MONROE, Ohio – A six-story statue of Jesus Christ was struck by lightning and burned to the ground, leaving only a blackened steel skeleton and pieces of foam that were scooped up by curious onlookers Tuesday.

The "King of Kings" statue, one of southwest Ohio's most familiar landmarks, had stood since 2004 at the evangelical Solid Rock Church along Interstate 75 in Monroe, just north of Cincinnati.

The lightning strike set the statue ablaze around 11:15 p.m. Monday, Monroe police… Continue

HELENA, Mont. – As Bob Marley music wailed in the next room, the makeshift clinic hummed along like an assembly line: Patients went in to see a doctor, paid $150 and walked out with a recommendation that they be allowed to buy and smoke medical marijuana.

So it went, all day, at a hotel just blocks from the state Capitol that was the latest stop of the so-called cannabis caravan, a band of doctors and medical marijuana advocates roaming Montana that has helped thousands of patients apply… Continue

NEW YORK – The Pakistani-American who police say admitted to igniting a failed car bomb in busy Times Square has made no court appearance since his arrest early this week and, though he is cooperating, authorities remain unsure he was acting alone.

New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly declined Friday to discuss what Faisal Shahzad is telling investigators, including what his motives were. He was arrested Monday aboard a Dubai-bound plane two days after the nighttime bomb scare… Continue

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. – A man whose overheard phone conversation on a Greyhound bus sparked a bomb scare and daylong standoff won't face criminal charges, but two other passengers were arrested for their behavior after leaving the bus.

John Smolens, of Lewiston, Maine, was charged with resisting arrest for refusing to follow orders after getting off the Maine-to-New York bus, police said Friday. Calvin Segar, of New York City, was charged with obstructing government administration for allegedly… Continue

NEW ORLEANS – Nashville police chief Ronal Serpas will return to his native New Orleans to become the city's new police chief — the first white police chief since the early 1980s.

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu made the announcement Thursday, a day after he asked the U.S. Justice Department to send a team to help reorganize the troubled police department.

Serpas left the New Orleans Police Department in 2001 to become chief of the Washington State Patrol. He later moved to Nashville… Continue