About 90 teenage girls at one public high school in Memphis, Tenn., are either pregnant or have had a baby this school year, according to media reports.

Frayser High School has 978 students – 508 of which are girls. That means nearly 18 percent of teen girls at Frayser are either currently pregnant or recently had babies.

As a Title One school, Frayser receives federal dollars based on the number of students from low-income families who qualify for free or reduced lunch, according to WMC-TV. 

Pregnancy is not a new problem for the school, one Frayser graduate says. "When we would come back from summer break, there would be a thousand people pregnant. We were like, what's going on?" Alicia Williamson told KTUU. Williamson graduated from Frayser in 2004. She added, "There were a whole lot of bellies. You had to watch out so you didn't bump into them. Being 2011, I thought a lot of them would have thought this is not the right way to go, having babies during school time.”

The news comes as the city plans an initiative to fight teen pregnancy in their community with a nonprofit organization called Girls Inc., which teaches girls about pregnancy prevention.

Map: Teen birth rates across the U.S.

In Memphis, the teen pregnancy rate is between 15 percent and 20 percent – and in Frayser, the rate is 26 percent, said Deborah Hester Harrison, executive director of Memphis’ Girls Inc. It’s no surprise that Harrison places at least part of the blame on the media, such as the popular MTV shows “16 and Pregnant” and “Teen Mom.”

"So much of our society is sexually oriented. As adults we can look at that and it doesn't impact us, but kids are different," Harrison said.

OCEANSIDE, Calif. -- A Marine trapped inside a sunken amphibious assault vehicle for two hours Friday at the bottom of Oceanside Harbor was airlifted out, NBC station KNSD reported.

His condition was not revealed.

According to a spokesperson with the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, search and rescue crews pumped oxygen into the vehicle to increase the chances of the Marine's survival.

The Marine was one of six in a training crew inside the vehicle when it flipped or capsized about noon (3 p.m. ET) at the Del Mar Boat Basin at Camp Pendleton, officials said.

Five were pulled out earlier and three of them were rushed to hospitals. Their conditions were not reported.

Marines routinely train in amphibious assault vehicles at the Del Mar facility, officials said. Each vehicle usually is occupied by a crew of three plus an instructor.

For further updates, see the story at msnbc.com.

Bank stocks drove the stock indexes higher on Friday.

According to preliminary calculations, the Dow Jones industrials closed up 55.48 points, or .47 percent, to 11,787.38. The S&P 500 closed up 9.48 points, or .74 percent, to 1,293.24. The Nasdaq closed uo 20.01, or .73 percent, to 2,755.30.

Check here for up-to-the-minute updates.

The organizer of a gun fair in which an 8-year-old boy accidently killed himself with an Uzi submachine gun was acquitted by a jury in Springfield, Mass., on Friday.

Here's background on the case from Associated Press:

Jurors heard testimony over seven days during the trial of Edward Fleury, the former police chief in Pelham, Mass. His company co-sponsored the machine gun expo at the Westfield Sportsman's Club where Christopher Bizilj of Ashford, Conn., fired a 9 mm micro Uzi submachine gun that kicked back and shot him in the head. The boy's father, emergency room Dr. Charles Bizilj, recorded a graphic video of the accident that was shown to the jury.

Fleury had faced up to 20 years in prison on an involuntary manslaughter count, and up to 10 years in prison for each of three counts of furnishing machine guns to minors.

Fleury's lawyer, Rosemary Curran Scapicchio, asked the jury in her closing argument why Fleury was being made a scapecoat in the boy's death. She said Fleury was taking $5 from patrons at the gate and wasn't supervising the firing line or picking out weapons for children.

"Where is the reckless and wanton conduct? There is none," Scapicchio said.

She said Fleury thought everything at the event was legal and safe, and he had checked with the local police department beforehand. The event had run seven years without incident. Scapicchio noted that there were several police officers at the machine gun expo who saw children shooting machine guns and did nothing to stop them.

