Missing Montana math teacher is dead, school officials

(Reuters) - A Montana high school math teacher who vanished last weekend while on her morning jog is dead, and a man has been taken into custody in connection with her disappearance, authorities said on Friday.

Sherry Arnold, 43, was last seen setting off for a run on Saturday in her hometown of Sidney, a fast-growing agricultural community in northeastern Montana. Her husband, Gary Arnold, later reported her missing, police said.

Sidney Public Schools Superintendant Dan Farr said law enforcement authorities had informed family members and district officials of Arnold's death, but declined to elaborate.

Sidney Police Chief Frank DiFonzo said in a prepared statement that authorities had taken one man into custody and were seeking information from another in connection with Arnold's disappearance.

A 47-year-old man has been jailed in neighboring Williston, North Dakota, and a 22-year-old man is being held for questioning in Rapid City, South Dakota.

"Because this investigation is rapidly moving forward, we are not able to provide any details of the case at this time," DiFonzo said in the statement.

He said a tip to a crime hotline led to the breakthrough in the investigation, which has blanketed the northern prairies of Montana and the Dakotas and drawn investigators from the three states and the FBI.

Sidney Mayor Bret Smelser said the crime had shattered the sense of security in the community of 5,000 people, where new homes were being built amid rapid growth brought on by a boom in oil and natural gas extraction through hydraulic fracturing.

"We never think it will happen in a small town. Now it has and we have to deal with it," he told Reuters.

Smelser said Arnold's disappearance and death has prompted a run on handguns and concealed weapons permits, especially among women, and caused some residents to view outsiders with mistrust.

Arnold, a math teacher at Sidney High School, vanished on Saturday after leaving her home wearing running clothes and mittens. One of her shoes was recovered during an initial search of the area.

A statement on the school district's website said counselors would be on hand following the news.

"She's a well-respected, well-liked teacher," Farr said. "She was the kind of teacher that every parent would want in front of their children. She would go the extra mile to help one of her students."

The school district dismissed students early from class on Friday afternoon and cancelled planned sports events.

Farr said counselors have been available to students and staff since Arnold vanished and that additional support would be offered in coming weeks.

Late Friday afternoon, Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer released a statement about Arnold, saying she would be remembered as "a wonderful daughter, mother, wife, teacher and a beloved member of the Sidney community."

(Editing by Dan Whitcomb and Greg McCune)

(This story corrects the headline and first paragraph to reflect officials saying the missing woman is dead rather than she has been found dead.)

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Missing Montana math teacher found dead

(Reuters) - A Montana high school math teacher who vanished last weekend while on her morning jog has been found dead, and a man has been taken into custody in connection with her disappearance, authorities said on Friday.

Sherry Arnold, 43, was last seen setting off for a run on Saturday in her hometown of Sidney, a fast-growing agricultural community in northeastern Montana. Her husband, Gary Arnold, later reported her missing, police said.

Sidney Public Schools Superintendant Dan Farr said law enforcement authorities had informed family members and district officials of Arnold's death, but declined to elaborate.

Sidney Police Chief Frank DiFonzo said in a prepared statement that authorities had taken one man into custody and were seeking information from another in connection with Arnold's disappearance.

A 47-year-old man has been jailed in neighboring Williston, North Dakota, and a 22-year-old man is being held for questioning in Rapid City, South Dakota.

"Because this investigation is rapidly moving forward, we are not able to provide any details of the case at this time," DiFonzo said in the statement.

He said a tip to a crime hotline led to the breakthrough in the investigation, which has blanketed the northern prairies of Montana and the Dakotas and drawn investigators from the three states and the FBI.

Sidney Mayor Bret Smelser said the crime had shattered the sense of security in the community of 5,000 people, where new homes were being built amid rapid growth brought on by a boom in oil and natural gas extraction through hydraulic fracturing.

"We never think it will happen in a small town. Now it has and we have to deal with it," he told Reuters.

Smelser said Arnold's disappearance and death has prompted a run on handguns and concealed weapons permits, especially among women, and caused some residents to view outsiders with mistrust.

Arnold, a math teacher at Sidney High School, vanished on Saturday after leaving her home wearing running clothes and mittens. One of her shoes was recovered during an initial search of the area.

A statement on the school district's website said counselors would be on hand following the news.

"She's a well-respected, well-liked teacher," Farr said. "She was the kind of teacher that every parent would want in front of their children. She would go the extra mile to help one of her students."

The school district dismissed students early from class on Friday afternoon and cancelled planned sports events.

Farr said counselors have been available to students and staff since Arnold vanished and that additional support would be offered in coming weeks.

Late Friday afternoon, Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer released a statement about Arnold, saying she would be remembered as "a wonderful daughter, mother, wife, teacher and a beloved member of the Sidney community."

(Editing by Dan Whitcomb and Greg McCune)

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Volunteers turn out for missing student

Lauren Spierer was captured on a surveillance video at her apartment complex right before her disappearance on June 3.Lauren Spierer disappeared three weeks agoShe was going home after a night out with friendsInvestigators have not been able to make any progressVolunteers turned out Saturday to search for clues

(CNN) -- The volunteers were told to wear long pants and sturdy shoes, to bring a driver's license so they could prove they were not minors. They were asked to check in and then placed in groups of four or five, maybe more.

And they were given the details of the last sighting of Lauren Spierer. She is only 4 feet, 11 inches tall and weighs 95 pounds. She has blond hair and blue eyes and was wearing black leggings and a white top when she last went out with her friends more than three weeks ago.

The volunteers streamed in starting at 7:30 in the morning, determined to search for clues that might help police find her.

Spierer, a Indiana University student, disappeared some time after 3 a.m. June 2 after leaving Kilroy's Sports Bar in Bloomington. She never made it home that night.

For three long weeks, her parents have lived with uncertainty, police have called regular press conferences and volunteers have joined professionals in the effort to find her.

In mid-June, police had found possible new clues to Spierer's disappearance -- images of a white pickup truck caught on a security surveillance video. But they ruled out a connection and were back to square one. They had received thousands of tips but none so far have yielded anything concrete.

Amid little progress in the case, the police announced Friday they would no longer call news conferences, unless there was news.

