Free Republic

AFFTON, Mo. (KMOV.com) - A happy ending to an otherwise tragic story was announced Thursday, as the dog of the woman found dead inside her Affton apartment was adopted. Police said they found Crystal Chrisp, 46, dead inside a burned out South County apartment Wednesday. Police ruled her death a suicide. "She was my friend and I'm going to miss her. My heart is really aching right now for her," said Sharon Hyster-Harris. Hyster-Harris said Chrisp had been a Metro bus driver for 18-years and that she’d beaten breast cancer several years ago but was facing another battle with cancer....

FARGO -- U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp will vote NO on U.S. Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh's nomination. Heitkamp sat down exclusively with WDAY News to share what she will do when the U.S. Senate votes to confirm U.S. Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. Heitkamp also shared her reasoning behind her decision.

Four years ago, 14-year-old Lizzie Lowe took her own life because she did not believe she would be accepted as a Christian who was also gay. Since then her church, St James in Didsbury, Manchester, and its sister church Emmanuel, has formally become an inclusive church - embracing everyone, regardless of gender, race, disability or sexuality. Lizzie's parents believe embracing inclusion could help save the lives of other teenagers.

"Multiple victims" were being treated after a "horrific shooting" in Aberdeen, Maryland on Thursday, authorities said. The Harford County Sheriff’s Office confirmed the shooting near Spesutia and Perryman Roads in Aberdeen. The first shots were reported just after 9 a.m. There was no immediate word on any suspects and it wasn't known if officials had taken anyone into custody in connection with the incident. "We are closely monitoring the horrific shooting in Aberdeen. Our prayers are with all those impacted, including our first responders. The State stands ready to offer any support," Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said. The conditions of...

Transgender adolescents are far more likely to attempt suicide than teens whose identity matches their sex assigned at birth, and trans male youth are especially at risk, a U.S. study suggests. Roughly half of transgender teens who identify as male but were assigned a female gender at birth have attempted suicide at least once, the study found. And 42 percent of adolescents who don’t identify exclusively as male or female have at least one prior suicide attempt. About 30 percent of trans female teens - who identify as female but have birth certificates that label them as male - have...

One of the most celebrated groups in the mainstream media is transgendered people or people who suffer from gender dysphoria. This lead to transgenderism becoming a fad that had many people claiming to be transgendered, especially among the young. However, data now shows that those young people who do embrace a life of transgenderism seem to have abnormally high suicide rates. ..... Female to male adolescents reported the highest rate of attempted suicide (50.8%), followed by adolescents who identified as not exclusively male or female (41.8%), male to female adolescents (29.9%), questioning adolescents (27.9%). ..... Compared to the suicide rate...

There was another tragedy in California last night. A spree shooter shot and killed five people, including his wife, and then committed suicide. Authorities say this was not a random shooting, that all of the victims are connected with this senseless act of violence, and that the spree arose from a domestic dispute (via NBC News): Six people, including the gunman, were dead following a shooting spree in Bakersfield on Wednesday that authorities believe was an act of domestic violence, Kern County sheriff's officials said. It was not clear why the man went on the rampage, but there may be...

A man was decapitated by the rope he used to hang himself in a Santa Monica parking garage Wednesday. The suicide was reported at about 12:40 p.m. The man was found on the seventh floor of parking structure four located on the 1300 block of Second Street, according to Santa Monica police. The garage is located a block away from the Third Street Promenade.

Ever since Donald Trump's improbable political rise, many have attributed his appeal among the white, male voter base to economic anxiety. Faced with unemployment and wage stagnation, these voters elected a president who promised to fight for jobs. A study published on Wednesday in the Journal of General Internal Medicine offers an additional explanation: declining health and rising death rates in rural Republican bastions helped tilt the presidential election toward Trump. "Changes in life expectancy were an independent factor in voting choices. Reduced health prospects are an important marker of dissatisfaction, discouragement, hopelessness, and fear — sentiments that may have...

Nine-year-old Jamel Myles took his own life days after returning to school in Denver, Colorado, following the summer holidays. His mother, Leia Pierce, says it was because of homophobic bullying. She spoke to the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire programme.

A 24-year-old kayaker who vanished during a family camping trip in Georgia had tied a rock to her ankles with an extension cord in an apparent intentional drowning, police said on Monday. Maranda Whitten’s body was located in Point Lake Monday morning, three days after she was last seen in a teal-colored kayak. The vessel, along with the paddle, life jacket and Whitten’s uncharged phone, were located near a dam in Shaefer Heard Campground on Saturday. “Maranda did have an extension cord which was missing from the campground tied to her ankles which was then tied to a large rock,”...

