Peace be with you brother?

Jesus wept.

Soldiers supervise the working priests. Talk about a nanny state.

Clergymen in a Broom Fight at the Birthplace of Jesus
By Amrutha Gayathri | http://www.ibtimes.com | December 29, 2011

An annual cleaning ritual at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, one of the most sacred and oldest continuously operating churches in the world, ended up in a broom fight between the rival clergy belonging to three separate monastic communities.

The church built over a cave, which is traditionally regarded as the birthplace of Jesus, is jointly administered by Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox and Armenian Apostolic authorities. According to convention, the right to own a portion or structure of the Church lies with the monastic community which cleans it up. This accepted practice may have led to the clash between clergymen who accused each other of encroachment by tidying up portions which didn’t belong to the community.

The ritualistic cleaning up of the church was part of the preparations leading to Orthodox Christmas celebrations in January, the Associated Press reported. Unlike the Western Christians who celebrate Christmas on Dec. 25, Eastern Christians, who follow the Julian calendar (which has a 13 day difference with the modern Gregorian calendar) celebrate Christmas on Jan. 6, which translates as Jan. 7 for the rest of the world. The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the Armenian Apostolic Church follow the Julian calendar, while the Roman Catholic Church follows the Gregorian calendar.

The fight erupted between clerics tidying up the borders of their respective portions, and the agitated monks were reportedly shouting and hurling brooms at each other. Palestinian security men rushed to break up the fight, which did not cause any serious human injury.

Clashes between Christian religious sects over the ownership of the Church of the Nativity aren’t new. The structure, which currently occupies about 12,000 square meters, was one of the key causes that led to French involvement in the Crimean war against Russia. The dispute between Roman Catholic monks supported by France and the Orthodox clergy supported by Russia, over the possession of keys of the main door of the church, led to the Crimean war in the 1850s.

The preservation of the Church has been a major concern since 2008, after it was placed in the watchlist of 100 most endangered sites by the World Monument Fund. The Palestinian authorities announced a restoration program in 2010.

Out of respect for the alleged victims, I will show an empty space in a mural where Sandusky once was.

Jerry Sandusky’s lawyer cites gay phone sex line in stating case
http://www.suntimes.com | December 14, 2011

BELLEFONTE, Pa. — Jerry Sandusky’s decision Tuesday to waive his preliminary hearing shifts the focus in the child sex-abuse scandal to two Penn State administrators accused of failing to properly report suspected abuse and lying to the grand jury investigating Sandusky.

Tim Curley and Gary Schultz face their own pretrial hearing on Friday in Harrisburg, and although the charges are much different, with far less severe potential penalties, their cases could hinge on a man also expected to be a prime witness against Sandusky: assistant football coach Mike McQueary.

McQueary testified that he happened upon “rhythmic, slapping sounds” in the football team locker room showers in March 2002, and looked in to see a naked boy being sodomized by the former defensive coordinator, according to a grand jury presentment.

McQueary, then a 28-year-old graduate assistant, reported what he saw to then-football coach Joe Paterno, the grand jury said. Paterno called Curley, the university’s athletic director, the next day, and a week and a half later McQueary met with Curley and Schultz — who oversaw university police in his position as a vice president.

What precisely was said at those meetings, and what Curley and Schultz did or didn’t do afterward is at the heart of the government’s case against them.

Their lawyers have declined recent requests for comment, but previously have said the two men deny the allegations and indicated they will contest the facts alleged by the attorney general’s office and dispute how the particular offenses have been applied to them

Also at issue are statements McQueary has made in emails that may contradict his grand jury testimony. Last weekend The Patriot-News of Harrisburg reported that McQueary’s story changed when speaking to Dr. Jonathan Dranov, a family friend. The newspaper report cited a source said to be familiar with Dranov’s testimony.

“If this information is true, and we believe it is, it would be powerful, exculpatory evidence and the charges against our clients should be dismissed,” said the lawyers for Curley and Schultz, Caroline Roberto and Thomas Farrell, respectively, in a statement.

