


NEWS BRIEFING
Pa. town rallies around Jewish family hit by swastika graffiti

Esther Cohen-Eskin was stunned when she went outside Aug. 19 and saw the Nazi symbol on her bin.
She said she felt targeted because the sign didn't appear anywhere else in her Havertown neighborhood, where she's lived for almost 20 years.
She spoke to her husband and called police, who have begun an investigation.
She called a friend for advice and he told her: “The only way to triumph (over) hate is with love.”
Hearing that, Cohen-Eskin, an artist, decided to paint over the swastika with flowers, and to stick letters in mailboxes asking her neighbors to paint their trash bins as well, turning symbols of hate into symbols of love.
“I still get goose bumps,” said Megan Connell, one of Cohen-Eskin's neighbors. “I had to explain to my 3-year-old that someone could do something so ugly, and we took it as a family thing.”
After she sent the letters, Cohen-Eskin went out for an art show — and came back to hundreds of messages and phone calls from people as far afield as Canada, Germany, and Ireland. Many sent pictures of trash cans they painted in a show of support.
Now, Cohen-Eskin wakes up every morning to new pictures of beautifully painted bins from all over the world.
“It gave me a whole new reassurance in humanity,” she said. “I feel invigorated by all the love. It's exciting it makes you feel there's so much good out there.”
Maine Gov. LePage apologizes
— sort of — after phone tirade
LePage said the outburst was justified because Gattine had called him racist; Gattine denies it.
Assistant House Democratic Leader Sara Gideon called for a “political intervention” to ensure either that the governor “gets the help that he needs” or that he's removed from office.
The voicemail followed a controversy that bubbled up Wednesday when LePage said that photos he's collected of drug dealers arrested in the state showed that 90 percent of them “are black and Hispanic people from Waterbury, Conn., the Bronx and Brooklyn.”
Jaycee Dugard loses court case against federal parole officials
A federal appeals court decided by a 2-1 vote Friday that Jaycee Dugard, who was kidnapped as a child and held by a parolee for 18 years, cannot hold federal parole officials liable for failing to supervise her abductor.
“Phillip Garrido, a parolee with a terrible history of drug-fueled sexual violence, committed unspeakable crimes against Jaycee Dugard for 18 years,” U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge John Owens wrote. “State and federal authorities missed many opportunities to stop these tragic events.”
Dugard received a $20 million settlement from California and sued the federal government for similar compensation.
Garrido was on federal parole when he and his wife kidnapped Dugard near her home in South Lake Tahoe. She was 11.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Schroeder temporarily blocked the University of North Carolina from making the three plaintiffs follow the restroom provision of the so-called HB2 law as the larger case makes its way to trial in November. His final decision on the law won't come until after that trial.
Passed in March, HB2 requires transgender people to use the restrooms in schools and many public buildings that correspond to the sex on their birth certificates, rather than their gender identity. It also excludes gender identity and sexual orientation from statewide antidiscrimination protections.
Prosecutors lose bid for harsher Pistorius term
Judge Thokozile Masipa said the state's appeal to extend the six-year sentence against the 29-year-old double amputee Olympic sprinter had a limited prospect of success.
“I am not persuaded that there are reasonable prospects of success for an appeal,” she said in the South Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg.
Pistorius shot Reeva Steenkamp, 29, in the early hours of Feb. 14. He claimed he thought she was an intruder.
The state charged that he shot her to death in anger after an argument.
Pistorius was found guilty of murder and sentenced by Masipa to six years in prison.
Toronto man
is charged in crossbow deaths of 3
Brett Ryan, 35, of Toronto, was charged with three counts of first-degree murder during a brief court appearance. He was remanded in custody until Sept. 2.
Details of the proceedings, including the names of the victims, cannot be reported due to a publication ban.
Police have released few details about the killings or what might have motivated them. The relationship between the accused and the three victims — two men and a woman — is not known.
It was not clear what became of the bank charges.