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Colin Blumer was born in Mudgee, New South Wales, in 1895, and was in his second year of agricultural studies at Hawkesbury Agricultural College when war broke out in 1914. He falsified his age in order to enlist on 26 August 1914, stating that he was 20 years and one month old rather than 18 years and nine months. His family was not happy about this but did not stop him. Blumer was appointed to the 3rd Battalion and underwent two months of basic training before his departure for war.
Blumer sailed from Sydney on HMAT Euripides on 20 October 1914, joining the rest of the First Convoy in Albany before proceeding to Egypt. Euripides arrived in Alexandria at 11 am on 3 December 1914, disembarkation began at 9 pm and the troops then travelled by train to Cairo.
On 5 April 1915, Blumer was promoted to sergeant, and on same day the 2nd and 3rd Battalions departed for Gallipoli aboard the captured German liner Derfflinger. Blumer and the 3rd came ashore at 5.30 am on 25 April 1915 under heavy gunfire. Forming up below Plugge's Plateau, they advanced, fully laden with packs, ammunition, picks, shovels and entrenching tools. By 10 am every man of the battalion was engaged in reinforcing the 3rd Brigade.
The 3rd Battalion suffered terrible loss of life in fierce fighting while repelling Ottoman counter-attacks near Russell's Top. When night fell, the men tried to dig in under continuous fire and heavy rain. They were subjected to constant attacks and fierce hand-to-hand fighting for the next four days, and when the exhausted men were finally relieved, 39 had been killed, 193 wounded and 69 were missing. Over the next two weeks, Blumer and the 3rd worked hard digging and reinforcing trenches, while enduring intense heat, flies, lice and the stench of those they could not bury. Deeper and more secure trenches were the only safeguard against the incessant enemy shelling and gunfire.
The 3rd Battalion then helped repel the Ottoman Offensive on 19 May. Under orders to fix bayonets and withhold fire to conceal their position, the 3rd had a close view of the oncoming Ottomans as they walked into a blaze of gunfire. On 24 May, during an armistice, they were finally able to enter no-man's-land and recover the dead for burial.
Blumer was wounded on four occasions while serving at Gallipoli. On 17 May, two days before the disastrous Ottoman Offensive, he was shot in the thumb and spent a month out of action. Three weeks after his return, with the battalion engaged in intense trench warfare near Lone Pine, he received a gunshot wound to the back that kept him away from the front for a further two months. He was slightly wounded once more on 9 September, but remained on the peninsula. However, on 19 November at Bolton's Ridge, he sustained serious chest and arm wounds from shrapnel resulting in his evacuation to Egypt and the end of his time on Gallipoli.
On 23 July 1916, Blumer and the 3rd Battalion were given the objective of Pozières trench, which they captured with few casualties. However, that night and the following day, heavy German shelling resulted in rapid losses for Blumer's A Company, and a large number of the battalion's most experienced soldiers were either killed or wounded. Many others were buried as severe shelling levelled the trenches. Supporting the advance of the 8th Battalion, three companies of the 3rd came under heavy machine-gun fire and an intense bombardment of high-explosive shells. The battalion's losses totalled 104 killed, 375 wounded and 43 missing. Blumer was awarded the Military Medal for keeping up his men's spirits and leading them forward, despite having been wounded and, on one occasion, buried.
On 9 August 1916, after the heavy loss of officers at Pozières, Blumer was commissioned as a second lieutenant. Just over a week later, at Mouquet Farm, the 3rd Battalion was inadvertently shelled by British artillery while in position near the front line, resulting in a disastrous loss of life and a bitter feeling among the men over the incident. By now, many were experiencing sleeplessness and fatigue caused by nonstop shelling. Subjected to soaking rain and having lost confidence in their own artillery, they were weary in body and mind and became deeply despondent. It was the battalion's lowest ebb of the war.
In early October 1916, Blumer and the 3rd joined the front in Ypres. Blumer, in a group specifically trained in trench raids, led a raid on the night of 12 October. As they rushed the German trenches, however, they met with strong resistance and a heavy fusillade of bombs. Unable to take prisoners, they killed 13 enemy soldiers. Four of the 3rd's own men were wounded and one was reported missing, believed killed. Blumer sustained a bomb wound to the left leg and eye, and was evacuated on 13 October to the 3rd London General Hospital. He was commended for his actions. The military citation read:
For great bravery while leading his men in a raiding party on the night 12/13th inst at YPRES while crossing NO MAN'S LAND he was wounded, but entered the enemy's trench and led his party being again wounded. He was the last man of his party to leave the hostile trenches. He set a fine example of determination and courage. 2/Lt. BLUMER received the MILITARY MEDAL for gallantry at POZIERES while a Sergeant.
Despite being commissioned as a lieutenant on 18 December 1916, Blumer appears not to have been involved in active engagements after this time. He was given a special Mention in Despatches on 9 April 1917, however by this time he was in Weymouth awaiting repatriation to Australia. He arrived home on 5 July 1917. Most likely due to wounds sustained at Ypres, Blumer was declared medically unfit for service and his AIF appointment was terminated on 28 August 1917.
Blumer was placed in the Reserve of Australian Army Officers with the honorary rank of lieutenant following his return to Australia. In March 1924, he was transferred from the Reserve and appointed to the Australian Army Veterinary Corps with the rank of provisional captain for part-time service with the Militia Forces.
Blumer completed the studies he had been undertaking when the First World War intervened. In May 1924, he was awarded a Bachelor of Veterinary Science, having also won the William Cooper and Nephews' Prize for Veterinary Parasitology. Three months later he was appointed as a veterinary surgeon in the Stock and Brands Branch of the Department of Agriculture. On 20 December the same year, Blumer married Clarice Aileen Beer in Nambucca Heads.
On 23 January 1940, Blumer was reappointed for service with the Militia Services. He served with the 12th Light Horse until 15 July 1942, when he commenced full-time duty with the 12th Australian Motor Regiment. In September that year, he volunteered and was accepted for service in the AIF. He was transferred to the 12th Australian Armoured Car Regiment on 4 November 1942. His appointment was terminated 11 April 1944, after having only undertaken garrison duty within Australia.
Following his war service, Blumer was appointed to the position of Senior Veterinary Officer for the State of New South Wales in 1944. Three years later, he was working in the Division of Animal Husbandry for the Department of Agriculture. He had been stationed in Armidale, New South Wales, but in 1948 moved to Sydney where he was appointed Chairman of the Board of Tick Control in Lismore, a position he held for about five years before being appointed Deputy Chief of the Division of Animal Husbandry. Two years later Blumer was promoted to chief, and he remained in this role until retiring in 1960. In 1965, the University of New England honoured him by naming its veterinary laboratory after him.
Blumer and his wife, Clarice, did not have any children. He died on 2 July 1973 aged 77 leaving a legacy of outstanding public and private achievement. His funeral was well attended, not least by those remaining of the 3rd Battalion AIF Association, of which he was president.
Australian War Memorial, Embarkation, Honour and Nominal Rolls, http://www.awm.gov.au/
National Archives of Australia: Australian Imperial Force, Base Records Office; B2455, NX137581, Colin Charles Blumer's First Australian Imperial Force personnel dossier, 1914-1948; BLUMER C C, 1914-1948
Woods, M 2014, Colin Charles Blumer 1895-1973, personal family research, unpublished
Wren, E 1935 Randwick to Hargicourt: History of the 3rd Battalion, AIF, 1914-1918, Naval-Military Press, East Sussex, and Imperial War Museum, London (Replica)
Hello, I'd like to thank you for your bravery and courage in the First World War. I send my condolences to your family.
You did good.
Colin Blumer
So glad he lived.
So glad he survived to live a full life.
He was a good man.
Thank you for serving our country. Lest we forget...
Dear BLUMER, I appreciate your courage for fighting in the war. I feel sorry that you had to sacrifice yourself for Australia and making our country beautiful. LOVE CHARLOTTE.
Paul Ellis
You made an amazing contribution. Many thanks. My generation and those that follow will be eternally grateful.
Thank you for your service.
Thanks for serving our nation.
A true hero.
Thank you to you and all our brave ANZACs for your courage and the sacrifices you all made. We are forever grateful.
Teresa Mcguirk
My hero, my freedom. Thank you MR Colin Charles Blumer.
Thank you for being brave and serving our country.
we will remembe...
Thank you will never be enough. Lest we forget. x
I salute your courage. You fought so the future generations of Australians could enjoy a safe future.
Did you die in the war or did you survive?
Thank you for your bravery and the future you have given me.
I will remember this day.
Dear Colin, You are very brave to serve your country. You and the other men will be greatly remembered for your bravery. Thank you.
Thank you for your service.
I hope you had a nice life.
You did well.
Thank you for fighting for our country.
You were very brave.
I hope you had a peaceful death.
Thank you for fighting in the war and helping animals.
You suffered so much to give us a better world. May we be worthy of that sacrifice.
Thank you so much for the freedom and joy you have given many generations in front of your own. The courage you held in you heart is impeccable. Thank you endlessly for your service.
Your courage and bravery will not be forgotten.
Thanks heaps for helping our country. You were a true Sergeant.
Thanks for serving in the war.
Lest we forget.
Thank you from us all.
cherry miller
Thank you for your dedication.
cathryn Roads
A privilege to walk a centimetre with you. Thank you.
Blumer was a brave hero. Even though being wounded four times, he still came home alive. So thank you, thank you very much.
I thank you for serving.
You are a good man.
Thank you for your knowledge and bravery.
So proud to be Australian.
Thank you for going to war.
Thank you for your service. RIP.


