Veteran L.A. County sheriff's deputy charged with murder

After spending much of his life putting people behind bars, a veteran L.A. County sheriff's deputy stood in handcuffs Thursday, charged with gunning down a former neighbor who apparently got into a fight with his son.

Francisco Gamez, 41, is accused of shooting Armando "Cookie" Casillas, a well-known figure in his blue-collar neighborhood in Sylmar.

Gamez was off duty, sitting in his car, when he allegedly fired two shots on the night of June 17, killing Casillas and narrowly missing a second man, prosecutors said.

Gamez, a 17-year veteran who worked as a detective in West Hollywood, was allegedly furious over a fight between his 20-year-old son and Casillas, 38, prosecutors said. The younger Gamez had called his father to the scene, authorities said.

Casillas was later found by relatives lying near his home, and died later at Providence Holy Cross Medical Center.

Gamez was removed from duty in July after witnesses and evidence tied the detective to the slaying, authorities said. He was arrested Wednesday and led handcuffed from his San Fernando home by his former co-workers.

On Thursday he was formally charged with murder, attempted murder and discharging a firearm from an occupied vehicle. Gamez could face 75 years to life in prison if convicted of all charges.

In court, where he stood handcuffed in a plexiglass cage, sheriff's deputies peeked into the room to gawk at their former colleague. Sheriff Lee Baca described the whole thing as "deeply disturbing."

Gamez is being held on $4-million bail.

On Beaver Street in Sylmar, where the shooting occurred, Casillas' photo sat in a frame in the midst of a makeshift memorial, along with a cross and a potted plant with U.S. and Mexican flags and candles.

"He was a sweetheart, and very generous," said Patsy Telles-Cabrera, who lived across the street from Casillas for years. "He would check in on my parents." She left a box of chocolates at the growing shrine.

"It never should have happened," said one neighbor. "This is a family neighborhood."

sam.quinones@latimes.com

richard.winton@latimes.com

Times staff writer Wesley Lowery contributed to this report.

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“Gangnam Style” song channels New Yorkers’ power woes

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Move over Psy. The next hot thing – at least on Long Island, New York – is a music video parodying the South Korean rapper and dancer’s blockbuster hit, “Gangnam Style.”

While the locally produced “LIPA Style” may not attract millions of YouTube views, it’s channeling the frustration of thousands of disgruntled New Yorkers, many of whom went weeks without power after Sandy slammed the East Coast last month.

“There’s been this outpouring of thanks,” said John “Online” Mingione, a correspondent for a Long Island radio station, who created the video after going more than week without power.

After watching the video, people “are saying this is the first time they’ve been able to smile in weeks,” said Mingione.

The response to the cleanup by the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) has resulted in lawsuits and investigations. The chief operating officer of the state-owned utility also quit under fire for the company’s slow response in restoring power.

Mingione, 23, did not initially mind going without power at his Long Island home. But after five days, the food and friends were gone, and he started to get lonely and bored. A colleague came up with the idea for the song, which was inspired by thousands of complaints the station – WBLI/106.1 FM – received from listeners.

In less than a week, the video with its lyrics about life without power, pleas for help from LIPA and absurd dance moves performed by Mingione and two co-workers in faux LIPA uniforms with a local 5-year-old has been viewed more than 250,000 times on YouTube.

Mingione’s favorite line: “I’m running out of formula, my baby won’t stop crying” which included footage with a co-worker’s infant son.

“I know they’re working their hardest,” he said. “It’s not the linemen’s fault, but at this point it’s ridiculous that people are still without power.”

(Reporting by Jilian Mincer; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Jackie Frank)

Music News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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For Alzheimer’s, Detection Advances Outpace Treatment Options

Joshua Lott for The New York Times

Awilda Jimenez got a scan for Alzheimer’s after she started forgetting things. It was positive.

When Awilda Jimenez started forgetting things last year, her husband, Edwin, felt a shiver of dread. Her mother had developed Alzheimer’s in her 50s. Could his wife, 61, have it, too?

He learned there was a new brain scan to diagnose the disease and nervously agreed to get her one, secretly hoping it would lay his fears to rest. In June, his wife became what her doctor says is the first private patient in Arizona to have the test.

