AP - Winter-hardened Northeasterners were socked with the same subzero temperatures and biting winds that have turned the Northern Plains, Midwest and Great Lakes into a teeth-chattering misery for much of the week.

AP - Illinois senators have taken their first steps toward an impeachment trial, after giving embattled Gov. Rod Blagojevich a cold reception hours into their new session.

AP - An ex-convict accused of strangling his ex-girlfriend and her four young children was returned to Oklahoma early Thursday from Texas following his arrest after a car crash.

AP - When a raging wildfire is racing toward your home, is it best to flee or stay and try to protect your house?

AP - Former FBI agent John Connolly has been sentenced to 40 years for the 1982 mob-related killing of a Miami gambling executive.

AP - A reputed gang member charged with shooting and wounding eight people including five children last year at a crowded South Los Angeles bus stop has been ordered to stand trial.

AP - Police fingerprint examiners whose errors falsely implicated two people in crimes have been linked with 945 other cases that police said must be reviewed to ensure their accuracy.

AP - A road atlas and campground directory discovered in the airplane cockpit of an Indiana financial manager helped lead authorities to the remote North Florida campsite where he was finally arrested.

AP - A Vatican office that evaluated U.S. Roman Catholic seminaries says the schools have made improvements in halting what they call 'homosexual behavior' among students.

AP - Concerns over consumer exposure to salmonella intensified Thursday, a day after Kellogg Co. asked stores to stop selling its peanut butter sandwich crackers until the food maker can figure out if the peanut paste is contaminated.

AP - Seven states sued the federal government Thursday over a new rule that expands protections for doctors and other health care workers who refuse to participate in abortions and other medical procedures because of religious or moral objections.

AP - The parents of a 16-year-old girl who was chained to her bed when she died in a fire at her southwestern Michigan home now face stiffer charges of murder and torture.

AP - A man accused in the slaying of a Little Rock, Ark., television news anchor has pleaded not guilty and says police have the wrong person.

AP - An Indiana financial manager suspected of staging his death in a plane crash and leading authorities on a chaotic three-day, multistate manhunt was recovering from a suicide attempt at a hospital Thursday as his legal troubles mounted.

AP - Diana Felber brought her groceries to the checkout and counted out her cash — purple, blue and green bills that are good only at businesses in western Massachusetts.

AP - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday called California's massive budget deficit a 'rock upon our chest' and said the state can address no other policy issues until the crisis is resolved.

AP - A Vatican evaluation of U.S. Roman Catholic seminaries in response to the clergy sex abuse scandal concluded that administrators have largely been effective in rooting out 'homosexual behavior' in the schools, although the agency said it persists.

AP - A man charged with setting an arson wildfire that killed five U.S. Forest Service firefighters in 2006 started nearly two dozen additional blazes for which he hasn't been charged, the district attorney alleges in court papers.

AP - William Davis has lived on the streets since the recession cost him his job as a commercial painter. Over the last eight months, he's made it through heat waves, wind storms, rain, snow and ice.

AP - The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit Thursday challenging the constitutionality of a law that requires whistleblowers with allegations of war profiteering or other contract fraud to file their lawsuits in secret.

AP - As the governor considers a replacement for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Caroline Kennedy has spoken repeatedly of her 'relationships' in Washington and her desire to use them on New York's behalf.

AP - Frank Corrente was caught on camera taking bribes from an FBI informant as part of a corruption probe that brought him down along with his boss, then-Mayor Vincent 'Buddy' Cianci.

AP - Authorities say a man disguised in a wig burst into a classroom and robbed students at gunpoint at a small private college in Memphis.

AP - The former transit police officer charged with murder in the shooting of an unarmed black man on New Year's Day in Oakland, Calif., has pleaded not guilty.

AP - Federal immigration officials have terminated their contract with a detention facility following an investigation into the death of an inmate, and several members of the local board that oversees the jail have been replaced.

AP - Two cousins from the Chicago area have pleaded guilty in Ohio to taking part in a plot to recruit and train terrorists to kill American soldiers.

AP - The leader in polls to become New York's next U.S. senator has enjoyed the enviable political position of never saying he sought the job, avoiding a potential defeat. But legal experts question the claim of privilege that Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and Gov. David Paterson have used repeatedly to refuse to tell New Yorkers if Cuomo wants the job.

