The week at a glance ... United States

Lucerne Valley, Calif.

Race turns deadly: An off-road dune buggy race in the Mojave Desert turned into a horrific scene of carnage this week when a truck hurtled into a crowd of spectators, killing eight people and injuring 12 others. The crash came early in the twilight race, called the California 200, when the driver of a Ford Ranger reportedly launched off a steep, rocky hilltop at high speed. Upon landing, the truck rolled sideways into a throng of spectators lining the course, which had no crowd barriers. Most of the dead were in their 20s. The tragedy sparked calls for improved safety precautions at the popular, minimally regulated races, which take place in remote areas of the California desert.

Chicago

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Mixed verdict for Blago: A jubilant Rod Blagojevich claimed vindication this week after a federal jury convicted him of lying to investigators but deadlocked on the remaining 23 corruption charges against him, including attempting to sell the Senate seat once held by President Obama. Lawyers for the 53-year-old former Democratic governor did not call any witnesses to rebut the prosecution’s case, which relied on recordings of Blagojevich’s conversations with aides and other political figures. Three members of the jury, which deliberated for two weeks, said a lone holdout blocked a unanimous guilty verdict on several charges. Prosecutors “could not prove I did anything wrong,” Blagojevich said, “except for one nebulous charge from five years ago.” Prosecutors said they would seek a retrial.

Boston

‘Craigslist killer’ is dead: Philip Markoff, the so-called Craigslist killer, committed suicide this week in his Boston jail cell, officials reported. Markoff, 24, was awaiting trial for a murder allegedly committed during a gruesome crime spree targeting women he met through the popular online classifieds site. He was scheduled to face trial next March for the 2009 murder of Julissa Brisman, 25, whom he allegedly shot to death in a Boston hotel room. On what he had hoped would have been his first wedding anniversary, Markoff reportedly used a crude scalpel fashioned from a pen and a strip of metal to open arteries in his neck and wrists, then suffocated himself with a plastic bag. His fiancée had called off the wedding shortly after his arrest.

Langley, Va.

Interrogation tapes found: U.S. officials have confirmed the existence of three CIA interrogation tapes of a suspected 9/11 plotter, which the agency earlier said had been destroyed. The recordings—two videotapes and an audiotape—are said to show alleged terrorist Ramzi Binalshibh being questioned in 2002 at a secret jail in Morocco. They are believed to be the only surviving recordings from the CIA’s now-defunct network of secret foreign prisons. The government had previously said the CIA destroyed all 92 videotapes of interrogations of terror suspects as the agency came under scrutiny for harsh interrogation techniques. An unnamed U.S. official said the tapes showed only “a guy sitting at a desk answering questions.”

Orangeburg, S.C.

Mother kills sons: An unemployed mother of two has confessed to smothering her sons, ages 1 and 2, then strapping their bodies into her Chrysler sedan and sinking it in the Edisto River, authorities said. Shaquan Duley, 29, allegedly told police that she smothered her sons Ja’van and Devean with her bare hands after a quarrel with her mother. “She had no way of taking care of her children,” said Orangeburg Country Sheriff Larry Williams. Neighbors said Duley lived with her mother in Orangeburg, a town of 13,000 about 40 miles south of Columbia, and had recently argued with her over how she was raising her children. “She was fed up with her mother,” Williams said. “She just wanted to be free.”

Pensacola Beach, Fla.

Cleanup coverup? An Alabama fisherman working on the cleanup of the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has accused BP of hushing up the discovery of large oil slicks and tar balls in the Gulf and on adjoining beaches. Fishing boat captain Mark Williams says he encountered oil plumes and 3-inch-wide tar balls off the Florida coast two weeks after BP and the federal government claimed that 75 percent of the oil spilled in the Gulf had disappeared. He says a contractor hired by BP ordered him not to record his findings in his logbook, according to a report this week in TheDailyBeast.com. Several other cleanup workers have offered similar accounts. BP denied ordering workers to suppress reports of finding oil.