SCGangNet, a statewide Web-based gang database, will be unveiled Monday at a Greenville conference hosted by the South Carolina Gang Investigators Association.

Law enforcement agencies often kept gang information to themselves, but now they have a central place to share it, said Lt. Bruce Otterbacher, supervisor of SLED’s Gang Intelligence Team.

“The whole idea behind this is to get everybody on the same sheet of music,” he said.

Since the database was launched in January, 42 law enforcement agencies have been trained how to use it and 242 gang members in dozens of gangs have been entered into the database, Otterbacher said.

No one was injured after the teen’s siblings accidentally set fire to a couch in the den about 12:30 p.m.

The two younger children were playing with matches in the room at the back of the house, Columbia Deputy Fire Chief Aubrey Jenkins said.

Chris Cunningham, 17, was in another room and heard his father yell about the fire. His father told him to get the younger children out of the house.

Cunningham saw the couch burning and hurried to the nearby kitchen, where he found his 8-year-old sister, Jamora, and 7-year-old brother, Daishon.

Angel Simmons Lindle, 37, of Donalds has been charged with seven counts of criminal sexual conduct with a child, according to the Greenwood County Sheriff’s Office.

Ninety Six School District 52 superintendent Dan Powell said the Edgewood Middle School teacher has been suspended pending the outcome of the charges.

Sheriff Tony Davis says police received the complaint Thursday and an investigation began Friday that resulted in Lindle’s arrest.

Davis says the former student, now 15, told authorities of “numerous incidents” when he was 14 years old.

“Take a walk, and let’s see how it feels,” Farah Hussain instructed her daughter.

But the girl’s smile said it all. This was the dress.

Less than half an hour later — after many hugs and “thank-yous” — the Hussains left with Nidah’s new prom dress, never whipping out their wallets.

“Is that all we have to do?” Farah Hussain asked.

“I think our governor would make an interesting college professor. I think he’s psyched himself out that he’s Mr. Intellectual. ... He don’t understand that he represents one of the poorest states, and neediest states, in the union.”

— Sen. Robert Ford, D-Charleston, quoted in a Los Angeles Times story about Gov. Mark Sanford’s refusal to commit to taking federal stimulus money. Sanford did another round of national TV and newspaper interviews last week affirming his opposition to the stimulus package.

• Stat of the week

Revealing numbers about S.C.

That day voters chose Burnet R. Maybank as the Democratic choice for U.S. Senate over a field of four others, including William Jennings Bryan Dorn.

Maybank was elected in November.

Credit: John McCray Papers

Courtesy of South Caroliniana Library, University of South Carolina