Blagojevich pleads innocent to corruption

Blagojevich pleads innocent to corruption

CHICAGO — Ousted Gov. Rod Blagojevich pleaded innocent Wednesday to revised federal corruption charges and challenged prosecutors to allow jurors to hear all of the FBI’s recordings of his telephone conversations.

Sounding unusually combative after the brief hearing, Blagojevich told reporters he would not ask Judge James B. Zagel to prevent jurors from hearing FBI wiretaps in which prosecutors say he schemed to sell or trade President Barack Obama’s former Senate seat.

Ex-rep who supported mujahedeen dies at 76

DALLAS — Charlie Wilson, the fun-loving Texas congressman whose backroom deal-making funneled millions of dollars in weapons to Afghanistan, allowing the country’s underdog mujahedeen rebels to beat back the mighty Soviet Red Army, died Wednesday. He was 76.

Wilson died at Memorial Medical Center-Lufkin after having difficulty breathing after attending a meeting in the eastern Texas town where he lived, said hospital spokeswoman Yana Ogletree. Wilson was pronounced dead on arrival, and the preliminary cause of death was cardiopulmonary arrest, she said.

Wilson represented Texas’ 2nd Congressional District in the U.S. House from 1973 to 1996 and was known in Washington as “Good Time Charlie” for his reputation as a hard-drinking womanizer. He once called former congresswoman Pat Schroeder “Babycakes” and tried to take a beauty queen with him on a government trip to Afghanistan.

His efforts to help the Afghan rebels — as well as his partying ways — were portrayed in the movie and book “Charlie Wilson’s War.”

Ohio man charged with tattooing 1-year-old girl

LOUISVILLE, Ohio — Police say an Ohio man tattooed the letter “A” on the rear end of a 1-year-old girl visiting his home.

Twenty-year-old Lee Deitrick of Louisville was arraigned Wednesday on a felony child endangering charge in Canton Municipal Court.

Authorities say there’s no evidence the toddler’s mother permitted the November tattooing. It’s not clear what the letter “A” signifies.

Bond was set at $250,000. If convicted, Deitrick could face up to five years in prison.

Pakistan confirms death of country’s Taliban leader

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The Pakistani government confirmed for the first time Wednesday that the country’s Taliban leader has died of injuries suffered in a U.S. drone strike in mid-January, setting the stage for a potential succession struggle that could further weaken the group.

But analysts caution that Hakimullah Mehsud’s death would not deal the al-Qaida-linked militants a knockout blow nor bring an end to attacks that have killed hundreds of people in the past few months.

Researchers find genes linked to stuttering

LOS ANGELES — Government researchers have discovered the first genes linked to stuttering — a complex of three mutated genes that may be responsible for one in every 11 stuttering cases, especially in people of Asian descent.

Studies of stuttering in both families and twins had long suggested that stuttering has a significant genetic component. But until now, scientists had not been able to identify specific genes that might cause the disorder.

The finding is important, experts said, because it shows that stuttering, which affects as many as 1 percent of all adults worldwide, is biological in origin and not the result of poor parenting, emotional distress or other nebulous factors that many physicians have cited as causes.

London plans playground to help elderly get fit

LONDON — Swinging London will take on a whole new connotation for the capital’s aging baby boomers, who will soon get their own specially designed outdoor playground.

The park will offer low-impact exercise equipment to help older people improve their balance and flexibility and tone muscles that may not have been tested for decades.

“Every park has a children’s playground, very few have playgrounds for adults, and none have playgrounds for the elderly,” said Madeline Elsdon, whose local residents’ association has won funding for the playground, which is planned for London’s popular Hyde Park.

Combined dispatches