NEW YORK (AP) — Parents of teens: If you think a drinking disaster at your kid’s party can’t happen at your house, not with your kid, because he’s a good kid, it’s time to wake up and smell the whiskey bottle tossed on your lawn.

Because of the high risk of underage drinking and driving this time of year, many parents open their homes to partying teens as a way to keep them off the roads. What some may not know is that liability laws can leave Mom and Dad vulnerable to lawsuits, fines and even jail time if underage drinking is found to be going on under their roof.

Parents can get in trouble even if they didn’t know about the drinking.

That’s what a Menlo Park, Calif., father says he is up against.

Bill Burnett, a Stanford University professor, was arrested the night after Thanksgiving over a basement party thrown by his 17-year-old son to celebrate a big high school football win.

Burnett said he and his wife had forbidden alcohol at the party and were upstairs at the time police received a call about possible drinking by minors. In fact, he said, he had twice made his way to the basement to check on the merry-making.

He spent a night in jail and was booked on 44 counts of suspicion of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Each misdemeanor count carries up to a $2,500 fine and nearly a year in jail.

Burnett questioned the deterrent value of laws that hold parents legally responsible even if they didn’t know there was alcohol at the party.

“In this case I think arresting a parent isn’t going to prevent kids from drinking,” he said on the “Today” show.

Eight states have specific “social host” laws that say parents can get in trouble if underage guests are drinking, even if no one gets hurt, according to the National Institutes of Health. (Some of those states allow parents to serve alcohol to their own children in some situations.)

Sixteen other states have laws that hold Mom and Dad legally responsible for underage drinking under certain circumstances — for example, if a teen who drank at their home got into a car accident, NIH said. In other states, parents can get in trouble under more general liability laws.

Stephen Wallace, a senior adviser at Students Against Destructive Decisions, or SADD, which used to be called Students Against Drunk Driving, said that with an increased awareness of the dangers of underage drinking, law enforcement authorities are increasingly relying on social host liability laws to go after parents.

While he acknowledged that teens are adept at finding ways to drink on the sly, he said he is all for anything that gets at the problem of underage drinking. He said he finds it troubling that the Burnetts said they saw no alcohol consumed at their party.

“Parents need to say to kids, ‘You shouldn’t be drinking at all and you certainly can’t do it here because we can be put in jail,’” Wallace said.

According to SADD research co-sponsored by the insurance company Liberty Mutual, more teens are saying that their parents allow them to go to parties where alcohol is being served — 41 percent in 2011, compared with 36 percent two years ago. Also, 57 percent of high school students whose parents allow them to drink at home said they prefer to drink elsewhere with their friends, Wallace said.

At some parties, the parents themselves supply the booze. In other cases, the kids bring it, sometimes with the hosts’ knowledge.

“Some parents feel helpless,” said David Singer of Demarest, N.J., who has 17-year-old twin daughters and a 20-year-old son in college. “Some parents feel they need to look the other way in order to help their kids fit in with the cool crowd. And some parents believe, ‘It’s better under my roof than who-knows-where.’”

Like Burnett, Singer said he doesn’t condone drinking by his underage kids under any circumstances. And yet he found a whiskey bottle in the yard after a party thrown by his son.

Burnett acknowledged he made a mistake but said he doesn’t believe police crackdowns like the one at his house do much good.

“All of this is probably going to go underground and result in a more dangerous situation for kids,” he told the online news network Patch. “I really don’t think it’s up to the police to help me parent.”

Astonishingly beautiful and breathtaking in its brutal imagery, “Snow White & the Huntsman” is thrilling and frightening in equal measure, yet as bereft of satisfying substance as a poisoned apple.

Rupert Sanders’ revisionist take on the classic Brothers Grimm fable, the first feature from the respected British commercial director, upends expectations of traditional gender roles while simultaneously embracing what a fairy tale should be. It’s dark and dangerous, vicious and violent. Yes, there are dwarves and adorable, furry woodland creatures but more often, death is a constant threat.

Donald Trump may have briefly sidetracked Mitt Romney’s campaign message in Las Vegas with his renewed “birther” talk, but it isn’t the first time an opinionated supporter has put a candidate in an awkward position.

In 2008, candidate Barack Obama had to distance himself from his former longtime pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, following the Chicago clergyman’s incendiary rhetoric and contentious public appearances. Obama also faced questions about his relationships with 1960s radical Bill Ayers and convicted Chicago businessman Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

NEW YORK (AP) — A key borrowing rate is sinking to a 66-year low as fear over Europe roils global markets.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury dropped to 1.62 percent in Wednesday trading as investors shifted money into Treasurys and other government bonds considered safe.

The flight to Treasurys was spurred by reports that the European Central Bank rejected a plan to help Spain pay for a banking bailout.

The price of the 10-year Treasury jumped $1.12 for every $100 invested. Rising demand for bonds lowers their yields.

Worries that troubles in Europe will set off a wider financial crisis have driven traders into Treasurys in May. The 10-year Treasury started the month paying 1.95 percent.

PERJURY: The former top media adviser to Prime Minister David Cameron, Andy Coulson, was detained Wednesday on suspicion of perjury in the trial of a flamboyant ex-Scottish lawmaker in 2010.

CONTEXT: Coulson was editor of the News of the World tabloid when stories about former politician Tommy Sheridan were published, and working as Cameron’s communications director when he gave evidence to the 2010 trial. He left his post at the newspaper in 2007 after a reporter and a private investigator were jailed over phone hacking offenses.

SECOND CHANCE: Cameron has insisted he had been right to offer Coulson a “second chance.”Coulson resigned as his media chief last year.

SAN ISIDRO, Colombia (AP) — Freed French journalist Romeo Langlois appears and speaks to reporters in Colombia.