ALL RECENT AP STORIES

The city of San Bruno said Wednesday settlement talks were back on track with Pacific Gas & Electric Co. about compensation for a deadly gas pipeline explosion after the city held a morning press conference announcing the collapse of negotiations. PG&E Senior Vice President Greg Pruett, however, said the company had always been willing to talk and set up a Friday meeting to continue settlement discussions. Officials in the San Francisco suburb want the utility to make good on its promise...

A Florida man trying to kick the smoking habit was puffing on an electronic cigarette when a faulty battery caused it to explode in his mouth, taking out some of his front teeth and a chunk of his tongue and severely burning his face, fire officials said Wednesday. "The best analogy is like it was trying to hold a bottle rocket in your mouth when it went off," said Joseph Parker, division chief for the North Bay Fire Department. "The battery flew out of the tube and set the closet on fire." Fire...

Police say an Arizona police officer who fatally shot a man holding a baby had been involved in six previous shootings since 2002, including five that were fatal. Officer James Peters was one of several officers called to a home in the Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale Tuesday night after neighbors reported a man holding a baby was threatening them with a handgun. Police Chief Alan Rodbell said Wednesday that 50-year-old James Loxas went back in his house when the first officer arrived then opened...

There are super-hot chile varieties. And then there's the sweat-inducing, tear-generating, mouth-on-fire Trinidad Moruga Scorpion. With a name like that, it's not surprising that months of research by the experts at New Mexico's State University's Chile Pepper Institute have identified the variety as the new hottest pepper on the planet. The golf ball-sized pepper scored the highest among a handful of chile breeds reputed to be among the hottest in the world. Its mean heat topped more than 1.2...

Two former executives of health care company Canopy Financial Inc. who pleaded guilty to defrauding investors out of $75 million have been sentenced to prison. Former President and CEO Jeremy Blackburn was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in prison. Former Chief Technology Officer Anthony Banas received a 13-year sentence. Both men pleaded guilty in 2010 to one wire fraud count. According to court documents, Blackburn and Banas used false information about Canopy's financial condition to obtain...

More than 1,000 once-forgotten rape kits that were part of a trove found in a Detroit police property storage facility are expected to be reviewed and possibly tested for DNA in crimes dating to the 1980s, a state police official said Wednesday. DNA found in the kits that doesn't belong to the rape victim will be loaded into the FBI's Combined DNA Index System _ or CODIS _ to search for matches that could lead to arrests, State Police Director of Forensic Science John Collins told The Associated...

President Barack Obama and former first lady Laura Bush will celebrate the groundbreaking for a new national museum showcasing black life, art and history on the National Mall. The Smithsonian Institution announced Wednesday that Obama will speak at the Feb. 22 groundbreaking for the National Museum of African American History and Culture. Actress Phylicia Rashad will host the event. Early construction work has already begun at the museum site near the Washington Monument. Officials have said...

Laughing tourists were either cynical or confused about whether a man was really suffering a medical episode amid the "doctor," "nurses" and health warnings at the Heart Attack Grill in Las Vegas, a restaurant owner said Wednesday. "It was no joke," said Jon Basso, who promotes himself "Doctor Jon," his scantily-clad waitresses as nurses and customers as patients. Basso said he could tell right away the man in his 40s eating a Triple Bypass burger was having trouble. He was sweating, shaking...

A teacher's role may be to expand a student's vocabulary, but one Arizona lawmaker wants to make sure that doesn't include four-letter words. A state legislator has introduced a bill that would punish public school teachers if they use words that violate the obscenity and profanity guidelines set forth by the Federal Communications Commission. State Sen. Lori Klein introduced the measure because a parent in her district complained about a high school teacher using foul language. The words were...

General Motors Co. plans to freeze its U.S. pension plan for longtime white-collar workers and give all salaried employees annual bonuses but not pay raises in an effort to hold down expenses, officials announced Wednesday. The Detroit-based automaker said roughly 19,000 salaried workers hired before 2001 will move from a traditional pension with guaranteed payments to a 401(k)-type plan with contributions based on salary and bonuses. Employees hired after 2001, which represent about 30 percent...

Police say they've arrested the owner of a suspicious vehicle that was found parked in a judicial center parking lot near the Kansas Statehouse with several homemade explosives and an empty gun holder inside. Capitol Police Spokesman Patrick Saleh (SAH'-luh) said officers arrested the owner Wednesday in a nearby state office building connected to the Statehouse by an underground tunnel. He wasn't armed. Saleh also said another man was arrested after allegedly phoning in a threat to Gov. Sam...

The weeping widower of a woman murdered 26 years ago testified Wednesday about a love triangle that prosecutors believe led his former lover _ then a Los Angeles police officer _ to kill his wife. Defendant Stephanie Lazarus avoided the gaze of witness John Ruetten as he said he never considered Lazarus to be his girlfriend, even though they had a long sexual relationship. "What was your understanding of the relationship?" Deputy District Attorney Shannon Presby asked. "We were good friends,"...

The debate of whether to grant Colorado same-sex couples rights similar to married couples returns to the state Capitol on Wednesday, this time with more momentum than when it failed narrowly last year. The proposal is likely to be among the most emotionally charged this year, with supporters pleading for equal rights and opponents saying civil unions undermine traditional marriages. The issue has gained traction as more states have recently passed either civil union or gay marriage laws. Democratic...

