Graphic details of Notorious B.I.G. murder revealed

The night rapper Notorious B.I.G. was gunned down in one of L.A.'s most famous unsolved homicides he had no drugs or alcohol in his system, according to a Los Angeles County coroner's report unsealed Friday.

A coroner's medical examiner ran toxicology screens for alcohol, cocaine, codeine, morphine and methamphetamine with negative results for all.

The autopsy report has been on a security hold and sealed for more than 15 years, ever since the rapper was killed in a drive-by shooting in March 1997.

DOCUMENT: Read Notorious B.I.G.’s full autopsy

The report shows that although he was shot four times, it was a single bullet that ended his life. One of the bullets entered the rapper's right hip, and fatally pierced several organs.

Notorious B.I.G., whose real name was Christopher George Latore Wallace, was killed by an unknown assailant on Wilshire Boulevard as the music star sat in the front passenger seat of a Chevrolet Suburban. The killing of the rapper, also known as Biggie Smalls, remains unsolved despite an LAPD task force that examined the death.

According to the autopsy, one bullet struck Wallace's left forearm and traveled down to his wrist while a another bullet hit him in the back and exited his body through his left shoulder.  Another shot  hit his left thigh and traveled through to his inner thigh before glancing off his scrotum. None of those rounds were fatal.

Notorious B.I.G.: FBI investigation files

The fatal shot, according to Dr. Lisa Scheinin, entered his right hip before slicing through his colon, liver, heart and part of his lung before wedging in his left shoulder area.

Two medium-caliber bullets were recovered from the hospital gurney, according to the report.

At the time of his death, Wallace was one of the biggest stars in rap music. His slaying shocked the hip-hop community, coming just months after the Las Vegas slaying of another marquee rapper, Los Angeles-based Tupac Shakur.

Once friends, the rappers became rivals whose respective camps regularly traded violent barbs in song lyrics and in interviews. Shakur's slaying also remains unsolved.

Various theories have linked the two homicides. Some believe the two men were killed as part of a rivalry between East Coast and West Coast rappers, or between their two music labels at the time, Los Angeles-based Death Row and New York-based Bad Boy Entertainment.

Amid questions about the killing, the FBI investigated various theories, including one from a former LAPD detective, who later publicly suggested that Wallace may have been killed by a hit man hired by a corrupt ex-LAPD officer on behalf of Marion "Suge" Knight, the founder of Death Row Records.

The FBI opened its probe after Wallace's family accused the city of covering up LAPD involvement in the rapper's slaying. Los Angeles police officials last year said they exhaustively searched for answers in the case without an arrest.

ALSO:

Man finds $175,000 in pot in backyard, then things get weird

D.A. dismissed tennis umpire case without seeing defense report

35,000 rubber ducks in Santa, reindeer outfits seized at L.A. port

-- Richard Winton

Follow Richard Winton (@LACrimes) on Twitter and Google+

Photo: Notorious  B.I.G. accepts his award for rap artist and rap single of the year at the 1995 Billboard Music Awards in New York. Credit: Mark Lennihan / Associated Press

Read More..

Smokers celebrate as Wash. legalizes marijuana

SEATTLE (AP) — The crowds of happy people lighting joints under Seattle's Space Needle early Thursday morning with nary a police officer in sight bespoke the new reality: Marijuana is legal under Washington state law.

Hundreds gathered at Seattle Center for a New Year's Eve-style countdown to 12 a.m., when the legalization measure passed by voters last month took effect. When the clock struck, they cheered and sparked up in unison.

A few dozen people gathered on a sidewalk outside the north Seattle headquarters of the annual Hempfest celebration and did the same, offering joints to reporters and blowing smoke into television news cameras.

"I feel like a kid in a candy store!" shouted Hempfest volunteer Darby Hageman. "It's all becoming real now!"

Washington and Colorado became the first states to vote to decriminalize and regulate the possession of an ounce or less of marijuana by adults over 21. Both measures call for setting up state licensing schemes for pot growers, processors and retail stores. Colorado's law is set to take effect by Jan. 5.

Technically, Washington's new marijuana law still forbids smoking pot in public, which remains punishable by a fine, like drinking in public. But pot fans wanted a party, and Seattle police weren't about to write them any tickets.

In another sweeping change for Washington, Gov. Chris Gregoire on Wednesday signed into law a measure that legalizes same-sex marriage. The state joins several others that allow gay and lesbian couples to wed.

The mood was festive in Seattle as dozens of gay and lesbian couples got in line to pick up marriage licenses at the King County auditor's office early Thursday.

King County and Thurston County announced they would open their auditors' offices shortly after midnight Wednesday to accommodate those who wanted to be among the first to get their licenses.

Kelly Middleton and her partner Amanda Dollente got in line at 4 p.m. Wednesday.

Hours later, as the line grew, volunteers distributed roses and a group of men and women serenaded the waiting line to the tune of "Chapel of Love."

Because the state has a three-day waiting period, the earliest that weddings can take place is Sunday.

In dealing with marijuana, the Seattle Police Department told its 1,300 officers on Wednesday, just before legalization took hold, that until further notice they shall not issue citations for public marijuana use.

Officers will be advising people not to smoke in public, police spokesman Jonah Spangenthal-Lee wrote on the SPD Blotter. "The police department believes that, under state law, you may responsibly get baked, order some pizzas and enjoy a 'Lord of the Rings' marathon in the privacy of your own home, if you want to."

He offered a catchy new directive referring to the film "The Big Lebowski," popular with many marijuana fans: "The Dude abides, and says 'take it inside!'"

"This is a big day because all our lives we've been living under the iron curtain of prohibition," said Hempfest director Vivian McPeak. "The whole world sees that prohibition just took a body blow."

Washington's new law decriminalizes possession of up to an ounce for those over 21, but for now selling marijuana remains illegal. I-502 gives the state a year to come up with a system of state-licensed growers, processors and retail stores, with the marijuana taxed 25 percent at each stage. Analysts have estimated that a legal pot market could bring Washington hundreds of millions of dollars a year in new tax revenue for schools, health care and basic government functions.

But marijuana remains illegal under federal law. That means federal agents can still arrest people for it, and it's banned from federal properties, including military bases and national parks.

The Justice Department has not said whether it will sue to try to block the regulatory schemes in Washington and Colorado from taking effect.

"The department's responsibility to enforce the Controlled Substances Act remains unchanged," said a statement issued Wednesday by the Seattle U.S. attorney's office. "Neither states nor the executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress."

The legal question is whether the establishment of a regulated marijuana market would "frustrate the purpose" of the federal pot prohibition, and many constitutional law scholars say it very likely would.

That leaves the political question of whether the administration wants to try to block the regulatory system, even though it would remain legal to possess up to an ounce of marijuana.

Alison Holcomb is the drug policy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington and served as the campaign manager for New Approach Washington, which led the legalization drive. She said the voters clearly showed they're done with marijuana prohibition.

"New Approach Washington sponsors and the ACLU look forward to working with state and federal officials and to ensure the law is fully and fairly implemented," she said.

___

Johnson can be reached at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle

Read More..

Mario Lopez Is Spontaneous, Romantic, Says New Bride Courtney Mazza

By Dahvi Shira and Patrick Gomez

12/08/2012 at 03:30 PM EST

Courtney Mazza, Mario Lopez and their daughter, Gia

FameFlynet

There's no lack of spice in the lives of newlyweds Mario and Courtney Lopez.

"The most romantic thing about Mario is his spontaneity," Courtney told PEOPLE on Friday, just under a week after the two tied the knot in Mexico. "He's so spontaneous and it's just fun to be with somebody [like that]."

Mario, 39, explains that he keeps the romance fresh by "taking off for a quick trip or having little quickies here and there," adding, "Kids and jobs and everything else gets in the way, but you can't forget about each other."

As for Courtney, she turns the heat up in the kitchen.

"The most romantic thing about my wife is the meals she cooks when I come home," Mario said, before Courtney added with a laugh, "My grandma did tell me to cook for him in nothing but an apron and stilettos."

