DES MOINES, Iowa

Police on horseback search for missing Colorado girl

Children find body at park during hunt for Easter eggs

Des Moines police say two children on an Easter egg hunt discovered a body at a city park.

Police said two children came across the man’s body in a wooded area at Beaverdale Park on Saturday morning. They were among 100 children participating in the park’s annual egg hunt.

Police said they don’t suspect any foul play, and an autopsy is planned.

The man’s identity hasn’t been released, pending notification of his family.

GREELEY, Colo.

Authorities look for signs of missing sixth-grader

Police on foot and on horseback were searching open areas near the home of a 12-year-old girl for any sign of the missing sixth-grader.

Kayleah Wilson was last seen last Sunday around 3:40 p.m. when she left her home to walk to a friend’s birthday party about a mile away, across a busy highway.

Police stopped more than 600 motorists passing near the area Friday to ask if they had seen anything last Sunday night.

Greeley Police Sgt. Joe Tymkowych said authorities have gone to Kayleah’s favorite hangouts, searched along the highway, interviewed friends, family and acquaintances, and have contacted registered sexual offenders who live nearby.

Kayleah weighs 145 pounds and has brown hair and blue eyes.

COOPERSTOWN, N.Y.

Police explore racial motives for shooting of black youth

A white schoolboy with a rifle chased a black classmate into a police station near the National Baseball Hall of Fame and shot him, then himself, as the lone officer on duty closed in, authorities said.

The shooter, 16, was hospitalized with a serious wound after shooting himself in the chin, police said Saturday. The other boy, also 16, was hit in the arm. He was treated at a hospital and released.

The shooting happened Friday afternoon at the small headquarters of the Cooperstown Police Department, across the street from the baseball museum.

It began when the white teenager stepped out of a car with a .22-caliber rifle and began chasing three youths who had been walking through a park near the Hall of Fame Library, village police Chief Diana Nicols said.

Authorities are investigating whether the shooter was motivated by racial hatred, she said.

The black teenager ran into the lobby the station shares with other municipal offices and took cover behind a partition. The shooter spotted him and fired two bullets, Nicols said.

One bullet passed through a wall and came within inches of the startled duty officer, James Cox, who leaped to his feet.

The white teenager then shot himself as Cox approached him with his gun drawn and ordered him to drop his rifle, said Nicols, who credited the officer’s bravery, and some luck, for halting the attack.

“If he had been out on patrol, this might have ended very differently,” she said.

The small-town department has six full-time officers, and the station is often empty during the day. Cox had been in the building only to fill out some paperwork.

The shooter remained hospitalized Saturday, police said. Depending on his condition, authorities hoped to arraign him in the hospital by today or Monday.

NEW YORK

Arrested for writing on desk, girl suing city for $1 million

A 12-year-old girl who was hauled out of her New York City school in handcuffs for doodling on her desk has started legal action against the city over her arrest.

A lawyer for Alexa Gonzalez filed legal papers seeking $1 million in damages, saying the Queens girl was subjected to overly harsh treatment.

The girl was arrested at her junior high school in February after scribbling “I love my friends Abby and Faith” on her desk with an erasable marker.

Her family’s lawyer said school officials overreacted by calling the police.

The Department of Education acknowledges the arrest was a mistake. The city’s legal department has declined to comment on the lawsuit.

REDWOOD CITY, Calif.

Woman accused in lab theft faces drug possession count

The woman accused of skimming drugs from San Francisco’s crime lab for her own use is facing a felony cocaine possession charge in San Mateo County.

Sixty-year-old Deborah Madden was charged Friday. She has been ordered to appear in San Mateo County Superior Court on Monday. Her attorney, Paul DeMeester, says she will plead not guilty.

Madden was arrested March 3 after authorities looking into the disappearance of drugs at the San Francisco lab say they found one-tenth of a gram of cocaine and a gun at her San Mateo home.

She has not been charged in the drug lab probe. DeMeester last month sought to downplay those allegations, comparing the situation to a bartender who sneaks a drink from a brewery. He says the lab has larger systemic problems.

SEATTLE

Investigators begin probe into deadly oil refinery blast

Investigators launched an inquiry into a deadly Washington state oil refinery blast as families hoped for the best Saturday for two employees who suffered severe burns over most of their bodies.

It could take months to find out what caused the explosion and fire that killed five workers early Friday.

Inspectors got permission from structural engineers late Friday night to enter the affected areas of the Tesoro Corp. refinery in Anacortes and begin their investigation, said Hector Castro, a spokesman for the Washington Department of Labor and Industries.

They remained at the scene Saturday but had no immediate indications about what caused the blast — or whether recent safety violations at the plant were contributing factors.

A team from the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board was en route Saturday.

MINNEAPOLIS

Police: Suspect in slaying was disarmed by daughter

A North Minneapolis man stabbed his wife 70 times before his 13-year-old daughter pulled him off her mother, disarmed him and fled with the knife.

That’s according to a criminal complaint charging Billy Nash, 46, with first-degree murder. He was ordered held on $1 million bail, pending a Monday court appearance.

Minneapolis police say an older girl woke to her mother’s screams about 3 a.m. Friday. They say the teen ran to her mother’s bedroom and saw her father beating her mother with his fist. She ran to call 911.

The criminal complaint says that’s when her 13-year-old sister came in and tried to save her mother.

No attorney for Nash was listed in court records, and a message left at his home was not immediately returned.