Australian woman, 50, faces three charges of murder and one charge of attempted murder relating to a beef wellington lunch she served at her house in Leongatha. Follow live updates

What we learned yesterday

While we wait for today’s proceedings to begin, here’s a recap of what the jury heard yesterday.

AI bot goes on hours-long fritz, bringing up ‘white genocide in South Africa’, which it is ‘instructed to accept as real’

Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence chatbot Grok went on the fritz on Wednesday, repeatedly mentioning “white genocide” in South Africa in its responses on completely unrelated topics.

Faced with users’ queries on issues such as baseball, enterprise software and building scaffolding, the chatbot offered false and misleading answers.

Cannes film festival
Drawn from a suppressed story by gulag survivor Georgy Demidov, Sergei Loznitsa’s haunting film unravels a terrifying parable of bureaucratic evil

An icy chill of fear and justified paranoia radiates from this starkly austere and gripping movie from Sergei Loznitsa, set in Stalin’s Russia of the late 30s and based on a story by the dissident author and scientist Georgy Demidov, who was held in the gulag for 14 years during the second world war and harassed by the state until his death in the late 1980s.

The resulting movie, with its slow, extended scenes from single camera positions, mimics the zombie existence of the Soviet state and allows a terrible anxiety to accumulate: it is about a malign bureaucracy which protects and replicates itself by infecting those who challenge it with a bacillus of guilt. There is something of Dostoevsky’s The House of the Dead and also – with the appearance of two strangely grinning, singing men in a railway carriage – Kafka’s The Castle.

Loznitsa moreover allows us also to register that the wretched political prisoner of his tale is a veteran of Stalin’s brutal battle to suppress the Ukrainian nationalist Symon Petliura. And given the nightmarish claustrophobia and disorientation in the scenes in cells, official corridors, staircases and government antechambers, there is maybe a filmic footnote in the fact that Demidov worked for the scientist Lev Landau, the subject of Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s huge and deeply pessimistic multi-movie installation project Dau in 2020.

The first prosecutor of the title is Kornyev, played by Aleksandr Kuznetsov, an idealistic young lawyer, given a startlingly early promotion to a state prosecutor role – his beardless youth fascinates and irritates the grizzled old time-servers with whom he comes into contact.

He has received a bizarre “letter” from Stepniak (Aleksandr Fillipenko) an ageing and desperately ill high security prisoner in Bryansk – written in blood on a piece of torn cardboard (which has escaped the bonfire that prison authorities make of protest letters like these). The letter alleges that the security services, the NKVD, are without reference to the rule of law, using the prisons and judicial system to torture and murder an entire older generation of party veterans like him, to bring in a fanatically loyal but callow and incompetent cohort of Stalin loyalists.

The prison authorities make the politely persistent Kornyev wait hours before being allowed to visit Stepniak in his cell, transparently hoping he will just give up and go away – Loznitsa shows this weaponised inertia is the traditional official approach to petitioners everywhere in the Soviet Union.

Manitoba experiences unusually hot conditions after authorities warned this fire season could be devastating

A major wildfire burning in central Canada has killed two people and forced 1,000 more to evacuate their homes, kicking off a fire season authorities warn could prove devastating.

Canadian federal police confirmed on Wednesday that two people died in the small community of Lac du Bonnet, in the central province of Manitoba, which is experiencing unusually hot, dry and windy conditions.

This may have done no more than delay the inevitable and no one truly believes in a miracle, but suddenly there was a roar, a release, some life at the Santiago Bernabéu. The day before, Carlo Ancelotti had talked about the many wonderful comebacks over his years at Real Madrid, moments he said would never be forgotten, and now here in his penultimate game in this stadium was another, 20-year-old centre-back Jacobo Ramón scoring with the last touch of the game to defeat Real Mallorca and keep the league title alive for another day at least.

