In the News
- Toddler shock on reality show
- Like stealing candy from a baby...
- Doctor: Boot Camp Teen Likely Suffocated
- The Doting Husbands Association?
- Mom in court outburst - Rages at killer on son's b-day
- N.Y. Man Charged After Toddler Found Drunk
- Magnet toy leads to 2-year-old boy's death
- High-fructose corn syrup fueling obesity epidemic, doctors say
Toddler shock on reality show
Bulgarian media and broadcasting authorities criticized a popular reality television show on Thursday for letting a toddler live in a house with 12 frolicking adults.
Media were initially delighted to find the cast of moderately famous Bulgarians on "VIP Brother" included self-described "sex hedonists," an ex-Playboy playmate, and former Miss Bulgaria Violeta Zdravkova.
But opinion shifted when Zdravkova brought her 3-year-old daughter Danaya to the show, which in previous years has featured nudity, sex and short-lived affairs between housemates.
"Little Danaya listens to sex lessons!" said the headline of a disapproving article in daily Trud.
Bulgaria's broadcasting regulator sent a letter expressing concern to Nova TV, the station airing the show.
"We are extremely worried at the presence in the house of a three-year-old, who has become an unwitting witness of indecent acts," it said, urging Nova to bring the show up to "public perceptions of moral standards."
Fans of the show have also complained.
But Nova said it would not kick the girl off the set.
"Only her mother can decide whether she should keep her daughter in the house," said the station's public relations officer Galina Dzhoreva.
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Like stealing candy from a baby...
A Los Angeles man and woman were each sentenced to two years in prison on Wednesday for stealing a gold chain from around the neck of a 5-year-old girl in January.
Julio Cesar Beltran, 18, and Patricia Serrano, 31, each pleaded no contest to one count of second-degree robbery and were given two year sentences by a Los Angeles judge, prosecutor June Chung said.
A videotape captured Beltran leaping from a car being driven by Serrano and grabbing two chains on the girl's neck as she stood in front of a meat market, Chung said.
Serrano ripped one of the chains off the girl, giving her an 8-inch (20-cm) cut, she said, and the couple admitted to police that they later pawned the necklace for drug money.
"It's very shocking to have a 5-year-old robbery victim," Chung said, adding that when the robbery was first reported "people were calling in from around the country offering to buy her a new necklace."
Chung said the girl still has a slight scar on the back of her neck but was otherwise doing well.
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Doctor: Boot Camp Teen Likely Suffocated
A teen who died after guards punched and kicked him at a boot camp likely was suffocated during the confrontation and was brain dead when he was brought to a hospital, a pathologist told lawmakers Friday.
Dr. Michael Baden observed the second autopsy performed on 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson on Monday in Tampa. He was there on behalf of Anderson's family, who disputes the original autopsy, which found the boy died of complications of sickle cell trait, a usually benign blood disorder many blacks have.
Speaking by telephone from New York, Baden told the state House Criminal Justice Committee that Anderson did not die of natural causes.
"He can't breathe, he can't get oxygen," he said. "When he leaves on that stretcher, he's already mostly brain dead."
But Dr. Charles Siebert, who conducted the first autopsy and witnessed the second one with Baden, said Friday that he saw nothing there to change his mind. He said in a phone interview with The Associated Press that he would review his findings when the results of the second autopsy are released.
Surveillance-camera videotape of the altercation at the Panama City boot camp has led some legislators and others to call for the closure of juvenile boot camps. Tampa-area prosecutors investigating the death agree with Baden's assertion that the boy didn't die of natural causes, but have declined to comment further because of the pending probe.
Anderson collapsed while doing exercises during his first day at the camp. The Bay County sheriff's office, which runs the camp, has said the guards were trying to get him to participate after he became uncooperative.
Baden said someone pressed on Anderson's back while he was on the ground - which could have kept him from breathing - and that a guard could be seen holding a hand over the boy's mouth.
"They did that, according to their report, so that he could inhale the ammonia that they were forcing up his nose" to revive him, Baden said.
He said hospital reports showed that an emergency room monitor indicated severe brain damage when he arrived.
