Captain Admits to Affair, but Denies Beating Officer

Abstract: A New York City police captain accused of assaulting a subordinate admitted in court yesterday that they had a forbidden sexual relationship, but he denied ever beating her. Turning the tables on his accuser, the captain, Alberto Sanchez, 42, painted her as the aggressor in the dispute that led to his trial, saying they had quarreled over her demand that he leave his live-in companion. He said that during the argument, which took place at a retirement party for a fellow officer in a Greenwich Village restaurant last year, he announced that he was leaving, stood up and walked out. Then he paid $15 for a cab ride from Bleecker Street to Grand Central Terminal, he told the jury, and took a train home to Peekskill, where his companion, whom he considered his wife, picked him up. At the party, “I told them I had to leave, turned around, walked out the door,” he testified in State Supreme Court in Manhattan. The defense rested yesterday after his testimony ended, and closing arguments are scheduled for Monday. Prosecutors have said Captain Sanchez and his accuser, Officer Sharon Gandarilla, who was married at the time, had a two-year affair that began in the 23rd Precinct in East Harlem and continued as both went to work at the Police Academy. Officer Gandarilla, 33, testified earlier this week that Captain Sanchez became enraged at the party because he thought she was flirting with another officer, dragged her to her car by the hair, kicked her inside, drove a short way, beat her again, then drove to the Bronx, where he beat her a third time. She said that in confusion and fear, she then drove him home to Peekskill from the Bronx. Captain Sanchez, however, said he left the restaurant before 9 p.m., then caught the 10 p.m. train to Peekskill. Witnesses testified that the beating took place sometime between 9 and 9:30 p.m., and the captain’s lawyer, Marvyn M. Kornberg, has been building a case that Officer Gandarilla was beaten by somebody else. The captain testified that when he left the restaurant, Gonzalez y Gonzalez, he forgot to collect his Police Department-issued cellphone, which was in his bag in Officer Gandarilla’s car. Mr. Kornberg introduced telephone records yesterday to support the captain’s testimony that he had taken the train home. The records showed that Officer Gandarilla used the captain’s departmental cellphone to call his personal cellphone at 10:41 p.m., and then again three minutes later, at 10:44 p.m. Mr. Kornberg suggested that there was not enough time for Officer Gandarilla to have been beaten twice in Manhattan and again in the Bronx, and then to have driven Captain Sanchez home to Peekskill — which he said was an hour from the Bronx — before making those calls. When those calls were made, “Where were you?” Mr. Kornberg asked his client. “On the train,” Captain Sanchez replied. The records also showed that Officer Gandarilla used the captain’s department phone to call her husband at 10:35, 10:51 and 10:59 p.m., Mr. Kornberg said. “Were you sitting next to her when she called her husband?” Mr. Kornberg asked. “No,” Captain Sanchez replied. The jury will have to consider conflicting eyewitness accounts of the beating, with one caller to 911 describing the assailant as blond. Captain Sanchez has dark hair. Officer Gandarilla has also filed a federal civil suit against him and the city, alleging sexual harassment. Captain Sanchez acknowledged on the stand yesterday that he was under an internal department investigation for fraternizing with Officer Gandarilla. Fraternization, a social or dating relationship with a subordinate in the same command, is forbidden by Police Department rules, a police spokesman said yesterday in a telephone interview. Captain Sanchez was the commander of the police cadet corps at the academy, and Officer Gandarilla worked there as an instructor. He is now on modified duty, assigned to a desk job. A typical remedy for fraternization would be a transfer, the spokesman said. Captain Sanchez said that when he met Officer Gandarilla for lunch the day after the retirement party, she had bruises under her eyes and on her arms. He said she told him that she had been beaten by a group of people in Lower Manhattan. The prosecutor, Jessica Taub, ridiculed this testimony, asking why the captain had not made sure that Officer Gandarilla filed a police complaint about the beating. “Well, captain, weren’t the people who she said assaulted her still out there?” Ms. Taub demanded. “I don’t know,” Captain Sanchez replied. Officer Gandarilla has also accused Captain Sanchez of beating her at a motel in the Bronx on Dec. 6, 2006. Under cross-examination, Captain Sanchez at first said he did not remember beating her at the motel. Under further questioning by his lawyer, he clarified that answer, saying that the part he did not remember was being at the motel, and that he had never beaten her at all.


Astor’s Son Appears in Court and Denies Charges

Abstract: Anthony D. Marshall , 83 years old, the only son of Brooke Astor , leaned forward slightly and gazed down at the table. The only sound in the courtroom yesterday afternoon was the voice of an officer reading a litany of criminal charges against him. One after another, the charges accused Mr. Marshall of stealing millions of dollars and valuable property from his mother, the philanthropist and socialite, after she was found to have Alzheimer’s disease. When the last charge was read, Mr. Marshall placed his right hand on his brow, stirred, and murmured two words, “Not guilty.” The heir to one of New York’s oldest and most legendary fortunes then borrowed a pen from one of his lawyers and signed some papers. They were given to the judge, who said, “The arrest warrant is vacated and the bond is approved” — meaning that Mr. Marshall, though a criminal defendant, still had his freedom. As he left the courtroom, he briefly comforted his wife, Charlene, patting her back. The two held hands as they walked slowly down the corridor, trailed by court officers and reporters. Before boarding an elevator, Mr. Marshall began leaning on a brown wooden cane with a gold-colored handle. The 18-count indictment that was unsealed yesterday accused Mr. Marshall and one of his mother’s former lawyers, Francis X. Morrissey Jr., of numerous crimes over a six-year period, including persuading the frail and ailing Mrs. Astor to change her will so they could enrich themselves. Mr. Morrissey even stands accused of forging Mrs. Astor’s signature on an amendment to the will. Elizabeth Loewy, an assistant district attorney, told Judge A. Kirke Bartley Jr. that Mr. Marshall “abused his position of trust to steal from” his ailing mother. She asked that Mr. Marshall provide a personal recognizance bond in the amount of $100,000 and surrender his passport, which he did. It was a striking new chapter in a divisive legal battle over Mrs. Astor’s fortune and well-being that started 16 months ago, when Mr. Marshall’s son Philip filed a court petition accusing his father of neglecting her care — a charge that was later found to be unsubstantiated — while trying to gain financially from her wealth. Mrs. Astor died in August at 105. The Manhattan grand jury found enough evidence of improprieties committed by Mr. Marshall and Mr. Morrissey to hand up the indictment, which carries with it the possibility of significant prison time. “Marshall and Morrissey took advantage of Mrs. Astor’s diminished mental capacity in a scheme to defraud her and others out of millions of dollars,” District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau said at a news conference. “Marshall abused his power of attorney and convinced Mrs. Astor to sell property by falsely telling her that she was running out of money.” Mr. Morrissey’s lawyer, Michael S. Ross, said that his client was flying back to the United States today and would surrender on Friday. Mr. Morrissey was charged in the indictment with forgery, criminal possession of a forged instrument, scheme to defraud, and conspiracy. Mr. Marshall, who had been his mother’s salaried financial adviser, is charged with scheme to defraud, grand larceny, criminal possession of stolen property, falsifying business records and other charges. One of Mr. Marshall’s lawyers, Kenneth E. Warner, said his client had “faithfully and effectively” managed Mrs. Astor’s affairs for more than 25 years, increasing the value of her investments from $19 million to $82 million. “Brooke Astor loved Tony, her only child, and whatever he received was in accordance with her wishes,” Mr. Warner said. “Just as the original claims of ‘elder abuse’ were found to have no basis, we’re confident that once all the facts are known, Mr. Marshall will be exonerated.” Mr. Marshall appeared weary at 8 a.m. yesterday as he arrived on Hogan Place in Lower Manhattan in a black Cadillac sedan, which parked in front of the entrance to the district attorney’s office. Photographers pressed their lenses up to the car window and camera lights flashed as Mr. Marshall sat impassively inside, staring straight ahead. Wearing a gray pinstriped suit and a dark blue tie, Mr. Marshall stepped onto the sidewalk and slowly walked the 20 paces to the entrance of the office, avoiding two plastic cones and a wooden ramp placed over part of the building’s front steps. More than a dozen reporters, photographers and television camera operators swarmed around him. A television reporter extended a microphone and asked a question. Mr. Marshall — his wife and a lawyer clutching his elbows — continued walking and made no response. The three passed through a revolving door and stood briefly in the lobby of the building. Then, holding a green building pass in his hand, Mr. Marshall boarded an elevator. The indictment alleges that in one instance, Mr. Marshall “stole” more than $50,000 to pay the captain of his yacht. The document also states that Mr. Marshall took money from his mother to pay the salary of a social secretary who worked primarily for his theater production company, which he operated out of his mother’s apartment without her knowledge.. He is also charged with stealing two pieces of art from her apartment — one by Tiepolo and one by John Frederick Lewis. The pieces, each valued at about half a million dollars, were returned as part of a settlement in the case brought by Philip Marshall. On a broader scale, the indictment says that Mr. Marshall, after consulting with Mr. Morrissey, used Mrs. Astor’s money in August 2005 to pay himself a retroactive salary increase, to $1.4 million from $450,000. Mr. Morgenthau said that as far back as 2001, Mrs. Astor’s doctors had told Mr. Marshall that she was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and that “her ability to understand complex issues was limited, and made it clear that his mother’s mental condition would be degenerative.” But Mr. Morgenthau said that according to the indictment, Mr. Marshall and Mr. Morrissey persuaded Mrs. Astor to change her will in 2004 with two amendments, one of which leaves her son her residuary estate and changes her longstanding plan to ultimately leave that money to charity. Daniel J. Castleman, the chief of the investigation division of the district attorney’s office, described that amendment as “depriving the charities of $60 million or more.” Mr. Morgenthau said that his office’s investigation had revealed that Mr. Marshall and Mr. Morrissey had conspired to fire Mrs. Astor’s longtime lawyer and to have Mrs. Astor sign that amendment. “Morrissey is charged with forging, or participating in the forging of Mrs. Astor’s signature” on the other amendment in question, Mr. Morgenthau said. The amendment believed to be forged, which was signed in March 2004, directed that Mrs. Astor’s real estate be sold upon her death and that the proceeds be added to her residuary estate. Mr. Castleman said that this would result in higher executor fees for Mr. Marshall and his handpicked co-executors: his wife and Mr. Morrissey.

