Thursday, January 08, 2015

BAUAW NEWSLETTER, THURSDAY, JANUARY 8, 2015

Petitioning San Francisco Planning Department
This petition will be delivered to:
San Francisco Planning Department

Refuse Lennar Urban Developers a Permit to Demolish Candlestick Stadium Through Implosion.

https://www.change.org/p/san-francisco-planning-department-refuse-lennar-urban-developers-a-permit-to-demolish-candlestick-stadium-through-implosion

Shirley Moore
San Francisco, CA
 Imploding Candlestick Park will further exaserbate the environmental health problems of this community. Extensive medical research backs up the connection between particulate matter exposure and many of the diseases Bayview Hunters Point residents already suffer from at the highest rates in this city - asthma and ischemic heart disease. Medical literature says particulate matter is also associated with risks of premature deaths, especially in the elderly and people with pre-existing cardiopulmonary disease. In children particulate matter exposre means reduced lung function, a condition that may plague them for the rest of their lives.
Also, concerns exist about brief exposure to implosion dust clouds as far as 6 to 12 miles from the implosion site, potentially affecting over two million lives.
To prevent further endangering this community with the dust from an implosion, we are demanding that Lenar is held to the mechanical dismantling that they put forward in their initial  EIR application in 2010 that was approved by all city agencies and the community.
This is a disenfranchised Bayview neighborhood in San Francisco. Similar work has been done all over the city during the last twelve months in more affluent neighborhoods and numerus buildings have been deconstructed using mechanical dismantling. It is only in this Southeast corner of the city that politicians and developers feel they can act with impunity towards the health and safety of the community.
Our community has been left out of the conversation, permits have been applied for without the knowledge of promninent community organizations. This is why we're asking for your help. We need to get our voices heard. We need the city to know that our lives matter.
Letter to
San Francisco Planning Department
Refuse Lennar Urban Developers a Permit to Demolish Candlestick Stadium Through Implosion.


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

Bay Area United Against War Newsletter

Table of Contents:

A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS

B. ARTICLES IN FULL



*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*



A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS



*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*


SHUT DOWN CREECH!

Mass Mobilization to Stop Drone Wars!

A Convergence For Peace in the Nevada Desert

Join us March 4-6, 2015 at Creech Air Force Base, Indian Springs, Nevada, for a national mobilization of nonviolent resistance to shut down killer drone operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan,Yemen, Somalia, and everywhere. Sponsored by CODEPINK: Women for Peace, Nevada Desert Experience , Veterans For Peace, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, and Voices for Creative Nonviolence. CODEPINK will also hold vigils daily on March 2nd and 3rd, prior to the official beginning of this Creech Convergence For Peace, and welcomes everyone to join them.


In 2005, Creech Air Force Base secretly became the first U.S. base in the country to carry out illegal, remotely controlled assassinations using the MQ-1 Predator drones, and in 2006, the more advanced Reaper drones were added to its arsenal.  Creech drone personnel sit behind computers in the desert north of Las Vegas and kill "suspects" thousands of miles away.  Recent independent research indicates that the identity of only one out of 28 victims of U.S. drone strikes is known beforehand. Though officials deny it, the majority of those killed by drones are civilians. In 2014, it was leaked that the CIA's criminal drone assassination program, officially a separate operation from the Air Force's, has been piloted all along by Creech's super-secret Squadron 17. 


Since 2009 dozens of activists have been arrested for allegedly trespassing at Creech, in attempts to stop the indiscriminate killing and burning of innocent people by drones.  At the trial of the "Creech 14," the first Americans prosecuted for trespass at a drone base, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark testified that "to have a baby burn to death because of a 'no trespass'  sign would be poor public policy, to put it mildly."  In a time of burning children, the "no trespass" signs attached to the fences that protect the crimes perpetrated with drones are not legitimate, and they do not command our obedience.  After all, it is the U.S. military that is guilty of lethal trespassing.


The US drone program is rapidly proliferating as air bases are being converted to drone bases across the U.S. and abroad, but Creech remains the primary air base in U.S. state-sponsored global terrorism. Creech is where the killer drone program started--it is where we shall end it.


We must put an end to this desecration of our Mother Earth and all creatures who inhabit it.

We must put an end to the dehumanization of lives from Ferguson to Palestine to Pakistan.

We must close all foreign U.S. military bases.  Money for human needs. 

We must put an end to drone warfare, drone surveillance, and global militarization.

We must...
SHUT CREECH DOWN! 
More details to come soon!

Sign up on facebook https://www.facebook.com/events/1525740921010540/?context=create&previousaction=create&source=49&sid_create=3742154553#

Or contact:

Toby Blomé of Code Pink, 510-215-5974 (h)

Brian Terrell of VCNV and NDE,   773-853-1886

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*





Save the Date - UNAC National Conference, May 8 - 10, 2015


UNAC is the major national antiwar coalition in the U.S. today.  The existence of a United National Antiwar Coalition is vital and we need your financial support to continue our work and to expand.

With U.S. wars today accelerating and expanding globally in various forms – from drone attacks on Yemen and Pakistan, never-ending wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, support to neo-fascists in Ukraine, and proliferating Africom forces to threats of war for regime change in Syria – we have an obligation to do whatever is possible to educate the public and to take action to stop the carnage.

The wars abroad are connected to global warming with most wars fought over energy resources with the U.S. war machine as the largest polluter.

At home, we see hugely growing income inequality, a militarized and racist police force, mass incarceration of Blacks and Latinos, and a massive police state apparatus that includes global surveillance and laws to quell dissent.

In spite of the trillions spent by the U.S. corporate war government and its controlled media propaganda machine to keep us in check, the people are fighting back.  We’ve been inspired and strengthened by the hundreds of thousands of new activists taking to the streets of this country to stop police brutality, to build Occupy encampments, to fight for decent wages, to demand full rights for immigrants, to win marriage equality, to end global warming, to demonstrate solidarity with the besieged people of Gaza, and to protest unending U.S. wars.

UNAC has played an active, often leadership role, in all of the antiwar and social justice movements of our time.  While most activists are focused on their particular issues, the most vital role we can play is to connect the issues to their source.  All of the injustices and crimes we protest, stem from the imperialist insatiable drive for expanding profit and control – and the U.S. is the largest imperialist power militarily and economically.  When there should be plenty for all, only the obscenely wealthy benefit while the rest of the 99% struggle just to survive.

Some of our recent major accomplishments:
·       Initiated protest against NATO and 15,000 marched in Chicago in 2012.
·        Called for immediate actions against threats of war and coups directed at Libya, Iran, No. Korea, Africa, Latin America,    Ukraine, and maintaining the U.S. presence in Iraq and Afghanistan.
·        Organized a national tour for Afghan leader Malalai Joya.
·        Sent representatives to international NATO protests and conferences.
·        Serve on the Board of the National Coalition to Protect Civil Freedoms to act against Islamophobia , racist attacks on Muslims, and attacks on our civil liberties.
·        Participated in national efforts to organize anti-drone actions.
·        Campaigned to defend victims of government repression who speak out and expose Washington’s crimes, including Rasmea Odeh, Mumia abu Jamal, Lynne Stewart, Chelsea Manning, and the Midwest activists targeted by the FBI.
·        Produced national educational conference calls featuring experts on topics such as U.S. intervention in Africa, the destruction of Libya, the developing wars in Syria, and others.
·        Built an antiwar contingent in the massive New York City Climate Change march and built Climate Change action in other cities around the country.
·        Helped organize protests against Israel’s attack on Gaza
·        Helped organize protests against the murder of Blacks by white police and the militarization of the police forces in the U.S.

UNAC has a history of bringing hundreds of activists together at large national conferences to learn about the issues of the day, to discuss the way forward and to vote on an Action Program for the coming period.

The UNAC conference next May will bring activists from all the movements in motion to cross-fertilize these struggles.  We are particularly dedicated to bringing young activists together to support and learn from each other.  For this, we need your help to offer subsidies to leaders from Ferguson, from the border wars in the southwest, from the Native Americans who are fighting against the pipelines ruining their lands, from the Students for Justice in Palestine, and many others.

Please give generously so that we can continue our work to bring harmony and justice to the peoples of this earth.

You can send a check to UNAC at PO Box 123, Delmar, NY 12054 or click the button below to contribute on-line with your credit or debit card.

 https://www.unacpeace.org/

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

On Behalf of Wadiya Jamal and
Mumia Abu-Jamal,
A Contribution Request

The message following is a forward from:
Rachel Wolkenstein
Sister, Advocate and Friend of the Extended Family

Samiya “Goldii” Abdullah, a daughter of Wadiya Jamal and Mumia Abu-Jamal died on December 17, 2014 after years of battle with breast cancer. Samiya would have been 37 this January 9 and is survived by two young daughters, Aiyanah and Aaiyah, affectionately known as Dolly and Puddy, ages eleven and four.

Samiya was a remarkable woman. She was accomplished as a musician, an activist and rapper on social justice, particularly in the struggle for Mumia’s freedom. She devoured books and education. During her long, often debilitating illness, Samiya finished her Masters Degree in School and Mental Health Counseling from the University of Pennsylvania with honors. She was dedicated to her young daughters and wanted them to grow up loving each other as much as she did her brothers and sisters. And she wanted her daughters to see Mumia (called “Pop Pop” by them) walk out of prison and home with their grandmother, Wadiya.

Samiya's active fight for Mumia's freedom, began at the young age of four. Mumia wrote about this in “The Visit” printed in Live from Death Row in 1994. This was recreated in the movie "Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary."

"My father is still considered to be a dangerous individual … his mind is what they fear, there is over- whelming evidence that would exonerate him of his conviction.
"He is an innocent man and the commonwealth has always known this, but being too Black, too smart, and too strong … The government will silence anyone that possesses the power to open the minds of the people."   
                     —Goldii

Samiya’s strength, character and spirit were nurtured by Wadiya and Mumia and are being passed on to her daughters.

On behalf of Wadiya Jamal and Mumia Abu-Jamal, this is a request for funds to assist Wadiya for care of her granddaughters, Dolly and Puddy.

A financial contribution of any amount will be greatly appreciated.

Please send checks or money orders, made payable to Wadiya Jamal:

Wadiya Jamal
P.O. Box 19404
Kingsessing Postal Station
Philadelphia, PA 19143-9998

In loving memory of Samiya and in tribute to her fierce fight for life,

Rachel Wolkenstein
Sister, Advocate and Friend of the Extended Family


Hear Mumia’s Words (and Song) played before the Janazah for Samiya on December 20, 2014: “Samiya Abdullah Makes Transition”:

http://prisonradio.org/sites/default/files/audio/uploads/SamiyaAbdullahMakesTransition12-19-2.mp3?download=1

 - This fwd message is from:
The Labor Action Committee to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal,
PO Box 16222, Oakland CA 94610. www.laboractionmumia.org

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

Cops vs Free Speech
How police are threatening Mumia, convicts, teachers, and all of us with censorship as well as bullets!


• The New “gag” law in Pennsylvania that seeks to silence prisoners. This law, cobbled together in days following Mumia’s recorded presentation to a commencement ceremony at Goddard College, was explicitly designed to “shut him up.” The targets of this blatantly unconstitutional law, however, include all prisoners convicted of violent crimes!

• A Law Suit has been filed to stop the “gag” law from being implemented!  Support for this effort is critical. Donations will go toward the fight against the “gag” law.

• The  suppression of the “Urban Dreams” web site by the Oakland School Board. This teacher-created site of voluntary curriculum ideas included one comparing the suppression of Mumia’s commentaries with censorship of Martin Luther King’s later writings. While the Superintendent of Schools has now promised to restore the site, we must remain vigilant!

• Both of these measures—the “gag” law in Pennsylvania, and the suppression of the Urban Dreams website—were taken at the behest of the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP)!  The FOP is a highly politicized organization which seeks to silence social critics such as Mumia Abu-Jamal, and dictate the curricula in schools! The FOP and Democrat/Republican politicians will continue their attempts at intimidation and suppression, unless we act!

• Ferguson shows that black and Latino youth particularly are threatened by militarized and politicized police who shoot first and ask questions later, and frame their targets for crimes they didn’t commit. Chief targets have included Native American Activists like Leonard Peltier, militant working-class activists, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Black Panthers and Martin Luther King. Mumia is currently a top target to silence.  But anyone and everyone can be on their enemies list, and in their cross-hairs!  Fight back now!

Donate Now
to fight the “gag” law!
go to:
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/protect-freedom-of-speech-keep-mumia-on-the-air

The Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
PO Box 16222  •  Oakland CA  •  510.763.2347
www.laboractionmumia.org

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

Support Prison Radio

$35 is the yearly membership.

$50 will get you a beautiful tote bag (you can special order a yoga mat bag, just call us).

$100 will get the DVD "Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary"

$300 will bring one essay to the airwaves.

$1000 (or $88.83 per month) will make you a member of our Prison Radio Freedom Circle. Take a moment and Support Prison Radio

Luchando por la justicia y la libertad,

Noelle Hanrahan, Director, Prison Radio

PRISON RADIO

P.O. Box 411074 San Francisco, CA 94141

www.prisonradio.org
info@prisonradio.org 415-706-5222



*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*


COURAGE TO RESIST
http://couragetoresist.org/

New Action- write letters to DoD officials requesting clemency for Chelsea!

November 24, 2014 by the Chelsea Manning Support Network
mchugh_md
Secretary of the Army John McHugh
President Obama has delegated review of Chelsea Manning’s clemency appeal to individuals within the Department of Defense.
Please write them to express your support for heroic WikiLeaks’ whistle-blower former US Army intelligence analyst PFC Chelsea Manning’s release from military prison.
It is important that each of these authorities realize the wide support that Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning enjoys worldwide. They need to be reminded that millions understand that Manning is a political prisoner, imprisoned for following her conscience. While it is highly unlikely that any of these individuals would independently move to release Manning, a reduction in Manning’s outrageous 35-year prison sentence is a possibility at this stage.
Take action TODAY – Write letters supporting Chelsea’s clemency petition to the following DoD authorities:
Secretary of the Army John McHugh
101 Army Pentagon
Washington, DC 20310-0101
The Judge Advocate General
2200 Army Pentagon
Washington, DC 20310-2200
Army Clemency and Parole Board
251 18th St, Suite 385
Arlington, VA 22202-3532
Directorate of Inmate Administration
Attn: Boards Branch
U.S. Disciplinary Barracks
1301 N. Warehouse Road
Fort Leavenworth, KS 66027-2304
Suggestions for letters send to DoD officials:
  • The letter should focus on your support for Chelsea Manning, and especially why you believe justice will be served if Chelsea Manning’s sentence is reduced.  The letter should NOT be anti-military as this will be unlikely to help
  • A suggested message: “Chelsea Manning has been punished enough for violating military regulations in the course of being true to her conscience.  I urge you to use your authorityto reduce Pvt. Manning’s sentence to time served.”  Beyond that general message, feel free to personalize the details as to why you believe Chelsea deserves clemency.
  • Consider composing your letter on personalized letterhead -you can create this yourself (here are templates and some tips for doing that).
  • A comment on this post will NOT be seen by DoD authorities–please send your letters to the addresses above
This clemency petition is separate from Chelsea Manning’s upcoming appeal before the US Army Court of Criminal Appeals next year, where Manning’s new attorney Nancy Hollander will have an opportunity to highlight the prosecution’s—and the trial judge’s—misconduct during last year’s trial at Ft. Meade, Maryland.
Help us continue to cover 100% of Chelsea’s legal fees at this critical stage!
> > > Please donate today! < < <



Courage to Resist
484 Lake Park Ave. #41
 Oakland, CA 94610
510-488-3559
couragetoresist.org

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*




 B. ARTICLES IN FULL




*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*


1) Three Al Jazeera Journalists Remain in Jail After Egyptian Court Orders a Retrial
By





2) A Look at the Problem of Rape in US Prisons
"More than half of all sexual assaults behind bars are committed by prison staffers, according to the U.S. Department of Justice..."
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS




3) Inmate Advocates Worry About Prison-Rape Law's Fate
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS





4) Race and Voting Rights in Ferguson
By




5) Privilege of ‘Arrest Without Incident’

6) Analysis: Mexico Scandals Taint Government
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS





7) On the Open Road, Signs of a Changing Cuba
By




8) Reports of Civilian Deaths Prompt Inquiry Into Strikes Against ISIS
By




9) Family of Mentally Ill Woman Who Died in Custody Sues
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS





10) New Research Links Scores of Earthquakes to Fracking Wells Near a Fault in Ohio
By




11) As Police Go Idle, So Do New York City Courts
By and




12) Texas Abortion Clinic Rules Tested in Appeals Court
By




13) A Bus Takes a Local Route to Fighting Mexican Corruption
By PAULINA VILLEGAS




14) Two Mississippi Men Plead Guilty to Hate Crimes
By RICHARD FAUSSET




15)  Health Premiums Rise More Slowly, but Workers Shoulder More of Cost
By


























*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Three Al Jazeera Journalists Remain in Jail After Egyptian Court Orders a Retrial
By

CAIRO — Egypt’s highest appeals court on Thursday ordered a retrial for three imprisoned journalists from Al Jazeera’s English-language service, implicitly acknowledging critical procedural flaws in a case that rights advocates have described, from the men’s arrests to their convictions, as a sham.

But the decision offered no guarantees that the journalists, who have been imprisoned for more than a year and now face a potentially lengthy second trial, would be freed anytime soon.

The convictions of the three men, Mohamed Fahmy, Baher Mohamed and Peter Greste, focused international condemnation on the government, drawing attention to a sweeping crackdown on news media freedom and political dissent since the military ouster of the country’s first democratically elected president, Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood.And from its beginnings, analysts say, the case has perhaps had little to do with the actions of the journalists themselves. Instead, they suggest it reflects a bitter dispute between Egypt’s military-backed government, led by President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, and Qatar, which owns Al Jazeera and has been a strong backer of his Islamist opponents in the Muslim Brotherhood.

The men were convicted in June on charges that included conspiring with the Muslim Brotherhood to broadcast false reports, though prosecutors presented no evidence for such claims. All three were sentenced to seven-year prison terms, but Mr. Mohamed received three additional years for possessing a spent bullet casing that he picked up at an anti-government street protest.

The case has drawn special notice partly because the defendants had reputations as experienced journalists and had in the past worked for other well-known international news organizations. But their ordeal, which the men have outlined in letters from prison and in messages sent through family members, has also highlighted the plight of thousands of Egyptians — including Islamists, leftist activists and other journalists — swept up by the authorities on charges that are widely viewed as politically motivated.

As the families of the Al Jazeera journalists sifted through the meaning of the latest court decision on Thursday, they applauded the court’s apparent criticism of the first trial but expressed disappointment that the judges had not granted a request to suspend the men’s sentences.

