Doctors locked out of Texas hospital, forced to treat patients in parking lot – owners are over $400K in back rent and fees
Doctors were locked out of a Texas hospital this week and forced to treat patients in the parking lot after the owners failed to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent on time, according to new reports.
Staff members at the Heights Hospital in Houston were given no warning, nor a chance to notify their patients, before they were shut out Monday.
“We showed up around 8 this morning, myself and my staff, to get ready, [and] were told we were not allowed in the building anymore,” family physician Dr. Felicity Mack told local station KHOU. “We weren’t given notice to take care of our patients and let them know, so I’ve got patients that continue to show up today that I was supposed to see.”
A note on the door explained that the locks for spaces rented by 1917 Ashland Ventures LLC — the owners on record of the hospital — were changed and keys will only be provided when $461,302.24 in rent and fees are paid, KTRK reported.
“I tried to contact the owners,” Mack told the outlet. “They aren’t responding. The title company is not responding. We are really not getting any answers, but at the end of the day, my primary concern, like I said, is my patients.”
She managed to treat some outpatients in the parking lot — but lacked the equipment to treat others, including Linda Fisher, who is battling the lingering effects of COVID-19.
“It’s detrimental to patients and to myself,” Fisher, who was in a wheelchair, told the station. “It will impact my functionality. I get regular visits all the time, so I don’t know what’s going to happen.”
Dr. John Thomas told the outlet the sudden closure makes it “very obvious that somebody is thinking only about money and not about community and lives.”
Property records reviewed by the station indicate that the building is owned by 1917 Heights Hospital LLC.
The attorneys whose names appeared on the letter posted to the door did not return requests for comment from the outlet.
Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, representing Texas’ 18th Congressional District, said a management company hired by the hospital took the action.
She called the lock-out unacceptable.
“It’s ironic that in the middle of the pandemic of COVID-19 when one of the patients locked out was a COVID-19 patient, that this dastardly act of confusion would occur,” Jackson Lee said.
via: https://nypost.com/2021/01/19/texas-doctors-forced-to-treat-patients-in-hospital-parking-lot/
Photo Credit: Google Maps
Capitol rioter accused of stealing Nancy Pelosi’s laptop arrested – had intentions to sell it to the Russians
An alleged Capitol rioter was arrested Monday after her former romantic partner accused her of taking a laptop or hard drive from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office with the intention of selling it to the Russians, authorities said.
Riley June Williams, of Pennsylvania, who was seen on video taking part in the Capitol siege, was charged with entering a restricted building and violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, according to Department of Justice records.
The FBI is also investigating the laptop theft claims, though there is no indication that one was actually pilfered from the speaker’s office. Williams has not been charged in connection to that allegation.
According to an affidavit filed Sunday, a witness described as a former romantic partner of Williams claimed to have seen footage of her “taking a laptop computer or hard drive from Speaker Pelosi’s office.”
“[Witness 1] stated that Williams intended to send the computer device to a friend in Russia, who then planned to sell the device to SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service,” court documents allege.
“According to [Witness 1], the transfer of the computer device to Russia fell through for unknown reasons and Williams still has the computer device or destroyed it,” according to the affidavit, which includes a link to a news segment on the US Capitol raid produced by Britain’s ITV News.
A woman who has been identified as Williams — wearing glasses, a green shirt, brown trench coat and carrying a bag over her shoulder — is seen on video yelling, “Upstairs, upstairs, upstairs,” and pushing people toward Pelosi’s office.
via: https://nypost.com/2021/01/18/alleged-capitol-rioter-accused-of-stealing-nancy-pelosis-laptop-is-arrested/
Photo Credit: FBI/Handout via REUTERS
Baltimore anti-gun violence activist Dante Barksdale fatally shot in head
A prominent anti-gun violence activist in Baltimore was fatally shot at a public housing project, police and city officials said.
Dante Barksdale, 46, who worked as an outreach coordinator for the city’s Safe Streets campaign, was shot in the head early Sunday at the Douglass Homes in southeastern Baltimore.
He was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead, police said.
“The investigation is ongoing and we have no further updates to provide at this time,” a police spokeswoman told The Post in a statement early Monday.
Homicide detectives are handling the investigation, police said.
Barksdale, also known as “Tater,” was the “heart and soul” of the city’s anti-gun violence program, where he worked for nine years, Mayor Brandon Scott said.
“His death is a major loss to Safe Streets, the communities they serve, and the entire city of Baltimore,” Scott said in a statement, adding that Barksdale’s impact left an indelible mark on the community. “Dante’s work saved lives. This is a sobering reminder of how dangerous this frontline work is.”
