CNN - Texas police shake down drivers, lawsuit claims

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Texas police shake down drivers, lawsuit claims

Roderick Daniels was traveling through eastern Texas in October 2007 when, he says, he was the victim of a highway robbery.

The Tennessee man says he was ordered to pull his car over and surrender his jewelry and $8,500 in cash that he had with him to buy a new car.

But Daniels couldn't go to the police to report the incident.

The men who stopped him were the police.

Daniels was stopped on U.S. Highway 59 outside Tenaha, near the Louisiana state line. Police said he was driving 37 mph in a 35 mph zone. They hauled him off to jail and threatened him with money-laundering charges -- but offered to release him if he signed papers forfeiting his property.

"I actually thought this was a joke," Daniels told CNN.

But he signed.

"To be honest, I was five, six hundred miles from home," he said. "I was petrified."

Now Daniels and other motorists who have been stopped by Tenaha police are part of a lawsuit seeking to end what plaintiff's lawyer David Guillory calls a systematic fleecing of drivers passing through the town of about 1,000.

"I believe it is a shakedown. I believe it's a piracy operation," Guillory said.

George Bowers, Tenaha's longtime mayor, says his police follow the law. And through her lawyers, Shelby County District Attorney Lynda Russell denied any impropriety.

Texas law allows police to confiscate drug money and other personal property they believe are used in the commission of a crime. If no charges are filed or the person is acquitted, the property has to be returned. But Guillory's lawsuit states that Tenaha and surrounding Shelby County don't bother to return much of what they confiscate.

Jennifer Boatright and Ron Henderson said they agreed to forfeit their property after Russell threatened to have their children taken away.

Like Daniels, the couple says they were carrying a large amount of cash --- about $6,000 -- to buy a car. When they were stopped in Tenaha in 2007, Boatright said, Russell came to the Tenaha police station to berate her and threaten to separate the family.

"I said, 'If it's the money you want, you can take it, if that's what it takes to keep my children with me and not separate them from us. Take the money,' " she said.

The document Henderson signed, which bears Russell's signature, states that in exchange for forfeiting the cash, "no criminal charges shall be filed ... and our children shall not be turned over" to the state's child protective services agency.

Maryland resident Amanee Busbee said she also was threatened with losing custody of her child after being stopped in Tenaha with her fiancé and his business partner. They were headed to Houston with $50,000 to complete the purchase of a restaurant, she said.

"The police officer would say things to me like, 'Your son is going to child protective services because you are not saying what we need to hear,' " Busbee said.

Guillory, who practices in nearby Nacogdoches, Texas, estimates authorities in Tenaha seized $3 million between 2006 and 2008, and in about 150 cases -- virtually all of which involved African-American or Latino motorists -- the seizures were improper.

"They are disproportionately going after racial minorities," he said. "My take on the matter is that the police in Tenaha, Texas, were picking on and preying on people that were least likely to fight back."

Daniels told CNN that one of the officers who stopped him tried on some of his jewelry in front of him.

"They asked me, 'What you are doing with this ring on?' I said I had bought that ring. I paid good money for that ring," Daniels said. "He took the ring off my finger and put it on his finger and told me how did it look. He put on my jewelry."

Texas law states that the proceeds of any seizures can be used only for "official purposes" of district attorney offices and "for law-enforcement purposes" by police departments. According to public records obtained by CNN using open-records laws, an account funded by property forfeitures in Russell's office included $524 for a popcorn machine, $195 for candy for a poultry festival, and $400 for catering.

In addition, Russell donated money to the local chamber of commerce and a youth baseball league. A local Baptist church received two checks totaling $6,000.

And one check for $10,000 went to Barry Washington, a Tenaha police officer whose name has come up in several complaints by stopped motorists. The money was paid for "investigative costs," the records state.

Washington would not comment for this report but has denied all allegations in his answer to Guillory's lawsuit.

"This is under litigation. This is a lawsuit," he told CNN.

Russell refused requests for interviews at her office and at a fundraiser for a volunteer fire department in a nearby town, where she also sang. But in a written statement, her lawyers said she "has denied and continues to deny all substantive allegations set forth."

