APNewsBreak: Plan would lift wolf protections

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — The Obama administration is proposing to lift most remaining federal protections for gray wolves across the Lower 48 states almost four decades after they were added to the endangered species list.

An official announcement is scheduled Friday.

More than 6,100 wolves roam parts of the Northern Rockies and western Great Lakes.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dan Ashe told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview that those populations are robust enough to stave off extinction.

Federal protections would remain only for a fledgling population of Mexican gray wolves in the desert Southwest.

Some prominent scientists and dozens of lawmakers in Congress want broader protections to remain in place so wolves can expand, including in the Northeast and along the West Coast.

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Flesher reported from Traverse City, Mich.

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APNewsBreak: Mogul to pay $2.5M in settlement

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Facebook billionaire Sean Parker's lavish, $10 million Big Sur wedding got even more expensive Monday.

The California Coastal Commission and Parker said they have reached a $2.5 million settlement to pay for coastal conservation programs after the Napster co-founder built a large movie-set-like wedding site in an ecologically sensitive area of Big Sur without proper permits.

The parties reached the agreement after officials were tipped that Parker had built a cottage, fake ruins, waterfalls, staircases and a huge dance floor near iconic redwoods and a stream with threatened steelhead trout.

The commission learned about the construction at a closed campground owned by Ventana Inn & Spa after a county investigation spurred by neighbor complaints. The Ventana is negotiating a separate settlement for allowing the construction to occur.

"Despite the continued unauthorized closure of the campground to the public, earlier this year, the property owner entered into an agreement giving Sean Parker exclusive use of the campground for several months to construct a sizeable wedding venue," the commission's staff wrote in a report.

Ventana spokesman Francisco Carrasco did not return a call or email seeking comment.

The Ventana is located within the coastal zone, an area regulated by the commission, an independent state agency that oversees coastal development. Any significant construction within the zone has to be permitted.

When staff inspected, they found the temporary structures had already been built, but they allowed the wedding to proceed anyway.

The commission started negotiating a settlement with Parker and his representatives instead of shutting the event down.

"Mr. Parker has been extremely cooperative and actively involved in working with Coastal Commission staff to reach this resolution which both addresses our Coastal Act concerns and will result in greater coastal access and conservation in the Big Sur and Monterey Peninsula areas," Charles Lester, the commission's executive director, said in a statement.

Parker, 33, the former president of Facebook Inc. who was portrayed by Justin Timberlake in the movie "The Social Network," married singer-songwriter Alexandra Lenas on Saturday in a ceremony with gowns and sets made by a designer for the "Lord of the Rings" films.

Rick Zbur, Parker's representative during negotiations with the commission, said Parker worked diligently to address the issue once it came to his attention.

"So as soon as he was made aware of the Coastal Commission's concerns, he immediately stepped forward to discuss how he could protect the coastal area and resolve these issues," Zbur said in an email.

Parker also asked his guests, many of them extremely wealthy entrepreneurs and celebrities, to donate to Save the Redwoods or the California League of Conservation Voters in lieu of giving gifts, according to a program.

Since Parker did not get permits for the construction, commission staff will oversee the breakdown of the vast set so no damage is done to the environment. The commission said no major damage had yet been done, but it wanted to reach a deal quickly so the violating structures could be removed safely.

"Normally (negotiations) happen over a couple of months, but because of the nature of the violations here we wanted to get it out as soon as possible so Mr. Parker could go ahead and do the work the way it should be done," said Lisa Haage, the commission's chief of enforcement.

Money from the agreement may be used to purchase public easements and hiking trails in the Big Sur area and as grants for nonprofits doing conservation projects.

Also, as part of the settlement, Parker offered to produce and distribute a public education video or create a mobile app aimed at helping to identify areas where the public can access the coast.

Haage said the commission is hopeful Parker's assistance will help it spread more information about California's coastal resources.

In a statement, Parker said he was delighted to help the commission achieve its conservation goals and to help Big Sur area businesses.

The commission will vote on the agreement at its next meeting scheduled June 14.

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Follow Jason Dearen on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/JHDearen . Associated Press writer Alicia Chang in Los Angeles contributed to this story.

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APNewsBreak: 5 charged in CA immigration scam

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Authorities said Wednesday they have broken up an immigration fraud ring that led to the arrests of four federal law enforcement officers accused of accepting bribes to help foreigners enter the country.

An 18-count indictment laid out a detailed account of alleged corruption where tens of thousands of dollars, a flat-screen TV and airline tickets to Thailand were some of the bribes used to have the officers forge documents and other illegal activity that involved three federal agencies.

