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From the Los Angeles Times

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Judge blocks Schwarzenegger bid to kill child-care program

Keeping the program for kids whose job-holding parents used to be on welfare is a priority for Democrats. The battle over it reflects the tough choices Brown will have to make as governor.

By Shane Goldmacher and Patrick McGreevy, Los Angeles Times

November 5, 2010

Reporting from Sacramento

A state judge Friday blocked Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's plan to eliminate a $256-million child-care program as Democratic legislators vowed to keep it operating, calling it their top priority once Jerry Brown takes office in January.

Schwarzenegger had used his line-item veto authority to eliminate the program before signing the budget last month, saying the cutback was needed to bolster the state's reserves.

The battle over the program, which serves nearly 60,000 low-income parents, is a reminder of the tough choices Brown will face as he straddles a line between the Democratic base that vaulted him into office and the chronic deficit he is vowing to tame. Democrats have been strong supporters of many of the programs slashed in recent years.

Friday's ruling, by Alameda County Superior Court Judge Wynne Carvill, came after program advocates sued the state, arguing that the state should have automatically enrolled parents in other subsidized day-care programs if they were eligible. The program that Schwarzenegger cut serves parents who were once on welfare but now hold jobs that do not pay enough for them to afford child care.

Carvill issued a temporary restraining order until a full hearing on the case can be held Nov. 23. The judge also ordered the state to notify parents that they can be screened to qualify for other state child-care programs.

Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez (D- Los Angeles) cheered Friday's ruling as "good news for the working families and child-care providers who were jeopardized."

Pérez has scrambled to save the program, offering $6 million from his own operating budget to bridge the gap until Brown is sworn in; he and state Senate leader Darrell Steinberg (D- Sacramento) are hoping Brown will restore the funding.

Pérez announced Friday that he had helped secure $40 million in funding, mostly from county First 5 Commissions, which fund preschool programs with voter-approved cigarette taxes.

If money for the program is not restored, Pérez has said, working parents will be forced to abandon their jobs and go back on the welfare rolls — or leave their children unattended.

Brown was noncommittal during his campaign about whether he would restore the program's funds, and he was unavailable for comment Friday. Before the election, his spokesman Sterling Clifford had said, "We have to ask those with the biggest belts to tighten them first, but everything has to be on the table."

The governor-elect spent part of Friday continuing to educate himself about the state's fiscal situation and getting to know key lawmakers. On Thursday, Brown met with Pérez, Steinberg and others.

Thursday evening, Brown dined with Assembly minority leader Connie Conway (R-Tulare) and five other current and incoming GOP lawmakers. Among those present were Assemblymen Brian Nestande of Palm Desert, Steve Knight of Palmdale and Bill Berryhill of Ceres, each of whose fathers were once legislators Brown knew.

On Friday, Brown met with Dutton and Sen. Sam Blakeslee (R- San Luis Obispo) in San Francisco, offering assurances that he would not leave Republicans out of the process of solving the state's fiscal problems.

"He indicated he wanted our input," Dutton said.

Voters this week approved a measure, Proposition 25, that allows the Democrats who dominate the Legislature to approve state budgets with a simple majority rather than the two-thirds majority that in the past has required some Republican votes.

Conway said Brown assured her: "'I want to work with everybody. All ideas are welcome."'

Brown highlighted such inclusive politics while on the campaign trail. And he made much of his view that budget-cutting should start at the top — in the governor's office.

With frugality as the watchword of the incoming administration, Brown, who is currently California's attorney general, selected space for his transition headquarters in his Department of Justice building in Sacramento.

"It's at no cost," said Tom Quinn, a leading member of the transition team.

The state has set aside $770,000 to pay for Brown's transition, but the governor-elect said this week, "I would seriously doubt whether anything near that amount would be required."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-state-budget-20101106,0,5647760,print.story

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2 fugitive fathers arrested in abduction of their sons

Two Westchester brothers accused of kidnapping their sons in July 2008 and taking them overseas were arrested in the Netherlands earlier this week, the FBI said late Friday.

John Silah failed to return his son, Greg, to his mother at the end of a summer visit. His brother, George Silah, also failed to return his sons, Alex and Zaven, to his ex-wife. The brothers turned off their cellphones, abandoned the Westchester home where they lived in together and vanished.

After an extensive search involving the FBI and international law enforcement, the Silahs were located in the Netherlands and taken into custody by Dutch authorities, said Laura Eilmiller, an FBI spokeswoman.

Greg, 12; Alex, 14; and Zaven, 11, are safe in protective custody and will be reunited with their mothers, who are traveling to the Netherlands to retrieve them, authorities said.

The boys' mothers took to the Internet and the airwaves in their battle to find their children.

One website, www.georgesilah.com, details the alleged kidnappings and asks the public for help. The website says the brothers are the sons of an Armenian author, Lucy Silah Sulahian, and that it was feared they had fled to their native Syria with George Silah's girlfriend.

LAPD chief opposes judge's ruling on Jessica's Law

Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck issued a statement Friday saying he disagrees with a decision by a judge to block enforcement of a major provision of Jessica's Law, which restricts how closely sex offenders can live to schools or parks.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Peter Espinoza concluded that the controversial measure left sex offenders in some areas with the choice of being homeless or going to jail because the law prohibits them from living in large swaths of some cities such as Los Angeles.

The temporary ban led state corrections officials to order parole agents not to enforce Jessica's Law residency requirements in Los Angeles County. More restrictive measures remain in place to regulate "high-risk" sex offenders whose crimes involve violence or repeated sexual offenses.

In his 10-page ruling, issued Monday after four registered sex offenders petitioned the court, Espinoza referenced Beck and LAPD data that there had been "a marked increase of homeless/transient [sex offender] registrants." In 2007, there were 30 sex offenders on active parole in Los Angeles. By this September, that number had jumped to 259.

"Rather than protecting public safety, it appears that the sharp rise in homelessness rates in sex offenders on active parole in Los Angeles County actually undermines public safety," wrote Espinoza, who is the supervising judge of Los Angeles County criminal courts. "The evidence presented suggests that despite lay belief, a sex offender parolee's residential proximity to a school or park where children regularly gather does not bear on the parolee's likelihood to commit a sexual offense against a child."

The LAPD statement said those referenced statistics were prepared in a report to the Los Angeles City Council's public safety committee "with information related to the concentration of sexual registrants in residential housing, not the merits of Jessica's Law." 

"This report, approved by Chief Beck, was intended solely to discuss the potential impact of additional restrictions placed on top of Jessica's Law and not to draw a conclusion on the merits of any provision in Jessica's Law," the statement reads.

The temporary ban on the residency restrictions in the county, which has sparked an emotional debate, is not the last word on the issue. Espinoza could revisit his decision in the case brought by four sex offenders on parole, or the case could be challenged. Corrections officials said Thursday they would appeal the ruling.

Proposition 83, overwhelmingly approved by state voters in 2006 and informally known as Jessica's Law, imposes strict residency requirements on sex offenders, including rules forbidding them from living near locations where children gather. Before the law passed, those residency requirements were imposed only on offenders whose victims were children.

There are about 5,100 registered sex offenders in Los Angeles, and about 1,020 of them are prohibited under Jessica's Law from living near places where children congregate. Throughout Los Angeles County, about 2,000 registered sex offenders are subject to residency restrictions.

Civil rights attorneys have argued that provisions of Jessica's Law make it impossible for some registered sex offenders to live in densely populated cities. Nearly all of San Francisco, for example, is off-limits to sex offenders because of the number of parks and schools close to housing. Los Angeles officials also said there are few places in the city where sex offenders can find housing that meets Jessica's Law requirements.

State Sen. George Runner (R- Lancaster), the author of Jessica's Law, said Thursday that most parts of the state still have ample housing for sex offenders, including Los Angeles County. Runner said he was confident the geographic rules would eventually be restored in L.A. County and elsewhere.

Runner said he believed Espinoza's order might prompt local cities to place greater restrictions on the neighborhoods where sex offenders can live than what Jessica's law allows, which is being explored in the city of Los Angeles.

Espinoza noted he acted amid a flurry of challenges to Jessica's Law residency restrictions. He wrote that the court has received about 650 habeas corpus petitions raising similar legal issues, and that hundreds more were being prepared by the public defender's and alternate public defender's offices in Los Angeles County.

Pictures of John Wesley Ewell and his car were released in October. Police don't know why he saved a July newspaper story on “Grim Sleeper” case.

Suspect in multiple slayings had newspaper article about 'Grim Sleeper' in his car Deputies don't know why John Wesley Ewell, accused of killing four, kept an account of Lonnie Franklin's arrest in July. By Richard Winton Los Angeles Times November 6, 2010 Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies found a copy of a newspaper announcing the arrest of the "Grim Sleeper" serial killer suspect in the car of a Harbor Gateway handyman charged with killing four people during three home-invasion robberies. The newspaper is one of the clues detectives are studying in the case of John Wesley Ewell. "It was really the only paper we found inside his car," Det. Peter Hecht said. "The subject is certainly telling."

The killings with which Ewell is charged began Sept. 24 with the death of an 80-year-old man and include the death of a woman who lives on the same block as Ewell and the strangulation of a couple inside their Hawthorne home.

Detectives are not investigating Ewell, who faces capital murder charges, in connection with any other killings, said Sheriff's Lt. Dave Coleman.

Other than the newspaper, there are few clues to Ewell's possible motive after a life as a career criminal. "We don't [know] what caused him to snap," Coleman said. "He was brazen. He used the ATM card from the couple several times. He didn't make an effort to hide his face from the camera."

Detectives said Ewell also tried to make it appear that a killer was still on the loose. A man who had contact with Ewell in jail later used a victim's debit card, according to investigators. Coleman said that man is now cooperating with detectives.

Sheriff Lee Baca said detectives are still seeking evidence that connects Ewell to the "terrifying spree of murders." He said that detectives seized items from Ewell's home connecting him to the victims but that they believe Ewell may have pawned, sold or given away some items.

Authorities allege that Ewell cased neighborhoods in Hawthorne and Harbor Gateway, pretending to be a utility worker to gain entry to homes. Surveillance tape shows a man carrying a briefcase entering one of the homes.

Although Ewell's neighbors on 12600 block of Hoover Street describe him as a popular and likable local handyman, investigators characterized him as a career criminal with two strikes and convictions for forgery, robbery and burglary dating to the 1980s.

Before the slayings, Ewell was charged in September with burglarizing a Hawthorne Home Depot store.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-home-slayings-20101106,0,4180507.story?track=rss

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The man who killed San Diego County teens Amber Dubois and Chelsea King described himself in his first interview since pleading guilty as "the most dangerous type of sexual prediator."

Killer of San Diego teens: 'I am the most dangerous type of sexual predator' Los Angeles Times November 5, 2010 "I am the type that needs to be locked up forever," John Albert Gardner III, 31, told CBS News in an interview to be broadcast Saturday on "48 Hours". Gardner pleaded guilty in April to strangling King during a rape attempt and stabbing Dubois during a rape attempt. He also admitted attacking another female jogger, who escaped. In the CBS interview, Gardner describes in detail his encounter with Dubois. "I passed her driving down the street. And that's the first time I saw her. I pulled up next to her with the windows down on the car. I had the knife out and visible. And told her that I also had a gun. And to get in the car or it was going to be a lot worse," according to an excerpt released by CBS News.

"She actually looked at me in kinda shock and disbelief. And asked me if I was kidding. And I raised my voice and yelled, 'No, get the 'F' in the car.' I drove to the remote area. On driving I put the music on. She wanted to hear music so that she could pretend she wasn't there."

The plea bargain was meant to spare him from the death penalty. Under the agreement, Gardner will be returned to prison for life without the possibility of parole.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/11/killer-of-san-diego-teens-john-albert-gardner-i-am-the-most-dangerous-type-of-sexual-predator.html

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Four Loko banned in Michigan

The fruity malt liquor known as 'blackout in a can' and dozens of similar drinks containing alcohol and caffeine must be taken off store shelves, the state liquor control commission rules.

