BY CRICKEY THATS GOOD NEWS

Rupert Murdoch's son Lachlan ends Australian defamation suit

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Fox Corp. chief executive Lachlan Murdoch on Friday dropped his defamation lawsuit against Australian news website Crikey, citing the Fox News settlement of a U.S. court case where the network agreed to pay almost $800 million over its lies involving the 2020 U.S. presidential election.



Media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s son filed the Crikey suit last August a day after executives at Crikey's publisher put their names to an ad in The New York Times inviting Lachlan Murdoch to sue to test the press freedom issue in court.

Murdoch's lawsuit targeted the publisher, Private Media, its then-managing editor Peter Fray, who was also the website’s editor-in-chief, and Crikey’s political editor, Bernard Keane.

Murdoch claimed he was defamed by Keane’s column about the U.S. congressional investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol building which Crikey published in June last year under the headlines: “Trump is a confirmed unhinged traitor. And Murdoch is his unindicted co-conspirator.”

Murdoch’s lawyer John Churchill said in a statement he had filed a notice of discontinuance in Federal Court on Friday.

“Crikey has tried to introduce thousands of pages of documents from a defamation case in another jurisdiction, which has now settled," the statement said, referring to the Fox News settlement with Dominion Voting Systems that was announced Tuesday.

Related video: Blame Rupert Murdoch and Fox for Iraq, Trump, and The Big Lie (MSNBC)

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“Mr. Murdoch remains confident that the court would ultimately find in his favor, however he does not wish to further enable Crikey’s use of the court to litigate a case from another jurisdiction that has already been settled and facilitate a marketing campaign designed to attract subscribers and boost their profits,” Churchill said.

Crikey’s lawyer firm Marque Lawyers welcomed the backdown.

“He’ll (Lachlan Murdoch) be up for Crikey’s legal costs. We and our client are well pleased,” the firm tweeted.

The Crikey suit had been set for a three-week hearing in Sydney starting Oct. 9.

Lachlan Murdoch had alleged the Crikey article conveyed a meaning that he illegally conspired with former President Donald Trump to “incite a mob with murderous intent to march on the Capitol" to prevent the transfer of power to President Joe Biden.

In its defense, Crikey had argued Lachlan Murdoch was “morally and ethically culpable” for the attack on the Capitol “because Fox News, under his control and management, promoted and peddled Trump’s lie of the stolen election despite Lachlan Murdoch knowing it was false."

The article did not name Lachlan Murdoch, but referred to “the Murdochs and their slew of poisonous Fox News commentators.”

Crikey attracts an audience of at least 175,000 unique readers a month and has at least 15,000 paid subscribers, according to court documents filed last year.

Rod Mcguirk, The Associated Press

U.S. bankruptcy judge halts 40,000 Johnson & Johnson talc and cancer lawsuits

Story by Annika Kim Constantino • Yesterday 

A federal bankruptcy judge halted roughly 40,000 of lawsuits alleging Johnson & Johnson's baby powder and other talc products caused cancer.

Judge Michael Kaplan put a temporary hold on the suits that will last through mid-June, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The decision is part of J&J subsidiary LTL Management's second attempt to settle talc cases in bankruptcy proceedings.


In this photo illustration, a container of Johnson and Johnson baby powder is displayed on April 05, 2023 in San Anselmo, California.© Provided by CNBC

A federal bankruptcy judge on Thursday halted roughly 40,000 lawsuits that allege Johnson & Johnson's baby powder and other talc products caused cancer.

The decision is part of J&J's second attempt to settle thousands of talc cases in bankruptcy proceedings.

J&J in 2021 spun off its subsidiary, LTL Management, to carry its talc-related liabilities and file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protections.

Judge Michael Kaplan during a hearing Thursday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Trenton, New Jersey, put a temporary hold on the suits that will last through mid-June, The Wall Street Journal reported.

J&J won't have to go to trial over any other talc claims during the pause, but new lawsuits can still be filed against the company, The Journal reported.

Kaplan said during the hearing that J&J has an "uphill battle" ahead, according to the newspaper.

The pause will give J&J time to reach a permanent settlement with plaintiffs in the talc cases. The company recently proposed an $8.9 million settlement for current and future talc-related claims and said it expects to bring that plan to bankruptcy court in mid-May.

J&J in a statement called Kaplan' decision "a win for claimants" because it brings them "one step closer" to being able to vote on the proposed settlement.

The New Brunswick, New Jersey-based company also said it believes claimants will overwhelmingly support the proposal.

J&J previously said more than 60,000 claimants have already committed to voting in favor of the plan.

"When presented with a clear and complete explanation and the opportunity to make an informed choice, we firmly believe the claimants will approve the plan," said Erik Haas, J&J's worldwide vice president of litigation.

Kaplan's decision is narrower than the one he made after LTL Management first filed for Chapter 11 in 2021.

The judge ruled in February 2022 that J&J can use the bankruptcy system to resolve talc allegations, enabling the company to avoid fighting thousands of individual lawsuits.

Kaplan essentially affirmed J&J's use of a strategy known as the "Texas two-step," which allows companies to split valuable assets from liabilities through a so-called divisive merger.

But in January, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit overturned that ruling. The appeals court said that neither LTL nor J&J had a legitimate need for bankruptcy protection because they were not in "financial distress."

Amid the ongoing legal fights, J&J has continued to deny the allegations that its talc products caused cancer.

