Firefighters hold back flames threatening towns in Idaho, California

Firefighters hold back flames threatening towns in Idaho, California
Seven charged in shootings that killed Louisiana police officers
Baseball star Eddie Murray settles SEC insider trading charges
Beard debate delays Fort Hood shooting trial
U.S. court says Florida's early voting rules discriminatory
Abortion charges against Kansas Planned Parenthood clinic dropped
Penn State perjury case trial date set for January
University of Colorado to allow guns at some off-campus housing
Emory gave incorrect data to publications that rank U.S. colleges
Chicago's Catholic Cardinal George has recurrence of cancer
Baseball star Eddie Murray settles SEC insider trading charges
Bondholders, insurers challenge San Bernardino bankruptcy
Battle far from over for U.S. immigrants who get deferrals
Sudan frees U.S. resident after Washington demands release
Seven charged in shootings that killed Louisiana police officers
U.S. sues Florida over ending kosher meals in prisons
Supremacist couple face racketeering charges in U.S. Northwest killing spree
U.S. Army suicides reached record monthly high in July
Obama recycles earmarks to fund transportation projects
Group sues to block Los Angeles ban on medical marijuana shops
Midday update shows dryness returning to US crops
Insight: Auto insurers' driver tracking hits wall in California
Illinois House expels Democrat indicted for bribery
Governments make new efforts to avoid strategic shocks
Pennsylvania groups appeal judge's ruling in voter ID case
Unemployment rates rise in U.S. election swing states
IRS wields summons to pry info out of wealthy, companies
U.S. pipeline oversight to be toughened under proposed rules
Shell California refinery restarted flexicoker Wednesday: filings
Firefighters hold back flames threatening towns in Idaho, California
Seven charged in shootings that killed Louisiana police officers
Abortion charges against Kansas Planned Parenthood clinic dropped
Baseball star Eddie Murray settles SEC insider trading charges
University of Colorado to allow guns at some off-campus housing
Emory gave incorrect data to publications that rank U.S. colleges
Chicago's Catholic Cardinal George has recurrence of cancer
Bondholders, insurers challenge San Bernardino bankruptcy
Battle far from over for U.S. immigrants who get deferrals
Supremacist couple face racketeering charges in U.S. Northwest killing spree

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:24 PM PDT

(Reuters) - Firefighters in Idaho's Boise National Forest held the line on Friday against a week-old blaze closing in on a small mountain resort, while evacuation orders were lifted for two communities menaced by lightning-sparked flames in Southern California. The so-called Trinity Ridge blaze on the edge of the Rockies and a cluster of wildfires northeast of San Diego had posed two of the most immediate threats to populated areas among dozens of fires raging out of control in recent days across the sun-baked western United States. ...

Seven charged in shootings that killed Louisiana police officers

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:57 PM PDT

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - Louisiana police have charged seven people in connection with shootings near New Orleans on Thursday that killed two sheriff's deputies at a trailer park and wounded two others, authorities said. Brian Lyn Smith, 24, of LaPlace was charged with attempted first-degree murder while six others also face charges linked to the violence, St. John Parish Sheriff's Office spokesman Dane Clement said on Friday. The charges stem from a pair of related shootings early on Thursday in and around LaPlace, about 25 miles west of New Orleans, in which a gunman shot and wounded St. ...

Baseball star Eddie Murray settles SEC insider trading charges

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:31 PM PDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. securities regulators on Friday charged Hall of Fame baseball player Eddie Murray with insider trading in shares of a medical device company, an allegation the former Baltimore Orioles first baseman settled by paying a $358,151 penalty. The Securities and Exchange Commission also filed civil charges against two other people, accusing them of insider trading in shares of Advanced Medical Optics before the company announced it was being acquired in 2009 by Abbott Laboratories. ...

Beard debate delays Fort Hood shooting trial

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 02:21 PM PDT

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - A military appeals court indefinitely postponed the court martial for accused Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Hasan on Friday while it decides if the trial judge can order his beard forcibly shaved, U.S. Army officials said. Hasan is accused of opening fire at a deployment center at Fort Hood, Texas, on November 5, 2009. He is charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder in the shooting at the sprawling Central Texas complex. He faces the death penalty if convicted of murder. ...

U.S. court says Florida's early voting rules discriminatory

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 10:43 AM PDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - New rules that reduce the number of early voting days in Florida are an unfair burden on minorities, a U.S. federal court said in a ruling that upheld the U.S. Justice Department's decision to block the changes in five of the state's 67 counties. The Justice Department and civil rights groups had argued that a 2011 Florida law allowing counties to reduce the window for early voting from 96 hours per week to as few as 48 made it more difficult for minorities to vote than whites. ...

Abortion charges against Kansas Planned Parenthood clinic dropped

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:40 PM PDT

KANSAS CITY, Kansas (Reuters) - Prosecutors on Friday dropped 32 remaining criminal charges accusing a Planned Parenthood clinic in Kansas of performing late-term abortions, ending the first-ever criminal case against a U.S. Planned Parenthood clinic over abortion. The case, brought in 2007 by then-Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline, accused Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri of 107 charges, some of them felonies. Kline, a Republican, said the clinic provided illegal abortions by not verifying the gestational age and viability of some fetuses. ...

Penn State perjury case trial date set for January

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 01:02 PM PDT

HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania (Reuters) - Two former Penn State University officials will go on trial in January on charges of failing to report suspected child sex abuse by former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky and then lying about their involvement to a grand jury. In an order released on Friday, Judge Todd Hoover set January 7 for the start of jury selection for the trial of former Athletic Director Tim Curley and retired Vice President Gary Schultz. Opening arguments at the Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, Court of Common Pleas will begin immediately after a jury is chosen. ...

University of Colorado to allow guns at some off-campus housing

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:31 PM PDT

DENVER (Reuters) - The University of Colorado will allow students with concealed-carry weapons permits to keep guns at some off-campus housing but students cannot have them in dormitories, school officials said on Friday. The new policy was in line with a court ruling overturning a university-wide ban on firearms that had been in place for years on the four campuses of the University of Colorado system. Law enforcement officers had permission to carry weapons on campus. ...

Emory gave incorrect data to publications that rank U.S. colleges

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 04:53 PM PDT

ATLANTA (Reuters) - Emory University intentionally gave incorrect data for more than a decade to publications such as U.S. News & World Report that rank schools and had placed Emory's undergraduate program in a top tier, the school said on Friday. Beginning in 2000, when publications asked for SAT and ACT test scores for students enrolled in the Georgia-based university, Emory instead sent scores for those who had been accepted, Emory president James Wagner said in a statement. Scores for students who enrolled at Emory were "somewhat lower" than the scores of those who were accepted, he said. ...

Chicago's Catholic Cardinal George has recurrence of cancer

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 04:11 PM PDT

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Chicago's Roman Catholic Cardinal Francis George had cancerous cells removed from his kidney and liver this week, six years after he underwent surgery for bladder cancer, the diocese said on Friday. George, who oversees 2.3 million Catholics in the nation's third-largest diocese after Los Angeles and New York, had a procedure on Wednesday removing the cancerous cells in his kidney and a nodule on his liver. He discussed a course of treatment with his doctors, the archdiocese said in a brief statement on its website. George, a former president of the U.S. ...

Baseball star Eddie Murray settles SEC insider trading charges

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 02:25 PM PDT

Bondholders, insurers challenge San Bernardino bankruptcy

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 03:43 PM PDT

(Reuters) - Bondholders and bond insurers are challenging the eligibility of San Bernardino, California, to file for bankruptcy protection, claiming the city provided no financial information to its creditors. Their court filings follow one by the city's firefighters this week that asked for more time to decide whether they will fight San Bernardino's request for bankruptcy protection. ...

Battle far from over for U.S. immigrants who get deferrals

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 03:31 PM PDT

MIAMI/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The Obama administration's new policy to grant temporary legal status to millions of young illegal immigrants will end the immediate threat of deportation but may not give them the same privileges as legal residents. Within hours of the policy's going into effect on Wednesday, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer issued an executive order denying public benefits such as driver's licenses to illegal immigrants shielded from deportation under the new rules. ...

