U.S. girl dies after marathon punishment

A 9-year-old Alabama third-grader died after her grandmother made her run for three hours as a punishment, the sheriff's office said. Etowah County Sheriff Todd Entrekin said Savannah Hardin died Monday at Children's Hospital in Birmingham. She collapsed Friday evening after she was ordered to run for three hours outside her home near Boaz, in northeastern Alabama, as punishment for lying about eating candy she had gotten on the school bus, The Gadsen Times reported. Grandmother Joyce Hardin Garrard, 46, and stepmother Jessica Mae Hardin, 27, face murder charges, the newspaper said. Savannah was taken off life support Monday after her father, a private contractor working overseas for the government, returned back to the United States.