THE NEXT MARS MISSION IS READIED

FROM:  NASA 

NASA's Next Mars Mission Arrives at Kennedy Space Center for Launch Processing

A crane lifts NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft inside the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility on Aug. 3, 2013, at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The spacecraft was flown to Kennedy Space Center for launch processing from Buckley Air Force Base in Colorado near the Lockheed Martin facility in Littleton, Colo., where it was built. MAVEN is to lift off on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket in November, 2013 to begin a 10-month voyage to Mars. It is the first mission dedicated to studying Mars' upper atmosphere and scientists hope to find traces of the ancient environment thought to have existed there.
Image Credit: NASA/Tim Jacobs.

JOHN KERRY'S REMARKS AT THE ARCANGELES WOUNDED WARRIOR PROGRAM

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 
Remarks at the Arcangeles Wounded Warrior Program
Remarks
John Kerry
Secretary of State
Coldeportes Bogota, Colombia
August 12, 2013

Buenos dias. Estoy encantado de estar aqui en Bogota and it's a great pleasure for me to meet with all of the teams here. I myself am a veteran. I fought in Vietnam. So for many years I’ve been involved with programs in America to work to try to make sports part of the reentry into life and part of an awareness for people about possibilities after injuries. And what I’ve learned is there are no limits, everything is possible. And you can be an amazing inspiration to so many people about how they can deal with either an accident or one of the things that happens in life that people think is somehow a setback, but people can turn it into something very positive and be an inspiration to millions of people.

The United States is very happy to be supportive of this program. And I understand that a lot of these chairs came from our support and I’m delighted, though I’m a little bit surprised to see how hard you guys bump into each other. That’s a tough sport, but I congratulate you and I really want to thank you for your service, for what you have done for your country, for your people, and what you continue to do even now. And we will do everything possible that we can do to try to be helpful to support this program and other programs and ultimately to try to help bring peace in Colombia.

So thank you for the honor of visiting with you today. Thank you for letting me play a little bit of the volleyball and thank you for my shirt with numero uno. Take care of yourselves. Thank you. (Applause.) And let me congratulate – and Pablo, I want to thank him for his incredible inspiration in helping to start this program and my great congratulations to Minister Botero and everything that you’re doing here in the country. God bless you. Thank you very much.

REMARKS BY SECRETARY OF STATE KERRY REGARDING INTERNATIONAL YOUTH DAY

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT
International Youth Day, August 12, 2013
Press Statement
John Kerry
Secretary of State
Washington, DC
August 12, 2013

The United States joins the international community today in celebrating International Youth Day.

The Department of State is committed to ensuring that we are engaging not only with the leaders of today, but also with the leaders of tomorrow. Today’s generation of young people is the largest and most interconnected the world has ever seen, defined by energy, talent, and optimism. Whether mobilizing for climate change or demanding democracy and equality, we are witnessing the unprecedented impact that young people can have in the 21st century.

Young people communicate with peers from all corners of the globe, on Twitter or Facebook or Google Hangout. They take to the streets to demand dignity and democracy. And they work across borders to find innovative solutions to some of the world’s toughest challenges.

On this year’s International Youth Day, we mark an important aspect of life for young populations around the world: youth migration. In 2010, there were an estimated 27 million young migrants throughout the world. Some of these young people migrate to find new opportunity; others are forced to flee from poverty or war.

As a nation founded by immigrants, and as a country with a long tradition of welcoming the “huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” the United States takes great pride in our commitment to the rights of migrants to realize educational and professional opportunities in their new homes.

So, today, I encourage you to celebrate International Youth Day by taking action that will positively impact young migrants in your community.

DOJ FILES LAWSUIT CHALLENGING MERGER OF US AIRWAYS AND AMERICAN AIRLINES

FROM:  U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT 
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Justice Department Files Antitrust Lawsuit Challenging Proposed Merger Between US Airways and American Airlines

Merger Would Result in U.S. Consumers Paying Higher Airfares and Receiving Less Service; Lawsuit Seeks to Maintain Competition in the Airline Industry
The Department of Justice, six state attorneys general and the District of Columbia filed a civil antitrust lawsuit today challenging the proposed $11 billion merger between US Airways Group Inc. and American Airlines’ parent corporation, AMR Corp.  The department said that the merger, which would result in the creation of the world’s largest airline, would substantially lessen competition for commercial air travel in local markets throughout the United States and result in passengers paying higher airfares and receiving less service.

The Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division, along with the attorneys general, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which seeks to prevent the companies from merging and to preserve the existing head-to-head competition between the firms that the transaction would eliminate.   The participating attorneys general are:   Texas, where American Airlines is headquartered; Arizona, where US Airways is headquartered; Florida; the District of Columbia; Pennsylvania; Tennessee; and Virginia.

“Airline travel is vital to millions of American consumers who fly regularly for either business or pleasure,” said Attorney General Eric Holder.   “By challenging this merger, the Department of Justice is saying that the American people deserve better.   This transaction would result in consumers paying the price – in higher airfares, higher fees and fewer choices.   Today’s action proves our determination to fight for the best interests of consumers by ensuring robust competition in the marketplace.”

Last year, business and leisure airline travelers spent more than $70 billion on airfare for travel throughout the United States.    In recent years, major airlines have, in tandem, raised fares, imposed new and higher fees and reduced service, the department said.

“The department sued to block this merger because it would eliminate competition between US Airways and American and put consumers at risk of higher prices and reduced service,” said Bill Baer, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division. “If this merger goes forward, even a small increase in the price of airline tickets, checked bags or flight change fees would result in hundreds of millions of dollars of harm to American consumers.   Both airlines have stated they can succeed on a standalone basis and consumers deserve the benefit of that continuing competitive dynamic.”

American and US Airways compete directly on more than a thousand routes where one or both offer connecting service, representing tens of billions of dollars in annual revenues.   They engage in head-to-head competition with nonstop service on routes worth about $2 billion in annual route-wide revenues.   Eliminating this head-to-head competition would give the merged airline the incentive and ability to raise airfares, the department said in its complaint.

According to the department’s complaint, the vast majority of domestic airline routes are already highly concentrated.  The merger would create the largest airline in the world and result in four airlines controlling more than 80 percent of the United States commercial air travel market.

The merger would also entrench the merged airline as the dominant carrier at Washington Reagan National Airport, with control of 69 percent of the take-off and landing slots.   The merged airline would have a monopoly on 63 percent of the nonstop routes served out of Reagan National airport.   As a result, Washington, D.C., area passengers would likely see higher prices and fewer choices if the merger is allowed, the department said in its complaint.   Blocking the merger will preserve current competition and service, including flights that US Airways currently offers from Washington’s Reagan National Airport.

The complaint also describes how, in recent years, the major airlines have succeeded in raising prices, imposing new fees and reducing service.  The complaint quotes several public statements by senior US Airways executives directly attributing this trend to a reduction in the number of competitors in the U.S. market:

·          President Scott Kirby said, “Three successful fare increases – [we are] able to pass along to customers because of consolidation.”
·          At an industry conference in 2012, Kirby said, “Consolidation has also…allowed the industry to do things like ancillary revenues…. That is a structural permanent change to the industry and one that’s impossible to overstate the benefit from it.”
·          As US Airways CEO Parker stated in February 2013, combining US Airways and American would be “ the last major piece needed to fully rationalize the industry.”
·          A US Airways document said that capacity reductions have “enabled” fare increases.

