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Peruvian police said Thursday they found skin underneath the fingernails of a 21-year-old student Joran van der Sloot is accused of killing.

Miguel Canlla Ore, a colonel in the Peruvian National Police and head of homicide, told journalist Victoria Macchi that the amount of skin was small and that laboratory DNA tests that might indicate who it came from had not been completed.

Peruvian authorities have charged the 22-year-old Dutchman with murder in the death of Stephany Flores, whose body was found June 2 in a hotel room registered to van der Sloot.

He also is the lead suspect in the 2005 disappearance of Alabama teenager Natalee Holloway in Aruba.

Van der Sloot was arrested twice in connection with Holloway's disappearance but was never charged because of a lack of evidence.

A court document obtained by CNN shows Flores had a cranial fracture and other injuries to her face and neck and showed signs of asphyxiation. Forensic tests in the hotel room where her body was found showed blood on the floors, hallway and mattress, the document said.

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Tom Foreman | BIO
AC360° Correspondent

I spent the week touring the Florida Panhandle talking to people about oil and the fear of oil, both of which are scaring away tourists faster than Ralph Nader in a Speedo. And I have concluded this: There are a lot of Waffle Houses down there.

Seriously. Seems like every few miles you see a yellow sign poking into the sky, inviting you to pull over and indulge in a dose of 24-hour cheer and bacon. Like Roy McAvoy in “Tin Cup,” I’m a Waffle House fan, which might explain why I was seized with the idea of how they could help that other WH (meaning the White House) take on the myriad problems facing our nation.

First, one of the issues plaguing President Obama is the sheer enormity of the country. Keeping up with 300 million folks and their complaints is tough, especially if your home is shunted way off to one side of the land. Waffle Houses are everywhere. Imagine how much more efficient things would be if the Administration could just get all those busy waitresses to change their routines to something like, “Would you like grits with that, or perhaps tougher sanctions on North Korea?”

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Alan Duke
CNN

Michael Jackson's death instantly changed the lives of his family and friends. The weeks immediately after the pop icon died were chaotic, and many questions are still unanswered for those closest to Jackson.

Michael's children

The day their father died, Prince Michael, 13, Paris, 12, and Blanket, 8, moved in with their grandmother Katherine Jackson at the Encino, California, home where Michael once lived with his family.

The home is filled with memories of their father, including many photos of a young Michael Jackson. The theater room of the large house was converted into a classroom where they've been home-schooled for the past year.

The grassy yard of the Encino estate is often filled with Michael's kids playing ball with four cousins - the sons of Jackson brothers Jermaine and Randy - who have lived there the past year with their mother.

They share a computer with internet access, which resulted in fans getting a rare and candid look at Blanket's dancing, acting and light saber skills when several videos were uploaded to YouTube in April.

While Jackson kept his children shrouded in privacy during his life, they have appeared at a handful of public events to honor their father since his death.

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Mike Mount
CNN Senior Pentagon Producer

On paper, it appeared to be a winning team for President Obama and his new plan to fix Afghanistan: a celebrated general, a master of counterinsurgency strategy overseeing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as head of CENTCOM, with his his protege running the war in Afghanistan.

The two - Gens. David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal - had enjoyed success because of their military minds. Ask around the Pentagon, and the phrase most often used in connection with both is "brilliant."

While coming from different paths, both generals have a good deal of similarities. After the now-infamous Rolling Stone article, however, it is clear that Petraeus alone has the savvy to survive in Washington.

An academic with political deftness, Petraeus approaches combat with a mix of military and diplomacy, the essence of counterinsurgency.

Petraeus made his first big mark with a successful air assault in northern Iraq in 2003 and kept the region U.S.-friendly while the rest of the country spiraled into chaos. He then used the counterinsurgency strategy to help bolster the U.S. war effort in Iraq for President George W. Bush.

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CNNMoney.com

If embattled BP chief executive Tony Hayward leaves the company, he is not likely to walk with a massive windfall, compensation experts said.

While his departure is not imminent, speculation is rampant that the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico will cost Hayward his job. According to a prediction market run by Intrade, there is a 70% chance Hayward will be gone before the year is out.

That raises the question of how much severance he could receive if he steps down.

BP spokesman David Nicholas would not comment when asked about a possible severance plan, adding that Hayward remains the company's chief executive.

But experts say Hayward will probably not get a lucrative package of bonus money and stock awards that many U.S. companies give to outgoing CEOs as so-called golden parachutes.

"He will be lucky to get a single year's salary," said Paul Hodgson, a senior researcher at The Corporate Library, a governance group. "And even that could be mitigated in certain circumstances."

Hayward's salary last year was just over 1 million British pounds, or $1.5 million, according to BP's annual report. He also received a bonus worth more than $3 million and stock valued at nearly $1 million in 2009, the report said.

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Tom Foreman | BIO
AC360° Correspondent

Reporter's Note: President Obama and I have our ages, and a certain love of athletics, in common. Plus we both work in Washington, and we love these letters. At least, fifty percent of us do...

Dear Mr. President,

Huzzah! I have figured out why most of my letters have been so weak lately. Barring, of course, the distinct possibility that I am a man of sorely limited ideas and my meter has expired. The slump is because I am exercising in earnest once again!

Don’t misread me here. I would not have it any other way. Truthfully if a man my age (which is also your age, btw) gets so caught up in writing an avalanche of letters which may not have been even noticed (ahem!) or pointedly ignored (double ahem!) that he lets his health slide down a fast chute of doughnuts and hotdogs, then that man needs to have his head examined. Possibly his aortic valves too.

This notion came to me while I was out on a five mile trot up and down the beautiful hills of Tallahassee in the soothing 90 degree evening heat. And yes, they do too have hills here. Sometime between my first painful attempts to suck in air that you could use to fill a bathtub, and the weird part where I started hallucinating that I was wind-surfing with Gwen Stefani and a pack of howler monkeys, it came to me like a vision. I’m pretty sure I even heard music, although it is possible that the shirtless guy in the rusty El Camino just blew his horn at me for weaving into traffic.

In any event, like a vision I realized that too often I’ve been trying to simply jam in this writing at the end of a long day without really giving it serious thought. Please accept my apologies, because frankly there is no excuse for that. What is the point of doing something, unless you try to do it well?

But there is a double good part to this epiphany: I found that if I run long enough, I can actually figure out what is really on my mind and worth writing about. There is a lesson in here, of course, about making sure that you take enough time to protect your health and peace of mind that you are capable of making wise decisions, not merely decisions.

But frankly, I’m too hot, sweaty and tired to write about it now. Ha! Give me a call if you have a spare moment. I am thinking about coming down here to Pensacola for a marathon with my brother this fall. Do you want to come along?

Regards,

Tom

Follow Tom on Twitter @tomforemancnn.

Find more of the Foreman Letters here.

Gabriel Falcon
AC360° Writer

Oregon authorities said Wednesday that a woman accused former Vice President Al Gore of "unwanted sexual contact" in connection with a 2006 encounter, but no charges resulted because detectives could not substantiate her claim.

In a statement released to the media, the Portland Police Department said the allegation involved an encounter between Gore and a licensed massage therapist at a hotel on October 24, 2006. "The detectives concluded that there was not enough evidence to support the allegations," Portland police spokeswoman Mary Wheat told CNN.

The department explained its timing in releasing a statement Wednesday by saying that while the department does not usually release information on alleged sex crimes, "A national tabloid magazine has published a story discussing allegations made by a Portland woman against former Vice President Al Gore."

The department statement said police were contacted by a lawyer for the woman in 2006 and, "After repeated attempts by Portland Police Detectives to interview the woman involved, the Police Bureau was told by her attorney in January 2007, that they were pursuing civil litigation and declined the assistance of the Portland Police Bureau's Detective Division."

The woman came to police in January 2009 and "explained that she would like to give a statement ...The woman read from a prepared statement and detailed the events of October 24, 2006. She reported that she was repeatedly subjected to unwanted sexual touching while in his (Gore's) presence," the police department's statement Wednesday said. The statement said the woman told detectives she had gone to Gore's hotel room because she had been called "to provide a massage to Mr. Gore."

Earlier this year, the woman asked investigators if she could edit her statement, indicating that she could provide detectives with more information, authorities said. "At this point, the police bureau does not consider this an ongoing investigation unless new evidence is received in the case, said Wednesday's police statement.

CNN attempted to contact Gore for a response to the allegations. "Our office has no comment," said Kalee Kreider, communications director for Gore.

Follow the Falcon File on Twitter @FalconCNN