RALEIGH - Three days after a state school board member was found injured in the West Raleigh home of a Raleigh lawyer, police still are combing the crime scene for evidence and remain uncharacteristically tight-lipped about the crime.

Raleigh attorney Thomas Farr's far-reaching work for the Wake County school board has included e-mail requests to officials for facts that are on their Web site and a meeting with current board lawyer Ann Majestic, for which taxpayers got billed from both sides for a total of $425 an hour.

WINSTON-SALEM - Democratic candidates for the U.S. Senate generally agreed on the issues, but offered sharply different styles and points of emphasis Monday in their first forum leading up to the primary May 4.

CARY - An Alamance County man was arrested Monday on charges of second-degree rape and second-degree sexual offense.

National Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele vowed to reclaim North Carolina for his party Monday and introduced a TV ad seeking to build support for the GOP brand in the state.

GREENVILLE - Donors across North Carolina are helping to restore the lives of people injured in Haiti's earthquake by giving, literally, parts of themselves.

RALEIGH - Prison inmates in North Carolina will be able to write novels and other manuscripts and send them to publishers without interference from guards under a settlement reached with the ACLU.

CHAPEL HILL - The 40 days of Lent are a time when Christians are called to examine their faith. At Church of the Holy Family, members have been invited to examine it in a new way: through Judaism.

RALEIGH - Two local universities are teaming up to offer a two-for-one special.

RALEIGH - A young mental patient from Louisburg who died last summer at a psychiatric hospital in Rocky Mount was killed by an overdose of prescription medications, according to the state medical examiner.

CHAPEL HILL - It wasn't the system that got Donna Bell appointed to the Town Council last year, but "ranked voting" is what Bell is recommending for future appointments.

Alex Garver of Garner only goes to his neighborhood library once or twice a month, but when he goes, he makes a big haul.

They snipped a red ribbon in Beaufort County a couple of weeks ago to celebrate the nearly finished U.S. 17 bypass around Chocowinity, a shrinking town with a pretty name.

A team of students from N.C. State and UNC-Chapel Hill is a finalist in a national urban design competition.

RALEIGH - Wake County community groups want to increase people counted in the 2010 Census, and they are inviting area pastors to help spread the word.

DURHAM - When police responded to a call of a disturbance involving a weapon shortly before 9 p.m. tonight, they found a vehicle crashed into a tree and the driver suffering from gunshot wounds.

A psychologist testified Monday that he determined Abdullah El-Amin Shareef was psychotic after meeting with him five times between 2004 and 2009.

Wilson is about to lose another employer.

American Eagle Airlines plans to add nonstop service between Fayetteville and Dallas/For Worth International Airport, increasing competition for travelers in the Sandhills region.

CLAYTON - More than a thousand teenagers, many of them from local churches, yelled, "Sex is great!" during a high-energy performance Sunday night at Cleveland Community Church. The phrase was followed closely by five other words: "In the context of marriage."