Nation briefs 081002

Abducted girl identifies accused kidnappers

PHILADELPHIA -- A 7-year-old girl who escaped kidnappers last month by gnawing through duct tape took the stand Friday to identify the two men charged with her abduction.

Under heavy prodding from attorneys and after twice refusing to identify the men, Erica Pratt told a judge that Edward Johnson, 23, snatched her outside her grandmother's home, and that James Burns, 29, drove the getaway car.

The judge ordered both men held without bail.

Erica had spent nearly 24 hours bound and blindfolded in the squalid basement of an empty building before she was able to claw loose and break open a door to call for help on July 23, police said.

In court Friday, when asked whether her kidnappers were in the courtroom, she twice answered no. But each time, she kept her head turned from the table where the two suspects were seated.

Erica identified the two men after Judge Joseph C. Bruno asked her to take a third look.

Nino Tinari, Burns' attorney, said Erica's testimony had been prodded, and he questioned whether she would be competent to testify at a trial. At one point while testifying Friday, Erica had pulled a sweater over her face and cried, and at other times she couldn't remember her birthday, her street or circumstances of her abduction.

White supremacist gets reprieve from execution

AUSTIN, Texas -- A white supremacist convicted of murdering a man he met in a bar was granted a reprieve Friday, four days before his scheduled execution, so hearings could be held to determine whether he is mentally retarded.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's highest court in criminal cases, ordered Brian Edward Davis' case returned to Harris County for the hearings. Davis was scheduled to die by lethal injection Tuesday.

Davis, 33, a parolee with a history of violence that began in grade school, was sentenced to death for fatally stabbing Michael Foster of Houston in 1991. He inscribed the victim's body with a swastika and initials of a skinhead group.

In June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that executing mentally retarded inmates is unconstitutional.

Charlton Heston says he has Alzheimer's

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- Charlton Heston revealed Friday that doctors have told him he has symptoms consistent with Alzheimer's disease.

"I'm neither giving up nor giving in," the 77-year-old actor said in a taped statement played at a news conference at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Heston recorded the message Wednesday.

Heston, who won a best-actor Oscar for 1959's "Ben-Hur," has appeared in dozens of films over six decades, including "The Ten Commandments," "El Cid" and "Planet of the Apes."

Heston's most prominent role since 1998 has been president of the National Rifle Association.

"For now, I'm not changing anything," Heston said. "I'll insist on work when I can. The doctors will insist on rest when I must."

Suspect arrested in girl's murder in Philadelphia

PHILADELPHIA -- Police arrested a man in the murder of a 6-year-old girl who disappeared from a sleepover and was found dead the next day in nearby woods.

Police said Abdul M. El-Shabazz, an 18-year-old acquaintance of the girl's family, confessed to killing Destiny Wright and led investigators to her body. He was arrested late Thursday and charged with murder.

"There is no motive. Nobody could possibly have a motive for killing a 6-year-old girl," said Philadelphia Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson.

Destiny was spending the night at the home of her father's girlfriend the last time she was seen, police said. Family members realized she was missing Wednesday morning.

Police found Destiny Thursday about 1 1/2 miles from the rowhouse where she had gone to sleep at about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday with five or six other children. Police didn't release details about the nature of her death, but said she was found fully clothed.

-- From wire reports