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’Wfednesday, February 15,1995 Page 2
House passes last bill
of GOP crime package
WASHINGTON — The House
passed the centerpiece of the Re
publican anti-crime package Tues
day, voting to create block grants
for local governments and elimi
nating President Clinton’s program
to hire more police.
But the latest milestone in the
House GOP’s “Contract with
America” agenda faces a far less
certain future in the Senate. And
Clinton, who has demanded that
his police program remain un
touched, has threatened to veto it if
it reaches his desk.
“I’m not going to let them wreck
our crime bill, which is putting
100,000 new cops on the street,”
Clinton said.
The sixth and final bill in the
crime package was passed by a
238-192 largely party-line vote.
The bill replaces crime-preven
tion programs and a commitment
to help put 100,000 new cops on
the streets — two cornerstones of
the 1994 anti-crime law — with a
$10 billion block grant that local
governments can use as they see fit
to fight crime.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said
the Judiciary Committee he chairs
will have to rewrite the House
package to secure Senate passage
andcome up with a bill that Clinton
will be compelled to sign.
The crime package faces a pre
carious future because of Senate
filibuster rules that could draw out
debate indefinitely, Hatch said.
“We’re going to have to come
up with our own Senate bill,” he
said, predicting it would take at
least a month before it emerges
from his committee.
• White House chief of staff Leon
Panetta said the administration
believed it had enough votes to
sustain a veto of a crime bill.
The block grant bill would give
local governments $2 billion a year
over the next five years for crime
fighting, replacing the $7.5 billion
for community police and $3.9
bil lion for prevention programs that
last year’s law authorized for 1996
2000.
Republicans argued that local
governments are better able than
Congress to decide how best to
fight local crime.
The other five bills in the pack
age, all passed last week, would:
-Require criminals to pay resti
tution to their victims.
-Ease restrictions on courts us
ing unlawfully seized evidence.
-Streamline deportation of
criminal aliens.
-Provide $ 10.5 billion for prison
construction while requiring states
receiving the money to impose
strict sentencing on violent crimi
nals.
-Allowing death-row inmates
only one year to file appeals to
federal courts.
Passage gave the new Republi
can majority their fifth major leg
islative triumph less than halfway
through the 100 days in which
their “Contract With America”
promised votes on a number of
issues.
.Crime bill - f y:1
;? The House passed ihe last
bill of foeir six-part C H111111|:|
anti-crime package • i | \ f \ |:(
% Tuesday.' How.the bill - I \ j \ \ | ;
3 differs from the crime iaw -'}i
i/ passed last year:’ ::'.vvC’’h v.:Ar:‘'C':?' j
i| j The Police or Prevention !.
”| Block Grants Bill
||i 1995: Authorizes $10 billion in block .
.J:;; grants, which state and local K.Cy'
authorities may use for police or" V-;
i f? prevention progams, ■ ^ C
/: • 1994: Authorized $8.8 billion to hire ;
: 100,000 hew pofice officers; biffions •
| more for prevention progams. ?•
§|| Both: $1.6 biffion to curb violence ipgf
?,.against women and $383 mthion fia|:V,v'i
> fdrug treatmentforprisoners"-V
C The five bills passed <
§ last week would...
iiil • Require criminals fo. pay restitirfon %
; to their victims % || - C. ', -
%:5i»Ease restrictions on courts. $eii$ii||l
viy unlawfully, seized evidence
Ifl • StrearnSrie deportatiph of criminal
ly? aliens :yC:fy:;yC.v;;f;: -': 5
\ • Provide $10.5 billion for prison. -
^.construction; states would have to .f
:; impose sk* sentencing to receive
the money' iff$ '■£*■ ?¥:>:3
if; • Allow death-row inmates only one v |::j
| year fo file appeals to federal courts i§i|
yf What’s next: The Senate wiBvoteoin?1
%, the package, ihen 8 moves to 3"”^
iff President. Canton, who may veto iLgfJ
AP/Eileen Glanton, Wm. J. Castello
Peru wants cease-fire
in Eauador border war
JL
LIMA, Peru — Peru announced a
unilateral cease-fire in its border war
with Ecuador Monday night, accord
ing to a Foreign Ministry statement.
The cease-fire will go into effect
Tuesday, the communique said
In the statement, Peru called on
Ecuador to cooperate in the cease
fire to avoid worse “bloodshed among
brother nations.”
There was no immediate reaction
from the Ecuadorean government.
But a television station in the
Ecuadorean capital of Quito reported
that officials were surprised and skep
tical about the announcement.
.According to the communique,
Peru would invite a commission of
observers to verify the cease-fire in a
disputed 48-mile border zone. The
border zone is in the Amazon jungle,
590 miles north of Lima and 220
miles south of Quito.
President Alberto Fujimori
planned to inform the governments
of the four nations trying to negotiate
an end to the fighting of Peru’s deci
sion, the statement said.
The communique said Peru was
confident that Chile, Brazil, Argen
tina and the United States could find
a permanent solution to the conflict
that broke out Jan. 26.
The four nations are guarantors of
a 1942 treaty that ended a war in
which Ecuador lost about half its
mOMOMOMMOOMOM? AP
Amazon territory to Peru. Ecuador
later renounced the treaty.
Earlier Monday in Lima, news
reports said that Peruvian troops had
taken the Ecuadorean base of
Tiwintza at the headwaters of the
Cenepa River. The reports couldn’t
be immediately confirmed.
Fujimori had said the base was the
last of three that Peruvian forces
needed to take to remove Ecuadorean
soldiers in the disputed region, a 40
square-mile area in the Cordillera del
Condor mountains.
According to the last figures avail
able, 36 Peruvian soldiers have died
in the fighting and 60 have been
wounded. Ecuador upped its casualty
figures Monday to 10 dead and 37
wounded.
ws... _
a Minute
I Alcohol, bad diet equal cancer
Cubans come ashore m Florida
MANASOTA BEACH, Fla. —
The man walked out of the water on
the fog-shrouded Gulf Coast beach
and spoke to Gary Grathmann, who
had been searching for shark’s teeth.
“Is this the U.S.?” he asked.
When Grathmann said yes, the
man responded: “Thank God.”
More than 50 Cuban refugees
reached Florida’sGulf Coast on Tues
day, some wading ashore and others
picked up off shore by the Coast
Guard. '
It was the largest movement of
Cuban refugees since 35,000 people
took to rafts last summer to cross the
90-mile-wide Florida Straits to the
Florida Keys. This group, however,
came ashore 170 miles north of the
Keys, avoiding the Straits where the
Coast Guard still searches for would
be refugees.
While immigration officials and
police tried to sort out the Cubans’
stories, the refugees told reporters
they had made the voyage from Cuba
south to the Cayman Islands in Sep
tember, and on Friday headed out on
a 700-mile voyage around Cuba to
Florida’s western coast.
In the Cayman Islands, officials
said Tuesday that three boatloads of
refugees had left there last week.
They blamed smugglers and said the
Cochran continues campaign
against handling of evidence
LOS ANGELES — The first po
lice officer on the scene of the mur
ders in the O.J. Simpson case ac
knowledged Tuesday he didn’t pre
serve a melting cup of ice cream or
check the temperature of Nicole
Brown Simpson’s bath water.
That evidence the defense sug
gested could have helped fix the time
of the slayings.
But Officer Robert Riske repeat
edly told jurors it wasn’t his job to
preserve or photograph evidence or
to watch the experts do so. He said he
was there to look for victims and
“secure the scene.”
Defense attorney Johnnie Cochran
Jr. undertook an item-by-item dis
section of the evidence in a campaign
to cast doubt on police work in the
case and suggest that investigators
overlooked or mishandled evidence.
The officer said repeatedly that he
was careful not to disturb any evi
dence because he wanted to preserve
the crime scene for the investigators.
Riske said he did not check trash
cans inside the home, did not turn off
the television or the music playing on
the stereo, did not try to open a Jeep
whose passenger door was slightly
ajar, anddid not check Ms. Simpson’s
blood-spattered dog for evidence.
Riske spent all morning answer
ing questions. Then his boss, Sgt.
David Rossi, a 25-year member of
the force at the time of the slayings,
took the stand and became the second
officer to testify that a single bloody
glove was found at the crime scene
before Detective Mark Fuhrman ar
rived.
The defense has suggested
Fuhrman planted the matching glove
at Simpson’s house.
During Riske’s testimony, the of
ficer said he used a phone in Ms.
Simpson’s house to call his supervi
sors, unaware he might be obscuring
fingerprints on the phone.
small British dependency is unable
to stop them.
Coast Guard Petty Officer Mark
Mackowiak in Miami said the trip
was under investigation as a possible
smuggling mission, but “policy
doesn’t allow me to discuss ongoing
law enforcement.”
Forty-three refugees, including six
women, were taken to a community
center where they were fed, ques
tioned and given fresh clothing be
fore being sent to a Immigration and
Naturalization Service’s detention
center outside Miami, officials said.
Simpson
trial update
: Tue$day,Ftb. 14,1995
► Defense lawyer F. Lee Bailey
delivered his first
cross-examination, questioning
Sgt. David Rossi about* his
actions at the crime scene the
morning of the murders. He
said the police were too slow
in notifying O.J. Simpson,
although he could have been
a target of killers.
^ Officer Robert Riske said
he didn’t preserve a cup
of ice cream or check the
temperature of Nicole Brown
Simpson’s bath water. That
evidence could have been
used to fix the time of death.
► Tomorrow: Rossi will return
to the stand
AP
WASHINGTON — Mixing alcohol with a bad diet steeply in
creases the risk of colon cancer, researchers report.
Dr. Edward Giovannucci of the Harvard School of Public Health
said Tuesday that a study of the health habits and diets of more than
51,000 male health-care professionals showed that those who had two
or more drinks daily while following a poor diet were three times as
likely to develop colon cancer.
Giovannucci said Tuesday in an interview that alcohol seems to
aggravate the effects of a bad diet that was low in fruits, vegetables, fish
and low-fat foods.
Such a diet, he said, deprives people of two ingredients in those
foods: methionine, an important amino acid, and folate, a nutrient that
is key to making methionine.
“The poor diet is a risk factor alone, but it’s particularly strong
when you see it together with alcohol consumption,” said the
researcher.
Stealing for love
OMAHA — Robbers who hit an Omaha drug store on Tuesday,
Valentine’s Day, apparently did it for love.
Or they were hungry.
Omaha police said two men, one of them armed with a revolver,
held up Lothrop Drug store. One shot was fired into the air as the men
got away by running from the store.
No injuries were reported.
The only things taken: three boxes of Valentine’s Day candy.
Nefciraskan
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