some lawmakers say it's illegal to essentially move on to city property. chris gordon is live at mcpherson square with this story. >> reporter: good evening, occupy d.c., you see the tents behind me, the occupiers have been living on federal land for about 100 days now, but some members of congress want them removed. if they are sleeping rather than protesting. occupy d.c. protesters have been living in tents since october. the national parkses service says it recognizes the protester's first amendment rights to occupy the park. the house oversight and government reform subcommittee called this hearing asking why is camping allowed despite its apparent illegality. >> i need a definition of camping, i need to go back to south carolina and tell everyone who wants to spent the summer in one of our parks, what camping

is and what it is not. >> the distinction is, for a 24 hour vigil, is that they are awake at all times, providing information or signs or whatever associated with their first amendment activities. >> u.s. park police have allowed protesters to sleep in the park. but in december, they moved in and made arrests when occupy d.c. built a permanent wood structure there. now public health and safety concerns have prompted d.c. to ask protesters here to join the occupy d.c. encampment in freedom plaza, so mcpherson square can be cleaned up. >> we are the united states of america, and people are lives in sub optimum conditions where they're putting themselves at risk and the rest of the community at risk. >> reporter: protesters are exercising constitutional rights. >> the district of columbia better watch out, because they could have a real conflagration

here if they hadn't found a way to deal with the protesters so there would not be an escalation of the kind that gets young people too excited. >> reporter: the national parks service says it will issue one last warning to occupy d.c. that camping will not be allowed. >> we're happy to work with them to keep the park safe and clean, for sure. but we think we have the right to be there. the first amendment gives us that right. >> reporter: we're back now live at occupy d.c. at mcpherson square, they will be holding a general assembly to determine what if anything they should do in light of this congressional hearing today. live at mcpherson square, chris gordon, back to you in the studio. >> thank you, chris. flip is out. the wizards fired their head coach today after last night's loss that brought the team's record to 0-7 on the road. >> reporter: the wizards just weren't progressing at all. their 2-15 record. the worst in the nba, and the

only thing that this team does consistently is get blown out. randy whittman will replace saunders for the remainder of the season. the wizards considered replacing saunders prior to the oklahoma city game, but the wizards won. now less than a week later, the players have fallen back into a rut of bad basketball. saunders leads the wizards with a record of 51-130 in just over two seasons. >> i don't know if the players were responding the way we thought they should have been for the first quarter of the season. and we felt like a different voice was needed to do some things a little different. and maybe to play a different style than we had been playing. >> i'm still here today because i believe this team is better than where we are right now. that's all i can say. i'm not -- it's not a popularity contest. if you don't win games, you're

not very popular. if you win games, everybody loves you. >> randy whittman will retain the entire coaching staff, including flip's son ryan saunders. a lot more coming up later in about a half hour or so. >> it's a new day down there, dan, thanks, see knew a bit. thousands of people lined up on the penn state campus today to pay respects to coach joe paterno. those attending the viewing included fans, friends of the assistant coach. mike mcqueary who told paterno of the sex abuse he says he witnessed was also there. >> i think the big thing with my dad is, through the last couple months, you really got a chance to see his true character. there was never a situation where he sat around and felt bad for himself, he was positive

with us about the direction he wanted the rest of his life to go, and how he wanted to build penn state, and to make sure the justice was done for victims involved. >> jay paterno was the quarterback's coach for the nittany lions until earlier this month when the university hired bill o'brien as head football coach. a private family funeral will be after the public viewing. the death tool has been brought to 16. another 17 are still unaccounted for, also today, crews hitched a barge carrying a crane and other equipment for the start of the fuel removal process, actual pumping isn't expected to start until this weekend and will likely last for several weeks. coming up later in our show, some surviving passengers hoping to sue over the crash will have a difficult and lengthy legal battle. friends and family are coming together via social media

today, to remember a young woman killed in a violent car crash. 19-year-old brynn carter died when her car ran off the road and slammed into a tree. it happened sunday afternoon. since then there's been a huge outpouring of support on twitter. friends are using the trending top topic #teenbrynn. they want something positive to come from the tragic experience. firefighters evacuated people living above a popular mexican restaurant because of a carbon monoxide scare. firefighters tell news 4 a faulty stove triggered the alarms upstairs, two pilot lights were left on. no one was hurt andveryone was able to return safely to their homes. in the republican race for the presidential nomination today. mitt romney released his income

