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3PAT R I O T L E D G E R . C O M Tu e s d a y, June 15, 2010STAT E /LOCALS
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FORMER INMATES WINLAWSUIT AGAINST MASS.BOSTON – A federal judgehas given preliminaryapproval to settlement for alawsuit filed by formerinmates who were housedat a Suffolk County Jailbuilding that had no toiletsor sinks in the cells.
Inmates who were jailedat Building 4 had to seekpermission to use thebathroom during lock-inhours. The lawsuit allegesthe system was inadequateand resulted in someprisoners using containers todeposit their bodily wastes.
U.S. Magistrate JudgeRobert Collings on Mondayapproved the settlement,which requires the state topay $1.5 million. It willbenefit about 4,000 inmateswho were jailed betweenAugust 2003 and February2008.
MAN ACCUSED OF RABBITATTACKS HELD ON BAILNORTH ADAMS – A mancharged with mutilating andkilling five pet rabbits duringa break-in at a constructioncompany has been orderedheld on $25,000 cash bail.
Innocent pleas wereentered Monday on behalfof Wayne Brackett Jr. inNorthern Berkshire DistrictCourt to charges includinganimal cruelty and breakingand entering.
Police arrested the 23-year-old North Adams manon Friday after getting a tip.
EX-SCHOOL OFFICIALFINED $5,000BOSTON – A formerLawrence school official hasagreed to pay a $5,000penalty for using schoolcomputers to rununauthorized backgroundchecks on politicians,celebrities, pro athletes andothers.
The state EthicsCommission said Mondaythat the checks made byMark Rivera were not partof his official duties.
Rivera resigned last year.
DIMASI PENSION CASEDELAYED UNTIL JUNE 30BOSTON – A judge hasdelayed until June 30 ahearing on whether formerMassachusetts HouseSpeaker Salvatore DiMasishould resume getting hisstate pension as he facesfederal corruption charges.
DiMasi was not presentfor Monday’s briefproceeding in BostonMunicipal Court. The judgesaid he wants to considerwho should hear the case,since many judges hadcontact with DiMasi in hisearly career as a prosecutor.
DiMasi and threeassociates were charged lastyear in an alleged bid-rigging scheme for a statesoftware contract thatprosecutors say netted theformer speaker $57,000. Hehas denied any wrongdoing.
The state RetirementBoard suspended DiMasi’s$5,000-per-month pensionas of Nov. 1. DiMasi hasargued that denial of hispension is a violation of hisdue process rights.
– PATRIOT LEDGERNEWS SERVICES
INBRIEF. ...... Cops have app for catching criminals
New crime-fightingtool uses iPhoneBy Maureen BoyleGATEHOUSE NEWS SERVICE
BROCKTON – Officer ScottShields held up the oversizediPhone and snapped a photo.
Within seconds, that photowould match one of a man in-cluded in a test database.
It is part of a new facial recog-nition system being used by
Brockton police.The system, called MORIS
(Mobile Offender Recognitionand Identification System), al -lows officers in the field to takephotos of suspects to be com-pared with a database now beingdeveloped by sheriff depart-ments across the state.
“This is something the offi-cers can access when they areout on the road,” Police ChiefWilliam Conlon said.
He said officers can take aphoto of the suspect, upload it
into a secure network where it isa n a ly z e d, then learn, often with-in seconds, who the person is.
Conlon said the hand-heldiPhone device will likely beused by the gang unit initiallyuntil the department can getmore of the devices t h r ou g hg rants.
The device, with the applica-tions, costs $3,000 and wasmade available thanks to part ofa $200,000 federal grant fun-neled through the Massachu-setts Sheriffs Association. Only
$148,300 of that grant is beingused for the system to eventuallybe used by 28 police depart-ments and 14 sheriff depart-ments in the state.
Brockton is the first in thecountry to use the device.
Sean Mullin, president andCEO of BI2 Technologies ofPlymouth, which developed thedevice, said what makes the sys-tem unique is it uses iPhonetechnology to allow officers toidentify suspects through facialrecognition, iris biometrics and
fingerprints – all on one device.The BI2 system combines the
iris identification system it de-veloped with the facial recogni-tion system developed by Ani-metrics of Conway, N.H.
With the iris recognition, ex-pected to be added to the Brock-ton system, suspects lookthrough a binocular-like devicethat details the unique areas ofthe iris. That information is thencompared with those in adatabase.
ence upon returning home fromthe hospital.
