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At least one dead and three wounded after gunman reportedly opens fire in Beaumont courthouse, while suspect now believed to be holding hostages. More headlines from FoxNews.com: http://email.foxnews.com/t?ctl=1D4B1:0DBDA5A47DC7658469E0706BCB13099D&

Amanda Knox may soon return to Italy by LINDA BYRON / KING 5 News NWCN.com Posted on January 25, 2012 at 6:03 PM The Amanda Knox saga isn’t over yet. Knox was acquitted of murder and released in October after spending four years behind bars in Italy. But her Italian attorney Carlo Dalla Vedova says Knox could be going back to Italy as soon as September in order to help her parents, who are on trial for slander. At a pre-trial hearing Tuesday, an Italian judge ruled there is enough evidence against Amanda’s parents, for the case to go to...

This is a topic that I have considered posting for a long time. I'm hoping to generate some good quality discussion, becuase I think this really matters. I don't know the answers. I hope that with some vigorous discussion maybe some good actionable ideas will come out. The exercise is this: You are out and about, let's say... at a shopping mall. It could be anywhere, of course. But for the purposes of this exercise we're at a shopping mall. You're looking at a nice pair of boots in the window of some store-- suddenly the unmistakable sound of gunshots...

<p>Oakland (CNN) -- A verdict has been reached in the trial of a former police officer who is white and who is accused of killing an unarmed black man in Oakland, California, according to a superior court spokesman. The verdict will be read at 4 p.m. (7 p.m. ET).</p>

Skin cells turned directly into neurons By Clive Cookson Published: January 28 2010 02:00 | Last updated: January 28 2010 02:00 Stem cell scientists at Stanford University in California announced "a huge step forward" last night, with the publication of research that turned skin into nerve cells without any intermediate step. The production of neurons [nerve cells] directly from other adult cells, without making stem cells en route, could transform "regenerative medicine" - providing a plentiful supply of neurons for treating people with degenerative brain diseases such as Parkinson's or those with spinal injuries. "We actively and directly induced one...

Posted: 9:02 am PDT July 3, 2009 Updated: 9:16 am PDT July 3, 2009 SEATTLE -- A fire at Fisher Plaza has disrupted stations that broadcast from the building near the Seattle Center and many Seattle-based Internet sites. KOMO Radio said the fire in an electrical vault about 11 p.m. Thursday forced the evacuation of the building and caused the sprinkler system to activate. The fire and water damage knocked out a large data center in the building that handles many Seattle-based web sites. Authorize.net, which handles credit card transactions for tens of thousands of e-commerce vendors, is one of...

PHOENIX (AP) - There was a time in the Wild West that cowboys had to check their guns before they could pull up a bar stool for a drink - rules that protected against the saloon gunfights that came to define the frontier era in places like Arizona. But a bill moving through the Arizona Legislature has some bar owners fearful that the state is turning back the clock to the Old West. Lawmakers are considering a bill that would allow anyone with a concealed-weapons permit to bring a handgun into bars and restaurants serving alcohol. The bill gives bars...

The Medieval and Renaissance blade, a profound and beautiful object handcrafted by master artisans of old. An object of great complexity, yet one with a singular use in mind- it is designed to kill. The truth of the sword has been shrouded in antiquity, and the Renaissance martial arts that brought it to being are long forgotten. The ancient practitioners lent us all they knew through their manuscripts. As gunslingers of the Renaissance they were western heroes with swords, and they lived and died by them. Yet today their history remains cloaked under a shadow of legend.

A little nugget that came up in a conversation with my Dad: It’s been a while since I took tax accounting, but as I recall: You can’t “gift” away income in order to avoid the tax on it. No matter what you do with it, it is still *income*, and still taxable. Isn't that swell... The AIG executives that have returned their bonuses—still have to pay the tax on them anyway. What do you suppose congress will do about *that*? LOL. What a comedy of errors this has become.

Washington, D.C. 09:28 AM PST on Monday, February 2, 2009 By KING5.com Staff SEATTLE – King County Executive Ron Sims is heading to Washington, D.C. to work for the Obama administration, Seattle Times columnist Joni Balter is reporting. Balter says Sims will take a job as deputy secretary, No. 2, at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Rumors about Sims have been circulating for months. Sims has called a 10 a.m. news conference. Sims was first elected to the King County Council in 1985. He was appointed King County Executive in 1996 after then-Executive Gary Locke was elected...

