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Michael Jordan buying controlling interest of NBA's Charlotte Bobcats from Robert Johnson

Mitch Lawrence
DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER

 

Originally Published:Saturday, February 27th 2010, 10:16 AM
Updated: Saturday, February 27th 2010, 1:15 PM

 

Phelps/AP

Charlotte owner Robert Johnson is selling controlling interest in the Bobcats to Michael Jordan.

Michael Jordan has saved his own job of running the Charlotte Bobcats by buying the Charlotte Bobcats.

Charlotte owner Robert Johnson announced early Saturday that he is selling controlling interest in the team to Jordan, who has been the Bobcats' top basketball executive since 2006.

Jordan beat out former Rockets president George Postolos, who, league sources said, would have replaced Jordan as the team's top basketball executive if he had been able to buy the club. Jordan and Postolos were the only people interested in buying the team.

League officials were skeptical that Jordan, a part owner of the Bobcats, would exercise his right to buy the team from Johnson, who founded the Bobcats in 2003 and was the NBA's first solo minority owner. The Bobcats have been beset by losses during Johnson's tenure and Jordan has been known in the past for talking a good game when it came to purchasing teams, but never following through. In recent weeks, Jordan was able to put together a team of investors.

Jordan struck a deal with Johnson minutes before his exclusive negotiating window was to expire late Friday night.

NBA owners are expected to approve the sale, terms of which were not disclosed. The league clearly wanted Jordan to step forward and make the necessary moves to become majority owner.

"I am certain that as Michael Jordan returns to his home state as the principal owner of the Bobcats the team will continue its growth as a success on the court, as a business success and as a valued community asset," NBA commissioner David Stern said in a statement. "We expect the expedited approval process to be completed by the end of next month."

The Bobcats are in contention for their first playoff berth. Jordan's recent moves, including the hiring of coach Larry Brown, have helped erase some of his earlier mistakes in the draft, trades and the hiring of coaches.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/basketball/2010/02/27/2010-02-27_jordan_buying_controlling_interest_of_bobcats.html#ixzz0gpRdTxfO

‘My husband just shot me,’ woman says in 911 call

Drunk man disputes wife’s account, says it was an accident

Orlando Sentinel

4:29 p.m. EST, February 26, 2010

President Barack Obama abandons Rep. Charles Rangel against ethics charges

Michael Mcauliff and Richard Sisk
DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU

 

Saturday, February 27th 2010, 4:00 AM

 

Burke/AP

House Way and Means Committee Chairman Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., makes a statement on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Feb. 25, 2010, regarding an ethics panel's finding against him.

WASHINGTON - President Obama abandoned his defense of Rep. Charles Rangel against a raft of ethics charges Friday as a handful of rank-and-file Dems echoed GOP demands to demand that Rangel give up his chairman's gavel.

White House officials have privately called Rangel "untouchable" in the past, but Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Obama stressed that "rules are put in place for a reason and that those rules can and must apply to each and every person."

Obama also said that members of Congress "ought to be accountable," Gibbs reported, "and that applies to everyone," including the powerful 79-year-old Harlem Democrat who chairs the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee.

Rangel typically tried to wisecrack his way out of trouble, saying he would not resign as chairman following his "admonishment" by the House ethics committee for taking two corporate-sponsored trips to the Caribbean.

Rangel snapped at reporters: "Why don't you ask me if I'm going to stay chairman of the committee in light of the fact that we're expecting heavy snow in New York?"

In a statement later, Rangel was defiant and unrepentant. He called the committee's report "ill-considered, unprecedented, unfair to Congressman Rangel, and wrong on the facts and the law."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) played for time, giving lukewarm support to Rangel on the issue of the Caribbean trips.

Rangel didn't "knowingly violate the rules," Pelosi said, acknowledging more serious allegations are pending with the ethics committee. "We'll see what happens with that."

Fearing fallout from the Rangel scandals on their own reelection bids, four Democrats - Reps. Gene Taylor (Miss.), Paul Hodes (N.H.), Bobby Bright (Ala.) and Mike Quigley (Ill.) - called on Rangel to step aside as Ways and Means chairman.

"He should step down until all this is resolved," Taylor said.

Other House Dems, including members of the New York delegation, withheld comment out of personal affection and respect for Rangel, but several acknowledged he has become a drag on their campaigns and Democrats' efforts to retain the House majority.

