LADY LAKE, Fla. - Disaster crews with dogs went from one pile of debris to another in a search for bodies Friday after powerful storms, including at least one tornado, smashed hundreds of homes across central Florida and killed 19 people or more.

It was the deadliest combination of thunderstorms and tornados to hit Florida in nearly a decade, cutting a 40-mile swath of destruction across four counties just before daybreak, terrorizing residents of one of the nation's biggest retirement communities, and leaving trees and fields littered with clothes, furniture and splintered lumber.

Residents help pull the dead from the ruins.

"It was scary, really scary," said Patrick Smith, who lives in the Paisley area, where at least 13 deaths were reported. He said he saw a weather alert on television, grabbed his wife and "went straight to the floor." After the storm passed, he pulled the bodies of a man and his 9- or 10-year-old son from a neighboring house.

Florida's emergency management chief, Craig Fugate, said it could take several days to determine the exact number of dead, and the main priority was finding survivors who may be trapped.

Gov. Charlie Crist declared a state of emergency in four counties, but the worst damage was reported where the twister touched down in northern Lake County and eastern Volusia County. In typical tornado fashion, the storm hopscotched across the landscape, demolishing some homes and leaving others virtually untouched.

"Our priority today is search and rescue," said Crist, who toured the damaged area in his first natural disaster since taking office last month. "Everything's being done to get them the aid and assistance that they need."

Lake County spokesman Christopher Patton said there were 19 confirmed deaths, all in Lake County, about 50 miles northwest of Orlando. The dead included at least two high school students, authorities said. Numerous injuries were reported, but officials could not immediately estimate how many.

Authorities said hundreds of houses, mobile homes and other buildings were damaged or destroyed.

The storm left yards strewn with chairs, beds and clothes, knocked trailer-trailers onto their sides as if they were toys, and tore away roofs. Debris hung from trees, and some homes were thrown off their foundations.

Bernadette Fields, 67, said two of her neighbors in mobile homes were blown through a bedroom wall into Lake Mack. Their bodies were found by their own dog, she said.

Dozens of rescue workers - many hardened by experience with Florida's multiple hurricanes - went from house to house, spray-painting big red X's to mark the husks of buildings that they had checked. Often they found people who awoke to the storm's roar and watched their homes disintegrate around them.

Lee Shaver, 54, said he and his wife, Irene, and their dog had "about 10 seconds" to take shelter in a closet before their roof was torn off.

"Every muscle and bone in my body shook," said Lee Shaver outside his damaged home in The Villages, one of the nation's largest retirement communities.

"It was terrifying. You're not thinking consciously. You're just trying to save your life," added his 55-year-old wife.

Tornado watches had been posted hours before the twister struck, and warnings were issued between eight and 15 minutes before they touched down, said meteorologist Dave Sharp of the National Weather Service in Melbourne.

But few people were listening to the radio or watching television at that hour, and few communities in the region have warning sirens.

"The most dangerous tornado scenario is a threat for killer tornadoes at night, and that was the case," Sharp said.

Vern Huber, 87, said his weather radio alarm went off around 3:30 a.m. and he and his wife, Louedna, 81, huddled in the hall and put pillows from the couch on top of themselves.

"It was a deafening roar," Huber said.

In Lady Lake, the Church of God was demolished, its pews, altar and torn Bibles left in a jumbled mess. The 31-year-old, steel-reinforced structure was built to withstand 150-mph winds, the Rev. Larry Lynn said.

By daybreak, parishioners gathered on the lot where the church once stood, hugging each other and consoling Lynn. They planned to clear the debris and hold Sunday services on the empty lot.

"That's just the building, the people are the church. We'll be back bigger and stronger," Lynn said.

While Lake County got the worst of it, Volusia County officials reported that 69 homes were damaged in New Smyrna Beach. A county medical clinic in DeLand was severely damaged.

"We heard a big boom then we heard the freight-train noise. All five of us got in the closet," said Linda Craig, 44, who lives in Hontoon Island, a heavily damaged area of Volusia County.

The winds lifted one tractor-trailer and dropped it on another, pinning the driver in his cab, said Kim Miller, a spokeswoman with the Florida Highway Patrol. The driver's injuries were not considered life-threatening.

About 10,000 customers were without power. Several counties opened shelters for those who lost their homes.

Friday's storms were reminiscent of past tornados during years where El Nino was a weather factor, as it was again in this case, said state meteorologist Ben Nelson.

In February 1998, five twisters hit near Orlando over two days, killing 42 people and damaging or destroying about 2,600 homes and businesses. It was Florida's deadliest tornado event on record.

- Associated Press reporters Curt Anderson, Damian Grass, Suzette Laboy, Stephen Majors, Adrian Sainz and Ron Word contributed to this report.

Punxsutawney Phil doesn't see his shadow, predicts early spring ahead

PUNXSUTAWNEY, Pa. (AP) - A new pair of hands pulled Punxsutawney Phil from his stump this year, so it was only fitting that the groundhog offered a new prediction. - Phil did not see his shadow on Friday which, according to German folklore, means folks can expect an early spring instead of six more weeks of winter.

Since 1886, Phil has seen his shadow 96 times, hasn't seen it 14 times and there are no records for nine years, according to the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club. The last time Phil failed to see his shadow was in 1999.

More than 15,000 revelers milled about in a misty snow waiting for the prediction, as fireworks exploded overhead and the "Pennsylvania Polka" and other music blared in the background.

Longtime handler Bill Deeley retired after more than a dozen years and was replaced Friday by Punxsutawney Groundhog Club Inner Circle members John Griffiths and Ben Hughes.

Each Feb. 2, thousands of people descend on Punxsutawney, a town of about 6,100 people about 65 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, to celebrate what had essentially been a German superstition.

The Germans believed that if a hibernating animal cast a shadow on Feb. 2 - the Christian holiday of Candlemas - winter would last another six weeks. If no shadow was seen, legend said spring would come early.

On the Net:

http://www.groundhog.org

Siberians warned not to eat yellow, orange and green snow

MOSCOW (AP) - Russian emergency workers have flown to a Siberian region where smelly, orange-, yellow- and green-colored snow fell earlier this week covering about a 40 square miles, officials said Friday.

The Emergency Situations Ministry said that officials in the Omsk region, about 1,400 miles east of Moscow, had warned local residents not use the snow for drinking or other purposes, and to keep domestic animals from it.

The ministry said the snow, which fell Wednesday afternoon, was yellow, green and orange and had an oily texture and unpleasant smell.

More than 27,000 people live in the area where the snow fell, but no health problems had yet been reported, the ministry said.

Local officials in Omsk could not be immediately reached for comment.

The RIA-Novosti news agency, meanwhile, cited an emergency official in the adjacent region of Tyumen, west of Omsk, as saying strange colored snow had fallen there as well.

Dutch gym to introduce 'Naked Sunday' for naturists

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) - Self-conscious about what you wear while working out? A Dutch gym plans to introduce "Naked Sunday" for people who like to huff and puff in the buff.

Patrick de Man, owner of Fitworld gym in the town of Heteren, said he got the idea in part from two of his customers who are avid nudists.

"I heard that some other gyms are offering courses on 'pole-dancing' as a sport, so I thought: Why not bring something new to the market?" de Man said.

He said the response had been overwhelming - positive and negative.

The 70,000-member Dutch Federation of Naturists was curious to see if Fitworld's plan would work, spokesman Bernd Huiser said.

"We recently conducted a large survey among our members, and most prefer to exercise with their clothes on," he said. "The most popular activities (for nudists) are things you do outdoors, like walking on the beach, or swimming in a lake, or maybe gardening."

De Man said the first question Fitworld customers were asking was whether it would be sanitary.

Nude exercisers would be required to put towels down on weight machines and to use disposable seat covers while riding bikes. All machines would be cleaned and disinfected afterward. "We clean them every day anyway," he said.

The first "Naked Sunday" is scheduled for March 4.

Atlantic City casino serves up $1,000 desserts

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) - For $1,000 in Monopoly, you can buy Boardwalk and Park Place and still have $250 left over. In the real Atlantic City, here's what $1,000 will get you these days: dessert.

And that's not even counting the tip.

Hyper-expensive desserts are the latest way increasingly upscale Atlantic City has found to separate casino winners from their winnings.

Calling the four-figure offering at Brulee: The Dessert Experience, just a brownie is a bit of an understatement. After all, you could get 371 boxes of Betty Crocker Supreme Ultimate Fudge Brownie mix for a grand.

The brownie at dessert-only restaurant in The Quarter at Tropicana Casino and Resort is made with hazelnuts imported from Italy, topped with gold dust, served with a vintage port wine in a $750 Baccarat crystal that the dessert-eater gets to keep as a souvenir. Like the other offerings at the restaurant, it's served with two other courses of dessert.

"You have this beautiful atomizer filled with the finest port known to man, pastry chef Jemal Edwards told The Press of Atlantic City. You take a bite of the brownie, and as the flavors are coating your palate, your partner squirts the port onto your tongue. The acidity and sweetness from the port are hitting your mouth at the same time."

Who would make such a gamble on dessert?

Big casino winners, of course, Edwards said.

The offering has not been a huge seller. In a year, Brulee has sold just three.

But that's not discouraging Red Square, a Russian-themed restaurant also in The Quarter, from offering another dessert at the same price, starting on Valentine's Day.

It's a chocolate pound cake with a raspberry chambord "bellini" and a plate of black tapioca pearls made to look like caviar, along with real caviar, shaved chocolate, fresh fruits, chopped candied nuts and two shots of super-pricey vodka served in Russian Faberge eggs, which the customer keeps.

Texas teacher disciplined for showing parts of R-rated slavery movie 'Amistad' to 5th-graders

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - An elementary school teacher was disciplined for showing her fifth-graders parts of the R-rated film "Amistad" during a lesson on slavery.

On Jan. 25, Larue Washington showed her Ridglea Hills Elementary class clips from the 1997 Steven Spielberg film depicting slaves en route to the Americas, including a scene in which a character was stabbed, district officials said.

Washington failed to follow school board policy requiring commercial movies to be reviewed and approved by the school principal, the district said.

The policy also prohibits showing any portions of an R-rated movie, and the principal would not have approved the film, district spokeswoman Barbara Griffith said. Letters explaining what happened were sent to parents this week, Griffith said.

Washington, who has taught for 27 years, declined to comment. The school district did not disclose what disciplinary action was taken.

"Amistad," released in 1997 and starring Morgan Freeman and Anthony Hopkins, is based on the true story of the 1839 revolt by Africans aboard the slave ship Amistad and the ensuing court case against them.

Larry Shaw, executive director of the United Educators Association, said Washington was trying to give students a sense of what life was like on a slave ship. He said it's not uncommon for teachers to forget to submit movie clips for approval since they are not showing a whole movie for entertainment.

Last May, officials in the Alvarado school district apologized after teachers showed fifth-graders a clip from "Saving Private Ryan," another R-rated Spielberg movie, this one about D-Day. Also last year, a teacher in the Birdville district was suspended after showing the Gulf War movie "Jarhead" to a high school class.

Squirrels just wanna have fun

LYNCHBURG, Va. (AP) - Audrey Hudgins never saw it coming, but then, who would have?

Hudgins, a sophomore from Durham, N.C., was sitting on a bench outside the campus' Main Hall on Tuesday when a squirrel crawled up her leg and sat in her lap.

"They come close to you, they're really friendly, but they don't climb on you," Hudgins said Wednesday.

To Hudgins' surprise, the squirrel - described as an infamous chowhound named Toby - snatched a piece of the strawberry Nutri-Grain bar she was holding.

"I said to myself, 'That doesn't happen every day."'

But when Toby went back for a second bite it locked on, and bit through Hudgins' right thumbnail.

At that point, the communications major said she tried to unlatch the squirrel by beating it against the bench.

"What else do you do in that situation?" she asked. "There's no stop, drop and roll."

After Hudgins shook Toby off, she sat in shock.

