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Couple charged with kidnapping, torture and child abuse of shackled teen...

A California Girl Scout leader and her husband were arrested after an emaciated, terrified and nearly naked 17-year-old showed up at a gym with a chain locked to his ankle, saying he had just fled his captors, authorities said. MSNBC News story here

The boy, who authorities said ran away from a Sacramento foster home last year, came into the In-Shape Sports Club in Tracy on Monday wearing only boxer briefs and covered in what appeared to be soot, gym manager Chuck Ellis said. Tracy is about 70 miles south of Sacramento.

Police arrested Kelly Layne Lau, 30, and Michael Schumacher, 34, late Monday after questioning the couple. A subsequent search of their nearby home found further evidence implicating them, Tracy police spokesman Matt Robinson said.

They were booked on charges of torture, kidnapping and child abuse, and were set to appear in court Thursday, according to online jail records. The couple were being held at San Joaquin County jail on bail of nearly $1.2 million each; county prosecutors did not know if the couple had hired attorneys.

Lau and Schumacher's four young children, two of whom were home when police arrived, have been placed with Child Protective Services, authorities said.

Lau started serving as a local Girl Scout leader sometime in September, after a background check turned up nothing to cause concern, said Pam Saltenberger, chief executive of Girl Scouts Heart of Central California.

Caren Ramirez, believed to be the boy's aunt, is the third suspect arrested in the alleged assault against the teen. Ramirez, 43, was arrested Tuesday night after police received a tip she was in the San Francisco suburb of Berkeley, said Tracy police spokesman Matt Robinson. AP News story here Tracy is about 60 miles east of San Francisco.

Ramirez had become the teen's guardian after child-welfare officials took him from his abusive father three or four years ago, police have said. After Ramirez was arrested for allegedly abusing the boy, he was placed in another foster home, which he fled in late 2007, police said.

Study claims 1 In 5 young adults has mental health problem...

Almost one in five young American adults has a personality disorder that interferes with everyday life, and even more abuse alcohol or drugs, researchers reported Monday in the most extensive study of its kind. CBS News story here

The disorders include problems such as obsessive or compulsive tendencies and anti-social behavior that can sometimes lead to violence.

The study also found that fewer than 25 percent of college-aged Americans with mental problems get treatment.

One expert said personality disorders may be overdiagnosed. But others said the results were not surprising since previous, less rigorous evidence has suggested mental problems are common on college campuses and elsewhere.

Experts praised the study's scope–face-to-face interviews about numerous disorders with more than 5,000 young people ages 19 to 25–and said it spotlights a problem college administrators need to address.

Study co-author Dr. Mark Olfson of Columbia University and New York State Psychiatric Institute called the widespread lack of treatment particularly worrisome. He said it should alert not only "students and parents, but also deans and people who run college mental health services about the need to extend access to treatment."

Counting substance abuse, the study found that nearly half of young people surveyed have some sort of psychiatric condition, including students and non-students.

Personality disorders were the second most common problem behind drug or alcohol abuse as a single category. The disorders include obsessive, anti-social and paranoid behaviors that are not mere quirks but actually interfere with ordinary functioning.

The study authors noted that recent tragedies such as fatal shootings at Northern Illinois University and Virginia Tech have raised awareness about the prevalence of mental illness on college campuses.

They also suggest that this age group might be particularly vulnerable.

In other news...

A Missouri mother on trial in a landmark cyberbullying case was convicted of only three minor offenses for her role in a mean-spirited Internet hoax that apparently drove a 13-year-old girl to suicide. Fox News story here The federal jury could not reach a verdict on the main charge against 49-year-old Lori Drew–conspiracy–and rejected three other felony counts of accessing computers without authorization to inflict emotional harm. Instead, the panel found Drew guilty of three misdemeanor offenses of accessing computers without authorization. Each count is punishable by up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine. Drew could have gotten 20 years if convicted of the four original charges. Tina Meier, the mother of the dead girl, said Drew deserves the maximum of three years behind bars. "It's not about vengeance; it's about justice," she said. Prosecutors said Drew and two others created a fictitious 16-year-old boy on MySpace and sent flirtatious messages from him to teenage neighbor Megan Meier. The "boy" then dumped Megan in 2006, saying, "The world would be a better place without you." Megan promptly hanged herself with a belt in her bedroom closet. Prosecutors said Drew wanted to humiliate Megan for saying mean things about Drew's teenage daughter. They said Drew knew Megan suffered from depression and was emotionally fragile. See vol5_iss76 and vol6_iss38. Megan's mother, Tina Meier, said in a telephone interview that she'll ask at sentencing that Drew serve the maximum penalty, three years in prison and a $300,000 fine. MSNBC News story here She said she's grateful that federal prosecutors in California filed charges after Missouri officials did not. MySpace, a social networking service, has computer servers in California. She believes the verdict against Drew will lead to more action to prevent, and prosecute, bullying and harassment. "We all have to be able to understand if you do something wrong, you have to face the consequences," Meier said.

