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American Idol contestant Alexis Cohen was found dead Saturday morning at around 4 a.m. in Seaside Heights, New Jersey.

Alexis Cohen was struck and killed by a car. Authorities also believes it to be a possible homicide,her body was 300 yards away from her car.

Ocean County prosecutors office believes Cohen might be a hit by a truck or a car.

She sustained “chest and abdominal injuries, along with a closed head injury “.

Mohel said medics took Cohen to Community Medical Center in Tom’s River, where she was pronounced dead at 6:35 a.m. “July 25

Los Angeles: The hot and saucy Playboy show ‘Girl Next Door’ just got hotter as playmates Holly Madison, Kendra Wilkinson and Bridget Marquardt striped naked for a raunchy bath in the caves.


According to the Sun, in the uncensored show, the girls would have water cascading down on them in the tropical-style setting, even as they will share cheeky glances, rubbing suds over their bare bodies.

The show that is aired at midnight will sure boast of a high TRP rating, considering the no holds bar bare all session from its sizzling playmates.

Sad for Hefner, who was not present to watch the live shooting but then, hasn’t the mogul watched it hundred times before?Read More Leaked Vidoes

The police photograph is chilling. In grainy black and white tones, it shows 13-year-old Martin Andrews sitting in a makeshift box, his leg chained. The look in his eyes is one of fear, fatigue and disbelief. He had just been rescued from a nightmare.

"I was abducted by a sexually violent predator by the name of Richard Ausley, who had been twice convicted for sexually assaulting young boys, and he had taken me for eight days," Andrews recalled of his ordeal 37 years ago this month. "I was left to die."

As a survivor of a sex crime, Andrews is one face of an issue the Supreme Court will revisit Tuesday: civil commitment, which allows the government to keep sex offenders in custody even after they have served their sentences. Twenty states have such laws, including Virginia, where Andrews was held captive and repeatedly assaulted.

CNN normally doesn't name victims of sex crimes, but Andrews, now a victims' advocate, agreed to tell his story.

On the other side of the debate is the first sex offender released from Virginia's civil commitment program, and one of just a handful nationwide.

"I served my time for what I did, and I didn't feel like I should be incarcerated again," said this man, who asked that his identity not be revealed for fear of retribution. "It was a scary thing to know that you could be committed to a mental institution for the rest of your life."

The man said mandatory therapy helped him, but he thinks that could have been initiated while he was in prison.

There is widespread disagreement on whether civil commitment is a Catch-22. In discussions of the effects of sex crimes, nothing is simple or dispassionate.

The practice of confinement in mental hospitals or treatment centers for those with severe mental illness has been around the United States since its founding. Around the turn of the 20th century, many laws dealing with sexual psychopaths were passed. Over the decades, the laws were repealed or rarely applied.

Then, in 1990, Washington state became the first to pass an innovative civil commitment law specifically for violent sex offenders. California, Wisconsin and New York, among others, later followed. Such "predator laws" focused on risk assessment and prevention of re-offending. It is a concept that the general public may not be aware exists.
Video: What to do with sex offenders?



The Supreme Court has upheld the use of such laws when the individual goal is rehabilitation, not further "punishment." But it has another, broader purpose.

"The primary goal is incapacitation, that is, protecting society from people who are predicted to be dangerous in the future," said Eric Janus, author of "Failure to Protect" and dean at William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota. "The second goal is to provide treatment to these individuals."

Critics of these programs say behavioral rehabilitation centers amount to prisons, are often overcrowded and understaffed, and rarely meet the stated goal of treating the "worst of the worst" offenders to the point they can rejoin society.

"The evidence is showing that it's only becoming a detainment center for people they do not went on the streets," said Derek Logue, a sex offender who was released and now advocates for offender rights through his Web site, oncefallen.com. "They have no hope of getting out, and the odds are stacked against you."

According to Justice Department statistics, 20 states use civil confinement, involving about 4,000 rapists, pedophiles and other sex offenders nationwide. Estimates are that these programs cost taxpayers more than $700 million a year, almost $150,000 per individual. That is about four times more than confining them in prison.

Virginia passed its civil commitment law in 1999 but had never fully funded it. Andrews found out from a reporter in 2002 that his attacker was just weeks away from being released after 29 years behind bars. Once a victim, now an empowered advocate, Andrews realized he had to act.

"I didn't know about other sex offenders. I didn't know about the extent of the problem. I only knew one, but I knew that one needed to be dealt with," Andrews, 50, said from his northern Virginia home, where he works as a program manger for a defense contractor. State officials, he said, "all told me there was nothing to be done; he was going to be set free; that was it."

But Andrews mobilized, lobbying lawmakers to quickly fund the program, despite a budget shortfall. It worked, and the state has become a national model, using a tool called "Static 99" that assesses which offenders qualify for civil commitment.

Andrews' attacker remained behind bars but was killed by a fellow inmate before ever going into the treatment program.

The catalyst for the state's change were once-dormant memories for Andrews, who now knew that he had to tell his story.

As a teenager in Portsmouth in 1973, Andrews was walking to the store in snowy weather when a van pulled up and the man inside asked the boy whether he wanted to earn some extra money moving furniture. Andrews agreed but instead was taken to a rural area and a metal box dug into the side of a hill.

"He looked at me, and he said, 'I've got bad news for you. You've just been kidnapped.' "
He looked at me, and he said, 'I've got bad news for you. You've just been kidnapped.'


What followed was days of brutal rapes and beatings. Ausley eventually left, and Andrews would certainly have died if some rabbit hunters had not stumbled upon him after hearing his screams.

Andrews believes that civil commitment is not the best tool, but for the most dangerous predators, "it is the only tool we have that is 100 percent effective, because they are removed from society. They are removed from their triggers."

The case before the Supreme Court on Tuesday deals with a federal law that has kept as many as 77 inmates held in federal prison in North Carolina under indefinite commitment.

The justices will decide whether the program enacted under the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006 is constitutional by infringing on a traditional state function. The law was named after the son of "America's Most Wanted" host John Walsh.

The justices said in 2007 that a Kansas law was neither double jeopardy (second criminal punishment for the same crime) nor "ex post facto" (new punishment for a previous crime).

"We have never held that the Constitution prevents a state from civilly detaining those for whom no treatment is available but who nevertheless pose a danger to others," Justice Clarence Thomas said.

Courts have since been at odds with what kind of treatment must be provided and to what extent, to pass constitutional muster.

Janus worries about the slippery slope if such laws -- federal or state -- are allowed to continue without strong judicial checks.

"The main danger of civil commitment of sex offenders is that it provides a precedent for doing an end run around those governmental protections, and we all may be comfortable right now because we say, 'Well, this is those people. It's not us. It's not our rights that are at stake,' " he said.

"I think we all ought to be cognizant of the fact that these laws set a precedent that greatly expands the power of government to take away our liberty, not for something we've done in the past, not after we've been convicted and punished, but out of fear that we might commit a crime in the future, and this is a very very powerful and dangerous idea," Janus said.
These laws set a precedent that greatly expands the power of government to take away our liberty.

The white-haired man sitting with his lawyer outside Richmond says he is no longer a danger to society. He served nearly eight years in prison for molesting three girls and nearly five years in forced civil commitment. Despite that state confinement, including being the first of only about four men to be released from it, he says post-prison treatment helped him.

"I think that civil commitment is unfair," he said. "I'm not against treatment. I have done everything in my power to help myself" understand the effects of sexual abuse.

He said that being told just days before his scheduled 2003 release that he was being civilly committed left him feeling "hopeless."

Shortly afterward, the man castrated himself with a razor in his jail cell. After the transfer and years in the rehabilitation unit, he was freed and lives a quiet life -- albeit under constant electronic surveillance -- with no further reported incidents, says his attorney.

Lawyer David Hargett convinced the Virginia Supreme Court that his client had a constitutional right to contest his civil commitment.

"I have found talking with people they are shocked to hear somebody can be sentenced by a judge, serve out that entire sentence and then say, 'Wait a minute, we're not going to let you go,'

"This treatment facility ... is a prison, let's be honest. It has barbed wire and locked doors." He said most in the Virginia facility realistically will never get out.

Julia Gilbert,21, was a student,and scheduled to graduate in May at the University of Oklahoma, a missing OU student since friday(she had last seen at about 3:30 a.m. Friday, leaving a friend’s house in the 600 block of Belle Air Avenue in Edmond) was found dead inside her wrecked silver Jetta by Edmond police on Sunday 10th January 2010.

Julia Gilbert, was found upside down in a creek bed near Waterloo and Morgan Road in Kingfisher County at about 3 p.m.on Sunday. A passerby saw the car and notified authorities,officials say Gilbert apparently hit a guardrail which caused her car to flip. Police say it was lucky anyone saw the car at all because of where it landed in the ravine.

BET Networks makes a joyful noise on Sunday, January 10 at 8:00 p.m.* with the premiere of CELEBRATION OF GOSPEL. Taped at the Orpheum Theater in Los Angeles and hosted once again by host and author Steve Harvey, the night included uplifting performances, powerful duets and soulful choirs. Aptly themed "Ten Years, Faithfully Yours," in honor of the show's 10th anniversary, CELEBRATION OF GOSPEL featured breathtaking performances and spoken word segments by both mainstream and gospel greats including Fantasia and her mother Diane Barrino Barber performing "He's Done Enough"; Anthony Hamilton and his wife Tarsha Hamilton singing "Better", and The Rance Allen Group performing a soulful rendition of "Something About the Name Jesus."

Additionally, BET SUNDAY BEST winner Y'Anna Crawley teamed up with Dr. Bobby Jones and the Nashville Super Choir for "The Lord Will Make a Way Somehow"; Kelly Price and Ledisi performed "How Great Thou Art"; Yolanda Adams, GRAMMY(TM) award winners BeBe and CeCe Winans, Fred Hammond, Donnie McClurkin, Pastor Shirley Caesar, Marvin Sapp, James Fortune & FIYA, Tye Tribbett & Greater Anointing, and The City of Refuge P.S.A.L.M.S. Choir all set the stage on fire with soul-stirring performances; and actresses Sherri Shepherd and Elise Neal lent their hearts with inspirational spoken words.

Playboy Model Paula Sladewski Found Dead in a Miami: Miami, Florida, USA — The burned woman’s body found on January 2nd night in a North Miami trash bin has been identified as 26-year oldPlayboy Model Paula Sladewski.

She and her 32-year old boyfriend Kevin Klym had flew into South Florida to spend New Year’s Eve at a Lady Gaga concert at Miami Beach’s posh Fontainebleau. It is reported to that they got into a fight when he wanted her leave the club and he got thrown out of the club. Later, Kevin filed a missing person’s report.

She was with her boyfriend, Kevin Klym, 34. The two got into a fight at the club, according to a missing person’s report he filed. Klym told authorities he wanted to leave because she was “too drunk.” She yelled at him and bouncers threw him out of the club.

He took a taxi to their Miami Beach hotel, and told police it was the last time he had seen her.

Klym called hospitals and police stations, but couldn’t find his girlfriend. He told police that she was last seen wearing a short blue dress and black six-inch heels.

That same Sunday, a few hours before the missing person’s report was made, a man spotted a fire from a Dumpster in the 1400 block of Northeast 130th Street in North Miami. The body was “burned beyond recognition,” said Lt. Neal Cuevas, a North Miami police spokesman. Nothing else was found in the trash bin.

Happy New Year 2010, The new year 2010 (MMX) will be a common year starting on Friday in accordance with the Gregorian calendar. It will also be the first year of the 2010s decade. Since we are facing problems related to climate change, the United Nations also proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year of Biodiversity. The proclamation of the International Year of Biodiversity is aimed at raising the awareness of people worldwide about the importance of biodiversity. Saving biodiversity requires an effort from everyone. The UN hopes that through activities and events in many countries, the global community will work together to ensure a sustainable future for us all.

Meanwhile, according to the Chinese Zodiac, the Year of 2010 is the Year of the Tiger, which begins on February 14, 2010 and ends on February 2, 2011. The Tiger is the third sign in the cycle of Chinese Zodiac, which consists of 12 animal signs. It is a sign of courage. This fearless and fiery fighter is revered by the ancient Chinese as the sign that wards off the three main disasters of a household: fire, thieves and ghosts.

Thus, the Biodiversity Year and the year of the tiger has been the dominant theme of most New Year wallpapers for 2010. Here, we gathered 20 of the most creative new year wallpaper designs to welcome 2010. Have a happy new year everyone!