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First-Grader Accused Of Sexual Harassment

POSTED: 7:40 am PST January 13, 2010

UPDATED: 7:50 am PST January 13, 2010

Superintendent Jeff Rose said the district is keeping a close eye on students at the Ninety-One School on South Whiskey Hill Road.

Several parents allege that a boy in first grade at the school harassed and abused their children and that some of the harassment was sexual in nature. The parents said the actions of the boy involved bullying and that the school has known about the problems since the start of the school year.

Rose said the district has been involved since last week.

"Certain things are handled at the school level and certain things are handled at the district level," Rose said. "What I am aware of, most acutely aware of, my involvement goes back to last Tuesday."

The district has met with the families and child involved. The student is under more direct supervision by certified staff, according to the district.

Parents said the boy is still in school but the school district would not confirm that.

Rose sent out an e-mail to parents to inform them of the sensitive situation.

LINK TO VIDEO:

http://www.kptv.com/video/22225153/index.html

Foxy 'Roxxxy': world’s first 'sex robot' can talk about football

The world’s first “sex robot”, a life-size rubber doll called Roxxxy who can have real conversations with her owner, including about football, has been unveiled.

Andrew Hough
7:30AM GMT 11 Jan 2010

Douglas Hines said Roxxxy could even have a conversation about Manchester United with her owner. Photo: AFP/GETTY IMAGES

The dark-haired, negligee-clad, life-size robotic girlfriend comes complete with artificial intelligence and flesh-like synthetic skin.

Standing five feet, seven inches tall, the doll weighs 120 pounds, comes with five “personalities”, is “ready for action” her developers said.

Aspiring partners can customise her features, including race, hair colour and breast size.

Roxxxy, who can chat with her flesh-and-blood mate about subjects including Manchester United, also elicits comments depending on how she is touched.

The anatomically-correct robot, who can even snore, has an articulated skeleton that can move like a person but can't walk or independently move its limbs.

There is Wild Wendy, who is outgoing and adventurous, Frigid Farrah, who is reserved and shy, a young unnamed doll with a naïve personality, “matriarchal kind of caring” Mature Martha and S & M Susan, who is geared for more adventurous types.

Coming with a laptop the doll, priced between US$7,000 (£4,350) to US$9,000 (£5,993), was unveiled at the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo in Las Vegas at the weekend.

Douglas Hines, the robot’s football loving inventor, said the real aim was to make the doll someone the owner can talk to and relate to.

“She can't vacuum, she can't cook but she can do almost anything else if you know what I mean,” the New Jersey-based artificial intelligence engineer said.

“She's a companion. She has a personality. She hears you. She listens to you. She speaks. She feels your touch. She goes to sleep. We are trying to replicate a personality of a person.”

She is wirelessly linked to the internet for software updates, technical support and to send her man email messages, he said.

Mr Hines, from TrueCompanion, said the doll could carry out simple conversations and was designed to “know exactly what you like”.

“Sex only goes so far, then you want to be able to talk to the person,” he said.

“She knows exactly what you like. If you like Porsches, she likes Porsches. If you like soccer, she likes soccer.”

People’s customised personalities can be shared with other users online through his company's website.

"Just think about wife or girlfriend swapping without actually giving the person to someone else," he said.

Its robotic movement is built into "the three inputs" while a mechanical heart powers a liquid cooling system.

Mr Hines said it was not only a recreational innovation but also something that shy people with sexual dysfunction, and those who want to experiment without risk, could use.

In a 2007 book, "Love and Sex with Robots," British chess player and artificial intelligence expert David Levy argues that robots will become significant sexual partners for humans, answering needs that other people are unable or unwilling to satisfy.

Inspiration for the sex robot sprang from the September 11, 2001 attacks, he said, where a friend died and he vowed to store his personality forever.

The sex robot is available in Europe and the United States and will eventually be available all over the world.

A male version of the doll, dubbed Rocky, is also planned.

