Learner driver kills toddler who was playing with twin brother, & more in News in 5.

-With AAP.

1. Brisbane toddler killed while playing with his twin brother.

A toddler had been playing with his twin brother before he was killed when they were both hit by a learner driver on Brisbane’s Bayside.

The three-year-old died when he was struck by a reversing car driven by a 16-year-old at Thornside in Brisbane’s east just at 3.35pm on Saturday.

The surviving child was taken to hospital with what was believed to be minor injuries.

The teenage driver of the car was also hospitalised for shock.

The Courier-Mail reports a witness heard the mother of the boys scream “no” before holding the unresponsive little boy in her arms.

Toddler killed while playing with twin brother after learner driver reverses into him https://t.co/G7KzJrJkiX via @Y7News

— Chris Halton (@chrishalton09) April 28, 2019

Witnesses said the pair had been playing in the large gated residential complex.

No charges have been laid, a police spokesperson confirmed to Yahoo News on Sunday. Investigations are continuing.

The death follows a road fatality in northwestern Queensland, where a woman was killed and two young children left in hospital.

It’s believed a car carrying two children and a ute collided on Camooweal Street in Mount Isa about 3.40pm on Friday. The driver of the car, a 26-year-old woman, died at the scene.

An eight-year-old boy was also taken to Townsville Hospital in a critical condition but he had improved to a stable condition by Saturday night.

A baby girl was taken to Mount Isa Hospital in a stable condition.

The driver and passenger of the ute, two men aged 44 and 57, were taken to hospital in a stable condition.

A 27-year-old motorcyclist also died following a crash at Park Ridge at 10am on Saturday.

2. Lindt Cafe sniper to sue NSW police.

The chief sniper during the Lindt Cafe siege will sue NSW Police, alleging he and fellow officers were prevented from doing their jobs and the lives of cafe manager Tori Johnson and barrister Katrina Dawson could have been saved.

The officer, who can only be identified as Sierra 3-1, alleges in a 30-page affidavit he has suffered psychological trauma due to decisions taken by his superiors during the siege on December 15, 2014 in which 17 people were taken hostage.

The Daily Telegraph reports the civil action, lodged in the NSW District Court on April 12, will be heard next year in a one-day hearing.

It follows another complaint he made to the Law Enforcement Conduct Commissioner that was dismissed, that claimed senior officers perjured themselves at the initial inquest.

3. Sri Lanka bomber relatives die in raid.

The father and two brothers of the suspected mastermind of Sri Lanka’s Easter Sunday bombings were killed when security forces stormed their safe house two days ago, police sources and a relative of the suicide bombers say.

Zainee Hashim, Rilwan Hashim and their father Mohamed Hashim, who were seen in a video circulating on social media calling for all-out war against non believers, were among 15 killed in a fierce gun battle with the military on the east coast on Friday, police sources said.

Niyaz Sharif, the brother-in-law of Zahran Hashim, the suspected ringleader of the wave of Easter Sunday bombings that killed over 250 people in churches and hotels across the island nation, told Reuters the video showed Zahran’s two brothers and father.

Three of the people killed in Friday’s gun battle were the same people who were seen in the undated video on social media, in which they discus martyrdom and urge their followers to kill all non believers, police sources said.

Sri Lanka has been on high alert since the attacks on Easter Sunday, with nearly 10,000 soldiers deployed across the island to carry out searches and hunt down members of two local Islamist groups believed to have carried out the attack.

Authorities have detained more than 100 people, including foreigners from Syria and Egypt since the April 21 bombings.

In the video, Rilwan Hashim is seen calling for all out ‘jihad’, or holy war, while children cry in the background.

“We will destroy these non-believers to protect this land and therefore we need to do jihad,” Rilwan says in the video, sitting beside his brother and father.

“We need to teach a proper lesson for these non-believers who have been destroying Muslims.”

Authorities suspect there may be more suicide bombers on the loose. Defence authorities have so far focused their investigations on international links to two domestic groups they believe carried out the attacks, the National Thawheedh Jamaath and Jammiyathul Millathu Ibrahim.

Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the Easter bombings, and on Sunday the group said three of its members clashed with Sri Lankan police for several hours in Friday’s gun battle on the east coast before detonating their explosive vests, the militant group’s news agency Amaq said.

The group said 17 policemen were killed or injured in the attack, but the Sri Lankan military has denied this. A police source told Reuters two policemen were slightly injured in the battle.

Police have said six children were among the other 12 people who died in the gun battle, but have not released further details.

4. Harvey Weinstein’s rape trial postponed to September.

Harvey Weinstein’s rape trial has been postponed to September 9.

The disgraced film producer had been set to go on trial on June 3, but Justice James Burke has agreed to give the defence additional time to prepare.

Weinstein is accused of five counts of rape and sexual assault, involving two victims, and could face life in prison if convicted. Burke on Friday ordered the courtroom closed for an argument on a prosecution motion to allow additional women to testify in the case.

Harvey Weinstein’s rape and sexual assault trial postponed to September https://t.co/ZTBIHdF6T4 #Scotland pic.twitter.com/YRsFp1NPVR

— NEWSONSCOTLAND (@NewsOnScotland) April 27, 2019

Robert Balin, a lawyer representing more than a dozen media outlets, protested that the hearing should be open to the public, and vowed to appeal Burke’s ruling.

The media was allowed back into the courtroom on Friday afternoon for a discussion of scheduling matters. The prosecution expects its portion of the case to take about three weeks, while defence lawyer Jose Baez estimated he would need one week to put on a defence. Jury selection is expected to take about two weeks.

Weinstein was originally supposed to go on trial in May, but he parted ways with his lead lawyer, Ben Brafman, in January, causing a delay.

Weinstein is accused of sexually assaulting Mimi Haleyi, a former production assistant, at his home in 2006. He is also accused of raping an unidentified woman at a hotel room in Manhattan in 2013. Prosecutors want to call additional women with similar allegations to help establish a pattern of misconduct. The number and identities of those women has been kept secret.

The defence has argued that calling such witnesses would prejudice the case, and asked the court to close Friday’s hearing on the subject to avoid tainting the jury pool. The prosecution also asked that the hearing be closed, in part to protect the witnesses’ identities. Burke’s decision, if he made one, was not disclosed.

The two sides also discussed discovery issues on Friday, as the defence sought access to a witness’s mobile phone records.

5. Donald Trump calls Jussie Smollett case a ‘disgrace’.

Donald Trump has called Jussie Smollett a “third-rate actor” whose highly-publicised case was a “disgrace to our nation”.

“It’s MAGA country,” the US president told the crowd at a campaign rally in Wisconsin on Saturday.

“I didn’t hear that term until that third rate actor in Chicago went out and said I was beaten up by MAGA country, can you believe it?”

“Turned out to be a total lie,” he added.

Trump spoke as the White House Correspondents’ Dinner took place in Washington, DC, an event he has skipped the past two years.

Pres. Trump refers to Jussie Smollett as “third rate actor in Chicago” during rally https://t.co/vCzpWKoYwh pic.twitter.com/3t0b6xqGlJ

— CBS News (@CBSNews) April 28, 2019

Smollett was indicted on 16 charges in February for falsely claiming he had been the victim of a racial and homophobic attack, in which he alleged the attackers yelled “This is MAGA country.”

Chicago’s State Attorney controversially dropped all charges against the actor to the surprise of the city’s police officials and mayor, Rahm Emanuel, who called it an “abomination of justice”.

On Wednesday, Smollett’s Empire co-stars Terrence Howard and Taraji P. Henson signed a letter defending the embattled actor, along with other key cast members.

“He is innocent … he is honest,” they wrote.