Families and Family Life
Frauds and Swindling
Aged
Marshall Anthony D
Astor Brooke


Champions League: Welbeck Scores Hat Trick as Arsenal Beats Galatasaray, 4-1

Abstract: LONDON — Sports, like many other things in life, often comes down to one generation putting faith in the next. We witnessed the manifestation of that during Arsenal’s 4-1 victory over Galatasaray here in north London on Wednesday. It was the night of Arsène Wenger’s 18th anniversary as Arsenal manager and the night that Danny Welbeck scored a hat trick of goals for the first time in professional soccer. Welbeck was five years old when Wenger, now 64, arrived in England. The Frenchman has coached Arsenal through 1,022 games and has managed some exquisite players through his seemingly eternal quest to win the Champions League. But Welbeck represents the closest thing that Wenger has come to making a panic buy. The forward was signed hours before the end of the transfer window on Sept. 2, after Arsenal’s principle striker, Olivier Giroud, broke a leg. Manchester United sold Welbeck to a main rival after United’s new coach, Louis van Gaal, stated that Welbeck was too inconsistent to be a true United front man. The sport is all about opinions. Van Gaal has three of the world’s top strikers — Wayne Rooney, Robin van Persie and Radamel Falcao — to choose from. And Welbeck, Manchester-born of Ghanaian parents, had been spotted as a talent by United when he was six. He is now 23. Welbeck is such an open book, so honest in front of the world’s media that he has said himself that he should have taken his opportunities more than his scoring ratio of one goal in every four or five United appearances achieved. However, if you ask for consistency, it would be a good idea to offer consistency of opportunity to a player. Welbeck, until now, had been selected more often than not on the wings, or asked to play off the bench, under successive managers. He grew up as a United red, but he took the chance to move south to London, in part because he could see chance beckoning. Giroud will be out of the game until Christmas or New Year, and Wenger needed someone with the presence, the physical qualities and the enthusiasm that Welbeck brings. “He’s given me the chance to play up front in my preferred position,” Welbeck answered when asked directly about Wenger’s management on Sky TV immediately after Wednesday’s game. “I’m going to do everything that I can to make sure that he’s happy. We’ve set the benchmark now and we’ve really got to try and grow on that positive win.” The benchmark. So swift, so alert, and so smooth and calm were the new striker’s three finishes that Arsenal fans began to see in him the new Thierry Henry. Now that is asking too much, too soon. Yes, the Mancunian has come in off the wing, as Henry did in Wenger’s first, and most accomplished Arsenal side. Yes, his running into space is intelligent, as Henry’s was par excellence. And yes, there is Wenger’s teaching, his patience with a willing convert. But Henry, still a scorer on instinct and memory at the age of 37 for the New York Red Bulls, was the jewel in the crown of Arsenal’s finest side ever, the so-called Invincibles of a decade ago. Henry scored 226 goals and made 92 assists in his 369 games as a Gunner. And he was elevated by the partnership with Dennis Bergkamp, without a doubt the most astute creator in Wenger’s time. Comparisons count for little. What Welbeck did on Wednesday was to illuminate the recklessness of Galatasaray’s attempting a new formation, based precariously on a three-man backline that had neither pace nor knowhow at this level. What Welbeck did was lurk at the shoulder of Felipe Melo, a destructive midfield player pressed into the position of centerback. Melo was simply not quick enough, not sufficiently aware or disciplined to cope with Welbeck’s leggy thrusts, or to read the slide-rule passes. It was surprising that Cesare Prandelli, the experienced Italian coach of Galatasaray, took a tactical gamble that exposed three defenders against Arsenal’s speedy front three. And it was not the greatest of nights for another Italian, the referee Gianluca Rocchi, who let Melo off with a caution after the Brazilian lunged with both feet off the ground into the ankles of Alexis Sánchez. That atrocious foul late in the first half signaled a manic few minutes when Turks behind the goal threw a succession of red flares and firecrackers onto the field — lawlessness that led to six arrests and will probably provoke UEFA punishments against both clubs. There were more flares ignited in the streets before and after the game. A pity, because this was a celebration of trust and longevity rewarding Wenger’s 18 years in a profession where tenure is often 18 months. And, perhaps, of Welbeck unleashing the potential inside him. Elswhere, it was another Turk, Arda Turan, who broke the deadlock of Wednesday’s tightest game. He popped up to score where no one else could, and to break the deadlock in Atlético Madrid’s 1-0 win against Juventus. Turan, more often the playmaker rather than the goal taker, stole in from close range to settle a contest that, in the words of those who competed in it, was the ultimate in intense concentration. “Arda is a little bit different,” commented Atlético’s Uruguayan defender, Diego Godín, afterward. Turan’s ratio of goals per game is not even comparable to Welbeck’s. But this, the Turk’s 82nd goal in 425 games for club and country, encapsulated his flair for reading the moment and sensing perhaps the one instance that Juve forgot to lock every door in a defense previously unbeaten this season. The half chance presented itself on 75 minutes. Turan pounced on it. And Atlético never let Juventus back into it.

Soccer
Manchester United
Arsenal Soccer Team
UEFA Champions League


16 Shortcuts to Take iPhone Use to Next Level

Abstract: The iPhone has been around for nearly four years. And in that time, millions of people have bought and used iPhones, swiping and tapping their way through life. Most of those people believe they know how the iPhone works. But dig a little deeper into the iPhone’s latest operating system, iOS 4.3 — available for the iPhone 3GS and the AT&T iPhone 4 — and there’s another layer to master. (Sorry, Android users, but that OS has so many versions and skins that a quick guide would be neither very quick nor much of a guide.) Beyond the realm of those basic iPhone controls is an advanced level of shortcuts and tweaks, some of which even hard-core users may not know exist. DOUBLE-TAP Even while your iPhone is locked, you can access the audio controls by double-tapping on the home button when the lock screen appears. This saves you the time it takes to unlock your phone, open a music -playing app like iPod and get to the volume and track controls. This feature is not limited to Apple ’s iPod app. If you are using Pandora, for example, the same technique will bring up its controls. VOICE ACCESS If you press and hold the home button while the phone is locked, you can still access Voice Control to place a phone call (or FaceTime call) or get to any of the iPhone’s other voice commands. TELL TIME Voice control can dial phone numbers (“dial 212-555-1212”) or people (“Dial Mom, mobile”), and it can control music (“Play music,” “Play artist Earth, Wind & Fire,” Play album “ That’s the Way of the World ,” “Play more songs like this,” “ Shuffle ,” etc). But did you know that it can also tell you what time it is? Say “What time is it?” and your phone will say the time back to you. It may sound silly, but it comes in handy if you are rushing and do not have the time or inclination to pull out your phone. (And who wears watches anymore?) SHORTCUT TO SEARCH Swiping to the right from your first home screen pulls up the search window, where you can pull up any contacts, apps, e-mails, calendar appointments and media that have the word you are seeking. But the search screen is also a shortcut to Google and Wikipedia . The last two search results for any entry are always “Search the Web” and “Search Wikipedia,” saving you the time it takes to open browsers or apps. FORCE-QUIT APPS Double-tapping the home button while your phone is unlocked reveals a panel of most recently used apps. Swiping to the left moves through the apps in reverse chronological order to aid in quick app switching. This is advanced-beginner stuff. But serious iPhone ninjas know that pressing and holding an app icon in this panel will cause minus signs to appear beside each app. Touching an app in this state forces it to shut down, a useful move if you have an app that is running in the background and causing trouble. MUSIC SHORTCUTS Swipe that same previously used app screen to the right and you get another shortcut to music-playing controls. If you have the latest operating system, iOS 4.3, you will also see a button that will call up controls for AirPlay, Apple’s wireless audio feature. It is here that you also gain access to the screen rotation lock button, so you can turn on or off the iPhone’s ability to switch from portrait to landscape mode. Swipe once more to the right from this screen and the iPhone’s volume control appears. VOLUME LOCK If you want to limit the iPhone’s volume (because it is being used by your children, for example), you can go into Settings, then iPod. Under “Volume Limit” you can adjust the maximum volume and set a code to lock the setting. This code can be different from the lock code for the entire phone, if you have set one of those. SAVE WEB IMAGES When you’re looking at Web pages in Safari, tapping and holding any image will call up buttons that can save the image to your camera roll or copy it to the clipboard. FIND WORDS Safari’s search bar will not only look up sites, it can also be used to find a word or phrase on a Web page. Type in your search term and scroll to the bottom of the results; the last result is always “On This Page”; tap that and you can see where that term appears on the page you are viewing. MULTIPLE KEYBOARDS You can add keyboards in other languages. Go to Settings, then General, then Keyboard, then International Keyboards. Add as many keyboards as you like. The next time the keyboard appears, it will have a small button next to the space bar with a globe icon on it. Tapping that will cycle through the languages you have selected (the name of each language will appear on the space bar). Tap and hold the globe icon, and a menu will pop up showing all your selected languages. You can then tap whichever one you want and jump right to that keyboard. Bonus: If you’ve downloaded an app for emojis, those little happy faces and icons, you can add it to your list of keyboards in this panel. ACCENT MARKS In the plain-Jane United States English keyboard, tapping and holding a letter will bring up other permutations of that letter for expressing yourself with aigus and macrons. Hold down the letter “e,” for example, and you will see diacritical-marked versions of the letter “e.” QUICK ERASE In a nod to the Etch A Sketch toy, shaking the iPhone when typing something brings up the option to undo it. WI-FI ALOFT Since in-flight Wi-Fi is growing, but cellphones still must be disabled on planes, the iPhone’s airplane mode does not control the Wi-Fi switch. You can still get on the plane’s network without running afoul of federal regulations. SCREEN GRAB Tapping the home and sleep buttons at the same time will save a picture of whatever is on your iPhone’s display to your camera roll. FORWARD AND REWIND When listening to audio or watching video, you probably know that you can move through the song/movie by sliding your finger left and right across the progress bar. But if you slide your finger down and then across, you can move at different speeds, allowing you to advance or rewind with increasingly fine control. RESTART If your phone is acting sluggish or buggy, do what the pros do: initiate a “hard reset” by holding down both the home and sleep buttons until the phone powers down completely and restarts with the mirrored Apple logo appearing on the display. Do not let go until you see this logo. Doing this will often solve a number of small to medium-size glitches; it’s a good idea to do it periodically if you do not regularly sync your phone. Knowing tricks like these will not necessarily earn you a job at one of Apple’s Genius Bars. But knowing them means you will not have to go to the Genius Bar nearly as often.