Russell "has used and continues to use prosecutorial discretion ... and is in compliance with Texas law, the Texas constitution, and the United States Constitution," the statement said.

Bowers, who has been Tenaha's mayor for 54 years, is also named in the lawsuit. But he said his employees "will follow the law."

"We try to hire the very best, best-trained, and we keep them up to date on the training," he said.

The attention paid to Tenaha has led to an effort by Texas lawmakers to tighten the state's forfeiture laws. A bill sponsored by state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, would bar authorities from using the kind of waivers Daniels, Henderson and Busbee were told to sign.

"To have law enforcement and the district attorney essentially be crooks, in my judgment, should infuriate and does infuriate everyone," Whitmire said. His bill has passed the Senate, where he is the longest-serving member, and is currently before the House of Representatives.

Busbee, Boatright and Henderson were able to reclaim their property after hiring lawyers. But Daniels is still out his $8,500.

"To this day, I don't understand why they took my belongings off me," he said.

CNN - Pregnant Briton to escape death penalty in Laos

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Pregnant Briton to escape death penalty in Laos

A British woman who had been facing possible execution in Laos will escape the death sentence because she is pregnant, a spokesman for the Laotian Foreign Ministry said Tuesday.

The country's criminal law prohibits courts from sentencing pregnant women to death, spokesman Khenthong Nuanthasing told CNN. The woman's trial hasn't been scheduled yet, he said, but is likely to happen next week.

Samantha Orobator, 20, was facing death by firing squad for drug trafficking, said Clare Algar, the executive director of Reprieve, a London-based human rights group.

She was arrested August 5, Khenthong has said.

Orobator was alleged to have been carrying just over half a kilogram (about 1lb) of heroin, Reprieve lawyer Anna Morris told CNN by phone from Vientiane, the Laotian capital. Those found guilty of carrying that amount normally face the death penalty, she said.

Reprieve has said Orobator became pregnant in prison, possibly as a result of rape, and that she is due to give birth in September. That would mean Orobator became pregnant in January.

Khenthong agreed that Orobator is five months pregnant.

But he indicated that Orobator might have already been pregnant when she was arrested, and that she lost the first baby while in prison.

He said Orobator declared on the day of her arrest in August that she was two months pregnant by her boyfriend. After she had already been in jail for some time, he said, Orobator asked for medication to cure a vaginal infection, and he believes it caused her to lose the child.

Nuanthasing said officials are investigating Orobator's pregnancy.

Orobator's mother said she found out about her daughter's pregnancy in January. Jane Orobator told CNN she heard the news from the British Foreign Office, which has been monitoring the case.

There is no British Embassy in Laos; a British vice-consul arrived in the country over the weekend, the British Foreign Office said.

Jane Orobator said she cannot believe her daughter was involved in drug trafficking, and she was surprised to learn she was in Laos.

"I don't know" what she was doing there, she said from her home in Dublin, Ireland. "The last time she spoke with me, she said she was on holiday in London and she would come to see us in Dublin before returning to the UK in July.

"She is not the type of person who would be involved in drugs," she added.

Reprieve is worried about her health, especially given her pregnancy, Anna Morris said.

"She became pregnant in prison. We are concerned that it may not have been consensual and we are concerned that someone who finds herself in prison at 20 is subject to exploitation," she said.

Reprieve sent Morris from London to Laos to try to help Orobator, Algar said.

The lawyer arrived there on Sunday and is hoping to visit Orobator on Tuesday, her boss at Reprieve said. A British consul has also arrived in the country.

"I am the first British lawyer who has asked for access to her," Morris said. "She needs to have a local lawyer appointed to her. We are pressing very hard for the local authorities to appoint one."

She said it was normal in the Laotian justice system for a defendant to get a lawyer only days before a trial.

The last execution in Laos was in 1990, the foreign affairs spokesman said.

Samantha Orobator was born in Nigeria and moved to London with her family when she was 8, her mother said.

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Old Japanese maps on Google Earth unveil secrets

When Google Earth added historical maps of Japan to its online collection last year, the search giant didn't expect a backlash. The finely detailed woodblock prints have been around for centuries, they were already posted on another website, and a historical map of Tokyo put up in 2006 hadn't caused any problems.

