Jul
21
BOSTON - An activist group hoping to pressure the Roman Catholic church into dropping its long-standing prohibition barring women from the priesthood says it ordained three women on Sunday.
Church officials did not recognize the ordination, and the Vatican has previously warned that women taking part in ordination ceremonies will be excommunicated.
The group known as Roman Catholic Womenpriests held the ceremony at the Church of the Covenant, a Protestant Church in Boston.
The group said the three women - Gloria Carpeneto of Baltimore, Judy Lee of Fort Myers, Fla., and Gabriella Velardi Ward of New York City - are responding to a heartfelt call to serve the church as priests.
A fourth woman, Mary Ann McCarthy Schoettly of Newton, N.J., was ordained as a deacon, the group said.
The Archdiocese of Boston issued a statement decrying the ceremony.
“Catholics who attempt to confer a sacred order on a woman, and the women who attempt to receive a sacred order, are by their own actions separating themselves from the church,” the archdiocese said.
The group says the women who are ordained remain loyal members of the church and will act as priests whether they are excommunicated or not.
Sunday’s ordination ceremony was performed by two women the group describes as bishops - Ida Raming of Struttgart, Germany, and Dana Reynolds from California.
The ceremony “is not in compliance with their man-made rules, but it’s certainly in compliance with the Roman Catholic ordination rituals because our bishops were ordained by all-male Roman Catholic bishops who are in good standing with the church,” as provided by the church’s ordination rituals, said Bridget Mary Meehan, the group’s spokeswoman.
The group, which was formed in 2002, has conducted similar ceremonies in the U.S. and other parts of the world.
In March, the archbishop of St. Louis excommunicated three women - two Americans and a South African who were part of the Womenpriests movement - for participating in a woman’s ordination.
Pope Benedict XVI, like his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, has rebuffed calls to change traditional church teachings on the requirement that priests be male.
Catholics who are excommunicated cannot receive sacraments. The penalty can be lifted if those who have been punished are sincerely repentant.
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Jul
18
SOUTHPORT, England - From sunny San Diego to bleak and blustery Royal Birkdale, the expression on Rocco Mediate’s face didn’t change. He watched one final birdie tumble into the cup for a 1-under 69 and a three-way share of the lead in the British Open, straightened his 45-year-old back, then dropped his jaw into a smile that said, “How did that just happen?”
Others must have been wondering the same thing Thursday.
Ernie Els was playing some of his best golf in the worst of the weather until taking 45 shots on the back nine and posting an 80, his highest score in nearly two decades at his favorite major.
Phil Mickelson was up to his knees in grass right of the sixth green and never found his ball, taking a triple bogey that sent him to a 79.
Robert Allenby and Graeme McDowell, who watched on television as the early starters suffered through raging wind and stinging rain coming off an angry Irish Sea, must have wondered where all that nasty weather went as they made their way around Birkdale in tamer wind to join Mediate atop the leaderboard.
Stranger still was seeing 53-year-old newlywed Greg Norman in the hunt.
Indeed, how did all that happen?
“I have no explanation for that whatsoever. No idea why that happened,” said Mediate, still going strong after his epic playoff loss to Tiger Woods last month in the U.S. Open.
“It was just one of those rounds,” he said. “It was just up and down, up and down, and a couple of birdies, and here we are. I would have been ecstatic with 73 or 74 today.”
For those who thought his performance at Torrey Pines was merely a mirage, Mediate again found bright lines under leaden skies of the Lancashire Coast by bouncing back from three bogeys on the opening six holes by holing a 40-foot birdie putt on the 13th, chipping in from off the 17th green for birdie and ending his round with a 20-foot birdie.
“Crazy stuff,” he said.
Norman made enough par-saving putts to sustain momentum and finish at 70 along with Australian protege Adam Scott and Bart Bryant.
The group at 71 included Retief Goosen, who might have played the best golf of anyone.
Goosen awoke at 2 a.m. when rain pelted his windows, and he caught the brunt of the bad weather his entire round. He still managed four birdies and was under par most of the round until a pair of late bogeys.
