Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Linguistics - Online Etymology of Word "Nice"
In my online Linguistics Class, there was a great resource that helped everyone find the etymology and thus history of English words. For example, "nice" originally meant foolish, senseless, and stupid in the late 13th century.
nice (adj.) 
late 13c., "foolish, stupid, senseless," from Old French nice (12c.) "careless, clumsy; weak; poor, needy; simple, stupid, silly, foolish," from Latin nescius "ignorant, unaware," literally "not-knowing," from ne- "not" (see un-) + stem of scire "to know" (see science). "The sense development has been extraordinary, even for an adj." [Weekley] -- from "timid" (pre-1300); to "fussy, fastidious" (late 14c.); to "dainty, delicate" (c.1400); to "precise, careful" (1500s, preserved in such terms as a nice distinction and nice and early); to "agreeable, delightful" (1769); to "kind, thoughtful" (1830).
By: Tatyana Vingert, Monterey Peninsula College Online
"In many examples from the 16th and 17th centuries it is difficult to say in what particular sense the writer intended it to be taken." [OED]
By 1926, it was pronounced "too great a favorite with the ladies, who have charmed out of it all its individuality and converted it into a mere diffuser of vague and mild agreeableness." [Fowler]
"I am sure," cried Catherine, "I did not mean to say anything wrong; but it is a nice book, and why should I not call it so?"
"Very true," said Henry, "and this is a very nice day, and we are taking a very nice walk; and you are two very nice young ladies. Oh! It is a very nice word indeed! It does for everything." [Jane Austen, "Northanger Abbey," 1803]
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Friday, February 22, 2013
Wednesday, February 20, 2013
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
History - Louisiana Neutral Strip
The Neutral Ground (also known as the Neutral Strip, the Neutral Territory, and the No Man's Land of Louisiana; sometimes anachronistically referred to as the Sabine Free State) was a disputed area between Spanish Texas and the United States' newly acquired Louisiana Purchase. Local officers of Spain and the United States agreed to leave the Neutral Ground temporarily outside the jurisdiction of either country. The area, now in western Louisiana, had neutral status from 1806 to 1821.
Spain had been concerned for many years with what it viewed as the encroachment of the French from Louisiana into Texas. About 1734, the French moved their post at Natchitoches from the east to the west side of the Red River. The Spanish governor of Texas, Manuel de Sandoval, was reprimanded for not protesting this violation of what Spain believed was its sovereign territory. In 1740, Governor Prudencio de Orobio y Basterra was ordered to investigate French intrusion in the Natchitoches area. Other investigations were ordered in 1744 and 1751.
In 1753, Texas Governor Jacinto de Barrios y Juaregui determined that the French had encroached on Texas by occupying territory to the west of Arroyo Hondo (the Calcasieu River), which runs from north to south between the upper Sabine River to the west and the lower Red River to the north and east. In 1764, the boundary dispute became temporarily moot when France ceded its Louisiana colony to Spain. This colony was the large area west of the Mississippi River but drained by the same, plus New Orleans and its immediate vicinity.[2] The transfer was made without resolving the earlier border dispute, which did not seem significant under the circumstances. Spain administered the area from Havana, contracting out governing to people from many nationalities as long as they swore allegiance to Spain.
By the secret Third Treaty of San Ildefonso of October 1, 1800, Louisiana was formally transferred back to France, although the Spanish continued to administer it. The terms of the treaty did not specify the boundaries of the territory being returned. Rumors of the treaty reached U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, who sought to purchase land at the mouth of the Mississippi to ensure American access to the Gulf of Mexico. Jefferson discovered that Napoleon was willing to sell the entire territory to help fund his wars in Europe. France took formal control of Louisiana from Spain on November 30, 1803, and turned over New Orleans to the United States on December 20, 1803. The U.S. took over the rest of the territory on March 10, 1804. The Louisiana Purchase doubled the size of the United States and opened U.S. expansion west to the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf Coast.
The precise boundaries of the area had still not been determined. The United States, having purchased the territory from France, claimed the same boundaries France had claimed before the transfer to Spain. In fact, the U.S. asserted a claim to the Rio Grande as the western border, based on the temporary settlement by René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle in Texas in 1684. The more serious U.S. claim, however, was to the Sabine River, today's boundary between the U.S. states of Louisiana and Texas. Spanish claims were the same as before — to Arroyo Hondo.