tax records for the last two years. he paid taxes at a rate of about 15%. he also donated more than $7 million to charity. today newt gingrich tried to turn romney's assets into a liability. romney's campaign has more money but he has more people. he said in his words, people power will beat money power in florida. president obama takes center stage tonight with his third state of the union address before congress and the public. nbc chief white house correspondent chuck todd joins us live with a preview. with this being an election year, will the tone and rhetoric be different compared to his previous addresses, do you think? >> the tone won't be, but it will sound -- put it this way, when you look back on the state of the union come september and october of this election year, you'll say to yourself, all of the campaign themes were there, you're going to hear the same things they've been talking about when it comes to middle class pop lichl if you will, where the president sets himself pushing policies that he believes will help the middle

class, whether it's on housing, tax fairness, you're going to hear a lot about that tonight, you'll hear warren buffett, the million air who has been calling for a higher tax rate for multimillionaires, there's some equality there a little bit. and then you're also going to hear a little bit about this idea of beating up, running against institutions, the unpopularity of wall street and congress. the president will call for tougher new regulations, even criminal investigations if necessary, when it comes to wall street. and even getting congress to deal with things like insider trading. you can just see the remnants here of what's going to be the president's re-election message. middle class pop lichl, anti-washington. >> how do you think he's going to be received by the gop members? >> well, look, it's going to be -- we have them sitting together again, it's going to be a little bit of a mixed applause, if you recall what happened a year ago, it was odd,

there wasn't this one side stands up, one side sits down. you're going to hear a lot of criticism from the republican side. he's simply doing a campaign stump speech and calling a state of the union or he's simply trying to tax the rich. this is class warfare. on the politics front, when he leaves town tomorrow to sell his state of the union, he's going to michigan, iowa, nevada, arizona, colorado. all of them swing states, so it's going to look a little more campaigny. >> who are some of the special invited grefts tonight? >> the big one is going to have to do with gabby giffords this is going to be her last state of the union as a member of congress. her husband, mark kelley will be sitting with the first lady, that's going to be in the beginning we're told there's going to be a big tribute to her. the second one is more about making that point i told you about, warren buffett. one of wearen buffet's seconds

is going to be sitting with the first lady. >> all right, big night tonight, chuck todd from nbc. thanks so much. chuck will have more on the president's state of the union address coming up on nightly news with brian williams this evening. you can watch the state of the union address live tonight at 9:00 right here on nbc 4 and on our website, nbcwashington.com. if you're heading downtown tonight, the state of the union could make it difficult for you to get around. starting at 7:00, police will be blocking off every street within a two or three block raid yugs of the capitol. starting at 6:00, just pedestrians with special credentials will be allowed inside the square. a good day for sun bathers down there, boy did we warm up from yesterday? >> yes, it did. and it is interesting because we went from like winter to spring. doug kammerer, you are back from vacation in time for some lovely

weather. you missed the gloomy, fog girks icy weather. >> yes, i may have brought the good weather with us. many of us saw stem tours rise into the low 60s across areas to the south. everybody made their way into the 50s. winds out of the south at about 3 miles per hour. take a look at the numbers at this hour. 54 manassas, culpepper and fredericksburg. the cool spots along the bay coming in at 48 degrees. what are we going to be seeing? nothing on the radar right now, that's the way we're going to stay through the day tomorrow, then we'll start to see our chances of showers increase. overnight tonight, waking up to a temperature of about 35 by tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m., it's going to be a little on the cool side tomorrow, still a little bit above average. when you wake up and throughout the day, i show you exactly what i expect in the next few days

and talk about our next storm that will move into the area. >> enjoy it while we can. still ahead, a family is searching for answers in the death of a young woman allegedly killed at the hands of her ex-boy friend and they want to know why. short term inconvenience for long term benefits. metro riders brace for another escalator outage that is likely to last eight months. understanding the true health value of vitamins, there are so many out there, which ones are worth taking.