Manhattan: Dispute Over Breast-Feeding

Abstract: A woman breast-feeding her 7-month-old son in a Toys “R” Us store in Times Square on Monday said yesterday that she was asked by staff members to move to the basement or leave. “There were three or four women standing over me at one time, harassing me,” said the mother, Chelsi Meyerson, 29, of Brooklyn. “I’ve never experienced such treatment while breast-feeding. I’ve received looks before, but I’ve never been humiliated or confronted.” The New York Civil Liberties Union asked for a meeting with the officials from the toy chain yesterday, said Donna Lieberman, the executive director. A representative of the store said there was a private area for breast-feeding mothers and denied that employees had asked Ms. Meyerson to leave.

New York Civil Liberties Union
Nursing of Infants
Manhattan (NYC)


Tiptoeing Around the Olive Branch

Abstract: WASHINGTON — It is a testament to the decline in party relations in the House that a simple private meeting Wednesday between Democratic and Republican leaders to discuss an economic stimulus plan was treated as remarkable. In 2007, the first year of Democratic rule and Republican exile, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, and the minority leader, Representative John A. Boehner, Republican of Ohio, barely spoke. The senior party leaders and their respective staffs circled one another like the Sharks and the Jets, displaying a similar spirit of trust, cooperation and understanding. But Ms. Pelosi said Wednesday that she hoped the glimmerings of bipartisanship seen on the economy could serve as a model and lead to increased dialogue between the two parties, easing some of the bitterness from last year and the partisan rancor that has pervaded the House from the days leading up to the Republican takeover in 1994. “I don’t want my legacy to be a continuation of that attitude,” said Ms. Pelosi, the first woman to hold the speaker’s job. “I had to get a certain amount of work done. I did. Now we need to go on to the next step, which is to expand the conversation.” After a dozen years in the minority, Democrats came to power a year ago, promising a new tone and pledging that they would not treat minority Republicans like they had been treated: shut out of negotiations, prevented from offering amendments and just generally overrun by Republicans trying to solidify their grip on Congress. But from the Republican perspective, things got off to a bad start when Democrats rammed through legislation on the minimum wage, energy, combating terrorism and other party priorities without allowing Republicans opportunities to push their alternatives. Angry Republicans fought back, using procedural moves, politically charged amendments and efforts to embarrass the speaker through tactics like highlighting her request for a larger airplane than her predecessor used for public trips. Democrats won bipartisan approval of many of their chief issues, but the enmity simmered through the year, fueled by repeated clashes over the Iraq war. It subsided only slightly as Congress wrapped up last month and finished off spending bills, energy legislation and war financing. Ms. Pelosi acknowledged that she occasionally short-circuited the process but said it was necessary to achieve some of her first-year goals. And she said she understood what Republicans were trying to accomplish in the minority, having spent considerable time there herself. But she said she hoped the climate could be improved. “Now that everybody has established their parameters, I think that we will be able to move forward with confidence,” she said. “I have respect for them. I want everything we do here to have legitimacy, to have a broader base of support, not just a simple majority. So I welcome the opportunity to increase not only the bipartisanship, but the communication.” Ms. Pelosi dismissed the notion that her attitude was an outgrowth of public calls for conciliation that are being sounded with some success in the presidential primary campaign. But others believe those are echoing in the corridors of a nervous Congress. “There’s a general pervasive feeling that Washington is broken,” said Representative Adam H. Putnam of Florida, chairman of the House Republican Conference. “And I think it is incumbent upon us to talk about how we intend to fix Washington, and what have we learned from our time in the majority, and what have we learned from our time in the minority.” Still, some veteran lawmakers are dubious that the tensions between the two parties can be eased, particularly in an even-numbered year. “Get serious,” said Representative Mike Simpson, Republican of Idaho. “It is a presidential election year.” Yet the tone in Congress, at least in the first 48 hours of the session, is a bit different from 2007. Members of both parties are moving cautiously, feeling one another out and not wanting to be the first to drop a political bomb. If voters are looking for change, the mood suggests, it is probably best to show you are getting the message now rather than waiting to get it in November. “Bipartisanship is spreading out all over,” declared Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the No. 2 Democrat, as he prepared for the economic meeting with Mr. Boehner and Representative Roy Blunt of Missouri. The Republican leadership was approaching the Democratic overture gingerly but certainly did not want to be seen as refusing any olive branch. Or taking it and breaking it in two. “I am hopeful we can work together,” Mr. Boehner said. Mr. Blunt, the No. 2 Republican, said maybe things could be better, at least part of the time. “This is a political year,” he said. “So my guess is we’ll have a conciliatory start and a conciliatory finish and the middle won’t be all that good.” Ms. Pelosi said she envisioned more regular meetings with her Republican counterparts, though not on a fixed schedule. And she said she believed the top lawmakers had at least a foundation of cordial relationships to build on. But no one expects the two sides to suddenly drop their gloves and embrace. A serious Congressional election is looming, and both parties will soon be trying to coalesce around a presidential nominee, eager to draw distinctions between the two competing ideologies. And, as Ms. Pelosi noted, Congressional political conflict is daily and intimate. But she said it was her hope that House members of both the Republican and Democratic persuasion could figure out a way to clash over ideas while finding at least a smidgen of common ground. “You can do both,” she said. “This body was created to be a marketplace place of ideas. The idea was you would come and debate different points of view. It is not a bad thing to say, ‘We disagree.’ ”

Leaders and Leadership
Law and Legislation
United States Politics and Government
Republican Party
Washington (DC)
Democratic Party


Rio Tinto Agrees to Sell Copper Mine to Chinese Company

Abstract: MELBOURNE — Rio Tinto has agreed to sell its majority stake in the Northparkes copper mine in Australia for $820 million to China Molybdenum, a Chinese company making its first foray offshore and into copper. The purchase is the biggest Chinese mining deal since China Guangdong Nuclear Power won control of the Husab uranium project in Namibia for about $2.3 billion last year. Beijing turned cautious about overseas acquisitions after spending billions of dollars on iron ore projects in Australia that have yet to generate returns. The stake in Northparkes is one of several assets Rio has put up for sale as it aims to cut $5 billion in costs, pare debt and focus on its biggest, most profitable mines. It is also trying to sell a minority stake in Coal & Allied in Australia and its majority hold in Iron Ore Co. of Canada. Copper assets are selling fastest among the wide range of mining assets on the block worldwide, with the higher-than-expected price tag on the Northparkes deal boding well for Glencore Xstrata’s sale of the $5 billion Las Bambas copper project in Peru. “Clearly there’s a market for these assets,” said Mike Harrowell, an analyst at the broker BBY. BHP Billiton recently sold a copper mine in Arizona for a better-than-expected $650 million. China Molybdenum was a surprise winner, as the Australian copper miner OZ Minerals had been seen as the most likely buyer of the 80 percent stake in Northparkes after MMG of China dropped out of competition. China Molybdenum, with a market value of $5 billion, mainly produces molybdenum and tungsten. The company went public last year, backed by the state-owned Luoyang Mining Group and the billionaire Yu Yong. “Copper is seen as one of the preferred commodities by the investment market,” said the UBS analyst Glyn Lawcock, adding that BHP and Rio’s $3.4 billion investment in a water plant at the Escondida copper mine in Chile, announced last week, was evidence of bullish views on copper. “Obviously the Chinese are taking a view on the copper market as well,” Mr. Lawcock said. Japan’s Sumitomo Metal Mining and Sumitomo Corp., which own the remaining 20 percent of Northparkes, have rights to match China Molybdenum’s bid. Sumitomo confirmed that, but otherwise declined to comment on the deal. The price was better than analysts’ valuations on Rio’s Northparkes stake, which were about $400 million, excluding potential new resources. But analysts had said the company would look for between $750 million and $1 billion. OZ Minerals had been under pressure from shareholders not to overpay for Northparkes, although the mine would have been a good fit, as OZ needs production to fill a gap between the decline of its Prominent Hill mine and full production at its Carapateena mine. Others who were in the running for Northparkes were Nyrstar and the private equity firms Carlyle and KKR. Most bids were below $800 million, said one banker involved. He declined to be named, as the process was confidential. Yu Yong’s Cathay Fortune, a major stakeholder in China Molybdenum, is in the midst of another potential copper mine takeover, with a conditional bid for Discovery Metals of Australia, which owns a mine in Botswana. Rio Tinto was advised by Macquarie Bank while Citigroup advised China Molybdenum. The Chinese company was not available to comment before releasing an announcement to the Hong Kong and Shanghai exchanges.


Sato Takes Pole; Dixon Wins

Abstract: Takuma Sato won the pole for the first race of the Houston Grand Prix doubleheader. It was the first pole for A. J. Foyt Racing since Billy Boat’s run at Atlanta in 1999. Scott Dixon won the race.


