MIDWEST

U.S. SOLDIER CONVICTED IN SHOOTING DEATH OF WOUNDED IRAQI

A military court yesterday convicted a U.S. Army tank company commander of a lesser criminal charge in connection with the shooting death of a wounded Iraqi last year.

Captain Rogelio Maynulet was found guilty of assault with intent to commit voluntary manslaughter, which carries a maximum of 10 years in prison. Prosecutors had sought conviction on a more serious charge of assault with intent to commit murder, which carried a 20-year maximum sentence. Maynulet, 30, of Chicago, stood at attention as Lieutenant Colonel Laurence Mixon, the head of the six member panel, read the verdict at the court-martial. The court was to reconvene later yesterday to consider Maynulet’s sentence.

Colonel Mixon did not give reasons for the ruling, which followed 2 1/2 hours of deliberations. At the sentencing hearing, Maynulet asked the court for leniency, occasionally pausing and looking down to keep his composure.

“I hope you can take into consideration my service, my attitude, and my love for the Army before you make a decision,” Maynulet said. “I respect your decision. I wouldn’t want to be in your position. I think you did what you have to do.”

Maynulet’s father, Rogelio Maynulet, and his wife, Brooke Maynulet, also took the stand as character witnesses. Several officers who have worked with the defendant in Germany since he left his command in Iraq praised his work.

– Associated Press

PAY-FOR-PERFORMANCE PLAN FOR DOCTORS DRAWS NATIONAL ATTENTION

CINCINNATI – A program started in Ohio and Kentucky to give doctors financial incentives for improving patient care has become a model for similar pay-for performance health care plans elsewhere.

Companies participating in the program, which began two years ago as a test in Cincinnati and Louisville, Ky., pay doctors extra money for meeting certain standards for care they provide for chronic illnesses. Doctors receive incentives ranging from $50 to $160 per patient annually through the Bridges to Excellence initiative, organizers say.

As of January, about 500 doctors in the pilot program that has expanded to Massachusetts and upstate New York had earned around $1 million in bonus payments across all segments of the program. The nonprofit coalition of doctors, employers, and health plans that created the Bridges to Excellence initiative announced this week that the concept is in the process of moving into 10 states and involving more than 2 million people as employers and insurers take it into the wider marketplace.

Mr. McClellan wants Medicare to adopt a similar pay-for-performance plan, and considers the program started in Cincinnati one of the best models for how the government’s version of the incentives should work.

– Associated Press

EAST

KISSINGER UNDERGOES HEART PROCEDURE

Henry Kissinger, the former secretary of state, was reported “resting comfortably” at home yesterday after an angioplasty procedure, a hospital and a spokeswoman for his office said. Neither would provide further details.

“Dr. Henry Kissinger was admitted to New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center on Tuesday, March 29, and underwent an angioplasty procedure,” hospital spokeswoman Myrna Manners said in a statement. “He was discharged earlier today and is resting comfortably at home.”

“We can confirm that statement. That is the gist of it,” said Jessie Incao, spokeswoman for Kissinger Associates, Incorporated, the foreign policy consulting firm that Kissinger founded after leaving government service in the mid-1970s. Angioplasty is a procedure for relieving blockages that impede blood flow to the heart, usually by inserting a catheter and inflating a tiny balloon. More than 2 million such procedures are performed worldwide yearly, according to the Website Angioplasty.org. Mr. Kissinger, who turns 82 on May 29, served Presidents Nixon and Ford for eight years as foreign policy adviser and secretary of state.

In a Cold War career marked by accomplishment and controversy, he played a key role in restoring American-China relations and bringing about arms control agreements with the former Soviet Union. He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize with North Vietnamese negotiator Le Duc Tho for a diplomatic settlement ending the American role in Vietnam.

– Associated Press