DOWN THE ALGORITHM RABBIT HOLE

In fall 2017, Gretchen Schmidt read an article about New Jersey’s adoption of algorithms in determining pre-trial sentencing. The concept of bail reform appealed to Schmidt, who prior to her career in higher education, worked in the legal field. In fact, during law school, she worked at a sheriff’s office where one of her responsibilities was conducting legal research with inmates two to three times a week.“While using data to inform sentencing decision is not new, the concept of using data-driven tools to help remove some of the apparently intrinsic bias in the current bail/bond system was appealing to me,” says Schmidt.

In February 2018, she presented on the use of algorithms in the pre-trail sentencing process at the 55th Annual Meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. The Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences is an international association established in 1963 to foster professional and scholarly activities in the field of criminal justice. It promotes criminal justice education, research, and policy analysis within the discipline of criminal justice for both educators and practitioners. Schmidt was part of a panel presenting papers related to issues with pre-trial detention.

There are extensive writings about algorithms being used in different ways and phases of the criminal justice process. “As I began my research, I did exactly what I caution my students against: I kept getting led down rabbit holes,” recalls Schmidt.

One rabbit hole she found herself exploring relates to the correlation between being detained pre-trial and the likelihood of being arrested. Related is research regarding the likelihood of someone detained pre-trial being sent to jail. “The theory is that if you are detained, you are more likely to take a plea and get a shorter sentence or, in best case scenario, time served. This, of course, leads to the last rabbit hole, the likelihood of pleading guilty to something you didn’t do because you don’t have the time or money to defend yourself,” she explains. These are serious issues to be considered when looking at pre-trial detention and the bail/bond system, and Schmidt was determined to see if algorithms were a solution.

Schmidt came to the conclusion that “in order for the algorithm to be successful, it needs to be properly [implemented], which includes intensive training on the tool, its goals and limitations, and consistent use at every level from the officer utilizing it and entering the data in the system, to the judge who determines the appropriate pre-trial action.” Her research supports this can happen. Schmidt reports that Kentucky added a public safety assessment tool and training for all parties involved in 2013 and, since then, has achieved great improvement in pre-trial detention. “In any case, a proprietary bail system that grossly over-houses the poor needs to be eliminated,” she says. – by Jenna Kerwin

NURSING INSTRUCTOR TOMAS SERNA, A VETERAN, GIVES BACK

Tomas Serna may have left active duty in October 2016, but his life remains anything but calm. Nowadays, the former lieutenant colonel is teaching, coaching, and mentoring the next generation of nursing leaders — what he claims was the best choice he could have made.

Serna initially joined the Army in 1983 because his business degree gave him few job prospects. When he briefly left the Army eight years later, he attended college at the University of Texas at El Paso and attained his bachelor’s in nursing. “I chose nursing because it gave me better career opportunities,” he says. Now he works as an employee for the federal government. “I just changed uniforms and returned to work,” says Serna. “My military and my civilian life is pretty much interconnected. I would not change it. I would rather continue to serve than to work in a civilian hospital.”

Tomas Serna’s strong will and dedication to lead others to survive and succeed has led him to support his fellow veterans in transferring to the civilian life, as well as encouraging his own children in following their educational dreams.

Photo: Aaron Ingrao

It wasn’t easy to transition to civilian life, however. “I think the most difficult thing for me was losing control. As an Army officer, I had a lot of responsibility, but I also had a lot of respect. I could make things happen with a single order,” Serna explains. Understandably, now it’s not so much the case, and Serna says a certain level of diplomacy must be mastered in order to get things done.

That doesn’t take away from his love of teaching. Serna teaches NUR 338 Introduction to Nursing Informatics and NUR 456 Leadership and Management in Nursing at Excelsior. “I enjoy dedicated students. I can work with students who are committed to succeed in the course. I can help them become successful in the class. I look for those students who work hard,” he says. It runs in the family, too. One of Serna’s greatest personal achievements is raising two nurses — his son and daughter. He says he “provided effective teaching, coaching, and mentoring. I could not give the profession more than my own two children.” One of Serna’s greatest military achievements is that in 2004, he took 450 soldiers to Iraq and brought them all back safely. Both accomplishments are a testament to Serna’s strong will and dedication to lead others to thrive and succeed.

