THANH HOA, Vietnam — After killing at least 31 people in China and the Philippines, Typhoon Damrey slammed ashore Tuesday in Vietnam, forcing the evacuation of nearly 300,000 people along the coastal region.

The most powerful typhoon to hit northern Vietnam in a decade injured nine people after it landed in Thanh Hoa province, packing winds of up to 60 mph, said Le Van Thao of the National Meteorology Center. Thanh Hoa is 100 miles south of Hanoi.

About 144,000 people from Thanh Hoa and another 145,000 from three surrounding provinces were evacuated from low-lying homes, schools and government buildings before the storm hit, said provincial disaster official Tran Quang Trung.

Some 950 homes were destroyed and another 9,000 were badly damaged.

Power outages were reported in Thai Binh and Thanh Hoa provinces, home to 5 million people.

More than 25,000 soldiers have been sent to help reinforce sea dikes and evacuate people, state media reported.

High tides sent 15-foot waves surging over a 100-mile sea wall in Thanh Hoa and Nam Dinh, Trung said. In another spot in Thanh Hoa, waves burst through the dike, creating a 100-foot-long break that flooded one village.

National broadcaster VTV reported that falling power poles injured five people in Thanh Hoa, while disaster officials said four workers had been slightly injured while clearing downed trees from the streets.

About 700 people were stranded in Thanh Hoa's Quang Cu village after surging waters breached a dike and engulfed their homes, VTV reported.

Initial damage is estimated at $5.2 million in Thanh Hoa alone, disaster relief officials said. About 950 homes were destroyed and another 9,000 lost their roofs.

VTV showed Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, wearing a rain poncho and soldier's helmet, touring a district in Nam Dinh province where dikes were breached, inundating three villages with 5 feet of water.

"Up to now, no deaths have been reported. That's our victory," he said.

Surrounded by rescue workers in life jackets, Dung urged local authorities to evacuate more people to safety and provide them with food and health care. Some 30,000 people from the district had been evacuated to higher ground the night before.

Weather forecasters said Typhoon Damrey was weakening as it slowly moved across northern and central Vietnam. By late afternoon, it was already crossing the border into Laos.

Eight flights to and from Hanoi were canceled Tuesday, temporarily stranding 400 passengers at the airport, said Vietnam Airlines spokesman Nguyen Chan.

Before hitting Vietnam, Typhoon Damrey — which means elephant in the Khmer language of Cambodia — ravaged southern China's Hainan island and the neighboring province of Guangdong, killing nine.

Four others were killed by tornadoes spawned by the typhoon, China's official Xinhua News Agency reported. Officials said about 25,000 homes were demolished and another 100,000 damaged, Xinhua reported.

It was the most destructive typhoon to hit southern China in more than three decades.

While still a tropical storm in the Philippines last week, Damrey triggered rain that killed at least 18 people there.

New eruption at Mexico's Volcano of Fire

By: - MEXICO CITY (AP) — A small eruption Tuesday of the Volcano of Fire in western Mexico scattered ash onto adjacent towns, the Jalisco state civil defense agency said.

No injuries were reported.

Clouds obscured the plume of gas and ash triggered by the eruption at 5:07 a.m. (6:07 a.m. EDT). The towns affected were to the west and southwest of the volcano, the agency said.

The 12,533-foot volcano on the border of Jalisco and Colima states — 420 miles west of Mexico City — is among the country's most active and most dangerous.

It has erupted repeatedly in recent years. On Sept. 16, it sent ash and gas three miles into the air.

Officials had warned Monday that an eruption this week was likely.

New eruption at Mexico's Volcano of Fire

MEXICO CITY — A small eruption Tuesday of the Volcano of Fire in western Mexico scattered ash onto adjacent towns, the Jalisco state civil defense agency said.

No injuries were reported.

Clouds obscured the plume of gas and ash triggered by the eruption at 5:07 a.m. (6:07 a.m. EDT). The towns affected were to the west and southwest of the volcano, the agency said.

The 12,533-foot volcano on the border of Jalisco and Colima states — 420 miles west of Mexico City — is among the country's most active and most dangerous.

It has erupted repeatedly in recent years. On Sept. 16, it sent ash and gas three miles into the air.

Officials had warned Monday that an eruption this week was likely.

