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Seeking good neighbors in Israel
Cathleen Chopra-McGowan reports on the tensions near her home in Israel.
Guest bloy by Cathleen Chopra-McGowan
Stones, sound bombs, and rubber pellets fly through the air as resident confronts settler and young men confront the Israeli border security forces. Over the last few days, protests have erupted again in Silwan, the neighborhood down the street from me.
Silwan has been in the news recently because it lies at the base of an important archaeological site, the City of David. The tourism ministry and the officials leading the excavation have discussed plans of extending the dig perimeters, which would involve relocating 22 houses in the area. This proposition has been met with severe displeasure and angry protests from residents in the neighborhood. The residents do not trust that the government will help them find housing elsewhere, and the government resorts to force quickly because they are distrustful of the people's intentions to come to any kind of mutual agreement.
I was going to visit a friend who lives on the Mount of Olives in East Jerusalem the other night. The quickest way to get there is to go down the hill and take a taxi that drives through the valley of Silwan and then up the hill of Olives on the other side. I stood waiting for a taxi at the street corner–one road leads to my neighborhood, the incredibly posh Abu Tor, home to diplomats, expats and UN officials, and other road goes down the hill, and into the volatile valley of Silwan.
As I stood on the corner, a gentleman with two dogs walked by. I nodded and said hello. "Where do I know you from?" he asked quizzically. "You don't know me," I responded, "I was just saying hello." "My God," he answered, "what a world we live in where neighbors are not even used to greeting each other." We chatted for a few minutes more, and parted ways, but his comment stuck with me.
When a taxi arrived, I hopped in and gave the driver the address in East Jerusalem. Immediately, he looked at me appraisingly, "You are not Jewish, then." "What makes you say that?" I asked, even though I knew the answer. "Jewish and Arab people do not live together. Jewish people would not go to East Jerusalem at this hour of the evening." It was five o'clock, but he was right.
As we were talking, I noticed the driver, an Arab gentleman, passed the turn for the valley and was continuing through the city centre. I asked him why, and he told me gravely that the road through Silwan had been closed because of stone throwing. Israeli police guarded the street now, ready to release tear gas shells and fire rubber pellets.
Two families had been forcibly evicted from their homes, and people were now protesting in the streets. The victims of these protests have not been the Israeli police or even many of the men in the streets. They have been babies, children, and a pregnant woman. Babies are now battling asphyxiation from tear gas, and a pregnant woman is unsure of the repercussions on her unborn child.
This is not the way to solve the problems the residents of Silwan and the Israeli government face. The police use the unruliness of the people as reason for the display of force, and the protesters use the law's force as reason to continue protesting. It's a twisted system of justice on both sides. An eye for an eye has been taken too literally, and loving thy neighbor has all but been forgotten.
Guest Blogger Cathleen Chopra-McGowan is a Fulbright fellow in biblical studies and a recent graduate of Boston College. She will be blogging about her experience as a young adult Catholic studying in Israel for the My Generation blog. Her posts can be found at "A year in Israel."
Guest blog posts express the views of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of U.S. Catholic, its editors, or the Claretians.


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Aston Villa v Manchester United: Classic Encounters
Aston Villa v Manchester United: Classic Encounters
Aston Villa 3 - 1 Manchester United
Barclays Premier League,
19th August, 1995
Alan Hansen's famous 'you'll never win anything with kids' quote followed this defeat for the Red Devils on the opening day of the 95/96 season. Ian Taylor, Mark Draper and Dwight Yorke scored for the Villains, with a relatively unknown David Beckham scoring United's reply.
Sir Alex Ferguson's side went on to win the double.
Aston Villa 2 - 3 Manchester United
FA Cup Third Round,
6th January, 2002
An amazing encounter that swung dramatically in the visitors favour following Ruud Van Nistelrooy's second-half introduction.
Ian Taylor and a Phil Neville own goal seemed to be sending the hosts on their way to the fourth round, but Ole Gunnar-Solskjaer pulled one back before Van Nistelrooy's double in three minutes sparked wild celebrations from the traveling supporters.
Aston Villa 1 - 2 Manchester United
Carling Cup final
28th February, 2010
Martin O'Neill was left to wonder 'what if' after Vidic avoided a red card on five minutes - pulling down Agbonlahor with the striker closing-in on goal.
James Milner slotted home the penalty, but Michael Owen made it 1-1 before leaving the pitch with injury. Wayne Rooney's arrival proved to be the catalyst for United, and the England striker headed home the winner to break the traveling Villa fans' hearts at Wembley.
And last time out at Villa Park.....
Aston Villa 2 - 2 Manchester United
Barclays Premier League
13th November, 2010
United showed their champions spirit after struggling for large spells against the Villains.
James Collins and Gabriel Agbonlahor struck the woodwork before Ashley Young made it 1-0 to the hosts. Marc Albrighton finished off a great move to put Gerard Houllier's side in control, but Federico Macheda pulled one back after his late introduction, and Nemanja Vidic headed home the leveler on 85 minutes to share the spoils.News Now - Sport News

subset: commoncrawl


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After leaving Cambridge, Pell became a schoolmaster. He worked first in Horsham, as an assistant master at Collyer's School, then in Chichester Academy in Sussex. He married Ithumaria Reginolles on 3 July 1632; they had four sons and four daughters. Pell spent five years from 1638 teaching mathematics in London. He then went abroad becoming Professor of Mathematics at the Gymnasium Illustre in Amsterdam from 1643 until he took up a similar post at the University of Breda in 1646. In 1651 the English brought in the Navigation Act which aimed to prevent the Dutch taking part in the English sea trade. Tensions between the English and the Dutch rose sharply and there was an incident in May 1652 when a Dutch force was defeated. Pell realised that war was imminent and that he would be in an extremely difficult position in Breda once war broke out. He returned to England and indeed the First Anglo-Dutch War did break out on 8 July 1652. After his return, Pell was appointed by Oliver Cromwell to a post teaching mathematics in London.
Pell spent the years 1654 to 1658 holding a government post in Zürich. He had been sent there by Cromwell on a diplomatic mission. The Peace of Westphalia of 1648 that ended the Thirty Years' War saw the Roman Catholicism (at this time identified with French rule) regain some territories which had previously been Lutheran Protestant. Cromwell wanted to split the Protestant cantons of Switzerland off to join a Protestant League, with England at its head. However Pell's negotiations were long drawn out and he returned to England to give his report to Cromwell only shortly before Cromwell's death. He was unable to report as he waited in vain for an audience with Cromwell which could not be arranged. After his return to England Pell was ordained a deacon, then a priest in 1661. He became vicar at Fobbing in Essex, and in 1663 he also became vicar of Laindon and Basildon in Essex. He held these two positions in the church for the last twenty years of his life. His wife Ithumaria died in 1661 and some time before 1669 he remarried.
Malcolm writes in [7]:-
The mathematician John Pell is a significant figure in the intellectual history of 17th century England - significant, however, more because of his activities, contacts and correspondence than because of his published work. His few publications are, nevertheless, valuable sources of information about his intellectual biography.Pell worked on algebra and number theory. He gave a table of factors of all integers up to 100000 in 1668. Pell's equation y2 = ax2 + 1, where a is a non-square integer, was first studied by Brahmagupta and Bhaskara II. Its complete theory was worked out by Lagrange, not Pell. It is often said that Euler mistakenly attributed Brouncker's work on this equation to Pell. However the equation appears in a book by Rahn which was certainly written with Pell's help: some say entirely written by Pell. Perhaps Euler knew what he was doing in naming the equation.
Pell published a number of works, for example Idea of Mathematics (1638) and the two page A Refutation of Longomontanus's Pretended Quadrature of the Circle (1644) (reprinted in Latin as Controversiae de vera circuli mensura (1647)). M J Klein writes of the Idea of Mathematics:-
Pell made a list of tasks that if executed would promote the progress of mathematics in England. His plans included cataloguing all past works, describing the extent of mathematics, selecting the best of the past, describing the advances already made, delineating the methodologies that would prove helpful, and noting the problems that cannot be solved.The Refutation was written because of a dispute Pell was involved in over the value of π. Longomontanus (Christian Severin) had published his quadrature of the circle in 1644. In fact Longomontanus died in 1647 but the controversy did not end with his death since others joined in. In [9] van Maanen describes in detail the correspondence between Pell and Charles Cavendish in which Pell is trying to enlist supporters for his side of the argument. Pell also translated Lansberge's tables, which were published in 1632, and worked on astronomy.
Pell was elected to the Royal Society on 20 May 1663. He served on the committee considering mechanical and optical inventions and was elected vice-president in 1675.
He is described in [2] as follows:-
Pell was a striking figure, remarkably handsome, with strong, excellent posture, dark hair and eyes, and a good voice. His temperament was sanguine and melancholic.When in London, Pell lived for a while with Collins. However in the autumn of 1664 an epidemic of the plague began in the poor outskirts of city. The epidemic died down after the winter but spread again in May 1665. The king and court fled from London in June and that summer Pell also left London being invited to Brereton Hall in Cheshire as the guest of William Brereton whom he had tutored while in the Netherlands. Aubrey writes [3]:-
Never was there greater love between master and scholar then between Dr Pell and this scholar of his, whose death on 17 March 1680 hath deprived this worthy doctor of an ingenious companion and a useful friend.After this Pell lived [3]:-
... in an obscure lodging, three stories high, in Jermyn Street, next to the sign of the Ship, wanting not only books but his proper manuscripts.He was now in debt and put in prison. After his release he lived in a number of different places such as the College of Physicians, the house of one of his grandchildren, and a lodgings in Westminster where he died.
Article by: J J O'Connor and E F Robertson