“How in the hell is he 1 under?” Pat Perez said from the warmth of the locker room after an 82. “I would pay to learn how to do that.”
The leaders caught a break by getting slightly better weather, although it was by no means easy. The average score in the opening round was about 76, driven up by 19 rounds in the 80s.
But they arrived at Royal Birkdale in good form.
McDowell, the first-round leader down the coast at Royal Liverpool in 2006, won the Scottish Open four days ago at Loch Lomond. Allenby lost in a playoff at the Stanford St. Jude Classic in Memphis, Tenn., last month, and tied for third two weeks ago at Congressional.
Even so, the British Open lived up to its billing as the major that sometimes requires the most luck. It wasn’t a goofy bounce but the tee times, thanks to weather that shifted along with the tide in the middle of the 15 hours of action.
“We did get the better side of the draw, no doubt about it,” Norman said. “When you watch it in the morning, you feel sorry for the guys. But there’s times when you say, ‘Well, I’ve been there before. I’ve been on that side of the draw, too.’ It all balances out, and you have to take advantage of it.”
Former Masters champion Mike Weir did his best in the morning, making an eagle on the 17th for a 71.
Sergio Garcia, the betting favorite at Birkdale with Woods on the disabled list, was among the late starters but did not make his first birdie until the par-5 15th and had to settle for a 72. Also at 72 was Brandt Snedeker, who has contended in both majors this year. After five bogeys on the first six holes, he was 3 under the rest of the way.
Now for the gloomy side of this opening round.
“It was miserable, miserable, miserable weather,” Vijay Singh said after his 80. “It was just a miserable day.”
Mickelson, at No. 2 the highest-ranked player at a major for the first time, was not terribly bothered by his 79 because he figured everyone else would struggle. When the winds died slightly, so did his hopes. He was tied for 123rd.
“You can’t play,” Simon Dyson said after an 82 while playing in the opening group. “You put a 4-handicapper on that first tee and they’d probably shoot 100. That’s no exaggeration. I don’t think I’ve played a par 4 that I couldn’t reach with my best drive and my best 3-wood, and there’s three of them.”
Royal & Ancient chief executive Peter Dawson responded to the complaints with a statement as old as this championship.
“Links golf,” he said. “Tough day by the seaside.”
It was so brutal that two major champions didn’t even bother to finish. Sandy Lyle stopped after 10 holes and former PGA champion Rich Beem made his exit after a 46 on the front.
“It’s the greatest golf known to man,” Beem said. “It was just difficult.”
McDowell considered himself fortunate. The British Open starts at 6:30 a.m. and did not finish until nearly 10 p.m., offering the late starters a chance to tune into the BBC and see how the course is playing.
“I sat at home this morning with my breakfast cereal and cup of coffee in my hand going, ‘God, do I really have to go out there this afternoon?’ Obviously, we got pretty lucky,” McDowell said.
He added to his good fortunes on the 499-yard sixth hole, playing dead into the wind toward the sea, when he got greedy with his second shot out of the rough and advanced it only 10 yards. He had to lay up to 9-iron range, hit that 30 feet and made it for bogey.
“If I made double there, I’m obviously feeling pretty bad about things,” McDowell said.
This was a day where a lot of players felt plenty miserable - except for Mediate, of course. Even in the chill of late afternoon, he felt the warmth of the gallery, of another good round and what is shaping up as a magical summer.
Jun
19
Firefox 3 Vulnerability Found
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Five hours after Mozilla officially released Firefox 3.0, researchers found a vulnerability in the new browser.
Tipping Point has verified the bug and reported it to Mozilla, Tipping Point said on Wednesday.
Since Mozilla is still working on a fix, the researchers won’t share details about the problem. Tipping Point ranked the severity of the vulnerability as high, but said that users would have to click on a link in an e-mail or visit a malicious Web page before being affected. The issue affects users of Firefox 3.0 as well as Firefox 2.0.
Once the problem is fixed, Tipping Point will publish an advisory on its Web site, it said.
Tipping Point found out about the vulnerability through its Zero Day Initiative, which lets researchers earn cash by submitting new vulnerabilities to the company. Once Tipping Point validates the issue, it pays the researcher for the information and notifies the relevant software vendor of the technical details.