Hostage of accused courthouse shooter says she gave him drugs

ATLANTA (AP) — Ashley Smith, the woman who says she persuaded suspected courthouse gunman Brian Nichols to release her by talking about her faith, discloses in a new book that she gave him methamphetamine during the hostage ordeal.

Smith did not share that detail with authorities at the time. But investigators said she came clean about the drugs when they interviewed her months later. They said they have no plans to charge her with drug possession.

In her book, "Unlikely Angel," released Tuesday, Smith says Nichols had her bound on her bed with masking tape and an extension cord. She says he asked for marijuana, but she did not have any, and she dug into her illegal stash of crystal meth instead.

Smith, a 27-year-old widowed mother who gained widespread praise for her level-headedness, says the seven-hour hostage ordeal in March led to the realization that she was a drug addict, and she says she has not used drugs since the night before she was taken captive.

"If I did die, I wasn't going to heaven and say, 'Oh, excuse me, God. Let me wipe my nose, because I just did some drugs before I got here,"' Smith told the Augusta Chronicle.

Police said Nichols took Smith hostage in her apartment March 11 after a shooting rampage at the Atlanta courthouse.

During the ordeal, Smith says, she pulled out Rick Warren's book "The Purpose-Driven Life" and read to Nichols a chapter called "Using What God Gave Me" to gain his trust. Nichols later released her, and she called 911 and told authorities where to find him.

Nichols is accused of killing four people, including a judge, and could get the death penalty.

Since Nichols' arrest, Smith has received $70,000 in rewards and has been bombarded with offers for books, movies and speaking engagements. Her ordeal has been held up as an example of the redemptive power of faith.

"It's hard for people to understand the miracle of the story," she told the newspaper. "This was totally a God thing, to me in my life. This was God getting my attention, going, `I'm going to give you one more chance."'

Financial details of the book have not been released, but Smith pledged to donate an undisclosed portion of the book's proceeds to a memorial fund for the victims.

Calls to Nichols' attorneys were not immediately returned Tuesday. Prosecution spokesman Erik Friedly would not comment on the case.

Smith says in her book that as the night wore on — after Nichols had snorted some of Smith's meth — she tried to win Nichols' trust by talking about her faith in God and relating to him her personal stories.

She says she told him how her husband had died in her arms four years earlier after being stabbed during a brawl.

She writes that she asked Nichols if he wanted to see the danger of drugs and lifted up her tank top several inches to reveal a five-inch scar down the center of her torso — the aftermath of a car wreck caused by drug-induced psychosis. She says she let go of the steering wheel when she heard a voice saying, "Let go and let God."

Cousin admits causing death of 7-year-old in New Jersey abuse case

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — The teenage cousin of a 7-year-old boy whose decomposed body was found stuffed in a basement storage bin pleaded guilty to manslaughter Tuesday, saying he killed the child while performing a wrestling move.

The admission from Wesley Murphy, the 19-year-old cousin of Faheem Williams, came in a case that generated nationwide outrage and led to a shakeup of New Jersey's child welfare agency.

"I tried to flip him on the bed, but he missed the bed and hit the floor," Murphy told a judge. "I was in shock. I ran out of the house. I think he was unconscious."

The prosecution recommended a sentence of four years for reckless manslaughter, but state Superior Court Judge Michael Casale said he was open to a lesser term at Murphy's sentencing in November.

Also pleading guilty Tuesday was Murphy's mother, Sherry Murphy, who admitted finding Faheem's body on the floor of her Irvington apartment in September 2002, trying to revive him, then leaving her dead nephew there for several days.

Murphy said she brought the plastic bin with her when she moved to Newark, where it was found in the basement in January 2003.

She also admitted she provided inadequate food and water to Faheem's twin, Raheem, and a younger half-brother, Tyrone Hill.

In pleading guilty to criminal restraint, aggravated assault and endangering the welfare of a child, Sherry Murphy, 41, faces 13.5 years in prison when she is sentenced Nov. 2.

Authorities investigated complaints involving Faheem but closed the case 11 months before his body was found. After his death, child welfare officials pledged to hire more employees and reduce caseloads for social workers.

Also Tuesday, family friend Joseph Reese, 48, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting one of the boys in 2001 and faces a term of up to seven years when sentenced Jan. 20.

The children's mother, Melinda Williams, entrusted her sons to Sherry Murphy, her cousin, before going to jail in an unrelated case. Now freed, she wants to regain custody of her surviving children.

"I just want to get my kids back," she said. "What my cousin did, I have to live with it each and every day."

