Article:
Two police reports written the night that George Zimmerman shot Trayvon Martin said that Zimmerman had a bloody face and nose, according to police reports made public today.

 The reports also note that two witness accounts appear to back up Zimmerman's version of what happened when they describe a man on his back with another person wearing a hoodie straddling him and throwing punches.

 It has been such a contentious case that even the evidence is being disputed.

 The police report states that Trayvon Martin's father told an investigator after listening to 911 tapes that captured a man's voice frantically callling for help that it was not his son calling for help.

 But Tracy Martin, Trayvon's father, claims that is not true. The Martin family lawyer Ben Crump told ABC News that Tracy Martin initially listened to a distorted version of the 911 calls and said he could not identify the voice. But when he listened to a second tape that had been "cleaned," "He immediately broke down in tears because he knew it was his son calling for help," Crump said.

 The new information is part of a trove of documents released by the Florida State Attorney today in the case against Zimmerman, who is charged with second degree murder for the Feb. 26 killing of Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old African American male.

 Surveillance video of Martin in a store purchasing skittles right before the fatal incident was also released today.

 Zimmerman, 28, is a multi-racial Hispanic man who volunteered for the neighborhood watch committee who claimed that he shot Martin in self-defense after the 6-foot tall, 160 pound teenager knocked him to the ground, banged his head against the ground and went for Zimmerman's gun.

 The documents start with a criticism of Zimmerman's decision to follow the teenager, who Zimmerman said was looking suspicious.

 "The encounter between George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin was ultimately avoidable by Zimmerman, if Zimmerman had remained in his vehicle and awaited the arrival of law enforcement," an investigating officer wrote.

 Zimmerman claims he got out of his vehicle to find a house number to let police know where he saw the allegedly suspicious person, and while returning to his car was knocked down by a punch in the nose and attacked by Martin.

 Two police officers reported that when they arrived at the scene of the shooting, Zimmerman seemed to have a battered nose and bloodied face. One wrote that his "facial area was bloodied," and the back of his clothing was soiled with wet grass.

 "Zimmerman was also bleeding from the nose and the back of his head," Officer Ricardo Ayala wrote.

 Another officer wrote, "I saw that Zimmerman's face was bloodied and it appeared to me that his nose was broken."

 Witnesses, whose names were redacted from the report, also lent support to Zimmerman's version of what happened.

 "He witnesses a black male, wearing a dark colored 'hoodie' on top of a white or Hispanic male and throwing punches 'MMA (mixed martial arts) style,'" the police report of the witness said. "He then heard a pop. He stated that after hearing the pop, he observed the person he had previously observed on top of the other person (the male wearing the hoodie) laid out on the grass."

 A second witness described a person on the ground with another straddling him and throwing punches. The man on the bottom was yelling for help, the witness told police.

 The documents state that Zimmerman can be heard yelling for help 14 times on a 911 call recorded during the fight.

 Yet another witness described the confrontation in emotional terms.

 The witness heard "someone yelling, almost crying. Then I heard a gunshot." The witness wrote that he or she "saw a man on top of a guy laying on the ground. He was putting his hands on his neck or chest."

 The man asked the witness to call 911.

 "He stood up and took a couple steps away and put his hands on his head and then walked back over to the guy on the ground. He looked at him for a minute, then started to walk away toward the road. That is when the police walked up," the witness wrote.

 The lead investigator on the case, Officer Christopher Serino, wrote that Zimmerman could be heard "yelling for help as he was being battered by Trayvon Martin."

 Martin's death sparked public outrage after police released Zimmerman without any criminal charges for the killing. Zimmerman was later charged with second-degree murder, and the killing provoked widespread debate about racial profiling.

 The autopsy also shows that Zimmerman shot Martin from a distance of between 1 inch and 18 inches away, bolstering Zimmerman's claim that he shot Martin during a close struggle.

 Martin's autopsy report also revealed that there was a quarter-inch by half-inch abrasion on the left fourth finger of Martin, another indication of a possible struggle.

 The teen, who lived in Miami, was in Sanford while serving a suspension for an empty marijuana bag discovered in his possession. Martin had THC, the drug found in marijuana, in his blood on the night of his death, according to the autopsy. His family told ABC News that it was "trace amounts" of THC. ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| Story highlights Martin would be alive if Zimmerman stayed in his vehicle, police said

 Trayvon Martin was pronounced dead 3 minutes after firefighters and EMS arrived

 Evidence of THC, an ingredient in marijuana, was found in Martin's blood, tests show

 Firefighters find forehead "abrasions" and "bleeding" from Zimmerman's nose

 Just over two weeks after the fatal shooting, and less than a month before an arrest was made, police in Sanford, Florida, urged prosecutors to take George Zimmerman into custody after arguing his killing of Trayvon Martin was "ultimately avoidable."

 This disclosure came out Thursday, part of a wealth of information released that is related to the case, including the medical's examiner's finding that the 17-year-old Martin had traces of drugs in his system in an autopsy conducted hours after his death.

 Overall, the newly released material paints the most complete picture yet of how investigators built the case, as well as its complexity. The police perspective was most succinctly stated in a March 13 "capias request" -- a request that someone be taken into custody -- sent to the state's attorney. It speaks to the fact that Zimmerman ignored a police dispatcher's advice not to chase Martin, as well as his communications with Martin prior to the shooting.

 "The encounter between George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin was ultimately avoidable by Zimmerman, if Zimmerman had remained in his vehicle and awaited the arrival of law enforcement, or conversely if he had identified himself to Martin as a concerned citizen and initiated dialog (sic) in an effort to dispel each party's concern" the request said. "There is no indication that Trayvon Martin was involved in any criminal activity."

 In his 911 call just before the shooting, Zimmerman had speculated that the teen looked like he was "up to no good or he's on drugs or something."

 But Martin's defenders have portrayed Zimmerman as the aggressor, accusing him of profiling the African-American teen. Plus, one expert notes the traces of the marijuana-related substance found in the teen's system, as measured hours after his death, don't necessarily speak to any level of intoxication, while another adds that marijuana use typically doesn't make people prone to aggression.

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 Martin's blood contained THC, which is the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, according to autopsy results released Thursday. The autopsy was conducted February 27, the day after the teenager was shot dead.

 Toxicology tests found elements of the drug in the teenager's chest blood -- 1.5 nanograms per milliliter of one type (THC), as well as 7.3 nanograms of another type (THC-COOH) -- according to the medical examiner's report. There also was a presumed positive test of cannabinoids in Martin's urine, according to the medical examiner's report. It was not immediately clear how significant these amounts were.

 No precise levels on the urine were released.

 Dr. Michael Policastro, a toxicologist, cautioned against reading too much into the blood THC levels, adding that one cannot make a direct correlation between those findings and a level of intoxication.

 He also noted levels of THC, which can linger in a person's system for days, can spike after death in certain areas of the body because of redistribution.

 And Dr. Drew Pinsky, an addiction specialist who hosts a show on CNN's sister network HLN, added that marijuana typically does not make users more aggressive.

 Concentrations of THC routinely rise to 100 to 200 ng/ml after marijuana use, though it typically falls to below 5 ng/ml within three hours of it being smoked, according to information on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's website.

 While some states have zero-tolerance policies for any drug traces for driving while impaired, others set certain benchmarks, the website of California's Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs notes. In Nevada, that equates to 2 ng/ml for THC and 5 ng/ml for THC-COOH, also known as marijuana metabolite. The cutoff level in Ohio is 2 ng/ml for THC and 50 ng/ml for THC-COOH.

 According to the medical examiner's report, which was one of several documents on the case released Thursday by the office of special prosecutor Angela Corey, Martin died from a gunshot wound to chest fired from "intermediate range," within 36 inches.

 The autopsy report lists the manner of death as a homicide.

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 Zimmerman, 28, is charged with second-degree murder for killing Martin in the Sanford neighborhood where the African-American teen was staying.

 Martin's father, Tracy, had taken his son with him to Sanford, about four hours away from the boy's home and where the father's fiance lived, after the teen was suspended for 10 days from Michael M. Krop High School in Miami.

 According to records obtained by the Miami Herald, Martin had been suspended from school three times: once for writing graffiti on a door, another time for school truancy and the last time due to drug residue being found in his backpack.

 Speaking of her son's suspension to CNN's Anderson Cooper, Sybrina Fulton said, "Whatever he had dealings with the school, it was not criminal, it was not violent, he's never been arrested."

 Just before the shooting, Zimmerman called 911 to complain about a suspicious person in his neighborhood.

 In the call Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer, said he was following Martin after the teen started to run, prompting the dispatcher to tell him, "We don't need you to do that."

 Zimmerman apparently disregarded that advice.

 Much has been made about whether Zimmerman during that call used a racial epithet in referring to Martin. But an FBI analysis, released Thursday, determined that the word could not be definitively identified "due to weak signal level and poor recording quality."

 A screaming voice could be heard on other 911 calls placed by neighbors, with some speculating those screams came from Martin and others that they belonged to Zimmerman. The FBI did not make a final determination either way, citing several reasons including the fact they came during "an extreme emotional state," there weren't enough words to make a good comparison and the sound quality was low and distant.

 Zimmerman claimed, according a police report released earlier, that he'd been "assaulted (by Martin) and his head was struck on the pavement."

 According a report from the Sanford Fire Department , released Thursday, Zimmerman had "abrasions to his forehead," "bleeding/tenderness to his nose," and a "small laceration to the back of his head" when emergency personnel arrived at the scene at 7:27 p.m., six minutes after they were first called.

 By that time, Martin had no apparent pulse, according to the fire and EMS report. Emergency personnel attempted mouth-to-mask resuscitation and chest compressions, to no avail. He was pronounced dead at 7:30 p.m.

 Prosecutors have said Zimmerman, who is a white Hispanic, killed the unarmed teenager unjustly after profiling him. Zimmerman, who has pleaded not guilty, has said that he shot Martin in self-defense.

 The start of the trial hasn't been set.

 The case put a spotlight on race relations, spurring protests nationwide and drawing prominent civil rights leaders to central Florida denouncing the actions of Sanford police and calling for Zimmerman's arrest. Special prosecutor Angela Corey announced he'd been charged on April 11, weeks after Sanford police initially declined to do so.

 It also raised questions about gun laws, as well as the merits of the "Stand Your Ground" law in Florida, and similar laws in other states that allow people to use deadly force anywhere they feel a reasonable threat of serious injury or death. |||||Summary:

– Get ready for a deluge of information in the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case, as prosecutors today released a cache of related documents. Some early samples: Pro-Zimmerman: His lawyers surely hope lots of attention will be paid to the fact that Trayvon apparently smoked pot at some point before the altercation. (It's not clear when or how much.) The autopsy found traces of the drug THC in his system, the active ingredient in marijuana, reports CNN. Also, ABC News notes that two witness accounts given to police "appear to back up Zimmerman's version" of events. Pro-Trayvon: Prosecutors will no doubt point to the police conclusion that the shooting was "ultimately avoidable," had Zimmerman "remained in his vehicle and awaited the arrival of law enforcement." The Orlando Sentinel leads its story with it. Zimmerman photo: The documents include a grainy copy of a photo police took of Zimmerman after the shooting in which he appears to have a bloody nose, notes AP. See the photo here. Trayvon's belongings: He had $40.15 on him, along with a packet of Skittles, a red lighter, headphones, and a photo pin in his pocket. See for yourself: MSNBC has the documents here in PDF form, and the Sentinel has crime-scene photos here. Click to read about a damning assessment of the Sanford police by the New York Times here.


Write an article based on this summary:

– Today is the 20th anniversary of Take Our Daughters to Work Day, and Jennifer Allyn at the Christian Science Monitor says it's time to declare mission accomplished and refocus on a bigger goal. Two decades ago, it was enough to get young girls in the workplace and "demystify" the whole concept of women getting a job. Now it's time to introduce girls to the executive suites, to give them role models of women as decision-makers. Girls still tend not to see themselves getting leadership positions as adults, and that's because they don't get to see enough real-life examples. "Simply showing our daughters what an office looks like is no longer enough," writes Allen. "Real breakthroughs will come when we bring girls inside the halls of power. We need to take our daughters into the C-Suite now so they can lead in the future." Click to read her entire column.

Twenty years ago, the Ms. Foundation started Take Our Daughters to Work Day to demystify the workplace for girls. That mission is accomplished. What girls need now is encouragement to become leaders. It's time to take them to the C-suite, where the corporate chiefs work.

 Girls also need to understand what leadership is like on a day-to-day basis. The more they understand the specific requirements and rewards of leadership, the better choices they can make about their own careers. How do executives motivate teams, solve complex financial problems, and develop new products? Making the responsibilities, roles, and payoffs of leadership clear from the time girls are in grade-school would help make leadership more tangible.

 It would also help resolve another issue the Girl Scouts identified: More than a third of girls said they wouldn’t feel comfortable trying to lead, and nearly 40 percent didn’t think they were cut out for leadership. Hearing directly from both male and female leaders about what they actually do could help close that gap.

 Finally, these efforts need to reach beyond a single day in April. Companies and schools need proactive efforts to move women into leadership roles. That’s what Princeton University did when it found that the number of female students winning top academic honors and holding visible leadership roles had declined over the last decade.

 President Shirley Tilghman convened a steering committee to investigate and recommend solutions. One immediate result was that the faculty started proactively encouraging female students to apply for academic prizes. In 2011, 3 out of 4 Princeton Rhodes Scholars were women. Ambition did not just appear out of nowhere for these women – encouragement from influential people clearly mattered.

 In corporate environments, that kind of support appears as sponsorship. In contrast to mentors, sponsors spend their political capital on behalf of their protégés. They provide opportunities instead of merely advice. A professor who pushes a student to apply for the Rhodes – and offers to write a letter of recommendation – is providing sponsorship. The best companies for diversity have formal sponsorship initiatives to achieve similar results.

 Much has changed in the workplace in the 20 years since we first took our daughters to work, but women’s rates of top leadership have barely budged. That disparity is costing our companies talent, hurting the country’s competitiveness, and undermining our ideals of fairness and social equality.

 Simply showing our daughters what an office looks like is no longer enough. Real breakthroughs will come when we bring girls inside the halls of power. We need to take our daughters into the C-Suite now so they can lead in the future.

 Jennifer Allyn is a managing director at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP responsible for retaining and advancing women. ||||| Twenty years ago, the Ms. Foundation started Take Our Daughters to Work Day to demystify the workplace for girls. That mission is accomplished. What girls need now is encouragement to become leaders. It's time to take them to the C-suite, where the corporate chiefs work.

 Hewlett Packard CEO and President Meg Whitman smiles as she speaks at a conference on the Stanford University campus in Palo Alto, Calif. on March 9. Op-ed contributor Jennifer Allyn argues: 'Girls no longer need help picturing themselves in a job; what they do need is encouragement to become leaders.'

 Today marks the 20th anniversary of Take Our Daughters to Work Day. The event, which now includes our sons too, is still a valuable chance to help children understand the workplace. But the problems that face girls and women have changed in the past two decades, and it’s time for the day’s emphasis to change, too.

 What we need now is Take Our Daughters to the C-Suite Day – the offices occupied by corporate "chiefs."

 Twenty years ago, the Ms. Foundation launched the program to demystify the workplace for girls and inspire them to embrace a wide range of careers. Now that women represent half the US workforce, we can fairly say that mission has been accomplished.

 Girls no longer need help picturing themselves in a job; what they do need is encouragement to become leaders. In Fortune 500 companies, women make up just 3.6 percent of CEOs, 14 percent of executive officers, and 16 percent of board directors. Companies need to do much more to inspire women to lead, rather than blaming the lack of women leaders on what Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg calls an “ambition gap.”

 Companies that are already committing time and resources to Take Our Children to Work Day can help close that gap by shifting their focus in three ways: introducing girls to female role models; more clearly explaining what leaders of both genders actually do; and supporting programs throughout the year that actively identify and groom female talent.

 Introducing girls to a company’s highest ranking women is an easy step any organization can add to their career day programs – and it’s one that can make a huge difference. Marie Wilson, founder of Take Our Daughters to Work Day, often quotes child-rights advocate Marian Wright Edelman on this topic: “You can’t be what you can’t see.”

 Girls want to see role models: A recent study by the Girl Scouts found that 80 percent of girls want to interact with successful women, but 60 percent had not been offered the opportunity to see these women in action at the workplace. Boys, in contrast, see a variety of male leaders in all aspects of their lives.

 Companies can help girls by using the day to introduce their employees’ daughters to women at the highest level of the company. And highlighting these leaders’ accomplishments will give the women themselves more visibility.

 Girls also need to understand what leadership is like on a day-to-day basis. The more they understand the specific requirements and rewards of leadership, the better choices they can make about their own careers. How do executives motivate teams, solve complex financial problems, and develop new products? Making the responsibilities, roles, and payoffs of leadership clear from the time girls are in grade-school would help make leadership more tangible.

 It would also help resolve another issue the Girl Scouts identified: More than a third of girls said they wouldn’t feel comfortable trying to lead, and nearly 40 percent didn’t think they were cut out for leadership. Hearing directly from both male and female leaders about what they actually do could help close that gap.