"He's looking at me, I'm looking at him," she said of the moment just before the squirrel grabbed the Nutri-Grain bar that she had dropped during the struggle and ran off.

A while later Hudgins met up with her friend Amberly Fradsham, a senior, who took her to the hospital to get the first in a series of rabies shots she'll need this week as a precaution.

"After everybody at the hospital laughed at her, I took her to Cold Stone Creamery for ice cream," Fradsham said.

In an e-mail on Tuesday, school officials told students about what had happened to Hudgins.

The e-mail's subject line?

"Please don't feed the squirrels."

Acapulco nightclub inspector says he witnessed beating of Canadian tourist

ACAPULCO, Mexico (AP) - A nightclub inspector in this Pacific resort city said Friday he and at least one of his colleagues witnessed the beating of a Canadian tourist before he was struck by a car - supporting claims by the victim's family that his death was more than a hit-and-run.

The inspector, who asked not to be identified for fear of repercussions, told The Associated Press that he and others saw Adam DePrisco, 19, from Woodbridge, Ontario, leave the Mandara discotheque in the pre-dawn hours of Jan. 9 with signs of being beaten.

The inspector said employees of the disco and taxi drivers continued to beat him outside the club, and that DePrisco was later struck by a car in front of a nearby disco as he ran to escape.

DePrisco was hospitalized with severe injuries, and died the following day.

The inspector said he and his colleagues relayed what they had seen to their boss, Juan Isidro Anorve, who is in charge of nightclub inspections in Acapulco, but that Anorve "told us to go, that nothing had happened."

Anorve told the AP he found no evidence to support the inspector's allegations.

Anorve said he entered the Mandara club after receiving a call regarding a disturbance there early Jan. 9, but "the employees and those in charge told me nothing had happened there, that the Canadian man had been run over."

"I was there personally and I did not find anything unusual," he said.

If authorities had determined that a beating had taken place inside the disco, they would have had to shut the club down while police investigated further.

Last month an Acapulco city official who asked that his name not be used because he was concerned it could put him in danger, said that witnesses had seen nightclub staff and taxi drivers severely beating DePrisco.

DePrisco's family told The Canadian Press last month that doctors had said DePrisco's injuries "did not indicate that it was a hit-and-run accident" and that they believe he was beaten. The family has asked Ottawa authorities to investigate.

DePrisco's traveling companion, Marco Calabro, has told the family that DePrisco had been dancing with a local woman when a bouncer grabbed him and removed him from the club. He said he later found a severely beaten DePrisco outside the club.

Calabro also said the hotel room where he and DePrisco were staying had been robbed. The two were in Acapulco for a two-week vacation.

In February, Woodbridge residents Domenic and Nancy Ianiero were found dead with their throats slashed in their hotel room in the resort of Cancun. The killings have not been solved and family members have accused Mexican authorities of botching the investigation.

Mexican police: British tourist plunges to death from 14th floor of Cancun hotel

CANCUN, Mexico (AP) - A 34-year-old British tourist plunged to his death from the 14th floor of a hotel in the Caribbean resort of Cancun on Thursday, Mexican police reported. - On Friday, British Foreign Office spokesman Mujib Ali confirmed the death of the man, who he said was from the "greater Manchester area."

"Mexican police are investigating the incident," Ali said, adding that the Foreign Office was not releasing the man's identity or confirming "any personal details" about him at the request of his family.

Mexican authorities said employees of the Riu Cancun hotel told them the tourist had a noisy argument with a woman believed to be his girlfriend before he fell.

"We do not know precisely what happened," said Antonia Salmeron, a spokeswoman for the attorney general's office in the state of Quintana Roo, where Cancun is located. "The only thing that hotel employees and guards have said is that the couple had a very forceful argument."

"Shouting was heard in the room, and later, about 12:30 p.m., there was a report that a man had fallen from the 14th floor," Salmeron said.

The woman, whose name also was not released, was being questioned in the case.

The victim's body was recovered by state prosecutors. In Mexico, an autopsy is usually conducted in such cases.

Women, not men, choose spouses on African isle

ORANGO ISLAND, Guinea-Bissau (AP) - He was 14 when the girl entered his grass-covered hut and placed a plate of steaming fish in front of him.

Like all men on this African isle, Carvadju Jose Nananghe knew exactly what it meant. Refusing was not an option. His heart pounding, he lifted the aromatic dish, prepared with an ancient recipe, to his lips, agreeing in one bite to marry the girl.

"I had no feelings for her," said Nananghe, now 65. "Then when I ate this meal, it was like lightning. I wanted only her."

In this archipelago of 50 islands off the western rim of Africa, it's women, not men, who choose. They make their proposals public by offering their grooms-to-be a dish of distinctively prepared fish, marinated in red palm oil. Once they have asked, men are powerless to say no.

To have refused, explained Nananghe, remembering the day half a century ago, would have dishonored his family - and in any case, why would he want to choose his own wife?

"Love comes first into the heart of the woman," he explained. "Once it's in the woman, only then can it jump into the man."

But the treacherous tides and narrow channels that have long kept outsiders out of these remote islands are no longer holding back the modern world. The young men of Orango, 40 miles off the West African country of Guinea-Bissau, are finding jobs carrying luggage for tourist hotels on the archipelago's more developed islands. Others collect oil from the island's abundant palm trees and sell it on the mainland.

They return with a new form of courtship, one which their elders find deeply unsettling.

"Now the world is upside down," complained 90-year-old Cesar Okrane, his eyes obscured by a cloud of cataracts. "Men are running after women, instead of waiting for them to come to them."

For a man to go so far as to openly propose marriage is dangerous, say traditionalists on this island of 2,000 people.

"The choice of a woman is much more stable," explains Okrane. "Rarely were there divorces before. Now, with men choosing, divorce has become common."

Records are not readily available, but islanders agree that there are significantly more divorces now than in the years when men waited patiently for a proposal on a plate.

They waited some more, as their brides-to-be then set out for the eggshell-white beaches encircling the island, looking for the raw materials with which to build their new house.

