Gunman Saw Nevada Walmart as 'Goliath' Before Shooting

RENO, Nev. -- A disgruntled Walmart employee decided to "take on Goliath" the night before he allegedly shot three of his managers and barricaded himself in the Reno store for six hours, according to court documents released Tuesday.

A probable cause declaration, filed in Reno Justice Court and first reported by the Reno Gazette-Journal, indicated John Gillane believed the Walmart superstore in Reno where he worked for the last nine years as his "Goliath."

According to the document, Gillane intended to use two handguns to confront managers in an office and force them to contact the corporate office so he could have a dialogue about his unspecified grievances.

Gillane, 45, confronted one manager at gunpoint in an office, court records show. He then made the man call over two other managers, the document said.

Police say all three managers were shot Friday as they fled from Gillane in a hallway.

Two victims shot in the torso remained in stable condition at Renown Regional Medical Center in Reno. A third was released from the hospital after treatment Friday. They have requested that their names not be released.

During interviews with police, Gillane said he had personal, financial and work-related problems, the court document said.

He expressed frustration with Walmart management, specifically two of the men he's accused of shooting. The third manager was a man Gillane said he liked, although he shot the man twice.

"Gillane stated that he had almost not followed through with his plan because he realized he would go to jail and not be able to see his daughter and would be fired," the document said. "Nonetheless, Gillane said he determined to carry out his plan and then turn himself into police."

Gillane, who worked in the store's receiving department most recently, remains in the Washoe County jail on three counts of attempted murder and battery. He has declined media interviews until he retains an attorney.

View the original article here

Bone Found in Search for Missing North Carolina Girl

Published November 03, 2010

| Associated Press

HICKORY, N.C. -- Police in Hickory say they've recovered a bone that may be related to the case of a missing 10-year-old girl.

A police statement issued Wednesday said the bone is being sent to the state medical examiner's office to see if it's linked to Zahra Baker, whose father reported her missing Oct. 9. The bone was recovered in neighboring Caldwell County, where the family lived until mid-September.

Police have already found a prosthetic leg identified as Zahra's.

Authorities say they believe the girl is dead. No one is charged in her disappearance.

The girl's stepmother, 42-year-old Elisa Baker, is jailed on an obstruction of justice charge. She admitted writing a bogus ransom note found at the scene of a fire in the family's backyard on the day Zahra was reported missing.

View the original article here

U.S. Men Among 3 Accused in al-Shabab Terror-Funding Plot

Published November 03, 2010

| Associated Press

ST. LOUIS -- A Missouri man and a Minnesotan are among three facing charges in a plot to funnel money to a Somalia terror group.

An indictment unsealed Wednesday accuses Mohamud Abdi Yusuf of St. Louis of providing material support to al-Shabab. Yusuf and Abdi Mahdi Hussein of Minneapolis also are accused of conspiring to structure financial transactions.

A third man, Duane Mohamed Diriye, is also charged and remains at-large.

The U.S. government alleges that from 2008 through at least July 2009, Yusuf used aliases in wiring funds to al-Shabab supporters in Somalia. Hussein allegedly worked a money-transferring businesses.

Both men made court appearances Tuesday. Yusuf's public defender declined comment, and it wasn't known if Hussein had an attorney.

View the original article here

Tribune Creditor Group Alleges Fraud in 2007 Deal

SAN FRANCISCO -- A group of creditors angling to get more money out of Tribune Co.'s bankruptcy case is alleging that greed and misconduct of the media company's lenders, advisers and own leaders led to its financial downfall.

A committee representing Tribune's unsecured creditors, which are relegated toward the back of the repayment line, filed two complaints late Monday in an attempt to recover billions of dollars from banks and company insiders. The creditors accuse them of shirking their duties so they could line their own pockets.

Virtually all the key principals involved in an $8.2 billion buyout of Tribune Co. in 2007 are named as defendants in the actions taken in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del. The unsecured creditors had been authorized to pursue the claims, technically known as "adversary proceedings," by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Carey to preserve their legal rights before the statute of limitations expires.

Among others, the complaints target Tribune Chairman Sam Zell, the real estate mogul who engineered the buyout; other Tribune board members; former CEO Dennis FitzSimons; and other former executives.

The unsecured creditors also are going after the lenders and advisers that enabled Zell to take over one of the nation's oldest media empires. The complaints allege that the banks were so interested in reaping huge fees and getting old loans repaid that they repeatedly ignored warnings that the 2007 buyout would bury Tribune in too much debt.

The buyout was "tainted from start to finish," one of the complaints contends.

Tribune Co., which owns the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times and more than 20 TV and radio stations, filed for bankruptcy protection in December 2008, a year after the buyout, because it wasn't generating enough revenue to repay more than $13 billion in debt.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s subsidiaries played a leading role in the buyout. Other major financiers and advisers included banks and firms owned by Bank of America Corp. and Citigroup Inc. Citigroup asserted the complaints are "without merit," and Bank of America declined to comment. Tribune spokesman Gary Weitman also declined to comment on behalf of Zell and other board members. FitzSimons, who resigned as Tribune CEO after the buyout was completed, didn't immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did JPMorgan.

The allegations of rampant fraud and other financial abuses threaten to deepen Tribune Co.'s legal troubles. The company, based in Chicago, hopes to emerge from bankruptcy protection by the end of the year. Adhering to that timetable became more difficult last week with the submission of three other reorganization plans to compete with a proposal backed by Tribune and several major debt holders, including JPMorgan.

Most adversary proceedings are used as bargaining chips by creditors that want a bigger share of money doled out in bankruptcy reorganizations, said Ira Herman, a bankruptcy lawyer in New York who isn't involved in the Tribune case. For that reason, adversary proceedings are typically settled, he said.

Some of the allegations leveled by the unsecured creditors echo a lawsuit filed in New York state court against JPMorgan, Bank of America and Citigroup last week by a group of the company's bondholders. Like last week's lawsuit, Monday's complaints build upon the findings of a court-appointed examiner, who concluded that some aspects of the buyout had bordered on fraud.

The complaints by the unsecured creditors provide more details, including e-mail exchanges from JPMorgan bankers involved in the 2007 buyout, to support their depiction of Tribune Co.'s lenders and advisers as money-grubbing charlatans who realized that the deal could ruin the company.

"There is wide speculation that the company might have put so much debt that all of its assets aren't going to cover the debt in case of (knock-knock) you-know-what," an unidentified JPMorgan analyst wrote to a colleague on April 7, 2007, according to the complaint. "Well that is basically what we are saying too, but we're doing this because it's enough to cover our bank debt."

In other e-mails in late March and early April 2007, the complaint said, an unidentified managing director for JPMorgan crowed about the $75 million in fees that the bank stood to make on the Tribune deal. "Can you say ka-ching!!" the managing director wrote in one excerpt included in the complaint.

While it tries to leave the bankruptcy case behind, Tribune Co. also has been reshuffling its leadership after a front-page story in The New York Times drew upon interviews with numerous employees to paint its management team as a lewd bunch that fostered a "frat house" atmosphere.

The backlash resulted in the resignation last month of CEO Randy Michaels, a former radio executive recruited by Zell. The four-man committee now running Tribune informed the staff that at least four other executives who used to work with Michaels at Clear Channel are also leaving as part of a restructuring.

View the original article here

GM IPO Shares to Be Priced Between $26 and $29

Published November 03, 2010

| Associated Press

DETROIT –  General Motors Co. says the company's shares will be priced between $26 and $29 each in an initial public offering.

GM announced the price range in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday. GM also says it has split its shares three-for-one in advance of the IPO, which is expected later this month.

The price range and split were revealed in a series of GM announcements that included a third-quarter earnings forecast of $1.9 billion to $2.1 billion.

View the original article here

U.S. Auto Sales Rise in October

DETROIT –  U.S. auto sales rose in October as buyers grew more confident in the economy and new models drew them into dealerships.

General Motors Co., which is preparing for an initial stock offering expected later this month, saw sales rise 3.5 percent in October. Last month is shaping up to one of the industry's best since August of 2009, when big government discounts spurred Americans to buy high numbers of cars and trucks.

"Consumer confidence is now stabilizing, and consumers are beginning to believe that they've already weathered the worst," said Don Johnson, vice president of U.S. sales operations for GM. The economy is showing "signs of a steady recovery, and we do believe they will bode well for the auto industry."

October sales could hit a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 12 million after all car makers report their U.S. results. While the rate falls short of the 14 million level during Cash for Clunkers in August 2009, it's up from a low of 10.5 million this February.

October sales were also strong for Honda, Chrysler and Hyundai.

GM said sales of SUVs and wagons were strong, up 36 percent for October and up 64 percent year to date. Sales of GM's most popular wagons - the Chevrolet Equinox, GMC Terrain and Cadillac SRX - were up 58 percent compared with last October. Truck sales were also up, with the newly launched Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra posting sales up 12 percent and 13.2 percent respectively.

Chrysler Group LLC said its sales were up 37 percent from last October, partly on the strength of the new Jeep Grand Cherokee, which saw sales more than triple. Ram pickup sales rose 41 percent.

New products also gave a boost to Honda Motor Co., whose sales climbed 16 percent. October was the first full month on the market for the Odyssey minivan, which saw October sales jump 52 percent. Wagons were also hot at Honda, where CR-V sales climbed 19 percent.

Automakers are expecting to sell around 11.5 million vehicles this year, up from a 30-year low of 10.4 million in 2009.

Consumer confidence rose slightly in October, according to a report released last week by the Conference Board. That, and a rebounding stock market, may have spurred buyers to invest in a new vehicle. Analysts are expecting last month to be the best October for the industry since 2007.

Most automakers were reporting U.S. auto sales Wednesday, but several reported results Tuesday. Among them:

— Hyundai said its October sales jumped 38 percent as sales of the new Sonata midsize sedan more than doubled.

— Subaru sales rose 25 percent for the month on strong sales of the Outback and Forester wagons.

— Volkswagen sales rose 18 percent with a boost from sales of the new Jetta. Jetta sales were up 32 percent over last October.

View the original article here

Plotters Didn't Know Where Mail Bombs Would Go Off

WASHINGTON -- The plotters behind last week's unsuccessful mail bombings could not have known exactly where their Chicago-bound packages were when they were set to explode, even after a suspected test run, U.S. officials say.

The communication cards had been removed from the cell phones attached to the bombs, meaning the phones could not receive calls, officials said, making it likely the terrorists intended the alarm or timer functions to detonate the bombs.

"The cell phone probably would have been triggered by the alarm functions and it would have exploded midair," said a U.S. official briefed on the investigation of the bombs taken off cargo planes Friday in England and the United Arab Emirates. This person, like other officials in this story, spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the case.

The official also said Tuesday that each bomb was attached to a syringe containing lead azide, a chemical initiator that would have detonated PETN explosives packed into each computer printer toner cartridge. Both PETN and a syringe were used in the failed Christmas Day bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner linked to an al-Qaida branch in Yemen.

The Obama administration, which has been monitoring intelligence on possible mail plots since at least early September, was preparing new security rules for international cargo in response to the attempted attack.

Security officials are considering requiring that companies provide information about incoming cargo before planes take off, one U.S. official said. Currently, the U.S. doesn't get that information until four hours before a plane lands.

A second official said the U.S. will also expand its definition of high-risk cargo, meaning more cargo will be screened from countries known as hotbeds of terrorism.

President Barack Obama stressed the need for stronger security for air cargo in a telephone conversation Tuesday with Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen's president, the White House said.

Investigators believe al-Qaida mailed three innocent-looking packages from Yemen to Chicago in mid-September to watch the route they took.

One of those packages contained a copy of British author George Eliot's 1860 novel "The Mill on the Floss." Authorities were investigating whether it was a subtle calling card from Anwar al-Awlaki, the U.S.-born Yemeni cleric who has inspired a string of attempted attacks against the West.

The militant cleric is now a fugitive, targeted by a U.S. kill or capture list. Yemeni authorities put him on trial in absentia Tuesday, charging him as a new defendant in the October killing of a French security guard.

Al-Awlaki became well versed in English literature while in prison in Yemen from 2006 to 2007 and later posted online book reviews slamming Shakespeare and praising Charles Dickens. Beyond that, however, there was no immediate connection between al-Awlaki and the book found in the package mailed in September, one U.S. official said.

Shipping carriers allow Internet users to monitor packages from point to point through the international cargo system.

While a test run would have given al-Qaida a sense of the shipping routes, there was no guarantee the route would be the same a month -- or even a day -- later, officials at UPS and FedEx said Tuesday. Routes change based on the weather, cargo volume and plane schedules, they said.

Neither company lets customers see precisely which planes their packages are on. Sometimes they are packed on cargo planes, sometimes on passenger planes. There is no way for customers to track their packages in real time while in flight, officials with both companies said.

Still, knowing the time shipments were logged in leaving Europe and the time they were scanned arriving in Chicago would have given al-Qaida operatives a large enough time window to allow them to have rigged their bombs to blow up somewhere along the way.

The packages sent last week were addressed to two Chicago-area synagogues. Because the addresses were out of date and the names on the packages included references to the Crusades -- the 200-year wars waged by Christians largely against Muslims -- officials do not believe the synagogues were the targets.

View the original article here