Brazil Justice has to stay, but he has to stay

Written by José Wilson Miranda
Friday, 19 June 2009
.
Sean Goldman The 16th Federal Court of Rio de Janeiro decided that American David Goldman can live with his 9-year-old son during the week as long as the boy stays in Brazil. It was a victory of sorts, a decision by the Brazilian justice favoring American David Goldman, who is trying to take to the US his son, Sean Goldman, who was abducted by his own mother from the US to Brazil 5 years ago.
.
The mother, Bruna Bianchi, died while giving birth to a daughter last year, but the woman’s new husband, a powerful Brazilian lawyer, has been able to prevent Goldman from taking his son home.
.
The new decision by Rio’s Federal Justice also stipulates that Sean is to spend Sundays with his Brazilian stepfather, João Paulo Lins e Silva. The boy’s Brazilian family lawyer informed, however, that they are going to appeal the decision.
.
The same judge who issued this last ruling, Rafael Pereira Pinto, had determined earlier that the child be returned to his biological father to be taken to the US, but that order was overruled by the Brazilian Supreme Court, which also refused to deal with the case and sent it back to be decided by Rio’s Regional Federal Court (TRF).
.
Sean is being disputed in the courts by the stepfather, whose family the Lins e Silvas, is a very rich and influential family in Brazil. The previous ruling by judge Pereira Pinto had ordered that the boy be given to the father in 48 hours. The Supreme, however, on intervening has also noted that there is no doubt that “the minor needs to once again have contact with the father as soon as possible.”
.
Sérgio Tostes, the Lins e Silva’s lawyer, informed that he intends to appeal to the Rio’s TRF but recognized that the new determination is more suitable to Sean’s Brazilian family aspirations. They want to prevent the boy from suddenly moving to the United States, something that according to the attorney would be a violence against the boy’s own wishes.
.
Said Tostes: “The judge’s decision is totally extravagant and shows his acknowledgment that he made a mistake when he ordered a trip in less than 48 hours and compliance to an agreement in that country, out of his jurisdiction. For the family, this is something better, since he will not need to travel to the United States.”
.
Tostes handed out to the Justice, this week, a report prepared by a psychologist hired by Lins e Silva where it’s shown that Sean wishes to stay in Brazil. While the document has no juridical value Tostes believes that it might help his case and he encourages David Goldman to get his own psychologist to also hear the boy.
.
In a tape made by the psychologist and released by Lins e Silva, Sean calls Lins e Silva his father and insists that he wishes to stay in Brazil. The boy also complains that this biological father has skipped some visitations with him.
.
According to the psychologist Bianca Zacher, general secretary of the Brazilian Society of Juridical Psychology, heard by daily O Estado de S. Paulo, the child’s Brazilian family might be adding to the boy’s suffering by making him talk again. She says that is important that the boy be heard, but this should be done seldom and with much tact .
.
“The child,” she observes, “relives the traumas every time he exposes himself and needs to tell his story, which is suffering.” She also criticized the interview’s publication. “This child has already been overexposed,” Zacher argues.
.
Sean was born in New Jersey and lived there until the age of 4, when his mother, Bruna Bianchi, took him for what should have been a brief vacation to Brazil. Bruna, however, never went back to the US and ended up marrying Lins e Silva. Today, a age 9, the kid lives in Rio with the stepfather, the maternal grandmother and the little sister who was born last year.
.
Some friends of Goldman in the US believe that the father would have a hard time to leave everything in the United States to go live right now in Brazil to comply with the new ruling. They say that he is very busy in New Jersey where he makes a living organizing fishing boat rides for tourists.
.
The decision over the return of Sean could take a long time. Rio’s Regional Federal Court still hasn’t scheduled hearings to rule on the case.

From Brazzil Magazine

The Large Hadron Collider

Interesting news today. I claim to be no astrophysicist or whatever, so I will let you all read the beginning paragraphs on the Wikipedia article on the subject. Today, September 10th was the day the first energy beam was circulate through the collider.