Women built all the grass-covered huts here, dragging driftwood back from the ocean to use as poles, cutting blond grass to weave into roofs and shaping the pink mud into bricks. Only once the house was built, a process that takes at least four months, could the couple move in and their marriage be considered official.

There are matrilineal cultures in numerous pockets of the world, including in other parts of Africa, as well as in China's Yunnan province and in northeastern Thailand, says anthropologist Christine Henry, a researcher at France's National Center for Scientific Research.

But the unquestioned authority given to women in matters of the heart on Orango island is unique - "I don't know of it happening anywhere else," says Henry, who has written a book on the customs of the archipelago.

That things are changing is evident in the material chosen for the island's newest house: concrete. It was erected by paid laborers, not local women.

Although priestesses still control the island's relationship with the spirit world, their clout is waning, as Christian missionaries have established churches here.

"When I get married it will be in a church, wearing a white dress and a veil," says 19-year-old Marisa de Pina, striking a modern pose outside her family's hut wearing tight Capri pants and sequined sandals.

She says the Protestant church she attends has taught her that it is men, not women, who should make the first move and so she plans to wait for a man to approach her. To make her point, the teenager pops into her hut and returns holding a worn copy of the New Testament, its pages stuffed with post-it notes, letters and business cards.

Her decision has caused strife inside the mud walls of her family's house.

Like her niece, Edelia Noro wears store-bought clothes instead of the grass skirts still favored by some older women. She, too, attends church. But she says she doesn't see why these trappings of modern life should alter the system of courtship.

Although the island's unique customs may be fading, there are still pockets of resistance. Often, it's women who lure men back into the fold of ancient ways.

Now 23, Laurindo Carvalho first spotted the girl when he was 13. He worked in a tourist hotel, wore jeans, owned a cell phone and thought of himself as a modern man, so he thought he could turn tradition on its head and ask the girl to marry him. With the wave of a hand, she rejected him.

Six years passed and one day, when both were 19, he heard a knock at his door. Outside, his love stood holding out a plate of freshly caught fish, a coy smile on her face.

Carvalho still wears sandblasted jeans and flip-flops bearing the Adidas logo, but he now sees himself as embedded in the village's matriarchal fiber.

"I learned the hard way that here, a man never approaches a woman," he says.

Officials: Florida ring that stole $48,000 worth of baby formula broken up with arrest of 7

STUART, Fla. (AP) - A theft ring that stole $48,000 worth of baby formula from grocery stores was broken up with the arrest of seven people, officials said. - The seven were arrested after an informant told the Florida Department of Law Enforcement that the group planned to steal formula at stores in Hobe Sound and Stuart, officials said Thursday.

At one of the stores, a Publix in Stuart, four suspects happened to be inside Wednesday just as the manager learned of the plot from the FDLE, authorities said.

The four fled when the manager confronted them but were found that day at a storage unit, where officials say they were seen unloading stolen baby formula. Three others were arrested Thursday.

Powdered baby formula has often been a target of thieves because of its high price. A 25.7-ounce can of powdered Similac formula costs about $25.

Most of the stolen baby food is repackaged and sold, which health experts say poses a potential danger to infants. Drug dealers also sometimes use the powdered formula to cut cocaine.

Mayor converts to Islam, wants to change name

MACON, Ga. (AP) - Mayor Jack Ellis has converted to Islam and is working to change his legal name to Hakim Mansour Ellis.

Ellis, 61, a Macon native who was raised Christian, said he became a Sunni Muslim during a December ceremony in the west African nation of Senegal.

Ellis said he has studied the Quran for years and that his new religion was practiced by his ancestors before they were brought to North America as slaves.

"Why does one become a Christian?" Ellis said Thursday. "You do it because it feels right. … To me it's no big deal. But people like to know what you believe in."

Name-changing by Ismaic converts is a common practice that is considered commendable, though it is typically not required.

Ellis said he would keep his last name at the request of two daughters.

Ellis, whose mayoral term expires this year, said he hasn't calculated how his religious conversion might affect him politically. He said he is proud to live in a country founded on religious freedom.

"If anybody wants to know about Islam, I can hold an intelligent conversation," Ellis said. "What I've found is how little we know about the religion."

On the Net:

Official biography: http://cityofmacon.net/CityDept/mayor/aboutmayor.htm

Michigan court: Gay partners can't get benefits from public universities, government agencies

LANSING, Mich. (AP) - Public universities and state and local governments would violate the state constitution by providing health insurance to the partners of gay employees, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled Friday.

A three-judge panel said a 2004 voter-approved ban on gay marriage also applies to same-sex domestic partner benefits. The decision reverses a 2005 ruling from an Ingham County judge who said universities and governments could provide the benefits.

"The marriage amendment's plain language prohibits public employers from recognizing same-sex unions for any purpose," the court wrote.

A constitutional amendment passed by Michigan voters in November 2004 made the union between a man and a woman the only agreement recognized as a marriage "or similar union for any purpose." Those six words led to the court fight over benefits for gay couples.

Gay couples and others had argued that the public intended to ban gay marriage but not block benefits for unmarried opposite sex or same-sex domestic partners.

The appeals court agreed with the Michigan attorney general, Republican Mike Cox, who said in a March 2005 opinion that same-sex benefits are not allowed in a state that does not recognize same-sex unions.

The legal challenge was mounted by 21 gay couples who work for the city of Kalamazoo, universities and the state.

"The protection of the institution of marriage is a long-standing public policy and tradition in the law of Michigan," Judges Kurtis Wilder, Joel Hoekstra and Brian Zahra noted In the unanimous ruling.

Jeffrey Montgomery, executive director of the Triangle Foundation, a leading gay and lesbian advocacy group in Michigan, said the legal sanctity of marriage was not in question.

"This ruling will result in families being robbed of their health care and other basic necessities that are fundamental to protecting their well being," he said.

The case will be appealed to the Michigan Supreme Court, said Jay Kaplan, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan.

"We're very disappointed by this result," he said. "It's a misguided analysis, and they produced a heartless result. It was never the voters' intention in 2004 to take away health insurance benefits from families and children."