The Associated Press was unable to reach Dranov at his home and office for comment. No one answered the door at McQueary’s home Tuesday. His father, John, declined comment to the Associated Press.

Sandusky’s lawyer, Joe Amendola, called McQueary the centerpiece of the prosecution’s case, and said shifting stories were helping his client.

“If anyone is naïve enough to think for a minute that Tim Curley, Joe Paterno and Gary Schultz, and for that matter, Graham Spanier, the university president, were told that he observed Jerry Sandusky having anal sex with a 10-year-old-looking kid in a shower room at Penn State, on Penn State property, and their response was simply to tell Jerry Sandusky that ‘don’t go in the shower anymore with kids,’ I suggest you dial 1-800-REALITY because that makes absolutely no sense,” Amendola said.

That number connects to a phone sex line touting gay and bi-curious sex for men.

Later, Amendola told the AP that “I’ve been using that line for years when people have said things that make no sense. It’s analagous to ‘get a life.’ I had no idea that was a real number, let alone what it actually is. I will not be using that line in the future!”

But Amendola’s statement about the case was only a recent example of how McQueary’s credibility, and the details of his testimony, may prove critical to proving or disproving the allegations against the three defendants.

The Friday preliminary hearing is meant to establish whether there is sufficient legal grounds to send the allegations to Dauphin County Common Pleas Court for a full trial, a relatively low standard and one that strongly favors the prosecution.

Curley, 57, was placed on leave by the university after his arrest. Schultz, 62, returned to retirement after spending about four decades at the school, most recently as senior vice president for business and finance, and treasurer

Both men were released on unsecured bail. The perjury charges against them are felonies, while the charges of failure to report under the Child Protective Services Law are summary offenses, less serious than misdemeanors.

Biographies released by a spokeswoman for their lawyers on Tuesday said Curley, a State College native, was named athletic director in 1993, working his way up through the sports department after being a walk-on football player for the Nittany Lions. Schultz started working for Penn State, in 1971 after receiving an undergraduate engineering degree. He retired in 2009, then returned earlier this year on an interim basis after his successor as vice president took another job.

Amendola said Tuesday Sandusky opted to waive his preliminary hearing out of concerns it would present a one-sided view of the facts. After the brief proceeding, he stood in freezing temperatures at a podium in front of the courthouse and answered questions for an hour or more from the hundreds of reporters assembled for what had been expected to be a daylong proceeding.

A prosecutor said about 11 witnesses, most of them alleged victims, as well as McQueary, were ready to testify at the hearing.

Sandusky pleaded not guilty and requested a jury trial, saying he would “stay the course, to fight for four quarters.”

Amendola said prosecutors agreed to give early warning of any further charges and to keep Sandusky’s bail at $250,000

A spokesman for the attorney general’s office said Sandusky’s bail conditions were adequate and that an agreement to share discovery information would result in a trail sooner.

“Sandusky waived his rights today. We waived nothing,” said the spokesman, Nils Frederiksen.

Despite the hearing waiver, both sides said there had not been talks of a plea bargain.

“There will be no plea negotiations,” Amendola said. “This is a fight to the death.”

Sandusky was accompanied to court by his wife, Dottie, some of their adopted children and alumni of The Second Mile, an organization that he founded in 1977 to help struggling children. The grand jury report said he used the charity to meet and lure his alleged victims.

The first known abuse allegation was in 1998, when the mother told police Sandusky had showered with her son.

Accusations surfaced again in 2002, the incident involving McQueary.

The grand jury probe began only in 2009, after a teen complained that Sandusky, then a volunteer coach at his central Pennsylvania high school, had abused him.

The teen told the grand jury that Sandusky first groomed him with gifts and trips in 2006 and 2007, then sexually assaulted him more than 20 times in 2008 through early 2009.

H&M recently admitted to using a computer-generated body to model clothing for much of their website. The company adds on different real-life models' faces in post-production for a result like the one seen here. All images from H&M's site.