Sword Post 2: Woohoo! It’s time for Tuesday night Sword Pron! � Today’s topic: Guards. “Guards” are essentially stances. They’re places to start and places to end. They are ways to hold the sword to begin fighting, and curiously enough, most of the strikes that one will take with a sword are merely a progression from one “guard” or “hut” to another. To wit: There are 4 basic guards. Since the vast majority of the surviving source material is in German, they are named in German. The picture is from a 14th century Fechtbuch (fight book). They are (in the...

Another Odd Guru By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Tuesday, April 22, 2008 4:20 PM PT Election '08: Killing God and destroying the right to private property are usually associated with communism. They also seem important to the prominent legal theorist serving as Barack Obama's technology adviser. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Stanford Law Professor Lawrence Lessig likes to treat his audiences to a short video that doesn't always go over so well. In it, Jesus Christ lip-syncs Gloria Gaynor's late '70s disco hit "I Will Survive," during which he strips down to just a diaper, effeminately struts along a city street and finally...

<p>Greensport Mall, Houston. Being reported on Fox News right now.</p>

TACOMA, Wash. - More than an hour after an explosion rocked the Atlast Foundry in Tacoma, Deputy Fire Chief Jolene Davis says firefighters are trying to prevent another propane tank from exploding. Washington State Patrol told KING 5 there was a possiblity of two more explosions at the foundry, located at 3021 South Wilkeson in Tacoma, if they didn't bring the fire under control. At 3 p.m. an explosion was heard miles away, and witnesses reported flames shooting into the sky. Two people have been taken to the hospital with burns, but there are no confirmed fatalities according to Jeff...

Former Congresswoman Jennifer Dunn dies 09:28 AM PDT on Wednesday, September 5, 2007 KING5.com staff Jennifer Dunn SEATTLE - Former Washington State Congresswoman Jennifer Dunn has died, her family announced Wednesday. Dunn, 66, collapsed from a pulmonary embolism in her Alexandria, VA apartment and never regained consciousness, her son, King County Councilmember Reagan Dunn, said in a press release. She passed peacefully surrounded by family. Dunn, member of the House of Representaives from 1993 to 2005, representing Washington's 8th Congressional District. On her retirement in 2005, President Bush said "She is a superb legislator and a strong leader who has...

One hurt in explosion in parking lot of Las Vegas Strip resort LAS VEGAS Authorities are investigating a report that an explosion hurt one person this morning in a parking lot outside a Las Vegas Strip resort. No word yet on the cause of the blast or the extent of injuries to the person. The incident was reported a little after 4 a-m on the second floor of the two-story parking structure behind the Luxor hotel-casino. Police, firefighters and federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents have blocked off the parking structure while they investigate.

What does it take to win a war? A young Canadian soldier thinks out loud. Might: Ever since the ancient Greeks invented the decisive battle, westerners have held an important edge in warfare. Some historians have hypothesized that the Greeks invented the decisive battle simply out of necessity. Farming was a full time occupation in the Greek city-states, and there simply wasn’t extra time to spend mucking about with protracted warfare. When differences arose, the Greeks found it simplest to line up in heavy armor with long spears and meet face to face. The battles would be gruesome, but short-lived,...

Developing Story Shooting at Tacoma high school - Students at Foss High School in Tacoma are being released following a shooting in the parking lot of the school. One student has been taken to the hospital. Parents are asked to pick up their kids between 8:30 and 9 a.m.

John Edwards' folly: A book signing gone wrong 9 hours, 57 minutes ago Former Sen. John Edwards is to spend an hour at the Manchester Barnes & Noble tonight promoting his new book. We find his choice of venue very interesting. In Manchester, the local Wal-Mart store sits right behind the Barnes & Noble. It has more floor space, a parking lot several times the size of Barnes & Noble's, and is easier to access by car or public transportation. But Edwards would not be caught dead inside a Wal-Mart. Saying that the company pays its employees too little, Edwards...

