Virginia executes convicted serial killer

Virginia executes convicted serial killer

RICHMOND, VA.

Virginia has executed a convicted serial killer who claimed he was intellectually disabled. Alfredo Prieto was pronounced dead at 9:17 p.m. Thursday at the Greensville Correctional Center in Jarrat.

The 49-year-old had fought to prove that he’s intellectually disabled to bar the state from putting him to death. But a federal appeals court in Virginia upheld his death sentence in June, and the U.S. Supreme Court refused Thursday to block his execution.

Prieto was sentenced to death in Virginia in 2010 for the rape and murder of 22-year-old Rachael Raver and the slaying of her boyfriend Warren Fulton III more than two decades earlier.

The El Salvador native had been on death row in California for the rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl at the time.

6 US service members killed in plane crash

WASHINGTON

Eleven people, including six U.S. service members, were killed early today when a U.S. Air Force C-130J transport plane crashed in Afghanistan.

The plane crashed at Jalalabad Airfield in eastern Afghanistan.

A spokesman for the 455th Air Expeditionary Wing at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan said six U.S. service members who made up the plane’s crew died, along with five civilian passengers.

The U.S. military said the cause of the crash was under investigation.

There are about 1,000 coalition forces in eastern Afghanistan, including U.S. and Polish forces, as well as about 40,000 Afghan troops, according to NATO.

Treasury: Nov. 5 is debt-limit deadline

WASHINGTON

The deadline for Congress to increase the government’s borrowing limit is coming earlier than expected, moving up to about Nov. 5.

That means the issue likely must be addressed before House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, leaves Congress at the end of October.

Three weeks ago, Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew issued a less-precise timeline that was interpreted as mid-November or later, but he told top lawmakers in a letter Thursday that tax receipts have come in below estimates and payments into military retirement trust funds are higher than anticipated.

Kicked off wine train, black women file suit

SAN FRANCISCO

A group of mostly black women filed a racial discrimination lawsuit Thursday after they were removed from a train that tours Napa Valley wineries, saying it was humiliating to be thrown off a rail car when loud and inebriated white passengers were allowed to stay.

The 11 women sued Napa Valley Wine Train Inc., claiming they were singled out because of race and are seeking $11 million in damages. The company said in a statement that it takes allegations of discrimination very seriously and has hired a former FBI agent to investigate.

NASA releases shots of Pluto’s jumbo moon

CAPE CANAVERAL, FLA.

Pluto’s big moon, Charon, is being revealed in all its rugged glory.

NASA released the best color pictures yet of Charon on Thursday. The images were taken by the New Horizons spacecraft during its flyby of Pluto in July and transmitted to Earth 11/2 weeks ago.

Massive canyons and fractures are clearly visible on Charon, which is more than half of Pluto’s size. These canyons are four times as long as the Grand Canyon and, in places, twice as deep.

Associated Press