The Seattle Parks and Recreation board has decided the city is large enough and diverse enough to include those who like to bare it all in public.

Parks commissioners have dropped an effort to have those who go nude in the parks charged with criminal trespass, The Seattle Times reported. They even said they will ask officials to consider making one of the public beaches clothing optional.

A large crowd attended Thursday night's meeting, a spokeswoman told the newspaper. Most of them, apparently, opposed criminalizing nudity.

The plan was introduced after police received complaints about the World Naked Bike Ride July 12. The event, publicizing dependency on oil, began in Gas Works Park, where the riders stripped to the buff and painted their bodies before taking off on a ride through the city.

Dewey Potter, the parks spokeswoman, said Seattle has no laws governing public undress. Washington state bans public nudity only if it offends someone or is considered a hazard. >>>>

Lawyers for the Bali bombers will file a last-minute appeal today to stop the executions of the three men, the Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported.

The legal team of Amrozi, Ali Ghufron and Imam Samudra is heading to a court in Bali's capital, Denpasar, to lodge the request, as Indonesian authorities prepare to carry out their death sentences by firing squad, the ABC said on its Web site.

Two national police helicopters landed yesterday on the island off the coast of Java where the bombers are being held, the broadcaster reported, citing comments that military intelligence chief Sergeant Giarto made to local media. The aircraft will transport the bombers' bodies for burial, he said.

The three were sentenced to death for the 2002 bombings in Bali's tourist strip of Kuta Beach that killed 202 people, 88 of them Australians. Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, blamed the Southeast Asian terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah for the attack. The group, which is linked to al- Qaeda, wants to turn the archipelago into an Islamic state.

Michael Heath 

---

Opposing the death penalty: a question of conscience

---

The execution of the three convicted Bali bombers, Amrozi, Mukhlas and Imam Samudra, is now upon us.

There is probably little that we can do now to change the course of events - the time for intercession was months ago and the opportunity has been lost. However, even if we have no control over events, we can still accept responsibility for our attitude to the fate of those to be killed.

I have heard many Australians express the view that they will be pleased to see the end of the murderous trio. I have also heard many Indonesians express the same point of view - good Muslims who reject the bombers' claim to Islamic piety as a degraded misinterpretation of Islam - that, in truth, abhors the killing of innocents.

I have also heard the voices of victims' families - opinion divided between those who think justice (even vengeance) should prevail and those who see no good coming from the shedding of further blood; who argue that many of those killed would cry out against the execution of their murderers.

Clearly, there is passion and argument on all sides. Those of us who are only indirectly affected by the tragic background to this situation must recognise the scale of loss faced by individuals and families, we must recognise that the bombers did more than kill and maim those present in Bali when their malicious plans unfolded - they wounded, forever, those who survived and the loved ones of those who did not. Our only response to those living with the hurt is unreserved, unqualified compassion.

Yet, the claims of compassion and an abiding respect for the integrity of justifiable anger should not lead us to suspend the work of our consciences - individual or collective.

Although I suspect that there are some Australians who would support the death penalty being reintroduced into domestic criminal law, the vast majority of the population does not. As far as I know, there is no political party advocating for capital punishment; no groundswell of popular opinion in its favour. For present, at least, it is a settled matter that it is wrong for the state to kill its own citizens.

Opposition to capital punishment is not just based on a practical concern that the administration of justice is imperfect; that the innocent might be killed (as happens too often in the USA). Beneath this concern, our national opposition to the death penalty is based on a principle that no person should take another's life - with strict necessity (as when in self-defence to kill is the only option) being the only exception.

The planned execution of Amrozi, Mukhlas and Imam Samudra forces us to ask if our opposition to the death penalty only applies when it affects Australians - and if so, then why. In many ways, our fates are shaped by accidents of birth - our health, wealth, opportunity - all the result of factors over which we have no control. It might seem like sheer bad luck to have been born a citizen of a state that executes its condemned.

However, as I noted above, the question here is not about the attitude of the Indonesian state - but about our own perspectives. Do we think that an accident of birth is relevant in this matter? Do we think that it's OK to be indifferent or inconsistent when it comes to the fates of strangers - or to those whom we assume to be very different to us because of geography, culture or religion?

That is how Amrozi, Mukhlas and Imam Samudra think. They think that people can be killed because they are different. And they assume that we would have them killed for the same reason. No doubt they believe that Australians only care about their own, that we will celebrate their deaths because we hate Muslims, that we treat people like them as less than us. It is these beliefs, held by the Bali bombers, that we privilege ourselves at their expense that allows them to delude themselves into thinking their bombing to be a noble deed waged against a corrupt foe.

What is our best answer to the Bali bombers? Is it that we should condemn the death penalty for our own but seek its imposition on others? Is it that we should look away and remain silent? Or should we answer by denying the core of their claim - that we are hypocrites? Even now, should we call for them to be spared and require them to live out their lives confounded by generosity of spirit and forced to live with the evil that they have done?

Simon Longstaff

Ford Motor Co. Unveils Car Key Computer Chip to Monitor Teen Drivers

long perceived as the keys to teenagers' freedom -- may soon be the best way for parents to monitor their every move. Ford Motor Co. announced today it will offer a new feature, starting next summer on some of its 2010 cars and trucks, that allows parents to set safety limits on teen drivers through a high-tech car key.

Watch "World News With Charles Gibson" tonight at 6:30 p.m. ET for the full report.

Want to ensure your teen can't drive over 80 mph? Or listen to loud music while driving? Or cruise around town without buckling up? A computer chip in the key allows parents to add those features when the key is in the ignition, and ensures a six-second chime will sound every minute if teens don't fasten their seatbelts. Drivers will also be alerted earlier than usual if they're low on fuel, with the computer chip triggering a warning at 75 miles before the gas tank is empty.

"I think it is a great idea. It is not something that is punitive, it is not set too low to be safe," said Barbara Kurzman, who added that she did buy her children cars when they turned 16. "It just makes sense. I would have wanted my children to have the capacity not to go over 80 miles an hour."

But just how warmly the device will be received by teenagers is up for debate. Today in Los Angeles, 17-year-old Joshua Cruz was among several teens who said he disliked the idea of his parents monitoring his driving habits when they weren't sitting next to him.

"I think it would mean that they don't trust you since they don't think that you are responsible enough to decide what to do," Cruz said. "It is not OK, because you should be able to trust your child."

Ruby Medina, who said she lost a friend in a car crash, also said it would limit her freedom, but conceded that if given a choice, "I would take it 'cause it is a car."

"Teens weren't really excited about this," admitted Jim Buczkowski, Ford's director of electronic and electrical systems engineering. "But when they found out that parents potentially would give them more access to the vehicle, their interest doubled as well, too."

Buczkowski added, "This is another example of a way we're trying to use technology to improve people's lives and improve driving skills and making the driving experience better and safer for everyone."

Daniel Garcia, 16, said he is OK with the idea. "It would be safe, you wouldn't be able to speed or no tickets -- that would be fine."

While Ford is the first automaker to offer built-in technology intended to reduce teen driving deaths, insurance and technology companies have also teamed up recently in similar efforts.

Motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of death for American teens, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

A high-tech surveillance system offered by Safeco sends parents a text message if their teenagers are driving too fast or break curfew. Other insurance companies, such as AIG Auto Insurance and American Family Insurance Co., also inform parents about their kids' driving habits, whether through GPS systems or cameras attached to the rearview mirror.

"We know what [teens] do. We know that they drive fast, that they exceed the speed limits quite often," said Adrian Lund, president of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. "We know that they follow other vehicles real closely, we know that, often, they don't wear safety belts."

Lund said Ford's development is a good idea, even if it takes some time to see whether it will be effective.

"It's a way for parents to sort of extend themselves into the car when they can't be there," added Lund. "Sort of like electronic parenting as their teens are learning to drive."

Ford will debut the technology with its upcoming Ford Focus, then expand the technology to other Ford, Lincoln and Mercury models. >>>>

Prosecutors release chilling details about the Sunday night attack, alleging that Deputy Robert A. McClain forced the victims at knifepoint to undress and ordered them to engage in a sex act.

A Los Angeles sheriff's deputy was charged today with torturing and forcibly sexually assaulting his wife and another man after learning that his wife planned to divorce him, authorities said.

Prosecutors released chilling new details about the Sunday night attack, alleging that Deputy Robert A. McClain repeatedly punched and kicked the victims and forced them at knifepoint to undress and ordered them to engage in a sex act. The ordeal, authorities said, spanned nearly nine hours.

At one point, prosecutors said, the deputy ordered his wife to castrate the 23-year-old man. She "fearfully pretended to follow his instructions" and the deputy used the knife to repeatedly slice the young man's face, according to a statement released by the Orange County district attorney's office.

McClain, 34, faces charges of torture, aggravated mayhem and sodomy by force with great bodily injury to a sexual assault victim. If convicted, he faces life in prison, authorities said.

According to prosecutors, the bloody attack occurred about 10 p.m. Sunday when McClain's wife told him she was leaving him for the younger man, whom she met while working at a leasing office in an Irvine apartment complex. After learning this, the deputy had his 31-year-old wife take him to meet the man at his apartment, prosecutors said.

After arriving, the deputy led the victims to a back kitchenette area in the leasing office, where he started to argue with them and physically attack them, authorities said.

"McClain is accused of taking out a knife and forcing both victims to undress," according to the district attorney's statement. McClain also disrobed, authorities said.

"While at knife point, McClain is accused of unsuccessfully ordering [his wife] to orally copulate both him and [the other man]," the statement read. McClain then ordered his wife to castrate the younger man, which she feigned doing, authorities said. The young man did, however, sustain puncture wounds to his groin area, Irvine police said.

