Toronto, Aug 5 (AP/UNB) — Police in Canada say five people have been wounded during a shooting inside a Toronto nightclub.

Police spokeswoman Const. Allyson Douglas-Cook said one man is in hospital with life-threatening injuries after the incident early Monday morning. Four other victims are in non-life threatening condition.

No information on the suspect was immediately released.

Officer Stacey Davis of the Toronto Police Service told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation there was an altercation near the back of the club's interior when shots were first fired.

Markham, Jul 30 (AP/UNB) — Canadian police have charged a 23-year-old man with first-degree murder after four bodies were found in a home north of Toronto.

York Regional Police Constable Andy Pattenden said Monday that Menhaz Zaman faces four counts of first-degree murder after the bodies of three adult women and one man were found in the home. He did not say whether there was any relationship between the accused and the victims or what a possible motive might have been.

Zaman was taken into custody Sunday afternoon after police were called to the home in response to reports of multiple injuries inside.

Pattenden said Zaman answered the door when officers arrived but police did not say who phoned in the tip.

Honolulu, Jul 12 (AP/UNB) — Intense turbulence struck an Air Canada flight to Australia on Thursday and sent unbuckled passengers flying into the ceiling, forcing the plane to land in Hawaii.

The flight from Vancouver to Sydney encountered "un-forecasted and sudden turbulence," about two hours past Hawaii when the plane diverted to Honolulu, Air Canada spokeswoman Angela Mah said in a statement.

"The plane just dropped," passenger Stephanie Beam told The Associated Press. "When we hit turbulence, I woke up and looked over to make sure my kids were buckled. The next thing I knew there's just literally bodies on the ceiling of the plane."

A woman behind her hit the ceiling so hard that she broke the casing of an oxygen mask, said Beam, of Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Of the 37 passengers and flight crew members injured, nine had serious injuries, emergency responders said. Thirty people were taken to hospitals.

Honolulu Emergency Medical Services Chief Dean Nakano said the injured ranged in age from children to the elderly. Customs agents and emergency responders met passengers at the gate at the Honolulu airport to ensure they could get medical attention quickly.

Honolulu Emergency Services Department spokeswoman Shayne Enright said injuries included cuts, bumps, bruises, neck pain and back pain. More than two dozen people were taken to hospitals, she said.

Llyn Williams was traveling with his wife Erica Daly back to their home in Sydney, Australia. His wife was injured and taken to the hospital.

He said when they hit the violent turbulence, "Everybody who was not seated and belted in hit the roof, almost everybody in our cabin."

Williams described the cabin afterward as frightening, with plastic lying around and oxygen masks dangling. "A lot of blood everywhere," he said. "It was really quite scary."

Andrew Szucs, originally from Ontario but now living in Sydney, was not injured.

There had been turbulence before the abrupt drop and he was awake, bracing himself.

"Then all of a sudden the plane dropped and went sideways," Szucs said. "And that's when the people who were strapped in flew, hit the ceiling."

He said the pilot came on the radio and said they didn't see the turbulence on radar and had "no warning this kind of air drop was going to happen."

Babies and children were crying as crew members went through the cabin assessing injuries. About 15 minutes later, there was an announcement asking for passengers who are medical professionals to help, Beam said.

Sandy Marshall of Sydney was injured, with her two children unhurt.

"I didn't have my seat belt on at the time. My child was sleeping on me, and I went straight up into the ceiling," she said.

Most of the impact was to her head, but she also suffered a laceration under her right eye, bruising and muscular pain in her neck.

The turbulence happened at 36,000 feet (10,973 meters) about 600 miles (966 kilometers) southwest of Honolulu, said U.S. Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor.

The Boeing 777-200 was carrying 269 passengers and 15 crew members, according to Air Canada spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick.

Air Canada was arranging hotel accommodations and meals in Honolulu and options for resuming the flight.

"If we're going to be stuck somewhere, I can think of worse places," said Beam, traveling with her 10- and 11-year-old children.

Dubai, Jan 17 (AP/UNB) — Another Saudi woman has turned to social media for protection from her father, just days after Canada granted refuge to Rahaf al-Qunun, the 18-year-old Saudi who fled her family.

Identified only as Nojoud al-Mandeel on Twitter, her case differs from that of al-Qunun. She has not fled the kingdom, has not revealed her face and has only made her pleas for help on Twitter in Arabic.

While their circumstances are different, the claims of abuse by the two women mirror those of other female Saudi runaways who have used social media to publicize their escapes.

There has been speculation that al-Qunun's successful getaway will inspire others to copy her. However, powerful deterrents remain in place. If caught, runaways face possible death at the hands of relatives for purportedly shaming the family.

Saudi women fleeing their families challenge a system that grants men guardianship over women's lives. This guardianship system starts in the home, where women must obey fathers, husbands and brothers. Outside the home, it is applied to citizens, often referred to as sons and daughters by Saudi rulers who demand obedience.

Hala Aldosari, a Saudi scholar and activist, said the male guardianship system replicates the ruling family's model of governance, which demands full obedience to the king, who holds absolute power in decision-making.

"This is why the state is keen to maintain the authority of male citizens over women to ensure their allegiance," she said, adding that this "hierarchical system of domination" necessitates "keeping women in line."

