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The father of a baby who infamously vanished in the Australian Outback more than 30 years said Monday that he was confident a new inquiry into the tragedy will officially rule that a dingo took his daughter. The disappearance of 9-week-old Azaria Chamberlain on Aug. 17, 1980, from a campsite near Ayers Rock, the red monolith in the Australian desert now known by its Aboriginal name Uluru, divided Australians between those who believed a native dog known as a dingo killed her and those who believed she was murdered by her mother, Lindy Chamberlain

The dingo came to Australia via southern China, and much earlier than previously thought, says new research. THE DINGO (Canis lupus dingo) first appeared in Australia's archaeological records in 3500-year-old rock paintings in the Pilbara region of WA, but the new evidence suggests they were roaming Australia long before that. DNA samples from domestic Asian dog species and the Australian dingo have shed light on how the iconic canine arrived on Australian soil. According to a study by an international research team, genetic data shows the dingo may have originated in southern China, travelling through mainland southeast Asia and Indonesia to...

A BABY girl mauled by her family's pet dingo-cross dog suffered more than 100 bite wounds, a doctor has told an inquest. Twenty-two-month-old Kara Compton's injuries were described by two senior nurses on Tuesday as the most horrific they've seen. Kara was in bed in her family's home at Bunyip, in Victoria's east, when the dog climbed onto her bed and mauled her. She was found by her father and taken by ambulance to Dandenong Hospital, but went into cardiac arrest and died.

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WHAT do you feed dingoes you believe are hungry? Well according to Adam Randall from Rainbow Beach you feed them apples, mangoes, coconuts, roast chicken, dog food and sausages. And that is exactly what he did feed a family of dingoes in 2008 at Hook Point on Fraser Island according to evidence presented yesterday at the Maryborough Magistrates Court. Randall, 36, pleaded guilty in the court to four counts of feeding a dingo and one count of disturbing a dingo – and was fined $2500. DERM prosecutor Ralph Devlin said Randall was in a relationship with wildlife photographer Jennifer Parkhurst,...

A former Holly High School music teacher accused of having sex with two students was sentenced to jail Wednesday and barred from most unsupervised contact with minors. Ranee Sue Proper hugged supporters before facing Oakland Circuit Judge Edward Sosnick, who sentenced her to five years probation, with the first nine months of that in Oakland County Jail. The judge also ordered her to participate in sex offender treatment and not to have any unsupervised contact with minors under 18 other than her own children and relatives’ children.

A DOG that leapt between a three-year-old boy and a highly venomous brown snake has been honoured by the RSPCA. Diesel, a cattle dog-dingo cross, was today hailed as a hero and received a big bone for saving a Sunshine Coast couple's grandson from being bitten by the snake. Drew Gralike was playing on a swing last month at his grandfather's Eumundi property when the snake appeared. Diesel leapt between the boy and the snake, receiving a near-fatal bite. Drew's grandfather, Stan Gralike, told ABC Radio that the snake was about to strike when Diesel intervened.

Source: University of New South Wales Date: September 5, 2007 Tasmanian Tiger No Match For Dingo Science Daily — The wily dingo out-competed the much larger marsupial thylacine by being better built anatomically to resist the "mechanical stresses" associated with killing large prey, say Australian scientists. Despite being armed with a more powerful and efficient bite and having larger energy needs than the dingo, the thylacine was restricted to eating relatively small prey while the dingo's stronger head and neck anatomy allowed it to subdue large prey as well. Earlier studies had given ambiguous results regarding the size of prey...

Been catching up on some old and not so old movies during this Christmas TV nothing season. This week, a review of "Cheaper by the Dozen -2". As a child I loved the book. I'm not at all sure Steve Martin captures the spirit of the book's character. And a short touch on a movie about those Australian parents whose baby was killed by a dingo. The movie did not deal at all with that possible True Crime in terms of parents as perpetrators rather than a dingo.

Germany-Israel-Submarines The German government gave the green light for the controversial export to Israel of a Dingo 2 armored personnel carrier and two Dolphin class submarines which could be modified to carry nuclear warheads, the daily Die Welt reported on Saturday. It cited coalition circles as saying that Germany's highest secret body -- the Federal Security Council -- expressed no objections to the Dingo sale for testing purposes. The Israeli army has repeatedly said it was interested in buying Dingo 2 which could be used to quell the Palestinian uprising in the occupied territories. In fact the German government halted...