The volunteers began to dwindle as well, prompting police, Spierer's family and community volunteers to come together Saturday for one last big push.

By Saturday afternoon, Find Lauren Day, as it was dubbed, had drawn about 400 or so people, said Kelly Holloway, who was helping coordinate search teams.

They were combing a 10-mile area and planned to be out all day long, Holloway said.

Police produced a photograph of Spierer taken at her apartment complex before she left home on the night of her disappearance. The petite fashionista wore black leggings with silver zippers at the ankles and a white shirt with elbow-length butterfly sleeves.

Surveillance camera footage from around 2:30 a.m. showed her and a male student, Corey Rossman, returning to her apartment building, Smallwood Plaza.

Spierer had left her shoes, along with her cell phone, at the bar earlier in the night.

An altercation with other people occurred there that led to Rossman getting punched in the face, his attorney told CNN affiliate WISH, and he claims he has no memory of what happened after that.

Police have said additional surveillance video from an alley showed them walking toward his building around 3 a.m. Her keys were later found in that alley.

A neighbor of Rossman reported seeing Spierer leave around 4:30 a.m., but police said they found no sign of her after the 3 a.m. sighting on any of the surveillance video they viewed from the blocks between the two buildings.

Spierer's mother, Charlene Spierer described her daughter as "a sweet, bubbly girl." She has repeatedly thanked the family's supporters and said she was trying to remain hopeful.

"As a parent, as a mom, you speculate and you wonder what happened," she said at the last regular police news conference Friday.

"Perhaps it was a terrible accident that happened and we can deal with that," she said. "What we can't deal with is what we don't know. So information is the most valuable thing we need right now."

Spierer's family is offering a $100,000 reward for information leading to her recovery. They have opened up a post office box for people to send in information.

As she has done at almost every news conference, Charlene Spierer pleaded again Friday for anyone with information to come forward.

"Please," she said, "we're begging you. Help us find Lauren."

CNN

Missing Vietnam War airman's remains identified

Remains of Air Force Capt. Darrell J. Spinler will be buried with full military honorsHis plane crashed during a mission over the Xekong River in Laos in 1967A POW/MIA accounting team found the remains during a full excavation last yearYears earlier, based on available evidence, his remains were deemed unrecoverable

(CNN) -- The remains of a U.S. Air Force pilot listed as missing in action since his plane crashed in Laos in 1967 have been identified, and will be returned to his family for burial with full military honors, the Defense Department's POW/Missing Personnel Office said Tuesday.

On June 21, 1967, Capt. Darrell J. Spinler was piloting an A-1E Skyraider -- a propeller-driven, single-seat aircraft -- attacking enemy targets along the Xekong River in Laos when villagers reported hearing an explosion before his aircraft crashed. The pilot of another A-1E remained in the area for more than two hours but saw no sign of Spinler.

In 1993, villagers who witnessed the crash told a joint U.S.-Laotian team led by Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) that Spinler's body was on the river bank after the crash, but that it likely washed away during the ensuing rainy season.

The team surveyed the location and found wreckage consistent with Spinler's aircraft.

In 1995, the U.S. government evaluated Spinler's case and determined his remains to be unrecoverable based on witness statements and available evidence. Teams working in the area revisited the location in 1999 and 2003 and confirmed Spinler's remains had likely been carried away by the Xekong River.

Last year, however, JPAC conducted a full excavation of the location and recovered aircraft wreckage, human remains, crew-related equipment and personal effects.

Among other forensic identification tools and circumstantial evidence, scientists from the POW/MIA team used dental X-rays in the identification of Spinler's remains.

Spinler, of Browns Valley, Minnesota, will be buried on June 18 near his hometown.

The number of service members still missing from the Vietnam War is now 1,689.

CNN

Air France crash recovery ends with 74 bodies missing

NEW: 74 bodies will never be foundHuman remains and airplane wreckage are en route to France by ship, investigators sayThe Airbus A330 plane crashed two years ago, killing all 228 people aboardIt took four searches to find the wreckage

Paris (CNN) -- The operation to recover bodies from the crash of Air France 447, which plunged into the Atlantic Ocean two years ago, has ended with 27 more sets of human remains brought to the surface, a French official told CNN on Wednesday.

That means 74 bodies will never be found.

The last group of bodies was brought to the surface on Friday, Philippe Vinogradoff said Wednesday.

A total of 104 bodies were recovered from the remains of the mystery crash during this year's operation, in addition to the 50 that were found in the days after the loss of the plane.

Human remains and aircraft parts are headed by ship to the Canary Islands, where they are expected to arrive Thursday, French air accident investigators said.

From there, they will be transferred to Bayonne in southwest France, investigators said.

All 228 people onboard were killed when the plane crashed in stormy weather en route to Paris from Brazil on June 1, 2009.

It took four searches over the course of nearly two years to locate the bulk of the wreckage, still containing many bodies, in a mountain range deep under the ocean.

Seventy-five bodies were recovered late last month, more than doubling the number of remains that have been found, the vice president of the French victims' association told CNN.

The remains have not yet been identified, Robert Soulas said.

Soulas got the news from a French government liaison appointed to deal with victims' families, he said.

"Personally, I would have preferred to leave the bodies of our loved ones on the seafloor," he added, repeating his long-held view.

Other victims' relatives disagree.

Details of the doomed plane's last minutes began to emerge last month as French air accident investigators studied data recorders recovered from the wreck earlier this year.

The Airbus A330 plummeted 38,000 feet in just three minutes and 30 seconds amid conflicting information that may have led the pilots to make bad decisions, France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA) said last month.

The pilots got conflicting air speed readings in the minutes leading up to the crash, according to an interim report. The aircraft climbed to 38,000 feet when "the stall warning was triggered and the airplane stalled," the report says.

Aviation experts are asking why the pilots responded to the stall by pulling the nose up instead of pushing it down to recover.

"You push down on the wheel to gain air speed, perhaps they (pilots) were getting information that the air speed was too high," said Miles O'Brien, a pilot and aviation analyst. "Pulling the nose up will exacerbate an aerodynamic stall."

The speeds displayed on the left primary flight display were "inconsistent" with those on the integrated standby instrument system (ISIS), the report says.

