Nation Briefs: Toxic mushrooms kill third person at Calif. senior care facility

REGION

Study: ADHD medicines help curb criminal behavior

Older teens and adults with attention deficit disorder are much less likely to commit a crime while on ADHD medication, a provocative study from Sweden finds.

It also shows that people with ADHD are four to seven times more likely to break the law than others.

The findings suggest that Ritalin, Adderall and other drugs that curb hyperactivity and boost attention remain important beyond the school-age years and that wider use of these medications in older patients might help curb crime.

“There definitely is a perception that it’s a disease of childhood,” said Dr. William Cooper, a professor of pediatrics and preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. “We’re beginning to understand that ADHD is a condition for many people that really lasts throughout their life.”

NEW YORK

Grinch pinched trailer loaded with 350 Christmas trees

HAMLIN — Police are looking for the thief who drove off with a trailer full of Christmas trees.

Monroe County Sheriff’s Office spokesman John Helfer says the heist happened between midnight Tuesday and 6:30 a.m. Wednesday in Hamlin, 18 miles west of Rochester and near the shore of Lake Ontario.

A farmer called police after he discovered the pickup truck he had backed into a driveway was gone and so was the 28-foot trailer behind it. Inside the trailer were 350 Douglas firs worth about $12,000.

OHIO

Judge says jailed Amish cannot attend family wedding

CLEVELAND — Defendants convicted in beard- and hair-cutting attacks on fellow Amish lost a bid Wednesday to leave jail to attend a family wedding.

U.S. District Court Judge Dan Polster, who presided at the trial of 16 Amish convicted in the attacks, ruled against requests by five of the nine who are locked up awaiting sentencing Feb. 8. Seven others remain free pending sentencing.

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