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So you've been thinking about dedicating more time to working out this coming autumn and winter. But as tough as it is to run outside, sometimes just getting out of the house and driving to the gym is twice as difficult. You're not alone - many folks find that the hardest part about working out isn't the free weights or 40 minutes on the elliptical - it's finding the impetus for the trip.
But what if your gym were right at the end of your driveway? One of the most popular spots for renovation in recent years has been the garage. People are rethinking this storage space as everything from an art or yoga studio to an extra bedroom - sans cars of course. But it may just be the perfect locale for your home gym. With a little remodeling, some premium equipment and a few cozy accents, you'll find yourself waking up each morning eager to hit the gym before work!
Looking for a place to start? Consider these tips.
Consider your flooring
While some people may prefer the garage's original hard concrete, consider reflooring your new home gym with hardwood. It's easy to clean and has style to spare. Whichever route you go, installing radiant floor heating is a good idea. It's an energy efficient way to heat your home gym that won't blast you with hot air from dusty ducts and vents.
Grab the essentials
Sometimes it can be hard to know what to buy when it comes time to equip your home gym. You can certainly invest in a number of machines, but there are a few essentials you'll definitely want. First, grab a solid set of free weights. You don't need to cover the full spectrum, but dumbbells are an essential part of your exercise routine, and you can always add more as you need them. You'll also want an exercise mat that you can comfortably do sit ups and stretches on. It makes for a great yoga locale as well. Thirdly, you'll definitely want some sort of cardio machine. A treadmill for running, jogging and walking may be the safest bet, but if you're concerned about your knees and potential impact injuries, look into ellipticals. Lastly, consider getting a weight bench. While you can do presses with your dumbbells, a weight bench gives you more stability.
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The Internal Audit Department has independent status within the Department of Health. Independence in fact and in appearance allows us to render impartial and unbiased judgments essential to the proper conduct of any internal audit.
To ensure our independence, we do not direct nor are we the primary participant in formulating Agency policies or procedures. We do not develop accounting or administrative systems, neither do we prepare or reconstruct data, records or reports.
Internal Audit staff are cognizant that independence can be impaired due to personal or professional involvement in the operations under review or with the staff of an area under review. It is their responsibility to notify the Director of Internal Audit of all instances where independence is thought to be impaired.
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Margaret "Mikki" Paul, a woman from North Siouxland, South Dakota, who may have been the oldest greeter at the nation's Walmart's has passed away.
Paul celebrated her 100th birthday in September.
Paul was raised in Newcastle, Neb. and lived in North Sioux City for roughly 50 years.
Many local residents remember Paul from her days working at old local venues such as Plaza Theater and 75 Drive Inn Theater.
She also worked at local mall theaters before moving on to her final destination - Walmart. She stopped working shortly before she turned 100.
In July, she served as Grand Marshal of a local parade in North Dakota.
As Siouxland City Journal points out, Paul has lived through World War I, the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, World War II, the Cold War, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Desert Storm, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars among other world events.


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Jamunjie on Family Tree Circles
sort: Date Alphabetical
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Journals and Posts
Looking for Robert John Clark of England? 1831?
I am trying to trace birth records of Robert John Clark presumably born in England in 1831.
Any information would be gratefully accepted as records here in Tasmania are sketchy.
His mother or father was an Indigenous Australian.
Does anyone out there know anything?
- Displaying 1-1 of 1 Journals
- 1
- of1


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Dear Support staff,
You have likely noticed that you are receiving no registrations of Nectar Cards through your website, please forward this message on to your site developers as it will explain how to fix this issue.
When registering my Nectar card online (using a temporary card I'd picked up in store), I was told that I had not filled in all mandatory field. Seeing that I had, I decided to debug your javascript. Your javascript's fnSubmit function clearly showed that it was looking for a field named "gender" that was not present on the form.
Using the debug tools in my browser, I created a hidden field named "gender" and (based on the coding style of single characters you've used) I guessed that the value needed would be "M". After doing this, your sign up process completed correctly.
Another error was encountered when I attempted to add a second card holder to my account. Selecting "Miss" for my girlfriend's account, I would then move down to select a gender, the field was this time present however by selecting "Female" the title "Miss" would be changed to no selected value. Selecting the title again would do the same for the gender field thus once again throwing up an error that not all mandatory fields were correctly filled in.
I hope this information will help you remedy the issues with your live site as quickly as possible so that you may start receiving online applications again.
Andy Barratt
Computer Scientist and Software Developer


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Jill Willhoite, OK.gov
405-524-3468 Ext. 127
OK.gov, Oklahoma's Official Website, in coordination with the Red Cross Southwest Blood Region, will be hosting a blood drive to help restock the American Red Cross blood supply. Currently, their blood supply has reached emergency levels, with 50,000 fewer donations than expected in June. This shortfall leaves the Red Cross with half the readily available blood products on hand now than this time last year. Share the gift of life. Save a life and donate blood.
|OK.gov and Red Cross Southwest Blood Region
|Make an appointment to donate blood by visiting www.redcrossblood.org or calling 1-800-RED-CROSS (733-2767); walks-ins welcome.
|Thursday, August 30 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
|OKC Chapter Building
601 NE 6th St.
Oklahoma City, OK 73104
|Opportunity for Oklahoma Citizens to help the local Red Cross Southwest Blood Region supply blood to those in need of transfusions throughout Oklahoma and Texas. The Red Cross Southwest Blood Region has reached emergency levels and needs blood now. Share the gift of life. Save a life and donate blood.


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Thanks to the families, bands, and San Mateo County Library for making the biggest little music fest the best yet! The 5th annual early literacy focused music series presented 29 live concerts from 9 coolest kindie rock bands.
Keep the dance party alive by checking out free music from the library and Children's Calendar for more events for the entire family!


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Opinion: Obama's New Cabinet
Bret Stephens, Global View Columnist, on Obama's new Cabinet. Photos: Associated Press
This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.
... welcome to Opinion Journal Live ... on Jason Riley in joining the first is four affairs columnist Bret Stephens ... to talk about whom I reply still Wakelin in the State Department in Leon Panetta defense will Brett ... good debater ... so odd couple names of them mentioned one for state is Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts though ... that might be some worry about who giving up that Senate seat and ... Democrats holding onto it but he's been on the front runner up for that position op twenty make of of of John Kerry and and aam and how he might ... handle it up ... for what I make a bid for Swayze is totally nauseated but you know that the president is is ... entitled to his ... picks um we all know what happened with ... Susan Rice someone Wideroe repeatedly was ... not qualified to be secretary of state in any administration ... John Kerry's been to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee ... um ... what I think of John Kerry I think of is outreach to push our Assad years of ... being the sort of man who went to dish are saying this guy's reformer when they're in were wouldn't ... exactly that also came when a little soft went ashore started murdering ... thousands of its own people ... be that as of May he is ... they ... said an old timer and he's going I suspect is going to nominate suspect he will easily become for ... what about the idea of ... replacing ... in terms of the type of ... secretary he would be a mean what do you make of her tenure order her calm what I think it's one of most overrated ten years and one when you think of ... of the kind of um ... he geography is that the written about Hillary Clinton how much is accomplished is the creatures of what exactly does Hillary accomplished a second to cities and ... scratch your head a new tape well ... you know George stall talk to the called of called Warren of James bigger manage ... the fate of its deserved Kissinger and the shuttle diplomacy ... and a killer include ... but you know ... a lot of people up for basically treating this is sort of ... the preface to her ... on her ... presidency say she's been a terrific said it is this I can hardly see John Kerry be worse than she is ... ah but I never read her very highly ... ok what so that the fence post currently held by Leon Panetta ... a Republican senator former Senate up a goal of Nebraska ... name is been floated ... for that post Euro of calm about Hegel recently prepared any ... doubt that most of your columns the kid glove treatment with this one ... was pretty tough outcomes ... well I've The car was called Notre Cable's Jewish problem and he's made of the beast to a very significant Cummins talking ... about the power of what he called the Jewish lobby ... by which presumably he meant the quote pro Israel lobby no I'm not really aware of the Jewish lobby that lots of Jewish organizations ... in this country but I'm not quite aware of the powerful Jewish lobby that lobbies for ... Jewish interests ok ... but you'll often find people will say say it hasn't been eating ... pro Israel interest other a lot of Christians in fact most supported the United States for Israel ... comes from people who are Christians or call themselves ... Christian Zionist who is very iffy he of language we sat in the Jewish lobby intimidates a lot of people that he was a senator from Nebraska okay ... there are by my count what I've seen sixty one hundred Jewish Nebraska's of cannabis in one twenty two in people ... who intimidated you more Chuck a go was that the ethanol lobby ... or was that the Jewish lobby so when people say this kind of thing ... you know people said ... you know that that that has a certain kind of older because Jews have a long history being accused of having dual loyalty to ... pack up at ... both of these gentleman would be some that come from a run in I would assume that lot of both of them have a lot of friends ... in the upper chamber would you anticipate either Handler carry ... on having trouble deciding there is going to sail through if he's nominated cables can have big problems first of all cables Republican in ... really in name only T ... T birds alarm registering last few years ... chalk a postcard of the Jimmy Carter of the Republican party I in my column I talked alot about the Jewish issue ... they're a lot of other form posse she is not the least of which ... isn't certain kind of squishy mess when it comes to Iran voted repeatedly against the rand sections were looking in the year winner ran as can be pivotal in terms of U S military and just having him as defense secretary is to send a signal to Israel ... the Pres Obama is not reliable when it comes to arrive ...


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Campus Guide
the middle campus
The Middle Campus
The Middle Campus was the first area to be developed on the Chestnut Hill campus. It is also the area where most of the lecture halls and classrooms are located.
Boston College was founded by the Society of Jesus in 1863 as a means of providing a college education for the children of Irish-Catholic immigrants. Originally located on Harrison Avenue in the South End of Boston, where it shared quarters with Boston College High School, the College outgrew its crowded urban setting toward the end of the 19th century.
A new location was selected, west of the city, in what was then an almost rural village of Newton called Chestnut Hill. The property purchased in 1907, overlooking the reservoir, had belonged to Amos Adams Lawrence, a wealthy textile magnate and a distinguished member of the Lawrence family. A design competition for the development of the campus was won by Charles Donagh Maginnis of the Boston firm of Maginnis and Walsh. Ground was broken on June 19, 1909, for the first of a series of handsome Gothic structures on "the Heights."
The style adopted for the group of buildings that would dominate the middle campus was English Collegiate Gothic. The architects felt this style would be not only suitable for the topography of the area, but also most appropriate for an academic institution with a strong religious foundation. Eventually Gasson Hall, St. Mary's Hall, Devlin Hall, and the Bapst Library became what the first university historian, Rev. Charles F. Donovan, SJ, called the "original architectural gems" of the University, and the center from which all future classroom buildings on the Middle Campus would radiate.
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Confidential Clergy Communications Privilege Statutes: North Dakota
Confidential Clergy Communications Statutes
North Dakota Confidential Clergy Communications Privilege Statute
Article V. Privileges.Rule 505. Religious Privilege.(a) Definitions. As used in this rule:
(1) A "clergyman" is a minister, priest, rabbi, accredited Christian Science practitioner, or other similar functionary of a religious organization, or an individual reasonably believed so to be by the person consulting him.
(2) A communication is "confidential" if made privately and not intended for further disclosure except to other persons present in furtherance of the purpose of the communication.
(b) General Rule of Privilege. A person has a privilege to refuse to disclose and to prevent another from disclosing a confidential communication by the person to a clergyman in his professional character as spiritual adviser.
(c) Who May Claim the Privilege. The privilege may be claimed by the person, by his guardian or conservator, or by his personal representative if he is deceased. The person who was the clergyman at the time of the communication is presumed to have authority to claim the privilege but only on behalf of the communicant.


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A young Wall Street analyst wrote this to The New York Times:
I am a 22-year-old man working at a new job on Wall Street. My boss is a very attractive 30-year-old woman. We happen to exercise at the same gym at the same time. We both swim, and the first time we ran into each other, she was wearing a one-piece bathing suit, and I was wearing a classic Speedo. I saw her look me up and down. The next week, she started wearing a thong bikini. Isn't this a power thing? Jim, Fort Lee, N.J.
[Via Dealbreaker's Bess Levin]


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AUBURNDALE, Fla.—Greenville College (Ill.) recorded a pair of three-run innings and shut the Beacons down for the final five frames, to spoil UMass Boston's season-opener with a 7-3 win Thursday afternoon at the Lake Myrtle Complex.
After UMass Boston evened the score at three in the fourth inning, the Panthers responded with three of their own in the bottom half of the inning, to move back above .500 at 3-2.
Sophomore outfielder Charles LaPaglia (Marshfield, Mass.) provided the majority of the Beacons offensive firepower, with a two-run blast to left inning to tie the score at three. LaPaglia scored two of the Beacons three runs, including the first run of the season to give UMB a short-lived 1-0 lead.
Luke Fischetti (Liverpool, N.Y.) added the other Beacons extra-base hit, with an RBI triple in the second. Senior Matt Consiglio (Southbury, Conn.) and Jose Pena (Boston, Mass.) each finished with two hits apiece, while Bryan Failla (Torrington, Conn.) was the only other player to reach base multiple times-with two walks.
The Panthers top of the order duo of Cole Lawson and Tim Osborne combined to finish 6-for-11 with two runs and five RBI.
On the mound, starter Michael Boughton (New Britain, Conn.) took the loss after going five innings, allowing six runs, three earned. The senior struck out three and allowed just one walk in his first career appearance on opening day.
Relievers Matt Dziok (Southampton, Mass.) and Tyler Kane (Wilbraham, Mass.) combined for three innings of one run ball to keep the game within striking distance.
It just wouldn't be enough against the Panthers pitching staff, as Josh Wagemann earned his first win of the year, by throwing 6 2/3 innings of three-run ball. Nick Bilfano and Scotty Voyles came out of the Greenville pen to allow just one base-runner over the final 2 1/3 innings.
After a scoreless first inning, UMass Boston struck first. Fischetti slammed a two-out triple to left field, to give the Beacons their first lead of the 2013 campaign at 1-0 in the top of the second.
The Panthers responded with three unearned runs of their own in the bottom half, after a Beacons error with two outs and none on sparked a Greenville rally. Greenville racked up three runs with back-to-back singles to load the bases, followed up by a bases-clearing double to make it 3-1 Panthers.
UMass Boston knotted the score at 3-3 in the fourth inning, when LaPaglia crushed a pitch over the left-field fence to score Todd Ezold (Westfield, Mass.) in front of him.
But Greenville answered right back, to take the lead for good. The Panthers put three runs across thanks to three singles, two stolen bases and a wild pitch to grab a 6-3 after four innings.
The Panthers tacked on an insurance run in the bottom of the sixth, when the leadoff batter reached on an error and came around to score on a two-out RBI single from Osborne.
The extra-run didn't come into play as the Beacons struggled to muster any baserunners against the Panthers pitching. After scoring twice in the fourth, UMB recorded just three hits and a walk over the final five innings.
UMass Boston will return to action Friday looking for the first win of the season, when they take on nationally-ranked Saint Joseph's College (Maine) for a doubleheader beginning at 1 p.m. at the Frostproof Sports Complex.


