Attorney accused of letting suspect use cellphone acquitted

Attorney Sladjana Vuckovic talks to the media after being acquitted of the charges against her. (Terrence Antonio James/Chicago Tribune)

Attorney Sladjana Vuckovic was acquitted tonight of charges she improperly gave her personal cell phone to a client who was being questioned in the murder of a Chicago police officer.

A Cook County jury deliberated a little less than three hours before acquitting Vuckovic of two counts of bringing contraband into a penal institution.

The jury began deliberating at about 3:55 p.m.

Sladjana Vuckovic, 44, was charged with a felony count of bringing contraband into a penal institution, faced up to 15 years in prison if convicted and would likely be disbarred from practicing law.

In closing arguments this afternoon in Judge Evelyn Clay’s packed courtroom, attorneys from both sides acknowledged the unusual nature of the case.

Assistant State’s Attorney Michael Golden told jurors that “anyone with common sense” should have known not  to let a suspect in custody for murder use a personal cell phone.

“You shouldn’t expect that attorneys across the country would be charged with such abysmal behavior,” Golden said.

Vuckovic’s attorney, Leonard Goodman, countered that common sense should tell jurors that Vuckovic wasn’t trying to obstruct the police investigation or “help some suspect cook up an alibi or destroy evidence.”

Goodman suggested to jurors that prosecutors were trying to insinuate there was an insidious motive for the calls “to trick you into convicting her based on something that this case is not about.”

The comment drew vehement objections from prosecutors.

“Counsel says she didn’t know it was wrong?” Golden said. “Well maybe somebody should tell her.”

Vuckovic was volunteering for a free legal service for indigent suspects when she twice went to the Calumet Area headquarters in November 2010 to meet with Timothy Herring after a relative of his had contacted the legal hotline about his arrest. Herring was undergoing questioning by detectives in the slayings of Officer Michael Flisk and another man.

Vuckovic testified in her own defense Wednesday she had made at least 100 client visits at police stations and had never been told that cellphones were prohibited. She said she was vaguely aware of a state law prohibiting bringing contraband into a penal institution but thought it barred "knives, guns, drugs." She also said that unlike a police lockup where suspects are behind bars, she didn't consider an interrogation room to be a penal institution.

Prosecutors alleged that 26 calls were made from or received by Vuckovic's cell phone during two meetings with Herring, including incoming calls from a number that was blocked.    

jmeisner@tribune.com

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Attorneys say Halle Berry, ex settle dispute

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Attorneys for Halle Berry and her ex-boyfriend have settled court issues that arose after a Thanksgiving Day fight at the actress’ home.

The fisticuffs involved Berry’s ex-boyfriend Gabriel Aubry and her fiance, actor Olivier Martinez. Aubry was arrested after the fight, which left him with a black eye, a broken rib and other injuries.

Aubry obtained a temporary restraining order against Martinez. The model and Berry have been battling over custody of their 4-year-old daughter for months and have appeared twice in a family law court since the fight.

Blair Berk, an attorney for Berry, and Shawn Holley, who represents Aubry, released a statement after Thursday’s hearing that said the two sides had reached an amicable agreement.

No details were released, and the attorneys declined to answer questions.

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Medicare Is Faulted in Electronic Medical Records Conversion

The conversion to electronic medical records — a critical piece of the Obama administration’s plan for health care reform — is “vulnerable” to fraud and abuse because of the failure of Medicare officials to develop appropriate safeguards, according to a sharply critical report to be issued Thursday by federal investigators.

Mike Spencer/Wilmington Star-News, via Associated Press

Celeste Stephens, a nurse, leads a session on electronic records at New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, N.C.

Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Marilyn Tavenner, acting administrator for Medicare.

The use of electronic medical records has been central to the aim of overhauling health care in America. Advocates contend that electronic records systems will improve patient care and lower costs through better coordination of medical services, and the Obama administration is spending billions of dollars to encourage doctors and hospitals to switch to electronic records to track patient care.

But the report says Medicare, which is charged with managing the incentive program that encourages the adoption of electronic records, has failed to put in place adequate safeguards to ensure that information being provided by hospitals and doctors about their electronic records systems is accurate. To qualify for the incentive payments, doctors and hospitals must demonstrate that the systems lead to better patient care, meeting a so-called meaningful use standard by, for example, checking for harmful drug interactions.

Medicare “faces obstacles” in overseeing the electronic records incentive program “that leave the program vulnerable to paying incentives to professionals and hospitals that do not fully meet the meaningful use requirements,” the investigators concluded. The report was prepared by the Office of Inspector General for the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Medicare.

