Friday, January 1, 1904
LONDON - A British man pleaded guilty Friday for threatening to kill 200 people in a Facebook posting that caused thousands of Warren County, Tenn., children to stay home from school.
Reece Elliott, 24, from South Shields, in Northeast England, was charged in February with making malicious comments.
The online posting threatening gun violence was made anonymously on a memorial page set up for a Tennessee student who died in October. The threat led to 2,900 children missing class in Warren County amid heightened tensions after the school shooting in Newtown, Conn., in which 26 people were killed.
Elliott, who prosecutors said was trying to see what reaction his posts would provoke, pleaded guilty at Newcastle Crown Court. He will be sentenced at a later date.
CLEVELAND, Tenn. - The Cleveland Civitan Club's 31st annual Special Olympics scheduled today has been postponed because of expected bad weather, a news release states.
The event will be rescheduled, according to the release from the Cleveland/Bradley Chamber of Commerce.
MACON, Ga. - One of Georgia's largest school systems has approved a plan to slash dozens of jobs.
The Telegraph reports that Bibb County school board members on Thursday night approved an anticipated 87 layoffs in response to the school system's budget shortfall.
The overall budget plan calls for cutting 97 positions. System administrators also are asking for a tax increase.
School system officials expected to begin identifying who would be laid off.
MONTGOMERY, Ala. - An Alabama appeals court is refusing to overturn the conviction of a former university professor who pleaded guilty to murdering three colleagues during a faculty meeting.
The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals upheld Amy Bishop's convictions Friday.
The Harvard University-educated Bishop challenged her conviction even though she pleaded guilty last year and waived her right to appeal.
The judges refused to reverse the case, but Bishop now could ask the Alabama Supreme Court to review the conviction.
Bishop admitted killing three co-workers and wounding three others at the University of Alabama in Huntsville in February 2010.
She is serving a sentence of life without parole. The guilty plea saved her from a possible death sentence.
Bishop is a Massachusetts native who once shot and killed her brother.