- Thursday, October 11, 2012

WESTMINSTER — Colorado police looking for a 10-year-old girl who disappeared on her walk to school have found a body in a park, but are not saying whether it is linked to the case and noted Thursday that officers are still searching for her.

The discovery of the body is the latest turn in the disappearance of Jessica Ridgeway that has seen police look for clues in a reported sighting in a car with Colorado plates in Maine and a Wyoming abduction. The FBI said Thursday that abduction was unrelated.

Police spokesman Trevor Materasso said the body “is not intact,” and that has slowed the work of identification. Mr. Materasso said no other information would be released until Friday. Police earlier declined to say whether the body was that of a child.

ARIZONA

Border Patrol kills teen throwing rocks from Mexico

PHOENIX — A U.S. Border Patrol agent opened fire on a group of people throwing rocks from across the Mexican border, killing a teenage boy and eliciting outrage from the Mexican government over the use of lethal force, authorities said Thursday.

The agents in Nogales had responded to reports of two suspected drug smugglers near the border at about 11:30 p.m. Wednesday. The agents watched the two abandon a load of narcotics, then run back to Mexico, according to the Border Patrol.

As the agents approached to investigate, people on the Mexican side of the border began throwing rocks at them and ignored orders to stop, the agency said.

One agent opened fire. A Mexican official with direct knowledge of the investigation said Thursday a 16-year-old boy was killed in the shooting. The Border Patrol declined to comment further, and would only say in a statement that one person “appeared to have been” shot by the agent.

The Mexican government issued a strongly worded statement, condemning the use of lethal force by U.S. agents in such situations along the border.

“Preliminary information at this time brings forth, once again, serious doubts about the use of lethal force by U.S. Border Patrol agents, something that both the Mexican government and Mexican society strongly deplore and condemn,” Ricardo Alday, a spokesman for the Mexican Embassy in Washington, said in the statement.

REGION

CDC: Meningitis cases reach 170; 14 people die

The government says 170 people now have been sickened in the meningitis outbreak linked to tainted steroid shots, and 14 of them have died.

Idaho becomes the 11th state to report at least one illness. The others are Florida, Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee and Virginia.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated the count Thursday, showing 33 more cases and two additional deaths reported to the agency in the past day. The outbreak of rare fungal meningitis has been linked to steroid shots for back pain.

NEW YORK

City, rabbis clash over circumcision ritual

NEW YORK — A group of rabbis is clashing with New York City health officials over the safety of an ancient circumcision ritual.

Three rabbis and three Jewish groups sued the city Thursday in an attempt to block enforcement of a new regulation requiring written parental consent for the rite, which health experts say spreads infection and has killed two children since 2004.

During the ritual, the person performing the circumcision attempts to cleanse the wound by sucking blood from the cut and spitting it aside.

New York City’s Health Department says the saliva contact could give the infant herpes simplex, a virus that is harmless in adults but can be deadly in newborns.

GEORGIA

Emory apologizes for ’50s anti-Semitism

ATLANTA — Emory University in Atlanta is apologizing for a legacy of anti-Semitism at its dental school in the 1950s.

From 1948 to 1961, dozens of Jewish students were flunked out or forced to repeat a year or more of classes. That left many feeling inadequate and ashamed for decades despite successful careers.

Emory this week invited many of those former students to campus for a meeting with President James W. Wagner and a screening of a film about the discrimination. Mr. Wagner expressed regret that the discrimination happened and that it’s taken so long for it to be properly acknowledged.

FLORIDA

Crews search for 4th victim in garage rubble

MIAMI — Workers inched closer Thursday afternoon to pulling a fourth likely casualty from the site of a parking garage collapse as a search for answers continued over what reduced a routine construction project to piles of twisted steel and crumbled concrete.

Family members of a still-missing worker huddled near the site, a day after the collapse at Miami Dade College, waiting for a crane to remove large debris and potentially remove a body from an area search dogs had identified. Some still held out hope for a miracle.

Earlier Thursday, a third worker succumbed to injuries from the collapse. Samuel Perez, 53, had been pulled from the piles of wreckage just hours earlier, after being trapped for about 13 hours. He was found after rescue workers heard his cries. Mr. Perez and the two other confirmed fatalities — Jose Calderon and Carlos Hurtado de Mendoza — died at hospitals after being rescued. They had worked for subcontractors of the firm handling the construction of the five-story garage, Ajax Building Corp.

MAINE

Drivers warned of zombie danger

PORTLAND — Drivers may have gotten a chuckle out of an electronic message board in Maine warning of zombies, but city officials were not amused.

The sign at a Portland road-construction site was changed by a hacker to read “Warning Zombies Ahead!” on Wednesday morning. It originally read “Night work 8 p.m.-6 a.m. Expect delays.”

City spokeswoman Nicole Clegg says the signs are a safety precaution and changing it could have led to driver distraction.

She told the Portland Press Herald tampering with a safety device is a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

From wire dispatches and staff reports

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