Rocky Mount Telegram from Rocky Mount, North Carolina • 6

Rocky Mount Telegram Saturday, December 27,2000 WORLD WEATHER OBITUARIES www.rockymounttelegram.com THE WEATHER Saturday, December 27 AccuWeather forecast for daytime conditions and high temperatures. NORTH CAROLINA Boone Greensboro TEN Asheville Rocky Mount Raleigh Charlotte Cape Hatteras SC. Wilmington TWIN COUNTIES Today's Forecast Cloudy High 67, low 57. Sunday Monday Tuesday Light rain. Parly cloudy.

Sunny. High 70, low 44. High 56 low 37. High 56, low 34. THE NATION Fronts Pressure Cold Warm Stationary Low High -10s -08 De 10s 30s 40s 506 608 70s 80s 90s 100s LUNAR PHASES NEW MOON IST QUARTER FULL MOON 3rd QUARTER Today Jan.

4 Jan. 10 Jan. 17 Deaths Deaths LOUISBURG Willie B. funeral will be held at 1 p.m. Perry, 78, died Tuesday, today at Wheeler WoodDec.

23, 2008. The funeral lief Funeral Home. Burial will be held at 2 p.m. Mon- will be in the Greenwood Ivan day at Haywood Baptist Church, with the Rev. Gertrude Jones officiating.

Burial will be at the Mitchell Baptist Church cemetery, Visitation will be from 3 to 8 p.m. Sunday at Richardson Funeral Home. LOUSIBURG Robert Lassiter died Friday, Dec. 26, 2008. Arrangements will be announced by Richardson Funeral Home.

LOUISBURG Annie Alston died Thursday, Dec. 25, 2008. Arrangements will be announced by Richardson Funeral Home. LOUISBURG Dorothy Anderson died Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2008.

Arrangements will be announced by Richardson Funeral Home. Donna Beach Hale, 62, died Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2008. The funeral will be held at 11 a.m. today at Carlisle Funeral Home, with the Rev.

Caswell Shaw officiating. Burial will be at the Greenwood Cemetery. SCOTLAND NECK Lessie Elan Bland Cooke, 84, died Tuesday, Dec. 23, 2008. The funeral will be held at 11 a.m.

today at Hope Free Will Baptist Church, with the Rev. Matthew Jones and the Rev. Billy Poteat officiating. Visitation will be from 10 to 10:45 a.m. today at the church.

Arrangements are by Letchworth Funeral Home. ENFIELD Diana Silver, 34, died Thursday, Dec. 25, 2008. Arrangements will be announced by H.D. Pope Funeral Home.

NASHVILLE Gloria Jean Newsome, 64, died Monday, Dec. 22, 2008. The Cemetery in Tarboro. VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. Dion Turner Kiah, died Monday, Dec.

22, 2008. The funeral will be held at noon today at Kehukie Baptist Church, with the Rev. Michael A. Watson Sr. officiating.

Burial will be at the Staton Memorial Cemetery, Arrangements are by New Beginnings Funeral Service in Rich Square. ENFIELD Johnny Mack Pittman, 56, died Friday, Dec. 19, 2008. The funeral will be held at 1:30 p.m. today at St.

Paul Baptist Church. Burial will be at the Elmwood Cemetery. Arrangements are by Lea Pope Funeral Home. CONETOE Sarah Elizabeth Brown Harrell, 79, died Tuesday, 1 Dec. 23, 2008.

The funeral will be held at 2 p.m. Sunday at Macedonia Baptist Church, with the Rev. Marvin Wilkes officiating. Burial will be at the Community Center in Princeville. Visitation will be from 2 to 8 p.m.

Saturday at Hemby-Willoughby Funeral Home in Tarboro. TARBORO Sherry Diane Long Johnson, 42, died Thursday, Dec. 25, 2008. Arrangements will be announced by Hemby-Willoughby Funeral Home. FARMVILLE Johnny Pettaway, 56, died Thursday, Dec.

25, 2008. Arrangements will be announced by Hemby-Willoughby Funeral Home in Tarboro. GASTON Nelson Lashley, 83, died Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2008. Arrangements will be announced by H.D.

Pope Funeral Home. OBITUARY POLICY The Rocky Mount Telegram publishes free of charge all area death notices, including funeral arrangement information.A fee is charged for obituaries. For more information, call 446-5161. Palestinian rocket misfires, kills 2 GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) A crude rocket fired by Palestinian militants fell short of its target in Israel on Friday, striking a house in the Northern Gaza Strip and killing two schoolgirls. The attack came as Israel sent mixed signals over its plans to respond to continuing Palestinian rocket fire.

Israeli defense officials say politicians have approved a large-scale incursion into the territory once rainy conditions clear. But at the same time, Israel appeared receptive to international pressure against an invasion, opening the Gaza border Friday to allow in deliveries of humanitarian aid. None of Gaza's militant factions claimed responsibility for the deadly attack on the house in Beit Lahiya. Gaza Health Ministry official Dr. Moiaya Hassa- Palestinian civilians inadvertently killed by militants since their truce with Israel began collapsing six weeks ago.

Family members and medics said they were killed by rocket fire. Israel's crossings with Gaza have been largely clamped tight since Islamic Hamas militants seized control of the coastal strip in June 2007, with only the barest essentials allowed in since a June 19 truce with Gaza gunmen began unraveling six weeks ago. On Thursday, however, Israel's Defense Ministry said it agreed to open its cargo crossings into Gaza to avoid a humanitarian crisis there. Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the decision followed consultations with defense officials and calls from the international community, suggesting Israel might be open to international pressure to resume the truce. A total of 106 trucks carried medicine, fuel, cooking gas and other vital goods into Gaza, including a small donation from Egypt, the military said.

Cabinet Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said the humanitarian shipment was meant to be a message to the people of Gaza that they were not Israel's enemy. "We are sending them a message that the Hamas leadership has turned them into a punching bag for everyone," he told Israel Radio. "It is a leadership that has turned school yards into rocket-launching pads. This a leadership that does not care that the blood of its people will run in the streets." Brother of deceased French investor speaks out PARIS (AP) The French financier who killed himself after losing more than $1 billion of his clients' investments to Bernard Madoff's alleged fraud also saw his own family's money disappear, his older brother told the AP on Friday. Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet and his business partner Patrick Littaye were "totally ruined," Bertrand Magon de la Villehuchet said in a telephone interview from his home on Paris' chic Place des Vosges.

Ivan Glenwood Ricks Sr. Ivan Glenwood Ricks, Sr. passed away December 25, 2008. He was born in Rocky Mount, Nash County, on August 20, 1928, to the late B. Frank Ricks and Mary Woodruff Ricks.

He retired from CSX Railroad in 1984 after 40 years of service. He was a graduate of Barton College. He was preceded in death by three brothers, Ish, Joe and Ben. He is survived by his wife Kathryn, son Ivan Jr. and his wife Mary Ricks of Richmond, as well as 4 grandchildren and their wives.

One granddaughter is Stacey, and 3 grandsons are Ian, wife Christine of Richmond, Scott, wife Lara of Moyock, NC, and Brad, wife Kathleen of Richmond, VA. There are 5 great grandchildren: Tyler and Madison Ricks of Richmond and Daniel, Brandon and Allie Ricks of Moyock, NC. Memorial services will be conducted at Northside Community Church at 3:00 p.m. Sunday, by Dr. Mark Pridgen.

Visitation will be in the church vestibule after the service. Arrangements by Wheeler Woodlief Funeral Home, 1130 N. Winstead Ave. On line condolences may be sent to the Ricks family by visiting www.wheelerandwoodlief. com.

AP photo Indian Border Security Force soldiers keep vigil Friday at the western sector of India-Pakistan international border at Ranjitpura village. Pakistan moves soldiers towards Indian border AP photo Masked Palestinian militants hold their weapons Friday during an Islamic Jihad rally in Bureij, Central Gaza Strip. nain said the two victims, ages 5 and 12, were cousins. Three other children were wounded, he said. The girls were the first Bertrand, 74, said his brother had "invested his own fortune" with Madoff up to several tens of milVILLEHUCHET lions of dollars along with money from friends and family.

Rene-Thierry, 65, was found dead at his desk in the New York office of Access International Advisors on Tuesday, both of his wrists slashed. A box cutter and a bottle of sleep- ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) Pakistan has started to redeploy thousands of troops to the Indian border from the tribal areas near Afghanistan, intelligence officials said Friday, raising tensions in the aftermath of the Mumbai terror attacks. The move was expected to frustrate the United States, which has been pushing Pakistan to step up its fight against al-Qaida and Taliban militants near the Afghan border. India has blamed Pakistani-based militants for last month's siege on its financial capital, which killed 164 people and has provoked an increasingly bitter war of words between nuclear-armed neighbors that have fought three wars in 60 years. The troops headed to the Indian border were being diverted away from tribal areas near Afghanistan, the two officials said.

They said elements of the army's 14th Infantry Division were being redeployed to the towns of Kasur and Sialkot, close to the Indian border. The military began the troop movement Thursday and plans to shift a total of 20,000 soldiers, they said without providing a timeframe. Earlier Friday, a security official said all troop leave had been canceled. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation. India and Pakistan have said they want to avoid military conflict over the attacks.

But India has not ruled out the use of force as it presses its neighbor to crack down on the Pakistani-based terrorist group it blames for the attack. Pakistani Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani has promised to respond aggressively if attacked but reassured India Friday that Pakistan would not strike first. "We will not take any action on our own," Gilani told reporters. "There will a be no aggression from our side." Meanwhile, Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee accused Pakistan of trying to divert attention away from its struggle to rein in homegrown terror groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba, which Delhi accuses of masterminding the Mumbai attacks. "They should concentrate on the real issue: how to fight against terrorists and how to fight against and bring to book the perpetrators of (the) Bombay terrorist attack," Mukherjee said.

Pakistan has arrested several. senior members of the banned group and cracked down on a charity the U.S. and UN say was a front for Lashkar. India has demanded greater action, but Pakistan says it needs to share evidence backing up its claims. Dec.

25th through Jan. 1st 2009 BEDTIME STORIES Ratad PG 12:00, 2:30 4.20, 7:00, CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON Rated PG13 11:30, 2:45 6:00, 9:15 CURIOUS CASE OF BUTTON shows Rated PG13 4:15, 1:00 7:30 5pm MARLEY AND ME the Rated PG 11:30, 2:00 4:30, 7:00, 9:30 (und Rated VALKYRIE PO13 after closing 11:30, 2:15 (dn 00:9 5:00, 7:30, 10:00 8 before will Rated PG13 12:00, 2:30 be THE SPIRIT (12-59); Shows we DOUBT 5:00, 7:20, 0:30 $7.50 Matinees (All Eve, Rated 5:15, PG13 12:30, 7:30, 3:00 8:45 Aduits Adult $6.00 Christmas SEVEN Rated PG13 11:20, POUNDS 2:00 4:30, 7:10, 8:45 TALE OF DESPEREAUX Reted Mount I Rated CHRISTMASES 815, PG13 1:15, 7:15, 2:18 8:15 1:00, 3:00 Apox Reted BOLT 5:00, PG 7:00, 9:00 1:00, 3:00 7:20 19 YES MAN SMH Rated PG13 815, 8:20 YES MAN yo Rated 415, PO13 11:45, 7:00, 2:00 8:15 Just MADAGASCAR 2 Rated PO Road DAY THE EARTH Rated PG13 1:00, STOOD 3:00 STILL 5.00, 7:20, 9:45 Benvenue NOTHING LIKE Rated TWILIGHT PG13 THE 8:43 HOLIDAYS Rated PG 13 18:30, 2:20 821 Show times are subject 5:10 change. to rating requires I.D. Open for matinees starting Dec. 19 Jan.

4 446-6500 We Have Dolby Digital and DITS in selected auditoriums. All Stadium ing pills lay nearby. Police say it was a suicide. Rene-Thierry had begun investing with Madoff three or four years ago and had a total of $1.4 billion invested with him when the scandal came crashing down, according to his brother. "At first he thought he'd be able to get the money back.

He was very determined. Gradually he realized he wouldn't be able to," Bertrand said. "He trusted Madoff completely," he said. Madoff, 70. was arrested Dec.

11 and allegedly told FBI agents he had masterminded a $50 billion Ponzi scheme that ensnared investors far and wide, from retirees to charities to the International Olympic Committee. Rene-Thierry's fund was among the biggest losers in the scheme, and one of a handful to get taken for more than $1 billion. Bertrand said he spoke with his brother almost every day. "My brother was a man of simple tastes," he said. "He was a very modest man.".