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PHOENIX – Phoenix police have rescued a 5-year-old girl who was reportedly abducted on Christmas Day. Sergeant Andy Hill with the Phoenix Police Department said 5-year-old Natalie Rose Flores and her two sisters, aged 7 and 9, were playing by a tree in a common area of an apartment complex near 19th Avenue and Cactus around 2:15 p.m. The girls are staying with an aunt, who reportedly has legal custody of the children, and her boyfriend, in an apartment in the complex. The parents live separately out of state. Hill said the male suspect parked his truck in the parking...

A teacher at a north side non-profit for at-risk youth was charged last week with criminal sexual assault for allegedly having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old male student of hers, authorities said.

MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota (NBC) -- A man who police say was a Girl Scout troop leader in Faribault faces sex charges for allegedly raping a 15-year-old troop member and taking naked photos of her. Entrusted to lead young members of two Faribault Girl Scout troops, authorities say 38-year-old Michael Borromeo is now accused of raping at least one of those girls. "It's pretty alarming to hear that a person in a position of authority would take advantage of a young child," says Joe Yetzer, an investigator with the Rice County Sheriff's Department. Borromeo is in the Rice County Jail, charged with...

TINLEY PARK, Ill. (CBS) Five people were shot Saturday morning at a Lane Bryant clothing store in a strip mall in Tinley Park Saturday morning. Police were sent to the mall at 7264 W. 191st St. around 11 a.m., according to a Tinley Park police dispatcher. WBBM Newsradio 780 reported that Tinley Park's mayor said five people were shot inside the Lane Bryant store. The conditions of the victims were not immediately available. Will County coroner's office investigators were sent to the scene, but a representative could not say whether anyone was dead. Unconfirmed reports said the shooting included at...

Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick exchanged romantic and sexually oriented text messages with a top aide, contradicting their denials in court that they had romantic ties, the Detroit Free Press reports?

Police in Las Vegas, Nev., have found a 15-year-old boy and a 30-year-old woman who have been missing for several days. The woman, a counselor who was wanted on sexual abuse charges, is in custody and will be returned to Oregon. According to a news release late this afternoon, Las Vegas authorities just found 30-year-old Jasmine Nguyen and the boy who were the subject of a search by the Portland Police Bureau's Child Abuse Team. Earlier, the bureau had issued a press release saying that Jasmine Nguyen had been tracked to a motel in Wilsonville last week. Then, earlier today,...

An accused stalker was shot to death Monday night by the object of his obsession after he broke into her Hessville home, police told the Northwest Indiana Times. Hammond resident Ryan Lee Bergner, 41, was pronounced dead from gunshot wounds to his abdomen shortly after 10:30 p.m. at a local hospital. According to the Times, Bergner went on a date with the 51-year-old woman last June, and his behavior became obsessive, offensive and violent. On Monday night, the woman was watching television in her living room when she said she heard Bergner break a bathroom window near her back door...

Police: Charges May Be Upgraded POSTED: 10:11 am CDT September 22, 2005 CHICAGO -- A 28-year-old man was charged with sex offenses against a 14-year-old boy whose body was found naked in Lincoln Park in mid August, police said Thursday. Shawn Thigpen, of Chicago, was charged late Wednesday with three counts of felony aggravated criminal sexual abuse and was to appear for a bond hearing Thursday, according to police News Affairs Officer Laura Kubiak. Thigpen is accused of sexually abusing Michael Smith Jr., whose body was found in Lincoln Park Aug. 18, Kubiak said. Cook County state's attorney's office spokesman...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A mortar shell hit a coalition office in the city of Samarra north of Baghdad, killing one Iraqi and injuring 12, a U.S. military statement said Thursday. The 82 mm mortar round crashed into the Civil Military Operations center, an office that coordinates military and civilian humanitarian aid, on Wednesday. U.S. soldiers said they contacted local police after hearing three explosions. Police arrived at the scene and found the dead and wounded, the statement said. "Soldiers were unable to respond or find the perpetrators," said the statement, from U.S. Central Command. "This is one of numerous incidents...

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Four U.S. soldiers on patrol were wounded Saturday when an Iraqi girl handed them an explosive and it blew up, American military officials said. They said they believed it was an accident. None of the injuries was life-threatening, said Col. Michael Linnington, commander of the 101st Airborne's 3rd Brigade, the wounded soldiers' unit. One soldier's leg was amputated. The girl, who appeared to be about 7 years old, suffered a hand injury and was taken away by her family, apparently to a hospital. U.S. forces were searching for her Saturday night to make sure she was safe.

The four soldiers were with the Army's 3rd Infantry Division, which was operating the checkpoint, and with which Koppel is embedded. The division has been among the closest U.S.-led forces to Baghdad, reaching approximately 50 to 60 miles south of Iraq's capital city. However, the exact location of the car bombing was not clear. The soldiers were standing at the side of their Bradley fighting vehicle at the checkpoint when a car drove up and exploded, killing all four, and presumably the occupants of the exploded car, Koppel reported. The incident has the military considering banning all civilian traffic through...

<p>NEW YORK (AP) All of the defendants in the 12 New York area cases in which Attorney General John Ashcroft has ordered federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty are either black or Hispanic, a published report said.</p> <p>Eight of the defendants in the cases in the New York region are African-American and four are Hispanic, The New York Times reported in Friday editions, citing figures from the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project, which provides information to defense lawyers.</p>

Hi, just spending my breaking watching our good friend Sen Lincoln Chafee (RINO) of Rhode Island on C-Span. (Foreign Relations Committe) Chafee claims these new inspections with tougher penalties be given more time. He actually mentions months if not a year. In so many words, Chafee calls Bush 'Arrogant' and wants US to go back to security council if more action is needed. Hopefully C-Span will repeat this tonight. If not the entire debate this weekend. Sen Barbara Boxer (D) is questioning now why Collin Powell has changed his mind and is giving up inspections.

BEIJING - North Korea (news - web sites) said Saturday it might end its self-imposed moratorium on ballistic missile tests if the United States doesn't take steps to improve relations. The North's ambassador to Beijing, Choe Jin Su, blamed current tensions with Washington and what he called its "hostile policies" toward his nation. "Because all agreements have been nullified by the United States side, we believe we cannot go along with the self-imposed missile moratorium any longer," Choe said at a news conference. Choe said the missile moratorium had been imposed in hopes that the United States would "renounce its...