Clemson students apologize for gang-themed party criticized as racist

CLEMSON, S.C. (AP) - More than a dozen Clemson University students apologized at an emotional campus meeting for a gang-themed party many criticized as racist after photos emerged showing a white person wearing blackface, school officials said.

The university organized the meeting, allowing 15 partygoers to stand up one by one and express remorse in front of about 200 people.

"Some people really recognized the courage that it took," said Gail DiSabatino, vice president for student affairs. There was discussion, tears, "and eventually there was hugging," she said.

University president Jim Barker and the NAACP announced investigations into the party, which was held during Martin Luther King Jr. weekend, after photos emerged online earlier this week. The pictures featured some white students drinking malt liquor and at least one wearing blackface.

"They didn't know that they were being racist. It's really sad," said Ranniece McDonald, a junior who is black.

McDonald said Wednesday's meeting was productive and the apologies seemed sincere, "for the most part."

The school also has said it was investigating whether students were harassed or whether there was underage drinking at the party.

Report with Wisconsin lawmakers' personal data stolen from staffer's car, raising ID theft fears

MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A report containing legislators' and staffers' personal data was stolen from a state worker's car, prompting calls for tighter safeguards.

The information, taken Wednesday when the staffer stopped at a health club on her way home from work, contained 150 names and Social Security numbers of Assembly members and aides, police said Friday.

Those affected were notified Thursday. One of them was Rep. Marlin Schneider, who has advocated tougher laws to prevent identity theft. He said he's already contacted a credit monitoring agency to look for signs of it.

"It's what I've been yelling about for decades, and all I've gotten in return are bills bottled up in committees and snickers from lobbyists," he said.

An employee of the Legislative Human Resources Office took the report with her, intending to work on it at home, Senate Clerk Rob Marchant said in an e-mail Friday.

It was among a variety of items taken after the thief broke into her locker and others at the health club and stole her car keys, Marchant said.

The staff member and all involved have apologized, and steps have been taken to prevent any repeat, he added.

Bob Delaporte, a spokesman for Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch, said the report was about people covered by a dental plan and it appeared the thief was not specifically seeking it.

Police spokesman Mike Hanson said he did not know how many of the 150 names were Assembly members and how many were staff. The Assembly has 99 members. State senators and their aides were not affected.

Former air traffic controller accused of planting homemade bombs is sentenced to 10 years

DENVER (AP) - A fired air traffic controller accused of planting homemade bombs outside the houses of a former superior and co-workers was sentenced to 10 years in prison Friday in a plea deal with prosecutors. - Robert Burke, 55, was arrested in Utah and charged with leaving bombs outside the homes in the western Colorado city of Grand Junction in March 2006. Three exploded, causing minor damage, but no one was hurt. Two of the bombs were defused.

In October, Burke pleaded guilty to a single count of malicious damage to a building after accepting the plea bargain. He faced up to 20 years in prison but prosecutors recommended 10 years and agreed to drop the other charges.

At his sentencing, Burke apologized and told U.S. District Judge Robert Blackburn he accepts responsibility.

"What I did wasn't right in any way, shape or form," he said. "But occasionally - and you read about it in the newspaper every day - people hit their limit, come across something they don't know how to handle."

Some of the targeted co-workers called Burke a coward and a terrorist and said they feared he would seek revenge against them.

"It's unconscionable that he was charged with destruction of a building," said Richard Smith, whose home was targeted. "He attacked and attempted to murder 16 people."

Burke was ordered to pay $11,865 in restitution for damage caused by another bomb to a building in Murfreesboro, Tenn., that belonged to his former employer, Serco Group PLC, a contractor that supplies traffic controllers to airports.

Blackburn said he didn't buy Burke's claim that he snapped because officials ignored his warnings about safety problems at the Grand Junction control tower.

"This had been brooding and stewing in the defendant for a substantial period of time," the judge said.

Serco, a British company, fired Burke in 2004 after four years. The company has not released a reason for his dismissal. An arrest affidavit said the people Burke targeted had provided information that Serco considered in determining whether to fire him.

Police: 'lifetime of stealing' led to 47 gravestones found in dead man's storage unit

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - A dead man's storage locker yielded dozens of tombstones, a macabre collection that police believe represents "a lifetime of stealing." - Some of the 47 gravestones date to the late 1800s; others are relatively recent. Police say they probably came from different cemeteries at different times.

The markers were found in the rented storage unit by the family of Clarence Horner, 54, after he died last year.

Police Chief Tom Casady said the tombstone collection "probably came from a lifetime of stealing headstones." Horner had a criminal record that included convictions for drunken driving and failing to appear at a hearing on a vandalism charge.

Two of the tombstones have been matched to graves.

Casady on Thursday found the mother named on a stone that said only: "Infant son of Charles & Janice Schmidt 1965."

Janice Schmidt of Clatonia, 25 miles south of Lincoln, said she and her husband had always thought of their stillborn baby as Michael Shawn Schmidt, so in 2000 they put in a new stone with the name.

She was shocked that the original gravestone had turned up in a storage unit.

"To think that it was stolen from wherever it was stolen from, you feel kind of hurt or violated," she said.

The second matched tombstone was a temporary marker for a Shelly Wright-Lair, who died Oct. 5, 1981. Someone from a Lincoln cemetery saw the marker on a police Web site and matched the name to cemetery records.

"We don't know how long it had been missing," police spokeswoman Katherine Finnell said, "but a larger one had been put back on the grave."

Authorities believe Horner died March 10. "He had been dead in his apartment for several weeks when maintenance found him, so I don't think he had much contact with family," Finnell said.

On the Net:

Lincoln Police Department: http://www.lincoln.ne.gov/city/police/grave

Oil barge burns for hours on Mississippi River before flames are extinguished

VICKSBURG, Miss. (AP) - Crews extinguished a burning barge Friday, hours after it struck a railroad bridge, erupted into flames and drifted for miles down the Mississippi River, apparently spilling oil.

The river remained closed to traffic while officials determined whether more fire could break out.

