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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

In brief: Suspect in Colorado slayings arrested

From Wire Reports

DENVER – A man suspected of killing three people and setting fire to a home in southern Colorado has been captured in Oklahoma after a nationwide manhunt, authorities said Sunday.

Harry Carl Mapps, 59, was arrested at a motel in Roland, Okla., on Saturday night, said Kirk Taylor, sheriff of Pueblo County, Colo. Mapps had spent more than a month on the run.

Taylor said Mapps was found using information developed by the U.S. Marshals Service in Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas. Mapps had lived in Texas.

Mapps is accused of fatally shooting Kim Tuttle, 55; her husband, Reggie Tuttle, 51; and their daughter, Dawn Roderick, 33. Their bodies were found in the Tuttles’ home in the small town of Rye after the house burned on Nov. 27.

Time running out to move brain-dead girl

OAKLAND, Calif. – The family of a California girl declared brain dead after complications from tonsil surgery was running out of time Sunday to find a new facility to take her in and keep her on a ventilator.

A judge’s ruling will allow Children’s Hospital Oakland to remove 13-year-old Jahi McMath from life support at 5 p.m. today unless her family appeals.

The family is now pinning its hopes on a New York facility after two California care homes withdrew offers to accept the teen.

Chris Dolan, the family’s attorney, said he was waiting to hear from the New York hospital after its facility director and medical director speak. He wouldn’t provide the hospital’s name, saying the media attention could hurt Jahi’s chance of being transferred there.

“The family is together, and today everybody is praying and being together,” Dolan told the Associated Press Sunday. He said no decisions had been made about legal options for today.

Hikers who triggered avalanche rescued

MOUNT WASHINGTON, N.H. – Two hikers who triggered an avalanche on Mount Washington that carried them 800 feet over rocks, cliffs and ice were rescued early Sunday morning and treated for non-life-threatening injuries, officials said.

The two were separated from a pair of fellow hikers and missed a turn on a trail because of low visibility and unknowingly entered an avalanche area known as “the Lip,” triggering the avalanche that carried them to the bottom of Tuckerman Ravine, said U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman Colleen Mainville.

Mainville said the avalanche occurred at about 5:30 p.m. Saturday and the call for help came in just after 8 p.m.

The injured and disoriented hikers climbed about 200 feet before they were met by rescuers and they were able to hike down with assistance to shelters on the mountain, Mainville said.

Two minor quakes shake Oklahoma

OKLAHOMA CITY – The U.S. Geological Survey said a 4.1-magnitude earthquake rattled an area about 30 miles north-northeast of Oklahoma City early Sunday and was followed by a smaller quake hours later in the state. There were no reports of any injuries or damages from either temblor.

Geophysicist Randy Baldwin at the USGS National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo., said the larger quake at 2:14 a.m. was centered 4.3 miles southwest of Langston and prompted several dozen reports from residents who felt the ground shake. But he told the Associated Press by phone that no area resident had reported feeling the 2.5-magnitude quake centered near Jones, recorded at 5:34 a.m.

Baldwin said Oklahoma has sporadically recorded several minor quakes in recent months but those are without any discernible pattern.