Anybody catch the ten o'clock news in Dallas tonight?

Guess where I live?

Sigh.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Elistan:
[B]Anybody catch the ten o'clock news in Dallas tonight?

Guess where I live?

Sigh.

 

Felons lawfully convicted of capital crimes by a jury of their peers and sentenced to death in a separate penalty phase are put to death by lethal injection (not electrocution) after any number of appeals over a period of several years. This is done according to a U.S. Supreme Court decision handed down in 1976. While the death penalty probably does not serve as a deterrent to the commision of murder it does create moral symmetry. If you kill someone in Texas, especially while committing another crime such as robbery or rape, you most likely will get the death sentence. However, even this conservative has to agree that if you are wealthy and can afford other than a court appointed attorney, you have a good chance of escaping the needle. I'll climb down off my soapbox now. Oh, by the way, don't mess with Texas!

 

Ummm, what does this have to do with the death penalty?

Stachybotrys is apparently a potent mold which causes potentially lethal pulmonary problems:

WEST BLOOMFIELD, Michigan (CNN)-- Deloris Griffin's 14-month-old granddaughter, Mikala, used to run freely through her house, but lately she has developed breathing problems.

Griffin hasn't been feeling so well herself. She gets headaches and often feels ill, especially when she's in her basement.

All this happened after the rains came this spring, flooding Griffin's basement and leaving behind something strange.

"There was a small, round, black circle which I attributed to a hole in the drywall," she says.

But it wasn't a hole. It was a mold called stachybotrys. And it was making them sick.

The symptoms Griffin and her grandchild display are indicative of those who have been exposed to stachybotrys, a mold so potent that a doctor in Ohio has linked it to the deaths of ten infants.

Dr. Dorr Dearborn, a pediatric pulmonary specialist in Cleveland, discovered the relationship between the infants and the mold after a rash of bleeding lung cases following Ohio's spring floods in 1994.

"These are young infants," Dearborn said. "Most of them are less than six months old and often less than two months. They'll come in with either coughing blood or having major nosebleeds."

'The average person will spread the mold'
The mold grows after a flood, or when a sewer backs up. The fungus can become airborne and spread through the heating ducts, which can make removing the mold dangerous.

That, in turn, puts a premium on cleaning up properly after a house has flooded, but Dr. George Riegel of Healthy Homes says it is something that few people do.

"The average person who goes to clean it up, who doesn't do it professionally and doesn't contain the area, will spread the mold and you'll have a higher concentration," he said.

Getting rid of the stachybotrys isn't always cheap. To remove it safely could cost the Griffins close to $10,000.

It is important to bear in mind that while stachybotrys is potent and must be dealt with efficiently, most black molds are not stachybotrys. Stachybotrys grows only on wood and paper products, and can be found in only about 2 to 5 percent of American homes.

Nonetheless, "It's kind of unnerving," Griffin said. "I am ready to move, but where am I going? This is my home. I can't afford to just pack up and leave."

 

I think I liked this thread better when it was about the dead penalty.

I think if you get the death penalty, you should be taken out and shot. Seems simpler that way. Then it would be a deterent that's for sure. I think it's cruel and unusual for both the victims family and the convicted to drag it out over years. I say if you are going to do it then have the balls to just do it. POW!

 

Tfota, I was responding to the "fried" comment above; I certainly think he was talking about the death penalty, thank you very much.

 

Do a little research on one of our local schools. We had to shut it down for a cleanup of this little mold sucker. Cost us frekin fortune. Pretty much a new school now.

 

Who was talking to you?

 

Death penalty...? Ahh, no.

But yes, I live in stachybotrys ground zero. Quite a few tenants have claimed some significant health problems. The toxin that stachybotrys produces is extremely nasty stuff. I feel sorry for the apartment complex since it's going to be a huge undertaking to properly clean this stuff up, but not so sorry that I'm okay about not being able to break the lease. We'll see what they say when we talk tomorrow, though.