WORLD DIGEST || Charge dropped in Steubenville rape case

Charge being dropped in case

STEUBENVILLE

An eastern Ohio elementary school official will perform community service related to rape awareness in exchange for prosecutors’ dropping a charge that she failed to report rumors of a teenage-sex and drinking party, state Attorney General Mike DeWine announced Wednesday.

Lynnett Gorman had faced a misdemeanor charge of failure to report child abuse or neglect related to the April 2012 party. The accusation against Gorman arose from an investigation into other crimes associated with the August 2012 rape of a 16-year-old girl after a different party, but it was not related to that case.

Gorman, a principal in the Steubenville city schools, must perform 40 hours of community service at a rape-crisis or victim-assistance center and talk to teachers and administrators in Steubenville about the importance of reporting child abuse and neglect, DeWine said.

She also must encourage the school system to host a speaker from the Ohio Alliance Against Sexual Violence during Sexual Assault Awareness Month in April.

If she completes those activities, the charge will be dropped by June 1, DeWine said.

Tribal leaders urge fighters to leave

BAGHDAD

Tribal leaders in the besieged city of Fallujah warned al-Qaida-linked fighters to leave to avoid a military showdown, echoing a call by Iraq’s prime minister Wednesday that they give up their fight as the government pushes to regain control of mainly Sunni areas west of Baghdad.

The warning came as gunmen attacked an Iraqi army barracks in a Sunni area north of Baghdad, killing 12 soldiers. Seven soldiers were wounded in the assault in Diyala province, authorities said.

2 die in crash of Navy copter off Va.

A Navy helicopter with five crew members crashed into the ocean off the Virginia coast during a routine training mission Wednesday, killing two crew members and leaving two in the hospital, the U.S. Navy said. Rescuers searched into the night for a fifth sailor.

The two who died were among four crew members hoisted from the 42-degree waters by a Navy helicopter and taken to a hospital, the Navy said in a statement. The two surviving sailors were being treated at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital. One is listed in serious condition, the other has been upgraded to fair, the Navy said in a news release.

W. Pa. native dies in helicopter crash

PITTSBURGH

A western Pennsylvania native was one of four U.S. Air Force crew members who died in a military helicopter crash in England.

The Royal Air Force says in a release that Capt. Sean M. Ruane died in the Tuesday evening crash.

Family members say that the 31-year-old Ruane was a graduate of Montour High School, near Pittsburgh.

The Pave Hawk helicopter slammed into the coast during a low-level training mission.

Gang targeted in prostitution ring

SAN DIEGO

Seventeen people were arrested Wednesday in California, Arizona and New Jersey under an indictment that accuses a San Diego-based street gang of running a vast prostitution ring.

The gang based in San Diego’s increasingly gentrified North Park neighborhood operated a prostitution ring spanning 46 cities in 23 states, recruiting women and girls by promising luxurious lifestyles, prosecutors said. Gang members reportedly branded the women with tattoos and bar codes and traded them among themselves.

Associated Press