Times reporter gets subpoena over book

A federal grand jury has issued a subpoena to a New York Times reporter, based in Washington, apparently to force him to reveal his confidential sources for a 2006 book on the Central Intelligence Agency, one of the reporter's lawyers said yesterday. The subpoena was delivered last week to the New York law firm that is representing the reporter, James Risen, and it ordered him to appear before a grand jury in Alexandria, Va., on Feb. 7. Risen's lawyer, David N. Kelley, who was the US attorney in New York City early in the Bush administration, said in an interview that the subpoena sought the source of information for a specific chapter of the book "State of War." The chapter asserted that the CIA had unsuccessfully tried, beginning during the Clinton administration, to infiltrate Iran's nuclear program. None of the material in that chapter appeared in the Times. (The New York Times)

TAMPA - Two Egyptian college students arrested near a Navy weapons station in South Carolina last year were carrying low-grade fireworks, as they asserted, not the dangerous explosives as alleged by federal prosecutors, the FBI has determined. Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed, 26, and Youssef Samir Megahed, 21, have been held in jail since sheriff's deputies found what they called bomb-making materials in the trunk of their car during a traffic stop near Charleston, S.C. The FBI report was submitted to the court Wednesday by Megahed's public defender as part of a motion seeking bail. The two men, both engineering students at the University of South Florida, were indicted on federal charges of transporting explosives illegally. (AP)

DAWSONVILLE - A drifter pleaded guilty yesterday to murdering a young woman who went missing while hiking in the north Georgia mountains on New Year's Day. He was swiftly sentenced to life in prison. Gary Michael Hilton, 61, signed a plea agreement earlier in the day, District Attorney Lee Darragh said. (AP)

SANDUSKY - A nightshift nurse charged with raping a partially paralyzed nursing home patient abused 13 other patients, including many who could not communicate, at healthcare centers since the mid-1980s, authorities said yesterday. John Riems, 49, told police following his arrest last week that he abused nearly 100 patients since the 1980s, but he could remember specific information on only about two dozen, authorities said. (AP)