Former Qwest Communications chief executive Joseph Nacchio was found guilty last week on 19 of 42 counts of insider trading.

Nacchio will remain free on a $2 million bond, pending an appeal.

The guilty counts revolve around the ex-CEO’s sale of $52 million in Qwest shares from April 26 to May 29, 2001. He had been accused of selling more than $100 million worth of Qwest stock in the first few months of 2001, even while knowing that the company could not meet the ambitious sales and earnings targets he had set. A federal investigation found that Qwest falsely reported sales as recurring revenue between April 1999 and March 2002 to meet those targets; in the process, the company improperly reported $3 billion in revenues.

The government chose to accuse Nacchio only of insider trading, rather than get into the more complicated issues surrounding the company's accounting. Nacchio still faces a civil suit in connection with the insider-trading case.

Nacchio is scheduled to be sentenced on July 27. The convictions carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and $1 million in fines for each of the 19 counts.

Prosecutors alleged he took two girls to an underground room, bound them with duct tape, raped them and left them to die because the room had no air supply. The girls said they managed to free themselves and escape.

Hinson said the sex was consensual and that he hid in the bunker because he thought police wanted him on drug charges. He testified that he built the room to package marijuana.

Had he been found guilty, Hinson would have faced a mandatory life sentence without parole because he was convicted of raping a 12-year-old girl in 1991.

According to the statement of facts to which Robirds pleaded, on Feb. 12, 2006, Robirds instructed Joshua Hill, then 21, of Coffeyville, to shoot her husband, Steven Means, 49, at the family home east of Lenapah.

Following this act, Robirds enlisted her teenage children to assist in removing Means’ body to a location in rural Labette County, where the body was weighted down with cement blocks and dumped into a creek. Robirds and her children then attempted to remove evidence of the crime with home cleaning products.

Robirds waived her right to remain in the county jail for an additional 10 days and asked to be delivered to the custody of the Department of Corrections as soon as possible. She will be held by Nowata County Sheriff Jim Hallett until that time.

According to District Attorney Rick Esser, Hill is scheduled to also plead to murder on May 11.

The Organization of Chinese Americans (OCA) on Sunday expressed outrage over a recent CBS radio segment, which it described as "racist, vulgar and sexist."

WFNY 92.3 Free FM, which is part of CBS Radio, aired twice a segment of a talk show involving a prank call to a Chinese restaurant.

In a press release, the OCA called for an immediate apology from the hosts of the segment, JV & Elvis, their producer and the station.

The leading Chinese American group also demanded the immediate firing of JV & Elvis and their show's producer.

In the segment, the caller began by telling the first restaurant employee, "I would like some Asian food, son of a bitch" as well as to the second employee, "I would love to have lots of Asian food, son of a bitch."

The caller then told the restaurant's female employee, "Should I come to your restaurant so I can see you naked? " and continued, "That way, I can see your hot Asian spicy ass."

As the caller went on, he told another employee that he would like some "flied lice," but not "some old dung" and indicated that "I am training in Kung Fu, bitch" before ending with "Tell that hot Asian girl answering the telephone, I'd like to tap her ass."

OCA-New York President Vicki Shu Smolin said that what is especially disturbing to the Asian American community is that even after CBS fired Don Imus for referring to the Scarlet Knights, the Rutgers University women's basketball team, as "nappy-headed hos" on April 4, one day before the segment was first aired, JV & Elvis aired it again on April 19.

It is apparent that not only did JV & Elvis not learn anything from the Don Imus scandal, but CBS and CBS Radio decided that Asian Americans are easy prey for racist radio broadcast, he said.

John Tandana, executive vice president of OCA-Long Island, said:" Once again, radio has tried to gain ratings to the detriment of Asian Americans. The segment lasted over six minutes, the entire time, casting Asian Americans and women in a demeaning manner. We will not allow talk radio to spread stereotypes that hurt our community."

The Dog House with JV & Elvis is a radio talk show airing in New York City. The Dog House stars JV (Jeff Vandergrift) and Elvis (Dan Lay), and the two met in 1993 and have been radio co-hosts for some 15 years.

Prank phone calls are considered one of the most controversial parts in their program. This segment involves JV or Elvis calling random people from the phone book and the calls are usually humiliating.

The Washington State Senate and House of Representatives approved the bill in March and early April respectively. Opponents of the measure claim it erodes the institution of marriage, but the bill's supporters stressed the importance of granting equal rights to same-sex couples. The bill is the latest step in Washington's pioneering stance on gay civil rights which includes a revision of the state's Civil Rights Act to include the phrase "sexual orientation" among the classes of people protected from discrimination in housing, lending, and employment.

Former chess champion and liberal United Civil Front leader Garry Kasparov has accused Russian police of "brutality" after meeting with Kremlin officials Friday to give an account of his treatment at the hands of police agents following his arrest participating in the latest of a series of "Dissenters' Marches." Kasparov was detained on April 14 for hours alongside approximately 200 activists arrested for pushing into a blocked-off central square during an anti-Putin protest in central Moscow. Dozens of protesters at that rally, as well as at an April 15 demonstration in St. Petersburg, were beaten by police, leading to criticism from human rights groups. The Russian Interior Ministry has responded by conducting an inquiry into the events of the protests, and thus far maintains that any police violence was provoked. After meeting with investigators, Kasparov told reporters that all accounts of violence or illegal actions of the part of the protesters were false and were part of an "attempt to cover up the brutality and cruelty of police officers."

Kasparov and fellow opposition leader former Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov have strongly criticized President Vladimir Putin and his allies in the run-up to Russia's December parliamentary elections and March 2008 presidential election. Each have accused Putin of suppressing dissent; Ukrainian publication Zerkalo Nedeli Saturday printed comments from Kasyanov stating that given the present course of Russian politics "a revolution is unavoidable," though it is not the aim of opposition leaders.

William Phillips, 60, took a revolver to work at the Johnson Space Center on Friday and shot dead fellow employee David Beverly, 62. Phillips bought the gun on the same day last month that he printed off the bad review, police said.

A woman was also held hostage in a four hour ordeal but was only slightly hurt.

Nasa said Phillips, a contract engineer, had been employed for about 12 years, was unmarried, had no children and reportedly lived on his own.

Security review

Nasa officials said Phillips brought the revolver into a building that houses communication systems for the space shuttle. Phillips confronted Beverly, a quality-control engineer, about the review and despite attempts by his victim to calm him, shot him twice. The stand-off took place in the communications Building 44

Phillips left the room briefly but later returned and shot Beverly another two times as he tried to resist, police said.

"The suspect blamed Mr Beverly for being responsible for his negative job-performance situation," Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt said.

Nasa said the woman hostage, Fran Crenshaw, was tied to a chair for hours and succeeded in providing a calming influence, preventing the situation from getting worse. Phillips held her hostage until he shot himself dead.

Nasa says it is undertaking a review of security procedures. It evacuated some employees in the building when the situation occurred while others were ordered to stay in their offices.

The Johnson Space Center contains Nasa's mission control, which oversees the agency's space flights.

Doors to mission control were locked and outlying roads cordoned off.

The stand-off came less than a week after a gunman killed 32 students and teaching staff at Virginia Tech university before killing himself.

There has been a rash of security alerts across the US, which is also marking the eighth anniversary of the Columbine school massacre in which 15 people died.