Green Bay News

NORTHEAST WISCONSIN – Plenty of people in our area are asking why it took so long to identify the remains of a woman, who authorities believe was murdered.

As FOX 11 first reported Wednesday night, a nearly two-year-old missing person’s case in Shawano County is now a homicide investigation.

Heather Szekeres was last seen during the summer of 2013 at a bar in Shawano.

Her husband said she never came home and he reported her missing.

Forensic experts say to the general public, it may seem like the process to identify the remains took a long time. But they say, they’re not surprised how long it took.

It was dark out last May when forensic workers collected human remains the Town of Richmond. But that was just the beginning.

“Depending on how decomposed the body was, if it was skeletonized or if there’s still some soft tissue left, you want to collect everything possible, the soil around it and bring that to the lab,” said Fox Valley Techical College Forensics Instructor Joe LeFevre.

Authorities used DNA samples collected from the remains and from the location to identify the body of Heather Szekeres.

She disappeared two years ago in the month of June.

LeFevre says that’s a time when decomposition can happen quickly.

“From late spring to late fall, and through any summer months, definitely we’re in the conditions right where it would take a matter of weeks to a month or two to get down to a point of near skeletonization,” said LeFevre.

LeFevre says DNA is mostly found in soft tissue not in the bones. That can make a badly decomposed body harder to identify.

Shawano County officials sent the remains to the state crime lab in Madison.

However, the Department of Justice says it was a separate lab that did the DNA testing.

LeFevre says Wisconsin’s crime lab isn’t equipped to do some of the more advanced testing on a decomposed body.

“It’s a kind of thing that happens once in a blue moon, so they wouldn’t need that technology everyday in our lab,” said LeFevre.

LeFevre says finding an outside lab capable of doing the testing can add more time to the process.

“Also getting in the production cue, you know an outside lab would have their own crime scenes to process. Another problem would be what’s the public safety concern,” explained LeFevre.

Once a DNA profile is built, it must be matched with the victim’s DNA. If that’s not available forensic workers must look to family.

“And see if there are enough points of comparison to say that this is likely this person based on their genetic profile is half of mom and half of dad’s,” LeFevre said.

Fox 11 attempted to reach out to Szekeres’ family but did not hear back.

Her husband said he’s not allowed to comment.

The Department of Justice would not comment for this story because the investigation is still open.

The sheriff’s department and Shawano police also declined to speak with FOX 11.

GLEASON, Wis. (AP) – Authorities suspect a lightning strike caused a barn fire that killed some animals in northern Wisconsin.

The Lincoln County 911 Center got a report of the barn engulfed in flames just before 3:30 a.m. Thursday. By the time deputies and firefighters arrived, the barn had collapsed.

Several animals that had been in the barn, including steers and goats, died in the fire. One goat was able to be rescued.

The fire happened outside Gleason in the Township of Russell.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The teenage daughter of Somali immigrants has a tough choice to make after her upcoming graduation from a private high school in the Twin Cities area.

Eighteen-year-old Munira Khalif has been accepted at all eight Ivy League schools — and then some.

Khalif downplays her achievements and says she’s had her share of disappointments. She says her pile of college acceptance letters is “a humbling experience.” The Fridley teen attributes her success to her school, community and a close family that values education.

Mounds Park Academy officials say Khalif has a stellar academic record and high ACT score. The Star Tribune says that besides Princeton, Yale, Harvard and the other Ivy League schools, Khalif has been accepted at Georgetown, Stanford and the University of Minnesota.

 

MADISON (AP) – A federal judge has denied Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson’s request for a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of a constitutional amendment that could lead to her being demoted.

U.S. District Judge James Peterson issued the order on Thursday.

Abrahamson filed a federal lawsuit on Wednesday, seeking to stop the amendment from taking effect until after her term ends in four years. The amendment approved by voters Tuesday gives justices on the court the power to choose the chief justice, rather than having it go to the most senior member.

The judge says in his order that Abrahamson could revive her request to block immediate enforcement the law later, but he doesn’t think it will be necessary because he plans for “prompt resolution” of the lawsuit.

GREEN BAY – Rain delayed the release Thursday of an injured Snowy Owl recovering at the Bay Beach Wildlife Sanctuary in Green Bay.

The two-year-old female snowy was found in January in Door County with a broken wrist.

After four months of rehab, the owl is strong enough to be released back to its home in Canada.

But a steady afternoon rain caused caretakers to call off the owl’s release, at least for Thursday.