Chief Financial Officer Joseph Wolk said on an earnings call Tuesday that it was "unfortunate" that J&J has to "put dollars towards quite frankly baseless scientific claims."

The suits allege J&J's talc products were contaminated with the carcinogen asbestos, which caused ovarian cancer in thousands of individuals.

Some lawsuits link several deaths to J&J's talc products.

US judge halts most talc lawsuits against J&J, stops trials

Story by By Mike Spector • Yesterday 


FILE PHOTO: Bottles of Johnson & Johnson baby powder line a drugstore shelf in New York© Thomson Reuters

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Thursday halted most of the tens of thousands of lawsuits alleging Johnson & Johnson’s baby powder and other talc products caused cancer and stopped any trials as part of a company subsidiary’s second attempt to settle cases in bankruptcy proceedings.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michael Kaplan put most of the litigation temporarily on hold during a hearing in Trenton, New Jersey. The decision, for the most part, granted a request from J&J to freeze cases while it attempts to reach a permanent settlement with current plaintiffs that would also set aside money for future lawsuits.

J&J says it has broad support for a proposed $8.9 billion settlement, a contention disputed by lawyers representing talc claimants who oppose it.

The J&J subsidiary, LTL Management, filed for bankruptcy a second time earlier this month to help finalize the latest deal, despite a federal appeals court’s decision in January that invalidated its first Chapter 11 filing, on the grounds the J&J unit was not in financial distress.

“I have more questions than answers,” Kaplan said during Thursday's court hearing, referring to arguments made to him about the second bankruptcy case earlier this week.

The judge halted roughly 38,000 talc lawsuits consolidated in a federal district court in New Jersey. He allowed other cases to proceed as long as no trials commence.

He said he would revisit the ruling in late May.

Erik Haas, J&J’s worldwide vice president of litigation, in a statement called the ruling “a win for claimants” and expressed confidence they would ultimately approve the proposed settlement.

LTL Management argued that allowing litigation against J&J to continue would imperil current settlement efforts. J&J previously used a complex legal maneuver, known as a Texas two-step, to shift responsibility for the lawsuits to LTL.

Leigh O’Dell, one of the lead lawyers for plaintiffs in cases consolidated in the New Jersey federal court, said prohibiting trials limits pressure on J&J.


Related video: J&J talc unit asks judge to halt cancer lawsuits as it pursues $8.9 bln settlement (WION)  Duration 1:12  View on Watch

“We continue to believe that this bankruptcy effort is illegitimate … and that stance will be affirmed through the appellate process,” she said in a statement.

The judge’s ruling kept in legal limbo consumers alleging J&J talc caused their ovarian cancer or mesothelioma. Some plaintiffs allege asbestos in the talc sickened them. For now, none can test their claims before juries.

J&J has said its talc is safe, asbestos-free and does not cause cancer.

The healthcare conglomerate has not filed for bankruptcy itself. In October 2021, J&J divided its consumer business in two and offloaded the talc lawsuits onto a newly created subsidiary, LTL, which then declared bankruptcy.

In January, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia invalidated LTL's bankruptcy filing. Kaplan dismissed the bankruptcy earlier this month, only for LTL to file for Chapter 11 again in his court about two hours later.

'UPHILL BATTLE'

Talc plaintiffs opposing J&J's proposed settlement plan to file a motion to dismiss the second bankruptcy filing, one of their lawyers said in court on Tuesday.

They portray J&J’s actions as an abuse of the bankruptcy system by a multinational conglomerate valued at more than $400 billion and in little danger of running out of money to pay cancer victims.

A U.S. Department of Justice official charged with monitoring the case has also pushed back against the second bankruptcy.

“Undoubtedly, the debtor has an uphill battle,” Kaplan said, referring to LTL’s settlement and reorganization prospects.

J&J and its subsidiary have argued bankruptcy delivers settlement payouts more fairly, efficiently and equitably than a “lottery” offered by trial courts, where some litigants get large awards and others nothing.

Jim Murdica, a lawyer tasked with resolving talc cases for J&J, testified in a deposition last weekend that as many as 80,000 claimants support the company’s settlement offer - enough to meet a bankruptcy threshold requiring agreement from 75% of all claimants, he said.

Lawyers representing opposing talc plaintiffs contend those figures reflect mostly unfiled claims and that people behind them have not yet agreed to the settlement. J&J and LTL argue their settlement process is typical.

LTL terminated a funding agreement with its parent company that the appeals court found insulated it from the financial distress necessary to legitimately declare bankruptcy.

Its lawyers now argue that new financing agreements leave LTL Management in financial distress. At the same time, they contend the agreements provide enough funds to pay plaintiffs and avoid rendering LTL insolvent, countering arguments from plaintiffs' lawyers that the transactions were fraudulent.

(Reporting by Mike Spector; Editing by Bill Berkrot)

MP Han Dong sues Global News for defamation over foreign meddling allegations

Story by The Canadian Press • Yesterday

OTTAWA — Toronto MP Han Dong is suing Global News and its parent company, Corus Entertainment, over stories he says portrayed him as a "traitor" and a knowing participant in Chinese interference in Canada.


MP Han Dong sues Global News for defamation over foreign meddling allegations© Provided by The Canadian Press

The statement of claim, provided by his lawyers and filed Thursday with the Ontario Superior Court in Toronto, accuses Global News of publishing "false, malicious, irresponsible, and defamatory" stories that have "destroyed … Dong's hard-earned reputation and career."

