2A

Breakfast Briefing

FRIDAY FEBRUARY 19 2016

CENTREDAILY.COM

president after the 1989

fall of communism.
Walesa, now 72, has long
admitted that he signed a
document in the 1970s
agreeing to provide information to the generallyhated communist secret
police, although he insisted
he never informed on
anyone and never took any
money. In 2000, he was
cleared by a court, which
said it found no evidence
of collaboration.
On Thursday, Walesa
suggested that the newly
uncovered papers were
fake and vowed to fight to
clear his name.
There can exist no documents coming from me,
Walesa said in a written
message from Venezuela,
where he is traveling. I
will prove that in court.

THE STATE

Cosby demands
money back from
accuser in case
PHILADELPHIA

Bill Cosbys legal and

public-relations strategy
took a sharp turn this week
with word that he has sued
the accuser in a criminal
sexual-assault case against
him for talking to police.
Cosby wants accuser
Andrea Constand to return
the money he paid her to
settle her 2005 civil lawsuit
because she sat for an interview last year with police who reopened the case.
Cosby said that violates the
confidentiality agreement
she signed to not talk about
the case.
Criminal defense lawyer
David Walker, who is not
involved in the case, has
followed Cosbys fall from
grace and said the TV stars
strategy makes him look
like a bully.
(Hes thinking), I paid
her to be quiet, and now
shes not being quiet, so
now Im going to sue her,
now Im going to harass
her, Walker said. I cant
see anything positive that
comes from it.
Cosby has kept lawyers
busy in several states this
past year as he fights the
criminal case in Pennsylvania, pursues defamation
suits against accusers in
Massachusetts and California and now files a
breach-of-contract suit
against Constand, her
mother and her lawyers.
The suit said Constand
had no legal duty to cooperate with Pennsylvania
authorities because she
lives in Canada. The interviews she and her mother gave to investigators last
year were therefore voluntary and violated the settlement terms, the suit
said.

Woman charged
with arson
in deadly fire

Zimbabwe
politicians engage
in bitter quarrels
RASHAH MCCHESNEY The Associated Press

An active aurora borealis hovers over downtown Juneau and the Mendenhall glacier on Thursday in Juneau, Alaska.

has agreed to take up a key

issue in the trials for the
Baltimore officers charged
in the death of Freddie
Gray, postponing trial proceedings until it can make
a ruling.
The states Court of
Appeals ruled Thursday
that it would take up the
issue of whether one of the
officers, William Porter,
whose October trial ended
in a mistrial, could be
forced to testify against the
other officers even though
he is awaiting retrial. The
issue had previously been
pending in the Court of
Special Appeals.
The order stalls the trial
for Officer Edward Nero,
whose trial was scheduled
to begin with jury selection
Monday.
Neros attorney, Marc
Zayon, could not comment
because of a gag order in
the case.
The court will hear oral
arguments March 3.

PITTSBURGH

A woman said a boarding

house was filled with
demons before she set it
on fire, killing the owner
and two other residents,
according to a criminal
complaint.
The suspect, Latoya
Lyerly, also told investigators she had argued about
the volume of a radio the
night before Wednesdays
fire and had threatened to
burn down the house, police said.
Lyerly, 42, remained
jailed Thursday on charges
of criminal homicide, aggravated arson, arson and
causing or risking a catastrophe.
Lyerly told police shed
been living at the house for
three weeks after getting
kicked out of a YMCA in
McKeesport. She said the
owner paid her to cook and
clean for him because she
had no money, and they
quarreled as she cooked
spaghetti and hamburgers
on Tuesday, according to
police.
Lyerly also told police
she argued with the homes
owner over the volume of
her radio. The argument
became very heated and
at one point during the
argument Lyerly stated
that she told (the owner)
she was going to burn the
(expletive) house down,
according to the complaint.
Lyerly is charged with
three counts of criminal
homicide in the deaths of
the homes 73-year-old
owner, Derlyn Vance, and
two other residents, Gerald
Johnson, 68, and Calvin
Turner, 56. The medical
examiner ruled they died
of burns and smoke inhalation.

Term limit
proposed for
Supreme Court
WASHINGTON

Justice Antonin Scalias

sudden death a month
before his 80th birthday
and the potential impasse
over replacing him is giving
new impetus to an old idea:
Limiting the service of
Supreme Court justices.
Scalia had been on the
court for nearly 30 years,
longer than any of the
current justices and all but
14 of the 112 men and women who have served on
the court.
I think 30 years on the
court is too long for anyone
liberal or conservative.
That is just too much power in one persons hands
for too long a period, said
Erwin Chemerinsky, a
liberal legal scholar and
dean of the law school at
the University of California
at Irvine.
The Constitution says
federal judges shall hold
their offices during good
behaviour, which means
essentially as they long as
they wish.
The most talked-about
idea has support among
both liberals and conservatives. A single 18-year term
would replace lifetime
tenure. Going forward,
presidents would appoint a
justice every two years,
ensuring both continuity on
the court and two picks for
each presidential term. On
the right, former Texas
Gov. Rick Perry advanced a
similar idea during his
2012 Republican campaign
for president.

THE NATION

Court of appeals
delays officers
trial in Gray case
BALTIMORE

Marylands highest court

HARARE, ZIMBABWE

THE BIG PICTURE

CORRECTIONS
The CDT strives for
accurate, thorough
reporting. Whenever an
error is made, we want to
correct it. Call 231-4640.

