LOS ANGELES - Robert Altman, the caustic and irreverent satirist behind "M-A-S-H," "Nashville" and "The Player" who made a career out of bucking Hollywood, has died at 81.

The director died Monday night at a Los Angeles Hospital, Joshua Astrachan, a producer at Altman's Sandcastle 5 Productions in New York City, told The Associated Press.

The cause of death wasn't disclosed. A news release was expected later in the day, Astrachan said.

A five-time Academy Award nominee for best director, most recently for 2001's "Gosford Park," he finally won a lifetime achievement Oscar in 2006.

"No other filmmaker has gotten a better shake than I have," Altman said while accepting the award. "I'm very fortunate in my career. I've never had to direct a film I didn't choose or develop. My love for filmmaking has given me an entree to the world and to the human condition."

Garrison Keillor, who starred in Altman's last movie - this year's "A Prairie Home Companion" - said Tuesday that Altman's love of film clearly came through on the set.

"Mr. Altman loved making movies. He loved the chaos of shooting and the sociability of the crew and actors - he adored actors - and he loved the editing room and he especially loved sitting in a screening room and watching the thing over and over with other people," Keillor said in a statement to The Associated Press. "He didn't care for the money end of things, he didn't mind doing publicity, but when he was working he was in heaven."

Elliot Gould, who starred in "M-A-S-H," said Altman's legacy would "nuture and inspire filmmakers and artists for generations to come."

"He was the last great American director in the tradition of John Ford," Gould said. "He was my friend and I'll always be grateful to him for the experience and opportunities he gave me."

Altman had one of the most distinctive styles among modern filmmakers. He often employed huge ensemble casts, encouraged improvisation and overlapping dialogue and filmed scenes in long tracking shots that would flit from character to character.

Perpetually in and out of favor with audiences and critics, Altman worked ceaselessly since his anti-war black comedy "M-A-S-H" established his reputation in 1970, but he would go for years at a time directing obscure movies before roaring back with a hit.

After a string of commercial duds including "The Gingerbread Man" in 1998, "Cookie's Fortune" in 1999 and "Dr. T & the Women" in 2000, Altman took his all-American cynicism to Britain for 2001's "Gosford Park."

A combination murder-mystery and class-war satire set among snobbish socialites and their servants on an English estate in the 1930s, "Gosford Park" was Altman's biggest box-office success since "M-A-S-H."

Besides best-director, "Gosford Park" earned six other Oscar nominations, including best picture and best supporting actress for both Helen Mirren and Maggie Smith. It won the original-screenplay Oscar, and Altman took the best-director prize at the Golden Globes for "Gosford Park."

Altman's other best-director Oscar nominations came for "M-A-S-H," the country music saga "Nashville" from 1975, the movie-business satire "The Player" from 1992 and the ensemble character study "Short Cuts" from 1993. He also earned a best-picture nomination as producer of "Nashville."

No director ever got more best-director nominations without winning a regular Oscar, though four other men - Alfred Hitchcock, Martin Scorsese, Clarence Brown and King Vidor - tied with Altman at five.

In May, Altman brought out "A Prairie Home Companion," with Keillor starring as the announcer of a folksy musical show - with the same name as Keillor's own long-running show - about to be shut down by new owners. Among those in the cast were Meryl Streep, Lily Tomlin, Kevin Kline, Woody Harrelson and Tommy Lee Jones.

"This film is about death," Altman said at a May 3 news conference in St. Paul, Minn., also attended by Keillor and many of the movie's stars.

He often took on Hollywood genres with a revisionist's eye, de-romanticizing the Western hero in 1971's "McCabe and Mrs. Miller" and 1976's "Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson," the film-noir gumshoe in 1973's "The Long Goodbye" and outlaw gangsters in "Thieves Like Us."

"M-A-S-H" was Altman's first big success after years of directing television, commercials, industrial films and generally unremarkable feature films. The film starring Donald Sutherland and Gould was set during the Korean War but was Altman's thinly veiled attack on U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

"That was my intention entirely. If you look at that film, there's no mention of what war it is," Altman said in an Associated Press interview in 2001, adding that the studio made him put a disclaimer at the beginning to identify the setting as Korea.

"Our mandate was bad taste. If anybody had a joke in the worst taste, it had a better chance of getting into the film, because nothing was in worse taste than that war itself," Altman said.

The film spawned the long-running TV sitcom starring Alan Alda, a show Altman would refer to with distaste as "that series." Unlike the social message of the film, the series was prompted by greed, Altman said.

"They made millions and millions of dollars by bringing an Asian war into Americans' homes every Sunday night," Altman said in 2001. "I thought that was the worst taste."

Altman never minced words about reproaching Hollywood. After the Sept. 11 attacks, he said Hollywood served as a source of inspiration for the terrorists by making violent action movies that amounted to training films for such attacks.

"Nobody would have thought to commit an atrocity like that unless they'd seen it in a movie," Altman said.

Altman was written off repeatedly by the Hollywood establishment, and his reputation for arrogance and hard drinking - a habit he eventually gave up - hindered his efforts to raise money for his idiosyncratic films.

While critical of studio executives, Altman held actors in the highest esteem. He joked that on "Gosford Park," he was there mainly to turn the lights on and off for the performers.

The respect was mutual. Top-name actors would clamor for even bit parts in his films. Altman generally worked on shoestring budgets, yet he continually landed marquee performers who signed on for a fraction of their normal salaries.

After the mid-1970s, the quality of Altman's films became increasingly erratic. His 1980 musical "Popeye," with Robin Williams, was trashed by critics, and Altman took some time off from film.

He directed the Broadway production of "Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean," following it with a movie adaptation in 1982. Altman went back and forth from TV to theatrical films over the next decade, but even when his films earned critical praise, such as 1990's "Vincent & Theo," they remained largely unseen.

"The Player" and "Short Cuts" re-established Altman's reputation and commercial viability. But other 1990s films - including his fashion-industry farce "Ready to Wear" and "Kansas City," his reverie on the 1930s jazz and gangster scene of his hometown - fell flat.

Born Feb. 20, 1925, Altman hung out in his teen years at the jazz clubs of Kansas City, Mo., where his father was an insurance salesman.

Altman was a bomber pilot in World War II and studied engineering at the University of Missouri in Columbia before taking a job making industrial films in Kansas City. He moved into feature films with "The Delinquents" in 1957, then worked largely in television through the mid-1960s, directing episodes of such series as "Bonanza" and "Alfred Hitchcock Presents."

Altman and his wife, Kathryn, had two sons, Robert and Matthew, and he had a daughter, Christine, and two other sons, Michael and Stephen, from two previous marriages.

When he received his honorary Oscar in 2006, Altman revealed he had a heart transplant a decade earlier.

"I didn't make a big secret out of it, but I thought nobody would hire me again," he said after the ceremony. "You know, there's such a stigma about heart transplants, and there's a lot of us out there."

Associated Press writers Jeff Baenen in St. Paul, Minn., and Jeff Wilson in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Films of Robert Altman as director, producer or writer include:

"Christmas Eve," 1947

"Bodyguard," 1948

"The Delinquents," 1957

"The James Dean Story," 1957

"Nightmare in Chicago," 1964

"Countdown," 1968

"That Cold Day in the Park," 1969

"M-A-S-H," 1970

"Brewster McCloud," 1970

"Events," 1970

"McCabe and Mrs. Miller," 1971

"Images," 1972

"The Long Goodbye," 1973

"Thieves Like Us," 1974

"California Split," 1974

"Nashville," 1975

"Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson," 1976

"Welcome to L.A.," 1977

"The Late Show," 1977

"Three Women," 1977

"A Wedding," 1978

"Remember My Name," 1978

"Quintet," 1979

"A Perfect Couple," 1979

"Rich Kids," 1979

"Health," 1980

"Popeye," 1980

"Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean," 1982

"Streamers," 1983

"Secret Honor," 1984

"Fool for Love," 1985

"Beyond Therapy," 1987

"O.C. and Stiggs," 1987

"Aria" (one segment, "Les Boreades,") 1987

"Vincent & Theo," 1990

"The Player," 1992

"Short Cuts," 1993

"Pret-a-Porter" ("Ready to Wear,") 1994

"Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle," 1994

"Jazz '34," 1996

"Kansas City," 1996

"The Gingerbread Man," 1998

"Cookie's Fortune," 1999

"Dr. T. and the Women," 2000

"Gosford Park," 2001

"The Company," 2003

"Tanner on Tanner," 2004

"A Prairie Home Companion," 2006

Sources: The Film Encyclopedia; Internet Movie Database

Michael Richards, Seinfeld's Kramer, apologizes for racial slurs

LOS ANGELES (AP) - He called two black hecklers the "n-word" and enthusiastically referenced a time when blacks were often victims of civil rights abuses, but Michael Richards said his verbal barrage during a stand-up routine was fueled by anger and not bigotry.

"For me to be at a comedy club and flip out and say this crap, I'm deeply, deeply sorry," the former "Seinfeld" co-star said during a satellite appearance for David Letterman's "Late Show" in New York.

"I'm not a racist. That's what's so insane about this," Richards said, his tone becoming angry and frustrated as he defended himself.

