THE BULLETIN • Tuesday, March 30, 2010 A3
T S By Corey Williams and Devlin Barrett The Associated Press
DETROIT — Nine alleged members of a Christian militia group that was girding for battle with the Antichrist were charged Monday with plotting to kill a police officer and slaughter scores more by bombing the funeral — all in hopes of touching off an uprising against the U.S. government. Seven men and one woman believed to be part of the Michigan-based Hutaree were arrested over the weekend in raids in Michigan, Indiana and Ohio, and another was still being sought. FBI agents moved quickly against Hutaree because its members were planning an at-
tack sometime in April, prosecutors said. Authorities seized guns in the raids but would not say whether they found any explosives. The arrests have dealt “a severe blow to a dangerous organization that today stands accused of conspiring to levy war against the United States,” Attorney General Eric Holder said. Authorities said the arrests underscored the dangers of homegrown right-wing extremism of the sort seen in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people. In an indictment unsealed Monday, prosecutors said the group began military-style training in the Michigan woods in 2008, learning how to shoot guns and make and set off bombs.
David Brian Stone, 44, of Clayton, Mich., and one of his sons was identified as the ringleaders of the group. Stone, who was known as “Captain Hutaree,” organized the group in paramilitary fashion and members were assigned secret names, prosecutors said. Ranks ranged from “radoks” to “gunners,” according to the group’s Web site. “It started out as a Christian thing,” Stone’s ex-wife, Donna Stone, told The Associated Press. “You go to church. You pray. You take care of your family. I think David started to take it a little too far.” Donna Stone said her ex-husband pulled her son into the movement. Another of Stone’s sons also was charged and still was being sought.
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52 Iraqi candidates may be disqualified BAGHDAD — A government commission sought Monday to disqualify six people who had won seats in Iraq’s parliamentary election and 46 other candidates because of what it called their ties to the banned Baath Party. The disqualification effort, by Iraq’s Accountability and Justice Commission, could prove critical to the election’s outcome because the political alliance headed by Ayad Allawi, the country’s former interim prime minister, won only two seats more than Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s coalition in the March 7 contest. At a news conference on Monday, the commission’s director, Ali Faisal al-Lami, refused to disclose the names or political affiliations of the 52 candidates the commission is seeking to disqualify. Many were likely to be members of Allawi’s Iraqiya coalition.
Myanmar opposition boycotts election YANGON, Myanmar — Many residents of Myanmar’s largest city today greeted a decision by the party of democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi to boycott elections with rousing approval, but others blamed it for leaving them with little choice in the military-organized balloting. The National League for Democracy on Monday decidServing Central Oregon Since 1946
CREATIVE LIGHTING U.S. Marshall via The Associated Press
These photos provided by the U.S. Marshals Service show, top row, from left: David Brian Stone Sr., 44, of Clayton, Mich.; David Brian Stone Jr., 44, of Adrian, Mich,; Jacob Ward, 33, of Huron, Ohio; and Tina Mae Stone; bottom row, from left: Michael David Meeks, 40, of Manchester, Mich,; Kristopher T. Sickles, 27, of Sandusky, Ohio; Joshua John Clough, 28, of Blissfield, Mich.; and Thomas William Piatek, 46, of Whiting, Ind. Federal authorities say Stone’s other son, Joshua Matthew Stone, is a fugitive.
Swine flu in Southeast raises new pandemic concerns By Thomas Maugh II Los Angeles Times
LOS ANGELES — Continuing activity of pandemic H1N1 influenza in the Southeast, particularly in Georgia, is raising fears of a third wave of swine flu, federal officials said Monday. They urged people to continue getting vaccinated as a preventive measure in case a new outbreak occurs. Although swine flu activity is still low in most of the country, flu-related hospitalizations in Georgia have, since the beginning of February, been higher than they were last October at the height of the second wave of swine flu, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, in a telephone news conference. A CDC team was sent March 6 to assist state officials investigating the outbreak, but they have so far found nothing unusual related to the outbreak or the virus itself. “There is no evidence the virus has changed in Georgia,” she said. Alabama and South Carolina are also reporting regional activity of the virus, and some unusual activity has also been noted in Hawaii and New Mexico. The Southeast is where the second wave of the pandemic began last fall, but experts generally attributed that to the earlier start of school in the region. Swine flu has so far infected about 60 million Americans, with 265,000 hospitalized and about 12,000 dead.
