Florida A&M News Blog @newzblogz.com

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) -- Exxon Mobil Corp. and ConocoPhillips refused to sign deals Tuesday that would enable them to keep pumping oil under tougher terms in Venezuela, the government's oil company said. Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA, said Tuesday it would sign with only four of the six major oil companies involved in lucrative oil ventures in the Orinoco River region - U.S.-based Chevron Corp.; Britain's BP PLC, France's Total SA and Norway's Statoil ASA. PDVSA said it was taking ow...

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VENICE, Fla. (AP) - For a Tennessee man, trying to fetch his golf ball from a Florida pond cost him more than an extra stroke on his score. It nearly cost him his arm.

Bruce Burger went to get his ball out of the sixth hole pond when a nearly-eleven-foot, one-eyed alligator latched onto his right forearm and dragged him into the water.

Burger battered the reptile with his free arm until the gator let go.

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BARTOW, Fla.—A former Ecuadorean businessman was sentenced to death Tuesday for killing four people in a business dispute, despite pleas from his native country to spare his life.

Nelson Ivan Serrano, 68, was convicted last year on four counts of first-degree murder for the Dec. 3, 1997, shootings of George Gonsalves, 69; Frank Dosso, 35; Diane Patisso, 28; and George Patisso Jr., 26.

Serrano, Gonsalves and Dosso's father were business partners at a garment conveyor factory until a dispute over finances led to Serrano's firing as company president in 1997.

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VENICE, Fla. --A man who lost his ball in a golf course pond nearly lost a limb when a nearly 11-foot alligator latched on to his arm and pulled him in the water, authorities said.

Bruce Burger, 50, was trying to retrieve his ball Monday from a pond on the sixth hole at the Lake Venice Golf Club.

The alligator latched on to Burger's right forearm and pulled him in the pond, said Gary Morse, a spokesman for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Burger used his left arm to beat the reptile until it freed him.

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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The former No. 2 official at the Interior Department says he does not deserve prison time in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal. Former Deputy Interior Secretary J. Steven Griles faces sentencing Tuesday for obstruction of justice. He has admitted lying to a Senate committee investigating his relationship with the disgraced lobbyist. As part of his plea deal, prosecutors recommended that Griles serve no more than a 10-month sentence, but only half of it in prison. The othe...

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