PITTSBURGH — Former Pittsburgh-area state Sen. Jane Orie wants to be released on bail while she appeals her conviction on campaign corruption charges.

Orie's attorney requested last week that the former lawmaker be released while she appeals her March conviction on charges she used her taxpayer-funded staff for campaign purposes. Prosecutors opposed that request in filings Monday.

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports Orie's request for a new trial says the judge in the case erred by barring discussion of the "personal animus" between her family and Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen Zappala Jr.

The defense claimed the charges against Orie were politically motivated, an allegation denied by prosecutors.

Two other Orie sisters are charged in the campaign corruption investigation, including suspended state Supreme Court Justice Joan Orie Melvin.

PHILADELPHIA — A Philadelphia grandmother has been ordered to spend more than four years in federal prison for selling prescription drugs out of her home.

Forty-five-year-old Diane Donnelly was ordered Monday to spend 57 months in prison for distribution of a controlled substance and related charges.

Donnelly was arrested in May 2011 after selling drugs to an undercover officer. A search of her home turned up $28,000 in pills including Xanax, Ritalin and Adderall.

The Philadelphia Daily News reports Donnelly was the primary caregiver for her 8-year-old grandson.

CONFLUENCE — State police are searching for a 69-year-old man who's been reported missing from a personal care home in southwestern Pennsylvania.

Troopers from the Somerset barracks aren't identifying the home, but say Hillel Seymour Chigev was last seen there about 1 p.m. Monday.

The home is located in Lower Turkeyfoot Township, near Confluence, about 60 miles southeast of Pittsburgh.

Volunteer firefighters and other volunteers searched for the man until late Monday and have yet to find him.

CORAOPOLIS — Police have been searching up to four men they say were also present when another was fatally shot in his Pittsburgh-area home, possibly as part of a drug deal.

The Allegheny County medical examiner has confirmed the man's death, but no other details about the 20-year-old man shot in Kennedy Township about 8 p.m. Monday.

County police say they're looking for three or four other men who reportedly sped away from the man's home, possibly in a maroon Chevy.

Police have stopped short of saying whether any or all the men are suspected in the man's death. Police say the man's parents were home at the time he was shot in the head. Kennedy Township is a quiet bedroom community about five miles west of Pittsburgh.

__________________________________

Officers want evidence excluded in beating suit

PITTSBURGH — A bond rating service says Highmark Inc.'s proposed $475 million takeover isn't enough to save Pittsburgh's second biggest hospital network.

Moody's Investor Service says dropping patient volume and continued operating losses mean the West Penn Allegheny Health System will need more capital or other outside investments in the next two years.

Highmark, the state's largest insurer, announced the takeover of the six-hospital West Penn Allegheny system in November. State regulators must still approve the deal.

Although Moody's predicts that will happen, the ratings service says West Penn's financial outlook remains negative and has kept its junk bond rating on $737 million in debt the hospitals have issued.

Highmark has reportedly given West Penn half of the $400 million in grants and loans promised in the deal, which includes another $75 million to start a medical school.

__________________________________

ELLWOOD CITY — A western Pennsylvania borough is considering a lottery system to solve objections from an atheists' group over a Nativity scene that has been erected annually on borough property for decades.

The Beaver County Times reports Tuesday that Ellwood City's borough council has given preliminary approval to a lottery that would let anyone enter a contest to erect a holiday display. The winner would then put up any kind of holiday display they wished which, borough officials believe, would prevent the Madison, Wis.-based Freedom From Religion Foundation from objecting that the borough had "endorsed" a particular religion.

Critics of the idea say the borough had better be prepared if someone wins the contest who doesn't wish to erect a Nativity.

The borough about 35 miles northwest of Pittsburgh added secular symbols after the Wisconsin group complained last year.