Clothing Giant H&M Defends ‘Perfect’ Virtual Models
By Katie Kindelan | Dec 6, 2011 | abcnews.go.com

Visiting the H&M website is not the only virtual experience to be had by H&M customers who choose to order the company’s clothes online instead of inside one of their 2,300 global retail stores.

Also “completely virtual” are the models at the center of H&M’s swimsuit and lingerie online campaigns, the Swedish-based retailer confirmed.

“It’s not a real body; it is completely virtual and made by the computer,” H&M press officer Hacan Andersson told Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet in an article questioning the company’s picture-perfect online models.

In the Dec. 4 article, translated into English by U.S. celebrity website Jezebel, Andersson explained the company’s approach.

“We take pictures of the clothes on a doll that stands in the shop, and then create the human appearance with a program on [a] computer,” he said.

Images from the company’s website show models wearing the latest swimsuit and lingerie looks appear in generic, stock-form with their left hand resting slightly below their waist, right arm straight and face looking directly ahead.

Advertising watchdogs in the company’s native Scandanavia elevated the controversy by criticizing the chain of lower-cost clothing stores for their generic approach to models.

The Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, one of the most outspoken groups to criticize H&M, accused the chain of “creating unrealistic physical ideals.”

“This illustrates very well the sky-high aesthetic demands placed on the female body,” spokesman Helle Vaagland said. “The demands are so great that H&M, among the poor photo models, cannot find someone with both body and face that can sell their bikinis.

Andersonn defended the company’s decision to rely on virtual instead of real models by explaining that computer-generated bodies would ensure that the garments remain the focus of online shoppers’ attention, not the model’s bodies.

“It’s not about ideals or to show off a perfect body, we are doing this to show off the garments,” he told Aftonbladet. “This is done for all garments, not just underwear. It applies to both women’s and men’s clothing.”

A spokeswoman for the company’s U.S. operations compared the use of virtual models online to the common retail practice of using mannequins in stores.

“In our Shop Online we show our fashion through real life models pictures, still life pictures or as virtual mannequin pictures,” the spokeswoman, Nicole Christie, told ABCNews.com. “The virtual mannequins are used in the same way as we use mannequins in our stores for ladies wear and menswear.”

Christie confirmed Andersonn’s description of how H&M creates its virtual models, as well as the intention behind the practice, one she said is common.

“This technique can be found in use throughout the industry,” Christie said. “This is not to be seen as conveying a specific ideal or body type, but merely a technique to show our garments.”

Responding to the fire the company has come under in just the two days since the Aftonbladet article was published, Christie issued this statement to ABC:

“It is regrettable if we have led anyone to believe that the virtual mannequins should be real bodies. This is incorrect and has never been our intention. We will continue to discuss internally how we can be clearer about this in the information towards our customers.”

“We have too many cellphones. We’ve got too many internets. We have got to get rid of those machines. We have too many machines now.”

Poster for the movie adaptation of Fahrenheit 451.

Fahrenheit 451 becomes e-book despite author’s feelings
30 November 2011 | www.bbc.co.uk

The science fiction novel Fahrenheit 451 has been published as an e-book despite its author’s dislike of the format.

Ray Bradbury previously claimed electronic books “smell like burned fuel”.

Mr Bradbury’s agent said the rights for the author’s book had been close to expiring and the publisher had insisted the new contract include e-book rights.

Experts said the news reflected the growing importance of e-formats.

Fahrenheit 451, first published in 1953, describes a dystopian future in which the US has outlawed reading and firemen burn books.

It has sold more than 10 million copies since publication.

‘Too many machines’

As late as last year, Mr Bradbury remained firmly opposed to the idea of his book appearing as a digital title.

“I was approached three times during the last year by internet companies wanting to put my books on an electronic reading device,” he told the Los Angeles Times in 2010.

“I said to Yahoo: ‘Prick up your ears and go to hell.’”

