Associated Press stories, Page 2147

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — A hotel watchman has been convicted of killing a Florida tourist staying at an Airbnb lodging in Costa Rica and was sentenced to 16 years in prison. The court in Pavas found on Monday that Bismark Espinoza Martínez had taken advantage of his position at...

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A 12-year-old boy was fatally shot at an Ohio home in what appeared to be a tragedy involving a mishandled firearm, police said Tuesday. Columbus police said they were called to the home a few miles west of downtown on Monday evening and found the injured boy,...

Barraged by hundreds of sex-abuse lawsuits, the Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy protection Tuesday in hopes of working out a potentially mammoth victim compensation plan that will allow the hallowed, 110-year-old organization to carry on. The Chapter 11 filing in federal bankruptcy court in Wilmington, Delaware, sets in...

LONDON, Ohio — The weekend death of an inmate at an Ohio prison is being investigated as a homicide. Robert Leach Jr., 23, died after “an incident” midday Saturday at Madison Correctional Institution, a spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction confirmed by email Monday. Spokeswoman JoEllen Smith...

Home goods retailer Pier 1 Imports Inc. said Monday that it has filed for bankruptcy protection. The Fort Worth, Texas-based company, which was founded in 1962, has been struggling with increased competition from online retailers such as Wayfair. Pier 1 said it will pursue a sale, with a March 23...

PORTSMOUTH, Ohio — A judge dismissed a professor’s lawsuit against a small, public university in Ohio that rebuked him for not addressing a transgender student using the student’s preferred gender terms. Nicholas Meriwether’s federal lawsuit alleged that Shawnee State University officials violated his rights by compelling him to speak in...

RED LION — Authorities say five firefighters were injured battling a blaze at an apartment building in Pennsylvania. Crews were called to the Hilltop Apartments in Red Lion at about 11:45 p.m. Saturday and quickly extinguished a basement fire, York County officials said. But fire crews then realized that the...

CLEVELAND — An Ohio village along Lake Erie is experiencing what officials describe as an “erosion emergency” because the lake hasn’t frozen over. With more waves pounding the shore, erosion has eaten away more than 40 feet of land from a park in Geneva-on-the-Lake in a two-week span, village administrator...

LONDON — Britain issued severe flood alerts Monday, warning of life-threatening danger after Storm Dennis dumped weeks’ worth of rain in some places. One woman swept away by the floodwaters was feared dead. To the east, Dennis’ gale-force winds also injured nine people in car accidents in Germany as trees...

POINCIANA, Fla. — A Florida SWAT team fatally shot a murder suspect early Monday after investigators say he pulled a gun on them after barricading himself inside a house. Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said his SWAT team first shot Rudy “Shorty” Arenas, 40, with beanbag guns to knock him...

AKRON, Ohio — A confidential settlement was reached in a former Ohio megachurch pastor’s lawsuit alleging televangelist Ernest Angley sexually abused and harassed him over a decade, starting in 2004. The allegations by Brock Miller, of Myrtle Beach, S.C., included that Angley forced him to get a vasectomy, inspected his...

LAS VEGAS — A growing number of Democratic lawmakers, union officials, state leaders and party strategists agree that Bernie Sanders is a risky nominee to put up against President Donald Trump. There’s less agreement about whether — and how — to stop him. Critics of the Vermont senator, who has...

RICHMOND, Va. — Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s push to ban the sale of assault weapons has failed after members of his own party balked at the proposal. Senators voted to shelve the bill for the year and ask the state crime commission to study the issue, an outcome that drew...

JOHANNESBURG — Former South African president F.W. de Klerk on Monday apologized and withdrew his statement that the country’s former harsh system of racial separation known as apartheid was not a crime against humanity. De Klerk, the last president under apartheid, caused an uproar with the comment during an interview...

QUETTA, Pakistan — A powerful suicide bombing killed eight people and wounded 16 others in Pakistan’s restive Baluchistan province on Monday, local police said, when it struck an Islamist rally in the regional capital. Police said the blast went off near Quetta’s press club, where dozens of supporters for a...

DETROIT — General Motors decision to pull out of Australia, New Zealand and Thailand as part of a strategy to exit markets that don’t produce adequate returns on investments raised dismay Monday from officials concerned over job losses. The company said in a statement Sunday that plans to wind down...