But Google failed to judge how its offering would be received, as it has often done in Japan. The company is now facing inquiries from the Justice Ministry and angry accusations of prejudice because its maps detailed the locations of former low-caste communities.

The maps date back to the country's feudal era, when shoguns ruled and a strict caste system was in place. At the bottom of the hierarchy were a class called the "burakumin," ethnically identical to other Japanese but forced to live in isolation because they did jobs associated with death, such as working with leather, butchering animals and digging graves.

Castes have long since been abolished, and the old buraku villages have largely faded away or been swallowed by Japan's sprawling metropolises. Today, rights groups say the descendants of burakumin make up about 3 million of the country's 127 million people.

But they still face prejudice, based almost entirely on where they live or their ancestors lived. Moving is little help, because employers or parents of potential spouses can hire agencies to check for buraku ancestry through Japan's elaborate family records, which can span back over a hundred years.

An employee at a large, well-known Japanese company, who works in personnel and has direct knowledge of its hiring practices, said the company actively screens out burakumin job seekers.

"If we suspect that an applicant is a burakumin, we always do a background check to find out," she said. She agreed to discuss the practice only on condition that neither she nor her company be identified.

Lists of "dirty" addresses circulate on Internet bulletin boards. Some surveys have shown that such neighborhoods have lower property values than surrounding areas, and residents have been the target of racial taunts and graffiti. But the modern locations of the old villages are largely unknown to the general public, and many burakumin prefer it that way.

Google Earth's maps pinpointed several such areas. One village in Tokyo was clearly labeled "eta," a now strongly derogatory word for burakumin that literally means "filthy mass." A single click showed the streets and buildings that are currently in the same area.

Google posted the maps as one of many "layers" available via its mapping software, each of which can be easily matched up with modern satellite imagery. The company provided no explanation or historical context, as is common practice in Japan. Its basic stance is that its actions are acceptable because they are legal, one that has angered burakumin leaders.

"If there is an incident because of these maps, and Google is just going to say 'it's not our fault' or 'it's down to the user,' then we have no choice but to conclude that Google's system itself is a form of prejudice," said Toru Matsuoka, a member of Japan's upper house of parliament.

Asked about its stance on the issue, Google responded with a formal statement that "we deeply care about human rights and have no intention to violate them."

Google spokesman Yoshito Funabashi points out that the company doesn't own the maps in question, it simply provides them to users. Critics argue they come packaged in its software, and the distinction is not immediately clear.

Printing such maps is legal in Japan. But it is an area where publishers and museums tread carefully, as the burakumin leadership is highly organized and has offices throughout the country. Public showings or publications are nearly always accompanied by a historical explanation, a step Google failed to take.

Matsuoka, whose Osaka office borders one of the areas shown, also serves as secretary general of the Buraku Liberation League, Japan's largest such group. After discovering the maps last month, he raised the issue to Justice Minister Eisuke Mori at a public legal affairs meeting on March 17.

Two weeks later, after the public comments and at least one reporter contacted Google, the old Japanese maps were suddenly changed, wiped clean of any references to the buraku villages. There was no note made of the changes, and they were seen by some as an attempt to quietly dodge the issue.

"This is like saying those people didn't exist. There are people for whom this is their hometown, who are still living there now," said Takashi Uchino from the Buraku Liberation League headquarters in Tokyo.

The Justice Ministry is now "gathering information" on the matter, but has yet to reach any kind of conclusion, according to ministry official Hideyuki Yamaguchi.

The League also sent a letter to Google, a copy of which was provided to The Associated Press. It wants a meeting to discuss its knowledge of the buraku issue and position on the use of its services for discrimination. It says Google should "be aware of and responsible for providing a service that can easily be used as a tool for discrimination."

Google has misjudged public sentiment before. After cool responses to privacy issues raised about its Street View feature, which shows ground-level pictures of Tokyo neighborhoods taken without warning or permission, the company has faced strong public criticism and government hearings. It has also had to negotiate with Japanese companies angry over their copyrighted materials uploaded to its YouTube property.

An Internet legal expert said Google is quick to take advantage of its new technologies to expand its advertising network, but society often pays the price.