He also complained about the spread of modern technology.

“We have too many cellphones. We’ve got too many internets. We have got to get rid of those machines. We have too many machines now,” he said.

However, Mr Bradbury’s agent said the deal had become unavoidable.

“We explained the situation to him that a new contract wouldn’t be possible without e-book rights,” Michael Congdon said.

“He understood and gave us the right to go ahead.”

‘A good thing’

The US publisher Simon & Schuster has released Fahrenheit 451 and is selling it at a list price of $9.99 (£6.35).

The company described the e-book as “a rare and wonderful opportunity to continue our relationship with this beloved and canonical author and to bring his works to a new generation of readers”.

A spokeswoman for HarperCollins, which publishes Mr Bradbury’s books in the UK, said the firm was still in talks with his agent.

Book industry insiders said it was ironic that a science fiction writer should have been so opposed to the idea of electronic reading devices, suggesting strong sales might have changed Mr Bradbury’s mind.

“The facts have changed, and so has his opinion,” said Neill Denny, editor of the Bookseller magazine.

“My view is good publishing is format-neutral, and so long as publishers control copyright and suppress piracy, then e-books are a good thing for publishers and authors in general.

“However, the e-book is a format that excludes the traditional bookshop and the book trade needs to find a way urgently to support their presence, otherwise there is a danger books drop out of sight permanently for many consumers.”

If you haven’t, please take a moment to view the original video of the protest and police response. It is shocking.

To help flesh out the backstory below are definitions of meme and a blurb of what happened on the UC Davis campus.

Wikipedia – The term Internet meme (meem)[1] is used to describe a concept that spreads via the Internet.[2] The term is a reference to the concept of memes, although the latter concept refers to a much broader category of cultural information.

dictionary-meme |mēm| noun Biology
an element of a culture or system of behavior that may be considered to be passed from one individual to another by nongenetic means, esp. imitation.

FACTS & FIGURES-from presstv.com
On November 18, UC Davis campus police used pepper spray against students protesting social inequality and tuition hikes at the University of California, Davis. wsws.org

The sticker price of studying and living on campus at the average public university has risen 5.4 percent for in-state students, or about $1,100, to $21,447 this fall, the College Board estimated. Tuition at the average public university has jumped 8.3 percent to $8,244. Chicago Tribune

The Occupy Wall Street movement that started in New York City on September 17 is protesting the income gap between Americans with the highest incomes and those with lower incomes and criticizes the greed of the nation’s wealthiest people. Occupytogether.org

Below are a few of the dozens of images of the pepper spraying cop meme that have been culled from random sources. Click to embiggen.

Artist Michael Pilato paints over the image of Jerry Sandusky in his mural, "Inspiration," in State College.

A mother of one of the young boys alleged preyed upon by Sandusky called the artist and requested he alter the mural.

A long history in Penn State child abuse case
By Kristina Cooke, Edith Honan and Ben Berkowitz | Reuters | Nov 13, 2011

STATE COLLEGE, Penn. (Reuters) – Until a few days ago, Jerry Sandusky’s face smiled down on students from a mural in downtown State College, the home of Penn State University, where football players and coaches are treated like royalty.

On Wednesday, the creator of the mural painted over Sandusky. The former assistant football coach was charged a few days earlier with sexually abusing eight boys over more than a decade.

“I got an email yesterday from one of the victim’s mothers saying simply, ‘Michael, can you please take Sandusky off the mural,’” said Michael Pilato, a local painter who created the “Inspiration” mural in 2001.

It will not be so easy to wipe out the stain on Penn State’s reputation from the alleged abuse and what critics see as a cover-up by university officials who were told that Sandusky was seen raping a young boy in a shower in 2002.

Sandusky, who played football at Penn State and then coached for 32 years at the school, has denied the charges and has been released on bail.

The case has drawn comparisons to the child abuse scandals that rocked the Catholic Church, whose top officials are also accused of covering up child abuse over decades.

