

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page.


Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
Corporate media outlets spent Wednesday headlining shocking news: the New York Police Department had found DNA that linked the Occupy Wall Street protests to an unsolved 2004 murder.
NBC New York reported, "forensic evidence from the 2004 murder scene of a Juilliard student" named Sarah Fox has been linked to "the scene of recent Occupy Wall Street subway vandalism." DNA on a CD player found at the crime scene matches "DNA found on a chain left by Occupy Wall Street protesters at the Beverly Road subway station in East Flatbush on March 28, 2012."
But now, the corporate media's anti-Occupy movement narrative seems to have hit a major snag.
The New York Times is reporting late Wednesday afternoon:
The DNA match that suggested a possible link between the unsolved killing of a Juilliard student in 2004 and a chain recovered at the site of an Occupy Wall Street protest in March was the result of a laboratory error, a person briefed on the matter said on Wednesday.
The DNA that investigators initially believed was recovered from skin cells on the slain woman's portable compact disc player and from the chain found after the March protest came from a laboratory supervisor at the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the person said.
"The O.C.M.E. tainted the samples and it was the O.C.M.E. supervisor's whose DNA was on both," the person said.
But Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the Medical Examiner's Office, denied that the DNA had come from laboratory personnel.
The Medical Examiner's Office maintains a database of employees' DNA for the purpose of eliminating such errors.
OWS activists, meanwhile, were furious the movement had been linked to the homicide -- and indignant that DNA was used to find out who propped open the subway gate March 28.
"Obviously it's a terrible murder, but the story here is really the NYPD rubbing for DNA on some chains at a peaceful Occupy Wall Street demonstration," said Ed Needham, a member of the press-relations team for OWS.
"That's a lot of resources to give to something when there's so many other things in this city that need such desperate resources."
* * *

* * *

* * *

# # #
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Corporate media outlets spent Wednesday headlining shocking news: the New York Police Department had found DNA that linked the Occupy Wall Street protests to an unsolved 2004 murder.
NBC New York reported, "forensic evidence from the 2004 murder scene of a Juilliard student" named Sarah Fox has been linked to "the scene of recent Occupy Wall Street subway vandalism." DNA on a CD player found at the crime scene matches "DNA found on a chain left by Occupy Wall Street protesters at the Beverly Road subway station in East Flatbush on March 28, 2012."
But now, the corporate media's anti-Occupy movement narrative seems to have hit a major snag.
The New York Times is reporting late Wednesday afternoon:
The DNA match that suggested a possible link between the unsolved killing of a Juilliard student in 2004 and a chain recovered at the site of an Occupy Wall Street protest in March was the result of a laboratory error, a person briefed on the matter said on Wednesday.
The DNA that investigators initially believed was recovered from skin cells on the slain woman's portable compact disc player and from the chain found after the March protest came from a laboratory supervisor at the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the person said.
"The O.C.M.E. tainted the samples and it was the O.C.M.E. supervisor's whose DNA was on both," the person said.
But Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the Medical Examiner's Office, denied that the DNA had come from laboratory personnel.
The Medical Examiner's Office maintains a database of employees' DNA for the purpose of eliminating such errors.
OWS activists, meanwhile, were furious the movement had been linked to the homicide -- and indignant that DNA was used to find out who propped open the subway gate March 28.
"Obviously it's a terrible murder, but the story here is really the NYPD rubbing for DNA on some chains at a peaceful Occupy Wall Street demonstration," said Ed Needham, a member of the press-relations team for OWS.
"That's a lot of resources to give to something when there's so many other things in this city that need such desperate resources."
* * *

* * *

* * *

# # #
Corporate media outlets spent Wednesday headlining shocking news: the New York Police Department had found DNA that linked the Occupy Wall Street protests to an unsolved 2004 murder.
NBC New York reported, "forensic evidence from the 2004 murder scene of a Juilliard student" named Sarah Fox has been linked to "the scene of recent Occupy Wall Street subway vandalism." DNA on a CD player found at the crime scene matches "DNA found on a chain left by Occupy Wall Street protesters at the Beverly Road subway station in East Flatbush on March 28, 2012."
But now, the corporate media's anti-Occupy movement narrative seems to have hit a major snag.
The New York Times is reporting late Wednesday afternoon:
The DNA match that suggested a possible link between the unsolved killing of a Juilliard student in 2004 and a chain recovered at the site of an Occupy Wall Street protest in March was the result of a laboratory error, a person briefed on the matter said on Wednesday.
The DNA that investigators initially believed was recovered from skin cells on the slain woman's portable compact disc player and from the chain found after the March protest came from a laboratory supervisor at the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the person said.
"The O.C.M.E. tainted the samples and it was the O.C.M.E. supervisor's whose DNA was on both," the person said.
But Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the Medical Examiner's Office, denied that the DNA had come from laboratory personnel.
The Medical Examiner's Office maintains a database of employees' DNA for the purpose of eliminating such errors.
OWS activists, meanwhile, were furious the movement had been linked to the homicide -- and indignant that DNA was used to find out who propped open the subway gate March 28.
"Obviously it's a terrible murder, but the story here is really the NYPD rubbing for DNA on some chains at a peaceful Occupy Wall Street demonstration," said Ed Needham, a member of the press-relations team for OWS.
"That's a lot of resources to give to something when there's so many other things in this city that need such desperate resources."
* * *

* * *

* * *

# # #