National Roundup

California
3 dead in copter crash on the set of TV reality show
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Three people were killed Sunday in a pre-dawn helicopter crash in a rural area of northern Los Angeles County while filming for a new reality TV show for the Discovery Channel.
The copter crashed at about 3:40 a.m. at the popular filming location of Polsa Rosa Ranch in the city of Acton, Los Angeles County Fire dispatcher Robert Diaz said.
All three people aboard died, Diaz said. Their names weren’t immediately released.
The show, listed on a filming permit as an untitled military-theme TV program, had not yet been aired or announced by Discovery, channel spokeswoman Laurie Goldberg said.
The show’s production company, Eyeworks USA, best known for creating NBC’s “The Biggest Loser,” also issued a statement expressing sympathies to the victims’ families and saying they were cooperating with authorities.
The company had been approved to use a helicopter for a reality TV show shooting at the ranch from Saturday afternoon until Sunday morning, said Philip Sokoloski, a spokesman for FilmLA, which processes filming permits for location shootings in the Los Angeles region.

Hawaii
Sub’s commander is relieved after collision at sea
HONOLULU (AP) — The commanding officer and executive officer of a Pearl Harbor-based submarine have been relieved of duty a month after the periscope on the USS Jacksonville collided with a vessel in the Persian Gulf.
Cmdr. Christy Hagen, spokeswoman for the U.S. Pacific Fleet’s submarine force, says Cmdr. Nathan Sukols and Lt. Cmdr. Lauren Allen were relieved after a disciplinary hearing in Bahrain on Sunday.
Hagen cited a lack of confidence in the pair’s leadership, but gave few details. Both have been assigned to administrative duties.
On Jan. 10, the Jacksonville hit a vessel that kept moving and showed no signs of distress afterward. A periscope was damaged, and has since been repaired.
The Navy couldn’t determine the boat’s purpose or country of origin before it moved on.
No one was injured.

Wyoming
Cheney criticizes Obama in state GOP speech
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Former Vice President Dick Cheney said Saturday night that President Barack Obama has jeopardized U.S. national security by nominating substandard candidates for key cabinet posts and by degrading the U.S. military.
“The performance now of Barack Obama as he staffs up the national security team for the second term is dismal,” Cheney said in comments to about 300 members of the Wyoming Republican Party.
Cheney, a Wyoming native, said it was vital to the nation’s national security that “good folks” hold the positions of secretary of state, CIA director and secretary of defense.
“Frankly, what he has appointed are second-rate people,” he said.
John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee, has been confirmed as secretary of state. CIA designate John Brennan and defense secretary nominee Chuck Hagel are still awaiting U.S. Senate confirmation.
Cheney said Hagel, a former Nebraska U.S. senator, was chosen because Obama “wants to have a Republican that he can use to take the heat for what he plans to do to the Department of Defense.”
He said Obama’s plans are to allow severe cuts in U.S. defense spending, which would limit the capability of the U.S. military to respond to future foreign crises well after Obama has left office.

Iowa
Bacon lovers pig out during annual state food festival
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The smell of bacon was in the air Saturday as thousands converged on Iowa’s capital city for an increasingly popular festival celebrating all things connected with the meat.
Some people wore Viking hats and others walked around with makeshift snouts for the Blue Ribbon Bacon Festival. The annual event featured more than 10,000 pounds of bacon served in unusual ways, such as chocolate-dipped bacon and bacon-flavored cupcakes and gelato.
There was a lot of bacon to choose from. The smell of unique concoctions like bacon gumbo and chocolate bacon bourbon tarts wafted through one of two buildings at the Iowa State Fairgrounds. The other building had an Iceland theme, with a Viking boat and Icelandic dishes with bacon, to honor a group of delegates visiting from the country.
Urbandale resident Mike Vogel showed up for a fourth year wearing a head-to-toe bacon costume. He said a widespread love for bacon is the reason about 8,000 tickets to the event sold out in just over three minutes.
Other events scheduled included lectures about bacon and an eating competition. The festival was preceded earlier in the week with a bacon queen pageant and a pig pardon by Gov. Terry Branstad.

California
Women shot in manhunt get new truck from cops
A mother and daughter newspaper delivery team who were mistakenly shot by Los Angeles police hunting for a fugitive former cop will get a new pickup truck courtesy of the department.
LAPD Cmdr. Andrew Smith says the department’s Chief Charlie Beck met with the women in their Torrance home Saturday to apologize and tell them he had arranged for someone to donate a new pickup truck.
The truck will be donated early this week, Smith said.
The women were accidentally struck by gunfire in the pre-dawn hours Thursday after it was reported that Christopher Dorner was sighted in the area. Beck called it a case of mistaken identity.
Dorner has vowed to avenge his firing from the department, which he wrote in an online manifesto was retaliation for reporting officer violence.

Georgia
5 killed, 2 injured in head-on crash near state line
LAGRANGE, Ga. (AP) — A driver ignoring a no-passing zone on a west Georgia highway crossed into oncoming traffic and crashed head-on into another car, killing himself and four others, including a 1-year-old boy, the Georgia State Patrol said.
The deadly crash Friday night in LaGrange, near the Alabama state line, also injured two teenage passengers who were airlifted in critical condition to hospitals in Atlanta and Columbus, said Georgia State Patrol spokesman Gordy Wright.
Witnesses said a 1986 Oldsmobile Cutlass was moving at a high speed when it crossed into the lane for oncoming traffic to pass another vehicle, though the roadway was marked as a no-passing zone. The Oldsmobile, driven by 28-year-old Willie Hooks of LaGrange, slammed into the front of a 1995 Pontiac GrandAm.