In the news

Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York City, has signed into law a ban, effective in 90 days, on smoking in city parks, at beaches, in public plazas and on boardwalks.

Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s president, predicted “hard times” and “fires for decades” in the Arab world if “fanatics” rise to power, adding during a security meeting in Vladikavkaz that no such unrest will be permitted in Russia.

Patricia Stafford Curll, 61, is in critical condition at a Nashville, Tenn., hospital after police say her 91-year old father, who suffers from dementia, shot her in the abdomen as she cared for him.

Faleh Hassan Almaleki, a 50-year-old Iraqi immigrant, has been convicted in Phoenix of second-degree murder for running over and killing his 20-year-old daughter because he felt she had visited dishonor on the family by becoming too Westernized.

Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., announced that he doesn’t intend to run for president in 2012, saying he had concluded that he would have a difficult time raising funds, since he isn’t as recognizable as other likely candidates.

Malikah Shabazz, 45, the daughter of slain civil rights leader Malcolm X, is being held in a Mars Hill, N.C., jail and could be extradited to New York to face charges including grand larceny, forgery and identity theft, authorities said.

Le Thanh Binh, a Vietnamese police spokesman, said valves used to cool a tour boat’s motor were left open overnight, causing a leak that sank the boat, killing 12 people on board.

Shawna Forde, 43, the leader of the Minutemen American Defense who was convicted in Tucson, Ariz., of murdering a young girl and her father during a May 2009 robbery that prosecutors said was an attempt to steal drug money to fund the group’s border-watch operations, has been sentenced to death.

Sharon Cissna, the Alaska lawmaker who is returning to the state by ferry after refusing at a Seattle airport what she called an invasive pat-down when a body scan showed scars from her mastectomy, is due back in Juneau on Thursday.

Stig Edqvist, a Stockholm investigator, said that while about 130 people have confessed to the murder of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme, the case remains unsolved 25 years after Palme was shot on his way home from a movie theater.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 02/23/2011

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