a candidate for the d.c. counsel who is charged with soliciting a prostitute has made an agreement. he has to stay out of trouble for the next four months and stay away from the unit block of k street. he's the son of kevin p. chavis. kevin b. is currently challenging alexandria to get on the same council seat. vitamins are essential to staying healthy, but popping a whole bunch of pills may not be the best way to go. you may not need a batch of

supplements to boost your health. >> it can be hard to know where to start to choose for many supplements out there. dr. kathleen muller says for most people they are not necessary. >> multivitamin, there's no good scientific data that says everyone should be taking a multivitamin. there are some groups that probably benefit. >> people suffering from diabetes and high blood pressure do generally need a multivitamin, others should be getting enough in their diet with 5 to 7 fruits and vegetables a day. >> whole grains, good fats in our diet. >> what about thinking vitamin b would give you nfrg? >> if there was a supplement to give everyone energy, there would be lines out the door for it. some people can add it in if they have some depression, it's not that simple, it's not something i recommend for

everyone. >> as for vitamin c, it's effects are minimal reducing cold symptoms and people can take too much. she is a fan of vitamin d during the winter when we can't get enough sun. and then there are omega threes and sixes found in fish oils and flaxse flaxseed. we do need supplements if we don't eat sfiv servings of salmon a week. >> inflammation is a sign of many illnesses like diabetes, cancer, arthritis. when bodies are not working well, you don't need other minerals. >> we don't need vitamin d today. >> the sunshine just puts a smile on people's faces. that is not bad at all. >> welcome back, by the way. >> thank you. >> from cold colorado. >> it was beautiful out there

too. it was fantastic out there. i timed that just about right. snow in the mountains, nice and warm in the plains. as far as our weather is concerned, a lot of you enjoying the day today. temperatures in the low 60s to the south. fredericksburg coming in at 63 today. got a report of a temperature of 68 degrees down there. just spectacular. right now we're sitting at 52 degrees at the airport. what have we seen over the last couple days? you just mentioned this off air. we web from the winger to sprung in two days. you got that right. how about 32 on sunday, monday a high of 44. a 22-degree temperature swing. so, yes, it definitely felt like winter on sunday and over the weekend -- today, though, gorgeous. much more like spring. this is the average temperature in mid-march. current temperatures right now, 48 in gaithers berg, 54 in manassas, cooler along the bay with a little bit of an easterly or southerly flow right off the

bay. temperature 48 degrees over toward annapolis. nothing to show you around our area, our next storm is starting to develop down to our south. we're talking about areas down toward portions of texas, let's see if the map can get itself together here. there it is, right down toward louisiana, new orleans seeing heavy rain today, in parts of dallas, they are also seeing heavy rain and the potential for severe weather. that storm is going to get its act together and move our way, today it's high pressure that's dominating our region. nice and warm today, we'll lead to a mild day tomorrow. we'll see more cloud cover during the day. still a little above average. our area of high pressure will slide right on out of here, what slides in, the storm coming up from the south. this one will have a good amount of shower activity through the day on thursday. the storm will move through overnight friday morning, when i expect most of the rain to be. we will see a rainy period and nen we start to increase our

sunshine once again as we head toward the weekend. nice and mild, enjoy it out there. 46 to 51 disagrees for our temperatures between 7:00 a 9:00 tonight. on the cool side, a nice start for this time of year. as we move on through the day tomorrow, we'll see sunshine early. increasing clouds late in the afternoon. winds out of the northwest 5 to 10 miles per hour. the next four days, high of 50 degrees on your thursday, with a chance of shower activity during the afternoon. friday, a better chance of rain early, high of 52. 48 degrees coming up on saturday, it does look like things will cool down after that, but those four days, not bad at all. >> no. >> thank you, doug. still to come, a consumer warning, thousands of lunch boxes have been recalled because of a poison risk believed to have killed a dog. protecting your kids at school bus stops. >> the sign says you cannot pass a stopped school bus.

apparently a lot of drivers aren't listening. now there's a proposal to videotape those drivers and slap them with a substantial fine. i'll have the story ahead. ♪ and the boss is coming back to the district. how you can get tickets right after the break. ♪