Committee chairman Gus Barreiro said he wants Siebert, medical examiner for the district that includes Panama City, to appear before the panel.
Siebert told the AP that he stands by his findings that exercise triggered the sickle cell trait, which led to severe internal bleeding.
He said there was no clinical or physical evidence of pressure on the body or compression to the chest that could have caused the kind of asphyxiation Baden described. Anderson instead suffered from cellular asphyxiation when his blood cells assumed a sickle shape, clogging his arteries, he said.
"His cells were not able to get the oxygen they needed," Siebert said.
On Thursday, Siebert issued a statement saying it's not unheard of for medical experts to come to different conclusions after reviewing the same case. He complained he has been subject to "baseless and mean-spirited accusations from special interest groups" calling for everything from revoking his license to criminal charges.
The second autopsy was conducted by Dr. Vernard Adams, the district medical examiner in Tampa. Also there was Hillsborough County State Attorney Mark Ober, who was appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush to investigate the death.
No guards have been arrested or fired. The camp no longer houses any juveniles and is being closed.
Baden told the committee it may be several weeks before official results of the second autopsy are released. Tissue samples from the body are still undergoing laboratory tests.
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The Doting Husbands Association?
A group of Japanese men hoping to encourage the nation's legions of workaholic husbands to head home early and show their wives some appreciation have proclaimed Tuesday "Beloved Wives Day."
The group, which calls itself the "Japan Doting Husbands Association," urged men to get home by 8 p.m. and say thanks to their wives for all they do.
"Many men can't put their feelings of gratitude toward their wives into words. Work is number one for them," the non-profit group says on its Website, http://www.aisaika.org
"This attitude is putting Japanese marriages under great pressure."
Statistics bear this out. Japan's divorce rate has risen steadily over the years. In 2004, more than one in three marriages ended in divorce.
The group urges men to improve the marital mood through five "golden rules" including going home early, calling wives by their given name and looking them in the eyes when talking.
Many Japanese husbands call their wives "you" rather than addressing them by name, or in some cases merely grunt.
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Mom in court outburst: Rages at killer on son's b-day - January 20, 2006
The mom of a toddler killed last August by a driver playing a drunken prank angrily confronted her son's killer yesterday in a Bronx Supreme Court corridor, on what would have been the boy's fourth birthday.
"You murdered my son," screamed distraught mom Tasha Gibbs, who suffered serious injuries in the tragedy. "You're supposed to be in jail!"
Court officers shielded driver Freddy Rodriguez, who is free on bail, but Gibbs continued to vent her pain at the loss of her son, little Saquan Williams.
"You were driving drunk and murdered my son," the anguished mom cried. "Today is my son's birthday. We're supposed to be having a party, not visiting his grave."
Saquan and his mother were last together on Aug. 1, 2005, when they were run over on Mount Eden Ave. by a produce truck that investigators say was driven by a drunken man playing a prank on his friend. Gibbs' friend Giselle Buie, who was struck by the truck, was in court, too.
Rodriguez was indicted on charges of second-degree manslaughter and two counts of driving while intoxicated. He is due back in court March 16. Saquan's relatives want the judicial process to move quickly and send Rodriguez to prison for a long time.
"It's hard for me to talk about it," said Saquan Williams Sr. "My son is gone. We should be celebrating his fourth birthday today ... he loved SpongeBob and Spider-Man."
Jackie Williams, 23, said her nephew's life was cut short and she will come to each court hearing in support of her brother and to get justice for her nephew, who the family affectionately called Noodles.
After the family left court, they set up a makeshift memorial outside the Walton Ave. building where Saquan lived, that included balloons, candles and a collage of news articles about the accident and photos.
"It's so sad and painful for our family," said Jackie Williams. "He didn't get a chance to graduate from pre-school. Our family thinks about him all the time."
Defense attorney Arlen Yalkut, who represents Rodriguez, said his client is "remorseful and sorry that it happened."
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N.Y. Man Charged After Toddler Found Drunk - December 29, 2005
A 37-year-old man was charged with child endangerment after one of two toddlers he was baby-sitting was found drunk, authorities said.
Suffolk County sheriff's deputies investigating a family court case peered through the window of a Patchogue home Tuesday and saw Juan Reyes passed out with the children wandering around the house.
They managed to rouse Reyes, who was the only adult at home with the two toddlers, ages 2 and 3, according to the sheriff's office. The deputies said Reyes appeared extremely intoxicated.
The deputies also noticed the 2-year-old was having difficulty standing, had bloodshot eyes, smelled of alcohol and was lethargic.
The toddler was taken to the hospital, where tests revealed he was legally intoxicated, with a blood-alcohol content of 0.094 percent, the sheriff's office said. In New York, a driver is considered drunk with an alcohol content of 0.08 percent or greater.
The second child was taken into the custody of Child Protective Services.
At the time, the children's parents were at a hospital, where the mother was giving birth.
Reyes was arraigned Wednesday in First District Court in Central Islip and ordered held on $5,000 bail. He was scheduled to return to court on Jan. 3.
Robert Clifford, spokesman for the Suffolk County district attorney, said the children's family lives at the house where the toddlers were found. Reyes also gave that as his address during his arraignment.
The district attorney's office said Reyes was being represented by the Legal Aid Society. Calls to the society went unanswered Wednesday evening.
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Magnet toy leads to 2-year-old boy's death - December 20, 2005
A freak accident involving a popular toy has killed a 2-year-old boy and now, Kenny Sweet's parents hope that other parents can learn from their tragedy.
It was Thanksgiving Day when Kenny was rushed to Kirkland's Evergreen Medical Center emergency room with what his mom thought was the stomach flu. But five minutes later, Kenny had died.
"I heard 'code blue' and I was hysterical at that point," Penny Sweet said. "I thought maybe if we all could pray at the same time that we could pull him out, but no amount of prayers or people could save him at that point."
The King County Medical Examiner's report blames his death on a toy. The autopsy found tiny magnets, smaller than the eraser on a pencil, in Kenny's intestine.
The magnets were encased in plastic building blocks toys that Penny's 10-year-old son had been playing with. Penny says some of the magnets fell out, and Kenny apparently found them in the carpet and swallowed them.
"It's very dangerous. Who can police this?" asks Kenny's mother.
Doctors found the magnets in Kenny's small intestine - one at the top and one at the bottom. The magnetic force was so great it connected both ends, twisting his intestine and forcing deadly bacteria into his blood stream.
"It does say there is a choking hazard on here," Penny Sweet said. "Unfortunately, they don't say it causes serious injury or death, which is the kind warning they need to have on here."
Dr. Terry Woodward, Children's Hospital Chief of Emergency Medicine, is not connected with Kenny's case, but he explained what happens when the intestine is twisted: "As it twists farther, you lose blood supply to the intestine. Once you lose blood supply, then it starts to die."
Mega Bloks, based in Montreal, manufactures the toy. It's one in a series called Magnetix.
A spokesperson for the company said that in nearly 70 years in the toy business, this is the first death resulting from one of their toys. The spokesman said the Magnetix toys are still on the shelf, but Mega Bloks is investigating.
With Christmas just days away the Sweets didn't want to wait for the company's findings, they want to warn other parents immediately.
Mega Bloks reported Kenny Sweet's death to The Consumer Product Safety Commission. The commission confirmed for KOMO 4 News it does have an "open investigation."
Mega Bloks says it's up to the commission to decide if the toy should be pulled off toy shelves.
In October, Toy Wishes, a self-described family entertainment guide, named the Magnetix as one of the top 12 toys for Christmas this year.
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High-fructose corn syrup fueling obesity epidemic, doctors say
High-fructose corn syrup isn't completely responsible for the nation's 6 million overweight children — but Dr. George Bray says it's a big part of the problem.
Nurture trumps nature in the current childhood-obesity epidemic, says Bray. It's the environment we're creating for our kids that's the problem, and that environment includes increasing numbers of products high in high-fructose corn syrup, or HFCS.
Bray, who served as founding president of the North American Association for the Study of Obesity and organized the first international congress on obesity in 1973, points out that between 1970 (when HFCS was introduced) and 2000 (when average yearly consumption of the ultra-sweet liquid sugar hit 73.5 pounds per person in this country), the prevalence of obesity more than doubled, from 15 percent to almost one-third of the adult population.
And worse, much worse, obesity among children 12 to 19 — who consume a disproportionate amount of the soft drinks, fruit juice, sports drinks and packaged cookies and other baked goods that are sweetened with HFCS — increased from 4.2 percent in 1970 to 15.3 percent in 2000.
Dangers of obesity
The implications for our children's future are clear: "We know that if it's not caught early, one in three of these overweight children will grow into overweight adults at increased risk for type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke and early death," Bray said at an October presentation in Fort Worth.
But there is hope. Obesity is largely preventable through changes in lifestyle, especially diet, says Bray, who called for removing soda machines from schools and reducing portion sizes of commercially available sodas in his now-famous commentary in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in April 2004.
Larger portions, more high-fat fast foods, less exercise of any kind, irregular sleep patterns, lower consumption of milk and other high-calcium foods, and increased consumption of HFCS in beverages go a long way toward explaining the obesity epidemic, Bray says.
"Genetic factors play an important role in the development of obesity, but given the rapidity with which the current epidemic of obesity has descended on the U.S. and many other countries, environmental factors are a more likely explanation," he says. "Whatever its genetic and biochemical determinants, obesity in man is susceptible to an extraordinary degree of control of social factors. Environment is very important."
You stop feeling full
Bray says the problem with HFCS is not only that it is sweeter than other forms of sugar, but also that it does not affect appetite. Fructose adds to overeating because it does not trigger chemical messengers that tell the brain the stomach is full and no longer hungry, like food and drinks that contain regular refined sugar do.
An internist whose pioneering research helped establish the connections between weight gain and the development of type 2 diabetes, Bray is a research professor and former director of the Pennington Center at Louisiana State University, the largest nutritional research center in the world.
He says consumers would be a lot better off without added sugar in any form, but that artificial sweeteners are much preferred over calorically sweetened drinks, even for children.
"Children less than 5 probably shouldn't have any sweetened drinks, and for older children, diet drinks are better than regular soft drinks and fruit drinks," Bray said. "A lot of parents are concerned about the 'chemicals' added to sweeten diet soft drinks, but all forms of extra added sugar and artificial sweeteners are bad. We don't need added sugar in our diet."
Bray is calling for improved packaging and labeling for food meant to be consumed as a single serving. Too many ready-to-eat foods and drinks are labeled as single servings but packaged as two or even three servings.
"It's hard to find a single-serving soft drink," he said. "Portion size is something government (the Food and Drug Administration) can and should do something about."
Cutting back the sugar
Here are some easy ways to cut down on high-fructose corn syrup and other added sugars:
- Buy only 100 percent juice instead of fruit "drinks," "punches," "cocktails" or "-ades," which are simply code names for added sugar — primarily high-fructose corn syrup.
- That said, choose whole fruits over fruit juices. Even 100 percent juices supply a concentrated source of fructose and calories without the fiber and nutrients found in whole fruits. Limit juice to one 8-ounce serving a day.
- Cut back on soda. A single 12-ounce can contains about 13 teaspoons of sugar in the form of high-fructose corn syrup. Drink water, seltzer, sugar-free iced teas and low-fat milk instead.
- Choose fruits canned in juice instead of heavy syrup and opt for unsweetened applesauce and frozen fruits.
- Snack on a handful of nuts, a chunk of cheese or piece of fruit instead of sweets.
- At breakfast, eat a bowl of low-sugar whole-grain cereal instead of a cereal bar, toaster pastry, doughnut or sweet roll.
- High on sugar:
The federal dietary guidelines recommend that we limit added sugars to about 8 teaspoons (32 grams) a day for an average 2,000-calorie diet. But many soft drinks far exceed that. Although the following bottles are labeled as 2 ½ servings per container, most people consume them in one sitting:- Arizona Raspberry Iced Tea (20-ounce bottle): 15 teaspoons of sugar
- Pepsi (20-ounce bottle): 17 teaspoons of sugar
- Hawaiian Punch (20-ounce bottle): 18 teaspoons of sugar
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