UVA president John Casteen has sat on the Wachovia board since 2001.
PHOTO BY LINDSAY BARNES

On Monday, September 29, the day banking giant Wachovia was in the depths of its monumental stock free-fall and then-pending sale to Citigroup, UVA president and company board member John Casteen was cutting the ribbon on a new dorm at his university. When the Hook asked if he had anything to say about the malaise of the bank he’s paid to govern, his response was brief.

“It’s very sad,” Casteen said, “but you’ll have to talk to them.”

At that point, before the Hook could ask a follow-up, an aide said that Casteen “really has to go.”

This day a year ago, Wachovia stock traded for $52.27 per share. When the market opened this morning, the stock’s value had plummeted to $5.74. According to one analyst, board members like Casteen— who earn six-figure sums for their board work— can’t completely wash their hands of this nosedive.

“The board failed,” says SNL Financial banking analyst Sebastian Hindman, “because (more)

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Obama campaign volunteer Adrienne Ghaly (left) registered voters outside the Lucky 7 on Market Street this morning. Fortunately, Michelle McSherrey was already registered. “I’m voting on November 4,” she says.
PHOTO BY COURTENEY STUART

Today at 5pm is the deadline for voter registration in Virginia, and the Obama campaign has volunteers positioned at convenience and grocery stores throughout town.

The effort has paid off, says volunteer Adrienne Ghaly, who in the last two days has assisted 17 voters– some new who were unregistered; some who simply needed to update their addresses. This morning, she was camped in front of the Lucky 7 convenience store on Market Street, but, she says, not all stores have been welcoming.

Management at Reid Super Save Market on Preston Avenue has asked several volunteers to leave the property, says Ghaly, who says the Reid’s manager kicked her off the property yesterday.

Reid Super Save Market is the closest grocery store to several primarily African American neighborhoods, including 10th and Page and Starr Hill.

“I am shocked,” Ghaly says, “that he would take the community’s money and not allow people to enfranchise that community to vote.”

But Reid’s manager Charlie Wood says that’s not the case– he doesn’t mind voter registration as long as its nonpartisan.

“They’re wearing a campaign button,” he says of the Obama volunteers. Wood says (more)

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Tammy Harlow Cox, 39, took the photo at left in February and posted it on her Facebook account. The right is her mugshot, taken by the Greene County Sheriff’s Department today.
FACEBOOK/GREENE COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE

The Greene County Sheriff’s Office announced today that it has charged 39-year-old Tammy Harlow Cox of Stanardsville with two felony counts in relation to carrying on several sexual relationships with members of the William Monroe High School football team, three of whom were between the ages of 15 and 18. Cox has been indicted on two counts of taking indecent liberties and having sex with a child while in a supervisory or custodial relationship.

According to the Newsplex, Cox’s arrest warrant states that she had sexual intercourse with the student athletes, sent them text messages containing “strong sexual content,” and that she sent them a picture of herself “where she exposes her full (more)

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Local vets, groomers and pet owners say they’re seeing more fleas than in previous years.
FILE PHOTO

Remember the old adage, “If you lie down with dogs, you’ll get up with fleas“? Well, this year Charlottesville pet owners are learning to take that literally. According to several veterinarians, groomers, and dog and cat owners, the nasty little bugs that nest in animals’ fur, drink their blood, and turn happy homes into hives of horror have been worse this year than at any time in recent memory.

“I never saw anything like this,” says Jim Stuart, whose indoor/outdoor cat brought fleas into the house where they multiplied and spread into every room. Stuart (no relation to this reporter) is a lifelong pet owner who says that in the past he’s been able to kill fleas quickly with over-the-counter treatments. Not this time.

“We set off bombs, used every flea thing known to man, and they kept coming back,” he says.

At Old Dominion Animal Hospital, the phone has been ringing off the hook with calls from flea-bitten pet owners desperate for help.

“People are saying, ‘What do I do?’” says Old Dominion (more)

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Attorney and author Vincent Bugliosi, famous for putting Charles Manson behind bars and writing a book about it called Helter Skelter, will speak in Charlottesville on Thursday, October 16 at the Albemarle County Office Building at 7pm.

Bugliosi’s new book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder, makes the case that President Bush should be charged and prosecuted for murder for the way his administration justified invading Iraq. In addition, Bugliosi argues that any state attorney general or county prosecutor could take up the case. As those familiar with the Manson case know, Bugliosi managed to convince a jury to convict Manson of murder even though Manson wasn’t present at the crime scenes when the victims were murdered.

Bugliosi is also the author of Outrage: The Five Reasons Why O.J. Simpson Got Away With Murder (1996), No Island of Sanity: Paula Jones v. Bill Clinton - The Supreme Court on Trial (1998), The Betrayal of America: How the Supreme Court Undermined the Constitution and Chose Our President (2001), and Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy (2007)

The Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice is sponsoring the event. For more information, contact David Swanson at 434-296-4228.

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Smoke detectors are not all created equal. A detector test conducted by the Hook with assistance from local fire officials revealed in June that ionization models may not activate until it’s too late to escape.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

Last week, the Albemarle County Fire Department announced a smoke detector promotion in which anyone ordering pizza from Domino’s Pizza on Seminole Trail on Monday, October 7 between 4 and 7pm will receive a free pizza if a firefighter riding along with the delivery driver determines all smoke detectors in a customer’s residence are functioning. If any of the detectors aren’t working, the customer pays for the pie but gets a free detector.

There was just one problem with the creative promotion: the department made no mention of the type of detector that should to be present in order to receive the free pie.

Not anymore!

At the Hook’s request, says Albemarle Fire Inspector Joseph Gould, the department will now not only check if the detectors are functioning but will also identify the type of detector. Homes equipped with battery operated ionization detectors, even if they function, will be offered the combination detectors that are supplied through the county’s free detector program. Residents of homes with hardwired ionization models will be educated on the need to replace their detectors.

As the Hook has reported on extensively, ionization detectors– the type found in at least 90 percent (more)

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Florida-based Spencer Connerat says his family still owns 1,480 shares of CPC stock.
SUBMITTED PHOTO

How much is a man’s silence worth? For one local company vexed by its most vocal shareholder, it’s worth a just a tad under $5,000.

Spencer Connerat, a former Charlottesvillian now living in Florida, appears to have signed an agreement with Charlottesville Parking Center Inc., in which he trades away three shares worth about $120— along with his right to sue or discuss the company— for $5,000.

“I can’t believe that Charlottesville Parking was so troubled by Spencer’s actions,” says fellow shareholder Richard Spurzem, “that they would have to do this.”

CPC, as the company is sometimes called, has long been troubled by Spencer Connerat’s actions. In 1997, for instance, Connerat was awarded a seat on the company board after a successful lawsuit. More recently, he helped organize an attempted purchase of CPC. (As with another recent buyout offer, CPC didn’t deign to take the $16.3 million bid to the shareholders.)

Connerat has quite the history with CPC’s president, Jim Berry. Back in 1996, Connerat worked for Berry when Berry was a top executive at Jefferson National Bank, the hometown firm whose (more)

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D + Fence = defense, and the Hook left a message with athletic director Craig Littlepage this morning asking why the orange guy’s sign is welcome on the official UVA football poster but not at the game.
PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

Heeding a variety of condemnations and a giant protest scheduled for this Saturday’s home game against Maryland, UVA has suddenly repealed its notorious ban on signs at sporting events.

“The policy prohibiting signs, banners, and flags in all UVa athletics venues has become a distraction and has taken the focus away from supporting our student-athletes,” said athletic director Craig Littlepage in a press release. “Our football team needs our support right now, and that should be our collective focus. With that in mind, I am repealing immediately the policy prohibiting signs, banners and flags in all athletics venues.”

The ban was in place for only one home football game, the Cavaliers’ win over the Richmond Spiders on September 6.

Littlepage didn’t say exactly what led him to repeal the ban at this particular time, but further down in his statement might lie a clue.

“My hope is our fans will wear orange and be prepared to support the Cavaliers,” he said.

This would appear to be a response to the mounting threat of (more)

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Can’t get right indeed! Wrecker driver Chris Hening, who rear-ended a Hook reporter’s car today.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

Here at the Hook we’re not big believers in karma, but when a Cavalier Wrecker truck, formerly Lethal Wrecker, rear-ends the car of a Hook reporter, we have to wonder. Over the years, the newsroom has reported on the towing company numerous times, including when they overcharged and when their drivers have been repeatedly indicted for reckless driving. (For a collection of Lethal Wrecker stories, click here.) Not surprisingly, the company changed its name to Cavalier Wrecker last year, though the owner of the wrecker in today’s accident was listed as Lethal Wrecker in the police accident report.

Fortunately, Hook reporter Lindsay Barnes and the two other drivers involved were uninjured at the time of the accident, though a two-month-old baby in one of the cars required some observation by paramedics on the scene.

According to Barnes, he was driving along Emmet Street South, right in front of the UVA tennis courts, when he slowed down for traffic. Suddenly, Cavalier Wrecker driver Chris Hening rear-ended him with enough force to (more)

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Melinda Denisenko has been on her own since federal immigration officials detained her husband Gennady April 30.
PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

After years of requesting political asylum while fighting deportation, Charlottesville resident and Soviet defector Gennady Denisenko received word this morning that he will not be deported and will be released from the federal detention facility in Texas where he has been held since late April.

“Oh, my God, you just want to fall on your knees and yell ‘Glory,’” says Denisenko’s wife, Melinda, who also got the news today. “I was glad I was sitting down because I probably would have fainted.”

Attorney Mark Urbanski has learned that the counsel for Citizenship and Immigration Services handling Denisenko’s case has joined the motion to re-open his client’s petition for legal residence in the United States.

“This was 90 percent of the battle,” says Urbanski. “We expect the court will re-open the case in a matter of days.”

It also means that after five months in federal custody, Denisenko will finally be able to reunite with his wife Melinda, who recounted a powerful story of hope and heartbreak last week in the Hook.

“He’s eligible for bond,” says Urbanski, “and now he’ll be able to be released.”

It couldn’t have come a minute too soon. Last Wednesday, September 25, Urbanski learned (more)

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A page from Gannett Fleming’s successful bid to carry out the community’s 2002 water plan, which the company promptly dumped to embark instead on a reservoir/pipeline project.
PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

The company that keeps Charlottesville unsure whether to laugh or cry over its work on the community’s 50-year water plan helped dry some tears in Boston yesterday. Two years after one of its projects became a deathtrap for a mother of three, Gannett Fleming has apparently agreed to a help pay $28 million to the woman’s family.

Survivors of 38-year-old Milena Del Valle will receive the money, via a settlement with Gannett Fleming and other companies involved in construction of a flawed auto tunnel in the Big Dig, a mammoth Boston highway project, it was announced Tuesday night.

A passenger in a car driven by her husband, Del Valle died in July 2006, after a three-ton concrete panel in an Interstate 90 connector tunnel fell from the ceiling. Gannett Fleming had designed the ceiling panels and the anchoring system.

Gannett Fleming attempted to defend its system of hanging the heavy panels by anchoring threaded bolts in epoxy-filled holes rather than tying in to structural members. After the suit was filed, (more)

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Logan Blanco was struck in a crosswalk by a turning vehicle in the pre-dawn hours of September 12.
PHOTO BY COURTENEY STUART

A pedestrian was struck by a car on the south side of the Belmont Bridge just before noon today, and on September 12, a pedestrian was struck at Ninth and Jefferson on the north side of the bridge.

This morning’s accident occurred at the corner of Graves and Avon streets near Spudnuts donut shop. According to city spokesperson Ric Barrick, the pedestrian, whose identity has not been released, “stepped off the curb into the street— not into a crosswalk— and the driver was not able to react in time.”

According to Barrick, the first officer on the scene interviewed the driver, the pedestrian, and witnesses, before deciding a ticket for the driver was not warranted. And unlike an incident in November 2007 in which a wheelchair-bound pedestrian was ticketed after being struck in a crosswalk, this time police decided not to pursue charges against the injured pedestrian, who was transported to UVA hospital. Barrick says there were no serious injuries.

In an incident on Friday, September 12, a woman out walking her dog was struck just after 6am as she crossed Ninth Street heading west on Jefferson Street. Driver James E. Shifflett was turning left onto Ninth Street from Jefferson St. and struck 59-year-old Logan Blanco. Both are residents of the Little High Street Neighborhood.

“It seemed to lift me up a little; I felt very rag doll-ish,” (more)

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And men aren’t excited about this. Why?
PHOTO BY COURTENEY STUART

If the reaction of Hook newsroom staffers is any indication, the news that a Sephora store is opening in Fashion Square Mall on October 17 will be greeted by men and women in markedly different ways.

“Oh my God!” squealed one female reporter (okay, this one) after Fed Ex delivered a large-ish black box bearing the black and white logo of the make-up emporium whose closest current location is Richmond’s Regency Square. Indeed, the bribe kit (ahem) press kit contained a bevy of beauty products that each XX-chromosomed staffer pored over with glee. Purity “high foaming facial cleanser” anyone? How ’bout “Buxom Lips” lip gloss? Bliss brand “triple oxygen instant energizing mask”?

Whoo-hoo!

Reporters with the XY chromosome’s response?

“Uh, what is wrong with you?”

Men.

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Racing cars was a passion for Newman, who voiced a character in the 2006 animated film Cars.
PHOTO JIM CULP/FLICKR.COM

Paul Newman’s passing last week made headlines around the world, and the tributes have been plentiful for the man who made scores of movies, raced cars, donated at least $250 million to charity, and embodied classic movie star mystique (while remaining married to– and smitten with– the same woman, Joanne Woodward, for 50 years).

In an obituary published Saturday, September 27 on Slate.com, Charlottesville resident/supreme court reporter Dahlia Lithwick recalled her days as a counselor at Newman’s Hole in the Wall camp for seriously ill children.

“Each summer of the four I spent at Newman’s flagship Connecticut camp was a living lesson,” she wrote, “in how one man can change everything.” Newman, who died at age 83 on September 26 after a battle with lung cancer, made his way to Charlottesville for visits on at least two occasions during the 1990s, and for at least two who spotted him, the memory is vivid. (more)

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Republicans anxiously await Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s vice presidential debate with Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) this Thursday, October 2.
PHOTO BY TOM LEGRO/PBS NEWSHOUR

A little over a month after Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) surprised the world with his female VP pick, democrats aren’t the only ones criticizing Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Palin is “out of her league,” wrote the conservative commentator Kathleen Parker in a September 26 editorial in New Republic that followed what many have called an “embarrassing” three-part interview last week with Katie Couric. (That interview was the subject of Tina Fey’s second biting Palin impersonation on SNL, the punch line of which was Palin asking Couric for a “lifeline” à la game show Who Wants to Be A Millionaire.)

Yet despite the mounting questions and criticism, on the eve of the one and only vice presidential debate this Thursday, October 2, some local Republicans say they still believe the plucky Governor from Alaska has what it takes to fill the nation’s number two slot.

“She’s been a good role model,” says UVA researcher Laura Berger. “She says, ‘You can have it all, you don’t have to be a liberal who’s backing quotas for women in the workplace.’”

Attorney Cyndra Van Clief, co-chair of the Albemarle division of Virginia Women for McCain/Palin is also standing behind the candidate. (more)

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