A "particularly dangerous" batch of heroin has left a man dead and 13 others being treated for overdoses in the space of 24 hours, police said.

Cleveland Police has warned drug users in Stockton some street dealers are selling the potentially lethal grade of the Class A drug.
Several deaths in the Stockton area this year have been linked to the sale of low grade heroin.
The dead man was 50 and from the town, a force spokesman said.
He added: "Police and North East Ambulance Service are reiterating the message once again that lives are being put at risk by accepting this particularly dangerous grade of heroin.
"This bad batch of drugs was centred around the Oxbridge area of Stockton.  However, there was also one victim brought into hospital from Middlesbrough.
"We have been warning drug users over the past months to be cautious as there has been a surge in these low grade drugs becoming available and they should seek the support of their service providers before putting their lives in danger.
"In particular, those who purchase their drugs via street suppliers should be extremely cautious."


Gabriel Agbonlahor has stepped down from his role as Aston Villa club captain and been given a "substantial fine" by the club.

The striker, 29, apologised for his "actions in recent weeks" after he was pictured apparently partying immediately after their relegation from the Premier League earlier this month.
His subsequent suspension will be lifted by the club on Monday.
Agbonlahor said he "did not deserve" the captaincy.
"This role was a huge honour to me and it hurts to have lost it," added the striker, who has been "reminded of his responsibilities" by Villa.
The former England frontman had previously been investigated in March, with Villa opting to take no further action, after being pictured on holiday in Dubai appearing to hold a shisha pipe.
"My celebrations and passion, especially in games against local rivals, shows my loyalty to Aston Villa," added Agbonlahor, who has spent 16 years at the club, in a post on Instagram.
"I am asking Aston Villa fans for forgiveness as I'm hurting as well despite reports and photos in the press making out otherwise.
"I agree my performances this season have not been good enough but I will be working hard to make things right! Up The Villa, Villa Till I Die!"
Agbonlahor, who had been put on a personal fitness plan before his ban, will miss Saturday's Premier League trip to Watford.


A man convicted of murdering another traveller by shooting him while a bare-knuckle fight was taking place has been jailed for life.

Mark Mosley, 43, of First Drove, Burwell, was found guilty of killing Jess Smith, 36, from Potton in Bedfordshire, at a Cambridgeshire travellers' site on New Year's Day.
It followed a dispute at a New Year's Eve party.
A judge ordered Mosley must serve a minimum term of 30 years.
Updates on this story and more from Cambridgeshire
Cambridge Crown Court also sentenced Mosley to 10 years for attempted murder, three years for assault and 10 years for possessing a firearm, all to run concurrently.
An eight-week trial heard Mr Smith's nephew Paul Smith was assaulted by Mosley at the party at Comrades Club in nearby Soham.
In the early hours of New Year's Day other members of Paul Smith's family, including Jess Smith, also known as Jessie, went to the travellers' site at First Drove where Mosley lived.
They wanted to settle the dispute with what police described as two "fair bare-knuckled fights" with family members there to observe.
The trial heard during the fights, Mosley, who was not one of the participants, used a sawn-off shotgun to shoot Jess Smith three times, including once in the back as he was trying to get into a vehicle.
In a statement after the trial, Det Insp Al Page, who led the investigation, said Mosley "broke every rule of traveller culture in which disputes are resolved by a fair fight between individuals, without resorting to the use of weapons".


South Africa have released batsman JP Duminy from their squad halfway through their four-Test series in England.

The 33-year-old, who made his debut in 2008 and has played 46 Tests, was dropped following the Proteas' first-Test defeat at Lord's.
The tourists levelled the series by winning the second Test at Trent Bridge by 340 runs.
Duminy has scored only 121 runs in his past eight innings and made just 17 in his two innings against England.
Uncapped right-hander Aiden Markram will remain with the squad as batting cover.


Although Puntland's charter provides for freedom of the press, the authorities have resorted to detaining journalists and closing media outlets.

Journalists working in Puntland are "constantly exposed to the threat of arbitrary arrest", Reporters Without Borders said in 2012.
Radio Galkayo is affiliated to the authorities. Private broadcasters are permitted to operate. No newspapers are currently published in Puntland.


An American backpacker has been killed by lightning while camping on an Australian mountain summit.

The 24-year-old man died instantly when lightning struck a tree above his tent on Mt Warning, in northern New South Wales, early on Tuesday, police said.
Local media named the victim as Sam Beattie, from New York.
His girlfriend, Michele Segalla, was also in the tent and suffered head and neck injuries.
The tourists arrived in Australia eight weeks ago and planned to spend a year travelling across the country in a campervan, reports said.
The alarm was raised when two hikers heard Ms Segalla crying in the tent about 15 minutes after Mr Beattie died.
Police said the hikers spent more than an hour trying to resuscitate Mr Beattie, but he had been killed instantly.
Ms Segalla was treated for head and neck injuries and taken to Murwillumbah Base Hospital.
It took a rescue team of 25 people nearly two hours to carry Mr Beattie's body from the summit.
Camping is not permitted on the 1550m (5000ft) mountain and hikers are discouraged from ascending the summit during thunderstorms.
"I'm not judgemental of the people in any way whatsoever, " police superintendent Wayne Starling told the Sydney Morning Herald.
"Regardless of whether they should be there or not, it's just a tragedy to lose a life."
Police will prepare a report for the coroner.


Dame Zaha Hadid has received the Royal Gold Medal for architecture from the Royal Institute of British Architects in recognition of her body of work.

The Iraqi-born architect said she was "very proud... to be the first woman to receive the honour in her own right."
Dame Zaha's designs include the Heydar Aliyev Centre in Baku, the Aquatics Centre constructed for the 2012 London Olympics and the Maxxi Museum in Rome.
She was made a dame in 2012 and has twice won the Riba Stirling Prize.
Hadid was personally approved by the Queen for the medal, an accolade whose previous recipients include Frank Lloyd Wright, Frank Gehry and Lord Norman Foster.
The two previous female honourees - Ray Kaiser Eames and Patricia "Patty" Hopkins - received the medal in tandem with their husbands, Charles Eames and Sir Michael Hopkins.
"We now see more established female architects all the time," said Dame Zaha as she accepted the medal on Wednesday. "That doesn't mean it's easy.
"Sometimes the challenges are immense. There has been tremendous change over recent years and we will continue this progress."
Professor Sir Peter Cook, a member of the Archigram group who received the medal in 2002, called Dame Zaha a "heroine" who was larger than life [and] bold as brass".
"How lucky we are to have her in London," he said as he presented Dame Zaha with the medal.
The architect left Iraq at 17 to study in the UK and set up her own practice in London in 1979.
Dame Zaha's other creations include the Serpentine Sackler Gallery in London, the Riverside Museum at Glasgow's Museum of Transport, and Guangzhou Opera House in China.
Last year, however, the Japanese government scrapped plans to build the futuristic-looking stadium she designed for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo, opting instead for a scaled-down, less costly design.


A Conservative claim £1bn savings, or 14%, could be found from the Welsh NHS's annual budget, has been defended by Welsh Tory leader Andrew RT Davies.

On Monday, party candidate Andrew Atkinson said there was "around £1bn a year's worth" of waste in the NHS.
Mr Davies said on Tuesday the figure was based on comments to AMs by a senior NHS manager in 2009.
Rival parties have called Mr Atkinson's claim "wild, "ridiculous" and potentially "devastating" for the NHS.
The Conservatives have pledged to increase spending in the Welsh NHS in real terms over the next five years and say efficiency savings would be re-invested in the health budget.
The annual budget of the Welsh NHS is around £7bn and local health boards currently face efficiency savings of 3% a year.
Mr Atkinson, Conservative candidate for Wrexham, told BBC Radio Wales: "There is around £1bn a year's worth of waste in the NHS year on year.
"We would make sure that we clamp down on that waste to make sure we are using that budget more appropriately and in a more targeted way."
Defending the £1bn claim, Mr Davies said: "This figure does stand there because it was given by the finance director at the time, in 2009, to an assembly finance committee, so I'm assuming he knew his brief and he was talking about the facts as he saw them.
"We've all known for some time that we need to move services out of the acute sector, i.e. big district general hospitals and into the community, because that's where most people like to be treated.
"We do know from the public health point of view as well that community pharmacists can play a far bigger role in delivering service as well, so those are two instant access points that can be developed in the community that can deliver a cheaper way of developing services."
Plaid Cymru has already set out plans for annual NHS savings of £300m, but its health spokeswoman Elin Jones said: "Plaid Cymru will not cut a single penny from the NHS budget, we are committed to investing in front line services such as more doctors and nurses and faster diagnosis.
"What the Tories are talking about here is the equivalent of around a seventh of the entire Welsh NHS budget and could have a devastating impact on services leading to even greater waiting times and fewer staff on hospital wards."
A Liberal Democrat spokesman said the party believed the NHS "needs to be more efficient" but "to cost your policies on a billion pound of 'savings' is nothing short of ridiculous".
"The Tories will savagely cut our public services to the bone to fund their uncosted pledges," he warned.
UKIP said it would "conduct a full independent inquiry into the NHS in Wales to determine where there is flagrant waste and where we should put more resources into front-line services".
"There is chronic underfunding in certain departments leading to unacceptable waiting times and lack of treatment choice but also too much spent on middle management," a spokeswoman added.
Labour First Minister Carwyn Jones said efficiency savings were a euphemism  for cuts, and called on the Conservatives to provide evidence that the Welsh NHS was wasting £1bn a year.
"It's one thing to make wild claims, it's another thing to back them up," he said.
'It's almost as if they've decided they're not going to win, so they can make any number of promises."


Chris Robshaw will meet with new England head coach Eddie Jones on Saturday night to discuss his international future.