The latest search for a man who went missing more than a month ago while hiking on Japan's Mount Fuji was unsuccessful, his father said Wednesday. Jerry Johnson spoke to The Associated Press after returning to Michigan following a week of searching the 12,388-foot (3,775-meter) peak, which is covered in snow and ice. "We just need a break," he said. His son, Matthew, last was seen Jan. 13 on the mountain. Described as an avid hiker and outdoorsman, the 33-year-old software engineer for Eaton...

World Bank President Robert Zoellick said Wednesday he is stepping down, raising the possibility that a non-American might be chosen for the first time to head the 187-nation lending organization. Zoellick, 58, informed the board he will leave June 30 at the end of a five-year term, during which he led the bank's response to the global financial crisis. The board now begins looking for a new president under guidelines directors adopted in 2011 calling for an "open, merit-based and transparent...

Six siblings who authorities say were subjected to sadistic sexual abuse by older relatives on a Missouri farm more than 25 years ago issued their first public statement Wednesday in an effort to counter defense arguments that the victims have been reluctant to take the case to trial. In a statement read to The Associated Press by one of the women after it was approved by her four sisters and one brother, the siblings said they are ready to tell their stories in court. "After four years of cooperating...

Cincinnati approved tough new restrictions Wednesday on metal sales in a measure aimed at curbing theft problems _ such as the case of a former crematory worker accused of dumping human ashes and selling the urns for scrap. The City Council voted 5-4 for rules that legislative experts say will be among the nation's strictest. They require frequent sellers to obtain licenses, pass criminal background checks and wait two days to get paid. Supporters said they are trying to deter would-be thieves...

Josh Powell's surviving relatives want him buried at the same cemetery as the two young sons he killed, the city manager in Puyallup said Wednesday. Powell's relatives visited the public Woodbine Cemetery and selected a plot about 25 feet away, just across a road from the boys, City Manager Ralph Dannenberg told The Associated Press. They haven't paid for it yet, and any sale is being put on hold because the parents of Powell's missing wife have promised legal action. "We don't have any rules...

A Georgia middle school student claimed in a lawsuit Wednesday he was humiliated and traumatized when he was brought to a vice principal's office and forced to strip in front of classmates who said he had marijuana. The student, then in the seventh-grade, said he still suffers from emotional distress because his classmates taunted him by calling him Superman, the underwear he was wearing when he was strip-searched. The student is suing the Clayton County school district for unspecified punitive...

A former police officer in suburban New York is expected to plead guilty to accepting a bribe to allow a prescription drug dealer to move cash proceeds through an airport. Michael Brady is scheduled to appear Thursday in federal court in Bridgeport, Conn. He previously pleaded not guilty. Brady's attorney now says he intends to plead guilty. Authorities say Brady, a Florida state trooper and three federal Transportation Security Administration officers accepted cash or gift cards in exchange...

An unusual school zone speed limit sign in suburban Detroit has drawn the attention of an irked driver. Greg Smith tells The Oakland Press of Pontiac ( http://bit.ly/zeVCbZ ) that he noticed the sign recently in Oakland County's White Lake Township that lists six separate times when drivers should slow down to 25 mph on school days. Smith says drivers "practically have to come to a stop to read it." An elementary, middle and high school all are nearby. Police Chief Ed Harris says a meeting is...

A Texas woman who authorities say was kidnapped and tortured for nearly two weeks by her ex-neighbor told jurors Wednesday that she rejected his romantic advances several years ago. The woman testified that Jeffrey Allan Maxwell occasionally chatted with her when he lived half a mile from her rural North Texas home, but she told him to keep away when he started coming on too strong. The 63-year-old woman said Maxwell once asked her to kiss him as a thank you for borrowing his tractor, recalling...

Los Angeles County prosecutors have charged a high school teacher's aide with committing lewd acts on a child. The felony complaint filed Wednesday against 40-year-old Alain Salas alleges three counts of lewd acts and one count of contacting a minor for a sexual offense. He's the fourth employee of the Los Angeles Unified School District arrested in recent weeks on child sex-related allegations. The FBI has said the victim of the alleged crimes is a 15-year-old student. Salas, who worked at...

A federal trial began Wednesday for an Indiana man accused of forcing his grandsons to hike for miles in the Grand Canyon without food or water in brutal August heat. Investigators have said that Christopher Alan Carlson of Indianapolis told them that the boys were overweight and that he thought hiking the Grand Canyon would help get them into shape. "He told me that he loved his grandchildren very much, but at the same time there were tough people in the world and his grandchildren needed to...

A Wisconsin man who found a severely malnourished 15-year-old girl walking barefoot outside in pajamas says she was bleeding from a gash on her nose and crying. Mike Vega told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the teen he found walking near her Madison home Feb. 6 also had scrapes and a big bruise on her forehead and was so scrawny he mistook her for an 8-year-old. Vega says while they waited in his car for an ambulance to arrive, she told him her stepmother had thrown her down the basement...

House investigators want to interview Angelo Mozilo, the former Countrywide Financial Corp. chief executive whose VIP program gave discounted mortgages to member of Congress, other government officials and influential people who could help the company. Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has been investigating the VIP operation to learn who received special deals from the program known internally as "Friends of Angelo." Issa's letter, dated Tuesday...

