NATION IN BRIEF

Judge Wins No Fans With Seahawks Cheer

TACOMA, Wash. -- A judge overseeing a manslaughter case embarrassed prosecutors and upset the victim's family when she called for a Super Bowl cheer for the Seattle Seahawks before the start of the sentencing hearing.

As Judge Beverly G. Grant took the bench Friday, she asked everyone in court -- twice -- to say "Go Seahawks." Then she sentenced Steve Keo Teang, 24, to 13 1/2 years in prison for the shooting death of Tino Patricelli, 28.

"Super Bowl Sunday is Tino's one-year anniversary of the day he was murdered," said his stepmother, Kathy Patricelli. "I was a little tiny bit offended -- well, a lot offended -- because this was kind of an important day for us. Cheering for the Seahawks with Steve Teang in the room, I didn't think it was appropriate."

Pierce County Superior Court personnel were embarrassed, sheriff's detective Ed Troyer and deputy prosecutor Sunni Y. Ko said.

"One family is seeing a son go off to prison, and one family is here to find justice for their loved one who was murdered. It's important to them. Do you think they want to root for the Seahawks?" Ko said.

Grant said she did not mean to offend anyone.

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· LOS ANGELES -- Black and Latino inmates were segregated in one Los Angeles County jail and the entire jail system was on indefinite lockdown after weekend riots that left one inmate dead and about 60 injured. Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca ordered the lockdown for the 21,000 inmates in his control after two riots at a detention center complex that he said reflected daily "brown on black" violence.

· NASHVILLE -- The Tennessee legislature passed a bill to reshape ethics laws in a special session called to clean up state government less than a year after four lawmakers were arrested on bribery charges. The bill would create an independent ethics commission, restrict lobbyist activities and cap cash political contributions at $50.

· HOUSTON -- Thousands of Hurricane Katrina evacuees who have been staying in hotels at FEMA's expense will have to pay their own way beginning Tuesday unless they were able to arrange extensions from federal officials. The Federal Emergency Management Agency will allow those who received extensions to stay in 20,000 hotel rooms through Feb. 13 or March 1, depending on their circumstances.

· DETROIT -- City leaders are using the Super Bowl, and the trouble fans had getting to the game Sunday, to push for a new mass-transit system. Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick said he was lobbying state House Speaker Craig DeRoche to help bring a transit system to the city. On Sunday, more than 300,000 people used Park and Ride shuttles, filling suburban lots to capacity, and people waited hours for buses, the mayor said at a news conference.

· SELMA, N.C. -- Investigators searching a farm for a missing man found two groups of decomposing human remains, possibly belonging to two people, and arrested a couple who live on the property, authorities said. Police were looking for Caesar Ruvalcava Ortiz after receiving a tip that someone was killed on the farm in August 1997. Robert Bruce Pollard, 34, was charged Saturday with first-degree murder and his wife, Cecilia Louise Pollard, 34, was charged with being an accessory to murder. Police said Ruvalcava and his girlfriend, Robin Clark -- a relative of Louise Pollard's -- often stayed with the Pollards in 1997. Relatives reported Clark missing in August 1997, when she was 17.

-- From News Services