San Juan

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- Coppin State rallied from an 11-point deficit late in the second half but came up short, losing, 57-55, to Washington State in the first round of the San Juan Shootout yesterday.Stephen Stewart hit one of two free throws with 1:49 remaining to cap a 10-2 Coppin run, cutting Washington State's lead to 55-52. Isaac Fontaine hit a free throw with 11 seconds left and Mark Hendrickson added another to put the Cougars up, 57-52.Sidney Goodman's three-pointer with three seconds left cut it to 57-55, but Washington State's Tony Harris ran out the clock.

A former American Airlines baggage handler pleaded guilty yesterday to pocketing $40,000 from a shipment of nearly $2 million in Federal Reserve money headed for Puerto Rico through Baltimore-Washington International Airport.Sylvester Augustus Moott pleaded guilty to one count of theft from an interstate shipment. Under federal guidelines, he is likely to receive anything from probation to six months in prison when he is sentenced Sept. 13 by U.S. District Judge Frederic N. Smalkin.Mr. Moott said little during yesterday's hearing and declined to be interviewed afterward.

SEATTLE -- Nine months after San Juan County imposed the nation's first ban on water bikes from its tranquil waters in the upper Puget Sound, a judge has overturned the ban on grounds that it violated state laws allowing the use of the personal watercraft on common waterways.Issuing his injunction Sept. 30, Judge Steven Mura of Whatcom County Superior Court acknowledged that the small craft, which can reach speeds of 60 mph, were noisy and potentially a nuisance to many residents of the county of about 170 islands, 75 miles north of Seattle.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- At the home of Maria Rodriguez, 27, a housewife with four children, the plants are dead, the washing machine is idle and the driveway is dirty.She gets water from civil defense trucks that, on most days, stop by to fill up the large drums and assorted buckets that now sit permanently by her front door. She does laundry with a washboard in a nearby brook. And she forages for bottled water in supermarkets.High on the mountains in Caguas, a city of 134,000 people 17 miles south of San Juan, the residents of Barrio Beatriz drew not a drop of water from their faucets for a month and a half, and only a trickle for a few hours this week.

I booked lunch at Giovanna's Cafe my first day in San Juan, Puerto Rico, planning to meet with chef Giovanna Huyke. Called "the Julia Child of Puerto Rico," she reputedly has revolutionized Puerto Rican cuisine.When fresh yucca chips with a fragrant garlic sauce called ajilimojili (a-he-lee-mo-he-lee) were served, I knew I was in for something special -- but not an interview with Giovanna Huyke, it turned out. No, the pioneer of the new Caribbean cuisine was in bed with a slipped disk and had sent her mother.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - A throbbing plena beat, blaring from a speaker truck, rattled centuries-old houses around a sun-bleached plaza. Barack Obama clutched a water bottle in the tropical heat. "Hola Puerto Rico!" he shouted to hundreds of cheering islanders - and a few surprised cruise-ship passengers - in Old San Juan. So began that most Puerto Rican of campaign activities: the caminata. Following the speaker truck, and trailed by supporters, Obama strolled the cobblestoned streets of the walled city, shaking hands, signing autographs and pausing every so often to wiggle his hips to the music.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Edwin Melendez Primos died from a gunshot wound in his right ear. Alcidez Bauza Rivera, 31, was found with five bullets lodged in his body. And 20-year- old Jose Almazar Correa was killed after a shootout in a small town near here. Their deaths were notable because they were among 16 people killed last month in the same week and for pretty much the same reason: an expanding drug war that has given Puerto Rico the dubious distinction of being one of the bloodiest places in the United States.

As baggage goes, it was hardly your typical dull cargo: nearly $2 million from the U.S. government, shrink-wrapped and bound for San Juan, Puerto Rico.The temptation proved to be too much apparently for an American Airlines baggage handler working at Baltimore-Washington International Airport on April 26. He sliced open the plastic wrap and grabbed two bricks of cash totaling $40,000, authorities say.For the FBI, it didn't take long to figure out what had happened.For Sylvester Augustus Moott, the 55-year-old suspect, who has no criminal record, the whole matter has been mortifying, says his attorney.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- Stephen Stewart scored 22 points and Sidney Goodman added 20 to pace Coppin State to an 86-77 victory over the University of Pacific yesterday in the San Juan Shootout at Eugenia Guerra Pavilion.The Eagles will play American University of Puerto Rico, which defeated Wright State, 68-61, for fifth place in the eight-team field.Keith Carmichael scored 13 of his 17 points in the first half to help the Eagles take a 51-23 halftime lead. Pacific rallied in the second half, as Michael Jackson scored 19 of his game-high 23 points.

Jean Childs Young, 61, an educator, civil rights activist and wife of former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, died of liver cancer in Atlanta on Friday. She taught school in Connecticut and Georgia before becoming coordinator of elementary and preschool programs with the Atlanta public schools. She also worked with IBM Educational Systems in the development of a multimedia software program called "The Illuminated Books and Manuscripts." During her husband's tenure as mayor from 1982 to 1990, she founded the Mayor's Task Force on Public Education, for which she served seven terms as chairwoman.