Rains flood homes, kill at least three in Mexico, Central America

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Intense rains throughout southern Mexico and parts of Central America have forced thousands of people from their homes, caused rivers to overflow their banks and resulted in the deaths of at least three people.

In southern Mexico, local officials declared a state of emergency in parts of Chiapas state and some 2,000 people were living in temporary shelters Tuesday after being forced from their homes by flooding and landslides.

On Monday, police officer Francisco Malpica drowned in a swollen river while trying to help several residents. In southern Guerrero state, a landslide buried a wooden home in Acapulco, killing one man.

In neighborhing Oaxaca state, more than 1,000 people were evacuated from their homes and were staying in shelters.

In El Salvador, heavy rains on Monday flooded rivers, and one man drowned in the capital's Acelhuate River.

Two other people were injured when an electric wire fell on their vehicle. The rains flooded homes and cars, temporarily trapping some people in their vehicles. There were electricity outages in parts of San Salvador.

In Honduras, a landslide on a remote highway left 15,000 people trapped in several coffee-growing communities.

Woman found dead, seminude in northern Mexican border city

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (AP) — Police on Tuesday recovered the partially clad body of a woman who had been dumped on a soccer field in this border city infamous for years of largely unsolved killings against women, authorities said.

The victim, who had not yet been identified, was found near the state prosecutor's office in Juarez, a city of 1.3 million across from El Paso, Texas, by two young men who alerted police, according to assistant state prosecutor Flor Aguilar.

She was between 40 and 50 years old and was found in some bushes wearing only a white T-shirt. Investigators also recovered a set of red sweat pants and a large red bag, Aguilar said.

Aguilar said the woman's body showed no signs of excessive violence, but declined to comment on whether the victim had been sexually assaulted. She said investigators were waiting for an autopsy report to establish the cause of death.

Federal investigators say more than 350 women have been killed here since 1993. About 100 killings followed an eerily similar pattern in which young women were sexually assaulted, strangled and dumped in the desert.

Authorities say the last victims of sexually motivated killings were found in 2003, when the remains of three young women were discovered.

Since the beginning of the year, more than 20 women have been killed in Ciudad Juarez and authorities have said most died in incidents of domestic violence.

France opens manslaughter case against former head of Concorde program

PARIS (AP) — Five years after a Concorde crashed in flames outside Paris, killing 113 people, France has taken the first step toward prosecuting an official who oversaw the supersonic jets, judicial officials said Tuesday.

Henri Perrier, a former head of the Concorde program, was placed under investigation — a step short of formal charges — for manslaughter and involuntary injury, the officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because French law bars the disclosure of information from judicial investigations.

Perrier, 76, served as chief engineer on the Concorde's first test flight in 1969 and directed the Concorde program in the 1980s and early 1990s. He is the first person to be placed under investigation in the crash. He was questioned by officials for nearly 12 hours on Monday and Tuesday.

Investigating judge Christophe Regnard has summoned three other executives from Concorde-maker Aerospatiale, one of whom was to be questioned Wednesday. Aerospatiale is now part of EADS, the European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co.

Three officials from France's civil aviation agency, the DGAC, have been called for questioning next month.

The Air France Concorde crashed on July 25, 2000, shortly after takeoff from Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport, headed for New York. As it rose from the runway, flames streaked from the jet's left wing. It crashed moments later, killing all 109 people on board and four on the ground.

Two investigations — one by France's accident agency, the other by the prosecutors' office — concluded that a titanium strip left on the runway by a Continental Airlines DC-10 was to blame. The metal strip had caused a Concorde tire to burst, propelling rubber debris that perforated the jet's fuel tanks, located under the wings.

Continental was placed under investigation in March for alleged manslaughter and involuntary injury. French prosecutors contend that the carrier had violated Federal Aviation Administration rules by using titanium in a part of the plane that normally called for use of aluminum, which is softer.

The French judicial inquiry also determined that the jet's fuel tanks lacked sufficient protection from shock — and that Concorde's makers had been aware of the weakness since 1979.

According to that report, which was made public last year, in the 60 cases of ruptured tires recorded since the Concorde entered service, seven led to a punctured tank. The reinforcement of the tanks only took place after the plane restarted service in November 2001, the report said.

In an interview with The Associated Press a year after the crash, Perrier said the Concorde's makers were stunned by the crash.