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On a Saturday night in July 1984, Jennifer Thompson, a 22-year-old, straight-A student at Elon College in Elon, North Carolina, returned to her apartment after attending a party. Thompson wasn't feeling well and went to sleep. Her boyfriend left around 11 P.M. About four hours later, Thompson awoke with a man on top of her. He held a knife to her neck. He smelled of alcohol and cigarettes. Thompson screamed. "Shut up, or I'll cut you," the man threatened.
Before, during, and after the rape, Thompson willed herself to study his features so she could increase the odds of identifying him later. She made mental note of his close-cropped hair, his small almond-shaped eyes, his high, broad cheekbones, his wisp of a mustache.
When the rape was over, Thompson lured the man into the kitchen by promising to pour drinks for both of them. His attention briefly diverted, Thompson ran out the door to a nearby house. The neighbors called 911. Later, Thompson would learn that her assailant broke into a residence less than a mile from her apartment and raped another woman that night.
Thompson worked with Detective Mike Gauldin on a composite sketch of the rapist. "The mouth wasn't quite right," she recalled, "and the ears stuck out too much, but it was close to the picture in my mind." The second rape victim, Mary Reynolds (a pseudonym), wasn't sure she could identify her assailant. One fact was certain: He was a black male raping white women in a small city with a legacy of shaky race relations.
Two days after circulating the composite, police asked Thompson to return to the station house. Gauldin and two other detectives sat with her. They placed in front of her an array of six photographs. The detectives specified that the rapist might not be in the array.
"I assumed they must have a suspect," Thompson later said. Why else would they have called her to come in? "All I had to do was pick him out. And if I failed to do that, would he go free? Would he find me?" Thompson eliminated four photos easily. Of the two that remained, one brought back "the image of the man performing oral sex on me so violently I thought I would be sick right there."
She pointed to a photo. "Yeah. This is the one. I think this is the guy."
One of the detectives asked, "You think that's the guy?"
Thompson replied, "It's him."
Another detective asked, "You're sure?"
She said, "Positive."
A minute later, Thompson asked, "Did I do OK?"
One of the detectives answered, "You did great, Ms. Thompson."
The session had taken five minutes.
Eleven days after the rape, Thompson went back to the police station to view a live lineup of seven men. No partition separated her from the suspects. The men in the lineup could see and hear her. The detectives told Thompson she should not feel pressure to identify any of the seven, but she felt pressure nonetheless. "If he was here, now he knew what I looked like in broad daylight," Thompson recalled thinking. "He knew my name. If he was here, I couldn't screw this up." She did not want to make eye contact as each man stepped forward. But she had to. Thompson concluded her rapist could have been No. 4 or No. 5.
She listened to their voices again. The voice of No. 5 resonated. She forced herself to look at him. His body was "long and lean." He sported a "light mustache." His eyes looked "cold." Thompson chose No. 5. In the hallway, she asked Gauldin how she had done. He replied, "We thought that might be the guy. It's the same person you picked from the photos." Thompson felt validated. "We got him," she thought.
His name was Ronald Cotton. He ended up in the photo array and then in the live lineup because of the composite drawing. Twenty-two years old, a ninth-grade dropout, employed at a restaurant, he'd been identified by a manager there who had seen the composite. Cotton had been previously incarcerated for breaking and entering with intent to rape, an arrest he insisted derived from a misunderstanding, not from a violent sexual act.
When Cotton learned that police were searching for him, he went voluntarily to the station. He spoke to detectives without a lawyer present, offering what he believed was a solid alibi, only to realize later he had mixed up his nights. As a result, police were no longer listening to explanations, and he was sitting in the county jail, unable to raise enough money for bail.
As Thompson prepared to testify at Cotton's trial, scheduled for January 1985, she learned that Mary Reynolds had not identified Cotton during a lineup. Instead, she had identified a man recruited by police to serve as a filler. Rather than wondering if she had been mistaken, Thompson felt even greater resolve. At trial, when asked if she could identify her rapist, Thompson pointed at Cotton. She noticed his expressionless visage, "as if he didn't care at all what he had done to me."
Cotton's defense lawyer emphasized the lack of physical evidence. Would the jurors, he asked, convict Cotton solely on the testimony of the victim? After all, Thompson had said nothing about identifying marks such as Cotton's scars. The defense wanted to present testimony from an expert about the vagaries of memory, especially during and after a traumatic event. The judge said no. The jury deliberated four hours before finding Cotton guilty. He received life imprisonment plus 50 years.
About three months into his prison sentence, Cotton noticed a new inmate being escorted to a cell. He looked strikingly similar to the composite of the man who had raped Thompson. Approaching the inmate, Cotton asked where he was from. Burlington, the new inmate answered, one town over from Elon. They exchanged names: Ron Cotton. Bobby Poole. Cotton soon learned the crime that had brought Poole to prison was rape. Their physical resemblance caused some of the corrections officers and inmates to confuse the two.
During his second year in prison, Cotton won a new trial from the North Carolina Supreme Court. The justices ruled that Cotton's lawyer should have been permitted to tell the jury about Reynolds's failure to identify the defendant. Cotton's hopes shattered, however, when, a few months before trial, the prosecutor charged him with raping Reynolds; three years after not identifying Cotton, Reynolds said she had recognized him but had been too frightened at the lineup to speak out. The new trial would consolidate the two crimes.
After Thompson's and Reynolds's testimonies, the judge sent the jury away so he could hear arguments about whether the defense would be allowed to question Poole with the jury present. As the jurors waited outside the courtroom, Cotton's lawyer asked Poole if he had raped Thompson and Reynolds. Poole denied everything. An inmate cast doubt on that denial by testifying that Poole had told him he had raped the women. Cotton's lawyer, still outside the presence of the jury, pointed out that Poole had blood type A, the same type found at the Reynolds rape scene. Cotton had blood type O. Nonetheless, the judge ruled that the evidence pointing to Poole was too precarious for the jury to hear.
Thompson saw Cotton and Poole in the courtroom, but when asked if Poole could have been the rapist, she answered no. Later, she recalled being furious that Cotton's lawyers "would try to point the finger at someone else, using a jailhouse snitch to do it, no less. There was never a doubt in my mind that Ronald Cotton was the man who assaulted me." The jurors deliberated about an hour before finding Cotton guilty again.
Thompson did her best to move on with her life. For a long time she found it difficult to trust men. She eventually married, and in 1989 learned she was pregnant with triplets. The rape, though, continued to haunt her. She saw Cotton's face while trying to sleep. She wished he would die in prison.
Then, in March 1995, Detective Gauldin and a prosecutor visited Thompson and her husband at their home. Gauldin was delivering news he knew would upset her. A new team of lawyers had taken on Cotton's case and had arranged a DNA test based on evidence still in the possession of the police. None of the evidence contained Cotton's DNA, but no DNA showed up from another man, either. That result did not constitute a finding of innocence. The next step, the lawyers had told Cotton, would be to test the rape kit from the hospital where Thompson had been taken right after the assault. But the blood sample from Thompson within the rape kit had deteriorated.
Gauldin told Thompson that she could give a blood sample voluntarily or perhaps face a court order later. "Why do I have to go through this again?" Thompson remembered asking. "I'm supposed to be the victim." Hoping to soothe her, Gauldin said, "Look, we all know it's not going to change anything. It's just a last attempt. Ronald Cotton is going to stay in prison. But they could drag this thing out." Thompson decided to comply, thinking that, finally, she would never have to hear Cotton's name again.
That is not how the script turned out. In June 1995, the next round of testing found insufficient DNA material in Jennifer Thompson's rape kit but found Bobby Poole's DNA in Mary Reynolds's rape kit. Confronted with that evidence, Poole confessed to both rapes.
Cotton attended a brief court hearing and walked out a free man after 11 years of incarceration.
Thompson, the seemingly ideal eyewitness, had been mistaken. She had chosen the wrong man. She had failed to identify her assailant.
Ronald Cotton's conviction based on Jennifer Thompson's mistaken identification did not surprise Gary Wells, who worked hundreds of miles away on a university campus in Ames, Iowa.
By 1995, Wells had already spent 21 years researching the uncertainties of eyewitness identification, explaining why faith in such testimony bedevils the criminal-justice system, and devising inexpensive protocols to reduce the number of wrongful convictions. Many jurors find eyewitness testimony more compelling than any other evidence, using the commonsense reasoning that "she was there, I wasn't, who am I to question her identification?" Even when defense lawyers cross--examine eyewitnesses and establish inconsistencies between the version in police reports and the version told at trial, jurors' acceptance of the eye-witness is often unshaken. For Wells, improving the accuracy of eyewitness testimony is a matter of morality but also a law-and-order issue: When an innocent person is convicted, the actual rapists and murderers remain at large, free to rape and murder again and again.
Although people like to think of themselves as perceptive, Wells's research has established that there is a Jennifer Thompson inside everyone, a well-intentioned individual who is certain of what she saw yet is sometimes mistaken. When eyewitnesses are confronted by a stressful situation—as a victim of rape, for example, or as a witness to a crime that involves a gun—the odds of a correct identification are no better than flipping a coin.
Over the past 40 years, Wells has become the most visible eyewitness researcher in a field crowded with accomplished researchers. No one else in the field possesses Wells's combination as a big-picture thinker, laboratory researcher, and effective advocate for reform within the judicial system. Under six feet and of slight build, with thinning, longish hair, he's not physically imposing. His attire tends toward the informal, jeans and a sport jacket. He could blend in anywhere.
Wells, who is 61, grew up in Hutchinson, a city of 37,500 in Central Kansas. His dad was a firefighter; his mom sold beauty products. Not expected to attend college, Wells settled on Kansas State University because he could not afford out-of-state tuition, and it offered a small scholarship. By his freshman year, he was married to his high-school sweetheart. By his sophomore year, he was the father of a baby boy.
Uncertain of a major, Wells enrolled in a psychology course during his freshman year. He liked the field's newness. "When you looked in the back of the textbooks, everyone was still alive," he says. In such a relatively young discipline, Wells thought he might make an impact. He also liked the opportunity psychology offered for a student to prove or disprove mistaken beliefs that had morphed into societal norms. "If you don't measure it, you can't study it scientifically" became Wells's foundational principle.
In 1973, Wells entered Ohio State University's combined master's and doctoral program in psychology. During his second year, he heard a man speaking loudly in the hallway of the psychology building, hoping to rouse someone's attention. The man was a lawyer from Cincinnati, representing a client he believed had been wrongfully arrested because of mistaken eyewitness testimony. Wells approached the lawyer, who was carrying an envelope containing a photograph of the lineup that had led to the client being charged with a crime. Yes, Wells told the lawyer, he and his colleagues knew something about the workings of memory but had not applied that knowledge to the reliability of eyewitness identification.
The lawyer handed the lineup photo to Wells, who tacked it onto the bulletin board in his graduate student office. Within a month, he and a colleague decided to learn more about eyewitness identification. (All these years later, Wells is unsure about the name of the lawyer and whether the client had been misidentified.)
Thomas Ostrom, a professor in the psychology department who specialized in human memory, helped steer Wells to the work of Robert Buckhout. A psychology professor at Brooklyn College, Buckhout was not a traditional academic; has crime rate was a self-described smartass. Early in his adult life he served in the Air Force, rising to captain. He earned his doctorate at Ohio State University and bounced around the academic world before landing at Brooklyn. Publishing in both academic and nonacademic journals, Buckhout argued that psychologists could improve outcomes within the criminal-justice system by sharing their expertise with police, prosecutors, judges, and jurors about the uncertainty of eyewitness testimony. He frequently agreed to assist the defense, criticizing prosecutors who relied on eyewitness identification while ignoring contrary evidence. Law-enforcement officials tended to dismiss Buckhout as a soft-on-crime crank, but his zeal left a mark on a younger generation of psychologists, including Wells.
Soon after encountering the lawyer and immersing himself in Buckhout's writings, Wells conducted an experiment that yielded a stunning insight. He devised a scenario in which he asked individuals to watch his bag while he left the room. A confederate then grabbed the bag, dropped it, and picked it up again, giving everyone a good look at him before he bolted. When shown a lineup, a majority of the witnesses chose the wrong man. More telling, those choosing the wrong person were just as confident as those who identified the right person. The confidence level of witnesses, a crucial factor for police, prosecutors, judges, and jurors when assessing testimony, suddenly seemed shaky as a gauge of accuracy.
The law-enforcement establishment bridled at such findings. So what? professional associations of prosecutors, police, and judges retorted. Laboratory experiments mean nothing in real life, where victims and other eyewitnesses have been vetted by skilled police detectives and district attorneys. Some people are confident. Others are tentative. That's human nature. Sure, mistakes occur, but not in most cases, and when they occur, they are well intentioned. What does all this academic research tell us about an individual witness in a specific case? Nothing.
Wells was determined to show law enforcement that eyewitness testimony plays into the memory center of the brain, a mysterious realm that scientists are still just beginning to understand. Most important, Wells wanted to convey the message that psychologists could offer suggestions for improving the criminal-justice system based on research, suggestions almost certain to reduce the number of wrongful convictions.
"The first thing to understand," Wells has written, "is that the usual safeguard of cross-examination simply does not work with eyewitnesses. … Cross-examination is designed to distinguish between truth tellers and liars and it is a fairly effective tool for doing so. … In the case of an eyewitness, however, lying versus truth telling is not the issue. … Mistaken eyewitnesses believe what they are saying, their errors are genuine, and those errors of memory tend to be indistinguishable from accurate memories."
The first psychologist to question the accuracy of eyewitness testimony was Hugo Munsterberg. One of the early giants of psychology, the Prussian-born Munsterberg was invited to teach at Harvard in 1892 by William James. Munsterberg advocated for the application of psychological insights to a variety of fields, including law. His most controversial book was also his most enduring, On the Witness Stand, published in 1908. A collection of articles on everything from jury selection to police interrogation, it argued that police, prosecutors, and judges should be wary of eyewitness testimony.
Munsterberg did not conduct controlled research, but he offered himself as an example of an unreliable eyewitness after his home had been burglarized. Despite Munsterberg's close examination of the crime scene and renowned memory (he lectured without consulting notes), his testimony under oath was riddled with errors. In his book, Munsterberg emphasized that such mistakes, while not inevitable, occur as a matter of course: "We never know from the material itself whether we remember, perceive or imagine, and in the borderland regions there must result plenty of confusion which cannot always remain without dangerous consequences in the courtroom."
Munsterberg lived before the era of modern electronics, but he implicitly understood that human memory is not the equivalent of a tape recorder or camera, popular but mistaken analogies relied upon by police, prosecutors, judges, and jurors. Witnesses testify under oath that they remember a face at a crime scene; even though they are wrong, everyone believes the testimony, as everybody would believe Jennifer Thompson.
Munsterberg lost the campaign to insert psychological insights into courtrooms. Sixty years later, though, psychologist Elizabeth Loftus would validate his assertions. While earning her doctorate from Stanford University in the late 1960s, Loftus became intrigued with Munsterberg's work. Teaching at the University of Washington, among other schools, she focused on the malleability of brain centers, especially how memory could be surprisingly unreliable. The process of viewing something and then storing the images in the brain and retrieving those images is extraordinarily complex, affected by myriad factors. False memories, for instance, can be created after an accurate memory has been established.
An example of Loftus's memory research with obvious implications for cases of wrongful conviction: She asked students to view a film of an automobile accident. Half the students answered the question "How fast was the white sports car going when it passed the barn while traveling along the country road?" No barn appeared in the film. About 20 percent of the students said they had seen the barn. By showing how her students "saw" something nonexistent, Loftus established how contamination can affect memory. A victim chooses No. 2 from a lineup of six men, for example, because he had already seen No. 2 in the photo array. Contamination has occurred. It was through experiments like this that Loftus changed the entire conversation about eyewitness testimony. The question was no longer "How good are eyewitnesses?" but "What are the factors that affect eyewitness performance?" Buckhout had not made eyewitness research respectable. Loftus did.
By the time Wells settled in at Iowa State University, in 1988, he had developed an elegant, deceptively simple framework for his research. He differentiated between the elements police and prosecutors could not control (what he called "estimator variables") and those they could ("system variables"). An example of an estimator variable might include the adequacy of light at the crime scene, the duration of the crime, or the racial and ethnic identities of victims, witnesses, and perpetrators.
For instance, research has shown that eyewitness unreliability tends to increase when the alleged perpetrators and the witnesses are of different races. Caucasians are less reliable when trying to identify African Americans, and African Americans are less reliable when trying to identify Caucasians. Witnesses viewing an image of a Caucasian male holding a weapon, with an African American male beside him, tend to recall that the African American was brandishing the weapon. Given the disproportionate number of African Americans among the wrongfully convicted, the research findings were important. They could be useful during a trial. But those studies could not improve the accuracy of eyewitnesses, because the elements were beyond the control of police and prosecutors.