"This is a classic example of Google outsourcing the risk and appropriating the benefit of their investment," said David Vaile, executive director of the Cyberspace Law and Policy Center at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

The maps in question are part of a larger collection of Japanese maps owned by the University of California at Berkeley. Their digital versions are overseen by David Rumsey, a collector in the U.S. who has more than 100,000 historical maps of his own. He hosts more than 1,000 historical Japanese maps as part of a massive, English-language online archive he runs, and says he has never had a complaint.

It was Rumsey who worked with Google to post the maps in its software, and who was responsible for removing the references to the buraku villages. He said he preferred to leave them untouched as historical documents, but decided to change them after the search company told him of the complaints from Tokyo.

"We tend to think of maps as factual, like a satellite picture, but maps are never neutral, they always have a certain point of view," he said.

Rumsey said he'd be willing to restore the maps to their original state in Google Earth. Matsuoka, the lawmaker, said he is open to a discussion of the issue.

A neighborhood in central Tokyo, a few blocks from the touristy Asakusa area and the city's oldest temple, was labeled as an old "eta" village in the maps. It is indistinguishable from countless other Tokyo communities, except for a large number of leather businesses offering handmade bags, shoes and furniture.

When shown printouts of the maps from Google Earth, several older residents declined to comment. Younger people were more open on the subject.

Wakana Kondo, 27, recently started working in the neighborhood, at a new business that sells leather for sofas. She was surprised when she learned the history of the area, but said it didn't bother her.

"I learned about the burakumin in school, but it was always something abstract," she said. "That's a really interesting bit of history, thank you."

CNN - Ammo hard to find as gun owners stock up

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Ammo hard to find as gun owners stock up

Gun shops across the country are reporting a run on ammunition, a phenomenon apparently driven by fear that the Obama administration will increase taxes on bullets or enact new gun-control measures.

"In the last two months it's gotten very, very difficult to find ammunition," says Richard Taylor, manager of The Firing Line, a gun shop and shooting range in the Denver, Colorado, suburbs.

"There are a lot of rumors floating around that the present government would like to increase taxes on ammunition. I think [there is] just a lot of panicked buying going on."

While campaigning for the White House, Obama supported re-enacting the now-expired ban on assault weapons. But there is no indication that the administration will take up that measure -- or any other gun-control initiative --anytime soon.

Nonetheless, some gun owners aren't taking any chances.

Two weeks ago, The Firing Line was forced to impose a four-box-per-customer limit on ammo. Before that, the shop was selling 10,000 rounds of 9 mm handgun ammunition a day.

Some calibers of ammunition have been unavailable for months.

"Currently no .380 ammunition -- I haven't seen any for about four months ... .38 special, it's been at least a couple of months," Taylor says. "It's just that there's been a huge demand and it's far outweighed supply right now."

Taylor says plenty of people are still coming to the range to shoot, but are gun owners hoarding ammo?

"People are buying cases or whatever they can get their hands on and putting it away, absolutely," he says. "The only way that this shortage can have to do with it is that people are buying and hoarding."

Karl Roos, a physician, stopped by the range to do some shooting with his Smith and Wesson .357-caliber Magnum, using some rounds from his personal stock of ammo.

"I have yet to see .38 special or .357 Magnum ammunition on the shelf. The stuff I'm shooting I've had for several years. I just haven't seen it for the last several months," says Roos, who adds he is always on the lookout for fresh sources of ammo. "As I'm doing the rounds of the local stores that carry ammunition, if I see something on the shelf I'll buy it."

"I'm not too worried about things being banned or anything like that," he says. But he notes that many of his fellow gun enthusiasts are scared: "There's definitely a lot of fear."

Jim Minardi, a gun dealer in Lakewood, Colorado, says only a few people are actually hoarding. But they are buying up so much ammo that there isn't much left on the shelves.

"The minority of our customers are stockpiling ammunition," Minardi says. "The majority are standard shooters buying what they can."

Wal-Mart is one of the largest ammo dealers in the United States. In an e-mail exchange, a Wal-Mart spokesman confirmed that ammo sales have been brisk.

