The Orlando Sentinel from Orlando, Florida • Page 9

CENTRAL-FLORIDA The Orlando Sentinel, Wednesday, February 26, 1992 B-3" After 50 years, siblings find 50-year-old twins they had never met By Dairyl E. Owens Ad mistake delays fee for 1 year OF THE SENTINEL STAFF ByWiUWellons OF THE SENTINEL STAFF Orlando Sentinel wrote about the search in 1989. "I was in shock," said Barbara Cashion. "I started crying and said this can't be true. Somebody had to prove it to me." The proof was sealed.

State law kept their adoption papers locked away. But with a lawyer's help, the seal was cracked. The twins met their "new" family last Friday in Orlando. "I'm very excited that with my other brothers and sisters I can learn about and find myself in them," said Barbara Cashion, who works at Woolworth's in Colonial Plaza. "It was like seeing myself in the mirror," said Bruce Cashion.

The Cashions' odyssey began in January 1942 when the 2V4 pound twins were born. Their mother, Calista Katherine Scribner, named them Paul and Paula. She wanted to take them home to Lockhart so her other four children could see them. They never made it. Hard times forced her to give up the babies for adoption.

The twins were adopted by an Orlando couple, Franklin and Elma Cashion, who died in the early 1980s. Soon after the adoption, Scribner's husband left her. Two children went to orphanages and two went to a boys' home. She remarried, improved her fortune and regained her children except the twins. Scribner always hoped for a reunion, but she died in 1979, never knowing the twins' fate.

Her daughter, Jean Taylor, and Jean's daughter, Gena Urbanek, both of continued the search. It was two weeks ago that the twins' learned of their birthright. Martha Everson, their older sister from their adoptive family, dropped the Everson, who also was adopted, had just' learned the truth from an aunt. II "I thought she was coming over to talk about the taxes on my trailer," Bruce said. "She pulled out a newspaper article that said we were adopted, but we didn't know we were the Scribners." After reading The Orlando Sentinel artU cle, the twins contacted Urbanek, who called other family members who live in Alabama, North Carolina and Georgia.

Bruce Cashion was watching the television show Unsolved Mysteries when a story about twins who were separated from their biological mother came on the air. A thought struck him. "I thought wouldn't it be funny if me and Barbara his twin sister were them, not thinking it was possible," said Cashion, who lives in Orlando's College Park neighborhood. Two weeks ago, the twins discovered it wasn't an absurd notion. They learned they'd been adopted 50 years ago and that their siblings were looking for them.

The Police find books about explosives in chemist's home Carter, Chiles and medical director Rodriguez meet at an Orange County public health office to discuss vaccinations for children. By Jim Leusner OF THE SENTINEL STAFF 3 VIPs urging shots for all kids By Delthia Ricks OF THE SENTINEL STAFF An advertising mistake by The Orlando Sentinel has forced Orange County to put off collecting a new stormwater utility fee for a year. Officials estimate the error will cost up to $6 million that would have gone to cleaning waterways and improving drainage countywide. On Tuesday, commissioners were set to approve putting the new charge on property tax bills that are mailed in the fall. The exact fee was to be set this summer, but consultants estimated it would be $3 to $5 a month or up to $60 per home a year.

To change tax bills to include the fee, state law said commissioners had to hold a public hearing before March 1. That law also required that Tuesday's meeting be advertised for four consecutive weeks in a newspaper. The Sentinel published the legal ad on Jan. 31 and Feb. 20.

But because of a computer problem, the newspaper did not publish the notice Feb. 6 and Feb. 13, as the county requested. Because the public hearing was not properly advertised, Interim County Administrator Tom Wilkes told commissioners they must delay the fee until 1993. If the county tried to approve the fee this year, a resident could sue on the basis of improper advertising, Wilkes said.

"I cannot guarantee" the county could win a court battle, he said. William E. Steiger vice president and advertising director for the Sentinel, called the error "very regrettable." Steiger said the mistake occurred because the newspaper switched computer systems for handling legal ads. Before Feb. 1, computers in Orlando processed legal advertisements.

Now that job is being handled by a Tribune Co. computer in Chicago. To make the switch, Sentinel workers had to reenter hundreds of advertisements into a new computer system. The county's ad was lost, Steiger said. "As far as we know we only missed one ad" of those re-entered, he said.

"We made an error. We feel very bad." The mistake angered commissioners. County Chairman Linda Chapin said the error means the county will have to use property taxes or money from its new utility tax to pay for stormwater improvements next year. "It reduces our options," Chapin said. Commissioner Hal Marston questioned why the paper cannot be held liable for the mistake.

"This is going to cost us a lot of money," he said. Wilkes said while the Sentinel made the mistake, it is not legally liable for the consequences of the error. JOHN RAOUXSENTINEL Bumpers in the 1970s. The program resulted in 90 percent of all preschoolers in the country being fully vaccinated. "The children who are getting sick and dying are the babies," Carter said.

"We are trying to find a way to reach the babies. Most of the babies are in our poverty areas." Scientists at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta estimate about 100 measles deaths nationwide in 1990. Two of those deaths occurred in Florida. Also that year, 13 Florida children died of haemophilus-B influenza, three of whooping cough and one because of diphtheria. None of the deaths occurred in Central Florida.

Last year in Florida, 10 deaths were attributed to haemophilus-B influenza and one to measles. Experts said all could have been prevented through vaccinations, which doctors usually recommend starting at the age of 2 months. Carter, Bumpers and Chiles all acknowledged the importance of getting children vaccinated, but public health officials said the job invariably falls on their shoulders. "The number of measles cases is going up, and that's disheartening," said Dr. Victor Harris, administrator of the Orange County Public Health Unit.

"Measles is the most striking of the rising number of childhood diseases because it has the most serious consequences more serious than mumps for small children." In 1990, Florida had one of its worst measles outbreaks in a decade with 603 confirmed cases. State health officials, who are still tabulating last year's measles data, expect upward of 450 cases. The most recent random survey of 2-year-olds in Orange, Seminole, Osceola, Brevard and Volusia counties show that immunization rates increased dramatically in 1991 compared with 1990. About 72 percent of all 2-year-olds were found to be vaccinated. Dr.

Mercedes Rodriguez, executive medical director of Orange County's health unit, has just returned from Atlanta where she applied for a $150,000 CDC grant that would help track immunization compliance countywide. One day after they seized hazardous chemicals from the home of an Orlando chemist accused of running a drug ring, investigators were trying to fig-' ure out why he had a library of books on explosives and booby traps. "He could have invented something that was a doomsday machine," said Orange County Sheriff' Walt Gallagher. "It's scary." On Monday, pharmacist and chemist Ted Burleson, 42, was arrested on charges of running a ring that since 1984 manufactured hundreds of pounds of the illegal stimulant Aminorex. A hazardous materials team and bomb squad from the Orlando Fire De-' partment later removed several containers of explo-' sive chemicals from 601 Lake Como Circle.

At an Orlando press conference Tuesday to announce 13 arrests in the case, investigators from the, Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the)' Sheriffs Office displayed a sampling of the reading' material from Burleson's lakefront home: Getting Started In The Illicit Drug Business; Psychedelic Chemistry; Secrets of Methamphetamine; Kitchen Improvised Plastic Explosives; and Expedient Hand Grenades. i Seized from the home was a MAC-10 machine gun with a silencer, Vh ounces of a powder believed to be Aminorex, a federal drug investigator's manual', scales and assorted chemistry equipment and formti-' las, investigators said. Burleson, a 1967 graduate of Lyman High School in Longwood, received a chemistry degree from the University of Tennessee before moving to Gainesville in 1984. There, he began work on a doctorate in pharmacology from the University of Florida, which he received in 1987. Burleson, who was jailed on $1 million bond, has declined comment.

