Colorado

Review clears officer in Columbine death

An independent investigation concluded Wednesday that a student killed in the Columbine High massacre was slain by one of the teen gunmen and not by a police officer, as his parents had alleged.

The report found that Denver Sgt. Daniel O’Shea was not present at the time that 15-year-old Daniel Rohrbough was shot. The report also concluded that a bullet from the Rohrbough’s body was a “textbook match” to Eric Harris’ gun.

“The murder of Daniel Rohrbough at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999, was undeniably caused by gunman Eric Harris beyond any reasonable doubt,” the report said.

Rohrbough was among 12 students and a teacher killed by Harris and Dylan Klebold during the rampage in suburban Littleton. Harris and Klebold then killed themselves in the school library.

Los Angeles

Five planets line up in rare celestial array

The five brightest planets visible from Earth have lined up in plain sight to form a spectacular celestial array that won’t be seen again until 2040.

Through the next four weeks, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus will appear tightly clustered in the Western sky. They will be visible in the evening with the naked eye.

Similar bunchings occur every 20 years or so, though they are not always visible. The last time they were this visible was in 1940.

In May 2000, the five planets formed a tighter bunch but were so close to the sun that they were washed out by its glare.

Pennsylvania

National park visitors must pack out trash

Visitors to four National Park Service sites in southwestern Pennsylvania will soon be taking something else home with their souvenirs their garbage.

Beginning April 22, Earth Day, trash cans will be removed. Instead, park workers will give visitors garbage bags.

The sites Fort Necessity, Friendship Hill, Allegheny Portage Railroad and Johnstown Flood National Memorial spend about $7,500 a year on garbage disposal, and officials say they would rather use that money on preservation projects.

The move is also expected to eliminate overflowing trash cans that can stink and attract animals.

Washington, D.C.

Scientists discover new order of insects

Scientists have discovered a new order of insects, the first in nearly a century.

Three of the paperclip-sized insects were identified in collections in museums in Europe by Oliver Zompro of the Max-Planck Institute for Limnology in Ploen, Germany.

Researchers later discovered a living population of the insects in the southwest African nation of Namibia.

The findings are being reported this week in the journal Science.

The insects, described as a predator that resembles a mix between a stick insect and a preying mantis, were placed in the new category “mantophasmatodea.”

The last time a new order of insects was discovered was in 1914.