When it came to celebrating the couple's Dec. 1 nuptials – which were captured on camera for TLC's Mario and Courtney's Wedding Fiesta, airing on Saturday – being together was the best present they could have received.

"To be honest, we didn't have a wedding registry and didn't ask for any gifts," Mario recently said. "We asked for people to donate to a charity. That was important to us."

Adds the X Factor host, "We had so many people say that was the best wedding ever. Oh my god, it was so much fun."

With their wedding day under their belt, the pair has another celebration nearing.

The couple teamed up with Nivea this year to help kick off the "Kiss of the Year" contest on Facebook, and they will head to Times Square in New York City for New Year's Eve to be with the winning pair, who can be voted on through Dec. 14.

"There were over 1,400 entries," Courtney says. "All of the stories were amazing. It was so hard to narrow it down to just three couples."

Their holiday destination has a special significance.

"We love New York," Mario says. "It's where we met and fell in love."

As for their first kiss, Courtney says with a laugh, "Oh, yeah, I remember it. He pounced me!"

Read More..

Are Online Degrees as Valuable as Traditional College Diplomas?

Millennials are the first generation to grow up with constant technology and personal computers. That might explain why they see such a value in online education.

A recent poll by Northeastern University showed that 18 to 29 year olds had a more negative view about attending college because of the high cost, and a more positive opinion about online classes than their older counterparts. The survey also showed more than half of the millennials had taken an online course.

Online education is attracting hundreds of thousands of students a year. Perhaps this is why more brick-and-mortar universities are searching for an online identity.

This week Wellesley College announced that it will offer free online classes to anyone with an Internet connection as part of the nonprofit project edX. Earlier this year, Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology teamed up to fund and launch the online platform.

More: Harvard and MIT Want to Educate You for Free

Online education was even the talk in Washington this week when a group of panelists convened to discuss Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC), which is an open source network like edX. These courses are very much like correspondence classes in the early 20th century.

But there are still those universities that only exist in a virtual world and students pay to attend. Are they as beneficial to students as attending a two- or four-year college?

“It depends at what level and what subject,” says Isabelle Frank, dean of Fordham College of Liberal Studies. “In general, fully online degrees are not valued as highly as degrees from brick-and-mortar institutions. This is because online-only universities do not have the faculty quality and interaction that occurs with full-time faculty and secure positions.”

She says that Fordham has online master programs and some online courses, but the model is “that of a small seminar style class with a lot of faculty feedback and involvement.”

Just like a physical college, a quality online education depends on the institution.

For example, students at Arizona State University’s W. P. Carey School of Business take online classes and communicate with other students around the world—something students 25 years ago couldn’t have dreamed of doing.

“This affords the opportunity to learn leadership, team-building and managerial skills by solving problems and coordinating efforts for projects through the process of establishing real-time meetings, coordinating time zones and dealing with potential language issues,” Sher Downing, executive director of online academic services at the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University, said. “This value cannot be mirrored as easily in a traditional classroom, and for many companies with offices located around the world, this is a valuable skill, when the workforce is required to handle these types of situations.”

Downing said that students can save money by taking online classes because they no longer have to commute, live on or near a campus or relocate.

The millennials surveyed by Northeastern University are keen to take online courses. In fact, nine in 10 said online classes should be used as a tool and mixed with other teaching methods. The poll also found that students want flex­i­bility, which is exactly what online colleges offer.

Employers may not yet see an online degree in the same light as a traditional university but that is likely to change in the near future. It may just be that millennials, who don’t want to go in debt for an education like some of their parents did, are just a bit ahead of educators and employers.

Related Stories on TakePart:

• Top Universities Want You to Take Free Online Classes in Your Pajamas

• Military Gives ‘F’ to Online Diplomas

• 2012 List: The Most Expensive Colleges in America

---

Suzi Parker is an Arkansas-based political and cultural journalist whose work frequently appears in The Washington Post and The Christian Science Monitor. She is the author of two books. @SuziParker | TakePart.com 

Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Soccer coach who molested boys 'a vulture,' judge says

This post has been corrected. See note at bottom for details.

An Anaheim man who worked as a soccer coach and martial arts instructor was sentenced to 298 years in prison Thursday for sexually assaulting 11 of his young students, according to the Orange County district attorney’s office.

Luis Alberto Pineda, 31, was convicted last month of committing forcible sodomy and other lewd acts on children and teen-agers whom he met through his coaching jobs, the district attorney’s office said.

Pineda was an assistant instructor at Moo Yea Do Martial Arts in Fullerton between 2005 and 2010, and coached in the North Orange County Youth Soccer Premier League, the D.A. said.

Authorities said Pineda befriended his victims’ parents and won their trust, and sexually assaulted the children after games and practices, during outings to dinner or movies, and while driving them home from soccer or karate class.

“Rats don’t do this to their children,” Orange County Superior Court Judge Richard King said in imposing a sentence of 298 years to life in state prison. “Vultures don’t do this to their children.”

[For the Record, Dec. 6, 1:55 p.m.: An earlier version of this post incorrectly said that Luis Pineda was sentenced to 285 years in prison. He was sentenced to 298 years.]

ALSO:

Northridge shooting victims identified as suspects await extradition

Woman assaulted, held captive in attic for two weeks, police say

Villaraigosa urges 'fiscal cliff' solution, defends Fix the Debt

-- Christopher Goffard

Photo: Luis Alberto Pineda. Credit: Orange County district attorney's office

Read More..

Smokers celebrate as Wash. legalizes marijuana

SEATTLE (AP) — The crowds of happy people lighting joints under Seattle's Space Needle early Thursday morning with nary a police officer in sight bespoke the new reality: Marijuana is legal under Washington state law.

Hundreds gathered at Seattle Center for a New Year's Eve-style countdown to 12 a.m., when the legalization measure passed by voters last month took effect. When the clock struck, they cheered and sparked up in unison.

A few dozen people gathered on a sidewalk outside the north Seattle headquarters of the annual Hempfest celebration and did the same, offering joints to reporters and blowing smoke into television news cameras.

"I feel like a kid in a candy store!" shouted Hempfest volunteer Darby Hageman. "It's all becoming real now!"

Washington and Colorado became the first states to vote to decriminalize and regulate the possession of an ounce or less of marijuana by adults over 21. Both measures call for setting up state licensing schemes for pot growers, processors and retail stores. Colorado's law is set to take effect by Jan. 5.

Technically, Washington's new marijuana law still forbids smoking pot in public, which remains punishable by a fine, like drinking in public. But pot fans wanted a party, and Seattle police weren't about to write them any tickets.

In another sweeping change for Washington, Gov. Chris Gregoire on Wednesday signed into law a measure that legalizes same-sex marriage. The state joins several others that allow gay and lesbian couples to wed.

The mood was festive in Seattle as dozens of gay and lesbian couples got in line to pick up marriage licenses at the King County auditor's office early Thursday.

King County and Thurston County announced they would open their auditors' offices shortly after midnight Wednesday to accommodate those who wanted to be among the first to get their licenses.

Kelly Middleton and her partner Amanda Dollente got in line at 4 p.m. Wednesday.

Hours later, as the line grew, volunteers distributed roses and a group of men and women serenaded the waiting line to the tune of "Chapel of Love."

Because the state has a three-day waiting period, the earliest that weddings can take place is Sunday.

In dealing with marijuana, the Seattle Police Department told its 1,300 officers on Wednesday, just before legalization took hold, that until further notice they shall not issue citations for public marijuana use.

Officers will be advising people not to smoke in public, police spokesman Jonah Spangenthal-Lee wrote on the SPD Blotter. "The police department believes that, under state law, you may responsibly get baked, order some pizzas and enjoy a 'Lord of the Rings' marathon in the privacy of your own home, if you want to."

He offered a catchy new directive referring to the film "The Big Lebowski," popular with many marijuana fans: "The Dude abides, and says 'take it inside!'"

"This is a big day because all our lives we've been living under the iron curtain of prohibition," said Hempfest director Vivian McPeak. "The whole world sees that prohibition just took a body blow."

