NASHVILLE -- Legislation that will cement Gov. Bill Haslam's deal with Amazon.com will cost the state $22.8 million per year in "foregone revenue" while in effect, but bring a like amount afterwards, according to a legislative staff estimate.

The Advocate, a gay and lesbian magazine, has released a list of the gayest cities in America for 2012 and Knoxville has made the list at number 8.

Aluminum company Alcoa Inc. said today it will permanently close its smelter in Alcoa as part of a global reduction its smelting capacity.

Tennessee wide receiver DeAnthony Arnett, who compiled the second-most receptions by a freshman in program history this past season, has asked for a release from his scholarship, a source close to Arnett confirmed to the News Sentinel late Wednesday.

A former East Tennessee Roman Catholic priest convicted of raping an altar boy nearly three decades ago wants a new trial.

Leslie Wakefield patrols Anderson County in a vehicle with an official insignia on the door and flashing blue lights.

A 50-year-old Knoxville man died this afternoon when he jumped from the seventh floor of an apartment complex, the Knoxville Police said.

KNOXVILLE — A man was jailed today on allegations he attacked his girlfriend in a drunken rage with a claw hammer, threw her son when he tried to help his mother and assaulted two officers responding to the call.

A three-year effort to obtain a pardon from the president of the United States ended Monday when a Jonesborough, Tenn., man learned Barack Obama had pardoned him of a 16-year-old federal felony conviction.

Here's a ranking Knoxville would prefer to forget. Property Scope blogger Josh Flory reports that Forbes magazine ranked the Knoxville area 15th on its dirtiest cities list, which ranks cities according to air quality.

KNOXVILLE — A 14-year-old Knoxville boy, already facing burglary and gun charges, was arrested driving on a city street with a stolen firearm, according to police.

If you were willing to plunk down a hearty contribution, you could have met Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney during a 90-minute Thursday campaign stop in Knoxville.

A Hawkins County woman allegedly stabbed her first cousin multiple times with a pair of scissors during a fight that occurred Tuesday night after she told him she wanted a relationship with him, and did not want to be “a booty call.”

Count David E. Schuster among those who want to be your president. Except for the fact that he has no campaign treasury, no staff, no 50-state strategy and his name will appear on no ballot, his chances are as good as anyone else's.

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and Department of Justice statistics indicate that complaints of religious harassment in the workplace are on the rise.

In a microbiology lab at the University of Tennessee, while studying yeast proteins that someday could help design better medical drugs, then-freshman Madelyn Crawford decided that was the kind of research she wanted to do for the rest of her life.

KNOXVILLE — An angry Knox County mom foiled the getaway of two men allegedly involved in robbing her home and holding her adult daughter at gunpoint.

The American Civil Liberties Union is now involved after a family has reported to police that a Madisonville teen was assaulted by his high school principal.

KNOXVILLE — Country Music hall of famer Glen Campbell will perform a benefit concert to honor University of Tennessee women's basketball coach Pat Summitt.

BRISTOL — A Bristol mother and her two children are accused of placing a package containing dirty underwear in a hospital waiting room and then calling in a bomb threat.

A West Knox County homeowner told law enforcement officers he acted in self-defense when he fatally shot a man who he discovered in bed with his girlfriend Thursday morning.

Three suspects were arrested Wednesday in connection with the death of a North Knoxville couple who were beaten with a hammer during the theft of pain pills and jewelry the night before and left inside as their home was set on fire, a police spokesman said.

Uniformed officers prohibited several protesters dressed in costume from entering TVA's board meeting this morning as directors for the public utility were set to vote on completing the Bellefonte nuclear plant in north Alabama.

KNOXVILLE — After being rescued from a makeshift hiding spot inside an East Knox County storm drain this morning, a Knoxville man readily admitted he dove inside the hole after burglarizing a nearby business and running from authorities.

Oral cancer cases have tripled over the past 20 years. And the most common culprit, doctors eventually discovered, is no longer liquor, or smokes. It's HPV — human papilloma virus.

It’s a $2.9 million bargain — or at least University of Tennessee officials think so. In March, a year after it went on the market, the price tag on the Georgian-style mansion in Sequoyah Hills that once served as the home to university presidents was slashed nearly in half from the original $5 million listing.

A 10-year-old boy flown by medical helicopter to the University of Tennessee Medical Center after being mauled by a dog was listed in serious condition this afternoon, a hospital spokeswoman said.

A local auto detailer will experience a "once in a lifetime opportunity" as he travels to Seattle this week to help preserve the historic Boeing 707 that served as Air Force One.

A few minutes from downtown Chattanooga is the North Chickamauga Creek Gorge State Natural Area, a 7,093-acre tract bisected by a 10-mile-long gorge with vertical sandstone walls and swimming holes that draw crowds in the summer.

A Sevierville man who police say brutally killed four 2-day-old kittens was sentenced to 6½ months in jail this week after pleading guilty to four counts of animal cruelty.

A tough new law imposing stricter state oversight of Tennessee’s 182 utility districts — which serve hundreds of thousands of customers and collect millions of dollars in rates — quietly went into effect Friday.

Sarah Ono Jones discovered her love of sculpting as a teenager.

Defensive tackle Montori Hughes is no longer a member of the Tennessee football team, UT spokesman Jimmy Stanton said Thursday.

UT estimates that 2,200 third-year students systemwide potentially could have trouble graduating within the new 120-hour limit.

WASHINGTON — Environmental groups already frustrated over how long it is taking the federal government to develop regulations for toxic coal ash are even more alarmed by what they now are hearing from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

NASHVILLE — The Legislature’s Republican leaders say they were advised that Sen. Stacey Campfield’s effort to defund Planned Parenthood in the state budget bill was unconstitutional and they will try to accomplish the same objective with separate legislation next year.

RINGGOLD, Ga. — Put them together, and the pieces tell the story of four lives cut short in a single moment. One by one, those pieces keep finding their way home.

Police this morning are investigating how a 55-year-old woman found shot in the leg in a Northwest Knoxville business parking lot was injured.

Police fatally shot a man along Interstate 275 after he raised a handgun in their direction, a police spokesman said this morning.

The cause of the catastrophic collapse of the Gatlinburg wastewater treatment plant basin wall that killed two workers and sent nearly 1 million gallons of raw sewage into the Little Pigeon River remained under investigation Tuesday night.

The first evidence of Fukushima fallout in Oak Ridge has been confirmed, with low-level amounts of radioactive I-131 measured in precipitation at three sampling sites, according to information from the Envirionmental Protection Agency's RadNet site.

Curiosity almost got the best of J.C. Ball's beloved grayish-brown Weimaraner, but 9-month-old Cole is one resilient pooch.

CLINTON - A man who broke into a woman's house and snatched from her arms the 15-month-old child he fathered by her has received four concurrent four-year prison sentences for the July 2009 incident.

Knoxville - Herbert Mike Merritt was likely in a psychotic state when he killed Anthony Laymon "Tony" Ford, a forensic psychologist told a Knox County Criminal Court jury today.

NASHVILLE - Legislative committees are expected to vote this week on whether big telecommunications companies should get to keep an estimated $16 million they would otherwise pay to small telephone companies.

NASHVILLE — The House approved and sent to Gov. Bill Haslam on Monday a bill declaring that Tennesseans can ignore a federal law's requirement that they buy health insurance.

KNOXVILLE — Further investigation this morning by police has shown a reported road rage shooting on a downtown portion of Interstate 40 to be bogus, a spokesman said.

A Hawkins County teenager awaiting trial in the double slayings of his grandparents apparently killed himself in the Knox County Jail on Saturday night, according to authorities.

A 1-year-old baby was treated for minor burns after his cries alerted family members to flames licking around his crib Tuesday morning.

GATLINBURG, Tenn. — As the historic preservation crew foreman for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gary Zbel oversees the construction and upkeep of 97 historic structures scattered throughout the Smokies.