***DUPLICATON ALERTS:
AAS: Bus driver
AJC and others: Richie Havens obit
ALL: Ricin also moved as a separate. See email from Anisha.***
MISSISSIPPI
No ricin found at suspect’s home
Investigators found no ricin in the house of a Mississippi man accused of mailing poisoned letters to President Barack Obama, a U.S. senator and a local judge, according to testimony Monday from an FBI agent. Agent Brandon Grant said that a search of Paul Kevin Curtis’ vehicle and house in Corinth, Miss., on Friday did not turn up ricin, ingredients for the poison, or devices used to make it. A search of Curtis’ computers has found no evidence so far that he researched making ricin. Christi McCoy, the leading defense attorney for Curtis, said the government have no probable cause to hold her client and his history of problems related to bipolar disorder are not enough to keep him in jail.
TEXAS
Bus driver may have blacked out
The driver involved in a fatal North Texas bus crash told authorities he may have blacked out in the moments before the bus careened off the roadway and struck a concrete barrier, a report released Monday shows. The preliminary report by the Texas Department of Public Safety said driver Loyd Rieve, 65, indicated he may have lost consciousness. The report found no defect with the Cardinal Coach Line bus. It cited Rieve’s failure to maintain his lane and his inattention as factors that contributed to the April 11 crash in Irving. The report shows Rieve tested negative for drugs or alcohol. Two people were killed and more than 40 hurt in the immediate aftermath of the crash. A third passenger died Sunday.
NICARAGUA
U.S. child porn suspect arrested
Police in Nicaragua detained a U.S. man who was on the FBI’s 10 most-wanted fugitives as a suspect in a child pornography investigation, authorities said Monday. Former school teacher Eric Justin Toth was arrested Saturday, said Glenda Zavala, head of detectives for Nicaragua’s National Police. Toth’s arrest was based on an international detention request, she said. Toth taught third grade at Beauvoir, a private elementary school on the grounds of the Washington National Cathedral. He was escorted off campus in June 2008 after another teacher reported finding sexually explicit photographs on a school camera in Toth’s possession. He had not been seen since he lost his job.
WEST VIRGINIA
Teen in T-shirt flap back in class
A teenager returned to school Monday wearing the same National Rifle Association T-shirt that led to his suspension and arrest Thursday after he refused a teacher’s order last week to remove it. Other students across Logan County wore similar shirts to school in a show of support for 14-year-old Jared Marcum, said his lawyer Ben White. White said school officials told him on Monday that Marcum’s one-day suspension was appropriate because the Logan Middle School eighth-grader was being disruptive. White disputed that position, saying Marcum was exercising his free speech rights and did not disrupt anything. School officials did not return phone calls Monday.
NEW YORK
Singer Havens dies of heart attack
Richie Havens, the folk singer and guitarist who was the first performer at Woodstock, died Monday, his family said. He was 72. Havens died of a heart attack, the family said it a statement. His performance at the three-day 1969 Woodstock Festival was a turning point in his career. He was the first act to hit the stage, performing for nearly three hours. His performance of “Freedom” — based from the spiritual “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child” — became an anthem.
NEW YORK
Proposal raises age limit for cigarettes
No one under 21 would be able to buy cigarettes in the city under a proposal unveiled Monday to make it the most populous place in America to set the minimum age that high. Extending a decade of moves to crack down on smoking in the nation’s largest city, the measure aims to stop young people from developing a habit that remains the leading preventable cause of death, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said. Eighty percent of the city’s smokers started lighting up before they were 21, officials say. Critics contend such a law would drive younger smokers to neighboring communities or corner-store cigarette sellers instead of city stores.
TENNESSEE
Feds probe shooting at nuclear plant
An East Tennessee nuclear power plant added security patrols after a weekend incident in which an officer exchanged gunfire with a man who then fled on a boat. The FBI and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission are investigating the shooting early Sunday at Tennessee Valley Authority’s Watts Bar nuclear power plant near Spring City, Tenn.
UNITED KINGDOM
Anti-pedophile group raises concerns
A band of self-styled pedophile hunters has been ambushing men it believes are out to meet young girls, posting video of the confrontations to the Web in a tactic that has yielded arrests — but alarmed police. Letzgo Hunting said its members pose as teenage girls online in an effort to lure would-be child abusers into the open — where they’re met with a camera. Police acknowledged that five suspects ages 24 to 54 had been arrested in connection with the group’s activities, but police and others warned that the stings could backfire. The stings are fraught with risk because self-appointed detectives could fall foul of police procedure or mishandle key evidence, said Laura Huey, a cyberpolicing expert at the University of Western Ontario.
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