The aircraft experienced some "rolling" before stalling and then descending rapidly at 10,912 feet (3,300 meters) per minute.

At the time of the descent, the two co-pilots and captain were in the aircraft cockpit.

The pilots lost contact with air traffic controllers while flying across an area of the Atlantic Ocean known for constant bands of severe turbulence.

Air crash investigators at the Paris-based BEA have been working on the theory that the speed sensors, known as pitot tubes or probes, malfunctioned because of ice at high altitude.

CNN's Thair Shaikh contributed to this report.

CNN

South African photographer missing in Libya believed dead (Reuters)

LONDON/JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – A South African freelance photographer missing in Libya since April is believed dead after being shot in the stomach and abandoned in the desert by forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi, his family said Friday.

Anton Hammerl, 41, who also had Austrian nationality and lived in London, was hit in the stomach after coming under fire on April 5, family friend Bronwyn Friedlander said in London.

South Africa and Austria criticized Gaddafi's government on Friday with Pretoria saying Libya had misled it about Hammerl and the ruling ANC also accused Tripoli of dishonesty.

Two American journalists and a Spanish photographer who were with Hammerl were taken captive by forces loyal to the Libyan leader. They could not report what had happened until their release in Tripoli Wednesday.

According to the released journalists, Hammerl was left behind bleeding while they were taken away by Gaddafi forces, Friedlander said.

"His injuries were such that he could not have survived without medical attention," she said.

"Anton was shot by Gaddafi's forces in an extremely remote location in the Libyan desert," the Hammerl family said in a statement on Facebook.

The American reporters, James Foley and Clare Gillis, spoke by telephone with Hammerl's wife Penny Sukhraj in London late on Thursday.

The attack took place on the outskirts of the eastern oil town of Brega when the journalists were fired on by pro-Gaddafi troops in two Libyan military trucks, Foley and Gillis said in an interview published on the GlobalPost website.

BRUTAL ACTION

Austria's Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger said in a statement Libya failed to provide any helpful information despite repeated requests.

"This brutal action by Gaddafi's soldiers is a shocking example of the dangers that journalists in particular face in conflict situations. Freedom of the press is especially important in just these situations," Spindelegger said.

South African President Jacob Zuma has been criticized for not bringing up the issue of Hammerl with Gaddafi on a visit to Tripoli last month.

South Africa's foreign ministry, which said this month it had proof Hammerl was still alive, said Friday the Libyan government had misled it about the photographer.

"We kept getting reassured at the highest level that he was alive until his colleagues were released and shared the information...," International Relations Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane told reporters Friday.

A senior ministry official who asked not to be named said: "She accused them of lying."

South Africa's ANC said it was incensed at the use of deadly force against civilians and the media.

"We are gravely incensed by the senseless and indiscriminate use of deadly force against innocent civilians and members of the media by the Libyan government ... We are particularly disappointed by the dishonesty of the Libyan government, which assured our government that our citizen was alive and in custody," the ANC said in a statement.

Hammerl, who had three young children, had lived in Britain for five years. His family had hoped he was still alive in captivity after he went missing in April, and had run a campaign for his release.

"From the moment Anton disappeared in Libya we have lived in hope as the Libyan officials assured us that they had Anton," his family said in a statement.

"It is intolerably cruel that Gaddafi loyalists have known Anton's fate all along and chose to cover it up."

Last month two photojournalists -- Oscar-nominated filmmaker Tim Hetherington and Getty photographer Chris Hondros -- were killed after coming under fire in the besieged Libyan town of Misrata.

(Additional reporting by Michael Shields in Vienna; Editing by Maria Golovnina)

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Body found in Utah desert is male, not missing mother

The fate of Susan Powell, who disappeared in 2009, is still unknownThe remains discovered over the weekend belong to a young man, police say The grim discovery fuels the mystery of the missing woman

(CNN) -- Human remains discovered in the Utah desert belong to a young male and are not a missing 28-year-old mother, authorities said, a grim discovery that fuels the mystery and opens a new case.

The fate of Susan Powell, who disappeared in 2009, is still unknown.

The remains discovered in Tooele County over the weekend belonged to a young man, Sheriff's Detective Lt. Travis Scharmann said.

Scharmann said the state medical examiner is working to determine the cause, time and other circumstances of his death.

In addition to Powell, authorities must now determine what happened to the man whose remains were found in the same region on Sunday.

They were ''badly decomposed and scattered throughout a wide area, possibly by wild animals,'' according to a news release from the sheriff's office.

An attorney found the bones in the area where his family owns ranch property.

Investigators will likely dig for more body parts, Bill Manion, a medical examiner for Burlington County, New Jersey, told HLN's Nancy Grace on Monday.

"The most important bones that they can find are the jaw and mandible, part of the skull, because if we have the teeth, we can be very, very accurate in identification,'' Manion said.

Meanwhile, the search for the missing woman continues.

Josh Powell says he last saw his wife on a cold December night in 2009 as he and his two young sons left to go camping in the Tooele County desert area. Powell's sister reported her as missing.

A month later, Powell and his children moved to the state of Washington.

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Missing Al Jazeera reporter safe

Al Jazeera's Dorothy Parvaz went missing after landing in Damascus, Syria, on April 29.NEW: Her fiance thanks Iran for Parvaz's releaseSyria says it deported the Al Jazeera reporter to Iran Iran says it has "no information" about her whereaboutsAl Jazeera says Dorothy Parvaz is safe and well in Doha

(CNN) -- An Al Jazeera reporter who disappeared after landing in the Syrian capital of Damascus last month to cover anti-government protests has been released, the network said early Wednesday.

The network said Dorothy Parvaz was safe and well in Doha, where her fiance had gone to greet her. The journalist will head to Canada.

Al Jazeera lost contact with Parvaz after she disembarked from a Qatar Airways flight from Iran on April 29.

In a statement last week, Syria said the 39-year-old journalist was taken into custody after she arrived in Damascus with an expired passport and deported to Iran two days later.

But Iran's state news agency IRNA quoted Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi on Saturday as saying the Islamic republic had "no information" about her.

A statement that Parvaz's fiance, Todd Barker, posted on the "Free Dorothy Parvaz" Facebook page indicated she had been taken to Iran.

