In the Nation

WASHINGTON - Disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff told a federal judge that his lifestyle of trading expensive gifts for political favors crossed the line, even by Washington standards, but said he was "not a bad man" and pleaded for leniency.

Abramoff, the central figure in a corruption scandal that shook up Washington politics, is due to be sentenced today. In a letter to the court yesterday, he said that even he was shocked to look back on what his life had become.

"It is amazing for me to see how far I strayed and how I did not see it at the time," he wrote. He is serving a nearly six-year prison term for a fraudulent Florida casino deal. He faces up to 11 years in prison when sentenced today for corrupting Capitol Hill lawmakers with golf junkets and other gifts. But prosecutors are asking for a much more lenient sentence.

- AP

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - The owners of The Station nightclub, where a 2003 fire killed 100 people, have reached a tentative $813,000 settlement with survivors and victims' relatives, the latest in a flurry of agreements made in the last year to resolve lawsuits.

The settlement offer from Jeffrey and Michael Derderian, revealed in court papers yesterday, will be covered by their insurance policy; the brothers have received bankruptcy protection that shielded them from lawsuits.

More than $175 million has now been offered by dozens of defendants to the more than 300 people suing over the fire at the West Warwick club, which began when a band's pyrotechnics ignited cheap packaging foam the Derderians had installed as soundproofing.

The brothers did not admit any wrongdoing under the settlement, but have apologized in court to victims.

- AP

WASHINGTON - The United States admitted fewer Iraqi refugees in August than in the previous record-setting month but remains on pace to meet the Bush administration's goal of 12,000 by the end of September.

The State Department said yesterday that 2,183 Iraqi refugees entered the country last month, vs. 2,352 in July.

August's figure brings the number of Iraqi refugees accepted into the United States to 10,998 since the budget year began Oct. 1. This means the administration needs to accept only 1,002 more refugees in September to reach 12,000. August was the fourth straight month in which admissions surpassed the administration's target of 1,000 refugees a month.

The Bush administration has been criticized for its performance on admitting Iraqi refugees since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

- AP

Authorities in Alger, Wash.,

about 70 miles north of Seattle, sought yesterday to determine what set off a shooting and stabbing rampage that left six people dead and four wounded. Isaac Zamora, 28, a drug offender recently released from jail, was being held in the attacks. His mother said he was mentally ill.

Twenty-two former judges

and prosecutors in Texas asked Gov. Rick Perry yesterday to stop an execution set for Wednesday because an important hearing in the case of the condemned inmate, convicted killer Charles Dean Hood, is scheduled two days later.