Two dead after strong storms rip path from southern Louisiana to Georgia

By: Associated Press | Friday, January 5, 2007 7:27 PM PST ∞

NEW IBERIA, La. -- Powerful storms killed at least two people, flooded streets and ripped apart homes as they swept from Louisiana through South Carolina on Friday.

Much of the worst damage was in Louisiana's Iberia Parish, where what appeared to be a tornado hit the New Iberia area just before 4 p.m. Thursday.

"We were just sitting and watching a movie, and then all of a sudden the wind started blowing and it got really bad," said Joyce Firmin of Iberia Parish. "It just sounded like a bunch of trucks or an airplane or something was coming toward the house."

Firmin's daughter, 14-year-old Jaci, said she could hear branches snapping and power lines popping during the storm. "My ears were popping a lot," she said. "When we came out, everything was down."

The storm killed a woman and 6-year-old girl in their home, the Iberia Parish Coroner's Office said, and at least 15 other people were injured.

Nine more people were hurt when the storm reached east-central Mississippi's Kemper County late Thursday and early Friday, according to the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.

"There's more damage out here than what we initially thought," Ben Dudley, Kemper County's emergency management director, said after trips to communities of Blackwater and Damascus on Friday. "We're looking at eight to 10 homes destroyed and several with major damage."

Carnell Newton said most of those injured in Blackwater were his relatives -- including a woman who suffered a head injury and was reported in critical condition Friday.

"They were in a doublewide (mobile home) and it just exploded," Newton said.

Laquita Clark, 21, said the storm knocked her two-bedroom home off its foundation and turned it into a "disaster area." She had been next door at the time.

Five more homes and businesses were damaged in southern Mississippi's Stone County.

In northwest South Carolina, 15 people were injured when a suspected tornado piled cars on top of each other Friday afternoon outside an elementary school, officials said.

In Alabama, several vacant mobile homes parked outside a mobile home plant in Hamilton were damaged and power lines were down, officials said. Trees were down across stretches of Georgia.

From a Louisiana hospital, Steven Bruno described how he was flipped over twice while furniture and glass flew around his mobile home on Thursday. His girlfriend, who is six months pregnant, was hospitalized for fetal monitoring, and the hospital gown he was wearing is now the only thing he owns, he said.

Whether his home and others in southern Louisiana were hit by a tornado won't be determined until storm surveys are conducted.

In New Orleans, city workers had been dispatched early to clean drains and prepare for possible flooding ahead of the heavy rain.

Southern Louisiana has been pounded by major storms that bumped its December rainfall total to more than 10 inches, nearly twice the normal average, and forecasters on Friday warned that more rain was coming.

"More showers and thunderstorms are on the way Saturday afternoon and evening as we get another cold front coming through. We're in a progressive pattern -- almost like clockwork, every three days we'll get a front through," said weather service forecaster Kent Kuyper.

Texas boy hangs himself while apparently mimicking Saddam's execution, family and police say

HOUSTON (AP) -- A 10-year-old boy was apparently mimicking Saddam Hussein's execution when he hanged himself from a bunk bed, police and family members said. - Sergio Pelico was found dead Sunday in his apartment bedroom after watching a news report on the execution of the former Iraqi leader, said Webster Police Lt. Tom Claunch.

"Our gut reaction is that he was experimenting," Claunch said after officials spoke with family members. An autopsy of the fifth-grader's body was pending.

Julio Gustavo, Sergio's uncle, described the boy as happy and curious. He said Sergio had watched TV news with another uncle on Saturday and asked the uncle about Saddam's death.

"His uncle told him it was because Saddam was real bad," Gustavo said. "He (Sergio) said, 'OK.' And that was it."

"I don't think he thought it was real," Gustavo said. "They showed them putting the noose around his neck and everything. Why show that on TV?"

Sergio's mother, Sara Pelico DeLeon, was at work Sunday and her children were being watched by a relative when one of them found Sergio's body, Gustavo said.

Police said the boy had tied a slipknot around his neck while on a bunk bed. Sergio had been upset about not getting a Christmas gift from his father, police said, but they don't believe he intentionally killed himself. Gustavo said the boy's father lives in New Jersey.

Family members held a memorial for the boy Wednesday in the apartment complex activity center. Gustavo said the family is trying to put together enough money to send Sergio's body to Guatemala for burial.

'Wonder' bra protects woman from falling bullet on New Year's Eve

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) -- A woman watching New Year's Eve fireworks from a picnic table found out that her bra can do more than lift and support: It also slowed a falling bullet.

The .45-caliber bullet struck Debbie Bingham, 46, after someone fired a gun into the air about 20 minutes before midnight. She still needed stitches, but the wound might have been much worse except for the bra strap, police spokesman George Kajtsa said.

Bingham, who was in town from Atlanta, said she is thankful for the undergarment, which she said was "very cheap."

"I'd love to have a couple more of those bras," she said.

Bingham said she was listening to music and enjoying the fireworks with her daughter and son when she felt a sharp pain in her shoulder.

Then Solanda Bingham, 30, noticed blood seeping through her mother's white shirt, and they found the bullet lodged halfway into the gold-colored bra. The other half was barely breaking the skin, Bingham told WTSP-TV.

Kajtsa described the wound as a "big scratch with bruising."

St. Petersburg police were searching for the shooter to determine if the shooting was intentional, Kajtsa said.

Girls' high school basketball team poster shot down for showing toy guns

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) -- A poster promoting a girls' high school basketball team has been shot down because it shows the players holding toy guns.

The "Mission: Impossible" themed posters were yanked this week before they hit businesses.

Al Graziano, principal at Des Moines Lincoln High School, said the image of the 10 varsity players holding guns was unacceptable.

"They posed as 'Mission: Impossible' agents and if it stopped there, it would have been OK, but each held a toy revolver in their hands and that's what's objectionable," he said.

"Its inappropriate in today's climate of school violence and shootings," he said. "It's also inappropriate with Des Moines discipline policy, which prohibits displays or possession of weapons, toy or otherwise."

School officials will contact sponsors and reimburse them if necessary. The school also will look at redoing the poster or possibly editing it to replace the guns with basketballs.

Two New York City men save toddler from 4-story fall off of fire escape

NEW YORK (AP) -- Two passers-by rescued a toddler who fell four stories, scrambling to catch him as he tumbled from a fire escape, police said.

Julio Gonzalez, 43, and Pedro Nevarez, 40, saw 3-year-old Timothy Addo dangling from a Bronx building on Thursday, police said. The boy had crawled out of a window when his baby sitter briefly took her eyes off of him, police said.

"He was hanging on for dear life," Gonzalez said.

Hearing people in the building scream for help as the boy's grip weakened, the men rushed over to position themselves under the fire escape to catch him.

"No one came," Nevarez said. "We knew it was up to us."

The boy tumbled and hit Nevarez in the chest so hard he knocked him off balance, but he bounced into Gonzalez' arms.

Timothy was treated at the hospital for a cut on his forehead.

"He's fine. He's happy. He's smiling," said his mother, 26-year-old Katrina Cosme, who was working at the time of the accident.

Police talked to the baby sitter, and an investigation was continuing Friday, Detective John Sweeney said.

The crucial catch came two days after a bystander threw himself onto a Manhattan subway track to save a man who had fallen, and a day after three police officers delivered a baby on a Brooklyn subway platform.

"This is the week of heroes in New York," Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said.

Maine changes mind: Santa's Butt, women's breasts OK on beer labels after all

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) -- It's a bit late for the holidays, but the state's beer sellers are now free to let Santa's Butt Winter Porter sit on their shelves.

The Maine Bureau of Liquor Enforcement had blocked a beer importer from selling the brew, along with two beers with labels depicting bare-breasted women. Those decisions were reversed after the state attorney general's office determined that the company probably would win the lawsuit the American Civil Liberties Union filed on its behalf last month.

Chris Taub, an assistant state attorney general, said Friday a court probably would find the beer labels in question to be protected under the First Amendment.

State officials had barred the English-made Santa's Butt out of concern its label might appeal to children. It depicts a rear view of a beer-drinking Santa sitting on a "butt," a large barrel brewers once used to store beer.

The other previously banned beers feature paintings of bare-breasted women on their labels. One of the paintings hangs in the Louvre -- Eugene Delacroix's "Liberty Leading the People" -- and the other was commissioned by the importer, Belchertown, Mass.-based Shelton Brothers.

The company was notified of the reversal in a letter dated Dec. 22, but owner Dan Shelton was out of the country and didn't learn of it until this week.

Shelton, whose company has challenged similar bans in other states, said Thursday he has no plans to drop his lawsuit because state law still allows officials to deny applications for beer labels that contain "undignified or improper" illustrations. About a dozen beer and wine labels, out of 10,000 to 12,000 reviewed, are rejected each year on such grounds.

"You can't have a law based on propriety and dignity. It's too vague," Shelton said.

Taub said his office is reviewing the rule about undignified or improper illustrations but declined to comment further.

Woman accused of setting deadly Reno hotel fire pleads not guilty to 12 murder counts

RENO, Nev. (AP) -- A convicted murderer accused of killing 12 people and injuring dozens in a hotel fire pleaded not guilty Friday to arson and multiple counts of first-degree murder.

Valerie Moore entered the pleas three weeks before prosecutors are scheduled to tell the court whether they will seek the death penalty.

Authorities are reviewing the mental competency of Moore, a casino cook accused of setting fire to a mattress Halloween night after arguing with another resident at the 84-year-old, $150-a-week Mizpah Hotel near downtown Reno.

All 12 victims died of asphyxiation from smoke and soot, investigators said, and another 31 people were injured.

Moore, 47, was paroled in 2005 after serving 17 years in prison for second-degree murder. Prosecutors said she killed a woman who had spurned Moore's sexual advances and argued with her over money.

Outside the courtroom Friday, defense attorney Jennifer Lunt said Moore has a history of mental illness, and that the defense was considering seeking a mental evaluation.

Moore, arrested a day after the fire, is being held without bail on 12 counts of first-degree murder and one count of first-degree arson. Her trial is set to begin Jan. 21, 2008.

Centerfold accused of running brothel in gated suburban Atlanta neighborhood

DULUTH, Ga. (AP) -- For years, Lisa Ann Taylor's neighbors suspected something was going on behind the doors of her white-columned, million-dollar mansion in one of suburban Atlanta's most exclusive neighborhoods.

Scantily clad women were seen posing for photos in the driveway. Cars and trucks came and went at all hours. And there were loud parties.

Despite repeated calls to police about the suspicious goings-on, there was no evidence of a crime. That is, until six weeks ago, when authorities were tipped off to a Web site showing Taylor -- a former Penthouse Pet of the Month -- sprawled topless on an ottoman and brazenly advertising services ranging from $300 one-hour photo shoots to "dream dates" that included a one-hour "show."

Police raided the red-brick mansion Wednesday and found what they described as a high-class brothel and the headquarters of a call-girl ring whose customers received favors limited only by their imaginations and their ability to pay.

Among the services offered was sex with the centerfold and other women for an entire weekend for $10,000, District Attorney Danny Porter said.

"Whatever was asked for had a price," Porter said.

Taylor, 42, and her alleged business partner and fellow call girl, 30-year-old Nicole A. Probert, were arrested on charges of prostitution, racketeering and conspiracy to possess cocaine. They were released from jail Thursday on $27,000 bail each.

The brothel's customers included doctors, lawyers and businessmen, and they, too, could face charges, the district attorney said, in a warning that could make men jittery across Atlanta and beyond. Taylor and her friends are accused of using their Web site to offer their services during visits to Boston, New York, Chicago and suburban Milwaukee.

Probert's attorney David Fuller denied she was involved in prostitution. He said she is a successful real estate developer and a single mother who recently came into an inheritance and did not need money.

"This is just not her. This is a nightmare for her. She can't believe this is happening," Fuller said.

It was not immediately known if Taylor had an attorney.

The mansion is near the ninth hole at Sugarloaf Country Club, home of the PGA's BellSouth Classic each May. It is in a gated neighborhood, about 20 miles from Atlanta, whose current or former residents include rapper Bow Wow, Atlanta Falcons wide receiver Brian Finneran and Washington Redskins tight end Brian Kozlowski.

Porter could not say for sure how long the illegal activity was going on, but neighbors have been complaining for at least three years.

Among other things, neighbors thought it was odd that all the basement windows were blacked out. Also, they saw lots of modest-looking cars and trucks that appeared out of place in the well-to-do neighborhood. In addition, scantily clad women were seen in the windows of Probert's house in nearby Lawrenceville.

Taylor -- a 1985 Penthouse centerfold who used the name Melissa Wolf professionally -- also held lavish Halloween parties, which were advertised in fliers passed out through the neighborhood and included fireworks, costumed characters, professional decorations and a haunted house for children. But some parents declared the house off-limits for trick-or-treating.

"The neighbors told us they wouldn't let their kids go to the house because they were afraid of who might answer the door," the district attorney said.

The prosecutor's office said it was tipped off to the Web site by The Gwinnett Daily Post, after an editor got an anonymous call from someone who pointed out Web sites where Taylor's alleged customers could rate her services.

Carol Northcutt, 49, who lives a block away, said many neighbors knew Taylor was in the adult entertainment industry. Northcutt said she once saw a photo shoot in Taylor's driveway with scantily clad women posing in a convertible.

"I knew she was in adult films and that there were cars in and out," she said. But prostitution? "Did I think for a minute it was that? No."

-- Associated Press Writer Doug Gross in Atlanta contributed to this report.

Third snowstorm in 3 weeks takes aim at hard-hit eastern Colorado and Plains as costs rise

DENVER (AP) -- The third snowstorm in as many weeks swept into Colorado on Friday, further hampering efforts to restore power to rural homes and rescue thousands of cattle stranded by last week's blizzard.

Several school districts canceled classes Friday because of blowing snow in the region, where the last storm had whipped up 10-foot drifts and shut down highways.

In Kansas and Nebraska, about 10,000 homes were still without power after more than a week, and the new storm was headed their way after dumping nearly a foot of snow in the foothills west of Denver. In hard-hit southeastern Colorado, no more than 1 inch of new snow was expected, but the high wind was making road clearing difficult.

Agriculture officials, meanwhile, were still trying to figure out how deal with the carcasses of thousands of livestock that were killed by the blizzard or starved, said Jery Bailey, emergency management director in Haskell County, Kan.

"Our foremost thing is to try to save human lives, but now we have the economic thing too with feedlots and animals," Bailey said. "This has been a nightmare."

An estimated 3,500 cattle are believed to have died on rangeland in six southeastern Colorado counties alone, said Leonard Pruett, the region's agriculture extension agent for Colorado State University.

Owners of feedlots, where range cattle are taken before slaughter, were still calculating their losses.

Luke Lind, a vice president of Five Rivers Cattle Feeding, which has 10 feedlots in Colorado, Kansas, Texas and Oklahoma, said the mortality rate could be "significant," but he declined to give specific numbers. Five Rivers had 60,000 cattle in pens in the Lamar, Colo., area alone, he said.

In a massive effort to save stranded rangeland cattle, the Colorado National Guard conducted a three-day airlift that dropped about 3,000 hay bales to herds spotted on the rangeland.

While that likely have saved livestock, the survivors still face the threat of fatal lung infections related to the stress of the storm and dehydration, Pruitt said.

The cold, windy conditions Friday could hurt early-season calves, as well, he said.

"The mother cows out there are in good shape," Pruitt said. "We had plenty of grass in the summer and fall, so they went into the storm in good condition and that makes all the difference in the world. But they're not going to stay in good condition without getting some feed because they're going downhill pretty rapidly."

In Washington, Sen. Wayne Allard and Rep. Marilyn Musgrave on Friday introduced bills to help speed financial aid to ranchers who have lost livestock in Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, New Mexico and Oklahoma.

Among the many effects of the blizzards, the price of hay has jumped from $150 a ton to $210 a ton, and much grazing land is still inaccessible, Pruett said. Ranchers will depend more on hay and other supplemental feed to keep livestock alive because the grass they normally eat is buried in snow, he said.

In a rare piece of good news, the snow was expected to help the winter wheat crop.

Kansas Secretary of Agriculture Adrian Polonsky said the moisture will be "very beneficial to getting the crop off to a good start."

-- Associated Press writers Sandy Shore, Dan Elliott, Colleen Slevin and Eric Daigh in Denver, Josh Funk and Oskar Garcia in Omaha, Neb., and Roxana Hegeman in Sublette, Kan., contributed to this report.

Snowman sensation has neighborhood foes

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) -- Snowzilla may be a smash hit with shutterbugs, but the towering snowman has detractors closer to its Anchorage home. - Some neighbors of the two-story high snowman say they're fed up with the hordes of gawkers clogging up Columbine Street.

"When you get 20 people out there in their cars, now the whole street comes to a stop and nobody can get through," said Anthony Bahler, who can see Snowzilla from his front window. "They just stand out there, in the middle of road, talking about a snowman."

Bahler's neighbor, Billy Powers, supervised construction of the original Snowzilla last year. Through the Internet, it became a media sensation, drawing crowds of visitors and TV crews from Japan and Russia before it melted in the spring.

This year, with the help from neighbors, Powers resurrected the snowman, with its giant hat made from tomato cages, corncob pipe and beer-bottle eyes. At 22 feet, Snowzilla is even more supersized, six feet taller than its predecessor.

Once again, traffic is streaming through the neighborhood.

"Everybody likes it," Powers said. "That's the reason I do it, really, I like the smiling faces."

But the crowds, including rowdy late-nighters fresh from the bars, have started grating on Bahler and other neighbors.

Mike Schmitz, whose family lives next door to Bahler, doesn't mind Snowzilla in theory, but can't stand the traffic.

"I don't dare let my kids go out front," he said. "I don't want them to get hit by a car."

He would like it better if Snowzilla were somewhere else.

"If it's such a public thing, you'd think the community could get together and find a place to do it," he said.

Even some of Snowzilla's fans understand the frustration.

Karla Beller, who lives in the Anchorage suburb of Chugiak, idled her minivan with her 3-year-old twins inside. She snapped a few photos with her cell phone.

"I think it's great," she said. "But traffic-wise, I probably wouldn't want it on my block."

Police linking Las Vegas businessman to four disappearance cases

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- Police say a businessman whose property they dug up southwest of the Las Vegas Strip is the focus of at least four missing persons cases dating back almost three decades. - David Lee Morgan, 71, appeared Friday in a Las Vegas court on a felony warrant charging him with murder with a deadly weapon. A judge set a Jan. 10 bail hearing and a Jan. 18 evidentiary hearing, and Morgan was returned to the Clark County jail.

Morgan had been identified previously as the focus of three missing persons cases, including the slaying of a man in 1979, and the disappearances of his wife in 1980 and his longtime live-in girlfriend in 2000.

On Thursday, Las Vegas police Lt. Brad Simpson, head of the department's missing persons unit, said Simpson was the focus a fourth investigation, but declined to provide details.

Police finished digging at Morgan's property Thursday without finding evidence in the 1979 slaying of Gabriel Vincent, whose body has never been found.

Morgan's middle name and age were corrected at Clark County jail in Las Vegas, where he was transferred Wednesday following his arrest Tuesday at a motel in Kingman, Ariz. Police said they found a witness recently who said he he gave a gun to Morgan, saw Morgan shoot a man he identified as Vincent, and helped dispose of the body.

Witnesses told police that Vincent, who rented a storage unit from Morgan, had been having an affair with Morgan's wife, Marie Morgan. She vanished about three months after Vincent.

Morgan has not been charged in Marie Morgan's disappearance or that of Diana Leone, 36, who vanished in 2000. She was Morgan's girlfriend of 14 years and mother of their two children.

But police issued a statement Wednesday saying they reopened cases related to David Morgan and the disappearances of Marie Morgan and Leone. The statement characterized the excavation of Morgan's property as a search for Vincent's body or evidence related to his death.

Vincent, an ex-convict with a record of robbery, auto theft, weapon possession and burglary, was 55 or 56 when he disappeared. Police say he never picked up his last paycheck from Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center, where he had been working as an orderly.

Marilyn Manson sued for divorce after 13-month marriage

LOS ANGELES - Shock rocker Marilyn Manson's marriage is on the rocks. - Citing irreconcilable differences, his burlesque dancing wife, Dita Von Teese, a.k.a. Heather R. Sweet, filed for divorce on Friday in Los Angeles Superior Court.

The couple married Nov. 28, 2005.

Manson, whose real name is Brian H. Warner, may not be aware of the divorce, according to the celebrity Web site TMZ.com, because a friend of the couple said Von Teese has been unable to reach her husband by phone.

Today is Manson's 38th birthday. He and Von Teese have no children.

-- North County Times wire services

Duo traveling by snowkite to promote wind energy

BILLINGS, MONT. (LEE) -- Barbed wire, power lines and a lack of snow have caused problems for a North Dakota duo snowkiting north to south across the state. - Sam Salwei and Jason Magness, both of Grand Forks, N.D., began their "To Cross the Moon" trip Monday as a way to draw attention to the state's potential as a supplier of wind-generated power and to educate people along the way about the sport of snowkiting.

"We hope to come out of this trip with more awareness for wind energy and snowkiting, as well as instilling a sense of pride in North Dakotans, as they live in a state with a huge amount of potential," Salwei wrote to The Gazette in an e-mail Friday.

In snowkiting, skiers or snowboarders use a harness attached to a large kite that propels them as they ride. The kites can, in optimal conditions, pull the riders along at 30 mph.

But that's in an ideal situation. With the hazards and lack of snow faced by the duo, by Friday they and their support crew had only covered 76 miles from their starting point at Crosby, N.D., to Williston, N.D.

"They had to hike a lot (Thursday) because the wind was horrible," said Jason Schaefer, the expedition's education and environmental coordinator. "(Wednesday), however, they were really cruising, moving at speeds over 20 mph."

From Williston, Salwei and Magness will hop on the Missouri River to ride the frozen waterway to the South Dakota border. The original plan called for making the 370 mile journey in about two weeks. That timeframe might be altered if problems persist along the rest of the route.

"The lack of snow has certainly increased the difficulty of the trip," Salwei said. "Not only are we having to choose our route based on, not only wind direction and destination, but also by snow cover. Another problem is that with the warmer weather it is creating wetter snow, which is heavier and hard to keep your momentum on."

The snowkiters have been riding in the borrow pit next to the highway and across farm fields that aren't marked with no-trespassing signs.

Using a wind-powered sport to push the idea of creating more wind-generated energy has drawn national and international attention to the excursion.

"People are really intrigued and supportive," Salwei said. "They love what 2XtM stands for."

The group even earned the endorsement of North Dakota Sen. Byron Dorgan's office. He wrote, "The trek across North Dakota that Jason and Sam have put together is an example of the exciting recreational opportunities our state offers. But even more importantly, it's bringing attention to an important issue - the development of our wind-energy resource. North Dakota is the Saudi Arabia of wind, and we have the potential to build a significant wind industry that will bring good-paying jobs to our state, improve our environment, and help eliminate our nation's dependence on foreign sources of energy."

In an attempt to keep their budget to a minimum, the Cross the Moon expedition is camping out along the way. Lack of snow affects their campouts, as well. Their tents require snow for added stability and the minimal snow may force them to melt ice instead of snow for drinking water.

The expedition has been funded by donations and contributions of gear.

"As of now," Salwei said, "the expedition is looking like $4,000 out of pocket, $25,000 worth of gear and approximately 5,000 man hours."

The Cross the Moon crew consists of eight people traveling and helping out where needed and another eight spread out across the world helping from as far away as Poland, Salwei said.

Schaefer is in charge of giving presentations on the potential of wind energy in North Dakota. He said the aim of the presentations is to educate, empower and excite people, especially youngsters.

