Boy accused of killing neo-Nazi father opts not to testify

The Riverside boy accused of murdering his neo-Nazi father decided not to take the witness stand Tuesday, bringing an end to testimony in a juvenile court trial that attracted nationwide interest.

Riverside County Superior Court Judge Jean P. Leonard must decide whether the boy knew it was wrong to shoot and kill his father as he slept on the family's living room couch in May 2011. If found responsible for the murder, the boy could remain in juvenile custody until he is 23.

The boy was 10 years old when he shot Jeffrey Hall, regional director of a neo-Nazi organization called the National Socialist Movement.

Closing arguments are scheduled to begin Wednesday morning and the judge said she expects to release her ruling Monday.

Testimony and evidence in the case, which began in October, revolved around the boy's upbringing and a family life steeped in the hatred and violence of the neo-Nazi movement, with psychologists focusing on whether those circumstances altered his capacity to realize that killing his father was wrong.

Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Michael Soccio argued that the boy plotted to kill his father because of fears that the father was about to divorce the boy's stepmother and break up the family. Soccio presented evidence that the boy expressed remorse within hours after the shooting.

Public Defender Matthew Hardy focused on the boy's abusive home life, where gunplay and neo-Nazi gatherings were commonplace. Witnesses testified that Hall beat his son repeatedly, often in drunken or drug-addled rages.

Social workers responded to the Hall household more than 20 times. At the time of the shooting, the boy was a dependent of the court, an effort designed in part to shield him from further abuse, Hardy said.

Clinical psychologist Anna Salter, a mental health expert called by the prosecution, testified that the boy's birth mother used heroin, LSD and other drugs while she was pregnant, which she called "devastating" to the boy's development. The boy also has an extensive history of violence dating to when he was 3. In school, he once tried to strangle a teacher with a telephone cord, she said.

Hall and his first wife divorced shortly after the boy was born. Hall won full custody when the boy was 3.

If the judge rules that the boy did not comprehend that his actions were wrong, he would be set free. If she finds the boy responsible for the killing, a hearing will be held to determine where to place him.

phil.willon@latimes.com

Read More..

Rogue Planet Confirmed Orbiting Around 'Eye of Sauron'

LONG BEACH, California – Astronomers have confirmed that a controversial exoplanet called Fomalhaut b actually does exist and have calculated its potential orbit. The results show that the object is even stranger than scientists could have imagined, dubbing it a “rogue planet.”

The uncertainty about this object started in 2008, when scientists released an image taken with NASA’s Hubble space telescope of a tiny dot of light in the debris disk of a young, bright star called Fomalhaut, which is about 25 light-years away in the constellation Piscis Austrinus. At the time, they presented only two data points, showing the exoplanet as it existed in 2004 and 2006. It was a sensational image — the enormous debris disk made the star resemble the “Eye of Sauron” from the Lord of the Rings movies — and was one of the first directly imaged extrasolar planets ever seen.

But follow-up from other researchers failed to find the purported world. The original instrument on Hubble that saw Fomalhaut b broke in 2007 and was never replaced, meaning the team that discovered the exoplanet couldn’t reproduce their results either. When they spotted it in 2010 with another instrument, the object seemed to have drifted too far to the right to be in orbit around the star. This led some astronomers to discount the discovery of Fomalhaut b.

But late in 2012, a few other telescopes managed to snap images of the exoplanet. And now, the original team has presented their own new data. “We have three times as many orbits and there you see it very clearly in 2012,” said astronomer Paul Kalas of the University of California at Berkeley and the SETI Institute, pointing to a new image released today during a press conference here at the American Astronomical Society 2013 meeting.

With their four data points, the original team has been able to calculate several potential orbits for the object. They show the exoplanet moving on a highly eccentric orbit around its parent star, coming in as close at 40 astronomical units (AU) and then swinging out to 350 AU. (An AU is the distance between the Earth and the sun). There is some indication that the planet’s orbit is very inclined relative to the debris disk around Fomalhaut, meaning that the exoplanet doesn’t pass through it, instead moving above and then underneath the dust.

This movement suggests to Kalas and his team that Fomalhaut b is a rogue planet, acting much more like a comet or icy body in our solar system’s Kuiper belt, which generally orbits far from the sun but may sometimes come in closer. The astronomers think the mass of the exoplanet is at least as much as an icy dwarf world, like Sedna in our solar system, but it could be as big as Jupiter. In either case, it’s unlike anything seen in our own system and shows that the architecture of other planetary systems could greatly differ from our own.

Image: NASA, ESA, and Paul Kalas (University of California, Berkeley and SETI Institute). Video: NASA/STSCI

Read More..

“Idol” judges Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj play nice after feud

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – New “American Idol” judges Mariah Carey and Nicki Minaj shrugged off their widely publicized feud on Tuesday as a “trumped-up thing” that was merely a passionate difference of opinion over the TV talent show‘s contestants.

In their first big media appearance ahead of the hit show’s return to Fox television on January 16, the two pop stars showered each other with praise while barely looking at each other.

A day after the airing of an ABC TV interview in which Carey said she hired extra security following threats reportedly made against her by Minaj last year, the “Hero” singer told reporters it was time to focus on the aspiring “Idol” stars.

“This is a very passionate panel. There are a lot of strong personalities,” said Carey, who is reportedly being paid $ 18 million to be an “American Idol” judge.

“The fighting is what it is. This is ‘American Idol.’ It is bigger than some stupid trumped-up thing. It’s about the next superstar … The whole thing is convoluted. It’s a distraction from the show and the contestants,” Carey said.

Minaj, an outspoken 30-year-old rapper, called Carey one of her “favorite artists of all time.”

“She has really shaped a generation of singers and to be on a panel with her where (contestants) all aspire to be Mariah Carey … I feel excited to see them, see someone they look up to so much,” Minaj said.

Carey, 42, recalled working with Minaj in 2009 on an album track, and knowing at the time that the rapper would be successful.

“Nothing to write about now!” quipped “American Idol” host Ryan Seacrest.

REVIVING AGING ‘IDOL’ FORMAT

Carey, Minaj and country singer Keith Urban joined “Idol” as judges in September for the upcoming 12th season after the departures of Jennifer Lopez and Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler.

Carey, with more than 200 million album sales, and Minaj, one of the most exciting voices in rap, are expected to revive the contest, which last year lost its eight-year crown as the most-watched show on U.S. television to “Saturday Night Football” on rival NBC.

Video of the pair arguing was leaked online from early auditions in last fall, and Minaj was reported to have said, “If I had a gun, I would shoot that bitch.”

“American Idol” executive producer Trish Kinane said the new panel was chosen after fans said they wanted to see judges who were current and talented in their own right.

“They (fans) also wanted honesty, and we very much took that into consideration. They (the judges) are not shrinking violets. They say what they think, and we encourage that,” Kinane said.

“American Idol“, which has produced stars like Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood, faces growing competition for TV audiences from a slew of rivals like “The Voice,” “The X Factor,” and “America’s Got Talent.” Last year, “Idol” attracted under 20 million viewers, down from the more than 30 million who watched on a regular basis five or six years ago.

But Mike Darnell, reality programming chief for Fox, said the new panel had “re-invigorated the show.”

“Yes, there are too many (talent) shows on the air and they are all taking each other down a bit. But this is still the king of the shows and the only one that makes stars,” Darnell said.

Fox is a unit of News Corp.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Paul Simao)

TV News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: “Idol” judges Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj play nice after feud
Url Post: http://www.news.fluser.com/idol-judges-mariah-carey-nicki-minaj-play-nice-after-feud/
Link To Post : “Idol” judges Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj play nice after feud
Rating:
100%

based on 99998 ratings.
5 user reviews.
Author: Fluser SeoLink
Thanks for visiting the blog, If any criticism and suggestions please leave a comment

Read More..

Gaps Seen in Therapy for Suicidal Teenagers

Most adolescents who plan or attempt suicide have already received at least some mental health treatment, raising questions about the effectiveness of current approaches to helping troubled youths, according to the largest in-depth analysis to date of suicidal behaviors in American teenagers.

The study, in the journal JAMA Psychiatry, found that 55 percent of suicidal teenagers had received some therapy before they thought about suicide, planned it or tried to kill themselves, contradicting the widely held belief that suicide is due in part to a lack of access to treatment.

The findings, based on interviews with a nationwide sample of more than 6,000 teenagers and at least one parent of each, linked suicidal behavior to complex combinations of mood disorders like depression and behavior problems like attention-deficit and eating disorders, as well as alcohol and drug abuse.

The study found that about one in eight teenagers had persistent suicidal thoughts at some point, and that about a third of those who had suicidal thoughts had made an attempt, usually within a year of having the idea.

Previous studies have had similar findings, based on smaller, regional samples. But the new study is the first to suggest, in a large nationwide sample, that access to treatment does not make a big difference.

The study suggests that effective treatment for severely suicidal teenagers must address not just mood disorders, but also behavior problems that can lead to impulsive acts, experts said. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1,386 people between the ages of 13 and 18 committed suicide in 2010, the latest year for which numbers are available.

“I think one of the take-aways here is that treatment for depression may be necessary but not sufficient to prevent kids from attempting suicide,” said Dr. David Brent, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh, who was not involved in the study. “We simply do not have empirically validated treatments for recurrent suicidal behavior.”

The report said nothing about whether the therapies given were state of the art or carefully done, said Matt Nock, a professor of psychology at Harvard and the lead author, and it is possible that some of the treatments prevented suicide attempts. “But it’s telling us we’ve got a long way to go to do this right,” Dr. Nock said. His co-authors included Ronald C. Kessler of Harvard and researchers from Boston University and Children’s Hospital Boston.

Margaret McConnell, a consultant in Alexandria, Va., said her daughter Alice, who killed herself in 2006 at the age of 17, was getting treatment at the time. “I think there might have been some carelessness in the way the treatment was done,” Ms. McConnell said, “and I was trusting a 17-year-old to manage her own medication. We found out after we lost her that she wasn’t taking it regularly.”

In the study, researchers surveyed 6,483 adolescents from the ages of 13 to 18 and found that 9 percent of male teenagers and 15 percent of female teenagers experienced some stretch of having persistent suicidal thoughts. Among girls, 5 percent made suicide plans and 6 percent made at least one attempt (some were unplanned).

Among boys, 3 percent made plans and 2 percent carried out attempts, which tended to be more lethal than girls’ attempts.

(Suicidal thinking or behavior was virtually unheard-of before age 10.)

Over all, about one-third of teenagers with persistent suicidal thoughts went on to make an attempt to take their own lives.

Almost all of the suicidal adolescents in the study qualified for some psychiatric diagnosis, whether depression, phobias or generalized anxiety disorder. Those with an added behavior problem — attention-deficit disorder, substance abuse, explosive anger — were more likely to act on thoughts of self-harm, the study found.

Doctors have tested a range of therapies to prevent or reduce recurrent suicidal behaviors, with mixed success. Medications can ease depression, but in some cases they can increase suicidal thinking. Talk therapy can contain some behavior problems, but not all.

One approach, called dialectical behavior therapy, has proved effective in reducing hospitalizations and suicide attempts in, among others, people with borderline personality disorder, who are highly prone to self-harm.

But suicidal teenagers who have a mixture of mood and behavior issues are difficult to reach. In one 2011 study, researchers at George Mason University reduced suicide attempts, hospitalizations, drinking and drug use among suicidal adolescent substance abusers. The study found that a combination of intensive treatments — talk therapy for mood problems, family-based therapy for behavior issues and patient-led reduction in drug use — was more effective than regular therapies.

“But that’s just one study, and it’s small,” said Dr. Brent of the University of Pittsburgh. “We can treat components of the overall problem, but that’s about all.”

Ms. McConnell said that her daughter’s depression had seemed mild and that there was no warning that she would take her life. “I think therapy does help a lot of people, if it’s handled right,” she said.

Read More..

A Financial Service for People Fed Up With Banks

Steve Dykes for The New York Times

Shamir Karkal, left,

Like many people, Josh Reich got fed up with his bank after it charged him overdraft fees and he endured painful customer service calls to fight them. But unlike most people, Mr. Reich, a software engineer from Australia, decided to come up with a better way to bank.

Mr. Reich and a co-founder, Shamir Karkal, created Simple, an online banking start-up company based in Portland, Ore., that offers its customers free checking accounts and data-rich analysis of their transactions and spending habits.

Few entrepreneurs dare to set their sights on industries as large and entrenched as banking and expect to flourish. But Mr. Reich, 34, a professed data nerd who has built computers and tinkered with the innards of sophisticated cameras, holds a master’s degree in business and has a robust background in financial data analysis. He is confident that Simple’s minimalist approach — it promises not to charge any fees for any services — will draw fans and customers.

“Banks make money by keeping customers confused,” Mr. Reich said. “There’s no incentives to make the experience better.”

Of course, inviting people to trust a start-up with their money is a lot to ask. The company, which began signing up customers late last year in a deliberately slow fashion, now has 20,000 and has processed transactions worth more than $200 million.

It also has the backing of prominent venture capital firms including Shasta Ventures, SV Angel and IA Ventures and has raised more than $13 million. Simple has few, if any, direct competitors, although some services like SmartyPig and Mint offer analysis of bank accounts and financial transactions.

Simple is actually not a bank. It has deals with CBW Bank and Bancorp, federally insured banks, to hold its customers’ money.

And it has built slick apps for the Web and mobile devices to give customers an overview of their accounts and transactions. But it encourages customers to treat it as a bank, closing their more traditional accounts and only using Simple.

The company’s biggest challenge, banking analysts say, will be to persuade people to give it a try.

“It is extremely difficult to get consumers to change and leave their banks,” said Jacob Jegher, an analyst at Celent, a research and consulting firm. “Plus, although they are not a bank, they still operate like a financial institution, and they will face challenges that big banks have decades of experience with.”

After the financial crisis, smaller community banks and credit unions gained customers eager for alternatives to larger corporate banks. Experts say Simple could attract those customers as well.

Early adopters are warming to the service; during a speech last fall at a conference aimed at technology enthusiasts, designers and creative people, Mr. Reich asked how many in attendance were Simple customers. A majority of the crowd raised hands.

Mr. Reich said Simple was keeping its first group of customers small to allow it to work out any kinks. (Already there have been some flaws, like one that briefly locked several users out of their accounts in November.) At this stage, those who want a Simple account have to request an invitation on its site, though these are handed out fairly liberally to those who meet the minimal qualifications of Simple and its bank partners.

Customers receive a plain white card that can be used like a debit card. The company offers most traditional banking features, like direct deposit and money transfers. But there is plenty it does not offer, like joint or business checking accounts, or paper checkbooks, which may be a deal killer for some.

The start-up does not have physical bank branches or automated teller machines, nor does it plan to build any. As a result, Simple customers cannot make cash deposits and must rely on the Internet and phone for service.

Simple tries to make up for what it does not have with modern software design and data analysis.

Each Simple transaction is tagged with detailed information that allows customers to search their accounts with plain English commands like “Show me how much I spent on meals over $30 last month,” or “Show me how much money I spent on gifts in December.”

Customers can see transactions plotted on a map or search for all transactions in a particular state or country, something that would be difficult with a traditional bank account.

Read More..

Wendy Greuel walks tightrope in mayor's race

One big advantage for a Los Angeles city controller aspiring to higher office is the ability to make news with a steady flow of audits exposing wasteful spending at City Hall.

So while stuck in Hollywood Freeway traffic on a recent morning, Wendy Greuel, controller and candidate for mayor, picked up her phone for a radio interview about one of those reports, accusing the city of squandering $325,000 on improper mileage reimbursements.

"That was really just the tip of the iceberg," she told listeners, recycling a line she's used to publicize previous audits finding lavish travel spending at the Housing Authority and credit card abuses at the Coliseum.

In a city beset by chronic budget shortfalls, Greuel is campaigning in the March 5th election primary as a fiscal conservative. She's uniquely qualified, she argues, not just because of her record as a city official, but as a result of her work at DreamWorks and her family's ownership of a building supply business in North Hollywood.

"I have inside knowledge and an outside perspective," she said in an interview.

But Greuel's record, her opponents contend, doesn't match the image she's crafting. They question what she's accomplished with her audits and portray her Hollywood experience — in government relations — as emblematic of a career as a political insider.

"This whole notion that she's some kind of outsider who has an ounce of political courage, it's frankly a bunch of hooey," said Eric Hacopian, chief strategist for mayoral candidate and City Councilwoman Jan Perry. Greuel's audits, he said, amount to "constant headline grabbing" and "a whole bunch of sound and fury that signifies nothing."

With three rivals jostling to cut into her presumed and potentially decisive base of support in the San Fernando Valley, Greuel's prospects for succeeding Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa depend largely on how effectively she can repel that line of attack.

"It's a tightrope act," said Steven P. Erie, a political science professor at UC San Diego, noting that Greuel, in particular, needs to secure support from groups whose priorities may diverge.

"She doesn't want to turn labor off," he said. Indeed, she has courted unions by promising to fight harder than her opponents to protect the city workforce.

At the same time, Erie said, Greuel has to "appeal to a more fiscally moderate-to-conservative base out in the Valley."

A former Valley area City Council member who was elected controller in 2009, Greuel takes credit for identifying $160 million in potential city savings through her audits. But stopping that waste, she says, is up to the council and the mayor under the city's charter.

"I've been the one that has been looking at fiscal responsibility," she said.

Greuel's effort to cast herself as a champion of fiscal restraint is likely to face other tests, among them her support — during seven years on the council — for a rapid rise in spending that worsened the city's budget crisis.

Like her top competitors in the race, Perry and Councilman Eric Garcetti, Greuel now expresses regret for backing generous raises for 22,000 city workers in 2007 — despite a $243-million budget shortfall. The deficit quickly swelled when the economy spiraled downward.

She also has joined calls to abolish the city's business tax, which brings in $439 million a year. The revenue loss would exacerbate budget shortfalls projected to range from $216 million to $327 million in each of the next four years, analysts have warned.

Greuel and Garcetti say getting rid of the tax would spur economic growth. Perry and another candidate, entertainment lawyer Kevin James, say the city can't afford to abolish the tax.

Greuel, who grew up in Granada Hills, said her family's business, Frontier Building Supply, taught her to appreciate the burden of city taxes. "I did everything from cleaning the bathrooms to sweeping the warehouse to doing the accounting to answering the phone to driving the forklift and driving a truck," she said. Now, she co-owns the company with her brother, who runs it.

Greuel, 51, a UCLA graduate, started her career as an aide to Mayor Tom Bradley, working on such issues as homelessness, child care and services for the elderly. A Republican until 1992, when she registered as a Democrat, Greuel was part of a group of Bradley aides who moved to Washington to take jobs in the Clinton administration.

She recalled leafing with colleagues through the "plum book" directory of federal political appointments — named for its "plum" government jobs — as the end of Bradley's tenure approached. Mark Fabiani, a top Bradley aide who became special counsel to President Clinton, passed Greuel's resume to Andrew Cuomo, then Clinton's assistant secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

Read More..

Brad Pitt Joins China's Version of Twitter, Creates Confusion

World-traveling man of intrigue Brad Pitt has joined China’s version of Twitter — Sina Weibo — and in his first message hinted that he could be making a visit to the country, which he had reportedly been banned from visiting. Or maybe not.

In a mysterious message posted to Pitt’s account the actor simply stated: “It is the truth. Yup, I’m coming.” The tweet of sorts got thousands of comments, the AP reports, and has raised speculation that the actor could be headed to the People’s Republic. The Inglourious Basterds star was reportedly banned from entering following his appearance in 1997′s Seven Years in Tibet, which offered a harsh portrayal of Chinese rule. However, a few hours after it was posted, the message reportedly was deleted.

Whether the ersatz tweet was an accident, something that was posted prematurely, or simply removed because it was being misconstrued, the actor’s cryptic appearance on the microblogging service brings up some interesting issues about the intersection of tech and culture in China. Because even if he’s not on his way to the Communist country — which would not be entirely impossible since, as Entertainment Weekly notes, the country lifted the ban on Seven Years director Jean-Jacques Annaud — his presence on the site is still a big get for Weibo and a move that shows the importance of both American celebrities and social networking in China.

Weibo, which according to parent company Sina Corporation has some 400 million registered accounts, has erupted in the world’s most populous nation, where actual Twitter is blocked by Chinese censors. The Chinese microblog service is also subject to censors as well; at the government’s behest some 1,000 Sina employees reportedly go through messages on Weibo and remove content considered offensive. But there are indications that more freedom is coming to the social network, like the fact that users now seem to be able to search for Chinese officials like President Hu Jintao and even write criticism despite the Great Firewall.

