By Daniel Lovering

ATTLEBORO, Mass., July 9 (Reuters) - Massachusetts police have found shell casings that could link former National Football League player Aaron Hernandez to the site where a semi-pro football player was gunned down last month, according to court documents unsealed on Tuesday.

Hernandez, 23, has been charged with the execution-style killing of Odin Lloyd, 27, and has lost his $41 million contract with the New England Patriots. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges, including five counts related to illegal firearms possession.

Hernandez, a tight end with the Patriots, one of the league's top franchises, had been a rising NFL star.

The court documents included an autopsy showing that Lloyd was shot several times and that two projectiles consistent with .45 caliber ammunition were recovered from the area where his body was recovered.

Police said they also found a matching spent shell casing that had been in a silver 2012 Nissan Altima rented by Hernandez.

At an apartment Hernandez rented in Franklin, Massachusetts, police also discovered five boxes of .45 caliber cartridges, according to the documents.

Prosecutors said Hernandez shot Lloyd after becoming upset with him days earlier at a Boston nightclub. Lloyd's body was found June 17 in an industrial area near Hernandez's house in North Attleboro, about 40 miles (64 km) south of Boston.

Two other men have been taken into custody in connection with the case. Ernest Wallace, who is suspected of being an "accessory after the fact," turned himself in to police in Miramar, Florida, last month. Another man, Carlos Ortiz, was arrested in Connecticut on charges of being a fugitive from justice.

Hernandez's lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A manager at an Enterprise car rental outlet in North Attleboro told police Hernandez had rented a silver 2012 Nissan Altima along with another vehicle. When he returned it on June 18, there was damage to the driver's side mirror and door, the documents said.

EVIDENCE MOUNTS

Investigators also found dirt on the tires and lower panels of the Nissan that was "similar in color and appearance" to the ground where Lloyd's body was found, according to the documents. Lloyd's fingerprints were also found in the car.

An Enterprise manager who cleaned the Altima after it had been returned said she recovered a "bullet" from the car and threw it into a dumpster. A search of the dumpster turned up a spent .45 caliber cartridge casing, which tests showed matched the casings found near Lloyd's body, the documents said.

A .45 caliber firearm has not been found.

The documents also revealed new details related to a black Chevy Suburban that Hernandez had rented and found in the yard at Lloyd's Boston residence. Keys to the vehicle were found in Lloyd's pocket.

When investigators questioned Hernandez about the car, he became argumentative, the documents said.

"We informed Mr. Hernandez that this was a death investigation," a police affidavit said. "Mr. Hernandez did not ask officers whose death was being investigated. Mr. Hernandez's demeanor did not indicate any concern for the death of any person."

Police have also recovered a semi-automatic rifle with an attached magazine containing 33 live rounds from a car parked in Hernandez's garage, according to the documents.

Hernandez did not have a valid or expired Massachusetts license to carry firearms, police said. (Editing by Edith Honan, Steve Orlofsky and Philip Barbara)

The case is the latest in roughly a dozen brought by the U.S. Department of Justice and Food and Drug Administration against distributors of unapproved pharmaceuticals.

Under the latest sentencing, in U.S. District Court in Missoula, Montana, Paul Daniel Bottomley, 48, agreed to forfeit $1.1 million in cash, a 2011 Aston Martin which was sold for $110,000 at auction, and 10 parcels of real estate. The Justice Department said it valued the total forfeiture at around $6 million.

John Roth, director of the FDA's office of criminal investigations, said Bottomley managed to avoid jail time because he fully cooperated with the investigation.

The sentencing comes a day after a British man, Richard Taylor, was sentenced to 18 months in prison and an $800,000 fine for selling a Turkish version of Roche Holding AG's multibillion-dollar cancer drug Avastin to U.S. physicians.

The discovery in late 2011 of fake Avastin in U.S. oncology practices sparked an international investigation. The drugs were sold in the United States by, among others, Bottomley's company, Montana Healthcare Solutions.

In October 2010, Bottomley sold his company to Rockley Ventures Ltd, a subsidiary of Canada Drugs Ltd, an Internet-based pharmacy based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, for $5 million. Bottomley remained an adviser to Canada Drugs.

(Reporting by Toni Clarke; Editing by Mohammad Zargham)

Teacher Orvar Arnarson, 41, and student Andrimar Pordarson, 25, jumped separately, not in tandem, on Saturday after successfully completing two jumps earlier that day with 20 other people. The two Icelandic skydivers did not return from their third jump, tipping off an hours-long air and ground search around the Zephyrhills facility, about 30 miles northeast of Tampa. The bodies were discovered later that evening in the woods.

Investigators will review the helmet cam footage to try to glean more about what happened, said Pasco County sheriff's spokeswoman Melanie Snow.