The investigators contrasted the looser management of the incentive program with the agency’s pledge to more closely monitor Medicare payments of medical claims. Medicare officials have indicated that the agency intends to move away from a “pay and chase” model, in which it tried to get back any money it has paid in error, to one in which it focuses on trying to avoid making unjustified payments in the first place.

Late Wednesday, a Medicare spokesman said in a statement: “Protecting taxpayer dollars is our top priority and we have implemented aggressive procedures to hold providers accountable. Making a false claim is a serious offense with serious consequences and we believe the overwhelming majority of doctors and hospitals take seriously their responsibility to honestly report their performance.”

The government’s investment in electronic records was authorized under the broader stimulus package passed in 2009. Medicare expects to spend nearly $7 billion over five years as a way of inducing doctors and hospitals to adopt and use electronic records. So far, the report said, the agency has paid 74, 317 health professionals and 1,333 hospitals. By attesting that they meet the criteria established under the program, a doctor can receive as much as $44,000 for adopting electronic records, while a hospital could be paid as much as $2 million in the first year of its adoption. The inspector general’s report follows earlier concerns among regulators and others over whether doctors and hospitals are using electronic records inappropriately to charge more for services, as reported by The New York Times last September, and is likely to fuel the debate over the government’s efforts to promote electronic records. Critics say the push for electronic records may be resulting in higher Medicare spending with little in the way of improvement in patients’ health. Thursday’s report did not address patient care.

Even those within the industry say the speed with which systems are being developed and adopted by hospitals and doctors has led to a lack of clarity over how the records should be used and concerns about their overall accuracy.

“We’ve gone from the horse and buggy to the Model T, and we don’t know the rules of the road. Now we’ve had a big car pileup,” said Lynne Thomas Gordon, the chief executive of the American Health Information Management Association, a trade group in Chicago. The association, which contends more study is needed to determine whether hospitals and doctors actually are abusing electronic records to increase their payments, says it supports more clarity.

Although there is little disagreement over the potential benefits of electronic records in reducing duplicative tests and avoiding medical errors, critics increasingly argue that the federal government has not devoted enough time or resources to making certain the money it is investing is being well spent.

House Republicans echoed these concerns in early October in a letter to Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of health and human services. Citing the Times article, they called for suspending the incentive program until concerns about standardization had been resolved. “The top House policy makers on health care are concerned that H.H.S. is squandering taxpayer dollars by asking little of providers in return for incentive payments,” said a statement issued at the same time by the Republicans, who are likely to seize on the latest inspector general report as further evidence of lax oversight. Republicans have said they will continue to monitor the program.

In her letter in response, which has not been made public, Ms. Sebelius dismissed the idea of suspending the incentive program, arguing that it “would be profoundly unfair to the hospitals and eligible professionals that have invested billions of dollars and devoted countless hours of work to purchase and install systems and educate staff.” She said Medicare was trying to determine whether electronic records had been used in any fraudulent billing but she insisted that the current efforts to certify the systems and address the concerns raised by the Republicans and others were adequate.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: November 30, 2012

An article on Thursday about a federal report critical of Medicare’s performance in assuring accuracy as doctors and hospitals switch to electronic medical records misstated, in some copies, the timing of a statement from a Medicare spokesman in response to the report. The statement was released late Wednesday, not late Thursday.

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Jewel parent says sale talks proceeding

Exterior of Jewel-Osco's first "Green Store" located at 370 N. Desplaines in Chicago. (Antonio Perez / November 29, 2012)

By Emily Bryson York




Chicago Tribune reporter

9:17 p.m. CST, November 29, 2012

Supervalu, the Minneapolis-based parent of Jewel-Osco said sale talks are proceeding Thursday after stock closed down more than 18 percent, to $2.28.

The beleaguered grocery chain was likely moving to combat reports that sale talks with suitor Cerberus Capital Management had stalled over funding.

"The company continues to be in active discussion with several parties," according to the statement. "There can be no assurance that this process will result in any transaction or any change in the Company's overall structure or its business model."

Supervalu has acknowledged sale talks since the spring. The company has been closing stores and cutting jobs as it has underperformed competitors like Dominick's parent Safeway and Kroger.

In addition to Jewel, Supervalu owns Albertsons, Cub and other regional grocery chains.

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Two men wounded in South Side shootings

By Peter Nickeas




Tribune reporter

11:59 p.m. CST, November 28, 2012

Two men in their 20s were shot in separate South Side attacks Wednesday night, police said.

A 25-year-old man told police he was driving in the Little Village neighborhood when he heard gunfire and pulled over in the 3100 block of South Pulaski Road to see who was shooting.

