Informant files lawsuit against FBI for not paying

LOS ANGELES -- A former FBI informant is suing the federal agency, claiming it abandoned him after he infiltrated a violent drug cartel in Mexico.

Avery "Skip" Ensley, 56, alleges the FBI failed to pay more than $1 million he had been promised from seized assets linked to the investigation into the Arrellano Felix syndicate. He sued in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles on Friday.

"One of the reasons I'm going forward with this thing is that I want other people to know the FBI does not take care of its people," Ensley said.

An FBI spokeswoman declined to comment, citing policy not to discuss pending litigation.

The lawsuit claims Ensley began as an informant in 1987, when he told FBI agents that a man shot and killed by police in Upland was the brother of a drug trafficker named Luis Valenzuela, the head of the Castro drug organization. The syndicate ran Los Angeles operations for the Arellano Felix cartel. Ensley knew of Valenzuela's activities because the drug dealer's brother was married to Ensley's wife's sister.

Hell's Angels prospects shot as rivalry continues

CONCORD, N.H. -- Two prospective members of the Hell's Angels motorcycle club were shot and wounded Saturday in what police said appeared to be a continuation of gang rivalry.

The shootings came less than two weeks after thousands of bikers from North America left the area after their annual Motorcycle Week, which had brought police warnings about violence.

In May, nine members of the Pagans motorcycle gang pleaded guilty to assault charges from a fight in which one man was killed at a Hells Angels motorcycle rally and tattoo expo at Plainview, N.Y. In late April, two Hells Angels members were killed in a fight between that club and the Mongols in a casino at Laughlin, Nev.

Lounge ad with Thai king starts diplomatic protest

PHILADELPHIA -- Sherry Levin says she was only trying to have some harmless fun when she spoofed the king of Thailand in an ad promoting her Thai-themed lounge.

The Thai government was not amused. And Levin, a community newspaper and even the governor have been hearing about it.

For days, Saint Jack's restaurant in Philadelphia's Old City neighborhood has been besieged with angry phone calls from Thai diplomats demanding that she withdraw the ad depicting the 74-year-old monarch as an urban hipster and apologize -- or risk souring relations between Thailand and the United States.

"They told me they were going to get the White House involved and the Department of Defense. I couldn't believe it," said Levin, 35.

--From wire reports