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On August 4, 1987, Joy White and Carl Tyson rushed their newborn daughter, Carlina White, to the hospital due to a fever. Little did these new parents know, however, that this night would be the last time they would see their child for the next 23 years.A woman dressed as a nurse kidnapped Carlina White from the hospital and raised the child as her own. It was a full two decades later, when Carlina White was due to become a mother herself, that she discovered the truth.Carlina White/FacebookCarlina White solved her own kidnapping case in 2005.Suspicious that her mother wasnt who she said she was, White began doing research on the website for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), and she soon saw herself in their database. She then reached out to the organization, which put her in touch with her birth parents.Finally, more than 23 years after her kidnapping, White was reunited with her parents in 2011. And though this reunion brought cathartic closure, White soon struggled to navigate her new life after unwittingly trapped in a lie for so many years.The Kidnapping Of Carlina WhiteCarlina Renae White was born in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City on July 15, 1987. Her parents were thrilled about the new addition to their family, but when White was just 19 days old, she developed a high fever.They rushed her to the hospital, where doctors discovered White had an infection from swallowing fluid during her birth. She was placed on intravenous antibiotics to fight the infection, and Joy White and Carl Tyson waited anxiously for news of their daughters condition.Shockingly, between 2:30 a.m. and 3:55 a.m., someone removed the IV from baby Carlina and abducted her from the hospital. Though the hospital had a surveillance system, it was not working at the time of the abduction, and there were few potential witnesses.Later, Carl Tyson recalled that a woman wearing a nurses uniform directed them upon their arrival, and he saw her again while looking for a phone to update Whites grandparents on her condition. Tyson and Joy White decided that she would stay at the hospital with the baby, but she needed to get some things from home first. As reported by New York magazine, Tyson dropped his girlfriend at her house and returned home to try to get some sleep. He had just managed to doze off when the phone rang.It was the police calling from Joy Whites apartment. They told him his daughter was missing while his girlfriend screamed in the background.It was the first time an infant had been abducted from a New York hospital, and no one knew how it had happened. Nurses said they had checked on baby White every five minutes and had discovered she was missing at 3:40 a.m.Soon, details began to emerge that for several months, a strange woman had been seen at the hospital. She passed herself off as a nurse, and even the other nurses believed her. It was the same woman who had given Tyson directions earlier.A security guard had seen someone matching the womans description leave the hospital around 3:30 a.m. She didnt have a baby with her, but he believed it was possible that the missing infant had been hidden in her smock. The last thing Joy White could recall about the nurse was a bizarre comment she made as her newborn daughter was admitted: The baby dont cry for you, you cry for the baby. She now believes it was the womans attempt to get rid of her.Police began a thorough investigation, and for a while they thought they had a suspect. But they soon came to a dead end, and the case of Carlina Whites kidnapping went cold.Carlina White Discovers The Truth About Her PastThe mysterious nurse from the hospital was Annugetta Ann Pettway of Bridgeport, Connecticut. Pettway had been in trouble with the law several times as a teenager on charges of larceny, theft, and forgery, but police who knew her said she wasnt a hell-raiser. As an adult, she struggled with a drug addiction. In 1987, Pettway told her friends she was pregnant, and a friend later said Pettway left town for a while before returning with a child. Friends and family assumed she had gone elsewhere to give birth to the baby, presumed to be the daughter of her on-again, off-again boyfriend Robert Nance. Carlina White grew up believing her name was Nejdra Nance. She spent her childhood in Bridgeport, Connecticut, before she and Pettway moved to Atlanta, Georgia. Growing up, White sometimes wondered if Pettway was her real mother. Her skin was much lighter than Pettways, and though relatives often called her little Ann, she didnt see a physical resemblance at all.Nejdra Nance was very suspicious of who she was and what family raised her, Lieutenant Christopher Zimmerman of the New York Police Department later told ABC News. There was no paperwork to follow her such as a birth certificate or social security card. In her late teens she became suspicious of who she was.Carlina White/FacebookCarlina White was reunited with her birth parents in 2011.In 2005, White became pregnant. To secure medical assistance from the state, she had to provide her original birth certificate. White asked Pettway for the document, but she couldnt provide it. After White pressed her about it for several days, Pettway finally gave her the birth certificate but when White tried to submit it, officials said it was a forgery.Pettway finally had to confess to White that she wasnt her biological mother. She claimed that