No arrest in bombing, authorities say

Authorities may have identified a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings, CNN reports.

The FBI is holding a press conference at 5:00 p.m. and may announce the news then. CNN attributed the news to an unnamed source, and reported that the breakthrough in the investigation came from analyzing department store surveillance video and video from a news station.

The Boston Globe reported that officials have found an image of "a suspect carrying, and perhaps dropping, a black bag at the second bombing scene."

An FBI spokesman in Boston declined to comment on the reports to Yahoo News.

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Boston bomb suspect spotted on video, no arrest made

By Tim McLaughlin and Mark Hosenball

BOSTON/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Investigators have spotted a Boston Marathon bombing suspect from security video taken before two blasts ripped through central Boston on Monday, a law enforcement source said on Wednesday, in what is potentially the biggest break in the case yet.

No arrests had been made, and the suspect in the video had not been identified by name, two government officials said.

Police considered making an appeal to the public for more information at a news conference, a government source said, but the FBI canceled that news conference after delaying it several times, Boston police said.

The explosions at the Boston Marathon finish line killed three people and injured 176 others in the worst attack on U.S. soil since September 11, 2001.

The bombings, as well as subsequent reports that someone tried to mail the deadly poison ricin to President Barack Obama - the second report of such a letter in two days - have created a climate of uncertainty in the country.

Nerves were jolted further by an inaccurate report on cable news network CNN that a bombing suspect had been arrested.

Shortly after CNN retracted its report of an arrest in the case, security officials at Boston's federal courthouse ordered staff, media and attorneys to evacuate due to a bomb scare that was later found to be a false alarm.

In Washington, authorities were investigating a letter addressed to the president after the contents preliminarily tested positive for ricin. Authorities had intercepted a similar letter sent to Republican Senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi on Tuesday.

The FBI said late on Wednesday it had arrested Paul Kevin Curtis, of Corinth, Mississippi, in connection with the letters.

Earlier the agency had said there was no indication of a connection between the ricin letters and the Boston bomb attacks, but they reminded Americans of anthrax mail attacks the country in the wake of the September 11 attacks 12 years ago.

THREE FATAL VICTIMS

The bombs in Boston killed an 8-year old boy, Martin Richard; a 29-year-old woman, Krystle Campbell, and a Boston University graduate student and Chinese citizen, Lu Lingzi.

The crowded scene along the race course in central Boston on Monday was recorded by surveillance cameras and media outlets, providing investigators with significant video of the area before and after the two blasts.

Investigators were also searching through thousands of pieces of evidence, from cellphone pictures to shrapnel pulled from victims' legs.

Based on the shards of metal, fabric, wires and a battery recovered at the scene, the focus turned to whoever may have placed homemade bombs in pressure cooker pots and taken them in heavy black nylon bags to the finish line of the world-famous race watched by thousands of spectators.

No one had claimed responsibility for the attack.

"Whether it's homegrown or foreign, we just don't know yet. And so I'm not going to contribute to any speculation on that," said U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who until January was Massachusetts' senior senator. "It's just hard to believe that a Patriots' Day holiday, which is normally such time of festivities, turned into bloody mayhem."

Amid an outpouring of public support for the victims, Kenneth Feinberg, the attorney who oversaw compensation funds for victims of the September 11 attacks and the April 2007 Virginia Tech shootings, was named to administer a fund for those affected by the Boston bombing.

Feinberg, a leading expert on disaster compensation, will serve as administrator of the One Fund Boston, Governor Deval Patrick and Mayor Thomas Menino said in a statement. The fund, unveiled on Tuesday, was seeded with a $1 million donation from the financial services firm John Hancock.

As of 5 p.m. EDT (2100 GMT) on Wednesday, the fund was up to $7 million, its sponsors said, including donations from more than 8,500 people.

(Additional reporting by Mark Hosenball in Washington and Scott Malone in Boston; editing by Daniel Trotta, Gary Crosse and Jim Loney)

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Arrest raises hopes of progress in killings of Texas prosecutors

By Lisa Maria Garza

KAUFMAN, Texas (Reuters) - A former justice of the peace in Kaufman County, Texas, whose home was searched as part of the probe into the killings of the local district attorney, his wife and a prosecutor, has been arrested on suspicion of threatening violence, officials said on Saturday.

Eric L. Williams, 46, was arrested on Friday on charges of making a "terroristic" threat, which generally involves a threat to commit violence, according to the Kaufman County jail website. Kaufman County is just east of the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

It was not immediately clear whether the alleged threat had any connection to the slayings, which along with the March slaying of the Colorado prisons chief raised concerns about public officials being targeted by criminal elements.

Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland and his wife, Cynthia, were found shot to death on March 30 at their home near Forney, 22 miles from Dallas, two months after Assistant District Attorney Mark Hasse was gunned down execution-style. McLelland had publicly vowed to capture Hasse's killer.

The arrest of Williams marked at least the third time investigators in the case have taken a person into custody over an alleged threat, and came as Texas authorities were seeking to double an existing $200,000 reward to find the killers.

Williams has not been named as a suspect in the slayings. He lost his position as justice of the peace in Kaufman County after being convicted last year of theft, according to local media reports.

His attorney, David Sergi, said in a statement on Friday that his client "has cooperated with law enforcement and vigorously denies any and all allegations," according to local news station KXAS-TV, an NBC affiliate.

Sergi did not return calls on Saturday.

SEARCH WARRANT

A jail official confirmed that Williams' bail was set at $3 million in connection with the charge against him, but she could not release further details.

Kyle Bradford, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Rangers, said authorities served a search warrant at Williams' home on Friday.

Richard Mohundro, who lives next door to Williams' house in Kaufman County, said he watched from his porch as police poured into the neighborhood on Friday afternoon. "There were cops everywhere and I thought, 'Oh my God,'" he said.

Officers were there until around midnight and took out bins filled with documents and computers, Mohundro said.

On Saturday, FBI agents and Texas Rangers also searched several storage units in the town of Seagoville as part of the probe into the slayings, the Dallas Morning News reported. It added that a car had been found in one of the units.

It was not immediately clear who the units belonged to. An FBI spokeswoman did not immediately return calls seeking comment on the developments, nor did a spokesman for the Kaufman County Sheriff's Department.

After the slayings of Hasse and the McLellands, investigators had tested Williams for gun residue and they examined his cell phone, but they did not name him as a suspect, according to the New York Times.

The theft conviction against Williams last year centered on his removal of computer monitors from a public building, according to a report on the trial from The Forney Post newspaper. Hasse prosecuted the case, according to the paper.

Police investigating the slayings previously have arrested others on a charge of making a public threat.

The Texas Rangers arrested a man on April 4 accused of using Facebook to threaten violence against an assistant district attorney. Two days earlier, authorities arrested another man suspected of making a telephone threat against a county official on a tip line set up for the case.

(Additional reporting Marice Richter in Dallas,; Writing by Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Colleen Jenkins, Vicki Allen, Cynthia Johnston and Paul Simao)

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Turkish police arrest suspected killer of American tourist

ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish police on Sunday arrested the suspected killer of an American tourist whose body was found in Istanbul earlier this year, a provincial governor's office said.

The man, identified by the initials Z.T. and nicknamed Laz Ziya by Turkish media, was arrested in Reyhanli in Turkey's southern Hatay province near the border with Syria, the provincial governor's office said on its website.

After questioning, the man was handed over to judicial authorities, the governor's office said. It gave no further details.

The body of 33-year-old Sarai Sierra, from New York, was found in the ruins of Istanbul's old city wall last month after she was reported missing in late January. Sierra, who had been travelling alone, was killed by a blow to the head.

The killing has attracted wide media attention in a country which receives millions of tourists each year and is generally seen as a safe destination for foreign travelers.

(Writing by Jonathon Burch; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

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Indian police arrest 5 over Swiss tourist's rape

NEW DELHI (AP) — Indian police said they arrested five men Sunday in connection with the gang rape of a Swiss woman who was on a cycling vacation with her husband in central India.

All five men admitted to the attack, which occurred Friday night as the woman and her husband camped out in a forest in Datia district of Madhya Pradesh state, said D. K. Arya, a senior police officer. Another police officer said earlier that six men had been arrested.

Arya said police were searching for two more men involved in the attack.

The couple told police that the woman had been raped by seven or eight men, but that it was dark and they could not be sure of the exact number, Arya said. They said the husband also was attacked by the men.

The woman, 39, was treated Saturday at a hospital in the nearby city of Gwalior and was released later that day, police said.

The couple were planning to travel later Sunday to New Delhi, India's capital, police said.

The attack came three months after the fatal gang rape of a woman aboard a New Delhi bus outraged Indians and spurred the government to pass laws to protect women.

Prior to the attack, the couple, who were on a three-month vacation in India, had visited the temple town of Orchha and were planning to cycle to Agra to visit the Taj Mahal, nearly 210 kilometers (130 miles) away.

They set out from Orchha on Friday and pitched their tent in a forest near Jatia village when they were attacked by a group of men armed with wooden sticks, police said.

The men beat up the husband, tied him to a tree and then raped the woman, police said. They also stole the couple's mobile phone, a laptop computer and 10,000 rupees ($185).

The Swiss ambassador in India, Linus von Castelmur, said he spoke with the couple and assured them of the Swiss government's help and support.

"Their health and treatment is the priority of the moment," the Swiss Embassy said in a statement.

The embassy said it was in touch with authorities in Madhya Pradesh and has urged a "swift investigation and for justice to be done."

Figures from India's National Crime Records Bureau show that one woman is raped every 20 minutes in India. However, many incidents of rape and other sexual crimes go unreported due to the stigma attached to such crimes in the conservative country. India's conviction rate for rapes and other crimes against women is among the lowest in the world.

Last month, the Swiss government issued a travel notice for India that included a warning about "increasing numbers of rapes and other sexual offenses" in the South Asian nation, and the latest incident could prompt other countries to issue similar warnings.

Travel industry representatives in India said the incident, coming just months after the December gang rape in New Delhi, would affect tourism.

"Such incidents will definitely have a negative impact on tourism. It is very unfortunate," said Subhash Goyal, head of the Indian Association of Tour Operators.

According to government statistics, around 6.5 million foreign tourists visited India in 2011, generating about $120 billion for the nation's travel and hospitality sector.

The gang rape in December of a 23-year-old student aboard a moving bus in New Delhi set off nationwide protests, sparking a debate about the treatment of women in India and highlighting the inability of law enforcement agencies to protect them.

One of six suspects in the December attack was found dead in a New Delhi jail this past week. Authorities said he hanged himself, but his family and lawyer insisted foul play was involved, and a magistrate is investigating. Four other men and a juvenile remain on trial for the attack.

The incident prompted the government to pass a new law that increased prison terms for rape from the existing seven to 10 years to a maximum of 20 years. The law provides for the death penalty in extreme cases of rape that result in death or leave the victim in a coma. It has also made voyeurism, stalking, acid attacks and the trafficking of women punishable under criminal law.

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