For many families, a Christmas tree represents joy, holiday spirit and precious memories. For others, a tree represents unsafe curiosity, potential danger and added stress.

Killeen native Jessica Mann’s 5 year-old son, Jayian, was diagnosed with autism in Febuary 2010. For her, having a large Christmas tree in the home poses multiple problems.

Violence that sometimes borders the University of Southern California crept onto campus when an argument outside a Halloween party escalated to a shooting that critically wounded one man and injured three other people and led administrators Thursday to reassess policies of the school near high-crime neighborhoods.

The “conspiracy of silence” that protected Jerry Sandusky extended all the way to the top at Penn State, prosecutors said Thursday as they charged former university President Graham Spanier with hushing up child sexual abuse allegations against the former assistant football coach.

Prosecutors also added counts against two of Spanier’s former underlings, Tim Curley and Gary Schultz, who were already charged with lying to a grand jury.

The characters in “Wreck-It Ralph” all have day jobs: They just happen to be characters in video games, re-enacting the same roles in the same universe over and over again, like stock players in a theatrical company. Some, like Mario and Pac-Man and Sonic are heroes; others, like the hulking but kind-hearted Ralph (John C. Reilly), are bad guys, relegated to smashing and destroying buildings and public property of a popular vintage arcade machine until the player runs out of quarters.