She also said there were several layers of protection at the fair, beginning with a waiver everyone at the event signed acknowledging the risks, including death, and absolving anyone of liability if something bad happened.

Scapicchio said there were safety discussions. She said there were safety officers on the firing lines. She said parents decided whether their children could shoot automatic weapons.

Scapicchio also said Charles Bizilj was responsible for allowing his son to shoot the Uzi.

"He's got some parental responsibility here," she said. "If you think it's a dangerous activity, don't go."

She noted the testimony of Michael Spano, the 15-year-old who supervised Christopher at the time of the accident. Spano said he told Charles Bizilj twice that he didn't think it was a good idea for Christopher and his then-11-year-old brother, Colin, to fire the guns because of their strong kickback and rapid fire.

But prosecutor William Bennett said it was Fleury who made it possible for Christopher to fire the Uzi that day. Bennett said Fleury recklessly organized the event, had others bring machine guns to it and wrongly advertised to the public that there was no age limit and no permits were needed.

Bennett also said it was Fleury who put an unlicensed, uncertified 15-year-old boy on the firing line as a safety officer who was helping Christopher when the accident happened.

"This was a land mine waiting to explode," Bennett said of the event.

The prosecutor also asked the jury to again watch the graphic video of the shooting in slow motion, saying it shows a lot of what went wrong that day.

"One thing you know from looking at that video ... you know that's one powerful weapon," Bennett said. "You know that's one dangerous weapon. You know that's one lethal weapon. ... You'll see that no amount of instruction could have saved Christopher Bizilj that day."

Bennett added, "Looking at the video you can understand why the law prohibits anyone from furnishing a machine gun to a child. It's just too dangerous."

A main issue of contention in the case is whether children can legally fire machine guns. Bennett says it's illegal in any circumstance, but Scapicchio says there's an exemption in state law that allows minors to shoot firearms if they're being supervised by a firearms license holder. Scapicchio argued that some machine guns fit the definition of firearms under state law, if their barrels are less than 16 inches long, which is the case with micro Uzis.

The jury sent a question to Judge Peter Velis late Thursday asking about the exemption and about the state law on possessing firearms. Velis, over an objection by Scapicchio, told the 12 jurors that the exemption was not an issue before them.

Michael Spano's father, Domenico Spano of New Milford, Conn., and Carl Giuffre of Hartford, Conn., were also charged with involuntary manslaughter and await trial after pleading not guilty. The two men, who had machine gun licenses, brought the automatic weapons to the expo.

Ronald Reagan’s youngest son says in a new book that he believes his father suffered from Alzheimer’s disease while in the White House, according to a column in U.S. News & World Report.

Ron Reagan makes the suggestion in his new book “My Father at 100," due out next week, Paul Bedard writes in the news  magazine’s “Washington Whispers” column. Ronald Reagan, who was president from 1981-1989,  and his wife Nancy publicly revealed he had Alzheimer’s in 1994.

His son Ron, who became a liberal and atheist, suggests he saw hints of confusion and "an out-of-touch president" during the 1984 campaign and again in 1986, when his father couldn't recall the names of California canyons he was flying over, according to the U.S. News & World Report column.

In his memoir, Ron Reagan notes that doctors today know that the disease can be present before it is recognized, according to the report.  "The question, then, of whether my father suffered from the beginning stages of Alzheimer's while in office more or less answers itself," Ron Reagan writes, according to the column.

The son also says his father, after leaving the White House, had brain surgery after being thrown from a horse on July 4, 1989, while in Mexico. He says his father, after initially refusing medical help, was taken to a San Diego hospital, Bedard writes.

"Surgeons opening his skull to relieve pressure on the brain emerged from the operating room with the news that they had detected what they took to be probable signs of Alzheimer's disease," the younger Reagan writes, according to Bedard. Several Reagan associates, however, say there was no surgery in San Diego, Bedard noted.

Feb. 6 is the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth.

