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That simply does not make any sense. But it is right there in black and white on the Federal Reserve’s own website….

The three men – teacher Adrian Leason, 45, Dominican friar Peter Murnane, 69, and farmer Sam Land, 26 – were acquitted yesterday on charges of burglary and wilful damage at the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) base at Waihopai.

After cutting through apparently alarmed, electric fences without setting off any audible alarms or getting electrocuted, the men reached one of two inflatable domes covering satellite dishes, placed their hands on the plastic skin and said “we disarm you in the name of Jesus Christ”, before slashing it with sickles.

The three said they were saving lives in Iraq by disrupting satellite transmissions. A jury in Wellington District Court found them not guilty.

But the Solicitor General, Dr David Collins, QC, said today further action may be taken.

He said in a statement that trial judge Stephen Harrop reserved a question of law relating to the “claim of right” defence used by the three.

“The Crown will now consider the judge’s ruling and directions and decide if it is appropriate to pursue an appeal,” said Dr Collins, who declined further comment.

The question was reserved under Section 380 of the Crimes Act, which provides for a trial judge to reserve questions of law for the Court of Appeal at the request of either the defendant or the prosecutor.

“If the result of the trial is acquittal the accused shall be discharged, subject to being again arrested if the Court of Appeal orders a new trial,” the law says.

Such an arrest would not be barred by rules against “double jeopardy”. Though the Bill of Rights says people who have been finally acquitted or convicted of an offence cannot be tried for it again, the Crown can get around that by effectively reserving the right to appeal an acquittal.

A similar tactic was used recently over the acquittal of Christchurch man George Gwaze whose case was appealed in the Supreme Court last month despite him having previously been found not guilty in May 2008 of the rape and murder of his 10-year-old niece. The Supreme Court has not yet issued a finding.

In the Waihopai case, the jury took two hours to acquit the defendants after finding they genuinely believed their actions would save lives and that the force they used was reasonable.

Mr Murnane said after the trial the trio knew what they had done “was right” because it was done for the greater good.

“That brought a claim of right and we knew we had a right to do that because we were saving people from much greater evil than the mere cutting of a bit of plastic.”

According to Auckland lawyer Peter Williams, QC, it may have been the first time the greater good defence was used in New Zealand.

Law Society criminal law sub-committee convener Jonathan Krebs said the “claim of right” was enshrined in statute law, but usually used in property cases, such as where a purchaser of stolen property believed the seller owned and had a claim of right to the property.

Organizations involved in workplace safety and responsible genetic research already have seized on the federal lawsuit by molecular biologist Becky McClain as an example of what they claim is evidence that risks caused by cutting-edge genetic manipulation have outstripped more slowly evolving government regulation of laboratories.

McClain, of Deep River, suspects she was inadvertently exposed, through work by a former Pfizer colleague in 2002 or 2003, to an engineered form of the lentivirus, a virus similar to the one that can lead to acquired immune deficiency syndrome, or AIDS. Medical experts working for McClain believe the virus has affected the way her body channels potassium, leading to a condition that causes complete paralysis as many as 12 times a month.

“If a worker in a plant as sophisticated as Pfizer is becoming infected with a genetically engineered virus, then I think the potential is everywhere,” said Jeremy Gruber, president of the Council for Responsible Genetics, a public interest group created to explore the implications of genetic technologies.

“Genetically engineered viruses are commonly worked on at your average university,” Gruber said. “The public has a right to know what regulations are in place and what regulations are required to fix an industrywide issue. We need to have a conversation about this. Ms. McClain’s attempt to do that has been hampered at every turn, by the courts and by regulators.”

Pfizer disputes all of McClain’s claims and says it fired her in 2005 because she refused to come to work. The global pharmaceuticals manufacturer, with research labs in southeastern Connecticut, defends its safety practices and denies that McClain’s physical disability is related to exposure at its Groton lab. The company says she did not link her disability to workplace exposure until after she was fired.

Serge Serykh, 43, who, along with his wife and stepson, threw himself off a Glasgow tower block, was convinced that if he was not given asylum in Britain his life would be at risk. It is clear, as The Times has learnt, that Mr Serykh was suffering from severe mental health problems.

No deportation order to remove him from the UK had been issued by the authorities at the time he and his family embarked on their macabre triple suicide — although official sources said they had had their benefit payments removed last month and were facing eviction from their YMCA flat in the notorious Red Road complex on the day that they died.

Last night, as Strathclyde Police pieced together the mysterious tale of Mr Serykh, his blonde-haired wife, thought to be called Tatiana, and his 21-year-old stepson, sources told The Times of the bizarre background to a suicide pact that has shocked Scotland.

Mr Serykh had been given refugee status in Canada in 2000 and, in a plot that resembles an airport thriller, had offered his skills as an alleged former member of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) to the Canadian Government, saying he had evidence of a foreign spy network across the country.

In November 2007 Canada rejected his application for citizenship and he immediately accused the authorities there of having used mind-altering psychotronic techniques against him.