Rangel's office issued a detailed rebuttal to the ethics committee's charge that he violated gift rules by accepting free trips to the Caribbean in 2007 and 2008.

The committee said it couldn't determine whether Rangel knew about the financing, but concluded Rangel's staff knew and the congressman should have known.

The committee has yet to rule on charges that Rangel failed to pay taxes on a Dominican villa, hid $500,000 in income and had a sweetheart deal on four rent-controlled apartments.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2010/02/27/2010-02-27_dont_want_charles_in_charge_rangel_should_quit_chairman_post__dems.html#ixzz0gnPFxNSX

Third-place 'American Idol' contestant Elliott Yamin became an unlikely voice from the Chilean earthquake after documenting his experience on Twitter.

Former "American Idol" contender Elliott Yamin was in Chile during Saturday's massive earthquake and has been tweeting his experience there.

"I just escaped w my life, from an 8.3 earthquake!!!…is everybody ok?…where was the [epicenter]?” Yamin wrote on Twitter moments after the quake, which was later determined to be an 8.8 magnitude.

Yamin's tweets were picked up by news outlets including ABC, CNN and NBC, thrusting the third-place finsher on "Idol's" season 5 into the spotlight in the hours immediately following the disaster.

"I was on the sixth floor of our hotel ... I was actually tweeting at the time that the earthquake struck," Yamin said in a CNN interview. "It was obviously without warning ... just a very abrupt kind of swaying back and forth. The building was swaying back and forth, as was my room.

"Stuff was starting to fall off of the wall. The light was starting to flicker on and off.

"I stood up and headed towards my doorway ... I was yelling very frantically."

Yamin was staying in Vina del mar, 90 miles outside of Santiago, when the earthquake struck. He had been in town for the Vina del mar International Song Festival.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/americanidol/2010/02/27/2010-02-27_former_american_idol_contestant_elliott_yamin_tweets_from_chile_during_earthquak.html#ixzz0gmD2jCYb

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/quake_tsunami

8.8 Earthquake hits Chile

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/lt_chile_earthquake

Rahm Emanuel ventured to the Capitol Friday evening to hash out health care strategy with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), a White House aide confirmed.

The meeting comes as Democrats are searching for a way to get to the health care finish line, though neither chamber wants to move first. Senate leaders want the House to pass the Senate bill first, after which the Senate would use reconciliation to fix the legislation to the liking of the Senate. House leaders contend that the votes aren't there for the Senate bill if the upper chamber doesn't move. The House, after two centuries of watching the Senate lag behind, doesn't trust that it'll act.

Senior Hill aides speculated to HuffPost that Emanuel, the White House chief of staff, would bring the message that the House must move first, with a pledge from Senate Democrats that they would follow. It's hard to make amendments to a law through reconciliation if that law hasn't been made official yet, they argue.

Pelosi's office wouldn't confirm that the meeting, which was still ongoing as of the early evening, was taking place or comment on what Pelosi's reaction might be. A White House aide said he was unsure what message Emanuel would deliver.

The meeting comes after Pelosi got under the skin of Senate Democrats on Wednesday by making a veiled challenge at a press conference. "We can't say to [the American people], at the end of the day, well, we had an idea, we had a vision, we had a majority, but the process did not allow us to make a change for your lives," she said. "We need to have the courage to get the job done, and I think we will. And I think today took us a step closer to passing health care."

Beer-drinking, smoking chimp sent to rehab

The former performer reportedly pesters zoo passers-by for booze

Tanya Ustinova and Amie Ferris-Rotman

updated 12:02 p.m. ET,

Fri., Feb. 26, 2010

  A Russian chimpanzee has been sent to rehab by zookeepers to cure the smoking and beer-drinking habits he has picked up, a popular daily reported on Friday.

An ex-performer, Zhora became aggressive at his circus and was transferred to a zoo in the southern Russian city of Rostov, where he fathered several baby chimps, learned to draw with markers and picked up his two vices.

"The beer and cigarettes were ruining him. He would pester passers-by for booze," the Komsomolskaya Pravda paper said.

It added he has now been transferred to the city of Kazan, about 500 miles east of Moscow, for rehabilitation treatment.

 Richard Peterson's appearance on 'Springer' landed him in hot water. 

                                            Richard Peterson 

 Richard Peterson's appearance on 'Springer' landed him in hot water. 

