Catfish's Michael Fortunato Dead at 26: MTV Subject Dies of Pulmonary Embolism

Another life cut tragically short. Michael Fortunato, who appeared on season two of MTV's Catfish series, died on Saturday, Oct. 12, of a pulmonary embolism, MTV reports. He was 26.

Fortunato's younger sister, Gena, confirmed the news on Monday, Oct. 14. An autopsy has yet to be released, but a spokesperson for the Farmington, Conn., medical examiner's office told MTV that the young man died at Hartford Hospital from a pulmonary embolism resulting from deep vein thrombosis. Other contributing factors included obesity and cardiomyopathy.

PHOTOS: Reality TV tragedies

Fortunato, a New Jersey native, was one of the subjects of MTV's popular docudrama Catfish, which helps couples in online relationships meet in real life. (The term "catfish" refers to a person who creates fake personal profiles on the Internet in order to trick someone else into falling in love with him or her.)

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Prior to appearing on the show, Fortunato had been in a seven-year online-only relationship with Ashley Sawyer. Their first meeting was documented in the series' 10th episode of the second season.

Sawyer told MTV that Fortunato had texted her the morning of his death about going to the hospital, but that he later changed his mind. According to Gena, he was en route to seek medical care when he swerved and hit a fence; two hours later, she got the call that he had died.

PHOTOS: People we've lost in 2013

"I don't even know where to start," Gena told MTV. "He was a little kid at heart -- a gentle giant. He's somebody who put everybody before himself; everybody else came before him. The biggest heart that you'd ever meet." 

Added Sawyer, 20, who told MTV she and Fortunato were "very much in love": "He would give anybody the last shirt he had -- anything. He would put his life on hold just to make sure other people moved forward. He always put people first."

Source: http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/catfishs-michael-fortunato-dead-at-26-mtv-subject-dies-of-pulmonary-embolism-20131510
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Once Upon a Time's Goodwin and Dallas to marry

NEW YORK (AP) — Ginnifer Goodwin and Josh Dallas' fairy tale extends beyond their day jobs.

The actors, both 35, play Snow White and Prince Charming on ABC's "Once Upon a Time" and have announced their engagement.

The couple met while working on the show and began dating in 2011.

Goodwin was previously engaged to actor Joey Kern, while Dallas was married to Lara Pulver from 2007-2011.

On her official Twitter account, Goodwin wrote Friday, "From my soon-2-b-Mrs-Dallas head 2 my soon-2-be Mrs-Dallas-toes, I'm oh-so grateful 4 your well wishes! THANK U!"

Dallas tweeted to on his account, "Thanks to all of you for the outpouring of love and congrats!"

"Once Upon a Time" is now in its third season.

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Online:

abc.go.com/shows/once-upon-a-time?/

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/once-upon-times-goodwin-dallas-marry-200051756.html
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Labelle, Latifah honorees of Black Girls Rock!

ATLANTA (AP) — Patti Labelle is a known diva and Queen Latifah does not consider herself one, but both will be among those honored as part of the Black Girls Rock! awards show on BET.

Black Girls Rock! founder Beverly Bond announced the show's honorees in a statement Monday. Other honorees include tennis champion Venus Williams, screenwriter-producer Mara Brock Akil, ballet dancer Misty Copeland, community organizer Ameena Matthews and children's rights advocate Marian Wright Edelman.

Actresses Tracee Ellis Ross and Regina King return as hosts of the ceremony, which will air Nov. 3. It will be taped later this month at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, N.J.

Black Girls Rock! is a nonprofit organization that mentors young black girls and works to fight negative images of black women in the media.

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http://www.blackgirlsrock.org

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/labelle-latifah-honorees-black-girls-rock-185937722.html
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Major quake shakes central Philippines, kills 32

Filipinos stand by a damaged Basilica Del Sto Nino in Cebu, central Philippines Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2013. A 7.2-magnitude earthquake collapsed buildings, cracked roads and toppled the bell tower of the Philippines' oldest church Tuesday morning, killing at least 20 people across the central region. (AP Photo/Chester Baldicantos)

Filipinos stand by a damaged Basilica Del Sto Nino in Cebu, central Philippines Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2013. A 7.2-magnitude earthquake collapsed buildings, cracked roads and toppled the bell tower of the Philippines' oldest church Tuesday morning, killing at least 20 people across the central region. (AP Photo/Chester Baldicantos)

Rescuers recover an unidentified man under the rubbles at a fish port in Pasil, Cebu, central Philippines Tuesday Oct. 15, 2013. A 7.2-magnitude earthquake struck in the central Philippines Tuesday morning, collapsing roofs and buildings, cracking walls and roads and killing at least 20 people. (AP Photo/Chester Baldicantos)

Map locates the city of Carmen in the Philippines; 1c x 3 inches; 46.5 mm x 76 mm;

Doctors treat a woman outside a damaged Vicente Sotto Hospital in Cebu, central Philippines on Tuesday Oct. 15, 2013. A 7.2-magnitude earthquake collapsed buildings, cracked roads and toppled the bell tower of the Philippines' oldest church Tuesday morning, killing at least 20 people across the central region. (AP Photo/Chester Baldicantos)

Damaged cars lie under a rubble outside the GMC Plaza Building in Cebu, central Philippines Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2013. A 7.2-magnitude earthquake collapsed buildings, cracked roads and toppled the bell tower of the Philippines' oldest church Tuesday morning, killing at least 20 people across the central region. (AP Photo/Chester Baldicantos)

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A 7.2-magnitude earthquake killed at least 32 people across the central Philippines on Tuesday, toppling buildings and historic churches and sending terrified residents into deadly stampedes.

