Adaiah blog

Computers seized from slain publicist's LA office

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – Investigators seized computers Tuesday from the business of a prominent Hollywood publicist who was shot to death in her car in Beverly Hills hours after attending a movie premiere.

Ronni Chasen, 64, who promoted the Academy Award-winning movie "Driving Miss Daisy" and other major films, was shot several times in the chest shortly before 12:30 a.m., a police statement said. Her Mercedes-Benz E350 sedan crashed into a light pole near Sunset Boulevard.

Police hauled the computers from her firm, Chasen and Co., about 12 hours after the attack. The reason for the seizure was unclear.

Police said they had not yet determined a motive or identified a suspect. No reports of threats against Chasen or her firm had been received, police Sgt. Lincoln Hoshino said.

Calls and e-mails to company representatives were not immediately returned.

Fellow publicist Howard Bragman called Chasen's shooting death bizarre.

"She wasn't a shady character," he said. "It's a small community and she was one of the fixtures in it."

Yellow police tape was stretched between two trees to mark the crime scene on a grassy parkway along a two-lane street that winds among stately homes south of Sunset. An orange cone marked the spot where the light post had stood, and a small bouquet of yellow and red flowers was next to the curb.

Bradley Turell, a longtime colleague of Chasen, came to the site in the serene neighborhood to mourn his friend.

"Ronni was a positive force of nature," he said. "She was just great at what she did, a supreme sales person and a great lady."

Nahid Shekarchain, who lives near the scene of the shooting, told the Los Angeles Times she heard at least three gunshots sometime after midnight then found Chasen in the car with blood on her chest and gushing from her nose. The front passenger's window had been shattered.

The driver was breathing heavily and did not respond, Shekarchain said.

The killing took place after Chasen attended the premiere of the movie "Burlesque," which she had a hand in promoting.

Chasen was involved in Hollywood publicity since the 1970s, working on campaigns for movies and artists. She promoted "On Golden Pond," which won Academy Awards for best actor, actress and screenplay in 1981.

She worked with a number of music clients in recent years, including Janet Jackson, composer Hans Zimmer, producer Glen Ballard and Diane Warren, who wrote the song "You Haven't Seen the Last of Me," which Cher sings in the new movie "Burlesque."

At the time of her death, Chasen was working for Screen Gems on a campaign to promote the soundtrack of "Burlesque" for an Oscar nomination, according to the trade publication Variety.

Chasen "was at our premiere last night and so full of her trademark energy and love of life," said Amy Pascal, co-chair of Screen Gems owner Sony Pictures. "We are heartbroken, shocked and completely devastated."

Chasen also was working with 20th Century Fox on a supporting actor Oscar campaign for Michael Douglas in "Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps," according to Allen Berry, a publicist for the actor.

Chasen's other clients included movie producers Irwin Winkler and Richard D. Zanuck.

Stephen Jaffe, a crisis management consultant, said he and his wife, actress Susan Blakely, knew Chasen for at least 25 years. The Hollywood awards season was always a busy time for Chasen, he said.

"She would always call us this time of year to come to really incredible events," he said, explaining Chasen would often arrange screenings followed by intimate gatherings of filmmakers and guests.

"This was an absolutely shocking and inexplicable event that has hurt us," Jaffe said of the shooting.

Bragman said Chasen had a unique way of doing business.

"She was not a woman who was a slave to the fashion of the day," he said. She played to her own vision and integrity. She was very bright, very successful."

___

AP entertainment writers Derrik Lang and Anthony McCartney contributed to this report.

Chinese stocks sink as Irish debt crisis boils

LONDON – China's stock market suffered another big drop Tuesday and prompted an early retreat in European shares, as investors waited to see if Ireland will end up asking its 15 partners in the eurozone for a financial rescue package.

In Europe, the FTSE 100 index of leading British shares was down 64.73 points, or 1.1 percent, at 5,755.68 while Germany's DAX fell 34.59 points, or 0.5 percent, at 6,755.58. The CAC-40 in France was 41.62 points, or 1.1 percent, lower at 3,822.62.

Wall Street was poised for a sizable drop at the open — Dow futures were down 65 points at 11,108 while the broader Standard & Poor's 500 futures fell 6.7 points to 1,189.10.

Investors on Tuesday were particularly worried about the growing realization that confidence in China is slipping, as evidenced by the 4 percent drop in the country's benchmark Shanghai Composite Index to 2,894.54.

The index is down 8 percent in just three trading sessions amid fears that Chinese monetary authorities will be raising interest rates to cool a property boom and dampen inflationary pressures. Rumors that price controls may be introduced too have added to investors' concerns.

"This hit confidence across much of Asia, so it's perhaps no real surprise that the sell-off is continuing," said Anthony Grech, head of research at IG Index.

The main focus in the markets for the rest of the day is whether Ireland does an about-turn and requests a financial aid package later at a meeting of eurozone finance ministers in Brussels.