After slashing the man's face, prosecutors said, McClain fled the scene, forcing his wife to go with him.

McClain then forcibly sodomized his wife, chopped off her hair with the knife, and ultimately drove her back to their Irvine home, prosecutors allege.

About 5 a.m. Monday, the wife was able to leave the house with her and her husband's four children and drive to a nearby hospital to get treatment, authorities said.

A cleaning crew two hours later discovered the young man in the leasing office and called authorities.

Chris Heflin, the young man's father, told The Times on Tuesday that his son's face was so badly disfigured that he was hardly recognizable. "I know it's him, but his face is just swollen so large I can hardly tell it's him," the father said. He said his son would need surgery for a "complete facial reconstruction."

In conversations before the attack, Heflin said his son had told him he had fallen for a married woman. "He said she was beautiful. I couldn't talk him out of it, and I tried three or four times," he said.

McClain, who also suffered injuries, will be arraigned at the Harbor Justice Center in Newport Beach once the medical treatment he is undergoing is completed, prosecutors said. He is being held in lieu of $1-million bail.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca has already announced that McClain, a 10-month probationary deputy, would be fired today.

Richard Winton and Scott Glover

A woman was sentenced Monday to life in prison without the chance for parole for burning her baby daughter to death in a microwave after fighting with her boyfriend. Common Pleas Judge Mary Wiseman lashed out at 28-year-old China Arnold, who opted to watch her sentencing from a side room on a monitor.

"No adjectives exist to adequately describe this heinous atrocity," Wiseman said. "This act is shocking and utterly abhorrent for a civilized society."

The judge rejected a plea by Arnold's attorneys for a minimum sentence of life in prison with the chance of parole after 25 years. A jury last week spared Arnold the death penalty when it couldn't reach a consensus.

"I am innocent of these charges," Arnold said in a statement read by her attorney, Jon Paul Rion.

Arnold was convicted Aug. 29 of aggravated murder in the death of month-old Paris Talley in 2005. Prosecutors said she intentionally put her baby in the microwave after a fight with her boyfriend. The couple had argued over whether the boyfriend was the biological father.

It was Arnold's second trial. Her first ended in a mistrial when new witnesses surfaced.

Rion has asked for a third trial, saying a former cellmate who said Arnold confessed has now changed her story. Rion said he's also found additional witnesses who point to someone else being responsible for killing the baby.

The judge hasn't ruled on the motion for a new trial.

Rion said Arnold loved her baby "with all of her heart and more" and regrets drinking the night of her baby's death to the point of not remembering what happened.

"We have a mother who has lost her own daughter," Rion said. "That will plague her and follow her like a shadow for the rest of her life and into the next."

Prosecutor David Franceschelli told Wiseman that Arnold has shown no genuine remorse.

"The only remorse here is she got caught," Franceschelli said. >>>>

A nearly half-ton Texas woman charged in the death of her toddler nephew couldn't have beaten the boy to death because of her limited movement from weight problems, her attorney said Tuesday.

Mayra Rosales, who weighs nearly 1,000 pounds, was indicted last week on capital murder charges in the death of Eliseo Gonzalez Jr. Prosecutors said the 2-year-old boy died after being struck at least twice in the head while in the care of Rosales, who is bedridden.

Jamie Rosales, the boy's 20-year-old mother, believes the death was possibly caused by the morbidly obese woman rolling onto the toddler, said Oscar Vega, her attorney. She faces one felony count of injury to a child, which carries a life sentence and 10,000 in fines.

"She doesn't believe her sister intentionally did anything to her child," Vega told The Associated Press.

A state district judge put Mayra Rosales, 27, under house arrest Monday because the county jail lacks a large enough cell or necessary medical resources. She is required to wear a global-positioning tracker until her trial.

Sergio Valdez, Mayra Rosales' attorney, said she lacks the movement in her arms to have killed the child, calling it an "impossibility."

"She is not physically capable of having committed those acts," Valdez said.

Valdez said Rosales suffers from a thyroid problem that has caused her to put on hundreds of pounds over the past three to four years and has been bedridden for more than a year.

The stress of the arrest and charges has exacerbated the poor health of Mayra Rosales, who also suffers from a "life-threatening" ailment he would not disclose, Valdez said.

"This whole ordeal has taken a very negative effect on her, emotionally and physically," Valdez said. "She wants this to be over. She wants to be vindicated."

Vega said Jamie Rosales has a learning disability and will plead not guilty.

He declined to say where his client was the day of her son's death, but said he knew of no order forbidding the boy to be watched by his aunt. >>>>

At the trial of a woman accused of killing her baby, a boy testified Tuesday that he saw another boy carry the baby into a kitchen, heard the microwave start and then saw the baby burned in the oven.

The defense witness, now 8, said he saw the boy then carry 1-month-old Paris Talley out the home's back door.

On cross-examination, the boy said the sun was out when the incident occurred.

Two forensic pathologists have testified the baby died between 1:15 and 3:15 a.m. August 30, 2005.

After the boy's testimony, defense attorneys for China Arnold, 28, rested their case after seven days of testimony.

Arnold has pleaded not guilty to aggravated murder. She could face the death penalty if convicted.

Prosecutors discount attempts to point the finger away from Arnold, saying her former cellmate claims that Arnold confessed to her and described putting the child in the microwave.

A judge declared a mistrial in Arnold's previous trial after he privately heard testimony from the juvenile who testified Tuesday. >>>>

A longtime sex offender was sentenced to death Wednesday for the 2005 kidnapping, torture and murder of a 9-year-old northern Idaho boy after federal jurors who watched video of some of the brutality deliberated just three hours.

The jurors' recommendation was binding on U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge, who thanked them, dismissed them and then sentenced Joseph Edward Duncan III.

Relatives of the victim, Dylan Groene, remained somber as the jury's decision was announced. Duncan murdered Dylan's mother, older brother and his mother's fiance to kidnap him and his younger sister, who was sexually abused along with her brother but survived.

"The jury speaks the mind of the community," U.S. Attorney Tom Moss said. "By the verdict today, they have given voice to the victims."

Duncan showed no reaction other than smiling as the verdict was passed to the judge.

He took Dylan and the boy's then-8-year-old sister, Shasta, to a remote western Montana campsite where he raped, tortured and threatened them before shooting Dylan in the head and burning his body. Jurors viewed horrifying video Duncan made of him sexually abusing, torturing and hanging Dylan until the boy lost consciousness.

"This defendant is dangerous. He is a predator who takes pride in his work," prosecutor Traci Whelan said. "He earned this day. His actions ... call out for the death penalty."

Duncan acted as his own attorney but had offered no response to prosecutors' closing argument.

"I have no argument," he told the court.

With an eye toward kidnapping the two children, Duncan stalked their family. In 2005 he entered their Coeur d'Alene-area home and used a hammer to fatally bludgeon their 13-year-old brother, Slade Groene, his mother, Brenda Groene, and her fiance, Mark McKenzie.

Duncan was arrested and Shasta rescued weeks after the kidnappings when a waitress at a Denny's in Coeur d'Alene called police after recognizing the two as they ate.

Duncan pleaded guilty in December to 10 federal charges involving the kidnappings and the murder of Dylan. He pleaded guilty to the other three murders in state court, where he also could be sentenced to death.

"I am so glad this is over. Justice has been served," said Darlene Torres, Brenda Groene's mother. "It's been very painful."

She said that when she saw Duncan in court, "I seen nothing but an evil, empty, coldhearted shell."

In closing arguments, Whelan reminded the jury of Duncan's lifelong "pattern of violence," including a conviction for raping a boy at gunpoint in 1980. Duncan has told investigators he killed two half-sisters from Seattle in 1996, and he is charged with killing a young boy in Riverside County, California, in 1997.

Duncan may now be brought to Riverside County to stand trial in the death of Anthony Martinez.

Whelan told the jury that Duncan would pose a risk even to prison guards and fellow inmates.

"This defendant uses the time that he has to think out these plans and he is dangerous," she said. "He is adaptable and he is dangerous."

The heinousness of the evidence in Dylan's murder made it particularly difficult for the jurors to remain impartial as they deliberate, said Art Patterson, a jury consultant and senior vice president of the trial consulting firm DecisionQuest.

"Generally, for human beings, it's pretty hard to maintain impartiality when confronted with such horror," Patterson said.

"How could any juror not want to see this person removed from our list of living human beings? How could you live with yourself as a juror if there's any chance this human being could escape from jail and do something like this again?" Patterson said. >>>>

A 14-year-old girl allegedly married to jailed polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs with her parents' blessing at age 12 was ordered back into foster care Tuesday by a Texas judge.

District Judge Barbara Walther said that there was "uncontroverted evidence of the underage marriage" and that the girl's mother, Barbara Jessop, refused to guarantee the girl's safety. The girl, shown in photographs submitted to the court kissing Jeffs, must immediately enter foster care.

Her 11-year-old brother, whom Texas child welfare authorities also wanted placed in foster care, will be allowed to stay with his mother but will have to undergo psychological evaluation in the next month.

The girl's case marked the first in which Child Protective Services returned to foster care a child who lived at the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado before the April raid that resulted in 440 children being placed in foster care for six weeks. The Texas Supreme Court later struck down that early custody decision, saying the state failed to show any more than a handful of teenage girls might have been abused.

The children were returned to their parents in June. The child welfare agency this week asked for custody of seven of the children, including the 14-year-old girl and her brother. It sought the dismissal of cases involving 76 children, including nine who have turned 18. The rest of the cases remain under investigation.

