Rifle-pointing road rage van driver branded "remarkably stupid" by judge
Ex-Royal Navy sailor accused of sex assaults 'never heard of boy victim'
Suspected WW2 bomb found off Maenporth beach, near Falmouth
Man charged after armed robberies in Cornwall
Government to have final say on Cornwall quarry expansion approval
Great Western Railway could be broken up under new government plans
More news, sport, travel and weather from 08:00 on Thursday
Live updates for Devon and Cornwall have finished for the day, but we'll be back at 08:00 on Thursday with the latest news, sport, travel and weather.
Don't forget Spotlight on BBC One later. There will also be news through the night on your BBC Local Radio station.
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Exeter is one of 15 National Police Air Service bases providing air support to England and Wales' 43 police forces.
The branch is due to open in early summer 2018.
Both St Ives lifeboats were launched and a coastguard rescue team sent out after a life raft was found washed into the shore, external near the steep cliffs of Hell’s Mouth.
Hamish Marshall
BBC Spotlight
A former Royal Navy officer and businessman from Plymouth accused of a string of sexual offences says he’d never heard of a boy making the most serious allegation against him.
Charles Howeson, 68, denies 11 historic counts of indecent assault and one attempted serious sexual offence.
The boy who made the latter allegation said Mr Howeson tried to assault him after he’d been showing him how to use an air rifle between 1987 and 1988 in Plymouth.
As he gave evidence at Bristol Crown Court, Mr Howeson was asked if he had committed this offence. He said: "Certainly not."
He told the court he had never heard of the boy and had not owned an air gun.
Mr Howeson said he did own a 12-bore shotgun which he kept locked away in a gun chest at his home.
He was asked if he had shown children how to use it. He replied: "Certainly not."
He said he only fired it to test it and expend cartridges, and his wife was there at the time.
He described shooting guns in a city as "quite inappropriate".
The trial continues.
Brent Pilnick
BBC Sport
Image source, Getty ImagesExeter Chiefs back-row Sam Simmonds wants to establish himself as a regular member of the England team.
The 23-year-old was a late call-up by head coach Eddie Jones for the first autumn Test against Argentina but ended up playing in all three internationals.
"This is just the start now. Once you've made your debut you don't want to just stop at having one, two or three games," Simmonds told BBC Sport.
"You want to push on and grow as a player and make yourself better."
Johnny O'Shea
BBC News Online
Three men have been jailed for 15 months after being found guilty of multiple burglaries at Truro Crown Court.
Greg Gregory, Luke Pembroke, and Johnathan Conian travelled from their homes in Bermondsey, South East London to commit the crimes at two shops and a service station in Devon and Cornwall in 2016.
Gregory, 22, and Pembroke, 27, were found guilty of four counts of burglary, while Conian, 32, was found guilty of two counts.
The first offences happened at Costcutter in Okehampton and Spar in Bugle on 16 November, 2016. The Spar in Bugle was again targeted on 19 November, when they also burgled the St Erth Service Station near Hayle.
The jury took a little over four hours to reach its verdicts, all of which were by a majority of ten to two.
Judge Simon Carr said: "I'm clear that somebody else arranged the way it was done. These were planned burglaries.
"You traveled down from London, and back, and switched number plates on cars."
He also explained that the offenders were found in part because their get away car crashed on one occasion.
All three men received 15 months prison sentences for their offences. Pembroke received an additional month for being in breach of a suspended sentence.
Thursday will have another frosty start followed by dry, sunny and cold weather for most in that continuing northerly wind.
Further showers are likely across parts of the north.
Maximum temperature: 7C (45F).
The evening and overnight will stay windy and cold.
It will be breezy across more northern areas. Frost will form more widely than last night.
Minimum temperature: 0C (32F).
BBC Politics
Transport Secretary Chris Grayling says plans to split up rail operator Great Western will not lead to a separate franchise for Devon and Cornwall.
The break-up of GWR is part of a wider government strategy that could also see the reopening of train lines closed in the 1960s.
Mr Grayling said a Devon and Cornwall franchise was "not part of the plans", but he wanted to get the "right answer for the South West".
He also insisted that the counties would not become isolated, no matter who managed services in the South West.
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Sean Coughlan
BBC News, education correspondent
Dame Prof Glynis Breakwell is stepping down from her role as vice-chancellor of the University of Bath - after an intense campaign, including by many of her own staff, complaining about excessive levels of pay.
It might be a fall from grace, but it's also a rather graceful fall - remaining on full pay during a sabbatical that will take her into 2019.
Her chief harrier, the former Education Minister Lord Adonis, says the terms of the departure are "outrageous" and symptomatic of an excessively cosy culture at the top of universities.
He is turning his sights on other institutions, listing Exeter, Southampton and Birmingham as among more than 50 universities paying their bosses more than £300,000 per year.
His charge is that there is insufficient regulation - and that universities need to have proper accountability when so much of their funding comes from the public purse or the pockets of students.