Japan, Looking for Money, Removes Ban on Casino Gambling

Abstract: TOKYO — Japan is dealing itself into the multibillion-dollar casino industry. Lawmakers have cleared the way for blackjack, roulette and other casino games in the country, approving legislation that removes a longstanding prohibition against gambling. The legislation, passed on Thursday, is a major victory in a longstanding effort to make Japan attractive to gamblers. For years, Japanese businesses and the tax authorities have watched enviously as vast sums have poured into jurisdictions like Macau and Singapore, which have built sparkling casino resorts catering to international gamblers, especially those from China. Japan is experiencing its own boom in Chinese tourism, and it sees casinos as an added way to cash in. Estimates of the potential size of the industry have ranged as high as $40 billion a year. International casino operators see a chance to profit, too. The last time Japanese legislators took up the issue, in 2014, Sheldon G. Adelson, the billionaire chief executive of Las Vegas Sands, said his company would be willing to invest as much as $10 billion to develop a casino resort in the country. “For the investment community, Japan is seen as the crown jewel of Asian gaming development outside of Macau,” said Grant Govertsen, a research analyst at Union Gaming, an investment bank focused on gambling. The most recent major market in Asia to legalize casinos was Singapore , which approved the introduction of two casino hotels a decade ago. With casino revenue of about $3.5 billion last year, Singapore, a Southeast Asian city-state, ranks as the second-biggest market in Asia behind Macau. The Japanese market, with its large and affluent local population, could be even bigger. “It would be shocking if Japan doesn’t become the No. 2 market in Asia on an overnight basis” once big resorts open, Mr. Govertsen said, adding that the exact size of the market is difficult to gauge until regulatory elements, like the number and location of licenses, are known. Uncertainties remain. The first casinos would take years to license and build, and competition is already stiffening. Newer industry players like South Korea and the Philippines , chasing the same Chinese cash, are building big resorts of their own. China itself is under a cloud, as its breakneck pace of economic growth slows and as the authorities in Beijing seek to tighten control over outflows of money from the country. The vote came as Japan looks for new sources of economic growth. Tourism is emerging as a newly powerful force in the country, where the economy has traditionally been geared more toward exporting cars and other manufactured goods than importing pleasure-seeking visitors. More than 20 million foreign tourists have made trips to Japan this year, triple the number from a decade ago, many from China’s swelling middle class. The government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hopes the boom will ignite broader economic growth and make up for dwindling competitiveness in other industries — some of which, like consumer electronics, are now dominated by China. The end of the prohibition on casinos does not mean that anyone could build the next Caesars Palace in Japan. At first, licenses likely will be granted to two or three so-called integrated resorts — which combine casinos with hotels, conference halls and shopping centers — in major cities. Rules governing the bidding and licensing process, as well as the regulation of the casinos themselves, would be detailed in a separate law next year. Actual gambling is unlikely to begin before 2023, several analysts said. Takashi Kiso, chief executive of the International Casino Institute, a consultancy that has been advising would-be entrants into the Japanese market, said ownership would probably take the form of joint ventures between international gambling groups and Japanese companies. MGM Resorts, Wynn Resorts and other large operators have also expressed interest, in addition to Las Vegas Sands. “Looking at the debate in Parliament, there’s a lot of resistance to the idea of 100 percent foreign-owned casinos, so that is probably off the table,” Mr. Kiso said. Some forms of gambling are already legal in Japan. The country allows betting on horse, bicycle and boat racing, and it has a publicly run national lottery. Pachinko, a derivative of pinball played at thousands of noisy parlors around the country, has a gambling element that is technically illegal but is universally tolerated by politicians and law enforcement. Japan has been debating whether to legalize casinos since at least 1999. A bill similar to the one passed on Thursday made progress in Parliament two years ago but never made it to a vote. Some lawmakers balked at the potential social problems caused by casinos. Among those opposed was Komeito, a Buddhist political party that is a junior partner in the governing coalition. Multiple opinion surveys have shown that more Japanese voters oppose legalizing casinos than support the idea. Since 2014, Mr. Abe’s party, the Liberal Democrats, has strengthened its hold on Parliament. It is now less reliant on Komeito and has found a new ally on the casino issue in Nippon Ishin no Kai, a small, right-leaning party with a support base in the western city of Osaka. Nippon Ishin no Kai has been lobbying for one of the first casinos to be built there.

Japan
Casino
Gambling
Legislation
China
Asia
Shinzo Abe


Alabama: No Prison for Resentenced Rapist

Abstract: The State Court of Criminal Appeals on Thursday upheld a judge’s ruling that a man convicted of raping a teenage neighbor should not serve prison time. The man, Austin Clem, was sentenced in December to probation by a judge in Limestone County after the appellate court ruled that his original punishment, which included a stint in a corrections program, was unlawful. Under both sentences, Mr. Clem faced decades in prison if he violated his terms of release. Although the district attorney also sought to have Mr. Clem’s second sentence overturned, the appeals court ruled that the judge acted appropriately.


Beijing to Raise Fines on Elites Who Violate the One-Child Rule

Abstract: BEIJING (AP) — Celebrity has its perks, but in Beijing, large families are not one of them. Family planning authorities in the city intend to increase fines for the rich and famous in an attempt to stem growing violations of the Communist government’s strict limits on the number of children the Chinese are permitted to have, the official Xinhua news agency reported Monday. Fines for violating the policy can bankrupt an average family. But they are easily paid by the wealthy and famous, who in some cases can use their influence to avoid paying fines entirely. While the exact amounts were still being debated, fines for the wealthy will be set many times higher than the fines for other Chinese, Xinhua said, quoting the director of Beijing’s family planning commission. The announcement follows recent reports in the state news media bemoaning the brazen flouting of family planning policies by government officials, successful businessmen, athletes, entertainers and others among the country’s newly wealthy. “Celebrities and well-off people should not have any privileges for having more children,” Zhang Weiqing, director of the State Commission on Family Planning, was quoted as telling officials at a recent meeting. Mr. Zhang said that while he believed that only a small number of celebrities were in violation of the policy limiting family size, their fame ensured that their behavior had an amplified “negative social influence,” the report said. China limits most urban couples to one child and rural families to two in an attempt to control population growth and to conserve natural resources. China is the world’s most populous nation, with 1.3 billion people. The limits, instituted about 30 years ago, have been credited with preventing 400 million births. However, there have been some side effects, including a gender imbalance reflecting the traditional preference for male offspring, and the prospect of a shrinking work force to support large numbers of elderly people.

Celebrities
China
Population
Families and Family Life
Children and Youth


The Hot Spots for Organic Food

Abstract: The map of organic farms in the United States is clustered into a few geographic centers, a strikingly different pattern than the map of all farms, which spreads densely over many regions, breaking only for the Rockies and Western deserts. Areas in the Northeast and Northwest have many small organic farms that sell produce directly to consumers. Large organic farms, which some critics call organic agribusiness, have flourished in California. The largest organic markets by far are for vegetables, fruit and dairy products, according to Catherine Greene, an economist at the Agriculture Department. Organic vegetables now account for 5 percent of all vegetable sales; organic dairies, which are the fastest-growing sector, now produce 1 percent of the nation's milk. And what of the wide swaths of the country with a dearth of organic farms? They'll be waiting a few more years for local organic produce. Even if demand, which has lagged in the South and other Sun Belt states, picks up, the Agriculture Department requires a three-year waiting period for farms to win organic certification.


Pablo Sandoval’s Heavyweight Game

Abstract: SAN FRANCISCO — If Pablo Sandoval hits a home run for every pound between his listed 240 and his actual weight, he may end up as the National League’s most valuable player. From the standpoint of body mass and natural ability, it is not such an outlandish proposition. Sandoval, 26, the San Francisco Giants’ free-swinging third baseman with the perpetual smile, plays heavy. He is a bad-ball and bad-body hitter with a penchant for M.V.P. awards, winning one for his performance in the World Series and one for his contributions in January’s Venezuelan winter league championship . He has also been an N.L. All-Star two seasons running. This season, he is hitting .316 and is among the National League leaders with 19 runs batted in for the Giants, the winners of two of the last three World Series. So even if Sandoval’s build seems to garner as much attention as his bat — even if he looks bigger than ever — the man nicknamed Kung Fu Panda seems content with the way things are shaping up. “I’m at the weight that I feel great to play at,” Sandoval said in an interview last week. “If you feel good, you’re going to play good. And I feel great.” Sandoval has been flourishing since the last postseason, when he hit three home runs in Game 1 of the World Series against Detroit, including two off Justin Verlander. Sandoval, a switch-hitter, ended up batting .500 for the series, with 18 total bases in the four games. This month, he is swatting an eye-level pitch over the wall one minute and, in the next, laying out to snare a sharp grounder before leaping to his feet and gunning out the runner at first. (So frequently does Sandoval blow bubble gum bubbles as he dives for balls — which he did again while making a play against the Arizona Diamondbacks last Tuesday — that his team-issued 2012 bobblehead depicts him outstretched, ball in glove, pink bubble on lips.) All of which leads to a question: how does a guy who looks so overstuffed do what Sandoval does at the plate and in the field? “He’s got great balance, great hands, tremendous power,” Giants catcher Buster Posey said. “Those are important things.” Shortstop Brandon Crawford said Sandoval was underappreciated as a fielder. “People give him a lot of flak about his size, but he moves around well,” Crawford said. “What he does athletically is spectacular.” Sandoval’s dexterity is such that he not only can bat from either side of the plate, but he can also throw adeptly with either hand. (A natural left-hander, he learned to throw with his right, which he now uses exclusively, at age 9 in order to play shortstop.) As much success as the 5-foot-11 Sandoval is having these days, things weren’t always so good. He was in similarly heavyweight shape during the Giants’ 2010 stretch run, but declining production kept him tethered to the bench as the team surged to its first championship in San Francisco. General Manager Brian Sabean publicly threatened to send Sandoval to the minor leagues. That winter, Sandoval stayed away from his native Venezuela for the first time as a big leaguer, instead heading to Arizona for an intensive workout program called Camp Panda, at which he shed some 40 pounds. It seemed to work. In 2011, the slimmed-down Panda hit .315 with 23 home runs, even while missing 45 games because of a broken bone in his right hand. After another injury-plagued season in 2012 — he broke the same bone in his other hand — and his Series M.V.P. performance, he was back home over the winter, as large as ever and leading Navegantes del Magallanes to the Venezuelan Winter League title. He followed that by hitting .308 with a homer and two doubles in three games for Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic earlier this spring. Sandoval’s ability to square up on pitches high and low, inside and out — he is perhaps the best bad-ball hitter since Vladimir Guerrero — should not detract from the fact that he is far more selective at the plate than he was two seasons ago. “He has a big zone, but not as big as it was,” Giants Manager Bruch Bochy said. The Giants’ brass appears resigned to the size of Sandoval’s waistline, but that does not mean it has escaped their attention. “We’re concerned,” Bochy said. “It’s something we have to keep an eye on, and Pablo does, too. He understands that at his age he can probably handle it, but long term, he’s probably going to have to keep it under control.” Sandoval agreed that he would eventually have to play at a lower weight. “I’m getting old, at least in baseball years,” he said, leaning back in his chair in the Giants’ clubhouse, hands behind his head. “You have to set your mind if you want a long career; you have to change your approach with weights and workouts. I’ve been focusing on other things, but now I have to do it.” When? “I don’t know. One day.” He smiled, which is one of the things he does best. Shawon Dunston, a former major league shortstop who is a Giants special instructor, views Sandoval’s situation through the lens of his own 18-year playing career, recalling how he coasted on natural talent until a back injury forced discipline upon him at 29. “How could they have changed me to make me work out more when I had all the gifts?” he said. “They couldn’t have. Well, Pablo is learning. Nobody beats Mother Nature — I don’t care what kind of specimen you are. “Life itself will teach him, automatically.” At the moment, though, the life lessons pertaining to Sandoval are being delivered primarily to N.L. pitchers. He is a heavy hitter in every sense of the term.

