Danny Puff

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The tip that led to the revelation that one of the most widely recounted U.S. sports narratives of the past year was a hoax came to the editors of an online sports blog as many of their news tips do: an unsolicited email.

That email led Deadspin.com assignment editor Timothy Burke on the hunt of a story that exposed the heart-wrenching tale of standout Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o's dead girlfriend as a fabrication, Burke said on CNN on Thursday.

Te'o sprang to national prominence last fall when the senior co-captain was seen heroically leading the Fighting Irish to an underdog victory against the Michigan State Spartans within days of learning his grandmother had died. Moreover, it was widely reported, Te'o's girlfriend had died of leukemia just hours after his grandmother's death.

From that point, Te'o's narrative was a prominent feature in coverage of the team, which has a dedicated following and whose games are televised nationally each week.

Notre Dame went on to an undefeated regular season, culminating in a berth in the national championship game, which the Fighting Irish lost to the Alabama Crimson Tide on January 7.

"We got an email last week at Deadspin.com that said 'Hey, there's something real weird about Lennay Kekua, Manti Te'o's allegedly dead girlfriend. You guys should check it out,'" Burke said.

The email prompted Burke and co-author Jack Dickey to begin searching online for background on Kekua. "So we start Googling the name Lennay Kekua. We can't find any evidence of this person that wasn't attached to stories about her being Manti Te'o's dead girlfriend."

Their investigation led about a week later to a 4,000-word expose, published Wednesday under the headline "Blarney," that painstakingly debunked the story of Kekua's existence. The story went viral online.

Within hours of its publication, officials at Notre Dame, one of the most powerful institutions in college football and U.S. collegiate athletics overall, held a hastily organized press conference to assert that Te'o had been duped in a hoax perpetrated by a friend of his.

The girlfriend, who called herself Kekua and claimed to be a Stanford University graduate, was merely an online persona who "ingratiated herself with Manti and then conspired with others to lead him to believe she had tragically died of leukemia," university spokesman Dennis Brown said in a statement.

Notre Dame Athletic Director Jack Swarbrick said the university learned of the hoax from Te'o on December 26. Te'o answered questions forthrightly and private investigators uncovered several things that pointed to Te'o being a victim in the case, Swarbrick said.

Deadspin's Burke said he remains skeptical of this being a hoax perpetrated on Te'o rather than by Te'o.

"Ask yourself why and what incentive a person would have to execute such a lengthy, time-consuming and expensive con that would involve multiple people and essentially consume his entire life just to screw around with a guy that he knows?" Burke said on CNN.

Deadspin.com said the woman whose photograph was frequently shown on TV and in news reports about Kekua was actually a young California woman who had never met or communicated with Te'o. The website declined to identify her by name.

On Thursday, TV newsmagazine "Inside Edition" said the woman in the photograph was a 23-year-old marketing professional in Los Angeles named Diane O'Meara. Inside Edition, which is syndicated by CBS Television Distribution, said O'Meara was a former classmate of one of Te'o's friends. It Aredid not give the friend's name.

In the expose published Wednesday, Deadspin.com said a friend of Te'o's named Ronaiah Tuiasosopo was "the man behind" the hoax.

Outside Tuiasosopo's home in Palmdale, California on Thursday, a member of his family who did not identify himself told reporters, "Please, we have no comment. Please respect that."

The Te'o hoax is the latest black eye Notre Dame's legendary football program has suffered in recent years.

In 2011, the school was fined $42,000 by an Indiana agency over the death of football videographer Declan Sullivan, 20, who died in October 2010 after a hydraulic lift he was using to record practice toppled over in high winds.

In 2010, Elizabeth "Lizzy" Seeberg, a freshman at nearby St. Mary's College, killed herself ten days after accusing a Notre Dame football player of sexual battery. Her family began questioning the campus police department's reluctance to gather evidence and a 15-day delay in interviewing the accused.

After a federal investigation into the matter, the school agreed to revise its policies on sexual misconduct.

(Additional reporting by Dan Burns, Dana Feldman, David Bailey and Mary Wisniewski.; Editing by Vicki Allen, Greg McCune and Andrew Hay)

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BRASILIA (Reuters) - A judge in Brazil's Rio de Janeiro state has confiscated copies of wildly-popular trilogy "Fifty Shades of Grey" and other erotic books from two stores, saying proprietors must seal the novels to prevent children leafing through them.

Police and judicial officials in the Rio town of Macae seized 64 books including 11 copies of the "Fifty Shades of Grey" series by British author E.L. James after the shops flouted Brazilian laws by failing to conceal erotic images and content deemed inappropriate for under-18s.

Officials will return the books within five days if the bookshop proprietors ensure they are sealed before being put back on display.

Judge Raphael Baddini de Queiroz Campos from the local family tribunal acted after finding a group of children gathered around a window display at one of the town's bookshops where erotic content was on display, the Rio de Janeiro justice service's web site said.

(Reporting by Peter Murphy; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

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Those airport scanners with their all-too revealing body images will soon be going away.

The Transportation Security Administration says the scanners that used a low-dose X-ray will be gone by June because the company that makes them can't fix the privacy issues. The other airport body scanners, which produce a generic outline instead of a naked image, are staying.

The government rapidly stepped up its use of body scanners after a man snuck explosives onto a flight bound for Detroit on Christmas day in 2009.

At first, both types of scanners showed travelers naked. The idea was that security workers could spot both metallic objects like guns as well as non-metallic items such as plastic explosives. The scanners also showed every other detail of the passenger's body, too.

The TSA defended the scanners, saying the images couldn't be stored and were seen only by a security worker who didn't interact with the passenger. But the scans still raised privacy concerns. Congress ordered that the scanners either produce a more generic image or be removed by June.

On Thursday Rapiscan, the maker of the X-ray, or backscatter, scanner, acknowledged that it wouldn't be able to meet the June deadline. The TSA said Friday that it ended its contract for the software with Rapiscan.

The agency's statement also said the remaining scanners will move travelers through more quickly, meaning faster lanes at the airport. Those scanners, made by L-3 Communications, used millimeter waves to make an image. The company was able to come up with software that no longer produced a naked image of a traveler's body.

The TSA will remove all 174 backscatter scanners from the 30 airports they're used in now. Another 76 are in storage. It has 669 of the millimeter wave machines it is keeping, plus options for 60 more, TSA spokesman David Castelveter said.

Not all of the machines will be replaced. Castelveter said that some airports that now have backscatter scanners will go back to having metal detectors. That's what most airports used before scanners were introduced.

The Rapiscan scanners have been on their way out for months, in slow motion.

The government hadn't bought any since 2011. It quietly removed them from seven major airports in October, including New York's LaGuardia and Kennedy airports, Chicago's O'Hare, and Los Angeles International. The TSA moved a handful of the X-ray scanners to very small airports. At the time, the agency said the switch was being made because millimeter-wave scanners moved passengers through faster.

Rapiscan parent company OSI Systems Inc. said it will help the TSA move the scanners to other government agencies. It hasn't yet been decided where they will go, said Alan Edrick, OSI's chief financial officer, in an interview.

Scanners are often used in prisons or on military bases where privacy is not a concern.

"There's quite a few agencies which will have a great deal of interest" in the scanners, Edrick said.

OSI is taking a one-time charge of $2.7 million to cover the money spent trying to develop software to blur the image, and to move the machines out of airports, Edrick said.

The contract to change the software on the scanners came under scrutiny in November when the TSA delivered a "show cause" letter to the company looking into allegations that it falsified test data, which the company denied. On Thursday it said final resolution of that issue needs approval by the Department of Homeland Security.

The agreement with the TSA is an indication that OSI Systems will be cleared of the issues raised by the agency, Roth Capital Partners analyst Jeff Martin wrote on Friday. OSI shares soared $2.37, or 3.5 percent, to close at $70.02.

Besides the scanners being dropped by TSA, Hawthorne, Calif.-based OSI Systems makes other passenger scanners used in other countries, as well as luggage scanners and medical scanners.

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(Reuters) - A Cheesecake Factory pasta dish with more than 3,000 calories - or more than a day and a half of the recommended caloric intake for an average adult - is among the headliners on this year's Xtreme Eating list of the most unhealthy dishes at U.S. chain restaurants.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer-focused nonprofit group that promotes healthier eating, compiles an annual list of "food porn" to alert consumers to menu items with eye-popping levels of calories, saturated fat, sugar and/or sodium.

"You'd think that the size of their profits depended on their increasing the size of your pants," CSPI Executive Director Michael Jacobson said of the industry's Xtreme Eating winners. The list was released on Wednesday.

CSPI for years has used the "awards" to raise awareness and drum up support for calorie disclosure on restaurant menus - something that larger chains soon will be required to do under the U.S. health reform law.

The Cheesecake Factory's Bistro Shrimp Pasta, made with a butter and cream sauce and topped with battered, fried shrimp, has 3,120 calories and 89 grams of saturated fat and 1,090 milligrams of sodium, said CSPI, which said it confirmed nutritional data with companies on the list.

Cheesecake Factory said that dish has 3,020 calories, 79 grams of saturated fat and 1,076 milligrams of sodium.

Typical adults are advised to consume no more than 20 grams of saturated fat and 1,500 milligrams of sodium per day.

"It's like eating three orders of Olive Garden's Lasagna Classico plus an order of tiramisu for dinner," CSPI said. Some in the food and beverage industries have dubbed the Washington-based group the "food police."

More than one-third of Americans are obese, and about 10 percent of the nation's healthcare bill is tied to obesity-related diseases, such as Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and hypertension, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

The nation's food and beverage industries are under increasing pressure from consumer, health and parents' groups to offer more healthy alternatives.

Restaurant companies say it is their job to give consumers choices. Many, including Cheesecake Factory, have lower-calorie sections on their menus alongside the indulgent offerings.

Cheesecake Factory is known for its ample portions and wide array of cheesecakes - many of which weigh in at around 1,000 calories per slice.

It makes regular showings on the Xtreme Eating list, but since August 2011 has promoted its "SkinnyLicious" menu of entrees with 590 or fewer calories, including salmon rolls and a pear and endive salad.

Jayne Hurley, CSPI's senior nutritionist and an author of this year's Xtreme Eating report, said such lower-calorie items should be recategorized as "normal" rather than "diet."

"It's the steady stream of high-calorie foods that sabotage your diet not just for the day, but for the entire week," Hurley said.

"The Cheesecake Factory has always been about choices. Many of our guests come in and want to celebrate and not be concerned with calories," Donald Evans, the company's chief marketing officer, said in a statement.

Evans also said Cheesecake Factory diners often share their dishes or take home leftovers.

Other Xtreme Eating winners for 2013 include:

- Johnny Rockets' Bacon Cheddar Double Hamburger with 1,770 calories, 50 grams of saturated fat and 2,380 milligrams of sodium. For comparison, three Quarter Pounders with Cheese from McDonald's have 1,570 calories.

- Cheesecake Factory's Crispy Chicken Costoletta with 2,610 calories, 89 grams of saturated fat and 2,720 milligrams of sodium. CSPI said an entire 12-piece bucket of KFC Original Recipe fried chicken has about the same number of calories but less than half the saturated fat. Cheesecake Factory told Reuters that dish has 2,560 calories, 86 grams of saturated fat and 2,767 milligrams of sodium.

- Smoothie King's Peanut Power Plus Grape Smoothie, which includes peanut butter, banana, sugar and grape juice. A 40-ounce, large size of that drink has 1,460 calories and 22 teaspoons of added sugar plus 29 teaspoons of naturally occurring sugar.

The U.S. government's Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommends that women consume no more than six teaspoons of added sugars per day and that men consume no more than nine.

- Chocolate Zuccotto Cake from Maggiano's Little Italy. One slice weighs nearly one pound and has 1,820 calories, 62 grams of saturated fat and 26 teaspoons of added sugar - or 15 Hostess Ho Hos, CSPI said.

(Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles; editing by Ros Krasny, Bob Burgdorfer and Maureen Bavdek)

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When President Barack Obama takes his oath of office to begin his second term Monday, NASA will be there.

NASA's famed "Mohawk Guy" Bobak Ferdowsi will march in Monday's Presidential Inaugural Parade on Monday (Jan. 21) along with life-size replicas of the space agency's Mars rover Curiosity and Orion space capsule.

Ferdowsi is a flight director at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory whose unique hairdo catapulted him to Internet fame after the spectacular Mars rover Curiosity landing last year.

"The things we do, the exploration we do, is not just about learning about other planets. It's about understanding our own. NASA gives us a chance to travel outside our world as a way to look back and learn about ourselves as a species as people. There's nowhere else in the world where you get to do that," Ferdowsi said in a statement.

Ferdowsi will march in the inaugural parade alongside Curiosity, the Orion spacecraft and other NASA scientists as part of the agency's official Presidential Inaugural Weekend. The $2.5 billion Curiosity rover landed on Mars on Aug. 5 to begin a two-year mission aimed at determining if the planet could have ever supported microbial life. [Obama and NASA: A Presidential Gallery]

NASA's Orion deep-space capsule the agency's first new spaceship designed by NASA since the space shuttle in the 1970s is designed to send humans farther into space than ever before. The space agency hopes the capsule will be the vessel for manned missions to asteroids, the moon and even Mars.

NASA is also hosting an open house for the agency s social media participants today (Jan. 18) in honor of the inauguration as well. The open house is available to the public without a reservation, but 75 specially chosen guests will get a reserved seat that gives them special access to various events throughout the day.

The open house will also include panel discussions with NASA astronauts and displays showing off some of the agency s accomplishments.

Telescopes will be set up outside the David M. Brown Planetarium in Arlington, Va., for a "Star Party" tomorrow (Jan. 19). Experts with NASA will speak about the future of space exploration and missions the agency already has in the works.

For NASA's full schedule of Inaugural Weekend events, click here.

You can follow SPACE.com staff writer Miriam Kramer on Twitter @mirikramer. Follow SPACE.com on Twitter @Spacedotcom. We're also on Facebook & Google+.

50 Years of Presidential Visions for Space Exploration What's Behind Mohawk Guy's Morse Code Shave? - Curiosity Update | Video Amazing Mars Rover Curiosity's Martian Views (Latest Photos) Copyright 2013 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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TOKYO/SEOUL (Reuters) - Sharp Corp has nearly halted production of 9.7-inch screens for Apple Inc's iPad, two sources said, possibly as demand shifts to its smaller iPad mini.

Sharp's iPad screen production line at its Kameyama plant in central Japan has fallen to the minimal level to keep the line running this month after a gradual slowdown began at the end of 2012 as Apple manages its inventory, the industry sources with knowledge of Sharp's production plans told Reuters.

Sharp has stopped shipping iPad panels, the people with knowledge of the near total production shutdown said. The exact level of remaining screen output at Sharp was not immediately clear but it was extremely limited, they said.

Company spokeswoman Miyuki Nakayama said: "We don't disclose production levels".

Apple officials, contacted late in the evening after normal business hours in California, did not have an immediate comment.

The sources didn't say exactly why production had nearly halted. Among the possibilities are a seasonal drop in demand, a switch to another supplier, a shift in the balance of sales to the mini iPad, or an update in the design of the product.

Macquarie Research has estimated that iPad shipments will tumble nearly 40 percent in the current quarter to about 8 million from about 13 million in the fourth quarter, although Apple's total tablet shipments will show a much smaller decrease due to strong iPad mini sales.

APPLE SHARES

Any indication that iPad sales are struggling could add to concern that the appeal of Apple products is waning after earlier media reports said it is slashing orders for iPhone 5 screens and other components from its Asian suppliers.

Those reports helped knock Apple's shares temporarily below $500 this week, the first time its stock had been below the threshold mark in almost one year.

Apple, the reports said, has asked state-managed Japan Display, Sharp and LG Display to halve supplies of iPhone panels from an initial plan for about 65 million screens in January-March. Apple is losing ground to Samsung, as well as emerging rivals including China's Huawei Technologies Co Ltd and ZTE Corp.

NO BIG CHANGE AT OTHER MAKERS

In addition to Sharp, Apple also buys iPad screens from LG Display Co Ltd, its biggest supplier, and Samsung Display, a flat-panel unit of Samsung Electronics.

Both LG Display and Samsung Display declined to comment.

A source at Samsung Display, however, said there had not been any significant change in its panel business with Apple, which has been steadily reducing panel purchases from the South Korean firm.

A person who is familiar with the situation at LG Display said iPad screen production in the current quarter had fallen from the previous quarter ending in December, mainly due to weak seasonal demand that is typical after the busy year-end holiday sales period.

Apple's iPad sales may have suffered amid a weak Christmas shopping period that hurt other consumer gadget makers as well.

CROWD OF RIVAL PRODUCTS

Apple also faces stiffening competition in tablets from a growing crowd of rival products from makers including Samsung with its Galaxy and Microsoft Corp's Surface. A consumer shift to smaller 7-inch screen devices, which Apple responded to late last year by launching its iPad mini for $329, are adding pressure.

BNP Paribas expects the iPad mini will eat into sales of the full-sized iPad, with the mini rise to 60 percent of total iPad shipments in the January-March quarter.

Looking to cut into Apple's market share in the smaller segment are Amazon.com Inc with its Kindle and Google Inc with its Nexus 7.

CEO Tim Cook, who is credited with building Apple's Asian supply chain, has overseen several gadget launches, including the iPhone 5, the latest iPad models and the iPad mini during his first year, is under pressure to deliver the kind of product innovations that wowed consumers during Steve Jobs' tenure to keep his company's profit growth stellar.

Sharp, which also supplies screens for the iPhone, has been working with its main banks on a restructuring plan after posting a $5.6 billion loss for the past fiscal year. To secure emergency financing from lenders including Mizuho Financial Group and Mitsubishi Financial Group it had mortgaged its domestic factories and offices including the one building screens for Apple.

In December, Qualcomm Inc agreed to invest as much as $120 million in Sharp and the two companies said they would work to develop new power-saving screens.

(Additional reporting by Poornima Gupta in San Francisco; Writing by Tim Kelly; Editing by Ken Wills)

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AURORA, Colo. (AP) One survivor had to pause on his way into the theater and pray. Another braced for flashbacks as he entered the auditorium where 12 people died and dozens were injured during a massacre six months earlier. Others refused to come, viewing the reopening of the multiplex as insensitive.

The former Century 16, now renovated and renamed the Century Aurora, opened its doors to victims of the July 20 attack on Thursday night with a somber remembrance ceremony and a special showing of "The Hobbit."

Theater 9, where neuroscience graduate student James Holmes allegedly opened fire on a midnight screening of "The Dark Knight Returns," is now an XD theater with a wall-to-wall screen and stadium seating.

"We as a community have not been defeated," Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan told victims, officials, and dozens of police officers and other first responders who filled half the theater's seats at the ceremony.

"We are a community of survivors," Hogan declared. "We will not let this tragedy define us."

Pierce O'Farrill, who was wounded three times in the shooting, made a point of finding his old seat in the second row of the theater. "It was just a part of closure, just going back to that spot where, obviously, I was in the most pain I'd ever felt in in my life," said O'Farrill, who was hit three times and had to be carried out by the SWAT team, past the shooter's discarded rifle.

Holmes is charged with 166 felony counts, mostly murder and attempted murder for the shooting. A judge has ordered him to stand trial, but he won't enter a plea until March.

The reopening comes nearly six months after the attack and a week after many victims sat through a three-day hearing at which prosecutors described the attack in excruciating detail

Several families boycotted what they called a callous public relations ploy by the theater's owner, Cinemark. They claimed the Texas-based company didn't ask them what should happen to the theater. They said Cinemark emailed them an invitation to Thursday's reopening just two days after they struggled through Christmas without their loved ones.

"It was boilerplate Hollywood 'Come to our movie screening,'" said Anita Busch, whose cousin, 23-year-old college student Micayla Medek, died at the theater.

Victims have filed at least three federal lawsuits against Cinemark Holdings Inc., alleging it should have provided security for the July 20 midnight showing of "The Dark Knight Rises," and that the exit door used by the gunman to get his weapons and re-enter should have had an alarm. In court papers, Cinemark says the tragedy was "unforeseeable and random."

"We certainly recognize all the different paths that people take to mourn, the different paths that people take to recover from unimaginable, incomprehensible loss," Gov. John Hickenlooper said at the ceremony.

"Some wanted this theater to reopen. Some didn't. Certainly both answers are correct," Hickenlooper said.

The governor credited Cinemark CEO Tim Warner for flying to Colorado after hearing about the shooting to see what he could do.

Warner told attendees that the caring response to the tragedy by first responders, the community and the world was a testament that good triumphs over evil.

Samuel Aquila, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Denver, concluded the ceremony with a prayer for the dead and the living.

"All of us in some small way suffered in your suffering," Aquila told the crowd. "The way of peace means rejecting the violence of that night."

Cinemark planned to offer free movies at the multiplex to the public over the weekend, then permanently reopen it Jan. 25. Throughout the evening, police officers and security guards turned away people who drove up asking how they could get tickets to the upcoming free shows.

The decision to reopen even divided at least one victim's family.

Tom Sullivan, whose son, Alex, was killed, attended the event.

"The community wants the theater back and by God, it's back," Sullivan said. "Nobody is going to stop us from living our lives the way that we lived our lives before. This is where I live."

Alex's widow, Cassandra Sullivan, joined the boycott. So did Tom Teves, whose own son, Alex, also was killed.

"They can do whatever they want. I think it was pretty callous," Teves said.

Adam Witt, who was grazed in the shoulder during the attack, was expecting flashbacks when he walked into the theater Thursday night. He and his wife Tiffany were pleasantly surprised at how unfamiliar the renovated space seemed.

"It was strange but oddly reassuring," said Tiffany Witt, 24. "The way it looks different -- it gives us the feeling that we're moving on from what happened."

Marcus Weaver struggled to keep his emotions under control as he walked through the multiplex lobby. On July 20 he was shot in the arm and his friend Rebecca Wingo was killed. Thursday night he had to stop and pray before entering the theater.

He was glad he did. Inside he saw the woman with whom he had shared a terrifying ambulance ride on July 20, and another woman from his church whom he hadn't even realized had been in the auditorium that night.

"There was so much love in that room, it conquered all the ill feeling I had," said Weaver, 42, who wore a shirt bearing Wingo's name and image. "The shooter, he can't win. This community is way stronger."

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Associated Press writers Nicholas Riccardi and Colleen Slevin contributed to this report.

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PARK CITY, Utah (AP) Diversity is king at the Sundance Film Festival and queen, too.

For the first time, half of the films featured at the festival were made by women.

Festival founder Robert Redford opened the event Thursday and said "diversity is the point" of the independent film showcase, further evidenced by contributions from 32 countries and 51 first-time filmmakers this year. The chorus of voices represented at Sundance "reflects the times we're in," he said.

"What Sundance stands for is giving new voices and new filmmakers an opportunity to be seen and heard," Redford said in an interview. "We show what's there, and what comes up will usually give you an indication of changing times."

Redford, along with festival director John Cooper and Sundance Institute director Keri Putnam, opened the 11-day festival with a news conference at the Egyptian Theatre in Park City, Utah, Sundance's home since 1981.

The films featured at the festival, like all art, reflect and inspire change, Redford told reporters.

"The festival, being as diverse as it is, shows all kinds of content, and that gives the audience a chance to choose," he said. "That's not quite so available in the main marketplace."

One of the most significant changes he's noticed over his years in filmmaking is the role sex plays on screen. Several of the festival films deal with sex: "Lovelace" looks at porn star Linda Lovelace, "Interior. Leather Bar." examines the gay, S&M leather-bar scene in the early '80s, "Two Mothers" follows a pair of friends who have affairs with each other's (adult) sons, and "Kink" is about the business of bondage and discipline pornography.

"When I got into the film business in the early '60s, it was a romantic time. Sex and romance were pretty well tied together," Redford said. "Now, 40, 50 years later, we see that sexual relations have moved to a place where it doesn't feel like there's so much romance involved. ... Relations have changed, and they've changed because of changing times and because of new technology. People are texting rather than dating and all that kind of stuff.

"We just show what's there. We don't predict anything. We don't shape anything. ... We might be agents for change, but we're not shape-shifters. So there you have sexual relations and you look at how sex is treated today: It's just simply a reflection of the times we're living in and nothing more."

One conservative group isn't pleased with the sexual content and suggested the state of Utah cease its financial support of the festival. But Redford isn't worried.

"We either ignore them or remind them that it's a free country and they should maybe look at the Constitution," he said.

Meanwhile, with recent attention on gun violence and what role Hollywood might play, Redford said the conversation ought to continue, noting that President Ronald Reagan was shot at the same year the Sundance Festival began.

"Now, 30 years later, it's absolutely not only appropriate, but overdue to have a dialogue," he said.

He added that he has a question for the film industry after seeing two movie billboards in Los Angeles that prominently feature guns: "Does my industry think that guns will help sell tickets?"

One of the documentaries in competition this year, "Valentine Road," deals with the 2008 school shooting of an eighth-grader in California by a fellow classmate.

"It all the sudden has a new resonance," said Cooper, noting that the film was selected before last month's school shooting in Newtown, Conn. "We chose it because it's an amazing movie."

The festival begins in earnest Thursday night with screenings of four films. Screenings, workshops, parties and schmoozing will continue through Jan. 27. Cooper, whose staff culled the 119 festival offerings from thousands of submissions, said he can't wait for audiences to see the selections.

"I just want to get this thing started," he said. "I feel like I'm sitting on a powder keg of talent that needs to explode."

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AP Entertainment Writer Sandy Cohen is tweeting from Sundance. Follow her at http://www.twitter.com/APSandy .

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Online:

http://www.sundance.org/festival/

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CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts (Reuters) - Former Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, owner of a bankrupt video game company, plans to auction off a blood-stained sock he wore in the historic 2004 World Series championship.

The sock, worn by Schilling in Game Two of the first World Series won by the Red Sox in 86 years, is expected to fetch more than $100,000 when it hits the auction block next month, Chris Ivy, director of sports at Heritage Auctions in Dallas, said on Thursday.

Schilling took the mound after having an unorthodox surgical procedure done on his injured right ankle, enabling him to pitch in Game Two of the team's four-game sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals.

The sock had been on display at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, since 2004, Ivy said.

Online bidding for the sock will open at $25,000 on February 4, followed by a live auction in New York on February 23, he said.

Last year, the state of Rhode Island sued Schilling and the former head of a state economic development agency over a $75 million loan guarantee the agency made to 38 Studios, a failed video game company owned by the retired baseball player.

The quasi-public agency made the loan in 2010 to lure Schilling, who promised to bring 450 jobs to the economically depressed state from neighboring Massachusetts. The deal was brokered by former Rhode Island governor Donald Carcieri.

38 Studios filed for bankruptcy in June, leaving Rhode Island taxpayers responsible for repaying roughly $100 million, including interest, to private investors who had bought bonds the state issued on behalf of the company.

The lawsuit charges some of the defendants committed larceny and permitted the video game company to rely on financial assumptions that were based on "known false assumptions."

(Editing by Barbara Goldberg and David Gregorio)

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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant and his wife, Vanessa, have reconciled and are no longer planning to divorce, the couple said in separate posts on social media sites.

Bryant, widely considered one of the greatest players ever in the National Basketball Association, and his wife filed for divorce in December 2011 after 10 years of marriage.

But they had been seen out together in recent weeks, leading to speculation about a possible reunion. They have two daughters, aged 10 and 6.

"I am happy to say that Vanessa and I are moving on with our lives together as a family," Bryant wrote on Facebook on Friday.

Vanessa Bryant posted a statement on her Instagram page that read: "We are pleased to announce that we have reconciled. Our divorce action will be dismissed."

In 2003, Bryant was accused of sexual assault by an employee at a Colorado hotel. He denied the allegations, and charges were dropped after the woman refused to testify.

Vanessa Bryant, who married the Lakers star in April 2001, stayed with her husband during that scandal.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Tim Gaynor and Peter Cooney)

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