Author: Sunfire

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DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla. (AP) — In the nearly 40 years after he escaped from the maximum-security military prison at Fort Leavenworth, convicted killer James Robert Jones carved out a new life for himself in Florida, living under an assumed name, getting married and working for an air conditioning company.

It all came to an end this week when Jones — or Bruce Walter Keith, as the former Army private was known in Florida — was recaptured with the help of technology that was more sci-fi than reality when he broke out during the disco era: facial-recognition software.   Continue reading “After 37 years on lam, killer caught in Fla.”

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats are grappling with an election-year dilemma posed by the Keystone XL oil pipeline.

Wealthy party donors are funding candidates who oppose the project — a high-profile symbol of the political debate over climate change. But some of the party’s most vulnerable incumbents are pipeline boosters, and whether Democrats retain control of the Senate after the 2014 midterm elections may hinge on them.   Continue reading “Dems grapple with dilemma on Keystone XL pipeline”

RT News

Unidentified hackers brought down the Russian presidency’s site and the Central Bank’s web page in a wave of online attacks. The website is now operational for most users.

“A powerful cyber-attack is underway on the [Kremlin] site,” a Kremlin spokeswoman said, adding they had been unable to discern who had carried out the attack.    Continue reading “Hackers down Russian presidential site in ‘powerful cyber-attack’”

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AMSTERDAM (AP) — Hundreds of years after wealthy merchants began building the tall, narrow brick houses that have come to define Amsterdam’s skyline, Dutch architects are updating the process for the 21st century: fabricating pieces of a canal house out of plastic with a giant 3-D printer and slotting them together like oversized Lego blocks.

Hedwig Heinsman of architect bureau Dus says the goal of the demonstration project launched this month is not so much to print a functioning house — in fact, parts of the house will likely be built and re-built several times over the course of three years as 3-D printing technology develops.   Continue reading “Amsterdam canal house built with 3-D printer”

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FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Some passengers aboard a plane whose nose gear collapsed on a Philadelphia runway finally made it to South Florida early Friday.

Officials say US Airways Flight 1702 was heading for Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport shortly after 6 p.m. Thursday when a tire on the front landing gear blew out, forcing the pilot to abort takeoff at Philadelphia International Airport.   Continue reading “Passengers from crippled Pa. plane arrive in Fla.”

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PHOENIX (AP) — A man convicted after his third trial in the 1991 killings of nine people, including six monks, at a suburban Phoenix Buddhist temple is set for sentencing and faces life in prison.

Johnathan A. Doody was 17 when he was accused of participating in the slayings at the Wat Promkunaram temple. He was found guilty in 1993 and sentenced to 281 years in prison. But an appeals court threw out his conviction in 2011 after ruling that investigators improperly obtained his confession.   Continue reading “Sentencing set for man in Arizona temple slayings”

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DADE CITY, Fla. (AP) — A former police officer accused of killing a man in a movie theater during a dispute over texting had used his own phone to send a message to his son minutes before the shooting, according to documents released Thursday by Florida prosecutors.

Curtis Reeves’ son, Matthew Reeves, told detectives that his father texted him at 1:04 p.m. Jan. 13, the documents show. Curtis Reeves told his son he was already seated inside the theater. Matthew Reeves, who is a Tampa police officer, made plans to meet his parents at the theater for the 1:20 p.m. showing of “Lone Survivor” but was late because he stopped to wash his truck, he told detectives.   Continue reading “Records: Man in theater shooting also was texting”

RT News

Ohio authorities have halted a fracking operation in following two quakes. Both the authorities and the operator say there is no evidence linking fracking with the tremors, but in the past an Ohio well was closed for causing quakes.

The Ohio tremors were felt on Monday in Poland Township and the village of Lowellville near the Pennsylvania. The first 3.0 magnitude quake stroke at about 2:30 am and was followed by a second 2.6 magnitude quake at 11:45 am, the US Geological Survey reported. Two smaller aftershocks were reported later in the day.   Continue reading “Ohio fracking drilling shut down after quakes”

RT News

If you ever wanted to dupe an enemy sonar (or a whale), a new tool that fools sound waves into thinking they’re hitting nothing but thin air is for you. The cloaking device, paid for by the US military, is a mathematical marvel of engineering.

The simple toy, a little bigger in diameter than an iPad, and which looks like lightweight sheets of plastic stacked together to form a sort of Mayan pyramid with tiny holes, acts as if sound passes right through it and whatever it hides inside. It works with sound coming from any angle, and does its magic by rerouting the sound waves to avoid collision with hard matter.   Continue reading “‘In one ear, out the other’: New cloaking device makes hidden objects completely inaudible”

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Errico Auricchio produced cheese with his family in Italy until he brought his trade to the United States more than 30 years ago. Now, the European Union is saying the types of cheeses he sells aren’t authentic enough to carry European names.

