Curious about turtles? The shelled reptile is easy to observe.

areas. The northern diamondback terrapin, Maryland’s state reptile and the mascot of the University of Maryland, is found in the Chesapeake Bay’s brackish (slightly salty) waters. “Similar to the uniqueness of our fingerprints, no two diamondbacks have exactly the same coloration and spot patterns,” Cover said. Karyn Molines, a spokeswoman for Calvert County parks, suggests a kayak or canoe trip for spotting a diamondback. “You’ll often see their eyes and noses popping up out of the water,” Molines said. Box turtles live on land and love to eat slugs. Hinges on their shells allow them to completely withdraw inside and close the shell tightly around them for protection. (Ann Cameron Siegal) Are turtles good pets? Having a pet turtle means being willing to care for an animal that can live 20 to 80 years or more. Turtles require very specific temperature, lighting, space, food and cleanliness. They can possibly transmit the salmonella bacteria to people. What would become of your turtle if you got tired of caring for it? It’s illegal and cruel to just drop it off in a woods or park. The Humane Society of America says turtles are best left in the wild. “To protect your health, the Earth and the animals, please don’t get a turtle for a pet!” the organization urges on its website. Instead of bringing one home, find a spot where you can watch turtles in their natural environment. Take photos. You’ll learn more about their lives, and they’ll be much happier. A wood turtle's skin ranges from yellow to deep orange. They live on land and in the water. ( John White/Virginia Herpetological Society) A red-eared slider, recognized by the red slash of color on the side of its face, is spotted at Mason Neck State Park in Lorton, Virginia. (Ann Cameron Siegal) What if? Just because a turtle is out of water, doesn’t mean it’s in trouble. It may be a female going to or from its nesting site. Turtles in the road should safely be guided to a space in the direction they were heading. But be careful: Turtles can bite. Snappers in particular have long necks and can whip their heads around quickly if they feel threatened. Turtle-spotting places There are many turtle habitats in our area. Some highlights are Huntley Meadows Park in Alexandria, Virginia; Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in Washington; and Wheaton Regional Park/Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, Maryland.


Neonics are bad, but so are these other pesticides

Giraldo Carratala, a Miami-Dade County mosquito control inspector, looks at mosquito larva in a sample of water that he took from a pool of standing water before using a pesticide to eradicate the larva as the county continues to be proactive in fighting a possible Zika virus outbreak, on April 20 in Miami Gardens, Fla. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images) The May 12 Local Living article “An insecticide controversy comes home” discussed the adverse impact of neonicotinoids, a.k.a. neonics, on bees and other beneficial insects. Unfortunately, neonics are not the only pesticide hazard to these critical insects in our ecosystem. With increased fears about the Zika and West Nile viruses, pesticide companies have ramped up marketing of mosquito-extermination products and services with promises that their sprays will eliminate or repel mosquitoes for up to three weeks. They don’t say that these adulticides, in particular organophosphates, and pyrethroids such as permethrin, are highly toxic to beneficial insects. These are the “broad spectrum” pesticides that kill mosquitoes, mosquito predators, and bees and other pollinators. We are rightly concerned about Zika and West Nile, but there are easy and more effective ways to reduce mosquito populations than mosquito sprays, including removing stagnant water, using mosquito repellants or covering up when outdoors and using safer larvicides to kill mosquito larvae in birdbaths and ponds before they become adults. In the same way that we need to check pesticide labels for neonic ingredients and ask nurseries whether their plants have been treated with neonics, we need to look for pyrethroids such as permethrin and words such as “broad spectrum” on mosquito spray products. Anyone who hires a mosquito exterminator should ask what is in the products and how toxic they are to wildlife we need to protect. Kasha Helget, Alexandria


Train in deadly 2015 Amtrak derailment had safety equipment that could have prevented it

Bostian told investigators he was thinking about an associate who was indeed hurt by getting shattered glass in his eye in such an incident. “I hesitate to criticize the guy. He’s going to live with that for the rest of his life,” Keppen said. The blurry nature of Bostian’s recollections have made drawing lessons, a primary goal of such NTSB exercises, difficult. But one thing is clear, he said. “It points to the importance of having technology like positive train control fully operational,” Keppen said. PTC has been called “arguably the single-most important rail safety development in more than a century” by federal regulators. Federal Railroad Administration head Sarah Feinberg threatened to fine passenger and freight railroads last year when a year-end deadline for its installation approached. But the railroads contended they had too little time to install the complicated system, and Congress listened to their plea and extended the deadline until 2018. Congress, whose members have received more than $24 million in campaign contributions from the powerful railroad industry since 2008, also said railroads could ask for up to two additional years after the 2018 deadline to complete the job. Feinberg made clear that she expects regular progress reports from railroads, some of which have systems nearly complete, while many others are well behind. Fearful that some railroads may think the wiggle room granted by Congress gives then until 2020 to finish installation, Feinberg has warned that unless railroads meet FRA benchmarks, no extensions will be granted beyond 2018. Though Amtrak owns most of the rail on which its trains run in the Northeast Corridor, the balance of it’s operations are on track owned by freight rail roads. To complete the PTC system, those freight railroads must install a system of way points with which equipment on board the train maintains contact. Aware of FRA criticism, the Association of American Railroads, a trade group for the freight lines, said Monday that it’s members have invested $6.5 billion dollars on PTC. They said the cost will climb to $10.6 billion to cover the 60,000 route miles of freight rail track. “Freight railroads continue to aggressively move forward with testing and installation of PTC on their individual networks,” said AAR spokesman Ed Greenberg. “The freight rail industry remains on schedule at having PTC fully implemented across the country as quickly as possible and in accordance with the extension passed by Congress.”


How to fight mosquitoes and, potentially, Zika

Asian tiger mosquitoes — the most common species of mosquito in the D.C. area and a species found to carry Zika in other countries — stay within 150 feet of where they hatch and prefer to stick close to homes, where they can feed on humans and pets. They are most active during the day. Here is what experts recommend to protect yourself from mosquitoes and prevent the spread of Zika: ● Pay close attention to standing water outside. Empty rain water from flower pots, toys, folds in tarps, even upturned garbage can lids. Mosquitoes can lay more than 100 eggs in as little as a bottle cap of water. ● Rid gutters and downspout extenders of standing water. Mosquito dunks — small disks carried by hardware stores — will kill mosquito larvae in areas where it is difficult to remove all of the water, such as the bend in downspouts. ● Make sure windows and doors have screens, and check them for holes. ● Talk to neighbors within 150 feet about paying close attention to standing water outdoors. Their mosquitoes could become your mosquitoes. ● Pregnant women should stay in air-conditioned places as much as possible and wear long sleeves and pants outside. ● Everyone, including pregnant women, should wear mosquito repellent regularly, particularly during the day when the Asian tiger mosquito is most active. For other tips, including how to prevent sexual transmission of Zika, visit the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website at: cdc.gov/zika/prevention. —Katherine Shaver Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Washington-area health agencies


Dozens of athletes face ban from Rio Olympics in IOC doping crackdown

The Russian and Olympic flags during the closing ceremony of the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia. (Kay Nietfeld/EPA) Dozens of former Olympic athletes could be barred from the upcoming Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, the International Olympic Committee announced Tuesday, after drug testers completed an initial wave of analysis of old samples in the aftermath of a series of reports alleging systemic, state-supported cheating by Russia. Testing of 454 urine samples from the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing revealed suspicious samples from 31 athletes from 12 countries, the IOC said. The testing was focused on athletes who could participate in this summer’s Games, and the IOC said it will soon test 250 samples from the 2012 Summer Games in London. The athletes implicated Tuesday were not identified by the IOC, which said it had started notifying the countries involved. While athletes from 12 countries were implicated Tuesday, the unprecedented mass analysis of old samples was triggered solely because of allegations involving one country — Russia. An investigation by the World Anti-Doping Agency last year found a “deep-rooted culture of cheating” in Russian athletics, prompting an ongoing global ban of the nation’s track and field athletes that may keep them out of the Rio Games. Documentaries and published reports over the past two years — including stories in the past two weeks by CBS’s “60 Minutes” and the New York Times — have alleged state-sponsored cheating and covert operations to compromise drug testing in Russia, culminating with a sophisticated scheme to subvert anti-doping efforts at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. A 2008 photo shows a protective fence with the Beijing 2008 logo outside the National Stadium in the Chinese capital. (Petr David Josek/AP) The U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York has opened a criminal investigation into possible state-sponsored doping by top Russian athletes, the Times reported Tuesday. Spokesmen for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the Justice Department and the FBI declined to comment. IOC President Thomas Bach, in a news release, termed Tuesday’s IOC announcement “a powerful strike against the cheats we do not allow to win” and said the action was spurred by the “worrying allegations against the laboratory in Sochi.” The IOC keeps urine samples of Olympic athletes for 10 years, and it’s not surprising that re examining old samples would uncover new positive tests for banned drugs because testing methods constantly evolve.


them out of the Rio Games. Documentaries and published reports over the past two years — including stories in the past two weeks by CBS’s “60 Minutes” and the New York Times — have alleged state-sponsored cheating and covert operations to compromise drug testing in Russia, culminating with a sophisticated scheme to subvert anti-doping efforts at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. A 2008 photo shows a protective fence with the Beijing 2008 logo outside the National Stadium in the Chinese capital. (Petr David Josek/AP) The U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York has opened a criminal investigation into possible state-sponsored doping by top Russian athletes, the Times reported Tuesday. Spokesmen for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the Justice Department and the FBI declined to comment. IOC President Thomas Bach, in a news release, termed Tuesday’s IOC announcement “a powerful strike against the cheats we do not allow to win” and said the action was spurred by the “worrying allegations against the laboratory in Sochi.” The IOC keeps urine samples of Olympic athletes for 10 years, and it’s not surprising that re examining old samples would uncover new positive tests for banned drugs because testing methods constantly evolve. The World Anti-Doping Agency — which oversees drug testing for the Olympics — confirmed in its own statement Tuesday that this wave of retesting has been prompted by allegations against Russia. This month, two reports quoting self-described whistleblowers from Russia have outlined allegations that support last year’s WADA investigation. First, a former elite Russian runner told “60 Minutes” she took a powerful regimen of anabolic steroids and banned endurance-boosting substances under the direction of her coaches and medical staff. Then the former director of Russia’s anti-doping lab went public in the New York Times with a description of drug testing sabotage from the Sochi Games that, if true, ranks among the more sophisticated drug cheating schemes in sports history. Grigory Rodchenkov claimed he worked for years to help his country’s top athletes take banned drugs and escape detection. He synthesized a literal steroid cocktail — it included alcohol to help speed absorption into the blood — for Russian athletes, and then when the 2014 Winter Games came to Sochi, he worked with a small team to replace tainted urine samples with clean ones. Each night during the Sochi Olympics, Rodchenkov said, he and others surreptitiously removed Russian urine samples via


