Robert Bropho, Australian indigenous rights activist and convicted criminal, died from natural causes he was 81.

Robert Charles Bropho was an Australian Aboriginal rights activist and convicted serial child sex offender from Perth, Western Australia. He was convicted of multiple cases of child sexual abuse. A judge described his crimes as the "lowest form of abuse imaginable".^[1]
Bropho was leader of the Swan Valley Nyungah Community settlement for over 40 years until its closure in 2003. He organised the protest against redevelopment of the Swan Brewery, and was involved in the repatriation of Yagan's head in 1997. He died in October 2011 while serving a six-year jail term.

(9 February 1930 – 24 October 2011) 

Childhood

Bropho was born in a bush camp at the back of the Coorinjie wine saloon at Toodyay, Western Australia, on 9 February 1930. His mother was Isobel Layland (1900–1993), who was the daughter of Clara Layland, a Nyungah woman who lived in the swamps on the fringes of Perth. His father was Tommy Nyinda Bropho (1899–1972), who was born at Argyle Downs Station on the Durack pastoral lease and was taken from his mother under the 1905 Aborigines Act and sent to an orphanage on the Swan River at the age of 7. It is believed he was named after a policeman called Brophy, who escorted him from Argyle Downs to Wyndham. Tommy's sister Jessie Argyle was the subject of the book Shadow Lines by Steve Kinnane.^[2]
During the 1930s Bropho, his parents and eleven siblings camped in a swamp at Swanbourne in the western suburbs of Perth.^[3] After being forced to vacate their camp, Bropho's family relocated to Eden Hill in the late 1930s. His family spent the next decade living in humpies on the edge of John Forrest National Park and around the rubbish dumps and swamps and waterways of South Guildford, Caversham and Success Hill. They survived by working in the brick kilns, carting rubbish and sewerage and picking grapes.^[4] Success Hill, on the edge of Bennett Brook, was a traditional campsite and was where the Irish journalist and amateur anthropologist Daisy Bates had gathered information for her books and articles on Nyungah culture.^[5]

Early activism

On 11 September 1977 Bropho, his family and members of the Anderson, Mead and Kickett families drove 3,000 kilometres across the continent of Australia to petition the Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Ian Viner for better housing conditions. On their return the Bropho family set up a public protest camp in the grounds of St Matthews Anglican Church in Guildford, a registered Aboriginal site.^[6]
On 11 December 1978 Bropho and members of the Lockridge Camp set up a protest on Heirisson Island as the City of Perth prepared for its 150th anniversary. The protest was supported by the Kimberley Land Council, the Aboriginal Medical Service and Black Action.
In 1980 Bropho published Fringedweller, an account of the third world living conditions of homeless Aboriginal people.^[6]
During the 1980s Bropho was involved in protests against mining and urban development, including Noonkanbah and Bennett Brook. In 1986 he won a Supreme Court injunction against plans by the State Energy Commission to excavate a sacred site at Bennett Brook.^[7]

Old Swan Brewery protest

In January 1989 Bropho led a protest against the State Government's deal with Multiplex to develop on a sacred Aboriginal site^[8] at the Old Swan Brewery on Mounts Bay Road. This protest received widespread media attention and gained support from the Construction, Mining and Energy Union (CMEU).^{[citation needed]} In October 1989, despite winning a Supreme Court injunction, the protesters were arrested and Aboriginal Affairs Minister Carmen Lawrence approved the proposal.^{[citation needed]}
In 1990 Bropho won the NAIDOC(National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee), Aboriginal of Year Award.^{[citation needed]}

Swan Valley Nyungah Community

Bropho led the Swan Valley Nyungah Community from 1963–2003. The community was the subject of a coronial inquest and the Gordon Inquiry in 2001. The community was closed in 2003 by an Act of Parliament after widespread allegations of rape, sexual abuse, family violence and substance abuse.^{[citation needed]}

Convictions

In 2003, Bropho was charged with raping Lena Spratt in 1975. His niece, Susan Taylor, committed suicide in 2001. The court was told during the trial that Bropho had offered Taylor and other girls money for sex before her death.^[9]
In 2005, four years after the girls came forward at Taylor's inquest, he was found guilty of three counts of indecently dealing with a young girl at the camp, and was jailed for 12 months.
In 2008, he was found guilty of five counts of carnal knowledge of a girl under 13, to whom he began giving money for sex when she was 11 years old at the height of the Swan Brewery legal battle in 1990. Bropho was sentenced to three years' jail. The sentence was later doubled after the Director of Public Prosecutions appealed against the sentence.^[10] Judge Peter Nisbet described his crimes as the "lowest form of abuse imaginable". Bropho told the court "I am the shadow of Martin Luther King and Gandhi." ^[11]

Death

Bropho died on 24 October 2011 at Royal Perth Hospital, while still serving a jail term. His death will be subject to a coronial inquiry as it occurred in custody.^[12]

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Liviu Ciulei, Romanian actor, writer and director, died after a long illness he was 88.

Liviu Ciulei  was a Romanian theater and film director, film writer, actor, architect, educator, costume and set designer. During a career spanning over 50 years, he was described by Newsweek as "one of the boldest and most challenging figures on the international scene".^[2]

(July 7, 1923 – October 24, 2011^[1])

Biography

Born in Bucharest to Liviu Ciulley [sic], a lawyer and constructor, Ciulei studied architecture and theater at the Royal Conservatory of Music and Theatre. He made his theater debut in 1946, as Puck in an Odeon Theatre production of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. Soon after, he joined the theater company known as Teatrul Municipal din Bucureşti, later renamed Teatrul Bulandra, and directed his first stage production in 1957 — The Rainmaker.
In 1961, Ciulei gained an overall recognition for his version of Shakespeare's As You Like It. He was the recipient of the Directors' Award at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival for The Forest of the Hanged,^[3] the film version of the Liviu Rebreanu's eponymous novel (where he also starred in the role of Klapka). In the 1980s, he was marginalized by the regime and transferred to work at Sahia film studio, as documentary filmmaker.
Ciulei was the artistic director of Teatrul Bulandra for more than a decade. During his tenure at the Bulandra he staged a wide range of classics. His Shakespeare productions include "As You Like it" "Macbeth" and "The Tempest", which was awarded Romania's Critics' Prize for Best Production of 1979. Also at the Bulandra, he staged such European classics as Gorki's "The Lower Depths and "The Children of the Sun", Buchner's "Danton's Death" and "Leonce and Lena", and Brecht's "Threepenny Opera". His productions of American classics include Williams' "A Street Named Desire", Saroyan's "The Time of Your Life", and O'Neill's "Long Day Journey into Night". Ciulei has been guest director in many theaters around the world: in West Berlin, Paris, Göttingen, Düsseldorf, Munich and Vancouver. In Sydney, he won the 1977 Australian Critics'Award for his production of "The Lower Depths". In 1974 he made his American debut at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., as director and designer with "Leonce and Lena". In 1980 he directed and created sets for the Shostakovitch opera "The Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk" at the Spoleto Festival in Italy: and in May 1982, he redirected the same opera for the Lyric Opera in Chicago. Between 1980-85, he was the artistic director of Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota. At the Guthrie he has directed "The Tempest", "Eve of Retirement", "As You Like it", "Requiem for a Nun", "Peer Gynt", "The Threepenny Opera", "Three Sisters", "Twelfth Night", "A Midsummer Night's Dream".
After the Romanian Revolution of 1989, back in his native Romania, Ciulei directed a series of stage productions that have been both publicly and critically acclaimed. He was named Honorary Director of the theater he has always loved the most, Bulandra. Besides being the costume and set designer of the majority of his own productions, Ciulei, as an architect, contributed to the rebuilding of the auditorium of Bulandra Theatre.

Family

He was first married to actress Clody Bertola.^[4] He remarried, to journalist Helga Reiter-Ciulei. His son by the second marriage is film director Thomas Ciulei.

Death

Ciulei died on October 24, 2011, in a hospital in Munich, aged 88; he had been suffering from multiple illnesses.

Filmography

• În sat la noi (1951), actor
• Mitrea Cocor (1951), writer
• Nepoţii gornistului (1953), actor/writer
• Răsare soarele (1954), writer
• Alarmă în munţi (1955), actor
• Pasărea furtunii (1957), writer
• Erupţia (1957), director
• Valurile Dunării (1959), director and actor
• Soldaţi fără uniformă (1960), actor
• Cerul n-are gratii (1962), actor
• Pădurea spânzuraţilor (1964), actor/director
• Facerea lumii (1971), writer/actor
• Decolarea (1971), actor
• Dragostea începe vineri (1972), actor
• Dimitrie Cantemir (1973), actor
• Ceaţa (1973), actor
• Mastodontul (1975), actor
• O scrisoare pierdută (1977), writer/director
• Falansterul (1979), actor

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Matty Alou, Dominican Republic-born American baseball player (Pittsburgh Pirates, San Francisco Giants, St. Louis Cardinals), died from diabetes he was 72.