"Some Wal-Mart stores have experienced an increase in demand for guns and ammo and for those locations, we are working closely with suppliers to replenish shelves," says William C. Wertz, the discount chain's divisional director for public affairs and government relations. "In some situations where demand is high, so that we can better serve all customers, we will place a limit on the amount of a product that can be purchased."

"It's no different with ammo than other products (toilet paper, batteries, etc.) that may be in short supply for one reason or another."

Each year U.S. ammo manufacturers make about 8 billion rounds, according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the trade association for the firearms and ammunition industry. Current production data won't be in until late May, but the foundation expects the numbers to be way up.

"In order to keep up with demand for ammunition, manufacturers are working at full capacity, 24-7," says Ted Novin, an NSSF spokesman. "Currently demand for ammunition is outpacing supply."

Novin says he believes the reason is clear.

"The increase in demand for firearms and ammunition is largely attributable to gun owner concerns regarding the current political climate," says Novin, referring to the Obama administration and the Democrat-controlled Congress.

"Many of the lawmakers in power have a long history of supporting legislation that violates the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans," Novin adds. "Gun owners recognize this and are reacting accordingly."

Ammunition manufacturers have been scrambling to keep up with demand.

A message from Steve Hornady, president of Hornady Ammunition, on the company's Web site reads:

"Here at Hornady Manufacturing we are breaking our own production records in an attempt to keep up with customer demand. We have added extra shifts, machinery and we are also in the process of expanding our manufacturing plant."

Winchester Ammunition posted a similar statement:

"Winchester Ammunition, like other ammunition manufacturers, has seen the demand for our products increase significantly since last fall. To meet that increased demand, our operations are running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week."

Andrew Arulanandam, communications director of the National Rifle Association, says the "unprecedented ammo shortages are widespread, and they affect small and large retailers."

"We have heard from members across the country in cities and in small towns from California to Maine," Arulanandam says. "There is a fear that Congress or the new administration will push for a firearm or an ammunition ban, or for a significant increase in excise taxes on firearms and ammunition. We hear this from hunters, target shooters and even from first-time gun owners who fear that there will be an effort to incrementally curtail and eventually dismantle this freedom."

Back at The Firing Line's gun range, pilot Ron Cardwell is working on his target shooting with his 9 mm semiautomatic pistol. He loves to shoot and hopes the ammo crisis ends soon.

"I have three or four boxes of 9 mm left at home and a couple of boxes of .45," he says. "I'm just buying as much as I can whenever I can."

CNN - Joint Chiefs chairman: Afghanistan now top priority

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Joint Chiefs chairman: Afghanistan now top priority

The U.S. military's primary focus needs to shift immediately from Iraq to Afghanistan, Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Monday.

"We remain committed to the mission we've been given in Iraq -- make no mistake. ... But Afghanistan has been an economy of force operation for far too long," he said at a Pentagon news conference.

Mullen said he is "gravely concerned" about recent Taliban and al-Qaeda gains across much of southern Afghanistan and in Pakistan.

"This isn't about 'can do' anymore. This is about 'must do,' " Mullen said. The Taliban and al-Qaeda are "recruiting through intimidation, controlling through fear, and advancing an unwelcome ideology through thuggery. ... The consequences of their success directly threaten our national interests in the region and our safety here at home."

Mullen's remarks came less than a week after the release of a State Department report indicating a dramatic spike recently in terrorist attacks in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan.

The report stated that al Qaeda and its extremist supporters have moved across the Afghan border "to the remote areas of the Pakistani frontier, where they have used this terrain as a safe haven to hide, train terrorists, communicate with their followers, plot attacks and send fighters to support the insurgency in Afghanistan."

It noted that the largest number of attacks occurred in Pakistani provinces near the Afghan border, including Balochistan, the North West Frontier and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, where extremists have sought to challenge the government and extend Islamic law.

President Obama is also "concerned about the situation," White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Monday.

The president, who is meeting with the presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan later this week, wants an "understanding that not just the United States faces security concerns, but each individual government has security concerns about extremists in the area," Gibbs said.

Mullen noted that while Obama's decision to increase troop levels in Afghanistan "provides commanders more manpower and more resources ... we need a commensurate commitment from a civilian side.

He said that "more concerted pressure" was needed from the Pakistani government as well.