Negotiations to resolve the dispute broke down in 1805 when Spain severed diplomatic relations with the United States. From October 1805 until October 1806, there was continual skirmishing, both verbal and military, around the Sabine River. There were rumors that both sides were amassing troops near the disputed area.[3]
Neither side, however, wanted to go to war over the dispute. In order to avert further armed clashes, U.S. General James Wilkinson and Spanish Lt. Col. Simón de Herrera, the two military commanders in the region, signed an agreement declaring the disputed territory Neutral Ground (November 5, 1806),[4] until the boundary could be formally established by their respective governments. The agreement was not a treaty and was not ratified by either government, although it was largely respected. Even with this agreement, the boundaries of the Neutral Ground were not entirely specified.
The Arroyo Hondo and the Sabine River were named the eastern and western boundaries, respectively. The southern boundary was undoubtedly the Gulf of Mexico, and it can be assumed that the northern boundary was the thirty-second parallel, approximately.[5] It included portions of the present-day Louisiana parishes of De Soto, Sabine, Natchitoches, Vernon, Rapides, Beauregard, Allen, Calcasieu, Jefferson Davis, and Cameron.[6]
The area covered by the agreement was declared off-limits to soldiers of both countries. The agreement also stipulated that no settlers would be permitted in the Neutral Ground. Nevertheless, settlers from New Spain and the United States territory began to move in. Some American settlers took Spanish land grants known as the Rio Hondo claims. Others simply squatted on unclaimed land. This lawless area also attracted exiles, deserters, political refugees, fortune hunters, and a variety of criminals. Eventually, the highwaymen organized to the degree that they manned outposts and organized spies in order to better fleece travelers and avoid the American and Spanish military.[7] In 1810 and again in 1812 the two governments sent joint military expeditions into the area to expel outlaws.
The Neutral Ground was settled in part by people of mixed-race informally called Redbones. Some of their family surnames can be traced back to African Americans who were free in Virginia and North Carolina during the colonial period. The origins and ancestry of Redbones continues to be debated.[8] During the years of migration from the Upper South, it is likely that some Native Americans also married into the community.
The Adams-OnÃs Treaty,[9] signed in 1819 and ratified in 1821, recognized the U.S. claim, setting the border at the Sabine River. Spain surrendered any claim to the area. (Two years after the treaty was negotiated, New Spain won its independence as the Mexican Empire.) Even after the treaty, however, the Neutral Ground and the adjacent part of East Texas remained largely lawless. The Regulator-Moderator War in East Texas in 1839-44 had its roots in the earlier anarchy of the Neutral Ground.[10]
Spain had been concerned for many years with what it viewed as the encroachment of the French from Louisiana into Texas. About 1734, the French moved their post at Natchitoches from the east to the west side of the Red River. The Spanish governor of Texas, Manuel de Sandoval, was reprimanded for not protesting this violation of what Spain believed was its sovereign territory. In 1740, Governor Prudencio de Orobio y Basterra was ordered to investigate French intrusion in the Natchitoches area. Other investigations were ordered in 1744 and 1751.
In 1753, Texas Governor Jacinto de Barrios y Juaregui determined that the French had encroached on Texas by occupying territory to the west of Arroyo Hondo (the Calcasieu River), which runs from north to south between the upper Sabine River to the west and the lower Red River to the north and east. In 1764, the boundary dispute became temporarily moot when France ceded its Louisiana colony to Spain. This colony was the large area west of the Mississippi River but drained by the same, plus New Orleans and its immediate vicinity.[2] The transfer was made without resolving the earlier border dispute, which did not seem significant under the circumstances. Spain administered the area from Havana, contracting out governing to people from many nationalities as long as they swore allegiance to Spain.
By the secret Third Treaty of San Ildefonso of October 1, 1800, Louisiana was formally transferred back to France, although the Spanish continued to administer it. The terms of the treaty did not specify the boundaries of the territory being returned. Rumors of the treaty reached U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, who sought to purchase land at the mouth of the Mississippi to ensure American access to the Gulf of Mexico. Jefferson discovered that Napoleon was willing to sell the entire territory to help fund his wars in Europe. France took formal control of Louisiana from Spain on November 30, 1803, and turned over New Orleans to the United States on December 20, 1803. The U.S. took over the rest of the territory on March 10, 1804. The Louisiana Purchase doubled the size of the United States and opened U.S. expansion west to the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf Coast.
The precise boundaries of the area had still not been determined. The United States, having purchased the territory from France, claimed the same boundaries France had claimed before the transfer to Spain. In fact, the U.S. asserted a claim to the Rio Grande as the western border, based on the temporary settlement by René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle in Texas in 1684. The more serious U.S. claim, however, was to the Sabine River, today's boundary between the U.S. states of Louisiana and Texas. Spanish claims were the same as before — to Arroyo Hondo.
Negotiations to resolve the dispute broke down in 1805 when Spain severed diplomatic relations with the United States. From October 1805 until October 1806, there was continual skirmishing, both verbal and military, around the Sabine River. There were rumors that both sides were amassing troops near the disputed area.[3]
Neither side, however, wanted to go to war over the dispute. In order to avert further armed clashes, U.S. General James Wilkinson and Spanish Lt. Col. Simón de Herrera, the two military commanders in the region, signed an agreement declaring the disputed territory Neutral Ground (November 5, 1806),[4] until the boundary could be formally established by their respective governments. The agreement was not a treaty and was not ratified by either government, although it was largely respected. Even with this agreement, the boundaries of the Neutral Ground were not entirely specified.
The Arroyo Hondo and the Sabine River were named the eastern and western boundaries, respectively. The southern boundary was undoubtedly the Gulf of Mexico, and it can be assumed that the northern boundary was the thirty-second parallel, approximately.[5] It included portions of the present-day Louisiana parishes of De Soto, Sabine, Natchitoches, Vernon, Rapides, Beauregard, Allen, Calcasieu, Jefferson Davis, and Cameron.[6]
The area covered by the agreement was declared off-limits to soldiers of both countries. The agreement also stipulated that no settlers would be permitted in the Neutral Ground. Nevertheless, settlers from New Spain and the United States territory began to move in. Some American settlers took Spanish land grants known as the Rio Hondo claims. Others simply squatted on unclaimed land. This lawless area also attracted exiles, deserters, political refugees, fortune hunters, and a variety of criminals. Eventually, the highwaymen organized to the degree that they manned outposts and organized spies in order to better fleece travelers and avoid the American and Spanish military.[7] In 1810 and again in 1812 the two governments sent joint military expeditions into the area to expel outlaws.
The Neutral Ground was settled in part by people of mixed-race informally called Redbones. Some of their family surnames can be traced back to African Americans who were free in Virginia and North Carolina during the colonial period. The origins and ancestry of Redbones continues to be debated.[8] During the years of migration from the Upper South, it is likely that some Native Americans also married into the community.
The Adams-OnÃs Treaty,[9] signed in 1819 and ratified in 1821, recognized the U.S. claim, setting the border at the Sabine River. Spain surrendered any claim to the area. (Two years after the treaty was negotiated, New Spain won its independence as the Mexican Empire.) Even after the treaty, however, the Neutral Ground and the adjacent part of East Texas remained largely lawless. The Regulator-Moderator War in East Texas in 1839-44 had its roots in the earlier anarchy of the Neutral Ground.[10]
Mainstream Media Lies That Adam Lanza Influence by Anders Breivik in Norway
(Reuters) - The man who shot dead 20 children and six adults at a Connecticut elementary school wanted to kill more people than the 77 slain by a Norwegian man in a 2011 rampage, CBS News reported on Monday, citing unnamed law enforcement sources.
A Connecticut state police spokesman dismissed the report as inaccurate speculation.Adam Lanza, 20, who killed himself as police closed in on him at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, saw himself in direct competition with Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 77 people in a bombing and shooting attack in Norway on July 22, 2011, CBS said. Breivik surrendered to police.
Citing two officials briefed on the Newtown investigation, CBS said Lanza targeted the elementary school because he saw it as the "easiest target" with the "largest cluster of people."
