Mom goes after ‘fight club’ day care
A Missouri mom claims her 4-year-old son was a victim of a “fight club” held at a St. Louis day care center — and that little has been done over the past two years to hold the teachers accountable.
Nicole Merseal shared shocking footage of brawls that she said involved her young son and claimed that teachers Mickala Guliford and Tena Dailey egged on the fights at Adventure Learning Center. She sued the facility in December 2016.
Guliford admitted to allowing the fighting, but said she merely meant it to be a “stress release exercise.”
Merseal said her 10-year-old son, who was with his older classmates in another room, filmed the incident through a window on his iPad after he saw his brother crying. He then texted his mother the video. Teachers were accused of forcing the younger boy to participate in three fights, Q13 Fox reported.
The newly released footage shows a teacher giving each child “hulk hands” before watching them wrestle one another to the floor. Merseal’s younger son wipes his tears away on the sidelines.
“My son was very afraid,” Merseal told ABC News.
“He didn’t understand why his best friends beat him up. These are children that he’s been around for a couple years. He described them as his best friends. He just doesn’t understand why they punched him in the face … I don’t know any parent that could watch their children go through this and not be upset.”
The fight occurred two years ago, but Merseal doesn’t think the teachers were held accountable enough for their actions. The teachers were fired but neither of them faced charges.
“I want them to be held accountable and I don’t want this to happen to any other child,” Merseal said.
Merseal also is seeking $25,000 in damages from the pre-school.
Inspectors visited the pre-school eight times since the incident and accounted for 26 violations.
One of those occurred in March 2018, when an inspector noticed a caregiver drag a 3-year-old by the arm. The pre-school director reportedly was in the room and did not respond.
via: https://nypost.com/2018/10/31/mom-goes-after-fight-club-day-care/
‘THIS IS A WHITE NEIGHBORHOOD’: Woman charged after racist note to new neighbors
HOWARD COUNTY, Ind. – An Indiana woman who discovered that her new neighbors had a biracial son toilet-papered the home and put an incredibly racist note on the front door, authorities say.
Deborah Cantwell, 63, was arrested and charged with misdemeanor intimidation and criminal mischief over the incident in Greentown, Time reports.
“THIS IS A WHITE NEIGHBORHOOD,” the lengthy note said, telling the family they should have “CONSIDERED THE NEIGHBORS” before bringing the child to the area. “YOUR (N-word) KID IS NOT WELCOME!”
The note even claimed that the stress of having a black neighbor could cause “serious health issues,” the Washington Post reports.
In a GoFundMe campaign to raise funds for a lawyer, a fence, and a security system, Amy Pundt says her husband found the vile note when he went to check on the property the day after they closed. She says the episode has “destroyed the innocence” of her 15-year-son and badly affected her other children.
Police say that when they interviewed Cantwell, she said she wrote the letter to “vent” and complained that “the blacks get away with it every time,” the Kokomo Tribune reports.
Police say Cantwell told them she was “just trying to let them know” they weren’t welcome and she wasn’t completely sorry for what she did because she felt like she “released some anger writing that letter.”
WTTV reports that the family has now received more than 70 cards and gift baskets from people who want to welcome them to the neighborhood. (This community wiped out racist graffiti before a family saw it.)
4-month-old found infested with maggots ‘died of diaper rash,’ prosecutor says
MOUNT PLEASANT, Iowa – A 4-month-old child found dead and covered in maggots “died of diaper rash,” Assistant Attorney General Coleman McAllister told an Iowa jury, according to the the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier.
The child’s parents have been charged with murder after their 4-month-old son, Sterling Daniel Koehn, was found dead last summer, weighing less than 7 pounds and in a diaper that hadn’t been changed in over a week.
Cheyanne Harris, 20, and Zachary Koehn, 28, face charges of first-degree murder and child endangerment resulting in death, according to WHO-TV.
“He died of diaper rash. That’s right, diaper rash,” McAllister said during his statement in Koehn’s trial Tuesday. Harris will be tried separately.
An ambulance was called to the couple’s Alta Vista apartment on Aug. 30 after Koehn called to report that his son had died, just a few hours after he said Harris fed Sterling.
