Around the world
CONVICTED: A court-martial jury in Hanau, Germany, convicted a U.S. Army sergeant Friday of premeditated murder for beheading his wife's lover. Sgt. Stephen Schap, 26, of Baltimore, stood calmly as the verdict was announced. Schap repeatedly stabbed his friend, Gregory Glover, 21, of Phoenix, decapitated him and took the head to his wife in a hospital where she was being treated for a pregnancy problem. The defense had argued that Schap was in an irrational rage after learning that his wife was pregnant by his friend.
KIDNAPPED: An American Red Cross worker kidnapped by Somlia gunmen is in good health and may be freed soon, the Red Cross said Friday. Alfred Petters, 36, a water and sanitation engineer sent to Mogadishu to help stem a cholera epidemic, was kidnapped Thursday by up to 15 gunmen who stopped his car within sight of a U.N. checkpoint a few hundred yards away. Petters was riding in a clearly marked, unarmed Red Cross vehicle that was followed by a security escort.
INDICTED: Japanese prosecutors Friday indicted former Construction Minister Kishiro Nakamura on a charge of accepting a $95,000 bribe from giant building contractor Kajima Corp. The indictment was a key development in one-year's digging by prosecutors into a batch of payoff allegations involving top Japanese construction companies and politicians. It was the first such case in 27 years.
DEADLY BLAST: French authorities confirmed one death in an explosion Thursday at a nuclear research center in southern France that also injured four others but caused no radioactive contamination, the director of the center said.
Across the nation
PRINCIPAL: A divided school board in Wedowee, Ala., refused to fire a white principal who threatened to ban interracial couples from the high school prom. One board member resigned in protest. The Randolph County School Board voted 4-2 Thursday to reject the school superintendent's recommendation that Hulond Humphries be dismissed, thus returning him to the job he has held for 25 years at Randolph County High School. Humphries, 55, was suspended by the board March 14 pending an investigation into complaints he told a mixed-race student that she was a "mistake" and threatened to stop the prom if interracial couples showed up. Humphries withdrew the threat the day after he made it.
EXECUTED: A former soldier went to his death in Georgia's electric chair for the 1978 bludgeoning death of a prostitute, demanding to know: "Why are you executing an innocent man? Why? Why? Why?" William Henry Hance, 45, was executed Wednesday night despite his claims of retardation and a juror's insistence that she never voted for the death penalty. The U.S. Supreme Court rejected his final, late-hour appeal. "Right at this very moment I can prove my innocence," he said in a final statement. "I've been trying to find a judge, any judge, who would help me."
In Washington
RECALL: A small plastic cap found in four bottles of medicine is causing the recall of 4 million bottles of antibiotics because of the possible choking hazard. People should immediately stop taking Ceclor, Lorabid and Keflex and call their doctor, the Food and Drug Administration said Thursday. If they cannot locate their doctor or the doctor says other antibiotics will not work, they should carefully check each teaspoon of medicine before swallowing, the FDA advised.
Other news
ROBERT DOISNEAU, whose intimate, often poignant pictures of Parisians became some of the world's best-known photographs, died Friday in Paris at age 81 . . . TWO MODERATE earthquakes rattled central California Thursday, but no injuries or damage were reported . . . THE FREQUENTLY delayed opening of the Channel Tunnel to link Britain and France is set for June, but only with reduced passenger service, the tunnel's operator said Friday . . . DETERMINED to thwart any threat of dissident activity, China on Friday detained its most prominent dissident, Wei Jingsheng, as he was attempting to enter Beijing, his secretary said.