North County Times

Officials alert swimmers after hundreds of sharks seen gathering off western Florida coast

ANCLOTE KEY, Fla. (AP) -- Hundreds of sharks have been sighted this week off central Florida's west coast, prompting officials to warn swimmers and scientists to ponder what is luring them here.

Bull sharks, hammerheads and nurse sharks were among those spotted by sheriff's marine patrols in the shallow Gulf of Mexico waters off Pasco County, northwest of Tampa, officials said Tuesday. Some of the sharks are up to 10 feet long.

Pasco County Sheriff's Office spokesman Kevin Doll said the sharks were first sighted Monday. No one has been bitten.

Terri Behling, a spokeswoman for Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, said it is too early to speculate what might be luring the sharks. Experts, who may visit the area as early as Wednesday, first need to determine the sharks' species and size, she said.

Behling said it is not unusual for sharks to swim up and down the gulf coastline, following tarpon. But a congregation of different species is unusual, she said.

Rapist sentenced after police get DNA evidence

SANTA ANA -- A man who left behind key DNA evidence as he shared lunch with a police detective pleaded guilty to two rape charges and was sentenced to two life terms in state prison plus 52 years.

Robert William Bradford Jr. was sentenced Monday for sexually assaulting a 24-year-old woman at her Brea home in 1998 and a 19-year-old woman at an apartment complex last year. Bradford slipped through an unlocked door in the middle of the night and attacked his victims, police said.

Authorities were able to link Bradford to the crimes in an unusual manner. After interviewing the victims and determining Bradford may be a suspect, Brea police Detective Susan Hanna invited him to lunch at a Taco Bell restaurant. When he wasn't looking, Hanna took his straw and sent it to a crime lab for DNA testing. The DNA found that his saliva from the straw matched evidence found at the crime scenes, police said.

"It was a shot in the dark," Hanna said. "It paid off."

Despite the detective's actions, Bradford's attorney didn't dispute that police did their job fairly.

"He voluntarily had the soda with the cops," said attorney Donald T. Barkmeyer. "They were tricky. But they weren't illegal."

Couple accused in San Francisco dog attack asks for change of venue

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- A couple accused in the dog-mauling death of a San Francisco woman has asked a judge to move the trial out of the city.

Lawyers for Robert Noel and Marjorie Knoller told Superior Court Judge James Warren on Monday it would be impossible to get a fair hearing here because of the "general tabloid coverage" and "political overtones" in the case.

Prosecutors said they will not contest the change-of-venue motion.

"We don't want anything to delay the trial," Assistant District Attorney James Hammer said.

A hearing was set for Sept. 14.

The husband-and-wife lawyers are charged with the Jan. 26 death of Diane Whipple, who was mauled by a Presa Canario dog, Bane, in her Pacific Heights apartment building.

Bane was put to death after killing Whipple. A second dog kept by the attorneys, Hera, has been ordered destroyed pending a hearing tomorrow.

Knoller faces charges of second-degree murder as well as manslaughter. Noel faces manslaughter charges.

College football player shot and killed; teammate wounded

NORWALK (AP) -- A defensive back for Antelope Valley College was shot and killed and his teammate was wounded after a fight erupted at a party, authorities said.

Kevin Jerron Morris, 20, was fatally shot in the upper torso shortly before 1 a.m. Sunday. His friend, 21-year-old Jerome Wright, a wide receiver on the team, was struck in the left arm.

Sheriff's investigators said the two men and several Antelope Valley teammates arrived at a party in Norwalk about midnight. There was an argument between the players and another group followed by a fight. At least six shots were fired by an unknown gunman, two of which struck Morris and Wright. No arrests have been made.

The two men played football at Highland High School in Palmdale, a community about 60 miles north of Los Angeles. They were both planning to return to the college for their second season.

"You can put another player at any position, but you can't replace the person Kevin Morris was," Antelope Valley head football coach Brent Carder said in a statement released by the college.

