Rapper Snoop Dogg Granted Visa for Australia

The rapper Snoop Dogg has been granted a visa to enter Australia after finishing a full character assessment. He has a concert tour scheduled for the near future in Australia. The immigration department had originally had concerns about his criminal record but considered the fact that he had traveled there three times before without any problems. In the assessment they weighed his previous convictions against his more recent charity work and they considered if he would be any risk to the Australian community. Snoop Dogg is also suppose to do charity work with at-risk youth during his visit.

Hip Hop Singer Nate Dogg Charged With Stalking

The hip hop singer Nate Dogg has been charged by prosecutors on Monday with stalking after he was accused of threatening and stalking his wife. He was arrested last month by the California Highway Patrol after his wife stated that he threatened and followed her while she was driving on a freeway south of Los Angeles.

He will be arraigned on July 16^th on felony counts of making criminal threats, stalking, and a misdemeanor charge of driving while his license was suspended for a drunken driving violation.

Rapper DMX Pleads Not Guilty

The rapper DMX has pleaded not guilty in court to charges of felony drug possession and misdemeanor animal cruelty charges on Thursday. He was indicted last week on 11 counts that included felony marijuana and paraphernalia possession and seven counts of misdemeanor animal cruelty.

The charges come from a raid that was done on his property last August where he was accused of neglecting to take proper care of 12 pit bull dogs at his Phoenix, Arizona property. Some of the dogs were found to be dehydrated and underfed. Three dogs were found buried in his back yard.

German Police Dogs Being Forced to Wear Shoes

Police dogs in Düsseldorf, Germany are being forced to wear fiber shoes while on patrol and the dogs are currently being trained to walk in the shoes. They are being forced to wear the shoes due to the high rate of paw injuries on duty and the dogs are often stepping on broken glass while on patrol. The pieces of glass often get stuck in their paws.

The dogs will start to wear the shoes on patrol during the spring but only during times that demand special foot protection. The shoes come in small, medium, and large sizes and were ordered in blue to match the officer uniforms.

Dog Barks Translated By Computer

There are scientists at Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest, Hungary that has recorded more than 6,000 dog barks, which were by 14 different Hungarian sheepdogs, and fed the sounds to a computer program which was able to categorized the barks into categories that included “stranger,” “fight,” “alone,” “ball,” “walk,” and “play.” The computer also was able to pick out different dogs by their bark.

Read More: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/earth/2008/01/16/scidog116.xml

Mike Vick Sentenced to 23 Months in Prison

Mike Vick, the Atlanta Falcons quarterback, was sentenced to 23 months in prison for his recent dogfighting case that involved gambling and killing pit bulls. He could have been sentenced to serve as many as five years. He could possible get out three months earlier if he gets time off for good behavior.

Back in August, Vick pleaded guilty to his part in a dogfighting operation that killed between six to eight dogs. He admitted to funding the dogfighting operation on his 15-acre property in southeastern Virginia. He said that he provided the money for the bets on the fights but didn’t get any money from the winnings.

Snoop Dogg Has Community Service Raking Leaves

Rapper Snoop Dogg has agreed to do 160 community service hours of raking leaves, washing cars, cleaning toilets, and picking up litter for his charge of an illegal possession of a dangerous weapon that he had when he went through security at a John Wayne Airport in September of 2006. Authorities decided not to release the name of the park where he will be “working” at so there will be no disturbances of fans while he "works."