Danny Puff

TORONTO (Reuters) - Canada's main stock index opened lower on Thursday, weighed down by Potash Corp after its fourth-quarter profit fell and an 11 percent drop in Research In Motion Ltd the day after the BlackBerry maker released a new line of phones.

The Toronto Stock Exchange's S&P/TSX composite index was down 35.22 points, or 0.28 percent, at 12,759.22 shortly after the open.

(Reporting by John Tilak; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson)

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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A California man who has admitted to fabricating Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o's girlfriend in an elaborate hoax and playing her part over the phone told talk show host Phil McGraw he felt a deep romantic love for Te'o, McGraw said on Wednesday.

"Here we have a young man that fell deeply, romantically in love," McGraw told the television morning show "Today" to discuss his two part interview with Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, which will air on "Dr. Phil" on Thursday and Friday.

"I asked him straight up, 'Was this a romantic relationship with you?,' and he says yes. I said, 'Are you then therefore gay?' And he said, 'When you put it that way, yes.' And then he caught himself and said, 'I am confused,'" McGraw told "Today."

Te'o has said in a previous media interview he is not gay.

The fake girlfriend hoax involving Te'o, who was a finalist for college football's highest individual honour the Heisman trophy, caused a sensation when it was revealed earlier this month on news website Deadspin.com.

Tuiasosopo says he played the part of Lennay Kekua, the fictitious woman who was Te'o's girlfriend in the hoax. Te'o, 22, had spoken about the woman in media interviews, and reports described her surviving a car accident and then dying of leukaemia in September.

Te'o has said since the hoax was exposed that he was the victim of an elaborate prank, that he never met Kekua and that his acquaintance Tuiasosopo admitted to him that he was the one who played the part of Lennay.

Dr. Phil said in a segment on "Today" on Wednesday that after an extensive interview with Tuiasosopo, he believes Te'o had no role in creating the hoax.

"Absolutely, unequivocally, no," McGraw said, in pinning the blame for the scheme on Tuiasosopo.

The NBC morning program also showed some comments Tuiasosopo made in his interview for the "Dr. Phil" daytime program.

"There are many times where Manti and Lennay had broken up," Tuiasosopo told "Dr. Phil."

"But something would bring them back together, whether it was something going on in his life or in Lennay's life, in this case in my life," Tuiasosopo said.

Tuiasosopo, 22, is from southern California and played high school football in 2005 at Antelope Valley High north of Los Angeles, according to media reports. Tuaisosopo's attorney had previously told reporters his client was behind the hoax.

Before the hoax was exposed, a photo of a woman who was described as Lennay Kekua was presented in media reports about Te'o and his struggles to overcome her death and that of his grandmother, who actually did pass away.

But the photo of Kekua was taken from a Facebook profile of a California woman who said she was unaware of the scheme, according to Deadspin.com.

Te'o told Katie Couric in a broadcast of her show "Katie" last week that he received a telephone call from the person claiming to be Kekua on December 6 - two days before the Heisman presentation. But he said he was not really certain she never existed until Tuiasosopo's later confession to him.

The linebacker, during the Katie Couric interview, presented a voice mail he received from the person he said he thought was Kekua. "Doesn't that sound like a girl?" Te'o told Couric.

Te'o also told Couric he is not gay. "No, far from it," he said.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Andrew Hay)

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LOS ANGELES (AP) Lindsay Lohan briefly appeared in court Wednesday for the first time in nearly a year and left with a new attorney, new trial date and new judge.

Superior Court Judge Stephanie Sautner shook her head when she saw Lohan seated with her attorney, just months after the judge had warned the "Liz and Dick" star to grow up and stay out of trouble.

The actress was required to attend the pretrial hearing involving three misdemeanor counts filed after a car crash last summer. Lohan has pleaded not guilty to lying to police, reckless driving and obstructing officers from performing their duties.

Sautner previously sent her to jail, placed her under house arrest and forced her to perform morgue cleanup duty in another case.

Sautner warned Lohan on Wednesday that she could face jail time for a possible probation violation, even if she is acquitted of the counts filed after her sports car crashed into a dump truck.

Lohan was on probation at the time of the wreck and could be sentenced to 245 days in jail if a judge determines her actions in the crash were a violation of her sentence in a theft case.

Sautner, however, won't be handling Lohan's upcoming case. The judge said she is retiring before the next court hearing on March 1. Lohan will not be required to attend that hearing.

Lohan's new trial date is March 18.