“The merger of these two important competitors will just make things worse –exacerbating current airline industry trends toward reduced service, increasing fares and increasing passenger fees,” added Baer.

As the complaint describes, absent the merger, US Airways and American will continue to provide important competitive constraints on each other and on other airlines.   Today, US Airways competes vigorously for price-conscious travelers by offering discounts of up to 40 percent for connecting flights on other airlines’ nonstop routes under its Advantage Fares program. The other legacy airlines – American, Delta and United – routinely match the nonstop fares where they offer connecting service in order to avoid inciting costly fare wars.   The Advantage Fares strategy has been successful for US Airways because its network is different from the networks of the larger carriers. If the proposed merger is completed, the combined airline’s network will look more like the existing American, Delta and United networks, and as a result, the Advantage Fares program will likely be eliminated, resulting in higher prices and less services for consumers. An internal analysis at American in October 2012, concluded, “The [Advantage Fares] program would have to be eliminated in a merger with American, as American’s large, nonstop markets would now be susceptible to reactionary pricing from Delta and United.”   And, another American executive said that same month, “The industry will force alignment to a single approach–one that aligns with the large legacy carriers as it is revenue maximizing.”   By ending the Advantage Fares program, the merger would eliminate lower fares for millions of consumers, the department said.

The complaint also alleges that the merger is likely to result in higher ancillary fees, such as fees charged for checked bags and flight changes.   In recent years, the airlines have introduced fees for those services, which were previously included in the price of a ticket. These fees have become huge profit centers for the airlines.   In 2012, domestic airlines generated more than $6 billion in fees from checked bags and flight changes alone.   The legacy carriers often match each other when one introduces or increases a fee, and if others do not match the initiating carrier tends to withdraw the change.   By reducing the number of airlines, the merger will likely make it easier for the remaining carriers to coordinate fee increases, resulting in higher fees for consumers.

The department also said that the merger will make coordination easier among the legacy carriers.   Although low-cost carriers such as Southwest and JetBlue offer consumers many benefits, they fly to fewer locations and are unlikely to be able to constrain the coordinated behavior among those carriers.

American Airlines is currently operating in bankruptcy.   Absent the merger, American is likely to exit bankruptcy as a vigorous competitor, with strong incentives to grow to better compete with Delta and United, the department said. American recently made the largest aircraft order in industry history, and its post-bankruptcy standalone plan called for increasing both the number of flights and the number of destinations served by those flights at each of its hubs.

The department’s complaint describes US Airways executives’ fear of American’s standalone growth plan as “industry destabilizing.”   The complaint states that US Airways worries that American’s growth plan would cause “others” to react “with their own enhanced growth plans…,” and that the resulting effect would increase competitive pressures throughout the industry.   The department said the merger will allow US Airways’ management to abandon these aggressive growth plans and continue the industry’s current trend toward higher prices and less service.

The department’s complaint states that executives of both airlines have repeatedly said that they do not need the merger to succeed.   The complaint states that US Airways’ CEO observed in December 2011, that “A[merican] is not going away, they will be stronger post-bankruptcy because they will have less debt and reduced labor costs.”   US Airways’ executive vice president wrote in July 2012, that, “There is NO question about AMR’s ability to survive on a standalone basis.”   And, as recently as January 2013, American’s management presented plans that would increase the destinations it serves in the United States and the frequency of its flights, and would position American to compete independently as a profitable airline with aggressive plans for growth.

AMR is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Fort Worth, Texas.   AMR is the parent company of American Airlines.   Last year American flew more than 80 million passengers to more than 250 destinations worldwide and took in more than $24 billion in revenue.   In November 2011, American filed for bankruptcy reorganization.

US Airways is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Tempe, Ariz.   Last year US Airways flew more than 50 million passengers to more than 200 destinations worldwide and took in more than $13 billion in revenue.

REMARKS BY SECRETARY OF STATE KERRY AT COUNTER-NARCOTICS DIRECTORATE HEADQUARTERS

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 
Remarks at Counter-Narcotics Directorate Headquarters
Remarks
John Kerry
Secretary of State
Bogota, Colombia
August 12, 2013

SECRETARY KERRY: Muchas gracias, Senora Ministra. It’s a great privilege for me to be here this afternoon with all of you. Thank you for a remarkable demonstration of Colombia’s capacity to fight against illegal narcotics and against terrorism.

This is a very impressive display of Colombia’s commitment to try to make a difference in this effort. We all know it’s a very difficult one. And I particularly want to express our gratitude to those police officers, those members of the military also, who have been wounded or have sacrificed their lives in the effort to try to make the world safe from narcotics traffickers, criminals and terrorists.

I want to say thank you on behalf of the United States of America because we’re very grateful for the partnership in working with you. A lot of what is happening here is happening in joint training and in joint support. And I am very impressed personally, because I served for many years in the United States Senate and I used to vote for the money that would help support this kind of program. But this is the first time I’ve seen it in person here in Colombia, and I’m very impressed by what I see.

So thank you very, very much, all of you, for being part of this fight. I know sometimes it may seem frustrating, but I will tell you that it is making a difference, and it is making a difference nowhere more than here in Colombia.

So I will take back with me the impressions that I have from today, and I am very happy to share with you, on behalf of President Obama and the American people, our gratitude for your partnership in this very important fight. Thank you, and keep working at it, and stay safe.

Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you, Minister. Great guy. You’re doing a great job. It’s very impressive. All right. (Applause.)

SHIPPING COMPANY AND ENGINEERS CONVICTED IN "MAGIC PIPE CASE"

FROM:  U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT 
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Shipping Corporation and Two Engineers Convicted in ‘Magic Pipe’ Case in Norfolk, Va.

Diana Shipping Services S.A., a Panamanian corporation headquartered in Greece,  Ioannis Prokakis and Antonios Boumpoutelos, both citizens of Greece, were convicted today after an 12-day bench trial  on charges related to the illegal discharge of waste oil and oil-contaminated waste water from the M/V Thetis, a cargo vessel operated by Diana Shipping Services, announced Robert G. Dreher, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division, Neil H. MacBride, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Otis E. Harris, Jr., Special Agent in Charge, Coast Guard Investigative Service, Chesapeake Region, and David G. McLeod, Jr., Special Agent in Charge of EPA’s criminal enforcement program for the Middle Atlantic States.

All the defendants were convicted of conspiracy, knowing failure to fully maintain an oil record book, falsification of records and concealing tangible objects in a federal investigation.  In addition, Prokakis was also convicted of obstruction of justice for ordering crewmembers to lie to U.S. Coast Guard inspectors on board the ship.  The guilty verdicts were handed down by U.S. District Judge Mark S. Davis of the Eastern District of Virginia.

