Thursday, April 27, 2006

Physical Education


April 27, 2006
SMH

A teacher jailed for having sex with a 13-year-old has been arrested again.

Pamela Rogers, 28, of Tennessee, is accused of violating her probation conditions by sending photos and videos of herself naked by mobile phone to the boy.

The former physical education teacher was sent to jail for nine months in a plea deal last August for the three-month affair with the boy.

She was released in February for good behaviour.

But the Tennessean reports that authorites claim that after her release she created a MySpace.com web site and blog.

She denies posting messages to the boy on her site.

Her arrest this week follows allegations that she has breached probation by contacting the boy by phone, e-mails and text messages along with the nude photos and sex videos, according to court documents.

"Some of the naked photos and videos she sent after her most recent court appearance on April 12, a warrant says", reports the Tenneassean.

Her jail term was part of an eight-year sentence for the attractive former homecoming queen, who was directed to surrender her teaching certificate, and barred from granting interviews or profiting from her story.

smh.com.au

Saturday, April 22, 2006

Girl Power


By Jason Hill
April 20, 2006
smh

Lara Croft's creator has been reunited with his million-dollar baby but controversy still surrounds his high-kicking adventurer.

A decade after she raided her first tomb, Lara Croft remains the world's most recognised game character.

Lara was instrumental in gaming's rise to mainstream entertainment as well as in attracting many women to pick up a joypad for the first time.

After six Tomb Raider games selling 25 million copies and two films grossing more than $500 million, it is easy to forget how revolutionary Lara was in 1996. At the time, the game industry was focused on adolescent males and few titles featured female characters, let alone in starring roles.

Lara Croft's rise to pop culture stardom included appearing on stage with U2, on countless magazine covers, television commercials and even a music single. Lara also became PlayStation's de facto mascot just as gaming hit the mainstream - a modern icon to replace the childish heroes of the past such as Mario and Sonic.

Lara's creator, Toby Gard, wanted to create a smart, athletic archaeologist in the Indiana Jones mould.

"Lara is fire and ice, mind and passion, strength and agility, but she is also an unusual anti-hero," he says.

"She pursues knowledge of the past, uncovers mysteries, but for her own personal reasons, and nothing stands between her and those goals. She inhabits a world full of mystery, not least of which is Lara herself."

Gard famously quit Tomb Raider developer Core Design after the first game was released, in protest at how Lara's physical dimensions had been drastically inflated to titillate, turning his back on millions of dollars in royalty payments.

"I left as a result of my disapproval of the sexualised marketing of Tomb Raider," Gard says.

"Over the years she was marketed in more and more sleazy ways, which were completely contrary to the goal of the character, and as a result lost a little of her popularity."

The latest Tomb Raider game released last week reunited Lara's creator and the buxom heroine for the first time in a decade.

After leaving developer Core Design in protest at the sexualisation of his beloved character, Toby Gard established a new studio, Confounding Factor. But the venture closed in 2004 after the failure of its first project, a critically panned pirate adventure called Galleon.

Returning to where he began, Gard was recruited by publisher Eidos to work on Tomb Raider: Legend with developer Crystal Dynamics. Eidos hope Legend will resurrect what many critics consider a flagging franchise after the disastrous reception to 2003's Angel of Darkness.

"I was brought in primarily to create the new look for Lara," says Gard, "but I ended up having input on the story, and overseeing all the other characters' designs, directing the cinematic, working on Lara's movement system and generally consulting on the design."

Despite his famous exit from Core, Gard still feels pride in his creation.

"It's a really cool thing to see Lara being so popular. It's especially mind boggling when I think that a character I made up ended up being turned into two Hollywood movies," he says.
Despite turning his back on millions in royalties, Gard has no regrets. "You are who you are because of your choices. I learned a great deal by leaving Core that I could not have learned if I'd stayed."

The Death of a brother in Arms


By Les Kennedy and Kate McClymont
April 22, 2006 smh

INTERNAL warfare in the Bandidos bike gang - and a dispute over an affair one of its members had with a female parole officer - were catalysts for a killing outside a Sydney restaurant strip, police believe.

Police have named Russell Merrick Oldham, 39, as their chief suspect in Thursday night's shooting of the gang's chapter president, Rodney "Hooks" Monk, in Little Italy in East Sydney. They warned the public not to approach Oldham, saying he was armed and extremely dangerous.