“We’ve learned not to expect anything,” said Mr. Greste’s father, Juris Greste. “We did expect a little better than this.”

Amal Clooney, a lawyer for Mr. Fahmy, noting what she said were numerous irregularities with the first trial, said her client could not rely solely “on the Egyptian judicial system to give us a necessarily fair or speedy outcome.”

In addition to focusing on the court proceedings Mr. Fahmy’s legal team was “doubling its efforts on the political and diplomatic tracks,” she said. “That seems to be the most promising way to achieve the outcome that is just.”

Mr. Sisi has said that the journalists should have been deported rather than stand trial, but he has so far insisted that the government does not interfere in judicial decisions.

A recent thaw in relations between Egypt and Qatar, brokered by Saudi Arabia, has raised hopes that the Egyptian president might be more willing to free the men. In December, in a major concession, Qatar suspended the broadcast of an Egyptian affiliate of Al Jazeera that had been sharply critical of Egypt’s government.

But the Qatari government has also refused to extradite Brotherhood leaders and supporters wanted by the Egyptian government, a source of continuing tension, according to Egyptian officials.

Although the appeals court did not give specifics for its decision, it is regarded as among Egypt’s most rigorous and independent legal bodies and may have been eager to remove the stain on Egypt’s judiciary after the spectacle of the first trial.

It was unclear whether the ruling made it any more likely that Mr. Sisi would step in before or during the retrial. The delay of a final decision could be useful in diplomacy with Qatar, or it could be viewed as an obstacle if Egyptian officials were quickly trying to rid themselves of a public-relations headache.

Mr. Sisi had issued a decree in November allowing him to deport non-Egyptians convicted of crimes, in an apparent sign that his government was seeking face-saving ways to end what has been an embarrassing case.

The decree could free Mr. Fahmy, who holds Canadian and Egyptian citizenship and Mr. Greste, an Australian, but it would not help Mr. Mohamed, an Egyptian citizen.

Ms. Clooney said that Mr. Sisi could act in several ways to free the journalists, including by granting a pardon at any time, releasing them on humanitarian grounds, or deporting Mr. Greste and Mr. Fahmy. “There is no reason this can’t happen quickly, and today’s decision doesn’t change that,” she added.

In their request for a new trial, lawyers argued that the previous case had had procedural errors, including that a “special court” had been illegally designated to hear the case, according to Negad el-Borai, another lawyer for Mr. Fahmy. The prosecutor also requested a new trial, Mr. Borai said, though the reasons have not been made public.

The defendants were not present Thursday, and reporters were barred from entering the court until after the hearing. Relatives of the men spoke to reporters after the decision and seemed stunned that they would not be released.

“I don’t know what the next step is,” said Marwa Omara, Mr. Fahmy’s fiancée. “It seems like it’s a long battle.” She added that Canadian officials needed to “do more.”

Lawyers said Thursday that the three journalists could still be granted bail at the start of their new trial, which is expected to begin within a month.

In a statement after the court decision, Al Jazeera said that the Egyptian authorities had a choice: “Free these men quickly, or continue to string this out, all the while continuing this injustice and harming the image of their own country in the eyes of the world. They should choose the former.”

Merna Thomas contributed reporting.





*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

2) A Look at the Problem of Rape in US Prisons
"More than half of all sexual assaults behind bars are committed by prison staffers, according to the U.S. Department of Justice..."
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Inmate advocates worry that a proposal to reduce the financial penalties for states that don't comply with a 2003 federal law aimed at eliminating rape behind bars will severally damage it.

The measure failed this fall. Its sponsor, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, vows to re-introduce it in the new GOP-controlled Congress.

Cornyn said the funds include grants for worthy programs — such as ones that support rape and domestic violence victims — and that the law should be more narrowly tailored to affect money that goes to prison construction, operations and administration.

Supporters of the measure acknowledge the change would essentially eliminate the financial penalties, since little — if any — federal grant money is used for prison construction, daily operations and administration.

Those costs are typically handled by local government budgets.

A LONG-IGNORED PROBLEM: PRISON RAPE

Inmate advocates had lobbied for years for policymakers and lawmakers to address the problem of prison rape. Federal statistics show about 216,000 adult and juvenile inmates are sexually assaulted each year, compared to 238,000 in the overall U.S.

More than half of all sexual assaults behind bars are committed by prison staffers, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, and more than half of those employee-on-inmate assaults are committed by women.

Among the most vulnerable populations are the mentally ill, juveniles and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender inmates.

ATTITUDES BEGIN TO CHANGE IN THE 1990s

By the mid-1990s, more than half of the states passed laws defining staff-on-inmate sexual misconduct as a criminal offense.

And in 1994, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that federal prison officials in Terre Haute, Indiana, failed to take reasonable measures to protect a transgender woman who was repeatedly raped after she was sent to live with the general male population.

A UNANIMOUS VICTORY

Prison rape survivors, inmate advocacy groups and evangelical organizations lobbied Congress to pass a law that aimed to end sexual assault behind bars. In 2003, Congress unanimously passed it.

The law's requirements ranged from increased training of staff about sex abuse policies to screening new inmates to determine if they're likely to commit sexual assault or to be assaulted.

If states opt out of the law or don't comply, they stand to lose 5 percent of federal funds they get for prison operations.

$110 MILLION, AND CHANGE

In all, states have spent more than $110 million in state and federal funds to implement the law. By last fall, every state was supposed to certify that it had instituted dozens of the standards.

So far, New Jersey and New Hampshire say they are compliant with the law's requirements, and 43 states and the District of Columbia are working toward that goal. All states have made some improvements to follow the law.

Pennsylvania developed a web-based incident reporting program, and is working to improve prosecution strategies to ensure that rapists are brought to justice. Colorado and Oregon, for example, are using software to help track sexual assault reports.

SOME STATES OPT OUT, CITING COST, AUTONOMY

Texas, Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Nebraska, Utah and Idaho have opted out, arguing that it's too costly to implement requirements that they say don't give them the flexibility to administer their facilities the way they see fit.

Texas, for example, says a requirement to prevent guards from seeing inmates of the opposite sex naked in the showers or during strip searches wouldn't work because 40 percent of the correctional officer workforce is female.

TOO EARLY TO SAY IF LAW IS WORKING

Federal surveys show the nation's rate of sexual victimization behind bars has remained steady for at least 7 years, with nearly 1 in 10 adult inmates reporting attacks. The rate is the same for juveniles, although that has improved slightly since 2008.


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) Inmate Advocates Worry About Prison-Rape Law's Fate
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

When Jan Lastocy was repeatedly raped by a Michigan state prison guard, she felt she'd become invisible. There was no rape crisis center hotline. She'd been warned that inmates were never believed over guards.

She was among roughly 216,000 prison rape victims not included in America's national rape statistics.

So when Congress passed a law in 2003 aimed at ending sexual assault in U.S. prisons, jails and juvenile detention centers, survivors like Lastocy hoped that it would help solve the long-ignored problem.

Lastocy and a coalition of inmate advocacy groups and evangelical groups had worked for years to convince policymakers and corrections officials that rape behind bars shouldn't be accepted, even if the public had little sympathy for its victims.

"I felt vindicated because I had been fighting so hard, and for so long, to bring attention to this issue and get justice for myself and for all survivors," said Lastocy, who was repeatedly raped by a guard while serving time for embezzlement.

Now, some advocates worry that a proposal to reduce the law's financial penalties will severely damage it. The measure failed this fall, but its sponsor, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, vows to re-introduce it in the new GOP-controlled Congress.

Cornyn said the funds include grants for worthy programs, such as ones that support rape and domestic violence victims. He said the law should be more narrowly tailored to affect money for prison construction, operations and administration.

The proposal has put some prison rape survivors on the opposite side of those who survived sexual assault on the outside.

Nearly two dozen organizations, including prison industry groups and the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, have lauded his efforts. They say they trust prison officials to work vigorously at reducing rapes even without financial penalties.

"There's no desire to do anything less than help victims," said Rebecca O'Connor, RAINN's vice president of public policy, adding that her organization just wants to make sure the law is applied in a way that doesn't harm existing programs.

Advocates say the measure is the latest sign that the law's implementation is too slow.

Federal statistics show about 216,000 adult and juvenile inmates are sexually assaulted each year, compared to 238,000 people living outside of correction facilities in the U.S.

Allen Beck, a statistician with the U.S. Department of Justice who researches the incidence of prison rape, said the biggest indicator of prisoner sexual assault is the culture of the facility, not the number of inmates or security cameras.

"Really it's about how the facilities are managed, in terms of institutional culture," Beck said.

When Lastocy stepped into Camp Branch, a minimum security women's prison in Michigan, in 1998, she was facing as much as 10 years in prison for attempting to embezzle several thousand dollars from her employer, ABO Security.

As she adjusted to the discovery after her arrest that she had bipolar disorder, rape quickly became a fact of life.

Like many prison rape survivors, she feared that the guard who raped her could extend her prison stay by writing her false tickets for breaking prison rules if she reported him. He was later convicted of sexually assaulting several inmates, including Lastocy.

When she learned that she may have been his first victim, she felt guilt for not speaking up, said Lastocy, who now is an advocate for prison rape survivors.

The passage of the law, however, gave her hope that there would be fewer victims. But like other advocates, she's been frustrated by the pace of change at correctional institutions throughout the country.

So far, seven states have opted out of the law, and stand to lose 5 percent in federal money that goes toward prisons. Two states — New Jersey and New Hampshire — say they are in compliance, and 41 others are working to meet the law's requirements.

