Nation News

A German man was charged Thursday with trying to extort $100,000 from former supermodel Cindy Crawford and her entrepreneur husband Rande Gerber over a photo of their daughter bound to a chair and gagged, authorities said. Read More

The parents accused of pulling a spectacular hoax by reporting that their 6-year-old son had floated away aboard a helium balloon have agreed to plead guilty in a deal that could send them both to jail but protect the wife from deportation. Read More

President Barack Obama says he'll give U.S. troops a strategy and a clear mission if he decides to put their lives at risk protecting the American people or U.S. interests. Read More

Former Massachusetts House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi has again pleaded not guilty to federal corruption charges. Read More

Federal prosecutors Thursday took steps to seize four U.S. mosques and a Fifth Avenue skyscraper owned by a nonprofit Muslim organization long suspected of being secretly controlled by the Iranian government. Read More

The Army psychiatrist in the Fort Hood massacre was charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder Thursday as he lay in a hospital bed and President Barack Obama ordered a review to determine if the government fumbled warning signs of the shooter's contacts with a radical Islamic cleric. Read More

Relentless rain drenched much of the Atlantic seaboard Thursday, pelting communities from North Carolina northward with gusty winds and heavy rains, inundating streets, stranding drivers and causing three deaths in hard-hit Virginia and one in North Carolina. Read More

Authorities say an officer was seriously injured when two school buses carrying students and a police patrol car all collided in New York's Hudson Valley. Read More

Federal prosecutors Thursday took steps to seize four U.S. mosques and a Fifth Avenue skyscraper owned by a nonprofit Muslim organization long suspected of being secretly controlled by the Iranian government. Read More

A man charged with killing his dementia-plagued father by dragging him into the ocean has reached a plea deal, his attorney said Thursday, in a case that illuminated the stresses faced by those who care for people with Alzheimer's disease. Read More

Authorities say a van carrying members of a Colorado church group overturned on black ice early Thursday in Eastern Oregon, killing one person and injuring 15, some of them critically. Read More

With his state under an emergency declaration because of heavy rain and floods Thursday, Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine was in Arkansas for a Democratic fundraiser. Read More

President Barack Obama is in Alaska for his first visit ever to the state, albeit a very short one. Read More

A day-by-day look at President Barack Obama's trip to Asia: Read More

A mother of seven is accused of running a house of horrors for pets at her suburban Long Island home, forcing her children to help torture them and burying at least 20 dogs in her backyard _ animals neighbors now fear were beloved pets that mysteriously disappeared over the years. Read More

Authorities say a woman was fatally stabbed soon after two police officers took a domestic violence report and left her apartment. Read More

The discovery of 11 victims of an alleged serial killer, most of them poor, drug-addicted black women, has prompted calls for Cleveland police to respond faster and devote more resources to missing-persons cases. Read More

Authorities have dropped the case against a Tennessee father arrested in Japan when he snatched his children from his ex-wife, the man's spokesman said Thursday. Read More

Delta Air Lines has suspended a pilot who was charged with trying to strike officers with his plane at a Georgia airport. Read More

ACORN has been cut off by banks, the government and most of its private foundation funders, severely hampering its housing operations and raising the possibility that it will not survive in its current form, according to a lawsuit the group filed Thursday against the U.S. government. Read More