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world’s largest and highest-energy particle accelerator complex, intended to collide opposing beams of protons charged with approximately 7 TeVs of energy. Its main purpose is to explore the validity and limitations of the Standard Model, the current theoretical picture for particle physics. It is theorized the collider will produce the elusive Higgs boson, the observation of which could confirm the predictions and missing links in the Standard Model of physics and could explain how other elementary particles acquire properties such as mass.

The LHC was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), and lies underneath the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, Switzerland. It is funded by and built in collaboration with over eight thousand physicists from over eighty-five countries as well as hundreds of universities and laboratories. The LHC is now operational, and in the process of being prepared for first collisions. The first beam was circulated through the collider on 10 September 2008 and the first high-energy collisions are planned to take place after the LHC is officially unveiled on 21 October 2008.

Here is Google’s image for the day-

It’s Only Tuesday

It’s Only Tuesday

AUGUST 26, 2008

WASHINGTON, DC- After running a thousand errands, working hours of overtime, and being stuck in seemingly endless gridlock traffic commuting to and from their jobs, millions of Americans were disheartened to learn that it was, in fact, only Tuesday.

“Tuesday?” San Diego resident Doris Wagner said, “How in the hell is it still Tuesday?”

Tuesday’s arrival stunned a nation still recovering from the nightmarish slog that was Monday, leaving some to wonder if the week was ever going to end, and others to ask what was taking Saturday so goddamn long.

“Ugh,” said Wagner, echoing a national sense of frustration over it not even being Wednesday at the very least.

According to suddenly depressed sources, the feeling that this week may in fat last forever was further compounded by the thought of all the work left to be done tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, and, if Americans make it that far, possibly even Friday , for Christ’s sake.

Fears that the week could actually be going backwards were also expressed.

“Not only do Americans have most of Tuesday morning to contend with, but all of Tuesday afternoon and then Tuesday night,” National Labor Relations Board spokesman David Prynn said. “If our calculations are correct, there is a chance we are in effect closer to last weekend than the one coming up.”

Added Prynn: “Fuck.”

Reports that this all has to be some kind of sick joke could not be confirmed as of press time.

Isolated attempts to make the day go faster, such as glancing at watches or clocks every other minute, compulsively checking e-mail, hiding in the office bathroom, fidgeting, or reading a boring magazine while sitting in the waiting room, have also proved unsuccessful, sources report.

The National Instituted of Standards and Technology, which oversees the official time of the United States, is flatly denying that it has slowed or otherwise tampered with Tuesday’s progression.

“The current Tuesday is keeping apace with past Tuesdays with no more than ten-thousandth of a second’s variation at the most,” NIST spokeswoman Dr. Geraldine Schach said. “However, I sympathize with the common consensus that this week has already been a colossal pain in the neck.”

Labor Secretary Elaine Chao released a statement addressing widespread speculation that it might as well be Monday for all anyone cares.

“We understand this day has been tough on many of you, what with meetings mercilessly dragging on and an entire stack of files still left to organize,” Chao’s statement read in part. “Yet we urge Americans to show patience. The midweek hump is just around the corner, and we have strong reason to believe that Saturday will be here before you know it.”

“Go about your lives as best you can,” the statement continued.” Do not, we repeat, do not take a sick day, as it’ll make the rest of the week that much harder to endure.”

In the meantime, citizens are doing their best to cope with the interminable week, though Tuesday is still hours away from ending.

“The more I try to speed it along, the longer it almost seems to take,” said Dale Bouchard, a Chicago-based broker who has been waiting for today to be over since it first began earlier this morning. “Honestly, today could not have come at a worse time this week.”

In the meantime, the latest wristwatch consultations indicate that it is somehow still Tuesday, if that makes any sense at all.

After the fire- Universal Studios Hollywood Nostalgia

After the devastating fire at the Universal Studios Hollywood complex, I felt compelled to post my pictures of my visit to the park last July.