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says he's concerned about reported clashes between security forces and demonstrators in Bahrain in recent days. U.N. deputy spokesman Eduardo del Buey said Wednesday that Ban is calling on all parties to exercise maximum restraint, and for Bahraini officials to respect their international human rights obligations. Bahraini Shiites are marking the one-year anniversary of their uprising against the country's Sunni rulers. Security forces fanned out across the island...

The U.N. General Assembly scheduled a Thursday vote on an Arab-sponsored resolution strongly condemning human rights violations by the Syrian regime and backing an Arab League plan aimed at ending the 11-month conflict. Assembly spokeswoman Nihal Saad said Wednesday that the vote will take place Thursday afternoon. There are no vetoes in the 193-member world body and U.N. diplomats said the resolution, which already has 60 co-sponsors, is virtually certain to be approved. While General Assembly...

The last of the once-ubiquitous FEMA trailers has been removed from New Orleans more than six years after floodwalls and levees broke during Hurricane Katrina and caused the city to flood. On Wednesday, the Federal Emergency Management Agency said the last trailer was removed Sunday. The agency said the household living in the trailer moved into their rebuilt home last week. New Orleans once had more than 23,000 FEMA trailers. The city complained they were eyesores. But people relied on them...

A State Department official says Iran and Russia are providing weapons to Syria that could be used against anti-government protesters. Thomas A. Countryman, the department's assistant secretary for international security and nonproliferation, told reporters Wednesday that Iranian weapon shipments are a matter of deep concern for the Obama administration. Countryman declined to provide specifics about the kinds of weapons provided to Syria by either Iran or Russia. He also said the U.S. is concerned...

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says a national biological and agricultural defense laboratory in the U.S. remains necessary despite the Obama administration's decision not to include construction funding in its budget request. Napolitano says President Barack Obama's budget request for the next fiscal year includes $8 million for research in Kansas, where the $1 billion National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility has been planned. Napolitano tells members of Congress that project is...

2012 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 Coupe Centennial Edition BASE PRICE: $61,995 for base Grand Sport 3LT coupe; $62,595 for base 3LT convertible; $75,600 for base Z06 coupe. PRICE AS TESTED: $101,835. TYPE: Front-engine, rear-wheel-drive, two-passenger coupe. ENGINE: 7-liter, overhead valve V-8. MILEAGE: 15 mpg (city), 24 mpg (highway). TOP SPEED: 198 mph. LENGTH: 175.6 inches. WHEELBASE: 105.7 inches. CURB WEIGHT: 3,175 pounds. BUILT AT: Bowling Green, Ky. OPTIONS: 3LZ premium equipment group...

The Corvette wasn't around 100 years ago when Chevrolet was born. But for 2012, the iconic two-seater gets a Chevrolet Centennial Special Edition package that founder and racing pioneer Louis Chevrolet could have loved. The Centennial package of suspension control, special graphics, badging and interior comes on Corvettes in only one color _ black inside and out. The first Chevrolet built in 1911 in Detroit was black, too. But the 2012 Corvette Centennial Special Edition's sinister look, created...

New Jersey officials are investigating a dentist after a 3-year-old boy died in his care while restrained and under local anesthetic for a routine cavity-filling procedure. The dentist was still on probation after the death of a 6-year-old girl in 2004. Dr. Patrick Bamgboye, 64, is cooperating with authorities, an attorney for his employer, Dental Health Associates, told The Star-Ledger newspaper of Newark for a story Wednesday. It's too early in the investigation to assert blame, attorney Harry...

Forget the three little pigs hiding from the big bad wolf. These six little pigs have found a new friend in a maternal French bulldog named Baby. The Lehnitz animal sanctuary outside Berlin said Baby took straight to the wild boar piglets when they were brought in Saturday, three days old and shivering from cold. Sanctuary worker Norbert Damm said Wednesday that, as soon as the furry striped piglets were brought in, Baby ran over and started snuggling them and keeping them warm, even though they're...

Firefighters in Pennsylvania have managed to save 200 pounds of Polish sausage from what they're calling the best-smelling fire they've doused in years. The New Castle News reports that firefighters responded about 11:30 a.m. Monday when a 20-by-20-foot smokehouse caught fire in the yard of Cash Koszela (koh-ZEL'-uh). He's a retired meat cutter who's been smoking his own sausage for about 30 years. Firefighters say some grease caught fire when the smokehouse got too hot _ about 300 degrees....

All across America, men gave their sweethearts flowers and chocolates for Valentine's Day. Michael Jennings gave his girlfriend something more memorable, if less fragrant: a tour of a Brooklyn sewage plant. Love was not the only thing in the air Tuesday as about 100 people ventured out to the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant for a free guided tour that was billed by the city as an "unforgettable" way to celebrate the most romantic day of the year. Proving, as the song says, that love...

Police in the Northern California city of Vallejo say the gunman who opened fire at a nail salon, wounding a toddler and four adults, was targeting a 27-year-old woman getting her nails done. Authorities still don't have a motive for Monday's evening shooting that spilled out onto the street. Police say the unidentified shooter came into Tina's Nails and opened fire, striking the 27-year-old woman, the 2-year-old and her grandmother. A man inside the store, 32-year-old Chester Landers, allegedly...

