10B
Thursday, April 27, 1995
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Study shows alarming rate of caretaker abuse of children
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — More babies and young children die at the hands of their parents than in car accidents, house fires, falls or drownings, a federal panel reported yesterday.
In the most comprehensive national study of the extent of child deaths by parents and other caretakers, the U.S. Advisory Board on Child Abuse and Neglect found that violence in the home is as much a danger to young children as street gunfire is to teenagers.
At least 2,000 children, the vast majority age 4 and younger, die every year of abuse and neglect, the panel said. An additional 18,000 children are permanently disabled and 142,000 are seriously injured.
Most physical abuse fatalities are caused by men who are enraged or under extreme stress — fathers,
stepfathers, boyfriends or other male caretakers, the report said.
Men primarily assault infants and small children by beating their heads and bodies, shaking them violently, intentionally suffocating them, immersing them in scalding water, and other brutal acts. Mothers are held responsible for most deaths caused by severe neglect, the study said.
"Violence towards very young children has reached the level of a public health crisis and is similar in scope to the destruction of teenagers by street gunfire," the panel said. "Abuse and neglect has become one of the biggest threats to the lives of infants and small children in America."
Deaths from abuse and neglect of children age 4 and younger outnumber those from falls, choking on food, suffocation, drownings, residential fires or car accidents. Motor
vehicle accidents kill about 1,000 preschoolers, infants and toddlers a year.
Yesterday's report, "A Nation's Shame: Fatal Child Abuse and Neglect in the United States," lists the horrible ways children die.
An unnamed newborn in New York was buried alive. Three-week-old Lindsay Creason of Colorado was smothered to stop her crying. Cimantha Shepeard, 10 days old, was dropped two stories to her death in Illinois. Latoya Harris, 8, was found entombed in cement in California. In Michigan, Felicia Brown, 1 1/2, was beaten to death with a shoe heel. Two-year old Eric Bunphy was beaten and stuffed into a Christmas ornament box in Rhode Island.
"Since we began our study in 1992, some 5,000 children have died at the hands of the very adults they depended upon for safety and love,"
national crisis. It requires am im mediate response within every community."
said Deanne Tilton Durfee, chairwoman of the advisory board. "This is an unacceptable and preventable
Her panel also found that deaths due to child abuse and neglect are often wrongly identified as accidents or the result of natural causes because police, physicians and coroners are largely
Some states, the report said, lack laws for felony child abuse prosecutions, and charges of homicide are
untrained in identifying evidence of inflicted trauma and severe neglect to children.
U. S. Advisory Board on Child Abuse and Neglect
routinely reduced to lesser crimes. The report lists 26 recommendations, including more effect i v e prosecutions of parents who kill children and increasing training of legal and medical professionals. The board was established under the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act amend- ments of 1988. Its report comes as the Senate takes up welfare reform
legislation, passed by the House, that would repeal many federal programs for abused and neglected children and replace them with a block grant to the states.
Spending on these programs would rise at a fixed rate, but would no longer grow to automatically reflect increases in the number of children in foster care. The Clinton administration said the plan would cut spending by $3.5 billion over five years.
Sen. Bob Packwood, R-Oregon and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said yesterday that he was not convinced such a block grant was essential to reforming the welfare system.
Packwood, however, said he supported converting food stamps and Aid to Families with Dependent Children into lump sum payments to the states as block grants.
Defense reasserts theory that police used blood to frame Simpson
The Associated Press
LOS ANGELES — A small vial of O.J. Simpson's blood took center stage again at his murder trial as a lawyer tried yesterday to hammer home for jurors the key defense theory that police used it to frame Simpson for murder.
Attorney Peter Neufeld, chided by the judge for everything from needless repetition to his Brooklyn accent, was undeterred as he questioned police criminalist Andrea Mazzola.
Mazzola, who collected almost all blood evidence in the case, acknowledged she never saw the vial of blood at Simpson's home the day after Nice Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman were killed June 12.
Repeating her testimony from last week, she also said she didn't log the blood into evidence until the following day.
"Later, the blood vial was brought to my attention." Mazzola said.
"Was there a concern in the laboratory about allegations that there had been tampering with Mr. Simpson's blood?" Neufeld asked.
"I do not remember if there was a concern over tampering with the sample," Mazzola
replied.
Mazzola said her supervisor, Dennis Fung, told her to log the blood as evidence and instructed her to change the evidence number originally assigned to it because it was out of sequence.
The defense has implied these events are actually sinister acts that prove a conspiracy against Simpson. Both Fung and Detective Philip Vannatter have testified that Vannatter delivered the vial to Fung on June 13. Simpson willingly provided a sample of his blood at police headquarters, and Vannatter said he drove it across town to Simpson's
estate, where Fung and Mazzola were collecting evidence. Fung testified that the vial was in an evidence envelope that Mazzola carried from the estate inside a plastic garbage bag.
The defense contends the blood wasn't handed over to Fung that day and the delay gave police an opportunity to plant it.
When he wasn't focusing on the blood and what became of it, Neufeld was seeking to add to the list of items the defense alleges were handled sloppily and carelessly.
He had Mazzola show jurors for the first time the pair of eyeglasses found in an envelope at the scene of the crime. The metal frame was bent and twisted and no longer held its prescription lenses; one was loose in the envelope and the other was missing. Mazzola said the glasses had seemed to be intact when she saw them at the scene.
Prosecutors allege Goldman was murdered when he went to Ms. Simpson's condominium to deliver the glasses, which Ms. Simpson's mother had left behind that Sunday evening at the restaurant where Goldman worked.
The envelope had the handwritten note: "Prescription glasses. Nicole Simpson. Will p.u. Monday."
The court session began with Superior Court Judge Lance Ito warning attorneys verbally and in writing that he was fed up with their courtroom behavior and, if it didn't change, they would be scolded in front of iurors.
Ito continued the campaign he began Tuesday to rein in the lawyers and speed up the trial, likely in response to a jury rebellion last week.
Ito maintained the demeanor of a top sergeant, snapping out orders, refusing to confer with lawyers at sidebar and interjecting his own objections to questions. He constantly prodded attorneys to "proceed." He was commented on Newfellow's report.
"Mr. Neufeld, I don't mean to single you out, but would you just try to slow down a little with your pace for the court reporters, because it's both your pace and the Brooklyn accent that they are having difficulty with," "to asked the New York attorney."
"Certainly, your honor." Neufeld said.
He issued a new code of conduct that limits to 15 minutes the amount of time attorneys can argue legal points. He also warned lawyers that if they continued to ask improper questions and make argumentative objections, he would admonish them in
front of the jury.
The once easy-going judge appeared transformed by his meetings with jurors, some of whom complained about their long sequestration and tried to stage a one-day boycott of the trial after three deputies who guarded them were replaced.
For their part, the jurors were serious and attentive yesterday, but only a few scribled notes during testimony. One woman sat with her fingers laced across her chest; another put a hand to her cheek and kept her eyes downcast through much of the session.
Reports of jury problems still lurked. As the judge continued his investigation into juror frictions and deputies, it was reported that the woman who spearheaded the juror revolt told to Ito her husband was ill with pneumonia and she didn't know whether she could continue to serve.
Sources told the Daily News of Los Angeles Tuesday that the juror, a 38-year-old white woman who works for Pacific Bell, disclosed her concerns to the judge in a private meeting Friday.
Six jurors have been replaced thus far, leaving just six alternates for a trial that likely has many more months of testimony.
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