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PHOENIX (AP) — A teacher at an Arizona prison was alone in a room full of sex offenders before being stabbed and sexually assaulted by a convicted rapist, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press about an attack that highlighted major security lapses at the facility.

The attack occurred Jan. 30 at the Eyman prison's Meadows Unit, which houses about 1,300 rapists, child molesters and other sex offenders. The teacher was administering a high school equivalency test to about a half-dozen inmates in a classroom with no guard nearby and only a radio to summon help. The Department of Corrections issued only a bare-bones press release after the attack, but the AP pieced together what happened based on interviews and investigatory reports obtained under the Arizona Public Records Act.

After the last of the other inmates left, Jacob Harvey asked the teacher if she could open the bathroom and then attacked her, records show. Harvey is accused of stabbing her in the head with a pen, forcing her to the ground and raping her.

The teacher told investigators that she screamed for help, but none came. Afterward, Harvey tried to use her radio to call for help. It had apparently been changed to a channel the unit's guards didn't use, so Harvey let the woman use a phone, according to the reports.

Carl ToersBijns, a former deputy warden at the prison, said the assault highlights chronic understaffing and lax security policies that put staff members at risk.

"Here you've got a guy that commits a hell of a crime ... and he's put into an environment that actually gives him an opportunity to do his criminality because of a lack of staffing," said ToersBijns, who was deputy warden at the Eyman prison in Florence until retiring in 2010 and oversaw the Meadows Unit for 19 months.

State prison officials, however, dismiss the concerns. They say the assault at the prison about 60 miles southeast of Phoenix is a risk that comes with the job of overseeing violent prison inmates.

Harvey was in the first year of a 30-year sentence for raping a Glendale woman in November 2011. Just 17 at the time, he had knocked on the woman's door in the middle of the day, asked for a drink of water, then forced his way inside, where he repeatedly raped and beat her while her 2-year-old child was in the apartment. He fled naked when the woman's roommate arrived home.

He was arrested after DNA evidence connected him to the crime, and he pleaded guilty.

Harvey was initially classified as a "Class 4" security risk, one notch lower than the highest level. Six months later, despite violating prison rules at least once, he was reclassified at a lower level.

Department of Corrections spokesman Doug Nick said classrooms at prisons across the state are having cameras installed. But he said no administrative investigation was launched because there was no need, and no one was disciplined. He said all prisons are dangerous places and staff are trained accordingly.

"This is an assault that reflects the fact that inmates in our system often act out violently, and it is the inmate suspect who is responsible for this despicable act," he said.

Nick also said that not having a guard in classrooms or nearby "follows accepted corrections practices nationwide."

That's not the case, said Carolyn Eggleston, a professor at California State University, San Bernardino, who started her career as a prison teacher in several states and now is director of the university's Correctional and Alternative Education Program.

"I have to say, I don't find that consistent with standards," Eggleston said. "In a sex offender unit, especially, they should be counting the people leaving the classroom. They just should. And there should be somebody, not in the class ... but there should be somebody in proximity so they can help monitor that."

The woman, who was not critically injured, has filed a worker's compensation claim against the state and did not want to comment on case. The AP does not usually identify sexual assault victims.

Internal emails obtained by the AP show that prisons Director Charles Ryan ordered all non-corrections officer staff at prisons statewide to be issued pepper spray and trained in its use just days after the attack. And an internal memo sent the day after the assault ordered guards at a nearby prison to begin checking on civilian staff every hour.

Nick said the pepper-spray order was in the works before the assault. And he said that, despite the internal memo from a major that ordered hourly checks, the actual practice is unpredictable and more frequent, with staggered checks three times an hour.

ToersBijns, who is an advocate for prison safety and believes understaffing has put state prison staff at risk, said multiple errors likely led to the assault, including not having video cameras in the classroom, a lack of checks on civilian staff and use of an outdated classification system for inmates that led to a violent predator being misidentified as a relatively low-level threat.

After the attack, Harvey was calm when confronted in the classroom, refused to talk to investigators and asked for a lawyer. He was charged last month with sexual assault, kidnapping and assault with a deadly weapon. A public defender was appointed, and he pleaded not guilty at his arraignment. The public defender assigned to his case, Paula Cook, declined to comment.