Prosecutors want to make an example of a former security chief at West Virginia's Upper Big Branch mine who was convicted of lying to investigators after the worst mine disaster in four decades. U.S. Attorney Booth Goodwin says Hughie Elbert Stover deserves the maximum possible sentence of 25 years in prison. Goodwin says Stover's actions contributed to the 2010 disaster that killed 29 men. In a sentencing recommendation reported by the Charleston Gazette ( http://bit.ly/z3Vdsm ), Goodwin says...

First lady Michelle Obama is planning a visit to the Pentagon to promote more help for military spouses who often suffer higher unemployment than others because they move so much. Mrs. Obama will join Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and other officials later Wednesday in talking about a new report that shows military spouses _ overwhelmingly women _ are 10 times more likely to move across state lines than their civilian counterparts. The military spouses working in jobs like teaching and nursing...

Nine black Boston police supervisors have filed a federal lawsuit in which they claim they were denied advancement because of a discriminatory promotion exam. The supervisors are suing the city, demanding that it scrap the multiple choice lieutenant's test. Black and Latino officers historically fare worse on the exams than white and Asian candidates. Harold Lichten, the lawyer for the officers, tells The Boston Globe ( http://b.globe.com/AvAMV4 ) that of the department's 51 lieutenants, there...

A Pennsylvania man who said he beat his wife's 2-year-old daughter because he thought she needed toughening up has been ordered to spend at least a decade in prison. Twenty-five-year-old Brandon Bishop was sentenced Tuesday to 10 to 20 years for the repeated assaults on the little girl he told police he thought was a spoiled princess. In a video played for the court, Bishop showed a police detective how he kicked, punched, choked and dropped the girl after picking her up by her hair. He pleaded...

Gastar Exploration plans to drill for natural gas on 1,400 acres at Bayer Corp.'s plant site in West Virginia's Northern Panhandle. Houston-based Gastar is leasing the property near New Martinsville from Bayer. Bayer expects to earn $30 million from the deal over the next 30 years. Gastar vice president Michael McCown tells The Intelligencer and Wheeling News-Register ( http://bit.ly/yv1VX5 ) that the lease will give the company a large block of acreage to develop in the Marcellus shale field....

Gastar Exploration plans to drill for natural gas on 1,400 acres at Bayer Corp.'s plant site in West Virginia's Northern Panhandle. Houston-based Gastar is leasing the property near New Martinsville from Bayer. Bayer expects to earn $30 million from the deal over the next 30 years. Gastar vice president Michael McCown tells The Intelligencer and Wheeling News-Register ( http://bit.ly/yv1VX5 ) that the lease will give the company a large block of acreage to develop in the Marcellus shale field....

The Diving Horse has finally been put out to pasture for good. The owner of Atlantic City's Steel Pier says he's dropping a plan to bring back the legendary attraction, which featured a horse and a rider plunging into a 12-foot-deep water tank from a platform 40 feet in the air, after animal-welfare activists lodged fierce criticism. The act ran on the pier from the 1920s to the 1970s. Anthony Catanoso, whose family owns the historic pier, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that he's no longer...

An attorney who prosecuted Casey Anthony is back in a courtroom in central Florida _ only this time he is standing in as defense counsel, for his son. Jeff Ashton, who retired after Anthony was cleared of killing her 2-year-old daughter, is representing his 21-year-old son, Alexander Ashton, on DUI charges. A jury was selected Monday. The Seminole County trial is set to begin Thursday. The Orlando Sentinel ( http://thesent.nl/ysWMF0 ) reports Ashton wrote in a statement he's defending his son...

Wet weather will move into the central U.S. on Wednesday, as a trough of low pressure moves into the Plains from the Rocky Mountains. A trough of low pressure in the East will pull eastward and away from the East Coast. This will bring an end to rain, freezing rain, and snow showers over the Central and Northern Appalachians and the Northeast. In parts of upstate New York, lake effect snow showers will persist along the downwind shores. In the South, a cold front extends southward from this system...

A Valentine's Day gift is being blamed for a power outage in Southern California. Southern California Edison spokesman David Song says a helium-filled balloon scored a direct hit on the company's Fontana substation Tuesday night, knocking out power to 15,099 customers. Song tells The Press-Enterprise ( http://bit.ly/wgrjI7 ) the balloon was likely a Valentine's gift. He says it dropped into the substation at about 8:40 p.m. Song says a utility crew rushed to the station and had the power restored...

A man suspected of killing two Northern California women and injuring a third was fatally shot by police officers Tuesday after a brief foot chase. Yuba City police spokeswoman Shawna Pavey said officers responded around 4:15 p.m. to multiple reports of gunshots at a Yuba City home. The arriving officers saw a gun-wielding suspect run from the house, and gave chase for about a block, Pavey said. "That pursuit culminated with an officer firing on the suspect, who was pronounced dead at the scene,"...

The former Kulani correctional facility has been identified as a possible site for the first culture-based wellness center for incarcerated Native Hawaiians. The state Senate is reviewing proposals to establish a wellness center, or puuhonua, on the Big Island of Hawaii. Proponents say the center will focus on healing rather than punishment, using proven Native Hawaiian cultural practices in substance-abuse rehabilitation and intervention. According to the Community Alliance on Prisons, Hawaiians...