"Australian researchers say they have discovered that dingo urine can act as a repellent for use in everything from rehabilitating old mine sites to reducing roadkill." "At one stage we fashioned a little urine catcher to walk dingoes and collect it from, but that tended to be risky," Parsons said.

<p>Aborigines had dingoes as companions for thousands of years, but modern Australians are debating whether these unique wild dogs should be kept as household pets.</p> <p>After all, the dingoes' role with the Aborigines was on hunting expeditions, and experts fear today's owners are at risk of attack as dingoes grow older, and their aggressive ancient instincts take over.</p>

A WOMAN has claimed she is Azaria Chamberlain, the infant who disappeared from an Uluru campsite 25 years ago. But 25-year-old Erin Horsburgh's claim that she is the missing baby whose disappearance sparked an extraordinary legal saga has been discounted by police. Ms Horsburgh and her 48-year-old partner Raymond Allen walked into Alice Springs police station on Wednesday after speaking to the Centralian Advocate newspaper on Monday. Detective Superintendent Don Fry said police were investigating Ms Horsburgh's claims but all had been discounted. On Monday, the couple said they thought it was time for the truth to be known. Ms...

One thing we can learn about America from the November elections – the gullibility of U.S voters is in perfect balance with the genius of their marketers. This was less a victory for the Republicans than a reflection of the glaring bankruptcy of the Democrats however, the convergence of left and right now so intimate, and the subversion of democracy now so complete that Kerry failed to distinguish himself from Bush on a single major issue – and therefore offered no alternatives. In the land of the Pepsi-Coke wars, the Marlboro-Man, and the happy ending, image and brand-association reign supreme....

JOHN Sharpe has been bashed in prison while trying to justify to inmates the shocking crimes with which he is charged. Sharpe, who is accused of murdering his pregnant wife, Anna Marie Kemp, and their daughter, Gracie, 20 months, has been labelled Barwon Prison's most despised inmate by other prisoners and assaulted. A prison source said Sharpe, 37, had tried to justify his alleged crimes by claiming his wife, 41, had been having an affair and the unborn child had not been his. The source said the alleged Mornington murderer had first used the story after his wife had disappeared...

A mother today described how her five-year-old daughter stepped between a dingo and her 14-week-old sister to save the baby from a possible attack on Queensland's Fraser Island. Georgia Corke was alone in a hotel room with her baby sister Scarlett at a resort on the island last Friday when a dingo entered the room. She stepped in front of the animal and began screaming for help from her parents, who were in the bathroom of the Kingfisher Bay eco-tourism resort which often has dingoes wandering through the grounds. Mrs Corke today told ABC radio that Georgia defended her baby...

The man who claims to have shot the dingo that killed Azaria Chamberlain had a change of heart about keeping his secret about a year ago after a serious accident that brought him face to face with his own mortality, a neighbour says. Bert Fraser, who lives near Frank Cole in Pascoe Vale in suburban Melbourne, said: "Frank was fixing tiles on his roof and the ladder slipped from under him. He fell across a trailer and smashed his hip and leg. He went to hospital and when he was coming out of anaesthetic he told his son, Don, about...

Singing, piano-playing Dingo voted Australia's best trivial icon Mon Mar 22,10:39 PM ET SYDNEY, (AFP) - He started life like any other native Australian dingo pup but now Dinky -- the singing, piano-playing toast of an outback roadhouse -- has been voted the country's most trivial icon. Dinky outclassed 300 other budding trivia trophy winners through his talent for singing along while his owner's daughters played the family piano and even tinkling the ivories a little himself. For his efforts, Dinky will this week launch the 20th anniversary edition of the world popular Trivial Pursuit boardgame. "One of the girls...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- A New Orleans company will be the exclusive U.S. maker of German armored vehicles built to withstand anti-tank mines and chemical attacks, and costing about $500,000 each. Textron Marine & Land Systems signed a license agreement Monday in Washington with Krauss-Maffei Wegmann of Munich. The ceremony was held at the Association of the U.S. Army convention. Like Humvees and Stryker armored personnel carriers, the German Dingos run on wheels rather than tracks. The Dingo is said to offer unparalleled protection from mines and roadside bombs for its class of armored vehicle. It also can be repaired...