Pakistan's military recently launched an assault on militants in Taliban-held areas, after the Taliban seized territory in violation of an agreement signed this year by Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari.

The deal, criticized by the United States, allowed the Taliban to implement Islamic law, or sharia, in the region in exchange for an end to fighting. The recent operations are part of the Pakistani army's intensified drive against the Taliban in its restive tribal regions.

The Pakistani government has been criticized for not cracking down on militants along its border with Afghanistan. As a result, the U.S. military has carried out airstrikes against militant targets in Pakistan. The strikes have rankled relations between the two countries.

Mullen said that while the United States is concerned about recent Taliban and al-Qaeda gains inside Pakistan, he remains confident that Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is secure.

"The worst downside with respect to Pakistan is that those nuclear weapons come under the control of terrorists," he said.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert Gates recently called Taliban gains in Pakistan an "existential threat" to the country.

Reuters - BlackBerry Curve seen better than iPhone

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BlackBerry Curve seen better than iPhone

Monday, May 04, 2009 8:2PM UTC

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Research in Motion Ltd's BlackBerry Curve moved past Apple Inc's iPhone in the first quarter to become the best-selling consumer smartphone in the U.S., research group NPD said on Monday.

RIM, which already dominates the corporate smartphone market in the United States, also had three of the top five best-selling consumer smartphones in the period, with the Storm at No. 3 and the Pearl at No. 4, NPD said.

T-Mobile's G1 ranked No. 5.

The iPhone was the top-selling consumer smartphone in the U.S. in both the third and fourth quarters of 2008. The Curve was second and the Palm Inc's Centro was third.

NPD credited a "buy-one-get-one" promotion by Verizon Wireless -- a joint venture between Verizon Communications Inc and Vodafone Group Plc -- for helping push the Curve past the iPhone.

"The more familiar, and less expensive, Curve benefited from these giveaways and was able to leapfrog the iPhone, due to its broader availability on the four major U.S. national carriers," said Ross Rubin, director of industry analysis at NPD, in a news release.

The iPhone is only available through AT&T Inc. Apple launched its second-generation 3G iPhone last July.

RIM's consumer smartphone market share climbed 15 percent from the previous period to nearly 50 percent in the first quarter, as Apple's and Palm's share both fell 10 percent.

More than half of RIM's 25 million subscribers now fall into the non-corporate category, according to the company.

But the smartphone battle is just starting to heat up. Apple is widely expected to unveil a new iPhone in the next few months, while Palm's highly-anticipated Pre smartphone is set to launch during the second quarter.

The smartphone market as a whole continues to grow, even as the larger handset market stagnates. The devices made up 23 percent of U.S. handset sales in the first quarter, NPD said, up from 17 percent in the year-ago quarter.

Shares of Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM rose 3 percent in late afternoon trading on the Nasdaq to $74.43. Shares of Cupertino, California-based Apple were up 3.4 percent to $131.63 on the Nasdaq.

(Reporting by Gabriel Madway; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)

Reuters - EU urges Internet governance revamp

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EU urges Internet governance revamp

Monday, May 04, 2009 11:18AM UTC

STRASBOURG, France (Reuters) - The body in charge of assigning Internet addresses such as .com and .net should be shorn of its U.S. government links from October and made fully independent, the European Union's information society chief said on Monday.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a not-for-profit organization set up in 1998 but operates under the aegis of the U.S. Department of Commerce, a set-up that raises concerns for some as the Internet is seen as belonging to a wider constituency.

Pressure in the past on ICANN from right-wing politicians to stop .xxx from becoming a domain name for pornography, worried some policymakers. ICANN's operating agreement with the U.S. government expires at the end of September.

"This opens the door for the full privatization of ICANN and it also raises the question of to whom ICANN should be accountable, as from 1 October," EU Information Society Commissioner Viviane Reding said in a statement.

She urged U.S. President Barack Obama to agree to a "new, more accountable, more transparent, more democratic and more multilateral form of Internet governance."

ICANN decides on what names can be added to the Internet's top level domains (TLDs) such as .com but Reding wants it to become completely independent, overseen by an independent judicial body as well as a "G12 for Internet Governance" to discuss Internet and security issues.