 Finally, these efforts need to reach beyond a single day in April. Companies and schools need proactive efforts to move women into leadership roles. That’s what Princeton University did when it found that the number of female students winning top academic honors and holding visible leadership roles had declined over the last decade.

 President Shirley Tilghman convened a steering committee to investigate and recommend solutions. One immediate result was that the faculty started proactively encouraging female students to apply for academic prizes. In 2011, 3 out of 4 Princeton Rhodes Scholars were women. Ambition did not just appear out of nowhere for these women – encouragement from influential people clearly mattered.

 In corporate environments, that kind of support appears as sponsorship. In contrast to mentors, sponsors spend their political capital on behalf of their protégés. They provide opportunities instead of merely advice. A professor who pushes a student to apply for the Rhodes – and offers to write a letter of recommendation – is providing sponsorship. The best companies for diversity have formal sponsorship initiatives to achieve similar results.

 Much has changed in the workplace in the 20 years since we first took our daughters to work, but women’s rates of top leadership have barely budged. That disparity is costing our companies talent, hurting the country’s competitiveness, and undermining our ideals of fairness and social equality.

 Simply showing our daughters what an office looks like is no longer enough. Real breakthroughs will come when we bring girls inside the halls of power. We need to take our daughters into the C-Suite now so they can lead in the future.

 Jennifer Allyn is a managing director at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP responsible for retaining and advancing women. |||||


Summarize this article:

WASHINGTON — The secretary of the Navy has recommended that future security reviews include any available police reports, even if they did not result in charges or convictions, after the shooting deaths of 12 Navy personnel by a gunman who had an honorable discharge, a Secret-level clearance and at least two firearms incidents in law enforcement files.

 The recommendation, disclosed Monday, came as the Navy completed a detailed review of the military career of Aaron Alexis, the gunman who was killed at the Washington Navy Yard after last week’s shooting rampage. The review, ordered by Navy Secretary Ray Mabus, included an assessment of whether events in Mr. Alexis’s military career should have raised alerts about his violent potential.

 In 2004, three years before enlisting as a Navy reservist, Mr. Alexis brandished a .45-caliber pistol and fired at the tires of a construction worker’s car. In another incident, in September 2010, after he was in uniform, commanders halted efforts to force Mr. Alexis out of the Navy with a less-than-honorable discharge because the police declined to pursue a case and it was not entered into his military file, Navy officials said.

 The proposals were an acknowledgment by the Navy that there were events that should have raised red flags about Mr. Alexis’s potential for violence. ||||| WASHINGTON — Washington Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis obtained a secret-level security clearance after a federal personnel report failed to mention that a 2004 arrest involved a firearm, the Navy said Monday.

 A senior Navy official told reporters the service learned of the incident's violent nature only after Alexis had shot 12 people to death at the Washington Navy Yard last week and was himself fatally shot by police.

 The Office of Personnel Management knew of Alexis' Seattle arrest because of a fingerprint check when he joined the Navy Reserve in 2007 and interviewed him about it, the official said. Alexis had not disclosed the offense on his security questionnaire.

 Alexis said that he had an altercation with a man doing construction work near his home and that the men had been "taking retaliatory action toward each other's parked cars," according to the investigative document that the personnel office gave to the Navy. Alexis said the construction worker had put a foreign substance in Alexis' gas tank, and Alexis retaliated by "deflating the male person's tires," according to the report.

 That account "reads very different from the police account of what took place that day," the senior official said. The Seattle police report says Alexis shot out the tires and was charged with malicious mischief, the official said.

 Monday's disclosure revealed another in a chain of missed opportunities by the Navy and Alexis' civilian employer — a military contractor — to come to grips with his violent tendencies and apparent mental illness. Alexis had complained that he was hearing voices and being bombarded by microwaves. Because of his job, which required a security clearance, he had a valid ID card that allowed him to enter the Navy Yard.

 "The summary of the Seattle incident that was provided to [the Navy] makes no reference to firearms, makes no reference to a gunshot ... makes no reference to firing into the air," the Navy official said. The Navy provided access to the briefing on condition that the official not be identified.

 The personnel office said Seattle police would not provide records on the 2004 incident. The office interviewed Alexis, who did not say that a weapon was involved. The personnel office said it could not force police departments to cooperate.

 The Navy cleared Alexis based on all the information it had, the senior official said, and there is no way to know "how they would have adjudicated knowing the events we know now. In a vacuum looking back, what we do know is that the events suggest very different activity."

 The construction worker did not press charges and the case was dismissed, the personnel office told the Navy.

 Sometimes personnel office investigations include police documents, the Navy official said, but in this case the report sent to the Navy did not.

 A recent memo sent to Navy Secretary Ray Mabus from Assistant Navy Secretary Juan M. Garcia included a recommendation that all personnel office investigative reports include "any available police documents related to the subject being investigated for clearance eligibility." The recommendation has been sent to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel.

 On his security clearance form, Alexis answered "no" to questions about whether he had been charged with or convicted of a felony, and "no" to whether he had been arrested by any law enforcement official in the last seven years. The personnel report said Alexis said he did not disclose information about his 2004 arrest because the charge was dismissed and he was told by his attorney that it would be removed from his record.

 Alexis was found to be eligible for the security clearance in March 2008 after the Navy reviewed the personnel investigation. The only concern was Alexis' credit history, according to a timeline released by the Navy. His clearance was valid for 10 years.

 In September 2008, Alexis was arrested in DeKalb County, Ga., on suspicion of disorderly conduct and jailed for two nights, resulting in an unauthorized absence. The Navy gave Alexis an administrative punishment.

 In July 2009, he was punished again for being "drunk and disorderly," according to the timeline. But there was no police involvement, and Alexis successfully appealed the punishment, which was removed from his record.

 In September 2010, he was arrested in Fort Worth for discharging a firearm in his home after an altercation with a neighbor. Alexis told police the gun accidentally went off as he was cleaning it. No charges were filed.

 After the Fort Worth incident, Alexis' commander began the process "to administratively separate him from the Navy," according to the timeline. But when Alexis was not charged, the matter was dropped.

 Alexis left the Navy three months later with an honorable discharge.

 becca.clemons@latimes.com |||||

– The Los Angeles Times sheds more light on how Navy Yard gunman Aaron Alexis was able to get secret-level security clearance from the Navy, despite the fact that he had been arrested in 2004 for an incident involving a gun. Alexis did not mention the incident on the security questionnaire he filled out three years later, but the Navy's Office of Personnel Management learned about it after doing a fingerprint check. He was asked about it and claimed all he did was deflate a man's tires. In reality, he shot out the man's tires, according to the police report filed in Seattle. Alexis said he did not disclose the incident because the charge was dismissed and his lawyer had told him it would be wiped from his record. Investigators did not interview anyone else about the incident, the Washington Post reports, and Seattle police refused to provide the records related to the incident, according to the personnel office. So the Navy cleared Alexis in March 2008 based on what it knew. (The LAT notes the only red flag was his credit history.) The full picture of the 2004 incident didn't emerge until after the Navy Yard shootings, says a senior Navy official. Now, the secretary of the Navy has recommended to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel that security reviews in the future include all police reports—even those that did not result in charges, the New York Times reports.


Article:

After 10-year rape kit delay, man charged with raping, kidnapping teen in Seattle The girl was detained in the defendant's home for two days and repeatedly raped and beaten, police say

 Darin Bolar, pictured here in an October 2009 Department of Corrections photo, is accused of a raping a 14-year-old girl in 2007. The victim's rape kit languished untested for 10 years. Darin Bolar, pictured here in an October 2009 Department of Corrections photo, is accused of a raping a 14-year-old girl in 2007. The victim's rape kit languished untested for 10 years. Photo: Department Of Corrections Photo: Department Of Corrections Image 1 of / 34 Caption Close After 10-year rape kit delay, man charged with raping, kidnapping teen in Seattle 1 / 34 Back to Gallery

 Eleven years after the attack, a 52-year-old man was arrested for the kidnapping and repeated rape of a 14-year-old girl he allegedly abducted in the Beacon Hill neighborhood of South Seattle.

 The victim's rape kit, stored among more than 1,000 in a well-known backlog of untested sets of evidence, was finally examined and yielded a DNA match for Darin Bolar in December 2017.

 Police arrested Bolar Sept. 26 and prosecutors charged him Monday with first-degree kidnapping and two counts of second-degree rape for the October 2007 attack.

 RELATED: Seattle PD to test all rape kits in storage

 Then-Seattle Police Chief Kathleen O'Toole announced an initiative in 2015 to test each of the backlogged kits. At the time, of the 1,641 rape kits administered in the previous 10 years, only 365 had been tested by the State Patrol crime lab.