One killed when construction crane collapses in Bellevue 10:31 PM PST on Thursday, November 16, 2006 KING5.com KING A construction crane collapse in downtown Bellevue Thursday evening. BELLEVUE, Wash. - One person was killed when a construction crane collapsed Thursday night at about 7:45 p.m. in downtown Bellevue on 180th Avenue NE near NE 4th Street. The west side of Pinnacle Bell Centre Apartments was torn away when the crane came down. The dead person was found in the top floor of the apartment building, Bellevue Fire Department Lt. Bruce Kroon said. The top floor of the Pinnacle Bell Centre...

NEWS RELEASE August 29, 2006 ICE arrests 15 aliens in Roswell working for U.S. military contractor ROSWELL, N.M. - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) special agents today arrested 15 illegal aliens who were working for a local company here that is under contract to paint U.S. military aircraft, including Lockheed C-130 military aircraft. Some of the aliens were in the process of painting these aircraft when they were arrested. Federal agents today executed a search warrant at Dean Baldwin Painting Inc., 82 Earl Cumming Loop, Hangar 1083, in Roswell, N.M. ICE was assisted in the investigation by the following...

Somebody has bought tickets to “United 93.” The movie about heroism about the doomed Sept. 11 flight grossed $11.6 million in sales and finished second place (to “RV”) when it debuted last weekend. Directed and written by Paul Greengrass, the docudrama has gotten spectacular critical reviews. But those same reviews tell you why “United 93” poses no box office threat to “Mission: Impossible III.” Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times, for example, called it “masterful and heartbreaking” – but also “deeply disturbing.” Gary Thompson of the Philadelphia Daily News described it as “taut, clinical, almost merciless.” Audience reaction has been...

Fugitive couple caught in Washington 06:59 PM PST on Tuesday, March 28, 2006 Associated Press LONG BEACH, Wash. - First they were missing, then they were found, then they fled and now - finally - an end is in sight in the saga of Elbert and Becky Higginbotham. AP file photo Elbert Higginbotham talks to reporters after the family is rescued. The Arizona couple was arrested Tuesday in Pacific County, Washington, according to police there. The two are wanted in Arizona after allegedly being caught with a small amount of methamphetamine and a shotgun 11 months ago. They received national...

MARCH 15, 2006 (IDG NEWS SERVICE) - Three computer science researchers are warning that viruses embedded in radio tags used to identify and track goods are right around the corner, a danger that so far has been overlooked by the industry's high interest in the technology. No viruses targeting radio frequency identification (RFID) technology have been released live yet, according to the researchers at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands. But RFID tags have several characteristics that could be engineered to exploit vulnerabilities in middleware and back-end databases, they wrote in a paper presented today at a conference in Pisa,...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 6, 2006 — A Justice Department inspector general report found that problems with FBI forensic analysis and performance led to the mistaken arrest of an Oregon man as a suspect in the March 11, 2004, Madrid train bombings. Portland attorney Brandon Mayfield was incorrectly identified by the FBI as a suspect in the attacks because of incorrect fingerprint data. Mayfield was arrested on May 6, 2004, and secretly held as a material witness for two weeks. He was released when the Spanish National Police eventually matched the fingerprints to an Algerian national. Justice Department's Inspector General Glenn Fine's...

Two separate reports, one from my Dad and one from a friend... both at Tacoma Mall. Not being allowed inside, due to "someone inside with a semiautomatic shooting in the mall". Large number of police on the scene, sealing the exits. Not letting anyone in or out. Will post a source as soon as I have one.

What a contrast there was between the VE-Day appearance of U.S. President George W. Bush and that of our parliamentary leaders. Bush talked about democracy taking root from old Europe to the new Middle East – and the people listening to him knew he was responsible for much of the change. Our guys were late and didn't stay long – Prime Minister Paul Martin was on the ground for only 16 hours. A vote likely to bring down a scandal-tainted government was the reason for the politicians' hurry, and their audience knew it. Can the West ask for a better...

Computer local area networks at East Japan Railway Co. and some media organizations were inaccessible Saturday morning, apparently due to a bug in antivirus software made by Trend Micro Inc. "A bug was detected in a file (designed to detect viruses), and it is highly likely that computer networks that were updated (with the file) encountered a system failure," the software company said. Trend Micro said its virus analysis and support center in Manila released the file worldwide at around 7:30 a.m. Saturday as part of an update for its Virus Buster software. It said the file was replaced by...

