Hurricane John lashes Mexico's Cabo San Lucas as tourists, slum-dwellers take shelter

By: Associated Press - | Friday, September 1, 2006 6:19 PM PDT ∞

CABO SAN LUCAS, Mexico -- Hurricane John bore down on the southern tip of Baja California on Friday, forcing tourists to shelter in luxury hotel ballrooms and local residents to huddle in vacant schoolhouses.

With top sustained winds of 110 mph, the Category 2 hurricane was advancing on the western Mexican peninsula at 8 mph with the storm's center expected to move over land within hours, forecasters said.

Bands of steady rain swelled normally dry stream beds and ran down some streets, but with the eye still 60 miles away Friday afternoon, there was little wind and officials had no immediate reports of damage. John wasn't likely to affect the United States; cooler Pacific waters tend to diminish storms before they reach California.

Known for the rugged beauty of their unique desert-ocean landscapes, the two resort cities of San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas on the southern tip of the Baja peninsula are studded with high-end golf courses. The resorts are extremely popular with sports fishermen -- and celebrities.

Hollywood stars including Demi Moore, Ashton Kucher, Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn visit places like the One and Only -- a hotel where the posted rates go well above $2,000 a night. Keith Richards got married in Cabo San Lucas with Mick Jagger as best man, Christina Aguilera had her bachelorette party there, Jessica Simpson celebrated her 26th birthday there and Kate Beckinsale's stay was immortalized on the Internet by paparazzi shots of her in a bikini.

On Friday, thousands of tourists who couldn't get flights out prepared to ride out the storm.

Shauna O'Leary and Sheree Bayeur, both from San Francisco, found themselves holed up in their hotel thinking of survival strategies.

"We've brought goggles," Bayeur quipped. "We're good swimmers, so I think we've got an advantage there."

"That water wasn't that high a few minutes ago," said Dale Broomfield, 26, a nurse from Adelaide, Australia, who negotiated a makeshift plank bridge over water that rose up between his hotel and an adjoining convention hall-turned-shelter in Cabo San Lucas.

Nearby, Guadalupe Amezcua, a 50-year-old tourist from Mexico City, set up camp on one of many mattresses on the floor of the hall, where windowless rooms provided protection from wind.

"This is like an adventure for us, but I've learned now: never travel during hurricane season," Amezcua said as she folded her clothes.

"We came for the sun -- and now look!"

Miles away from the glittering coastal hotels, 46-year-old bricklayer Francisco Casas Perez sat outside a schoolroom where he and his 14-year-old son spent the night. They were evacuated from their tin-roofed shack in Tierra y Libertad, one of the squatters camps that dot the sandy flats around Cabo San Lucas.

"We've been asking God to not let it hit too hard," he said. "We could lose all our possessions."

The Mexican Navy and police evacuated residents, sometimes forcibly, from Tierra y Libertad and other shantytowns, many of which are built next to usually dry riverbeds.

Casas Perez went voluntarily to the shelter, where people slept on thin pads stretched side-by-side over the concrete floor.

"The hurricane is no game, especially where we are surrounded by water on all sides," he said.

Olga Lidia Aguilar, 32, was evacuated from her tar-paper shack in the shantytown of Lagunita.

"We feel safer here," she said as she and her five children waited in line for free tuna salad and tortillas. "Our house could just blow away in the wind."

Up to 8,000 tourists remained in Cabo San Lucas on Friday; hundreds more foreigners are full-time residents. Most visitors are American.

As the storm approached, the Hotel Tesoro told guests they could stay in their rooms at their own risk, but suggested they go the hotel's shelter or hunker down in their bathrooms.

The towns' shops and restaurants were almost all closed, many with their windows boarded up. Hotel workers stripped rooms of light fixtures and furniture, in case plate-glass windows shattered.

Officials closed the airport Thursday night, ending a mad scramble for last-minute flights, and driving out wasn't an option for many -- the one, narrow road north stretches 400 miles to Tijuana on the U.S. border. A tropical storm warning was in effect for the desolate middle stretch of the peninsula, a region dotted with American-owned vacation and retirement homes.

The National Hurricane Center warned that John could fuel storm surges of up to 5 feet above normal tide and bring 6 to 10 inches of rain, possibly causing "life-threatening flash floods and mudslides" over mountainous areas.

Meanwhile, Tropical Storm Kristy churned farther out in the Pacific Ocean on Friday, with maximum sustained winds of 58 mph, and forecasters at the U.S. Hurricane Center in Miami said it could eventually be absorbed by John.

On the Net:

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov

Ernesto weakens to tropical depression but drenches Virginia, Carolinas with heavy rain

NORFOLK, Va. -- Ernesto weakened to a tropical depression Friday, but the storm still packed enough punch to dump more than half a foot of rain, knock out power to more than 300,000 customers and force hundreds of people from their homes.

And it was far from finished. On the eve of the Labor Day weekend, the storm prompted flash flood watches for wide sections of Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and central New York.

"Nobody is relaxing until long after the storm has passed," Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine said.

At least one person died when a massive tree crushed a modular home in Gloucester, Va. Gloucester Sheriff's Maj. Mike Nicely told the Daily Press of Newport News that rescuers found one body trapped under the tree and feared another resident was dead inside.

