World/Nation briefs February 13, 2011
Thousands demand reforms in Algeria
ALGIERS, Algeria - Heavily outnumbered by riot police, thousands of Algerians defied government warnings and dodged barricades to rally in their capital Saturday, demanding democratic reforms a day after mass protests toppled Egypt's autocratic ruler.
Protesters chanting "No to the police state!" and brandishing signs that read "Give us back our Algeria" clashed with baton-wielding police in helmets and visors. Organizers said more than 400 people were briefly detained, but aside from some jostling between police and protesters no violence was reported.
The opposition said demonstrators' bold defiance of a long-standing ban on public protests in Algiers marked a turning point.
Organizers said as many as 26,000 riot police were deployed to try to quash Saturday's rally, but that an estimated 10,000 people succeeded in jostling, squeezing and jumping over the barricades and gathering in the city center before the protest was broken up. Officials put turnout at the rally at 1,500.
Algeria has long been ruled by a repressive government and beset by widespread poverty and high unemployment - factors that helped foment popular uprisings that ousted leaders of two other North African nations in the past month.
Man fatally stabs 3, runs over pedestrian
NEW YORK - A Ukranian-born graffiti artist armed with five knives went on a bloody 28-hour rampage across New York City, slashing to death his stepfather, ex-girlfriend and her mother, running down a pedestrian in a stolen Lexus and knifing a subway passenger before being arrested in Times Square, police said.
Maksim Gelman, 23, was armed with a bloodied kitchen knife when he was taken into police custody at about 9 a.m. Saturday after a nightlong manhunt across New York City.
The stabbing spree started just after 5 a.m. Friday, when police say Gelman fatally knifed his stepfather, Aleksandr Kuznetsov, at their apartment in Brooklyn's Sheepshead Bay neighborhood. Gelman had gotten into a fight with his mother after she refused to allow him to use her Lexus, and Kuznetsov intervened and was attacked, Kelly said.
Police found the 54-year-old man's body at his home in the predominantly Eastern European immigrant neighborhood. Gelman and his mother became naturalized U.S. citizens in 2004 or 2005, Kelly said.
Taxi plows into crowd, injures 25
SAN DIEGO - A taxi driver plowed slowly through a crowd on a sidewalk in a popular restaurant and nightclub zone early Saturday, severing the leg of one woman and injuring more than two dozen other people, police said.
The crash occurred about 2 a.m. in the heart of the busy Gaslamp District as revelers were heading home, according to police Sgt. Ray Battrick. Witnesses said the cab was traveling around 15 miles an hour.
The driver sustained a broken nose after being beaten by people in the crowd, who also smashed windows on the taxi, Battrick said.
The crash did not appear to be intentional, authorities said.
- The Associated Press