• Spy-plane bonus
Declassified photographs from American U2 spy planes reveal a treasure trove of archaeological information in the Middle East, from prehistoric hunting traps to 3,000-year-old irrigation canals. Emily Hammer of the University of Pennsylvania and Jason Ur of Harvard University have indexed and analyzed the frames, which were taken during the Cold War era and remained classified until 1997. “The photos provide a fascinating look at the Middle East several decades ago, showing, for example, historical Aleppo long before the massive destruction wrought in the ongoing civil war,” Hammer said. “Plus, the work and the accompanying online resources will allow other researchers to identify and access U2 photos for the first time.”
• Hospital readmissions
Medicare patients sent home from the hospital have higher readmission rates than those discharged to a skilled nursing facility. “With the increasing costs of post-acute care, it’s important to assess and understand the impacts of these choices,” said Rachel Werner of the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. “We found clear trade-offs: While home health care may cost less, it doesn’t have the same intensity of care as a skilled nursing facility, which may be sending many of them back into the hospital.”
• U.S. debt
The U.S. national debt has crossed $22 trillion. According to a Treasury Department report, the federal budget deficit rose to $310 billion in the first four months of the 2019 fiscal year, up 77 percent from the same time last year, as revenues fell 2 percent to $1.1 trillion and spending rose 9 percent to $1.4 trillion. Kent Smetters of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania said the growth in debt "is very closely in line with our previous projections of the impact of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. It is hard to definitely pin down a date of ‘no return.’ But, under the current debt path, we currently estimate that the government will have almost no reasonable options left, outside of debt default, in about 25 years.”
• Risk & adolescents
Adolescents are not naturally inclined to be greater risk-takers than younger children, despite stereotypes to the contrary and as some neuroscience theories have suggested. A recent policy review, led by Ivy N. Defoe, a recent postdoctoral fellow at the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, found instead that when adolescents can opt out of taking a risk, they take the safer option more often than children do. The researchers noted that despite the lack of evidence for adolescents being inherently more risk-taking than younger children, they are more likely to take risks than adults, even when the risks are spelled out.
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LIVESTOCK SLAUGHTER – 2018 ANNUAL UNITED STATES HIGHLIGHTS
Total red meat production for the United States totaled 53.5 billion pounds in 2018, 3 percent higher than the previous year. Red meat includes beef, veal, pork, and lamb and mutton. Red meat production in commercial plants totaled 53.4 billion pounds. On-farm slaughter totaled 90.2 million pounds.
Beef production totaled 26.9 billion pounds, up 3 percent from the previous year. Veal production totaled 80.9 million pounds, up 1 percent from last year. Pork production, at 26.3 billion pounds, was 3 percent above the previous year. Lamb and mutton production totaled 158.2 million pounds, up 5 percent from 2017.
Commercial cattle slaughter during 2018 totaled 33.0 million head, up 3 percent from 2017, with federal inspection comprising 98.5 percent of the total. The average live weight was 1,350 pounds, up 1 pound from a year ago. Steers comprised 51.2 percent of the total federally inspected cattle slaughter, heifers 28.2 percent, dairy cows 9.7 percent, other cows 9.3 percent, and bulls 1.7 percent.
Commercial calf slaughter totaled 580,300 head, 13 percent higher than a year ago with 98.5 percent under federal inspection. The average live weight was 226 pounds, down 24 pounds from a year earlier.
Commercial hog slaughter totaled 124.4 million head, 3 percent higher than 2017 with 99.4 percent of the hogs slaughtered under federal inspection. The average live weight was up 1 pound from last year, at 283 pounds. Barrows and gilts comprised 97.3 percent of the total federally inspected hog slaughter.
Commercial sheep and lamb slaughter, at 2.26 million head, was up 4 percent from the previous year with federal inspection comprising 88.3 percent of the total. The average live weight was up 2 pounds from 2017 at 135 pounds. Lambs and yearlings comprised 94.7 percent of the total federally inspected sheep slaughter.
For a full copy of the Livestock Slaughter 2017 Summary report please visit www.nass.usda.gov. For state specific questions, please contact:
Arizona – Dave DeWalt 1-800-645-7286 Colorado – William R. Meyer 1-800-392-3202 Montana – Eric Sommer 1-800-835-2612 New Mexico – Longino Bustillos 1-800-530-8810 Utah – John Hilton 1-800-747-8522 Wyoming – Rhonda Brandt 1-800-892-1660
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TO WRITE LOVE ON HER ARMS
Founder Jamie Tworkowski Announces
New York City Speaking Event
Melbourne, FL - April 24, 2019 - To Write Love on Her Arms (TWLOHA) founder Jamie Tworkwoski is thrilled to be returning to New York City next month for a special event in partnership with the Mental Health Comedy Tour. Tworkowski will be speaking at Comic Strip Live on Thursday, May 30th alongside comedian Joe Matarese and host Preston Gitlin, to use their voices to fight the stigma that surrounds mental health. Tickets are available now at http://bit.ly/2GrbMPb for $25, with half of the proceeds benefiting the organization.
In their 13-year history, TWLOHA has donated over $2.3 million directly into treatment, traveled more than 3.4 million miles to meet people face-to-face at nearly 3,000 events, and has responded to over 210,000 messages from over 100 countries. Each month, they connect with 5 million people online through social media and their FIND HELP Tool fields 5,000 searches made by people seeking affordable, local mental health resources.
This past September TWLOHA wrapped their 7th Annual World Suicide Prevention Day campaign for World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) and National Suicide Prevention Week (NSPW). With the help of supporters from around the world, the organization was able to raise over $200k for treatment and recovery, more than doubling their initial goal of $100k. Over 3600 people donated to the "Tomorrow Needs You" campaign, in addition to the sale of 4655 World Suicide Prevention Day packs. The money raised will help sponsor nearly 4000 counseling sessions and connect 55,000 people to local mental health resources.
As part of the campaign, TWLOHA shared an inspiring video featuring actors Chris Sullivan (from This Is Us) and Jaina Lee Ortiz (from Station 19), country music star Hunter Hayes, who raised $25,000, writer/artist Morgan Harper Nichols, and singer/songwriter Matt Wertz, along with a number of clips submitted by TWLOHA supporters from around the world. To watch the video, please visit: youtu.be/aEzUMnBHHK0.
For more information on To Write Love On Her Arms, please visit https://twloha.com/.
WHO: Jamie Tworkowski w/ Joe Matarese & Preston Gitlin
WHAT: Mental Health Comedy Tour
WHERE: Comic Strip Live | 1568 2nd Ave | New York, NY 10028
WHEN: Thursday, May 30th | 8pm
INFO: http://bit.ly/2GrbMPb | $25
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Inside The Interrogation Room:
Manipulation Brings False Confessions
By Brian Leslie
True crime shows comprise one of the most popular genres in the entertainment culture. People are fascinated with who did it and why; how they got caught or got away.
More and more, though, it seems the storyline is “falsely accused” and “false confession.” Curiosity and fascination deepen when the possibility emerges that the convicted criminal may actually be an innocent victim. Recent developments regarding the central figure in Netflix’s controversial documentary series, “Making a Murderer,” is a case in point.
In numerous cases where prime suspects end up in jail, defense attorneys later go back to the beginning and, with the help of forensic and interrogation experts, expose flaws in the evidence gathering and, often, in the way investigators interviewed suspects. In “Making a Murderer,” Steven Avery is in prison for the murder of Teresa Halbach. Avery denied carrying out the crime, and his attorney, Kathleen Zellner, recently won a request that could help lead to a new trial.
The conviction was based in part on the confession of also-convicted 16-year-old Brendan Dassey, Avery’s nephew. However, the teen later recanted the confession, which he gave without a lawyer present. It was claimed that Dassey was coerced and intimidated by investigators. Attempts by Dassey's attorneys to have his confession overturned have bounced through state and federal courts since his conviction.
Without his confession, there wasn't much of a case. With a suspect like Dassey, who has reported intellectual disabilities, interrogators often try to build a rapport so the suspect will see them as being good guys trying to help. That’s particularly effective with someone as young as Dassey. You can convince a 16-year-old of anything, especially if they're in a vulnerable position.
The Netflix series investigated the law enforcement and judicial procedures in the case and suggested: 1) evidence may have been planted and, 2) that Dassey’s confession came due to interrogators pressuring him.
The latter occurrence, statistics show, happens a disturbing amount of the time in law enforcement, and the public isn’t aware of it. Let’s take a peek inside the interrogation room and see how forced and false confessions happen.
There’s a misnomer about what occurs inside the interrogation room. One of the issues is that what juries see in an interrogation video is not necessarily what’s really occurring. Some of the interviewing language and techniques that are used are sometimes not explained to juries.
Remember, the whole point of an interrogation is to get a confession, and it can lead to all kinds of tricks to get just that.
The “narrative trap.” When investigating how interrogations went down, I look at how the questions were constructed, and also how law enforcement got to the point where they targeted the suspect. The narrative trap is when a question is constructed in such a way by the interviewer that the context may not be understood completely by the suspect. Thus he or she provides an answer that may be incriminating.
But when a jury looks at that video, they don’t know why certain questions are being asked. Or, why is a rapport being built between the interrogator and the suspect? Or, why during rapport-building was the suspect given their Miranda Rights – their right to silence – which they soon forgot in an hour during the interview?
Blackout confessions. Drug use and drinking get brought up in interrogations, and interrogators sometimes will use it as a way to establish having something in common with the suspect. The questioner will say something like, “Yeah, I’ve had a few too many drinks and done things I didn’t remember. A lot of us make mistakes like that. Maybe you had too much that night.” The interrogator engages in rapport-building, and questions can come in a sneaky way, eliciting responses that can be seen as incriminating. The innocent suspect gets tricked into a confession. He or she leaves the interview thinking everything is fine, and the next thing they know, they’re arrested.
Minimizing and maximizing. Interrogators talk suspects into a confession sometimes by telling them “coming clean” will result in a minimized sentence. Otherwise, they say, it could be the maximum. The pressure builds on the suspect to confess.
One of the key issues is the pressure of the press and local community. The police believe they’ve targeted the right person, but there can be biases and a lack of information or hard evidence. That happens because they’re not using the inductive method of investigation, which considers all evidence – not just the part that fits their original theory.
You have to ask yourself: Why would someone confess something he or she didn’t do? Sometimes they’re being led down a garden path by interrogators. The suspect believes they’re helping interrogators solve the problem – when in reality they’re on a path to prison.
Brian Leslie (www.criminalcaseconsultants.com) is a forensic expert focusing on coercive police interrogation and interview techniques. The author of three books – Reaction Analysis Profiling, Deception of a Witness, and Visual Liar – Leslie has over 15 years of previous law enforcement experience. He is regularly retained to analyze the contents of written, video and audio witness/victim interviews, suspect interviews and interrogations that were conducted by law enforcement. He also examines the interviews and investigative notes by child protection service agencies in the United States.
