wetnwildgrl LRFA's blog: "Erica's blog"

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) -- As if the West Nile-toting mosquito isn't enough to worry Mississippians, add the poisonous Latrodectus geometricus to the state's list of creepy-crawly creatures. Dr. Jerome Goddard, entomologist with the Mississippi Department of Health, said the poisonous Brown Widow spider that is a cousin to the well-known Black Widow, is now calling the Mississippi Gulf Coast home. "The tropical Brown Widow spider .... has recently been captured in many locations along the Mississippi Gulf Coast," Goddard said in a news release Tuesday. He said his office has been receiving many phone calls reporting buildings and grounds heavily infested with this type of spider. "This spider is in the same family as the Black Widow, and is poisonous to humans," Goddard said. "I first heard of a collection of this spider at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi in early 2005 and figured it was probably just an isolated incident." The Health Department said the Brown Widow can grow to 1 1/2 inches long. It is brown or grayish-brown instead of black and has an orange-to-yellow hourglass design on its underside, as opposed to the familiar red hourglass design on the Black Widow. "That's a dead giveaway," Goddard said. "When the hourglass design is yellowish or orange, instead of deep red, you know it is a Brown Widow." He said there is a positive note - the Brown Widow is not as aggressive as the Black Widow. And although some scientific reports claim the Brown Widow is twice as poisonous, Goddard said that was doubtful. "One very good medical review of 45 cases of Black Widow and Brown Widow bites showed that the symptoms of Brown Widow bites were mild and tended to be restricted to the bite site and surrounding tissues (not the case with black widows)," Dr. Goddard said. "Brown Widows will not attack if they are not bothered or made to feel threatened." Most spiders in Mississippi are unable to puncture human skin, and if they do, their venom is not generally harmful to humans. There are three main spider species in Mississippi that health officials worry about - the Black Widow, Brown Recluse and now the Brown Widow. Goddard said he was unaware of the new species existing anywhere else in Mississippi. "I've gone down to the Gulf Coast several times and looked for myself," he said. "They are, indeed, in many places." He said the spider probably made its way to Mississippi from Florida through commercial imports of plants, food, building materials, or furniture.

RADCLIFF, Ky. (AP) -- An Army soldier who fled to Canada rather than redeploy to Iraq surrendered Tuesday to military officials after asking for leniency. Spc. Darrell Anderson, 24, said he deserted the Army last year because he could no longer fight in what he believes is an illegal war. "I feel that by resisting I made up for the things I did in Iraq," Anderson said during a press briefing shortly before he turned himself in at nearby Fort Knox. "I feel I made up for the sins I committed in this war." Anderson, of Lexington, returned to the United States from Canada on Saturday. He could face a charge of desertion. Attorney Jim Fennerty of Chicago said Anderson will be interviewed by military investigators, given a uniform and assigned to a barracks while his case is processed. In three to five days, he will be given a discharge of other than honorable. At that point, he should be free from his military commitment and face no other charges, Fennerty said. "He's not a criminal," Fennerty said. As Anderson left the news conference, World War II veteran Les Powers confronted him, and shouted: "They should have shot you." Powers said Anderson abandoned his military commitment and should face a court martial, not receive a deal that lets him out of the Army. "He's a deserter. He's a coward," Powers said after Anderson was gone. "He should be given a dishonorable discharge." Gini Sinclair, a spokeswoman for Fort Knox, would not discuss Anderson specifically, but said officers review AWOL soldiers' cases before they are discharged. "In some cases, you can be here only a few days," Sinclair said. Anderson joined the Army in January 2003 and went to Iraq a year later with the 1st Armored Division. He was wounded and received a Purple Heart in 2004. He fled to Canada in early 2005 after receiving orders to return for a second tour of duty in Iraq, becoming a highly visible war critic and spokesman for Canadian peace groups. Anderson's mother, Anita Dennis, said the military failed in its responsibility to take care of her son after he returned from war. "They treated his physical wounds, but they left his emotional wounds untreated," Dennis said through tears. Anderson said he suffered from nightmares and was unable to get the treatment he needed by the time he was ordered to redeploy. He said he was able to get some treatment for emotional distress while in Canada. Anderson's Canadian wife, Gail Greer, said she supports her husband's decision. "I'm really anxious and nervous, but he's definitely doing the right thing," Greer said. "I just hope people listen to what he has to say."

New York - Two Americans won the Nobel Prize in medicine Monday for discovering a way to silence specific genes, a revolutionary finding that scientists are scrambling to harness for fighting illnesses as diverse as cancer, heart disease and AIDS. Andrew Fire, 47, of Stanford University School of Medicine in California, and Craig Mello, 45, of the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, will share the $1.4 million prize. They were honored remarkably swiftly for work they published together just eight years ago. It revealed a process called RNA interference, which occurs in plants, animals and humans. It's important for regulating gene activity and helping defend against viruses. It is "a fundamental mechanism for controlling the flow of genetic information," said the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, which awarded the prize. Since the discovery, scientists have already made RNA interference a standard lab tool for studying what genes do. And they're working to use it to develop treatments against a long list of illnesses, including asthma, cystic fibrosis, diabetes, flu, Parkinson's and Huntington's diseases, and age-related macular degeneration, a major cause of blindness. "This has been such a revolution in biomedicine, everybody is using it," said Tom Cech, president of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, for which Mello is an investigator. "It's so important that people almost take it for granted already, even though it was discovered fairly recently," said Cech, won a Nobel in 1989 for RNA research at the University of Colorado. Nobel prizes are generally awarded decades after the work that they honor, so a prize now for a finding published in 1998 is striking. But it's appropriate, said Bruce Stillman, president of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y., because the work "is recognized now as one of the really revolutionary changes in the way we think about how genes are controlled." Genes produce their effect by sending molecules called messenger RNA to the protein-making machinery of a cell. The messenger RNA directs that machinery to produce a particular protein. In RNA interference, certain molecules trigger the destruction or inactivation of the messenger RNA from a particular gene, so that no protein is produced. Thus the gene is effectively silenced. For instance, researchers have shown they can lower cholesterol levels in lab animals by suppressing a gene through RNA interference. Mello, who is still doing research on RNA interference, said "there's a lot of work to do" to turn the basic work into drug treatments. When the congratulatory call from the Nobel committee reached his home at 4:40 in the morning, Mello was checking the blood level of his diabetic 6-year-old daughter. "You don't really appreciate how important the work of the last 50 years or so of modern molecular medicine ... has been until you know somebody who is alive and well because of it," he said. Fire said the award showed the importance of publicly funding basic research that doesn't appear to have a near-term payoff. Fire, who was working for the Washington-based Carnegie Institution at the time of the discovery, and Mello did their groundbreaking experiment in a tiny worm called C. elegans. They found they could block the effect of a specific gene by injecting worms with a particular double-stranded version of RNA. Usually RNA - ribonucleic acid - has only one strand. "That was the breakthrough that set the whole field on fire, no pun intended," Cech said. While scientists had already known that RNA played a role in gene silencing in plants, they didn't understand the process. The prize-winning research "was like opening the blinds in the morning," said Erna Miller, a member of the Nobel committee. "Suddenly you can see everything clearly."

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- When Julianna Redd's parents took her for a long drive the day before her wedding, they weren't trying to impart parental advice. Rather, they drove her to Colorado and kept her there long enough that she missed the nuptials. Now the Utah county attorney's office has filed second-degree felony kidnapping charges against Julianna's parents, Lemuel and Julia Redd. The Redds told their daughter they were taking her on a shopping trip Aug. 4 and then drove her to Grand Junction, Colo., according to Provo police Capt. Rick Healey. The bridegroom, Perry Myers, called police when his bride-to-be didn't attend a pre-wedding dinner with his parents that night. The Redds spent the night in Colorado and returned the 240 miles to Provo the next day, Healey said. But they arrived after the couple was supposed to have participated in a wedding ceremony on Aug. 5 in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Temple in Salt Lake City. The couple were married in the temple on Aug. 8, Myers said. He said they are doing well and are expecting their first child in May. Both are students at Brigham Young University in Provo. The Redds didn't want their daughter to get married, but Julianna, 21, has been reluctant to say what happened on the drive. Myers, 23, said he and his wife were not discussing details of the car ride but said her parents' objections were not about him. "It really has nothing to do a lot with me. It really is some issues with the family," he said. Utah County Attorney Kay Bryson said Tuesday he met with the Julianna and Perry Myers before charging her parents. "One of our purposes was to see how they felt. It was their desire to proceed with those charges," Bryson said. Bryson said after reviewing the police investigation it was clear a crime was committed. The charges were filed Friday. "I've never had a case quite like this," he said. "It is strange that parents would go to that extent to keep an adult daughter from marrying the man that she had chosen to marry." Lemuel, 59, and Julia Redd, 56, are scheduled to make an initial appearance in court Oct. 26 before 4th District Judge James R. Taylor. A call made to a listing for Lemuel H. Redd at the address in Monticello, Utah, listed in court documents went unanswered Tuesday. No attorney for the Redds is listed in court documents and it couldn't immediately be determined if they had legal representation yet. If convicted, the Redds could face one to 15 years in the Utah State Prison.

1. Collect all the laundry in the house. Do not just throw in your stinky gym clothes. Towels and sheets like to be washed once in a while. See that nasty washrag in the kitchen sink? Throw it in the garbage. 2. Sort the laundry into small piles. Whites and Darks and Towels should be washed seperately. Would you like to wear a pink tie dye shirt to work? Do not stuff the washer with clothes unless you want to buy me a new washing machine. 16 pairs of jeans in one load is too many. Also, 10 towels in with everything else is too much. 3. There is a measuring device. Use it. One cup of detergent is enough. Do not, I repeat do not touch the bleach bottle. It is off limits to you. Likewise with the other dangerous chemicals. 4. Just use the button that says Warm. Hot will make my clothes too small and you will hear me say I am fat every time I put my jeans on. Do you really want to hear me say I am fat, again? Also, I will have to go shopping if you shrink my clothes. You will have to come and hold my purse for 7 hours. I will probably say I am fat at least 22 times. 5. Don't forget to shut the lid on the washing machine.The cycle will not finish if the lid is not closed, and I will complain. Plus, one of our children will climb in. Do you want someone to drown? 6. When the washing machine starts scooting around by itself, you have packed it too full. If it starts shaking from side to side and smacking the wall, you are an idiot. If you pack the washer too tight, clothes will not get clean and later, they will not get dry. Did I mention you are an idiot? 7. Washing the clothes is only a part of what I call "Doing the Laundry." Clothes have to be dried as well. And later, they will need to be folded and yes, put away. It is time consuming. There is no laundry fairy. Why do you think I complain about it? 8. Put clothes into the dryer immediately after the washing machine stops moving. If you wait until the game is over or until tomorrow, I will complain. Also, there won't be any sheets for the bed tonight. Have you smelled the inside of a washing machine after clothes have gotten moldy in there? Not good. 9. 50 minutes should be long enough to dry a load, unless you are an idiot (see #6). 60 minutes for towels. I do not like burn marks on my white shirts. You do not want burn marks on your fancy golf shorts. 10. Clothes like to be folded while they are hot. If they get cold, they will get wrinkled from sitting in the bottom of the dryer, then you will have to iron them or take them to the cleaners. I do not iron. It is your choice. 11. The hamper is not our dresser. A dresser is for clean clothes. A hamper is for dirty clothes.We do not wear clothes from a hamper, even if they look clean. When the hamper overflows, do a load. 12. If you "do the laundry," you do not get a medal. You do not get a chest to pin it on. You get clean clothes. I won't complain. We all win.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea triggered global alarm on Tuesday by saying it will conduct a nuclear test, a key step in the manufacture of atomic bombs that it views as a deterrent against any U.S. attack. But the North also said it was committed to nuclear disarmament, suggesting a willingness to negotiate. The contradictory statement fits a North Korean pattern of ratcheting up tension on the Korean Peninsula, a Cold War-era flashpoint, in an attempt to win concessions such as economic aid. The strategy has had mixed results in recent years as the totalitarian regime sinks deeper into isolation and poverty, with China serving as its lifeline for food and fuel. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called the announcement "a very provocative act" and urged Asian nations to rethink their relationships with North Korea. South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun called for a "cool-headed and stern" response, his office said. Roh will hold summits with the leaders of Japan and China next week, his office said Wednesday. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said his country would find it unacceptable if North Korea tested a nuclear weapon. China appealed to its communist ally to stay calm and show restraint. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao expressed hope all parties to the dispute would reach a negotiated settlement, "rather than adopt actions that intensify tensions," the official Xinhua News Agency said. The North's announcement came as the standoff deepened over Iran's nuclear program, with senior U.N. diplomats saying six world powers would begin negotiations Friday in London on possibly imposing sanctions against Tehran for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment. It was the first time the North had publicly announced its intent to conduct a nuclear test. Previously, it had warned that it might conduct a test, depending on U.S. actions. "The U.S. extreme threat of a nuclear war and sanctions and pressure compel the DPRK to conduct a nuclear test, an essential process for bolstering nuclear deterrent, as a self-defense measure in response," said a statement by the North's Foreign Ministry and carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency. DPRK stands for Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the North's official name. Yet it said it wanted to "settle hostile relations" between the North and the United States, and that it "will do its utmost to realize the denuclearization of the peninsula." Many North Korea watchers believe the country's dictator, Kim Jong Il, knows that all-out confrontation with the United States would lead to his destruction. Even if Kim seeks negotiations, though, the risk of a miscalculation that spirals out of control cannot be ruled out. The North Korean statement did not say when a nuclear test might occur, but the prospect drew rebukes from Japan, South Korea, and the United States. The allies, along with China and Russia, had participated in the stalled six-party talks aimed at getting the North to give up its nuclear ambitions. The announcement was not a big surprise to many observers of North Korea because U.S. intelligence reports previously had indicated that Pyongyang might be preparing a nuclear test. Many experts believe the North has enough radioactive material to build at least a half-dozen or more nuclear weapons. "They are an active proliferator," said Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. "And were they to test and were they then to proliferate those technologies, we'd be living with a proliferator and obviously we'd be living in a somewhat different world." Rumsfeld, in Managua, Nicaragua, for meetings with Central and South American foreign ministers, declined to say whether Pyongyang's announcement had triggered any changes in the U.S. alert status. During a visit to Cairo, Egypt, Rice said the United States would have to assess its options if the North carries out the test, without detailing what those options were. She stressed, however, that a North Korean test was an issue "for the neighborhood" and not just for the United States. "It would be a very provocative act," Rice said. "A North Korean nuclear test ... would create a qualitatively different situation on the Korean peninsula," Rice said. "I think that you would see that a number of states in the region would need to reassess where they are now with North Korea." The remarks appeared directed primarily at China and South Korea. The White House, which has denied it has any intention of attacking the communist nation, also denounced the threat. White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said a test "would be directly contrary to the interests of all of North Korea's neighbors and to peace and security in the Asia-Pacific region." South Korea said it won't tolerate North Korea's possession of nuclear weapons and the presidential office said the country had raised its "security level." "If North Korea pushes ahead with a nuclear test, North Korea should take full responsibility for all consequences," said South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman Choo Kyu-ho. The United States keeps about 29,500 troops in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War. The Japanese prime minister said North Korea's announcement was "extremely regrettable." Abe was responding to questions in parliament. "Naturally, we simply could not accept if North Korea were to conduct a nuclear test," he said. China, North Korea's ally and chief benefactor, had no immediate comment. North Korea counters U.S. influence in the region, but China is believed to be increasingly frustrated with North Korea's go-it-alone belligerence. In Finland, European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said such a test "is always bad news." NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said he was "gravely concerned" by the reports of a North Korean test. "Such a test would pose a threat to peace and security in Asia and the world," he said in a statement. In a worst-case scenario, a North Korean nuclear test could prompt Japan to seek its own nuclear deterrent, intensifying historical tensions with China and South Korea, both of which suffered under Japanese colonial rule in the early 20th century. A test could also strain the alliance between the United States and South Korea, which has sought to engage its neighbor. The United States is likely to seek a military solution to the North Korean problem only as a last resort, partly because of the burden of conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan. U.S. Ambassador John Bolton raised the issue before a regularly scheduled meeting of the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday. He said he urged members "to come up not just with a knee-jerk reaction ... but to develop a coherent strategy to convince them that it's not in their interest to engage in nuclear testing." But France's U.N. Ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sabliere said he wants a swift council statement, and China's U.N. Ambassador Wang Guangya said the best place to deal with the threat is in the six-party talks. Wang urged stepped up efforts to get the North to return to the stalled talks. After a brief discussion, members decided to meet Wednesday morning to address the issue. North Korea has sometimes made a splash with statements or military actions on important anniversaries at home, or political events such as elections in South Korea and the United States. The test declaration came ahead of congressional elections in the United States in November and shortly before the expected election of South Korea's foreign minister, Ban Ki-Moon, as secretary-general of the United Nations. North Korea staged a series of missile tests to coincide with July 4, needling the United States on its Independence Day. But no talks or concessions were forthcoming. Six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear activity have been stalled for almost a year. Pyongyang skipped the talks in protest over U.S. financial restrictions imposed for alleged illegal activity, including money laundering and counterfeiting. "If they feel they are not getting interaction with us, they tend to do things to get our attention," said Charles Kartman, a U.S. nuclear negotiator with North Korea under the Clinton administration. "The tools that they have are all bad ones. They don't really have anything else going."

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- A suicide bomber unleashed a blast in a Baghdad fish market Tuesday and two Shiite families were found slain north of the capital as violence across Iraq claimed at least 52 lives. The U.S. military, meanwhile, announced the deaths of nine soldiers and two Marines in what has been a deadly period for American forces in Iraq. The announcement brought to at least 15 the number of service members killed in fighting since Saturday. Four of the soldiers were killed in Baghdad on Monday in separate small-arms fire attacks, the military said. Another four were killed the same day in a roadside bomb attack on their patrol northwest of Baghdad. The ninth died Sunday when his vehicle was struck by a roadside bomb west of the capital. Sunni politicians expressed worries over a new government plan to stop sectarian violence. The plan, announced a day earlier by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, won some praise in parliament Tuesday. But Shiite and Sunni leaders delayed potentially contentious talks to work out its details. The four-point plan calls for creating neighborhood Shiite-Sunni committees to monitor efforts against sectarian violence. The aim is to overcome the deep mistrust between Sunnis and Shiites. Many Sunnis remain skeptical that Shiite leaders will allow security forces to crack down more strongly on Shiite militias blamed for killing Sunnis - including some linked to parties in the government. "I haven't seen any real desire in the other side. There are militias supported by the government," said Sunni lawmaker Khalaf al-Alayan. U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said that under the plan, parties that have militias have agreed to take "responsibility for what their groups or people under them are doing, ... committing themselves to ending the sectarian violence." Still, "there are forces that are not under their control," Khalilzad said in an interview with National Public Radio. "But if they implement what they've agreed to, there should be a significant decrease in the level of violence in Baghdad." Another lawmaker, Izzat Shabandar, from the secular Iraqi Bloc, cautioned "we have to be realistic." "Those who signed this blessed agreement have to confess, at least to themselves, they are the basis of the problem and they are part of it," he said. Al-Maliki's government has been under intense pressure to put an end to Shiite-Sunni violence that has killed thousands of people this year and raised fears of civil war. This week, gunmen carried out two mass kidnappings in as many days, abducting 38 people from workplaces in Baghdad - attacks that Sunnis said were carried out by Shiite militias. Some 400 Sunnis marched Tuesday at the site of one of the kidnappings - a frozen meat factory in Baghdad's Amil district - demanding the government put a stop to the violence. Some carried banners reading "get police troops out of our area" - reflecting the widespread suspicion that Shiite-led security forces have been infiltrated by militias. Gunmen took 24 workers from the factory on Sunday and the bodies of seven were later found dumped in the capital. The fate of the others is not known. The Interior Ministry said the police commander for the Amil district had been discharged and arrested for investigation in the kidnapping - a possible response to Sunni complaints that Shiite-led security forces allow militias to operate freely. Earlier Tuesday, a suicide bomber detonated a belt rigged with explosives in an outdoor fish market in the primarily Sunni area of Sadiyah in southwestern Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 19, police said. Hours later, four mortars hit homes in another Sunni district, killing seven people and wounding 25. The mixed city of Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, saw a string of deadly attacks. Gunmen opened fire on a Shiite family trying to flee the city, killing five of them. Later, the bodies of a woman and two men lay on the street near the family truck, billowing smoke. In addition, eight people were killed in another shooting in Baqouba, and two others died in a roadside bombing. Attacks elsewhere in Baghdad and around the country killed 17 other people. Ten more bodies also were found, the apparent victims of sectarian slayings. They included seven bodies in an area north of Baqouba, identified as a father, three sons and three other relatives from a Shiite family. In the mainly Shiite south, the bodies of two women - one beheaded, the other burned - were found in Kut, while a former army officer was discovered dead and handcuffed in Amarah. Talks on creating joint security committees to end the violence must tackle a range of issues - including how many members will be on the panels, the proportion of Shiites and Sunnis and which areas of Baghdad they will cover. Khalilzad said the committees would include Shiite and Sunni political, religious and tribal leaders as well as military figures. The intent is that each committee will oversee the effort against violence in its district - with a central body overseeing them and working with security forces. But it still must be decided what powers the committees will have and how decisions will be reached. Every month, the parties will meet to review progress. Sunnis hope the committees will give them a voice to ensure that security forces go after Shiite militias. But it remains unclear whether the new system will lead to tougher action. Shiite leaders insist the main problem is attacks by Sunni insurgents. Al-Alayan, the Sunni lawmaker, said the two sides made progress in talks over the weekend and agreed on banning weapons and militias. But when a representative of Muqtada al-Sadr, a radical Shiite cleric who holds a place in the government and heads a powerful militia, joined talks Monday, "everything was overturned" and the ban was put aside. Still, al-Sadr's party signed onto the new security plan.

