Gas Explosion Rocks Portland Shopping District, Injuring 8 and other top stories.

• Gas Explosion Rocks Portland Shopping District, Injuring 8

  

  Firefighters who responded to what should have been a routine call about a gas leak in Portland, Oregon, likely saved lives when they decided to evacuate the building and pulled a fire alarm to warn holdouts just minutes before a powerful explosion, officials said. The blast shortly after 9:30 a.m. Wednesday in a popular shopping district injured eight people and ignited a fire that sent a plume of smoke over the heart of the city. Three firefighters, two police officers and three civilians..

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• Sheriff's deputy fatally shot in Northern California

  

  USA Today Network Jim Schultz, Redding (Calif.) Record Searchlight 11:08 p.m. EDT October 19, 2016California Promo Art(Photo: Shane Music)REDDING, Calif. — A Modoc County sheriff’s deputy was shot and killed Wednesday while responding to a disturbance call near Alturas in northern Colorado, and a suspect was arrested, authorities said.Deputies were responding to a call on County Road 115 about 10 miles south of Alturas at around 10:30 a.m. PT when the deputy was fatally shot, accordi..

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• Jacques: NAACP fights hope for kids

  

  Cornell Brooks, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), addresses the media, as Stephen Green, right, National Director of the Youth and College Division of the NAACP, and Roanoke's NAACP chapter president Brenda Hale, second from left, and vice president Gloria Randolph-King, listen outside of Roanoke General District Court Thursday, Sept. 8, 2106, in Roanoke, Va., after Brooks and Green faced trespassing charges for taking part in a six hour sit-in ..

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• Police: Boy, 13, hit by stray bullet while lying in bed

  

  CHELSEA, Mass. (AP) — Police say a 13-year-old boy was hit by a stray bullet while he was lying in bed inside a Massachusetts apartment. Chelsea police say the boy was in a third-floor apartment Wednesday night when he was struck in the shoulder by a stray bullet fired from the street. Your current subscription does not provide access to this content. Please click the button below to manage your account. Subscribe ..

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• Feds launch Baylor probe over Title IX complaint

  

  8:16 PM ETPaula LavigneClosePaula LavigneESPN Staff WriterData analyst and reporter for ESPN's Enterprise and Investigative Unit. Winner, 2014 Alfred I. duPont Columbia University Award; finalist, 2012 IRE broadcast award; winner, 2011 Gannett Foundation Award for Innovation in Watchdog Journalism; Emmy nominated, 2009.Mark SchlabachCloseMark SchlabachESPN Senior WriterSenior college football writer Author of seven books on college football Graduate of the University of GeorgiaThe U.S. Departmen..

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• Trump Jr.: Running for president a 'step down'

  

  "Unlike Hillary Clinton, who's gotten very rich being a politician, peddling American influence, he hasn't -- this is only a step down," Trump Jr. told Fox News following the third and final presidential debate in Las Vegas. Trump Jr. added that his father wanted to ensure that "all Americans, all ethnicities and backgrounds have the same opportunities to do what he's been able to do" in business.The candidate's son, who emerged early in the campaign as one his most fierce surrogates, has stumbl..

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• Patrolling the US Mexico border

  

  None A Customs and Border Protection agent scans the Rio Grande on the U.S.-Mexico border in McAllen, Texas. U.S. Air and Marine Operations agents fly over border areas, coordinating with Border Patrol agents on the ground to stop undocumented immigrants and drug smugglers from entering the U.S. John Moore, Getty Images ..

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• Insiders: Trump's refusal to accept election outcome is a big mistake

  

  Democratic and Republican insiders blanched at Donald Trump’s refusal to say in Wednesday night's debate that he would accept the presidential election outcome if he loses next month. That’s according to The POLITICO Caucus — a panel of activists, strategists and operatives in 11 key battleground states that will determine Trump’s fate. Four-out-of-five Republicans, and virtually all Democrats, said Trump — when he was asked in his third debate with Hillary Clinton whether he would accept the ..

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• Disagreements over wages and health care cause Pennsylvania faculty members to strike

  

  Faculty members from 14 public campuses in Pennsylvania went on strike Wednesday after contract negotiations came to a halt, leaving more than 100,000 students without classes. The faculty union at the Pennsylvania State System for Higher Education had been working without a contract since June 2015 -- 477 days -- and contentious negotiations that lasted for longer than a year ended without success Tuesday night. The system administration offered the union what it called a “last best offer” of a..

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• Father who 'repeatedly raped his 12-year old daughter' gets 60-day sentence. Fury erupts.

  

  (iStock) As the judge in the Stanford rape case learned, along with the judge in the “affluenza” drunken driving case, the whole world is watching them. A crowd, an angry crowd, can form in a matter of days of people outraged by what they consider a lenient sentence for a heinous crime. In the case of Judge John McKeon, as of early morning Wednesday, almost 20,000 people had signed a Change.org petition calling for his impeachment for the 60-day sentence he gave a Glasgow, Mont., man who ple..

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