Sandra Chesterman, left, puts a braclet on the wrist of Christine Kirby during a birthday party for her son Jayden Kirby, 1, on Sunday, Feb. 9, 2014, in Fremont, Calif. Chesterman's daughter Kristina was killed by an alleged drunk driver last September while coming home from nursing school in Chico. Jayden was given months to live before he received part of Kristina Chesterman's liver. Jayden and Christina share the same birth stone and that gem is embeded into the bracelet. (Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group) ( ARIC CRABB )

 LIVERMORE -- When she was still in high school, Kristina Chesterman wrote out her bucket list. Flying a plane was on it; so was running through a poppy field and breaking up a fight between two boys over her affections. She also wanted to save a life.

 The aspiring nurse's ambitions came to a halt in September, when she was killed by a suspected drunken driver near Chico State, where she attended school.

 Though Chesterman, 21, didn't get to mark much off her list, she has saved more lives than she hoped -- and is profoundly affecting many others. Five Northern Californians have been saved through Kristina's choice to donate her organs. And her grateful friends and family are making the rest of her bucket list their own.

 A photograph of Kristina Chesterman is displayed during a birthday party for Jayden Kirby on Sunday, Feb. 9, 2014, in Fremont, Calif. Chesterman was killed by an alleged drunk driver last September while coming home from nursing school in Chico. Jayden, 1, was given months to live before he received part of Kristina Chesterman's liver. (Courtesy of the Chesterman Family) ( Chesterman Family )

 Chesterman's mother, Sandra, of Livermore, said her daughter wanted to help people from an early age. She routinely gave blood and, at age 18, registered as an organ donor, because -- as the young woman explained to her mom -- "it's the right thing to do."

 "I know she would've been so proud," Sandra Chesterman said of her daughter's legacy. "It hasn't been an easy process for us, but at the same time, it's brought us so much comfort."

 Comfort came from the family of Jayden Kirby, of Fremont, who might have died as an infant had he not received a part of Kristina Chesterman's liver. Jayden's mother, Christine, figured out the name of the mystery donor after hearing news reports, and she connected with the Chestermans through Facebook. On Feb. 9, Sandra Chesterman, director of the Livermore Homeless Refuge, and her husband, Dave, met with the Kirbys in Fremont to celebrate Jayden's first birthday.

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 "I wanted her to see the impact Kristina had," Christine Kirby said. "(The transplant) absolutely saved (Jayden's) life."

 Jayden's grandmother Ana Martinez, who wears a pink bracelet honoring Kristina Chesterman, considers the young woman their "guardian angel."

 "I believe Kristina was here to really make an impact, and that goodness will ripple forever," she said.

 Chesterman also saved Sakariah "Zak" Pappachan, a Fremont resident who is overcoming renal failure thanks to her kidney. Pappachan and his wife, Angela, attended the same church as Chesterman's aunt, Patricia Picard. Immediately after Chesterman's death, Picard texted the couple, asking if Zak Pappachan was a match. Within hours, he had his new kidney.

 Now he is enjoying being a dad to his young daughter, RayeAnn, and is advocating for organ donation.

 The Pappachans, who are making a memorial to Chesterman in their backyard, have grown close to the Chesterman family since the transplant. Angela sang at Kristina's funeral, and the two families spent Christmas Eve together at church.

 Sandra Chesterman, left, visits with Christine Kirby, center, her son Jayden Kirby, 1, during a birthday party for Jayden on Sunday, Feb. 9, 2014, in Fremont, Calif. Chesterman's daughter Kristina was killed by an alleged drunk driver last September while coming home from nursing school in Chico. Jayden was given months to live before he received part of Kristina Chesterman's liver. (Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group) ( ARIC CRABB )

 "It's given me a different perspective and (taught me) to be grateful that a miracle happened," Zak Pappachan said. "(Kristina's) saved so many people's lives. No matter what I go through, I have to be thankful for Kristina."

 Three others also share Chesterman's organs. A Northern California man, 42, received her kidney and pancreas. The rest of her liver went to a San Francisco man, and her heart still beats inside an unidentified 63-year-old woman from the South Bay, whom Sandra Chesterman hopes to meet someday.

 For the Chestermans, the community created with the Pappachans and Kirbys has helped them deal with a nightmarish year. In February 2013, son Daniel was brutally beaten while visiting Kristina in Chico. After multiple surgeries, he still lacks feeling on the left side of his face.

 Daniel Chesterman's attacker will be sentenced for felony assault in early March. About the same time, a preliminary hearing begins for Riley Dean Hoover, the 19-year-old charged with felony DUI and hit-and-run in Kristina Chesterman's death.

 While the wheels of justice turn, Kristina Chesterman's impact continues to build. Her friends and family have taken on her bucket list, and it is inspiring even more good works. Chico State's Kristina Chesterman Memorial Nursing Scholarship has raised more than $30,000, and -- prompted by Chesterman's desire to join Doctors Without Borders -- fellow nursing students are raising money for a medical clinic to be built in her name in Nigeria. They hope to break ground this summer.

 Bridget Kline, of Livermore, built up the courage to go sky diving over the ocean near San Diego, knowing it would've meant a lot to Chesterman.

 "It was so cool to do one of the crazy activities she never got to do," Kline said. "I was terrified, but I thought about her and it was comforting. ... It was like I had a friend with me."

 Longtime Chesterman family friend and neighbor Chris Leslie brought a photo of Kristina with him on a first-class flight to Japan -- meeting her goal to fly posh -- and will do so again on an upcoming trip to Paris.

 "It's not quite the same, but she'll be in first class with me," Leslie said. "You wonder why someone like that is taken so young, but I believe Kristina was one of those very rare people who was so complete as a person already. ... The rest of us are just a work in progress."

 In powerful ways, though not how she would've imagined, Sandra Chesterman thinks her daughter is still fulfilling her destiny.

 "I have gotten so many signs from Kristina that give me inspiration," she said. "I know she's doing whatever she can to lead us in the right direction."

 Contact Jeremy Thomas at 925-847-2184. Follow him at Twitter.com/jet_bang. ||||| As Sandra Chesterman cleaned out her recently killed daughter Kristina’s college apartment last fall, she noticed a makeup bag stuffed with pieces of paper.

 In it, she found one tattered note that had been folded and re-folded many times. It was Kristina Chesterman's bucket list.

 “Kristina had said something to my husband at one time about something that was on her bucket list, but he didn’t realize she had something written down,” Sandra Chesterman said. “It was so like her because she was so organized. She had her whole life planned out. ... It was almost like she knew her life was going to be short. She felt like she had so much to do.”

 Kristina Chesterman, a 21-year-old nursing student at Chico State University, was hit by an allegedly drunk driver in September while she was riding her bike home from studying.

 She was declared brain dead a few days later -- but, despite her premature death, items will continue to get checked off the bucket list.

 Kristina Chesterman's organs went on to save several lives, including that of Susan Vieira, the 64-year-old retired nurse in Campbell, Calif., who received her heart.

 Because organ donors and recipients are anonymous to each other for at least the first six months, Vieira didn’t know who her donor was.

 Then, one day, a friend called her and told her to look at the San Jose Mercury News. There was an article about Kristina Chesterman, her bucket list, and how her mother hoped to meet the woman who received her heart.

 “She read me Kristina’s bucket list,” Vieira said. “It was as if I was getting a CV of my life. There were so many points that I had already accomplished on that bucket list. It was uncanny.”

 For instance, Vieira had already ridden a camel and learned to fly a plane, she said.

 Sandra Chesterman and Vieira connected on social media that day and agreed to meet in person soon after. Hugging Vieira was especially important to Sandra Chesterman because she could feel her daughter’s heartbeat.

 “It just felt so good to be close to Kristina’s heart,” she said, adding that Vieira has offered to let her use a stethoscope next week to listen to it.

 “It was almost as if Kristina hand-picked Susan," Chesterman said. "The heart is who you are, and I think Susan is the perfect person to get this.”

 Now, Vieira wants to honor Kristina Chesterman by ticking off the rest of her bucket list. She’ll need to visit all of the continents and sky dive, to name a few.

 “I’d like to think all the things I continue to accomplish in my life, I’m taking Kristina with me,” she said. “Together, we will finish her bucket list.” |||||

Write a summary.

– Kristina Chesterman, 21, was studying to be a nurse when she was killed by a suspected drunk driver last year—but she managed to save lives anyway. A registered organ donor, Chesterman gave five people, including a baby, new life, and now the woman who received her heart wants to do something in return. Susan Vieira, 64, has vowed to check off everything on Chesterman's bucket list—written down on a piece of paper her mom only recently found. (One of the items? "Save someone's life." Another? "Be in four places at once.") Vieira had completed several of the tasks already, including learning to fly a plane and riding a camel, ABC News reports. And now, "together, we will finish her bucket list," Vieira says. Other points on the list include running through a poppy field and riding in a hot-air balloon, the San Jose Mercury News reported earlier this year. "I'd like to think all the things I continue to accomplish in my life, I’m taking Kristina with me," Vieira continues; Chesterman's mom adds that she "felt an instant connection" to the woman she just met. Chesterman's friends are also helping to complete the bucket list, including one who took Chesterman's picture along for a first-class flight and another who went skydiving in her honor. "You wonder why someone like that is taken so young, but I believe Kristina was one of those very rare people who was so complete as a person already," says one friend. "The rest of us are just a work in progress."


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 An Illinois man exonerated of an abduction and rape conviction that kept him locked up for 20 years was a free man Tuesday night after he was cleared of a separate property damage charge that had kept him locked up.

 Angel Gonzalez, 41, had pleaded guilty to a property destruction charge stemming from when he destroyed the sink in his cell while he was in solitary confinement. That added more time to the sentence he was serving for the rape and abduction conviction that was thrown out Monday.

 Gonzalez was released Tuesday night after the property charge was dismissed, Vanessa Potkin, a senior attorney with the Innocence Project, told NBC News.

 Potkin said Gonzalez told her the first thing he wanted to do was "hug my mother and thank her for being there."

 "It was very hard when you don't understand what is going on. She always believed in me," Potkin quoted Gonzalez as saying as he drove to his family's home.

 Gonzalez's younger brother Saul said the wrongful conviction that took Gonzalez away hit him very hard because he the two often did things together.

 "The family is so excited. Everyone is so excited. Everything is moving so fast. We haven't had time to think about this," Saul, 34, said in a telephone interview.

 He said his mother, Maria, quickly started handing out tasks to everyone. "Go pick up this and go pick up fried chicken and fix this," Saul said, describing her orders.

 Gonzalez also has two sisters, and Saul said he would be introducing his children, ages 11 and 5, to their uncle for the first time. "All the kids are decorating with balloons," said Saul, who visited his brother one to three times a month during his time in prison when he was old enough to do so.

 Gonzalez was jailed for a 1994 rape and abduction of a woman who had identified him as her attacker. But DNA testing returned profiles belonging to two other men and did not connect Gonzalez to the crime.

 The Innocence Project found other problems with the investigation and with Gonzalez's conviction, which forced a re-examination of his case and brought about the new DNA testing of evidence from the crime scene.

 In addition, Immigration and Customs Enforcement canceled what is known as a detainer, which would have required that he be turned over to ICE custody after he finished serving his sentence. The detainer was placed on Gonzalez on Aug. 20, 1995.

 "Since Mr. Gonzalez has been exonerated on all charges, ICE is exercising prosecutorial discretion and has canceled his detaineer," said Gail Montenegro, an ICE spokeswoman.

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 The Gonzalezes are originally from Mexico. An ICE spokeswoman referred questions about Angel Gonzalez's future immigration status to Citizenship and Immigration Services, which was considering the question late Tuesday.

 Although wrongly imprisoned, Gonzalez used his time in prison to educate himself and learn skills. He is an artist and mentored other younger prisoners and helped those who spoke Spanish.

 "He was always studying in school and teaching other inmates," Saul said.

 Saul remembered that about five years before Gonzalez's arrest, his brother also was teaching him. His fondest memory has been of the two swimming in Mexico and riding a bike, he said.

 "He showed me how to swim and he taught me how to ride a bike," Saul said.

 But Saul said his brother is now ready to learn from him. "I told him I drive a truck. He said, 'You are going to show me now.'"

 Video interview by Telemundo correspondent Janet Rodríguez and photographer Cesar González ||||| Lake County prosecutors plan to exonerate a man who has spent 20 years in prison for rape and abduction, a move that would lengthen the list of the county's criminal convictions wiped away by DNA evidence.

 State's Attorney Mike Nerheim said he will go to court Monday afternoon and ask a judge to throw out the conviction of Angel Gonzalez, who has been serving a 55-year sentence for a 1994 rape and abduction in Waukegan.

 The crime involved two suspects, and DNA test results that arrived late last week showed the presence of bodily fluids from two men, both of whom remain unidentified, Nerheim said. The prosecutor said it was "very clear" that the evidence indicates that Gonzalez, now 41, is innocent and contradicts the confession he gave and the victim's identification of him as one of her rapists.

 Gonzalez, who is incarcerated at Dixon Correctional Center in northwestern Illinois, was speechless at first when he learned last week that prosecutors planned to clear him, said Vanessa Potkin, an attorney from the Innocence Project in New York who has represented him with the help of the Illinois Innocence Project at the University of Illinois at Springfield. Barry Scheck, co-founder and co-director of the New York group, said Gonzalez voiced sympathy for the victim and said he hoped that the perpetrators would be caught.

 Gonzalez has maintained his innocence for decades, Potkin said.

 "He's obviously anxious and excited to see his family again," she said.

 If Monday's court hearing proceeds as planned, Gonzalez's conviction would be the fifth major felony case to collapse in the last five years after DNA indicated Lake County authorities had put an innocent man behind bars. Gonzalez, who lived in Waukegan, was tried during the 22-year tenure of State's Attorney Michael Waller, who retired in 2012 following revelations that prosecutors had disregarded forensic evidence that contradicted their conclusions and worked to prevent men from walking free even after DNA had indicated their innocence.

 It is not clear whether Gonzalez will be freed after his scheduled appearance in Lake County court. He is a Mexican national who had once obtained a visa, but that expired after he was arrested, Potkin said. Attorneys have been working to try to make sure Gonzalez can remain in the country if he's freed, Potkin said.

 Deporting him upon his release would be "a huge travesty of justice," she said, since he planned to seek citizenship before he was imprisoned.

 "It's only the wrongful conviction that makes his status in the country illegal at this point," Potkin said.

 Gonzalez also was convicted in the late 1990s of criminal damage to state property and has not served his three-year sentence for that crime, according to prison records. That charge stemmed from an accusation that he destroyed a sink while in solitary confinement in prison, Potkin said. Nerheim said Friday afternoon he hoped Livingston County prosecutors would agree to have that conviction wiped away.

 The rape victim, Nerheim said, was distraught to learn of prosecutors' plan to clear Gonzalez.

 "She is completely devastated about this," Nerheim said.

 On the night of July 10, 1994, the victim, then 35, heard the door buzzer at her home in Waukegan, according to court records and Tribune archives. She opened the door to two men and asked what they wanted. One of the men said, "You," and they dragged her to a sedan and drove away, according to court records.

 She was driven to another location, pulled from the car and raped in some bushes by Gonzalez, she testified at trial. She ran and hid, but the second man quickly found her and raped her, according to a transcript. After the attack, court records show, she walked to a convenience store and called police.

 Early the next morning, police stopped a vehicle matching the description of the car the woman gave and detained the driver, Gonzalez, court records show. An officer testified that Gonzalez matched the description the woman had given of one of her attackers.

 The victim was summoned to the scene of the traffic stop, where she identified Gonzalez as her attacker as he was illuminated in the dark by headlights, according to court records.

 "He was wearing the same clothes, everything. I recognized him immediately," the victim testified.

 At trial, prosecutors presented a videotaped statement from Gonzalez in which he acknowledged participating in the assault but said he didn't ejaculate, according to court records.

 DNA tests at the time on semen taken from the victim and her clothing were inconclusive. Despite his confession, Gonzalez presented an alibi at trial, saying he'd been with his girlfriend at the time of the attack, court records show.

 Gonzalez, who had no felony record at the time, was found guilty of sexual assault and kidnapping, court records show. He continued to maintain his innocence, and a judge sentenced him to 55 years in prison, according to court records.

 In the early 2000s, tests determined that some of the forensic material from the victim matched an unidentified man other than Gonzalez, according to court records. But judges ruled that the new DNA was not conclusive because Gonzalez said he did not ejaculate and could still could have been one of the two men who participated in the crime.

 More recent DNA testing revealed distinct genetic profiles of two men, neither of whom is Gonzalez, Nerheim said. The identity of the two men is unknown.

 Scheck and Potkin said the evidence against Gonzalez was never solid. Witnesses' identifications have been proven fallible, and some experts regard the type of "show-up" procedure by which the victim identified Gonzalez as unreliable. The lawyers said there were discrepancies between the description the victim gave police and Gonzalez's appearance.

 Gonzalez confessed after some 13 hours in custody, Potkin said, and court records indicate there were also discrepancies between the confession and the victim's account of the attack.

 Asked about her client's mindset, Potkin said Gonzalez "has kept his humanity and his hope and is so thankful."

 Gonzalez wrote to the Innocence Project for years before the group took his case in 2012, Potkin said. Nerheim agreed to new testing in 2013, according to court records, and now plans to reopen the case.

 Nerheim took office promising reform, and he's faced criticism for not clearing other people who claim innocence. Scheck praised the prosecutor for his plan to act promptly on the DNA.

 "Lake County, unfortunately, was infamous for its resistance to ... DNA evidence," Scheck said. "This is exactly the opposite."

 Tribune reporter Lisa Black contributed.

 dhinkel@tribpub.com ||||| A Waukegan man walked out of prison Tuesday evening, nearly 20 years after he was convicted of a rape and abduction that authorities now say he did not commit.

 Angel Gonzalez, who spent about half of his life incarcerated for the Lake County conviction, hugged his attorneys at the Dixon Correctional Center gatehouse before emerging a free man.

 "I'm free," he said. "Thank God."

 Lake County authorities cleared Gonzalez of the rape conviction on Monday after determining that new DNA testing of evidence eliminated him as the one of the two men who committed the crime. But he was not freed right away because he still had a property damage conviction on his record, stemming from an incident in which he broke a sink while in solitary confinement in prison, his lawyers said.

 They went to court earlier Tuesday in downstate Livingston County, where a judge agreed to void that charge, paving the way for his release hours later.

 At about 7 p.m., Gonzalez, wearing a new dark gray track suit, walked out into an early evening fog that shrouded the prison. After raising his arms with his lawyers and staff from the Innocence Project in New York, he appeared jovial as he spoke with the assembled media.

 The 41-year-old Gonzalez thanked his family, his supporters, his lawyers and the criminal authorities who worked for his release.

 Gonzalez said he had no reason to be angry: "The past is the past."

 Angel Gonzalez Jr., of Waukegan, walked out of prison March 10, 2015, nearly 20 years after he was convicted of a rape and abduction that authorities now say he did not commit.

 Now, he looks forward to learning and continuing with his hobby of painting.

 "To be here today is making me feel alive again," he said.

 Before leaving for the long-awaited trip home to Waukegan, he said that years in prison can make it feel like "no one believes in you."

 One of his attorneys, Lauren Kaeseberg, from the Illinois Innocence Project, said: "He never gave up, and we've always believed in him."

 Gonzalez's lawyers had argued that the property damage conviction, for which he received a three-year sentence, to be served after he completed his 55-year term for the rape, should also be wiped away. They noted that the property crime occurred when he was in prison for a wrongful conviction, and also that Gonzalez, who speaks limited English, pleaded guilty to damaging the sink without the assistance of an interpreter.

