Latest news with #TheoNichols
The Guardian
26-05-2025
- General
- The Guardian
Theo Nichols obituary
My friend Theo Nichols, who has died aged 86, was a social sciences professor dedicated to the critical study of the relationship between capital and labour. Theo's first book, Ownership, Control and Ideology (1969), was followed by Workers Divided (1976) and Living With Capitalism (1977), two case studies of work at a large chemical complex, while The British Worker Question (1986) employed his powerful prose to critique dominant accounts of low productivity and the performance of the British economy. He went on to publish another 15 books and edited collections including the classic study The Sociology of Industrial Injury (1997). Theo was born in Rugby, Warwickshire, as the only child of Wally and Min (nee Baker), both factory workers. Educated first at St Andrew's Murray secondary modern school and then Lawrence Sheriff grammar school, both in Rugby, in 1957 he went on to take up social studies at Hull University. Drawn to industrial sociology, and after stints lecturing at the universities of Aston (1963-64) and Bath (1964-68), in 1969 he took up a lectureship at Bristol University, where he and I were part of the second tranche of appointments to its new department of sociology. In 2000 he left Bristol to take up a distinguished research professorship in social sciences at Cardiff, working there until his retirement in 2010. Theo was a principled man who had little time for authority figures, valued hard work and disliked unfairness. An avid reader, he loved walking his dog and watching Bristol City at Ashton Gate. His second wife, Nancy Lineton, whom he married in 1994, died 15 days before Theo. He is survived by three children, Rob, Jo and Claire, from his first marriage to Joyce Sage, which ended in divorce, by Nancy's three children from a previous marriage, and 15 grandchildren.
Yahoo
18-02-2025
- Yahoo
Warren man pleads guilty after young son accidentally shot himself in the face last year
A Warren man who was the first person in Macomb County charged under Michigan's new firearms safe storage law last year pleaded guilty Tuesday, less than a year after his young son accidentally shot himself in the face with his father's unlocked and loaded gun. Theo Nichols pleaded guilty to a felony firearms safe storage violation and an added count of fourth-degree child abuse, a misdemeanor, during a pretrial conference in Macomb County Circuit Court. Four other charges, including second-degree child abuse, are to be dismissed, according to online court records. The records indicate Nichols requested a Cobbs agreement with the court, which could put his fate in the bottom third of the sentencing guidelines. Sentencing is set for April 1. Noel Erinjeri, a Macomb County assistant public defender representing Nichols, had no comment. Last year, Warren police said the boy's mother, then 33, and Nichols, then 56, were home at the time of the April 19 shooting with a Glock 40-caliber handgun that Nichols bought on the street in Detroit a couple of months prior for personal protection. Police and fire crews were sent to an apartment in the Cove on 10 apartment complex at Hoover and 10 Mile roads after receiving a 911 call from the mother, who said her child had accidentally shot himself. They found the boy, age 8, with a gunshot wound to his face and head area. The boy survived, the county prosecutor's office stated in a release in May. More: Madison Heights couple charged after 9-year-old shoots himself with unsecured gun Three other children were in the apartment at the time of the shooting — a girl, then age 6, and twins, then 6 months old. At the time, police said, they were all children of Nichols and the mother, and they were not hurt. At a news conference after the shooting, Warren Police Lt. John Gajewski said it appeared the boy used a chair to get to the gun. Executive Lt. Scott Isaacson said it was stored on top of an upper kitchen cabinet. Gajewski said there were no safes, lock boxes or gun locks found in the residence. Isaacson said one shot was fired. Nichols had a prior felony drug-related conviction, police said, preventing him from buying a gun legally. They said the gun was reported lost in 2022 out of Westland. Two months after the shooting, in June 2024, Demetrius Owens, then 27, of Eastpointe, was charged after the county prosecutor's office said Owens' son, then 3, shot himself in the hand with his father's handgun, which allegedly was not properly secured. Owens pleaded no contest to a felony firearms safe storage violation and added count of fourth-degree child abuse, a misdemeanor, last month, according to online Circuit Court records. Other charges, including second-degree child abuse, the records indicate, are to be dismissed at sentencing March 13. While Nichols was the first person in Macomb County charged with violating the new firearms safe storage law last year, a Flint man, Michael Tolbert, is believed to be the first person in Michigan charged with violating the law after his daughter, then 2, was shot in the head on Valentine's Day 2024 — the day after the law took effect. Tolbert, 45, is facing nine charges, including first-degree child abuse, in Genesee County Circuit Court, where online court records indicate a pretrial hearing is set for April 1 and a trial is scheduled for May 7. The girl, Skye McBride, is still recovering, according to an update this month posted in an online fundraiser. Contact Christina Hall: chall@ Follow her on X, formerly Twitter: @challreporter. Support local journalism. Subscribe to the Free Press. Submit a letter to the editor at This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Warren dad pleads guilty after young son accidentally shot himself