Washington's new law decriminalizes possession of up to an ounce for those over 21, but for now selling marijuana remains illegal. I-502 gives the state a year to come up with a system of state-licensed growers, processors and retail stores, with the marijuana taxed 25 percent at each stage. Analysts have estimated that a legal pot market could bring Washington hundreds of millions of dollars a year in new tax revenue for schools, health care and basic government functions.

But marijuana remains illegal under federal law. That means federal agents can still arrest people for it, and it's banned from federal properties, including military bases and national parks.

The Justice Department has not said whether it will sue to try to block the regulatory schemes in Washington and Colorado from taking effect.

"The department's responsibility to enforce the Controlled Substances Act remains unchanged," said a statement issued Wednesday by the Seattle U.S. attorney's office. "Neither states nor the executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress."

The legal question is whether the establishment of a regulated marijuana market would "frustrate the purpose" of the federal pot prohibition, and many constitutional law scholars say it very likely would.

That leaves the political question of whether the administration wants to try to block the regulatory system, even though it would remain legal to possess up to an ounce of marijuana.

Alison Holcomb is the drug policy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington and served as the campaign manager for New Approach Washington, which led the legalization drive. She said the voters clearly showed they're done with marijuana prohibition.

"New Approach Washington sponsors and the ACLU look forward to working with state and federal officials and to ensure the law is fully and fairly implemented," she said.

___

Johnson can be reached at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle

Read More..

Lady Antebellum's Hillary Scott Is Pregnant

By Stephen M. Silverman

12/07/2012 at 05:15 PM EST

Chris Tyrrell and Hillary Scott

Courtesy Hillary Scott

First comes the sound of wedding bells, and next comes the baby rattle.

Lady Antebellum's Hillary Scott and drummer Chris Tyrrell, who became engaged on Independence Day in 2011 and married Jan. 7 in upstate New York, are now expecting a child.

"Chris & I are excited to announce that our Christmas gift has arrived a little early this year! We are having a BABY!" she wrote on Twitter Friday. "We feel so blessed!!!"

"Everything is brighter. Everything has a deeper meaning," Scott, 26, previously said of her new husband. "He makes me feel more comfortable in my own skin."

Scott has certainly had kids on the brain: On Monday, the band announced they are starting a new charity called LadyAID, which will focus on children's hospitals and as well as other charitable causes.

Scott and Tyrrell met while they were in college, though things didn't turn romantic until later. Lady Antebellum's song, "Just A Kiss," was inspired by Scott and Tyrrell's relationship when they first began dating.

Read More..

iPad mini fails to draw crowds for China launch

Either Apple’s (AAPL) reservation-only system works better than anyone could have expected, or consumers in China have little interest in the company’s new iPad mini. Apple’s tiny tablet launched on schedule on Friday but according to IDG News Service, the turnout for Apple’s new slate was minimal. At Apple’s new flagship store in the well-trafficked Wangfujing district in Beijing, for example, turnout was “nearly nonexistent” according to the report, with no lines forming at all on Friday.

We’ve seen Apple rack up big numbers despite small launch-day turnouts in the past, but Apple’s reservation system does not appear to be responsible for the seemingly slow launch — according to IDG, many consumers who did turn up at Apple stores looking to purchase an iPad mini were unable to do so because they weren’t even aware that the reservation-only system existed.

Apple’s iPhone 5, which will presumably draw more of a crowd, launches in China next Friday.

Get more from BGR.com: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook

Gadgets News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

The Lede Blog: Latest Updates on Protests in Egypt

“@ssaadani: محمد محمود في الإتحادية. http://t.co/cTfsNeKB”my favorite Mohamed Mahmoud graffiti made it to presidential palace

— Abdel-Rahman Hussein (@ElFoulio) 7 Dec 12

The Lede is following the political crisis in Egypt, where supporters and opponents of President Mohamed Morsi rallied on Friday.

Read More..

Church volunteer had sex with kids he met at church school, police allege

A well-known Orange County church has been roiled by allegations that a volunteer sexually assaulted children.

A Sunday school volunteer at Rock Harbor Church in Costa Mesa
allegedly formed relationships with children in his church and went on
to sexually abuse at least one of them multiple times between November
2009 and November 2011, according to church leaders and court documents.

Two families at Rock Harbor came forward with new allegations
against Christopher Bryan McKenzie, the pool cleaner accused of
years-long sexual relationships with at least three children younger
than 14, pastors said Monday night.

McKenzie, 48, of Costa Mesa, attended Rock Harbor and applied to be a
child-care volunteer at the 3,000-member campus in late 2007,
Communications Director Jeff Gideon said.

On Saturday, Newport Beach police announced
they had arrested McKenzie on suspicion of sexually abusing two boys,
one from the late 1990s to 2005 and one from 2005 to 2007. Neither had
ties to the church, police said.

At a Monday night meeting, Rock Harbor pastors announced two families from the congregation added allegations against McKenzie.

Lead Pastor Todd Proctor said the families approached Rock Harbor leadership after the announcement and were directed to police.

It's alleged McKenzie had substantial sexual conduct with one of the
children on at least three occasions, according to court documents.

In total, McKenzie is charged with inappropriate interaction with
four children. The fourth, who pastors said is also from Rock Harbor,
was allegedly used to distribute obscene material.

Pastors told congregants Monday that they don't believe McKenzie had
inappropriate contact with any children at the church or during a church
function. Volunteers are never allowed to be alone with children,
Proctor said.

However, he said, leaders believe McKenzie most likely met the
children and formed relationships with their parents at Rock Harbor
where he volunteered in a fifth-grade classroom for about five years.

At Rock Harbor, all child-care applicants are background checked,
screened on the Megan's Law website, must produce references and are
interviewed, leaders said.

McKenzie pleaded guilty to driving under the influence of
alcohol in 2007. Gideon said the team conducting a background check was
not informed of the incident. If a crime does appear on a volunteer’s
application, a committee weighs the severity and how much time has
elapsed, Gideon said.

McKenzie was ultimately granted approval to volunteer.

"Our kids probably had different levels of interaction with Chris,
and we need to recognize that," Proctor said, adding that he had spoken
to each of his three boys about the allegations. "One of my sons in
particular had way more exposure under Chris' leadership."

Throughout the meeting, pastors repeatedly encouraged parents to talk
to their children and contact police if they believe something
inappropriate occurred.

"It's all heartbreaking," Proctor said.

McKenzie was charged with 10 felony counts of lewd acts upon a child
younger than 14, four felony counts of using a minor for the
distribution of obscene matter, and two felony counts of distributing
pornography to a minor with sentencing enhancements for substantial
sexual conduct with a child and committing lewd acts upon a child
younger than 14 against more than one victim.

If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of 45 years to life in state prison. He is being held on $1-million bail.

ALSO:

New litigation related to alleged lewd conduct at Miramonte

Officials blame leak, not explosion, for ammonia spill at Dole plant

More than 1,600 unidentified, unclaimed remains buried in Boyle Heights

--Jeremiah Dobruck, Times Community News

Photo: Christopher Bryan McKenzie. Credit: Daily Pilot

Read More..

Celebrations planned as Wash. legalizes marijuana

SEATTLE (AP) — Legal marijuana possession becomes a reality under Washington state law on Thursday, and some people planned to celebrate the new law by breaking it.

Voters in Washington and Colorado last month made those the first states to decriminalize and regulate the recreational use of marijuana. Washington's law takes effect Thursday and allows adults to have up to an ounce of pot — but it bans public use of marijuana, which is punishable by a fine, just like drinking in public.

Nevertheless, some people planned to gather at 12:01 a.m. PST Thursday to smoke in public beneath Seattle's Space Needle. Others planned a midnight party outside the Seattle headquarters of Hempfest, the 21-year-old festival that attracts tens of thousands of pot fans every summer.

"This is a big day because all our lives we've been living under the iron curtain of prohibition," said Hempfest director Vivian McPeak. "The whole world sees that prohibition just took a body blow."

In another sweeping change for Washington, Gov. Chris Gregoire on Wednesday signed into law a measure that legalizes same-sex marriage. The state joins several others that allow gay and lesbian couples to wed.