The 29-year-old Harlequins back row was England captain throughout the reign of previous boss Stuart Lancaster.
It will be the first time the pair have met after Jones said a face-to-face meeting was a top priority, soon after his appointment on 20 November.
Jones watched Quins' Premiership win over London Irish on Saturday.
It was the first match he had attended since replacing Lancaster two weeks ago because of visa issues delaying the 55-year-old Australian's arrival.
Jones was flanked by Rugby Football Union chief executive Ian Ritchie and was present in the same executive box as Premiership Rugby supremo Mark McCafferty.
Jones was critical of Robshaw during England's recent poor World Cup campaign, stating in a newspaper column that "at international level he just doesn't have that point of difference", describing him as "workmanlike" and a "six-and-a-half at best".
But Quins director of rugby Conor O'Shea insisted Robshaw's international career was far from over following Saturday's 38-7 win.
"Chris is seeing Eddie for a coffee at some stage this evening," O'Shea said.
"Chris was outstanding against Irish, like he was against Exeter. I cannot speak more highly of him and what he has done for this club. There's a lot left in him."
He added Robshaw was in "a high profile position and will get criticism, but he deserves to be lauded for what he is rather than being pilloried because there are so many people in sport who aren't proper role models".
"Chris is a proper role model and a great rugby player. Hopefully he showed that to Eddie out there."


School improvements will only happen if the Welsh Government, teaching professionals and parents work together, Education Secretary Kirsty Williams has said.

Ms Williams told The Wales Report that it was time for a "coalition" in education to achieve high standards and get the basics right in classrooms.
The results of Pisa tests conducted last year are expected in December.
Wales performed worse than the rest of the UK in the last tests in 2012.
A Liberal Democrat AM, Kirsty Williams was appointed to Carwyn Jones' Labour cabinet after reaching an agreement with the first minister following May's assembly election.
She told the programme that her appointment had created "a new dynamic" in the Welsh Government.
More than 70 countries are signed up to the Pisa education tests, which assess the skills of students in maths, reading and science every three years.
Ms Williams said: "I am clear that I can not change education from the fifth floor office of the Welsh Government building.
"We need to create a coalition of Welsh Government, local education authorities and regional consortia who are in charge of school improvement and we also must work with headteachers, teachers in the classroom and parents".
The education secretary added that it would take time for the Welsh Government's educational reforms to reflect an improvement in those tests.
"We have to accept that last year's tests were taken during a process of change and it will take a number of years for our reforms to bed in," she said.
She said her plan was based on reforming teacher training, a new school curriculum, supporting poorer students and securing additional resources for school improvements.
"We cannot afford to be changing and dashing off in a different direction every time there's a bump in the road. We need to stick to it," she added.


The former head of Grampian's fire service has lost an age discrimination case, the BBC Scotland news website has learned.

David Dalziel, 62, held the Grampian post for eight years until it was merged into a single service.
He applied to become the chief fire officer of the new Scotland-wide service and a number of other senior posts but was not appointed.
The tribunal was held last year, and Mr Dalziel has lost the case.
Mr Dalziel's legal representative Frank Lefevre said: "The judgement is a 42 page document and we'll take time to consider it and also whether to appeal the judgement."
A spokesperson for Scottish Fire and Rescue Service said: "We acknowledge the decision of the tribunal and are very pleased the employment tribunal accepted the case put forward by SFRS.
"We look forward to reading the judgement in full."
Mr Dalziel - whose salary was more than £110,000 - had told the tribunal he received a telephone call from the new Scottish chief Alasdair Hay, from the Tayside brigade, telling him he had not been successful for any of the posts.
He said: "I asked him what job I had got and he said 'none at all.' I felt physically sick."
Expecting to be told he had been appointed as deputy chief officer, Mr Dalziel had put his mobile on speakerphone for the call so his wife could share the moment with him.
He added: "As a family we had discussed moving once the offer came through.
"When it didn't come I felt totally humiliated and embarrassed by the whole process."


A 56-year-old woman has been found dead in the same house which was the scene of a murder 10 years ago.

The woman was found in her home in Kintail Court in Inverness at about 16:45 on Thursday.
It is the same terraced bungalow where the body of hairdresser Ilene O'Connor, 39, was found in 2006.
Brian Grant, 50, was jailed in 2007 for beating Ms O'Connor to death and burying her body in the garden.
It is understood the deceased, described as a "quiet and private woman", was found with some injuries and that there was blood on the floor.
She is thought to have lived alone in the terraced bungalow in the Hilton housing estate of Inverness.
Police Scotland have not said if they are currently looking for anyone in connection with the death which they described as "unexplained".
The garden of the house was taped off soon after she was discovered and uniformed officers were stationed outside overnight.
Forensic experts arrived early on Friday morning and remained for several hours.
One neighbour said: "She was a quiet and private woman. Although she had been here for a few years, she didn't say much. She was a bit of a loner.
"She would come out her door and rather than walk past her immediate neighbours, she would walk across the road to the opposite pavement to continue her journey.
"She would often walk into town and could be seen sometimes picking up items off the street. I didn't hear or see anything recently which would have made me suspicious. It is sad and tragic that another woman should die in that house."
A police spokeswoman said: "Police Scotland were made aware of the sudden death of a woman in the Kintail Court area of Hilton at around 4:45pm yesterday.
"The death is currently being treated as unexplained and enquiries to establish the full circumstances are ongoing.
"No further information is available at this time."


A new island has formed off the coast of North Carolina's Cape Hatteras National Seashore.

The isle is a mile long (16.km), depending on tides and weather, and separated from the mainland by a (330ft) 100 metre wide channel.
It was first spotted by locals as a "bump" above the water in April, according to the Island Free Press.
Photos taken by a Connecticut tourist have gone viral on Instagram, leading to a boost in curious visitors.
Photographer Chad Koczera described encountering the island during his visit to Cape Point.
"My fiancee and I were driving to the point after a storm to collect shells when we spotted an area we couldn't get to by car," he said.
He described returning for his fifth time to the park, and to visit Cape Point where he had proposed marriage to his then-girlfriend.
"I sent the drone up to check it out and noticed this beautiful island. We didn't get a chance to make it on to the island because of the strong current."
The island is littered with old shipwrecks and whale bones that poke through its sands, says local historian Danny Couch.
Experts say the shores of the Outer Banks are constantly shifting, as sandbars rise above or sink back below the water.
Park superintendent Dave Hallac has cautioned visitors against trying to swim or walk across the channel to reach the island.
Currents can swiftly carry away a person, while sharks and sting rays have been spotted in the area.
Visitors are advised to use a kayak or paddleboard to reach Hatteras Island, as it's been dubbed.


West Brom have signed Scotland midfielder Darren Fletcher on a free transfer from Manchester United.

The 31-year-old has signed a two-and-a-half-year contract at The Hawthorns with a 12-month option.
West Ham were also interested in signing Fletcher, but a move to Upton Park broke down last weekend.
Albion failed in deadline day moves to sign West Ham striker Carlton Cole and Norwich defender Martin Olsson, but kept Brown Ideye and Graham Dorrans.
Fletcher made 342 appearances for United but started only five times for the club after Louis van Gaal took over as manager in the summer.
The Scot, who recovered from chronic bowel disease ulcerative colitis to resume his career in December 2013, had been at Old Trafford since he was a schoolboy and helped the Red Devils win the Premier League title five times.
But with his contract set to expire in the summer he was granted a free transfer to help him find a new club in this transfer window.
"This is a fantastic new challenge for me in my career," Fletcher told West Brom's website.
"I've spent my career at Manchester United and it's all I've ever known. But I felt it was the right time to move and I'm not sentimental about doing that."
Fletcher is the second player signed by West Brom head coach Tony Pulis following the £4.75m capture of winger Callum McManaman from Wigan.
The Scotland captain will wear the number 24 shirt for the Baggies.
Albion had hoped to sign Cole and Olsson on a busy deadline day, with Dorrans set to join Norwich and Ideye linked with a move to Qatari club Al Gharafa.
But Cole was called back to West Ham when they did not sign Tottenham's Emmanuel Adebayor, and Olsson failed to arrive for a medical on time.
Chairman Jeremy Peace said: "We did not get all the business done that we might have but we are thrilled to bring in a player and a character of Darren's calibre.
""We were disappointed for Carlton because he was also excited about joining us but for reasons which were beyond our control we could not complete the deal. The same can be said for the proposal involving Martin Olsson and Graham.
"But we have always maintained that January is a difficult time to do business and we are very happy with the deals we have done."


John McAreavey, whose wife Michaela was murdered on honeymoon in Mauritius six years ago, is returning to the island to make a fresh appeal for information.

No-one has been convicted of the murder of Mrs McAreavey (27), the daughter of Tyrone gaelic football manager Mickey Harte.
She was strangled at a hotel in Mauritius 12 days after her wedding in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland.
Mr McAreavey wants justice for his dead wife.
Before leaving for Mauritius, he told the BBC he was prepared "to go to the ends of the earth to ensure that justice is achieved for Michaela".
Other family members are expected to join him on a short visit to the island.
Mr McAreavey said: "We need to appeal to the people of Mauritius, so we felt that the best way to achieve that is to get on a plane and get out there."
John and Michaela McAreavey went on honeymoon to Mauritius in January 2011.
She was found dead in a bath at the four-star Legends Hotel, after returning to her room to collect a packet of biscuits.
Two hotel workers - Avinash Treebhoowoon and Sandip Moneea - were later accused of murdering her and stood trial in the Mauritian capital Port Louis in 2012. Both were cleared of her murder in a unanimous verdict by a jury at the Supreme Court.
Mauritian police launched a fresh investigation following the trial, but it came to nothing.
Mr McAreavey remarried in September last year. His wife, Tara Brennan, is an accountant from County Kildare.
He said: "I'm very, very fortunate that I've such a loving family.
"You move forward with life, you enjoy the good things, but you don't shy away from the hard things either."
When he arrives in Mauritius, Mr McAreavey is expected to hold a news conference at which he will appeal for anyone with information about the murder of Michaela to come forward.


Mike Ashley is one of the most intriguing characters in British business.