"She said that she was treated well in Iran. She sounded positive and grateful for the support - but a little embarrassed. We are very thankful to Iranian authorities for her release and good treatment," the statement said.

Added an Al Jazeera spokesman: "We are with her now to find out more about her ordeal over the last 18 days."

Syria has been roiled for six weeks by anti-government protests and has largely prevented foreign journalists from covering the unrest. Media organizations have been relying on social media, eyewitness accounts and cell-phone video to report the story.

Thousands of supporters from around the world started a social media campaign on Facebook and Twitter in an effort to draw attention to her disappearance.

Dozens of international journalists have been detained and expelled from Syria since March 15, when anti-government protests began, said Mohamed Abdel Dayem, program coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists in the Middle East and North Africa.

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Costa Rica finds body of U.S. student missing at sea

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (AP) — Costa Rican rescuers on Friday found the body of a third U.S. high school student who was swept out to sea while taking a beach break during a religious mission.

A coast guard patrol recovered the body of Kai Lamar in waters off Bejuco beach on the Pacific coast, said Jesus Escalona, Red Cross assistant director of operations. The bodies of the other two students, Caity Jones and James Smith, were found earlier this week.

A strong undertow pulled the three away from shore Wednesday afternoon, according to a statement from their school, Patriot Preparatory Academy in Columbus, Ohio. They were among eight juniors and seniors on a trip not sponsored by the school.

Escalona said the body was found in roughly the same area where Smith's body was recovered a day earlier. He said the body fit Lamar's description and rescuers called off the search.

The bodies were taken to a morgue where relatives or U.S. Embassy officials can claim them. The U.S. Embassy has declined to comment, citing privacy restrictions.

Wednesday, the day before they were to return to Ohio, was a free day, and students were given a choice of whether they wanted to ride horses near a waterfall or go to the beach, the brother of one of the students told an Ohio television station.

"Unfortunately, it was just a fatal mistake," Smith's brother Nick Smith told WCMH-TV in Columbus.

He said the trip was the first mission for his brother and that he had worked to raise every penny needed to pay for the trip.

"That kid was more driven to do things for God than I've seen anybody at his age ever. ? He was doing things and so committed that honestly, in 16 years, he finished everything he needed to do in this life," Smith told the station.

A message seeking comment was left by The Associated Press on Friday at a phone listing for Smith's parents.

Shari Lamar, Kai Lamar's mother, said that while her family was saddened by her son's death, they found some comfort in knowing he had taken advantage of an opportunity "to show his love for the Lord and to do what he thought he was called to do."

"He and his friends had the time of their life doing the work," she said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. "It just brought them great joy. They were phenomenal kids. ? It's sad, but we just trust God."

The three students swept away, all juniors, were described as active in school and the community, well-liked and good students.

The mission was organized by Ohio-based Impulse International Mission Trips, where a spokeswoman said no one could comment Friday. The students visited an orphanage, a drug rehabilitation center and some villagers, according to a post by Lamar on a blog the group was keeping on the trip. The group also played soccer, colored and read with youngsters at a community center and did some painting at a Salvation Army church.

The K-12 school, on the city's east side, is a former private Christian school that converted this year to a charter school, meaning it is publicly funded but privately run. It has about 500 students.

Students had made the same volunteer trip to Costa Rica in the past when the school was private, said Paul Blythe, a friend of the Jones family and a school board member whose children graduated from the school. They raised funds and obtained sponsors to pay for the trip, he said.

In 2006, three Kansas students and their teacher drowned in Costa Rica while on a Spanish language immersion trip. A group of students were swimming and some were swept away by strong currents. At least two were rescued, but the teacher and one of the students died trying to save the others.

"These beaches are some of the most dangerous beaches in the world," said David Angueira, a Boston attorney who brought a wrongful death lawsuit against a tour operator over the 2006 deaths. "These beaches are unbelievably dangerous, rip currents like you wouldn't believe. And our kids just keep drowning."

At least 52 people have drowned at sea in Costa Rica this year, said Freddy Roman, another Red Cross spokesman. While that appears to mark an increase from the 2010 full-year total of 76, Roman said he did not think it was a trend, noting last year's number was far below the usual. There were 103 drownings registered in 2009 and 128 in 2008.

Emergency officials have attributed the drop last year to an overall decrease in vacationers caused by an economic downturn.

Jim Batres, assistant director for rescues and operations for the Red Cross of Costa Rica, said the Red Cross is the only agency that offers lifeguard service at Costa Rican beaches, but doesn't have a big enough budget to cover all the beaches full time.

Batres said there are only about 60 volunteer lifeguards for all the country's beaches. Some hotels hire their own lifeguards, and there are signs on many beaches warning about hazards.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Costa Rica finds body of U.S. student missing at sea

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (AP) — Costa Rican rescuers on Friday found the body of a third U.S. high school student who was swept out to sea while taking a beach break during a religious mission.

A coast guard patrol recovered the body of Kai Lamar in waters off Bejuco beach on the Pacific coast, said Jesus Escalona, Red Cross assistant director of operations. The bodies of the other two students, Caity Jones and James Smith, were found earlier this week.

A strong undertow pulled the three away from shore Wednesday afternoon, according to a statement from their school, Patriot Preparatory Academy in Columbus, Ohio. They were among eight juniors and seniors on a trip not sponsored by the school.

Escalona said the body was found in roughly the same area where Smith's body was recovered a day earlier. He said the body fit Lamar's description and rescuers called off the search.

The bodies were taken to a morgue where relatives or U.S. Embassy officials can claim them. The U.S. Embassy has declined to comment, citing privacy restrictions.

Wednesday, the day before they were to return to Ohio, was a free day, and students were given a choice of whether they wanted to ride horses near a waterfall or go to the beach, the brother of one of the students told an Ohio television station.

"Unfortunately, it was just a fatal mistake," Smith's brother Nick Smith told WCMH-TV in Columbus.

He said the trip was the first mission for his brother and that he had worked to raise every penny needed to pay for the trip.

"That kid was more driven to do things for God than I've seen anybody at his age ever. ? He was doing things and so committed that honestly, in 16 years, he finished everything he needed to do in this life," Smith told the station.