"In the long run, it is not defendable that the government department of only one country has oversight of an Internet function which is used by hundreds of millions of people in countries all over the world," Reding said.

Such a "G12" would include two representatives from each North America, South America, Europe and Africa, three representatives from Asia and Australia, as well as the chairman of ICANN as a non-voting member.

The European Commission holds a public hearing on Wednesday in Brussels to debate future governance of the Internet.

Despite Dept of Commerce concerns, ICANN agreed last year to relax the rules on TLDs, the suffixes, such as the ubiquitous .com, .net and .org, among others.

(Reporting by Huw Jones; Editing by David Cowell)

Reuters - HP and RIM form alliance on BlackBerry

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HP and RIM form alliance on BlackBerry

Monday, May 04, 2009 3:3PM UTC

(Reuters) - Hewlett-Packard Co and BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd said they have formed an alliance to provide services for the BlackBerry.

Among the services are HP CloudPrint for BlackBerry smartphones, which allows users to print e-mails and documents at the nearest printer using the Internet.

The services include support for BlackBerry's Enterprise Server 5.0, which was launched on Monday.

HP's enterprise customers can also use the PC maker's ProLiant servers to run the BlackBerry Enterprise Server software, the companies said.

BlackBerry handsets have become a staple of executives, lawyers, politicians and other professionals who use them to send wireless e-mail securely.

(Reporting by S John Tilak and Ajay Kamalakaran in Bangalore; Editing by Derek Caney)

CNN - Teens acquitted of murder in immigrant's fatal beating

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Teens acquitted of murder in immigrant's fatal beating

Two Pennsylvania teens were acquitted of murder, aggravated assault and ethnic intimidation charges Friday in the beating death of a Mexican immigrant last summer.

However, a Schuylkill County jury found Brandon Piekarsky and Derrick Donchak guilty of simple assault stemming from the death of Luis Ramirez, who died of blunt force injuries to the head after a fight with the defendants and their friends.

Donchak, 19, was also found guilty of providing alcohol to the group of teens that encountered Ramirez the night of July 12 on a residential street in the rural mining town of Shenandoah.

Prosecutors alleged the teens baited the undocumented Mexican immigrant into a fight with racial epithets, provoking an exchange of punches and kicks that ended with Ramirez convulsing in the street, foaming from the mouth.

He died two days later in a hospital in Danville.

Piekarsky, 17, had faced a charge of third-degree murder for allegedly delivering a fatal kick to Ramirez's head after he was knocked to the ground. He also was found not guilty of ethnic intimidation, aggravated assault and attempting to solicit a cover-up.

An all-white jury of six men and six women heard from several prosecution witnesses, including a juvenile co-defendant and another teen who pleaded guilty in federal court for his role in the fight.

While the jury heard conflicting accounts about who initiated the encounter or delivered the final kick to Ramirez's head, defense lawyers attempted to place the blame on another co-defendant, who is facing charges in juvenile court, and Colin Walsh, who has pleaded guilty to violating Ramirez's civil rights.

The juvenile admitted on the stand to shouting "go home you Mexican [expletive]" after the first fight dispersed, prompting Ramirez to turn back and attack him.

The juvenile's testimony was corroborated by Walsh, who admitted to punching Ramirez and knocking him to the ground after he charged the juvenile.

Both witnesses said Piekarsky delivered the final blow to Ramirez's head while he was on the ground, but others testified that they couldn't be certain who had actually kicked him.

The incident drew national attention to the small town of Shenandoah, highlighting issues of race relations.

CNN - Nearly 300 at Hong Kong hotel placed under quarantine

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Nearly 300 at Hong Kong hotel placed under quarantine

Hundreds of guests and staff were under quarantine in China on Saturday after health officials determined that a hotel guest had contracted the H1N1 virus.

Nearly 200 hotel guests and 100 staff members were ordered to stay in Metropark Hotel in Hong Kong for seven days to stop the spread of the H1N1 virus, a government spokesman said.

The quarantine was ordered after a 25 -year-old Mexican man stayed in the hotel and became sick, according to the spokesman. The man reportedly flew from Mexico to Shanghai on April 30 and then went to Hong Kong.

