2A - The Michigan Daily - Thursday, September 14, 1995 Ito fines prosecution, allows DNA evidence Los Angeles Times LOS ANGELES - Scrambling to conclude their rebuttal case, prosecu- tors in the murder trial of0.J. Simpson dropped plans yesterday to introduce evidence about Simpson's failure to surrender to police, lost a battle to tell the jury that fibers on a bloody glove probably. came from a Ford Bronco such as Simpson's and got fined for showing up to court late. They won the right to introduce new DNA evidence,-however, and presented it to the jury through a witness who said that bloodstains in Simpson's car con- tained genetic markers matching those of the defendant and murder victim Ronald Goldman. The witness, state Department ofJus- tice analyst Gary Sims, testified that he combined DNA from three bloodstains found on the console of Simpson's Ford Bronco. Once he had done that, there was enough DNA to conduct an RFLP test, a very precise analysis that yielded the results suggesting a mixture of the blood of the defendant and a victim with whom Simpson had no known contact. "The finding of that pattern on the console," Sims said, "is consistent with the mixture and the banding pattern of the defendant, Mr. Simpson, and also the contribution of Mr. Goldman." Under cross-examination, Sims ac- knowledged that he could not account fbr the handling of the car during the months after police towed it from Simpson's home to a police garage. During that period, a number of un- authorized people entered the vehicle, and Simpson's lawyers have suggested that they could have compromised any evidence later taken from it. Sims' testimony was part of yet an- other tumultuous day in the Simpson case, which has grown more frantic as it has wound toward conclusion. Prosecutors danced on the edge of a contempt-of-court charge, and Los Angeles County District Attorney Gil Garcetti, in a furious denunciation of the judge, threatened to appeal the fine that Ito imposed against them. Defense attorneys, meanwhile, filed. an appeal of Ito's decision not to strike selected portions of former Detective Mark Fuhrman's testimony, and pressed their efforts to secure the testimony of an FBI agent who has accused a col- RATIONA EPORT . Study: Being plump is bad for health BOSTON - Being even a little bit plump is bad for your health, a major new study of American women found. Health experts have long recognized the hazards of true obesity, but the new research from Harvard Medical School suggests that even love handles are a bad thing. Indeed, within reason, it appears that thinner's always better. "It's a fairly simple message," said Dr. JoAnn E. Manson, who directed the study. "Even mild to moderate overweight is associated with a substantial risk of premature death." Federal weight guidelines, which have been criticized as too liberal, say women over age 35 who are 5-foot-5 can safely weigh between 126 and 162 pounds. But the new research suggests that anything over 119 is too much. In fact, at middle age, the average American woman - 5-foot-5, between 150 and 160 pounds - runs a 30 percent higher risk of death than that of someone her height who weighs less than 120, Manson and her colleagues conclude. The lowest death rate is among women who are at least 15 percent below the AP PHOTO Defense attorney Robert Blasler (right) asks questions of glove expert Richard Rubin during the O.J. Simpson trial. league of pressuring him to "bias my interpretation" of evidence in another case. Defense lawyers want that agent, Frederic Whitehurst, to testify in the Simpson case because the agent he ac- cused is Roger Martz, an analyst called by the defense during the Simpson trial but whose account regarding scientific tests favored prosecutors. Yesterday, prosecutors said they would fight the effort to call Whitehurst, arguing that his testimony is irrelevant to Simpson's guilt or innocence. Simpson, 47, has pleaded not guilty to the June 12, 1995 slayings of Goldman, 25, and Simpson's ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, 35. Mindful ofthe jury's restlessness, Ito had scheduled an early morning session to hear legal arguments on the admissi- bility of the evidence relating to Simpson's actions on June 17, the day he was scheduled to surrender to police, but ended up in a widely televised low- speed freeway pursuit instead. To avoid delaying further testimony in the trial, Ito directed attorneys for both sides to be in his courtroom at 8:30 a.m. to argue the issue. Defense lawyers showed up as sched- uled, but prosecutors did not, and it was a testy Ito who demanded an explana- tion from Clark. She apologized and said that a member of the government team had an emergency - prosecutors later acknowledged that the deputy dis- trict attorney, who was not named, had merely overslept. Ito fined the district attorney's office $250 for failing to appear or to notify him. "Excuse me, Your Honor," Clark re- sponded with obvious pique. "May I remind the court that Mr. Shapiro kept the court waiting on the stand - and suffered no sanction." Ito glowered back and said: "Thank you. The sanction will be $1,000." Although prosecutors have generally prevailed in arguments before Ito, that sanction enraged members of the dis- trict attorney's office, including Garcetti. "What thejudge did today was outra- geous," Garcetti said during a news conference, leveling an extraordinary blast at Ito. "It was vindictive, it was petty, it was uncalled for. I've told my people I do not want them to pay that fine. This office will not pay this fine." Garcetti visited Ito's courtroom later that afternoon. As he left, he said he had paid the unexpected visit to his deputies because there were a "a couple of things I needed to get clear with Marcia and Chris." The district attorney declined to de- scribe the substance of their conversa- tion, but left little doubt the topic was Ito's sanction. "I am sick and tired," he said, "of this judge not treating the prosecution fairly. The defense gets away with murder; we get hit. This is not about just one thing. But in this instance there just isn't any legal basis for what he did to Marcia. He overstepped all legal grounds when he increased his sanction without warn- ing, simply because she stood up." Ito later agreed to back off the $1,000 fine, however, and went back to to the original $250 fine. . Before testimony began yesterday, Ito rejected the latest prosecution effort to tell the jury that fibers from a glove found at Simpson's Rockingham estate matched samples taken from Simpson's car and that those fibers only were used in an extremely small number of ve- hicles. average weight for people their height,l Red Cross tones down AIDS program NEW YORK - The American Red Cross is seeking to tone down the con- tent of its AIDS-prevention program at the behest of its president, Elizabeth Dole, The New York Times reported. Although internal Red 'Cross docu- ments did not suggest any political motivation, some Red Cross officials told the Times the move by the organization's board of governors was reflecting Mrs. Dole's desires at a time when her husband was trying to appeal to conservatives. Her husband, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, has sought to emphasize his conservative credentials in his quest for the Republican presidential nomination. "It is unconscionable," Shana Ross, the HIV-AIDS commissioner for the Red Cross' Houston chapter, was quoted in yesterday's Times. "I have to take into account that this is because of who our president is, who her husband is and the fact that he's involved in a cam- paign now for the presidency, and he is seemingly losing ground to opponents who are more conservative than he is." A spokesman for the Dole campaign, Nelson Warfield, said Mrs. Dole's work Manson said. at the Red Cross was "strictly separate" from the campaign. The organization's chairman, Norman Augustine, said the board in- tervened at Mrs. Dole's request be- cause she has "some strongly held per- sonal views." Red Cross spokesman Roy Clason, said Mrs. Dole was not available for comment. Consumer prices rose .1% last month WASHINGTON - Big declines in the cost of gasoline and airline tickets held consumer price inflation to a tiny 0.1 percent last month while the economy showed fresh signs ofperking up. The good news on inflation, disclosed in the Labor Department's Consumer Price report, came yesterday as the Fed- eral Reserve released its latest national survey of economic conditions. The Fed survey, compiled from re- ports from the Fed's 12 regional banks, said construction activity was strength- ening in many parts of the country. The Chicago and St. Louis districts noted strong home sales and Cleveland, At- lanta and San Francisco reported a re- bound in nonresidential construction. _ A'w- I i I Looking for Business Experience? Join The Michigan Daily Finance Staff " Be responsible for daily billing, figuring commissions, tearsheets, assisting with payroll and accounts payable and the reconciliation of the phone bills. * 10 hrs./week, flexible around your schedule! " Contact Heather Rooney at 763-3246 between 8 a.m.-5 p.m. to set up an interview. Paintings reported stolen in Calif:never left Italy . 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Ambroselli, 57, was arrested last week after more than three years of investigation by the FBI and the Italian Arma de Carabinieri art theft unit. The retired Alitalia employee is ac- cused of swindling State Farm by claim- ing that the paintings, an Iranian silk rug, a Russian icon and a jade Buddha were stolen in 1992. Police found the rug, icon and statue wrapped in sheets stuffed into a duffel bag when they searched his house on Friday. "Can you imagine State Farm com- ing to your house and insuring your house without even having an appraiser look at it?" said art professor Phil Hitchcock of California State Univer- sity at Sacramento. "They should have never insured those." The insurance agent who visited Ambroselli's house in a gated commu- nity in Loomis, 20 miles east of Sacra- mento, was shown two sealed wooden crates. Oo A ROU ND T HE W Belarussians shoot down balloonists; 2 Americans killed MINSK, Belarus- The Belarussian military shot down a helium balloon during an international race, killing its two American pilots, Belarus and U.S. officials said yesterday. The Clinton administration com- plained that it wasn't notified for a full day. Belarussian authorities said the Americans, flying close to an air base and a missile site Tuesday near the Polish border, didn't respond to a radio call or warning shots fired by a military helicopter. The names of the two Americans were withheld pending notification of their relatives. The helium balloon was hit near the village of Beryioza, but it wasn't imme- diately clear how the craft was downed, according to the U.S. Embassy in Minsk. The wreckage and the bodies were found several hours later in a wooded area, the Russian news agency ITAR-Tass said. A second American balloon was forced to land, but its two-man crew was unharmed, said Nicholas Burns, a State Department spokesman in Wash- ington. "This is so senseless. We are not talking about people on a spy mission here," said Ruth Ludwig, editor of Bal- ORLOD looning, the journal of the Balloon Fed- eration of America. "It's the most be- nign thing people could do, float around the sky."~ One team of Americans - Richard Abruzzo and Jacob Traub - landed in Gerny this week. Three other two- member American teams are compet- ing, Ludwig said by telephone from Pope Mills, Vt. Irish leaders work to legalize divorce DUBLIN, Ireland - The govern- ment began a new campaign yesterday to legalize divorce in this mostly Catho- lic country, despite strong opposition from church leaders and traditionalists who helped sink the proposal nearly a decade ago. The government called the existing constitutional ban on divorce grossly unfair to the estimated 75,000 people stuck in failed marriages. Yet the proposed amendment also sets strict conditions on divorce to pre- vent Ireland from developing what For- eign Minister Dick Spring called "a quickie divorce culture." The Family Law (Divorce) Bill stipu- lates that a divorcing couple must have lived apart for at least four years and proved that "there is no reasonable pros- pect of a reconciliation." - From Daily wire services i BOOKSTORE I FREE STUFF YOU CAN REALLYUSE FROM YOUR - + FRIENDS AT htfrb'pt O il *A FREE FUTON WITH FRAME FROM DREAM ON FUTON "A YEAR'S SUPPLY OF PEPSI e UNLIMITED FREE MOVIE PASS FOR A YEAR The Michigan Daily (ISSN 0745-967) is published Monday through Friday during the fall and winter terms by students at the University of Michigan. Subscriptions for fall term, starting in September, via U.S. mail are $90. Winter term (January through April) is $95, year-long (September through April) is $160. On-campus subscriptions for fall term are $35. Subscriptions must be prepaid. 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