The law's backers say Cornyn's proposal would essentially gut the penalty because little, if any, federal grant money actually goes toward prison administration, operations and constructions. Those are funded by state and local governments.

To take the provision out "would totally obliterate the incentive states have to comply with" the law, said U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton, the chairman of the former National Prison Rape Elimination Commission.

The commission developed the law's requirements, which range from increased training of staff about sex abuse policies to screening new inmates to determine if they're likely to commit sexual assault or to be assaulted.

In Texas, which has six facilities among those nationally with the highest prevalence rate of sexual assaults, officials used nearly $2.6 million in federal money to install extra cameras in some facilities and develop a sexual assault awareness curriculum.

The state has since opted out, and faces an $800,000 loss in federal funding.

Jason Clark, a corrections spokesman, said a requirement to prevent guards from seeing inmates of the opposite sex naked in the showers or during strip searches wouldn't work because 40 percent of the correctional officer workforce is female.

Many states have trained staffers and educated inmates about how to spot and report sexual assault.

Addressing sexual assault and caring for victims "decreases the likelihood of an offender becoming a victim again and committing a violent act once he or she returns to the community," said Norah West, Washington state's corrections spokeswoman.

Eight state correctional facilities comply with the federal law, West said. Nine more are set to be audited in 2015.

For Lastocy, the trauma didn't end when she left prison.

She struggled with terror as she watched her teenage daughter begin to navigate the dating. She worked to repair her wounded marriage, trying to explain to her husband why she didn't tell him, or anyone, about the rapes.

She still has nightmares, 15 years after her ordeal.

"I know the judge did not sentence me to be raped," said Lastocy. "As much as I despise him, I don't even wish my rapist would be raped while he is in prison, because nobody deserves it."


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

4) Race and Voting Rights in Ferguson
By

For most people, Ferguson, Mo., will be remembered for one awful August afternoon, when a white police officer there shot and killed an unarmed black teenager, Michael Brown.

But that incident was only a snapshot in the town’s long and complicated racial history — a history characterized by entrenched segregation and economic inequality, as well as by familiar and systemic obstacles that have kept black residents from holding positions of political power.

Ferguson’s population is two-thirds African-American, and yet its mayor, city manager and five of its six City Council members are white. So are its police chief and all but three officers on its 53-member police force.

The school board for the Ferguson-Florissant School District is much the same: More than three-quarters of the district’s 12,000 students are black, but the seven-member board includes only one African-American.

Last month the American Civil Liberties Union sued the school board under the Voting Rights Act, arguing that the way its members are elected blocks minority voters from fully participating in the political process.

The method is known as “at large” voting, and lets voters cast ballots for all candidates in the district, regardless of where the voters live. Since the district’s voting-age population is 50 percent white and 47 percent black, and since both groups there tend to vote along strict racial lines, the white voters’ candidates almost always win.

The lawsuit, filed in a Missouri federal court on Dec. 18, contends that the white board members have not been attentive enough to the needs of black students, and in 2013 the board dismissed the district’s first black superintendent without explanation.

The suit calls for at-large voting to be replaced with another system, like one that allows residents to vote for a candidate who lives in their part of the district, which would make it possible for majority-black neighborhoods to elect board members of their choice.At-large voting is not necessarily discriminatory, but it has long been one of the most common tools for reducing minority voting power. It is also by far the most common ground for successful claims under the Voting Rights Act, and courts have repeatedly struck down at-large voting schemes around the country where plaintiffs have shown that, when combined with racial polarization, they weaken minority voters.

In 1982, the Supreme Court explained that minority voting power “is particularly diluted when bloc voting occurs and ballots are cast along strict majority-minority lines.”

That is the case in the Ferguson-Florissant School District, where blacks and whites also live in extreme geographical and economic segregation. (The St. Louis metropolitan region as a whole is among the most racially segregated in the nation.)

There are other solutions to the problem of racial polarization. Alternative vote-counting methods — like cumulative or choice voting — may do a better job of giving minorities a voice, especially as redistricting efforts grow more sophisticated. And more municipalities are starting to realize on their own that there is not much to gain by defending at-large election systems.

The bottom line is that while democratic elections will always favor majorities, they must also protect the interests of minority populations of all kinds — and give them an equal opportunity to elect the candidates they choose.


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

5) Privilege of ‘Arrest Without Incident’



The day after Christmas, a shooter terrorized the streets of a Chattanooga, Tenn., neighborhood. According to the local newspaper, the shooter was “wearing body armor” and “firing multiple shots out her window at people and cars.” One witness told the paper that the shooter was “holding a gun out of the window as if it were a cigarette.”

There’s more:

“Officers found two people who said they were at a stop sign when a woman pulled up in a dark-colored sedan and fired shots into their vehicle, hitting and disabling the radiator. Then more calls reported a woman pointing a firearm at people as she passed them in her car, and that she fired at another vehicle in the same area.”

When police officers came upon the shooter, the shooter led them on a chase. The shooter even pointed the gun at a police officer.Surely this was not going to end well. We’ve all seen in recent months what came of people who did far less. Surely in this case officers would have been justified in using whatever force they saw fit. Right?

According to the paper, the shooter was “taken into custody without incident or injury.”

Who was this shooter anyway? Julia Shields, a 45-year-old white woman.

Take a moment and consider this. Take a long moment. It is a good thing that officers took her in “without incident or injury,” of course, but can we imagine that result being universally the case if a shooter looks different? Would this episode have ended this way if the shooter had been male, or black, or both?

It’s an unanswerable question, but nevertheless one that deserves pondering. Every case is different. Police officers are human beings making split-second decisions — often informed by fears — about when to use force and the degree of that force.

But that truth is also the trap. How and why are our fears constructed and activated? The American mind has been poisoned, from this country’s birth, against minority populations. People of color, particularly African-American men, have been caught up in a twister of macroaggressions and micro ones. No amount of ignoring can alleviate it; no amount of achieving can ameliorate it.

And in a few seconds, or fractions of a second, before the conscious mind can catch up to the racing heart, decisions are made that can’t be unmade. Dead is forever.

It’s hard to read stories like this and not believe that there is a double standard in the use of force by the police. Everyone needs to be treated as though his or her life matters. More suspected criminals need to be detained and tried in a court of law and not sentenced on the street to a rain of bullets.

It is no wonder that whites and blacks have such divergent views of treatment by the police. As The Washington Post noted recently about a poll it conducted with ABC News, only about two in 10 blacks “say they are confident that the police treat whites and blacks equally, whether or not they have committed a crime.” In contrast, six in 10 whites “have confidence that police treat both equally.”

Michael Brown was unarmed. (Some witnesses in Ferguson, Mo., say he had his hands up. Others say he charged an officer.)

Eric Garner was unarmed on a Staten Island street.Tamir Rice was 12 years old, walking around a Cleveland park and holding a toy gun that uses nonlethal plastic pellets, but he didn’t shoot at anyone.

John Crawford was in an Ohio Walmart, holding, but not shooting, an air rifle he had picked up from a store shelf.

The police say Antonio Martin had a gun and pointed it at a police officer in Berkeley, Mo., but didn’t fire it.

And last Tuesday, the police say, a handgun was “revealed” during a New Jersey traffic stop of a car Jerame C. Reid was in.

But none had the privilege of being “arrested without incident or injury.” They were all black, all killed by police officers. Brown was shot through the head. Garner was grabbed around the neck in a chokehold, tossed to the ground and held there, even as he pleaded that he couldn’t breathe; it was all caught on video. Rice was shot within two seconds of the police officers’ arrival on the scene. Crawford, Martin and Reid were also cut down by police bullets.

In the cases that have been heard so far by grand juries, the grand juries have refused to indict the officers.

Maybe one could argue that in some of those cases the officers were within their rights to respond with lethal force. Maybe. But shouldn’t the use of force have equal application? Shouldn’t it be color- and gender-blind? Shouldn’t more people, in equal measures, be taken in and not taken out?

Why weren’t these black men, any of them, the recipients of the same use of force — or lack thereof — as Julia Shields?


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

6) Analysis: Mexico Scandals Taint Government
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

MEXICO CITY — As he heads to Washington on Monday to meet with Barack Obama, Enrique Pena Nieto leaves behind a year that was hardly what he had envisioned.

The Mexican president and his team started 2014 carrying out a slew of newly passed reforms, from breaking up telecommunications monopolies to opening the nation's energy sector, earning him international plaudits, including a Time magazine cover with his image above the caption "Saving Mexico."

Then came a 1-2-3 punch of scandals: Soldiers killing 22 civilians in a questionable "shootout"; the abduction and presumed murder of 43 college students, allegedly at the hands of local officials and police in league with a drug cartel; and revelations that Pena Nieto and his treasury secretary live in luxury homes built and financed by a favorite government contractor.

Pena Nieto's meeting with Obama at the White House on Tuesday comes amid what was supposed to be "Mexico's moment," a new era of transparency and reform.

Tens of thousands have taken to the streets since the 43 college students disappeared Sept. 26. Even institutions normally cautious about criticizing the government, including the Roman Catholic Church, have spoken out, and a Mexican protester even disrupted the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony in Oslo, Norway, to draw attention to the tragedy.

"The protests are an expression of people fed up with impunity, and indignant at the complicity between some authorities and criminals," said Luis Raul Gonzalez, president of the normally politic Human Rights Commission, speaking directly to Pena Nieto at a recent public event.

When Pena Nieto took office two years ago, he promised Mexico would see a new Institutional Revolutionary Party, known as the PRI, which had ruled Mexico for 71 years, often through coercion and corruption. After losing the presidency in 2000, the party portrayed itself as repentant and reconstructed.