In March, Global published a story citing unidentified security sources who alleged Dong told a Chinese diplomat in February 2021 that releasing Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor would benefit the Conservatives.

The two Canadian men at that time had been detained in China since December 2018, just over a week after the RCMP arrested Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver on a U.S. extradition warrant.

Global had previously published allegations that Dong benefited from Chinese foreign interference in his successful bid to become the Liberal candidate for his riding in 2019, which is also included in the lawsuit.

The Canadian Press has not independently verified the allegations.

Shortly after the allegations about his conversation regarding Kovrig and Spavor were published, Dong resigned from the Liberal caucus to sit as the Independent MP for Don Valley North.

He told the House of Commons he would defend himself against "absolutely untrue claims." The next day, he voted with opposition parties in favour of a public inquiry into foreign meddling in Canada's elections.

Rishma Govani, a spokeswoman for Global News and Corus Entertainment, said in an email Thursday night that she was unable to provide further comment, but referred to an earlier statement.

"Global News is governed by a rigorous set of Journalistic Principles and Practices. We are very mindful of the public interest and legal responsibility of this important accountability reporting," she wrote.


Dong, whose statement of claim has not been tested in court, also wants Global to remove the stories and broadcasts.

The statement of claim, which names several Global News reporters and editors as defendants, alleges the media outlet acted "irresponsibly" in the way it reported and wrote the stories.

"These allegations were made by anonymous sources whose credibility and reliability were assumed, rather than vigorously tested," said the statement of claim.

It also says that Dong won a "hard-fought race" for the 2019 Liberal nomination and followed all election rules.

The statement claims that Global did not review a transcript or recording of the February 2021 conversation between Dong and Han Tao, the Chinese consul general in Toronto, which is at the heart of the allegations.

It says that while Dong does not have notes from that telephone call, in which he and Tao were both speaking Mandarin, "he is certain that he did not (and would never) advocate for the continued arbitrary detention" of the two Canadians.

"The defendants knew or ought to have known that the call took place in a specific cultural context and in Mandarin," the statement says. "There was an obvious risk that Canadian intelligence 'sources' could have interpretative challenges in this context."

China's Toronto consulate has described the allegations reported by Global regarding the February 2021 call as "utterly groundless.''

Dong's statement of claim says there were three other conversations with Chinese diplomats between 2020 and 2021 in which Dong pushed for their release.

It also said that Dong's conversations with the Chinese consul general and other diplomats were taking place in the context of helping his constituents, many of whom are Chinese Canadian, or as part of his role as co-chair, along with Quebec Sen. Paul Massicotte, of the Canada-China Legislative Association.

He also said he would sometimes seek guidance from the Global Affairs Department ahead of these conversations and "from time to time" share notes from his calls with the department.

The Prime Minister's Office has previously said it was unaware of the February 2021 conversation between Dong and Tao until the MP informed the office about it after receiving questions from the media.

The Globe and Mail reported in March, citing an unnamed source, that the PMO had reviewed a transcript of the conversation provided by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and concluded there was "no actionable evidence."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 20, 2023.

MP Han Dong seeking $15M in defamation suit against Global News

Story by Darren Major • CBC - Yesterday 

MP Han Dong is seeking $15 million in damages from Global News over articles alleging he was a "witting" participant in a Beijing-backed foreign interference network.

The statement of claim, provided by Dong's legal team, accuses Global of publishing "a series of false, malicious, irresponsible and defamatory," stories about the MP.

Last month, Global published a story alleging Dong advised a senior Chinese diplomat in February 2021 that Beijing should hold off on freeing Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, the two Canadians being held by China at the time.

The story quotes two anonymous national security sources who alleged that Dong told China's consul general Han Tao in Toronto that releasing the men would benefit the Conservatives.

In a February story, Global News cited anonymous sources who alleged national security officials gave an urgent briefing to senior aides from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's office in 2019 "warning them that one of their candidates was part of a Chinese foreign interference network."



Michael Spavor, left, and Michael Kovrig were released from detention in China in September 2021.© Colin Hall/CBC, Chris Helgren/Reuters

The statement of claim says that both articles are "false and defamatory" and that Global acted "irresponsibly" in its reporting.

"These allegations were made by anonymous sources whose credibility and reliability were assumed, rather than vigorously tested," the statement reads. It also says Global failed to provide enough context about the sources' jobs or seniority.

The lawsuit names a number of Global reporters, including the author of the two stories in question. Dong is also asking that the articles and associated broadcasts be retracted and removed from Global's website.

"The defendants… have maliciously destroyed Han Dong's hard-earned reputation and career and have exposed Dong and his family to a campaign of hateful messages and threats," the statement of claim says.

Dong said last month he planned to take legal action against Global. Sonia Verma, editor-in-chief of Global News, said then that Global "is governed by a rigorous set of journalistic principles and practices. We are very mindful of the public interest and legal responsibility of this important accountability reporting."

A spokesperson for Global said on Thursday they had no further comment.

Dong stepped down from the Liberal caucus last month to sit as an Independent, saying he would work to clear his name.

WAGE THEFT
Bed Bath & Beyond stiffed thousands of workers on severance pay

Story by Nathaniel Meyersohn • Yesterday 

In early February, Diane Zaccagna learned that the Bed Bath & Beyond store in New Jersey where she had been working for 18 and a half years was closing and she would be laid off.

CNN

Why Bed Bath & Beyond is in big trouble

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“We knew Bed Bath was in trouble, but we thought we would have at least a couple more years,” said Zaccagna, 50, who started out as a part-time employee and climbed her way to a merchandise supervisor.

Zaccagna loved working for Bed Bath & Beyond and said the company treated her well. Even during the depths of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, when the deadly virus was spreading and Bed Bath & Beyond temporarily closed stores to customers, she showed up to help ship out online delivery orders.

Managers initially told Zaccagna and around 25 employees at the store that they would receive severance pay. Bed Bath & Beyond has been on bankruptcy watch and has been closing hundreds of stores since late 2022.



 Bed Bath & Beyond store in Clifton, New Jersey, in February. The company laid off more than 1,000 workers in the state days before a new severance law took effect.

 - Kena Betancur/VIEWpress/Getty Images

Laid-off workers at previously shuttered stores received severance packages, and so Zaccagna assumed it would be the same for her store. The severance plan for full-time workers laid off in earlier rounds of Bed Bath & Beyond closures was one week of regular pay for each year of service, with a maximum of 10 weeks severance. For supervisors, the maximum was 12 weeks of severance pay.

But Bed Bath & Beyond never paid severance to Zaccagna and her co-workers. The company also told employees it would not match annual contributions to their 401(k) retirement savings plans they paid into for all of 2022.

“In the end, I’m heartbroken. I’m very disappointed in how they handled it,” she told CNN. “It was a punch in the gut.”

She feels the company abandoned her and co-workers and that their years of loyalty meant nothing at the end.

But the timing of the layoffs angered her most.

Gaps in severance protections

Bed Bath & Beyond, based in Union, New Jersey, laid off 1,295 workers in its home state, including at Harmon Face Value stores, just days before a new law kicked in that mandates severance pay — equal to one week of pay for each year of employment — for workers who lose their job in mass layoffs at large employers in New Jersey.

The law also requires that large employers, defined as businesses with more than 100 workers, must give workers at least 90 days notice for mass layoffs, up from 60 days. Prior to the law’s enactment, employers in the state were only required to pay workers severance if they failed to notify employees they were being let go within 60 days. The law also expands severance benefits for part-time workers and includes other worker protections.

“Knowing the law took effect a week after — it’s even worse,” said Zaccagna, who is job hunting and plans to start a new career outside of retail. “Every single person in New Jersey knows it’s wrong.”

Bed Bath & Beyond said in a statement that, as a practice, it does not comment on specific employee matters.

“Every decision over the past several months has been the product of diligent analysis, advisement, and consideration,” the company said. “The difficult but necessary decision to reduce our workforce impacted valued colleagues and is one of many crucial actions taken to enable Bed Bath & Beyond to improve our financial position and serve our customers well into the future.”

The company did not specifically address not paying severance.

New Jersey is the first state in the country to implement guaranteed severance pay protections for workers at large chains. The law was inspired by Toys “R” Us, Sears and Forever 21 and other chains that filed for bankruptcy and attempted to avoid paying workers severance, said New Jersey State Sen. Joseph Cryan, who introduced the legislation.


 Toys "R" Us store in Totowa, New Jersey, in 2018. Toys "R" Us and other chains that filed for bankruptcy have been criticized for failing to pay workers severance. - Julio Cortez/AP

Bed Bath & Beyond’s timing was deliberate and designed to get around the new legislation, Cryan charged. “It is intentional, it is calculated, and it is disgraceful,” he said.

Business Insider first reported the layoffs in the state.

There is no federal requirement for severance pay, although some collective bargaining agreements with unions cover severance agreements. Senior executives often have multimillion-dollar severance plans with employers and receive lucrative retention bonuses to stay with companies if they file for bankruptcy.

At Bed Bath & Beyond, CEO Sue Gove is eligible for $7.1 million in severance pay and former Bed Bath & Beyond CEO Mark Tritton is suing the company for $6.8 million in unpaid severance.

The absence of severance pay requirements for frontline workers in the United States is “one of the many holes in our protective workplace legislation,” said David Weil, a professor at Brandeis University and administrator of the Labor Department’s Wage and Hour Division under former President Barack Obama.

It can also be difficult for rank-and-file workers to claw back unpaid severance once a company files for bankruptcy.

“It’s all about the bankruptcy court’s jurisdiction,” Weil said. “The Labor Department has little authority to demand severance.”

Policy approaches for laid-off workers have tended to focus on unemployment insurance programs, he said, but severance protections help soften the economic hit for displaced workers as they search for a new job.

‘This was our reward’

Some Bed Bath & Beyond employees recently laid off in other states did not receive severance pay either, as first reported by Bloomberg.

A former Harmon store manager has filed a proposed class action lawsuit alleging the company did not give him and others required notice of mass layoffs and denied severance pay.

In late January, Bed Bath & Beyond store manager Norman Frisch, 65, got a call from a regional vice president notifying him that his St. Louis store would close in 10 to 12 weeks and the store’s roughly 20 employees would be laid off.

Frisch, who had been with Bed Bath & Beyond for 12 years and ran a top-performing store that company leaders used as a model for other stores in the area, was told that there would be severance pay and was given talking points to inform employees of the closing.

He sat down with each of his employees individually and explained to them that they should stick around to help close out the store. He assured them a severance package was coming.

Frisch reached out to human resources three times over the next month to ask for more details on the severance plan. Each time, he was told they were on the way.

Bed Bath & Beyond store set to close in Paramus, New Jersey, shown in February. All items were on sale for 10% off. - Ted Shaffrey/AP

But in late February, he got a call from a supervisor saying there would be no severance. He was stunned and felt the company lied.

“My store was the only perfect 5 store in the region, meaning our rating was the best of the best,” he said. “And this was our reward.”

Frisch had been planning to pay his credit card and car bills using his severance, but will instead dip into his retirement savings.

Bigger than the financial hit, though, was his guilt. He felt he personally misled his loyal employees.

“I’m the guy who sat down face to face with each one of these people, and now I had to tell them they weren’t going to get anything,” he said. “I still feel that I betrayed them. They deserved so much more.”

Additionally, the store closing date was moved up, so workers had less time to find new work than they had been led to believe. And they found out the company was not matching 401(k) contributions.

During his final weeks at the company, he made it his job to help his employees find other work. All but two found work by the time the store closed for good in March.

Before Frisch’s email was shut down, he reached out to Gove, the CEO. The way the company handled the layoffs was wrong and workers deserved better, he told her.

“When people invest their life in something, they should be treated right,” he said.

He never heard back.

US West Coast port union, employers reach tentative agreement on some issues

Story by Reuters • Yesterday

(Reuters) - The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) said on Thursday it had reached a tentative agreement with an association representing the U.S. West Coast employers of port laborers on some key issues.

Negotiations over a new deal have dragged on for roughly a year since the contract between the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) and the union expired on July 1, 2022.

Any strike in the absence of a deal may prove costly as supply chain issues persist, and high inflation takes a toll on consumer spending, compounding challenges for many companies that are bouncing back from a pandemic slump.

In anticipation of a possible action, major shippers - including suppliers to retailers such as Walmart Inc and Home Depot Inc - have been diverting cargo from the West Coast to rival seaports on the East Coast and Gulf of Mexico to avoid potential work stoppages.

Terms of the tentative agreement announced on Thursday were not disclosed, but the parties had previously struck a deal on terms for maintenance of health benefits.

The agreement that's being negotiated will cover more than 22,000 longshore workers at 29 U.S. West Coast ports.

(Reporting by Priyamvada C in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)

COMMODITY FETISH

First T. rex skeleton sold at auction in Europe fetches less than expected price

Story by Sam Riches • Wednesday

Koller auction house director Cyril Koller gestures next to the skull of 'Trinity' prior to the sale of the skeleton of the Tyrannosaurus-Rex (T-Rex) by Koller auction house in Zurich, on April 18, 2023

A Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton, comprised of nearly 300 bones excavated from three different sites, was recently purchased for 4.8 million francs (about $7.2 million) at an auction in Switzerland.

The skeleton, which measures 11.6 meters long and 3.9 meters high, had been expected to fetch between $7.5 million to $12 million, reports The Associated Press.

According to the Koller auction house in Zurich, the sale marked the first time a T. rex skeleton was auctioned in Europe and only the third time worldwide that a T. rex skeleton of “exceptional quality” had been up for sale.

The skull of the T. rex, dubbed “Trinity,” remained next to the podium all day as more than 70 lots went under the hammer.

Koller told AP the skull was particularly rare and well-preserved. So why the drop in price?

'Very misleading': Christie's calls off auction for T. rex skeleton after questions raised

Lawren Harris paintings sell for $1.2M each in record-breaking Paul Allen collection auction

“It could be that it was a composite — that could be why the purists didn’t go for it,” said Karl Green, the auction house’s marketing director. “It’s a fair price for the dino. I hope it’s going to be shown somewhere in public.”

Vertebrate paleontologist Thomas Holtz told AFP that Trinity, which is made up of bones from three dinosaurs excavated between 2008 and 2013, “really isn’t a ‘specimen’ so much as it is an art installation.”

The buyer, identified only as a European private collector, was also on the hook for additional fees, like the “buyer’s premium,” which pushed the final sales price to 5.5 million francs (about $8.2 million.)

Trinity was built from bones found at sites in the Hell Creek and Lance Creek formations of Montana and Wyoming.

The same areas were also home to T. rex skeletons that have been auctioned for substantially higher prices, including Stan, the most expensive fossil ever sold. At more than 70 per cent complete, Stan sold for US$31.8 million at auction in October 2020.

Stan was out of the public eye for more than two years, and some researchers began to fear it would remain that way, until it was announced last March that Stan would have a new home at a natural history museum in Abu Dhabi , which is slated to open in 2025.

In 1997, another T. rex, named Sue, sold for about $8.5 million at an auction in New York. Sue is currently on display at Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History and is the largest and most complete T. rex skeleton ever found, at around 90 per cent complete by bone volume.

Sue contains 250 of the approximately 380 known bones in the T. rex skeleton, and a team of museum preparators spent more than 50,000 hours preparing the skeleton and building the exhibit.

Sue Hendrickson unearthed the specimen during a commercial excavation trip to South Dakota in 1990.

Big John, the largest known Triceratops skeleton, went for $7.7 million at an auction in Paris in 2021 . Big John was discovered in the Hell Creek Formation in 2014.

Last year, a T. rex dubbed Shen was expected to sell for between $21 and $34 million in Hong Kong before questions about its authenticity led to the auction being called off .

Peter Larson of U.S. fossil company, Black Hills Institute of Geological Research, noted that Shen had similar features to Stan, mainly holes in the lower left jaw. Despite the sale of Stan, the company retains intellectual property rights and sells polyurethane casts of the skeleton for about $16,000.

Larson told the New York Times that he believes Shen’s owner purchased the cast from his company to replace some of the missing original bones.

Christie’s auction house later pulled the listing and said in a statement that Shen was on loan to a museum.

Despite Trinity’s less-than-expected price tag, auctioneer Cyril Koller told AFP that the event was a success, as the skeleton was displayed for two-and-a-half weeks in the concert hall in Zurich and attracted more than 30,000 visitors.

The lowered price point might also be a good thing for science, as experts warn that soaring dinosaur prices may cause such specimens to end up in the hands of private collectors and limit research opportunities and public viewings.

That doesn’t seem to be the case for Trinity, according to Koller.

“I’m 100 per cent sure we will see Trinity in the future somewhere again,” he said.

Dinosaur-killing asteroid did not trigger a long 'nuclear winter' after all

The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs did not trigger a long-lasting impact winter, scientists have found — a discovery that raises new questions about what happened on Earth just after it hit.

 Mark Garlick via Getty Images

Story by Joanna Thompson • LIVE SCIENCE - Yesterday 

One spring day 66 million years ago, a 6-mile-wide (10 kilometers) asteroid smashed into the Yucatán Peninsula and upended life on Earth. This event, called the Chicxulub impact, triggered a mass extinction that wiped out 75% of species, including all non-avian dinosaurs.

But how exactly it killed the dinosaurs is a bit of a mystery — after all, they weren't congregated beneath the asteroid, waiting to be squashed. For decades, scientists speculated that the impact tossed so much dust and dirt into the atmosphere that it triggered an "impact winter" (similar to a nuclear winter) — a period of prolonged cooling during which global temperatures plummeted.

However, a study published March 22 in the journal Geology tells a different story.

Related: Largest asteroid ever to hit Earth was twice as big as the rock that killed off the dinosaurs

"We found that there was no evidence for the 'nuclear winter,'" Lauren O'Connor, a geoscientist at Utrecht University in the Netherlands and first author of the study, told Live Science in an email. "At least, not in the resolution of our study," which would have detected temperature declines spanning 1,000 years or more.

O'Connor and her team analyzed bacteria fossilized in coal samples from before, during, and after the Chicxulub impact. In response to temperature changes, these bacteria thicken or thin their cell walls "like putting a blanket on or taking one off," she said.

The researchers found that in the millennia after the impact, the bacteria didn't seem to be bulking up for winter. Instead, they found a roughly 5,000 year warming trend that stabilized relatively quickly. These hot years may have been the result of super volcanoes belching CO2 into the atmosphere in the millennia leading up to the Cretaceous period's abrupt end.

This doesn't mean that an impact winter is off the table altogether, Sean Gulick, a geophysicist at the University of Texas at Austin who was not involved in the study, told Live Science. The blanket of dust kicked up by the asteroid may have only lingered in the atmosphere for a decade or less — not noticeably changing global temperatures, but plunging Earth into darkness. "It doesn't even need to be that long," said Gulick. "If you just had months without the sun, it would be enough to kill most of the plants in the world."

With so many plants gone, herbivores would have struggled to find enough food to eat. As these species died, it would have sent shockwaves up the food chain, killing off large carnivores and other species that depended on them. This event, while devastating, would have been a blip in the fossil record. "It's really, really fast geologically," Gulick said.

O'Connor's team agreed that there likely was a short period of cold and darkness at the start of the end-Cretaceous extinction. But it doesn't seem to have set off a long-term cooling trend.

Their findings indicate that Earth may be capable of rebounding from a climate-changing event faster than previously thought — but not without triggering a mass extinction, O'Connor said.

The researchers now plan to investigate coal from more sites in the U.S. in order to piece together a record of temperature changes in the millennia leading up to the asteroid impact. They hope these data will help them disentangle the effects of volcanism from the Chicxulub impact, and that the parallels to volcanic warming give us a clearer idea of what to expect in our current climate crisis.

An end to the reading wars? More US schools embrace phonics

Story by The Canadian Press • Yesterday 

Move over “Dick and Jane.” A different approach to teaching kids how to read is on the rise.



For decades, two schools of thought have clashed on how to best teach children to read, with passionate backers on each side of the so-called reading wars. The battle has reached into homes via commercials for Hooked on Phonics materials and through shoebox dioramas assigned by teachers seeking to instill a love of literature.

But momentum has shifted lately in favor of the “science of reading.” The term refers to decades of research in fields including brain science that point to effective strategies for teaching kids to read.

The science of reading is especially crucial for struggling readers, but school curricula and programs that train teachers have been slow to embrace it. The approach began to catch on before schools went online in spring 2020. But a push to teach all students this way has intensified as schools look for ways to regain ground lost during the pandemic — and as parents of kids who can't read demand swift change.


OK, CLASS. TIME FOR A HISTORY LESSON.

One historical approach to teaching reading was known as “whole language.” (Close cousins of this approach are “whole word” and “look-say.”) It focused on learning entire words, placing the emphasis on meaning. A famous example is the “Dick and Jane” series, which, like many modern-day books for early readers, repeated words frequently so students could memorize them.

The other approach involved phonics, with supporters arguing students need detailed instruction on the building blocks of reading. That meant lots of time on letter sounds and how to combine them into words.

In 2000, a government-formed National Reading Panel released the findings of its exhaustive examination of the research. It declared phonics instruction was crucial to teaching young readers, along with several related concepts.

Whole language had lost.

What emerged, though, was an informal truce that came to be known as “balanced literacy” and borrowed from both approaches. The goal: Get kids into books they found enjoyable as quickly as possible.

But in practice, phonics elements often got short shrift, said Michael Kamil, professor emeritus of education at Stanford University.

“It wasn’t a true compromise,” said Kamil, who had sat on the national reading panel. The approach often led to students learning how to guess words, instead of how to sound them out.

Now, as schools look to address low reading scores, phonics and other elements of the science of reading are getting fresh attention, fueled in part by a series of stories and podcasts by APM Reports. Textbook makers are adding more phonics, and schools have dumped some popular programs that lacked that approach.

WHAT IS THE SCIENCE OF READING?

While the phrase doesn’t have a universal definition, it refers broadly to research in a variety of fields that relates to how a child's brain learns to read. Neuroscientists, for instance, have used MRIs to study the brains of struggling readers.

In practice, this science calls for schools to focus on the building blocks of words. Kindergartners might play rhyming games and clap out the individual syllables in a word to learn to manipulate sounds. Experts call this phonemic awareness.

Students later will learn explicitly how to make letter sounds and blend letters. To make sure students aren’t just guessing at words, teachers might ask them to sound out so-called nonsense words, like “nant” or “zim.”

Gone is rote memorization of word spellings. Instead, students learn the elements that make up a word. In a lesson using the word “unhappy,” students would learn how the prefix “un-” changed the meaning of the base word.

WHY DOES IT MATTER?

For some kids, reading happens almost magically. Bedtime stories and perhaps a little “Sesame Street” are enough.

But 30% to 40% of kids will need the more explicit instruction that is part of the science of reading, said Timothy Shanahan, a professor emeritus at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Other kids fall somewhere in between. “They’re going to learn to read,” said Shanahan, also one of the members of the 2000 panel and the former director of reading for Chicago Public Schools. “They’re just not going to read as well as they could be or should be.”

Complicating the situation, colleges of education often have stuck with balanced literacy despite concerns about its effectiveness. That means teachers graduate with little background on research-backed instructional methods.

The upshot: Parents often pick up the slack, paying for tutors or workbooks when their children struggle, Shanahan said. Extra help can be costly, contributing to racial and income-based disparities.

As a result, a growing number of NAACP chapters are pushing for wider adoption of the science of reading, describing literacy as a civil rights issue.

WHAT IS DYSLEXIA'S ROLE IN THE READING DEBATE?

Parents of children with dyslexia have led the push to use the science of reading. For them, the issue has special urgency. Kids with dyslexia can learn to read, but they need systematic instruction. When the wrong approach is used, they often flounder.

“I can’t even tell you how many screaming fits we had,” recalled Sheila Salmond, whose youngest child has dyslexia. “My daughter would come home and say, ‘Mom, I’m not learning.’ And then it became, ‘Mom, I’m stupid.’”

Salmond found herself testifying before Missouri lawmakers, taking a graduate class so she could tutor her daughter and eventually moving her from a suburban Kansas City district to a parochial school. She now is making progress.

WHAT IS CHANGING?

Just a decade ago, it was rare for a state to have laws that mentioned dyslexia or the science of reading.

Now every state has passed some form of legislation. The laws variously define what dyslexia is, require that students are screened for reading problems and mandate that teachers are trained in the most effective strategies, said Mary Wennersten, of the International Dyslexia Association.

States often look to duplicate what has happened in Mississippi, which has credited reading gains to a curriculum revamp that started a decade ago. The multi-million dollar effort includes training teachers on the science of reading.

The changes have put some curriculum programs in the crosshairs.

Some Colorado districts, for instance, have ditched instructional materials that didn’t pass muster under a state law that requires schools to use scientifically based reading programs. New York City, whose mayor often talks about his personal struggle with dyslexia, is making changes in its schools as well.

WHAT DOES THE SCIENCE OF READING MEAN FOR PARENTS?

Should they be researching the tenets of the science of reading? Do they need to help their children form letters out of Play-Doh? What about drilling their kids on nonsense words? Flashcards?

Only if they want to, said Amelia Malone, director of research and innovation at the National Center for Learning Disabilities.

What parents must do, she said, is read to their kids. Otherwise, she recommends helping teachers when they ask for it and pushing for evidence-based practices in their children’s schools.

“Parents can be part of the solution," she said, "if we educate them on why this is kind of the movement we need.”

___

The Associated Press education team receives support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Heather Hollingsworth, The Associated Press

Resurgence of matriarchy pushes issue of violence against Indigenous women onto the UN stage

The Canadian Press 

There is a resurgence of matriarchy in First Nations communities, said Assembly of First Nations National Chief RoseAnne Archibald, and that is why the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls is being voiced on a world stage.

Archibald was joined by two other women leaders on a five-member First Nations panel from Canada that spoke to media during the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in New York April 19.

Addressing violence against Indigenous women and girls, said Archibald, was one of the priorities that “has driven us from our home fires all the way here to New York City to this global forum…There are families that are affected directly and those families need a space internationally.”

“Now we see traditional women in leadership coming to the forefront… and that’s why, I think, we’re talking more about our missing and murdered Indigenous sisters and two-spirited relatives,” said Vice Chief Aly Bear of the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations.

However, she added, having three women representing First Nations from Canada appears to be a “contradiction” between women leadership and the violence Indigenous women and girls and two-spirited people still face.

Bear spoke about the death of Linda Mary Beardy, a 33-year-old woman originally from Lake St. Martin First Nation, whose body was found in a Winnipeg landfill site. Winnipeg police ruled the death not suspicious in nature.

“We are not trash. We are not garbage. We deserve to be valued,” said an impassioned Bear, a mother of two girls. “Traditionally our women held high respect in our communities and it’s that colonial violence that came here, that colonial mindset that came here and put us to the lowest of the hierarchy.”

Former Neskonlith First Nation chief and panelist Judy Wilson agreed.

“Indigenous women in communities in Canada are facing a crisis,” said Wilson. “With the disruption of the colonial cloak … and the Indian Act, it displaced that role (of Indigenous women), and the Indian residential schools that removed our children broke down the families.”

As the first woman to hold the position of national chief, Archibald said “these spaces are particularly difficult for women, especially at this juncture, and being the first is always a really difficult place to be.”

With women making up half of the Indigenous population, only about 25 per cent of the chiefs are women, said Archibald. So while there is a resurgence there is still not parity.

However, low numbers haven’t discouraged women leaders from speaking out.

“We are bringing forward those issues that have not been discussed in the past. This is the second United Nations forum where I have spoken about missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls,” said Archibald.

Also part of the panel were Chief Joe Alphonse of Tl'etinqox First Nation and Grand Council Chief Reg Niganobe of Anishinabek Nation.

Windspeaker.com

By Shari Narine, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

B.C. First Nation sues port firm, others for disrupting ancestral remains

Story by The Canadian Press • Yesterday 

VANCOUVER — A First Nation is suing the British Columbia and federal governments and the company behind a railway terminal port in the province's Interior, claiming it wasn't property consulted about the project it says has "desecrated" its ancestral territory.



Bonaparte First Nation Chief Frank Antoine said inland port development by Ashcroft Terminal Ltd. over the First Nations' ancestral remains continues unabated with the support of the federal and provincial government.

The nation filed a lawsuit Wednesday, saying it has been wrongfully misled and shut out of the development process.

In June 2021, Antoine said members of the Bonaparte staged a sit-in protest on the site of Ashcroft Terminal's inland port, where expansion activities unearthed ancestral remains and other culturally significant artifacts.

"They just put it in a box, put it in a trailer and left it there until our membership decided to say enough is enough," Antoine said. "From that day forward, since June, we've been trying to sit down and have these open discussions and honest discussions with them and it just seems that they don't want to sit down with us. They just keep moving forward."

The Bonaparte First Nation lawsuit names Ashcroft Terminal Ltd. and several others, claiming railway infrastructure development for the inland port has destroyed and disturbed ancestral burial grounds.

In a notice of civil claim filed in B.C. Supreme Court, the First Nation alleges Ashcroft Terminal misled the band about the scope of construction activities for the 300-acre railway terminal port.

The lawsuit alleges the terminal is on the site of Bonaparte's historical village, which it says carries deep spiritual and cultural significance to the band and its members.

The First Nation claims the site contains "numerous" burial grounds and carbon dating places the Bonaparte on the territory dating back nearly 8,000 years.

The lawsuit says Ashcroft Terminal's construction and excavation activities have disturbed the remains and other archeologically significant artifacts on the site.

The allegations in the lawsuit have not been tested or proven in court and the defendants have yet to file responses to the claim. Ashcroft Terminal Ltd. and the federal government did not immediately provide comment on the lawsuit.

B.C.'s Ministry of Transportation said it could not comment on a matter before the courts.

Antoine said the companies involved in the expansion are "bypassing" what they want them to stop doing and will "keep pushing forward until this terminal is completely built."

Months after Bonaparte members protested at the site, Ashcroft Terminal signed an investment deal with Canadian Tire Corp., giving the company — which is not a party to the lawsuit — a 25 per cent stake in the project.

Antoine said things "went quiet" afterwards, leaving the First Nation, again, shut out of discussions about development activity on their unceded traditional territory.

"We have a list of stuff that we want to work with them on, and if this is what they call UNDRIP or Truth and Reconciliation, they're definitely doing it on the wrong side of the tracks," Antoine said, referring to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. "They're not working with us; they'd rather work away from us."

The lawsuit alleges the provincial and federal governments failed to adequately consult the band about the project, which has received millions in subsidies since development plans were unveiled back in 2006.

The Bonaparte First Nation claims in court that they were misled about the size of the inland port development plans, alleging Ashcroft deceptively presented the 300-acre terminal as "small-scale, piecemeal, bite-sized mini projects and proposals."

"Each of which posed a small fractional threat to (Bonaparte First Nation's) interests compared with the true scope of (Ashcroft Terminal Ltd.'s) development," the lawsuit states.

Antoine said the Bonaparte's attempts to have a dialogue with governments and Ashcroft Terminal have been unsuccessful, leaving him and the First Nation's approximately 1,000 members with little other choice than to take the matter to court.

"They need to understand that they can't just bypass us anymore. We're not a group of Indigenous people that doesn't understand the government, how government works," he said. "We are part of government now and we want to be self-sufficient, we want to be independent and we want to be partners and build a relationship. They just don't seem to want to build that relationship."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 19, 2023.

Darryl Greer, The Canadian Press