AP/Morry Gash

The hearse carrying the body of John Roll arrives at a Catholic church in Tucson, Ariz., on Friday for his funeral service.

From NBC, msnbc.com and news services

TUCSON, Ariz. — Rep. Gabrielle Giffords continues to make progress, her doctors said Friday, as mourners gathered nearby to honor slain judge John Roll, one of the victims of the attack on Giffords and others.

Trauma surgeon Dr. Peter Rhee said the breathing tube attached to Giffords might be removed in a day or so.

“She is progressing normally without any complications or setbacks. She’s on schedule as we had hoped ... Even overnight, she’s made significant progress," he told MSNBC TV.

“She can hear us, she can respond," Rhee added. "As it gets higher up on the curve the changes are going to be less dramatic . We’ll see a lot of things in the next 2 months. Then the changes will be more subtle for the next year … and after that.”

Neurosurgeon Michael Lemole added that "we're very encouraged that she continues to make all the right moves in the right direction. We're cautious that she's making them at her own pace." Her eyes are opening more frequently and she is more responsive, he added.

AP reported that Giffords' husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, posted a message on Twitter Friday thanking people for the messages of support and said "GG," as he referred to her, was "improving each day."

On Thursday, doctors said Giffords had passed a "major milestone" on her recovery and suggested the tube might be removed soon.

The Arizona congresswoman has been sitting up, dangling her legs on the edge of the hospital bed and moving her limbs in response to commands. That's after she spontaneously opened her eyes during visits with her colleagues Wednesday night. She is able to lift both of her legs on command and is yawning and starting to rub her eyes, doctors said Thursday.

Mourning a judge
Meanwhile, the federal judge killed in the Arizona shooting rampage was remembered Friday not just for his work from the bench, but for who he was in private: a man devoted to family, faith and fairness.

U.S. District Judge John Roll had stopped by a supermarket meet-and-greet for Giffords on Saturday when he was killed, along with five others. Authorities say the shooter, 22-year-old Jared Loughner, was targeting the lawmaker, who was wounded along with 12 others.

Roll's funeral Friday came a day after the youngest victim, Christina Taylor Green, was laid to rest and amid tight security. Four big coach buses brought dozens of judges who knew Roll over the years.

During the funeral, Roll's older brother, Ed, recalled how the family had moved to Arizona from Pittsburgh because their mother was in poor health. She eventually died when Roll was 15, said Carol Bahill, 61, who attended the ceremony.

Ed Roll told mourners Roll changed his middle name from Paul to his Irish mother's maiden name, McCarthy, "to keep that part of the family alive," Bahill recalled.

"It made it very personal," she said. "You do feel like you knew something about him personally."

Roll's three sons were among the pallbearers, and family members and two federal judges gave readings, according to a program for the funeral. Dignitaries including Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer as well as Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl attended.

Former Vice President Dan Quayle was to bring a handwritten message from former President George H.W. Bush, who appointed Roll to the bench in 1991, said Adam Goldberg, a spokesman for the fire department and the event.

Most of the nation had never heard of Green before the tragedy Saturday, but Roll, 63, had attracted death threats and became a lightning rod in the state's immigration debate after his ruling in a controversial border-crossing case two years ago.

Roll's death leaves a huge hole in the federal judiciary in Arizona, not only because of the workload but because he had a reputation as a fair-minded and hardworking jurist, said Paul Carter, an assistant state attorney general.

"Although I really knew him as a judge, what came through here today and what I hoped would be my legacy as well, is that he was a good father, a good family man, and just a fair guy," Carter said.

Death threats
Roll, 63, who had attended daily Mass, was just coming from a service when he stopped by the local Safeway to see Giffords, by some accounts to thank her for her support in addressing the issue of a federal judge and court shortage in Arizona.

Roll's Saturday was full of mundane errands, but he was no stranger to death threats and controversy.