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WELCOME ALISSA!!! You have BIG shoes to fill, but we know you will do the job well!! Glad you are still around Denise, otherwise I would cry!
Passing the Torch
Alissa has graciously taken over WI GC duties as I have retired. Just wanted to update you all, and say it's been a pleasure! I'm still around, so no worries there.[:D]
Please welcome Alissa as our new WI Group Coordinator!
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Intervention Needed To Address Broadcaster Collusion and Anti-Consumer Tactics, Trade Group Says
PITTSBURGH, June 27, 2011 – Relying on clear and convincing evidence in the record, the American Cable Association called on the Federal Communications Commission to protect the television viewing public by confronting rampant price fixing by broadcasters before ACA members must start a new round of retransmission consent negotiations with hundreds of commercial broadcasters in October.
ACA also urged the FCC to sweep away barriers erected by networks and local stations that effectively ban cable operators from serving consumers with out-of-market signals as they are entitled to do under longstanding federal policy designed to promote access to significantly viewed stations and others stations providing important information deemed distant by an advertising research company.
"To protect consumers from skyrocketing retransmission consent fees and greater service disruptions, the FCC must outlaw the growing practice of separately owned TV stations in the same market coordinating their negotiations for carriage fees in an effort to extract monopoly rents from local cable operators. Outright prohibitions and other hurdles imposed by broadcasters on ACA members curtailing access to out-of-market stations similarly must be abolished as restrictions on choice repugnant to the public interest and contrary to longstanding policy positions of Congress and the FCC," ACA President and CEO Matthew M. Polka said.
ACA stressed the need for reform with the annual cost of retransmission consent expected to double by 2017 to $3.6 billion, according to SNL Kagan. The customers of small and midsize cable companies, largely defenseless against the market power wielded by local broadcasters, will end up shouldering a disproportionate amount of these exploding TV signal carriage costs. ACA has urged the FCC to investigate and address rampant price discrimination against smaller cable operators.
ACA underscored the need for FCC action in the near term because thousands of carriage contracts are to expire on Dec. 31, 2011. Retransmission consent contracts are typically negotiated triennially.
"Broadcasters are poised to execute their strategy of blacking out signals until their outrageous cash demands are met. New rules of the road that curb broadcasters' misconduct should be adopted in time to protect consumers from losing signals if their pay-TV providers are forced to decline the 'take-it-or-leave-it' offers of price-gouging TV station owners," Polka said.
ACA highlighted widespread retransmission consent abuses in a new round of comments intended to help guide the direction of the FCC's latest and probably most significant review of its broadcast carriage rules in nearly 20 years. ACA, a retransmission consent reform advocate for nearly a decade, applauded the FCC's decision in March to examine the rules governing retransmission consent.
ACA argued that current retransmission consent rules contribute to the misallocation of capital by
siphoning funds from independent cable operators into the pockets of TV stations exploiting or performing end-runs around badly outdated laws and regulations. This dynamic not only raises the cost to consumers to view broadcast programming on cable but also depletes funds needed to expand the availability and performance of broadband services that are greatly in demand as essential tools of learning, commerce and communications.
In its comments, ACA documented some of the ways broadcasters seek to gain insurmountable bargaining leverage over ACA members. In reaction to broadcaster claims that the FCC lacked evidence of occurrences of coordinated negotiation of retransmission consent, ACA confirmed and detailed 36 pairs of broadcasters involved in coordinated negotiations in 33 markets – providing the names of the broadcasters and the individual markets involved – that ACA members have experienced in the past three years.
In light of this data-driven evidence of broadcaster misconduct, ACA called on the FCC to adopt a rule that independently owned TV stations in the same market engaging in coordinated bargaining are per se violations of their legal obligation to bargain in good faith. Forcing TV stations in the same market to bargain on their own is crucial given that cable operators have reported that they pay less for retransmission consent when they negotiate with one station at a time as opposed to two, and that the harm is exacerbated when the two are affiliates of ABC, NBC, CBS and FOX. ACA pointed out that coordinated negotiations lead to greater consumer disruption during negotiation impasses because consumers would simultaneously lose access to two broadcast stations, instead of just one.
ACA noted that in responding to broadcaster collusion, the FCC should be aware that TV stations told they must not engage in coordinated negotiation by contract could evade the prohibition through less formal channels, such non-binding agreements not to sign carriage deals until the two stations involved have obtained a suitable fees structure. ACA urged the FCC to prohibit both formal and informal forms of coordinated negotiations.
ACA also urged the FCC to focus on the consumer harms taking place with regard to cable carriage of distant broadcast signals. In this regard, ACA called for a per se rule prohibition on any TV station or broadcast network that interferes with cable operators' right to carry, and consumers' legal right to view, distant TV signals. ACA informed the FCC that TV stations are both withholding retransmission consent unless cable operators agree not to carry any out-of-market stations and relinquishing to their network their right to grant out-of-market station carriage rights to a cable operator.
"TV stations are ganging up against ACA members to squeeze as much money as possible from our customers and also strengthening that monopoly power by denying cable carriage of distant signals otherwise permissible under FCC rules," Polka said. "If a clearer case for pro-consumer regulatory reform exists, I am unaware of it."
About the American Cable Association
Based in Pittsburgh, the American Cable Association is a trade organization representing nearly 900 smaller and medium-sized, independent cable companies who provide broadband services for more than 7.6 million cable subscribers primarily located in rural and smaller suburban markets across America. Through active participation in the regulatory and legislative process in Washington, D.C., ACA's members work together to advance the interests of their customers and ensure the future competitiveness and viability of their business. For more information, visit https://acaconnects.org/


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Tougher scoring blamed for state drop in Illinois elementary school reading, math scores
SPRINGFIELD — Test scores for Illinois elementary students dipped significantly in 2013 in both reading and math. But the state board of education says the changes are due to tougher scoring criteria, and students are still making gains.
State education officials announced the results on Tuesday. The overall percentage of students meeting and exceeding standards in 2013 dropped to 61.9 percent in 2013, down from 82.1 percent in 2012.
The Illinois Standards Achievement Test is given to third through eighth graders in public schools. The board of education last year raised requirements for better alignment with tests given to high school students for college and career readiness.
The changes also come as Illinois and 44 states across the country prepares adopt Common Core standards in 2014, a more rigorous test for students.
via Tougher scoring blamed for state drop in elementary school reading, math scores – Chicago Sun-Times.


