PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Police in Philadelphia say a man used a banana he swiped from a convenience store counter to simulate a gun while he robbed the place.

Police on Wednesday posted surveillance video (http://bit.ly/1thASUL ) of the holdup reported in the East Parkside neighborhood.

The footage shows a man entering the corner grocery store on Tuesday. He waits in line and then takes a banana from the counter by the cash register.

The suspect then sticks the banana in a front pocket of his sweatshirt and points it toward the cashier.

Police say the man demanded money and cigarettes, and made off with an undetermined amount of cash. The video shows him riding off on a bicycle.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — An Institute of Medicine report says Americans often suffer needless discomfort and undergo unwanted and costly care as they die.

The “Dying in America” study released Wednesday was done by a panel of 21 experts. It finds that people repeatedly stress a desire to die at home, free from pain, but often the opposite happens.

The authors blame a medical system ruled by “perverse incentives” for aggressive care, inadequate physician training and too few conversations about end-of-life wishes.

They say patients’ advance directives have not been particularly effective, and urge a series of conversations throughout life about what’s desired in death. They say those talks should begin early, perhaps when people are teenagers.

 

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Authorities say an 8-year-old girl who fell nine stories from a west Philadelphia apartment building has died.

Police say the girl fell from an apartment window on the ninth floor of the building at 7:44 a.m. Wednesday.

A police spokeswoman said medics rushed the girl to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where she was pronounced dead just before 8:30 a.m.

Police said the death is under investigation.

NEW YORK (AP) — The former police chief at a Massachusetts Veterans Administration medical center has been sentenced to 10 years in prison in a kidnap-murder case that resulted from the prosecution of a cannibalism case against a New York City police officer.

Richard Meltz was sentenced Tuesday in federal court in Manhattan. U.S. District Judge Paul Gardephe said the 66-year-old ex-police chief at the Bedford, Massachusetts, Veterans Administration medical center went far beyond Internet fantasy chats when he conversed with two others who were recently convicted at trial in the case.

Meltz faced a maximum of 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to two charges of conspiracy. He admitted assisting in the planned kidnapping of adult relatives of a New Jersey man and of a woman who was actually an undercover FBI agent.

CLEVELAND (AP) — Police say an Ohio school bus driver sacrificed her life to save a 10-year-old girl during an evacuation drill outside a charter school.

A police spokesman says the vehicle rolled over the driver Tuesday morning after she saved a 10-year-old girl who was about to jump out of the emergency exit at the back of the bus. The driver was identified as 51-year-old Laura Zborowski of Akron.

The accident occurred around 8:10 a.m. when about 40 children were participating in the drill at Middlebury Academy in Akron. The girl was the last student to evacuate the bus when it began rolling backward. The driver threw the girl onto a lawn before being struck.

The other children witnessed the accident. Grief counselors have been sent to the school.

ATLANTA (AP) — President Barack Obama says the world is looking to the United States to address the deadly outbreak of Ebola in West Africa.

Obama says the U.S. embraces that responsibility.

The president is outlining new U.S. efforts to respond to the outbreak during a visit to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

Obama is ordering 3,000 military personnel to West Africa to erect new facilities and train health workers. He says it’s the largest international response in the history of the CDC.

Obama says the outbreak is now an unprecedented epidemic that threatens global security and is spiraling out of control. But he says chances the outbreak will spread into the U.S. are “extremely low.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — Some of the nation’s largest cities are ratcheting up their criticism of prescription painkillers, blaming the industry for a wave of addiction and overdoses that have ravaged their communities and busted local budgets.

The heightened rhetoric comes as Chicago tries to recover millions in health care costs from opioid drugmakers, alleging that companies deliberately misled the public about risks. It’s a strategy that could be attractive to other cash-strapped cities.

On Tuesday, health commissioners from Chicago, New York and Boston came to Washington to lobby Congress and the White House on efforts to combat painkiller abuse.

Chicago’s lawsuit, filed in July, alleges that five pharmaceutical companies deceptively marketed their drugs. The drugmakers have asked that the suit be dismissed because it fails to cite specific instances of fraud.

BRENTWOOD, N.H. (AP) — A New Hampshire woman accused of trying to kill her children by forcing them to drink bleach has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.

Wendy Miller-Wright, of Seabrook, was charged last year with attempted murder.

Police say her 6-year-old son and 7-year-old daughter spit out most of the bleach and went to a neighbor for help. Miller-Wright also drank bleach. Police say she was trying to kill herself and her children.

Miller-Wright’s lawyer says his client was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

WMUR-TV reports (http://bit.ly/ZoaI7m) Miller-Wright was taken to a psychiatric hospital for evaluation Tuesday. A hearing will follow, at which she could be committed for up to five years.

The plea was part of a deal with prosecutors, who decided mental health treatment would be better for Miller-Wright than prison.

BELLINGHAM, Wash. (AP) — Authorities say a Washington state man fed up with barking fatally shot his neighbors’ dog in front of them. But the corgi apparently wasn’t the one barking.

David William Latham faces charges of felony animal cruelty, among others. His attorney, Adrian Madrone, says his client feels terrible.

Police Lt. Bob Vander Yacht says Latham admitted he shot the dog and that “something made him go over the edge, beyond reason.”

Authorities say Latham walked across the street Saturday, aimed his gun over his neighbors’ backyard fence and shot the dog. Owner Loyce Andrews says her husband, Cary Chunyk, ran after Latham but stopped when Latham brandished the gun.

The dog died in the backyard.

Other neighbors heard a dog barking and whining at a nearby home for hours after the shooting.

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — The South Carolina man accused of killing his five children and dumping their bodies in Alabama was an ex-convict whose homes were visited by social workers a dozen times in the last three years.

Records released Thursday by South Carolina social workers show the children seemed happy and well-adjusted despite occasional spankings, and the family took a summer trip to Disney World and the beach.

The documents also show Timothy Ray Jones Jr. was a single father and computer engineer trying to raise five children. A social worker wrote after the final visit Aug. 13 that Jones “appears to be overwhelmed as he is unable to maintain the home, but the children appear to be clean, groomed and appropriately dressed.

Jones is being brought to South Carolina to face charges.