Nickel Mines, Pa. - A milk-truck driver carrying three guns and a childhood grudge stormed a one-room Amish schoolhouse Monday, sent the boys and adults outside, barricaded the doors with two-by-fours, and then opened fire on a dozen girls, killing three people before committing suicide. At least seven other victims were critically wounded, authorities said. It was the nation's third deadly school shooting in less than a week, and it sent shock waves through Lancaster County's bucolic Amish country, a picturesque landscape of horse-drawn buggies, green pastures and neat-as-a-pin farms, where violent crime is virtually nonexistent. execution-style at point-blank range after being lined up along the chalkboard, their feet bound with wire and plastic ties, authorities said. Two young students were killed, along with a female teacher's aide who was slightly older than the students, state police Commissioner Jeffrey B. Miller said. "This is a horrendous, horrific incident for the Amish community. They're solid citizens in the community. They're good people. They don't deserve ... no one deserves this," State Police Commissioner Jeffrey B. Miller said. The gunman, Charles Carl Roberts IV, a 32-year-old truck driver from the nearby town of Bart, was bent on killing young girls as a way of "acting out in revenge for something that happened 20 years ago" when he was a boy, Miller said. Miller refused to say what that long-ago hurt was. Roberts was not Amish and appeared to have nothing against the Amish community, Miller said. Instead, Miller said, he apparently picked the school because it was close by, there were girls there, and it had little or no security. The attack bore similarities to a deadly school shooting last week in Bailey, Colo., and authorities there raised the possibility that the Pennsylvania attack was a copycat crime. Miller said Roberts was apparently preparing for a long siege, arming himself with a 9mm semiautomatic pistol, a 12-gauge shotgun and a rifle, along with a bag of about 600 rounds of ammunition, two cans of smokeless powder, two knives and a stun gun on his belt. He also had rolls of tape, various tools and a change of clothes. Roberts had left several rambling notes to his wife and three children that Miller said were "along the lines of suicide notes." The gunman also called his wife during the siege by cell phone to tell her he was getting even for some long-ago offense, according to Miller. From the suicide notes and telephone calls, it was clear Roberts was "angry at life, he was angry at God," Miller said. And it was clear from interviews with his co-workers at the dairy that his mood had darkened in recent days and he had stopped chatting and joking around with fellow employees and customers, the officer said. Miller said that Roberts had been scheduled to take a random drug test on Monday. But the officer said it was not clear what role that may have played in the attack. Miller said investigators were looking into the possibility the attack may have been related to the death of one of Roberts' own children. According to an obituary, Roberts and his wife, Marie, lost a daughter shortly after she was born in 1997. As rescue workers and investigators tromped over the surrounding farmland, looking for evidence around this tiny village about 55 miles west of Philadelphia, dozens of people in traditional plain Amish clothing watched - the men in light-colored shirts, dark pants and broad-brimmed straw farmer's hats, the women in bonnets and long dark dresses. Reporters were kept away from the school after the shooting, and the Amish were reluctant to speak with the media, as is their custom. The victims were members of the Old Order Amish. Lancaster County is home to some 20,000 Old Order Amish, who eschew automobiles, electricity, computers, fancy clothes and most other modern conveniences, live among their own people, and typically speak a German dialect known as Pennsylvania Dutch. Bob Allen, a clerk at a bookstore in the Amish country tourist town of Intercourse, said residents see the area as being safe and the Amish as peaceful people. "It just goes to show there's no safe place. There's really no such thing," he said. The shooting took place at the one-room West Nickel Mines Amish School, a neat white building set amid green fields, with a square white horse fence around the schoolyard. The school had about 25 to 30 students, ages 6 to 13. According to investigators, Roberts walked his children to the school bus stop, then backed his truck up to the Amish school, unloaded his weapons and several pieces of lumber, and walked in around 10 a.m. He released about 15 boys, a pregnant woman and three women with babies, Miller said. He barricaded the doors with two-by-fours and two-by-sixes nailed into place, piled-up desks and flexible plastic ties; made the remaining girls line up along a blackboard; and tied their feet together with wire ties and plastic ties, Miller said. The teacher and another adult at the school fled to a farmhouse nearby, and someone there called 911 to report a gunman holding students hostage. Roberts apparently called his wife around 11 a.m., saying he was taking revenge for an old grudge, Miller said. Moments later, Roberts told a dispatcher he would open fire on the children if police didn't back away from the building. Within seconds, troopers heard gunfire. They smashed the windows to get inside, and found his body. Miller said he had no immediate evidence that the victims were sexually assaulted. Killed were two students, and a female teacher's aide who was 15 or 16 years old, authorities said. No one answered the door at Roberts' small, one-story home on Tuesday afternoon. Children's