AP - The question at the heart of Staff Sgt. Ray Girouard's murder trial is this: Who ordered the killing of three Iraqi captives?

AP - The same jury that last week found a sex offender guilty of abducting, raping and murdering 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford must now decide whether he should be executed for the crime.

AP - More than six years after terrorists bombed the USS Cole in Yemen, the families of the 17 sailors killed in the blast are heading to court to try to prove the attack could not have happened without Sudan's help.

AP - Jose Lechuga struggled as a grocer, but he said his Hispanic customers became scarce when the city of Hazleton began to crack down on illegal immigrants.

AP - Jose Lechuga struggled as a grocer, but he said his Hispanic customers became scarce when the city of Hazleton began to crack down on illegal immigrants. 'They didn't feel safe and they didn't want to have any problems,' he testified through an interpreter as the first federal trial began on a local law meant to curb illegal immigration.

AP - Highway security videotape could hold clues about who torched a stolen car and triggered a fierce wildfire near the hills southeast of Los Angeles.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Continental Airlines Inc., the No. 4 U.S. carrier, said on Tuesday that domestic air fares are coming under pressure even as demand strengthens.

AP - Investigators searched the ruins of an adult care home Tuesday looking for the cause of a late night fire that killed one resident and critically injured four others.

AP - A military pilot safely ejected from an F-16 fighter jet shortly before it crashed on a southern Nevada training range, Nellis Air Force Base officials said Tuesday. It was the second F-16 training crash in a day.

AP - A suspected kidnapper accused of hiding a newborn in her purse as she left a hospital was in a Texas jail Tuesday, while the mother celebrated the reunion with her baby girl.

AP - The sole survivor of a car wreck that killed six people was a victim, and a judge was wrong to convict her as an accomplice to drunken driving, an appeals court ruled.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday pushed for tougher rules to stop American companies from buying illegally logged timber plundered from fragile forests around the world.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Video games aren't just for the kids anymore. More than one in three U.S. adults who go online, or 37 percent, own a video game console and 16 percent own a portable gaming device, Nielsen//NetRatings said on Tuesday.

AP - Gov. Sonny Perdue and Republican legislative leaders agreed Tuesday to a temporary fix that would keep a health insurance program for poor children running in spite of dwindling federal funding.

AP - A gunman opened fire at a state parole office Tuesday, wounding at least one person, police said.

AP - A convicted sex offender committed a calculated, horrific crime when he murdered 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford by burying her alive, and he deserves a death sentence despite evidence of his mental problems, a state prosecutor told jurors Tuesday.

AP - Orlando International Airport will begin screening all employees who enter secure areas after baggage handlers were accused of smuggling guns aboard a commercial airliner last week.

AP - A convicted triple-murderer escaped from the Kentucky State Reformatory early Tuesday but was quickly caught, corrections officials said.

AP - A woman accused of snatching a newborn girl from a hospital and taking her 100 miles to New Mexico was arraigned Tuesday on a federal kidnapping charge.

AP - Six Islamic leaders who were removed from a US Airways flight in November are suing the airline for discrimination.

AP - A Democratic congressman was named the No. 1 choice Tuesday to become the next chancellor of the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, a school spokesman said.

AP - An Iraqi immigrant faces deportation after triggering a security scare at Los Angeles International Airport when authorities found a suspicious device lodged in his body, officials said.

BOSTON (Reuters) - Five Episcopal priests in Massachusetts have vowed to stop performing all wedding ceremonies until the Anglican Church allows them to bless same-sex marriages, calling their protest a 'holy fast.'

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The Bush administration wants to eliminate federal support for geothermal power just as many U.S. states are looking to cut greenhouse gas emissions and raise renewable power output.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday pushed for new rules to stop American companies from buying illegally logged timber plundered from fragile forests around the world.

AP - A video recreating the terrorist bombing that killed 17 soldiers aboard the USS Cole opened a civil trial Tuesday over the Sudanese government's connection to the attack six years ago.

AP - A man arrested in one of the city's two serial killer investigations pleaded guilty Tuesday to assaulting a homeless man with a knife, and prosecutors agreed to drop an attempted murder charge.

AP - A gunman wounded two people in a drive-by shooting outside a state parole office Tuesday, and police wounded one of the suspects, authorities said.

AP - A lawyer for one of three men claiming to be the father of Anna Nicole Smith's baby asked a judge Tuesday to order the late Playboy model's partner, Howard K. Stern, to come to California and provide a DNA sample.

AP - Georgia highway officials investigating a deadly bus crash said Tuesday they would add safety measures to several commuter-lane exits like the one the baseball team's bus had taken before it plunged off an overpass two weeks ago.

AP - A Democratic congressman was named the No. 1 choice Tuesday to become the next chancellor of the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, a school spokesman said.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Six Muslim clerics have filed a discrimination suit against U.S. Airways Group Inc. for removing them from a flight last November after passengers reported 'suspicious behavior.'

BOSTON (Reuters) - Immigrants advocates on Tuesday said dozens of children may not have seen their parents since last week when federal agents rounded up 361 undocumented workers at a leather-goods factory in New Bedford, Massachusetts.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A New York City police officer involved in the fatal 1999 shooting of unarmed African immigrant Amadou Diallo wants to be allowed to carry a gun again while on the job.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. researchers tracking government health care spending on illegal immigrants found that most of the money goes to childbirth costs and pregnancy complications, a study conducted in North Carolina showed.

AP - The Army Corps of Engineers, rushing to meet President Bush's promise to protect New Orleans by the start of the 2006 hurricane season, installed defective flood-control pumps last year despite warnings from its own expert that the equipment would fail during a storm, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

AP - A squad leader never ordered his soldiers to shoot three Iraqi detainees, but he did help cover up the slayings, a defense attorney said in opening statements of the soldier's murder trial Tuesday.

AP - Authorities blamed thick fog for a 13-vehicle wreck on Florida's Turnpike that killed at least five people Tuesday and included a fire truck and sheriff's cruiser headed to an earlier crash, officials said.

AP - In Alaska, students are calling their teacher 'lao shi.' In Illinois, they're learning that one plus one equals 'er.' And in western Massachusetts, kindergarten students who can sing their ABCs will soon start honing Mandarin accents.

AP - A federal judge rejected a request by prosecutors to send former District of Columbia Mayor Marion Barry to jail for violating his probation in a criminal tax case.

AP - National Guard members filled sand bags and a crane wielding a steel beam pounded away Tuesday at the ice-jammed Winooski River as the capital city maintained a tense watch on the river, fearing a repeat of a 1992 flood that devastated downtown.

AP - New Mexico got an official state neckwear Tuesday. Not one of those pretty little silk numbers, but a real Western icon: the bolo tie.

AP - All Orlando Airport employees who enter secure areas will be screened for at least a few days because of the arrests of baggage handlers accused of smuggling guns aboard a commercial airliner, federal officials said Tuesday.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A judge ordered on Tuesday that rights to O.J. Simpson's aborted book, 'If I Did It,' be sold at auction to help satisfy a civil judgment against the former football star -- meaning the book could find its way into stores.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is heading toward a major shortage of cancer doctors by 2020 as the population ages and the medical profession struggles to replace retiring oncologists, researchers said on Tuesday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Less than 1 percent of Medicaid spending went to health care for illegal immigrants, according to a study that the researchers said defied a common belief that they are a bigger drain on taxpayer money.

AP - As his family and neighbors focused on rebuilding homes and lives battered by Hurricane Rita, few gave much thought to Larry Euglon's long absence.

AP - A soldier testified Tuesday that his sergeant gave him orders to kill three Iraqi detainees, then cut him with a knife to make it appear there had been a struggle.

AP - A man arrested in one of the city's two serial killer investigations pleaded guilty Tuesday to assaulting a homeless man with a knife, and prosecutors agreed to drop an attempted murder charge.

AP - A wildfire that damaged a home and forced 1,200 residents to evacuate the hills southeast of Los Angeles has been contained, firefighters said Tuesday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is heading toward a major shortage of cancer doctors by 2020 as the population ages and the medical profession struggles to replace retiring oncologists, researchers said on Tuesday.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - Part of an elaborate Japanese science laboratory has arrived at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida ahead of its liftoff for the International Space Station, officials said on Tuesday.

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - The diamondback terrapin, a turtle species that lives on the U.S. east coast, is under siege from Asian gourmets and American developers, but now officials and lawmakers are coming to its rescue.

AP - Investigators are probing whether oxygen tanks may have started a fire at an adult care home that killed one person and left more than a dozen hospitalized, among other possible causes, authorities said Tuesday.

AP - A drive-by shooting outside a state parole office Tuesday killed one person and wounded one, and police later shot and wounded a suspect, authorities said.

AP - The state is investigating a day care center that disciplined a 5-year-old boy by spraying a vinegar-water solution in his mouth, although one official acknowledges such practices were once accepted.

AP - A nonprofit organization has unveiled a series of electronic greeting cards that concerned friends and relatives can send to a woman after she chooses to have an abortion.

AP - Former Gov. James McGreevey, who resigned from office after revealing that he was gay and had an affair with a male staffer, is seeking custody of his 5-year-old daughter and child support from his estranged wife.

AP - An insurance company sued a prominent Denver minister and four of his affiliated church groups Tuesday, accusing them of filing fraudulent life-insurance claims on behalf of parishioners.

AP - Mary and Ray Smith can't make heads or tails of a new presidential dollar coin they found last week. It doesn't have either.

DETROIT (Reuters) - Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick on Tuesday pledged a crackdown on crime, calling a spike in narcotics-related violence and the city's nagging reputation for unsafe streets a barrier to its economic recovery.

AP - A Portland couple arranged to trade marijuana for the chance to have sex with a 5-year-old girl, the authorities said Tuesday.