Nation Digest
FBI searches offices of top pro-Israel lobby

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The search and the subpoenas for four top officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) indicate that the politically charged investigation remains active. No criminal charges have been filed.

The FBI investigation became public in August with news reports that authorities were looking into the handling of classified information by Pentagon employee Lawrence Franklin.

Current and former U.S. officials have said that authorities are investigating whether Franklin shared a highly classified draft presidential policy document on Iran with AIPAC staffers, who in turn passed it to Israel.

Woman's execution blocked by Texas governor

HUNTSVILLE, Texas — Texas Gov. Rick Perry blocked the execution of a woman two hours before she was to go to her death yesterday so her lawyers can conduct new tests on evidence in the 17-year-old case.

Frances Newton, 39, was convicted of killing her husband and two young children. She would have been the first black woman and the fourth female put to death in Texas since the Civil War. She denied involvement in the slayings.

Meanwhile, in Harrisburg, Pa., the Pennsylvania Supreme Court blocked the execution of a man convicted of killing 13 people in a 1982 shooting rampage.

The justices ordered a mental-competency evaluation for George E. Banks, 62, convicted of killing five of his children, four current or former girlfriends and four others. He said he wanted to protect his children from abuse he suffered as a biracial child.

Ex-Bush campaign official is indicted

CONCORD, N.H. — President Bush's former New England campaign chairman was indicted yesterday on federal charges he took part in the jamming of the Democrats' get-out-the-vote phone lines on Election Day 2002.
 
James Tobin, 44, stepped down Oct. 15 — two weeks before Election Day — after the Democrats accused him of involvement.

HIV rises 11 percent among gay and bisexual men

The number of newly diagnosed HIV and AIDS cases among U.S. gay and bisexual men increased 11 percent in the four-year period ended in 2003, raising fears of a new outbreak of the disease in a group experts say has become increasingly casual about taking protective measures.

The increase was offset somewhat by a decline in new cases among intravenous drug users, so the overall rate increased by 1 percent over the same period, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

ALSO

A Roman Catholic priest, the Rev. Robert Gale, was sentenced yesterday in Cambridge, Mass., to 4½ to 5 years in prison for repeatedly raping an altar boy in the 1980s.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush went to the Supreme Court yesterday in a bid to keep severely brain-damaged Terri Schiavo alive over her husband's objections.

A jury of seven men and five women was selected yesterday in Los Angeles to decide whether actor Robert Blake murdered his wife, Bonny Lee Bakley. The panel was ordered to return Monday for opening statements.