MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) -- When Roy James needed money to buy equipment and dig an irrigation well for his father's Mississippi farm, he applied for a loan from the U.S. Department of Agriculture - but was turned down.

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- Passengers aboard an early morning flight from New York bound for Las Vegas first noticed something wrong when the plane's top pilot came out of the cockpit, didn't close the door and tried to force his way into an occupied bathroom.

"Stand Your Ground," "Shoot First," "Make My Day" -- state laws asserting an expansive right to self-defense -- have come into focus after last month's killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Natural gas prices fell again Tuesday amid doubts that consumers, businesses or industry can put a significant dent in the huge surplus of the fuel in the U.S.

MINEOLA, N.Y. (AP) -- Students taking college entrance exams this fall will have to submit photo IDs with their applications - a key security upgrade following a widespread cheating scandal at a number of high schools on New York's Long Island, a prosecutor and testing officials announced Tuesday.

BALTIMORE (AP) -- A 37-year-old Virginia man injured in a 1997 gun accident has received what University of Maryland physicians say is the most extensive face transplant ever performed.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The new debt-slashing budget plan pushed by House Republicans heated up as a presidential campaign issue Sunday as the proposal's architect, Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, sparred with top Democrats over its political fallout and downplayed the possibility he could be tapped as a vice presidential candidate.

SEATAC, Wash. (AP) -- The wife of a U.S. soldier accused of killing 17 Afghan civilians says her husband showed no signs of PTSD before he deployed, and she doesn't feel like she'll ever believe he was involved in the killings.

MIAMI (AP) -- A man identified as a friend of the Florida neighborhood watch captain who fatally shot an unarmed black teenager said Monday the man would tell the teen's parents he's "very, very sorry" if he could.

SANFORD, Fla. (AP) -- The parents of an unarmed black teenager shot dead by a neighborhood watch captain in a gated community are leading a rally Monday in the city where he was killed to protest the lack of an arrest or prosecution.