Richards described himself as going into "a rage" over the two audience members who interrupted his act Friday at the Laugh Factory in West Hollywood.

His explanation was reminiscent of Mel Gibson's assertion that he wasn't anti-Semitic after he let off a barrage of Jewish slurs during a traffic stop last summer: despite what came out of his mouth, that's not what is inside him.

Industry colleagues were in no hurry to accept Richards' apology.

"Once the word comes out of your mouth and you don't happen to be African-American, then you have a whole lot of explaining," comedian Paul Rodriguez, who was at the Laugh Factory during Richards' performance, told CNN. "Freedom of speech has its limitations and I think Michael Richards found those limitations."

Veteran publicist Michael Levine, whose clients have included comedians George Carlin, Sam Kinison and Rodney Dangerfield, called Richards' remarks inexcusable. Comics often face hecklers without losing their cool, he said.

"I've never seen anything like this in my life," Levine said Monday. "I think it's a career ruiner for him. … It's going to be a long road back for him, if at all."

His Laugh Factory tirade began after the two clubgoers shouted at him that he wasn't funny. A videotape of the incident was posted on TMZ.com.

Richards retorted: "Shut up! Fifty years ago we'd have you upside down with a f--- fork up your a-."

He then paced across the stage taunting the men for interrupting his show, peppering his speech with racial slurs and profanities.

"You can talk, you can talk, you're brave now mother---. Throw his a- out. He's a n---!" Richards shouts before repeating the racial epithet over and over again.

Moderating his tone at one point, Richards tells the audience, "It shocks you, it shocks you" and refers to "what lays buried."

While there is some chuckling in the audience throughout the outburst, someone can be heard gasping "Oh my God" and people respond with "ooh" after Richards uses the n-word.

Eventually someone calls out: "It's not funny. That's why you're a reject, never had no shows, never had no movies. `Seinfeld,' that's it."

Richards deserved the chance to apologize, Jerry Seinfeld said on the "Late Show."

"He's someone that I love and I know how shattered he is about" what happened, Seinfeld said.

At one point, however, Richards grew flustered and expressed second thoughts about appearing on the program when his use of the term "Afro-American" caused some audience members to laugh.

"I'm hearing your audience laugh and I'm not even sure that this is where I should be addressing the situation," he said.

Richards, 57, who played Seinfeld's eccentric neighbor Kramer on the hit 1989-98 sitcom, hadn't spoken publicly about his remarks before "Late Show."

Associated Press Writers Jacob Adelman in Los Angeles and Erin Carlson in New York contributed to this report.

On the Net:

CBS: http://www.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow/%emph-o ff(%)

Teen bride was 'terrified' and 'devastated' by marriage

ST. GEORGE, Utah (AP) - A woman who claims she was forced to marry an older cousin testified Tuesday that her polygamist church leader commanded her to submit to the man's desires over her repeated objections.

"He pretty much told me I needed to go home and do better," said the woman, who testified tearfully but forcefully for 90 minutes as Warren Jeffs, leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, sat without expression at a defense table.

The testimony came during a hearing to determine if Jeffs will stand trial on charges of rape as an accomplice for his alleged role in forcing the 14-year-old girl to marry a 19-year-old cousin in 2001.

The woman, now 20, said she initially refused to say "I do" and wouldn't take the man's hand during a ceremony at Caliente Hot Springs Motel in Nevada.

"The silence became unbearable. (Jeffs) was drilling a hole in me with his eyes," she said. She finally relented, but then locked herself in a bathroom.

Security at the Washington County courthouse was extraordinary Tuesday, with police sharpshooters posted on the red rock hills that ring the building. No vehicles were allowed to park on the street.

Looking gaunt in a dark gray suit, Jeffs, 50, sat nearly motionless. He smiled at family and fellow church members in the audience.

Prosecutors first called Rebecca Musser, a former member of Jeffs' church who was married to his late father, Rulon Jeffs. She recalled Jeffs telling her to counsel her teenage sister after the wedding at the Nevada motel.

"You need to encourage her to be happy. God has put this marriage together. You need to encourage her to be submissive and obedient," Jeffs said, according to Musser.

At the time, Utah and Arizona were cracking down on marriages involving minors. She said Jeffs warned her that "this marriage could cause us some problems."

In court documents, prosecutors say the bride, identified as Jane Doe No. 4, objected to the marriage and later begged to be released. The Associated Press does not identify victims of sexual assault.

Jeffs was arrested Aug. 28 and is being held without bail in the county jail in Purgatory, about 25 miles west of the twin towns of Hildale, Utah and Colorado City, Ariz., where most of his estimated 10,000 followers live.

