Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff Declares Himself "Cancer-Free"; Calls For His Resignation Over The Debra Brown Flip-Flop Should Subside

Regardless of how one feels about Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff's politics, one should rejoice at the news that Shurtleff has declared himself "cancer-free" on June 7th, 2011. On Twitter, Shurtleff announced "Full body CT/PET scan results are in: I'M CANCER FREE! Sincere thanks to ALL for faith, prayers, love and support!"

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

Shurtleff was diagnosed with Stage 3 colon cancer in November 2010 after doctors discovered a malignant growth when performing an emergency appendectomy. He underwent surgery to remove a portion of his colon just two weeks later and began a grueling chemotherapy regiment, but Shurtleff continued to work throughout his treatment.

But in early May, he was admitted to the hospital after having a bad reaction to the chemo. This was triggered in part by the fact that because he attempted three types of chemotherapy, departing from the normal protocol. It was during this time that the Debra Brown controversy broke out; after she was declared factually innocent of murder and released from prison, the Attorney General's office first said they would appeal. But on the same day, Shurtleff got on Twitter and overrode that decision; days later, Shurtleff flip-flopped again and declared his intent to appeal. This outraged many people and triggered concern as to whether or not Shurtleff's judgment was being adversely affected by the chemotherapy; grass-roots calls for Shurtleff's resignation began to surface.

Shurtleff then asked doctors to halt the chemotherapy thereafter, stopping him about five treatments short of what was originally scheduled. One doctor then decided to run a scan to see if any cancer remained and, while Shurtleff was in Jackson Hole, WY for a conference with other attorneys general, he got a text on Monday June 6th giving him a clean bill of health. The doctor told Shurtleff he could resume his full schedule and that he would have to be checked again in six months to ensure the cancer hasn’t returned.

So if Shurtleff can resume his full schedule and is no longer being dosed with chemo drugs, this means his capacities are no longer impaired or diminished. Consequently, there is no need for him to resign for medical reasons, and calls for his resignations should subside. I say "should"; comments to the Tribune story indicate a few people are still put out over his mishandling of the Debra Brown situation.

Shurtleff will be growing his hair back, for those who are wondering. This man has had more than his fair share of serious challenges; cancer, a daughter with emotional problems, and a difficult recovery from a previous motorcycle accident in which he nearly lost a leg.

Woman's Confrontation With TSA At Sky Harbor Airport In Phoenix May Have Been Provoked Or Staged By Her Son, Who Was Videoing The Event

A video of a May 28th, 2011 confrontation between a woman and TSA agents at Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix has gone viral on YouTube. It has also been picked up by both The Blaze and Gateway Pundit and presented as a supposed "outrage". However, there are indications it may have been staged by the woman's son, who has been revealed by the Phoenix New Times to be a "9-11 Truther", among other things. Gather is also a bit skeptical of the woman's claims.

During a routine security patdown, the woman claims the TSA officer grabbed her breast, after which she chimps out, repeatedly demanding a police officer. Her son is subsequently reproved by TSA officers for recording the spectacle. Video embedded below:



However, one commenter to the first New Times story alerted us that there may be more than meets the eye. The person wrote "If you look at the kid's you tube video channel, this is his second TSA video in 6 months. He also has videos of him holding signs above the freeway claiming 9/11 was an inside job".

9-11 an inside job? That's a red flag marking a virulent conspiracy theorist, someone who is anti-government just for the sake of being anti-government. In their second story, the New Times reported that the woman's son seems to have an obsession for confronting TSA officials and posting it on Youtube. This information caused me to review the video again, and I noticed the following:

-- The video does not include the actual screening; instead, it begins after the screening has taken place. Why didn't her son video both the screening AND the aftermath if it was so "outrageous"? Her son did provide an explanation in this AOL interview, claiming that his camera phone had been stashed, and by the time he retrieved it, the screening itself was finished.

-- The woman's reaction is completely over the top for a mature adult. I've seen videos of six-year-old and nine-year-old kids getting patted down by TSA agents, and they didn't chimp out nearly as much as this ostensibly mature adult woman. One commenter to Gateway Pundit did suggest that the woman's extreme reaction may have attributable to the possibility that she was raped at some time in her life, and that TSA patdowns force victims of sexual abuse to relive those memories and feelings of violation.

