Sex Scandal, Scandal | featured news

A dance instructor accused of using her Zumba fitness studio as a front for prostitution pleaded guilty Friday to 20 counts in a scandal that captivated a quiet seaside town. The plea agreement spares Alexis Wright from the prospect of a high-profile trial featuring sex videos, exhibitionism and pornography, and more than a thousand texts and emails detailing the operation. Prosecutors will recommend a prison sentence of 10 months.

Flowers and mementos left by supporters adorned Joe Paterno's gravesite Tuesday, a year after the longtime Penn State coach's death, while at the spot where a bronze statue of him used to stand, a makeshift sign of cardboard flapped in a cold wind....

U.S. defense officials say Gen. John Allen, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, has been cleared of allegations of sending potentially inappropriate emails to a civilian woman linked to the sex scandal that ousted David Petraeus as CIA director.

Federal prosecutors have notified Paula Broadwell's lawyers that she won't be charged with cyberstalking in connection with the sex scandal that brought down David Petraeus.

Another man on Monday sued the former Elmo puppeteer who resigned amid sex abuse allegations, claiming the voice actor befriended him in Miami and promised to be a father figure before flying the teen to New York to have sex with him.

Amid reports of widespread sexual abuse of children in the late 1980s, several leading youth organizations began conducting criminal background checks of volunteers and staff members. Big Brothers Big Sisters ordered the checks for all volunteers starting in 1986. Boys and Girls Clubs of America recommended their use the same year. One of the nation's oldest and largest youth groups, however, was opposed — the Boy Scouts of America.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former head of the International Monetary Fund, is reportedly settling a lawsuit brought against him by a woman who accused him of sexual assault.

Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash has resigned from "Sesame Street" in the wake of an allegation that he had sex with an under-aged youth... As the announcement was made, a lawsuit was being filed in federal court in New York charging Clash with sexual abuse of a second youth. The lawsuit alleges that Cecil Singleton, then 15 and now an adult, was persuaded by Clash to meet for sexual encounters.

Jill Kelley, the Tampa socialite who triggered the scandal that brought down CIA director David Petraeus, viewed the e-mails that she got anonymously from Paula Broadwell, Petraeus' mistress, as "death threats" from someone "clearly unhinged," according to a close friend of Kelley's, the Daily News reported Tuesday.

Washington superlawyer Joseph Califano once passed a message to a client being grilled by a congressional committee that read: “Keep cool in Kabul.” That phrase has a certain piquancy now, but Califano simply wanted to calm the witness, slow the process a bit and get everyone to chill out.