He is accused of manufacturing the drug and building his organization starting in 1984 while at UF, said FDLE agent Nick Del Castillo. He also; interned or worked as a pharmacist in the Orlando area in 1984 and late 1986, state licensing records show. Agents have investigated Burleson for the past 18 months, but they were stunned to find explosive chemicals and military manuals. Sheriffs Sgt. Jon Swanson, said several Soldier of Fortune magazines also were-seen inside the home, along with a photo of Burleson in a U.S.

Army uniform with an airborne insignia. An Army spokesman confirmed Tuesday that Bur- leson served in the military. After poring over the seized material, investigators, said they are wondering if the man nicknamed "Dr. Ted, the Pilot" was merely an avid reader or some-' thing more. Burleson, a pilot whose plane also was seized by investigators, has traveled extensively overseas.

He made numerous trips to Costa Rica in recent years and last year went to the Philippines and Hong Kong, Del Castillo said. Corporate records show Burleson has operated two. cleaning supply and chemical companies, Ingram Trading Co. and Chem-Technique since 1988. -Investigators say both companies were used as fronts -to obtain chemicals needed to manufacture Amin-' orex.

Burleson moved into the quiet Lake Como neighborhood in April 1990, said neighbor Tom Kline. Burleson left home early and returned late at night. He had few visitors, Kline said. "He was the kind of person who you couldn't get friendly with," Kline said. "He just didn't want to become close to anybody, it seemed to me." Low vaccination rates and a rising number of deaths from preventable childhood diseases have sparked a movement to achieve a fully immunized preschool population by the year 2000.

Florida's first lady Rhea Chiles, joined by former first lady Rosalynn Carter and Betty Bumpers of Arkansas, put a Florida emphasis Tuesday on a plan Carter and Bumpers are promoting across the country. Bumpers is married to Sen. Dale Bumpers, D-Ark. The women toured an Orange County public health unit and talked to parents about the benefits of having their children vaccinated. Measles outbreaks have caught health officials by surprise.

Doctors thought the disease was conquered more than a decade ago. "When I read in the paper that there were measles epidemics I was shocked," said Carter, who had organized an immunization program with Winter Park center is given 3 months to move By Karen Pankowski OF THE SENTINEL STAFF think the food and clothing distribution center belonged near a residential neighborhood. The commission also voted to give the center three months to continue operating while it looks for another location. About a dozen residents urged commissioners to deny the request, saying they feared for their safety. They complained about panhandlers, peeping toms, crime, parking and traffic problems, and rats from the large quantities of food stored at the center some of it outside.

Lew Petzold, founder and director of the center, offered a compromise, saying he would only use the property for storage and distribution and would direct clients to satellite centers in other cities. He said he had already reduced the number of patrons at the site from 5,000 to 1,000 a month. After the meeting, Petzold expressed surprise the City Commission did not agree to his proposal. "I couldn't see why they would turn us down," he said, adding that he hoped to find a new site. The stormwater utility fee will raise money to improve drainage and prevent waterways from being polluted by stormwater runoff.

The state requires counties to come up with better ways to handle stormwater runoff by 1993. Stormwater runoff, which pulls oils, pesticides and other debris from streets, parking lots and yards, is a leading pollutant of lakes and rivers. WINTER PARK The non-profit Human Crisis Council has three months to move out after the City Commission voted Tuesday to deny a special request that would have allowed it to stay. Because of the way the property is zoned, the center needed permission to operate at 1130 Schulz Ave. just off U.S.

Highway 17-92. Commissioners voted 3-2 to deny the request, saying they did not tion. Forrester tried unsuccessful- ly to get court officials to give her father a longer sentence after he pleaded guilty to committing a na. The U.S. Equestrian Team trained at the ranch for the 1988 Olympics and the 1989 world championships.

This weekend's events are free and open to the public. The trials begin at 8 a.m. Saturday and continue until about 6:30 p.m. The events Sunday will be from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Network TV show deals with Lake child-sex case TAVARES A network television show is to broadcast a segment Thursday night that partially deals with a Lake County sex crime case. CBS' Street Stories is to air at 9 p.m. on WCPX-TV Channel 6. This segment concerns the efforts of a Philadelphia-area woman to intervene in a lewd and lascivious sex crime case in which her father pleaded guilty. Kathie Lee Forrester, 34, and about 180 pounds with a husky build.

Anyone with information should contact Investigator J.R. Johnson at (904) 822-5781. Police search for tips on Altamonte bank robber ALTAMONTE SPRINGS Police are asking for help in identifying a suspect in a Feb. 20 bank DeLand gunman takes bank's cash, teller's car DELAND An armed man wearing a stocking mask robbed a bank here Tuesday morning and escaped in a car owned by one of the tellers. A man walked into Barnett Bank at 3101 N.

Woodland Blvd. at about 9:30 a.m., jumped over the front counter, aimed a silver-colored gun at the tellers and ordered everyone in the bank to get down on the floor, a Volusia County sheriffs report said. He grabbed money from tellers' cash drawers and stuffed an undetermined amount into a bag. He then drove off in a teller's four-door, silver Omni hatchback. He was followed for a time by a bank customer.

Deputies later found the car abandoned in woods near Trails West subdivision, along with gloves, mask and black T-shirt. The suspect's footprints were followed to the Lakeside subdivision, where investigators believe he was picked up by another person. The robber is described as a white male, 5-feet 10-inches tall, of money and fled on foot. He is white, heavy-set with brown hair, a mustache and beard. He wore sunglasses, a cap, a dark T-shirt and jeans.

Anyone with information should contact the Altamonte investigations bureau at 830-3826. Council to discuss Lake's bid for spring training TAVARES A progress report on Lake County's effort to land a major league team for spring training is to be given during today's Tourist Development Council meeting. In December, Lake submitted a proposal to host spring training for the Florida Marlins, one of two expansion baseball franchises. The county is offering part of a 285-acre site it holds off Florida's Turnpike at U.S. Highway 27 and State Road 19.

The Marlins are almost two months past their initial Jan. 15 deadline to announce a training site. Some of today's discussion by the tourism board is to focus on the creation of a Lake County task force. The tourism council's meeting is to be held at 5:30 p.m. in the Lake County Commission chambers at the county courthouse on Main Street in Tavares.

Altoona-area ranch hosts would-be Olympic riders ALTOONA Some riders on the trail to the Summer Olympics hope to rack up points toward their goal during spring trials this weekend at a north Lake County horse ranch. About 140 equestrians from across the country are expected to converge on the Rocking Horse Ranch for what's called a "combined training" event. Expected to attend are a dozen or more who have a shot at earning a place on the U.S. Olympic Equestrian Team, ranch operator Shelley Howerton said. Combined training as an Olympic event incorporates dressage, jumping, and cross-country riding.

The events Saturday and Sunday will give Central Florid-ians a chance to get a look at top riders. Rocking Horse Ranch is on State Road 19 just north of Altoo- lewd or lascivious act in the presence of a child. Car skids into pickup 2 dead, including activist ST. CLOUD A car skidding out of control on a dark, rainy stretch of highway smashed into a pickup truck, killing two people and injuring a third, the Florida Highway Patrol reported Tuesday. Killed in the Monday night accident were Kathren "Kitty" Lawson, 42, a local activist in child abuse is- sues, and her passenger, Robert W.

Patten, 50, both of St. Cloud. They were on their way to a dart tournament in Kissimmee when4 their car skidded out of control and into a truck driven by Ste- phen Lynn, 22, of Orlando, accord-, ing to FHP. Lynn, who was alone in his truck, suffered a broken nose and bruises. Lawson was a member of the Child Abuse Prevention Force, a local group trying to open I a shelter for runaway children.

robbery. The man walked into the Glendale Federal Bank, 478 E. State Road 436, about 12:47 p.m., showed a teller a gun and demanded money. He was given an undisclosed amount her sister have said they and a brother were sexually abused as children. Forrester's father, Asa Eric Culver, 56, of Tavares, recently was sentenced to 60 days in the Lake County jail and 10 years proba Suspect.