That law also takes effect Thursday, when gay and lesbian couples can start picking up their wedding certificates and licenses at county auditors' offices. Those offices in King County, the state's largest and home to Seattle, and Thurston County, home to the state capital of Olympia, planned to open the earliest, at 12:01 a.m. Thursday, to start issuing marriage licenses. Because the state has a three-day waiting period, the earliest that weddings can take place is Sunday.

The Seattle Police Department provided this public marijuana use enforcement guidance to its officers via email Wednesday night: "Until further notice, officers shall not take any enforcement action — other than to issue a verbal warning — for a violation of Initiative 502."

Thanks to a 2003 law, marijuana enforcement remains the department's lowest priority. Even before I-502 passed on Nov. 6, police rarely busted people at Hempfest, despite widespread pot use, and the city attorney here doesn't prosecute people for having small amounts of marijuana.

Officers will be advising people to take their weed inside, police spokesman Jonah Spangenthal-Lee wrote on the SPD Blotter. "The police department believes that, under state law, you may responsibly get baked, order some pizzas and enjoy a 'Lord of the Rings' marathon in the privacy of your own home, if you want to."

Washington's new law decriminalizes possession of up to an ounce for those over 21, but for now selling marijuana remains illegal. I-502 gives the state a year to come up with a system of state-licensed growers, processors and retail stores, with the marijuana taxed 25 percent at each stage. Analysts have estimated that a legal pot market could bring Washington hundreds of millions of dollars a year in new tax revenue for schools, health care and basic government functions.

But marijuana remains illegal under federal law. That means federal agents can still arrest people for it, and it's banned from federal properties, including military bases and national parks.

The Justice Department has not said whether it will sue to try to block the regulatory schemes in Washington and Colorado from taking effect.

"The department's responsibility to enforce the Controlled Substances Act remains unchanged," said a statement issued Wednesday by the Seattle U.S. attorney's office. "Neither states nor the executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress" — a non-issue, since the measures passed in Washington and Colorado don't "nullify" federal law, which federal agents remain free to enforce.

The legal question is whether the establishment of a regulated marijuana market would "frustrate the purpose" of the federal pot prohibition, and many constitutional law scholars say it very likely would.

That leaves the political question of whether the administration wants to try to block the regulatory system, even though it would remain legal to possess up to an ounce of marijuana.

Colorado's measure, as far as decriminalizing possession goes, is set to take effect by Jan. 5. That state's regulatory scheme is due to be up and running by October 2013.

___(equals)

Johnson can be reached at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle

Read More..

Michelle Obama's Grammy Nod: The Beekeeper Gets Credit, Too!, She Says

By Sandra Sobieraj Westfall

12/06/2012 at 05:45 PM EST

Her husband already has two Grammys on the shelf, but for First Lady Michelle Obama, her first nomination is still an honor – one for which she shares the credit.

Mrs. Obama, who is nominated in the spoken-word category for her book American Grown, says in a statement to PEOPLE: "This nomination is such an honor not just for me, but for everybody who contributed to the garden and the audio book, from the National Parks Service employees to our White House chefs to our beekeeper."

The book – part gardening how-to, part cookbook, part White House history – is, "So close to my heart because it tells the story of our White House Kitchen Garden and gardens all around the country," she says, "as well as what Americans are doing to make sure our kids are growing up healthy."

No official word on whether Mrs. Obama will attend the glittery music-awards ceremony in February (her husband never did; neither did Hillary or Bill Clinton when their audiobooks won), but the First Lady says she hopes the nomination alone "keeps the conversation going about how we can all work together to ensure a healthy future for all our nation's children."

Read More..

Facebook might buy Microsoft’s Atlas Ad platform to compete with Google

Is Facebook (FB) preparing to compete with Google (GOOG) in online advertising? According to AllThingsD and BusinessInsider’s sources Facebook might be taking steps to build its own advertising network for online websites. AllThingsD says that rather than build a new advertising network from scratch, Facebook could just buy Microsoft’s (MSFT) Atlas Solutions platform “that already delivers billions of ad impressions a day.”

BusinessInsider reports that Facebook will reportedly pay a lower price than the $ 6 billion that Microsoft paid for aQuantive in 2007 that included Atlas Solutions. It’s estimated that Atlas is worth more than $ 30 million — a small price to pay to compete with Google’s DoubleClick ad network.

So why is Facebook interested in advertising now? Well, it’s got over 1 billion active users with emails, phone numbers, and unprecedented amounts of “likes.” As BusinessInsider puts it, Facebook has so much data it could “tell marketers whether or not a Facebook user saw, on Facebook.com, an ad for a product before going to the store and buying it.”

Get more from BGR.com: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook

Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

U. S. and Russia to Meet on Syrian Conflict

DUBLIN — A new round of diplomacy on the conflict in Syria will begin on Thursday afternoon when Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations special envoy, hosts an unusual three-way meeting with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and the Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov.

Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey V. Lavrov, right, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the Organization for Security and Economic Cooperation conference in Dublin.

The session, which is being held on the margins of a meeting on European security, comes amid reports of heightened activity at Syria’s chemical weapons sites and signs that Russia may be shifting its position on a political transition in Syria.

“Secretary Clinton has accepted an invitation by U.N. Special Envoy Brahimi for a trilateral meeting on Syria this afternoon with Mr. Brahimi and Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov,” a senior State Department official said Thursday morning.

This is not the first time that American and Russian consultations have spurred hopes of a possible breakthrough. In June, Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Lavrov and the United Nations’s envoy on the Syrian crisis at the time, former United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, appeared to be close to an agreement that a transitional government should be established and that President Bashar al-Assad give up power.

But that seeming understanding quickly broke down, with American officials complaining privately that the Russian side had pulled back from the deal. A major sticking point, it later emerged, was the American insistence that the United Nations Security Council authorize steps to pressure Mr. Assad if he refused to go along under Chapter 7 of the United Nations Charter, which could be used to authorize tougher economic sanctions and, in theory, the use of force.

It remained to be seen if the new round of negotiations would be more successful.

On the one hand, the military situation on the ground appears to be shifting in the rebels’ favor. Some Russian officials reportedly no longer believe that Mr. Assad will succeed in holding on to power and may have a new interest in working out arrangements for a transition. The changing battlefield, some experts say, may have led to a softening of the Russian position.

A senior Turkish official said that after President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey recently met in Istanbul that Moscow was “softening” its “political tone” and would look for ways of getting Mr. Assad to relinquish power.

On the other hand, it was possible that Mr. Lavrov had, in effect, merely agreed to meet so that Russia could maintain influence over the discussions on Syria and find out what exactly Mr. Brahimi was prepared to propose.

There were indications on Thursday that Russian officials see the positions of Washington and Moscow on Syria moving slightly closer.

Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov of Russia expressed satisfaction in a Twitter message that the United States was moving to designate Al Nusra Front, a Syrian opposition group seen by American experts as linked to Al Qaeda, as an international terrorist organization.

The aim of the American move, which is expected soon, would be to isolate radical foes of the Assad government.

With the rebels making gains on the ground, American officials have been trying to ensure that military developments do not outpace political arrangements for a possible transition. American officials have hinted that the United States would upgrade relations with the Syria opposition, possibly to formal recognition, if the coalition made progress on a political structure by the time of a meeting of the so-called Friends of Syria in Morocco.

But emerging policy on the Al Nusra Front also acknowledges Russia’s longstanding argument that the Syrian opposition includes radical jihadists. Mr. Gatilov said that the American step “reflects understanding of the danger of escalating terrorist activity in Syria.”

A lawmaker with the dominant party, United Russia, told British legislators visiting Moscow that Russia saw Mr. Assad’s government struggling. “We think that the Syrian government should execute its functions,” he said, according to the Interfax news service. “But time shows that this task is beyond its strength.”

Dimitri K. Simes, a Russia expert the Center for the National Interest in Washington, said, based on conversations with top officials, that Russia has indeed softened its position in light of military setbacks for the Assad government, and it is now understood that neither Mr. Assad nor his close associates would take a central role in a new government.

However, he said Russia still wanted Iran to take part in negotiations about the transition. Iran’s presence, he said, would reassure Alawites, the Shiite Muslim minority of Mr. Assad and the core of the military, that they would be protected in the change of government.

