10 things you need to know today: October 9, 2014

(Image credit: (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez))

Jump to category:

1. U.S. Ebola patient dies
2. Kurds protest in Turkey as ISIS renews its push into a Syrian border town
3. White officer shoots and kills black teen in St. Louis
4. Justice Kennedy lets Idaho delay same-sex marriages despite ruling
5. NBC News reportedly tried to hire Jon Stewart
6. Man killed by bees in Arizona
7. Former death-row inmate released in Texas
8. Spanish officials euthanize Ebola patient's dog despite protests
9. Civilians die in fighting between India and Pakistan
10. Nobel literature prize goes to French writer Modiano

last updated 13 January 2015

1. U.S. Ebola patient dies

Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the U.S., died Wednesday. Duncan, who developed symptoms after flying from Liberia to Dallas, was treated with experimental medication and had been on a ventilator in an isolation ward. The Dallas clinic said it was examining a man who may have had contact with Duncan and was exhibiting symptoms. The White House said Wednesday that passengers entering the U.S. from West Africa will be screened at five major airports to help prevent others infected with Ebola from entering the country.

At least 21 people have been killed in protest by Turkish Kurds against their government's failure to send military aid to Kurdish fighters trying to keep the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria from taking over the Syrian border town of Kobani. Turkey imposed curfews in areas along the country's border with Syria. ISIS fighters launched a renewed assault on Kobani and seized a third of the city, a monitoring group said Thursday, after airstrikes by a U.S.-led coalition turned them back a day earlier.

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A white police officer shot and killed a black teenager in St Louis on Wednesday night, setting off fresh protests in communities still tense following the fatal police shooting of another black youth, Michael Brown, in the nearby suburb of Ferguson. Police said the 18-year-old, identified by relatives as Vonderrit Myers Jr., fired three shots at the officer, who was off-duty but patrolling for a private security firm. Myers' relatives said he was unarmed. "It's like Michael Brown all over again," a cousin said.

Nevada began allowing same-sex couples to get married on Wednesday, a day after the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal of a ruling striking down gay-marriage bans in Nevada and Idaho. Same-sex couples in Idaho, however, were told they would have to wait to exchange vows, after Justice Anthony Kennedy decided to grant a request from that state's leaders to delay letting gay couples marry, disappointing gay couples who showed up in Idaho clerks' offices hoping to apply for marriage licenses.

NBC News tried to hire Comedy Central star Jon Stewart to host Meet the Press. One person with knowledge of the wrangling said NBC was ready to offer Stewart, host of the wildly popular satirical Daily Show, "anything" to take the job. "They were ready to back the Brink's truck up," the source said. NBC representatives declined to comment. Newsman Chuck Todd got the show instead of Stewart, and after a brief ratings spike the program has returned to third place among Sunday news shows.

A man was killed by a swarm of bees from a hive of more than 800,000 on Wednesday while he did lawn work in Douglas, Arizona, near the Mexican border. The man, 32, was part of a gardening crew. His face and neck were covered with bees. Several other men in the crew ran to a nearby home to escape the bees. One other man was stung more than 100 times, but he was treated and released at a local hospital. A 90-year-old man who lives in the home where the attack occurred was not stung.

A judge ordered a former construction laborer who spent four years on death row to be released on parole for a lesser charge, after ruling that his court-appointed lawyers had given him an inadequate defense. The man, Manuel Velez, 49, was convicted and sentenced to die for the 2005 beating death of the 1-year-old son of a women he was living with. A prosecution expert had said the child's fatal injuries occurred more than two weeks before his death, when Velez was 1,000 miles away, but defense lawyers failed to present the evidence in his trial.

Spanish authorities put down a dog belonging to a nurse's assistant, Teresa Romero Ramos, who has become the first person to contract the Ebola virus outside of West Africa, which is in the grip of the worst outbreak of the deadly virus in history. Health officials said it was necessary to kill the dog, Excalibur, to make sure it would not infect humans. Dozens of animal rights activists had protested in front of the home of the patient and her husband, yelling "murderers" at arriving medical workers.

At least five civilians were killed Wednesday in some of the most intense fighting in years between India and Pakistan in the mostly Muslim Himalayan region of disputed Kashmir. The civilian death toll from more than a week of violence has now reached 17 — nine Pakistanis and eight Indians. The neighboring, nuclear-powered countries accused each other of intentionally targeting civilians despite an 11-year border truce.

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.