“We want to make sure that she has the best chance possible. So, with the rain coming down, that might thwart her chances of really getting to a good roosting site tonight. Really being able to maneuver, find some food,” said Lori Bankson, Bay Beach Wildlife Sanctuary Curator of Animals.>

The owl returned to its pen for another night.

Bay Beach officials say weather permitting, they will try again Friday.

CHILTON – A former teacher’s aide at Appleton West High School was sentenced to one year behind bars and five years probation Thursday.

Laura Ernst, 45, was charged with multiple counts of sexual assault of a student by a staff member.

Ernst, formerly known as Bates, now goes by her maiden name after she and her husband divorced.

Prosecutors said Ermst had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old boy, who is a special education student. Bates was a paraprofessional in his classroom.

 

MADISON (AP) – Assembly Speaker Robin Vos says Gov. Scott Walker’s proposal to remove powers of the Natural Resources Board is getting a mixed reception from Republican lawmakers.

Vos said Thursday that Assembly Republicans talked about the proposal as they are beginning to discuss elements of Walker’s budget. He says the idea to make the seven-member board advisory only got a “mixed reception.”

Walker’s budget calls for transforming the board into an advisory panel, ending its ability to set policy for the DNR. That would allow the governor to control the agency directly through Secretary Cathy Stepp, a Walker appointee, with no checks or balances.

The proposal has been widely criticized by current board members, Democrats and environmental groups that work closely with the DNR.

MADISON (AP) – Wisconsin Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos says he’s confident a deal can be reached to finance a $1 billion plan for a new Milwaukee Bucks stadium and entertainment complex.

Vos said Thursday that he hopes an amiable agreement can be reached with Democratic Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett to get the city to commit more money.

Vos and fellow Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald have repeatedly called on Barrett to put forward more money.

Barrett has committed $25 million, with another $25 million expected from the county. Vos and Fitzgerald have said they don’t want the state to spend more than $150 million. Republican Gov. Scott Walker has proposed $220 million in state financing.

An additional $250 million is expected to come from current and former Bucks team owners.

PARIS (AP) – Thousands of protesters, many blowing whistles and waving union flags, marched through Paris and other French cities on Thursday in a day of nationwide strikes that kept many children out of school, forced the closure of the Eiffel Tower and cancelled some 2,000 flights in and out of France.

Stepping up pressure on President Francois Hollande’s already-unpopular Socialist government, the protesters aired an array of grievances against state funding cuts, planned increases in the retirement age, and business-friendly reforms that could make firing workers easier.

The strikes, called by key unions like the Communist-backed CGT, in the protest-friendly country follow recent complaints by groups as diverse as doctors and notaries against new government reforms, and come on top of ongoing strikes by air traffic controllers and workers at the state radio.

The CGT union estimated late Thursday that 300,000 people turned out in marches nationwide, including 120,000 in the capital. Paris police put the figure in the city at 32,000.

Workers have traditionally made up the bedrock of support for Hollande’s Socialists, and the protests suggested that his government’s recent move to the political center – including with business-friendly reforms – has rankled many on the left.

Analyst Pascal Perrineau said the mishmash of movements suggested that Hollande, who has cast himself as primarily a negotiator since he was elected in 2012, has not been clear enough with the French about his plans for getting the economically struggling country back on track.

“This proves that, if you will, he (Hollande) has lost control. When you’re the president, it’s not enough to be a negotiator. You have to able to fix a clear line for everyone,” said Perrineau, a professor at Paris’ Sciences Po political university.

The air traffic controllers were holding the second half of a two-day strike. It led to the cancellation of some 2,000 flights, mostly short- and medium-haul routes, in and out of France Thursday, according to Eric Heraud, spokesman for the French civil aviation agency DGAC.

Their walkout, in part over plans to raise their maximum retirement age to 59, was expected to resume in each of the next two weeks. Many European carriers were avoiding French airspace.

Employees at Radio France, the state-backed broadcaster, were entering the third week of their walkout to protest budget cuts – and many of them were expected to be carrying banners at the Paris protest.

Railway workers, health care providers, teachers and energy sector personnel and others honored Thursday’s general strike, partially to register discontent against the government’s proposed so-called “Macron Law” that would reduce workplace protections coveted by many French employees.

“All the established social rights of our labor law are being questioned with this bill,” said Nicolas Mas, a teacher marching in Paris. “We are back to the nineteenth century. It is incredible. A total loss of all the benefits of the working class obtained through years.”