Victims, parents testify in sentencing of church worker accused of raping children

SALEM, Mass. (AP) - One of the boys raped by a former church worker testified Tuesday that the abuse ruined his life, as other victims and their parents asked a judge to sentence the molester to life in prison.

"Chris, you ruined my life," the boy said, looking across the courtroom at Christopher Reardon. "You deserve the worst."

Reardon, 29, faces up to life in prison after pleading guilty last month to 75 counts including rape, indecent assault and battery on a child, and disseminating pornography. The charges involve 24 boys, ages 7 to 14, Reardon met as a youth ministry coordinator, Boy Scout leader and YMCA instructor.

"I feel depressed and angry and I feel that I no longer trust a lot of people," one boy said in a statement read by a prosecutor. "No one should go through what I and the other children had to suffer. I think he should spend the rest of his life in prison for his heinous actions."

Prosecutors asked the judge for a 50- to 75-year sentence.

Psychologist Kenneth A. Chase said he had tested Reardon and found he had several psychological disorders but could be treated.

"This is a very anxious, confused man. … He's not somebody who's going to be sexually aggressive," Chase said. "Mr. Reardon presents as someone who's intelligent, who's conforming, who engages with treatment."

Prosecutor Robert A. Brennan challenged Chase, at one point piling evidence in front of the psychologist and asking him whether he'd considered the totality of Reardon's crimes.

"I had some knowledge but not an exhaustive knowledge" of the crimes, Chase said.

Raymond McGuiggan, who knew Reardon as a member of St. Agnes parish, said Reardon was "always prepared to help others" and that he was part of an "exemplary, loving and Catholic family."

Reardon watched impassively, even as parents called him a monster. Parents described their children's sleepless nights, nightmares and falling grades. The boys began obsessively locking their doors and windows, flying into unexplained rages, and shying from adults, they said.

"I will never know if this is normal teen-age behavior, or because of what Christopher Reardon did to my son. I will never know," a mother said.

Three boys took the stand, and the assistant district attorney read statements from other boys.

All but one of the victims asked for lengthy or life prison terms for Reardon.

That boy quoted from the Book of Revelations, where it says the number of "the beast" is 666. "I'm sorry, this is not Chris," the boy said.

Salem Superior Court Judge Isaac Borenstein will hear testimony Tuesday and Wednesday. Sentencing was scheduled Friday.

12-year-old boy charged with reckless homicide in death of his infant cousin

MILWAUKEE (AP) -- A 12-year-old boy who told police he "snapped" while watching three young cousins has been charged in the death of the youngest child.

The youth, whose name was withheld, was charged Monday with reckless homicide and felony child abuse in the death of Latrell Douglas, who would have turned 2 on Tuesday.

Latrell died Aug. 1 of head injuries, and investigators found numerous other injuries on the infant's body, including bite marks and a burn, according to court records.

The 12-year-old told police he became upset at Latrell because the infant would not stop crying or take a nap. He said he hit Latrell on his stomach and chest, and pushed him into a door, banging the infant's head, according to court records.

The boy became scared when Latrell wouldn't move and started to shake the child "hard, but not real hard," court records say. He called 911 when Latrell gasped for breath.

Defense attorney Joy Sherard said the boy takes medication for emotional problems, and was too young to be responsible for his cousins while his grandmother went to work.

Latrell and the two other young children, ages 3 and 4, were living with their grandmother in Milwaukee. The 12-year-old was visiting for the summer.

The boy told police he didn't want to watch the children and "just wanted to have some fun and go outside and play," according to court records.

Milwaukee County Children's Court Judge Michael Malmstadt ordered the youth held in secure detention.

Cult leader linked to slayings to be freed

MIAMI (AP) -- The Nation of Yahweh was a mystery to most people when Aston Green, a breakaway follower, was beheaded with a machete in 1981.

But the public came to know the religious group well over the next five years because of a series of apparently random killings, notable for the severed ears of the victims. Ultimately, Green's slaying and several others were blamed on the commands of the group's charismatic founder, Yahweh Ben Yahweh.

