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Nation in brief

Cost revised for Medicare drug benefit

By wire services
Published March 5, 2005

WASHINGTON - The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office on Friday released higher cost estimates for a Medicare prescription drug program that has already drawn fire for its soaring price tag.

The CBO said its estimate for the drug benefits for the 10-year period ending in 2015 had grown by $54-billion since January. No cumulative 10-year total was provided, but a separate CBO letter used figures that indicated a total over that period of $849-billion.

Significantly, though, that number omitted savings expected with the new program. As a result, the new CBO estimate was not directly comparable to the $724-billion projection the Bush administration released last month, which factored in those savings. Subtracting those savings from the $849-billion figure would likely put it lower than Bush's estimate, according to figures cited by the CBO.

LOS ANGELES - Jurors began deliberating Friday in the Robert Blake murder trial after defense attorney M. Gerald Schwartzbach ridiculed the evidence in the case and urged them to "end this nightmare" by clearing the actor's name.

The jury deliberated for about 90 minutes before going home for the weekend. They were ordered to return Monday.

Blake is accused of killing Bonny Lee Bakley, 44, in 2001. The 71-year-old actor is charged with murder, two counts of solicitation of murder and a special circumstance of lying in wait. If convicted, the former Baretta star could be sentenced to life in prison.

SANTA MARIA, Calif. - A family now accusing Michael Jackson of child molestation was seen by jurors Friday in a video praising him as a father figure, and the sister of the accuser testified under cross-examination that she had accused her own father of molesting her after her mother made the allegation.

Prosecutors showed jurors the video, which they say was a staged and scripted response to a damaging documentary about Jackson, during testimony by the accuser's 18-year-old sister.

The witness acknowledged accusing her father, who is divorced from her mother, of sexually abusing and imprisoning her and of making terrorist threats.

She said she learned she had been sexually abused when her mother blurted out the accusation in a conversation with her father.

CHICAGO - The FBI announced a $50,000 reward Friday for information leading to the identification of anyone involved in the slayings of a federal judge's husband and mother.

No one has been declared a suspect in the slayings of U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow's relatives, and FBI Agent Robert Grant said Friday, "We don't know at this time who did this murder."

Lefkow said she planned to return to her job and would not be intimidated by the killings.

PORTLAND, Ore. - A terminally ill cancer patient who tried to end his life with drugs prescribed under Oregon's assisted-suicide law awoke three days later, alert and talkative, his wife said.

David Prueitt, 42, who had lung cancer, took what was believed to be a fatal dose of a barbiturate prescribed by his doctor in January. He fell into a coma within minutes, but woke up three days later, said his wife Lynda Romig Prueitt. He lived two more weeks before dying of natural causes.

LEXINGTON, Va. - Virginia Military Institute said Thursday that it punished 12 cadets for dressing up as Nazis and drag queens and wearing other costumes deemed inappropriate at a Halloween party in the barracks.

The punishments included confinement to quarters and writing essays about the incident.

[Last modified March 5, 2005, 00:42:15]