Nation & World in brief Dec. 5

| New Mexican wire services

12/4/2008 -

Report links state gun laws to rates of slayings, trafficking

WASHINGTON — States with lax gun laws had higher rates of handgun killings, fatal shootings of police officers and sales of weapons that were used in crimes in other states, according to a study underwritten by a group of more than 300 U.S. mayors.

The report, which was obtained by The Washington Post, found 10 states supplied 57 percent of the guns that were recovered in crimes in other states in 2007. The 38-page report is based on an analysis of annual crime-gun data compiled by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The analysis tracks guns used in crimes back to the retailers that first sold them.

"Many law enforcement officials have long maintained that a pattern of illegal gun trafficking exists between states," the report says. "This report confirms these accounts, suggesting there is an interstate illegal gun market driven, at least in part, by the relative ease of access to guns in particular states."

Stiff drug law could figure in Blackwater shooting charges

WASHINGTON — Blackwater Worldwide guards involved in the deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting of Iraqi civilians could face mandatory 30-year prison sentences under an aggressive anti-drug law being considered as the Justice Department readies indictments, people close to the case said.

Charges could be announced as early as Monday for the shooting, which left 17 civilians dead and strained U.S. relations with the fledgling Iraqi government. Prosecutors have been reviewing a draft indictment and considering manslaughter and assault charges for weeks. A team of prosecutors returned to the grand jury room Thursday and called no witnesses.

Though drugs were not involved in the Blackwater shooting, the Justice Department is pondering the use of a law, passed at the height of the nation's crack epidemic, to prosecute the guards. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 law calls for 30-year prison terms for using machine guns to commit violent crimes of any kind, whether drug-related or not.

California trio charged with torturing, abusing teen

STOCKTON, Calif. — A central California couple was charged Thursday with kidnapping and torturing a teenager that authorities say was sometimes kept shackled inside their home and abused with a baseball bat, belt and knife. The boy's one-time guardian was charged with similar allegations.

Kelly Layne Lau and husband Michael Schumacher were charged with 13 counts of abuse, and former guardian Caren Ramirez, whom the boy called an aunt, was charged with 10 counts.

The boy escaped from the couple's home in Tracy, about 60 miles east of San Francisco, on Monday and fled with a chain still attached to his foot to a nearby fitness center. He appeared emaciated, was covered in soot and was wearing only boxer shorts.

Obama's donor list again to be asked to help pay Clinton debt

NEW YORK — President-elect Barack Obama's vast list of donors is being asked to donate to Hillary Rodham Clinton as she scrambles to reduce her massive campaign debt before she becomes secretary of state and federal ethics rule limit her fundraising, an Obama adviser said Thursday night.

An appeal on Clinton's behalf signed by Vice President-elect Joe Biden is to be sent by e-mail to all of the more than 3 million donors to Obama's record-setting fundraising, according to this adviser, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the e-mail had not yet been sent.

Obama promised after Clinton endorsed him to help her pay off her debt, and this is the second time the Obama list has been asked to help Clinton. It was used once during the campaign as well, but its second use underlines the urgency of Clinton's task now that she is Obama's choice to be secretary of state.

Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, will headline a major debt retirement event in New York on Dec. 15 with Ugly Betty star America Ferrera as master of ceremonies. Tickets range from $50 to $1,000, with top donors earning a premium seat and a backstage photo with the former first lady.

NASA delays launch of new Mars rover by two years

The launch of NASA's sport-utility vehicle-sized, next-generation Mars rover has been delayed two years because of continuing technical problems and cost overruns, the space agency announced Thursday.

Originally set to launch late next year, the mission now is scheduled to take place in 2011, officials said at a news briefing at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration headquarters in Washington, D.C. "We ran out of time," said Charles Elachi, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where the rover is being built.

The new rover, known as the Mars Science Laboratory, is one of the most challenging projects NASA has undertaken. The craft will carry an instrument payload 10 times heavier than the twin rovers Spirit and Opportunity, which landed on Mars in 2004. With a 43-inch-high deck, MSL will be able to drive over obstacles that deterred earlier generations of rovers.