Mateo Rojas "Matty" Alou ^[1] was a Dominican outfielder who spent fifteen seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) with the San Francisco Giants (1960–1965), Pittsburgh Pirates (1966–1970), St. Louis Cardinals (1971–1972, 1973), Oakland Athletics (1972), New York Yankees (1973) and San Diego Padres (1974). He also played in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) with the Taiheiyo Club Lions from 1974 through 1976.^[2]

^{(December 22, 1938 – November 3, 2011)}

He was the middle of a trio of baseball-playing brothers that included the older Felipe and Jesús.^[3] They were the first set of three siblings to play together in the same outfield (on September 15).^[4] and all bat in the same half-inning in the majors (September 10),^[5] accomplishing both with the Giants in 1963. Matty had been teammates with Felipe during the prior three campaigns, and would do likewise with Jesús for the following two. Matty and Felipe later reunited with the Yankees in 1973.^[6]
Alou's best years as a player were spent with the Pirates, where he won the National League (NL) batting title in 1966 and was a two-time All-Star in 1968 and 1969. He was a member of a World Series Champion with the Athletics in 1972 and a NL pennant winner with the Giants in 1962.

Playing career

Alou was born in Haina, Dominican Republic. Alou was a platoon player for the Giants for several years and was mostly unremarkable. His finest moment in San Francisco came in 1962 when his pinch-hit bunt single in the final game of a three-game tie-breaking playoff against the Los Angeles Dodgers began the rally that won the game and the pennant for the Giants. He batted .333 in the Giants' losing effort against the Yankees in that year's World Series. While he was primarily an outfielder, Alou also appeared in one game in 1965 as a pitcher, pitching two scoreless innings.^[7]
After Alou was traded to the Pirates before the 1966 season, he received instruction from expert hitting instructor Harry "the Hat" Walker that helped turn him into a formidable hitter. He won the batting title with a .342 average, with his brother Felipe finishing second, and finished in the top five in hitting four more times after that 1967-1969, 1971. He also led the league in at bats twice (1969-1970), hits once (1969) and doubles once (1969). After leaving the Major Leagues following the 1974 season, he played three seasons in Japan (Taiheiyo Club Lions) and managed in the Dominican Winter League.
On June 23, 2007, the Hispanic Heritage Baseball Museum Hall of Fame inducted Matty Alou into their Hall of Fame during an on-field, pre-game ceremony at AT&T Park before a game between the San Francisco Giants and the New York Yankees. He, along with San Francisco Giants shortstop Omar Vizquel were inducted in front of over 43,000 fans. Alou died in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic because of diabetes complications


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Linda Bebko-Jones, American politician, member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives (1993–2006), died he was 65.

Linda Bebko-Jones was an American politician who represented the 1st district of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, which includes portions of Erie County.

(May 1, 1946 – November 20, 2011) 

Personal

Linda Bebko was born in Erie, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Villa Maria Academy in 1964.^[4] She attended the Erie Business Academy from 1964 to 1965.^[5] Prior to elective office, she spent time working as an alcohol and drug counselor and said that she had been an alcoholic herself in the past.^[6] Later on, she was director of Women Against Sexual Harassment from 1989 to 1992 and a caseworker for Community House for Women from 1990 to 1991. Her career in politics began with a stint as an administrative assistant for Pennsylvania State Senator A. Buzz Andrezeski from 1984 to 1989, moving on to become a caseworker for former United States Senator Harris Wofford in 1990. Her husband, Tom Jones, died in 2001 after a bout with throat and neck cancer.^[6]

Political career

Early career

Bebko-Jones was first elected to represent the 1st District in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 1992, defeating freshman incumbent Ken Kruszewski in the Democratic primary. She went on to defeat Republican Jerry Knight, an aide to Rep. Phil English,^[7] in the general election by 1,100 votes.^[8] Bebko-Jones easily won the 1994 election by over 5,000 votes over Jerry Podolsky.^[8] In 1996 and 2000, she ran unopposed for re-election and in 1998, she won after her GOP opponent quit the race and tried to withdraw from the ballot.^[9]

2004 election

In the 2004 Democratic primary election, Bebko-Jones faced Jim Herdzik. His challenge came on the heels of a scandal involving a fire in her district office. Immediately after the fire, there were reports that it has been caused by Bebko-Jones leaving a lit cigarette in the office.^[10] The fire marshal never conclusively determined the cause, only that it was accidental.^[11] After the repairs were made to the office, Bebko-Jones moved out prior to lease expiration, claiming that the air inside the building was unhealthy. Eventually, her landlord agreed to a settlement with the state at the taxpayer's expense.^[6][12] Herdzik even rented the former office as a campaign headquarters, highlighting the incident. On election day, Bebko-Jones won easily with 60% of the vote.^[13][14]

Campaign for Erie Mayor

In 2005, she ran for mayor of Erie against incumbent Rick Filippi, who had been indicted on corruption charges.^[15] Bebko-Jones ultimately finished third in the race, behind Joseph Sinnott who went on to become mayor.^[16]

Retirement and indictment

Bebko-Jones was forced to withdraw from the 2006 Democratic primary when questions arose over the propriety of her nomination petitions.^[6] Pat Harkins won the primary and went on to win the general election.^[6] In November 2007, a state-wide grand jury was convened to investigate abnormalities in her nominating petitions for the 2006 Democratic primary. On February 28, 2007, Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett charged Bebko-Jones and her former chief-of-staff with forging nominating petitions and submitting the fraudulent forms to the Secretary of the Commonwealth.^{[17][18][19][20][21][22]} On August 6, 2008, Bebko-Jones and her former chief of staff Mary B. Fiolek were both sentenced 12 months probation and fined $1,500. They each pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor charges of forging and submitting false signatures, and criminal conspiracy. All other charges were Bebko-Jones was ordered to perform 200 hours of community service and Fiolek 100 hours.^[23]
In 2007, it was revealed that Bebko-Jones, as a lame duck legislator, attended legislative training trips at the public's expense after her defeat.^[24]


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H. G. Francis, German science fiction author, died he was 75.

Hans Gerhard Franciskowsky was a German author of popular fiction, notably science fiction, and radio dramas. He wrote pseudonymously, most often as H. G. Francis, or as Hans G. Francis, H. G. Francisco, Gunther Frank, Peter Bars, R. C. Quoos-Raabe, Frank Sky, Hans G. Stelling or Ted Scott.

(14 January 1936 – 3 November 2011) 

Francis was one of post-war Germany's most prolific authors, writing more than 400 novels and about 600 radio drama plays.^[1] His written work includes about 300 entries in the Perry Rhodan science fiction series and its spin-offs,^[1] as well as a young adult science fiction series of his own, Commander Perkins.
In the heyday of cassette radio dramas until the 1980s, he wrote hundreds of adaptations or original plays for youth series such as Three Investigators, The Famous Five, TKKG and Masters of the Universe.^[1] In total, more than 120 million of his plays were sold. They reached gold status 120 times and platinum status six times.^[2]


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Harold Huskilson, Canadian politician, member of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly (1970–1993), died he was 91.

Harold MacKay Huskilson  was a political figure in Nova Scotia, Canada. He represented Shelburne County in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly from 1970 to 1993 as a Liberal member.

(March 25, 1920 – October 24, 2011)

Early life

He was a son of the late Lewis and Sarah (Lloyd) Huskilson. After graduation from Lockeport Regional High School, he attended Mount Allison University. His education was interrupted due to World War II until 1945. After the war he studied at the Renaud School of Embalming in New York City and graduated in 1946.^[2]

Entrance to politics

Huskilson made his way into a life of politics where he served on both the Shelburne Town Council and the Yarmouth Town Council. He resigned when he was elected to the Nova Scotia House of Assembly, and successfully held the seat for 23 years in Shelburne.^[2]

Personal life

He is married to Elsie, and they have two children, Elizabeth and Clifford.^[3]

References

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Nick Strincevich, American baseball player (Pittsburgh Pirates, Boston Braves), died he was 96.

Nicholas Strincevich  was an American Major League baseball player. Born in Gary, Indiana, the right-handed pitcher made his big-league debut with the Boston Bees on April 23, 1940, played part of the 1941 season with the Boston Braves, played from 1941 to 1948 (excluding 1943) with the Pittsburgh Pirates, and finished his big league career on June 11, 1948, with the Philadelphia Phillies. According to at least one source, Strincevich was selected to play on the 1945 All-Star team from the National League, but, due to wartime travel restrictions, the game was never played.

(March 1, 1915 – November 11, 2011)

In a 10-season career, Strincevich posted a 46–49 record with a 4.05 ERA in 889²⁄₃ innings pitched. Nicknamed "Jumbo," he was listed as 6 feet 1 inch (1.85 m) tall and 180 pounds (82 kg).
Strincevich died on November 11, 2011 in Valparaiso, Indiana.^[1] His funeral service was held at the Saint Sava Serbian Orthodox Church of Merrillville, Indiana. He was buried at Calumet Park Cemetery.


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