Pablo Sandoval
San Francisco Giants
Baseball


Just Before His Breakout, Lin Struggled Mightily

Abstract: GREENBURGH, N.Y. — On the night before he altered the N.B.A. universe, Jeremy Lin ’s primary goal was to keep his job. Things could have gone better. The Knicks were in Boston on Feb. 3, battling the Celtics and fighting to save their season. Lin got the call late in the first quarter, his earliest appearance as a Knick. The next six and a half minutes were a blur of miscues, missed layups and poorly timed fouls. Lin was benched early in the second quarter of the 91-89 loss, his box-score line set for the night: 0 for 3 on field goals, 2 for 2 on free throws, 2 rebounds, 1 assist, 2 fouls, 1 turnover, 2 points. Amar’e Stoudemire remembered as much about the performance as most people. “Uh, not much,” he said, chuckling. There was no hint of what was to come, just one night later: a 25-point, 7-assist outburst against the Nets. The start of a seven-game winning streak. A record-setting string of performances. And something called Linsanity. On Feb. 3, Jeremy Lin looked like an overmatched, easily rattled, mistake-prone reserve. On Feb. 4, Lin looked like a polished N.B.A. star. What changed in 24 hours is some sort of cosmic mystery, a delicate blend of confidence, preparation and kismet. “Sometimes, you can’t explain it,” Knicks Coach Mike D’Antoni said. “Sometimes, it happens.” The Knicks are back in Boston on Sunday for a nationally televised matinee against the Celtics. Nothing that happened 29 days ago seems relevant. The Knicks (18-18) are better, deeper, more stable. Their offense is functioning. And Lin is a star, averaging 22.1 points and 9.2 assists in 12 games since becoming a starter. “Lin has obviously taken over the world,” the Celtics’ Kevin Garnett told Boston reporters. “You always like to see someone succeed. He plays with a lot of passion.” There is much at stake in this rematch. The Celtics (18-17), a powerhouse for the last four years, are enduring their toughest season since Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce became teammates — and facing growing speculation that their core could be broken up before the March 15 trading deadline. They are jockeying for position with the Knicks in the last two playoff spots in the Eastern Conference while hoping for a second-half surge. Both teams are chasing the Philadelphia 76ers (22-15), the surprise leaders of the Atlantic Division. The Knicks have won 10 of their last 13 games, but they are 3-3 over the last six and still need to prove themselves against the N.B.A.’s elite defensive teams. For all of their struggles, the Celtics rank fourth in defensive efficiency, and Rajon Rondo, who will guard Lin, is among the league’s top defenders. Lin played superbly against the Dallas Mavericks’ stiff defense on Feb. 19, but he had his worst game as a starter against the Miami Heat’s swarming attack four days later. D’Antoni said it was up to the entire lineup, not just Lin, to solve the top defenses. “Maybe when there’s a lot of pressure, the ball has to move faster,” D’Antoni said. “But we as a team have to have our flow and things. I think Jeremy can read the situation, and he’ll be comfortable with it. I think he’s passed all the tests. Now it’s just a matter of learning and getting better, and getting older and wiser as a point guard. But there’s definitely no test. I don’t have to say anything.” The picture was much different Feb. 3. The Knicks were trailing by 4 points when Lin replaced Iman Shumpert with 2 minutes 38 seconds left in the first quarter. The ESPN broadcast team of Mike Breen and Jeff Van Gundy did not mention him when he took the court. The first time Lin touched the ball — lunging for a rebound after Landry Fields’s missed layup — he knocked it out of bounds. On his next trip up the court, Lin lost the ball at midcourt to Avery Bradley, who sped the other way for a fast-break layup. Lin missed his first shot , a 19-footer. Moments later, Lin fouled Pierce on a 3-point try with 3.6 seconds left in the period. Lin quickly earned some redemption by making two free throws himself after drawing a foul on Sasha Pavlovic with 0.1 left on the clock. The one glimpse of Lin’s potential came early in the second quarter. Dribbling on the perimeter, Lin found a seam, darted into the lane, drew in the defense and fed Stoudemire for a layup. Van Gundy, who had just noted the Knicks’ lack of creative perimeter players, perked up, saying, “That’s a very nice play by Lin.” Lin missed his next two shots (a four-footer and a layup) and did not make another positive play before D’Antoni pulled him with 8:02 left in the second quarter. “I had some jitters,” Lin said Saturday, noting it was his first turn with the Knicks’ starters and his first chance to play in the first quarter. “Just hoping it wouldn’t be my last chance,” he added. Had Lin kept stumbling, he might have been waived the next week. But against the Nets’ softer defense, Lin found a comfort level. His failures in Boston were fresh, but so were the lessons. He kept attacking and made history. Still, the 24-hour turnaround remains striking and difficult to explain. “Most of it is psychological,” D’Antoni said, adding: “Some guys are anointed and can get that confidence right off the bat. Some guys got to work through it. Some guys don’t do it. He just took the challenge.” At least one person left the arena that night believing that Lin had a chance. “In my game notes that I literally write when I go in the office, I wrote, ‘I think Jeremy Lin is a pretty good player,’ “ Celtics Coach Doc Rivers told reporters Saturday. “Didn’t think this. But I should have had him sign it right after the game. I could have made millions.”

Basketball
New York Knicks
Boston Celtics
Lin Jeremy
D'Antoni Mike


Frustration Grows in Iraq at Slow Pace of Vote Tally

Abstract: BAGHDAD — At a vote-counting center in eastern Baghdad, a dozen men representing various political parties sat on a stage in a school gymnasium on Sunday, monitoring the counting of ballots. The process was painstaking. The ballots, after being sealed at local polling stations, arrived at the center in large plastic containers. Before any votes were counted, the names on each ballot were checked against a computer database. Once the counting began, election officials recorded the results on four separate forms. Redundancy was built into every procedure. “People want us to rush, but it is very complicated,” said Abbas Sabah, an election official. “It is like trying to build a Rolls-Royce by hand.” With results still trickling in slowly from Iraq ’s parliamentary elections last week and no clear winners likely to emerge anytime soon, public frustration here seems to be growing. American officials have privately expressed concern that even a fair election might be made to appear unfair. Political officials continue to make public accusations of election fraud, including the alleged stuffing of ballot boxes and forgery. In the absence of final results, months of careful preparation could be threatened. Both the United States and the United Nations spent millions of dollars to ensure that the election was viewed as transparent and credible. “One way to reassure someone who fears the results are being rigged is to get results out there,” said a Western observer working on election issues. The many checks put in place by Iraq’s Independent High Electoral Commission are laudable, said the official, who added, “but if taken too far it will backfire and erode public confidence by further delays.” There are now partial preliminary results from each of Iraq’s 18 provinces, and they point to a very close contest. Officials cautioned that only a fraction of the more than 12 million votes had been counted. In the Shiite south, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki ’s coalition and a coalition of Shiite religious parties appear to be splitting the majority of votes; early results announced Sunday from Basra, Iraq’s second-largest city, showed Mr. Maliki doing well there. In the Sunni heartland in the north and west of the country, the coalition led by Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite who has become a champion of Sunni candidates , appears to be dominating. The Kurdish parties, as expected, are maintaining their control in Kurdish territories. But in the city of Kirkuk, which is disputed by Arabs and Kurds, Mr. Allawi’s coalition appeared to be doing surprisingly well in early returns released Sunday evening. If these early trends continue, no coalition is likely to emerge with a clear mandate. Each seat that the various parties control in the new 325-member Parliament could become a crucial bargaining tool, because the approval of a two-thirds majority of lawmakers would be essential to form a new government. Among the many questions likely to be answered over the coming weeks and months, in addition to whether the Iraqi public will accept the election results as fair, is whether some Iraqi politicians will be willing to accept defeat at the polls. United Nations officials said there had been little evidence of large-scale irregularities so far. The elaborate procedures meant to ensure transparency and to catch irregularities are partly responsible for the slow pace of the count. Every step in the complicated process has been open to observers, including representatives from every political party. At the counting center in the eastern Baghdad, with everyone watching everyone else on Sunday, it would have been difficult to tamper with votes. About 30,000 have been counted at the station so far, and about 800 improper ballots were discarded, said Mr. Sabah, the election official. “People will try and trick us,” he said. “They try and vote twice.” After the voters’ names were checked in the database, the boxes were marked with green tape and hundreds of men and women, who have been working 12-hour shifts since the election on March 7 , sat at six long tables tallying the votes. Maky Alkras, an observer from one of the political parties, said that election officials listened to complaints, but were too lenient. For instance, he said, ballot boxes were not allowed to be placed on counting tables, to prevent workers from adding votes. “When we saw a box on a table, we told the officials and they scolded the employees,” he said. “They should have fired them.” In a country where basic services like electricity and trash collection remain abysmal, entering all the information from more than 50,000 polling stations into a central database — and doing it twice to prevent fraud — has proved challenging. But the longer it takes to complete the count, the more Iraqis fear that things may spin out of control. “The delay is wrong, and it will give the political parties more opportunities to interfere,” said Ali Khazal, 28, a day laborer in Baghdad. “The crisis could start like a tiny bubble and the delays give it a chance to grow, and we, as Iraqis, fear that it might reach the point of bursting in the Iraqi street. And the biggest loser will be the Iraqi people, as usual.”