According to a Ukrainian custom, a woman rejects an unwanted suitor by handing him a pumpkin. So it was that pro-democracy supporters said "no" to corruption and autocratic rule by dumping pumpkins on a street in Kiev Sunday - and voting for the reform-minded Viktor Yushchenko for president. These pumpkin-rolling Ukrainians, along with 52 percent of their fellow citizens, succeeded in overturning a rigged election Nov. 21. In backing Mr. Yushchenko in a vote that this time was far fairer, they have proven to the world that they want to join the march of newly free nations. And it is...

WASHINGTON — Government leaders, their policies and their capabilities all failed to protect Americans from the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history — one that could be repeated unless there is a bold and urgent restructuring of U.S. defenses, members of the bipartisan commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks said yesterday. "We do believe we are safer today than we were on 9/11," the commission's chairman, former New Jersey Republican Gov. Thomas Kean, said. "But we are not safe."

POSTED: 10:56 a.m. PST November 1, 2003 TACOMA -- A suspect in a domestic dispute was shot and killed early Saturday after he struck a Pierce County sheriff's deputy with his car on Interstate Five in Tacoma. The highway's northbound lanes are still shut down in, and will be for hours. The incident began when officers received a call for a domestic dispute at a home in eastern Pierce County. They wound up chasing the man as he drove onto I-Five, even though they had punctured his tires with spike strips. Eventually the deputies struck the man's car and forced...

The CERT/CC has received a report that the system housing the primary FTP servers for the GNU software project was compromised. I. Description The GNU Project, principally sponsored by the Free Software Foundation (FSF), produces a variety of freely available software. The CERT/CC has learned that the system housing the primary FTP servers for the GNU software project, gnuftp.gnu.org, was root compromised by an intruder. The more common host names of ftp.gnu.org and alpha.gnu.org are aliases for the same compromised system. The compromise is reported to have occurred in March of 2003. The FSF has released an announcement describing the...

A tanker traveling northbound exploded shortly before 1 p.m. Saturday near 212th St in Lynwood, Wash., Snohomish County. Firefighters are the scene. The highway is closed in both directions, causing severe backups. Drivers are urged to avoid the area.

Any other America's Cup junkies out there? The race just started! The game is afoot!

A Container ship is listing badly while at the dock in the Port of Seattle. Coast Guard and ship owners investigating to figure out how to right it.

Being reported on channel 5, the CBS affiliate in San Francisco now. A tractor-trailer truck has crashed into the capitol building in Sacramento. Live video shows a large fire engulfing the truck and one of the entrances to the building. Further details are sketchy, but developing.

From an e-mail message this morning: [snips] are my edits to withhold the name of the author... for now. Date: Thu, 28 Sep 2000 10:52:26 -0400 Here's an interesting tidbit on Presidential hopeful George W. Bush: I don't know how many of you are stationed in Europe, but in February 15th's edition of Stars and Stripes it talks about his reaction to the dragging death of James Byrd Jr. This man's family was pushing for a hate crime law in Texas, and Bush made it clear that the bill was not to reach his desk. Even though he was the ...

BT claims a patent on hyperlinks British Telecom believes it owns a 14-year-old patent on one of the keys to the Internet. And, if upheld, it could start to ask for payments. By Richard Barry, ZDNet (UK) June 20, 2000 7:44 AM PT British Telecom believes it owns a 14-year-old U.S. patent for the World Wide Web's hyperlink technology and has hired an intellectual property specialist to ensure it can commercialize the patent, in court if necessary. Buried amongst 15,000 global patents, BT claims it discovered its lapse during a routine update of its intellectual property. Hyperlinks are used to ...

Bill is a sneak attack on our digital liberties BY DAN GILLMOR Mercury News Technology Columnist THE uproar was fierce but quick last summer when an internal Clinton administration document leaked out, revealing yet again the administration's hostility to fundamental liberties. The idea was to give law enforcement the authority to secretly break into people's homes and businesses to conduct searches, including discovering what was on computer hard disks or even plant rogue programs on the machines to record keystrokes or transmit data to the government. The idea was considered a legislative non-starter, and it sank out of sight -- ...