British man lynched by mob after arrest in remote Ecuadorian Amazon village
The man, named locally as Michael Hann, 34, was taken into custody on 20 April in the riverside village of Playas del Cuyabeno, near the Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve. He was suspected of fatally shooting his long-time friend and business partner, Rodrigo Chavez, in an alleged dispute linked to their struggling tourism business.
Police confirmed that Hann was arrested early that morning and brought to the station for his own safety after he was 'intercepted and beaten by local residents' following the shooting. Authorities said they were preparing to transfer him to Lago Agrio, about 75 miles away, but were delayed due to 'geographical conditions.'
At around 12:30 pm, a group of angry villagers stormed the station, forcibly removed Hann, and lynched him in the street before setting his body on fire, according to the local outlet Extra, which described the incident as 'a shocking act of apparent community justice.'
A police report identified the victim only as an 'English national,' and a senior police official told the Daily Mail: 'We are still trying to establish the specific identity of the citizen we believe is a British national. We know that he was working and teaching English and was making reservations for tourists visiting the area but we don't have any more information right now.'
Authorities said the situation escalated quickly, with seven officers present at the station during the mob attack. The officers reportedly feared for their lives and potential damage to state property. 'They were carrying guns and other weapons including stones, sticks, spears and even cans of petrol they were threatening to burn the police station down with and harm officers,' the police chief said.
Extra reported that the officers had received advance warnings about threats to the detainee's safety but were unable to act due to the delayed arrival of backup. Ecuadorian broadcaster Ecuavisa stated that Hann died hours later from burns sustained during the lynching.
According to sources close to the investigation, the motive behind the shooting was rooted in a bitter business dispute. Chavez had accused Hann of misappropriating funds from their tourism venture, cutting him out of the business amid financial struggles.
The UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said it is urgently working with Ecuadorian authorities and forensic teams to verify the victim's identity and gather more information. The FCDO has not yet issued an official statement.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Time of India
32 minutes ago
- Time of India
Epstein case: 'Ex-girlfriend' Ghislaine Maxwell interviewd by DOJ deputy; 'answered all the questions truthfully, honestly, says her lawyer
US deputy attorney general Todd Blanche held a meeting with convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell and her lawyer in Tallahassee, as pressure mounts on the justice department to disclose more about its handling of the Jeffrey Epstein case. The meeting lasted several hours, with Blanche posing extensive questions and Maxwell responding to each of them, according to her lawyer David Oscar Markus. 'Productive day today with the Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche and Ghislaine Maxwell,' he said, as quoted by CNN. 'She never invoked a privilege. She never declined to answer. She answered all the questions truthfully, honestly and to the best of her ability,' Markus added, though he declined to reveal the content of the conversation. Blanche later confirmed he would return tomorrow to continue the interview. 'The Department of Justice will share additional information about what we learned at the appropriate time,' he posted on X. The meeting comes just weeks before Maxwell is due to testify before the US Congress under subpoena. The House Oversight Committee has ordered her to appear on 11 August, calling her testimony 'crucial' to understanding the federal government's failings in the Epstein case, including controversial plea deals and prosecution gaps. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like American Investor Warren Buffett Recommends: 5 Books For Turning Your Life Around Blinkist: Warren Buffett's Reading List Undo Maxwell, a British socialite and former girlfriend of Epstein, is serving a 20-year sentence after being convicted in 2022 for grooming and trafficking underage girls in partnership with the disgraced financier. She has since filed an appeal. Blanche had earlier acknowledged that Maxwell was never before approached by federal investigators willing to hear her out. 'That changes now,' he said, signalling a shift in the justice department's posture under President Donald Trump's directive to release all 'credible evidence' related to Epstein's crimes. Her lawyer also said that past prosecutors had avoided direct talks and welcomed the administration's new approach. 'The truth should not be feared or ignored,' Markus said. 'We're grateful someone is finally listening.' Maxwell's possible testimony before Congress could mark a turning point in the saga, depending on whether she decides to fully cooperate. 'She's taking this one step at a time,' Markus said. 'If she chooses to testify before Congress, and not plead the Fifth, she will speak the truth—as she always said she would,' he added The renewed attention to Maxwell's case comes amid mounting scrutiny over the handling of Epstein-related investigations and growing calls for transparency. A federal judge in Florida last week refused to unseal grand jury records from the early 2000s, rejecting a request by the Trump administration to make them public. Meanwhile, political tensions continue to rise following a Wall Street Journal report highlighting past links between Trump and Epstein. The US president filed a defamation lawsuit against Rupert Murdoch and the newspaper.