Lawyers reached settlements Tuesday before hearings were held on the other children they had sought to return to foster care. The five girls in those cases can stay with their mothers, provided the women restrict contact with men accused of being involved in underage marriages and comply with other, more routine custody-related court orders.

The agreements technically put the children in state custody, but the state has agreed to let them stay with their mothers as long as they comply with the agreements.

In the case of the 14-year-old allegedly married to Jeffs, Walther said she felt she had to place the girl in foster care because Jessop "was unable to provide assurances that she'd be able to protect the child in the future."

On Monday, Jessop, 55, refused to answer about 50 questions asked by attorneys for Child Protective Services, including what constituted abuse, the names of her children, her relationship with their father and whether a parent had an obligation to protect her children.

"I stand on the Fifth (Amendment)," she said repeatedly.

Her attorney Gonzalo Rios said she was exercising her right against self-incrimination because of the continuing criminal investigation. Two of her husband's sons have been indicted on charges of sexual assault of a child, as has Jeffs.

Invoking the Fifth Amendment can protect Jessop in a criminal case. But previous court rulings have found that negative inferences can be made in civil cases, like the child custody case, if she refuses to answer.

Rios said after the hearing that Jessop's decision to invoke the Fifth Amendment probably hurt her custody case, but he plans to argue on appeal that the welfare agency didn't make a reasonable effort to keep the family together, as required under Texas law.

He also said Jessop was being treated differently from other parents from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. All the other parents were given a chance to keep their children if they complied with agency requirements.

"It's fundamentally unfair," Rios said. "She's the only parent they wouldn't negotiate with."

Jessop is married to Fredrick "Merril" Jessop, who according to court documents blessed several underage marriages. He did not attend the hearing and has not provided a court-ordered DNA sample.

FLDS spokesman Willie Jessop said no marriages have been conducted for two years, and the church has said it will refuse to bless any unions involving underage girls.

The FLDS believes polygamy brings glory in heaven. It is a breakaway sect of the mainstream Mormon church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which renounced polygamy more than a century ago.

Jeffs, convicted as an accomplice to rape in Utah and awaiting trial on similar charges in Arizona, was indicted along with four followers in Texas last month on charges of sexual assault of a child. One of the followers was also indicted on a bigamy charge.

A sixth man, Dr. Floyd Hammon Barlow, was indicted on three misdemeanor counts of failure to report child abuse. Two of his daughters, who were among the children the state wanted back in foster care, will be allowed to stay with their mother under an agreement reached Tuesday. He will have to provide for them financially and will be allowed supervised visits.

MICHELLE ROBERTS

Identity thieves know no boundaries.

They even go after one of the most vulnerable groups: children."Children are not in any condition to protect themselves," said Adam Levin, chairman and co-founder of Identity Theft 911, which provides identity-theft products and helps victims of the crime. "It's up to their parents."

Children are especially enticing targets for identity-theft crooks because it can take years before the crime is discovered.

"Children, while it doesn't occur often, are probably the most vulnerable just because if someone steals my child's identity, they can use that for 10 to 15 years before they [the child] apply for a loan and they find that their credit is really not good," said Thomas Harkins, chief strategy officer for Secure Identity Systems in Nashville.

Statistics on child identity theft are hard to pin down.

"We don't ask for age in our identity-theft surveys," said Claudia Bourne Farrell, spokeswoman for the Federal Trade Commission. "Our self-reported, anecdotal data indicates that about 5 percent of the complaints last year were for people 18 and under."

The number of child identity thefts reported may be lower than the actual number because "many people find out after they're over the age of 18 that they were victims of identity theft when they were under 18," Mr. Levin said.

"The conventional wisdom is that it's about 500,000 people a year who are children who become victims of identity theft," he said.

The most common way child identity theft occurs is when the child's Social Security number is used to establish new lines of credit.

"What most people do not understand is that credit issuers may not have a way to verify the age of the applicant," said Linda Foley, co-executive director of the Identity Theft Resource Center in San Diego. "The information on the application is typically taken at face value. This is particularly true with telephone and Internet applications."

One clue that may indicate your child is a victim of identity theft is if he or she has a credit report. Young children typically don't have a credit report because they don't have credit.

"A child should not have a report unless someone has started to apply for credit using that child's Social Security number," Ms. Foley said.

There are exceptions, of course. Some parents may add their teenager to their credit card as an authorized user or a joint account holder, which would generate a legitimate credit report for that teen.

But in general, no news is good news.

"If you ask for a report for a child and there's no report, that's the best result because if there is no credit history, there won't be a fraudulent account opened," said Rod Griffin, manager of consumer education at Experian, one of the three major credit bureaus. "It's highly unlikely that the lender will open an account if there is no credit history."

Experian flags credit reports that belong to minors, he said.

"If we get a request for a credit report that has a birth date that belongs to a minor, we will not provide a credit report," Mr. Griffin said, adding that Experian informs the lender of the discovery.

Watch out for these signs that may indicate your child is a victim of identity theft:

•Your child gets credit-card applications, bills or bank statements in the mail. It may indicate that someone has started a credit history in your child's name, though Ms. Foley said there could be a legitimate explanation.

"Receiving a preapproved credit card offer in your child's name might upset you as a parent," she said. "However, it might only be an innocent marketing tool sent by an affiliate of your bank because you opened a college fund for your child."

In that case, you should check your child's credit report.

"If you are told that there is no credit report, this is probably not a case of financial identity theft," Ms. Foley said.

When opening a bank account for your child, ask the bank to remove your child's name from marketing lists.

•Debt collectors call or send letters about accounts not opened by the child.

•When attempting to open a savings account or college fund for your child, you discover there's already an account with that Social Security number or that the new account is denied because of a bad check record.

•When your teenager is denied a driver's license because another person has a license with his or her Social Security number as identification.

If you suspect your child has been the victim of identity theft, report it to the three national credit bureaus – Experian, TransUnion and Equifax. Also, find out whether there are credit reports in your child's name and Social Security number.

If your child does have a credit report, ask to have all accounts, application inquiries and collection notices removed immediately from the report. You do this by contacting the credit issuer and through a dispute process with the credit bureaus.

Tell the credit issuer that the account is in the name of your minor child, who by law isn't permitted to enter into a contract. In the end, it's up to the issuer whether to accept a claim of fraud.

The bottom line is that children are easy targets for identity thieves, and it's crucial that parents guard their financial reputation.

You don't want your children to apply for their first jobs or loans and discover that their names have been tarnished before they even have a chance to start life on their own.

WHAT TO DO

If you suspect fraudulent use of your child's identity, contact the three national credit bureaus. Here's how

•TransUnion: Go to its Web site, which gives you information on its Fraud Victim Assistance Department.

•Experian: Go to its Web site, or call toll-free 1-800-311 4769 and select the option for fraud victims.

•Equifax: Write to Equifax Minor Child Department, P.O. Box 105139, Atlanta, Georgia 30348

WAYS TO SAFEGUARD YOUR CHILD'S IDENTITY

•Protect your child's Social Security number. If it is requested, ask why it's needed, what procedures exist for protecting that information and whether there's an alternative number that can be used for identification.

•Teach your child not to give out personal information over the phone or Internet, and don't give out any of your or your child's information on the Internet unless you are absolutely sure you are dealing with a legitimate company. When in doubt, don't.

•Don't carry your or your child's Social Security number in your wallet. If necessary, make a photocopy of the card, cut off the last four digits of the number and carry that photocopy with you. Carry original cards only on days you know you will need them.

•Learn about credit reports and children. Be wary of online services that claim to check a child's credit reports regularly because there won't be any reports to check unless fraud has been committed. "No minor should have a credit report," said Steven Katz, director of consumer education at TransUnion, one of the three national credit bureaus.

PAMELA YIP

2 men arrested, charged with murder of British honeymooners in Antigua

A man and a teenager were charged Monday with the murders of a British couple who were shot in their resort cottage on the last day of their honeymoon, police in this Caribbean island said.

The 20-year old man and 17-year-old male were taken to a magistrate court in the capital, St. John's, and were charged with murder, robbery and receiving stolen goods, court officials said. Police would not identify the men, who were taken to prison after being charged, or say where they were from.

Benjamin and Catherine Mullany, both 31 and from Wales, were married on July 12 and went to Antigua for a two-week honeymoon. On July 27 — the day they were to leave — they were shot before dawn at the Cocos Hotel in the island's southwest. Police have said robbery appeared to be a motive.

Police in Wales said they have informed the families of the slain couple of the latest developments.

"We are pleased at how the investigation is progressing," the families said in a statement.

Last week, authorities charged two women with crimes "connected to the murders."

Police then detained eight other people. Five were released, and the two men charged on Monday were among those who had remained in custody. A 31-year-old woman also remained in custody but has not been charged.

ANIKA KENTISH

Thaksin Shinawatra, Thailand’s ousted former prime minister, has jumped bail and fled into exile in Britain rather than face trial at home on corruption charges. His decision probably marks the end of the billionaire businessman’s dominant influence over Thai political life.

The Supreme Court issued warrants on Monday for the arrest of Mr Thaksin and his wife Pojamarn after they failed to appear in court for proceedings in one of a number of corruption and abuse of power cases against them for alleged wrongdoing during Mr Thaksin’s nearly six-year tenure as premier.

In a handwritten and signed statement faxed to Thai television stations – and confirmed as authentic by a close political ally of Mr Thaksin – the former premier claimed that his life was in danger in Thailand and that the courts had been rigged against him.

“I’d like to apologise . . . that my wife and I have travelled to and now live in England, a country that values democratic principles above all,” the statement said. “If I still have luck, I would like to come back and die on Thai soil like every other Thai person.”

The Shinawatras’ flight to Britain comes less than two weeks after Ms Pojamarn was sentenced to three years in jail for tax evasion. His wife’s conviction visibly stunned Mr Thaksin, who was a billionaire telecommunications mogul before entering politics. He has always denied using his political power to benefit his family’s business interests.

Ms Pojamarn was free on bail, pending appeal, and the couple had court permission to fly to Beijing for the Olympics opening ceremony. Instead of returning to Bangkok on Sunday night, the couple boarded a flight to the UK, where Mr Thaksin may seek political asylum.

“He has defamed the courts and his chance of coming back is about zero,” said Chris Baker, author of a political biography of Mr Thaksin. “But he will never fade completely. His role in the imagination of people will continue.”

Mr Thaksin leaves behind about $2bn (€1.3bn, £1bn) from his family’s January 2006 sale of their share of Shin Corp, the telecommunications company he founded before entering politics, to Singapore’s Temasek Holdings. The money was seized after the September 2006 military coup that forced him from power.

“Thaksin is politically finished,” said Thit­inan Pongsudhirak, a Chulalongkorn University political scientist. “He is not going to get his hands on the $2bn.”

Mr Thaksin already spent 18 months in a UK-based exile after the coup, during which time he bought control of Manchester City football club, but returned to Thailand in February after national elections brought his political loyalists back to power. Upon his return, Mr Thaksin said he would defend himself in court against all charges.

But in his statement, Mr Thaksin claimed the forces that supported the coup against him were interfering with the courts. “These people marked me as their political enemy. They don’t care about legal due process and internationally accepted investigation procedures.”

Thailand’s stock market closed up 1.8 per cent on hopes that his departure would bring an end to protests accusing the People’s Power party-led coalition government of being a proxy for Mr Thaksin. But analysts warned of instability ahead as the coalition could fracture without the charismatic former premier.

Amy Kazmin

A military jury rebuffed prosecutors' calls for 30 years or more. With time served, he could be released in January.

In a stunning rebuke, a six-member U.S. military jury yesterday ignored a Pentagon prosecutor's plea for a 30-year-plus sentence and ordered Osama bin Laden's driver to 66 months in prison.

With credit for 61 months already served, that means Salim Hamdan, a Yemeni father of two with a fourth-grade education, will be sent back to the general detainee population of Camp Delta by January, and be eligible to return home.

Choked with emotion on hearing the sentence, Hamdan stood and addressed the jury, unscripted, and twice more apologized for any pain his work as a $200-a-month driver had caused.

"And I would like to thank you for what you have done for me," he said.

Earlier in the day, at his sentencing hearing, he expressed regret over the "innocent people" who died in the terror attacks in the United States, according to a Pentagon transcript.

The jury's decision, after 70 minutes of deliberation, was a huge rebuke to the U.S. government, which had insisted that no less than 30 years' confinement - and even a life term - would suffice on Hamdan's conviction for material support for terror.

His sentence now goes for mandatory review to a Pentagon official, who can shorten it but not extend it.

In response to a question sent to the judge, Navy Capt. Keith Allred, the jury knew before handing down the sentence that Hamdan - convicted in the first contested U.S. war-crimes tribunal since World War II - had already been given credit toward his conviction for 61 months and eight days served.

On Wednesday, the panel of senior U.S. military officers convicted Hamdan of providing material support for terror as bin Laden's driver and bodyguard from 1996 until Hamdan's capture in Afghanistan in 2001.

The jury, led by a Navy captain, acquitted Hamdan of conspiracy charges that had alleged he was responsible for al-Qaeda violence from the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Africa to the Sept. 11 attacks.

Prosecutor John Murphy had urged the jury to make an example of Hamdan. "You have found him guilty of offenses that have made our world extremely unsafe and dangerous," Murphy said during the sentencing hearing. "The government asks you to deliver a sentence that will absolutely keep our society safe from him."

The defense had urged leniency, reminding jurors that Hamdan was not convicted of any role in al-Qaeda's attacks. "It is important the world recognize that this is justice and not revenge," said Charles Swift, one of Hamdan's civilian attorneys.

Later yesterday, Murphy, despite disappointment over the sentence, described the jury's rejection of the prosecution's recommendation as "a vindication for the system."

Judge Allred had been inquiring for months into the circumstances of Hamdan's confinement at Guantanamo. Ever since Hamdan was designated in July 2003 to face one of the first trials, defense lawyers said, he had been separated from other detainees, in virtual solitary confinement with long periods of no sunshine.

Prosecutors and prison-camp officials say there is no such thing as solitary confinement at Guantanamo.

After the jury's sentence, the judge turned to the Yemeni and said: "I wish you godspeed, Mr. Hamdan. I hope the day comes when you return to your wife and your daughters and your country."

"God willing," Hamdan, in traditional Yemeni robe and head scarf, replied in Arabic, interrupting.

The judge continued: "And I hope that you are able to be a father, and a provider, and a husband in the best sense of the word."

Then Hamdan said it again: "Inshallah."

Allred replied in Arabic: "Inshallah."

It remains unclear what will happen to Hamdan once his sentence is served, since the military has said it would not release anyone who still represented a threat. A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon, said, "I know staff in Washington are working very hard on this issue."

Defense lawyers said they expected that Hamdan would be let go in five months. "It was all for show if Mr. Hamdan does not go home in December," Swift said.

As of yesterday, the Defense Department reported it held about 265 detainees at the Navy base in Cuba - including 16 "high-value" detainees, who were once held by the CIA and are in segregation at Camp 7, and one convict.

As the lone convict, his defense attorney told the judge, Hamdan was put in his own separate wing of Camp 5 on Wednesday night.

Moments later, as he was led out of court by military guards, Hamdan turned to the spectators' gallery, waved both hands in the air, and called out, "Bye-bye, everyone."

Carol Rosenberg

The war crimes trial of a driver for Osama bin Laden could bring the United States closer to its goal of closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay.

The 10-day trial of Salim Hamdan, in a makeshift courtroom behind coils of razor wire, offers a road map for clarifying the legal status of nearly a third of the more than 250 men still held here.

The military jury considering the case, the first U.S. war crimes trial since World War II, adjourned Tuesday without reaching a verdict and was set to return Wednesday for a third day of deliberations.

Hamdan could face life in prison if convicted of any of the charges against him — two counts of conspiracy and eight counts of aiding terrorism.

About 80 of the roughly 265 men held at Guantanamo are slated to be prosecuted by military tribunals. Hamdan's case, stalled by years of legal challenges that reached the Supreme Court, signals those cases can move forward now.

The U.S. government has long said it wants to close Guantanamo but has struggled get other countries to take the remaining prisoners — those not slated for prosecution — off its hands.

For those who are prosecuted, convictions could make it easier to send detainees to mainland prisons to do their time. The chief prosecutor for the Guantanamo tribunals, Army Col. Lawrence Morris, has even predicted the trials would be like Space Shuttle launches — so routine the public mostly ignores them.

"We are confident that we can try cases to the highest standards of justice," Morris said while waiting for the jury, six U.S. military officers selected by the Pentagon, to reach a verdict.

The military has not said where Hamdan, a Yemeni in his late 30s with a fourth-grade education, would serve his sentence, and has suggested he could even be held at Guantanamo indefinitely.

Hamdan was never alleged to be more than a minor figure in al-Qaida, a chauffeur to bin Laden. He was captured at a roadblock in Afghanistan with two surface-to-air missiles in the car.

He is accused of conspiring with al-Qaida in its plots against the United States, but his lawyers say he was a low-level bin Laden employee who stayed with him for the $200-a-month salary.

A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon, said the completion of the 10-day trial marks "a substantial sign of progress" in one aspect of the Bush administration's effort to eventually close Guantanamo.

The military has already released more than 500 Guantanamo detainees to their home countries, where most were eventually set free.

Some analysts, noting Hamdan's relatively minor status in al-Qaida, believe his trial is mostly an opening act, a demonstration of the U.S. legal system for prosecuting suspected terrorists.

The main event will be the prosecution, perhaps beginning by year's end, of five alleged plotters in the Sept. 11 attacks, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh.

"I assume the notion was, 'Let's see if we can get this engine to turn over,'" said Eugene Fidell, who teachers military law at Yale Law School. "I find it difficult to consider this as much of a landmark."

As a test run, the trial has drawn mixed reviews. Critics say it revealed the system's shortcomings by accepting secret testimony in a closed session, with journalists and other observers removed from the courtroom, and by using evidence from interrogations that defense lawyers say involved coercion.

The Hamdan trial also established some of the rights that Guantanamo prisoners will have before the tribunals. For example, the judge, Navy Capt. Keith Allred, rejected Hamdan's claims of certain consitutional rights, including the right to a speedy trial and to be advised of a right to remain silent — rulings that will be the subject of later appeals.

Even after jurors began deliberating, the prosecutors and defense were sparring Tuesday over the legal definition of a war crime.

The dispute centered on the charge Hamdan conspired with al-Qaida by transporting shoulder-launched missiles to kill U.S. service members. In his instructions, the judge said it was a war crime for "unlawful combatants" to kill civilians but did not mention soldiers — an instruction the prosecution said was incorrect. Prosecutors eventually dropped their complaint, avoiding a mistrial.

Jennifer Daskal, senior counterterrorism counsel for Human Rights Watch, said there was no excuse for failing "to close Guantanamo, try those accused of terrorist acts in a fair process, release or resettle the others, and finally put an end to this black spot on America's reputation.

Scott Silliman, executive director of Duke's Center on Law, Ethics and National Security, said he hopes Congress eventually moves detainees' cases to the U.S. federal court system or traditional military court-martials.