Lohan was accompanied to court by her new attorney, Mark Heller, who said he wanted to get the case resolved as quickly as possible.

The judge quipped that it would only solve her legal trouble "on this coast" a reference to her two arrests in New York since being released from supervised probation in Los Angeles in March. No charges have been filed in those cases.

Heller, a New York attorney, was granted permission to handle Lohan's California cases. He said he was meeting with prosecutors to determine how to proceed.

Sautner gave him more time by delaying the trial but said, "This is not the most complex case we've ever seen."

Lohan appeared in court in a black dress. She spoke only briefly to confirm that she was switching attorneys and no longer wanted her longtime lawyer, Shawn Holley, to represent her.

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Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Actress Lindsay Lohan will stand trial on March 18 on charges she lied to California police about a June car crash and violated probation, raising the possibility she could be sent back to jail.

A judge in Los Angeles on Wednesday set the trial date on charges related to the car crash and said the court will hold a hearing at the same time on whether Lohan in the incident violated probation from a 2011 jewelry theft.

The star of the movie "Mean Girls," who has been in and out of rehab and jail since 2007, wore a black sleeveless dress and looked tired at the brief court hearing. She arrived in Los Angeles late Tuesday from New York and has abandoned her longtime lawyer in favor of new attorney Mark Heller.

Lohan has pleaded not guilty to three misdemeanor charges of reckless driving, lying to police and obstructing police when she said she was not behind the wheel of her sports car, which smashed into a truck in Santa Monica, California in June.

Lohan, 26, left court without speaking to the media.

The former "Parent Trap" child star has been in and out of trouble since a 2007 arrest for drunk driving and cocaine possession.

Sautner warned Lohan that she could be found in violation of probation even if she is acquitted on charges connected to the car crash because the standard of proof is lower.

Lohan was ordered to appear at Wednesday's hearing because she decided to switch lawyers, firing longtime attorney Shawn Holley this month.

She was arrested in New York on a misdemeanor assault charge on the same day in November that the Santa Monica car crash charges were filed. The Manhattan district attorney's office has not filed a criminal complaint in the assault case.

Lohan's appearance in Los Angeles had been in doubt after Heller wrote to the court earlier this week saying was suffering from an upper respiratory infection and could not appear.

"Glad to see you're feeling better," Judge Stephanie Sautner told Lohan at the hearing.

(Reporting by Eric Kelsey, editing by Jill Serjeant and Cynthia Osterman)

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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A California man who has admitted to fabricating Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o's fake girlfriend in an elaborate hoax told talk show host Phil McGraw he felt a deep romantic love for the football player, McGraw said on Wednesday.

"Here we have a young man that fell deeply, romantically in love," McGraw told the television morning show "Today" to discuss his two part interview with Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, which will air on "Dr. Phil" on Thursday and Friday.

"I asked him straight up, 'Was this a romantic relationship with you?,' and he says yes. I said, 'Are you then therefore gay?' And he said, 'When you put it that way, yes.' And then he caught himself and said, 'I am confused,'" McGraw told "Today."

Te'o has said in a previous media interview he is not gay.

The fake girlfriend hoax involving Te'o, who was a finalist for college football's highest individual honor the Heisman trophy, caused a sensation when it was revealed earlier this month on news website Deadspin.com.

Tuiasosopo says he played the part over the phone of Lennay Kekua, the fictitious woman who was Te'o's girlfriend in the hoax. Te'o, 22, had spoken about the woman in media interviews, and reports described her surviving a car accident and then dying of leukemia in September.

Te'o has said since the hoax was exposed that he was the victim of an elaborate prank, that he never met Kekua and that his acquaintance Tuiasosopo admitted to him that he was the one who played the part of Lennay.

Dr. Phil said in a segment on "Today" on Wednesday that after an extensive interview with Tuiasosopo, he believes Te'o had no role in creating the hoax.

"Absolutely, unequivocally, no," McGraw said, in pinning the blame for the scheme on Tuiasosopo.

The NBC morning program also showed some comments Tuiasosopo made in his interview for the "Dr. Phil" daytime program.

"There are many times where Manti and Lennay had broken up," Tuiasosopo told "Dr. Phil."

"But something would bring them back together, whether it was something going on in his life or in Lennay's life, in this case in my life," Tuiasosopo said.

Tuiasosopo, 22, is from southern California and played high school football in 2005 at Antelope Valley High north of Los Angeles, according to media reports. Tuaisosopo's attorney had previously told reporters his client was behind the hoax.

Before the hoax was exposed, a photo of a woman who was described as Lennay Kekua was presented in media reports about Te'o and his struggles to overcome her death and that of his grandmother, who actually did pass away.

But the photo of Kekua was taken from a Facebook profile of a California woman who said she was unaware of the scheme, according to Deadspin.com.

Te'o told Katie Couric in a broadcast of her show "Katie" last week that he received a telephone call from the person claiming to be Kekua on December 6 - two days before the Heisman presentation. But he said he was not really certain she never existed until Tuiasosopo's later confession to him.

The linebacker, during the Katie Couric interview, presented a voice mail he received from the person he said he thought was Kekua. "Doesn't that sound like a girl?" Te'o told Couric.

Te'o also told Couric he is not gay. "No, far from it," he said.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Andrew Hay)

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NEW YORK (AP) An online auction of Andy Warhol's works will give a broader audience the chance to own a piece of his pop art.

It is Christie's International's first online-only Warhol sale. About 125 paintings, drawings, photographs and prints will be offered from Feb. 26 through March 5. Pre-sale estimates range from $600 to $70,000.

The auction is being held in partnership with The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

The works can be previewed online before the sale.

Bidders can browse, bid and receive instant updates by email or phone if another bid exceeds theirs.

The first live auction raised $17 million for the Warhol Foundation's endowment.

Warhol is famous for his silk screened images of celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe and detailed renderings of Campbell's Soup cans.

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Online: www.christies.com/warhol

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TOKYO (AP) Nintendo's president Thursday ruled out price cuts for its new Wii U home console as a way to boost sales, vowing to become profitable again in its core businesses as smartphones and tablets increasingly threaten specialized game machines.

Satoru Iwata, speaking at a Tokyo hotel to investors and reporters a day after earnings were released, acknowledged the sales momentum for the Wii U, as well as the 3DS hand-held game machine, had run out of steam during the key year-end shopping season, especially in the U.S.

But he said no price cuts were in the works. Price cuts are common in the gaming industry to woo buyers, but the move can backfire by trimming revenue. The Wii U now sells for about $300 in the U.S. and 25,000 yen in Japan.

"We are already offering it at a good price," he said.

Iwata said he expects operating profit of more than 100 billion yen in the 12 months ending March 2014, promising that as "a commitment."

But he acknowledged more work was needed to have consumers understand the Wii U, which went on sale globally late last year, as well as producing more game software to draw buyers.

All game machines have suffered in recent years from the advent of smartphones and other mobile devices that have become more sophisticated and offer games and other forms of entertainment.

Nintendo returned to net profit for the April-December period of 2012 from deep losses the previous year, but that was due to a perk from a weaker yen, which helps Japanese exporters such as Nintendo.

Its operating result, which removes currency fluctuations, was a loss of 5.86 billion yen ($64 million), and Nintendo expects that to swell to a 20 billion yen ($220 million) loss for the full business year ending March 2013 as sales of its game consoles fall short of expectations.

Iwata said Nintendo is preparing more game software, including those developed in-house, for the end of this year.

Kyoto-based Nintendo, which makes Super Mario and Pokemon games, lowered its full year sales forecast Wednesday to 670 billion yen ($7.4 billion) from 810 billion yen ($8.9 billion). It also said it was going to sell fewer Wii U consoles for the fiscal year through March than its previous projection. The Wii U has a touch-screen tablet controller called GamePad and a TV-watching feature called TVii.

The company forecasts it will sell 4 million Wii U consoles for the current fiscal year, ending March 31, down from its earlier estimate of 5.5 million units. The Wii U, which went on sale late last year, was the first major new game console to arrive in stores in years.

Nintendo, also behind the Donkey Kong and Zelda games, lowered its full year sales forecast for Wii U game software units to 16 million from 24 million.

Iwata said last year holiday sales quickly dissipated in the U.S. and some European nations, including Great Britain, the key market. He said the U.S. home console sales were the worst for Nintendo in nearly a decade.

He said Nintendo needs hit games to push console sales, and the company remains confident Wii U will prove more popular with time.

"The chicken-and-game problem has not been solved," he said of the need for both game software and machine hardware.

"I feel a deep sense of responsibility for not being able to produce results for our year-end business," said Iwata.

He declined to say what he would do if the company failed to attain the promised operating profits.

Nintendo sank into a loss the previous fiscal year largely because of price cuts for its hand-held 3DS game machine, which shows three-dimensional imagery without special glasses. That machine is also struggling in most global markets.

Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo's famed game designer, said what was missing were games for the Wii U that made its appeal clear. The progress in smartphones has also posed a challenge for Nintendo, he said.

"People have to try it to see it is fun," Miyamoto said of Wii U.

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Follow Yuri Kageyama on Twitter at www.twitter.com/yurikageyama

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Research In Motion Ltd. showed off two new BlackBerry phones on Wednesday. They will run the new BlackBerry 10 operating system. Here's how the phones compare with Apple's iPhone 5 and Samsung's Galaxy S III.

BlackBerry Z10 tech specs:

Display: 4.2-inch (diagonal) with a resolution of 1280 by 768 pixels (356 pixels per inch)

Keyboard: Touch screen only

Memory capacity: 16 gigabytes, expandable with microSD card of up to 32 gigabytes.

Price: Varies by carrier, some of which have yet to announce details. Verizon Wireless says it will sell it for $200 with a two-year service agreement.

Size: height: 5.12 inches; width: 2.58 inches; depth: 0.35 inch (130 x 65.6 x 9 mm)

Weight: 4.78 ounces (135.4 grams)

Cameras: 8-megapixel camera on back, 2-megapixel on front.

Video recording: high-definition for rear camera (1080p comparable to the resolution of a 40-inch flat panel TV); lower resolution for front (720p)

Battery life: talk time is up to 10 hours on 3G. Up to 60 hours of audio playback and 11 hours of video playback. Battery can be replaced by user with a spare.

U.S. wireless carriers: Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile and others.

Operating system: BlackBerry 10

Near-field communications: A chip lets the phone act as a credit card at some payment terminals and share data wirelessly when tapped against some other phones.

Availability: In U.S. in March. Varies elsewhere, including U.K. on Thursday, Canada on Feb. 5 and Latin America by end of March.

BlackBerry Q10 tech specs:

Display: 3.1-inch (diagonal) with a resolution of 720 by 720 pixels (330 pixels per inch)

Keyboard: Touch-screen and 35-key physical keyboards. Physical keyboard will have back light, with language-specific keyboards such as QWERTY and AZERTY depending on market.

Memory capacity: 16 gigabytes, expandable with microSD card of up to 64 gigabytes.

Price: Not yet announced.

Size: height: 4.71 inches; width: 2.63 inches; depth: 0.41 inch (119.6 x 66.8 x 10.35 mm)

Weight: 4.90 ounces (139 grams)

Cameras: 8-megapixel camera on back, 2-megapixel on front.

Video recording: high-definition for rear camera (1080p comparable to the resolution of a 40-inch flat panel TV); lower resolution for front (720p)

Battery life: Not yet announced.

U.S. wireless carriers: AT&T, Sprint and others.

Operating system: BlackBerry 10

Near-field communications: A chip lets the phone act as a credit card at some payment terminals and share data wirelessly when tapped against some other phones.

Availability: In some markets in April, but unknown when it will be available in the U.S.

iPhone 5 tech specs:

Display: 4-inch (diagonal) with a resolution of 1136 by 640 pixels (326 pixels per inch).

Keyboard: Touch screen only

Memory capacity: 16, 32 or 64 gigabytes, depending on price. There's no way to expand it with memory cards.

Price: Starting at $199, for 16 gigabytes of memory.

Size: height: 4.87 inches; width: 2.31 inches; depth: 0.30 inch (124 x 59 x 7.6 mm)

Weight: 3.95 ounces (112 grams)

Cameras: 8-megapixel camera on back, 1.2-megapixel on front.

Video recording: high-definition (1080p comparable to the resolution of a 40-inch flat panel TV) up to 30 frames per second with audio

Battery life: talk time is up to 8 hours on 3G. Internet works for up to 8 hours on LTE and up to 10 hours on Wi-Fi. Up to 10 hours of video playback. Battery can be replaced by service personnel only.

U.S. wireless carriers: Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel and others.

Operating system: Apple's iOS 6

Near-field communications: None.

Availability: Sept. 21, 2012, initially in U.S. and selected markets. Expanded throughout the world in subsequent months.

Samsung Galaxy S III tech specs:

Display: 4.8 inches (diagonal) with a resolution of 1280 by 720 pixels (306 pixels per inch).

Keyboard: Touch screen only

Memory capacity: 16 or 32 gigabytes. Can be expanded by up to 64 gigabytes with a memory card.

Price: As low as $99 for basic model, though carriers typically charge $199 with two-year contract.

