FORT HOOD VICTIMS WILL FACE ACCUSED SHOOTER AT TRIAL

LILLINGTON, N.C. (AP) -- Alonzo Lunsford has trouble getting out of chairs and warns his family to wake him gently. Kathy Platoni can't shake the image of the man who died in a pool of blood at her knees. Shawn Manning still has two bullets in his body and gets easily unnerved by crowds.

Survivors of the 2009 shooting rampage that claimed the lives of 13 people at the Fort Hood Army base in Texas fight these demons daily.

Now after years of delay, they will come face to face with Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist who goes on trial in the attack starting Tuesday. After dismissing his attorneys, Hasan got permission to represent himself, putting him in the unusual position of asking questions of the very people he admits targeting.

Hasan, a Muslim who argues he was protecting the Taliban from American aggression, was shot by a civilian police officer and is now in a wheelchair, paralyzed from the abdomen down.

AUCTION SET FOR GOLD FORTUNE AMASSED BY RECLUSE

CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) -- The final treasures of a quiet man who collected a fortune in gold coins will be auctioned off Tuesday in Nevada.

The body of Walter Samaszko Jr. was found in his Carson City home in June 2012. After his death, a cleaning crew hired to tidy his modest, ranch style home where he had lived for four decades came upon a stunning discovery - boxes and boxes full of gold coins and bullion collected over an unassuming lifetime. It was enough to fill two wheelbarrows.

One batch, mostly bullion, was sold at auction in February for $3.5 million. Tuesday's auction at the Carson City courthouse includes more than 2,600 coins to be sold in six lots.

"These are the rated coins; the collector types," said Alan Glover, Carson City Clerk-Recorder who is charge of handling Samaszko's estate, on Monday. "It's a little more complicated on the pricing that it is on the bullion."

He estimated the value of the collection at $3 million, though the final tally will depend on the condition of the coins as assessed by bidders.

The fortune, after taxes, will go to Samaszko's only surviving cousin, Arlene Magdanz of San Rafael, Calif.