But he said the military commissions do serve a purpose by allowing for the prosecution of senior terror suspects against whom some evidence was obtained through harsh interrogations.

"I don't think you want to bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh into the federal court system right now," Silliman said of the two al-Qaida figures, who were transferred to Guantanamo from secret CIA custody in 2006.

MIKE MELIA

Eleven people, including a U.S. Secret Service informant, have been charged in connection with the hacking of nine major retailers and the theft and sale of more than 41 million credit and debit card numbers, the Justice Department announced Tuesday.

The data breach is believed to be the largest hacking and identity theft case ever prosecuted by the Department of Justice, which said the suspects were charged with conspiracy, computer intrusion, fraud and identity theft.

Three of those charged are U.S. citizens while the others are from places such as Estonia, Ukraine, Belarus and China.

The indictment returned Tuesday by a federal grand jury in Boston alleges that the suspects hacked into the wireless computer networks of retailers including TJX Cos., BJ's Wholesale Club, OfficeMax, Boston Market, Barnes & Noble, Sports Authority, Forever 21 and DSW and set up programs that captured card numbers, passwords and account information.

"They used sophisticated computer hacking techniques that would allow them to breach security systems and install programs that gathered enormous quantities of personal financial data, which they then allegedly either sold to others or used themselves," Attorney General Michael Mukasey said at a news conference. "And in total, they caused widespread losses by banks, retailers, and consumers."

Mukasey called the total dollar amount of the alleged theft "impossible to quantify at this point." U.S. Attorney Michael J. Sullivan said that while most of the victims were in the United States, officials still haven't identified all the people who had a card number stolen.

"I suspect that a lot of people are unaware that their identifying information has been compromised," he said.

Sullivan said the alleged thieves weren't computer geniuses, just opportunists who used a technique called "wardriving," which involved cruising through different areas with a laptop and looking for accessible wireless Internet signals. Once they located a vulnerable network, they installed so-called "sniffer programs" that captured credit and debit card numbers as they moved through a retailer's processing networks.

The information was stored on two servers in Ukraine and Latvia — one with more than 25 million credit and debit card numbers and another with more than 16 million numbers, Sullivan said.

The heist was a black eye for retailers like TJX. The company initially disclosed the data breach in January 2007 but said a few months later that at least 45.7 million cards were exposed to possible fraud in a breach of its computer systems that began in July 2005. Court filings by some banks that sued TJX put the number of cards affected at more than 100 million, based on estimates by officials with Visa and MasterCard, who were deposed in the suit.

In May, TJX said it won support from MasterCard-issuing banks for a settlement that will pay them as much as $24 million to cover costs from the breach. A similar agreement reached last November with Visa-card issuing banks set aside as much as $40.9 million to help banks cover costs including replacing customers' payment cards and covering fraudulent charges.

According to the indictments unsealed Tuesday, three of the defendants are U.S. citizens, one is from Estonia, three are from Ukraine, two are from China and one is from Belarus. One individual is known only by an alias online, and his place of origin is unknown.

In the Boston indictment, the alleged ringleader Albert "Segvec" Gonzalez of Miami was charged with computer fraud, wire fraud, access device fraud, aggravated identity theft and conspiracy. Gonzalez, who is in custody in New York, faces a maximum penalty of life in prison if he is convicted of all the charges.

Gonzalez was a U.S. Secret Service informant who helped the agency take over a Web site being used to transmit stolen identifiers and stolen credit card numbers, U.S. Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan said at the news conference.

"That was the first time ever that a computer system was wiretapped," he said.

But he said the Secret Service later found out that Gonzalez had also been feeding criminals information about ongoing investigations — even warning off at least one person.

"Obviously, we weren't happy that a person working for us as an informant was double-dealing," Mark Sullivan said.

Indictments were also unsealed Tuesday in San Diego against Maksym "Maksik" Yastremskiy of Kharkov, Ukraine, and Aleksandr "Jonny Hell" Suvorov of Sillamae, Estonia. They are charged with crimes related to the sale of the stolen credit card data.

Yastremskiy was arrested when he traveled to Turkey on vacation in July 2007. He is facing related Turkish charges, and U.S. officials said they have requested his extradition.

Justice Department officials said Suvorov was arrested on the San Diego charges by German officials in March when he traveled there on vacation. He is in custody awaiting the resolution of extradition proceedings.

Indictments against Hung-Ming Chiu and Zhi Zhi Wang, both of China, and a person known only by the online nickname "Delpiero" were also unsealed in San Diego.

A Justice Department spokeswoman said those three suspects, together with five others, are still at large. Officials did not give an arraignment date for Gonzalez.

In May, federal prosecutors in New York indicted Yastremskiy, Suvorov and Gonzalez on 27 counts of fraud and identity theft. The charges stemmed from allegations that they hacked into a national restaurant chain's computerized cash registers and stole credit card information from customers. Eleven Dave & Buster's restaurants around the United States suffered at least $600,000 in losses, prosecutors said.

It was not immediately possible to reach Yastremskiy, Suvorov and Gonzalez for comment and it was not clear if they have legal representation.

RODRIQUE NGOWI and ANNE D'INNOCENZIO

In one of the most significant legal rulings in the tech industry this year, a Superior Court judge in California has ruled that the practice of charging consumers a fee for ending their cell phone contract early is illegal and violates state law.

The preliminary, tentative judgment orders Sprint Nextel to pay customers $18.2 million in reimbursements and, more importantly, orders Sprint to stop trying to collect another $54.7 million from California customers (some 2 million customers total) who have canceled their contracts but refused or failed to pay the termination fee.

While an appeal is inevitable, the ruling could have massive fallout throughout the industry. Without the threat of levying early termination fees, the cellular carriers lose the power that's enabled them to lock customers into contracts for multiple years at a time. And while those contracts can be heinously long, they also let the carriers offer cell phone hardware at reduced (subsidized) prices. AT&T's two-year contract is the only reason the iPhone 3G costs $199. If subsidies vanish, what happens to hardware lock-in? Could an era of expensive, but unlocked, hardware be just around the corner? It's highly probable.

Of course, the carriers aren't going to take this lying down. Early termination fees are seen as critical to business, so carriers are expected to look for ways to reclassify the fees (such as by calling them "rates," part of the arcane set of laws that covers the telecommunications industry). The industry is also pushing for the federal government to step in and claim oversight over the early termination fee issue, which would invalidate any state ruling. The FCC is generally more tolerant of such fees, though Chairman Kevin Martin has proposed a plan whereby the fees are decreased the closer you are to the end of your contract.

The FCC may also buy the argument that, since carriers are nationally based (and consumers can use their phones anywhere in the country), that a single policy should apply across the nation, rather than creating a patchwork of legislation that could lead to confusion and chaos caused by having 50 different policies.

Is the early termination fee dead? Not yet, but it's looking a little haggard. >>>>

Wednesday's demise of the Scrabulous application on Facebook led some of our readers to question the legal claim Hasbro has on Scrabble, the official game. The toy company last week filed a copyright and trademark infringement lawsuit against the developers of Scrabulous, an online word game that played very much like Scrabble.

Invented in 1938 by a New York architect named Alfred Mosher Butts, Scrabble counts millions of players worldwide. Hasbro estimates that more than 100 million copies of the board game have been sold in 29 languages and 100 countries. Hasbro, through its subsidiary Milton Bradley, bought the North American rights to the game in 1987.

To answer our readers' questions on Hasbro's copyright and trademark case, we turned to Ian Ballon, an intellectual property and Internet attorney with Greenberg Traurig. What follows is an abridged interview with Ballon, who also wrote the four-volume treatise, "E-Commerce & Internet Law."

----

Q: Many people think that because Scrabble is 70 years old, it should be in the public domain. Why isn't it?
A: A copyright claim lasts for the life of the author, plus 70 years.

Q: Butts passed away in 1993, which would extend the copyright in this case to the year 2063.

A: Yes, but it’s really important to remember that the plaintiff is also asserting a trademark claim, and that lasts as long as you exploit it. Marks like Coca-Cola, Mercedes -- those can continue indefinitely as long as it remains in use. The law prevents third parties from making both literal use of a trademark as well as uses that are confusingly similar. The term “Scrabulous” is obviously intended to evoke the name Scrabble. Plainly, the people who created the game were trying to evoke the Scrabble mark.

Q: What’s the policy argument for having copyrights in the first place?
A: Th term of protection is what allows authors, composers and other creators to successfully exploit their works. If material immediately came into the public domain, then there would be no financial incentive to write a song, film a movie or undertake similar creative ventures. The reality is that all of the great authors, composers and artists wouldn’t be able to make a living. The public benefits by encouraging the arts. In return, artists and creators are compensated. If you took that away, you would have a much smaller body of creative works.

Q: So why create an expiration date?
A: It’s a balance that the framers of the Constitution had to make. They wanted to create financial incentives for artists and creators. But they also wanted to foster free speech. The quid pro quo is that after the period expires, a work comes into the public domain.

Q: Why 70 years?
A: That was fixed by an international treaty so that U.S. authors, performers and creators have the same right as people in other countries. The term of protection used to be shorter.

Q: What if the creators of Scrabulous were to change the name to “XYZ Game” and tweak the board and point system for their application. Would that make it legally permissible?
A: People are always free to create their own original games. But if they copy the creative expression of a third party, or they try to mimic the logos or trademarks for a famous brand, they will typically be enjoined. Intellectual property law protects against copying and unfair competition. But people are always allowed to engage in fair competition which would require them to create their own original game. The law requires a minimal level of “original and creative expression” to be entitled to copyright protection.