The cause of death was blunt force trauma, the medical examiner's office said. Autopsy results were pending, but a preliminary investigation determined that the manner of death was accidental.

The men didn't deploy their main parachutes, which could mean that they lost altitude awareness and didn't know where they were during the jump, Skydive City co-owner T.K. Hayes told The Associated Press on Sunday. Both victims had backup automatic activation devices, but they didn't have time to fully inflate.

Out of just over 3 million jumps, 19 skydivers died last year across the U.S., according to the United States Parachute Association. Experts said it is "very rare" for two jumpers to die in the same accident.

"It happens from time to time if two skydivers collide while flying their parachutes if they don't see each other," said Nancy Koreen, Director of Sport Promotion for association.

"In that situation, their canopies can tangle, causing an accident. I don't yet know the details of this particular accident, but from what I understand, this was a different case," she said, adding that "it's extremely rare for this type of double fatality to occur."

The victims were part of a skydiving group from Iceland who travel to Florida annually.

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"Following a scan this evening on a hamstring injury sustained in training, it has been decided that Wayne Rooney should return home immediately for further assessment and rehabilitation," United said on their website (www.manutd.com).

"It is anticipated he will be unavailable for selection for a month," added the statement as Rooney prepared to fly back to England from Bangkok for treatment.

Rooney will be doubtful for the Community Shield clash with FA Cup winners Wigan Athletic at Wembley in the traditional season curtain raiser on August 11 before United begin the defence of their Premier League title away to Swansea City a week later.

He has been the subject of transfer speculation since retired United manager Alex Ferguson revealed at the end of last season the England forward had asked for a transfer.

However, new United coach Moyes reiterated on Wednesday that Rooney was not for sale and would not be leaving the club.

"I have met Wayne two, three, four times. A lot has been said about myself and Wayne over the years but we have a really good relationship," said the Scot, who was manager of Everton when Rooney began his career on Merseyside.

"He is training great. They are telling me it is the best shape they have seen him in for a long time... I am going to try and get the best Wayne Rooney I possibly can," he added.

United open their tour against a Singha All-Star X1 in Bangkok on Saturday and will also play in Sydney, Yokohama, Osaka and Hong Kong before facing AIK in Stockholm on August 6.

LONDON (Reuters) - When Andy Murray lost his first three grand slam finals without winning a set, it seemed he was destined to join a long line of 'Brave Brits' whose career would be defined by near misses.

Many predicted that when he finally hung up his racket, he would simply tag on the end of the queue which was already heaving with such tennis luminaries as Bunny Austin, Roger Taylor, John Lloyd, Greg Rusedski and Tim Henman.

Fred Perry's standing as the last British player to win a grand slam title, in 1936, looked like it would stretch on to another generation.

But just when British fans were starting to despair, Murray decided to seek out a new coach and dialed the number of a tennis great who had barely been seen around a court in 18 years.

The fact that that man happened to be Ivan Lendl - a player whose love-hate relationship with Wimbledon went to extremes - certainly raised eyebrows within the tennis fraternity.

What had initially seemed like a crazy idea has turned out to be a masterstroke because over the course of 18 months, the Czech-turned-American plotted Murray's path to glory in arguably the greatest ever era for men's tennis.

First came the Olympic gold amid joyful scenes at the All England Club last August, then the U.S. Open at Flushing Meadows and finally on Sunday Murray got his hands on the ultimate prize in tennis - the Wimbledon men's trophy.

"He believed in me when a lot of people didn't," said Murray whose calm demeanor on Sunday was in stark contrast to 12 months ago when he ended up being a tearful wreck after finishing runner-up to Roger Federer.

"He stuck by me through... obviously some tough losses the last couple of years. He's been very patient with me. I'm just happy I managed to do it for him. He would have loved to have won here... but I think this was the next best thing for him."

When Murray lost to Federer in the final last July, his career path seemed to be mirroring Lendl's who also lost his first four major finals.

FAMOUSLY BOYCOTTED

Lendl famously boycotted Wimbledon in 1982 after declaring "grass is for cows" but a decade later winning Wimbledon became an all-encompassing, yet ultimately futile, obsession for him.

The lessons Lendl learnt from his own failures, however, fuelled his desire to help Murray succeed and end Britain's marathon wait for a men's champion at Wimbledon.

"He's made me learn more from the losses that I've had than maybe I did in the past," explained the 26-year-old following his win over Novak Djokovic.

"He's always told me exactly what he thought. And in tennis, it's not always that easy to do in a player/coach relationship.

"The player is sometimes the one in charge. But he's been extremely honest with me. If I work hard, he's happy. If I don't, he's disappointed and he'll tell me."

When Lendl came on board, it was not as if he had to tinker too much with Murray's arsenal. The weapons were all there and his fitness regime was already bordering on the extreme - with Murray famously training on Christmas Day in the Miami heat.