The report did not say how the investigators learned of Lanza's desire to compete with Breivik.
Lanza was also motivated by violent videogames and had spent numerous hours playing games and working on his computer shooting skills in a private gaming room in his basement with blacked out windows, CBS said. Investigators recovered a large number of games from the basement, the report said.
Evidence shows that in his mind, Lanza was likely acting out the fantasies of a videogame during his shooting spree with each death amounting to some kind of "score," CBS said.
Lanza killed 20 schoolchildren aged 6 and 7 plus six adults who worked at the school, shocking the United States and leading President Barack Obama to propose new gun-control legislation.
Authorities have not publicly spoken of his motive.
"This is not official Connecticut State Police information and is someone's speculation regarding the case," Connecticut State Police Lieutenant Paul Vance told Reuters in an email statement.
When asked if the CBS report was in any way accurate, Vance responded, "No."
Breivik, a self-styled warrior against Muslim immigration, killed eight people by bombing the Oslo government headquarters and then shot dead 69 people at the ruling party's summer youth camp.
A Norwegian judge last year sentenced Breivik to the maximum 21 years in prison, though his release can be put off indefinitely should he be deemed a threat to society.
(Reporting by Daniel Trotta in New York; Editing by Mohammad Zargham and Eric Beech)
Saturday, February 16, 2013
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Fake Shooter Chris Dorner Allegedly Shot During Hoax?
Tactical Operation Against American Public Underway
Christopher Dorner CABIN FIRE caused by Tear Gas 1 Deputy Killed - HOAX
CHRIS DORNER COMPARTMENTALIZED MIHOP OPERATION
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Charlie Sheen to Christopher Dorner, ex-LAPD officer-turned-accused cop killer: ‘Call me’
As the manhunt widens for Christopher Dorner, the former naval and LAPD officer-turned-triple-murder suspect, actor Charlie Sheen--who was mentioned in Dorner's online manifesto--released a video on Saturday pleading with the accused killer to call him.
"You mentioned me in your manifesto, so thank you for your kind words," Sheen said in the brief video posted to TMZ.com. "I am urging you to call me. Let's figure out together how to end this thing."
In the manifesto posted to his Facebook page, Dorner promised "unconventional and asymmetrical warfare" against the LAPD, which fired him in 2008. He also praised a number of celebrities, including Larry David, Bill Cosby, Jon Stewart, Kate Winslet, Ellen Degeneres, Anthony Bourdain, Michelle Obama and the former "Two and a Half Men" star. "Charlie Sheen, you’re effin awesome," Dorner wrote.
Sheen was dismissed from the CBS sitcom in 2011 after posting online rants attacking the show's creator.
Earlier this month, CNN's Anderson Cooper received a package that appears to have been sent by Dorner. In it was a hand-labeled DVD accompanied by a yellow Post-It note that read, in part, "I never lied."
Meanwhile, Los Angeles police said on Saturday they would re-examine Dorner's firing, though not "to appease a murderer," LAPD chief Charlie Beck said. "I do it to reassure the public that their police department is transparent and fair in all the things we do."
Beck called on the former officer Christopher Dorner, 33, to turn himself in and tell his side of the story. Dorner was dismissed after officials found he had made false statements accusing another officer of using excessive force.
One of the three people Dorner is accused of killing this week is the 28-year-old daughter of a retired police captain who represented him in a disciplinary action that led to his firing. He is also wanted for the killing of the young woman's fiance and an officer from the town of Riverside.
The manhunt continues for Dorner, whose burned out pickup truck was discovered last week in Big Bear Lake, a ski resort in the San Bernardino Mountains about 80 miles northeast of Los Angeles. After a door-to-door search, police believe Dorner may have slipped away.
The U.S. Border Patrol says it has stepped up security, screening vehicles to prevent Dorner from fleeing the country into Tijuana.
Friday, February 8, 2013
Manhunt LA Police Department Under Seige
Up until I noticed Anderson Cooper is involved in this I thought this was an isolated incident. But now I'm thinking brain-washed manchurian candidate MIHOP instead of LIHOP...Made-it-happen-on-purpose versus let-it-happen-on-purpose...I mean did Anderson cooper really get a letter from this guy in Los Angeles...so he was like "before I go on a killing spree I"m sending Anderson Cooper or the major network a letter"...come on give me a fucking break.