Clayton police burn $12M in drugs

As part of a scathing indictment of former Police Chief Jeff Turner's management of the department, county Chief of Staff Alex Cohilas cited a narcotics evidence room that was "in shambles."

The burns happened on two different occasions, last week and Tuesday, in an undisclosed, secure location, Daniel said.

"This is just a small part of the police department's aggressive efforts to fight illegal drug use and sales in Clayton County," police chief Timothy Robinson said.

The burn was done with the aid of the Clayton Fire and Emergency Services, the Clayton County Sheriff's Office and the Clayton County District Attorney's Office.

LINK TO PHOTO

http://www.ajc.com/news/clayton-police-burn-12m-273741.html

updated 12:24 p.m. ET, Tues., Jan. 12, 2010  

  A Florida grandmother was arrested for driving on a suspended or revoked license and spent 15 days in jail — including Thanksgiving — before being released, the Miami Herald reported on Tuesday.

The 78-year-old woman, Gabrielle Shaink Trudeau, was initially pulled over in September for driving too slowly. She was then issued a ticket for driving on a suspended or revoked license. After failing to show up for a court appearance, a judge issued an arrest warrant for the criminal charge that carries a penalty of up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

Ten days after the ticket was issued, Shaink Trudeau received a letter from the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, saying that her driving privileges were restored pending further review. While she believed her driving troubles were solved, the letter was actually in response to another incident.

In November, police arrested Shaink Trudeau at her home.

"They came on real strong, like I had killed somebody or something,'' she told the Miami Herald of the arrest.

Public defenders failed to appear at her initial court appearance, and no assistant public defender met with Shaink Trudeau at the Broward County Jail, the newspaper reported. On the morning of her initial appearance, the pretrial services division found that Shaink Trudeau was eligible for pretrial release on her own recognizance, but failed to alert the judge of that, the newspaper reported.

Finally, at her arraignment on Dec. 2, 15 days after her arrest, prosecutors dropped the charges against her.

"She's handcuffed like Houdini, for the record. She's got chains around her waist, and she's got handcuffs in front around her hands as if she was some kind of a violent criminal,'' the judge said at her final hearing on Dec. 2, according to the newspaper. "I want her released. I think she's suffered enough at our system's mistakes.''

Prostitute fined $820,000 for unpaid tax

WARSAW

Tue Jan 12, 2010 12:15pm EST     

WARSAW (Reuters) - Poland's tax office has levied a fine of 2.3 million zlotys ($820,000) on an unemployed woman for failing to pay tax on income worth at least 13.7 million zlotys she said she had earned as a prostitute.

The woman told the tax office in the southern city of Katowice that she had very "generous" customers, the website gazeta.pl, which is linked to leading Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza, reported Tuesday.

One of her clients paid the woman 5 million zlotys during the 1997-2002 period, she was quoted as saying.

The website gave no further details.

(Reporting by Kuba Jaworowski)

Man buying marijuana carjacked in Pittsburg

Roman Gokhman
Contra Costa Times

Posted: 01/11/2010 08:44:54 PM PST

Updated: 01/11/2010 09:55:44 PM PST

PITTSBURG — A man who drove to a Loveridge Road apartment complex to buy marijuana was robbed at gunpoint and carjacked Monday evening.

The man, a 25-year-old Pittsburg resident, drove to the Loveridge Terrace Apartments, off Loveridge Road and near East Leland Road. about 7 p.m., police Lt. Brian Addington said.

He was supposed to meet with someone in the parking lot to buy marijuana. Instead he was approached by two men with a gun who ordered him to give them his wallet and get out of the car.

The robbers then got into the car and drove away south on Leland. The man was not injured.

Addington said it was not clear whether the men who robbed the victim were the ones who were supposed to sell him drugs, or whether the robbery was a coincidence.

http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/gallery/0,23816,5036296-5007115,00.html

Gwinnett County News

5:37 a.m. Monday, January 11, 2010

Math miscue costs Snellville city attorney his job

Shane Blatt
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A numerical blunder has cost the Snellville city attorney his job, officials said.