Oldham is the Bandidos' former sergeant-at-arms. He had been a student at Sydney University, in science then in medicine, in the 1980s but eventually dropped out to become a security guard. He has a passion for astronomy and a history of violence.

He lost his post when he went to jail for five years for the manslaughter of two men at Bankstown in 1998, a post Monk, 32, was later to fill. Monk is the brother of senior police officer Detective Inspector Brad Monk.

Police believe the two Bandidos had been arguing about Oldham's relationship with his parole officer - against club rules.

The dinner at Bar Reggio on Thursday was to have been a farewell supper for Oldham. Police believe Monk, who was on bail for driving offences, told him he could no longer wear the gang's black, red and gold colours of a bandit brandishing a machete and pistol. They also believe that when Monk told him he could no longer ride with the gang the two men began shouting at each other.

Oldham, Monk and several other Bandidos entered the crowded restaurant about 9pm, taking a table at the back. It is not known whether Monk had taken his bodyguard, Raymond Curry, who was also jailed over the Bankstown killings.

Superintendent Mark Murdoch said Monk asked Oldham to step outside so they "could continue their discussion".

Monk was unarmed, and police suspect Oldham was carrying a firearm in a small black handbag. No one in the restaurant heard a thing, but neighbours say they heard at least three shots. Then two men ran into Reggios and said a man had been shot at the corner of nearby Chapel and Riley streets.

At 9.15pm police, who were on an undercover sting in neighbouring suburbs, arrived and found Monk sprawled on the ground with two gunshot wounds. He had been shot in the head by a heavy calibre semi-automatic pistol.

Superintendent Murdoch said a man was seen running from the body towards the nearby Lord Roberts Hotel, where he hailed a taxi. At Sydney Town Hall the same man abandoned the taxi and ran off, possibly to Town Hall station.

"Witnesses tell us there was more than one shot," he said. "What we have been told is the deceased and another man had a conversation. The conversation became heated and the two went outside to discuss their differences. We believe we have a good idea who we are looking for … That man has links to the Bandido outlaw motorcycle gang."

Tensions had been simmering within the Bandidos since it had stripped Monk's predecessor, Felix Lyle, of his colours after a dispute over the gang's finances and an alleged assault of a gang member. Matters reached fever pitch when Lyle's 24-year-old son, Dallas Fitzgerald, was kidnapped.

The Herald understands he was released on the payment of a large sum of money and the promise of a further $2 million. Suspicion first fell on a rival gang, the Nomads, but the Bandidos now suspect the job was carried out by some of their own. The resulting dispute threatened Monk's presidency, and it was against this backdrop that Oldham came out in support of Lyle.
Superintendent Murdoch said police had met Bandidos officials yesterday amid concerns of revenge attacks. "It is something that we can't dismiss … We have put plans in place to minimise the impact of that retribution."

Although the gang had given police no promises, "they certainly appreciate what we are trying to do".

"We are confident that we will be able to locate this fellow fairly quickly and put an end to the matter," he said.

Superintendent Murdoch said there had been some discussion that "the person we are looking for was obviously upset with some decisions that had been made by the hierarchy of the Bandidos … It is our understanding they were meeting to resolve those issues, but obviously that didn't occur."

Monk's brother, Inspector Monk, who is Redfern police crime manager, was in shock last night at the news of the shooting. Police said there was no suggestion he was involved in the Bandidos.

White House knew there were no WMD: CIA

April 22, 2006

The CIA had evidence Iraq possessed no weapons of mass destruction six months before the 2003 US-led invasion but was ignored by a White House intent on ousting Saddam Hussein, a former senior CIA official said, according to CBS.

Tyler Drumheller, who headed CIA covert operations in Europe during the run-up to the Iraq war, said intelligence opposing administration claims of a WMD threat came from a top Iraqi official who provided the US spy agency with other credible information.

The source "told us that there were no active weapons of mass destruction programs," Drumheller said in a CBS interview to be aired on Sunday on the US network's 60 Minutes.
"The (White House) group that was dealing with preparation for the Iraq war came back and said they were no longer interested," he was quoted as saying in interview excerpts released by CBS on Friday.

"We said: 'Well, what about the intel?' And they said: 'Well, this isn't about intel anymore. This is about regime change'," added Drumheller, whose CIA operation was assigned the task of debriefing the Iraqi official.

He was the latest former US official to accuse the White House of setting an early course toward war in Iraq and ignoring intelligence that conflicted with its aim.

