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Closing arguments to begin in Cosby's sexual assault trial

The prosecution and Bill Cosby's defense team are expected to begin closing arguments on Tuesday in the retrial of the entertainer, who is accused of drugging and raping a one-time friend more than a decade ago. Cosby, 80, faces three counts of aggravated indecent assault of Andrea Constand, 45, a former administrator of the Temple University women's basketball team, at his Philadelphia home in January 2004. Cosby, who declined to testify on his own behalf on Monday, has denied wrongdoing, saying any sexual contact he had was consensual.

Express Scripts targets new migraine drugs to change U.S. pricing dynamic

By Deena Beasley LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The largest U.S. manager of prescription benefits is telling drugmakers that the current pricing model is broken, and taking aim at Amgen Inc and other makers of new migraine medicines to try and fix it. Express Scripts told Reuters it is pressing them to forego the usual strategy of setting a high U.S. list price, then lowering the cost for health plans through hefty rebates. The shift could help Express Scripts and other pharmacy benefits managers (PBMs) bring prices down, and deflect growing criticism of their role as "middlemen" in the drug supply chain.

Prince heirs sue Illinois hospital, Walgreens pharmacy chain over singer's death

The wrongful death lawsuit, filed in Cook County Circuit Court in Chicago on Friday, accuses a doctor and pharmacist at Trinity Medical Center in Rock Island, Illinois, of failing to properly investigate the overdose or see that the pop star received appropriate counseling. The six heirs also accuse two Walgreens pharmacists of improperly dispensing prescription medication to Prince, according to the lawsuit.

Nashville police arrest Waffle House shooting suspect after manhunt

Police on Monday arrested the man suspected of fatally shooting four people at a Waffle House restaurant, ending a 36-hour manhunt after tips from the public led police to search secluded woods nearby. Photos posted online by Nashville police showed Travis Reinking, a 29-year-old construction worker, in custody. Photographed in the back of a police car, he looked disheveled and was wearing a torn red shirt and dirty blue jeans.

Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush admitted to Houston hospital

Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush was admitted to a Houston hospital on Sunday after contracting an infection that spread to his blood, a family spokesman said on Monday. Bush, 93, was admitted to Houston Methodist Hospital a day after a funeral was held for his wife, Barbara Bush, spokesman Jim McGrath said. Bush, the country's oldest living ex-president, served a single term in the Oval Office from 1989 through 1993.

Waffle House shooting suspect arrested in Nashville woods

By Tim Ghianni NASHVILLE, Tenn. (Reuters) - Police on Monday arrested the man suspected of fatally shooting four people at a Waffle House restaurant, ending a 36-hour manhunt after tips from the public led police to search secluded woods nearby. Photos posted online by Nashville police showed Travis Reinking, a 29-year-old construction worker, in custody. Photographed in the back of a police car, he looked disheveled and was wearing a torn red shirt and dirty blue jeans.

Three MS-13 gang members in Massachusetts convicted in murder trial

Three suspected members of the MS-13 gang in Massachusetts were convicted on Monday of participating in gang-related murders, in a case U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has called an example of how authorities can try to tackle the criminal organization. The verdict in Boston federal court came in the largest U.S. criminal case involving MS-13, whose members include immigrants from El Salvador and which U.S. President Donald Trump has sought to link to his efforts to crack down on illegal immigration.

Ex-Insys employee in U.S. opioid case sentenced to home confinement

Natalie Perhacs, 32, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Callie Granade in Mobile, Alabama, after pleading guilty to conspiring to pay kickbacks to the doctors to prescribe Insys' product Subsys, according to court records. The home confinement is part of a five-year period of probation imposed by Granade, who also ordered Perhacs to participate in 300 hours of community service.

Southwest cancels more U.S. flights as it inspects engines

Southwest Airlines Co canceled more flights on Monday as it worked to complete inspections of engines like the one that failed last week in a deadly accident over Pennsylvania. Flightaware.com, a website that tracks aviation cancellations, said Southwest canceled 129 flights on Monday, or 3 percent of its total flights, and delayed 468 other flights, or 11 percent. Southwest said the cancellations were the result of the company’s announcement last Tuesday that it would begin voluntarily stepping up inspections of some CFM56-7B engines over the next 30 days.

U.S. anti-Muslim hate crimes rose 15 percent in 2017: advocacy group

Hate crimes targeting U.S. Muslims rose 15 percent in 2017, the second year of increases, according to a study released on Monday by advocacy group the Council on American-Islamic Relations. The group recorded 300 U.S. hate crimes targeting Muslims last year, ranging from the June beating of a Muslim man in the Bronx borough of New York City by attackers who called him a terrorist to a November incident when a Muslim family's Kansas restaurant was burned down. CAIR attributed the increase in part to the policies of U.S. President Donald Trump, particularly restrictions on immigration from Muslim-majority countries.

California risks severe 'whiplash' from drought to flood: scientists

By Alister Doyle OSLO (Reuters) - California will suffer more volatile weather this century with a "whiplash" from drought to rain and mounting risks a repeat of the devastating "Great Flood" of 1862, scientists said on Monday. Climate change, driven by man-made greenhouse gas emissions, would drive more extreme shifts between hot and dry summers and wet winters in the most populous U.S. state, they wrote in the journal Nature Climate Change. Global warming is making California and other regions with similar Mediterranean-style climates, from southern Europe to parts of Australia, drier and warmer in summer, said lead author Daniel Swain of the University of California, Los Angeles.

Miami police use stun gun on man accused of touching female passenger

Jacob Garcia began screaming insults on Sunday when airline staff tried to move him to another seat after the woman and her boyfriend accused him of touching her inappropriately, according to a Miami-Dade Police Department arrest report. Police ordered everyone off the plane, which was about to depart for Chicago, according to the arrest report and an American Airlines statement. A stun gun had little effect on him, possibly because it did not attach properly through his clothing, the arrest report said.

Police search for gunman who killed four at Nashville waffle house

By Tim Ghianni NASHVILLE, Tenn. (Reuters) - A nearly nude gunman killed four people at a Waffle House restaurant in Nashville, Tennessee, early on Sunday and then fled after a patron saved lives by wrestling the assault-style rifle from his hands. The suspected shooter, identified by authorities as Travis Reinking, 29, fled on foot and was still at large as murder warrants were being issued for him, the Metropolitan Nashville Police said. Reinking, originally from Morton, Illinois, lives near the restaurant, Nashville police spokesman Don Aaron told an afternoon news conference.

Southwest cancels about 40 flights for engine inspections

At the time, Southwest said those inspections would cause some impact on operations, but it has not said how many engines it planned to inspect. On Friday, the Federal Aviation Administration and European airline regulators ordered emergency inspections within 20 days of nearly 700 aircraft engines similar to the one involved in a fatal Southwest engine blowout earlier this week. The engine explosion on Southwest Flight 1380 on Tuesday was caused by a fan blade that broke off, the FAA said.

Trump aide urges Congress to pare back bipartisan spending deal

By David Morgan WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Congress needs to consider rolling back the spending deal that U.S. Republicans brokered with Democrats last month, because lawmakers voted to enact the $1.3 trillion legislation without reading it, an aide to President Donald Trump said on Sunday. White House legislative director Marc Short said the spending bill, which ran to more than 2,000 pages, was rushed into place to avoid a government shutdown.

Austin Powers movies' Mini-Me, Verne Troyer, dies

The diminutive actor who starred in the Austin Powers movies' as "Mini Me", Verne Troyer, died Saturday at a hospital in Los Angeles. "It is with great sadness and heavy hearts to write that Verne passed away today," his family posted on his Instagram account. Troyer, who was 2 feet 8 inches (81 cm) tall, is best known for Austin Powers movies "The Spy Who Shagged Me" and "Austin Power in Goldmember." He also had the role of the goblin Griphook in the Harry Potter movies.

White Sox struggle in wake of Farquhar brain hemorrhage

(Reuters) - The Chicago White Sox lost 10-1 to the Houston Astros on Saturday but matters on the field took a backseat to concerns about their reliever Danny Farquhar, who suffered a brain hemorrhage a day earlier. The White Sox said tests had revealed a ruptured aneurysm. White Sox starter James Shields told reporters prior to the game on Saturday the players were all suffering.

Turkey's Erdogan says U.S. should look at its own actions if it wants jailed pastor freed

President Tayyip Erdogan said the United States should look at its own actions if it wants the return of an American Christian pastor who has been jailed in Turkey for suspected links to a 2016 failed coup. Erdogan made the comment in a live interview with broadcaster NTV. Andrew Brunson, who has lived in Turkey for more than two decades, was indicted on charges of helping the group that Ankara holds responsible for the failed coup against Erdogan.