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who's introduced social reforms loosening restrictions on women, told The Atlantic that doing away with guardianship laws has to be done in a way that does not harm families and the culture. He said abolishing these laws would create problems for families that don't want to give freedom to their daughters.

The issue of guardianship is extremely sensitive in the kingdom, where conservative families view what they consider the protection of women as a man's duty.

More than a dozen women's rights activists have been detained, many since May, after they campaigned against the guardianship system. Some had also wanted to create alternative shelters for women runaways.

Regardless of their age, women in Saudi Arabia must have the consent of a male relative to obtain a passport, travel or marry. In the past, a travel permit was a paper document issued by the Interior Ministry and signed by a male relative.

Today, Saudi men download a government mobile app that notifies them of a woman's travel. Through the app, men can grant or deny a woman permission to travel. Some young women who have fled the country had managed to access their father's phone, change the setting and disable its notifications.

In a statement read to reporters in Canada on Tuesday, al-Qunun said she wants to be independent, travel and make her own decisions.

"I am one of the lucky ones," she said. "I know there are unlucky women who disappeared after trying to escape or who could not change their reality."

That's especially true for women from conservative tribal families, like al-Qunun's.

Al-Qunun, one of 10 children, posted online that her father, Mohammed Mutliq al-Qunun, is the governor of the city of al-Sulaimi in the hilly hinterland of Ha'il — a province where nearly all women cover their face in black veils and wear loose black robes, or abayas, in public. The family belongs to the influential Shammar tribe, which extends to Iraq, Syria and other parts of the Middle East. Her father has considerable clout as a prominent town official and member of a powerful tribe.

Al-Qunun, who barricaded herself in an airport hotel room in Thailand last week to avoid deportation, said she was abused by a brother and locked in her room for months for cutting her hair short. She said she would have been killed if sent back to her family.

According to government statistics, at least 577 Saudi women tried to flee their homes inside the country in 2015, though the actual number is likely higher. There are no statistics on attempted or successful escapes abroad.

Shahad al-Mohaimeed, 19, who fled abuse and an ultraconservative family in Saudi Arabia two years ago, said fear is a powerful deterrent.

"When a Saudi girl decides to flee, it means she's decided to put her life on the line and take a very, very risky step," said al-Mohaimeed, who now lives in Sweden.

Al-Qunun's plight on social media drew international attention, helping her short-circuit the typically complex path to asylum. A little more than a week after fleeing Saudi Arabia, she was in Canada, building a new life, posting pictures of wine, bacon and donning a dress above the knees.

Back in Saudi Arabia, the woman identified as Nojoud al-Mandeel posted audio on Twitter on Monday alleging her father had beaten and burnt her "over something trivial". She posted a video looking onto a neighbor's gated pool, where she says she jumped from her bedroom window before a friend picked her up and they escaped.

"Don't tell me to report to police," she said, explaining that in a previous attempt, police just had her father sign a pledge saying he would not beat her again.

After her story gained some traction online, she was promised attention by a protection hotline in Saudi Arabia for domestic abuse victims. Prosecutors also reportedly began looking into her allegations of abuse, according to Saudi news sites.

She was placed in a domestic abuse shelter, but on Tuesday complained on Twitter about the shelter's restrictions over her movements.

Al-Mohaimeed said Twitter is where Saudi women can share stories and be heard. She and two other Saudi women took over al-Qunun's Twitter account, writing messages on her behalf during the height of her pleas last week to avoid deportation.

"I was not born in this world to serve a man," al-Mohaimeed said. "I was born in this world to fulfill my dreams, achieve my dreams, grow, learn and be independent — to taste life as I hold it in my hands."

Thousand Oaks, Nov 8 (AP/UNB) — A gunman opened fire Wednesday inside a country dance bar crowded with hundreds of people on "college night," wounding 11 people including a deputy who rushed to the scene, police said.

"Multiple injuries reported" - Firefighters and first responders are arriving at the scene of a reported mass shooting in Thousand Oaks, Ventura County.

Follow the latest updates on the story here: https://t.co/9Pc8K5AUeD pic.twitter.com/cNBc9WE1wL

— Sky News (@SkyNews) November 8, 2018

Ventura County sheriff's Capt. Garo Kuredjian said he could not confirm whether any of those shot were dead. Kuredjian said he could not confirm that the shooter was killed or in custody, but said there was no further threat to the community.

Kuredjian said hundreds of people were inside the Borderline Bar & Grill in Thousand Oaks at 11:20 p.m., and shots were still being fired when deputies arrived.

Tayler Whitler, 19, said she was inside the bar when a gunman walked in with his face partly covered by something resembling a ski mask, opened fire on a person working the door, then began to shoot people at random.

"It was really, really really shocking," Whitler told KABC-TV as she stood with her father in the Borderline parking lot. "It looked like he knew what he was doing."

It was college night and country two-step lessons were being offered Wednesday at the Borderline, according to its website.

It has been "quite some time" since there was a  shooting of any kind in Thousand Oaks, a city of about 130,000 people about 40 miles (64 kilometers) west of Los Angeles, just across the county line.

Nick Steinwender, student body president at nearby California Lutheran University, rushed to the scene when he heard about a shooting at the bar where he knew friends and fellow students were inside.

"It was chaos, people jumping out of windows, people hopping over gates to get out" Steinwender told KABC.

He said he heard from people inside that they were hiding in bathrooms and the attic of the bar.