CBS said the CIA's intelligence source was former Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri and that former CIA Director George Tenet delivered the information personally to US President George W Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other top White House officials in September 2002. They rebuffed the CIA three days later.

"The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy," the former CIA agent told CBS.

US allegations that Saddam had WMD and posed a threat to international security was a main justification for the March 2003 invasion.

A 2002 National Intelligence Estimate, to which the CIA was a major contributor, concluded that prewar Iraq had an active nuclear program and a huge stockpile of unconventional weapons.

No such weapons have been found, however, and US assertions that they existed are now regarded as a hugely damaging intelligence failure.

But Drumheller, co-author of a forthcoming book entitled On the Brink: How the White House Has Compromised American Intelligence, rejects the notion of an intelligence failure.

© 2006 Reuters

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Rene Rivkin's chauffeur arrested on murder charges


ONE of Sydney's most controversial murder investigations reached a dramatic climax in London overnight when police arrested Gordon Wood for allegedly murdering his former lover, the model Caroline Byrne, by throwing her over The Gap.

Wood, 43, who was chauffeur to the late millionaire stockbroker Rene Rivkin at the time of the alleged murder in 1995, was arrested about 12.45am Sydney time by British police at his inner-city flat after a tip-off from the Herald. He put up no resistance.

Detective Inspector Paul Jacob, head of Task Force Irondale, which hunted Wood, will fly to London to begin extradition proceedings so Wood can face trial in Sydney. The extradition hearing could take several weeks. Wood, born in England, has dual Australian and British citizenship.

The arrest came three weeks after the Director of Public Prosecutions, Nicholas Cowdery, QC, agreed with police that there was enough evidence to charge Wood, who left Australia in 1998 under a cloud of suspicion.

The former economics graduate and gym instructor has managed a comfortable existence since, spending most of his time in the French Alps ski resort of Megeve and London, to which he returned about 12 months ago to work as a physical fitness consultant to a large company. The job pays about $150,000 a year and affords a lifestyle that involves frequent travel across Europe and the US.

The central allegation by police will be that Wood and a mysterious accomplice threw Byrne off The Gap at Watsons Bay about 11.30pm on June 7. On a moonless night, two fishermen heard a woman scream in distress.

Not long after, Wood ran out of the darkness. They told him about the scream. Wood said, "Oh, no, she's done it," and ran back into the night.

About 1am Wood returned with Byrne's father, Tony, and his son Peter, claiming Byrne's "spirit guided me" to a spot on the cliff face 150 metres from the fishermen. Wood shone a borrowed torch, its glow so weak the fishermen had not used it, on to the rocks 30 metres below, shouting that he could see a leg and a sandshoe. No one else saw anything.

Police have investigated at least three suspects but have been unable to identify the "second man", who remains free.

Wood has three times denied killing Byrne, twice in police interviews and again on a television current affairs show, saying she committed suicide. He did not say why she would do this.

But police got expert evidence from two of Australia's top physicists that it would have been impossible for even an Olympic athlete to have jumped and landed where Byrne did, more than 10 metres out from the cliff face, impaled head first in a cleft in the sea level rock shelf.

After two trials with policewomen and athletes of the same age and build as Byrne, the physicists told Irondale investigators it was "beyond doubt" that Byrne was thrown off the Gap. This evidence clinched the decision to charge Wood with murder.

The alleged motive is as yet unknown. However, witnesses say Byrne had indicated she was thinking of ending her relationship with Wood, who was said to be obsessively jealous.
It might also involve incriminating information Wood had conveyed to Byrne about a fire that destroyed Offset Alpine in 1993, resulting in a $53.2 million insurance payout to Rivkin and other shareholders.

Byrne's death came a day after Rivkin and Wood were interrogated by the Corporate Affairs Commission on their return from a business trip to Switzerland.

Both denied they knew who owned 38.5 per cent of Offset Alpine shares that were held in secret accounts in Swiss banks. Rivkin, at least, was lying because it has since been revealed the shares were owned by him and two business associates. Tony Byrne told police that Wood told him and his daughter in 1994 that the Offset Alpine fire was a "set up" and advised them to buy shares to make a windfall profit when the insurance payout hugely inflated their value.

