Hewitt Upsets del Potro; Murray and Djokovic Rebound

Abstract: Two former United States Open champions, both strong-willed competitors and veterans of the spotlight, carried on late into Friday night in one of the most dramatic contests of the early stages of the Open. After a day of mostly tidy business as usual, the prime-time matchup of sixth-seeded Juan Martín del Potro and Lleyton Hewitt was highly anticipated, even if it did not have the current brand name figures of the sport. It was still the charismatic del Potro, the winner here in 2009, and Hewitt, a perennial contender whose backward cap and spunkiness fans have come to adore. Their performance surpassed its billing. Hewitt, 32, from Australia, outlasted del Potro, 6-4, 5-7, 3-6, 7-6 (2), 6-1. “It’s an amazing feeling,” Hewitt said. “I love being out in that atmosphere, soaking up every second of it.” Image Lleyton Hewitt of Australia beat sixth-seeded Juan Martín del Potro of Argentina, 6-4, 5-7, 3-6, 7-6 (2), 6-1, on Friday. Credit Richard Perry/The New York Times From the outset, both players seemed to nestle into their comfort zones. Hewitt was serving to win the second set, ahead by 5-4, but he double-faulted to bring the game back to deuce — a severe miscue that cost him. Del Potro wound up winning the game and rallied to take the set, 7-5. From there, it was back and forth, neither player sustaining momentum for more than a game or even a point. Del Potro struggled with his backhand, but his powerful forehand was crisp. Hewitt, who won here 12 years ago, played like the grizzled bulldog he has become known as. “He’s a great champion and a great fighter,” del Potro said of Hewitt. “For the second round, it’s a really difficult player.” Two hours and 45 minutes into the match, it could not have been tighter: both players had 105 points. After del Potro won the third set, he fought off two break points to hold serve and even the fourth set at 3-3. Both players wound up exchanging breaks and the set went to a tiebreaker. Image Andy Murray dropped the third set to Leonardo Mayer but rebounded to win, 7-5, 6-1, 3-6, 6-1. “I was a bit frustrated at points in the match,” Murray said. Credit Ben Solomon for The New York Times There, Hewitt played at his sharpest, jumping ahead, 6-0, before winning, 7-2. He committed only four unforced errors in the fifth set, and del Potro fell flat. “I just kept fighting and putting it out there,” Hewitt said. “I kept coming at him the whole night. I felt like I was seeing the ball well. Felt like I played a good game plan.” Earlier in the evening, the defending champion, Andy Murray, became the highest seed to drop a set at the Open, and for a moment it looked as if Leonardo Mayer of Argentina could push the match to its brink. But the third-seeded Murray rebounded with a fourth set more typical of him, beating Mayer, 7-5, 6-1, 3-6, 6-1, at Louis Armstrong Stadium. Image Novak Djokovic needed a tiebreaker to win the first set in a 7-6 (2), 6-2, 6-2 victory over Benjamin Becker on Friday. Credit Chang W. Lee/The New York Times Against the hard-hitting Mayer, Murray made seven unforced errors, while Mayer was superb with his forehand and turned up the intensity of his serves, notching five aces. The match stretched well past two hours. “I was a bit frustrated at points in the match,” Murray said. “I was doing quite a lot of the running for a lot of it, and wasn’t getting quite as much depth on my returns. You don’t feel like you’re dictating the match. It can be a little frustrating.” Top-seeded Novak Djokovic needed a tiebreaker to win the first set in a 7-6 (2), 6-2, 6-2 victory over Benjamin Becker of Germany. Djokovic admitted he had trouble adjusting to the winds and conditions early in the match, but it hardly sounded like cause for alarm. “It was very tough,” he said. “It was a lot of unforced errors, very windy conditions. You couldn’t really read and predict where the ball is going to go, so you have to be very alert. At the start I had difficulty with my footwork. But, you know, I won the set, and after that, it was much, much better.” Also advancing was No. 12 seed Tommy Haas, who beat the qualifier Yen-Hsun Lu, 6-3, 6-4, 7-6 (3). Haas, 35, is playing in the rare over-30 crowd, now enthusiastically joined by Li Na.

US Open Tennis
Tennis
Juan Martin del Potro
Lleyton Hewitt
Leonardo Mayer
Novak Djokovic
Benjamin Becker
Andy Murray


Pennsylvania Officers on Trial in Obstruction Case

Abstract: Three former Pennsylvania police officers went on trial Thursday on charges of obstructing justice in the beating death of a Mexican immigrant in 2008, a prosecution that Hispanics have come to view as a national test case for treatment of Latinos. The federal case against the former officers, Matthew Nestor, Jason Hayes and William Moyer, began with the killing of Luís Ramírez, 25, an undocumented Mexican immigrant who was beaten and kicked to death in July 2008 by a group of young white men in the central Pennsylvania town of Shenandoah. The case became a cause célèbre for Latinos who argued that the two main defendants, Brandon Piekarsky, a member of a high school football team, and his friend Derrick Donchak, got off with light sentences in a state trial in 2009. They were acquitted of the most serious charges and convicted of simple assault, a misdemeanor. After mounting criticism from state officials, federal prosecutors pressed civil rights charges against the two men, and in October, they were convicted of a hate crime. The men, who are 19 and 20, face a maximum of life in prison when they are sentenced on Jan. 24. In federal court on Thursday in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., prosecutors argued that the police officers, who are charged with conspiracy, making false statements and obstruction of justice, misrepresented facts during their investigation because they had personal connections to the families of the accused. Mr. Nestor, the chief of police at the time, had vacationed with Mr. Piekarsky’s mother, according to the indictment. Mr. Hayes, a patrolman, was dating her, and the son of Mr. Moyer, a lieutenant, played on the same football team as those accused in the beating. All have since left the police department. Joseph Nahas, a lawyer for Mr. Nestor, strongly disputed the charges, according to The Republican Herald newspaper, and said that his client had called the district attorney for Schuylkill County within three hours of the beating. “Everything the government just told you about my client is absolute nonsense,” Mr. Nahas said. The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which circulated a petition in 2009 calling for the Justice Department to bring federal charges in the case, welcomed the trial. “This trial sends a strong message that hate crimes and those who attempt to cover them up, including law enforcement officers, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” said Gladys Limón, a staff lawyer for the fund. Included in the indictment were accusations that Mr. Hayes, an investigating officer, had called Mr. Piekarsky’s mother and told her to tell the young men to “get their stories straight,” because Mr. Ramírez’s condition was deteriorating. He died in the hospital shortly after the beating. The indictment also said that Mr. Moyer contacted the parents of one of the accused and told them to have their son throw away his sneakers, and that a Shenandoah official told the officers to recuse themselves from the case, but they refused. Prosecutors said Mr. Moyer and Mr. Hayes “deliberately mischaracterized” an eyewitness account of what happened in an official police report in order to “exculpate Brandon Piekarsky.”

Ramirez Luis
Mexican-Americans
Hate Crimes
Police
Pennsylvania
Immigration and Emigration
Piekarsky Brandon
Donchak Derrick


Ducks Are Finding an Easy Playoff Road so far After Several Bitter Exits

Abstract: ANAHEIM, Calif. — Despite their history of postseason calamities, the Anaheim Ducks enter this year’s Western Conference finals against the Chicago Blackhawks with a strong wind at their backs. They have a playoff-best 8-1 record. They have averaged nearly four goals per game during the postseason, a figure that leads the N.H.L. They have allowed the fewest postseason goals of any team in the West. They have posted the best five-on-five goal differential of the postseason, and they are second by an eyelash to the now-eliminated Washington Capitals for the top face-off-win percentage. They have yet to lose when they score first, and they have also mounted four comebacks when trailing after two periods. “I don’t want to say that they’re more intense or more determined or more committed,” Anaheim Coach Bruce Boudreau said of his players, “because I thought, at the time, every other team I’ve had, whether it was here or in Washington, was also committed and determined. But there sure is a feeling of we can do it when we’re behind. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a team anywhere that has that feeling like we do.” The Ducks have had the most efficient power play in the league, scoring on 31 percent of their opportunities, after finishing third from last in power-play conversion rate during the regular season (15.7 percent). That success has been complemented by the top penalty kill rate in their conference during the playoffs. “Along the way, special teams can win or lose you some games,” defenseman Cam Fowler said, “and the way we’ve been going so far, it’s definitely won us some hockey games.” The Ducks dispatched two upstart teams in the first two rounds, sweeping the Winnipeg Jets and eliminating the Calgary Flames in five games. Now they face the Chicago Blackhawks, the Stanley Cup champions in 2013 and 2010 and conference finalists last year. A year ago, the Ducks held a 3-2 lead in their second-round series against the Kings but lost the series as Los Angeles went on to win its second Stanley Cup in three seasons. In 2013, the Ducks had 1-0, 2-1 and 3-2 series leads before falling to the Detroit Red Wings, a top-flight franchise that left a first-round upset of Anaheim as a parting gift on their way to a realigned Eastern Conference. “The last couple years, we felt like we had a team that could contend and compete,” Fowler said. “Losing in the first round left a bitter taste in our mouth. Then we go toe to toe against our rivals, L.A., and lose pretty badly at home for Game 7. Those are experiences that we have gone through together, and we’ve added a couple pieces that can help us along the way. We’re as motivated as we’ve ever been.” Fowler was among several Ducks who said they wanted to focus primarily on their own game plan rather than Chicago’s tendencies and strengths. He said his team would seek to play “meat and potatoes” hockey, avoiding a high-tempo game in which the two teams traded many scoring chances. The Ducks are armed with not only more experience, superior depth and stronger momentum but also an unusual amount of rest. They played just four games in the final 13 days of the regular season and had four days of rest before Round 1 and seven days before Round 2. They are now getting six days without a game starting their series against Chicago. Boudreau, the coach, has pushed his players during those layoffs. He gave them one full day off at the start of each break, otherwise holding practices that were often lengthy, intense and varied in their emphases. “It’s a combination of having hard practices where you push the pace and you’re out there for a while working on what you need to work on but also taking the days off when you get them and giving tired guys rest,” forward Andrew Cogliano said. “With the amount of time we’ve had, we’ve been able to find the balance in between.” Heading into Game 1, the Ducks have their full array of players available, a rare luxury at this stage of the season. Right wing Corey Perry sustained a lower-body injury in Game 5 against Calgary but returned and scored the series-winning goal in overtime. He missed some practice action last week but will play in Game 1 against Chicago after participating in two practices. Perry’s 15 postseason points lead the N.H.L., and center Ryan Getzlaf, his linemate, is close behind with 12. Center Ryan Kesler has averaged a point per game in the playoffs in addition to his defensive exploits against opponents’ top lines and his unparalleled success in the face-off circle. “Going into this year with the Kesler trade in the off-season, the organization sent the message that we’re going after it,” Getzlaf said. “We’re not rebuilding anything here; we’re trying to play for a championship.” The Ducks’ defensemen have contributed 29 playoff points, and the team has also gotten a goal in each of the last five games from left wing Matt Beleskey, who had just three in his previous 21 games, and four goals from left wing Patrick Maroon, who had nine all season. Through March, right wing Jakob Silfverberg had a modest 35 points, having endured four lengthy goal droughts. But he has compiled 15 points in his last 13 games, including 11 in nine playoff games, which is more points than stars such as Rick Nash, Alex Ovechkin, Steven Stamkos and Zach Parise have recorded in more games. During the season, the Ducks dressed six goalies, and last year they used three during the playoffs. But Frederik Andersen has stopped the carousel at last and played every minute of these playoffs. With so many pieces falling into place, many observers have been reminded of the 2007 season, when the Ducks won the lone Stanley Cup in franchise history. “The belief is the same,” said Getzlaf, one of three remaining Ducks from the 2007 team. “No matter what the score is, we just keep playing and keep doing the same things that we do well.”

Ice hockey
Playoffs
Chicago Blackhawks
Anaheim Ducks


N.B.A. and Union to Hold Bargaining Session

Abstract: Lead negotiators for the N.B.A. and its players union will hold a bargaining session next week — just the second since the lockout began — with an unofficial deadline fast approaching to save the start of training camps. Four people involved in the talks said the sides planned to meet in New York, although the day and the location were still being arranged. They might not be in a conciliatory mood when they arrive. Union leaders are still steaming over comments made by Commissioner David Stern in a recent podcast with ESPN.com ’s Bill Simmons. In the interview, Stern insinuated that players were not well informed on the issues. He also framed the economic debate in terms that the union considered misleading — most notably an assertion that players were being asked to take a pay cut of just 8 percent. “It’s not true,” Maurice Evans, a member of the union’s executive board, said Wednesday in a telephone interview. He added, “Blatantly, it’s just lying.” The N.B.A.’s proposal calls for an 8 percent cut in the first year, but it virtually freezes player salaries for the next six years, for a total reduction of $7.6 billion in player salaries, according to the union. “Once you explain that to the guys, the guys understand more fully what’s separating us and why we don’t have a deal,” Evans said from Chicago, where the union is holding a membership meeting Thursday. Union leaders have been holding meetings across the country to keep players informed — and to correct the record when necessary, they say. “While we haven’t heard Maurice Evans’s remarks, I can confirm that we last proposed $2 billion in total player compensation for next season, an 8 percent reduction from last season,” the N.B.A. spokesman Mike Bass said. Officials on both sides of the labor divide have pointed toward Labor Day as a key milestone, because training camps are scheduled to open the week of Oct. 2. Next week’s bargaining session may be the first critical moment of the two-month standoff. “I think so,” Evans said. “Hopefully, the owners will have some kind of sense of urgency, sooner rather than later, for everybody’s sake.”

Basketball
National Basketball Assn
Organized Labor
Lockouts
Stern David


Wary of Losing Rams, St. Louis Is Set to Huddle on Stadium

Abstract: ST. LOUIS — For beleaguered Rams fans, it was the happiest of celebrations: Last month, the team that won the franchise’s only Super Bowl title gathered for a 15th-anniversary reunion. Marshall Faulk, Kurt Warner and four dozen other members of the Greatest Show on Turf were bathed in cheers from fans who have watched a lot of losing teams since that magical season. But when their coach, Dick Vermeil, thanked the team’s owner, Stan Kroenke, for putting the party together, he was showered with boos. A multibillionaire with a flair for staying in the shadows, Kroenke has become a bogeyman to Rams fans who fear he will move the team back to Southern California. There is no shortage of omens for those in search of them. When negotiations between Kroenke and the regional sports authority over renovations to the team’s stadium stalled, the team reverted to a year-to-year lease. Kroenke bought a big piece of property in Los Angeles, where two other real estate groups hope to build stadiums to lure a team. Kroenke rarely speaks to the news media, and his silence, some fans believe, means he has made up his mind to leave. The reality is that no matter how much Kroenke may want to move to Los Angeles, he cannot leave St. Louis without the consent of the other 31 N.F.L. owners, who will weigh many factors, including whether the club has engaged in good-faith negotiations with the local community. To that end, Gov. Jay Nixon of Missouri, who has insisted that St. Louis should remain an N.F.L. city, is expected this week to appoint a task force of local leaders whose charge will be to work with the Rams, government officials and business leaders on a plan for a new football stadium in St. Louis. By engaging the Rams in conversations about a stadium, the group hopes to prevent St. Louis from losing its second N.F.L. team in a quarter-century. (The Cardinals left for Arizona in 1988.) While no formal proposal for a stadium is in place, civic leaders have been laying the groundwork, including looking for sites for an outdoor facility that could be located near the Edward Jones Dome, the team’s current home. Business leaders hope a new stadium will revitalize the Mississippi River waterfront and other parts of downtown, which has been significantly transformed in recent years. “To be a competitive N.F.L. city, we’re going to have to work on a new stadium, and there’s no better place to do it than in the heart of our region, downtown,” said Doug Woodruff, chief executive of Downtown STL, an economic development group. “St. Louis works hard to be on the national scene, and having an N.F.L. team is one measure of that.” Still, significant hurdles remain. Given the experience of N.F.L. teams in Atlanta, Minneapolis and elsewhere, a new stadium for the Rams could easily top $1 billion, and no financing has been identified. Like other N.F.L. owners, Kroenke, who through a spokesman declined to speak for this article, could demand revenue from parking, naming rights and nonfootball-related events that might otherwise be used to cover construction costs. Against Public Financing Politics in Missouri are thorny, too. Nixon is a Democrat in his final term, while the statehouse is dominated by Republicans, many of whom favor cuts in government spending. Cost-conscious conservatives and liberals who favored using public money on social causes joined hands to oppose public financing to help the far more popular Cardinals baseball team build a new stadium a decade ago. Back then, the Coalition Against Public Funding for Stadiums successfully pushed for laws that would force politicians to hold public referendums before any tax money was spent on building a professional sports stadium. “The one uniting factor was not wasting money that could otherwise be used for other public services and not wasting money on making rich people richer,” said Fred Lindecke, a leading member of the coalition. The city, county and state now spend $24 million a year to pay off the bonds on the Edward Jones Dome, which was built two decades ago to attract an N.F.L. team to St. Louis. Politicians, Lindecke said, are wary of writing another blank check to a wealthy sports owner. Kroenke is not just any owner. He grew up in Mora, Mo., a town about three hours west of St. Louis, and was named after two Cardinals Hall of Famers, Enos Slaughter and Stan Musial. He attended the University of Missouri, married Ann Walton, a Walmart heiress, and became a major real estate developer. According to Forbes, Kroenke and his wife are worth $10.7 billion . Image The Rams playing a preseason game at the Edward Jones Dome, their home since 1995. Credit Jamie Squire/Getty Images Along the way, he built a sports empire that includes the Denver Nuggets of the National Basketball Association, the Colorado Avalanche of the National Hockey League, the Colorado Rapids of Major League Soccer, Arsenal of the Premier League and, of course, the Rams. Despite owning such visible organizations, Kroenke has been labeled Silent Stanley. Kroenke is not even quoted in his own biography in the Rams Insider magazine. At a recent N.F.L. owners meeting, he turned and walked away from journalists who tried to introduce themselves. “If the owner connects with the fans, it makes all the difference,” said Frank Viverito, the president of the St. Louis Sports Commission. “The relationship with the Rams isn’t bad now, but it isn’t warm.” Two decades ago, though, civic leaders persuaded Kroenke to help attract an N.F.L. team to replace the Cardinals. After St. Louis failed to land an expansion franchise, Georgia Frontiere moved the Rams here from Anaheim, Calif., and Kroenke took a 40 percent stake in the club. By most measures, the Rams got a good deal. The city, county and state built them a home, charged them a reasonable rent and agreed to maintain the building so it was competitive with the top quarter of N.F.L. stadiums. Since the dome opened in 1995, though, nearly every other team has upgraded its stadium or moved into a new home. The dome has been improved over the years, but by N.F.L. standards it is an outdated building. There was hope the stadium would get a face-lift after Kroenke exercised his right of first refusal and bought the 60 percent of the team that was owned by Frontiere, who died in 2008. Shahid Khan, who now owns the Jacksonville Jaguars, had sought that stake. “When he took over the 100 percent, we thought he was committed,” said Randy Karraker, a radio show host at 101 ESPN. “But it seems like he bought the Rams more as an investment than for a love of sports.” Karraker said Kroenke’s silence has left fans uneasy, particularly because the Rams have not had a winning season since 2003 and just four since they arrived in St. Louis in 1995. “It makes us nervous that we don’t hear anything from Stan,” said David Wahl, a season-ticket holder who attended a recent home game. “He wouldn’t have to do much to show he cares. There would be a scar on the city if we lost a team twice.” No Decision on Move While Kroenke rarely speaks, Kevin Demoff, the team’s chief operating officer, said in a recent radio interview that no decision has been made about whether to move the Rams. “I think our focus is on, you know, playing through the rest of the lease and seeing how things play out,” he said, adding that a “global solution for St. Louis on the stadium front” was needed to prevent the team from moving. The governor’s task force and any stadium proposals that it produces could provide the global solution Demoff suggested. “If they do it properly, it’s hard to see how the Rams would qualify to relocate under existing league rules,” Marc Ganis, a consultant to several N.F.L. teams, said of the governor’s task force. The league’s relocation guidelines designed to prevent teams from moving willy-nilly are extensive. When other owners consider whether to let a team move, they look at whether a team is profitable, received public financing and made credible attempts to build or refurbish its stadium. According to Forbes, the Rams are worth $930 million , the least of any N.F.L. team, yet they generated $16.2 million in operating income last year. At least three-quarters of the owners must approve any relocation. The owners will have to weigh many other factors, including whether a team in Los Angeles will hurt the Chargers in San Diego, and whether abandoning St. Louis, the country’s 21st-largest television market and home to several big sponsors, will hurt the league. Commissioner Roger Goodell also said a credible long-term stadium deal was needed in Los Angeles before any team could move there, without specifying what that deal might look like. But given that the N.F.L. has grown steadily since the Rams and the Raiders left Southern California two decades ago, it is not clear the league is any rush to return, no matter how much Kroenke might want to.

