The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Monday, December 6, 2010 - 3A
NEWS BRIEFS
MENOMINEE, Mich.
Memorial held in
Mich. school for
Wisconsin shooter
Hundreds of people showed
up yesterday for a memorial to a
15-year-old Wisconsin boy who
held his social studies class hostage
before shooting himself last week,
setting aside the terrifying stand-
off to honor him as a quiet, helpful
leader who loved the outdoors.
Sam Hengel's family held the
gathering in a school auditorium
in Menominee, Mich., because
they expected so many support-
ers. Menominee lies just across the
Menominee River from Marinette,
" Wis., where Hengel held 26 class-
mates and his teacher at gunpoint
for nearly six hours.
Barb Post of Marinette, Wis., said
she didn't know Hengel's family but
attended anyway to show support.
"You care about the people and
the family, and you understand it
could happen to anybody," Post said.
Why Hengel took his class hos-
tage remains a mystery. Other stu-
dents and his teacher have said
he was well-liked and had many
friends.
The standoff last Monday at
Marinette High School began when
Hengel returned to his sixth-hour
Western Civilization class from a
bathroombreak.
LINCOLN, Mont.
Unabomber's
1.4-acre land on
market for $69,500
A i.4-acre parcel of land in west-
ern Montana that was once owned
by Unabomber Ted Kaczynski is on
the market for $69,500.
The listing - by John Pistelak
Realtyof Lincoln - offers potential
buyers a chance to own a piece of
"infamous U.S. history."
"This is a one of a kind property
and is obviously very secluded," the
listingsays. It doesn'tsay who owns
the property.
The forested land, which had
been listed at $154,500, does not
have electricity or running water.
Photos posted with the online
listing show tall trees, chain-link
fences topped by barbed wire and
a tree with "FBI" carved into it,
though it's not clear why. Pistelak
said Friday he couldn't immedi-
ately comment on the listing, and
he didn't return phone messages
yesterday.
The property does not include
Kaczynski's cabin, which is on dis-
play at the Newseum in Washing-
ton, D.C.
CARACAS, Venezuela
Chavez tells hotels
to shelter those left
homeless by flood
President Hugo Chavez said yes-
terday that he would force privately
owned hotels to help shelter tens
of thousands of Venezuelans who
have left their homes due to floods
and mudslides caused by weeks.of
torrential rains.
"I want the tourism hotels,"
Chavez said during a visit to the
coastal state of Miranda. He said
his government would pay for flood
victims to remain at the hotels until
the rains subside. "We will occupy
them under lease."
Chavez also announced that his
government would build apart-
ments near Simon Bolivar Interna-
tional Airport, the country's largest
and busiest airport, and other resi-
dential complexes inside El Avila
National Park, a mountainous
swath of land separating Caracas
* from the coast.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand
23 protected seals
clubbed to death
New Zealand police and con-
servation officials are hunting
offenders who clubbed to death 23
protected fur seals, including new-
born pups.
Conservation Minister Kate
Wilkinson said Monday some of
the eight bludgeoned pups were
just days old when they were killed.
She's "beyond appalled" over the
deliberate and abhorrent attacks.
Wilkinson appealed for public
W help to find those responsible.
The attacks involved the Ohau
Point seal colony on northern South
Island and is north of the town of
Kaikoura - an international whale-
watching center.
The conditions of the carcasses
suggest the attacks took place over
two weeks.
- Compiled from
Daily wire reports.
Texas judge to
hold hearing on
death penalty law
rc r
DON HEUPEL/AP
Dale Kasprzyk, acting head of the Drug Enforcement Administration in Buffalo, stands in front of a chart outlining suspects
in a prescription drug ring.
N.Y. bust. uncovers Rx
,drugs going to ealers
33 medical patients
charged with selling
pills to dealers
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) - Ethel
Johnson couldn't get her pre-
scription for pain medication
filled fast enough. The 60-year-
old Buffalo woman was hurt-
ing - but investigators say that
wasn't the reason for the rush.
According to secretly record-
ed telephone conversations, the
sooner Johnson could pick up
her pills, the more quickly she
could sell them to her dealer.
Her pain pills were destined for
the street.
Johnson is among 33 people
charged so far in a large-scale
investigation that has opened a
window into an emerging class
of suppliers in the illicit drug
trade: medical patients, includ-
ing many who rely on the pub-
licly funded Medicaid program
to pay for their appointments
and prescriptions. She has
pleaded not guilty.
For the first time, the Buffalo
investigators devoted the kinds
of resources normally aimed at
street drugs like heroin or crack
- wiretaps, buys, surveillance
and cross-agency cooperation
to trace the drugs from phar-
macy to street. Even they were
taken aback by the burgeoning
market for the kinds of pills
found in medicine cabinets in
typical American homes.
"I have to admit we were
sort of surprised at how big
this had become," said Charles
Tomaszewski, former supervi-
sor of the DEA office. "The sub-
urbs, the city, there was no area
that wasn't touched by this."
Often at no charge, the
patients see a doctor, or sev-
eral doctors, and come away
with prescriptions for narcotic
OxyContin and other pills they
then sell to a dealer for as much
as $1,000. If they are on Medic-
aid, the program is billed about
$1,060 for a typical 60-pill,
80-mg prescription, along with
the $23-to-$39 cost of the doc-
tor's visit.
"These patients, in essence,
become the source for the
drugs," said Dale Kasprzyk, act-
ing head of the Drug Enforce-
ment Administration in Buffalo.
"This is a lucrative under-
ground business for people," he
said.
A report last year by the Gov-
ernment Accountability Office
estimated that 65,000 Medicaid
beneficiaries in New York and
four other states had visited six
or more doctors in fiscal 2006
and 2007 to acquire duplicate
prescriptions for controlled
substances.
The cost to Medicaid was
$63 million for the drugs alone,
excluding doctors' exams. The
report examined Medicaid
abuse in New York, Califor-
nia, Illinois, North Carolina
and Texas, high-volume states
in Medicaid prescription drug
payments.
OxyContin, a time-release
formulation of oxycodone,
packs 12 hours' worth of pain
relief into one tablet. It is espe-
cially prized by drug abusers,
authorities say, because it can
be crushed and ingested, snort-
ed or injected for the full nar-
cotic impact, a heroin-like rush.
The criminal cases brought in
July by U.S. Attorney William
Hochul's office in Buffalo illus-
trate how patients are coached
about which doctors to see and
what to say when they get there.
Prosecutors, in November court
filings, said plea agreements are
being negotiated.
"Tell him, you know, you
know you've been in a lot of
pain, your throat is complain-
ing. And then, you know, even
throw a little of that stress on
about your baby," alleged Buf-
falo kingpin Michael McCall
instructs a 40-year-old patient-
supplier in a conversation
recorded by investigators.
"You need to tell doctor you
need to go up to 90 (pills) 'cause
...you've been taking three a day
and you ran out earlier," he says.
When another patient, a
60-year-old woman, tells
McCall a doctor is insisting on
a urine test to be sure she's tak-
ing the prescribed medication,
McCall responds: "You want
some?" and offers to bring the
urine to her home.
Dealers "don't have to get
their money together, smuggle
or reach out to connections
in Mexico or anything," said
Tomaszewski, who helped
oversee the Buffalo crackdown
before becoming the city's dep-
uty police commissioner. "They
were clever enough to find the
sources of supply were in their
own neighborhood."
After buying the pills from
patients, dealers resell them for
an average of $1 a milligram,
investigators say. With a single
80-mg OxyContin selling for
$80, the 90-count bottle of pills
McCall allegedly paid $1,000 or
less for was worth $7,200 on the
street. Authorities say he would
meet his'suppliers in pharmacy
parking lots or pick up the pills
at their homes - even getting
some patients' prescriptions
filled himself, signing for them
at the pharmacy.
After OxyContin was intro-
duced in 1996, it quickly became
the top prescribed painkiller
in the nation, and among the
most abused. The Food and
Drug Administration in April
approved a new version of
the painkiller with a coating
designed to make the drug hard-
er to crush and snort or inject.
