Charities

In a city that is usually impossible to shock, the savaging of Roy Horn on Oct. 3, 2003, onstage and in front of a live audience at the Mirage, created one of those rare moments where all locals can say where they were when they heard the news. Steve Wynn, who spent millions to have the theater at the Mirage customized for the "Siegfried & Roy" show, remembered his first reaction in an interview this week: "I could not believe one of Roy's cats attacked him."

Despite success in shutting down the financing of terrorist groups within its borders, Saudi Arabia remains a top source of funding for Al Qaeda elsewhere and Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan, the Government Accountability Office said in a report to Congress. The report does not name individuals or estimate how much money might be flowing to the terrorists. Since 2003, the Saudis have barred charities from transferring money outside the kingdom, but the GAO said that this hasn't prevented Saudi-based charities with branches abroad from serving as funding sources for terrorist groups.

The Obama administration on Friday lost its bid to halt a lawsuit charging that President George W. Bush broke the law when he authorized warrantless spying on terrorism suspects, the only such case to make it to federal court. A federal appeals court rejected the Justice Department's bid to halt the lawsuit by a now-defunct Islamic charity over warrantless wiretapping.

The federal government's crackdown on suspected terrorism financing since the Sept. 11 attacks has violated the rights of American Muslim charities and deterred Muslims from charitable giving, the American Civil Liberties Union said in a report Tuesday. An expansion of laws and policies since 2001 has given the U.S.

Like everybody else these days, politically engaged Hollywood -- and particularly its younger activists -- is in a back-to-basics mood. That's why David Arquette called together a group of actors, musicians, artists, even some athletes, recently at the Beverly Hills home of his manager, Eric Kranzler, to discuss new ways of taking on one of the oldest of causes: feeding the hungry.

Charitable organizations providing aid to people evacuated from Southern California wildfires say that their greatest need is for cash gifts to sustain supply lines of food and to maintain counseling and relocation services. Donations of pet food also are being requested. Volunteers who want to help out at emergency shelters should contact agencies such as the Salvation Army and the American Red Cross before showing up at the facilities, officials say. The goal is to ensure proper training, maintain security and distribute staffing where it is most needed.

Intel Corp. dropped support for a foundation working to provide inexpensive laptops to the developing world because the group would endorse only one model of computer. The world's largest chip maker reached a "philosophical impasse" with the One Laptop per Child foundation and founder Nicholas Negroponte, who had asked the company to support exclusively the group's XO laptop, Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy said Thursday. The XO is built around a chip made by Santa Clara, Calif.

In those first terrible days, amid all the hugs and tears, all the flowers and casseroles, the telephone rang yet again. This was not another condolence call, a relative or friend comforting Prairie Wilson after her husband, Brian, died of a heart attack at 33. This was a bank official, calling to let her know $20,000 had just shown up in the memorial fund established to support her and the three young girls her husband left behind. Brian Wilson worked as a scout for the Cincinnati Reds.

A complaint filed with state ethics officials Tuesday accused Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez of using a charity to illegally funnel donations into political activities. The complaint cites more than $270,000 that Nunez solicited in 2005 and 2006 from corporations, utilities and other interests with a stake in legislation to pay for toy giveaways, scholarships, youth summits and other events that featured Nunez and were arranged by his staff.

What started as a Los Angeles family's creative way to dispose of a box of old movies has grown into a project that helps sick children cope with their illnesses. Sisters Marni and Berni Barta, 15 and 17, run Kid Flicks, a nonprofit organization that collects old movies and ships them to children's hospitals across the country and even as far as South Africa. So far the family has collected 28,700 movies and donated them to 287 hospitals.