Mike Williams, who was hired in 2008, won’t be reappointed at tonight’s City Council meeting. In late September, he miscounted the number of days required between the call of a Sunday alcohol sales referendum and the actual vote.

“We need a city attorney who can count to 40,” said Councilman Tod Warner, noting that Williams’ miscalculation meant the city was three days shy of the state-mandated time period. “He screwed up.”

The blunder led to the council changing its liquor laws by council vote, rather than referendum. Although Williams told the city it was on firm legal ground to do so, the vote prompted a lawsuit and temporary restraining order against Snellville. The matter is being heard later this month.

Williams offered his resignation after the Sept. 28 mistake, but Mayor Jerry Oberholtzer wouldn’t talk about it until after the November election. The city appoints or renews the contract for the city attorney each January.

“I thought Mike did a good job as the city attorney,” Oberholtzer said. “The issue in my book was we needed someone who understood the politics of Gwinnett County.”

But, Oberholtzer added, he knew the city needed to make a change after the miscount.

Williams, who is managing partner of a law firm in Jonesboro, did not return phone calls Friday seeking comment.

Although Williams’ numerical mistake was the “straw that broke the camel’s back,” there were other issues, Warner said.

Namely, Warner said, the city attorney took part in crafting a group homes ordinance that cost the city about $10,000 in legal fees but couldn’t pass constitutional muster.

Williams also had trouble standing his ground against a divided City Council, officials said.

“I’ve enjoyed working with Mr. Williams,” Warner said, “ but we need somebody who will champion what’s right, and not what the council wants. He just wasn’t forceful enough.”

Although Williams won’t be the city attorney, he’ll still be on the payroll handling the city’s ongoing battle over Sunday liquor-by-the-drink sales.

Three weeks ago, an attorney working on behalf of eight residents requested a temporary restraining order against Snellville. He argued that city leaders acted unlawfully Dec. 14 when by council vote rather than referendum, they opened the tap on Sunday alcohol sales to help struggling restaurants.

A magistrate judge on Dec. 28 issued the order, which temporarily prevents the city from handing out any additional Sunday alcohol licenses.

Tonight, Oberholtzer said he will recommend Tony Powell, Lawrenceville’s once-longtime city attorney, as Williams’ replacement.

Powell recently led an investigation into allegations that Lawrenceville Mayor Rex Millsaps violated the city’s ethics code 18 times, mostly by presiding over deliberations or voting on contracts involving a local architectural and engineering firm where he works. Last week, the Lawrenceville City Council absolved Millsaps of any wrongdoing.

Lee/APSarah Palin signs with Fox News as a contributor.

Sarah Palin is becoming a TV star.

The former Alaska Governor has signed a multi-year deal to serve as a contributor to Fox News, effective immediately.

"I am thrilled to be joining the great talent and management team at Fox News," Palin said in a statement. "It's wonderful to be part of a place that so values fair and balance news."

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Joining Fox News, the top-rated cable news network, is the latest twist in Palin's meteoric rise to fame after being named Sen. John McCain's vice presidential candidate for the 2008 election.

Since then she's left her job as governor, saying she can do more out of office than in, and written a book "Going Rogue: An American Life."

"Gov. Palin has captivated everyone on both sides of the political spectrum and we are expected to add her dynamic voice to the Fox News lineup," Bill Shine, Fox News' executive vice president of programming said in a statement.

Palin has been no fan of the media, either. She slammed CBS' Katie Couric and ABC's Charles Gibson for the way she was treated in interviews during the presidential race.

She's also been in the middle of a tabloid squabble with Levi Johnston, the father of her daughter's child, over parental visitation.

As a contributor to Fox News, Palin will offer political commentary and analysis for all of the network's platforms, as well as special event political coverage for Fox Broadcasting.