 Richard Peterson's appearance on 'Springer' landed him in hot

         From Jerry Springer to jail

February 24, 2010 4:59 PM

Diane Turbyfill

LINCOLNTON — Richard Peterson’s 15 minutes of fame cost him 72 hours in jail.

The Lincolnton man appeared on a recent episode of “The Jerry Springer Show.” Bragging rights could’ve been what led him into trouble with his probation officer.

Peterson told District Court Judge Anna Foster Wednesday that he boasted about being on the show with the topic, “It was the greatest one-night stand.”

He told Foster he’s no longer crowing.

Probation Officer Melissa Seals told the judge how she came to learn of Peterson’s brush with infamy.

“I was at lunch the other day and found out he was at the show,” Seals said.

Seals confirmed Peterson’s appearance on the show filmed in Stamford, Conn., by looking it up on Springer’s Web site.

The show featured people who had cheated on their significant other. Peterson revealed the truth of his one-night stand to his girlfriend on the show.

A video clip on Springer’s Web site shows Peterson running around the stage dodging swings from his girlfriend.

While the couple fought, a stripper started twirling around a pole and flashed her censored breasts to the audience. When Peterson’s girlfriend learned that the stripper was the “other woman,” the women followed Springer Show etiquette and engaged in a fistfight.

Peterson admitted his cameo on the show during court. The 30-hour all-expenses-paid trip for Peterson and his girlfriend was hardly worth it, he told the judge.

Peterson stood before Foster in an orange jumpsuit often holding the chains that connected his handcuffs to his leg shackles.

The courtroom erupted in laughter as Peterson told of the circumstances that led him to the Jerry Springer stage.

Peterson and his father are big fans of the show. When he called producers to nominate a neighbor for one of the topics, Peterson said he was approached about flying up for a taping.

“They really suckered us into the whole deal, and I feel like an idiot for going,” said Peterson. “They made me look like an idiot.”

The courtroom lost its serious tone as Peterson told his story. Everyone in the room laughed at least once.

“This might be my most humorous time as a judge in 11 years,” Foster said.

But Foster also addressed the seriousness of Peterson’s infraction, violating his probation by traveling outside the state without permission.

Peterson was serving a year’s probation for possession of marijuana and resisting a public officer. The 30-year-old man broke into tears a couple of times while telling the judge about his attempts to change the direction of his life. He spoke of getting sober and earning an associate’s degree.

Peterson’s probation officer confirmed that he always made appointments, passed drug tests and paid most of his payments.

Foster showed some concern that Peterson didn’t use money he earned from the Springer Show to pay his debt.

Peterson said the production paid him $150, which he split with his girlfriend.

Foster ruled to release Peterson after 72 hours in jail and imposed a $161 fine

80-year-old woman gets 3-year sentence for Torrance burglary

Larry Altman and Denise Nix

Staff Writers

02/24/2010 08:19:42 PM PST
   

 80-year-old Doris Thompson has a long rap sheet. 

Thompson said she deserved a longer prison sentence.

Police arrested her Feb. 4 as in the burglary at the Children's Medical Group office at 3440 Lomita Blvd.

Employees at the doctor's office believe she slipped inside as a male employee worked Dec. 19, and stayed inside when the worker left.

"She just kind of came through and ransacked the drawers and stole money," an employee said. "She was very sly and quiet."

Thompson had plenty of experience with crime.

State Department of Corrections records - which list her as Betty March, one of 27 aliases - show her first offense as "disturbing the peace" in 1955.

For more than five decades to follow, Thompson spent time in and out of lockup for crimes ranging from petty theft to burglary.

Records show that in 1957, police arrested her in connection with a homicide, but she was deemed insane and committed to a hospital.

In 1965, she received 90 days in jail for petty theft, and another seven days for a theft in Beverly Hills. In 1967, it was second-degree burglary and a prison sentence.

In 1969, forgery and theft convictions landed her in jail for 180 days. In 1972, another 44 days in prison for burglary.

The arrests and sentences continued: Grand theft property in Glendale in 1975, misdemeanor theft in Beverly Hills in 1977, and burglary again in Beverly Hills in 1980.

She moved north to Redwood City and San Mateo, where she was held for burglary but never prosecuted.

Thompson received another six months in jail for burglary and receiving stolen property in Pasadena in 1981. Then there were two years in state prison in 1983 for second-degree burglary in Los Angeles; and another 30 days in 1984 for burglary.

