Petitions filed in S.D. seek vote to repeal abortion ban
Pierre, S.D. – An abortion- rights group Tuesday submitted more than twice the number of signatures needed to hold a statewide vote in November on whether to repeal South Dakota’s ban on abortion.
The Legislature earlier this year passed the strictest abortion law in the nation, banning all abortions except those necessary to save a woman’s life. The law, scheduled to take effect July 1, makes no exceptions for rape or incest.
The South Dakota law was aimed at sparking a court fight that supporters hope will lead to the Supreme Court overturning Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 decision that established the right to an abortion.
The South Dakota Campaign for Healthy Families said it turned in more than 38,000 signatures for a statewide referendum. Nearly 17,000 valid signatures are needed to put the issue on the ballot.
The South Dakota secretary of state’s office will check the validity of the signatures collected and determine whether the measure qualifies for the ballot.
Jan Nicolay, co-chairwoman of the South Dakota Campaign for Healthy Families, said she believes it would be the nation’s first statewide election on abortion since Roe vs. Wade.
Opponents of the ban decided to pursue a popular vote instead of filing a lawsuit.
PEORIA, Ill.
Killer pleads guilty in 8 women’s deaths
A serial killer who prosecutors say burned some of his victims to ash and bits of bone in his mother’s backyard pleaded guilty Tuesday to killing eight women.
Under a deal with prosecutors, Larry Bright, 39, escaped a possible death sentence and instead will get life in prison without parole.
Four of his victims’ bodies were found dumped along little-traveled roads around Peoria in 2003 and 2004, and the remains of the others were found in burn pits in the yard at the home he shared with his mother.
DETROIT
Killing of rapper called self-defense
The man who police say shot and killed rapper Proof in a nightclub shootout acted lawfully in defense of another man, a prosecutor said Tuesday.
But Mario Etheridge still will have to face weapons charges in the April 11 incident in which Etheridge’s 35-year-old cousin Keith Bender also was killed.
Etheridge’s lawyer has said his client fired a gun while trying to defend Bender during the April 11 fight at an after-hours club on Detroit’s Eight Mile Road.
NEW YORK
Search for missing passenger called off
The Coast Guard suspended its search for a Carnival Cruise Lines passenger who jumped overboard while returning from the British Virgin Islands with his family.
Ramesh Krishnamurthy, 35, of Doylestown, Pa., had been arguing with his wife over the bar tab early Saturday when he jumped from the ship in front of his two children.
HAVANA
Officials crack down on contraband cigars
Cuban customs officials seized nearly 25,000 boxes of contraband cigars last year in efforts to decrease smuggling of the world-famous stogies, the island’s domestic news agency AIN reported Tuesday.
Travelers to Cuba can leave the island with 23 cigars without receipts, but for any amount above that they must have proof of purchase from cigar stores approved by Habanos S.A., Cuba’s cigar marketing firm.
Cigars are one of the island’s most important exports, worth about $340 million annually. But the prestige of Cuban cigars and a rise in tourism in recent years have combined to increase the black market for the product, prompting customs agents to tighten their controls.
TOKYO
Marines to leave Okinawa for Guam
Some 8,000 U.S. Marines will leave Okinawa for Guam under a proposal approved by Tokyo that is the largest realignment of U.S. troops based in Japan in 50 years, a senior Japanese official said Tuesday.
The sweeping change approved by the Cabinet will give Japan greater responsibility for security in Asia, Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said.
Japan and the United States agreed on the plan in April.