"I want to reach as many people as possible with our positive message about the potential of North Dakota's wind." Schaefer said.

-- Lee Enterprises

Hollywood sleuth Pellicano will be own lawyer in LA wiretap trial

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- A judge on Friday allowed Hollywood private investigator Anthony Pellicano to act as his own lawyer at his racketeering and wiretapping trial. - U.S. District Court Judge Dale Fischer approved Pellicano's motion seeking self-representation.

A call to his attorney, Steven Gruel of San Francisco, was not immediately returned on Friday.

Reached late Thursday, however, Gruel said Pellicano had been pleased with his services but had failed to pay him.

Pellicano has maintained he is broke.

"He realizes this is an ongoing complex case and he doesn't want his friend to be hurt financially representing him," Gruel said.

Pellicano, 62, has pleaded not guilty. In November, Fischer pushed back the trial to Aug. 22 because of a lengthy discovery process. Pellicano opposed the joint motion by prosecutors and five attorneys representing his co-defendants to delay the trial.

Pellicano has repeatedly asked for a speedy trial and told The Associated Press during a phone interview in October that prosecutors have had plenty of time to build their case against him.

"What are they waiting for?" Pellicano said. "Why should I sit around and wait for them?"

Prosecutors contend in a 112-count indictment that Pellicano illegally wiretapped the phones of Hollywood stars such as Sylvester Stallone and bribed police officers to run the names of more than 60 people, including comedians Garry Shandling and Kevin Nealon, through government databases.

The information gathered was used to get dirt for threats, blackmail and in some cases to secure a tactical advantage in litigation, prosecutors alleged in court documents.

Fourteen people have been charged in the case, with seven pleading guilty. One person has been acquitted but has since had new charges filed against her.

New Orleans police officers charged in bridge shootings after Katrina can return to work

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- All seven policemen charged in the deadly bridge shootings after Hurricane Katrina will be allowed to post bail, and the six still on the New Orleans Police force can return to limited duty, a judge said Friday.

The seven men pleaded not guilty in court Friday to murder or attempted murder charges.

Four of the officers face counts of first-degree murder that carry a possible death sentence. A grand jury indicted the seven last week in connection with the Sept. 4, 2005, shootings on the city's Danziger Bridge that killed two men and wounded four other people.

Bail on a first-degree murder charge is rare in Louisiana and activists who had gathered outside the courthouse prior to the hearing protested allowing it.

As one of the officers left the courthouse, surrounded by attorneys and police officers, a small group of activists shouted "murderer."

Five of the indicted men will be required to wear monitoring devices if they post bail and will be confined to home, work, attorney visits and court appearances, defense attorneys said.

One former officer, now a truck driver in Texas, can also return to work, Judge Raymond Bigelow said during the officers' first court appearance since their indictments last week.

Assistant Police Superintendent Steven Nicholas said no decision had been made about whether they would be returned to the duty. They were put on a 120-day unpaid suspension after the indictments, he said.

Tracie Washington, spokeswoman for the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, expressed disappointment that officers accused of murder would be allowed out and to return to work. She and other NAACP representatives hoped to meet with Police Superintendent Warren Riley to ask that the officers not be allowed to return to duty.

"There should be accountability on both sides. We want a fair trial, but we want the community to feel safe," she said.

Exactly what happened that day on the Danziger Bridge remains unclear. The hurricane had hit the city a few days earlier, flooding 80 percent of it, and there were widespread reports of lawlessness, looting and violence.

Police say that the indicted officers were responding to a report of other officers being attacked at the bridge and that one of the victims, 40-year-old Ronald Madison, was reaching for a gun.

Madison's brother, Lance, has said that his mental retarded brother wasn't armed and that the two were running from a group of teens who had opened fire when seven men jumped out of a rental truck and also shot at them without warning.

Sgts. Kenneth Bowen and Robert Gisevius Jr., officer Anthony Villavaso II and former officer Robert Faulcon Jr., were indicted on first-degree murder charges and attempted murder charges. Officers Robert Barrios and Mike Hunter Jr. were charged with attempted first-degree murder, and Officer Ignatius Hills was charged with attempted second-degree murder.

Hunter and Hills made bail earlier this week. A defense lawyer said they will not be required to wear monitoring devices.

-- Associated Press Writer Michael Kunzelman contributed to this report.

Natalee Holloway's stepfather seeks divorce from missing teen's mom

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) -- The stepfather of Natalee Holloway, the Alabama teen who disappeared in Aruba in 2005, has filed for divorce from Holloway's mother.

George "Jug" Twitty and Beth Twitty separated Dec. 15 and have "such a complete incompatibility of temperament that the parties can no longer live together," according to his Dec. 29 court filing in Jefferson County.

Jug Twitty declined to comment. A phone message left Friday for Beth Twitty was not immediately returned.

The Birmingham News reported the filing Friday.

The couple, whose 2000 union was a second marriage for both, attracted international attention after 18-year-old Holloway disappeared in Aruba in May 2005 during a trip with high school classmates. Police spent months searching for her, but the case did not lead to a criminal trial in Aruba.

Last month, Beth Twitty and her daughter's father, Dave Holloway, sued two former suspects in the case. The suit, filed in California, claimed that brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe intentionally caused fatal injuries to Holloway.

Penn professor named suspect in wife's murder won't teach this semester, school says

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- A University of Pennsylvania economics professor suspected in the beating death of his wife will not be teaching when classes start up again Monday, the school said.

Prosecutors have not charged Rafael Robb but said they have circumstantial evidence that "very strongly" indicates he may have had a role in the slaying.

Robb, 56, has denied any involvement in beating, and told police he found 46-year-old Ellen Robb's body in their home in an upscale Philadelphia suburb after he returned from work on Dec. 22.

She was beaten so severely that investigators initially believed she had been blasted with a shotgun from close range. Detectives think the scene was staged to look like a burglary.

Montgomery County District Attorney Bruce Castor has said Ellen Robb's divorce plans were a possible motive for the killing. She told several people that she had hired a divorce attorney and planned to move into her own town house on Jan. 1, Castor said.

Robb remains a full, tenured professor, but under a mutual agreement, another instructor will take over the graduate seminar he was scheduled to teach on game theory, university spokeswoman Lori Doyle said.

Scientists: Object that fell into New jersey home's bathroon is a meteorite

FREEHOLD TOWNSHIP, N.J. (AP) -- A mysterious rocklike object that crashed through the roof of a home and landed in the bathroom was a meteorite, experts said Friday.

For now, scientists are calling the dense metallic object "Freehold Township" after the place where it fell. It's about the size of a golf ball but weighs about 13 ounces, as much of a can of soup. Magnets held near it are attracted to it.

Rutgers University geologists Jeremy Delaney, Gail Ashley and Claire Condie and Peter Elliott, an independent metallurgist who studied the object, determined it was an iron meteorite because of its density, magnetic properties, markings and coloration.

It belongs to the family whose home was hit, but it is being kept for now in a secure location, according to Freehold Township police.

Police have not released the name of the homeowner nor identified the neighborhood where the home is located, but have said the object bounced off bathroom tiles and embedded in a wall.

3 men from South Carolina killed in small plane crash in fog near Columbia; no survivors

WEST COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- Searchers on Friday found three bodies in the wreckage of a small plane that had crashed while trying to land at Columbia's fog-bound main airport the night before, authorities said. There were no survivors.

The four-seat Cessna 182 was about a mile from Columbia Metropolitan Airport when it disappeared from radar around 11 p.m. Thursday, airport executive director Mike Flack said.

A helicopter with a spotlight and heat-sensing equipment located the wreckage shortly before dawn, Lexington County Sheriff's Maj. John Allard said.

The victims were identified as Len Lovette, 71, of Hopkins; and Bernard Stanek Jr., 57, and Nathan Derek Faulkenberry, 34, of Columbia, Lexington County Coroner Harry O. Harman said in a news release. Authorities believe Stanek was flying the plane.

The pilot had planned to land at Owens Field, a smaller airport near downtown Columbia, but diverted to the city's commercial airport about seven miles away because of fog, sheriff's Capt. Mike Gordon said.

He said witnesses in a neighborhood near the airport said they heard a sputtering engine, then heard what sounded like a plane crashing into trees and saw flames.

The plane was built in 1976 and registered to Four Seasons LLC of Wilmington, Del., according to the Federal Aviation Administration. It had taken off from the Newport News-Williamsburg International Airport in Virginia around 8:30 p.m. Thursday, according to flightaware.com, a flight-tracking Web site.

Man freed by DNA evidence gets $700,000 settlement; served 7 years on rape charge

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) -- A man who served seven years in prison for a rape he didn't commit has settled part of a lawsuit for $700,000.

William Thomas Gregory, 58, was convicted of rape and two counts of attempted rape in 1993 and sentenced to 70 years in prison, based in part on a hair comparison that linked him to hair found in a stocking worn by the attacker.

Gregory was freed in 2000 after a DNA test proved the hair was not his. He has accused Kentucky State Police forensic examiner Dawn Ross Katz of falsifying the results of the hair comparison, which she has denied in court filings.

The settlement, approved by a judge last week, covers only Katz's conduct; Gregory still has a lawsuit pending against the city of Louisville and various police officers. Settlement talks are set for the end of January, with a trial scheduled for July.

"It's a long time coming," Gregory said. "I thought it was good for this point. I'm expecting bigger things from the rest of the case, though."

Jeff Middendorf, an attorney for the Kentucky Justice and Public Safety Cabinet, said Katz's findings are being reviewed.

"Even though the analysis took place close to 15 years ago, we believe it is important to review the work because the ongoing integrity and accuracy of results from the state lab is our primary concern," Middendorf said.

DNA tests were not available at the time of the trial, but became available in the late 1990s. The New York-based Innocence Project helped Gregory successfully appeal to have the hairs tested.

Since being released from prison, Gregory has worked in retail and electronic sales.

Arrests made in high-dollar prostitution case in suburban Atlanta

DULUTH, Ga. (AP) -- Two suburban women -- including one who police identified as a former Penthouse Pet -- have been arrested for prostitution in a case in which "dates" could cost as much as $10,000, authorities said.

Lisa Ann Taylor, 42, was arrested Wednesday at her million-dollar home in the exclusive Sugarloaf Country Club area.

She was charged with violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. She also was charged with prostitution, keeping a place of prostitution and conspiracy to possess cocaine, District Attorney Danny Porter said.

Her alleged partner, Nicole A. Probert, 30, of Lawrenceville, was arrested on the same charges, Porter said. Both women are cooperating, but police said they had to force entry into Probert's home with a battering ram.

Both women are suspected of participating in prostitution in Gwinnett County and other states, Porter said.

"A 'date' can cost as much as $5,000 to $10,000," Porter said. "Eight-hundred to $1,000 for the prostitution act is the bottom-line price. They have a large number of customers. ... It's not street prostitution."

Taylor, who goes by the name Melissa Wolf on her Web site, boasts that she is "North America's Most Published Centerfold and one of Penthouse Magazine's Most Published Pets."

Duluth is about 20 miles northeast of Atlanta.

Prosecutors: NYC rapist posed as law officer to win victims' trust before attacks

NEW YORK (AP) -- A rapist lured victims by posing as a law-enforcement officer -- flashing an identification card, talking into a radio and saying he needed to take them for questioning, prosecutors said.

After taking the women to motels, Eric McCoy threatened to arrest or shoot them and forced them to have sex, Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said Thursday.

Authorities said McCoy, 37, used his real name during an attack, allowing them to trace him through past arrest records. He was arrested Wednesday on charges including rape and criminal impersonation in two attacks and was being held until arraignment, Brown said.

Brown said McCoy used the victims' trust of police "to disarm them of any natural suspicions of strangers."

According to Brown, McCoy approached women and girls on the street and told them he was an investigator, showed the ID card and talked into a two-way radio to imply that he was communicating with other authorities. He told them to come with him for questioning, saying they were in serious trouble, Brown said.

On Dec. 4, McCoy met up with a 27-year-old woman and planted what appeared to be marijuana in her bag, Brown said. On Tuesday he accosted a 17-year-old girl, searching her backpack and temporarily taking her ID and cell phone, the district attorney said.

Under the guise of questioning the victims, McCoy took them to motels, sometimes saying the inns were being used for surveillance, Brown said. Threatening to arrest or shoot them, he forced the women to have sex with him, the district attorney said.

Brown said McCoy also approached a 15-year-old girl with similar claims on Jan. 2, but another woman called police.

No telephone number for McCoy was listed at the address provided by prosecutors.

Delaware dad gets 9-month sentence for killing man who daughter says molested her

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) -- A man was sentenced to nine months in prison Friday for beating to death a 77-year-old man he believed had molested his 5-year-old daughter.

Robert Fontanez Jr. pleaded guilty last year to killing Bismark Vasquez. Police have said that although there was no physical evidence to support his daughter's allegations that Vasquez had fondled her, the account she gave police was consistent with what she had told her family.

In April, an infuriated Fontanez punched Vasquez so hard that Vasquez went through the back door of his home. Fontanez punched him several more times as he lay bleeding on the concrete outside, police said.

Fontanez, 27, of Elsmere, had been charged with second-degree murder but pleaded guilty to criminally negligent homicide.

Superior Judge Joseph Slights III sentenced Fontanez to far less than the maximum five years, telling him, "The circumstances surrounding this crime were taken into consideration by the state" and the court.

Former college student who got millions from fake hedge fund is released on bond in Conn.

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) -- A former college student who posed as a Turkish heir and persuaded sophisticated investors to pour millions into a nonexistent hedge fund was released on bond Friday.

Hakan Yalincak's release on $1.1 million bond until his Feb. 14 sentencing followed three unsuccessful bond requests. Yalincak, 22, said he asked again because his mother, who also pleaded guilty in the scheme, is being treated for what appears to be cancer.

"This has been a learning experience," said Yalincak, who pleaded guilty in June to bank and wire fraud and faces up to 50 years in prison.

The former New York University student admitted to using his student ID and expertly forged documents to pose as the heir to a billionaire Turkish family and trick investors into giving him millions of dollars for the fake fund.

Prosecutors say Yalincak charmed his way into the exclusive world of Greenwich high finance, shuttled counterfeit checks across the world and brokered deals with a Kuwaiti financier. Prosecutors said investors lost more than $7 million, an amount he contests.

His bond was ordered by U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton.

Yalincak's mother, Greenwich mortgage broker Ayferafet Yalincak, admitted helping him recruit investors and faces up to five years in prison.

Suburban NYC woman who went by 'RoccerMom' pleads guilty to DWI that killed teenager

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (AP) -- A woman who went by "RoccerMom" on MySpace.com and listed nightclubs among her interests pleaded guilty Friday to manslaughter in a drunken car crash that killed her 15-year-old daughter's friend after three went out clubbing.

Under a plea deal, Ann Marie Ciarcia is to be sentenced to no more than two to six years in prison.

Ciarcia, 47, tearfully admitted that her blood alcohol level was nearly twice the legal limit when she drove the wrong way on the Saw Mill Parkway and slammed into another car Sept. 18. The driver of that car was seriously injured and 16-year-old Emily Cornish, who was in the back seat of Ciarcia's car, died.

Ciarcia, her daughter Alexa, and Cornish had been returning home to Yorktown Heights after a night at the Continental Club in Manhattan.

In addition to second-degree manslaughter, Ciarcia pleaded guilty to vehicular assault and driving while intoxicated. Sentencing was set for March 23.

Florida prosecutors won't seek death penalty for teens accused of killing homeless man

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) -- Three teenagers charged with beating a homeless man to death with a baseball bat as he slept on a park bench won't face the death penalty if convicted, prosecutors said Friday.

William Ammons and Brian Hooks, both 19, would have been eligible for the ultimate penalty, but the third defendant was only 17 at the time, so prosecutors chose not to seek the death penalty against any of them.

"As a matter of proportion, it would have been improper for the death penalty to be sought," said Brian Cavanagh, the assistant state attorney prosecuting the case.

The teens could now face up to life in prison if found guilty of first-degree murder in the Jan. 12, 2005, killing of Norris Gaynor, 45.

Ammons, Hooks and Thomas Daugherty also are charged with attempted murder in two other beatings of homeless men in Fort Lauderdale. One was caught on a surveillance camera and was broadcast around the world, helping detectives crack the case.

All three teens have pleaded not guilty and are being held without bail. No trial date has been set.

Hooks' and Ammons' lawyers said the prosecutors' decision not to seek the death penalty was proper.

"It takes courage. They didn't just do something that would have been politically expedient," said attorney Sam Halpern, who represents Ammons. "He's been living under the shadow of a possible death sentence for about a year."

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2005 that people convicted of crimes committed when they were under 18 cannot face execution.

More than 80 at risk of meningitis after contact with N.H. student who later died

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) -- More than 80 people in three states may be at risk for meningitis after coming into contact with a University of New Hampshire student who died of the illness this week, health officials said.

The warning came amid another meningitis scare that shut down schools Thursday and Friday in three towns in Rhode Island.

The college student, 21-year-old Danielle Thompson, had been in her home state of Maine, as well as in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, in the 10 days before she was admitted to a Dover hospital. She died of bacterial meningitis on Wednesday.

Health and Human Services Commissioner John Stephen said the state has identified 29 people in New Hampshire and 55 in Maine who should receive antibiotics. Officials were still tracking down how many people Thompson visited in Massachusetts.

No one has yet shown symptoms, Stephen said.

Bacterial meningitis can be spread through saliva, creating the most risk for people who shared food or drinks, kissed or used the same eating utensils. It causes an infection of fluid in the spinal cord and surrounding the brain, with symptoms include high fever, headache and stiff neck.

"This case underscores just how serious this illness can be," Stephen said.

In Rhode Island, epidemiologists from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are working with state officials investigating a possible case of meningitis and three cases of encephalitis that surfaced in public school children. One second-grader in Warwick died from encephalitis that was brought on by "walking pneumonia."

Dr. David Gifford, director of Rhode Island's Public Health Department, said there have been an unusually high number of walking pneumonia cases in the children's communities.

As a precaution, classes for about 20,000 students in those communities -- Warwick, West Warwick and Coventry -- were cancelled Thursday and Friday while health experts investigate, Gifford said.

Two-faced calf draws crowds to dairy farm

RURAL RETREAT, Va. (AP) -- One of the newest arrivals at Kirk Heldreth's dairy farm is drawing freaked-out crowds.

A calf with two faces was born Dec. 27 at Heldreth Dairy Farm, and word has spread in southwest Virginia as residents flock to his farm.

The calf breathes out of two noses and has two tongues, which move independently, according to Heldreth. There appears to be a single socket containing two eyes where the heads split.

"It's the craziest thing I've ever seen," the dairyman said.

During the calf's birth, Heldreth said he first thought there were two calves. It has two lower jaws, but only one mouth. Heldreth feeds her through a tube, and acknowledges he probably can't maintain that feeding schedule for long.

The calf was the product of artificial insemination, which was supposed to create a genetically superior specimen. "Genetically, this is one of my better calves," he said.

Bob James, a professor in the dairy science department at Virginia Tech and Heldreth's former teacher, said such births are unusual. "In my 25 years, I've seen it maybe two or three times, but it's pretty rare," he said.

The animal is normal from its tail until its unusually large head. Heldreth said the calf doesn't appear to have any other physical ailments or complications.

"It's as healthy as can be," he said.

Chief sells hook-and-ladder fire truck on eBAy
HOOPESTON, Ill. (AP) -- No one around here wanted the volunteer fire department's old hook-and-ladder truck when it was put up for sale last year, so the chief came up with a modern solution.

Auction it on eBay, figured Chief Greg Shipman. It worked.

The $5,000 winning bid came from Middletown, N.Y., where Andrew Leider plans to open a museum and put the truck on display.

Shipman said Wednesday he had hoped to get more money for the department out of the old truck, which was given to Hoopeston by the city of Watseka, Ill.

The chief figures the department spent about $7,500 on the truck's restoration, while he and the other volunteer firefighters put in several thousand hours of labor.

"We no more got it done than we found another one we were happier with," he said.

But Shipman said he is happy the old truck has a new home. Until it heads to New York, "it's sitting outside, and it's hurting," he said.

Police track felon on cell phone's GPS
SPARTANBURG, S.C. (AP) -- Norman Rattliff Jr.'s cell phone gave him away, police said.

Authorities were able to arrest Rattliff on Wednesday night by using the global positioning system in his cell phone to track the fleeing suspect, Sheriff Chuck Wright said.

Rattliff, who was wanted in West Virginia for forgery and failing to register as a sex offender, ran from officers trying to arrest him at a Spartanburg home where he had been staying for about six months, Wright said.

But he didn't get far, the sheriff said.

"The GPS locator on his cell phone told us about where he was, so we went and started knocking on doors," Wright said.

Deputies found Rattliff in the back bedroom of one of the homes and arrested him, the sheriff said. Rattliff is awaiting extradition back to West Virginia.

Warm winter in Northeast is no relief for allergy sufferers

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) -- The unseasonably warm weather along the East Coast has flooded some offices with patients suffering from an unusual ailment this time of year: allergies.

Doctors say this winter's weather has sparked an onslaught of mold spores that cause allergies and fluctuating temperatures that irritate already-suffering nasal passages. Many patients may confuse an allergic reaction with a common cold.

"The phone is ringing off the hook -- it's incredible," said Dr. Clifford W. Bassett, vice-president of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, who has a practice in Manhattan.

"It's an explosion of people who are realizing that they may have allergies," said Bassett. "Typically, January and February are quiet times in most allergists' offices."

Mold spores that grow outdoors would normally die off during a cold snap or be covered with snow. But in warm weather mold spores continue to grow and spread. Throwing open the windows to enjoy the weather makes things worse: The mold spores waltz inside.

Maria Carola, 35, of New York said usually she could go without her medication for chronic allergies in the winter. But she learned Friday from her doctor her runny nose and itchy eyes weren't symptoms of a cold as she suspected.

"Usually, the symptoms wouldn't be that prominent," Carola said of her allergies.

The most common allergy symptoms are itchy eyes, noses and throats, and possibly runny or stuffy noses, said Bassett. People with colds may share the stuffed up nose problem, but also may see changes in the color of their mucus, loss of appetite, fatigue, low-grade headaches or fevers.

Some doctors say a warm spell could bring a very early allergy season since trees might begin to bud early; others say the temperatures don't always make much of a difference.

Security beefed up for Prince William's girlfriend

LONDON (AP) -- Ten police officers surrounded Prince William's girlfriend Kate Middleton as she left a London nightclub early Friday, signaling increased security following fears for her safety, British media reported. - The officers emerged from two vans to form a cordon around Middleton as she left the club with William at 3 a.m., preventing photographers from getting too close, the Evening Standard newspaper reported. The prince, who is second in line to the British throne, was accompanied by his bodyguards.

The extra security comes as a growing number of photographers have started following Middleton, who began dating William when they were university students. There have been persistent reports in recent weeks that the two may soon get engaged.

Police were stationed outside Middleton's home in Chelsea on Thursday to deal with the pack of photographers waiting to catch her leaving for work, the Evening Standard reported.

Police officials refused to comment on the security measures. Clarence House, Prince Charles' London residence, also refused to comment.

As an ordinary member of the public, Middleton, 24, is not entitled to a police guard. Her lawyers complained to newspaper editors in 2005, requesting the papers leave her alone.

The royal family is sensitive about media intrusions into their lives. Princess Diana was trying to escape chasing paparazzi when she died in a car crash in Paris in 1997.