Mozilla did not respond to a request for comment.
Mozilla launched its newest browser on Tuesday along with a marketing stunt that went a bit wrong. The company announced that it wanted to set a Guinness World Record for the largest number of software downloads in a 24-hour period. However, the volume of downloads crippled Mozilla’s site, and so customers in the U.S. couldn’t begin downloading the software until two hours later than expected. Still, Mozilla said it logged more than 8 million downloads within 24 hours. There is currently no record for number of software downloads in a day, but Mozilla must now wait for review of the stunt by Guinness officials
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Jun
17
Mozilla Ready to Launch Firefox 3 into Browser Wars
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Just more than 10 years ago, Mozilla threw its open-source code into the public domain. Today, its browser — Firefox — is preparing to launch its third major release in hopes of continuing to eat away at Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.
Firefox already has more than 18 percent of the global market, according to Net Applications. With the release of Firefox 3, Mozilla could see a boost in downloads and market share. Microsoft’s next version of Internet Explorer won’t come to market until later this year.
On June 17, Mozilla will release Firefox 3. After more than 34 months of active development and the contributions of thousands of people, Firefox 3 will be downloadable free from the Mozilla Web site. Mozilla is promising this is the best browser — period.
“Firefox 3 is a very nice browser. It’s still going to have to go up against Internet Explorer {Windows] and Safari [Mac], which have the home court advantage on their operating systems,” said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at JupiterResearch. “It shows that the browser market is anything but stagnant.”
A Focus on Security
Firefox 3 is based on the Gecko 1.9 Web rendering platform. Building on the previous release, Gecko 1.9 has more than 15,000 updates, including some major re-architecting for improved performance, stability, rendering correctness, and code simplification and sustainability. The result, Mozilla said, is a more secure, easier to use, more personal product with a lot more under the hood to offer Web-site and Firefox add-on developers.
Mozilla begins with a focus on security. Users can click a Web site’s favicon [icon] in the location bar to see who owns the site and to check if the connection is secure. Identity verification is prominently displayed and easier to understand, Mozilla said. When a site uses Extended Validation (EV) SSL certificates, the site’s favicon will turn green and show the name of the company.
Firefox 3 also has malware protection to warn users when they arrive at sites known to install viruses, spyware, trojans or the like. And a new Web Forgery Protection service blocks the content of pages suspected as Web forgeries. New SSL error pages, Mozilla said, are clearer and stricter, and Firefox automatically disables old and insecure add-on and plug-in versions.
Add-ons that provide updates in an insecure manner will also be disabled. Firefox will inform antivirus software when downloading executables and the browser respects the Vista parental control setting for disabling file downloads.
Easier, More Personal
Mozilla also concentrated on making Firefox easier to use and more personalized. In terms of password management, that means an information bar replaces the old password dialog so users can save passwords after a successful login. The add-on whitelist has been removed, making it possible to install extensions from third-party sites in fewer clicks. And a new download manager aims to makes it much easier to locate downloaded files. Users can also see and search the Web site where a file came from.
Firefox 3 allows users to add bookmarks from the location bar with a single click and associate keywords with bookmarks to sort them. Web applications, such as a favorite Webmail provider, can now be used instead of desktop applications to handle Web-site mail links. The Add-ons Manager can be used to download and install a Firefox customization from the thousands of add-ons available from Mozilla’s Web site.
Gartenberg expects the competition to dominate browsing will continue. Even now, Microsoft is working on the release of IE 8 and Apple is seeding Safari 4. “Clearly, Web browsers are still very important, as important as they were 10 years ago, but just in a different way,” he said. “The bottom line is no one is actually paying for a browser any more. A browser is free. It’s something you give away in order to make money elsewhere.”
May
18
Police: Gunman wounds 3 outside SoCal church
Filed Under Most Pepular, News, USA News | Leave a Comment
LOS ANGELES - A man with a semiautomatic rifle opened fire at a church festival Saturday, wounding his ex-wife and two bystanders before festival-goers grabbed him and held him for police, authorities and a church official said.
Gunfire rang out on a grassy field where the festival was being set up at the St. John Baptist de la Salle Roman Catholic parish shortly before 11 a.m., said police Capt. Steven Ruiz.
“We believe this is an isolated incident, a domestic-violence dispute,” he said.
Father Robert Milbauer, the parish’s pastor, said a woman injured in the attack was the gunman’s ex-wife. The two have a child who attends the school and had been mired in an ongoing dispute, Ruiz said.
The gunman’s identity was not immediately released.
He opened fire with a .22-caliber rifle a few minutes before the church’s annual weekend festival was to begin. Milbauer said about 50 people, mainly church volunteers and their children, were setting up food and game booths and carnival-style rides when the gunfire erupted.
“I was walking toward the festival area to say an opening prayer and I saw them,” Milbauer said of the shooting victims.
The man’s 30-year-old ex-wife was one of the festival workers. She was hospitalized in stable condition, Ruiz said.
A 45-year-old man was shot in the chest and was in critical condition and another man, 47, was in stable condition with a leg wound, Ruiz said.
Their identities were not immediately released.
The man walked away after the shooting but was quickly grabbed by bystanders, one of whom was an off-duty Burbank police officer.
“They managed to overtake him and held him down,” Ruiz said. “I’m told that he was in the process of possibly reloading.”
The festival was shut down for the day, and Milbauer said grief counselors were meeting with witnesses, particularly the children.
The parish plans to go ahead with the festival on Sunday, Milbauer said, in part to help parishioners put the tragedy behind them.
The church and school are located in the city’s Granada Hills area in the San Fernando Valley, an ordinarily peaceful, multiethnic, middle-class residential neighborhood not far from the historic San Fernando Mission.
The annual festival is held to raise money for the school’s building fund.
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May
12
Toll from China quake estimated at 3,000 to 5,000
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BEIJING - A massive earthquake struck central China on Monday and state media reported that as many as 5,000 people were killed in a single county while nearly 900 students were trapped under the rubble of their school.
The official Xinhua News Agency said 80 percent of the buildings had collapsed in Beichuan county in Sichuan province after the 7.8-magnitude quake.
Xinhua reported that 3,000 to 5,000 people had died in Beichuan, which has a population of 160,000, raising fears the overall death toll could increase sharply. Another 10,000 people were believed to be hurt.
The earthquake sent thousands of people rushing out of buildings and into the streets hundreds of miles away in Beijing and Shanghai. The temblor was felt as far away as Pakistan, Vietnam and Thailand.
Four of the dead were ninth-grade students killed when their high school collapsed, Xinhua said. Photos showed heavy cranes trying to remove rubble from the ruined school. Xinhua did not say how many of the students were feared dead.
It said its reporters in Juyuan township, about 60 miles from the epicenter, saw buried teenagers struggling to break loose from underneath the rubble of the three-story building “while others were crying out for help.”
Two girls were quoted by Xinhua as saying they escaped because they had “run faster than others.”
The earthquake comes less than three months before the start of the Beijing Summer Olympics, when China hopes to use to showcase its rise in the world.
Shanghai’s main index inched up Monday, but the advance was capped by worries over inflation and potential damage from the earthquake. Analysts said that shares of companies located in the Sichuan region may fall in coming sessions due to the quake.
It struck in the middle of the afternoon when classes and office towers were full, about 60 miles northwest of Chengdu. There were several smaller aftershocks, the U.S. Geological Survey said on its Web site.
Calls into the city did not go through as panicked residents quickly overloaded the telephone system. The quake affected telephone and power networks, and even state media appeared to have few details of the disaster.
“In Chengdu, mobile telecommunication convertors have experienced jams and thousands of servers were out of service,” said Sha Yuejia, deputy chief executive officer of China Mobile.
Although it was difficult to telephone Chengdu, an Israeli student, Ronen Medzini, sent a text message to The Associated Press saying there were power and water outages there.
“Traffic jams, no running water, power outs, everyone sitting in the streets, patients evacuated from hospitals sitting outside and waiting,” he said.