Feb. 8, 2013 - Los Angeles Ex-Cop Declares War; Fired in 2008
6 HOURS AGO CHRISTOPHER DORNER MANHUNT
AUTHORITIES SEARCHING IN BIG-BEAR,CA
Thursday, February 7, 2013
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Nathaniel Rothschild: Up to a Billion Dollars Missing
Jan. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Nathaniel Rotschild, founder of Bumi Plc., discusses his calls to find up to a billion dollars of missing funds as he plans to regain control of the company. He speaks on Bloomberg Television's "The Pulse."
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Phoenix Gunman Who Shot Fusion CEO Steve Singer Found Dead of Apparent Suicide
A man who shot and killed a call-center CEO and critically wounded a lawyer at a Phoenix office building where they were meeting to discuss a contract dispute was found dead early Thursday, ending a nearly 24-hour manhunt that had area residents on edge.
A landscaper found the body of Arthur Douglas Harmon among some bushes in the Phoenix suburb of Mesa. Harmon, 70, died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said.
A handgun was found near his body, and a rented Kia Optima sedan that he drove from Wednesday's shooting scene was located in a nearby parking lot.
Authorities had been searching for Harmon since Wednesday morning, when they say he drew a gun and shot two men at the end of a mediation session at a north-central Phoenix office building.
Steve Singer, 48, died hours later. The law firm that employs Mark Hummels, 43, said Thursday he is on life support and isn't expected to survive.
A third person, 32-year-old Nichole Hampton, was caught in the gunfire near the office building's entrance and suffered a gunshot wound to her left hand. The mother of two is recovering and expects to be discharged from a hospital Friday.
Hampton works for another company inside the office complex and wasn't involved in the contract dispute. She told reporters Thursday that she never saw Harmon or the two men who were shot.
AP
This image provided by the Phoenix Police... View Full Caption
"We believe the two men were the targets," Phoenix police Sgt. Tommy Thompson said. "It was not a random shooting."
Harmon also fired at someone who tried to follow him to get his license plate number, authorities said.
Singer was the CEO of Scottsdale-based Fusion Contact Centers LLC, which had hired Harmon to refurbish office cubicles at two call centers in California.
According to court documents, Harmon was scheduled to go to a law office in the building where the shooting took place for a settlement conference in a lawsuit he filed against Fusion in April.
Fusion said Harmon was paid nearly $30,000 under the $47,000 contract. But the company asked him to repay much of the money when it discovered the cubicles could not be refurbished, according to the documents.
Harmon argued Fusion hung him out to dry by telling him to remove and store 206 "worthless" work stations after the mix-up was discovered. Harmon said Fusion then told him that the company decided to use a competitor.
Harmon's lawsuit had sought payment for the remainder of the contract, $20,000 in damages and reimbursement for storage fees and legal costs.
The company countersued Harmon, protesting the sale of his home to his son for $26,000 and asking a judge to prevent Harmon from getting rid of other assets. Harmon said the company's claims that the home was fraudulently transferred to his son were unfounded.
Harmon represented himself in the lawsuit, and Hummels represented Fusion.
Colleagues of Hummels described him as a smart, competent and decent man who was a rising star in his profession and dedicated to his wife, 9-year-old daughter and 7-year-old son.
"This is a day of just unspeakable sorrow," said 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Andrew Hurwitz, who hired Hummels straight out of law school to serve as a law clerk from 2004 to 2005 while Hurwitz was serving on the Arizona Supreme Court.
The shooting took place in the building where pro tempore Judge Ira Schwartz, who scheduled the mediation, has an office.
Fusion CEO Scott Singer Killed by Douglass Harmon over Contract Dispute
A gunman opened fire at an office complex in Arizona's largest city yesterday, killing the CEO of a company, wounding two other people and setting off a manhunt. Police warned the public that the suspect was “armed and dangerous.”
Authorities identified the suspect as Arthur D. Harmon, who they said opened fire at the end of a mediation session. Authorities believe Harmon acted alone and fled the scene in a car after the 10:30 am shooting. Sgt. Tommy Thompson, a Phoenix police spokesman.
Harmon allegedly shot at someone who tried to follow him after the shooting in an attempt to get his license plate number, according to authorities.
Authorities identified a man who died hours after the shooting as 48-year-old Steve Singer. Police believe he was the target of the attack, along with a 43-year-old man who was wounded, Thompson said.
"It was not a random shooting," Thompson said.
According to court documents, Harmon had filed a lawsuit against Scottsdale-based Fusion Contact Centers LLC, where Singer was the CEO.
The wounded man was listed in critical condition. A 32-year-old woman suffered non-life threatening injuries.
America's latest public shooting came on the same day Congress took up the issue of gun control for the first time since the Connecticut school shooting in December left 20 young children dead and changed the national conversation on guns.
Former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot in the head during a 2011 shooting rampage in Tucson that left 6 people dead, appeared in Washington to testify in favour of stricter gun controls.
As police searched for the suspect in yesterday's shooting, Swat teams and two armoured vehicles surrounded a home about 7 miles (11 kilometers) from the shooting scene. Police served a search warrant to enter the home, which county property records show was sold by Harmon to his son last year for $26,000.
For a time, officers, believing the shooter might be inside, used a megaphone to ask him to surrender.
The gunfire at the office complex prompted terrified workers to lock the doors to their offices and hide far from the windows. Swat officers searched the building.
"Everyone was just scared, honestly, just scared," said Navika Sood, assistant director of nursing at First at Home Health Services who along with her co-workers locked the entrances to their office.
Sood said police evacuated the office about 30 minutes after she first heard the popping noises.
Police didn't immediately release the names of the wounded. But a Phoenix law firm, Osborn Maledon, said one of its lawyers, Mark Hummels, was among the wounded. The firm said he "was representing a client in a mediation" when he was shot.
According to court documents, Harmon was scheduled to go to a law office in the same building where the shooting took place for a settlement conference in lawsuit he filed last April against Fusion. Hummels was representing Fusion in the lawsuit.
The company had hired Harmon to refurbish office cubicles at two call centers in California, but a contract dispute arose.
Fusion said Harmon was paid nearly $30,000 under the $47,000 contract but asked him to repay much of the money when the company discovered that the cubicles could not be refurbished, according to the documents.
Harmon argued Fusion hung him out to dry by telling him to remove and store 206 "worthless" work stations after the mix-up was discovered. Harmon said Fusion then told him that the company decided to use a competitor.
Harmon's lawsuit had sought payment for the remainder of the contract, $20,000 in damages and reimbursement for storage fees and legal costs.
Pro tempore Judge Ira Schwartz, who scheduled the meeting, did not immediately return an email seeking comment. A message left Wednesday at Singer's home also was not returned.
Vanessa Brogan, who works in sales support at an insurance business in the three-storey complex, said she heard a loud bang that she thought at first was from somebody working in or near the building.
She said others at the business thought they heard multiple loud noises. She said people locked themselves in offices until authorities evacuated the complex that houses insurance, medical and law offices.
Becky Neher, who works for a title company in the building, said the two gunshots she heard sounded like two pieces of metal banging against each other.
Watching from her second-story office, she saw people leaving the building.
"Someone yelled, 'We have a shooter,"' she said. She saw two victims lying on the ground outside the back side of the building. She said health care workers who have offices in the complex came out to help.
Friday, February 1, 2013
Santa Maria Telecommunications CEO fatally shot in Phoenix
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SANTA MARIA, Calif. -
Wednesday's fatal shooting at a business complex in Phoenix may take investigators across state lines to Santa Maria.
Sgt. Tommy Thompson with the Phoenix Police Department confirmed to NewsChannel 3 that 70-year-old Arthur Harmon shot and killed 48-year-old Steve Singer after meeting over pending litigation.
An employee at KNXV, our sister station in Phoenix, tells NewsChannel 3 that Singer was the owner of call centers in Phoenix, Nevada and in Santa Maria, including Fusion Contact Center on Stowell Rd.
According to KNXV, the lawsuit involved furniture at the Santa Maria business.
Three people were shot. Singer died at the scene and another victim remains in critical condition.