Skeptics question
Chicago video
policy
CHICAGO

Mayor Rahm Emanuels

promise to release videos
of police shootings in no
more than three months
was touted as a way to
bring more transparency to
Chicago after the city took
more than a year to make
public the footage of a
teenagers death.
But skeptics question
why Chicago needs so long
to release the same type of
videos that Cincinnati and
Seattle already make public
within days, if not hours.
That has sown doubts that
the new practice will do
little to restore the trust
that was damaged when
the public saw the nowfamous video of a white
officer firing an entire
magazine into Laquan
McDonald, who was black,
as he appeared to walk
away from police.
The policy announced
Tuesday calls for all videos
to be released within 60
days. The deadline could
be extended to 90 days if
law enforcement requests a
delay.
That just gives them
time to alter the video, do
something to it, change the
dates, maybe delete some
things, said April Cross,
who lives in a predominantly black neighborhood
on the citys West Side.
Thats not giving people
in the community faith in
the police department at
all.
Emanuel, in a statement,
said the policy strikes a
better balance of ensuring
transparency for the public
while also ensuring any
criminal or disciplinary
investigations are not compromised.

THE WORLD

Opposition
candidate briefly
arrested

Kizza Besigye was arrested in the Kampala suburb

of Naguru, where he had
gone to investigate alleged
ballot-stuffing in a house
run by the intelligence
agencies, said Shawn Mubiru, who is in charge of
communications for Besigyes Forum for Democratic Change party.
The police did not respond to requests for comment.
Besigye is Ugandan President Yoweri Musevenis
main challenger in the
polls, in which six other
opposition candidates are
also standing.
Besigyes supporters said
the delays were deliberate
and were aimed at favoring
Museveni, whose rival is
popular in Kampala. The
head of the Commonwealth Observer Group,
former Nigerian President
Olusegun Obasanjo, called
the long delays absolutely
inexcusable.

Pope suggests
birth control OK
in Zika crisis
ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE

Pope Francis has suggested women threatened

with the Zika virus could
use artificial contraception,
saying avoiding pregnancy is not an absolute
evil in light of the global
epidemic.
The pope unequivocally
rejected abortion as a response to the crisis in remarks Wednesday as he
flew home after a five-day
trip to Mexico.
But he drew a parallel to
a decision by Pope Paul VI
in the 1960s to approve
giving nuns in Belgian
Congo artificial contraception to prevent pregnancies
because they were being
systematically raped.
Abortion is an evil in
and of itself, but it is not a
religious evil at its root, no?
Its a human evil, Francis
told reporters. On the
other hand, avoiding pregnancy is not an absolute
evil. In certain cases, as in
this one (Zika), such as the

one I mentioned of Blessed

Paul VI, it was clear.
Francis was responding
to a reporters question
about whether abortion or
birth control could be considered a lesser evil
when confronting the Zika
crisis in Brazil, where there
has been a spike in babies
born with abnormally small
heads to Zika-infected
mothers.

Walesa a paid
informer, papers
show
WARSAW, POLAND

Lech Walesa, the legendary anti-communist leader

who played a historic role
in bringing down communism in Poland and across
Eastern Europe, had served
as a paid informant in the
1970s for the same communist regime that he later
fought, according to documents revealed publicly
Thursday.
It is not yet clear how
damaging the revelations
will be to Walesa, who won
the Nobel Peace Prize in
1983 for his defiant opposition to the communists and
who became Polands first
democratically-elected

Crocodiles, Lacoste
shirts, DNA tests and accusations of stealing underwear and radios.
Sniping around these
topics highlights the intensifying battles in Zimbabwes faction-ridden
ruling party over who will
succeed President Robert
Mugabe, in power for 36
years.
Mugabe, the worlds
oldest head of state, recently warned officials of
his ZANU-PF party to stop
insulting each other.
A lot of the bitter quarrels, which come ahead of
Mugabes 92nd birthday on
Feb. 21, happen on Twitter
and other social media
platforms, providing Zimbabweans with a stream of
nasty, colorful and sometimes entertaining quips
that would have been unthinkable not long ago.
None of Mugabes current close allies has challenged his rule, which began with independence
from white rule in 1980
and has been marked by
economic hardship and
contentious relations with
the West. The disputes
within the ruling party are
the result of Mugabes
failure to groom an obvious
successor, said Gabriel
Shumba, a human rights
lawyer and chairman of the
South Africa-based Zimbabwe Exiles Forum.
FROM WIRE REPORTS

KAMPALA, UGANDA

The main opposition

candidate for president in
Uganda was briefly arrested late Thursday, his aide
said, as vote counting started in presidential and parliamentary polls marred by
the late arrival of voting
materials.

Sepich Eye Care

is now...

LOTTERIES
Midday Pick 2: 7-0
Nightly Pick 2: 2-3
Midday Pick 3: 2-9-8
Nightly Pick 3: 9-7-8
Midday Pick 4: 9-0-2-7
Nightly Pick 4: 6-9-5-6
Midday Pick 5: 6-3-0-3-1
Nightly Pick 5: 7-4-7-2-3
Treasure Hunt: 6-9-16-18-27
Cash 5: 7-22-24-30-32
Match 6: 8-12-18-19-25-45
Cash4Life
Numbers: 21-24-37-38-49
Cash Ball: 4

Our experienced doctors and

professional staff will provide you
with the excellence in eye care
services and superior eyewear,
you have come to expect!

Dr. Tracy Sepich, Dr. Christine Zlupko,

Optometrists, and their team of
experienced professionals!

Bringing your life

100 Oakwood Ave., State College, PA 16803

www.restoreeyecare.com
814.272.0262

into focus