Entrepreneur, owner of Newcastle United, and once a possible saviour of the collapsed retailer BHS, he has been a reluctant fixture in the headlines of the business and sports pages.
But it's the treatment of workers in his Sports Direct empire that has been most controversial, and which he was called before Parliament to explain.
The retail business has produced its share of eccentric characters, and Mr Ashley is no exception. Born in Walsall, in the West Midlands, the family moved to Berkshire, where his father, a warehouse manager, loaned his 17-year-old son the money to buy his first sportswear shop.
It is now the UK's largest sportswear retailer, with more than 400 stores including the famous Lillywhites shop in London's Piccadilly.
It owns a raft of venerable sportswear brands, from Dunlop and Slazenger to Lonsdale and Karrimor, and has 270 more shops in 19 European countries.
This success has made Mr Ashley a fantastically rich man, with a fortune recently estimated at £2.4bn.
He reportedly commutes by helicopter from his north London home, complete with tennis court and swimming pool. He bought it for £12m in 2005, and it would be worth considerably more today.
He divorced his wife in 2003, paying out a £50m divorce settlement, and has not remarried. Marriage, he once joked, was the one of the few things he couldn't afford. Together the couple have three children.
Mr Ashley's relationship with the City started badly. He raised £929m in 2007 when he sold a 45% stake in Sports Direct on the stock market. In the following months, the shares lost half their value, with many investors unhappy at the way the company was run.
Mr Ashley called them "cry babies" in a Sunday Times interview, telling the paper: "Sports Direct should come with a government health warning - this stock is not for the fainthearted."
Complaints about the governance of the company haven't gone away. But in the next six years the share price soared, with the business promoted to the FTSE 100 index of London's biggest companies.
This January, however, things got more difficult. After a warning of lower profits, blamed on tough trading conditions and bad weather, the share price plunged again and the firm dropped out of the FTSE 100 in March.
Sports Direct has been accused of building its success by exploiting workers. It has been in the frontline of the controversy for zero-hours contracts, and has been on the receiving end of a number of media exposes.
Last year a documentary film crew even went undercover in its Shirebrook distribution centre, alleging onerous security searches, strict discipline, and harsh penalties for lateness and absenteeism.
Sports Direct contested the film's findings. It has issued statements denying the use of zero-hours contracts in its warehouse, though it does use them in shops, where it claims "all parties appreciate the flexibility provided".
Its zero-hours contract shop workers receive sick pay, holiday pay and bonuses, and are not prohibited from working elsewhere, the company says.
At the end of 2015, Mr Ashley hit back in an interview with the Daily Mirror, where he promised a pay rise to all staff, worth a total of £10m, pledging to become "the best high street retail employer, after John Lewis".
He initially declined to appear before a parliamentary select committee to explain the working practices at his stores. He then changed his mind, agreeing to appear only if the MPs visited his Shirebrook HQ first.
Despite accusing them of wanting to organise a "media circus", he invited them to travel in his helicopter with TV cameras in tow.
The MPs declined, and it seemed that Mr Ashley would refuse to appear - an almost unprecedented situation, raising the bizarre prospect of a Serjeant at Arms hauling Mr Ashley in front of the Speaker of the House.
But with less than 48 hours to go, he relented, promising to defend the "good name" of Sports Direct.
During the near two-hour session, Mr Ashley told MPs that Sports Direct's policy of docking staff 15 minutes pay for being one minute late was "unacceptable", and also admitted that some workers had been effectively paid less than the minimum wage in the past.
Mr Ashley's ownership of Newcastle United has also not been without drama. Since his purchase in 2007, the club's progress has not been for the fainthearted.
They have been relegated, promoted, qualified for the Europa Cup, and this season, relegated once again.
It was never entirely clear why Mr Ashley bought the club, as he had no previous connection with the team or the area.
But in the early days, he would sit and cheer among the ordinary travelling Newcastle fans in his black-and-white Newcastle shirt.
He told the News of the World that he bought the club "to have fun", attracted by the gung-ho, take-no-prisoners attacking style that the team adopted under manager Kevin Keegan in the mid-1990s.
It's not a bad analogy for the way Mr Ashley runs his business. He has been accused of using the club as a way to advertise his sports gear. If so, it is an expensive ploy, as he has poured considerable sums into the club which he may never recoup.
To date, these include the club's £140m purchase price and £129m in interest-free loans.
Last May he said the club was not for sale. "I'm not going anywhere until we win something," he declared.
A punchy remark that is typical Mike Ashley.


Hundreds of people braved chilly temperatures for the annual Boxing Day dip in Redcar.

The estimated temperature was about 5C (41F) as people of all ages dived into the waves.
Dave Cocks from the RNLI Redcar team photographed many of those taking part.


Scientists working on the American space agency's new Juno mission say its initial observations at Jupiter have taken their breath away.

In particular, they have been amazed by the storms seen at the planet's poles.
"Think of a bunch of hurricanes, every one the size of the Earth, all packed so close together that each hurricane touches the other," said Mike Janssen.
"Even in rooms of hardened researchers, these images of swirling clouds have drawn gasps," the Nasa man added.
The Juno probe arrived at the fifth planet from the Sun on 4 July last year. Since then, it has been making a close pass over the gas giant every 53 days.
The first data to come out of these observations are now being reported in two papers (here and here) in the journal Science, and in more than 40 others in a special collection for Geophysical Research Letters.
The mission team says that in nearly all instances, previously cherished theories about how Jupiter works are being challenged.
"We're getting the first really close up and personal look at Jupiter and we're seeing that a lot of our ideas were incorrect and maybe naive," said Juno principal investigator Scott Bolton from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas.
Those big cyclones that cover the highest latitudes of the planet are only now being seen in detail because previous missions to the planet never really got to look from above and below like Juno - certainly not at such a high resolution. Features down to 50km across can be discerned.
The structures are very different from those seen at Saturn's poles, for example, and the team will have to explain why. It is also not clear at this stage how long-lived they are. Will they dissipate much faster than the storms at lower latitudes, which in some cases - as with the famous Great Red Spot on Jupiter - have persisted for centuries?
Another surprise comes from Juno's Microwave Radiometer (MWR), which senses behaviour below the visible cloud surface. Its data indicates the presence of a broad band of ammonia around the equator that goes from the top of the atmosphere to as deep as it is possible to detect, at least 350km down. It could be part of a major circulation system.
But the MWR records the ammonia at higher latitudes to be much more variable.
"What this is telling us is that Jupiter is not very well mixed on the inside," said Dr Bolton. "The idea that once you drop below the sunlight everything would be uniform and boring was completely wrong. It's actually very different dependent on where you look."
Mission team-members picked out a number of highlights in the new results.
One concerned the magnetic field of Jupiter. It was known to be strong but it has now been determined to be even stronger than expected - a doubling of the assumed strength where the probe makes its closest approach to the planet (the field is about 10 times the strength of Earth's magnetic field).
But the signal is quite lumpy, which tells the scientists that the dynamo system - the electrically conducting region generating the field - is probably not that deep into the planet.
"When we see small spatial-scale variation, it indicates to us that we may be very close to the source and so that might mean the dynamo is above the metallic hydrogen (layers) and it may operate in the molecular hydrogen envelope above. That's very significant," said Jack Connerney, Juno's deputy principal investigator and the lead for the mission's magnetic field investigation.
It is the magnetic field investigation that is also at the heart of trying to understand Jupiter's very bright auroras - its northern and south lights. And again, what Juno is finding is not what everyone was expecting.
The auroras should result from electrons running down field lines and then striking the atmosphere. But the current carried by the electrons should have its own magnetic signature, and Juno has not at this stage been able to detect it.
"It's got us all scratching our heads, I have to say," said UK scientist Dr Jonathan Nichols from the University of Leicester.
"We see the auroras, we have a good idea we think of how they're generated but when it comes down it we're not seeing the signature of supposedly millions of amps of current."
One very smart picture taken by Juno and released on Thursday showed the ring of dust that surrounds Jupiter. It is not well known that Jupiter has a ring, but it does. What was clever was getting the familiar stars of the Orion constellation to be in on the shot as well.
"This is the first image of Jupiter's ring that has ever been collected from the inside of it looking out," said mission scientist Heidi Becker from Nasa.
"Juno is 3,000 miles from the planet when we took this picture. So, what you're looking at is a ring of dust that's 40,000 miles away and stars that are hundreds of light-years away, all in the same picture."
It is early days in the mission still (it is likely to run for several years yet), but the first gravity sensing data is pointing to some weirdness in respect of Jupiter's centre. Theories had suggested it either had a relatively small rocky core or no core at all (one suggestion was that the planet's gases went all the way down to the centre in an ever more compressed state).
Scientists are now considering something in between - a diffuse core. "It really looks fuzzy," said Dr Bolton. "There may be a core there but it's very big and it may be partially dissolved, and we're studying that."
Dr Bolton flagged up Juno's next pass, on 11 July. This will be dedicated to investigating the Great Red Spot.
Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos


Three sheep have been attacked and killed in Ballyholland, County Down, the second such attack in four days.

The dead animals were found with their throats cut and their ears removed on Friday night, having been last checked on Wednesday evening.
PSNI Chief Inspector Roy Robinson described it as a "brutal attack".
The owner of the sheep believes that three people would have been needed to carry out such an attack on sheep in an open field.
Gerald Travers said he could not believe it when he discovered the slain animals, just days after an almost identical incident: "I knew it had happened up the road a bit, I didn't really expect it to happen again.
"Some sick mind has just kept going," he said.
He said local farmers are worried about their own livestock, "Neighbours are messaging me to try and sort out a way to try and catch them, and to get a 'farmers' watch' going", he said.
He believes "at least three people" had to be involved.
"The sheep must have been cornered, it definitely wasn't one man on his own.
"A couple of neighbours saw the sheep, all up at the top of the field looking down over the hill and had found it suspicious.
"That was 8 or 9 o'clock on Thursday night, it had already happened, we think, because the sheep were looking down at the three dead ewes and obviously were petrified.
"The sheep still haven't gone down to the bottom of the field where it happened," he added.
Local SDLP councillor Declan McAteer said there is growing concern for the safety of livestock in the Ballyholland area after the two attacks.
He has called for local people to be vigilant.
Police are appealing for witnesses and have conducted house to house inquires.


The former republican prisoner whose interviews led to Gerry Adams' recent arrest gave an account of his own IRA activity to a controversial US archive.

Anthony McIntyre was the lead researcher on Boston College's oral history project on the Troubles.
He told BBC Northern Ireland's Spotlight programme he is exposed to the same risk of arrest facing other participants in the project.
Mr McIntyre, who is now an academic, was jailed for murder in 1977,
He told Spotlight reporter Declan Lawn his own activities were included with more than 20 other former IRA members.
Participants thought the interviews would remain confidential, but detectives in Northern Ireland investigating the 1972 disappearance and murder of mother-of-10 Jean McConville obtained a United States court order giving them access to the material concerning her death.
Sinn FÃ©in president Gerry Adams was arrested on 30 April and questioned about the IRA killing on the basis of some of those interviews.
Mr Adams, who denies involvement in the murder, was released without charge four days later.
The arrest has fuelled controversy about the Boston College oral history project, mainly because the taped interviews were not afforded the legal protections that participants expected.
Mr McIntyre and Ed Moloney, the journalist who managed the project, have clashed with Boston College about whether the project had legal safeguards.
Mr McIntyre said the fact that he gave an interview himself demonstrated that he believed the material would be shielded from police investigations.
He said his interview has not been given to the PSNI.
"I am one of the people who was interviewed," he said.
"I am on tape, I am saying no more. I won't go into any detail, but I exposed myself to exactly the same risks as anybody else was exposed to.
"I did not lead people into a project that I wasn't prepared to take the same degree of exposure.
"Why would I put my own interviews in Boston College if I thought the police were going to maybe at some point look at them for to prosecute me?
"Self-interest alone would have prevented me."
Spotlight is available to watch on the BBC's iPlayer until 13 May 2014


Hundreds of thousands of Catalans rallied in Barcelona on Friday to show support for independence from Spain.

Local police said 1.4 million people turned out but the Spanish government put the figure at no more than 550,000.
A separatist coalition of parties is leading the polls ahead of Catalonia's regional elections this month.
The Together For Yes campaign says if it wins a majority in the regional assembly it will push through plans for an independent Catalan state.
But the Spanish government has promised to block any move to break away. Madrid said an unofficial Catalan referendum last November was invalid.
The November poll saw 80% of voters back independence but turnout was just 40%.
Together for Yes kicked off its campaign late on Thursday night ahead of the rally on Friday, when Catalans celebrate their national day.
The coalition comprises political groups from both the left and right, who have come together in the face of continued Madrid government opposition to a referendum.
One of those marching on Friday said it was a "definitive" year.
"The goal is to become independent, because we're suffocating - economically and emotionally," Silvia Palomares told Reuters.
Polls suggests a majority of Catalans favour a referendum on independence but are evenly divided over whether they want to secede.
The Spanish government says it will block any unilateral declaration of independence, reports the BBC's Tom Burridge in Barcelona.
Such a move would be unprecedented in the history of the European Union, our correspondent adds.


Taunton is to introduce a ban on people taking intoxicating substances including legal highs in public places.

The borough council has been working with Avon and Somerset Police to introduce a Public Space Protection Order (PSPO) covering the town centre.
PSPOs are a type of power given to local councils to help tackle persistent anti-social behaviour.
The new order - which does not apply to pavement cafes or licensed premises - will be enforced from 1 June.
The PSPO replaces the "no drinking" order that applies to some areas of Taunton but is far broader, covering the town centre as well as parts of Priorswood Road through to Toneway and Blackbrook Way.
Anyone in breach of the order will be committing a criminal offence and could receive a fixed penalty notice or face a fine in court.
Last year, Taunton Deane councillors voted unanimously to ban the sale of legal highs in premises rented from the authority.
In March, new anti-social behaviour legislation was upheld in a test case involving the closure of a legal highs shop in Taunton, which police said was responsible for serious nuisance and disorder in the town.
Taunton is following in the footsteps of Lincoln City Council which introduced a similar scheme in February.
Leader of Taunton Deane Council, councillor John Williams, said the order sent "a clear message that unacceptable, anti-social behaviour in Taunton will not be tolerated".
Legal highs are similar to illegal drugs but have had their chemistry tweaked, meaning they are not covered by the Misuse of Drugs Act and are legal to sell.


A man who attacked Tube passengers with a knife at Leytonstone station in east London has been found guilty of attempted murder.

Muhiddin Mire, 30, injured musician Lyle Zimmerman, 56, in the station's ticket hall last December.
Somali-born Mire admitted the attack but denied attempted murder.
Mr Zimmerman suffered "a deep and ragged wound" to his neck and his windpipe was exposed, the Old Bailey jury heard.
Mire, of Sansom Road, Leytonstone, threatened four other travellers as he ran amok through the station.
The minicab driver had already admitted four counts of attempted wounding and an alternative count of wounding with intent to cause Mr Zimmerman grievous bodily harm.
The attack was caught on CCTV and mobile phone footage taken by a passer-by who carried on filming even as Mire lunged at him with his knife.
Mire claimed he was carrying out the attack for "my Syrian brothers", prompting one onlooker to shout: "You ain't no Muslim, bruv".
Police officers shot Mire with a Taser and arrested him.
The Old Bailey jury heard Mire had a history of mental illness and that he believed he was being watched by the security services and persecuted because he was a Muslim.
Mire had images of soldier Lee Rigby and the Islamic State (IS) group's British executioner Jihadi John on his mobile phone, along with material linked to IS.
The defendant stared ahead with a blank expression as the jury returned its verdict after little more than a day of deliberations.
Mire was remanded in custody at Broadmoor secure psychiatric hospital and will be sentenced at the end of July.
After the conclusion of the trial, Transport for London confirmed Mire had gained a private hire licence after "satisfactorily" completing a Disclosure and Barring Service and health checks - part of which include a medical assessment with a registered practitioner who had full access to medical records.
Before adjourning for sentencing, Judge Nicholas Hilliard QC told jurors he would be highlighting the "public spiritedness" of the people who rushed in to help on the day of the attack.
He said: "It would have been very easy to continue one's journey on, but that did not happen."
The jury heard that on 5 December, Mr Zimmerman had been singled out by Mire as they both travelled on the same train.
Mr Zimmerman was wearing cowboy boots and a hat. He was carrying a mandolin and an amplifier and had a guitar strapped to his back.
Mire followed him off the tube train and attacked him with a black-handled knife as they reached the ticket barriers.
Grabbing Mr Zimmerman from behind, Mire swung his victim to the floor before kicking him repeatedly as a woman nearby called out to him to stop.
As Mr Zimmerman lay defenceless on the ground, Mire crouched down and attacked him with the knife in front of horrified passengers.
Giving evidence from behind a screen, Mr Zimmerman told the jury: "At the time, my subjective impression was that I was being attacked by a crazy person, a mentally unwell person."
Following the attack on Mr Zimmerman, Mire threatened several more members of the public, swinging his blade at Daniel Bielinski who began filming events on his mobile phone.
Mire then went on to lash out at Serena Valori and an unknown man before coming face-to-face with Russian security guard Andrius Sabaliauskas, who tried to talk to him.
Meanwhile, a junior doctor on his way home rushed to treat the neck wounds of Mr Zimmerman.
Despite efforts to calm him down, Mire tried to slash lift engineer David Pethers before police arrived.
Mire ran at one of the police officers, shouting: "This is for my Syrian brothers, I'm going to spill your blood," before he was finally subdued.
The court heard how Mire had been referred to mental health services by his GP a month before the attack.
Mire's family had also become concerned about his mental health and tried unsuccessfully to persuade him to travel back to Somalia.
Commander Dean Haydon, head of Scotland Yard's Counter Terrorism Command, said Mire had been influenced by extremists.
He said: "I would class Mire as being part of a vulnerable section of the community, and terrorist organisations such as Daesh, or IS, over in Syria, prey on individuals such as him.
"And what we found following his arrest is, certainly from his mobile phone and other digital media, that he had downloaded a vast amount of extremist material which we think certainly inspired him to conduct an attack here."
He added much of the material was aimed at the vulnerable to inspire lone atrocities by so-called "spontaneous volatile extremists".
"If you look at some of the propaganda that's coming out of IS and Syria and elsewhere, part of their propaganda is specifically targeted in relation to the vulnerable.
"We're not just talking about mental health here, we're talking about vulnerable individuals within the community," Commander Haydon said.
Mire was found to have started downloading extremist material two or three months before the attack, coinciding with his mental health crisis.


Guatemala has declared three days of national mourning after a fire killed 31 teenage girls at a children's care home.

Wednesday's blaze at the government-run Virgen de Asuncion shelter in San Jose Pinula, near Guatemala City, has focused attention on how it was run.
Police say some residents set fire to mattresses after a riot and an escape attempt.
There have been allegations of abuse at the overcrowded centre.
Nineteen girls aged 14 to 17 were reported to have died at the scene, and more have died in hospital since.
Around 40 people were taken to hospital with second- and third-degree burns, according to hospital officials.
President Jimmy Morales declared the country to be in official mourning. His office said the cause of the fire was being investigated.
The tragedy was "a great shame for the state and for the whole world", Supreme Court Magistrate Maria Eugenia Morales told reporters.
Distraught relatives of the residents waited at two local hospitals and the morgue for news.
Some of the victims were hard to identify because the bodies were so badly burnt, and authorities said DNA tests would have to be conducted.
Reports say the capacity of the home is 400, but that many more children were living there at the time.
Hundreds of children escaped the fire, but many are not yet accounted for.
A group of youths isolated by authorities after the riot caused the blaze by setting fire to mattresses, police chief Nery Ramos said.
Firefighters said it appeared to have started in the female section of the shelter.
Guatemalan media report that the riot erupted as a result of alleged sexual abuse by staff and frustration with the poor conditions and food.
"It was a ticking time bomb. This was to be expected," a former employee, Angel Cardenas, told the AFP news agency.
Open-living arrangements meant that "girls who simply were suffering, that didn't have any problems with the law, are mixed with young people who have committed crimes", presidential spokesman Heinz Heimann said.
"This can't be allowed to continue."
The fire ripped through the facility in minutes.
The shelter, run by the social welfare ministry, takes in children up to the age of 18 who have suffered abuse or have been abandoned.
But local media say the shelter was also functioning as a juvenile detention centre, to which judges were sending adolescents involved in criminal cases.
The UN children's fund in Guatemala said on Twitter it "condemns the tragedy", adding: "These children and adolescents must be protected".


