Free Republic

Idaho State Police (ISP) have confirmed the suspect in multiple hit-and-run collisions leading up to an officer-involved shooting near Post Falls has died from his injuries. ISP did not state what the injuries were, nor who caused them. No officers were injured. While westbound traffic was closed on the I-90 for several hours following the incident, it is now open again in both directions. There are no significant delays at this time. Further updates will be released by the Coeur d’Alene [Idaho] Police Department. I-90 westbound near Post Falls will remain closed for most of the day after a suspect...

The body of one of two men chased after a violent robbery at a small grocery Thursday night was found this morning at the Interstate 20-U.S. 61 interchange and authorities were trying to determine whether he was shot, jumped or fell from an overpass. A second suspect, described, like the dead man, as Hispanic, was being sought by police in the robbery and assault at La Chiquita grocery store, 4002 U.S. 61 South, which triggered the chase and shootout. Police received a call about the armed robbery at 8:41, said Sgt. Sandra Williams. “The caller reported two Hispanic males entered...

Ohio State University officials on Friday cleared Scott Savage, a librarian at the Mansfield campus, of harassment charges filed against him based on his recommendation of an anti-gay book for a freshman reading assignment. A conservative group had threatened to sue the university if the charges were not dropped. They were dropped the same day that the group went public with its complaints about the way the librarian was being treated.

Same-sex couples from states where gay marriage is banned cannot legally marry in Massachusetts, the state's highest court ruled Thursday. The Supreme Judicial Court, which three years ago made Massachusetts the first state to legalize gay marriage, upheld a 1913 state law that forbids nonresidents from marrying in Massachusetts if their marriage would not be recognized in their home state. "The laws of this commonwealth have not endowed non-residents with an unfettered right to marry," the court wrote in its 38-page opinion. "Only non-resident couples who come to Massachusetts to marry and intend to reside in this commonwealth thereafter can...

In Kirkuk, Iraq, a high stone wall surrounds an ornate soldiers' barracks dating from the Ottoman Empire. Until a few weeks ago, the stone floors were fractured, littered with rubble and silenced by a velvet coat of sun-streaked dust. The fountain in the center of the courtyard was still, and green with scum. Around it, parched flowers straggled up among bleached cobblestones -- vestiges of bulbs planted long years ago. This is a historic site, a monument, for the citizens of Kirkuk, defining them to the rest of Iraq, integral to their culture, history and pride. Before Saddam Hussein's rise...

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli soldiers freed unharmed Wednesday an Israeli who was held by Palestinians in the West Bank for five days in a kidnapping that raised further questions about the stability of a fragile truce. The release of cab driver Eliahu Gurel came a day after a Palestinian fatally stabbed an Israeli strolling along the Tel Aviv seaside promenade with his girlfriend in an attack that rattled the cease-fire crucial to a U.S.-backed peace plan. "In a combined operation, a large number of forces rescued Eliahu Gurel from his Palestinian kidnappers tonight," an army spokesman said. The elite security...