Tropical storm kills eight, leaves 23 missing in Haiti
Port-au-Prince, Haiti – Alpha, the Atlantic season’s record- breaking 22nd named storm, left at least eight people dead and 23 missing in Haiti before moving north into the Atlantic Ocean and weakening into a tropical depression.
At least three people also were missing in the neighboring Dominican Republic as mudslides and overflowing rivers flooded streets and destroyed homes, according to officials in both countries.
Alpha passed over the two nations that share the Caribbean island of Hispaniola and dropped heavy rains on ground already saturated by other recent storms, including Hurricane Wilma – which was blamed for 12 deaths in Haiti.
Alpha rumbled ashore Saturday as a tropical storm with maximum winds of 50 mph near the southern Dominican town of Barahona and doused the region with showers.
It was later downgraded to a tropical depression after passing over the mountainous zone near the Dominican border with Haiti. The system moved into the open Atlantic after passing over the southeastern Bahamas. It posed no threat to the United States and was expected to dissipate.
Emergency authorities were still assessing the damage from Alpha and the death toll could rise, Maria Alta Jean Baptiste, the head of Haiti’s civil protection agency, said Monday.
LOS ANGELES
Death warrant signed for Crips co-founder
A judge signed a death warrant Monday for Stanley “Tookie” Williams, co-founder of the notorious Crips gang, rejecting his attorneys’ request for a delay in the execution date to give them more time to seek clemency from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Williams is scheduled to die Dec. 13 at San Quentin prison. He maintains he is innocent, and supporters cite his renunciation of his past and his efforts to curtail gang violence, including a series of children’s books he co-wrote in prison.
Williams, 53, was sentenced to death in 1981 for fatally shooting Albert Owens, a Whittier convenience store worker, in 1979. He also was convicted of killing two Los Angeles motel owners and their daughter during a robbery that same year.
SAN FRANCISCO
Lawyer’s slain wife had stab wound
The slain wife of prominent defense attorney Daniel Horowitz had a 4-inch stab wound in her abdomen and was found lying in a pool of blood, according to documents released Monday.
Pamela Vitale also had a traumatic head injury and multiple wounds on her legs, and investigators found a bloody shoeprint on the lid of a storage container at the crime scene.
A neighbor, Scott Dyleski, 16, was charged as an adult with murder last week. Police believe he tried to have marijuana-growing supplies delivered to Vitale’s address, then confronted Vitale.
AUSTIN, Texas
Retired judge to rule on judge for DeLay
A retired Texas judge will decide next week whether state District Judge Bob Perkins should continue presiding over former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s trial on money-laundering and conspiracy charges.
C.W. Duncan, a former state district judge, will preside at a Nov. 1 hearing on DeLay’s request that Perkins leave the case because he has contributed money to candidates and Democratic causes that oppose DeLay.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti
U.N. peacekeeper from Jordan dies
A U.N. peacekeeper who was shot while on patrol near the volatile Cite Soleil slum of Haiti’s capital died Monday at a hospital in neighboring Dominican Republic, a U.N. spokesman said.
The peacekeeper was shot in the head Saturday while his patrol was trying to rescue a kidnapped woman. The peacekeeper was identified as Muhammed Khalaf, 32, a corporal from the Jordanian army. He is one of some 7,600 U.N. troops and police trying to re-establish order ahead of elections.
VILNIUS, Lithuania
NATO will help Ukraine join alliance
NATO pledged Monday to help Ukraine push through military reforms seen as essential to prepare the country for membership in the Western alliance – a prospect viewed with concern in Russia.
The alliance, anxious not to alarm Moscow, dodged questions at a meeting of defense ministers about whether Ukraine might be included in 2008, when NATO is expected to take in new members from the Balkans.
“NATO reaffirmed its open- door policy and intends to offer maximum help in the implementation of the necessary reforms” to Ukraine’s oversized armed forces, NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said.
KATMANDU, Nepal
14 climbers believed killed by avalanche
Fourteen climbers from France and Nepal were swept away in an avalanche on a Himalayan mountain and believed killed. Rescuers were sent to the 22,900-foot Kang Guru in northwestern Nepal to search for seven French and seven Nepalese climbers missing since last week.
“The climbers were swept and buried by the avalanche, and our team have reported there is no hope of finding them alive,” a Nepalese official said.