A father who died after being assaulted outside a nightclub in Gwynedd has been named as Henry Ayabowei.

North Wales Police found the 27-year-old unresponsive outside Peep on Dean Street, Bangor, shortly before 02:00 BST on Saturday.
Officers carried out CPR before he was taken to hospital, where he died on Sunday morning.
A 26-year-old man, arrested in connection with the assault, has now been arrested on suspicion of murder.
The family of Mr Ayabowei, a father-of-two from the Llangefni area, has been informed.
He had initially been taken to Ysbyty Gwynedd Hospital, but was transferred to a hospital in Stoke where he later died.
In a statement on its Facebook page, Llanfairpwll football club paid tribute to Mr Ayabowei - also known as Henry Esin - who had been one of their players, saying he was a "true gentleman in every sense".
Det Ch Insp Brian Kearney said: "A major incident room has been set up at Bangor police station, and a team of detectives are continuing to establish the full circumstances leading up to the victim's tragic death."
Insp Owain Llewellyn said: "I am deeply shocked and saddened by the tragic death of this young family man.
"The thoughts of our community are with his wife, children and friends.
"Whilst incidents of this nature are very rare, and North Gwynedd is one of the safest parts of the United Kingdom, we will continue to work closely with our licensees, businesses and our partner agencies to prevent such tragic events."


Dundee United claimed their first Championship win at the third attempt as they brushed aside Ayr at Tannadice.

Simon Murray, Jamie Robson and Willo Flood all scored as the hosts brought their League Cup form into the league.
After Cammy Smith was fouled, Nick van der Velden's penalty was saved by Greg Fleming but Murray was the quickest to react and headed in from close range.
Robson turned in Flood's low delivery before Flood sealed the points when he converted Tope Obadeyi's cross.
It was the midfielder's first goal since returning to the club for a fourth time last month, and helped lift United to fourth place, five points behind leaders Raith Rovers and Hibernian.
The Tangerines began the game in whirlwind fashion with Van der Velden, Scott Fraser, Murray and Coll Donaldson all going close in the opening 10 minutes.
The visitors' defence was under severe pressure and was eventually breached after 13 minutes.
Smith was pulled down inside the box by Paddy Boyle and, although Dutch midfielder Van der Velden's spot-kick was saved, Murray reacted swiftly to nod the ball in.
Ayr's former Dundee midfielder Gary Harkins warmed the palms of Cammy Bell with a thunderous 25-yard shot but United scored their second eight minutes before the break.
Van der Velden cut the ball back from the bye-line and, although the Ayr defence cleared the initial cross, Robson pounced to blast the ball beyond Fleming.
It was the 18-year-old's first ever goal for the club as he continues to repay the faith shown in him by manager Ray McKinnon.
Ayr introduced Jamie Thoms and Brian Gilmour for the second half and the visitors did improve but failed to test Bell in the home goal.
The home side, urged on by a crowd of 6,427, looked a little uneasy in the second period until McKinnon brought on Obedeyi and Blair Spittal with 15 minutes left, producing an immediate impact.
Obedeyi did well to Flood inside the six-yard box and the midfielder found the back of the net with ease as United strolled to victory.
Dundee United boss Ray McKinnon:
"If you had said to me before the game we would have a 3-0 win I would have been happy with that.
"We had a really good first half so I'm very pleased with that. The second half we have to give credit to Ayr United who came back into the game and made it difficult for us.
"There is no divine right to win games in this league. Everybody has quality in their teams and you have to be at it for 90 minutes."
Ayr United boss Ian McCall:
"I don't think it was a fair reflection on the game. We had a couple of really good opportunities in the first half but I would not begrudge Dundee United their 2-0 lead.
"I thought we were the dominant team for most of the second half and had numerous opportunities to work the keeper but didn't.
"Some of the players are still finding their feet. They were a lot better today but they just need to find their belief at these places and just play."
Match ends, Dundee United 3, Ayr United 0.
Second Half ends, Dundee United 3, Ayr United 0.
Attempt missed. Gary Harkins (Ayr United) right footed shot from outside the box is close, but misses to the right.
Attempt saved. Blair Spittal (Dundee United) right footed shot from long range on the right is saved in the centre of the goal.
Attempt saved. Gary Harkins (Ayr United) right footed shot from the right side of the box is saved in the centre of the goal.
Foul by Charlie Telfer (Dundee United).
Gary Harkins (Ayr United) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Attempt missed. Craig McGuffie (Ayr United) left footed shot from outside the box is close, but misses to the right.
Attempt missed. Patrick Boyle (Ayr United) right footed shot from a difficult angle on the left is close, but misses to the left.
Foul by Lewis Toshney (Dundee United).
Gary Harkins (Ayr United) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Blair Spittal (Dundee United) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Patrick Boyle (Ayr United).
Substitution, Dundee United. Charlie Telfer replaces Willo Flood.
Attempt missed. Gary Harkins (Ayr United) header from the centre of the box is close, but misses to the left.
Corner,  Ayr United. Conceded by Sean Dillon.
Foul by Stewart Murdoch (Dundee United).
Craig McGuffie (Ayr United) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Substitution, Ayr United. Craig McGuffie replaces Kevin Nisbet.
Goal!  Dundee United 3, Ayr United 0. Willo Flood (Dundee United) right footed shot from very close range to the centre of the goal.
Attempt missed. Brian Gilmour (Ayr United) right footed shot from outside the box is close, but misses to the right.
Simon Murray (Dundee United) is shown the yellow card for a bad foul.
Ross Docherty (Ayr United) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Foul by Simon Murray (Dundee United).
Corner,  Ayr United. Conceded by Jamie Robson.
Scott Fraser (Dundee United) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Foul by Nicky Devlin (Ayr United).
Corner,  Ayr United. Conceded by Jamie Robson.
Attempt saved. Cameron Smith (Dundee United) right footed shot from outside the box is saved in the bottom left corner.
Attempt missed. Kevin Nisbet (Ayr United) right footed shot from a difficult angle on the left is close, but misses to the left.
Ross Docherty (Ayr United) is shown the yellow card for a bad foul.
Scott Fraser (Dundee United) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Foul by Ross Docherty (Ayr United).
Substitution, Dundee United. Blair Spittal replaces Scott Fraser.
Substitution, Dundee United. Tope Obadeyi replaces Cameron Smith.
Attempt missed. Gary Harkins (Ayr United) right footed shot from outside the box is just a bit too high.
Attempt missed. Jamie Thomas (Ayr United) right footed shot from the centre of the box is close, but misses the top left corner.
Foul by Cameron Smith (Dundee United).
Ross Docherty (Ayr United) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Scott Fraser (Dundee United) wins a free kick in the defensive half.


Political leaders in Northern Ireland are to address a parliamentary inquiry into the future of UK devolution later.

The Political and Constitutional Committee's inquiry was set up after Scotland voted to remain in the UK in last September's referendum.
Committee members have previously visited Cardiff and Edinburgh.
MPs are holding separate meetings with DUP leader Peter Robinson, SDLP leader Alasdair McDonnell, Alliance leader David Ford and UUP leader Mike Nesbitt.
Among the issues the committee is looking at are whether Northern Ireland, England and Wales should be offered the level of devolution discussed in relation to Scotland, and the implications of last month's Stormont House Agreement.
Speaking ahead of Thursday's discussions, Labour MP Fabian Hamilton said: "The committee would like to know from the party leaders what else they think should be devolved to the Northern Ireland administration.
"It's all very well having a devolution settlement, but if that devolution isn't in reality devolution, then it's meaningless.
"We need to know what more needs to be devolved, whether it's tax raising as in the Scottish system, or a further and deeper devolution out of Whitehall to the people here."


Ipswich Town manager Mick McCarthy says he has been taken aback by the hatred between his side and East Anglian rivals Norwich City.

The 58-year-old is yet to defeat the Canaries as Town boss, as he prepares for his sixth derby in charge.
"If you come to both clubs you get well received, it's a nice place to come to, except for when Norwich and Ipswich play each other," said McCarthy.
"They hate each other, and I've been surprised at that."
He added to BBC Radio Suffolk: "The same points are at stake but of course everybody associated, from both sides, all want to win because it's a derby."
Norwich's recent record in the derby includes a play-off semi-final victory on their way to promotion to the Premier League in 2015, though they were relegated the following season.
Alex Neil's Canaries, seven points off the top six, are also ahead of McCarthy's side in the table, and the former Republic of Ireland boss says he thought, after a strong start to the season, they would "at least" be in the play-offs.
"A point at Norwich is certainly a good point, said McCarthy. "I'm not bothered if you're a supporter, a pundit, a journalist, a team that's spent that amount of money and the squad that they've got.
"I'm not bothered what anybody else says - if we get a point there I'll be happy with it."
Neil's side suffered defeat at Championship strugglers Burton last time out, ending the Canaries' six-match unbeaten run, and the manager admits they have "very little room for error" in their play-off push.
And the Scotsman believes that their next run of fixtures, which includes a match against fellow play-off hopefuls Sheffield Wednesday, could prove decisive in their race for the top six.
"For the importance of where we're going and if we're going to get there, the next three games are going to be crucial," Neil told BBC Radio Norfolk.
"I think the derby has come at the perfect time because we need to respond, and let's hope we get that response."


There will be no more free schools under a future Labour government, the shadow education secretary has said.

During her first speech in post, Lucy Powell also told her party's conference in Brighton that academy chains would be made accountable.
Critics of free schools complain they are expensive and often not in the areas where school places are needed.
The government argues free schools are providing places where they are needed and that parents should have a choice.
Ms Powell accused the government of wilfully neglecting its "basic duties of providing a school place and teachers to teach".
She said it was "no wonder there's a crisis in school places when local authorities have neither the means or the resources to open or expand good schools. This, we will change," she added.
Local councils should be able to ensure there are sufficient places for children in their area as well as fair admissions, she said.
But the government's "fixation" with turning all schools into academies and its "political positioning" on free schools had meant the Tories had been failing to address the big challenges in education.
Ms Powell said she, and her team, would hold "the government to account on the areas where they are wholly failing".
She said teacher recruitment had been "botched", that teacher retention was "in freefall" and that teacher shortages were "dangerously high".
This was because ministers were "doing down the profession" and "ignoring the views of the workforce", she said.
"They are leaving in their droves and it's our children who are paying the price," she added.
There are 252 free schools open in England, with a further 52 set to open this term,  out of a total of about 22,000 schools in the state sector.
The Conservatives have pledged to open 500 extra free schools by the end of this Parliament.
Nick Timothy, director of the New Schools Network which supports opening free schools, said: "Free schools are better placed to give parents what they want and drive up standards because they give more control to head teachers, teachers and governors, rather than politicians and bureaucrats.
"It is time to accept that free schools are here to stay and we hope Labour will support the creation of more of desperately needed schools."
A Conservative Party spokesman said Lucy Powell had "confirmed" the Labour Party "don't have a single idea about how to raise standards in our schools".
He added: "Rather than trusting heads and teachers to run their schools, Labour would return to the failed model of schools micromanaged by bureaucrats and politicians, undoing everything we've done to extend opportunity and give families security."
The statement added: "Our reforms have seen more 11-year-olds leaving school able to read, write and add up properly, a narrowing of the achievement gap between pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds and their peers and a million more pupils in good and outstanding schools."


Johanna Konta beat Russian Ekaterina Makarova at the Australian Open to reach the last eight of a Grand Slam, something no other British woman has done for 32 years.

Media playback is not supported on this device
As Konta looks to join a prestigious list of British tennis players when she takes on Chinese qualifier Zhang Shuai on Wednesday, BBC archives looks back at those British women who have made an impact at Grand Slams through the years.


A former child migrant, sent from Wales to an Australian orphanage, has told a child abuse inquiry how it was a "feast of kids" for paedophiles working there.

Giving evidence, the anonymous 72-year-old said Brother Lawrence Murphy took him in to his bedroom twice, forcing him to perform sex acts.
If I had told anyone, I would have been belted or got the strap, he said.
Castledare orphanage near Perth, run by the Christian Brothers order, was like "a legal paedophile ring", he said.
The witness told the inquiry: "If someone did it in the public eye, he'd go to court, he'd get sentenced and he'd serve time.
"If he'd got a habit on, if you're a Christian Brother then it seemed to be a free-for-all.
"We knew what would happen if you told somebody, especially in authority, they would say 'this doesn't happen here.'"
The abuse scandal of the British children sent abroad
'Name the villains', abuse inquiry told
He went on to claim that Brother Murphy was later "transferred from place to place" to effectively hide him.
He said his time at the orphanage still haunted him and was "probably something I will never forget".
He had bottled it up for nearly 30 years and had only chosen to speak out when he found out about the inquiry, he added.
Life for the orphans involved hard physical labour including pulling down trees, clearing land, digging out a swimming pool and building a handball court by chipping bricks.
"You had to chip X amount of bricks before you can knock off, before you had something to eat," he told the inquiry, which is looking into abuse in England and Wales.
The boys wore only a grey shirt and shorts, no matter what the weather, he said.
There were no underpants and shoes were only worn when somebody important visited, otherwise feet were bare, he added.
Brothers would be fully clothed with shoes and gloves while the boys shivered in the cold, he said.
The inquiry also heard from another former child migrant, Oliver Cosgrove, who is now in his late sixties and who also lived at Castledare.
He said the Christian Brothers, who ran the home, would visit the children's beds at night.
"We were told at Castledare that we always had to sleep on our right hand side so that the heart was closer to heaven," he said.
Brother Murray had fondled him and had also "come to my bed and forced me to give him oral sex," the Inquiry was told.
Mr Cosgrove only fully remembered some of the abuse in 2014 after reading documents connected to an Australian abuse inquiry.
He said: "The memory of this caused me to have several days of sobbing in my apartment, the apartment walls are not very thick. I used to drive down to a riverside reserve which is nearby and just sob for several hours in the night."
How will the inquiry work?
The first phase of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse is looking at the way organisations have protected children outside the UK.
Between 7,000 and 10,000 children were moved from the UK to Australia after World War Two.
They were recruited by religious institutions from both the Anglican and Catholic churches, or charities, including Barnardo's and the Fairbridge Society, with the aim of giving them a better life.
The inquiry, now into its third day, will hear testimonies from child migrants over a fortnight.


The head of Chesterfield's commercial department has left the club after a winning raffle entry was faked.

Fans were invited to enter a £20 raffle to follow the team on their pre-season tour of Hungary.
But the winning entry was later described as "not legitimate".
"After a thorough internal investigation, I can now confirm that the person responsible for this total farce has left the football club," said director Ashley Carson.
"Kevin Fitzgerald has been a hard-working, respected, likeable employee who has, for some reason, made a massive error of judgement and has subsequently paid the consequences for his actions.
"The board were unaware of his actions and have taken swift action after uncovering the truth."
The club apologised to supporters on Tuesday and said all other lotteries and raffles run by the club would not be affected by the incident.
"I do hope that we can look for a replacement to head our commercial department, move forward and pick up the pieces from the whole sorry mess," added Carson.


More British Muslim parents are turning to online service providers for their child's Islamic education - but this has fuelled concern that members of radical groups, based abroad, could pass on extremist views to children.

Traditionally youngsters have been sent to after-school classes run at madrassas, where they learn to read and write Arabic and recite verses from the Koran.
The madrassas are sometimes attached to mosques or Islamic centres but can also be in a person's home.
An estimated 250,000 Muslim children attend about 2,000 of these religious education establishments in the UK.
But increasingly parents are turning to online service providers who teach children how to recite the Koran using Skype.
Listen to Rahila Bano's report on learning the Koran online on the BBC Asian Network Reports at 13:00 BST and 17:00 BST on Wednesday 6 June.
BBC Asian Network Reports
Humza Rana, who is eight, eagerly logs on to the computer in his living room, closely watched by his mother.
He enrolled on a course run by the Faiz-e-Quran Online Academy, three years ago.
He receives three 30-minute sessions a week of one-to-one tuition with a qualified Islamic scholar based at a centre in Pakistan.
The lesson is conducted over Skype but without the video and using software that displays pages of the Quran. He reads the verse and is corrected by his tutor if he makes a mistake.
His father, Fawad, says it is an excellent service and, as they live on the outskirts of Birmingham several miles from their nearest Islamic educational institution, it is the best way for his son to learn.
Mr Rana says: "If we took him to a madrassa it would take two hours in the traffic and when he got home, it would be time to eat and then go to bed. It's a quality service at a premium price and we can monitor him at the same time. My five-year-old son is now also a pupil."
He says his son has made excellent progress. He has almost completed reading, in Arabic, the 30 books of the Koran.
Saima Bibi, from Sheffield, chose the same route for her 10-year-old daughter.
She says: "It's very time consuming, you have to bring the child home from school and then take them out again and it's hard. I also work and I prefer her to be taught in the comfort of her own home, it is much safer."
News of the online service providers spreads by word of mouth and relatives or friends can often vouch for the quality of the education provided.
But there is concern that some of the hundreds of online teachers, who are often based in Pakistan, Syria, Egypt and elsewhere, hold radical views and could indoctrinate their pupils.
One online service, Easy Qur'an Memorising, is run by a former member of a banned terrorist organisation. Mian Shahzib was a student activist for Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) in Pakistan, an organisation proscribed by the UN.
But, speaking to me on the phone from Lahore, he denied he was still involved with them.
Mr Shahzib says: "I don't talk about jihad, I don't talk about any organisation. I just teach the Koran and nothing else. I am a simple preacher man."
He says he had been a student activist but no longer had any contact with JuD.
There is no evidence he was ever involved in criminal activity.
Imam Salim Ghisa, from the Iqra Education Centre in Preston, is worried about some of the online providers.
The Iqra centre is a modern madrassa with desks and chairs, interactive whiteboards and other up-to-date teaching aids. It aims to recreate the schooling experience a child has in the classroom.
Mr Ghisa says: "Largely, with Islamic teachings and statements, a lot of it is up to interpretation. That is why we have different interpretations by extremists, they throw a different slant on to a verse from the Koran, so the same verse can be interpreted by a modernist or a traditionalist and have a different meaning."
Sultan Chaudhri, the owner of one online service, Faiz-e-Quran, believes the onus must be on parents to research education providers.
He is a former army colonel and has 47 British children on his books.
Mr Chaudhri says:" Anything which is said by our teachers is recorded by our IT server and we sometimes monitor this. Also, our tutors are all in one small room and are supervised so whatever is said is said in front of everyone. We also encourage parents to take a keener interest in what their child is learning. We find it helps them to complete the course faster."
The Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board (MINAB) is a self-regulatory body for about 500 madrassas and mosques in the UK.
Director, Mustafa Field, said:"At this stage, there is little evidence to suggest that Muslim pupils are in danger of being radicalised. What we would say is that children should get a holistic education. They must be able to critically analyse what they are reading and what they are taught."
It is not known if any British youngsters have been led astray through online services run by radicals but it is clear there is concern among some Muslims that it could happen.


Antrim hurlers maintained their promotion push as they moved to the top of Division Two A with a 2-18 to 2-11 away win over Armagh.

Four David Carvill points helped Armagh lead 0-7 to 0-5 but a Ciaran Clarke goal contributed to Antrim's 1-8 to 0-7 half-time advantage.
Armagh moved 1-10 to 1-9 up thanks to a Cahal Carvill goal but a run of eight straight points put Antrim in control.
Carvill's second goal cut the margin before Conor McCann netted for Antrim.
Antrim's run of eight unanswered points in the second half included five scores from Deaglan Murphy.
With overnight table-toppers Carlow being held to a 1-20 to 2-17 draw by Kildare, Antrim now lead the division by a point and they will secure a place in the Division Two A final if they avoid defeat in their final round-robin game against Westmeath at Ballycastle in two weeks.
The winners of the Division Two A final will then face the bottom team in Division One B in a promotion-relegation play-off.
The defeat keeps Armagh in relegation trouble ahead of their final game against Carlow in two weeks.
London and Armagh both remain on one point, although the Exiles are in the automatic relegation spot on scoring difference, having drawn with the Orchard County in the second round of fixtures.
SUNDAY'S ALLIANZ LEAGUE RESULTS
Football League Division One
Tyrone 0-19 1-09 Cavan
Hurling League Division One A
Clare 0-20 1-15 Dublin
Waterford 1-13 1-21 Cork
Division One B
Kerry 0-12 1-22 Galway
Offaly 0-15 1-17 Wexford
Division Two A
Armagh 2-11 2-18 Antrim
Westmeath 2-20 2-07 London
Kildare 2-17 1-20 Carlow
Division Two B
Derry 3-15 0-12 Roscommon
Mayo 0-15 2-19 Meath
Wicklow 0-18 0-11 Down
Division Three A
Donegal 1-21 2-13 Monaghan
Tyrone 1-22 2-10 Louth
Division Three B
Leitrim 1-15 3-16 Sligo


Kent kept their hopes of promotion to Division One alive after tying up a 10-wicket win over Worcestershire before lunch on the final day at Canterbury.

After resuming on 213-6 in their second innings, still trailing Kent by 27 runs, the visitors added seven before Matt Coles removed Ben Cox (39).
Darren Stevens (3-31) then cleaned up the tail as Worcestershire were all out for 251, leaving Kent 12 runs to win.
Daniel Bell-Drummond and Sean Dickson easily guided the hosts to victory.
Kent move to the top of the Division Two table on 147 points, six ahead of Essex, whose match against Sussex is ongoing, and 13 ahead of Worcestershire, who slip to third.
On-loan Kent all-rounder Will Gidman told BBC Radio Kent:
"To get those two second-innings wickets with a slightly older ball just as Worcestershire were forming a decent partnership was really pleasing.
"I got slightly lucky with the first wicket. The lad George Rhodes was playing really well, but he started batting way out of his crease and, when I bowled him a really full one, he ended up yorking himself.
"Then, against Daryl Mitchell, that was one that moved back up the him and hit him full in front.
"I'd have loved to have scored a hundred, but batting at number eight. It's the last thing you're really expecting."
Worcestershire head coach Steve Rhodes told BBC Hereford & Worcester:
"Kent played really well. The fact that we were a little under par was mainly due to the fact that Kent played some really good stuff over the four days. On this performance they're becoming a very good side.
"Brett D'Oliveira will come back in but it won't be a case of wholesale changes just because we've lost one match.
"Sport is all about winning and losing. I don't know many teams who just keep winning all of the time.
"Sometimes these lads deserve another chance to get themselves into some better form. We've played plenty of good cricket already this season to know that we're capable of producing better than this."


A man accused of murdering his nine-year-old grandson in Lincoln has appeared in court.

Stewart Greene, 64, has been charged with killing Alex Robinson.
The boy was found at a house in Pennell Street on Tuesday and was taken to Lincoln County Hospital, where he died.
Mr Greene, from Danes Court in Grimoldby, near Louth, was remanded in custody by Lincoln magistrates to appear at the city's crown court on Monday.


Three men have been run over and killed as they protected property in a second night of violence in Birmingham.

The men aged 31, 30 and 21 were hit by a car in Winson Green. They were taken to City Hospital where about 200 people from the Asian community gathered.
Witnesses said the men were in a group protecting their community after riot police were called into the city.
Police have arrested a 32-year-old man who is being questioned on suspicion of murder following the deaths.
Haroon Jahan, 21, Shahzad Ali, 30, and Abdul Musavir, 31,  were taken to hospital but died from their injuries.
West Midlands Police Chief Constable Chris Sims said the incident happened when a group of males had been gathered close to a petrol station in Dudley Road.
"At some point, and in circumstances that as yet I can't fully explain, a vehicle has been driven into that group of males, which tragically has led to three of those men losing their lives," he said.
All three were from the Asian Muslim community, he said.
Referring to the arrest he said: "He has been arrested for murder because the information that we have at the moment would support the idea the car was deliberately driven."
Prime Minister David Cameron called it a "truly dreadful incident" and offered his condolences to the men's families.
Tariq Jahan, whose son Haroon Jahan was killed, said he was nearby when it happened.
"My instinct was to help the three people, I did not know who they were but they had been injured.
"I was helping the first man and someone from behind told me my son was behind me.
"So I started CPR on my own son, my face was covered in blood, my hands were covered in blood.
"Why, why?"
He said his son, who was a mechanic, had been trying to protect the community as incidents were taking place elsewhere in the area. He said a petrol station along the road had been attacked.
"He was a very good lad, a good man starting at the beginning of his life and had his whole life ahead of him," he said.
"I've got no words to describe why he was taken and why this has happened and what's happening to the whole of England.
"It makes no sense why people are behaving in this way and taking the lives of three innocent people."
Witnesses to the incident said the three victims - two of them brothers - were part of a group protecting shops from looting.
Kabir Khan Isakhel said: "People came out of prayers [at a local mosque] and they were protecting the area.
"They were standing on the side of the road and the car just came and ran them over."
Mohammed Shakiel, 34, a carpenter, said the men "lost their lives for other people".
"They weren't standing outside a mosque, a temple, a synagogue or a church - they were standing outside shops where everybody goes.
"They were protecting the community as a whole."
West Midlands Police said: "Three men have died following a road collision in the Winson Green area of Birmingham which detectives are treating as murder.
"Three men were taken to hospital where two later died from their injuries. A third man was in a critical condition but confirmed dead at around 6.30am.
"West Midlands Police have launched a murder inquiry, arrested one man in connection with the incident and recovered a vehicle nearby which will be examined by forensics experts."
Mr Sims said he wanted to ensure the incident did not lead to a wider level of mistrust or violence.
"At these difficult times, people across all our communities must trust the police to protect them," he said.
A community meeting has been held in Winson Green with police and Ladywood MP Shabana Mahmood attending.
Residents called for police to protect them and Ms Mahmood said it was important people did not take matters into their own hands.
Speaking after the meeting, she said the families of the young men were "absolutely devastated".
"There have been a number of meetings with local community members and there will be more later on," she said.
"We must not allow anyone to panic - we should give the community some space to grieve."
She also said the police should be given space to carry out their inquiries and appealed for calm.
Derrick Campbell, of Race Equality Sandwell, appealed to people not to take the law into their own hands.
"The police are here to take charge and are doing their job," he said.
"I would appeal to all to please remain calm - we must cease the violence and please do not turn this into something that it is not.
"This is an accident, by the sounds of it - we certainly haven't got any more information more than that but we must remain calm and wait for the investigation to be concluded."
The Bishop of Aston, Andrew Watson, said he had attended a meeting with local MP Shabana Mahmood and 40 Muslim men from the community.
"There was a mix of voices," he said.
"Some were saying we mustn't rise up but there was some talk of reprisals. The community is in shock.
"The meeting helped, it was good the MP responded so quickly and we could talk to the community."
Officers have appealed for witnesses or anyone with information to come forward.
There was looting in Birmingham city centre, Wolverhampton and West Bromwich on Tuesday night.
Police said there were 163 arrests on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning up to 03:00 BST. That brings the total number of arrests in the West Midlands to about 300 since the disorder began.
Police have been investigating reports that shots had been fired in the Aston area of Birmingham.


The Met Office has warned of very strong winds along the western coastlines of Wales throughout the day on Monday.

It issued a yellow warning of wind, saying gusts of up to 75mph (120kmph) could occur locally, particularly to the west of the mountains.
It added the unusual easterly direction could add to the impact of the winds.
Forecasters said disruption to travel on roads and at sea was likely.
The affected counties are Conwy, Anglesey, Gwynedd, Pembrokeshire, Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion and Powys.
Gusts overnight brought a tree down in Menai Bridge on Anglesey, closing one of the main routes into the town.
The council said Telford Road was expected to remain closed for most of Monday to allow clean-up work to be carried out.


An aid convoy has reached the besieged rebel-held Syrian town of Madaya, bringing vital food and medicines.

Distribution will continue through the night to 40,000 people who have been trapped for six months by a government blockade and without aid since October.
The UN says it has received credible reports of people dying of starvation.
Simultaneously, aid lorries entered two villages besieged by rebel forces in the northern province of Idlib under a deal between the warring parties.
The situation in Foah and Kefraya is also said to be extremely dire, with an estimated 20,000 people trapped there since March.
The arrival of the aid was delayed until both sets of lorries were ready to enter.
Pawel Krzysiek, who is with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Madaya, said after arriving: "The people... were coming every five minutes asking, 'listen did you bring food, did you bring medicine?'
"Some are smiling and waving at us but many are just simply too weak, with a very bleak expression, too tired."
This humanitarian mission was forged by a cruel conflict. Aid for rebel-held Madaya was contingent on help for government-controlled Foah and Kefraya.
Images of Madaya's emaciated children sparked alarm in many capitals and created greater impetus but they also provoked a war of words.
Supporters of the Syrian government and its Lebanese Hezbollah allies accused rebel forces in Madaya of seizing food for themselves. Some even mocked reports of starvation. The opposition charged President Assad's forces with more war crimes.
Today, Madaya is the face of Syria's suffering. Two years ago, it was Yarmouk.
These are moments that mobilise the world's sympathy but over the past year, only 10% of the UN's requests to deliver aid to people to in besieged and hard-to-reach areas were granted. That is where 4.5 million Syrians live.
Siege warfare in Syria
Syria's civilians living a 'life worse than death'
One resident, Hiba Abdel Rahman, 17, told Agence France-Presse: "For 15 days we have been eating only soup.
"I saw a young man killing cats and presenting the meat to members of his family as rabbit. Some people went through garbage bins, others ate grass. We sought food from the fighters but they refused to give it to us."
In total, some 44 lorries operated by the UN, the ICRC, the Syrian Red Crescent and the World Food Programme reached Madaya from the capital, Damascus.
Another 21 entered Foah and Kefraya.
They were carrying basic food items - including rice, vegetable oil, flour, sugar and salt - as well as water, infant formula, blankets, medicines and surgical supplies.
Marianne Gasser, head of the ICRC's Syria delegation, said the deliveries should not be one-offs.
She said: "To relieve the suffering of these tens of thousands of people, there has to be regular access to these areas."
A few residents were given permission to leave and could be seen with belongings awaiting evacuation.
Madaya, which is about 25km (15 miles) north-west of Damascus and 11km from the border with Lebanon, been besieged since early July by government forces and their allies in Lebanon's Shia Islamist Hezbollah movement.
Brice de la Vigne from the medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) described the situation in the town as "quite horrific".
Mr de la Vigne, whose organisation supports a health centre in Madaya, told the BBC that more than 250 people there had "acute malnutrition".
MSF said on Sunday that a total of 28 people - including six children less than one year old - had died of starvation in Madaya since 1 December.
However, Hezbollah has denied that there have been any deaths in the town, and accused rebel leaders of preventing people from leaving.
Madaya is a major talking point in the Arabic media, with attitudes ranging from sympathy for its trapped inhabitants to anger at allegedly fake imagery.
Two pan-Arab satellite television channels that take a firmly pro-rebel line - Saudi-funded Al-Arabiya and Qatar's Al Jazeera - say the Syrian government and its Hezbollah allies are "starving Madaya to death".
But Syrian state and allied media dismiss the "rumours". Al-Baath newspaper accuses Al Jazeera and Al-Arabiya of a "misleading campaign, using photos of displaced and sick people from all over the world", and says the rebels are using civilians as human shields,
Some commentators try to take a broader view. Muhammad Kharrub in the Jordanian newspaper, Al-Rai, complains that the rebels themselves are besieging government-held towns, and Mahir Maqlad in Egypt's Al-Ahram notes that both sides "keep their information ambiguous to suit their own interests".
Blockades have been a feature of Syria's civil war. Up to 4.5 million people live in hard-to-reach areas, including nearly 400,000 people in 15 besieged locations who do not have access to life-saving aid.
In a separate development on Monday, activists said at least 12 children had been killed in an air strike on a school in the rebel-held town of Ain Jara, in Aleppo province.
What's happening in Syria?
More than 250,000 Syrians have lost their lives in almost five years of conflict, which began with anti-government protests before escalating into a brutal civil war. More than 11 million others have been forced from their homes as forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad and rebels opposed to his rule battle each other - as well as jihadist militants from Islamic State.
Why are civilians under siege?
All parties to the conflict are using siege warfare, encircling populated areas, preventing civilians from leaving and blocking humanitarian access in an attempt to force opponents to surrender. Shortages of food, water, medicine, electricity and fuel have led to malnutrition and deaths among vulnerable groups.
Where are the sieges?
Government forces are besieging various locations in the eastern Ghouta area, outside Damascus, as well as the capital's western suburb of Darayya and the nearby mountain towns of Zabadani and Madaya. Rebel forces have encircled the villages of Foah and Kefraya in the northern province of Idlib, while IS militants are besieging government-held areas in the eastern city of Deir al-Zour.


Shots have been fired at the front of a house in Londonderry, police have said.

It happened just before 22:00 GMT on Thursday in the Ballymagowan Avenue area of the city.
No one was injured but a man and a woman, who were in the house at the time, were left badly shaken.
The PSNI have appealed for information.


Many and bitter have been the criticisms levelled at the British prime minister and members of her cabinet when it comes to their handling of Brexit, so what about the other side: Michel Barnier, the EU's chief Brexit negotiator and his colleagues - what's the dirt on them?

When Mr Barnier was initially named for the role there was a sharp intake of breath in London. His time as EU commissioner for the single market (from 2010 to 2014) included a clash with the City of London over bankers' bonuses - earning him the remarkable British label: "the most dangerous man in Europe".
Reacting to Michel Barnier's Brexit appointment, the Financial Times quoted a senior banker saying: "It's incredibly provocative. This is Juncker's revenge on Britain."
But interestingly, since taking the job, there have been few direct attacks either in the UK or amongst EU countries which are usually critical of Brussels on Michel Barnier's Brexit manoeuvres.
Last month, after the first round of face-to-face EU-UK talks, the vociferously pro-Brexit Daily Mail described him as sleek, dandyish and the model of diplomacy except, it said, when he adopted the tones of an "upset divorce lawyer".
By this week, the UK press was so eager for evidence of discontent with the way Brussels was orchestrating Brexit talks that journalists jumped on derogatory comments by German MEP Hans-Olaf Henkel.
He asserted that Michel Barnier and Guy Verhofstadt, the European parliament's Brexit co-ordinator, were out to sabotage Brexit. In an op-ed in The Times, he wrote that the two men wanted to "make a mess out of this whole unhappy situation" and to "punish the British, full stop".
But what most UK publications failed to point out was that, far from representing a mainstream view in Germany, Mr Henkel was, until not long ago, a prominent member of the minority Eurosceptic Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
That is not to say that European leaders and civil servants I speak to are wild about Monsieur Barnier (who has insisted from the start there is no "spirit of revenge" about his Brexit approach). You find widespread respect for him in EU circles, but many Europeans have an inherent suspicion of the French, whom they view as having a superiority complex.
Some criticise Mr Barnier for "being too ready to take to Twitter" to show his preparedness for all things Brexit. One contact said he put out a negative tweet about the British position paper on EU citizens' post-Brexit rights before he could have had time to read it all.
"Ego and vanity" were cited as Mr Barnier's main failings in a profile that ran in Spain's conservative El Mundo newspaper last month.
The paper said after years of travelling in chauffeur-driven cars (in commission jobs in Brussels and government positions in Paris), he was out of touch with "real people". But the same article also goes on to describe Mr Barnier as indefatigable, a good listener and someone who will tirelessly search for a workable compromise.
Compromise will be needed from both the EU and the UK for a Brexit deal to emerge from talks.
European diplomats say it's too early to really judge Mr Barnier as this is still the beginning of Brexit negotiations - and Brussels has a habit of showing creative-thinking and making deals at the 11th hour.
But you could argue the Barnier team should show some flexibility to encourage the British side - if they are indeed serious about reaching a Brexit deal.
The UK has already made significant concessions: accepting the EU-chosen phased timetable for negotiations (divorce first and only then talks about a future relationship) and it has also now acknowledged the notion of financial liabilities on leaving the EU (after the government first pooh-poohed the idea).
So, as a confidence-building measure, shouldn't Mr Barnier give an inch or four on the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice in the UK after Brexit, and/or the total of a Brexit bill, for example?
Yet I am unable to put him on the Brexit spot with these questions as BBC colleagues do day in and day out with UK government ministers.
Why? Because Mr Barnier and his team are simply not speaking to journalists right now outside scheduled press conferences.
So far in his capacity as the EU's chief Brexit negotiator, he has given one simultaneous interview to a group of British and European papers following the UK general election.
And that's it.
The European Commission would argue that the EU is being extremely transparent - with a plethora of its Brexit position papers available online. But, of course, that's not the same as sitting down for a rigorous interview.
Here in Brussels there's not much of a sense of accountability to journalists.
Just pop along to the European Commission's daily midday press briefing for a taster. Controversial or uncomfortable questions are often met with a "no comment" in a way that would be unthinkable in London or most other European capitals.
The interesting thing for me is that it's not just the commission - European countries have "closed ranks" too. Leading European politicians do not want to give on-the-record interviews about Brexit right now.
There has, in fact, been a complete role reversal amongst the Brexit negotiators.
Before talks started, UK government ministers were keeping stumm. Their line: we don't give a running commentary on our Brexit positions; that would not help us in negotiations.
At that stage, here in Brussels and elsewhere in Europe, leaders were happy to talk.
Now, Prime Minister Theresa May is having a hard time keeping her cabinet quiet while the EU has gone silent.
This all probably boils down to self-interest.
Ministers like David Davis, Boris Johnson and Philip Hammond are keen to make a name for themselves over Brexit, with an eye, following Theresa May's poor election performance, on the prime minister's job.
The unusual unity over Brexit amongst often fractious EU leaders can be explained by their common goal in these divorce proceedings: ensuring the UK pays an exit bill.
That would go a long way - in the short term at least - towards covering the gaping hole which will be left in the EU budget when the UK walks out the door.
Rich countries like Germany and the Netherlands want to put off having to pay a penny more to make up the shortfall, while recipients of EU subsidies like Hungary or Romania want to ensure they get the funding they've been expecting.
In the end, we shouldn't be too surprised by the lack of criticism aimed at Michel Barnier in mainstream European circles.
He's their man, after all - more divorce lawyer than powerful politician - and can only negotiate along the previously-agreed guidelines 27 EU countries have given him, and according to EU law (hence his assertion that there can be no "cherry-picking" when it comes to single market access, for example).
What makes this historic Brexit process all the more dramatic is that it is played out by two starkly different negotiating parties.
The EU is like a huge tanker, weighty and solid - its journey carefully mapped out - but unable to react quickly to changing circumstances.
The UK is freer to move as it chooses through uncharted waters, though its course - post-election - remains rather erratic and unclear.
The final Brexit deal isn't up to Michel Barnier.
EU countries will again set political priorities, parameters and tone when it comes to discussing the future EU-UK relationship and any transition periods.
For now, Mr Barnier says the European Union is still waiting - with a little anxiety and a lot of impatience - to know exactly what the UK wants, while there is still time left to negotiate.


Trams were halted in Greater Manchester when a car got stuck on tracks and another collided with a tram.

Services between Manchester Piccadilly and Ashton-Under-Lyne were suspended when a car drove on to the tracks at New Islington.
It caused problems for passengers travelling to the Bruce Springsteen concert at Etihad Stadium.
A crash involving a car and tram in Droylsden caused the suspension of trams to and from Ashton-under-Lyne.