watching live across the country, hammered the southern poverty law center which has spent decades fighting hate groups like the kkk. >> corkins was given a license to shoot an unarmed man by organizations like the southern poverty law center that have been reckless in labeling organizations hate groups because they disagree with them on public policy. >> reporter: corkins had volunteered at a u street center for gay, lesbian and transgendered people. he allegedly said, "i hate your politics" before opening fire and wounding the operations manager at the frc, but gay advocates quickly condemned the violence and were just as quick to condemn perkins' words. >> there's this implication that only the other side from him is in some way giving license to people to become violent when if you look at the evidence, the statistics about hate crimes, that's very much demonstrated not to be the case. >> reporter: corkins shoveled into court in a plastic

jumpsuit ill at ease and staring repeatedly into the gallery at a crowd of reporters. is he so far charged with neither terrorism nor hate crime. instead he faces a federal charge of interstate transportation of a firearm and ammunition and a d.c. charge of assault with intent to kill while armed. if convicted, he could face nearly a half century in prison, but first psychiatrists will have to certify that he is competent to stand trial. perkins says the shooting victim leonardo johnson was unarmed and in plainclothes when corkins allegedly shot him and johnson wrestled the gun away. perkins went and spoke to johnson at the hospital and he said to him groggily after coming out of surgery this hero stuff is heart work. hard work, strong guy. by all accounts leo johnson

was a hero in yesterday's shooting and his mom says she couldn't be prouder of him. >> reporter: i'm scott broom and the family of leo johnson say they are proud of his actions. chief cathy lanier visiting with virginia johnson, the mother of 46-year-old building operations manager leonardo johnson, to talk about how he's doing. >> i think it was -- what he did yesterday probably saved a lot of lives. he just told ma, i've been shot and he said don't worry about me. i'm okay. >> reporter: johnson's mother says she's recovering from the shock that her son took on a gunman at the family research council and survived a wound to his arm and she is thankful for his actions. >> i couldn't be no prouder than i am. i thank god for everything. i thank god for him, too, because so many people could have been gone away from here today. he was just looking all around at different things and he asked him a couple questions

and it got into an altercation or something. then he pulled a gun out on him and then they got to tussling and that was. it. >> reporter: in southeast washington, scott broom, 9 news now. >> the president of the family research council has plenty to say about what he called the reckless rhetoric that led to the shooting. we have the whole press conference for you at www.wusa9.com. yeah saw first on 9 and after our report about two women jailed in georgia for claiming to be insurance agents the d.c. police and fire departments came forward and said those women approached them, too. they have been making the rounds. peggy fox broke the story and you've got an update. >> we told you tuesday the same two women tried to sell and did, in fact, sell some insurance to arlington county police. now we've learned that those same two women were allowed to sell insurance at two more police departments and a fire department. union officials in d.c. are warning their members about these two women, cynthia padone

and donia underwood who have been arrested for allegedly scamming city workers and police for their personal information. the president of the d.c. firefighters union put an alert on their website saying the same two females have visited many d.c. firehouses trying to sell supplemental insurance policies. atlanta police say they were posing as aflac representatives. one of the women, 30-year-old cynthia padone seen in this video posted a picture of herself with fishnet stockings and bulletproof vest standing inside what appears to be a drug enforcement unit of the metropolitan police department. a police spokeswoman says the criminal investigations division is looking into whether the women broke any laws here. mpd's union leader wants to know why the women were let in. >> why was a private contractor, even if they were legitimate, what were they doing in a government building? what were they doing selling at a government building? my understanding is that's prohibited. >> reporter: a soce tells 9news the two women met with

park police officers in april and they were actually listed as aflac representatives at that time. the source says one officer even bought a legitimate policy. however, now atlanta police say they aren't legit. he contacted the women's alleged supervisor who lives in clinton maryland and told him that he wasn't authorized to solicit personnel in this manner. hi, mr. enunco. nobody would come to the door. when i reached mr. enunco earlier by phone he would not definitely whether he sells insurance or has any -- confirm whether he sells insurance or has any connection with the two women. he still hasn't called me back. why some local officers and firefighters may be worried their personal information may have been stolen, the union leader kris baumann says the mpd doesn't even have the officers to investigate. >> the individuals that would be working this case are

probably out right now somewhere writing a parking ticket on somebody's car. all that training and investigating knowledge is being wasted. >> baumann says they're 400 officers short and many people that are detectives are being taken way and writing tickets. -- taken away and writing tickets. the big question is were these women authorized aflac representatives? tuesday i contacted the vice president for corporate communications and she said absolutely no, that the women arrested in atlanta were not aflac representatives. however, now she backtracked and said that she didn't say that and has no comment about any of it. so we're still waiting for more information. >> this is fascinating because if this is true, they have convinced police departments from here to georgia that they were legitimate. >> everybody agrees they are very bold. >> that's a nice way of putting it, peggy fox. thank you. down in louisiana a sheriff is calling the death of two deputies nothing short of

assassination. they were killed during a series of shootings this morning west of new orleans. two other deputies and two suspects were wounded and are in the hospital before it was over. it started when a man shot and wounded a deputy during a traffic stop. other officers tracked the suspect to a trailer park. as they began to question people there, more gunfire. >> as we were interviewing the two suspects, another person exited that trailer with an assault weapon and ambushed my two officers. >> tonight five suspects in total in custody. louisiana state police and federal officers are helping with the investigation after the violence. the families of some of those killed or wounded at virginia tech want the presidential candidates to take action on gun control. 67 of them sent a letter to president barack obama and republican candidate mitt romney asking them what are you

going to do to improve the background check system? they say five years after the shooting on campus millions of mental health records are still missing from the national database of people prohibited from buying guns. seung-hui cho killed 32 after state agencies never shared his records with that database. coming up at 7:00 these might look like high dollar designer shoes, but you won't see them in the shoes soon, moor on this multi-mill -- more on this multi-million dollar counterfeit bust. we hear about cases of cyber bullying with heartbreaking results, but tonight one student is fighting back. >> you'll need your sunglasses and an umbrella for your friday, but you got to enjoy tonight's beautiful weather. here's a look at our almanac for today. we did get up to 91 degrees, a

few degrees above the advertised 87 but nowhere near the record high 102 set in 1997. i've got your full forecast including the weekend coming up. >> up next one candidate pulls out the white board to try to make a point about medicare. 9news continues after the break.

medicare has long been offly. s to presidential hopefuls -- off limits to presidential

hopefuls, but this year the issue is front and center. >> reporter: mitt romney rolled out a white board to show the difference between his medicare plan and president obama's. >> as the seniors in america understand what the president's plan is doing to medicare, they'll find it unacceptable. >> reporter: romney sketched oua chart that he says shows the president's healthcare reforms will leave medicare bankrupt in little more than a decade. the white house disputed those claims. >> the aarp has said, heats be clear, has said that -- let's be clear, has said that the president's healthcare act strengthens and protects medicare benefits and beneficiaries. >> reporter: the president stopped by party headquarters to fire up the troops thursday. he pressed medicare on the campaign trail wednesday. >> my plans extended medicare by nearly a decade. their plan ends medicare as we know. it. >> reporter: the president says the romney/ryan plan will force seniors to pay an additional $6,000 a year.

randall pinkston, cbs news washington. >> mitt romney's running mate will be in virginia tomorrow. congressman paul ryan will visit deep run high school in glen allen in the morning. tomorrow afternoon he'll attend a victory rally at west springfield high school. both presidential candidates will not run campaign ads on september 11th. they are honoring request from a group that promotes september 11th as a national day of service. mygoodday.org told the candidates the day should be about unity, not politics. in 2008 ads were also pulled on 9/11. some disappointing news on the job front, the number of americans filing for unemployment jumped slightly last week. an additional 2,000 people filed for benefits. the economy improved slightly in july after falling into a midyear slump. there were 163,000 jobs added last month, the highest since february. plenty of work for firefighters in the western u.s. tonight. we'll have a look at their efforts and the help they're getting from across the country

coming up.

check out this animation from nasa. it say record breaking galaxy crust -- is a record breaking galaxy cluster light years from earth. in the center is a galaxy producing stars at a record pace. scientists believe the rapid growth will be short lived. a minnesota steen is standing up to cyber bullies --

teen is standing up to cyber bullies by killing them with kindness. he was not happy when his classmates were using twitter to bully other kids, so he quietly made his own twitter account to start lifting spirits. kevin starting singling out students and praising them. kevin decided to let everybody know he was the one sending out the good vibes. >> find a kid that can be strong enough to take the other angle and the positive angle on it. so that was very cool and very mature of kevin to do something like that. >> turns out kevin's idea is spreading. similar pages have popped up at nearby schools. kevin has taught his classmates the nice guys do win. >> that's a nice thing. >> the summer is relentless, hot and dry weather, fueling a brutal wildfire season in the western u.s. >> now crews are in 13 states fighting flames and as stacy cohen reports, even the u.s. military is pitching in. >> reporter: this is an aerial view of california burning. at least 70 wildfires west of

the mississippi are ravaging tens of thousands of acres and chasing more than 1,000 people from their homes. california has the largest number of fires with 13, more than 9,000 local and federal firefighters there battling flames from san diego to san bernadino and up to lake county just north of napa. >> they've been dealing with temperatures well over 100 degrees for almost a week. this is on top of fuel conditions that are very, very dry. >> reporter: east of seattle at least 60 homes have been destroyed and 900 people evacuated as the flames are encouraged by wednesday's winds, but those have now subsided and the new problem is heat. searing temperatures will sap the area of humidity creating a virtual oven for folks hoping to contain the flames. elaine weiss lost many of the animals on her farm. >> the home, that's gone and i can get another home, but they had to have suffered.

>> reporter: the fire in cle ellum is now 25% contained but for how long? the pacific northwest is expecting unusually warm weather with highs near 100 degrees. >> we are holding our own at the very least. i feel we are getting some large parts of the fire contained, but we still have some very difficult terrain and fire behavior conditions ahead of us. >> reporter: i'm stacey cohan reporting. >> what a daunting task. you look at these guys out there day in, day out. >> they're not getting much relief from the weather, talking about portland's forecast close to 100 tomorrow, seattle very dry up and down the entire west coast very dry for them. they need the we're looking at big storms once again firing up, not tonight, but tomorrow. i think come tomorrow this time some of us could be dealing pretty big thunderstorms and maybe damaging wins and hail. we'll keep you post -- winds

and hail. we'll keep you posted. right now we're looking at a very nice evening. look at our live doppler 9000 hd, it is quiet thanks to the ridge of high pressure dominating our weather pattern. our live weather cam brought to you by michael and son this thursday night, a beautiful shot of the white house, 89, mostly sunny, winds north, northwest around 8 miles per hour. check out the dew points. we like dew points in the 50s this time of year. that is why the temperature out there does feel a lot better and much more bearable. temperatures in manassas 86, leesburg down to 83 already, 87 gaithersburg and 88 degrees for la plata. so satellite and radar picture has been quiet the last several hours. high pressure is in control, but we have a cold front coming through tomorrow that could really change things especially by afternoon. so we'll still stay nice, but then we become stormy, but tonight very pleasant. friday morning a sunny start. you'll want your umbrella and your sunglasses for friday because we have some big storms possible in the afternoon and evening and then the weekend is

turning to be much cooler. check out your 9 futurecast, quiet tonight, tomorrow lots of sunshine to start the day, but from the north and west of town the front comes through. we'll see cloud increasing throughout the afternoon, showers and -- clouds increasing throughout the afternoon, showers and storms, some strong to severe. we'll have to watch for those storms tomorrow afternoon and evening. they pull out of here but that front stalls south of us into southern virginia which could give us some unsettled weather through the weekend. tonight enjoy the pleasant conditions, lows in the lower 60s outside the beltway to lower 70s. our next three days 9 weather alert code tomorrow is yellow. we may change it to red. high 94, saturday 84, chance for morning showers and storms. check out your next seven days. look at sunday, even cooler, lower 80s, a chance for a shower, still maybe unsettled monday, lower 80s once again under partly cloudy conditions for a chance of showers as well. tuesday mid-80s, wednesday maybe a stray storm, thursday

temperatures back into the upper 80s. boy, it may feel like a little bit of fall especially come this weekend and nats are playing starting tomorrow for the next few days and pretty good baseball weather with the exception of tomorrow's potential big storms. we'll keep you posted. >> some refreshing breezes. who knows is the weather is contributing. something is happening. >> you're going to have good weather and i bet you'll have good games this weekend. the nationals keep on rolling backed by some stellar performances on the mound, but what about the bats? they've been just as hot. we'll compare coming up. >> plus the skins talk about why preseason games are more important than you think. sports is next.

now 9 sports with kristen berset, the best sports in town. >> it's been 16 days since their last day off, a long grueling stretch, but one that has been successful. the nationals have gone 12-5 during that time including an eight-win road trip solidifying their spot as the best team in the league. they're ranked first in pitching and their e.r.a. in the league. they also have held their opponents to the lowest batting average. at the plate .258 batting average good for fifth in the national league along with their amount of home runs. that is for the fifth as well. bryce harper talks about his team.

>> it's going to be a lot of fun for the next 10 years. i think having the team that we have and having the organization that we have, we have a team that can produce hopefully for the next couple years and i think just going in every day trying to win every single ballgame. >> harper didn't rest on his day off. the rookie held a free baseball camp at fairfax high school for over 220 young athletes. all of them as you can imagine are in awe of the 19-year-old couldn't believe they were standing next to an all-star. harper also donated $3,500 for the washington area urban league. as the maryland terrapins get back to work they have to fill the shoes of quarterback c.j. brown out with a torn acl. the terps turn to two untested freshman, caleb roe and perry hillis. right now it's hillis' job to lose. today he completed his second practice as state and has impressed both top mates and coaches with how well he's

handling -- teammates and coaches with how well he's handling the pressure. several older guys are showing him the ropes. >> the older guys just do more coaching and give him easier reads, so when he sees things, it's a little more comfortable for him. you probably get away with a few more things as a veteran, but this is a young guy. the skins are having their second preseason game saturday. quarterback rg3 and the rest of the starters will see a bit more playing time against the pairs. even though the games don't mean anything for the overall record, it's still important to win. >> the game doesn't mean anything, but you want to establish those good habits of winning football games. we started out good in buffalo. we'll try to leave it up to our young guys to try to get a win in chicago. >> we'll take it however it comes. that's it for us. the cbs evening news is next. >> derek is back with your area's only local newscast at

7:00. >> have a good night.