The baby was found in a powered swing seat in a different bedroom from where the couple and their other child slept.
The criminal complaint says an autopsy by the State Medical Examiner’s Office found the infant measured well below the fifth percentile in size and weight for the child’s age. Maggots were also found in various stages of development on the child’s skin and in his clothing. A forensic entomologist was able to determine the child “had not had a diaper change, bath, or been removed from the seat in over a week.”
McAllister said the feces in Sterling’s diaper had attracted the maggots, and the baby’s irritated skin ultimately ruptured, causing an E. coli infection to develop.
An EMT who responded to the couple’s Hilltop Avenue apartment testified that the entire room was hot and reeked of urine.
“His eyes were open, and it was a blank stare,” Toni Friedrch said. She remembered thinking, “This isn’t right, this is not a baby who I can do CPR on.”
Friedrich said when she moved the boy’s blanket, gnats flew out.
The trial is scheduled to continue Wednesday in Henry County, where it was moved from Chickasaw because of the high level of publicity.
Don Lemon – “The biggest terror threat in this country is white men.” CNN not commenting on Lemon’s remark about white men
NEW YORK (AP) — CNN isn’t commenting about Don Lemon’s statement that white men represent the biggest terrorist threat in the country.
Lemon’s statement, on his show Monday, attracted criticism in conservative circles. He was talking about the negative attention given to a caravan of potential refugees in Central America. Meanwhile, white men are the suspects in recent shootings of two blacks in Kentucky and at a synagogue in Pittsburgh.
Lemon said that, “we have to stop demonizing people and realize that the biggest terror threat in this country is white men, most of them radicalized to the right, and we have to start doing something about them.”
A CNN spokeswoman said Wednesday neither Lemon nor the network would speak more about it.
CVS launches pilot membership program: $5 monthly gets you $10 store credit
CVS Health is launching a pilot membership program that provides delivery perks, discounts and $10 monthly to spend in its stores.
The drugstore giant, one of the largest retailers in the U.S., will charge $5 monthly or $48 for a full year for the new CarePass program, which will be tested in Boston.
“The goal is to expand the program nationally but the pilot is to test-and-learn so we can make sure it is a great experience for customers,” CVS spokesperson Erin Pensa said in an email.
The $10 monthly store credit can be spent on most retail items at CVS Pharmacy locations but doesn’t roll over to the next month if you haven’t used the full amount.
The membership program includes free one-day or two-day delivery on certain prescription drugs and “eligible purchases” from the company’s website with no minimum amount required, CVS said.
In that respect, CarePass bears a resemblance to Amazon’s Prime membership, which requires users to pay an annual fee of $119 for free shipping and other services.
Fending off Amazon is crucial to the long-term success of CVS. The drug industry is bracing for Amazon’s entry into the pharmacy business after the company recently bought online pharmacy startup PillPack.
With more than 9,800 locations, CVS is one of the largest retailers in the U.S. and had about the same annual revenue as Amazon in 2017.
CVS currently offers retail customers discounts through a free membership card called ExtraCare. Cardholders can also accumulate ExtraCare dollars, which act like expiring gift-card money, to spend on in-store products.
CarePass members will get $10 to spend every month on most items in the store. Exceptions include alcohol, lottery tickets, prescriptions and gift cards.
“The CarePass promo reward is automatically added to the customer’s ExtraCare card at the beginning of each monthly benefit cycle and expires at the end of the monthly benefit cycle,” CVS said.
Article via USAToday
The Obamas’ First Netflix Project Will Be Adapting This Book About the Trump Administration
The Obamas have licensed a book about the Trump administration’s incompetence, which is quite the passive-aggressive way to start out their Netflix deal. According to Deadline, Barack and Michelle have picked up the rights to Michael Lewis’s book The Fifth Risk, which describes how Trump’s animosity toward and failure to understand the basic structure of the government has left many departments severely understaffed or headed up by incompetent appointees. According to Deadline, the Obamas are considering making a possible series out of the book, which Lewis describes as a sort of “civics lesson” about how government really works — or in this case, doesn’t.
Article via Vulture
People warned Kanye not to date Kim K. because of her sex tape
Kim Kardashian claims that people warned Kanye West not to get involved with her because of her infamous sex video with ex Ray J.
“He’s put himself up against the world for me when everyone told him, ‘You cannot date a girl with a sex tape. You cannot date a reality show girl. This is going to ruin your career,’ ” Kardashian, 38, told Van Jones. “Everyone told him that.”
“To me, he was like, ‘Oh, you’re not going to tell me what to do. I’ll let you know that it’s going to be okay,’ ” she recalled. “And he always was that strength for me. So I’ll always love and appreciate him for always standing up for me.”
“We’ve been through a lot together,” she added. “You know, I’ve known him for 15 years now. Became friends with him maybe in like 2006, 2007. Met him in like [2002 or 2003]. I’ve known him forever.”
Kardashian’s sex tape, “Kim Kardashian Superstar,” was released in March 2007, when West, 41, was engaged to Alexis Phifer.
Kardashian and West began dating publicly in 2012, though West’s ex Amber Rose alleged that West cheated on her with Kardashian (who was dating Reggie Bush at the time) before they became an exclusive couple.
The couple collectively known as Kimye welcomed daughter North West in 2013 and tied the knot a year later.
They’ve since had son Saint in December 2015 and daughter Chicago in January 2018.
Part of why Yeezy may not have minded Kardashian’s past may be because of his own personal porn preferences.
West revealed on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” over the summer that he still watches Internet porn and is particularly fond of the “black on white” genre because “it mirrors my own reality.”
Article via PageSix
Nurse fired for blackface Beyoncé costume
A nurse at a Missouri hospital lost her job after using blackface to dress as Beyoncé for Halloween.
Shelbi Heenan posted a photo of her in the racist costume to her Facebook account on Monday alongside her boyfriend, also in blackface, dressed as Jay-Z, KCTV reported.
The photo quickly circulated online and by lunchtime, St. Luke’s hospital in Lee’s Summit released a statement saying Heenan was no longer an employee.
“While it is against Saint Luke’s policy to comment on specific personnel matters, we can confirm that this individual is no longer a Saint Luke’s employee,” read the statement.
“Saint Luke’s is deeply committed to our culture of diversity and inclusion. It is fundamental to who we are as an organization and we vigorously protect it on behalf of all our patients and employees and expect those who represent us to do the same,” the statement continued.
Heenan’s Facebook account was no longer active on Wednesday, but a photo of her from 2009 reportedly showed her in blackface dressed as a member of Destiny’s Child, Fox4KC reported.
Teachers in the local community used the incident as an opportunity to educate people on the racist history of blackface.
“The fact that this racist behavior persists is simply an indication that our racist history is not past, basically,” Matthew Osborn, associate professor of early American history at UMKC, told Fox4KC.
“African-Americans, in our history have been the most exploited, most marginalized group and yet African culture is inseparable from American popular culture. It’s at the heart of popular culture, music, sports, theater and film. That is something about American society and culture that we haven`t really come to grips with. Why is it that the racial divisions that exist here in Kansas City exist while we all enjoy so much of African-American culture?” he added.
Article via NYPost
Kanye says he’s been ‘used’ and is ‘distancing’ himself from politics
Yeezy goes.
The outspoken pro-Trump rapper Kanye West complained on Tuesday that he has been “used” and has decided to leave the political world to focus more on his music and design work.
West, who f
amously held a bizarre meeting with President Trump at the White House, tweeted his vision for a better world while announcing his departure from politics.
“My eyes are now wide open and now realize I’ve been used to spread messages I don’t believe in,” the “Yeezus” rapper wrote.
“I am distancing myself from politics and completely focusing on being creative !!!”
West, who went on a pro-Trump rant last month while wearing a MAGA hat on “Saturday Night Live,” tried to emphasize his “actual beliefs.”
“I support those who risk their lives to serve and protect us and I support holding people who misuse their power accountable,” he wrote.
“I believe in love and compassion for people seeking asylum and parents who are fighting to protect their children from violence and war.”
West also ripped pundit Candace Owens for putting his name on a project about African-Americans leaving the Democratic party called “Blexit.”
“I never wanted any association with Blexit,” he wrote. “I have nothing to do with it.”