Nation Digest: Millions Being Smuggled Between Mexico, Colombia, Officials Say

CUS TOMS

U.S. Says Millions Were Seized From Smugglers

U.S., Colombian and Mexican customs agents in one week this month seized more than $41 million in cash being smuggled between the ports of Manzanillo, Mexico, and Buenaventura, Colombia, officials said Monday.

It is the largest seizure ever by Colombia or the United States, said John Morton, assistant secretary of homeland security for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The two ports are key hubs in a well-known cocaine-trafficking route, and an investigation is ongoing, ICE said in a statement.

Agents uncovered three shipments of roughly $11 million each on Sept. 9, 10 and 11, opening cargo containers aboard a ship bound from Manzanillo to Buenaventura and searching containers and vessels in Buenaventura and at Manzanillo, officials said. Authorities seized $7 million more on Sept. 14 and Sept. 18 in containers originating from or arriving in Manzanillo.

Currency in $20, $50 and $100 denominations was concealed in bags or shipping containers holding or labeled as holding industrial chemicals, ICE said.

-- Spencer S. Hsu

3 Students Charged in Boy's Death: Three teenagers were charged Monday in the beating death last week of a 16-year-old Chicago honor roll student on his way home from school, a melee captured on a cellphone video. The death of Derrion Albert, a bystander caught up in a fight between two groups of students, has reignited community outrage over chronic violence involving students in the city and is putting pressure on school and police officials to address gang problems. More than 30 Chicago students were killed in 2008, according to district figures, and the city could exceed that toll in 2009.

Possible Terrorism Accomplices Identified: Investigators have identified possible accomplices of Najibullah Zazi, an Afghan immigrant accused of plotting a terrorist attack on New York, a law enforcement official said Monday, but the whereabouts of the helpers or any bombmaking materials they procured are unclear. The three people are from New York City, the official told the Associated Press, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Adoptions Investigated: New York prosecutors are investigating a possible "adoption Ponzi scheme" in which clients were defrauded out of fees for babies who did not exist. The Nassau County district attorney's office on Long Island said last week's arrest of Roslyn, N.Y., lawyer Kevin Cohen has led eight other couples to contact investigators. Cohen is accused of taking $65,000 and failing to deliver on a promised adoption.

Teenager Says He Was Locked in Closet: A woman was arrested after her 14-year-old son told authorities he escaped from a home in the Oklahoma City area where he had been kept for 4 1/2 years, spending most of his time locked in a bedroom closet, police said. The boy had numerous scars and other signs of abuse, authorities said. Officers on Saturday arrested the boy's mother, LaRhonda Marie McCall, 37, and a friend, Steve Vern Hamilton, 38.

Hero Pilot to Fly Again: The pilot who guided his crippled jetliner to a safe landing in the Hudson River in January is set to fly again. US Airways says Chesley Sullenberger will return to the cockpit as a management pilot and will join the airline's safety management team. Sullenberger says he looks forward to his return to the sky.

-- From News Services