The traveler was taken to a hospital and tests confirmed that he had the virus, said York Chow, the secretary for food and health.

Chow said officials would isolate the hotel and that "relevant people" would be quarantined for seven days and treated with an anti-viral medication, commonly known as Tamiflu.

It is the first confirmed case of the virus in Hong Kong, local medical officials said. The World Health Organization said Friday that the number of confirmed cases stood at 367 worldwide, though no cases have been confirmed in mainland China.

South Korean officials on Saturday confirmed their first case -- a 51-year-old nun who recently traveled to Mexico for volunteer work. The case has not been confirmed by the WHO.

As the number of swine flu cases across the globe is expected to rise, scientists are racing to develop a vaccine to confront the virus.

WHO counted 367 cases, including 141 in the United States and 156 in Mexico. Thirteen countries have confirmed cases, the organization said. National governments have confirmed an additional 381 cases, but the WHO has not yet reported those in its master list.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, hopes to have a vaccine for the virus available to manufacturers within a month, said Michael Shaw, the agency's lab team leader for the virus response.

"We're doing the best we can as fast as we can," he said.

Still, it would take four to six months from the time the appropriate strain is identified before the first doses become available, said Dr. Marie-Paule Kieny, WHO director of the Initiative for Vaccine Research.

"Of course, we would like to have a vaccine tomorrow. We would have wanted to have it yesterday," she said. "It's a long journey."

Kieny said there is "no doubt" that a vaccine can be made "in a relatively short period of time."

Producing a vaccine involves isolating a strain of the virus, which has already been done, and tweaking it so manufacturers can make a vaccine, Kieny said.

Once the virus reaches manufacturers, it faces additional testing before national regulatory agencies decide whether to approve a vaccine.

CDC officials were asked Friday how the H1N1 virus measures up to the deadly virus that sparked the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

"What we have found by looking very carefully at the sequences of the new H1N1 virus is that we do not see the markers for virulence that were seen in the 1918 virus," said Nancy Cox, chief of the CDC's Influenza Division.

However, she added, "we know there's a great deal that we do not yet understand about the virulence of the 1918 virus or other influenza viruses that have a more severe clinical picture in humans."

As researchers work, the mayor of Mexico City expressed optimism Friday.

Authorities in Mexico are "beginning to see evidence that the (virus) might be letting up, and the number of people who have been hospitalized has leveled out in regards to people who are contagious, at least as of yesterday," Mayor Marcelo Ebrard told reporters.

"I do not say this so that we lower our guard or so that we think that we do not have a problem anymore," he said.

"We do have a problem, but I say this so that we know where we are as a city after we have done all we have done, and in what direction we are heading and how much we have progressed. And what I can say is that we are heading in the right direction."

The WHO said Mexico has 156 confirmed cases and nine deaths. Mexican authorities say they have confirmed 16 deaths and at least 381 cases, and they suspect another 85 deaths may have been caused by the flu.

The CDC gave the following state-by-state breakdown of the 141 confirmed H1N1 cases in the United States: Arizona, 4; California, 13; Colorado 2; Delaware, 4; Illinois, 3; Indiana, 3; Kansas, 2; Kentucky, 1; Massachusetts, 2; Michigan, 2; Minnesota, 1; Nebraska, 1; Nevada, 1; New Jersey, 5; New York, 50; Ohio, 1; South Carolina, 16; Texas, 28; and Virginia, 2.

One death in the United States has been attributed to swine flu -- a toddler from Mexico whose family brought him to Texas for medical treatment.

At a Cabinet meeting Friday, President Barack Obama praised the "extraordinary" government response to the virus but emphasized that "we also need to prepare for the long term."

"Since we know that these kinds of threats can emerge at any moment, even if it turns out that the H1N1 is relatively mild on the front end, it could come back in a more virulent form during the actual flu season, and that's why we are investing in our public health infrastructure."

In addition to the confirmed H1N1 cases in Mexico and the United States, Canada has 34; Spain has 13; United Kingdom has 8; New Zealand and Germany each have 4; Israel has 2; Austria, China, Denmark, Netherlands and Switzerland each have one, according to the WHO.

Several other countries were investigating hundreds of other probable cases of the virus.