AP - The FBI is questioning three men in the fatal shooting of an Ohio woman whose 4-year-old son was left unharmed by the gunman at a highway rest area.

AP - It could be one of the nation's oldest cold case files: What happened to eight Confederate sailors aboard the H.L. Hunley after it became the first submarine in history to sink an enemy warship?

AP - A contractor has been indicted on homicide charges in a crane collapse in midtown Manhattan that killed seven people last year, the district attorney said Monday.

AP - Former President Bill Clinton praised the late Sen. Claiborne Pell during his funeral service Monday as a quirky multimillionaire who served the less-fortunate and enabled millions of Americans to afford college.

AP - Fire has struck a homeless shelter in the town of Paris, Texas, and the fire chief says more than one person was killed.

AP - Illinois' lieutenant governor says his state has become an 'international laughing stock' and he wants to form a panel to find ways to clean up corruption.

AP - A man who spent his adolescent years in state custody for a slaying he committed at age 11 was sentenced Monday to four to 20 years in prison on a drug conviction.

AP - A conservation group is suing to force the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to enforce the law and clean up the polluted Chesapeake Bay, citing 25 years of failure to restore the nation's largest estuary.

AP - A federal judge on Monday gave prosecutors an additional three months to obtain a corruption indictment against Gov. Rod Blagojevich, saying the complexity of the case against him makes it 'unreasonable' to expect the indictment sooner.

AP - Take that, Andromeda! For decades, astronomers thought when it came to the major galaxies in Earth's cosmic neighborhood, our Milky Way was a weak sister to the larger Andromeda. Not anymore.

AP - Authorities are searching for the head of a northern Alabama city's organized crime unit who went missing over the weekend.

AP - A couple who hadn't been seen since New Year's Eve have been found dead inside their locked bedroom with their crying 9-month-old daughter in an apparent murder-suicide. Three older children had been left out on their own.

AP - The contractor that raised the crane that toppled in midtown Manhattan last year and killed seven people was charged Monday with manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide for failing to stabilize it, prosecutors said.

AP - Hoping to prevent convicts from being shut out of the work force, some major U.S. cities are eliminating questions from their job applications that ask whether prospective employees have ever been convicted of a crime.

AP - The late Sen. Claiborne Pell was remembered during his funeral service Monday as a patrician statesman of enormous personal wealth who devoted his career to serving the less fortunate and enabled millions of American students to attend college.

AP - A drug investigator says authorities delayed the arrest of a woman tied to Gov. Sarah Palin's family until after the November election, in which Palin was the Republican vice presidential candidate, a newspaper reported.

AP - The state's high court has prohibited three Southern California parishes who left the U.S. Episcopal Church over its ordination of gay ministers from retaining ownership of their church buildings and property.

AP - A fast-moving house fire killed eight people, including four young brothers, despite the homeowner's frantic attempts to save them, authorities and a witness said.

AP - A judge has ordered an Illinois prison inmate who killed his cellmate — after allegedly warning guards he would harm the man — to pay $13 million to the dead inmate's estate and his mother.

AP - Former NBA player Antoine Walker was charged with suspicion of drunk driving in Miami Beach early Monday morning, further hurting his chances of playing again this season.

AP - A former South Carolina policeman who fired shots from a Georgia motel while holding his infant son and two women hostage surrendered peacefully Monday after a 13-hour standoff.

AP - A missing Kansas boy's adoptive parents, who failed to report his disappearance for nearly a decade, are considered 'people of interest' in the case as authorities expand their search nationwide, a sheriff said Monday.

AP - Authorities combing through 60 tons of trash, searching for the body of a baby allegedly dumped by his 16-year-old mother, found a dead infant in the garbage Monday.

AP - President-elect Barack Obama's decision to fill the nation's top intelligence jobs with two men short on direct experience in intelligence gathering surprised the spy community and signaled the Democrat's intention for a clean break from Bush administration policies.

AP - The state's high court ruled Monday that three Southern California parishes that left the U.S. Episcopal Church over its ordination of gay ministers cannot retain ownership of their church buildings and property.

AP - A fire fueled by donated clothes ripped through a homeless shelter in northeastern Texas early Monday, killing five residents as some tried dousing the blaze with pans of water.

AP - A former South Carolina trooper caught on video kicking a suspect in the head after a highway chase pleaded guilty Monday to violating the man's civil rights, according to federal court documents.

AP - A person with knowledge of the discussions says former eBay Inc. chief executive Meg Whitman plans to run for governor of California.

AP - Gov. Rod Blagojevich's attorney says he'll ask a federal judge to give an impeachment committee all FBI tapes of the governor's conversations, not just the four prosecutors are offering.

AP - A former Boeing employee who vandalized a $24 million military helicopter was sentenced Monday to five months in prison and five months on home confinement after telling the judge the tension and tedium of his assembly-line job had gotten to him.

AP - Welcome to Washington, Mr. President-elect.

AP - Senate Democrats struggled to avert a showdown steeped in race and corruption Monday as a defiant Roland Burris declared, 'I'm a United States senator' and flew to the capital to claim President-elect Barack Obama's old seat in Congress.

AP - Gov. Bill Richardson's gold-plated resume had never been tarnished as he moved up the political ladder from congressman and diplomat to governor.

AP - A contractor was charged with manslaughter Monday for allegedly using worn, fraying safety straps that broke apart and caused a crane to crash down on a Manhattan neighborhood, killing seven people in one of the city's worst construction accidents in decades.

AP - A 13-hour hostage standoff at a Georgia motel ended peacefully Monday when a former South Carolina police officer and a teenage girl surrendered, freeing his estranged wife and infant son.

AP - Caroline Kennedy's missteps and halting speech patterns have been replayed endlessly since she announced her bid to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton in the U.S. Senate.

AP - State legislators weighing evidence against Gov. Rod Blagojevich may finish their work before getting any tapes of the governor's conversations that were made secretly by the FBI, attorneys indicated Monday.

AP - A whopper about a devious baby and his diapers is the top lie of 2008, an organization of champion fibbers declared Monday.

AP - The Kansas parents who failed to report their 11-year-old adopted son missing nearly a decade ago are 'people of interest' as authorities search for him nationwide, a sheriff said Monday.

AP - The nation's largest owner of timberland disclosed Monday that it will no longer pursue changes in agreements governing its use of U.S. Forest Service roads — changes that critics complained could transform forests into housing subdivisions.