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Your analysis of your local problem should give you a better understanding of the factors contributing to it. Once you have analyzed your local problem and established a baseline for measuring effectiveness, you should consider possible responses to address the problem.
The following response strategies provide a foundation of ideas for addressing your particular problem. These strategies are drawn from a variety of research studies and police reports. Several of these strategies may apply to your community's problem. It is critical that you tailor responses to local circumstances, and that you can justify each response based on reliable analysis. In most cases, an effective strategy will involve implementing several different responses. Law enforcement responses alone are seldom effective in reducing or solving the problem. Do not limit yourself to considering what police can do: give careful consideration to whom else in your community shares responsibility for the problem and can help police better respond to it.
You will note that one set of responses fits under the label "improving the police response to incidents." Normally, problem-oriented policing is not very concerned with improving incident response—rather, it is focused on the underlying problems and conditions that give rise to incidents. In the case of people with mental illness, however, it is widely recognized that traditional police response to incidents has been unsatisfactory, and a tremendous amount of attention has been focused on improving incident response over the past decade. It has been much less common, so far, for police to take a problem-oriented approach to situations involving people with mental illness. The responses described below address both the incident-oriented and problem-oriented approaches.
1. Working with the mental health community. Mental health professionals and others who work with or as advocates for people with mental illness can be viable partners with the police. They can provide training and direct assistance during emergencies, as described below. [24] They provide inpatient and outpatient services for people with mental illness and operate emergency facilities. There seems to be a general recognition that "neither the mental health system nor the law enforcement system can manage mental health crises in the community effectively without help from the other." [25]
Working together can be a challenge, however. The police responsibility to reduce disorder and hold offenders to account does not always square with the clinical and treatment goals of mental health providers. For these reasons as well as privacy and confidentiality considerations, the law enforcement and mental health systems sometimes fail to share information fully or quickly. Also, each system has a tendency to want to unload problematic individuals onto the other system. [26] Police often complain about the difficulty of getting hospitals to accept responsibility for people in crisis, while mental health professionals often complain that the police are too quick to seek civil commitment and too prone to place criminal charges.
The police problems associated with people with mental illness provide an opportunity for collaboration and partnerships. [27] A number of agencies and individuals, besides the police, have a professional interest in, and responsibility for, preventing incidents and tragedies as well as improving immediate and follow-up services. Others, including people with mental illness and their families, have a more personal but no less compelling interest in the same ends. Police departments should take the lead, if necessary, in building collaboration and partnerships among these groups to enhance incident response, coordination, and prevention.
2. Working with emergency hospitals. Those emergency hospitals (whether general hospitals or specialized psychiatric hospitals) to which police may take people in crisis are important elements of the mental health system. Police agencies should meet with staff of these hospitals periodically to clarify expectations, develop workable protocols, and address problems and issues. For example, it should be clear when an officer must remain at the hospital and when hospital security can take over. It should be clear whether either the police or an ambulance is responsible for transporting a patient to another facility. It should be the responsibility of police commanders and specialists to work these matters out in advance, so that patrol officers with people in crisis at 2 a.m. do not have to argue and debate with hospital staff.
3. Appointing police liaison officers. Issues related to people with mental illness need champions within the police department, or else they run the risk of falling through the cracks. Some police departments appoint an officer or commander to serve as liaison to the entire mental health community, including sitting on appropriate boards and committees. In addition, some departments appoint liaison officers for each mental health facility (hospital, shelter, group home, etc.) in the jurisdiction. These facility liaison officers can be particularly effective for problem-solving location-specific issues to reduce and prevent crimes, disorder, and calls for service at current and potential hot spots (see responses below under "Targeting Locations").
4. Training generalist police officers. Training should be regarded as a promising method for improving the police response to incidents involving people with mental illness, but it is no panacea and should not be regarded as the complete solution to the problem. [28] Some police academies use role-playing—sometimes with trained actors—to teach police officers how to handle incidents involving people with mental illness. [29] Proper training typically integrates lecture, discussion, tours of mental health facilities, and role-playing. [30] Many states now require that police officers receive preservice and in-service training in dealing with people with mental illness. [31]
Although some training on handling mental health crises is provided in most police academies, [32] it may not be adequate. A British survey found that 61 percent of police officers felt inadequately trained to deal with problems associated with people with mental illness. [33] A study of Pennsylvania police departments found that 47 percent of respondents disagreed that they were "qualified to manage persons with mental illness." [34]
The aim of training is typically "to enhance officers' understanding of mental disabilities and their symptoms, to increase the knowledge of available community resources and dispositional alternatives, and to develop some basic crisis communication skills." [35] It is also important to train police to "make decisions free of prejudice, preformed attitudes, and stereotypical approaches." [36] Evaluations indicate that such training can succeed in improving understanding and knowledge, but that it is more difficult to change police officers' attitudes and behaviors. Training that exaggerates the danger involved in police encounters with people with mental illness can lead to premature and excessive use of force, but realistic training with role-playing might significantly reduce police use of deadly force when dealing with emotionally disturbed people. [37] A review of the evidence on the effectiveness of training for generalist patrol officers concluded that "educational programs and crisis intervention training are probably not harmful and may be helpful, but there is good reason to believe that they are not sufficient to change fundamentally the nature of police encounters with mentally ill persons in crisis." [38]
5. Providing more information to patrol officers. Ordinary patrol officers called up on to handle incidents involving people with mental illness can benefit from at least two types of specific information. One is information about clinics, shelters, and mental health services that are available in the community. Armed with this type of information, officers may be able to effectively refer people with mental illness to agencies better suited to provide treatment and other services, and/or to provide such information to family members or other potential guardians. Departments might provide this information to officers via brochures, printed referral agency directories, or the agencys online intranet or web site.
A second type of information that might be valuable for patrol officers pertains to community members with a history of mental illness. People who repeatedly report fictional events, for example, or who have had mental health crises that led to violent encounters with officers, might be logged in a database or flagged in the department's dispatching system. The purpose of this information would be to forewarn an officer who subsequently is dispatched to a chronic caller's address, or who encounters a potentially violent person. Otherwise, especially in a large department, officers find themselves at a disadvantage dealing with people whom they know nothing about, despite the fact that the people have a history with other agency officers. [39]
Of course, the compilation and dissemination of this type of information raises some legal and privacy issues that have to be carefully addressed (one would hope that everyone with a police scanner would not hear that "a known mental case resides at that address" or some similar announcement). Another concern is labeling—advance information about a person's mental illness history might prejudice an officer's decision-making. One study found that advance information about a suspect did not affect officer arrest decisions in a minor crime situation, but officers were "less willing to investigate and take action on behalf of a victim with mental illness." [40]
6. Using less-lethal weapons. Police officers can resolve most tense and threatening situations involving people with mental illness by maintaining a calm demeanor, using good oral and nonverbal communication, and using proper tactics, but when those techniques fail, it is crucial to have additional alternatives short of deadly force. Too often in the past in encounters with people experiencing mental health crises, officers have used poor tactics and then turned immediately to the use of deadly force. [41] Today, the practicality and effectiveness of less-lethal police weapons, including pepper spray and stun guns, have improved and police agencies should explore obtaining those that are reliable and affordable. In particular, less-lethal weapons offer police officers important alternatives in those situations when a person with mental illness is wielding a knife or a blunt object in a threatening manner, or when the person's strength threatens to overwhelm the officer. Needless to say, police agencies need to have clear policies and procedures in place that guide officers' use-of-force decisions and ensure that police use the least-necessary amount of force.
7. Deploying specialized police officers. In recent years, the most popular approach to improving police response to incidents involving people with mental illness, and especially crisis incidents, has been specialization. Departments have seen the value of preparing specialist officers or even special units to handle these situations, relieving regular patrol officers of that responsibility. Specialists can be carefully selected and given extra training, and then over time they acquire substantial experience, all of which should contribute to better performance.
The Memphis, Tennessee CIT (Crisis Intervention Team) model is the most pervasive. [42] A cadre of selected patrol officers (10 to 20 percent of those assigned to patrol) receive extra training (40 hours initially) and then serve as generalists/specialists—they perform the full-range of regular patrol duties, but respond immediately (from anywhere in the city) whenever crisis situations occur involving people with mental illness. In those situations, these officers assume on-scene command as soon as they arrive. They are trained to handle the crisis situations as well as to facilitate the delivery of treatment and other services. In particular, they become knowledgeable about voluntary and involuntary commitment, plus they become well known to professionals in the mental health community, facilitating the delivery of treatment and other services to the people in crisis.
Evidence indicates that the CIT model has worked effectively in Memphis. [43] Response times are generally under 10 minutes, the CIT officers handle 95 percent of all mental disturbance calls, regular patrol officers support the program, police time spent waiting for mental health admissions is dramatically down, arrest rates of people with mental illness are low, referrals to treatment are high, police-caused injuries suffered by people with mental illness are down, officer injury rates are down, and call-outs of the Special Weapons and Tactics team are down. A recent CIT evaluation in Louisville, Kentucky also found that "in addition to reducing use of force, officer injury, and criminalization of mental illness, CIT programs may save money and reduce psychiatric morbidity by referring severely ill subjects to appropriate treatment earlier than might occur otherwise." [44]
Several limitations of the Memphis CIT model for smaller agencies should be noted. [45] First, in small agencies, at least half of, if not all, officers would need the specialized training so that a CIT officer would always be on duty; in such a situation, picking these officers could not be as selective as in Memphis, since every officer or every other officer would be selected. Also, the likelihood that those officers in a small agency would gain substantial additional experience in handling people in mental health crisis would be reduced, simply because the volume of such situations would be limited. In addition, a key factor in the success of the CIT model is networking and collaboration between police and mental health service providers. In a small jurisdiction, however, such providers may be totally absent, and certainly not available around the clock. Consequently, the CIT model may not be as effective in smaller jurisdictions as it is in larger ones. That said, it may still be more effective than other alternatives, especially the alternative of providing officers with no special training in dealing with people with mental illness.
8. Deploying specialized nonpolice responders. An alternative to specialized police response to calls and crises involving people with mental illness is specialized nonpolice response. This usually involves response by social workers/mental health clinicians or some kind of combined sworn police and nonsworn civilian response. [46] The nonpolice approach is generally based on the belief that educated and trained mental health professionals have skills and knowledge that most police officers do not. The combined model adds the recognition that situations involving people in mental health crisis can be dangerous and may require the use of physical force and/or enforcement of the criminal law, capacities that are provided by police officers, not social workers or mental health clinicians.
Implementation of these nonpolice and combined models can be even more complicated and challenging than the Memphis CIT model, because social workers and mental health professionals are not routinely available 24 hours a day or typically dispatched to emergencies in the field. Nevertheless, models of this type have been used in Birmingham (Alabama), Knoxville (Tennessee), Burlington (Vermont), Los Angeles, San Diego, and a number of other cities.[47] Comparative analysis suggests that these nonpolice alternatives do not succeed in handling as high a proportion of applicable calls and do not achieve as quick a response as the CIT model, but they may resolve a greater proportion of incidents at the scene or through referral, whereas the CIT approach tends to rely on transporting the person in crisis to a treatment location. [48]
The choice between police and nonpolice specialized responses largely depends on available resources. If a jurisdiction can afford both, it should employ both. Where available, the services of a trained clinician at the scene of a mental health crisis seems to help divert people away from the criminal justice and emergency medical systems in favor of informal handling and referral to nonemergency treatment providers. In most cases, however, sufficient social work/mental health resources are rarely available to provide prompt mobile response to a majority of incidents. In these situations, specialized police response seems to help prevent tragedies and unnecessary criminalization and to provide a number of other positive outcomes, as noted above.
9. Initiating assisted outpatient treatment. A result of deinstitutionalization is that many people with serious mental illness live in the community. For a variety of reasons, these people often fail to adhere to prescribed treatment, including medication. In most states, if a person is under court jurisdiction, a condition of remaining in the community can be compliance with prescribed treatment. Studies in New York, North Carolina, and elsewhere have demonstrated that when mechanisms are in place to encourage adherence to prescribed treatment, problems are reduced.[49] Assisted outpatient treatment (AOT), also called outpatient commitment, uses enforcement of treatment plans by mental health workers or others (sometimes including police) to increase compliance. Results indicate that "AOT is effective in reducing the incidents and duration of hospitalization, homelessness, arrests and incarcerations, victimization, and violent episodes. AOT also increases treatment compliance and promotes long-term voluntary compliance. [50]
10. Establishing crisis response sites. Several jurisdictions, including Memphis, Montgomery County (Pennsylvania), and Multnomah County (Oregon) have established specific facilities where police can transport people in mental health crisis, as an alternative to the general hospital emergency room or jail.[51] These sites are usually located within hospitals. What sets them apart from the norm is their identification as a central drop-off point, the availability of both mental health and substance abuse services, a no-refusal policy for police (although this does not mean that inpatient stays are guaranteed), and their streamlined intake procedures (usually 30 minutes or less for officers). These features have resulted in reduced police officer frustration and reduced reliance on arrest and jail to deal with people with mental illness.
11. Establishing jail-based diversion. It is inevitable that some people with mental illness will be arrested for minor crimes and disorder. When these people get to jail and are identified as suffering from serious illness, they can be diverted immediately after booking (with special conditions), as soon as the case is reviewed for prosecution (through deferred prosecution with conditions), or as soon as the case comes to court (by summary probation with conditions).[52] Techniques like these benefit the jail by removing detainees with mental illnesses who require services that the jail probably cannot provide, and they benefit the detainee by diverting them from jail to treatment. For these diversion options to be successful, though, resources must be in place to supervise release conditions and provide treatment. Otherwise, diversion will just contribute to the deinstitutionalization/ criminalization revolving door.
12. Establishing mental health courts. When people with mental illness do go to court for committing minor offenses and disorder, the experience is often unsatisfactory, because most prosecutors and judges lack the experience and expertise to handle such cases effectively, including knowledge about mental illness and awareness of treatment options. Also, general criminal court can be chaotic, causing lots of cases to receive only superficial attention. In this context, people with mental illness sometimes get much longer incarceration sentences than makes any sense, burdening the jail or prison and failing to address the defendant's real problems. Conversely, in other cases, people with mental illness get unsupervised probation without treatment conditions, compounding deinstitutionalization effects. One remedy for this dilemma is a specialized mental health court, in which one or a few judges hear all such cases and have ready access to mental health professionals.[53] These courts are in a much better position than a general criminal court to make adjudication and sentencing decisions that are tailored to the specific needs of each defendant, while at the same time protecting the community.
13. Protecting repeat crime victims. An effort should be made to identify repeat crime victims associated with people with mental illness, because previous victimization is generally the best predictor of future victimization.§ When repeat crime victims are identified, the behaviors or conditions connected to their victimization should be identified to explore possible responses. For example, if a person with mental illness is a repeat victim, an abusive caregiver might be uncovered. Alternatively, it might be discovered that the person frequents risky places or engages in risky behaviors. It is also possible, of course, that the crimes reported by the person with mental illness are imaginary and never happened. Identifying any of these "causes" could lead to solutions that reduce or even eliminate future victimizations. Alternatively, people with mental illness might habitually victimize others—caregivers, family members, employers.
§ See Problem-Solving Tools Guide No. 4, Analyzing Repeat Victimization.
14. Providing services to victims. From the standpoints of equity and prevention, it is important to provide information and services to people with mental illness who are crime victims, as well as to people who are victimized by people with mental illness.[54] In either instance, standard victim services should be provided as well as information specifically associated with mental illness. It should be noted that a person with mental illness who is a crime victim may experience more trauma than another person, including the possibility that memories of past abuses can be triggered. Similarly, family members of a person with mental illness who are victimized by that person may experience extra fear, anger, remorse, or even guilt because of the intimate relationships involved.§
§ Police agencies and individuals can obtain more information for and about victims from the National Organization for Victim Assistance, the National Center for Victims of Crime, the U.S. Justice Department Office for Victims of Crime, and the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, among others.
In one case in Baltimore County, Maryland, police responded frequently to a residence based on complaints from neighbors about trash and property in disrepair.[55] They made referrals to social services agencies, but both the police and social services responses were fragmented, resulting in no improvement and continued calls. When the situation was finally targeted, it was determined that the real victim was a mother who lived in the house with her grown daughter. The daughter, who suffered from mental illness, abused and intimidated her mother. This led to a case management focus with services for the mother and involuntary commitment of the daughter, as well as the establishment of a Vulnerable Adults Assistance Network in the county designed to address future situations more promptly.
15. Targeting repeat criminals. It is widely recognized that a relatively small proportion of offenders commit a relatively large proportion of offenses. If people with mental illness are identified who are repeat criminal offenders, attention should be focused on them. This may involve criminal charges, involuntary commitment, better guardianship, court-ordered medication, restraining orders, or any number of other techniques, depending on the circumstances. The key is to focus attention on anyone who is responsible for a disproportionate share of a problem.
Similarly, there may be community members who commit repeat crimes against people with mental illness. These might include assault, theft, harassment, or fraud. The perpetrators might be caregivers, family members, neighbors, or relative strangers. Because people with mental illness who report crimes are sometimes treated with skepticism and suspicion, those who repeatedly victimize them may be more difficult to identify than should be the case. Police efforts to identify and target these people should be given high priority, though, because they are repeat criminals and because of their victims' particularly vulnerable nature.§
§ See Problem-Solving Tools Guide No. 11, Analyzing and Responding to Repeat Offending.
16. Targeting those responsible for repeat or chronic disturbances. Chronic disturbances involving people with mental illness are among the most frustrating situations for police, because there are few options available to officers. If a person with mental illness is merely being loud, being annoying, or acting strangely, involuntary civil commitment is not usually an option, because the person is not putting himself or others in danger. In response to any particular incident, officers might attempt informal "soothing or smoothing," [56] look for a guardian, command the individual to cease or leave, or make an arrest for disorderly conduct. When the same person engages in the same behavior repeatedly, however, officers may run out of options quickly, especially if the jail tightens its criteria on accepting people with mental illness. The situation is exacerbated if there are complainants who expect the officer to do something.
Although easy solutions may not be available, it is nevertheless productive to target those people responsible for repeat or chronic disturbances. In San Diego, for example, police received an average of four calls per month about a man who was disruptive and threatening in his neighborhood.[57] Previous responses were found to have been ad hoc and ineffective. When police targeted him, they were able to meet with him, gather his history, and then use criminal charges and probation conditions to exercise greater control over him. At the same time, the police organized and empowered the community to apply more supervision over the man and gather better evidence in case additional charges or probation revocation became necessary. The end result was a 75 percent decrease in calls and a community that was more satisfied that the police department had helped them address a chronic problem.
In Charlotte, North Carolina, police were called to a single residential address over 100 times in regard to trash, property in disrepair, and threats to neighbors.[58] An unmarried couple lived at the residence. When police targeted the situation, they learned that the woman suffered from mental illness and that she had completely intimidated her common-law husband, in addition to terrorizing the neighborhood. Police identified relatives of the man, and gained their assistance once a long-term involuntary commitment for the woman was obtained. The house and property were then completely cleaned up. The man chose to remain at the residence. Once the woman was released from inpatient care, she moved to a different residence and started working. During the follow-up period, both people were reported as doing well, and the police department received no further calls.
17. Targeting those responsible for repeat calls for service. In addition to chronic disturbances, some individuals are responsible for a disproportionate volume of calls for police service. In the case of people with mental illness, this might involve a large number of false, imaginary, or trivial calls. If police can identify and target these repeat complainants, they may be able to reduce the volume of calls substantially. For example, in Georgetown, Texas, police discovered that they had received 70 calls over eight years from a particular address.[59] Upon investigation, they found an elderly woman suffering from mental illness who was living in a very deteriorated home, but who refused to move or make repairs. With persistence and patience, officers were able to get her some greatly needed medical attention. With medical professionals involved, they were then able to make a case for involuntary commitment, after which the woman moved into a group home and exhibited much better physical and mental health. The police received no more calls from the address or from the woman.
In Ithaca, New York, calls from emotionally disturbed people were the police department's most common noncrime calls.[60] Police officers were familiar with a number of chronic callers, but the department had not adopted a systematic approach other than responding to each incident as it was reported. A new system was adopted in which calls from or about people with mental illness were handled as they were received, but also referred to community-based officers and mental health providers for next-day follow-up. People were recontacted and an effort was made to coordinate a variety of service providers. Chronic calls were all but eliminated.
18. Targeting hot spots. Crime, disorder, and calls for service tend to be concentrated in a subset of all locations in any jurisdiction. This general pattern seems to hold with regard to problems associated with persons with mental illness. In Lexington, Kentucky, for example, of 507 calls for service in one year that could be identified in dispatch data as involving a person with mental illness and that had exact addresses, 20 percent occurred in just 17 locations, each of which had three or more calls during the year.[61] Those locations included a psychiatric hospital, a general hospital, two shelters, three group homes, and 10 apartment buildings. Moreover, when all calls for service at each of those locations were then examined, it was apparent that the calls initially identified as involving people with mental illness were just a small portion of the total volume of calls at these locations. The two shelters totaled 641 calls for the year, the psychiatric hospital 133, and the three group homes 134. At five of the apartment buildings, further investigation revealed a total of 122 calls from five persons known to be suffering from mental illness (i.e., one person per building), plus another 76 calls with no complainant name.
Of course, identifying hot spots is just the first step. Once a chronic repeat call location is identified, it is important to analyze the situation to determine the nature of the calls and why they are occurring, as a prelude to implementing tailored responses.§ The situation might involve a single chronic false complainant, a poorly managed group home, or a hospital with inadequate security staff.
§ See Problem-Solving Tools Guide No. 14, Understanding and Responding to Crime and Disorder Hot Spots.
Effective responses at hot spots clearly depend on problem analysis. In Overland Park, Kansas, police identified a man in an apartment complex who made chronic unfounded calls to 911. [62] The man had ignored previous suggestions and encouragement to take advantage of available mental health services. Finally, officers contacted mental health providers directly and asked them to reach out to the man. He did accept the services that were recommended, and the police department received no further calls.
19. Regulating facilities more effectively. One effective approach to a mental health facility hot spot might be to apply or enhance external regulation. In San Diego, calls to the police from an apartment building had increased from three to 13 per month. [63] Analysis revealed that the apartment building had been turned into an independent living facility for people with mental disabilities, with four residents living in each of eight units. Further investigation determined that independent-living facilities were intended for people capable of living on their own, which was not the case for the residents of this building. The independent-living designation was being used fraudulently because such facilities were largely unregulated by the state, in contrast to group homes. The facility's operators were simply ignoring state regulations so that they could make more money, one result of which was a high volume of calls to the police. Another result was that residents were underserved and endangered. The police threatened the operators with a civil injunction and called in state regulators. Within a short time, the facility was closed and the residents were dispersed to more appropriate accommodations.
In Lancashire, England, police found that some mental health facilities had high rates of walk-aways and missing persons.[64] Their analysis indicated that key factors included the physical features and security of the facilities as well as management practices. The constabulary appointed liaison officers to work with each mental health facility to improve its security and practices, and then took the extra step of negotiating very specific performance targets for each facility. In the future, if a facility exceeds its annual performance limit for missing persons, it will come under government review and run the risk of losing its license and social services funding.
20. Arresting people with mental illness. Except when people with mental illness commit serious crimes, arrest is generally not an effective response. When police arrest people with mental illness for minor crimes and disturbances, it is frequently because they cannot identify any other options and are desperate for a short-term solution. Even so, jails often refuse to accept the arrestees, resulting in their almost-immediate release. Long-term solutions are not usually reached either, because prosecutors often refuse to file charges. Making arrests in these situations typically frustrates both police officers and the people who get arrested, while accomplishing little or nothing.
In those instances when arresting someone with mental illness does result in jail and prosecution, police may feel satisfied that a short-term solution has been achieved, but evidence indicates that the costs are considerable, as explained below.
21. Incarcerating people with mental illness. People with mental illness may end up in jail awaiting trial, in jail serving a sentence, or in prison serving a sentence. They end up in jail and prison in large numbers—about one in six inmates has a mental illness, and the jails serving New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago each hold more people with mental illness per day than any hospital in the United States.[65] Sheriffs, jail administrators, and prison wardens regularly express their frustrations over the stresses and strains caused in their institutions by the inappropriate criminal justice incarceration of persons with mental illness.
Neither jail nor prison is a good setting for mental health treatment, if such treatment is even available. People with mental illness often get worse while incarcerated, and tragedies involving victimization and suicide are too common.[66] In the long run, criminal justice incarceration of the mentally ill harms the lives of those people, interferes with the proper operation of jails and prisons, and accomplishes little or no long-term solution to the original crime-and-disorder problems that led to arrest and incarceration in the first place. Referral, treatment, and civil commitment for people with mental illness should be preferred over arrest and criminal justice incarceration as responses to minor crime-and-disorder problems.
22. Ignoring the needs of people with mental illness. Police officers sometimes get frustrated by people with mental illness, and respond by doing nothing. They may ignore disruptive behavior, hoping that no citizen will complain, or refuse to respond when chronic complainants call to report a crime, or try to trick or distract a person whose behavior seems driven by mental illness. The real purpose of these responses is to extricate the officer from the immediate situation, leaving the problem unresolved. Doing nothing, while understandable when officers have little training about mental illness or few viable response options, nonetheless demonstrates poor policing.
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"Easy decisions, based on clear evidence, will be fast; difficult decisions, based on uncertain evidence, will be slow." This spectacular insight was published this week not in the Journal of Duh, but in the illustrious Science.
The reason this isn't Duh material is that the neural mechanisms underlying decision-making remain poorly characterized. Researchers at Oxford's Centre for Neural Circuits and Behavior have been trying to tease out the role that sensory information plays in decision-making using everyone's favorite lab animal, the fruit fly. They've now found that flies are remarkably deliberative, and mutations can cause them to take longer to make decisions, especially difficult ones.
Flies were trained to avoid a specific concentration of 4-methylcyclohexanol, which to us has a menthol-like scent. They were then herded into narrow chambers with varying concentrations of the compound at the entrance, and a distasteful concentration farther inside.
The researchers measured how quickly the flies deliberated in the "decision zone" before taking off. When the scent was diffuse, the decision was easy because the odors were dissimilar; the flies went straight through the decision zone to its border with the smell they didn't like. Once they hit that border, they did a hairpin turn and flew right out.
But when the odors were not as distinct from one another, the decision was harder. The flies zigged and zagged back and forth over the border between the two concentrations before eventually leaving—it took them a longer time to accumulate the information on which to base their decision. The researchers were surprised by this behavior; they had thought the flies would be impulsive and were not expecting to see them deliberating, with their decision time increasing with increasing task difficulty.
Fly researchers have many strains at their disposal, many of them carrying mutations in known genes. So these researchers stuck forty-one different mutant fly strains into their stinky test tubes to see if any of them were particularly indecisive.
Those with mutations in a transcription factor (a gene that controls the activity of other genes) called FoxP took longer to decide than normal flies. This problem was especially pronounced when it was a tough choice—when the experimental smell was very similar to the yucky one. The scientists concluded that these mutants were impaired in their ability to accumulate and/or retain enough sensory information to enable them to make a choice.
In vertebrates, FoxP is important in cognitive development, motor control, and vocal communication. Mutations in FoxP genes have been implicated in a number of developmental disorders in humans, and in 2001 one member of the Foxp subfamily was identified as the first gene to be linked to an inherited form of language and speech disorder. The authors speculate that the common factor linking decision-making to language is the fact that they unfold over time. Thus perhaps FoxP is somehow important for processes where time plays a key role.


