There are segments of this city where you go to an estate sale and find five TVs and three books," Leathem said.
The idea of burning the books horrified Marcia Trayford, who paid $20 Sunday to carry away an armload of tomes on art, education and music.
"I've been trying to adopt as many books as I could," she said.
Dozens of other people took advantage of the book-burning, searching through the books waiting to go into the flames for last-minute bargains.
Somehow, I feel like I am becoming a geezer. After my bike accident, I have used a cane. I feel like poking a young whipersnapper...
Monday, May 28, 2007
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
flying with viagra?
I don't know about you, but I would not want to be on the test flights where they are testing viagra for jet lag....a bunch of horny guys stuck in the aluminum tube could get ungly....worse than snakes on the plane.....maybe we could call it woodies on the plane!
Worried about jet lag? Researchers think they might have just the ticket to perk you up: Viagra.
While it's too early to know if it will work in humans, Argentinean researchers are reporting that the drug sildenafil -- better known by the brand name Viagra -- appears to reduce symptoms of jet lag in hamsters.
Viagra does come with potential side effects, and some men might not appreciate experiencing a temporary respite from erectile dysfunction at 30,000 feet. Still, a sleep specialist called the research promising.
"We do need more effective therapies for jet lag and for sleep difficulties that occur as a consequence of shift work," said Dr. Robert Vorona, an associate professor at Eastern Virginia Medical School who's familiar with the study findings.
In the study, researchers administered small doses of sildenafil to hamsters before adjusting the cycles of light and dark they lived in. This reset their body clocks as if they'd taken a six-hour plane trip to the east.
The hamsters recovered 25 percent to 50 percent more quickly from the equivalent of human jet lag, needing less time to synchronize themselves to the new schedule, said Dr. Diego Golombek, a researcher with the Universidad Nacional de Quilmes in Buenos Aires. He said sildenafil worked at least as well as melatonin, a jet-lag treatment.
But the drug didn't help hamsters who underwent a simulation of westward jet travel.
The findings were published in this week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The drug, originally developed to treat high blood pressure and angina, might alleviate jet lag by interfering with a molecule that sends signals to the hamster brain's body clock mechanism, Golombek said.
But the potential impact on humans isn't clear, and Golombek said people shouldn't rush out to prevent jet lag with doses of Viagra. For one thing, Viagra can cause side effects such as low blood pressure.
As for the next step, Golombek said "a full-scale clinical trial has to be performed in humans, which is indeed quite expensive and time-consuming. Jet-lag trials might involve laboratory simulations, but we also need 'the real thing,' which means testing pharmacological treatments on long-haul air travel."
And that, he added, will take even more time.
Worried about jet lag? Researchers think they might have just the ticket to perk you up: Viagra.
While it's too early to know if it will work in humans, Argentinean researchers are reporting that the drug sildenafil -- better known by the brand name Viagra -- appears to reduce symptoms of jet lag in hamsters.
Viagra does come with potential side effects, and some men might not appreciate experiencing a temporary respite from erectile dysfunction at 30,000 feet. Still, a sleep specialist called the research promising.
"We do need more effective therapies for jet lag and for sleep difficulties that occur as a consequence of shift work," said Dr. Robert Vorona, an associate professor at Eastern Virginia Medical School who's familiar with the study findings.
In the study, researchers administered small doses of sildenafil to hamsters before adjusting the cycles of light and dark they lived in. This reset their body clocks as if they'd taken a six-hour plane trip to the east.
The hamsters recovered 25 percent to 50 percent more quickly from the equivalent of human jet lag, needing less time to synchronize themselves to the new schedule, said Dr. Diego Golombek, a researcher with the Universidad Nacional de Quilmes in Buenos Aires. He said sildenafil worked at least as well as melatonin, a jet-lag treatment.
But the drug didn't help hamsters who underwent a simulation of westward jet travel.
The findings were published in this week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The drug, originally developed to treat high blood pressure and angina, might alleviate jet lag by interfering with a molecule that sends signals to the hamster brain's body clock mechanism, Golombek said.
