NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A scruffy little fugitive is on the lam again in New Orleans, gaining fame as he outwits a tenacious band of citizens armed with night-vision binoculars, nets and a tranquilizer rifle. Scrim, a 17-pound mutt that's mostly terrier, has become a folk hero, inspiring tattoos, t-shirts and even a ballad as he eludes capture from the posse of volunteers. And like any antihero, Scrim has a backstory: Rescued from semi-feral life at a trailer park and adopted from a shelter, the dog broke loose in April and scurried around the city until he was cornered in October and brought to a new home. Weeks later, he'd had enough. Scrim leaped out of a second-story window, a desperate act recorded in a now-viral video. Since then, despite a stream of daily sightings, he's roamed free. The dog’s fans include Myra and Steve Foster, who wrote “Ode to Scrim” to the tune of Ricky Nelson’s 1961 hit, “I’m a Travelin’ Man.” Leading the recapture effort is Michelle Cheramie, a 55-year-old former information technology professional. She lost everything — home, car, possessions — in Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and in the aftermath, found her calling rescuing pets. “I was like, ‘This is what I should be doing,’” Cheramie said. “I was born to rescue.” She launched Zeus’ Rescues, a nonprofit shelter that now averages 600 cat and dog adoptions a year and offers free pet food to anyone who needs it. She helped Scrim find the home he first escaped from. It was Cheramie's window Scrim leaped from in November. She's resumed her relentless mission since then, posting flyers on telephone poles and logging social media updates on his reported whereabouts. She's invested thousands of dollars on wildlife cameras, thermal sensors and other gear. She took a course offered by the San Diego Zoo on the finer points of tranquilizing animals. And she's developed a network of volunteers — the kind of neighbors who are willing to grid-search a city at 3 a.m. People like writer David W. Brown, who manages a crowd-sourced Google Map of all known Scrim sightings. He says the search has galvanized residents from all walks of life to come together. As they search for Scrim, they hand out supplies to people in need. "Being a member of the community is seeing problems and doing what you can to make life a little better for the people around here and the animals around you," Brown said. And neighbors like Tammy Murray, who had to close her furniture store and lost her father to Parkinson's Disease. This search, she says, got her mojo back. “Literally, for months, I’ve done nothing but hunt this dog,” said Murray, 53. “I feel like Wile E. Coyote on a daily basis with him.” Murray drives the Zeus' Rescues' van towards reported Scrim sightings. She also handles a tactical net launcher, which looks like an oversized flashlight and once misfired, shattering the van's window as Scrim sped away. After realizing Scrim had come to recognize the sound of the van's diesel engine, Murray switched to a Vespa scooter, for stealth. Near-misses have been tantalizing. The search party spotted Scrim napping beneath an elevated house, and wrapped construction netting around the perimeter, but an over-eager volunteer broke ranks and dashed forward, leaving an opening Scrim slipped through. Scrim's repeated escapades have prompted near-daily local media coverage and a devoted online following. Cheramie can relate. “We’re all running from something or to something. He's doing that too,” she said. Cheramie's team dreams of placing the pooch in a safe and loving environment. But a social media chorus growing under the hashtag #FreeScrim has other ideas — they say the runaway should be allowed a life of self-determination. The animal rescue volunteers consider that misguided. “The streets of New Orleans are not the place for a dog to be free,” Cheramie said. “It’s too dangerous.” Scrim was a mess when Cheramie briefly recaptured him in October, with matted fur, missing teeth and a tattered ear. His trembling body was scraped and bruised, and punctured by multiple projectiles. A vet removed one, but decided against operating to take out a possible bullet. The dog initially appeared content indoors, sitting in Cheramie's lap or napping beside her bed. Then while she was out one day, Scrim chewed through a mesh screen, dropped 13 feet to the ground and squeezed through a gap in the fence, trotting away. Murray said Cheramie's four cats probably spooked him. “I wholeheartedly believe the gangster-ass cats were messing with him,” Murray said. Cheramie thinks they may have gotten territorial. Devastated but undeterred, the pair is reassessing where Scrim might fit best — maybe a secure animal sanctuary with big outdoor spaces where other dogs can keep him company. Somewhere, Murray says, “where he can just breathe and be." Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Brook on the social platform X: @jack_brook96President-elect Donald Trump’s lawyers urge judge to toss his hush money conviction

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ANNAPOLIS, Md. — No. 3 Nebraska finished with four individual champions and had finalists in seven of the 10 weight classes as the Huskers won the team title at the 12-team Navy Classic on Saturday. Nebraska finished with 150 points, while Oregon State was next with 130.5. Brock Hardy won a matchup of top-10 opponents at 141 pounds earned a 10-3 decision over ninth-ranked Joshua Koderhandt of Navy. NU’s other champions were Caleb Smith at 125, Antrell Taylor at 157 and Silas Allred at 184. Runners-up were Lenny Pinto at 174 and heavyweight Harley Andrews. At 165, Nebraska had both finalists in Bubba Wilson and Chris Minto. Nebraska is off until Dec. 6 when it competes in the Cliff Keen Invitational. Get local news delivered to your inbox!