Dr. Suniti Nimbkar, her surgi-cal oncologist, said the doublemastectomy went “very well.”She called Trisha last week totell her that the tissue removedfrom the old breasts showed nosigns of cancer. Dr. DonaldMorris, the plastic surgeon, tellsTrisha he is increasingly pleasedevery time he sees her. In threemonths, Morris will constructher nipples, then three monthslater, the tattoos to define them.
Trisha, though, still has trou-ble looking in the mirror.
“I think seeing my new bodywas such a shock,” she said. “Itlooks like a battlefield to me.”
The pain from the surgery,controlled with medication,“wa s n ’t horrible,” she said.More unpleasant, she said, wereside effects from an undiag-nosed hernia that caused rarecomplications during surger yand prolonged her hospital stay.She went into surgery May 21and returned home a week lat-e r.
Trisha finds herself exhaustedduring the day, and feels pain,sometimes sharp, in her torso.Last week, doctors removed thelast of six tubes that had beendraining built-up fluid from herbody. She will begin physicaltherapy this week, which willhelp her gradually rebuild ab-dominal strength. The doctorshave told her to expect at leastsix weeks of recovery.
“I think I did great throughthe surgery, I’m handling thepain good and I’m not com-plaining – too much,” she said.“But I know I’ve got some workahead of me.”
Trisha, who had a small butaggressive malignant tumor re-moved from her left breast in2008, has the BRCA2 gene mu-tation, which is linked to 5 to 10percent of breast cancers in theU.S. Three of her four sisters al-so battled cancer, one of whomdied from the disease last fall.One of Trisha’s two daughtershas tested positive for the gene.
A woman who has a lumpec-tomy to treat breast cancer has a5 to 7 percent chance of her can-cer recurring. For a woman withthe gene mutation, the risk is 25to 35 percent. Choosing a pro-phylactic double mastectomyreduces these risks by 90 per-cent.
Going into the surgery, Trishaput on a brave face, discussingher decision with a cheerfulbravado. Today, she has no re-grets. It has, however, been anemotional journey.
“I’m still vulnerable underthis. I’m a woman. I just lost mybreasts,” Trisha said, while sit-ting on a sectional couch in herliving room, surrounded by pil-lows and blankets.
When asked how she nowfeels, Trisha took a long pause,then tears formed, for the firsttime.
“I’m feeling ugly, but I gothrough stages of feeling uglya ny way, ” she said. “When I lookat it, it looks horrible to me, butthe surgeon says he’s so pleasedand I have faith in him when hesays it’s going to look better.”
“The decision was hard; thisis harder,” she said.
There is a story behind thecouch Trisha calls her “nest.”
Trisha bought it the day doctorstold her they needed to test herlungs for cancer, months afterher lumpectomy. Trisha said shewanted to be comfortable in hersecond battle with cancer.
“I didn’t have cancer. Butnow I have a nice couch to helpme get through this,” she saidwith a chuckle.
Trisha is comforted by beingproactive. She also hopes shar-ing her experience will raiseawareness about the options forcancer prevention.
She said she realizes not ev-eryone would choose such apublic, emotional journey. Buttelling her story has helped herremain strong, she said.
“I’m glad I’ve done it,” shesaid. “We started a story 10months ago. The story is notover. I’m not done, I don’t thinkthe Swanson sisters are done.”
Jennifer Mann may bereached at [email protected].
Recovery begins for Trisha
GREG DERR/THE PATRIOT LEDGER� Trisha Swanson Bergeron fixes her hair, as she tries to get herlife back to normal following a voluntary double mastectomy.
TRISHA/FROM PAGE 1
Three-car crash on Route 3PATRIOT LEDGER STAFF
HINGHAM – Traffic onRoute 3 was slowed to a crawlshortly before 6 a.m. todaywhen a car going south crossedthe median and slammed intotwo cars going north, State Po-lice said. The accident hap-pened just south of the DerbyStreet exit in Hingham.
Amanda Milano, 34, ofQuincy, who was driving the2002 Chevrolet Trailblazer thatcrossed the median, com -plained of a head injury at the
scene, but it was unclearwhether she was going to betaken to a hospital, State PoliceSgt. Kenneth Long said.
The two other drivers did notappear to be injured.
Long said Milano would becited for driving to endanger,driving after her license had beensuspended and driving an unin-sured and unregistered vehicle.
Drivers going north were re-stricted to the breakdown lanefor about 30 minutes while vehi-cles and debris were removedfrom the road, State Police said.
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