The arrest of an illegal immigrant — who authorities say worked as a Newark Airport security supervisor under a false identity for 20 years — has renewed police interest in the 1992 unsolved murder of the man whose identity he assumed.

New York City cold case investigators spent more than two hours questioning Bimbo Olumuyiwa Oyewole about the murder following his arrest on Monday for identity theft, authorities said. And they were planning to compare the fingerprints of the Nigerian national and Elizabeth resident to unmatched prints found at the scene of the fatal shooting in a Y.M.C.A. in Queens, a Port Authority official said.

Got that? He worked as a security supervisor at Newark Airport for twenty years using a false identity. Actually a stolen identity from a guy who was later murdered. Twenty years means that he was there before the September 11, 2001 attacks and that he worked there for ten more years after the attacks.

A resume on file with the Port Authority indicates Oyewole was hired at Newark in March 1992 under the name Jerry Thomas.

Bimbo Olumuyiwa Oyewole versus Jerry Thomas? No wonder he stole the ID. Besides four months after his ID was stolen Jerry Thomas didn’t need it any longer because he was dead.

Investigators were still trying to find out Tuesday how Oyewole obtained what appeared to be Thomas’ birth certificate and Social Security card, documents he used to get his job, a state driver license and high school equivalency degree.

Thomas’s story is he bought it from a cab driver who has since been deported.

Oyewole’s attorney, Regina Lynch, could not be reached for comment.

Probably too busy banging her head against a wall. Who could blame her?

Oyewole got a security guard license from the New Jersey State Police by using Thomas’ name and documents. And he was given clearances that also included fingerprint checks by the Customs and Border Patrol and the Transportation Security Administration. The Port Authority, which operates the airport, said it relies on the private security companies it hires to vet its own employees and provide proof of the required background checks.

A spokesman for the Custom and Border Patrol said Monday that fingerprint checks did not turn up any concerns because neither Thomas’s nor Oyewole’s prints were found in criminal databases when background checks were conducted. But an NYPD spokesman on Tuesday said Thomas, who was 41 when he was killed, had a criminal history that included drug possession, burglary, robbery and resisting arrest and that his fingerprints had been taken.

“Duck Dodge, Hide!” These guys would do a better job of vetting people than the NJSP, the various federal agencies, and the private security agency. Even the Farrelly Brothers couldn’t come up with this shit.

Officials and a spokesman for the company Oyewole worked for, FJC Security Services, have said he had an unblemished employee record. He had worked for three other security companies that had Port Authority contracts at the airport before working for FJC.

I’d advise you to follow Attorney Lynch’s lead and STFU. You are not helping yourself here.

Although rare, illegal aliens have been charged federally for using false documents on applications to get private airport security jobs, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General.

How do we know that they are “rare” since it seems to be ridiculously easy to obtain a fake ID and slip past all those highly paid law enforcement agents? For all we know this could be widespread, but not recognized because of those alleged “loopholes”.

In case you are wondering why there is still private security at airports since we have all those highly trained and vigilant TSA employees, the answer is that they guard the place when most of the operations are shut down. Great, so we have who knows who guarding airport facilities during the middle of the night when no one is around. What could possibly go wrong with that plan?

Oh, and he’s Nigerian. That’s not a blanket condemnation of Nigerians but there is some history  to suggest it’s slightly possible.

This makes me feel oh so safe and secure when I fly.

Just a week ago the establishment media was aflutter with news that a CIA double-agent had thwarted a new type of underwear bomb attack targeting U.S. flights in a plot devised by al-Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula.

But as the week progressed, a developing bombshell story got buried under President Obama’s gay marriage announcement. Not only is the supposed CIA asset not a CIA asset at all, but the entire operation was exposed prematurely and the double-agent’s life was immediately threatened by an intelligence leak that very well may have come out of the White House for political gain.

Read the whole story, and be sure to click on the links.