The Olympic sinkhole

stiff demands on cities that host the games. These include an Olympic Village capable of housing at least 15,000 athletes and officials, as well as 40,000 hotel rooms (Rio de Janeiro had to construct 15,000 rooms). After 9/11, security costs also soared. In 2000, they were $250 million for the summer Sydney Games; by the 2004 Athens Games, they had climbed to $1.6 billion and “have stayed near that figure.” For the Olympics to make financial sense, Baade and Matheson argue, the short-term and long-term economic benefits have to fill the gap between immediate costs and revenue. But their review of academic studies, including some of their own, reveals that this is rarely the case. One purported benefit is a construction boom, as cities build stadiums and swimming pools as well as hotels. In reality, say Baade and Matheson, this construction often substitutes for other projects that are crowded out or postponed. Tourism poses the same problem. Many visitors come for the Games, but others stay away to avoid the crowds. For the 2012 London Games, visitors to the United Kingdom dropped 6 percent from a year earlier. “The actual impacts [on short-term economic growth] . . . are either near-zero or a fraction of that predicted,” say Badde and Matheson. Long-term benefits are also skimpy, they contend. The new stadiums are often unneeded once the Games are over. “Beijing’s iconic ‘Bird’s Nest’ Stadium has rarely been used since 2008 and has been partially converted into apartments,” they write. Some projects are put to good use after the Olympics (in Atlanta and Los Angeles, Olympic villages became college dormitories), but they are exceptions. The increasingly expensive Olympics have a harder time attracting bidders. For the 2022 Winter Olympics, four cities (Oslo, Stockholm, Krakow and Munich) dropped out. For the summer 2024 Games, two cities — Boston and Hamburg — withdrew. There are ways to control costs. One idea is to designate a permanent site or several sites that would be reused. But does the world have the will to do something so obvious? Read more from Robert Samuelson’s archive. Read more on this topic: John Rennie Short: We should host the Olympics in the same place every time Charles Lane: The Olympics should be on their way out Victor Matheson: Why democracies don’t want the Olympics anymore The Post’s View: A shot at the 2024 Summer Olympics for the District


Montgomery County Animal Watch

These cases were received by the Montgomery County Animal Services Division. For information, call 240-773-5900. This number provides recorded information on topics such as the new animal services and adoption center’s hours and location in Derwood, adoption and licensing procedures, and lost-and-found and field services. Attack ends in broken finger: Abandonment: Adoptable cats at no-kill shelter: Gaithersburg Adopt dogs and cats at MCHS no-kill rescue: Rockville Reduced fees for cat adoption: Germantown — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton


‘Brothers of the Quill’: How an 18th-century hack found his literary footing

many younger readers, Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774) is probably little more than a name, if that. Yet by the time of his relatively early death at age 45, he had produced a classic of sentimental fiction, “The Vicar of Wakefield ,” the witty stage comedy, “She Stoops to Conquer,” and the influential descriptive poem, “The Deserted Village.” His essays, collected as “The Citizen of the World,” remain models of easygoing harmonious prose. Samuel Johnson, who should know, declared that Goldsmith was “a man who, whatever he wrote, did it better than any other man could do.” In Clarke’s view, Goldsmith and his writing, both typically characterized as “good-natured,” deserve to be studied more closely through the lens of his ethnicity and social class. Before you shudder, rest assured that Clarke isn’t doctrinaire or heavy-handed in this; she simply supplies an illuminating, hitherto absent context. Born in Ireland, the penniless Goldsmith arrived in London after almost two years of vagabondage in Europe and, to survive, soon fell to cranking out introductions, translations, tracts and book reviews for various magazine editors and parsimonious publishers. In short, through most of his life, he was always in harness. One of his earlier employers was none other than John Newbery, after whom the famous children’s literature award is named. It is even thought that Goldsmith may have been the author, or part-author, of the moralizing (but still touching) kids’ classic, “The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes.” To the English, Goldsmith appeared stereotypically Irish: easygoing, innocent and loquacious, but also impudent, feckless and improvident. Whatever money he earned, he immediately spent. When he acquired wealth, he bought luxuries yet still managed to die heavily in debt. With few real facts extant about Goldsmith’s early years in Grub Street, Clarke sensibly turns for insight to the parallel lives of his “brothers of the quill,” most of them Irish. Theirs is the world of Richard Savage’s barely fictional writer for hire, Iscariot Hackney, and of scores of other real-life poetasters, rogues, sycophants and dreamers. Samuel Derrick, John Pilkington, James Grainger and Robert Nugent Jr. aren’t names anyone is likely to recognize today. But they are a fascinating, colorfully disreputable crew. Derrick wrote poetry and worked as a part-time pimp, further supplementing his income by ghosting the scandalous “Harris’s List of Covent Garden Ladies.” Later in life, he succeeded Beau Nash as the arbiter of taste in upscale Bath. Pilkington


Lowe’s first-quarter profit tops projections

A Lowe's store in Philadelphia. Rising property values have encouraged people to spend on their dwellings. (Matt Rourke/AP) Lowe’s posted first-quarter profit that topped analysts’ projections, reinforcing the notion that Americans are still willing to spend on their homes. Earnings last quarter were 87 cents a share, excluding some items, the Mooresville, N.C.-based company said Wednesday in a statement. Analysts projected 85 cents, on average. Sales rose 7.8 percent to $15.2 billion, topping the average estimate of $14.9 billion. Last week, retailers such as Macy’s posted disappointing results, raising concerns that U.S. consumers are pulling back on spending. The home-improvement industry has been largely immune from the malaise, with rising property values encouraging people to spend on their dwellings. That trend helped larger rival Home Depot top expectations Tuesday. “Home-improvement spending trends remain robust in the U.S.,” Kate McShane, an analyst for Citigroup, said in a research note. The strength is despite the “uncertainty” that has arisen in other retailing categories, she said. Lowe’s said profit this year will be about $4.11 a share, including an 11-cent gain on a foreign-currency hedge. The company had projected profit of $4, and analysts’ had set their average estimate at that level. The company maintained its forecasts that revenue would gain 6 percent and comparable-store sales would rise 4 percent. The shares rose as much as 4 percent to $79.08 in New York, the biggest gain in three months. Lowe’s was little changed this year through Tuesday. Sales at stores open for more than a year — a key metric for investors — rose 7.3 percent, topping analysts’ 4.3 percent prediction. Lowe’s said a warm winter led homeowners to take on more projects. That gain surpassed Home Depot’s 6.5 percent increase, marking only the second time since 2009 that Lowe’s has beaten its larger rival. Lowe’s should get a boost in sales after buying Rona, a Canadian home-improvement chain with about $4 billion in sales. The acquisition received approval from regulators earlier this month and was expected to close Friday. While retailers of many stripes have posted disappointing results, with discount giant Target describing shopping trends as “volatile,” Lowe’s hasn’t seen a significant change in sentiment. Company surveys of consumers show discretionary spending levels staying constant during the past several quarters, but with more purchases going toward the home, Lowe’s chief executive Robert Niblock said in an interview. “It’s being driven by the


Stop the Olympics

Brazilian badminton players Lohaynny Vicente, left, and her sister Luana Vicente stand under a set of Olympic rings installed at Madureira Park in Rio de Janeiro on May 4. (Nacho Doce/Reuters) If anyone reading this column still believes in the “Olympic ideal,” please give me a call: I’ve got a stadium in Rio de Janeiro I’d like to sell you. Discredited long ago by the very corruption and nationalism they were originally meant to transcend, the Olympic Games are embroiled in a wave of scandal that’s embarrassing even by the sorry standards of this hypocritical “movement.” It’s hard to say what’s more outrageous: credible new allegations of a clandestine state-sponsored doping scheme carried out by the 2014 Winter Olympics’ host nation, Russia — or the fact that the International Olympic Committee entrusted the event to a despotic regime run by a glory-hungry former KGB agent in the first place. Meanwhile, the integrity of the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing — another dictatorship’s showcase — has been retrospectively undercut by the discovery of previously undetected doping by a reported 31 athletes from 12 countries; similar findings may be about to taint the 2012 London Games. French prosecutors are investigating allegations that the IOC’s decision to award Tokyo the 2020 Summer Games was greased by payoffs, as many previous games have been. Brazil's senators voted overwhelmingly on Thursday, May 12, to put President Dilma Rousseff on trial, an impeachment push driven by mounting frustration in the country. In Brazil, where the 2016 Summer Olympics are supposed to begin Aug. 5, police and prosecutors have found evidence that Olympics-related infrastructure development became a font of payoffs and kickbacks. Potentially involved are some of the politicians implicated in the wider corruption scandal that has destabilized the Brazilian government, at precisely the moment it should have been devoting full attention to the security and efficiency of the Games. In response, IOC officials spout indignant rhetoric and issue earnest threats against wrongdoers, just as they have on what seem like a million previous occasions. These promised reforms are no more likely to succeed than those of the past. The truth is that incentives influence behavior. And participants in the Olympics, at all levels, face overwhelming incentives, financial and political, to cheat — or to try to cheat — whether by using performance-enhancing drugs, rigging the venue selection or raking off government funds, which host nations borrow


