Thursday, July 5, 2012

Bond set at $1 million for Trayvon Martin's killer

Bond set at $1 million for Trayvon Martin's killer

Bond set at $1 million for Trayvon Martin's killer

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 11:55 AM PDT

Undated handout photo of George ZimmermanSANFORD, Florida (Reuters) - A Florida judge said George Zimmerman was a flight risk and set bond at $1 million on Thursday for the neighborhood watch volunteer who shot and killed unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin. Zimmerman had been released on $150,000 bond but was sent back to jail in June after prosecutors alleged he misled the court about his finances and failed to surrender a valid passport. ...

Source of deadly Colorado wildfire located, cause unknown

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 01:56 PM PDT

A man walks through his backyard after returning to his Mountain Shadows neighborhood devastated by the Waldo Canyon fire in Colorado Springs ColoradoDENVER (Reuters) - Investigators probing the cause of a deadly Colorado wildfire that charred more than 300 homes, making it the most destructive in state history, have located the point of ignition but have not concluded how the blaze started, officials said on Thursday. At its height, the 12-day-old blaze forced the evacuation of some 35,000 people in and around Colorado Springs, the state's second most populous city, and threatened the campus of the U.S. Air Force Academy before fire crews gained an upper hand late last week. ...

New York cop shot patrolling public housing complex

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 12:07 PM PDT

(Reuters) - A New York City police officer patrolling a Manhattan housing project was shot in the chest at point blank range early on Thursday by an unidentified gunman who remained at large. Housing officer Brian Groves, 30, was in stable condition at Bellevue Hospital after the 3:30 a.m. shooting in a stairwell of the Seward Houses on the Lower East Side, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. ...

California city sued over fatal police beating of homeless man

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:42 PM PDT

SANTA ANA, California (Reuters) - The father of a homeless man who died after he was beaten and shocked with a stun gun by police in Southern California filed suit on Thursday, the first anniversary of the incident, seeking unspecified damages from the city of Fullerton. The lawsuit paints a vivid picture of how Kelly Thomas, 37, a transient who had been diagnosed as schizophrenic, repeatedly apologized, begged for his life and expressed pain during his encounter with officers last year. ...

Actor Andy Griffith's death caused by heart attack

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 02:39 PM PDT

A wreath of flowers is pictured on the star of actor Andy Griffith on the Walk of Fame in HollywoodWINSTON-SALEM, North Carolina (Reuters) - Actor Andy Griffith, beloved as a small-town sheriff on the popular television program "The Andy Griffith Show," died of a heart attack, according to his death certificate. Griffith, 86, died on Tuesday at his home in coastal Manteo, North Carolina. According to his death certificate, he was buried in a family cemetery, an employee at the Dare County Register of Deeds Office said on Thursday. The certificate noted that Griffith had suffered for years from coronary artery disease, hypertension and hyperlipidemia, a condition related to high cholesterol. ...

California high-speed rail plan faces tough vote in Senate

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:45 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The California state Assembly on Thursday approved an $8 billion high-speed rail financing plan that likely will face a tougher vote in the Senate over the system's projected $68 billion cost and concerns about its management. The project, expected to take decades to complete, has the backing of Democratic Governor Jerry Brown, who says a bullet train network will boost job creation and provide an alternative to car and plane travel in the country's most populous state. ...

Father, son arrested in Texas shooting of immigration agent

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:23 PM PDT

(Reuters) - A father and son face federal charges after investigators say they opened fire and wounded a U.S. immigration special agent near the U.S.-Mexico border during an early-morning chase, federal officials said Thursday. The father and son, along with an unidentified minor, are accused of opening fire and chasing after Kelton Harrison, an Immigration Customs Enforcement special agent working a narcotics investigation before dawn on Tuesday in Hargill, Texas, a community of about 900 residents about 30 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border, Kenneth Magidson, the U.S. ...