In this tight-knit town where the university is everything, Sandusky was known as a church-going family man and a philanthropist. “Jerry was just held in very high regard. It’s definitely a shock to hear something like this. This has kind of blindsided everyone in town. He was the definition of Penn State,” said Nick Savereno, who grew up in the university town, attended Penn State and now owns a sandwich shop near campus.

FOOTBALL STATE

That the alleged abuse continued even after university officials were alerted to specific allegations has raised questions about the power and influence of the football program and its coaches — especially Joe Paterno, one of the most revered figures in American sports.

The football program at Penn State was so sacrosanct as to be almost untouchable. “We just had this empire all by itself, reporting to nobody,” said one member of the university’s board of trustees.

Pennsylvania State University used to be a sleepy engineering school, but it was turned into a national powerhouse with the money raised by its marquee football program. In 2008, the last year for which data is available, Penn State was one of the 20 largest recipients of federal research dollars in the country. It has fostered what is now the world’s largest dues-paying alumni association.

Now, the university is in turmoil. When the Sandusky news broke last weekend, at least two board members found out from television news rather than from the university. That probably helped seal the fate of university president Graham Spanier, said the trustee.

Spanier was fired on Wednesday, along with Paterno, the 84-year-old coach who was known simply as JoePa and who had won more major college football games than any coach in history.

In a statement earlier this week, Paterno said: “With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more.”

Spanier said after he was dismissed: “I was stunned and outraged to learn that any predatory act might have occurred in a university facility or by someone associated with the university.”

Two other officials, former athletic director Tim Curley and former finance official Gary Schultz, have been charged with failing to report an incident of abuse and lying to the grand jury, which detailed the allegations against Sandusky in a 23-page report (Available on the Pennsylvania attorney general’s website here: http://www.attorneygeneral.gov/uploadedFiles/Press/Sandusky-Grand-Jury-Presentment.pdf)

Lawyers for Curley and Schultz have denied the charges.

The grand jury report, and dozens of Reuters interviews with people in State College and connected to the case, indicate there were key moments when the alleged abuse was suspected or witnessed – and might have been stopped.

1998 INCIDENT

During the period documented in the report, from 1994 to 2008, the first occasion authorities were alerted to possible abuse was in 1998.

According to the grand jury report, “Victim 6,” then 11 years old, told his mother he had showered with Sandusky in a locker room on the Penn State campus, and the coach had lathered the boy’s body and squeezed him in a bear hug.

The boy’s mother complained to campus police, who launched an investigation, during which they discovered there was a second boy who had a similar experience.

A detective from the campus police and an investigator from the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare met with Sandusky, who admitted to the shower. They extracted a promise from the coach that he would not do it again.

The investigation ended when the Center County District Attorney at the time, Ray Gricar, decided not to press charges. Some seven years later, while still in office, Gricar went missing under mysterious circumstances; his body was never found. There is no indication of any connection to the child abuse case, but his disappearance means he can provide no answers as to why the case was dropped.

A year after the investigation, in 1999, Sandusky retired as Penn State’s defensive coordinator. At his last home game he received a standing ovation from nearly 100,000 fans crammed into the Nittany Lions’ stadium. But at a farewell gala held for Sandusky at around that time, several attendees said they were struck by Paterno’s absence.

Requests for comment from Paterno, directed through his son, were not answered.

“TOUCHED”

Sandusky’s memoir titled “Touched” was published in 2000. His daughter, Kara Sandusky Werner, wrote in the introduction: “We were always proud of the things he did for kids.”

In the book, Sandusky confesses an inability to grow up. “I had always professed that someday I would reap the benefits of maturity, but my lifestyle just wouldn’t let me,” he wrote, later adding that “the times when I found myself searching for maturity, I usually came up with insanity.”

With more time on his hands after retiring, Sandusky shifted his focus to the Second Mile, the foster home-turned-charity for kids from broken homes he started in 1977, the year after taking the defensive coordinator job at Penn State.

