Philadelphia

Kidnapped daughter’s parents sell film rights

The parents of a 6-year-old girl who was raised by her kidnapping suspect after she was believed to have died in a fire have sold the rights to their life stories for a movie and book.

The buyer is the Larry A. Thompson Organization of Beverly Hills, Calif., maker of TV movies including “And the Beat Goes On: The Sonny and Cher Story.”

Terms of the deal call for a six-figure payment up front and an additional six figures once production on the movie begins, Thompson said. He declined to elaborate.

Authorities believe Delimar Vera was kidnapped from her crib in Philadelphia in 1997 when she was 10 days old and her house set ablaze to cover the crime.

Carolyn Correa was found raising the girl and is charged with kidnapping and arson. Delimar was reunited with her family, including mother Luzaida Cuevas, earlier this month.

Florida

Imprisoned pastor returns to pulpit

The Rev. Henry J. Lyons, the scandalized former leader of the National Baptist Convention USA released from prison in November, is back in the pulpit.

He’s also getting remarried nearly six years after his then-wife sparked his downfall by setting fire to the waterfront mansion he secretly owned with his mistress.

The fire sparked an investigation, and Lyons was convicted in 1999 of grand theft and racketeering and was sentenced to five years in prison.

Lyons, 62, is interim pastor of New Salem Missionary Baptist Church in Tampa, where he helped mediate a dispute leading to the departure of the previous pastor.

Lyons and Willie Beatrice Thomas applied for a marriage license Wednesday, public records show. Thomas is a former member of Lyons’ congregation at St. Petersburg’s Bethel Metropolitan Baptist Church.

Lyons divorced Deborah Lyons last year. She is suing him for breach of contract.

New York

Minister performing same-sex marriages

A Unitarian Universalist minister married two same-sex couples Saturday in Albany, adding to dozens of gay marriages performed in the state in recent weeks.

The Rev. Samuel Trumbore described the weddings as civil ceremonies, a distinction a New York prosecutor considers illegal.

Unitarian ministers have officiated at religious weddings for same-sex couples for decades, but the burgeoning debate about gay marriage has drawn more attention to the ceremonies.

Two Unitarian Universalist ministers were charged this month with solemnizing marriages without a license for officiating at same-sex weddings in the Hudson Valley village of New Paltz. Ulster County Dist. Atty. Donald Williams had said he brought charges in the recent cases because the ministers considered the weddings civil ceremonies.

An additional 11 same-sex weddings took place Saturday in New Paltz. Unitarian ministers there have stepped in since Mayor Jason West, who conducted 25 gay weddings last month, was barred from performing more.

Ohio

Report: Millions spent in highway sniper search

The investigation into a deadly string of highway sniper attacks cost more than $3 million in overtime pay, aircraft surveillance and equipment such as security cameras, a newspaper reported.

City, state and federal agencies spent a total of about $750,000 each month of a four-month investigation that led to the arrest of Charles McCoy Jr., according to a story in Sunday’s edition of The Columbus Dispatch. The newspaper surveyed 10 agencies that participated in the investigation.

McCoy is in jail, charged with felonious assault for a Dec. 15 shooting of a house while two people were inside. He is a suspect in two dozen shootings at cars, schools and homes, many of them along a 50-mile stretch of Interstate 270 around Columbus. One person was killed.

About $2.2 million was spent on equipment, staffing and overtime.