Pitt isn’t the only star to have a presence on Weibo. His Interview with the Vampire co-star Tom Cruise and British actress Emma Watson are also on the service, which launched in 2009 and boasts functionality similar to a Twitter/Facebook hybrid – allowing users to not only post messages but also embedded videos and images. And as American films gain in popularity in China — Pitt’s Mr. and Mrs. Smith brought in $7.5 million at the Chinese box office — it only seems logical that more and more celebrities will use the service to reach their international fanbase.

But for Pitt, who along with his partner Angelina Jolie is known for humanitarian efforts, one can’t help but wonder if any messages he has for China could go beyond movie promotion — whether he delivers them online or in the flesh.

Read More..

NBC chief braces for ratings drop after strong fall season

PASADENA, California (Reuters) – NBC Entertainment Chairman Robert Greenblatt said he expects the network’s ratings to slip in the coming months after an unexpectedly strong fall season, though he hopes some coming new shows will break out to help stem the decline.

The Comcast-owned network made a surprise comeback in the final months of 2012 after years in the ratings basement. The network’s viewership jumped 24 percent among the 18- to 49-year-old age group that advertisers crave, the only increase among the four major TV broadcast networks.

Critics are skeptical of whether NBC can stay on top of its competitors through the rest of the TV season. The NBC schedule received a boost in the fall from “Sunday Night Football,” singing competition “The Voice,” and new drama “Revolution.” NFL football games are gone from NBC until next fall, and “The Voice” and “Revolution” will not return until March 25.

Greenblatt said he was “totally prepared” for NBC ratings to decline in the coming weeks. “I think it’s inevitable,” Greenblatt told reporters at a meeting of the Television Critics Association.

He said NBC had a “very robust” mid-season plan that includes new shows such as “1600 Penn,” a comedy about a First Family living in the White House; soapy “Deception” about a murder in a wealthy family; and “Do No Harm,” a thriller about a neurosurgeon.

“I’m hoping that out of this new crop of shows we’ll get lucky,” Greenblatt said.

He said he decided to keep “Revolution” off the air until late March, rather than bringing it back in January, so the rest of the show’s first season can run without being interrupted by repeats.

“It’s a little bit more of a cable model,” Greenblatt said. “If you market properly and have the goods, and then you can run them all in a row without repeats, I actually think that’s the better long-term play,” he said.

When “The Voice” returns, it will have new judges Usher and Shakira in place of Christina Aguilera and Cee Lo Green. NBC also is bringing back Broadway musical drama “Smash” for a second season starting in February.

Greenblatt began his presentation to reporters and TV critics with a litany of ratings numbers from the fall season, many with double-digit percentage gains.

“I’m going to bore you with some statistics,” he said, “because I’m not sure when I’m going to have the chance to do this again.”

(Reporting By Lisa Richwine; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)

TV News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: NBC chief braces for ratings drop after strong fall season
Url Post: http://www.news.fluser.com/nbc-chief-braces-for-ratings-drop-after-strong-fall-season/
Link To Post : NBC chief braces for ratings drop after strong fall season
Rating:
100%

based on 99998 ratings.
5 user reviews.
Author: Fluser SeoLink
Thanks for visiting the blog, If any criticism and suggestions please leave a comment

Read More..

Oil Sand Industry in Canada Tied to Higher Carcinogen Level

Todd Korol/Reuters

An oil sands mine Fort McMurray, Alberta.

OTTAWA — The development of Alberta’s oil sands has increased levels of cancer-causing compounds in surrounding lakes well beyond natural levels, Canadian researchers reported in a study released on Monday. And they said the contamination covered a wider area than had previously been believed.

For the study, financed by the Canadian government, the researchers set out to develop a historical record of the contamination, analyzing sediment dating back about 50 years from six small and shallow lakes north of Fort McMurray, Alberta, the center of the oil sands industry. Layers of the sediment were tested for deposits of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs, groups of chemicals associated with oil that in many cases have been found to cause cancer in humans after long-term exposure.

“One of the biggest challenges is that we lacked long-term data,” said John P. Smol, the paper’s lead author and a professor of biology at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. “So some in industry have been saying that the pollution in the tar sands is natural, it’s always been there.”

The researchers found that to the contrary, the levels of those deposits have been steadily rising since large-scale oil sands production began in 1978.

Samples from one test site, the paper said, now show 2.5 to 23 times more PAHs in current sediment than in layers dating back to around 1960.

“We’re not saying these are poisonous ponds,” Professor Smol said. “But it’s going to get worse. It’s not too late but the trend is not looking good.” He said that the wilderness lakes studied by the group were now contaminated as much as lakes in urban centers.

The study is likely to provide further ammunition to critics of the industry, who already contend that oil extracted from Canada’s oil sands poses environmental hazards like toxic sludge ponds, greenhouse gas emissions and the destruction of boreal forests.

Battles are also under way over the proposed construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would move the oil down through the western United States and down to refineries along the Gulf Coast, or an alternative pipeline that would transport the oil from landlocked Alberta to British Columbia for export to Asia.

The researchers, who included scientists at Environment Canada’s aquatic contaminants research division, chose to test for PAHs because they had been the subject of earlier studies, including one published in 2009 that analyzed the distribution of the chemicals in snowfall north of Fort McMurray. That research drew criticism from the government of Alberta and others for failing to provide a historical baseline.

“Now we have the smoking gun,” Professor Smol said.

He said he was not surprised that the analysis found a rise in PAH deposits after the industrial development of the oil sands, “but we needed the data.” He said he had not entirely expected, however, to observe the effect at the most remote test site, a lake that is about 50 miles to the north.

Asked about the study, Adam Sweet, a spokesman for Peter Kent, Canada’s environment minister, emphasized in an e-mail that with the exception of one lake very close to the oil sands, the levels of contaminants measured by the researchers “did not exceed Canadian guidelines and were low compared to urban areas.”

He added that an environmental monitoring program for the region announced last February 2012 was put into effect “to address the very concerns raised by such studies” and to “provide an improved understanding of the long-term cumulative effects of oil sands development.”

Earlier research has suggested several different ways that the chemicals could spread. Most oil sand production involve large-scale open-bit mining. The chemicals may become wind-borne when giant excavators dig them up and then deposit them into 400-ton dump trucks.

Upgraders at some oil sands projects that separate the oil bitumen from its surrounding sand are believed to emit PAHs. And some scientists believe that vast ponds holding wastewater from that upgrading and from other oil sand processes may be leaking PAHs and other chemicals into downstream bodies of water.

Read More..

DealBook: Banks Reach Settlements on Mortgages

Correction Appended

11:38 a.m. | Updated

Bank of America agreed on Monday to pay $11.65 billion to Fannie Mae to settle claims over troubled mortgages that soured during the housing crash, mostly loans issued by the bank’s Countrywide Financial subsidiary.

Separately, federal regulators reached an $8.5 billion settlement on Monday to resolve claims of foreclosure abuses that included flawed paperwork used in foreclosures and bungled loan modifications by 10 major lenders, including JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Citibank. About $3.3 billion of that settlement amount will go toward Americans who went through foreclosure in 2009 and 2010, while $5.2 billion will address other assistance to troubled borrowers, including loan modifications and reductions of principal balances. Eligible homeowners could get up to $125,000 in compensation.

The two agreements are not directly related, but they illustrate the extent of the banks’ role in the excesses of the credit boom, from the making of loans to the seizure of homes.

Under the terms of the Bank of America deal, the bank will pay Fannie Mae $3.6 billion to compensate for faulty mortgages and will also pay the housing finance giant $6.75 billion to buy back mortgages. It also must pay the agency $1.3 billion related to loan servicing problems.

The settlement will resolve all of the lender’s disputes with Fannie Mae, removing a major impediment to Bank of America’s rehabilitation. The bank had settled its fight with Freddie Mac, the other government-owned mortgage giant, in 2011.

Both Fannie and Freddie, which have posted billions of dollars in losses in recent years, have argued that Countrywide misrepresented the quality of home loans that it sold to the two entities at the height of the mortgage bubble. Bank of America assumed those troubles when it bought Countrywide in 2008.

Before the latest settlement announced on Monday, the Countrywide acquisition had cost Bank of America more than $40 billion in losses on real estate, legal costs and settlements, according to several people close to the bank.

By removing part of the bank’s mortgage albatross, the move is a continued retreat from home lending by Bank of America, even as rivals including JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo compete for the profitable refinance business that has boomed with interest rates persistently low.

Bank of America also agreed to sell the servicing rights on about $306 billion worth of home loans to other firms. In separate statements, Nationstar Mortgage Holdings and the Newcastle Investment Corporation announced they were buying the rights. Those servicing costs, which were roughly $3.4 billion in the third quarter, have weighed on the bank’s profits, especially as borrowers fall behind on their bills.

Brian T. Moynihan, the bank’s chief executive, said in November that he intended to sell off about two million loans the bank currently serviced.

“Together, these agreements are a significant step in resolving our remaining legacy mortgage issues, further streamlining and simplifying the company and reducing expenses over time,” Mr. Moynihan said in a statement on Monday.

Bank of America said it expected the settlement to hurt its fourth-quarter earnings by $2.5 billion because of costs tied to foreclosure reviews and litigation. The firm also expects to record a $700 million charge, an accounting move known as a debt-valuation adjustment, related to an improvement in the prices of its bonds.

The deal on Monday helps the bank move away from its troubled mortgage business. Still, the bank’s attempts to resolve other costly mortgage litigation have so far been stymied. Looking to appease investors that sued the bank for losses when mortgages packaged into securities imploded during the financial crisis, the bank agreed to pay $8.5 billion in June 2011. But the settlement, which would help mollify investors including the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Pimco, has been stalled.

Further thwarting Bank of America’s retreat from the mortgage business, federal prosecutors sued the bank in October, accusing it of churning through loans so quickly that quality controls were virtually forgotten. The Justice Department sued the bank under a law that could mean Bank of America could pay well more than $1 billion to settle.

Bank of America has been embroiled with other legal woes, including accusations that it misled investors about the acquisition of Merrill Lynch. Shareholders, led by pension funds, had said the bank provided false and misleading statements about the health of the Wall Street firm, which, unknown to the public, was racking up huge losses in late 2008 amid turmoil in the markets.

The separate agreement with 10 banks on foreclosure abuses concludes weeks of feverish negotiations between the federal regulators, led by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the banks. That settlement will end a troubled foreclosure review mandated by the banking regulators.

The deal, which was hashed out over the weekend, had teetered on the brink of collapse after officials from the Federal Reserve demanded that the banks pay an addition $300 million to address their part in the 2008 financial crisis, according to several people briefed on the negotiations who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Federal Reserve, though, agreed to back down on the demands in the hope that the pact could move ahead and bring more immediate relief to homeowners struggling to stay afloat in a time of persistent unemployment and a sluggish economy.

The multibillion-dollar foreclosure settlement was driven, to a large extent, by banking regulators, who decided that a review of loan files was inefficient, costly and simply not yielding relief for homeowners, these people said. The goal in scuttling the reviews, which were mandated as part of a consent order in April 2011, was to provide more immediate relief to homeowners.

The comptroller’s office and the Federal Reserve said on Monday that the settlement “provides the greatest benefit to consumers subject to unsafe and unsound mortgage servicing and foreclosure practices during the relevant period in a more timely manner than would have occurred under the review process.”

The relief will be distributed to homeowners even if they did not file a claim for their loan files to be reviewed.

Concerns about the Independent Foreclosure Review began to mount in within the comptroller’s office, according to the people familiar with the matter. The alarm, these people said, was that the reviews were taking more than 20 hours a loan file at a cost of up to $250 an hour. Since the start of the review, the banks, which are required to pay for consultants to review the files, had spent an estimated $1.5 billion.

More vexing, the banking regulators said that the reviews were not providing any relief to borrowers or turning up meaningful instances where homes of borrowers current on their payments were seized, according to these people.

Michael J. de la Merced and Ben Protess contributed reporting.

---

Correction: January 8, 2013

An earlier version of this article omitted one element of the settlement between Bank of America and Fannie Mae, and summaries of the article in some sections of nytimes.com consequently understated the total amount of the two mortgage-related settlements announced Monday. It is more than $20 billion, not $18.5 billion.

Read More..