Second Mile was an integral part of Sandusky’s life. He was its chief fundraiser and best cheerleader and even drew a salary, though he had no operational authority.

According to the Pennsylvania Department of State, in fiscal 2010 the charity had income of $2.2 million and assets of just under $9 million.

It has also had a huge presence on campus. Its board is a veritable Who’s Who of State College. The charity’s annual golf fundraiser is attended by some of the university’s famed alumni, including professional football players.

Bob Hill, a stock broker and former board member who ran the golf event for 17 years, is one of the State College locals who says everyone bought into the Sandusky mystique. “Before all this came out, if you were going to line up 100 guys and say which was the nicest guy, it would have been Sandusky. I never heard one person say anything negative about him,” he said.

According to the grand jury, the Second Mile was also where Sandusky found his victims.

As one former Second Mile employee remembers, Sandusky seemed at times to prioritize the charity over his coaching duties, and was frequently seen with his arms around children or putting them in a playful headlock.

The charity issued a statement earlier this week expressing shock and sadness. “To our knowledge, all the alleged incidents occurred outside of our programs and events,” the statement said. Officials from the group have declined further comment.

JANITOR WITNESS

According to the grand jury report, another opportunity to stop Sandusky’s alleged abuse came and went in 2000, when a janitor said he saw the man performing oral sex on a young boy.

Fellow janitors told the grand jury that the witness, Jim Calhoun, approached a colleague in tears and related what he had seen. He was so upset by what he saw that they feared he might have a heart attack.

The other janitors decided their jobs might be at risk if they reported the incident to authorities, according to the grand jury report.

They convinced Calhoun to tell his supervisor, who told Calhoun how to report the incident if he wanted to. The grand jury found there was no report, no follow-up, and the identity of the boy remains unknown.

The eyewitness, Calhoun, is now in a nursing home with dementia and not competent to testify. The supervisor could not be reached for comment and a second janitor declined comment.

An alleged incident in March 2002 is particularly shocking.

Despite his retirement, and despite the 1998 probe, Sandusky still had privileges on campus, including access to gyms and locker rooms.

Late in the evening of March 1, 2002, a Friday before the university’s spring holiday, a graduate assistant on the football team entered the main football building’s locker room to the unexpected sound of showers running, according to the grand jury report. It said he heard “rhythmic, slapping sounds” which he believed to be the sound of sexual activity.

The graduate assistant found Sandusky sodomizing a boy of about 10 years old, the grand jury report said. Rather than calling the authorities, though, he called his father.

The next morning, at his father’s urging, he called Paterno and told him a version of what he had seen – exactly how much detail he gave is not clear from the grand jury report. Paterno – whose stature among sports fans is hard to overstate – did not call police either.

“HORSING AROUND”

The graduate assistant was later identified as Mike McQueary, a red-headed former Penn State quarterback who has since risen to the ranks of assistant coach.

McQueary, who was described in the grand jury report as a “credible” witness, has not commented since the charges were brought. Requests for comment via his father and brother were declined. On Friday, he was put on administrative leave by the university.

A full day after Paterno spoke to McQueary, the head coach told his boss, athletic director Tim Curley, that a graduate assistant had seen Jerry Sandusky “fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy” in the team showers, the grand jury report said.

Nearly 10 days later, McQueary met Curley and Gary Schultz, the Penn State vice president, and told them he had witnessed “what he believed to be Sandusky have anal sex with a boy” in the showers, the grand jury report said.

Curley denied to the grand jury that McQueary had reported anal sex and described the conduct as “horsing around.”

The grand jury report said McQueary was never interviewed by police, even though he had reported what he saw to Schultz, who ran the campus police department. Schultz later told the grand jury he was surprised to learn there was a long report in the police files from the 1998 investigation.

The reporting of the 2002 incident went all the way to Graham Spanier, the university’s president since 1995 and a sociologist and family therapist by training.

