A city job, and a world that suddenly explodes: Surviving a Bangladesh factory collapse
SAVAR, Bangladesh (AP) — Merina was so tired. It had been three days since the garment factory where she worked had collapsed around her, three days since she’d moved more than a few inches. In that time she’d had nothing to eat and just a few sips of water. The cries for help had long since subsided. The moans of the injured had gone silent.
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It was fatigue she feared the most. If sleep took her, Merina was certain she would never wake up.
“I can’t fall asleep,” the 21-year-old thought to herself, her face inches from a concrete slab that had once been the ceiling above her. She’d spent seven years working beneath that ceiling, sewing T-shirts and pants destined for stores from Paris to Los Angeles. She worked 14 hours a day, six days a week, with her two sisters. She made the equivalent of about $16 a week.
Now she lay on her back in the sweltering heat, worrying for her sisters and herself. And as the bodies of her former coworkers began to rot, the stench filled the darkness.
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Bangladesh police interrogate owner of collapsed building, as rescuers use heavy equipment
SAVAR, Bangladesh (AP) — A Bangladesh court on Monday gave police 15 days to interrogate the owner of a building that collapsed last week, killing at least 382 people, as rescuers used heavy machinery to cut through the destroyed structure after giving up hopes of finding any more survivors.
Mohammed Sohel Rana, who was arrested Sunday as he tried to flee to India, will be held for questioning on charges of negligence, illegal construction and forcing workers to join work. His father, Abdul Khaleque, was also arrested on suspicion of aiding Rana to force people to work in a dangerous building.
The illegally constructed, 8-story Rana Plaza collapsed in a heap Wednesday morning as thousands of people worked inside in five garment factories. About 2,500 survivors have been accounted for.
Rana was brought to the Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court in a bullet-proof vest, and led away to an unknown detention place after the magistrate granted a police request to hold him longer before filing formal charges. The crimes he is accused of carry a maximum punishment of seven years. More charges could be added later.
The collapse was the deadliest disaster to hit Bangladesh’s garment industry, which is worth $20 billion annually and supplies global retailers.
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FDA will investigate added caffeine in foods after new caffeinated gum introduced
WASHINGTON (AP) — Trail mix. Potato chips. And now gum.
With a growing number of foods boasting added caffeine for an energy boost, the Food and Drug Administration says it’s time to investigate their safety.
The FDA’s new look at added caffeine and its effects on children and adolescents is in response to a caffeinated gum introduced this week by Wrigley. Called Alert Energy Gum, it promises “The right energy, right now.” The agency is already investigating the safety of energy drinks and energy shots, prompted by consumer reports of illness and death.
Michael Taylor, FDA’s deputy commissioner of foods, said Monday that the only time FDA explicitly approved the added use of caffeine in a food or drink was in the 1950s for colas. The current proliferation of caffeine added to foods is “beyond anything FDA envisioned,” Taylor said.
“It is disturbing,” Taylor said in an interview with The Associated Press. “We’re concerned about whether they have been adequately evaluated.”
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Syrian prime minister narrowly escapes assassination attempt in heart of Damascus
DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Syria’s prime minister narrowly escaped an assassination attempt in the heart of the heavily defended capital Monday, state media said, laying bare the vulnerability of President Bashar Assad’s regime.
The bombing, which killed several other people, highlights an accelerating campaign targeting government officials, from mid-level civil servants to the highest echelons of the Syrian regime.
State television said Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi was not hurt in the bombing, which struck his convoy as it drove through the posh Mazzeh neighborhood — home to embassies, government officials and business elites with close ties to the regime. Footage of the scene broadcast on state TV showed the charred hulks of cars and the burnt-out shell of a bus in a street littered with rubble.
The attack on al-Halqi punctuated a series of attacks on government officials in recent weeks. On April 18, gunmen shot dead the head of public relations at the Ministry of Social Affairs while he dined at a Mazzeh restaurant. A day later, a Syrian army colonel was killed in Damascus, and five days after that a bomb killed an official from the Electricity Ministry.
Then there are the larger attacks that have shaken the regime to its core.
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Prominent death penalty lawyer Judy Clarke appointed for Boston Marathon bombing suspect
BOSTON (AP) — The defense team representing the Boston Marathon bombing suspect got a major boost Monday with the addition of Judy Clarke, a San Diego lawyer who has managed to get life sentences instead of the death penalty for several high-profile clients, including the Unabomber and the gunman in the rampage that injured former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.
Clarke’s appointment was approved Monday by U.S. Magistrate Judge Marianne Bowler.
Bowler denied, at least for now, a request from Miriam Conrad, the public defender of 19-year-old suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, to appoint a second death penalty lawyer — David Bruck, a professor at Washington and Lee University School of Law.
Tsarnaev has been charged with using a weapon of mass destruction during the April 15 marathon. Three people were killed and more than 260 injured when two bombs exploded near the finish line.
The suspect’s lawyers could renew their motion to appoint another death penalty expert if he is indicted, the judge said.
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NBA veteran center Jason Collins comes out as gay in Sports Illustrated article
WASHINGTON (AP) — With the simplest of sentences, NBA veteran Jason Collins set aside years of worry and silence to become the first active player in one of four major U.S. professional sports leagues to come out as gay.
In a first-person article posted Monday on Sports Illustrated’s website, Collins begins: “I’m a 34-year-old NBA center. I’m black. And I’m gay.”
Collins has played for six teams in 12 seasons, most recently as a reserve with the Washington Wizards after a midseason trade from the Boston Celtics. He is now a free agent and wants to keep playing in the NBA.
“I didn’t set out to be the first openly gay athlete playing in a major American team sport. But since I am, I’m happy to start the conversation. I wish I wasn’t the kid in the classroom raising his hand and saying, ‘I’m different,'” Collins writes. “If I had my way, someone else would have already done this. Nobody has, which is why I’m raising my hand.”
Saying he had “endured years of misery and gone to enormous lengths to live a lie,” Collins immediately drew support for his announcement from the White House — President Barack Obama called him — along with former President Bill Clinton, the NBA, current and former teammates, a sponsor, and athletes in other sports.
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Lawyer asks government for temporary housing for former ricin suspect
OXFORD, Miss. (AP) — A Mississippi man’s house is uninhabitable after investigators searched it but failed to find evidence of the deadly poison ricin, a lawyer said Monday, arguing that the government should repair the home.
Kevin Curtis was once charged in the mailing of poisoned letters to President Barack Obama, U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker and a Mississippi judge, but the charges were later dropped. The investigation shifted last week to another man who had a falling out with Curtis, and that suspect appeared in court Monday on a charge of making ricin.
Curtis’ lawyer, Christi McCoy, has sent a letter to U.S. Attorney Felicia Adams demanding that Curtis be provided temporary housing and the government repair his Corinth, Miss., home and possessions. She also wants the government to pay his legal bills.
“To be specific, Mr. Curtis’ home is uninhabitable. I have seen a lot of post search residences but this one is quite disturbing. The agents removed art from the walls, broke the frames and tore the artwork. Mr. Curtis offered his keys but agents chose to break the lock. Mr. Curtis’ garbage was scheduled to be picked up Thursday, the day after he was snatched from his life. A week later, the garbage remains in his home, along with millions of insects it attracted,” the letter says.
Though attorneys for Curtis say their client was framed, McCoy believes whoever sent the letters had a primary goal of targeting the public officials. Curtis has said that he feuded with the man now charged in the case, James Everett Dutschke.
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Standard & Poor’s 500 edges above its previous record high; technology stocks lead the way
NEW YORK (AP) — Technology companies are leading the stock market higher, pushing the Standard & Poor’s 500 index to another record high.
A pair of strong economic reports also encouraged investors Monday. Wages and spending rose in the U.S. last month, and pending home sales hit their highest level in three years.
The S&P 500 closed at 1,593, a fraction above its previous record high reached on April 11. It rose 11 points Monday, or 0.7 percent.
The Dow Jones industrial average closed up 106 points at 14,818, a gain of 0.7 percent.
Major tech companies had the biggest gains in the Dow: Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and IBM.
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Man in Albuquerque church stabbings claimed choir leader was a ‘Mason,’ attacked others
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Lawrence Capener was shaking hands with his fellow churchgoers at Sunday Mass, exchanging the traditional peace offerings when some people next to him noticed something strange — his hands were quite sweaty and clammy. Then, as the choir began singing a hymn to wrap up Mass, the man bolted from his pew, ran to the choir area and started stabbing the choir leader and others.
Parishioners screamed and ran for cover and others, including the church flutist, tried to subdue him. Police said the assailant thought the choir members were members of a secret society.
The episode caused panic among church members such as 12-year-old Jordan Schalow and his mother, Valerie, who had just heard the pastor read a Gospel message about the importance of loving everyone and had the recent bombing in Boston on their mind.
Jordan had told his mom, “Thank God. I’m in church and nothing bad is going to happen here.”
Valerie Schalow said her husband, Gerald, sat next to Capener during services at St. Jude Thaddeus Catholic Church and had noticed him acting nervously. When he shook Capener’s hand, she said her husband found them to be very sweaty. “My husband even had to go wash his hands after that,” Schalow said.
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Michael Jackson’s addiction struggles, tender side detailed for jury as civil trial begins
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Michael Jackson’s struggle against drug addiction was put on display Monday during opening statements at his mother’s wrongful death case against concert promoter AEG Live.
Competing portraits of Jackson emerged during the first hours of the trial, with Katherine Jackson’s attorney acknowledging the pop star’s drug problems while also trying to show he was a caring son and father.
AEG’s attorney Marvin S. Putnam said, however, that the singer’s guarded private life meant the company was unaware that he was using the powerful anesthetic propofol.
“The truth is, Michael Jackson fooled everyone,” Putnam said. “He made sure that no one, nobody, knew his deepest darkest secrets.”
A jury of six men and six women will determine whether AEG should pay Jackson’s mother and three children after his 2009 death from an overdose of propofol. Millions and possibly billions of dollars in damages are at stake in the case that opened with private photos and video clips of Jackson dancing.