The barge, which was carrying crude oil, broke away from three others after hitting the bridge in Vicksburg on Thursday. The barge drifted for about 2.5 hours before it was corralled and pushed against the riverbank about 12 miles downstream, the Coast Guard said.

Coast Guard and environmental officials flew over the area Friday to determine the scope of the spill, Chief Petty Officer James Tylman said.

Workers reported a sheen on the water Friday and oil globules, some as large as pie pans, said Robbie Wilbur, spokesman for the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality.

Still, "there does not appear to be a significant amount of oil in the water," he said. Booms were placed in the river around the disabled barge as a precaution, Wilbur said.

The barge company - Florida Marine Transporters Inc., based in Mandeville, La. - said Friday that an examination of the area showed no sign that oil was released into the water. The company also said Louisiana environmental officials had conducted a visual inspection and "reported no adverse environmental impact."

No injuries were reported.

The railroad bridge and the Interstate 20 bridge, which crosses the river at the same point, were temporarily closed.

The captain of the towboat pushing the barges called in the accident immediately, authorities said. The vessel was pushing the barges downstream as the river was rising because of recent rains.

Warren County Sheriff Martin Pace said barge floats commonly hit bridges as they are pushed downriver by towboats.

"What's different here is it caught fire," he said.

On the Net:

Florida Marine Transporters Inc.: http://www.flmarine.net

Chicago churches, theaters giving up time, attention to watch beloved Bears in Super Bowl

CHICAGO (AP) - Mass is at 5 p.m. Kickoff's at 5:25. What's a priest and lifelong Bears fan to do?

"I'm going to say the fastest … Mass you've ever been to," the Rev. Dan Brandt said.

To keep parishioners from having to choose between their God and their team on Super Bowl Sunday, Brandt will forego his sermon and parts of the liturgy at Nativity of Our Lord Parish on Chicago's South Side.

"People will be in front of their TVs at home by kickoff time," promised Brandt, 36, who planned to ring the church bells every time the Bears score against the Indianapolis Colts.

Chicago restaurants, theaters and other businesses also plan to account for their patrons' less-than-undivided attention Sunday.

Chicago's Feast restaurant is closing early, although one worker will stick around to refurnish the floor.

"He's European, so he cares more about soccer than football," manager Kelly Hunt said.

The Goodman Theatre was offering Sunday tickets for half price, while other city venues were building references to the game into their performances.

Directors of "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" planned to write references to the game into Sunday night's script, said Eileen LaCario, an executive with the company that manages the Drury Lane Theatre.

Characters in the musical may even give the crowd the score as the game progresses. That's what the musical director of the Chicago-area Ars Viva Symphony Orchestra plans to do during its Sunday night performance.

The Archdiocese of Chicago didn't know how many churches might alter Mass schedules - or speed them up. But spokeswoman Susan Burritt suggested Sunday might be a bad day to skip church.

"Praying for the Bears may be the best thing they can do to help," she said, laughing.

On the Net:

Nativity of Our Lord Parish: http://www.nativitybridgeport.org/

Legal experts predict case against men in Boston bomb scare will be difficult to prove

BOSTON (AP) - Some legal experts say prosecutors will have a hard time proving that two men intended to cause a scare when they planted blinking electronic devices around Boston in a publicity stunt for a cartoon show.

They say the key difficulties prosecutors face are demonstrating that the men intended to cause fear, and that the devices, which depict a cartoon character, looked dangerous. The state must prove both to win felony convictions for placing a hoax device, the experts said.

"Their intent was to place these devices as part of an admittedly idiotic advertising campaign," said defense attorney Edward P. Ryan Jr., a former president of the Massachusetts Bar Association. "Just because people got scared doesn't mean there was intent."

Peter Berdovsky, 27, and Sean Stevens, 28, were paid to place the devices to promote a television show on the Turner Broadcasting System subsidiary Cartoon Network, and even took videos documenting their work.

David White-Lief, the state bar's president-elect and a Boston lawyer, said the lighted boxes probably do not meet the state statute's definition of a hoax device, which must resemble an "infernal machine," such as "piles of dynamite, or a simulated Molotov cocktail."

The devices in Boston, which displayed a boxy-looking cartoon character giving the finger, "looked like toys," said White-Lief.

More than three dozen electronic signs were placed in high-profile spots in Boston weeks before authorities responded Wednesday. Authorities shut down highways, bridges and river traffic while bomb squads checked out devices that turned out to be harmless. There was barely a stir in nine other cities across the country where similar devices were placed.

Berdovsky and Stevens pleaded not guilty Thursday and were released on $2,500 bail. They face up to five years in prison if convicted.

At the arraignment, Assistant Attorney General John Grossman focused on a device that had been placed on a highway support beam, saying police believed it might have been a bomb because it contained a cylinder wrapped in duct tape, a power source and a circuit board.

"It's clear the intent was to get attention by causing fear and unrest that there was a bomb in that location," Grossman said.

But White-Lief said the only intent was to get people to watch a cartoon.

"What they did, I imagine, in their minds, was no different than a guy who wallpapers ads for the circus on a vacant building," he said.

White-Lief said it could also prove difficult to win convictions on a second count the men face, misdemeanor disorderly conduct, which is generally related to an immediate annoyance or threat. But the devices were in place for a couple of weeks before police were notified.

Critics have mocked Boston for overreacting.

"If they were bombs, at that response rate, the city would have been screwed," said Norajean McCarthy, 24, a friend of both suspects.

Safety officials, however, have praised the response as evidence of the city's ability to respond quickly to a crisis.

"The coordinated response by all departments proves the system we have in place works," Mayor Thomas Menino said.

During a visit to Providence, R.I., Friday, Homeland Security's Undersecretary for Preparedness George Foresman said Boston officials conducted "a very seamless and coordinated response."

Menino has estimated the costs of the publicity stunt in Boston alone to be more than $500,000, while the costs for the local transit system and the cities of Cambridge and Somerville could be another $500,000.