It came late, very late on a grey, wet Wednesday night in front of perhaps 30,000 empty seats, with a manager whose departure was announced two days earlier and a dozen players missing. Ultimately it may not matter and it arrived at the end of an evening that had often felt empty. Yet now it was full of noise, it meant the world to Ramón and for a moment everyone could just go wild, the defender’s strike in the 95th minute and Kylian Mbappé’s goal a quarter of an hour earlier overturning Martin Valjent’s 11th-minute opener.

• ‘Hell yes’ investment believed to be for 10% of club’s value
• Ohanian is married to tennis legend Serena Williams

Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of the social media platform Reddit and husband of the tennis legend Serena Williams, says he has invested in the Chelsea women’s team in order to “finally match their talent with the resources and respect they deserve”.

It was reported earlier on Wednesday that the American entrepreneur had bought a 10% stake in the Women’s Super League champions for £20m and, while there has been no official comment from Chelsea, Ohanian confirmed the news on social media.

• League says Warriors star questioned integrity of refs
• ESPN reports the comments referred to the game spread

Golden State Warriors star Draymond Green has been fined $50,000 by the NBA for making an “inappropriate comment” to the officials during Game 3 of their second-round playoff series against Minnesota.

The league announced the penalty on Wednesday, saying Green’s comments during Saturday’s game, which the Warriors lost 102-97, questioned “the integrity of game officials.”

Despite their cute fluffy ears and sharp-toothed grin, these dolls are part of a conspicuously grown-up consumer conversation

Labubu dolls first hit the market in 2019, but in 2025 they’re sustaining a viral moment. We should ask ourselves why.

News.com.au reports that recent “drops” of the toy in Australia have seen queues form for blocks around its distributor, Pop Mart, with 3am-risers racing to meet the arrival of restocked merchandise. A Pop Mart spokesperson insists such a mania in pursuit of the highly-collectible plushies and miniatures has gripped Australia “like never before”.

Self-styled Nazi cell had amassed 200 weapons and discussed attacks on mosques and synagogues

Three Nazi extremists who amassed an arsenal of 200 weapons and discussed targeting mosques and synagogues in England have been convicted of planning a terrorist attack.

Among the haul of weapons was a 3D printed gun that was almost ready to be fired. The planned attack was averted when an undercover officer infiltrated the self-styled Nazi cell.

Mark Carney says Canadians ‘not very impressed’ after Keir Starmer delivered invitation to US president in February

Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, has criticised Britain’s invitation to Donald Trump for a second state visit, saying it undermined his government’s effort to project a united front against the US president’s talk of annexing Canada.

Since taking office in January, Trump has repeatedly said he wants Canada to become the 51st US state, a suggestion that has angered Canadians and left Britain trying to tread a fine line between the two North American countries.

Cruise does things his way in this eighth and last Mission: Impossible, as his maverick agent Ethan Hunt takes on the ultimate in AI evil

Here it is: the eighth and final film (for now) in the spectacular Mission: Impossible action-thriller franchise, which manifests itself like the last segment jettisoned from some impossibly futurist Apollo spacecraft, which then carries on ionospherically upwards in a fireball as Tom Cruise ascends to a state beyond stardom, beyond IP. And with this film’s anti-AI and internet-sceptic message, and the gobsmacking final aerial set piece, Cruise is repeating his demand for the echt big-screen experience. He is of course doing his own superhuman stunts – for the same reason, as he himself once memorably put it, that Gene Kelly did all his own dancing.

Final Reckoning is a new and ultimate challenge (actually the second half of the challenge from the previous film) which takes Cruise’s buff and resourceful IMF leader Ethan Hunt on one last maverick, deniable mission to exasperate and yet overawe his stuffed-shirt superiors at Washington and Langley. And what might that be? To save the world of course, like all the other missions.

Alphabet warns of ‘Scattered Spider’, network of hackers reportedly behind cyber-attack against UK retail giant M&S

Alphabet’s Google warned on Wednesday that hackers responsible for paralyzing disruptions of UK retailers are turning their attention to similar companies in the United States.

