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WASHINGTON – The Army said Friday it has determined that suicide was the cause of death of a two-star general who was found dead in his home on a military base in Alabama. Maj. Gen. John Rossi was found dead July 31 at Redstone Arsenal, two days before he was to assume command of Army Space and Missile Defense Command.

Morgan County Sheriff Ana Franklin has denied claims in a federal lawsuit, filed last week, that alleges the search and seizure of phones and computer from a Falkville business was political retaliation for critical blog posts. The lawsuit was filed by blog contributor Glenda Lockhart and her company, Straightline Drywall & Acoustical LLC, and complains about the Oct. 5 search of her business. Lockhart is a contributor to the Morgan County Whistleblower blog, which has been a frequent critic of Franklin and others in the sheriff’s office. [Read the lawsuit: lawsuit-filed-against-morgan-co-sheriff-deputies ] The lawsuit claims 19 electronic devices were taken...

ADVOCATE STAFF REPORT October 25, 2016 LSU running back Leonard Fournette (7) points to the sky as he runs in a 78-yard touchdown in the third quarter against Mississippi, Saturday, October 22, 2016, at LSU in Baton Rouge, La."After his record-setting performance against Ole Miss Saturday night, LSU running back Leonard Fournette has turned his attention to Alabama. In an interview on "SEC Now" Monday, Fournette previewed the much-anticipated matchup between the Tigers (5-2, 3-1) and the Crimson Tide (8-0, 5-0) on Nov. 5. “It’s going to be hectic, especially because they’re undefeated,” Fournette told host Peter Burns. “I just...

empers are high for some this election season, but there's no excuse for what apparently happened to someone's car a few days ago in Marshall County. The Marshall County Sheriff's Office is investigating a case of vandalism involving a car left on the side of Cathedral Caverns Highway. A spokesperson for the Sheriff's Office said he believes the silver Cadillac broke down, possibly Saturday or Sunday, and the driver left it the side of the road, just about a half mile from Highway 72.

With $65 million in new money thanks to the state's BP settlement, the long-beleaguered U.S. 98 project in coastal Alabama has a new life, but officials are proceeding cautiously.It was nearly a decade ago when a previous U.S. 98 project was shut down amid lawsuits and accusations surrounding sediment from the construction site that ran off into the waterways supplying a majority of the Mobile region's drinking water."The job has been redesigned," said Vince Calametti, ALDOT's Southwest Region's chief engineer. "There was an environmental assessment, and it will have to be re-evaluated. It will be one of the first things...

Chief Justice Moore further remarked, “I have been targeted for my belief in marriage, a belief shared by the majority of Americans. No one can point to any illegal, unlawful or unethical aspect of my four-page Administrative Order. That order was a status report on the case. A justice should not be removed from office because of a political agenda.”

Hidden among all the recent great news affecting Birmingham’s amazing rebirth is the story of the long-awaited opening of I-22, or Corridor X. That’s a shame, because no single success in our recent past may prove to be more important and have greater long-term favorable impact on this region than today’s ribbon cutting. Since the days of the Roman Empire and the famous Appian Way, roads (and particularly crossroads) have always played a critically important role in the economic growth and prosperity of cities. In the earliest days of our country, waterway intersections were the places where communities grew into...

Donald Trump must not be president. Alabama has voted for every Republican candidate since Ronald Reagan, a man that captured our imagination with a hopeful view of America as a shining city upon a hill. Nearly 40 years later, Donald Trump offers a deeply cynical view of an America in ruin, an America that seems to exist only in his own dangerous mind. Even before the revelation of video evidence of Trump making lewd, demeaning comments advocating sexual advances on women against their will, we knew that he was unfit to lead this country. We unite with people across this...

MONTGOMERY, AL (WSFA) - Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley, United States Representative Martha Roby (R-AL) and Congressman Bradley Byrne (R-AL) denounced Republican candidate Donald Trump on Saturday following a controversial recording that emerged this week. Recordings obtained by the Washington Post caught Trump on a live microphone speaking to Billy Bush, who worked for Access Hollywood at the time, talking about making sexual advances on women, one of whom was married. Trump has since released an apology in regards to the comments made in 2005, but many GOP lawmakers have expressed their disapproval, including U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan. Gov. Bentley...

