Court gives Texas OK to enforce abortion limits

Court gives Texas OK to enforce abortion limits

AUSTIN, Texas

A federal appeals court Thursday gave Texas permission to fully enforce a sweeping abortion law signed by Republican Gov. Rick Perry last year that would effectively close all but seven abortion facilities in America’s second-most populous state.

Two years ago, Texas had more than 40 abortion facilities. Many clinics have already closed under a part of the law requiring doctors who perform abortions to obtain hospital admitting privileges, and now more than a dozen remaining clinics are set to shutter as well.

The decision by a panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court in New Orleans wipes out what was a fleeting victory for abortion-rights groups — a lower court in August blocking requirements of the law that say clinics must meet hospital-level operating standards to stay in business.

Study: Heroin deaths doubled in much of the US

NEW YORK

Deaths from heroin overdose doubled in just two years in much of the nation, a new government study says.

The annual number of U.S. drug overdose deaths has been growing for more than 20 years. Officials have been most worried about a class of powerful prescription “opioid” painkillers such as Vicodin and OxyContin. Deaths involving such painkillers continue to be much more common than heroin-related deaths, the study found.

But though those deaths are leveling off or declining in many parts of the country, heroin-related deaths soared between 2010 and 2012 in the 28 states for which information was available to the researchers.

Police look at cold cases after arrest in Virginia case

RICHMOND, Va.

Authorities are taking a fresh look at unsolved rape, murder and missing-persons cases after a man was charged in the abduction of a University of Virginia student who vanished about three weeks ago.

One police chief said he and his officers would be “derelict in our duties” if they didn’t dust off their cold cases, even if there was only a remote possibility of being connected to Jesse Leroy Matthew Jr. Another agency said it had a responsibility to review the open cases now that Matthew has been linked to the 2009 disappearance and death of a Virginia Tech student and three sexual-assault allegations.

Matthew has been charged with abduction with intent to defile 18-year-old Hannah Graham, who disappeared after a night out with friends. He has not been charged in the other four cases.

Red Cross office hit by shells in Ukraine; 1 dead

DONETSK, Ukraine

A Red Cross worker was killed by shelling in the rebel-held city of Donetsk, the aid group said Thursday.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said Laurent DuPasquier, a 38-year-old Swiss national, died when a shell landed near the group’s office in the eastern Ukrainian city.

“We are deeply shocked by this tragic loss,” Dominik Stillhart, the Geneva-based organization’s director of operations, said in a statement.

DuPasquier had worked for the Red Cross for more than five years in Pakistan, Yemen, Haiti, Egypt and Papua New Guinea before taking up his post in Ukraine six weeks ago.

Associated Press