CALIFORNIA IS A GOOD PLACE FOR CRIMINALS ON THE RUN
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Criminals have a good shot at life on the lam in California, where more than 2.5 million arrest warrants have gone unserved, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.Most of the outstanding warrants are for minor offenses, but tens of thousands are for people wanted for violent crimes, including more than 2,600 homicides, the newspaper reported Tuesday.
"These numbers are startling and disturbing and represent a serious defect in the criminal justice system," California Attorney General Bill Lockyer said. "It breeds disrespect for the law . . . and exposes innocent people to criminal behavior."
Law enforcement agencies statewide say they have more important priorities and lack the staff to act on all the bench warrants received from judges.
JUDGE SENTENCES FILMMAKER TO MAKE MOVIE ON VIOLENCE
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -- Filmmaker John Singleton, director of the gangster picture "Boyz N the Hood," was ordered Tuesday to make a short film about domestic violence after pleading no contest to charges he had punched the mother of his 6-year-old daughter.
Singleton, 31, was accused of battery in the January incident, which prosecutors told the Los Angeles Municipal Court followed a dispute over visiting rights.
Singleton allegedly struck the 28-year-old woman in the face and body and choked and shoved her when she came to pick up their child after the girl had visited him.
Judge Susan Isacoff placed Singleton on three years' probation, fined him $300 and ordered him to undergo a year of domestic violence counseling.
'BURMA' LAW STRUCK DOWN BY FEDERAL APPEALS COURT
BOSTON (AP) -- A Massachusetts law barring the state from doing business with companies that trade with Myanmar is unconstitutional, a federal appeals court held.
The decision released Tuesday by the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals could affect dozens of states and local governments with economic boycotts protesting social or political injustices in foreign lands.
The 1st Circuit upheld a decision by a lower federal court that struck down the so-called Burma law -- the former name of Myanmar.
While the ruling found that "human rights conditions in Burma are deplorable," the court said the Massachusetts law "interferes with the foreign affairs power of the federal government and is thus unconstitutional."
Massachusetts, which purchases $2 billion in goods and services annually, enacted its law in 1996 because of human rights violations by Burma's military dictators.
MISSISSIPPI GOVERNOR SAYS MARRIAGE OF 44 YEARS IS OVER
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) -- Gov. Kirk Fordice said there's no chance for a reconciliation with his wife of 44 years. The only lingering question is how ugly the divorce will get before she sets him free to marry a Memphis widow.
Fordice announced Tuesday he was resigning as a national co-chairman of Dan Quayle's presidential campaign in part because of the gossip about the governor's love life. The two-term Republican said he talked to Quayle -- who has emphasized family values during his campaign -- and both agreed it would be better if Fordice gave up his post.
PIANO TEACHER IS ACCUSED OF SEX ASSAULT OF SEVERAL GIRLS
HACKENSACK, N.J. (AP) -- A piano teacher arrested this month on charges of sexually assaulting two 8-year-old girls has been accused of assaulting five other girls while videotaping them.
Samuel S. Aster, 59, a professor at Manhattan College, was arrested June 5. At a bail hearing Tuesday, prosecutors accused him of assaulting five other girls -- all between the ages of 8 and 13 -- often during lessons at his home.
Aster was not required to enter a plea at the hearing and did not speak during the proceeding. He remained jailed today in lieu of $500,000 bond.
FLIGHT ATTENDANT SUES TABLOID OVER AFFAIR WITH SPORTSCASTER
MIAMI (AP) -- A flight attendant whose affair with sportscaster Frank Gifford exploded into tabloid fireworks has filed a $10 million federal lawsuit against a Canadian corporation that publishes the weekly Globe.
Suzen Johnson, 48, said the Globe choreographed the scandal to boost profits and pressured her into seducing Gifford in 1997. Her suit alleges false imprisonment, negligence and slander.
In the complaint filed in Miami federal court Tuesday, Johnson said she told the Globe that she and Gifford never had sex, just a flirtatious relationship. Gifford is married to TV talk show host Kathie Lee Gifford.
RADAR GLITCH GROUNDS FLIGHTS OVERNIGHT AT ST. PAUL AIRPORT
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -- Technicians worked through the night trying to fix a radar problem that forced the cancellation or delay of more than 100 flights at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
Airport officials weren't sure how long it would take to solve the problem, which involved the radar scopes in the Twin Cities control tower. The scopes display radar data to controllers.
Only about half of the nine scopes were working Tuesday.
TEENS TO STAND TRIAL AS ADULTS FOR PLOTTING SCHOOL MASSACRE
PORT HURON, Mich. (AP) -- A judge has ordered two 14-year-old boys tried as adults on charges of plotting a massacre at their middle school, despite his own misgivings about whether they would have succeeded.
Judge David Nicholson ruled Tuesday that a conspiracy to commit first-degree murder had occurred, and that there was probable cause to believe that Jedaiah Zinzo and Justin Schnepp participated in the conspiracy.
Another judge ordered June 1 that two other Holland Woods Middle School students, 13-year-olds Daniel Fick and Jonathan McDonald, stand trial as juveniles on charges of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.
Witnesses testified during preliminary hearings for the four suspects that the teens were plotting to stage a robbery to obtain firearms, then seize the school office, use the public address system to call an assembly in the gym and massacre students and teachers.