Jeffs' defense team has said he is being persecuted for his religious beliefs.

The church arranges marriages for young girls and believes plural marriage ensures exaltation in heaven. Jeffs assumed leadership in 2002 after the death of his father. Followers revere him as a prophet who communicates with God.

The church represents itself as a fundamentalist offshoot of the Mormon church. But the Mormons disavow any connection and renounced polygamy more than a century ago.

Canceled O.J. Simpson project could turn up in bootleg form on the Internet

NEW YORK (AP) - The O.J. Simpson project is dead, but the book and the TV interview could turn up in bootleg form in this age of YouTube and eBay, when scandalous information seldom stays secret for long.

News Corp., owner of Fox Broadcasting and publisher HarperCollins, called off Simpson's "confession" Monday after advertisers, booksellers and even Fox personality Bill O'Reilly branded the project sick and exploitive.

A two-part interview had been scheduled to air Nov. 27 and Nov. 29 on Fox, with the book, "If I Did It," to follow on Nov. 30.

HarperCollins spokeswoman Erin Crum said some copies had already been shipped to stores but would be recalled, and all copies would be destroyed. She would not say how long that would take.

But with the interview already taped, and thousands of books either sitting in warehouses or headed to booksellers, his supposedly hypothetical account of how he would have committed the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman appears all but certain to surface.

"A book becomes collectible when it's hard to find, and this will become very, very collectible, surely worth four figures," said Richard Davies, a spokesman for AbeBooks.com, an online seller that specializes in used and collectible books.

It's entirely possible that the Simpson TV interview will get out in some form, said Jeff Jarvis, operator of the BuzzMachine Web log and a journalism professor at City University of New York.

"All life is on the record now," he said. "Anything you can do can get out there and get out there quickly."

The Simpson book will also almost certainly remain underground, with another publisher unlikely to take on "If I Did It."

Even Michael Viner, whose previous releases include a memoir by disgraced New York Times reporter Jayson Blair and a tell-all by four Hollywood call girls, said his Beverly Hills-based Phoenix Books was not interested.

"It's the public equivalent of doing a snuff film," said Viner, referring to films that claim to show a person being killed. "People can make money by doing snuff films, but no one wants to be associated with it."

The Simpson saga took another twist Tuesday when his former sister-in-law, Denise Brown, accused News Corp. of trying to buy her family's silence for millions of dollars.

A News Corp. spokesman confirmed that the company had conversations with representatives of the Brown and Goldman families over the past week and said that they were offered all profits from the book and TV show, but he denied it was hush money.

"There were no strings attached," News Corp. spokesman Andrew Butcher said.

Denise Brown told NBC's "Today" show that her family's response was: "Absolutely not."

"They wanted to offer us millions of dollars. Millions of dollars for, like, 'Oh, I'm sorry' money. But they were still going to air the show," Brown said. "We just thought, `Oh my god.' What they're trying to do is trying to keep us quiet, trying to make this like hush money, trying to go around the civil verdict, giving us this money to keep our mouths shut."

Pre-publication sales for "If I Did It," had been strong but not exceptional. It cracked the top 20 of Amazon.com last weekend, but by Monday afternoon, at the time its elimination was announced, the book had fallen to No. 51.

AP Television Writer David Bauder in New York, and AP Special Correspondent Linda Deutsch and Associated Press writer Greg Risling in Los Angeles also contributed to this report.

Family of deceased mother of missing boy sues CNN's Nancy Grace, says grilling led to suicide

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) - Relatives of a mother who committed suicide after CNN's Nancy Grace aggressively questioned her about the disappearance of her son sued the network and the talk-show host Tuesday, accusing Grace of pushing the woman over the edge.

Melinda Duckett shot herself to death on Sept. 8, a day after Grace's show on CNN Headline News aired a segment in which Grace interrogated Duckett about her whereabouts on the August day that 2-year-old Trenton Duckett was reported missing.

Investigators have since named Melinda Duckett as the prime suspect in his disappearance.

Jay Paul Deratany, the attorney for Duckett's estate, said that Grace encouraged Duckett to appear on her show by saying the goal was to draw public attention to help find the boy.

"It's not just about the questioning. It's about the misrepresentation with the knowledge that she was emotionally distraught," Deratany said. The attorney said Grace improperly took on the role of a law enforcement officer.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages.

CNN Headline News said in a statement: "We stand by Nancy Grace and fully support her, as we have from the beginning of this matter."

Fourth high school student dies in school bus plunge from Alabama overpass

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (AP) - A fourth high school student has died from injuries she got in when a school bus nose-dived off an interstate overpass, the police chief said Tuesday.

