"Chicago Tribune" Reader

"Chicago Tribune" Reader

Peterson allowed to pay respects to late mother

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 05:50 PM PDT

Convicted murder Drew Peterson was allowed to attend a private visitation at a suburban Chicago funeral home for his 84-year-old mother, who died earlier this week.

Tonight's debate lineup: What to watch for

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 01:30 PM PDT

Students posing as Vice President Joe Biden, and Republican vice presidential candidate, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., shake hands during set up for Thursday's vice presidential debate, Wednesday, Oct. 10, 2012, at Centre College in Danville, Ky. (AP Photo/Morry Gash)Tonight's one and only vice presidential debate will look and feel a little different than last week's first presidential debate. Like the presidential debates, tonight's debate will last 90 minutes and will not have any  commercial breaks. ABC News' Martha Raddatz will...

Stakes high as Ryan, Biden square off

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 05:28 PM PDT

With polls showing a spike in support for Mitt Romney over the last week, the stakes are high for Vice President Joe Biden in Thursday night's debate against Rep. Paul D. Ryan.

NW Side cops give chase, arrest man wanted in 3 robberies

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 02:59 PM PDT

Chicago police captured a man wanted in three robberies this morning on the Northwest Side after officers spotted him in a possibly stolen car and chased him for a mile, police said.

Poll: Romney leads Obama in Florida by 7 points

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 03:29 PM PDT

Republican presidential nominee Romney waves after speaking at campaign stop at Bun's Restaurant in DelawareMitt Romney has opened up a 7-point lead over President Barack Obama in Florida—yet more proof that last week's presidential debate may have been a game changer for the Republican nominee's campaign. A new Tampa Bay Times/Miami Herald/Bay News 9 poll found Romney leading Obama 51 percent to 44 percent among likely Florida voters. That's [...]

New weapon in the war against malaria - the cell phone

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 11:00 AM PDT

FILE - In this Aug. 27, 2009 file photo, stacks of expired malaria medication are stored in a box at an NGO's village office near Pailin, Cambodia. More than a third of the malaria-fighting drugs tested over the past decade in Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa were either fake or bad quality, seriously undermining efforts to combat the disease, a study said Tuesday, May 22, 2012. (AP Photo/David Longstreath, File)There's a new weapon in the war against malaria – the cell phone. Harvard researchers found they could track the spread of malaria in Kenya using phone calls and text messages from 15 million mobile phones. "Before mobile phones, we had...

Billy Graham to Romney: ‘I’ll do all I can to help you’

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 02:11 PM PDT

Republican presidential nominee Romney meets with Reverend Graham at his home in MontreatAhead of a Thursday night campaign rally in North Carolina, Mitt Romney made an impromptu stop to meet with the Rev. Billy Graham and his son, Franklin, at the reverend's home outside Asheville. Romney didn't officially land the elder Graham's endorsement, but he came pretty close. The famed evangelist told Romney he would do whatever [...]

Border Patrol agents discover ancient artifacts in Arizona

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 12:07 PM PDT

U.S. Border Patrol agents in Arizona have discovered a pair of ancient artifacts while making their rounds—two pieces of Native American pottery that could be up to 1,000 years old. One piece appears to be fully intact while the other was part of a larger piece of pottery. The Border Patrol agents found the pottery [...]

‘Dead Fred’ gets a prime spot at vice presidential debate

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 02:16 PM PDT

DANVILLE, Ky.—Fred's dead, baby, but he'll have the best seat in the house for the vice presidential debate. Known as "Dead Fred," a painting of former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and Centre College alum Frederick M. Vinson is a fixture at major events at the school hosting Thursday's debate. The real Vinson died [...]

Student returns check for a half-billion dollars

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 02:36 PM PDT

Let's face it: We could all imagine what to do with a little extra cash. But when Allen Smith received his monthly Veterans Affairs dependency check, it contained an unimaginable amount. Instead of the usual $650, it was made out for a half-billion dollars. Billion. The 22-year-old receives a dependency check from the Department of [...]

12 quadrillion euro phone bill shocks woman

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 01:09 PM PDT

Nobody likes paying their phone bill. But when the bill is nearly 12 quadrillion euros severe anxiety can ensue. Of course, in this case, the bill was a mistake. When Bouygues Telecom customer Solenne San Jose of Bordeaux, France, opened her bill, she said she nearly had a heart attack. "There were so many zeroes [...]