“The scan was floridly positive,” said her doctor, Adam S. Fleisher, director of brain imaging at the Banner Alzheimer’s Institute in Phoenix.

The Jimenezes have struggled ever since to deal with this devastating news. They are confronting a problem of the new era of Alzheimer’s research: The ability to detect the disease has leapt far ahead of treatments. There are none that can stop or even significantly slow the inexorable progression to dementia and death.

Families like the Jimenezes, with no good options, can only ask: Should they live their lives differently, get their affairs in order, join a clinical trial of an experimental drug?

“I was hoping the scan would be negative,” Mr. Jimenez said. “When I found out it was positive, my heart sank.”

The new brain scan technology, which went on the market in June, is spreading fast. There are already more than 300 hospitals and imaging centers, located in most major metropolitan areas, that are ready to perform the scans, according to Eli Lilly, which sells the tracer used to mark plaque for the scan.

The scans show plaques in the brain — barnaclelike clumps of protein, beta amyloid — that, together with dementia, are the defining feature of Alzheimer’s disease. Those who have dementia but do not have excessive plaques do not have Alzheimer’s. It is no longer necessary to wait until the person dies and has an autopsy to learn if the brain was studded with plaques.

Many insurers, including Medicare, will not yet pay for the new scans, which cost several thousand dollars. And getting one comes with serious risks. While federal law prevents insurers and employers from discriminating based on genetic tests, it does not apply to scans. People with brain plaques can be denied long-term care insurance.

The Food and Drug Administration, worried about interpretations of the scans, has required something new: Doctors must take a test showing they can read them accurately before they begin doing them. So far, 700 doctors have qualified, according to Eli Lilly. Other kinds of diagnostic scans have no such requirement.

In another unusual feature, the F.D.A. requires that radiologists not be told anything about the patient. They are generally trained to incorporate clinical information into their interpretation of other types of scans, said Dr. R. Dwaine Rieves, director of the drug agency’s Division of Medical Imaging Products.

But in this case, clinical information may lead radiologists to inadvertently shade their reports to coincide with what doctors suspect is the underlying disease. With Alzheimer’s, Dr. Rieves said, “clinical impressions have been misleading.”

“This is a big change in the world of image interpretation,” he said.

Like some other Alzheimer’s experts, Dr. Fleisher used the amyloid scan for several years as part of a research study that led to its F.D.A. approval. Subjects were not told what the scans showed. Now, with the scan on the market, the rules have changed.

Dr. Fleisher’s first patient was Mrs. Jimenez. Her husband, the family breadwinner, had lost his job as a computer consultant when the couple moved from New York to Arizona to take care of Mrs. Jimenez’s mother. Paying several thousand dollars for a scan was out of the question. But Dr. Fleisher found a radiologist, Dr. Mantej Singh Sra of Sun Radiology, who was so eager to get into the business that he agreed to do Mrs. Jimenez’s scan free. His plan was to be the first in Arizona to do a scan, and advertise it.

After Dr. Sra did the scan, the Jimenezes returned to Dr. Fleisher to learn the result.

Dr. Fleisher, sad to see so much plaque in Mrs. Jimenez’s brain, referred her to a psychiatrist to help with anxiety and suggested she enter clinical trials of experimental drugs.

But Mr. Jimenez did not like that idea. He worried about unexpected side effects.

“Tempting as it is, where do you draw the line?” he asks. “At what point do you take a risk with a loved one?”

At Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, Dr. Samuel E. Gandy found that his patients — mostly affluent — were unfazed by the medical center’s $3,750 price for the scan. He has been ordering at least one a week for people with symptoms ambiguous enough to suggest the possibility of brain plaques.

Most of his patients want their names kept confidential, fearing an inability to get long-term care insurance, or just wanting privacy.

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L.A. County sheriff's deputy held in fatal off-duty shooting

A veteran Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy was arrested Wednesday for allegedly shooting and killing a man in Sylmar while off-duty in June, authorities said.

The deputy, Francisco Gamez, 41, has been with the department for 17 years and was last working as a station detective in West Hollywood.

Law enforcement sources told The Times that the deputy's son got into a dispute with another person. The son, they said, called his father to the scene. The deputy allegedly drove up soon after and exchanged words before opening fire from inside his car, striking one man, the sources said.

