Kidnappers release Italian aid worker
Kabul, Afghanistan An Italian aid worker held hostage for more than three weeks was released Thursday evening, healthy and ready to go home, officials said.
Clementina Cantoni, 32, had worked with widows and their families for CARE International in Kabul for almost two years. She planned to return home in June but was kidnapped May 16 by armed gunmen who dragged her from her vehicle. On Thursday, she called her mother and said she was fine.
The Afghan government paid no money and did not negotiate with the kidnappers, said Ali Ahmad Jalali, the interior minister.
The release of Cantoni capped three weeks of protests by Afghans. Widows gathered with signs and slogans almost daily. Nationally respected clerics issued a ruling against the kidnapping. When a video of Cantoni was shown on the Tolo TV station, Afghans were outraged.
First big Atlantic storm of season nears Florida
Pensacola, Fla. The Atlantic hurricane season’s first named storm headed north Thursday toward the Gulf Coast as Florida residents, still recovering from last year’s devastation, watched with a wary eye.
Tropical Storm Arlene, which strengthened from a tropical depression that formed Wednesday, was centered about 75 miles south-southeast of the western tip of Cuba at 11 p.m. EDT.
The large storm’s wind and rain extended 140 miles to the north and east from its center. Eastern Cuba, the Florida Keys and parts of south Florida were getting rain from the system Thursday night.
Arlene had maximum sustained winds of 40 mph and was, at least for the time being, mostly a rain threat, forecasters said. The storm could drop as much 10 inches of rain, meteorologists said.
Forecasters earlier warned that heavy rain in Nicaragua and Honduras could cause flash floods and mud slides.
The storm was expected to enter the Gulf of Mexico by today – a path that prompted authorities to warn residents of coastal communities to beware.
Teen accused of plot accepts gun charges
Mount Clemens, Mich. A teen accused of plotting a massacre at his suburban Detroit high school pleaded guilty Thursday to several firearms charges – a day before his Internet terrorism trial is set to begin.
Andrew Osantowski, 17, faces charges of making a threat of terrorism, using a computer to make threats of terrorism and possession of a firearm in a felony. Opening statements are scheduled for today.
The case appears to be among the first in the nation in which anti-terrorism laws are being applied to school violence, according to law enforcement officials.
Police arrested Osantowski in September after discovering Internet chat room messages in which the teen allegedly threatened to kill students at Chippewa Valley High School. The messages were sent to Celia McGinty, a Moscow, Idaho, girl who alerted her father, a university police officer. He contacted Michigan authorities.
Boy, 11, crashes while driving minivan to school
Chicago A woman allowed her 11-year-old son to drive the family’s minivan to his elementary school, where the boy crashed the vehicle near a group of children.
No one was hurt. The boy, however, was expelled from school, and both he and his mother were ordered to traffic court later this month.
The crash happened Monday outside St. John Fisher School on Chicago’s South Side, not far from where the children were lining up to go inside. The minivan jumped the curb and hit a school zone sign as the boy tried to turn a corner, authorities said.
Police said they don’t know why Erin Sarandah decided to let her son drive the couple of blocks from home to the school while she and her daughter were passengers. “She had a license,” said police spokesman Pat Camden. Sarandah was cited for damage to property and allowing an unauthorized person to drive, Camden said. The boy received a traffic ticket for negligent driving and driving without a license.