Missouri
Football
Stadiums Arenas
St Louis
Stan Kroenke
Jay Nixon
Urban Planning
Los Angeles
Rams


U.N.C. Seeded No. 1 in Baseball

Abstract: North Carolina is the No. 1 seed in the N.C.A.A. baseball tournament. The Division I selection committee rewarded the Tar Heels (52-8) for a strong body of work that included an exhausting run to the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament championship. The 64-team tournament opens Friday with 16 four-team, double-elimination regionals. ■ Nicole Gibbs of Stanford repeated as women’s N.C.A.A tennis champion, defeating a hobbled Mary Weatherholt of Nebraska, 6-2, 6-4. Blaz Rola became Ohio State’s first men’s tennis champion, beating Jarmere Jenkins of Virginia, 7-6 (8), 6-4.


Woman Charged as Madam Has Powerful Ties, Prosecutor Tells Judge

Abstract: According to Manhattan prosecutors, Anna Gristina is a well-connected madam who made millions of dollars running a brothel on the Upper East Side that catered to wealthy clients, where passers-by say fancy cars were seen idling past midnight. And when she was arrested last month, they said, she was with a Morgan Stanley banker whom she had just met about expanding her business. But to one of Ms. Gristina’s lawyers, Peter J. Gleason, she is simply an entrepreneur who held business meetings about setting up a legitimate dating Web site that “would have rivaled Match.com .” And to Susan Magidson, who worked with Ms. Gristina rescuing pet pigs from unsuitable homes, she is a demure, plain-living mother of four with a special empathy for the animals they helped match with adoptive families. “We identify the pigs who need homes and we try to match-make,” Ms. Magidson said in a telephone interview from Bucks County, Pa., where the two women work with Ross Mill Farm and Piggy Camp. The investigation, under way for five years, has been conducted by the Official Corruption Unit of the Manhattan district attorney’s office. It is unclear whether the inquiry has uncovered any criminal activity by police officers or public officials. Prosecutors have not named any suspected clients. At a hearing on Tuesday, prosecutors told a judge in State Supreme Court in Manhattan that Ms. Gristina, 44, had connections to rich and powerful people who might help her flee in order to keep the case from proceeding. Ms. Gristina, who pleaded not guilty on Feb. 23 to a single count of promoting prostitution, is being held on Rikers Island, unable to make bail set at $1 million cash or $2 million bond. The charge of promoting prostitution is a felony that carries a maximum sentence of seven years in prison. The case, prosecutors say, stems from what they have described as hundreds of hours of surveillance by the corruption unit, which they said conducted multiple undercover operations and developed numerous informers. Prosecutors said the investigators had videotaped sexual encounters and had a witness to at least one encounter involving under-age prostitutes. Ms. Gristina has a co-defendant, whose name was blacked out from the indictment, which could indicate that the person is cooperating with the authorities. Before she was arrested, Ms. Gristina boasted that she had law enforcement contacts who would tip her off if she was in danger of getting caught, an assistant district attorney, Charles Linehan, said in court on Tuesday. Now, wealthy friends and business associates may have “an interest in not allowing this case to go forward,” he told Judge Juan Merchan as he argued successfully against a request by Ms. Gristina’s lawyers to reduce her bail so that she could see her children in Monroe, N.Y., north of New York City. Mr. Gleason, who is a former police officer, said in an interview that he did not know who the co-defendant was or who else was involved in the case. He said he was put in touch with Ms. Gristina by a mutual friend, Vincent Parco, a private investigator whom Ms. Gristina had consulted about how she could check the backgrounds of clients for her planned dating Web site. Mr. Parco, who was also in court, said the site would be “sophisticated,” for people who “want to know who they’re meeting.” Mr. Gleason called the prosecution “hypocrisy,” adding, “Eliot Spitzer gets a pass, and the females all go to jail.” While the idea of a brothel on the Upper East Side might conjure images of luxurious gilt boudoirs, the building where the prostitution is said to have taken place, on East 78th Street, is more Yorkville tenement than mansion. The modest, narrow, brick walk-up just east of Second Avenue is near an Indian restaurant, a dry cleaner and the historic bakery Orwasher’s. A resident of the building said she had wondered about the frequency of visitors, who often annoyed her by ringing her buzzer to get into the building. At least twice, she said, a man rang her bell and said he was a broker coming to show an apartment. M. D. Azad, the owner of the Indian restaurant on the ground floor of the building, said he would see groups of up to six people, mainly women younger than 30, entering and leaving the building. Camilo Ruan, 36, a salesman, said he lived a block away and walked by late at night to go to the gym. He often saw nicely dressed women going into the building, which he said was nothing unusual for the neighborhood. But what did seem “extremely strange,” he said, were the fancy cars frequently waiting in the street at 11 p.m. or midnight. Ms. Magidson, who has placed six pigs with Ms. Gristina for foster care over the years, said Ms. Gristina was not “flashy or rich.” “Pigs are one of Anna’s passions,” she said. “When people love pigs, in my opinion, they are special and unique — and in my opinion, the chosen ones — because they’re just such a special animal, highly intelligent, emotional animal, so it’s like working with orphans.” But at Ms. Gristina’s arraignment on Feb. 23, according to a court transcript, prosecutors described her as brashly declaring that she had powerful allies “poised to help” if she ever needed to flee. “She has business contacts worldwide,” Mr. Linehan said then, adding that Ms. Gristina “claimed to have made millions over the 15 or so years she has been in business as a madam.” On Tuesday morning, Ms. Gristina entered the courtroom in handcuffs, wearing a black herringbone jacket. As she left, she looked over her shoulder as if looking for someone in particular.

Prostitution
Upper East Side (NYC)
Gristina Anna
Pigs


Amid the Wall Street Chaos: Confusion, Anger and Shifting Opinions

Abstract: BOULDER, Colo. — Molly Winter, a longtime supporter of Mark Udall, the Democratic congressman for this liberal-leaning city nestled up against the Rocky Mountains, got up Tuesday, looked at the shambles of her 401(k) retirement plan, and dashed off an e-mail message to Mr. Udall. It was laced, she said, with some very pointed questions. “I asked him what his plan is now to reinstate the value in my 401(k),” said Ms. Winter, 58, who works for the city and identified herself as a Democrat. “He needs to be accountable and say what his long-term strategy is.” In interviews across the country, in the districts of six members of Congress — three Republicans and three Democrats, three who voted for the bailout and three, including Mr. Udall, who voted against it — voters and members of Congress alike said they were grappling Tuesday with a cold, harsh newfound reality. What had been perhaps been a philosophical or ideological debate — about the role of government in the financial markets or the wisdom of sending billion-dollar checks to Wall Street, or the political calculus of voting yes or no for a plan that most people assumed would pass anyway — had become in the course of one day suddenly, frighteningly concrete. “Reality is here,” said Ms. Winter, who said she still planned to vote for Mr. Udall, who is running for the Senate, but that the pressure is now on him to deliver. “How do we move forward?” Some Congressional offices reported a shift in tone and tenor. Strong opposition to the plan in predominantly Democratic districts like Mr. Udall’s and Republican-leaning ones like Representative Steven C. LaTourette’s near Cleveland melted into an anxious babble, with lots of support for the idea of doing something — anything — that would end the crisis. “Before yesterday, they were about 200-to-1 against the bailout,” said Mr. LaTourette, who voted against the package. “Now I’d say it’s balanced 50-50 between those who favor a bailout and those who oppose it. I know people who are taking out cash from their savings accounts and literally hiding it under their mattresses.” Still, some people here in Colorado and in the other districts said they were standing pat. They had hated the bailout plan before, some for conservative reasons, some for liberal ones, and were thoroughly glad it was dead. Something better would arise from the ashes, they predicted. But many others were just shaken and shocked and afraid and not at all sure what Congress, or individuals in taking stock of their finances and futures, should do next to reinstate some sense of stability. Everywhere, sometimes in the same sentence, beliefs and fears — what should happen and what might happen — were in collision, and a deep well of anger was, for almost everyone, just beneath the surface. “The thing is that I don’t think I got a call from her office to ask our opinion; they didn’t call to say, ‘Do you want to fill out a survey or what do you think about this?’ ” said Verona Burks, 56, of Los Angeles, referring to her congresswoman, Maxine Waters, a Democrat who voted for the bailout package. “When they want your vote, they call and keep calling.” Ms. Burks, a Democrat who lost a retailing job after 22 years when the company went bankrupt in 2004, now works as an administrative assistant in a restaurant in Inglewood, Calif., said Ms. Waters and the rest of Congress needed to get back to work, and fast. “I’m of the opinion today, after hearing everything, that she — they — need to go back to the table and figure out a solution that thinks of taxpayers first,” Ms. Burks said. Some voters said they sympathized with their elected representatives, facing situations that were unpalatable on either side. “It’s hard to know whether Congressman Lewis was right or not,” said Larry Phillips, 28, a management consultant in Atlanta who identified himself as a Democrat, referring to his representative, John Lewis, a Democrat who voted against the bailout. “There doesn’t seem to be any easy solution,” Mr. Phillips added. “If he supports the bailout, people will say he’s helping Wall Street companies. If he doesn’t, they’ll say he made the economy even worse.” The pressure was clearly flowing both ways. “I checked online to see if Kirk voted in favor of the bailout,” said John McLaughlin, 52, a consultant from Arlington Heights, Ill., who said he applauded Representative Mark Steven Kirk’s decision — as one of just 65 Republicans in the House — to support the bailout. “I was going to send him an angry e-mail if he voted no,” added Mr. McLaughlin, who has a “Kirk for U.S. Congress” sign on his front lawn. “I don’t like the bailout, but unfortunately, we have no other choice.” Indeed, some members of Congress actually seemed to have found a winning position through the political fallout after the vote, even as the markets reeled on Monday and the public perception of Congress, many people said, sank another notch. Representative Jon Porter, a Republican from the Las Vegas suburbs who voted for the package, said calls and e-mail had been heavily against the bailout, but he voted for it because of the economy’s dire circumstances. That surprised and impressed Julianna Hendrickson, 34, of Henderson, Nev., who said it showed an independence in Mr. Porter that she had not seen before. “I will admit I am thinking again about voting for him because of this, and he never did much for me before,” said Ms. Hendrickson, a Democrat and mother of five whose bank recently reassessed her home and yanked her equity line of credit because of its dwindled value. A spokesman for Mr. Porter said calls and e-mail running strongly against the bailout before Monday’s vote had shifted since then to support it. Some people said the intense level of public input on the bailout plan, in pressuring members of Congress to vote one way or another, was an expression of democracy at its worst. “I think that the mob shot it down,” said Phil Schmidt, 44, an aerospace engineer from Longmont, Colo., in Mr. Udall’s district. “People calling their congressman and saying I’m not going to vote for you if you don’t do this, and them fearing for their jobs, they voted no even though it was the smart thing to do.” Added Mr. Schmidt, who identified himself as a Republican: “Never underestimate the stupidity of a mob.” Mr. Udall, who said on the television program “Meet the Press” on Sunday that his mail was divided between “people who say no and people who say hell no,” said in an interview on Tuesday that he was “moderately surprised” when the bailout package failed. But he said he had known all along that more work needed to be done. “I knew it wouldn’t be the end either way,” he said. “That was the point of my vote: let’s go fix it.” But what needs fixing, and how to do it, were questions that left many voters scratching their heads on Tuesday. “I’m really not understanding all that’s involved in this bailout and why this is such a problem all of a sudden,” said Edna Ivery, 63, a retiree who lives with her husband, Jerry, in Warrensville Heights, Ohio, and was shopping in Mentor, in Mr. LaTourette’s district. “I worked in the central office of a bank for 35 years, and things were good; the bank was solid,” Ms. Ivery, a Democrat, said. “How did the banks fail so bad, so quickly?” A common thread most everywhere was that the pain and damage, financial and psychological, was running deep. Ted Walker, an 87-year-old retired professor of geology from the University of Colorado, said he had lost 10 percent of his life savings in the last week. Even with that, Mr. Walker, a Democrat, said he supported Mr. Udall’s decision to vote no and would hold firm and vote again for the congressman in his Senate race. But even as people debated and discussed the consequences and the best way forward, some said they were more confused than ever about what to believe. Alisa Arnold, 42, a flight attendant from Jacksonville Beach, Fla., was having pizza on a layover in Providence, R.I., on Tuesday (and brought her own Diet Coke with her to save money), said she was afraid that the government was not telling Americans just how bad things could get. But Ms. Arnold also thought it was possible she was being manipulated by that very sense of fear. “I hope I’m not being scared into supporting the bailout,” she said.

Troubled Asset Relief Program (2008)
House of Representatives
Subprime Mortgage Crisis


At the U.S. Open, They Know the Ins and Outs

Abstract: Line umpires are charged with a fairly simple task: to sit or stand around the perimeter of the court and monitor one specific line, calling the ball out if it lands beyond that line. But they have to make a correct call, instantaneously, on a ball that can be traveling upward of 140 miles per hour if it is a serve. They also have to keep their view from being obstructed by the player trying to return the shot they are calling. The first step in accomplishing this task happens before the match. Joan Vormbaum, a veteran chief of line umpires who has officiated at the United States Open 31 times, said that the most experienced officials picked up on patterns of the specific players they were watching, particularly when working sidelines for a serve, so they could anticipate the most advantageous position for an unobscured line of sight. These patterns include basics like whether the server is right-handed or left-handed (which changes how a serve will spin), as well as more advanced patterns like tendencies when a player is facing a break point. “The experienced line judges watch them during a warm-up,” Vormbaum said. “They have called on a court with them before, so they have an idea of where the best place is to stand so that you have an unobstructed view of your line. You have to have an unobstructed view of the ball approaching your line because we don’t really see that point of contact when it’s a 140-m.p.h. serve — you see the approaching trajectory and the departing trajectory. Your brain manufactures an image.” Lamont Penry, who will be officiating at the Open for a 33rd year, also adjusts for the patterns of returners who may cheat toward one side to improve their odds of hitting their preferred type of shot, putting their body in an unexpected place. “If it’s the deuce court and the returner is a lefty, then it’s likely that the serve is going to go to his backhand on the first serve,” Penry said. “The returner is going to move around to get to his forehand on the first serve; a lot of guys like to hit the inside out.” To increase their chances of seeing where a serve lands, line umpires working on the sidelines will sometimes shift position slightly before a serve. “What you don’t want is to be blocked in any of that process,” Vormbaum said, “by a player’s racket or his leg, or with the girls a skirt, or something like that.” To keep returners from blinding them, line umpires will stand wide of a line to observe it from an angle instead of directly behind it. As the player moves with the oncoming ball, the official maintains an unimpaired vantage point. “You don’t want to go too wide because then when the ball comes down, it blocks your view of the space between the ball and the line,” Vormbaum said. “So it’s a total judgment call, and it’s all about experience.” Some line umpires assigned to the sideline will take a different tack, moving toward the middle of the court instead of outside the sideline. “You have to be counterintuitive,” said Jim Bodensick, who is officiating at his 20th Open this year. “You have to go against the flow so that if the player goes in front of you, if they go right, you go left. Some people stay with the flow, and they’re blocked. “You want to have a clear view, and you want to be focused where the ball hits, when it hits, and with your head still. That way, your eyes can take the picture, and then you can instantaneously make the judgment and the call.” Video All eyes will be on Serena Williams and Roger Federer at this year’s United States Open. Credit Credit Michael Appleton for The New York Times While line umpires are allowed to move before the serve and then reset to their standard position behind the line as the rally begins, movement beyond leaning during the point is discouraged. “If you get blocked, you give an unsighted signal, hands over face, which you don’t like to do very often — it’s your job to get in the right place,” Vormbaum said. “And the most important thing is, if you feel like it’s not the greatest spot, you change the next time you’re behind the receiver.” Aside from the sidelines, the line that is most often obstructed is the service line during doubles, which can be completely blocked by the receiver’s partner. Calling the baseline also presents challenges in terms of keeping the head still, which requires line umpires to focus on the area of the line and pick up the moving ball with their peripheral vision, instead of moving their head to follow the ball during the rally. “That’s called tracking, and you get graded down for that because your eyes are moving,” Vormbaum said. “It’s the hardest line on the court. You try to keep it in your peripheral vision so you’re not surprised, because that makes your head jump. But you get your head down before and you get to see it approach, and then you get a really good picture of the trajectory.” Though each line on a tennis court is at least one inch wide (the baseline is wider), elite umpires train their eyes on the outside edge of the line. “If the ball is on the line, dead on the line, that’s usually a very easy call,” Bodensick said. “We’re calling the edges, whether it’s touching the edge or missing by millimeters.” Marija Cicak started as a line umpire when she was 15 at satellite tournaments in her native Croatia and worked her way up to more prestigious tournaments to become a chair umpire. In July at Wimbledon, Cicak officiated a Grand Slam singles final for the first time. Cicak said that next to great vision, which must be checked regularly for officials, match experience was the most important asset for a line umpire. “It’s not easy to call a ball that you see just out on match point that could be a double fault,” she said. “You have to know how to deal with the pressure.” The pressure would seem to have increased when line umpires’ calls began to be publicly audited in 2006, when the Hawk-Eye review system was introduced. But Vormbaum, who was the chief of line umpires when the challenge system made its debut, remembered being impressed by how the technology validated their calls. “We were anxious beforehand because we want the calls to be right,” she said. “That’s all we want. There would be nothing more frustrating than making a great call and having the machine say something else. But it didn’t come to be.” Though the chair umpire is a fixed role at nearly every level of professional tennis, the number of line umpires varies. At show courts at the United States Open, there are nine line umpires per court; on outer courts there are seven (the official calling the center service line moves to the left or right to cover the sideline for the next shot). Just like players, line umpires advance through the tournament based on merit. As the tournament progresses from qualifying through the main draw and the number of matches shrinks, the officials who have received the best marks for their work advance. By the final, the cream of the crop remains. “There’s clearly science to it because we have to be exact, but it’s really an art,” Vormbaum said. “The crazy thing is, line umpires aren’t made; they’re born. You have to have a special talent, and these people have that talent. When I started to be a chief umpire — the first time was 1985 — I was just stunned by how accurate some people are. “It’s a gift. Like being an opera singer, you have to have the voice. To be a line umpire, you have to have that special something. I don’t even know what you call it.”


Andrew Luck Helps Stanford Top Virginia Tech in Orange Bowl

Abstract: MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — So spectacular was the Orange Bowl show they had seen, members of the Stanford football traveling party held up cellphone cameras as if they were lighters and roared for an encore. As Cardinal quarterback Andrew Luck stood on the makeshift stage after leading Stanford to a 40-12 victory against Virginia Tech on Monday night, Cardinal fans serenaded him with the chant “One more year!” Luck , a junior, was named the game’s most valuable player after breaking open a one-point game with a near flawless second half. He completed 9 of 10 passes after halftime, including three for scores to tight end Coby Fleener. If this was Luck’s last college game, he went out with fireworks, passing for 287 yards and 4 touchdowns. Luck’s counterpart, Tyrod Taylor, passed for 223 yards and a touchdown, and was intercepted once. Asked about the decision he is mulling over taking his talents to the N.F.L., Luck demurred, saying he wanted to savor the victory, which assures No. 5 Stanford (12-1) of its first national top-five finish since the 1940 season. “I think there are a lot of worse decisions you might have to make in life,” Luck said. It was an answer that elicited a guffaw from Stanford Coach Jim Harbaugh, who was seated next to Luck on the dais. Harbaugh might have said the same thing about his own career options. Harbaugh has become the beau of the bowl season, with N.F.L. teams and his alma mater, Michigan, among those reportedly courting him. When asked if he had coached his last game at Stanford, Harbaugh smirked and said: “Oh, please. Please. Give me a break. Have some respect for the game. It’s about the performance tonight of these players, and I love them.” Harbaugh, a quarterback who starred for the Wolverines before playing 15 seasons in the N.F.L., has a special affinity for Luck, whom he described as “the straw that stirs the drink around here.” After struggling to find his rhythm in the first half, Luck led the Cardinal on scoring drives of 59, 97 , 87 and 72 yards in the final 30 minutes in a performance that Harbaugh described as “a point explosion.” He added: “I thought there were no mistakes from there on out. Everybody was just on point and executed extremely well.” Making his first appearance in a bowl game, in his team’s biggest game in decades, Luck seemed a beat off in his rhythm. In the first half he completed 9 of 13 attempts for 86 yards. Luck was intercepted only seven times during the regular season. But on a second-quarter pass, cornerback Jayron Hosley made the ninth interception of his superlative season. Hosley nearly recorded his 10th interception early in the third quarter on a Luck pass aimed right at him, but he dropped it. After averting the momentum swing, the Cardinal scored a few plays later on a 1-yard run by fullback Owen Marecic to take a 19-12 lead. On the Hokies’ ensuing drive, Taylor was intercepted inside the Stanford 5 by safety Delano Howell, who was one of the largely unheralded Cardinal players to take a star turn. Fleener, who had a career-high six receptions for 172 yards, was another. So was Shayne Skov, a sophomore linebacker who led a Cardinal defense that sacked Taylor seven times. Then there was Jeremy Stewart, a senior running back who broke a 60-yard run, his career long, for the first score of the game. Stewart had gained only 39 yards during an injury-plagued regular season. The Cardinal entered intermission clinging to a 13-12 lead on the strength of Luck’s first touchdown throw, of 25 yards to tight end Zach Ertz. “There’s so many M.V.P.’s on the team tonight,” Luck said, adding, “so it is very humbling as well to take that trophy.” No. 12 Virginia Tech (11-3) unveiled mandarin orange helmets for the first time, which was an inspired touch. From the multihued blues of Biscayne Bay to the winter carnival that is Collins Avenue, South Florida is where subtlety goes to hibernate. With three trips to the Orange Bowl in the past four seasons, the Hokies have figured out that the best way to fit in here is to stand out. Taylor never looked more brilliant than on a play in the second quarter when he scrambled to his left to avoid being tackled and bought himself enough time to find David Wilson in the end zone with an 11-yard pass. Taylor was terrific, but against an inspired Stanford defense, he spent more of his energy running for his life than for the end zone. For all the sterling performances on the field, the man of the moment did not make a tackle or convert a first down. So long a shadow did Harbaugh cast over the game that a thousand miles away, he was darkening Michigan Coach Rich Rodriguez’s door. In Monday’s Detroit Free Press , Harbaugh’s face appeared on the front page, above the fold, alongside the headline “Fire Rodriguez, Hire Harbaugh.” Rodriguez is 15-22 in three seasons at Michigan; Harbaugh is 25-13 at Stanford in the same period. Was the Orange Bowl Harbaugh’s last hurrah at Stanford? Will Luck leave school early to take his talents to the N.F.L.? After the Cardinal’s impressive victory, it was all over but the agonizing.

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University


Belarus Executes Man, 26, Convicted in Subway Bombing

Abstract: MOSCOW — A man sentenced to death in connection with the bombing of a subway station in Belarus has been executed, the man’s family said Saturday. The man, Vladislav Kovalyov, 26, was convicted of helping his childhood friend carry out the April 2011 bombing , but human rights groups and Western governments have cast serious doubt on the verdict, pointing to flaws in the investigation. Confirmation of Mr. Kovalyov’s execution came in a letter from the Supreme Court delivered on Saturday to his family’s residence in Vitsyebsk, a town in northeastern Belarus. Tatyana Kozyar, Mr. Kovalyov’s sister, uploaded a copy of the letter to the Russian social networking site VKontakte with the caption “They’ve killed Vlad.” The letter, dated March 16, said, “I inform you that the sentence of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Belarus from 30 November 2011 in relation to your son, Kovalyov Vladislav Yuryevich, has been carried out.” Ms. Kozyar told Radio Liberty that her mother was in shock after reading the letter and could not speak. “They killed him,” she said, sobbing. “All was in vain, all was in vain.” The authorities have not yet publicly confirmed the execution, though they rarely do in capital punishment cases. Mr. Kovalyov was convicted as an accessory to the bombing, which killed 15 people and wounded about 200 during the evening rush hour at a crowded subway station in Belarus’s capital, Minsk. Dmitri Konovalov, a childhood friend, was said to have built and detonated the explosive device. Mr. Konovalov was also sentenced to death, but there has been no confirmation that his sentence has been carried out. For months, human rights groups and Western governments have been urging Belarus’s president, Aleksandr G. Lukashenko, to call off the execution, citing a failure by prosecutors to offer conclusive evidence linking the men to the bombing. Though both men initially confessed , Mr. Kovalyov later testified that he had been beaten by investigators and forced to accept responsibility for the bombing. Mr. Konovalov never retracted his confession but was not able to offer a clear motive. The men were both factory workers from Vitsyebsk who had gone to school together and lived in the same apartment complex. Months before the bombing, Mr. Kovalyov moved to Minsk in search of better employment, his family said. Their last hope for clemency dissipated last week, when Mr. Lukashenko refused to grant them a presidential pardon. Belarus, a former Soviet republic of about 10 million people, is the only country in Europe that still has the death penalty. Its system of capital punishment, which has changed little since Soviet days, has been criticized as barbaric. Prisoners are told of their impending execution only moments before it is carried out. Typically, the condemned are shot in the back of the head. Bodies are buried in unmarked graves that are kept secret from family and friends. Speaking to journalists in December, Mr. Lukashenko said he personally reviewed all death penalty cases before the sentences were carried out. “I take all death penalty sentences to heart,” he said. “When I open those folders with documents and photographs, it is terrifying.”

Belarus
Capital Punishment
Kovalyov Vladislav


U.N. Envoy for Syria Seeks to Resume Peace Talks

Abstract: The United Nations special envoy for Syria said Wednesday that he had invited a range of Syrians to participate in what he described as preparatory, separate discussions on how to restart peace talks after more than four years of war. In a briefing to the United Nations Security Council, the special envoy, Staffan de Mistura, said such discussions were “aimed at stress-testing any willingness, if there is any, of narrowing gaps” between President Bashar al-Assad’s government and its opponents. Mr. de Mistura, who is the third United Nations envoy to seek negotiations to resolve the conflict, which began in March 2011, was vague about the timing, participants and venue of such discussions. But Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who also appeared before the Security Council on Wednesday, later told reporters outside the chambers that the proposal was aimed at beginning a “step-by-step process to operationalize the Geneva Communiqué ,” the 2012 document that became the starting point for Syria peace talks. Mr. Ban said the discussions were envisioned to start in coming weeks. Mr. de Mistura said that he had spent the past few months interviewing 216 people connected to the conflict, Syrian and non-Syrian, and that those discussions had revealed “a genuinely shared sense of urgency” about the fracturing of the country and the rise of Islamic militancy there, providing the basis for seeking a new way to resume peace talks. In his prepared remarks to the Council, Mr. Ban said that at least 250,000 Syrians had been killed in the conflict, which has morphed into the world’s “largest humanitarian crisis.” Syria After Four Years of Mayhem A look at the conflict that has dismembered Syria and inflamed the region with one of the world’s worst religious and sectarian wars. Almost half the country’s 25 million people have been forced to flee their homes, Mr. Ban said; the Islamic State and Nusra Front extremist groups have taken over parts of the country; sectarian hatreds have worsened; and the conflict has become a theater for “new, indiscriminate killing devices.” They include the Syrian Army’s barrel bombs — explosive-filled barrels dropped on civilian populations — and so-called hell cannons, improvised artillery devices made by Syrian insurgents. “Atrocious crimes are now almost an hourly occurrence, fed by a lack of accountability for the major human rights violations committed over the past four years and through decades of repression,” Mr. Ban said. The Security Council meeting on Syria came against a backdrop of other political shifts in recent weeks that could portend changes in the conflict, although it is unclear whether they mean that it is any closer to an end. On Sunday, in a striking admission , Mr. Assad conceded on Syrian national television that his army lacked soldiers and that it had surrendered territory to insurgents. Last week, the United States and Turkey, which oppose Mr. Assad, reached an agreement that will allow American warplanes to bomb Islamic State redoubts in Syria and create a safe zone near the Turkish border for the moderate Syrian insurgents seeking to oust Mr. Assad. This month, an international agreement was reached on the disputed nuclear activities of Iran, Mr. Assad’s ally in the region. Mr. Ban and other diplomats have said that they hope that the momentum generated by the agreement can spill over into finding a way to end the Syrian conflict.

Syria
UN
Staffan de Mistura
Ban Ki moon
Bashar al-Assad


N.B.A. Draft Lottery: Timberwolves Get First Pick, Knicks Fall to Fourth

Abstract: Steve Mills, the general manager of the Knicks, leaned back in his chair and sighed as ESPN went to its final commercial break Tuesday night during the N.B.A.’s annual draft lottery. The order of the top three teams had yet to be revealed, but Mills and the rest of civilization already knew that the Knicks would not be among them. Mills was soon left alone in his four-person row on the ballroom stage at the New York Hilton, having been abandoned by representatives of the Minnesota Timberwolves, the Los Angeles Lakers and the Philadelphia 76ers, each of whom took a spot at the center of the dais. Mills could only watch the festivities unfold without him. “There’s a little disappointment, obviously,” he said later. Months after abandoning any hope of a respectable season in hopes of wooing the lottery gods, the Knicks were instead slapped with the fourth pick in this year’s draft, scheduled for June 25 at Barclays Center. It was not a total disaster — the Knicks could have fallen to fifth — but they had the second-best odds of winning the top pick and are now almost assured of missing out on two potentially franchise-altering big men, Karl-Anthony Towns of Kentucky and Jahlil Okafor of Duke. The Timberwolves, who had finished with the league’s worst record (16-66), won the top pick, followed by the Lakers and then the 76ers. Byron Scott, the coach of the Lakers, pumped his fist on the stage when he learned that his team had leapfrogged the Knicks to secure a top-three pick. Knicks personnel had practically set up camp at Kentucky this winter to scout Towns and a couple of his teammates. “We would have liked to have received a higher pick,” Mills said, “but we went into this knowing that anywhere between 1 and 5, we were going to get a good player. And the way we look at this, this is a player that’s complementary to a player that we have in place in Carmelo and what we’re going to do in free agency.” In referring to Carmelo Anthony, Mills worked to put a positive spin on the evening. He was not wrong to suggest that this draft class is deep, especially at the top of the lottery, featuring several players who could improve teams from the outset. The list of elite prospects includes two point guards, D’Angelo Russell of Ohio State and Emmanuel Mudiay, a native of the Democratic Republic of Congo who played professionally in China this season. Mills said he had not scouted Mudiay in China, and Mudiay remains a bit of a mystery. But the Knicks are expected to evaluate several players as the draft approaches, and Mills did not rule out the possibility of trading the pick. “We think he’s a guy who obviously will be in the mix,” Mills said of Mudiay, “but we’re going to look at all of our options.” Mills, who was seated alongside representatives of 13 other teams, watched as Mark Tatum, the league’s deputy commissioner, opened 14 envelopes, one by one, each containing a team logo. The Knicks, who went 17-65, the second-worst record in the league, had a 19.9 percent chance of winning the lottery and a 55.8 percent chance of being among the top three. But they also had a 31.9 percent chance of dipping to No. 4. Fran Fraschilla, an analyst for ESPN, said it was not the worst place to be, given the quality at the top of the draft. “All of these players, in their own way, have skills that are going to translate well to the N.B.A.,” Fraschilla said in a telephone interview. This draft lottery came 30 years after the Knicks won their first and only top overall pick since the lottery era began that year, 1985. They selected Patrick Ewing, who turned out to be a transformative force for the organization. The team had no such luck this time around. Then again, a top-five pick is a luxury for the Knicks, who have a troubling history of trading away picks in ill-advised deals. More recently, they have been hamstrung by salary-cap limitations — code for excessive spending. Still, they will have money to spend this summer after shedding the onerous contracts that belonged to Amar’e Stoudemire and Andrea Bargnani, among others. Mills projected that the team would be $28 million under the cap. He also said that free agency could affect the Knicks’ approach to the draft. “It’ll have a big impact,” he said. “We’ll look at what kind of guys are going to move in free agency and have our draft plans accordingly.” On Tuesday, Mills was seated between Glen Taylor, the owner of the Timberwolves, and Nerlens Noel, the young center for the 76ers. Mills wore Dave DeBusschere’s Basketball Hall of Fame ring — the same ring that DeBusschere wore for the 1985 lottery. The opening of the envelopes was a made-for-television affair, with the actual lottery procedure — a complex sorting of Ping-Pong balls — taking place in a separate room before ESPN’s broadcast. Jamie Matthews, the Knicks’ vice president for basketball operations, represented the Knicks at that closed-door event. The Timberwolves, who had a 25 percent chance of securing the top pick, became only the fifth team (and the first since 2004) to finish with the N.B.A.’s worst record and win the lottery that same year. The Knicks were guaranteed to stay in the top five, a consolation prize after trudging through an injury-marred, stomach-churning season. “We’re going to get a good player,” Mills said. “We’re going to continue with our process.”

