Couple accused of trying to sell baby for cash, SUV

Couple accused of tryingto sell baby for cash, SUV
OWENSBORO, Ky. -- A couple are charged with trying to sell a 15-month-old girl for 3,000 and a sport-utility vehicle. Charles G. Hope Jr., 32, and Amber M. Revlett, 26, both of Owensboro, planned to use the money to pay off his fines for previous criminal charges, said Daviess County Sheriff's Lt. Bill Thompson. They were arrested Friday. Thompson said it started out Wednesday as a joke between the couple and two women, but it became apparent that Hope and Revlett weren't kidding. Hope told the Owensboro Messenger-Inquirer that he wasn't trying to sell his girlfriend's little girl. Thompson said Revlett's three children were placed in the custody of child protective services. Selling a child for adoption is a felony punishable by up to five years in prison.
Three die in plane crash
JACKSONSVILLE, Md. -- A small plane crashed in a suburban wooded area Saturday, killing three people in the aircraft, a Baltimore County fire spokeswoman said. The plane crashed about 75 feet from a house, with some wreckage landing 10 feet from the building, but the house was unoccupied and no one on the ground was injured, said spokeswoman Elise Armacost. The single-engine plane took off from a Harford County airport and crashed near a golf course about 15 miles north of Baltimore, Armacost said.
Lawsuits threatened
ALBANY, N.Y. -- Pet owners were rechecking their cabinets Saturday and threatening legal action after state officials said rat poison was found in pet food blamed for the deaths of at least 16 cats and dogs. It was unclear how many deaths would eventually be linked to the "cuts and gravy" style food produced by Menu Foods, but scientists said Friday they expected more would be announced. The substance in the food was identified as aminopterin, a cancer drug that once was used to induce abortions in the United States and is still used to kill rats in some other countries, state Agriculture Commissioner Patrick Hooker said. The pet deaths led to a recall of 60 million cans and pouches of dog and cat food the company produced and sold throughout North America.
Tornadoes injure dozens
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- At least 13 tornadoes swept along the New Mexico-Texas state line, destroying homes and other buildings and injuring at least 37 people, two critically, authorities said. The worst damage was reported in Clovis and the village of Logan about 80 miles to the north, state officials said. The Clovis twister touched down shortly before 8 p.m. Friday, forecasters said. On Saturday, city officials described a narrow path of destruction about three miles long. About 100 homes and businesses were either lost or damaged, and at least three schools were damaged, police said. By midday Saturday, the storms had weakened and moved across the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles into the central Plains.
Remains of 8 found
FORT MYERS, Fla. -- The remains of eight bodies have been found in a wooded area, where investigators believe they had been for several years, police said. The skeletal remains were found Friday about 25 feet off an unpaved street in Fort Myers, in southwest Florida, police Lt. Brian Phillips said. No trauma was evident, but investigators were treating the deaths as homicides, Phillips said. An ecologist discovered the remains while surveying a 10-acre lot for a developer, police spokeswoman Shelly Flynn said. Three skeletons were found at first, and a search turned up five more within a 50-yard radius, detectives said.
Butterfly assistance
TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Taiwan will cordon off part of a highway to create a safe passage for a massive seasonal butterfly migration in the coming days, an official said Saturday. The milkweed butterflies migrate in late March from southern Taiwan to the north, where they lay eggs and die. The young butterflies then fly south every November to a warm mountain valley near the southern city of Kaohsiung to escape the winter cold in the north. To protect the migrating butterflies, a 600-yard stretch of highway in southern Taiwan's Yunlin County will be sealed off in the coming days as the migration peaks, said Lee Tai-ming, head of the National Freeway Bureau.
U.N. barred from camp
KASSAB, Sudan -- Sudanese troops barred the U.N. humanitarian chief on Saturday from a Darfur refugee camp whose residents have been raped and attacked by gunmen suspected of belonging to pro-government militias. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon failed, meanwhile, to persuade Egypt to push Sudan's leader to accept a U.N. peacekeeping mission in the region. More than 200,000 people have been killed and more than 2 million displaced in four years of fighting, and the Arab janjaweed are accused of widespread atrocities against ethnic African civilians.
Associated Press