Episcopalians debate transgender inclusion in ministry

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:30 PM PDT

INDIANAPOLIS, IN (Reuters) - A proposal to expand the U.S. Episcopal Church's nondiscrimination canons for the ordained ministry to include "gender identity and expression" passed its first hurdle on Thursday, when it won committee approval at the church's General Convention. The move comes nine years after the Episcopal Church, part of the worldwide Anglican Communion, approved its first openly gay bishop, Gene Robinson, sparking the departure of conservative parishes. The church now allows gay men and lesbians to join the ordained ministry. ...

Alaska man treated for flesh-eating infection in Seattle

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 05:28 PM PDT

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - A man from Juneau, Alaska, contracted a rare infection from flesh-eating bacteria and was in satisfactory condition in a Seattle hospital after being flown in for emergency treatment, hospital officials said on Thursday. Ruben Pereyra was the latest person in the United States to suffer the flesh-eating disease that has also afflicted a Georgia graduate student who has had to undergo multiple amputations and a South Carolina woman who is a new mother of twins. ...

West Virginia struggles with power outages amid new storms

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 03:25 PM PDT

Crossing guards guide motorists though an intersection in Bethesda, MarylandLEWISBURG, W.V. (Reuters) - Six days after violent storms hit the eastern United States, the state of West Virginia was struggling to recover on Thursday, with nearly a third of electricity customers still without power and new storms putting more customers in the dark. Electric utilities said more than 550,000 homes and businesses are without power from Ohio to Virginia, leaving them without air conditioning amid a heat wave. West Virginia, with a population of about 1.9 million people, was the hardest hit. ...

California high-speed rail plan nearing key votes

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 04:50 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California lawmakers were nearing a vote on Thursday on a make-or-break $8 billion financing plan to launch the state's planned high-speed rail system, which has been mired in controversy over its management and cost, now pegged at $68 billion. Votes in favor of the plan would mean California could begin selling bonds for its most ambitious public works project and lock in federal funds for a line in the state's Central Valley, while a "no" vote would stop the entire plan in its tracks. ...

Syracuse University should have told police of sex abuse accusation: report

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 03:11 PM PDT

Attorney Allred, flanked by Davis and Lang, announces the filing of a lawsuit against Syracuse University in a news conference in New YorkNEW YORK (Reuters) - Syracuse University should have contacted police when officials learned in 2005 that a basketball coach had been accused of sexually abusing a boy, a failure that exposed the school to "harsh criticism," according to a report commissioned by the university's board of trustees. The report, released on Thursday, cited a number of failures in the university's response to former ballboy Bobby Davis' allegations against former assistant coach Bernie Fine. But it concluded that officials were not trying to "conceal or 'cover up' any conduct. ...

Florida hero turns down offer to return to lifeguard job

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 05:34 PM PDT

MIAMI (Reuters) - A Florida lifeguard who was fired after he left his post to help a distressed swimmer outside his assigned zone turned down an offer on Thursday to return to his old job. Tomas Lopez, a 21-year-old lifeguard in Hallandale Beach, Florida, was dismissed earlier this week by a private company that manages the lifeguards at the city's beaches and municipal pool. The company, Jeff Ellis Management, said Lopez put swimmers in his area at risk by leaving his lifeguard station to assist a struggling swimmer outside the area the firm is paid to watch over. ...

L.A. County voters to decide on condoms in porn

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 04:06 PM PDT

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Los Angeles County voters will decide in November whether to require porn actors to use condoms during film shoots, in a ballot measure that marks a new front for an AIDS group that has long targeted the adult entertainment industry. The ballot initiative is the latest salvo against the industry, after the city of Los Angeles passed a similar requirement in January that has yet to be enforced. ...

Father, son arrested in Texas shooting of immigration agent

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 03:40 PM PDT

(Reuters) - A father and son face federal charges after investigators say they opened fire and wounded a U.S. immigration special agent near the U.S.-Mexico border during an early-morning chase, federal officials said Thursday. The father and son, along with an unidentified minor, are accused of opening fire and chasing after Kelvin Harrison, an Immigration Customs Enforcement special agent working a narcotics investigation before dawn on Tuesday in Hargill, Texas, a community of about 900 residents about 30 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border, Kenneth Magidson, the U.S. ...

