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KNOXVILLE — A judge said today he has no authority to make public the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation's file on former judge Richard Baumgartner. "This court has no authority whatsoever to decide on its own, 'I'm going to let the public see this file,'" Special Judge John Kerry Blackwood said at a specially-called hearing in Knox County Criminal Court. Blackwood said the portions of the file not made public contain phone records and recorded conversations in which Baumgartner discusses sex with two women and makes "crude remarks" about people. "What you're not going to find (in the TBI file) is...

Gabrielle Giffords is nowhere close to returning to Congress. And there remains real doubt about whether she ever will. That appears to be the bottom line of an article Thursday in the Arizona Republic that provides the most complete assessment yet of the wounded congresswoman’s current condition. Giffords was shot in the head by a gunman in Tucson in January. Now, six months later, she still struggles mightily to communicate, although her staff believes her comprehension skills are strong. And it remains unclear just how much damage her brain has suffered. Asked for a blunt description of Giffords’ condition, her...

John Huff/Staff photographer Rochester residents Ellen Edgerly, left, and her daughter Sara. ROCHESTER — A few years back, hundreds of bikers gathered in Representatives Hall in Concord to protest a proposed helmet law. Ellen Edgerly, 51, an advocate with the state's Brain Injury Association, was sitting in the middle of the room, a lone voice in a sea of leather and wild beards, when a lawmaker asked if anyone supported the change. "She stood up, passed all of these tough guys, and testified about brain injury and what it means," says Steven Wade, the association's executive director. "It took...

Enlarge Image Get the progesterone! Administering a female hormone shortly after an accident could help prevent brain injury. Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Hendrike SAN DIEGO—The hormone progesterone is best known for its work in the female reproductive system, where it plays various roles in supporting pregnancy. But starting next month, it will be the focus of a phase III clinical trial for traumatic brain injury (TBI). Researchers hope an infusion of progesterone given within a few hours of a car accident or other trauma will help prevent brain damage, said the trial’s principal investigator, David Wright of Emory University...

PHILADELPHIA — The Army plans to require that all 1.1 million of its soldiers take intensive training in emotional resiliency, military officials say. The training, the first of its kind in the military, is meant to improve performance in combat and head off the mental health problems, including depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and suicide, that plague about one-fifth of troops returning from Afghanistan and Iraq. Active-duty soldiers, reservists and members of the National Guard will receive the training, which will also be available to their family members and to civilian employees. The new program is to be introduced at two...

No direct impact caused Paul McQuigg’s brain injury in Iraq three years ago. And no wound from the incident visibly explains why Mr. McQuigg, now an office manager at a California Marine base, can get lost in his own neighborhood or arrive at the grocery store having forgotten why he left home. But his blast injury — concussive brain trauma caused by an explosion’s invisible force waves — is no less real to him than a missing limb is to other veterans. Just how real could become clearer after he dies, when doctors slice up his brain to examine any...

The consequences of mild traumatic brain injury are often anything but mild. Recent studies linking concussion to long-term neurologic deficits suggest that, for some individuals, the characteristic transient brain dysfunction and acute symptom resolution represent the beginning of potentially irreversible structural and functional brain alterations. “Traumatic brain injury occurs as a spectrum disorder. The term 'mild' describes only the initial insult relative to the degree of neurological severity. There may be no correlation with the degree of short- or long-term impairment or functional disability,” said Dr. Nathan Zasler of the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, and medical director of the Concussion...

As a combat engineer in Iraq, Jeremy was supposed to find roadside bombs. They found him instead. Within 72 hours of each other, two improvised explosive devices (IEDs) went off within 15 feet of this father in his late 20s. The first set of blast waves, a moving wall of highly compressed air that emanates from an explosion, knocked him out briefly. The second left him dazed for about 30 minutes and produced ringing in his ears that disappeared within a week. These detonations did not visibly injure Jeremy (not his real name)—but he was never the same.

Former Staff Sgt. Kevin Owsley is not quite sure what rattled his brain in 2004: the roadside bomb that exploded about a yard from his Humvee or the rocket-propelled grenade that flung him across a road as he walked to a Porta Potti on base six weeks later. After each attack, he did what so many soldiers do in Iraq. He shrugged off his ailments — headaches, dizzy spells, persistent ringing in his ears and numbness in his right arm — chalking them up to fatigue or dehydration. Given that he never lost consciousness, he figured the discomfort would work...

AP Medical Writer Traumatic brain injury, described as the signature wound of the Iraq war, may be less to blame for soldiers' symptoms than doctors once thought, contends a provocative military study that suggests post-traumatic stress and depression often play a role. That would be good news because there are successful treatments for those conditions, said several nonmilitary doctors who praised the research. Thousands of soldiers returning from Iraq have struggled with memory loss, irritability, trouble sleeping and other problems. Many have suffered mild blast-related concussions, but there is no easy way to separate which symptoms are due to physical...