Stop the Olympics

the IOC’s decision to award Tokyo the 2020 Summer Games was greased by payoffs, as many previous games have been. Brazil's senators voted overwhelmingly on Thursday, May 12, to put President Dilma Rousseff on trial, an impeachment push driven by mounting frustration in the country. In Brazil, where the 2016 Summer Olympics are supposed to begin Aug. 5, police and prosecutors have found evidence that Olympics-related infrastructure development became a font of payoffs and kickbacks. Potentially involved are some of the politicians implicated in the wider corruption scandal that has destabilized the Brazilian government, at precisely the moment it should have been devoting full attention to the security and efficiency of the Games. In response, IOC officials spout indignant rhetoric and issue earnest threats against wrongdoers, just as they have on what seem like a million previous occasions. These promised reforms are no more likely to succeed than those of the past. The truth is that incentives influence behavior. And participants in the Olympics, at all levels, face overwhelming incentives, financial and political, to cheat — or to try to cheat — whether by using performance-enhancing drugs, rigging the venue selection or raking off government funds, which host nations borrow and spend like water in pursuit of ephemeral economic stimulus. And don’t get me started on the judges and referees. It’s all become a grandiose mockery of the fine sentiment declared by the Games’ modern founder, Pierre de Coubertin of France: “The important thing at the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part; for the essential thing in life is not to conquer but to struggle well.” Equally hollow, in view of the historical record — which includes the hideous 1936 Berlin Olympics hosted by Adolf Hitler — are the words of the Olympic Charter: “The goal of Olympism is to place sport at the service of the harmonious development of humankind, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity.” In fact, the Olympics have repeatedly provided a flashpoint for international rivalry, as in the alternating boycotts carried out by the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and for terrorist attacks, such as the ones that marred the 1972 and 1996 Summer Games. The threat of another such incident casts a necessary but unseemly security pall over the contemporary Games, as each host nation mobilizes its


Patriotism in a beer can

to buy beer rather than Buicks. Rather, the commercials’ primary purpose is to defend and expand a brand’s market share. They do this by giving particular beers distinctive personalities. By doing so, they stroke consumers’ psyches, drawing beer drinkers into what Boorstin called “consumption communities.” Consumers are moved to covet a product less for its intrinsic qualities than its manufactured meaning. Advertising does this by reducing its information content and increasing its emotional appeal. Budweiser is the “king of beers” — we know it is because Budweiser says it is — but will not be saying so during this advertising campaign. The slogan will be replaced by “E Pluribus Unum.” This is Latin for “Perhaps a gusher of patriotic kitsch will stanch the leakage of our market share to pestilential craft breweries.” The United States has more than 4,000 craft breweries. Most American adults — all 235 million of them — live within 10 miles of a local brewery. And more than 40 percent of Americans 21-to-27 have never tasted Budweiser. They prefer craft beers (a craft brewer ships no more than 6 million barrels a year; Budweiser shipped 16 million in 2013, down from 50 million in 1988), which perhaps explains Budweiser’s current weirdly truculent commercials, such as this: “Proudly a macro beer. It’s not brewed to be fussed over. . . . It’s brewed for drinking, not dissecting. . . . Beer brewed the hard way. Let them sip their pumpkin peach ale.” And this: “Not small. Not sipped. Not soft. Not a fruit cup. Not imported.” Not cheerful. Last year, craft brewers, which are increasing at a rate of almost two a day, won 12.8 percent of the $105.9 billion beer market. And 2015 was the sixth consecutive year, and the 12th time in 15 years, in which beer’s portion of the nation’s alcohol revenue declined as more Americans drank cocktails like the characters on “Mad Men.” If, however, these aspiring Don Drapers hoist an America, they will have in their hands bottles and cans adorned with snippets of American Scripture — the Pledge of Allegiance, “The Star-Spangled Banner” and “America the Beautiful.” The psalmist said that joy cometh in the morning. Fat lot the psalmist knew. Joy cometh in the evening when you crack a cold can of America and anticipate the thrills of the looming “patriotic summer.” Go ahead. It’s 5 o’clock somewhere. Read more


Man killed in shooting in Southeast Washington

A man was fatally shot early Thursday in Southeast Washington near the border with Maryland, according to D.C. police. The shooting occurred about 2:40 a.m. in the 800 block of Southern Avenue SE in Washington Highlands. Police said the man was taken to a hospital, where he died. Police identified the victim as Dana Hamilton, 44, of Oxon Hill, Md. No further details were released. Police also have identified a man who was fatally shot Wednesday afternoon in Anacostia as Thomas Meriedy, 24, of Southeast. That shooting occurred about 12:40 p.m. in the 2300 block of Mount View Place SE, in the same block as a large Salvation Army National Capital Area building. There are a number of schools in the area, and the scene of the shooting is about four blocks from the Anacostia Metro station.


Targeting reproductive-health-care providers hurts women and families

(iStock/iStock) The May 12 editorial “The ticking clock on Zika” rightly noted that Congress is wasting precious time sitting on emergency funding for Zika virus research. What’s worse, its members are actively working to hurt other programs that are crucial to countering this dangerous virus. The physicians across the country whom I represent are especially concerned by the House Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives. The misleadingly named committee is needlessly targeting the same medical professionals — doctors who provide reproductive health care — who serve the families and pregnant women that Zika puts most at risk. At the same time, it is stymieing scientific research, including fetal-tissue research, which will be essential to understanding and combating Zika, as it has been in fighting diseases such as polio and measles. Alarmingly, the House panel has moved to force researchers and abortion providers to submit detailed personal information as part of a politicized campaign against fetal-tissue research. This is a gross abuse of taxpayer resources. If legislators truly cared about preventing Zika, they would focus on expanding women’s access to critical reproductive health care and promptly fund the research required to develop effective treatments and vaccines. Our elected representatives must do better. Jodi Magee, New York The writer is president and chief executive of Physicians for Reproductive Health.


Scientists refute the scaremongering about GMOs

An aisle at a Whole Foods store displays shelves with labels promoting products that don’t contain genetically modified organisms. (Portland Press Herald/Getty Images) THE NATIONAL Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine already examined genetically engineered (GE) crops once, concluding six years ago that the facts do not justify the fears about “Frankenfoods.” Overblown worries nevertheless continue to proliferate, prompting a movement to stigmatize genetically engineered crops by requiring labels on food packaging. Meanwhile, the technology also has advanced: New tools will allow scientists to more precisely cut and paste genetic code. So the National Academies have again tried to sort things out, releasing another authoritative report Tuesday that refutes the counterproductive scaremongering from the anti-genetically-engineered side. It also points to a bright future in which these crops help solve a range of problems — if governments get the policy right. The National Academies experts reviewed the relevant studies and solicited huge amounts of feedback. The upshot? “No differences have been found that implicate a higher risk to human health safety from these GE foods than from their non-GE counterparts,” they concluded. They based their findings partially on a comparison of European countries, where genetically engineered crops generally are not used, and the United States, where they are plentiful. They could find no significant differences attributable to genetically engineered crops, across a range of diseases and disorders. Moreover, the experts concluded, “the committee found no conclusive evidence of cause-and-effect relationships between GE crops and environmental problems.” Among other things, the scientists found concerns that the crops are degrading plant and animal biodiversity to be insubstantial. The major problem with insect- and herbicide-resistant genetically engineered plant varieties appears to be that, particularly if used irresponsibly, they can lead to resistant bugs and weeds, which would require more gene editing and new herbicides. The experts also found that, while small and large farms seem to be benefiting from the crops, there is mixed evidence — at best — that planting them has increased yields, which is a major goal of the research. Rather than be discouraged by these findings, the experts argued that research and investment in genetically engineered technologies should increase. Crops could be modified to show “improved tolerance to abiotic stresses, such as drought and thermal extremes; increased efficiency in plant biological processes, such as photosynthesis and nitrogen use; and improved nutrient content,” the report noted. The experts concluded: “If deployed


We need an American Foreign Legion

officers, takes its orders exclusively from Paris, offers its legionnaires the opportunity to apply for French citizenship and serves only the French government. It’s like a French army unit, except that its enlisted members come from all over the world. It’s time for an American Foreign Legion. It would be a part of the Defense Department, but its enlisted members would be recruited globally. This encompasses the best of option three (sending more troops to the Middle East) without the pitfalls of option four (relying on private contractors and mercenaries). An American Foreign Legion would solve many problems that have plagued us in the past decade of war. First, it would provide a publicly acceptable, truly volunteer force for long-term operations in the Middle East. Second, training and vetting standards could be maintained in a transparent manner, unlike with today’s contractors. Third, legionnaires could be held accountable under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Today, when contractors do something wrong, such as commit murder, they typically get sent home with minimal punishment. As Prince put it, they get a choice: “window or aisle.” Fourth, it solves the loyalty problem. The American Foreign Legion would be a path to citizenship in exchange for service to our cause. This is not a radical idea; we do this to a limited extent in our military. Fifth, a long-term Foreign Legion would be cheaper than contracting. In fiscal 2014, the Pentagon spent $131 billion on contractors — more than twice Britain’s entire defense budget. Lastly, it would help stem the growth of the mercenary industry worldwide. The United States is the biggest consumer of private military services, but we have limited control. When we no longer wish to pay military contractors, they will find someone who will. We should stop outsourcing war. Nor should we have a Vietnam War-esque draft. An all-volunteer force is core to our values, so let’s extend that opportunity to the rest of the world. An American Foreign Legion would create many solutions, including a viable Middle East strategy. Read more: The Post’s View: The Obama administration must put boots on the ground to stop the Islamic State James Jeffrey: The U.S. must send ground forces to eliminate the Islamic State Phillip Carter: Why foreign troops can’t fight our fights Max Boot and Michael O’Hanlon: A military path to citizenship Brigid Schulte: Why won’t we let them fill the ranks?


Fact-checking in a ‘post-fact world’

fact-checking can achieve. Those who have tried to measure the impact of fact-checking have found that there are many kinds of audiences, and that fact-checking affects each of them differently. All people are more likely to believe in “facts” that confirm their preexisting opinions and to dismiss those that don’t. But those with unusually strong opinions — those who are more partisan — are less likely to change their views, more likely to claim that fact-checkers themselves are “biased,” and even more likely to spread their views aggressively to their friends. This has always been the case, but social media now multiplies the phenomenon: In a world where people get most of their information from friends, fact-checking doesn’t reach those who need it most. The constant growth of information may be undermining the effectiveness of fact-checking, too. As Jill Lepore of the New Yorker has written, the sheer quantity of facts now available makes people cynical about truth itself. Can anything really be “known” if Google customizes its searches for particular people and places? With so many sources of information available, isn’t it better to assume they are all wrong? If truth is passe — if we really do live in a “post-fact world” — then there isn’t any reason for liars to feel any shame, let alone worry about being “PolitiFacted.” These may sound like philosophical questions, but in the campaigns of 2016, they are beginning to loom larger as a problem for democracy itself. Exhibit A is Donald Trump, who lies repeatedly and is fact-checked repeatedly, with no noticeable impact on either his own behavior or that of his supporters. Britain’s European Union referendum campaign is also plagued by deliberate misuse of facts. Over and over, the “Leave” campaign refers to the 350 million pounds ($511 million) that Britain supposedly pays to the European Commission every week. Over and over, that number is shown to be fiction, by InFacts.org (whose editorial board I am on), BBC Reality Check and others. The number remains painted on the side of campaign buses, and nothing changes. These problems aren’t exactly new: The question of what is propaganda and what is truth has plagued politics since politics began. But the nature of information in the social media age means it keeps getting easier for politicians, partisans, computerized “bots” and foreign governments to manipulate news, and it keeps getting harder to correct this.


Stephen King’s ‘End of Watch’: Doom never felt so close, or so real

if murderous, computer genius before Holly clobbered him, Brady’s consciousness has returned, augmented by illegal drugs administered by Babineau, chief of the clinic’s neurology department. While he’s unable to move from his bed, Brady’s consciousness can leapfrog from his own brain into those of others, controlling them like zombie drones. Worse, he uses all of these human puppets to buy up hundreds of Zappits, discontinued computer tablets. Among the many games bundled into each Zappit is one called Fishin’ Hole. The fiendish Brady reprograms the benign game into a demonic version of Candy Crush or Angry Birds: Anyone looking at the demo becomes hypnotized by its brightly colored fish, whereupon Brady commands them to kill themselves. Even more nefariously, Brady has plans to give away the Zappits to all those kids who attended that boy-band concert five years earlier, thereby igniting a suicide epidemic. He sets up a suicide-inducing website, too, which, in a sly nod to the TV version of King’s “The Stand,” uses “Don’t Fear the Reaper”as its theme song. So much for the page-turning aspects of “End of Watch,” which are many, complex, and grimly entertaining. More intriguing is the novel’s emotional heart, which resides in Hodges. As the book opens, the aging detective learns he has pancreatic cancer. He refuses treatment and tells no one, although the loyal Holly quickly figures out the truth. King sends Hodges, and the reader, on a death march in pursuit of Brady. Exhausted and in gut-wrenching pain, Hodges knows this will be his last case. No point in enlisting the cops: Who would believe that a paraplegic patient is capable of possessing another human being? Not long ago, the events described here would seem as improbable as a haunted 1958 Plymouth Fury named Christine. Today, however, quantum advances in neuroscience, computers and social media make “End of Watch” seem creepily plausible, especially in its vivid depiction of the diabolical game Fishin’ Hole, and the reactions of those vulnerable people, mostly teenagers, who are susceptible to its deadly subliminal message. Throughout his tale, King nimbly pulls together numerous plot threads and characters, adding a few from “Mr. Mercedes” and “Finders Keepers,” and for good measure throws in a final, nail-biting chase through a blizzard. One finishes this novel feeling great empathy for its resolute protagonist, and even greater trepidation about that next round of Candy Crush. Elizabeth Hand’s Best-selling author Stephen


Local digest: D.C.-area news briefs for May 20, 2016

THE DISTRICT Man fatally shot near Md. border A man was fatally shot early Thursday in Southeast Washington near the border with Maryland, D.C. police said. The shooting occurred about 2:40 a.m. in the 800 block of Southern Avenue SE in Washington Highlands, police said. They said the man was taken to a hospital, where he died. Police identified the victim as Dana Hamilton, 44, of Oxon Hill, Md. No further details were released. Police also identified a man fatally shot Wednesday afternoon in the Anacostia neighborhood as Thomas Meriedy, 24, of Southeast Washington. That shooting occurred about 12:40 p.m. in the 2300 block of Mount View Place SE, in the same block as a large Salvation Army National Capital Area building. There are a number of schools in the area, and the scene of the shooting is about four blocks from the Anacostia Metro station. MARYLAND Driver, 30, dies after multi-vehicle crash A 30-year-old man died this week after a multi-vehicle crash in Clinton, Prince George’s County police said. The man, identified as Brandan Sneed of Waldorf, died Tuesday of injuries suffered Monday night in a collision in which four other people were injured, according to police. Police said Sneed was driving east on Old Alexandria Ferry Road when, for reasons still under investigation, he lost control at about 7:45 p.m. Monday. Sneed’s car hit one vehicle head-on in the westbound lane and then hit another vehicle, police said. They said debris struck a fourth vehicle. A passenger in one of the other vehicles was critically injured, police said. Three other people suffered injuries not considered life-threatening, police said. — Victoria St. Martin VIRGINIA Public asked to help search for two teens The FBI and Fairfax County police are searching for two Fairfax teenagers who have been missing for about 10 days, officials said. Authorities are asking the public to help find Facette Danielle Lema, 13, and Rudy Toranzo, 14, who were last seen May 10. Facette was described as a Pacific Islander, 5-foot-3 and 142 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes. Her ears are pierced, and she may be wearing glasses. Rudy was described as a Hispanic male, 5-foot-1 and 140 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes. They both may need medical attention, authorities said. — Clarence Williams Woman found dead in pond is identiﬁed Fairfax County police on Thursday identified a woman found dead in


Why we like what’s popular

breezy read. Vanderbilt includes more than 60 pages of footnotes, from scholarly sources as diverse as the International Journal of Psychophysiology and the Journal of Interactive Marketing, about studies as different as “The Revolution Will Probably Wear Mom Jeans” and “Neural Portraits of Perception: Reconstructing Face Images From Evoked Brain Activity.” The footnotes have a David Foster Wallace-like wit as Vanderbilt calls our attention to such issues as whether people find donuts less yummy if they taste them in a salmon cannery and whether rats enjoy grape Kool-Aid more if it is infused directly into their stomachs. Vanderbilt makes a convincing argument about the tyranny of popularity in determining our choices. We like things better when we become more familiar with them — whether it’s a vegetable, a painting or a tune. Things that are popular tend to get more so. You’d think that having access to millions of songs on Spotify would give less-renowned bands a chance, but you’d be wrong. “The route to the top of the charts has in theory gotten more democratic, less top-down, more unpredictable. . . . But the hierarchy of popularity at the top, once established, is steeper than ever. In 2013, it was estimated that the top 1 percent of music acts took home 77 percent of all music income.” The importance of popularity might seem like an easy equation, but on the other hand, we also crave novelty, and “exposure contains a hidden peril: We begin to like some things less the more we are exposed to them.” Vanderbilt is quite funny about hipsters and their desperate wish to belong to the cool group — but also to be individual, and thus recoiling from others who sport beards and drink craft beer. “The subtle movement of people trying to be like each other and people trying to be different from each other” is not, by the way, an exclusively human trait. He references one zoological study in which a Zambian chimp put a blade of grass in her ear, for no reason whatsoever, and the other chimps, finding the look fetching, copied her. “You May Also Like” is intended for a lay audience, and Vanderbilt mostly succeeds in making his summaries of the science clear and engaging. Sometimes the array of subjects can get dizzying; Vanderbilt is fond of a quick jump-cut between past and present, and he can overcompress, as


The days of freely prescribed painkillers are ending. Here’s what’s next.

patient for 20 years and had no idea he had a drug problem.” Before Kentucky physicians were required to check the database, patients commonly visited multiple doctors to get prescriptions for opioid painkillers, the sedative Xanax and the muscle relaxant Soma, according to David Hopkins, director of the database. “The cocktail” of these three drugs, as it’s known in Kentucky, produces a high that is similar to heroin and just as deadly. It has become much less prevalent since the law was enacted. The number of people receiving the components of the cocktail has dropped 30 percent since the law took effect, Hopkins said, and the number of doctor shoppers has dropped 52 percent. Kentucky’s rules, which were developed by the state Board of Medical Licensure, allow doctors to have a delegate review patients’ drug profiles. Doctors typically ask their assistants to run prescription-drug histories on all the patients they will see the next day and add the information to their electronic medical records, said Michael Rodman, director of Kentucky’s licensure board for physicians. If a potential problem is detected, prescribers can query the database to determine how other physicians in the state are addressing the pain needs of similar patients and they can discuss an individual patient’s drug history with another prescriber, something that was forbidden under previous state privacy laws. To increase the effectiveness of drug monitoring programs, Kentucky and other states use reciprocal agreements to allow interstate sharing of drug dispensing information for pharmacists, law enforcement and physicians in nearby states. Kentucky has agreements with at least 12 other states. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, announced in April that New York had joined his state in sharing PDMP information, along with Connecticut, Delaware, Minnesota, Rhode Island, South Carolina and Virginia. As for what happens when physicians discover people who are obtaining drugs from multiple doctors, Rodman said, they often dismiss the patients and no longer treat them. But Jones, who heads the Kentucky Physicians Health Foundation, which supports doctors with substance use disorders, tells doctors not to do that to patients. “Maybe you don’t keep prescribing them 90 OxyContins with five refills,” he said, “but don’t throw them out. If you do, you’re missing an important opportunity to save a life.” — Stateline Read more: Deaths from opioid overdoses set a record in 2014 CDC urge doctors to curb opioid prescriptions: “The benefits are unproven.”


In the galleries: Spins on ‘The Starry Night,’ from critical to cheeky

scattered black dots represent a map of the stars Van Gogh would have seen when he painted. One of the starkest and most striking contributions is Wayson R. Jones’s near-abstract “Giant Angry Stars,” rendered in grainy black-and-white. Far less minimally, Sondra N. Arkin uses images from the Hubble Telescope to make an intergalactic fantasia no one of Van Gogh’s age could have imagined. Among the cheekier entries are those of Laura Elkins, who dangles a toilet brush in front of her painting; Kristy Simmons, who turns the famed picture into a sort of 3-D postcard; and Ira Tattleman, who incorporates shards of a “Starry Night” mug. If Van Gogh’s renown is now shatterproof, at least today’s struggling artists can express their frustration by smashing something from the gift shop. Sip and Paint: Van Gogh’s “The Starry Night” Sentient Chamber Someday, the technology of “Sentient Chamber” might qualify as architecture. For now, the installation at the National Academy of Sciences seems more like art: beautiful, intriguing and without apparent practicality. The structure was designed by a multidisciplinary team led by Canadian architect Philip Beesley. The group’s statement calls the thing a “free-standing pavilion,” but it can be just as easily seen as a grove of cyber-trees. Some 20 metallic posts, floor-to-ceiling and tightly grouped, support LEDs, plastic fronds and liquid-filled vials. Sensors react to people who pass near or through the technological thicket, triggering lights, movement and metallic music. The algorithms that produce these responses are said to “mimic curiosity” and be so complex that they essentially never repeat themselves. (In this, they’re like the ones Leo Villareal employs to drive his unpredictable light pieces.) The idea is that this semi-conscious edifice might lead to buildings that react to, and learn from, their inhabitants. The creators even suggest that tomorrow’s residences and office blocks might “care about us.” In fiction, artificial smarts and feelings usually don’t work out for the best. Yet “Sentient Chamber” is a long way from passing the Turing test. Within its metal and acrylic chassis, computers cue buzzing, blinking and murmuring. The effect is beguiling, but more akin to wind through branches than a chat with C-3PO. Also at NCAS, “Large Hadron Collider” is a series of seven big renderings of particle accelerators. Jonathan Feldschuh, a data scientist and artist, drew the massive machinery in pencil on Mylar and then added acrylic washes. The light-colored, freely applied


‘Space wrench’ goes where no man has gone before

a whole different way.” The fact that it didn’t, he said, “had a lot to do with my family.” When Bunsun Chhan, Vong’s uncle, attended school for his airframe and powerplant certification, Vong also enrolled, encouraged by his mother. Vong was in school on Sept. 11, 2001. After the terrorist attacks, demand for airplane mechanics stalled. Vong worked at Costco for three years in various positions: bagger, cashier, forklift driver, tire installer. Then he took a job in construction management. In the meantime, his uncle was hired at Scaled Composites, the company that originally developed WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo and is now owned by Northrop Grumman. Vong joined him at Scaled, where Chhan has worked on both spacecraft. When Virgin Galactic acquired WhiteKnightTwo, Vong came with it. Vong specializes in composites, but he and his fellow space wrenches maintain everything: the body, the wing, the skin of the aircraft and the engines. “We check the structure, the structural integrity of the aircraft. We make sure there’s no discrepancies in the wing skin. We check the systems, the wiring, the control cables, the hydraulic systems, the environmental systems, which is the breathing air and the pressurization systems,” he said. “There’s not one thing on this aircraft I haven’t touched.” In 2014, Virgin Galactic suffered a fatal accident, in which the previous incarnation of SpaceShipTwo broke apart during a test flight. The pilot, Peter Siebold, 43, survived a fall from 40,000 feet. The co-pilot, Michael Alsbury, 39, was killed. Federal investigators determined the cause was Alsbury’s error and a system that failed to anticipate it. To Vong, the loss was colossal. “It was a horrible feeling,” he said. “I was on the program for about two years at that time. It was hard to lose a friend. It was a bad day for everybody.” Virgin Galactic shares its hangar with the Spaceship Co., the sister company that is building its fleet. This arrangement means that Virgin Galactic, the operator, can inform the manufacturing process and designs. Mechanics, pilots, engineers and designers have input that commercial airlines do not. (Boeing and Airbus build planes around the world, and then airlines take possession.) Because of this communal space and familiarity, the mechanics and pilots actually know one another well. Branson and his company remain determined to bring space travel to the masses. Their future “astronauts” echo his optimism — after the crash, only 20 canceled


Sports Authority closing all its stores; court rejects Exxon appeal in pollution case

to gasoline produced in a refinery in another state.” — Associated Press Also in Business ● Midwestern homebuyers helped spark a nationwide rise in real estate sales in April. Sales of existing homes increased 1.7 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.45 million, the National Association of Realtors said Friday. Sales jumped 12.1 percent in the Midwest, the most affordable region for housing. Purchases increased slightly in the Northeast but fell in the South and West. The median home sales price was $232,500 in April, a 6.3 percent increase from a year ago. First-time buyers accounted for 32 percent of sales last month, compared with the 30 percent share in March. ● General Motors said Friday that it will give debit cards or extended warranties to 146,000 North American owners of new sport utility vehicles to compensate them because GM overstated the vehicles’ fuel efficiency. The program covers about 135,000 U.S. owners and 11,000 in Canada, GM said. It said most of the debit cards would be worth $450 to $900 for U.S. owners of 2016 SUVs. ● Deere & Co. cut its fiscal-year profit outlook Friday and reported lower quarterly earnings on weak demand for its farming and construction equipment. Deere, which had cut its net income forcast for the year to $1.3 billion in February, now says it expects to make $1.2 billion. Net income attributable to Deere fell to $495.4 million, or $1.56 per share, in the quarter that ended April 30; it had been $690.5 million a year earlier. Net revenue dropped by 4 percent, to $7.88 billion. ● Petroleo Brasileiro SA will be led by veteran business executive Pedro Parente as the state-controlled oil producer struggles to reduce debt and navigate the fallout from the country’s biggest corruption scandal. Parente, chairman of BM&FBovespa SA, the operator of Latin America’s biggest securities exchange, accepted an offer from acting Petroleo president Michel Temer to become Petrobras’s third chief executive in less than two years. The company’s board will meet Monday to discuss Parente’s appointment, it said in a statement Friday. ● Campbell Soup Co. shares slipped the most in almost nine months Friday after the company posted fiscal third-quarter sales that missed analysts’ estimates. It was the six straight quarter of falling revenue for the company, which is suffering as Americans pass up soup in favor of fresher products. — From news services


Not so fast with the pesticides to prevent mosquitoes

Aedes Albopictus mosquitoes. (Josh Replogle/Associated Press) Regarding the May 17 Metro article “How to control mosquitoes and cut the risk of a dangerous virus”: Residential spraying of pesticides for mosquito control has a limited efficacy and considerable adverse effects. The practice is viewed by many, including me, a retired biologist, as having dubious value in preventing mosquitoes around a given residence beyond a few days, while its adverse effects are a real concern and include broad-spectrum killing of beneficial insects such as pollinators and natural predators such as spiders. While the practice of fogging and spraying is legal and growing, people should be presented with the whole picture so that they can weigh benefits against environmental costs. Scott Fredericks, Arlington


Local digest: D.C.-area news briefs for May 21, 2016

THE DISTRICT Suspects in sexual assault sought D.C. police are searching for two men wearing ski masks — one armed with a gun — who investigators say forced a woman into a vehicle and sexually assaulted her Wednesday in Southeast Washington, according to authorities. The incident occurred at about 10 a.m. in the 4500 block of Benning Road SE, near a busy intersection at East Capitol Street NE. Police said the men forced the woman into a minivan and drove her about one mile to the 1100 block of 46th Place SE, where she was sexually assaulted. One assailant was described as a black man standing 6 feet 6 inches talll with a medium complexion and wearing a black jacket, blue jeans and Timberland boots and a black ski mask. Police said he was armed with a handgun. The second assailant was also described as a black man standing about 6 feet 6 inches tall with a dark complexion and wearing a black jacket, black sweatpants and black Nike boots and a black ski mask. Police described the vehicle as an older model white minivan with tinted rear windows. The license plate number was not known. — Peter Hermann VIRGINIA Police investigate homicide in Fairfax Fairfax County police are investigating a fatal shooting Friday at an apartment complex as a homicide. Officers went to the 6000 block of Richmond Highway for a report of a person shot at about 2:20 a.m., police said. Officers found an unresponsive man in the parking lot of the Cityside Huntington Metro Apartment Homes in Alexandria, police said. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Police identified the victim as Tarreece John Sampson, 24, an Alexandria resident and Fairfax County Public Schools employee. Police had not yet announced a possible motive or suspects in the case. — Lynh Bui THE REGION WWII female pilots can be buried at Arlington Female pilots who served in the air forces during World War II can now be buried at Arlington National Cemetery, thanks to legislation President Obama signed Friday. Women Airforce Service Pilots, or WASPs, were buried at the military cemetery from 2002 until 2015, when then-Secretary of the Army John McHugh ruled that they never should have been allowed under then-current law. During the war, Congress voted down a bill that would have granted the female pilots military status. In January, Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.), the


The next time you want to drink wine outdoors, try popping a top

Robles, Calif., Field Recordings winery owner Andrew Jones launched Alloy Wine Works to focus on cans; his Fiction rosé made a splash last summer. So did the Infinite Monkey Theorem, a Denver winery that markets cans in Colorado. Those inspired one of the more novel efforts this year: a slightly fizzy rosé from Dos Cabezas Wineworks in Sonoita, Ariz., made mostly of grenache from the Cimarron Vineyard, high in the desert plains in nearby Cochise County. Winemaker Todd Bostock created his own, which will be sold in New York and Arizona for $12.50 in a decorative tallboy can with a rose on the front, after taking cans of Infinite Monkey on a Colorado camping trip. “There’s all these places that beer gets to go that wine should get to go, too,” Bostock says, which brings us to the obvious inspiration for these efforts. The craft beer world has learned how to can better beer, such as El Hefe Speaks from local DC Brau and Dale’s Pale Ale from Oskar Blues Brewery in Colorado. With canning technology becoming less expensive and winemakers occasionally borrowing their brewer friends’ equipment, it makes sense that small-production wine would follow suit. The concern is that canned wine’s grass-roots revival will be overtaken by more cynical efforts and turned into just another momentary trend. Already, a handful of projects have appeared that seem born more out of the marketing department than the barrel room. Consider the Drop, a canned rosé devised by a recent business-school graduate and canned by a custom-bottling facility in Lodi, Calif. It’s named for a surfing term and destined for New York this summer, particularly the Hamptons, although it seems equally likely to show up in the free fridge of a tech startup. It’s not that momentary fads don’t work. The Drop follows in the spirit of White Girl Rosé, a huge hit last year even after its co-creator, Instagram wonder Josh Ostrovsky, a.k.a. the Fat Jew, had his career summarily dismantled for “unauthorized use” of other comedians’ jokes. It’s more that we don’t need the Axe body spray of pink wine. And wine in a can is too good an idea to fall to fad. That hardly means it has to be serious. Perhaps the season’s best idea has been from Hoxie Spritzer, a Los Angeles company that makes what we’ll call an artisan wine cooler. Hoxie founder Joshua Rosenstein has