Michael R. Gordon reported from Dublin, and Ellen Barry from Moscow. Anne Barnard contributed reporting from Beirut, Lebanon.

Read More..

Man lived with dead girlfriend for months, faced murder charges

A jury is being selected in Stockton to hear the murder case against a
man accused of living for months with his girlfriend's dead body.

Devon Epps was evicted from his apartment in December 2011. The next
day, when the apartment manager stopped by, they found a dead body in
the bathroom.

The body had been there for some time, authorities said.

Epps was arrested and then arraigned a few days later. At an earlier hearing, he yelled at a San Joaquin County judge, according to Fox 40.

Read More..

Study could spur wider use of prenatal gene tests

A new study sets the stage for wider use of gene testing in early pregnancy. Scanning the genes of a fetus reveals far more about potential health risks than current prenatal testing does, say researchers who compared both methods in thousands of pregnancies nationwide.

A surprisingly high number — 6 percent — of certain fetuses declared normal by conventional testing were found to have genetic abnormalities by gene scans, the study found. The gene flaws can cause anything from minor defects such as a club foot to more serious ones such as mental retardation, heart problems and fatal diseases.

"This isn't done just so people can terminate pregnancies," because many choose to continue them even if a problem is found, said Dr. Ronald Wapner, reproductive genetics chief at Columbia University Medical Center in New York. "We're better able to give lots and lots of women more information about what's causing the problem and what the prognosis is and what special care their child might need."

He led the federally funded study, published in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.

A second study in the journal found that gene testing could reveal the cause of most stillbirths, many of which remain a mystery now. That gives key information to couples agonizing over whether to try again.

The prenatal study of 4,400 women has long been awaited in the field, and could make gene testing a standard of care in cases where initial screening with an ultrasound exam suggests a structural defect in how the baby is developing, said Dr. Susan Klugman, director of reproductive genetics at New York's Montefiore Medical Center, which enrolled 300 women into the study.

"We can never guarantee the perfect baby but if they want everything done, this is a test that can tell a lot more," she said.

Many pregnant women are offered screening with an ultrasound exam or a blood test that can flag some common abnormalities such as Down syndrome, but these are not conclusive.

The next step is diagnostic testing on cells from the fetus obtained through amniocentesis, which is like a needle biopsy through the belly, or chorionic villus sampling, which snips a bit of the placenta. Doctors look at the sample under a microscope for breaks or extra copies of chromosomes that cause a dozen or so abnormalities.

The new study compared this eyeball method to scanning with gene chips that can spot hundreds of abnormalities and far smaller defects than what can be seen with a microscope. This costs $1,200 to $1,800 versus $600 to $1,000 for the visual exam.

In the study, both methods were used on fetal samples from 4,400 women around the country. Half of the moms were at higher risk because they were over 35. One-fifth had screening tests suggesting Down syndrome. One-fourth had ultrasounds suggesting structural abnormalities. Others sought screening for other reasons.

"Some did it for anxiety — they just wanted more information about their child," Wapner said.

Of women whose ultrasounds showed a possible structural defect but whose fetuses were called normal by the visual chromosome exam, gene testing found problems in 6 percent — one out of 17.

"That's a lot. That's huge," Klugman said.

Gene tests also found abnormalities in nearly 2 percent of cases where the mom was older or ultrasounds suggested a problem other than a structural defect.

Dr. Lorraine Dugoff, a University of Pennsylvania high-risk pregnancy specialist, wrote in an editorial in the journal that gene testing should become the standard of care when a structural problem is suggested by ultrasound. But its value may be incremental in other cases and offset by the 1.5 percent of cases where a gene abnormality of unknown significance is found.

In those cases, "a lot of couples might not be happy that they ordered that test" because it can't give a clear answer, she said.

Ana Zeletz, a former pediatric nurse from Hoboken, N.J., had one of those results during the study. An ultrasound suggested possible Down syndrome; gene testing ruled that out but showed an abnormality that could indicate kidney problems — or nothing.

"They give you this list of all the things that could possibly be wrong," Zeletz said. Her daughter, Jillian, now 2, had some urinary and kidney abnormalities that seem to have resolved, and has low muscle tone that caused her to start walking later than usual.

"I am very glad about it," she said of the testing, because she knows to watch her daughter for possible complications like gout. Without the testing, "we wouldn't know anything, we wouldn't know to watch for things that might come up," she said.

The other study involved 532 stillbirths — deaths of a fetus in the womb before delivery. Gene testing revealed the cause in 87 percent of cases versus 70 percent of cases analyzed by the visual chromosome inspection method. It also gave more information on specific genetic abnormalities that couples could use to estimate the odds that future pregnancies would bring those risks.

The study was led by Dr. Uma Reddy of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

___

Online:

Medical journal: http://www.nejm.org

___

Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP

Read More..

Josh Lucas Says Sleep Training Son Was 'Incredibly Difficult'

Mom & Babies
Celebrity Baby Blog

12/04/2012 at 05:00 PM ET

Paul Zimmerman/WireImage

No amount of tears, tantrums or extreme tiredness can deter new dad Josh Lucas from reveling in his most important role.

“Everyone says it’s the greatest adventure you’ll ever have and I’m amazed at how much I’m loving it,” the actor told PEOPLE during MoMA‘s benefit honoring Quentin Tarantino on Monday in New York City.

Recently, Lucas and his wife Jessica Henriquez set out to sleep train 5-month-old Noah Rev — and not even a week of wailing could affect his mood.

“It was incredibly difficult. The child is enraged and hates you,” the first-time father admits. “And yet you’re totally sleep-deprived and amazed by the experience — even when he’s screaming — of what you’re going through.”

Calling fatherhood a “beautiful thing,” Lucas has been busy bonding with his baby boy, including taking his son to see Wreck-It Ralph, Noah’s first movie theater experience.

“I took him to a Tiny Tots screening, which is where you’re allowed to bring your baby,” Lucas, 41, shares.

“He sat there with his mouth wide open. He literally watched 15 minutes with his mouth agape and then passed out like he’d been shot.”

– Anya Leon with reporting by Michelle Ward

Read More..

25 top-rated Facebook games from 2012

Games can be both a welcome and an annoying diversion on Facebook, the world’s most popular online social network. This year, Facebook crossed a big milestone — reaching 1 billion active users. Game companies such as “FarmVille” creator Zynga Inc. and Rovio Entertainment Ltd. of “Angry Birds” fame seek to tap into that vast base of users to gain more players for their games.

This week, Facebook Inc. issued a list of the 25 top-rated games that launched on Facebook in 2012. The company says the rankings are based on user ratings and engagement with the games. It’s the same methodology that Facebook uses to rank apps in its App Center.

Some of the games are played on Facebook’s website, while others are only on Apple Inc.‘s iOS or Google Inc.‘s Android devices using Facebook’s app.

Here’s the list:

1. “SongPop” (by FreshPlanet, on Facebook.com, iOS and Android)

2. “Dragon City” (by Social Point, on Facebook.com)

3. “Bike Race” (by Top Free Games, on iOS)

4. “Subway Surfers” (by Kiloo, on iOS and Android)

5. “Angry Birds Friends (by Rovio, on Facebook.com)

6. “FarmVille 2″ (by Zynga, on Facebook.com)

7. “Scramble with Friends” (by Zynga, on iOS)

8. “Clash of Clans” (by Supercell, on iOS)

9. “Marvel: Avengers Alliance” (by Playdom, on Facebook.com)

10. “Draw Something” (by Zynga, on iOS and Android)

11. “Hay Day” (by Supercell, on iOS)

12. “Baseball Heroes” (by Syntasia, on Facebook.com)

13. “ChefVille” (by Zynga, on Facebook.com)

14. “CSR Racing” (by NaturalMotion Games, on iOS)

15. “Candy Crush Saga” (by King.com, on Facebook.com and iOS)

16. “Matching With Friends” (by Zynga, on Facebook.com)

17. “Legend Online” (by Oasis Games, on Facebook.com)

18. “Jurassic Park Builder” (by Ludia, on Facebook.com)

19. “Dungeon Rampage” (by Rebel Entertainment, on Facebook.com)

20. “Pockie Ninja II Social” (by NGames Ltd., on Facebook.com)

21. “Jetpack Joyride” (by Halfbrick, on Facebook.com)

22. “Social Empires” (by Social Point, on Facebook.com and iOS)

23. “Bil ve Fethet” (by Peak Games, on Facebook.com)

24. “Ruby Blast Adventures” (by Zynga, on Facebook.com and iOS)

25. “Pyramid Solitaire Saga” (by King.com, on Facebook.com)

Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Typhoon Bopha Kills Hundreds in Philippines

Bullit Marquez/Associated Press

A resident hung clothing amid fallen trees and debris on Wednesday, a day after Typhoon Bopha made landfall in the village of Andap, in southern Philippines. More Photos »

MANILA — With many roads and bridges washed away, rescue teams struggled Wednesday to reach isolated villages in the southern Philippines after a powerful out-of-season typhoon tore through the region, leaving more than 270 people dead and hundreds more missing, officials said.

