THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, September 19, 1996 TAG: 9609190352
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B4 EDITION: FINAL
LENGTH: 83 lines
RICHMOND - Legislation requiring insurance companies to pay for birth-control pills would cut health costs by reducing unintended pregnancies, the bill's supporters said Wednesday.
But one health care insurer says it already offers the coverage. And a Catholic Church official says the proposal poses moral problems.
Del. Julia A. Connally's proposal will be considered by a legislative commission today and a House of Delegates committee Friday.
``This bill targets a very pervasive, expensive problem - the high rate of unintended pregnancies,'' Connally, D-Arlington, said.
Brooke Taylor of Trigon Blue Cross Blue Shield said Trigon already covers birth-control pills for individual policyholders and HMO members because of customer demand. Coverage also is available on group policies.
Stephen M. Colecchi, director of the Office of Justice and Peace at the Catholic Diocese of Richmond, said the bill raises religious issues.
``The Catholic Church does not approve of artificial birth control,'' he said. VMI harassment RICHMOND The Justice Department is harassing Virginia Military Institute by trying to force the school to immediately give enrollment applications to women, a lawyer for the state said in court papers. Deputy Attorney General William H. Hurd said VMI is making a good-faith effort to comply with a Supreme Court decision striking down the school's 157-year-old male-only admissions policy. VMI's governing board is meeting this week and may decide Saturday whether to accept women or take the school private. The Justice Department last week asked the the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to return the case to a federal judge for an injunction barring the school ``from continuing its exclusionary practices.'' Fifty-two women have inquired about attending VMI since the June 26 Supreme Court ruling. NORTHERN VIRGINIA Man guilting in crash case
A man involved in a high-speed duel with another driver on the George Washington Parkway has been convicted of killing two other motorists in a horrific triple-fatality crash.
A federal jury on Tuesday convicted Narkey K. Terry of two counts of involuntary manslaughter and one count of reckless driving. He faces up to 13 years in prison.
Terry, 26, a Fairfax County computer analyst, testified that he was a victim of an aggressive driver who died in the crash. He told jurors another car pulled up on his bumper and challenged him repeatedly in morning traffic April 17.
``I tried slowing down. The guy would get behind me very closely,'' Terry said.
Terry said he did not cause the crash that killed Billy Canipe, 27, of Sterling. Also killed were Nancy McBrien, 42, of Vienna, and George Smyth, 49, of Poolesville, Md.
``This was no accident,'' Assistant U.S. Attorney Randy Bellows said. ``They are culprits, and this was a crime.'' Cash laundering alleged
ALEXANDRIA - A Swiss businessman arrested in a hotel lobby with a suitcase full of cash faces up to 145 years in prison if convicted of money laundering.
Karl Burkhardt, 53, who lives in Zurich and West Palm Beach, Fla., will be arraigned Sept. 30 on charges he used American and overseas banks to launder $600,000 for a federal drug agent posing as a drug dealer. Burkhardt had also agreed to launder $2 million, prosecutors said.
Burkhardt was indicted Tuesday along with two associates. ALSO...
RICHMOND - A federal appeals court upheld a lower court ruling that F. Gregg Bemis Jr. established his ownership of the sunken British passenger liner Lusitania's ``hull, tackle and appurtenances'' but not to the cargo and personal effects of passengers and crew.
BRISTOL - The United Mine Workers of America will launch a radio and television campaign this week to enhance the union's image as part of its plan to organize workplaces beyond coal mines. by CNB