2 charged in death of boy hung by feet, beaten

By MARYCLAIRE DALE 1 hour ago

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A Pennsylvania couple went car shopping, bought pizza and took a nap as the woman's unresponsive 3-year-old son lay dying after weeks of escalating abuse that ended in three days of systematic torture, officials said Thursday.

Jillian Tait, 31, and Gary Lee Fellenbaum, 23, were charged Thursday with murder in the death of Tait's son, Scott McMillan, and aggravated assault in the beating of his older brother.

They are accused of laughing as Scott was hung upside down and whipped, striking him repeatedly with a frying pan, and eventually beating him to death.

Chester County District Attorney Thomas Hogan called the case "an American horror story."

"It was an unspeakable act of depravity," he said.

Noting that investigators found no evidence that drugs or alcohol had been involved, he said: "This is just evilness."

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This undated photo provided by the Chester County District Attorney's Office, in Pennsylvania, s …

The couple met working at Wal-Mart and last month moved in together, along with Fellenbaum's estranged wife and three children — Tait's 6- and 3-year-old sons and the Fellenbaums' 11-month-old daughter. The six lived in a mobile home park outside the city of Coatesville, about 35 miles northwest of Philadelphia.

The prosecutor said what started as spankings morphed into "concentrated, repeated, escalating abuse." Then, "over three days he was systematically tortured and beaten to death," Hogan said.

The prosecutor said late Thursday he had not yet been notified of the couple having obtained lawyers.

The three adults told authorities "that Scott McMillan had been punched and beaten with blunt and sharp objects, whipped, taped to a chair with electrical tape and beaten, hung up by his feet and beaten, and suffered other acts of violence," police said in affidavits released Thursday.

"During one incident," the affidavits say, "Gary hung Scott and (his older brother) up by their feet one at a time and beat the boys while they were hanging upside down. Jillian stated that she and Gary were laughing during the incident."

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This undated photo provided by the Chester County District Attorney's Office, in Pennsylvania, s …

Hogan said the older brother apparently knew that if he struggled while being hung from the back of a door, it would only get worse. But his younger brother squirmed and struggled, he said.

"They thought that was funny," he said.

Fellenbaum's 21-year-old estranged wife, Amber Fellenbaum, was charged with child endangerment for allegedly failing to help the toddler. She ultimately called 911 Tuesday night, authorities said. By then, Scott had been unresponsive for hours and had been put in a shower for more than 30 minutes by his mother and her boyfriend, investigators said. When the boy failed to awaken, they placed him on an uninflated air mattress and went shopping, authorities said.

Gary Fellenbaum severely beat the boy for refusing to eat toast both Monday and Tuesday morning, authorities said. The "discipline" included throwing him against a wall, knocking him off a chair with a punch and then taping him to the chair to keep him upright for more beatings, police said.

Tait said Fellenbaum had thrown the boy against the wall so hard, it "caused a hole in the wall," according to the statement she gave police.

She told police that she took part in the abuse and saw the scars on her younger son, court documents said.

Police said her older son also showed signs of abuse.

"It is going to take us years to put him back together again physically and mentally," Hogan said.

There was no evidence the infant was harmed, authorities said. She and the 6-year-old were placed in the custody of relatives, the prosecutor said.

Tait and Fellenbaum were being held without bail after their arraignments Thursday. They are scheduled for a preliminary hearing Nov. 14.

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Associated Press writer Larry Rosenthal contributed to this report.

Last week, I visited the Palestinian territories. I wanted to hear firsthand from the people of Gaza and understand the scope and magnitude of the recent conflict.

I am now back from Gaza with a prevailing feeling of disbelief and sadness. Throughout my career at the World Bank, and at the United Nations or even before, I have come across many war zones but none compare to what I have just seen in Gaza: no scene of destruction, desolation and despair I have witnessed is equal to the tragic stage of Gaza.

Today, I feel obliged to add my voice for the voiceless and to plead that none of us forget the Palestinian people. It is our collective and historic responsibility to step up support and mobilise a response commensurate to the needs of the Palestinian people.

As development professionals, we deplore the level of violence and destruction and urge all sides to make determined efforts to find a permanent end to these recurrent hostilities, whether incursions, missile attacks or bombings. This will require access to imports and freedom of movement in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as mutual assurance of security in both Palestinian territories and Israel. Our response needs to address both the urgency of now - the humanitarian imperative - and to pave the way for a sustainable development of the Palestinian economy - the development imperative.

Humanitarian tragedy

The conflict and humanitarian tragedy in Gaza has made an already struggling Palestinian economy worse and put further stress on the fiscal situation of the Palestinian Authority. Recession hit the Palestinian territories in the first quarter of 2014, with levels of consumption and donor assistance declining significantly. Donors' assistance in the first half of 2014 has fallen by more than $200m compared to 2013.

The economic decline has resulted in growing unemployment: one in six in the West Bank, and nearly every second person in Gaza. Poverty has reached 26 percent and is twice as high in Gaza than in the West Bank.

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Growth increases when restrictions ease. As documented in last year's World Bank report: Area C and the Future of the Palestinian Economy, political uncertainty and restrictions on movement and access are the main reasons why the Palestinian economy is unable to take off.

The Bank estimates that $3bn is lost annually due to restrictions imposed on 60 percent of the West Bank (the so-called Area C).

Even before the conflict, these constraints were more binding in Gaza, where the economy suffered from recurring violence as well as blockades on exports and imports and where two-thirds of the population was receiving food assistance.