Associated Press LONDON - The British government is conducting a survey of its soldiers to determine if those exposed to powerful explosions in Iraq and Afghanistan have suffered mild traumatic brain injuries, the Ministry of Defense said Saturday. The ministry said it has begun distributing questionnaires to British troops in both countries as part of a self-assessment program to see if they have symptoms such as memory loss, depression and anxiety. The Guardian newspaper, which first reported the survey, said it followed concerns within the U.S. Army that up to 20 percent of its returning soldiers and Marines were suffering...

FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. (AP) - Before they leave for Iraq, thousands of troops with the 101st Airborne Division line up at laptop computers to take a test: basic math, matching numbers and symbols, and identifying patterns. They press a button quickly to measure response time. It's all part of a fledgling Army program that records how soldiers' brains work when healthy, giving doctors baseline data to help diagnose and treat them if they come back with a traumatic brain injury - the signature injury of the Iraq war....

The war in Iraq is not over, but one legacy is already here in this city and others across America: an epidemic of brain-damaged soldiers. Thousands of troops have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury, or TBI. These blast-caused head injuries are so different from the ones doctors are used to seeing from falls and car crashes that treating them is as much faith as it is science. "I've been in the field for 20-plus years dealing with TBI. I have a very experienced staff. And they're saying to me, 'We're seeing things we've never seen before,'" said Sandy Schneider,...

With a hidden video camera rolling, Memphis City Councilman Edmund Ford allegedly pocketed a $1,900 payoff from a government informant in October, then promised results. "I'll drum up seven (votes) or make somebody walk out." That was among allegations levied Thursday against council members Ford and Rickey Peete, who were arrested by FBI agents on federal bribery charges accusing them of accepting thousands of dollars from an informant in exchange for their votes. In the second major local public corruption investigation in two years, authorities say secret audio and video recordings show the pair received cash payments -- $12,000 for...

Just a quick taste of this "quality" citizen of the NFL community ... 10/2003: Jones was sentenced to one year in jail following a bar fight while he was a student at West Virginia University, but the sentence was suspended and he was placed on two years probation. His probation was scheduled to end on Thursday. 4/27/05: Adam "Pacman" Jones was at Club Blaze in Conley, Ga., around 3 a.m. ET on April 27 when officers responded to a fight involving two women. Andrea Akins, a supervisor at the club, told police she was punched in the mouth by a...

FORMER TENNESSEE COUNTY SHERIFF’S DEPUTY SENTENCED FOR PLOT TO STEAL CASH FROM MOTORIST WASHINGTON, D.C.-The Justice Department today announced that a former Tennessee County Sheriff’s Deputy was sentenced to over four years in prison for conspiring in a plot to steal $35,000 from a motorist driving through Hardeman County, Tennessee. U.S. District Court Judge James D. Todd, for the Western District of Tennessee, also sentenced the defendant to two years probation. Tracey Jones, a former County Sheriff’s Deputy for Hardeman County, Tennessee, was indicted in 2003 on charges he violated the civil rights of a motorist by engaging in...

Officer charged in Texas drug haul By Tom Bailey Jr. January 24, 2004 A brand-new traffic law in Texas led to drug charg es Friday against a Memphis police officer. Terrance A. King, who patrols on the 5 p.m.-to-1 a.m. shift for the North Precinct, was released on $50,000 bond Friday morning from the Bi-State Justice Center Jail in Texarkana, Texas. The 39-year-old officer was charged Friday in state court with possession of 100 pounds of marijuana and possession of 2.2 pounds of cocaine. The arrest started with a Texas traffic law that took effect Sept. 1: If you pass...

Property room theft easily turned routine By Erin Sullivan January 25, 2004 He was wearing a baseball cap, leaning against his green pickup truck in the driveway in front of his house, on a street where all of the houses look the same. It was Friday afternoon on Cordova Club Drive in a neighborhood of quarter-million dollar homes, varying slightly in shades of brick veneer and shutters, neatly wrapped around a golf course. A woman was walking her two Shih Tzus on the sidewalk. Another woman was power walking with a cell phone pressed to her ear. He saw a...

Larry Wallace Is Surprise Choice For Police Chief Former TBI Director Had Been Hired To Help Pick Dotson Replacement posted January 13, 2004 Former TBI Director Larry Wallace is the surprise choice of Mayor Bob Corker as the next Chattanooga Police chief. Mayor Corker said at a press conference late Tuesday morning that he would be recommending Mr. Wallace to the City Council at their 3 p.m. meeting today. Mr. Wallace had been hired by the mayor as a consultant to help pick the new police chief. He replaces Jimmie Dotson, who is stepping down at the end of the...

Chattanooga mayor backs consultant as police chiefBy Bill Poovey, The Associated PressJanuary 14, 2004CHATTANOOGA - Former Tennessee Bureau of Investigation director Larry Wallace, hired as a consultant in the city's search for a police chief, will get the job himself if the City Council approves, Mayor Bob Corker said Tuesday. Wallace, 59, said at a City Hall press conference that he was ready to begin work in the $118,500-a-year job as successor to the resigning chief, Jimmie Dotson, if the council approved the mayor's recommendation. Two council members who attended the press conference declined to say if they were ready...