Xinhua said an underground water pipe ruptured near the city’s southern railway station, flooding a main thoroughfare. Reporters saw buildings with cracks in their walls but no collapses, Xinhua said.
The earthquake also rattled buildings in Beijing, some 930 miles to the north, less than three months before the Chinese capital was expected to be full of hundreds of thousands of foreign visitors for the Summer Olympics.
Many Beijing office towers were evacuated, including the building housing the media offices for the organizers of the Olympics, which start in August. None of the Olympic venues was damaged.
“I’ve lived in Taipei and California and I’ve been through quakes before. This is the most I’ve ever felt,” said James McGregor, a business consultant who was inside the LG Towers in Beijing’s business district. “The floor was moving underneath me.”
In Fuyang, 660 miles to the east, chandeliers in the lobby of the Buckingham Palace Hotel swayed. “We’ve never felt anything like this our whole lives,” said a hotel employee surnamed Zhu.
Patients at the Fuyang People’s No. 1 Hospital were evacuated. An hour after the quake, a half-dozen patients in blue-striped pajamas stood outside the hospital. One was laying on a hospital bed in the parking lot.
Skyscrapers in Shanghai swayed and most office occupants went rushing into the streets.
In the Taiwanese capital of Taipei, 100 miles off the southeastern Chinese coast, buildings swayed when the quake hit. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.
The quake was felt as far away as the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi, where some people hurried out of swaying office buildings and into the streets downtown. A building in the Thai capital of Bangkok also was evacuated after the quake was felt there.
A magnitude 7.8 earthquake is considered a major event, capable of causing widespread damage and injuries in populated areas.
The last serious earthquake in China was in 2003, when a 6.8-magnitude quake killed 268 people in Bachu county in the west of Xinjiang.
China’s deadliest earthquake in modern history struck the northeastern city of Tangshan on July 28, 1976, killing 240,000 people
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Apr
25
NEW YORK - Three detectives were acquitted of all charges Friday in the 50-shot killing of an unarmed groom-to-be on his wedding day, a case that put the NYPD at the center of another dispute involving allegations of excessive firepower.
Justice Arthur Cooperman delivered the verdict in a Queens courtroom packed with spectators, including victim Sean Bell’s fiancee and parents, and at least 200 people gathered outside the building.
The verdict provoked an outpouring of emotions: Bell’s fiancee immediately walked out of the room. His mother cried.
Outside the courthouse, which was surrounded by scores of police officers, many in the crowd began weeping as news of the verdict said. Others were enraged, swearing and screaming “Murderers! Murderers!” or “KKK!”
Bell, a 23-year-old black man, was killed in a hail of gunfire outside a seedy strip club in Queens on Nov. 25, 2006 - his wedding day - as he was leaving his bachelor party with two friends.
Officers Michael Oliver, 36, and Gescard Isnora, 29, stood trial for manslaughter while Officer Marc Cooper, 40, was charged only with reckless endangerment. Two other shooters weren’t charged. Oliver squeezed off 31 shots; Isnora fired 11 rounds; and Cooper shot four times.
The officers, complaining that pretrial publicity had unfairly painted them as cold-blooded killers, opted to have the judge decide the case rather than a jury.
The judge indicated that the police officers’ version of events was more credible than the victims’ version. “The people have not proved beyond a reasonable doubt that each defendant was not justified” in firing, he said.
A conviction on manslaughter could have brought up to 25 years in prison; the penalty for reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor, is a year behind bars.
The case brought back painful memories of other NYPD shootings, such as the 1999 shooting of Amadou Diallo - an African immigrant who was gunned down in a hail of 41 bullets by police officers who mistook his wallet for a gun. The acquittal of the officers in that case created a storm of protest, with hundreds arrested after taking to the streets in demonstration.
The mood surrounding this case has been muted by comparison, although Bell’s fiancee, parents and their supporters, including the Rev. Al Sharpton, have held rallies demanding that the officers - two of whom are black - be held accountable.
Still, a phalanx of police officers, some uniformed and some in the department’s community affairs polo shirts, was stationed outside the courthouse Friday. The building was ringed by metal barricades. Some in the crowd wore buttons with Bell’s picture or held signs saying “Justice for Sean Bell.” After the verdict was read, some in the crowd approached officers but were held back; the jostling quickly died down.