He then allegedly drove a short distance before shooting at a second person, added the sources, who asked for anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

That person was not injured, according to authorities.

The other victim, Armando Casillas, 38, was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead from a gunshot wound to the chest just before midnight on June 17.

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FOR THE RECORD:
An earlier version of this article misspelled the victim's first name as Armondo.

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Neighbors said Gamez and Casillas lived a block apart.

In August, a person who identified himself as the victim's brother commented on the website of the Los Angeles Times, saying he suspected a deputy was responsible.

"We think he is a L.A. COUNTY SHERIFF," the comment stated. "The reason we think he is a Sheriff is that he shouted to my Brother "L.A. COUNTY SHERIFF WHERE YOU FROM" as if the sheriff was in a gang."

The person who wrote the comment could not be reached Wednesday evening.

At the time of the killing, authorities said the victim got into an argument with an unknown person. At some point, the other person left the area only to return and shoot Casillas in a drive-by, authorities said then. Now they are saying that the shooter was not the same person who initially got into the argument.

LAPD officers arrested Gamez on suspicion of murder, attempted murder and use of a firearm in the commission of a felony. He was booked into the LAPD's 77th Street station Wednesday in lieu of $4-million bail, officials said. He has not been charged.

Casillas' sister said that the family was thankful for the arrest, but that they were not prepared to discuss the events that led to the fatal shooting.

In a statement, Sheriff Lee Baca called the incident "deeply disturbing."

His spokesman Steve Whitmore said the department placed Gamez on leave July 3 after learning from the LAPD about the investigation.

"He's been stripped of all law enforcement power," Whitmore said. "It casts a pall over the scores and scores of deputy sheriffs that every day do their job."

robert.faturechi@latimes.com

richard.winton@latimes.com

Times staff writer Andrew Blankstein contributed to this report.

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Jon Bon Jovi’s daughter arrested after suspected drug overdose

(Reuters) – Rock star Jon Bon Jovi‘s daughter was arrested in New York state on Wednesday on drug possession charges following a suspected heroin overdose, local police said.

Stephanie Bongiovi, 19, was found unresponsive in a dormitory room at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York from an alleged overdose and taken to a local medical facility, according to the Town of Kirkland Police Department.

Heroin and marijuana were found in the dorm room during a search, police said.

Bongiovi was later booked on misdemeanor charges of possession of a controlled substance (heroin), marijuana possession and criminal use of drug paraphernalia. She has since been released, police said.

Representatives of the singer declined to comment.

Police said Ian S. Grant, 21, a student who was in the same room as Bongiovi, was also charged with possession of a controlled substance (heroin) and later released. Both Bongiovi and Grant will appear in court at a later date.

Hamilton College declined to comment on the arrests or Bongiovi’s health but said it is cooperating with the police investigation.

Bongiovi is the oldest of four children of rocker Bon Jovi and his wife, Dorothea Hurley.

(Reporting By Eric Kelsey and Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Patricia Reaney and Kenneth Barry)

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Alzheimer’s Tied to Mutation Harming Immune Response

Alzheimer’s researchers and drug companies have for years concentrated on one hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease: the production of toxic shards of a protein that accumulate in plaques on the brain.

But now, in a surprising coincidence, two groups of researchers working from entirely different starting points have converged on a mutated gene involved in another aspect of Alzheimer’s disease: the immune system’s role in protecting against the disease. The mutation is suspected of interfering with the brain’s ability to prevent the buildup of plaque.

The discovery, researchers say, provides clues to how and why the disease progresses. The gene, known as TREM2, is only the second found to increase Alzheimer’s risk substantially in older people.

“It points very specifically to a potential metabolic pathway that you could intervene in to change the course of Alzheimer’s disease,” said William Thies, chief medical and scientific officer of the Alzheimer’s Association.

Much work remains to be done before scientists understand precisely how the newly discovered gene mutation leads to Alzheimer’s, but already there are some indications from studies in mice. When the gene is not mutated, white blood cells in the brain spring into action, gobbling up and eliminating the plaque-forming toxic protein, beta amyloid. As a result, Alzheimer’s can be staved off or averted.

But when the gene is mutated, the brain’s white blood cells are hobbled, making them less effective in their attack on beta amyloid.

People with the mutated gene have a threefold to fivefold increase in the likelihood of developing Alzheimer’s disease in old age.

The intact gene, says John Hardy of University College London, “is a safety net.” And those with the mutation, he adds, “are living life without a safety net.” Dr. Hardy is lead author of one of the papers.

The discovery also suggests that a new type of drug could be developed to enhance the gene’s activity, perhaps allowing the brain’s white blood cells to do their work.

“The field is in desperate need of new therapeutic agents,” said Alison Goate, an Alzheimer’s researcher at Washington University in St. Louis who contributed data to Dr. Hardy’s study. “This will give us an alternative approach.”

The fact that two research groups converged on the same gene gives experts confidence in the findings. Both studies were published online Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine. “Together they make a good case that this really is an Alzheimer’s gene,” said Gerard Schellenberg, an Alzheimer’s researcher at the University of Pennsylvania who was not involved with the work.

The other gene found to raise the odds that a person will get Alzheimer’s, ApoE4, is much more common and confers about the same risk as the mutated version of TREM2. But it is still not clear why ApoE4, discovered in 1993, makes Alzheimer’s more likely.

Because the mutations in the newly discovered gene are rare, occurring in no more than 2 percent of Alzheimer’s patients, it makes no sense to start screening people for them, Dr. Thies said. Instead, the discovery provides new clues to the workings of Alzheimer’s disease.

To find the gene, a research group led by Dr. Kari Stefansson of deCODE Genetics of Iceland started with a simple question.

“We asked, ‘Can we find anything in the genome that separates those who are admitted to nursing homes before the age of 75 and those who are still living at home at 85?’ ” he said.

Scientists searched the genomes of 2,261 Icelanders and zeroed in on TREM2. Mutations in that gene were more common among people with Alzheimer’s, as well as those who did not have an Alzheimer’s diagnosis but who had memory problems and might be on their way to developing Alzheimer’s.

The researchers confirmed their results by looking for the gene in people with and without Alzheimer’s in populations studied at Emory University, as well as in Norway, the Netherlands and Germany.

The TREM2 connection surprised Dr. Stefansson. Although researchers have long noticed that the brain is inflamed in Alzheimer’s patients, he had dismissed inflammation as a major factor in the disease.

“I was of the opinion that the immune system would play a fairly small role, if any, in Alzheimer’s disease,” Dr. Stefansson said. “This discovery cured me of that bias.”

Meanwhile, Dr. Hardy and Rita Guerreiro at University College London, along with Andrew Singleton at the National Institute on Aging, were intrigued by a strange, rare disease. Only a few patients had been identified, but their symptoms were striking. They had crumbling bones and an unusual dementia, sclerosing leukoencephalopathy.

“It’s a weird disease,” Dr. Hardy said.

He saw one patient in her 30s whose brain disease manifested in sexually inappropriate behavior. Also, her bones kept breaking. The disease was caused by mutations that disabled both the copy of TREM2 that she had inherited from her mother and the one from her father.

Eventually the researchers searched for people who had a mutation in just one copy of TREM2. To their surprise, it turned out that these people were likely to have Alzheimer’s disease.

They then asked researchers around the world who had genetic data from people with and without Alzheimer’s to look for TREM2 mutations.

“Sure enough, they had good evidence,” Dr. Hardy said. The mutations occurred in one-half of 1 percent of the general population but in 1 to 2 percent of patients with Alzheimer’s disease.

“That is a big effect,” Dr. Hardy said.

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If soldier killed Afghan civilians in rampage, did he act alone?

JOINT BASE LEWIS MCCHORD, Wash. — The case against U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales appeared at first to be horribly simple: Days after a bomb blew off the leg of a friend in southern Afghanistan, the 39-year-old combat veteran picked up his rifle, a pistol and a grenade launcher, walked to two villages and allegedly conducted a one-man campaign of vengeance, killing 16 civilians and wounding six more.

But by the time a weeklong hearing wound up Tuesday in a military courtroom, one of the Army's highest-profile war crimes from Afghanistan raised almost as many questions as it answered.

If Bales acted alone, why were shots heard coming from one of the villages 20 minutes after he was spotted returning to the base for the first time?

Why was a witness who claimed to have seen two U.S. soldiers killing her husband while helicopters flew overhead not brought in to testify?

Why were the crime scenes so very different — at one house, a surgical execution of the head of the family, while at the next house, 11 men, women and children were shot and possibly stabbed, their bodies piled in a heap and burned?

The Article 32 hearing, held to determine whether there was evidence to hold the serviceman for a court-martial, drew a portrait not just of a rogue soldier, defense lawyers said. It revealed a U.S. combat outpost at which soldiers spent their evenings drinking alcohol, snorting Valium and taking steroids, all three of which Bales apparently had done before asking a friend to "take care of my kids" and setting out into the darkness outside the base perimeter, laughing.

"We have a dysfunctional, drinking and drugging … team," civilian defense lawyer Emma Scanlan said in her closing argument.

"We can't isolate Sgt. Bales within a bubble," Scanlan said, noting that he was under the supervision of Special Forces officers. "They are the command. They are in charge. And they are terrible at it."

Army prosecutors claim Bales acted alone and with chilling rationality: walking to the village of Alkozai, where he is accused of killing four people and wounding six, coming back to the base and telling a friend what he had done, then venturing out again to the village of Najiban, where he is accused of killing 12.

When Bales returned to Camp Belambay the second time, he admitted to friends he had done some "sick" things, and told them they would thank him when fighting season got underway again during warmer weather later in the spring, said prosecutor Maj. Robert Stelle.

"Terrible, terrible things happened. That is clear. The second thing that is clear is that Staff Sgt. Bales did it," Stelle said.

He urged investigating officer Col. Lee Deneke to recommend a full court-martial and that it be tried as a capital case, with the possibility of the death penalty. Bales committed "the worst, most despicable crime a human being can commit: murdering children in their own homes," Stelle said.

If Deneke recommends a court-martial, a lengthy process of mental health evaluations and further forensic reports will follow. Defense lawyers have pledged there will be a full exploration of the medical care Bales received at the Madigan Army Medical Center for an earlier traumatic brain injury.

The hospital south of Seattle was the subject of an investigation this year for tossing aside diagnoses of post-traumatic stress disorder, making it harder for those soldiers to receive follow-up medical care.

In the year before the shootings, Scanlan said, Bales had received an exemplary evaluation, in which he was praised for "a strong moral compass, never wavering from what was right."

What went wrong?

Scanlan suggested part of the answer might lie in the steroids and sleep aids Bales was taking, along with the Jack Daniels he drank with two friends on the evening before the killings as they watched "Man on Fire," a movie about a former CIA operative who executes a violent campaign of revenge.

"They drank a ton, and they were all drunk," Scanlan said, noting that testimony showed that one of the soldiers who'd been drinking with Bales that night, Cpl. David Godwin, was stumbling, slurring his words and smelled like alcohol four hours later.

The prosecution said Bales had plenty of time to reach both villages and return at the end of the night with his clothing and weapons covered in blood. Before he left, prosecutors said, he had discussed his frustration with the Army's lack of response to the bomb that blew off his friend's leg; after his arrest, he reminded one soldier of an Afghan machine gunner the unit had faced earlier.

"That's not going to happen again," Bales said, according to Staff Sgt. Ross O'Rourke.

Prosecutors also established that DNA from at least one of the women killed at the home of Haji Mohammed Wazir in Najiban was found on Bales' clothing.

Yet defense lawyers continue to raise questions about whether Bales was the only one responsible — whether one person could have killed so many people in so many locations in one night.

A lot of the evidence suggests otherwise, Scanlan said, pointing to an agent from the Army's Criminal Investigations Command who said that Masuma Dawood, whose husband was shot, told her that two soldiers had killed her husband.

Army officials said Dawood did not testify because of "cultural differences," and the reluctance of Afghan families to allow a woman to testify in an American courtroom, even by remote video from Afghanistan. But sources in Afghanistan have told the Los Angeles Times that Dawood was, in fact, willing to testify.

Scanlan said the timeline laid out by prosecutors also raises questions, beginning with the Afghan guard who testified that he checked his watch, and was certain that the U.S. soldier he saw — returning from the initial killings in Alkozai, prosecutors allege — had returned to Camp Belambay at 1:30 a.m.