Yacht capsizes off New York's Long Island, three drown

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 07:06 AM PDT

(Reuters) - A private yacht ferrying 27 friends and family to watch Fourth of July fireworks capsized off New York's Long Island and three children drowned, Nassau County Police said on Thursday. The children's bodies were found in the cabin of the submerged boat in the waters off the town of Oyster Bay after a 911 call was placed at about 10:10 p.m. on Wednesday, police said. "These individuals were out observing a fireworks show. They were returning from this fireworks display," Detective Lieutenant John Azzata of Nassau County Police said at a news conference on Thursday. ...

San Diego fireworks show: dazzling, but short

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 01:27 PM PDT

SAN DIEGO (Reuters) - A computer glitch may have caused the premature and thunderous end to an Independence Day pyrotechnic show in San Diego, where all 20,000 fireworks lit the sky in 15 seconds and thousands of disappointed spectators were told the display was over. The annual "Big Bay Boom" show, which cost about $350,000 to produce, became the talk of the town on Thursday, but not for the reason organizers had hoped. ...

Lesbian reverend at heart of Presbyterian gay marriage quandary

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 02:11 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - As the Presbyterian Church U.S.A.'s legislative body considers this week whether to allow ministers to perform same-sex marriages, Reverend Jane Spahr will not be present. But in some ways she will be at the center of the proceedings. Spahr, a 69-year-old lesbian evangelist who has defied the church and been rebuked by a church court for performing same-sex weddings in California, has been an outspoken advocate for liberalizing church policy on weddings. ...

Americans squeezed by higher rents, tight credit

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 10:01 AM PDT

A tenant sits on the front steps of her building as she attends a meeting of a group who are fighting to battle proposed rent increases in Malden, Massachusetts(Reuters) - One night last spring, David Hall returned home to his studio apartment outside Boston to learn that his monthly rent had spiked from $725 to $995. It would be much cheaper for the maintenance manager to buy a nearby starter house than to stay put. But his mortgage broker told him that while his credit score was good, it was not high enough to meet banks' tough standards, he said. "I know if I walk into a bank, they are just going to laugh at me," Hall says. "So I'm stuck." He is not alone. ...

Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. needs "extended" in-patient treatment

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 12:28 PM PDT

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Representative Jesse Jackson Jr., who disclosed recently that he has been on medical leave since early June with an unspecified condition, is grappling with "physical and emotional ailments" that require in-patient treatment, his office said on Thursday. In a statement, Jackson's press secretary Frank Watkins said the 47-year-old congressman's condition was "more serious than we thought and initially believed" and would require "extended in-patient treatment as well as continuing medical treatment thereafter." The statement did not specify the medical problem. ...

Con Edison repairing equipment to end NYC brownout

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 11:53 AM PDT

Unionized Consolidated Edison workers protest outside the company's offices in New YorkNEW YORK (Reuters) - Locked out workers resumed negotiations with Consolidated Edison on Thursday while replacement crews worked to end additional brownouts as New York City sweltered in a prolonged heat wave. Con Edison said it reduced the voltage by 5 percent in several Brooklyn neighborhoods Wednesday night as a precaution to protect the system and maintain service as crews fix equipment problems, the company said in a statement. ...

In U.S. soda scuffle, experts say it's no easy choice

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:55 AM PDT

Soft drink cups sized at 32 ounces and 64 ounces are displayed at a news conference at City Hall in New YorkWASHINGTON (Reuters) - At Andrea Giancoli's community nutrition classes, participants bring in cans and bottles of whatever they typically drink every day, from sodas and fruit juices to sweet teas. Then the Los Angeles-based dietician helps them read the back of their containers for portion size, calories and sugar content. Then one by one, she stacks sugar cubes by their drink so they can visualize what they are swallowing. Sometimes she has to stack as many as 25 cubes - nearly 400 calories worth. ...

