Missouri

Credibility of state’s expert witnesses questioned in Missouri transgender health care trial • Missouri Independent

Published

1 day ago

October 2, 2024

Credibility of state’s expert witnesses questioned in Missouri transgender health care trial • Missouri Independent

Missouri’s defense of a state law barring minors from beginning puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones will depend on whether the judge in the case puts stock in expert witnesses touting retracted studies and conspiracy theories about Jerry Sandusky.

Wright County Circuit Court Judge Craig Carter, who is presiding over a lawsuit challenging Missouri’s gender-affirming care restrictions, will have to weigh the credibility of expert witnesses alongside his judgment.

Questions of credibility came up Tuesday, when the Missouri Attorney General’s Office called as a witness John Michael Bailey, a psychology professor at Northwestern who testified about his now-retracted study entitled “Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria,” which concludes that adolescents identify as transgender as a result of social contagion.

But it was his social media post about the accusers of Jerry Sandusky that appeared to concern Carter.

Sandusky, a former college football coach, was convicted of molesting young boys over a period of at least 15 years. Bailey repeatedly posted on social media that he believes Sandusky is innocent.

Judge Craig Carter, a Wright County judge serving in Cole County for Missouri’s gender-affirming care trial, listens to a nurse practitioner testify last week (Annelise Hanshaw/Missouri Independent).

“You believe the people testifying against Jerry Sandusky are lying?” Carter asked.

“I can see that if you are not familiar with the evidence that I am familiar with, you would be shocked,” Bailey told him.

“Mmhmm,” Carter replied.

Bailey said he had listened to a podcast and lauded the work of conservative commentator John Ziegler.

“Do you know (Ziegler)? Have you talked to anybody that was an eyewitness in that case?” Carter asked.

“I have read testimony, but I have not talked to anyone,” Bailey said.

Although the underlying case was not about Sandusky, the exchange may have chiseled away at Bailey’s credibility and showed a greater pattern of basing conclusions on secondary sources.

Bailey’s research on transgender youth has been retracted, which he chalked up to pressure from activists.

The academic journal that retracted his article cited an issue with informed consent protocol, meaning participants didn’t know their responses would be in an article. On cross-examination, the circumstances of his research became clearer.

To investigate his hypothesis of whether “rapid onset gender dysphoria” caused a rise in referrals to gender clinics, Bailey surveyed parents and guardians who interacted with the website ParentsofROGDKids.com, a website for parents who believe their child has rapid onset gender dysphoria.

He said the study’s co-author Suzanna Diaz isn’t a researcher, so she didn’t create the survey with typical informed-consent procedures. He didn’t explain that Diaz is a pseudonym.

He knew Diaz was associated with ParentsofROGDKids.com but didn’t know her real name and if she ran the website.

Diaz had created the questionnaire to “weed out troublemakers.”

When Bailey looked into detransitioners and desisters, which are people who have stopped or reversed gender-affirming care, he looked to the website Reddit and looked at groups titled “detrans” and “desist.”

Plaintiffs’ attorney Nora Huppert asked if he verified that participants had previously been diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Bailey admitted that he had not.

The other defense expert on the stand Tuesday was Dr. Daniel Weiss, an endocrinologist from Utah.

For 10 years in Ohio, Weiss accepted transgender adults as patients that needed cross-sex hormones, but later decided the intervention was harmful to prescribe.

“I’m opposed to it medically,” Weiss said of adults using cross-sex hormones to transition. “I think there’s no scientific evidence to support it. But if someone wants to do it, and they’re adequately informed, they can do it.”

His testimony included a look at adverse event reporting of puberty blockers, which he does not prescribe, and the discussion of risks to gender-affirming care.

When asked to compare the risks of puberty blockers to aspirin, he couldn’t make a direct comparison.

“It’s hard to compare,” he said. “With any intervention, you want to balance risk and benefit and look at all the treatment options.”

Gillian Wilcox, an attorney with the ACLU of Missouri, asked if he has published a peer-reviewed article on gender dysphoria. He hadn’t.

“My article, if I were to write one, would be rejected by most medical journals because there is no good treatment,” Weiss said. “I call it child-harming treatment. There is no good intervention.”

He has testified in favor of state bans on gender-affirming care for minors. He told Wilcox that the Center for Christian Virtue, an advocacy group with anti-LGBTQ views, asked him to testify and he was paid to prepare his testimony.

He does not have clinical experience with minors.

In the state’s pretrial brief, Solicitor General Joshua Divine wrote that defendants will only need to prove “medical and scientific uncertainty” to show that state lawmakers are allowed to enact restrictions on gender-affirming care.

Although the state has entered the trial confident in the task ahead, credibility may limit what the judge will consider from its experts.

Other witnesses Tuesday included parents, one of which lives in Chicago, who disagreed with their children about their transition.

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Missouri

Community Partnership of Southeast Missouri forms gun violence task force.

Published

2 hours ago

October 3, 2024

Press Room

Community Partnership of Southeast Missouri forms gun violence task force.

CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. (KFVS) – A new gun violence task force is coming to Cape Girardeau.

This will be the second group of its kind formed this year in Cape Girardeau.

Similar to the task force formed by the city council, the goal behind this new group is to make the community safer.

Leaders with Community Partnership of Southeast Missouri will host their first task force meeting on Monday, October 7 and they want you to come out and have your voices heard.

Quinton Roberts will lead the Community Partnership task force.

“I want to know what they feel is important when solving gun violence,” said Roberts.

While it will be separate from the city’s official task force on gun violence, the two groups have the same goal.

“This one ties more into the community,” said Roberts.

Roberts said the issues he wants to address are the same concerns on many people’s minds.

“Gun violence is very prevalent in Cape Girardeau and this is kind of like a smaller city. So I feel like once you hear about it, it travels fast and everybody’s scared.”

Roberts said these open dialogues can help make everyone feel safe.

“That’s kind of the goal is we want people to start thinking this can end, this can be something that we can overcome if we do it together.”

And he hoped this would open up the door to make a difference.

“We just really hope to have if not solutions right away, things to think about, and seeing where we can go from there,” added Roberts.

That first meeting will be on Monday at 5 p.m. at Community Partnership of Southeast Missouri on South Sprigg street.

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Missouri

Missouri vs. Texas A&M score prediction by expert college football model

Published

10 hours ago

October 3, 2024

Press Room

Missouri vs. Texas A&M score prediction by expert college football model

SEC football gets underway this weekend with two ranked teams on the same field as No. 9 Missouri travels to No. 25 Texas A&M in college football’s Week 6 action, so let’s take a look at the updated predictions for the game from a proven expert model.

Missouri is still perfect through 4 games, including the SEC opener two weeks ago, but played the last 2 close, winning by a combined 11 points.

Texas A&M dropped its season opener against Notre Dame, but has won 3 games since, emerging as the first SEC team to go 2-0 in conference play with wins over Florida and Arkansas.

What do the experts have to say about the matchup?

For that, let’s turn to the SP+ prediction model to get a preview of how Missouri and Texas A&M compare in this SEC football game, along with an updated score prediction.

So far, the simulations favor the Tigers over the Aggies in this road matchup.

SP+ predicts that Missouri will defeat Texas A&M by a projected score of 29 to 24 and will win the game by an expected 5.2 points.

The model gives Mizzou a 63 percent chance of outright victory in the game.

SP+ is a “tempo- and opponent-adjusted measure of college football efficiency” that attempts to predict game outcomes by measuring “the most sustainable and predictable aspects of football.”

How good is it this season? So far, the SP+ model is 133-114-2 against the spread with a 53.8 win percentage.

Texas A&M is a slight 2.5 point favorite against Missouri, according to the lines at FanDuel Sportsbook.

FanDuel listed the total at 48.5 points for the game.

And it set the moneyline odds for Missouri at -130 and for Texas A&M at +110 to win outright.

If you’re using this projection to bet on the game, you should take …

Other analytical models also favor the Tigers to come out ahead this weekend.

That includes the College Football Power Index, a computer prediction model that uses data points from both teams to simulate games 20,000 times to pick winners.

Missouri is projected to win the game in 51.5 percent of the computer’s most recent simulations.

That leaves Texas A&M as the expected winner in the remaining 48.5 percent of sims.

Missouri is projected to be just 0.7 points better than Texas A&M on the same field in both teams’ current composition, according to the model’s latest forecast.

Missouri is sixth among SEC teams with a 32.2 percent chance to qualify for the College Football Playoff and will win 9 games this season, according to the FPI’s metrics.

That model gives Texas A&M a win total projection of 8 games and a 12.3 percent chance at the playoff.

More … Missouri vs. Texas A&M prediction: What the analytics say

When: Sat., Oct. 5
Time: 11 a.m. Central
TV: ABC network

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Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.

If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, please call 1-800-GAMBLER.

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More college football from SI: Top 25 Rankings | Schedule | Teams

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Missouri

Initial Availability Report for Missouri vs. Texas A&M

Published

21 hours ago

October 2, 2024

Press Room

Initial Availability Report for Missouri vs. Texas A&M

The No. 9 Missouri Tigers enter their matchup with Texas A&M Aggies relatively healthy, benefitting the time off from the bye week to get healthy.

The initial availability report for the Week 6 game was filed Wednesday night.

WR Marquis Johnson (ankle)	Questionable Advertisement
QB Sam Horn	Out (for season)
DE Darris Smith	Out (for season)

Johnson suffered an ankle injury in the third quarter in the game against Vanderbilt on a kick off.

Both Sam Horn and Darris Smith are expected absences, announced to have season-ending injuries prior to the season.

OL Ar’maj Reed-Adams	Questionable
QB Conner Weigman	Questionable Advertisement
OL TJ Shannahan	Out
OL Mark Nabou Jr.	Out
DB Tyreek Chappell Advertisement	Out
RB Rueben Owens	Out

The Aggies have gone with redshirt freshman Marcel Reed as the starter for the past three weeks, as Connor Weigman deals with a shoulder injury. With Reed going undefeated as starter, Missouri head coach Eli Drinkwitz does not buy the idea that there is any sort of competition at quarterback.

READ: Mizzou’s Eli Drinkwitz Preparing for Marcel Reed, Not Conner Weigman at Quarterback

“I mean, at this point, I know on their depth chart, it says the other kid (Conner Weigman) is the starting quarterback, but, I mean, that’s just semantics. In my opinion, the guy’s (Marcel Reed) 3-0 as the starter and whether he’s listed as questionable or whatever, I don’t see him going back.”

Ar’maj Reed-Adams is the Aggies’ right guard and would be a significant loss along the starting offensive line for Texas A&M. He’s allowed six pressures through five games of the season.

Updates to the availability report will come at approximately 7 p.m. central on Thursday and Friday night, followed by a final report 90 minutes before kick off.

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Texas A&M’s Mike Elko Says Mizzou Receiving Core is ‘Best We’ve Seen to This Point’
Limiting Texas A&M’s Nic Scourton Major Focus Ahead of Mizzou Matchup

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