Nation briefs 10/6/03

Tiger and alligator found in Manhattan apartment

NEW YORK -- A tiger and an alligator found in a Manhattan apartment were sent to an Ohio wildlife preserve Sunday while their owner recovered from bite wounds inflicted by the more than 400-pound cat.

Police said Antoine Yates, 31, would face reckless endangerment charges after he gets out of a hospital in Philadelphia, where he fled. He was listed in good condition.

A team of animal control officers, police and Bronx Zoo workers removed the animals from Yates' fifth-floor apartment in a Harlem housing project on Saturday.

Wes Artope, director of the city's animal shelters, said the tiger, an orange and white Siberian-Bengal mix, had been kept in the apartment since he was a 6-week-old cub. The 20-month-old tiger now weighs at least 425 pounds, Artope said.

The tiger and the 5-foot-long alligator, both in good condition, were taken first to a local shelter, then to a Long Island animal sanctuary and then to Ohio, Artope said.

Woman opens fire at church, killing three

ATLANTA -- A woman opened fire at an Atlanta church before services started Sunday morning, killing her mother and the minister before committing suicide.

Congregants of Turner Monumental AME Church said Shelia W. Chaney Wilson, 43, was agitated when she came to the church. She was sitting with her mother, Jennie Mae Robinson, and the Rev. Johnny Clyde Reynolds in the sanctuary after Sunday school when Wilson opened fire with a handgun, police said. No one else was in the sanctuary.

Police did not say how many shots were fired.

Geraldine Andrews, the pastor's daughter-in-law and a friend of Wilson's family, said Robinson recently took her daughter out of a mental health facility.

Debra Mitchell, a member of the church, said Wilson had recently lost her job.

"We knew she has some instability, but we didn't know it was this deep," Mitchell said.

McDonald's to introduce a new, leaner McNugget

CHICAGO -- McDonald's plans to introduce a new, all white-meat Chicken McNugget with less fat and fewer calories, the latest move by the fast-food giant to offer healthier fare.

In the next six weeks, McDonald's will begin offering the smaller McNuggets in all of its 13,600 U.S. restaurants, the Chicago Tribune reported in Sunday's edition.

The revamped McNuggets are designed to meet a growing consumer preference for chicken breast meat. The change is a big, and some say risky, move for the Oak Brook-based company.

Ever since McDonald's first unveiled McNuggets in 1983, they have been one of the restaurant's most popular entrees, especially among children.

But the company says extensive consumer tests over the past six months show the time is right to shift from a McNugget that is 30 percent dark meat to one that's 100 percent white meat.

"It's clear now that consumers prefer white meat, so we started to work on how we might evolve the McNugget to a situation where it is now all white meat," said Wendy Cook, McDonald's vice president of menu innovation.

In September, the hamburger chain unveiled it was test marketing an adult version of its Happy Meal. Rather than a burger and a toy, the new Go Active meal will include a salad, an exercise booklet and a pedometer meant to encourage walking.

The new six-piece McNuggets will contain 260 calories, down from 310 calories, and 16 total grams of fat, down from 20 grams.

-- From wire reports