The bus driver, who was found critically injured on the overpass, was among 15 who remained hospitalized, authorities said. Four were listed as critical.

Police Chief Rex Reynolds identified the fourth victim of Monday's school bus wreck as Crystal Renee McCrary, 17. Like the other victims, she was a student at Lee High School who was on the bus when a car came up in a side lane and the bus veered over the guardrail and crashed about 30 feet below.

Debbie Hersman, a spokeswoman for the National Transportation Safety Board, said investigators were trying to determine how the driver ended up on the overpass, escaping the devastating impact that crumpled the front of the bus.

Two teenage girls died in the wreckage; a third died later at a hospital. More than 30 students were injured.

"The bus went to the side, and I guess it went over," passenger LaWanda Jefferson said. "When it was falling … I was just glad when it hit the ground."

"They were falling on each other. People were screaming, yelling, crying," said Jefferson, 16, who suffered fractures to her left arm and cuts and bruises to her face.

Five people, including the bus driver, had undergone surgery, a hospital spokeswoman said.

Police said the bus, taking students to classes at a downtown tech center, swerved on the overpass, plowed through a concrete barrier and plunged to the street.

Reynolds said an orange Toyota Celica driven by another Lee High student apparently came close to or struck the bus, causing it to swerve.

There is "some contact evidence," Hersman said, noting that investigators were looking for paint transfers between the vehicles.

Reynolds declined to say whether charges would be filed.

Students on the bus, which was not equipped with seat belts, were screaming when rescue workers arrived. "They were thrown all over the bus," said Huntsville Fire Chief Dusty Underwood.

Some had to be extracted from the crumpled front of the bus, he said.

The police chief identified the high school students who died at the scene as Christine Collier, 18, and Nicole Ford, 17. A third, Tanesha Hill, 17, died at the hospital from her injuries, Huntsville Hospital CEO David Spillers said.

Some parents were called to the scene by wailing children on cell phones. Many were angered that police held them back or had no information. At the hospital, some collapsed in tears amid more confusion.

Hospital officials said the horror of the wreck was compounded by the inability of hospital staff to identify some of the more severely injured students who were unable to talk and had no identification on them.

The police chief said the driver and a passenger in the Celica went to a hospital following the crash, but he was not aware if they were treated for injuries. He said the driver was interviewed by police.

The bus driver was in critical condition, said Brooke Thorington, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Education.

"This is a heartbreaking tragedy," said Gov. Bob Riley in a statement in Montgomery.

The National Transportation Safety Board, which was to investigate the wreck, has said that school buses are designed to protect occupants without the use of seat belts. A new design uses strong, well-padded, high-backed seats, closely spaced together, the NTSB has said.

However, Hersman said at a news conference Monday night that the board last week added school bus safety to its list of most wanted transportation safety improvements. She said the board is recommending that new standards be devised to improve safety when buses are involved in rollover crashes.

2 bodies recovered from Ind. home explosion; worker hit natural gas line

HUNTINGTON, Ind. (AP) - Two bodies have been pulled from the rubble of a house that exploded after a cable company worker hit a gas line, officials said Tuesday.

A resident of the two-story home, Emilie Wilson, 75, and R. Alan Dalrymple, a 21-year veteran Vectren Corp. worker, died in the explosion that flattened the home Monday, the Huntington County coroner's office said.

The woman's husband and the Comcast worker were being treated Tuesday at the St. Joseph Hospital burn unit in Fort Wayne, officials said. The extent of their injuries was not available.

Dalrymple came to the home after the Comcast employee called to report that he had hit a gas line, Vectren spokesman Mike Roeder said Tuesday. The house blew up around 5 p.m., shortly after firefighters arrived, authorities said.

Fire spread to two neighboring homes, but no one else was injured.

Firefighters needed more than an hour to extinguish the flames in the line of homes near downtown Huntington, about 25 miles southwest of Fort Wayne.

6th body found in Utah reservoir; discoveries made as searchers looked for missing couple

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Searchers looking for a husband and wife missing when their boat capsized in a remote reservoir have found the couple's remains and also discovered four other bodies, thought to be swimmers and boaters who disappeared in the reservoir over the last decade.

The latest discovery of a man's body was reported Monday by the Wasatch County Sheriff's Office.

Authorities began using sonar equipment at Strawberry Reservoir earlier this month to search for Catheryn Roundy, 23, and her husband, Steven Roundy, 28. The two disappeared Nov. 8 when waves swamped their fishing boat, and their bodies were recovered Nov. 17.

Also found were the bodies of Drake McMillan, 46, who disappeared while swimming in 2001, and two boaters who had been missing since 1995.

The fourth body recovered Monday could be a man who was with the two boaters, authorities said. The state medical examiner is trying to identify them.

The lake, 65 miles southeast of Salt Lake City, is in the mountainous Uinta National Forest. The reservoir is at a high elevation, 9,000 feet, and winds can whip up waves quickly, swamping boaters.

Sonar had not been used before in any of the searches and investigators are continuing to look for more bodies.

23 miners feared trapped after suspected gas explosion in Poland

WARSAW, Poland (AP) - Officials lost contact with 23 workers inside a coal mine after a suspected gas explosion Tuesday, and rescue teams were trying to reach the site far below the surface, authorities said.

Officials lost contact with the men inside the Halemba coal mine in the city of Ruda Slaska, said Zbigniew Madej, spokesman for the Southern Mining Co.

Madej told TVN24 television that an explosion was believed to have taken place 3,300 feet underground, trapping the 23 men.

"There may be an inferno underground," he said.

Four rescue teams were trying to reach the miners, who had been removing a wall in an underground corridor when contact was lost, he said, adding that he could not confirm Polish media reports that two miners had been killed.

"It is hard to say … whether it will be possible to reach the area" because it is so far below the surface, Madej said. "The conditions there are very difficult."

Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski flew to the mine in support of the rescue operation, said his spokesman, Jan Dziedziczak.

The mine is in the Silesia region, the heartland of Poland's sizable coal industry.

Labor unions complain that a lack of investment and massive layoffs in recent years have resulted in falling safety standards.

Earlier this year, a miner was rescued at the Halemba mine after he spent five days underground following a gas explosion.

More than 80 miners have been killed in Poland's coal and copper mines since 2003.

'Steam Train Maury,' the 5-time 'King of Hobos,' dies at age 89

NAPOLEON, Ohio (AP) - Maurice Graham, who began hitching rides on trains as a teenager and was known as the "King of the Hobos," has died at the age of 89.

Graham, who recently suffered a stroke, died Saturday at the Northcrest Nursing Home, his family said.

Graham, nicknamed "Steam Train Maury," was a founding member of the National Hobo Foundation and helped establish the Hobo Museum in Britt, Iowa.

He was "a true hobo hero," said foundation president Linda Hughes.

"He was a classy and respected man," she said. "No one can live up to Steam Train. He's irreplaceable."

Graham in 1990 wrote "Tales of the Iron Road: My Life As King of the Hobos," telling his stories of hopping trains beginning at the age of 14 and living in hobo camps until 1980. He was named National Hobo King five times at the annual hobo convention in Britt, and was crowned Grand Patriarch of Hoboes in 2004.

Graham worked as a mason and founded a school where he taught the trade. He was a medical technician during World War II.

He is survived by his wife, Wanda, and two daughters.

On the Net:

Hobo Foundation: http://www.hobo.com/

Woman gets life for helping boyfriend murder young Michigan couple

MOUNT CLEMENS, Mich. (AP) - A woman convicted of killing a suburban Detroit man and his pregnant wife with the help of her former boyfriend was sentenced Tuesday to life in prison without parole.

Samantha Bachynski, 20, was accused along with Patrick Selepak in the February killings of Scott and Melissa Berels. She was convicted last month of first-degree murder, home invasion, aiding and abetting, and other charges.

As he sentenced her to four life terms, Macomb County Circuit Court Judge Richard Caretti told Bachynski that her actions were "beyond all bounds of human behavior."

Raymond Berels, Scott Berels' father, addressed the court before the sentencing, and provided a graphic account of the last moments of the lives of his son and daughter-in-law, which included a vicious beating with the butt of a rifle and Bachynski injecting bleach into Scott Berels with a hypodermic needle.

Raymond Berels said he wished the death penalty was an option in Michigan.

"It's too bad that a mere matter of geography has saved her from a far different fate. Regrettably, we the taxpayers of the state of Michigan will have the burden of housing, clothing and feeding this parasite for the rest of her life," Berels said.

Bachynski sobbed loudly throughout the proceeding. When given the opportunity to address the court, she blamed her fear of Selepak for her role in the killings.

"All I wanted to do is to go, but I was too scared to do it, and no one seems to understand that," she said.

"I never wanted those people to die," she said.

Prosecutors have said Bachynski chose to help her 27-year-old boyfriend kill the Berelses, both 27, in their home. He pleaded guilty in July and is serving life without parole.

Bachynski had testified that Selepak had told her he or someone else would kill her and her family unless she helped him. That account differed from an earlier, taped confession she gave to police.

Selepak was subpoenaed to testify for her defense but refused to take an oath to tell the truth and never testified.