A message seeking comment was left by The Associated Press on Friday at a phone listing for Smith's parents.

Shari Lamar, Kai Lamar's mother, said that while her family was saddened by her son's death, they found some comfort in knowing he had taken advantage of an opportunity "to show his love for the Lord and to do what he thought he was called to do."

"He and his friends had the time of their life doing the work," she said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. "It just brought them great joy. They were phenomenal kids. ? It's sad, but we just trust God."

The three students swept away, all juniors, were described as active in school and the community, well-liked and good students.

The mission was organized by Ohio-based Impulse International Mission Trips, where a spokeswoman said no one could comment Friday. The students visited an orphanage, a drug rehabilitation center and some villagers, according to a post by Lamar on a blog the group was keeping on the trip. The group also played soccer, colored and read with youngsters at a community center and did some painting at a Salvation Army church.

The K-12 school, on the city's east side, is a former private Christian school that converted this year to a charter school, meaning it is publicly funded but privately run. It has about 500 students.

Students had made the same volunteer trip to Costa Rica in the past when the school was private, said Paul Blythe, a friend of the Jones family and a school board member whose children graduated from the school. They raised funds and obtained sponsors to pay for the trip, he said.

In 2006, three Kansas students and their teacher drowned in Costa Rica while on a Spanish language immersion trip. A group of students were swimming and some were swept away by strong currents. At least two were rescued, but the teacher and one of the students died trying to save the others.

"These beaches are some of the most dangerous beaches in the world," said David Angueira, a Boston attorney who brought a wrongful death lawsuit against a tour operator over the 2006 deaths. "These beaches are unbelievably dangerous, rip currents like you wouldn't believe. And our kids just keep drowning."

At least 52 people have drowned at sea in Costa Rica this year, said Freddy Roman, another Red Cross spokesman. While that appears to mark an increase from the 2010 full-year total of 76, Roman said he did not think it was a trend, noting last year's number was far below the usual. There were 103 drownings registered in 2009 and 128 in 2008.

Emergency officials have attributed the drop last year to an overall decrease in vacationers caused by an economic downturn.

Jim Batres, assistant director for rescues and operations for the Red Cross of Costa Rica, said the Red Cross is the only agency that offers lifeguard service at Costa Rican beaches, but doesn't have a big enough budget to cover all the beaches full time.

Batres said there are only about 60 volunteer lifeguards for all the country's beaches. Some hotels hire their own lifeguards, and there are signs on many beaches warning about hazards.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.We've updated the Conversation Guidelines. Changes include a brief review of the moderation process and an explanation on how to use the "Report Abuse" button. Read more.

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Coast Guard searches for missing cruise ship passenger

The FBI is investigating the 65-year-old's disappearanceThe woman is reported as missing after arriving in San Diego from Cabo San Lucas, MexicoThe U.S. Coast Guard is searching for her

(CNN) -- The U.S. Coast Guard said it was searching early Wednesday for a woman who was reported missing from a cruise ship as it sailed from Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, to San Diego.

The Celebrity Millennium arrived in San Diego on Tuesday after an overnight cruise from the Mexican resort city, according to Petty Officer Levi Read. The 65-year-old was reported to the Coast Guard as missing early Tuesday afternoon.

A cutter began a search around early Wednesday for the woman. A daytime search by two Coast Guard aircraft yielded "negative" results, Read said. The FBI has joined an investigation into her disappearance.

Calls to Celebrity Cruises were not immediately returned.

CNN

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Missing cobra gains followers, even on Twitter

NEW YORK — Like a true New Yorker, the escaped Bronx Zoo cobra appears to be angling for fame.

The missing serpent is likely younger than this one. The 20-inch female is an adolescent.

File photo by Salah Malkawi, Getty Images

The missing serpent is likely younger than this one. The 20-inch female is an adolescent.

Missing since Friday, the slippery serpent has supposedly begun posting updates on Twitter about its adventures, under the name @BronxZoosCobra.

"Enjoying a cupcake at Magnolia Bakery," the cobra allegedly tweeted Tuesday afternoon. "This is going straight to my hips. Oh wait, I don't have hips. Yesss!"

The cobra seems to have headed from the Bronx straight to Manhattan. "Leaving Wall Street," read a tweet late Monday. "These guys make my skin crawl."

Overnight, the pseudo-snake picked up more than 50,000 followers for the parody Twitter feed. That's many more than the 40,000-plus followers attracted by Dan Sinker, the Chicago journalism professor whose @MayorEmanuel Twitter posts — supposedly from Rahm Emanuel, newly elected mayor of Chicago — earned him a book deal last week.

In reality, the 20-inch, pencil-thin Egyptian cobra, which zoo officials say is female and weighs less than three ounces, is likely hiding somewhere in the zoo's Reptile House after escaping from its enclosure Friday.

The venomous cobra is an adolescent and will likely come out of hiding when she is hungry.

The runaway cobra has inspired a sketch on The Daily Show, which showed a fake snake riding cabs around New York and vomiting in Times Square, and a Top Ten list on The Late Show of "Bronx Zoo Excuses: "No 2. We sent the snake to take out Qaddafi. You'll thank us later!"

Zoo officials did not respond to a request for comment on the Twitter parody. The zoo's Reptile House remains closed until the snake re-emerges.

"Right now, it's the snake's game. At this point, it's just like fishing; you put the hook in the water and wait. Our best strategy is patience, allowing her time to come out of hiding," Bronx Zoo director Jim Breheny said in a statement. "She will likely remain in hiding and not move until she feels completely secure."

Dangerous creatures on the loose aren't unknown in New York. Coyotes have been spotted in Central Park, and in 2003 a tiger named Ming was discovered living in an apartment in Harlem, with an alligator for a roommate.

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India searches for missing VIP chopper

State's chief minister, 4 others disappear in remote areaSearch to resume Monday

New Delhi, India (CNN) -- India's air force unsuccessfully struggled to trace a helicopter carrying the top leader of a state bordering Tibet a day after it disappeared in the remote mountainous region, officials said Sunday.