She will also host periodic episodes of FNC's "Real American Stories," a series looking at inspirational real-life tales set to launch this year.

Palin joins an on-air team that also includes former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who hosts a weekend show, and Fox News analysts Newt Gingrich and Karl Rove.

Man accused of trying to ship illegal drugs through mail 

January 11, 2010 8:21 AM

Michael Stewart

Florida Freedom Newspapers

CRESTVIEW — A Crestview man faces a felony charge of possession of methadone, with intent to deliver within 1000 feet of a school.

Jack Anthony Houle, 26, of the 100 block of Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue, was released from the Okaloosa County Jail on a $5,000 bond.

Police allege that on Wednesday, Houle attempted to mail 100 methadone pills to Nederland, Texas at One Stop Mail Service in Crestview.

According to a Crestview Police Department arrest report, employees at the mail center said Houle entered the store and asked that a package already wrapped be sent immediately and requested it not be opened.

“The reporting party suspected Houle might be trying to ship illegal drugs,” the report states. “…Due to the shipping store having the right to open and inspect all packages before shipping them, they opened the package.”

Employees alerted police after discovering the pills, the report continues.

Houle was arrested and told police he was shipping the pills to a man in Texas, who had been staying with him, who has a valid prescription for the pills.

“Houle stated he did take ‘a few’ of the pills, and further stated he sold some because ‘times are tough,’” the arresting officer states in the report. “Houle insisted if (the man in Texas) was contacted, he would be able to claim the pills as his, however, Houle would not provide (the man’s) information.”

Engman/GettyIn 'Game Change' (below), Sarah Palin is portrayed as having an erratic personality.

The gossipy new campaign book that has the political world buzzing portrays Sarah Palin not just as an ignoramus who believed Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11 but also as possibly mentally unstable.

"Game Change," the 2008 deconstruction, says the stress of vaulting onto the national stage caused Palin to have wild mood swings.

"One minute, Palin would be her perky self; the next she would fall into a strange blue funk," the authors write.

The morning of her ill-fated CBS interview with Katie Couric, Palin - "her eyes glassy and dead" - was unresponsive to attempts to prep her as she was being made up.

"As they were about to set off to meet Couric, Palin announced 'I hate this makeup' - smearing it off her face, messing up her hair, complaining she looked fat," the book relates.

Palin went on to give answers to Couric that were so incoherent the interview permanently damaged her.

Palin went into a tailspin. She stopped eating or sleeping, and drank only a half a can of diet soda a day, recounts the book written by John Heilemann of New York magazine and Mark Halperin of Time magazine.

"When her aides tried to quiz her she would routinely shut down - chin on her chest, arms folded, eyes cast to the floor, speechless and motionless, lost in what those around her described as a kind of catatonic stupor," the book says.

"If I had known everything I know now, I would not have done this," the book quotes Palin as saying.

She talked often about her baby, Trig, who spent most of the time in Alaska, and some John McCain aides thought she might be suffering postpartum depression.

When the campaign took her to Arizona to prep for the veep debate, McCain's staff made sure a doctor friend was on hand "to observe her," the book says.

Palin's spokeswoman Meg Stapleton has dismissed the book's allegations as inaccurate gossip from people who weren't there.

"The governor's descriptions of these events are found in her book, 'Going Rogue.' Her descriptions are accurate," Stapleton said in a statement Sunday night to 60 Minutes."  "She was there. These reporters were not."

"Game Change," which features priceless images like Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mike Huckabee in a line at a pre-debate urinal, making fun of the absent Mitt Romney - also up contains many other revelations:

The book says aides feared Bill Clinton was jeopardizing his wife's run by having an affair in 2006. The book says a trio of Hillary's top aides formed "a war room within a war room" to counter gossip about her husband and were able to discount all philandering rumors but one.