The storm was blamed for at least one traffic death in Virginia and one in North Carolina, where it swirled ashore late Thursday, a day after severe thunderstorms had already drenched the region.

More than 200 homes were evacuated in Richmond and about a dozen people had to leave their homes in coastal Poquoson, which is still recovering from Hurricane Isabel three years ago. About 50 homes on Chesapeake Bay's Northumberland County were also evacuated, Kaine said.

People also were ordered to evacuate a few hundred homes in three low-lying Maryland communities -- Cornfield Harbor, Breton Beach, and St. George's Island -- and people in 17 other communities were encouraged to evacuate, said St. Mary's County spokeswoman Jennifer Fabbricante.

North Carolina got the heaviest initial rainfall, with 8 to 12 inches across much of the eastern part of the state. Parts of western Virginia got 6 inches by midmorning, and rain in North Myrtle Beach, S.C., measured nearly 7 inches.

The weather was bad enough that the Breeder's Cup, scheduled for Saturday in Delaware, was postponed for a week.

In Beaufort County, near the North Carolina coast, about 1,500 families were under a mandatory evacuation order, and police went door to door early Friday in an area with poor drainage, said George Sullivan, director of the county Emergency Management Office.

To the southwest in rural Duplin County, about 90 people in the towns of Chinquapin and Wallace were rescued from flooded homes. Mailboxes and street signs poked out of about 4 feet of lakelike water along one road.

The Northeast Cape Fear River at Chinquapin rose about 7 feet over 12 hours to stand just a few inches below its flood stage of 13 feet by mid-afternoon Friday, and Tom Matheson of the National Weather Service in Wilmington said there was more to come.

More than 300,000 customers were without power from North Carolina to New Jersey, with the majority of the outages in Virginia.

The governors of North Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia, and the mayor of the District of Columbia, each declared a state of emergency because of the storm. Maryland Gov. Robert Ehrlich said Friday he decided against a state of emergency because his state has been so dry.

Also Friday, a team of hurricane forecasters in Colorado lowered their expectations for the 2006 Atlantic season, predicting only five hurricanes instead of the seven previously forecast.

Ernesto's wind reached 70 mph, just 4 mph below hurricane strength, as it passed over land at Long Beach, N.C., just west of Cape Fear. Its sustained wind speed had dropped to 35 mph by midday Friday.

In South Florida, where Ernesto came ashore earlier in the week, several counties prepared to seek reimbursement from the federal government for millions of dollars spent in anticipation of storm damage that never happened.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency said that without a federally declared disaster, there was no option for counties to be reimbursed for preparation costs. The only declared state of emergency in Florida was made by Gov. Jeb Bush.

At midday, Ernesto was centered about 80 miles west-southwest of Norfolk, Va., and moving north at nearly 14 mph. It was expected to continue north into Pennsylvania and slow down.

At the Virginia Beach oceanfront, winds knocked down tents and portable toilets that had been set up for a music festival this weekend, and all Friday shows at the American Music Festival were canceled.

Winds gusted at about 60 mph in Hampton, Newport News and Poquoson, the weather service said. Tractor-trailers and recreational vehicles were barred from the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, and several ferries on eastern Virginia rivers closed.

On Richmond's north side, officials ordered residents of more than 200 homes in the Battery Park area to evacuate because the area flooded earlier this week.

The weather service canceled flood warnings for rivers in the western part of the state, but the James River was likely to flood in the east.

Associated Press writers Zinie Chen Sampson, Kristen Gelineau and Terri Nelson in Richmond, Sue Lindsey in Roanoke, Mike Baker in Chinquapin, N.C., and Alex Dominguez in Baltimore contributed to this report.

Hurricane forecast team downgrades season's expectations to 5 Atlantic hurricanes, from 7

DENVER (AP) -- A team of top hurricane researchers lowered its 2006 forecast for Atlantic hurricanes for the second time in a month Friday, predicting a slightly below-average season with five hurricanes instead of seven.

Two of the hurricanes will be intense, according to the team headed by forecaster William Gray at Colorado State University.

His team predicted a 59 percent likelihood that a hurricane would hit the U.S. coastline in September, and a 35 percent chance of an intense hurricane. For October, the forecasters said there was a 14 percent chance a hurricane would strike the coast.

It was the second time the team had downgraded its expectations in the span of a month. Last spring, Gray's team predicted 17 named storms would form in the Atlantic basin during the June through November hurricane season. Team members lowered that to 15 in early August, and then to 13 in their latest forecast.

"Our August forecast was very high. It stunk," said team member Philip Klotzbach. "We didn't have the major formations we expected. There was a surprising amount of dry air. It choked them off."

As of Friday, five named storms had formed, including Ernesto, which briefly became the season's first hurricane last week and was moving north up the East Coast Friday as a tropical depression.

The average storm count for the Atlantic basin is 9.6 named storms, 5.9 hurricanes and 2.3 intense hurricanes per year.

Klotzbach identified several factors for the changed forecast, including higher levels of West African dust over the Atlantic and a warmer eastern equatorial Pacific indicating a potential El Nino event this fall.

The National Hurricane Center has also lowered its Atlantic storms forecast since spring. In May, it predicted 13 to 16 named storms and eight to 10 hurricanes, with as many as six major ones. In early August, the hurricane center revised that to between 12 and 15 named storms and seven to nine hurricanes.