The last time China's soon-to-be leader visited Iowa, he slept in a bedroom with green shag carpeting and Star Trek character cutouts on the walls. He ate eggs with a spoon because his host forgot the chopsticks. But apparently Xi Jinping (shee jeen ping) remembered the 1985 stay fondly because he insisted on returning this week to Muscatine, a small farming community he toured to learn about crop and livestock practices. Back then, he was a young Communist Party leader seeking ideas to help...

For the 99 percent of colleges, it was a pretty good fundraising year. For the 1 percent of super-wealthy elite, it was a much better one that catapulted them even farther ahead of the pack. The latest annual college fundraising figures out Wednesday show donations to colleges and universities rose 8.2 percent in fiscal 2011, crossing back over the $30 billion mark for just the second time ever, and improving many schools' financial footing after several lean years due to the economic downturn....

Police say a man suspected of killing two Northern California women has been fatally shot by officers after a foot chase. Shawna Pavey, a Yuba City police spokeswoman, tells the Appeal-Democrat of Marysville ( http://bit.ly/wIhK4F ) that police responded Tuesday afternoon to multiple reports of gunshots at a Yuba City home. Pavey says the arriving officers saw a gun-wielding suspect run from a home near the scene, and chased him before firing the fatal shots. Police didn't identify the slain...

A fifth person charged in the execution-style killings of three friends in a New Jersey schoolyard has been convicted. An Essex County jury on Tuesday found Jose Carranza guilty of felony murder and robbery charges. It acquitted him of charges he sexually assaulted a woman who survived the August 2007 attack in a playground behind Newark's Mount Vernon School. Carranza is an illegal immigrant from Peru. He was free on bail in an unrelated case when the killings occurred. He declined to testify...

The chances of Texas voters having much influence in the Republican presidential race faded Tuesday after a panel of federal judges acknowledged the state's deep divisions over political maps had made it nearly impossible to preserve an April primary. Delegate-rich Texas was originally scheduled to be a part of next month's slate of Super Tuesday primaries, but the redistricting clash forced the state to reschedule its contest to April 3. With that date now all but dead too, elections workers...

A hotel worker in Utah said Tuesday she saw Josh Powell and his boys the morning his wife was reported missing in 2009 _ and when the older child asked a question about his mom, they left immediately. "He didn't even give the kids time to eat their sweet rolls _ each had a small bite on them," said the worker, Robin Leanne Snyder. Powell, long a suspect in his wife's disappearance, killed the boys, 7-year-old Charlie and 5-year-old Braden, as well as himself in a gas-fueled fire in a rental home...

Mormon church leaders apologized to the family of Holocaust survivor and Jewish rights advocate Simon Wiesenthal after his parents were posthumously baptized, a controversial ritual that Mormons believe allows deceased people a way to the afterlife but offends members of many other religions. Wiesenthal died in 2005 after surviving the Nazi death camps and spending his life documenting Holocaust crimes and hunting down perpetrators who remained at large. Jews are particularly offended by an attempt...

A Utah woman was sentenced Tuesday to consecutive prison terms for spiking a 79-year-old man's peach smoothie with antifreeze after taking control of his bank accounts. Vernal's 8th District Judge Clark McClellan ordered Selena Irene York, 34, to serve three consecutive terms of up to five years each. York pleaded no contest in December to reduced charges of aggravated assault and forgery. Authorities said York took control of Ed Zurbuchen's bank accounts after he opened his home to the woman...

A Republican supermajority has muscled two of the most restrictive anti-abortion bills in years through the Virginia House, including one that would all but outlaw the procedure in the state by declaring that the rights of persons apply from the moment sperm and egg unite. The bills passed over bitter yet futile objections from Democrats. And one GOP delegate caused the House to ripple when he said most abortions come as "matters of lifestyle convenience." Del. Bob Marshall's House Bill 1 on...

Israel's deputy prime minister said Tuesday that Iran wants to revive the Persian Empire and once again become a major superpower with a nuclear bomb. Silvan Shalom told reporters after meeting U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that Iran would like to change the types of regimes in the Middle East and take control of all the oil fields in the region as part of its quest for power. The ancient Persian Empire encompassed millions of miles (kilometers) in Asia, Africa and Europe. Shalom said if...

A forensic expert acknowledged in testimony Tuesday that her years of DNA analysis of evidence in the 1986 murder of a woman did not cast suspicion on a veteran Los Angeles police detective until she focused on saliva from a bite mark on the victim's arm. Under questioning by defendant Stephanie Lazarus' attorney, criminalist Jennifer Francis said bloody evidence from the crime scene did not suggest any suspect when she was first given the case in 2004. There was no DNA match for any person other...

Authorities investigating the October 2009 disappearance of a Missouri girl had seized muddy clothes and shovels from the home of a neighboring teenager who later confessed to killing and burying the girl, according to secretly filed court documents obtained by The Associated Press. The previously undisclosed details of the investigation _ including that the teen's boyfriend was repeatedly questioned _ were released Tuesday in response to an open-records request made by the AP. Alyssa Bustamante...

