Customs leader to leave position

WASHINGTON (AP) — The head of Customs and Border Protection will leave his post at the end of the month.

The agency said Commissioner Alan Bersin told President Barack Obama on Thursday that he intended to leave office Dec. 30, the day before his appointment to the job expires.

David Aguilar, former chief of the Border Patrol and the number two official at CBP, has been named the acting commissioner.

Obama nominated Bersin to head the agency in September 2009 and appointed him commissioner in March 2010, after the Senate didn’t act on the nomination. Bersin was one of 15 officials to receive a recess appointment that year.

In a statement, Bersin said he was “proud of the significant and meaningful achievements we have made on our borders and at our nation’s ports of entry over nearly two years.”

Boy shot near Texas school loses kidney

McALLEN, Texas (AP) — A 14- year- old Texas boy shot while trying out for his school basketball team lost a kidney but should recover to live a normal life, his doctors said.

Edson Amaro sustained massive injuries earlier this month when he and Nicholas Tijerina were shot outside Harwell Middle School near Edinburg in South Texas. The boys were in a parking lot that had been converted into a temporary basketball court.

Doctors at Rio Grande Regional Hospital discussed Edson’s condition during a news conference Wednesday.

Edson was shot in the back and the bullet went through a large vein, his stomach, his liver and his right kidney, said Dr. Carlos Garcia-Cantu, director of trauma services at the hospital. The kidney was removed in a five- hour surgery, but Edson is recovering and could make it home for the holidays, he said.

11 people killed in attacks in Mexico

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexican officials say a group of armed men attacked people traveling by bus through the Gulf coast state of Veracruz, killing seven.

The state prosecutor’s office says in a statement that the same gunmen killed four other people in the Veracruz town of El Higo. Both attacks took place early Thursday.

The statement says that law enforcement agents confronted the gunmen, killing five in a gunbattle.

On Wednesday, federal officials announced they were disbanding the police in the state’s port city of Veracruz and sending in units of marines to patrol the streets.

Woman charged in false bomb threat

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A Southern California woman angry with her husband called in a bomb threat to prevent him from departing on a jetliner at Los Angeles International Airport, the FBI said.

Johnna Woolfolk was charged by federal prosecutors on Tuesday with providing false and misleading information.

She’s expected to plead guilty during a Jan. 9 hearing, U.S. attorney’s office spokesman Thom Mrozek said.

Defense attorney Gordon E. Turner said Thursday that Woolfolk, who is about 50, admitted in court and to the FBI that she made the call and she now realizes it was wrong.