He left Canada in late 2007 and went to several European countries, including Germany, the Netherlands and Spain, seeking asylum without success.

Shortly afterwards, he turned up in the UK and, having applied for asylum, he and his family at first stayed in Brent, North London before moving to Glasgow in autumn 2009. His case for asylum in the UK was based on his belief that because of an alleged deal between Stephen Harper, the Canadian Prime Minister, and former President Putin of Russia, he would be killed by Canadian security agents if he was returned there. He still had a Canadian passport.

Those who had dealings with the Serykh family and have spoken to The Times say he was 90 per cent lucid and 10 per cent “off the wall”.

When the UK authorities rejected his application for asylum last year, on the ground that he still had refugee status in Canada, Mr Serykh approached three Glasgow solicitors, all experts in handling asylum issues, to take up his case, but they said they could not help him. He then sent a letter of appeal to the Queen and used it to repeat his fantasy that her life was at risk from the Canadian Government.

One senior source told The Times: “No removal order had been issued. They were not under imminent threat of deportation but their financial support of £35 a week each had been removed in mid February.

“However, they were going to be evicted from their home in the YMCA block in the Red Road on Sunday and they took their own lives”.

Reports yesterday suggested the family leapt from the balcony of their flat on Sunday morning either holding hands or joined together by a rope. They apparently used a wardrobe to break through the wire security mesh on the balcony. Last night, when police forensic science tents were removed, all that remained of the incident were three deep indentations in the turf where their bodies landed.

Residents said they knew little about the trio, and had barely seen them since they moved in about two months ago. Carol Craig, 51, who lives in the flat next door, said: “The police woke me at 10am to tell me the neighbours had jumped. I had only seen them on Saturday for the first time.”

Judge Simone Luerti scheduled the trial of the four firms, 11 bankers and two former city officials for May 6, Prosecutor Alfredo Robledo said after a hearing in Milan today. The banks allegedly misled the city on swaps that adjusted interest payments on 1.7 billion euros ($2.3 billion) of borrowings.

Prosecutors across Italy are probing banks as local and national government agencies face potential losses of 2.5 billion euros on derivatives, lawyers say. The Milan probe may also affect cases as far away as the U.S., where securities firms have faced charges for price-fixing and bid-rigging in the sale of derivatives to municipalities, though not for fraud, according to former regulator Christopher “Kit” Taylor.

“This case could have repercussions over here if the trial showed deliberate intent,” said Taylor, a former executive director of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board, the national regulator of the municipal-bond market. “What happened in Europe was the continuation of a pattern in the U.S.”

Police with Austin’s High Tech Crime Unit on Wednesday arrested 20-year-old Omar Ramos-Lopez, a former Texas Auto Center employee who was laid off last month, and allegedly sought revenge by bricking the cars sold from the dealership’s four Austin-area lots.

“We initially dismissed it as mechanical failure,” says Texas Auto Center manager Martin Garcia. “We started having a rash of up to a hundred customers at one time complaining. Some customers complained of the horns going off in the middle of the night. The only option they had was to remove the battery.”

The dealership used a system called Webtech Plus as an alternative to repossessing vehicles that haven’t been paid for. Operated by Cleveland-based Pay Technologies, the system lets car dealers install a small black box under vehicle dashboards that responds to commands issued through a central website, and relayed over a wireless pager network. The dealer can disable a car’s ignition system, or trigger the horn to begin honking, as a reminder that a payment is due. The system will not stop a running vehicle.

The tax refund delay is part of a bigger cash crunch.

Message to New Yorkers: don’t start spending your tax refund money because it’s going to be delayed.

Half a billion dollars’ worth of refund checks were put on hold last Friday, and state beancounters won’t start sending you your money until at least April 1.

“I apologize that we had to do this. I hope it serves notice on the public of how serious our financial situation is,” Gov. David Paterson said.

Several hundred thousand New York taxpayers will be affected with most getting an average refund of $1,000. People who filed in late February and early March might have to wait as long as six weeks till the checks are in the mail.

The governor said the move was unavoidable. He’s also planning to withhold $1.5 billion in school payments and aid to local governments.

Capio Nightingale Hospital, a private facility in Central London, introduced the service after calls from parents concerned about their children’s use of games, the internet, or mobile phones.

A spokeswoman for the hospital said the service would be offered for children as young as 12 but those aged 15 to 17 are expected to be the main target group.

Richard Graham, a consultant psychiatrist who is leading the new clinic, added that although other clinics provided treatment for young people as part of general addiction treatments, services needed to “adapt quickly” to specifically address problems linked to technology.

Dr Graham, who also sees NHS patients, said some parents reported that their children flew “into a rage” when they were told to turn off their computer, and police had even been called to sort out the rows.

“Mental health services need to adapt quickly to the changing worlds that young people inhabit, and understand just how seriously their lives can be impaired by unregulated time online, on-screen or in-game,” he said.

He called for official guidelines “on what counts as healthy or unhealthy use of technology.”