Yahweh, whose birth name is Hulon Mitchell Jr., will be freed Friday after serving 11 years for a federal racketeering conspiracy conviction. He will be sent to a halfway house under extremely tight conditions his attorneys have challenged as unconstitutional.

Yahweh, 65, wants to lead his sect again. But the U.S. Parole Commission is barring him from contacting any followers -- including indirectly via the Internet, television or radio -- until 2008, when his parole ends.

Attorneys for Yahweh say the rules are aimed at putting him back behind bars.

"They're clearly acting out of fear, but I don't know that they're acting out of malice," defense attorney Jon May said. "I think it reflects ignorance and maybe prejudice and a lack of understanding."

The Nation of Yahweh once claimed 10,000 members. It started in black communities of Miami, with Yahweh drawing supporters with fiery speeches on black history.

The group's members, known for their head-to-toe white garb, used their collective money to build a multimillion-dollar empire of businesses, and helped rejuvenate housing in some of Miami's bleakest neighborhoods.

The group's enterprising spirit, promotion of family values and anti-drug message were cited in a mayoral proclamation declaring a Yahweh Ben Yahweh day in Miami before he was indicted. Even Yahweh's sentencing judge in 1992 cited the "good deeds" of followers who gave all of their possessions and earnings to the group.

But the brutality of the killings stood out even in Miami, a city tainted in the 1980s by routine machine-gun killings in cocaine turf wars.

During Yahweh's federal trial, cult member Robert Rozier testified that Yahweh established a secret group of "death angels" called the Brotherhood within the cult. To become a member, Rozier testified, one had to kill a white person and bring physical proof to Yahweh in the form of a head, ear or other body part.

Prosecutors said some of the killings were intended to intimidate both followers and outsiders. Two shooting victims resisted eviction from a drug-infested apartment complex bought by the cult.

Yahweh was convicted in federal court as the leader of a conspiracy blamed for 14 killings, arsons and other attacks. Six other Nation of Yahweh members also were convicted.

Yahweh's subsequent trial on a state murder charge ended in a quick acquittal due to doubts about the testimony of Rozier, a former NFL player who received a reduced sentence for his testimony. Two other murder charges were dropped, which left Yahweh convicted in a murder plot but not of any killings.

He is being released now because federal rules dictate he cannot be held any longer.

The visibility of the Nation of Yahweh has dwindled. Gone are many of the group's visible assets. The Yahwehs once owned temples, motels, restaurants, stores and houses, as well as hundreds of white cars, buses and trucks.

Banks foreclosed on several buildings in the 1990s. Undisclosed sums of money also were spent to settle wrongful death lawsuits.

But the Nation of Yahweh still claims a good deal of support. A recent gathering in Montreal drew about 1,000 people. Several supporters, many dressed in all-white garb, showed up at a recent hearing to challenge conditions of Yahweh's release.

Miami-Dade police Detective John King is one who would rather not see Yahweh thrive again as leader of group. During the murder investigations, King visited the group's communal Temple of Love in a converted warehouse and talked to former followers.

"I couldn't say with any degree of certainty whether he would be a danger or not," King said. But he "strongly promoted racism, he hated whites, and this is something he was teaching to the kids."

The group, which has whites among its members, denies it is racist.

King, who read Yahweh's teachings and listened to his tapes, called Yahweh as spellbinding as Billy Graham.

"I can understand the draw to him," he said. "He's an excellent teacher. I just wished he was a positive influence instead of turning out as negative as he did."

On the Net:

Nation of Yahweh: http://www.yahwehbenyahweh.com

Official says tourist helicopter hit rocks before crash near Grand Canyon

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- A helicopter that crashed near the Grand Canyon, killing the pilot and five tourists, scraped a rock outcropping before hitting the ground, a sheriff's official said.

The sole survivor of Friday's crash, a 25-year-old mother of two, remained in critical condition Tuesday at a Las Vegas hospital with burns over 80 percent of her body.

A sheriff's detective found that the helicopter struck hillside boulders, went a short distance downhill and hit the ground, Mohave County sheriff's spokesman Steve Johnson said.

"There was evidence of scraping on the rocks just above the crash site itself," Johnson said. "It indicates to us the aircraft was following the slope of that hill down, then there was the scrape and farther down there was the helicopter itself."

Sheriff's investigators don't know what caused the helicopter to crash into the rocks, Johnson said.

National Transportation Safety Board officials did not immediately return calls seeking comment, but have said determining the cause of the accident would be difficult because the helicopter had no recording device.

The wreck killed five New York tourists and pilot Kevin Innocenti, 27, of Henderson, Nev. The helicopter went down near the canyon's western end, 60 miles east of Las Vegas.

Officials at Las Vegas-based Papillon Grand Canyon Helicopter said Innocenti's family was planning a memorial service Tuesday, including a helicopter flight to the crash scene.

David Daskal, Shayie Lichtenstein, Avi and Barbara Wajsbaum and Aryeh Zvi Fastag were mourned Monday by several hundred people during Orthodox Jewish ceremonies in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Borough Park.

In Las Vegas, University Medical Center doctors were closely watching Chana Daskal, David's widow and the only survivor of the accident. She was reported to be heavily sedated while being monitored for swelling and infection from her burns.

The crash was the deadliest canyon tour accident since 1995, when a plane crashed while trying to return to Grand Canyon Airport, killing eight people.

Three people arrested in alleged Internet kidnapping and sex assault case

FARMINGDALE, N.Y. (AP) -- A 15-year-old girl says she was kidnapped by a man she corresponded with on the Internet, then handcuffed, tied up in a closet and sexually assaulted by the man and two other people for a week, police said.

Police said they were looking into the possibility that the defendants were involved in an Internet child pornography ring.

James Warren, 41, of Hampton Bays; Beth Loschin, 46, of Farmingdale; and Michael Montez, 35, of New York City, have been arrested and face multiple charges, authorities said Monday.

The teen had been exchanging messages for several months with Warren, and recently told him she wanted to run away from home, Nassau County Detective Lt. Vincent Robustelli said at a news conference Monday. They arranged to meet Aug. 3 at a mall where she worked in Wrentham, Mass., police said.

The teen got in a car with Warren and Loschin, "and after about an hour, she knew she was in over her head," Robustelli said.

The girl told authorities she was handcuffed much of the time and was kept under constant surveillance. She was taken back and forth between Farmingdale and Hampton Bays on Long Island, and at one point was taken to Montez's home in New York City, police said.

According to a criminal complaint in Queens, Warren and Loschin told the girl that if she didn't do what Montez wanted, they "would beat her more than they already had done and would kill her and get rid of her."

The complaint said Montez stuffed toilet paper in the girl's ears, wrapped bandages over her eyes and ears, put her in a closet, attached a rope to a collar around her neck and tied it and her arms to a clothes rack. She was later returned to Warren and Loschin.

On Friday, she was left alone and managed to call a friend and Wrentham police for help, police said. She told police she was on Long Island but didn't know where, and they told her to look for mail in the house to find the address, Robustelli said.

Loschin and Warren were arrested Friday, Nassau County authorities said. Loschin was charged with sodomy and sexual abuse and held in lieu of $80,000 bail. Warren was charged with kidnapping, sodomy, rape and sexual abuse and held without bail.

Montez was arrested during the weekend and charged with kidnapping, rape, sodomy, sexual assault and other crimes, said Mary de Bourbon, a spokeswoman for the Queens District Attorney's Office. A judge ordered Montez held without bail after prosecutors said a physical examination of the girl showed evidence of choking and investigators found a rope in his home.

"My client states that the way they've laid it out in the complaint is not the way things transpired," Montez's lawyer, Michael Siff, said after the arraignment.

