Category: Featured

Angela Russo was missing at the time of her 25th birthday last month. Tragically, there was, and will be, no celebration — Russo’s body was found in a shallow grave at the end of May. According to KPNX-TV 12 News, Russo’s mother is now warning others about the potential danger in online dating.

“She said ‘I’ll be home tomorrow after work, I promise and I love you’ those were the last words she said to me,” Russo’s mother Diana Schalow said.

Russo is believed to have then gone on a date with Lashawn Johnson, the man police officials now believe ultimately murdered her after they found her cell phone at his apartment. Russo’s mother said her daughter was always the type to look for the good in people and believes that may have led to her trusting the online dating scene more than perhaps she should have.

“I would always tell her make good choices, good choices, ‘I will mom and I love you,’” Schalow said.

Russo isn’t alone, though. Approximately 59% of all internet users agree with the statement, “Online dating is a good way to meet people.” In today’s day of mobile technology and social media, there’s certainly a lot of truth to that notion. Still, Schalow is now on a mission to try and raise awareness over the risks that online dating can have to help prevent other families from suffering a similar tragedy.

In addition to finding Russo’s cell phone at Johnson’s apartment, investigators said the man’s live-in girlfriend directed them to the spot of the shallow grave where Russo’s body was found. Biological evidence at the apartment also suggested an attack occurred in the kitchen, which authorities ultimately believe led to her kidnapping and death.

While Johnson did not admit to guilt, he was quoted as saying that his “life was over” and that he “f***** up and made a mistake” during interrogation. Johnson is currently being held on $1 million bond for charges including second-degree murder, kidnapping, tampering with evidence, and abandoning and concealing a body.

At the SID Display Week 2016 trade show in San Francisco last week, Samsung stole the spotlight with its latest advancement in display technology: a flexible screen that can be rolled into a 10 mm radius tube.

Samsung has been experimenting with flexible screen technology for several years now, and some of their efforts have been introduced to the general public, such as the “Edge” products with their curved displays. However, the company pushed the concept beyond its conceivable limits with the creation of “rollable” technology.

At Display Week 2016, Samsung showed off the new 5.7 inch display with a resolution of 1920 x 1080 and a pixel density of 386 pixels per inch. The entire product weighs only five grams.

The tech is not perfect or even complete at this time. The screen does not yet have a touch layer or a battery, which will ultimately add to the size and weight of the final commercially available product. It is also unclear how many “rolls” the panel can handle before it cracks or breaks.

These display panels are not yet commercially available, however, and Samsung may have a long way to go before it can mass produce “rollable” displays.

SID’s Display Week is the premier event for the electronic display industry. It is where the newest breakthrough technologies are introduced as exhibitors and attendees representing the greatest display-engineering talent from all over the world gather to share ideas. While about 50% of the largest U.S. trade shows take place in Las Vegas, Chicago, and Orlando, the San Francisco Bay Area is the ideal location for such an event as SID’s Display Week as it remains the world’s hub for the tech industry as a whole.

Apple is now teaming up with high-fashion brand Coach for a new product that will be available this June.

Apple Insider reports that Coach sales associates have been informed that new bands for the leather Apple Watch will be arriving in June, after Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC).

At any given moment, the average person is wearing four fine leather goods. That number could increase once Apple’s leather products start selling.

The bands will be available in black, red, white, and brown and each is expected to be priced at $150.

The Apple Watch went on sale last year and since then Apple has released new styles of bands. Just last month, Apple launched new nylon bands at the unveiling of the iPhone SE and iPad Pro.

According to Tech Times, the straps for the watch will be part of Coach’s Spring and Summer 2016 collection and will go with the newest design of Coach handbags.

Along with the new fashion developments, Apple is planning on releasing few products in the near future as well.

The Apple Watch 2 is expected to be released shortly and some are projecting the release to be at this years WWDC, along with the new Coach bands.

The Parent Herald reports that a rumor of a March 21 release date for the Apple Watch 2 caused much frustration among Apple enthusiasts, and believes that a June release date could be unlikely.

Although a September release date could be in the works, Barry Lam, Quanta president and Apple Watch supplier hinted at an earlier release. “Quanta and Apple are currently developing the second-generation of the Apple Watch, expected late next year in the second quarter,” Lam said.

The WWDC will run from June 13 through June 17 in San Francisco, California. Apple released a statement saying that developers will learn about the future of its four main operating systems at the conference: iOS, OS X, tvOX and watchOS.

