Goodlatte, Emerson meet with area growers groups

U.S. Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., and U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, R-Cape Girardeau, spent Friday afternoon with representatives of Missouri growers. Goodlatte, who chairs the House Agriculture Committee, and Emerson toured the Delta Center in Portageville, Mo., and met with members of groups representing rice, soybean, corn and cotton growers as well as the Missouri Cattlemen's Association and the Missouri Farm Bureau. Topics scheduled for talks included the ongoing drought, country-of-origin labeling for food products and the renewal of federal farm programs scheduled for 2007, Emerson said in a statement.

Health data: State's life expectancy hits record

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Missourians are living longer lives and having fewer abortions, the latest state health statistics show. The state hit a record for life expectancy, increasing four-tenths of a year to 76.8 years in 2004, but still lagging behind the national figure of 77.6 years in 2003, the state Department of Health and Senior Services said, citing provisional data. But Missouri lags behind the national rate. Women's life expectancy continues to outpace men's, 79.4 years compared with 74.1 years. Abortions dropped to 12,000, the lowest total in nearly 30 years.

Mo. man becomes first indicted under ART Act

A Missouri teen is accused in a federal indictment of using a camcorder to videotape movies in theaters, then putting the bootleg movies on a computer network. Curtis Salisbury, 19, of St. Charles, Mo., is the first person arrested under a provision of a law signed this spring by President Bush making it a federal crime to use recording equipment to make copies of movies in theaters. Salisbury is charged with one count of conspiracy; two counts of copyright infringement by distributing a copyrighted work on a computer network; and two counts of unauthorized recording of motion pictures in a motion picture exhibition facility.

-- From staff and wire reports