♪ [ male announcer ] combine a pnc cashbuilder visa credit card with a pnc performance select checking account and get up to 1.75% cash back for just about every purchase. learn more and apply today at pnc.com/cashbuilder. pnc bank. for the achiever in you. today my journey continues across the golden state,

where everyone has been unbelievably nice. mornin'. i guess i'm helping them save hundreds on car insurance. it probably also doesn't hurt that i'm a world-famous advertising icon. cheers! i mean, who wouldn't want a piece of that? geico. ah... fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent oh dear... or more on car insurance.

two recalls to tell you you about tonight involving insulated lunch boxes and what do others really think of the brand of car that you drive. you can now find girl scout cookies for sale on your phone. liz crenshaw has more for you. >> we begin with two recalls involving insulated food carriers with those freezer gel packs. the recall of nearly 250,000 ci sport expandible lunch boxes. the gel in the freezer pack can leak out if it's damaged and pose a poisoning hazard. a dog reportedly died after chewing and ingesting the gel. the lunch boxes were sold at costco and other stores. the second recall includes a brand sold at walmart. the concern is the gel freezer

pack can leak if damaged. both products were made in china. consumers should stop using both products and return them to the store where they were purchased or dispose of them properly. consumers often consider brand perception when looking to buy a product. a new consumer reports survey shows when it comes to cars, consumers are seeing fewer differences among car brands. the survey scores look at how con sirms perceive each brand in seven categories, including safety, value, performance, environmentally friendly. according to the survey, overall the car brand leaders do not stand out from the pack the way they did a couple years ago. but the overall best brand perception does include toy quote tarks ford, honda, chevrolet and mercedes-benz. the worst brand perceptions, saab, fiat, mini-and mitsubishi. it's that time of year, girl

scout cookies are for sale. in case you're wondering when the popular fund-raising cookies will hit your area there's an app for that. the app to locate the closest girl scout cookie sale. they're sold oath during cookie season to raise money for the organization. and you cannot order girl scout cookies online. so this is not how to buy them. you have to go find the girl scout. the troop, hunt them down. >> usually they're hunting us. >> yeah, well, the app will say, you're sitting there at home, very to find some girl scout cookies, i need a samoa. >> thank you, liz. still ahead, one of metro's most used escalators comes to a halt, a plan that will take it out of service for months. they were high school

sweethearts, they had a beautiful baby boy, but now he's an orphan. i'm pat collins, the story coming up. customs officials make a major heroin bust at dulles airport. how the sus

hello, everybody, welcome back. we're taking a look at what was

going on today. how about a high temperature of 54 degrees at the airport. 63 in fredericksburg, and culpepper coming in at 61 degrees. todayed warmest day that we're going to see over the next five to seven days, there are going to be a couple chances for rain too, a lot of rain coming in toward the south and west of us, where that rain is going to go coming up. a little boy in maryland is now an orphan after the murder/suicide of his mother and father. the biggest mystery though may be why it happened. his parents were on friendly terms. pat collins joins us live in prince georges county to tell us about this. pat? >> reporter: there are a number of victims in this story. two families surrounded by satness and a 2-year-old boy left without parents. >> the victim's sister.

>> unbelievable. >> the shooter's friend. >> i talked to him that morning, he seemed fine. >> nobody knows what drove adam to do what he did inside is this laurel apartment. no one knows why he killed the mother of his baby and then turned the gun on himself. the victim 19-year-old ayers was a nursing assistant, the gunman 21-year-old he was an employee at the goddard space center, he was a member of the national guard. they were high school sweethearts, together they had a little boy named dwayne. even though they broke up a year ago, they still remained friends. for police this was an open and shut case, for family members on both sides what happened last weekend will likely haunt them for a long time.

what do you think caused this? >> no one knows. >> reporter: adam comes over and picks of ayers they're going to buy some things for their son. saturday afternoon no word from either, saturday night still no word. sunday the concern begins to field. sunday night the bodies found behind a locked bedroom door. >> i was in shock, it caught me offguard. >> now there is another victim here. that little boy 2-year-old dwayne left without a father or mother. >> he's too young to kind of know really what's going on. with both families, he will

