Horiyoshi the Third is a veteran tattoo artist from the Yokohama area of Japan, and is considered a legend by many tattoo enthusiasts. We sat down with him and listened to him explain his work as well as his philosophies behind tattoo culture.

By now you've probably heard about this week's racially charged police brutality incident. A video that has since gone viral shows a black teenager in the Dallas suburb of McKinney being held down by a white officer while she cries and screams for her mother, the cop shoving her face into the ground.

If the visuals look bad, the facts behind them don't make the cop involved look much better. The incident started around 7:15 PM, when officers responded to complaints from a pool party in a planned community called Craig Ranch focused on the presence of young black people who allegedly didn't live in the area. The situation intensified quickly as attendees wrapped towels around themselves and tried to take off, while the police became increasingly agitated and forceful.

Things came to a head when the white officer who seemed to take the lead, Corporal Eric Casebolt, forced a bikini-clad 14-year-old African-American girl named Dajerria Becton to the ground, and gestured with his gun toward a group of black teens.

According to what Becton later told the media, "He grabbed me and he like twisted my arm on the back of my back. And he shoved me in the grass. He started pulling the back of my braids."

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Screencap via YouTube user Brandon Brooks

The climactic moments were filmed by a 15-year-old named Brandon Brooks. His footage focused on the erratic behavior of Casebolt, who sprints around, chasing and grabbing people, and at one point literally either dives to the ground or trips and turns the move into a roll for some reason. All the maneuvering seems to be part of an attempt to control dozens of people at once as he becomes more and more visibly emotional.

All the while, Brooks's video captured Casebolt repeating orders for teens to "get their asses down on the ground," "stop shooting [their] mouths off." He also complained that he had to "fuckin' run around with 30 pounds of goddamn gear."

Brooks, who is white, was asked on a local news broadcast whether he thought the other teens were singled out for their race, and said, "I do feel that is true." He told the interviewer, "I was one of the only white people in the area when that was happening, and you can see in part of the video where he tells us to sit down, and he kinda, like, skips over me, and tells all my African-American friends to go sit down."

McKinney. Protest. pic.twitter.com/SjRQv71z0w
— deray mckesson (@deray) June 9, 2015

There was a protest on Monday at a local elementary school organized by a civil rights group called the Next Generation Action Network. According to the Washington Post, the group has called for Casebolt to be fired.

Slogans included things like, "Don't tread on our kids," and, "My skin color is not a crime."

The McKinney Police Department claimed in a Facebook statement that the clash came about after officers encountered teens "actively fighting" and that "first responding officers encountered a large crowd that refused to comply with police commands." But Casebolt has been suspended during an inquiry into the incident. McKinney Police Chief Greg Conely has conceded that "several concerns about the conduct of one of the officers at the scene have been raised."

One witness who refused to be identified told CNN on Monday that she's on Casebolt's side, and that she supports "him drawing his weapon, or a Taser or whatever it was that he did pull, because he was being attacked from behind," adding "he probably didn't intend on using it." She added that the cop "deserves a medal for what he did."

Another professed witness named Michael Quattrin claims that the trouble started when too many people showed up to the party. "A DJ setup in a public space next to the private pool in our neighborhood on Friday and played loud explicit (F-bomb) music for multiple hours," he wrote in a Facebook note. Quattrin went on in the post to claim that teens "were being brought into our neighborhood by the carload because the DJ was tweeting out invites to a 'pool party' for $15 (obviously unauthorized by our neighborhood)."

He claims the teens then started fighting. But while video exists of what looks like a fight, it's not between two teens. Instead, it shows a middle-aged white woman fighting a younger woman.

Brooks did acknowledge in the local news interview that security kept trying to get him to leave the pool party because he didn't have the right documentation. "The security guard immediately had a problem with us being there," he conceded. Guards, he added, told Brooks and his friends that they "needed more cards because there's a two-guests-per-card rule or whatever."

Jahda Bakari, an African-American teen who was a resident of the area—and had a pool pass—claims she was chased by the cops, in contrast to Brooks. "They were trying to make us leave, but if we ran, they'd chase after us, and if we stayed, then they'd arrest us," she told the local CBS affiliate.

Self-styled radio personality Benet Embry, another African-American resident of the neighborhood, posted a controversial message on Facebook (which has since been removed) that reads, "A few thugs spoiled a community event by fighting, jumping over fences into a private pool, harassing and damaging property. Not everything is about race."

McKinney was Money magazine's number one-ranked place to live in America in 2014; it's a predominantly white city in which African Americans make up 11 percent of the population. A 2008 lawsuit alleged the McKinney Housing Authority kept the city largely segregated by relegating its federally-subsidized Section 8 housing to the east of highway 75. A consent decree the next year was supposed to change that, though the area west of the highway remains lily white. (America, of course, has a robust history of racism at pools, with private ones cropping up mostly after public pools were desegregated.)

The incident appears to have ignited those long-running racial tensions: A neighborhood woman allegedly shouted, "That's why you live in Section 8 homes!" at party host Tatiana Rhodes, and Rhodes claims sometime during that barrage of slurs, the neighbors slapped her, and a fight began.

She also claims that someone called her a "black effer."

Adrian Martin, one of the teens in the video who drew Casebolt's ire by coming up behind him, was the only person arrested; he was charged with interfering with an officer and evading arrest. His attorney, Heath Harris, told a local FOX affiliate that "all he wanted to do was make sure she knew [Becton] wasn't out there by herself."

Weighing in about the moment Casebolt unholstered his gun, Robert Taylor, a criminology professor at the University of Texas Dallas, told the Associated Press, "That's not the way we're trained," and, "We're trained in policing to de-escalate problem encounters like this." He added that, "Obviously, that officer lost his cool. No doubt about it."

Others have criticized Caselock as well, including a former McKinney officer named Pete Schutle, who was interviewed by the local Fox affiliate. The anchor pointed out that in the video, it looks like Becton may have said something salty to Officer Caselock.

Schulte countered, "We have this saying, that we can't be offended because we're also the law. We're not individuals. Anything would not have justified throwing her to the ground and pushing her down and throwing her face into the concrete like he did."

Follow Mike Pearl on Twitter.

We can never be sure what Bruce Blunt, a 40-year-old marijuana aficionado in Chicago, was thinking when he blew a puff of weed smoke into his pet chameleon's mouth. What we do know is that he wasn't charged for animal cruelty.

Blunt (yes, that's his real name) became a viral sensation when the video of him blowing marijuana smoke into his pet chameleon's mouth racked up over 500,000 views in a matter of days. Blunt claims the smoke helps calm his chameleon, whose name is Binna and who can sometimes be aggressive. After catching wind of the video, PETA filed a complaint with Chicago authorities, who arrested Blunt several days later. However, Judge Robert Kuzas ruled that Blunt's behavior, while "really, really uncalled for and immature," was not criminal, as the animal showed no signs of harm. Blunt was acquitted.

In Colorado and Washington, it's now completely legal for (human) adults to use marijuana. But veterinarians in these states are specifically prohibited by law from prescribing cannabis to animals, as one woman learned after driving to Colorado from Utah because she mistakenly believed she could obtain a medical marijuana prescription for her dog. There is no state in which it's legal for veterinarians to prescribe medical pot for dogs, although the Nevada legislature is debating a bill that would allow it.