Panic ensued as people spilled out on the street after the quake struck at 8:12 a.m. It was centered about 33 kilometers (20 miles) below Carmen town on Bohol Island, where many buildings collapsed, roads cracked up and bridges fell. Extensive damage also hit densely populated Cebu city, across the narrow strait from Bohol, causing deaths when a fish port and a market roof fell.

The quake set off a stampede in a Cebu gym where people lined up to receive government cash assistance, killing five and injuring eight others, said Neil Sanchez, provincial disaster management officer. In another city nearby, 18 people were injured in the scramble to get out of a shaking building where the assistance was being handed out.

At least 16 people died in Bohol and 15 in Cebu, officials said. Scores were injured.

"We ran out of the building, and outside, we hugged trees because the tremors were so strong," said Vilma Yorong, a Bohol provincial government employee.

"When the shaking stopped, I ran to the street and there I saw several injured people. Some were saying their church has collapsed," she told The Associated Press by phone.

As fear set in, Yorong and the others ran up a mountain, afraid a tsunami would follow the quake. "Minutes after the earthquake, people were pushing each other to go up the hill," she said.

But the quake was centered inland and did not cause a tsunami.

Offices and schools were closed for a national holiday — the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha — which may have saved lives. The earthquake also was deeper below the surface than the 6.9-magnitude temblor last year in waters near Negros Island, also in the central Philippines, that killed nearly 100 people.

Aledel Cuizon, who works for a Finnish company in Cebu, said the quake that caught her in her bedroom sounded like "a huge truck that was approaching and the rumbling sound grew louder as it got closer."

She and her neighbors ran outside, where she saw "the electric concrete poles were swaying like coconut trees." She said it lasted 15-20 seconds.

Cebu city's hospitals quickly evacuated patients in the streets, basketball courts and parks.

Cebu province, about 570 kilometers (350 miles) south of Manila, has a population of more than 2.6 million people. Cebu is the second largest city after Manila. Nearby Bohol has 1.2 million people and is popular among foreigners because of its beach and island resorts and the Chocolate Hills.

Many roads and bridges were reported damaged, but historic churches dating from the Spanish colonial period suffered the most. Among them is the country's oldest, the 16th-century Basilica of the Holy Child in Cebu, which lost its bell tower.

A 17th-century limestone church in Loboc town, southwest of Carmen, crumbled to pieces, with nearly half of it reduced to rubble.

Regional military commander Lt. Gen. Roy Deveraturda said that he recalled soldiers from the holiday furlough to respond to the quake. He said it damaged the pier in Tagbilaran, Bohol's provincial capital, and caused some cracks at Cebu's international airport but that navy ships and air force planes could use alternative ports to help out.

Passenger flights resumed later Tuesday after officials checked runways and buildings for damage.

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Associated Press writers Hrvoje Hranjski, Teresa Cerojano and Jim Gomez contributed to this report.

Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-10-15-Philippines-Earthquake/id-d9fd06318c5045afbff042a43cd71429
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Kim Kardashian Brings Baby North for a Casa Vega Lunch

Carefully keeping her baby out of view of the pesky shutterbugs, Kim Kardashian left Casa Vega after lunch with her pal Jonathan Cheban on Saturday (October 12).

The 32-year-old reality star wore a short-sleeved white top, blue jeans, and knee-high brown boots as she put North West into the car.

Earlier this weekend, the new mama got some support from her man as she continues to work off her baby weight.

On Friday, Kanye West joined Kim at Barry's Bootcamp class bright and early at 6:30am in Sherman Oaks, California.

Source: http://celebrity-gossip.net/kim-kardashian/kim-kardashian-brings-baby-north-casa-vega-lunch-941938
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Syria air raids on rebels 'kill 30'

Beirut (AFP) - Syrian air raids on rebel positions in the northern Aleppo and southern Daraa provinces killed 30 people on Thursday, including civilians, a monitoring group said.

With the world's attention trained on Syria's chemical weapons, set to be destroyed by international experts under a UN resolution, the latest deaths highlighted the lethality of the regime's conventional arsenal.

Fighting has raged in Syria's onetime commercial hub of Aleppo, where President Bashar al-Assad's regime and rebels have battled street by street for neighbourhoods and supply routes.