Size: height: 5.4 inches; width: 2.8 inches; depth: 0.34 inch (137 x 71 x 8.6mm)

Weight: 4.7 ounces. (133 grams)

Cameras: 8-megapixel camera on back, 1.9-megapixel on front.

Video recording: high-definition (1080p comparable to the resolution of a 40-inch flat panel TV) up to 30 frames per second with audio.

Battery life: Up to 9 hours of talk time (depends on network). Battery replaceable by user.

U.S. wireless carriers: Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile and others.

Operating system: Ice Cream Sandwich version of Google's Android (at release).

Near-field communications: A chip lets the phone act as a credit card at some payment terminals and share data wirelessly when tapped against some other phones.

Availability: Worldwide, including U.S. in June 2012 and Europe in May 2012.

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NEW YORK (Reuters) - Research In Motion Ltd on Wednesday unveiled the long-delayed line of smartphones it hopes will put it on the comeback trail, but it disappointed investors by saying U.S. sales of its all-new BlackBerry 10 devices will not start until March, sending its share price tumbling 12 percent.

Chief Executive Thorsten Heins also announced that RIM was abandoning the name it has used since its inception in 1985 to take the name of its signature product, signaling his hopes for a fresh start for the company that pioneered on-your-hip email.

"From this point forward, RIM becomes BlackBerry," Heins said at the New York launch. "It is one brand; it is one promise."

RIM, which is already starting to call itself BlackBerry, had initially planned to launch the new BlackBerry 10 devices a year ago. But it pushed the release date back twice as it struggled to perfect a new operating system.

Ahead of Wednesday's announcements, analysts had said that any launch after February would be a black mark for the Canada-based company.

"The biggest disappointment was the delay in the U.S., that it will take so long before the devices get going there," said Eric Jackson, founder and managing Partner at Ironfire Capital LLC in New York.

Heins said the delays reflected the need for U.S. carrier testing, although carrier AT&T Inc offered few clues on what that meant. Instead, the carrier merely stated it was enthusiastic about the devices and would announce availability, pricing and other information at a later date.

"Carriers in all other parts of the world get their devices through the testing process significantly faster than the U.S. carriers do," said John Jackson, an analyst at IDC, adding that the U.S. process can often take "weeks" longer.

Nevertheless investors were extremely disappointed with the delay and RIM shares on the Nasdaq ended the day 12 percent lower at $13.78. Its Toronto-listed shares fell by almost the same margin to close at C$13.86.

RIM launched its first BlackBerry back in 1999 as a way for busy executives to stay in touch with their clients and their offices, and the company quickly cornered the market for secure corporate and government emails.

But its star faded as competition rose and the BlackBerry is now a far-behind also-ran in the race for market share, with a 3.4 percent global showing in the fourth quarter - down from 20 percent three years before. Its North American market share is even smaller - a mere 2 percent in the fourth quarter.

RIM shares have tumbled along with the company's market share and the stock is down 90 percent since its 2008 peak. Despite the pullback on Wednesday, RIM's share price has more than doubled over the last four months, reflecting the growing buzz about its new devices.

TOUCH COMPETITION

The new BlackBerry 10 phones will compete with Apple's iPhone and devices using Google's Android technology, both of which have soared above the BlackBerry in a competitive market.

The BlackBerry 10 devices boast fast browsers, new features, smart cameras and - unlike previous BlackBerry models - enter the market primed with a large application library, including services such as Skype and the popular game Angry Birds.

The BlackBerry Z10 touchscreen device, in black or white, will be the first to hit the market, with a country-by-country rollout that starts in Britain on Thursday.

A Q10 model, equipped with a small "qwerty" keyboard that RIM made into its trademark, will launch globally in April.

"I'm still confident that a lot of the subscriber base are going to want the upgrade to BlackBerry 10. It's a very strong improvement over what they currently have. This is not going to cause mass defections from iOS and Android, but it doesn't have to be a success for RIM. You've got to start somewhere," said Jackson of Ironfire, which owns shares in RIM.

The Z10 device won a lukewarm review from The Wall Street Journal's tech blogger Walt Mossberg, who complained of a shortage of apps.

On the other hand, David Pogue, who writes for The New York Times, apologized for describing BlackBerry as doomed in the past. The Z10 touchscreen device was "lovely, fast and efficient, bristling with fresh, useful ideas," he said.

While technology analysts conceded that RIM has done quite a remarkable job on many of the features of BlackBerry 10 and on the array of its app selection for a new platform, many argue it will be a very tough slog for RIM to regain its crown.