The helicopter, belonging to the government-run Pawan Hans company, took off from Tawang for Itanagar in Arunachal Pradesh state Saturday at 9.45 a.m. Authorities sounded an alert for it when it did not arrive for landing.

The helicopter, carrying Arunachal Pradesh chief minister Dorjee Khandu and four others, remains missing, said Avinash Kumar Mishra, the state's resident commissioner in New Delhi, Sunday.

He told CNN the search would resume Monday morning.

According to Mishra, the helicopter did not go outside Indian airspace into neighboring Bhutan, as some initial reports, rejected by officials later, suggested. "That's completely ruled out. It is missing within the Indian territory," Mishra said.

On April 20, at least 17 people were killed as a Pawan Hans helicopter crashed in Tawang upon landing and caught fire, officials said.

Arunachal Pradesh has been the center of a tense struggle between India and China.

The two giant neighbors fought a brief but bitter border war in 1962 over the hill territory.

India insists Arunachal Pradesh is its "integral" and "inalienable" part. China lays claim to 90,000 square kilometers (34,750 square miles) of land in that Himalayan region governed by India.

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Missing cobra gains followers, even on Twitter

NEW YORK — Like a true New Yorker, the escaped Bronx Zoo cobra appears to be angling for fame.

The missing serpent is likely younger than this one. The 20-inch female is an adolescent.

Missing since Friday, the slippery serpent has supposedly begun posting updates on Twitter about its adventures, under the name @BronxZoosCobra.

"Enjoying a cupcake at Magnolia Bakery," the cobra allegedly tweeted Tuesday afternoon. "This is going straight to my hips. Oh wait, I don't have hips. Yesss!"

The cobra seems to have headed from the Bronx straight to Manhattan. "Leaving Wall Street," read a tweet late Monday. "These guys make my skin crawl."

Overnight, the pseudo-snake picked up more than 50,000 followers for the parody Twitter feed. That's many more than the 40,000-plus followers attracted by Dan Sinker, the Chicago journalism professor whose @MayorEmanuel Twitter posts — supposedly from Rahm Emanuel, newly elected mayor of Chicago — earned him a book deal last week.

In reality, the 20-inch, pencil-thin Egyptian cobra, which zoo officials say is female and weighs less than three ounces, is likely hiding somewhere in the zoo's Reptile House after escaping from its enclosure Friday.

The venomous cobra is an adolescent and will likely come out of hiding when she is hungry.

The runaway cobra has inspired a sketch on The Daily Show, which showed a fake snake riding cabs around New York and vomiting in Times Square, and a Top Ten list on The Late Show of "Bronx Zoo Excuses: "No 2. We sent the snake to take out Qaddafi. You'll thank us later!"

Zoo officials did not respond to a request for comment on the Twitter parody. The zoo's Reptile House remains closed until the snake re-emerges.

"Right now, it's the snake's game. At this point, it's just like fishing; you put the hook in the water and wait. Our best strategy is patience, allowing her time to come out of hiding," Bronx Zoo director Jim Breheny said in a statement. "She will likely remain in hiding and not move until she feels completely secure."

Dangerous creatures on the loose aren't unknown in New York. Coyotes have been spotted in Central Park, and in 2003 a tiger named Ming was discovered living in an apartment in Harlem, with an alligator for a roommate.

For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.We've updated the Conversation Guidelines. Changes include a brief review of the moderation process and an explanation on how to use the "Report Abuse" button. Read more.

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Chinese lawyer freed, another missing

Teng Biao is freed after 70 days in custodySoon after his release, another lawyer is seized by unknown people "We've seen a serious backsliding in human rights," a top U.S. diplomat says

Beijing, China (CNN) -- Chinese authorities freed a prominent lawyer held for more than two months shortly after a U.S. official called for his release, a rights group said.

Teng Biao was released Friday after 70 days in custody, according to a U.S. Embassy spokesman.

China Human Rights Defenders also confirmed that he was no longer detained.

His release comes after two days of talks between the U.S. and China in Beijing.

"We've seen a serious backsliding in human rights," said Michael Posner, assistant U.S. secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor.

During his meetings with Chinese officials, Posner highlighted the lawyer's case along with a host of other activists, artists and religious groups.

Posner said Thursday that relations between the United States and China could suffer as a result of the crackdown on activists following calls for a revolution in February.

However, celebration of his release was quickly muted when another lawyer was taken into custody soon after.

Li Fangping was seized by unidentified people while leaving an office building in Beijing and has been out of contact since then, according to China Human Rights Defenders.

Li has represented several high-profile individuals, including lawyer Chen Guangcheng, who remains under house arrest in Shangdong Province following his release from prison.

He also defended Zhao Lianhai, an outspoken food safety activist and parent of a child contaminated by melamine-tainted milk powder in 2008.

China Human Rights Defenders said Li told his wife by phone on Friday that "I may be gone for a period of time ... can't talk more."

Attempts to contact Li since then have gone unanswered.

"Releasing Dr. Teng is welcoming news, but China cannot continue to play this game of letting one go and taking another in if China wants to be seen as a responsible international partner," Bob Fu, founder of the nongovernmental organization China Aid, said in a statement.

Calls to Chinese officials for comment were not returned.

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Police: Body found in Md. river is missing N.C. teen

Maryland State Police Superintendent Col. Terrence Sheridan said at a news conference.

Descriptions of Barnes that circulated since her disappearance included a rose tattoo on her lower right leg.

She was found near the Conowingo Dam on the Susquehanna River, one of two pulled from the Susquehanna River on Wednesday. The other body was a man, who has not been identified and it is not clear if there is any connection between the two. Investigators were trying to identify him through fingerprints.

There were no signs of injury or wounds to Barnes when her body was found, Sheridan said. The cause and how they died have not yet been determined. Neither body had clothes on.

The Susquehanna is a cold river and it is possible that Barnes

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Missing honor student's body found, dad says

Phylicia Barnes said she was going to get something to eat and then disappeared. STORY HIGHLIGHTSNEW: Police say there are no "overt"signs of wounds or injuries on Phylicia BarnesNEW: Hers and another body were found in a river, three to four miles apart NEW: A top officer says her body could have been in the cold water since DecemberThat's when she was last seen in Baltimore, where she was visiting her half-sisterRELATED TOPICSMissing PersonsBaltimore (CNN) -- The body of a 16-year-old honor student from North Carolina -- missing since December -- has been found in a Maryland river, her father and police said Thursday.