Less than one year after the launch of the iPhone 6S, software company and smartphone juggernaut Apple seems poised for the release of a new iPhone 7 model by the end of the third quarter.

CNBC reports that Apple’s top manufacturing and supply plants in Southeast Asia have already begun recruiting workers in preparation for the high-volume assembly season, including Foxconn in Zhengzhou, China, and Pegatron and Wistron in Taiwan.

Apple traditionally releases new products at the end of September — as it did with the iPhone 6S in 2015 and the iPhone 5 in 2012 — and the 2016 schedule for the iPhone 7 seems no different. It is, however, the earliest that supply companies have ever begun recruiting workers in the calendar year.

The urgency in hiring raises speculations that the new iPhone 7 features will be significantly more complex than previous models, therefore requiring more time to build and manufacture. Rumors have long circulated that Apple plans to forego the traditional headphone jack design, which, at 3.5 millimeters, prevents the implementation of ever-thinner body case technologies.

Leaked intelligence also suggests that larger versions of the iPhone 7 will employ a dual camera system, higher resolution displays, 3GB of RAM, and an A10 processor.

It may also be possible that some models will include a magnetic Smart Connector cover, a feature widely implemented with the latest Apple iPad Pro design that allows devices to power and hold charge without being plugged in or battery-powered. This would be a substantial upgrade from the iPhone 6, which generally takes one hour and 50 minutes to charge via typical 12-watt USB power adapters.

Apple itself has not yet detailed specific plans for the launch or design of the iPhone 7. The company’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference showcasing new technologies is scheduled for June 13 to 17 in San Francisco, at which time it is likely formal announcements will be made.

A 14-month-old girl was pronounced dead after a routine cavity filling in Texas on Tuesday, March 29.

Daisy Lynn Torres stopped breathing during the dental procedure and was rushed to the hospital, where she died five hours later. The Texas State Board of Dental Examiners have opened an investigation to determine what exactly happened in the dentist’s chair that day, and autopsy results are still pending.

“This is a tragedy,” said a spokesperson for the dental office, “and we’re just waiting to learn more information from the medical examiner’s office.”

The child’s aunt told local newspaper the Austin American-Statesman, “Daisy was a happy, healthy, baby. She was playing with the family on Easter. She went to the dentist and didn’t come home.”

Mother Betty Squier said that the dentist told her that Daisy needed two fillings. Squier was nervous about the anesthesia, but the dentist said that it was “no big deal,” and that they “do it all of the time.”

Squier received a phone call only five minutes later. “[The dentist] said that the baby had gone into cardiac arrest and her heart stopped beating and the anesthesiologist had to perform CPR,” she said.

A friend of Betty Squier has started a YouCaring fundraiser for the family. On the site she says, “This was completely unexpected and has shattered this family’s world. Daisy’s mom, Betty, would give anyone in need her last dollar and has been my best friend since the 6th grade. My heart is broken for her and my second family.”

Filling a cavity is a routine procedure done in dentist offices every day. As many as 78% of people have a cavity by age 17.

Sadly, this is not the first dentist-related injury or death Texas has seen this year. Last month, 4-year-old Nevaeh Hall suffered major brain damage after a procedure similar to Daisy’s. This case has been under investigation by the Texas State Board of Dental Examiners as well.

A landlord in Colorado refuses to rent his two-bedroom apartment to anyone who supports presidential candidate Donald Trump.

Mark Holmes placed an ad in The Nickel, a free paper in Grand Junction, that read, “For rent: Downtown apartment, 2 bedrooms. Includes organic garden space, hot tub, great backyard. You can bring your dogs if they have references as good as yours. If voting for Donald Trump, do not call.”

Holmes explained his reasoning behind the specific political requirement in his ad. He told the Daily Sentinel that he simply doesn’t know what to do anymore about the possibility of a Trump presidency; he does not want to share a roof with anyone who subscribes to Trump’s rhetoric, which includes controversial comments about Muslims, immigrants, and many other groups.

“I’m living in the top part of the house,” Holmes said. “I don’t want anybody that even thinks that Donald Trump can be a good president to live in my home.”

Holmes was very aware of the large presence of Trump supporters in Grand Junction. In August, Grand Junction featured a billboard that depicted Donald Trump as a knight in shining armor slaying a dragon labeled such things as “Libtards,” “NSA,” “Muslims,” “Iran,” “GLBT,” and many more.