Disillusioned by 12 years of opposition party rule, many Mexican voters returned to the PRI on the theory it at least knows how to govern.

But the purported "new PRI" has turned out to be younger politicians operating with the old playbook. Though its leaders were lauded for passing reforms, they had nothing to fall back on when violence knocked them off their message of economic growth.

They sent police to crack down on protesters and called the unrest a plot to "destabilize" the government and undermine the reforms.

Pena Nieto told the country it was time to "move beyond" the case of the 43 students just weeks after their abduction, and he took a month to meet with their families.

The administration has tried to explain away the president's $7 million mansion by saying it belonged to his wife, former soap opera actress Angelica Rivera, and it said Treasury Secretary Luis Videgaray's bought his house before he officially took office, although he was part of Pena Nieto's transition team.

Yet he is facing a Mexico much changed in the years since the PRI left office, when the country was still largely isolated, had very little investigative media and no citizen watchdogs armed with cellphone cameras and social media.

Mexicans have responded irreverently to Pena Nieto's defenses, which they have seen as arrogance and disconnect. One protest sign declared that it isn't demonstrations that are destabilizing Mexico but "your narco-government corruption."

Cabinet chief Aurelio Nuno admitted to the Spanish newspaper El Pais that the government didn't have an adequate plan to deal with insecurity because it hadn't understood the dimensions of the problem. Nevertheless, he said the answer was in the economic reforms.

Pena Nieto maintained the strategy late Sunday when he delivered a New Year's message acknowledging "a difficult year."

"The violence of organized crime hit the country once again," he said, adding that Mexico "can't continue the same." But his answer is that 2015 would be a year of lower gas, electricity and telephone bills, thanks to the reforms.

Pena Nieto's economic strategy has yet to pay off in investment or growth — one of the main reasons his approval ratings recently hit 38 percent, the lowest for any Mexican president since the peso crisis of 20 years ago. Oil prices are in the basement just as Mexico is opening its energy sector to foreign bidders, and job growth is stagnant.

Once-favorable coverage in media abroad has turned scathing.

Pressing Videgaray in an interview, CNBC correspondent Michelle Caruso-Cabrera said, "If Barbara Bush were living in a house built by Halliburton, her husband would have been impeached."

All levels of government have been sullied, with mayors and state police found to be in cahoots with organized crime, and prosecutors more interested in solving political problems than crimes.

The military, which has spearheaded anti-drug efforts, was stained by allegations that soldiers shot suspects who had already surrendered, when the army initially said it killed them in a fierce shootout in June. Federal Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam didn't investigate until three months later, after news media found witnesses who contradicted the official version.

Mexico's major parties are all viewed negatively, leaving few options for those disappointed with Pena Nieto. The city officials directly implicated in the attack on the students and state officials who carried out the initial, floundering investigation were backed by the leftist Democratic Revolution Party that has long crusaded against PRI corruption.

In his Sunday address, Pena Nieto promised to be a better listener, and to "combat corruption and impunity and strengthen transparency."

But once again, he offered no specifics.

Katherine Corcoran is chief of The Associated Press' bureau in Mexico City.


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

7) On the Open Road, Signs of a Changing Cuba
By

A 17-hour drive across the heart of the island in a battered burgundy and gray 1956 Ford Fairlane included long stretches in which there was surprisingly little ideology on display, few of the billboards that once trumpeted revolutionary slogans.

Those that remained had less of the nostalgic lilt of “socialism or death” and more of the eager pitch of self-help books or business management bibles.

“Florida advances through its own effort,” said a sign in the town of that name.

“Quality is respect for the people,” said another.

Another said simply, “Work hard!” — a notion stripped of the ideological imperative that used to complete the thought with phrases like “to defeat imperialism” or “to build socialism.”

Dispatched to Cuba in December after the surprise announcement by President Obama that he would renew full diplomatic relations, I set off on a road trip from Havana, near the west end of the island, to Guantánamo, at the east end.

The mileage chart on my map said the distance was 565 miles. It felt a lot longer sitting on the cream-colored, quilted vinyl seat of the Ford, which had lost a lot of its spring in the years since Fidel Castro swept into power.

The vintage Ford was not part of the original plan.

It was Christmastime, and flights across the island were sold out and the rental cars were all rented. So I started looking for a driver, preferably someone with a newish car. I didn’t want to get stuck on the roadside in some broken-down Soviet-era Lada or a rusting relic from the Eisenhower administration.

When Julio César López showed up in his big Ford at my hotel, the Habana Libre, I almost dismissed him out of hand. But he said that he had recently replaced the motor, and that the car had made several trips across the island and back. He even promised to replace the bald front right tire and change the oil.

We had a deal.

Along the way, a slowly changing Cuba revealed itself, sometimes through what was there and sometimes through what was not.

More signs of the times:

“This house for sale.” That concept did not exist, legally, before 2011, when home sales were first allowed under changes designed to inject some capitalist life into the country’s creaky socialist economy. Now, “For Sale” signs are a common sight.

Even more common are signs for the hundreds of small private restaurants, called paladares, which operated largely in the shadows until 2010, when they greatly expanded after the government allowed some people to go into business for themselves.

There were also discouraging signs:

One was the lack of little bars on my phone, showing that there was no cellular coverage in the areas between cities, an indication of Cuba’s backward telecommunications network.

There was a near absence of trucks carrying merchandise or farm produce, a sign of an economy that barely ticks.

While there was little car and truck traffic, there was a lot of everything else. Sharing the highway with us were bicycles, oxcarts, tractors, motorcycles (some with sidecars) and horsecarts of every type (large and small two-wheeled farm carts, four-wheeled carts that carried up to 10 passengers, and light carriages that served as taxis).

And there were lots of breakdowns, which is to be expected when a high percentage of the cars on the road were manufactured before John F. Kennedy was elected president in 1960.

An hour out of Havana, a man with no shirt leaned on a gray Lada with the hood up, not having bothered to move it off the road. Near a town called Torriente, a couple kissed passionately beside a broken-down red Chevy. Near Santiago de Cuba, a woman with an anxious face sat surrounded by a brood of children in the back seat of a stalled, burnt-orange Buick.

I never saw a tow truck.

Cuba is a beautiful island, green and fertile, a poem of vibrant color and sensual light:

A scarlet sunset bleeds across the Caribbean sky, bruised purple at the edges.

In the heat of the day, a woman in a shocking pink shirt walks under a red parasol.

An old man in jonquil pants sits on a fence.

Pale green sugar cane grows in red dirt fields.

On Day Two, we had breakfast at the Ciego de Ávila Hotel, nearly smack in the center of the island, a decaying throwback to an age of Soviet-financed plans to build big resorts for vacationing workers.Done up in peeling, garish green and gold, it was a jumble of window boxes sprouting miniature palm trees, concrete arches and balconies. The swimming pool sparkled blue and empty. Of 147 rooms, only about 15 were occupied; there seemed to be more workers than guests.

We drove with the windows down, swaying over the blacktop, the air beating around us. The big engine hummed. Mr. López, my driver, babied the car over the bumpy stretches, which got more frequent the farther we got from Havana. The Ford was full of rattles and bangs, and when we hit a bump it was like shaking a can loaded with nickels. There were small vent windows in the front, and no seatbelts.

The odometer was stuck at 26948.0. How many times had it turned over before freezing? Cuba, too, is frozen in the past. Younger Cubans, and many older ones too, are aching for the odometer to start turning again.

This car is beautiful and old and tired. Cuba is all those things.

For all that, a Cuban journalist remarked to me along the way how much the country has changed since an ailing Fidel Castro first stepped aside in 2006 and his brother Raúl became president two years later and started his gradual economic reforms.

Five years ago, he said, people talked about politics. What Fidel said. What Raúl was going to do. Now they talk about money and business.

The average salary in 2013 was about $20 a month, according to the government. People told me that could easily be eaten up by monthly bills for a cellphone, electricity and other basics, though some other expenses, like education and health care, are covered by the government.

The gap between what people earn and what things cost was a constant topic of conversation. Many people rely on money sent to them by relatives abroad. Many are in a constant struggle to get by, raising and selling pigs, buying or selling products on the black market, starting a business or waiting tables in a paladar.

Yasmani Bérbes, 27, quit his job as a physical education teacher to run a restaurant in his family’s house in Contramaestre, a town near Santiago de Cuba. As a teacher, he made 500 pesos a month, or about $21.

“Here, there are days now when I can make 500 pesos,” he said.

“There’s a positive change in the Cuban population,” Mr. Bérbes said. “They’ve opened up a lot to the idea of doing business.” He had less faith in the country’s leaders. “There’s still a lot of people with a 19th-century revolutionary mentality,” he said. “Lots of taboos and prohibitions.”

Mr. López, who is about half the age of his Ford, was a careful motorist — his car was his livelihood.

“If I had the choice, I’d pick a modern car,” he said. “With a modern car, what we’re doing in 12 hours we could do in nine.” (He was also an optimist: The trip ended up taking 17 hours over two days, although that included small detours and meals.)

But he said that having any car at all was a blessing because it gave him a way to make a living. I told him that lots of people abroad saw old cars like his as a quaint symbol of revolutionary Cuba.

I asked him what the car symbolized for him. “Money,” he said.







*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

8) Reports of Civilian Deaths Prompt Inquiry Into Strikes Against ISIS
By

WASHINGTON — The United States military is investigating reports of civilian casualties that may have occurred as part of the American-led fight against the Sunni militancy known as the Islamic State, a senior Pentagon official said Tuesday.

Rear Adm. John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary, told reporters during a news conference that investigators with the United States Central Command had begun looking into whether coalition airstrikes, which have targeted Islamic State fighters, equipment and oil depots, may have inadvertently hit civilians. Admiral Kirby said he had no additional information. It was the first time that the Pentagon had acknowledged that the air campaign against the Islamic State may have caused civilian deaths.The military has examined the credibility of 18 allegations that coalition airstrikes led to civilian casualties in Iraq and Syria from Aug. 8 to Dec. 30 last year, Sgt. Lawry said. Of those, 13 have been determined not to be credible.

Of the 18 allegations, nine were said to have taken place in Syria, and nine in Iraq, she said, adding that no further details would be provided until the investigations were finished.

Since the bombing campaign against the Islamic State began in August, American military officials have maintained that they had no reports of civilian casualties.Lt. Gen. James L. Terry, the commander of the coalition of countries that is fighting the Islamic State, told reporters last month that the military had been going out of its way to avoid civilian casualties.

“To date, we’ve got a very good record,” General Terry said. “I am tracking no civilian casualties.”

Admiral Kirby said that the United States had made some progress in its effort to find moderate Syrian rebels to train to fight the Islamic State, adding that a United States-led training mission could begin as early as spring. Maj. Gen. Michael Nagata, commander of the American Special Operations forces in the Middle East, has been working with Syrian opposition groups to identify and recruit Syrian forces.

The training is expected to take place in Saudi Arabia and Jordan, and perhaps Turkey, officials said.

Turkey, which has thus far been a reluctant ally in the fight against the Sunni militants, has more recently indicated that it might be willing to host a training facility.



*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

9) Family of Mentally Ill Woman Who Died in Custody Sues
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

CLEVELAND — The family of a woman who died while lying face first on the ground in handcuffs has sued the city of Cleveland and the two police officers who subdued her.

The lawsuit filed in federal court on Wednesday says 37-year-old Tanisha Anderson panicked Nov. 12 when officers put her in the back of a patrol car after they'd responded to a call about Anderson having a mental health crisis.

The lawsuit says officers slammed her to the ground face first and handcuffed her when she tried to get out of the patrol car and that she then quickly lost consciousness. Paramedics could not revive her and she was pronounced dead at a hospital.

Anderson suffered from bipolar disease and schizophrenia.

A city spokesman declined to comment on Thursday.


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

10) New Research Links Scores of Earthquakes to Fracking Wells Near a Fault in Ohio
By

Not long after two mild earthquakes jolted the normally steady terrain outside Youngstown, Ohio, last March, geologists quickly decided that hydraulic fracturing operations at new oil-and-gas wells in the area had set off the tremors.

Now a detailed study has concluded that the earthquakes were not isolated events, but merely the largest of scores of quakes that rattled the area around the wells for more than a week.

The study, published this week in The Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, indicates that hydraulic fracturing, commonly called fracking, built up subterranean pressures that repeatedly caused slippage in an existing fault as close as a half-mile beneath the wells.

The number and intensity of fracking-related quakes have risen as the practice has boomed. In Oklahoma, for example, quakes have increased sharply in recent years, including the state’s largest ever, a magnitude 5.7 tremor, in 2011. Both state and federal experts have said fracking is contributing to the increase there, not only because of the fracking itself, but also because of the proliferation of related wells into which fracking waste is injected. Those injection wells receive much more waste, and are filled under high pressure more often, than oil or gas wells, and the sheer volume of pressurized liquids has been shown to widen cracks in faults, raising the chances of slippage and earthquakes.

The authorities in Ohio ordered a halt to fracking at seven wells on March 10 after the two biggest quakes there, measured at magnitudes 2.8 and 3, were felt in Poland Township, about 10 miles south of Youngstown on the Pennsylvania border.

A spokeswoman for the state’s Department of Natural Resources, Bethany McCorkle, said Wednesday that the wells remained in production but that further fracking had been banned.

Wells for fracking are typically sunk horizontally into thin bands of shale deep beneath the surface, and a soup of water, chemicals and sand is injected under intense pressure to fracture the rock and release trapped oil and gas.The Poland Township study concluded that only two of the seven wells, with segments closest to the fault, were inducing the earthquakes. “It seems that only the segments that were within about a thousand yards from where the fault was produced earthquakes,” Michael R. Brudzinski, a professor and seismologist at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, said in a telephone interview. “It appears you have to be quite close to the fault for fracking operations to trigger earthquakes. Having that sort of information helps us to see that this stuff is pretty rare.”

Dr. Brudzinski researched the Poland Township quakes with a Miami University geologist, Brian Currie, and a graduate student who is the study’s lead author, Robert Skoumal.

In Poland Township, an analysis of seismological data found 77 well-related earthquakes from March 4 to March 12, the four largest of them on March 10. All occurred about 1.9 miles underground, along a horizontal fault that at times ran less than a half-mile under wells where fracking was underway.

Dr. Brudzinski said the study underscored the need to monitor wells in seismically active areas, something Ohio has since required.


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

11) As Police Go Idle, So Do New York City Courts
By and

One arraignment courtroom instead of two. Clerks watching “Batman” on their computer screens and playing with their cellphones as they wait for something to happen. And Manhattan’s night court shutting down an hour early because there are no more cases to call.

Those were scenes from the city’s arraignment courts in the third week of a precipitous drop in arrests by the New York Police Department. The usual chaotic bustle of the courts — the odd mix of transgressors, from murderers to fare-beaters — has given way to unusual scenes of tranquil inactivity.

“It’s slow, crazy slow,” Marcy Seckler, a veteran Legal Aid lawyer, remarked with a smile, as night court started in Manhattan on Tuesday.Things did not pick up: Over the course of the night, only 30 defendants came before Judge Abraham Clott, who often rubbed his eyes and yawned. On a typical night, he would see 60 to 90 defendants. No more than 12 people sat in the courtroom at any time, and court officers checked their watches and wandered away from their posts.

At 12:15 a.m. Wednesday, the judge looked out into the gallery and its nine rows of benches, which were all empty. There were no prostitutes, no one accused of publicly drinking or urinating — and there had not been any all night.

Judge Clott declared the session over — 45 minutes early.

For the last two weeks, New York City police officers have sharply curtailed making arrests and issuing summonses. Only 347 criminal summonses were written in the seven days through Sunday, down from 4,077 in the same period a year ago.

The sharp downturn magnifies a continuing divide between the rank-and-file and Mayor Bill de Blasio, whose standing had fallen so low among uniformed officers that some turned their backs to him at the funerals of two slain officers.

Police union leaders met for two hours on Wednesday with the city’s police commissioner, William J. Bratton. Patrick J. Lynch, the president of the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, said afterward that the parties had a “frank discussion” in which union leaders expressed concern over their members’ safety and how that might affect public safety overall.

He stressed that his “members are doing their job,” adding that solutions “will come from the leaders here.”

“We wish there was a leader in City Hall,” Mr. Lynch said.

The drop in arrests is particularly striking for low-level misdemeanors and so-called quality of life violations, like riding a bike on the sidewalk. Arrests for offenses that a few weeks ago were common — loitering, turnstile jumping, lying down on subway benches — are suddenly rare.

The number of cases handled by the arraignment courts fell 36 percent in December compared with the same month last year, and most of the drop came in the last two weeks of the month, court officials said.

Just in the last two and a half weeks, arraignments for misdemeanors have fallen about 60 percent, to 2,581, from 6,395. The drop was more pronounced for people arrested for violations, like disorderly conduct: a 91 percent decline to 97 cases, compared with 1,157 over the same period a year ago.

There have been similar declines in the past, but they have come after natural disasters and other emergencies, court administrators said. The last one occurred during Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Another slow period followed the terrorist attacks in September 2001.

Few managers in the court system expect the current downturn to last. Many public defenders, however, said they hope the steep decline in minor arrests will become permanent. They noted felonies did not rise over the last three weeks as arrests for low-level crimes plummeted.

“This proves to us is what we all knew as defenders: You can end broken-windows policing without ending public safety,” said Justine M. Luongo, the deputy attorney-in-charge of criminal practice for the Legal Aid Society.

Legal Aid lawyers and veteran clerks in the courts said the police appeared to be bringing in only people who they must have taken into custody: shoplifters caught by store owners, drunken drivers, people accused of assaulting their spouses or others accused of violent crimes. Felony arraignments did decline but not nearly as precipitously as misdemeanors, decreasing 25 percent to 1,026.

“There has been a big difference,” said Steven Chavez, a Legal Aid supervisor in Manhattan. “The cops say, ‘We are going to stop making arrests unless we absolutely have to.' ”

Brooklyn Criminal Court is usually so busy that although each arraignment lasts only a few minutes, two courtrooms are occupied day and night, one for felonies and one for misdemeanors.

Now, just one courtroom handles all the traffic. That led to a strange mix of cases on Tuesday. Offenders, whether they were accused of felonies or whether they were given desk-appearance tickets weeks ago, passed through a single courtroom. Tuesday’s cases included an armed robbery, shoplifters and traffic offenders.

Manhattan Criminal Court on Tuesday night was so quiet that the sound of court officers’ fingernails tapping on phone screens could be heard.

The night’s most common charge was assault, followed by grand larceny, robbery and weapons possession. There was one case of turnstile jumping, one of selling fake Billy Joel tickets, and one of advocating on Facebook to kill police, which earned the defendant glares from courtroom officers.