He heard more gunfire and realized he had been shot, Chicago Police Department News Affairs Officer Amina Greer said.

He drove himself to MacNeal Hospital, police said, with a gunshot wound to the knee. Greer said he’s in good condition.

About 8:40 p.m., a 22-year-old was shot in the 6800 block of South Ridgeland Avenue in the South Shore neighborhood. He was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in stable condition, Chicago police Department News Affairs Officer Ron Gaines said.

Area detectives are investigating and nobody is in custody for either shooting, police said.

pnickeas@tribune.com
Twitter: @peternickeas

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Cate Blanchett in negotiations for evil stepmother in Disney’s Cinderella film

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Cate Blanchett is in negotiations to play the evil stepmother in Disney‘s re-imagining of the classic fairytale Cinderella, the “Untitled Cinderella Story,” an individual with knowledge of the situation told TheWrap.

Blanchett would be the first to be cast in the live-action film. It is being directed by Mark Romanek for the studio based on a script by Chris Weitz.

The film is being produced by Simon Kinberg, who is best-known for the “X-Men” series.

The feature was first set up at Disney in May 2010 based on a pitch by Aline Brosh McKenna (“Devil Wear Prada.”), who wrote the initial draft.

Disney set the project up in the wake of its success with “Alice in Wonderland,” an adaptation of the Lewis C. Carroll book that starred Johnny Depp.

Disney representatives could not be reached for comment.

Blanchett can next be seen on screen in “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” on December 14. She was recently confirmed for George Clooney’s upcoming film “The Monuments Men.” She will also be seen in “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug” and “The Hobbit: There and Back Again.”

Cinderella has been adapted for the big screen dozens of times. In Andy Tennant’s 1998 version “Ever After: A Cinderella Story,” Angelica Houston played the evil stepmother. In the TV movie “Cinderella” in 1997, the role was played by Bernadette Peters. Sigourney Weaver voiced the character in “Happily N’Ever After” in 2006. Disney‘s 1950 version featured Eleanor Audley in the voice role of Lady Tremaine, the wicked stepmother.

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Phys Ed: Keeping Your Eye on the Ball

Recently, researchers in England set out to determine whether weekend golfers could improve their game through one of two approaches. Some were coached on individual swing technique, while others were instructed to gaze fixedly at the ball before putting. The researchers hoped to learn not only whether looking at the ball affects performance, but also whether where we look changes how we think and feel while in action.

Phys Ed

Gretchen Reynolds on the science of fitness.

Back in elementary school gym class, virtually all of us were taught to keep our eyes on the ball during sports. But a growing body of research suggests that, as adults, most of us have forgotten how to do this. When scientists in recent years have attached sophisticated, miniature gaze-tracking devices to the heads of golfers, soccer players, basketball free throw shooters, tennis players and even competitive sharpshooters, they have found that a majority are not actually looking where they believe they are looking or for as long as they think.

It has been less clear, though, whether a slightly wandering gaze really matters that much to those of us who are decidedly recreational athletes.

Which is in part why the British researchers had half of their group of 40 duffers practice putting technique, while the other half received instruction in a gaze-focusing technique known as “Quiet Eye” training.

Quiet Eye training, as the name suggests, is an attempt to get people to stop flicking their focus around so much. But “Quiet Eye training is not just about looking at the ball,” says Mark Wilson, who led the study, published in Psychophysiology, and is a senior lecturer in human movement science at the University of Exeter in England. “It is about looking at the ball for long enough to process aiming information.” It involves reminding players to first briefly sight toward the exact spot where they wish to send the ball, and then settle their eyes onto the ball and hold them there.

This tight focus on the ball, Dr. Wilson says, blunts distracting mental chatter and allows the brain “to process the aiming information you just gathered” and direct the body in the proper motions to get the ball where you wish it to go.

A quiet, focused eye, in other words, seems to encourage a quiet, focused mind, which then makes for more accurate putting.

And in fact, after Dr. Wilson had his golfing volunteers practice for hours on either specific aspects of stroke technique or on focusing their gaze and not worrying about technique, those who had worked on their gaze were more accurate than those who had fine-tuned their technique. Those trained to focus also had lower heart rates and less muscle twitchiness, indicating less performance anxiety.

Similar results have been reported among soccer penalty kickers, who, like golfers, need to precisely place a ball but have the added distraction of a peripatetic, obstructive goalie. Many players tend to glance at the goalie as they prepare to shoot. Their eyes are not quiet, and their aim is affected.

But in a study published last year in the journal Cognitive Processing, collegiate players who were instructed to look briefly toward one of the upper, far corners of the goal and then immediately back to the ball, ignoring the goalie, significantly improved their shooting accuracy and reduced by 50 percent the number of times the goalie blocked their try, compared to teammates who didn’t quiet their gaze.

It did not seem to matter, says Greg Wood, also of the University of Exeter, who led the study, that kickers were glancing briefly toward where they planned to shoot, potentially telegraphing their intentions to the goalie. “An accurate shot kicked with typical speed will reach the goal in approximately 400 milliseconds, leaving the goalie with insufficient processing and response time,” he says. Players needn’t disguise intent if their aim is true.

Of course, merely keeping your eye on the ball won’t induce it to roll or rise to the desired location if you employ miserable technique. No amount of laser-eyed focus will get one of my putts to land. But what is interesting about Quiet Eye-style training, Dr. Wilson says, is that it can allow recreational and novice athletes with rudimentary skills to progress rapidly.

Specifically, Dr. Wilson says, after having extensively studied just how the best golfers look, he now teaches novice golfers at his lab to “keep their gaze on the back of the ball, which is the contact point for the putter, for a brief period before starting the putting action” — long enough to, for instance, “say ‘back of the cup’ to themselves,” he says. The golfers are told to hold that position throughout the putting stroke and, he says, “importantly, after contact for a split second. I often ask golfers to rate the quality of their contact on the ball from 1 to 10, before they look up to see where the ball went.”

Inexperienced putters who followed these instructions improved much more rapidly, he says, than those who merely practiced putts repeatedly.

“It seems so obvious,” Dr. Wilson says. “It is almost too simple. People assume that they are doing all of this already. ‘You mean I should look at the ball?’ Duh!”

But, he concludes, “the fact is that many people do not look at the right place at the right time.”

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Groupon CEO Mason offers to step down

Groupon Inc Chief Executive Andrew Mason, under fire for a plunging share price and tapering growth, declared on Wednesday he would fire himself if he ever thought he was the wrong man for the job.

Mason, whose performance at the helm will come under scrutiny from his board of directors during a regular board meeting Thursday, said it would be "weird" if they did not. But he said he believed the board was comfortable with his strategy.

Shares in the company, once touted as innovating local business advertising t hrough the marketing of Internet discounts on everything from spa treatments to dining, surged 8 percent to $4.25 i n the afternoon.

"It would be more noteworthy if the board wasn't discussing whether I'm the right guy for the job," Mason said in an interview from a Business Insider conference in New York. "If I ever thought I wasn't the right guy for the job, I'd be the first person to fire myself."

"As the founder and creator of Groupon, as a large shareholder ... I care far more about the success of the business than I do about my role as CEO," he said.

Groupon has shed four-fifths of its value since its public trading debut as an investor favorite during last year's consumer dotcom IPO boom, and Mason himself has presided over a string of high-profile executive departures.

Wall Street has grown uneasy about the viability of its business as fever for daily deals has cooled among consumers and merchants, hurting its growth rate.

In the interview broadcast from the conference, the outspoken and sometimes-zany co-founder argued his company was going through a period of volatility but believed it was on the right path. Groupon's efforts to reduce its reliance on plain vanilla deals include bumping up its "Goods" retail business, increasing the selection of "persistent" or long-running deals, and allowing users to search for such deals on demand.

Shares in Groupon spiked after the interview and were up 8 p ercent at $4.2 6, still way below its $20 market debut price.

Groupon and rivals in the daily deals business, like Amazon.com-backed LivingSocial, were supposed to change the very nature of small-business advertising. Instead, they were forced to revamp their business models as evidence mounts that their strategy was flawed.

This month, Groupon reported another quarter of disappointing earnings, and its stock went as low as $2.60 on Nov. 12.

Europe has been a particular problem for Groupon, partly because the sovereign debt crisis has sapped demand for higher-priced deals. Groupon was also offering steeper discounts, turning off some European merchants.

International revenue, which includes Europe, grew just 3 percent to $277 million in the third quarter, while North American revenue surged 80 percent to $292 million.

Adding to its difficulties, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is looking into Groupon's accounting and disclosures, areas that raised questions among some analysts during its IPO.

But Mason shrugged off speculation that the company might run into a cash crunch and go bankrupt. The company has said it had $1.2 billion in cash and equivalents with no long-term debt.

"There was a period when those stories started that I'd go to my CFO and say: 'How would that happen, walk me through what would be required for us to actually go bankrupt'," Mason said. "And it's like an end of days, apocalyptic scenario. The business would have to go into severe negative growth for something like this. The scenario is so absurd there's no evidence for it."

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Charges dropped against NIU officer

Sex assault charges against a former Northern Illinois University police officer were dropped Tuesday after new revelations of possible irregularities in the investigation surfaced, the officer’s attorney said.

The charges against Andrew Rifkin were dropped following a hearing where a campus police IT specialist testified that he was summoned around 10 p.m. on Nov. 9, by NIU Police Chief Donald Grady and was told to remove between 60 and 70 files from the chief’s computer, Rifkin attorney Bruce Brandwein said.

Earlier that day, university administration had appointed a new supervisor to oversee Grady and the department. That same day, a DeKalb County judge had ordered the NIU police to sign an affidavit confirming that all evidence in the Rifkin case had been handed over to county prosecutors, following a previous finding that the department had withheld evidence.

Grady was placed on administrative leave the following day.

Brandwein said the specialist did not know whether the files he removed pertained to the Rifkin investigation, but Brandwein said he found the timing curious.  After hearing about the removal of the files, DeKalb County State’s Atty. Clay Campbell told the judge that prosecutors would drop the charges against Rifkin, Brandwein said.

“It was incredible,” he said. “I applaud the state’s attorney for doing the right thing.”

An attempt to reach Campbell for comment was not successful Tuesday night.

Rifkin, 25, was fired from the department in October 2011 after it was alleged he sexually assaulted an NIU student. However, the NIU police’s investigation of the case came under fire this month when it was learned that the department had failed to turn over reports of witnesses who indicated that Rifkin and the student had engaged in consensual sexual activity.

Those reports ended up in a personnel file in what the NIU police said was an oversight. But DeKalb County Judge Robin Stuckert called it an “egregious” error and ruled that the department had purposely withheld the evidence.

That prompted university officials to place Grady on leave, pending a final disciplinary action. NIU also said it plans to terminate the officer who conducted the investigation against Rifkin.

chicagobreaking@tribune.com
Twitter: @chicagobreaking

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Robbie Williams aims to seal solo legacy with tour

LONDON (Reuters) – Still famous as the in-again/out-again member of chart-topping boyband Take That, British singer Robbie Williams says it is time to get serious as a solo artist and prove his place at the top of the pop pile.

Williams told reporters on Monday he planned a 15-date European stadium tour kicking off in Manchester on June 19, 2013 and concluding in Tallinn, Estonia on August 20.

“I’m buzzing. I’m ready to go. I haven’t done a tour of this size since 2006,” he said in London.

“I think it’s legacy time, because I’m venturing into getting my handicap down at golf and all that business.

“I’m nearly 40, that’s what I’m trying to say. I want to go and seal my place in pop history and go off and deliver a tour of great magnitude while I still can.”

The 38-year-old in fact enjoyed major success after leaving Take That in 1995, producing a string of hit albums and singles including “Angels” and “Millennium” and signing a contract with EMI in 2002 reportedly worth tens of millions.

But by the time his 2006 album “Rudebox” came out followed by “Reality Killed the Video Star” in 2009, he was seen as a dwindling force in British pop who had failed to break the key U.S. market.

Williams rejoined Take That in 2010 and they recorded the hit album “Progress” before touring together in 2011, and the singer said the experience had helped give him confidence to tour large venues again as a solo artist.

“I just ran out of ideas and ran out of a bit of creativity and ran out of energy and did the textbook ‘burnt out’,” he said of the late 2000s.

“But I’ve been working really hard and I needed to do something else, and fortunately it came in the shape of my old band. A lot of demons were vanquished from the past. A lot of wrongs were put to rights.

“That tour last summer was just absolutely incredible. It kick-started my professional career.”

Earlier this month, Williams returned to the top of the album charts with “Take the Crown”.

Asked whether he would consider rejoining Take That again, he replied: “I haven’t officially left … What I do know is that … if we all remain healthy then I will definitely be a part of Take That at some point. It’s joyful being around them.”

Williams conceded it may be too early to talk about his legacy at 38, but added he wanted to “put my stamp down.

“The fact that 40 is looming plays on my mind more than it does on anybody else’s mind. Pop stars cease to be pop stars at 40 and start being old people singing, don’t they?

“There is a forum for a male solo star to get up there in stadiums and own the place and I want that to be me, so I’ve kind of been lethargic for the last couple of albums.”

Williams recently became a father, and said his daughter would accompany him on tour. Olly Murs, who rose to fame on “The X Factor” reality TV show, will support Williams on his tour.

(Reporting by Mike Collett-White, editing by Paul Casciato)

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