Most human trafficking related to prostitution

More than 80 percent of the 2,515 suspected incidents of human trafficking investigated by law enforcement agencies between January 2008 and June 2010 involved adult prostitution or the exploitation and forced prostitution of children, a Justice Department report released Thursday says.

The report, written by the department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), says 48 percent of the investigated incidents involved adults, while 40 percent uncovered the exploitation or forced prostitution of children. The remainder, about 350 cases, involved allegations of labor trafficking, in which people were being forced against their will into performing labor — including forced begging and roadside sales, along with work at hair salons, hotels and bars.

Jacksonville air pollution among the worst in Florida Read more: Jacksonville air pollution among the worst in Florida

Air quality in the Duval County area isn’t so great, according to an annual report by the American Lung Association. The State of the Air 2011 study, which grades smog and and soot levels, handed out a D grade to Duval County in both ozone and short-term particle pollution.

Duval also came in first (not in the good way) as the most polluted county in Florida for short-term particle pollution.

Jacksonville jury awards $40 million in tobacco case

A Jacksonville jury this afternoon awarded $34 million in punitive damages from two tobacco companies to the husband of a woman who died after smoking for 36 years.

That amount is on top of a $6 million verdict against the tobacco companies yesterday in the lawsuit brought by Andy Allen against R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris. Allen's wife Patty died in 2002 at 54.

The verdict is the third largest of the post-Engle cases that have gone to trial, according to the Tobacco Products Liability Project at Northeastern University, which monitors tobacco lawsuits.

Supreme Court Allows Contracts That Prohibit Class-Action Arbitration

Businesses may use standard-form contracts to forbid consumers claiming fraud from banding together in a single arbitration, the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday in a 5-to-4 decision that split along ideological lines.

Though the decision concerned arbitrations, it appeared to provide businesses with a way to avoid class-action lawsuits in court. All they need do, the decision suggested, is use standard-form contracts that require two things: that disputes be raised only through the informal mechanism of arbitration and that claims be brought one by one.

“Requiring the availability of classwide arbitration interferes with fundamental attributes of arbitration,” Justice Scalia wrote. He was joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.

Arbitrators are ill suited to handling sprawling cases, Justice Scalia said, and sensible businesses would not agree to participate in informal proceedings from which very limited appeals are possible when faced “with even a small chance of a devastating loss.”

“We find it hard to believe,” Justice Scalia wrote, “that defendants would bet the company with no effective means of review, and even harder to believe that Congress would have intended to allow state courts to force such a decision.”

Justice Stephen G. Breyer, writing for himself and Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, said the state court decision banning class waivers did not violate the federal law favoring arbitrations.

Class arbitrations, Justice Breyer wrote, are perfectly appropriate ways to resolve claims that are minor individually but significant in the aggregate.

Report names U.S. cities with foulest, cleanest air

The nation's 25 most smoggy cities improved air quality over the last year, but half the nation's residents still live with unhealthy levels of air pollution, according to an American Lung Association report released on Wednesday.

Weighing the pluses and minuses in U.S. air quality over the past year, the "State of the Air 2011" report concluded that the U.S. Clean Air Act, the federal law aimed at limiting pollution in the nation's skies, is working.

Cities with the foulest air were broken down into three categories and the worst three in each were Los Angeles, Bakersfield and Visalia, all in California, as most ozone polluted; Bakersfield and Fresno, both in California, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, as most polluted by short-term particle pollution; and Bakersfield, Los Angeles and Phoenix as most polluted by year-round particle pollution.

Cities with nation's best overall air quality were Honolulu and Santa Fe, New Mexico, the report said.

Obama Releases Full Birth Certificate, Calls Controversy 'Silliness'

President Obama spoke to the White House press corps after the certificate was released, and said that the big debates over the country's fiscal situation cannot be solved if the country is distracted by false stories about where he was born.

"We do not have time for this kind of silliness," President Obama said. "I am confident that the American people and American political leaders can get together and solve these problems. We always have," he said. "We aren't gonna be able to do it if we are distracted."

Jacksonville City Council action

A look at some of the issues Jacksonville's City Council considered Tuesday:

Issue: City pension investments

What it means: Trustees of the general employee pension system wanted permission to invest up to 10 percent of the fund in "alternative" investments that could include hedge funds and private equity funds.

Bill No. 2011-108

Action: Deferred until May 10

Issue: Police training money

What it means: The council was asked to approve using $200,000 from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for specialized training of police and correctional officers.

Bill No. 2011-175

Action: Approved

Issue: Selling city land

What it means: The council was asked to let the city sell flood-prone property on McCoys Creek Boulevard near the new Fire Station 5 without a bidding process. City departments said they had no use for it. A neighboring company, Miner Properties, Jacksonville Ltd., wanted to buy the land at its appraised value of $62,000.

Bill No. 2011-135

Action: Approved

1 in 4 children in US raised by a single parent

One in four children in the United States is being raised by a single parent - a percentage that has been on the rise and is higher than other developed countries, according to a report released Wednesday.

Of the 27 industrialized countries studied by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.S. had 25.8 percent of children being raised by a single parent, compared with an average of 14.9 percent across the other countries.

Ireland was second (24.3 percent), followed by New Zealand (23.7 percent). Greece, Spain, Italy and Luxemborg had among the lowest percentages of children in single-parent homes.

Experts point to a variety of factors to explain the high U.S. figure, including a cultural shift toward greater acceptance of single-parent child rearing. The U.S. also lacks policies to help support families, including childcare at work and national paid maternity leave, which are commonplace in other countries.

Single parents in the U.S. were more likely to be employed - 35.8 percent compared to a 21.3 percent average - but they also had higher rates of poverty, the report found.

Report: Fla. Hispanics outpace the rest of the nation in college degrees

Preliminary excerpts from the report emphasize that Hispanics are by far the largest minority in U.S. public schools — comprising more than 1 in 5 in pre-kindergarten through 12th grade. Hispanics are also projected to account for the majority of the nation’s population growth between 2005 and 2050.

In the other report released this week — authored by the Washington-based nonprofit Excelencia In Education — a spotlight is placed on Florida’s Hispanic college students.

What those numbers show: about 32 percent of Florida Hispanic adults have earned an associate’s degree or higher, a number higher than in any other state. The national average is 19 percent.

Yet even that first-place showing among Florida Hispanics was behind Florida’s overall degree attainment percentage of 36 percent.

American women pass men in advanced college degrees

For the first time, American women have passed men in gaining advanced college degrees as well as bachelor’s degrees, part of a trend that is helping redefine who goes off to work and who stays home with the children.

The educational gains for women are giving them greater access to a wider range of jobs, contributing to a shift of traditional gender roles at home and work. Based on one demographer’s estimate, the number of stay-at-home dads who are the primary caregivers for their children reached nearly 2 million last year, or one in 15 fathers. The official census tally was 154,000, based on a narrower definition that excludes those working part-time or looking for jobs.

Among adults 25 and older, 10.6 million U.S. women have master’s degrees or higher, compared to 10.5 million men. Women still trail men in professional subcategories such as business, science and engineering.

When it comes to finishing college, roughly 20.1 million women have bachelor’s degrees, compared to nearly 18.7 million men — a gap of more than 1.4 million that has remained steady in recent years. Women first passed men in bachelor’s degrees in 1996.

By the admittedly outmoded measure of the census, the number of stay-at-home dads has remained largely flat in recent years, making up less than 1 percent of married-couple households.

Guantanamo Docs Neglected, Concealed Medical Evidence of Torture, Study Finds

Doctors caring for detainees at the Guantanamo prison may have neglected or concealed medical evidence of torture, such as bone fractures, lacerations, and symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder, , according to a study released today by Physicians for Human Rights.

For example, one of the suspected terrorists held at Gitmo who claimed he had been severely beaten with kicks and punches until he was unconcious had evidence of a fracture on X-ray, but the circumstances of the injury were not discussed in his medical file.

"Apparently the clinician did not ask how the injury occurred," says Dr. Vincent Iacopino, senior medical advisor for Physicians for Human Rights and co-author on the study

The study acknowledged that the Gitmo medical staff provided quality medical care for ailments ranging from athletes foot to nearsightedness.

"What was so striking in our investigation," Iacopino says, "was that it's clear the Department of Defense clinicians provided medical care in the way you'd expect at any hospital or clinic, except that whenever an injury implied the possibility of intentional harm or psychological symptoms suggesting torture, the cause of those symptoms were completely ignored."

Duval County no longer state murder capital

Figures released Tuesday by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement show Miami-Dade now has that crown, with a rate of 9.03 murders per 100,000 people. Duval is second by a slim margin at a rate of 8.98 murders per 100,000 among counties of 500,000 or more.

The number of murders in Duval County dropped from 101 in 2009 to 81 in 2010, according to the annual report.

In Duval County, overall crime was down 12.2 percent, nearly double the state rate. While rapes were up, robberies and aggravated batteries dropped along with murders. Burglaries, larcenies and motor vehicle thefts also were down.

Number of 100-year-olds is booming in US

But turning 100 isn't such a big deal anymore.

America's population of centenarians - already the largest in the world - has roughly doubled in the past 20 years to around 72,000 and is projected to at least double again by 2020, perhaps even increase seven-fold, according to the Census Bureau.

The Census Bureau estimates there were 71,991 centenarians as of Dec. 1, up from 37,306 two decades earlier. While predicting longevity and population growth is difficult, the census' low-end estimate for 2050 is 265,000 centenarians; its highest projection puts the number at 4.2 million.

Florida crime rate at lowest mark since 1971

Florida Gov. Rick Scott and Florida Department of Law Enforcement Commissioner Gerald Bailey said Tuesday the crime rate dropped by 6.6 percent in 2010 from the 2009 figures which reflected 54,000 fewer crimes. There were 987 murders last year, which was 26 fewer than in 2009 and nearly 5,000 fewer robberies, a decrease of 15.6 percent.

However, the improved safety numbers come with a price. Six police officers have already been killed while doing their job in the first four months of 2011.

Scott still upbeat on Florida corporate tax cut

Gov. Rick Scott says he's still confident Florida lawmakers will cut taxes.

Scott maintained that upbeat attitude Tuesday, just a day after his latest proposal to phase out Florida's corporate income tax was tabled by a Senate committee.

New Yorkers lead pack in government benefits

New York spent $2,903 per person on Medicaid in 2010 — a third more than any other state. The U.S. average is $1,364. Nevada spent the least: $666 per person.

High School Classes May Be Advanced in Name Only

But other studies point to a disconnect: Even though students are getting more credits in more advanced courses, they are not scoring any higher on standardized tests.

The reason, according to a growing body of research, is that the content of these courses is not as high-achieving as their names — the course-title equivalent of grade inflation. Algebra II is sometimes just Algebra I. And College Preparatory Biology can be just Biology.

Lynn T. Mellor, a researcher in Austin, Tex., who has studied the phenomenon in the state, compares it to a food marketer labeling an orange soda as healthier orange juice.

The 2009 results — the most recent available — of the federal test that measures change in achievement levels over decades showed that the nation’s 17-year-olds were scoring no higher in reading and math than in 1973. SAT scores have dropped or flat-lined, too, since 2000.

But a federal study released this month of nearly 38,000 high school transcripts showed that the proportion of graduates completing a rigorous curriculum rose to 13 percent in 2009 from 5 percent in 1990.

Florida No. 8 in U.S. employment growth

Florida continued its upward climb from the recession in March, posting the eighth-largest employment gain of any state.

The latest figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show Florida with an increase of 51,500 nonfarm jobs between March 2011 and the same month this year. (Click here for a database with the new seasonally adjusted numbers for all 50 states and the District of Columbia.)

CEOs warn of subpar school standards

A group of top business leaders warned in a new report Thursday that U.S. schools have set a standard for their students that’s too low and that subpar expectations put the country in danger of falling even further behind other nations in reading and math proficiency.

The survey by Change the Equation, a coalition of educators and CEOs of companies that includes Time Warner, Xerox and ExxonMobil, found that while students in many schools meet the benchmarks set by their states, those thresholds fall far below national levels set by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Assessment of Education Program (NAEP).

U.S. Orders Airlines to State Fees More Clearly

Although the rules do not set limits on how much carriers can charge for items like bags, ticket changes and seats, they do require airlines to more clearly disclose these and other fees in advertisements and on their Web sites. Ads will have to cite the full price, including government taxes that now are often relegated to the fine print.

Other provisions increase the compensation carriers must pay passengers who are involuntarily bumped from flights (from up to $800 to as much as $1,300 for the longest delays). They also require the airlines to refund checked baggage fees if luggage is lost, and require airlines to promptly notify customers of delays over 30 minutes. The provisions impose a four-hour limit on time spent on the tarmac for delayed international flights, expanding a policy that has been in place for domestic flights for a year.