Turner Broadcasting, a unit of Time Warner Inc., apologized to Boston-area residents in full page newspaper ads on Friday, with Turner's chairman and CEO expressing regret for "the confusion and inconvenience."

Turner has said it is in discussions with Boston city officials on how to best make amends.

North Korea eyes German man's behemoth bunnies as solution to hunger problems

BERLIN (AP) - A German breeder believes he has the answer to North Korea's hunger problems: his giant bunnies that can grow to as big as 23 pounds.

Karl Szmolinsky has raised the German Giants - gray rabbits the size of cocker spaniels - for 44 years at his home in Eberswalde, northeast of Berlin.

After winning the biggest bunny prize a year ago at a state fair - for a 23.2-pound, 29-inch-long gray giant - the retired chauffeur received an unexpected call from the regional farmers' federation.

North Korea, apparently, was interested in his rabbits as a possible solution for its hunger-stricken population of 23 million.

The secretive regime of communist leader Kim Jong Il has relied on foreign food aid since natural disasters and mismanagement devastated its economy in the mid-1990s and led to a famine estimated to have killed 2 million people.

Diplomats from the North Korean Embassy in Berlin drove out to Eberswalde to see the big bunnies for themselves.

"They came here and they checked out the rabbits," Szmolinsky, 67, told The Associated Press. "They really liked them."

A woman answering the telephone at the North Korean Embassy in Berlin said she could not comment.

Szmolinsky sold them four females and two males to start a pilot program, and he plans to fly to Pyongyang, the capital of the communist nation, in April at their request to see how things are progressing.

Females produce two litters of eight to 14 offspring each year, so the four alone could produce as many as 112 rabbits in the first year alone. At that rate, it would not take long to make an impact, especially because a single rabbit produces some 15 pounds of meat.

"They're really good for their hunger problem," Szmolinsky said.

Szmolinsky said the rabbits' appetite should not be a concern for the North Koreans. "They'll eat absolutely anything," he said. "It's no big problem."

As an added bonus, Szmolinsky says the meat is quite tasty.

"I eat a lot of roast rabbit," he said.

Groups calls on Israel Museum to hand over paintings taken by Nazis

JERUSALEM (AP) - Four hundred paintings taken by the Nazis, discovered by U.S. troops and turned over to Israel are at the center of a dispute between Israel's national museum and a group entrusted with finding the lost property of Holocaust victims.

The artwork, currently in the storerooms and galleries of the Israel Museum, includes paintings by Egon Shiele, the early 20th century figurative painter, and the French impressionist Alfred Sisley. Found by American soldiers in Nazi art caches after World War II, they were eventually given to the museum.

No survivors or heirs of victims have ever claimed them.

But last year, Israel's parliament passed a law requiring anyone in Israel holding property that belonged to Holocaust victims to turn it over to a new organization known as the Company for Retrieving Assets of Holocaust Victims.

The company, controlled by Holocaust survivor's groups and other Jewish organizations, is required to look for heirs. If none is found, it must sell the property and distribute the money to needy survivors.

During a recent parliamentary discussion of an upcoming exhibit of French paintings at the museum, the company discovered that the institution was holding 400 paintings that belonged to European Jews killed by the Nazis. It demanded they be turned over.

"It's not left to the museum's judgment. It has to return the artwork according to the law," Nadav Haetzni, the company's legal adviser, told The Associated Press.

The museum declined, saying it is holding the artwork as a national institution of the Jewish state.

"The State of Israel gave the artwork to the museum to take care of, so that it would remain for the coming generations," a statement from the museum said. "If someone comes and says, this belonged to my grandmother or grandfather, of course we will return it to them according to law."

Whenever the pieces of art are exhibited, the museum said, a label always notes that they belonged to Holocaust victims and were entrusted to the museum for safekeeping. Most of the paintings are not major works, however, and are not on display.

Haetzni criticized the museum's insistence on keeping the artwork, saying its actions would be noted by other museums and governments still holding on to the property of Holocaust survivors.

"In moral terms, it's an international precedent," he said.

This is not the first time the Israel Museum has been asked to turn over art that once belonged to Holocaust victims.

In 2000, the museum struck an agreement with the descendants of the owner of Camille Pissarro's "Boulevard Montmartre: Spring," which had been taken by the Nazis and later purchased and donated to the museum. Ownership returned to the heirs of the original owner, Max Silberberg, but the painting remained on display, along with an explanation of its history.

Scandal over photos of Turkish police posing with teen charged with killing journalist

ISTANBUL, Turkey (AP) - The Turkish media published photographs and video on Friday of police posing with a teenager charged with killing an ethnic Armenian journalist, and newspapers denounced the officers for treating the suspect as a "hero." - The photographs show 17-year-old nationalist Ogun Samast holding out a Turkish flag and posing with officers, some in uniform. Behind Samast, a poster with another Turkish flag carries the words of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the revered founder of modern Turkey: "The nation's land is sacred. It cannot be left to fate."

Samast is charged with the Jan. 19 killing of Hrant Dink, a 52-year-old ethnic Armenian journalist who had angered Turkish nationalists with repeated assertions that the mass killings of Armenians around the time of World War I was genocide.

The Turkish media was outraged by the photographs and video. "Shoulder to shoulder with the triggerman: suspected killer Samast was given the hero treatment," the Sabah daily reported on its front page.

Later Friday, the state-owned Anatolia news agency reported that four police officers in Samsun, where the photographs were taken, had been dismissed and four military police officers had been moved to other assignments.

It was not clear whether the eight officers were the ones posing with Samast.

Initial reports said the photos were taken at a military police office at the bus station where Samast was captured, but military police said they were taken at a police station nearby.

"The military police personnel seen in the images were personnel assigned to hand over the suspect to the police," a statement from military police headquarters said.

The statement urged the media to be cautious in publicizing "attempts aimed at fraying the Turkish Armed Forces" and expressed concern about the motives of those who leaked the images.

More than 100,000 people marched at Dink's funeral, many of them chanting for Turkey to abolish a repressive article in the penal code used against many intellectuals, including Dink, who spoke openly on controversial topics.

