Updates on Friday 13 November 2015
More news, sport, travel and weather from 08:00 on Monday
Live updates for Coventry & Warwickshire have finished for the day.
We'll be back from 08:00 on Monday with the latest news, sport, travel and weather.
Any showers this evening will clear to leave a mostly dry night.
It will turn milder tomorrow, but rain will move in from the west with strong winds.
Rugby could soon become the centre of the Midlands transport network, external as a new £22m Rail Operating Centre officially opened in the borough.
Image source, Rugby AdvertiserThe BBC is hoping to smash the £32.6m total it raised at last year's Children in Need.
A choir of 1,100 people sang the Sound of Music and raised more than £7,500
Some of the fundraising efforts have included a choir of 1,100 people which rehearsed for six hours to sing the Sound of Music, 50 years after the film's release.
They raised over £7,500.
BBC Coventry & Warwickshire
Watch another one of our animations based on first-hand accounts of the Coventry Blitz.
You can watch and listen to more of our coverage marking the 75th anniversary here.
Moira Rawlings
BBC Coventry & Warwickshire
These are our main stories today:
- The jury in the Nicola Payne murder trial has been sent home for the weekend
- Ex-directors of City Link have been cleared in court
- Coventry prepares to mark the 75th anniversary of the Blitz on the city
Kevin Reide
Midlands Today
As a nine-year-old evacuee, Tony Vail remembers watching his city burn from the relative safety of a country manor 20 miles away.
Moira Rawlings
BBC Coventry & Warwickshire
Sheep have been attacked and killed, external in a field in Tanworth-in-Arden, according to police.
It happened during the night of Wednesday, 11 November in a field.
It is believed 568 people died in the bombings, with a further 1,256 injured.
Yet, within weeks of the raid - and contrary to all expectations - the city revived.
Factories were soon turning out aircraft parts that would be used to avenge the attack.
Image source, Getty Images
BBC Travel
An accident has closed one lane of the M40 northbound between J15, A46 and J16, A3400.
Clive Eakin
BBC Coventry & Warwickshire Sport
Sky Blues goalkeeper Reice Charles-Cook believes that the City don't have to dip into the transfer market to replace long-term injury victim Reda Johnson.
Image source, EmpicsThe 21-year-old stopper is back from injury to challenge Lee Burge for the keeper's position in tomorrow's League 1 match at Colchester.
Manager Tony Mowbray's still trying to find a player to fill the void left by "Big Reda" but Charles-Cook says he thinks the current centre-back pairing are doing a good job.
Vanessa Pearce
BBC Local Live
The jury in the trial of two men accused of murdering Nicola Payne in 1991 has been sent home for the weekend.
Image source, West Midlands PoliceNigel Barwell and his brother-in-law Thomas O'Reilly, who are both from Coventry, deny murdering the 18-year-old mother-of-one as she walked across waste ground.
The jury at Birmingham Crown Court was sent out yesterday and has so far spent two days deliberating.
Kevin Reide
Midlands Today
Former hostage Terry Waite has praised the people of Coventry for the way they responded when the city was all but destroyed during the Blitz.
He's been attending a special peace conference at the cathedral to mark the 75th anniversary.
The head teacher of All Saints Primary in Nuneaton, Sally Kaminski-Gaze, also took some pupils to the conference.
BBC Coventry & Warwickshire
Coventry City Council has unveiled proposals for more than £1m worth of cuts to libraries and community facilities.
The report includes plans to shut every library outside the city on a Wednesday and Sunday and to end the mobile library service.
Councillor David Kershaw, Cabinet Member for Education and Libraries, says the proposals are necessary if the council are to balance their books.
Moira Rawlings
BBC Coventry & Warwickshire
County councillors in Warwickshire are pressing ahead with plans to open up a pedestrian bridge over the A444 in Nuneaton so vehicles can use it.
They were reviewing the project after concerns were voiced that the scheme's costs had doubled to £6.5m.
The charity celebrated outstanding achievements, externalby both staff and service-users during a fun-packed evening.
Image source, Stratford Observer
Jennifer Harby
BBC News Online
In the days following the Coventry Blitz the BBC broadcast an interview with anthropologist Tom Harrison, who talked about the number of casualties and the shock people felt in the city.
Image source, Getty imagesCabinet documents of the time show Secretary of State for War Anthony Eden describing the broadcast as "most depressing", adding it would have a "deplorable effect" on morale.
The Coventry bombing turned out to be a trigger-point for the government, and ministers were determined to exert more control over the BBC.
A magistrate has questioned the government's use of a "retrospective crystal ball" in prosecuting three former directors of the collapsed firm City Link.
Deputy District Judge David Goodman dismissed charges against the three men after hearing that a £17m offer to rescue the courier firm was rejected following it's slide into administration.
Image source, ReutersDuring a two-day trial, Mr Goodman said, counsel for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, Paul Ozin, had suggested former director David Smith would have seen collapse was inevitable if he had looked into a crystal ball.
Delivering his verdict, Mr Goodman said: "Retrospective use of a crystal ball is a concept I struggled at the time to understand."
Employees at soon-to-be-axed Co-op stores across Nuneaton, Bedworth, Hinckley and Atherstoneare to be consulted on their future., external
Image source, Nuneaton NewsA windy and unsettled afternoon with sunny spells and blustery showers with hail and thunder possible.
Tonight feeling much colder than of late, with gales in places.
