Cruise-ship killing

Cruise-ship killing

SAN DIEGO — Court documents allege that a school teacher accused of killing his wife on a Mexican cruise told an FBI agent he killed her “with his bare hands.”

FBI Special Agent James Stinnett included the statement in a probable-cause affidavit attached to Friday’s criminal complaint against Robert John McGill of Los Angeles.

Stinnett also says in the papers that the 55-year-old’s knuckles were injured.

McGill purportedly made the statement Thursday, the day the cruise ship returned to port.

Prosecutors alleged McGill killed his wife, Shirley, on Tuesday.

Calls seeking comments from McGill’s attorney were not immediately returned.

McGill made an initial court appearance Friday in U.S. District Court in San Diego on a murder charge. A federal magistrate entered an initial innocent plea on his behalf.

Zelaya sets deadline

MANAGUA, Nicaragua — Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya says he will give negotiators until the end of today to reach an agreement that would restore him to power.

Representatives of Zelaya and Honduras’ interim government are scheduled to meet in Costa Rica for U.S.-backed talks today. Zelaya says he will consider the negotiations a failure unless he is restored to office by midnight.

Zelaya did not say what he would do if the talks fail. He has previously said Hondurans have a constitutional right to launch an insurrection against an illegitimate government.

Zelaya was ousted in a June 28 military coup.

$50M divorce settlement

HARTFORD, Conn. — The chairman of United Technologies ended his marriage — and a highly publicized divorce trial — Friday by giving his Swedish countess ex-wife a settlement agreement worth about $50 million.

George David and Marie Douglas-David signed the pact in Hartford Family Court, drawing an end to a rancorous trial that featured days of testimony about lavish gifts, their jet-setting lifestyles and detailed accusations of infidelity.

The couple married in 2002 in Greenwich and signed a postnuptial agreement in 2005 that awarded 37-year-old Douglas-David the equivalent of $43 million if the couple split. But for months now she has been using a high-profile legal team, including New York celebrity divorce lawyer William Beslow, to bargain for about $99 million from David’s $329 million fortune.

Pope breaks his wrist

AOSTA, Italy — Pope Benedict XVI waved reassuringly to well-wishers outside a hospital Friday where he underwent surgery to set a fractured right wrist suffered when he fell in his Alpine vacation chalet.

The 82-year-old pope’s overnight accident was the first significant medical issue of his four-year-old papacy, but doctors said he would suffer no long-term effects and would be able to return to playing piano and writing once the wrist heals. His cast will be removed in a month.

The pontiff’s first public appearance of his mountain holiday is scheduled for Sunday in Ivrea, the hometown of his No. 2, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, where he is to deliver his traditional Sunday blessing.

Iranians protest in Tehran

TEHRAN, Iran — In a sign of endurance for Iran’s protest movement, demonstrators clashed with police Friday as one of the nation’s most-powerful clerics challenged the supreme leader during Muslim prayers, saying the country was in crisis in the wake of a disputed election.

The turnout of tens of thousands of worshippers for former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani’s sermon at Tehran University and the battles with police outside represented the biggest opposition show of strength in weeks. Protesters faced fierce government suppression, and hundreds were arrested after the disputed June 12 presidential election.

Jackson sculpture nixed

Since his death last month, The King of Pop has been memorialized in many forms — from music to film — but butter will have to wait.

Of more than 100,000 votes cast online, 65 percent did not consider Michael Jackson to be butter-worthy for the Iowa State Fair, officials announced Friday.

The decision to include a life-size replica of the entertainer sculpted out of animal fats met with strong resistance because of his “character” issues, as reported in the Chicago Tribune this week.

Jackson was originally to be on display not because of his untimely passing, but in celebration of the 40th anniversary of Neil Armstrong’s walk on the moon. The pop star was “the first to perfect and popularize choreographed moonwalking,” according to fair spokeswoman Lori Chappell, admitting that officials didn’t anticipate the push back.

Combined dispatches