That’s pretty serious stuff if it’s true. It should be immediately investigated and if someone did in fact leak this information, they should be prosecuted and spend a long time in prison. Remember a few years ago when the Democrats accused someone in the White House of “outing” Valerie Plame? Wall to wall coverage, FBI investigations, and in the end it turned out no one in the White House outed anyone, Valerie Plame wasn’t a covert agent, and the only conviction was of VP Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff for lying to the FBI. Only no one was quite sure what he lied about since he wasn’t the source of the leak.

In this case, not only was a covert agent exposed, but he wasn’t even a covert US controlled agent. He was an asset belonging to the British and was working for them and the Saudi Secret Police. I can’t imagine that this will improve relations with one of our key allies, not one bit. I also would bet that other nations will think twice, or maybe more than twice, before they share secret information with the US.

The President should order his Attorney General to start an immediate investigation. Better yet, he should appoint a Special Counsel to do that.

I’m not holding my breath, though. Hypoxia is not good for you.

Death risks higher for heart attack survivors living near major roadways

Heart attack survivors who live about 100 meters (328 feet) or less from a major U.S. roadway face increased risk of death from all causes, according to new research in the American Heart Association’s journal Circulation.

In the Determinants of MI Onset Study of 3,547 heart attack survivors (average age 62), researchers found:

• Those living less than 100 meters (328 feet) from the roadway have a 27 percent increased risks of dying over 10 years than those living at least 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) away.
• Those living 100 to 199 meters (328 to 653 feet) from the roadway have a 19 percent increased risks of death.
• Those living 200 to 999 meters (653 feet to 3,277 feet) from the roadway have a 13 percent increased risk of death.

Those are the hard numbers, but what do they mean? Do people who are more ill tend to live in more urban areas and closer to major roadways? Are there implications of an urban life style versus a rural one?

“We think there is exposure to a combination of air pollution near these roadways and other exposure, such as excessive noise or stress from living close to the roadway, that may contribute to the study findings,” said Murray A. Mittleman, M.D., Dr.PH, study author and director of the Cardiovascular Research Unit at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, Mass.

In this case I have to wonder if thinking = guessing.

“People with lower levels of education and income are more likely to live in communities closer to a major roadway, so they are bearing a larger burden of the risk associated with exposure than people with more resources” said Mittleman, who is also associate professor at Harvard Medical School.

People with lower levels of education and income are also less likely to go to follow up appointments, understand or follow doctors instructions, get prescriptions filled, and be diligent in taking prescription medications. Not to mention less likely to eat healthier foods, because as any home economist can tell you, junk food costs less than healthy food. I wonder if the researchers went to any of the homes that were close to the highways and observed first hand the living conditions of the people who were more likely to die? Or the people who were more likely to live for that matter?

OK, I’ll give you a required warning here. As Rogue Medic says, the plural of anecdote is not data. I, on the other hand, refer to them as observational data. While I don’t have a grant and thus couldn’t do a double blind study, I can tell you that from my years in EMS that ER (and other specialty) physicians for the most part have no idea what the living conditions of their patients are. Maybe primary care doctors do, but often they are only tangentially involved in the in hospital care of their patients. I’ve seen patients with implanted devices, such as central lines, sent home to incredibly filthy homes where there is not ONE person who can help them keep the injection sites clean, let alone sterile. People sent home on ventilators with only elderly, debilitated, relatives to take care of them. I think if some of these physicians were to visit the homes to which they are discharging patients, they’d be frankly shocked if not horrified.

“From the public policy point of view, the association between risk of death and proximity of housing to major roadways should be considered when new communities are planned,” Mittleman said. “From an individual point of view, people may lessen the absolute risk of living near a roadway by paying attention to the general prevention measures, including quitting smoking, eating a heart-healthy diet exercising regularly, and keeping blood pressure and cholesterol under control.”

Kind of reminds me of those ads for miracle weight loss drugs. “Our product, along with a healthy diet and regular exercise will help you lose weights. Of course results vary and there is no guarantee” I’ve got news for you, a healthy diet and regular exercise will help you lose weight without any miracle drug. In fact, health diet and regular exercise are the ONLY things proven to help you lose weight.

Since we don’t really know the exact causes of the increase in deaths, how can we make public or medical policy decisions based on this study? Hmmm…

And finally,

The Environmental Protection Agency and the National Institute of Environmental Health Science funded the study.

The EPA is a federal agency with a vested interest in proving that air is more, not less, polluted in the 40 years since the agency was created to clean up the environment. Only if they’ve been this ineffective in improving air quality, I have to wonder what they hell they’ve been doing with our money all these years?

TRENTON — One out of three people who went to emergency rooms at two hospitals in Newark and Long Branch didn’t actually have medical emergencies and could have been treated at less-costly doctor’s offices or clinics, according to a study released today.

And a comprehensive effort to educate and follow up on these patients reduced emergency room visits at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center and Monmouth Medical Center in Long Branch by more than 20 percent by the end of the study.

The second part is encouraging, but the bigger question is if that effort can be expanded throughout the system. I’d wager that the numbers are the same or maybe higher in most other urban areas.

The most frequent ER visitors had health coverage through Medicaid and FamilyCare, but said they couldn’t get an appointment with their doctor, or did not understand what constituted an emergency, according to the study, which was also conducted by the state Department of Human Services and the New Jersey Primary Care Association, which represents health clinics.

Is it cynical of me to suggest that a lot of the patients on Medicaid don’t have primary care physicians or just find it inconvenient to work around the doctor’s schedule as opposed to just calling 9-1-1 for a (free) ride to the ER (also free), where they can get their prescriptions refilled for (free)? In other words how much is lack of education and how much is just lack of incentive to see a primary care physician. My son has pretty decent health insurance through his employer. Still he has a $200.00 co pay for ER visits. That’s on the high end, mine is only $30.00. I know other people who have $100.00 co pay. People on welfare have no co pay. Therefore there is absolutely no reason for them to not use the ER. That’s human nature, not education.

I, and I’ll bet just about any provider who reads this blog, can tell stories about people who have called 9-1-1 for an ambulance ride to the ER to get prescriptions for over the counter drugs such as Tylenol, Motrin, Aspirin, and decongestants. Why? Because if they walk into their local big box pharmacy and pick those items off the shelf, they have to pay for them. However, if they get a prescription for the same medication, it’s free, free, free. Not for us of course, but for them. They not only don’t have to pay, but unlike you and me, there is no co pay for prescriptions.

The team “made sure they had follow-up appointments, and education on what’s an appropriate use of the emergency room without turning people off,” Eric J. Wasserman said, chairman and medical director for Newark Beth Israel’s Emergency Department. The team was trained to explain “there’s a better way of doing this – to get care just as efficiently without the wait and having to come to a crowded emergency room.”

Intensive (and expensive) one on one follow up resulted in the improvement. So, what will happen now that the $4.8 Million dollar federal grant is gone? Will the hospitals fund those staff positions that were covered by the grant? My guess would be not without reimbursement. So, the program will fall by the wayside and soon things will go back to the status quo.

If anyone in the government were serious about reforming health care finance then they would impose co pays and other financial penalties for abusing 9-1-1 and ERs. Only they aren’t so they won’t.

He who represents himself in court has an idiot for a lawyer and a fool for a client

Or in this case, herself.

Honda gets $9,867 hybrid mpg judgement overturned

LOS ANGELES –  A judge overturned a nearly  $10,000 small-claims judgment against American Honda Motor Co. that was won by a  car owner who said the automaker misrepresented the gas mileage of her hybrid  Civic, according to a ruling released Wednesday.

I’d guess that at least in Honda’s mind, it wasn’t the amount, it was the idea of encouraging people to sue in lieu of accepting the rather paltry class action settlement. Probably a sound strategy.

Peters, a lawyer, previously urged Honda owners to take the small-claims route  as she did, and her initial success led some 1,700 other hybrid owners to follow  suit.

I wonder how many of those 1,700 are now likely to sue Peters?

This could go on for years.

Read the whole article, it’s pretty interesting. The judge refuted every one of Peters’ Points (try saying that three times fast) with not only logic and law, but common sense.

President Obama may be the leader of the free world, but if a national group of health care professionals has its way, traditional shots of POTUS tucking into cheesy pizza, greasy burgers and soft serve will be verboten!

The 125,000-member Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine today will petition the White House to abolish all future staged photo opportunities with the president gobbling french fries and fried dough — staples not only of the presidential campaign trail but the rail-thin chief executive’s summer vacations on Martha’s Vineyard.

That would be 125,000 doctors who are much smarter than we are and feel entitled to tell people how to live their own lives. Interestingly, about 120,000 deaths per year are attributed to errors by doctors.

Maybe the Physicians Committee for Sticking Our Noses Into Other People’s Lives should look at that and see if they can help their peers kill fewer patients per year. Maybe doctors should be required to wear warning labels on their lab coats. WARNING: The Surgeon General has determined that being treated by doctors is hazardous to your health! Certainly we should not see pictures of President Obama eating a physician, since that sends the wrong message to “sick kids”.

Oh yes, the justification for this, as it so often is with the Nanny State contingent is that it’s “for the children”.

“millions of sick kids due to excess calories, excess fat …”

Millions? Really? Is that a verified number MS. Levin? Or did you as we say around here, pull that one out of your ass?

You know what else is bad for people? High blood pressure. Maybe MS Levin should think of people like JayG, whose head is in danger of exploding when  he sees this tripe. Think of the millions of bloggers, MS Levin. Have you no decency?

Much of Europe lies in ruins, millions of people killed, many more injured, many are missing.

Meanwhile in the Pacific the war against the Japanese continued and would continue until September.

Dispatched to a call for a motorcycle versus car accident. As a general rule of thumb, the smart money bets on the car to win. Physics and all that dictates that the object with the most mass will win. Velocity of course mediates that, but the soft tissue riding on top of the motorcycle is still bound to lose either way. By how much is a matter of what he or she hits, protective gear (helmets are good), and sheer dumb luck. Sometimes the motor cycle rider will walk away with minor injuries when logic and the afore mentioned laws of physics tell you that the should be. Of course sometimes the rider will die when the impact seems relatively minor. While mechanism may give you some good rules of thumb for assessing for potential injuries, mechanism is not definitive by any definition of the word.

Back to our patient, or rather our patient’s motorcycle and the car it hit. Looking at the back of the car, which is where the motorcycle impacted, the damage looked impressive. Impressive to a body man, that is. My first thought when I looked at the back of the car was “Crumple zone”. A crumple zone is the term used for parts of cars that are designed to collapse and thus absorb energy from the collision. The entire reason for having them is to trade sheet metal (and plastic) for a reduction in injury. A crumpled fender or trunk lid has absorbed a lot of energey which would otherwise be transmitted to the patient. Motorcycles don’t have crumple zones because their body work is minimal. They also don’t have seat belts, bumpers, or airbags. As a result only the luckiest of riders escape all injuries in accidents. The #1 killer of motorcyle riders is head injury. Protect the noggin and the patient will stand a good chance of living, even if they have serious injuries to the torso. No guarantee, but it improves the odds. The better the helmet, the more protection is provides, which makes sense. No helmet means no protection and then the rider is depeding on pure luck. Good luck with that, as the saying goes.

Back to our patient. Who was conscious, had a pretty good recollection of what happened, was able to give us a complete medical history, and cooperate with the exam. Vital signs were good, and other than some cuts, bruises, and maybe a fractured wrist, he was pretty much uninjured. That’s luck of the good kind.

Mechanism, by itself, without a thorough examination, would dictate (in some systems) that this patient be given a full ALS work up. Which is why using mechanism alone is silly. Should this patient go to a trauma center? Very possibly, since there might be occult injuries that will only show up later. Should this patient go to a trauma center by ALS ambulance? A tougher question, with a lot of variables. The chief amongst them is the travel time to a trauma center or other capable hospital. If the patient has no airway issues, the trauma center is within a shortish distance, and the EMTs are capable, there doesn’t seem to be any real reason to travel by ALS ambulance.

Certainly mechanism alone should not be a criteria for anything. Mechanism with physical findings suggestive or indicative of serious injury are a different story. Or even a finding of serious injury without a mechanism for that matter.

A case in point. 30 or so years back I had an acquaintance who wanted to be a police officer. Specifically, he wanted to be a motorcycle officer. He had that part down, the motorcycle that is. He rode one whenever the weather permitted. In fact he rode a Harley Davidson, which as you probably know is a big motorcycle. One day he was stopped at a traffic light and somehow lost his balance. He and his HD fell over and one end of the handle bar dug into his flank. As luck (bad luck) would have it the end dug into his flank right over one of his kidneys. Which promptly started bleeding, which required a trip to the hospital, and removal of the injured kidney. A stupid accident caused him to end up in the operating room, the loss of his kidney, and thus disqualification from becoming a police officer. Remember what I said about luck and how it works both ways? Here’s an example of bad luck and a serious injury with no mechanism to suggest it.

It’s the examination of the patient that counts, not the amount of damage or “mechanism”.

Which is something that a lot of EMTs and all too many paramedics can’t seem to understand.

Are Educators Showing a ‘Positive Bias’ to Minority Students?

A major study, led by Rutgers-Newark psychology professor Kent D. Harber, indicates that public school teachers under-challenge minority students by providing them more positive feedback than they give to white students, for work of equal merit. The study, which is currently available online in the Journal of Educational Psychology (JEP), involved 113 white middle school and high school teachers in two public school districts located in the New York/New Jersey/Connecticut tri-state area, one middle class and white, and the other more working class and racially mixed.

Teachers read and commented on a poorly written essay which they believed was composed by a student in a writing class. Some teachers thought the student was black, some thought the student was Latino, and some thought that the student was white. Teachers believed that their feedback would be sent directly to the student, in order to see how the student would benefit from their comments and advice.

In fact, there was no actual student, and the poorly written essay was developed by Harber and his team. The real purpose was to see how teachers would respond to subpar work due to the race of the student who composed it. As Harber and his team predicted, the teachers displayed a “positive feedback bias,” providing more praise and less criticism if they thought the essay was written by a minority student than by a white student.

The article is longer than this, and of course the study is even more detailed.

Teachers were less critical when they believed that the poorly written paper was produced by a Black or Latino student. There can be many reasons for this, none of them speak well of modern education. Or liberalism for that matter.

One reason can be that teachers are afraid that giving a minority student a poor grade might result in a charge or racism. Another is that maybe the minority students were poorly taught in the past. Another, one which should disturb us all, is that minority students just can’t achieve and so need to have their grades inflated to make up for past bias.

I’d like to think that this would start an earnest discussion among academics about how to address this problem and how to develop ways to help minority students do better in school. I don’t think grade inflation is the way to do that if there is a widespread achievement gap among the races. Sadly, I think that the only discussion will be how to get more federal money into the public schools to fix this problem.

One thing I’ve noticed is the persistence, perniciously so, of some apps, especially ones that have come with the phone. For example, my phone has Facebook on it. I don’t use it, have taken it off the screen, but it’s still running and using power and memory. Probably not a lot of either, but if they’re going to load the phone up with crap I don’t want, then they should just give them out for free. I also have a Blockbuster Video app that I can uninstall updates to, but not the core app. I’m sure that there are others, but those are the two I’ve found so far.

So, is there way to dig down deep into the OS and get rid of these virus like apps? I know that there is such a thing as “rooting” a phone and I should do some research on Al Gore’s Internet and see what that’s all about, but hopefully one of my readers can help me out with that one.

The only downside to this phone is that it eats through the charge on the battery quickly. Which the sales guy told me was a problem with Android based phones. Hopefully by getting rid of some apps I don’t use and don’t want, I’ll be able to improve that a bit.