“US retailers should take note. These actors are aggressive, creative, and particularly effective at circumventing mature security programs,” John Hultquist, an analyst at Google’s cybersecurity arm, said in an email sent on Wednesday.

Justification for Israel’s blockade is hard to sustain amid photos of malnourished children and critical famine warnings

For many decades, Israel was proud of its officials’ ability to defend and argue and convince around the world. The war in Gaza has seen the country’s public diplomacy face its greatest test – as was made clear on Wednesday morning with a robust exchange between David Mencer, a spokesperson for the Israeli government, and Nick Robinson, a presenter of the BBC’s flagship Today programme.

Mencer stressed that he was speaking on behalf of the prime minister and made an uncompromising statement of Israel’s arguments, including the accusation that Hamas – described as a “genocidal death cult” – uses civilians as human shields.

• Deal is a record for a running back over the age of 30
• Henry was second in rushing yards in NFL last season

The Baltimore Ravens have signed Derrick Henry to a two-year contract extension worth $30m, a record for a running back over 30 years old.

The deal, which Henry’s agent confirmed to ESPN, includes $25m guaranteed. Henry’s previous deal, worth $16m over two years, was due to expire at the end of this season.

Daré accepted the £10,000 prize for her latest novel, And So I Roar, the follow-up to her bestselling debut The Girl with the Louding Voice

Nigerian writer Abi Daré has won the inaugural Climate fiction prize for her novel And So I Roar, the follow-up to her bestselling debut The Girl with the Louding Voice.

Daré was announced as the winner of the £10,000 prize at a ceremony in London on Wednesday evening.

Brothers, convicted of parents’ 1989 murders, resentenced to 50 years to life, making them immediately parole eligible

After months of delays and decades behind bars, Erik and Lyle Menendez now have a long-awaited chance at freedom after a judge reduced their sentences for the 1989 killings of their parents.

Their family and extensive network of supporters celebrated on Tuesday when Judge Michael Jesic resentenced the brothers from life in prison without the possibility of parole to 50 years to life. The judge’s decision means they are immediately eligible for parole under California’s youthful offender law because of their young ages at the time of the murders.

UK judge rejects Robert Albon’s application for parental right of three-year-old girl he had with woman in Durham

An unregistered sperm donor who says he has fathered more than 180 children has failed to gain custody of a three-year-old child he had with a Durham woman, who said she was left “broken” and “suicidal” by their encounter.

Robert Albon, who goes by the pseudonym “Joe Donor” and has appeared on This Morning and in a Channel 4 documentary, applied to have the girl live with him after a court deemed her mother was unable to look after her.

Government uses arcane procedure to strip amendment passed by House of Lords from its data bill

Ministers have used an arcane parliamentary procedure to block an amendment to the data bill that would require artificial intelligence companies to disclose their use of copyright-protected content.

The government stripped the transparency amendment, which was backed by peers in the bill’s reading in the House of Lords last week, out of the draft text by invoking financial privilege, meaning there is no budget available for new regulations, during a Commons debate on Wednesday afternoon.

• Coach clarified claim he could quit after West Ham loss
• ‘What I am saying is we must perform or they will change’

Ruben Amorim has insisted he is “very far from quitting” Manchester United, the head coach moving to clarify his suggestion after Sunday’s loss to West Ham that he could walk away.

After the 2-0 defeat at Old Trafford that left his team in 16th Amorim stated that if next season started with the same dismal form it may be time for “new persons to occupy this space”.

The trial of Nicola Packer shows why MPs should seize the opportunity to change the law and safeguard vulnerable women now

The Crown Prosecution Service has yet to explain why it thought that pursuing a case against Nicola Packer was in the public interest. Thankfully, jurors last week cleared the 45-year-old of illegally terminating her pregnancy. But more than four years of police and criminal proceedings have had a lasting impact on a woman already traumatised by discovering that she was 26 weeks pregnant, not about 10, when she acted. The trial dragged her private life – even her sexual preferences – into the public eye. Understandably, she called it “humiliating”. But it is prosecutors who should feel shame.

Ms Packer was prescribed abortion pills in a remote consultation, due to a Covid lockdown. Prosecutors alleged that she deliberately breached the abortion time limit. Jurors believed Ms Packer, who said that she was horrified to realise how advanced her pregnancy was when she saw the foetus and that she “wouldn’t have put the baby or myself through it” had she known.

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The dissolution of boundaries between the president’s official and commercial business is a leading symptom of democracy in crisis

Donald Trump’s tour of Gulf nations this week is notionally state business. The president has discussed trade, investment and defence. But the boundary between statecraft and self-aggrandisement is blurred. To honour the US president, the government of Qatar has  offered him a Boeing 747 aircraft. This “flying palace”, worth around $400m, would serve as a substitute for Air Force One as Mr Trump’s personal jumbo.

The US constitution explicitly forbids anyone holding a government office from accepting any “present, emolument, office or title” from foreign powers without congressional consent. White House lawyers, obedient to their master, say the Qatari jet doesn’t cross that line.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Opposition warns that planned legislation would allow government to shut down all independent media and NGOs

Hungary’s parliament is considering legislation that would give authorities broad powers to monitor, penalise and potentially ban organisations it describes as a threat to national sovereignty, in a move that opposition politicians warned would allow Viktor Orbán’s government to potentially shut down all independent media and NGOs engaged in public affairs.

The bill, submitted late on Tuesday by a lawmaker in Orbán’s rightwing populist Fidesz party, seeks to expand the authority of the country’s controversial sovereignty protection office.

Assistant referees need more scope to use their common sense as opposed to simply relying on VAR

It was an accident waiting to happen. Anyone with an ounce of common sense could see the potential for the International Football Association Board’s offside protocols in the era of the video assistant referee (VAR) system to cause serious injury. Needless collisions are inexcusable. It should not have been allowed to reach the point where we are wondering whether Nottingham Forest’s Taiwo Awoniyi being placed in an induced coma will act as a red flag for the authorities.

Injuries happen. What is not acceptable is the safety of players being compromised as a result of technology warping the game and officials being instructed not to flag for offside if a goalscoring opportunity is on the cards. Thankfully, he was reported to have woken from his coma on Wednesday evening.

Dangerous indoor pollution could be tackled with air purifiers but costs are too high for many, researchers say

Toxic pollution from wildfires has infiltrated the homes of more than a billion people a year over the last two decades, according to new research.

The climate crisis is driving up the risk of wildfires by increasing heatwaves and droughts, making the issue of wildfire smoke a “pressing global issue”, scientists said.

Government to analyse potential benefits of new generation of reactors

Denmark is reconsidering its 40-year ban on nuclear power in a major policy shift for the renewables-heavy country.

The Danish government will analyse the potential benefits of a new generation of nuclear power technologies after banning traditional nuclear reactors in 1985, its energy minister said.

As many films struggle to find distribution, Watermelon Pictures has stepped in to help tell stories from Palestine and other marginalized communities

In March, The Encampments, a documentary on the pro-Palestinian protest movement on US college campuses, opened at the Angelika Film Center in New York. The nonfiction theatrical marketplace has never been breezy in the US, but this is a particularly difficult time for documentaries, let alone films about hot-button issues considered politically sensitive or, under the new administration, outright dangerous; one of the Encampments’ primary subjects, the Columbia University student-activist Mahmoud Khalil, remains in detention by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) without charge for any crime. Large-scale distributors, including all of the major streaming services, are increasingly wary of anything deemed controversial, leaving such films as Union, on the Amazon Labor Union, or the Oscar-winning Palestinian-Israeli documentary No Other Land without distribution in the US.