Harvey was convicted in a prison administrative hearing of sexually assaulting the staff member. Three weeks after the rape, he assaulted another prison employee, although records don't show any details. His security classification was raised two levels, to the highest, nearly three months after the teacher was assaulted.

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Follow Bob Christie at http://twitter.com/APChristie .

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq asked the U.S. to launch airstrikes to beat back militants holding vast territories across its north, a decision Washington mulled over as insurgents pressed an assault on the country's largest oil refinery.

U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday briefed leaders of Congress on options for quelling the insurgency by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, which launched an offensive across Iraq more than a week ago. While Obama has not fully ruled out the possibility of launching airstrikes, such action is not imminent, officials said, in part because intelligence agencies have been unable to identify clear targets on the ground.

Instead, the U.S. pushed Iraq to present its people a clear coalition to fight the militants, with Vice President Joe Biden offering praise Iraq's Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish leaders as a means to tamper the sectarian anger roiling the country. It's unclear whether that will work, as Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Shiite-led government has faced widespread dissatisfaction from its people despite coming out ahead recent parliamentary elections.

Al-Maliki, a Shiite, has rejected charges of bias and instead said the crisis has led Iraqis to rediscover "national unity."

"I tell all the brothers there have been negative practices by members of the military, civilians and militiamen, but that is not what we should be discussing," al-Maliki said. "Our effort should not be focused here and leave the larger objective of defeating" the militants

Still, al-Maliki's outreach remain largely rhetoric, with no concrete action to bridge differences with Sunnis and Kurds, who have been at loggerheads with the prime minister over their right to independently export oil and over territorial claims.

The United Arab Emirates, a key Western ally and important regional trading partner for Iraq, temporarily withdrew its ambassador from Iraq "for consultations." The Gulf federation's foreign ministry cited deep concern at the Iraqi government's "exclusionary and sectarian policies," according to a statement carried Wednesday night by the state news agency WAM.

Meanwhile, violence continued Thursday as a car bomb exploded inside a parking lot in Baghdad's southeastern Shiite neighborhood of New Baghdad, killing three people and wounding seven, police and hospital officials said.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Wednesday that his country had formally asked the U.S. to launch airstrikes against positions of the Islamic State.

Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed the U.S. had received a request for air power to stop the militants, but highlighted the uncertain political situation in Iraq.

"The entire enterprise is at risk as long as this political situation is in flux," told a Senate panel Wednesday. He added that some Iraqi security forces had backed down when confronted by the militants because they had "simply lost faith" in the central government in Baghdad.

The discussions over tactics came as Iraq's military said government forces had repelled repeated attacks by the militants on the country's largest oil refinery and retaken parts of the strategic city of Tal Afar, near the Syrian border.

The chief military spokesman, Lt. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, said Iraqi army troops had defended the refinery at Beiji, some 250 kilometers (155 miles) north of Baghdad, and 40 attackers were killed in fighting there overnight and early Wednesday.

An employee at the oil refinery reached by The Associated Press late Wednesday also said the facility remained in government hands, though one of its fuel tanks was on fire after it was apparently hit by a mortar shell fired by the militants. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he wasn't authorized to speak to journalists.

The Beiji refinery accounts for a little more than a quarter of the country's entire refining capacity — all of which goes toward domestic consumption for things like gasoline, cooking oil and fuel for power stations. Any lengthy outage at Beiji risks long lines at the gas pump and electricity shortages, adding to the chaos already facing Iraq.

There was no independent confirmation of the military's claims about the Beiji refinery or that its forces had retaken neighborhoods in Tal Afar, which Sunni fighters captured Monday. Both are in territories held by insurgents that journalists have not been able to access. Tal Afar's proximity to the Syrian border strengthens the Islamic State's plan to carve out an Islamic caliphate, or state, stretching across parts of the two countries.

The campaign by the al-Qaida-inspired Islamic State militants has raised the specter of the sectarian warfare that nearly tore the country apart in 2006 and 2007, with the popular mobilization to fight the insurgents taking an increasingly sectarian slant, particularly after Iraq's top Shiite cleric made a call to arms on Friday.

The Islamic State has vowed to march to Baghdad and the Shiite holy cities of Karbala and Najaf, home to some of the sect's most revered shrines, in the worst threat to Iraq's stability since U.S. troops left in late 2011. The militants also have tried to capture Samarra, a city north of Baghdad and home to another major Shiite shrine.

Meanwhile, the government in India said 40 construction workers have been seized near Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, which Sunni fighters captured last week.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry said its diplomats were also investigating a Turkish media report that militants grabbed 60 foreign construction workers, including some 15 Turks, near the northern Iraqi oil city of Kirkuk.

Ethnic Kurds now control Kirkuk, moving to fill a vacuum after the flight of Iraqi soldiers. They too are battling the Sunni extremist militants.

Republicans continued to insist Wednesday that Obama bore the blame for allowing the insurgency to strengthen because of his decision to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq in late 2011 after more than eight years of war. Washington and Baghdad failed to reach a security agreement that would have allowed American forces to stay longer.

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Associated Press writer Adam Schreck in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq's prime minister said Wednesday that his government has regained the initiative after the "shock" defeat of its army and security forces in a lightning attack by Sunni militants in the country's north. Meanwhile, diplomats said they were investigating claims of some 100 foreign workers being kidnapped in areas under militant control.

Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite who has been in office since 2006, said in a televised address that the loss last week of a large swath of territory has helped Iraq restore its national unity.

"We were able to contain the strike and arrest deterioration. ... We have now started our counteroffensive, regaining the initiative and striking back," al-Maliki said.

Al-Maliki's upbeat assessment came as news broke of government forces regaining parts of a strategic city near the Syrian border that was captured Monday by fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

It also came hours after the chief military spokesman, Lt. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, said government forces on Wednesday repelled an attack by militants on the country's largest oil refinery at Beiji, north of the capital. He said 40 attackers were killed in fighting there overnight and on Wednesday morning.

The Beiji refinery accounts for a little more than a quarter of the country's entire refining capacity — all of which goes toward domestic consumption for things like gasoline, cooking oil and fuel for power stations. Any lengthy outage at Beiji risks long lines at the gas pump and electricity shortages, adding to the chaos already facing Iraq.

In New Delhi, the Foreign Ministry said that 40 Indian construction workers have been kidnapped in Iraq. Meanwhile, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said its diplomats were investigating claims that militants abducted 60 foreign construction workers, including some 15 Turks, near the oil city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq.

Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin said the government has been unable to contact the workers.

There are about 10,000 Indian citizens working and living in Iraq. Akbaruddin said only about 100 are in violent, insecure areas. That includes the construction workers near Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city, as well as 46 Indian nurses working in a hospital in the Iraqi town of Tikrit. Both Mosul and Tikri were captured by the Islamic State last week.

Akbaruddin said humanitarian organizations have been in touch with the nurses, who are safe and have been advised to avoid travel by road.

India sent a senior diplomat to Baghdad on Wednesday.

Near Kirkuk, which Kurdish fighters took over from fleeing Iraqi soldiers amid the militants' advance, the Islamic State kidnapped 60 foreign construction workers building a hospital, Turkey's private Dogan news agency reported Wednesday. The agency based its report on an unnamed worker who was reportedly freed by the militants.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry could not immediately confirm the report but said its embassy was investigating.

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Associated Press writers Katy Daigle in New Delhi and Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A pair of Cy Young Awards, three straight major league ERA titles, a 20-win season — and now a no-hitter.

There isn't much more for Clayton Kershaw to accomplish from an individual standpoint. Now all the Los Angeles Dodgers' ace wants is a World Series ring.

Kershaw dominated the Colorado Rockies on Wednesday night, striking out a career-high 15 and allowing his only baserunner on a throwing error by shortstop Hanley Ramirez in Los Angeles' 8-0 victory.

Kershaw's gem gave the Dodgers the only two no-hitters in the majors this season. Josh Beckett tossed one May 25 in Philadelphia.

"I am so amazed," Kershaw said. "Beckett told me he was going to teach me how to do that, so I have Josh to thank."

Cheered on by his wife in the stands, Kershaw (7-2) retired his first 18 batters before Corey Dickerson led off the seventh with a slow bouncer to Ramirez. His throw on the run went wide past first baseman Adrian Gonzalez for a two-base error — ending any chance for a perfect game.

But that was it for the Rockies against Kershaw, who shrugged off the miscue and came oh-so-close to throwing the 22nd perfecto in the majors since 1900.

"He had command of everything. I told him between innings: 'It's not fair when you have a devastating slider and a devastating curveball in the same night," catcher A.J. Ellis said. "And when he does that, nights like this are really possible."

One batter after Dickerson reached base, rookie third baseman Miguel Rojas backhanded Troy Tulowitzki's grounder behind the bag and let fly with a strong throw to first that Gonzalez — a three-time Gold Glove winner — scooped out of the dirt to keep the no-hitter intact.

With the crowd of 46,069 on its feet and roaring, Kershaw made quick work of the Rockies in the ninth.

DJ LeMahieu grounded out to first base on the first pitch of the inning and Charlie Culberson hit a lazy fly to right field on the next one. Dickerson then got four straight strikes and went down swinging.

"I've seen some great pitching performances, but it's tough to be any better than Kershaw," Colorado manager Walt Weiss said.

After his 107th and final pitch, a beaming Kershaw raised his arms above his head and waited for a huge hug from Ellis.

"I started tearing up out there in the ninth inning, just sitting out there catching and watching him throw after he got those first two outs," Ellis said. "It was pretty special."

"It's something you never forget," he added. "It's a game I'll watch on replays with my kids forever."

Moments later, as he was about to be interviewed on the field, Kershaw was doused by teammates with two large buckets. The left-hander with the big-breaking curve also got a hug from his wife.

Kershaw gave Los Angeles sports fans their second memorable thrill in just a few days.

The Kings won the Stanley Cup at home last Friday night, their second NHL championship in three years, and brought the famous trophy to Dodger Stadium on Tuesday for a pregame ceremony.

The only other time the Dodgers pitched two no-hitters in one season was 1956, when the team was still in Brooklyn. Carl Erskine and Sal Maglie turned the trick that year.

Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax, who tossed four no-hitters, pitched the franchise's only perfect game on Sept. 9, 1965, against the Chicago Cubs.

"I guess I haven't really thought of the ramifications of throwing one of these things, but it's definitely special company," Kershaw said. "I don't take for granted the history of this, or what it means. I definitely understand all that. But as far as individually, it's right up there with winning playoff games and all that stuff. It's pretty cool."

Ramirez was back in the lineup after leaving Tuesday night's game with a bruised ring finger on his throwing hand, the result of a sharp grounder by Dickerson than deflected into short center field for a double.

Ramirez was replaced on defense by rookie Carlos Triunfel to start the eighth.

Kershaw missed more than six weeks early this year because of a strained muscle in his upper back, after beating Arizona in the season opener during the Dodgers' two-game trip to Australia.

It was the 22nd no-hitter in Dodgers history and the first at home since Ramon Martinez's 2-0 gem against the Marlins on July 14, 1995.

"His stuff was phenomenal tonight. I think all the guys said that. We tip our hats to him," Dickerson said.

The day after Beckett's no-hitter, teammate Hyun-Jin Ryu took a perfect game into the eighth inning against Cincinnati before giving up a leadoff double to Todd Frazier.

"As far as individual games go, this is really special. To do it at home is more amazing," Kershaw said before looking up and thanking the crowd.

Kershaw received a standing ovation when he came to bat in the eighth, and another one minutes later after finishing the job against one of baseball's top lineups.

The Rockies began the day leading the majors in batting average, hits, total bases, on-base percentage and slugging percentage. They were first in the NL in runs and homers.

"There are some guys in that lineup that give him fits," Ellis acknowledged. "But the way he made those guys look tonight was a testament to how good his stuff was. He was pretty dialed in and pretty locked in — especially as the game progressed."

Rojas also supported Kershaw with his bat, hitting a three-run double while continuing to fill in for injured third baseman Juan Uribe. Gonzalez and Matt Kemp each drove in two runs, helping the Dodgers complete their first three-game sweep at home this season.

Jorge De La Rosa (6-6) threw 86 pitches over 3 1-3 innings and was charged with eight runs, six hits and five walks. The left-hander is 0-3 with an 8.19 ERA in his last four starts after going 6-0 with a 1.80 ERA during his previous seven outings.

NOTES: The last time the Rockies were held hitless, it was by Dodgers pitcher Hideo Nomo on Sept. 17, 1996. The only other no-hitter against Colorado was pitched by Al Leiter of the Marlins in May 1996.