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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (March 29, 2006)
5()£ ■ years ■ of Drag Races T* ; Safe alternative to illegal street racing f=*| See inside, •/community service pages A5-A8 zïtSï 4jânî*ii£trtv (¿EJusHírlicr i í ‘City of Roses Volume XXXVI, Number 12 See Metro, inside k Established in 1970 wvvw.portlandobserver.com Committed to Cultural Diversity Wednesday • March 29, 2006 T, Week in Thc Review Unlocking Bloodline Mysteries Top Bush Official Replaced W hite House chief o f staff A n drew C ard has resigned and will be replaced by budget director Joshua Bolten, President Bush announced Tuesday am id grow- i ng calls for a W hite House shake up and Republican concent about B ush’s tum bling poll ratings. Reagan Era Secretary Dies C aspar W einberger, defense sec retary under the Reagan adm inis tration, died T uesday at the age o f 88. W einberger presided over an unprecedented peacetim e mili tary buildupcosting more than $ 1 trillion and w as pardoned by form er President Bush on the eve o f his trial in the Iran-Contra scan dal in 1992. DNA mail order approach opens widows Remains Found Near WTC C onstruction w orkers cleaning toxic w aste from a vacant sky scraper near the W orld T rade C enter site have found more bone fragm ents and hum an rem ains, officials said Tuesday. O fficials plan to extract DNA from the re m ains and try to m atch it against a database o f the 2,749 people killed at the trade center on Sept. 11,2001. No Election Delay A federal judge M onday refused to delay New O rleans’ April 22 m ayoral election, but told law yers on both sides o f the case to identify any problem s that might hinder displaced residents’ abil ity to vote and then solve them. Afghan Convert Vanishes An Afghan man who had faced the death penalty for converting from Islam to Christianity quickly vanished Tuesday after he was released from prison, apparently out o f fear for his life with Muslim clerics still dem anding his death. Bonds ‘Life in Shambles’ Seven hom e runs shy o f passing Bahe Ruth, this should be a tim e o f unbridled joy and excitem ent fo r B a rry B onds. N ot so, he says. “M y life is in s h a m b le s ,” B onds said M onday, fo llo w in g the recent re lease o f “G am e o f S h ad o w s,” th e book d etailin g his alleged regim en for taking perform ance en h an cin g drugs. See story, page H6. photo by S arah B lount /T he P ortland O bserver Multnomah County librarian Wanda Snyder pulls a book on black genealogy at the North Portland Library. The branch at 512 N. Killingsworth St. houses the Black Resource Center, the library system's major collection of black history information. A young African A m erican man was one o f the heroes as bystanders thw arted a child kidnapping from a T riM etM ax train. Max passenger Lam a Curry helped w restle the alleged kidnapper to the ground during the S un day incident. Randy William Koon, 41, was held for police and charged with kid napping. W itnesses said Koon was moving from seat to seat in the train as they ap p ro ach ed a sto p at S o u th w e st F ifth A v e n u e an d M o rriso n Lamar Curry helped rescue baby. Street. He then grabbed the 2-year-old girl out of (KATU photo) WILSHIRE TAVERN photo by M ark W ashinoton /T he P ortland O bserver The Wilshire Tavern on Northeast 42nd Avenue is one o f four Portland bars to be robbed at gunpoint in the last two weeks. o 2 Ï» Jc ' > 00 i S '5 ; □ ! f 2Í 'y f on page A3 MAX Riders Stop Baby Snatcher Beach Clean Up 0 5 o oo 6 2 è* continued MMftMN Saturday, 5,245 volunteers turned out to participate in the G reat O re g o n S p rin g B e ac h C le a n u p . T h e e n tire O re g o n coastline, 362 m iles, was cleaned o f debris that had accum ulated d u r in g th e s to rm y w in te r months. V olunteers rem oved an estim ated 46.5 tons o f trash. o o o g o by S arah B lount T he P ortland O bserver W hen author Alex Haley set out to trace his roots, it took him lOyears. a half a million miles and three continents. 40 years later, it takes around a hundred bucks and a quick Internet search to reveal the m ysteries o f your bloodline. Thousands o f people are taking advantage o f mail order genetic testing, a service th at’s gained popularity and notoriety over the past few years. Scientists can read your DNA to uncover a wealth o f inform ation on gender, predisposition to any one o f the 3,(XX) diseases, and our guilt or innocence. For thousands o f African A m ericans, DNA answ ers ques tions not about them selves, hut a family legacy that was significantly blotted out cen turies ago. Private com panies w ho charge a fee to study DNA are banking o ff indi viduals w ho want to trace their A frican A m erican history. T his “sw ab and ship" ap proach opens an incredible new window - w ithout DNA a genealogy search can hit a brick wall, with absent birth records and skewed written and oral histories. The recent Public Broadcasting System series “African- A merican L ives” touched on the popularity o f DNA science. The series featured prominent African Americans, Oprah Winfrey am ong them, tracing their black history through DNA and genealogy, with surprising results. Oprah was convinced she had Native American blood. Her DNA told her she’s right out o f Africa. Q u estio n in g T echnology Portland State University professor Greg Fow ler has closely follow ed the recent attention and controversy o f DNA science. Fow ler is executive director and founder o f G eneforum , a non- String of Robberies Hit Local Bars Cash registers and customers cleaned out Several custom ers at a Northeast Portland tavern were robbed at gunpoint Saturday, the fourth armed attack at a Portland tavern in the past tw o w eeks, police said. Tw o men carrying handguns cam e into the Blue D iam ondT avem at 2016 N.E. Sandy BIvd. around 12:24 a m., held the guns to the custom ers' heads and forced them to give them cash, said Portland Police Bureau spokesw om an Kathy Kent. The pair took the custom ers' w allets and cleaned out the tav ern 's cash registers before leaving the building, said D ebbie Relling, the m anager o f Blue Diamond. There w ere no injuries, she said. The men, who were not w earing m asks, w ere de- continued on page A3 her stroller and ran off the train. He d id n 't get far before C urry, the toddler's parents and other q uick thinking passengers tackled him. “W e saw a dude ju m p on the girl and her mom ju m p on the dude, so we ju st pushed the dude dow n to the ground." Curry told KATU Channel 1 The fam ily was a bit shaken, but the to d d ler is d oing fine, p olice spokesm an Kathy Kent said. Police said Kixtn w as a stranger to Randy Koon charged the family w ho w as visiting Portland with kidnapping. for spring break and using the Max Red Line. The family from I uiGrande also had their 5-year-old son with them at the time. 4 »