Two years ago, Roll presided over the case of 16 illegal immigrants who had sued border rancher Roger Barnett, saying he threatened them at gunpoint, kicked them and harassed them with dogs. Barnett argued that the plaintiffs couldn't sue him because they were in the U.S. illegally, but Roll upheld the civil rights claim and allowed a jury to hear the case.

The panel eventually awarded the illegal immigrants just $73,000 — much less than the millions sought — but the case was a flash point in a state that struggles to curb crossings at its border.

Roll received death threats and was under around-the-clock protection while hearing the case.

"It was unnerving and invasive ... by its nature it has to be," Roll told the Arizona Republic in a mid-2009 interview. He said he followed the advice of the Marshals Service to not press charges against four men identified as threatening him.

Roll also had taken a leading position in pressing for more courts and judges to deal with the dramatic increase in federal cases caused by illegal immigration.

A week before his death, he declared a judicial emergency in southern Arizona as the number of federal felony cases more than doubled, from 1,564 to 3,289, the Los Angeles Times reported. He asked the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals for an emergency declaration extending the time to bring felony defendants into court from 70 days to 180 days, the paper reported.

Roll was an Arizona Court of Appeals and state trial court judge from 1987 to 1991. He worked as a city, county and federal prosecutor from 1973 until his appointment to the bench. He also worked for two years as a bailiff in the Pima County courts in the early 1970s.

A Pennsylvania native, he earned undergraduate and law degrees at the University of Arizona and an advanced law degree from the University of Virginia. He was an avid golfer and was heavily involved in his church, St. Thomas the Apostle.

Roll is survived by his wife, Maureen, three sons, and five grandchildren.

Roll walked his two basset hounds around the neighborhood every morning, and seemed inseparable from his wife, said George Kriss, 70, who came to the service Friday but didn't get in.

"They were always together, walking the dogs, when the grandkids were with them," Kriss said.

Flocks of birds falling en masse from the sky in Arkansas, Louisiana, Kentucky and even Sweden is strange, but these mysterious mass deaths don’t hold a candle to the “Kentucky Meat Shower” of 1876 when it comes to avian oddities.

“Flesh Descending in a Shower. An Astounding Phenomenon in Kentucky – Fresh Meat Like Mutton or Venison Falling  From A Clear Sky,” read the headline in the New York Times on March 10, 1876.
 
A second Times article the next day provided more detail on the strange occurrence.

“Mrs. Crouch, of Olympian Springs, Ky., was employed in the open air and under a particular clear sky, in the celebration of those mysterious rites by which the housewife transmutes scraps of meat, bones and effete overshoes into soap,” it said. “Suddenly, there descended upon her a gentle shower of meat.”    

For a couple of minutes, it continued, big pieces of meat, three or four inches square, fell all over Mrs. Crouch’s yard. The meat “appeared to be perfectly fresh.”

The incident was corroborated for the New York Times by two sources – one Mr. Harrison Gill “whose veracity is unquestionable” and a correspondent of the Louisville Commercial newspaper.

But what exactly was the red flesh? “Two gentlemen” satisfied their curiosity by tasting the meat and determined that it was either mutton or venison, the Times said. 

The incident sparked a lot of curiosity, skepticism and several scientific studies at the time.

The Royal Microscopical Society of Great Britain reported the most plausible explanation in its Monthly Microscopical Journal in July 1876.

After examining several specimens of meat, one scientist determined what fell out of the sky was in fact of “animal origin” (apparently he didn’t trust the taste buds of the locals). Therefore “the Kentucky shower was a veritable ‘meat’ shower.” Beyond that, he admitted that he had no explanation.

However, he relayed the most popular local theory:  a large pack of buzzards must have flown over the area after having eaten some dead horses, then one of the buzzards disgorged himself and the others followed suit, (as is their custom, according to the journal).

The scientist reported that similar occurrences with buzzards had been known to happen in the past, so “it would seem that the whole matter is capable of reasonable and simple explanation, and we may expect to hear of similar downfalls in other localities.”

So watch out!