Barksdale had delivered winter coats just weeks earlier to residents at the complex where he was fatally shot, one resident told the Baltimore Sun. The circumstances surrounding his death were not immediately clear, the newspaper reported.
Barksdale, who had served time in prison, was well known throughout the community and had a personal connection to the struggle of ridding the city’s streets of guns. He was the nephew of Nathan “Bodie” Barksdale, an infamous Baltimore drug kingpin who served as inspiration for some of the characters in HBO’s “The Wire,” including Avon Barksdale.
Barksdale’s slaying shocked many community leaders, including former Safe Streets workers.
“His life was dedicated to preventing this type of stuff from happening,” James Timpson, a former program leader who now runs another violence prevention effort, told the Baltimore Sun. “Nobody can believe that this happened.”
A description of a suspect or a possible motive was not available late Sunday, a police spokeswoman told the newspaper.
The city’s police commissioner, meanwhile, lauded Barksdale for his crime-fighting efforts in the streets he served while sending condolences to his family.
“His work in outreach, mediating conflicts and reducing gun violence in our city was invaluable and he embodied a message of redemption and peace to the many young people of our city,” Commissioner Michael Harrison said.
Anyone with information about the shooting should call police at (410) 396-2100.
via: https://nypost.com/2021/01/18/baltimore-anti-violence-activist-dante-barksdale-fatally-shot/
Photo Credit: AP Photo/Patrick Semansky
California man who told police that the coronavirus pandemic left him afraid to fly hid in a secured area at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport for three months
Aditya Singh, 36, is charged with felony criminal trespass to a restricted area of an airport and misdemeanor theft after he was arrested Saturday. At a court hearing on Sunday, a judge ruled that the Orange, California, man could be released if he paid $1,000, but said that Singh was prohibited from setting foot in the airport.
As of Monday morning, Singh remained in the Cook County Jail.
Assistant Public Defender Courtney Smallwood said Singh does not have a criminal record. She also said it was unclear why Singh, who is unemployed, came to Chicago or if he has ties to the area.
During the hearing, Assistant States Attorney Kathleen Hagerty said that Singh was spotted by two United Airlines employees, who asked him for identification, the Chicago Tribune reported. Singh lowered his mask and showed a badge that actually belonged to an operations manager at the airport who had reported it missing in late October, Hagerty said.
The employees called police, who took Singh into custody. Singh was “scared to go home due to COVID,” Hagerty said, and told authorities that he’d found the badge and that other passengers at the airport had given him food.
Before she granted Singh bail, Cook County Judge Susana Ortiz was clearly troubled that someone could remain in a secured area for so long at the airport without anyone noticing.
“The court finds these facts and circumstances quite shocking for the alleged period of time that this occurred,” the judge said. “Being in a secured part of the airport under a fake ID badge allegedly, based upon the need for airports to be absolutely secure so that people feel safe to travel, I do find those alleged actions do make him a danger to the community.”
Singh is scheduled to return to court Jan. 27.
via: https://www.kmov.com/news/man-allegedly-hid-3-months-at-chicago-airport-due-to-virus/article_e2e70ed4-a7ff-50f6-b9c0-113a6c63f316.html
Photo Credit: Cook County Sheriff’s Office via AP
Teacher uses stimulus money to help students’ families
HERSHEY, Pa. (WPMT/CNN) — A Pennsylvania teacher went above and beyond to help his students.
Matthew Pierce, a teacher at Milton Hershey School, knew right away what he wanted to do with his stimulus money when he got it.
Pierce saw the need to support his students’ families.
He decided he was going to try and solve one day’s worth of problems.
Pierce said he used his stimulus money to buy several Uber Eats gift cards and provide families with a meal.
“Whatever situation that they begin with is not the situation that they have to end in, and along the way, you can do good things for other people,” added Pierce.
The Dauphin County teacher said it’s important to set a good example for kids.
via: https://www.kmov.com/news/teacher-uses-stimulus-money-to-help-students-families/article_80982216-fefd-5b84-8e56-b0d90c9f2840.html?block_id=985911
Photo Credit: CNN
How to get a free bag of marijuana with the COVID-19 vaccine – “Joints for Jabs” campaign
Cannabis activist group DC Marijuana Justice plans to offer weed gift bags to those who get the COVID-19 vaccine in the nation’s capital, the organization has announced.
“We are looking for ways to safely celebrate the end of the pandemic and we know nothing brings people together like cannabis,” wrote DCMJ co-founder Nikoas Schiller in a press release for the initiative, dubbed “Joints for Jabs.”
The group plans to hand out free ganja baggies at Washington, DC, vaccination sites, both to commemorate what is hopefully the beginning of the end of the coronavirus pandemic and as advocacy for both reefer and getting vaccinated.
“To celebrate this momentous occasion and thank people for getting vaccinated, dozens of DC homegrowers will lawfully distribute free bags of cannabis outside vaccination centers as soon as the general public is able to get vaccinated,” the release says, further quoting Schiller as saying, “When enough adults are inoculated with the coronavirus vaccine, it will be time to celebrate — not just the end of the pandemic, but the beginning of the end of cannabis prohibition in the United States.”
DC’s Department of Health has not yet named the public vaccination sites, but DCMJ says they will release further details once those addresses and hours of operation have been made public. In the meantime, local growers have already pledged three pounds of cannabis for the giveaway, and DCMJ hopes to have a total of five pounds by the time they begin offering them to freshly vaccinated members of the public, DCist reported.
The organizers plan to distribute loose cannabis, as opposed to pre-rolled joints. Handing out free joints, they learned after doing as much during President Trump’s 2017 inauguration, leads to people smoking them on site and violating city law, in addition to being problematic to pandemic health protocol.
“Four years ago, we handed out over 10,000 joints — and we licked those joints,” DCMJ co-founder Adam Eidinger told DCist. “Today, we think that’s an issue.”
Baggie recipients might consider passing off their dank freebie to those currently suffering from the coronavirus, as a recent study found that cannabis extracts could possibly reduce the risk of dying from COVID-19. Researchers at the University of Lethbridge in Canada reported that the human body’s often fatal “cytokine storm” — during which the malfunctioning immune system attacks itself — was calmed by using three promising strains of sativa plants.
via: https://nypost.com/2021/01/18/how-to-get-a-free-bag-of-weed-with-your-covid-19-vaccine/
Photo Credit: nypost.com
Doctor explains why he’s not getting vaccinated right now
PORTLAND, Or. — The vaccine roll out is on, and doctors and nurses are lining up for the shot.
But, not all health care workers are on board. Heart surgeon Dr. Stephen Noble is one of them.
“I choose, for my family and I, to wait to get the vaccine,” said physician and cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Noble.
His decision has been months in the making.
“I listened to the CDC, the FDA, I sat in on those virtual conferences this year about it,” he said.
Yet, his lingering questions outweighed any answers he could find.
“We don’t know what, how this vaccine is going to affect us,” said Dr. Noble.
He worries data from some trials may not be complete.
“The trial in and of itself was supposed to be a two-year trial. There’s the experience of being a researcher, spending time in the lab, you understand that there is what we do in the lab, or in the trial, in the study, and what we do in real life,” said Dr. Noble.
Despite Dr. Noble’s concerns, Moderna’s trial showed its vaccine was 94 percent effective and Pfizer’s vaccine was 95 percent effective in preventing COVID-19.
Dr. Anthony Fauci received the Moderna vaccine himself. He told Americans the protection from the shot could be life-saving for millions.
For Dr. Noble, he believes there’s no way to tell now if the vaccine rollout will be as successful as the trials.
“When you have a trial, everything is so controlled: getting the shot on day zero, then getting another shot on day 21,” he explained. “But in real life, it’s very difficult for everyone to come in on that specific time at a specific date.”
He believes if the majority of the country isn’t vaccinated properly, it isn’t worth taking the risk.
“What America is dealing with right now is working the bugs out of vaccine distribution, and if we can’t deliver the vaccine in the same exact way that the trial was done, you know, are we doing good medicine?”
Other health care professionals have similar questions. A recent study by the Kaiser Family Foundation found 29 percent of front-line healthcare workers were not getting the vaccine right away, two percentage points higher than the general public.
The main concerns were possible side effects, the speed of the vaccine becoming available, and distrust in vaccines and the healthcare system.
“The hesitancy isn’t in the vaccine or isn’t in the drug or isn’t in this device, but it’s the system in which this vaccine was created. It’s a system that has perpetuated health care disparities, racial discrimination, and all these other things.And so now, at this eleventh hour, as we’re in over-time to ask the community to trust, and it can be difficult,” Dr. Noble said.
Dr. Noble says trust is a big factor in getting communities of color to take the vaccine, especially when many of the trials involved more white participants.
“There’s questions or concerns in regard to representation within the studies. You know, these studies are done in a demographic, that you know the demographic that is really hurting the most, we’re not seen represented in the science.”
Still, the doctor says he believes the vaccine will work, even if he needs more data to accept the science.
“I’ve never been in doubt of the vaccine working, but because they work in the lab doesn’t mean they’re going to work the same way in real life. And so to that point, going forward we need to do the things that we know work: masking up, hand hygiene, and social distancing,” he stressed.
He hopes each member of the community will make their choice to get vaccinated based on their own health, remembering that even with the shot, COVID-19 is still a threat.
via: https://www.pix11.com/news/national-politics/the-race-2020/doctor-explains-why-hes-not-getting-vaccinated-right-now
Photo Credit: pix11.com
Colin Powell says he no longer considers himself a Republican
Washington (CNN) – Former Secretary of State Colin Powell said Sunday he is no longer a Republican following the deadly insurrection at the US Capitol incited by President Donald Trump and criticized the party for supporting his behavior.”They did, and that’s why I can no longer call myself a fellow Republican. I’m not a fellow of anything right now. I’m just a citizen who has voted Republican, voted Democrat throughout my entire career. And right now I’m just watching my country and not concerned with parties,” he told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria on “GPS.”The announcement by Powell, a grandee of the Republican Party who served in multiple administrations and at one point was considered a potential presidential nominee, underscores the ongoing estrangement of the so-called establishment wing of the GOP from its modern direction under Trump.The first Black secretary of state and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has long criticized Trump and voted for President-elect Joe Biden in the 2020 election after voting against Trump in 2016. He has criticized Republicans for not condemning Trump in the past and admonished them on Sunday for putting political interests ahead of the interests of Americans.
“They should have known better, but they were so taken by their political standing and how none of them wanted to put themselves at political risk. They would not stand up and tell the truth or stand up and criticize him or criticize others,” Powell told Zakaria. “And that’s what we need. We need people who will speak the truth, who remember that they are here for our fellow citizens. They are here for our country. They are not here simply to be re-elected again.”As House Democrats move toward an impeachment resolution unless Vice President Mike Pence acts to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from power, Powell said he would back a Senate conviction if he were serving in the chamber.
“I would have done it last time if I had the opportunity,” he said, referring to the effort to remove Trump from office following the Ukraine scandal.
via: https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/11/politics/colin-powell-no-longer-republican-cnntv/index.html
Photo Credit: cnn.com
Kansas nurses refuse to give COVID-19 vaccines
Coffee County in Kansas has roughly 8,500 residents, but they won’t be getting their COVID-19 shots from the county health department’s four nurses.
Department chief Lindsay Payer and her staffers have opted out of giving the injections because they have doubts about the safety of the Moderna vaccine, which the county is offering, local TV station WIBW reported.
Payer told WIBW that her employees made up their own minds and “not without considerable thought.” The county will hire at least one outside nurse, who will be paid with COVID-19 funds.
“I will tell you we will have to contract staff…because my staff is not comfortable with that. It’s a new technology. We’ve never seen it before. It was only studied in 45 people before it was approved…,” Payer said.
“It’s somewhat discomforting to a nurse who has to put that in people’s bodies.”
via: https://nypost.com/2021/01/16/kansas-nurses-refuse-to-give-covid-19-vaccines/
Photo Credit: Coffey County KS
Thief steals car with child in it — then lectures the mom about leaving child alone in car
An Oregon carjacker who realized there was a young kid in the vehicle circled back to scold the mom about her parenting, according to police.
The bizarre episode unfolded outside a grocery store in the Portland suburb of Beaverton Saturday, after the mom left her 4-year-old in a booster seat inside the running car.
She’d left the car unlocked when she ran in to buy a gallon of milk and some meat, according to the Oregonian.
The thief happened to be walking by, and hopped in the 2013 Honda Pilot and took off.
He apparently quickly realized he had gotten more than he bargained for.
He pulled a U-turn in an adjacent parking lot and drove back to the store.
Once there, the bad guy gave the mom a piece of his mind, said Beaverton police spokesman Officer Matt Henderson.
“He actually lectured the mother for leaving the child in the car and threatened to call the police on her,” Henderson said.
The mom grabbed her kid on the thief’s orders before he again drove off with her car, cops said.
“Obviously, we’re thankful he brought the little one back and had the decency to do that,” Henderson said.
via: https://nypost.com/2021/01/16/thief-steals-car-with-child-in-it-then-lectures-the-mom/
Photo Credit: nypost.com