The CGT’s website laid out 10 of its reasons for employees to stay off the job – such as to end wage stagnation for state workers, demand equal pay for women and men and defend the state-supported health care system.

A spokeswoman for the Eiffel Tower said it closed because many employees of the famed Paris landmark took part in the protest in solidarity with the overall movement. A sign out front said it was closed until 6:30 p.m. local time, frustrating some eager would-be visitors.

“The Eiffel Tower closed because of the strike in the peak season, it’s kind of disappointing,” said Diane Powell, a 49-year-old tourist from New York.

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Oleg Cetinic and Nicolas Garriga contributed to this report.

DAYTON, Ohio (AP) — Officials say a southwest Ohio college student is in critical condition after he was struck by lightning.

Safety and fire officials say medics responded to a call of a male student struck by lightning around 7 p.m. Wednesday at a parking lot at the University of Dayton.

The university said Thursday that 23-year-old Sean Ferguson was in critical but stable condition at a Dayton hospital. He is a senior marketing major from Pittsburgh.

The Dayton Daily News and WHIO-TV report Ferguson was struck near the university’s Fitness and Recreation Complex. Fire officials say he was dressed in workout clothes and suffered severe burns.

A prayer service for Ferguson at the university chapel was scheduled for Thursday afternoon.

 

(SBG-TV) Now that Boko Haram has pledged its allegiance to ISIS, these two extreme terror organizations can now spread their hate on two continents.

Their end goal is terrifying: to establish a caliphate and accelerate the apocalypse. In order to do that, it’s all about real estate.

Boko Haram and ISIS are well-matched in their brutality. ISIS made headlines first with its slick hi-tech videos of sheer cruelty. Boko Haram was taking notes; using ISIS tactics to put into their own playbook.

Johnnie Moore is the author of the book ‘Defying ISIS’. “Not only have they [Boko Haram] pledged allegiance to ISIS, but they started doing the same things that ISIS has done; which is really really terrifying.”

Terrorism expert Dr. Amy Pate concurs. “All of the sudden, you start to see beheading videos which hadn’t been a Boko Haram trademark in the past,” Pate says. “So you see them start to mirror ISIS; probably to gain international attention.”

ISIS also benefits from this form of “terror franchising.”

“ISIS has been able to get what Boko Haram always had; which was territory,” Moore said. “You can’t have a caliphate unless you have land. The two go together.”

As a result, the two jihadist groups have nearly doubled their land mass. ISIS occupies various pockets inside Iraq and Syria.

Now with Boko Haram at their side, ISIS just acquired northern Nigeria where Boko Haram operates.

“Because they believe a caliphate will come; and this caliphate is standing up to the western crusaders,” says Moore.

Meantime, Iraqi soldiers are containing the last remnants of ISIS in the Iraqi city of Tikrit. Their eventual target is the city of Mosul.

While this is happening, extremism is hard to contain in Nigeria. But now, Nigeria’s neighbor to the northeast Chad, is sending troops to combat these extremists.

Some U.S. lawmakers want America to take action to divide and ultimately defeat these militant jihadists. Lawmakers like Republican Senator Ron Johnson of  Wisconsin sits on the Subcommittee on Near East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Counterterrorism. “Look at what they represent. Look at what their tactics are and their strategy,” Johnson said. “Beheadings, crucifixion, mass execution, murder, rape and their subjugation of women; they are evil barbarians and the sooner they are defeated, the better.”

ISIS and Boko Haram both shun international borderlines. Their only “country” is a radical idea. It states one cannot be a Muslim but by disavowing democracy.”

“Once that caliphate is created,” says Senator Johnson, “now full sharia law kicks in. Full sharia law is quite brutal.”

The Green Bay Packers’ preseason schedule is highlighted by games against two playoff teams from last season, including opening at the defending Super Bowl champion New England Patriots.

For the fourth time in the last five years, the Packers will kick off their preseason slate away from Lambeau Field, traveling to Gillette Stadium to face the Patriots. It will be the first preseason meeting between the clubs since they met in Green Bay in 2005 and the first time the Packers visited New England for a preseason game since 1993.

In Week 2, Green Bay will travel to Pittsburgh to face the Steelers, the first preseason meeting between the two teams since they met at Heinz Field in 2007.

The Packers will conclude the preseason with two home games for the second consecutive year. Green Bay will host the Philadelphia Eagles in Week 3, the first preseason meeting between the two since 2002 and the first at Lambeau Field since 1983. The Packers finish the preseason with a home contest against the New Orleans Saints, marking the ninth preseason meeting between the two.

For the fourth straight year, the Packers will not play any of their preseason opponents during the regular season.

The exact dates and times for the Packers’ preseason games are to be determined. The Packers didn’t announce which preseason game is for the Green and Gold ticket packages.

The league is expected to release the regular-season schedule later this month.

Preseason Schedule
Aug. 13-17, at New England Patriots
Aug. 20-24, at Pittsburgh Steelers
Aug. 27-30, PHILADELPHIA EAGLES
Sept. 3-4, NEW ORLEANS SAINTS

WAUKESHA, Wis. (AP) – University of Wisconsin System President Ray Cross is still making the case for more flexibility despite Republican lawmakers’ opposition.

Gov. Scott Walker’s 2015-17 budget calls for cutting $300 million from the system and decoupling the system from state oversight.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and his fellow Republicans on the Legislature’s finance committee believe the cut is too deep but don’t support more system independence.

Cross told regents at UW-Waukesha on Thursday that autonomy must come with accountability. He says system officials are considering offering lawmakers data tracking graduation and retention rates, the number of students taking remedial math, alumni satisfaction and affordability. He also says autonomy could save up to $20 million by eliminating excessive restrictions.

He also says there’s hope the finance committee will reduce the $300 million cut.

GREEN BAY – How does the Resch Center get ready for the biggest show on four wheels? By bringing in some dirt.

100 truckloads of dirt are being dumped on the arena floor for Monster Jam.

The dirt will be used to build a hybrid track designed to maximized jumps and test agility.

There will be two shows on Saturday and one show on Sunday.

Organizers say it is a day long process for the dirt to be brought into the center.

Public Relations Manager for PMI, Terry Charles, says the event is always fun but time consuming, “We always joke around here it’s always fun to get dirt in the Resch Center, but the cleaning crew is always like, no so happy, but it’s all in fun, it’s a good time.”

After the show, the dirt will be removed and cleaning crews will be hard at work to get the place clean for the next Green Bay Blizzard game.

WINNEBAGO COUNTY – A stretch of Appleton Rd. (Hwy. 47) at Hwy. 10/441 in the Appleton-Menasha area is about to close for construction.

The state Department of Transportation says the road, along with the interchange ramps to and from 10/441, will close on Monday. Crews will be widening the Hwy. 10/441 bridges to accommodate six lanes, adding turn lanes at ramp and crossroad intersections and building roundabouts where the ramps meet Appleton Rd.

To get around the closures, drivers on Appleton Rd. can take Valley Rd., Racine Rd. (Hwy. P) and Midway Rd. Drivers on Hwy. 441 can use the Oneida St. and Midway Rd. interchanges to access the area.

Drivers will be able to get to local businesses by crossing Appleton Rd. at Tuckaway Ln. and Drum Corps Dr. Pedestrians will be able to access the area using existing sidewalks and temporary asphalt.

The roads are expected to reopen in early July.

SPRINGDALE, Wash. (AP) – Authorities say a log cabin that a family reported stolen off its foundation has been found in rural northeast Washington.

A notice sign for the Hempel’s stolen cabin is displayed on Wednesday, April 8, 2015, near Springdale, Wash. Stevens County Sheriff Kendle Allen says deputies have located a log cabin that a family said had been stolen off its foundation. Allen says deputies following a tip found the cabin Thursday morning about 10 miles from its original location. He says the structure had been placed on stilts and was at the end of a private road, east of Springdale in rural northeast Washington. (AP Photo/The Spokesman-Review, Tyler Tjomsland)

Stevens County Sheriff Kendle Allen says deputies following a tip found the cabin Thursday morning about 10 miles from its original location. He says the structure had been placed on stilts and was sitting at the end of a private road east of Springdale.

Chris Hempel tells The Spokesman-Review newspaper in Spokane that her family drove to their cabin Tuesday and found the entire 10-by-20-foot structure missing.

Investigators think that whoever took the cabin was living in it.

Allen says deputies are getting a search warrant to get onto the property and inside the cabin. He says he has identified suspects but declined to name them.

BEIRUT (AP) – An international aid group on Thursday called on the United States to resettle 65,000 Syrians before the end of 2016, highlighting Washington’s slow response to the massive refugee crisis generated by the civil war.

David Miliband, the President and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, told The Associated Press in Beirut that the whole international community shares responsibility for the consequences of the Syrian civil war.

Syria’s civil war has claimed the lives of more than 220,000 people and driven some 9 million of the prewar population of 23 million from their homes. Of those, more than 3.8 million have fled to neighboring countries.

Miliband, a former U.K. Foreign Secretary, said the U.S. has traditionally taken half the world’s registered refugees who resettle in third countries and that the United Nations says it wants 130,000 refugees from Syria resettled in the wealthier countries of the world by the end of 2016.

Half of that number would be 65,000. To date, the U.S. has resettled just 648 Syrians, less than 1 percent of that figure.

“We are calling for scale and speed in response to this crisis. The Syria crisis shows no signs of abating,” he said.

“You don’t want people caught up in bureaucracy, especially if they are orphans or widows. You don’t want them caught up in bureaucracy for years and years,” Miliband said.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Anne Richard said during a visit to Lebanon last week that between 1,000 and 2,000 Syrian refugees will be brought to the U.S. by the end of September and several thousand more in 2016.

“It’s good that the pace of U.S. resettlement is rising from the very low figures of the first four years, but it certainly needs to improve,” Miliband said.

Miliband said that when he visited Lebanon in 2013, the refugees “were still saying they could see a time when they could go back to Syria. Now it’s much more depressing, frankly, for them.”

“There is little light at the end of this tunnel,” Miliband said.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) – A man was fatally shot during a confrontation with police near a middle school when he refused to drop his gun and instead raised it toward two officers Wednesday night, according to police and witness accounts.

Cherylyan Rayhel told The Associated Press that she called police about 8 p.m. after a neighbor fired several shots. Rayhel, who is new to the neighborhood near the middle school, said she recognized the man but did not know him.

When the man took out a gun and fired it, she said the shots were close enough to vibrate her window. She said she was unsure what, if anything, the man was shooting at.

Officers arrived about 10 minutes later, she said, and approached the man. She said she watched from a back window of her home, alone and frightened.

She said the officers yelled, “Put down the weapon.” The man instead raised the gun toward the officers, she said. She said she did not see him fire, but she saw him fall.

“I screamed,” Rayhel said. “I haven’t slept all night.”

Police interviewed her at midnight and again at 4 a.m., she said.

Police spokeswoman Officer Carey Klain confirmed that a call came in at 8 p.m. about a man with a gun near the school. The man was pronounced dead at the scene. Police have not publicly identified the man or the two officers, who have been placed on routine administrative leave while the shooting is investigated.

Rayhel said that before the shooting, she first noticed the man arguing with a woman on the street in front of her house.

A young boy was nearby as well, and Rayhel said she saw the man hug the boy. The man was crying as he walked through Rayhel’s lawn to the field behind her house, near the middle school, she said.

Another neighbor, Sherri Reynolds, described the man as friendly and sweet. She said often saw him playing in the neighborhood with a little boy.

Shawn Jones, an eighth-grader at the school, said he also saw the shooting. He said he was with two friends in the field when he saw the man yelling and waving a handgun in the air. Shawn said the man shot into the sky before police arrived.

NEW YORK (AP) – The steep cost of caring for the elderly continues to climb. The median bill for a year in a nursing home is now $91,250, according to an industry survey out Thursday.

The annual “Cost of Care” report from Genworth Financial tracks the staggering rise in expenses for long-term care, a growing financial burden for families, governments and insurers like Genworth. The cost of staying in a nursing home has increased 4 percent every year over the last five years, the report says. Last year, the median bill was $87,600.

“Most people don’t realize how expensive this care can be until a parent or family member needs it,” said Joe Caldwell, director of long-term services at the National Council on Aging. “And then it’s a real shock.”

The annual report from Genworth, which sells policies to cover long-term care, looks at costs for a variety of services, including adult daycare, and home health aides. And it’s nursing home bills that are rising at the fastest pace, double the rate of U.S. inflation over the last five years. One year in a nursing home now costs nearly as much as three years of tuition at a private college.

For its report, Genworth surveyed 15,000 nursing homes, assisted living facilities and other providers across the country in January and February. It found wide differences from state to state. In Oklahoma, for instance, the median cost for a year in a nursing home came out to $60,225. In Connecticut, it was $158,775. Alaska had the highest costs by far, with one year at $281,415.

