FBI: Airline passenger restrained with tape

RALEIGH, N.C. -- An airline crew used duct tape to keep a passenger in her seat because they say she became unruly, fighting flight attendants and grabbing other passengers, forcing the flight to land in North Carolina.

Maria Esther Castillo of Oswego, N.Y., is due in court Thursday, charged with resisting arrest and interfering with the operations of a flight crew aboard United Airlines Flight 645, from Puerto Rico to Chicago.

Castillo, 45, struck a flight attendant on the buttocks with the back of her hand during Saturday's flight, FBI Special Agent Peter Carricato said in a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Charlotte. She also stood and fell onto the head of a blind passenger and later started pulling the person's hair, the complaint stated.

Ankle cuffs kept slipping off Castillo, so the flight crew and two passengers were forced to use duct tape to keep her in her seat, the complaint states.

She calmed as the pilot diverted the flight to Charlotte-Douglass International Airport, but became disruptive again when authorities boarded the plane to remove her, authorities said.

Carricato states that a passenger saw Castillo having drinks in an airport bar before boarding. She bought another drink on the plane. Flight attendants stopped serving her alcohol because of her behavior, the complaint states.

McCain contemplates new role in the Senate

PHOENIX -- Before resting from the grueling presidential race, John McCain began discussing with senior aides what role he will play in the Senate now that he has promised to work with the man who defeated him for president.

One obvious focus will be the war in Iraq. After two years spent more on the campaign than in the Senate, McCain will return as the ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee.

That will put the four-term Arizona senator in a position to influence Democrat Barack Obama's plan to set a timetable to withdraw U.S. troops from combat in Iraq.

During the campaign, McCain staunchly opposed setting such a time frame, even as the Iraqi government began working with the Bush administration to do so.

But in conceding the presidency to Obama Tuesday night at a Phoenix hotel, McCain pledged "to do all in my power to help him lead us through the many challenges we face."

He allowed that defeat was disappointing but said that starting Wednesday "we must move beyond it and work together to get our country moving again."

Aides said they believed McCain would work well with Obama as president because much of his best work in the Senate had been done with Democrats, including a landmark campaign finance law he crafted with Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold and an unsuccessful effort with Massachusetts Sen. Edward M. Kennedy to pass comprehensive immigration reform.

Jogger runs a mile with rabid fox attached to her arm

PRESCOTT, Ariz. -- Authorities in Arizona say a jogger attacked by a rabid fox ran a mile with the animal's jaws clamped on her arm and then drove herself to a hospital. The Yavapai County sheriff's office said the woman told deputies she was on a trail near Prescott on Monday when the fox attacked and bit her foot.

She said she grabbed the fox by the neck when it went for her leg but it bit her arm.

The woman wanted the animal tested for rabies so she ran a mile to her car with the fox still biting her arm, then pried it off and tossed it in her trunk and drove to the Prescott hospital.

The sheriff's office says the fox later bit an animal control officer. He and the woman are both receiving rabies vaccinations.

Teen compacted in Wis. garbage truck

MILWAUKEE -- Police in Milwaukee say a teenage boy has survived after being accidentally dumped into the back of a recycling truck and compacted. Police say the 14-year-old ran away from a boot camp-style school for teens Monday and hid in a recycling bin filled with cardboard.

The bin was picked up by a Waste Management truck and dumped into the vehicle's rear compactor. The truck continued on its collection route, compacting cardboard several times.

The boy wasn't discovered until the truck dumped its load at a recycling processing center. He was semiconscious and was taken to a hospital, but police say his injuries aren't life-threatening.

Minn. Senate race headed to recount

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- A slugfest for nearly two years, Minnesota's U.S. Senate race headed into a new round Wednesday as the campaigns girded for an automatic statewide recount to determine whether Republican Sen. Norm Coleman's bare lead over Democratic challenger Al Franken would stand.

Coleman declared himself the winner of Tuesday's election, but Franken said he would let the recount play out, hoping it would erase the incumbent's 475-vote lead out of nearly 2.9 million ballots. State officials said the recount wouldn't start until mid-November and would probably take weeks.

If he hangs on, Coleman would be among the Republicans who survived Democratic gains in Senate races nationwide. Democrats ousted two Republican incumbents and picked up three seats held by retiring GOP incumbents. Three other Republicans besides Coleman were trying to hang on in races too close to call.

"Yesterday the voters spoke. We prevailed," Coleman said Wednesday at a news conference. He noted Franken could opt to waive the recount.

"It's up to him whether such a step is worth the tax dollars it will take to conduct," Coleman said, telling reporters he would "step back" if he were in Franken's position. Secretary of State Mark Ritchie said the recount would cost 3 cents per ballot, or almost $90,000.