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X Games freestyler dies

DENVER -- Caleb Moore was a Texas kid drawn to the snow, rehearsing complicated tricks on a snowmobile into a foam pit back home until they became second nature.

The innovative freestyle snowmobile rider, who was hurt in a crash at the Winter X Games in Colorado, died Thursday morning. He was 25.

Moore had been undergoing care at a hospital in Grand Junction since the Jan. 24 crash. Family spokeswoman Chelsea Lawson confirmed his death, the first in the 18-year history of the X Games.

A former all-terrain vehicle racer, Moore switched over to snowmobiles as a teenager and quickly rose to the top of the sport. He won four Winter X Games medals, including a bronze last season when his younger brother, Colten, captured gold.

Caleb Moore was attempting a backflip in the freestyle event in Aspen last week when the skis on his 450-pound snowmobile caught the lip of the landing area, sending him flying over the handlebars. Moore landed face first into the snow with his snowmobile rolling over him.

Moore stayed down for quite some time, before walking off with help and going to hospital to treat a concussion. Moore developed bleeding around his heart and was flown to a hospital in Grand Junction for surgery. The family later said Moore, of Krum, also had a complication involving his brain.

Scouts' gay policy bashed

NEW YORK -- The Boy Scouts of America faces criticism from the left and right over its proposal to move away from a mandatory no-gays membership policy and allow troop sponsors to decide the matter for themselves.

The Human Rights Campaign, a gay-rights group that initially welcomed the possible shift, said Thursday it was inadequate and urged the Scouts to adopt a nationwide policy to accept gays as scouts and adult leaders.

The Human Rights Campaign said any corporation that continued to donate funds to the Scouts if any troops were allowed to discriminate would lose points in an annual evaluation of how corporations deal with gay-related workplace issues.

Meanwhile, conservative groups which support the no-gays policy asked their followers to flood Scout headquarters with phone calls opposing any change.

Pope shooter blames Iran

VATICAN CITY -- The Turkish gunman who shot Pope John Paul II has changed his story once again, saying in a new autobiography that Iran's late leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini personally told him to kill the pope.

Mehmet Ali Agca writes in They Promised Me Paradise, released Thursday in Italy, he was trained in Iran by Khomeini's forces after escaping from a Turkish prison, and the Iranian leader himself told him to kill John Paul in the name of God.

Agca shot and wounded John Paul on May 13, 1981, in St. Peter's Square.

Minutes after being arrested, Agca said he had acted alone. Later, he suggested Bulgaria and the Soviet Union's KGB were behind the attack, but then backed away from that assertion. Agca was released from prison in 2010.

Killer mistakenly let out

CHICAGO -- Police in Indiana and Illinois are hunting for a convicted murderer who was mistakenly released from custody in Chicago.

Steven L. Robbins, 44, was serving a 60-year sentence for murder and weapons charges in Indiana when he was sent to Chicago on Tuesday to face a drug charge. Indiana officials say the drug charge was dropped and Illinois authorities released Robbins without returning him to Indiana.

-- from the news services

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition February 1, 2013 A16

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