Wood's mother bought shares and made a profit. Another witness told police Wood asked him for $500,000 to buy Offset Alpine shares, boasting he would turn it into $1 million in a short time.Police believe that Wood was afraid of any disclosures that might arise if Ms Byrne left him. This would have endangered his job with Rivkin, a mentor who had bought Wood and Byrne the Kings Cross flat in which they lived.Rivkin, 61, committed suicide last May, depressed by a broken marriage and the threat of criminal charges arising from the Offset Alpine investigation. He had served nine months' periodic detention in relation to another matter and lost his stockbroker's licence.

In 1998 Wood told an inquest into Byrne's death that he had last seen her "drowsy and still in bed" at lunchtime on the last day of her life.

When he came back at 4pm, she was gone. He said he fell asleep watching television, woke about 11pm and went looking for her. But three witnesses gave a different story.

Two restaurateurs told the inquest they saw Wood, Byrne and a second man in Robert Park at Watsons Bay and near The Gap at 1pm and again at 3pm. They identified the other man as Adam Leigh, Byrne's booking agent. Wood and Leigh denied being at the park with Byrne.Three months after the inquest returned an open finding into Byrne's death, a third witness gave police a graphic description of the last known sighting of Ms Byrne.At 8.30pm, an artist, John Doherty, heard a woman cry out. He went to the front window of his studio and looked down onto Military Road, opposite The Gap.

He saw a woman he identified as Byrne sitting on the kerb, holding her head in her hands, crying, moaning. Nearby he saw a man of similar appearance to Wood who was abusing her verbally and, further away, another man whom he could not clearly see.The three walked to a road that leads to a reserve next to The Gap. Later he heard voices of a woman and two men raised in loud argument from that direction. No other witnesses have testified to seeing Byrne alive after that.

Sunday, April 02, 2006

Prayer does not heal the sick, study finds

Praying for the health of strangers who have undergone heart surgery has no effect, according to the largest scientific study ever commissioned to calculate the healing power of prayer.

In fact, patients who know they are being prayed for suffer a noticeably higher rate of complications, according to the study, which monitored the recovery of 1,800 patients after heart bypass surgery in the US.

The findings of the decade-long study were due to be published in the American Heart Journal next week, but the journal published the report on its website yesterday as anticipation grew.

The power of intercessory prayer has been studied by doctors for years in America, but with no conclusive results. This $2.4 million study, funded in large part by the John Templeton Foundation, which seeks "insights at the boundary between theology and science", was intended to cast some clear light on the matter.

But the study "did not move us forward or backward" in understanding the effects of prayer, admitted Dr Charles Bethea, one of the co-authors and a cardiologist at the Integris Baptist Medical Center in Oklahoma City. "Intercessory prayer under our restricted format had a neutral effect," he said.

Members of three congregations - St. Paul's Monastery in St. Paul; the Community of Teresian Carmelites in Worcester, Massachussetts; and Silent Unity, a Missouri prayer ministry near Kansas City - were asked to pray for the patients, who were divided into three groups: those who would be told they were being prayed for, those who would receive prayers but not know, and those who would not be prayed for at all.

The worshippers starting praying for the patients the night before surgery and for the next two weeks, asking God to grant "a successful surgery with a quick, healthy recovery and no complications".

The study found no appreciable difference between the health of those who did not know they were being prayed for and those who received no prayers. Fifty-two per cent of patients in both groups suffered complications after surgery. But 59 per cent of those who knew they were prayed for went on to develop complications.

The reports authors said they had no explanation for the difference beyond a possibility that the prayers made people anxious about their ability to recover.

"Did the patients think, ’I am so sick that they had to call in the prayer team?"’ said Dr Bethea.

The results of the study provoked discord among doctors and scientists in the US, many of whom questioned the wisdom of subjecting prayer to the conditions of a research project.

Dr Richard Sloan, a professor of behavioral medicine at Columbia and the author of a forthcoming book, Blind Faith: The Unholy Alliance of Religion and Medicine, told The New York Times: "The problem with studying religion scientifically is that you do violence to the phenomenon by reducing it to basic elements that can be quantified, and that makes for bad science and bad religion."

But Paul Kurtz, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo, and chairman of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal, had a simpler response when asked why the study had found no evidence for the power of prayer. "Because there is none," he said. "That would be one answer."

Dr. David Stevens, executive director of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations, told the AP that he believed intercessory prayer could influence people's health, but that scientists were not equipped to measure the phenomenon."Do we control God through prayer? Theologians would say absolutely not. God decides sometimes to intervene, and sometimes not," he said. As for the new study, he said, "I don’t think... it’s going to stop people praying for the sick."