Accused witch burned alive in Papua New Guinea

PORT MORESBY, Papua New Guinea -- Assailants stripped, tortured and bound a woman accused of witchcraft, then burned her alive in front of hundreds of witnesses in a Papua New Guinea town, police said Friday after one of the highest profile sorcery-related murders in this South Pacific island nation.

Some of the hundreds of bystanders took photographs of Wednesday's brutal slaying. Grisly pictures were published on the front pages of the country's biggest circulating newspapers, The National and Post-Courier. The prime minister, police and diplomats condemned the killing

Kepari Leniata, a 20-year-old who had a child, had been accused of sorcery by relatives of a 6-year-old boy who died in the hospital the day before, police spokesman Dominic Kakas said.

She was tortured with a hot iron rod, bound, doused in gasoline, then set alight on a pile of car tires and trash in the Western Highlands provincial capital of Mount Hagen, Kakas said.

"Investigations are continuing. We've got good leads. The husband is the prime suspect," Kakas said.

Sorcery has traditionally been countered by sorcery in Papuan New Guinean culture. But responses to sorcery allegations have become increasingly violent in recent years.

Kakas said the death was the first the sorcery-related murder in Papua New Guinea in a year.

Police Commissioner Tom Kulunga described the murder as "shocking and devilish."

"We are in the 21st century and this is totally unacceptable," Commissioner Kulunga said in a statement.

He suggested courts be established to deal with sorcery allegations, as an alternative to villagers dispensing justice.

Prime Minister Pete O'Neill said he had instructed police to use all available manpower to bring the killers to justice.

"It is reprehensible that women, the old and the weak in our society should be targeted for alleged sorcery or wrongs that they actually have nothing to do with," O'Neill said.

The U.S. Embassy in the national capital Port Moresby issued a statement calling for a sustained international partnership to enhance anti-gender-based violence laws throughout the Pacific.

The embassy of Australia, Papua New Guinea's colonial ruler until independence in 1975 and now its biggest foreign aid donor, said "We join ... all reasonable Papua New Guineans in looking forward to the perpetrators being brought to justice."

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Greenberg Traurig shuffles leadership

Law firm Greenberg Traurig on Tuesday announced a new management lineup that includes naming Hilarie Bass as the first female president in the firm’s history.

Bass, one of the firm’s Miami shareholders, most recently had been global operating shareholder. She will share the presidency with Brian L. Duffy, a Denver shareholder who has been global litigation chair, a position previously held by Bass.

As part of the shuffle, Miami shareholders Cesar L. Alvarez and Matt Gorson move to co-chairs and Larry Hoffman becomes founding chair. Alvarez previously served as executive chair, Gorson as president and Hoffman as chair.

These were just some of the new leadership changes announced by Greenberg’s Chief Executive Richard A. Rosenbaum. The firm began a leadership transition plan in 2010 when Rosenbaum took over the helm of the firm that today includes about 1,750 attorneys in 35 offices in the United States, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

“We are pleased to have so many talented leaders and performers, not just those with titles,” Rosenbaum said in a statement. “We have never been about titles or politics, and titles do not create leaders. We and others already in place in our regions, offices and practices form a seamless team focused on respecting and serving our clients and lawyers.”

Rosenbaum, who will remain in his post, also announced four new vice presidents:

• Ernest Greer, Managing Shareholder of the firm’s Atlanta office.

• Brad Kaufman, Co-Chair of the National Securities Litigation Practice, leader of the firm’s Associate Development Program and a Palm Beach County shareholder.

• Patricia Menendez-Cambo, Chair of the Global Practice, Co-Chair of the Infrastructure and Project Finance Practice and a Miami shareholder.

• Keith Shapiro, Chair of the Chicago office and Co-Chair of the Business Reorganization Practice.

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Judge angered after learning mentally ill Miami man was placed in assisted living facility, and escaped

After Cristobal Abreu was arrested for stabbing a Hialeah SWAT officer with a large BBQ fork in December 2009, doctors deemed his mind too ravaged by mental illness to stand trial.

For years, he bounced around mental health facilities.

Then a stay at a Miami Gardens assisted living facility, where funds for his medications ran out and his mental state deteriorated, ended last month when the 72-year-old Abreu was shipped without a judge’s permission to Jackson North Medical Center.

Then last week, a Jackson case worker — again, without permission from the court — sent him to an ALF in Little Havana. He promptly escaped.

“I’m free! I’m free,” Abreu yelled as he shuffled away from the San Martin de Porras facility Tuesday, according to lawyers and court personnel who aired the episode over two days in court this week.

Abreu’s ping-ponging treatment has drawn the ire of Circuit Judge Ellen Sue Venzer, who has now ordered hospital and state-contracted mental health administrators to court Friday to explain what happened.

“The system is broken,” Venzer said angrily in court this week, adding: “What would have happened if Mr. Abreu had decompensated and gone out and hurt somebody else in our community?”

Abreu’s escape was short-lived: police quickly detained him, committing him back to Jackson Memorial Hospital for an involuntary psychiatric evaluation.

The unusual episode underscores what mental health advocates in Miami-Dade’s criminal justice system say has been a reoccurring problem: “incompetent” defendants are often shuffled between facilities without the knowledge of the court tasked with supervising them.

ALFs mostly house the elderly and others with mental health issues or disabilities. It is not unusual for incompetent defendants, usually non-violent ones, to be placed at an ALF in a residential neighborhood.

“The people in the social services arena have to recognize that a court-order is sacrosanct,” Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said Wednesday. “I really understand the judge’s ire. She has the absolute right to be livid with everyone in the system.”

Subpoenaed to appear before the judge on Friday: Representatives from Jackson, the South Florida Behavioral Network, which contracts with the state to manage cases of the mentally ill defendants, and New Horizons Community Mental Health Center, which monitored Abreu’s case.

A lawyer for the Florida Department of Children and Families will also appear.

“It sounds like all these different agencies are treating these individuals like hot potatoes,” Venzer said in court Wednesday.

Abreu was initially arrested in December 2009 for attempted murder and aggravated battery of a law enforcement officer. The attempted charge was later dropped; the SWAT officer was not hurt because the knife pierced his shield.

During a jailhouse interview with a psychologist, the incoherent Abreu admitted that he sometimes hears voices and see visions of “flowers [and] gold diamonds.”

The court determined that Abreu was “incompetent” to proceed to trial, meaning he could not assist his lawyer in defending the accusations.

After stays in several other facilities, Abreu wound up at the Graceful Gardens ALF, 18101 NW 47th Ct., in November.

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Justin Timberlake Reveals New Album Cover for 20 20 Experience

We're one step closer to The 20/20 Experience!

Justin Timberlake just dropped a major treat for his fans on Twitter, revealing the cover art and tracklisting to his upcoming solo album, The 20/20 Experience.

"I wanted you guys to see this first!!!," wrote Timberlake with a link to the cover (featuring the singer dressed to the nines behind a phoropter) and song titles.

Pics: Justin & Jessica's Long Road to the Altar

Check out the full tracklisting below:

-Pusher Love Girl

-Suit & Tie

-Don't Hold The Wall

-Strawberry Bubblegum

-Tunnel Vision

-Spaceship Coupe

-That Girl
Let The Groove Get In

-Mirrors

-Blue Ocean Floor

The 20/20 Experience hits stores on March 19.

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Mayor Mike’s morning after

Mayor Bloomberg doesn’t seem to realize it, but he’s handing his opponents a weapon to undermine his biggest policy triumph — mayoral control of the public schools.

In an exclusive last Sunday, The Post reported that the mayor’s Health Department is running wild, distributing the controversial “Plan B” morning-after pill to city schoolchildren without many parents even knowing it.

“I’m in shock,” Mona Davids of the NYC Parents Union told The Post. “What gives the mayor the right to decide, without adequate notice, to give our children drugs that will impact their bodies and their psyches? He has purposely kept the public and parents in the dark with his agenda.”

REUTERS

Michael Bloomberg

The evidence supports her charges. In September, the city suggested this was a relatively small program limited to 13 high schools and 567 girls who were receiving Plan B. Yet as The Post’s Susan Edelman found, that barely scratches the surface.