Judge denies Philadelphia priest's bid for house arrest

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 11:34 AM PDT

Monsignor William Lynn walks from the courthouse after the jury finished deliberating for the day in his sexual abuse trial in PhiladelphiaPHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Monsignor William Lynn, the first senior U.S. Roman Catholic Church official to be convicted of covering up child sex abuse, was sent back to prison on Thursday after a judge rejected his bid for house arrest. Family members sobbed in the court gallery after Common Pleas Court Judge M. Teresa Sarmina denied Lynn's request to be released to the home of a distant relative in Philadelphia. The judge did, however, grant his request to move up his sentencing to July 24 from August 13. Lynn, 61, faces up to seven years in prison. ...

Struggling homeowners avert foreclosure via mediation

Posted: 04 Jul 2012 10:07 PM PDT

To match Feature USA-HOUSING/RECOVERYNEW YORK (Reuters) - Verise Campbell was excited. She could finally help struggling homeowners negotiate deals with their lenders to avoid foreclosure, but the angry response to her first phone call shocked her. "There will be no mediation! There will be no mediation! There will be no mediation!" she recalls the representative of the lender shouting. "And then he took the phone, and he struck something hard three times," said Campbell, who is deputy director of Nevada's mediation program. ...

Apartment rents rise at highest rate since 2007: Reis

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 08:19 AM PDT

To match story TRAVEL-SANFRANCISCO/(Reuters) - Renting an apartment in the U.S. became even more expensive during the second quarter, as vacancies set a new 10-year low and rents rose at a pace not seen since before the financial crisis, according to real estate research firm Reis Inc. The average U.S. vacancy rate of 4.7 percent was the lowest since the fourth quarter of 2001, down 0.2 percentage points from the prior quarter, according to preliminary data Reis released on Thursday. Asking rents jumped to $1,091 per month, 1 percent higher than the first quarter and the biggest increase since the third quarter of 2007. ...

Con Edison cuts voltage in more NYC neighborhoods

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 11:02 AM PDT

(Reuters) - New York power company Consolidated Edison Inc said on Thursday it reduced the power voltage in additional neighborhoods in Brooklyn during the current heat wave. The voltage reduction, or brown out, on Thursday afternoon follows a 5 percent voltage reduction in some neighborhoods in Brooklyn Wednesday night. The company imposes a voltage reduction to keep the system reliable and prevent the heavy air conditioning usage from further straining the power lines while crews fix problems with equipment. (Reporting By Scott DiSavino; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

More than one million in U.S. still without power five days after storm

Posted: 04 Jul 2012 08:17 PM PDT

Pepco contract worker works on a damaged utility pole in Silver Spring MarylandWASHINGTON (Reuters) - More than 1 million homes and businesses in a swath from Indiana to Virginia remained without power on Wednesday, five days after deadly storms tore through the region. The outage meant no July 4 Independence Day holiday for thousands of utility workers who scrambled to restore lingering power outages. Much of the damage to the power grid was blamed on last weekend's rare "derecho," a big, powerful and long-lasting wind storm that blew from the Midwest to the Atlantic Ocean. ...

West Virginia struggles with power outages amid new storms

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:53 PM PDT

Crossing guards guide motorists though an intersection in Bethesda, MarylandLEWISBURG, W.V. (Reuters) - Six days after violent storms hit the eastern United States, the state of West Virginia was struggling to recover on Thursday, with nearly a third of electricity customers still without power and new storms putting more people in the dark. Electric utilities said more than 566,600 homes and businesses were without power from Ohio to Virginia, leaving them without air conditioning amid a scorching heat wave. West Virginia, with a population of about 1.9 million, was the hardest hit. Utilities warned that some people could be without power for the rest of the week. ...

California high-speed rail plan faces tough vote in Senate

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:45 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The California state Assembly on Thursday approved an $8 billion high-speed rail financing plan that likely will face a tougher vote in the Senate over the system's projected $68 billion cost and concerns about its management. The project, expected to take decades to complete, has the backing of Democratic Governor Jerry Brown, who says a bullet train network will boost job creation and provide an alternative to car and plane travel in the country's most populous state. ...

California city sued over fatal police beating of homeless man

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:42 PM PDT

SANTA ANA, California (Reuters) - The father of a homeless man who died after he was beaten and shocked with a stun gun by police in Southern California filed suit on Thursday, the first anniversary of the incident, seeking unspecified damages from the city of Fullerton. The lawsuit paints a vivid picture of how Kelly Thomas, 37, a transient who had been diagnosed as schizophrenic, repeatedly apologized, begged for his life and expressed pain during his encounter with officers last year. ...

Episcopalians debate transgender inclusion in ministry

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:30 PM PDT

INDIANAPOLIS, IN (Reuters) - A proposal to expand the U.S. Episcopal Church's nondiscrimination canons for the ordained ministry to include "gender identity and expression" passed its first hurdle on Thursday, when it won committee approval at the church's General Convention. The move comes nine years after the Episcopal Church, part of the worldwide Anglican Communion, approved its first openly gay bishop, Gene Robinson, sparking the departure of conservative parishes. The church now allows gay men and lesbians to join the ordained ministry. ...

Father, son arrested in Texas shooting of immigration agent

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 06:23 PM PDT

(Reuters) - A father and son face federal charges after investigators say they opened fire and wounded a U.S. immigration special agent near the U.S.-Mexico border during an early-morning chase, federal officials said Thursday. The father and son, along with an unidentified minor, are accused of opening fire and chasing after Kelton Harrison, an Immigration Customs Enforcement special agent working a narcotics investigation before dawn on Tuesday in Hargill, Texas, a community of about 900 residents about 30 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border, Kenneth Magidson, the U.S. ...

Florida hero turns down offer to return to lifeguard job

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 05:34 PM PDT

MIAMI (Reuters) - A Florida lifeguard who was fired after he left his post to help a distressed swimmer outside his assigned zone turned down an offer on Thursday to return to his old job. Tomas Lopez, a 21-year-old lifeguard in Hallandale Beach, Florida, was dismissed earlier this week by a private company that manages the lifeguards at the city's beaches and municipal pool. The company, Jeff Ellis Management, said Lopez put swimmers in his area at risk by leaving his lifeguard station to assist a struggling swimmer outside the area the firm is paid to watch over. ...

Alaska man treated for flesh-eating infection in Seattle

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 05:28 PM PDT

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - A man from Juneau, Alaska, contracted a rare infection from flesh-eating bacteria and was in satisfactory condition in a Seattle hospital after being flown in for emergency treatment, hospital officials said on Thursday. Ruben Pereyra was the latest person in the United States to suffer the flesh-eating disease that has also afflicted a Georgia graduate student who has had to undergo multiple amputations and a South Carolina woman who is a new mother of twins. ...

California high-speed rail plan nearing key votes

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 04:50 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California lawmakers were nearing a vote on Thursday on a make-or-break $8 billion financing plan to launch the state's planned high-speed rail system, which has been mired in controversy over its management and cost, now pegged at $68 billion. Votes in favor of the plan would mean California could begin selling bonds for its most ambitious public works project and lock in federal funds for a line in the state's Central Valley, while a "no" vote would stop the entire plan in its tracks. ...

Source of deadly Colorado wildfire located, cause unknown

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 01:56 PM PDT

A man walks through his backyard after returning to his Mountain Shadows neighborhood devastated by the Waldo Canyon fire in Colorado Springs ColoradoDENVER (Reuters) - Investigators probing the cause of a deadly Colorado wildfire that charred more than 300 homes, making it the most destructive in state history, have located the point of ignition but have not concluded how the blaze started, officials said on Thursday. At its height, the 12-day-old blaze forced the evacuation of some 35,000 people in and around Colorado Springs, the state's second most populous city, and threatened the campus of the U.S. Air Force Academy before fire crews gained an upper hand late last week. ...

L.A. County voters to decide on condoms in porn

Posted: 05 Jul 2012 04:06 PM PDT

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Los Angeles County voters will decide in November whether to require porn actors to use condoms during film shoots, in a ballot measure that marks a new front for an AIDS group that has long targeted the adult entertainment industry. The ballot initiative is the latest salvo against the industry, after the city of Los Angeles passed a similar requirement in January that has yet to be enforced. ...
Posted by Harshad at 7:16 PM

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