Sunday, March 10, 2002
Second teen-age girlmissing in Oregon town
OREGON CITY, Ore. -- Authorities searched Saturday for a 13-year-old girl who was reported missing from the same apartment complex where her 12-year-old friend disappeared two months ago.
Miranda Gaddis was last seen at the apartment complex on Friday morning, said Oregon City police Lt. Mike Jarvis. He said she didn't make it to school and didn't return home.
Gaddis and 12-year-old Ashley Pond, who has been missing since Jan. 9, both attend Gardiner Middle School and are both on the school's dance team, KOIN-TV reported.
Jarvis said the girls are friends, but there was no evidence to suggest the disappearances are connected.
"I understand the similarities," he said. "They're friends, they go to the same school, they live in the same apartment complex, but we're treating them as separate investigations."
Former '60s activistconvicted in slaying
ATLANTA -- H. Rap Brown, the 1960s black power radical turned Muslim cleric, was convicted of murder Saturday in the shooting of a deputy sheriff who tried to serve him with a warrant two years ago.
Jurors deliberated 10 hours over two days before finding the Muslim cleric now called Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin guilty of shooting to death Deputy Ricky Kinchen and wounding Deputy Aldranon English on a southwest Atlanta street.
The trial now moves to a penalty phase, in which jurors will decide whether to recommend execution or life in prison for the 58-year-old Al-Amin.
He was found guilty of 13 counts, including murder, aggravated assault on a police officer, obstruction and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
The verdict came at the end of the third week of the trial, which was postponed once after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks because the judge feared anti-Muslim sentiment would taint the jury pool.
Presidential pardon
NEW YORK -- Advisers to one-time fugitive financier Marc Rich waited until after the November 2000 election to approach the Clinton administration about getting Rich a presidential pardon, The New York Times reported Saturday.
Rich fled the country after he was indicted in 1983 on federal charges of evading more than $48 million in income taxes and illegally buying oil from Iran during the 1979 hostage crisis. Clinton pardoned Rich on his last day in the White House, setting off a storm of criticism. Rich's ex-wife, Denise Rich, is a major financial contributor to the Democratic Party.
E-mail messages between Rich's advisers indicated that the effort to win a pardon began almost immediately after a prosecutor wrote on Feb. 2, 2000, that there would be no negotiations on a deal to allow Rich back in the United States.
In an e-mail one week later, attorney Robert Fink told former White House counsel Jack Quinn he would speak with Rich about "the second option" -- apparently the pardon, the Times reported.
Tunnel reopens
CHAMONIX, France -- Rebuilt and blessed, the Mont Blanc tunnel linking France and Italy reopened Saturday for the first time since a fire three years ago transformed the Alpine passage into an inferno that killed 39 people.
After a formal religious blessing of the fully rebuilt 7.4-mile tunnel, the first car rolled through, 50 minutes after the scheduled noon opening. The Italian entrance opened at the same time, officials said.
However, signs that not all was well preceded the opening -- a pre-dawn blast at the French entrance that destroyed a maintenance truck. The explosion was thought to be the work of protesters opposed to truck traffic in the tunnel.