SAN DIEGO, Calif.

Charity that helps veterans accused of misusing funds

California’s attorney general has sued a major veterans charity on allegations that its directors misused in private donations for hefty pensions, golf memberships and other perks.

Attorney General Kamala Harris told The Associated Press on Thursday that her office filed the complaint in Riverside County SuperiorCourt against Help Hospitalized Veterans of Winchester.

Officials want several directors ousted and the recovery of at least $4.3 million they say was mishandled. They also seek untold punitive damages.

Help Hospitalized Veterans ranks among the top 1 percent of charities in the nation for the amount of money it reports raising annually. Its primary mission is to provide veterans with arts and crafts kits.

Lawyers for the charity didn’t immediately return calls.

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina

Miracle baby closer to home after move to new hospital

Argentina’s miracle morgue baby is now four months old and closer to home.

Luz Milagros Veron – the name means “Miracle Light” in English – was flown with her mother Analia Bouter on Thursday to a pediatric hospital closer to her home in provincial Chaco after months in intensive care in Buenos Aires.

Doctors said the baby showed no signs of life when she was born three months premature in April, and quickly sent her to the morgue. She’s alive today because her parents insisted on seeing her body to say goodbye. After 12 hours inside a sealed coffin, she moved and let out a tiny cry.

Since then, Luz Milagros has grown and become stronger, but she isn’t ready to go home yet.

Hugo Ramos, the deputy director of the hospital in provincial Resistencia where she will now be cared for, said she suffered neurological damage, still has internal bleeding and remains on a respirator.

She’s in stable but very serious condition, Ramos said, according to Argentina’s Diarios y Noticias news agency.

MEXICO CITY

Body count from drug war rises by 14 in a single day

Fourteen bodies were found in a truck Thursday in the state of San Luis Potosi, at least 17 people have been killed since Sunday in the port of Acapulco and 12 others were reported killed in 24 hours in metropolitan Mexico City.

The string of bloody reports grabbed headlines in Mexico, reminding the public that drug-related violence continues unabated as the six-year mark approaches in the federal government’s declared war on drug cartels.

The bodies Thursday were found in a truck left near a gasoline station on the highway between the city of San Luis Potosi and Zacatecas state. Authorities said in initial statements that all the victims were male and had come from the neighboring border state of Coahuila.

Body dumps along highways are a fixture of the conflict between Mexico’s most powerful drug cartels, Sinaloa and the Zetas. San Luis Potosi, however, until recently had not seen the same level of violence as other parts of the country.

TRIPOLI, Libya

Former opposition leader picked as interim president

Libya’s newly formed national assembly elected former opposition leader Mohammed el-Megarif as the country’s interim president on Friday, the latest move to establish a democratically based leadership after decades of rule by deposed dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

El-Megarif won 113 votes to defeat another opposition leader and human rights lawyer, Ali Zidan, who won 85 votes from the 200-member General National Congress, an assembly created in the first nationwide election since Gadhafi’s ouster and killing last year. Both men had been diplomats who defected and fought Gadhafi’s regime in exile.

HARTFORD, Conn.

Peace Corps donates to fund for girls abused by volunteer

The Peace Corps has voluntarily agreed to contribute $20,000 to a fund for four girls sexually abused by a former volunteer while serving in South Africa.

Jesse Osmun pleaded guilty in June in a federal court in Connecticut to traveling from the United States to engage in illicit sexual conduct with children. Authorities say the victims were 3 to 6 years old at the time.

Osmun’s attorney, Richard Meehan Jr., says the Peace Corps offered the contribution at a hearing Thursday in Hartford. Meehan says Osmun’s family also plans to donate $10,000 to the fund to help the victims.

Osmun faces between 14 to more than 21 years under guidelines when he is sentenced Oct. 10. Meehan has described Osmun as remorseful.

CENTENNIAL, Colo.

Shooting suspect’s lawyers ask for time to assess client

Attorneys for the suspect in the Colorado movie theater shootings said Thursday their client is mentally ill and that they need more time to assess the nature of his illness.

James Holmes’ lawyers made the disclosure at a court hearing in suburban Denver where news media organizations asked a judge to unseal documents in the case.

Holmes, a 24-year-old former Ph.D. student at the University of Colorado, Denver, had the dazed demeanor noted in previous court appearances.

Holmes is accused of going on a July 20 shooting rampage at a midnight showing of the latest Batman movie in Aurora, killing 12 people and injuring 58 others.

– From news service reports

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