In the news
■ Mark Simon with the zoo in Utica, N.Y., said a white peacock named Merlin flew over a fence into the zoo’s African lion enclosure and was killed when a lion swatted at it with a paw as a group of home-schooled children and their parents watched.
■ Charles Thompson, archbishop of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, said the Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School “can no longer use the name Catholic and will no longer be identified or recognized as a Catholic institution” because it refuses to fire a teacher who is in a same-sex marriage.
■ Virgil Holder resigned as mayor of South Pittsburg, Tenn., saying “certain powers” in the city are blocking changes he wants to make and he’s been “thwarted” by commissioners by being left out of meetings and bypassed on city purchases.
■ Russ Walsh, chief of Mississippi’s wildlife department, says a growing number of deer are starving as they seek shelter on levees because persistent flooding has decimated their habitat and food supplies, so the state is temporarily allowing supplemental deer feeding in two counties.
■ Lucy Silliman, president of the Westlake Aquatic Center in Laurie, Mo., called it “a miracle no one was hurt” after a 93-yearold woman blacked out and drove her car into an indoor pool where eight people were participating in an exercise class.
■ Emily Shanahan of Wellesley, Mass., took her family’s 3-year-old bulldog, Mortimer, to an animal hospital when he stopped eating and got a surprise after clinic workers took several X-rays and discovered 19 baby pacifiers in the dog’s stomach.
■ John Funes, 49, a former fundraiser for the Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center in Baton Rouge, pleaded guilty to stealing more than $550,000 for personal use, including gift cards and football tickets, federal prosecutors said.
■ Sarah Conde, 29, of Lansing, Mich., accused of punishing her five children with whippings and confinement in a dark, locked bedroom that police described as a dungeon, faces up to 43 months in prison after pleading guilty to child abuse, prosecutors said.
■ Erick Cuevas-Pastrana, 30, who told a Rowan County, N.C., sheriff’s deputy who offered him a ride that he’d been walking for hours after a fight with his girlfriend, was arrested when deputies found that his backpack contained a loaded handgun, methamphetamine, scales and marijuana.