During Tuesday's sentencing hearing, Sara Katsavrias, Scott Berels' mother, said Bachynski stole her son, daughter-in-law and unborn grandchild from the family.

"You are truly pitiful," Katsavrias said. "How could you have thought your so-called fiance really cared about you? He didn't. He was only using you. What a fool you were and still are."

Katsavrias added: "I hope a little of you dies every day you are locked in your cell."

Bachynski also faces trial on first-degree murder and other charges in the death of Winfield Johnson Jr., 53. He had befriended Selepak and Bachynski at a bar and invited them to stay at his house, then was killed Feb. 21 after learning they were being sought in the Berelses' deaths six days earlier.

After Johnson was killed, authorities say, the couple stole his pickup truck and drove to visit a friend in Owosso, where they were captured. Johnson's body was found in the back of the truck.

Bachynski's trial in Johnson's death is scheduled to begin Dec. 5.

Selepak was mistakenly released from prison Jan. 10 and became engaged to Bachynski that day.

The case led to widespread criticism of Michigan parole officials who allowed Selepak to remain free despite a domestic violence complaint against him. Several parole workers were disciplined and state rules were tightened.

Companion dog found, ending hunt across western U.S.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - A three-week search for the companion dog of an Oregon man battling depression has ended with a happy reunion in Wyoming, more than 700 miles from the spot where the pet was stolen.

Melody, a 12-year-old border collie mix, was found huddled under a pickup in Sheridan, Wyo.

Bliss Green of Myrtle Creek, Ore., had been e-mailing shelters around the country since losing his faithful companion Nov. 3. Melody was inside Green's car when the vehicle was stolen at a York, Neb., gas station.

Green, 75, adopted the dog from a shelter 11 years ago, after going to a hospital because of suicidal impulses. A nurse practitioner wrote Green a prescription for Melody in 2003, allowing him to keep her with him at all times.

"If she was with me and knew I was upset about something, her head would come on my lap," Green said. "I haven't been depressed since I've had her."

York police said they tracked a cell phone in Green's car as it was used through Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Idaho and Oregon. It led them to the car and a suspect who was arrested in Oregon, Green said.

A Wyoming couple found the dog and fed her for a week, thinking she belonged to someone in the neighborhood, authorities said. Investigators connected the pet to Green after some of Green's belongings from the car were found in the area.

Green was headed to Dayton on Tuesday to thank the couple. But first he was on his way to the grocery store to find Melody's favorite foods.

"It's my duty to feed some things to her to help her settle down - chicken livers being one of them," Green said.

China's animal rights activists welcome proposed EU ban on cat and dog fur

BEIJING (AP) - Chinese animal rights activists welcomed a proposed European Union ban on imports of dog and cat fur, saying Tuesday it would pressure the Beijing government to enact better legal protections for animals, while the government denied torture and cruelty are widespread.

The European Union proposed the ban Monday in all 25 member nations, saying cats and dogs were being kept in cages and slaughtered in cruel conditions for their fur.

Humane Society International estimates 2 million cats and dogs are killed for fur each year, with an estimated 5,400 killed in China each day. A ban on dog and cat fur has been in place in the United States since 2000, but activists complain that labeling is not required on items costing less than $150, so dog and cat fur can be used without consumers' knowledge.

However, an attorney with the Federal Trade Commission, Connie Vecellio, said there was no loophole. "It is illegal to import dog or cat fur products into this country," she said.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu insisted Tuesday the country was increasingly aware of animal rights and said the "torture and cruel killing of cats and dogs was by no means a universal phenomenon in China."

"In recent years, our awareness of protecting animals has been on the rise, especially along with the economic and social development in China and the rise of living standards," Jiang said when asked about the proposed ban at a press briefing.

But Chinese animal rights campaigners said abuse was widespread. Merchants beat cats and dogs to death and even flay them alive for their skins, said Zhang Dan, vice chairman for the China Small Animal Protection Association.

She welcomed the proposed EU ban, saying "it's a very important signal to the Chinese government and there's no way they can't notice it."

"Many animal rights volunteers in China are trying to spread the news of what's happening here and I hope people in the West will notice," she said.

To back his call for an EU ban, Markos Kyprianou, the European Commission's consumer protection commissioner, showed gruesome videos Monday of dogs being bludgeoned or cut open to bleed to death, and cats in cages being strangled by wire nooses.

Zhang said she had seen similar videos, including footage of a market in southern China where live cats were thrown into boiling water to kill them and prepare them for skinning.

Activists say cat and dog fur is mainly used for lining gloves, as trim on boots and coats, as well as on keys chains and toys.

One Chinese trader said, however, that most exporters would prefer to use rabbit fur because it's cheaper.