 Cases had to meet certain criteria to be sent to the state crime lab for testing, but O'Toole's announcement prompted Seattle police to send each kit along for examination.

 Bolar was already a Level III sex offender and had been convicted in 1993 of third-degree child rape for assaulting a 14-year-old girl at the Wild Waves amusement park.

 The 14-year-old girl in the Seattle case was walking on a street in Beacon Hill Oct. 24, 2007 looking for a pay phone to call her boyfriend when she noticed a man walking behind her, according to a police report.

 RELATED: Rape kit backlog testing yields charge for 2007 Seattle rape, kidnapping

 The man grabbed her, pulled her into a yard with tall bushes and raped her. He allegedly used a garden hose attached to the house and forced it in the girl's vagina to clean the evidence of the assault.

 The attacker then took her to a nearby vehicle and threatened to kill her if she tried to find help. They reportedly drove to a McDonald's and headed back to the man's residence somewhere off Martin Luther King, Jr. Way South. The man told the teen that she was not allowed to leave and he would find and kill her if she did, according to court documents.

 He raped and beat the girl and forced her to clean his house throughout the next two days, police said. The girl would later claim that the man raped her at least seven or eight times. Every time she tried to leave, he beat or raped her again.

 RELATED: Charges: Man rapes, holds woman captive for 2 days in Kent

 The teen escaped while the attacker was at work and another man inside the house was asleep on the couch. She ran out the front door and contacted a friend who called police.

 Staff at Harborview Medical Center collected forensic evidence from the girl for her rape kit. The kit was not tested until Dec. 28, 2017, when the crime lab found a DNA profile that matched Bolar's in their database.

 Bolar was 42 at the time of the girl's assaults.

 The state Attorney General's office won a $3 million U.S. Department of Justice grant last year to test and investigate the 6,460 rape kits stored and untested at law enforcement agencies throughout Washington. The oldest dates back to 1982, the office said.

 The Attorney General's office has only received 25 percent of the award to perform an inventory of the state's backlog, but announced Wednesday it would request the remainder of the money to so the kits can be tested and investigated.

 SeattlePI reporter Lynsi Burton can be reached at 206-448-8381 or lynsiburton@seattlepi.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LynsiBurton_PI. Find more from Lynsi here. ||||| Darin Bolar is seen in an October 2009 Department of Corrections photo.

 SEATTLE - Eleven years after the attack, a 52-year-old man is arrested for the kidnapping and repeated rape of a 14-year-old girl he allegedly abducted in the Beacon Hill neighborhood of South Seattle.

 The victim's rape kit, stored among more than 1,000 in a well-known backlog of untested sets of evidence, was finally examined and yielded a DNA match for Darin Bolar in December 2017.

 Police arrested Bolar Sept. 26 and prosecutors charged him Monday with first-degree kidnapping and two counts of second-degree rape for the October 2007 attack.

 Then-Seattle Police Chief Kathleen O'Toole announced an initiative in 2015 to test each of the backlogged kits. At the time, of the 1,641 rape kits administered in the previous 10 years, only 365 had been tested by the State Patrol crime lab.

 Cases had to meet certain criteria to be sent to the state crime lab for testing, but O'Toole's announcement prompted Seattle police to send each kit along for examination.

 Bolar was already a Level III sex offender and had been convicted in 1993 of third-degree child rape for assaulting a 14-year-old girl at the Wild Waves amusement park.

 The 14-year-old girl in the Seattle case was walking on a street in Beacon Hill Oct. 24, 2007, looking for a pay phone to call her boyfriend when she noticed a man walking behind her, according to a police report.

 The man grabbed her, pulled her into a yard with tall bushes and raped her. He allegedly used a garden hose attached to the house and forced it in the girl's vagina to clean the evidence of the assault.

 The attacker then took her to a nearby vehicle and threatened to kill her if she tried to find help. They reportedly drove to a McDonald's and headed back to the man's residence somewhere off Martin Luther King, Jr. Way South. The man told the teen that she was not allowed to leave and he would find and kill her if she did, according to court documents.

 He raped and beat the girl and forced her to clean his house throughout the next two days, police said. The girl would later claim that the man raped her at least seven or eight times. Every time she tried to leave, he beat or raped her again.

 The teen escaped while the attacker was at work and another man inside the house was asleep on the couch. She ran out the front door and contacted a friend who called police.

 Staff at Harborview Medical Center collected forensic evidence from the girl for her rape kit. The kit was not tested until Dec. 28, 2017, when the crime lab found a DNA profile that matched Bolar's in their database.

 Bolar was 42 at the time of the girl's assaults.

 -----

 Seattlepi.com is a media partner of KOMO News. Read the original seattlepi.com story ...

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What is a summary?

– In October 2007, a 14-year-old girl was kidnapped while looking for a pay phone in the Beacon Hill section of Seattle and repeatedly raped by her abductor over the next couple of days before escaping. Now, 11 years later, police may have their man—but they may have had him much sooner if there hadn't been a massive backlog in testing a pile of rape kits. KOMO News reports that, among the more than 1,000 kits stockpiled by the Seattle Police Department, was the one that made a DNA match to Darin Bolar at the end of last year, leading to the 52-year-old's arrest on Sept. 26. Bolar, a Level III sex offender, already had a rape conviction under his belt from 25 years ago after assaulting another 14-year-old at a theme park. In the Beacon Hill case, the suspect had first grabbed the girl and raped her in some nearby bushes, then forced a garden hose into her vagina to try to clear out any evidence of the assault, per police reports. He then allegedly took the girl back to his home, where she was beaten, raped, and made to clean his house for the next two days. She finally said to have escaped while the suspect was at work and another man slept on the couch. She was tested immediately for forensic evidence, but that kit wasn't tested until December 2017. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer notes that a $3M DOJ grant was given to the state's AG office in 2017 to help start testing the more than 6,400 untested rape kits across Washington. Bolar has been charged with first-degree kidnapping and second-degree rape.


Article:
Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (L) speaks with U.S. President Barack Obama after the start of the second and final plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

 Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte (L) talks with China's President Xi Jinping during a family photo at the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jim Bourg

 China's President Xi Jinping (L) speaks with Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan (R) during the during first plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

 U.S. President Barack Obama (L) delivers remarks to start the final plenary session as he sits with (L-R) Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron, Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite and Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

 U.S. President Barack Obama puts his hand on the shoulder of Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte during the family photo of leaders at the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

 U.S. President Barack Obama opens the first opening plenary session as world leaders gather at the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jim Bourg

 U.S. President Barack Obama (L) listens to remarks by Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte (R) at the opening of the first plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

 U.S. President Barack Obama (R) smiles as he speaks with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte (L) at the opening of the first plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

 French President Francois Hollande (C) looks up as and other leaders take part in the first plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (R) speaks with U.S. President Barack Obama during the first plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

 U.S. President Barack Obama (C) hosts a meeting with members of the P5+1 group, with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry (L), Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron (2nd L), French President Francois Hollande (3rd L) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (3rd R) attending, during the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

 World leaders gather for the opening plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Jim Bourg

 Leaders convene for the first plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

 U.S. President Barack Obama hosts a meeting with members of the P5+1 during the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington April 1, 2016. Flanking Obama are French President Francois Hollande (L) and Chinese President Xi Jinping. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

 Leaders convene for the first plenary session of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, April 1, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

 President Obama speaks with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte at the opening of the first plenary session. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe checks his watch while seated with President Obama during the first plenary session. REUTERS/Jim Bourg

 WASHINGTON U.S. President Barack Obama urged world leaders on Friday to do more to safeguard vulnerable nuclear facilities to prevent “madmen” from groups like Islamic State from getting their hands on an atomic weapon or a radioactive “dirty bomb.”

 Speaking at a nuclear security summit in Washington, Obama said the world faced a persistent and evolving threat of nuclear terrorism despite progress in reducing such risks. “We cannot be complacent,” he said.

 Obama said no group had succeeded in obtaining bomb materials but that al Qaeda had long sought them, and he cited actions by Islamic State militants behind recent attacks in Paris and Brussels that raised similar concerns.

 “There is no doubt that if these madmen ever got their hands on a nuclear bomb or nuclear material, they would certainly use it to kill as many innocent people as possible,” he said. "It would change our world.”

 Obama hosted more than 50 world leaders for his fourth and final summit focused on efforts to lock down atomic materials to guard against nuclear terrorism, which he called "one of the greatest threats to global security" in the 21st century.

 Obama has less than 10 months left in office to follow through on one of his signature foreign policy initiatives. While gains have been made, arms-control advocates say the diplomatic process – which Obama conceived and championed - has lost momentum and could slow further once he leaves the White House in January.

 A boycott by Russian President Vladimir Putin, unwilling to join in a U.S.-dominated gathering at a time of increased tensions between Washington and Moscow over Ukraine and Syria, may have contributed to summit results marked by mostly technical measures instead of policy breakthroughs.

 At the closing news conference, Obama, a Democrat, made clear that the raucous Republican presidential race, particularly controversial comments by party front-runner Donald Trump, weighed on leaders' discussions on the summit sidelines.

 Obama sternly dismissed as proof of foreign-policy ignorance Trump’s recent suggestion that Japan and South Korea should be allowed to build their own nuclear arsenals, putting him at odds with decades of U.S. policy.

 “The person who made the statements doesn't know much about foreign policy or nuclear policy or the Korean peninsula, or the world generally," Obama said, adding that Americans don’t want anyone with such views to occupy the White House.

 'DIRTY BOMB' THREAT

 Deadly bomb attacks in Brussels last month have fueled concern that Islamic State could eventually target nuclear plants, steal material and develop radioactive dirty bombs. Militants were found to have videotaped the daily routine of a senior manager of a Belgian nuclear plant, Obama said.

 Obama said the required 102 countries have now ratified an amendment to a nuclear security treaty that would tighten protections against nuclear theft and smuggling. “We have measurably reduced the risks,” he said.

 But he acknowledged that with roughly 2,000 tons of nuclear material stored around the world, “not all of this is properly secured.”

 Obama, wrapping up the summit, said leaders had agreed to strengthen their nuclear facilities against cyber attacks, something that outside experts see as a major weak point.

 The United States and Japan also announced they had completed the long-promised task of removing all highly enriched uranium and separated plutonium fuels from a Japanese research reactor. Japan is an avowedly anti-nuclear-weapons state as the only country to have ever suffered a nuclear attack.

 Despite significant strides by Obama in persuading dozens of countries to rid themselves of bomb-making materials or reduce and safeguard stockpiles, much of the world's plutonium and enriched uranium remain vulnerable to theft.

 Obama convened a separate meeting of world powers to take stock of the landmark nuclear pact they negotiated with Iran last July. It is a critical component of his nuclear disarmament agenda and a major piece of his foreign policy legacy.

 LANDMARK PRAGUE SPEECH

 Obama inaugurated the first Nuclear Security Summit nearly six years ago, after a 2009 speech in Prague laying out the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons. There is no guarantee that Obama's successor will keep the issue a high priority.

 Obama made no public mention of Putin as a summit no-show. But he did say that because of the Russian’s leader’s emphasis on building up his military, there was unlikely to be any further deals for reducing the two countries’ vast nuclear weapons stockpiles during what is left of the Obama presidency.

 For now, U.S. experts are less concerned about militants obtaining nuclear weapons than about thefts of ingredients for a low-tech dirty bomb that would use conventional explosives to disperse radioactive material and sow panic.

 U.S. officials said they had no doubt that Islamic State, which controls swaths of Syria and Iraq, was interested in obtaining such materials, but authorities had no explicit evidence that the group had tried to do so.

 Obama held a special summit session to coordinate the overall fight against Islamic State. He touted gains against the group in Iraq and Syria, which he said were forcing it to lash out elsewhere, and called for stepped-up efforts to stem the flow of foreign fighters to and from the battlefield.

 Also looming over the summit was continuing concern about North Korea. Obama joined South Korean President Park Geun-hye and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Thursday in vowing to ramp up pressure on Pyongyang in response to its recent nuclear and missile tests.

 But So Se Pyong, North Korea's ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, told Reuters on Friday that Pyongyang will pursue its nuclear and ballistic missile program in defiance of the United States and its allies, saying there is now a state of "semi-war" on the divided peninsula.

 (Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom, Doina Chiacu, Patricia Zengerle, Lesley Wroughton, Idrees Ali, Timothy Gardner, David Alexander, Susan Heavey and Jeff Mason; Writing by Matt Spetalnick; Editing by James Dalgleish, Leslie Adler and Mary Milliken) ||||| Play Facebook

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 President Obama told a gathering of world leaders that the possibility of terrorists getting nuclear material and scientists would be catastrophic.

 "ISIL has already used chemical weapons — there is no doubt if these madmen ever got their hands on a bomb or nuclear material they would use it to kill as many as possible," Obama told world leaders meeting in Washington Friday for the Nuclear Security Summit.

 Related: Obama, World Leaders Discuss Keeping Nuclear Weapons from ISIS

 Over the past two days, 50 world leaders have huddled on the best ways to keep terrorists from gathering materials for a dirty bomb and keeping nuclear weapons away from dangerous political regimes. The meeting comes on the heels of new information that some of the suspects in the Brussels' attacks were tracking and recording the movements of a top Belgian nuclear scientist.

 Related: Brussels Attacks

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 On Friday, Obama referenced those videotapes.

 "It would change our world. We cannot be complacent. We have to build on our progress," the president said.

 U.S. officials estimate there's some 2000 metric tons of material being housed in civilian and military programs around the world that could be used to craft nuclear weapons. In an op-ed published this week in the Washington Post President Obama underscored the need to work with world leaders in preventing terrorist groups like ISIS from getting that material.

 "Given the continued threat posed by organizations such as the terrorist group we call ISIL, or ISIS, we'll also join allies and partners in reviewing our counterterrorism efforts, to prevent the world's most dangerous networks from obtaining the world's most dangerous weapons," Obama wrote.

 The president met earlier on Friday with leaders from nations that worked, alongside the U.S., to reach a historic accord aimed at curbing Tehran's nuclear program. Those efforts, the president said, involved intense negotiations and are backed by strong sanctions.

 Related: Fact Sheet: Who Has Nuclear Weapons, And How Many Do They Have?

 "The countries represented in this room achieved what decades of animosity and rhetoric did not — a long-term deal that closes off every possible path to building a nuclear weapon, and subjects Iran to the most comprehensive nuclear inspections ever negotiated," Obama said.

 The summit, and by extension Obama's efforts at shoring up his legacy on nuclear policy, began early in his presidency during a 2009 speech on the need for a global effort to secure nuclear material and atomic weapons.

 The administration cites the Iran nuclear deal and an arms reduction treaty with Russia as major steps toward exactly that type of non-proliferation.

 But while the U.S. and Russia have an agreement to decrease their Cold War-era nuclear arsenals, Russia opted to skip this year's summit citing tension over Ukraine and Syria. Russia — along with the U.S. — holds a combined 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons.

 North Korea's claims to have tested a hydrogen bomb, followed by tests of a ballistic missile, are also provocations that the U.S. will continue to "deter and defend" again, Obama said on Thursday following a meeting with the leaders of Japan and South Korea, regional allies in that effort.

 Some experts worry that such efforts aren't enough.

 "The bad news is that for all their success, these summits are not moving fast enough. When fleeing a forest fire, direction is important — but so is speed," Joseph Cirincione, president of the Ploughshares Fund, a global security foundation wrote in a column for the Huffington Post. "Can we get to safety before catastrophe engulfs us?" ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption President Obama: ''There's still a great deal of nuclear and radioactive material around the world that needs to be secured''

 The threat from terrorists trying to launch a nuclear attack that would "change our world" is real, President Barack Obama has said.

 The world has taken "concrete" steps to prevent nuclear terrorism, he told the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington.

 But the so-called Islamic State (IS) obtaining a nuclear weapon is "one of the greatest threats to global security," he added.

 More than 50 nations were represented at the summit.

 World leaders convening in Washington for the summit expressed concern about North Korea's nuclear weapons programme and Russia's lack of attendance.

 Mr Obama expressed concern that Russia has been building up its military at the expense of nuclear arms reductions.

 Russian President Vladimir Putin refused to attend the summit, and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan cancelled his trip after the deadly bombing in Lahore. Both countries are nuclear-armed.

 Image copyright AFP Image caption Russia declined to the attend the summit in Washington

 As the summit closed, the leaders reaffirmed their commitment to fight proliferation.

 Mr Obama cited progress in making large parts of the world free of nuclear materials. South America had already achieved this, and Central Europe and South East Asia were expected to do so later this year.

 "Together, we have removed the world's most deadly materials from nuclear facilities around the world," he said.

 Despite these gains, Mr Obama said the Indian subcontinent and the Korean peninsula were areas where more could be done to combat proliferation.

 Mr Obama said the world cannot be "complacent" and must build on its progress in slowing the stockpiling of nuclear weapons.

 IS has already used chemical weapons in Syria.

 "There is no doubt that if these mad men ever got their hands on a nuclear bomb or nuclear material, they would certainly use it to kill as many people as possible," he said.

 "The single most effective defence against nuclear terrorism is fully securing this material so it doesn't fall into the wrong hands in the first place."

 Could Islamic State make a 'dirty bomb'?

 Mr Obama hailed his own nuclear agreement with Iran, which has been criticised by Republicans and other groups for the sanctions relief it provides. He called it a "substantial success".

 "This is a success of diplomacy that hopefully we will be able to copy in the future," he said.

 Mr Obama said Iran has so far followed the letter of the agreement. He urged patience as the country becomes re-integrated into the global economy.

 "So long as Iran is carrying out its end of the bargain, we think it's important for the world community to carry out our end," he said.

 At the summit, Mr Obama was asked about recent comments by presidential hopeful Donald Trump.

 The Republican front-runner had floated the idea that Japan and South Korea should have nuclear weapons, a dramatic departure from decades of US foreign policy.

 "The person who made the statement doesn't know much about foreign policy, nuclear policy, the Korean peninsula or the world generally," Mr Obama said. |||||Summary:

– At a nuclear summit attended by more than 50 world leaders Friday in Washington DC, President Obama called the possibility of ISIS getting its hands on a nuclear weapon "one of the greatest threats to global security," the BBC reports. “There is no doubt that if these madmen ever got their hands on a nuclear bomb or nuclear material, they would certainly use it to kill as many innocent people as possible,” Obama said, per Reuters. “It would change our world.” It was part of Obama's pitch to world leaders to better secure their nuclear materials, which he said is the most effective way of keeping them from falling into the hands of terrorists. He also called on countries to stop stockpiling nuclear weapons. Obama said both al-Qaeda and ISIS are still seeking nuclear material for weaponizing, and the risk of nuclear terrorism remains very real. He pointed out recent news that ISIS members had been following a Belgian nuclear plant's senior manager and secretly recording his daily activities. "We cannot be complacent," he said. In addition to ISIS and al-Qaeda, world leaders also expressed concern with North Korea's nuclear weapons program. US officials estimate there is approximately 2,000 metric tons of material worldwide that could be used to build a nuclear weapon, NBC News reports. The US and Russia (Putin refused to attend the summit) account for 90% of the world's nuclear weapons with more than 14,000 nuclear warheads between them.


Image caption HMS Illustrious is being sent to the Philippines to help the aid effort

 The aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious will be sent to help people affected by the typhoon in the Philippines, Prime Minister David Cameron has said.

 Speaking on a visit to India, Mr Cameron also said the UK government had now given more than £20m in aid.

 Meanwhile, the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) said its UK appeal had raised £23m in its first 48 hours.

 Typhoon Haiyan, which hit on Friday, killed at least 2,300 people and displaced more than half a million.

 HMS Illustrious is currently in the Gulf and is expected to arrive in the Philippines on 24 November.

 The carrier will relieve destroyer HMS Daring, which is already on its way to the country and should arrive on Friday.

 'Absolute tragedy'

 Mr Cameron said helicopters from HMS Illustrious would be used to take food and water to people stranded in remote parts of the Philippines, which is made up of more than 7,000 islands.

 The carrier, which currently has 900 crew and seven helicopters, has equipment to provide water suitable for drinking, which Mr Cameron said was badly needed.

 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption David Cameron said it was clear long term help was needed in the Philippines

 "What happened in the Philippines is an absolute tragedy," he said.

 "You can see the devastation, the suffering, and it's quite clear that we are going to need long-term help for those people."

 The Royal Navy said almost all of its ships carried supplies and equipment for use in such emergencies and added its crews were trained for dealing with humanitarian disasters.

 HMS Daring has more than 200 personnel on board including a doctor, a dentist, engineers and a chaplain. It is also carrying members of the Royal Marines band who, as a secondary role, are trained first aiders.

 The ship holds 700 ration packs, can provide more than 20,000 litres of water, and has other equipment including generators and thermal-imaging cameras.

 Image caption An international aid effort is under way to help people in the Philippines

 Image caption Many people in storm-hit areas are desperate for food and water

 Image caption HMS Daring is expected to arrive in the Philippines on Friday

 The UK is also sending aid to the Philippines by air. The first flight arrived at 16:00 GMT on Tuesday.

 A specialist cargo aircraft loaded with equipment to speed up the offloading of relief supplies at airfields and help with rubble clearance was also deployed.

 A team of 12 medical experts from the UK, requested by the Philippines Department of Health, has also flown to the country.

 Secretary of State for International Development, Justine Greening, said Britain was "helping thousands of people in desperate need".

 Elsewhere, the Ministry of Defence said it would be deploying a Royal Air Force C-17 military transport aircraft in the early hours of Friday morning.

 'Remarkable' support

 A huge international aid effort is under way, but widespread infrastructure damage is hampering efforts to distribute it to some areas.

 These are extraordinary figures, and this allows us to get aid right into the heart of this catastrophe Justin Forsyth, Save the Children

 A US aircraft carrier and other US vessels have already arrived in the Philippines, where the UN estimates 11 million people have been affected by the typhoon.

 The DEC, which brings together 14 major UK charities, launched its appeal on Monday and said the response from the public had been "remarkable".

 DEC chief executive Saleh Saeed said: "This has already become one of our most generously-supported appeals but there is still a huge humanitarian need for help."

 Paul Jenkins, of the British Red Cross, one of the DEC's members, said: "We are so amazed that the generosity of the British public - in very difficult times for everybody - is still there."

 He said the priority was to get "goods and supplies" to those most in need as quickly as possible.

 Planes carrying British Red Cross aid have started landing in the Philippines following early difficulties due to the damage done by the storm, Mr Jenkins added.

 Image caption The British Red Cross is sending aid and equipment to the Philippines

 Justin Forsyth, chief executive of Save the Children, said: "These are extraordinary figures, and this allows us to get aid right into the heart of this catastrophe.

 "Aid is beginning to get through even in the worst affected areas. Save the Children has landed a plane today in Cebu and all the Disasters Emergency Committee agencies are there trying to do their best, but we need to get more aid in and very quickly."

 British couple Andrea Agarwal and Trevor Holmes, who own a dive centre in the island of Malapascua, have been helping with the aid effort.

 They were not on the island at the time the typhoon hit but said their bar and restaurant was destroyed. They have been co-ordinating aid efforts from the island of Cebu, 360 miles south of Manila.

 "We have started a fund for donation and we managed to raise around 30,000," said Ms Agarwal. "The island is relatively small, with about 7,000 people. But the situation there is very devastating." ||||| Major relief packages have continued to pour into the typhoon-devastated city of Tacloban – from food aid to medicine and search-and-rescue teams – on the second day of a ramped-up effort by the Philippines government to reach those hardest hit by the super storm that many fear has killed more than 10,000 people.

 The aid comes amid heightened insecurity and tension in the city, where reports of gunshots, stabbings and ambushes have caused many residents and aid workers to fear for their lives.

 Local and American military C-130 planes were flying in with supplies on Thursday, while the USS George Washington, an aircraft carrier that can accommodate the landing of helicopters, was expected to arrive off the coast.

 An American medical ship has been ordered but would not arrive for another few weeks. British digger maker JCB announced it would send heavy machinery and generators to help clear up the debris that still lines the streets.

 Despite the arrival of aid and a concerted effort by the military to restore order to the town, thousands of stricken residents still crammed the crumbling airport desperate for a way out of the city that has borne the brunt of the storm and its aftermath.

 On Wednesday night the Tacloban mayor, Alfred Romualdez, led a mass burial in a graveyard just outside the city. Officials said every effort had been made to ensure those buried could be identified in the weeks to come.

 The official death toll of 2,357 is a considerably lower figure than that estimated by aid workers, who say the lack of information coming from various areas – some 29 municipalities in all are affected – could mean that the devastation is far greater than yet realised. Most casualties seem to have been around the islands of Samar and Leyte, where the storm first made landfall at 195mph on Friday morning, with accompanying sea surges of up to 20ft.

 The resulting damage in the region – a coastal flatland that has seen whole villages blown apart by the storm's heavy winds and rain – has created a state of pandemonium in Tacloban, where survivors have had to loot shops and malls for water, while others have resorted to scavenging for food among the bloated bodies of the dead.

 On Wednesday stories of heightened violence and tension circulated around the city as eight were killed after stampeding a rice warehouse looking for food. A Philippine Red Cross convoy was allegedly hijacked by armed men who were later shot dead by police, and a 13-year-old boy was knifed in the neck and stomach by unknown men, AFP reported. There were unverified reports that prisoners from the local jail, who had successfully broken out of their cells after the storm, were ambushing people carrying supplies across San Juanico bridge, which connects Tacloban with Samar island.

 A Facebook status warning of traffickers posing as relief workers and targeting women and children circulated on Thursday but the Guardian was not able to verify the report. Officials urged people to stay calm and not believe everything they heard. "There have been so many reports of looting and rape which have turned out not to be correct," Ricky Caradang, a spokesman for President Benigno Aquino III, told the local ABS-CBN TV channel.

 A nighttime curfew has been in place since Monday and in a televised report on Wednesday the BBC correspondent Rupert Wingfield-Hayes said Tacloban had turned into a "war zone". Footage showed tanks rolling through the centre of the devastated town and soldiers crouching behind walls with automatic rifles. Just what the threat was to the city had not been made clear, he said.

 Some aid agencies, fearing for the safety of their employees, have ordered teams to evacuate. Plan International has withdrawn all 15 of its employees – normally permanently based in Tacloban – until security is restored in the city, according to spokesman Ian Wishart. The fact that many aid workers had arrived in Tacloban but little aid had yet been distributed was creating a security concern, one aid worker told the Guardian. A memo was circulating among relief workers advising them not to move around in Tacloban as some UN staff had already been pulled out for security reasons.

 But officials have pointed to an increased presence of police and military, and the arrival of aid, as a turning point for the ravaged city.

 Carandang said 26 of 138 barangays (neighbourhoods) in Tacloban had received aid, with many of the roads previously blocked by fallen trees and debris now cleared.

 Oxfam has sent enough emergency water supplies for 20,000 families in Tacloban on a first-run delivery of effort, although the charity added that delivery was dependent on a stable security situation in the town itself.

 Plans are to provide half a million people affected by the super storm with emergency shelter, water and construction materials to rebuild their homes and boats. The World Food Programme successfully delivered nearly 25 tonnes of high-energy biscuits on Wednesday and another 10 tonnes were on their way, the UN body said.

 Much of the devastation wrought by Haiyan occurred in the Philippines' agricultural belt, with the majority of residents in Leyte and Samar working on farms or as fishermen. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hayes: "Progress is being made"

 The relief operation in the central Philippines to help those affected by Typhoon Haiyan is making progress following the arrival of a US aircraft carrier and its escort of two cruisers.

 More victims are receiving help but a BBC correspondent at the scene says there is still no large-scale food distribution taking place.

 The first mass burials have been carried out in Tacloban.

 The confirmed death toll, more than 2,300, is expected to continue rising.

 More than 11 million people have been affected by the typhoon, according to the UN.

 Unprecedented

 The top US commander in the Philippines told the BBC that US military support would be on an unprecedented scale.

 The USS George Washington, carrying 5,000 crew and moored off the east of Samar island, will expand search-and-rescue operations and provide a platform for helicopters to move supplies, the White House said.

 Two US destroyers are already in the Philippines and other US vessels are expected to arrive in about a week, the US Navy said.

 Pallets loaded with food and water have been taken from the aircraft carrier to Tacloban, the capital of badly hit Leyte province, and Guiuan, which was also devastated by the typhoon, on Samar's east coast.

 Image caption The big international aid operation is being given a further boost by the arrival of a US aircraft carrier

 Image caption Survivors have been forming long queues in the worst hit areas to collect food and water

 Image caption Aid officials are trying to gain a more accurate picture of the typhoon damage from the air

 Image caption Many buildings were flattened by the storm and others heavily damaged including this church in Tacloban

 US Marine Brigadier General Paul Kennedy told BBC Radio 5 live that the US aid effort was being stepped up to a level that has "probably never been applied" to a humanitarian crisis.

 The presence of the USS George Washington is expected to triple the number of available helicopters, which can also deliver hundreds of thousands of gallons of water every day.

 Food, water and medical help are beginning to reach residents of Tacloban as soldiers clear roads blocked by debris.

 But thousands of people continued to line up at the city's airport on Thursday to escape the difficult conditions.

 Aid at a glance Asian Development Bank: $500m (£312m) emergency loans and $23m in grants Australia: A$30m ($28m, £17m) package, including aircraft, medical staff, shelter materials, water containers and hygiene kits China: 10m yuan ($1.6m; £1m) in relief goods plus $200,000 (£120,000) from government and Red Cross European Commission: $11m (£6.8m) Indonesia: Logistical aid including aircraft, food, generators and medicine Japan: $10m (£6.2m), including tents and blankets. Pledged up to 1,000 soldiers, 25-person medical team already sent South Korea: $5m (£3.1m) plus a 40-strong medical team UAE: $10m (£6.2m) in humanitarian aid UK: $32m (£20m) aid package, sending aircraft carrier, destroyer and large transport aircraft US: $20m (£12.4m) in humanitarian aid, 300 military personnel, aircraft carrier and other ships, military aircraft plus logistics support Donate to the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) In pictures: Aid ramps up Typhoon Haiyan: Aid in numbers Q&A: Haiyan disaster management

 Many of the dozens of bodies which have been lying in the open since Haiyan struck are now being cleared from the streets and buried.

 The first of several hundred bodies were interred in a mass grave in Tacloban after samples were taken to enable identification, the authorities told AP.

 Philippine Health Minister Enrique Ona told the BBC that international criticism of the government's relief efforts was "unkind".

 He said the final death toll was likely to be "significantly lower" than an early estimate of 10,000, but warned that it was unlikely all victims would be identified.

 Looting

 The full extent of what is needed to help survivors has yet to emerge as aid workers struggle to reach more isolated areas.

 Guiuan, a town of 45,000, was heavily damaged by the typhoon. French aid charity MSF described the situation there as bleak.

 But the BBC's Andrew Harding, reporting from near Guiuan, says after earlier problems with looting, some supplies are now getting in.

 Other countries have also pledged help in the shape of financial aid, relief supplies or emergency teams.

 The UK government is sending the aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious, more than £20m ($32m) in aid, a team of medical experts and an RAF transport aircraft.

 China's latest pledge of $1.6m still looks pointedly small besides its previous aid packages to other nations - even to Japan, with whom it is also squabbling over territory China's aid controversy

 Japan is also preparing to send up to 1,000 troops as well as naval vessels and aircraft, Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said.

 China - which is engaged in a territorial dispute with the Philippines - is sending 10m yuan ($1.6m; £1m) in relief goods.

 Its initial pledge of $200,000 (£120,000) from the government and Chinese Red Cross combined drew criticism in US media, but was also condemned by some Chinese internet users as excessive.

 Unprecedented logistics

 Typhoon Haiyan, one of the most powerful storms ever recorded on land, hit the Philippines last Friday.

 Tacloban's airport was left in ruins by the storm, but in recent days US military planes have been arriving with World Food Programme supplies. A French-Belgian field hospital has also been set up.

 Manila sent troops to Tacloban to keep law and order, but correspondents say there is a growing sense of panic.

 In some areas survivors have resorted to digging up water pipes and extracting fuel from reservoirs at petrol stations.

 Health experts have warned that the worst-affected areas are entering a peak danger period for the spread of infectious diseases. ||||| The few doctors here said they've been treating cuts, fractures and pregnancy complications but expect to face more serious problems soon.

 Residents stand next to grafitti requesting aid in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan. As many as 10,000 people are feared dead in the strongest typhoon to hit the Philippines this year. (Photo: Kevin Frayer, Getty Images) Story Highlights The risk of waterborne diseases such as cholera will increase

 Getting in good clean water is a priority, said U.N.

 The government says planes, ships and trucks were on their way with help

 MANILA — Hundreds of injured people, pregnant women, children and the elderly have been crowding into a small building behind the control tower of this city's airport, one of the few places to find medical care here.

 The few doctors here said Wednesday they've been treating cuts, fractures and pregnancy complications but expect that soon they will be faced with more serious problems such as pneumonia, dehydration, diarrhea and infections.

 "Certainly there are many people who had chronic illnesses before this disaster struck who need to be taken to the medical treatment center that area still working," said Mathias Eick, Regional Information Officer, East, Southeast Asia and the Pacific, European Commission- Directorate General for Humanitarian and Civil Protection.

 "You have the elderly, small children, babies who are being born, there are many things."

 But because there is no clean running water, he said, the risk of waterborne diseases such as cholera will increase and that could cause serious trouble.

 "You have people sleeping out in the open, so malaria or dengue could be a threat," he said. "There are thousands of injured people who need medical treatment, and many of the medical facilities have also been damaged so they are working under very truing circumstances."

 Getting in good clean water is a priority, said U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos after touring Tacloban.

 Very little aid has arrived in the city because of clogged roads, broken bridges and ports, and an airport that until today was not able to operate at night given the electricity went out on the Friday that the typhoon hit and has not been restored. Power generators were flooded as well.

 Most of the aid is stuck in Manila and the nearby airport of Cebu, a 45-minute flight away.

 "There's a lot of dead bodies outside. There's no water, no food," said Dr. Victoriano Sambale, one of the dozen medical workers tending to thousands of people at the airport clinic.