What might the first year of health reform have in store for you? high-risk plans. On average, an enrollee won’t pay more than 35 More than a week after Presi- percent of covered benefits, and dent Barack Obama signed the annual out-of-pocket costs won’t sweeping new health care law, be more than $5,950 for individuwhich will eventually provide in- als and $11,900 for families. surance coverage for 32 million How many people can sign uninsured Americans, many of up for the new plan? us are still scratching our heads. Until national health offiWhat just happened? And how cials specify the premium and when will we start feeling its costs and exactly what will or will effect? not be covered, nobody knows In the long term, the legislation how many people can sign up. will require most AmerThe $5 billion set aside icans to obtain health by Congress must last insurance. It will also until 2014, when other offer federal subsidies options become availto lower premiums and able. By comparison, 35 significantly expand elistates already spend a HEALTH gibility for Medicaid. combined total of $2 bilCARE While the biggest lion annually on highchanges will not take efREFORM risk insurance pools that fect until 2014, some imcover 200,000 people. portant provisions will How is the new begin as early as June, federal pool difwhile others will kick in by the ferent from what is already ofend of the year. fered by state high-risk pools or Some of the specific details will Medicaid? be outlined in the coming weeks The federal plan is expectby the Department of Health and ed to offer more-affordHuman Services. However, here able coverage than the existing are answers to some commonly state plans and will not impose asked questions about the health the same income restrictions as care changes coming within the Medicaid. State plans also typinext year. cally impose high deductibles I don’t have health insur- and premiums (some charge as ance. How soon will the much as $1,200 a month), and up new law help me? to 12-month waiting periods beThe answer depends on fore covering pre-existing health your age and reasons for problems. not having insurance. If you How will the law affect haven’t had insurance for six children with pre-existing months, and you can’t afford or conditions? don’t qualify for insurance beBeginning in September, cause of a pre-existing medical the new law is expected to problem, you may be eligible for a stop insurance companies from new federal “high risk” pool to be rejecting children or excluding offered by the end of June. coverage because of pre-existing The cost of the monthly pre- medical problems. Since the law miums hasn’t been announced, passed, insurers have argued that but the rates are to be based on it uses vague language and does a “standard population,” sug- not require them to provide insurgesting they will be based on a ance to all children right away, healthier group than typically and they may take the battle to used to calculate premiums for court.
By Tara Parker-Pope
New York Times News Service
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ed to opt out of the country’s first election in two decades, following the lead of the detained Nobel Prize laureate who had earlier denounced the laws guiding the election as undemocratic. The decision, approved by an unanimous vote of the 113 executive members, spotlights the question of the polls’ credibility. The NLD won the most parliamentary seats in the last election in 1990, whose results the military refused to honor.
Rio Tinto employees found guilty in China SHANGHAI — Four employees of the British-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto, including an Australian citizen, were found guilty by a Chinese court on Monday of accepting millions of dollars in bribes and stealing commercial secrets. They were sentenced to seven to 14 years in prison and ordered to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines. Until the verdict, Rio Tinto — one of the world’s biggest producers of iron ore — had strongly defended its employees. But the company issued a statement Monday saying that it had decided to immediately fire the four employees, describing the evidence released during the trial that they had accepted about $13.5 million in bribes as “beyond doubt.”
‘Door to afterlife’ unearthed in Egypt CAIRO — Archaeologists have unearthed a 3,500-year-old “door to the afterlife” from the tomb of a high-ranking Egyptian official near Karnak temple in Luxor, the Egyptian antiquities authority said Monday. These recessed niches found in nearly all ancient Egyptian tombs were meant to take the spirits of the dead to and from the afterworld. The nearly 6-foot-tall slab of pink granite was covered with religious texts. The door came from the tomb of User, the chief minister of Queen Hatshepsut, a powerful, long ruling 15th century B.C. queen from the New Kingdom with a famous mortuary temple near Luxor in southern Egypt. — From wire reports
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