She reportedly escaped from jail for that one, but went back in 1985 following a sentence for petty theft in San Francisco in 1985.

In 1990, she went back to prison when prosecutors say she cracked open a safe in Los Angeles.

When she got out, she committed more crimes in Newport Beach in 1993. A judge sent her to prison for 20 more months in 1999 for burglaries in Orange.

As she moved into her 70 s, Thompson went to prison in 2002 on a four-year sentence for receiving stolen property. She was released in 2006, but went straight back to jail for a two-year sentence for burglary in 2008 in Beverly Hills.

Thompson was released on parole in October.

Shortly after the December crime, a detective in Torrance remembered the elderly woman when he saw the surveillance video from the doctor's office. He remembered the wanted flier he received from Beverly Hills police a couple of years ago.

"We worked with Beverly Hills P.D. from their prior cases and were able to identify the suspect as Doris Gamble," Torrance police Sgt. Jeremiah Hart said.

Gamble turned out to be another alias.

During questioning by officers, Thompson told them she had worked as a nanny, cook and clerk. She explained her life of crime by saying she "wouldn't do all this nonsense if the government gave us more money," Deputy District Attorney Paulette Paccione said.

Then, at her first appearance in Torrance court on Feb. 5, she said she wanted to plead guilty "because she does her time like a lady," Paccione said.

Wearing a blue jail jumpsuit, the elderly, 5-foot-3 defendant walked into the courtroom in shackles and sat before the judge.

"I can't hear," she said as the proceeding began. "I have a hearing impairment."

Paccione moved in front of her and talked directly to her. Sokolov spoke loudly from the bench, asking several times "Can you hear me OK?"

In entering her plea, Thompson said she agreed to pay $1,427 to the the Children's Medical Group as reimbursement for her crime.

Before she left the courtroom, Thompson asked Sokolov if she could go to a state prison immediately. County jail, she said, was not a place she wanted to be.

Sokolov granted her request.

"Thank you," she said as she left. "God bless you."

http://www.wbaltv.com/video/22669572/

Posted: Feb 23, 2010 10:18 PM EST

Updated: Feb 23, 2010 10:18 PM EST

MEMPHIS, TN (WMC-TV) - A spitting match between two students at Riverview Elementary School Monday apparently led to a bizarre encounter in the office Tuesday morning.

"She had spit on me so I spit on her back," said second grader Aaliyyah Price.

Price and her grandmother spoke with us from the family's home.  They said 32-year-old Toni Price went to the school to confront the parents of the girl who spit on her daughter.

"She said she went up there to talk to the girl's parents," said Bennie Price.  "But the girl's parents wasn't there."

According to court records, Toni Price ended up inside the school where an employee reported a drunk woman was armed with a sword running through the halls of the school.  She told police Price was threatening to cut her.

Officers who arrived on the scene retrieved a black walking cane in which a long sharp blade is concealed.

"When I got up there I took the cane," said Price's mother, Bennie.  "I had it, police drew guns on me, and I didn't know what was going on."

Price's mother believes she probably had the weapon to ward off pit bulls in the neighborhood and had no idea where she may have gotten such a weapon.

"I don't know," she said.

She said she does know her daughter would have never actually hurt anyone inside the school.

Price told police she drank a 40 ounce bottle of Colt 45 before going to the school.  She's charged with aggravated assault and for having a weapon on school property.  Her bond is set at $4500.

LINK TO VIDEO:

http://www.wmctv.com/Global/story.asp?S=12033987

Woman used young girl in purse-snatching at eatery, police say

Metropolitan police were searching for a woman and a young girl they said acted together to steal a woman's purse at a Northeastside Chuck E. Cheese restaurant on Valentine's Day.

Police say a woman distracted Amanda J. Harrington, 38, while a girl about 5 years old grabbed Harrington's purse from a chair and ran to the exit door about 3:45 p.m. Sunday at the Chuck E. Cheese, 5501 E. 82nd St.

The woman, about 21 years old, then walked out of the restaurant, according to a police report. Security cameras captured the incident, police say.

The two got away with the purse, a digital camera, a cell phone, a Nintendo DS game system and Harrington's wallet with about $52, identification and credit cards.

Police were attempting to gather more surveillance video to try to find a picture of the vehicle the woman and child used, according to the report.

http://www.wbaltv.com/video/22666669/