Storms kill motorist, damage skyscraper

Storms kill motorist, damage skyscraper

DEXTER, Mich.

Severe thunderstorms sweeping through the Midwest have killed a motorist in Michigan, shattered windows in an iconic Chicago skyscraper and knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of people.

Sheriff’s officials say a driver was killed near Dexter, Mich., about 40 miles west of Detroit, when winds toppled a tree onto a vehicle.

In Chicago, powerful winds and heavy rains broke windows in the 110-story Willis Tower. Witnesses say the debris looked like icicles falling from the skyscraper, formerly known as Sears Tower.

Utility officials say power is out for about 215,000 Chicago-area customers and 150,000 in Michigan.

In Indiana, wind gusts stronger than 75 mph knocked out power to about 60,000 customers. Storms left about 19,000 in the dark in Wisconsin.

Floods leave 90 dead in China

BEIJING

After months of punishing drought, China’s rainy season has returned with a vengeance, causing floods and landslides that as of Saturday were blamed for 90 deaths.

An estimated 1.4 million people have been evacuated. On Saturday, China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs raised alert levels because of forecasts by the National Meteorological Center of torrential rains in southern and central China in the coming week.

The rains have inundated the provinces of Fujian, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Hunan, Sichuan, Jiangxi and Guizhou and the autonomous region of Guangxi. The latter two have been hit hard by a record drought.

Footage on Chinese state television showed brown waters gushing through city streets, staircases turned into waterfalls, residents seeking safety on rooftops — and the staple of Chinese disaster coverage: troops rescuing children who had been trapped in a flooded school in Fujian province.

Sex offender says rights were denied

CONCORD, N.H.

A New Hampshire sex offender is asking the state’s highest court to allow him to go to church with a chaperone.

The case of 35-year-old Jonathan Perfetto of Manchester marks the first time the New Hampshire Supreme Court is being asked to rule on whether a probation condition that effectively bars church attendance violates a person’s constitutional rights to religious freedom.

Perfetto was convicted in 2002 of possessing child pornography. A condition of his probation is that he have no contact with children. A lower court denied Perfetto’s request to attend Jehovah’s Witnesses services with a church elder acting as a chaperone.

The New Hampshire Civil Liberties Union and Perfetto maintain the chaperone would eliminate any risk to children. The state says public safety trumps Perfetto’s religious rights.

Yemeni militants kill 11 in jailbreak

SAN’A, Yemen

Four suspected al-Qaida gunmen blasted their way into the intelligence headquarters of Yemen’s second largest city Saturday and freed several detainees in the group’s most spectacular operation since a U.S.-backed government crackdown began late last year.

The attack on the heavily protected security complex killed 11 and further bolstered U.S. concerns that Yemen’s weak central government may not be up to tackling an increasingly effective foe seemingly able to strike anywhere inside or outside the country.

Combined dispatches