 "Right now, everybody is saying, finally, there is justice for him," said Angel's younger brother, Saul Gonzalez, 34. "Finally, this is over."

 Angel Gonzalez, who was exonerated Monday of a 1994 rape and abduction in Waukegan, was cleared of property damage charges and will be freed from prison. His family shares their reaction to the events. (Stacey Wescott, Chicago Tribune) Angel Gonzalez, who was exonerated Monday of a 1994 rape and abduction in Waukegan, was cleared of property damage charges and will be freed from prison. His family shares their reaction to the events. (Stacey Wescott, Chicago Tribune) SEE MORE VIDEOS

 The family was planning a party with his favorite foods, like chile relleno and fish, to make up for all the family events that Angel missed, said his mother, Maria Gonzalez, 67, speaking in Spanish. Those included siblings' weddings and the births of five nieces and nephews, the family said. The children, the eldest of whom is 11, asked about their missing uncle at every family event.

 On Monday, a Lake County judge vacated Gonzalez's conviction for the abduction and rape of a woman in Waukegan in July 1994. State's Attorney Mike Nerheim agreed to ask for Gonzalez's freedom after recent DNA tests showed that bodily fluids collected as evidence had come from two men, neither of whom was Gonzalez. Nerheim, who took office long after Gonzalez was convicted, said it was clear that this indicated he wasn't guilty and that two other men, who have yet to be identified, committed the crime.

 Nerheim apologized for the case outside court, striking a markedly different tone than his predecessor, Michael Waller, who generally remained unapologetic in public as DNA repeatedly indicated he had sent innocent men to prison. Five rape or murder cases have collapsed in Lake County since 2010; DNA cleared all the men, but they spent a combined 80 years behind bars. Prosecutors under Waller, who held the office for 22 years, were responsible for Gonzalez's prosecution and three of the other convictions.

 In several cases, the prosecutor's office under Waller fought for years to prevent inmates from going free after DNA had suggested their innocence, and his office attracted unflattering national attention as prosecutors proposed alternate theories of the crimes that many found implausible.

 Nerheim took office promising reform after Waller retired in 2012.

 Gonzalez's relatives said they never doubted his innocence, Saul Gonzalez said, but they wondered if they would see him vindicated after spending thousands of dollars over the years for his defense. Their efforts seemed to be wasted until the Innocence Project took over, he said.

 "We were thinking when he went to jail it was a mistake and he'd get out," Gonzalez said Tuesday afternoon, as his mother proudly displayed early family photos. "But everything went wrong."

 Saul Gonzalez worried most of all that his parents wouldn't live to see the day Angel was released. Their father, Angel Gonzalez Sr., 68, had a stroke last year after spending years working in a factory.

 "I wanted them to see him out (of prison) before they passed away," Saul Gonzalez said.

 He answered phone calls all day Monday and Tuesday, as family and friends from California and Texas reacted with excitement after hearing that the charges were dropped.

 His sister went shopping for clothes for Angel on Monday, he said.

 "He's kind of scared right now," said Saul Gonzalez, who on Sunday reassured his brother that his family will help him readjust to life outside prison. "He's seen many bad things. He says he's lucky he's not crazy. He says thank God for everything. He says he's lucky to be alive."

 While in prison, Angel obtained his high school diploma and learned skills in electronics, mechanics, window-washing, construction and auto mechanics, his brother said. He also painted pictures, including a Mother's Day card with an iris set between two hearts.

 "The hardest part is over," Saul Gonzalez said.

 Following Angel Gonzalez's exoneration in Lake County, another issue threatened his prospects for immediate release: his immigration status. His lawyers said he had a visa in 1994 but that it expired after Gonzalez, a Mexican national, was arrested. One of his lawyers, Vanessa Potkin, from the Innocence Project in New York, said she was informed Tuesday that an immigration hold on Gonzalez had been lifted, allowing him to remain in the country as he seeks citizenship.

 dhinkel@tribpub.com

 lblack@tribpub.com |||||
A summary of this is?

– A man wrongly convicted of rape is finally free after spending nearly half his life in prison. After hugging his lawyers from the Innocence Project, Illinois' Angel Gonzalez left Dixon Correctional Center yesterday with his arms raised, saying simply, "the past is the past." A day earlier, a judge threw out Gonzalez's conviction for the abduction and rape of a woman in 1994 at the request of state attorney Mike Nerheim. Though NBC News reports the victim identified Gonzalez, new DNA tests show bodily fluids related to the crime came not from Gonzalez but from two still-unidentified men, the Chicago Tribune reports. Yesterday, a judge waived Gonzalez's conviction and three-year sentence for property damage—the 41-year-old broke a sink while in solitary confinement, his lawyers say—allowing for his release. Nerheim apologized outside court, though it was prosecutors under his predecessor, Michael Waller, who secured Gonzalez's wrongful conviction, as well as three others that have since been overturned. Nerheim told the Chicago Tribune that the victim was "devastated" to learn Gonzalez would be cleared. The then-35-year-old victim was taken from her Waukegan home, put in a sedan, and driven to a location where she was raped by two men. Gonzalez was stopped the next day while behind the wheel of a car similar to the one she had described. In 1994, Gonzalez, who speaks little English, gave a statement to police admitting to taking part in the assault but said he didn't ejaculate; he has since maintained his innocence, and testified he was with his girlfriend at the time. A Mexican national, Gonzalez's visa expired after his arrest, but he's gotten the OK to stay in the US while he pursues citizenship, one of his lawyers says.


– Ahh, the ‘90s: a time when Vanilla Ice was still famous … and, apparently, sleeping with Madonna. The rapper reveals to News of the World that they were a couple when he was 24 and she 33, Digital Spy reports. She was “a great lover,” he says, even though she was—and still is—“the oldest person I’ve ever been with.” Alas, their “exciting” relationship had to end when she published Sex, a 1992 book featuring pictures of her with the rapper—and other men. “I was hurt to be an unwitting part of this slutty package,” he says. Click for more, including his stories of Madonna “taking pictures and running round naked” for the “porno” book.

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 ITV

 Vanilla Ice has revealed that he dated Madonna when he was 24-years-old and she was 33.The rapper admitted that it was "exciting" to have a relationship with an older woman but said he ended it when Madonna published her 1992 coffee-table book Sex, which featured intimate photographs of the pair and images of her with other men."Going out with Madonna was exciting," he told the News of the World. "She was older than me and a great lover. She's still the oldest person I've ever been with, so it was an experience."But I broke up with her after she printed that book because I was hurt to be an unwitting part of this slutty package. It was disgusting and cheap. We were in a relationship yet it looked like she was screwing all these other people."I thought she was taking pictures and running round naked because she was like that. Then when the book came out I was so embarrassed and ashamed. It was a porno. She threw me in like I was a product off a shelf and I didn't appreciate it. That was it and I ended it. She said she didn't have sex with these men but it looked like she was."Vanilla Ice stars in the new series of Dancing On Ice, which starts tonight at 6.30pm on ITV1. ||||| Vanilla Ice Reveals Why He Broke Up With Madonna

 Email This Rapper Vanilla Ice revealed in an interview that he dated

 Ice, whose real name is Robert Van Winkle, ended it when Madonna published her 1992 coffee-table book 'Sex,' which featured intimate photographs of the couple and images of her with other men.

 "I broke up with her after she printed that book because I was hurt to be an unwitting part of this slutty package," said the 'Ice Ice Baby' rapper. "It was disgusting and cheap. We were in a relationship, yet it looked like she was screwing all these other people." Rapper Vanilla Ice revealed in an interview that he dated Madonna in 1991. It was "exciting" to be in a relationship with an older woman, and she was a "great lover," he told 'News of the World,' according to Digital Spy . He was 24 years old, and Madonna was 33 at the time they were dating.Ice, whose real name is Robert Van Winkle, ended it when Madonna published her 1992 coffee-table book 'Sex,' which featured intimate photographs of the couple and images of her with other men."I broke up with her after she printed that book because I was hurt to be an unwitting part of this slutty package," said the 'Ice Ice Baby' rapper. "It was disgusting and cheap. We were in a relationship, yet it looked like she was screwing all these other people."

 http://xml.channel.aol.com/xmlpublisher/fetch.v2.xml?option=expand_relative_urls&dataUrlNodes=uiConfig,feedConfig,entry&id=691977&pid=691976&uts=1273167996 http://www.popeater.com/mm_track/popeater/music/?s_channel=us.musicpop&s_account=aolpopeater,aolsvc&omni=1&ke=1 http://cdn.channel.aol.com/cs_feed_v1_6/csfeedwrapper.swf PopScene: Week's Hottest Pics Gabourey Sidibe attends The American Cancer Society's Choose You luncheon on May 5th in New York City. Amy Sussman, Getty Images Amy Sussman, Getty Images PopScene: Weeks Hottest Pics

 He goes on to say, "I thought she was taking pictures and running round naked because she was like that. Then when the book came out I was so embarrassed and ashamed. It was a porno. She threw me in like I was a product off a shelf, and I didn't appreciate it. That was it, and I ended it. She said she didn't have sex with these men, but it looked like she was."Ice is currently participating in the U.K. reality competition 'Dancing on Ice.' |||||


– For the first time, scientists have successfully implanted living bone grown in a laboratory, Live Science reports. And while those implants were in miniature pigs, not humans, it's pretty impressive nonetheless. Scientists removed part of the jaw bones of 14 pigs, carved cow thighbones into the right shape, removed all the cells from the cow bones, saturated the cow bones with stem cells from the pigs, and left the bones to grow in the lab. When the new, living bones were implanted in the pigs, they showed impressive regrowth and returned the jaw to full strength, according to Science Magazine. “The pigs woke up, and a half-hour later they were eating,” researcher Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic tells the New York Times. “We thought they would be in pain. But no, they’re doing great.” The researchers published their findings this month in Science Translational Medicine. They want to try the process in humans in the next few years. At the moment, no great options exist for people who need replacement bones due to injuries, birth defects, or diseases. There are titanium replacements or donated bones, but those come with the risk of rejection. Doctors replacing facial bones currently take the bone from elsewhere in the patient's body, but that causes a new injury, and it can be hard to find a large enough chunk of bone to borrow. Prior methods of bone regrowth have involved letting the new bone grow inside the body, but researchers say growing it first in a lab could have a number of benefits. (Scientists hope to grow human organs in farm animals.)

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Break your arm, and it will probably heal—but lose a big chunk of your chin, and that’s a different story. Now, researchers have made a significant advance toward replacing large pieces of bone in humans by growing a pig’s own cells into bone in the lab and then using it to restore a piece of missing jaw.

 “Being able to translate into a large, functional animal model is an important step for this technology,” says Scott Hollister, a biomedical engineer at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, who was not involved in the study. But he says the new technique, now inching toward testing in humans, will still have to prove its advantages over other experimental bone regeneration approaches.

 The face is an especially tricky testing ground for bone reconstruction. It takes precision to match our subtle features and symmetry, and bones in the jaw must be strong enough to withstand the force of chewing. Today, surgeons often repair facial damage by grafting a piece of bone from somewhere else, such as the patient’s pelvis or rib. But that procedure, called an autograft, creates a whole new bone injury that can be painful and slow to heal. The extracted bone is also tough to carve into the desired shape, and surgeons sometimes struggle to find a piece big enough to replace what’s missing.

 Instead, researchers have been experimenting with ways to grow new facial bone, many of them based on synthetic scaffolds—porous structures shaped like the missing region that can be grafted onto existing bone to encourage the body to rebuild. Some experiments have implanted these empty scaffolds on their own and let new bone grow into them. Others have loaded scaffolds up with growth factors or cells that can transform into bone, or both. Several such techniques have made it to large animal testing—a key step in proving they’re worth trying in humans. But these approaches have involved adding precursor cells or growth factors to the scaffold right before it’s implanted and allowing the bone to develop inside the body.

 Growing new bone in the scaffold for weeks before implanting it could have advantages, says Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic, a biomedical engineer at Columbia University and senior author on the new paper. It would give growth in the scaffold a kind of head start, so that the synthesis of bone matrix is more likely to keep up with the body’s natural process of degrading bone. And if cells are already part of a growing tissue, rather than a smattering of precursor cells recently injected into the scaffold, she says, they may be less likely to disperse out of the scaffold (and go to waste) after they’re grafted.

 In the new study, Vunjak-Novakovic and her colleagues tested that idea in 14 pigs with facial bone damage. They cut a hammer-shaped chunk roughly 6 centimeters long out of the back of each pig’s jawbone—the vertical piece that extends up toward the ear and bears the most weight when an animal chomps down. To replace those chunks, the team first crafted scaffolds out of cow leg bone by removing all the living cells to leave behind a porous matrix of minerals and proteins. These were carved with a tiny computer-guided pin that shaved away material to match 3D images of each pig’s jaw, created from a computed tomography scan.

 Next, the researchers sucked some fat from the pigs’ backs and isolated precursor cells that can become bone, known as mesenchymal stem cells. Forcing these cells—and culture medium to nourish them—into the tiny spaces of the scaffold is no easy task. By simply soaking the scaffold in the medium, “you’d get something that looks like M&M candy,” Vunjak-Novakovic says: Healthy bone cells might coat the outside, but they wouldn't penetrate to the center. So the team designed a silicon chamber cut to fit snugly around each scaffold so that the injected medium would be forced inside it instead of diverted around it. The cells were permeated with culture medium as they grew in this bioreactor for 3 weeks.

 Six pigs received a personalized graft seeded with their own cells. To test the specific benefit of these cells, six other pigs received a custom-carved scaffold with no cells growing inside. The remaining two were left to heal on their own. Over 6 months, pigs in all three groups regrew a portion of the missing jaw, but regrowth was more complete in the seeded grafts, the researchers report online today in Science Translational Medicine . In tests of mechanical strength, only these grafts could withstand the same stress as the original bone, and only they reached and maintained the height of the original bone. The unseeded scaffolds, meanwhile, actually shrank slightly over time, which suggests the body was degrading bone matrix faster than it could be formed, Vunjak-Novakovic says. “This is convincing evidence that you do need provisional bone to get new bone.”

 The use of a bioreactor to grow bone before grafting holds definite advantages, says Dietmar Hutmacher, a biomedical engineer at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia, who was not involved in the study. But there is still debate over the precise recipe for a bone-stimulating scaffold. He suspects, for example, that adding growth factors known as bone morphogenetic proteins—a step this group avoided out of concerns for uncontrolled bone growth—would make for a stronger and more complete bone.

 The group will also need to show that the technique is an improvement over other approaches, including the currently used autografts, Hollister notes. “There will be lots of questions whether, for example, growing [bone] in a bioreactor gives you an advantage.” Hollister and his collaborators have managed to regrow pig facial bone by adding precursor cells to a scaffold right when it’s implanted, with no cultivation ahead of time.

 Vunjak-Novakovic, who founded a company called EpiBone in Brooklyn, New York, to commercialize the technology, is now planning to gather more evidence that the procedure is safe to try in humans. She hopes it will be in human trials in roughly 3 years. ||||| Thank you for your interest in spreading the word about Science Translational Medicine.

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 The pigs, all 14 of them, are doing fine. Considering they’d been retrofitted with bone grown in a laboratory, that came as a pleasant surprise.

 “The pigs woke up, and a half-hour later they were eating,” said Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic, a professor of biomedical engineering at Columbia University. “We thought they would be in pain. But no, they’re doing great.”

 Dr. Vunjak-Novakovic and her colleagues have managed to create living bone from stem cells. First, they made a CT scan to create a 3-D image of each pig’s jaw. From cow bone, they sculpted a “scaffold” — a three-dimensional copy of the pig bone.

 They put the scaffold in a nutrient solution along with stem cells extracted from the pigs. The cells attached to the scaffold, forming a new bone identical to the original. Then the researchers implanted the new bone in each pig. They reported their results in Science Translational Medicine.

 There was no problem with rejection, and the new bone integrated with the pig’s own tissue. Clinical trials in humans, however, are at least three years away. |||||


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U.S. federal air marshals have been secretly observing specific American travelers on domestic flights under a previously undisclosed program called "Quiet Skies," The Boston Globe reported Sunday. According to internal documents obtained by the Globe, "thousands of unsuspecting Americans have been subjected to targeted airport and inflight surveillance, carried out by small teams of armed, undercover air marshals" since the program began in March. The Transportation Security Administration, which runs the Federal Air Marshal Service, publicly acknowledged the Quiet Skies program later Sunday, declining to specify how passengers are targeted or if any arrests have resulted from the initiative but saying the program has been around in one form or another since 2010.

 "We are no different than the cop on the corner who is placed there because there is an increased possibility that something might happen," TSA spokesman James Gregory said. The Globe says air marshals follow about 35 Quiet Skies targets a day, observing them on a flight and recording such activities as fidgeting, using a laptop or smartphone, sweating heavily, or sleeping. "If that person does all that stuff, and the airplane lands safely and they move on, the behavior will be noted, but they will not be approached or apprehended," Gregory tells The Washington Post.

 Gregory insisted the TSA does not single out travelers based on race, religion, or nationality, but privacy advocates aren't convinced. "Such surveillance not only makes no sense, it is a big waste of taxpayer money and raises a number of constitutional questions," ACLU staff attorney Hugh Handeyside said. "These concerns and the need for transparency are all the more acute because of TSA's track record of using unreliable and unscientific techniques to screen and monitor travelers who have done nothing wrong." Air marshals also tell the Globe and CNN that they fear the program may be unconstitutional and is certainly a potentially dangerous waste of money and human resources. Peter Weber ||||| Archaeologists open granite tomb but are dismayed at state of decay after ‘sewage leak’

 Egyptian archeologists have opened a 30-tonne black granite sarcophagus to find three decomposed mummies after sewage water apparently leaked inside.

 “The sarcophagus has been opened, but we have not been hit by a curse,” said Mostafa Waziry, the head of Egypt’s Supreme Council for Antiquities, in response to news reports warning of maledictions hidden inside the tomb in the port city of Alexandria.

 Waziry, accompanied by a team of specialists in mummification and restoration, instead found three mummies and a red liquid he identified as sewage water, believed to have entered the sarcophagus through a crack on its right side, causing the decomposition of the mummies.

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Tomb after the lid was removed. Photograph: Mohamed Abd El Ghany/Reuters

 The tomb was found buried five metres beneath the surface and the help of Egyptian military engineers was required to open the 15-tonne lid. After capturing the world’s attention because of its unusually large size, observers believed it could contain the remains of a prominent figure, with some considering the possibility that it could contain the corpse of Alexander the Great.

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest The alabaster head. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

 The sarcophagus, almost three metres across and two metres high, is believed to date from the early Ptolemaic period, which began following the death of Alexander in 323BC.

 It was found during construction work in Egypt’s northernmost city, accompanied by a weathered alabaster head thought to depict one of the occupants of the tomb. Archeologists were excited because a layer of mortar beneath the lid suggested it had remained untouched since it was buried thousands of years ago.

 The skulls of the three mummies found inside will now be analysed in order to identify their ages and cause of death.

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest Skulls of the three decomposed mummies. Photograph: EPA

 Shaaban Abdel Amonem, one of the specialists in mummification who attended the opening, said initial assessments showed the trio were probably soldiers, with one of the skulls displaying evidence of arrow blows.

 Waziri said the lack of death masks in precious metals, amulets, statuettes or inscriptions on the sarcophagus meant the bodies were unlikely to be those of Ptolemaic or Roman royals.

 Video footage from the news website Youm7 showed a man pouring the red liquid into the street, after samples were taken to be analysed. ||||| Image copyright EPA Image caption Experts wore face masks to open the sarcophagus, which released a terrible smell

 Three weeks ago, archaeologists in Egypt found a massive black granite sarcophagus in Alexandria, untouched for 2,000 years - and fleet-footed rumour quickly got to work.

 Could it contain the remains of ancient Greek leader Alexander the Great, or (less appealingly) a deadly curse?

 According to experts who have now unsealed it, it's a no to both.

 Instead, it revealed three skeletons and red-brown sewage water, which gave off an unbearable stench.

 Egypt's Ministry of Antiquities had appointed a committee of archaeologists to open the relic, which was unearthed at a construction site.

 According to Egyptian news outlet El-Watan, they initially lifted the lid of the tomb by just 5cm (2 inches) before the pungent smell forced them from the inspection scene entirely. They later prised it open with help from Egyptian military engineers.

 "We found the bones of three people, in what looks like a family burial... Unfortunately the mummies inside were not in the best condition and only the bones remain," said Mostafa Waziri, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities.

 Image copyright AFP/Getty Images Image caption The tomb was found to contain three skeletons, believed to be those of ancient Egyptian army officers

 Addressing media fears that disturbing the tomb could trigger an implacable Pharaoh's curse, Mr Waziri declared: "We've opened it and, thank God, the world has not fallen into darkness.

 "I was the first to put my whole head inside the sarcophagus... and here I stand before you ... I am fine."

 Despite that, the site has now been cleared of people amid fears the sarcophagus could release lethal toxic fumes, Egypt's state-owned newspaper Al-Ahram says.

 Are mummies' tombs dangerous?

 Scientists have debunked the infamous "Mummy's Curse", but are there other threats in ancient tombs?

 Lord Carnarvon, financial backer of the excavation of Tutankhamun's burial site, died from an infected mosquito bite shortly after they opened the chamber in 1923.

 Since then, rumours have swirled that mould or bacteria survived in the sealed area and caused or contributed to his fate.

 But F DeWolfe Miller, professor of epidemiology at the University of Hawaii, told National Geographic that there's no real danger.

 "We don't know of even a single case of either an archaeologist or a tourist experiencing any negative consequences [from bacteria or tomb moulds]," he told the magazine.

 Experts have said the three individuals in the Alexandria sarcophagus may have been soldiers in the time of the Pharaohs.

 The skull of one is said to show cracks which point to an arrow injury.

 An alabaster bust, its features weathered beyond recognition, was also found with the tomb.

 Image copyright Reuters Image caption The huge sarcophagus weighs almost 30 tonnes

 The structure is almost two metres (6.5ft) high and three metres long, and is the largest of its kind ever found intact.

 It weighs in at 27 tonnes (59,500lb), and is believed to date from the early Ptolemaic period, which began in 323 BC after the death of Alexander the Great.

 Archaeologists will now study the sarcophagus in depth to pinpoint when its occupants lived, and how they died. |||||

– "The sarcophagus has been opened, but we have not been hit by a curse," declared the head of Egypt’s Supreme Council for Antiquities after opening a huge black sarcophagus that had been untouched for 2,000 years. Those prone to queasiness might have disagreed. Sewage water had leaked into the Alexandria sarcophagus over the centuries through a crack, meaning that instead of well-preserved mummies, antiquities head Mostafa Waziry and his team found three skeletons, a vile red liquid, and a terrible smell when they opened the sarcophagus, the Guardian reports. The discovery of the massive sarcophagus two weeks ago sparked rumors that the tomb of Alexander the Great could have been found, but archaeologists believe the three bodies were those of soldiers, judging by the lack of elaborate death masks and the arrow wound in one of the skulls, the Week reports. Waziry spoke to the media to dispel rumors that the sarcophagus was cursed, the BBC reports. "We've opened it and, thank God, the world has not fallen into darkness," he said. "I was the first to put my whole head inside the sarcophagus... and here I stand before you ... I am fine." (A less fragrant find was recently made at an ancient necropolis south of Cairo.)


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Ko Young-tae's office, located in the building on the right, is next to Choi Soon-sil's residence in the other building. Both buildings are owned by Choi. Ko is suspected of managing The Blue K and Wide Sports. Ko underwent 40 hours of questioning by prosecutors until Saturday as he had voluntarily appeared at the prosecution's office late Thursday after entering the country earlier that day. No details have been released yet. / Korea Times photo by Bae Woo-han

 By Chung Hyun-chae

 Ko Young-tae

 The investigation by the prosecution on the influence-peddling scandal surrounding Choi Soon-sil, President Park Geun-hye's confidant, shed light on Choi's clandestine relationship with a host bar worker.

 Ko Young-tae, 40, had voluntarily turned up at the prosecutor's office for questioning late Thursday after entering the country earlier in the day. After a 40-hour prosecutorial investigation over how confidential documents including the President's speeches reached Choi, he returned home around noon Saturday but was summoned again Sunday.

 No details about the interrogation are available.

 Ko is suspected of managing The Blue K and Widec Sports _ paper companies Choi set up in Korea and Germany allegedly to funnel money away from the Mir and K-Sports foundations.

 Little is known about Ko.

 He is a former member of the national saber team, winning a gold medal at the 1998 Asian Games in Bangkok.

 Being through with sports, Ko worked at well-known host bars in Gangnam, southern Seoul, according to reports and witnesses. A host bar is an establishment where female customers are served by male hosts who engage in conversation as well as sometimes barter for sexual services. The two are believed to have met and become close at one such host bar, around 2006.

 "Ko made a lot of money with his good looks," said an anonymous man who introduced himself as Ko's coworker at the bar during Kim Hyun-jung's "NEWS SHOW" on Christian Broadcasting Service (CBS) Radio, Friday.

 "I assume that Choi was one of Ko's close customers as they are on friendly terms with each other despite the 20-year age gap between them," he said. Choi is 60 years old, and the friendly terms despite a two-decade age difference can indicate an intimate relationship, according to reports.

 According to the coworker, Ko was working as a sales director, tasked to bring in rich middle-aged women to the bar using the alias Min-woo.

 Having a foot in the fashion industry in 2008 with Choi's assistance, Ko launched his accessory brand Villomillo. It became famous after President Park carried his bag in 2013. With the instant success, his products drew a lot of celebrity customers and he established a wide range of contacts.

 Cha Eun-taek, another embattled man in charge of Mir Foundation, was Ko's acquaintance, and Ko introduced Cha to Choi, which marked the turning point of their relationship from good to sour, according to news reports.

 "Choi's favorite thing to do is to edit presidential speeches," Ko said during an interview with broadcaster JTBC in the middle of this month.

 That comment prompted the cable news channel to look for the President's speeches in computer files. The JTBC finally found the files and that turned out to be one of the biggest breaking stories in recent years.

 This backfired on Choi when she said the tablet computer's owner is Ko, not her.

 "I do not even know how to use a tablet PC," Choi said during an interview with the Segye Ilbo on Wednesday in Germany. ||||| Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Mr Ko has denied he had an affair with presidential confidante Choi Soon-sil

 The political scandal engulfing South Korea has culminated in Park Geun-hye's impeachment but according to one account, it all started with an argument over a puppy. The BBC's Tessa Wong unravels an outlandish series of events.

 With his good looks and athletic build worthy of any South Korean pop star, Ko Young-tae has been the object of public fascination for months.

 The former national fencer is closely linked to Choi Soon-sil, 60, the presidential confidante who now faces corruption charges.

 Rumours about Mr Ko, 40, have saturated local media, which even labelled him Ms Choi's "toy boy".

 But this week in front of a parliamentary committee he denied they were a couple.

 Then, he proceeded to tell the extraordinary tale of how an argument prompted him to go to the press with revelations that would ultimately lead to the president's impeachment.

 Read more: What is South Korea's presidential scandal?

 Read more: The friendship behind the presidential crisis

 Dressing the president

 According to Mr Ko it all began in 2012, shortly after Ms Park was elected president.

 Mr Ko, an Asian Games gold medallist, had long retired from fencing. His day job at that time was running a handbag and clothing company called Villomillo.

 One day a friend asked him to show some of Villomillo's latest products to a mysterious buyer.

 Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Mr Ko has been the object of public fascination since the scandal blew up

 "My friend asked me to bring some new items (to a designated place), so I did. That's when I saw Choi for the first time," Mr Ko recounted at a public hearing this week.

 Ms Choi liked what she saw, and he began supplying her with items which would end up in Ms Park's wardrobe.

 He gave around 40 luxury handbags made of ostrich skin and crocodile leather, and 100 bespoke pieces of clothing to the president.

 They cost tens of thousands of dollars, and Ms Choi paid for all of them out of her own pocket, according to Mr Ko.

 Image copyright AFP/Getty Images Image caption Ms Choi is accused of influence-peddling

 He strongly denied that he and Ms Choi became a couple - they were just friends, he said.

 But he did not deny that she trusted him enough to give him appointments in two Germany-based companies which she owned.

 As Ms Park's unofficial clothier Mr Ko also began to enjoy fame and success, especially after Ms Park was spotted toting a Villomillo bag in 2013, according to local media reports.

 The brand drew celebrity customers and Mr Ko became a member of the local entertainment scene, even joining a celebrity baseball team called Play Boys.

 'Puppygate'

 In perhaps some of the most extraordinary testimony heard in South Korea's parliamentary chamber, Mr Ko described how trouble was brewing between him and Ms Choi.

 In 2014, the businesswoman asked him to take care of her daughter's puppy. Mr Ko brought the dog to his house, then left it there as he went out to play a round of golf.

 When he returned, he found Ms Choi in his home, furious with him for abandoning the puppy. The two had a "huge fight", he said.

 From then on their relationship went downhill. "She treated me like a slave, swearing at me many times," he said in his candid account.

 Angry and hurt, Mr Ko decided to exact revenge by going to the press about Ms Choi and Ms Park's relationship.

 Image copyright AP Image caption The scandal is centred on the close relationship between Ms Park and Ms Choi

 Over the months he collected evidence of Ms Choi's power over Ms Park's administration, including CCTV footage of Ms Choi treating presidential aides as her personal servants. He eventually turned them over to a local broadcaster.

 Then, in October, he did a TV interview where he alleged Ms Choi's "favourite thing" was to edit Ms Park's presidential speeches.

 Reporters went digging for evidence to back it up, and obtained a tablet containing selfies of Ms Choi and files of presidential speeches.

 The discovery, along with other revelations of Ms Choi's allegedly suspicious business dealings, sparked public outrage and launched a wide-reaching corruption inquiry that has ensnared even corporate bigwigs and celebrities.

 Ms Park later admitted she gave Ms Choi inappropriate government access - including to her speeches - and apologised. But she has denied the allegations of corruption that prosecutors have laid down.

 Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Parliamentarians have voted to impeach Ms Park

 The president has now been impeached, while in another twist Mr Ko is seen as a public hero, hailed by netizens for his "whistleblowing".

 One lawmaker during the public hearing even praised him for "opening Pandora's box".

 Asked in parliament if he feared opposing Ms Choi, the woman who had the president's ear, Mr Ko said "No".

 "I was hot-tempered and never thought about that part," he declared. "I have no regrets." ||||| Photo

 SEOUL, South Korea — Did a fight over a puppy lead to the vote to impeach South Korea’s leader? A whistle-blower whose account has riveted South Koreans says it did.

 The corruption scandal that engulfed the president, Park Geun-hye, was rooted in her friendship with Choi Soon-sil, her secretive adviser and friend for 40 years. Ms. Choi has been indicted on charges of extorting tens of millions of dollars from big businesses, and prosecutors have identified Ms. Park as a criminal accomplice, a first for a South Korean president.

 Ko Young-tae, the whistle-blower, said at a parliamentary hearing this week that he got into an argument with Ms. Choi over walking her daughter’s puppy one day in 2014. He said Ms. Choi became upset when she found the dog alone at his home.

 “I didn’t get her call because I was out golfing,” he said. “She was angry that I left the dog alone, and we had a fight.”

 Mr. Ko, 40, a former Asian Games gold medal fencer, said afterward he decided to expose Ms. Choi’s ties with Ms. Park to local news media.

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 Mr. Ko had apparently videotaped Ms. Choi in 2014 giving orders to two presidential aides as though they were servants. In one scene that went viral, one of the aides wiped his smartphone on his shirt before handing it reverentially to Ms. Choi. The footage, aired in October on TV Chosun, left little doubt about Ms. Choi’s influence over Ms. Park.

 Mr. Ko also was said to have an advance copy of Ms. Park’s itinerary for an overseas trip that Ms. Choi had received; it showed that the president had worn certain colors on certain days based on Ms. Choi’s recommendations.

 Mr. Ko has become a hero to many in South Korea. “You opened Pandora’s box,” Sohn Hye-won, an opposition lawmaker, said during the hearing.

 Photo

 Even before he gave his account, Mr. Ko had emerged as an intriguing figure in Ms. Park’s corruption scandal, which has involved as many plot twists as the best of Korean soap operas. Local media said he was a former employee at a Seoul “host bar,” where male prostitutes cater to female clients, before he befriended Ms. Choi, 60.

 In his testimony, Mr. Ko denied that he and Ms. Choi had been a couple.

 He said a friend introduced him to Ms. Choi in 2012, when he was running a handbag and clothing company called Villomillo. Ms. Choi ordered 100 pieces of clothes and 40 handbags made of ostrich skin and crocodile leather. The items were delivered to Ms. Park, who was later seen toting Villomillo handbags.

 (Ms. Park’s office said she paid for the items, denying opposition lawmakers’ allegations that they were bribes from Ms. Choi.)

 Mr. Ko said he handed over his video footage to TV Chosun last year, but it was not broadcast until Oct. 25.

 A day earlier, on Oct. 24, the rival cable channel JTBC broadcast what was considered the biggest media scoop connected to the scandal. One of its reporters obtained a discarded tablet computer that it said had belonged to Ms. Choi.

 Advertisement Continue reading the main story

 Files discovered there included drafts of 44 speeches and statements that Ms. Park had given between 2012 and 2014, as a candidate and later as president. Many passages were marked in red.

 “The only thing Ms. Choi did well was to edit President Park’s speeches,” Mr. Ko told JTBC in October. (Ms. Park has since acknowledged that she asked for Ms. Choi’s feedback on her speech drafts.)

 South Koreans were outraged that Ms. Park let Ms. Choi, who had no experience in government, edit some of her most important speeches. The allegation was particularly damning because Ms. Park was known for shunning one-on-one meetings with her own official aides.

 Mr. Ko said Ms. Choi’s behavior made him believe she was the most powerful person in Ms. Park’s government.

 “She insulted me and acted as if her underlings were subhuman,” Mr. Ko said. |||||

– The impeachment of South Korean President Park Geun-hye, and the scandal surrounding it, all comes down to a canine. Park's downfall started over ties with Choi Soon-sil, a close friend for decades embroiled in criminal controversies and secretly advising Park—and who got into an argument with the eventual whistleblower over her daughter's pup, the New York Times reports. Ko Young-tae relayed his story at a parliamentary hearing last week, noting he and Choi got into a tiff after she discovered the dog, which he'd been asked to walk, alone in his apartment while he was out golfing. He says that after they exchanged words, he decided to come forward with what he knew about Choi and Park. Ko, 40, an ex-member of the nation's fencing team and called Choi's "boy toy," had worked at a Seoul "host bar," where male workers entertain female customers with conversation and sexual services. The Korea Times says he reportedly met Choi at one of those bars in 2006, though he testified last week he'd been introduced to her by a pal in 2012 (and he denied at last week's hearing they were ever a couple, per the BBC). Regardless of how they met or their official status, their relationship allowed him to reportedly get his hands on Park's clothing choices for a trip overseas, as well as videotape of Choi ordering two presidential aides around; he turned that footage over to a Korean cable network, which aired it in October. "She insulted me and acted as if her underlings were subhuman," he said in his testimony, adding that after the dog fight, she "treated me like a slave, swearing at me many times," per the BBC. Some of his compatriots say Ko is a national hero for his revelations. "You opened Pandora's box," one lawmaker said during the hearing.


Here is a news article: Published on Aug 11, 2016

 Help end this abuse: http://cok.net/tyson. A Compassion Over Killing investigator worked inside several Tyson facilities in Virginia. This footage offers a shocking, never-before-seen look behind the closed doors of chicken breeding factory farms, known as “broiler breeder” farms. ||||| This video from Compassion Over Killing alleges mistreatment of chickens at a Tyson's chicken (Compassion Over Killing)

 This video from Compassion Over Killing alleges mistreatment of chickens at a Tyson's chicken (Compassion Over Killing)

 An animal rights group has released graphic video that appears to show the mistreatment of chickens by Tyson Foods employees in Virginia, leading to at least two Animal Control investigations.

 Compassion Over Killing, a Washington-based animal-advocacy organization, said the video was taken by an undercover investigator for the group in May and June at four facilities where Tyson employees process chickens. The video depicts Tyson employees throwing, punching and kicking chickens as well as sticking plastic rods through their beaks in a process known as “boning.”

 Workers also wrung birds’ necks, ran over them with forklifts and left injured birds in “dead piles,” as the video’s narrator put it, to die.

 One worker, discussing standing on a chicken’s head and letting it suffocate, mentioned that the behavior would look bad if caught on tape.

 “You can’t let nobody see you do that,” the man said, describing the act as “inhumane.” “A stranger . . . you don’t know if he’s working for the Animal Rights.”

 Compassion Over Killing, which says it “focuses on cruelty to animals in agriculture and promotes vegetarian eating,” has undertaken undercover investigations before. On Wednesday, it condemned the workers’ behavior.

 [“That one was definitely alive”: An undercover video at one of the nation’s biggest pork processors]

 “This level of violence and abuse is so egregious, it violates Virginia state animal protection laws,” Erica Meier, the organization’s executive director, said in a statement. “The company should be held accountable — and consumers deserve to know the truth about the horrors inflicted upon these animals.” She added: “Tyson, the titan of this industry, is literally crushing the life out of birds.”

 In a statement, Tyson, the largest chicken-processing company in the United States, called the behavior “inexcusable” and said that it fired 10 people who were members of the crew depicted in the video.

 The company also said it discontinued the process of “boning” — which it described as “a historical way the industry has used to keep males from eating food intended for females” — at two of the facilities in the video after its release. The process had already been ended at its other facilities in the United States, the company said.

 “I’m disgusted and outraged by what’s shown in this video,” Christine Daugherty, vice president of sustainable food production for Tyson Foods, said in a statement. “We do not tolerate animal abuse. . . . The people shown in the video by Compassion Over Killing were all trained in proper animal handling, yet chose to ignore it and failed to alert management about the despicable treatment on these farms.”

 Daugherty added: “Animals in our care deserve to be treated humanely.”

 Two of the facilities shown in the video are in Virginia’s Mecklenburg County, one is in Buckingham County and one is in Lunenburg County. Animal Control officials in Mecklenburg and Buckingham counties confirmed that they were investigating the allegations but said they couldn’t comment further. An Animal Control official in Lunenburg County did not return a request for comment.

 The Compassion Over Killing employee, who filmed the video while working undercover at Tyson, said the company’s processing facilities are part of a system that desensitizes people to suffering.

 “They are not building a system to ensure animal welfare is a top priority. Or employee welfare,” said the worker, who asked to remain anonymous.

 News of the mistreatment comes weeks after Perdue, the nation’s third-largest chicken producer, announced plans to kill chickens using carbon dioxide or argon gas — a method some hailed as more humane.

 [This could be the start to a whole new world of chicken]

 Compassion Over Killing questioned whether there is any way to humanely kill and eat animals.

 “The best way we can protect chickens and all animals is simply to leave them off our plates,” the video’s narrator says. ||||| CLOSE Animal advocacy group Compassion Over Killing presents an undercover investigation into cruelty at Tyson Foods chicken farms. Video courtesy of Compassion Over Killing

 In this Jan. 29, 2006, file photo, a car passes in front of a Tyson Foods Inc., sign at Tyson headquarters in Springdale, Ark. (Photo: APRIL L BROWN, AP)

 In the face of new allegations of ghastly animal abuse by its employees, Tyson Foods says it's retraining all of its live poultry workers on the company's animal welfare policies.

 The move by one of the world's largest meat producers came as the animal rights group Compassion Over Killing released secretly-recorded footage on Thursday that shows Tyson workers stomping, kicking and suffocating breeder chickens at facilities in three Virginia counties. Tyson says it has fired ten workers who can be seen in the video, and a senior company executive, Christine Daugherty, described the employees' actions as "disgusting."

 “The people shown in the video by Compassion Over Killing were all trained in proper animal handling, yet chose to ignore it and failed to alert management about the despicable treatment on these farms,” said Daugherty, vice president of sustainable food production for Tyson Foods. “Animals in our care deserve to be treated humanely. It’s our responsibility to ensure that everyone who works for our company behaves properly. Our management team is dedicated to continue fostering a culture of proper animal handling.”

 The latest video marks at least the fifth time in roughly 13 months that advocates for various animal rights groups have been able to infiltrate Tyson-connected facilities and secretly record footage of workers abusing chickens and cramped living conditions for chickens before they are slaughtered. The activists typically apply for work at the facilities and are able to surreptitiously record the footage.

 In the video released Thursday, a Tyson worker is caught on tape warning the undercover investigator that "you can't let nobody see you do that" as he stepped on a chicken's head, suffocating it.

 "You don't know if he's working for the animal rights," the worker says. "It is inhumane standing on his head and let them suffocate. They'll take you to court for that."

 The footage also shows workers punching, kicking and roughly tossing birds.

 In the past, the company has responded to the abuse seen in such videos as inexcusable, while stressing that the abusers were not reflective of Tyson’s institutional commitment to animal welfare.

 But with the latest video, Tyson said in a statement, “we believe we haven’t gone far enough and must do more to stop this inexcusable behavior.” The company, which made more than $10 billion in poultry sales last year, says it is now evaluating further steps it can take to ensure animal well-being procedures are being followed throughout its operations.

 The new video has also spurred Tyson to discontinue the practice of inserting plastic tubes in rooster's beaks, something known as beak modification, that helps chicken growers prevent males from eating females' feed.

 Compassion Over Killing, which is headquartered in Washington, D.C., said it recently made formal complaints about the abuse to prosecutors and animal control officers in Mecklenburg, Lunenburg and Buckingham counties. No charges had been filed as of Wednesday.

 "We believe that Tyson as a company needs to be held accountable," Erica Meier, the group’s executive director, told USA TODAY. “This is too common of a problem being documented for Tyson's to be pushing this aside as a few rogue workers or bad apples. This is a systemic problem.”

 Worth Sparkman, a Tyson spokesman, said the company has also been in touch with local authorities about the video, but declined to say whether the company wants to see the employees charged.

 He said that the retraining will impact hundreds of Tyson’s employees working in live chicken production.

 Tyson said in a statement that it has begun meeting with every employee in its chicken operations that handles live birds “to aggressively re-emphasize the importance of proper animal handling and the consequences of not complying with the company’s animal welfare policies.”

 The company also said it conducted a video conference on Thursday in which Tyson's senior management will discuss handling of live birds with managers at the company’s facilities.

 "We take animal well-being very seriously, and we are going to get to the bottom of this," Daugherty said.

 Follow USA TODAY Chicago correspondent Aamer Madhani on Twitter: @AamerISmad

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A summary of this is?

– Chicken giant Tyson Foods says it will retrain all of its workers who deal with live birds after an animal rights group released hidden footage from within its facilities on Wednesday, USA Today reports. According to the Washington Post, the video from Compassion Over Killing shows workers choking, punching, and kicking chickens, plus running them over with forklifts and leaving them in piles to die. One worker in the video says it's "inhumane" to kill a chicken by stepping on its head while he kills a chicken by stepping on its head. Tyson calls the behavior "inexcusable" and says it fired 10 employees at the Virginia facilities shown in the video. Animal rights activists have infiltrated Tyson Foods to film such videos at least five times in a little over a year.


Skip in Skip x Embed x Share Nice pocket protector. Here's what Anna Kendrick and Ben Affleck learned from playing gawky accountants who have trouble communicating in 'The Accountant.' USA TODAY

 Ben Affleck in 'The Accountant.' (Photo: Chuck Zlotnick)

 The Accountant proves one thing about Ben Affleck: He's a hot asset in Hollywood.

 Affleck star-powered his action role as a genius bookkeeper with a particular set of killing skills to $24.7 million and No. 1 at the weekend box office, according to studio estimates.

 Director Gavin O'Connor's moderately budgeted film ($44 million) didn't have gaudy opening numbers, but it was a clear win.

 "The marketing for this movie showed it to be a smart action movie with Ben Affleck," says Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst for comScore. "That combination worked for audiences this weekend."

 The Accountant did take some deductions for negative reviews; just 51% of critics liked it on review aggregate site RottenTomatoes.com. But audiences gave it an A grade at CinemaScore. "And it's the audience paying the bills," Dergarabedian says.

 Ben Affleck in 'The Accountant' (Photo: Chuck Zlotnick)

 Kevin Hart's live comedy concert film Kevin Hart: What Now? made $11.98 million for the weekend and finished second.

 "It doesn't matter what the rank, Kevin Hart is a profit machine," Dergarabedian says. "Hart is the rare movie star working today that can open a scripted comedy and fill a theater with stand-up comedy."

 The opening weekend beat 2013 predecessor Kevin Hart: Let Me Explain, which opened with $10 million and went on to make $32 million.

 What Now? has already covered its sparse production budget of $10 million. It received a 78% positive critical rating on Rotten Tomatoes and an A-minus from audiences at CinemaScore.

 Thriller The Girl on the Train, starring Emily Blunt in the title role, took third with $11.97 million ($46.6 million total in two weeks). Tim Burton's Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children landed in fourth with $8.9 million in its third weekend ($65.8 million total).

 The wheels of 'The Girl on the Train' are set into motion when Rachel witnesses a shocking act on her daily commute. (Photo: Universal Pictures)

 Mark Wahlberg's disaster drama Deepwater Horizon rounded out the top five with $6.4 million ($49.3 million in three weeks).

 Max Steel, the weekend's other major release, disappeared with $2.2 million. The toy-based sci-fi adventure, featuring a teen named Max and his alien companion Steel, couldn't crack the top 10, landing at No. 11.

 "Minimum effort, maximum misfire," says Jeff Bock, senior box office analyst for Exhibitor Relations. "They didn’t even try to promote this film — I'm surprised they even released it."

 Without early screenings for critics, Max Steel had a 0% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes (based on eight reviews) and received a B from audiences at CinemaScore.

 The Birth of a Nation dropped a startling 61% in its second weekend, landing in 10th place with $2.7 million (for $12.2 million total).

 Bock says the lackluster performance will hurt the chances of the Oscar hopeful, written/directed by and starring Nate Parker.

 "That's a horror-show box office drop," Bock says. "This movie isn't going anywhere."

 Final numbers are expected Monday.

 Nat Turner (Nate Parker, center) leads a slave revolt in 'The Birth of a Nation.' (Photo: Jahi Chikwendiu)

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Write a summary.

– Ben Affleck is still a box office draw outside of the bat suit. His new thriller The Accountant opened to a chart-topping $24.7 million this weekend, reports the AP, according to studio estimates Sunday. Gavin O'Connor directed the R-rated thriller, starring Affleck as an autistic mathematician. Audiences were 58% male and gave the film an "A'' CinemaScore. "The marketing for this movie showed it to be a smart action movie with Ben Affleck," a comScore analyst tells USA Today. "That combination worked for audiences this weekend." The comedy concert film Kevin Hart: What Now? debuted in second place with $11.98 million, marking a minuscule edge over last week's champ The Girl on the Train, which netted $11.975 million. The films could easily switch places when final numbers come in on Monday. Holdovers Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children and Deepwater Horizon rounded out the top five. The weekend's other new opener, the Mattel-inspired Max Steel, bombed with only $2.2 million.


Article:

This collection contains web crawls performed as the pre-inauguration crawl for part of the End of Term Web Archive, a collaborative project that aims to preserve the U.S. federal government web presence at each change of administration. Content includes publicly-accessible government websites hosted on .gov, .mil, and relevant non-.gov domains, as well as government social media materials. The web archiving was performed in the Fall and Winter of 2016 to capture websites prior to the January 20, 2017 inauguration. For more information, see http://eotarchive.cdlib.org/. ||||| Mary Knowlton arrived at the Punta Gorda, Fla., police station Tuesday night to learn how to be a community steward.

 The 73-year-old was there as a student in the citizens police academy, a two-hour course intended to give an intimate look at what makes the department in the quaint Florida town work. On this night, the group of 35 would tour the station and talk with officers, an essential part of academy curriculum that has gained popularity across the country amid a heated national debate about police violence.

 When it came time to get involved, Knowlton volunteered.

 The hosting officers chose two students to role-play a lethal force simulation, a scenario intended to demonstrate how and when officers decide to pull the trigger. Knowlton played the victim, Charlotte Sun photographer Sue Paquin told the newspaper, and a Punta Gorda police officer played a “bad guy.” These scenarios are usually safe, acted out with either fake or empty weapons.