"I don't think that RIM will return to its glory days," said Charles Golvin, analyst at Forrester Research. "Success for them looks like staunching the bleeding and clawing back a percentage or point or two of market share."

Announcements about pricing so far have been in line with expectations. U.S. carrier Verizon Wireless said the phone would cost $199 for a two-year contract, while Canada's Rogers Communications is quoting C$149 ($150) for certain three-year plans.

GLITZY LAUNCH

RIM picked a range of venues for its global launch parties, including Dubai's $650-a-night Armani Hotel, which occupies six floors of the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest tower.

The New York event took place in a sprawling basketball facility on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, just north of the Manhattan Bridge. The BlackBerry has been "Re-designed. Re-engineered. Re-invented," RIM said.

RIM, which is splurging on a Super Bowl ad to promote its new phones, also introduced Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Alicia Keys as its global creative director.

"I was in a long-term relationship with BlackBerry and then I started to notice some new, kind of hotter, attractive, sexier phones at the gym, and I kind of broke up with you for something that had a little more bling," Keys said at the New York launch.

"But I always missed the way you organized my life and the way you were there for me at my job, and so I started to have two phones - I was kind of playing the field. But then ... you added a lot more features ... and now, we're exclusively dating again, and I'm very happy," she said.

($1=$1.0029 Canadian)

(Writing by Janet Guttsman; editing by Frank McGurty, Lisa Von Ahn, Peter Galloway, G Crosse)

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MIDLAND CITY, Alabama (Reuters) - The gunman suspected of fatally shooting an Alabama school bus driver before holing up in an underground bunker with a young child is a Vietnam veteran with anti-government views, authorities and an organization that tracks hate groups said on Wednesday.

Law enforcement officials from multiple agencies were bivouacked near the bunker in Midland City but offered few details about an overnight standoff with the shooter that stretched into Wednesday evening.

Authorities said driver Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, was killed after the gunman boarded a bus ferrying more than 20 children home from school on Tuesday.

The suspect demanded the driver let a student off the bus, Alabama media reported. When Poland refused, the man boarded the bus and shot the driver before taking a 6-year-old kindergarten student and fleeing the scene.

On Wednesday, the gunman remained holed up with the boy in the underground bunker on his property down a dirt road. Dale County Coroner Woodrow Hilboldt said the man and child were barricaded in "some kind of a tornado bunker."

The shooting comes as national debate rages over gun violence, especially in schools, after a gunman shot dead 20 students and six staff members at a Connecticut elementary school last month.

Schools in the area of the Alabama shooting were closed on Wednesday and will remain shuttered for the rest of the week.

Dale County Superintendent Donny Bynum lauded Poland as "a hero...who gave his life to protect 21 students who are now home safely with their families."

The superintendent's assistant said the young boy still being held by the gunman appeared to have been chosen at random.

"Emotions are high, and it's a struggle for us all to make sense of something so senseless, but let us keep this young student, his family and Mr. Poland's family in our thoughts and prayers," Bynum said in a statement.

Reuters could not independently verify the gunman's identity. The Southern Poverty Law Center reported on its Hatewatch blog that a chief investigator with the Dale County Sheriff's Office identified the gunman as 65-year-old Jimmy Lee Dykes.

Investigator Tim Byrd said Dykes' friends and neighbors described him as a "survivalist" who did not trust the government, according to the law center blog.

"He was standoffish, didn't socialize or have any contact with anybody," Byrd told Hatewatch.

Dykes had not been on the law center's radar before the shooting and standoff, and there was nothing to suggest he was a member of any hate group, said senior fellow Mark Potok.

"What it looks like is that he's some kind of anti-government radical and survivalist," Potok told Reuters. "And exactly what that means, we don't know."

Court records show Dykes had been due to appear for a bench trial on Wednesday following his arrest last month on a menacing charge.

James Edward Davis told CNN the arrest stemmed from an altercation he had with Dykes that ended with Dykes allegedly firing two gunshots from a pistol, as Davis sped off in his car.

"He fired the gun twice," said Davis, adding that he had a child inside the vehicle when the shooting occurred.

Neighbors told the Dothan Eagle newspaper they also had seen Dykes walk around his yard late at night with a shotgun and flashlight. Ronda Wilbur, who lives across the street from Dykes, said he once beat her family dog with a lead pipe. The dog later died from his injuries, she said.

(Reporting by Kaija Wilkinson in Mobile, Alabama; Additional reporting and writing by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Tom Brown and Andrew Hay)

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