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Presented by Big Duck Management, this night of rock marks the start of a big year for all three bands and the first time that they have all appeared on the same bill!
Tickets are $6 in advance and $8 at the door. Information about all three bands is available below. For more about the Stone Church on Zion Hill visit http://www.stonechurchrocks.com/.
One Hand Free:
One Hand Free have come careening out of the back woods of New Hampshire with a sneer that signals they know exactly what they are doing, and a twinkle in their eye that says they intend to do it to you. Lead vocalist Andrew Blowen anoints all in a voice of honey coated buckshot, while the boys revel in smearing a smoky progressive tang on their southern-soul tinged brand of Rock. No punches pulled. No prisoners taken. No apologies to offer. No irony to bear. This is unrepentant Rock & Roll!
One Hand Free (Andrew Blowen [Vocals/Keyboards], Geoff Taylor [Bass], Josh DiJoseph [Guitar/Engineering] and John Santarelli [Drums]) has been a vibrant part of the Seacoast scene since the early 2000s, climbing the ladder from clubs like the Brick House and the Stone Church all the way to the stage at the Hampton Beach Casino Ballroom in 2006.
One Hand Free stepped up their game with their sophomore release Quadraphonic in 2008 and have since been claiming their rightful place at the top of the New Hampshire rock scene ever since. They were voted the Best Rock Band at the 2009 Spotlight Awards and had banner years in 2011 & 2012 returning to the Ballroom stage (2011 & 2012), making their Meadowbrook U.S. Cellular Pavilion debut (2011) and releasing their EP Sweetbreads (2011) and new single HardX (2012).
Red Sky Mary:
Red Sky Mary is a Rock 'N' Roll machine. Over the last three years the band has been relentless in its quest to establish itself as a New England musical powerhouse. Red Sky Mary's fire-driven brand of Rock 'N' Roll combines early 1970s high voltage swagger with grunge influenced sludgy brutality.
In the last year the band has performed in Manchester, Boston, NYC, and L.A. Recently RSM opened for Eve to Adam at the newly refurbished Wally's Pub in Hampton Beach. Other big name acts RSM has supported include Jonathan Tyler and the Northern Lights and Texas Hippie Coalition.
A heavy gigging schedule coupled with radio performances, feature articles in Spotlight Magazine, and Seacoast Spotlight awards including; Best New Act, Best Rock Act and two People's Choice awards, have propelled RSM toward being one of the area's most exciting new groups!
Lit On The Flash:
Lit on the Flash is an alternative rock band featuring Jake Roche (guitar/vocals) and Kerry Ryan (drums/production). Roche & Ryan have played in and out of a duo arrangement for many years as their own music journeys had taken them in varying directions. Their basement side project turned suddenly interesting as the two carved out a sound that incorporated all their years of hard experience.
The Bangor Daily News calls their self-titled 2012 album, "a heavy rock explosion — all big riffs, smart songwriting and catchy vocal melodies. A little early 90s alt-rock — think the driving thunder of Pearl Jame, or the swirling tones and vocals of Jane's Addiction — but with a heart and soul that's uniquely theirs." (Emily Burnham).
The band have played and developed their live sound consistently since the conception of the band. In recent months, Lit on the Flash has shared the stage with the top bands in the Maine music scene including the Rustic Overtones, the Mallett Brothers Band and the Milkman's Union


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Carol Pogash tells the true story of this troubled woman and her turbulent marriage to her therapist. Pogash, who lives in the same little town where the murder occurred, is an award-winning journalist and has covered the Polk story since its inception. She's written a chilling story of love, hate, power, and control. Below is an excerpt of her book, out this June.
Before the hearing began, Susan's head turned as she stared longingly at her baby, Gabriel, and then at Adam. Both were dressed in suits and ties, young men on the move. And on the other side of the room, Eli, in an oversized Warriors jacket held hands with a pretty but severe-looking woman with pale skin who bore an eerie resemblance to his mother....
Late in the morning, after listening to the entirety of the defense's case for a mistrial, Judge Brady rejected all the defense arguments.
The rest of the day was set aside for victim impact statements and statements on Susan's behalf. …..
Then it was Adam's turn. ….. he tried to resurrect his father's good name. Sturdy and muscled, he looked as if the blows he'd taken in life had made him only more resilient. His father had been a kind and good father, he said, inspiring his love of literature and music. As he spoke, his mother watched, turning occasionally to take notes. He told the judge and his mother about the impact his father's murder has had on his life: "One day I was a sophomore in college," he said. "The next day I was head of a family." She had robbed him of his carefree years. "You took my dad, and I don't know if I can ever forgive you. My father will never see me get married, never share a beer with me, never watch the Giants with me. He will never see Barry beat Hank's record," he said. Softer in his denunciation than his older siblings, he told his mother, "I still care about you, sincerely," he said. Susan smiled, but it disappeared when he added, "I hope you get the help you clearly need." When he talked about having graduated from UCLA, Susan's lower lip jutted forward, the closest she would come to a mother's approving smile. Adam said that he believed his father "loved you even as you murdered him. If he were here today he would want you to get the best head doctor and get fixed." Gabriel's comments were the most heartbreaking: He stood at the prosecution's table and turned toward his mother. "Mother, Mom," he said "the words are not hard for me to utter." In the eight months since his mother was convicted of murder, Gabriel had become a freshman at the University of California at Santa Barbara. Although his eyes were sunken, he was fit, as though he spent part of every day working out. He said Susan had given birth to him, she had raised him and "given me so much. Then you took it way. I was fifteen and you left me with no home. No family." Now twenty he said, "You may have been done with my father, but I was not." The center of her face turned a shade of pink; she began to cry. …..
Eli, ever his mother's protector stood up to defend her again. He looked distraught, his empathetic eyebrows lifted like a church steeple. He said his mother was the real victim in this case and that he had loved his father. "He's my father," he explained, but "my mom is the best person, the most caring person I know." Turning toward the audience, he found his brothers and said not in a vindictive voice so much as a sad one, "I don't know you guys anymore." Then he talked about how lost he was without his mother. He said he couldn't start his life again until she was released from custody. "There is an emptiness eating away at me every single day of my life."
And then it was his mother's turn to fight for herself. In a highly unusual move, she insisted she speak from the witness stand– so that she could address her adversaries. To her son Adam, she said she could show no remorse. "I cannot express remorse for surviving." To Adam and Gabe she said, "I can only say this, I forgive you. I love you," then she added, "I'm sorry the way things turned out," but she blamed it all on their father, whom she said she had failed to transform "into a better human being."
To all of Felix's children, she said that she was "sorry" she dragged Felix's name through the dirt, but she didn't sound at all apologetic. Sequeira and the other DAs scattered in the courtroom had never seen a performance like this.
Her eyes swept the court as she proclaimed, "Shame on you all!" In her denunciation she included the court staff and the judge – whom she now icily called "Mrs. Brady -- and the court." She said "I would rather die on my feet than live on my knees. I'm not going to beg for mercy!"
Susan Polk would not give her adversaries the satisfaction of knowing she will be punished. "I hate to tell you this," she told the court, and she didn't sound at all regretful, "I enjoy every day in my cell." She said she writes letters and reads and that if she spends the rest of her life in prison, she'll write poetry, write about what happened, and "do things I want to do." ….. To her son Eli she said as she looked down and wept, "Don't wait for me. This is the springtime of your life."
"I'm going to be okay, she assured. At least she wasn't going to be sent to a mental ward: Her fate in prison, she said, "is better than being hospitalized in some sort of coma." …..
Swiftly and without emotion, Judge Brady sentenced Susan Polk to the maximum: sixteen years to life. The defendant showed no emotion. The judge said Mrs. Polk would be given credit for the 1,376 days she had already served–which means she might be eligible for parole in twelve years, when she is sixty-one. The judge ordered her sent to state prison "forthwith."


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Drop in Traffic Takes Toll on Investors in Private Roads
Millions of motorists cross the Foley Beach Express toll bridge every year, many to hit Alabama's beaches. But traffic never reached the 10 million drivers that the bridge's investors were led to believe would be paying tolls in 2012.
The result is a familiar scenario to global investors who wagered on U.S. toll roads in the years before the financial crisis—and have since seen many of those bets fail.
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The search found 460 results in 0.012 seconds.
Each year, 311 — New York City's main hub for government information and non-emergency services — receives millions of requests and complaints, including New Yorkers' gripes about their neighbors.
People whose sexual identities changed toward same-sex attraction in early adulthood reported more symptoms of depression in a nationwide survey than those whose sexual orientations did not change or changed in the opposite direction, according to a new study by a University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) sociologist.
A new study reveals that individuals in their 60s who give advice to a broad range of people tend to see their lives as especially meaningful. At the same time, this happens to be the age when opportunities for dispensing advice become increasingly scarce.
Rebellious collective action is rare, but it can occur when subordinates are severely discontented and other circumstances are favorable. The possibility of rebellion is a check—sometimes the only check—on authoritarian rule. Although mutinies in which crews seized control of their vessels were rare events, they occurred throughout the Age of Sail. To explain the occurrence of this form of high-risk collective action, this article holds that shipboard grievances were the principal cause of mutiny. However, not all grievances are equal in this respect.
Do police treat religious-based protest events differently than secular ones? Drawing on data from more than 15,000 protest events in the United States (1960 to 1995) and using quantitative methods, we find that law enforcement agents were less likely to show up at protests when general religious actors, actions, or organizations were present. Rather than reflecting privileged legitimacy, we find that this protective effect is explained by religious protesters' use of less threatening tactics at events.
Lawyers keep the gates of public justice institutions, particularly through their roles in formal procedures like hearings and trials. Yet, it is not clear what lawyers do in such quintessentially legal settings: conclusions from past research are bedeviled by a lack of clear theory and inconsistencies in research design. Conceptualizing litigation work in terms of professional expertise, I conduct a theoretically grounded synthesis of the findings of extant studies of lawyers' impact on civil case outcomes.
There are concerns about the meaning of self-rated health (SRH) and the factors individuals consider. To illustrate how SRH is contextualized, we examine how the obesity–SRH association varies across age, periods, and cohorts. We decompose SRH into subjective and objective components and use a mechanism-based age–period–cohort model approach with four decades (1970s to 2000s) and five birth cohorts of National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data (N = 26,184).
Multiple chronic conditions (i.e., multimorbidity) increase a person's depressive symptoms more than having one chronic condition. Little is known regarding whether multimorbidity similarly increases the depressive symptoms of one's spouse and whether this depends on type of condition, gender, or both spouses' health status. Analysis of multiple waves of the Health and Retirement Study reveals husband's number of chronic conditions is positively related to wife's depressive symptoms when both spouses are chronically ill.
We develop a gendered marital biography approach—which emphasizes the accumulating gendered experiences of singlehood, marriage, marital dissolution, and remarriage—to examine the relationship between marital statuses and transitions and heavy alcohol use. We test this approach using individual-level (n = 10,457) and couple-level (n = 2,170) longitudinal data from the Health and Retirement Study, and individual-level (n = 46) and couple-level (n = 42) in-depth interview data.
A large literature has documented that Hispanic immigrants have a health advantage over their U.S.-born counterparts upon arrival in the United States. Few studies, however, have disentangled the effects of immigrants' arrival cohort from their tenure of U.S. residence, an omission that could produce imprecise estimates of the degree of health decline experienced by Hispanic immigrants as their U.S. tenure increases.


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42.25" Ignis Ethanol Fireplace Grate
Product Description
|This EBG3600 Ethanol Fireplace Grate makes it very simple and easy to upgrade your existing wood burning fireplace into an eco-friendly, environmentally safe, bio-ethanol burning unit. It takes just a few short minutes to set up and upgrade your existing fireplace set-up. Hurry and get started on burning environmentally safer fuel in your home. This clean burning grate comes with an ethanol burner insert that you stick into your fireplace, and it absolutely requires no venting. It holds up to 10 liters of fuel, and it burns for up to 9 hours between fills. It offers a very impressive output of 20,500 BTUs while still able to fully keep a small to medium sized room warm and toasty. This set includes a free damper tool for your convenience.
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Before we compare our list of CPS requirements against the universe of NoSQL, it helps to have an understanding of what NoSQL actually is. As it turns out, NoSQL doesn't refer to a single technology but rather a grab bag of otherwise unrelated technologies that are only loosely "related" by virtue of not being based on relational (specifically SQL) technologies.
And you thought the NoSQL moniker was simply a clever marketing ploy to incite rage amongst relational aficionados! 🙂
While Wikipedia lists no less than 7 major types of NoSQL solution, the "Big 4" that are discussed most frequently are:
- Key / Value
- BigTable-like
- Document
- Graph
Let's look at each of them in turn.
Key / Value
These solutions are typically little more than sophisticated distributed hash tables, often adding direct support for some combination of persistence (durability of data across restarts), replication (physical duplication of data, typically across multiple servers) and sharding (partitioning of data into discrete subsets, each of which is stored on separate sets of servers). They often restrict what data can be used for keys, while allowing values to be any kind of data that can be serialised. Typically querying can only be done by key.
Some examples:
These solutions are based on Google's BigTable system (used internally by Google, as well as being the primary data storage facility available to Google App Engine developers). They can be thought of as being one step above a Key / Value store in that the values are not simply unstructured binary blobs that are opaque to the store, but are instead structured data elements that can be used for additional non-key based queries.
In some respects these solutions are quite similar to a relational database, minus explicit foreign keys, and with support for different "rows" in the same "table" having different "columns" (this is somewhat of an over-simplification, but from a data/content modeling perspective is reasonably accurate).
Some examples:
Document databases store "flat" collections of structured documents – in this case "document" does not (as the name might suggest) mean binary documents (Word, PDF etc.), but rather structured data objects with potentially rich internal structures.
The current generation of document databases have, for the most part, standardised on JSON as the underlying data format for documents, however I consider XML databases to fall under this umbrella as well (albeit many of those have additional facilities for slicing and dicing XML in various weird and unnatural ways that are illegal in some states).
Interestingly, query facilities vary widely between the extant document databases, with some offering query facilities on par with relational databases, while others don't provide anything resembling a traditional query capability†.
Some examples:
Graph databases are unquestionably the oldest NoSQL solution, with at least one example predating the relational model by several years!
In these databases, data is stored as a series of discrete objects ("vertexes") connected by zero or more relationships ("edges") to one another. Typically the objects are simple hash table data structures and cannot have rich internal data structures (in contrast to a document in a Document database).
Some examples:
Borrowing a nice diagram from the Neo4J folks, one way of comparing the different classes of NoSQL solution is as follows:
Note: when looking at this graph I mentally replace the "Complexity" label with "Sophistication of data modeling" – the diagram is equally accurate with that substitution and to my mind that's a more interesting picture (not to mention more relevant to the discussion of CMS and NoSQL).
In the next post we'll instead look at how these classes of NoSQL solution compare to the CPS requirements we previously identified.
There are any number of good NoSQL primers available on the interwebitubes, and I'd encourage you to read them if you're new to the topic. I particularly like:
- Slides 11 through 17 of "A NOSQL Overview And The Benefits Of Graph Databases (nosql east 2009)" by Neo4J's Emil Eifrem.
- NoSQL – the Shift to a Non-Relational World
- NoSQL – Death to Relational Databases(?)
- Ricky Ho's NOSQL Patterns (if you're after a little more "meat")
† Before I get flamed to a burnt crisp by the CouchDB fanbois, yes I'm quite familiar with map/reduce "materialised" views – I simply don't consider that to be a "real" query mechanism. This feature also runs afoul of my "avoid crystal ball gazing at all costs" principle, but that's a topic for another day.


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Writing the Book that Comes to You
I didn't plan to write this book. I had been planning and drafting and revising another book—a novel about a fake Intuitive Medium—for the better part of ten years. That book remains in progress. The new one took over, and it came to me in a flash.


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Are you starting a career as an esthetician or considering one? To help you develop your career, here is valuable advice from a professional esthetician who has created her own successful skin therapy business.
Fauzia Morgan is a licensed esthetician in Seattle, Washington. She graduated from the Euro Institute of Skin Care in 2005 and offers facials, resurfacing peels and body treatments through her own business, Sacred Skin Therapy.
"I still can't really get over how lucky I am to do what I love for a living," says Fauzia. "I give facials the way I would want to receive one. I love how good people feel after a facial with me."
Fauzia offers the following advice for new estheticians and those considering a career in skin care.
1. Do what you love.
Fauzia Morgan, Owner
of Sacred Skin TherapyWhen it comes to choosing a school or creating a focus for your practice, Fauzia's advice is consistent – be yourself and do what you love.
Her own approach to esthetics is holistic and rooted in her own experience. After struggling with chronic, severe acne from ages 13 to 26, Fauzia learned to heal her body from the inside out through acupuncture and dietary changes. Then, while working at an integrative pharmacy, she realized that she was able to help other people with their skin by recommending natural skin care products and making referrals to naturopaths, nutritionists, acupuncturists and herbalists. She decided to translate this talent into a career as an esthetician.


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Comedian Stevieweevie - MILFs & COUGARs: Live/Twerkin Ver. (Over Kanye West & Jay Z's "OTIS") [Unsigned Hype]
Stevieweevie now has over 400,000 hits on World Star Hip Hop!
Type "Stevieweevie" in the search box to check out his other viral hits here on WSHH like:
"Big Girls Do It Better" music video (Over Drake's tracks)
"MILFs & COUGARs" music videos (Over "Watch the Throne" tracks)
"The Bishop Eddie Long Story" (Comedy Sketch)
Please click the "Report" button below if the video on this page is not working properly.
Comments will only be displayed by verified emails. No Spamming or Racism.


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Walker and Associates' eBusiness suite via WalkerFirst.com include:
- Order/Shipment Tracking
- Order Status (includes shipment notifications)
- Invoice Look Up
- RMA Requests
- Pricing and Availability
- Quote Creation
- Online Ordering (Certain limitations may apply to activating this feature for an account. Customers are encouraged to discuss requirements with Walker in order to maximize all available resources.)
With an account, users are free to perform many tasks that would normally require a phone call or an email message to sales or customer service. While there are still plenty of reasons to reach out to Walker via phone or email, many simply find it very convenient to conduct portions of their business with us online. Available 24/7, accounts provide a secure, reliable resource of order and quote data.
To access this online feature set, customers simply register and create a free account from the home page of www.walkerfirst.com. An account is activated within 24 hours. Users are notified by email once the account becomes active.
For more information, or questions, contact us today at firstname.lastname@example.com.


text: I was completely blown away by Franz Ferdinand. They were beyond awesome. That drum solo at the end was impressive to say the least. Very cool. They passed my "test". A great band will captivate your attention for the duration of their performance even if you don't know any or the majority of their songs. This was the case with FF. I arrived knowing a couple of thier more "popular" songs, and left as a fan for life. These 4 clean-cut guys came onstage after performing at Lolla and fucking rocked! :D


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Thomas à Becket, Saint
Thomas à Becket, Saint, or Saint Thomas Becket, 1118–70, English martyr, archbishop of Canterbury, b. London. He is called St. Thomas of Canterbury and occasionally St. Thomas of London.
Sections in this article:
The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2012, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.
See more Encyclopedia articles on: British and Irish History: Biographies


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I have downloaded the same set of NEF images onto two different machines (using TransferNX). On one machine, I have gone through the images in ViewNX2 and rated/number labelled the images.
Is it possible to somehow either:
export the labels/ratings so I can apply them to the copy of the images on the other machine (in ViewNX2); or
export the images WITH the labels/ratings so I can copy them onto the 2nd machine (and essentially replace the existing copy)?


