Democrat and Chronicle from Rochester, New York • Page A27

BRIEFLY $90K Prosecutors say the treasurer of a New York City youth baseball organization stole more than $90,000 that was supposed to be used for sports programs for teenagers. William Jacobvitz was indicted Friday on a second- degree grand larceny charge. Prosecutors say Jacobvitz was the treasurer and made more than 50 unauthorized withdrawals from its bank accounts. The money came rom fees and donations. NYC woman talks about suing nephew The New York City woman vilified for suing her 12-year-old nephew over a broken wrist she suffered when he jumped in her arms to greet her four years ago said Thursday she was never with the lawsuit.

Jennifer Connell appeared on show along with her nephew, Sean Tarala. She said she wanted her home- wners insurance to pay her medical bills, but under Connecticut law she ould only sue an individual. An individual has to be named, and in this case, because Sean and I ad this fall together, I was informed hat Sean had to be named. I was never comfortable with she said. A jury last week rejected 127,000 suit.

Connell said she broke her wrist when the boy jumped into er arms at his 8th-birthday party at is home in Westport, Connecticut, causing her to fall. Her at- orneys say she filed suit after her insurance company offered her $1over the accident. Connell and Sean sat side by side and said they loved each other. would never do anything to hurt the family or Sean said. Connell said she was shocked by the backlash, which included her vilification on social media as a terrible aunt, the most hated woman in America and an awful human being.

was amazing how I walked into court that morning and walked out all over social media. It just spun and spun, and suddenly I was getting calls, look at the Internet. turn the she said. Contact he team NY STATE SECTION Ben Jacobs 585) 258-2268 ollow him on Twitter bjacobsroch ALBANY BUREAU CHIEF Joseph Spector 518) 436-9781 ollow him on Twitter GannettAlbany ALBANY BUREAU EPORTER Jon Campbell 518) 436-9781 ollow him on Twitter autism to do, find other ways for them to interact with their environment and their world and the people within it, then be less likelihood do those ther A ngela Pagliaro, director of clinical services, showed the workshop attendees a series of videos of therapists orking with children: a therapist saying to the and rewarding the child with praise and stickers when he omplies, another therapist training a boy to make eye contact by putting an object interested in near her face. he idea is to provide the paraprofessionals, who are not required to have a ollege degree and who typically earn around $30,000 a year about $20,000 less than the minimum for a New York ity teacher with some of the tools used by well-paid private therapists.

Pagliaro said crucial for parapro- essionals in New York and beyond to receive this type of training. Paraprofessionals are the last group to get training and the ones that are working with she said. Marilyn Likins, the executive director of the National Resource Center for Paraeducators, based at Utah State University, agreed that more training is eeded. have frequently been left out of the she said. they need training? City Department of Education spokesman Harry Hartfield said the department is committed to providing high-quality services for students with autism with the help of Rethink and oth- NEW YORK The icebreaker was imple: Choose a partner and learn three hings about her.

The catch: Your partner will pretend she does not speak. The room full of New York City school araprofessionals gestured and thumped the table in an exercise meant to put them in the mindset of their stud ents: children with autism who in many cases are nonverbal. Recent years have seen autism diag- oses skyrocketing in New York and elsewhere. There were 14,600 such stud ents in city schools last year, up from 6,000 in 2008. One such student, 14-year-old Avonte quendo, slipped out of his school two years ago and was later found dead, a tragedy that prompted the City Council pass Law legislation requiring audible alarms on doors as well a additional training to stop kids from running out of the building.

Last training session at Public School 396 in Brooklyn run by a company called Rethink, known for its videos that demonstrate therapy techniques for children with autism was i ntended to help special-education workers reach children, and perhaps keep them from wanting to run in the first place. did Avonte said Principal Nira Schwartz Nyitra. never going to know other than something that he did. If we find other more appropriate and safer things for students with er contractors. our goal to ensure all staff has the knowledge and expertise they need to support students with he said.