Yemen shooting: Are U.S. embassy officials in the Mideast secure?

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 01:55 PM PDT

Concerns about the security of officials tied to US diplomatic missions in the Middle East – already acute – ratcheted up Thursday with the drive-by shooting of a Yemeni security officer assigned to the US Embassy in Sana.

NIU president to step down

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 05:08 PM PDT

John Peters, Northern Illinois University's long-time president who led the university during the fatal 2008 campus shootings, announced this afternoon that he planned to step down at the end of the academic year.

Obama aide blames Romney-Ryan for politicizing Libya attack

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 01:32 PM PDT

A man looks at documents at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, after an attack that killed four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2012. The graffiti reads, "no God but God," " God is great," and "Muhammad is the Prophet." The American ambassador to Libya and three other Americans were killed when a mob of protesters and gunmen overwhelmed the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, setting fire to it in outrage over a film that ridicules Islam's Prophet Muhammad. Ambassador Chris Stevens, 52, died as he and a group of embassy employees went to the consulate to try to evacuate staff as a crowd of hundreds attacked the consulate Tuesday evening, many of them firing machine-guns and rocket-propelled grenades.(AP Photo/Ibrahim Alaguri)President Barack Obama's deputy re-election campaign manager argued Thursday that the deadly attack in Benghazi, Libya, has become "the political topic it is" only because of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan. In a combative interview with CNN, Stephanie Cutter sidestepped questions about why Obama did not label the attack "terrorism" days after other top officials [...]

Ft. Hood shooter's lawyers argue against beard-shaving order

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 01:48 PM PDT

Bell County Sheriff's Office photograph of Nidal HasanFORT BELVOIR, Virginia (Reuters) - Defense lawyers for Major Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood massacre suspect, told an Army appeals court on Thursday that his court martial judge had overstepped his authority in ordering him to appear clean shaven for trial. A prosecutor, in turn, argued before the Army Court of Criminal Appeals that the court martial judge, Colonel Gregory Gross, was empowered to maintain decorum in his courtroom. Hasan is accused of shooting to death 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas, in November 2009. ...

Teen jokes while pleading not guilty in Chicago car-bomb plot

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 01:50 PM PDT

A 19-year-old high school graduate accused of plotting to bomb a Loop bar joked in court today when he was asked about the sentence is facing – life imprisonment.

Otter rescued from Exxon Valdez oil spill dies

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 11:23 AM PDT

One of the last sea otters rescued from the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill has died. Kenai was orphaned after her oil-covered mother died. The baby otter had somehow managed to avoid the oil, and was taken to the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, where she lived out the next 23 years. When she arrived, Ken [...]

'Bachelor' couple Jason, Molly Mesnick expecting baby

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 02:40 PM PDT

FILE - In this file image originally released by ABC, Jason Mesnick, right, is shown with Molly Malaney on the season finale of "The Bachelor," airing Monday, March 2, 2009 on ABC. The couple, now married, are expecting a child together. Mesnick proposed to contestant Melissa Rycroft on the ABC reality dating show. But in the subsequent "After the Final Rose" special, taped six weeks after Mesnick's proposal, he told Rycroft he was dumping her because he still had feelings for the runner-up, Molly Malaney. (AP Photo/ABC, Matt Klitscher)One of the few couples from ABC's "The Bachelor" franchise to marry is now expecting their first child. Jason and Molly Malaney Mesnick's baby is due in March.

Feds target finances of ultra-violent street gang MS-13

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 01:38 PM PDT

This handout photo provided by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, taken June 23, 2008 in Washington, shows an example of a tattoo of the gang Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13). The Obama administration has labeled a violent Central American street gang as an international criminal organization subject to U.S. government sanctions, the first time this designation has been given to such a group. (AP Photo/Michael Johnson, ICE)MS-13, or Mara Salvatrucha, members are infamous for hacking and stabbing victims with machetes.

Ryan drops endorsement of lawmaker over rape comment

Posted: 11 Oct 2012 10:32 AM PDT

Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan has withdrawn his endorsement of a Wisconsin state lawmaker who has come under fire for controversial comments he made about rape. Late last year, while discussing an alleged rape at a high school in his district, Rep. Roger Rivard told a local newspaper that his father taught him "some [...]