November 30th, 2012
04:21 PM ET
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Murder charge dismissed against U.S. Open tennis ump

New evidence has persuaded Los Angeles County prosecutors to drop murder charges against a U.S. Open tennis umpire.

Lois Goodman, 70, had been accused of bludgeoning her 80-year-old husband, Alan, with a coffee mug, and then fatally stabbing him with the broken mug's shards at their California home in April.

"We received additional information regarding the case," Sandi Gibbons of the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office said Friday. "Based upon this information, we announced that we are unable to proceed with the case at this time. The court granted our request to dismiss the case without prejudice."

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Filed under: California
November 30th, 2012
03:45 PM ET
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College faculty member, suspect among three killed in Wyoming

Three people were killed Friday in the eastern Wyoming city of Casper, among them the suspect who died of an "apparent suicide," police said.

According to a statement from the Casper police, "there were no firearms involved in the crime, and the victim's injuries were caused by a sharp-edged weapon." It was not immediately clear how the three people - one of whom as a faculty member at Casper College - were killed.

Police Chief Chris Walsh did not identify the dead but said they included two males and one female. "One of those deceased is one of those who were committing all the violence," he said.

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November 30th, 2012
01:54 PM ET
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Syria caused Internet blackout, security firm says

Despite claims to the contrary, the Syrian government is almost certainly responsible for a blackout Thursday that shut down virtually all Internet service in the country, according to a leading Web security firm.

"The Syrian Minister of Information is being reported as saying that the government did not disable the Internet, but instead the outage was caused by a cable being cut," writes Matthew Prince, CEO of CloudFlare. "From our investigation, that appears unlikely to be the case."

Fighting again between rebels and forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad disrupted much of Damascus on Friday, and there was no Internet service throughout much of Syria for a second straight day. The airport was closed to flights, and fighting killed another 31 people across the country on Friday, according to an opposition group that counts casualties.

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Filed under: Syria • Technology
Powerball winners claim half of record prize
November 30th, 2012
01:45 PM ET
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Powerball winners claim half of record prize

"I think we're going to have a pretty good Christmas," Cindy Hill joked Friday, just minutes after a Missouri lottery official announced that Hill and her family had won half of the record $587.5 million Powerball jackpot.

"We're still stunned by what's happened. It's surreal," Hill said. "Every once in a while you look at each other and say, 'Did we really win that money?'" said the Dearborn, Missouri, resident.

Seated at a table at Dearborn's North Platte R-1 High School, Hill, her husband, Mark, their three grown sons, Jason, Cody and Jarod, and their adopted 6-year-old daughter, Jaiden, joyfully answered questions from the media.

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Filed under: Lotto • Missouri
November 30th, 2012
11:30 AM ET
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‘I knew I had to help,’ cop says of charity act gone viral

New York police Officer Larry DePrimo's gift of boots to a barefoot homeless man on a cold November night warmed the hearts of America when a candid photo of the act spread on the Internet.

DePrimo says it was an easy decision - the man's feet had blisters the size of his palm - and the kind of thing that fellow officers often do without fanfare.

"It was extremely cold out, and ... you could see the blisters from like 10, 15 feet away," DePrimo told CNN on Friday morning. "He was a gentleman when I had spoken to him, and I knew I had to help him."

DePrimo, 25, was the unwitting star of a photo that a tourist captured near Times Square on November 14, showing him kneeling by the man and presenting him boots and socks that he had just bought for him.

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Filed under: New York
November 30th, 2012
09:54 AM ET
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Man sentenced to death for holding women in sex dungeon

A Chinese man was sentenced to death Friday for holding six women as sex slaves in an underground lair and ordering the deaths of two of them, state media reported.

A court in Luoyang city convicted Li Hao on charges of murder, rape, organized prostitution, illegal detention and selling pornography, state-run Xinhua said.

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Filed under: China • Crime • Justice • World
Train with toxic cargo crashes off bridge into creek
Train tanker cars dangle from a collapsed railroad bridge near Paulsboro, New Jersey, on Friday.
November 30th, 2012
09:17 AM ET
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Train with toxic cargo crashes off bridge into creek

bridge collapsed in the West Deptford area of New Jersey on Friday, sending several train cars carrying toxic chemicals crashing into a creek near the Delaware River, the U.S. Coast Guard said.

Vinyl chloride, a highly toxic and flammable chemical, is believed to be leaking into Mantua Creek, Petty Officer Nick Ameen told CNN. No serious injuries have been reported, but nearby schools are on lockdown, a borough emergency official said, and people in the immediate area have been evacuated.

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November 30th, 2012
07:43 AM ET
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Friday's live events

The talk in Washington is all about the "fiscal cliff" and what the president and Congress need to do to avoid it.  Watch CNN.com Live for continuing coverage of the fiscal cliff debate.

Today's programming highlights...

Ongoing coverage - Crisis in Egypt

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Filed under: Budget • Economy • Egypt • Finance • Jobs • On CNN.com today • Taxes • World