Briefs package

Weapons inspectors miss deadline

International inspectors overseeing the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile have missed an early deadline in a brutally tight schedule after security concerns prevented them from visiting two sites linked to Damascus’ chemical program. Experts from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons were to have checked all 23 of Syria’s declared chemical sites by Sunday, but the organization said Monday that inspectors have visited only 21 because of security issues. The chemical weapons watchdog said it has not given up hope of gaining access to the two locations.

CALIFORNIA

High winds topple big rigs

A wind storm brought powerful gusts to California and Nevada on Monday, knocking over several big rigs on a stretch of highway and damaging trees, signs and vehicles. The California Highway Patrol said two drivers suffered minor to moderate injuries after the truck accidents on a Northern California highway. Heavy winds were also whipping through Nevada, where planes at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas changed their takeoff patterns. Airport officials said no flights have been delayed because of the weather. Trees were also blown down in Las Vegas. The National Weather Service warned of gusts reaching 80 mph Monday in the Spring Mountains and Red Rock Canyon, and gusts of 60 mph in parts of the Las Vegas valley.

MAINE

Challenge ahead for hermit thief

A man who lived nearly three decades in the Maine woods, surviving brutal winters, breaking into houses and avoiding detection by police and neighbors now faces a big challenge: reintegrating into society. Christopher Knight, 47, known as the North Pond Hermit, pleaded guilty Monday to 13 counts of burglary and theft and was admitted into a special court program that will allow him to be released from jail and live and work in the community under the supervision of court officials. Police said Knight may have been responsible for as many as 1,000 burglaries for food, clothing, camping and cooking gear from homes and camps while living in the woods for 27 years. He was arrested in April. A date has not been set for Knight’s release, but his lawyer said it could be within a few months.

MEXICO

Five killed in vigilante clashes

Clashes in which self-described “self-defense” forces sought to oust the Knights Templar drug cartel from the western Mexico state of Michoacan left at least five men dead and hundreds of thousands of people without electricity. The weekend confrontations followed a daring march by a self-defense force into the city of Apatzingan, the central stronghold of the pseudo-religious Knights Templar cartel that for years has dominated Michoacan, a state that sends a steady stream of avocados and migrants to the United States.

TEXAS

Attorney guilty in cartel laundering case

A West Texas lawyer and former Carnegie Mellon University trustee was found guilty Monday of conspiring to launder hundreds of millions of dollars in drug money for a Mexican cartel. Marco Antonio Delgado was accused of devising a scheme to launder up to $600 million for the now-disbanded Milenio cartel from 2007 to 2008. Delgado faces up to 20 years in prison on the single count and is scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 24. Defense attorney Richard Esper said they plan to appeal.

ARIZONA

Ex-congressman gets 3-year prison term

A federal judge on Monday sentenced former U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi to three years in prison for convictions on public corruption, money laundering and other charges, capping a corruption case prosecutors said began more than a decade ago. U.S. District Judge David C. Bury also sentenced Renzi co-defendant James Sandlin to 18 months in prison, and ordered both men to pay fines. They are to begin their prison terms in January. Renzi, 55, a Republican, represented Arizona’s sprawling 1st Congressional District from early 2003 until early 2009. A federal jury convicted him in June on 17 of 32 counts.