“The pollution of our oceans, the falsification of environmental records, and lying to the U.S. Coast Guard are serious crimes,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Dreher.  “Companies and individuals that intentionally attempt to cover up these crimes and obstruct U.S. Coast Guard investigations, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

“These defendants not only violated the law when they illegally discharged contaminated waste into our waters, but then conspired to cover up their nefarious conduct,” said United States Attorney Neil H. MacBride.  “Those who choose to continue to violate the law, even after being confronted, will find themselves in the same, serious trouble as these defendants.”

“The Coast Guard protects not only the environment of our nation, but the world’s,” said Capt. John Little, Commander of Coast Guard Sector Hampton Roads.  “Our Port State Control Teams board thousands of vessels annually to ensure compliance with U.S. law, regulations, and international treaties on pollution prevention.  This case affirms the strength of our partnerships with the Department of Justice, the U.S. Attorney’s Office and our Coast Guard Investigative Service in holding accountable those vessel operators who deliberately discharge oil and falsify ship records.”
“The oceans must be protected from shipping companies that cut corners and dump waste improperly,” said David G. McLeod, Jr., Special Agent in Charge of EPA’s criminal enforcement program for the Middle Atlantic States.  “The defendants conspired to discharge oily waste from the M/V Thetis into the open water, falsified the ship’s record books and attempted to thwart the investigation.  Today's guilty verdict should send a clear message that our collaborative efforts will lead to the vigorous prosecution of those who despoil our oceans and violate our nation’s environmental laws.”

Diana Shipping Services, S.A. faces a maximum fine of $5.5 million and five years of probation.  Prokakis and Boumpoutelos face a maximum sentence of five years for the conspiracy conviction, six years per failure to maintain an oil record book conviction, and 20 years per falsification of record conviction.  Prokakis faces an additional five year sentence for obstruction of justice.  All three defendants will be sentenced on Nov. 8, 2013.

Diana Shipping Services S.A., Prokakis, and Boumpoutelos, were indicted on May 22, 2013, in an 11-count superseding indictment alleging the illegal discharging of waste oil and oil-contaminated waste water in violation of the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships. In September 2012, crewmembers of the M/V Thetis, a cargo vessel operated by Diana Shipping Services, reported that the vessel was discharging its bilge waste and sludge illegally by various means, including a “magic pipe” that bypassed the oily water separator.  Coast Guard inspectors boarded the vessel when it entered port in Norfolk and discovered the “magic pipe” and that the oily water separator was non-functioning.  The inspectors were also presented with an oil record book that contained false entries made by the ship’s Chief Engineer, Ioannis Prokakis and the Second Engineer Antonios Boumpoutelos.  During the inspection, Prokakis lied to inspectors about the “magic pipe” and told other members of the engineering crew to not disclose its existence to the Coast Guard inspectors.

This case was investigated by the Coast Guard Investigative Service and the EPA’s Criminal Investigations Division.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph L. Kosky of the Eastern District of Virginia and Trial Attorney Kenneth E. Nelson of the Environmental Crimes Section of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division are prosecuting the case on behalf of the United States.

DOJ FILES SUIT TO STOP MAN FROM PREPARING TAX RETURNS, ALLEGING MAN HAD ROLE IN BOGUS RETURNS

FROM:  U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT 
Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Justice Department Files Suit to Stop San Diego Man from Preparing Tax Returns
The Justice Department announced today that  the United States has filed a civil injunction suit against Michael I. Turner, of San Diego to stop him from preparing federal tax returns.

The government complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California, alleges that Turner, who has prepared returns since at least 2004, has failed to sign or affix a Preparer Tax Identification Number (PTIN) to many of the returns that he has prepared. In addition and according to the government, Turner takes bogus deductions on his customers’ returns in order to claim larger refunds for his customers.  His customers then recommend Turner as a tax preparer to their friends, which helps Turner to expand his customer base and further increase his own profits.  Specifically, the government alleges that Turner claims inflated or fabricated deductions on the Schedule A of his customers’ Form 1040 tax returns, claiming that his customers have large non-cash charitable contributions and unreimbursed employee expenses.  The complaint also  alleges that when Turner’s customers are audited, Turner has provided false documents to those customers in an attempt to assist them in substantiating charitable contributions and employee expenses that they did not incur.  According to the complaint, however, Turner has instructed his customers not to identify him as their tax return preparer in communications with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
         
The government alleges that Turner continues to prepare tax returns.  According to the complaint, Turner applied for a PTIN in 2010, and has prepared at least 68 tax returns for the 2012 tax year using that PTIN.

The government seeks, among other things, that the court bar Turner from acting as a tax return preparer or assisting others in preparing or filing federal tax returns or other tax forms or documents.  The government also requests that the court bar Turner from appearing as a representative on behalf of any person or entity before the IRS, and from owning, managing, controlling, working for or volunteering for a tax-return preparation business.

In the past decade the Justice Department Tax Division has obtained injunctions against hundreds of tax preparers.

LOOKING FOR THE ANSWERS TO THE INCREASE IN WESTERN WILDFIRE

The Yarnell Hill wildfire began on June 28, 2013, after a lightning strike.

FROM:  NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION  

As large Western wildfires increase, scientists look for answers

Barely halfway into the summer of 2013, this year's wildfire season is already a record breaker. The Yarnell Hill wildfire, which started on June 28, was the deadliest fire in Arizona's history, killing 19 firefighters. The Black Forest wildfire, which started on June 11, was the most destructive wildfire in Colorado's history; it scorched more than 14,000 acres, destroyed more than 500 homes and killed two people.

The western U.S. has seen large, destructive wildfires on a daily basis this summer. Already in 2013, the acreage burned is more than three times the size of Rhode Island. What's more, the worst may be yet to come. Large swathes of the western U.S. will remain at risk of significant burning through September, according to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC). NIFC attributes this prolonged risk to long-term drought along with record high temperatures and dry weather.

Our flammable planet

"Wildfires are not new. They have continuously occurred on Earth for at least the last 400 million years," says Jennifer Balch of Penn State University. But, she adds, research shows that since the 1970s, the frequency of wildfires has increased at least four-fold.

According to this research--a study published in 2006 by a team led by A.L. Westerling of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the University of California, Merced--the total size of burn areas in the western U.S. increased at least six-fold in the later part of the 20th century. In addition, studies show that wildfires at high altitudes, which used to be rare, are increasing. (Thomas Swetnam of the University of Arizona discussed this finding during a 2009 National Science Foundation- (NSF) sponsored teleconference.) All of this means that large western wildfires are becoming more frequent and more intense.

Steadily rising, the cost of fighting U.S. wildfires totaled close to $2 billion in 2012, according to NIFC. According to Balch's most recent analysis, more than 80 percent of reported landscape fires that burned in the U.S. from 2001 to 2008 were started by people.

Invasive species fan the flames

Bigger and more frequent fires are linked to various types of human activities, including those that spread invasive species. A case in point: During the westward expansion, around 1880, settlers accidentally introduced to the west from Europe and Asia an invasive grass known as cheatgrass. Today, this plant covers more than 40,000 square kilometers of the western U.S., says Balch.

Scientists suspect that cheatgrass increases the number and severity of fires because it grows in arid lands and dries out before native vegetation does--a continuous carpet of fuel for fires.

An NSF-funded study conducted by Balch and other scientists shows that cheatgrass has been involved in a disproportionately large number of fires in the Great Basin, a 600,000-square kilometer area that includes parts of Nevada, Utah, Colorado, California and Oregon.