The 2005 Atlantic hurricane season set a record with 28 named storms and 15 hurricanes, including Katrina, which hit one year ago this week and devastated the Louisiana and Mississippi coasts.

On the Net:

CSU forecast: http://hurricane.atmos.colostate.edu/

National Hurricane Center: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/

Kidnapping case unnerves Austria as families ready for new school year

VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- Extra police officers and crossing guards will be on hand to help parents and their children feel safe when schools reopen next week in Austria, which is still reeling over revelations that a schoolgirl spent 8.5 years imprisoned in an underground cell.

But to many in this nation stunned by Natascha Kampusch's ordeal and her dramatic escape last week from her kidnapper, the heightened security was just window dressing.

"You almost don't want to let them out of your sight. Not even for a second," said Birgit Meisner, 34, watching her two young boys kick a soccer ball around a Vienna park on Friday.

Kampusch's flight to freedom on Aug. 23 from the suburban home of abductor Wolfgang Priklopil, who killed himself hours later by leaping in front of a commuter train, was more than a sensational end to one of Austria's greatest unsolved mysteries.

It was a sober reminder that even in this carefree, alpine country, where incidents of kidnapping and other violent crime are among the lowest in the European Union, there are predators stalking society's most vulnerable people: its children.

Of the roughly 800 people registered with police as missing people in Austria, 200 are youths under 18, said Regine Wiesentahler-Buchmann of the Federal Criminal Investigations Bureau.

Although most turn out to be runaways who return home after a few days or weeks, or children abducted by a parent involved in a messy divorce, a few each year simply vanish the way Kampusch -- now 18 -- did as a 10-year-old girl walking to school on March 2, 1998.

Her story has made the Education Ministry's slogan for the new term -- "Joy in the new school year" -- ring hollow to many Austrians.

School officials in Vienna, where Kampusch lived until she was abducted and kept in a cramped windowless cell beneath the garage of Priklopil's home in suburban Strasshof, were taking pains to ease parents' fears before Monday's first day of classes.

The school district, which urged children to walk in groups and memorize their parents' cell phone numbers, said police would guard the entrance to Kampusch's former elementary school in a district of the capital near the Danube River. Patrols also were expected to be stepped up near other schools.

Luise Hollerer, an expert with the Austrian Federation of Psychologists, said children would understandably be rattled after seeing photographs and videotape on TV of the vault Kampusch had to crawl through to reach her tiny quarters.

"Some may be afraid they're going to be kidnapped themselves," she said.

As the investigation continues, it is the small details that keep fueling Austria's angst.

On Friday, federal police Maj. Gen. Gerhard Lang told reporters investigators were trying to determine whether Priklopil might have been inspired by "The Collector," a novel by British author John Fowles about a man who abducts and imprisons an adult woman.

Police who conducted an exhaustive search of Priklopil's house found neither the book nor any videotapes or DVDs of the film version, Lang said, but authorities could not rule out that the 44-year-old communications technician may have been influenced by it.

Lang reiterated that investigators still could not exclude the possibility, however remote, that the house might contain other secret rooms -- or victims. Police have said that was unlikely, since DNA taken from Priklopil's body and checked against a vast nationwide database indicated he was not a suspect in any other missing person cases.

"This is really a horror story," said Thomas Gruber, a Vienna accountant.

"Every time they show the place where she was held on TV, it gives me the creeps. But I can't stop watching, and in that respect, I know I'm not alone," he said. "We are a nation of voyeurs because of this."

Powerful quake strikes under ocean near Papua New Guinea

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) -- A powerful earthquake struck Friday under the Pacific Ocean near Papua New Guinea, but there were no reports of damage on land and there was no major tsunami threat, authorities said.

The magnitude 6.7 quake struck 38 miles south of the island province of Bougainville and 33 miles beneath the seabed at 6:19 a.m. EDT, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The quake did not pose a major tsunami threat, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said.

One women shot dead, another hanged in violent Mexican border city

NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico (AP) -- A gunman shot and killed a 24-year-old woman as she walked her son to preschool Friday in this violent city on the U.S.-Mexico border. Another woman with her hands and feet tied behind her back was discovered hanged in her home.

Lucero Perla was shot in the head and died instantly shortly before 8 a.m. local time (1300 GMT), as she and her son left their home in downtown Nuevo Laredo, investigator Octavio Almanza said. Police recovered the pistol used in the shooting, but had made no arrests and weren't sure why Perla was slain.

Also Friday morning, authorities recovered the body of 36-year-old Silvia Garcia, a waitress at a number of clubs and bars downtown, who had been hung to death at her home in western Nuevo Laredo.

Authorities said Garcia's arms and legs were bound, suggesting she was killed rather than that she had committed suicide. Victims found with their arms and legs bound are often the victims of drug smugglers, but investigators had yet to determine a motive for the slaying or to detain any suspects.

Investigators say that so far this year, 143 people have been killed in Nuevo Laredo, a city of 300,000 across the border from Laredo, Texas.

U.S. and Mexican investigators attribute a spike in the violence to a bloody territorial struggle between rival Mexican drug gangs competing for the city's lucrative cocaine smuggling routes into American territory.

