Free Republic

OKLAHOMA CITY - Thousands of gallons of water went pouring into the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority office Sunday. "A hundred thousand gallons of water had already spilled in the building," said Jack Damrill, communications director for the OTA. Damrill said cold temperatures caused the fire sprinkler system to burst. "It's just amazing. Water poured out of there in a short amount of time," Damrill said. The water didn't just stop on the main floor; it kept flowing through cracks and the ceiling, spilling through offices on the first floor. "We've had to relocate a couple of people to some different offices,"...

A state judge will not grant an injunction stopping changes to Pennsylvania's residential and commercial building codes, including mandatory fire sprinkler systems for new homes. Commonwealth Court Judge Johnny Butler said in a Wednesday order that the petition by the Pennsylvania Builders Association and private developers does nothing to address the underlying issue they are citing. The builders' January lawsuit is still standing. It says changes written by an outside code commission and adopted Dec. 31 by the state are unconstitutional delegations of lawmaking authority. It says the recent updates to the codes will increase the cost of construction and...

A Staten Island mailman who was a follower of the blind terror sheik tracked down confidential addresses of FBI agents and prosecutors pursuing Al Qaeda, according to court records and federal sources. Ahmed Sattar, described by federal prosecutors as a point man for a major terror group in America, was spotted by one federal agent near his home. The agent moved his family from the area.Sattar also was put on the federal payroll, receiving thousands of dollars to be a paralegal for Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman during his 1995 terror trial, government officials said.Even though federal investigators became suspicious of...