AP - Nestled among the lush forests and mountain foothills of rural southeastern Oklahoma is a soldier's utopia, a sleepy enclave where U.S. military veterans can claim their share of the American dream for pennies on the dollar.

AP - Federal officials proposed more than $8.7 million in fines Friday against Imperial Sugar Co. for violations at a Georgia plant where an explosion this year killed 13 people and at another plant in Louisiana.

AP - The first of 200 ships idled by a massive oil spill began crawling down the Mississippi River Friday after the Coast Guard reopened the waterway to traffic, but it could be days before all of the ships are cleared.

AP - A federal appeals court ruling that a Christian university in Colorado can receive state scholarship money is the latest in a string of legal victories for religious schools seeking public dollars.

AP - Church members watching the steeple being raised on their new building looked on in horror Thursday as a crane holding the structure toppled, crushing a car and killing a 79-year-old man who had been watching from inside the vehicle, firefighters said.

AP - Hate crimes in Los Angeles County soared last year to their highest mark in five years even as overall crime dropped across the region, according to a report released Thursday.

AP - One of two men accused of killing four people aboard a fishing charter last year pleaded guilty Thursday in exchange for an agreement that prosecutors will not seek the death penalty.

AP - The operator of a collapsed Utah mine violated safety protocols by cutting coal pillars that should have been left standing to prevent cave-ins, federal regulators said Thursday.

AP - Dozens of cargo ships, petrochemical tankers and smaller vessels stacked up Thursday near a closed stretch of the Mississippi River, a day after a collision between a barge and tanker spilled more than 400,000 gallons of fuel oil into the nation's busy shipping waterway.

AP - Authorities are investigating whether a veteran state lawmaker possessed child pornography on his office computer, two assemblymen who share an office with him said Thursday.