TSA posted their response on their blog:

TSA takes all allegations of improper screening seriously and investigates each claim to the fullest. After reviewing this passenger’s time at the checkpoint, we found that our security officers acted properly and neither the CCTV footage nor this YouTube video support any of the allegations levied. Real violations of our protocols are worth every ounce of our energy to investigate, but this alleged incident does not meet that threshold.

Analysis: I don't think the woman herself deliberately staged the confrontation. Instead, I believe her son, hungry for attention and hits on his YouTube channel, provoked her into reacting so irrationally by scaring her to death with TSA horror stories before she went through the checkpoint. Then when she predictably chimped out, Video Boy got his movie. There are enough REAL confrontations between TSA and the public that we don't need attention whores staging or provoking fake confrontations.

Sign Petitions To Free Jerome Ersland And To Remove Oklahoma County District Attorney David Prater For Prosecuting Him

As outrage spreads over the unjust murder conviction of Jerome Ersland in Oklahoma City, a couple of petition campaigns have been initiated by concerned citizens seeking justice. One petition calls for Ersland to be freed on the basis that his shooting of 16-year-old robber Antwun Parker was self-defense. The other petition calls for the removal of Oklahoma County District Attorney David Prater, who decided to prosecute Ersland for murder.

Petition to free Jerome Ersland:

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/free-jerome-ersland/

Petition to remove David Prater from office:

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/784/petition-to-remove-david-prater-from-office-of-the-district-attorney-of-oklahoma-county/

On May 26th, 2011, an all-white jury of eight men and four women found Jerome Ersland guilty of first-degree murder in the May 19th, 2009 shooting death of Antwun Parker, one of two black perpetrators who attempted to rob the Reliable Discount Pharmacy where Ersland worked. They returned the guilty verdict after a mere three-and-a-half hours despite the uncertainty of the case. The jury also had the options to convict for first-degree manslaughter or acquit outright. They did elect to assess a penalty of life imprisonment rather than death. Two female co-workers at the pharmacy testified that Ersland was a hero who saved their lives, prosecutors called him an executioner who shot a wounded, unarmed robber five more times after the robber fell to the floor unconscious and was no longer a threat. Ersland will be formally sentenced on July 11th. More background on this case when it first broke was posted on May 28th and May 29th in 2009.

The following raw surveillance video shows the entire sequence and much of the action. You will see the two robbers enter the pharmacy; Parker is wearing a white shirt and the other robber is 14-year-old Jevontai Ingram. Suddenly, Parker appears to fall down and Ingram flees the pharmacy. Ersland chases him out, then returns to the pharmacy. He then goes to get a second gun, then at the 0:55 point, walks over and appears to shoot Parker multiple times. Ersland earlier explained this as because it appeared Parker was trying to reach for a weapon.



Ersland's story allegedly changed somewhat after he was shown the raw video, but he never denied shooting Parker. The confusion can be attributed to the heat of battle; a person in such a stressful situation may block out parts of the incident. But also undermining his case was the disclosure that Ersland had misrepresented his military service somewhat, claiming to have been deployed on Operation Desert Storm when he actually had been stationed at Altus AFB, OK during the time. These misstatements may have biased the jury against him.

As for Jevontai Ingram, he pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for his role in his friend's death and was sentenced to a juvenile detention facility. He will be released before his 19th birthday in 2014 if he completes a treatment plan. Two adults who masterminded the robbery were also nailed. Earlier in May, another jury convicted the two men who planned the drugstore robbery of first-degree murder. That jury decided Emanuel D. “E Man” Mitchell, 33, and Anthony D. “Black” Morrison, 45, should spend life in prison.

A June 3rd Daily Oklahoman story reports that Jerome Ersland is having a difficult time in jail since his conviction. He's had all 13 of his medications he needs to treat military injuries and an inner ear disorder known as Meniere’s disease cut off, and is allegedly being threatened with death by another inmate who is supposedly related to Antwun Parker. He's also been served with legal papers notifying him Parker’s mother had filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against him and the pharmacy.

Local public opinion is clearly on the side of Jerome Ersland; an unscientific Daily Oklahoman poll shows that out of 9,179 respondents so far, 76.6 percent say Ersland should not have been convicted. He's also picking up considerable support on Stormfront, which is where I learned the jury was all white. But regardless of the race of those involved, this was a world-class miscarriage of justice.