However, Lendl has left an indelible mark on Murray's on-court demeanor, which used to swing to extremes.

Whereas Murray used to become 'Mr Desperate' or 'Mr Angry' when things were not going his way - often drawing blood from his knuckles as he bashed his fist against his racket strings - Lendl has taught him how to stay 'Mr Cool' even when the going gets tough.

That approach means that under Lendl, Murray has finally fulfilled the promise he showed when he won the boy's title at the U.S. Open in 2004 as a 17-year-old tyro.

After single-handedly shouldering the hopes of 60 million Britons for almost a decade, Murray now hopes it will not take another lifetime for Britain to find a worthy Wimbledon successor.

"With the amount of money that's invested in the sport in this country, then it shouldn't take another 70 odd years. I would hope that it wouldn't be that long again," he added before heading off to the Wimbledon champions' ball.

(Editing by Ed Osmond)

A judge on Friday refused the request by Monsignor Nunzio Scarano's lawyers to let him await a decision on his fate in a monastery, ruling he must stay in Rome's Queen of Heaven prison. Attorney Silverio Sica said he would appeal.

Scarano was arrested June 28 along with two others, accused of plotting to bring 20 million euros into Italy from Switzerland without declaring it at customs.

The decision came a day after the Vatican bank president, Ernst von Freyberg, told his board that an internal investigation into the Scarano affair uncovered "clear failings" in the bank's anti-money-laundering procedures, according to excerpts of his remarks obtained Friday by The Associated Press.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the message sent in his name promising a temporary cessation of violence with next week's start of Ramadan was the latest incident in a simmering cyber war between intelligence agencies and the insurgents.

"In that mail the enemy losers have tried to influence attacks by mujahideen fighters," Mujahid said. "We strongly reject sending any such email on a stoppage of operations."

Afghan spy agency the National Directorate of Security has increasingly targeted the Taliban's sophisticated messaging network, which includes websites and email accounts, social media and spokesmen using noms de guerre.

The Taliban use Afghanistan's improving phone network to distribute anti-government messages and use Twitter to claim largely improbable successes as most foreign combat troops look to leave the country by 2014.

The Taliban, who ruled Afghanistan with an iron fist from 1996 to 2001, are seeking to overthrow the U.S.-backed government and end foreign occupation.

While Ramadan is usually a relatively quiet month for insurgent attacks marked mainly by the use of roadside bombs rather than direct assaults by armed fighters, Zabihullah said the month also carried extra religious significance for insurgents.

"During the holy month of Ramadan, jihad has major rewards. And mujahideen will continue to employ all their fighting techniques to mount attacks on the enemy," he said.

Taliban fighters in 2011 used car bombs to attack a British government cultural center in the Afghan capital over the Ramadan period, killing almost a dozen people.

This year the militants have stepped up attacks ahead of the Afghan summer months. Insurgents including a suicide bomber attacked a foreign logistics and supply company last week in Kabul, the latest in a string of daring assaults in the capital.

Kabul's police chief General Mohammad Ayoub Salangi said on Friday that security forces had arrested three people in a night raid and seized five suicide bomb vests.

(Reporting by Rob Taylor and Mirwais Harooni; Editing by Nick Macfie)

During a news conference at which he was peppered with questions about a weekend that left 11 people shot to death and several dozen more wounded, Superintendent Garry McCarthy said residents will be able to come forward anonymously with tips and the police officers who get that information will never know where it originated.

McCarthy said the department's efforts to build trust in the community, starting with an emphasis on putting beat officers in neighborhoods so they can get to know the people they serve, are paying off. But McCarthy has repeatedly talked about the no-snitch street culture that often leaves people reluctant or unwilling to come forward with information. Monday's announcement came with an assurance that police will never know who the tip came from or even the tipsters' phone numbers.

"That is one of the concerns that we hear echoed across the communities when we talk to them about new technology," said Jonathan Lewin, managing deputy director of public safety information technology for the department.

McCarthy said tips can be routed to police officers in squad cars before they arrive at crime scenes.

Further, McCarthy, said people making 911 calls will be able to send photographs directly to police from their cell phones.

"If we have a picture of a criminal committing a crime and we are approaching the scene ... something like that would be an unbelievable assistance to our men and women," he said.

The pilot program that is being rolled out in three communities two high crime areas on the city's West and South Sides and the trendy River North area also will include a pilot Twitter program that will allow police to share information such as community alerts, missing persons reports with residents.

McCarthy stressed the department's tactics to reduce crime have been successful, pointing out that so far this year the 200 homicides is 76 fewer than there were for the same period last year, and that the number of shooting incidents has dropped to 909 compared to 1,193 for the same period last year.

He said the weekend shootings including the wounding of two young children in two parks prompted him to enact a non-technical strategy.