"Rabbit is the cheapest fur in China," said Liu Ning, a trader with Furshion, a fur import-export business based in Hebei province. "If they are using cat or dog instead of rabbit, it doesn't make sense economically."

Liu said that rabbit skins in China cost $1 to $4, while cat pelts sell for $2 and dog pelts for $6.

More often, cat or dog fur is dyed and passed off as other types of more expensive fur, said Liu, who said his company doesn't export cat or dog fur.

Kyprianou said the fur trade's secretive nature makes it hard to estimate how much dog and cat fur finds its way onto the market, or pinpoint its source.

A woman who answered the phone at the Chinese Association of Fur Professionals refused to give figures for the amount of fur China exports every year and said the association had no comment on the proposed ban. The woman, who would only give her surname Liu, said cat and dog fur exports are "just a small part" of China's total fur exports.

Yang Jianzhong, a sales manager with the Liushi Leather Plant in Hebei province said his company exported dog and rabbit fur - but only to South Korea, so the proposed EU ban wouldn't affect their business. He refused to say how much fur they exported every year.

Zhang said concerns about animal welfare are growing in China as more people own pets, but the country still lacks basic legal protections for animals.

She said activists were trying to use the 2008 Olympics as leverage to pressure the government into enacting an anti-cruelty law and animal rights protection legislation, arguing that failing to do so would sully China's image during the games.

Poverty and isolation are the main reasons animals in China are not treated as well as they are in some other countries, she said.

"We don't have a tradition to treat animals as equal living creatures," Zhang said. "In rural areas, many people don't know animal rights. … Animals are just seen as labor, a family-owned property they can use any way they want. They think the animals' existence is just for making money."

Liu, the trader, said ending China's cat and dog fur trade will mainly depend on measures like the proposed EU ban, which will curb overseas demand.

"If the European Union and Americans don't like cat and dog fur and don't use them, then China's businessmen won't produce them," he said. "But if they use them, there is a market and they will make them."

Aryan Brotherhood members sentenced to life in prison

SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) - A federal judge on Tuesday imposed an automatic sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole for two suspected leaders of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang.

Barry "The Baron" Mills, 58, and Tyler "The Hulk" Bingham, 59, were eligible for the death penalty but a jury deadlocked earlier this year during the trial's penalty phase, leading to Tuesday's sentencing by U.S. District Judge David O. Carter.

A third defendant, Edgar "The Snail" Hevle, was sentenced to three consecutive life sentences for racketeering, conspiracy and murder.

The men showed no reaction when the verdicts were announced, but before federal marshals escorted Mills and Bingham out, both men hugged their attorneys repeatedly and shook the hands of other defense attorneys.

Carter said the sentences were appropriate for crimes "spanning well over 30 years of murder and organizational murder."

The defendants have 10 days to file appeals with the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

Christopher Overton Gibson, 47, the fourth man convicted, is recuperating from back surgery and won't be sentenced Tuesday. He also faces 20 years to life in prison for racketeering and conspiracy.

All four men were convicted in July on charges including murder, conspiracy and racketeering.

Among other things, the jury convicted Mills and Bingham for inciting a race riot at a prison in Lewisburg, Pa., in 1997 that resulted in the deaths of black inmates Frank Joyner and Abdul Salaam, alleged members of the rival DC Blacks prison gang.

The killings made Mills and Bingham eligible for the death penalty under the statute of Violent Crime in Aid of Racketeering, but the judge declared a mistrial in the sentencing phase after the jury deadlocked.

Hevle, 55, and Gibson were convicted of conspiring to murder the black inmates.

Mills, Bingham and Hevle were also convicted of a count of murder for the killing of Arva Lee Ray, a prisoner slain at the Lompoc, Calif., penitentiary in 1989. Gibson was not charged with that count.

Prosecutors spent six years building their case against suspected members of the Aryan Brotherhood in an effort to eventually dismantle the violent white supremacist organization accused of dealing drugs and spreading terror inside some of the nation's most dangerous prisons.

Late last week, prosecutors dropped a bid to place severe lifestyle restrictions on the men. Instead, Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Wolfe said in court papers that the government would likely pursue the restrictions "administratively," meaning they could be imposed by the Bureau of Prisons without a court hearing or judge's order.

Federal prosecutors had originally asked Carter to prohibit visits, letters and phone calls to the convicts from anyone but their attorneys and keep writing tools, paper and previously viewed reading material out of their cells.

Similar bans have been imposed only 11 times in the history of the federal prison system. Inmates Zacarias Moussaoui, the suspected "20th hijacker" in the Sept. 11 World Trade Center attack, and convicted Unabomber Ted Kaczynski are among those with restrictions on their prison contacts.