A Texas woman who prosecutors say was tortured for 12 days seemed to be in shock as she spoke to authorities following her rescue, initially defending the man accused of hanging her from a deer-skinning device and chaining her to a bed, according to a recording of the interview played at his trial Tuesday. The woman is heard telling an investigator that Jeffrey Allan Maxwell, her former neighbor, told her he'd been hired to kill her. During the rambling interview after she was found last March,...

A Connecticut human-rights commission has rebuked a mayor who made a disparaging remark about Latinos. The state Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities said Tuesday it unanimously approved a resolution condemning East Haven Mayor Joseph A. Maturo Jr. for saying last month he might have tacos as a way to do something for the community. The Republican mayor made the remark in response to a reporter's question after the arrests of four police officers on charges they harassed Latino residents...

Police say a Maine teenager has confessed to smashing windows at the house where a toddler was reported missing in December. Nineteen-year-old Jeremy Hanson, of Clinton, was summonsed Monday night on charges of criminal mischief and violating conditions of release. Police Chief Joseph Massey tells the Morning Sentinel ( http://bit.ly/yvOcRx ) that an officer questioned Hanson based on an anonymous tip and that Hanson confessed to smashing the windows of Ayla Reynolds' home with a baseball bat...

Standard & Poor's on Tuesday improved California's bond outlook from stable to positive, a sign the state might be poised for a credit-rating upgrade if the Legislature continues to make spending cuts and tax revenue meets projections. Although California still faces a $9.2 billion deficit, the credit rating agency said the state has corrected a significant portion of its budget imbalance. "We are revising the outlook because, barring any other credit deterioration, (we) think the state is...

Injured and disoriented, a pilot was trapped upside down in his crashed airplane for several hours Tuesday but was able to make calls on his cellphone while rescuers searched the north Mississippi woods where he went down, authorities said after finding the man alive. Monroe County Sheriff Cecil Cantrell said the pilot, Greg Huggins, 49, of Memphis, Tenn., was taken to a hospital for treatment after crashing his single-engine Piper Cherokee Six when the plane ran out of fuel and went down near...

A Chicago doctor who prosecutors say dispensed more of the powerful painkiller oxycodone from 2003 to 2005 than any other physician in the country was sentenced Tuesday to four life terms in the overdose deaths of four patients. Dr. Paul Volkman made weekly trips from Chicago to three locations in Portsmouth in southern Ohio and one in Chillicothe in central Ohio before federal investigators shut down the operations in 2006, prosecutors said. He was sentenced in federal court in Cincinnati. "This...

Egypt circulated a U.N. General Assembly resolution Tuesday strongly condemning human rights violations by the Syrian regime and backing an Arab League plan aimed at ending the 11-month conflict in the country. The draft resolution was finalized by Arab nations a day after U.N. human rights chief Navi Pillay decried Syria's escalating crackdown on civilian protesters and warned that the Security Council's recent failure to take action has emboldened President Bashar Assad's government to launch...

A lobbyist wept on the witness stand during a corruption trial in Alabama when she heard a taped phone call of her casino owner client suggesting she expose her breasts to win a senator's vote on gambling legislation. Jennifer Pouncy testified Tuesday in the trial of former Sen. Jim Preuitt, two other present and former senators, and three people associated with casinos. Pouncy lobbied for the electronic bingo casino Country Crossing. In an FBI wiretap, Country Crossing developer Ronnie Gilley...

Leaders in Minnesota's largest school district said the long debate over how teachers should handle discussions about sexual orientation probably had a bigger impact than a new policy will. The Anoka-Hennepin School District replaced a policy requiring teachers to be neutral in discussions about sexual orientation with a new one requiring them to foster a respectful learning environment for all students. The change came after six students in the Anoka-Hennepin School District committed suicide...

California's credit could be turning a corner. Standard & Poor's on Tuesday improved California's bond outlook from stable to positive, a sign the state might be poised for a credit-rating upgrade if the Legislature continues to make spending cuts and tax revenue meets projections. S&P analyst Gabriel Petek says California has corrected a significant portion of its budget imbalance. The agency's report says a higher rating is contingent on sufficiently credible solutions to the state's...

The school where bomb technicians from all branches of the U.S. military learn their craft has been ordered to remove the unofficial motto "Initial Success or Total Failure" from its classroom walls. Rear Adm. Michael Tillotson told school leaders this month that the motto could be viewed as disrespectful to the hundreds of Explosive Ordnance Disposal technicians who have died in the line of duty. "The motto itself holds potential insensitivities and implies that our fallen and wounded EOD Warriors...

Dozens of couples donned ski goggles, winter coats, and skis or snowboards to mark Valentine's Day by saying "I do" during a mass mountaintop ceremony at Colorado's Loveland Ski Area. Resort spokesman John Sellers says 60 couples either got married or renewed their vows at Loveland's 21st annual mountaintop matrimony ceremony and reception Tuesday. He says about 15 of those couples are newlyweds. The couples rode a chairlift up the mountain and then skied or snowboarded down the mountain for...

Arizona is celebrating its centennial and marking 100 years since becoming the 48th state. Gov. Jan Brewer shouted "Happy birthday, Arizona" from a stage in front of the domed Old Capitol in Phoenix at the start of Tuesday's festivities. The event included storytelling and pageantry amid recollections of the state's long independent streak. Arizona shed its five-decade status as a U.S. territory when it became the last state in the contiguous 48 on Feb. 14, 1912. The U.S. Postal Service issued...