Indian Express
38 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Lower judiciary treated like ‘shudras', ‘les misérables', High Court judges like ‘savarnas': Madhya Pradesh HC quashes termination of district judge
In a scathing comment on judicial power structures, a Division Bench of the Madhya Pradesh High Court has likened the relationship between the High Court and the District Judiciary to a caste system, observing that judges in the lower judiciary are treated like 'shudras' and 'les misérables', while High Court judges function with the entitlement of 'savarnas'. The French term, 'les misérables', translates to 'the miserable ones' in English and is commonly used to refer to the poor and marginalised, as in Victor Hugo's French novel of the same name. A Division Bench of Justices Atul Sreedharan and Dinesh Kumar Paliwal made the observations on July 14 while quashing the termination of former Additional District and Sessions Judge Jagat Mohan Chaturvedi. He was dismissed in 2014 after passing divergent bail orders in cases linked to the Vyapam scam. The court said the judicial officer had suffered 'gross injustice' and ordered the restoration of his pensionary benefits. It also imposed a cost of Rs 5 lakh on the state for the 'hardships he and his family were subjected to' and 'the humiliation in society that he had to face, only on account of passing judicial orders, without an iota of material coming on record to even establish corruption even on the anvil of preponderance of probability'. Speaking on the entrenched hierarchy in the judiciary, the Bench observed, 'The relationship between District Judiciary and the High Court in the state is not based on mutual respect for each other, but one where a sense of fear and inferiority is consciously instilled by one on the subconscious of the other. At a subliminal level, the penumbra of the caste system manifests in the judicial structure in this state where those in the High Court are the savarnas and the shudras are the les misérables of the District Judiciary.' Describing the dynamic between the High Court and the lower courts, the judges said, 'The dismal relationship between the Judges of the High Court and the Judges of the District Judiciary is one between a feudal lord and serf.' 'The body language of the Judges of the District Judiciary when they greet a Judge of the High Court stops short of grovelling before the High Court Judge, making the Judges of the District Judiciary the only identifiable species of invertebrate mammals,' they said. The Bench further added, 'Instances of the judges of the District Judiciary personally attending to Judges of the High Court (as desired by them) on railway platforms and waiting on them with refreshments, are commonplace, thus perpetuating a colonial decadence with a sense of entitlement.' Judges of the district judiciary deputed to work at the High Court registry 'are almost never offered a seat by the Judges of the High Court, and on a rare occasion when they are, they are hesitant to sit down before the High Court Judge,' the Bench said. The court also observed that the 'subjugation and enslavement of the psyche of the Judges of the District Judiciary is complete and irreversible, so it seems'. 'An overbearing High Court, ever willing to excoriate the District Judiciary for the most innocuous of its errors, ensures that District Judiciary is kept under perpetual and morbid fear of punishment,' it said. 'The fear of the District Judiciary is understandable. They have families, children who go to school, parents undergoing treatment, a home to be built, savings to be accumulated and when the High Court terminates his service abruptly…he and his entire family are out on the streets with no pension and the stigma of facing a society that suspects his integrity,' the court said. The court observed that a 'District Judiciary which is compelled to work perpetually under this fear cannot dispense justice and instead shall dispense with justice'. It added, 'All this adds up to the passive subjugation of the District Judiciary, leaving it psychologically emaciated, which ultimately reflects in their judicial work where bails are not granted in even the most deserving cases, convictions are recorded in the absence of evidence… All this in the name of saving their job, for which the Petitioner in this case suffered, for thinking and doing differently.'
Time of India
an hour ago
- Time of India
Top Justice Dept official grills Epstein accomplice Maxwell
A top US Justice Department official spent hours on Thursday grilling Ghislaine Maxwell , the imprisoned accomplice of sex offender Jeffrey Epstein , as President Donald Trump struggles to tamp down a furor over his handling of the explosive case. David Markus, Maxwell's attorney, said the former British socialite answered every question she was asked during a day-long meeting at a courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida. Explore courses from Top Institutes in Please select course: Select a Course Category Design Thinking MCA MBA Data Science CXO Data Analytics Finance Cybersecurity Operations Management Digital Marketing Product Management Leadership Public Policy Data Science Healthcare others Project Management Others Technology Degree healthcare Management PGDM Artificial Intelligence Skills you'll gain: Duration: 22 Weeks IIM Indore CERT-IIMI DTAI Async India Starts on undefined Get Details Skills you'll gain: Duration: 25 Weeks IIM Kozhikode CERT-IIMK PCP DTIM Async India Starts on undefined Get Details "She never invoked a privilege. She never declined to answer," Markus told reporters. "She answered all the questions truthfully, honestly, and to the best of her ability." by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Connect Hearing Is Looking For People Who Want To Hear Better in North Bay Connect Hearing Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said he would continue interviewing Maxwell on Friday and "share additional information about what we learned at the appropriate time." Markus said he was not going to comment on the "substance" of the meeting with Blanche, Trump's former personal lawyer for his hush money trial and two federal criminal cases. Live Events Maxwell, 63, is serving a 20-year sentence after being convicted in 2021 of recruiting underage girls for Epstein, who died in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting trial in his own sex trafficking case . Earlier this week, Blanche said if Maxwell has "information about anyone who has committed crimes against victims, the FBI and the DOJ will hear what she has to say. "No one is above the law -- and no lead is off-limits," he said. Trump, 79, was once a close friend of Epstein and The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that the president's name was among hundreds found during a DOJ review of the so-called " Epstein files ," though there has not been evidence of wrongdoing. Trump filed a $10 billion defamation suit against the Journal last week after it reported that he had penned a sexually suggestive letter to Epstein for his 50th birthday in 2003. Maxwell is the only former Epstein associate convicted in connection with his activities, which right-wing conspiracy theorists allege included trafficking young models for VIPs. The meeting with Maxwell marks another attempt by the Trump administration to defuse anger among the Republican president's supporters over what they have long seen as a cover-up of sex crimes by Epstein, who was a wealthy financier with high-level connections. - 'Corrupt deal' - Democratic Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said the meeting between Maxwell and a Justice Department official who used to be Trump's own lawyer smacks of a "corrupt deal so that she can exonerate Donald Trump." Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse said it raises a number of troubling questions. "Is he really going as (deputy attorney general) or is he going de facto as Trump's personal criminal attorney, Tom Hagen style?" the senator said in a reference to the Corleone family lawyer in "The Godfather." "Will he promise her a pardon for silence, or for a Trump-friendly tale?" Whitehouse asked. Many of the president's core supporters want more transparency on the Epstein case, and Trump had promised to deliver that on retaking the White House in January. But he has since dismissed the controversy as a "hoax" and a "witch hunt" and the DOJ and FBI released a memo this month claiming the Epstein files did not contain evidence that would justify further investigation. Epstein committed suicide while in jail and was not murdered, did not blackmail any prominent figures, and did not keep a "client list," according to the July 7 FBI-DOJ memo. Seeking to redirect public attention, the White House has promoted unfounded claims in recent days that former president Barack Obama led a "years-long coup" against Trump around his victorious 2016 election. The extraordinary narrative claims that Obama had ordered intelligence assessments to be manipulated to accuse Russia of election interference to help Trump. Yet it runs counter to four separate probes between 2019 and 2023 -- each of them concluding that Russia did interfere and did, in various ways, help Trump. Epstein was found hanging dead in his New York prison cell while awaiting trial on charges that he sexually exploited hundreds of victims at his homes in New York and Florida.
