Police re-opening Gore investigation

July 1, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

PORTLAND, Ore.

Police said Wednesday they are reopening an investigation into a Portland massage therapist’s allegations that former Vice President Al Gore groped her at an upscale hotel in 2006. The statement did not say why. Police earlier said they considered the case closed because there was no evidence.

A spokeswoman for Gore said the former vice president “unequivocally and emphatically” denied making unwanted sexual advances toward the woman and that he welcomed the investigation. Gore and his wife announced June 1 they were separating.

2 on trial in plot to blow up airport

NEW YORK

Two Muslim militants plotted to cause more death and destruction than the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks by blowing up John F. Kennedy International Airport six years later, federal prosecutors said Wednesday at the men’s terrorism trial in federal court in Brooklyn.

Lawyers for Russell Defreitas, a naturalized U.S. citizen, and Abdul Kadir, another Muslim defendant from Defreitas’ native Guyana, countered by telling the jury that their clients were framed.

Defreitas, 66, a former JFK cargo handler, and Kadir, 58, once a member of Parliament in Guyana, were arrested in 2007 after an informant infiltrated the plot and made a series of secret recordings.

4 bodies found in plane wreckage

MOIESE, Mont.

Authorities found four bodies inside the wreckage of a small plane Wednesday on a rugged hillside in northwestern Montana, bringing a tragic end to a 21/2-day search for a group of friends who went out for an afternoon sightseeing trip and never returned.

Family members awaiting word in Moiese, headquarters of the National Bison Range, broke down upon hearings of the deaths of pilot and recent University of Montana graduate Sonny Kless, law student Brian Williams and newspaper reporters Erika Hoefer and Melissa Weaver.

Kagan’s confirmation seems all but sure

WASHINGTON

Her confirmation all but assured, Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan neared the end of a final grueling day of Senate questioning Wednesday, fielding GOP challenges on abortion, gays in the military and other divisive issues while sidestepping Democrats’ invitations to blast conservative decisions by the court she’s hoping to join.

Kagan, prompted by Democratic supporters on the Senate Judiciary Committee, gave a blunt denunciation of “results-oriented judging,” the adjusting of judicial reasoning to fit a preconceived conclusion, but she refused to join them in applying the criticism to the current court under Chief Justice John Roberts.

Al-Qaida terrorist linked to subway plot

NEW YORK

U.S. counterterrorism officials have linked one of the nation’s most wanted terrorists to last year’s thwarted plot to bomb the New York City subway system, authorities said Wednesday.

Current and former counterterrorism officials said top al-Qaida operative Adnan Shukrijumah met with one of the would-be suicide bombers in a plot that Attorney General Eric Holder called one of the most dangerous since the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

German election

BERLIN

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s candidate was elected German president Wednesday in a lackluster victory that took an embarrassing three rounds of voting and dashed hopes of a strong show of support from her governing coalition.

Christian Wulff, a 51-year-old deputy leader of Merkel’s conservative party, won 625 votes in a special parliamentary assembly compared with 494 for opposition candidate Joachim Gauck.

Associated Press