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It’s a musical, it’s a series, it’s High School Musical: The Musical: The Series! Set at the high school wherein the High School Musical movies were filmed, Disney+’s new series follows a group of high schoolers and their passionate theatre teacher in rehearsals for High School Musical: The Musical. In this scripted series with straight-to-camera confessionals, the drama between the cast members (all up and coming performers) occurs on and off-stage.
Gay ‘chemsex’ is fueling HIV epidemics in Europe, experts warn
Chemsex refers to the use of drugs such as crystal meth to enhance sexual arousal and performance. Experts say it’s pervasive in some European cities.
A surge in “chemsex” parties, where people spend days getting high on drugs and having sex with scores of partners, is re-fueling epidemics of HIV among gay men in European towns and cities, doctors say.
Despite much higher risks of contracting the virus that causes AIDS, as well as other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), users search online “hook-up” apps like Grindr for tags such as “high and horny” or “party and play” to find others wanting drug-heightened and often anonymous and unprotected sex.
The result, AIDS experts say, is that in cities across Europe, HIV is spreading rapidly among men who have sex with men – leading to concentrated epidemics in hard-to-reach groups.
“Chemsex is very pervasive now – it’s a growing phenomenon,” said Rusi Jaspal, a professor of psychology and sexual health at De Montfort University in the British city of Leicester who has been studying the spread of HIV and the chemsex scene.
At a London conference hosted by the International Association of Providers of AIDS Care (IAPAC), the group’s president Jose Zuniga, described chemsex as a “challenge of proportions we cannot fully comprehend at this time”.
Chemsex is characterized by the use of drugs such as crystal meth, mephedrone and GHB, or gamma-hydroxybutyric acid, to enhance sexual arousal, performance and pleasure.
A subset of chemsex is known as “slamsex”, where partygoers self-inject drugs rather than taking them as pills or via pipes.
The drugs “reduce inhibitions and increase feelings of horniness or lust”, Jaspal said, and contribute to “a perfect storm” in groups with high HIV rates for the virus to spread.
In a small study published in 2014 of people attending HIV clinics in England and Wales, 30% of HIV-positive men surveyed reported chemsex in the previous year, and 10% said they’d engaged in slamsex.
HIGH-RISK BEHAVIOR
Ignacio Labayen de Inza, a chemsex specialist who works at several UK clinics and online as a counsellor for men seeking help, says “things have got much worse” since then.
“It’s not just a UK thing,” he told Reuters during the IAPAC conference. “It’s in Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich, Rome, Kiev, Moscow, Helsinki – and in many of what people call ‘gay destinations’, like (Spain’s) Ibiza, Torremolinos, the Canary Islands.”
A Spain-based study last year found that of almost 750 HIV-positive men surveyed, 60 percent reported having unprotected anal sex and 62 percent had been diagnosed with an STI. Rates of infections and high-risk sexual behavior were higher among the 30 percent who reported having engaged in chemsex or slamsex.
Globally, the fight against HIV and AIDS has made dramatic progress in the past decade. According to the UNAIDS agency, 1.7 million people were newly infected with HIV in 2018, a 16% drop since 2010, driven mostly by reducing HIV rates in Africa.
But progress is stalling and the epidemic is tightening its grip in key groups. UNAIDS says more then half of new HIV cases in 2018 were in minority or marginalized groups such as men who have sex with men, transgender people and sex workers.
The human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS can’t be cured, but can be kept in check for decades with cocktails of highly effective antiviral medicines. It’s partly this advance that is behind the high-risk practice of chemsex, said de Inza.
“People are not scared any more of HIV,” he said. “Many people I see say they think ‘it’s only a matter of time anyway, so I might as well have some fun’.”
Shannon Hader, deputy director of UNAIDS, says the key to limiting chemsex and its consequences is to get the right protection messages and methods to those who need them.
Encouraging use of HIV prevention drugs known as PrEP, or pre-exposure prophylaxis, is one effective step, she said, and can give people who have chemsex some control over their health.
“In this epidemic, we always have to be looking for what’s coming next that we’re not addressing,” she told Reuters. “And with PrEP, we need to ensure we’re not missing people in the chemsex environment.”
Article via CNN
A church needed money, so members held homeless people captive and forced them to beg, prosecutors say
Twelve leaders of a California-based church were charged with luring in dozens of mostly homeless people, locking them in group homes and forcing them to panhandle up to nine hours a day, six days a week, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.
Twelve defendants, including former pastor of Imperial Valley Ministries Victor Gonzalez, were charged with conspiracy, forced labor, document servitude and benefits fraud, according to an indictment unsealed Tuesday.
The nondenominational church, which has been around since the 1970s, is headquartered in El Centro, California, and has approximately 30 affiliate churches throughout the USA and Mexico. The programs were meant to “restore” people struggling with drug addiction in faith-based rehabilitation group homes. Participants were enticed with offers of free food, shelter and the resources to eventually return home.
The alleged criminal activity began in 2013 around the time that Gonzalez became pastor, according to the indictment. Gonzalez allegedly told members that the church needed money and instructed them not to let participants leave.
Prosecutors said church members locked victims inside group homes with deadbolts and kept them hostage by taking their identification documents such as driver’s licenses, passports, immigration papers, money and personal items. At some homes, the windows were nailed shut.
“The indictment alleges an appalling abuse of power by church officials who preyed on vulnerable homeless people with promises of a warm bed and meals,” U.S. Attorney Robert Brewer said in a statement. “These victims were held captive, stripped of their humble financial means, their identification, their freedom and their dignity.”
Church leaders allegedly stole their food stamp and welfare benefits and coerced them into panhandling, the proceeds from which all going back to the church. In some cases, church officials allegedly told victims that their children would be taken away if they left or that their loved ones had rejected them and only God loved them.
The indictment alleges church leaders required their victims to follow a strict set of rules, prohibited them from going unaccompanied, reading books other than the Bible or discussing “things of the world.” If the rules were broken, the indictment says, there would be “discipline,” which allegedly included withholding of food.
Two people got out: a woman with diabetes who was allegedly refused medicine for her low blood sugar and a 17-year-old who broke a window and called the police from a neighboring property.
Officials said all known victims have been freed. The charges of forced labor, document servitude and violating the Food Stamp Act have a maximum penalty of up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
“This is the most significant labor trafficking prosecution in this district in many years,” Brewer said. “These cases are few and far between because many victims live in captivity and fear, powerless to report the crimes against them. My office wants victims to know that we are here to help you.”
Homeless Woman Charged After Allegedly Trying to Kill Man by Lighting Him on Fire at South L.A. Encampment
A homeless woman has been charged after allegedly trying to kill a man by lighting him on fire at a South Los Angeles encampment last week, officials said Wednesday.
Shalonda Christine Shaw, 23, faces one count each of attempted murder and assault with caustic chemicals, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office. She is expected to be arraigned on Wednesday.
Shaw allegedly poured gasoline from a container onto a 36-year-old man and set him on fire along the 1600 block of West Slauson Boulevard in the Harvard Park neighborhood on Sept. 6.
The victim suffered burns on 30% of his body, including his hands, feet and legs, authorities said after the attack. He was taken to a hospital in critical but stable condition.
A 27-year-old woman was also injured after some of the gasoline landed on her, according to the DA’s office.
Los Angeles Police Department officers eventually found Shaw based on witness descriptions and she was arrested.
The motive behind the incident is unknown.
She faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted as charged.
Photo Credit: ktla.com
Illinois Teen’s Memory Resets Every 2 Hours — and Doctors Don’t Know Why
An Illinois teenager says her memory has reset every two hours since suffered a traumatic head injury three months ago, and even doctors are baffled over her condition, according to KTLA sister station WQAD in Moline.
Riley Horner of Kirkwood told the station on Monday that she feels a sense of confusion each morning when she awakens.
“I have a calendar on my door and I look and it’s September, and I’m like, ‘Woah’,” Riley said.
Her mother, Sarah Horner, explained Riley wakes up thinking it is June 11, the day she was accidentally kicked in the head by a student “crowd surfing” during a dance at the FFA State Convention.
Since then, she’s suffered dozens of seizures and visited the hospital countless times. But her symptoms are still a medical mystery.
Horner told WQAD that the first doctor dismissed Riley’s condition as a concussion and sent her home on crutches.
“They tell us there’s nothing medically wrong,” Horner said. “They can’t see anything. You can’t see a concussion though on an MRI or a CT scan. There’s no brain bleed, there’s no tumor.”
But for the past three months, even the simplest things are wiped from Riley’s memory every couple hours. She’s forced to carry every notebook, textbook, and pencil with her throughout the school day because she can’t even remember the location of her locker.
In order to keep up with her coursework, Riley needs to leave herself detailed notes, take photos of them on her phone and sets an alarm for every two hours so she can brush up on what she has forgotten.
Horner told the station her brother passed away last week, and although they repeatedly tell Riley, she can’t remember it.
“I know it’s hard for them as much as it’s hard for me. And people just don’t understand. It’s like a movie,” Riley said. “Like I will have no recollection of (this interview) come supper time.”
The injury has changed everything for this former athlete and scholar.
“I’m not making memories,” Riley said. “And I’m just like really scared.”
“(Doctors) told us that she might just be like this forever. And I am not okay with that,” Horner said tearfully.
The family is desperate for a diagnosis before it is too late. Horner said research has shown that at six months with short term memory, it can cause irreversible damage.
“We need help,” she pleaded. “We need somebody that knows a little bit more because she deserves better. I mean, she wanted to be in the medical field and now she can’t even hold a job if she wanted to.”
Riley said she also wants to share her story so that anyone else experiencing similar symptoms knows they are not alone.
Photo Credit: ktla.com
White couple gave birth to Asian daughter after fertility clinic mishap
A white New Jersey couple who had a daughter through IVF were stunned when the baby developed “Asian features” — and a DNA test proved the husband was not the father, according to their lawsuit against the clinic.
Kristina Koedderich and Drew Wasilewski, who are now divorced, went to the Institute for Reproductive Medicine and Science at Saint Barnabas in 2012 and spent $500,000 for treatment, according to the court papers filed in Essex County Superior Court.
Their daughter was born in 2013 and “a couple years later, they noticed the baby started having Asian features,” the couple’s attorney David Mazie of Mazie, Slater, Katz & Freeman, told The Post.
A DNA test in 2015 confirmed that there was “0% probability” that Drew, 49, was his daughter’s biological father, according to the suit.
The clinic’s negligence caused “the breakdown of the marriage between Kristina and Drew Wasilewski,” claims the suit.
Superior Court Judge Keith Lynott last month ordered the clinic to hand over a list of men who donated sperm around the same time the couple used the facility — in the hopes of narrowing down who the girl’s biological father is.
The parents want to know whose sperm was used so they can learn about their now-6-year-old daughter’s genetic history — and in case she wants to have a relationship with her biological dad in the future.
“They love her very much, but it’s a very sensitive and very stressful situation for them,” Mazie said.
They also want to know if Drew’s semen was used for someone else’s IVF treatment.
The couple is seeking unspecified monetary damages, saying the clinic’s mistake caused “great pain, suffering, permanent injuries and disabilities, as well as the loss of enjoyment of the quality of life.”
A spokesperson for Saint Barnabas Medical Center told Patch they don’t comment on litigation matters.
Last month, an Ohio couple who also went through IVF treatment filed a lawsuit claiming their clinic used a stranger’s sperm to father their now-24-year-old daughter.
Photo Credit: Facebook
Cashier allegedly used photographic memory to steal credit card info from more than 1,000 customers
A Tokyo cashier with a photographic memory was busted when he used his natural ability to rip off credit card information from more than 1,000 customers — and go on a shopping spree, according to a report.
The part-time employee who worked in the Koto neighborhood was arrested Thursday for allegedly using the stolen credit card information to make 270,000 Japanese yen ($2,600) in online purchases, CNN reported.
Sources with the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department said the cashier memorized customers’ credit card information while ringing them up at a Koto mall, the outlet reported.
He allegedly then went on the spree back in March, using stolen credit cards from 1,300 customers.
Police discovered the worker had a notebook with the credit card details written down.
The unnamed man remains in police custody, though he hasn’t been charged for the alleged theft, according to CNN.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/09/10/cashier-allegedly-used-photographic-memory-to-steal-credit-card-info/
Photo Credit: nypost.com
Day care workers did nothing as kids bullied 5-year-old girl
Two day care workers in Ohio have been arrested after they were caught on video doing nothing as older students bullied and assaulted a “frightened” 5-year-old girl, police said.
Video footage obtained by detectives in Columbus showed Joshua Tennant, 27, and Emma Dietrich, 31, making no attempt to stop several kids from taunting the girl at the Worthington Learning Center on Aug. 13, police said.
The pair was busted Tuesday on misdemeanor counts of child endangerment — after admitting they refused to stop the attack as a twisted form of discipline, according to court documents cited by WCMH.
“In the video, the older students are grabbing, pulling, dragging, swinging and just ‘bullying’ [the girl],” police said in an incident report. “She appears frightened and keeps her eyes closed or covered and attempts to curl up into a fetal position.”
The girl then tried to get away from the older students, but she was held down. As the bullying continued, police said Dietrich and Tennant “continually” sat at a table nearby and took no steps to stop the onslaught.
Later in the footage, Tennant picked up the 5-year-old girl by her right ankle and left leg and carried her upside down, placing her back on a rug near her tormentors, police said.
The owner of the day care center said she was “heartbroken” by what she saw on the video and immediately fired Dietrich and Tennant, both of Columbus, after seeing the footage, WBNS reported. The video was sent to child welfare investigators.
Several parents, meanwhile, told the station Tennant had been wonderful with their children and that they never suspected any problems at the family-operated facility. Some parents plan to remove their children after the arrests, WCMH reported.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/09/11/day-care-workers-did-nothing-as-kids-bullied-5-year-old-girl-cops/
Photo Credit: Franklin County Jail
Boat carrying $4.3M worth of weed washes up on San Diego coast
A small boat carrying $4.3 million worth of marijuana washed ashore on the coast of San Diego last weekend, according to a report.
The motorboat with more than 1,000 pounds of reefer ended up on a beach between Carlsbad and Oceanside about 6:30 a.m. Sunday, the Oceanside Police Department told NBC 7.
Witnesses on the beach said they saw two people flee the boat and run south along the shoreline after the vessel crashed onto the sand, the report said.
As of Tuesday, no arrests have been made.
“I was really surprised to see a drug smuggling boat here in Carlsbad,” Zachary Boyer, who witnessed authorities unload the drugs, told the cable network.
“I noticed a few cops around,” Boyer said. “Then when they started unloading the bundles of marijuana, we knew it was something different.
“They were throwing bundle after bundle of marijuana off the boat.”
via: https://nypost.com/2019/09/11/boat-carrying-4-3m-worth-of-weed-washes-up-on-san-diego-coast/
Photo Credit: nypost.com