"Nothing we knew would ever have led us to believe that such a catastrophe could happen," said Perrier, who worked with the aircraft until his retirement in 1994 and then joined investigators after the crash to determine what went wrong.

"This was a catastrophic mishap," he said in the 2001 interview.

The supersonic planes were flown commercially by Air France and British Airways, and were finally retired in 2003 amid ballooning costs and dwindling ticket sales.

Anti-drug federal prosecutor shot and killed in northern Mexico

MONTERREY, Mexico (AP) — An anti-drug federal prosecutor was shot and killed while driving in a Monterrey suburb, police said Tuesday.

Police said Miguel Esquivel, 42, was shot late Monday in the city of Guadalupe, where he was assigned to a federal task force against organized crime.

Witnesses told investigators an unknown number of gunmen had been chasing Esquivel and opened fire from a white car. A man who was riding with Esquivel was being questioned but authorities have made no arrests and have yet to determine a motive for the killing.

In Nuevo Laredo, a 24-year-old man was shot to death Monday while he washed his pickup truck in a downtown neighborhood.

Oscar Martinez was shot at least 12 times by a lone gunman who escaped in a car. Martinez died minutes after arriving at a hospital, said Victor Almanza, an investigator for Tamaulipas state, which includes Nuevo Laredo.

Since January, more than 130 people have been killed in drug-related violence in the border city across from Laredo, Texas.

The border region in northeast Mexico has seen a sharp increase in drug-related killings after the man alleged to be the area's top drug lord, Osiel Cardenas, was arrested in 2003 during a shootout in Matamoros, across from Brownsville, Texas.

Authorities say the violence has intensified as another drug gang battles smugglers loyal to Cardenas to gain access to border drug routes.

Hearing set on Laci Peterson's life insurance policy

MODESTO (AP) — A judge on Tuesday set an Oct. 21 court date to decide who will collect Laci Peterson's $250,000 life insurance policy.

Sharon Rocha, the mother of the slain pregnant teacher, petitioned the court for the money, her attorney, Adam Stewart, said Tuesday.

But Scott Peterson's attorney, Mark Geragos, won't give up his client's claim to the money until he has exhausted appeals of his conviction in her murder.

"We shouldn't have to wait a quarter of a century to find out whether he's exonerated or put to death," Stewart said Tuesday after a brief hearing in Stanislaus County Superior Court.

Peterson was convicted and sentenced to death last year for killing his pregnant wife and the fetus she carried. He maintains his innocence.

A $25 million wrongful death lawsuit filed against Scott Peterson by Laci Peterson's family is set for trial April 4.

A telephone call to Geragos was not immediately returned Tuesday.

Two to share $100,000 reward in Wendy's finger case

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A Las Vegas man who complained he hadn't received a $100,000 reward from Wendy's International Inc. for helping solve the infamous "chili finger" case will split the reward with an anonymous tipster, the company said Tuesday.

Mike Casey, who runs the asphalt plant in Las Vegas that employed both the man who lost the finger and the husband of the woman who claimed she gagged when she bit into the digit, said last week that he provided the tip that helped authorities unravel the scheme.

"I did what they wanted and they offered it, so I think I have it coming," he said at the time.

Wendy's, based in Dublin, Ohio, said it was grateful to the tipsters who called a hot line set up when profits plunged after reports of the hoax hit headlines worldwide and quickly became a fodder for late-night comedians and water cooler chatter.

"We sincerely thank these citizens for stepping forward and calling the special hot line number with information that helped investigators break open this case," Wendy's officials said in a statement.

Casey could not immediately be reached by phone at work Tuesday. A person who answered the phone said he was away at a seminar and would probably not return calls.

Company officials said the second recipient asked to remain anonymous.

Anna Ayala, 39, and Jaime Placencia, 43, face sentencing Nov. 2 after pleading guilty earlier this month in Santa Clara County Superior Court to conspiring to file a false claim and attempted grand theft. Placencia's co-worker lost the finger in an industrial accident.

Ayala said she found the fingertip March 22 while eating chili with her family. Authorities said they believed it was a bogus report, but the story quickly took on a life of its own.

Wendy's set up a hot line and offered a reward for information leading to the finger's owner. The fast food chain said it lost $2.5 million from the bad publicity.

The company said the district attorney's office and police asked that Wendy's not distribute the reward until the case was resolved, since the tipsters could have been asked to testify.

On the Net:

Wendy's International: www.wendys.com