Serna’s advice extends far beyond the paternal. He encourages veterans to take advantage of every possible program available to them; for instance, the VA has many programs, including job placement opportunities. “The transition center can also help them [veterans] before they get out of the service,” Serna explains. “They need to find a way to transfer their military experience, education, and training to the civilian job force. They need to dress to impress.”

In addition to helping fellow veterans, Serna is a member of a variety of local community organizations. He is also a member of the Texas Nursing Association and the National Association of Hispanic Nurses. “We conduct bi-yearly health fairs, seminars and educational activities within the community. The goal is to promote the profession within the community,” he explains. As a former Army Nurse Corps officer, he is a member of the Army Nurse Corps Association. In this capacity, he helps mentor young officers. “Further,” continues Serna “as a certified medical-surgical nurse, I help our clinical nurse specialists develop and present in-services to help our young nurses attain medical-surgical certifications.”- by Jenna Kerwin

SUSAN PIPER: USING DIGITAL STORYTELLING TO HELP VICTIMS OF PTSD

Post-traumatic stress disorder can happen to anyone. Military servicemembers and veterans most often experience PTSD due to the shocking and dangerous combat events they have witnessed during times of service. Susan Piper, a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner, knows firsthand the effects of PTSD since it took many years for her husband to admit he experienced symptoms of the disorder. Since then, Piper has been using digital storytelling to share his story with others in hopes that they might learn they aren’t alone and that help is available.

Piper, who hails from western Kentucky, comes from a large family of servicemembers. “I chose to join the military, and answer that call, because my family is a military family. My dad served, my brothers served, uncles, and aunt; from the Air Force, to the Army, to the National Guard,” says Piper. She has over 25 years of military service with most of that serving in the Army National Guard, and only moved into nursing eight years ago.

“The things that influenced me to become a nurse go way back,” Piper recalls. Her older sister was a nurse and after being a “classic, traditional” college student, she decided on nursing, too. “It was an overwhelming urge to want to help, to make a difference,” says Piper, who visited Excelsior in February.

What influenced her to become a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner stems back to her military family. “What drove me to specialize in that particular area falls back to my passion related to my service as a military member myself, having a family that is full of servicemembers. I have watched, over the years, so many soldiers go to war, and then return home, and talk of the things they experienced,” she explains.

Susan Piper, an instructional faculty member for the School of Nursing, shares her experience with recognizing PTSD and teaching veteran students during a presentation at Excelsior College in February 2018.

Photo: Danny Santandrea

Her husband was one of these soldiers. In fact, Piper had been a nurse for 12 years when her husband finally admitted he had a problem. “I was a nurse in the military, I was a soldier, and was standing right beside him, and even though I saw these things happening, it even took me a little bit of time to say there was a problem,” she says.

As a nurse educator at Hopkinsville Community College, about 10 miles from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, Piper was used to teaching students who had served in the military or are currently still serving in the military, or who are military dependents. That’s when she had an idea to use her husband’s PTSD as a learning tool while teaching for Excelsior in 2016. Piper decided to create a video to further enhance material in the bachelor’s degree in nursing’s community health curriculum. The video was funded by the Veterans’ Bachelor of Science Degree in Nursing grant. “I decided to use the fact that my husband has PTSD in my digital story, and sharing that with my students, because I think it is important to make connections. When you make connections, learning occurs,” she says. Piper has taught NUR 212 Health Differences Across the Life Span 2, NUR 211 Health Differences Across the Life Span 1, and NUR 105 Essentials of Nursing Care Health Differences for Excelsior.

Piper describes digital storytelling as a method of using multimedia, such as photographs, music, videos, text, and sometimes even the spoken word, to share information—a story, an idea, or a thought. “Digital storytelling is a wonderful method to provide reflective thought, and that is important for all of us to do in some way,” she adds, explaining the process of reflective thought as being a method of analyzing a situation and then developing a course of action. “It’s a method of problem solving, if you will.”

For example, she says, “If I want to better myself, then I’m going to take a minute, every day, and reflect upon the day, and anything that may have caused me a problem. Or maybe it was something new that I’d been exposed to, then I’m going to think about that, and analyze how that impacted me. What have I gained from it? And then develop that plan, or course of action, or what am I going to do with this now that I’ve been exposed, or experienced it.”

