LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I had a feeling there would be mixed reaction, so let me get into it.”
Paul Ryan,
Republican vice presidential candidate, who was booed at an AARP gathering after calling for repealing President Barack Obama’s health-care law Article, 1A
Captor posts on Facebook, gives up
PITTSBURGH - A mentally ill man accused of holding a businessman captive for five hours apparently picked his victim at random after escaping from a halfway house, Pittsburgh police said.
Klein Michael Thaxton, 22, who was armed with a hammer and a kitchen knife, gave himself up after posting Facebook updates in the early hours of Friday’s standoff, police said. The captive, business owner Charles Breitsman, was unhurt.
In all, Thaxton sent seven messages, many of them despairing and written in disjointed style: “this life im livin rite now i dnt want anymore,” said one post. “ive lost everything and I aint gettin it back.”
Thaxton rode his bike from a halfway house and arrived at the high-rise around 7 a.m., police Chief Nathan Harper said
Thaxton will be charged with kidnapping, terroristic threats and aggravated assault, Harper said.
Thaxton served as a private in the U.S. Army from December 2008 to June 2010. He also has a criminal record, including a guilty plea to robbery earlier this year.
Shuttle tours California, lands safely
LOS ANGELES - Space shuttle Endeavour landed safely at the Los Angeles International Airport on Friday after an aerial tour of California landmarks.
Strapped to the back of a 747 jumbo jet, it touched down around 1 p.m. after a nearly five-hour flyover. One of the crew members stuck an American flag out of the hatch of the jet.
The flyover took Endeavour over the state Capitol, Golden Gate Bridge, the Hollywood sign and other icons en route to the Los Angeles airport, where the shuttle will be prepped for a slow-speed journey to its museum home next month.
Endeavour is the second of three remaining shuttles to head to its retirement home. In April, Discovery arrived at the Smithsonian Institution’s hangar in Virginia. Atlantis will stay in Florida.
Zoo-train rider leaps off; tiger rips him
NEW YORK - A visitor to the Bronx Zoo was mauled by a tiger Friday after he leapt from an elevated monorail train and plummeted over a fence into an exhibit, police and zoo officials said.
The attack happened about 3 p.m. in the Wild Asia exhibit, where a train with open sides takes visitors over the Bronx River and through a forest, where they glide along the top edge of a fence, past elephants, deer and a tiger enclosure.
Passengers aren’t strapped in on the ride, and the 25-yearold man apparently jumped out of his train car and cleared the perimeter fence.
Details of what happened next were unclear, but police said the tiger attacked. The zoo’s staff used a fire extinguisher to chase the tiger off, and the man was instructed to roll under an electrified wire to get to safety, zoo director Jim Breheny said in a statement. Zookeepers then called the tiger into a holding area.
The man was conscious and talking after the mauling, Breheny said. Police said the man was hospitalized in critical condition.
Boys, 13, charged in relative’s death
MILWAUKEE - Two 13-year-old Wisconsin boys were ordered held in lieu of $1 million bond Friday after being accused of using a hatchet and hammer to kill one boy’s great-grandmother while stealing jewelry and a car from her home.
Prosecutors said the boys, both charged as adults, went to 78-year-old Barbara Olson’s home on Monday with the intent to rob and kill her. Her daughter discovered her body in the garage, in a pool of blood, two days later, authorities said.
The boys appeared in Sheboygan County court Friday, where they were charged with being party to the crime of first-degree intentional homicide.
According to a criminal complaint, the teens told investigators that after they fatally beat Olson in her home in Sheboygan Falls, about 50 miles north of Milwaukee, they grabbed jewelry and loose change before stealing her car and driving to get pizza.
George Limbeck, the great-grandson’s attorney, said the boy had a “good relationship” with Olson. Limbeck said he will try to have the case heard in juvenile court.
Sheboygan County District Attorney Joe DeCecco said he would oppose such a move.
Front Section, Pages 4 on 09/22/2012