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We are pleased to welcome guest blogger, Maggie Anton, long time HUC patron, author, and lover of all things Talmud.
When I began researching third-century Babylonia for my historical novel, Rav Hisda's Daughter, I had never imagined that the subtitle would be "A Novel of Love, the Talmud and Sorcery." But I soon learned that magic, whose etymology comes from Magi, the scholar-priests of Zoroastrian Babylonia, was pervasive throughout Persia. My initial glimpse of this world came when I discovered a corpus of research on Babylonian Incantation Bowls.
These were ordinary pottery with inscriptions inside whose purpose was to protect the people under whose home the vessels were buried. Thousands of these bowls had been unearthed in what is now Iraq and dated to the 4th-6th century. My initial interest in the incantations, written in the same Aramaic language as the Talmud, was purely as a source of authentic women's names. But upon careful reading, I saw that they must have been produced by educated Jews.
Most were for benevolent purposes – healing the sick, protecting children and pregnant women from harm, guarding against demons and the Evil Eye. The spells often contained biblical verses and drawings of bound demons. One even quoted Talmud. The bowl pictured here, one of two I own, includes the verse from Zechariah 3:2, "May the LORD rebuke you, O Satan."
Archeologists have also found amulets with similar, albeit shorter, incantations written by Jews throughout the Persian and Roman empires. They discovered Hebrew magic instruction manuals that list an astonishing variety of spells, some benevolent and some not. My favorite was one for winning at chariot races.
Meanwhile, I learned that the Talmud contains discussions of spells, amulets, demons, the Evil Eye, and other occult subjects. Some rabbis, including Rav Hisda, performed acts of magic themselves, but our Sages agreed that sorcery was predominantly the province of women. Though the Bible says, "You shall not allow a sorceress to live," these women apparently practiced freely. They were respected professionals, not scary hags with pointy hats as in Wizard of Oz. The Talmud even tells of a rabbi who consulted the 'head sorceress' to learn a special protective spell.
When I read that Rav Hisda's daughter demonstrated ways of protecting her husband Rava, a rabbi well versed in magic himself, from demons, I realized that my heroine was an enchantress! Indeed, sorceresses who inscribed incantation bowls were probably members of rabbinic families too, for what other Jewish women would be learned enough to create them?
In the end, the difference between Rav Hisda's Daughter and novels likeHarry Potter is that Harry's magic is product of Rowling's imagination, while I use actual, historical spells and procedures as found in incantation bowls, amulets, and the Talmud.
Maggie Anton
p.s. from Sheryl. If you are interesting in learning more, check our catalog for books on magic, incantations, amulets, or witchcraft. Also look for Maggie Anton's earlier books on Rashi's daughters.


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A suspected member of a burglary ring that stole cash, jewelry and clothing from celebrities' homes has pleaded not guilty in Los Angeles.
Alexis Neirs, 18, is one of five people charged with felony burglary for an alleged spree that began last fall, targeting the homes of Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and others.
Neirs entered the plea to a burglary charge on Monday. She is accused of burglarizing Orlando Bloom's Los Angeles-area home on July 15.
She remains free on bail. If convicted, she could face up to six years in prison.
Police in Los Angeles and Las Vegas say the burglars trawled the Internet to find celebrity homes and learn when their owners were away.
Related Content from AccessHollywood.com:
VIEW THE PHOTOS: Orlando Bloom
PLAY IT NOW: Michael Lohan's Revealing Conversations With Lindsay
PLAY IT NOW: Michael Lohan: 'Lindsay Was Hysterical' (October 26, 2009)
MORE ACCESS ON THESE TOPICS: Crime - Arrests - Celebrities - Orlando Bloom - Lindsay Lohan


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WF&FSA Bylaws
Below please find a link to WF&FSA's bylaws. These bylaws govern the association help position WF&FSA for future growth and development.
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to WF&FSA Executive Vice President Molly Alton Mullins at firstname.lastname@example.com.
Meet the New Wholesale Distributor
& the New WF&FSA
In the last few years, no one in the floral industry has changed more than the wholesale florist. Today, wholesalers are in a new position in the distribution channel, serving a vital and expanding role in floral distribution.
And no organization is as uniquely positioned to meet the needs of floral distribution today as WF&FSA. We understand the logistical, operational and marketing challenges that both wholesalers and suppliers face in a changing market.
We tackle the big issues – increasing profitability, improving logistics and reducing operational costs – as well as the every day ones, like helping you find new sources, new customers and new ways to sell.
WF&FSA's programs, services, events and communications are designed to provide the solutions, guidance and information your business demands today – and into the future.
WF&FSA is the one - and only - association solely dedicated to the floral wholesale business and its suppliers.
Let WF&FSA become a valuable resource for you and your company.
Pivotal Moments in the History of WF&FSA
- 30 floral wholesale industry representatives met in Chicago to address the need for wholesale and commission florists to form a national group to provide a national platform for the industry. WF&FSA's predecessor,
- The Wholesale Commission Florists of America (WFCA) is born on September 22, 1926 in Rochester, NY. WFCA's functions are held in conjunction with other industry organizations.
- In response to changes in the industry, WFCA expands its membership and changes its name to the Wholesale Florists and Florist Suppliers of America (WF&FSA).
- WF&FSA moves out of the offices of the Society of American Florists and initiates the first WF&FSA trade fair. The trade show grows to over 400,000 net square feet and is the 40th largest trade show in the country. The trade show "Wares of the World" is highly profitable and subsidizes other WF&FSA activities. Focused heavily on Christmas decorations, the show has no cut flowers.
- Michael Dupey converted one of a group of Ben Franklin stores owned by his father into an arts and craft store that operated under the name of "Michaels" in Dallas, Texas. This was the beginning of large arts and craft stores and latter big box stores that took most of the Christmas decorations, silk flower and plant business away from retail florists and subsequently wholesaler florists.
Late 1970s
- Cut flower production in Colombia explodes and for the first time there is over supply of flowers year round and during holidays, leading to the eventual decline of U.S. grower membership.
- Supermarkets take notice of production in Colombia and start to seriously sell cut flowers and change consumer buying habits. Supermarket sales of cut flowers expand rapidly. Industry consolidation into large national chains in the late 1990's and early 2000's tends to eliminate purchases from local wholesalers.
- Introduction of the World Wide Web. Sources of supply in the floral industry are about to become transparent and easily accessible.
- A group of exhibitors make good on their threat to leave the WF&FSA trade show because WF&FSA won't open the show to large retailers like Michaels. They move to Dallas to start their own show on the same show dates. WF&FSA's trade show income drops by more than $430,000 and WF&FSA has its first deficit year.
- At the WF&FSA Convention in Santa Barbara, members split on whether or not to allow mass marketers into the WF&FSA trade show as buyers. WF&FSA experiences a loss of membership for the first time in its history.
- The first of three wholesale buying groups form, in part, as a response to the creation of a publically traded roll-up called USA Floral Products. Buying groups are supportive of WF&FSA but in many ways compete with WF&FSA for wholesalers' time.
- Flowerbuyer.com held its first auction. This is the first major use of the Internet by florists to buy flowers direct and bypass the wholesaler.
- WF&FSA enters into a partnership with the Floral Marketing Association to create FloraWorld. The Floral Marketing Association is an arm of the Produce Marketing Association and represents supermarket floral.
- ProFlowers puts flowers in a box and ships them directly to consumers, bypassing florists and wholesalers, creating a new consumer marketing segment.
- The second and last FloraWorld is held. Supermarket buyers did not participate, angering wholesalers because supermarkets were allowed to attend the show as buyers. Subsequent loss of WF&FSA's trade show income results in budget shortfalls.
- WF&FSA again changes its name to reflect the international composition of its membership. The Wholesale Florist & Florist Supplier Association begins actively serving members from outside North America.
2001 – 2007
- WF&FSA holds smaller on-again off-again trade shows focused mainly on cut flowers. Success is moderate to poor. WF&FSA holds its last trade show in Tampa in 2008. The number of retail florists shrinks to 1977 levels; a drop of 14% in five years.
- Wholesale florist sales flat since 2006. On average, wholesale sales decline 5.5% in 2008.
- The worst recession since the Great Depression decimates retail florists and wholesale florists who were already weakened by shifts in consumer buying habits. Parts of the industry are restructured forever.
- WF&FSA restructures its annual industry event under the name of WF&FSA Floral Distribution Conference and commits to hosting the fall event in Miami, with very low attendee registration fees. The event held that November attracts over 500 members and over 100 exhibitors, with very favorable attendee response. The association commits to the fall event in Miami for the next five years.
- Upon the retirement of Executive Director, Jim Wanko, at year's end, the WF&FSA board retains the services of Thompson Management Associates, LLC in Annapolis, Maryland, to provide headquarters and full staffing support for WF&FSA.
- The combination of a restructured budget, expanded staff team, motivated board, active committees and a second very successful fall Conference puts WF&FSA 'back in the black.'
- Become part of your company's, your industry's and WF&FSA's future success – get involved as an active WF&FSA member. Attend the spring WF&FSA Management Institute and fall Floral Distribution Conference; join a committee; use the association's education, marketing and technology resources. Full details at WFFSA.org.


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Last updated on March 2020
A 24-Month Study to Evaluate the Efficacy and Safety of Elenbecestat (E2609) in Subjects With Early Alzheimer's Disease
Brief description of study
The name of this trial is MissionAD1. This phase 3 study consists of a Core and Open Label Extension (OLE) Phase in participants with Early Alzheimer's Disease (EAD), and will be conducted to evaluate the efficacy and safety of E2609. The Core is a 24-month treatment, multicenter, double blind, placebo controlled parallel group study. The OLE is a 24-month treatment, one group study. The data for end points for the studies E2609-G000-301 (NCT02956486) and E2609-G000-302 (NCT03036280) will be pooled for a combined total of 1900 participants.
Clinical Study Identifier: NCT02956486


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Sparky, the spirited Dalmatian with soccer ball spots, has been a loyal Chicago Fire mascot since 1998. Sparky's flair for dribbling, passing and scoring made him a natural to join the Fire, and he's served on behalf of the "Men in Red" at every home game and dozens of community events and special corporate gatherings each year since.
Sparky is branching out even more in the Chicagoland area as an ambassador for the team's official fan club, the Chicago Fire Kids Club. Sparky's contribution on the field and in the community has made him one of the most notable mascots in the Chicagoland area.