The Furnari Family by Nick Furnari

          Where does my family come from? What is our nationality? When did we immigrate to the United States? These questions have always intrigued me. I assumed the only way to find answers is through my parents and grandparents, but they didn't know much about our family history either. With both my grandfathers proudly claiming to be 100% Italian, I didn't find out too much. Until I heard about Ancestry and 23 & Me DNA tests.

          When I first heard about this idea, I was a little bit skeptical. Well, a "little bit" is an understatement. Being interested in biochemistry, I know DNA is who you are. It codes for every cell in your body, your height, intelligence, and even your personality, it could also tell your family history and if you are likely to develop a disease, or if you possess an eventually fatal mutation. Oh, and if that's not crazy enough, you could even grow an identical copy of yourself with your DNA. It's scary to think just how much your DNA can tell about you, and it made me think that sending it away wouldn't be the best idea. I already found out that if you send your DNA to Ancestry or 23 & Me, samples of your DNA are put in federal databases corresponding to your own personal file. In order to keep tabs on you. For example, if they discover that your DNA created mutations in your brain, they could monitor you on the internet, access your phone camera and more. I know I sound extremely paranoid but, this stuff is real. As you could probably tell, I obviously wouldn't want to send my own DNA away, even if I could find out my family history. So I didn't. My aunt did. I know, her DNA is linked to mine, but they still won't have my exact DNA, so it's alright, I think.

          Anyway, back to the important part, about 6 weeks later she got the results back, and shared the findings with our family. (Be mindful since, she is my mom's sister, her DNA is half of what's in me,  and as of right now, I still don't entirely know my father's side of the family). After endlessly being told by my grandfather that we were all 100% Italian for a fact, I was shocked to find we were only 65% Southern European, (Mostly Italian), we didn't tell my grandfather, not that he would believe us anyway.              The next most shocking thing to me was that she was almost 20% Asian. Now, Asia is a big continent, and "Asian" could mean a lot of things, including anything from Turkish, Russian, and possibly even east Asian, like Chinese, or Japanese. We suspect most of our roots from Asia are probably mostly in Turkey, since it's along the Mediterranean, and was Catholic before being conquered by the Seljuk Turks. Thus after being conquered, some of our ancestors might have fled west, further down the Mediterranean, to places like Italy. Where most of our modern ancestors derived. There is not much more percentage to go around, and most of our remaining nationality was European, either West Europe, like the British Isles, Central Europe, like France, or Germany, and even a little bit North Europe like Scandinavia.

Although the results may not be totally accurate, I presume my family to be all of the stated nationalities, in some way, shape, or form. Most notably, Italian. I have always known my family to be Italian, and I didn't need our DNA tested to prove that. My last name, Furnari, is an Italian name, loosely tied to the translation "furnace" but as a name, I assume it means "baker" probably a the  profession of my early ancestors. Also, Furnari is the name of an actual town in northern Sicily, Italy. A city that my ancestors might have founded long ago, or maybe were named after. Overall, I don't entirely know my family's history and backstory, but I know enough to be satisfied, and the rest I just leave up to interpretation. It's better not to know everything sometimes.

                                                                      Furnari, Sicily
         

Wrongful Incarceration By: Gianna Gorvan

 In 1999, Horace Roberts, a now 60 year old man, was convicted and charged of second degree murder. Just days ago, on October 3, 2018 Roberts was released from incarceration. Horace Roberts was convicted of a crime he did not commit, but due to reason to believe he may have had something to do with it, such as his affair with the deceased, Terry Cheek, he was placed behind bars. Roberts knew that there was no reason for him to be placed in jail for such a long span of his lifetime, let alone any at all, and so he reached out to a non-profit organization to review his case. This organization had given Roberts a new found freedom when they discovered, it was indeed, not his DNA found anywhere on the crime scene. In contrast to being let out of jail, the two men whose DNA was later found on the dead body have been taken into custody.
   I feel as though the wrongful incrimination of any man or woman is far too common. There are too many scenarios where the court or the victims just want some sort of verdict to be made, and they convict the wrong person. When the justice system takes the wrong person into custody, it takes away the wrong person's freedom. They are stripped of all the possible life experiences they may have encountered, things like love, education, adventure, they can lose their family and friends, their jobs. In the case of Horace Roberts, he lost 20 years. 20 years of laughs, smiles, family time, and happiness all because he was stuck behind bars, knowing that he shouldn't have been.
   It isn't even just the fact that an innocent man is facing these punishments he shouldn't have to be, it is the fact that two murderers have been roaming the streets living their normal day to day lives. How many more people are we putting at risk by allowing that? If our justice department continues to convict the wrong people, that means the right people are still out there, still dangerous and capable. Our society needs to take a step back and evaluate what can be changed. How can we ensure people's safety if we aren't guaranteed to have the right criminal? It doesn't feel right or safe to be in this position with murderers, rapists, burglars, arsonists, all living their lives, ready in an instant to begin the next felony, but nobody would know because the accused was already put in jail.
   To keep peace, order, and stability in our world, we need to better improve how our government and justice system operate. It is a scary world were living in, where someone who once did something that put themselves or others at risk has the ability to do it again if they aren't arrested. There needs to be more time, more effort, and better processes put into finding a way to find the true felon so that we don't take away innocent people's freedom and let civilians have unknowingly be at risk. This is just one example of a case where the true criminal isn't found until years later, and I am sure that it will not be the last, but there certainly cannot and should not be many more.
  

Horace Roberts eats his first meal after 20 years of prison.  

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/16/us/20-years-exonerated-dna-prison.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fus&action=click&contentCollection=us&region=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront