A state audit has found that Nebraska improperly sent nearly $8 million in federal energy-assistance money directly to customers, including some who were known to be dead.

State Auditor Mike Foley said Monday that the payments were made in haste in August 2011, just five weeks before the federal deadline to use the money.

Auditors found that the state made nearly 19,000 payments of either $250 or $500 directly to customers who had previously qualified for “crisis assistance.” The payments should have gone to their energy companies, to ensure they were used as intended.

Auditors say there’s no way to confirm how the money was spent. But some checks were cashed at a keno parlor, grocery stores and funeral homes.

State officials say they’ve added safeguards to prevent future occurrences.

One of the stars of MTV’s “BUCKWILD” has been found dead along with two other people in an apparent off-road accident in West Virginia.

Twenty-one-year-old Shain Gandee, his uncle David Gandee, and a third person who has not been identified were last seen around 3 a.m. Sunday at a bar in Sissonville. They had told people that they were going four-wheeling.

The Kanawha County Sheriff’s Department says their 1984 Ford Bronco was found in a ditch near Gandee’s home about 15 miles outside of Charleston with the three men inside. Search teams had to use all-terrain vehicles to reach the site, which they described as “very muddy” and “very rough.”

Gandee had become a breakout star of the reality show that follows the antics of a group reality star of young friends enjoying a wild country lifestyle. MTV announced in February that “BUCKWILD” would be picked up for a second season, after pulling in an average of 3 million viewers per episode in its first season.

MTV issued a statement saying it was shocked and saddened to learn of Gandee’s death, describing him as “a magnetic personality, with a passion for life that touched everyone he met.”

 

The New York City medical examiner says it has started sifting construction debris from the World Trade Center site in an effort to find any human remains from the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

The work began Monday. It’s expected to continue for about 10 weeks on Staten Island.

Deputy Mayor Cas Holloway said in a memo Friday that DNA testing will continue until every possible identification can be made.

City officials say about 60 truckloads of construction debris have been collected around the site over the past 2½ years. A skyscraper will replace the twin towers.

Some 2,750 people died at the World Trade Center in the 2001 attacks. So far, 1,634 people have been identified.

Over the 30 years of its the bone marrow/stem cell transplantation program, researchers at University of Nebraska Medical Center and its hospital partner, The Nebraska Medical Center, have forged strong partnerships with researchers around the world. As a result, many patients come from all over the U.S. and world to see medical center experts.

One example of how research plays a critical role in advancing treatment and care of patients is a recent study that shed new light on T-cell lymphoma.

“We don’t see a lot of cases of this rare kind of lymphoma, so our partnership with others around the world is one way everyone can share to advance our knowledge and help patients,” said Julie Vose, M.D., chief of the Division of Hematology/Oncology. “T-cell lymphoma is more common in other parts of the world. It’s very important that we have the resources and expertise to be able to do these types of studies. There has not been adequate information on it.”

Several different clinical trials for T-cell lymphoma currently are ongoing.

Dr. Vose, also a physician on staff at The Nebraska Medical Center,  was involved in an international study that looked at 1,300 cases of T-cell lymphoma to identify which treatments were helpful and which ones weren’t. In the United States, there are about 85,000 new cases of lymphoma annually of which about 10 percent are T-cell.

It produced surprising results.

“We found that our current treatments for T-cell aren’t very helpful and that we have to look for new treatments,” said Dr. Vose, the Neumann M. and Mildred E. Harris Professor. “We were surprised to learn patients did so poorly on current treatments. We also found some new types of T-cell lymphoma from genetic information that previously hadn’t been described.”

As a result of the study, she said there will be changes in treatment.

“It’s important to tailor treatment since not all T-cell lymphomas are alike,” she said. “Some are aggressive, some slow growing. Some patients do better with certain combinations of therapies while others do better with other types of treatment. We need to understand why.”

In the past few years, Dr. Vose said two new drugs have been approved for T-cell lymphoma.

She said treatment of lymphomas have come a long way in 30 years, thanks to research. There are 50 different types of lymphoma.

“Physicians used to treat many lymphoma patients with the same treatments,” she said. “We didn’t understand that different types of lymphoma can benefit from different types of treatment. Now we know.”