NEW YORK All across America, men gave their sweethearts flowers and chocolates for Valentine's Day. Michael Jennings gave his girlfriend something more memorable, if less fragrant: a tour of a Brooklyn sewage plant.

COLUMBUS, Ohio As a young state senator 30 years ago, Paul Pfeifer helped write Ohio's death penalty law. Today, as the senior member of the state Supreme Court, he's trying to eliminate it.

NEWARK, N.J. A New Jersey dentist on probation for an earlier incident in which a patient died is under investigation after a second child has died in his care during a routine procedure.

STARKE, Fla. The U.S. Supreme Court has denied a stay of execution for a man who raped a 29-year-old mother and left her to drown in the surf of Tampa Bay more than three decades ago.

VALLEJO, Calif. Police in the Northern California city of Vallejo say the gunman who opened fire at a nail salon, wounding a toddler and four adults, was targeting a 27-year-old woman getting her nails done.

PHOENIX A federal trial is set to begin Wednesday for an Indiana man accused of forcing his grandsons to hike for miles in the Grand Canyon without food or water in brutal August heat.

SAN ANTONIO The Texas primaries, which were once key to emerging from next month's Super Tuesday elections with the momentum and backing to win the Republican presidential race, may be pushed into May - and perhaps out of relevance for the race - because of a dispute over the state's proposed redistricting maps.

WASHINGTON The Washington-area Metro transit agency has settled seven of nine lawsuits by families of people killed in a 2009 train crash.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. Prosecutors want to make an example of a former security chief at West Virginia's Upper Big Branch mine who was convicted of lying to investigators after the worst mine disaster in four decades.

TEHRAN, Iran Iran claimed Wednesday that it has taken two major steps toward mastering the production of nuclear fuel, a defiant move in response to increasingly tough Western sanctions over its controversial nuclear program.

CHICAGO Protesters are coming by the thousands to Chicago, armed with smartphones, video cameras and social media links that will allow them to instantly map strategy, share plans and disseminate images of what's happening - right in front of a police force renowned for responding with tough tactics.

WASHINGTON The United States and Europe are weighing unprecedented punishment against Iran that could cripple the country's financial lifeline but result in higher oil prices for the U.S. and its allies. Underscoring the potential costs, Iran on Wednesday cut oil exports to six European countries.

DENVER The debate of whether to grant Colorado same-sex couples rights similar to married couples returns to the state Capitol Wednesday, this time with more momentum than when it failed narrowly last year.

WASHINGTON First lady Michelle Obama is planning a visit to the Pentagon to promote more help for military spouses who often suffer higher unemployment than others because they move so much.

BANGKOK Israeli officials ramped up accusations Wednesday that Iran was launching covert attack plots, saying "sticky" bombs found in a Thai house rented by Iranians were similar to devices used against Israeli diplomats in India and Georgia.

Commercial banks spent nearly $62 million last year on lobbying, another record total for an industry that has become one of the most active voices in the political arena.

For the 99 percent of colleges, it was a pretty good fundraising year.

Congress has signed off on a plan that will transfer 785 acres of federal parkland along the coast of the Pacific Ocean in Washington state to the tiny Quileute Indian tribe, a move aimed at protecting the tribe's safety in case a tsunami ever strikes.

Battle lines are hardening in the Legislature over oil taxes, with Gov. Sean Parnell saying Tuesday that he remains firmly committed to his legislation rolling back taxes, and state senators just as sure that they are right to reject his strategy.

In a unanimous opinion Tuesday, the Missouri Supreme Court struck down a 2010 ethics bill that banned the laundering of donations through campaign committees.

BOSTON Nine black Boston police supervisors have filed a federal lawsuit in which they claim they were denied advancement because of a discriminatory promotion exam.

ALLENTOWN, Pa. A Pennsylvania man who said he beat his wife's 2-year-old daughter because he thought she needed toughening up has been ordered to spend at least a decade in prison.

NEW MARTINSVILLE, W.Va. Gastar Exploration plans to drill for natural gas on 1,400 acres at Bayer Corp.'s plant site in West Virginia's Northern Panhandle.

NEW MARTINSVILLE, W.Va. Gastar Exploration plans to drill for natural gas on 1,400 acres at Bayer Corp.'s plant site in West Virginia's Northern Panhandle.

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. The Diving Horse has finally been put out to pasture for good.

ORLANDO, Fla. An attorney who prosecuted Casey Anthony is back in a courtroom in central Florida - only this time he is standing in as defense counsel, for his son.

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. West Virginia University's journalism school is creating a fund to honor a professor and former Associated Press correspondent who died earlier this month.

Wet weather will move into the central U.S. on Wednesday, as a trough of low pressure moves into the Plains from the Rocky Mountains.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. The prosecution is nearing the end of its presentation in the trial of a former University of Virginia lacrosse player accused of killing his ex-girlfriend.

LOS ANGELES After days of DNA testimony, prosecutors planned to tell jurors the story of love and betrayal that they claim provided a motive for murder by a veteran police detective.

WEATHERFORD, Texas After finally getting a strong lead in the case of a woman discovered missing when her house burned down, investigators drove 100 miles to her former neighbor's house and were shocked when she ran outside, frail and covered in bruises, yelling, "I'm here! I'm here!"

WEATHERFORD, Texas Authorities searching for a missing North Texas woman found her 100 miles away at her ex-neighbor's house - frail and covered in bruises.

NEW YORK A man already sentenced to 200 years in prison for killing four people in a rampage of stabbings and carjackings across New York City is facing sentencing for slashing a subway passenger at the end of his bloody spree.

YUBA CITY, Calif. A man suspected of killing two Northern California women and injuring a third was fatally shot by police officers Tuesday after a brief foot chase.

HONOLULU The former Kulani correctional facility has been identified as a possible site for the first culture-based wellness center for incarcerated Native Hawaiians.

DES MOINES, Iowa The last time China's soon-to-be leader visited Iowa, he slept in a bedroom with green shag carpeting and Star Trek character cutouts on the walls. He ate eggs with a spoon because his host forgot the chopsticks.

BANDON, Ore. The National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo., says an earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.0 off the Oregon coast caused no reported damage and only a smattering of reports from people who felt it as a weak jolt.

For the 99 percent of colleges, it was a pretty good fundraising year.

WASHINGTON The United States and Europe are considering unprecedented punishment against Iran that could immediately cripple the country's financial lifeline. But it's an extreme option in the banking world that would come with its own costs.

WASHINGTON A German-born man charged with killing his much-older socialite wife in Washington was ordered transferred to a mental hospital on Tuesday for a competency screening after a doctor said he was delusional.

NEWARK, N.J. A fifth person charged in the execution-style killings of three friends in a New Jersey schoolyard has been convicted.

MONTGOMERY, Ala. Hundreds packed the Alabama Statehouse courtyard on Tuesday to rally against the state's tough immigration law, with organizers saying they chose to send a message on Valentine's Day that lawmakers need to love and respect immigrants.

SAN ANTONIO The chances of Texas voters having much influence in the Republican presidential race faded Tuesday after a panel of federal judges acknowledged the state's deep divisions over political maps had made it nearly impossible to preserve an April primary.

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah A hotel worker in Utah said Tuesday she saw Josh Powell and his boys the morning his wife was reported missing in 2009 - and when the older child asked a question about his mom, they left immediately.

SALT LAKE CITY Mormon church leaders apologized to the family of Holocaust survivor and Jewish rights advocate Simon Wiesenthal after his parents were posthumously baptized, a controversial ritual that Mormons believe allows deceased people a way to the afterlife but offends members of many other religions.

SALT LAKE CITY A Utah woman was sentenced Tuesday to consecutive prison terms for spiking a 79-year-old man's peach smoothie with antifreeze after taking control of his bank accounts.

RICHMOND, Va. A Republican supermajority has muscled two of the most restrictive anti-abortion bills in years through the Virginia House, including one that would all but outlaw the procedure in the state by declaring that the rights of persons apply from the moment sperm and egg unite.

DENVER Medical marijuana is legal in 17 states, but the industry has a decidedly black-market aspect - it's mostly cash-only.

PORTLAND, Ore. A Libyan-American who says he was forbidden from returning to the United States and questioned by FBI agents in Tunisia after visiting neighboring Libya insists he has done nothing wrong.

WASHINGTON The Obama administration is weighing options for sharp new cuts to the U.S. nuclear force, including a reduction of up to 80 percent in the number of deployed weapons, The Associated Press has learned.