Alex Pham

A Texas grand jury on Tuesday charged the jailed polygamist leader of a breakaway Mormon sect with sexually assaulting a child and indicted five followers after state officials raided a polygamist ranch near Eldorado in April.

Included in the indictments issued by a grand jury in Schleicher County, Texas, was Warren Jeffs, the controversial spiritual leader and self-proclaimed prophet of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Jeffs has already been sentenced in a Utah court to 10 years to life in prison as an accomplice to rape for forcing a 14-year-old girl to marry her 19-year-old first cousin. He is in jail in Arizona awaiting trial on similar charges for arranged marriages there.

Texas authorities descended on the sect's Yearning for Zion ranch in West Texas in April in response to allegations that a middle-aged man there had married and fathered a child with an underage girl.

More than 400 child members of the polygamist sect were taken into custody by state officials in April, but were later returned to their families after a Texas judge in June lifted the custody order.

The indictments, announced by the office of Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott against Jeffs and five others, totaled nine counts of sexual assault, bigamy and related charges.

Jeffs was charged with sexually assaulting a child - a first-degree felony that could carry a life prison sentence - and four other unnamed defendants were indicted for allegedly sexually assaulting young girls under the age of 17.

The last unnamed defendant was charged with three counts of failure to report child abuse.

Abbott's office did not release any more information on the case and said the indictments were part of an ongoing criminal investigation. 

The case has gripped Americans with lurid allegations of adolescent brides, teenage pregnancies and a secretive sect on a remote ranch.

Plural marriage is illegal in the United States but FLDS men typically marry one legal wife while the others become their "spiritual wives."

That may be a way around the law but the sect stands accused of marrying underage brides, which is not legal.

The mainstream Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as the Mormon faith is officially known, renounced polygamy more than a century ago and tries to distance itself from breakaway factions that still practice it.

Chris Baltimore, Jackie Frank

Fadila Efendik had little time to rejoice this week over the capture of Radovan Karadzic, the man she blames for the death of her only son: she was too busy looking for his missing and scattered body parts.

The arrest on Monday of Mr. Karadzic, the wartime leader of the Bosnian Serbs accused of masterminding the worst massacre since World War II, brought her cold comfort, Mrs. Efendik said.

She nervously played with her head scarf and sobbed as she scanned the endless rows of white gravestones here on Wednesday in the area where Serbian paramilitary forces under the command of Mr. Karadzic separated the men and boys who would later be killed in a frenzy that claimed 8,000 lives.

“I am bitter because it took so long to find Karadzic,” she said. “My son was two weeks shy of his 20th birthday. I still can’t find his body. I found some of my husband’s bones but not enough to bury him whole. Karadzic may have been found, but now I am alone in the world.”

When news of Mr. Karadzic’s arrest on war crimes charges broke on Monday, hundreds of Muslims poured onto the rainy streets of Sarajevo, the Bosnian capital. The city still bears the scars of a brutal three-and-a-half-year siege during which Mr. Karadzic is accused of authorizing the shooting of civilians.

Some danced and chanted, “This is Bosnia!” — a defiant answer to Mr. Karadzic’s wartime aim of the “ethnic cleansing” of Bosnian Muslims from the country and making it part of a greater Serbia. More than 10,000 Bosnians died in Sarajevo during the war.

But here in Srebrenica, where the massacre took place in 1995, locals said they had little faith in a legal process undertaken by the United Nations tribunal in The Hague 13 years after the hunt for Mr. Karadzic began. Some feared the tragedy he is accused of helping to orchestrate was being overshadowed by the lurid soap opera, played out on front pages across the world, detailing his evasion as an alternative medicine specialist, with a mistress, a fake American family and an elaborate disguise.

Mr. Karadzic has been indicted, along with the Bosnian Serb military commander, Gen. Ratko Mladic, on charges of genocide in connection with the killings during the siege at Sarajevo and the massacre at Srebrenica, where unarmed Bosnian Muslim men and boys were lined up, killed and buried in mass graves.

Mrs. Efendik said residual anger for the West’s inaction remained. In particular, she pointed to the 300 Dutch peacekeepers at the United Nations-protected enclave where 40,000 people had sought refuge before the killings. She said the peacekeepers should have done more to protect Bosnian Muslims from the raiding Serbian forces, some of whom stole the helmets and vehicles of peacekeepers to trick and capture victims trying to flee. Past Dutch governments have said responsibility for the massacre lay with the killers, not with the United Nations troops.

“The U.N. couldn’t save us then. What is it going to do now?” Mrs. Efendik said.

She recalled the day the killings began, when Serbian paramilitary forces separated the men from the women, putting the women on open trucks that would carry them to Muslim-controlled territory. She said the truck she was traveling on was stopped along the route, where the women were forced to watch and give the three-finger Serbian nationalist salute as Serbian forces mowed down their fathers, brothers and sons before their eyes.

Only a handful of the 8,000 men and boys survived, some by pretending to be dead and hiding under corpses. Witnesses said those who remained were herded to nearby wooded areas, soccer grounds, warehouses or barren meadows, where they were killed. Many bodies were later found in mass graves with their hands tied behind their backs.

Hatidza Mehmedovic, president of Srebrenica Mothers, a victims support group, who lost two young sons, her husband, her father and two brothers during the massacre, said she would be able to rest only when the West had brought Mr. Mladic to justice. For now, he remains at large.

“Karadzic gave the orders for Srebrenica, but it was Mladic who executed it,” she said. “I have some satisfaction from Karadzic’s arrest, but it doesn’t change the fact that Srebrenica remains a mirror to the shame of the world and its inaction. All those who could have prevented this should see the graves so that this will never happen again.”

Ms. Mehmedovic said all that she had left of her two sons, Almir and Azmir, 19 and 21 when they were killed, was a tree Almir had planted in her front yard and a school notebook Azmir had left on his desk. “We were awaiting the wedding of our children, the birth of our grandchildren,” she said. “Now all we have are empty graves.”

She said Mr. Karadzic’s arrest was little solace for thousands of families like hers that had not been able to bury their loved ones because forensic experts had recovered only part of their remains. Last year, she said, she found the mangled body of one of her sons, but was unable to identify which one. She also found the bones of her husband, but not enough to give him a proper burial.

Avdo Suljic, 35, an unemployed Bosnian Muslim who lost 200 relatives at Srebrenica, ranging in age from 16 to 85, said he had only recently returned, for fear of confronting too many ghosts. He recalled he had escaped being killed by trekking seven days in the mountains, drinking rainwater and hiding. “Karadzic is an old man. Nothing with his arrest has changed for me. I have no job and little future.”

Mr. Suljic, who fought with Bosnian forces during the war, said the war had devastated the town economically. He said he spent his days gambling and drinking. He noted two events that eased his pain since he returned to Srebrenica two years ago. “I found my father’s legs two years ago, and two weeks ago I found his head,” he said.

DAN BILEFSKY

And then there was one.

The surprise capture of former Bosnian leader Radovan Karadzic on U.N. genocide charges has raised expectations that fellow fugitive Gen. Ratko Mladic — Karadzic's wartime military commander — could soon join him behind bars.

Serbian authorities made a startling disclosure Tuesday in describing the arrest of Karadzic: They basically stumbled across him while searching for Mladic, a far more brazen figure who — up until a few years ago — reportedly made daring forays into downtown Belgrade.

Since 1995, both men have topped the U.N. war crimes tribunal's most-wanted list, and both had a $5 million State Department bounty on their heads.

They were indicted together for genocide and crimes against humanity for allegedly orchestrating the bloody siege of Sarajevo during Bosnia's 1992-95 war and the wanton slaughter of up to 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica.

Although Karadzic's arrest by Serbian security forces and his imminent handover to the tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, represents a huge step for the Balkan country, the international community wasted no time in clamoring anew for Mladic to be brought to justice.

NATO, the European Union and New York-based Human Rights Watch all pressed Serbia to track down the elusive Mladic, who is believed to be hiding somewhere in Serbia.

"That Ratko Mladic is still at liberty is a major obstacle to full accountability for the genocide at Srebrenica," said Richard Dicker, who heads Human Rights Watch's International Justice Program.

A U.N. "safe haven" for Muslim refugees during Bosnia's war, Srebrenica wound up overrun by Serbian forces loyal to the late strongman Slobodan Milosevic.

In a rampage that lasted a week, and led to the worst civilian carnage since World War II, the Serbs separated the men and boys, forced them to strip, killed them and bulldozed their bodies into mass graves, U.N. prosecutors allege.

"Children had their throats slit before their mothers' eyes," said Fouad Riad, an Egyptian judge who prepared the indictment against Mladic and Karadzic. The scene, he said, was marked by "a frenzy of terror that led many to take their own lives."

Just hours before the massacre, Mladic handed out candy to Muslim children rounded up at the town's square and consoled them that all would be fine — even patting one child on the head. That sinister image is forever imprinted in the minds of Srebrenica survivors.

Mladic's ruthlessness is legendary. Once, demanding that air traffic controllers clear his helicopter to land, the general famously uttered: "Here speaks Ratko Mladic — the Serbian god."

Now, many hope the influence of Serbia's pro-Western president, Boris Tadic, will overcome the entrenched nationalism that long protected Karadzic and finally lead to Mladic's capture.

Tadic recently replaced the head of Serbia's secret police, a man loyal to former nationalist Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica — a significant change that officials here say led to Karadzic's capture Monday evening.

Until about five years ago, Mladic — who once kept a goat he named Madeleine Albright after the former U.S. secretary of state — regularly ventured into downtown Belgrade, dining at gourmet restaurants and attending soccer matches.