toys were strewn on the porch and in the yard. A family spokesman, Dwight LeFever, read a short statement from Roberts' wife that said, in part, "Our hearts are broken, our lives are shattered, and we grieve for the innocence and lives that were lost today. Above all, please pray for the families who lost children and please pray too for our family and children." The shootings were disturbingly similar to an attack last week at Platte Canyon High School in Bailey, Colo., where a man singled out several girls as hostages in a school classroom and then killed one of them and himself. Authorities said the man in Colorado sexually molested the girls. "If this is some kind of a copycat, it's horrible and of concern to everybody, all law enforcement," said Monte Gore, undersheriff of Park County, Colo. Miller, though, said he believed the Pennsylvania attack was not a copycat crime: "I really believe this was about this individual and what was going on inside his head." On Friday, a school principal was shot to death in Cazenovia, Wis. A 15-year-old student, described as upset over a reprimand, was charged with murder. The Pennsylvania attack was the deadliest school shooting since a teenager went on a rampage last year on an Indian reservation in Red Lake, Minn., killing 10 people in all, including five students, a teacher, a security guard and himself. Nationwide, the 1999 Columbine High School massacre in Littleton, Colo., remains the deadliest school shooting, with 15 dead, including the two teenage gunmen. In Pennsylvania's insular Amish country, the outer world has intruded on occasion. In 1999, two Amish men were sent to jail for buying cocaine from a motorcycle gang and selling it to young people in their community. There were four murders in Lancaster County in 2005, including the killings of a non-Amish couple were shot to death in their Lititz home in November by their daughter's 18-year-old boyfriend. Kenneth Trump, president of the National School Safety and Security Services consulting firm in Cleveland, said the Colorado and Pennsylvania crimes underscore the lesson that no school is automatically safe from an attack. "These incidents can happen to a one-classroom schoolhouse to a large urban school," he said. "The only thing that scares me more than an armed intruder in a school is school and safety officials who believe it can't happen here." Most of the victims had been shot

1999 April 20: Columbine High School, Jefferson County - Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, killed 12 students and one teacher and wounded 24 other people before committing suicide in the school library. Nov. 19: Deming Middle School, Deming, N.M. - Victor Cordova, 12, shot and killed a 13-year-old classmate. He was sentenced to two years in juvenile detention. 2000 Feb. 29: Buell Elementary School, Mount Morris Township, Mich. - A 6-year-old boy, whose identity was not released, shot and killed 6-year-old playmate Kayla Rolland. He was not charged with a crime, but he was removed from his mother's custody. May 26: Lake Worth Community Middle School, Lake Worth, Fla. - After being sent home for misbehaving, Nathaniel Brazill, 13, returned to school and killed teacher Barry Grunow. Brazill was sentenced to 28 years in prison. 2001 March 5: Santana High School, Santee, Calif. - In a San Diego suburb, Charles "Andy" Williams, 15, killed two classmates - a 14-year-old and a 17-year-old - and injured 13. He was sentenced in 2002 to at least 50 years in prison. April 26: Gutenberg High School in Erfurt, Germany - Robert Steinhaeuser, 19, a recently expelled student, entered his former school and methodically killed 16 people, going room to room with a shotgun and a handgun, before committing suicide. 2003 April 24: Red Lion Area Junior High School, Red Lion, Pa. - James Sheets, 14, brought three handguns to school and killed principal Eugene Segro before fatally shooting himself in the cafeteria. Sept. 24: Rocori High School, Cold Spring, Minn. - Jason McLaughlin, 15, shot and killed 17-year-old Aaron Rollins, and critically wounded another student, who died of his injuries two weeks later. McLaughlin, charged as an adult, was found guilty of murder and sentenced to life in prison. 2004 September: Beslan School No. 1, Beslan, Russia - On the first day of school in this southern Russian town, Chechen militants took more than 1,100 children, parents and staff hostage in the gym. After a three-day siege, 331 hostages died - including 186 children - during the explosions and gunfire that ended the standoff. 2005 March 21: Red Lake Senior High School, Red Lake, Minn. - Jeff Weise, 16, killed his grandfather and his grandfather's girlfriend before driving to Red Lake Senior High School and killing five students, a teacher and a security guard. Weise fired on police as they entered the building, then retreated and killed himself. Nov. 8: Campbell County Comprehensive High School, Jacksboro, Tenn. - A 15-year-old student shot a principal and two assistant principals before a teacher wrestled his weapon away. Assistant principal Ken Bruce was killed. 2006 Aug. 30: Orange High School, Hillsborough, N.C. - Former student Alvaro Castillo, 19, was arrested after opening fire in the school's parking lot, wounding two. Police found Castillo's father murdered at his home. Sept. 13: Dawson College, Montreal - Kimveer Gill, 25, opened fire, authorities said, killing one person and wounding 20 others. He was killed in a shootout with police. Sept. 27: Platte Canyon High School, Bailey - Duane R. Morrison fatally shot 16-year-old Emily Keyes and then himself. Sept. 29: Weston High School, Cazenovia, Wis. - A 15-year-old student fatally shot his principal.