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‘You do you, Jane’: O’Neil and Hume clash over government’s response to antisemitismThree students of National University of Science and Technology – Al Yaqeen Amur Asuti, Reem Ahmed al Qassabi and Ahamed al Awad – have designed an innovative device that transforms palm waste into circular green aluminum. Their project, titled ‘Green Initiative for Utilising Omani Palm Waste to Produce Circular Green Aluminum’, is a pioneering step towards creating a zero-waste, sustainable economy in Oman. According to Dr Shabib al Rashdi, the project’s supervisor, the project was born out of the need to tackle Oman’s agricultural waste problem, particularly the large volume of waste generated by palm trees. Launched two years ago, the project aligns with Oman’s sustainability goals and Vision 2040, offering an environmentally friendly solution to agricultural waste management. The project involves extracting lignin from palm waste, which is then applied to commercial aluminium, transforming it into a more sustainable, recyclable, and environmentally friendly material. It is one of the first zero-waste technology ventures in Oman. Once completed, the project is expected to produce 800 tonnes of circular green aluminum annually. The next phase will involve manufacturing the device in China and conducting trials at the Waste Research Laboratory in Oman, positioning the project as a trailblazer in waste-to-resource innovation. The project addresses critical environmental challenges while promoting sustainability. Additionally, the recycling process incorporates renewable energy, contributing to carbon emission reduction and supporting green industry practices. While the project has made significant progress, it has not been without challenges. The team encountered technical difficulties in adapting recycling technologies, logistical issues in collecting palm waste from remote areas, and lack of initial expertise. However, through international collaborations and innovative approaches, they overcame these obstacles. Their efforts were recognised when the project placed first in the Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation’s Upgrade Competition 2024 and third in MoHERI’s We Are Oman Competition 2024. Looking ahead, the team plans to expand operations to recycle larger volumes of palm waste, creating job opportunities in rural areas and enhancing environmental awareness. They aim to encourage industries to adopt sustainable practices, contributing to Oman Vision 2040 by advancing the circular economy and promoting a low-carbon future.

The Defence Force admits it will have to stop doing a "raft" of things and scale down missions due to its financial crunch. On Tuesday it confirmed it had a $360m deficit looming next year , after RNZ revealed that earlier in the day. "So that number, I don't know how it's got out," Chief of Defence Air Marshal Tony Davies told MPs during scrutiny week at Parliament. While all key missions were still going ahead, with eight or nine deployed, that would become more difficult, he said. "There's a whole raft of things that we have to pause or turn off to make sure that we can keep our flying sailing, shooting and deploying going. "There's a lot of things we can't afford to do at the moment." The likes of training, travel and building relationships with overseas partners would pause or stop but it had "not failed to to deploy or do an operation". "The issue really is it takes us longer to prepare to do those missions and those deployments, and we might not be able to send the same number of people that we have previously sent or for as long. Davies confirmed they faced a $360m deficit in operating costs next year. A memo had gone out last week, which also said an option was to cut its wage bill by another $50m, as RNZ had reported. "Three hundred and sixty million dollars is the figure we're looking at, at the moment. Now, is that going to result in output failure for us? No," Davies said. "I'll have to say the leaking of that figure was not intended," he said, after Green MP Teanau Tuiono asked what the plan was to ensure the deficit did not affect national security. "We were talking to a select group of people within the headquarters to brief them on what's going on with our workforce programme. As we've promised, we are trying to be very transparent with them." Davies emphasised missions were still going ahead. Cost pressures Defence Minister Judith Collins said the forces got funding in this year's Budget that other agencies did not get, but faced very difficult cost pressures. "Nobody's shying away from that." Asked how the Defence Capability Plan would deal with the deficit, she said the plan would be out early next year. The sinking of the survey ship Manawanui off Samoa has added to a weight of rising routine costs for fuel, ammunition and to maintain plant and housing; housing was "under significant pressure", Davies said. Cutting another $50m from the wage bill might depend on more voluntary redundancies among Defence's civilian workforce, which has dropped from 3300 to about 3100 recently. Collins said the numbers on the non-civilian side, particularly Navy, were recovering after high attrition under the Labour-led government. Air Force attrition was down to about seven percent, from 17 percent, she said. Attrition, and fixing it, and the growing tensions of international geopolitics had combined to delay the release of the Defence Capability Plan. Collins said. Also, the work on it had to ensure interoperability with Australia. The plan, out to 2040, was begun in August 2023 and had been expected to be out earlier this year. The previous government issued the principles behind it and these aimed at building forces more capable of going into combat than before. NZ firms get small slice of Defence business The problem of New Zealand companies getting little business from the NZDF came up at the scrutiny week hearing. Only $119m of Defence's $6 billion budget was spent locally, mostly on niche firms that subcontracted to huge multinational contractors, Defence Secretary Brook Barrington told MPs. Defence routinely told these "prime" contractors to look for local supply if they could, he said. It also kept a tight rein on capital spending, such as by using fixed-price contracts when it bought equipment. "We both try to constrain .. the risk of cost overruns, [and] we have disciplines around contractors to make sure they don't themselves over-run or fail to meet their contractual obligations," Barrington said. A "bitter lesson" over many years had been to get the user requirements right at the very start; "What exactly does the Defence Force require an asset to do?" was the crucial question, he said. Defence recently initiated its first meeting with local "emerging" technology firms, and Collins called for more teamwork with tech firms at a defence industry meeting in July: "In a speech to Defence industry leaders in May, I noted that asymmetric and disruptive technologies , and the requirement to get the technological advantage offered by those capabilities into service quicker, is the modern-day catalyst for change in Defence and Defence industry technology," her speech notes said. How Defence will afford a raft of new technology amid the financial crunch remains not clear. "You'll have to wait and see for the DCP (Defence Capability Plan) to be released, and as for the Budget, you'll have to wait for that, too," Collins told journalists on Tuesday. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

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