Stew of News - Brooks, Hasselbeck, cancer boy

Oscar winning songwriter and director Joseph Brooks is led by police in handcuffs, Tuesday, June 23, 2009, in New York. Brooks has been charged with rape and sexual assault after at least four women accused Brooks of luring them to his home and performing sex acts on them while they auditioned for movie roles. (AP Photo/Louis Lanzano)

"You Light Up My Life" songwriter indicted for rape

Joseph Brooks, the 71-year-old director, producer and songwriter who scored an Academy Award and No. 1 hit for penning the 1977 ballad "You Light Up My Live" was indicted Tuesday on charges of raping and sexually assaulting 11 women in his New York apartment.

His personal assistant, 42-year-old Shawni Lucier, was also indicted on charges of knowingly facilitating the crimes, which occurred between March 2005 and April 2008, several news services reported Wednesday.

Brooks pleaded not guilty to a 91-count indictment and posted a $500,000 bail, a spokeswoman for the Manhattan district attorney said. The case was adjourned until Aug. 11. The charges carry a penalty of at least 25 years in prison.

The victims, who ranged in age from 18 to 30, responded to an ad for an audition posted by Brooks on Craigslist and a talent website, and were allegedly lured to his Upper East Side apartment to see the Oscar he won for Best Original Song for the 1977 ballad.

Prosecutors said Brooks and Lucier then plied the women with drinks and possibly drugs. Toxicology results have been inconclusive.

Aside from writing and directing You Light Up My Life, Brooks also composed the music for and produced the 1983 cult hit Eddie and the Cruisers.

We'll never listen to that song the same way again...eek.

The View host Hasselbeck denies plagiarism charges

The View co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck said Wednesday a claim that she plagiarized parts of her best-selling diet book is "without merit."

She defended her book The G-Free Diet: A Gluten-Free Survival Guide on Wednesday, speaking to the camera briefly just before the first break on the ABC daytime show.

(Photo by Sara Jaye Weiss/Startraks)

"I just want to assure you the allegations are without merit and are being handled appropriately," said Hasselbeck, 32, who has spoken openly about her self-diagnosed celiac disease, an autoimmune disorder linked to gluten proteins in wheat, barley and rye.

Susan Hassett, a self-published author on Cape Cod, alleges in the $3-million lawsuit filed in Boston Monday that Hasselbeck lifted content from her book on celiac disease "word for word," though she doesn't cite specific examples, noting also that the books follow a similar structure and chapter format.

She claims she sent Hasselbeck a copy of her own book–- the self-published Living with Celiac Disease-- along with a homemade cooking video, a newspaper story about the condition, her business card and a personal note last year.

Hassett says she will donate a portion of whatever proceeds she receives from the suit to create a camp designed for children with celiac disease. (Is this supposed to earn her brownie points with the judge?)

Hasselbeck's book, The G Free Diet-A Gluten-Free Survival Guide, was published in May 2009 by Center Street Hachette Book Group.

While this is entirely possible--though, how can people make up stuff like this and get away with it?--without examples of the "word-for-word" copying there is no lawsuit.

Teenager tumor shrinks after court-ordered chemo

The Minnesota teenager who fled with his mother to Mexico to avoid chemotherapy is responding well to his court-ordered cancer treatments.

Left: Danny Hauser with his mother, Colleen. (ABC News)

But Danny Hauser and his parents credit their alternative therapies, not the chemotherapy, for the doctor's good news that 13-year-old's tumor has shrunk, ABC News reported.

So he wasn't getting better on the so-called natural remedies, and he starts getting better only after starting chemo, but it's the natural remedies and not the chemo shrinking the tumor. Alrighty then.

Danny, who has been diagnosed with Hodgkins lymphoma, insists he doesn't want chemo.

"Because it's poison," he told Good Morning America. "That's why."

His mother, Colleen Hauser, said the chemo treatments are hitting her son hard. "There's a lot of crying," she said.

