1955
Oct 31, Britain's Princess Margaret ended weeks of speculation by announcing she would not marry Royal Air Force Captain Peter Townsend because he had been divorced.

1978
Oct 31, The US Pregnancy Discrimination Act was passed making it illegal to fire women for being pregnant or having a child. It amended Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit sex discrimination on the basis of pregnancy.

1984
Oct 31, In Decatur, Illinois, 2 young girls were assaulted and killed. In 2009 DNA evidence revealed that Melvin Johnson (d.2003) was the murderer.

1996
Oct 31, In Pontiac, Mich., Jenny Jones testified at the trial of one of her talk show guests, Jonathan Schmitz, who was accused of killing another guest, Scott Amedure in March, 1995.

2001
Oct 31, Kathy Nguyen (61), a NYC hospital worker, died of anthrax. She was the 4th person to perish in a spreading wave of bioterrorism. The source of infection remained a mystery.
2003
Oct 31, Kamato Hongo (116), a Japanese woman believed to have been the world's oldest person, died.

2007
Oct 31, In Alameda, Ca., Ichinkhorloo Bayarsaikhan (15) was shot in the back and killed in a robbery attempt by a group of teenage boys. She had been out with some 10 friends on Halloween when they were accosted at Washington Park. Quochuy Tran (16), the suspected shooter, was arrested Nov 7 and 5 others were picked up the next day. 3 boys arrested earlier in the week were released. On Dec 14 three teenage boys were convicted in juvenile court of first degree murder. Charges were still pending against 3 others. On Jan 25 Tran was sentenced to 7 years. His younger brother (15) and another boy (13) were sentenced to a wilderness camp for 2 years. In 2010 Quochuy Tran was tried as an adult and sentenced to 50 years to life in prison for first degree murder.


2012
Oct 31, The kaleme.org reported that 9 Iranian women have started a hunger strike after female guards at Evin prison in northern Tehran carried out unannounced inspections that included body searches, beating and verbal insults of the prisoners.
2014
Oct 31, In California Susan Su (44) of Pleasanton was sentenced to 198 months behind bars, forfeit $5.6 million and pay $904,000 in restitution for operating the fake Tri-Valley Univ. She used it as a front for foreign students seeking to establish US immigration status.

2014
Oct 31, In southern California 3 girls (13) were killed while trick-or-treating when they were struck by a hit-and-run driver in Santa Ana. On Nov 2 Jaquinn Bell (31) of Orange was arrested for the hit-and-run.