The search for a missing Reno women is getting some Las Vegas support. Students at Richard Bryan Elementary school are donating money to help keep the search for Brianna Denison going.

Denison, who is a 19-year-old college student, has not been seen since Jan. 20, 2008 when she was abducted from a friend's home.

Brianna Denison Website

Family and friends have organized search parties and are raising money to help find out what happened to Brianna. The girl's aunt, Christi Rogers, is a Las Vegas school teacher.

The students see her sadness and how desperate she is to find her niece. That's why the Parent Teachers Association at Richard Bryan Elementary School made a flyer asking for donations to make sure the searching doesn't stop. Rogers is also using her family tragedy as a teaching tool for her young students.

“Jacob, what's something you know will keep you safe?” she asks. “Lock the door.” “I would run to a neighbor's house,” her students reply.

It's been nearly three weeks since her niece disappeared and few clues about Brianna's disappearance have surfaced.

“Unfortunately, they have not found anything of substance,” she said. The family is hopeful they will get more information. So far, police have linked DNA from Brianna's case to an unknown suspect who has sexually assaulted three other women in the same Reno neighborhood.

Rogers wants to prepare her students in case they are ever in a dangerous situation. “The bad guy came in and put a pillow… so if she screamed…,” Rogers tells her students asking them what they would do? “Scream as loud as you can,” said one student. “Kick him,” said another.

“We need to be safe and I need to start right now with my six-year-old students,” she said adding that if this could happen to Brianna, it could happen to anyone.

Rogers said her first graders have responded with much care and concern for her family's situation. The school PTA is also heading up a donation drive to make sure the search for Brianna Denison does not end.

The case has received national attention. America's Most Wanted and national news outlets have been running stories hoping to find the suspect.

Two Chinese businesses and a Las Vegas-based company were indicted Wednesday in the tainted pet food incidents that killed dozens of animals last year and raised worries about products made in China.

Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development Co., Suzhou Textiles, Silk, Light Industrial Products, Arts and Crafts I/E Co., and Las Vegas-based ChemNutra Inc. were charged in two separate but related indictments. The U.S. attorney's office in Kansas City said the tainted food led to the death and serious illness of pets in the U.S. last year.

One of the indictments charges Xuzhou Anying Biologic, located in China's Jiangsu Province, and Suzhou Textiles, in Suzhou, China, with 13 counts of introduction of adulterated food into interstate commerce and 13 counts of introduction of misbranded food into interstate commerce.

ChemNutra and company owners Sally Quing Miller, a Chinese national, and her husband, Stephen S. Miller were charged with 13 counts of introduction of adulterated food into interstate commerce, 13 counts of introduction of misbranded food into interstate commerce and one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

The indictments allege that Suzhou Textiles, an export broker, mislabeled 800 metric tons of wheat gluten tainted with the toxic chemical melamine to avoid inspection in China. Xuzhou then did not properly declare the contaminated product it shipped to the U.S. as a material to be used in food, the indictment says.

It also says the shipment was falsely declared to the Chinese government in a way that would avoid a mandatory inspection of the company's plants.

According to the indictment, ChemNutra picked up the melamine-tainted product at a port of entry in Kansas City, then sold it to makers of various brands of pet foods. The indictment alleges that the melamine was added to make the gluten meet the required standard for protein content specified in the contract between Suzhou and ChemNutra.

“Millions of pet owners remember the anxiety of last year's pet food recall. These indictments are the product of an investigation that began in the wake of that recall,” U.S. Attorney John Wood said in a news release announcing the indictments.

ChemNutra did not immediately return a call seeking comment. The indictment also names Xuzhou Anying Biologic owner and manager, Mao Linzhun, and Suzhou Textiles' President Chen Zhen Hao.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

A local high school student was kicked out of class for not saying or standing during the pledge of allegiance. The incident has sparked a heated debate but the student himself says he'll continue to not participate.

That student, 16-year-old Devon Smith, says he was told to leave the classroom yesterday morning after refusing to say or stand for the pledge. Though he's been questioned as to why he did it, he says under the constitution, he has every right to not participate.

The sophomore says he hasn't been standing for the pledge since eighth grade because of religious beliefs. The teen says he doesn't believe in God and has every right not to recite the pledge.

“One nation under God. I don't believe in God but I'm not a devil worshiper, just my thought on life,” he said.

The ACLU agrees with Smith and says as long as he was not being disruptive, he should not have been forced to leave the class.

However, the Clark County School District says they can't comment on whether Smith was being disrespectful or disruptive during the pledge. Smith says he wasn't acting out.

“I just think he did the right thing. He stood for what he believes. Whether I agree with it, whether the teacher agrees with it, it must have been a really hard thing to do,” said Smith's mother Donna Pearson.

Smith's parents both say this was their sons second week at Spring Valley High, after spending a little more than a month at an alternative school.

Smith says he was caught writing on a bathroom wall, but he and his parents say it was first offense and he is not a trouble maker.

The district will not say if Smith was being disruptive inside the classroom. Both his parents say they support their son, but even they disagree on their son's choice to not say the pledge.

The ACLU says they get several complaints each year over this very issue.

Email your comments to Reporter Melissa Duran