Typhoon Bopha packed winds of up to 100 miles per hour when it struck Tuesday, bringing torrential rains that washed away villages and left thousands homeless.

The deaths were concentrated in the province of Compostela Valley, a mountainous gold mining area, and the neighboring province of Davao Oriental, on the eastern coast of the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, Lt. Col. Lyndon Paniza, a military spokesman, said in a telephone interview late Wednesday afternoon.

A national disaster official, Benito Ramos, said at a news conference on Wednesday afternoon that 274 people had died, 339 were injured and 279 were missing. Those figures were likely to rise, he suggested, since rescue workers had not yet reached several villages in the hardest-hit areas and the casualties there were not known.

Most of the dead appeared to have drowned or been hit by falling trees or flying debris, officials said.

“There is debris in the road, so our soldiers are moving by foot,” Colonel Paniza said. “They are crossing rivers and landslides. I don’t want to speculate, but we don’t know what they will find when they reach those cut off areas.”

Three soldiers are known to have died, and eight are missing, he said. Some of the soldiers died when a landslide washed out their patrol base, and others disappeared while on search-and-rescue operations.

Local television crews broadcast grisly footage of mud-covered bodies being loaded into trucks in villages that appeared flattened by the storm. In some areas, not a single structure could be seen standing.

In areas where roads were washed out, the government sent seagoing vessels to take relief goods to remote coastal areas from the provincial capital of Davao Oriental, Mati.

“I have thus authorized the local government of Mati, its mayor and the provincial governor to use their calamity funds to hire all available large, local fishing boats for an immediate sea-lift transfer of goods to the affected areas,” Manuel Roxas, the interior secretary, said in a statement.

The eastern coast of Mindanao, which was the area hardest hit by the storm, is a remote, impoverished agricultural area. Mr. Roxas told reporters on Wednesday that during his visit to the area, he had seen tens of thousands of fallen coconut trees and many acres of destroyed banana plantations.

In New Bataan, the town hit hardest by the storm, Virgilia Babaag had been waiting nervously in her home before dawn on Tuesday as hard rain from the approaching typhoon pounded her small village.

“My neighbors started yelling, ‘The water is coming fast! Run! Run!’ ” she said Wednesday by telephone.

Ms. Babaag gathered up her three young nieces staying with her and ran through the night toward high ground. There she stayed with dozens of others as winds ripped through the town.

“When I came back, my roof was gone,” she said from her devastated home. “The houses around my place are destroyed. There are so many who have died here. The soldiers are still finding more.”

The Philippines is hit by as many as 20 powerful tropical storms each year, but this one struck remote communities south of the usual typhoon path.

“This is the first time that the people in this area have experienced a storm like this,” Colonel Paniza said. “They aren’t accustomed to big storms.”

Last December, Tropical Storm Washi — another out-of-season storm that hit south of the usual Philippine typhoon belt — killed more than 1,200 people and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

This year, officials put out strong warnings days in advance and carried out mandatory early evacuations of vulnerable communities.

President Benigno S. Aquino III, stung by criticism last year that the national government had not done enough to prepare for Tropical Storm Washi, went on television the day before the storm hit and pleaded with people to follow the instructions of local government officials.

“I am facing you now because the incoming storm is no laughing matter,” Mr. Aquino said, adding later, “We expect the cooperation of everyone so that nobody gets in harm’s way.”

Read More..

Decapitated body of man found at hospital

About L.A. Now

L.A. Now is the Los Angeles Times’ breaking news section for Southern California. It is produced by more than 80 reporters and editors in The Times’ Metro section, reporting from the paper’s downtown Los Angeles headquarters as well as bureaus in Costa Mesa, Long Beach, San Diego, San Francisco, Sacramento, Riverside, Ventura and West Los Angeles.

Have a story tip for L.A. Now?

Can I call someone with news?

Yes. The city desk number is (213) 237-7847.

Read More..

Study: Drug coverage to vary under health law

WASHINGTON (AP) — A new study says basic prescription drug coverage could vary dramatically from state to state under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.

That's because states get to set benefits for private health plans that will be offered starting in 2014 through new insurance exchanges.

The study out Tuesday from the market analysis firm Avalere Health found that some states will require coverage of virtually all FDA-approved drugs, while others will only require coverage of about half of medications.

Consumers will still have access to essential medications, but some may not have as much choice.

Connecticut, Virginia and Arizona will be among the states with the most generous coverage, while California, Minnesota and North Carolina will be among states with the most limited.

___

Online:

Avalere Health: http://tinyurl.com/d3b3hfv

Read More..

Snooki Gives Kate Middleton Motherhood Advice

By Julia Haskins

12/04/2012 at 05:30 PM EST

Nicole Polizzi and Kate Middleton

Daniel Boczarski/WireImage; REX USA

Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi is lending her expertise to Kate Middleton – as a mommy mentor!

The Jersey Shore star, who gave birth to son Lorenzo in August, offered the expectant Duchess of Cambridge a few tips on being a new mom.

"It's hard, but don't stress out,” Polizzi told the New York Daily News. "Enjoy your pregnancy and be excited."

Middleton is currently in the hospital to treat her severe morning sickness, but Polizzi encouraged her to take it easy out of the public eye. “Enjoy your time at home – or the castle, in her case – with the baby,” she said. “Especially the first few months.”

Nobody said it would be easy, but Polizzi knows from experience that it's worth the (baby) bumps along the way.

"You'll get to know him/her, keep them safe and fall more in love each day," she says.

Read More..

Google updates Gmail for iOS to support multiple accounts, deliver autocomplete suggestions

Read More..

U.S. Navy Denies Iranian Claim to Have Captured Drone

TEHRAN — Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps naval forces have captured an American drone that it said entered Iranian airspace over the Persian Gulf, state television reported on Tuesday. The claim was quickly denied by the United States Navy.

Iranian state media said the aircraft was a ScanEagle built by Boeing, which, according to the company’s Web site, can be launched and operated from ships.

A spokesman for the United States Navy in Bahrain denied the Iranian claim, saying that no American drones were missing.

“The U.S. Navy has fully accounted for all unmanned air vehicles operating in the Middle East region,” a spokesman for the United States Naval Forces Central Command in Bahrain told Reuters. “Our operations in the gulf are confined to internationally recognized water and airspace. We have no record that we have lost any ScanEagles recently.”

However, the drone could have been one used by the Central Intelligence Agency, or even the National Security Agency, which both have eyes on Iran. Several kingdoms of the Persian Gulf also have ScanEagle drones.

If the seizure is confirmed, it would indicate a spike in tension between the United States and Iran in the skies over the gulf. On Nov. 8, Pentagon officials said Iranian warplanes had fired at a Predator drone flying over the gulf the previous week. It was believed to be the first incident in which Iranian warplanes had fired on an American drone, they said.

State television showed images of what seemed to be an intact ScanEagle being inspected by Rear Adm. Ali Fadavi, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards’ naval forces. The drone was displayed in front of a large map of the Persian Gulf with a text in English and Persian saying, “We shall trample on the U.S.”

Without mentioning the drone claim, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Tuesday warned Iran’s adversaries against aggression. “Our enemies should open their eyes,” he said in a speech. “They may be able to take a few steps forward, but in the end we will make them retreat behind their own border.”

Iran’s foreign minister, Ali Akbar Salehi, told state television on Tuesday that the country planned to use the capture of the drone as evidence against the United States in international organizations.

“We had announced to the Americans that according to international conventions, we would not allow them to invade our territories, but unfortunately they did not comply,” Mr. Salehi said. “We had objected to the Americans before, but they claimed they were not present in our territories. We will use this drone as evidence to pursue a legal case against American invasion in international forums.” Admiral Fadavi said his forces had “hunted down” the ScanEagle over the gulf after it violated Iranian airspace and had forced it to land electronically, the semiofficial Fars news agency reported. A state television commentator said the drone was on a spy mission.

A September report by the Government Accountability Office on unmanned aircraft systems warned that some drones were sensitive to jamming and spoofing. In a spoofing operation, an unencrypted GPS signal can be taken over by enemy forces, the report warns, effectively hijacking the drone.

A former member of Iran’s Foreign Policy and National Security Commission said the seizure of the drone illustrated Iran’s growing military powers and showed that the United States was not really interested in mending relations with Tehran.

“How can we trust President Obama for talks if he sends his drones into our airspace?” the former commission member, Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh, said in an interview. “This move is counterproductive for any détente.”

Iran’s Parliament, which always cheers on any success by the Revolutionary Guards, invited top commanders to present details of the capture to lawmakers.

“The hunting and capturing of this American drone once again showed off the defensive and repelling strengths of the Islamic republic to the world,” Ebrahim Aghamohammadi, a member of Parliament, told Fars. “We are moving forward with dominance.”

In the Nov. 1 attack on the Predator, American officials maintained that the drone had been over international waters, while Iranian commanders insisted that it had violated Iranian airspace. Sea and air borders in the region are strongly contested. Iranian naval forces in small speedboats and United States warships monitor the sea lanes, through which nearly 30 percent of the world’s oil is transported.

Last month, Iran complained to the United Nations over at least eight violations of its airspace by American planes.

Iran’s latest claim came 12 months after Iran said it had brought down an RQ-170 Sentinel operated by the C.I.A. At the time, Iranian state television showed images of the bat-winged drone — apparently fully intact — that Iran had nicknamed “the beast of Kandahar,” a reference to a drone base in Afghanistan.

Iran has maintained that it hacked into the RQ-170’s controls and forced it to land. But American officials said it had crashed in Iranian territory.

Read More..

Girl, 12, held as sex slave, forced into prostitution by couple, police allege

An Oceanside couple are scheduled to be in court Monday to face accusations that they kept an underage
Mexican immigrant as a sex slave, forcing her into prostitution and
beating her severely.

Marcial Garcia Hernandez, 45, and Inez Martinez Garcia, 43, were
arrested Thursday on suspicion of 13 felony counts of aggravated sexual
assault of a child under age 14.

The girl had been smuggled into the U.S. at age 12, and the abuse by
Hernandez and Garcia occurred over a 21-month period, the Sheriff's
Department said.

Hernandez and Garcia forced the girl to care for their three children
and cook and clean for the family, as well as have sex with Hernandez,
according to Deputy G. Crysler, an investigator with the North County
Human Trafficking Task Force.

"When the girl victim refused to participate in the sex acts or did
not complete her tasks in a timely or correct manner, she was beaten,"
Crysler said.

The couple forced the victim into lying about her age so she could
work at a local restaurant, with Garcia and Hernandez keeping the money
she earned, according to the arrest documents. She was also forced into
having sex with older men, with Garcia and Hernandez keeping the money
paid by "johns," the documents said.

Authorities were called after the victim was allegedly beaten by
Garcia. Reunited with her family, she returned to Mexico. Recently,
she returned to the U.S. and is assisting in the criminal investigation,
according to the Sheriff's Department.

ALSO:

Lindsay Lohan is 'victim' despite criminal charges, lawyer says

Teacher pleads guilty to having sex with 17-year-old ex-student

Inmate charged in 1991 slaying, rape of 16-year-old Compton girl

-- Tony Perry in San Diego

Read More..

Fossil fuel subsidies in focus at climate talks

DOHA, Qatar (AP) — Hassan al-Kubaisi considers it a gift from above that drivers in oil- and gas-rich Qatar only have to pay $1 per gallon at the pump.

"Thank God that our country is an oil producer and the price of gasoline is one of the lowest," al-Kubaisi said, filling up his Toyota Land Cruiser at a gas station in Doha. "God has given us a blessing."

To those looking for a global response to climate change, it's more like a curse.

Qatar — the host of U.N. climate talks that entered their final week Monday — is among dozens of countries that keep gas prices artificially low through subsidies that exceeded $500 billion globally last year. Renewable energy worldwide received six times less support — an imbalance that is just starting to earn attention in the divisive negotiations on curbing the carbon emissions blamed for heating the planet.

"We need to stop funding the problem, and start funding the solution," said Steve Kretzmann, of Oil Change International, an advocacy group for clean energy.

His group presented research Monday showing that in addition to the fuel subsidies in developing countries, rich nations in 2011 gave more than $58 billion in tax breaks and other production subsidies to the fossil fuel industry. The U.S. figure was $13 billion.

The Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has calculated that removing fossil fuel subsidies could reduce carbon emissions by more than 10 percent by 2050.

Yet the argument is just recently gaining traction in climate negotiations, which in two decades have failed to halt the rising temperatures that are melting Arctic ice, raising sea levels and shifting weather patterns with impacts on droughts and floods.

In Doha, the talks have been slowed by wrangling over financial aid to help poor countries cope with global warming and how to divide carbon emissions rights until 2020 when a new planned climate treaty is supposed to enter force. Calls are now intensifying to include fossil fuel subsidies as a key part of the discussion.

"I think it is manifestly clear ... that this is a massive missing piece of the climate change jigsaw puzzle," said Tim Groser, New Zealand's minister for climate change.

He is spearheading an initiative backed by Scandinavian countries and some developing countries to put fuel subsidies on the agenda in various forums, citing the U.N. talks as a "natural home" for the debate.

The G-20 called for their elimination in 2009, and the issue also came up at the U.N. earth summit in Rio de Janeiro earlier this year. Frustrated that not much has happened since, European Union climate commissioner Connie Hedegaard said Monday she planned to raise the issue with environment ministers on the sidelines of the talks in Doha.

Many developing countries are positive toward phasing out fossil fuel subsidies, not just to protect the climate but to balance budgets. Subsidies introduced as a form of welfare benefit decades ago have become an increasing burden to many countries as oil prices soar.

"We are reviewing the subsidy periodically in the context of the total economy for Qatar," the tiny Persian gulf country's energy minister, Mohammed bin Saleh al-Sada, told reporters Monday.

Qatar's National Development Strategy 2011-2016 states it more bluntly, saying fuel subsides are "at odds with the aspirations" and sustainability objectives of the wealthy emirate.

The problem is that getting rid of them comes with a heavy political price.

When Jordan raised fuel prices last month, angry crowds poured into the streets, torching police cars, government offices and private banks in the most sustained protests to hit the country since the start of the Arab unrest. One person was killed and 75 others were injured in the violence.

Nigeria, Indonesia, India and Sudan have also seen violent protests this year as governments tried to bring fuel prices closer to market rates.

Iran has used a phased approach to lift fuel subsidies over the past several years, but its pump prices remain among the cheapest in the world.

"People perceive it as something that the government is taking away from them," said Kretzmann. "The trick is we need to do it in a way that doesn't harm the poor."

The International Energy Agency found in 2010 that fuel subsidies are not an effective measure against poverty because only 8 percent of such subsidies reached the bottom 20 percent of income earners.

The IEA, which only looked at consumption subsidies, this year said they "remain most prevalent in the Middle East and North Africa, where momentum toward their reform appears to have been lost."

In the U.S., environmental groups say fossil fuel subsidies include tax breaks, the foreign tax credit and the credit for production of nonconventional fuels.