Search intensifies for bodies of Iranian flood victims; about 200 dead

BESHOILY, Iran (AP) -- Gholam Ezati cried as he waded through mud Tuesday near the buried bus he believes his brother was driving when flash floods swept through northeastern Iran, killing approximately 200 people.

"I've lost hope that he is alive after four days," Ezati said of his brother, Jilal. "What I can't accept is not being able to find his body."

As search efforts shifted to recovering bodies, relief workers set up cities of white burlap tents for about 500 residents whose homes were heavily damaged or destroyed by flooding state-run media described as the worst in 200 years.

Tanker trucks moved slowly along damaged roads to bring drinking water to villagers; helicopters of the Red Crescent, the Islamic equivalency of the Red Cross, ferried food, blankets, water and medicines to stranded villagers.

Trucks and bulldozers moved ahead with repairs to damaged utilities and roads, including the main highway between Tehran and the northeastern city of Mashhad. State television estimated damage at $25 million and thousands of people were said to be left homeless.

State-run radio on Tuesday reported "about 200" people were confirmed dead. The figure was expected to rise, with Iranian television reporting more than 150 people remained missing in the flash floods and mudslides that began with heavy rains Friday. Authorities have said finding more survivors appeared unlikely.

Near the village of Beshoily, 315 miles northeast of Tehran, Gholam Ezati was among about 15 people who had met up searching the region for missing loved ones. Ezati sobbed as he looked at the wrecked remains of a bus; the serial number matched the bus driven by his brother. No bodies were visible.

He and the others had heard four buses were washed into fields, creeks and rivers in the area. Fearing relatives were aboard, they came to search the mud flats and water, hoping a piece of luggage poking through mud meant someone's search would end.

Mohammad Tabesh, a high school teacher in Beshoily, said he saw buses floating toward him during the flooding.

"At the time, I thought they were boats the Red Crescent was sending to help us. Later, when I saw what they were, I couldn't believe they had been carried along like small boats," he said.

In Beshoily, mud at least three feet deep was left behind in most houses.

Raging water had looted homes, ripping out refrigerators, gas stoves, doors, windows and carpets.

Denver goes to the dogs

ST. LOUIS (AP) - There is no shortage of lists suggesting the perfect place for a retiree to retire, a college student to study, or a working mother to live and raise a family.

Now the "perfect place" trend has gone to the dogs.

If the 131 million dogs and cats in the U.S. had a choice, they'd ask their owners to move to Denver, according to a study by St. Louis-based Ralston Purina Inc.'s research arm, the Pet Institute.

The Colorado capital, with a higher than average ratio of veterinarians to pets, clean air and water, and a climate that's unfriendly to fleas, ranked at the top of the Pet Institute's first study picking the country's "Pet Healthiest" cities.

Web site tells naked truth

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) - Missouri students hoping to find information about their future careers may get more than they bargained for.

A state-sponsored career guide lists a Web address leading to a pornographic site.

The address originally had led to an education-related site, but the domain name was dropped and then bought by a company that owns the adult site, state officials said Monday.

The site now contains explicit pornographic material and a warning that those younger than 21 should not view it.

Witnesses describe gunshots during Christmas Eve burglary for prison escapee's trial

DALLAS (AP) -- An Irving police officer was riddled with bullets at the scene of a holdup before he could even put his squad car in park, an investigator testified Tuesday at the murder trial of an inmate accused of leading a deadly prison break last year.

And after he was shot, Officer Aubrey Hawkins was pulled from his car and run over, his body lodging under his assailants' getaway car, Officer Steven Hazard said.

"He was wedged in the tire so that he's skidding along the ground," Hazard testified during the second day of the capital murder trial of prison escapee George Rivas.

Hawkins, who had been shot 11 times, was dragged more than six feet before the driver of the escape vehicle shifted into reverse, dislodged Hawkins' body and ran over it again, Hazard said.

"Every time the tire made a revolution it left a blood print," he said.

Rivas is accused of being the ringleader of a gang of seven Texas convicts who broke out of a maximum-security prison Dec. 13 and evaded authorities for weeks before they were tracked down in Colorado. One committed suicide.

Rivas already is serving one of 17 life sentences, most of them for armed robbery; if convicted in Hawkins' death on Christmas Eve, he could face the death penalty. The others face trial later.

Rivas has admitted shooting Hawkins, and prosecutors will show jurors the 21-page statement he gave to police. His lawyer says the shooting was unplanned.

Parents, friends visit inmate as execution nears for killing of father of a federal judge

LIVINGSTON, Texas (AP) -- A day before he was scheduled to be executed, Napoleon Beazley spent Tuesday visiting with his parents and friends by telephone from inside a cage in the visiting area of Texas' death row.

"Two can talk at once on the telephones and the others can watch through the cubicle window," prison spokesman Larry Todd said.

A divided U.S. Supreme Court has refused to block the execution of the 25-year-old Beazley, who was just 17 when he killed a man during a 1994 carjacking in Tyler, Texas.

The approaching execution has drawn attention because of Beazley's age at the time of the killing and because his victim, John Luttig, 63, was the father of J. Michael Luttig, a judge on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals based in Richmond, Va.

Beazley is set for lethal injection Wednesday evening. He would be the 12th convicted killer put to death this year in Texas, where a record 40 executions were carried out last year.

Three U.S. Supreme Court justices - Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and David Souter - removed themselves without comment from participating in rulings in the case. All three have ties to J. Michael Luttig.

After they recused themselves, the high court voted 3-3 Monday and refused to grant a reprieve.

Beazley, who does not deny his role in the murder, is still awaiting word from the high court on a request for a broader review of his case, including the question of whether the Constitution bars executing people who were under age 18 when they committed their crimes.

The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles already has refused requests for a reprieve and a commutation of Beazley's death sentence to life in prison.

Beazley would be the 19th U.S. prisoner to die since 1976 for a murder committed by a killer younger than 18. He would be the 10th in Texas, where he's among 31 death row inmates who were 17 at the time of their crimes.

In a 1989 ruling on a case from Kentucky, the Supreme Court said death sentences imposed on defendants as young as 16 when they committed their crimes were constitutional.

In Texas, a capital murder committed at age 17 makes an offender eligible for the death penalty.

"In Texas, we have a situation where under 18-year-olds are considered too young to drink, vote or serve on a jury - yet they are considered old enough to be executed," said Curt Goering, Amnesty International USA's senior executive director.

Beazley shot John Luttig in the head after pulling him from his car at his home. Testimony at the trial showed he stood in a pool of blood while going through Luttig's pockets, searching for the car keys.

"If you look at the facts of this case, the premeditation, and the absolutely random predatory nature of the crime . . . the death penalty is certainly appropriate," said Jack Skeen, the district attorney who prosecuted the case.

Angry over busted water system, women in one Turkish village enforce a sex boycott

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) -- No water, no sex.

That's what a group of women from a village in southern Turkey have told their husbands, who have been banished from the bedroom until they fix the village's water system.

For months the women of Sirt have been forced to line up in front of a trickling village fountain for water that they carry home in large containers, a walk that for some can be miles.

And they have had enough.

"One of the women launched the idea as a joke, but it is serious," Faliha Sari said of the boycott, which began about a month ago. "It's natural. … When we cannot wash ourselves and cannot wash our clothes, we don't want to do other things," she said shyly.

Islam demands that followers bathe after having sex.

Sari, who was interviewed by phone, said most of the women in the village were dealing with the same water problem, but she did not know how many women were refusing sex. Sirt, near the Mediterranean resort of Antalya, has some 600 residents.

Local newspapers said the bedroom boycott in Sirt appeared to have been inspired by a popular Turkish movie. In the 1983 film, women in a village refuse sex to protest having to work the fields while their husbands sipped tea or played backgammon at the village coffee shop.