Nevertheless, over an exclusive first-weekend run, The Encampments made $80,000 at the Angelika – the highest per-screen average for a documentary since the Oscar-winning Free Solo in 2018. That number may sound like peanuts compared with, say, the multimillion theatrical haul of a Marvel movie, but it’s a significant win for the specialty box office – and validation for a film whose mere existence, as a pro-Palestinian narrative, led to threats of violence at the Angelika, an incident of vandalism in the theater’s lobby and social media censorship of its ads.

Georgetown postdoctoral fellow Badar Khan Suri had visa revoked and was arrested by immigration officials in March

The Georgetown academic Badar Khan Suri was released from Ice detention hours after a Virginia federal judge’s order on Wednesday.

Khan Suri was among several individuals legally studying in the US who have been targeted by the Trump administration for their pro-Palestinian activism. He has spent two months in detention.

Trump’s foray into cryptocurrency involves him leveraging his presidency for personal gain and operating in an industry he has power over

The 220 winners of a cryptocurrency contest were told on Monday to look out for an email featuring “the most exclusive invitation in the world”. As a reward for spending immense amounts of money, in some cases millions of dollars, they had won the prize of attending a private gala with Donald Trump at his own Washington DC golf club later this month.

Awarding access to the president in exchange for investment in his crypto endeavor was Trump’s latest conflict of interest in a political career filled with, in the words of one of his most repeated catchphrases, “many such cases”. Real estate holdings, a media company, merchandising deals, fraud and most recently Qatar’s gift of a $400m plane are only some of the myriad of entanglements that government ethics watchdogs have warned about for a decade now.

It is hard to prove the judicial impact of two shows inspired by the notorious double murder case. But undoubtedly, they heightened public scrutiny

When the true-crime documentary Menendez Brothers: Misjudged? aired in 2022 on Discovery+, its impact was not immediate, except on TikTok, where – chicken and egg-style – it was hard to determine whether people were talking about the case because of the show or because a general cultural osmosis had brought the topic to the fore.

Erik and Lyle killed their parents in 1989, when they were 18 and 21. They alleged a childhood of sexual, psychological and physical abuse by their father, which their mother knew about but didn’t act on. The judge disallowed what was called the “abuse excuse” at the time, and the prosecution successfully landed the argument that they had murdered their parents for their inheritance, resulting in whole-life sentences without the possibility of parole.

Death of Valeria Márquez, 23, being investigated as femicide, says Jalisco state prosecutor

A young Mexican social media influencer, known for her videos about beauty and makeup, was brazenly shot to death during a TikTok live stream, in an incident that sent shock waves through a country that faces high levels of gender-based violence.

The death of Valeria Márquez, 23, is being investigated as a femicide – the killing of a woman or girl for reasons of gender – the Jalisco state prosecutor said in a statement released on Tuesday evening.

WBD execs reverse the 2023 name change as shares at conglomerate reported down 15% since this year’s start

Executives at Warner Bros Discovery, the vast media conglomerate, had a bright idea to turbocharge the growth of its streaming service in 2023: rebrand its famous streaming service HBO, home to everything from The Sopranos and Game of Thrones to The Last of Us, from HBO Max to Max.

The move was made because HBO was not the sort of place “parents would most eagerly drop off their kids”, said the head of streaming, JB Perrette. Fast forward two years, and on Wednesday, executives at the same company unveiled a new bright idea: re-rebrand the service from Max to HBO Max.

Man, 21, can be held until Friday morning as detectives investigate if three incidents are linked

Police have been given another 36 hours to question a man arrested in connection with suspected arson attacks on properties in London linked to Keir Starmer.

The 21-year-old was arrested early on Tuesday at an address in Sydenham, south London, on suspicion of arson with intent to endanger life. Police can now hold him until Friday morning.

Millions will cast votes in crucial contests in Romania, Poland and Portugal

Millions of voters in Romania, Poland and Portugal will cast their ballots this weekend in an electoral “super Sunday” that will determine the course of their democracies at a time of heightened political, commercial and economic tensions.

In Romania, the far-right candidate is the frontrunner in a presidential runoff, while in a deeply polarised Poland’s first-round vote, a liberal, a conservative and a far-right candidate are vying to become president.