Federal regulators said Tuesday that safety violations at the Palisades nuclear power plant in southwestern Michigan had led them to downgrade the plant to a status held by just two others in the U.S. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission assigns the more than 100 nuclear reactors in the U.S. to one of five categories based on their safety performance. Most are in the top-performing group. Palisades was bumped to the No. 2 category last month and now will join two others in the third category: the...

A judge on Tuesday granted California and four other states more time to consider objecting to a class-action settlement between Honda Motor Co. and car owners over inflated fuel-efficiency claims about the automaker's hybrid vehicles. The states' sudden interest in the proposed settlement came shortly after Honda owner Heather Peters won $9,867 in small claims court _ much more than the couple hundred dollars cash that the settlement is offering. Attorneys general in California, Iowa, Massachusetts,...

An Alabama man drowned his new bride during a dive on Australia's Great Barrier Reef in hopes of collecting $210,000 in insurance benefits and belongings that included her diamond engagement ring, a prosecutor told jurors in opening statements Tuesday. Gabe Watson, 34, planned the honeymoon on the other side of the world and then used it to kill 26-year-old Tina Thomas Watson just 11 days after they wed in October 2003, said Assistant Alabama Attorney General Andrew Arrington. Watson is being...

All across America, men gave their sweethearts flowers and chocolates for Valentine's Day. Michael Jennings gave his girlfriend something more memorable, if less fragrant: a tour of a Brooklyn sewage plant. Love was not the only thing in the air Tuesday as about 100 people ventured out to the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant for a free guided tour that was billed by the city as an "unforgettable" way to celebrate the most romantic day of the year. Proving, as the song says, that love...

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is promising "very swift action" on gay-marriage legislation he opposes if it makes it to his desk. The Republican governor opposes same-sex nuptials and has vowed to veto the bill. The bill passed in the state Senate on Monday and is due to go before the Assembly on Thursday. At a news conference on Tuesday, Christie virtually guaranteed the Legislature would not muster the votes needed to override his veto. Support from Republican lawmakers would be needed to...

Two men charged in the kidnapping of a high school math teacher were extradited Tuesday to Montana, where they appeared in court less than a mile from where Sherry Arnold disappeared during her morning run. Sidney City Judge Gregory Mohr told Lester Van Waters, 47, and Michael Spell, 22, that they could face the death penalty if convicted of aggravated kidnapping. The judge set a Feb. 28 appearance in Montana district court. Arnold's body has not been found, and authorities have released few...

As of Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2012, at least 1,771 members of the U.S. military had died in Afghanistan as a result of the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001, according to an Associated Press count. The AP count is five less than the Defense Department's tally, last updated Monday at 10 a.m. EST. At least 1,478 military service members have died in Afghanistan as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers. Outside of Afghanistan, the department reports at least 102...

The Grant County sheriff's office in Washington state says detectives have no suspect or motive in the fatal shooting of a pregnant woman in Mattawa. Chief Deputy Ryan Rectenwald says the woman had no significant history of contact with police. He says there's nothing to indicate drugs or gangs were involved, and it wasn't a drive-by shooting or domestic violence. But Rectenwald says it's his personal opinion that it was not random. The 28-year-old woman, Esperanza Vicente-Mestizo, was unloading...

A 59-year-old fugitive is back behind bars after he ran out of gas in Wyoming and called the local sheriff's office for roadside assistance. The Wyoming Highway Patrol said Tuesday that Richard Vincent of Prineville, Ore., was wanted in Georgia for violating parole on a murder and escape conviction. Vincent called the Uinta (YOO'-ihn-tah) County Sheriff's Office sent state troopers to help him out. When they learned that Vincent had an outstanding felony warrant from Atlanta, he was taken into...

The following recall has been announced: ____ CHAIN SAWS DETAILS: MS 391 Chain Saws manufactured by STIHL Inc., of Virginia Beach, Va.; sold at authorized STIHL dealers nationwide from March through July 2011. This recall involves gas-powered chain saws with an orange top casing, gray base and black front handle and hand guard. "STIHL" and "MS 391" are printed in an orange circle on the starter side of the unit. The chain saws were manufactured in the United States. WHY: The flywheel on the...

A high school teacher's aide accused of sending inappropriate Internet messages to a 15-year-old student was arrested Monday on suspicion of contacting her with the intent to commit a sexual offense, the FBI said. Alain Salas, 40, was taken into custody at John C. Fremont Senior High School. It was the fourth child sex-related arrests of a Los Angeles Unified School District employee in recent weeks, but FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said there was no evidence that the cases were connected....

The air in the parking lot of Orlando's Citrus Bowl smells like fresh cut oranges, shrimp and barbecue. A crowd has gathered before the game around a guy in a black chef's coat. A camera crew orbits as he sets some shrimp and star melon kebabs on the grill with a flourish. "Florida seafood _ ya gotta love it!" the guy says, grinning. The crowd cheers. The cameraman is happy. A man walks up and inquires about the hoopla. Someone in the crowd tells him the man in black is Justin Timineri, the state...