The Capio spokeswoman declined to comment on the costs of a private consultation at the Young Person Technology Addiction Service, which aims to increase off-screen social activities and improve children’s general confidence.

It also encourages them to think about their relationship with their phone, computer games or social networking websites like Facebook and teaches them skills to help them to switch off.

Other experts have previously questioned whether technology addiction is a real illness, or just an over-reaction on the part of parents and gamers.

Richard Wood, a researcher at Nottingham Trent University, argued in 2008 that video game addiction was a “myth”.

Burglars broke into the Lilly warehouse either late Saturday or early Sunday in the town of Enfield, Connecticut, as violent rain and winds lashed the Eastern seaboard, Enfield Lt. Steven Kaselouskas said.

“You certainly don’t see a $50 million to $75 million burglary many times in your career,” he said. “This was a well-planned event.”

The thieves disabled a burglar alarm in the building and carted away dozens of pallets loaded with Lilly antidepressants Prozac and Cymbalta, anti-psychotic Zyprexa and other company medicines, according to published reports.

A warehouse employee saw the hole in the roof on Sunday afternoon and notified police. Police did not receive notice of an alarm going off, said Kaselouskas.

Kaselouskas speculated the drugs could be headed for the black market and possibly overseas, where there is demand for medicines made in the United States because of their deemed safety.

Lilly officials could not immediately be reached for comment and did not issue a release about the theft.

In an interview late Thursday, Dmitry Rogozin also highlighted the lack of cohesion within NATO, saying Moscow is worried about declining public support in Europe for the war.

Russia “is losing 30,000 lives a year to the Afghan drug trade, and a million people are addicts,” Rogozin said. “This is an undeclared war against our country.”

“We are obviously very dissatisfied with the lack of attention from NATO and the United States to our complaints about this problem.”

For years, the allies tried to eradicate poppy crops, but that resulted in a boost to the insurgency as impoverished poppy farmers joined the Taliban. U.S. Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s new policy of trying to win the support of the population means that these farmers are now left alone, enabling them to tend crops that produce 90 percent of the world’s heroin.

Last month, the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime said Afghanistan’s cultivation of opium — the main ingredient in heroin — is unlikely to rise or fall dramatically in 2010, after a major drop over the last two years. But even during 2008 and 2009 Afghanistan was producing far more opium a year than the world consumes, the Vienna-based office said.

Russia claims that drug production in Afghanistan has increased tenfold since the U.S.-led invasion that ousted the Taliban regime in 2001. Smugglers freely transport Afghan heroin and opium north into Central Asia and Russia, and also on to Western Europe.

Rogozin pointed to Washington’s inconsistency in its attitude to international drug trafficking saying that in contrast to Afghanistan, it was waging a drug war in Colombia because that was the primary source of cocaine that goes to America.

“But in the case of the heroin which goes to Russia, they are doing practically nothing,” he said. “This is not how you treat your friends and partners.”

NATO spokesman James Appathurai said the alliance understands Russian concerns, and that the problem affects Europe as well. The most important part of solving the drug trade was helping to defeat the insurgency, and NATO has 120,000 troops trying to do just that, he said.

Appathurai noted that the U.N. cites the Marjah region, where NATO has just completed a large-scale offensive, as one of the world’s foremost opium-producing areas. “By helping re-establish government control there, we are making a substantial contribution to the counter-narcotics effort,” he said.

“We would welcome increased support from Russia for our overall effort and (NATO) has made very specific requests to Moscow which they are considering,” Appathurai said.

Russia contributes logistical support for NATO- and U.S.-led operations by providing a vital land and air transit corridor for the shipment of supplies to the international force. It also services Soviet helicopters and organizes training for the Afghan anti-drug police. But Moscow always has ruled out sending ground troops.

During the Cold War, the Soviets provided military support for the secular Afghan government, and deployed over 100,000 troops to defend it against religious fundamentalists being financed by the United States, Saudi Arabia, Britain, and other Western nations. About 15,000 Soviet soldiers died in the 10-year war in the 1980s.

“Today we are helping them fight the same fanatics whom they supported against us 20 years ago,” Rogozin noted.

He expressed concern over weakening support for the nine-year war from America’s European allies, “who ended up in Afghanistan without really knowing what they were doing there.”

“The result is falling public commitment to the war,” he said.

Last month, the Dutch government collapsed because it tried to comply with a NATO request to keep its 2,000-strong contingent in Afghanistan. The Dutch crisis, and growing public opposition in other European countries to further involvement in Afghanistan, has sparked fears that other NATO nations might also pull out their troops.

“NATO is still dominated by the United States, and European allies still fall in line just to keep the alliance going, (by) participating in U.S.-initiated military adventures, even though their national interests in doing so are far from clear,” said Ian Buruma, a professor of democracy at Bard College in New York.

“It is hard to see how this can continue for much longer.”

In a related development, NATO’s top official said Russia’s military doctrine — which still identifies the Western military alliance as a top threat — is outdated and “does not reflect the real world.”