State News-Tuesday

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Philadelphia police are looking for the 26-year-old son of a state lawmaker who's been missing since he was abducted at gunpoint on Saturday night. The kidnapping victim is Shamari Taylor, whose father, Representative John Myers, has been a vocal advocate for gun-control legislation. Police say seven to ten masked men in four vehicles grabbed him and a female companion. She was released the next morning but he's still missing. But that's not all that's happened to Taylor's family. On Sunday night, Taylor's 56-year-old mother and 21-year-old sister were wounded by gunfire -- with the mother shot in the head. Police say both are expected to survive. Myers' spokeswoman says the lawmaker has been married to his wife, Joyce, for more than 20 years and that Taylor is his son from a previous relationship.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A detention hearing is scheduled today for a University of Pennsylvania professor accused of bringing child porn into the country. Authorities say marketing professor Scott Ward had a video that showed him in sex acts with boys. Ward was arrested after an airport security check on Sunday as he flew in to Washington Dulles International Airport from Brazil. Court papers say Ward drew the attention of federal agents because of his unusual number of trips to Thailand. Ward had been charged with child-sex crimes in Montgomery County twice before. Once he was acquitted and another time he paid a fine and got probation.

BLOUNTVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - The F-B-I has released the plane that was flying from Philadelphia to Houston when a threatening note caused an unscheduled stop yesterday in Tennessee. The plane eventually continued on to Houston, though it wasn't known how many of the 56 passengers stayed with the flight. Authorities say no bomb has been found on U-S Airways Flight 3-4-4-1. Earlier, the passengers were taken into the terminal at the Tri-Cities Regional Airport in eastern Tennessee to be questioned by the F-B-I.