Daily Archives: 18 February 2015

Kim Jones murder case moves to trial

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Randolph Sanders, the 36-year-old charged with murder in the case of Kim Jones, waived his preliminary hearing in Common Pleas court this morning. His trial will be held on March 11.

Sanders will be held on all charges including murder, firearms carried without a license, carrying firearms in public and possession of an instrument of crime with intent.

Jones, 56, was waiting for the No. 23 SEPTA bus on the morning of Jan. 13 at the corner of 12th and Jefferson streets when Sanders allegedly shot her in the back of the head, police previously told The Temple News.

“It’s pretty clear that he planned it, and he prepared for it and he perpetrated a violent killing and I think his waiver demonstrates that there is evidence – the defense agrees that there’s evidence to go forward to a trial,” said Prosecutor Mark Levenberg.

Police spokeswoman Tanya Little told The Temple News that Sanders believed Jones was going to report him for misappropriating about $40,000 in funds from the Families and Schools Together Program of Turning Points for Children – an organization devoted to assisting abused and economically disadvantaged children, where they both worked.

“This is a horrible case because an innocent woman is dead,” said Defense Attorney Michael Coard. “Just because I’m the attorney for an accused, that doesn’t lessen the fact that a wonderful, great woman – that nobody had anything bad to say about at any point, so clearly an innocent victim – so I think first and foremost, my condolences and the condolences of all of us should go to them and then secondarily, we deal with the legal issues.”

Patricia Madej can be reached at patricia.madej@temple.edu or on Twitter @PatriciaMadej.

2 suspects sought in robbery of student at off-campus apartment

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A 23-year-old student and 21-year-old former student were robbed and attacked in the basement of an apartment on the 1800 block of Cecil B. Moore Avenue around 9:45 p.m. Monday, police said.

Executive Director of Campus Safety Services Charlie Leone said in an email that there is an ongoing search for two suspects who were armed with a gun and a knife and struck the former student in the head. Surveillance footage from local businesses and surrounding properties is being checked, he said.

Police found drug paraphernalia and are also investigating possible marijuana usage in the apartment, Leone said.

“The place may be known to have parties that increased risk for this directed crime,” Leone said.

Two cell phones and a Sony Playstation system were taken. The complainants were taken to Philadelphia police’s Central Detective Division.

The former student initially denied medical attention, but was taken for evaluation at Temple University Hospital, Leone said.
Lian Parsons can be reached at lian.parsons@temple.edu or @Lian_Parsons on Twitter.

News in brief: 2.17 Issue

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NBC SUSPENDS BRIAN WILLIAMS

Longtime NBC anchor and reporter Brian Williams has been suspended for six months without pay for his actions concerning false reports about his role in a helicopter during the Iraq War in 2003, the New York Times reported.

Williams, the managing editor for “NBC Nightly News,” received the Lew Klein Excellence in the Media Award from Temple in September for his success in the field of journalism. Throughout a Q&A session with Temple students at Tomlinson Theater, Williams talked about various experiences during his career, including his time reporting in Iraq in 2003.

While students in attendance expressed approval in what Williams had accomplished in his career, Temple journalism professor Christopher Harper told the Inquirer last week that NBC was at fault for Williams’ mistake.

 “NBC has not monitored the crossover between Brian Williams as news anchor and Brian Williams as entertainer,” Harper told the Inquirer. “NBC is in the crosshairs because it has made more mistakes than CBS, ABC, or CNN.”

An investigation into Williams’ reporting is ongoing.

-Steve Bohnel

KHALILI RECEIVES NIDA GRANT

A five-year, $7.4 million grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse will allow researchers from Temple’s School of Medicine to examine how HIV-1 and cocaine interact to cause brain impairment, according to a university press release.

The leader of the study will be Kamel Khalili, chair of the Department of Neuroscience and director of Temple’s Comprehensive NeuroAIDS Center. He said he’s been interested in how HIV impacts the body since it was first discovered.

“I have been interested in the central-nervous-system impact of HIV-1 since the very first days of the disease,” Khalili said in the release. “We realized that the impact is not as simple as the virus directly infecting neuronal cells, but rather a series of highly complicated events that lead to neuronal injury and death and ultimately dysregulated brain function.”

Last July, The Temple News reported that Khalili had led and successfully achieved an effort in developing a technology that destroys the HIV-1 virus from human cells in a laboratory – the first time such an accomplishment had ever occurred.

Past research conducted in Khalili’s lab suggests that cocaine causes the virus to disrupt neuronal cell function and even kill neuronal cells. He said that although the grant was given to his team to specifically focus on damage to the central nervous system caused by HIV-1, the research could lead to more treatment options for those with neurocognitive disorders.

“This area of AIDS research is very novel, and we are just scratching the surface in terms of scientific information and knowledge,” Khalili said. “Through this grant, we hope to answer several important questions that could help in the next phase for the development of therapeutic molecules.”

-Steve Bohnel

DNC WILL COME TO CITY IN 2016

The Inquirer reported Friday that the 2016 Democratic National Convention will be hosted in Philadelphia in July of that year. The city’s bid beat contenders Brooklyn, New York and Columbus, Ohio.

Mayor Nutter said Philadelphia will be on a global stage when the convention rolls around next year.

“This was a rigorous, grueling, and appropriate process for the kind of decision the DNC had to make,” Mayor Nutter said following the announcement last Thursday. “This is a very serious matter. The world watches what happens in American politics.”

Former Gov. Ed Rendell told the Inquirer that U.S. Rep. Bob Brady, chairman of the Philadelphia Democratic Party, was key in helping the Democratic National Committee make its decision.

Rendell said the projected cost of the convention would be $84 million, according to Philadelphia 2016, the nonprofit organization that is coordinating funding for the event.

He added that nearly $5 million has been raised, and the organization has another $12 million in pledges.

Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey told the Inquirer that hosting the DNC and Pope Francis – who will visit Philadelphia in September as part of the World Meeting of Families – within a 10-month span won’t require specific security measures.

“They’re different, but crowds are crowds,” Ramsey said. “You learn every time you handle a large event, whether it’s the pope or the DNC. You get better at handling it. And we’re pretty damn good at handling these things.”

-Steve Bohnel

WASHINGTON BILL WOULD CHANGE STATUS OF ADJUNCTS

A Washington State Senate bill would accredit adjunct faculty members at colleges as public school substitute teachers, the Chronicle of Higher Education reported.

State Sen. Christine Rolfes, a sponsor of the bill, wrote that “there are hundreds of highly qualified part-time college instructors with degrees in math, science, English, history, and the arts who would step in and help if their qualifications were better recognized and the process streamlined.”

The bill was drafted in response to the widespread shortage of substitute teachers in the state of Washington. Rolfes and other sponsors of the bill argue that it is “absurd” for the state to require college instructors to obtain formal teacher training to qualify as public school substitutes.

Rolfes told the Chronicle that “a lot of work” still needs to be done to the bill, which is scheduled for its first Senate-committee hearing next week.

-Allan Barnes