Industry groups, like the Independent Petroleum Association of America, are against removing such support, saying that would harm smaller companies, rather than the big oil giants.

In Doha, Mohammed Adow, a climate activist with Christian Aid, called all fuel subsidies "reckless and dangerous," but described removing subsidies on the production side as "low-hanging fruit" for governments if they are serious about dealing with climate change.

"It's going to oil and coal companies that don't need it in the first place," he said.

___

Associated Press writers Abdullah Rebhy in Doha, Qatar, and Brian Murphy in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report

____

Karl Ritter can be reached at www.twitter.com/karl_ritter

Read More..

Parents Learn of Daughter's Suspicious Death Via Facebook

By Steve Helling

12/03/2012 at 05:55 PM EST

On the evening of Nov. 18, Judith and James Jackson logged onto Facebook to find a horrifying message. Their daughter's college friend posted on their wall, consoling them about the loss of their daughter, Jasmine.

Until that moment, the Jacksons thought their daughter was alive and well, enjoying her freshman year at Valdosta State University in southern Georgia.

Jasmine Benjamin, a 17-year-old nursing student, was found dead in her dorm's common study area around noon that day. Authorities soon determined that the she had been dead for at least 12 hours but her roommates thought she was simply sleeping on the study room couch. Because the body had been moved, Valdosta police suspect foul play.

The news has left her parents reeling.

"That's the most disturbing part of it. Aren't there RAs?" her mother, Judith Jackson tells CBS. "What kind of school is this that they don't know someone's laying on the couch – to go check on them after a certain amount of hours?"

Valdosta State University released a statement saying it was "continuing to work with law enforcement agencies in their ongoing investigation into the death of Jasmine Benjamin."

Police are still investigating. Autopsy and toxicology results are not back yet.

"We want answers," says Jasmine's stepfather, James Jackson. "This family needs closure. It's extremely tough when you don't know, and you have no answers."

Read More..

Ericsson seeks U.S. import ban on Samsung products

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Swedish telecoms gear maker Ericsson has filed a request with the U.S. International Trade Commission to ban U.S. imports of products made by South Korean group Samsung,

The request from Ericsson, which said on Monday the products infringe on its patents, came after it sued Samsung for patent infringement in a U.S. court last week.

“The request for an import ban is a part of the process. An import ban is not our goal. Our goal is that they (Samsung) sign license agreements on reasonable terms,” spokesman Fredrik Hallstan said.

Ericsson said last week it was suing Samsung after talks failed to reach agreement on terms that were fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) over patents.

Samsung said it would defend itself against the lawsuit, adding that Ericsson had asked for “prohibitively higher royalty rates to renew the same patent portfolio”.

(Reporting by Sven Nordenstam; Editing by Dan Lalor)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Pope Starts Personal Twitter Account

Osservatore Romano, via Reuters

Pope Benedict XVI using an iPad at the Vatican last year.

On Monday, the Vatican announced that the 85-year-old pontiff would begin posting messages on Twitter next week under the handle @pontifex, a term for pope that means bridge-builder in Latin. Within hours, he had more than 250,000 followers.

Benedict is expected to hit “send” on his first post at a general audience at the Vatican on Dec. 12 — a response to questions about matters of the faith that he is now accepting via the hashtag #askpontifex, officials said.

The Vatican acknowledged that it had chosen the @pontifex handle not only because of its meaning but also because many other handles had been taken.

The move is aimed at drawing in the church’s 1.2 billion followers, especially young people. “The pope’s presence on Twitter can be seen as the ‘tip of the iceberg’ that is the church’s presence in the world of new media,” the Vatican said in a statement.

Just do not expect the pope to start following you on Twitter or retweeting your posts, Greg Burke, a former Fox News correspondent in Rome who was named a Vatican communications adviser this year, said at a news conference. “He won’t follow anyone for now,” Mr. Burke added. “He will be followed.”

Benedict’s posts will go out in Arabic, English, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Other languages are expected to be added in the future. The messages will mostly feature the contents of the pope’s speeches at his weekly general audience and Sunday blessings, as well as homilies on major holidays and reaction to major world events, like natural disasters.

Aides will write the texts of Benedict’s posts, but the pope himself will “engage and approve” the content. The pope will post messages however often he feels like it.

“The pope is not the kind of person like the rest of us who in a meeting or a lunch is looking at their BlackBerrys to see if any messages have come in,” Mr. Burke said. “He is not walking around with an iPad, but all the pope’s tweets are the pope’s words.”

The pope’s account will not have special security, the Vatican said, but precautions have been taken to make sure the pope’s certified account is not hacked. All the posts will come from one computer in the Vatican’s Secretariat of State.

The prospect of the pope’s using Twitter has raised some puzzling theological questions. Asked whether the pope’s posts would be infallible, Msgr. Claudio Maria Celli, the president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, laughed and said that they would be part of the church Magisterium, or collective teaching, but should be considered “pearls of wisdom,” not exactly doctrine.

“In any case, it’s a papal teaching,” Monsignor Celli said. “The message is just entrusted to a new technology.”

A shy theologian who directed the Vatican’s doctrinal office for 25 years before becoming pope in 2005, Benedict is best known for complex theological positions that require far more than 140 characters to explain. His book “Jesus’s Childhood,” the last in his three-volume biography of Jesus, appeared last month and is a best seller in Italy.

The Catholic Church may be one of the slowest-changing institutions in the world, but when it comes to communicating with the faithful, it has generally been a pretty early adopter. In 1896, Pope Leo XIII became the first pope to appear on film. In 1931, Vatican Radio was founded, and Pope Pius XI was the first pope to make a radio broadcast. In 1949, Pope Pius XII was the first to appear on television.

In 2009, a Vatican Web site, www.pope2you.net, went live, offering an application called “The pope meets you on Facebook,” and another that allows readers to upload the pope’s speeches and messages to their smartphones. In 2011, the Vatican started its own news Web site, News.va.

Last year, Benedict wrote that new media and social networks offered “a great opportunity,” but he also warned that they carried the risk of alienation and self-indulgence.

Gaia Pianigiani reported from Vatican City, and Rachel Donadio from Rome.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: December 3, 2012

An earlier version of this article misspelled the name of the first pope to make a radio broadcast. He was Pope Pius XI, not Piux.

Read More..

Church volunteer molested boys 'for years,' police allege

Newport Beach police arrested a Costa Mesa man Saturday suspected of
having inappropriate sexual relationships that spanned years with at
least two boys.

Christopher Bryan McKenzie, 48, allegedly sexually abused at least
two victims between the ages of 8 and 16. Newport Beach police said both
victims, now adults, contacted police separately early last week.

One victim was abused from the late 1990s to 2005, and the second
victim was abused from 2005 to 2007, Newport Beach Police Department
spokeswoman Kathy Lowe said.

"Basically, this relationship was an ongoing inappropriate sexual relationship over a period of many years," she said.

McKenzie, a pool cleaner who works throughout Orange County, was a
volunteer Sunday school teacher at Rock Harbor Church in Costa Mesa, but
it is not suspected he had any victims from the congregation, police
said.

After an investigation, police obtained a no-bail warrant for
McKenzie, who was arrested at 11 a.m. Saturday and booked at the Newport
Beach Police Department Jail and transported to Orange County Jail
without incident, a news release stated.

He is scheduled for arraignment at the Harbor Justice Center early next week.

Police said the crimes took place in a residence in Newport Beach but
did not elaborate on the exact nature, saying only that McKenzie is
suspected of lewd and lascivious acts with a child.

Lowe said police hope releasing the information will help identify victims of any similar, unreported crimes.

However: "I don't have any information at this time to indicate there are more victims," Lowe said.

After Newport Beach police announced the arrest Saturday, Rock Harbor
leaders released a statement saying they informed parents and invited
them to a 7 p.m. Monday meeting to discuss the situation at its Costa
Mesa campus, 345 Fischer Ave.

"We sent an email to our entire congregation this afternoon before
the police department's press release came out," said Jeff Gideon, the
church's communications director.

— Jeremiah Dobruck, Times Community News

Read More..