If you live in California, you can legally purchase Treatibles, dog treats that contain cannabidiol, a non-psychoactive compound in marijuana. The treats contain no THC, which is the compound that gets you high. The makers of Treatibles claim their treats can help aging dogs with aches and pains, just like medical marijuana can for humans.

There isn't much legal precedent for stoned pets and their owners. Most weed ingested by pets is done so unbeknownst to the owner—usually a case of the pet getting into their owner's stash of edibles. In May, Robin Thicke and his girlfriend April Love Geary told TMZ their dog was hospitalized for ingesting marijuana, but no one alerted the authorities or complained about animal cruelty. Last August, a Michigan woman posted a video of her dog, who had accidentally ingested her marijuana, acting "stoned," while the woman looked on and laughed. Viewers were outraged and posted thousands of comments accusing the woman of animal abuse. According to local news station WXYZ, Animal Control began an investigation into the case, but it appears no legal action was ever taken.

On MUNCHIES: Legal Weed Edibles Are Going to Look a Lot Different by Next Year

It's much harder to find cases of owners intentionally getting their pets high (and owning up to it). I wondered if that might be because it's not exactly clear whether it's legal—or ethical, for that matter. I asked Suzanna Harman, an animal rights attorney, where she stood. Harman told me that if we're talking about criminal law, there's no law that specifically states that it's illegal for pet-owners to give their pets weed.

"There are different animal cruelty statutes in each state," Harman told me, "so a judge would have to look at the facts of each individual case and see if the manner in which the pet guardian attempted to, or did, get the pet 'high' amounted to animal cruelty. This isn't to say that it won't one day be specifically outlawed, but it's such a new area right now, there are no statutes along those lines."

Pets are one thing, but should you give weed to kids? Watch VICE's report on children who use medicinal marijuana.

She also explained Blunt's case further: "Under Illinois law, there are a few levels of animal abuse: cruel treatment, aggravated cruelty, and animal torture. Cruel treatment is defined as: [any] person or owner [who] beat[s], cruelly treat[s], torment[s], starve[s], overwork[s], or otherwise abuse[s] any animal. Aggravated cruelty is defined as: [any] person [who] intentionally commits an act that causes a companion animal to suffer serious injury or death. Animal torture is defined as: [any] person commits animal torture when that person without legal justification knowingly or intentionally tortures an animal." Blunt was acquitted because his actions didn't fall under any of these categories.

Harman also told me that there are subsections in most state animal cruelty laws that make exceptions for veterinarians. She told me, for example, that under Illinois law, "the definition of animal torture does not include 'any alteration or destruction of any animal done by any person or unit of government pursuant to statute, ordinance, court order, or the direction of a licensed veterinarian.' So, if eventually medical marijuana was prescribed to pets by veterinarians, then that would account for an exception to any illegality of the pet guardian getting the pet 'high.'"

As I mentioned earlier, there are currently no states that legally allow veterinarians to prescribe marijuana to pets. In states where marijuana is legal for physicians to prescribe marijuana to humans, vets could still be criminalized for writing marijuana prescriptions for animals because, as Harman explained, "there would have to be another law passed altogether on behalf of animals for it to be legally prescribed to them by veterinarians." But, as she pointed out, marijuana statutes are very new, so it's not crazy to think it might be possible in the future.

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Photo by Flickr user wsilver

Aside from the legal implications, another big question is whether it's ethical to give your pets marijuana? I posed the question to Dr. Robert Goggs, a Doctor of Veterinary Science and lecturer at Cornell University's College of Veterinary Medicine. He believes it would be "misguided but not unethical for a pet owner to attempt to alleviate pain or distress in their own pet using medical marijuana," but adds that he'd much prefer the person seek veterinary advice before doing so. "Veterinarians have access to a wide range of painkillers designed for and/or routinely used in animals that we know are safe, effective, and inexpensive," said Dr. Goggs. "Why experiment with a drug that may not help and might harm when you can readily obtain safe and effective drugs instead?"

I also asked him about the effectiveness of the drug in animals. Are people like Blunt anthropomorphizing their pets by assuming they'll get high like we do?

Speaking of anthropomorphizing your pets, Motherboard reports on people who freeze-dry their pets after they die.

Dr. Goggs told me that "the receptors for the active ingredient in cannabis and marijuana are found in the brain and in the other tissues of dogs, and probably cats too. We know that the drug produces signs of intoxication in both dogs and cats. This implies that the drug and its metabolites cross into the brain and affect the receptors—so you could say the drug is 'effective.'"

At the same time, "there isn't really a safe dose for marijuana in dogs or cats, so it isn't sensible to try to use it." Plus, Dr. Goggs added, "plenty of veterinarians have seen dogs and cats become sick from eating their owners' pot edibles. Most pets will recover, but there is a chance that ingesting medical-grade pot could kill your pet."

For now, it's probably safest to avoid giving your pets marijuana. If they're suffering from physical pain, stick with the time-tested method of taking them to a vet. If they just seem bored, buying them a new toy is a lot safer—and cheaper—than giving them weed. And remember that pets can't tell time, so when the clock hits 4:20 each day, keep the weed to yourself. They'll be none the wiser.

Follow Allegra Ringo on Twitter.

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This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

LA gets a bad reputation at times for being a soulless, sprawling nest of crushed dreams and wildly tacky aspirations. But Canyon, a new publication by photographer Dan Wilton and writer Josh Jones, dispels some of that image.

The limited-run book, released this week and produced in collaboration with Ditto Press, takes a look at one place in the mega-city where Angelinos of almost every kind imaginable walk, interact, and escape the smog and bustle of the city center. We had a quick chat with Dan and Josh about their project.

VICE: First off, I guess you should explain where the canyon is—and what it is—for people less familiar with LA.
Dan Wilton: Runyon Canyon dangles off the end of Mulholland Drive, in between Beverly Hills and the massive hill with the Hollywood sign on it. It's a couple of big, dusty hills with loads of fitness freaks, wannabe actors, and dogs scrambling all over it. I was in LA for a job and Josh happened to be in town, so I stayed on for a week extra to hang out. We ended up spending most of it crisping ourselves on top of the Runyon.

The idea for the book seems to be that this place is a rare example of somewhere where the vast social spectrum of the city mixes. What makes this so rare in LA? And how come the canyon works like this?
Josh Jones: That's exactly what it is. We went up there just to see who we'd meet, and within 15 minutes we realized that this dusty mountain trail was full of people representing every single walk of life in the city. The thing that struck us was that all these people were mingling and chatting at the peak. Guys with grills and massive dogs were having pleasant chats with millionaire grannies in their visors and Cape Cod sweaters. Someone was telling us it's one of the few places in the whole city you can let your dog off the lead, so I guess that's why the dog walkers are up there—but I think it's mainly because you can literally climb out of the city. The view is fantastic and it gets you out of the smog and traffic and constant shit that's going on in people's lives. It's a total break from the electricity. It's also one of the few absolute parts of nature that's easily accessible for most Angelinos. But mainly it's the view. The view's pretty badass—when you can see it.

What sort of people did you come across while shooting there?
Dan: All of them! Millionaires, fitness freaks, gangsters, some dude who told us a story about his dog being raised by feral ninja cats in a Sikh temple, weed farmers, wannabe models, pushy mothers who really wanted their daughters to be models, plenty of actors, kale eaters, video directors, and a lot of entrepreneurs. The one thing about the people we met is they were all on the hustle. I love LA.

READ ON VICE SPORTS: A Drug Kingpin and His Racket, the Untold Story of Freeway Ricky Ross' LA Tennis Years

Was there any one character that really struck you?
Josh: My favorite was this lady called Yolande. She was this lovely grandma type, but when she started telling us her story it was crazy. She was born in Belgium, went to school in Windsor, moved to America—because she liked Doris Day—and was a Playboy Bunny in the original Playboy bar in Chicago. Then she ran away from a bad man to LA, met the guy who wrote Escape to Victory, which starred Sylvester Stallone, Pele, and Michael Caine, and married him. They lived up on the canyon before it was a park, and she had seen two Native American ghosts up there. She told us she was neighbors with this lady called Blanche, who'd ridden her horse to LA from Oklahoma in the 1930s and bought acres of land on the canyon for $1 each, built herself a cabin in her spare time, and died there aged 102.

Watch: Illegal LA

How did people react to your accosting them on their barefoot runs and rambles? Were any irritated at being stopped or disturbed?
Josh: The handy thing about LA is everyone wants to talk about themselves. Also, Dan does an excellent Hugh Grant–esque, "Hello! How are you? I'm from England!" and they all absolutely love that. They were genuinely interested in the project and the fact we were just doing it for the fun of it. Also, a good percentage of them had never seen a film camera before, which is a worry but a good ice-breaker.

Do you see the canyon as a sort of antidote to the rest of LA? How do you two feel about the city generally? It seems to really divide people.
Dan: I love it. I think it gets a really bad rap, but every time I've been I've met truly nice and creative people. But then again, I've hardly explored the whole place—if I was from LA and went to Peckham I'd say I'd met a bunch of creative people I liked and [been to some] decent bars. If I'd flown to Brent Cross for a week, I doubt I'd like it so much.

Check out the photographers' work at danwilton.co.uk / joshjoshjones.co.uk

The launch party for Canyon is this Thursday at Ditto Press. If you can't make it, pre-order yourself a copy of the book here.

See some of the photos from the book below:

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A state corrections officer monitors traffic outside Clinton Correctional Facility on June 8, 2015. Photo by Mike Groll/AP

Two murderers escaped Clinton Correctional Facility this weekend, willing to risk death by AR-15 and seven extra years for their attempt. That's drawn a lot of attention to the facility, which many outlets have referred to by the nickname of "Little Siberia" because of the cold upstate climate. But it's not really called Little Siberia, or at least not by anyone I met over my ten years and three months in the Correctional Department of New York State.

Whether by cop or by con, I've only heard Clinton called "Dannemora," and that's enough. Because Dannemora is the most notorious prison in the state, a place even the most hardened criminals try to avoid.

Dannemora has the nation's attention right now, but it had mine for a years. Attica is more famous thanks to the 1971 riot, and Sing Sing still has the chair (though it's getting dusty, the last electrocution having come in 1963), but to properly put the fear of God into prisoners, cops threatened us with a 400-mile trip upstate.

Convicts cherish the northernmost "max"—maximum security prison—when they bullshit, frequently bragging about surviving Clinton. All four of Dannemora's syllables were meticulously enunciated every time it was used to scare me. The five letters of my simple last name were routinely misread, but Dannemora was never stuttered nor contracted by the cops and cons who said it nice and slow to convey the horror.

"Keep fucking around, Genius." (Always the extra U rather than a dreaded P up in front—that was college.) "You ain't built for up north. You won't last in Dah-nneh-morrrr-ah."

The southern wall of Clinton's 30-foot-high perimeter composes two blocks of the village of Dannemora's main drag, Route 374. From 1900 to 1972, this was the home of the Dannemora Hospital for the Criminally Insane, which kept the "level-one bugs" (as they'd say inside) safely locked away.

Seven of my years incarcerated were spent in maximum security, although the robberies that earned me the monicker of "Sorry Bandit" left no one hurt and scared me as much as my victims. Nevertheless, the category of armed felony was unavoidable, and I visited four maxes. I started hearing about Clinton back on Rikers Island in New York City, when a well-intentioned prisoner called "Doc Martin" told me to make sure I saw "Pirate" as soon as I hit the Clinton yard, and to bring my papers with me. I had to demonstrate that I wasn't a sex offender.

Like many others, Doc was quite sure I was going to Clinton.

"Your first bid, they start you off in Dannemora—let you know how bad it can get," he said.

On VICE News: See photos of the aftermath of the two convicts' escape from Clinton.

Doc was a kind man and had witnessed the third of the four times I had to fight on Rikers. My stubborn struggle against a Somali closer to seven feet tall than six won his respect. The outcome, however, did not inspire Doc's confidence. (My only victory was won from a middle-aged barber ashamed to have stolen from me in the first place; he also slipped mid-fight.) Before my arrest, I hadn't fought since the Reagan presidency, and Doc could tell.

"Maybe they won't send you all the way up like that. They might not even send you to a max. But if they do, see Pirate right away. He'll square you away if you tell him we're friends."

Doc was a skinhead, and not the kind in the scene for the music. It was almost charming to hear him rationalize his Chilean girlfriend ("Aryan-Chilean") and Jewish friend (me). He spared me the stories I would soon hear about Clinton's notorious specialty of "spearing." The compound was apparently built in the days when the purpose of confinement was punishment, not "rehabilitation," so the cells are very small—so small that there is no defense against a determined hunter with a sharpened broomstick.

Pirate's umbrella would have kept a newjack like me unspeared, but in the end I survived a stay at Dannemora without him. I'd just spent a winter in Upstate CF, an entirely disciplinary prison in Clinton's hub, satisfying a six-month solitary sentence. My visit to Dannemora occurred on the day of my release. Everybody on the bus was cheerful despite the 4 AM chaining and dozen hours ahead of us; the day marked our emergence into relative liberty.

After half a year confined to a room, even a prison yard feels free.

We chattered through the unpleasantness of having a leg shackled to a stranger's. However, one fellow with few teeth and less sense was not as pleased; the prospect of returning to the regular population troubled him. He started his uprising with an asthma pump, though it never went further.

"I wants my asthma pump!" screamed the man, piercing the frozen tundra we were rolling through at seven in the morning. "I wants it, Sergeant Cracker!"

The sergeant in charge of the trip was unwilling to engage, and the dreadlocked convict who was attached to the lone rioter was on meds heavy enough to temporarily anchor the fierce asthmatic. Nevertheless, the nervous energy in him prevailed; he dragged his dozing partner to the front of the bus to bang on the partition behind the driver.

More on what it's like to be transported on a prison bus.

There is a gunman at the back of every transit bus who could probably have gotten away with at least a leg shot to prevent the demanding bug from "inciting a riot," which is the usual charge issued in such cases. (Sometimes posthumously, as dead convicts' estates can sue, too.) Instead, we pulled over. I watched the sergeant sheath his cell phone and step out to call using a little suitcase. After he finished with the satellite phone, our bus moved again but soon left the highway. The convicts who recognized the town of Dannemora nervously warned the rest of us to be cool.