Recovered Munch masterpieces damaged after theft, but repairable, museum says

OSLO, Norway (AP) -- The Edvard Munch masterpieces "The Scream" and "Madonna" suffered minor damage after being stolen by masked gunmen in August 2004, but it can be repaired, museum officials said Friday.

Police remained tightlipped over how they recovered the national treasures Thursday.

Munch Museum director Ingebjoerg Ydstie said "The Scream" had been banged hard in one corner and "Madonna" had a roughly one-inch hole and some loose paint.

"Our skilled conservators will be able to repair the damage," she said.

"The Scream" is probably the best known of Munch's emotionally charged works and was a major influence on the Expressionist movement. In four versions of the painting, a waif-like figure is apparently screaming or hearing a scream. The image has become a modern icon of human anxiety.

"The Scream" and "Madonna" were stolen in a brazen daylight raid on the Oslo city-owned Munch Museum on Aug. 22, 2004. Police announced their recovery but refused to say how they found the paintings.

Almost two weeks ago, the Norwegian news media began reporting that David Toska, considered the mastermind of one of Norway's most notorious bank robberies, was secretly negotiating with police for the return of the paintings.

The reports, citing anonymous sources, said he wanted milder terms in a 21-year prison sentence. Police refused comment.

During the trial of three suspects in the Munch theft, prosecutors suggested the paintings were stolen to draw police focus away from solving the commando-style bank robbery four months earlier that left a police officer dead in the western city of Stavanger.

Thirteen men were convicted and sentenced to lengthy prison terms in the robbery of Norsk Kontantsevice, or NOKAS. Their appeal begins Monday.

Leif A. Lier, now a private investigator, headed the police inquiry that led to the recovery of another version of "The Scream" that was stolen in 1994.

"When the paintings were recovered four days before the court opens the NOKAS appeal, it is my opinion that the police got a tip," he was quoted as telling Norway's largest newspaper, Verdens Gang.

Iver Stensrud, head of the police effort to recover the paintings, said only that the investigation was built "stone by stone." The City of Oslo had offered a $317,000 reward for the return of the paintings, but Stensrud said no reward had been paid.

The makers of M&M's said they would honor a reward offered last week of two million dark chocolate M&M's for the safe return of "The Scream." The painting was featured in an advertisement for the candy, which was launched in August, as part of a campaign incorporating dark works of art.

Whatever the motive in the Munch theft, famous artworks everywhere are targets.

According to the FBI's 10 most-wanted artworks list, among those still missing are three Rembrandts, a Vermeer, a Manet and five Degas taken from Boston's Isabella Steward Gardner Museum in 1990 and a Cezanne stolen from England's Ashmolean Museum in 1999.

Earlier this year, gunmen raided the Chacara do Ceu Museum during Carnival celebrations in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. They made off with a Picasso, a Monet, a Matisse, and a Dali before melting into the crowd.

In Scotland in 2003, two men overpowered a tour guide and stole Leonardo Da Vinci's "Madonna of the Yarnwinder," worth an estimated $65 million. In 2002, two Van Gogh paintings worth $30 million -- "View of the Sea at Scheveningen" and "Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church in Nuenen" -- were stolen from Amsterdam's Vincent Van Gogh Museum.

In the Norwegian case, three men, Petter Tharaldsen, 34, Bjoern Hoen, 37, and Petter Rosenvinge, 38, were convicted in May of minor roles in the art theft and sentenced to prison terms ranging from four to eight years.

Tharaldsen and Hoen were also ordered to pay $120 million in compensation to the City of Oslo. But government prosecutor Terje Nyboe said that demand would be dropped, since the paintings were recovered, but that the two could be held accountable for restoration costs.

The works have been returned to the Munch Museum, although it was not clear when they would again be on display after restoration.

After the shockingly easy theft, the once lightly guarded Munch Museum closed for nines months for a $6.4 million security upgrade. Now, key paintings are behind bulletproof glass, and visitors must pass through metal detectors and baggage scanners to enter.

"The Scream" and "Madonna" were part of Munch's "Frieze of Life" series, in which sickness, death, anxiety and love are central themes. He died in 1944 at the age of 80.

On the Net:

http://www.munch.museum.no

Trucker charged with 5 counts reckless homicide in Indiana mistaken-identity crash

MARION, Ind. (AP) -- A truck driver was charged Friday with five counts of reckless homicide for a highway crash that crushed a university van and led to the heartbreaking mix-up of two students, one killed in the crash and the other severely injured but alive.

A four-month investigation concluded that trucker Robert F. Spencer acted recklessly when his tractor-trailer rig crossed the Interstate 69 median and collided with the van on April 26, Grant County Prosecutor James Luttrull Jr. said.

Four Taylor University students and a staff member were killed.

The crash drew widespread attention when two families discovered that one of the victims had been misidentified as a survivor. The two young women were similar in appearance, and the family of the one who died had kept vigil for five weeks at the bedside of the survivor, Whitney Cerak, believing she was their daughter. Cerak's family had buried 22-year-old Laura VanRyn's body, believing she was Whitney.

Luttrull said investigators had to decide whether Spencer, 37, was simply negligent or criminally reckless.