After a few halfhearted attempts by Serbian authorities to close in on him, he moved underground.

The problem has always been the same: Mladic is still widely hailed at home as a patriot.

Tough young men stand on street corners across Serbia, selling black T-shirts that bear Mladic's image and the words: "Serbian Hero!"

In October, Serbia's leading human rights activist said the nation's intelligence agencies had "absolutely precise information" on Mladic's whereabouts and was tracking his movements.

That caused a stir and raised expectations that an arrest was imminent, but nine months later, he remains at large.

On several occasions, NATO-led peacekeepers were said to have come very close to his hideouts. But Mladic's entourage reportedly tipped him to the troops' presence — and he always managed to slip away.

WILLIAM J. KOLE

For more than a decade, the world's most-wanted war crimes fugitive displayed a talent for eluding international justice. His secret? Hide in plain sight.

In a ruse worthy of any thriller, Radovan Karadzic transformed himself from a leader instantly recognizable by his famous shock of salt-and-pepper hair into a man resembling a New Age mystic, with a flowing white beard and black robe.

Believed to be protected by a coterie of ultra-nationalists, the former Bosnian Serb strongman — a doctor and psychiatrist who received training in the U.S. — worked at an alternative medicine clinic in Belgrade.

Karadzic's disguise was so effective that prosecutors say he walked freely around town without being noticed and even his landlords didn't know his true identity.

A photograph displayed by prosecutors at a news conference Tuesday showed a gaunt elderly man unrecognizable from the robust warlord who strutted brashly before his troops during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war.

That life on the run ended abruptly with Karadzic's capture Monday — an arrest made possible by the election of a new pro-Western government that tightened the dragnet around the war crimes suspect.

Many observers have long suspected that recently fallen prime minister Vojislav Kostunica, a nationalist with close ties to Karadzic during the Bosnian war, had shielded him from arrest.

Karadzic's capture has broad political implications — for the future of the U.N. war crimes tribunal, eventual closure of the cycle of Balkan blood feuds and for Serbia's fitful journey out of international isolation.

The wartime Bosnian Serb leader stands accused of genocide for masterminding the deadly siege of Sarajevo and the massacre of 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica, Europe's worst carnage since the end of World War II.

The fugitive had been masquerading as an expert in "human quantum energy" using the fake name "D.D. David" printed on his business card. The initials apparently stood for Dragan Dabic, an alias authorities said he used.

He even had his own Web site — http://www.psy-help-energy.com — and gave lectures before hundreds of people on alternative medicine. The site displays pictures of metallic bullet-shaped amulets and Orthodox crosses with wires running out of them.

TV footage provided by a local station to Associated Press Television News shows Karadzic sitting on a panel at a medical conference, glancing nervously at the cameraman next to him — another glimpse into his knife's-edge life of hiding in plain view.

Using his alias, Karadzic was a regular contributor to the Serbian alternative medicine magazine "Healthy Life;" its editor Goran Kojic said he was stunned when he saw the photo of Karadzic on TV and realized the bizarre truth.

"It never even occurred to me that this man with a long white beard and hair was Karadzic," said Kojic. "He was eloquent and a bit strange, like a true bohemian."

Karadzic's whereabouts had been a mystery since he went on the run in 1998, with his hideouts reportedly including monasteries and mountain caves in remote eastern Bosnia. The U.S. set a $5 million bounty for his arrest.

For years it has been widely assumed that Karadzic's whereabouts were known to nationalist supporters and even to high-ranking Serbian officials. One cartoon depicted Karadzic clandestinely enjoying the company of Kostunica himself. But in the murky labyrinth of postwar Serbia, such accusations could never quite be proven.

The picture painted by officials suggested a successful search — as opposed to the end of protection.

But few in Serbia failed to link the capture to the recent establishment of a largely pro-Western government committed to bringing Serbia into the European Union, which has been demanding the handover of war criminals.

EU officials said Tuesday the arrest would boost Serbia's EU prospects.

"After Karadzic's arrest, Serbia is on a good road to the European Union and the arrest of the remaining war crimes fugitives," said former Serbian Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic.

Serbian security services said they found Karadzic Monday while looking for another top war crimes suspect facing genocide charges, Bosnian Serb wartime commander Gen. Ratko Mladic. The connection — why the search for one led to the other — was not explained.

Prosecutors said Karadzic was arrested while waiting for a bus in a grim part of Belgrade known as a nationalist stronghold. Authorities refused to reveal more details, saying Karadzic's movements were being analyzed and would be kept secret until Mladic's capture.

"We are absolutely determined to finish this job," said Rasim Ljajic, a Serbian government official in charge of war crimes.

Karadzic's lawyer Sveta Vujcic claimed his client was arrested Friday, not on Monday as authorities say. He said Karadzic was hooded during the capture and kept for three days in solitary confinement.

A judge ordered Karadzic's transfer to the U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, to face genocide charges, war crimes prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic said. Karadzic has three days to appeal the ruling.

Karadzic's family in Bosnia, banned from leaving the country over suspicions they helped him elude capture, asked Tuesday to have the restrictions lifted, his daughter told The Associated Press.

Sonja Karadzic said family members want to spend at least a few hours with Karadzic before his transfer to U.N. custody.

"We even suggested traveling under police escort to see him for at least for a few hours," she said. "For years we have not seen our father, husband and grandfather. My mother's health is not very good, and we do not have the financial means necessary to travel to the Netherlands."

During the siege of Sarajevo that began in 1992, Bosnian Serb troops starved, sniped at and bombarded the population, operating from strongholds in Pale and Vraca high above the city, and controlling nearly all roads in and out.

Inhabitants were kept alive by a fragile lifeline of food aid and supplies provided by U.N. donors and peacekeepers. Walking down the street to shop for groceries or driving down a main road that became known as "Sniper Alley" was a risk to their lives.

The siege was not officially over until February 1996. An estimated 10,000 people died in Sarajevo.

The worst massacre of the war was in Srebrenica in 1995, when Serb troops led by Mladic overran the U.N.-protected enclave sheltering Bosnian Muslims. Mladic's troops rounded up the entire population and took the men and boys away for execution.

By war's end in late 1995, an estimated 250,000 people were dead and another 1.8 million driven from their homes.

Under the U.N. indictment, Karadzic faces 11 counts of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and other atrocities committed between 1992 to 1996.

In Sarajevo, Bosnian Muslims rushed into the streets Monday night to celebrate the news of Karadzic's arrest.

"We have been waiting for 13 years and we lost hope. Now we know — there is justice," said Kada Hotic, a survivor of Srebrenica massacre.

DUSAN STOJANOVIC

The "spam king" was sentenced on Tuesday to 47 months in prison, with a ruling that the court hopes sends a message to other online criminals.

Robert Soloway, the man known as the spam king for the massive volume of spam he sent out, pleaded guilty to fraud, spamming and tax evasion after being indicted in May 2007. After an unusually long sentencing hearing lasting two-and-a-half days, Judge Marsha Pechman handed down her sentence in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington in Seattle.

The case has been closely watched because only a few such spam cases have ever been tried. A man named Jeremy Jaynes was sentenced in Virginia earlier this year to nine years in prison for his spam crimes, and Adam Vitale got slightly more than two years for a recent conviction in New York.

The prosecution argued that Soloway should get more prison time than any of the previous spammers, asking for a sentence of seven to nine years. "None of those cases, not one, comes close to this case in terms of the duration of the maliciousness, the harassment techniques, the high level of spamming activity that we have in this case," said assistant U.S. attorney Kathryn Warma.

However, compared with some other notorious spammers, Soloway deserved some leniency, his attorneys said. Soloway didn't damage anyone's computer, he didn't send out malicious code, and he never directed people to pornography, as some spammers have done, his lawyer Richard Troberman said. Jaynes, for example, had millions of AOL e-mail addresses that were stolen from the ISP (Internet service provider), and he was earning as much as US$700,000 a month from his activities, Troberman said. By comparison, the government figured conservatively that Soloway earned more than $700,000 in three years.

But the Soloway case was an opportunity for the courts to dissuade online criminals from continuing their work, Warma said. "A disturbing theme we repeatedly saw from the complainant is, why isn't the law being enforced on the Net? Why isn't CAN-SPAM being enforced?" she said. "This individual has refused to stop his criminal conduct, notwithstanding two separate civil judgments and an injunction by a U.S. federal court judge. I suggest to you the only effective way to stop Soloway is a long prison sentence during which he'll be incapable of continuing this criminal activity." Soloway has previously lost cases brought against him by Microsoft and by an ISP in Oklahoma, yet continued to spam.

Pechman said it was difficult to come up with a sentence for Soloway because there have been so few other spam cases in the courts and because the legal system doesn't yet have appropriate sentencing guidelines. "This statute really needs a set of guidelines written and tailored to the CAN-SPAM act, tailored to the evolving computer science that allows people to engage in this activity," she said. "The current guidelines are not really very helpful," especially when CAN-SPAM violations are combined with other crimes, she said.

Soloway apologized to the judge and to his family, admitting that his actions were wrong. "There is no one else to blame but myself," he said, before the judge handed down her sentence.

Soloway has apologized for his activities before. After he was investigated in 1999 in California for spamming activities, he told detectives that he was sorry and learned a lot, Warma said. "He then moved on to another state and immediately engaged in the same behavior," she said.

It has been more typical for Soloway to boast about his techniques than to apologize for them. In online forums he would brag that he would never have to pay the millions of dollars the civil courts ordered him to pay.