Wells decided to focus on the elements that could be controlled. He embarked on a series of experiments that involved multiple witnesses observing staged crimes in progress and then viewing lineups and photo arrays after the action occurred. The experiments consistently showed that many of the witnesses identified the wrong alleged perpetrator. Clearly, some mechanism within the human brain was triggering the mistakes. But which mechanism? How could it be bypassed?
Clarity began to emerge when Wells experimented with six-person lineups and six-person photo arrays typically used by police. One hundred witnesses to a staged crime viewed a lineup and a photo array that included the perpetrator. Fifty-four accurately picked the perpetrator. Twenty--five failed to. Twenty-one said they did not think the perpetrator had been included. Then a different group of 100 viewed the same staged crime, live lineup, and photo array. This time, however, Wells did not include the perpetrator in the lineup or the array. Thirty-two witnesses correctly chose nobody. Almost all of the remaining witnesses selected the innocent individual who most resembled the perpetrator.
What had happened? Wells theorized that when witnesses are asked to choose among multiple suspects, those witnesses often make a relative judgment, identifying the suspect who looks the most like the perpetrator, even when the perpetrator is absent. Imperfect memory plus the desire to please police and prosecutors were producing incorrect identifications and leading to wrongful convictions.
Revelation after revelation emerged from the experiments, and those revelations led to recommendations: Law-enforcement officers unaware of a suspect's identity should administer live lineups and photo arrays, thus eliminating verbal and physical cues, intentional or unintentional. Witnesses and victims should be told that the lineup or photo array might not include the perpetrator, thus reducing the pressure to identify somebody when certainty is absent. During lineups and photo arrays, witnesses should be presented one person or one photo at a time, thus compelling a direct response (yes or no) about each alleged suspect rather than a relative response from witnesses (more likely or less likely).
Early in his career, Wells published his findings in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, the most prestigious publication in the field. "For boldness," says James M. Doyle, a defense attorney who co-authored a book on eyewitness testimony with Loftus, "this was the equivalent of a high-school English student sending a short story off to The New Yorker. … Typically, articles in scholarly journals are cited once or twice by other academics, then forgotten. Wells's 'system variables' article has been cited hundreds of times. The term has now, like 'Xerox' or 'Kleenex,' passed out of the realm of proper nouns dressed in capital letters and into the everyday language of the field. It is not uncommon to see the term 'system variable' used with no reference to its origins. It is as though it has always been there."
Wells's visibility rose. He lectured across the country. Journalists called on him as a resource. Defense attorneys hired him as a well-paid expert witness, a practice Wells gradually halted because he decided it damaged his credibility with law enforcement. "It should not be the purpose of expert testimony merely to raise doubt about the guilt of a defendant in a given case," Wells says. "Expert testimony does nothing to address the misidentification problem unless it helps the legal system improve its methods for collecting the evidence."
Wells's research led him to an incontrovertible conclusion: Because of the fallibility of eyewitness testimony, the legal system produced avoidable wrongful convictions. Wells hoped what he had learned in the laboratory and the field would win the attention of the ultimate arbiters—the U.S. Supreme Court. But his research, plus that of Loftus and others, clashed with the Court's controlling decision regarding eyewitness identification, the 1977 ruling in John R. Manson v. Nowell A. Brathwaite.
The case centered on the eyewitness testimony of a Connecticut State Police trooper named Jimmy Glover. On May, 5, 1970, Glover made an undercover purchase of heroin from a seller in a Hartford apartment. Glover said that he observed the seller from outside the apartment, with the door open about 12 to 18 inches. It was 7:45 P.M. According to Glover, natural light from an apartment window provided adequate illumination to recognize faces inside. He handed the suspect $20 through the partially opened door. The door closed. Soon it reopened, and the suspect handed two bags of heroin to Glover.
Glover did not know the identity of the seller. At police headquarters, he described the suspect to two colleagues. One of the officers thought the description fit Nowell Brathwaite and obtained his photograph from the local police. On May 7, Glover found the photograph on his office desk and believed it matched the seller in the apartment. At trial, Glover identified Brathwaite as the seller. The prosecution never explained why Brathwaite had not been placed in a lineup or why the photograph had not been shown to Glover as part of an array. When Brathwaite testified, he denied being at the apartment on the day of the sale but could not offer an unbreakable alibi. The jury convicted Brathwaite, and he began a prison sentence of six to nine years.
The Connecticut Supreme Court rejected Brathwaite's appeal, as did the federal district court. A federal appeals court reversed the conviction, however, stating that Glover's photographic identification should have been excluded from the trial as "unnecessary and suggestive." The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case.
It is impossible to know whether Brathwaite was innocent or guilty. This much is certain: The seven justices who ruled on June 16, 1977, that Brathwaite's conviction should be restored believed Glover's testimony was untainted.
Writing for the majority, Justice Harry Blackmun said "reliability" (in this case, of Glover) "is the linchpin in determining the admissibility of identification testimony." The factors in determining reliability, according to Blackmun, included the opportunity of the witness to view the suspect, the witness's degree of attention, the accuracy of the description from the start of the case onward, the level of certainty demonstrated by the witness when viewing the suspect after an arrest, and the amount of time passing between the crime and the later viewings. Almost everything Blackmun identified would be contradicted by Wells's research.
In dissent, Justice Thurgood Marshall (joined by Justice William Brennan) accused the majority of "dismantl[ing] the protections against mistaken eyewitness testimony" and "blindly uphold[ing] the conviction of a defendant who may well be innocent." Marshall went on: "The use of a single picture (or the display of a single live suspect, for that matter) is a grave error, of course, because it dramatically suggests to the witness that the person shown must be the culprit. Why else would the police choose the person?"
Until the 1990s, anybody claiming that wrongful convictions occur at a high rate invariably encountered skepticism, and often scorn, from the legal establishment: "All inmates claim they are innocent," went the standard line. As crime rates climbed through the 1970s and 1980s, few people in law enforcement—and even fewer in elected office—wanted to hear that they were sending the wrong people to prison.
Then two related movements began to occur.
The first involved the use of DNA in forensic laboratories. Attempts to match genetic material to a specific crime suspect had previously suffered because the typing of human blood into a group still left lots of potential candidates—maybe hundreds of thousands in a locale like New York City. DNA molecules, however, are unique to each person. Fingerprints are unique, too. But matching a fingerprint from a crime scene to the print of an individual involves interpretation by a forensic examiner, especially if the print is smudged or otherwise flawed. Testing material containing DNA is more objective. In many rape cases, for example, DNA samples from the victim and the attacker can be matched to allow the presentation of ironclad evidence.
The first DNA exoneration of a wrongfully convicted suspect occurred in 1989, freeing Gary Dotson from an Illinois prison after a mistaken rape conviction. As DNA testing became increasingly sophisticated, police, prosecutors, defense lawyers, and judges agreed that the results could be considered highly accurate—maybe not flawless but close. As genetic material from crime scenes in current cases showed that the incorrect suspect had been arrested, the conventional wisdom about all guilty prisoners proclaiming innocence began to fray. Then, as testing of preserved genetic material in older cases led to exonerations, the conventional wisdom collapsed altogether.
The second movement involved the creation of innocence projects around the nation. The largest, the Innocence Project, founded in New York City by lawyers Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld in 1992, specialized in exonerating wrongfully convicted inmates through the use of DNA testing. Scheck likens DNA testing within the criminal-justice system to the telescope within astronomy, "a way to see things as they really are." Over the past 30 years, innocence projects—there are now more than 50—have played a significant role in hundreds of exonerations.
With the acceptance of DNA testing and the spread of innocence projects, Wells no longer needed to refute the view that he was a researcher seeking a solution to a "minor" problem or an academic being duped by streetwise cons.
Janet Reno, President Bill Clinton's attorney general, was the first national law--enforcement figure to express interest in Wells's work. Alarmed by the number of wrongful convictions coming to her attention in local and federal courts, Reno in 1996 invited Wells to make a presentation to the department. Afterward, Wells told a friend that Reno "asked about blind testing, about pre-lineup instructions, selection of fillers, the use of composites, leading questions, and the use of live versus photo-identification procedures. She got it!"
In 1997, Reno named Wells to the newly created Technical Working Group for Eyewitness Evidence. For the next two years, representatives from police departments, prosecutors' offices, defense-lawyer groups, and universities argued about what should be included in a manual for law-enforcement agencies.
Wells and his fellow researchers felt confident that they knew what guidelines to provide police and prosecutors so that eyewitness misidentifications would decrease: Interview victims and other witnesses using neutral words and open-ended questions. Ensure the police officer conducting a live lineup or showing photographs does not know the identity of the suspect. Use the sequential method for mug-shot viewing. Tell the witness that the perpetrator may or may not be present in the lineup. Find fillers for the lineup who resemble the witness's description of the suspect but who don't resemble the suspect too closely. Videotape all proceedings. After the witness makes a choice, record the witness's level of confidence immediately, so it can be compared with later testimony.
All these techniques seemed obvious to Wells and his allies in drafting sessions, but some law enforcers on the panel felt even the term "guidelines" would box them in. They feared that defense lawyers would cast doubt on investigative techniques that did not comport with the recommendations. Some of the rancor could be explained as a clash of cultures. Police who place their lives in danger every day resisted being told how to do their jobs better by professors. Police have used the simultaneous lineup since the 19th century. Changing to a sequential procedure seemed like going into uncharted territory. Police representatives on the panel were especially resistant to the guideline regarding conduct of a lineup by an officer unaware of the suspect's identity. Did Wells think cops lacked integrity or that officers were so badly trained they would tip off the witness?
The prosecutors on the panel proved even more resistant, which surprised the academics. After all, Wells and his colleagues reasoned, they had the imprimatur of Reno, the nation's top prosecutor. Unlike police, who were required only to have graduated from high school, prosecutors were all highly educated, with a minimum of a law degree. Perhaps Wells should have attributed greater significance to his initial encounter with Melissa Mourges, an assistant district attorney in New York City who served on the panel. "I think you are the devil incarnate," Mourges said to Wells, who hoped she was joking.
Despite the wrangling, Wells took heart in the knowledge that Reno wanted a positive result. During the sessions, he sensed the police representatives coming around somewhat. Police tend to favor specific procedures; their conduct manuals tend to be massive, trying to cover every contingency. Wells also grasped that police officers understood that many eyewitnesses were unreliable. Police see misidentifications every day—at lineups and in photo arrays. These are misidentifications that often occur before prosecutors ever become involved in cases. The police in the room worked with Wells to moderate his insistence that officers administering live lineups and photo arrays be unaware of the suspect's identity. Wells's proposal was sensible, the police said, but it would take time for it to be adopted.
In 1999, the Justice Department distributed Eyewitness Evidence: A Guide for Law Enforcement to police agencies in every U.S. jurisdiction. For all of the compromises it contained, the document was a substantial achievement, a victory of science over tradition. Finally, methods to minimize eyewitness error had been memorialized in a widely available, easy-to-read manual. But after the months of arguing and compromising, there remained a huge question: Would police and prosecutors actually change their behavior?
A year and a half after the guide was distributed, New Jersey Attorney General John J. Farmer Jr. issued an order that every law-enforcement jurisdiction in the state had to follow its recommendations. Farmer grasped, in particular, the need for the blind administration of photo and live lineups, the guideline that law enforcement had expressed the most concern about. Knowing the sensitivity of the recommendation, Farmer said that it "is not intended to question the expertise, integrity, or dedication of primary investigators working their cases. Rather, it acknowledges years of research which concludes that even when utilizing precautions to avoid any inadvertent body signals or cues to witnesses, these gestures do occur when the identity of the actual suspect is known to the individual conducting the identification procedure."
Farmer's order was only the initial step. For a statewide criminal-justice system to reduce eyewitness misidentifications, it requires not just the cooperation of police and prosecutors but judges as well. In 2010, New Jersey courts adopted eyewitness reforms after a drawn-out case involving the alleged wrongful conviction of Larry R. Henderson. The state supreme court asked Geoffrey Gaulkin, a retired judge, to serve as a "special master"; he convened ten days of hearings that included testimony from Wells. Gaulkin asked the attorney general, the public defenders representing Henderson, and other parties to cooperate with one another so that the eventual guidelines would be as definitive as possible. Relying heavily on Wells's research, Gaulkin released an 88-page primer for New Jersey judges that laid out how to reduce impermissible or misleading eyewitness testimony.
Soon after Farmer's memo, the chief justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court created a 31-member commission to examine why wrongful convictions were occurring at an alarming rate. It was Wells's testimony, according to Christine Mumma, executive director of the North Carolina Center on Actual Innocence, that established that reform was possible. "Gary's presentation," she says, "convinced the commission members it was necessary and possible to increase the reliability of convictions, and eventually led to unanimous support for eyewitness-identification reform." The precise number of U.S. police jurisdictions that have changed their eyewitness practices since the guide was published is unknown. But it is estimated that as many as 40 percent of the approximately 18,000 have adopted reforms.
Wells's research, however, has not held sway in the one arena where it would yield the most impact: the United States Supreme Court. The latest disappointment began to unfold on November 2, 2011, when the nine justices heard oral arguments in Perry v. New Hampshire. The Court had not ruled on the reliability and validity of eyewitness identification since Manson v. Brathwaite in 1977. Wells hoped the consensus about problematic eyewitnesses would lead the justices to revise or overturn Manson v. Brathwaite. But he worried that the specific case leading to a review of eyewitness testimony served as a poor vehicle for reform, because it turned on a narrow, technical legal nicety.
In 2008, Barion Perry had been arrested in Nashua, New Hampshire, after allegedly trying to break into cars parked in an apartment building lot. When police responded to a 3 A.M. telephone call from an apartment resident who had spotted somebody roaming the parking lot, they found Perry holding car stereo amplifiers. A metal bat was on the ground nearby. Perry told police he had spotted the amplifiers in the parking lot and picked them up. One of the police officers entered the apartment building, while another officer stood with Perry in the parking lot. The officer inside asked the witness for a specific description of the suspect. The witness pointed to her kitchen window and said the person she saw break into a car was standing in the parking lot next to the uniformed officer. The prosecutor charged Perry with theft and criminal mischief.
Before his trial, Perry petitioned to strike the identification, given that it approximated a one-person show-up in the parking lot, pretty much guaranteeing that he would be identified as the culprit. The trial judge denied the request, despite acknowledging reasons to question the accuracy of the eyewitness identification: The parking lot was poorly lit; Perry was the only African American male in the vicinity; he was standing next to a police officer; and the eyewitness later failed to identify Perry from a photo array.
Perry was convicted of theft but acquitted of the criminal-mischief charge, and the New Hampshire Supreme Court affirmed the lower court's ruling. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case on the narrow question of whether the due-process clause of the Constitution "requires a trial judge to conduct a preliminary assessment of the reliability of an eyewitness identification made under suggestive circumstances not arranged by the police."
Wells was chief author of an amicus brief submitted on behalf of Perry by the American Psychological Association. Drawing on the breakthroughs he and his colleagues had made in the previous decades, the brief sent the message—clearly but with some subtlety, Wells hoped—that the 1977 ruling was a reasonable proposition then, "but we know much more today."
On January 11, 2012, the Supreme Court rejected Perry's petition by a vote of eight to one. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote the majority opinion as if eyewitness research had never been conducted. Sonia Sotomayor, the only justice who is a former prosecutor, cast the dissenting vote. In her opinion, she pointed to Wells's work, scolding her colleagues for failing to recognize the power of the research that "cast doubt" on the Court's 1977 precedent.
"In my rational mind," Wells wrote after the decision, "I knew that the Perry case was not likely to yield any substantial solutions to the serious eyewitness identification problem in the legal system, a problem that I have been working on for 35 years. But my emotional side, aroused by the splendor and mystique of the majestic Hall and Courtroom, permitted me a temporary illusion of hope. … [As I exited], I wondered if the Court would wait another 34 years before they again took up the serious problem of eyewitness identification evidence. I hope not … I don't think I can climb these stairs at the age of 95."
Among the four amicus briefs filed on behalf of Perry, there was one from Jennifer Thompson.