Survivors of Indonesian ferry sinking recall fight for life

SURABAYA, Indonesia (AP) -- Ahmad Rifai thought he was going to die as huge waves hurled his life raft around the Java Sea following last week's ferry sinking in central Indonesia. But for five days he desperately gripped the boat, too scared to sleep, until he washed ashore.

"I remember those nights when I was adrift in the middle of the dark night with storms, rain, lightning and high waves," said Rifai, a 45-year-old plantation worker, as he recovered Friday in a hospital in the coastal city of Surabaya.

"There was nothing I could do, I could only keep chanting, 'God is great, God is great."'

Almost 630 people were on board the Senopati Nusantara when it sank before midnight after being pounded by towering waves for several hours on a trip from Borneo to the main island of Java.

More than 230 people, including the captain, have so far been rescued. Just eight corpses have been recovered.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono ordered the search on Friday to continue for the time being, saying survivor stories from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami showed that people could stay alive for up to three weeks on rafts in the country's tropical climate.

Survivors of the ferry sinking have been found on life rafts, clinging to debris or on beaches of remote islands after washing ashore. They have been found farther away from the site of the sinking each day because of ocean currents.

Col. Jan Simamora, head of the search and rescue mission, said ships and planes were scouring the sea near the resort island of Bali, some 430 miles west of where the ferry sank.

No survivors have been found, though, since Rifai and 14 others in his tiny raft ran aground Wednesday on an island hundreds of miles away.

Rifai said that during his time at sea he saw no rescue teams. The men in the raft spotted land three times, but high waves prevented them from using their hands to paddle the vessel ashore. They survived on rain water before washing ashore.

"We just went where the waves took us," he said.

Indonesia has been wracked in recent weeks by seasonal storms that have triggered deadly landslides, flooding and at least six maritime accidents in different parts of the sprawling archipelago. A jetliner with 102 people on board disappeared in heavy winds and is still missing.

As the ferry sank, Rifai said he saw two adults and two children hugging each other on deck before jumping into the sea, still holding on to each other.

"It seemed they wanted to die together," he said, adding the image stayed with him during his time on the life raft. "Thank God we managed to get in a raft," he said.

Another survivor said thinking about his wife and children gave him strength.

"I tried to remember what they did each day," said Ansari, who goes by a single name. "I could not imagine dying and leaving no one to look after my family. "

Pilot of missing Indonesian jetliner changed flight path twice due to weather

MAKASSAR, Indonesia (AP) -- A jetliner with 102 people aboard that disappeared after encountering 80 mph winds over northern Indonesian waters twice changed course, an official said, as authorities widened the search Friday for the Boeing 737.

A U.S. National Transportation Safety Board team arrived to help investigate the apparent crash of Adam Air Flight KI-574, which disappeared from the radar Monday near the Sulawesi coastal town of Majene without issuing a mayday.

Three Americans -- Scott Jackson, 54, and his daughters 18-year-old Lindsey and 21-year-old Stephanie, of Bend, Ore., -- were on board.

"Whatever happened to the plane, it was likely rapid and catastrophic," said Patrick Smith, a U.S.-based airline pilot and aviation commentator, pointing to a possible massive structural failure due to metal fatigue or an onboard explosion.

He noted that in many accidents, "there are no distress calls simply because the cockpit crew is too busy dealing with the situation rather than calling around for help."

The plane left Indonesia's main island of Java for Manado on Sulawesi but altered course and turned westward halfway into the two-hour trip after being warned of rough weather near the city of Makassar, said Eddy Suyanto, head of the search and rescue mission.

But when it ran into winds of more than 80 mph over the Makassar Strait, it changed course again, bringing the plane eastward toward land, then disappeared from the radar, he said.

It is not clear why there have been no transmissions from the plane's emergency locator.

Smith speculated it may not have been operational or -- in the event of a crash at sea -- that it could have sank into an underwater trench from which its signals could not be picked up.

Nearly 3,000 soldiers, police and civilians have been trudging along steep jungle paths on Sulawesi, while sonar-equipped ships and a fleet of aircraft have scoured the sea over an area roughly the size of California.

With no sign of the wreckage, rescuers extended their search south toward the resort island of Bali, believing that in the event of a sea crash strong currents may have washed debris or bodies hundreds of miles away, officials said. Teams also patrolled coasts further northeast.

Authorities wrongly said Tuesday the wreckage had been found with a dozen survivors, causing further anguish to relatives camped out at airports and hotels in Manado and Makassar.

About 50 protesters gathered in the capital, Jakarta, dressed like bloodied air-crash victims, calling for the resignation of the transport minister over the erroneous reports, which have made family members doubt almost anything officials tell them about the probe.

"All we do is watch television," said Fandi, who had four relatives on the plane and like many Indonesians only uses a single name. "Officials from Adam Air aren't able to tell us anything."

Adam Air is one of about 30 budget carriers that sprang up in Indonesia after 1998, when the industry was deregulated. The rapid expansion has led to cheap flights to scores of destinations across Indonesia, but has also raised concerns about maintenance of the leased planes.

Air navigation can be difficult in Indonesia, which spans 6 percent of the equator, because there are gaps in the communications systems. Last year, an Adam Air Boeing 737 flew off course on a stretch of the same route and was lost for several hours before it made an emergency landing at a small airstrip, hundreds of miles off course.

-- Associated Press writer Slobodan Lekic in Brussels and Anthony Deutsch in Jakarta contributed to this report.

Lord Chief Justice ponders dispensing with wigs - and centuries of British court history

LONDON (AP) -- In horsehair wigs of tight, white curls, Britain's judges and lawyers have stalked oak-paneled courtrooms since the 17th century. But the head of the judiciary is considering scrapping the historical uniform.

Baron Nicholas Phillips, Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales, is expected to soon decide following a study intended to examine concerns that wigs and gowns intimidate the public.

His office confirmed Friday that he may ditch the traditional costume altogether -- meaning red and black silk gowns, gold braided waistcoats, wigs and colored ceremonial sashes could be consigned to history.

Lawyers believe the latest review will conclude that a less formal style should be adopted for most cases.

John Cooper, a London criminal lawyer and a member of the Bar Council -- the authority representing senior lawyers -- said lawyers expect the wig and gown to be preserved only for criminal matters.

"The weight of opinion among barristers is to see the attire retained for criminal cases, and the public agree -- it is one of the only things they actually like about the legal profession," he said.

Lawyers in Britain have worn gowns and wigs in court since the late 17th century, though they stopped wearing perukes -- a long, shoulder-length style -- on a daily basis in the 1840s, opting for a shorter, less elaborate version.

The attire of High Court judges, who hear the most serious cases, dates to the 14th century, when cloaks were fashioned from ermine, taffeta or silk.

Strict rules govern the color of gowns, with senior judges using red for criminal cases and black for civil or family court work. In summer, some judges can dress in blue or violet, but all must wear scarlet on Red Letter Days, which include the monarch's birthday and some religious festivals.

To pay for the opulent wardrobe, a High Court judge is given an allowance of about $30,000 and a circuit judge gets about $20,000. Wigs can cost as much as $1,600, while long perukes cost about $4,000 each.

Before his appointment, Phillips described courtroom dress as ridiculous, suggesting Britain should follow France in adopting a simple black gown and dispensing with wigs.

In 2002, a government-ordered Opinion Research Corporation poll of 2,000 people found 42 percent favored retaining traditional dress for all lawyers and judges. Support for wigs in criminal cases was stronger; only 27 percent said judges in such cases should go bareheaded. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

Wigs have disappeared from other arenas. The speaker of the House of Commons dispensed with a peruke in 1992, and the Lord Chancellor stop wearing a wig when presiding in the House of Lords in 1998. The Law Lords, Britain's supreme appeal judges, do not wear wigs.

Cooper said many lawyers believe their attire has a practical purpose. Some lawyers in serious criminal cases, he said, welcomed the partial disguise provided by a wig and gown in the belief they were unlikely to be recognized by a defendant outside court.

Traditional dress also ensured jurors will not be influenced by a lawyer's clothing, Cooper said.

