NEWS
IN A FEW
State:
•
SACRAMENTO (AP) - Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante
paid a record $263,000 fine for violating
state limits on accepting campaign donations,
California's Fair Political Practices Commission
said.
•
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Violent crime decreased
slightly in California last year, while
property crimes increased, according to
preliminary figures released by the state
Department of Justice.
•
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Two men caught allegedly
taping movies at Los Angeles theaters became
the first people arrested under California's
new ''anti-camcorder'' law, industry officials
said Wednesday.
•
HAYWARD (AP) - The killing of a transgender
teen was cold-blooded murder carried out
by three men furious that the beautiful
girl they had sex with was biologically
male, a prosecutor said as he began presenting
his case Wednesday.
•
WEST HOLLYWOOD (AP) - Leroy ''Lee'' S. Walker,
an activist and lawyer who earned important
workplace rights for gays and lesbians,
has died. He was 63.
•
SANTA ANA (AP) - A convicted child molester
serving a life sentence was freed after
an appeals court ruled he never had a chance
to confront his accuser - a teenager who
committed suicide before the man's trial.
•
PASADENA (AP) - Uploads of improved software
to both of NASA's Mars rovers were successful,
a mission official said Wednesday.
•
LOS ANGELES (AP) - A man who was videotaped
shooting a lawyer outside a courthouse last
Halloween is preparing for a preliminary
hearing next month after losing a legal
battle over the trust fund that spurred
the attack.
•
CALEXICO (AP) - The federal government began
drilling holes in this border town searching
for a tunnel it believes may be used to
smuggle drugs from Mexico. But after seven
hours of work, officials said they had come
up empty.
National:
•
STATELINE, Nev. (AP) - A representative
of a Lake Tahoe-based security company said
Wednesday that he had no new information
on three Italian employees being held hostage
in Iraq.
•
EL RENO, Okla. (AP) - The Cheyenne and Arapaho
tribes of Oklahoma said Wednesday they will
make a claim to the federal government for
27 million acres of land in Colorado, a
claim they say they will drop in exchange
for 500 acres to build a casino.
•
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - Facing a new Alaska
program to hunt wolves from airplanes, the
animal-rights group Friends of Animals is
trying to revive its successful pressure
tactic of a decade ago and persuade vacationers
to boycott the state this summer. But tourism
officials say this time the plea seems to
be falling mostly on deaf ears.
•
MINDEN, Nev. (AP) - A Douglas County boy
accused of setting a friend on fire was
ordered back into detention after violating
conditions of his release.
•
MADISON, Wis. (AP) - Audrey Seiler, the
University of Wisconsin sophomore accused
of staging her own disappearance last month,
was charged Wednesday with two misdemeanor
counts of obstructing officers.
International:
•
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) - Palestinians
and Israeli hard-liners rejected statements
by President Bush on Wednesday suggesting
Israel would not have to give up some key
West Bank settlements and ruling out the
right of Palestinian refugees to return
to Israel.
•
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Visibly shaken and
exhausted, a French television journalist
taken hostage in Iraq was freed Wednesday
after a four-day ordeal he said was marked
by constant movement and threats to his
life.
•
BEIJING (AP) - Vice President Dick Cheney
sought Wednesday to prod China to apply
more pressure on North Korea to abandon
its nuclear program, citing new evidence
that it has atomic weapons.
•
FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) - U.S. warplanes and
helicopters firing heavy machine guns, rockets
and cannons hammered insurgents Wednesday
in the besieged city of Fallujah, and the
commander of U.S. Marines here warned that
a fragile truce was near collapse.
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