Although the Irish government has been saying it doesn't need any money as it's fully funded until the middle of next year, there's mounting pressure on Dublin to agree to a rescue deal amid worrying signs that Europe's debt crisis will create a domino effect — Portugal is widely considered to be next in the line of fire.

The Irish government has been trying to convince investors that its debt crisis is not the same as Greece's, since the Irish woes are rooted in the near-collapse of its banking system as opposed to a systemic budgetary failure like that in Greece.

As a result, many in the markets thinks that Ireland is trying to negotiate as good a deal as possible in return for what is rumored to be an euro80 billion ($110 billion) financial package.

"Although Ireland is weak and in obvious need to external finance, at some point anyway, the current situation is somewhat unique in that Ireland does have some bargaining power," said Derek Halpenny, European head of global currency research at the Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ.

"Given that it doesn't require finance now, in theory Ireland could allow for the turmoil to spread as confidence in bank debt tumbles as concerns grow over the state of liquidity not just in Irish banks but in financial institutions across the eurozone," Halpenny added.

That's the last thing that Europe's finance ministers will want as they meet over the next two days — the eurozone ministers meet this evening followed Wednesday by all 27 of the EU's finance chiefs.

Analysts remain skeptical that an Irish deal will put an end to the crisis that has engulfed the eurozone over the last year. If recent history is any guide, it's more than likely that another country could be targeted.

"A more probable outcome is that the market would move on to look for the next vulnerability, much as they have done after Greece," said Daragh Maher, an analyst at Credit Agricole.

The big worry is that one of Europe's biggest economies, Spain, will end up being dragged into the mire and the consequences of that for Europe are potentially dramatic.

Ahead of the meeting, some stability has emerged in both the bond and currency markets, with the euro recovering its poise somewhat after a pretty dire run in the last week or so — by mid-morning London time, the euro was up 0.2 percent at $1.3608.

As recently as November 4, the euro had been trading at a multi-month dollar high of $1.4281.

Better-than-expected German economic news helped solidify the euro. The ZEW institute said its main gauge of investor sentiment rose in November to 1.8 from minus 7.2 the previous month, meaning that investors think that conditions will improve over the coming six months than deteriorate. The rise was ahead of the market consensus of a more modest improvement to minus 4.

Earlier in Asia, South Korea's Kospi closed down 0.8 percent at 1,899.13 after the Bank of Korea raised its key interest rate for the second time in four months after inflation burst above 4 percent in October. It also adopted a more aggressive stance, removing the wording "under the accommodative policy stance" from its statement, suggesting that interest rates will continue to rise to more normal after two years of super-low borrowing costs.

Japan's Nikkei 225 stock average lost 0.3 percent to 9,797.10. Hong Kong's Hang Seng slid 1.4 percent to 23,693.02 while Australia's S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.3 percent to 4,700.30.

Benchmark crude for December delivery was down 69 cents at $84.17 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Apple Updates Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server

Apple issued updates Wednesday for Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server. The version 10.6.5 updates, the company said, are recommended for all users running Mac OS X Snow Leopard or Snow Leopard Server. They include general fixes to improve stability, compatibility and security.

The "combo" package for Mac OS X improves reliability with Microsoft Exchange servers, addresses the performance of some image-processing functions in iPhoto and Aperture, increases the stability and performance of graphics applications and games, and resolves a delay issue between print jobs. There is also a fix that addresses an issue for some Hewlett-Packard printers when connected to an AirPort Extreme.

Address Book To Active Directory

The update also addresses a variety of relatively minor issues. These include resolving a bug that occurs when dragging contacts from the Address Book to iCal, and one that causes the Dock to not automatically hide when an item is dragged from a stack. On some occasions, Wikipedia information does not display correctly in Dictionary, and that is addressed as well.

The update also improves the performance of MainStage on certain Mac systems, resolves spacing issues with OpenType fonts, improves reliability with some Bluetooth Braille displays, and resolves a VoiceOver issue when browsing some web sites with Safari 5.

Other improvements include enhancing Bluetooth pairing with Magic Trackpad, resolving performance issues with third-party displays that use InstaPort technology, adding SSL support for transferring files with iDisk, and resolution of an issue when opening four-up Photo Booth pictures in Preview.

Keyboard responsiveness issues in the Dock when Spaces are turned on is also improved, as is an issue of syncing Address Book with Google. Performance issues for users bound to an Active Directory domain and the reliability of Ethernet and Fibre Channel connections are also addressed.

Security Fixes, Server Update

The combo update also includes several dozen security updates, including ones in which a remote attacker could cause AFP Server to unexpectedly shut down or execute arbitrary code. Multiple vulnerabilities on Apache 2.2.14, the Flash Player plug-in, gzip, "maliciously crafted" images, MySQL, PHP 5.3.2 and 5.2.12, and the Safari RSS are also fixed.

A large number of the security-related updates deal with Flash, which would seem to support one aspect of Apple's continuing battle against the use of Adobe's software on its mobile devices.

The OS X Server update includes general operating-system fixes, as well as specific fixes for such bugs as problems with name queries in Web Calendar, issues with the setup of Podcast Producer when bound to an Active Directory Server, and problems with Podcast Capture always storing passwords in a key chain.