We were going to Clinton.

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Photo of Route 374 via Flickr user Doug Kerr

The gates swung open with precision; the bus was inside the walls and safely back in the incarcerated world in a maneuver that had likely been practiced many times. There were 20 "turtles" waiting for us in the "trap," or two gates with enough room for a bus between them. Back on Rikers, I had seen a response team in action, so I knew to be afraid. The helmets freed the guards of personal responsibility. I had been showered with my neighbor's teeth on Rikers. It was his first day, and he didn't know to take the screaming about "kissing a wall" seriously. Now they were beating a tattoo on the side of our bus with oak batons.

"Still want your asthma pump?" asked the sergeant.

"Nah, I'm all right. Thank you, we can go. I'm alright." None of us cared to make eye contact with the sacrifice among us. He had blatantly called it on himself, but still... this was Clinton.

"Oh, you're getting your asthma pump now," replied the sergeant. Then the biggest cop I'd ever seen stepped on the bus, straight out of a dystopian future. Experienced in the theater of fear, he expertly held the pause and silence it commanded long enough to make us all queasy. The man shackled to our Spartacus was waking up into this nightmare as his morning dose wore off, looking around for help but afraid to ask for it. The giant turtle politely asked the sergeant whether the dreadlocked man had been an accomplice. The sergeant ordered him unshackled, even though the shock trooper was willing to take him along. As the 20 turtles in motorcycle helmets took away their poor excuse for a revolutionary, who could help feeling relieved it was not them? For the hour we waited, the usual talk of incest birthing the giant guards of Dannemora and the tattoos of hanged black babies they all had on their arms almost atoned for the shame of not backing up the asthmatic. The sergeant returned well exercised, his shirt in disarray.

The asthmatic never made it back to the bus.

Watch our documentary on an ex-con trying to rebuild his life:

Tonight, these very turtles are hunting the escaped men. The runaways' antics in the sewers, the passive-aggressive "Have a nice day!" note they left, a failure of the count procedures—all of it shames the Department of Corrections. The US Marshals have issued warrants, chafing for a man hunt. Governor Andrew Cuomo has publicly noted how dangerous these men are, knowing that there might not be a Hollywood ending and omitting that it was Honor Block they had escaped from. To live in one of those, an inmate has to go for years without disciplinary problems. On top of that, the men were living in cells side by side. Cops move pairs of friends next to each other so that they can cook and chat together. That's an infrequent perk, especially in Honor Block, because of the multiyear waiting list. The cops only do it if they really like you.

There will be blood.

Precedent suggests the runaways will be caught, especially since they're deep in enemy territory. Seven additional prisons were built in the area to either address the 1970s crime wave or the synchronous collapse of the region's dairy-farming industry, depending on your level of cynicism. Most everyone around that sparsely populated tip of America at least knows someone benefiting from the industry of prison. The escapees won't find much local help, though NRA members are plentiful. Of course, Canada is close, but this isn't the same Canada that sheltered Vietnam War draft resisters. This is the Canada with a stringently policed border, halting American felons from visiting decades after their crimes unless the Canadians deem they're rehabilitated.

All of the accounts describing the escape from "Little Siberia" note that the absences were only discovered during the 5:30 AM count. The hoodies that concealed the absence of convicts in those bunks are being held against the security staff. How could such a breach be allowed? Hasn't anyone seen Escape from Alcatraz? But why do prisoners sleep in hoodies anyway? Was it that Siberian last week?

This is Dannemora. Security is high. They don't give a fuck about how well you sleep. In my experience, there's only one reason you sleep with a hoodie in New York State prison—the lights never truly go off.

And there's only one way to really escape it.

For more from Daniel Genis, visit his website or follow him on Twitter.

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A triumphant Vincent Bugliosi talks to the press on January 25, 1971, after the four defendants in the Manson trial were found guilty. Photo by AP/WF

With the recent uptick in interest in Charles Manson, capped by the cloying, threadbare David Duchovny cop drama Aquarius, it's easy to forget that the seven brutal slayings known as the Tate-Labianca murders remain perhaps the most nightmarish killings in the history of American crime. The trial received an incredible amount of publicity, and was the most expensive criminal proceeding to date when it finished in 1971, having lasted nearly ten months—a record at the time.

Late on Monday, just a week shy of the trial's 45-year anniversary, we learned that Vincent Bugliosi—the prosecutor who made his name putting Manson and his followers in prison—passed away. He died Saturday in a Los Angeles hospital at the tail end of a multi-year battle against cancer. He was 80.

Every young person of a particularly morbid disposition goes through a Manson phase at some point or other. I've been deep in my own for about five years. I collect ephemera, read the books, and force my long-suffering wife to watch innumerable documentaries and TV movies. In the four and a half decades since the trial, there's been enough written about the so-called "Manson Murders" to last a lifetime. Through them, Manson has been transfigured into a mythological figure, rendered demon-like and illusory through rumors of the occult, human sacrifice, ritualistic drug use, and savage orgies.

Bugliosi, on the other hand, has remained a real and tangible person, and a key point of interest for those fixated on the national Manson nightmare. Even if you believe, like myself, that the lessons we can learn from the Manson family are more nuanced than the simple reassurance that good will eventually triumph over evil, it's clear that Bugliosi is one of the most impressive figures in the entire story. Manson called him a genius, and Bugliosi reportedly gathered much of the evidence himself.

It's difficult to imagine a deputy district attorney as cutting or intelligent as Bugilosi. When I think of him, I like to recall his performance in Robert Hendrickson and Laurence Merrick's Oscar-nominated 1973 documentary Manson. The film is notable for its many direct interviews with members of the family—it was shot after Manson was in jail, but before much of the family had left the Spahn Movie Ranch. In it, Bugliosi is young and animated, still buoyed by his success in the trial. He stalks through the courtroom where he prosecuted Manson, speaking in a high, staccato tenor as he recalls his victory:

"Sharon Tate's husband, movie director Roman Polanski, could not himself have conceived of a more monstrous, macabre scene of human terror and massacre than that which took place at his own residence in the early morning hours of August the ninth, nineteen sixty-nine," Bugliosi says.

I love listening to him speak: His tone and diction are sharp as a tack, and he's able to condense the ethical complexities of such a nuanced case into clear, plain English. Here he is speaking on the case during the trial:

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It's worth remembering what happened that night to understand what Bugliosi, then an unknown, was facing in his signature case. Under the cover of darkness, four young men and women had piled into an old Ford and driven toward the Bel Air residence of the gorgeous blond actress Sharon Tate. Her husband, Roman Polanski, was out of town at the time on a location scout in London. Seeing as she was eight and a half months pregnant with her first baby, Tate had entreated two friends to stay with her in her husband's absence, including Voytek Frykowski and his lover, Abigail Folger, heiress to the Folger coffee empire. They were joined by another friend, hairstylist Jay Sebring.