Eliza M. Orlins, another staff attorney for the Legal Aid Society, finished with her clients at 11 p.m. “As a public defender, we’re constantly overbooked,” she said. “So I can’t really complain about being less busy than usual.”

Those arrested for relatively minor offenses now stand out. On Wednesday morning in Manhattan, William Talen, 64, who calls himself Reverend Billy, awaited arraignment. He had been arrested on Tuesday afternoon as he gave a sermon in Grand Central Terminal — protesting police brutality.
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

12) Texas Abortion Clinic Rules Tested in Appeals Court
By

NEW ORLEANS — Lawyers for abortion clinics squared off with Texas state attorneys in a federal appeals court here on Wednesday, arguing over the constitutionality of stringent abortion clinic rules that would force more than half the remaining abortion providers in Texas to close.

But more is at stake than whether large portions of South and West Texas will be left with no abortion clinics, forcing some women to drive hundreds of miles for an abortion, for safety reasons that doctors and clinic owners call a pretense.

The case argued here — along with others arising from the hundreds of abortion restrictions adopted by more than half of the states in recent years — poses issues that are likely to end up before the Supreme Court in the next year or two, many legal experts say, with the potential for significant effects on the ability of women to obtain abortions in much of the country.The core question raised by the Texas case and others is where the constitutional boundaries lie, as anti-abortion forces, unable to ban the procedure outright, seek to use clinic regulations to raise costs and limit access. Supreme Court rulings (stemming from Roe v. Wade, a 1973 decision) have held that women have a right to an abortion until the fetus is viable, usually around 22 weeks after conception. But the court has allowed states to impose restrictions on abortion provided that they do not present an “undue burden.”

The case argued here before the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit involves the most far-reaching provision of the anti-abortion law adopted by Texas in 2013, a requirement that all facilities, even those performing simpler, early-stage abortions and nonsurgical medicinal abortions, meet the costly construction, equipment and staffing standards of ambulatory surgery centers. No waivers were granted for longstanding clinics with good safety records. Obstacles to abortion, if the law takes effect, would fall particularly on Hispanic and low-income women, the clinic owners say.

“How many clinics do you have to close before the court says, ‘Enough’?” asked B. Jessie Hill, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University who is not involved in the case. “Can you leave a state the size of Texas with only seven clinics?

“Would that be an undue burden?” she asked, referring to the ill-defined limit on abortion regulations set by the Supreme Court in 1992, and at the center of several court cases.

In a spirited hearing that went past its allotted time, a panel of three judges, including two who upheld Texas abortion restrictions in previous actions, questioned whether many of the new requirements would improve patient care.

But they also criticized a lower court for voiding the entire surgery-center law, rather than specifying which parts were justified and which were not.

From the questioning, it appeared possible that the appeals court would send the case back to the district court in Texas that blocked the surgery-center requirement last fall, requiring it to parse the rules more finely rather than voiding the law wholesale.

If, on the other hand, the appeals court, which is known as conservative, upholds the law, the clinic owners are almost certain to appeal to the Supreme Court. Clashing court decisions on other issues — such as mandatory ultrasounds and counseling messages, and requirements for doctors to have admitting privileges at local hospitals — could also reach the Supreme Court, experts say.

As the constitutional issues percolate in courts across the country, anti-abortion groups, buoyed by Republican gains in the November elections, say they will pursue more restrictions in dozens of states this year.

If high-impact measures like the Texas surgery-center rule are ultimately declared legal, then state disparities in the availability of abortion could widen even more. On the other side, advocates for abortion rights have won some important legal battles in the last year, including a decision by the Fifth Circuit preventing the closing of Mississippi’s only abortion clinic.

“It’s an ongoing national question, whether women will have meaningful access to abortion across the country, or only in a subset of states,” said Suzanne B. Goldberg, director of the Center for Gender and Sexuality Law at Columbia Law School.

The Texas surgery-center rule has already taken a dizzying path through the courts.

Last August, Judge Lee Yeakel of the Federal District Court in Austin blocked the measure, saying it would affect some women drastically and would not bring significant medical benefits. He also partly lifted another disputed requirement, that doctors have admitting privileges at local hospitals, for two clinics in isolated locations, McAllen and El Paso.

The state appealed to the Fifth Circuit, arguing, as it did again Wednesday, that the Legislature should decide whether a law protected health, that abortion providers could choose to build more surgery centers and that since at least 83 percent of the population would still live within 150 miles of a clinic, the undue burden standard had not been violated.

On Oct. 2, the appeals court lifted Judge Yeakel’s stay of the law, causing all but eight abortion centers, none of them west of San Antonio, to close. (An earlier appeals court ruling, upholding the state’s requirement that doctors have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital, had already helped cause the number of abortion clinics to decline to fewer than 20, from 41.)

But then on Oct. 14, the Supreme Court reinstated the injunction against the law, allowing clinics to reopen pending the further consideration that started with Wednesday’s hearing.

The panel hearing the case Wednesday, picked by lottery, included Jennifer W. Elrod and Catharina Haynes, appointees of President George W. Bush who previously voted to uphold parts of the Texas abortion law, and Edward C. Prado, who was also appointed by Mr. Bush. To the surprise of many in the courtroom, the two conservative female judges aggressively challenged the Texas solicitor general, Jonathan F. Mitchell, asking whether many of the new building requirements made medical sense and whether it might be dangerous to force women to drive hundreds of miles home after an abortion.

“It seems like we’ll have women driving a long way and suddenly have a bleeding episode,” Judge Haynes said. “Isn’t this the antithesis of what the state is trying to achieve?”

The judges also pressed the lawyer for the clinics, Stephanie Toti of the Center for Reproductive Rights. She argued that there was “no rational basis” for the new regulations because “they will actually increase the risks that women face.”

But the judges said that the clinics had failed to show that a “large fraction” of abortion facilities would close and asked why the courts should not demand more limited changes in the law.

One way or another, many legal experts say, a major new abortion case is likely to reach the Supreme Court in the next year or two, most likely involving a single state law and issue.

Beyond the case argued Wednesday, which provides a stark test of the undue burden standard, several other abortion cases are in the judicial pipeline, including some with directly clashing decisions from federal appeals courts.

Last month, the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, in Richmond, Va., struck down a North Carolina law that required women to undergo ultrasounds as the doctor described the fetus — whether the patients wanted to hear it or not — and offered scientifically disputed advice on the safety of abortions.

The North Carolina attorney general has promised to appeal the decision because it contradicts, he argues, a 2012 decision by the Fifth Circuit, upholding a similar ultrasound and patient counseling law in Texas.

State requirements that abortion clinic doctors have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals are also percolating in the courts, and federal appeals courts have issued divergent rulings on state laws restricting the use of medication abortions.

“Ultrasound, admitting privileges, ambulatory surgery centers — I think that by next term at least one of these issues will be before the Supreme Court,” said Ms. Goldberg, of Columbia Law.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

13) A Bus Takes a Local Route to Fighting Mexican Corruption
By PAULINA VILLEGAS

MONTERREY, Mexico — Inside a large, open-air bus, a corrupt politician quarrels over the loudspeakers with a fed-up citizen who tells the passengers about the millions of pesos lost in a series of corruption scandals.

As the scripted recording plays, three security guards sitting on a bench watch in awe at the passing bus before cracking up in laughter, pointing at the bright red and yellow insignia on its side: the “Corruptour.”

The broadside includes caricaturized faces of the state’s former and current governors. Both grin at passers-by, drawing stares at each of the 11 “corruption landmarks” that the bus tour aims to spotlight, including the casino where gunmen started a fire that killed 52 people.

“We have failed to place the issue of corruption at the center of political debate,” said Miguel Treviño, the head of the Corruptour project and founding member of Via Ciudadana, one of many local groups pushing to raise political and social awareness here in Mexico’s richest city.

“We need to make it tangible and understandable to people, and to explain its direct implications on our everyday lives so they will want to fight it,” he said.

Born through a mix of frustration, satire and savvy, the Corruptour is a free one-hour ride led by young activists hoping to stir a political awakening with five trips per weekend. After a hiatus for the holidays, the tours are to resume next week.

In this industrial city of 1.1 million people, the quirky bit of political tourism is the latest creative attempt to agitate for what Mexicans widely say they sorely need: a less corrupt, more efficient government.

The systematic violence that defined this place as recently as 2012 has declined. The private and public sectors came together to tackle the issue by creating a new state police force, known as Fuerza Civil, which has been recruiting and training more than 4,000 polygraphed, in theory, more trustworthy police officers.

But broad government corruption here, and in Mexico at large, remains a largely untreated illness. Mexicans are enraged over the disappearance and presumed murder of 43 college students (one has been confirmed dead) in the southern state of Guerrero last fall, and the government has been plagued with questions over the purchase of homes by the country’s first lady and finance minister from a company that has won numerous government construction contracts.

For decades, corruption and impunity have inspired apathy and anger, and both were again on display in the past months when President Enrique Peña Nieto, during a television interview, described corruption as largely a “cultural problem.”

It was a remark that many interpreted as a feeble attempt to excuse public theft, rather than trying to stamp it out.

“If the matter of corruption is cultural, then it means there is no salvation for this country,” said Denisse Dresser, a political analyst, during a radio show after the president’s remarks.

Other experts agree that there may be an acceptance of Mexico’s long-lasting tradition of corruption, but they disagree with the inexorability of it — pointing to this city as an example.

“Monterrey is a perfect example of how the balance of powers can be overturned,” said Carlos Elizondo, a scholar at the Center for Economic Research in Mexico City, referring to the blossoming of civil groups and businesses demanding better governance here in recent years.

The leaders of the Corruptour are hoping for more change — the kind of voter engagement that would generate higher political costs for public officials embroiled in corruption scandals and planning to run for office in this year’s midterm elections.

“This is not about just complaining, it is about understanding what is our role in history,” says Lorenia Canavati, a member of Via Ciudadana.

It was no coincidence that on one recent weekend afternoon, the tour started off at the government palace, a 20th-century brownstone building and office to the sitting governor of the state of Nuevo León, Rodrigo Medina. The omniscient voice of the bus tour guide — the activist — warned passengers about the state’s public debt, which has risen to almost 73.6 billion pesos ($5 billion), making it Mexico’s second largest. The governor’s office had no response.

The Corruptour continued on to the Administrative Tower, an impressive 36-story pearl-white skyscraper, a monument to a city that embraces opulence and modernity. The building, which holds government offices, was not only finished late — it also still carries a public debt of around $88 million, according to Via Ciudadana.

For the roughly 25 passengers, including some crime victims, the bus trip was at once educational and highly politicized, entertaining and cathartic. At a red light near downtown, the activist and his amplified voice asked in a recording: “You know what politicians — from any given party — fear the most?”

“A budget cutback?” The cynical official chimed in, chuckling in response.

“What they fear the most is a group of informed citizens united and organized to do something on their own, without asking for permission,” the activist replied. “They feed and live from our insolence and from our leniency — from our general conformity.”

The crowd on the bus smiled and nodded.

As the corruption bus steered past the decaying remains of Casino Royale — the gambling parlor set ablaze in August 2011 by people suspected of being cartel hit, killing 52 people — one local resident on the bus, Edmundo Jiménez, glared in silence. His said his wife died that day in the fire, trapped in a bathroom, despite his efforts to break down the window from the outside.

At the time, there were questions about whether corruption was part of the cause. The brother of Monterrey’s mayor had been caught on video collecting a huge wad of cash from another casino. He was initially detained, then his lawyer said the money was for cheese from Oaxaca. Two months later, he was released.

The investigation did reveal that government safety inspectors, suspected of taking bribes, had failed to do their jobs; there were several building code violations inside, including blocked emergency exits.

“It is time to wake up, or this country will sink,” Mr. Jiménez said. He looked away, and the ride continued.

 


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

14) Two Mississippi Men Plead Guilty to Hate Crimes
By RICHARD FAUSSET

The two remaining defendants among a group of young white Mississippians charged with carrying out racially motivated attacks on African-Americans in Jackson in 2011 pleaded guilty Wednesday to violations of the federal hate-crime law, with one of them admitting his role in the killing of a 47-year-old man.

John L. Blalack, 20, and Robert H. Rice, 24, are the last of 10 defendants who have pleaded guilty in the attacks, closing a chapter on the kind of gruesome Mississippi story that many had hoped the state, long mired in racial violence, had outgrown.

“Justice has been served,” said Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in a statement released Wednesday. “The hate crimes to which these defendants have pleaded guilty were as shocking as they were reprehensible — targeting innocent people for racially motivated acts of violence that inflicted grievous harm and even claimed a life.”

Prosecutors said that the 10 defendants, most of whom were from suburban Rankin County, amused themselves by driving into Jackson, seeking out what were often homeless or inebriated blacks, and assaulting them.

Some of the victims were attacked with beer bottles or metal ball bearings hurled from a slingshot. Others were beaten.

In the early morning of June 26, 2011, seven of the 10, including Mr. Blalack, confronted James C. Anderson, a 47-year-old auto factory worker, in a motel parking lot. Two of the defendants, Deryl Dedmon and John A. Rice — the brother of Robert Rice — beat Mr. Anderson. Then Mr. Dedmon fatally struck Mr. Anderson with his pickup truck.

Prosecutors said that Mr. Dedmon and one other assailant yelled “White Power!” before Mr. Dedmon ran Mr. Anderson down.

Mr. Blalack pleaded guilty to one hate-crime count for his role in that episode, and to another count for his role in an episode in which he and others threw beer bottles and shot ball bearings at black pedestrians from a moving vehicle.

Mr. Dedmon pleaded guilty to murder in 2012, and was sentenced to two concurrent life terms after Mr. Anderson’s family, which opposes capital punishment on religious grounds, pleaded that he be spared the death penalty.

Robert Rice was not present during the assault on Mr. Anderson. He pleaded guilty to one hate-crime count for a prior episode in which he, Mr. Blalack and others went looking for a black man to beat up.

Prosecutors said they found their man walking near a Jackson golf course. Three of the attackers, not including Mr. Rice, beat the unidentified victim “to the point that he begged for his life,” according to a Justice Department news release.

The federal statute that Mr. Blalack and Mr. Rice violated, the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, was signed into law by President Obama in October 2009. Each violation carries a maximum 10-year prison sentence and a $250,000 fine. Both men are scheduled to be sentenced in April.

 


*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

15)  Health Premiums Rise More Slowly, but Workers Shoulder More of Cost
By

When Charlotte Alger, 25, was working at a Home Depot just outside Boston last year, she said she earned $10.75 an hour working on the sales floor in the woodworking department. She chose one of the more comprehensive health insurance plans offered, but it came with a whopping $3,000 deductible.

Paying for such a large share of her costs upfront was burdensome, particularly because Ms. Alger, who recently went back to college, regularly sees a psychologist for depression and anxiety. “I felt sort of ripped off,” she said, adding that none of her previous doctors were included in the plan’s network. “I see a mental health care professional, and it’s not the kind of doctor you want to switch.”

She ultimately decided to switch employers, largely in an effort to find better benefits. She recently started working as an accounting clerk with a more affordable plan.

Although the rise in premiums has slowed since passage of the Affordable Care Act, workers who receive health insurance through their employers are shouldering more health care expenses at a time when wages are stagnant, according to a new report from the Commonwealth Fund that analyzed costs across the states.

These costs are particularly high — relative to median income — for workers in the South and south central states, where income is below the national average, the report found, even though the growth of premiums had slowed in several states in those regions.

“Without growth in income, rising out-of-pocket costs means less affordable care,” said Cathy Schoen, executive director of the Commonwealth Fund’s Council of Economic Advisors.

Insurance premiums have risen faster than median incomes for workers under 65 in all states in the decade from 2003 to 2013. Average annual premiums — including what both employers and employees contribute — represent 20 percent or more of the median income in 37 states. That was the case in only two states in 2003.

While employers are trying various strategies to contain health care costs, shifting more expenses to employees is one of the main tools. “Increasing cost-sharing is the tried and true way to keep their premiums down,” said Drew Altman, president of Kaiser Family Foundation. “We’re seeing a steady, slow increase in cost-sharing every year.”

According to Commonwealth, out-of-pocket costs — including workers’ premium contributions and deductibles — accounted for 9.6 percent of median household income in 2013, on average, up from 5.3 percent in 2003. (That does not include items like co-payments or co-insurance, which would have increased these costs further.)

That is the case even though the growth of overall premium increases has slowed.

In the three years after the passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, premiums rose about 4.1 percent annually, down from a national average of about 5.1 percent from 2003 to 2010, according to the report.

In 31 states and the District of Columbia, premiums increased more slowly from 2010 to 2013 than in previous years, particularly in several southern and western states. But in 10 other states, annual premium growth rates remained high during the same period, at least 6 percent on average.

The average premium for a family was $16,000 in 2013 — including the portions paid by both employer and employee — and ranged from $13,477 to $14,382 in the states with the lowest costs, which include Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Mississippi and Hawaii. In the most expensive states — New Jersey, Massachusetts, New York and Alaska — premiums were more than $17,000 to nearly $21,000.

“The steady increase in premium growth means health insurance is expensive no matter where you live,” Ms. Schoen said.

The burden of out-of-pocket costs causes Elizabeth Price, a 40-year-old administrative assistant with a rare genetic disorder, to avoid the emergency room, which costs $175 each visit. “High co-pays that do not count towards my out-of-pocket maximum definitely make me think twice before going,” said Ms. Price, who works for a small college in Chicago. “And that’s just the co-pay — once I’m in the hospital there are more costs, and I can never be sure that all the treatment I’m receiving is ‘in network’ and preapproved, so it might not be covered.”

At less than $80 a month, her premiums are reasonable, she said. But since she is prone to kidney stones, she said she could expect to visit an emergency room two to four times a year. She said she had to weigh the pain level and possible complications from delaying treatment.

Given her health condition, Ms. Price said her job choices had been limited; she needs to work for an employer that offers policies with reasonable out-of-pocket maximums because she knows she will reach them.

To contain costs, many large corporate employers are offering high-deductible plans, also known as consumer-directed plans. At about one-third of large companies, it is the only option available, according to the National Business Group on Health. The plans require employees to pay for a greater share of their medical costs upfront, before the plan starts making payments. The goal is to make employees comparison-shop for medical services, something not always easy to do, particularly in emergency situations.

“It’s quite shocking when you see the range of costs for the same services in a market,” said Brian Marcotte, president and chief executive of the National Business Group on Health. “But employers are also trying to get employees to play a greater role in managing their care.”

In 2013, 81 percent of workers were enrolled in a health plan with a deductible, according to Commonwealth Fund, compared with 52 percent in 2003. The average per-person deductible has more than doubled over that period, rising 146 percent on average. In 2013, the average per-person deductible exceeded $1,000 in most states, and exceeded $1,500, on average, in seven states.

Reed Abelson contributed reporting.




*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*


























Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment