Wife decries 'senseless' mob beating

Mob pulled man who honked horn from car and beat him

MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin (AP) -- The wife of a man yanked from his car and brutally beaten by a mob of young people called on the community to stop the violence and for parents to control their children.

"It's just senseless," Linda Johnson, wife of Samuel McClain, said Wednesday in her first public statement since Monday's beating.

"If people could see him now compared to how he looked before, they'd be shocked," she said.

The family released a photo of the 50-year-old man in a hospital bed with a bruised and swollen face. He was in critical but stable condition Wednesday.

Samuel McClain was well enough to talk to officers Tuesday night, and several other people also were questioned, police said.

City officials asked for the public's help in finding the assailants, believed to be between 16 and 23 years old.

As many as 15 youths punched, kicked and jumped on McClain after he honked his horn for them to move out of the street, police said. It was the latest in a string of mob beatings in the city since 2002.

Harlem Boys Choir saved from eviction

Choir stays as after-school activity but must open own office

NEW YORK (CNN) -- New York's public school system has reached a deal with the historic Boys Choir of Harlem to save the beleaguered institution from eviction while it grapples with a $5 million cash shortfall.

The choir, which has performed before large audiences around the world, recently was told to leave the Harlem public school it has called home for the last 12 years for failing to address financial and managerial problems.

The deal will allow it to continue as an after-school activity.

The problems arose after choir director Walter Turnbull failed to fire an employee who sexually abused a student and did not report the abuse to authorities.

The choir, which has an estimated $5 million deficit and has had trouble raising funds because of the scandal, had been told to leave the school by January 31. The New York Department of Education had demanded the choir install new leadership, but Turnbull has remained at the helm with a new title.

Jobless Aborigines at risk

The consistently higher rates of unemployment among the Aboriginal population compared with the rest of the population puts their survival at risk, officials said yesterday.

A panel discussion involving the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA), the Council for Economic Planning and Development (CEPD), and the Council of Indigenous People (COIP) was held yesterday to discuss government initiatives to resolve the issue.

Deputy head of the Katagalan Institute Lin Hsiang-kai (林向愷) said that while the trend toward export trade in the 1960s had boosted the labor market, globalization in the 1990s had led to the closure of many industries in Taiwan, decreasing demand for laborers.

This, in addition to the legalization of the import of foreign laborers in 1992, had reduced job opportunities for indigenous people, a majority of whom are laborers.

"The economic development of Taiwan cannot be deemed fruitful if the economic survival of even a portion of the nation's citizen's isn't accounted for. Taiwan cannot call itself a democratic society if indigenous peoples' right to survive isn't protected," Lin said.