U.S. National News

Keandre Bledsoe, 8, cools off under a fountain in St. Louis, Thursday, July 20, 2006, after storms knocked out power to nearly half a million St. Louis-area households and businesses in the middle of a searing heat wave Wednesday. Bledsoe's family lost all power in the storm. (AP Photo/Seth Perlman)
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AP

Guard to St. Louis; heat deaths rise

AP - 1 hour, 47 minutes ago

ST. LOUIS - The governor sent in the National Guard to evacuate people from their sweltering homes Thursday after storms knocked out power to more than half a million St. Louis-area households and businesses in the middle of a deadly heat wave.

Society

Heroes go postal

New postage stamps that feature comic book characters go on sale Friday.

The Week in Photos

July 7-July 13

See a selection of the week's best images.

HEALTH

Medication errors

More than 1.5 million Americans are injured every year by drug errors, a report finds.

Health

Fat city

Chicago debates banning trans-fats from fast-food restaurants.

  • The scene of a house fire where four people died in a house fire in Kirkland, Wash., is seen on July 19, 2006. All four people found dead in the home fire Monday were stabbed several times in the neck before the blaze was set, police say. One man has been arrested for investigation of arson and homicide. (AP Photo/Kevin P. Casey)
    Soldier whose family was slain returns AP - Thu Jul 20, 11:58 PM ET

    SEATTLE - A neighbor arrested in the slayings of an Iraq soldier's family told police he woke up in the victims' home after an alcoholic blackout, covered in blood, according to court records.

  • The AT&T logo in a file photo. A federal judge declined motions on Thursday to dismiss a lawsuit against AT&T alleging the firm illegally allowed the U.S. government to monitor phone conversations and e-mail communications. REUTERS/Handout
    Judge refuses to dismiss spying lawsuit AP - Thu Jul 20, 7:38 PM ET

    SAN FRANCISCO - A federal judge Thursday refused to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the Bush administration's domestic spying program, rejecting government claims that allowing the case to go forward could expose state secrets and jeopardize the war on terror.

  • Julie Goodridge, left, and her spouse Hillary Goodridge cross the street in front of the State House in Boston while leaving the Unitarian Universalist church after being married in this Monday, May 17, 2004 file photo. According to a local political consultant, the couple whose lawsuit ultimately led to legal same-sex marriage in Massachusetts have announced they have separated. (AP Photo/Winslow Townson)
    Same-sex marriage pioneers separate AP - Thu Jul 20, 10:35 PM ET

    BOSTON - The lesbian couple whose lawsuit led to legal same-sex marriage in Massachusetts have announced they have separated.

  • This photo provided by the Virginia Department of Corrections shows death row imnate Brandon Wayne Hedrick who is scheduled to be executed July 20, 2006, at the Greensville Correctional Center in Jarratt, Va. Hedrick has chosen the electric chair as his method of execution rather than lethal injection. Hedrick was convicted of the 1997 abdution, robbery, rape and murder of Lisa Crider. (AP Photo/Virginia Department of Corrections)
    Va. killer executed by electric chair AP - Thu Jul 20, 11:48 PM ET

    JARRATT, Va. - A man convicted of raping and murdering a 23-year-old woman was executed Thursday, becoming the first person in the United States to die in the electric chair in more than two years.

  • Lawyers debate 'gay panic' defense AP - Thu Jul 20, 11:11 PM ET

    SAN FRANCISCO - Prosecutors said Thursday they want to limit the use of "gay panic" defenses — where defendants claim their crimes were justified because of fear or anger over their victims' sexual orientation.

  • In this photo provided by KTRK-ABC News, Andrea Yates is shown during a videotaped jail interview with psychiatrist Lucy Puryear on July 27, 2001, in Houston. The tape, shown in court Monday, July 10, 2006, during her retrial, shows Yates explaining why she drowned her five children. (AP Photo/KTRK-ABC News)
    Testimony ends in Andrea Yates retrial AP - Thu Jul 20, 5:46 PM ET

    HOUSTON - Testimony in the Andrea Yates murder case ended Thursday after a nearly monthlong retrial that included some new witnesses but no appearance by Rusty Yates, her ex-husband and father of the children she is accused of drowning.

  • Pakistani man sentenced in terror trial AP - Thu Jul 20, 8:51 PM ET

    NEW YORK - A Pakistani man convicted of agreeing to help an al-Qaida operative with terrorist plans sneak into the United States was sentenced Thursday to 30 years in federal prison.

  • Lou Ann Savoie Jacob sits in her home in Henderson, Nev., Wednesday, July 19, 2006. Jacob's 90-year-old mother, Rose Savoie, was among those prosecutors say were killed by Dr. Anna Pou and nurses Lori Budo and Cheri Landry at Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans, where patients and staff were stranded for days without running water or communications after the hurricane overwhelmed New Orleans' levees. (AP Photo/Laura Rauch)
    Doctor in Katrina case reassigned AP - Thu Jul 20, 4:37 PM ET

    NEW ORLEANS - The doctor accused of killing four patients at a hospital that was plunged into chaos after Hurricane Katrina has been reassigned to non-clinical duties, a supervisor said Thursday.

  • Authorities say 'Band-Aid bandit' captured AP - Thu Jul 20, 8:07 PM ET

    TAMPA, Fla. - The Band-Aid Bandit — a stick-up artist who robbed 40 Florida banks over the past 5 1/2 years, often while wearing a bandage on his cheek — was finally captured Thursday, authorities said.

  • Smuggled Cubans to stay in U.S. AP - Thu Jul 20, 4:44 PM ET

    MIAMI - In an unusual move, 28 Cubans who were caught trying to slip into the United States were brought ashore this week so they can testify against those accused of organizing the deadly smuggling voyage — a step that means they can stay permanently in this country.

  • Spray-painting politician convicted AP - Thu Jul 20, 8:28 PM ET

    TOLEDO, Ohio - A former councilman and one-time mayoral candidate was convicted of spray-painting anti-war slogans on highway overpasses.

  • SAT scoring errors cited in report AP - Thu Jul 20, 4:06 PM ET

    Steps ranging from better software to more training — and even providing pencils and erasers at test centers — could improve the reliability of scoring the SAT exam, a consultant's report says.

  • New Orleans police officers escort Michael Anderson to central lock up in New Orleans, Thursday night, July 13, 2006. Anderson, 19, of New Orleans, was arrested as a suspect in the deadly shooting of five teenagers last month that returned the national spotlight on the city's growing violent crime problems. He was booked on five counts of first-degree murder, New Orleans Police Chief Warren Riley said at a news conference. (AP Photo/Bill Haber)
    Murders down, arrests up in New Orleans AP - Thu Jul 20, 2:52 PM ET

    NEW ORLEANS - The homicide rate in New Orleans has been cut in half since the National Guard and state police arrived to help patrol the city a month ago, city police statistics show. At the same time, arrests in some crime-plagued neighborhoods have almost doubled.

  • A stuffed male ivory billed woodpecker, is shown in this Monday, May 2, 2005 file photo taken in the main lobby at the New York State Museum in Albany, N.Y. The museum is uncertain about the date or place of acquision of this artifact or the female ivory billed woodpecker, which is also on display. Until recently the last sighting of the bird was in 1944. (AP Photo/Jim McKnight)
    Woodpecker halts Ark. irrigation project AP - Thu Jul 20, 7:36 PM ET

    LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - A federal judge halted a $320 million irrigation project Thursday for fear it could disturb the habitat of a woodpecker that may or may not be extinct.

  • 5 kids among 7 dead in Okla. house fire AP - Thu Jul 20, 1:15 PM ET

    CHICKASHA, Okla. - A fire caused by an electrical problem in a refrigerator swept through a home early Thursday, killing seven family members who were overcome by smoke before they could escape, officials said.

Crimes and Trials News

  • Mother describes fire that killed five children in trial against accused arsonist CourtTV - Thu Jul 20, 6:16 PM ET

    A Michigan mother choked back tears on the witness stand Thursday as she recalled her fruitless efforts to rescue her children from a blazing house fire.

  • In Andrea Yates murder trial, both sides rest CourtTV - Thu Jul 20, 6:10 PM ET

    HOUSTON (Court TV) - Both sides rested in Andrea Yates' murder trial Thursday morning.

  • Yates experts both believe she was insane, just not legally CourtTV - Wed Jul 19, 5:23 PM ET

    HOUSTON (Court TV) - As the murder trial of former Texas housewife Andrea Yates draws to a close, medical experts from both sides seem to agree that Yates was psychotic when she drowned her five children, but they cannot agree on the key question jurors must decide: Was Yates legally insane?

  • In this copy of a photograph made available to the Associated Press on Wednesday, July 19, 2006, a military vehicle is seen on the side of a road in Hamdania, Iraq, on May 9, 2006. Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents claim that on April 26 seven Marines and a Navy medic, without provocation, went into the rural Iraqi town of Hamdania and kidnapped and murdered 52-year-old Hashim Ibrahim Awad. They allegedly tied him up, put him in the hole shown in this photograph and shot him. After the killing, the troops allegedly placed an AK-47 in Awad's hands and put a shovel in the hole to make it appear Awad was an insurgent planting explosives, investigators say. (AP Photo)
    Marines' lawyers denied Iraq visit AP - Fri Jul 21, 12:07 AM ET

    SAN DIEGO - The Marine Corps turned down a request by defense lawyers who want to visit the Iraqi village where military investigators say seven Marines and a Navy medic kidnapped and murdered a civilian.

  • 3 plead guilty in Oregon to ecoterrorism AP - Thu Jul 20, 11:52 PM ET

    GRANTS PASS, Ore. - Three people pleaded guilty Thursday in an ecoterrorism case and agreed to help in the investigation of a series of firebombings at ranger stations, wild horse corrals, a ski resort and lumber mill offices around the West.