.
He is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence after being convicted in 2019 by the Braunschweig court for the rape of a 72-year-old American woman in Portugal in 2005.
The Braunschweig state court has jurisdiction because Brueckner had his last German residence in that city in Lower Saxony.
Vice President Kamala Harris called Trump on Wednesday to congratulate him on his election victory.
Donald Trump was elected the 47th president of the United States on Wednesday, an extraordinary comeback for a former president who refused to accept defeat four years ago, sparked a violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, was convicted of felony charges and survived two assassination attempts.
The former U.S. president and now president-elect addressed a crowd of supporters at his campaign headquarters in West Palm Beach, Fla., shortly after 2:30 a.m. EST, Wednesday morning.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and members of his cabinet congratulated Donald Trump Wednesday morning on his second United States presidential election win, amid questions about how the federal government intends to navigate a second term.
Donald Trump's election victory was history-making in several respects, even as his defeat of U.S. Vice-President Kamala Harris prevented other firsts. She would have been the nation's first Black and South Asian woman to be president.
Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency on Tuesday, and as of Wednesday morning, was also ahead in the popular vote. Historically, though, the candidate with the most votes hasn’t always won the contest.
Calgary police have charged a senior with sexual assault, and say the accused was a volunteer sponsor who helped families immigrate to Canada.
U.S. search engine queries about moving to Canada shot up Wednesday in the wake of Donald Trump’s decisive win in the presidential election.
It was a moment that encapsulated one of the biggest challenges facing U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris' campaign – which, in the end, proved insurmountable. A country crying out for change got a candidate who, at a crucial moment as more voters were tuning in, decided to soft-pedal the change she knew she represented.
A Vancouver artist whose streetside singing led to a chance encounter with one of the world's biggest musicians is encouraging aspiring performers to try their hand at busking.
Ten-thousand hand-knit poppies were taken from the Sanctuary Arts Centre and displayed on the fence surrounding the Dartmouth Cenotaph on Monday.
A Vancouver man is saying goodbye to his nine-to-five and embarking on a road trip from the Canadian Arctic to Antarctica.
A Windsor teen’s social media post showing off a distinctive Windsor pizza topping has gone viral, drawing millions of views worldwide and sparking new curiosity about Windsor-style pizza.
Auston Matthews has come face to face with his look-alike. On Thursday, the Maple Leafs star met seven-year-old Grayson Joseph, who went viral for dressing up as an Auston Matthews hockey card.
A Halifax junk remover shares some of his company’s strangest discoveries.
When Leah arrived at work directing traffic around a construction site, she never expected to see a van painted in all sorts of bright colours, and covered in eclectic decorations, including a stuffed moose attached to its roof.
After 14 years of repairing and selling bicycles out of the garage of her home, a Guelph, Ont. woman’s efforts have ended – for now, at least.
Epcor says it has removed more than 20,000 goldfish from an Edmonton stormwater pond.