Basketball
Sports Drafts and Recruits
Timberwolves
NBA
Steve Mills
Knicks


Federal Jury in Utah Convicts Environmentalist

Abstract: SALT LAKE CITY — A Utah man who infiltrated a sale of federal energy leases in December 2008 to protest United States policies about climate change was found guilty by a jury on Thursday of disrupting a government auction and faces up to 10 years in prison. The defendant, Tim DeChristopher , 29, became a folk hero and a martyr in some corners of the environmentalist movement for taking action against the leases, which provoked protests and demonstrations in the closing days of the administration of President George W. Bush because of the perceived risk to sensitive lands in southern Utah. In his four-day trial here in Federal District Court, his lawyers argued that Mr. DeChristopher was passionate but impulsive, and had no thought-out “plan” or “scheme” — words central to the language of the charges — to ruin the auction by buying nearly $1.8 million worth of oil and gas leases with no intent to pay. “He really didn’t know what he was doing,” one of his lawyers, Ronald J. Yengich, told the jury in closing arguments on Thursday morning. But the jury of eight men and four women, after deliberating for about four and a half hours, apparently agreed with the assistant United States attorney, John W. Huber, who said in his closing argument that the “rule of law” was a boundary of civil society that passion and zeal for a cause could not justify crossing. “He chose a path of illegality and criminal conduct,” Mr. Huber told the panel. Mr. DeChristopher, who in 2008 was an undergraduate economics student at the University of Utah here in Salt Lake City, freely admitted putting in bids, and then actually winning more than a dozen oil and gas leases before being pulled out of the room by suspicious auction officials. The debate within the trial, which had been repeatedly delayed, was over the question of Mr. DeChristopher’s intent, and, out of the jury’s presence, his motive. Judge Dee Benson strictly limited how much the defense could say about federal energy policies and climate change, which Mr. DeChristopher has said in numerous interviews were his primary motivations in going to the auction. Mr. DeChristopher repeatedly said his specific hope was that by delaying the auction, the leases could be reconsidered by the Obama administration, which was then just about to take office. But the jury, beyond a few cryptic references during the trial, was told only that Mr. DeChristopher had strong environmental beliefs. In an interview last week, Mr. DeChristopher predicted a short trial and conviction because of the limits put on what he could say in his defense. He said prosecutors offered a reduced sentence last summer in exchange for pleading guilty to one of the two counts in the indictment. “I wasn’t interested,” he said. He added: “Their goal is to make an example out of me. It intimidates others into following the rules.” Mr. DeChristopher faces up to five years on each of the two counts — disrupting a federal auction and making false statements on federal forms to enter the auction — and up to $750,000 in total fines. Sentencing was set for June 23.

DeChristopher Tim
Decisions and Verdicts
Environment
Utah


Pittsburgh Tops Villanova to Win Big East Title

Abstract: Ashton Gibbs had 18 points and No. 4 Pittsburgh clinched the outright Big East regular-season title, using a big second half to beat No. 19 Villanova, 60-50, on Saturday. Host Pittsburgh (27-4, 15-3) earned its first outright Big East title in seven years and the No. 1 seed for next week’s conference tournament for the third time. Second-place Notre Dame put pressure on the Panthers with a 70-67 victory at Connecticut earlier Saturday, but Pitt was up to the task. Brown, Nasir Robinson and Travon Woodall each had 9 points for the Panthers, who won their first seven Big East games and stayed in first all season. Villanova guard Corey Stokes, the Wildcats’ second-leading scorer, aggravated a hamstring injury at practice Thursday and did not play Saturday. With the leading scorer, Corey Fisher, already limited by severe tendinitis in his right knee, Villanova (21-10, 9-9) felt it had no choice but to take the air out of the ball. “We just said there’s no way we’re going to go in there and outscore those guys without Corey,” Coach Jay Wright said. “So we still ran our stuff; we just did it later in the clock, that’s all.” NOTRE DAME 70, UCONN 67 Ben Hansbrough scored 21 points despite fouling out with more than eight minutes left, and No. 8 Notre Dame held off Kemba Walker and No. 16 UConn in Storrs, Conn. Walker scored 34 points but missed a 3-point attempt with eight seconds left and UConn trailing, 69-67. Hansbrough made his first seven shots before missing a jumper six minutes into the second half. But two minutes later, with Notre Dame (25-5, 14-4) leading by 54-46, he picked up his fourth foul while guarding Walker. He came back in with 8 minutes 34 seconds left but fouled out 10 seconds later with his team ahead, 60-52. The call sent the crowd into a frenzy, and UConn (22-9, 9-9) scored the next 13 points. But Tim Abromaitis (11 points) helped put the Irish back in front, 67-65, without Hansbrough. ST. JOHN’S 72, SOUTH FLORIDA 56 D. J. Kennedy scored 16 points and No. 15 St. John’s bounced back from a loss to Seton Hall. The Red Storm (20-10, 12-6) honored its 10-man senior class before the players’ final home game, then reached the 20-win mark for the first time since 2002-3. SETON HALL 85, MARQUETTE 72 Jeremy Hazell scored 21 points in his final home game and Seton Hall (13-17, 7-11) made a dozen 3-pointers. PROVIDENCE 75, RUTGERS 74 Marshon Brooks (28 points) broke the Big East single-season scoring record, with 468 points, in his final home game for Providence. PENN 70, DARTMOUTH 58 Tyler Bernardini scored all 16 of his points in the second half for visiting Penn (13-14, 7-6), which can still play a role in the Ivy League race. If the Quakers beat Princeton on Tuesday, Harvard will win the league title outright. COLUMBIA 91, BROWN 74 Noruwa Agho scored 31 points to win the Ivy League scoring title as Columbia won its regular-season finale. Agho, a junior guard, entered the weekend tied with Yale’s Greg Mangano for the conference scoring lead. Both scored 20 points Friday in Yale’s 87-81 double-overtime win over Columbia, but Mangano had only 18 Saturday as Yale lost to Cornell, 68-55. MAAC TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINALS Derek Needham scored 22 points and Fairfield (24-6) held Marist to the lowest point total in MAAC tournament history in its 55-31 win in Bridgeport, Conn. Iona also advanced to the semifinals by routing Siena, 94-64. IN OTHER GAMES Chris Martin scored 18 points and Stony Brook held off Albany, 67-61, in the America East Conference tournament in West Hartford, Conn. The Seawolves (14-16) will play Vermont on Sunday. ... New Jersey Institute of Technology made 16 3-pointers in a 78-46 rout of Chicago State.

University of Notre Dame
University of Connecticut
Hansbrough Ben
Walker Kemba
Basketball
College Athletics
NCAA Basketball Tournament (Men)
Basketball (College)
Villanova University
University of Pittsburgh


High-Priced Oil Adds Volatility to Power Scramble

Abstract: As the price of oil surges toward a symbolic milestone of $100 a barrel — hitting $96.70 yesterday — it is creating new winners and losers across the globe. In southern China, high oil prices forced Wang Pui, a trucker, to wait in line 90 minutes the other day to fill up, just to be told he could pump only 25 gallons, as China faced spot shortages of gasoline and diesel fuel. When Vladimir V. Putin was making Russia’s bid to be host of the 2014 Winter Olympics last July, he reached into the country’s deep pockets, bulging with oil profits, and pledged $12 billion to turn a Black Sea summer resort into a winter-sports paradise. Russia, which was nearly bankrupt a decade ago, won the Games. The prospect of triple-digit oil prices has redrawn the economic and political map of the world, challenging some old notions of power. Oil-rich nations are enjoying historic gains and opportunities, while major importers — including China and India, home to a third of the world’s population — confront rising economic and social costs. Managing this new order is fast becoming a central problem of global politics. Countries that need oil are clawing at each other to lock up scarce supplies, and are willing to deal with any government, no matter how unsavory, to do it. In many poor nations with oil, the proceeds are being lost to corruption, depriving these countries of their best hope for development. And oil is fueling gargantuan investment funds run by foreign governments, which some in the West see as a new threat. “Five months ago, readers would not have recognized S.W.F. as meaning sovereign wealth fund,” said Daniel Yergin, chairman of Cambridge Energy Research Associates, referring to the funds set up by Russia, Norway and others to invest their oil profits. “And yet now,” he said, “they’re recognized as one of the fundamental forces of the global economy.” The basic calculus of expensive oil still holds: exporters enjoy a windfall and importers bear a heavier burden. But some unexpected countries are reaping benefits, as well as costs, from higher prices. Consider Germany. Although it imports virtually all its oil, it has prospered from extensive trade with a booming Russia and the Middle East. German exports to Russia grew 128 percent from 2001 to 2006; exports to the United States grew just 15 percent. Throughout Europe, the rise of the euro has acted as a hedge against fluctuations in the dollar-denominated oil market, while the heavy taxation of fuel has made rising oil prices less jarring to motorists. “For Europeans,” said David Fyfe, a senior oil market analyst at the International Energy Agency in Paris, “$100 oil is mostly symbolic.” Elsewhere, it is much more. For developing countries, oil can be a tool of national transformation — whether the goal is a middle-class standard of living or a utopian society. In Venezuela, President Hugo Chávez is pouring oil proceeds into a socialist revolution, creating free health care, free education and cheap food; enabling heavy public spending that has helped fuel four years of economic growth. The trouble, said Theresa Paiz, a Latin American director for the Fitch ratings agency, is that “it’s not really clear how the money is invested.” Mr. Chávez’s government is steering large chunks of money to development funds and state-owned companies not subject to audits. Transparency International, an organization that tracks corruption, ranks countries from least to most corrupt, and in its 2007 index Venezuela was at 162 out of 179 countries. Concerns about corruption are even more pronounced in Nigeria and Angola. Oil-rich Angola is taking in two and a half times the cash it did three years ago. Hotels in the capital, Luanda, are booked months in advance, largely by foreign oil companies. Sales of luxury cars are booming, and the International Monetary Fund projects the economy will grow 24 percent this year, one of the world’s fastest rates. Yet analysts for the Catholic University of Angola’s research center say two in three Angolans live on $2 or less a day, the same ratio as in 2002, when the country’s decades-long civil war ended. The government is eager to show that oil wealth is benefiting ordinary citizens. It has rebuilt 2,400 miles of roads, refurbished 4 airports, and laid 430 miles of new railroad track. But many Angolans take it as a given that oil has enriched public officials most of all. In 2003, a newspaper in Luanda identified the 20 richest people in Angola: 12 were government officials; 5 were former officials. Angola’s growing muscle — it is now the biggest oil supplier to China and the sixth biggest to the United States — is leading it to rethink its global position. It recently joined the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and is limiting its cooperation with the I.M.F. In perhaps the most far-reaching change, China has become Angola’s financier, lending Luanda as much as $12 billion for the country’s reconstruction, in return for guaranteed oil supplies. The contest among importers to secure access to oil supplies has become fierce. China, a one-time oil exporter that now must import half its oil to lubricate its booming economy, is facing politically troublesome shortages of fuel from Shenzhen to Beijing, as Chinese refining companies refuse to supply diesel at unprofitable state-regulated prices. To head off a crisis, China raised retail prices for fuel nearly 10 percent on Nov. 1. India is potentially even more vulnerable than China, some analysts say. Although it consumes a third as much oil as China, it imports 70 percent of its oil. It also has no strategic reserves, and demand is growing faster than in any other economy except China’s. Like China, India subsidizes fuel, particularly the kerosene used by lower- and middle-class families for cooking — a policy that costs it some $12 billion a year. If oil reaches $100 a barrel and stays there, analysts say, India will be forced to roll back those subsidies. “Sooner or later, prices are going to bite,” said Subir Gokarn, Standard & Poor’s chief economist in Asia. “Clearly household budgets will be significantly affected.” Without an increase in retail prices, officials at the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas warned recently, they might no longer be able to buy adequate supplies of crude for India’s refineries. “Unless consumers are paying for what they consume,” said M. S. Srinivasan, the petroleum secretary, the ministry “is going to be left with a big hole in its pocket.” But raising fuel prices could ignite even greater civil unrest in India than in China, where a man was killed recently after jumping a line to buy gas in the city of Xinyang, in Henan Province. Even in developed countries like Canada, rising oil prices can cause dislocation. The region around the oil sands in northern Alberta is the closest thing the developed world has to a 19th-century boom town. The influx of workers has created a shortage of skilled labor in neighboring British Columbia, where construction is under way for the 2010 Winter Olympics. In comparison, the problems faced by other oil producers seem almost benign. For them, the most burning question is what to do with all the money. Norway, the world’s 10th-largest oil producer, wants to guarantee every child a subsidized kindergarten spot by the end of 2008. It has increased spending on kindergarten to $3.3 billion this year, from $2.75 billion, partly using money transferred from its $350 billion State Pension Fund, once known as the Petroleum Fund. Most of the fund is earmarked to pay the future pensions of Norway’s 4.6 million people. “The discipline is structural,” said Johan Nic Vold, a consultant and former executive at Royal Dutch Shell. “Without it, the demands on politicians to use the oil revenue would be almost insatiable.” Perched on the Persian Gulf, Dubai has taken a similarly long view. Treating its oil reserves as temporary, it used the proceeds to expand pell-mell into tourism, trade, real estate and construction. The oil sector now accounts for only 5 percent of Dubai’s gross domestic product. But perhaps no country has reveled in its oil wealth like Russia. NetJets Europe, the private-jet company, plans to open an office in Russia because the traffic between Moscow and London has become so dense. This month, Christie’s will stage what it expects to be a record-setting auction week dedicated to Russian art, including the auction of a Fabergé egg made for the Russian royal family. Russians have kept London’s high-end real estate market buzzing. “There are a lot of Russian buyers around who are prepared to pay a vast amount of money,” said Michael Chetwode of the Home Search Bureau. Back home, Russia’s oil wealth is trickling down. Mr. Putin is using it to finance “priority national projects,” like improved health care and education, and access to affordable housing. Oil may also help Mr. Putin cling to power after he leaves the presidency, perhaps as prime minister. As he noted recently, “We all remember what state the country was in seven, eight years ago.” Eight years ago, oil was trading at $16 a barrel.

Oil (Petroleum) and Gasoline
International Trade and World Market
Third World and Developing Countries
Economic Conditions and Trends


English Player May Face a Bigger Problem: Lashing Out After Her Injury

Abstract: LONDON — The FIFA Women’s World Cup, involving 24 nations, will start in Canada next month. The laws of the women’s game are no different from the men’s, but the last few days have seen different interpretations of the same rules between the men’s and women’s game and a difference in tolerance of foul tackles. When Kelly Smith, a leading player for Arsenal Ladies , suffered torn ligaments in her ankle following a late tackle as she ran into the penalty box against Sunderland Ladies, the male referee did not hesitate to send off the perpetrator, Abby Holmes. When John Terry, the Chelsea captain, kicked the ankle of West Bromwich Albion striker Saido Berahino on Monday night, the referee, also a man, awarded a penalty kick to West Brom but kept his yellow and red cards in his pocket. On video, the tackles looked similar. A defender that was too slow lunged from behind, missed the ball and brought down the forward. The repercussions were entirely different: Smith will not play again for three, maybe four months following surgery. Berahino was merely shaken and bruised, but got up to take the shot and score from the penalty spot. Soccer, the saying goes, is a game of opinions. But FIFA law in this case is unequivocal: a foul preventing an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, which both these incidents clearly were, is punishable by a mandatory red card. The referee Stuart Franklin followed that procedure in the women’s game. The referee Mike Jones failed to do that on Monday in the Premier League, possibly because he had already sent off Chelsea’s Cesc Fàbregas and did not wish to reduce Chelsea to nine men just a few moments after halftime. Another way of looking at it is that the two arbiters were influenced by the harm suffered by the victim. That is not the purpose of the law, but it is perhaps human instinct to react to the severity of the injury when a referee sees it in front of him or her. Judging intent is a very tricky subject. Legal courts cannot define it, though people have taken foul play there for more than 100 years. Way back in 1878, a jury acquitted a player in Leicester of manslaughter after he was prosecuted for an unlawful tackle of an opponent who later died. The jury found the case could not be proven because it was unable to determine if the foul was deliberate. More than a score of similar trials have ended the same way, most notably in 1994 when a Chelsea player, Paul Elliott, sued a Liverpool player, Dean Saunders, after a tackle two years earlier ruptured ligaments in his knee, an injury that prematurely ended Elliott’s career. Both sides in that civil case called household names in the sport as expert witnesses, and the judge allowed video and photographic evidence. He noted, however, “there was complete disagreement about what the pictures showed” and concluded: “My strong impression was that the defendant was telling the truth when he said his intent was only on going for the ball and it was instinct which at the last minute made him take both feet off the ground in an attempt to avoid probable serious injury to himself.” The case was dismissed and, like the Leicester trial almost 120 years before it, the outcome rested on the fact that proving intent on a mistimed tackle is nearly impossible for judges or juries to decide. Nevertheless, Smith, 36, and Holmes, 23, might well end up taking their dispute to court. Over the weekend, Smith went online to accuse her opponent of intending to cause serious harm. “There is no hiding the fact: the tackle was malicious and designed to do one thing only — to do serious damage.” Smith, a former captain on the English women’s national team, said on kicca.com . “I have watched the tackle twice since on video so this isn’t an emotional verdict. It was a disgraceful tackle and one fully intended to hurt me.” Smith went on to say that the foul has ended her season and could have ended her career. “Sure, she apologized as I got stretchered off, and Sunderland subsequently apologized to Arsenal,” Smith stated. “That’s all well and good, but she should be thinking about how to tackle, not how to apologize. Smith also said, “She’s clearly not good enough to be playing at this level and while she gets a three-match ban I, in effect, get a 15 game ban in the league as well as cup games on top. “I am totally laid up, can barely move to make a coffee or have a shower, and face the mental challenge yet again of recovering from a long term injury. Twice before I have been the victim of a seriously bad challenge, once in America and once playing for England against France.” The implication is that the better the player is — and Smith clearly has been — the more an opponent will try to stop her at whatever cost. The reason why this tackle might yet be heard in a court of law, however, is not because of what Holmes did, but because of what Smith said, if Holmes thinks she was libeled. Sunderland on Monday announced that it reported the Arsenal captain to the Football Association, which oversees soccer in England, believing that Smith’s “public statement is a breach of F.A. regulations and the players’ code of conduct.” Sunderland’ added “Abbey strongly refutes claims that there was any malicious intent in the challenge or that it was premeditated. Furthermore she is taking legal advice regarding the nature of the remarks.” So the outcome of the foul that resulted in a red card could be the tackler taking the victim to court. Soccer has yet to move on after 137 years of trying to settle disputes in court.

Soccer
Arsenal Soccer Team
Sunderland Soccer Team
England


U.S. Shares Tumble as Worries Grow Over European Debt

Abstract: Sovereign debt concerns and the prospects for slower growth in Europe and Asia took their toll on global markets on Monday, with stocks on Wall Street spiraling more than 1 percent lower on all three major indexes. Treasury prices and the dollar rose. Asian and European shares were lower after developments in Greece, Spain and Italy refocused attention on the euro zone’s fiscal uncertainty. Manufacturing statistics released by Germany and China were softer than forecast, raising the prospect of slower growth in Europe and in China, which has the world’s second-largest economy, and unsettling investors. “It is a bit of a risk-off environment right now,” said Eric Viloria, senior technical strategist for Forex.com . “Markets are risk-averse, and the U.S. dollar is benefiting.” The Dow Jones industrial average fell 130.78 points, or 1.05 percent, to 12,381.26, its lowest close since April 19. The Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index was down 15.90 points, or 1.19 percent, at 1,317.37. The Nasdaq was down 44.42 points, or 1.58 percent, at 2,758.90 Materials, energy, industrials, utilities, financials and information technology tumbled by about 1 percent. Caterpillar fell about 2.34 percent, to $101.89, and General Electric was 1.17 percent lower at $19.39. Energy stocks tumbled, with Halliburton falling 2.16 percent, to $46.16, Exxon Mobil down 1.1 percent at $80.67, and Schlumberger down 1.7 percent at $82.08. Citigroup was more than 2 percent lower at $40.16, while Bank of America was lower by 1.38 percent at $11.42. JPMorgan Chase fell more than 1.3 percent to $42.55. In Asia, the Nikkei index fell by more than 1.5 percent and the Hang Seng was down by just over 2 percent. The Shanghai index was lower by 2.9 percent. In Europe, the CAC 40 closed down by 2.1 percent, the DAX in Germany was 2 percent lower, and the FTSE ended the day down by 1.9 percent. Analysts said recent news from Europe had not instilled confidence in the Continent’s ability to handle its fiscal challenges. Last week, Fitch Ratings downgraded Greece’s credit ratings by three levels to B+, a rating that is below investment grade. Standard & Poor’s lowered its outlook on Italy’s debt to negative from stable over the weekend, citing a weaker outlook for growth and lower prospects for the country’s ability to trim its debt. And Spain made headlines after its Socialist Party lost on Sunday in regional and municipal elections as tens of thousands of Spanish protesters, their anger partly fueled by the debt crisis and joblessness, are trying to force an overhaul of the political system. Declines in Asia’s markets followed the HSBC preliminary purchasing managers’ index reading, a gauge of the manufacturing sector activity, for China, which fell to a 10-month low of 51.1 in May, according to news agencies, signaling a slowdown in expansion. Still, the Chinese government is poised to continue fiscal tightening. A similar gauge for Germany dropped to 54.9 in May, below forecasts. The financial services and valuations company, Markit, said on Monday that its manufacturing P.M.I. for the euro zone was at a seven-month low at 54.8 in May, the sharpest slowdown since just after the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008, according to Chris Williamson, the chief economist. While the numbers could have been affected by seasonal factors like the timing of Easter this year or by supply chain disruptions from the disasters in Japan, they show a “more fundamental slowing in the pace of economic growth,” he said in a statement. Bruce McCain, the chief investment strategist of Key Private Bank, said the signs of weaker economic activity in China were counterbalanced by high inflation, with the possibility that they would have to continue to raise rates. In Europe, he added, “not only are they again grappling with the sovereign debt issue, but inflation remains uncomfortably high and they seem determined to raise rates again.” Treasury prices rose on Monday. The Treasury’s benchmark 10-year note rose 5/32, to 99 31/32 , and the yield fell to 3.13 percent from 3.15 percent late Friday. The yield has fallen by more than 40 basis points in a little more than a month. Concerns over Europe reawakened the potential for oil demand to decline, causing crude prices on Monday to slip. The dollar was higher against a range of currencies, with the euro falling below $1.40. “Certainly while there is concern about the dollar’s secular decline we have to be encouraged that it is still seen as a strong currency,” said Colleen Supran, a portfolio manager with Bingham, Osborn & Scarborough, which is based in San Francisco.

European Sovereign Debt Crisis (2010- )
Stocks and Bonds


DuPont Cuts Its Forecast on Lower Sales

Abstract: The chemical maker DuPont reported a $629 million fourth-quarter loss on Tuesday as a result of lower sales and a huge revamping charge. The company also cut its earnings forecast for 2009. The company, based in Wilmington, Del., said its loss for the quarter was 70 cents a share, compared with a profit of $45 million, or 60 cents a share, a year ago. Excluding a charge of $380 million from a previously announced overhaul program, the fourth-quarter loss was $249 million, or 28 cents a share. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters, on average, expected a loss of 24 cents a share. The analyst estimates typically exclude one-time items. Net sales in the quarter dropped 17 percent, to $5.8 billion, from $6.98 billion. Higher prices in all regions and across all business segments were more than offset by volume declines and negative currency effects. The company said declines in consumer spending, construction and motor vehicle sales led to a sharp drop in demand and a steep decline in global industrial production. Its full-year earnings for 2008 were $2 billion, or $2.20 a share, down from $2.9 billion, or $3.22 a share a year ago. The company lowered its full-year earnings estimate for 2009 to $2 to $2.50 a share, down from its previous guidance of $2.25 to $2.75 a share. It also announced that it would cut 8,000 contractors from its work force. Last month, DuPont announced that it would cut 2,500 jobs and was releasing 4,000 contractors by the end of 2008.

DuPont Company
Company Reports
Layoffs and Job Reductions


Obama Budget’s Call for Increased Funding for N.H.T.S.A. Faces Uncertainty

Abstract: After a year of a record number of recalls in the auto industry, the Obama administration is aiming in its proposed budget to nearly triple the funding for defect investigations at the government’s auto safety agency and increase its overall budget by 20 percent annually over six years. But the proposal, like many items in the president’s proposed budget, faces an uncertain fate in the Republican-controlled Congress. As of Thursday, John Thune, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation who is a Republican from South Dakota, had yet to weigh in on the requested increase for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. A spokesman said the committee was “still reviewing” the proposal. A spokeswoman for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, headed by Fred Upton, Republican of Michigan, said the panel was reviewing the proposal but that “our oversight of N.H.T.S.A. over the last year has revealed that problems facing the agency run deeper than staffing or funding.” The House committee is also waiting for the results of an oversight report it requested in October from the Government Accountability Office. The agency has fallen under scrutiny as more than 60 million vehicles were recalled in the United States last year, double the previous record set in 2004. Five times last year, the agency’s acting head was called before congressional hearings, where lawmakers criticized the agency for failing to identify potential defects and act on consumer complaints. In its budget released this week, the Obama administration is proposing to increase funds for the agency’s Office of Defects Investigation to $31 million from about $11 million. Agency officials say that will allow them to hire more staff members to comb through an increasing number of consumer defect complaints. Anthony Foxx, the transportation secretary, told reporters this week that the increase was about “giving N.H.T.S.A. the tools it needs” to keep on top of about 75,000 complaints a year, and that the defects office simply is overwhelmed with only 28 full-time staff members. The proposal would increase that number by 57. The agency’s new administrator, Mark Rosekind, recently said it was important for the agency not just to have more positions, but the right kind of people in those roles — jobs that are increasingly about using technology and data skills to decipher the information on crashes in the United States. Mr. Rosekind said he wanted to bring more Silicon Valley-style innovation to data analysis so the agency could spot potential problems early, before they became full-blown crises.


Peter Wallenberg, Patriarch of a Swedish Dynasty, Dies at 88

Abstract: Peter Wallenberg, who helped build a global conglomerate out of his family’s closely held businesses, a dynasty that was often referred to as a Swedish version of the Rockefellers, died on Monday at his home on the island of Varmdo, in Stockholm County. He was 88. His death was reported by his family’s foundation. For years, starting in 1982, Mr. Wallenberg was chairman of Investor, a company whose various holdings once amounted to roughly 40 percent of shares traded on the Stockholm stock exchange. Its portfolio included stakes in Ericsson, Electrolux, SAS airlines, Astra, Scania, Saab, Gambro — just about any Swedish company known to Americans. Outside Sweden, the Wallenberg name typically conjures Raoul Wallenberg, the World War II humanitarian credited with saving the lives of thousands of Jews, who was a distant relative. In Sweden, Wallenberg is synonymous with an industrial and financial empire founded by Peter Wallenberg’s great-grandfather Andre Oscar Wallenberg, starting with the bank that he opened in 1856. The Wallenbergs vastly expanded their stature and wealth under the leadership of Peter Wallenberg’s father, Marcus Wallenberg Jr., a former diplomat and tennis star, who controlled the family fortune with a combination of charisma and iron will for decades. He often said that Peter lacked the intelligence and vision to run the company, and Peter was sent for three years to Montclair, N.J., where he sold portable compressors. Marcus intended his older son, Marc, to inherit the company. But Marc committed suicide in 1971, and Peter outmaneuvered the onetime chief executive of Volvo, Pehr Gyllenhammar, whom Marcus regarded as yet another candidate better suited as a successor. “Nobody would have thought Peter would take on the role and be successful,” P. O. Edin, a Swedish economist, told The New York Times in 1996. Peter Wallenberg was born on May 29, 1926, in Stockholm. He was married and divorced three times. He is survived by two sons, Jacob and Peter Jr.; a daughter, Andrea Gandet; a sister, Ann-Marie Bonsor; seven grandchildren; and two step-grandchildren. As a businessman, Peter Wallenberg proved formidable. He was portly and often described as disheveled, though always in well-tailored clothes. He was tireless and more than capable of adapting to a business environment that was increasingly focused on international megamergers. He was chairman until 1997. His son Jacob is the current chairman. For years, the family’s motto had been “Esse non videri,” Latin for “To be, not to seem,” reflecting a quiet, almost provincial approach to deal-making. But by the 1990s, there was a limit to how much Investor could grow without venturing beyond Sweden’s borders. Under Mr. Wallenberg, Investor stepped directly into foreign markets. In 1996, for instance, it sold 50 percent of Scania, a truck manufacturer, on the London, Stockholm and New York exchanges in what was then one of the world’s largest initial public offerings, raising $2.7 billion.

Obituary
Sweden
Investor
Stocks,Bonds
Peter Wallenberg