AP - A man looking to rob a young mother's home tied her up in the basement, had sexual contact with her 4-year-old son and fatally shot the woman after she broke free and stabbed him, a prosecutor said Thursday as he announced he was seeking the death penalty against the suspect.

AP - A New York City judge says John A. 'Junior' Gotti should remain behind bars while he awaits trial on charges he was involved in three gangland murders and cocaine trafficking.

AP - Prosecutors charged Racine Mayor Gary Becker with child-sex felonies Thursday and said he had gone to a mall to meet a 14-year-old girl he thought he had met during an online chat.

AP - A US Airways pilot reported a 'double bird strike' less than a minute after takeoff Thursday and was headed for an emergency landing in New Jersey when he ditched into the Hudson River, an air controllers union spokesman said.

AP - US Airways officials say most of the people aboard a Charlotte-bound flight that crashed into New York's Hudson River were headed for the Queen City.

AP - New York City police stopped, questioned and frisked more than half a million people last year, 80 percent of them black and Hispanic, a civil-rights group said Thursday.

AP - Battery charges have been dropped against an 8-year-old autistic girl who was arrested and handcuffed following an altercation with her teachers that was apparently sparked when they refused to let her attend a school party.

AP - Gov. Rod Blagojevich took a taxpayer-funded flight to southern Illinois where he attended an unscheduled meeting and raised $42,000 from contributors that included the family of a man he had recently appointed to a university board, records show.

AP - Federal prosecutors fired back Thursday at defense claims that U.S. Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald's comments at a news conference were so strongly worded that he should be taken off the fraud case against Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

AP - Grieving family members struggled with their emotions Thursday morning as a burly ex-convict accused of strangling his ex-girlfriend and her four children made his initial court appearance in Oklahoma.

AP - Shock, relief, gratitude. Most of all, the soaked and freezing passengers of Flight 1549 just seemed amazed to be alive. All of them. 'You've got to give it to the pilot,' said Jeff Kolodjay of Norwalk, Conn., who was aboard the US Airways jet that ditched in the frigid Hudson River after an apparent collision with a flock of birds. 'He made a hell of a landing.'

AP - Airplanes chew up birds all the time but sometimes the birds win. That may be what happened Thursday in New York when a US Airways Airbus 320 made a crash landing in water only three minutes after taking off from LaGuardia International Airport.

AP - Jeff Kolodjay settled into seat 22-A, near the rear of the Airbus A320, glad to be on his way. It had been a frustrating afternoon. First, the Spirit Airways flight Kolodjay, his father and four buddies were ticketed for was canceled. Now this one, US Airways Flight 1549 to Charlotte, N.C., was running behind.

AP - Police say a poodle mistakenly left for nearly three weeks inside a van in a Vermont airport parking garage has survived.

AP - Some peanut butter at a Georgia plant shows signs of contamination, but officials said Thursday they don't know if it's linked to a salmonella outbreak that has sickened hundreds and prompted Kellogg to pull crackers from store shelves.

AP - The Environmental Protection Agency said in a report Thursday that toxins remain at levels harmful to people, fish and wildlife throughout the Northwest, despite decades-long cleanups.

AP - As the US Airways plane hit the frigid waters of the Hudson River, emergency crews were already headed to the scene. And the swift, dramatic response had an amazing result: All the 155 people aboard were pulled to safety.

AP - A moored boat sank after bumping into an oil rig platform Thursday, spilling some of the vessel's diesel fuel into the Cook Inlet and forcing 14 people to evacuate from the rig.

AP - Three suspects in the alleged gang rape of a lesbian woman pleaded not guilty Thursday and are likely to remain jailed until a judge decides whether there's enough evidence to put them on trial. Lawyers for Humberto Hernandez Salvador, 31, Josue Gonzalez, 21, and Darrell Hodges, 16, entered the pleas to charges that include kidnapping, carjacking, gang rape and sodomy in the Dec. 13 attack in Richmond, about 15 miles northeast of San Francisco.

AP - A prominent lawyer accused of cheating hedge funds in a $380 million investment ruse argued to be freed on bail Thursday, saying in court documents he's no risk to flee because his U.S. ties are strong and his foreign connections are weak.

AP - A woman accused of child endangerment after her four children were doused with sulfuric acid said she was the intended target for the caustic material, Cooke County Sheriff Michael Compton said Thursday.

AP - The Department of Homeland Security will allocate as much as $50 million to mitigate the environmental impact of the U.S.-Mexico border fence ordered by the Bush administration.