Early Thursday morning, police in Mesa, Ariz. found Harmon dead of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot.
Douglass Harmon Found Dead After Shooting Fusion Contact Center CEO
Steven D. Singer, 48, was the CEO of Fusion Contact Centers, a Scottsdale company that provides its clients with technical-support, billing, and other services. Singer, whose company is involved in litigation with a man police have identified as a “person of interest” in the shooting, had been attending a mediation session at a law firm within a Phoenix office compex.
Back in Washington, Giffords’s husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, interrupted his own testimony to break the news about the Phoenix shooting. “While we are having this hearing,” a seemingly incredulous Kelly told senators, “there is another what seems to be possibly a shooting with multiple victims.”
Meanwhile, just a few miles west of the shooting, Arizona lawmakers prepared for the first committee hearing on a proposed bill that would bar enforcement of any new federal laws restricting semiautomatic weapons and high-capacity magazines.
“These things are getting out of control,” says officer James Holmes, a spokesman for the Phoenix police. As Holmes points out, these types of shootings have been happening around the country “for years and years and years,” but recent national events have now brought them to the forefront. “We are all concerned, and because we are all concerned, anything that happens outside of a drug deal gone bad will be of national interest until we figure out what to do. The country is still crying over Sandy Hook.”
Around 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, police reported that three people had been shot in the Phoenix complex, a three-story structure home to about 10 to 15 businesses. The alleged shooter, identified as 70-year-old Arthur Douglas Harmon, had apparently gotten into an altercation in the lobby with Singer and employees of the law firm Osborn Maledon.
When police arrived, according to Holmes, the scene was chaotic. Officers had to evacuate more than 100 people and tend to the wounded, all while trying to locate a suspect.
Singer was transported to a hospital in extremely critical condition and later died. Two other gunshot victims, one a female, suffered non-life-threatening injuries. Another two received treatment related to stress.
Holmes said the shooter, who at the time was identified as a white man in his 60s, somehow escaped the police dragnet and drove off in a white car. “We have every available officer in the city working on this,” says Holmes. “We have hundreds of officers on it.”
One of the surviving victims, Mark Hummels, 43, was reportedly shot in the head and the neck after walking out of the mediation. Hummels, a former government reporter with a Santa Fe, New Mexico, newspaper, specializes in business disputes, real-estate litigation, and legal malpractice defense and is president of the Phoenix chapter of the Federal Bar Association.
“We have every available officer in the city working on this.”
Police have not revealed a motive in the case. But according to a lawsuit filed in Maricopa County, Hummels represented Fusion Contact Centers in its 2012 litigation with Harmon, a furniture refurbisher. The lawsuit centered around Harmon’s claim that he was a “victim of a scam” that “hurt and injured his health and strength” and caused “severe shock to his nervous system and person,” resulting in ongoing “mental and physical nervous pain and suffering.”
In court papers, Fusion claimed it contracted with Harmon early last year to dismantle, refurbish, and reinstall furniture in a California call center. Fusion paid Harmon over $29,000 in advance, but when Harmon inspected the furniture he claimed it could not be refurbished. Fusion canceled the deal, but by that time Harmon had moved the furniture to Arizona and was paying storage on what he called “206 worthless workstations.”
Fusion told Harmon to sell the furniture. Harmon said it wasn’t worth anything. Then Harmon sued Fusion for lost wages, damages, and storage fees. Fusion countersued for breach of contract and damages, claiming that Harmon destroyed internal cables in the call center when he dismantled the furniture.
The case was sent to arbitration, and a hearing was scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Jan. 30, the same day as the shooting.
Shortly after the shooting, Phoenix police detectives and SWAT officers descended on Harmon’s home, in a quiet middle-class neighborhood in north Phoenix, but he wasn’t home. (Attempts to call the home also went unanswered.)
Sara Hawkins, who lives about half a block away from the house, says Harmon appeared to be an amiable guy who liked to sit on his front porch and wave at neighbors. He was meticulous about his house, manicuring the lawn in front and desert landscaping on the side, she said.
However, she said, he had recently attempted some sort of remodeling, but never completed it. The unfinished construction is covered by what appears to be a tarp, she said.
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