Here is my before picture of King Kong-

And an after picture of the area from AP after Sunday morning’s fire

Here are all of my pictures from the album of my California trip.

Spy Satellite shot down by our awesome Navy!

Yesterday, during the lunar eclipse, the US Navy took one shot, one missile and successfully blew apart the spy satellite.

Here is a picture of the lunar eclipse, and oh yes, the cool news video about the shoot-down.

(Thank you Baltimore Sun)

 

Brazilian family has many things stolen, even their dog

Canoas, Brazil-

Robbers “cleaned” out a house in this city. According the police report, the family had left their house on a trip at noon on Saturday. 

When they had returned Sunday night, they discovered that their house was broken in to. The robbers took two televisions, a stereo, a DVD player, two computers, a printer, a portable wine cellar, tennis shoes, clothes, and jewelry among other objects.

Even their six-month-old Rotweiller was stolen. This was not the first time that the victims had their house broken in to. The last time they were robbed was last June when several belongings were taken from the house by criminals who took advantage of the owners’ absence.

Translated from Portuguese at Ziptop

w00t the word of the year in the US.

Our language is constantly evolving- here is proof-

Massachusetts-based Merriam-Webster Inc. said “w00t” — typically spelled with two zeros — reflects a new direction in the American language led by a generation raised on video games and cell phone text-messaging.

It’s like saying “yay,” the dictionary said.

“It could be after a triumph or for no reason at all,” Merriam-Webster said.

I enjoy the website www.woot.com that sells exactly one item per day at normally good prices. (subject to stock availablity)

“w00t belongs to gamers the world over. It seems to have been derived from the obsolete ‘whoot’ which essentially is another way to say ‘hoot’ which itself is a shout or derisive laugh,” Think Geek said on its Web site.

Source: Reuters

Cops mugging cops- Rio, Brazil

From Reuters-

RIO DE JANEIRO: Rio de Janeiro police arrested two fellow officers yesterday accused of extorting money from two American tourists who happened to be San Francisco cops on vacation.
“One of the victims identified the officers and they are under administrative arrest for now,” a police spokeswoman in Rio said.
The crime-ridden city is swarming with tourists during the Pan American Games, which end on Sunday.
The US tourists were leaving a night club in Rio’s Copacabana beach neighbourhood before dawn on Wednesday, when two uniformed police officers approached them and searched them for drugs.
At night, the neighbourhood is a red-light district with several brothels and strip joints.
Although no drugs were found, the officers told the tourists they would have to pay a bribe or be arrested. One of the Americans went back to their hotel to fetch the equivalent of some $2,200 in local and foreign currency.
The Brazilian policemen then took off with the money and an MP3 player.
Corruption is rife in Rio’s police force despite the authorities’ efforts to root out bad cops.  – Reuters

Simpsons movie debuts in Springfield, VT

As we told you earlier on booksontables.com,  a vote gave Springfield, Vermont the honor of premeiring the new Simpsons movie. They debuted today there.

Read more

At least 200 killed in Brazil TAM flight 3054

A few hours ago, we learned that a TAM airlines flight had slid off the runway, across a road, and into a building in heavy rain at Sao Paulo’s Congonhas airport.

CNN says-

A TAM Airlines Airbus 320 carrying 176 people crashed while attempting to land in heavy rain at Sao Paulo’s Congonhas Airport, the airline said.

The Sao Paulo fire department said at least 200 people, including some on the ground, were dead at the scene.

There was no immediate word on survivors.

They also said that the runway had recently been paved and was open despite not being complete. The grooves that are designed to drain rainwater had not been cut. The Airbus 320 likely did not have sufficient distance to stop in the heavy rain.

This is Sao Paulo’s domestic airport, and I have landed there once in a Boeing 737 on dry pavement. I thought it was strange that it was so close to tall buildings and the runway was so short.