Far from being limited to 13 schools, the program involves 40 separate “school-based health centers.” Last year, these centers handed out 12,721 doses of Plan B — up from 10,720 in 2010-11 and more than double the 5,039 doses given out in 2009-10.

That the city is concerned about teen pregnancy is fine. And state law allows minors to get contraceptives without parental consent. But that doesn’t absolve the city of its obligation to be forthcoming to moms and dads about the medications its “health centers” are offering their daughters.

Plan B is the kind of issue that raises passions on all sides. For that reason alone, the city never should have allowed this program to be imposed by fiat by one of the least accountable of the many un-elected bureaucracies: the Department of Health.

This is an issue that cries out for the people’s elected legislators to decide, acting in the open, after all sides have had a chance to make their concerns heard.

Instead, the city took the imperial approach: Officials refused even to talk to The Post about the program.

If that’s the city’s position, the mayor shouldn’t be surprised if, the morning after he’s gone, his hard-fought win on mayoral control is reversed on the grounds that it shuts parents out of key decisions involving their children.

Have an opinion on this Post editorial? Send it in to LETTERS@NYPOST.COM!

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FMLA still helping families cope with illness

When I gave birth to my daughter, I returned home with a squirmy little bundle and immediately felt overwhelmed. Though I was exhausted from changing diapers and waking for feedings, I was thankful that my job was secure.

In our struggle to balance our family lives and our work lives, one law has made a giant difference for me and 35 million other American workers — the Family Medical Leave Act.

This week, the FMLA celebrates its 20th year in existence. It’s been a godsend for those of us who want time to bond with our newborn, care for an aging parent or deal with a health emergency without the fear of losing our jobs.

But two decades after President Bill Clinton signed the FMLA into law, advocates say they still have unfinished business.

“It was meant to be a first step toward a family-friendly American workplace. But it is 20 years and we haven’t gotten to the second step,” says Judith Lichtman, senior advisor to the National Partnership for Women & Families and an original advocate for passage of FMLA.

In many ways, the FMLA has been even more helpful to working families than expected. The law initially was conceived to allow working mothers like me to take time off for childbirth and post-maternity.

But over 20 years, it has been used 100 million times by all types of workers — about 40 percent of them men.

The FMLA has provided time off for women who needed medical care during difficult pregnancies, fathers who took time to care for children fighting cancer, adult sons and daughters caring for frail parents and workers taking time to recover from their own serious illnesses.

The federal law says we can take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave if we work at a company with more than 50 employees, with a caveat that we must be employed there for a year. The big benefit is that our jobs are protected during that leave.

During the recession, the job security and the continuation of health insurance that FMLA guarantees proved particularly important.

Debbie Winkles, senior VP/director of human resources at Great Florida Bank in Miami Lakes, used FMLA three years ago when she needed to care for her husband who was battling cancer. Today, Winkles has male and female bank employees who are using FMLA to care for their newborns or to cope with illness.

Her company has created an easy spreadsheet system to track its employees’ FMLA leave. “With today’s health issues, so many people diagnosed with cancer are having chemotherapy, and employees need medical leave for themselves or a family member.”

In Wisconsin, Jill Delie is using FMLA to manage a chronic disease by taking a few days off each month for doctors appointments. In Maine, Vivian Mikhail used FMLA to care for her daughter, Nadia, when the little girl was diagnosed with an autoimmune condition that left her completely deaf.

Just this week, a longtime friend of mine told me how fortunate she feels to be able to take FMLA to spend time with her mother who has incurable lung cancer. “I don’t want to lose my job, but I can’t imagine not being there for her when she needs me,” my friend sighed.

Yet for all the benefit, FMLA doesn’t guarantee wages while workers are on leave, a component advocates had planned as a second step. According to a Department of Labor study, 78 percent of workers who needed FMLA leave did not use it because they could not afford to take unpaid leave. Proposed federal legislation would expand eligibility and introduce a paid family-leave insurance program. Funded through a small payroll tax, the program would provide two-thirds of an employee’s wages for up to 12 weeks of leave.

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6 Miami-Dade cops fired or suspended for loafing

A Miami-Dade police sergeant and two officers have been fired, and three others have been suspended, capping a two-year investigation into accusations that they ignored emergency calls, filed false police reports and lied about calls they handled, Miami-Dade police spokeswoman Nancy Perez said Tuesday.

The Miami-Dade Internal Affairs Bureau launched the investigation into the Kendall District police squad in 2010. The discharged officers are fighting to get their jobs back.

The officers — who worked the 2-to-10 p.m. shift — were followed, captured on video and tracked with GPS devices. More than 130 violations of department policy were documented.

Fired were Sgt. Jennifer Gonzalez and officers Dario Socarras and Jose Huerta. The other three — officers Jeffrey Price, Fabian Owens and Ivan Tomas — were suspended without pay in September and are back on the job.

Gonzalez was caught shopping, loading purchases into her patrol car and visiting her parents — all while on duty — according to CBS 4’s Jim Defede, who first reported the investigation and its outcome. Socarras ignored emergency calls, including a robbery, instead having a romantic rendezvous with his girlfriend at the Dadeland Mall.

A video captures him making out with the woman while in uniform. He also ignored a call involving a 5-year-old boy who was unconscious and locked inside a car, telling dispatchers he was on his way when, in fact, he was having a cup of coffee with Gonzalez and Huerta, who also ignored the emergency call.

The child was tended to by paramedics.

Price, Owens and Tomas were given suspensions of from five to 20 hours without pay. They, too, ignored a number of emergency calls.

Although police internal affairs investigations of individual officers are not uncommon in an agency as large as the Miami-Dade Police Department, a probe of an entire squad is unusual.

The boundaries of the Kendall District are Bird Road to the north, Coral Reef Drive to the south, Biscayne Bay on the east and Florida’s Turnpike on the west.

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Jessica Chastain Reveals Her Oscars Date Will Be Her Grandmother

Who will arrive arm-in-arm with Jessica Chastain on Oscar Sunday?

The 35-year-old beauty, who is nominated for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her work in Zero Dark Thirty, tells ET she plans to bring a very special date to Hollywood's biggest night!

"I'm going to take my grandmother to the Oscars," beamed Jessica at The Hollywood Reporter's award season bash at Spago in Los Angeles on Monday. "We did that last year and it was one of my favorite days of my life."

Pics: Fierce Fashions at the Oscar Luncheon

The star, along with many of her fellow nominees that morning, came straight to the festivities after attending the Academy's annual Oscar luncheon.

Amy Adams, who is no stranger to attending the star-studded class photo, opened up to ET about the experience which she still feels is a bit surreal.

"Just to be on the bleachers with everybody and to hear everyone's name called, it's always overwhelming to realize the company you're in," said Amy.

Like Jessica, The Master star is mixing it up, as far as her dates go, during the award show hoopla.

Related: Five Things You Don't Know About Jessica Chastain

"I'm bringing my friends," disclosed Amy. "My fiance's been taking some time off-- he's working on an art show he's doing-- so it's fun to infuse some new energy into it."

For more with this year's Oscar nominees, click the video above!

Visit ETonline for complete Oscar coverage Sunday, February 24 as the 85th Annual Academy Awards, hosted by Seth MacFarlane, airs live from the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center in Los Angeles.

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Sad Muslim summit

Amir Taheri

Cairo - ‘May Allah protect believers against fear!” This is one of the slogans that greet visitors arriving at Cairo Airport for the Islamic summit set to open here today.

Yet, in a sign that Allah’s protection may not be quite enough, the Egyptian hosts have moved the summit’s venue from the old Palace of Conferences to a new luxury hotel near the airport.

Heads of state from 26 countries are expected to attend the summit of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, along with senior officials from 50 other Muslim-majority nations across the globe.

The venue change came after police said they might be unable to prevent anti-government demonstrators from laying siege to the “palace.”