Spanier testified to the grand jury that he was told of an incident in 2002 – though he said the sexual aspects were not part of the report – and that he was also told there were no plans to inform law enforcement or child welfare officials.

“The records reveal that the 2002 incident was never reported to any officials, in contravention of Pennsylvania law,” the grand jury report said, adding that no effort was made to identify the child in question.

Curley and Schultz have been charged with lying to the grand jury. They have denied the charges through their lawyers.

Sandusky was banned from bringing children into the football locker room and the Second Mile charity was advised of an incident involving Sandusky and a child in the shower.

The Second Mile said in its statement this week that Curley had told them only that “an individual had reported to Mr. Curley that he was uncomfortable about seeing Jerry Sandusky in the locker room shower with a youth.” The statement added: “At no time was The Second Mile made aware of the very serious allegations contained in the Grand Jury report.”

THE INVESTIGATION

It was through Second Mile that Sandusky allegedly found a new victim in 2005 or 2006 – a boy who was 11 or 12. Their relationship began with frequent gifts and massages in the basement of Sandusky’s home, escalating into repeated incidents of oral sex, according to the grand jury report.

In early 2008, while the boy was in his first year of high school, he cut off contact with Sandusky.

But before that happened, the boy and Sandusky used to routinely meet in a conference room at the boy’s school where Sandusky was a volunteer football coach. School administrators would pull the boy out of study sessions for the meetings.

The school’s assistant principal, Steven Turchetta, said Sandusky had a “very controlling” relationship with the students he mentored, the grand jury report said. Turchetta declined to comment for this story.

The mother of the boy in question eventually called the school to report the alleged abuse. Sandusky was immediately barred from the school and it was reported to authorities.

The Second Mile said in this week’s statement that Sandusky told the organization in November 2008 he was under investigation over the boy’s allegations.

But the Pennsylvania Attorney General did not contact the charity until early 2011. In the interim period, it appears investigators were working on building their case, which was taken up in 2009 by Pennsylvania’s then attorney general, Tom Corbett, who has since been elected governor.

Corbett, an ex-officio member of Penn State’s board, told reporters this week he supported the firing of Paterno and Spanier. “When it comes to the safety of children, there can be no margin of error,” Corbett told a news conference. He said he was “disappointed” in the two men for their lack of oversight.

The Harrisburg Patriot-News, citing five sources, reported in March 2011 that a grand jury had been meeting for at least 18 months to consider child abuse allegations against Sandusky.

Last weekend, Sandusky was charged with sexually abusing eight boys between 1994 and 2008.

Through the long investigation, Sandusky himself remained a fixture on campus. As recently as this summer, he was seen using the football players’ weight room several times a week.

Sandusky was also seen at a Second Mile golf fundraiser, and several attendees said he appeared up-beat.

“I saw him this summer. He seemed relaxed, which I was surprised by given the investigation. He was pretty much his normal self,” said John Skorupan, a former professional football player who has known Sandusky since the 1970s.

“To know Jerry you wouldn’t believe it, because of the type of guy he is,” he added.

This week, a police car guarded access to the Sandusky property in State College and he was nowhere to be seen.

(Edith Honan and Kristina Cooke reported from State College; Ben Berkowitz and Janet Roberts reported from New York; editing by Claudia Parsons and Martin Howell)

(This story was corrected to clarify that Paterno is winningest coach in major college football, also fixes typo)

Bornean orangutan in Central Kalimantan. Photo by Rhett A. Butler.

Crop raiding intensity in different villages across Kalimantan. High = reported conflict frequency every week; Medium = every month; Low = once a year or less frequently. Courtesy of PLoS One.

Crop raiding intensity in different villages across Kalimantan. High = reported conflict frequency every week; Medium = every month; Low = once a year or less frequently. Courtesy of PLoS One.

Bornean orangutan with baby in Central Kalimantan. Photo by Rhett A. Butler.