It is a crime to insult Turkey or the Turkish national character.

Police in Zanzibar ban women from driving while veiled

ZANZIBAR, Tanzania (AP) - Police in largely Muslim Zanzibar have banned women from driving while veiled, arguing it impairs their vision and has caused some accidents, an official said Friday.

Women who violate the ban, imposed Thursday, will be fined, said Regional Police Commander Bakati Khatib. He did not say how much.

"We have evidence showing some accidents were caused by women drivers wearing the nikab," which some Muslim women wear over their face, Khatib said.

"Let me be clear we haven't banned women from wearing the nikab," he added. "What we insist is that they must take the nikab off while they are driving. Their vision is not accurate when they are driving."

Women are increasingly wearing the nikab in Zanzibar, an archipelago off Tanzania's coast that is 98 percent Muslim.

The Quran, Islam's holy book, tells Muslim men and women to dress modestly. Some woman choose the hijab, a scarf that covers their hair and neck. The nikab, which in Arabic means full veil, leaves just a slit for the eyes or covers them with transparent material.

Last year, Ministry of Agriculture official stirred controversy when he banned women from wearing full veils during office hours.

He backed down two weeks later following protests from Muslims and after other government officials intervened.

Institute: Norwegian cruise ship leaked diesel oil in Antarctic grounding

OSLO, Norway (AP) - A Norwegian cruise ship that ran aground on a remote Antarctic island leaked 130 to 200 gallons of diesel oil in the fragile environment, the Norwegian Polar Institute said Friday. - The 404-foot M/S Nordkapp ran aground Tuesday at Deception Island, which is part of the Antarctic archipelago's South Shetland Islands. It pulled off the rocks under its own power, but the 294 passengers were transferred to a sister ship.

While the crew was transferring diesel oil from damaged fuel tanks to other tanks, some of the oil leaked into the water, the Polar Institute said, citing reports from the cruise operator Norwegian Coastal Voyage.

"A spill of such limited extent would normally not pose a threat to the environment," the institute said in a statement. "But the spill happened at Deception Island which has a special ecosystem because of its volcanic origin."

Norwegian Coastal Voyage said it would track the situation together with the cruise operator and scientists from Argentina and Spain.

It said a Spanish research station on Deception Island had issued an alert about the oil spill. The company said the oil was a light blend that should break up easily in sea water.

The Nordkapp was anchored at a Chilean scientific station in Maxwell Bay, off King George's Island, where British divers were examining damage to the hull.

Odds are good Super Bowl gamblers can find something to bet on

MIAMI - (AP) Indianapolis Colts reserve defensive tackle Dan Klecko laughed as he calculated the odds he'll score the first touchdown in the Super Bowl.

"Slim to none," Klecko said.

Wrong. They're 50 to 1.

Betting on Klecko is one of the myriad wagers offered by Las Vegas bookmakers for Sunday's game. The Colts are seven-point favorites over the Chicago Bears, but odds are many gamblers won't settle for merely choosing the winner.

There's money to be won - and lost - picking the team that calls the first timeout, the result of the coin toss and the direction of the first errant field goal. Wide left is favored over wide right.

Thanks to hundreds of such exotic propositions, it's a safe bet legal Super Bowl wagering will top $100 million for the first time.

Colts receiver Reggie Wayne, for one, isn't surprised by the variety of wagers that can be placed on the big game.

"Every year I go to Vegas, and I've seen a lot of stuff being bet on," he said. "It's kind of cool to sit back and see people finding other ways to make fun out of the game.

"This is the big dance. They'll probably bet on who has the first fumble. I don't want any part of that bet."

Wayne is a 6-to-1 favorite to score the first touchdown.

"Wow," he said. "Hopefully I can make a lot of people rich."

The 275-pound Klecko's one of the choices to score because he caught two touchdown passes this season doubling as a fullback in short-yardage situations.

"I would probably bet on Reggie before I would bet on Klecko," teammate Dallas Clark said.

Clark seems a pretty savvy oddsmaker. Asked to guess the over-under on his receiving, he said 45 yards.

It's actually 42.5.

Clark finds the numerous wagering categories amusing.

"It doesn't surprise me, because people bet," he said. "On this team we have some guys who will bet on which bird will fly off a post first. I'm not going to mention any names."

Gamblers can wager on all sorts of individual performances - total points by Robbie Gould, rushing attempts by Joseph Addai and even whether Rex Grossman throws an interception in the first half. A wager on Bears fullback Jason McKie scoring the first touchdown is available at 40 to 1, even though his most recent TD came in 2004.

The Colts' Dominic Rhodes, whose over-under is 46.5 rushing yards, was enthralled to learn people are betting on him - or against him.

"That's crazy. That's absolutely insane, man. Just me? Wow," Rhodes said. "That tells me what we've got here and what I'm a part of. Someday I can tell my grandkids I was a part of something special.

"You can either become very rich or very poor real quick, right? You've got guys betting on touchdowns and coin tosses, man."

Bookies consider the coin toss a tossup. If those odds seem unappealing, gamblers can also put themselves in the hole before kickoff by wagering on Billy Joel's rendition of the national anthem.

The over-under on the length is 1 minute, 44 seconds.

"You have everybody betting in Vegas on who's going to tie their shoe first," Gould said. "It's really crazy as far as what people will bet on. It's fun. If they enjoy it and can make a little extra money, more power to them."

Odds are 5,000 to 1 that the Colts will finish with four points. The Bears are considered more likely to commit the first penalty, and the over-under on the distance of the first punt is 43.5 yards.

There are even bets linking the Super Bowl to other sports. Vegas will take wagers on whether Tiger Woods' fourth-round score Sunday at Dubai is higher than Bernard Berrian's receiving yardage total for the Bears.

With hundreds of propositions to choose from, where's the wisest wager?

Bears rookie Devin Hester, who set an NFL record this season with six touchdown returns, might receive the opening kickoff. He said that makes him a good choice to score the first TD at 30 to 1.

"If I get a chance to get my hands on the ball, I could go the distance," Hester said.

You bet.