A new genetic study confirms theories that the global epidemic of HIV and AIDS started in New York around 1970, and it also clears the name of a gay flight attendant long vilified as being “Patient Zero.” Researchers got hold of frozen samples of blood taken from patients years before the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes AIDS was recognized, and teased out genetic material from the virus from that blood. They used it to show that HIV was circulating widely during the 1970s, and certainly before people began noticing a “gay plague” in New York in the early 1980s, NBC News reported. “We can date the jump into the U.S. in about 1970 and 1971,” Michael Worobey, an expert on the evolution of viruses at the University of Arizona, told reporters in a telephone briefing. “HIV had spread to a large number of people many years before AIDS was noticed.” Their findings also suggest HIV moved from New York to San Francisco in about 1976, they report in the journal Nature.
Some Miami fans might consider getting banned from the stadium a blessing these days, but two men accused of stealing Dolphins jerseys by stuffing them down their pants appear to have chosen the hard way out.
"Bess?" asked the bond court judge Monday, reading the back of Nelson Walker's jersey. "Is he new this year?"
"This ain't the one, your honor," Walker protested.
Walker, 40, and James A. Hanna, 49, stand accused of third degree theft by Miami-Dade police. Authorities say the pair were hanging around during Sunday's loss to the Texans when they took two jerseys and a hat, hid them in their pants, and tried to leg it.
(Perhaps, like games, the pair assumed the Dolphins were just giving stuff away.)
Both men appeared in bond court Monday, where Judge Diane Ward put bond at $5,000 -- approximately 8,000,000,000 times more than the street value of aqua and orange tops during an 0-2 start.
"Your honor, obviously [it] was a losing proposition for yesterday -- for Mr. Hanna, for the Dolphins for everybody," said a public defender.
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After Judge Ward noted that the value of the jerseys and hat was $301.74, Hanna's attorney remarked the hats and jerseys were "really expensive."
"Have you been out there lately?" quipped the judge.
Hanna told the court he has been diagnosed with schizophrenia, and accepted an offer to go to hospital instead of jail.
Walker, who has 29 priors according to the court, was officially banned from the stadium.
