AP - The brother of a man suspected of killing eight people in Illinois and Missouri was charged Wednesday with concealing a homicidal death and obstructing justice.

AP - The Rev. Jesse Jackson used the N-word during a break in a TV interview where he criticized presidential candidate Barack Obama, Fox News confirmed Wednesday.

AP - A man recently divorced from his wife of more than 20 years shot and killed her inside a suburban St. Louis mall on Wednesday before committing suicide, police said. No one else was injured but the Jamestown Mall in Florissant was evacuated.

AP - Garry McCarthy had barely settled into his new job as Newark's police director in the fall of 2006 when he came face to face with the twin scourges of violence and apathy that plagued New Jersey's largest city.

AP - When Volkswagen said yes, a city that shed its reputation for dirty air to become a top outdoors destination forgot years of frustrating rejections by automakers.

AP - Police in the District of Columbia are set to begin registering residents for handguns Thursday now that the district's 32-year-old ban has been lifted.

AP - Debbie Halcomb unpacked boxes as she moved back into her flood-damaged home, but worried that her damp carpet harbors mold. She enjoys the normally tranquil setting of Winfield, a community about three miles from the Mississippi River. But she's had enough. She's hoping for a government buyout so she can move to higher ground.

AP - The White House said President Bush will visit Northern California on Thursday to get a first-hand look at the wildfires that have ravaged hundreds of square miles and strained the state's firefighting resources.

AP - Just months into his job, the outsider brought in to shake up Chicago's police department is on the hot seat over an increase in homicides and other violent crimes and a decrease in gun seizures, arrests and even traffic stops.

AP - Fire crews started a controlled burn in the Los Padres National Forest in hopes of halting the massive blaze's spread through the ravaged hills of the central California coast.

AP - Nearly 40 years ago, Susan Atkins was a leading character in one of the most horrific chapters in California history.

AP - Chesapeake Bay crabber Paul Kellam has advice for the teenage boys who help tend his traps every summer: You better have a backup plan.

AP - Lou Pearlman and federal authorities have finally agreed on how much the former boy band promoter swindled from banks and investors in a decades-long scam: a staggering $300 million.