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The Quilt Company
The Quilt Company, a fixture in Allison Park, Pennsylvania, since 1993, features an expanding inventory of fabric and patterns.
A large front porch adorned with quilts beckons quilters to The Quilt Company in Allison Park, Pennsylvania.
Bird's-Eye View
The spacious shop means room for a bevy of bolts and samples in an array of sizes and colors.
Meet the Staff
Front row, from left: Nancy Forsythe, Carol Redman, Pam Weston, Karen Montgomery (owner), Leona Avny, and Jane Campbell; middle row: Patty Yankovich, Heather Caparoso, Brandon Montgomery, Cary Montgomery (owner), Honey Stermon, and Donna Huck; back row: Pam Valentine, and Marsha Bujaky.
Patterns Galore
Scores of samples and patterns designed by owner Karen Montgomery are available at The Quilt Company.
Wine Time
One display at The Quilt Company features a wine butler, wine bag, and table runner showcasing wine-theme fabrics.
Bevy of Batiks
Batiks—including bolts, precuts, and stitched samples—fill an entire room at The Quilt Company.
Three-Pocket Purse
Shop owner Karen Montgomery designed Three-Pocket Purse for Quilt Sampler® Spring/Summer 2013 magazine.
Get the Magazine!
Contact The Quilt Company to purchase a copy of Quilt Sampler® Spring/Summer 2013 magazine, pick up the issue at your local quilt shop or newsstand, or get the digital issue online.
Peek inside Front Porch Quilt Shoppe, another quilt shop featured in the Spring/Summer 2013 issue.