So, who pays the nursing-home bill? “A lot of people believe Medicare will step in and cover them, but that’s just not true,” said Bruce Chernoff, president and CEO of The Scan Foundation, a charitable organization. Medicare will cover some short visits for recovery after a surgery, for instance, not long-term stays.

Often enough, people wind up spending their savings until the last $2,000, and at that point Medicaid, the government’s health insurance for the poor, starts covering the bill.

Less-intensive care remains much cheaper than staying at a nursing home, according to Genworth’s survey. One year in in an assisted-living facility runs $43,200. A year of visits from an agency’s home health aides runs $45,760.

PARIS (AP) — Hackers claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group seized control of a global French television network, simultaneously blacking out 11 channels and taking over the network’s website and social media accounts. The attack appeared to be an unprecedented step in the extremist group’s information warfare tactics.

The hackers briefly cut transmission of 11 channels belonging to TV5 Monde and took over its websites and social media accounts starting Wednesday night. The channel’s director, Yves Bigot, said the attack continued into Thursday. He told RTL radio that the network has restored its signal but can only broadcast recorded programs.

The Islamic extremist group has claimed complex hackings before, but experts and a French official said the ability to black out a global television network represented a new level of sophistication for the group. The Paris prosecutor’s office said Thursday it has opened a terrorism investigation into the attack.

Bigot said he was shaken when he saw the black screen across the network’s broadcasts “and when we discovered the sense of the message appearing on our social media and our websites, it both allowed us to understand what was happening and obviously worried us.”

The message on the TV5 Monde website read in part “I am IS” with a banner by a group that called itself Cybercaliphate. It was replaced later Thursday by a simple message saying that it was undergoing maintenance.

Hackers claiming to work on behalf of the Islamic State have seized control of the Twitter accounts of other media, such as Newsweek, and in January they hacked into the Twitter page and YouTube site of the U.S. military’s Central Command.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls, on his Twitter account, called the attack “an unacceptable insult to freedom of information and expression,” and French government ministers visited the channel’s Paris headquarters Thursday.

TV5 Monde, which was founded by the French government in 1984 and calls itself the “worldwide French cultural channel,” broadcasts news and other programs produced in France, Belgium, Switzerland and Canada. Its Facebook page says its signal reaches more than 257 million homes in over 200 countries and territories.

After January terrorist attacks in France by gunmen claiming links to the Islamic State group and al-Qaida in Yemen, officials said hackers had targeted some 19,000 French websites. William Reymond, editor of the French investigative website Breaking3zero, which traced the January hackings, said the latest attack can be directly linked to two Islamic State-linked militants — one in Algeria who built the malicious software and another in Iraq who helped speed up the attack.

Within a half-hour, he said, the malware had burrowed in and exploited a weakness to enter the network’s computer system and take over its central transmission server, preventing the signal from being beamed to a satellite. He said TV5 Monde will have a hard time regaining full control.

“They have to erase everything. There were at least three other encrypted viruses,” he said.

Islamic State has called out France in particular for attacks, but Reymond could not say whether they had a particular reason to target TV5 Monde.

A French security official said investigators would examine whether the attackers had found a hole in TV5 Monde’s information defense systems that was left unguarded, or whether those systems failed outright, which he said would be a more worrying development. The official was not authorized to be publicly named discussing sensitive security matters.

The hackers also claimed to have leaked files that included resumes, passport scans and government letters, according to an analysis by the SITE Intelligence Group.

It isn’t the first time that hackers have caused on-air mischief.

British security expert and commentator Graham Cluley said the incident was reminiscent of the Zotob worm, which hit computers at CNN’s New York bureau in 2005, disrupting programming.

Cluley noted that CNN appears to have been collateral damage. Zotob’s authors were “just trying to hit as many computers as possible.”

Britain-based cybersecurity specialist Rob Pritchard cautioned that the hackers who hit the French network could have unsuccessfully attempted similar attacks against others before cracking open TV5 Monde’s system.

He said taking a global network off the air was a new step.

“They might have targeted hundreds and hundreds of broadcasters and just got lucky with this one,” he said. “The hacking group might have realized they can cause more mayhem. It might embolden them and give them bigger ideas.”

TV5 had recently upgraded to an automated high-definition broadcast platform run by Ericsson, according to a promotional video posted to the web by the Swedish company earlier this month. TV5 official Alexis Renard said in the video: “Everything is managed by this new system. There is no surprise. It works.”

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Jamey Keaten in Paris and Raphael Satter in London contributed to this report.