On the day of the accident, Spencer had driven at least nine hours more than what is allowed under federal rules, said chief deputy prosecutor Bill Heck.

Spencer, 37, was arrested Friday afternoon at his trailer home in Canton Township, Mich., near Detroit. He walked past television cameras with his head down.

Statements from witnesses and equipment tests suggest Spencer fell asleep at the wheel before his truck, loaded with baking flour, drifted across the median between Fort Wayne and Indianapolis.

A probable cause affidavit said evidence showed Spencer had the truck's air conditioner on maximum with his windows down. Records show he called his sister on his cell phone minutes before the accident but was not talking when the crash happened. His sister did hear the accident, the affidavit said.

The Michigan secretary of state's office, which regulates drivers in that state, cautioned Spencer last August after he had accumulated five infraction points against his license in two years.

Records show several traffic violations, including two for speeding while driving his truck and three for disobeying traffic controls while driving his personal vehicle. His license was suspended for a day for failing to pay a ticket in 1999.

Spencer was being held in Michigan and would be given the opportunity for an extradition hearing. If he waives his right to the hearing, he would be picked up by Indiana authorities, Canton Township police Sgt. Mark Schultz said.

A judge in Indiana set bail at $135,000. It was unclear whether Spencer had a lawyer.

Cerak, 19, of Gaylord, Mich., was in a coma-like state for several weeks after the crash but has largely recovered. She returned to Taylor this week to begin her sophomore year.

Foreign buyers make London luxury home market the most expensive in the world

LONDON (AP) -- As the average Briton struggles to get on the London property ladder, an influx of foreign buyers is fueling the top-end of the capital's overheated property market.

Buyers from Asia, Eastern Europe and the Middle East have helped push London past New York as the most expensive luxury home market in the world.

"In terms of time zones and location, London is the most attractive place to be," said Liam Bailey, head of residential research at Knight Frank real estate agency.

Prime residential property in London now costs around $2,300 per square foot, compared with $1,900 in New York, according to research by CB Richard Ellis Hamptons International.

And at the very top-end of the market, so-called "super prime properties" in the British capital are going for up to $5,715 per square foot, compared with $5,100 per square foot in New York.

Jenny Siebrits, head of residential research at CB Richard Ellis Hamptons International, said market activity, mortgage lending and house prices all remain strong in London.

"With continued strength in the London market, we expect this trend to continue," Siebrits said.

The U.S. housing market boom is ending following 17 interest rate increases by the Federal Reserve.

In Manhattan, the average price of a luxury apartment -- calculated from the top 10 percent of all transactions -- was $5 million in the second quarter, down 3 percent from a year earlier when prices hit a record $5.2 million, according to Miller Samuel, a Manhattan-based real estate consultant.

In Britain, where interest rates were held steady for a year until a surprise hike last month, prices for central London homes worth more than $2.9 million climbed 21 percent for the year ending Aug. 31, according to Knight Frank.

Knight Frank research also showed that 51 percent of the $3.8 million- plus market in London is owned by foreign buyers, compared to 34 percent of the equivalent market in New York and 27 percent in Paris.

The most expensive homes sold this year -- a $62.8 million house in Belgrave Square and a former office block on Park Lane -- were sold to Middle Eastern buyers.

But even those are dwarfed by the record $133.2 million paid by Indian-born steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal for his home at Kensington Palace Gardens in April 2004.

Foreign buyers target London because of its position as the emerging global financial center and a strong tradition of ease of access and open communications.

"Over the past five or 10 years, London has gained a larger share of international financial activity," said Bailey. "And, unlike other European financial centers like Frankfurt, buyers are attracted by all the other things the city has to offer."

Bailey said Americans, other Europeans and Russians were already a strong presence in the London market, with Asian buyers taking an increasing slice -- the volume of Asian purchasers has grown 60 percent over the past five years.

However, he added that strict currency transfer rules are holding back investment from China and India. A significant increase in Indian buyers is expected in 2007 when changes to the rules governing the export of capital are introduced, he said.

The high prices demanded for prime residences have also been underpinned by the $14.3 billion in bonuses paid this year to around 330,000 workers at financial firms in the British capital.

Another reason for the continuing high prices is the relatively small number of residences available to buy in the center of London, many of which are only available as leasehold properties.

A leasehold property means buyers can only purchase the right to live in the building for a set number of years -- the number the lease has to run -- and at the end of the lease, ownership reverts to the freeholder. To live there, the landlord is also paid a ground rent, as well as a service charge to manage any communal areas inside and outside the building.

In most cases, leaseholds run for more than 100 years.

Couple who happened upon rape in Philadelphia are killed by attacker, police say

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- A couple found a man raping a young woman in their driveway and tried to flee with her but were shot to death by the attacker, police said.

The teenager was also shot and was expected to recover, police said. A suspect was arrested.

The couple came upon the attack when returning to their home in the Fern Rock neighborhood from a night out late Wednesday, police said. The 18-year-old woman broke free and began screaming about the assault, and she and the couple then fled while the attacker fired at them with a semiautomatic handgun, according to police.

The three tried to hide nearby, but the assailant found them and fired more shots as they lay on the ground, Chief Inspector Joseph Fox said.

"It sounds like it was all happening in a matter of seconds," Fox said.