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FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas kicker John Henson was elated to find out he was going on scholarship for his senior season.
But Henson's excitement was nothing compared to his mother.
"I told my mom and I couldn't hear for about 30 minutes," Henson said.
The Texas native, along with tight end A.J. Derby, became the latest in a large group of walk-ons who have been awarded scholarships under coach Bret Bielema.
Both players were informed of the decision during a team meeting Sunday.
Derby was added to the list of scholarship players after arriving from Coffeyville (Kan.) Community College following the 2012 season. Derby, who spent two years on scholarship at Iowa after high school, was Arkansas' backup quarterback last season and is expected to play a big factor in the tight end rotation this season.
In fact, Bielema said at SEC Media Days he believed Derby would be one of the biggest surprises in the conference. Arkansas offensive coordinator Jim Chaney said the tight end deserved the recognition because of his work at multiple positions.
"Any time you are my age and you are a coach and you have been at it a lot of years, any time a young man has worked hard to achieve something you feel like he needs to be rewarded," Chaney said after Monday's practice. "I'm pleased Bret made that decision. He's a good kid and he's going to be a valuable part of the team."
Derby said his parents are glad they don't have to "write that check every semester" for tuition. But the Iowa native believed he earned the scholarship.
"I never felt like I was a walk-on here," said Derby, who missed Monday's practice because of a minor knee injury he suffered last Friday. "Coming out of high school I was on scholarship, but being here as a walk-on guy I played in front of scholarship guys. So I definitely felt I was one of them."
This is the first time Henson has been placed on scholarship in his college career.
He has spent most of his time on Arkansas' campus as a backup kicker behind record-setting Razorback Zach Hocker. Henson has appeared in five games — he made two field goals and an extra point against LSU in 2012 — and is finally getting a chance to compete for the starting job with freshman Cole Hedlund.
Henson was asked Monday why he kept waiting for an opportunity at Arkansas despite the lack of playing time. He didn't consider it waiting.
"I just see it as a great opportunity to come and learn on-field things and off-field things," Henson said. "Just having all sorts of coaching staffs, I think it was three head coaches and four different specialist coaches. I got a lot of good perspectives on all sorts of lessons on on-the-field and off-the-field stuff."
Derby and Henson join a lengthy list of former walk-ons who were put on scholarship by Bielema since the coach's arrival in Dec. 2012.
Long snapper Alan D'Appollonio and tight end Mitchell Loewen were the first to join the list after spring practice in 2013. Fullback Patrick Arinze, tight end Alex Voelzke, and former linebackers Price Holmes and Austin Jones were added to the list last fall. Two freshmen — defensive end Jake Hall and fullback Tyler Colquitt — also were awarded scholarships after being scheduled to walk on in 2014.
Henson said he's glad to be on the list. But it doesn't change his plans for the rest of the preseason as he and Hedlund compete for the starting position.
"We're really pushing each other," Hedlund said. "We're both performing well. At the end of the day I'm just worrying about myself. Can't control anything else."