Apple noted that the size of the update from Software Update may vary from computer to computer, and some updates may need to be installed before others.

Alabama A&M routs Talladega 93-77

NORMAL, Ala. – Casey Cantey scored 22 points to lead Alabama A&M to a 93-77 win over Talladega College on Saturday night.

The Bulldogs led 47-34 at halftime and increased their lead in the second half thanks to poor shooting — 20-for-36 (31.7 percent) — by the Tornadoes.

Phil Wood led all scorers with 28 points and Terry Harvis added 20 for the Tornadoes, but it wasn't enough as Talladega was forced to play catch-up the entire game.

The Tornadoes (3-1) scored 32 of their points from the free-throw line, but they only registered seven assists for the night compared to 20 for the Bulldogs.

Bo Amusa scored 14, Jonathan Inman and Desmond Jackson added 12 and Jeremy Crutcher had 11 as the Bulldogs had five players score in double figures.

The Bulldogs shot 30 for 65 from the field, including 7 of 15 (46.7 percent) from three-point range.

Food production a bright spot in gloomy economy

MILWAUKEE – While the recession took a toll on manufacturing and other industries, one part of the economy has remained a bright spot over the past few years: food production.

Across the nation, food producers are seeing enough growth that many are expanding and investing in new equipment.

For cheesemakers, dairy farmers and vegetable growers, the slow economy has brought opportunities to expand while construction costs are low. Food makers have also benefited from having products that consumers still buy in hard times and from ongoing efforts to open up new markets overseas.

The result is growth — both in sales and in facilities. The expansions include cheese-making operations in Wisconsin and Idaho and a sweet potato canning plant in Arkansas. Hershey Co. is spending $200 million to expand and update a plant in its namesake town in Pennsylvania, and General Mills Inc. has been pouring millions into yogurt plants in Michigan and Tennessee.

"Even in tough economic times, people are still going to buy groceries," said Barbara Gannon, a spokeswoman for Wisconsin-based Sargento Foods Inc.

While Chrysler, General Motors and other companies tied to the auto industry have closed factories in Wisconsin in recent years, Sargento is among the food makers expanding there. It's adding a multi-million-dollar building to its headquarters in Plymouth.

Sargento is the fifth local cheese company to expand in the past five years, Plymouth Mayor Don Pohlman said. Their growth makes his job easier when it comes to attracting other companies, he said.

"Businesses want to be around other businesses that are growing and expanding," Pohlman said. "The cheese industry here really helps me sell the city."

Unemployment in surrounding Sheboygan County was 7 percent in September, slightly better than the state average of 7.8 percent.

Gannon said Sargento began considering expansion a few months ago to keep up with demand that has remained brisk even as the economy stalled. The company, which is best known for its cheddar, Swiss and provolone cheeses, had about $900 million in sales last year and projects about $950 million in sales this year, Gannon said.

Other cheese makers and distributors — from Vern's Cheese Inc. in Chilton, Wis., to Jerome Cheese in Jerome, Idaho — also are expanding factories and office spaces, saying they expect their good times to last.

That's because cheese is recession food, said John Umhoefer, the executive director of the Wisconsin Cheese Makers Association. People are eating more frozen pizzas, he said, or adding string cheese to the lunches they're increasingly packing at home.

"Even we didn't necessarily see this coming," Umhoefer said, "where a recession is a net positive for cheese sales."

Another reason companies are expanding now is that constructions costs have come down. Edith Knoespel, who owns Vern's Cheese with her husband, said their business hasn't fully recovered from a dip two years ago but it's come back enough that now is a smart time to grow. They expanded their retail store so the space that once held 10 customers can now fit 60.

"It's just a good time to invest in building costs right now," Knoespel said.

If it's a good time for construction, it's also apparently a good time to invest in heavy equipment.

The Association of Equipment Manufacturers is a Milwaukee-based industry group whose members includes companies like John Deere tractor maker Deere & Co.

Sales of 100-horsepower tractors, which cost about $75,000 to $100,000 each, were up 27 percent last month over the same month last year, said Charlie O'Brien, AEM's vice president of agricultural services. Combine sales also have been up.

"They're purchasing the equipment because there's pretty good optimism," O'Brien said of farmers who raise commodities such as corn, soybeans, wheat and rice. "There continues to be good demands for their commodities."

That's partly because China is importing more U.S. food, he said, and poor harvests because of bad weather in countries like Russia have led to even greater demand.

Michigan, one of the nation's top producers of fruits and vegetables such as tart cherries, blueberries, apples, dry beans and sugar beets, exports about $1.7 billion in crops each year. Officials said that's provided some stability in the state with the nation's second-worst unemployment rate of 13 percent.

Food producers are "investing a lot of dollars here for the long term," said Don Koivisto, the director of Michigan's Department of Agriculture. "That's led to lot of interest from other national industries about moving here. Agriculture has been one of the real backbones as we've struggled with the manufacturing downturn."