"Over the past decade, cheatgrass fueled the majority of the largest fires, including 39 of the largest 50 fires, even though this species only dominates about 6 percent of the land in the Great Basin," said Balch. "In addition, cheatgrass burned twice as frequently as any other vegetation."

The heat is on

Another factor promoting increased wildfires in the western U.S. is climate change, which is characterized by increased year-round temperatures, reduced precipitation and earlier springs. These changes:

create hot, dry conditions that are conducive to fires,
increase the length of the wildfire season, and
generate fuel for wildfires by increasing infestations of mountain bark beetles that kill trees. Since the mid-2000s, mountain bark beetles have felled millions of acres of forests, from New Mexico to British Columbia.
Climate change promotes fire-friendly infestations of bark beetles via a double whammy: Milder winters enable populations of bark beetles to survive the winter, and thereby increase their numbers and amplify their killing power. By contrast, populations of these pests used to be thinned, and thereby neutralized, by the killing cold of winter.

At the same time, climate change increases the vulnerability of forests to bark beetle attacks. It does so by triggering droughts that subject trees to water stress, which reduces their resistance to bark beetle infestations--much the way that starvation reduces the resistance of people to infections.

Climate change and wildfires reinforce each other

To make matters worse, the problem is not only that climate change promotes wildfires--but also that the reverse is true. That is, wildfires promote climate change. How? For one thing, wildfires char and darken the land. Darkened land absorbs more heat than non-charred, vegetated land. In addition, wildfires release carbon dioxide and methane--both of which are greenhouse gases that trap heat in the atmosphere and thereby help raise global temperatures. In fact, fires that people intentionally start to clear land of vegetation currently contribute up to one-fifth of human-caused increases in carbon dioxide emissions, according to a study conducted by Balch and other scientists.

The complex relationship between climate change and wildfires mean that areas that experience temperature increases and altered precipitation patterns may also experience more wildfires. And if wildfires occur more frequently across the globe, they will emit more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

Fighting fire with fire

An upsurge in wildfires raises pressing questions about fire management, says Balch. One management option, she says, is to reduce fuel for intense fires through prescribed and controlled burns--a trend that began during recent decades following almost 100 years of widespread fire suppression. But efforts to increase prescribed and controlled burns face major obstacles, including funding shortages during these lean economic times and a lack of support from the public, which is generally fearful of fires.

After the fire...

NSF is continuing to support research that will improve our understanding wildfire behavior. This topic is important because wildfire characteristics can change with maddening capriciousness over short distances and short time periods. In fact, a single wildfire may devastate one particular area but leave a similar, nearby area relatively unscathed because of even slight changes in time and space involving weather conditions, local winds, landscape features, microclimates, day-to-night changes in atmospheric conditions, soil moisture and the types and distribution of vegetation.

To better define the influence of these and other factors on wildfire behavior, a study of the causes and impacts of the High Park wildfire in northern Colorado, which started on June 9, 2012, is being jointly conducted by Colorado State University (CSU) and the NSF-funded National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON), headquartered in Boulder, Colo. (See this Science Nation video.)

The High Park wildfire was selected for study because it was among the worst wildfires in Colorado history and because CSU researchers had fortuitously been studying the area before the fire started, and had thereby generated rare, pre-fire baseline data on area ecology.

Critical components of the High Park study are flyovers of the burn scar and adjacent areas by a Twin Otter airplane that collects ecological measurements with state-of-the-art remote-sensing instruments. These instruments can quickly collect high-resolution measurements down to 1 meter and capture data from much larger areas than can ground sensors or field crews. In fact, these instruments may measure the individual tree heights, leaf area and leaf chemistry of 15 million trees in a single flyover.

High Park data--which will offer unparalleled precision related to the extent and condition of surviving vegetation, plant species, ash cover, soil properties and other factors--are being incorporated into high-definition, 3-D images as well as other types of rich ecological data covering the study area. Release to the public of High Park data is slated to begin later in 2013.

Results from the High Park study may help scientists understand how preexisting conditions defined by the CSU data influenced the behavior and severity of the fire and how the fire's burn patterns are affecting recovery of vegetation, wildlife and water resources. They may also support regional recovery efforts conducted by the U.S. and state forest service and the cities of Fort Collins and Greeley, Colo.--both of which have water supplies that are likely to be affected by post-fire erosion. And they may ultimately be used to help refine models of fire behavior and help improve future firefighting and post-fire management decisions.

REMARKS BY SECRETARY OF STATE KERRY AT EMBASSY IN BOGOTA, COLOMBIA

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 
Embassy Bogota Meet and Greet
Remarks
John Kerry
Secretary of State
Embassy Bogota, Colombia
August 12, 2013

AMBASSADOR MCKINLEY: Secretary Kerry, 42 U.S. Government agencies and departments, all of our Colombian colleagues who work with us, it’s terrific to have you here. Si podemos darle la bienvenida calurosa – el Secretario Kerry, por favor. (Applause.)

And I know we’re here to hear Secretary Kerry, so without further ado I’ll turn over the microphone to you, sir.

SECRETARY KERRY: Thank you. Muchas gracias. Thank you very much, Mike McKinley. I really appreciate it. Hello, everybody. Buenos dias. Estoy encantado de estar aqui en Bogota. Gracias. Que mas? (Laughter and applause.) Good? I don’t know. I want more energy out of all you guys. We have a long workday ahead of us. Get this going.

Thank you for coming out for a few minutes. And Michael, thank you. Where’d he go? He ran away. Oh, there he is. He’s over here with Fatima. Fatima, thank you for what you do and the kids and everybody. And Michael, thanks for your extraordinary leadership. He’s worn a lot of hats through his career, and now is heading off to beautiful Kabul and Afghanistan to help us, the important task of winding down. But I’m grateful, very grateful to you for the work you’ve done. And Andy Bowen somewhere – where is Andy? He’s somewhere over here. Andy, thanks for hanging in there in the interim while we got another Deputy Chief of Mission. And Ben Ziff is somewhere here. I haven’t met him yet.

Ben. I’ve got high marks on Ben because my brother-in-law was the Ambassador to Rome for the last four years, to Italy, and Ben worked there, among other places, in Baghdad and elsewhere. So Ben, welcome aboard. And I’m sure everybody looks forward to getting to know you. Bring your – well, maybe, maybe. (Laughter.) I don’t know.

Anyway – and to all of you, Foreign Service Officers, civil servant employees, local employees, political employees, whatever you may be – half-baked employees – thank you very, very much for being part of this extraordinary effort. This is one of our – it was amazing to me. I was not aware of this previously, but this is one of our largest missions. And it goes back to a time when I was in the United States Senate in the 1990s, when we were really desperately trying to figure out what’s the path forward in Colombia. And I was then Chairman of the Western Hemisphere Subcommittee, so I was very, very involved in Central and Latin America. Back in those days, we were dealing with the Contras and with Nicaragua and, ironically, the same person, Ortega, who is there today. So it goes around full-circle.