Prosecutors have offered a plea deal to an 8-year-old boy charged with murder in the shooting deaths of his father and another man in their Arizona home. KPHO News story here Complete details of the offer aren't spelled out in a court filing posted on the Apache County Superior Court's Web site on Saturday. But Apache County Attorney Chriss Candelaria writes that he has "tendered a plea offer to the juvenile's attorneys that would resolve all the charges in the juvenile court contingent on the results of the mental health evaluations." CBS 5 News spoke with one of the boy's attorneys who said they're not making any decisions or statements about the plea offer until those mental evaluations come back. Candelaria was responding to a defense motion seeking to block him from dropping one of two first-degree murder charges the boy is facing for the November 5th shooting deaths of his father, 29-year-old Vincent Romero, and 39-year-old Timothy Romans. His grandmother told police that if any 8-year-old was capable of the crimes, it was him. Police reports say the boy told a state Child Protective Services worker that his 1,000th spanking would be his last. See more at vol6_iss74.

American teenagers lie, steal and cheat more at "alarming rates," a study of nearly 30,000 high school students concluded. Breitbart.com article here The attitudes and conduct of some 29,760 high school students across the United States "doesn't bode well for the future when these youngsters become the next generation's politicians and parents, cops and corporate executives, and journalists and generals," the non-profit Josephson Institute said. In its 2008 Report Card on the Ethics of American Youth charactercounts.org/reportcard, the Los Angeles-based organization said the teenagers' responses to questions about lying, stealing and cheating "reveals entrenched habits of dishonesty for the workforce of the future." Boys were found to lie and steal more than girls. Overall, 30 percent of students admitted to stealing from a store within the past year, a two percent rise from 2006. More than one third of boys (35 percent) said they had stolen goods, compared to 26 percent of girls. An overwhelming majority, 83 percent, of public school and private religious school students admitted to lying to their parents about something significant, compared to 78 percent for those attending independent non-religious schools. "Cheating in school continues to be rampant and it's getting worse," the study found. Amongst those surveyed, 64 percent said they had cheated on a test, compared to 60 percent in 2006. And 38 percent said they had done so two or more times.

A Pennsylvania woman was sentenced Tuesday to 5½ to 12 years in state prison for prostituting her 11-year-old son to a woman twice the boy's age. Intelligencer Journal story here The 35-year-old mother took money from a York woman daily in exchange for sexual trysts with her son from August 2005 to December 2005. Lancaster County Judge Jeffery Wright scolded the mother for putting her drug addiction before "the safety of (her) own son." "This was a crime of abuse and betrayal," Wright said. The judge appeared irked by the mother's claim of innocence and her wishes to regain custody of her son. Wright called it an "utter lack of remorse." "I can assure you that your son will be over the age of 18 before you have the opportunity" to regain custody, Wright told the woman.

Some sharp detective work helped southwest Florida deputies find a 12-year-old girl who they say threatened suicide over the Internet. CBS News story here The Collier County Sheriff's Office says someone from Texas called early Friday to report that a girl on a webcam in Naples was threatening suicide. The girl said she was 17 and was holding a knife to her throat and arms. An investigator was able to find the Web site and send the girl an instant message. Posing as a young girl, the investigator got the girl to reveal the area where she lived. Deputies were able to find the house where she lived with her grandparents. She was taken to a mental health center. The incident comes about two weeks after a 19-year-old in Pembroke Pines committed suicide by taking a drug overdose in front of a live Internet audience. For more information on teen suicide see eGuide/vol1_iss23.

Spending a lot of time watching TV, playing video games and surfing the Web makes children more prone to a range of health problems including obesity and smoking, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday. ABC News story here U.S. National Institutes of Health, Yale University and the California Pacific Medical Center experts analyzed 173 studies done since 1980 in one of the most comprehensive assessments to date on how exposure to media sources impacts the physical health of children and adolescents. The studies, most conducted in the United States, largely focused on television, but some looked at video games, films, music, and computer and Internet use. Three quarters of them found that increased media viewing was associated with negative health outcomes. The studies offered strong evidence that children who get more media exposure are more likely to become obese, start smoking and begin earlier sexual activity than those who spend less time in front of a screen, the researchers said.

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