The shots heard from the direction of Alkozai didn't stop till 1:50 a.m., the defense attorney said.

"I don't know what that means," Scanlan said. "But one thing it means is, if you believe what the government is telling you, that Sgt. Bales is the one who came back through that wire at 1:30, then somebody else was firing for another 20 minutes."

kim.murphy@latimes.com

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Liza Minnelli to guest star on TV musical drama “Smash”

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Liza Minnelli will guest star on an episode of TV musical drama “Smash,” NBC said on Tuesday.

The singer and actress will play herself and sing a number in one episode of the show when it returns in February 2013. The series, starring Debra Messing, Anjelica Huston and Katharine McPhee, dramatizes the backstage life of writers, producers and actors working to create a Broadway musical about Marilyn Monroe.

“Liza Minnelli is the essence of a multi-talented, singular show business sensation, particularly for her extraordinary contributions to Broadway,” Robert Greenblatt, the president of NBC Entertainment, said in a statement.

“So what could be more fitting than to have her legendary talent on a show that celebrates a world Liza has dazzled for decades?” he added

The daughter of director Vincente Minnelli and Hollywood legend Judy Garland, Minnelli, 66, is one of a handful of stars to have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy and Tony award.

She is best-known for her portrayal of Sally Bowles in the musical “Cabaret.” She is also expected to revive her role as Lucille on the upcoming fourth season of “Arrested Development,” which is slated to air on Netflix after being canceled by Fox in 2006.

NBC has moved the second season of “Smash” from Monday to Tuesday night, starting on February 5, 2013.

(Reporting by Eric Kelsey; editing by Jill Serjeant and Matthew Lewis)

Music News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Recipes for Health: Roasted Eggplant and Chickpeas — Recipes for Health

Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

Eggplant is always a good, substantial vegetable to use for a vegetarian main dish. The chickpeas and the feta provide plenty of protein. Vegans can leave out the feta and substitute sugar or agave nectar for the honey.

 

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 28-ounce can chopped tomatoes, with juice, pulsed to a coarse purée

1 teaspoon mild honey (more to taste)

1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, to taste

Salt to taste

1 large or 2 medium eggplants (about 1 1/4 pounds), cut into 1/3-inch-thick slices

3 cups cooked chickpeas (2 cans, drained and rinsed, or, 1 1/2 cups dried – about 3/4 pound

4 ounces feta, crumbled (3/4 cup)

1 teaspoon dried oregano, preferably Greek or Turkish

 

1. Make the tomato sauce. Heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil in a heavy skillet or wide saucepan over medium heat, and add the garlic. Cook, stirring, until it smells fragrant, about 30 seconds, and add the tomatoes, honey, salt to taste and cinnamon. Cook over medium heat until the tomatoes have cooked down and the sauce is fragrant, about 20 minutes. Taste and adjust seasonings.

2. Meanwhile, heat the oven to 425 degrees. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and brush the boil with olive oil. Place the eggplant slices on the baking sheet, salt lightly and brush with olive oil. Place in the oven and bake 20 minutes, or until eggplant is lightly browned and soft all the way through. Remove from the heat. Fold the aluminum foil over and crimp the edges together so that the eggplant steams as it cools. Do this in batches if you need more than one baking sheet. Turn the oven down to 350 degrees.

3. Oil a 2-quart baking dish or gratin. Place the chickpeas in the baking dish and stir in 1 cup of the tomato sauce. Layer the eggplant over the chickpeas and top with the remaining tomato sauce. Sprinkle the feta over the top and drizzle on any remaining olive oil. Sprinkle with the oregano and cover tightly with foil. Bake 30 minutes. Uncover and bake another 10 minutes, until the dish is bubbling.

Yield: 6 servings

Advance preparation: The eggplant slices can be cooked up to a day ahead. Hold in the refrigerator, covered. The tomato sauce will keep for 3 days in the refrigerator and freezes well.

Nutritional information per serving: 366 calories; 16 grams fat; 4 grams saturated fat; 2 grams polyunsaturated fat; 8 grams monounsaturated fat; 17 milligrams cholesterol; 44 grams carbohydrates; 14 grams dietary fiber; 431 milligrams sodium (does not include salt to taste); 15 grams protein

Martha Rose Shulman is the author of “The Very Best of Recipes for Health

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At Microsoft, Sinofsky Seen as Smart but Abrasive

On a warm night in late October, Steven Sinofsky stood on a platform in New York’s Times Square, smiling as a huge crowd roared at the unveiling of a Microsoft retail store, where Windows 8 and the company’s new Surface tablet were about to go on sale.

Less than three weeks later, Mr. Sinofsky — who, as the head of Windows, was arguably the second-most important leader at Microsoft — suddenly left the company. His abrasive style was a source of discord within Microsoft, and he and Steven A. Ballmer, Microsoft’s chief executive, agreed that it was time for him to leave, according to a person briefed on the situation who was not authorized to speak publicly about it.

Mr. Sinofsky was widely admired for his effectiveness in running one of the biggest and most important software development organizations on the planet. But his departure, which Microsoft announced late on Monday, parallels in many respects that of Scott Forstall, the headstrong former head of Apple’s mobile software development, who was fired by Apple’s chief executive, Timothy D. Cook, in late October.

Both cases underscore a quandary that chief executives sometimes face: when do the costs of keeping brilliant leaders who cannot seem to get along with others outweigh the benefits?

The tipping point that led to Mr. Sinofsky’s departure came after an accumulation of run-ins with Mr. Ballmer and other company leaders, rather than a single incident, according to interviews with several current and former Microsoft executives who declined to be named discussing internal matters.

One example of the kind of behavior that hurt Mr. Sinofsky’s standing at the company occurred this year at a two-day retreat for Microsoft’s senior executives at the Semiahmoo resort on the coast just below the Canadian border in Washington State. At the meeting, Microsoft’s various division heads were expected to make presentations on their businesses, answer questions and remain to hear their peers repeat the exercise.

When Mr. Sinofsky stood on the first day to speak about the Windows division, he told the group he had not prepared a presentation, and if they wanted to catch up on the progress of Windows 8, they could read his company blog, where he publicly chronicled the software’s development. He answered questions from the audience and then left the resort, while his colleagues remained until the next day, according to multiple people who were present.

Mr. Sinofsky’s early exit and halfhearted presentation were widely noted by his colleagues, irking even his admirers in the company. “He lost a lot of support,” one attendee said.

It wasn’t until this Monday, though, that Mr. Sinofsky and Mr. Ballmer both decided it would be best if Mr. Sinofsky left. Bill Gates, Microsoft’s chairman, supported the move, a person briefed on the matter said. Mr. Sinofsky served as a technical assistant to Mr. Gates in the 1990s.

In an e-mail to Microsoft employees, Mr. Sinofsky said the decision to leave “was a personal and private choice.” Many surprised Microsoft insiders noted that Mr. Sinofsky’s departure was immediate, an unusual arrangement for someone with a 23-year track record at the company. A Microsoft spokesman, Frank Shaw, said Mr. Sinofsky was not available to comment.

Although Mr. Ballmer grew increasingly impatient with Mr. Sinofsky throughout the year, he held back from taking any action earlier to avoid disrupting the release of Windows 8, the most important product Microsoft has unveiled in years, a person with knowledge of his thinking said.

The final decision could not have come lightly. Although many people at Microsoft viewed him as a ruthless corporate schemer, Mr. Sinofsky ran the highly complex organization responsible for Windows as a disciplined army that met deadlines, and he was respected by people on his team.

He achieved hero status within Microsoft several years ago by taking over the leadership of Windows after the debacle that was Windows Vista, a much-delayed operating system whose sluggish performance and technical problems worsened Microsoft’s reputation for mediocre software. Mr. Sinfosky led the development of a new version of the operating system, Windows 7, which was positively reviewed and sold well.

“He did great things with Windows,” said Michael Cusumano, a professor at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “That’s still the core of the company.”

But while Mr. Sinofsky was effective, Mr. Cusumano said, he could be secretive and difficult to get along with, as he learned while dealing with Mr. Sinofsky while Mr. Cusumano was writing a book on Microsoft in the early 1990s. “I could imagine that he burned a lot of bridges and created a bunch of enemies,” he said.

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