PORTLAND, Ore. — A single mother fatally shot her severely disabled 7-year-old son and then attempted suicide after years spent caring for her child, authorities and family friends in Oregon said Wednesday. A relative found Tashina Aleine Jordan, 28, unconscious Monday at the Bend home she shared with her son and mother. Authorities found the boy, named Mason, and pronounced him dead. Notes at the scene indicated Jordan was the shooter, police spokesman Lt. Clint Burleigh told KTVZ-TV. Jordan remained hospitalized Wednesday and clinging to life after taking a combination of pills, said Deschutes County District Attorney John Hummel.

A Denver mom says her 9-year-old son died by suicide in their home on Thursday after experiencing bullying in school. She is now sharing the story in hopes of shining a light on bullying and suicide, KDVR reports. Leia Pierce says bullying was a factor in the death of her son, Jamel Myles, who started fourth grade just last week. Over the summer, Jamel came out to his mother as gay, she said. "(H)e looked so scared when he told me. He was like, 'Mom I'm gay.' And I thought he was playing, so I looked back because I was...

Denver mom says her 9-year-old son died by suicide in their home on Thursday after experiencing bullying in school. She is now sharing the story in hopes of shining a light on bullying and suicide, KDVR reports. Leia Pierce says bullying was a factor in the death of her son, Jamel Myles, who started fourth grade just last week. Over the summer, Jamel came out to his mother as gay, she said. "(H)e looked so scared when he told me. He was like, 'Mom I'm gay.' And I thought he was playing, so I looked back because I was driving,...

In a sweeping, one-hour meeting with The Salt Lake Tribune's editorial board on Monday, the Salt Lake County Republican Party's new communication director made claims about the LGBTQ community that the county health department described as "wildly inaccurate" and Equality Utah said are " deeply irresponsible. " Dave Robinson joined county GOP Chairman Scott Miller, who has been on the job for a little more than a month, for a conversation about where they see the party headed on issues ranging from water to land use and the LGBTQ community. Miller said he's looking to make his party "relevant again"...

A "suicidal" airline employee stole an empty Horizon Air turboprop plane, took off from Sea-Tac International Airport and was chased by military jets before crashing into a small island in the Puget Sound on Friday night, officials said. Preliminary information suggests the crash occurred because the 29-year-old man was "doing stunts in air or lack of flying skills," the Pierce County Sheriff's Department said. Ed Troyer, a spokesman for the Pierce County Sheriff's Department, said on Twitter the man was suicidal and there was no connection to terrorism. Video showed the Horizon Air Q400 doing large loops and other dangerous...

Yesterday afternoon, the California Senate passed SB 282 which legalizes aiding, advising, or encouraging assisted suicide. The bill was rushed through on the first day the legislature returned from its summer recess, giving no opportunity for debate or even opposing remarks. The bill was introduced in the wake of Life Legal’s challenge to California’s assisted suicide law. We registered our opposition to the bill early on, as it grants complete legal immunity to anyone who wants to facilitate the death of someone who is defined as “terminally ill” under California’s assisted suicide law. The law defines “terminal” as a condition...

Kidder’s daughter, Maggie McGuane, told the AP “It’s a very unique sort of grief and pain. Knowing how many families in this state go through this, I wish that I could reach out to each one of them.” Kidder is best remembered for playing Lois Lane opposite Christopher Reeve in the Superman films. The Canadian-born actress had long been open about drug and alcohol addictions, which she said partially triggered her very public breakdown in 1996. The screen icon was equally open about her bipolar diagnosis. When speaking about her lifelong struggle with mental illness, she told the Los Angeles...

An Ontario man suffering from an incurable neurological disease has provided CTV News with audio recordings that he says are proof that hospital staff offered him medically assisted death, despite his repeated requests to live at home. Roger Foley, 42, who earlier this year launched a landmark lawsuit against a London hospital, several health agencies, the Ontario government and the federal government, alleges that health officials will not provide him with an assisted home care team of his choosing, instead offering, among other things, medically assisted death. Foley suffers from cerebellar ataxia, a brain disorder that limits his ability to...

Rick Genest, a model who was known for his head-to-toe tattoos and for appearing in the music video for Lady Gaga’s 2011 song “Born This Way,” has died at 32. Dulcedo Management, which represented him, confirmed his death on its Facebook page on Thursday but did not say where or precisely when he died. He lived in Montreal. On her Twitter account, Lady Gaga said the cause was suicide, and that it was “beyond devastating.” “We have to work harder to change the culture, bring Mental Health to the forefront and erase the stigma that we can’t talk about it,”...