The names of the couple were being withheld pending notification of family.

Kevin White, 24, of Philadelphia, was arrested a short time later and will be charged with murder, rape, aggravated assault and other offenses, Fox said. Police said they recovered a gun during the arrest.

The attack was one of six shootings -- two of them fatal -- overnight in Philadelphia.

Milwaukee zoo euthanizes Lucy the elephant, among oldest African elephants in captivity

MILWAUKEE (AP) -- Lucy the elephant, believed to be the world's fourth-oldest African elephant in captivity, was euthanized Friday morning after staffers found her lying down in her stall, the Milwaukee County Zoo said.

The medical staff had recently decided that if the 46-year-old elephant were found lying down again, she would be euthanized, spokeswoman Jennifer Diliberti said.

In June, Lucy became ill and was unable to stand up in the African exhibit yard. A crane was brought in to lift the 9,000-pound animal to her feet; she struggled for a few days after that but improved.

Diliberti said Lucy was found lying down in late July but was able to get up on her own.

Brittany, Lucy's companion and the only other elephant at the zoo, was allowed in Lucy's stall after she was euthanized so she could grieve, Diliberti said.

She said the zoo hopes to get another elephant soon as a companion for Brittany, who is in her late 20s. Lucy spent 44 years at the zoo.

"It's just so sad but she had a good, long life here so that's good," Diliberti said.

Lawsuit filed over Comair crash accuses airline of negligence; Funerals begin for victims

LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) -- The family of a woman killed when Comair Flight 5191 took off on the wrong runway and crashed in flames sued the airline Friday, blaming it for the nation's deadliest airplane disaster in five years.

The lawsuit accuses Comair of negligence and says passenger Rebecca L. Adams suffered "conscious pain and suffering" when the plane went down Sunday morning and quickly burned with 49 people still inside.

The only survivor was the co-pilot, who remained hospitalized Friday but was upgraded from critical to serious condition.

The regional jet had left the gate before dawn with 50 people aboard. The pilots mistakenly turned onto the wrong runway, one too short for the twin-engine plane, and tried to take off. The plane crashed in a field just beyond Lexington's Blue Grass Airport.

The crash "could not have happened if those having control of the instrumentality had not been negligent," attorney Bobby Wombles of Lexington said in the lawsuit.

Adams' son, Joshua Isaac Adams, said the family was pursuing legal action "so that we can one day have the answers we need."

The action needed to be taken immediately to make the family a full part of the investigation, giving it power to subpoena witnesses who also are being questioned by federal investigators, said another of the family's lawyers, Robert Clifford of Chicago. Other families also have contacted his firm, he said at a Lexington news conference.

Nick Miller, a Comair spokesman, said he couldn't comment on pending litigation.

"Comair extends its heartfelt sympathy to everyone affected by the accident and our focus remains addressing the needs of family and loved ones in cooperating with the investigative process," Miller said.

Earlier this week, a Texas law firm ran a full-page ad in the Lexington Herald-Leader promising to get maximum damages for the families of victims who hired it.

Comair, a subsidiary of Delta Air Lines Inc., operates 850 flights to 108 cities daily. Both airlines filed for bankruptcy protection last year.

The Lexington airport board met in a private session Friday morning to discuss "proposed litigation" against it as well. Michael Gobb, the airport director, said at least one family of the victims had told the airport it intends sue.

Federal officials have been looking into how the plane ended up on the 3,500-foot-long runway, the shortest of two runways at the Lexington airport and meant only for small planes.

The taxiway to the 7,000-foot-long main runway had been altered by repaving one week before the crash.

In addition, only one air traffic controller was in the tower. The controller had had only two hours of sleep before starting work and had turned his back to do administrative work as the plane headed down the runway, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. The FAA has since added a second controller.

Nearly a week after the crash, the first funerals began for the victims.

Clark and Bobbie Sue Benton had boarded Flight 5191 for a trip to the Caribbean and vacation. They were buried Friday near Stanford in south-central Kentucky.

"We're asking difficult questions," the Rev. Wayne Galloway said at their funeral, attended by more than 300 people at Calvary Hill Baptist Church. "Why? Why do bad things happen to good people."

Another memorial service was planned Friday in Lexington for Larry Turner, who oversaw the University of Kentucky's extension service.

Associated Press writers Samira Jafari in Pikeville; Roger Alford in Stanford; and Brett Barrouquere in Louisville contributed to this report.

Bird flu, but not deadly version, suspected in Maryland wild ducks

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Testing found suspected bird flu in nine Maryland ducks, but federal officials said Friday it is not the deadly Asian version that they fear could reach North America.

Initial genetic testing suggested the nine wild mallards carried the mostly harmless, low-pathogenic strain of the H5N1 virus, officials from the Agriculture and Interior departments said. The results of confirmatory tests should be available in two weeks, they said.

University researchers collected fecal samples from the birds on Aug. 2 in Queen Anne's County, Md., for testing. USDA officials said the ducks appeared to be healthy, which would further suggest they were not carrying the high-pathogenic strain of the H5N1 influenza virus.

That deadly Asian flu strain has ravaged poultry stocks and killed at least 141 people worldwide.

The low-grade strain has been found many times in North American wild birds and poses no threat to people, federal officials said. Two Michigan mute swans tested positive for that strain last month.