In response to the advertisement, the landlord began receiving a number of angry phone calls regarding his blatant “discrimination,” one caller even claiming that Holmes was violating federal housing rules. However, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development stood up for the landlord, stating it is not illegal to discriminate against tenants because of political beliefs. Jerry Brown, spokesperson for the HUD, commented, “That has nothing to do with the Fair Housing Act. But that seems to be a first, and it’s original.”

While many liberal-minded individuals may have sympathy towards Holmes, completely understanding his frustration, some wonder if it’s messages such as this that are further pulling the country apart. The average American moves about 12 times in his or her life; with the political rift dividing states and even counties, how difficult will it be to comfortably move around the country in the future? Are the United States no longer united?

A Texas man was executed on Tuesday, March 22, despite his claim of mental illness.

Adam Kelly Ward had been on death row since 2007, convicted of shooting and killing a city worker over a dispute regarding piles of trash outside of his house in Commerce, Texas. Ward claimed he was defending himself, although code enforcement officer Michael Walker was unarmed while taking photos outside the home.

During his trial, Ward’s defense attorneys presented evidence of severe mental illness, arguing that he suffered from delusions, paranoia, and bipolar disorder. The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, however, rejected Ward’s appeal last week. He was executed by lethal injection on Tuesday night.

After his arrest in 2005, Ward claimed in a videotaped statement that Walker had been spying on him and his father for a long time. The Ward family had been cited for housing and zoning code violations several times prior to the incident.

“Only time any shots were fired on my behalf was when I was matching force with force,” Ward told the Associated Press. “I wish it never happened, but it did, and I have to live with what it is.”

Exceptions have been made for inmates on death row with mental illness or an IQ under 70. The American Civil Liberties Union states that there is “an increasing recognition that severe mental illness is a reason to spare people not from the responsibility of their crimes but from the ultimate sanction of death.” However, it is often ruled that if an inmate understands that he is about to die and the reasons for such punishment, then he is competent enough to receive that punishment.

Mental impairment can present itself in two different ways: intellectual disability or mental illness. Intellectual disability primarily refers to a person’s IQ and inability to perform basic tasks. The person may not understand his actions simply because the brain isn’t fully developed. Mental illness, on the other hand, disrupts a person’s thinking, mood, and ability to relate to others. Those who are mentally ill are often out of touch with reality and therefore do not understand right from wrong.

State attorneys claim that Ward had an IQ of up to 123, and was therefore fully capable of understanding his actions and his punishment. Professor Christopher Slobogin of Vanderbilt Law School has a different theory.

“Why would you go out and shoot an officer just because he was taking pictures of your home? There has to be some, to use a layman’s term, craziness there,” he says. Because mental illness cannot be determined by IQ, some believe that Ward was, in fact, mentally impaired, and that his execution was unethical.

There are no records indicating that Ward was undergoing treatment for mental illness. Estimates project that the nation’s overall spending on mental health is approximately $113 billion, or 5.6% of total medical costs, annually. However, mental illness is not always easy to identify, and often goes undiagnosed — and therefore untreated.

Ward became the ninth person to be executed in the U.S. in 2016.

The Eiffel Tower on Tuesday, March 22, was illuminated in black, yellow, and red to represent the Belgian flag as a sign of solidarity following the deadly terror attacks in Brussels.

The Belgian capital was struck on Tuesday by a series of organized terrorist attacks. Suicide bombers at the airport and the metro station killed 31 people and injured an estimated 250.

The mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, said in a statement that the Eiffel Tower display was meant to pay homage to “the victims, their loved ones and all the people of Belgium.”

“Today Europe is targeted at her heart,” the mayor stated. “Once more it is basic values that are attacked: freedom, humanism, tolerance and unshakeable commitment to democracy.”

The act of solidarity comes four months after the Brussels Grand Place was illuminated with the colors of the French flag to honor the victims of the terror attacks in Paris.

Other cities around the world have also dedicated monuments to Brussels. Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate and the courthouse in Lyon, France, were also illuminated in black, yellow, and red. New York lit up One World Trade Center with Belgian colors Tuesday night, as well.

The Eiffel Tower is widely regarded as the national symbol of France, and while it is not the nearly the tallest structure in the world, it does stand proud at 984 feet tall, though it is a full six inches shorter in the winter as the steel contracts in the cold. A monument as big and awe-inspiring as the Eiffel Tower, glowing and illuminating the night with the colors of Belgium, is a strong image to behold and a strong message to the terrorists that Europe is united and unbreakable.