Just before 1 AM, the intruders cut the phone lines and jumped the fence at the bottom of the property. A car pulled up the driveway, and the only man in the group, Tex Watson, pulled a gun and blasted four shots into the window, murdering an 18-year-old named Steven Parent, who was unconnected with Sharon Tate. They entered the house and slaughtered everyone inside. Police discovered a total of 102 stab wounds on the four victims, and on the wall, in Tate's blood, one of the intruders wrote the words "PIG."

The next night, another carload of young men and women traveled to the Los Feliz home of Leno LaBianca, a supermarket executive, and his wife, Rosemary, a dress-shop co-owner. A similar scene took place, with the intruders scrawling the words "RISE," "PIG," and "HEALTER [ sic] SKELTER" on the walls in blood.

Originally, Bugliosi, then 35 years old, was assigned to a team of prosecutors run by a more experienced lawyer named Aaron Stovitz. But when Stovitz was removed for making inappropriate remarks to the media, Bugliosi took his place. It is Bugliosi's prosecution from which much of the narrative of the Manson story is drawn. During the trial, he called 84 witnesses and presented 290 pieces of evidence.

Most obituaries, including this one, focus on Bugliosi's relation to the Manson case. It is, by far, his career-defining moment, and his excellent book about the experience, Helter Skelter, remains the best-selling true-crime book ever published. Bugliosi, however, had a long and eclectic professional life. In addition to running for public office and practicing law, he authored many books on crime, including studies of O. J. Simpson, George W. Bush, and the Kennedy assassination.

But Manson always remained at the forefront of his reputation and career. In 2009, he reflected on his cultural legacy in an interview with NPR:

If I were to give you what I believe to be the single most important reason is that the murders were probably the most bizarre in the recorded annals of American crime. I mean, the incredible motive for the murders: to ignite a war between blacks and whites, that Manson called helter skelter, would be the last final destructive on the face of this Earth, according to him.

Who were the killers? Young kids from average homes of fairly good backgrounds, completely different from what we would expect of mass murderers. The very thought of young women dressed in black, armed with sharp knives entering the homes of total strangers in the middle of the night, is really so horrendous a thought that it's difficult to contemplate a thought like that.

In part because of the story Bugliosi told, Americans today can contemplate thoughts like that. He translated the darkest elements of our national consciousness into legal reality, and the story he told during the Manson trial, as well in his subsequent writing on the subject, has seeped irreversibly into our cultural imagination, my own included. He won't be soon forgotten.

Bugliosi is survived by his wife, Gail, to whom he was married for nearly 60 years, and two children, Wendy and Vincent Jr.

And, of course, Charles Manson.

Follow Benjamin Shapiro on Twitter.

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A still from 'Daniel's World'

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

If a sexual fantasy is never acted on, never indulged in through pornography, understood to be impossible and rightfully illegal, is it still harmful? This is the question raised by Veronika Liskova's documentary, Daniel's World.

The film (you can watch a trailer here) is an intimate portrait of Daniel, a long-haired Czech man in his mid-20s who loves and is sexually attracted to boys, particularly boys aged between eight and ten years old. He does not believe that the Czech age of consent should be lowered from 15. He seeks help from a sexologist. He has accepted that he will never be able to have a relationship or sex with someone he loves. He has come out to his family and seeks support from others like him. And yet to watch him, and others, standing at the fence of a playground and commenting on small children as they play, is one of the most uncomfortable experiences you can have as a viewer.

In becoming the subject of such a documentary, Daniel is publicly admitting to possibly the greatest taboo we have in our society. He is laying himself open to an international shitstorm of abuse and threats. But according to the World Health Organization's definition of pedophilia, he is also admitting to a mental illness, an illness he believes he was born with, and for which he understands there is no cure.

We spoke to director Veronika Lisková about making the film and how it changed her attitude toward pedophilia.

VICE: Hi, Veronika. I read that to find a subject for the film you actually set up your own profile on a pedophile-support website. Were you worried about the implications of doing that?
Veronika Lisková: Yes, it was very weird. The website is open to the public, though, so not everyone who has a profile is part of the community. As soon as I agreed to make the film I knew I needed to dive deep into the topic. But yes, when I joined I was asked to write what age I was attracted to, and other things like that so I just wrote "adult men."

When making a documentary you can either have an opinion you want to put forward, or you can use the making of that film as a way to form an opinion. Which did you do with Daniel's World?
My idea from the beginning was to make a one-person portrait that opened up the subject. To try to bring it into the light. I was full of stereotypes, of course. I saw all pedophiles as child abusers, but in making this film I educated myself. I realized I had a complete lack of knowledge.

Do you have children?
Yes, I have a one-year-old son.


That's interesting. Do you think you could have made this film if you'd had a child during the time of shooting?
I think it would have been harder. It probably would have taken longer to convince myself that I should do it. However, during my research I came across a study that showed the majority of cases of child abuse are not perpetrated by pedophiles. It was a piece of research done by sexologists in the Czech Republic but similar findings have come out of Germany through an organization called Don't Offend. As a society, we have simply chosen not to see this; and that means we don't know how to approach it.

As a mother, would you let your children spend time with someone like Daniel?
For me, it's impossible to imagine that I would ask Daniel to come over to my place to spend some time with my son. But if it occurred naturally—if we met him in the street, for example—then yes. The most important thing is that now, if someone I had known for many years told me that they were a pedophile, I wouldn't stop seeing them. That is the journey I have been on.

The film is a very intimate portrait of Daniel—a lot of the voiceover we hear in the film are recordings he made on a dictaphone you'd given him. Why did you do that?
I was worried that Daniel wasn't very comfortable in front of the camera—I could see sometimes that he was overacting. But by keeping an audio diary, if he was alone and something came into his mind, he could record it. He sent me maybe 200 recordings like that. So I tried to build up a narrative arc from that, to combine situations from his daily life with what was happening in his head.

There were a couple of time where, as a viewer, I think we were encouraged to compare Daniel's sexuality to other sexual orientations. For instance, when he meets the organizer of Prague Pride. But homosexuality and pedophilia are unequivocally separate things.
I didn't want to compare the two. But the thing they have in common is how people talk about just being born like that. Pedophiles have no chance of ever having a normal relationship. It will never reach the same status as homosexuality, for example, because it will never be possible to legalize a relationship with children. And people in the pedophile community don't want to change that; all they want is to remove the stigma.

There's a scene in the film where Daniel and other pedophiles are in fancy dress; as devils and a bishop. Visually, it's incredibly arresting, but what's actually going on?
In the Czech Republic we have Saint Nicholas Day where people dress up and go out in the evening. There is a bishop, an angel, and a devil.

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Daniel, far left

So Daniel is actually dressed up as a devil?
Yes. The devil is there to scare the children, but the angel and Saint Nicholas are there to save them. I knew it would be very interesting in the film because this event is very much related to children, but it is also very visually striking.

There are several times in the film, in fact, where you go to places closely associated with children—a playground, an ice rink, the Saint Nicholas Day celebration. Did you feel uncomfortable being there with people you knew were sexually attracted to children?
Yes. But I didn't want to avoid it. That is the reality of the community. They choose to have their meetings in places where they can talk, but at the same time watch children. I was uncomfortable with the way they commented on children, but on the other hand I didn't want to hide it. I think it's important that the audience feel some discomfort while watching.

