Author: CNN Newsource

By Sarah McGrew

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    LAFAYETTE, California (KCRA) — Sitting in the backyard of the home she shares with her husband and daughter, Ofelia Noroozi constantly feels the absence of the fourth member of their family: her son Amin Noroozi.

“Just those everyday little moments are just so cruel,” Ofelia Noroozi said. “It’s like we’re missing what could’ve been. The future.”

Amin Noroozi was a 17-year-old student and multisport athlete at Acalanes High School.

In April, he and his girlfriend, Audrey, and some of their other friends headed to Stinson Beach for the day. Ofelia Noroozi had told her son to be safe while driving on the winding roads leading into the beach community in Marin County.

Later in the day, Ofelia Noroozi’s phone lit up with Amin Noroozi’s name, but when she picked up, it was Audrey’s voice.

“It was Audrey saying that he had gotten into an accident and that he couldn’t feel his legs,” Ofelia Noroozi recalled. “They were waiting for the helicopter to land to airlift him somewhere.”

Amin Noroozi and Audrey had been out in the water, diving through the waves. After going through a wave, Audrey looked behind her to find Amin Noroozi floating face down. When she reached him to flip him over, Amin Noroozi told her he could not feel his legs.

He was airlifted to John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek. The same hospital where he was born. His neck was broken, and the doctor told the family that Amin Noroozi was paralyzed from the chest down. He needed emergency surgery.

Before going into the operating room, Ofelia Noroozi told her son that she would go to the ends of the Earth to make sure he was OK.

Ofelia Noroozi said one of the last things her son told her before heading back to surgery was, “These legs may not work anymore, but these lips are always going to kiss you.”

The surgery was a success. His parents and younger sister said that, at one point, he wiggled a finger and indicated he could feel a touch on his leg. But in the days after surgery, his condition became increasingly critical.

“You think they would do everything possible for your son,” Amin’s father, Payman Noroozi, said. “There was no point where we were thinking of him dying.”

His parents said his temperature hit 109 degrees, and his heart rate plummeted. Four days after he was admitted to the hospital, he went into cardiac arrest and died.

A lawsuit the family filed on Oct. 9 alleges that “despite the successful surgery, the critical post-surgical care was deficient, disorganized, unsupervised, and spun out of control, directly and unnecessarily causing Amin Noroozi’s suffering and death.”

With tears threatening to spill over, Payman Noroozi said, “I feel like if they couldn’t have done it, they should have told us so we could take him somewhere else. That’s where I feel like failed [Amin].”

The family says Amin Noroozi should have been transferred to a Level 1 pediatric trauma center. John Muir is a Level 2.

In a statement obtained by our colleagues at the San Francisco Chronicle, John Muir declined to comment on the specifics, given the pending litigation and patient privacy policies.

“We extend our deepest sympathies to the family and loved ones of Mr. Noroozi,” the hospital said in a statement. “We stand behind the professionalism and dedication of our physicians, nurses, and staff, and we remain focused on patient safety, quality, and continuous improvement.”

The Noroozis know they cannot bring their son back, but they want to prevent something similar from happening to another family.

“No seeing him coming back from school every day — it was going to be his senior year,” Ofelia Noroozi said. “It doesn’t get better. It doesn’t. You just kind of have to keep going.”

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By Jacquelyn Quinones

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    SALINAS, California (KSBW) — The County of Monterey is enhancing health care access for indigenous communities by training interpreters and expanding services in local hospitals, with Natividad Hospital leading the initiative.

For years, the county health department and Natividad Hospital have partnered to train indigenous language interpreters to ensure patients can communicate clearly and receive better care.

Natividad Hospital is one of the first hospitals to provide interpreter services for the indigenous population, and as of today, the hospital has about 20 indigenous interpreters and is actively seeking more.

Monterey County is home to a large Hispanic and indigenous population, and that diversity is driving a push for more indigenous language interpreters, especially in local hospitals.

“They are different communities that identify with certain language groups, and for more than a decade we’ve realized that there weren’t suitable services for language access,” said Victor Sosa, the Interpreter Services Manager at Natvidad Medical Center. “Generally, some of the community would interpret for their parents, and that just wasn’t appropriate and didn’t really give families access to health care.”

Staff at Natividad Hospital decided to take action by creating a pipeline to train and certify interpreters from indigenous communities.

In 2017, Sosa co-authored the indigenous interpreter textbook, a first-of-its-kind resource.

“In using that, we’ve trained over 200 interpreters that identify belonging to indigenous communities, and some work here in the hospitals and others work throughout Monterey County,” said Sosa.

Natividad Hospital was also recognized for its OB-GYN department, which has improved the birthing experience for both Latina and indigenous mothers.

“They went out to the communities, provided more research and training so that when moms got appropriate prenatal care, they came to the hospital and had a better birthing experience,” said Sosa.

The county’s health department has also partnered with Natividad and other groups to expand interpretation services into mental health programs.

“Many of our indigenous women in South Monterey County, specifically Soledad, Greenfield, and King City, may not be comfortable accessing mental health services,” said Elsa Jimenez County of Monterey Director of Health Services. “So we’ve partnered with CBDIO out of Greenfield to develop a community-based program.”

The health department is partnering with Natividad and, pending board approval, plans to hire a full-time indigenous interpreter who would be based at the Alisal Health Center.

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By James Stratton

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    MILWAUKEE (WISN) — Milwaukee police released dashcam video showing an off-duty officer shooting and killing Elijah Wilks after Wilks’ family called for its early release.

The confrontation occurred between Elijah Wilks and an off-duty Milwaukee Police Department officer Thursday at 49th Street and Mill Road in Milwaukee, where 26-year-old Wilks died after an exchange of gunfire with the officer.

Milwaukee police typically release video to the public within 15 days of a shooting, per department policy. This release happened roughly four days after the shooting. Milwaukee Police say they released the video “in the interest of transparency.”

The family called the shooting justified and wanted the video released because they believe it shows everything that happened. The off-duty officer shot and killed Wilks after video shows Wilks hit him with his gun. The plea and urgent release of the video came after grainy surveillance video was posted on social media over the weekend.

Police say, and the officer’s dash camera video shows, the pair were involved in a crash. Then, video shows the pair get out of their cars and quickly exchange words, and Wilks then pulls out his gun and hits the officer with it. The entire exchange is 26 seconds long.

“Elijah pulls out a firearm with his right hand, and that, he’s essentially swinging it in the direction of the off-duty officer. One time. It’s almost like a punch is what actually transpired,” attorney B’Ivory LaMarr, who represents the family, said.

The pair exchanged gunfire, according to police. The officer had his service weapon, and video shows Wilks had a gun of his own.

Last Thursday, a neighbor said police pulled a 10 mm bullet from his living room wall. Wilks was facing that direction, according to video. Milwaukee police say they do not have any 10 mm service weapons.

Balloons and photos now sit where Wilks died as the family works to grieve his death.

“What this family has done is made the difficult decision, while they’re grieving, to put aside their privacy, put aside their grieving to allow again the opportunity for accountability to actually exist where the public can see what they saw. And just try to move past the situation and heal this city,” LaMarr said.

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By Hannah Hilyard

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    MILWAUKEE (WISN) — A Milwaukee mother is dead after police said someone hit her with a rock in her own backyard.

The medical examiner identifies the woman as 64-year-old Carrie Zettel. On Monday, WISN 12 News obtained a search warrant that identifies the suspect as 29-year-old Lauren Spors, Zettel’s daughter.

“She called me at 3:53 this morning,” close family friend Loretta Moyer said. “Lauren was here beating on the doors, throwing rocks, trying to break in. She called the police.”

Less than 12 hours later, police returned to Zettel’s home near South 23rd Street and West Ramsey Avenue to find a violent crime scene.

The search warrant revealed that Zettel called 911 at 2:06 p.m. Sunday, claiming her daughter was “being violent.”

MPD District 6 officers responded and found Zettel dead.

“It happened in the backyard, and she beat her mother to death with a rock,” said Susan Henderson-Hoffmann, another family friend.

The warrant states that officers found Spors “covered in blood” and arrested her.

“I cannot believe Carrie is gone, but you want to know something? I’m not surprised,” Henderson-Hoffmann said.

She’s not surprised based on Spors’ violent past. 12 News uncovered a trail of run-ins with the courts.

In 2018, Zettel was granted a restraining order against her daughter after penning a handwritten plea detailing her fears of Spors, who struggled with mental health issues. Court records show Spors is accused of violating that order four times. Each time, Spors was found incompetent for the case to move forward.

Court documents show she was taken to the county mental health facility after the fourth event, when she had “thrown a rock through one of the double pane windows” at Zettel’s home. Public records do not indicate how long she was held.

“The girl should have been stopped years ago, and I don’t understand why. And that angers me,” Henderson-Hoffmann said.

Zettel’s restraining order against her daughter expired in 2022.

Spors has not yet been formally charged in Sunday’s crime. Police booking records show she is in custody for first-degree intentional homicide.

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