National and State News-Tuesday, June 19th

CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) - Charleston, South Carolina, has been rocked by the deaths of at least two firefighters in a blaze at a furniture store where the roof collapsed. Authorities say others are missing and feared dead.

NORTH CANTON, Ohio (AP) - All Ohio authorities have to go on so far in their search for a missing pregnant woman are frightening words from her two-year-old who says "Mommy's in the rug." Authorities hope 26-year-old Jessie Davis' son, Blake, will remember more if they don't pressure him.

GEORGETOWN, Ind. (AP) - A 15-year-old boy suspected of the shooting two sheriff's deputies has been found dead in his southern Indiana home. The discovery was made after hours of searching for Tyler Dumstorf. One deputy is dead and the other is critically wounded.

GAINESVILLE, Texas (AP) - With five dead and five missing after a weekend of heavy storms and flooding, North Texas may not be out of the woods yet. Forecasters say the complex weather pattern that helped spawn the storms may be around for weeks. Some places were
under a foot of water.

BAGHDAD (AP) - Thousands of U-S troops in Iraq are in the opening stages of "Operation Arrowhead Ripper." They've fought their way into an al-Qaida sanctuary northeast of Baghdad and killed at least 22 insurgents so far. They've also found torture devices in some houses.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - The state Senate is delaying consideration of a broad ban on smoking in public and nearly every workplace until next week. That's because Republicans are unable to agree on a set of exemptions that they want to insert into the broadly worded ban in the current legislation. Senators have been pressed by owners of casinos, clubs and bars for exemptions. Senator Joe Scarnati of Jefferson County says Republicans have been unable to achieve broad support for any of the exemptions. Twenty-seven other states have approved a smoking ban of some sort.

PROSPERITY, Pa. (AP) - The state will pay half the cost to build a simulated coal mine to train miners. Governor Ed Rendell says with nearly five thousand miners planning to retire in the next five or six years, there will be a shortfall that the simulated mine will help address.
The center, to be operated by the United Mine Workers of America Career Centers Incorporated, will teach underground mining basics, including first aid, ventilation and mine evacuation. The eight-point-six (m) million dollar training mine to be built in Greene County will be in a large metal building and will consist of artificial blocks of coal replicating the physical layout and conditions of an underground mine. Clemmy Allen of the U-M-W-A says it will be the largest simulated coal mine in the world.

AKRON, Ohio (AP) - Both sides have outlined their cases in federal court in the Ohio Turnpike slaying of a wealthy Pennsylvania doctor. The doctor's wife, Donna Moonda, faces the death penalty if convicted in the federal court trial getting under way in Akron, Ohio. Testimony is expected to last two to three weeks. Prosecutor Nancy Kelley said yesterday (Monday) that Moonda didn't pull the trigger but her actions planning the roadside shooting near Cleveland were just as deadly. Defense attorney Roger Synenberg says his client was a hardworking but naive nurse who got romantically involved with a street thug. He says his client fell in love with the ex-convict and he fell in love with her money. Her one-time lover will testify that Moonda promised half of her husband's inheritance for killing Doctor Gulam Moonda of Hermitage,
Pennsylvania.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - House Republicans have been unable to alter Governor Ed Rendell's half-(b)-billion dollar biotechnology proposal. Rendell wants to borrow to fund bricks-and-mortar investment in biotech research. And the party-line defeat of several amendments on the House floor last night signaled wide support among Democrats for the Jonas Salk Legacy Fund. Democrats say they don't want to restrict portions of the fund in ways that could make researchers less effective. Republican leader Sam Smith says the proposal didn't generate
"any significant push" from Democrats during previous budget negotiations. He says the proposal undermines existing, successful research programs and his caucus opposes it.

MAHANOY CITY, Pa. (AP) - Governor Ed Rendell plans to be in Schuylkill County today for the opeing of the new Locust Ridge Wind Farm. The 13 electric-generating wind turbines are near Mahanoy City. Rendell is to be there along with community members, wind energy
customers and supporters and various government officials.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - The recipient of the 2007 Marian Anderson Award is to be announced today (Tuesday) in Philadelphia. The award is presented annually to humanitarians in
entertainment. Previous winners include Sidney Poitier, Oprah Winfrey, Danny Glover, Quincy Jones and Harry Belafonte. The award is named after a Philadelphia opera singer who often
faced discrimination in the 20th century because she was black. Anderson may be best remembered for singing from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1939 at the invitation of then-First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. That happened after she was unable to book a concert hall or even a high school auditorium in heavily segregated Washington, D-C.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - The lawyer for a New York commune whose founder was shot a year ago says a viewer of "America's Most Wanted" apparently tipped off authorities about the suspect's whereabouts. Forty-four-year-old Rebekah Johnson was arrested yesterday by a fugitive task force as she stepped off an elevated train in West Philadelphia. Johnson faces an attempted murder charge in the shooting of Jeff Gross, who helped found the Staten Island, New York-based Ganas community. Johnson was described as a disgruntled former member of the group. She is accused of jumping from the bushes at Gross's home and shooting him in the chest and arm in May 2006. He survived.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - The 25-foot-tall chandelier that's hung in the Philadelphia Academy of Music for 150 years has been taken down. It's to be disassembled then shipped to workshops in France to be restored to its original glory. The person overseeing the project says as many as 40 percent of the chandelier's eight-thousand crystals were cracked, broken or replaced over the years. Sometimes, the replacements weren't real crystals. And it lost some of its luster as designers added black scoop lights, steel cups, hanging crystals and a large hanging metal ball. The restoration project is expected to cost about one-point-two (m) million dollars. The chandelier is to return in 2008.