The sex boycott also recalled "Lysistrata," a play by Greek playwright Aristophanes in which Athenian women, fed up with the Peloponnesian War, barricade themselves in the Acropolis and go on a sex strike to force their husbands to vote for peace with Sparta.

Villagers say the 27-year-old water system breaks down frequently, leaving the village without running water for months. But this time, the women took action. And it appears to be having some impact. In recent days, men have asked the municipality to fix the village's water supply system or give them the parts.

"Our women are right to protest, but we're the ones who are suffering," Milliyet newspaper quoted village leader Ibrahim Sari as saying. Sari could not be reached by telephone. Most of Sirt's villagers are related and have the same surname.

After the boycott began, the men asked visiting local governor Mehmet Capraz for government help to repair the village water-system and even asked Capraz to provide them with the materials so they could fix damaged pipes.

Capraz was not available for comment but an aide, who asked not to be named, confirmed that the villagers asked for help.

For some, the issue had little to do with marital bliss.

"I am 70-year-old and alone - I have no husband to ban from the bedroom," said Fatma Sari, also reached by telephone. "But I can tell you this much, I am fed up with the water situation."

Firefighters take on blazes across West, including a California fire that threatens homes

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) -- Firefighters struggled Tuesday to contain dozens of wildfires in California, Nevada, Oregon and Washington as federal officials ratcheted up the warnings and took steps to prevent future fires.

More than 8,500 firefighters were battling wildfires across the West on Tuesday, according to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho.

The fire center went to Level Four status Monday for the first time this year after 37 new blazes burned across more than 300,000 acres. The preparedness level ranges from one to five.

Also on Monday, the Western Governors' Association and the Bush administration agreed to a 10-year national plan to prevent and suppress wildfires. It calls for the aggressive removal of brush, trees and debris that can fuel catastrophic fires, and seeks a long-term strategy for restoring wildlife habitats.

Four separate fires raged through the night in Northern California.

One closed Interstate 80 in the Sierra Nevada for hours, while another, a 57,000-acre blaze, threatened 13 ranch homes east of Ravendale, Calif., near the Nevada border. The fire near Ravendale was 45 percent contained on Tuesday, said David Widmark of the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center in Portland.

In Nevada, more than 200,000 acres have been burned since last week, the largest being an 82,000-acre blaze about 25 miles north of Battle Mountain, which fire officials declared contained on Tuesday.

At least 30 fires were active Tuesday in Oregon, including one near Ashland that had burned two homes and several outbuildings and threatened seven other homes, said Ellen Watson, spokeswoman for the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center in Portland.

Nearly 1,200 firefighters, water-dumping helicopters and aerial tankers battled a 5,000-acre wildfire in the rugged Siskiyou Mountains of southern Oregon, one day after Gov. John Kitzhaber declared a state emergency to free up 200 National Guard members.

The blaze burned a remote house and cabin Sunday. About 10 miles to the west, a new fire broke out Monday night on a hillside within sight of the small town of Applegate. There was no immediate word on its size or what caused it.

"Mother Nature is controlling us on this fire," said Oregon Department of Forestry incident commander Greg Gilpin. "There is nothing I or my team can do with this portion until Mother Nature gives us a break."

Some $1 million a day has been spent on firefighting in Oregon.

In Washington, lightning sparked new wildfires, stretching the state's firefighting resources. The largest was the 400-acre Indian Dan Canyon Fire, burning in hilly sagebrush and timber five miles northwest of Brewster.

A 1,200-acre fire near Virginia Lake and an 800-acre fire near Goose Lake forced the evacuation of six ranches on the Colville Indian Reservation, said Colleen Roberts, a spokeswoman for the Washington state Emergency Operations Center.

"There are a lot of fires out there," said Charles Gulick, a spokesman for the Washington state Department of Natural Resources' northeast region in Colville. "It's a mess."

8/15/01