A month after a gunman invaded Sandy Hook Elementary School, killing 20 children and six adults, a group of local residents are calling for efforts to make communities safer from gun violence.

A news conference is scheduled for Monday, the one-month anniversary of the shootings at the Connecticut school, a tragedy that has reignited the national debate on gun control.

A task force led by Vice President Joe Biden has been meeting this week with advocates on all sides of the thorny gun control issue and he has said he is hoping to have recommendations by next week.

Biden has offered to talk with any victims' families who would like to speak with him personally, a support group said Saturday, the Associated Press reported. 

“If you choose to wait a few weeks, or months, the offer is still there,” the group called Sandy Hook Promise wrote.

White House officials have said they are communicating with local groups and the families in Newtown, Conn.

“We remain in touch with...

New York's governor declared a state health emergency Saturday because of a flu epidemic that has sickened more than 19,000 people, giving pharmacists the right to immunize infants and children in hopes of curbing the spread of the potentially lethal virus.

Under Gov. Andrew Cuomo's executive order, pharmacists for at least the next 30 days will be able to give flu shots to children as young as 6 months, a break from state law that usually limits them to immunizing those 18 years and older. Cuomo said the change was crucial given the nationwide flu epidemic. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, there have been at least 28,747 cases of flu reported so far this season nationwide, and 20 deaths of children from the flu.

In New York state, 19,128 cases have been confirmed, compared to 4,404 for the previous 2011-12 flu season. The true national and state numbers are far higher, though, because many people who become ill do not go to doctors to get tested...

Erika Andiola, a well-known immigrant rights leader, watched Thursday night as agents handcuffed and took away her mother and adult brother from their Phoenix home--arrests that sparked swift outrage among activists like her across the nation.

Organizations released scores of statements condemning the action. Federal officials were bombarded with petitions and calls for the release of Andiola’s mother, Maria Arreola, and brother, Heriberto Andiola Arreola. Both are suspected of being in the country illegally.

By Friday morning both mother and son had been released. An Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman said their case warranted a further review and “exercise in discretion” in keeping with policies of the Obama administration.

 “My mom was on the way to Mexico,” Andiola posted on Facebook. “She said the driver turned around when she received a call. She was really confused.... They told her that the reason why she was returning was because...

The body of a Chicago lottery winner who authorities say died of cyanide poisoning will be exhumed, a judge ruled Friday.

Mary Paleologos, a spokeswoman for the Cook County Medical Examiner, told the Los Angeles Times that  the exhumation of Urooj Khan’s body would take place next week and an autopsy will be performed.

Khan -- who won a $1-million jackpot from the Illinois lottery last summer -- died July 20. His death was initially ruled to be natural and his body was released for burial. But after a family member raised concerns, the medical examiner ran additional tests from blood and tissue samples and in late November deemed the death a homicide.

In a court filing, Chief Medical Examiner Stephen J. Cina said a full autopsy was needed to confirm the results of cyanide poisoning, "as well as to rule out any other natural causes that might have contributed to, or caused Mr. Khan’s death."

A full autopsy was never performed because the death appeared to be natural and...

In 1994, a boy vanished from LaGrange County, Ind., allegedly whisked away by his paternal grandparents, who worried where a court might place their grandson.

Authorities at the time issued arrest warrants for the grandparents, and descriptions of 5-year-old Richard Wayne Landers Jr. landed in missing-children databases. Charges were filed.

But in 2008, Indiana authorities dropped the charges against Landers' grandparents after failing to locate them or the now-grown boy.

Last fall, Landers reappeared -- alive, married and living in rural Browerville, Minn.

Indiana State Police announced the discovery Thursday, saying they were able to locate the now-24-year-old after his stepfather, Richard Harter, gave police Landers' Social Security card in September.

Police said they then found a man last year in Minnesota with same birth date and social Security number as Landers, and who looked similar to what the boy might look like today.

An investigation ensued, bringing in the Long Prairie...

HOUSTON -- The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights delivered an update on its examination of sexual assault in the military with a briefing Friday on Capitol Hill that comes amid a widening sex scandal among Air Force basic instructors and recruits at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland in Texas.

According to the report, about 4% of female service members experience some form of sexual assault each year compared to 1% of male service members. In fiscal year 2011, the Armed Services completed 2,353 investigations of reported sexual assaults, a “small fraction” of the total estimated sexual assaults, according to the report.