Brandi Allen says she learned her son Brian Ogle had been beaten Friday night only moments after she caught sight of him while she drove by. "I wish I had stopped," she said. "Or maybe it wouldn't have happened." Now Allen says her son is looking at more than a month of treatment and rehab in the hospital after he was the victim of a beating Friday night following a Sylacauga High School football game in an attack that authorities say was possibly racially motivated. Sylacauga police said investigators have met with Talladega County District Attorney Steve Giddens to obtain...

A 17-year-old Alabama high school student is in critical condition after being assaulted this weekend. According to Sylacauga Police Chief Kelley Johnson, Brian Ogle was assaulted in an Ace Hardware parking lot following Sylacauga High School’s homecoming game on Friday. When authorities arrived on the scene, they discovered Ogle beaten and bleeding from the head. He was airlifted to the University of Alabama Birmingham Hospital where tests revealed three skull fractures and trauma to his shoulder. Ogle remains in critical condition.

A 17-year-old Sylacauga High School student is recovering at UAB Hospital after police say he was attacked following the Homecoming football game Friday night. Brandi Allen, the victim's mother, identified her son as Brian Ogle. Johnson says one or more black teens assaulted Ogle, a 17-year-old white teen. When officers arrived, they found him bleeding from his head. Medics took him to the Coosa Valley Medical Center in Sylacauga and he was then airlifted to UAB Hospital where he is in critical condition recovering from head injuries. Allen says her son suffered a broken skull in a few places and...

Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore has been suspended from the bench for telling probate judges to defy federal orders regarding gay marriage. The Alabama Court of the Judiciary (COJ) issued the order Friday suspending Moore from the bench for the remainder of his term. "For these violations, Chief Justice Moore is hereby suspended from office without pay for the remainder of his term. This suspension is effective immediately," the order stated. The court found him guilty of all six charges of violation of canon of judicial ethics. Moore's term is to end in 2019. Gov. Robert Bentley will...

Cork GainesSeptember 25, 2016 The trees at Toomer's Corner after a game earlier in the season. Butch Dill/AP The toilet paper hanging from one of Auburn University's famed Toomer's Corner oak trees was set on fire late Saturday night and surveillance footage of the corner appears to show a person intentionally setting the fire. The toilet paper celebration is a longstanding tradition at Auburn following wins by their football team. Following Auburn's 18-13 upset win over No. 18 LSU, the toilet paper caught fire causing damage to the tree. (snip)

On the morning of Sept. 9, an inspector with the Alabama Surface Mining Commission was performing a routine monthly check of an old coal mine in Shelby County when he noticed "a strong odor of gasoline" as well as a sheen on the surface of one of the retention ponds. The gasoline he was smelling came from Colonial Pipeline's Line 1, an underground pipeline three feet in diameter that normally pushes 1.3 million barrels of gasoline per day from refineries in Houston to distribution centers across the Southeast and along the eastern seaboard. That 36-inch line, built in 1963, has...

Colonial pipeline is investigating what caused a pipeline to leak nearly 336,000 gallons of gasoline into a man-made retention pond. That leak was discovered back on September 9th near Helena, Alabama after state workers noticed a strong smell of gas. The shutdown pipeline caused rising fuel prices amid gas shortages across the South. Investigators say the broke portion, built in 1963, has since been repaired. A preliminary report does not identify the cause of the break as the federal investigation continues.

The internet was aflame last night with many people upset over a piece in the Huffington Post from contributor Rebecca Walden. Walden penned a piece titled, “Young ladies of the SEC, cover it up!” and boy was it just awful. Now, it turns out that the Huffington Post wants this all to go away and so they deleted it. Not a good look HuffPost and not very journalistically sound either. But have no fear, below you can read the piece as it look on the HuffPost website before it was deleted: Dear young ladies of the SEC, can you do...

More than 40 Nigerian students are suing Alabama State University for allegedly incorrectly using millions of dollars in scholarship funds provided by their country's government and discriminating against them. Godsgift Moses, Promise Owei, Savior Samuel, Success Jumbo, Thankgod Harold, and 36 other students filed their claim in federal court, alleging the school took advantage of them because they were 'black foreigners', according to the Daily Beast.

The Mobile County Sheriff’s Office has released the names of the five victims killed in a “gruesome” and “vicious” murder Saturday at a home in Citronelle. It’s being called one of the worst mass killings in Alabama history. ... After examining the crime scene, Mobile County District Attorney Ashley Rich said it was the most disturbing murder scene she’s ever seen. “[In my] 20-year career as a prosecutor, I’ve never seen a scene where there were five people that were brutally and viciously murdered,” Rich said. “That’s what we have here.” Dearman is believed to have used multiple weapons to...