It's interesting, because up to that point I actually felt quite sorry for Daniel—his flat is very bare, his life seems very sad. So to then see him in that setting is really uncomfortable.
Yes.

The child that Daniel says he is in love with is called Misha in the film. Is that his real name? And are those pictures of him on Daniel's wall?
Oh, no. Some of the pictures on the wall are of Daniel and others are photos we found on international websites. To be honest, we had to change some of the pictures because we were worried people might recognize the children he actually has on his wall. We didn't want to expose Misha to any danger—we have to protect his privacy and that of his family.

After making the film, do you believe we have to change the way we treat pedophiles?
For sure. The main thing is lack of information, which means you can't assess the dangers properly. A lot of the pedophiles I spoke to told me that they consider themselves to be more dangerous when they are frustrated. When they feel unable to talk openly or have to hide their orientation and suppress their affections, it makes them more of a threat. In Germany, through the Don't Offend program every major city has a center where pedophiles can go to see sexologists and get psychotherapy. They have a campaign arguing that to be a pedophile doesn't mean you are a child molester.

If people are able to think about the issue frankly, and pedophiles know they can be more open about their feelings, then I believe that is the best way to prevent abuse.

Thanks, Veronika.

The UK premiere of Daniel's World screens at 6 PM, Saturday, June 20, Bertha Dochouse, Curzon Bloomsbury as part of Open City Documentary Festival.

Follow Nell on Twitter.

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This woman is not inhaling laughing gas—she's blowing up a balloon. Photo by flipchip via Wikimedia Commons

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

Why would you want to outlaw something that facilitates laughing? This is a question that ought to be posited to the UK's Home Office, as its new Psychoactive Substances Bill begins to be felt. On Saturday night, four large bags of laughing-gas canisters, balloons, and dispensers were seized by police in Shoreditch, East London. The new law would mean that anyone caught in possession of this kind of stuff—i.e., anyone selling balloons—could face up to seven years in prison.

As some have already pointed out, the Psychoactive Substances Bill seems to go beyond just clamping down on drugs, effectively seeking to criminalize pleasure itself.

However, there's more to it than just that: Entrepreneurial instincts are being stunted here, too. Think of the late-night NOS salesmen, the enterprising shufflers wading their way through high streets, filling balloons with a charge of gas less harmful than a pint of beer and punting them to guys in Hype T-shirts. What will become of them?

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The gear seized in Shoreditch on the weekend. Photo courtesy of the Met Police

The Conservatives bang on about building an economy for "people who work hard." Is spending all weekend, every weekend traipsing through crowds of hammered idiots to sell nitrous not a perfect example of exactly that? The NOS salesman's willingness to go out and earn his keep—a quality assumed to be nonexistent in today's young by stupid classists—has been thwarted by a Conservative government criminalizing something that needn't have been criminalized in the first place.

There are few drugs less innocuous than laughing gas, bar maybe khat, an astonishingly mild stimulant that the government banned a couple of years ago for no good reason. Despite the UK's right-wing media getting itself in a tizzy over the stuff, there's still no real evidence to suggest NOS is as harmful as everyone likes to make out. DrugScience (formerly known as the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs) calls laughing gas "one of the least risky drugs."

It's not addictive, and it's not going to kill you, unless you do something really, really, extra stupid, like inhale a bunch of canisters straight from the dispenser without breathing in any oxygen, or put a plastic bag over your head while you do a balloon. It's not even a high that lasts long enough for you to get yourself into any dangerous situations; it's a 20-second head rush that teleports you through a thumping maze of looping sound and geometric shapes.

There's also something almost romantic about the nitrous midnight market—a kind of Smithfields charm, an echo of the old London currently being whitewashed by local councils and the "redevelopment" they've been approving in spades. Its legality meant that instead of someone walking past at dawn, whispering "coke, MD, lemon haze" in your ear like druggy ghosts, people could be a little more boisterous.

The sound of deals being made in between the ear-splitting whoosh of a balloon being filled with good times—the whole thing was at least a bit more communal than meeting some faceless guy down an alley, or getting into someone's car with the sweat of trepidation on your brow. It was drug dealing as it should be: open, safe, and a bit silly, with everyone falling about and enjoying themselves. Why bother pushing that underground? Why take away an avenue for those with less cash to earn more on the side? Why put the threat of police confrontation on yet another part of daily life?

READ ON NOISEY: How Will the Ban On Laughing Gas, Poppers, and Legal Highs Affect This Summer's Festivals?

Why is no one allowed to have anything? Why aren't these guys allowed to just sell a couple of balloons on the street on a Friday night, for fuck's sake? Imagine the same situation in somewhere like Barcelona. How European and fun it would seem—jovial men and women breathing in silly air on a balmy evening with a cheeky Estrella chaser.

But this is England, where everything is a crime, everything is dark and drab and rainy and cold and shit. Having fun without a million quid in your bank account is an offense soon to be punishable by death in London, and a last-ditch attempt to salvage a bit of money and enjoyment from this swirling toilet water could land you seven years in the bin. Let's not assume that all NOS sellers are destitute, on the breadline, making ends meet by selling joy-fug to Essex boys on Brick Lane. Because they're not. However, what they do tend to be are young (mostly) men who are often trying to get some reparations from the very people forcing them out of their areas via gentrification.

The ban is a populist policy borne of a moral panic, a knee-jerk reaction to appease the readers of the newspapers making a fuss about "hippy crack." With benefits for under-21s being cut, and the abolition of EMA, the young are being pushed further and further into a corner—and the lashing out that'll inevitably occur will also, of course, be all their own fault.

Follow Joe on Twitter.

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Toronto-based poet, novelist, and PhD Lynn Crosbie's latest work is a mind-bending account of a young woman's co-dependent romance with a dude who is Kurt Cobain, incarnate. Steeped in junkie culture and shot through with self-aware elements of fan fiction, Where Did You Sleep Last Night has been getting great reviews. (And since it's intended as fiction, Buzz Osborne should have no qualms with it.)

Earlier this year, Crosbie talked to Noisey about the evolution of the story itself, and now the author has shared an exclusive extra chapter with VICE.

At approximately a third of the way through the novel (page 123) Where Did You Sleep Last Night, Evelyn and Celine are in New York: his band Bleach is playing SNL, and they have just performed at the Roseland. The couple are bingeing on smack, and joyful, having just reunited after another of their hideous fights. (NB: "He" is always Celine, who is Kurt Cobain.)

After the italics is the hidden track, a little story that doesn't appear in the book.

...

We walked around slowly, smashed into each other, waded through stores and streets and sometimes people called out to us or asked us questions.

Or we stopped them.

"Where can we get syringes? Our cat has diabetes," "Can we sit in your car for a minute?" and "Where's Brooklyn?"

Two Mormon nuns let us into the back of their station wagon where we coaxed the most limber of our veins to rise and admit the sweet point of the needle.

Sister Smith asked if we wanted to take her picture with Sister Mapplethorpe, and we said no.

"If you never cover one of my songs," he said, and embarrassed, I said, "I'm out of film," as we walked through chiffon-textured water towards the subway.

But a bunch of strangers shot us on the subway, as I slithered onto his lap and shredded his neck with my new, razor-sharp incisors; as he moaned and vomited an arc of milk onto the black window behind us.

We realized we were at Coney Island after an hour or longer of rattling back and forth, and went straight to the freak show, holding nude hotdog buns from Nate's.

The fat man, a fussbudget who kept plucking at his errant flesh, asked me to make his cheap sari look "more glam," and I pulled out sparkles and a glue gun from my purse as he talked earnestly to the bearded lady about getting work as a lumberjack.

On this perfect day, we used clam shells to make a sand motel, and, after rolling our pants to our knees, waded into the pale jade sea, smiling as frightened flukes leaped around us in shimmies of emerald.

"Are you going to stay?" he asked, more than once, and I always said yes, I cried "YES" when he broke six plates and won me an armful of broken, bleating baby dolls.

And I sang to him, in the affirmative, when he got on his knees behind a striped popcorn tent and lifted my skirt; I filled the sky with my assent right before he clutched my shoulders and filled my mouth with the taste of Fruit-Loops and tart mayonnaise.

The carnie barring us into the Cyclone asked if I liked his ink—the greenish babe on his arm looked eerily like me, or "like your titties," and he smacked him so hard, his teeth sprayed the metal car.

We moved upward slowly.

I leaned against him and with each click forward, I flashed on having betrayed him.

On what we had already done, on what we had lost, on the relentless nausea.

As we gathered speed, I looked at him, my face drained of everything but fear and he said "It doesn't matter."

"Because it gets so much worse," he says as the sky pierces the sea with a spike and, retracting, pulls back its water; pulls back its fish and stones and weeds and shells and strange, porous wands then shoots it all back.

We are taking the turns in a wet, jet sky without making a sound.

Our arms are sleek with blood and fast around each other's necks as we kiss each other for the last time, for what feels like the last time, the fall is that steep; what we have left undone, so dangerous and repeating.

Follow Lynn Crosbie on Twitter.

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Look at Kelsey Wroten's website, Twitter, and Instagram.

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This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

It was around 7 AM on May 3, on a quiet, residential street, that Sheku Bayoh came into contact with the police. Within 15 minutes, he was unconscious and by just after 9 AM, he had been pronounced dead within a nearby hospital. It's a tragic sequence of events that we have become inured to hearing over recent months, as the world has watched on in horror at tales of police brutality, killings, and subsequent protests, in the United States.

It is not a story that you expect to hear taking place in Kirkcaldy, an unassuming Fife coastal town of around 50,000 people, less than an hour north of Edinburgh. The events of that morning have since shaken the town and given rise to a desperate search for answers as to how, and why, Sheku Bayoh died.

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What Bayoh's grieving family and his legal team understand of what happened is this: Responding to calls that a black man had been seen carrying a knife, police officers—in the midst of a shift change at Kirkcaldy police station—responded en masse. Batons, CS spray, and the similar but more potent PAVA spray were used, as up to nine officers engaged the 31-year-old gas engineer who, originally from Sierra Leone, had lived locally for 15 years and had two young children.

He was pinned, facedown, to the pavement. When it became clear he was losing consciousness, Bayoh was rushed to hospital, where medical staff made a frantic effort to save his life and had to demand that the police remove the handcuffs and leg restraints he had been taken there in. A short time later, he was pronounced dead. How Bayoh died has still to be determined, although positional asphyxia—that restraint by police officers prevented him from breathing adequately—suspected.

Pathologists do not yet have the full information necessary to confirm this because, until last week, they were unable to get statements from the officers involved, despite having made "several attempts" to do so. With an investigation live, Police Scotland have not been in a position to pass comment beyond offering their condolences. However, the Scottish Police Federation, a de facto union organization that represents police officers, has been vocal over the past few weeks and has criticized "unhelpful" commentary and speculation around the case. They have said that a "petite" female officer, who feared for her life, received significant injuries during the incident and has made several visits to hospital.

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On Sunday, exactly five weeks on from the death, Bayoh's funeral was held. Gathering at the site where the arrest took place, around 400 mourners joined a solemn, dignified, and mostly silent procession through the town. Many were dressed in bright blue, Bayoh's favorite color, and wearing T-shirts bearing his face. The march was led by Bayoh's family and his partner Collette Bell, clutching their five-month-old son Isaac. A hearse, with a floral wreath spelling out "Daddy," led the procession as it made it slowly made its way through Kirkcaldy's streets.

Watch: The Militarization of America's Police Force

Outside the town's police station, two minutes silence were held, before some of the crowd broke out into chants of "we want justice." The police, who accompanied the march in numbers, backed off as it approached the station, remaining at the end of the street. The march continued to Kirkcaldy Islamic Centre, where a ceremony and prayers were held, followed by a burial at a nearby cemetery. Later in the day, hundreds gathered again for a meeting in a community hall, which heard from members of Bayoh's family and their representative, the prominent human rights lawyer Aamer Anwar.

Among family and friends of Shek, as he was known to them, the anger at local police is palpable. Exactly what happened that morning has been difficult to establish, not least because the family say they were provided with five different and often conflicting versions of events by the police in the hours that followed the death.

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Bayoh's partner, Collette Bell, was questioned and had her house keys taken away from her before she was even notified about his circumstances. When she was eventually told, the story provided by officers was that Bayoh had been found in the street by members of the public, who called an ambulance. His sister, who lives locally, was relayed a similar version of events. At 4:30 PM, officers returned and told the assembled family that they had been instructed by a senior officer to inform them of the truth of the situation—that Sheku Bayoh died in police custody.

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Aamer Anwar (left).

Addressing the packed meeting which took place after the funeral ceremony, the family's solicitor Aamer Anwar slammed what he called the "systematic lies" that officers provided the distraught and grieving­ family over the course of the day.

"Police Scotland, over those several hours from 9 AM onwards, gave five different versions of events to the family. That is a matter of grave concern. Sensitive and thorough handling of the investigation in the golden hours after the death is critical to evidence gathering, and setting the direction and quality of the investigation to follow," he said. "The family does not understand why the officers who engaged with Sheku Bayoh were not immediately suspended without prejudice after his death. It's a matter of public concern that officers remain at their desks or in contact with the public, pending the outcome of an investigation into a death in custody."­

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Sheku's partner Collette Bell (center) holding their son.

An independent body, the Police Investigations and Review Commissioner (PIRC) has since been appointed to take control of the investigation. PIRC was established in 2013 as the Scottish equivalent of the Independent Police Complaints Commission for England and Wales, and this is believed to be the most serious case they have dealt with to date. Already, its credibility has been brought into question after it emerged that the body does not have the powers to compel officers to provide it with statements in situations in which they could be themselves culpable.

"PIRC came onto the scene later that morning, but we understand that the nine officers, who had been in a room together for several hours, refused to provide any details of what happened," Anwar told the visibly shocked room on Sunday—a version of events that the Police Federation denies.

"We understand that the Police Federation subsequently said that they wished to know what their status was, but the fact remains that PIRC have stated publicly that they asked several times for statements which the police officers refused to provide," said Anwar.