There were several things Piper wanted people to take away from her digital story. “The first was related to the struggles that came with PTSD. The second was … that they’re not alone, that someone else has experienced this. I wanted my students, specifically my nursing students, to understand,” says Piper. “So, many things that I want[ed] for them to take away from my husband’s story of PTSD, and how I handled it, and the things that I went through … . And I guess one thing that, maybe as I spoke about it, a lot of times the military family is kind of forgotten about, and that would probably be one of the other things that I wanted to make sure that they took away. The soldier, the veteran, suffers, but the family suffers also. And the struggle touches many,” she adds. “But I also wanted them to know, related to that, they’re not alone, that there’s someone that could stand with them. That there’s help available.”

Digital storytelling is not only beneficial in the classroom, but it can be used therapeutically, also. That’s what Piper and her husband came away with — like a “weight had been lifted off their shoulders,” she says. Piper says, “I was very excited when he [her husband] was anxious to then share that himself. His friends, my friends, said it best. They said, ‘she’s not just telling your story, she’s telling our story.’ So that was exactly the response. That’s what I wanted. I wanted that connection.”

Piper has not assigned digital storytelling to any of her students, but she believes it can surely be utilized in the teaching process. She explains that any course that promotes critical thinking and problem solving (reflective thought) would be ideal for this sort of teaching. She is interested in using it in Hopkinsville’s mental health track. “I have recently taken on the responsibilities of our behavioral health nursing course, back at Hopkinsville Community College, and I think that as I make it my own, this is one of the things that I’m going to utilize … I’m hoping to use it in my mental health course. I think that I can embed it there, in some way. I believe that it will be very beneficial to these students.”

She also hopes to go back to her story to revise it. “At the end of that digital story, I talk about how I’m finishing my post-master’s, and starting my DNP. And now I’m looking at my two-year anniversary of being a certified mental health nurse practitioner, and in May I graduate with my DNP.” Piper’s capstone project focused on veterans, particularly access to mental health related to the veterans at Hopkinsville. It is her dream to make a greater difference at the government level, but for now she is happy she has made a difference with her digital story. “I said, well, even if I just impact one person, that’s one person … I can walk away OK. But I can’t walk away, no, I’ve got to do more,” she says.

Piper says personal connections and being aware are the most important things in understanding, but also in learning. They are building blocks for developing trust. She says, “Awareness is key, whether it’s awareness of issues, awareness of signs and symptoms, awareness of what you can actually then do to help or compensate, or awareness of resources that may be available in your area. So, to me, that [awareness] is key. That’s how we best can make a difference.” – by Jenna Kerwin

WHAT’S IN A NAME? LAWRENCE SELLS FORD HATFIELD FINDS OUT

Lawrence “Larry” Sells Hatfield, the eldest of a large family in Indiana, was headed to college for engineering when he requested a copy of his birth certificate. When it arrived, the teenager learned an unexpected truth: the father listed on his birth certificate was a complete stranger. Larry was not a Hatfield; he was a Ford. The man he’d called “father” his whole life was a step-father and his many siblings were only half-siblings. His biological father died of the Spanish flu in boot camp in 1917. His widowed mother, with infant Larry, remarried soon after.

Larry was furious that his mother had lied to him his entire life. In a rage, he threw away a full scholarship and broke all ties with the man he knew as his father. Larry married, served in World War II, raised four children, and found a career on the floor of an Indiana factory.

Larry’s anger is not unusual, but he may have made better decisions had his family handled the information differently. The reveal of his true identity shattered his trust, but did that need to be the case?

Today, genealogists know we have four kinds of family: a genetic family (where DNA contributions from certain ancestors eventually disappear); a genealogical family (everyone who is your ancestor); a social family (including anyone you welcome into your life); and, finally, a legal family (defined by law, as in adoption or disinheritance). There is now a fifth kind of family for people who have organ transplants and share the donor’s DNA. For example, a sister who receives her brother’s kidney will now test as both female and male, so this leads to a new definition of self.

Identity is defined and embraced by the individual. Is it ethical to conceal the truth as in Larry’s case? Do fostered or adopted children have the right to know their origins?

MIRIAM PERLSTEIN LOWY, SABINOV HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR, SHARES HER PAST

Miriam Perlstein Lowy survived the Holocaust and told her story to her son only once when he was 18. He wrote it out in Hebrew and never forgot. Forty years later, an elderly Miriam was plagued by dementia and began living her life backward. Knowing her history, he understood why his mother mistook him for his father, then later hated him as an SS officer trying to imprison her. Ultimately, she cried about her older sister, torn from the family and sent to entertain the troops, never to return.

His reluctant retelling of the story captured the attention of a screenwriter. But was it true? As important as never forgetting is not perpetuating a fraud. Could the incredible facts be proven and documented?

Years later the answer is a resounding “Yes!” Genealogical research reveals extraordinary evidence. Survivors from the 100 Jewish families of Sabinov, Slovakia, were few but fierce. At least nine made it to New York City by the late 1950s. Six of the nine made recorded testimonies about their experiences. Each Holocaust witness was instructed to tell only their own story, yet details in their testimonies helped corroborate information in Miriam’s story.

Florence Reimer was Miriam’s best friend after the war. In her testimony, Reimer tells that she was born in America and recounts her father’s fateful decision to return to Slovakia in the 1930s to be with his parents. Her father, mother, and teenaged brother were killed, but she was exempt from the March 1942 “transport” of young, unmarried Jewish women because the government did not dare mistreat an American.

Miriam Perlstein (center top) stands with her parents, Anna Landesmann and Kolomon Perlstein, and three of her five siblings, about 1926 at Sabinov. Her youngest sister, Rozalie, was killed in a drug test at Auschwitz. This photo, by an unknown Sabinov photographer, was hidden by friends in Sabinov and is owned by Miriam’s son.

Dr. Eugene Schnitzer and his wife Serena survived the war in Sabinov with an “exception” that he was a doctor. They kept his niece and his in-laws in a large armoire in the living room under the noses of the authorities. He once took niece Vera out for a walk, but never again. The townspeople, once so friendly, knew Vera was not supposed to be there and their stares were hostile.

Lt. Joseph Schnitzer and his wife were transported in May 1942. Joseph’s relative bribed many people and chased the train for 15 miles before catching it. The car doors were opened and Schnitzer was called to come out. He refused to leave because he felt everyone should be allowed to go home. At the Polish border, Schnitzer fed hundreds of people during a wait for a new train to the concentration camp Sobibor. He fired up an abandoned bakery and scrounged supplies. Schnitzer’s Bakery on the show “Seinfeld” was a real place owned by the real Joseph Schnitzer.

Every detail in Miriam’s story—from jumping from the train headed to Auschwitz, eluding capture for almost two years, escaping death when the camp was liberated as she faced execution, hiding in the snowy Tatra Mountains, and hating the people of Sabinov who stole her family home and shunned her when she returned—can be documented. Research into independent testimonies such as those above, the log books of Auschwitz, a census of Sabinov, and the tattered photos hidden for decades say it is so. As a result, her story meets the genealogical proof standard of truth and will soon be told through a book, a screenplay, and eventually a film.

A NEW LOOK AT AN OLD CASE: JANE DOE NH 1971

A young hunter found Jane Doe NH 1971, as she came to be called, a long time too late. He stirred the woodpile with his rifle and ran to the police station when her sightless eyes met his. Since New Hampshire did not have a medical examiner in 1971, the go-to doctor came from Massachusetts to preside over the recovery in the chilly October rain.

Dr. George Katsas said Jane Doe was 16 to 35 in age, probably in the older range. He wrote down no cause of death in the first autopsy, and inexplicably took home her mandible and maxilla. She had no ID, so the police placed an ad in the local newspaper. Many people came forward, searching for their lost daughters, sisters, or wives. Those missing women were eventually found, but no one claimed Jane Doe NH 1971.

Decades later, the technology exists to date her age to within six months. This requires counting rings of cementum formed around her teeth, but that part of her skull is not with her remains. Height and weight estimates for Americans have also been updated from the long-used Depression-era figures, but people reading Jane Doe’s description still envision a young runaway or prostitute. She was almost certainly a housewife in her 30s, robbed of her future. Two reconstruction artists created what her face may have looked like, based on her skull, but the renderings could not be more different.

Jane Doe 2006 reconstruction by Mary Fish (left) and Jane Doe reconstruction circa 1995 by an unidentified artist.Photos courtesy of the New Hampshire State Police Cold Case Unit

When all else fails, genetic genealogy can lead to a definitive answer. DNA is not just for exclusion any more. With basic skills, a researcher can use autosomal DNA to name the remains of soldiers missing in action or killed in action by matching the primary next of kin. It can and will also name Jane Doe NH 1971 and the tens of thousands of unknown dead who await the return of their identities. A non-disclosure ends the story here, for now. More than five of these cases have been solved in the last few years and all road signs point to genetic genealogy becoming a necessary step in cold case identifications in the future.