As part of trade talks, the EU wants to limit the use of names like Parmesan, feta and Gorgonzola on cheese made in the United States. The argument is that the American-made cheeses are shadows of the original European varieties and cut into sales and identity of the European cheeses.   Continue reading “Europe makes a stink about American cheese names”

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NEW YORK (AP) — Kitty Genovese’s screams for help couldn’t save her on the night she was murdered outside her apartment in 1964. Fifty years later, those screams still echo, a symbol of urban breakdown and city dwellers’ seeming callousness toward their neighbors.

The case “caught the spirit of the time,” said Thomas Reppetto, a police historian. “It seemed to symbolize that society no longer cared about other people.” Genovese’s random stabbing by Winston Moseley on March 13, 1964, became a sensation when The New York Times reported that “38 respectable, law-abiding citizens” in Queens watched the attack unfold over more than half an hour and didn’t call police during the assault.   Continue reading “50 years later, New York murder still fascinates”

RT News

For the second year in a row, attendees at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference this weekend picked United States Senator Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) as their likely choice for the Republican Party’s next presidential nominee.

The first-term senator and son of longtime lawmaker Ron Paul received 31 percent of the vote during a presidential straw poll held at CPAC on Saturday in National Harbor, Maryland outside of Washington, DC. Organizers say 2,459 attendees participated in the non-binding election.   Continue reading “Rand Paul wins CPAC straw poll”

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BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Hundreds of Serbs rallied Saturday against plans by the Serbian Orthodox Church and nationalist leaders to move the ashes of scientist and engineer Nikola Tesla from his museum in Belgrade to the country’s biggest church.

Hefting banners that read “Leave Tesla alone!” the protesters blocked traffic in front of the museum, where the urn bearing Tesla’s remains has been on display for six decades. The protesters, among them many scientists, want his ashes to stay put.   Continue reading “Serbs decry plans to move Tesla’s ashes to church”

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PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — With no one else on the ballot, state media reported Monday that supreme leader Kim Jong Un was not only elected to the highest legislative body in North Korea, he won with the unanimous approval of his district, which had 100 percent turnout.

North Koreans went to the polls on Sunday to approve the new roster of deputies for the Supreme People’s Assembly, the country’s legislature. The vote, more a political ritual than an election by Western standards, is generally held once every five years.   Continue reading “NKorea: Not a single vote cast against Kim Jong Un”

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MEXICO CITY (AP) — Cartel kingpin Nazario Moreno Gonzalez had two lives.

One ended in late 2010 when the leader of a vicious drug gang ruling the western state of Michoacan was supposedly killed by federal police. The second ended just after his 44th birthday, when he died in a shootout with government troops early Sunday.   Continue reading “‘Slain’ Mexico cartel leader dies a second time”

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MAASTRICHT, Netherlands (AP) — A young man at a bus stop hisses at a passer-by: “What you looking for … marijuana?” It’s a scene of street peddling that the Netherlands hoped to stamp out in the 1970s when it launched a policy of tolerating “coffee shops” where people could buy and smoke pot freely.

But Maastricht’s street dealers are back, local residents complain. And the reason is a crackdown on coffee-shops triggered by another problem: Pot tourists who crossed the border to visit the cafes and made a nuisance of themselves by snarling traffic, dumping litter and even urinating in the streets.   Continue reading “As US states allow pot sales, Dutch reverse course”

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BOBTOWN, Pa. (AP) — Critics are raging after an energy giant offered pizza coupons to a community near a natural gas well that exploded last month, killing a worker.

News stories, TV shows and blogs — many sarcastic or outright scornful — spread the word far and wide. “Shame on you,” one person wrote about the offer by Chevron Corp. “How insulting!” said another. Comedy Central’s satirical “The Colbert Report” skewered it.   Continue reading “Chevron pizza ‘scandal’ isn’t one in small town”

The Independent – by TIM WALKER , HEATHER SAUL

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RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A U.S. Army general accused of sexual assault was set to plead guilty to three lesser charges Thursday in a move that his lawyer says will strengthen his position going into trial.

Brig. Gen. Jeffrey A. Sinclair plans to enter the plea before opening statements scheduled for the morning in his court martial at Fort Bragg. The primary accuser in the case is a female captain who says Sinclair twice forced her to perform oral sex and threatened to kill her family if she told anyone about their three-year affair.   Continue reading “General to admit guilt on 3 counts; denies assault”

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NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — A man was charged Wednesday with kidnapping and killing a nursing student who was last seen outside her West Tennessee home nearly three years ago, investigators said.

Holly Bobo was 20 when she disappeared on April 13, 2011. Her brother told authorities he saw a man in hunting clothes leading her into the woods around the family home near Parsons, about 100 miles northeast of Memphis.   Continue reading “Indictment in missing Tenn. nursing student case”