AP - The 8-foot alligator opens its jaws wide and hisses in the dark at Julie Harter, who takes a few steps closer and dangles a lasso just like the kind rodeo cowboys use.

AP - Two towns nestled in the rugged coastline and the liberal politics of Northern California have fought the federal government by banning the U.S. military from recruiting minors within their city limits. Now the federal government is fighting back.

AP - Jaylynn Banks and her family have moved four times since the Cedar River burst its banks last June and flooded a huge swath of Cedar Rapids, including their neighborhood.

AP - The director of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum says their security training helped save lives when guards quickly shot an elderly gunman who opened fire with a rifle.

AP - A woman is in critical condition after a car being chased by Philadelphia police crashed into a crowd and killed three young children, at least one of them hers.

AP - Federal agents are ready to begin investigating an explosion that killed three people and leveled part of a Slim Jim snack factory, but it may be a few days before they can safely enter.

AP - Scientists say the swine flu virus may have jumped from pigs to people as early as last August. That's several months before it was reported in Mexico in April.

AP - A woman who was struck by a car fleeing a robbery scene died Thursday, a day after the vehicle jumped a curb, smashed into a crowd and killed three young children.

AP - Helicopters airlifted rescuers as close as they could to the wreckage of a state police helicopter Thursday, looking for two people still missing from a crash on a 12,000-foot mountain near Santa Fe.

AP - A union official says he asked for protective vests for guards at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum two years ago, but they never got them.

AP - A convicted scam artist was able to pull off a lavish bar mitzvah for his son featuring kosher catered food and more than 60 guests at a New York City jail.

AP - What budget crisis?

AP - Police in Philadelphia say two men with lengthy criminal records were fleeing police when they caused an accident in which a car jumped a curb, slammed into a crowd, and killed four people, including an infant two days short of her first birthday.

AP - A former New York City police officer convicted of shooting an unarmed man to death while off duty has been sentenced to one to three years in prison.

AP - As early as last August, the swine flu virus may have been spreading among people — long before it was first recognized in April, scientists reported Thursday.

AP - A union official says he requested that U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum guards be equipped with protective vests during contract negotiations two years ago, but they were never issued.

AP - Thousands of Americans who have generally kept up with their mortgages are still in danger of losing their homes because they made a fateful trade-off in this shaky economy — they let their homeowner association dues slide.

AP - Searchers have found the body of a hiker who was in a state police helicopter that went down on a snowy Santa Fe mountain peak, but were still searching for the pilot.

AP - When a lobster net pulled Lester Drisko into the chilly waters off the coast of Maine and then entangled him last month, his 8-year-old grandson didn't panic.

AP - Federal investigators say at least half of a sprawling Slim Jim processing plant in North Carolina was damaged in a fatal explosion and that parts of the building may need to be removed before their agents can go inside.

AP - Crazies. Lone nut jobs. Isolated loonies. Those are frequent descriptions of people like James von Brunn, the 88-year-old white supremacist who opened fire at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and killed a black guard.

AP - A New Jersey blogger who urged readers to 'take up arms' against Connecticut lawmakers and who suggested government officials should 'obey the Constitution or die' surrendered Thursday on a charge of inciting violence.

AP - The pilot of a state police helicopter and the student hiker he was rescuing were killed when the aircraft crashed on a snowy mountain near Santa Fe, officials said Thursday.

AP - Looking out the 11th floor window of her law office, Jane Wiggins did a double take and grabbed her camera. The dark, undulating clouds hovering outside were unlike anything she'd seen before.

AP - Crazies. Lone nut jobs. Isolated loonies. Those are frequent descriptions of people like James von Brunn, the 88-year-old white supremacist accused of opening fire at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and killing a black guard.

AP - A Pentagon official initially accused of unknowingly supplying secrets to China had actually been aware for some time that he was dealing with an agent for Beijing, according to a new indictment issued Thursday.

AP - Authorities have released the first two autopsies of the 11 people found in a mass grave in the desert west of Albuquerque.

AP - A Camp Pendleton Marine has pleaded guilty in military court to giving classified information to a Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy.

AP - The U.S. Coast Guard says an administrative review has determined it was slow to respond to a deadly fishing boat accident off Massachusetts.