Nation, World Briefs: Richard Roberts resigns at Oral Roberts University

TULSA, Okla. — The president of Oral Roberts University, facing accusations he misspent school funds to support a lavish lifestyle, resigned Friday, officials said. Richard Roberts’ resignation is effective immediately, according to a statement from the Board of Regents. Roberts and the university have come under fire since a lawsuit was filed by three former professors last month. The lawsuit includes allegations of a $39,000 shopping tab at one store for Richard Roberts’ wife, Lindsay, a $29,411 Bahamas senior trip on the university jet for one of Roberts’ daughters and a stable of horses for the Roberts’ children.

D.C.: Flu medicine warnings

Food and Drug Administration experts are recommending new label warnings about possible dangerous psychiatric side effects of influenza drugs Tamiflu and Relenza, according to FDA documents. The documents, posted Friday on the agency’s Web site, were prepared for a meeting Tuesday of the FDA’s Pediatric Advisory Committee. Studies revealed 596 cases in which patients who took Tamiflu experienced “neuropsychiatric events” such as delirium, delusions or hallucinations. The episodes sometimes led to impulsive behavior and self-injury.

Illinois: Chicago names for sale?

Might visitors to the Windy City someday ride the Lowe’s Chicago El, shop on the Microsoft Magnificent Mile and tour Old Navy Pier? The city has hired a marketing firm to explore the potential for selling naming rights and sponsorships as a way to bring in much-needed city revenue, the Chicago Tribune reported Friday. The contract states that any plan must ensure “the integrity of the city of Chicago’s brand image.”

Connecticut: Rapist released

A former high school wrestling star who fled to Europe before his rape trial and lived a jet-set life for years before surrendering was released from prison Friday. Alex Kelly, 40, was released from the Bridgeport Correctional Center just after 7 a.m., a Correction Department spokesman said. Kelly was convicted in 1997 and sentenced to 16 years in prison for raping two teenage girls in 1986. He was released after 10 years because of good behavior.

Pennsylvania: Bear bites visitor

A bear at a private Farmington zoo bit a participant in a program for budding zookeepers and scratched a person who tried to help. The bite victim required eight stitches, and the other person had only minor injuries, the owner of the Woodland Zoo and More said. “There’s dog bites more serious than this every day, and the only reason this is drawing attention is because it is a bear,” he said. The victim was participating in a behind-the-scenes tour as part of a program called Zookeeper For a Day.

Georgia: Thief pulls off finger

A man tore a woman’s finger off during a drive-by purse snatching, police said. Caesare Pinkins, 21, is charged with multiple felony counts of robbery, aggravated battery and burglary. He is being held in Gwinnett County Jail without bond. Pinkins drove by a 55-year-old woman at about 2 p.m. Wednesday, swiped her purse and stepped on the gas, a Gwinnett Police officer said. “As the suspect drove away, one of the victim’s fingers was pulled off,” she said. Attempts to reattach the finger were unsuccessful.

France: Transport strike ends

Most striking French transportation workers returned to their jobs Friday, ending the most crippling public transit strike in a dozen years and restoring normalcy to the streets of Paris and other major cities. President Nicolas Sarkozy said the nine-day strike, which frustrated the public and cost the French economy hundreds of millions of dollars a day, did not diminish his determination to reduce expensive worker benefits and trim the French bureaucracy.

Rumsfeld charges are dismissed

A Paris prosecutor has thrown out a complaint against former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld for torture in Iraq and at the U.S. military detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, a lawyer for one of the four groups that filed the case said Friday. The prosecutor dismissed the case on the grounds that Rumsfeld benefits from immunity, the president of the International Federation of Human Rights said. The organizations that brought the complaint have asked the prosecutor to reconsider. The complaint was filed Oct. 25 during a visit by Rumsfeld to Paris.

India: Bombs rock courthouses

A series of near-simultaneous explosions shook courthouses Friday in three north Indian cities, with blasts going off in Lucknow, Varanasi and Faizabad and killing at least four people, officials said. At least two bombs went off in Faizabad, killing four lawyers and injuring 10 to 12 more, a local police officer said. One of the bombs was rigged to a motorcycle, he said. Faizabad is near the town of Ayodhya, where Hindu extremists destroyed the 16th century Babri Mosque in 1992, sparking widespread Hindu-Muslim riots.

From Herald news services