1 dead, 3 missing in Colorado floods
Floodwaters wash over a highway in Manitou Springs, Colorado, this weekend.
August 10th, 2013
03:00 PM ET
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1 dead, 3 missing in Colorado floods

Three people were unaccounted for in Manitou Springs, Colorado, after an inch and a half of rain caused flash floods, the town's police chief said Saturday.

One of the missing is a petite blonde woman "seen near the creek hanging in a tree one minute and not seen the next," Police Chief Joe Ribeiro said. Two other men were also reported missing by a family member and a neighbor.

The National Weather Service say more showers and thunderstorms are expected through the weekend in states ranging from the Pacific Northwest to the deep South. In Colorado, slow-moving, heavy rain could wreak even more havoc by way of flash flooding as it falls on saturated and unstable soils in the area plagued by last year's devastating Waldo Canyon wildfire.

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Filed under: Colorado • Flooding • Weather
Pennsylvania suing to stop NCAA's Penn State sanctions
January 2nd, 2013
11:32 AM ET
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Pennsylvania suing to stop NCAA's Penn State sanctions

[Updated at 11:32 a.m. ET] The state of Pennsylvania will file a federal antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA, seeking to have a judge throw out all sanctions the association levied against Penn State University in the wake of the child sex abuse scandal involving former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett said Wednesday.

Corbett (pictured) said the penalties - a $60 million fine, a four-year ban on bowl games, football scholarship reductions, and the stripping of 14 seasons of football victories under late head coach Joe Paterno - were unfair to the university, its students, and Pennsylvania citizens because the Sandusky criminal matter already is being handled in courts.

The NCAA "piled on ... (punishing) the citizens of Pennsylvania, who had nothing to do with these crimes," Corbett said.

"These sanctions are an attack on the past, present and future students of Penn State, the citizens of our commonwealth and our economy. As governor of this commonwealth, I cannot and will not stand by and let it happen without a fight," Corbett said.

He said the NCAA's actions were unlawful and overreaching, and that it essentially forced Penn State to accept the sanctions under the threat that if the school didn't accept them, the NCAA would impose on the football program a "death penalty" - a suspension from play of a year or more.

The NCAA levied the penalties last July.

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Coming nor'easter prompts evacuations in seaside New Jersey town hit by Sandy
Sandy devastated parts of Brick, New Jersey, as shown here last week, and a new storm could bring more damage.
November 5th, 2012
10:32 PM ET
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Coming nor'easter prompts evacuations in seaside New Jersey town hit by Sandy

One week after Sandy devastated many seaside communities in northern New Jersey, one of them is telling some of its residents to evacuate yet again - this time because of  a new storm.

The Office of Emergency Management for Brick, New Jersey, issued the mandatory evacuation order for residents in low-lying areas as a nor'easter approaches. According to the National Weather Service, the community of about 75,000 people will get more than an inch of rain and wind gusts as strong as 55 mph.

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Filed under: New Jersey • Weather
October 26th, 2012
10:02 AM ET
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'All clear' given at Canadian Embassy in Washington

[Updated at 10:50 a.m. ET] People are being allowed back into the Canadian Embassy in Washington after police have given the "all clear" after a report of a suspicious package inside. FULL POST

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Filed under: Canada • District of Columbia
May 20th, 2012
09:36 PM ET
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Guard killed, several others injured in riot at Mississippi prison, officials say

A prison guard was killed and several employees injured Sunday in a riot at the Adams County Correctional Facility in Natchez, Mississippi, officials said.

The 23-year-old guard appeared to suffer "blunt trauma to the head," said Adams County Coroner James Lee.

The riot, which began about 2:40 p.m., was ongoing Sunday night, the facility said in a statement. Local and state law enforcement officials as well as authorities from the Federal Bureau of Prisons were helping the facility quell the violence.

"The disturbance is contained within the secure perimeter of the facility, with no threat to public safety," the statement said.

Five employees and one inmate were taken to a hospital for treatment of unspecified injuries, while additional staff members were being treated at the prison.

The cause of the incident is under investigation.

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Filed under: Crime • Justice • Mississippi • Prisons
January 8th, 2012
12:19 AM ET
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Linguists name 'occupy' as 2011's word of the year

The linguists have spoken and they have decided - "Occupy" is 2011's word of the year.

Members of the American Dialect Society came out in record numbers to vote Friday night at the organization's annual conference, held this year in Portland, Oregon.

"Occupy" won a runoff vote by a whopping majority, earning more votes than "FOMO" (an acronym for "Fear of Missing Out," describing anxiety over being inundated by the information on social media) and "the 99%," (those held to be at a financial or political disadvantage to the top moneymakers, the one-percenters).

Occupy joins previous year's winners, "app," "tweet," and "bailout."

"It's a very old word, but over the course of just a few months it took on another life and moved in new and unexpected directions, thanks to a national and global movement," Ben Zimmer, chair of the New Words Committee for the American Dialect Society, said in a statement.

The Occupy Wall Street movement began in September in Lower Manhattan, before spreading to communities around the country and the world as a call to action against unequal distribution of wealth and other issues.

Founded in 1889, the American Dialect Society is made up of "academics, linguists, anyone involved in the specialization of language," according to Grant Barrett, the society's vice president.

Barrett, who also co-hosts "A Way with Words," a public radio program about language, said the annual conference provides an opportunity for linguistics professionals and graduate students to share information and research.

But Barrett says the word of the year vote, now in its 22nd year is, "light-hearted and whimsical."

Nominations for the word of the year are submitted by society members in attendance at the annual conference, but can also be submitted by the community at large.

"Occupy" may have taken top honors, but several other words and phrases received recognition.

"Mellencamp," a woman who has aged out of being a "cougar" (after John Cougar Mellencamp), and "kardash," a unit of measurement consisting of 72 days, after the short-lived marriage of Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries, were both recognized in the "Most Creative" category.

Barrett said many of the nominated words that have significance now likely won't stand the test of time.

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Filed under: U.S. • World
December 24th, 2011
08:26 PM ET
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2-year-old missing after double homicide in Virginia

Police in Richmond, Virginia, issued an Amber Alert on Saturday for a 2-year-old girl who was in a car a shooting suspect allegedly used to flee the scene of a double homicide.

The shooting occurred during a home invasion, Richmond police spokesman Linwood Harris said. The suspect then left the scene in a car idling nearby, according to CNN's Richmond affiliate WWBT. The toddler was inside the car, Harris said.

The identities of the shooting victims were not released and it was not immediately known what relation, if any, they had to the missing girl.

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Filed under: Crime • Missing Children • Virginia