Because growth increases when restrictions ease, and inversely, growth slows when restrictions are greater, the ongoing negotiation between Israel and the Palestinians on the new mechanism allowing construction materials to go into Gaza is a step in the right direction. But it is only an inch in a journey of miles.

I am convinced that the World Bank Group can play a transformational role in the Palestinian territories, as it should in most fragile and conflict affected settings. As a development institution, it is both a mandate and a responsibility.

Since the Oslo Accords, the World Bank Group has provided nearly $1bn and has leveraged four times more. Our Board of Directors recently approved additional support, and we will be front-loading a $62m emergency package consisting of budget support and investment projects in such key sectors as water, electricity and municipal services. These are areas where the needs are immense and where the Bank Group has a competitive edge.

Budget support

But more is needed. As discussed with Finance Minister Shukri Bisharra, budget support is essential to ensure institutional strengthening and provision of services. More is needed to anchor reforms and services and sustain a viable economy. The two pillars of the Bank Group strategy are effectively designed to contribute to respond to this challenge: Strengthen the institutions of a future state to ensure service delivery to citizens; and support private sector-led growth that increases employment opportunities.

Numbers fail to capture the human realities of the daunting scenes I witnessed at the hospital. As winter sets in, the partial or total destruction of 60,000 housing units has led to 100,000 people without shelter.

On October 12, the international community came together in Cairo to voice strong support for the Palestinians and for the reconstruction of Gaza, and pledged resources. This is encouraging but we need to ensure that these are new resources and are effectively committed and disbursed in order to mitigate the tragic impact of the Gaza conflict and to unleash the economic potential of the Palestinian territories.

In cooperation with the Palestinian Authority (PA), and in coordination with the EU, UN and other international partners, the World Bank Group intends to play its full role and assist the Palestinians in mobilising the resources with a view to short and long term needs.

Unfulfilled promises are a sword of Damocles. An economy cannot live under siege, nor can the tragic cycle of destruction-reconstruction be sustained. It is not too early to strengthen the institutions that will eventually contribute to greater peace and security. It is not too late to ensure a viable economy that will foster a just and sustainable development for all Palestinians.

Because Palestinians have often given the region its tempo and have always served as a cause or as an excuse, because Palestinians are on the cutting edge of Arab minds and of the world's collective imagination, and because Palestinians will remain at the heart of the Middle East, a breakthrough on the path of stability and prosperity would have far-reaching consequences and a positive impact on the rest of the region. Would it not be the best way to fight sectarianism, violence and extremism? I'm just back from Gaza and this is still my hope.

Inger Andersen is responsible for World Bank strategy and operations throughout the Middle East and North Africa region. She assumed her position shortly after the start of the Arab Spring and led the realignment of Bank engagement with the region to meet emerging needs and priorities.

(Health Secrets) Ebola vaccines are being sped to market with the endorsement of the United Nations, and large supplies should be ready for use on West Africans in 2015, according to reports from Agence France-Presse. However, this vaccine is untested and experimental, bypassing the normal testing and approval process that usually vets a new vaccine. Sound like the “swine flu” all over again?

One vaccine, manufactured by British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), (the company associated with the largest drug fraud settlement in history), and another manufactured by U.S.-based NewLink Genetics, are being accelerated through clinical trials, says the World Health Organization (WHO) Assistant Director General Marie-Paule Kieny. If all goes as planned, shots of the vaccine will be available to health workers by the end of this year.

“If everything goes well, we may be able to begin using some of these vaccines in some of the affected countries at the very beginning of next year,” stated Kieny to the media.

Expect 10,000 doses to be ready for Christmas

Human trials have already been initiated by GSK of its vaccine in both the U.S. and Great Britain. Trials of NewLink’s offering have been set to begin in the U.S. and Germany in the coming weeks. Patients will be monitored for adverse events and to see if the shots produce an adequate immune response, during this trial period.

“They have given very promising results in monkeys, but monkeys are not humans,” stressed Kieny, warning that Ebola vaccines have not yet been shown to work. “We could still face a situation where these vaccines would be unsafe in humans or where they would do nothing in terms of protection. So we need to be very prudent.”

Gavi, a pro-vaccine alliance started with funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is of course on board with the latest effort. The group pledged in a recent statement to do whatever it can to help speed up the availability of Ebola vaccines determined to be effective.

Even though human trials have yet to be completed, GSK is already planning to have 10,000 of its vaccines available before years’ end. NewLink is also preemptively declaring the safety of its Ebola vaccines, having recently donated 800 vials, which represent 1,500 doses, to WHO for distribution in the coming months.

Drug trials to use West Africans as guinea pigs

Several other drug companies are planning to unveil their own experimental Ebola drugs as well, which they plan to test directly on West Africans in the heat of the crisis. Reuters reports that Mapp Biopharmaceutical, Sarepta and Tekmira will all initiate trials in the affected countries as part of a fast-track approval scheme to get the drugs released as quickly as possible.

“We are starting to discuss with African sites to see which would be the most suitable to test these new drugs and establish as soon as possible which one gives an advantage for survival to patients,” stated Kieny, emphasizing WHO’s support of the effort.

In the meantime, WHO says blood transfusions of human serum taken from Ebola survivors may be helpful in preventing the spread of infection. This treatment was shown to be effective in American physician Richard Sacra, who was given a blood infusion from fellow doctor Kent Brantly. Both men contracted Ebola while working in West Africa.

“This is something where the African population doesn’t have to wait for anybody else to develop it for them,” Kieny emphasized about the experimental treatment. “This is why there is a lot of enthusiasm.”

For more information:

http://www.france24.com

http://www.reuters.com

http://www.usatoday.com

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