Nickel Mines, Pa. - The first thing Charles Carl Roberts IV did when he walked into the one-room Amish schoolhouse, police said, was to show the children his semiautomatic pistol. He was talking, but he didn't make sense. "Have you seen anything like this?" police say he asked. "Can you help me find it?" Roberts let all 15 boys leave. A pregnant woman, too. Three adults were allowed to escape with their infant children. He bound the girls with wire and plastic ties and lined them up at the blackboard. He called his wife to say that he wouldn't be coming home, that he loved her. And then he began to shoot the girls. A scene of carnage erupted in pastoral Lancaster County about 11 a.m. Monday as a lone gunman with a 20-year-old grievance took his revenge on a room full of pupils at the West Nickel Mines Amish School, then turned the pistol on himself. State police officers stormed the building at the sound of shots - some of the bullets aimed at them - to discover the doors barricaded by desks and lumber. They broke windows and climbed inside to find Roberts and three girls dead, and eight children badly wounded. Two more children died overnight.. It was the nation's third fatal school shooting in a week. The murdered children were shot in the head, execution- style, police said. The survivors, many critically injured after being hit at close range, were taken to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and other medical facilities in the region. Authorities did not release the names of the dead or wounded. A group of Amish families, the women in dark dresses and the men in straw hats, declined to comment as they entered the Philadelphia hospital Monday night. Their children, ages 8, 10 and 12, were listed in critical condition Monday night after surgery. "Clearly, he wanted to attack young female victims," said Col. Jeffrey Miller, commissioner of the Pennsylvania State Police, who briefed reporters at a makeshift press center at the Nickel Mines Auction House. The father of three - who was not Amish - came prepared for a siege, Miller said. Found with Roberts' body were a 9mm pistol, purchased three years ago in a local gunshop; a shotgun; a rifle; a stun gun; two knives; smokeless powder; and 600 rounds of ammunition. He brought a 5-gallon bucket filled with tools that included a hammer, a hacksaw, pliers and rolls of clear tape. He also brought a change of clothes. Roberts' wife, Marie Roberts, issued a statement that described him as a loving spouse and caring father, not a homicidal killer. She asked people to pray for the families of the dead - and for her own family. "Our hearts are broken, our lives are shattered, and we grieve for the innocence and lives that were lost today." The West Nickel Mines school is located on East White Oak Road about 12 miles southeast of Lancaster. It is a simple, cream-colored building surrounded by a white fence. The school, attended by 25 to 30 students, isn't far from the outlet malls that draw thousands of visitors. Tourists come from across the country to see the Amish farmers work their spreads with horse-drawn equipment. The county had only four murders in all of 2005. Horse-drawn buggies Monday were parked not far from giant TV satellite trucks, their dishes pointed at the stars. The sky buzzed with the drone of news helicopters. "It's very sad," said Randy Gockley, emergency management coordinator for Lancaster County. "You don't find a more peace-loving people than the Amish." Police said that Roberts, of nearby Bart, worked as a truck driver, collecting milk overnight from local farms and delivering it to his employer, Northwest Foods. Before proceeding to the Amish school, authorities said, he dropped his children at the school-bus stop. Roberts left suicide-type notes for his children and his wife, police said. They described the contents as rambling and disjointed. "They don't make a lot of sense," Miller said. Roberts indicated he was "angry at life and angry at God," Miller said. Police believe he made the decision to attack the school several days ago, based on interviews with co-workers. Colleagues said Roberts had been withdrawn, but during the past couple days he seemed more relaxed. Miller would not say what may have motivated Roberts, but said it was something that occurred about 20 years ago. That would have been when Roberts was about 12. Roberts, who had no criminal record, did not appear to be seeking revenge on the Amish specifically, Miller said. They were "a target of opportunity," likely chosen because the school was close to his home and had no security - and because he knew there were girls inside.