I look at the situation closer here.
Hayley Westcott
BBC News Online
Image source, Mark MilburnA suspected World War Two parachute mine which was found by local divers near Falmouth is due to be destroyed on Thursday, coastguards say.
A Royal Navy team from Plymouth has been on-site assessing the object, which is about 800m offshore from Maenporth beach.
The Maritime and Coastguard Agency said safety exclusion zones were in place and that the public should stay clear.
The Falmouth lifeboat has been keeping vessels clear of the area.
Andrew Segal
BBC Local Live
An incident where two people with learning difficulties were subjected to verbal abuse by a group of teenage boys in Exeter is being treated as a hate crime, police say.
Officers said, external the man and woman were stopped from leaving the Vue cinema at about 19:15 on Sunday when three boys aged about 15 blocked the entrance and "subjected the pair to threats and verbal abuse".
Police said the victims, from the city, were "left very distressed and fearful".
Officers have appealed for witnesses, describing one boy as wearing a red coat, the second in a green coat and the third wearing a black coat.
BBC Business News
Railway lines closed in the 1960s could be reopened if they boost the economy, the government has said.
If they were reopened, it would see some reversal of the infamous Beeching cuts - where some 4,000 miles of rail routes were closed in the 1960s, mainly in rural areas.
Image source, Getty ImagesBut who was Beeching? And what did his cuts affect?
Dr Richard Beeching's brief as chairman of the British Transport Commission was simple: "Make the railways pay."
British Rail was losing £140m a year when Dr Beeching took over the commission. His solution, announced on 27 March 1963, was equally straightforward: massive cuts.
The then Conservative government welcomed the report, but thousands of people - many in remote rural areas - were horrified they would lose their local branch lines.
Opposition from the pressure groups failed and, during the 1960s, "Beeching's Axe" fell on 2,128 stations and more than 67,000 British Rail jobs.
Hamish Marshall
BBC Spotlight
A former Royal Navy officer from Plymouth accused of historic sexual offences said he felt "very relieved" when he was told there would be no further action taken against him by the Royal Navy after an inquiry.
Charles Howeson, 68, is on trial Bristol Crown Court and denies 12 charges against nine males dating back to the 1980s and 1990s.
One of the alleged offences took place on board a Devonport-based frigate.
Mr Howeson was second-in-command of HMS Cleopatra in 1985 when he was accused of indecent assault by a young sailor.
He told Bristol Crown Court that two-man inquiry held by the service into the allegations was "very thorough".
He added that he was told in a telephone call six weeks later that the report had gone up the line and there was no further action to be taken.
He told the court: "I felt very relieved that the full process had been carried out and was unchallengeable."
Mr Howeson then spent five years on shore duties including a promotion to commander.
He told the court he was due to take charge of a ship but decided to leave the navy for family reasons in 1991.
The trial continues.
Julie Skentelbery
BBC Radio Cornwall
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An air rifle which was pointed by a road rage van driver at another vehicle, and made its occupants fear they would be shot, looked like a hunting rifle, a court heard.
Joseph McNally claimed his dog jumped into the front seat of his van and knocked the lawfully-held air rifle into the driver's foot well during the incident on the A361 in February after a "cat and mouse" chase on the M5 with a car.
The 26-year-old, of Bilbie Close, Cullompton, said he had been moving the 42in-long Remington Tyrant Tactical weapon to a safer place and not pointing it when it was seen by a passenger in another car.
His story was dismissed as "almost laughable" by Judge Graham Cottle after McNally was found guilty by a jury of possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence.
Adjourning the case for a probation report, he called McNally's actions "remarkably stupid and very serious".
Lee Bremridge, defending, said McNally had no previous convictions and was a hard-working man with a partner and stable home life.
Staff at waterfront bars in Falmouth are to get specialist training to help prevent people from drowning after a night out.
They're being issued with throw lines and will be taught how to use them in case of an emergency.
Harbour master Mark Sansom said it was part of the "Don't Drink and Drown" initiative from Cornwall Fire and Rescue and the police.
He said it has come after national statistics showed a "worrying national picture" of such deaths, and it was "particularly young males drowning a result of entering the water after consuming alcohol."
Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service safety officers will be checking the fire safety measures at hotels in a Devon town, external following a suspected arson attack which left four people in hospital.
Six fire crews attended the Dilkhusa Grand Hotel in Ilfracombe on Tuesday to deal with a fire in a third-floor room.
Andrew Segal
BBC Local Live
Two barns have been completely destroyed in a fire and another two badly damaged in the blaze, firefighters say, external.
Crews were called the scene in Compton, near Marldon in south Devon, at about 02:45, and found one 40m by 25m structure - converted into four barns - containing a large amount of straw and farm machinery, alight.
About 150 tonnes of hay and straw was completely destroyed.
The fire is under control and Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service said it would make "periodic revisits to ensure that the fire is left to burn under control".
