Horrible ‘human’ Lawrence Stowe indicted

Posted on December 29, 2011 by Michael

EDIT: See the comments for an update on the near-exoneration of Vincent Dammai.

I’ve been thinking about it. When I first wrote about scam-artist Lawrence Stowe, I called him “a horrible human being”. I now regret that. Allowing him the title of “human” is far too generous. Far, far too generous. Just look at what he did:

Stowe told [CBS’s “60 Minutes”] MS patient that he can reverse her disease with his program of herbs and vitamins to boost the immune system, custom vaccines and stem cell injections. Medical experts say it’s nonsense but it’s the same pitch that we secretly recorded again and again as Stowe claimed to reverse cancer, ALS, MS, Parkinson’s disease and more.

He did this sort of thing to desperate person after desperate person. He scammed people out of their life savings, sometimes putting them into debt and convincing them to sell their homes. He promised cures where there are no cures. He ruined the lives of real humans nearly as much as nature herself was in the process of already doing.

As awful as that all is, there is at least some good news on the horizon:

Three men have been arrested for their participation in a scheme to manufacture, distribute and sell to the public stem cells and stem cell procedures that were not approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), United States Attorney Kenneth Magidson announced today along with Assistant Attorney General Tony West of the Department of Justice’s Civil Division, Special Agent in Charge Patrick J. Holland of the FDA—Office of Criminal Investigations (OCI) and Special Agent in Charge Cory B. Nelson of the FBI.

Francisco Morales, 52, of Brownsville, Texas, was arrested by Customs and Border Protection agents pursuant to a arrest warrant late Dec. 22, 2011. He made his initial appearance the following morning at which time he was ordered held without bond. Alberto Ramon, 48, of Del Rio, Texas, and Vincent Dammai, 40, of Mount Pleasant, S.C., were arrested yesterday. Ramon was arrested as he was about to enter his clinic and has already made his initial appearance in Del Rio, while Dammai was arrested in Florence, S.C., and is expected to make his initial appearance in Charleston, S.C., this morning. Lawrence Stowe, 58, of Dallas, Texas, also charged in relation to this case, is considered a fugitive and a warrant remains outstanding for his arrest. The two indictments in this matter, returned Nov. 9 and 10, 2011, have been unsealed by order of the court.

Given the terrible nature of Stowe, it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that he has already packed up his stuff and moved his operation to another part of the world. Fortunately, the thing with criminals is that they almost always slip up. If he is out of the country, he will return at some point. He can’t hide from his lies and crimes forever.

via SCmom.

Filed under: News, Pure bullshit | Tagged: , , , , , | 6 Comments »

Obama continues to fix the errors of Bush

Posted on July 6, 2009 by Michael

Scientists will be allowed to make the guidelines surrounding use of embryonic stem cells.

The government issued final rules Monday expanding taxpayer-funded research using embryonic stem cells, easing scientists’ fears that some of the oldest batches might not qualify and promising a master list of all that do.

President Barack Obama lifted previous restrictions on the field in March, but left it to the National Institutes of Health to decide just what stem cell research was ethically appropriate: Only science that uses cells culled from leftover fertility clinic embryos — ones that otherwise would be thrown away — the agency made clear in draft guidelines.

This is precisely how it should be. It is those well versed in science who should be making the relevant decisions within science. Politicians rarely ever know much of anything about how science needs to work. This is doubly true for Republicans. So it comes as no surprise that it has taken the election of Democrats to at least get a few things right.

Filed under: News | Tagged: , , , , , , | 7 Comments »

More Stem Cell News

Posted on January 30, 2009 by Michael

Stem cells have been used to help reverse paralysis in rats.

The study, headed up by Miodrag Stojkovic, deputy director and head of the Cellular Reprogramming Laboratory at Centro de Investigacion Principe Felipe in Spain, involved transplanting so-called progenitor stem cells from the lining of rats’ spinal cords into rodents with serious spinal cord injuries.

The rats recovered significant motor activity one week after injury, Stojkovic and his co-authors wrote in the Jan. 27 early online edition of the journal Stem Cells.

…

The researchers say the new rat results “open a new window on spinal cord regenerative strategies.”

These are great results, of course. But we all know what’s going to happen now. Those who are motivated by magic will claim this somehow proves embryonic stem cells are not needed. It, obviously, does not, but some people give extra respect to certain blobs of differentiated cells. The reason why is jarbled and arbitrary. On the upside, however, is the fact that the U.S. no longer has an anti-science administration in place, so the cries of the religious aren’t going to be heard quite so well, at least on this subject.

Obama

Oh, right. In every other ceremonial service from inauguration day.

Filed under: News, Politics and Social | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Embyonic stem cells

Posted on January 27, 2009 by Michael

The FDA has approved a study which will inject embyonic stem cells into humans.

The Geron corporation announce the approval today. The therapy used in the study is designed to treat spinal cord injuries by injecting stem cells — which are able to transform into the many different types of cells we need in our bodies — directly into the patients’ spinal cords.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted clearance of the company’s application for the clinical trial of GRNOPC1 in patients with acute spinal cord injury.

“This marks the beginning of what is potentially a new chapter in medical therapeutics – one that reaches beyond pills to a new level of healing: the restoration of organ and tissue function achieved by the injection of healthy replacement cells,” said Geron’s president and CEO. Dr. Thomas B. Okarma.

“The neurosurgical community is very excited by this new approach to treating devastating spinal cord injury,” said Dr. Richard Fessler, a professor of neurological surgery at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University.

While, according to the article this doesn’t have much to do with the recent shift from hating science and its beauty to embracing truth (the shift from Bush to Obama), it is pretty exciting. Stem cells are wonderful things. If some major theraputic treatment does not arise out of these cells, I’ll be awfully surprised (and the scientific community). I think it may be safe enough to say if many treatments do not come from stem cells, the surprise will be huge around the world. These far-from-conscious cells are the future of medical science.

Filed under: Politics and Social | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Japanese Researchers Begin to Pull Ahead

Posted on November 6, 2008 by Michael

Thanks to the tireless efforts of the soon-to-thankfully-end Bush administration, the United States is beginning to fall behind in science and technology. One example to this effect is the recent advancements made by the well-funded research of Japanese scientists.

TOKYO (AFP) – Japanese researchers said Thursday they had created functioning human brain tissues from stem cells, a world first that has raised new hopes for the treatment of disease.

Stem cells taken from human embryos have been used to form tissues of the cerebral cortex, the supreme control tower of the brain, according to researchers at the government-backed research institute Riken.

The tissues self-organised into four distinct zones very similar to the structure seen in human foetuses, and conducted neuro-activity such as transmitting electrical signals, the institute said.

Research on stem cells is seen as having the potential to save lives by helping to find cures for diseases such as cancer and diabetes or to replace damaged cells, tissues and organs.

The team’s previous studies showed stem cells differentiated into distinct cells but until now they had never organised into functioning tissues.

Let’s hope an Obama administration can finally give the scientific community the true support it has been needing for the past 8 anti-science years.

Filed under: Evolution, News | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »