Video shows prince beating servant, suspect in murder investigation
 
LONDON (AP) — A security camera captured a Saudi prince savagely beating his servant in a hotel elevator only weeks before the aide was slain, a British prosecutor said Tuesday.
 
Prince Saud Abdulaziz bin Nasser al Saud is accused of murdering Bandar Abdullah Abdulaziz in a frenzied sex attack at London’s Landmark Hotel on Feb. 15.
 
Abdulaziz was found beaten and strangled to death in the room the two shared at London’s Landmark Hotel.
 
Prosecutor Jonathan Laidlaw told London’s Central Criminal Court there was evidence of a sexual assault, including bite marks on the victim’s cheeks.
 
 
 
3 killed, 9 injured in explosion at Bangkok apartment building
 
BANGKOK (AP) — A blast blew out the side of a Bangkok residential building Tuesday killing three people and injuring nine.
 
Police have yet to establish the cause of the blast, which took place around 6 p.m. Explosives experts speculate the blast was caused by TNT or C4 explosive, perhaps used in a bomb as big as 50 kilograms (110 pounds).
 
Dozens of bombings have plagued Bangkok this year, but none of such magnitude. Small blasts since July have killed one person and wounded a dozen.
 
There have been no claims of responsibility for any of the attacks.
 
 
 
Donors pledge $11.7 billion to fight AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis
 
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Donors have pledged $11.7 billion to fight three pandemics over the next three years.
 
 
Contributions were 20 percent higher than 2008-2010 donations, but The Global Fund’s executive director told a news conference that it is not enough to meet expected demand and could slow expansion of existing program efforts.
 
 
 
64-year-old man stranded in desert survives six days by staying shaded
 
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A 64-year-old man who was stranded for six days in the Southern California desert said Tuesday he survived by staying still in a small canyon and moving only to follow the shade.
 
Edward Rosenthal said he became so weak that he couldn’t sit up when a helicopter rescue crew finally found him last Thursday.
 
He was unsteady Tuesday at his first news conference and said he lost 20 pounds in the desert.
 
He recounted days without food or water apart from rain drops he caught in his mouth during a drizzle the day before he was rescued.
 
 
 
Florida gunman goes on spree, kills self and father, wounds 5
 
GAINESVILLE, Fla. (AP) — Friends and family knew Clifford Miller Jr. had a history of mental illness, yet they never imagined the 24-year-old would kill his father, go on a 13-minute shooting spree around his sleepy north Florida neighborhood, then take his own life while parked in a friend’s driveway.
 
Miller killed his 52-year-old father, Clifford Miller Sr., before he went on a rampage Monday and wounded five men.
 
 
 
Thousands of unsupported BP claims slow application process
 
ORANGE BEACH, Ala. (AP) — BP’s $20 billion fund to compensate victims of the Gulf oil spill has been inundated with inflated or unsupported claims and fraud — slowing the process of getting money to people who need and deserve it.
 
Kenneth Feinberg, program administrator, said more than a third of the 104,000 applicants need to back up their claims. He added that the amount sought in some cases bears no resemblance to actual losses, such as a fisherman’s claim for $10 million “on what was obviously a legitimate claim of a few thousand dollars.”
 
 
 
Father-son Mardi Gras float building dispute resolved
 
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A father and son who fought for control of a family business that has been building Mardi Gras floats in New Orleans for more than 50 years announced Tuesday they have resolved their feud.
 
The agreement calls for Barry Kern to be reinstated as president of Blaine Kern Artists Inc., the company that bears his father’s name. The younger Kern agreed to withdraw a lawsuit seeking to oust his father, Blaine Kern Sr., from the company.
“Mardi Gras is more important than our spat,” Barry Kern said.
 
“Mardi Gras is definitely going to go on, bigger and better than ever,” his father said.
 
The captains of the Bacchus and Endymion carnival krewes helped broker the agreement, arranging a meeting Tuesday between the Kerns.
 
Barry Kern said he resigned last month after his father tried to fire him without authority.
 
 
 
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