But it was a time of unbelievable, sort of, “How do you save this place?” Because the narcotics trafficking and the violence was so prevalent. And I remember back then – I think it was something like 13 members of the supreme court had been assassinated in one moment, and there was a challenge to civil authority, a challenge to the state. To his credit, President Uribe came in and stood up, and we came up with this thing called Plan Colombia, all of us, everybody working on it together. And you all, many of you were here, local employees certainly who were part of that amazing transformation. And today Colombia is, without exaggeration, one of the most important leaders in all of Latin America, one of our most important allies – most importantly, an enormous statement about the possibilities of what happens when people put their minds together with good diplomacy, good political leadership, good concepts, and you go out and you actually take the risks.

I just came from the high-altitude training center where I met a lot of the veterans, a lot of the people who have paid the price of this journey – police officers, military personnel who have been wounded by an IED or grenade or explosion of some kind. And they’re getting on with their lives and setting an example, but it’s never easy. And proudly, USAID is involved in helping to support that program, and we’re doing things. But what all of you are part of is one of very few success stories anywhere in the world right now. President Obama and I were talking the other day about the challenge that we’re facing in the Sahel, in the Maghreb, in the Arabian Peninsula, in the Levant, in South Central Asia, in other parts of the world, where you have either failing or failed states, none of whom have been able to make the kind of decision that was made here in Colombia.

So I just wanted to come and say – and my message to President Santos will be one of huge support. He is continuing on – and I think bravely and courageously – with the right track. What had to happen from 2000 and 2002 on for a period of time had to happen, a direct confrontation, a struggle to restore the credibility and viability of the government itself. But after that, you need to look beyond and figure out: How do we get away from perpetual conflict and actually make peace? That’s what we’re all engaged in right now and that’s what President Santos is trying to lead. And I think it’s the right decision and the right direction. And hopefully, we can contribute to that, all of us together, as we go forward in these next months.

Now, you know, obviously, it’s always difficult and you are engaged on the front lines. So I want to say thank you to you for moving from home, many of you, and for those of you who are local employees, for being willing to be part of this mission. I’m confident that sometimes some people say, “Oh, well, you work for the Americanos. What’s that all about?” And you take some flak for it and everything else, but we’re very proud and very grateful that you are part of this mission.

I want all of the local employees, raise your hands, and I want everybody else to say thank you to our local employees for their great, great work. (Applause.) We cannot possibly do this without your help, and so we thank you for it.

The fun thing is that I don’t think there’s better work in the world. I really mean that. I am privileged to get up every day and go be the Secretary of State in Washington and think about a lot of different places, but I love what you’re doing every day at this local level where we have the 42 agencies that the Ambassador talked about, and 3,500 people with contractors and all the people who are a part of this effort. It’s amazing. And every day we get to go out and try to make other people’s lives better, and every day we get to go out and try to make the relationship between the United States and Colombia and the rest of this region better.

And we do it in profound ways and different ways. Sometimes it’s by giving somebody a visa so there’s a family reunification or the chance to go to some special event or to go be educated somewhere else. And the numbers of increases in visas is extraordinary, given President Obama’s new efforts to try to increase the numbers of students coming from Latin America, and given the numbers of people who automatically want to try to do that.

And those ties are ties for a lifetime. You have no idea how many places I get to go as Secretary and I meet the leaders of countries who proudly say to me, “Oh, well, I went to Michigan State.” “I went to Stanford.” “I was at Princeton.” “I was in California.” “I went to University of Mississippi.” It’s amazing. And they carry the values that come from that experience with them for the rest of their lives. That’s what we’re doing. We’re sharing values with people and trying to improve people’s lives so that we can all get along a little better and look to a future that is more peaceful, and frankly, more shared by more people.

So I want to thank you on behalf of President Obama, on behalf of all American citizens. We are grateful for those of you who pack up your bags, move your families, go from mission to mission, and carry our flag and carry our values and our hopes and our aspirations with you. It’s really a privilege, I think, and I hope you feel the same way. So I’m grateful have a moment to come here. I apologize that it’s quick coming through Colombia and then tomorrow in Brazil and then back, because as you know, there’s a lot of turmoil going on. We’re trying to figure what’s going to happen in Egypt, in the Middle East, and other places. But we’re working hard at all of this, as you are.

So from all of us, muchas gracias. I wish you well and I look forward to having a chance to shake a few hands and say hello to everybody. God bless. Thanks for being part of this mission.

One thing, I know we lost a couple – we’ve lost a few people in the last days. Tom Watson[1], the DEA agent, I know, senselessly, after three tours in Afghanistan and 20 years in law enforcement, and senselessly his life was taken recently. And Meghan Aberle who was a resident of Massachusetts, I talked to her sister Kathryn. For those of you who did meet her in the two days she was privileged to be here – and that happens, unfortunately. And there’s a young fellow by the name of Fabio Artunduaga, I think, whose life was always playing sports.

So look, life is transitory and we all know that. It shouldn’t be as fragile as it is in some places because of violence. So whatever we do we will continue to do in memory of those people, too, who were as committed as all of us, to try to make a difference. And we’re going to continue to make that difference, and in the end, I think we will have contributed to a great enterprise. Thank you all and God bless. (Applause.)

One last thing. Where is she? Will you all – I promise this is the last comment. I want to introduce – what?

STAFF: (Off-mike.)

SECRETARY KERRY: She’s working on the phone? Jen Davis. Many of you know Jen Davis. She’s working – she’s one of my right arms up in Washington and she’s back here and she’s doing a heck of a job. And I want you all to welcome Jen back because she loves Bogota. (Applause.) Her kids were here right up until a couple of weeks ago. They just moved into their new home in Washington and she feels like this is home. So thank you. Anyway, thanks so much.

FTC SENDS REFUNDS TO CONSUMERS WHO PURCHASED DISNEY-OR MARVEL HERO-THEMED CHILDREN'S VITAMINS

FROM:  U.S. FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION 
FTC Sends Refunds to Consumers Who Purchased Disney- or Marvel Hero-themed Children's Vitamins

The Federal Trade Commission has mailed 10,144 checks to consumers who bought Disney- or Marvel Hero-themed vitamins for their kids that featured characters such as the Disney Princesses, Winnie the Pooh, Finding Nemo, and Spider-Man.

More than $425,000 is being returned to consumers who submitted claims for vitamins they bought between May 1, 2008 and September 30, 2010.  Eligible consumers will receive 100 percent of what they paid, up to $125 per household.  The FTC is providing these refunds as part of a settlement with vitamin marketer NBTY Inc. and two subsidiaries, which resulted from charges that they made false health claims about their vitamins.

The period for filing claims has ended.  Consumers who receive the checks from the FTC’s refund administrator have 60 days to cash them.  The FTC never requires consumers to pay money or provide information before refund checks can be cashed.

Major retailers such as CVS Pharmacy, Wal-Mart, Target, Walgreens, Kroger, Kmart, Meijer, and Rite Aid sold the vitamins, and they also were sold online.

As part of its ongoing efforts to stop bogus health claims, the Federal Trade Commission reached a settlement in 2010 requiring the marketers to stop making allegedly false and unproven claims that their vitamins promote healthy brain and eye development in children.

The FTC charged NBTY, Inc., NatureSmart LLC, and Rexall Sundown, Inc., with making deceptive claims about the amount of DHA, an Omega-3 fatty acid, in their children’s vitamin gummies and tablets, and the effect of that amount on eye and brain development in children.

Consumers should carefully evaluate advertising claims for vitamins and other dietary supplements.  For more information see:  Dietary Supplements.

The Federal Trade Commission works for consumers to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices and to provide information to help spot, stop, and avoid them.  To file a complaint in English or Spanish, visit the FTC’s online Complaint Assistant or call 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357).  The FTC enters complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to more than 2,000 civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad.  The FTC’s website provides free information on a variety of consumer topics.  Like the FTC on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and subscribe to press releases for the latest FTC news and resources.

SEC CHARGES ENTITIES OF BANK OF AMERICA WITH MAKING MATERIAL MISREPRESENTATIONS IN SALE OF RMBS SECURITIES

FROM:  U.S. SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
SEC Charges Bank of America Entities with Material Misrepresentations and Omissions in Connection with an RMBS Offering

On August 6, 2013, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“Commission”) filed a civil injunctive action against Bank of America, N.A. (“BANA”), Banc of America Mortgage Securities, Inc. (“BOAMS”), and Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc. f/k/a Banc of America Securities LLC (“BAS”) (collectively the “Bank of America Entities”). The Commission alleges that the Bank of America Entities made material misrepresentations and omissions in connection with the sale of residential mortgage-backed securities known as BOAMS 2008-A. Specifically, the complaint alleges that the Bank of America Entities failed to disclose the disproportionate concentration of wholesale loans (72% by unpaid principal balance) underlying BOAMS 2008-A as compared to prior BOAMS offerings. The complaint also alleges that the Bank of America Entities failed to disclose known risks associated with the high concentration of wholesale loans in BOAMS 2008-A including higher likelihood that the loans would be subject to material underwriting errors, become severely delinquent, fail early in the life of the loan, or prepay. The complaint further alleges that the Bank of America entities violated Regulation S-K and subpart Regulation AB of the Securities Act of 1933 (the “Securities Act”) by failing to disclose the material characteristics of the pool of loans underlying BOAMS 2008-A. The complaint also alleges that the Bank of America Entities made material misrepresentations and omissions in its public filings and in the loan tapes it provided to investors and rating agencies that the loans in BOAMS 2008-A complied with BANA’s underwriting standards when a material amount did not. Finally, the complaint alleges that BOAMS and BAS violated Section 5(b)(1) of the Securities Act by failing to file with the Commission certain loan tapes that it provided only to select investors.

The Commission’s complaint, filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of North Carolina, charges the Bank of America Entities with violating the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws. The complaint alleges that that each violated Sections 17(a)(2) and 17(a)(3) of the Securities Act. The complaint also alleges that BAS and BOAMS violated Section 5(b)(1) of the Securities Act. The complaint seeks against each of the Bank of America Entities a permanent injunction, disgorgement with prejudgment interest and civil monetary penalties pursuant Section 20(d) of the Securities Act.

The Commission would like to thank the United States Attorney’s Office for the Western District of North Carolina for its substantial assistance in this matter.

THE CHANGES IN SEASONAL CARBON DIOXIDE LEVELS

FROM:  NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION 

Seasonal carbon dioxide range expanding as more is added to Earth's atmosphere
Northern Hemisphere land-based ecosystems "taking deeper breaths," scientists find

Levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere rise and fall each year as plants, through photosynthesis and respiration, take up the gas in spring and summer, and release it in fall and winter.

Now the range of that cycle is expanding as more carbon dioxide is emitted from burning fossil fuels and other human activities, according to a study led by scientists at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO).

The findings come from a multi-year airborne survey of atmospheric chemistry called HIAPER Pole-to-Pole Observations, or HIPPO.

Results of the study are reported in a paper published online this week by the journal Science.

The National Science Foundation (NSF), along with the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the Office of Naval Research funded the study.

"This research provides dramatic evidence of the significant influence the land-based biosphere can have on the amplitude [amount of change] in seasonal trends of carbon dioxide exchange," says Sylvia Edgerton, program director in NSF's Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences, which funded the research.

Observations of atmospheric carbon dioxide made by aircraft at altitudes between 3 and 6 kilometers (10,000-20,000 feet) show that seasonal carbon dioxide variations have substantially changed during the last 50 years.

The amplitude increased by roughly 50 percent across high latitude regions north of 45° N, compared with previous aircraft observations from the late 1950s and early 1960s.

This means that more carbon is accumulating in forests and other vegetation and soils in the Northern Hemisphere during the summer, and more carbon is being released in the fall and winter, says study lead scientist Heather Graven of SIO.

It's not yet understood, she says, why the increase in seasonal amplitude of carbon dioxide concentration is so large, but it's a clear signal of widespread changes in northern ecosystems.

"The atmospheric carbon dioxide observations are important because they show the combined effect of ecological changes over large regions," says Graven.

"This reinforces ground-based studies that show that substantial changes are occurring as a result of rising carbon dioxide concentrations, warming temperatures and changing land management, including the expansion of forests in some regions and the poleward migration of ecosystems."

Adds Peter Milne, a program director in NSF's Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences, "We can easily measure the greenhouse gas budget from a single smokestack, but somewhat less well for a stand of trees. Knowing that for the entire planet is much more challenging.

"Taking advantage of the long-duration and high-altitude-profiling capabilities of the NSF Gulfstream V aircraft [also known as HIAPER], the HIPPO project was designed to take a 'snapshot' of the global troposphere [Earth's lowest atmospheric layer] to see whether we can explain and model greenhouse gas distribution."

In the study, the scientists compared the recent aircraft data with aircraft data gathered from 1958 to 1961 using U.S. Air Force weather reconnaissance flights.

The older data were analyzed by SIO geochemist Charles David Keeling, the father of Ralph Keeling, also an SIO scientist and a member of the research team.

These aircraft measurements were done at the time Charles Keeling was beginning continuous carbon dioxide measurements at Mauna Loa, Hawaii.

While the Mauna Loa measurements are now widely recognized as the "Keeling Curve," the early aircraft data were all-but-forgotten.

Carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere have varied between 170 and 280 parts per million during the last 800,000 years.

When Charles Keeling began collecting data at Mauna Loa in 1958, the concentration had risen to about 315 parts per million.

In May, 2013, daily carbon dioxide measurements at Mauna Loa exceeded 400 parts per million--for the first time in human history.

Recent observations aboard the Gulfstream V were made during regular flights conducted during the HIPPO campaign, from 2009 to 2011.

The aircraft repeatedly ascended and descended from a few hundred meters to roughly 12 kilometers (40,000 feet) in the skies between the North Pole and Antarctica. The goal was constructing a unique snapshot of the chemical composition of the atmosphere.

Additional recent data comes from regular flights conducted by NOAA at a network of locations.

Increasing carbon dioxide amplitude since 1960 had already been observed at two ground-based stations: Mauna Loa and Barrow, Alaska.

Other stations operated by Scripps and NOAA only began measuring carbon dioxide in the 1970s to 1990s.

The aircraft-based observations uniquely show the large area in northern high latitudes where carbon dioxide amplitude increased strongly since 1960.

The exact reasons for the wider seasonal swings in carbon dioxide concentration remain to be determined, say the researchers.

Although plant activity can increase with warmer temperatures and higher carbon dioxide concentrations, the change in carbon dioxide amplitude over the last 50 years is larger than expected from these effects.

Carbon dioxide concentration has increased by 23 percent, and average temperature north of 30°N has increased by one degree C, since 1960.

Other factors may be changes in the amount of carbon in leaves, wood or roots; changes in the extent or species composition of ecosystems; or changes in the timing of plant photosynthesis and respiration.

Simulating complex processes in land-based ecosystems with models is a challenge, scientists have found.

The observed change in carbon dioxide amplitude is larger than that simulated by models used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

While this underestimate does not call into question the response of climate to carbon dioxide concentration in the IPCC models, the researchers say, it does suggest that a better understanding of what happened during the last 50 years could improve projections of future ecosystem changes.

The bottom line, according to Graven, Ralph Keeling and colleagues, is that Northern ecosystems appear to be behaving differently than they did 50 years ago.

In addition to Graven and Ralph Keeling, Science paper co-authors include Stephen Piper, Lisa Welp and Jonathan Bent of SIO; Prabir Patra of the Research Institute for Global Change in Yokohama, Japan; Britton Stephens of NCAR; Steven Wofsy, Bruce Daube and Gregory Santoni of Harvard University; Colm Sweeney of NOAA and the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder; Pieter Tans of NOAA; John Kelley of the University of Alaska, Fairbanks and Eric Kort of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

U.S. CONDEMNS TERRORIST ATTACKS IN IRAQ

FROM:  U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 
U.S. Condemns Terrorist Attacks in Iraq and Pledges to Help Combat al Qaeda
Press Statement
Jen Psaki
Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
August 10, 2013

The United States condemns in the strongest possible terms the cowardly attacks in Baghdad. These attacks were aimed at families celebrating the Eid al-Fitr holiday that marks the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The terrorists who committed these acts are enemies of Islam and a shared enemy of the United States, Iraq, and the international community.

The attacks today bear the hallmarks of similar suicide and vehicle bomb attacks in Iraq over the past ninety days. Most of these attacks have been perpetrated by al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). AQI is led by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, a Specially Designated Global Terrorist under Executive Order 13224. He is also listed at the United Nations Security Council 1267/1989 al-Qa'ida Sanctions Committee.

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, also known as Abu D'ua, is now based in Syria and has changed the name of AQI to the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS). He has taken personal credit for a series of terrorist attacks in Iraq since 2011, and most recently claimed credit for the operations against the Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad, the suicide bombing assault on the Ministry of Justice, among other attacks against Iraqi Security Forces and Iraqi citizens going about their daily lives.

The United States has offered a $10 million reward for information that helps authorities kill or capture Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. This reward is second only to information leading to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the chief of Al Qaeda’s network, and symbolizes our ongoing commitment to helping our partners in the region eliminate this threat from their territory.

In this regard, the United States is prepared to work closely with the Iraqi Government to confront the threat posed by Al Qaeda in Iraq and other terrorist groups. We look forward to discussing bilateral cooperation in this and other areas, pursuant to the Strategic Framework Agreement between our two countries, during the upcoming visit of Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari next week in Washington.

Our deepest condolences go out to the victims of today's attacks and we hope for the quick recovery of those injured. The United States will stand with the Iraqi people as they work to overcome these horrific attacks perpetrated by a common enemy.

A PERSISTENT PLUME OVER THE RED SEA

A Persistent Plume over the Red Sea

DEA TROUBLED OVER RELEASE OF DRUG TRAFFICKER CONNECTED TO MURDER OF DEA AGENT IN 1985

FROM:  U.S. DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION

The Drug Enforcement Administration is deeply troubled to learn of the decision by a Mexican court to release infamous drug trafficker Rafael Caro-Quintero from a Mexican prison.  Caro-Quintero had been serving a 40 year prison sentence in connection with the kidnapping, torture and murder of DEA Special Agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena in February 1985.  Caro-Quintero was the mastermind and organizer of this atrocious act.  We are reminded every day of the ultimate sacrifice paid by Special Agent Camarena and DEA will vigorously continue its efforts to ensure Caro-Quintero faces charges in the United States for the crimes he committed.  

MAN SENTENCED FOR TAX EVASION FOR FAILING TO PAY TAXES ON MONETARY AWARD FROM EMPLOYMENT DISPUTE

FROM:  U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT 
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Former Sevierville, Tenn. Resident Convicted of Tax Evasion

The Justice Department and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced today that Jimmie Duane Ross of Lehi, Utah, and formerly of Sevierville, Tenn., was convicted today of five counts of tax evasion following a jury trial in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee.

According to the indictment and evidence produced at trial, Ross won a monetary award of approximately $840,000 in 1999 after arbitration of an employment dispute with a former employer.  Ross thereafter failed to pay the full amount of his income tax due and owing for 1999 and evaded the tax by filing a false mortgage on his residence, filing a false lien on his vehicle, dealing extensively in cash and directing funds to an offshore account.  In addition, from 2004 through 2007, Ross earned commission income for referring clients to a purported Nevis-based investment company and evaded his taxes by using nominees and other means.

Following the jury verdict, U.S. District Judge R. Leon Jordan ordered that Ross be detained and scheduled the sentencing for Jan. 14, 2014.  On each of the five counts of conviction, Ross faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a maximum fine of $250,000.

The case was investigated by Special Agents of IRS – Criminal Investigation.  Trial Attorneys Kevin Lombardi and Kimberly Shartar of the Justice Department’s Tax Division prosecuted the case.

U.S. Department of Defense Armed with Science Update

U.S. Department of Defense Armed with Science Update

BUSINESSMAN SETTLES FALSE CLAIM ALLEGATIONS OF FRAUD INVOLVING THE E-RATE PROGRAM

FROM:  U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE 
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Texas Businessman Agrees to Settle False Claims Allegations Involving the E-Rate Program

Larry Lehmann of Giddings, Texas has agreed to pay $400,000 to settle allegations that he violated the False Claims Act in connection with the Federal Communications Commission’s E-rate Program, the Department of Justice announced today. The E-rate Program, created by Congress in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, subsidizes eligible equipment and services to make Internet access and internal networking more affordable for public schools and libraries.  The Houston Independent School District (HISD) was one of the applicants that successfully sought and received E-rate subsidies from 2004 through 2006.

“The E-rate Program provides vital support for our nation’s students and schools,” said Stuart F. Delery, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division of the Department of Justice.  “We are committed to protecting the integrity of this important program, which helps our children connect to the digital world.”

“Our office is committed to protecting the integrity of government initiatives,” said U.S. Attorney Kenneth Magidson.  “We will continue to work closely with the Department in cases such as this one to ensure the E-rate and other federal programs are free from fraudulent and deceitful claims.”

Lehmann functioned as the CEO and managing partner of Acclaim Professional Services (Acclaim), which partnered with other companies to provide E-rate funded equipment and services to HISD during this period.  The United States contended that, in violation of E-rate competitive bidding requirements and HISD procurement rules, Lehmann provided gifts and loans to HISD employees, including tickets to sporting events and two loans totaling $66,750 to an HISD employee who was involved in the procurement and administration of HISD’s E-rate projects.