Barbara Bush remembered for her dignity and wit at Houston funeral

By Erwin Seba HOUSTON (Reuters) - Former first lady Barbara Bush was remembered at her funeral on Saturday as a formidable but caring figure whose devotion to her family was matched only by her commitment to public service. "She was our teacher and role model in how to live a life of purpose and meaning," one of her four sons, former Florida governor and 2016 presidential candidate Jeb Bush, told the crowded Houston church. Bush, the wife of the 41st president of the United States, George H.W. Bush, and the mother of the 43rd, George W. Bush, was lauded as an inspiration both to the country and her loved ones, a woman who leavened a strong sense of decency and honor with a self-deprecating wit she employed to great effect.

Turkey's Erdogan says U.S. should look at its own actions if it wants jailed pastor freed

President Tayyip Erdogan said the United States should look at its own actions if it wants the return of an American Christian pastor who has been jailed in Turkey for suspected links to a 2016 failed coup. Erdogan made the comment in a live interview with broadcaster NTV. Andrew Brunson, who has lived in Turkey for more than two decades, was indicted on charges of helping the group that Ankara holds responsible for the failed coup against Erdogan.

Former U.S. taekwondo star waits a decade for her #MeToo moment

It has taken a decade, but Mandy Meloon, a two-time taekwondo world champion thrown off the U.S. national team in 2007 after accusing her coach of molesting her at age 16, has won a measure of vindication. When she first complained about being sexually abused by Jean Lopez, then the team's head coach, USA Taekwondo officials said the claims were false slurs that damaged morale, and Meloon was soon suspended from the team. In 2016, she began serving a two-year prison sentence after assaulting an off-duty Texas sheriff's deputy who was trying to remove her from a bar after an employee asked her to leave.

Missouri governor charged with felony computer data tampering

Missouri Governor Eric Greitens, already facing an invasion-of-privacy trial next month in connection with an extramarital affair, was charged separately on Friday with felony computer tampering tied to his political fund-raising. The new case was brought by the same St. Louis prosecutor two days before the statute of limitations deadline for the charge, which stems from Greitens' alleged theft of a donor list from the military veterans charity he created and ran for several years. Greitens, a Republican under mounting pressure from Missouri politicians of both parties to resign since the sex scandal broke earlier this year, called the latest case part of a "smear" campaign orchestrated by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, a Democrat.

Internal review cleared Trump's CIA pick in videotape destruction

By Warren Strobel WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An internal CIA review in 2011 cleared U.S. President Donald Trump's choice to head the agency, Gina Haspel, of wrongdoing in the destruction of videotapes depicting the harsh interrogation of an al Qaeda suspect, according to a memorandum that the CIA declassified and released on Friday. The spy agency released the memo in response to demands by U.S. lawmakers for more details on Haspel's career and as part of its effort to bolster her nomination. Haspel's bid to be the first woman CIA director faces scrutiny on Capitol Hill due to her involvement in a discontinued interrogation program that many regarded as using torture.

Southwest challenged engine maker over speed of safety checks

Southwest Airlines Co clashed with engine-maker CFM over the timing and cost of proposed inspections after a 2016 engine accident, months before the explosion this week of a similar engine on a Southwest jet that led to the death of a passenger, public documents showed. The proposed inspections would have cost $170 per engine for two hours of labor, for a total bill to U.S. carriers of $37,400, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said in its August 2017 proposal, citing the engine manufacturer. The documents reveal that airlines including Southwest thought the FAA had "vastly understated" the number of engines that would need to be inspected - and therefore the cost.

Missouri governor charged with felony computer data tampering

The new case, referred to prosecutors by Missouri's attorney general, was filed by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, according to her office, which also brought the privacy charge against Greitens in February. The criminal complaint in the computer tampering case, a copy of which was furnished by prosecutors, said the alleged computer offense occurred in April 2015.

Democrats sue Russia, Trump campaign for alleged 2016 election conspiracy

The Democratic Party sued the Russian government, U.S. President Donald Trump's campaign and WikiLeaks on Friday, charging that they carried out a wide-ranging conspiracy to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election. In its federal lawsuit in Manhattan, the Democratic National Committee said that top officials in Trump's campaign conspired with the Russian government and its military spy agency to hurt Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and tilt the election to Trump by hacking Democratic Party computers.

Internal review cleared Trump's CIA pick in videotape destruction

A internal CIA review in 2011 cleared U.S. President Donald Trump's choice to head the agency, Gina Haspel, of wrongdoing in the destruction of videotapes depicting the harsh interrogation of an al Qaeda suspect, according to a memorandum that the CIA declassified and released on Friday. The spy agency released the memo in response to demands by U.S. lawmakers for more details on Haspel's career and as part of its effort to bolster her nomination. Haspel's bid to be the first woman CIA director faces scrutiny on Capitol Hill due to her involvement in a discontinued interrogation program that many regarded as using torture.

