Nation Digest
Increase in traffic deaths tied to SUVs

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Last year's 43,220 fatalities marked a 1 percent increase from the 42,815 deaths recorded in 2002, according to the NHTSA. The rate of fatalities, however, was unchanged because more vehicles were on the road and more miles were driven.

The number of fatalities for all classes of vehicles except SUVs and motorcycles declined last year.

Invader fish that wriggles on land found in Maryland

WHEATON, Md. — Authorities plan to drain a Maryland lake after an angler caught a northern snakehead, the same voracious, nonnative species that infested a pond only miles away in 2002.

State officials said the 19-inch fish, an Asian species that can wriggle on land for short distances and eats so many smaller fish it can destroy an ecosystem, was pulled out of Pine Lake in Wheaton Regional Park on Monday.

The lake north of Washington, D.C., feeds a tributary of the Anacostia River, which empties into the Potomac River.

State biologists used electric shocks Tuesday to try to get a rise out of any other snakeheads, but none appeared. Wire mesh was placed over a pipe that leads out of the lake to prevent any others from escaping. Draining of the lake could begin as early as today, officials said.

Virginia snuffs out tradition of cheap cigarette taxes

RICHMOND, Va. — Without a word of dissent, Virginia legislators did what once seemed unthinkable: increased the nation's lowest cigarette tax in the state where colonists first raised tobacco as an American cash crop nearly 400 years ago.

The Senate and the House of Delegates, both controlled by Republicans, passed a $1.3 billion tax package Tuesday night that increases the state's cigarette tax from 2.5 cents a pack to 20 cents this year and to 30 cents in 2005. Democratic Gov. Mark Warner had sought higher cigarette taxes and other tax increases to balance the state's budget.
 
While a 30-cent tax seems modest compared with Washington state's tax of $1.425 a pack — the highest in the nation — the increase is remarkable in a state that has protected tobacco interests for decades, public-health advocates said.

Four charged in e-mail fraud under new 'can spam' law

WASHINGTON — U.S. authorities charged four people in Detroit yesterday with e-mailing fraudulent sales pitches for weight-loss products, the first criminal prosecutions under the government's new "can spam" legislation.

Court papers identified the four as Daniel J. Lin, James J. Lin, Mark M. Sadek and Christopher Chung, all believed to live in suburban Detroit. They were accused of disguising their identities in hundreds of thousands of sales pitches and delivering e-mails by bouncing messages through relay computers on the Internet.

Chung and Sadek appeared in U.S. District Court and were released on unsecured bonds. The Lins have not been arrested.

Sadek's lawyer, James Feinberg, said his client will plead not guilty to the criminal charges, which have not yet been challenged in court.

"No one's done this before," Feinberg said. "It will be fun — not for my client, but for me professionally."

Also ...

Allen Dwayne Coates, a Kentucky man who stalked and sexually assaulted an 11-year-old girl at a Target store in West Virginia while pretending to be a security guard was sentenced yesterday to a maximum 45 years in prison. ... Two teenage girls pleaded guilty in juvenile court in Baltimore to assaulting 12-year-old Nicole Townes at a birthday party because a boy kissed her on the cheek, beating her so badly that she spent three weeks in a coma.