PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - Again and again, decade after decade, an array of authorities - police chiefs, prosecutors, pastors and local Boy Scout leaders among them - quietly shielded scoutmasters and others accused of molesting children, a newly opened trove of confidential papers shows.
WASHINGTON (AP) - Weekly applications for U.S. unemployment benefits jumped 46,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 388,000, the highest in four months. The increase marks a rebound from the previous week's sharp drop. Both swings were largely due to technical factors.
It's the latest snapshot of the growing burden of student debt and it's another discouraging one: Two-thirds of the national college class of 2011 finished school with loan debt, and those who borrowed walked off the graduation stage owing on average $26,600 - up about 5 percent from the class before.
NEW YORK (AP) - After vowing not to get involved in this year's presidential election, Bruce Springsteen is supporting Barack Obama again, saying he believes Obama is the best person to lead America.
NEW YORK (AP) - Nike has severed ties with cyclist Lance Armstrong, citing insurmountable evidence that he participated in doping and misled the company about those activities for more than a decade.
LAS VEGAS (AP) - Entertainer Flavor Flav threw his fiancee to the floor twice and grabbed two knives as he chased and threatened to kill her 17-year-old son during an argument Wednesday at their home in Las Vegas, a police report states.
CAIRO (AP) - Syria's wealthy, long cultivated by President Bashar Assad as a support for his regime, are seeing their businesses pummeled by the bloody civil war. Factories have been burned down or damaged in fighting. International sanctions restrict their finances. Some warn that their companies are in danger of going under, worsening the country's buckling economy.
NEW YORK (AP) - Dignitaries on Wednesday dedicated a new memorial state park overlooking the United Nations to former President Franklin Roosevelt.
Beautifully decorated tables set with fine china, hot tea, savories and desserts greeted the 180 guests who attended the ninth annual Circle of Hope Afternoon Tea.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - It's difficult to argue with the goals of the World Food Prize Foundation - to recognize people who have helped improve the quality and availability of food to reduce world hunger.
MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) - Uruguay's Senate voted to legalize first-trimester abortions for all women Wednesday in a groundbreaking measure that came with so many strings attached it left neither side in the bitter debate completely satisfied.
NEW YORK (AP) - A Bangladeshi man who came to the United States to wage jihad was arrested in an elaborate FBI sting on Wednesday after attempting to blow up a fake car bomb outside the Federal Reserve building in Manhattan, authorities said.
LARISSA, Greece (AP) - The world's oldest profession is giving a whole new meaning to love of the game.
DENVER (AP) - Denver police don't have any suspects as they investigate the slayings of five people whose bodies were found at a neighborhood bar after a fire broke out early Wednesday. Investigators believe they were killed before the fire and the blaze was set to cover up the slayings.
LAS VEGAS (AP) - Entertainer Flavor Flav is jailed in Las Vegas on felony assault and misdemeanor domestic battery charges after police say he argued with his fiancee and threatened to attack her teenage son with a knife.
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) - Sen. Mark Udall of Colorado is urging the U.S. Forest Service to make sure a contract dispute doesn't ground large air tankers used to fight wildfires.
SACRAMENTO (AP) - California's unemployment rate has fallen to its lowest level in 4 1/2 years as the state experienced one of the sharpest drops in joblessness nationwide, the state Employment Development Department reported Friday.
SACRAMENTO (AP) - Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson announced to screaming throngs of Kings fans Friday that the deal to sell the NBA franchise to a group led by software tycoon Vivek Ranadive has been signed.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The growing use of unmanned surveillance "eyes in the sky" aircraft raises a thicket of privacy concerns, but Congress is getting mixed advice on what, if anything, to do about it.
NEW YORK (AP) - Ratings for the "American Idol" finale plunged to a record low for the 12-year-old show.
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - Anchorage police say a young man who didn't want to return to jail ran out onto the uncertain ice of an Alaska lake to escape officers armed with an arrest warrant.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Days after a burst of gunfire brought a chaotic and bloody end to a Mother's Day neighborhood parade in New Orleans, news of six arrests gave an organizer of the traditional event reason to celebrate again.
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama picked a senior White House budget official to become the acting head of the Internal Revenue Service on Thursday, the same day another top official announced plans to leave the agency amid the controversy over agents targeting tea party groups.
ELIZABETH, N.J. (AP) - A homeless, hatchet-wielding hitchhiker who became an Internet hero earlier this year was arrested Thursday for allegedly beating a New Jersey lawyer to death inside his home.
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) - Sitting on a dirty straw mat on the parched ground of southern Afghanistan, Masooma sank deeper inside a giant black shawl. Hidden from view, her words burst forth as she told her side of what happened to her family sometime before dawn on March 11, 2012.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - A mother whose 4-year-old was being abducted chased the suspect down and crashed her vehicle into his car, triggering a manhunt and the arrest of the suspect, Albuquerque police said Thursday.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - California is losing key employees at the Department of Water Resources because it can't pay afford to pay them enough.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The government allowed "a small but significant number" of terrorists into America's witness protection program and then failed to provide the names of some of them for a watch list that's used to keep dangerous people off airline flights, the Justice Department's inspector general says.
CINCINNATI (AP) - An Ohio man was found guilty Thursday of fatally shooting a man who authorities say identified his assailant by blinking his eyes while paralyzed and hooked up to a ventilator.
SAN DIEGO (AP) - The numbers sum up the frenzy that has taken over the Golden State since it became the newest in the nation to join the madness over Powerball, which saw its jackpot soar Thursday to $550 million.