Trucker in deadly Texas migrant case given life sentences

The driver of a truck packed with migrants, 10 of whom died due to sweltering Texas heat in July, was sentenced on Friday to life in prison without parole after pleading guilty in October to federal human smuggling charges. James Bradley, 61, could have faced the death penalty in the case, considered one of the deadliest human smuggling incidents in modern U.S. history. "This was the equivalent of torture," U.S. District Judge David Ezra told Bradley when he handed out two concurrent life sentences at a court in San Antonio.

U.S., European regulators mandate checks on some 737 engines

WASHINGTON/PARIS (Reuters) - European and U.S. airline regulators on Friday ordered mandatory inspections within 20 days of aircraft engines similar to one involved in a fatal Southwest Airlines accident earlier this week. Engine maker CFM International on Friday recommended the ultrasonic inspections on fan blades that have been used in more than 30,000 cycles, and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and European Aviation Safety Administration are making those recommendations into requirements.

U.S. students walk out again to protest gun violence

By Keith Coffman LITTLETON, Colo. (Reuters) - Demanding an end to gun violence and tougher restrictions on firearm sales, thousands of students again walked out of classes across the United States on Friday in hopes of putting pressure on politicians ahead of November's midterm elections. Timed to coincide with the 19th anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre, students left classes at midmorning, many waving placards with slogans including "I should be worried about grades, not guns," and "Enough is enough." Organizers said students from more than 2,600 schools and institutions were scheduled to take part, but that was fewer than participated in a similar walkout last month. In some places, demonstrators even met with resistance from school administrators.

Southwest giving passengers $5,000 checks on accident flight

Southwest Airlines Co confirmed Friday it has sent $5,000 checks to passengers aboard a flight that made an emergency landing this week after an engine failed, killing a passenger. The airline confirmed news reports from passengers it had sent the checks along with $1,000 travel vouchers. The CFM56 jet engine on Southwest flight 1380 blew apart over Pennsylvania on Tuesday, about 20 minutes after the Dallas-bound flight left New York’s LaGuardia Airport with 149 people on board.

Charges against New York officer urged in 2014 choke hold death: NY Times

Federal civil rights prosecutors have recommended charging a white New York City police officer for putting Eric Garner, an unarmed black man, in a fatal choke hold during a 2014 arrest, the New York Times reported on Friday, citing unnamed officials. Garner, a 43-year-old father of six, was stopped by police on July 17, 2014, for illegally peddling cigarettes on a sidewalk in New York's Staten Island borough. Garner argued with police and was tackled by Pantaleo, who brought Garner to the ground with an arm around his neck.

New York banning cars from Central Park starting this summer

New York City's Central Park will kick out cars this summer after more than a century, returning its roads to walkers, runners and cyclists, Mayor Bill de Blasio said on Friday. It was built for people," de Blasio said. More than 42 million visitors a year are drawn to Central Park, which encompasses more than 800 acres (325 hectares) in the borough of Manhattan.

Judge delays ruling on deposition by Cosby accuser's friend

The judge in Bill Cosby's sex assault retrial on Friday delayed a decision on whether defense attorneys can introduce testimony from a woman they say could undercut his accuser's claim that she was unaware of the entertainer's physical interest in her. The 80-year-old entertainer, best known as the dad in the 1980s television hit series "The Cosby Show," is on trial on charges of drugging and raping Andrea Constand, 45, a former employee of his alma mater, at his Philadelphia-area home in 2004. Constand is one of more than 50 women to accuse Cosby of a string of sexual assaults dating back decades, and hers is the only claim recent enough to be the subject of criminal prosecution.

Ex-FBI No. 2 alerted then-FBI chief Comey of plans to talk to press: lawyer

By Sarah N. Lynch WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe sent emails to then-Director James Comey alerting him he planned to push back against negative news coverage related to his oversight of probes into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a lawyer for McCabe said on Friday. In an interview with reporters, Michael Bromwich said the emails could help clear McCabe of allegations by the Justice Department's internal watchdog that McCabe "lacked candor" with Comey by misleading him into thinking McCabe did not authorize disclosures to a newspaper to combat articles about his wife's political campaign and his role in overseeing an investigation into the Clinton Foundation.