Late Goal Gives Rangers Life Against Capitals

Abstract: Four-on-four hockey would seem to favor the Washington Capitals and their superstar, Alex Ovechkin , in their first-round playoff series against the Rangers . But Ovechkin gave away the puck during a late-game four-on-four situation Sunday, then watched in horror as Brandon Dubinsky broke in and scored the tie-breaking goal with 1 minute 39 seconds left to give the Rangers a 3-2 victory at Madison Square Garden. Dubinsky’s unassisted goal and Ovechkin’s miscue kept the Rangers’ hopes alive, and now they trail the series, 2-1, with Game 4 Wednesday at the Garden. “I was trying to bring pucks to the net and bang something in there, especially with how much time was left in the game,” said Dubinsky, who played a game-high 25:45. “It was a fortunate bounce.” It was a third consecutive gritty, hard-hitting game with few chances, little scoring and strong goaltending. But for the first time this series, the puck bounced the right way for the Rangers. The teams were skating a man short because the Rangers’ Brian Boyle and the Capitals’ John Carlson got into a shoving match after the whistle with 3:15 left and the score tied, 2-2. Both were sent off for roughing, setting up the four on four and the increased open ice that results. “I probably shouldn’t have done that,” Boyle conceded after the game, in which he led both teams with nine shots. “We’re trying to play whistle to whistle. It’s the playoffs, and it’s pretty high intensity.” He gave a small, relieved smile, and said, “But you know, it worked out for us.” Capitals Coach Bruce Boudreau held Ovechkin in reserve at the start of the four on four, putting out Brooks Laich and Alexander Semin as forwards instead. But with 2:15 left, he sent out Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom, a fearsome pairing. “They have a few more weapons than we do in those types of situations,” Rangers Coach John Tortorella said, acknowledging that he was a little worried when Boyle and Carlson were sent off. But when Ovechkin came over the boards, Tortorella countered. “I wanted Dubie and Fedotenko when Ovechkin was out there, and we got that,” Tortorella said, referring to Dubinsky and Ruslan Fedotenko. “Dubie made a hell of a play.” Ovechkin, with the puck, was forced back into his own zone by Fedotenko’s forecheck and wound up dumping it into his own corner. A scrum ensued, and Dubinsky wound up with the puck, skating away from Ovechkin and Backstrom. He barged in on goalie Michal Neuvirth, taking a close-in shot that nicked the stick of Washington defenseman Karl Alzner. The puck looped into the air, and over Neuvirth, and came down on the other side of the goal line. “It was my mistake,” said Ovechkin, who lay disconsolate on the ice as the Rangers celebrated. “I had the puck in the corner and tried to make a play. I turned it over, it hit something and went in for them.” The Rangers had only unfortunate bounces in the first two games of the series, and in the first two periods of this game. A particularly bad turn of fortune occurred at the end of the second period, when a shot by Fedotenko banked into the Washington net off the leg of Capitals defenseman John Erskine just as the buzzer sounded. If the goal stood, it would give the Rangers a 2-1 lead. The green light signifying the period’s end shone rather than the red goal light, but it could have gone on a moment late. The question loomed: had the whole puck crossed the goal line in time? The referees went to the replay and to the league judges in Toronto to find out. The only thing NBC had to offer with a clock visible was a distant view that showed the puck disappearing behind the goalpost as the clock moved from 00.1 to 00.0. A long delay ensued, and finally the ruling came down: no goal. That could have been a crushing blow for the Rangers, especially in light of an Ovechkin goal that had tied the game just 59 seconds earlier and a power play that went only 1 for 7 and has just two goals to show for its last 38 advantages. Still, the Rangers persevered and took the lead on a goal from Vinny Prospal with 11:59 left to play — only to face disappointment again when Mike Knuble equalized on a power play with 5:12 left. But Dubinsky’s late goal won it, and Tortorella praised his team’s resilience. “No one is down — they keep going about their business,” he said. “It doesn’t surprise me anymore.” SLAP SHOTS Midway through the second period, the referee Chris Rooney fell awkwardly, breaking his left ankle. A 10-minute delay ensued until the standby referee, Frederick L’Ecuyer, was ready to take his place. An N.H.L. officiating supervisor, Mick McGeough, said that Rooney would miss the rest of the playoffs.

Washington Capitals
Hockey Ice
Playoff Games
New York Rangers
Dubinsky Brandon
Ovechkin Alex
Lundqvist Henrik
Prospal Vinny


With Spitzer Inquiry, Albany’s Eyes Are on Ethics Panel Just as It Is Changing

Abstract: ALBANY, Aug. 10 — In 39 years as a litigator, Herbert Teitelbaum, who became executive director of the State Ethics Commission last month, sued Boston to let college students vote. He sued school officials in Philadelphia for not providing better English instruction for Hispanic children. And he took on the cities of White Plains, New Rochelle, Mount Vernon and Yonkers for discriminating against blacks applying for jobs as firefighters. “I say to clients, ‘I take the case wherever it goes,’ ” Mr. Teitelbaum said recently, sitting in his new office. “Wherever it takes me, I follow it.” Even, perhaps, to the inner sanctum of Gov. Eliot Spitzer . Last month, the commission’s investigators began a preliminary review of whether Mr. Spitzer’s aides violated ethics laws when they asked the State Police to help them gather damaging information on the Senate majority leader, Joseph L. Bruno, the state’s top Republican and Mr. Spitzer’s chief antagonist. It is perhaps the biggest test that the commission — long criticized by watchdog groups as overly secretive and glacially slow to act — has faced since its creation 20 years ago. And it comes just before the commission is poised to take on a new, more prominent role on the capital’s ethics beat. On Sept. 22, the Ethics Commission will absorb another state body, the Lobbying Commission, and become a new Commission on Public Integrity, with jurisdiction over employees of the executive branch and the thousands of lobbyists who work each day to sway them. The new commission will inherit most of the staffs and continuing investigations of its two precursors. But it will also have broader powers and a larger, 13-member board. Most of the new board will be appointed by Mr. Spitzer. “Obviously this is a tricky situation,” said Russ Haven, the legislative counsel for the New York Public Interest Research Group, referring to the commission’s preliminary inquiry into the governor’s staff, “partly because it’s a big matter, and partly because it will be an early predictor of how the new commission will perform.” The effort to tarnish Mr. Bruno was detailed in a report last month by Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo, roiling Albany and leading to calls from Republican officials for a special prosecutor. Mr. Spitzer rebuffed those calls but said he would gladly testify under oath before the Ethics Commission, which has subpoena power. But Republicans declared the commission untrustworthy, noting that its new chairman, John D. Feerick, and another member of the five-member board were appointed by Mr. Spitzer. They have also complained that partners at Mr. Teitelbaum’s former law firm, Bryan Cave, have made campaign contributions to the governor. “They’re not elected by the people,” Mr. Bruno said of the commission members during a recent radio appearance. He added, “They’re not unbiased, objective people.” Even some people without a personal and political stake in the matter have doubts about the commission. With a staff of 20, the commission currently has jurisdiction over 250,000 executive-branch employees, who submit 26,000 financial disclosure forms a year. Under state law, it serves in an awkward dual role, both providing confidential advice on ethics to state employees and imposing fines or recommending other punishment in some cases. Partly for that reason, according to Mr. Teitelbaum and others, the commission’s board is required to meet and deliberate in secret. Most advisory opinions it issues remain confidential; a smaller number of opinions, typically those on questions that have not previously come before the commission, are made public but redacted of personal information. All the paperwork is locked away among the ranks of massive dull gray cabinets that dominate the commission’s offices. “It’s very much like an attorney-client relationship,” said Karl J. Sleight, the previous executive director of the commission, who is now in private practice. “Enforcement is part of the mission. But their primary mission is as counsel to executive-branch employees. The goal is to prevent people’s reputations from being destroyed inappropriately.” When the commission issues an advisory opinion on ethics law, its critics say, it sometimes interprets the law too expansively. Case in point: During the 1990s, the commission advised the Pataki administration that public officials could use state aircraft on trips that included nonofficial business like fund-raising events, so long as the trips also included at least some official business. Such trips by Mr. Bruno were what Mr. Spitzer’s aides were hoping to learn more about, Mr. Cuomo found in his report, when they set the scandal in motion by asking officials of the State Police to recreate the senator’s travel itineraries. “This whole travel issue has arisen because the Ethics Commission has refused to draw a bright-line standard,” Mr. Haven said. What kind of standard they set for Mr. Spitzer may not be clear for weeks. The commission does not typically divulge whether an investigation is under way in any particular case, unless the board votes to issue a notice of reasonable cause, indicating that it believes that a violation of state ethics law may have occurred. Last year, the commission issued five such notices. One of them went to Alan G. Hevesi, then the state comptroller, making him the only statewide elected official whom the commission has ever found in violation of state ethics laws. P. David Soares, the Albany County district attorney, used that finding as the basis for a criminal investigation that ended with Mr. Hevesi’s resigning and pleading guilty to charges of fraud. The commission’s defenders point to the Hevesi case as a model for how any potential investigation of a governor would progress. That inquiry was completed in less than a month, and a commissioner appointed by Mr. Hevesi recused herself from voting on the final determination. “I think the biggest criticism might be that it has not taken on the full array of what it governs,” said Barbara Bartoletti, legislative director of the League of Women Voters of New York State . “But it did undertake Hevesi.” Ms. Bartoletti and others praised Mr. Feerick, a former dean of the Fordham University School of Law and an acclaimed ethics expert, saying his involvement promised a more aggressive posture by the commission and its successor. “Perhaps we’re putting all of our eggs in one basket, but certainly with Feerick driving it, we can at least be sure they will follow their mission,” she said. The commissioners currently serve staggered five-year terms, with the comptroller and attorney general each appointing one member and the governor appointing three. When the new commission comes into being next month, Mr. Spitzer will appoint 7 of the 13 commissioners, with the rest appointed by the comptroller, the attorney general, and both the minority and majority party in each legislative house. Mr. Feerick will be reappointed chairman, Mr. Spitzer has said. Mr. Teitelbaum will need to be reappointed by the new board, as he was by the current board. Until the new commission is formed, two of Gov. George E. Pataki’s appointees remain on the board, along with Mr. Feerick. So do Mr. Hevesi’s appointee and one made by Mr. Spitzer when he was still attorney general. Though the terms of both appointees have expired, neither Mr. Cuomo nor Mr. Hevesi’s successor as comptroller, Thomas P. DiNapoli, has gotten around to naming a replacement. Mr. Cuomo is still reviewing candidates for the job, according to a spokesman for Mr. Cuomo, Jeffrey Lerner. Dennis Tompkins, a spokesman for Mr. DiNapoli, said the comptroller was now doing the same, six months after taking office. “It didn’t seem like a real hot issue at the time,” said Mr. Tompkins.

