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Friday, March 14, 2008

Two doctors who treated actor John Ritter for chest pain in Burbank, California were cleared of a negligence lawsuit on Friday. Ritter was an American television and film actor who died of aortic dissection on 11 September 2003.

Ritter’s children and widow (Amy Yasbeck) filed a US$67 million lawsuit claiming negligence by the doctors, both at the time Ritter fell ill and at a medical checkup two years earlier where problems with Ritter’s aorta could have been spotted.

A jury hearing the case at Los Angeles County Superior Court voted 9-3 to dismiss the claims, satisfied that the defendants, Dr. Joseph Lee and Dr. Matthew Lotysch, acted properly during their examination and treatment of Ritter.

Ritter’s last role was in leading the cast of the television series 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter whose production was disrupted by his death.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

The United Stated Department of Justice has asked for corruption charges against former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens to be dropped because evidence was withheld from the defense team by the original prosecutors. The Justice Department has stated that they will not retry Stevens.

In a statement, US Attorney General Eric Holder said, “After careful review, I have concluded that certain information should have been provided to the defense for use at trial. In light of this conclusion, and in consideration of the totality of the circumstances of this particular case, I have determined that it is in the interest of justice to dismiss the indictment and not proceed with a new trial.”

Stevens was convicted in October on seven felony counts of lying on senate disclosure forms about gifts, largely in the form of free renovations to his home, received from an oil service company; his conviction is thought to have been a large factor in his November electoral defeat to former Anchorage mayor Mark Begich, the current junior Senator from Alaska. Stevens immediately appealed his conviction and has maintained his innocence.

The prosecution case has met with a number of procedural difficulties, with US District Court judge Emmet G. Sullivan holding the prosecution in contempt in March for failing to turn over documents concerning an FBI whistleblower’s reports of mishandling of the case. The Justice Department has since replaced the case’s prosecutors, and the allegations of misconduct have held up sentencing from the original convictions.

The filed papers indicate that notes were never turned over from an interview that has the oil contractor estimated the house renovation for far less then he specified at trial.

The original trial team was removed, but in the end Attorney General Eric Holder thought it would be best if the case was dropped. NPR’s source indicate that Holder wish to forcefully transmit that prosecutorial misconduct will not be tolerated. The trying prosecutors are under investigation by the Justice Department for their conduct in the matter.

Stevens, now 85, served as Alaska’s Senator from 1968 to 2009.

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Businessman Rocky De La Fuente took some time to speak with Wikinews about his campaign for the U.S. Democratic Party’s 2016 presidential nomination.

The 61-year-old De La Fuente resides in San Diego, California, grew up in Tijuana, and owns multiple businesses and properties throughout the world. Since getting his start in the automobile industry, De La Fuente has branched out into the banking and real estate markets. Despite not having held or sought political office previously, he has been involved in politics, serving as the first-ever Hispanic superdelegate to the 1992 Democratic National Convention.

De La Fuente entered the 2016 presidential race last October largely due to his dissatisfaction with Republican front-runner Donald Trump. He argues he is a more accomplished businessman than Trump, and attacks Trump as “a clown,” “a joke,” “dangerous,” and “in the same category as Hitler.” Nevertheless, De La Fuente’s business background begets comparisons with Trump. The Alaskan Midnight Sun blog described him as the Democrats’ “own Donald Trump.”

While receiving only minimal media coverage, he has campaigned actively, and according to the latest Federal Election Commission filing, loaned almost US$ 4 million of his own money to the campaign. He has qualified for 48 primary and caucus ballots, but has not yet obtained any delegates to the 2016 Democratic National Convention. Thus far, according to the count at The Green Papers, De La Fuente has received 35,406 votes, or 0.23% of the total votes cast. He leads among the many lesser-known candidates but trails both Senator Bernie Sanders who has received nearly 6.5 million votes and front-runner Hillary Clinton who has just shy of 9 million votes.

With Wikinews reporter William S. Saturn?, De La Fuente discusses his personal background, his positions on political issues, his current campaign for president, and his political future.

Sunday, September 19, 2010

The Civic Parade of Pichilemu took place on Saturday morning, in Daniel Ortúzar Avenue. The event was attended by around 9,000 people. It started with an exhibition of cueca, the Chilean national dance, by winners of communal and regional Cueca championships.

All the schools from urban Pichilemu and its rural villages participated in the parade, including La Aguada School, Espinillo Basic School, Cáhuil School, Charly’s School, Colegio Preciosa Sangre, Agustín Ross High School, Digna Camilo Aguilar School, and others. Neighborhood councils (such as Infiernillo, presided by Mauricio Vargas), elderly clubs, sport clubs (such as Arturo Prat and Independiente), the Public Safety Agency and the Fire Bureau also participated. The Parade music was performed by Banda Instrumental Pichilemina (Pichileminian Instrumental Band).

The parade is part of celebrations marking two hundred years since Chile began the Independence process, that ended in 1818 after Bernardo O’Higgins proclaimed it.

“This parade shows the power that the Pichileminian people has to stand again [after the February 27 earthquake],” Mayor of Pichilemu Roberto Córdova said. “It is the greatest parade in the History of Pichilemu,” he added.

The event was broadcast by the local radio stations Entre Olas, Atardecer and Somos Pichilemu. Jorge Vargas González, owner of Radio Somos Pichilemu and former Mayor of the city also attended the event, along with his wife Andrea Aranda, current Councillor.

Monday, October 1, 2007

Kate Holloway is running for the Ontario Liberal Party in the Ontario provincial election, in the Trinity-Spadina riding. Wikinews’ Nick Moreau interviewed her regarding her values, her experience, and her campaign.

Stay tuned for further interviews; every candidate from every party is eligible, and will be contacted. Expect interviews from Liberals, Progressive Conservatives, New Democratic Party members, Ontario Greens, as well as members from the Family Coalition, Freedom, Communist, Libertarian, and Confederation of Regions parties, as well as independents.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

On Friday, the United States House of Representatives passed House Resolution 2998, better known as the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, following days of debate. The final vote was 219–212, with only 8 Republicans voting for the legislation, and 44 Democrats voting against it. The resolution addresses the “greenhouse effect,” and calls for a 17% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2020, and an 83% reduction by 2050. In addition, the legislation will establish new requirements for utilities, and various incentives for “going green.”

The resolution was sponsored by Representative Henry Waxman of California, and Representative Edward Markey of Massachusetts. At 3:09 a.m. (EDT) on Friday morning, a 341 page amendment was added to the resolution. In an attempted filibuster, House Minority Leader John Boehner read the majority of the added amendment, and stated that “…when you file a 300-page amendment at 3:09 a.m., the American people have a right to know what’s in this bill.”

Reactions to the legislation have been mixed, with opponents and advocates speaking out. The President of the Union of Concerned Scientists, Kevin Knobloch, said that the Union was “thrilled that Congress has finally caught up with science and the American people in recognizing the need to switch on clean energy.” A report by the The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, stated that the legislation would “damage the economy and hobble growth.”

Most House Republicans opposed the bill for going too far in its regulation, with GOP chairman Mike Pence saying that “raising the cost of energy is a bad idea in prosperous times.” Democrat Dennis Kucinich, on the other hand, opposed the bill for not going far enough, calling it an “illusion” that “locks us into a framework that will fail.” Kucinich pointed out that the bill gives subsidies to coal, which is not a clean source of fuel, and includes greenhouse gas emitters such as trash incinerators under its definition of “renewable energy.”

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

A memorial service has been held in Nova Scotia, Canada to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Swissair Flight 111 disaster. None of the 229 people on board survived the aircraft’s impact with the sea on September 2, 1998.

Hundreds of search and rescue personnel and local fishermen were mobilised after the crash in St. Margaret’s Bay near Halifax to recover fragments of both the aircraft and the victims. The state of the human remains was such that identifying them resulted in what would remain the largest DNA identification operation up until the World Trade Center collapse.

At the ceremony, attended by around 100 people, 229 heart-shaped stones crafted from beach rocks and simply decorated with painted stars flowers and hearts were available for the mourners to take and place at the foot of the memorial at Bayswater, one for each of the 229 names upon the granite monument. Many flowers were also laid there.

The aircraft was a wide-bodied jet which had departed John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York at 8:18 p.m. 53 minutes after takeoff pilot Urs Zimmerman and co-pilot Stephan Loew smelt smoke in the cockpit and within three more minutes smoke was visible. The plane, by then in Canadian airspace, tried to reach Halifax Airport but never made it, hitting the water at around 9:31 p.m. at 350 mph (563 kph).

The cause of the disaster was determined to be highly flammable insulating foam, which caught light after an arcing electrical wire triggered a small fire. The fire was ferocious enough to destroy critical power cables, leaving the aircraft uncontrollable.

The investigation was one of aviation’s costliest and most complicated, costing the Transportation Safety Bureau of Canada $60 million. The TSB produced 23 recommendations to prevent a recurrence of the disaster, but only five have been implemented in the decade since the crash, including some flammable material restrictions and electrical safety improvements.

Several people at the hour-long multi-faith ceremony complained at the perceived lack of action. “How come after 10 years we are hearing reports that only five of some 20 recommendations for airplanes have been carried out? What has gone wrong with the bureaucracy – the inertia for that?” asked Rabbi David Ellis. John Butt, who headed the identification effort as Nova Scotia’s chief medical examiner at the time, said it was ‘disappointing’ that action had not been taken and that it was “not very good to think about flying in an aircraft when you know recommendations have been made about the standards of safety and they haven’t been adopted.”

TSB member Jonathan Seymour was also critical of the lack of action, particularly on the US Federal Aviation Administration’s part. “It’s just that obviously after 10 years you would have hoped that things would have moved on quite significantly further than they have. It’s frustrating that we’re still that far away from where we might want to be after 10 years,” he said.