Sudan frees U.S. resident after Washington demands release

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 03:18 PM PDT

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudan's security services have freed a resident of the United States who was arrested just after being released in one of the first trials of people detained in anti-government protests, his lawyer said on Friday. The United States had demanded the release of Radwan Daoud who was re-arrested by security agents on Monday, the same day a judge found him not guilty of the most serious charges against him, which included forming a terrorist organization. ...

Seven charged in shootings that killed Louisiana police officers

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 02:51 PM PDT

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - Louisiana police have charged seven people in connection with Thursday's shootings near New Orleans that left two sheriff's deputies dead and two others wounded, authorities said. Brian Lyn Smith, 24, of LaPlace, Louisiana, was charged with attempted first-degree murder, St. John Parish Sheriff's Office spokesman Dane Clement said on Friday. Terry Smith, 44, Derrick Smith, 22, Kyle David Joekel, 28, and Teniecha Bright, 21, were charged with being a principal to attempted first-degree murder, Clement said. ...

U.S. sues Florida over ending kosher meals in prisons

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 01:48 PM PDT

MIAMI (Reuters) - Hundreds of Florida prisoners have been forced to choose between starving or violating their religious beliefs since the state stopped offering kosher meals in its prisons, the U.S. Justice Department said in a lawsuit. The federal government filed suit against the Florida Department of Corrections in U.S. District Court in Miami on Tuesday, accusing the state of violating prisoners' religious rights by ending its kosher meal service in 2007. ...

Supremacist couple face racketeering charges in U.S. Northwest killing spree

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 02:34 PM PDT

PORTLAND, Oregon (Reuters) - A white supremacist couple accused of killing four people in a violent road trip across the Pacific Northwest have been indicted on racketeering charges and other federal offenses that carry a maximum sentence of the death penalty. The 15-count indictment, announced on Friday, charges David Joseph Pedersen, 32, and his 25-year-old girlfriend, Holly Ann Grigsby, with belonging to a criminal enterprise that committed "acts of murder on the basis of race, color, religion and perceived 'degenerate' conduct. ...

U.S. Army suicides reached record monthly high in July

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 01:16 PM PDT

(Reuters) - Twenty-six active-duty soldiers are believed to have committed suicide in July, more than double the number reported for June and the most suicides ever recorded in a month since the U.S. Army began tracking detailed statistics on such deaths. During the first seven months of this year, there were 116 suspected suicides among active-duty soldiers, compared to 165 suicides for all of last year, the Army said. The military branch reported 12 likely suicides during June. The monthly totals for 2012 include confirmed suicides and cases still under investigation, the Army said. ...

Obama recycles earmarks to fund transportation projects

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 01:31 PM PDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama is sending $473 million to 49 U.S. states and Washington, D.C., for transportation projects, pulling together funds that were earmarked for them in past federal budgets but never spent, his administration said on Friday. States must tell the federal government how they will apply the funds for highway, transit, passenger rail, or port projects by October 1 and then have a definite plan in place by December 31. ...

Group sues to block Los Angeles ban on medical marijuana shops

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 02:11 PM PDT

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A group of medical marijuana patients sued the city of Los Angeles on Friday, seeking to block a citywide ban that would shut down most of its storefront pot dispensaries in three weeks. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of 11 patients by the nonprofit Patient Care Alliance Los Angeles trade association, says users are protected by California's 1996 legalization of medical marijuana and a constitutional right to freedom of assembly. "The medical marijuana center of the globe is L.A. just as much as the movie capital of the globe is L.A. ...

Midday update shows dryness returning to US crops

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 10:16 AM PDT

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Midday weather updates on Friday indicated little shift from earlier outlooks for dry weather to return to the drought-stricken U.S. Midwest crop region, agricultural meteorologists said. They said the showers this week as corn and soybeans neared the end of their growing season were too little too late to greatly revive crop prospects. "There were some decent rains in central Illinois and west central Indiana yesterday, but it's too late for corn and too late for most of the bean crop," said Don Keeney, meteorologist for MDA EarthSat Weather. ...

Insight: Auto insurers' driver tracking hits wall in California

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 10:33 AM PDT

(Reuters) - California is turning into a battleground for technology that allows auto insurers to track their customers' driving behavior and offer them lower premiums, but that privacy advocates reject as an excessive intrusion with serious consequences. Insurance companies are increasingly installing small boxes in clients' cars that monitor everything from how much customers drive to their average speeds to where they drive. ...

Illinois House expels Democrat indicted for bribery

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 01:19 PM PDT

SPRINGFIELD, Illinois (Reuters) - The Illinois House of Representatives on Friday expelled a Democratic lawmaker indicted for bribery, the first member to be booted from the chamber since 1905. State House Representative Derrick Smith, who represents a staunchly Democratic district in Chicago, was arrested in March and charged with accepting a $7,000 bribe in exchange for endorsing a daycare center's state grant application. He has denied the charges. ...

Governments make new efforts to avoid strategic shocks

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 01:03 PM PDT

LONDON (Reuters) - Blindsided by the "Arab Spring", taken aback by the speed of the economic and geopolitical shift to Asia and apparently always a step behind on the Eurozone, Western governments are putting new effort into "horizon scanning" for coming seismic global shifts. For the United States and its allies, some worry the heightened focus on Iraq, Afghanistan and the "war on terror" meant the bigger picture was far too often ignored. ...

Pennsylvania groups appeal judge's ruling in voter ID case

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 12:06 PM PDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A coalition of civil rights groups has asked Pennsylvania's highest court to review a voter identification law that it says will disenfranchise over 1 million voters ahead of the U.S. presidential election in the battleground state. A state judge this week rejected their challenge to the law, which requires voters to present photo identification such as a driver's license in order to cast a ballot. Republican lawmakers say it will help prevent voter fraud. Critics charge that it is a ploy to keep mainly Democratic voters from casting ballots. ...

Unemployment rates rise in U.S. election swing states

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 02:11 PM PDT

Washington (Reuters) - Unemployment rates rose in July from June in almost all states, including those where the presidential election fight is expected to be fiercest, according to data released on Friday by the Labor Department. Altogether, jobless rates rose in 44 states. Rates dropped in Idaho, Rhode Island and the District of Columbia, and were unchanged in four states. As the country moves closer to November's election day, voters' attention is squarely focused on the economy and a national jobless rate hovering above 8 percent. Because of the unique U.S. ...

IRS wields summons to pry info out of wealthy, companies

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 10:19 AM PDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Internal Revenue Service is increasingly urging its examiners to make more use of a powerful legal tool - the administrative summons - to obtain sensitive documents from uncooperative taxpayers, agency officials and Washington lawyers said. But targets of the summonses have been pushing back. As a result, litigation involving the IRS has increased sharply in recent years as the agency challenges more wealthy individuals and businesses it believes are underpaying. ...

U.S. pipeline oversight to be toughened under proposed rules

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 10:34 AM PDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Oversight of the U.S. pipeline system will be toughened, including a doubling of fines for mishaps, under proposed rules announced by the Department of Transportation on Friday. The proposed rules, which follow a number of high-profile oil leaks in the United States, are meant to implement the bipartisan pipeline safety act that Congress passed last year. "There are 2.6 million miles of pipeline crisscrossing this nation that impact each and every one of us," Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said in a statement. ...

Shell California refinery restarted flexicoker Wednesday: filings

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 10:36 AM PDT

(Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell Plc's 156,400-barrel-per-day Martinez, California, refinery restarted a flexicoker unit on Wednesday, according to notices filed with the Contra Costa Health Department Hazardous Materials Program. A pressure relief valve failed on the debutanizer column on the flexicoker, which is a type of coking unit, on Tuesday, according to filings with the Contra Costa County Hazardous Materials Program. A coking unit increases the amount of refinabale material in a barrel of oil and converts residual crude to petroleum coke, a coal substitute. ...

Firefighters hold back flames threatening towns in Idaho, California

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:24 PM PDT

Seven charged in shootings that killed Louisiana police officers

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:57 PM PDT

Abortion charges against Kansas Planned Parenthood clinic dropped

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:40 PM PDT

Baseball star Eddie Murray settles SEC insider trading charges

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:31 PM PDT

University of Colorado to allow guns at some off-campus housing

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 05:31 PM PDT

Emory gave incorrect data to publications that rank U.S. colleges

Posted: 17 Aug 2012 04:53 PM PDT