Ethics
Ethics Commission
New York State
Spitzer Eliot L
Albany (NY)


Rafael Ferrer’s Work Is Finding Many Audiences

Abstract: Greenport, N.Y. “WE both like Spanish, or Puerto Rican, coffee,” the artist Rafael Ferrer said, referring to his wife and himself, as he prepared a strong cup for a recent visitor to his snug but airy home here. “It’s not the beans,” he said. “It’s how you make it.” Much the same might be said of Mr. Ferrer’s art over the decades, created at times from such seemingly unpromising materials as dead leaves, blocks of ice, paper bags, slate blackboards and gourds. His paintings on canvas of tropical scenes, deep-shadowed and vaguely disturbing — the word “hallucinatory” has popped up in descriptions — suggest his Puerto Rican roots. At 78, Mr. Ferrer, who was out of the limelight for years, is on a roll. A retrospective last year at El Museo del Barrio in New York, part of its series for mature and under-recognized artists, received mostly glowing reviews. Mr. Ferrer “is finally having his moment,” Roberta Smith wrote in The New York Times, praising his “instinctive facility for color and materials of all kinds.” The retrospective, she wrote, was “almost criminally overdue.” Now, Guild Hall in East Hampton is keeping up the momentum with “Rafael Ferrer: Contrabando,” an exhibition of paintings, sculptures and assemblages from the 1970s to the present. The show, organized by Esperanza León, a guest curator who is on the board of Guild Hall, remains on view through Jan. 16. There’s more in the wings. The Lancaster Museum of Art in Pennsylvania will display his works on paper next spring. And a monograph on the artist by Deborah Cullen, El Museo’s director of curatorial programs and the organizer of last year’s retrospective, will be published by the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center Press in 2012. The belated attention scarcely seems to faze Mr. Ferrer, who has experienced both renown, from the late 1960s into the ’70s, and decades outside the mainstream. “I am blasé about fame,” he said. Still, the renewed interest “gives me an opportunity to put things in perspective, to clarify the misunderstandings” — about the sources and the nature of his art — that have dogged his career, Mr. Ferrer said. Born in 1933 in San Juan, P.R., to a well-to-do family, Mr. Ferrer was sent to the mainland for his education. The summer after his freshman year at Syracuse University, he stayed with his half-brother, the actor José Ferrer — more than 20 years his senior — and José Ferrer’s wife Rosemary Clooney in Hollywood. “I used to drive Rosemary to the studio, where she was making ‘White Christmas.’ And Joe was filming ‘The Caine Mutiny,’ ” Mr. Ferrer recalled. “And one day he said to me, ‘You know, fame — it’s an empty shell; there’s nothing to it.’ ” Not that Mr. Ferrer was interested in acting. Music, specifically Afro-Cuban percussion, had fascinated him since he began playing the drums while attending a military academy in Virginia. As an adult, Mr. Ferrer was a professional drummer before turning full time to art. His interest in visual art was spurred in part by a 1954 summer trip to Paris, where he met Surrealist artists and writers. “That was what turned me on,” Mr. Ferrer said. Making art privately at first, he traveled between New York and Puerto Rico, settling in Philadelphia — “it was inexpensive,” he said — in 1966. In 1968 came the guerrilla action that put him on the radar: With 87 bushels of autumn leaves in a pickup truck, he drove from Philadelphia to New York, scattering them at three contemporary art venues. “It’s about something appearing where it doesn’t belong,” Mr. Ferrer said of that stealth move long ago. Soon he was fielding calls from European curators for international shows, and exhibiting at the Whitney Museum of American Art , alongside major Conceptual artists; in 1969, he famously installed large blocks of ice at the entrance ramp to the Whitney, allowing them to melt. Other high-profile shows followed. But eventually, Mr. Ferrer said, his courtly manner growing feisty at the memory, the art world “avoided” him as he moved among styles and materials. That restless sensibility is one reason “he is not a household name,” said Edward J. Sullivan, a professor of art history at New York University and an expert in Latin American and Caribbean art. “He has such a diverse trajectory, he goes off in so many different directions, he’s almost too inventive for his own good.” Ms. León, the curator of the Guild Hall show, said Mr. Ferrer’s bicultural background may also have contributed to his marginalization. “It’s that problematic situation of being from two places, and not fitting into either one,” she said. (Ms. Smith, in The Times, said “his sometimes bristly personality” may also have undercut his career.) Nevertheless, Mr, Ferrer said, he was constantly working. “I’ve always had a minority of people who love what I do,” he said, “and they’ve been very generous with me.” These days, he works out of the Greenport home that he and his wife, Françoise (known as Bunny), bought in 1999, building a studio in the backyard. In the house, a scene painted in the Dominican Republic in the early 1990s hangs over the couch: The Edenic setting, at a jungle pond or river, lures us in; but the glare of its human figures is unsettling. “I like half-made places,” Mr. Ferrer said of the painting. “I like subcultures. I don’t like places that are all figured out.”

Art
El Museo del Barrio
Museums
Ferrer Rafael
Long Island (NY)


Trying to Make Teenage Hygiene Hip

Abstract: WHAT interests could a 10-year-old girl and a 17-year-old young woman possibly share? Procter & Gamble is banking that the two-pronged answer is high Internet use and music. Procter has teamed up with Sony BMG to feature Sony recording artists on Beinggirl.com , a Web site that Procter had until now used mainly to help young girls cope with puberty. The idea behind the partnership is that girls of all ages will want to hear and download songs by artists like Natasha Bedingfield or Teddy Geiger. And inevitably, the Procter theory goes, the association with those artists will add a patina of coolness to Secret deodorant, Cover Girl makeup, Always sanitary napkins and Tampax tampons, the four Procter brands most likely to come onto a pubescent girl's radar screen. "This is the wired generation, the Internet is their 'can't be without' tool, and music is a high passion point for them," said David G. Knox, a manager who specializes in the teenage market for Procter's beauty division. Branding experts say he is onto something. "There's really nothing cool about deodorants or tampons, but music can wrap them with a cloak of hipness," said Michael Watras, president of Straightline International, a New York brand consultant. A Web site aimed at young girls is nothing new at Procter. But the idea of making it hip most certainly is. The company started Beinggirl in what Mr. Knox calls the "fun dot-com years of 1999 and 2000," but he concedes that until now, "fun certainly wasn't one of the elements on the site." Beinggirl was the domain of Procter's sanitary pad and tampon managers, who used it to educate girls about their changing bodies. But Procter, no stranger to focus groups and customer surveys, asked visitors to the site what else they wanted. Their answers were beauty tips and entertainment. Then, last fall, Mr. Knox saw a survey, conducted by Yahoo, that showed that music was high on the list of teenage passions. So, Procter added Cover Girl and Secret to the site, and turned to Sony for the entertainment. "Teens wear their brands as a badge," Mr. Knox said. "You can't sell them lipstick because it's long lasting or deodorant because it keeps them dry. But if they associate the brand with the first time they saw Teddy Geiger's eyes — well, you can't buy that kind of thing!" Actually, Procter is buying precious little. It is not running any broadcast or print ads to promote the site, on the assumption that word of mouth — and links on the home pages of many Sony artists — will generate traffic. And its arrangement with Sony is pretty much a barter: Sony provides the artists; Procter provides the exposure. Indeed, each company's duties are clearly delineated. Each month, Sony and Procter will decide on two featured artists: one already popular and one Sony is hoping will soon become so. The artists will provide songs for downloading and will have a page on the site — and they will include a link to the Beinggirl site from the Web pages they maintain for themselves. Procter will set up a message board where visitors to the site are encouraged to chat about the artists. Beinggirl is not set up for live chats, but Mr. Knox said that he eventually hoped to set up live chats for the artists on AOL or a similar site. Sony and Procter will also be co-sponsors of high school tours of Sony artists. The May tour, by Cheyenne Kimball, was also sponsored by MTV, which is preparing a show about Ms. Kimball. Girls who visit the Web site can also request samples of various products. For now, the site is not including women's razors and shaving creams, products that entered Procter's portfolio when it purchased Gillette last year. But Mr. Knox is not ruling that out. "Our other brands are looking at the Web site to see how they can best use it," he said. Still, Beinggirl's founding brands, Tampax and Always, probably have the most to gain from the addition of music and other products. Feminine hygiene products are not among the world's highest-tech items, after all. Nor are they subject to the whims of fashion. So, there is a small window of opportunity to get young girls to try new products, the experts say, and that window quickly shuts. "It is hard to get a user of tampons to switch from one brand to another unless you have meaningful technological improvements, and those are few and far between," said Amy Low Chasen, who follows Procter for Goldman Sachs and expects the stock to perform in line with the market. "So, young girls are a critical market for anybody who's selling products to women, because if you get them young they remain loyal." Music tastes, in contrast, usually do change with age. But Sony will happily provide a steady stream of fresh faces and voices. "A majority of the new artists that we release appeal to that 10-to-17 demographic, so Beinggirl provides the perfect venue for us," said David A. Santaniello, senior vice president for strategic marketing and business development at the Sony Music Label Group. "It doesn't talk down to the girls; it's consumer friendly; and it deals with issues they find important." Just as important, both Mr. Santaniello and Mr. Knox stress, the site is a G-rated forum. Rap and hip-hop songs that use scurrilous terms for women are barred from Beinggirl.com. The site includes articles, quizzes and tip lists dealing with how to avoid Web predators and other online dangers. And Ms. Kimball and other artists have agreed to talk about Internet safety during their high school tours. "Girls have already been beaten over the head about smoking and drugs, and Internet safety is the most important new issue they face," Mr. Knox said. The approach is not without risk. Ten-year-olds love to emulate older teens — but the reverse is rarely true. "A 17-year-old wants to align with 20-year-olds; she doesn't want to be anywhere near a 10-year-old," Mr. Watras warned. "This could have a real backlash, if the older girls think the site is aimed at youngsters." But that, of course, is assuming that the older girls realize that the younger girls are online with them. "Procter can talk about the 10-to-17 demographic in their promotional materials, but they are not putting that up on the site," Ms. Chasen said. "The hit rate is probably higher among the younger kids, but the older girls just may not know."

The Procter & Gamble Company
Computers and the Internet


F.B.I. and S.E.C. Probe Missing Fund Manager

Abstract: The F.B.I. and securities regulators have joined the investigation of Arthur Nadel, a Florida hedge fund manager who disappeared four days ago, leaving clients concerned that they might have lost as much as $350 million. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Securities and Exchange Commission are helping on the case, police Lt. Stanley Beishline of Sarasota, Fla., said in a telephone interview. One of Mr. Nadel’s business partners, Neil Moody, said Mr. Nadel had spoken to his wife, Peg, since he was reported missing. Mr. Nadel, 76, is president of Scoop Management in Sarasota, which oversees funds that include Valhalla Investment Partners. Mr. Moody holds no position in Scoop Management and was a partner with Mr. Nadel only on the Vahalla fund and two Viking funds. Scoop’s claim to have managed as much as $350 million “may be high because performance results were exaggerated,” Mr. Moody said in an interview. Mr. Moody said he did not know anything was wrong until Mr. Nadel was reported missing. Mr. Nadel was last seen by his wife at 8:45 a.m. on Wednesday when he left for work, said Lt. Chuck Lesaltato of the Sarasota County sheriff’s office. Calls to Mrs. Nadel’s home or cellphone were not answered. The Herald-Tribune in Sarasota described Mr. Nadel as a “prominent player in Sarasota social and philanthropic circles.” Mr. Nadel, who graduated from New York University Law School, was a real estate developer during the 1960s, according to marketing documents for the Valhalla fund.

Hedge Funds
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Securities and Exchange Commission
Missing Persons
Securities and Commodities Violations


Montgomery Scores 25 as UConn Advances

Abstract: Renee Montgomery scored 25 points in her final game at home and undefeated Connecticut beat eighth-seeded Florida, 87-59, in the second round of the N.C.A.A. women’s basketball tournament on Tuesday night in Storrs, Conn. The Huskies (35-0) advanced to the regional semifinals for the 16th straight season. They will play fourth-seeded California on Sunday in Trenton. Tina Charles followed up her 32-point effort in the first round with 22 against Florida. She also had 10 rebounds for her 11th double-double this season. Maya Moore added 22 points and 14 rebounds for her 16th double-double of the season. Montgomery, a senior guard, left the game to a long standing ovation from the crowd with 6 minutes 23 seconds left and Connecticut ahead by 36. “I was trying to take it all in,” Montgomery said. “It was my last game here. It was a blessing to play an extra game here.” Marshae Dotson scored 22 points to lead Florida (24-8). TEXAS A&M 73, MINNESOTA 42 Sydney Colson had six steals to pace Texas A&M and the Aggies forced a season-high 32 turnovers in a victory over Minnesota in South Bend, Ind. Danielle Gant led Texas A&M (27-7) with 20 points on 9-for-12 shooting, Takia Starks added 17 and Colson had 13. “We win with defense, and we’ll continue to keep winning with defense,” Texas A&M Coach Gary Blair said. Ashley Ellis-Milan scored 15 points to lead the Gophers (20-11), who shot 35 percent. Texas A&M will play sixth-seeded Arizona State (25-8) in Trenton on Sunday. Berkeley Region IOWA ST. 71, BALL ST. 57 Nicky Wieben scored 18 points as fourth-seeded Iowa State held off Ball State in Bowling Green, Ky. Kelsey Bolte added 16 points and 7 rebounds and Amanda Nisleit had 14 points and 10 rebounds for Iowa State (26-8). Raleigh Region MARYLAND 71, UTAH 56 With help from their teammates and a spirited crowd in College Park, Md., Maryland’s Marissa Coleman and Kristi Toliver enthusiastically celebrated one final victory on their home court. Coleman had 18 points and a career-high 18 rebounds, Toliver scored 17, and top-seeded Maryland advanced to the Round of 16. The Terrapins (30-4) will next play Vanderbilt (26-8). BAYLOR 60, S. DAKOTA ST. 58 Kelli Griffin hit a floater from outside the lane on the right side with 0.5 of a second remaining to lift the second-seeded Bears past South Dakota State in Lubbock, Tex. Griffin scored 21 points for Baylor (29-5), which trailed for most of the game and rallied from 14 points down in the first half. The Bears will face Louisville on Saturday. Jennifer Warkenthien scored 18 points to lead the Jackrabbits (32-3). LOUISVILLE 62, L.S.U. 52 Angel McCoughtry scored 28 points and Louisville advanced to the regional semifinals for the second straight year with a victory over Louisiana State in Baton Rouge. Candyce Bingham added 17 points for the third-seeded Cardinals (31-4), who ended sixth-seeded L.S.U.’s bid to reach an unprecedented sixth straight Final Four. Allison Hightower scored 21 for the Lady Tigers (19-11). OKLAHOMA CITY REGION OKLAHOMA 69, GEORGIA TECH 50 Danielle Robinson scored 17 points and had 7 assists, Whitney Hand added 15 and top-seeded Oklahoma beat Georgia Tech in Iowa City. Courtney Paris finished with 9 points and 10 rebounds — missing a double-double for just the seventh time in 134 career games. But Paris had three quick blocks early in the second half to key a 27-11 run by Oklahoma (30-4) that put the game out of reach. Deja Foster had 15 to lead Georgia Tech (22-10), which shot only 5 of 29 in the second half. Oklahoma will face fourth-seeded Pittsburgh on Sunday.

NCAA Basketball Tournament (Women)
University of Connecticut
University of Florida


Jets Minimize Showdown, but Tom Brady and the Patriots Make the Most of It

Abstract: FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — The game was only as big as the Jets wanted it to be, and they did not want it to be big. That was what they said all week, diminishing the importance of playing New England, and regardless of whether the Jets believed it, the rhetoric served another purpose: It would insulate them from defeat. “We’ll see them again,” running back Chris Ivory said late Sunday afternoon, after the Jets staggered in the fourth quarter and lost, 30-23, to fall to two games behind the unbeaten Patriots in the A.F.C. East. The Jets will indeed see New England again, but not until the penultimate week of the season, by which point the division could very well be decided. The Jets (4-2) arrived at Gillette Stadium seeking not validation of others’ perceptions but affirmation of their own — that they were as good as they thought they were. That the league’s best defense could flummox the league’s best offense. About eight hours later, as the sun finished blazing over the horizon, they left a little wobbly, humbled again by Tom Brady and the Patriots’ mastery. It is Brady’s quality that mitigates the Jets’ late implosion. Against a quarterback or team of lesser skill or pedigree, the Jets’ performance over the final 13 minutes might be considered a collapse. They buckled twice on critical third-and-long plays. They failed to thwart New England at 23-20 when a stop would have returned possession with a chance to go ahead. They yielded a 10-play, 68-yard drive capped by Brady’s 15-yard touchdown pass to an open Rob Gronkowski after Coach Todd Bowles opted to save his timeouts. And still, after recovering an onside kick following Nick Folk’s 55-yard field goal with 15 seconds remaining, they had a remote chance to win. They ran one play — a pass over the middle to Eric Decker, hoping to get into position for a Hail Mary — but not another: Brandon Marshall was called for a false start, and by rule, a 10-second runoff was assessed, ending the game. Just as the Patriots tried neutralizing the Jets’ running game — Ivory, hampered by a sore left hamstring, managed 41 yards on 17 carries — the Jets tried making the Patriots’ offense one-dimensional as well. Brady handed the ball off five times. Five. The Patriots did not even feign an interest in running, gaining all of 16 yards on the ground. Brady, the team leader, accounted for 15. On every snap, the Jets expected him to drop back and pass. Which he did, exploiting soft spots in zones and finding open receivers on pick plays. “I felt like we had them,” guard Willie Colon said. “I felt like we were the better team.” Through three quarters, perhaps. As the fourth began, the Jets led by 17-16. They were 15 minutes from first place in the division, from silencing a capacity crowd, from beating New England for only the second time in their last nine meetings. The Jets had been this close here before. In 2012, they lost on a field goal in overtime. In 2013, they lost by 3 points after Geno Smith threw three fourth-quarter interceptions. In 2014, they lost by 2, despite rushing for more than 200 yards, possessing the ball for nearly 41 minutes and not committing a turnover. Bowles may be new to the Jets, but he understood Brady’s wizardry at Gillette. As the interim coach in Miami in 2011, Bowles watched as the Dolphins went up, 17-0, at halftime. New England wound up winning by 3. Reminded last week of that day, Bowles smiled and said, “There are four quarters in a game.” That fourth quarter began with a missed opportunity for the Jets, who settled for Folk’s 30-yard field goal because Marshall dropped a back-shoulder pass that would have been a touchdown. “Absolutely,” Marshall said. “That is all on me.” Trailing by 20-16, the Patriots did what they do, what Brady does, even when his receivers have been dropping passes — 10 through three quarters — all day. On third-and-17 from the New England 27, the Jets dropped into a zone. Bowles opted not to bring pressure because he wanted to mix up the coverages. “You’ve got to play cat and mouse with them,” Bowles said. “You can’t give them what they want all the time.” Given time, Brady fired a 19-yard pass over the middle to Julian Edelman on what Bowles indicated was a breakdown in coverage. Brady squeezed it between linebacker David Harris, who blamed himself for not playing deeper, and the backup safety Dion Bailey, who blamed himself for not redirecting Edelman toward the corner of the zone. Image New York Jets quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick lost a fumble in the first quarter. Credit Steven Senne/Associated Press “It was right on the rope,” Bailey said. “As soon as I turned around.” Onward the Patriots moved, a 10-play drive ending with an 8-yard toss to Danny Amendola that put New England ahead to stay. “We should be upset we lost,” Bowles said. “You show me a good loser, I’ll show you a loser.” The early kickoff Sunday — the first 1 p.m. start for a Jets game at New England since 2007 — belied the quality of the matchup: The teams’ combined .900 winning percentage entering the game was the second highest this late in the season for a game between them since 2004, when both were undefeated heading into Week 7. For a rivalry so steeped in acrimony, the week leading up to this latest installment lacked the rancor of past years. The only trash talk emanated from, of all places, a since-deleted tweet from the Patriots’ official account: On Thursday, it posted a photo of the former Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez slamming into Brandon Moore’s backside on Thanksgiving night 2012 with the message “This seems relevant.” Except it really was not, since these are the new Jets, conditioned by Bowles to be confident without expressing it. They knew the game plan could outwit the Patriots. They just had to execute it. The only guaranteed way to stop Brady is to keep him on the sideline. And to keep him on the sideline, the Jets needed to convert third downs and control the clock. They held the ball for nearly 19 minutes in the first half, as Ryan Fitzpatrick, who completed 22 of 39 passes for 295 yards with two touchdowns and a first-quarter fumble, led two scoring drives that featured a combined 29 plays. That worked for three quarters. Just not for four. There have been losses here in which the Jets afterward looked defeated and deflated. This was not one of them. They are still 4-2, in command of a wild-card berth — but not the division. Asked to characterize the gap between his team and New England, Marshall said, “Very little.” “I think they respect us; I do,” linebacker Calvin Pace said. “Just like we respect them. That don’t win you championships, though.” EXTRA POINTS Todd Bowles said that Calvin Pryor (ankle) and Nick Mangold (neck), who left wearing a brace, were scheduled to have X-rays.