| Show National 4A Thursday May 20 1999 Woman gets dying wish sought to die after she was shot allegedly by her mother lowing and unable to control her bladder She was fed through a tube and ran a high nsk of pneumonia infections ulcers and bedsores The Associated Press “All I can do is wink my ees and wiggle my nose wiggle my tongue I can't moe any other part of my body” she said m court papers “I can’t live like this” Floridian ORLANDO Fla - Paralyzed by a bullet to her spine and barely able to speak Georgette Smith nevertheless was able to make her point unmistakably She didn't want to live this way She died Wednesday one day after a court granted her wish and gave her permission to disconnect the ventilator that was keeping her alive For her family the ordeal is far from over Her frail and aging mother already charged with shooting Smith now may be charged with her murder Smith 42 was shot in March the bullet tearing through her neck and spinal cord and leaving her unable to speak without effort incapable of swal The judge ruled in her favor Tuesday and said she could have life support removed after 5 pm Wednesday She died at 546 pm Even though Smith made the decision to die prosecutors were likely to charge Egan 68 with murder creating a highly unusual - and perhaps unprecedented - case woman who is blind in one Egan an eye allegedly shot her daughter after overhearing her and her boyfriend talking about putting Egan in a nursing home Standard-Examin- Spending package nears OK "The Associated Press WASHINGTON - A compromise $15 billion package paying for the assault on Yugoslavia support for victims of Caribbean hurricanes and other items is on the verge of winning final con- three gressional approval months after President Clinton first requested some of the funds Despite some unhappiness among Republicans and Democrats alike Senate leaders were hoping the chamber would approve the measure today Since the House endorsed the legislation on Tuesday that would send it to the Vrhite House where Clinton is all but sure to sign it When GOP senators met privately Wednesday to discuss the measure some complained that all but $2 billion of it would be paid for from the federal surplus participants said Others were upset that most of the claimed savings - $13 billion - came from cutting food stamp funds that would not be spent anyway because the healthy economy has reduced dependency on the program “1 don’t like” parts of the bill either Senate Majority Leader told reportTrent Lott ers “But it probably won’t get better if it’s defeated” Sen Phil Gramm said the bill should have cut ss spending more so it would eat away less of the budget surplus which comes from Social Security He said even though he would probably lose he would use Senate procedures to force supporters to get 60 of the 100 senators to support the bill The bill also contains $22 million for Utah to build sewers for the 2002 Winter Olympics WARNING!!! 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Free report reveals what you need to know before you settle your case or speak to anyone call toll free: 24-h- r recorded mwiiagg NEWS BRIEFS Disaster toll rising WASHINGTON - Shortsighted development policies have increased the nation’s vulnerability to major natural disasters rather than lessening it a new report warned Wednesday “We are responsible for the losses in future disasters It is not God It is not nature Because we make the decisions on what to put in harm's way” said Dennis S Mileti a University of Colorado sociologist “There is a fundamental flaw in the way our nation and culture have tried to solve the problem of natural disasters It is based on the fantasy that technology can make us safe” said Mileti who headed a panel of 132 experts who spent five years studying how the United States copes with disasters Disasters over the past 20 years have cost the United States more than $500 billion and the toll is rising due to an increasingly complex society and more people moving to disaster-pron- e areas according to the report “Disasters by Design: A Reassessment of Natural Hazards in the United States” released Wednesday by the National Science Foundation In fact attempts to head off disasters made some worse he said For example the chain of dams and levees built along the Mississippi River was able to contain most floods But the system was not designed to work together so in the great floods of 1993 some levees trapped water after breaking and made the damage worse Mileti said The nation needs to take responsibility for containing disasters by designing systems that can handle the greatest events -or by understanding the potential damage and being prepared to accept the loss when it happens he said New Israeli leader focuses on troops JERUSALEM - Prime MinistEhud Barak says he can get Israeli troops out of Lebanon ahead of the one-yetarget date he has set - and he cowants to form a broad-base- d alition to lower Palestinian expectations in the peace process Barak a former armed forces chief of staff also said in interviews published today that handing over parts of the West Bank will be extremely painful for him The prime minister-elec- t said he would not conduct negotiations with Israel's neighbors until he has established his government Barak has 45 days from next Tuesday - the day the final results are formally published in the government journal Reshu-m- to form his coalition Negotiations begin Sunday er-elect ar ot Russian prime minister shows Yeitsln loyalty MOSCOW - Boris Yeltsin’s latest political victory looked complete today with his new prime minister saying the president would call the shots in the new government Sergei Stepashin a Yeltsin loyalist who won easy approval in the lower chamber of parliament Wednesday said it would take several days for him to form a new government but that the president would decide appointments Chinese concerned over Tiananmen anniversary BEIJING - The Chinese government is renewing efforts to crush dissent before the 10th anniversary (June 4) of a crackdown on democracy demonstrators in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square Dissidents said today that police sur- veillance stepped up has already been Shop all stores Monday through Saturday 10 a -- Vie Associated Press 9 p m Saturday 10 a 7 pm and St George Downtown: (except Salt Lake Downtown and ZCMI Order by phone: In Salt Lake 579-666- 6 elsewhere in Utah and in the US Visit us on the Internet it wwwzcmlcom Monday through Saturday 10 a m -- 6 p m ) POOR COPY Closed Sunday I t |