Is your persimmon soap infused with geisha wisdom? The precious world of artisanal beauty.

a big business, with more and more dedicated websites and retail outlets cropping up — such as San Francisco-based Credo Beauty, which features brands like Graydon Clinical Luxury, started by a yoga teacher/macrobiotic chef who makes skin-care products out of “cold-pressed broccoli seed oil,” or Follain, which has a location in the District’s Union Market and a founder who once apprenticed on an organic lavender farm in France. Last year, New York City hosted its first Indie Beauty Expo, which one marketing agency described as a “sold-out media and buyer frenzy.” Gwyneth Paltrow’s new Goop skin-care products boast ingredients with highly specific names — “poet’s daffodil” and “sweet iris,” for instance, in her $90 Luminous Melting Cleanser — to emphasize their individuality (like yours, dear consumer). “People are looking for an increased identity with the products, a personal relationship,” says Eleanor Dwyer, a beauty researcher for the market analysis firm Euromonitor. “There’s an idea that the products you use symbolize yourself.” The labor-intensive, heavily pedigreed, exotica-spiked world of artisanal beauty attests to the hunger for handcrafted authenticity, simple supply chains and the glory of the way things used to be. (Bruno Mallart/for The Washington Post) Hair and skin products have always thrived “I feel like I have a mission to introduce this Japanese greatness to the world,” she says. The artisanal beauty trend has been fueled by a growing interest in natural ingredients, as Whole Foods shoppers who buy grass-fed beef consider what they’re putting on their T-zones, and environmentalists warn about the dangers of parabens and phthalates. Within skin care, “natural organic ingredients are among the fastest-growing [segments] in the marketplace,” says Karen Grant, NPD Group’s beauty analyst. A growing number of consumers care deeply about transparency, sustainability and fair trade, so companies that source carefully and recycle and give back to communities where they harvest are often rewarded for it. Most brands don’t have Paltrow, though, so they must rely on compelling brand stories to distinguish themselves. The result is a bevy of origin tales as familiar as Greek mythology. These stories all seem to start with protagonists seeking to craft greatness from nature; they’re described as “plant-whisperers” or are said to be devoted to “wild-crafted” ingredients or a “farm-to-face” mission. The founder might be a professional apiarist who discovered the secret to good skin in the honey she was harvesting, or perhaps a globe-trotting pharmacognosist who has


Why the hottest trend in beer is an IPA that tastes like pineapple or mango

category is pretty explosive right now,” Knorr says. “We’re brewing it non-stop, getting prepared for summer.” (Conveniently, his brewery is located along the heavily traveled route between the District and Ocean City.) For Hugh Sisson, the founder of Baltimore’s Heavy Seas Beer, there’s no shame in admitting that he’s jumping on the tropical IPA bandwagon: “The market is hot for citrus IPAs, so we decided we’re going to do one.” Like Ballast Point and Green Flash, Heavy Seas honed its recipe by experimenting with fruit additions into cask-conditioned firkins of IPA in the brewery tap room, going through “30 or 40 iterations” of the flagship Loose Cannon IPA before coming up with TropiCannon, which is strongly infused with grapefruit, mango, orange, blood orange and lemon peel. Unlike at other breweries, Sisson didn’t intend for TropiCannon to be a permanent fixture in the Heavy Seas lineup. The beer was intended to be sold from April through June, and Sisson thinks it might even be sold out before then, before it wears out its welcome. “We’re living in the age of ‘What do you have that’s new?’ ” he says. “I think there will always be a market for classic styles. But I think the public is fickle.” The tidal wave of tropical beers shows no signs of subsiding — there’s Stone’s Enjoy By 5.30.16 Tangerine IPA, Ardent’s Ardent’s Tangelo IPA, Sierra Nevada’s Beer Camp Tropical IPA to name a few – and that was a topic of the discussion at the Craft Brewers Conference. Jennifer Litz-Kirk, an executive editor at industry journal Beer Business Daily, compared the mania for fruit beers with the explosion of fruit-flavored vodkas a few years ago, calling it “the flavored-vodkafication of beer.” She said the trend is “getting a little bit faddish” and might be due for a correction. Heavy Seas owner Sisson has a cautionary tale: “Three or four years ago, black IPAs were all the rage,” he says. “We released Black Cannon, and Beer Advocate [magazine] called it ‘the benchmark for the style’ [in March 2013]. And by the time we released it for the third year as a seasonal, sales kind of petered out.” Black Cannon is no longer part of the Heavy Seas lineup. But summer’s on the horizon, and a smooth, citrusy tropical IPA sounds refreshing. By the time Labor Day rolls around? We’ll see. More from Food: Beer Column archive


Israeli prosecutors target group that collects testimony on soldiers’ conduct

Palestinians react in 2009 after learning that their mother was killed in Israeli shelling in the Gaza Strip. In Breaking the Silence testimonies, soldiers who participated in fighting describe demolishing homes and using firepower beyond what was necessary. (Khalil Hamra/AP) PETAH TIKVA, Israel — The organization of current and former soldiers, called Breaking the Silence, released a sobering report last year on the 2014 Gaza war that included anonymous testimony suggesting that permissive rules of engagement coupled with indiscriminate artillery fire contributed to mass destruction and a high number of civilian casualties in the coastal enclave. Many Israeli leaders have branded the group’s activists as traitors, funded by foreign donors, whose anonymous and unverifiable testimonials are used to undermine the Israel Defense Forces and to smear the country before an international audience. Israel’s state attorney is seeking a court order to force the group to reveal names of soldiers whose testimonies appear in the Gaza report. In court Sunday, Michael Sfard, a lawyer representing Breaking the Silence, told the judge that the group would be destroyed if it broke its promise to soldiers and provided names. Sfard also argued that the testimonials serve a vital public interest, exposing ordinary Israelis to the actions of their forces in the field. “The only other alternative is the Israel Defense Forces’ spokesman’s unit,” he said. The group is also claiming protection as “journalists.” It is not clear how many soldiers’ identities are being sought or what crimes they may have discussed in their testimonies. Statements by the prosecutor seemed to suggest she was seeking only a single name, but Breaking the Silence activists said there was more than one. Attorneys for the group said that the soldiers being sought were low-ranking troops and that the crimes alleged involved the destruction of property, not the killing of civilians — and so there is no compelling reason for the state to insist that the anonymous soldiers be named. The hearing on whether to compel the group to reveal its sources will continue in July. The Breaking the Silence website contains dozens of videotaped interviews with soldiers, but it blurs their faces and disguises their voices. One example: a young tank gunner describing how during the Gaza war his commander told them to fire at random buildings. Israeli officials denied that such acts were committed. Israel’s Foreign Ministry issued a report last year on military actions


Medical marijuana advocates frustrated by slow pace in Maryland

Jennifer Porcari looks over some of the information she has collected about medical marijuana. She has a daughter who has epilepsy that hasn’t responded to traditional medications. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post) Maryland’s state medical marijuana commission delivered a blow to marijuana advocates and would-be entrepreneurs last week by abruptly capping the number of businesses that can process marijuana into pills, oils and other products. The commission also gave conflicting information about when the first long-awaited growing licenses would be issued, with Executive Director Patrick Jameson first saying it would be late summer or early fall, then stating that licenses would come “weeks” after the evaluations of the applications are completed in early July. At the commission’s first public meeting in months, marijuana advocates and entrepreneurs complained about the slow pace and the secrecy of the process. “We have been waiting patiently for the commission to do its work, but every day is a challenge when you’re watching your child seize, fall behind in school and lose ground,” said Jennifer Porcari, who has fought for years for access to medical cannabis to treat her child’s epilepsy. “We ask you to remember that the work of this commission is to help Marylanders and children like our daughter.” An analysis by the advocacy group Marijuana Policy Project found Maryland to be among the slowest states to get its approved cannabis program up and running. The commission was supposed to start awarding licenses to grow marijuana for medical use in January. But the commission received applications from twice as many businesses as it anticipated, and the timetable has changed several times. Executive Director Hannah Byron abruptly announced her resignation in December and wasn’t replaced until this month. The commission, which declined to comment on its pace, has extended by four months its contract with the Regional Economics Studies Institute at Towson University, which is managing a committee of two dozen evaluators that is reviewing and scoring the applications. Records show that the cost of the contract has quadrupled, to more than $2 million. Towson is expected to deliver scored applications in July to the 15-person commission, which has the final say in who gets licenses. Given the time needed to grow and process cannabis, medical marijuana probably will not be available in the state until the summer of 2017. The delays are costing businesses money, entrepreneurs and their allies said. “There are applicants


Jeff and Amy Frederick trade politics for beer brewing in Prince William

master. Brew Republic will use a 10-barrel brewing system, which is common for a start-up. Although no suds are flowing yet, the company’s website lists 22 planned beers. The kitchen at the pub will produce small plates, appetizers and snack foods, and the operation is looking to make its own root beer. The non-alcoholic offering is part of the founders’ vision that Brew Republic will be a place where patrons of all ages are welcome. “I want families to be comfortable here,” said Frederick, who was removed from his position at the helm of the state GOP by the party’s central committee in 2009. Anastasia Paszkiewicz, Stonebridge’s property manager, underscored this idea, as well. She said a recent trip to a winery showed her how the alcohol industry is creating a product different from the stereotype of a dimly lit bar. “It’s become so much more than that,” Paszkiewicz said. Another alcohol-themed venture, Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar & Grill, closed last year after occupying a space across the street from where Brew Republic is under construction in Stonebridge. But the Fredericks and Heiseys aren’t worried about their chances of success, saying the two enterprises are different. The Ornery Beer Co. Public House also is less than 1½ miles away, but this brewpub’s presence won’t necessarily hurt the Brew Republic, either. The proximity may seem notable in terms of a brewing market that’s still growing, but it’s not as big of a deal when viewed in historical terms, said Bryce Capodieci, who teaches in West Virginia University’s Craft Beer Certificate Program. Some cities had brewpubs in every neighborhood before Prohibition shut them down, Capodieci said. Larger craft brewers might face a fight for store shelf space if they distribute nationally, he said, but local and regional operations haven’t hit a saturation point. “They have plenty of room for growth,” Capodieci said. Those beer makers are indeed growing. Craft brewers in Virginia produced 274,111 barrels of beer last year, according to the state’s Economic Development Partnership. That is a 346 percent increase over four years earlier. There are more than 130 licensed breweries in Virginia, and they have an economic impact of $1 billion, according to the EDP. Brew Republic’s founders hope to add to this commerce, and the Fredericks are working hard at their new venture. There’s one big difference from their political careers, however. This enterprise is nonpartisan.


Donated organs kept ‘alive’ may ease the transplant shortage

he asked. “We would hope so. But we don’t know.” A Massachusetts company, TransMedics, founded in 1998 by a heart surgeon, developed the Portable Organ Care System being used in the U.S. trials. Competitors here and abroad also are testing alternative technology. The TransMedics device encloses the organ in a plastic box that attaches to a wheeled cart and can be removed to fit in a vehicle or aircraft. Blood, nutrients and fluids are pumped through tubes into the liver. Heaters warm the blood. Sensors monitor critical functions during the trip, relaying them to doctors wirelessly on a control screen. Specialists can alter a number of conditions — including oxygen levels and pressure in veins — with a touch of the panel. James Markmann, Chief of organ transplantation at Massachusetts General Hospital, holds the wireless remote control for the Transmedics Organ Care System. (Matthew Cavanaugh for The Washington Post) The TransMedics system, first tested in Europe in 2006, is awaiting approval by the Food and Drug Administration for commercial use with hearts and lungs in the United States. The liver trial is a first-level safety study. In Australia and parts of Europe, the device has been approved and used about 200 times commercially, according to a company spokeswoman. A substantial remaining obstacle is cost, including whether insurance, Medicare and Medicaid will cover the $250,000 initial purchase, the $45,000 price of each organ container — which are used only once — and the staff time needed to transport an organ this way. Nearly 31,000 organs were transplanted in the United States last year, including 2,804 hearts and 7,127 livers. But the sizable gap between demand and supply generally widens every year, leaving tens of thousands of people on waiting lists. An average of 22 people die each day waiting for transplants. David Klassen, medical director for the United Network for Organ Sharing, the nonprofit organization that runs the U.S. organ procurement and transplantation network, agreed that devices such as the organ-care system could help ease the shortage if they make currently unusable organs available for transplant. Cost, he said, is still a barrier to widespread adoption of the devices, but with trials underway it is early for decisions on coverage. There are two types of death in the transplant field — brain death and cardiac death. Donor hearts are useful only after brain death, because the heart continues to pump and


The online lending scare

The LendingClub logo appears above the post where it trades on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. (Richard Drew/Associated Press) Could online lending cause the next financial crisis? While the odds seem overwhelmingly against it, the recent turmoil at LendingClub — a leading online lender — makes it hard not to ask the question. There are some disquieting parallels with subprime mortgages, which seemed beneficial until sloppy and fraudulent lending practices triggered a wider collapse of confidence. Are we about to repeat the cycle? In theory, online lending makes a lot of sense. Consumers and companies that want credit submit their applications electronically; their creditworthiness is evaluated electronically from data, including FICO scores and payment history, kept by credit bureaus or available from other sources. If prospective borrowers pass the tests, they get the loans. The process is straightforward and fast; the lack of bank branches cuts costs. Business has boomed, in part because some traditional banks retreated from consumer and business lending after the financial crisis. By one study, online lending in the United States totaled $36 billion in 2015, triple the 2014 volume. The increases have continued. In the first three months of 2016, LendingClub’s new loans rose 68 percent to $2.75 billion from the same period in 2015. Online lending was emerging as an alternative to bank and credit card loans. Much of the personal lending goes toward “refinancing existing debts, not receiving new credit,” concluded a new Treasury Department study of the industry. LendingClub says nearly 70 percent of its borrowers use loans this way. Small businesses, frustrated by long waits and tough lending guidelines at banks, are also turning to online lenders. A 2015 survey found that 22 percent of small firms (annual revenues: $100,000 to $1 million) applied for online loans, Treasury reports. Now comes the LendingClub surprise. In early May, its directors pushed out the company’s founder and chief executive, Renaud Laplanche. According to excellent reporting by the Wall Street Journal, the schism apparently reflected a loss of trust between the directors and Laplanche. He allegedly failed to provide the board with timely information on several issues. An investigation also found that the firm’s rapid growth had compromised some of its financial controls. Normally, this would be a run-of-the-mill business dispute. What gives it added significance is that LendingClub, aside from being one of the largest online lenders, had a “sterling”


Wave of bombings kills scores in area of Syria loyal to Assad

group was responsible for the blasts, which coincided with an escalated regional campaign of bombings by the group as it is steadily pushed back from strongholds in Syria and Iraq. Syrian state television, however, blamed an Islamist rebel group, Ahrar al-Sham, and claimed that the group is backed by the United States. The accusation may represent an attempt to push the U.S. government to accede to Russian demands that it designate Ahrar al-Sham as a terrorist organization. Obama administration officials say they have no direct contacts with Ahrar al-Sham, which is tied to the wider rebel movement and also al-Qaeda, but have rejected Russian requests to label it as terrorist. An Ahrar al-Sham official visited Washington in December, according to a report by the McClatchy news organization on Saturday. The official, Labib Al-Nahhas, denied that Ahrar al-Sham carried out Monday’s attacks. “This is not our modus operandi: we do not target civilians,” he said in a statement posted on Twitter. The attacks appeared to be a well-planned operation in which suicide bombers wearing vests and at least one car bomb detonated almost simultaneously in two cities. According to state media, two or three explosions struck the port city of Tartus, where Russia has long maintained a naval base, and four more hit Jabla. Russia established an air base in the countryside outside Jabla when it intervened in Syria’s war last year, but there was no indication either of the Russian bases was the target. The sites that were attacked could have been expected to be crowded with civilians at the time, and civilians appeared to have been the main target. The blasts in Jabla struck a busy bus station, a hospital’s emergency entrance and a government electricity office, while those in Tartus also hit a bus station, as well as a residential neighborhood nearby. State television broadcast footage of dozens of mangled buses and cars and pools of blood at a wrecked cafeteria at the Jabla bus station. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks the Syrian conflict through a network of activists and other sources, said the toll could be as high as 121 dead, with 73 in Jabla and 48 in Tartus. The coastal area is populated mostly by members of Assad’s minority Alawite community who have remained loyal to him throughout the war, sparing the region from the battles raging elsewhere. The blasts come two


‘That is not the son I raised’: How a British citizen became one of the most notorious members of ISIS

four. An undated photograph of El Shafee Elsheikh, 27, a Londoner who joined the Islamic State. He has been identified as one of the Britons who supervised the torture and killings of Americans and British hostages in Syria. (Family photo) Elsheikh was identified through a joint Washington Post and BuzzFeed News investigation. His name was confirmed by a former U.S. counterterrorism official and other people familiar with British nationals in Syria. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. The FBI declined to comment. Elsheikh’s family said he is still alive and living in Syria. He remains in touch with some friends and family — but not his mother, she said. All four Britons grew up in the same part of West London, but it is unclear whether they knew each other before they left for Syria. All of them apparently joined al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria before defecting to the Islamic State. Three of the four were immigrants. Kotey, a convert, is of Ghanaian and Greek Cypriot background, and Emwazi was born in Kuwait. Davis was born in West London and later converted to Islam. Elsheikh’s mother, Maha Elgizouli, said in an interview that for most of his life, her son was a regular Londoner, supporting the Queens Park Rangers soccer team and working as a mechanic without ever attracting the attention of the authorities. Known to his friends as “Shaf,” he was one of three sons raised by their mother after the family moved to Britain. When he was 11 years old, his mother said, he joined the Army Cadet Force, a youth organization. He spent three years with the cadets, she said, enjoying his time with the group. This footage of "Jihadi John" shows his role in the barbaric actions of the Islamic State. Elgizouli said she tried to shield her boys from trouble, but in 2008, the eldest brother, Khalid, was arrested with two others on charges of killing a gang member involved in a dispute with Elsheikh. He was eventually cleared in the man’s death but was convicted of possessing a firearm with intent to endanger, according to media reports. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison. “The brothers loved each other very much. They were very close,” said a close family friend, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation. “When Khalid went to prison,


The self-deprecating titan behind Alibaba

"Alibaba: The House That Jack Ma Built," by Duncan Clark. (Ecco) Fred Vogelstein is a contributing editor for Wired magazine. He is the author of “Dogfight: How Apple and Google Went to War and Started a Revolution.” If you don’t know anything about business in China, and you have never heard of Jack Ma, you will learn something from “Alibaba” by Duncan Clark. Clark has known Ma for 17 years and been a China-based investment adviser since 1994. Few foreigners have been as close to ground zero of the Chinese economic miracle as Clark has. And Ma is definitely worthy of book-length treatment. Imagine an online marketplace, retailer and banking business as powerful as eBay, PayPal and Amazon combined, and you have Alibaba. Ma is as rich, powerful and successful as Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Jeff Bezos of Amazon (who also owns this newspaper) or Elon Musk of Tesla. But because few see Alibaba in the United States, and U.S. media don’t do a good job of writing about titans beyond our borders, most don’t know who Ma is. The problem is that although the book is loaded with interesting facts about Ma’s rise, some of which have never appeared anywhere else, Clark’s storytelling skills need work. Ma is a fascinating figure. He grew up during Mao Zedong’s cultural revolution. His family, who lived 100 miles southwest of Shanghai, constantly feared persecution from the Red Guards. Yet today Ma is one of the richest men in China. His ambitions to expand Alibaba’s business globally, to the United States and beyond, are just as big as those of the U.S. Internet titans to expand into China. But after the first chapter or two, which are loaded with great detail about China’s burgeoning Internet economy, “Alibaba” often reads like a long Wikipedia entry. Clark tells us about many things, but shows us very little. As a result, the parts of the book that should be suspenseful don’t feel suspenseful at all. Building any company, especially one as big as Alibaba, is difficult and full of conflict and uncertainty. But this book doesn’t make it feel that way. We learn that when Ma was growing up, he developed a deep relationship with an Australian family named Morley, and Clark supplies letters and pictures from the family he tracked down in Australia. He tells us the relationship triggered Ma’s desire to learn English and