A 14-year-old girl charged with attacking two students with a hammer at Columbine High School this week probably found the hammer on the suburban Denver campus, authorities said Tuesday. Monday's attack was the first assault with a weapon at the school since the 1999 shootings that left 12 students, a teacher and the two teen gunmen dead. The girl was being held at a juvenile jail on suspicion of second-degree assault and felony menacing. A hearing was scheduled for Tuesday. Her name hasn't...

Tina Fey's red suit, flag pin and eyeglasses worn to channel her Sarah Palin parodies of the 2008 presidential race are going on view at the Newseum, along with items from journalists and candidates who made history in presidential politics. A new exhibit, "Every Four Years: Presidential Campaigns and the Press," which opens Friday at the museum and will be updated with material from the long campaign season ahead. It also includes relics of presidents and comics from long before "Saturday Night...

Scavenging scrap metal to sell enables 28-year-old Milissa Scarberry and family of seven to get by. She advertises on Craigslist offering free pickup, knocks on doors when she sees piles of metal outside, or helps herself to junked metal left on the curb for trash removal. She usually earns $40 or so a day, sometimes much more depending on the haul. "We scrap every day," said the former restaurant worker, who has been unemployed for about a year. "We would really struggle without it." She and...

A suburban Denver couple is fighting fines after the husband was jailed for failure to get a license for his daughter's service dog. Authorities say another 50 people in Jefferson County could face the same fate. Matthew Townsend says he spent seven hours in jail after the dog got out and he was issued a $50 ticket. Townsend ignored the ticket and was arrested. His wife was fined $100. Last year, the county issued nearly 500 citations for violations. KCNC-TV ( http://cbsloc.al/z1VKE5 ) reports...

A bill inspired by the death of 2-year-old Caylee Anthony is moving closer to passage in the Florida Legislature. Lawmakers crafted the bill last year after Caylee's mother, Casey Anthony, was acquitted of murdering the toddler. Casey Anthony was convicted of four misdemeanor counts of lying to investigators. She was sentenced to the maximum of four years, but was set free after nearly three years because of time served and good behavior. The bill in Florida increases the maximum penalty from...

SinFire Cinnamon Whiskey is marketed as a "sinful spirit." Sazerac Inc. thinks it's an idea that's sinfully close to its own brand of cinnamon flavored alcohol, Fireball Whiskey. Sazerac has sued the makers of SinFire, Hood River Distillers, in federal court in Louisville, asking a judge to declare that the Hood River, Ore., company violated its trademark in trying to sell the booze in the U.S. New Orleans-based Sazerac, which owns three distilleries in Kentucky, wants a judge to stop Hood River...

A western Pennsylvania man is jailed on drug charges because police say something other than a confession came out of his mouth when he was hit with a stun gun. The Beaver County Times ( http://bit.ly/AqnSRP ) reports Tuesday that 56-year-old Frank Lee Turner was mumbling when Ambridge police stopped a car in which he was a passenger on Feb. 5. Police say Turner was mumbling before he struggled with police and was hit with the stun gun _ only to have 23 individually wrapped pieces of crack cocaine...

SinFire Cinnamon Whiskey is pitched as a "sinful spirit." Sazerac Inc. thinks it's an idea that's sinfully close to its own brand of cinnamon flavored alcohol, Fireball Whiskey. Sazerac has sued the makers of SinFire, Hood River Distillers, in U.S. District Court in Louisville, asking a federal judge to declare that the Hood River, Ore., company violated its trademark in trying to sell the booze in the United States. New Orleans-based Sazerac, which owns three distilleries in Kentucky, wants...

A champion arm wrestler has been ordered held without bail in Massachusetts after pleading not guilty to manslaughter and other charges in connection with the death of his wife. Allen Stilkey was arraigned Monday in Uxbridge District Court. Prosecutors say Stilkey and his wife, Lisa, were involved a heated argument late Thursday night. Authorities say Lisa Stilkey threw a pillow out a second-floor window of their Douglas home before jumping out herself in an attempt to flee from her husband....

Police say a South Florida mother managed to call 911 as a would-be burglar raped, beat and choked her while her newborn baby lay on a bed beside her. Coral Springs police say dispatchers heard the assault taking place Sunday night after the 25-year-old woman called 911 on her cell phone. Police set up a perimeter around the neighborhood and arrested 19-year-old Gary L. Holmes. Authorities say Holmes faces multiple felony charges and is being held without bond in the Broward County Jail. The...

Police have arrested an Indianapolis man in connection with two convenience store robberies in Mississippi where the thief wore a mask like the one used by the villain in the 1990s slasher flick "Scream." Meridian police charged 33-year-old Jerry Jones with two counts of armed robbery. Jones is suspected of robbing the two stores roughly four hours apart early Friday, The Meridian Star reported ( http://bit.ly/wCHD5Y ) Monday. Both times, authorities say, he was wearing a mask like the one worn...

Valentine's Day will be greeted by a storm that will begin the day in the Mississippi Valley before moving eastward into the eastern third of the country. In the colder air to the north, snow is expected to fall through the Ohio Valley before moving into the Northeast in the evening. The warmer air to the north will only allow areas of light to moderate rain to form from Louisiana through the Carolinas. By the end of the day, much of the precipitation from this storm will be off the eastern seaboard,...