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Christian Science Monitor July 22, 2004 US Bounty Hunter Claims Pentagon Ties One of three Americans charged with torturing Afghans says Pentagon "applauded" his work. By Gretchen Peters, Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor KABUL, AFGHANISTAN – Making an already murky case murkier yet, three Americans accused of torturing Afghans in a private jail went on trial Wednesday insisting their counterterrorism mission had support from the Pentagon. The US military has denied any ties to Jonathan K. Idema, who was arrested along with Brett Bennett and Edward Caraballo on July 5 when Afghan security forces raided the Kabul compound where...

MONTPELLIER, France - A Frenchman allegedly traumatized by the Madrid bombings tried to run down a pedestrian he mistook for Osama Bin Laden. The 35-year-old, identified as Pierre, was the "victim of a hallucination" while driving through Montpellier in southern France, his lawyer said. Pierre was sentenced Tuesday by a court to a three-month suspended prison term and fined $615. The man he tried to run over was unharmed, but the car was wrecked. "If it was [Osama], we would have won $5 million," Mendel said.

<p>IT WAS half past one in the morning when Harry Cokley, desperately trying to get enough sleep so that his early rising wouldn't leave him groggy, heard the knock at his front door.</p> <p>Cokley, a 52-year-old truck driver who lives on Belvieu Avenue in Northwest Baltimore, works for the North Bay Distributing Co. His job requires getting up early and allows no time for late-night nonsense. But that's exactly what happened on this August evening.</p>

So here's what the FBI says about the capture of convicted rapist Andrew Luster, who was on the lam in Mexico before a bounty hunter nicknamed "Dog" beat the FBI at its own game and collared him:

LOS ANGELES &#8211; A bounty hunter who calls himself "Dog" captured convicted rapist and cosmetics heir Andrew Luster, but it has cost him time in a Mexican jail and the disdain of his colleagues. Duane "Dog" Chapman &#8211; his nickname is God spelled backward &#8211; and two others took Luster down at a taco stand on Wednesday, witnesses said. Luster, 39, was deported to California Thursday, but Chapman and four others remained in Mexican custody, facing potential charges ranging from entering Mexico illegally to kidnapping. Fellow bail enforcement agents, as they prefer to be identified, were disgusted. "This Chapman ......

The Western Mail - The National Newspaper Of Wales HUNDREDS of foreign fighters have infiltrated southern Iraq to target and kill British troops in one of the final major showdowns of the war, intelligence officers have discovered. Young fighters from Syria, Lebanon and Palestine have joined the ranks of the Iraqi regime's die-hards to fight against the Royal Marines and 7 Armoured Brigade around the besieged city of Basra. Many are motivated by religion and appear to have answered Saddam Hussein's call for jihad - or holy war - against western forces. But others have come in search of the...