She and her husband are worried that the chemicals used to treat cancers like their son's will leave him with damaging side effects.

Colleen Hauser has maintained that she fled with Danny last month because they wanted to treat his cancer with natural remedies despite a judge's ruling ordering him to undergo what doctors said was life-saving chemo treatment.

Sources: E! Online, The Associated Press, Reuters, ABC News

Stew of News - Gay marriage, death penalty, Jolie, Jonas Brothers, Craigslist

Gay marriage legal in New Hampshire

New Hampshire became the 6th state in the U.S. to allow gay marriage today when Gov. John Lynch signed the state's Sex Marriage Bill.

Maybe, by the time I reincarnate as a gay man not trapped in a woman's body it will be legal in, say, Texas. Ya think?

"Thumbs up" to the executioner

A convicted killer was executed Wednesday under Ohio's new "set to die" procedure. And what, you ask, is that? Well...after he received the initial dose of sedatives, the prison warden had to try to wake up him up by calling his name, shaking and pinching his shoulder to make sure he was unconscious and ready for the next round of lethal drugs--a paralytic and a heart-stopping drug. If not, a second dose of sedatives is injected. Executions had been on hold for several months in the U.S. while the Supreme Court considered whether lethal injection was cruel and unusual punishment because of a man who remained conscious after the sedatives, which means he would've felt the painful effects of the other two drugs.

This dude was sentenced to die for the 1991 murder of woman he locked in the trunk of her car and burned alive. So what's a little pain during execution? He's lucky he wasn't burned at the stake, if you ask me.

Now, this one wasn't "set to die"

A woman who had been arrested and placed in the back of a police cruiser, a Ford Crown Victoria, was fatally burned Wednesday when another car slammed into the parked cruiser, igniting both vehicles and another cruiser in front, authorities said Wednesday according to an AP report.

So while the Ohio dude drifted into dreamland on valium and who knows what else, this woman, who apparently was pulled over for some traffic infraction, gets burned at the stake. Interesting...

Jolie named most powerful celebrity by Forbes

In its annual Celebrity 100 list, Forbes magazine named Angelina Jolie as the most powerful celebrity in the world. The star, who earned $27 million last year, knocked Oprah Winfrey, who earned $275 million, of the top spot, which the talk show host has held for the past two years. Madonna came in third.

Could anyone please explain to me exactly how Angelina Jolie is powerful? How does this power manifest itself through her? The kids? The lips? What's the source of this power? The womb? Inquiring minds want to know.

Jonas Brothers' homemade chastity belt

So the mother of the Jonas Brothers admits her sons "have desires" in the July issue of Good Housekeeping. The heartthrobs are virgins, so she says, but that doesn't mean they don't look at women (or men...). "They are men. They have desires. They have testosterone," Denise says of Kevin, 21, Joe, 19 and Nick, 16. "If they make a mistake, I'm not going to hate them. I don't think they're above or beyond being seduced."

--This is wrong on so many levels...are you kidding me? Virgins? Good Housekeeping? Wouldn't hate them? If seduced? By whom? Nine-year-old girls? WTF is she smoking? I say this is a job for the Law & Order SVU detectives...

What else is Craigslist good for these days?

A North Carolina man is accused of arranging to have his wife raped through personal ads on the Web site Craigslist, police said Wednesday in a statement.

The 25-year-old genius, of Kannapolis, North Carolina, was arrested in connection with the incident that occurred at his home early Sunday, CNN reported.

Police responded to the home at about 2:45 a.m. after receiving a 911 call indicating a male armed with a knife appeared in the couple's bedroom and sexually assaulted the man's wife.

Investigators became suspicious when they noticed no sign of forced entry in the house, but on Tuesday they found that the man "had responded to at least two personal ads on craigslist trying to arrange for someone to come to his home and have sex with his wife using some type of scare tactic.

Well, I say we have a strong contender for Sick Fuck of the Week here.

Source: Me and as noted
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