THE BIG STORY

Shocking conditions at the only immigration jail with space for trans women

Immigrants at the Cibola County Correctional Center have waited more than two weeks for urgent medical cale and were put in dangerous, uncertain situations, according to a secret Department of Homeland Security memo seen by Hamed Aleaziz. The privately run jail is the only such facility in the US with dedicated spaces for transgender women.

One trans woman locked up in the New Mexico jail told staff she was bleeding from her rectum. It took 13 days for her to receive urgent medical care. She then tested positive for HIV.

“The negligence of addressing a medical emergency such as this not only placed the infected detainee at risk for severe medical complications,” wrote Dana Salvano-Dunn, director of the compliance branch for the DHS Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, in the memo. “But it also exposed other detainees and facility and ICE staff to an infectious and potentially deadly disease.”

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STAYING ON TOP OF THIS

The murder trial of Robert Durst has begun

Opening arguments began yesterday in the trial of Robert Durst, the wealthy real estate heir who was the subject of the 2015 HBO documentary The Jinx. Prosecutors believe he murdered his first wife, Kathy, whose body was never found. He is charged with murdering his longtime friend Susan Berman — to prevent her from implicating him in his wife’s death, prosecutors say.

“A graphic image of Berman lying on her back in a pool of blood from a gunshot wound to the head was one of the first pieces of evidence that Deputy District Attorney John Lewin presented to the jury,” reports Drusilla Moorhouse, who will be covering the entire trial from the courthouse in Los Angeles. “Jurors also heard audio of the 911 call placed by her concerned neighbor.”

Robert Durst and Susan Berman. Courtesy HBO

SNAPSHOTS

Michael Bloomberg has ended his presidential campaign and endorsed Joe Biden. The billionaire former NYC mayor spent more than $500 million on the doomed effort, but he won in American Samoa and nobody can take that away from him.

Twitter is finally adding a stories feature, which will be called “Fleets.” It will work similarly to the stories options on every other app, obviously.

Tiffany Haddish praised the brutal dictator of Eritrea in a conversation with young members of the Eritrean diaspora. Among his mainly positives, she said he gave her a pot of local honey that did wonders for her grandma.

Jeopardy host Alex Trebek got very honest about living with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. He spoke beautifully about how his wife, supporters and faith have all kept him alive.

CORONAVIRUS UPDATE

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California reported its first coronavirus death yesterday. In total, 11 people in the US have died and 159 have tested positive; a medical professional who was tasked with screening passengers at Los Angeles International Airport also tested positive yesterday.

What’s does it mean to be pregnant during the coronavirus outbreak? Our (pregnant) science reporter Zahra Hirji compiled the most frequently asked questions about the issue and got them answered by the experts.

Tech companies including Microsoft, Amazon and Twitter are encouraging staff to work from home during the outbreak. Some in the industry think it could be a turning point in work-from-home culture.

Bad news if you wanted to buy a cutesy hand-knitted model of a coronavirus particle: Etsy is removing all coronavirus merchandise from its store.

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EAT MY STORIES

Why is the voice of Bart on The Simpsons viewing so many random people’s Instagram stories?

It’s a question that could only be asked, and answered, in this blessed year 2020. Nancy Cartwright, the voice actor who has played Bart since 1989, was one of just 15 people who viewed an Instagram story by Dan Alani, a 28-year-old radio host in London who has 1,500 followers.

Cartwright is not one of them, and they don’t have any mutuals. What is going on? Alani soon found out that other people had the same question: Twitter is awash with people asking why Cartright just viewed their Insta story.

So what’s the deal? David Mack took a look into the situation and found that it seems to have begun in late January — at least, that’s when people started tweeting their bemused questions about it. What else happened in late January? Cartright’s Instagram followers spiked, according to Crowdtangle:

It looks like the classic work of a social media consultant trying to boost Nancy’s clout, and as Slate has reported, bots that mass view Instagram stories in a bid to get people to follow back are often used by wannabe influencers. Cartright’s people said they’d let us know what’s going on, and we’ll keep you updated, obviously.

May your attempts to not touch your face be triumphant today,

Tom