States have cracked down, as
well, with New York and others
adopting tamperproof prescrip-
tion pads.
To curtail abuse by Medicaid
patients, several states, includ-
ing Alaska, Florida, Maine,
Ohio, South Carolina and West
Virginia, require state approval
before OxyContin prescrip-
tions are filled, according to the
National Conference of State
Legislatures.
Harris County has
sent 286 convicts to
death row since 1982
HOUSTON (AP) - In the
deeply Republican state that has
executed more convicts than any
other and the county that has sent
the most to death row, an unusual
legal proceeding will begin this
week: A Democratic judge will
hold a lengthy hearing on the con-
stitutionality of the death penalty
in Texas.
State District Judge Kevin
Fine surprised many Texans last
spring when he granted what is
usually a routine and typically
rejected defense motion and ruled
the death penalty unconstitution-
al. His ruling came in the case
of John Edward Green Jr., who
is awaiting trial on charges he
fatally shot a Houston woman and
wounded her sister during a June
2008 robbery.
Followinga torrent of criticism
from Republican Gov. Rick Perry
and other Texans, Fine clarified
his ruling, saying the procedures
the state follows in getting a death
sentence are unconstitutional.
Then Fine rescinded his ruling
and ordered the hearing, which
starts today, saying he needed
more information before making
a final decision.
Most Texans consider the
death penalty a fitting pun-
ishment for the worst kind of
crimes, and Harris County, which
includes the state's largest city,
Houston, has sent more inmates
to the lethal-injection gurney
than any other in Texas. But, anti-
death penalty activists have cre-
ated serious doubt recently about
whether two men were wrongly
executed.
Fine is an unusual Houston
jurist: a Democrat who sports
dense tattoos and has said he's a
recovering alcoholic and former
cocaine user.
He declined to be interviewed
for this story, but he's said that
he's taken notice of recent death
row exonerations and his ruling
will "boil down to whether or not
an innocent person has actually
been executed."
But Fine also has said he has no
personal interest in the death pen-
alty, he believes the death penalty
is constitutional and the hearing
will be limited to issues related
to Green's case. The hearing,
which could last up to two weeks,
is expected to include testimony
that Green's attorneys say will
show how flaws in such things as
eyewitness identification, confes-
sions and forensic evidence have
led to wrongful convictions.
Green's attorneys say the hear-
ing is not a referendum on wheth-
er Texas should have a death
penalty.
"We don't say a state doesn't
have the right to have a death
penalty," attorney Casey Keirnan
said. "We're saying the way we
do it in Texas under our statute is
unconstitutional."
The debate over possible
wrongful executions in Texas
has been fueled by the cases of
Cameron Todd Willingham and
Claude Jones.
Willingham was put to death
in 2004 after being convicted of
burning down his home in Corsi-
canain 1991 and killinghis 2-year-
old daughter and 1-year-old twins.
His execution has been ques-
tioned since several fire experts
found serious fault in the arson
findings that led to his conviction.
Jones was convicted inthe 1989
killing of a liquor store owner
during a robbery near Point
Blank, about 75 miles north of
Houston. His 2000 execution was
called into question after a new
DNA test showed a hair that had
been the only piece of physical
evidence linking him to the crime
scene didn't belongto him.
Green's attorneys say they
plan to bring up the Willngham
and Jones cases at the hear-
ing. They claim the state's death
penalty procedures violate the
Eighth Amendment right to free-
dom from cruel and unusual pun-
ishment because they create a
"substantial risk" that innocent
people are wrongfully convicted
and sentenced to death.
Harris County prosecutors,
who unsuccessfully tried to get
Fine removed from the case,
declined to comment before
today's hearing. But in a peti-
tion filed last month, they asked
the Texas Court of Criminal
Appeals to stop the hearing, say-
ing Fine doesn't have the author-
ity to declare the state's death
penalty law unconstitutional and
higher courts, including the U.S.
Supreme Court, have previously
rejected Eighth Amendment chal-
lenges to capital punishment.
Prosecutors said Fine has
shown "antagonism against the
death penalty" and a jury should
decide Green's fate.
