AP - A U.S. Border Patrol agent shot and wounded a man throwing rocks at agents near the U.S.-Mexico border in the San Diego area, authorities said Wednesday.

AP - A report on three heart transplants involving babies is focusing attention on a touchy issue in the organ donation field: When and how can someone be declared dead?

AP - Bill Gwatney, who served stints as an Arkansas state senator, chairman of the state's Democratic Party and as a party superdelegate, died Wednesday after a gunman burst into his office at the state party headquarters and shot him several times. He was 48.

AP - The seriousness Bill Gwatney brought to his political maneuvering was absent as he advertised his three car dealerships. He sometimes hoisted a giant inflatable dragon atop a showroom and dubbed it "Gwatzilla."

AP - Faced with hundreds of big, hard-to-control blazes, California is struggling with what could be its most expensive firefighting season ever, burning through $285 million in the last six weeks alone and up to $13 million a day.

AP - When a 13-year-old Minnesota boy was banned from church after parishioners complained about his behavior, it exposed a painful truth so politically incorrect that some people feel guilty just saying it out loud: Some autistic children can be annoying and disruptive in public.

AP - A judge threw out murder and attempted murder charges Wednesday against seven New Orleans police officers accused of gunning down two men on a bridge in the chaotic aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

AP - When police finally searched the squat white mobile home where they say a man held his family captive for three years, the place was so filthy and bug-infested that one officer had to wear a gas mask and another refused to continue.

AP - A woman who grew to be 7 feet, 7 inches tall and was recognized as the world's tallest female died Wednesday, a friend said. She was 53.

AP - A former sheriff was ordered Wednesday to stand trial on felony charges that accuse him of demanding sex from female inmates in exchange for his help in getting them into a drug court rehabilitation program.

AP - Passengers and a pilot testified Wednesday they never saw or heard anything that indicated the wife of megachurch evangelist pastor Joel Osteen assaulted a flight attendant before the start of a 2005 flight.