Across the Southeast

Man denies tossing children from bridge

BAYOU LA BATRE, ALA. --- A man accused of tossing his four young children off a coastal bridge to their deaths denies killing them and says police harassed him into making a false confession, his attorney said Thursday.

Authorities say Lam Luong confessed to killing the children, ranging in age from a few months to 3 years, a day after reporting them missing and claiming a woman had taken them.

But Mr. Luong's appointed attorney, Joe Kulakowski, said his client told him he falsely confessed under pressure after being questioned Monday night and the entire day Tuesday.

"When police yelled, 'We know you killed them,' he at some point realized they weren't going to believe him," Mr. Kulakowski said.

Based in part on a witness's account, investigators said the four children were thrown from the highest part of the two-lane Dauphin Island bridge Monday morning, a point about 80 feet above the Intracoastal Waterway.

Mr. Luong had had an argument with his wife earlier, authorities said.

Crews searching near the bridge and into the Gulf of Mexico have found no sign of the children.

State and local teams were to continue searching today, but the Coast Guard announced Thursday that it was pulling out.

-- Edited from wire reports