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Last Thursday, over a month after Bayoh's death, officers finally agreed to give statements to PIRC. The incomplete knowledge about the circumstances in which Sheku Beyoh died has been a key factor preventing pathologists, both those appointed by the Crown and independent experts hired by the family, in determining the cause of death. "The fact that for 32 days, the officers refused to provide us with information, and that PIRC could do nothing about it, beggars belief and compounds the agony of Sheku's family," said Anwar. "The family strongly urge Kirkcaldy police officers to co-operate with the investigation, to help provide them, the Crown Office and PIRC with accurate information with how and why Mr. Bayoh died. There is nothing unreasonable about this demand."

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There are many unanswered questions about the death of Sheku Bayoh. It's the latest and most serious scandal to hit Police Scotland, which has been riven by controversy since it was formed as a merger of Scotland's regional police forces in April 2013.

The force has come under fire, with its extensive roll-out of stop and search, revealed as being "nine times" that of the NYPD, ongoing controversy over armed officers responding to routine calls, and active hindering of research critical of their operations. They now stand accused of covering up the circumstances in which Sheku Bayoh died, pitting themselves against a community that is struggling to come to terms with the loss of a popular and well liked young father. The fiery war of words that has broken out between the Bayoh family and the Scottish Police Federation, which represents officers, has done little to sooth relations.

"We won't rest until we get justice for Sheku," his sister, Kosna Bayoh, said on Sunday. His family have so far tried to keep an open mind about what happened that morning, in the face of what are widely seen as police lies, intransigence, smears, and attempts to blame Bayoh for his own death. They deserve justice, but it remains to be seen whether the institutions tasked with delivering it are capable of doing so.

Follow Liam on Twitter.

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All screen shots via Blizzard

When Blizzard launched Warcraft III back in 2002 I very much doubt that they expected to be releasing a game 13 years later that is based on a mod developed for their strategy classic, let alone be one of the last major developers in the world to do so.

Heroes of the Storm is Blizzard's take on the MOBA, the genre that was invented in its own back yard. But instead of rushing out a Dota clone to try and reap the rewards as soon as possible, they held off, creating something truly unique that features tons of revolutionary mechanics. With the long beta over and done with, Heroes is finally freely available to everyone, and here are six reasons why you should care.

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Iconic Characters Meet for the First Time

Blizzard's biggest initial advantage over the likes of League of Legends and Dota is that they have a gigantic history of characters, most of whom PC gamers will instantly recognize. Every one of the playable characters in Heroes is from a past Blizzard title, ranging from classics such as Warcraft to more obscure output like The Lost Vikings.

However, it's not just the fact that the characters are recognizable that is great—it's also that this is the first time many of the characters have met within the realms of Blizzard lore. Seeing iconic Warcraft characters such as Chen face off against the likes of Valla from Diablo or Tychus from StarCraft is something many Blizzard fans never thought they would see, and is certainly a fan pleasing moment. Despite all the characters having extensive histories, new players don't need to know any of it to enjoy Heroes, as ultimately no one's past has any impact on their gameplay of the present.

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Shared XP Means You're Never Underpowered

One of the hurdles to overcome when starting out with a MOBA is the feeling that you are a hindrance to your team. Both LoL and Dota require you to actually do things so you aren't underpowered and useless, but Heroes features shared XP (experience) system, meaning every member will be the same level.

This is especially useful in the first few games, where at the start you have no idea what to do. In most MOBAs, by the time you get the hang of things you are too under-leveled to be able to help, and just become an easy way for the enemy to extend their lead. But shared XP system means that once you get to grips with things you will still be powerful enough to be of assistance, and this is where the fun begins, after you get those first few kills and feel like a badass.

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All the Maps are Different

Each of the seven (an eighth is on the way) battlegrounds or maps features its own unique sub-objective. Obviously to win you still have to kill the opponent's core, but claiming these sub-objectives for your team can make destroying it a lot easier. On the Dragon Shire map, for example, if a team manages to capture two shrines, positioned at the top and bottom of the playable environment, one of their members will be able to become the Dragon Knight, a powerful hero with a large HP pool and incredibly strong attacks. Other examples include massive minions pushing down a lane if enough skulls are collected on Haunted Mines, or temples firing ancient lasers at the opponent's buildings on Sky Temple.

Having great variety in the maps, along with ways to win that aren't simply obliterating the enemies and smashing their buildings (although that is still an option), is a refreshing change in the MOBA space and something that keeps Heroes entertaining for hours.

Watch: VICE's documentary on eSports

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No Gold or Items Simplifies Everything

The single most complex part of any of the major MOBAs is easily the hundreds of items that you can purchase, and more pertinently knowing what each of those items does. Fortunately, the folks over at Blizzard realized how confusing this could be and have decided to scrap gold and items entirely, resulting in a MOBA that is incredibly simple to learn.

Getting rid of gold helpfully removes the need for last hitting (getting the killing blow on a AI-controlled creep), something that many struggle with. Having no items also makes the control scheme a lot easier, with only a small handful of keys to worry about.

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There are Multiple Skills to Choose from in Each Match

The complexity lost by not having items to chose from is somewhat regained by each character having multiple skills that can be chosen partway through a match, likewise different boosts to these skills. Hitting a certain level will give you a choice of talents to improve one of your abilities, while reaching level ten will offer up the choice of two ultimate abilities for each hero, and choosing the right one for each match is key.

Having a choice of talents and abilities is where the builds in Heroes comes in. In one game you may want to build E.T.C as a tank that absorbs all the damage and disables the enemy team; next time, you can build him as a mobile, split-pushing hero whose job it is to be everywhere on the map. The differences possible between builds means it takes hours to truly master one hero and find the best combinations, although there are already plenty of helpful guides online.

"Video games aren't sport?" Ok man, we've a channel for you, too.

The Other Players (Usually) Aren't Dicks

MOBA players generally aren't the friendliest bunch. Going two matches in Dota without being called some expletive (or what you assume is an expletive, as it's in Russian) is almost unheard of. Heroes of the Storm, on the other hand, has the nicest, most welcoming community of any of the MOBAs (so far). Only once have I witnessed someone swear at a teammate, and even then the person in question did have it coming after intentionally feeding himself to the enemy team. While you may come up against the odd bad egg here and there, just be grateful that you aren't being insulted in a language you don't understand every couple of hours because, believe me, that isn't fun.

Heroes of the Storm is available to play now, here, for free, if you like.

Follow Mike on Twitter.

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Today on City, VICE takes a look at the improbable life of Steve Ludwin, who has been injecting what would for any normal human be fatal amounts of snake venom into his body since the late 80s.The basic principle laid out by pioneer herpetologist, Bill Haast, who died last year at the age of 100­, is that regular exposure to the venom results in the body developing an immunity.

Steve claims to not only never get ill, but that cobra venom is the ultimate pick-me-up, with effects lasting a days after injecting, making Steve stronger, faster, and more resilient.The hemotoxins that attack human blood cells in a tree viper's venom can result in an agonizing death in less than 30 minutes. The neurotoxins in a cobra bite can kill a person in half that time. For the past 20 years Steve Ludwin has been privately milking an array of deadly snakes including rattlesnakes, monocled cobras, and a few casual vipers thrown in to the mix, and sticking all this lovely deadly snake juice in a syringe and mainlining it all the way to immortality.

Check it out tonight on City, if you think you can handle it.