Orangutans in Indonesian Borneo doomed to extinction?
mongabay.com  |  November 14, 2011

A new study finds orangutans in Indonesian Borneo in unprotected areas are being killed at a rate faster than what population viability analysis considers sustainable. Conflict between orangutans and humans is worst in areas that have been fragmented and converted for timber, wood-pulp, and palm oil production, but hunting is occurring in relatively intact forest zones away from industrial development.

comprehensive new study finds that orangutan populations in Indonesian Borneo are being diminished at unsustainable rates due to conflict with humans. The results suggest orangutans outside protected areas may be headed toward extinction

The study, published Friday in PLoS One, is based on 18 months of interviews with nearly 7,000 people across 687 villages in areas where orangutans persist in East, Central, and West Kalimantan. The research involved 18 NGOs, including local and international organizations.

The study, which sought to address a dearth of quantitative data on human-orangutan conflict, asked villagers about their knowledge of wildlife laws and orangutan conflict and killing. The researchers tracked responses across age, ethnicity, religion, and livelihoods as well as geography and the villages’ proximity to industrial operations, including oil palm and pulp and paper plantations, mining areas, and logging concessions. Two-thirds of respondents were Dyaks, about a third were Malays and migrants, while less than one percent were punans, who until recently were nomadic forest people.

The assessment, which included responses only from people who were able to reliably differentiate orangutans from other primate species, found that only a small number of people have personally killed an orangutan, but that nearly a sixth of villages reported agricultural conflicts with orangutans and a quarter had killed at least one orangutan. At 18 percent, East Kalimantan had the highest rate of conflict, while West Kalimantan had the lowest at 12 percent.

Crop-raiding by orangutans was commonly cited as a reason for conflict in agricultural areas, while hunting for food was the prime motivation in relatively intact forest zones away from industrial development. Conflict and killing for crop-raiding was most frequent in village areas where palm oil, rice, and industrial pulp and paper was being produced. Those most likely to kill an orangutan were involved with logging, hunting or mining, rather than collection of non-wood forest products.

“Our data suggest that conversion of forests to other land uses can result in orangutans entering villagers’ gardens and raiding crops,” write the authors, led by Erik Meijaard, an ecologist formerly with The Nature Conservancy who now works for People and Nature Consulting International in Jakarta. “This form of direct conflict can result in killing.”

The study found marked differences in the level knowledge between different ethnic groups. 17 percent of respondents were unable to identify an orangutan, but that number was lower for traditional forest people: only 13 percent of Dyaks and less than 0.1 percent of Dyaks failed to distinguish orangutans from other primates. However migrants were considerably more likely than forest people to know that killing an orangutan was against the law. Overall 73 percent of villagers said they knew orangutan-killing was illegal under Indonesian law. 15 percent reported orangutans were protected under customary law known as adat.

The most troubling finding is the scale of orangutan killing, which the study estimated at 750-1790 in past year and 1970-3100 per year on average during respondents’ lifetimes — higher than previously thought.

“These killing rates… are high enough to pose a serious threat to the continued existence of orangutans in Kalimantan.”

Of particular concern is the implied impact of killing female orangutans, which have low reproductive rates due to the extended amount of time they spend rearing their young.

“Population viability studies of orangutans suggest that if annual mortality of females is higher than 1% then populations will go extinct,” write the authors, who go on to estimate the current kill rates of females at 0.9 percent and 3.6 percent, suggesting a dire future for orangutans in Indonesian Borneo.

“These mortality rates caused by hunting alone are higher than the theoretical maximum mortality for population viability, suggesting that unless they can be reduced most Kalimantan populations will go extinct,” they write.

“The data suggest no orangutans outside Kalimantan’s protected areas are safe. They are either threatened by habitat degradation and deforestation, or they are threatened by ongoing hunting within their forest habitats.”

The authors conclude with a call to better target anti-killing measures to specific groups within Kalimantan. They note that because the vast majority of villagers don’t themselves kill orangutans there may be an opportunity to convince those who killing orangutans opportunistically that it is no longer socially acceptable to do so.