definitely be well taken care of. >> police and friends say adam also left behind his new girlfriend who they say is expecting his child. web dirks back to you. >> sad story. pat collins, thank you. there is a plan in place tonight to transform tyson's corner virginia into a major city center. tyson's is currently home to about 17,000 residents. a 250 page design manual just approved bied fairfax county board of supervisors calls for making tyson's a green pedestrians city of up to 100 thousand residents by the year 2050. >> we have wonderful pictures in here of different places where they have things like the streets scaping we're looking for, bike racks for the bikers. the urban parks, pocket parks, recreation facilities, all of the things we expect in terms of

how do we turn tyson's into an ush an placepposed to an office park. >> 75% of the growth will be within a half mile of those new metro stations. julie carrie will have a closer look at the plan coming up at 6:00. relief is on the way for metro riders tired of battling those broken escalators. major improvements are slated for dupont circle before riders can ride problem free, they're going to have to spend eight months putting their feet to good use. >> reporter: some of the blue construction fencing is already up. next week, the whole on the southern end will close. it's both bad and good news. there are 588 separate

escalators in the sprawling and aging metro system. problems are frequent. passengers at lafont plaza spilled out in panic when escalators speeded up and suddenly stopped. metro has a major effort to now replace 94 of the worst escalators. the south entrance at dupont circle is next. >> these are among the least reliable escalators in the entire system. given their lengths and disability to keep them in service they were made a priority. >> reporter: metro says this fifth busiest station will close february 1st for nearly nine months. better escalators, but a egg inconvenience. >> metro is increasing its fares and it seems like the services are getting worse, it's like a catch 22. >> i look at the other side of the circle where everybody's going to be entering and exiting, i think it's going to be horrible. >> i'll be glad for the improvement, i think it's awful that it takes that much time.

>> does it really take nine months to replace a few escalators? metro says yes. >> this is heavy construction, we have to rip out the existing units, in order to prepare the space for the snow units coming in, there's work underneath with the tresses that has to be done. one of the steps is preserving an escalator at all times as a set of stairs. we put in a new spiral staircase in event shafts. there are emergency evacuation options we're keeping in play. metro has had signs up all along the blue wall here and signs in the station saying be prepared next wednesday, this side closes. wendy back to you. >> is that side just as steep as the northern side which feels like you are traveling for miles to get up that escalator? >> don't hold me to this, but i think this side is not as long. i know you're talking about the north side of dupont circle. this one's pretty lodge, but i

don't think it's as long as the one on the north side. they're worried everyone's going to go to the north. >> the working one. >> yeah, they want the working one. >> thanks. the smithsonian is getting set to welcome the space shuttle "discovery." it will arrive on the back of a boeing 737 in april. there may be a flyover the nation's capital as discov"disc makes its way to its final home in virginia. a ceremony is set for april 15th. >> a flyover would be lovely. it would be cool to see that. the legal ramifications of that wreck on the cruise ship in italy. >> they owe us. i mean, like it's our sanity. >> lawyers say not so fast, passengers considering a lawsuit may not get what they're expecting. and have you heard?

the boss is coming to washington, where and when you can get tickets next. [ male announcer ] this was how my day began.

a little bird told me about a band... ♪ an old man shared some fish stories... ♪ oooh, my turn. ♪ she was in paris, but we talked for hours... everyone else buzzed about the band. there's a wireless mind inside all of us. so, where to next? ♪

♪ the boss has a date in

washington. bruce springsteen and the e street band will be coming to the verizon center april first. fans have been wondering how the boss would replace clarence clemens who passed away last year. the biggest solar storm in six years is threatening satellite communications starting early this morning, charged particles from solar flairs hit our atmosphere, and they're expected to continue hitting earth throughout the day. and the only problem so far expected is that it's interfering with things like our gps systems. if you get lost today, have you a good excuse, you're late. customs agents at dulles, say a passenger swallowed 86 pellets of heroin in order to smuggle it into the united states. it was a 19-year-old arrested on thursday, after taking a flight here from nigeria. customs agents say that during the inspection the man asked to use the restroom where he passed 55 pellets of heroin, he was taken to the hospital where he

passed another 31. this was the second arrest in two weeks for attempted heroin smuggling, by someone who had ingested it. when we come back, the debate over cameras mounted on school buses. supporters say the measure is key to keeping kids safe. how much should vie laters pay for passing a school bus? dan is talking to the wizards president about why today was the day he chose

people! look at you! texting...blogging... all this technology, but you're still banking like pilgrims! get high yield free checking at capital one bank. why earn bupkis, when your checking could earn five times the national average!! and free atms anywhere. five times the national average!!! that's new school banking. sign up for high yield free checking at a capital one bank.

what's in your wallet? somebody help me down. there is a proposal to put

cameras on montgomery county school buses so they can catch and fine drivers who don't obey those school bus signs. darcie spencer is live where there's a debate on this. >> there are signs like these around the county saying you cannot pass a stopped school bus. believe it or not, a lot of people are doing it, and they want to put cameras on buses and catch those drivers, is $250 too much? steven has three children who attend montgomery county schools. every day he sees drivers pass the school bus that's picking up his children. >> you've stopped people yourself? >> yes, i have. >> how do you do that? >> i just stand in front of the bus and tell them to stop. and then they apologizapologize tell them not to do it again. >> he supports a proposal to put cameras on the outside of county school buses. those who don't hit the brakes

when the lights and stop signs are deployed would be fined. >> do you think this is a good idea as a former bus drive summer. >> absolutely, it can't do any harm to try to convince people who are careless about the lives of children that they have to pay if they mess up. >> reporter: some of the buses here in montgomery county are already equipped with cameras on the outside of buses. if someone is caught passing the bus when they're not supposed to, they're sent a letter. there is no enforcement. >> as far as i'm concerned right now, it's not worth the paper it's presented on. >> reporter: bus drivers tell me they see several drivers breaking the law every day. >> it's an accident waiting to happen. >> reporter: a survey was conducted last year, and on just one day right here in montgomery county, more than 1600 drivers kept going even when the stop signs were activated. initially, the county counsel proposal was to fine motorists

$250. now they're looking at a fine of maybe $100. >> we're working with the police department and with judges here in montgomery county to try to work out how large the fine should actually be. >> how much will this program cost montgomery county? these are tough budget times, i was told it's going to be zero, they're hoping this program will pay for itself through those fines. reporting live from bethesda, darcie spencer, news 4, back to you. let's go to doug for a final check on our weather. we could get used to this. >> no, you can't. that's what it's going to do, it's going to complaining over the next couple days. it's been well above average so far the entire winter so far, we're sitting at about 3 to 4 degrees above average. that's pretty nice today. just another day well above average. high temperature at 52 degrees, winds out of the south at three miles per hour, tomorrow

morning, this is what you can wake up to, 34 in the city, 29 in gaithersburg, 27 in frederick. look at fredericksburg, virginia tomorrow, 48 degrees for a high. we'll see a mixture of partly cloudy skies tomorrow, we'll see more clouds during the afternoon, as our next storm system begins to approach the area. it will be a little cooler, but still on the mild side. looking at the next seven days, no extremely cold air, but the weekend will hold some problems. >> we'll see you then. dan is here, big changes with the wizards. why did he pick today? was there anything magic about the timing? >> they were down by so much at half time yesterday. the players seemingly gave up in that game, i think they felt it was time. they had to make this move. flip saunders did last through a lot of turmoil. at 2-15 record the end of the

road, saunders fired after 51 wins and 130 losses with the wizards, randy whittman will replace saunders for the rest of the season. the call to let saunders go was made by ernie gunfeld, the first question we asked ernie, why now? >> we had a couple wins there, you're hoping that things would turn around for you, obviously let go today. i felt it was the right time to make a change. i think we need a different voice. i don't think the players are responding. and we have to go in a different direction. >> how did you tell flip and what was his reaction initially? >> flip is a terrific guy. and we have a conversation, obviously he was disappointed by the record. and flip is a good friend so it was a very difficult thing to two. >> some coaches when they're going through a situation like this almost know it's time. they know they need a new voice,

do you feel like he knew it was time? >> i don't want to speak on his behalf, nobody ever wants to give up on something. and he's a smart basketball man as i said before, when we hired flip, we had a totally different team than we have today. but we're 2-15, and i think, like i said -- >> in terms of the inmates running the asylum, maybe because the young players knew you didn't have a choice, and had you had to play them, how do you remedy that? >> it's like randy said in the press conference today, the coach has one weapon, it's minutes. the players that are playing hard and earning their minutes will be out there playing more. that's the way we have to do it, and we have to get it through to the players this is a team game, both offensively and defensively. it's a process, it's not going to happen for us overnight.