The agriculture department's National Veterinary Services Laboratories in Ames, Iowa, is performing the confirmatory tests on the duck samples.

On the Net:

Agriculture Department: http://www.usda.gov

North Carolina teen mails taped confession of father's killing to newspaper

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- A man obsessed with the 1999 Columbine school attack made a videotape showing his father's bloody corpse and describing plans to attack his former high school, then mailed it to a newspaper which posted excerpts on its Web site.

The release of the video was the latest twist in the case, which began when Alvaro Castillo was arrested Wednesday in front of Orange High School in Hillsborough after multiple shots were fired from the parking lot.

Two students suffered minor injuries in the attack.

Investigators say Castillo confessed to his father's slaying after he was taken into custody.

"Don't judge me for what I did," Castillo said in the homemade video mailed to The Chapel Hill News, a twice-weekly newspaper that shares a staff with The News & Observer of Raleigh. "Based on what I did, you might think I'm a monster, a sick freak. ... But I tried to do good things. I tried. I did it. I killed my father. I sacrificed him. He's with the Lord now. I shot him four times."

On the video and in an accompanying letter, which the paper received Thursday via overnight delivery, Castillo stated that he wanted the public to see his video, unlike the so-called "basement tapes" made by Columbine killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. The tapes, in which Harris and Klebold discuss their planned attack, have never been made public.

"I sent you the tape because I do not want them locked away just (like) the Basement Tapes," the letter says. "The police would not release them. This will not happen again. I want the world to see myself."

Castillo, 19, is being held without bond at Central Prison in Raleigh on a charge of first-degree murder. He also faces multiple charges stemming from the school attack.

On his way into a courtroom for an initial appearance Thursday, Castillo told reporters he was obsessed with Columbine. The Colorado school's principal has said he received an e-mail from Castillo sent shortly before Wednesday's attack.

Witnesses to the school attack have said the shooter wore a trench coat similar to those worn by the Columbine killers; investigators say they found a shotgun, rifle and pipe bombs in the van Castillo drove to the school.

However, Castillo appears to have aimed mainly at car tires and a window, according to authorities. He did not resist arrest by a sheriff's deputy working at the school and a driver's education teacher who is a former state trooper.

The News & Observer published the text of the letter and a description of the videotape in Friday editions and also posted four excerpts from the videotape late Thursday on its Web site, www.newsobserver.com. The newspaper released one of those clips to The Associated Press for it to share with its members.

The paper's executive editor, Melanie Sill, said Friday that the material was a rare opportunity to hear firsthand from an accused killer. But Sill said the paper decided not to comply with Castillo's request to make the entire tape public. That would have given in to his wish "to join the high school violence pantheon," Sill said in a blog entry.

Among the graphic portions that the paper chose not to share were shots of the sheet-covered corpse of Castillo's father, Rafael Huezo Castillo.

"I'm sorry for the pain I'm going to cause, but I'm not right in the head," the teen said on the tape. "I just want to die. I might get jailed. I might get tortured. I don't know what's going to happen."

Escaped convict on run since April suspected in ambush shooting of 2 New York state troopers

FREDONIA, N.Y. (AP) -- Two state troopers staking out the home of an escaped convict's ex-girlfriend were shot in an ambush, and authorities Friday were searching the surrounding area for the fugitive.

Neither trooper saw the suspect when they were shot Thursday evening, and neither returned fire, but one was able to radio for help, State Police Superintendent Wayne Bennett said. Both officers were hospitalized in critical condition.

"It's clear to me the troopers were ambushed," Bennett said.

Police believe the gunman was Ralph "Bucky" Phillips, who escaped from jail in April and may be traveling between Pennsylvania and western New York, Bennett said. Since his escape, he has been suspected in the wounding of another state trooper, numerous burglaries and the theft of firearms from a gun shop.

Friday morning, police checked vehicles on roads approaching the New York State Thruway. Bennett ordered 75 additional troopers to help with the manhunt and urged Phillips to surrender.

"We are not looking for a shootout. That's not the way we want this to end," Bennett said. But he also warned Phillips that "We have long memories. We don't forget. We are patient. ... Don't stop to look over your shoulder because we'll be there."

Officers Joseph Longobardo, 32, and Donald Baker Jr., 38, each shot once with a high-powered rifle in woods behind the isolated hilltop home of Phillips' ex-girlfriend, Kasey Crowe, in the rural western New York town of Pomfret.

One trooper was hit in the back with a bullet that penetrated his bullet-resistant vest, Bennett said. The other was shot in the thigh and suffered massive blood loss from a severed artery. They remained in critical condition after each underwent a second round of surgery Friday, Bennett said.

Despite a reward increased to $225,000, friends and family members have not turned Phillips in, police said.

Crowe was charged last week with hindering prosecution for allegedly helping Phillips, and prosecutors said she has continued to help him. A Chautauqua County judge jailed her Friday afternoon and increased her bail to $100,000 from $10,000.

A state police investigator testified at the bail hearing that a search of Crowe's house after the shootings turned up night-vision binoculars and a two-way radio along with pizza crusts and beer cans that will be tested for Phillips' DNA.

Phillips, 44, escaped April 2 from the Erie County jail, where he was sent for violating parole on a burglary conviction, police said. He also is wanted in the June 10 shooting of Trooper Sean Brown, who survived after being shot in the abdomen as he approached a stolen car near Elmira.

Since his escape, Phillips has evaded police, helped himself to food, clothes and guns from unattended homes and hunting cabins in western New York, and is believed to have stolen about 15 cars, police said.

Authorities said they were aware based on witness interviews that Phillips made threats against police after the Aug. 21 arrests of Crowe, their daughter and the daughter's boyfriend.

Phoenix police say serial shooting suspects acted like witnesses after 1 attack

PHOENIX (AP) -- The two men charged in a series of random shootings had flagged down police officers arriving at the site of one of the attacks, authorities said Friday.

Sam Dieteman and Dale Hausner were at the scene of the May 30 shooting of James Hodge in west Phoenix and directed officers to the wounded man, police Sgt. Andy Hill said.

The men told officers they had been out looking for a missing cat and heard Hodge screaming, Hill said. Officers considered the men witnesses at the time, but also entered their names into a database assembled by a task force investigating the crimes.

Hausner told police he heard tires squealing in the parking lot, where he was able to flag down police, but Hodge, who survived the gunshot wound to his back, said he never heard a vehicle, according to the police report.

Police did not realize the two men had been interviewed as witnesses until after their arrest in early August, Hill said.

Dieteman and Hausner are charged with his shooting. All together, both face two counts of murder and 14 counts of attempted murder connected to a yearlong shooting spree across the metropolitan area.

Dieteman, 30, and Hausner, 33, were arrested by a task force investigating 37 shootings dating back to May 2005. Seven people were killed and 17 wounded, and several animals also were shot.

Police first became aware of Dieteman's possible involvement in the shootings June 20 after a tip. But when a detective entered Dieteman's name in a database, nothing came up because Dieteman's name had been spelled wrong.

Hill did not know whether Dieteman purposely misspelled the name or whether investigators made an error. Although Hausner's name was spelled correctly, police weren't aware of him until late July, just before they arrested the pair.

The task force also is searching for another serial predator, dubbed the "Baseline Killer," who has been forensically linked to eight killings and several robberies.

Pope makes pilgrimage to view 'Holy Face' on veil of Veronica

MANOPPELLO, Italy -- Pope Benedict XVI on Friday prayed at a sanctuary in this village in central Italy that holds a veil some Christians believe was used to wipe blood and sweat from Jesus' face on his way to his crucifixion and bears his image on the cloth.

It was the first time that a pontiff has made a pilgrimage to the little-known, 17th-century sanctuary of Manoppello. Benedict arrived by helicopter and was greeted by a few thousand pilgrims waving flags with the Vatican's white and yellow colors, and carrying banners that read, "Hurrah for the pope," and "Benedict, Benedict."

Those welcoming the pontiff included Bishop Bruno Forte, a friend and theologian. Forte is bishop in the nearby town of Chieti.

The pontiff entered the sanctuary and prayed before the altar for about five minutes, then went behind it and prayed before the relic, which is known as the "Holy Face" and the "Veil of Veronica."

The veil is not as famous as the Holy Shroud of Turin, held to be Christ's burial cloth, but some experts say the images on the two cloths can be perfectly superimposed and that they were formed at the same time. Skeptics say it appears to have been painted.

According to Christian tradition, Veronica was one of the holy women who accompanied Jesus to Calvary. She offered him a veil or cloth to wipe his face, and the image of Christ's face was imprinted on it.

Although the story is not in the Bible, it became one of the most popular in Christian lore.

The name "Veronica" also is a colloquial version of the Latin word "vera," meaning true, and Greek word Icon meaning "image." The "Veil of Veronica" was therefore largely regarded in medieval times as "the true image" of Jesus, preceding the Shroud of Turin.

Benedict did not address the veil's origins, as is usual with the Vatican, which is generally very cautious. But his visit has drawn interest to the image some believe to show the real face of Christ.

"This is the meaning of my visit. So that together we can try to better know the face of our Lord, so that from it we can find strength in love and peace that can show us the path," Benedict said.

The image, measures 6.7 by 9.4 inches, is that of a man with long hair, a sparse beard and a half-open mouth. The face is oval and asymmetric, the color is a light brown.

The veil, kept under glass, is believed to have been in Manoppello since 1506, and the pope's visit was the highlight of yearlong celebrations marking the 500th anniversary of the relic's arrival in this mountainous town about 125 miles east of Rome.

The veil was donated to the sanctuary in 1638, said the rector, the Rev. Carmine Cucinelli. The sanctuary is visited every year by some 250,000 pilgrims, he said. But officials hope that the pope's visit will increase that number.

To many in Manoppello, the visit by Benedict reinforced their beliefs about the veil.

"We've been worshipping the Holy Face for five centuries," said resident Gina Virgilio, a retiree. "The pope's visit has confirmed the veil is authentic."

"This has been a special day. It's been a wonderful, touching, emotional encounter," she said.

Benedict has been spending time at his summer retreat in Castel Gandolfo, a hill town south of Rome. Later Friday, he starts a two-day meeting with his former students on the issue of creationism and evolution.

He is to travel to his native Germany later this month.