A 61-year-old man is set to appear in Pictou provincial court Thursday to face charges of murdering a woman with an axe.

John Douglas Cress of Thorburn briefly appeared Wednesday and the matter was put over.

The public prosecution service says the victim is Mary Evelyn Cress, who is the accused’s mother.

She was found with serious injuries at the suspect’s home in Thorburn, and was taken to hospital where she died from her injuries on Monday.

 

 

A Nova Scotia Court of Appeal judge has denied bail for William Sandeson as he appeals his conviction for killing a man during a drug deal in 2015.

In a written decision dated Tuesday, Justice David Farrar says Sandeson “failed to persuade me that he should be released”, adding that he considers the grounds for appeal “weak.”

A jury found Sandeson guilty in February of second-degree murder in the killing of 22-year-old Dalhousie physics student Taylor Samson.

He was sentenced in April to life in prison without the possibility of parole for 15 years and filed a handwritten notice of appeal of the decision in May.

Premier Tim Houston has announced a new mobile phone app that is aimed at giving people easier access to health services and system information.

Developed at a cost of 10 million dollars, YourHealthNS is touted as a “one-stop shop” to book services, get information and to find available health care faster.

Houston also says that through the app all Nova Scotians will be able to get two virtual health sessions a year covered by the province, regardless of whether they have a family doctor.

Officials say the additional virtual coverage through private provider Maple will cost the province 18 million dollars.

 

 

The federal government plans to level out the number of new permanent residents to Canada in 2026.

Immigration Minister Marc Miller submitted new targets for the next three years Wednesday, which call for the number of new permanent residents to hold steady at 500-thousand in 2026.

The plans show the goals for 2024 and 2025 will increase as planned.

The Liberals have aggressively increased their targets in recent years, leading to two years of record breaking immigration in 2021 and 2022.

 

 

Rose Cousins and Damhnait Doyle will host this year’s East Coast Music Awards in Charlottetown on May 2nd.

Cousins is a singer-songwriter who’s from P-E-I and now living in Halifax.

She’s won 11 E-C-M-As and two Junos, and she was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2018.

Doyle is a singer-songwriter from Newfoundland and Labrador, and she’s won seven E-C-M-As and was nominated for two Junos.