$14K DONATED TO OHIO FOUNTAIN CHANGE THEFT SUSPECT: BELLEFONTAINE, Ohio (AP) — More than $14,000 has been donated online to help a western Ohio woman who said she stole change from a courthouse fountain to buy food and was charged with petty theft.
Police allege Deirdre Romine took $2.87 from a fountain at the Logan County Courthouse in Bellefontaine this month. Romine has said she didn't think the money belonged to anyone and she was jobless and trying to feed herself and her cats.
Police Chief Brandon Standley says Romine lied when an officer questioned her and found the change. He says that's why the officer determined a citation was merited.
The 38-year-old Romine pleaded not guilty. Her trial is scheduled next month. Officials hope to resolve the case sooner.
INTERNET ADDRESS SYSTEM EXPANDS WITH 4 SUFFIXES: SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The oversight agency for Internet addresses says it has added four domain name suffixes— the first of hundreds expected in the coming years in the online addressing system's largest expansion ever.
The first four are all in foreign languages to reflect a growing international population that still has to enter Latin characters for many websites. They represent Chinese for "game," Arabic for "network" and Cyrillic for "online" and "site."
People and businesses should be able to start registering names ending on those suffixes soon. The announcement Wednesday reflects the addition of those suffixes into the master database.
There are currently more than 300 suffixes, mostly codes assigned for specific countries. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers has been taking bids for new ones in English and other languages.
EX-CAMPUS COP REACHES WORKER'S COMP SETTLEMENT: DAVIS (AP) — The former University of California, Davis police officer who pepper-sprayed Occupy protesters has reached a worker's compensation settlement with the university system.
A judge on Oct. 16 approved the $38,000 settlement between John Pike and the University of California.
The 40-year-old former officer said he suffered depression and anxiety after death threats were sent to him and his family over the Nov. 18, 2011 event.
University spokesman Andy Fell said the case was resolved in accordance with state laws.
Video of Pike pepper-spraying the protesters went viral online.
His address and other personal information were posted online afterward, and he received scores of death threats.
Pike was fired in July 2012 after eight months of paid administrative leave.
ER PHYSICIAN SAYS DOCTOR OFFERED $10K TO SAVE WIFE: SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A Utah doctor accused of killing his wife offered money to an emergency room physician to keep trying save his wife, the physician testified Wednesday.
"He offered me $10,000 to continue my resuscitation and not quit," Scott Vanwagoner said during the murder trial of Martin MacNeill.
Vanwagoner said he was already working furiously to revive Michele MacNeill, and the defendant must have known his wife was already dead.
He called MacNeill's remark "off-the-wall" and the oddest experience of his medical career.
"I'm not sure how to answer that question, or why he would make that offer," Vanwagoner told a jury in Provo.
It was the latest testimony about MacNeill's bizarre behavior on the day his wife died.
N O CHARGES AGAINST ZIMMERMAN IN DISPUTE WITH WIFE: SANFORD, Fla. (AP) — A police spokesman says no criminal charges will be filed against George Zimmerman in a dispute last month with his estranged wife.
Lake Mary Officer Zach Hudson said Wednesday that investigators had decided the dispute didn't rise to a criminal level.
The dispute last month came just days after Shellie Zimmerman filed divorce papers.
Shellie Zimmerman said in the divorce papers that she had separated from her husband in August, a month after he was acquitted in the 2012 fatal shooting death of unarmed black teen Trayvon Martin.
OSWALD WEDDING RING AMONG JFK ITEMS UP FOR AUCTION: DALLAS (AP) — On the morning of Nov. 22, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald left his wedding ring in a cup on the dresser and left $170 in one of its drawers before he headed for work at the Texas School Book Depository.
The gold band that belonged to the man who assassinated President John F. Kennedy later that day is among nearly 300 items linked to the former president that go up for auction Thursday in Boston.
Bobby Livingston, an executive vice president with the New Hampshire-based auction house, RR Auction, described the ring, which has a tiny hammer and sickle engraved on the inside of the band, as a "very powerful, significant piece of evidence."
"It gives you such insight into the mind of Lee Harvey Oswald," said Livingston, who added that the ring could bring $100,000 or more.
It was relatively recently that the seller, Oswald's widow, Marina Oswald Porter, recovered the ring, which apparently sat forgotten for decades in the files of a Fort Worth lawyer who once did work for her.
SAUDI AIRMAN FOUND GUILTY IN VEGAS CHILD RAPE CASE: LAS VEGAS (AP) — A jury found a Saudi Arabian air force sergeant guilty Wednesday of raping a 13-year-old boy at a Las Vegas Strip hotel last New Year's Eve.
Defendant Mazen Alotaibi (MAH'-zen ah-loh-TAH'-bee) remained seated, clenching his jaw but showing no outward emotion as the verdict was read in Nevada state court.
The 24-year-old Royal Saudi Air Force mechanic, who had been in the U.S. for military training, will face a minimum mandatory 35 years in state prison at sentencing Dec. 16.
Clark County District Court Judge Stefany Miley could sentence him to prison for life.
The jury of nine women and three men found Alotaibi guilty of sexual assault with a minor for forcing oral and anal sex on the boy in the bathroom of a sixth-floor room at the Circus Circus hotel, and lewdness with a child for fondling and kissing the boy on the way to the room.
