Give Me Liberty: The long lurid trial of 32-year-old Jodi Arias, a California photographer, ended in Phoenix with a 1^st degree murder conviction for killing her ex boyfriend. Evidence included naked photos of the defendant and a one-hour recording of phone sex with the victim played in court. Arias admitted killing 30-year-old Travis Alexander, but said she did it in self-defense because he attacked her after she dropped his camera while photographing him in the shower. She stabbed him 27 times, cut his throat, and shot him in the forehead. The prosecution said she did it in a jealous rage because Alexander was going to Mexico with a new woman. Arias told a television reporter after the verdict she would prefer death to life in prison. “I believe death is freedom and I’d rather have my freedom as soon as I can get it.”

On Ice: European authorities rounded up 31 suspects in the daring February heist that netted $50 million in diamonds at the Antwerp Airport. Police seized diamonds, cash and luxury cars. Some mugs with a violent record are among those being held in Belgium, France, and Switzerland. In the choreographed caper, robbers dressed as cops drove through a hole they cut in the airport fence and got the diamonds as they were being loaded on a jet for Geneva. It was all in high Hollywood style, except the part about getting away with it.

National: Republicans promised to produce “whistleblowers” at a hearing about the attack last September on the US consulate in Benghazi, but the witnesses came without whistles. No new information was revealed and the hearings continue today.

• The body of Boston bomber Tamarlan Tsarnaev has been buried at an undisclosed location outside Worcester, Mass.

Cleveland: Prosecutors charged 52-year-old Ariel Castro with kidnapping and rape in the bizarre imprisonment of three young women in Cleveland. Bail was set at $8 million. His two brothers, originally taken into custody, were released with no charges. Two women have returned to their families, one of them with a 6-year-old daughter born in captivity.

World:  Eight people died when fire swept through a Bangladesh garment factory. This comes while recovery teams are still finding bodies in the rubble of a factory collapse that killed over 900 people.

MediCost: A study by Medicare revealed wild disparities in what hospitals charge for similar procedures. A joint replacement costs $5,304 in Ada, Okla., and $223,373 in Monterey, Calif.

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