In brief: California’s extreme drought leveling off

After months of worsening drought across California, conditions appear to have leveled off, at least for now.

According to the latest assessment released Thursday, more than 80 percent of California continues to suffer extreme drought conditions – a figure that has remained unchanged now for roughly two weeks.

Despite recent thunderstorms, 58 percent of California continues to experience “exceptional” drought – the harshest on a five-level scale. Nearly 82 percent of the state, meanwhile, is experiencing “extreme” drought, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor map.

Abducted Amish sisters turn up unharmed

ALBANY, N.Y. – Two missing Amish sisters turned up safe Thursday evening, about 24 hours after they were apparently abducted from their family’s roadside farm stand in northern New York, authorities said.

St. Lawrence County District Attorney Mary Rain said the girls turned up cold and wet but unharmed at a home in Richville, about 13 miles from where they disappeared in the rural town of Oswegatchie.

She said 12-year-old Fannie and 7-year-old Delila Miller were dropped off and knocked on the door, asking for help getting home.

There were no details immediately available on what happened to the girls or if there are suspects in their disappearance.

Former crime boss appeals life sentence

BOSTON – Former Boston crime boss James “Whitey” Bulger is appealing the federal conviction that sent him to prison for life last year, arguing that he was unable to fully present his defense.

Bulger, who’s 84, was convicted and sentenced on racketeering charges that tied him to 11 murders and other gangland crimes from the 1970s and ’80s.

In an appeal filed Thursday in the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Bulger’s lawyers Henry Brennan and James Budreau argue he was “deprived” of a critical defense in his trial: that a now-dead federal prosecutor had given him immunity from his crimes.

Bulger had been an FBI informant against the rival New England Mafia, which his lawyers say allowed him to avoid prosecution for almost 25 years while his gang consolidated power and built a criminal enterprise that took in millions of dollars through drugs, gambling, loansharking and other illegal activities.