Ocean trash turned into a thing of beauty

National Zoo’s ‘Washed Ashore’ exhibit tells the story of how plastics can harm ocean creatures. Flash the marlin is a fine fish and a fine piece of trash. Standing just outside the National Zoo’s visitor center, he is poised, mouth open, to make a splash in a wave of turquoise fishing nets and clear plastic bottles. His gills, made from toilet seats, are rather dirty; his long bill, narrowing to a point that seems sharp enough to pierce a small fish — or at least a plastic trash bag — is made from three fishing rods. His eyes — well, if the eyes are a window into the soul, Flash’s soul has seen better days. His creator, pointing to one of the sculpture’s large silvery eyes, says it was made from a mayonnaise lid, a beer can, a motor oil container and a silver sandal. The socket was made from a deflated Cinderella beach ball. Flash, an 850-pound sculpture made almost entirely of plastic trash that washed up on Oregon beaches, is one of 17 larger-than-life marine sculptures that will be on display at the National Zoo starting Friday. Made by a team of artists and volunteers led by Angela Haseltine Pozzi, “Washed Ashore,” which will run through September 5, is an art exhibition with a message. As Haseltine Pozzi (pronounced Hazel-teen POTS-ee) puts it: “Plastic pollution is just choking the ocean. It’s hurting the animals, and we have to change our consumer habits.” A former art teacher from Washington state, Haseltine Pozzi grew up spending summers at a cabin in the seaside town of Bandon, Oregon. She turned to the ocean after the death of her husband, Craig Pozzi, from a brain tumor in 2004. One afternoon a few years after her husband’s death, she looked down at one of her favorite beaches and saw a line of “tiny little plastics” stretched across the shore “as far as your eye could see.” The plastic bits were pieces of trash that had washed up with the waves. Noticing beachcombers searching for shells farther down the shore, she decided she needed to find a way “to get those people to pick up that stuff” — trash, pounds and pounds of it. Haseltine Pozzi, now 58, decided that turning trash into beautiful art, showing some of the animals most affected by ocean pollution, was the solution. In 2010 she founded Washed Ashore,


Va. high school student charged with giving drugs to classmate who died

A Fairfax County high school student has been charged with distributing drugs to a classmate, who later died after drinking alcohol and ingesting a range of controlled substances, police said Tuesday. David Evers, 18, a Centreville High School student from Clifton, turned himself in to police last week after the death of 17-year-old Centreville resident Alexia Springer in March, police said. The Virginia medical examiner found that Springer’s death was accidental and that it resulted from a combination of alcohol, the painkiller morphine, the opioid oxycodone and the anti-anxiety medication alprazolam. Rona Powell, Springer’s mother, said her daughter drank and took the drugs during a party on the night before she was found dead in her family’s home. Police did not elaborate on the alleged interaction between the two students. Powell said police told her Evers had given her daughter crushed morphine. David Evers, 18, a Centreville High School student, and resident of Clifton, was charged with drug distribution. Police allege he provided drugs to a classmate who later died. (Fairfax County Police) “I feel that justice has been served,” Powell said of the charge. “I hope it’s an awakening call to all teenagers out there who are experimenting with these drugs.” A call to the Evers family was not returned, and it was not immediately clear whether he had retained an attorney. Powell said that Springer, who was the homecoming princess, a soccer player and varsity runner as a junior at Centreville High School, went to a birthday party in a friend’s basement on the night of Feb. 29. Over the course of the evening, Powell said, her daughter consumed the drugs and alcohol and then returned home with a friend. Springer went to sleep after going on a computer and texting but never awoke. Powell went to work on the morning of March 1, and the friend later discovered that Springer was not responsive, Powell said. Powell eventually got a call from a Fairfax County detective and returned home. She said her daughter had died during the night. The drugs had suppressed her breathing and heart rate. Powell said it was the first inkling she had that her daughter had used drugs. “She was a really good kid,” Powell said. “This is something I would never have thought would happen to her.” Springer and Evers were acquaintances, Powell said. Evers was listed on an “All A” grade list


For many Somali refugees, this industry offers hope — then takes it away

other National Beef workers, and then his family arrived. His sister, the youngest, enrolled at the local high school, and his two younger brothers got jobs at the meat plant, all on the same shift, 3 p.m. to 11 p.m., that was most popular for Somalis. They found a two-bedroom apartment across from the African grocery store for $765 per month and the International Rescue Committee provided them with a kitchen table and some worn furniture. They decorated the home with giveaway Kansas Jayhawks calendars and pinned tapestries over the bedroom windows, sealing out all daylight so the brothers could sleep from 4 a.m. until noon. Ahmed, thin with an easy, toothy smile, needed and liked the money. He and his brothers bought a car, a used Saturn. He bought a laptop on Black Friday. He wore a hat that said “Detroit” and felt kind of like an American. But then the sameness set in. Ahmed slept and worked. He worked and slept. He got home late and watched European soccer in a daze. The main difference in each shift was the number of cows that came down the line: 2,700, 2,900, 3,100. “You cut and cut and cut,” Ahmed said, and he had periods of wheezing breath, and talked less about school. The cows came in from Colorado and Kansas and Oklahoma and went out as steaks and ribs to foreign countries and American restaurants. Ahmed was just one cog, giving a few cuts to the fat of the animals’ legs long after they’d been killed with a bolt to the head, shucked of the skin, drained of the intestines and shaved into portions. Where Ahmed worked, on the cutting line, the temperatures were just above freezing, and the meat felt hard and cold. He wore steel-toed boots and bundled himself in sweatshirts, and he used a six-inch blade that grew dull as the shifts dragged on. Monday: Cut, cut, sharpen. Tuesday: Cut, cut, sharpen. And now it was Wednesday, another shift ending after midnight, and Ahmed folded onto the second-hand sofa as his sister slept in the other room. The bedroom doors were closed. The light was dim. The brothers whispered, and Osman turned on the gas range, a steam smelling of chicken and spices filling the apartment. “Could you open the door?” Osman said. Elyas got up and cracked it open. Ahmed shifted on the sofa and


Montgomery County crime report

Sycamore Farm Dr., Town Commons Dr., Wims Rd., INDECENT EXPOSURE Frederick Rd., THEFTS/BREAK-INS Birdseye Dr., Carlow Point Cir., Century Blvd., Clopper Rd., Country Ridge Dr., Crystal Rock Dr., Dovedale Way, Doxdam Way, Fair Garden Lane, Fenchurch Ct., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd. and Shakespeare Blvd., Frederick Rd. and Shakespeare Blvd., Frederick Rd., Frederick Rd., Frederick and Gunners Branch roads, Germantown Rd., Germantown Rd., Great Seneca Hwy. and Wisteria Dr., Knolltop View Ct., Leaman Farm Rd., Middlebrook Rd., Middlebrook Rd., Middlebrook Rd., Observation Dr., Ridgecrest Dr., Ripplemead Dr., St. Johnsbury Lane, St. Johnsbury Lane, Staffordshire Dr., Tattershall Dr., Town Commons Dr., Turtle Rock Terr., University Blvd. E., Waterbury Way, Watkins Rd., Western Ave., Western Ave., Western and Wisconsin avenues, Wisteria Dr., BREAK-IN Cedarbluff Dr., VEHICLE THEFT Owl Run Way, VANDALISM University Blvd. E., District 6 Gaithersburg Station Telephone: 240-773-5700 SEXUAL ASSAULTS Blue Smoke Ct., Broschart Rd., Buttry Rd., Epsilon Dr., Fulks Corner Ave., ASSAULTS Brassie Pl., Brassie Pl., Brassie Pl., Brassie Pl., Crested Iris Ct., Deer Park Rd. W., Diamond E. and Summit avenues N., Docena Dr., Frederick Ave. N., Killarney Lane, Lost Knife Cir., Russell Ave., Shady Grove Rd., Travis Lane, Westland Dr. S., ROBBERIES Skidmore Blvd., Summit Ave. N., THEFTS/BREAK-INS Beacon Square Ct., Beechcraft Ave., Beechcraft Ave., Bethany Pl., Bonanza Way, Chadburn Pl., Clopper Rd., Contour Rd., Contour Rd., Founders Mill Dr., Frederick Ave. N., Frederick Ave. S., Frederick Ave. N., Frederick Ave. N., Frederick Ave. N., Frontwell Cir., Goshen Rd., Granite Pl., Lost Knife Cir., Lost Knife Rd., Mahogany Cir., Marathon Cir., Montgomery Village Ave., Montgomery Village Ave., Montgomery Village Ave., Montgomery Village Ave., Montgomery Village Ave., Muncaster Mill Rd., Pembrooke View Lane, Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Russell Ave., Shady Grove Rd., Shady Grove Rd., Snouffer School Rd., Suthard Dr., Towne Crest Ct., University Blvd. E., Western Ave., Western Ave., Western and Wisconsin avenues, Westland Dr. N., Whitcliff Ct., BREAK-INS Clopper Rd., Walkers Choice Rd., VEHICLE THEFT Snouffer School Rd., VANDALISM Mahogany Dr., University Blvd. E., Takoma Park and other areas SEXUAL ASSAULT Anne St., ASSAULT Piney Branch Rd., THEFTS/BREAK-INS Chicago Ave., Ethan Allen Ave., Fenton St., Holton Lane, Montgomery Ave., New Hampshire Ave., University Blvd. E., Western Ave., Western Ave., Western and Wisconsin avenues, VANDALISM University Blvd. E.,


Montgomery County Animal Watch

These cases were received by the Montgomery County Animal Services Division. For information, call 240-773-5900. This number provides recorded information on topics such as the new animal services and adoption center’s hours and location in Derwood, adoption and licensing procedures, and lost-and-found and field services. Horsing around: Papillon bites girl: Adopt dogs and cats at MCHS no-kill rescue: Rockville Reduced fees for cat adoption: Germantown Adoptable cats at no-kill shelter: Gaithersburg — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton