Our coverage from across the daypublished at 18:00 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
That is it from Local Live on Wednesday. Please join us again from 08:00 for more news, sport, travel and weather updates.
Summary
Nuisance call firm based in Dudley fined £70,000
A free weight loss programme for Birmingham has been axed
A Victorian Valentine's mystery has been solved
A £50m project is launched to help young people into work in Birmingham
Updates on Wednesday 17 February 2016
Our coverage from across the daypublished at 18:00 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Watch: Latest weather forecast for the West Midlandspublished at 17:58 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Shefali Oza
BBC Midlands TodayFalling temperatures tonight and be warned there should be some ice as temperatures are dipping as low as freezing.
Media caption, The afternoon weather forecast for the West Midlands
M6 Wolverhampton: One lane blocked and slow trafficpublished at 17:56 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
BBC TravelOne lane blocked and slow traffic on M6 southbound between J10a M54 and J10, A454 (Wolverhampton), because of a broken down vehicle.
Latest: Fine for nuisance calls; Unemployment drops; Police officer head-buttedpublished at 17:53 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Alex Homer
BBC Local LiveIf you are just catching up on Wednesday's news, here are the headlines for the past few hours:
- A Dudley firm which made tens of thousands of nuisance sales calls in the middle of the night has been fined £70,000
- Latest figures show 12,000 fewer unemployed people across the West Midlands in the last quarter
- A police officer was head-butted during an operation to crackdown on drugs at a Birmingham shopping centre
Dudley rower braves deadly storms and close encounters as he nears cross-Atlantic featpublished at 17:48 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Here's today's frontpage - an amateur Kingswinford rower was this week just 500 nautical miles from achieving a feat very few people have ever done, external.
Image source, Dudley NewsJonas Olsson: West Brom defender happy with gap to Premier League drop zonepublished at 17:33 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
BBC WM SportDefender Jonas Olsson says West Bromwich Albion have taken an important step towards securing their Premier League status after a long-awaited win at Everton.
Image source, Getty ImagesTwenty-nine thefts from vehicles in Tamworth in past month, police revealpublished at 17:13 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Motorists in Tamworth have been warned to remain vigilant, external after police dealt with 29 thefts from vehicles in the past month.
M6 Wolverhampton: Lane blocked and slow trafficpublished at 16:45 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
BBC TravelOne lane is blocked and there is slow traffic on the M6 southbound between J10a M54 and J10, A454 (Wolverhampton), because of a broken down vehicle, BBC Travel reports.
The Best Birmingham Art Events Spring 2016 by Sally W Jonespublished at 16:37 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Grapevine BirminghamWell, Spring is almost springing and it looks a bit like full frontal nudity and audience participation (although hopefully not at the same time) might be the theme for arts in Birmingham, external. Good luck!
Syria wife Lorna Moore 'abused' by fighter husbandpublished at 16:18 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Dominic Casciani
Home Affairs CorrespondentA woman accused of failing to tell police her husband was part of a group heading to fight for so-called Islamic State in Syria has told her trial she was a victim of his domestic abuse.
Lorna Moore, 33, said she hated her estranged husband Sajid Aslam.
Image source, PAMs Moore, who lives in Walsall, told the Old Bailey she would have told the police if she had known her husband had gone to fight for IS.
She denies failing to disclose information about acts of terrorism. The trial continues.
Soldier turned Amazon worker stole £1,500 of goods in first week on the jobpublished at 16:01 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
A former soldier from Staffordshire stole almost £1,500 worth of goods just a week into a job working for Amazon.
Image source, Express & StarListen: Nuisance call company based in Dudley made tens of thousands of calls in one daypublished at 15:39 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
A nuisance call company which made a deluge of calls in the middle of the night from a withheld number have been by hit with a £70,000 fine.
Direct Security Marketing Ltd, based in Dudley, made nearly 40,000 automated calls in just one day in an attempt to sell burglar alarms. Of these, 9,775 were made between 01:00 and 06:00.
Media caption, Nuisance call
The government's data watchdog, the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), which ordered the fine, said the automated calls were made from a withheld number on 24 August 2015.
Andy Curry, from the ICO, said "Elderly people were among those who were left distressed after being woken up in the night by the automated calls."
Officer headbutted as man tried to escapepublished at 15:19 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
A police officer was head-butted at a Birmingham shopping centre. The culprit was later found to have a loaded handgun in his bag.
Officers asked a 19-year-old man to stop outside William Hill bookmakers at Newtown Shopping Centre at around 17:00 on Tuesday but he cycled away.
He was then challenged by plain-clothes officers who approached from the opposite direction. The man was handcuffed on the floor after a struggle, police said.
While being taken to a van, he tried to flee and head-butted a sergeant. He was arrested for assaulting a police officer in the execution of their duty and searches found a handgun in his bag.
Birmingham City: Keeper Kuszczak hoping experience will count in play-off pushpublished at 15:00 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
BBC WM SportGoalkeeper Tomasz Kuszczak says he hopes his near-miss with Wolves last season will help Birmingham City go one better and qualify for the Championship play-offs this time round.
Image source, Getty ImagesKuszczak, 33, has kept four clean sheets in five games with Blues only three points shy of the top six.
Countdown to Lichfield by-elections tomorrowpublished at 14:44 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
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End of twitter postYou've heard of a crime ring, well this suspect left his number for police to callpublished at 14:22 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
A wanted thief left a handwritten note urging police to give them a call.
Officers in Oxley and Bushbury came across the message taped to the door and tweeted the picture.
The suspect asked police to get in touch but said "after I finnish (sic) work is best cause I am staying with my kids again".
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End of twitter postValentine's love mystery solvedpublished at 14:03 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Ben Godfrey
BBC Midlands TodayA Valentine’s postcard love mystery has been solved.
A dusty postcard emerged at Coventry Market which had been written in code and signed with the letter H. It had been posted in the early 1900s to a Miss M Greaves in the Black Country.
Media caption, Love mystery solved
A report on the postcard last week brought forward plenty of suggestions from viewers, and now their family has been tracked down.
Latest: Weight loss programme scrapped; Unemployment drops; Criticism over illegal schoolspublished at 13:39 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Alex Homer
BBC Local LiveHere is a recap of the top stories in the BBC WM newsroom:
- A free weight loss programme in Birmingham has been scrapped
- Unemployment in the West Midlands dropped by 12,000 in the last quarter, according to figures released today
- Labour has accused the government of not acting quickly enough to close down illegal schools, after one was exposed previously in Birmingham
M5: Lane closed and heavy trafficpublished at 13:19 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
BBC TravelOne lane is closed and there's heavy traffic on the M5 northbound between J1, A41 (West Bromwich) and M6 J8, because of a broken down vehicle, BBC Travel news reports.
Ready for the best 'Bottom' in the land?published at 13:10 Greenwich Mean Time 17 February 2016
Amy Cole
BBC Midlands TodayOn Midlands Today at lunch time we’ll be finding out how researchers are recruiting young scientists to develop medicine that tastes nicer to children.
We’ll be live in Stratford-upon-Avon where the search for the best “Bottom” in the land has reached a conclusion.
And up close and personal with Gordon Banks…the world cup winning goalie and former Stoke player has been speaking to Ian Winter.