• FIA softens hard line on clean-up after Verstappen’s ire
• Stewards granted more discretion on deciding penalties

Formula One’s governing body the FIA has retreated from its hard stance against drivers using bad language that has caused controversy and division since it was pursued by the president, Mohammed Ben Sulayem.

The move will be considered a climbdown by the FIA among drivers and others in the F1 paddock, not least the defending world champion Max Verstappen, who has been among many who were vociferous in their dismissal of the policy and the FIA’s previous refusal to listen to the drivers’ standpoint.

• Masters champion will not set targets after glory
• DeChambeau fallout: ‘I was trying to win, not be his mate’

Rory McIlroy has warned his rivals that he is playing with the biggest pile of house money imaginable as the Northern Irishman prepares for his first major since completion of the career grand slam.

McIlroy will tee up on Thursday morning in the US PGA Championship at Quail Hollow – a venue where he has tasted victory four times – a month after claiming the Masters. McIlroy’s emotional glory at Augusta National made him just the sixth golfer in history to win all four men’s majors.

How you pass your days is how you pass your life – mine seem to slip through my fingers

The other day, a visiting friend and I planned a trip to the seaside. I was taking her on the scenic route to the station, ambling happily along, when she pointed out: we might miss our train.

We made it with seconds to spare. My friend was very understanding, but it was a wake-up call.

The star, who at 62 performed his own stunts for the forthcoming Final Reckoning, tells Cannes press conference ‘I don’t mind encountering the unknown’

Tom Cruise got stuck on the wing of a biplane shortly before it ran out fuel during the filming of Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, the director of the eighth instalment of the action franchise has revealed.

Speaking to an audience at the Cannes film festival hours before the film’s premiere, director Christopher McQuarrie recounted the filming of a stunt sequence in which Cruise, in his long-running role as the field agent Ethan Hunt, walked between between the two wings of a biplane as the aircraft was mid-air over South Africa.

This kind of behavior from the Trump administration has gone on for so long that it is hard to rouse the media to cover it

It certainly looks as if policy is for sale in the Trump administration. After all, the president’s primary domestic policy deputy, Elon Musk, gained his position in the administration more or less by purchasing it: he is the richest man in the world, and the primary funder of Trump’s last presidential campaign, and it is seemingly by this virtue – does he have any others? – that Musk has been granted the authority to dismantle large swaths of the federal bureaucracy.

This is something of a pattern for Donald Trump. In his first term, it became de rigueur for foreign dignitaries to stay at Trump’s hotel on trips to Washington, a practice long perceived to be a way of currying favor with the president by spending money at his businesses. Trump funneled money to his hotel business from domestic sources, too: when Secret Service agents were required to stay at Trump’s hotels, they were charged exorbitant rates – including after he left office. Before their recent worldwide jaunt making deals with foreign governments and businesses that will financially benefit their father – including plans for a major new golf course in Qatar, built in partnership with a company controlled by the royal family – Trump’s sons launched $Trump, a cryptocurrency coin – that ever-popular scheme of shameless millennial grifters.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

Cannes film festival
Told in four different timeframes in the same rural family home, this story of national guilt and yearning is powerfully unsettling

Here is a mysterious and uncanny prose-poem of guilt, shame and yearning in 20th-century Germany, and the 21st; a drama of intergenerational trauma and genetic memories, visions and experiences suppressed and handed on to descendants and grandchildren in whom they can return as neurotic symptoms of the repressed.

There are visual rhymes and unexplained cosmic echoes, and the film speaks of militarism and resentment, guilt and horror, with dark hints of abuse and sterilisation, the female slavery of domestic servitude and the pastoral world of rural Germany in which the city’s political currents are only dimly perceived. And it gestures at the terrible pathos of the old GDR, which laboured and sacrificed for 40 years after the war in Soviet vassalage finally to discover it was for nothing. The film’s original German title is In Die Sonne Schauen, or Staring at the Sun.