 Until Wednesday there was no anesthetic.

 "Patients had to endure the pain," Sambale said.

 Clutching her swollen belly, 26-year-old Reve Rose was writhing on her side on a wooden bench as her husband looked on. Her first child was not due until around Christmas, but she feared she was in labor already. Sambale felt her belly and tried to calm her down, certain it was just a panic attack.

 "I am nervous, sad," she said. "The house is lost. Everything is gone."

 Thelma Superable, 74, was vomiting and needed emergency dialysis. She, her 51-year-old son, Danny Superable, and his young son have made their way to the clinic from their home, 20 miles away, by walking and hitching rides.

 "I am trembling because I am hungry," Danny Superable said. "It's survival of the fittest."

 The government says planes, ships and trucks were on their way with generators, water-purifying kits and emergency lights. The U.S. military said it was installing equipment to allow the damaged Tacloban airport to operate at night.

 Rick said more doctors and medical help is needed but there will be a great need to fly people in serious distress. The Belgian government was setting up a field hospital hospital Wednesday with doctors and nurses who can help with basic health needs, he said.

 "But certainly more chronic or serious cases will have to be evacuated from the zone and taken somewhere where there are still functioning health institutions," he said.

 But it could all be overwhelmed with an epidemic of diseases from people drinking dirty water and exposure to filth.

 "There could be other threats from especially the lack of proper sanitation facilities, children in the open getting chronic coughs or lung infections," he said. "All these issues are a threat to the population at the moment."

 Contributing: The Associated Press

 Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1cp4Zyo ||||| MANILA — Five days after Typhoon Haiyan ripped through the central Philippines, panic was spreading Wednesday and parched, hungry residents were resorting to increasingly desperate measures, including breaking into the homes of the dead.

 Eight people were crushed to death when a huge crowd stormed a rice warehouse near Tacloban, one of the worst-hit cities, authorities said. More than 100,000 bags of rice were carted away in the melee, according to news reports Wednesday.

 Elsewhere, residents dug up underground pipes and smashed them open to get water.

 PHOTOS: Central Philippines devastated by Typhoon Haiyan

 The official death toll stood at 2,275, but aid workers feared it would continue to grow. The United Nations estimates that more than 11 million people were affected by the storm, one of the most powerful ever to make landfall.

 As concerns grew about rampant looting and lawlessness, Philippine security forces sent reinforcements and imposed a nighttime curfew in Tacloban. Armed assailants have been holding up aid convoys headed to the city. On Tuesday, troops killed two suspected communist rebels who attacked one such convoy, the military said.

 Local officials said bands of looters, having cleaned out shops in Tacloban, were beginning to break into the homes of people who had died or fled the city. But there were reports that newly arrived troops were restoring order.

 Flights delivering aid from around the world are arriving at the airport in Cebu, which has been turned into a logistics hub for the relief effort. The many donations included a field hospital from Belgium and a portable purification plant from Germany, according to European officials.

 By the end of the day Wednesday, the United States had delivered nearly 274,000 pounds of supplies to Tacloban, about 100 miles northeast of Cebu, said two senior Obama administration officials who briefed reporters in Washington on condition of anonymity. The shipments included plastic tarps, hygiene kits, blankets and medical supplies.

 U.S. military personnel had also evacuated about 800 people from Tacloban to Manila for medical treatment.

 Philippine welfare personnel loaded up packages of rice and canned food provided by the World Food Program and distributed them to nearly 50,000 Tacloban residents. But even there, where the bulk of assistance has been delivered, bodies still lined the streets because, authorities said, there were not enough hands to remove them.

 Hundreds of additional Marines are expected to arrive in the Philippines by week's end to bolster the relief effort, which has struggled against logistical hurdles and the scale of the devastation.

 Aid has yet to reach many victims of the typhoon, known by Filipinos as Yolanda, particularly on outlying islands.

 "The major challenge is logistics," said Mathias Eick, a regional spokesman for the European Commission's humanitarian aid directorate. "With all this aid arriving and at the same time, the various Philippine authorities — military, civilian structures, the Philippine Red Cross — trying to distribute aid to so many communities ... obviously there are bottlenecks."

 Some of the logistical problems eased Wednesday, as remote airstrips and major roads were cleared of debris. However, fuel shortages and lack of power remain problems in rural areas.

 The longer the aid takes to arrive, the more people try to leave. Every day, desperate residents gather at Tacloban airport hoping for a spot on one of the departing supply planes.

 "It's a very natural decision to take," Eick said. "However, that of course makes it difficult for aid agencies to find out where people are going to, where people are staying, and how much is needed in the various towns."

 With much of the aid headed to Tacloban, on the island of Leyte, concern is growing for other hard-hit communities, such as the port of Ormoc.

 "There is enough food in Ormoc for about two or three days, but if aid doesn't come through soon ... the situation could descend into chaos," said Julien Anseau, a spokesman for the U.S.-based aid group ChildFund International. "What we are seeing is aid coming into Ormoc, but it's not staying in Ormoc, it's going on to Tacloban."

 An assessment team from the international aid group Doctors Without Borders visited Guiuan, in Eastern Samar province, where the typhoon first made landfall.

 "The village has been flattened — houses, medical facilities, rice fields, fishing boats, all destroyed. People are living out in the open; there are no roofs left standing in the whole of Guiuan," team leader Alexis Moens said in a statement. "The needs are immense, and there are a lot of surrounding villages that are not yet covered by any aid organizations."

 Defending the relief effort, Philippine Cabinet Secretary Rene Almendras said Wednesday that major roads have been cleared of debris and authorities have reached all but four affected areas to assess the needs. Additional logistics hubs are being established in Ormoc and at an airstrip in Guiuan.

 Aid deliveries will accelerate, Almendras told reporters. "It's just we have not seen anything on the magnitude that we are talking now."

 Amid the devastation, there were heartwarming moments of resilience. Daryl Dano flew from Manila to Tacloban to search for her family, whom she found alive. When she arrived in the morning, she said residents were busy sifting through the vast fields of debris for anything they could salvage. But at night, she said, she was amazed to see people light a bonfire and gather in a circle to sing.

 "They were sitting like Boy Scouts, sharing survival stories and what they did," she said. "They were sometimes even making jokes about the destruction around them.

 "I asked them why or how they could laugh?" she said. A person replied, "I just have to think happy thoughts. This is my second life. I just have to move on from this point to the next."

 [For the Record, 11:47 a.m. PST Nov. 14: In an earlier version of this post, Mathias Eick's last name was incorrectly given as Rick.]

 alexandra.zavis@latimes.com

 De Leon is a special correspondent. |||||
What is a one-paragraph summary of the above article?

– Help is finally beginning to reach hundreds of thousands of people struggling to survive in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan. The USS George Washington and two US cruisers have arrived in the Philippines and will distribute food, water, and medicine, as well as assist search and rescue operations in what the top US commander in the Philippines tells the BBC will be an American aid effort on an unprecedented scale. US planes are bringing in supplies and a medical ship is on the way; Britain is also sending an aircraft carrier, notes the BBC. In other developments: Supplies from the US and other countries are arriving, but some areas are still in desperate need of relief and "the major challenge is logistics," a European Commission spokesman tells the LA Times. "With all this aid arriving and at the same time, the various Philippine authorities—military, civilian structures, the Philippine Red Cross—trying to distribute aid to so many communities ... obviously there are bottlenecks." Lawlessness in the devastated city of Tacloban is also slowing the distribution of aid, the Guardian finds. A Red Cross convoy was allegedly hijacked by armed men and there are rumors that inmates who escaped during the storm have been ambushing people carrying supplies. Communist rebels have declared a ceasefire in disaster areas, but troops say there has been at least one attack. Some 2,357 people have been confirmed dead, but the toll is expected to rise significantly as remote areas hit hard by the storm are reached. In Tacloban, where bodies are being trucked to mass graves, the city administrator says he is sticking by his original estimate of 10,000 dead in the city alone. In a smaller city south of Tacloban, the devastation is even worse and a 16-member medical team from California is laboring in extreme conditions to help survivors, NBC finds. The volunteer surgeons—working by flashlight in Tanawan's ruined town hall—believe the region will need help for months. "I don’t know when or how we are going to be able to leave," one doctor says. "This is just the beginning of a wave of misery." USA Today has more on that front: The few doctors in Manila are already overwhelmed with hundreds of patients—and those are mostly minor injuries. They're soon expecting to see big problems like pneumonia, diarrhea, infections, and dehydration. And the New York Times looks at a hospital in Tacloban that has no power, where victims lay waiting for care. Food, water, and medical supplies are short; one patient interviewed by the Times says he has not received painkillers, antibiotics, or even an antiseptic for his wounds.