A investigation into Octo- er 2013 disappearance from the Riverview School in Queens found that numerous lapses contributed to the eath. Among them, the paraprofessionals who escorted class from the lunchroom to recess said they id not know that mother had warned that he had a tendency to run. Asubsequent investigation did not ecommend that any employee be disciplined, and none has been. A lawsuit family over his disappearance is pending. Asked if mother, Vanessa ontaine, feels that the Department of Education has improved its services to children with autism since her son dis- a ppeared, lawyer, David Pe- recman, said, hard when ost a child to be pleased with someone closing the barn door after the horse has Tennielle Johnson, one of the paraprofessionals who attended the Rethink session, said she followed story even though she was liv- i ng in Trinidad when he vanished.

She said the workshop bolstered what she knows about taking care of the children responsible for. want to make sure safe, they run even if they get she said. use positive SCHOOL TRAINING BARBARA FILE PHOTO 2013 Amissing poster displayed in a New York subway station asks for help in finding Avonte Oquendo, an autistic 14-year-old who was last seen in October 2013 walking out of his Queens school toward a park overlooking the East River. remains were found in the East River in January 2014, several miles from where he vanished. NYC READIES AIDES TO HELP KIDS WITH AUTISM KAREN MATTHEWS Associated Press DemocratandChronicle Page27A NYState HURLEY Call them Buzzing oneybees are being threatened by tiny flies that lead them to lurch and stagger around like zombies.

The afflicted bees often make uncharacteristic night flights, sometimes buzzing around porch lights before dying. Well-documented on the West Coast, some zombie-bee cases also have been detected in eastern states by volunteers helping track their spread. This comes a honeybees have already been ravaged i recent years by mysterious colony col- apse disorder, vampire mites and nutri- ional deficiencies. not making a case that this is the doomsday bug for said John Hafernik, a biology professor at San Francisco State University. it is certainly an interesting situation where we have a parasite that seems to affect the behavior of bees and has them essentially abandoning their Hafernik in 2012 started a project to enlist people to track the spread of zom- bie bees called ZomBee Watch.

Partici- ants are asked to upload photos of the ees they collect and photos of pupae and a dult flies as they emerge. They have ore than 100 confirmed cases. The fly had already been known to afflict bumblebees and yellow jackets. Then in 2008, Hafernik made a discovery after scooping up some disoriented bees beneath a light outside his campus office. Before long, he noticed pupae emerging from a bee.

That led to the first of many zombie honeybee cases found in the San Francisco area and beyond. Researchers believe Apocephalus borealis flies attack bees a they forage. The flies pierce the a bdomens and deposit eggs, affecting he behavior of the doomed bees. A beekeeper in Burlington, Vermont, detected the first zombie case in the East, in 2013. Then this summer, amateur beekeeper Joe Naughton of Hurley, New York, discovered the first of two recently confirmed cases in the Hudson Valley, north of New York City.

Naughton, who has 200,000 or more bees, is not panicking just yet. know, the thing is a little bit sensational and some people hear that and hey go right into alarm bells Naughton said. the state of things are right now is mostly just fact A nd there are a lot of facts to find. I possible that zombie watchers like Naughton are just now detecting a parasite that has been targeting honeybees for a long time, though Hafernik notes that reports of honeybees swarming night lights are a recent phenomenon. not clear if zombie bees can be linked to colony collapse disorder, a syndrome in which whole colonies fail after the loss of adult worker bees.

Scientists ave not been able to prove what causes CD, though some believe it could be an i nterplay of factors including mites, pest icides and habitat loss. For now, threats like mites are more of a concern to researchers than the spread of zombie fly parasites. have several other stresses on bees and we want any other stress like this said Ramesh Sagili, an assistant professor of apiculture at Oregon State University. have to be cautious, but not alarmed that this parasite is going to create a big ZomBee Watch: Scientists track honeybee killer MICHAEL HILL ASSOCIATED PRESS MIKE Ahoneybee works atop gift zinnia in Accord on Sept. 1..