By Melanie D. Scott

November 5, 2010

Reporting from Detroit

The Michigan Liquor Control Commission has banned the drink Four Loko and dozens of similar alcoholic drinks from being sold in the state.

Known as "blackout in a can" for its combination of caffeine and 12% alcohol, Four Loko is one of 55 drinks that the state banned Thursday.

The commission reversed its approval of all energy drinks that contain alcohol, citing safety reasons, and is giving manufacturers of the beverages 30 days to remove them from store shelves.

"The commission's concern for health, safety and welfare of Michigan citizens and the fact that there is not enough research to validate that these products are safe for consumption has made me believe that until further research is done by the FDA, they should no longer be on Michigan shelves," Michigan Liquor Control Commission Chairwoman Nida Samona said in the statement.

A Melvindale, Mich., teen said she consumed Four Loko before being sexually assaulted last month. The drinks have been banned on some college campuses across the country.

Phusion Projects, the maker of Four Loko, issued a statement protesting the Michigan ban.

"The commission did not provide advance notice of its proposed action, voted on the ban with only three of the five commissioners in attendance, and did not give parties who will be affected by the ban any opportunity to be heard," the company said.

The manufacturer said it planned to challenge the ban in court. Other drinks banned include Joose and Smirnoff Raw Tea.

The makers of Four Loko came under fire after dozens of students at Central Washington University became sick after consuming the drink along with pills and other alcoholic beverages.

Central Washington University officials announced they were temporarily banning such brews on campus. New Jersey's Ramapo College announced a similar ban after a surge in alcohol intoxication cases since the beginning of the school year, with about half a dozen involving Four Loko. And the Food and Drug Administration is investigating whether caffeine and alcohol can safely be mixed and consumed as a single beverage.

Several attorneys general across the country, including California and Washington, have urged the FDA to move quickly.

A Melvindale, Mich., teen said she consumed Four Loko before being sexually assaulted last month.

The 23 1/2-ounce can of fruity malt liquor is said to contain the equivalent of about four beers and three to four cups of coffee.

"The drink needs to be banned, because I've seen too many people messed up after drinking just half of a can," said Carlaie Bunn , 22, of Detroit. "It's dangerous, period."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-four-loko-20101105,0,223259,print.story

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EDITORIAL

The flaw in Jessica's Law

Banning sexual predators from living close to schools and parks forced many ex-cons into homelessness, making them harder to monitor, and making it harder to protect society.

November 6, 2010

Before parents shudder at the thought of sex offenders now being allowed to live within 2,000 feet of schools and parks, they should remember the utter lack of evidence that the restriction ever kept a child from being molested. Sexual predators don't stick to a half-mile radius when it comes to finding victims. And making them homeless, as Jessica's Law sometimes did, is more dangerous to the public. That's why Thursday's Superior Court ruling that found sections of the law unconstitutional isn't just good news for ex-convicts trying to find a place in society; it's better for society too.

"It's harder to protect the public when he is homeless," a Ventura County prosecutor told The Times three years ago, when a molester there was unable to find housing. "Were he in a condo or an apartment, we could supervise him more effectively."

The law also places a burden on residents of rural counties, where the distance between housing and schools makes it easier for ex-cons to live in compliance with the law, and on those who live near the few urban spots where offenders can congregate. In Orange County, for example, more than a third of registered offenders are homeless. Many of them set up camp in an industrial zone in Anaheim, which was hardly reassuring to nearby residents.

Voters could hardly be blamed, when 70% of them approved Proposition 83 in 2006, for trying to protect children from dangerous predators. It almost, sort of, makes sense to say that sexual offenders shouldn't live near places where children can be found without direct parental supervision — if, that is, you don't know much about how such offenders operate, or that most molestations are committed not by strangers but by relatives, family friends or acquaintances. Another problem with the law is that it treats a person convicted of statutory rape for having sex with an underage girlfriend the same way it treats a repeat child molester.

The law has had profound negative effects on ex-cons trying to rebuild their lives, while doing almost nothing to keep them from re-offending. As it happens, no one yet knows the most effective ways to stop sexual predators, short of keeping children within eyeshot every moment. It is a subject that begs for serious and comprehensive study. Once we have better answers, we can engage in a serious discussion of which restrictions on parolees are justified in the name of preventing horrendous crimes.

"I am the most dangerous type of sexual predator," John Albert Gardner III told CBS news in an interview six months after being sentenced to life in prison for the rapes and deaths of two teenage girls in San Diego County, Amber Dubois and Chelsea King. The first was walking to school; the latter going for a jog at a lakeside park. Neither was saved by Jessica's Law.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-jessica-20101106,0,2003074,print.story

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EDITORIAL

They killed a child

Five-year-old Aaron Shannon's slaying by suspected gang members was horrifying; progress is being made in fighting gangs, but there's much left to do.

November 6, 2010

In the hurly-burly of an election week, it would have been easy to overlook the death of one little boy in a gang shooting. Such deaths are not infrequent enough in Los Angeles to be considered unusual; too often, children living in tough neighborhoods are caught in the crossfire of the youths and adults warring around them.

But that's not what happened to 5-year-old Aaron Shannon Jr. Dressed in his Spider-Man costume for Halloween and showing it off to his grandfather and uncle in the family's backyard, he was, by all appearances, intentionally gunned down Sunday. It is a crime that is heinous even by Los Angeles' brutal gang warfare standards. Aaron's family, police said, is not connected with gangs, but lives in a neighborhood where tensions between rival gangs are always simmering. Police suspect that the two shooters, who entered an alley adjacent to the family's backyard, targeted the wrong house and the wrong family. But whether they were at the right house or the wrong house, there's no getting around the fact that they aimed at and shot a child.

Immediately after the shooting, two intensive efforts began in the neighborhood of the 1000 block of East 84th Street. One, by intervention workers, was to calm the community and prevent violent retaliation for the boy's death by rival gang members. The second — to find his killers — paid off when police arrested two suspects this week.

Until this homicide, recent news about gang violence in Los Angeles had been positive. Citywide, gang-related crime has been falling, and where the Summer Night Lights program was active, the reductions were particularly dramatic, with a 57% decrease in homicides. That program kept parks open after dark from July 4 to Labor Day; an audit found that residents made 710,000 visits to the program's 24 sites and that free meals were served to 10,929 people.

One crucial component to combating gangs is changing the culture in the neighborhoods where they operate. That includes building a trusting relationship between residents and the police and encouraging a willingness to cooperate with investigations and prosecutions. The mayor's gang czar, Guillermo Cespedes, says Summer Night Lights' real success is not in statistics but in community buy-in. In Aaron's case, the community rallied against the perpetrators, and even gang members cooperated with the investigation, police said, a sign of hope in an otherwise tragic situation.

The best programs cannot stop every random act of viciousness, and public safety is not only about catching criminals— it is about stitching together neighborhoods that will not tolerate gang warfare. That's the work that continues.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-aaron-20101106,0,1391384,print.story

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A no-pardon Justice Department

President Obama should rely more on his own moral judgment than the Justice Department's in making clemency and pardon decisions.

By Samuel T. Morison

November 6, 2010

The Times' well-intentioned Oct. 30 editorial bemoaning that fact that President Obama hasn't yet granted any pardons or commutations, in which the editorial board correctly notes that the president is "aided in such decisions by the Office of the Pardon Attorney in the Justice Department," betrays a profound misunderstanding of the role the pardon office plays in the clemency advisory process. In particular, The Times writes, "Ideally, presidents would give great deference to the pardon attorney's recommendations and take a liberal view of the clemency power, exercising it often and on the basis of clear standards."

This assertion is hopelessly confused. In fact, the problem in the vast majority of garden-variety clemency cases — those involving ordinary applicants for whom a grant of clemency would not cause any public controversy — is precisely that recent presidents have given far too much deference to the pardon attorney's office. Having spent more than 10 years as a staff attorney in that office, I can say with some authority that the prevailing view within the Justice Department is that the pardon attorney's sole institutional function is to defend the department's prosecutorial prerogatives. There is little, if any, pretense of neutrality, much less liberality. On this parochial view, the institution of a genuinely humane clemency policy would be considered an insult to the good work of line prosecutors.

As a result, there is a strong presumption within the pardon office that the number of favorable recommendations should be kept to an absolute minimum, regardless of the equitable merits of any individual petition. This stance ignores the reality of a burgeoning federal prison population of more than 200,000 inmates, many serving lengthy sentences for nonviolent drug offenses, and the proliferation of collateral disabilities that hinder ex-offenders' ability to restart their lives, which the attorney general himself has criticized as a "recipe for high recidivism."

Yet the bureaucratic managers of the Justice Department's clemency program continue to churn out a steady stream of almost uniformly negative advice, in a politically calculated attempt to restrain (rather than inform) the president's exercise of discretion. This advisory record presupposes, falsely, that the federal criminal justice system is virtually flawless; that injustices almost never occur, sentences are almost never excessive, circumstances almost never change, and mercy is almost never appropriate.

No disinterested person really believes this. Even if most prosecutors, judges and legislators act with the best of intentions, they can and do make mistakes with some regularity, which often are evident only with the benefit of hindsight. Not surprisingly, the frank acknowledgment of such mistakes tends to strengthen, rather than undermine, public confidence in the legitimacy of the system. The traditional purpose of executive clemency is to serve that error-correcting function, at least where courts and legislatures fail to intervene. As the Supreme Court once put it, "Without such a power of clemency, to be exercised by some department or functionary of a government, it would be most imperfect and deficient in its political morality."

Accordingly, if Obama is going to "take a liberal view of the clemency power, exercising it often and on the basis of clear standards," as The Times suggests, he will have to defer less to the jaundiced advice he receives from the Justice Department and rely more on his own moral judgment.

Samuel T. Morison was a staff attorney in the Justice Department's Office of the Pardon Attorney. The views expressed here are solely his personal opinions.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-oew-morison-pardon-20101106,0,6535352,print.story

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From the New York Times

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Hundreds Were Raped on Congo-Angola Border

NAIROBI, Kenya — More than 600 women and girls were recently raped along the Congo-Angola border during a mass expulsion of illegal immigrants, according to the United Nations.

Many of the victims said they were locked in dungeon-like conditions for several weeks while they were raped repeatedly by security forces. At least one woman died from her internal injuries, United Nations officials said.

Maurizio Giuliano, a United Nations spokesman in the Democratic Republic of Congo, said Friday that it was unclear on which side of the Congo-Angola border the women had been attacked, and that the United Nations was calling on both countries to investigate promptly.

“What worries us is that rape seems to be becoming endemic in several parts of Congo,” Mr. Giuliano said, also referring to recent rapes in the eastern Kivu provinces. “We fear it's becoming part of the routine.”

For the past decade, Congo has been torn apart by dozens of rebel groups that have often swept into villages and brutalized women. United Nations officials call Congo the worst place in the world for sexual violence, and even the longstanding presence of international peacekeepers has not been able to stop it.

A few months ago, more than 200 women were raped in a single thatched-roof village in eastern Congo while United Nations peacekeepers were less than 12 miles away.

According to United Nations officials, the women along the border were raped in September and October at several locations during an expulsion of more than 6,000 illegal Congolese and other immigrants from Angola.

The two countries often expel each other's citizens. Last year, Angola expelled 160,000 Congolese, while Congo expelled 51,000 Angolans, according to United Nations officials. Angola is fast becoming an economic powerhouse, with a booming oil business and diamond exports, after decades of intense civil war.

The United Nations first learned about the rapes along the border last month, after hearing scattered reports from local aid organizations. But the initial reports suggested that around 30 Congolese women had been raped, not 600. Many of the women said they had been kept in derelict buildings and gang-raped by security forces. When they were released, they said they had been forced to walk back into Congo without any clothes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/06/world/africa/06congo.html?_r=1&ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Germany: 18-Year-Old Faces Charges of Terrorism Over Internet Videos

An 18-year-old man was arrested in northwest Germany on Friday on charges that he posted three videos on the Internet in October threatening terrorist attacks unless a convicted terrorist serving a 12-year prison term was released, the police said.

The police said the suspect, whom they would not identify because he might be tried as a juvenile, uploaded three crude yet threatening videos onto YouTube.

He also downloaded bomb-making manuals from the Internet, but was unable to make explosives because he did not have money for materials. In the videos, the man hid his face while claiming to speak on behalf of what he called the German mujahedeen.

He demanded the release from prison of Daniel Schneider, the leader of the so-called Sauerland Cell, whose members were convicted in March 2010 for planning attacks on United States military installations in Germany.

The police said that there was no evidence that the suspect was linked with Al Qaeda or any terrorist groups but that he had become a dangerous longer.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/06/world/europe/06briefs-GERMANY.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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As HIV Babies Come of Age, Problems Linger

WARWICK, R.I. — “They've been telling me since age 3 that I would die,” Tom Cosgrove said quietly. “Then age 6, age 8, age 10.”

Now 20, he is considered the longest-living person born with H.I.V. in his state, but every year has brought struggle.

As a toddler at a shelter for children infected with H.I.V. from birth, he watched others die. Then, AIDS killed his mother and newborn brother. At 8, his body rejected medication and he became temporarily unable to walk.

He raged with anger, once even striking a teacher with a chair. Classmates, paranoid about his disease, refused to shake his hand or sit at his lunch table. Friends' parents forbade them to visit, and he could not join basketball teams or karate classes.

Even now, medications impair his short-term memory, making school, and job prospects, difficult.

“We call them his stupid drugs,” said Barbara Cosgrove, who adopted Tom at 3. “But, as I say to Tom, ‘You're either stupid or you're dead.' ”

At a time when H.I.V. in the United States has become a manageable disease for many, Tom Cosgrove and others like him are proof of the epidemic's troubling, lingering legacy. They are the survivors, born beginning in the 1990s to the first big wave of people with AIDS, babies practically destined to die. Improvements in drugs, along with some luck, allowed some 10,000 of them to live — and these days only about 200 children a year are born with H.I.V., thanks to vigilant drug treatment of infected pregnant women.

But life for those first H.I.V. babies now entering adolescence and adulthood has been a battle, and their experience is considered so significant — not only in this country but also for the millions of H.I.V.-positive babies worldwide — that federal health agencies have begun an extensive study to follow these young people as they grow up.

Some are weakened by years of yo-yoing symptoms that early drugs failed to treat. Some have developmental delays or other problems related to having H.I.V. at birth. And their medications often have harsher side effects than those taken by people infected more recently as teenagers or adults because complications from their illness, or previous drugs they took and became resistant to, have made their disease more stubborn to treat.

Emotionally, they grapple with hostility toward parents who infected them, grief that those parents suffered and usually died, and anxiety about trusting others with a secret that still provokes hazing and fear.

And a serious problem is emerging: some are rebelling or asserting independence by skipping or stopping medication, which can make H.I.V. spiral out of control and become impervious to previously effective therapies.

“It ain't over yet,” Dr. Ellen Cooper, medical director of pediatric and adolescent H.I.V. at Boston Medical Center, said about keeping these young people alive and healthy. Although she has not lost a patient in five years, she said, “I'm expecting a second wave” of these young people “dying because they're not adherent” to medication, or because of “complications from treatment.”

Dr. Lynne M. Mofenson, chief of pediatric, adolescent and maternal AIDS at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development , said that despite H.I.V. babies' increased survival, their “mortality is still thirtyfold higher than similarly aged children,” and there is “a lot of research that's needed, and interventions to improve their lives.”

Seven agencies of the National Institutes of Health are following 451 H.I.V. babies ages 7 to 16, monitoring their hearts, cholesterol, bones, brains, hearing, sexual development, school performance, language ability, behavior and mental health.

Preliminary findings show many of their current lifesaving drugs cause high cholesterol, raising fears of serious heart problems, said Dr. Russell Van Dyke, the study's co-principal investigator. Their bone density appears poor. And many have mental health and behavioral problems, although it is unclear to what degree those problems are related to the disease or to the children's often-difficult family circumstances.

“There is a lot of concern,” Dr. Van Dyke said, “about how the kids adapt to living and what sort of challenges they have. The lessons are going to be applicable to the rest of the world.”

‘I Was Born This Way'

Davi Morales is the kind of young person doctors worry about. He has H.I.V.-related cognitive disabilities, and spent months homeless after uncles who raised him in a Providence, R.I., housing project returned to Puerto Rico.

Davi, 20, lost Social Security disability assistance because the government now considers most H.I.V.-infected people able to work, said Scott Mitchel, a counselor with AIDS Care Ocean State, who got him into an apartment that his agency owns. But Davi has trouble staying employed, following rules, working with managers.

“I don't think right now he can go out there and support himself,” Mr. Mitchel said. For one thing, his medication, five pills twice daily, causes severe insomnia and diarrhea.

Nowadays, people contracting H.I.V. through sex or drugs may take one easily tolerated pill, but the H.I.V.-baby generation often needs complex multipill doses with irritating side effects, making pill-skipping more likely.

In desperation, doctors sometimes allow them to stop medication altogether rather than take their “last rescue regimen poorly,” Dr. Cooper said.

Davi sometimes skips several days, and “when I feel down, like I just want to give up, I don't want to take my medicine at all,” he said. “If I didn't have that kid, I probably never would take them.”

That kid is the son born three years ago after Davi, who was 16, told his girlfriend at the time, who was 14, “I want to have a kid” and “she was cool with it,” he said. “I didn't really know what I was really doing.”

She took medication during pregnancy, and their son is uninfected. Her family, fearful of Davi's disease, blocked access to the boy for awhile, and the couple broke up. He is facing assault charges for striking her during an argument, but now sees his son regularly.

He said he wants to stay alive, but “maybe my lifespan is not as long as a normal lifespan. I was born this way and that's what it is.”

Medication is not the problem for Elizabeth. Eighteen, white, from a wealthy Massachusetts suburb, she has been ostracized and tormented, “ ‘H.I.V. slut' being yelled across the hallway, anything you can think of,” she said.

Elizabeth did not know she had H.I.V. until the age of 14, when her parents and physician appeared at her therapist's appointment and told her.

“I couldn't speak or really breathe,” said Elizabeth, whose mother was infected through a blood transfusion before she was born.

Elizabeth, who asked that her last name be withheld, said her mother “wants me to be completely closed about it,” and even Elizabeth's little sister, who is uninfected, does not know. Keeping it inside feels “like holding your breath underwater for too long.”

But close friends she confided in betrayed her. Her best friend gossiped about it, and a boyfriend she broke up with “told everyone to get back at me,” she said. Schoolwork suffered as she constantly feared hazing and “focused on having to deal with this.”

At 16, she told a new boyfriend, who “promised that he'd never judge me upon it, that he'd never break up with me, that he'd never tell anyone,” she said. “The next day he broke up with me because of it.” They reunited, but his parents scorned her and he sometimes hid their relationship from friends, said Elizabeth, who recently stopped seeing him.

She said people in her well-educated community, who should know that H.I.V. can be well controlled with medication and protected against with condoms, have been surprisingly intolerant.

“There's no need to think I'm dirty,” she said. “I've basically had my trust for people completely taken away.”

Sharing and Trusting

Things get harder as H.I.V. babies grow up and leave the “very nurturing network” of pediatric AIDS clinics and programs, said Rena Greifinger, who formed the One Love Project to help such young people. “At 18, all that support melts away,” plus some of them “have been completely rejected by their families, the leper child.”

At a weeklong retreat at Babson College in Wellesley, Mass., One Love provided music therapy, role-playing about disclosing H.I.V. status, and explicit discussions about sex and having children.

“When I was pregnant, I was crying all the time, worried she would be positive,” said Imani Walters, 19, who contracted H.I.V. as a teenager. Her daughter turned out healthy. “Then you get scared you might not see them grow up.”

The young people were told that having infected children was unlikely with medication through pregnancy, avoiding breastfeeding and giving the babies medication for six weeks.

“We wanted to give them so much information that we get that buy-in to stay on their meds, and they learn how to live with H.I.V.,” said Bill Kubicek, executive director of Next Step, which sponsors One Love and was co-founded by Paul Newman.

Elizabeth met other H.I.V. babies for the first time at the conference, and “here I trust everyone,” she said.

The gathering was eye-opening for Sandy Perez, 18, from Canaan, N.H., too. Her mother, infected through drug use, died when Sandy was 7. Some foster families mistreated her, she said; at one home, underfed, she slept in the laundry room, locked in, and would climb out the window and re-enter the house through the garage to grab food.

Although she now has a loving family and takes medication regularly, she has experienced serious symptoms: sunken cheeks, gaunt face, bony arms. Medication has caused diabetes, and liver and kidney problems.

Sandy rarely disclosed her H.I.V., not even to boyfriends, although she always used condoms. But she said the conference “inspired me” to feel “comfortable with myself and with having this H.I.V., so I can now share it with people that I feel I trust.”

Like her boyfriend of two years, with whom she had not had intercourse. Unable to reach him by phone from the conference, she texted him: “I have H.I.V.” He texted back: “Are you serious?” She replied: “Yes.”

Sandy felt relieved. If he did not know and “became infected, then there would be a part of me that felt responsible and guilty and just icky inside,” she said.

Soon after, the relationship ended, on good terms, she said. “He kind of didn't really know how to handle it,” she said. But “he calmed down and we eventually talked” and “he was happy I had told him before we did anything.”

A Family's Acceptance

When the Cosgroves adopted Tom, he was unruly and angry, and at 5 was further traumatized by seeing his mother “turning different colors, losing her hair,” dying of AIDS, he said. He pasted her obituary on his First Communion banner, and had “nightmares, night sweats,” he said, “very mad at her because I thought she purposefully gave me this disease.”

Since “people were petrified to take any of these children,” Ms. Cosgrove said, she adopted four other “throwaway babies,” saying she was abused as a child and “kind of a throwaway baby myself.”

All four, who arrived untested for H.I.V., turned out negative. “I really felt alone,” Tom said, and at 9, after an H.I.V.-camp friend died, he begged them to adopt someone like him.

They adopted Tyree, who had two H.I.V. strains, one from each parent, and developmental delays. For years, he took medication through a stomach tube because he would vomit it otherwise. Now 11, he often needs leg braces, and his viral load — the amount of virus in the blood — is too high.

Tyree's adoption did not improve everything for Tom, and Tom was “very out of control” for years, he said. To tame his behavior, Ms. Cosgrove said, she had to “push him down and say, ‘You are not going to talk like that, you are not going to act like that.' One day I dragged him across the carpet, and his teacher called and I told her this is what I did and why.”

By 12, Tom had calmed down, but he chafed at people's reactions. Ms. Cosgrove informed his school about his H.I.V. and held a meeting for parents, but while school officials were supportive, some parents and classmates shunned him. Tyree attends another school, whose principal advised against disclosure because parents would react badly. And a soccer coach Ms. Cosgrove told said, “Oh, we're not taking kids like that.”

Tyree said he feels “lonely” because “none of my friends come over.” He already knows how to protect others, saying, “Don't have sex with me.”

Tom, now mature and thoughtful, finds things more complicated. With his infection well suppressed with medication, he has started Job Corps, a federal job-training program, but his medications' side effects affecting his memory concern him, and he said that girlfriends have not lasted long because “people have a lot of worries about going out with someone with this disease.”

Still, since his adoptive family “can accept me for who I am,” he said, “I look at it as if there's other people out there who can probably do the same.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/06/us/06hiv.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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From the Chicago Sun Times

Cop revives lifeless boy: 'You're doing this like it's your own child'

ALBANY PARK | Applies CPR after frantic mom flags him down

As Chicago Police Officer Thomas Norberg patrolled Albany Park on Thursday afternoon, a car came up behind him, with lights flashing, horn blaring.

"My baby is not breathing! Help me! Help me!" screamed a frantic mother sitting in the back seat of the car on West Montrose.

Norberg pulled over and peered into the back seat, where a 2-year-old boy lay lifeless.

"I'll be the first to admit, when I saw the boy slumped to the side with his eyes rolled back, I actually didn't think he was alive," Norberg, 46, recalled Friday morning.

The toddler might not be today but for Norberg's quick thinking and CPR training.

With the child's frantic parents hovering nearby, Norberg pulled the boy out of the car and gently laid him on a blanket on the ground. About 20 spectators had gathered, Norberg learned later.

"I guessed maybe his airway might be clogged," said Norberg, a policeman for 15 years. "So I rolled him onto his side, keeping his head elevated, and I was tapping his back. ... I started doing two-finger light compressions."

Norberg said he lost track of time. "You're not really thinking, you're not looking," he said. "I've got two kids. I'm thinking, 'This could be my kid.' You're doing this like it's your own child -- because he's just an innocent little child."

At some point, the child came back to life.

"He started moving his hands and arms, and his eyes started to come back down," Norberg said. "That's when [Chicago Fire] Engine No. 124 showed up."

The boy's parents later told Norberg that the boy had been sick for a couple of days and that they were on their way to the hospital when they saw Norberg's squad car.

Norberg stayed with the family at the emergency room at Swedish Covenant Hospital.

Friday, the grateful mother told reporters how happy she was that Norberg was there to save her son, Sergio Martinez Real.

"Yesterday, I thanked him because maybe if he wasn't there maybe my baby would die," Maribel Real said.

Norberg gave Sergio a navy blue Chicago Police Department T-shirt and a "Hug me. It's the Law" shirt to Sergio's sister, 5-year-old Karen Martinez Real.

Maribel Real knew her boy was OK on Friday because he wanted to go to Target, his favorite store.

Norberg doesn't see himself as heroic.

"As a policeman, if you do something like that, it's just part of your job," he said.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/2870268,CST-NWS-kidsaved06.article

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From the Department of Justice

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Departments of Justice and Health and Human Services Team Up to Crack Down on Health Care Fraud

Attorney General Holder and Secretary Sebelius Host 3rd Regional Health Care Fraud Prevention Summit in Brooklyn, New York

WASHINGTON – Today, Department of Justice Attorney General Eric Holder and Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius visited Brooklyn, N.Y., where they participated in the third Regional Health Care Fraud Prevention Summit. The summits bring together a wide array of federal, state and local partners, beneficiaries, providers and other interested parties to discuss innovative ways to eliminate fraud within the U.S. health care system. The summits are part of a larger effort on behalf of the Obama Administration to root out waste, fraud and abuse within the U.S. health care system.

“Here in New York and in communities across the country, health-care fraud schemes are being aggressively and permanently shut down. That's in large part because of the great work being led by the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team,” said Attorney General Holder. “Through this initiative, we are working in partnership with government, law enforcement and industry leaders to protect taxpayer dollars, control health-care costs and ensure the strength and integrity of our most essential health-care programs. Simply put, we have taken our fight against health-care fraud to a new level. And I am committed to continued collaboration, vigilance and progress.”

“Today, we continue to work with patients to protect their information, with providers to strengthen screening standards, and with private insurers to share strategies about how to prevent fraud,” said HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. “The Affordable Care Act gives us new resources to eliminate waste and kick criminals out of the health care system. As long as we continue to aggressively put these tools to work preventing and prosecuting fraud, we can continue to protect and strengthen Medicare's future.”

In addition to remarks by Attorney General Holder and Secretary Sebelius, the summit featured four educational panels aimed at identifying best practices for providers, law enforcement and beneficiaries in preventing health care fraud. The HHS Office of the Inspector General (OIG) also introduced a new tool for medical students called, “A Roadmap for New Physicians: Avoiding Medicare and Medicaid Fraud Abuse.”  The new program will go out to medical school across the country and explains the laws that apply to physicians so they can comply with federal law, avoid liability and spot signs of potential fraud. The “Roadmap” is available at www.oig.hhs.gov/fraud/PhysicianEducation/.

The recently enacted Affordable Care Act provides additional tools and resources to fight fraud in the health care system by providing an additional $350 million over the next 10 years through the Health Care Fraud and Abuse Control Account. The act toughens sentencing for criminal activity, enhances screenings and enrollment requirements, encourages increased sharing of data across government, expands overpayment recovery efforts and provides greater oversight of private insurance abuses.  For information on the 2009 Health Care Fraud and Abuse Control Program Report, please visit: www.justice.gov/dag/pubdoc/hcfacreport2009.pdf.

The Affordable Care Act also includes tools and resources to help states reduce improper payments through the establishment of recovery audit contractors (RACs).  Today, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services expects to propose regulations outlining steps that states need to take to implement these Affordable Act provisions. Information about the Medicaid RACs can be found at www.cms.gov/apps/media/press_releases.asp and www.stopmedicarefraud.gov

Investments in fraud detection and enforcement pay for themselves many times over, and the administration's tough stance against fraud is already yielding results. In FY 2009, anti-fraud efforts put $2.51 billion back in the Medicare Trust Fund, resulting from civil recoveries, fines in criminal matters and administrative recoveries. This was a $569 million, or 29 percent, increase over FY 2008. In FY 2009, more than $441 million in federal Medicaid money was returned to the treasury, a 28 percent increase from FY 2008.  Most recently, in FY 2010, the department obtained settlements and judgments of more than $2.5 billion in False Claims Act matters alleging health care fraud. This is more than ever before obtained in a single year and represents a 66 percent increase over FY 2009 in which $1.68 billion was obtained.

New York City is responsible for many of these recoveries. On Oct.13, 2010, more than 70 defendants were indicted in the largest Medicare fraud scheme ever perpetrated by a single criminal enterprise. The defendants are alleged to have participated in various health care fraud-related crimes involving more than $163 million in fraudulent billing. On July 16, 2010, more than 22 defendants were charged in Brooklyn for their alleged participation in schemes to submit fraudulent claims totaling nearly $80 million. These arrests were part of a larger, nationwide takedown that resulted in the indictment of more than 90 individuals.