The raids by planes and helicopters on Thursday killed 16 people, including a woman and two children in the village of Sfire to the east of the city, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The village is controlled by Islamist groups, including the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

"The regime has bombarded Sfire for two days in order to relieve pressure on the supply route to Aleppo," which the army reopened earlier this week, said Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Britain-based group, which relies on a network of activists across the war-torn country.

The route is used not only to ferry weapons and reinforcements to troops at the front, but also to deliver food and medical supplies to civilians in regime-controlled areas.

Another six people, including a woman and a child, were killed in air raids on Menbej, another village east of Aleppo controlled by ISIL and other Islamist groups.

In the southern province of Daraa, where the uprising began in March 2011, eight people, including two children, were killed in air raids on Nawa village, split between the army and rebels.

The General Commission of the Syrian Revolution said there were many people wounded and in serious condition, indicating the toll would rise.

At another front close to Damascus, fierce fighting broke out pitting government troops backed by the Lebanese Hezbollah and pro-regime militiamen against rebels in Bueida and Dyebiye near Sayyeda Zeinab, site of a revered Shiite shrine.

Fighting has been under way for months in the area, where Shiite Hezbollah fighters have long been deployed to assist regime forces and protect the shrine.

State news agency Sana said the army was able to seize control of Dyebiye and Husseiniyah, another nearby district.

The Observatory said troops had seized the nearby villages of Sheikh Amro and Bassatine.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/syria-air-raids-rebels-kill-30-155317978.html
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UN: Report will show chemical weapons use in Syria

UNITED NATIONS (AP) ? Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Friday he believes there will be "an overwhelming report" from U.N. inspectors that chemical weapons were used in an attack in Syria on Aug. 21, but he did not say who was responsible.

The Syrian government and rebels blame each other for the attack in the Damascus suburb of Ghouta. The Obama administration, which says 1,429 people were killed, has said it has evidence that clearly indicates the Syrian government was behind the attack. But Russia, a key ally of Syria, has said it is not convinced by the U.S. evidence.

The U.N. inspectors have a mandate to determine whether chemical weapons were used ? and if so, which agent ? not to establish who was responsible. But two U.N. diplomats said the report could point to the perpetrators, saying that the inspectors collected many samples from the attack and also interviewed doctors and witnesses.

Ban spoke shortly before the chief chemical weapons inspector, Ake Sellstrom, told The Associated Press that he would deliver his report to the secretary-general in New York this weekend.

A senior U.S. intelligence official, meanwhile, said the U.S. reached its own figure for the dead in Ghouta by analyzing videos taken in the hours after the attack and counting the number of people who appeared to have died by chemical attack, including bodies under bloodless shrouds ? a sign that they probably did not die by rocket fire or some other conventional means.

U.S. lawmakers were also shown transcripts of the communications intercepts of Syrian officials discussing the attack both before and afterward ? including a conversation where one Syrian commander told the military's chemical weapons unit to cease firing, because they'd done enough damage, according to a congressional official.

The intelligence official said the U.S. is not going to release those transcripts, in part because foreign intelligence agencies provided some of the material.

The Obama administration also said it had established that rockets were fired from a regime-held area into rebel-held areas through satellite imagery, but such imagery has not been shown to lawmakers, though the congressional official said they will ask to see it.

Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss how they obtained the intelligence publicly.

At the United Nations, Ban said President Bashar Assad's regime "has committed many crimes against humanity," though he did not refer specifically to chemical weapons attacks.

"Therefore, I'm sure that there will be surely the process of accountability when everything is over," he said.

U.N. associate spokesman Farhan Haq said that while the report still hasn't been completed, Ban "has been in touch with different people including the experts."

The secretary-general spoke at the Women's International Forum. He thought his speech and his responses to questions that followed were not being broadcast, but they were shown on U.N. television.

Speaking by telephone from the Netherlands, Sellstrom said he didn't know exactly when the report would be released publicly. He said that "it's done, but when to present it is up to the secretary-general." But in a later conversation Friday, Sellstrom said he wasn't quite finished with the report, and that what he meant was that it would be done once he delivered it to Ban this weekend.

The two U.N. diplomats said the inspectors had soil, blood and urine samples and may also have collected remnants of the rockets or other weapons used in the attack, which could point to those responsible. The diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity because discussions on the issue have been confidential.

Haq said after receiving the report, Ban will present it U.N. member states and that the media should receive it shortly afterward.

In his speech, Ban said "the disaster" in Syria has created "a lost generation of children and young people" and led to "rising sectarian tensions, regional instability, the largest displacements of people in a generation, grave violations of human rights, including sexual violence."

"The latest fighting has also raised the specter of chemical warfare ? which, if confirmed by the U.N. investigation mission, would be an atrocious violation of international law," Ban said.

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Associated Press writer Karl Ritter in Stockholm and AP Intelligence writer Kimberly Dozier in Washington contributed to this story.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/un-report-show-chemical-weapons-syria-172822553.html

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