The world at a glance . . . United States

last updated 8 January 2015

San Francisco

Setback for Ashcroft: U.S. citizens who were held without charge during post-9/11 terror investigations can sue then–Attorney General John Ashcroft for unlawful imprisonment, a federal court has ruled. A panel of three federal appellate judges, all Republican appointees, ruled that Ashcroft violated the rights of citizens held on material-witness warrants when the government lacked probable cause to arrest them. Calling Ashcroft’s detention policy “repugnant to the Constitution,” the panel ruled that Ashcroft had no immunity from lawsuits brought by those arrested. The case was brought by Abdullah Kidd, a Kansas-born Muslim convert, who was held without charge for 16 days in 2003. Ashcroft had no immediate comment.

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Horses threatened: A rancher protesting county zoning rules has threatened to kill the 23 horses on his property, distributing fliers in the town of Fort Lupton to recruit “riflemen-executioners.” Trenton Parker, 64, made the threat after clashing with officials who had ordered him to remove derelict vehicles from his 45-acre ranch outside Fort Lupton. Parker, known as an eccentric, was jailed in the 1980s for bilking investors in a gold-mining scheme. He says he moved to the ranch to “get away from everyone, but obviously that didn’t work.” A judge has ordered Parker not to harm the horses; they’re being guarded by state police, who are seeking donations of hay from local ranchers.

Milwaukee

Multiple-murder suspect: Following a trail that started with a toothbrush, Milwaukee police have tracked down a man suspected of killing nine women since 1986. Police last week arrested Walter Ellis, 49, after they spotted his car outside a suburban Milwaukee motel. The arrest came days after investigators matched DNA found on Ellis’ toothbrush to samples taken from the murder victims. Ellis is suspected of killing the women, ages 16 to 41, over a 23-year period. Eight of the women were prostitutes and one was a runaway. Ellis served time in the 1990s on an assault charge, but his prior record, said Police Chief Edward Flynn “does not lead one to immediately say, you know, ‘prime suspect.’”

Marion, Ill.

Hidden relatives: A 51-year-old woman and her boyfriend have been jailed on kidnapping charges after police discovered her 6-year-old grandson and 30-year-old daughter hidden in a secret room in her home. Acting on a tip, police found Ricky Chekevdia and his mother, Shannon Wilfong, in a cramped, low-ceilinged hideaway in Diane Dobbs’ Marion, Ill., home. Dobbs said she’d hidden the boy for two years from Wilfong’s ex-husband, Mike Chekevdia, whom she accused of sexual abuse. Child-welfare officials say there is no evidence of abuse. Police say the boy was healthy and cheerful, but they disputed Dobbs’ claim that he was only rarely confined to the secret room. “We let him out of the car and he ran around like he’d never seen the outdoors,” said Stan Diggs of the Illinois State Police. “It was actually very sad.”

Detroit

End of the line: Michigan’s 160-year-old state fair, which ended its 11-day run this week, probably won’t reopen next year, a victim of shrinking attendance and vanishing corporate sponsorship. The fair, one of the oldest in the country, lost $362,000 last year, and Gov. Jennifer Granholm says the cash-strapped state can no longer afford to cover the losses. She has proposed cutting state funding for the fair, though the draft budget currently before the legislature includes an unspecified amount of money to support the event. Granholm wants to use the site of the fair, a 164-acre parcel on Detroit’s northern edge, for industrial development.

Chatham, Mass.

Great whites sighted: Five great white sharks were spotted in the waters off Cape Cod, prompting local officials to close all beaches in the popular resort town of Chatham over the Labor Day weekend. One of the sharks was 10 to 12 feet long. Using harpoon guns, state fisheries officials placed electronic tags on two of the sharks to track their movements. They are the second and third great whites ever to be tagged in the Atlantic Ocean. “From a scientific perspective, it’s fantastic,” said marine biologist Gregory Skomal. The last documented death from a shark attack in Massachusetts waters occurred in 1936.

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