Bookie refuses to pay out $11 million on snow bet

Girish Gupta

LONDON

Fri Jan 8, 2010 1:38pm EST        

LONDON (Reuters) - Bookmaker Ladbrokes is refusing to pay out more than 7 million pounds ($11 million) to a man who gambled on a white Christmas across the UK, as the bet was accepted by mistake.

Cliff Bryant, 52, had placed two 5-pound accumulator bets that snow would fall on 24 towns and cities across the north of England on Christmas Day.

"We have apologized to the customer for any confusion and for mistakenly accepting an accumulator bet when our own rules state that only single bets are available on a market of this nature," said a Ladbrokes spokesman.

"We are happy to void the bets and to pay the customer his winnings on the relevant singles."

They however amount to just 31.78 pounds, rather than the 7.1 million Bryant was expecting.

The graphic designer from Southampton, who told the local Southern Daily Echo newspaper he was "gutted" and would seek legal advice, claims the first accumulator would have won him 4.9 million pounds, with the second adding 2.2 million.

"If I make a mistake in my work like that it costs me dearly and I think the offer should be a lot more generous than they have made," he told the paper.

Ladbrokes should have made their rules clearer, he added.

"They are one of the leading bookmakers in the country and I think they ought to do their homework a bit better in future."

Ladbrokes gave Bryant details of the Independent Betting Adjudication Service (IBAS), an impartial adjudicator on disputes that arise between gambling operators and their customers.

Danny Cracknell, a manager of the IBAS, told Reuters that Bryant had been in contact and they would be investigating the issue once he had completed the relevant forms.

Attacked Walmart greeter says he was fired

ASSOCIATED PRESS • January 10, 2010

PALM BAY — A local Walmart greeter seen on video getting punched by a customer says he's been fired.

Ed Bauman told WESH TV his termination notice called the incident an act of "gross misconduct."

A Wal-Mart statement says Bauman violated company policy on how they treat customers, and his actions put other customers' safety in jeopardy.

The 69-year-old Bauman was working at the Palm Bay store on Dec. 26 when 23-year-old Skyler Lowery set off the alarm. Bauman asked to see Lowery's receipt. Lowery showed the receipt quickly and kept walking, and Bauman followed Lowery. Police say Lowery grabbed Bauman's clipboard and punched him in the head.

Lowery was charged with battery.

LINK TO VIDEO

http://www.floridatoday.com/section/videonetwork?bctid=59414080001

Vucci/APTed Kennedy famously endorsed Barack Obama for President, after Bill Clinton (below) reportedly belittled the future president.

 Brose/AP

Bill Clinton helped sink his wife's chances for an endorsement from Ted Kennedy by belittling Barack Obama as nothing but a race-based candidate.

"A few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee," the former president told the liberal lion from Massachusetts, according to the gossipy new campaign book, "Game Change."

The book says Kennedy was deeply offended and recounted the conversation to friends with fury.

After Kennedy sided with Obama, Clinton reportedly griped, "the only reason you are endorsing him is because he's black. Let's just be clear."

The revelations in "Game Change" are guaranteed to reopen the 2008 Clinton racial wounds that had been scabbing over amid his post-election public silence and his wife's high marks as Secretary of State.

Laden with potent pass-the-torch symbolism, the January 2008 endorsement of Obama by Kennedy and his niece, Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg was a pivotal campaign moment that allowed the Democratic establishment to abandon the Clintons.

Bill Clinton wasn't the only one to bungle handling the Kennedys -  the book says Hillary Clinton managed to alienate Caroline by fobbing off a key request on staff instead of calling personally.

When a group of prominent New Yorkers headed to Iowa to campaign for Hillary Clinton, Caroline "dreaded" getting a call to join them because she "would have found it impossible to refuse," the book says.

When Hillary Clinton's staffer called, someone "who sounded awfully like" Caroline said she wasn't home.

Bill Clinton, whose stock with black voters was so high he used to be referred to as "America's First Black President," severely damaged his rep in his overheated drive to help elect his wife.