The United States also alleged that Lehmann helped devise a scheme in which HISD outsourced some of its employees to Acclaim, which allowed them to continue to work for HISD while passing the cost on to the E-rate Program.  The United States further alleged that, with Lehmann’s approval, Acclaim hid the cost of these employees in its E-rate Program invoices by rolling them into the cost of eligible goods and services.        

The settlement with Lehmann is part of a broader investigation by the United States of E-rate funding requests submitted by HISD and the Dallas Independent School District (DISD).  The government previously recovered $16.25 million from Hewlett-Packard, $850,000 from HISD, and $750,000 from DISD.  The government’s investigation was initiated, in part, by a qui tam or whistleblower lawsuit filed under the False Claims Act by Dave Richardson and Dave Gillis, who investigated allegations of improprieties based on Richardson’s experience bidding for contracts at HISD and DISD.  The False Claims Act authorizes private parties to file suit for false claims on behalf of the United States and share in the government’s recovery.  The United States intervened in Richardson and Gillis’ lawsuit, and added Lehmann as a defendant.

“E-rate is one of the FCC’s biggest success stories, helping connect nearly every U.S. library and school to the Internet,” said Julie Veach, Chief of the FCC Wireline Competition Bureau.  “We take any abuse of our rules seriously and thank the Department of Justice for their assistance in protecting the integrity of the E-rate Program for students, teachers, and libraries across the country.  Today’s action is a signal to those interested in profiting at the expense of our nation’s schools and libraries: fraud doesn’t pay.”

This case was handled by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Division, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas, and the FCC’s Office of the Inspector General and Office of the General Counsel.

GENES BY THE NUMBERS

Photo:  DNA.  Credit:  NIH/Wikimedia.

FROM:  NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION 

Genomic and computational tools provide window to distant past

Out of the estimated 23,000 or more genes in the human genome, about 100 of them will differ--they will be present or not--between any two individuals. Genes lost or gained over time result from evolution and adaptation, as species respond through the years to their environment and other influences.

The availability of genomic sequences now allows scientists to study the presence or absence of whole genes among individuals and between species, and the impact of such changes for evolution.

Some individuals, for example, have a sharper sense of smell than others because they have more copies of olfactory receptor genes, which allow them to detect a wider range of odors. Others, especially those who live in societies with starchy diets, have more copies of the gene responsible for producing amylase, an enzyme in saliva that breaks down starch.

"There have been lots of changes, and we want to know which ones might have been involved in human adaptation," says Matthew Hahn, an associate professor of biology and informatics at Indiana University at Bloomington. "The comparison of whole genomes has revealed large and frequent changes in the size of gene families. Comparative genomic analyses allow us to identify large-scale patterns of change in gene families, and to make inferences regarding the role of natural selection in gene gain and loss."

Using computer models and available genomic data, Hahn studies the differences in genes among humans and other species, and compares them, in order to better understand the timeline of genetic changes and adaptation throughout our history. By developing computational and statistical tools to analyze whole genomes, Hahn and his team are learning new things about the evolution of gene regulation and gene families, human genomic history, and the evolution of phenotypically important genes.

"We can't go back in time, but we can use current species to get a pretty good estimate of what the ancestors looked like, and to get some ideas of what changes occurred and the order of these changes," he says.

The scientists are examining all the genes in the genome, and focusing on differences among species, such as chimpanzees and other primates compared to humans. "There's a 6 percent difference between humans and chimps in the genes they have," he says. "In the end, after 6 million years of being separate, we don't have exactly the same set of genes as chimps. How and when did those differences occur?"

Hahn is conducting his research under a National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award, which he received in 2009 as part of NSF's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding. The award supports junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education and the integration of education, and research within the context of the mission of their organization. He is receiving about $1 million over five years.

The work could have wide-ranging applications in diagnosing and treating diseases, since many illnesses and conditions arise from genetic mutations, including the duplication or loss of important genes.

"There is a lot of interest in trying to associate these changes to human diseases," Hahn says. "There are diseases that are caused when you lose or even gain a gene, not just affecting smell or the ability to digest starch. A lot of the genes that differ in copy number are genes involved in our immune response, and these are obvious candidates for the genetic changes underlying differences in disease susceptibility among individuals. By understanding normal variation in gene copy-number, we hope to be able to better recognize changes that may be detrimental to human health."

The researchers often start by examining the differences in the number of copies of different genes among individual humans.

"The 1,000 Genomes Project (an international research effort, launched in 2008, to establish the most detailed catalogue of human genetic variation) has allowed us to study the full genetic complement of genes in a wide variety of human populations, from all of the inhabited continents," he says. "We find differences between individuals within populations and among populations, largely recapitulating the known relationships among humans.

"But we also find population-specific changes in genes that have allowed us to adapt to our surroundings," he adds. "These changes have involved both the adaptive gain and adaptive loss of genes, and are associated with important phenotypic differences among individuals."

To understand the differences shared among all humans, and that distinguish us from our ancestors, the researchers then compare the full complement of genes to those of other primates, including chimpanzees, orangutans, macaques and marmosets.

"These comparisons, and similar ones to other new genomes that are being sequenced all the time, allow us to make strong inferences about what our common ancestral genome looked like, and, therefore, the changes that have occurred along the human lineage," he says.

Such genetic changes are highly likely to have been involved in human-specific adaptations, for example, humans' increased cranium size, according to Hahn.

"Having these genomic and computational tools gives us a window into the distant past that we otherwise would not have had," he says.

-- Marlene Cimons, National Science Foundation
Investigators

CDC REPORTS OBESITY DECLINES AMONG LOW-INCOME PRESCHOOLERS IN SEVERAL STATES

FROM:  CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION

Obesity among low-income preschoolers declines in many states
Nineteen states and territories report decreases in obesity among this group

After decades of rising rates, obesity among low-income preschoolers declined slightly in 19 states and U.S. territories from 2008 through 2011, according to the latest Vital Signs report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The report found that Florida, Georgia, Missouri, New Jersey, South Dakota, and the U.S. Virgin Islands saw at least a one percentage point decrease in their rate of obesity. Twenty states and Puerto Rico held steady at their current rate. Obesity rates increased slightly in three states.

Previous research shows that about one in eight preschoolers is obese in the United States. Children are five times more likely to be overweight or obese as an adult if they are overweight or obese between the ages of three and five years.

“Although obesity remains epidemic, the tide has begun to turn for some kids in some states,” said CDC Director, Tom Frieden, M.D., M.P.H. “While the changes are small, for the first time in a generation they are going in the right direction. Obesity in early childhood increases the risk of serious health problems for life.”

“Today’s announcement reaffirms my belief that together, we are making a real difference in helping kids across the country get a healthier start to life,” said First Lady Michelle Obama. “We know how essential it is to set our youngest children on a path towards a lifetime of healthy eating and physical activity, and more than 10,000 childcare programs participating in the Let’s Move! Child Care initiative are doing vitally important work on this front. Yet, while this announcement reflects important progress, we also know that there is tremendous work still to be done to support healthy futures for all our children.”