PITTSBURGH — A woman suspected of cutting open a pregnant woman’s uterus and stealing the baby has been charged with homicide, unlawful restraint and kidnapping, police said Sunday.
Andrea Curry-Demus, 38, of Wilkinsburg is charged in the death of Kia Johnson, 18, of McKeesport. Curry-Demus is accused of taking the baby boy to a Pittsburgh hospital and claiming it was her own.
Johnson’s body was found Friday in Curry-Demus’s apartment. The body was positively identified through dental records, Allegheny County Medical Examiner Karl Williams said Sunday.
In 1990, Curry-Demus, then known as Andrea Curry, was accused of stabbing a woman in an alleged plot to steal the woman’s infant. A day after that stabbing, Curry-Demus snatched a 3-week-old baby girl from a hospital after the child’s 16-year-old mother had gone home for the night. The baby was found unharmed with Curry-Demus at her home the next day.
Curry-Demus pleaded guilty in 1991 to various charges from both incidents and got three to 10 years in prison, according to court records. She was paroled in August 1998.
Massachusetts: Patient tested for mad cow
Public health officials are investigating whether a patient in a Cape Cod hospital has the human form of mad cow disease, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. There have only been three cases of the human form of mad cow disease reported in the United States in the last several years, and officials say it’s extremely unlikely the patient in Cape Cod Hospital has the disease. Eating meat products contaminated with mad cow disease is linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a rare and fatal human malady.
D.C.: Rice says Iran not serious about nuke talks
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice says Iran was not serious in weekend talks over its disputed nuclear program and will face new sanctions unless it changes its behavior soon. Rice says Iran gave envoys from the U.S. and five other world powers the run-around at Saturday’s talks in Switzerland and time is running out for it to accept a package of incentives in exchange for halting suspect activity. Iran now has two weeks to respond.
California: Showers unlikely to halt fires
Scattered showers forecast for California’s northern mountains Sunday are unlikely to extinguish wildfires that still threaten homes, fire officials said. But cooler temperatures mean lightning strikes don’t pose as much of a threat as they did a month ago, when storms sparked nearly 2,100 fires that have burned almost 1 million acres, said officials with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. All but 34 of the fires sparked after a lighting storm on June 20 have been contained around the state, leaving nearly 1,470 square miles of destruction.
Iran: Nine to be stoned to death
Iran has sentenced eight women and one man convicted of adultery in separate cases to death by stoning, activists said Sunday. Six of the nine were convicted based solely on judges’ decisions with no witnesses or the presence of their lawyers during their confessions, said Shadi Sadr, a lawyer and women’s rights activist who has been leading a campaign in Iran against stoning deaths. Under Iran’s Islamic laws, adultery is the only capital offense punishable by stoning. A man is usually buried up to his waist, while a woman is buried up to her neck. Those carrying out the verdict then throw stones until the condemned dies.
Australia: Portland, Ore., doctor returns
Dr. Jayant Patel, an Indian-born, American-trained surgeon charged with three counts of manslaughter in the deaths of patients at a regional Queensland state hospital, arrived back in Australia today more than 18 months after being charged with the offenses. Patel, 58, had been in custody in Portland, Ore., since March 11 and late last month agreed with an extradition request by the Australian government.
@3. Headline News Briefs 14 no:Pope meets with abuse victims
Pope Benedict XVI met privately in Sydney today with Australians who were sexually abused as children by priests. The pontiff held prayers and spoke with four representatives of abuse victims — two men and two women — in the last hours of his nine-day visit to Australia for the church’s global youth festival. “He listened to their stories and offered them consolation,” a Vatican statement said. “Assuring them of his spiritual closeness he promised to continue to pray for them, their families and all victims.”
Sri Lanka: Rebel base captured
Sri Lankan government forces captured a Tamil Tiger rebel base on the northwest coast Sunday after a 48-hour battle that left at least 15 rebels dead, while air force jets destroyed six rebel boats that attempted to flee, the military said. Clashes elsewhere in the region killed 16 rebels and one soldier, the military said. The civil war on the Indian Ocean island has escalated in recent months.
From Herald news services
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