After the verdict, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly acknowledged that some people were disappointed with the acquittals.
“We don’t anticipate violence, but we are prepared for any contingency,” he said.
The nearly two-month trial was marked by deeply divergent accounts of the night.
The defense painted the victims as drunken thugs who the officers believed were armed and dangerous. Prosecutors sought to convince the judge that the victims had been minding their own business, and that the officers were inept, trigger-happy aggressors.
None of the officers took the witness stand in his own defense. Instead, Cooperman heard transcripts of the officers testifying before a grand jury, saying they believed they had good reason to use deadly force. The judge also heard testimony from Bell’s two injured companions, who insisted the maelstrom erupted without warning.
Both sides were consistent on one point: The utter chaos surrounding the last moments of Bell’s life.
“It happened so quick,” Isnora said in his grand jury testimony. “It was like the last thing I ever wanted to do.”
Bell’s companions - Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman - also offered dramatic testimony about the episode. Benefield and Guzman were both wounded; Guzman still has four bullets lodged in his body.
Referring to Isnora, Guzman said, “This dude is shooting like he’s crazy, like he’s out of his mind.”
The victims and shooters were set on a fateful collision course by a pair of innocuous decisions: Bell’s to have a last-minute bachelor party at Kalua Cabaret, and the undercover detectives’ to investigate reports of prostitution at the club.
As the club closed around 4 a.m., Sanchez and Isnora claimed they overheard Bell and his friends first flirt with women, then taunt a stranger who responded by putting his right hand in his pocket as if he had a gun. Guzman, they testified, said, “Yo, go get my gun” - something Bell’s friends denied.
Isnora said he decided to arm himself, call for backup - “It’s getting hot,” he told his supervisor - and tail Bell, Guzman and Benefield as they went around the corner and got into Bell’s car. He claimed that after warning the men to halt, Bell pulled away, bumped him and rammed an unmarked police van that converged on the scene with Oliver at the wheel.
The detective also alleged that Guzman made a sudden move as if he were reaching for a gun.
“I yelled ‘Gun!’ and fired,” he said. “In my mind, I knew (Guzman) had a gun.”
Benefield and Guzman testified that there were no orders. Instead, Guzman said, Isnora “appeared out of nowhere” with a gun drawn and shot him in the shoulder - the first of 16 shots to enter his body.
“That’s all there was - gunfire,” he said. “There wasn’t nothing else.”
With tires screeching, glass breaking and bullets flying, the officers claimed that they believed they were the ones under fire. Oliver responded by emptying his semiautomatic pistol, reloading, and emptying it again, as the supervisor sought cover.
The truth emerged when the smoke cleared: There was no weapon inside Bell’s blood-splattered car.
Mar
30
Bolton 2-3 Arsenal
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Arsenal hung on in the title race by coming from 2-0 down to beat Bolton despite Abou Diaby’s sending off.
Matthew Taylor headed Bolton in front from a cross by Gretar Steinsson, who was later clattered by Diaby and the referee produced a straight red.
Taylor’s deflected drive doubled the lead before William Gallas volleyed home to cut the deficit.
Robin Van Persie made it 2-2 with a penalty and Arsenal won it when Jlloyd Samuel put through his own net late on.
It was a remarkable turnaround, as for large spells Arsenal failed to cope with the driving rain, slippery pitch and Bolton’s greater desire.
Kolo Toure, playing at right-back because Bacary Sagna is out injured, looked a shadow of his normal self - and even Cesc Fabregas looked shockingly out of sorts in midfield.
Bolton, by contrast, were focused on their task and punished some slack defending when Taylor rose unchallenged to thump home a header from Steinsson’s excellent delivery out on the right touchline.
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Further evidence of Arsenal’s lack of concentration came when Diaby produced a foul throw, but if that was comedy of sorts, there was nothing funny about the Frenchman’s challenge on Steinsson which followed.
He slid in and clearly planted studs on Steinsson’s standing leg at ankle height, and was given his marching orders by referee Chris Foy.
Down to 10 men, Arsenal needed to hit back quickly and almost snatched an equaliser when Toure’s shot deflected off Gallas and skidded narrowly wide.
The Gunners were rocked when Matthieu Flamini hesitated on the edge of the box, the ball found its way to Taylor and his side-foot shot arrowed into the corner via Gallas’s ankle.
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Interview: Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger
Game over, it seemed - and the end of Arsenal’s fading title hopes, but then everything changed as on the hour mark Arsenal woke up, and Bolton went to sleep.
From Fabregas’s corner, Gallas stole in completely unmarked at the far post to volley in and hand Arsenal a lifeline they had barely deserved.
They were level six minutes later, however, when Van Persie crashed in from the penalty spot after Gary Cahill brought down Hleb.
Van Persie had a chance to win it for Arsenal after substitute Theo Walcott cut the ball back to him but the Dutchman fired high and wide from 12 yards.
But he was not to rue his miss as Arsenal managed to scramble a victory when Fabregas’s shot was deflected twice, the final touch off the unfortunate Samuel, and keeper Ali Al Habsi could not keep it out.
Source:BBC.Com
Mar
30
Praying parents’ other 3 kids removed
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WAUSAU, Wis. - The three siblings of a girl who died of diabetes that went untreated as her parents prayed instead of taking her to a doctor have been removed from the home during an investigation, police said Friday.
The parents and social services experts agreed the move would be best for everyone, Everest Metro Police Chief Dan Vergin said. The children are staying with other relatives, though they were not in danger, he said.
“There is no physical evidence of abuse or neglect,” he said.
Madeline Neumann, 11, died Sunday the Weston home of an undiagnosed but treatable form of diabetes as her parents, Dale and Leilani Neumann, prayed for her to get better. Her mother said she never expected her daughter, whom she called Kara, to die.
The family believes in the Bible, which says healing comes from God, Leilani Neumann said.
The children removed from the home range in age from 13 to 16 and are expected to return to their parents once an investigation of the girl’s death wraps up, Vergin said.
He would not specify where they are living, other than with another family member.
Vergin said his agency’s final report will make no recommendations on possible charges against the parents, leaving that up to the district attorney.
“There is no intent. They didn’t want their child to die. They thought what they were doing was the right thing,” he said. “They believed up to the time she stopped breathing she was going to get better. They just thought it was a spiritual attack. They believed if they prayed enough she would get through it.”
Source: Yahoo News
Mar
28
Pa. judge sentences 3 to learn English
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WILKES-BARRE, Pa. - A judge known for creative sentencing has ordered three Spanish-speaking men to learn English or go to jail.
The men, who faced prison for criminal conspiracy to commit robbery, can remain on parole if they learn to read and write English, earn their GEDs and get full-time jobs, Luzerne County Judge Peter Paul Olszewski Jr. said.
The men, Luis Reyes, Ricardo Dominguez and Rafael Guzman-Mateo, plus a fourth defendant, Kelvin Reyes-Rosario, all needed translators when they pleaded guilty Tuesday.
“Do you think we are going to supply you with a translator all of your life?” the judge asked them.
The four, ranging in age from 17 to 22, were in a group that police said accosted two men on a street in May. The two said they were asked if they had marijuana, told to empty their pockets, struck on the head, threatened with a gun and told to stay off the block.
Attorneys for the men said they were studying the legality of the ruling and had not decided whether to appeal. One of the attorneys, Ferris Webby, suggested that the ruling was good for his client, Guzman-Mateo.
“My client is happy,” Webby said. “I think it’s going to help him.”
The judge sentenced the four men to jail terms of four to 24 months. But he gave the three men, who already had served at least four months, immediate parole. Reyes-Rosario remains imprisoned on an unrelated drug charge.
Olszewski ordered the three to return with their parole officers in a year and take an English test. “If they don’t pass, they’re going in for the 24 (months),” he said.
Olszewski is known for outside-the-box sentencing.
He has ordered young defendants who are school dropouts to finish school. He often orders defendants to get full-time employment. But he also has his staff coordinate with an employment agency to help them find the jobs
Source: Yahoo News