He claims he lived in a modest household growing up but went to school with kids who were wealthier. He didn't have friends and always figured that if he earned a lot of money, people would like him, he said. "The only time people ever talked to me was when I made money or spent it," he said. "It was completely wrong. I'm very embarrassed and ashamed."

Microsoft attorney Aaron Kornblum attended the hearing and said he was pleased with the results. "Soloway repeatedly broke the law. He defied a federal judge and he made a lot of money. This sends a strong message."

Soloway was one of the first spammers Microsoft sued when, in 2003, the company decided it was time to try to put a stop to spam using legal means. At the time, Soloway was known as the third-most-prolific spammer in the world, Kornblum said.

In addition to the prison term, Soloway will serve three years of probation and must do 200 hours of community service.

The government has also asked for a separate restitution hearing.

Another notorious spammer, Eddie Davidson, escaped from his prison camp in Colorado on Sunday, authorities said Tuesday. He had been serving a 21-month sentence after pleading guilty to spam charges in December.

Nancy Gohring

A Fort Bliss soldier's husband kicked her in the face, stabbed her and raped her before abducting her from her off-post apartment last week and taking her to Las Vegas, police said Monday.

The soldier, who turned up wounded but alive in El Paso on Sunday night, was attacked as she entered her apartment about 5:15 p.m. Thursday, police said in an affidavit charging Clinton W. Lewis, 34, with aggravated kidnapping.

The soldier, a mother of three, was reported missing Friday after failing to show up for work at Fort Bliss. When soldiers from her unit found her apartment locked and no one apparently inside, they called police.

Officers found evidence of a struggle, including bloody clothes and washcloths. They also found an empty roll of duct tape, said El Paso police Officer Chris Mears.

The Associated Press has previously identified the 29-year-old soldier but is no longer naming her because of the sexual assault allegations. The AP does not identify alleged victims of sexual assault without their consent.

Lewis turned himself in to El Paso police Sunday night. He is being held in the El Paso County jail on $75,000 bail. Jail records do not show whether he has a lawyer, but he was scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday.

A police request for an emergency protective order barring Lewis from contacting his wife or being within 200 yards of her was denied overnight. Municipal Judge John Needham said instead that if Lewis is released on bond, he is to have no contact with his wife or children.

The police affidavit says Lewis was waiting inside the soldier's apartment and kicked her in the face as she walked through the door. The private first class was stabbed with a kitchen knife, threatened with death, then raped, investigators allege.

Investigators said Lewis then drove the soldier more than 720 miles to Las Vegas and apparently boarded an El Paso-bound bus sometime Saturday.

Lewis is wanted in Tennessee on suspicion of not paying child support and has a decade-long criminal history that includes several arrests for assault and domestic assault.

Mears said the soldier persuaded Lewis to take her back to El Paso from Las Vegas. When they arrived at a downtown bus station, they saw news reports of the case and went to a police station, Mears said.

Delores Pigeon, the women's grandmother, said the soldier called relatives early Monday to say her husband kidnapped her, drove her to Nevada and then came back to El Paso to turn himself in.

"She said she's in shock," Pigeon said. "She's got two big holes in her legs, and she lost of a lot of blood."

Army officials at William Beaumont Army Medical Center, the Fort Bliss hospital, said the soldier had been treated and released.

The woman was planning to leave her husband of two years, Skelton said. The soldier sent her sister a series of text messages saying that Lewis had left and had even sent a picture that looked like it was taken from inside a Greyhound bus.

"She left him an envelope with money and a note telling him to leave and not to come back," Skelton said. "She was so happy, saying he's 400 miles away."

By Wednesday afternoon, Skelton said, her sister believed Lewis was gone for good and started making plans to go back to her apartment and start over without him.

"Hey sis he's gone so when my check comes I'm going to buy a futon," the soldier wrote in the text message Wednesday, Skelton said. "Yeah, he's gone. Had police go with me yesterday, it's all clear."

She was last heard from in a text message at 4:56 p.m.

Skelton said her sister joined the Army last year to get away from her husband and start a new life with her children.

The children have been living in Tennessee with the soldier's mother. She planned to move the children to Texas once she got a place to live in Fort Bliss.

ALICIA A. CALDWELL

Bosnian Serb wartime president Radovan Karadzic, one of the world's most wanted men for his part in civilian massacres, was arrested on Monday, Serbian President Boris Tadic's office said.

Government sources said he had been under surveillance for several weeks, after a tip-off from a foreign intelligence service. In Sarajevo, scene of a bloody 43-month siege at the hands of Karadzic's Belgrade-backed forces, Croats and Bosnian Muslims streamed onto the streets to celebrate.

The arrest of Karadzic and other indicted war criminals, is one of the main conditions of Serbian progress towards European Union (EU) membership.

Richard Holbrooke, former U.S. assistant secretary of state for Europe who negotiated the 1995 Dayton accords that ended the war in Bosnia, welcomed his capture, describing him as the Osama bin Laden of Europe, "a real, true architect of mass murder."

The arrest came on the eve of a meeting of EU Foreign Ministers scheduled to discuss closer relations with Serbia after formation of a new pro-western government led by Tadic's Democratic Party. The EU welcomed the capture, apparently in Belgrade, as a milestone in Serbian EU aspirations.

Karadzic, still seen by militant nationalists as a national savior following the collapse of Yugoslavia, was expected to be transferred quickly to the custody of the Hague court.

Karadzic's place of hiding has been a constant subject of international speculation since he went underground in 1997. The West had long suspected Belgrade of failing to press the search, but the new government had signaled it wanted to comply.

SREBRENICA MASSACRE

Sources close to the government said Karadzic, distinguished by his characteristic long, grey hair, was arrested in Belgrade.

He was currently undergoing a formal identification process, including DNA testing, and would be meeting with investigators overnight.

"Karadzic was located and arrested," the President's statement said. It gave no details.

The West is also pressing for the arrest of Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic, also in hiding.

Karadzic, was leader of the Bosnian Serbs during the 1992-95 Bosnia war. He was indicted by the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague in July 1995 for authorizing the shooting of civilians during the 43-month siege of Sarajevo.

He was indicted for genocide a second time four months later for orchestrating the slaughter of some 8,000 Muslim men after Mladic's forces seized the U.N. "safe area" of Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia.

He went underground in 1997, two years after NATO military intervention ended the war that followed from the collapse of Yugoslavia.

Ellie Tzortzi

A woman suspected of cutting open a pregnant woman's uterus and stealing the baby has been charged with homicide, unlawful restraint and kidnapping, police said Sunday.

Andrea Curry-Demus, 38, of Wilkinsburg, is charged in the death of Kia Johnson, 18, of McKeesport. Curry-Demus is accused of taking the baby boy to a Pittsburgh hospital and claiming it was her own.

Johnson's body was found Friday in Curry-Demus's apartment. The body was positively identified through dental records, Allegheny County Medical Examiner Karl Williams said Sunday.

In the criminal complaint, police said that video surveillance at the Allegheny County Jail from Tuesday afternoon shows Curry-Demus talking with Johnson for several minutes. The women were at the jail visiting different inmates, police said.

The clothing Johnson is seen wearing on the surveillance tape was consistent with the garments found on her body, police said.

Allegheny County Police Superintendent Charles Moffatt said the jail was the last time Johnson was seen alive.

Curry-Demus was being held in county jail on Sunday and it was not immediately clear whether she had an attorney. A lawyer who had represented her previously did not immediately return a phone message left Sunday.

No one was home at the McKeesport home of Johnson's father on Sunday.

In the criminal complaint, police said Johnson's body was found bound at the wrists and ankles with duct tape, and there were layers of duct tape and plastic covering much of her head. Her body was wrapped in a comforter and garbage bags and placed under the headboard of the bed in the master bedroom.

Williams said Johnson appeared to have been dead for about two days. She "had a wound to the abdomen consistent with the removal of a baby," Allegheny County Police Superintendent Charles Moffatt said.

"A very sharp instrument" was used to cut open Johnson's belly, he said.

Authorities said Johnson was 36 weeks pregnant, and they were trying to determine whether she was alive when the baby was removed. They also are awaiting toxicology tests to find out whether she was drugged. Test results are not expected for several weeks.

Police said in the complaint that Curry-Demus denied meeting Johnson but that she told investigators that her fingerprints would be on the duct tape and plastic used to wrap the body.

Curry-Demus showed up at the hospital Thursday with a newborn that still had the umbilical cord attached, police said. Tests later proved that she was not the mother.

Police said Curry-Demus initially told investigators she bought the baby for $1,000 from the its mother. She later said two people brought a pregnant woman to her apartment Tuesday evening, removed the baby the next day and gave it to her. She said she then took the newborn to her sister's apartment and told her she had just given birth, police said.

Curry-Demus' sister told investigators she didn't see anyone else in Curry-Demus' apartment when she visited twice Wednesday morning, police said. On the first occasion, Curry-Demus repeatedly went into the bedroom alone, closed the door and stayed there for several minutes. On the second occasion, Curry-Demus showed her sister the baby and claimed to have just given birth, police said.

Wilkinsburg Police Chief Ophelia Coleman said Sunday the child was "under observation." Williams earlier said the baby was "apparently doing well." The hospital has declined to release any information about the child.

In 1990, Curry-Demus, then known as Andrea Curry, was accused of stabbing a woman in an alleged plot to steal the woman's infant. A day after that stabbing, Curry-Demus snatched a 3-week-old baby girl from a hospital after the child's 16-year-old mother had gone home for the night. The baby was found unharmed with Curry-Demus at her home the next day.

Curry-Demus pleaded guilty in 1991 to various charges from both incidents and got three to 10 years in prison, according to court records. She was paroled in August 1998.

RAMESH SANTANAM