Tallahassee Democrat from Tallahassee, Florida • Page 17

Tallahassee Dec. 31, 19885B It's tough to tell who's on first in Miami TV switches Associated Press MIAMI Television viewers are ready with remote-control channel changers and "TV Guides" to find their favorite shows as five stations in south Florida switch network affiliations Sunday and a sixth makes its debut. "This is about as confused as a market can get," said Allen Shaklan, a CBS television vice president of programming sent from New York to run Miami's WCIX, an independent station becoming a CBS affiliate. The swaps have created enough mind-boggling situations to fill a made-for-televi- sion movie. For instance, standing amid the holiday decorations in the lobby of television station WTVJ, a CBS-network affiliate since 1949, is a life-size cardboard cutout of Bill Cosby, the star of NBC's programming lineup.

Meanwhile, WPEC, an ABC affiliate, has rented billboards promoting Bob Ne-whart, a CBS star. Just before the opening sequence of "LA Law," the popular NBC show beginning at 10 p.m. Thursday, Miami station WSVN urges viewers to start watching the news at 10 p.m. Confused? Just stay tuned. Industry veterans say this Sunday's network swaps are the biggest affiliation switch in history.

"It's absolutely incredible," said Robert Ware, vice president and general manager of Palm Beach Gardens station WPBF, which goes on the air Sunday morning. The two large stations keeping the same network affiliations are trying to capitalize on viewer confusion; independents are planning improved programming to lure channel-switching viewers; and cable companies are adding stations to make sure their subscribers have all of the networks. Making the new TV picture even fuzzi er is the signal-delivery problem' for the new Miami CBS affiliate WCIX and the overlap of the two markets. The announcement in January 1987 of the $275-million purchase of WTVJ from private owners by NBC's parent corporation, General Electric, set corporate wheels turning and the affiliation dominoes clicking. "That set the ball rolling.

This gives us the opportunity to do some of the things we always wanted to do," said Alex Dry-foos, owner-president of WPEC in West Palm Beach. The moves after the NBC purchase of CBS' WTVJ in Miami were: Miami's WSVN, the NBC affiliate, couldn't work out a deal with CBS and became independent. CBS instead bought WCIX, the ing Miami independent, for $59 million. WPEC, the Palm Beach area ABC-affiliate, decided to switch to CBS so could expand south into Broward, where" new WCIX has the signal problems. WTVX, a Fort Pierce-based CBS affiliate, becomes independent.

New station WPBF took the unusual step, in an industry in which the networks court affiliates to carry their programs, of going to ABC and paying it a reported $1 million to become an ABC affiliate. U.S. missing out on technology to help identification, official says Associated Press UNBELIEVABLE DISCOUNTS END Sunday 12989 6 CALL NOW FOR OUR 30-PAGE COLOR BROCHURE Sometimes we have very little evidence to identify a person. Yet we've got a family waiting to find out if it is their loved one and the investigators waiting to find out if it is the victim they think it is, so they can start questioning that person's associates. QUALITY GUNITE CONCRETE CONSTRUCTION South's Largest 3 the identification of the alleged victim," he said.

Developing new techniques, for example, high-resolution video equipment to superimpose the images of photographs and skulls to identify victims, benefits everyone in criminal investigations, he said. "Sometimes we have very little evidence to identify a person," Maples said. "Yet we've got a family waiting to find out if it is their loved one and the investigators waiting to find out if it is the victim fhey think it is, so they can start questioning that person's associates." Some of these techniques work not only to the advantage of police, but also to the advantage of innocent people accused of crimes, he said. Occasionally, law-enforcement agencies spend years on a case, only to be unable to identify a human skeleton from a fire or some other tragedy, he said. "One can just imagine the thousands and thousands of dollars that have gone into these investigations by law enforcement, only to have the investigation crumble," he said.

"All that money is wasted, all because in some cases we haven't had the money and research to develop these new techniques." GAINESVILLE Authorities in this country are missing opportunities to identify the remains of drug and homicide victims and elderly people who wander away, says a University of Florida anthropologist. Many other countries have developed elaborate equipment and innovative ideas to identify bones and solve the mystery of why someone died, said William Maples, an anthropologist at the Florida Museum of Natural History who specializes in application of anthropology to legal problems. "Unfortunately, forensic anthropology is a field that's expanding and that's especially true in Florida with its drug problem, homicide rate and elderly people who wander away from nursing homes," he said. Burned bodies are especially difficult to identify and may be incorrectly identified on the basis of clothing found at the scene or the fact that all but one person believed to be in a car accident or plane crash has been identified, he said. Insurance companies are one of several American industries that would benefit from sophisticated William Maples, forensic anthropologist Builder 30 Years Over 1 0,000 Gunite Pools 562-8505 CPC011605 techniques.

"It continues to amaze me that insurance companies haven't hired forensic anthropologists to check their cases," Maples said. "The number of cases that I've come across where the burn victim turns out not to be the person thought to be leads me to believe that insurance companies are paying out a lot in claims each year simply because they haven't confirmed through biological means II I II M.W 11.11 II I jai' I VWJ Free funeral a gimmic with a purpose DUNLOP D40M2 DUNLOP Questor1 OFF Associated Press OUR ALREADY LOW PRICE! On All Dunlop Tires In Stock. Mm mi Whitewall, Blackwall, Small Truck, Raised White Letters and Performance Tires $3,500, Neel said. Originally, Woodlawn required that those who planned to drink and drive over the holiday had to sign up to take advantage of the offer. Later, Neel dropped that stipulation and just had people call in beforehand.

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