BRUNSWICK, Maine (AP) _ Police are looking for a man they say stole two rings worth nearly $25,000 from a woman after grabbing her dog. Brunswick police Detective William Collins said a woman was walking her Shih Tzu on Monday when a man picked up the dog and demanded the rings if she wanted the dog back. Police said the victim gave...

AMBRIDGE, Pa. (AP) _ A school bus driver will be charged with endangering a 10-year-old boy for intentionally braking suddenly so the boy would fall down, police said. The driver was upset because the boy would not remain in his seat, Harmony Township police Sgt. Jim Essek said. The driver told the boy to stop moving around before allegedly...

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) _ Police have arrested a man suspected of leaving greasy, graphic imprints on the windows of stores, churches and schools in a small Nebraska town. A 35-year-old man was caught in the act by police early Wednesday morning, Cherry County Attorney Eric Scott said Friday. The man hasn't been charged yet, but authorities believe he...

WASHINGTON (AP) _ Verizon Wireless on Friday fired an unspecified number of employees it said had accessed President-elect Barack Obama's old cell phone records without permission. The firings ended an internal investigation into the matter. Verizon Wireless earlier had disclosed the privacy breach and apologized to Obama. Obama...

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) _ A truck-driving thief made off with more than $3 million worth of merchandise from a venerable maker of cowboy boots and other footwear, authorities said. The thefts occurred Labor Day weekend and Nov. 9 at a Justin Boots distribution center, said Fort Worth police Lt. Paul Henderson. A...

WEST DANVILLE, Vt. (AP) _ A thief who robbed a general store apologized to the owner and left the singles behind so workers on the next shift would have something in the till. The knife-wielding man made off with an undetermined amount of money from Joe's Pond Country Store on Wednesday after threatening owner Jeff Downs....

ROXBURY, Vt. (AP) _ When you gotta go, you gotta go. But for decades, when you had to go in the Roxbury Free Library, you really had to go — somewhere else, that is. The one-room clapboard building, a beloved small-town gathering place since 1923, had no restrooms. When nature called, patrons young and old either had to hold it,...

COVINGTON, La. (AP) _ R.J. Richard says he doesn't normally put his cell phone in his chest pocket. But he says it saved his life the one time he did. The 68-year-old man from Covington, La., was mowing the lawn on his 5-acre property when a stray bullet from nearby woods struck that cell phone. He figured a rock kicked up by his...

COVINGTON, La. (AP) _ A man says his cell phone saved his life. A stray .45-caliber bullet hit R.J. Richard's chest while he was mowing the lawn — hitting so hard he thought it was a stone kicked out by his tractor. He pulled out the phone. It fell apart. The 68-year-old man was bruised. He said doctors told him two things...

ST. JAMES, N.Y. (AP) _ A dog left inside a running van put the vehicle in drive, causing it to crash into a Long Island coffee house. Suffolk County police said no one was injured in the incident, which damaged the glass window and some patio furniture at Cool Beanz coffee shop in St. James. Police said a 60-year-old Port Jefferson...