But the potential impact on humans isn't clear, and Golombek said people shouldn't rush out to prevent jet lag with doses of Viagra. For one thing, Viagra can cause side effects such as low blood pressure.
As for the next step, Golombek said "a full-scale clinical trial has to be performed in humans, which is indeed quite expensive and time-consuming. Jet-lag trials might involve laboratory simulations, but we also need 'the real thing,' which means testing pharmacological treatments on long-haul air travel."
And that, he added, will take even more time.
Saturday, May 19, 2007
quiet, please!
Sam Rozati of Colchester, England, regarding an incident that started when he walked past a nest of geese at a tranquil lake while talking on his cell phone:
"They flew over and started biting my hand until I dropped the phone."
One of the geese made off with the cell phone.
"They flew over and started biting my hand until I dropped the phone."
One of the geese made off with the cell phone.
Friday, May 18, 2007
I am glad we did have commencement when I went to this school....
Ellen Foley
Deborah Cureton, dean and CEO of the University of Wisconsin-Richland in Richland Center, invited me to give the commencement address May 11 to the school's 70 or so graduates.
It was a thrill to spend some time with the dedicated faculty at this intimate campus about an hour and a half drive west of Madison and to get to know the stories of the hardworking students, most of whom hail from the Richland Center area and many of whom will attend four-year campuses of the university next year.
I understand that a DVD version of my speech will be coming out next week. For those of you patient enough to read the full speech, you'll understand why that might be rather entertaining.
Here's your editor in her multimedia splendor:
Commencement Address
University of Wisconsin-Richland
It is such a treat for me to drive through the rolling hills of Wisconsin to Richland Center.
I couldn't help pondering on the drive from Madison the very words that name your school and your town: RICH LAND.
I am humbled to have been asked to share a bit of commencement wisdom with the graduates of such a magical place
You are some of our best and our brightest. Many of you are the first person in your family to graduate from college. And we know that it hasn't been an easy pull for most of you.
I sit on an interesting perch as an editor of a newspaper who is becoming the editor of a newspaper AND a website.
Technology is changing my work life dramatically. And because I realize that your lives are about to change dramatically, I feel surprisingly qualified to share with you a few observations about what the world needs from the graduates of this fine school.
You are blessed with at least two great gifts that are going to propel you into leadership roles ---- not only in your home communities --- but most likely in the world.
These two gifts are tools and timing.
We'll take timing first.
Congratulations on choosing the best time since the year 2000 to be looking for a job. The economy is booming for many industries. The stock market keeps setting record highs. There are a lot of business moguls with lots of cash investing in very interesting corners of American life.
A recent article in the Wisconsin State Journal (which you can also see on madison.com/wsj), noted that the hiring of college grads will increase almost 20 percent this year from 2006. That's a 20 percent increase in just one year. The big winners are those studying engineering, business, health care and computer-related fields.
However, recruiters told the State Journal that the job-seekers who will command the highest salaries and the best jobs have one distinguishing trait: They are well rounded.
Employers are looking for graduates who have had jobs during school, who can communicate, who have leadership potential and who can work on a team.
In short, they are looking for the kinds of students who come from this Rich Land.
In addition to your school work, your dean tells me that you have been athletes, newspaper editors, student government leaders, campus ambassadors, musicians, thespians, tutors, work-study students, Road Ralley winners (AND LOSERS. Sorry about that) active members of various clubs ---- and much more.
You are exactly what the nation's employers and universities are looking for.
You also have an historic demographic shift going for you. There are many Baby Boomers, like me, and a lot fewer of you. There will be many more jobs than job seekers in the coming years as the Boomers retire. If you play this right, you will be in the driver's seat when you go to find a job.
So let's move to gift, No. 2.
Tools.
You are THE multimedia generation. You have amazing tools. You watch movies at home via DVDs or TIVOs. And you do this ---- cuddling your laptops so you can IM your friends and keep your eye on the text messages coming in on your cell phones. (Laughter)
I have observed this at my own home.
Most likely every one of you has a cell phone that you will use to take photos tonight. Some of you may even be recording me right now with your Ipods.
Recently a professor at the Madison campus suggested the next wave of change will involve nanotechnology in the wallpaper of our homes. It will sit there quietly monitoring our vital signs ready to call our physicians if we need to go to the emergency room. This astonishes me!
Very soon OUR WALLPAPER IS GOING TO BE CALLING OUR DOCTORS!!!
Yes, I see you're laughing, but I also know that you are a bit relieved, because you don't want to be the ones coming by to check mom's blood pressure every day.
Let the wallpaper do it!
My point here is that the tools will continue to evolve exponentially and in another year or perhaps two, the job you have trained for or the topic you are preparing to study at your next college will be changing and you will need to be nimble enough to change with it. You will need to create the next tool. You will need to build on the technology.
With these two gifts come almost unfathomable challenges. Author Thomas Friedman of the New York Times in his recent bestseller told us that our world is flat. Routine jobs, such as customer service call centers, will be offshored to places, such as India, where the cost is lower and the quality may be better.
You will need to stay one step ahead of these complicated global changes, including the warming of the planet.
Many of you are saddled with debt from student loans. We worry about how you will build a life when starter homes in places like Madison cost $200,000 and health care benefits take increasingly larger bites out of paychecks.
You are coming of age at time of random violence, from Oklahoma City to Columbine to 9/11 to Virginia Tech. These horrific events will define the rest of your lives and keep you ever vigilant.
We are a nation at war, as your colleague Cody can attest to. We look to your leadership so that this conflict will come to an end.
We will look to your skills of diplomacy so our nation can resolve other international tensions without resorting to warfare and the deaths of our brave soldiers.
Yes, you are a lucky group but you will need to use your gifts wisely.
This, of course, is why your administrators invited ME to give this commencement speech.
I have the secret to success.
And I will give you that secret in just one minute after I explain to you how hard this is. You see, the problem with commencement addresses is that no one ever remembers what the speaker says.
I asked our State Journal researchers to help me remember the details of my own commencement from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 1974. I was pretty sure it involved Sen. George McGovern and the reading of a poem.
Not only was George McGovern NOT the commencement speaker but there was no poem. (Laughter.)
Our speaker was then-Lt. Gov. Marty Schreiber and he spoke to us passionately about avoiding another Watergate scandal. You'd think I'd remember that.
So graduates, listen up. This is the only thing we expect you to remember after you have long forgotten Ellen Foley or mixed her up with Hillary Clinton. (Hoots.)
If you remember nothing else, remember THIS simple secret to success:
Are you ready?
WALK ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET.
Walking on the sunny side of the street is a choice you will have to make every day of your life from now on. And I want to emphasize that word "Choice". It is a daily job.
It is hard work to choose the sunny side.
I am not going to go on and on about this because it's getting late, and we all know you are NOT going to remember much of what I just said. So I'm going to try something that I hope will embed this secret of survival into your reptilian brains. And I'm going to use one of those multimedia tools I referred to --- albeit a low tech one.
I'm going to sing a little song for you.
A capella.
This should be memorable.
I have never done this before in public in my entire life.
GRAB YOUR COAT AND GET YOUR HAT
LEAVE YOUR WORRIES ON THE DOORSTEP
LIFE CAN BE SO SWEET
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET
CAN'T YOU HEAR THE PITTER PAT
AND THAT HAPPY TUNE IS YOUR STEP
LIFE CAN BE COMPLETE
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET
I USED TO WALK IN THE SHADE
WITH MY BLUES ON PARADE
BUT I'M NOT AFRAID
THIS ROVER'S CROSSED OVER
YOU'LL BE RICH AS ROCKEFELLER
GOLD DUST AT YOUR FEET
ON THE SUNNY
ON THE SUNNY
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET.
Congratulations, graduates.
Deborah Cureton, dean and CEO of the University of Wisconsin-Richland in Richland Center, invited me to give the commencement address May 11 to the school's 70 or so graduates.
It was a thrill to spend some time with the dedicated faculty at this intimate campus about an hour and a half drive west of Madison and to get to know the stories of the hardworking students, most of whom hail from the Richland Center area and many of whom will attend four-year campuses of the university next year.
I understand that a DVD version of my speech will be coming out next week. For those of you patient enough to read the full speech, you'll understand why that might be rather entertaining.
Here's your editor in her multimedia splendor:
Commencement Address
University of Wisconsin-Richland
It is such a treat for me to drive through the rolling hills of Wisconsin to Richland Center.
I couldn't help pondering on the drive from Madison the very words that name your school and your town: RICH LAND.
I am humbled to have been asked to share a bit of commencement wisdom with the graduates of such a magical place
You are some of our best and our brightest. Many of you are the first person in your family to graduate from college. And we know that it hasn't been an easy pull for most of you.
I sit on an interesting perch as an editor of a newspaper who is becoming the editor of a newspaper AND a website.
Technology is changing my work life dramatically. And because I realize that your lives are about to change dramatically, I feel surprisingly qualified to share with you a few observations about what the world needs from the graduates of this fine school.
You are blessed with at least two great gifts that are going to propel you into leadership roles ---- not only in your home communities --- but most likely in the world.
These two gifts are tools and timing.
We'll take timing first.
Congratulations on choosing the best time since the year 2000 to be looking for a job. The economy is booming for many industries. The stock market keeps setting record highs. There are a lot of business moguls with lots of cash investing in very interesting corners of American life.
A recent article in the Wisconsin State Journal (which you can also see on madison.com/wsj), noted that the hiring of college grads will increase almost 20 percent this year from 2006. That's a 20 percent increase in just one year. The big winners are those studying engineering, business, health care and computer-related fields.
However, recruiters told the State Journal that the job-seekers who will command the highest salaries and the best jobs have one distinguishing trait: They are well rounded.
Employers are looking for graduates who have had jobs during school, who can communicate, who have leadership potential and who can work on a team.
In short, they are looking for the kinds of students who come from this Rich Land.
In addition to your school work, your dean tells me that you have been athletes, newspaper editors, student government leaders, campus ambassadors, musicians, thespians, tutors, work-study students, Road Ralley winners (AND LOSERS. Sorry about that) active members of various clubs ---- and much more.
You are exactly what the nation's employers and universities are looking for.
You also have an historic demographic shift going for you. There are many Baby Boomers, like me, and a lot fewer of you. There will be many more jobs than job seekers in the coming years as the Boomers retire. If you play this right, you will be in the driver's seat when you go to find a job.
So let's move to gift, No. 2.
Tools.
You are THE multimedia generation. You have amazing tools. You watch movies at home via DVDs or TIVOs. And you do this ---- cuddling your laptops so you can IM your friends and keep your eye on the text messages coming in on your cell phones. (Laughter)
I have observed this at my own home.
Most likely every one of you has a cell phone that you will use to take photos tonight. Some of you may even be recording me right now with your Ipods.
Recently a professor at the Madison campus suggested the next wave of change will involve nanotechnology in the wallpaper of our homes. It will sit there quietly monitoring our vital signs ready to call our physicians if we need to go to the emergency room. This astonishes me!
Very soon OUR WALLPAPER IS GOING TO BE CALLING OUR DOCTORS!!!
Yes, I see you're laughing, but I also know that you are a bit relieved, because you don't want to be the ones coming by to check mom's blood pressure every day.
Let the wallpaper do it!
My point here is that the tools will continue to evolve exponentially and in another year or perhaps two, the job you have trained for or the topic you are preparing to study at your next college will be changing and you will need to be nimble enough to change with it. You will need to create the next tool. You will need to build on the technology.
With these two gifts come almost unfathomable challenges. Author Thomas Friedman of the New York Times in his recent bestseller told us that our world is flat. Routine jobs, such as customer service call centers, will be offshored to places, such as India, where the cost is lower and the quality may be better.
You will need to stay one step ahead of these complicated global changes, including the warming of the planet.
Many of you are saddled with debt from student loans. We worry about how you will build a life when starter homes in places like Madison cost $200,000 and health care benefits take increasingly larger bites out of paychecks.
You are coming of age at time of random violence, from Oklahoma City to Columbine to 9/11 to Virginia Tech. These horrific events will define the rest of your lives and keep you ever vigilant.
We are a nation at war, as your colleague Cody can attest to. We look to your leadership so that this conflict will come to an end.
We will look to your skills of diplomacy so our nation can resolve other international tensions without resorting to warfare and the deaths of our brave soldiers.
Yes, you are a lucky group but you will need to use your gifts wisely.
This, of course, is why your administrators invited ME to give this commencement speech.
I have the secret to success.
And I will give you that secret in just one minute after I explain to you how hard this is. You see, the problem with commencement addresses is that no one ever remembers what the speaker says.
I asked our State Journal researchers to help me remember the details of my own commencement from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 1974. I was pretty sure it involved Sen. George McGovern and the reading of a poem.
Not only was George McGovern NOT the commencement speaker but there was no poem. (Laughter.)
Our speaker was then-Lt. Gov. Marty Schreiber and he spoke to us passionately about avoiding another Watergate scandal. You'd think I'd remember that.
So graduates, listen up. This is the only thing we expect you to remember after you have long forgotten Ellen Foley or mixed her up with Hillary Clinton. (Hoots.)
If you remember nothing else, remember THIS simple secret to success:
Are you ready?
WALK ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET.
Walking on the sunny side of the street is a choice you will have to make every day of your life from now on. And I want to emphasize that word "Choice". It is a daily job.
It is hard work to choose the sunny side.
I am not going to go on and on about this because it's getting late, and we all know you are NOT going to remember much of what I just said. So I'm going to try something that I hope will embed this secret of survival into your reptilian brains. And I'm going to use one of those multimedia tools I referred to --- albeit a low tech one.
I'm going to sing a little song for you.
A capella.
This should be memorable.
I have never done this before in public in my entire life.
GRAB YOUR COAT AND GET YOUR HAT
LEAVE YOUR WORRIES ON THE DOORSTEP
LIFE CAN BE SO SWEET
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET
CAN'T YOU HEAR THE PITTER PAT
AND THAT HAPPY TUNE IS YOUR STEP
LIFE CAN BE COMPLETE
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET
I USED TO WALK IN THE SHADE
WITH MY BLUES ON PARADE
BUT I'M NOT AFRAID
THIS ROVER'S CROSSED OVER
YOU'LL BE RICH AS ROCKEFELLER
GOLD DUST AT YOUR FEET
ON THE SUNNY
ON THE SUNNY
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET.
Congratulations, graduates.
A bad time a long time ago....
There is little overt physical evidence now that UW-Madison's Sterling Hall was the site of a horrific act of domestic terrorism.
To date, there has been nothing to mark the fact that a young post-doctoral student in physics, Robert Fassnacht, lost his life there.
That's about to change.
This afternoon, more than 37 years after a truck bomb blasted a crater in Sterling Hall, the UW-Madison physics department will dedicate a plaque in memory of Fassnacht, who was killed in the Aug. 24, 1970, attack.
"I'm personally embarrassed that it's taken so long," said UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley, who knew Fassnacht well from his days here as a physics graduate student.
"The department's been trying to do something for a long while," added physics professor Wesley Smith.
The dedication will take place in the courtyard between Sterling and Chamberlin halls, near the bombing site.
Several members of Fassnacht's family -- possibly including wife Stephanie, son Christopher, and twin daughters Heidi and Karin -- are expected to attend.
"I did talk to Stephanie before we did this and got her permission," Wiley said. "We wanted to be respectful of her and she approved it."
The bombing capped a tumultuous time of protest on the UW-Madison campus against U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. The target was the Army Math Research Center on the upper floors of Sterling Hall, where it was alleged weapons research was being conducted.
The perpetrators hadn't counted on someone like Fassnacht being there at the time. Karl Armstrong, one of four people involved in the plot, said later that they bombed Sterling Hall in the wee hours of the night because they assumed it would be vacant. They hadn't wanted anyone to be hurt.
But Fassnacht, 33, was in his basement lab at Sterling Hall that night trying to finish a project before leaving on vacation with his family the next day for San Diego.
The blast at 3:42 a.m. was so powerful that pieces of the stolen Ford Econoline van containing the ammonium nitrate bomb landed atop an eight-story building three blocks away. Twenty-six buildings in the area sustained damage.
The bombing and Fassnacht's death rocked not only the Madison and university communities but also the anti-war movement.
The plaque commemorating Fassnacht's tragic part in history is simple, stating what happened there that summer morning.
There are lessons in that violent episode worth remembering, Wiley said, and posting a plaque is part of that.
"It's very valuable in a university that honors and respects free speech (to recognize) that there are limits to what's appropriate," Wiley said. "This was way beyond the extreme limits of what's appropriate."
To date, there has been nothing to mark the fact that a young post-doctoral student in physics, Robert Fassnacht, lost his life there.
That's about to change.
This afternoon, more than 37 years after a truck bomb blasted a crater in Sterling Hall, the UW-Madison physics department will dedicate a plaque in memory of Fassnacht, who was killed in the Aug. 24, 1970, attack.
"I'm personally embarrassed that it's taken so long," said UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley, who knew Fassnacht well from his days here as a physics graduate student.
"The department's been trying to do something for a long while," added physics professor Wesley Smith.
The dedication will take place in the courtyard between Sterling and Chamberlin halls, near the bombing site.
Several members of Fassnacht's family -- possibly including wife Stephanie, son Christopher, and twin daughters Heidi and Karin -- are expected to attend.
"I did talk to Stephanie before we did this and got her permission," Wiley said. "We wanted to be respectful of her and she approved it."
The bombing capped a tumultuous time of protest on the UW-Madison campus against U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. The target was the Army Math Research Center on the upper floors of Sterling Hall, where it was alleged weapons research was being conducted.
The perpetrators hadn't counted on someone like Fassnacht being there at the time. Karl Armstrong, one of four people involved in the plot, said later that they bombed Sterling Hall in the wee hours of the night because they assumed it would be vacant. They hadn't wanted anyone to be hurt.
But Fassnacht, 33, was in his basement lab at Sterling Hall that night trying to finish a project before leaving on vacation with his family the next day for San Diego.
The blast at 3:42 a.m. was so powerful that pieces of the stolen Ford Econoline van containing the ammonium nitrate bomb landed atop an eight-story building three blocks away. Twenty-six buildings in the area sustained damage.
The bombing and Fassnacht's death rocked not only the Madison and university communities but also the anti-war movement.
The plaque commemorating Fassnacht's tragic part in history is simple, stating what happened there that summer morning.
There are lessons in that violent episode worth remembering, Wiley said, and posting a plaque is part of that.
"It's very valuable in a university that honors and respects free speech (to recognize) that there are limits to what's appropriate," Wiley said. "This was way beyond the extreme limits of what's appropriate."
Friday, May 11, 2007
a scared little boy
Shawn Hainstock made no secret of his tears Thursday after a Sauk County Circuit Court hearing for his 16-year-old son, Eric, who is charged with killing the principal of Weston School in September.
"I'm concerned (Eric) might say the wrong thing (in an adult prison) and somebody would hurt him," Shawn Hainstock said, tears in his eyes. "Somebody would kill him, and that would be that."
In his first public interview since the shooting, Shawn Hainstock said he visits his son in the Sauk County Jail every day or two. "He kind of breaks down and cries a lot," he said.
Sauk County Circuit Judge Patrick Taggart's decision last month that the younger Hainstock be tried as an adult was a "tragedy," Hainstock said. "My heart's been tore out," he said. "That just about killed me."
Eric Hainstock is charged with first-degree intentional homicide in the killing of John Klang, who was shot three times with a handgun while Hainstock wrestled with him at the school on Sept. 29.
Shawn Hainstock's comments came after Taggart heard a request from Assistant Public Defenders Jon Helland and Rhoda Ricciardi that the teenager's videotaped confession to police be declared inadmissible at trial.
Ricciardi argued the youth was railroaded into confessing to the shooting by law enforcement officers. She said police didn't make sure Eric Hainstock understood his rights before they questioned him.
"This kid had his rights rammed down his throat," Ricciardi told Taggart.
Sauk County District Attorney Patricia Barrett countered that police were polite and thorough.
When the teenager said he was uncomfortable, police took his handcuffs off, she said. "Very, very quickly this confession occurs," he said.
On Thursday, Shawn Hainstock said Eric was drinking a lot of coffee to help him deal with confinement and sitting through court hearings.
"Nobody knows him like we do," Shawn Hainstock said. "They don't realize how loving a boy he is. He can be saved."
But he said his son is "getting railroaded."
Defense lawyers have argued the youth was abused from the time he was 2, suffered from hyperactivity and attention deficit disorder and had a troubled home life with his father and his adoptive mother.
Shawn Hainstock and his wife, Priscilla, have previously declined requests for interviews, but witnesses have testified that both parents abused him and failed to follow through on getting medication and counseling for the troubled boy when asked by school and social services workers.
Shawn Hainstock did not address those allegations Thursday.
"I'm concerned (Eric) might say the wrong thing (in an adult prison) and somebody would hurt him," Shawn Hainstock said, tears in his eyes. "Somebody would kill him, and that would be that."
In his first public interview since the shooting, Shawn Hainstock said he visits his son in the Sauk County Jail every day or two. "He kind of breaks down and cries a lot," he said.
Sauk County Circuit Judge Patrick Taggart's decision last month that the younger Hainstock be tried as an adult was a "tragedy," Hainstock said. "My heart's been tore out," he said. "That just about killed me."
Eric Hainstock is charged with first-degree intentional homicide in the killing of John Klang, who was shot three times with a handgun while Hainstock wrestled with him at the school on Sept. 29.
Shawn Hainstock's comments came after Taggart heard a request from Assistant Public Defenders Jon Helland and Rhoda Ricciardi that the teenager's videotaped confession to police be declared inadmissible at trial.
Ricciardi argued the youth was railroaded into confessing to the shooting by law enforcement officers. She said police didn't make sure Eric Hainstock understood his rights before they questioned him.
"This kid had his rights rammed down his throat," Ricciardi told Taggart.
Sauk County District Attorney Patricia Barrett countered that police were polite and thorough.
When the teenager said he was uncomfortable, police took his handcuffs off, she said. "Very, very quickly this confession occurs," he said.
On Thursday, Shawn Hainstock said Eric was drinking a lot of coffee to help him deal with confinement and sitting through court hearings.
"Nobody knows him like we do," Shawn Hainstock said. "They don't realize how loving a boy he is. He can be saved."
But he said his son is "getting railroaded."
Defense lawyers have argued the youth was abused from the time he was 2, suffered from hyperactivity and attention deficit disorder and had a troubled home life with his father and his adoptive mother.
Shawn Hainstock and his wife, Priscilla, have previously declined requests for interviews, but witnesses have testified that both parents abused him and failed to follow through on getting medication and counseling for the troubled boy when asked by school and social services workers.
Shawn Hainstock did not address those allegations Thursday.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
A date to remember
At three minutes and four seconds after 2 a.m., on May 6, the time and date will be 02:03:04 05/06/07.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)