The summits are part of the overall joint health care fraud fighting effort undertaken jointly by the Department of Justice and the Department of Health and Human Services through the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT). As one part of HEAT's efforts, Medicare Fraud Strike Force operations have expanded from South Florida and Los Angeles to a total of seven health care fraud hot spots including Houston; Detroit; Brooklyn; Baton Rouge, La.; and Tampa, Fla. The strike force is a partnership between the Criminal Division's Fraud Section, U.S. Attorneys' Offices, HHS-OIG, FBI and other federal, state and local law enforcement partners.

On June 8, 2010, President Obama announced this nationwide series of regional fraud prevention summits as part of a multi-faceted effort to crack down on health care fraud. The New York summit was the third in a series, with additional summits to follow in the coming months in Detroit, Boston, Philadelphia and Las Vegas. Previous summits were held in Miami (July 16, 2010) and Los Angeles (Aug. 26, 2010).

http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2010/November/10-ag-1256.html

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From ICE

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Attorney General lauds HSI special agents for their work on terrorism task force

ICE Denver team brings immigration charges, helping to seal conviction against terrorist

On Oct. 27, 2010, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Special Agents Jason Cassidy, Travis McFarren and Robert Marten were awarded the Attorney General's Exceptional Service Award-the highest Department of Justice award-for their exemplary efforts in Operation High Rise.

As part of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)-led Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF), they played integral roles in the disruption, apprehension and prosecution of individuals involved in the planned terrorist attack on New York City.

In September 2009, just days prior to the 9/11 anniversary date, intelligence analysts discovered from a monitored e-mail account that al-Qaeda trained operatives in Denver and New York were plotting to detonate explosives in the New York City subway system on or about Sept. 11.

With a terrorist attack imminent, JTTF special agents from Denver and New York worked nonstop knowing that every minute that passed was closer to the possible detonation of a ticking bomb. An interagency flourish of surveillance, emergency wiretap requests, warrants, interviews and undercover actions ensued in an effort to identify and locate the individual behind the incriminating e-mail messages. Investigators identified the mastermind of the plot, Najibullah Zazi, a cab driver of Afghani decent who worked at the Denver International Airport.

An exhaustive review of databases pinpointed two of Zazi's associates who were located in New York City. Further investigation, combined with in-depth analysis of information supplied by foreign and interagency partners, revealed that Zazi and his associates posed the most serious terrorist threat to our nation since September 11, 2001. In fact, Zazi and his New York co-conspirators had been planning their deadly strike against Americans ever since their return from a trip to Pakistan in 2008, where they attended an al-Qaeda training camp.

In a synchronized cross-country surveillance maneuver, JTTF agents, as well as detectives from the New York City Police Department tracked Zazi as he traveled from Denver to New York City. Exhaustive efforts continued until investigators confirmed Zazi was constructing an explosive device. Zazi was arrested and charged with conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction. With Zazi in custody, investigators continued their search for evidence needed to seal a successful prosecution.

SAs Cassidy and McFarren talked with key Zazi family members and associates, raising questions about immigration status and travel-related matters. Many of these individuals voluntarily divulged information that helped investigators stitch together the terrorist plot.

"HSI's unique law enforcement authorities in investigating violations of criminal law, as well as immigration offenses, proved to be a critical advantage in building a case against the three conspirators in this case," said HSI Executive Associate Director James Dinkins. "HSI will continue to use our immigration enforcement authority to help prosecute those who threaten national security."

On Feb. 22, 2010, Zazi pleaded guilty to conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction, conspiring to commit murder in a foreign country and providing material support to a terrorist organization. Zazi, who has not yet been sentenced, faces a possible life sentence without possibility of parole.

http://www.ice.gov/news/releases/1011/101104denver.htm

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From the FBI

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Fake truck bomb, supplied by undercover agents

Terror Plot Foiled Inside the Smadi Case from FBI 11/05/2010 Hosam Smadi will be spending the next 24 years in prison for trying to blow up a Dallas skyscraper in 2009. His recent sentencing brings to a close a successful FBI operation—one that potentially saved many lives—and it also illustrates the threat posed by lone offenders. Smadi, at the time a 19-year-old Jordanian citizen living in Texas, came to our attention in January 2009 through his pro-violence writing on a radical Islamic website.

Hosam Smadi

Although he espoused loyalty to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, Smadi was not affiliated with any group or other would-be terrorists. With the help of the Internet, he had become radicalized on his own. Smadi entered the U.S. legally but overstayed his visa. “Based on that expired visa, law enforcement could have immediately arrested and deported him,” Petrowski said, “and that would have been the easiest thing to do.” But it would not have been the right thing to do—because after conferring with the experts in our Behavioral Analysis Unit, it became clear that Smadi was not making empty threats. He wanted to mount an attack. During the undercover operation, Petrowski noted, Smadi said if he were to be deported, he would go to Pakistan or elsewhere overseas to seek out terrorist training.

Fountain Place is a 60-story skyscraper in downtown Dallas

What followed was 10 months of around-the-clock surveillance, until the moment Smadi was arrested—after dialing a cell phone number he believed would detonate a truck bomb. But the bomb—which was made to Smadi's specifications—was a fake, supplied by our undercover agents. “This case involved a lot of work by many people throughout the FBI and our partner agencies,” Petrowski said. In addition to the undercover agents, surveillance teams, and behavioral analysts, contributions were made by our bomb experts, the multi-agency Joint Terrorism Task Force, attorneys in the U.S. Department of Justice, and other members of our Counterterrorism Division in Washington, D.C. The Smadi case ended successfully, with no injuries or loss of life. But the threat from lone offenders continues—and requires constant vigilance. “One big takeaway from this case,” Petrowski said, “is the question of how many other potential violent extremists are out there, being exposed to terrorist ideologies online and contemplating an attack.”

http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2010/november/terror-plot-foiled/terror-plot-foiled

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