The briefing, streaming live on C-SPAN, includes three panels: one of victims and accused attackers, another of academic experts and a third of military officials.

On Friday morning, the expert panel's discussion centered on the influence of commanders on investigating and prosecuting alleged sexual assaults.

Philip D. Cave, a Washington-based military lawyer and...

CENTENNIAL, Colo. –   A judge on Friday delayed the arraignment of James E. Holmes to March after the defense in the Colorado movie theater massacre case said it needed more time to prepare a plea.

During a 15-minute proceeding, Judge William Sylvester set March 12 for the arraignment of Holmes on 166 criminal counts in connection with the July 20 attack on a movie theater in Aurora. Twelve people were killed and at least 70 wounded.

After three days of evidence this week, Sylvester on Thursday night ruled the prosecution had established probable cause to hold a trial of Holmes, 25. The judge had set Friday for a status hearing and possible arraignment.

PHOTOS: Colorado movie theater shooting

But the defense on Thursday had argued it needed more time to prepare for an arraignment and asked for a delay.

The delay angered many of the relatives of the victims, who have often openly wept this week but have maintained decorum. The prosecution said that 84 of 93 contacted relatives or...

A young mother carried her baby, along with a loaded gun in a diaper bag, into a Philadelphia school where she had gone to sign up for classes, police said, one of two gun-in-school incidents reported in the city as the national debate on gun control raged in the wake of the Newtown, Conn., massacre.

In the second incident Thursday, a high school student hid a gun in his shoe, but it was found when he walked through a metal detector. His gun was not loaded.

But the weapon carried by 21-year-old Kelly Jones in the bottom of her pink-and-white diaper bag was fully loaded, police say, and Jones -- who was accompanied by her aunt and her baby when she was caught with it -- now faces criminal charges.

"She is claiming that she was not aware that the loaded .40-caliber Smith & Wesson semi-automatic handgun was in the diaper bag," said police Capt. Laurence Nodiff. He said Jones did not have a permit to carry the weapon, whose serial number had been scratched off.

Jones arrived at South...

Cook County prosecutors are expected to ask a judge Friday morning to exhume the body of a Chicago lottery winner who died of cyanide poisoning, according to the medical examiner’s office.

A spokeswoman for the Cook County Medical Examiner previously told the Los Angeles Times that the removal of 46-year-old Urooj Khan’s remains may not take place for several weeks because the decision must receive a judge's approval and authorities must coordinate with the cemetery.

Khan -- who won a $1-million jackpot from the Illinois lottery last summer -- died before he could receive his winnings. His July 20 death was initially believed to stem from heart disease. But a family member raised concerns and the medical examiner ran additional tests from blood and tissue samples after the office released Khan’s body to his family.

On Nov. 30, the medical examiner labeled Khan’s death a homicide. Now the medical examiner wants the body back so it can complete its investigation.

HOUSTON -- A Texas judge is expected to consider Friday whether to grant a new trial for a man serving a life sentence for murdering his two stepsons by arson, or even to declare him innocent.

Ed Graf, 60, was convicted in 1988 of locking his 8- and 9-year-old stepsons in a backyard storage shed in Hewitt, Texas, just outside Waco, and setting the shed afire.

Graf’s is among a handful of arson cases under review by the Lubbock-based Innocence Project of Texas and an expert state fire panel, an unprecedented investigation of closed cases recommended by the state’s Forensic Science Commission. The expert panel includes the leader of the science commission.

Innocence Project officials hope the review will help overturn wrongful convictions that relied on so-called “junk science,” discredited approaches of determining whether fires were intentionally set.

Earlier this week, the officials brought their findings to the fire panel assembled by Texas Fire Marshal Chris...

SEATTLE — Adding to the troubles plaguing Shell Alaska and its drilling program in the Arctic, the Environmental Protection Agency announced late Thursday that it had issued air pollution citations to both of the company’s Arctic drilling rigs for “multiple permit violations” during the 2012 drilling season.

In a brief notice, the federal agency said the company could be subject to fines or other measures as a result of the violations. EPA officials said the problems were discovered during an inspection of the Noble Discoverer drilling rig and because Shell reported that it had exceeded nitrogen oxide emissions limits on both its drilling rigs during operations last summer.

Shell officials have known for some time that they would not be able to meet the stringent pollution limits set for the Arctic, especially the ambitious “best available technology” goals initially established for the Noble Discoverer in the Chukchi Sea.

Early last summer, Shell ap...