1999 Year

The fervent hopes of scientists--including these planetary experts at UCLA--for a successful landing at the south pole of Mars were dashed when the $165-million Mars Polar Lander vanished without a trace Dec. 3 as it began its descent to the surface of the Red Planet. It was the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's second failed Mars mission of the year. In September, JPL's $125-million Mars Climate Orbiter disappeared as it began to orbit the fourth planet.

David Miller buried the father he never got to know on Friday. Under an afternoon sun obscured by coastal fog and smoke from inland wildfires, a five-member rifle squad fired off a 15-shot salute at Wood- lawn Cemetery in Santa Monica. They were honoring an Army Air Forces pilot who had survived nearly two years of service in the Pacific during World War II, only to die on a routine flight just weeks after the Allies declared victory over Japan. It has been 58 years since 1st Lt.

The last Indonesian governor of East Timor was convicted Wednesday of crimes against humanity for allowing government-backed militias to slaughter more than 100 people in 1999, when the territory was part of Indonesia. Former Gov. Jose Abilio Soares, who denied having any part in the killings, was sentenced to three years in prison, which some human rights activists criticized as too short.

Two and a half years after workers at a San Fernando Valley recycling center found a partial human torso and leg on a conveyor belt, Los Angeles police say they have solved the mystery. Los Angeles Police Department detectives, who long ago determined that the body parts were those of a 35-year-old Syrian immigrant named Hilal Taweel, arrested his uncle, Fadel Tawil, at his Burbank apartment Wednesday.

The small jump in Orange County killings last year doesn't appear to be materializing into a trend, according to law enforcement agencies. In 1999, Orange County homicides rose for the first time in seven years--7% to 60. But so far this year, most police departments report declines in murders as well as other violent crimes. The one exception was Santa Ana, the county's largest city, which has had 16 homicides so far this year, compared with 13 in all of 1999.

Orange County's celebrated crime drop stretched for a record eighth straight year in 1999, with total crime falling 7% and every major crime category noting a decrease except homicide, according to statistics released Wednesday. Murders across the county rose for the first time in six years, jumping 8% from 85 to 92. Despite the increase, the number remains fewer than half the homicides recorded in 1993, when gang feuds helped push the total to 196.

BADMINTON SOUTHERN SECTION Alhambra Individual Boys Singles: Mike Chansawangpuvana, Villa Park Doubles: Magella Ky/Richard Chong, Long Beach Wilson Individual Girls Singles: Elie Wu, Keppel Doubles: Lin Cai/Connie Hwang, Villa Park Mixed doubles: Mike Chansawangpuvana/ Mai Mangkalakiri, Villa Park BASEBALL CITY SECTION Championship: Kennedy Invitational: Venice SOUTHERN SECTION Division I: Capistrano Valley Division II: California Division III: Villa Park Division IV: San Luis Obispo Division

American consumers' buying spree of foreign goods from TVs to cars last year led to an immense increase in the trade deficit--up more than 50% from the previous year to a record high of $338.9 billion. The deficit in the "current account," which measures not only trade in goods and services but also investment flows and foreign aid payments, grew by 53.7% from the previous record, a $220.6-billion imbalance in 1998, the Commerce Department said Wednesday. The hefty $118.

America's record-setting economy is poised to smash one more record today when the government announces that the nation's colossal addiction to foreign goods drove the trade deficit to about $270 billion last year. It's not an occasion for celebration, although whatever the precise number, "It's going to be big," promised Nariman Behravesh, chief international economist at Standard & Poor's DRI in Lexington, Mass. Yet, remarkably, hardly anyone is complaining.

U.S. consumers bought new homes at a faster than expected pace in December, the government said Wednesday, capping a record year for the housing market that may finally be showing signs of slowing under the weight of higher interest rates. The Commerce Department said the number of new single-family homes sold in December rose 4.5% to a seasonally adjusted annual pace of 900,000 units, faster than the 889,000 pace economists expected.

More than 3 out of every 4 new dollars invested in stock mutual funds in 1999 went to just a handful of fund companies and two types of funds--large-growth-stock and technology sector funds. Analysts say the new data, compiled by Financial Research Corp., are the clearest sign yet that fund investors, long viewed as conservative "buy-and-hold" types, increasingly are succumbing to the temptations of aggressive "momentum" investing.