For weeks, the government of Egyptian President Mohammad Morsi has been shaken by mass protests in Cairo and half a dozen other cities, with army chief Gen. Abdul-Fattah al-Sissi warning that the Egyptian state may face “total collapse.”

Al-Sissi’s melodramatic statement, posted on his Facebook page, may well be exaggerated, yet it’s clear that Morsi has lost a good part of the goodwill he had earned on his election last year.

The summit was supposed to come to Cairo back in 2011, while President Hosni Mubarak was still in charge. It was scrapped when the Arab Spring swept Mubarak away, paving the way for Islamist takeover under the Muslim Brotherhood with Morsi as president.

Morsi had hoped to use the summit to launch Egypt’s bid for the leadership of the Muslim world. But the demonstrations will make it hard to market his “Egyptian way,” which is supposedly midway between Turkey’s secular system and Iran’s theocratic setup.

Traditionally, Iran, Turkey and Egypt have been the main contenders for leadership in the so-called Muslim world. That rivalry was in abeyance for much of the 20th century, under secular regimes in all three countries.

Now, however, all three nations are back in the Islamic fold. Turkey is governed by a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. Iran is run by mullahs, while Egypt has fallen under Brotherhood rule for the first time.

Yet all three countries are experiencing rough patches. On top of Egypt’s turmoil, Turkey’s “economic miracle” is fizzling out, while Iran is heading for a deep political crisis ahead of its presidential elections in June.

So some look to Saudi Arabia, the traditional dark horse in the race for Islamic leadership. But the Saudis, under aging leadership, may lack the political energy needed to promote a leadership claim.

Still, checkbook diplomacy has secured Saudi Arabia numerous allies in the Muslim world, notably Pakistan and several nations in sub-Saharan Africa. And the kingdom also hosts and finances the OIC’s headquarters in Jeddah.

Iran will be represented by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in his last major diplomatic appearance before his term ends in June. He has vowed to force the summit to “focus on the Palestinian issue” and relieve pressure on President Bashar al-Assad in Syria, where the bloody civil war continues.

But Egyptian sources tell me Ahmadinejad is likely to fail on both scores. Assad has been excluded from the summit, and Morsi has insisted that there should be no attempt at fomenting trouble between Egypt and Israel.

Plus, Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyib Erdogan is slated to promote a new initiative on Syria that could include the use of force to protect a number of safe havens for victims of Assad’s campaign of repression.

With the leading powers all distracted and at odds, the summit may seek some “safe” issue to offer a veneer of unity. The group’s retiring secretary-general, Turkish diplomat Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, offers “the threat of disintegration” of a number of Muslim-majority countries in Africa, where non-Muslim communities feel threatened by the rise of ideological Islam. The secession of South Sudan from Muslim-dominated Sudan, he says, sets “a dangerous example” that others in Africa may follow.

Condemning the shrinkage of the Muslim world may well be all that the leaders of the Muslim world can agree upon.

Have a comment on this PostOpinion column? Send it in to LETTERS@NYPOST.COM!

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Register for our free Business Plan Bootcamp

Whether you are planning to enter the Miami Herald Business Plan Challenge or want to refine a short business plan you already have, our free Business Plan Bootcamp later this month can help.

Melissa Krinzman, a veteran Business Plan Challenge judge and managing director of Venture Architects, will be leading a panel of experts who will give you advice on crafting a short business plan aimed at grabbing the attention of investors — or judges. If you are entering the Challenge, we encourage you to bring your entry with you because the panel will critique critical sections of the short plan.

Panelists include:

•  Richard Ginsburg, co-founder of G3 Capital Partners, a mid-market and early stage investment company.

•  Steven McKean, founder and CEO of Acceller, a Miami-based tech company, and a Challenge judge.

•  Mike Tomas, CEO of Miami-based Bioheart, president of ASTRI Group and a Challenge judge.

Time, date, place: 6:30 p.m. Feb. 26, Miami Dade College, Wolfson Campus Auditorium (Room 1261, Building 1, 2nd floor).

To register: It’s free, but please register here.

You do not have to enter the Challenge to attend our free boot camp, but we hope you will. The Challenge deadline is March 11.

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