Sacramento
Caught on tape: A state legislator whose crude boasts about his extramarital sexual exploits in a public hearing room were picked up by a live microphone has resigned, saying that he did not want to distract lawmakers working on the state’s dire fiscal problems. Michael Duvall, 54, a Republican champion of family values, was recorded recounting in graphic detail his trysts with two women, one of them an energy-company lobbyist. He later said he was just “story-telling,’’ but statehouse staffers say Duvall and the lobbyist, Heidi Barsuglia, 36, were frequently seen together at fundraising events. Duvall, a vocal opponent of gay marriage, is married and has two children.
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Blagojevich aide found dead: A close aide to former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was found dead last week, days before he was to begin an eight-year prison term. Police say Christopher Kelly, 51, apparently killed himself with an overdose of over-the-counter medications. Days before his death, Kelly had pleaded guilty to tax and mail fraud charges, telling reporters afterward, “I know my life is over.” Prosecutors were pressuring him to testify against Blagojevich, who has been indicted for scheming to defraud the state. Hours before his death he sent two text messages to his girlfriend, who found his body at the contracting business he owned. Kelly raised millions of dollars for Blagojevich and was one of his closest confidants.
Owosso, Mich.
Pro-lifer killed: An outspoken anti-abortion activist was shot to death last week, and his accused killer said he acted out of anger at the victim’s confrontational approach. Jim Pouillon, 63, was frequently seen at demonstrations displaying graphic photographs of aborted fetuses. He was shot several times from a moving vehicle while protesting across the street from Owosso High School. Police traced the vehicle to the home of Harlan Drake, 33, who reportedly confessed to killing Pouillon as well as Mike Fuoss, 61, a local businessman who was found dead an hour after Pouillon was slain. Drake, who attempted suicide after being arraigned on murder and gun charges, reportedly told police he planned to kill a third person against whom he held a grudge.
El Paso, Texas
The Rangers ride again: Texas Gov. Rick Perry has dispatched an elite team of Texas Rangers to patrol the border with Mexico, claiming that federal efforts are ineffectual. The team, dubbed the “Recon Rangers,” is a highly trained, commando-style unit that bears little resemblance to the cowboy-style Rangers of popular mythology. They will focus on El Paso, where violence by Mexican drug gangs has grown more brazen. Perry has asked the federal Department of Homeland Security to send 1,000 National Guard troops to the border, but the request has stalled in a dispute over funding. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, Perry’s challenger in the hotly contested GOP primary for governor, accused him of “grandstanding for the cameras in an election year.”
Washington, D.C.
ACORN falls: ACORN, the controversial community-organizing group, has been dropped from the Obama administration’s census-taking effort after ACORN staffers at four offices were caught in a secret-camera sting by conservative activists, giving advice to a couple posing as a pimp and a prostitute on how to qualify for housing assistance. During the 2008 presidential campaign, ACORN was a frequent target of conservatives who accused the group of encouraging voter fraud. This week the Census Bureau reacted to the sting by dropping ACORN as one of its 80,000 partners in promoting the census, and the Senate voted to ban giving federal housing money to the organization. Republicans demanded that the administration cut all federal funding to the group.
New Haven, Conn.
Student slaying: After searching frantically for days, police this week discovered the body of Yale graduate student Annie Le hidden behind a wall in the basement laboratory where she worked. Le, 24, went missing last week, a few days before her planned wedding day. Le’s disappearance set off a five-day search and threw the Yale campus into a panic. Police found her body in a space housing electrical wiring and water pipes. Police said she died of strangulation and that the killing was not a random act. No arrests have been made, but a lab technician, Raymond Clark, 24, was questioned by police and his home was searched. He was released after giving a DNA sample.
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