Russell Barnes, the girl's father, said that a female body found in the Susquehanna River in northeast Maryland is that of his daughter, Phylicia Barnes. It was recovered about 40 miles from where she was last seen, in the city of Baltimore.

On Thursday night, Maryland State Police Superintendent Terrence Sheridan and Baltimore Police Commissioner Fred Bealefeld confirmed at a press conference that the body is that of the teenager student from Charlotte, North Carolina.

"All of us, since that fateful day, have been praying and hoping for a different outcome," said Bealefeld. "But unfortunately, we are here today."

Phylicia Barnes' body was one of two found Wednesday in the river -- one south and the other north of the Conowingo Dam -- state police said.

Her body was recovered around 10 a.m. that morning, less than three hours after people spotted it and flagged down police, said Sheridan. Authorities spotted another body -- which hasn't been indentified but was described by the superintendent as a black male weighing 240 pounds and standing about 6 feet, 4 inches tall -- floating in water about three to four miles away just before 2 p.m.Wednesday. There were no clothes on either body.

"There's no other indication of any connection," Sheridan said of the bodies, besides the fact both were found in the same river, though he didn't rule out a link.

The teenage girl said she was going out to get something to eat and maybe a haircut when she left a residence in Baltimore where she'd been staying with her half-sister, according to that city's police.

Later, authorities said they feared that Barnes had been abducted or otherwise harmed. She had left her debit card where she was staying, and hadn't answered her cell phone since her disappearance, her mother, Janice Sallis, told HLN.

Sallis, who described herself as very "protective" as a mother, said she was "stunned" and "devastated" after learning from one of Phylicia Barnes' siblings "there was a listing of 20 different guys going in and out" of where the teen was staying. The mother claimed that the daughter was also allowed to drink alcohol.

On Thursday, Russell Barnes said that his daughter didn't know anyone besides immediate family in Baltimore.

"She's a well-loved individual, with everyone," Russel Barnes told HLN's "Nancy Grace."

According to police, Phylicia Barnes communicated through text messages with her half-sister about 12:30 p.m. the day she disappeared.

The half-sister's ex-boyfriend was moving out of the apartment and he saw the teenage girl on the couch around 1:30 p.m. But he said when he came back around 5:10 p.m., she was not there there. The door was reportedly unlocked, and music was blasting very loudly in the apartment.

In January, Baltimore police spokesman Anthony J. Guglielmi said the FBI did a profile on the girl and found no reason that she might run away. She was a good student with no major emotional disturbances in her life, he said.

"The fact set of this case is different than anything else we've seen," he said.

Her body was positively identified at the Baltimore city medical examiner's office thanks to a tattoo on "her lower extremity," said Sheridan. He added there was "no indication of any overt wounds or injuries," nor any indication either body found was weighed down.

The superintendent said the bodies may have been dumped much further down the fast-moving river, and said that its cold temperatures may have prevented the bodies from signficantly decomposing for several months.

"The medical examiner has indicated that it's not out of the ream that the body could have been there" since December, said Sheridan. "If you look at that river, look at how fast it's moving, all sorts of things could have happened."

Bealefeld, the top policeman in Baltimore, vowed that authorities will "work as hard now as we've worked all those days since December 28." A city police spokesman earlier said more than 100 Baltimore police officers, Maryland State Police troopers and FBI agents had been working on the case.

"Our goal is simply to bring closure to Phylicia Barnes' family ... and hold those responsible accountable," Bealefeld said.

The girl's father called the discovery of her body a "first step" in providing closure. But he said that the family won't be fully satisfied until justice is done.

"We're still not finished," Russell Barnes said. "We're going to find out what happened with Phylicia ... There are a lot of answers that we need to find out."

HLN's Natisha Lance contributed to this report.

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Search for missing woman expands as police look for serial killer

STORY HIGHLIGHTSPolice say the search for a missing woman will expand MondayInvestigators are embroiled in a manhunt for a potential serial killerThree bodies found last week were uncovered within a few miles of each otherA woman's body was also found March 29 west of Cedar Beach New York (CNN) -- Police say the search for a missing woman, which led investigators to the closely grouped remains of eight bodies in Long Island, New York, will expand Monday.

Investigators -- now embroiled in a manhunt for a potential serial killer -- are expected to spread out along the Nassau County line, working westward from Jones Beach in their search for Shannan Gilbert, who has been missing since May.

"We will be looking for human remains and any possible evidence," said Nassau Police spokesman Kevin Smith.

On Thursday, investigators said they were nearly finished with at least one part of the search effort in the Oak Beach area, where four female bodies were found stuffed in bushes along a quarter mile strip of beachfront property in December.

"Our search for (Gilbert) will continue, even though this component of the search is nearly over," Suffolk County Police Commissioner Richard Dormer told reporters.

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72 bodies at burial site as Mexicans seek missing

By Alexandre Meneghini, AP

People wait to know if missing relatives are among bodies found Wednesday in a mass grave in Matamoros, northern Mexico.

EnlargeCloseBy Alexandre Meneghini, AP

People wait to know if missing relatives are among bodies found Wednesday in a mass grave in Matamoros, northern Mexico.

Finally a strange man answered: "Stop bothering me. He doesn't have this phone anymore. If you keep bothering me, you'll see what happens."

Though he had yet to identify the body, Cote said his father's driver's license was recovered in one of the graves as people across Mexico contacted authorities in search of the disappeared, including dozens who vanished from buses as they crossed the same part of northern Mexico headed to the United States.

Federal authorities said they have 14 people in custody related to the second mass killing in violent Tamaulipas state, the scene of a massacre of 72 migrants last August.

But no one could explain the horror of innocent civilians pulled off buses and out of cars on a well-traveled stretch of highway patrolled by the Mexican military that runs near the Gulf Coast to the U.S. border.

"How sick do you have to be to commit such atrocities," said Cote, whose 55-year-old father traveled from their home in central Tlaxcala state to pick up a minivan in late March. The family buys and sells used cars.