The appeals court is dominat-
ed by Republicans and led by a
chief judge who was disciplined
for closing the court promptly at
5 p.m. while a death row inmate
tried unsuccessfully to file an
appeal hours before he was exe-
cuted. But it denied the prosecu-
tion's motion, saying it couldn't
act until Fine ruled.
Anti-death penalty groups
have lauded Fine, while those in
favor of capital punishment call
him misguided.
"It's appropriate that a Har-
ris County judge is stepping up
and saying we need to take a time
out and look at the system," said
Scott Cobb, president of the Texas
Moratorium Network, a group
that advocates for a suspension of
executions in the state.
Harris County has sentenced
286 people to death since Texas
resumed executions in 1982, and
115 of those have been executed.
Sign up and SAVE!
i100 Off any MCAT, LSAT, GMAT,
r GRE course. Now is the perfect
.me mto prep with one of the nations
eaders in test preparation.
'Small Classes
'Expert Inatructors
Free Extra Help
U.K. Parliament assistant
Qoruc~r. kJ]P R J
u%, U 1.x.0 %. u V p1"%-/ 1.16 1 WI
Aide worked with
lawmaker for more
than two years
LONDON (AP) - A member of
the House of Commons Defense
Committee said yesterday that
his Russian assistant is facing
deportation as a suspected spy.
Mike Hancock said he was
unaware that the security ser-
vices had any suspicions about
his aide, Katia Zatuliveter, 25,
until she was detained.
Hancock, 64, is a member of
the House of Commons Defense
Committee, and the European
Security and Defense Assembly
of the Western European Union,
a security and defense organiza-
tion. He is a Liberal Democrat,
the junior party in the Conserva-
tive-led government.
In October, The Sunday
Times reported that Home Sec-
retary Theresa May has already
approved Zatuliveter's deten-
tion. The Home Office declined
to comment, saying it never com-
ments on individual cases.
"She is not a Russian spy. I
know nothing about espionage,
but she has been subjected to
a deportation order," Hancock
said. "She is appealing it because
she feels, quite rightly, that she
has done nothing wrong."
The Sunday Times said Zatu-
liveter was stopped and ques-
tioned at Gatwick airport in
August when she returned to
Britain.
Hancock said the security ser-
vices had never told him of their
concerns about Zatuliveter.
"No one has ever said to
me under any circumstances
whatsoever that she has been
involved in anything like that,"
he said. "It is now in the hands
of her lawyers. I am sure that in
the end she will be proved to be
right."
Hancock said Zatuliveter had
been a full-time researcher in his
officer for 2 1/2 years, and earlier
had worked there as an intern.
"As far as I am concerned,
there was nothing she was
doing for me that was sensi-
tive. Defense Select Commit-
tee papers have been leaked to
newspapers before now, and
I have never read anything in
a Defense Select Committee
paper or report which was worth
someone believing they couldn't
get from another source," Han-
cock said in an interview with
the BBC.
He said her work included
hosting constituents visiting
Parliament, writing speech-
es and working on early day
motions, which serve as expres-
sions of lawmakers' opinions.
"Katia was ambitious, she had
ideas to go a lot further than just
working for an MP in the House
of Commons," Hancock said.
Other legislators were cau-
tious in commenting on the case.
Yvette Cooper, the opposition
Labor Party's spokeswoman on
foreign affairs, said she knew
nothing at Zatuliveter's case.
"Depending on what happens
in this individual case, if there
do turn out to be problems and
breaches of security here, then
obviously the wider security in
Parliament would need to be
looked at," Cooper said.
Conservative lawmaker Iain
Duncan Smith said he had never
met the woman.
"Trouble is, I would say nor-
mally this would be a joke but
actually after what's been going
on with some of the spies that
Russia seems to have put into all
sorts of places, you have totake it
quite seriously really I suppose,"
Duncan Smith said in an inter-
view with Sky News.
In July, the government
revoked the British citizen-
ship of Anna Chapman who was
among 10 people who pleaded
guilty in the United States to
procuring information for a for-
eign government.
H--, OK