Driver arrested in Fla. day-care crash

Driver arrested in Fla. day-care crash

WINTER PARK, FLA.

A manhunt across Florida ended Thursday with the surrender of a driver blamed in a deadly crash at a day care that injured 14 and killed a 4-year-old girl who was sitting in a classroom awaiting her afternoon snack.

Robert Alex Corchado turned himself in and was charged with leaving the scene of a deadly accident almost precisely 24 hours after the KinderCare facility in Winter Park was torn open in the wreck. He was being held on $100,000 bond, said the Orange County Corrections Department. His attorney confirmed his client turned himself in but refused further comment.

Police say Corchado, 28, of Winter Park, crashed his Dodge Durango into a convertible, which in turn smashed into the KinderCare building. Authorities pleaded for the suspect to give up, even as they blanketed the state searching for him. Nicole Quintus, whose daughter, Lily, was killed, joined the pleas.

PM confident signals are from Flight 370

PERTH, AUSTRALIA

Australia’s prime minister said today authorities are confident that a series of underwater signals detected in a remote patch of the Indian Ocean are coming from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

Tony Abbott told reporters in Shanghai, China, that search crews had significantly narrowed down the area they were hunting for the source of the sounds.

“It’s been very much narrowed down because we’ve now had a series of detections, some for quite a long period of time,” Abbott said. “Nevertheless, we’re getting to the stage where the signal from what we are very confident is the black box is starting to fade. We are hoping to get as much information as we can before the signal finally expires.”

The plane’s black boxes, or flight data and cockpit voice recorders, could help solve the mystery of why Flight 370 veered so far off course when it vanished March 8.

Putin warns leaders over gas dispute

MOSCOW

Vladimir Putin warned Europe on Thursday that it may face a shutdown of Russian natural-gas supplies if it fails to help Ukraine settle its huge Russian gas bill — a debt that far exceeds a bailout package offered by the International Monetary Fund.

The Russian president’s letter to 18 mostly Eastern European leaders, released Thursday by the Kremlin, aimed to divide the 28-nation European Union and siphon off to Russia the billions that the international community plans to lend to Ukraine. It was all part of Russia’s efforts to retain control over its struggling neighbor, which is teetering on the verge of financial ruin and facing a pro-Russian separatist mutiny in the east.

Study: ‘Jesus’ wife’ text not likely fake

BOSTON

New scientific tests suggest a fragment of papyrus in which Jesus speaks of “my wife” is more likely an ancient document than a forgery, according to an article published Thursday by the Harvard Theological Review.

The text, which is written in Coptic and is roughly the size of a business card, specifically contains the phrase “Jesus said to them, my wife.”

Karen King, a Harvard professor of divinity, says the papyrus probably dates to eighth-century Egypt, based on radiocarbon dating and tests on the ink’s chemical composition.

“If it was written in the eighth or even the ninth century, it’s still an ancient document,” she said Thursday.

But, she stressed, the fragment doesn’t prove that the historical Jesus was actually married. Most reliable evidence from early Christianity is silent on Jesus’ marital status, King added.

Associated Press