Cincinnati

Father says suspect harassed by co-workers

A trucker accused of opening fire on employees of a company that once employed him had been harassed by other workers from the business, his father said Friday.

Two men were killed and three were wounded in the attack Thursday at Watkins Motor Lines in the suburban Cincinnati town of West Chester. Tom West, 50, also known as Joseph Eschenbrenner III, was arrested in Indiana and charged with two counts of aggravated murder and three counts of attempted murder.

“There were a series of things going on that were driving Joey crazy and he blamed Watkins people for it,” Joseph Eschenbrenner Jr. said from his home in Rolling Meadows, Ill., a Chicago suburb.

West’s father said his son complained that while he worked at Watkins horns and alarms would go off on his truck with no explanation. His son has suffered physical problems since he left Watkins and blamed the company for his ailments, his father said.

Texas

Killer of three children gets death sentence

A man who confessed to suffocating, stabbing and beheading his common-law wife’s three young children was sentenced to death Friday after telling a judge he wanted to be executed.

Jurors in Brownsville sentenced John Allen Rubio to death by injection a day after convicting him of three counts of capital murder, one for each of the children he admitted killing March 11.

Rubio, 23, and his common-law wife, Angela Camacho, told police they killed 3-year-old Julissa Quezada, 1-year-old John Esthefan Rubio and 2-month-old Mary Jane Rubio because they thought the children were possessed and they didn’t want them to grow up evil.

Camacho, 23, is awaiting a hearing on whether she is mentally competent to stand trial.

Cincinnati

Inmates’ religious freedoms struck down

A federal appeals court Friday declared unconstitutional a 3-year-old U.S. law that gives inmates the right to gather for worship and follow religious dietary practices.

The law, the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, prohibits governments from limiting the religious freedom of people in prisons and other federally funded institutions unless there is a compelling reason.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the law violated the separation of church and state because it had “the primary effect of advancing religion.”

The ruling applies only to Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee. Five other federal appeals courts throughout the country have found the law to be constitutional.

New Orleans

Anti-Bush obituary attracts donations

Gertrude M. Jones didn’t want flowers or cards when she died. She wanted to get rid of President Bush.

The 81-year-old woman’s obituary asked that memorial donations be given “to any organization that seeks the removal of President Bush from office.”

And people across the country are following her wishes.

In an online memorial book to Jones, dozens of people posted messages of support. Many wrote that they would contribute to the Democratic National Committee or one of the presidential contenders.

The campaign of fellow candidate Wesley Clark has also received at least 15 donations in Jones’ name in Montana alone, said Angela Monaghan, Clark’s campaign coordinator in Ramsay, Mont.

Jones, of Mandeville, La., died Aug. 25 and her brief obituary appeared Oct. 2 in The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune.