The Sidebar

September 14, 2022

The Hon. Kwame Raoul
Illinois Attorney General
500 South Second Street
Springfield, IL 62701

Dear Mr. Raoul:

I'm writing regarding your office's 12+ year investigation of a tainted nonprofit, the Chicago-area Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF). SALF, which from 2006-2020 has been the subject of dozens of media exposes, was dissolved as an Illinois corporation in 2009.

SALF was founded in 1993 by the late Carol Jean Spizzirri, a convicted shoplifter and child batterer, according to an order of protection filed in 1992 by her daughter, Christina Jean Pratt. To perpetrate the SALF scam, Spizzirri falsely claimed to be a registered nurse and relentlessly promoted a fabricated backstory about Christina's tragic 1993 death.

SALF reportedly received over $10 million in tax dollars and what I estimate to be tens of thousands of dollars in private grants. Based on media reports and my estimates, about $7 million came from Illinois state taxpayers (including $200,000 to buy an office building in Springfield) and over $3 million came from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the first million of which was arranged by U.S. Senator Dick Durbin in 1999.

To obtain the funding, SALF claimed the money would be used to provide training in CPR and the Heimlich maneuver to students in Illinois schools.

In 2009, Spizzirri told the Chicago Tribune her organization trained about two million students in the Chicago Public Schools (CPS), then-headed by future U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan who called Spizzirri “one of my heroes.” As documented on my web site, Duncan personally arranged a $174,000 contract for SALF to provide first aid training classes for 18,000 CPS students from 2004-06.

However, in response to my FOIA requests, CPS failed to produce a single training record. Further, in 2003 your agency awarded $25,000 to SALF to provide first aid training to students in these schools:

Salem School District #111 (Marion County)
South Central Community Unit School District #401 (Kinmundy, Marion County)
Camp Point CU School District #3
Beardstown CU School District #15
Rantoul City School District #137 (Champaign County)
Cass County School Districts (Cass County)
Edwardsville CU School District #7
Greenview CU School District #200

Per IL Senator Tim Bivins' 2012 emails to then-IL Attorney General Lisa Madigan (which include thorough documentation), none of the eight schools had records of any training.

In a 2015 interview, Senator Bivens said, "(SALF) claimed they had trained thousands and thousands of children...We can't substantiate that all of these children were trained."

As you may know, in approximately June 2010, your office initiated an investigation into SALF. According to a 2010 IL Public Radio report, "The Illinois Attorney General's office confirms it is reviewing how the funds were used, as is done whenever a charitable organization disbands."

To learn the outcome of the investigation, every six months or so, I file FOIA requests with your agency, asking for related records.

In an August 15, 2022 response to my most recent FOIA request, Assistant Attorney General Mark Rogina wrote: "(This office has reviewed) its records, and we determined that approximately 10,000 pages of records are maintained only in physical, hard copy form."

Based on the volume of documents, he suggested I narrow my request. I did so, resubmitted it, and received this August 22, 2022 response from Mr. Rogina:

Please be advised that because this investigation remains ongoing, we have no records responsive to your request.

It's unclear why it's taking your office over 12 years to investigate a long-defunct, thoroughly-discredited organization. Still, I hope you agree that the public is entitled to learn what happened to the millions of misappropriated tax dollars.

With that hope in mind, this is to respectfully request that you initiate a review to determine if the investigation of SALF has been conducted properly.

This is also to respectfully request that you provide me with the name of the staff member leading the SALF investigation and an approximate date when the investigation will be completed. I appreciate your consideration and I look forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

Peter M. Heimlich
Peachtree Corners, GA 30096 USAphone/text: (678)322-7984‬
email: peter.heimlich@gmail.com
website: http://medfraud.info
blog: http://the-sidebar.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/medfraud_pmh
bio: http://tinyurl.com/ych7o7dr

I've got two problems with the May 27, 2016 Guardian article by Joanna Walters, Dr Henry Heimlich uses Heimlich manoeuvre for first time at 96.

The second problem is a bone I have to pick about inattentive reporting.

More about that later.

The first problem's the headline and the lead. 
Per the videos at the end of this item, my father, my brother Phil, and 87-year-old Patty Ris (the "ostensible choking victim" according to Slate) claimed this was the first time my father saved the life of a choking victim using his namesake maneuver.

Partly as a result of my efforts, that claim was swiftly debunked.

From 2001-2006, my then 81-year-old father told reporters from the Private Clubs Newsletter, Chicago Sun-Times, BBC, and the New Yorker that he had Heimlich-ed a choking victim in June 2001 while having lunch with a friend at the restaurant of Cincinnati's Banker's Club.

If my father -- no slouch when it comes to ginning up press coverage -- had shared that information with Cincinnati reporters, obviously it would have gone viral, just as the recent story did.

But the Banker's Club tale was never reported by any news outlets in Cincinnati.

As my father undoubtedly realized, local reporters would have fact-checked it.

Mary Mihaly (source)

Then there's a December 2009/January 2010 Health Monitor article by Cleveland writer/editor Mary Mihaly entitled Heimlich's Latest Maneuvers:
Just three years before Mihaly's article, the New Yorker published this by staff writer Lauren Collins:

Dr. Heimlich himself said the other day that he has performed the move only once, in Cincinnati.

Also, my wife Karen and I were on reasonably good terms with my family in June 2001, when the Banker's Club incident supposedly took place.

If my father had saved a choking victim with "the Heimlich," wouldn't he or another member of my family have told us?

But no one did.

Per the Cincinnati Enquirer, my father didn't even tell my brother Phil, who has been my father's right-hand man for decades:

"All I can say is none of us had a recollection of it," Phil Heimlich said. "If dad did it, I would’ve heard about it."

No surprise to me, my father -- an abject coward -- is now hiding from questions about his earlier claim.

Via Christine Hauser's May 27, 2016 New York Times report about the Deupree House incident:

A BBC article in 2003 quoted (Dr. Heimlich), then 83, describing a similar encounter where he tried the maneuver on a fellow diner, a man, although the story lacked details such as a precise date, location and name. A New Yorker article in 2006 made reference to a similar incident, also without details. But a son, Phil Heimlich, said his father had never mentioned any previous incidents to him. The doctor himself did not return a follow-up call.  

Back to the Guardian story, here's what I meant by inattentive reporting:


If my father's quote is accurate, either the local department of health should be notified that the Deupree House is serving substandard hamburger meat -- or my father didn't keep his story straight.

I know plenty of reporters and editors who wouldn't have let that one get by without a follow-up question, especially when the source has a history of lying to the press and publishing phony case reports (here, here, and here).

But it's not to late for the Guardian or other news outlets to ask Dr. Maneuver to clarify.

If any reporters do ask him, maybe he could also respond to this?

Slate and McKnight's have questioned whether the May 23 choking incident at the retirement may have been a publicity stunt staged as a tie-in to "National Heimlich Maneuver Day" which fell only a week later on June 1.

Via At Least Part of Last Week's Charming Viral Heimlich-Maneuver Story Was Bogus by Ben Mathis-Lilley, Slate, June 3, 2016

How else to perhaps get to the bottom of the mystery -- and the mystery meat?

On Monday evening, when a woman who happened to be sitting next to him in their upscale Cincinnati retirement community choked on a piece of hamburger, 96-year-old Heimlich sprung into action.

"I immediately knew she was choking," Heimlich told NBC News. "I just realized, I've got to go over and save her."

...(Patty Gill) Ris, a former third-grade teacher who just moved to Deupree in March, hadn't met Heimlich before that night. 

According to this Facebook post by Carol J. Spizzirri of San Marcos, CA, who had a close personal and professional relationship with my father via her tainted Chicago nonprofit, the Save-A-Life Foundation:

source

Click here for plaintiff Annabel Melongo's November 15, 2014 Second Amended Complaint and other key case documents.

Click here for media reports about the Melongo case.

Click here for media reports about Carol Spizzirri and the Save-A-Life Foundation.

FBI Director James B. Comey presents 2014 Director’s Community Leadership Award to WSB-TV investigative Jodie Fleischer "for her extraordinary contributions to preventing crime and violence in the Atlanta area and throughout the state of Georgia...Ms. Fleischer further demonstrated leadership by coordinating her investigative reporting with investigative efforts of law enforcement, to include the FBI." (source)

On July 15, WSB-TV (Atlanta's ABC affiliate) aired CDC gives millions of tax dollars to shady nonprofit by investigative reporter Jodie Fleischer, the latest chapter in the $9 million Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF) scandal and the sweeping federal civil rights lawsuit filed by former SALF employee, Annabel Melongo.



Don't miss the video, but here's the takeaway:

The (U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) is refusing to answer Channel 2 Action News' questions about a high-ranking employee who served on the board of a now-defunct nonprofit that's been the subject of a series of scandals.

The Save A Life Foundation (SALF) also happened to receive more than $3 million in CDC funding, much of it while that same employee (Doug Browne of Doraville, GA) was serving as the nonprofit's treasurer.

"Save A Life was a fraud, it can't be described as anything but a total fraud," said attorney Jennifer Bonjean, who represents a whistleblower who used to work there.

The nonprofit was based in a Chicago suburb, and in its heyday, claimed to have helped teach more than a million school children various first aid techniques.

But beginning in 2006, a series of investigations by the ABC station in Chicago debunked the nonprofit's founder as a fraud.

Carol Spizzirri had claimed to be a registered nurse in her bio on the SALF website and on various grant applications; but she wasn't. She's also accused of lying about the circumstances of her daughter's tragic accident that was the motivating force behind the creation of SALF.

Screenshot from SALF's now-defunct website -- the correct spelling of Spizzirri's alleged alma mater -- also defunct -- is Mt. Senario College in Ladysmith, Wisconsin

Spizzirri was born Carol Jean Niemann and grew up in Milwaukee where in 1968, according to his 2009 affidavit, she met and married her first husband, the late Gordon T. Pratt, with whom she had three daughters and who divorced her in 1980. About seven years later, she moved to Grayslake, Illinois, with her second husband, David T. Spizzirri, who divorced her in 1993, the year she started SALF.


Around the time the IL Attorney General's investigation was made public, Spizzirri beat feat to San Marcos, California, where she and former SALF executive Scott Anderson co-own a property in a mobile home park at which Spizzirri is vice president of the residents association.

Re: the Melongo lawsuit, as I reported last month, Ms. Bonjean told me, "Carol Spizzirri has been served and I will be filing a motion for default judgement against her."

Here's proof of service from November:

  
Via SALF's year 2000 Annual Report:


Via the print edition of the San Diego Reader:


Click here for the June 16, 2015 motion of default filed against Spizzirri.

Donald J. Angelini, Jr. (source)

That apparently made Spizzirri snap to because about a month later, her Chicago attorney Donald J. Angelini, Jr. filed this motion on her behalf:



As it happens, her lawyer and I have something in common.

Both of our fathers worked the dark side of the street.

Via FBI: Mob boss on tape in McCormick Place case, an April 25, 2010 ABC7 Chicago story by investigative reporter Chuck Goudie who coincidentally (per the Atlanta CDC expose) was responsible for the "series of investigations by the ABC station in Chicago that) debunked (Spizzirri) as a fraud.":

The FBI recorded more than 50 conversations involving Chicago Outfit boss Rudy "The Chin" Fratto during an investigation of alleged bid-rigging at the city's McCormick Place.

...Fratto, 66, the leader of the Mob's Elmwood Park crew according to federal authorities, was indicted with another man last month on charges that he used inside information to score a forklift deal at McCormick Place.

...An attached affidavit from Donald Angelini, Jr., the attorney handling the sweetheart contract case, states that Fratto's defense would be "greatly hampered" if he was imprisoned and couldn't assist in the preparation.

...Angelini Jr. (is the) son of the late Mob bookmaker Don "the Wizard of Odds" Angelini....

Via Donald J. Angelini, Odds Wizard Who Ran Gambling For Chicago Mob by Cam Simpson, a December 8, 2000 obituary published by the Chicago Tribune:

Dubbed the "Wizard of Odds" in the Chicago Outfit, the name organized crime members for decades have given to the city's Mafia faction, (Donald Angelini Sr.) was viewed by authorities as one of the top money makers in Chicago crime syndicate history.

...Mr. Angelini (Sr.) pleaded guilty to federal gambling charges in 1989 and was sentenced to 21 months in prison.

Prosecutors alleged that Mr. Angelini (Sr.), along with the late Dominic Cortina, reigned as gambling czar over a $20 million per-year sports betting empire.

Mr. Angelini (Sr.) and his attorney scoffed at the government's figures, but government agents insisted their numbers may even have been conservative.

The Heimlich Institute's notorious "malariotherapy" experiments were the subject of three federal investigations (CDC, FDA, Justice Department), but my pa never did time.

However, via a 2003 Reuters story about vulnerable AIDS patients being infected with malaria, at least one expert thought he deserved to:

"If (Dr.) Heimlich is really doing this, he should be put in jail," said Mark Harrington, executive director of Treatment Action Group, an AIDS research advocacy organization.

In any event, I don't know how Spizzirri came to choose the younger Angelini to represent her, but of course everyone's entitled to hire any lawyer willing to represent them, be they Rudy "The Chin" or Carol "The Nurse."

Judge Lee (source)

In a 13-page order, yesterday U.S. District Court Judge John Z. Lee "(granted) in part and (denied) in part Defendants’ motions (to dismiss)." In other words, Annabel Melongo's wide-ranging civil rights lawsuit is moving forward.

Page down to view the motion. Click here to download a copy from IllinoisCorruption.net, the website tracking Annabel Melongo's 8-1/2 year struggle for justice against former Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF) president Carol J. Spizzirri and her political cronies.

Click here for my compilation of media reports about the Melongo case. Click here for my compilation of media reports about SALF and Spizzirri. Click here for photos of Spizzirri and some of her cronies.

In a subsequent item, I'll report about Judge Lee's findings, but his summary of the complicated, circuitous history is so elegant and concise, I'm copying it below. (For clarity, I've left out the citations.)

Via Skin & Ink magazine, October 2007

Carol Jean Spizzirri -- whose once high-flying, politically-connected Save-A-Life Foundation nonprofit is now under investigation by the IL Attorney General -- has been named as a defendant in a sweeping federal civil rights lawsuit filed by attorney Jennifer Bonjean on behalf of her client Annabel Melongo

For those interested in political corruption and abuse of the legal system by public officials, the 26-page complaint, filed November 5 in U.S. District Court in Chicago, makes for lively reading.

Click here to download a copy or page down to view.

Via the San Diego Reader

To read about the sordid history of Spizzirri (who per the complaint, now lives in San Marcos, California) and her tainted organization, don't miss Where Did the Save-A-Life Money Go? by Don Bauder, San Diego Reader, November 17, 2010.

A few weeks ago, the office of the IL Attorney General confirmed to me in writing that their investigation of SALF, which started in July 2010, is ongoing.

For more details, see Illinois senator seeks answers on possible $9 million misappropriation by Erin Murphy, Dubuque Telegraph Herald, June 26, 2013.

Thomas Frieden MD MPH (source)

Today former IL congressional candidate Tim Bagwell PhD (who now lives in St. Louis) and I asked our congressmen, Reps. Lacy Clay (D-MO) and Rob Woodall (R-GA), to help us get answers regarding an institutional cover-up by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that involves CDC Director Thomas Frieden MD MPH.

Our thoroughly-documented letter requested that Reps. Clay and Woodall ask Dr. Frieden to account for millions of tax dollars the agency awarded to the Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF).

As Sidebar readers know, SALF was a politically-connected Chicago nonprofit that's been the subject of dozens of media exposes and is reportedly under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General for the "possible $9 million misappropriation" of federal and state tax dollars.

Our letter also asked why CDC executive Douglas R. Browne was permitted to moonlight as SALF's corporate treasurer while the agency was funneling millions to the group.


Here's the big question we asked Reps. Clay and Woodall:

Would you please ask Dr. Frieden to provide you with a thorough accounting of how the $3,335,578 awarded to SALF was spent? That should present no difficulty for him since SALF's corporate treasurer Douglas Browne, still a CDC employee, should be able to provide him with the records.

Click here to download a copy of our letter.

Even if you're new to the case, three words of advice: READ THIS MOTION.

In days to come, I plan to blog about specific sections of the motion, which was filed on June 25, 2014 by attorney Jennifer Bonjean re: the computer tampering charges filed against her client, Annabel Melongo, about eight years ago by Cook County, IL. To direct download a copy of the motion, click here.

Click here for a compilation of media reports about the Melongo case posted on my web site -- the first is a March 14, 2012 interview I did with a Rockford, IL, newspaper that includes the history of the computer tampering allegations which originated with Save-A- Life Foundation (SALF) founder/president Carol J. Spizzirri, a former politically-connected media darling in Chicago who now lives in a trailer park in San Marcos, CA. Click here for a compilation of media reports about SALF and Spizzirri.

On March 19, 2002, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published Lessons to take to heart; New program would make CPR and other emergency techniques a course of study in Pennsylvania schools by staff writer Anita Srikameswaran.

The article was about Carol Spizzirri, founder/president of the Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF), and efforts to expand the organization into Pennsylvania, aided by the eminent Peter Safar MD, namesake for the University of Pittsburgh's Safar Center for Resuscitation Research. (Dr. Safar died about a year later -- his New York Times obituary called him "the father of CPR." Incidentally, not long before his death, I exchanged some lively e-mails with him about my father.)

As Sidebar readers know, since November 2006, SALF has been the subject of dozens of media exposes and, per The Hill, has been under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General since 2010. Via the June 26, 2013 Dubuque Telegraph Herald, here's the pointed stick:

Since its establishment in 1993, the foundation pledged to teach school children first aid and emergency response practices. Despite receiving nearly $9 million to fund the program, however, very few records of students being taught have been found.

Along those lines, the 2002 Post-Gazette article included what appears to be pie-in-the-sky claims about how many students had received SALF training plus some factual errors.

Susan Smith (source)

It's never too late to fix the record, so this morning I wrote managing editor Susan Smith to ask if the paper has a "statute of limitations" on publishing corrections.

She promptly invited me to submit information for consideration and wrote that "if a correction is warranted, we will run one."

You can't ask for a better invitation than that, so this afternoon I sent her a letter co-written with my friend Gordon Pratt of Milwaukee.

Gordon is Carol Spizzirri's ex-husband who reportedly divorced her in 1981. In a published letter to the editor, he wrote that he has attempted "to bring to light misrepresentations made by the Save A Life Foundation" since his ex-wife founded the operation in 1993.

As I reported last week, Gordon and I sent a similar letter to the House Leaders of the Pennsylvania Legislature, Senators Mike Turzai and Frank Dermody, requesting their help to clean up similar errors in a House Resolution honoring Spizzirri and her organization.

I don't know how that Resolution came to be, but it happened a month after the publication of the Post-Gazette article.

Click here to download a copy of our corrections request letter in which we also suggested that the Post-Gazette contact the Safar Center to obtain more information about SALF's relationship with the Center which, according to page 6 of the nonprofit's 2003 Annual Report and other records, was a SALF “branch office.”

Former PA Rep. Thomas Petrone, SALF founder/president Carol J, Spizzirri, and Tammy Janney (Guardian Angel Ambulance Service, West Homestead, PA) display proclamation honoring Spizzirri and her organization

On April 16, 2002, the Pennsylvania Legislature passed House Resolution 533 "Honoring Carol Spizzirri on her accomplishments with the Save A Life Foundation and supporting the expansion of the Save A Life Foundation in Pennsylvania."

Since then, the Save A Life Foundation has been the subject of dozens of media exposes and, according to a June 26, 2013 Dubuque Telegraph Herald article by reporter Erin Murphy, the organization is being investigated by the IL Attorney General for the "possible $9 million misappropriation" of federal and state funds:

Since its establishment in 1993, the foundation pledged to teach school children first aid and emergency response practices. Despite receiving nearly $9 million to fund the program, however, very few records of students being taught have been found.

Resolution 533, introduced by former Rep. Thomas Petrone of Pittsburgh, includes a variety of bogus claims.

It's never too late to clean up the record, so yesterday my friend Gordon Pratt of Milwaukee and I wrote to House Majority Leader Mike Turzai (who co-signed the Resolution) and Minority Leader Frank Dermody requesting that they take steps to do so.

Per Gordon's 2009 letter to the editor of the Daily Herald, "I was married to Carol Spizzirri from 1968-1981, when we divorced. Since 1993, I have repeatedly contacted elected officials in Illinois and elsewhere in an attempt to bring to light misrepresentations made by the Save A Life Foundation."

Here's one of those misrepresentations -- Spizzirri's distortions regarding the tragic death of their 18-year-old daughter, Christina Jean Pratt -- via a clip from The Maneuver Part I by Chuck Goudie, ABC7 Chicago, November 16, 2006:


Per our letter to the senators -- click here to download a copy -- that false version of events and other squiffy claims were in the House Resolution praising/supporting Spizzirri and her operation's expansion into the Keystone State.

The Resolution also noted that "the Save A Life Foundation medical advisory board includes Dr. Henry Heimlich, father of the Heimlich maneuver and head of the Heimlich Institute (and) Dr. Peter Safar, developer of cardiopulmonary resuscitation and the head of the Safar Research Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania...."

source

 This summer I reported a few items based on claims made to me by actor David Hasselhoff.

According to newly-available documents, it looks like The Hoff lied to me.

And he's not responding to my follow-ups.

The tale began last summer when I asked Hasselhoff's press agent, Judy Katz, about her client's relationship with the Save-A-Life Foundation, a once high-profile, politically-connected Chicago nonprofit that's been the subject of dozens of media exposes and which has reportedly been under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General's Charitable Trust Bureau since 2010. (Last week the AG's office confirmed to me that the investigation is ongoing.)

Via Illinois senator seeks answers on possible $9 million misappropriation, a June 26, 2013 Dubuque Telegraph Herald article by Erin Murphy:

(The Save a Life Foundation) received nearly $9 million in state and federal funding for a program whose services, it appears, were never rendered.

Since its establishment in 1993, (SALF) pledged to teach school children first aid and emergency response practices...(However), very few records of students being taught have been found.

From 1993 to at least 2000, in grant applications, fundraising materials, and media reports, SALF claimed that Hasselhoff was the group's "Honorary Chairman of the Board" and actively supported the group's mission.

As reported by ABC7 Chicago and other media outlets, SALF used a variety of bogus claims to gin up millions in public and private dollars, so I wanted to find out if they also lied about the Baywatch star's affiliation.

The only records I had that originated from Hasselhoff were a signed June 30, 1995 rah-rah letter on Baywatch stationary to SALF's founder/president Carol Spizzirri and this 1993 PSA:



I sent his press agent these and other documents that originated from SALF, along with news articles in which Hasselhoff is identified as SALF's "Honorary Chairman" and was an enthusiastic booster of the organization.

Via her July 15 reply:

I was able to reach Mr. Hasselhoff over the weekend. He's currently out of the country working in UK on his way to Austria but I had told him of your pending deadline today.

He was never SALF's Honorary Chairman. He never had any financial relationship with SALF. He never had any personal contact with SALF. They had requested, through the production office at Baywatch, for David to do a psa about saving lives back in the 1990's while he was starring on Baywatch. The letter you sent me was prepared and written by someone in the Baywatch production office around the same time.

I hope this information is helpful to you.

Sincerely,

Judy

Re: "He never had any personal contact with SALF," about a week after I blogged the story on July 23, this turned up on Spizzirri's Facebook:


Who knew that Spizzirri -- who now lives in a mobile home park in San Marcos, CA, according to the jaw-dropping article Where Did the Save-A-Life Money Go? --  reads my blog? In any event, I appreciated her uploading the photo.

But rubbing elbows with Hasselhoff on the Baywatch set doesn't amount to much and in a follow-up, I gave him the benefit of the doubt.

Based on his word, I even tried (unsuccessfully) to obtain a published correction from the Chicago Tribune, which over the years had run three articles that reported the SALF/Hoff relationship.

But a couple of documents I've since obtained via a FOIA request suggest his word ain't worth much.

This comes from a letter included in the program for a November 11, 1999 fundraising dinner at which SALF awards were presented to my father and to IL Secretary of State Jesse White:


In this video of a SALF awards ceremony at a Chicago school, the January 28, 1999 letter below is read aloud by White with Spizzirri and former Chicago School CEO Paul Vallas on hand:





I shared the new information with his press agent and asked for a response.

Three weeks ago I received:

From: Judy Katz
Subject: Re: media inquiry
Date: Tue, 5 Nov 2013 14:02:23 -0500
To: Peter Heimlich

Dear Peter:

David is currently in Abi [sic] Dhabi but should be back in the states by the weekend.  I am not able to reach him until then...probably Monday.  I can discuss it with him then.

Judy

Judy Katz
Katz PR
250 W.57th Street Suite 1218
New York, NY 10107
O: 212-489-5595
C: 201-788-3331
Judy@KatzPR.com
JKPR4@aol.com

I've sent several follow-ups, but no further replies. If I ever get one, I'll publish it.

Finally, a couple of personal notes.

To David Hasselhoff: I don't like my blog being used to circulate lies.

To Carol Spizzirri: If you have any more documents or photos re: The Hoff, Jesse White, Paul Vallas, or other VIPs who were involved with SALF, would you please post them or e-mail them to me?

11/25/13 UPDATE ARTICLE BASED ON NEWLY-AVAILABLE DOCUMENTS: Why did actor David Hasselhoff lie to me about his role with a shady nonprofit now under investigation for "possible $9m misappropriation"?

Screenshot from grant applications signed by Carol Spizzirri for $200,000 awarded by the IL Dept. of Commerce and Community Affairs to buy SALF an office building in Springfield, IL. Click here for a related 3/14/13 WCIA-TV  investigative report.

Is Carol Spizzirri a Sidebar reader?

Based on the following, it sure looks like it.

Spizzirri's the founder/president of the Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF), the ethically-challenged Chicago nonprofit that's been the subject of dozens of media exposes and is reportedly under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General for the "possible misappropriation" of $9 million in federal and state tax dollars.

On July 23, I reported that actor David Hasselhoff denied claims made for years by Spizzirri's organization that he supported SALF and served on the organization's board as "Honorary Chairman."

For years SALF made the claim in grant applications, fundraising materials, and in the media -- including three Chicago Tribune articles published between 1993-2009.

For example:



But via a recent e-mail I received from The Hoff's press agent:

He was never SALF's Honorary Chairman. He never had any financial relationship with SALF. He never had any personal contact with SALF.

About two weeks after my item about Hasselhoff's denial, look what turned up on Spizzirri's FB:


I'm not sure what to make of her posting what I'm guessing is a 20-year-old snapshot.

Did Spizzirri -- reportedly a serial embellisher with a sordid past -- spin her daughter's puny role as an extra in a Baywatch episode into claims that for years David Hasselhoff was closely involved with her organization?

I dunno, but, Ms. Spizzirri, if you're reading this and want to respond to Hasselhoff's assertions that your organization lied about him, please feel free to e-mail me and I'll publish your response.

Also, since you're apparently a Sidebar reader, you already know this, but supporting documents are always welcome.

Video clip from 1/19/05 presentation to US Conference of Mayors in which Save-A-Life Foundation founder/president Carol Spizzirri introduces, then lip-kisses and embraces my 85-year-old father (with whom she had a personal relationship). SALF is now reportedly under investigation by the IL Attorney General. According to a January letter from IL State Senator Tim Bivins, Spizzirri celebrated Xmas 2011 at Mullins's home in Palatine. 

From Save-A-Life Foundation in limbo, an October 11, 2009 Chicago Tribune article by staff reporter Lisa Black:

(Carol) Spizzirri launched a nonprofit organization dedicated to teaching children emergency response techniques, raising at least $8.6 million in federal and state grants for her Save-A-Life Foundation...(Spizzirri) estimates 2 million children took the classes, many of them from the Chicago Public Schools.

If that's accurate - according to a number of records, including an official statement I received from Carol Spizzirri - a generation of Chicago students were taught to perform the Heimlich maneuver on drowning victims, an unapproved treatment that preeminent medical and water safety organizations had already determined was ineffective and potentially lethal since it wastes time and may cause vomiting leading to aspiration.

The millions of public dollars that funded SALF came from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Guard, and numerous Illinois state agencies.

The following is from last year's Washington Post. In parentheses, I've added dates with links to the supporting documents.

(The Heimlich maneuver has) been utterly discredited as a way of rescuing a person who is drowning, and can actually do serious harm to someone who has just been pulled from the water, numerous experts say.

...The list of experts who reject the Heimlich maneuver (to revive drowning victims) is lengthy: The American Red Cross (2000); the United States Lifesaving Association (1996); the American Heart Association (2000); the Institute of Medicine (1995); the International Life Saving Federation (1998).

...Dr. James Orlowski said he has documented nearly 40 cases where rescuers performing the Heimlich maneuver have caused complications for the victim. Orlowski is chief of pediatrics and pediatric intensive care at University Community Hospital in Tampa.

Via a Cleveland Scene cover story by reporter Thomas Francis that references the IOM's 1995 benchmark report rejecting the use of the Heimlich maneuver to revive drowning victims:

"The Institute of Medicine is the crown jewel of medical intelligentsia in the United States," says (drowning expert and retired Coast Guard Admiral Alan) Steinman. "They looked at this issue and said, 'Bad idea.'"

Former SALF medical director Stanley Zydlo MD at a 2009 book signing (source)

Five years later, SALF's medical director ignored the IOM report and the other organizations.

From Water Rescue Sequence: The Controversial Role of the Heimlich Maneuver (in drowning rescue) the year 2000 article by Pamela Mills-Senn which was the Rosetta Stone for much of my later research:


Since there are no published studies supporting the use of the Heimlich maneuver for drowning rescue, it's unclear what "documented literature" Dr. Zydlo researched.

His time might have been better spent researching SALF's founder/president. 


From Where Did the Save-A-Life Money Go? by Don Bauder in the November 17, 2010 San Diego Reader:

(Carol) Spizzirri was a darling of politicians and bureaucrats, although it was a matter of record that she had been convicted twice for shoplifting. Save-A-Life began raking in money from government grants.

...(Spizzirri) had told (ABC I-Team reporter Chuck Goudie) that she was a registered nurse. But the station reported that the institution from which she had claimed to receive her nursing degree had never given her one. A hospital in which she had claimed to be a transplant nurse said she had been a patient care assistant, which is akin to a candy striper....

...On May 18, 1992 - four months before the fatal accident - Christina filed for an order of protection against her mother...The complaint stated that Spizzirri had struck Christina “on several occasions and threatened her on many occasions.

Per the May 30, 2000 Los Angeles Times, Ellis & Associates, the lifeguard training company discussed in Mills-Senn's article, dumped the Heimlich-for-drowning protocol shortly after her article appeared.

But SALF continued to teach and promote the treatment.

Here's a May 3, 2001 workshop held at the Illinois PTA's annual convention:


A year later, my father told reporter Angela D. Sykora of the Grayslake Review (IL):

SALF executives Rita Mullins (in the red turtleneck) and Carol Spizzirri (seated) with Mike "Heckuva job, Brownie" Brown at January 23, 2003 signing ceremony when SALF became a FEMA member organization, US Conference of Mayors annual meeting, Washington, DC. Six years later, as first reported by The Sidebar, FEMA kicked SALF out.

Astoundingly, in January 2003 SALF became a member organization of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

My father marked the occasion with a joint letter to FEMA chief Mike Brown and Carol Spizzirri (page down) that included:


In other words, FEMA was fully aware that SALF's training program was putting the public at risk as the agency provided SALF access "to train and educate children and families in basic first aid through the Citizen Corps network of state and local councils."  

Two years later, from SALF's annual "Bridge the Gap" convention in 2005:


Here comes the clincher.

When I started researching my father's career in 2002, I already knew he hadn't held a hospital job since he was fired for misconduct in 1976 by Cincinnati's Jewish Hospital.

But I quickly learned that for decades he's been persona non grata in the medical profession.

Besides his crackpot claims that the Heimlich maneuver can revive drowning victims, stop asthma attacks, and cure cystic fibrosis, the Heimlich Institute conducted a series of notorious offshore experiments in which US and foreign nationals suffering with cancer, Lyme Disease, and AIDS were infected with malaria. (For more details, watch Brian Ross's ABC 20/20 report, Is Dr. Heimlich really a savior?)

My father and SALF's second-in-command, former Palatine, IL mayor Rita Mullins

Sure he has a famous name, but what legitimate organization would want him as a medical adviser?

And what reputable first aid training group would teach the public to perform the Heimlich maneuver on drowning victims, as reported by Pamela Mills-Senn?

I wanted to find out for myself so in early 2004, using a pseudonym, I e-mailed SALF and asked for a position statement.

In a chirpy, solicitous February 8, 2004 e-mail, Carol Spizzirri sent me the following. (Page down to view the entire letter which, incidentally, is littered with grammatical errors.)


Were the CDC, the National Guard, and the Illinois government agencies aware that they were providing millions of dollars to an organization that was teaching and promoting an unapproved, long-discredited medical treatment that might seriously injure or kill people?

Did any of these agencies ever review SALF's training protocols? Did any of them ask the American Heart Association, the American Red Cross, or independent medical experts to evaluate SALF's program?

What about the prominent public officials from Illinois like Arne Duncan, Senator Dick Durbin, Congressman John Shimkus, Paul Vallas, Gery Chico, and others who promoted and/or helped fund SALF? Were they even aware what SALF was teaching to students in their state?

In days to come, I'll try to get answers to those questions and will report the results here.


8/20/12 UPDATE: I just sent letters of concern re: SALF's faulty, dangerous training to the Illinois Attorney General's Charitable Trust Bureau (which reportedly has been investigating SALF since mid-2010), and to Chicago Public Schools Inspector General James M. Sullivan with whom I filed an investigation request on January 5, 2011. Click the links to view my letters on Scribd.com.






This item has been slightly revised.