House panel OKs bill to ban assault weapons

WASHINGTON A House panel Tuesday approved legislation to ban 19 assault-style weapons as President Clinton's top lieutenants in the battle against the firearms went to Capitol Hill.

The House Judiciary Committee's crime subcommittee voted 8-5 along party lines to pass the

legislation, sending it to the full committee, which is scheduled to act on it Thursday.

The full House was expected to vote next week or the week after.

To soothe House members besieged by telephone calls and letters from irate gun owners, Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen urged them to disregard organized, mass-produced opposition, saying they should recognize ''the difference between grass roots and Astroturf.''

Abortion pill

may soon become available

NEW YORK An abortion rights organization signed an agreement with an overseas manufacturer to produce a generic equivalent of the RU-486 abortion pill.

The duplicate drug could be ready for human trials by the end of the year, said Lawrence Lader, president of Abortion Rights Mobilization. He refused to identify the company.

Abortion opponents have fought to keep RU-486 out of the United States. The drug's maker, Rou

ssel-Uclaf of France, began negotiating a year ago to make the drug available for testing in the United State

s through the Population Council, an international research organ

ization.

But the negotiations dragged on and Abortion Rights Mobilization announced in April 1993 that its researchers had duplicated the drug. The organization spent the last year raising money, finding a manufacturer and consulting with the Food and Drug Administration, Lader said.

The agreement to produce the drug for U.S. use was signed last week.

Senate votes to make banking easier

WASHINGTON Banking would be more convenient for 60 million Americans living near state borders and expansion easier for the nation's largest banks under legislation adopted by the Senate on Tuesday.

In the most important change to the structure of the banking system since the Bank Holding Company Act of 1956, the Senate bill, adopted by voice vote, would lower barriers to interstate banking dating to 1927.

''The lives of bank customers nationwide will improve considerably for the better as a result of this legislation,'' said Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn.

The 60 million people who live in border areas and the 4 million who commute to work across state lines would be able to establish bank accounts in their home states and make deposits and cash checks in branch offices in nearby states.

Offi

cer denounces colleagues in beating

LOS ANGELES A policeman tearfully testified Tuesday that he tried to stop Rodney King's beating and implored fellow officers across the courtroom: ''Is it only me that's admitted something wrong happened out there?''

Theodore Briseno, who broke rank with his colleagues early on and called the beating unjustified, was choked with emotion as he blurted out his feelings on being a pariah in the Los Angeles Police Department.

''For three years I've put up with this and it hurts,'' said Briseno, a defendant in the punitive damages phase of King's civil lawsuit over the March 3, 1991, beating.

''Look around this courtroom at these officers,'' Briseno said. ''Not one of them likes me. No one across the street (at police headquarters) likes me. What I'm telling these jurors is I did what I thought was right.''

At another point, h

e said: ''I don't know if it was right or wrong. I don't have the answers. I'm sorry.''