 But when the officer’s gun was fired, Knowlton — a mother, wife and career librarian — was hit with a live round.

 She was rushed to a local hospital and was pronounced dead.

 Her husband of 55 years witnessed the shooting and is “devastated,” her son, Steve Knowlton, told the Associated Press.

 The tragedy has rocked the historic waterfront town on Florida’s west coast, home to 17,500 people and a popular destination for retirees. Punta Gorda Police Chief Tom Lewis called the shooting a “horrible accident” and said that everyone involved was in a “state of overwhelming shock and grief.”

 “Our entire police department and all of our city leaders are absolutely devastated for everyone involved in this unimaginable event,” the chief said Tuesday night. “I am asking that if you pray, you pray for Mary’s husband and family and for all of the officers and witnesses involved in this incident.”

 At a news conference Wednesday afternoon, Lewis shared few details about how the tragedy unfolded but said his department was unaware that live ammunition “was available to the officer” during the class.

 Lewis has asked the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to conduct an independent investigation which, the chief said, will determine how the ammunition ended up in the handgun without anyone noticing.

 That same weapon has been used in previous simulation classes, which the department holds annually, Lewis said.

 The morning after Knowlton’s death, city leaders issued a brief statement calling her a beloved member of the Punta Gorda community.

 “We are shocked by this horrific accident and are grieving deeply over Mary’s passing,” the statement said. “We also would like to acknowledge the impact this had on the other participants who were present during this tragedy.”

 City officials are providing grief counseling to anyone who may need it.

 Knowlton’s Facebook page says she worked at the public library in Scott County, Minn., where she was from. Jake Grussing, the library director, said Knowlton worked there in the 1980s and was an active community member, serving on the library board from 1993 to 2001.

 “She was a vibrant, outgoing person who was really dedicated not only to libraries, but also to serving the community,” Grussing told The Washington Post.

 Knowlton and her husband moved south to Florida, where she continued her librarian work and served on the Friends of the Punta Gorda Library board of directors.

 73yo Mary Knowlton was accidentally shot and killed by PGPD officer during citizen police academy, police say pic.twitter.com/xRmTnwniJ1 — Corey Lazar (@CoreyLazarWINK) August 10, 2016

 Authorities have not yet said where Knowlton was shot. And they have not released the name of the officer, who has been placed on administrative leave.

 Lewis said Wednesday that the officer is with friends and family.

 “I forgive him,” Steve Knowlton told the AP of the officer who killed his mother.

 He added: “There’s too much hate in this world, in America. We always feel like we need revenge and it doesn’t solve anything.”

 Photos posted online late Tuesday night showed the police station surrounded by yellow tape and illuminated by red and blue lights. Inside, FDLE officers questioned citizen academy students and other witnesses to the shooting, according to CBS affiliate WINK.

 The citizen police academy was organized by the chamber of commerce, police said, but the program mirrors the one presented as part of the city’s Citizens Academy, a free, eight-week class intended to give an “up-close and personal look” at Punta Gorda government, according to the city website.

 That program includes class work, on-site visits and facility tours and is meant to “develop future leaders through well informed and civically engaged residents,” according to the website.

 Photos on the Punta Gorda Police Department Facebook page posted in March show academy participants engaged in simulations similar to the one that police described was taking place Tuesday night. Civilians are taught how to aim and holster what appears to be a fake gun or a stun gun. They climb in and out of police cruisers and ride on department Segways.

 In a series of photos, two people dressed in dark protective gear and helmets appear to be simulating a physical fight. Another participant approaches the scene, gun in hand, to mitigate the situation. Here, the gun does not appear to be real. Nobody is shot.

 Citizens police academies have proved to be a successful tool for law enforcement agencies hoping to improve relations between officers and the community. The first known citizens academy held in the United States was established in Orlando in 1985, according to a report from the Criminal Justice Institute. In 2000, the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that 15 percent of police departments surveyed conducted citizen academies at the time. Seven years later, that figure had not changed.

 Last year, the International Association for Chiefs of Police listed citizens police academies as an integral way to improve community relations, and establishing these courses was also named as an action item in the final report from the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing.

 There is even a National Citizens Police Academy Association, which explains the importance of the courses on its website.

 “The Citizens and Police Officers meet each other face to face in a neutral, friendly setting and each becomes a person to the other,” according to the website. “In the past, citizens have simply seen a uniform, now they have an understanding about the person behind the badge.”

 And like the one in Punta Gorda, many citizens police academies across the country teach a curriculum that includes addressing use of lethal force by police.

 As citizens heard of the fatal shooting Tuesday night, they took to the comment sections of news articles online, expressing grief — and shock.

 “So sad.”

 “So horrible.”

 “How the hell did this happen?”

 A previous version of this story misidentified Jake Grussing. This post has been updated.

 More from Morning Mix:

 Nine people fatally shot in Chicago, marking city’s deadliest day in more than a decade. 10 more wounded. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. |||||
What is a summary?

– In what's being described as a "horrible accident" by Punta Gorda Police Chief Tom Lewis, a 73-year-old Florida woman was mistakenly shot dead while participating in a citizen police academy designed to better relations between officers and the community they serve. The "shoot or don't shoot" role-playing session was part of Punta Gorda's eight-week academy—a "series of interactive sessions designed to provide insight into city government and to develop ... civically engaged residents." Mary Knowlton was one of 35 participants who was on Tuesday night touring the police station; she was chosen at random to play the victim to an officer's "bad guy" during a session about when officers decide to use lethal force, reports WBBH. The weapon used should have been fake or empty; instead, Knowlton was hit. The Washington Post reports by way of her Facebook page that Knowlton was a long-time librarian in Minnesota who had relocated to Punta Gorda, where she was part of the Friends of the Punta Gorda Library board of directors. The name of the officer who shot her has not been released, but he is on administrative leave pending an investigation. The Post reports that for three decades, citizen police academies have been offered throughout the US; per decade-old Justice Department stats, about 15% of surveyed police departments had such academies. Said Lewis of the "unimaginable event": "If you pray, please pray for Mary's family, and for the officers who were involved. Everyone involved in this accident is in a state of overwhelming shock and grief."


Write an article based on this summary:

– The Vatican is doubling down on its anti-gay marriage stance, which today had the unlikely result of a group of women ripping their shirts off as Pope Benedict gave his Sunday address, reports Reuters. Four members of the Ukrainian Femen group screamed "homophobes, shut up!" and shed their shirts to reveal slogans including "In Gay We Trust," but were quickly carted away by police. The Pope didn't appear to notice. "Today we are here to protest against homophobia," one of the women tells the AP. The women were responding to a Vatican editorial in response to a gay adoption case. It read: "The human is the masculine and the feminine ... the monogamous family is the ideal place to learn the meaning of human relations and is the environment where the best form of growth is possible."

VATICAN CITY The Vatican underlined its opposition to gay adoption on Sunday as same-sex marriage supporters staged a topless protest in front of the pope in St. Peter's Square.

 The Vatican paper L'Osservatore Romano published a response to an Italian court's rejection of an appeal by a father who feared his son would not have a balanced upbringing if he lived with his mother and her female partner.

 The Court of Cassation ruled it was "mere prejudice" to assume that living with a homosexual couple could be detrimental for a child's development.

 While gay rights group Arcigay called it a "historic ruling" for Italy, where it is illegal for gay couples to adopt, Catholic leaders were quick to defend the traditional family unit.

 L'Osservatore Romano, the 151-year-old mouthpiece of the Holy See, ran an editorial that sought to play down the court ruling, saying that children often grow up in difficult circumstances without a mother or father.

 "But no one believes that these situations should be created just because in some cases they don't cause damage," wrote Adriano Pessina, director of bioethics at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart.

 "The human is the masculine and the feminine ... the monogamous family is the ideal place to learn the meaning of human relations and is the environment where the best form of growth is possible," he wrote.

 He reaffirmed the Vatican's view that no one has the "right" to children that he said gay couples who want to adopt are claiming.

 In Paris, hundreds of thousands of people protested against President Francois Hollande's planned legalization of same-sex marriage.

 The Vatican has become increasingly vocal against homosexual marriage in recent months. Pope Benedict strongly reaffirmed the Church's opposition to it in December, saying heterosexual marriage had an indispensable role in society.

 While the pope was giving his weekly address on Sunday, four women from the Ukrainian Femen group who were in the crowd, pulled off their T-shirts to reveal the slogan "In Gay we Trust" painted over their bodies.

 Screaming "Homophobes shut up" as the pope started his Angelus blessing, they provoked angry reactions from pilgrims in St. Peter's Square. One woman in the crowd started hitting the activists with an umbrella, calling them "diabolical".

 Italian police grabbed the protesters and pulled them away from the crowd.

 (Additional reporting by Carmelo Camilli; Editing by Robin Pomeroy) ||||| Four women have gone topless in St. Peter's Square to protest the Vatican's opposition to gay marriage.

 Pope Benedict XVI waves to the faithful during the Angelus noon prayer he celebrated from the window of his studio overlooking St. Peter's square at the Vatican, Sunday, Jan. 13, 2013. (AP Photo/Alessandra... (Associated Press)

 Pope Benedict XVI waves to the faithful during the Angelus noon prayer he celebrated from the window of his studio overlooking St. Peter's square at the Vatican, Sunday, Jan. 13, 2013. (AP Photo/Alessandra... (Associated Press)

 Police quickly took the women away Sunday, and the pope appeared not to have been disturbed as he delivered his traditional prayer from his studio window overlooking the piazza.

 On their bare backs, the women had painted slogans "In Gay We Trust," and "Shut Up." One of them, Inna Shevchenko, said: "Today we are here to protest against homophobia."

 The small demonstration coincided with a march in Paris that is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of people to protest the French president's plan to legalize gay marriage and let gay couples adopt children.

 French Catholic bishops and other religious leaders have strongly opposed the proposal, and the Vatican has backed them. |||||