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This was my first marathon and it was brilliant, the support from all the marshalls kept me going all the way. Thank you for a great run!
@RunBournemouth you did a great job. Fab organisation. Stunning scenery. Inspiring to see so many different people loving their running!
Fabulous weekend, brilliant organisation, well marshalled cheery and so encouraging and enjoyed every moment. Will be back. Runners were amazing and would be crazy not to include this one on their next year's race event itinerary. Well done to everyone!
What a day! Great atmosphere and I'm over the moon with finishing my first every marathon and raised £1000 for Breast Cancer Now.
Crowds and marshals were the best I've ever seen today, well done to everyone involved, fantastic! Water station crews amazing as welll.
Many thanks for a brilliant marathon today. Organisation, marshals, spectators, route were all brilliant. Well done.


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Join Shell Maritime and you could make an impact on the future world's energy demands
Maritime jobs with Shell involve working with pioneering technology, maintaining high safety standards and building and managing relationships with contractors around the world. We are looking for high-performing maritime professionals who can bring their expertise and industry know-how to help Shell remain one of the world's most competitive companies in the energy industry.
Whether in Fleet Management, Maritime Standards and Assurance, Marine Technical roles or HSSE, there are a number of management and operational opportunities worldwide that can further develop and enhance your marine expertise.
Fleet Officer roles at Shell range from cadets, starting their career with us on one of our vessels and working their way up through the ranks, to more experienced officers.
Experienced officers
As part of our global team of officers, you will share our core values: to deliver flawless execution in safety, reliability and cost management to our customers around the globe. As part of Shell Maritime, you will be given ample opportunity to propel your career within the Shell Fleet team.
Shell is committed to recognising and developing your expertise in positions both at sea and onshore. Proactive cadets will be given career progression opportunities and the chance to develop experience while seeing the impact of your work on our growing fleet of oil and LNG carriers.


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|August 2019
|Home | Literary Events
|Novel Writing
|Dates: December 1, 2018 - September 23, 2019, Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday
Location: WriterHouse
|The WriterHouse located at 508 Dale Ave. in Charlottesville, Va...Is offering a nine-month class on Writing, Revising, and Pitching your Novel getting it out of the drawer and off to market...With instructor Randall Klein, it all starts Monday January 14, 2019...(more)
|Memoir Writing
|Dates: December 18, 2018 - December 5, 2019, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday
Location: WriterHouse
|Memoir in a Year...The WriterHouse located at 508 Dale Ave in Charlottesville, Va will be offering a year-long class on Drafting and Revising your book with instructor Lisa Ellison...This year-long class begins Thursday January 24, 2019 thru Thursday December 5, 2019...Applications...(more)
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