"In America, for example, a trial advocate will take a look at a jury and, if they are dressed in suits and ties, the advocate will dress in a suit and tie -- in an attempt to win favor," he said. "Our system maintains parity between barristers."

German hamlet becomes the center of Europe and says: show me the geld

GELNHAUSEN, Germany (AP) -- Some think the center of Europe is in Brussels. Others, more financially inclined, say London.

But according to meticulous calculations by French experts, geographically speaking the European Union's center has shifted -- with Romania and Bulgaria joining the bloc this week -- to a wintry wheat field outside a small town in Germany.

Is there money in it for the townsfolk of Gelnhausen? They're determined to find out.

"I never thought this would happen," marveled Eckhard Paul, a 47-year-old truck driver whose family owns the land -- leased to a farmer -- where the would-be center lies.

In joining the EU on Jan. 1, Romania and Bulgaria -- former communist nations on the southeast fringe of Europe -- moved the EU's geographic center 110 miles east, says the French National Geographic Institute.

City officials in Gelnhausen happily erected three white flagpoles to mark the new center, locating them some 30 yards away from the exact spot so as not to trample on crops.

City official Michael Schwaab said the town, population 23,000, hopes to add a sandstone monument and benches at the site to help market the distinction.

Gelnhausen already attracts upward of 50,000 tourists a year, he said.

After all, it's just regaining earlier glories: the 12th-century Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa of the Hohenstaufen dynasty built a residence in Gelnhausen, making it a center of sorts for the Hohenstaufen empire.

On a rainy January afternoon, the town didn't seem to be in the center of anything, pretty and sleepy with its ancient church steeples, half-timbered houses and quiet cobblestone streets.

"We could really benefit from some more tourists," said Alexandra Kehr, owner of the Schelm von Bergen hotel in Gelnhausen's old town.

As ever, there's a lack of outright consensus on where Europe's center lies.

Depending on the method used, and what countries and islands are included as "Europe" -- Russia makes a big difference -- there are other claimants to the title.

One of them is a spot in Lithuania where the authorities have put up a large white granite column with a crown of golden stars and a visitor center. The western Ukrainian town of Rakhiv also lays claim, with a monument dating to the 1880s, and the German town of Neualbenreuth attracts tourists to a liberally defined "Midpoint of Europe" marker on the nearby German-Czech border.

The French institute's calculation takes into account far-flung European territories such as Britain's Falkland Islands and France's Reunion in the Indian Ocean.

Whatever the methodology, the center could have landed inconveniently -- in the middle of a body of water like the Adriatic, or even in a non-EU territory like Switzerland, which lies only a few hundred miles due south.

But the institute's Christophe Grateau is quite clear: the center of Europe lands precisely at 9 degrees 9 minutes 0 seconds west longitude and 50 degrees 10 minutes 21 seconds north latitude.

Edgar Donner, who lives nearby, said he might "stand out there with a hat and collect money" from tourists.

Horst Rasbach, the mayor of Kleinmaischeid -- a German town that was the previous "center," said his town did gain visitors during its brief reign, but he couldn't say exactly how many.

Kleinmaischeid -- which held the title only since May 1, 2004, when the EU expanded from 15 to 25 countries -- put up a 15-foot-high sculpture of calipers marking the spot on a mosaic map of Europe.

"People said, 'We're in the center of the European Union, and then took a picture by the monument, and some of them perhaps went to a hotel or restaurant," he said.

The $26,000 statue stays, said Rasbach. "It signifies the center of the EU of 25 members, and we're still that," he argued.

The urge to put up a monument or a plaque seems irresistible.

Kleinmaischeid's predecessor, Viroinval in Belgium, put up a "glass cathedral" sculpture to mark the center when the EU had only 15 members.

Gelnhausen may enjoy more longevity. EU public opinion opposes further expansions, and candidates such as Turkey -- whose bulk would yank the midpoint considerably farther east -- may have to wait years.

"It's kind of silly, the whole thing," Donner said. "But we're famous, I suppose."

Worldwide music events to remember conductor Toscanini 50 years after his death

ROME (AP) -- Concerts, exhibitions and movie showings are among the events planned worldwide to remember Arturo Toscanini, 50 years after the death of the celebrated Italian conductor.

Commemorations will take place throughout 2007, mostly organized by countries and musical institutions that were touched by Toscanini's work as an artist and by his political stance as a staunch opponent of fascism and Nazism.

Key events are to take place on Jan. 16, the anniversary of the maestro's death, with performances by some of the world's top orchestras.

Daniel Barenboim leads a performance of Beethoven's "Eroica" Symphony at La Scala's Philharmonic in Milan, the storied opera house where Toscanini was chief conductor.

On the same day, the Arturo Toscanini Philharmonic plays pieces by Verdi and Richard Strauss in the conductor's native Parma, while Lorin Maazel leads the New York Philharmonic in a gala concert at Lincoln Center in New York City. Proceeds of this event will go to establish the orchestra's Toscanini assistant conductor's chair.

Born on March 25, 1867, Toscanini showed great musical talent as a young man, aided by a photographic memory that gave him strong command over a vast repertoire. He went on to conduct important operatic premieres, among them Giacomo Puccini's "La Boheme" in 1896.

Toscanini moved to the United States in 1908 to lead the Metropolitan Opera and later the New York Philharmonic and the NBC Symphony. He died in New York in 1957.

Opposed to Benito Mussolini's regime, he refused to conduct in Italy after he was assaulted by fascist thugs in 1931. He returned to his native country only to conduct La Scala's reopening in 1946 after its reconstruction from wartime bombings.

In 1936, he helped establish the future Israel Philharmonic Orchestra by conducting the inaugural concerts in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Haifa of the Palestine Orchestra, an ensemble created by many Jewish musicians who had fled central Europe.

"Toscanini deserves to be remembered for his artistic qualities and for his political and social commitments," said Piero Melograni, an Italian historian and member of an international committee at the head of the "Viva Toscanini" campaign, which organized some of the commemorations.

Toscanini, considered an all-time great by critics and followers, is still a model for today's conductors, said Gianluigi Gelmetti, who will direct a tribute at Rome's Opera Theater on Tuesday.

"I find him increasingly modern," Gelmetti said Friday at a presentation in Rome of the events. "At a time when conducting an orchestra is more and more a matter of hedonism and of putting up a show ... Toscanini's dry style is an extraordinary thing."

The commemorations will conclude with a concert by the Israel Philharmonic in Venice's La Fenice theater. La Scala also plans for November two additional concerts in Milan and one in Parma dedicated to Toscanini.

Also scheduled are biographical exhibits across Italy and one in New York featuring artwork collected by the conductor. Film retrospectives include one on Italian emigrants to be held in Italy, Israel and the United States.

"I thank you for organizing all these events," said Toscanini's granddaughter, Emanuela di Castelbarco. "I don't know what he would make of them, he was such a modest and shy man."

On the Net:

http://www.toscaninionline.com

Clapton to appear Jan. 20 at Shanghai Grand Stage, where the Stones made their Chinese debut

SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- Eric Clapton will perform in Shanghai later this month, the latest rock legend to take the stage in China's business and entertainment hub.

Clapton, 61, will appear Jan. 20 at the Shanghai Grand Stage, the same venue where the Rolling Stones made their Chinese debut last April.

Ticket prices range from $230 for stage-side seats to $38 for the upper balcony, Emma Entertainment, one of the concert organizers, said in a statement Friday.

Western stars such as Elton John and the Black Eyed Peas have performed in Shanghai in recent months. The Stones' concert was considered the most lavish and high-profile rock show ever staged in the communist state.

Yet while such appearances point to Shanghai's increasingly affluent and cosmopolitan profile, they also underscore some enduring limitations.

Most of the audience members at the concerts have been expatriates because many Chinese remain unfamiliar with such stars or are unwilling to pay high ticket prices.

Meanwhile, China's conservative culture czars still call the shots. They ordered the Stones to strike three songs from their set list due to sexual content and canceled permission for an October concert by Jay-Z, citing a need to protect local hip-hop fans from nasty lyrics.

On the Net:

Eric Clapton:

http://www.ericclapton.com/