Among those charged with conspiracy to commit bribery are James Dominguez, 46, a special agent with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; Jesus Figueroa, 66, a supervisory officer with Citizenship and Immigration Services and Michael Anders, 53, a Customs and Border Protection officer.

Federal prosecutors said lawyer Kwang Man Lee, who was previously charged in a related case, paid bribes to the officers to secure admission stamps and lawful permanent residence status for people who paid fees ranging from a few hundred dollars to more than $50,000.

The bribes ranged from as little as $50 to as much as $10,000, prosecutors said.

"The allegations in this case concern federal law enforcement officers selling their services and betraying their oaths to our nation so they could profit from a clandestine immigration fraud ring that allowed scores of aliens to improperly enter and reside in the United States," said United States Attorney Andre Birotte Jr.

A fifth person seeking legal status in the U.S. also was indicted.

Authorities said they have identified several dozen people who improperly received immigrations benefits, but that number is growing as the investigation continues.

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APNewsBreak: US says bin Laden knew of Europe plot (AP)

By KIRSTEN GRIESHABER and KIMBERLY DOZIER, Associated Press Kirsten Grieshaber And Kimberly Dozier, Associated Press – 24 mins ago

BERLIN – The United States has told Germany that evidence pulled from Osama bin Laden's hideout shows the terror chief was linked to a plot to attack targets in Europe last year, a senior German official told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Two U.S. officials also told the AP that bin Laden had advised Europe-based militants to attack in unspecified mainland European countries just before Christmas. The officials offered no details.

Separately, bin Laden encouraged multiple attacks on Danish targets because of disparaging references to the Muslim prophet Mohammed in Danish media, the U.S. officials said.

European security officials said earlier this month that they'd seen very little of the information from the May 2 raid on bin Laden's hideout, but the Americans have begun sharing more information with intelligence agencies in Europe.

The German official said U.S. officials had told their German counterparts that information retrieved from the Pakistani house where bin Laden was killed shows that senior al-Qaida member Sheikh Yunis al Mauritania was in contact with bin Laden about the Europe plot.

A 29-year-old Moroccan terror suspect was arrested last month in the German city of Duesseldorf with letters between him and al Mauritania about planned terror attacks in Europe, the official told the AP on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information.

He and other European security officials said they have not seen evidence to suggest that bin Laden was involved in planning the attacks.

"We now know he was a lot more operational than previously thought — and there's some interesting information that has come out on this — but whether this means he was involved in the actual planning or advising remains unclear," said a European security official who spoke on condition of anonymity in order to discuss sensitive intelligence information.

In September, intelligence gleaned from a terror suspect detained in Afghanistan prompted heightened security in Britain, France and Germany.

Germany raised its security threat level in November after officials said they had received information from their own and foreign intelligence services, including in the U.S., that indicated a sleeper cell of some 20 to 25 people may have been planning an attack somewhere in Europe. Later, Germany also received information on possible separate attacks at Christmas or New Year's.

Germany eased the threat level this year.

The first link to bin Laden appears to have been uncovered with the April arrest of a Moroccan named Abdeladim El-Kebir. At the time he was taken into custody, German officials said el-Kebir and two or three other suspects were working on making a shrapnel-laden bomb in Germany to attack a crowded place such as a bus in spring or summer 2011.

The message exchange with al Mauritania found at his home also indicated that he belonged to the group that American security officials last year warned may be plotting attacks in Europe, the German official told the AP.

The German official suggested that the letter contained some indication that bin Laden had been kept abreast of the plot to attack Europe in fall 2010.

A recent U.S. security briefing on the bin Laden house evidence "basically confirmed to us what we had already found in the letter exchange between El-Kebir and (al Mauritania)," the official said.

On the day of El-Kebir's arrest, German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich released a statement saying the suspects had been under surveillance since November, when Germany increased security. He added authorities had accumulated enough evidence to launch an official criminal investigation last month.

After his arrest, German intelligence officials said el-Kebir received the assignment to carry out a bombing from a high-ranking al-Qaida member early last year. At the time they did not identify the al-Qaida leader, and did not say he was also thought to be connected to earlier European plots.

El-Kebir left Germany in early 2010 and trained in an al-Qaida camp in Waziristan near the Afghan-Pakistan border, and returned last year to carry out the attack.

He had at one time resided in Germany on a student visa but later returned illegally after abandoning his studies.

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Dozier reported from Washington. Contributing to this report were Paisley Dodds in London, Karl Ritter in Stockholm and Al Clendenning in Madrid.

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