but we have to continue to coach them. we have to continue to demand that they work hard and pay attention to player development. >> randy also said he's going to keep the entire coaching staff. does that mean that ryan saungders stays? >> yes. >> when you look at the long term plan, i know you have one, because you talked about it many times, do you feel like maybe there was a missed opportunity this year, because it was a stronger free agent flock than next year. when you look at the free agents that are available next year, it doesn't seem like a strong crop. >> you can use it in trade scenarios, through free agency as you just said, you can use it through a lot of different ways. flexibility is always a very good thing to have. we're going to have a lot of young players on the team, accumulating assets, and along the way it can be painful. and so far it has been because we're all very, very

competitive. we don't like to lose, and we have to continue to work hard, and i hope our players don't get used to that, i don't think they will. >> if you're wondering what the state of professional sports in d.c. is right now, ted has fired both of his head coaches with the capitals and the wizards this season. mike shanahan is the longest tenured head coach of the big four sports franchises in washington, d.c., and he's only been here two years. >> wow! >> isn't that crazy? >> it is crazy. >> it puts it in perspective. >> it moves quickly, and you have to -- it's easier to get rid of the coach before you get rid of the players, there are going to be massive changes at the end of the year as well. >> jim vance joins us with a preview with, what's coming up? mitt romney has released his income tax records, he's trying to shift the focus in the race for the republican presidential nomination. people in virginia could

soon be forced to pass a drug test in order to collect welfare. and a man buried alive in an avalanche and then he was rescued. the whole thing was caught on tape. that and more coming up. after the break, the legal ramifications of the cruise ship crash in italy. >> why passengers looking f

survivors of that shipwrecked italian cruise line have 19 days to file notice that they want to make legal claims for lost property. >> those looking for further compensation will have to deal with a lengthy and complicated legal process. >> reporter: as one family from michigan made their way to carnival paradise monday she said she had no idea her ticket was a contract releasing the company from liabilities. >> it's probably in the fine print. >> you didn't read it? >> no, i didn't read it. >> who reads it? >> no, nobody reads it. >> reporter: legal experts say american survivors returning home from the costa concordia shipwreck are slamming head on

to a legal reality. >> nobody's going to become a millionaire. the jurisdiction, there's a form selection clause on every ticket that requires them to go to italy to even try or make a claim. that means an italian lawyer. have you to pay a lawyer in italy to bring a claim. >> teams of u.s. lawyers are now in miami where tomorrow they'll file arguments that this case is so unusual it should be heard in a u.s. courtroom. >> the conduct of this ship is so outrageous that it does -- they are not entitled to tell anybody where they can litigate. >> in an e-mail sent to survivors on sunday, costa concordia offered victims a full refund, travel expenses, reimbursement for any on board expenses and credit card

charges, full payment for documented medical expenses. not addressed, compensation for long-term mental anguish. >> my sister says i'm talking in my sleep and grasping for like -- just anxiety and waking up, you just -- thinking about it. >> connecticut residents maria -- >> they owe us, it's our sanity. >> and her daughter melissa, say they're having nightmares. >> this is something that i'm going to remember for the rest of my life. i didn't trip and fall and sprain any ankle this is something that will be burned into my memory. >> what they are about to find, the passengers on the ship, is that instead of the regular damages that we've come to expect like pain and suffering, passengers have signed away their rights to recover for those things. >> and that was kerry sanders reporting. >> the cruise line says it will do its best to locate and return passenger belongings. it didn't comment on the

passenger complaints about its contracts. >> that's going to do it for news 4 at 5:00. thank you for watching. fighting for first place, newt gingrich changes his approach. and mitt romney releases his income tax records. >> a final warning from u.s. park police before some of the of course my protesters may be kicked out. flip saunders is fired. the wizardses have the worst record in the nba and now it's cost their head coach his job. it could be president obama's attempt to outline his vision for the next four years. tonight his state of the union address is expected to focus on our economy. the president will also likely argue that he's the one who could fix the economy steve handlesman joins us with a preview.