"Killing and mutilating people just because you can," Cote, 32, said amid the stench outside the morgue in Matamoros, a city across the border from Brownsville, Texas, where the bodies were taken.

As investigators looked for more mass graves, calls from people and state governments around Mexico about the missing shed new light on the problem of the drug war's disappeared. More than 34,600 people have died in drug-related violence since President Felipe Calderon launched his offensive against organized crime in late 2006, but no one knows how many people are missing at the hands of drug cartels.

The National Human Rights Commission recently reported it has registered 5,397 people who have gone missing since 2006, but stressed they were not all drug-related. Spokesman Cesar Correa said such a study has never been done.

All day on Friday families were turned away in Matamoros as morgue officials said they would have no information until at least Monday. State authorities are still not sure about the origin of the victims found in the pits.

The majority of victims were men, though four women were among the bodies that authorities started to recover on April 1 while investigating reports that gunmen had begun stopping buses and pulling off some passengers in the area in late March.

Federal security spokesman Alejandro Poire said the suspects led authorities to the pits. The suspects belonged to a "criminal cell," he said, but he did not specify which one.

Authorities speculate the men pulled off the buses fell victim to ever more brutal recruiting efforts by cartels to replenish their ranks. But one local politician, who didn't want to be quoted by name for safety reasons, said there were rumors that the Gulf cartel was sending buses of people to fight its rival, the Zetas, who control that stretch of road and who began boarding buses in search of enemies.

Investigators interviewing witnesses on the bus abductions calculated that from 65 to 82 people went missing, according to Tamaulipas state Tamaulipas state Interior Secretary Morelos Canseco.

Some who came to the morgue had no reason to believe their missing relatives would have been in San Fernando in late March, when the complaints first came in.

Margarita Avellaneda, 41, clutched the flier she has posted around Matamoros since her husband disappeared in October. Gustavo Contreras, 54, was looking for a cousin also not heard from since October as he hitched a ride with the San Fernando mayor-elect. Both vanished.

Ambrosio Leon Rodriguez, 60, came looking for his brother-in-law, who has been missing since he went to board a bus in February in the Tamaulipas port city of Tampico.

"We don't know why they disappeared, but we want to know if they're here," said Avellaneda, whose husband went to pick up a friend near their home in Matamoros. Neither have been heard from since.

Griselda Guerrero, 22, said her relatives disappeared on a bus in Tamaulipas in March 2010 as they headed with other migrants to the U.S. They never found a trace of the bus or the passengers, she said.

Tamaulipas authorities have heard from officials in several states across Mexico looking for residents reported missing from buses that had crossed Tamaulipas, Canseco said.

Suana Montero, a spokeswoman for the Guanajuato state attorney general, said 17 residents of the state haven't been heard from since taking an Omnibus de Mexico bus to northern Mexico in March. The bus route and exact date were unknown, but Montero said they were apparently traveling to the United States.

An official with the Mexican Attorney General's Office said 43 residents of the central states of Queretaro, Hidalgo and San Luis Potosi headed to the U.S. in buses disappeared in March and early April. The official agreed to disclose those details only if she wasn't quoted by name because she was not authorized to talk about the investigation.

"We have information that they got to the state of Tamaulipas," the official said.

Relatives who have filed missing-person reports across Mexico are sending DNA samples to Mexico City, she added.

Michoacan state Attorney General Jesus Mandujano said at least 13 residents of that western state have disappeared in Tamaulipas. In addition, Mandujano said, an unknown number of people from the city of Uruapan went missing while traveling in a bus to Tamaulipas.

Canseco told the Milenio television channel that he had yet to hear from other countries, particularly those in Central America, the origin of thousands of migrants who cross Mexico each year on their way to the U.S.

The victims of the massacre last August were from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador and Brazil. Survivors said they were killed for refusing to work for the Zetas drug cartel. Fourteen of those bodies still have not been identified.

Although a federal offensive has been underway in the region since November, criminals have become so brazen they apparently kidnapped the bus passengers on a stretch of highway that area people say lay between two military checkpoints.

Cote said he and his father, also named Pablo Cote, traveled the road often between Tlaxcala and Tamaulipas for their used-car business, passing through military and federal police roadblocks. He said they knew about the dead migrants and heard stories of crimes along the road, but they never saw anything strange.

When they were in San Fernando, sometimes they would see armed men, Cote said.

"There they are," the locals would say.

He said his father arrived in San Fernando by bus on March 30 and stayed only a few hours before heading back to Tlaxcala. He told his son he would call when he reached Tampico. He was never heard from again. He left behind Cote and four daughters.

The family did everything together.

"I don't have words," Cote said. "My family is destroyed ... as the days go by, the pain only increases."

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Bronx Zoo cobra that went missing is named Mia

The Bronx Zoo will announce the winning name for the Egyptian cobra on Thursday. STORY HIGHLIGHTSThe snake was named Mia after vote sponsored by Bronx Zoo and newspaper, officials sayThe Egyptian cobra captured public imagination when it escaped last monthVisitors to Bronx Zoo can see Mia on Saturday, zoo says New York (CNN) -- An Egyptian cobra that turned into a media darling after its escape and subsequent capture at New York's Bronx Zoo was named Mia on Thursday after a public vote.

The name is a play on the days when the snake was missing in action, zoo officials said.

The Bronx Zoo and New York Daily News asked the public to vote on the best name for the mischievous cobra. After receiving more than 34,000 suggestions, officials whittled the list down to five nominations before Mia was chosen.

Mia received 15,972 votes, or 27 percent of the total vote, a zoo statement said.

The four runners-up were Subira, which means patient in Egypt, with 14,016 votes (24 percent); Amaunet, an ancient Egyptian goddess, meaning 'the female hidden one," with 11,672 votes (20 percent); Cleopatra, the last ruler of ancient Egypt who supposedly killed herself by means of an Egyptian cobra bite, with 10,730 votes (18 percent); and Agnes, Greek for pure or holy and also a reference to St. Agnes, with 6,777 votes (11 percent).

"Now that Mia has received her official name and has settled into her exhibit at the Bronx Zoo's Reptile House, the building will be re-opened to the public on Saturday, April 9 and visitors will be able to see her for the first time," the statement said.

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