"You're going to see more enforcement of curfews in parks," he said. "Having people shot at 12:30 at night in a city park can be prevented by the police if we clear that park and get them out of the park."

McCarthy said he talked with Mayor Rahm Emanuel for more than an hour before the news conference.

"He wants to know what's going on, just like I want to know," he said.

Since last year, when the number of homicides in the city climbed past 500, Chicago has become a focus of the gun debate as it plays out nationally and in Illinois. On Monday, McCarthy found himself fielding questions about what might happen in the city once state lawmakers enact a law, as soon as Tuesday, that will allow residents to carry concealed weapons as they walk and drive the streets.

As he has done in the past, McCarthy said he was worried that the provision in the law that requires 16 hours training for a concealed carry permit is "absolutely inadequate."

"As sure as we're standing here, we're going to have tragedies," he said. "We have one playing our in Florida as we speak," he said, referring to the trial of a man charged in the shooting death of an unarmed teenager, Trayvon Martin.

The triangle consists of three of the brightest stars in the sky, each the brightest star in its own constellation. The brightest is the bluish-white star Vega, in Lyra, the lyre. Next in brightness is yellow-whitein Aquila, the eagle. Finally there is white Deneb, in Cygnus, the swan.

From our viewpoint, Vega appears twice as bright as Altair and more than three times brighter than Deneb. But sometimes things are not always what they seem. We know that Vega clearly is more luminous compared to Altair, because its situated at a greater distance from us. Altair is 17 light years away, while Vega is just a little farther out at 25 light years away. []

The light you're seeing from Altair tonight started on its journey to Earth in 1996, and the light from Vega started on its way toward Earth back in 1988. But brilliant Vega actually pales in comparison with Deneb, one of the greatest supergiant stars known.

Deneb's distance measures 1,467 light-years from Earth with a luminosity computed to be more than 60,000 times that of the sun. Because its light takes nearly 15 centuries to reach us, Deneb merely appears as a fairly conspicuous but by no means particularly notable star.

See the Milky Way

With the moon arriving at new phase on Monday (July 8), and then waxing to just a thin crescent phase by week's end, there is no better time than now to observe the beautiful summer Milky Way.

Under a dark sky with a good pair of binoculars or ayou can now observe millions of sparkling little stars that make up this glowing, irregular belt of luminosity.

It appears to arch from the north-northeast to the south-southeast, with its brightest and most spectacular region running across the summer triangle and beyond toward the south-southeast horizon.

There appears to be a great black rift dividing it into two streams (called the "dark bifurcation"), beginning with Cygnus and extending down toward the south. Also in Cygnus is the black void known as the "northern coal stack." The coal stack and the rift are not holes in the , but rather are vast clouds of dust "floating" out in interstellar space which present a solid and impenetrable curtain between us and the more distant stars.

Star-crossed lovers

There have been many stories, myths and legends told about the Milky Way in many different cultures.

In a Japanese legend involving the galaxy, the starrepresented Orihime, the weaving princess, who produced brilliantly colored fabrics. Across the "heavenly river" (the Milky Way), Altair represented the cow herder Hikoboshi, who was also known as Kengyu.

After meeting each other, they received divine permission to marry, whereupon both abandoned their occupations. This angered the gods who consequently separate them and send them back to their original jobs on opposite sides of the heavenly river.

The couple, however, received permission from the gods to get together for one night each year. That special night is July 7 but only if the sky is clear.

As a result, the evening of July 7 has evolved into a young-peoples holiday in Japan called Tanabata, meaning "evening of the seventh." Prayers are offered for clear skies so that Orihime and Hikoboshi, the star-crossed lovers can be reunited.

Popular customs relating to the festival vary by region, but generally, girls wished for better sewing and craftsmanship, and boys wished for better handwriting by writing wishes on strips of paper. The date of Tanabata also varies by region, but the first festivities begin on July 7 of the Gregorian calendar.

The original Tanabata date was based on the Japanese lunisolar calendar, which is about a month behind the . As a result, some festivals are held on July 7, some are held on a few days around August 7, while the others are still held on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month of the traditional Japanese lunisolar calendar, which is usually in August in the Gregorian calendar.

This year, the Gregorian date of "the seventh day of the seventh lunar month of the Japanese lunisolar calendar" will fall on Aug. 13.

Editor's note: If you snap an amazing picture of the night sky that you'd like to share for a possible story or image gallery send photos, comments and your name and location to Managing Editor Tariq Malik at .

Joe Rao serves as an instructor and guest lecturer at New York's Hayden Planetarium. He writes about astronomy for "Natural History" magazine, the "Farmer's Almanac" and other publications, and he is also an on-camera meteorologist for News 12 Westchester, New York. Follow us on ,and . Original article on SPACE.com.