White was abandoned by her mother at birth. Pettway kept repeating, She left you and never came back.For the next year, White kept pressing Pettway for more details about her birth mother, but Pettway claimed she couldnt remember anything. At that point, 23-year-old White started scouring the internet for clues as to her true identity.At first, White only searched for kidnappings that had occured near Bridgeport, Connecticut. It wasnt until 2010 that she visited the NCMEC website and expanded her search outside of her home state.There, she found a photo of a baby who had been kidnapped in 1987 and looked just like her own daughter, Samani. The infant even had the same birthmark as White.The Connecticut Post reports that Pettways sister Cassandra Johnson helped White reach out to NCMEC in December 2010. The center quickly contacted Joy White and Carl Tyson to inform them their long-lost daughter was found.An Emotional Reunion After 23 YearsNCMEC reached out to Joy White and Carl Tyson through email just before Christmas 2011. DNA testing was performed to confirm that Carlina White was indeed their child. I just always believed that she would find me. That was something that I always believed in myself, you know, that she would come and find me and thats the same way that I thought it would happen, Joy White said of receiving the miraculous email.For the next few weeks, White was in constant contact with her birth parents, but she sometimes struggled to form a relationship with them. She recalled, The mom had that mother instinct. The dad is like I was talking to a stranger. Nevertheless, the family continued to try to build a relationship, and White flew to New York to meet them for the first time. Her mother picked her up at the airport, and she was welcomed by her extended family with open arms. It was wonderful, she didnt even seem like a stranger, she just fit right in, Whites biological grandmother Elizabeth White said. We all went up there, we had dinner together, her aunts were there. She brought her beautiful daughter. It was magic.After a quick visit, White returned to the airport to catch her flight back to Atlanta. Before she boarded her plane, she was stopped by a police detective who told her that her DNA results had come back and that Joy White and Carl Tyson were indeed her biological parents.When national news broke of the reunion, White flew back to New York to do a series of interviews which she felt forced parts of the new relationship that hadnt developed yet. She began to think about Pettway, who was on the run from the FBI. Carlina White pulled away from her birth parents and returned home to Atlanta. The Saga Of Carlina Whites Kidnapping Comes To An EndPublic DomainAnn Pettway surrendered on Jan. 23, 2011.On Jan. 23, 2011, Annugetta Pettway turned herself in to the FBI after a warrant was issued for her arrest. According to The New York Times, Pettway explained that she kidnapped White after suffering several miscarriages in an attempt to fill the emptiness they left behind. White recognizes that she caused her biological family pain when she pulled away after meeting them, but she was overwhelmed by the media attention and felt guilt about abandoning the family who raised her.Now, the former Nejdra Nance has legally changed her name to Carlina White, but she informally goes by Netty a name she chose for herself. She has reconnected with her biological parents but admits that she still has love for the woman she called Mom for the first 23 years of her life.White explained, There was a part of me that wasnt even there, and now I feel whole. Even in the beginning of the year, with all the drama and stuff, I was kind of cloudy. But now I know who I am. Thats the main thing just to find out where you come from and who you are.After reading about the kidnapping of Carlina White, read about the Ariel Castro kidnappings and how his victims escaped 10 years of abuse. Then, learn more about the Jim Twins, who were separated at birth only to discover they lived the same life.The post Carlina White Was Abducted As A Baby Then Solved Her Own Kidnapping 23 Years Later appeared first on All That's Interesting.

FlickrA depiction of the alleged ancient Greek torture device known as the brazen bull in the Torture Museum in Bruges, Belgium.The Brazen Bull, also known as the Bronze Bull, was a brutal torture and execution device allegedly used in ancient Greece.Created in the 6th century B.C.E., it was designed to be a particularly gruesome method of capital punishment. The device was a hollow brass statue, crafted to resemble a real bull, in which victims were placed before a fire was lit beneath it. The metal would, naturally, become extremely hot, causing the person inside to suffer a painful death.To add insult to injury, the Brazen Bull was specifically designed to amplify the screams of its victim as they burned alive. Due to the acoustic apparatus, those screams sounded, to a listener, like the deep bellowing of a bull.Calling it a spectacle would be an understatement.How The Brazen Bull Was Allegedly Invented By Phalaris And PerilausLike many ancient torture devices, its difficult to actually verify whether the Brazen Bull had ever actually been put to practice. That said, there are still ancient records that speak to the Brazen Bulls existence and the legend of its creation.Wikimedia CommonsWhen victims were placed inside the brazen bull, their screams were allegedly transformed by the torture device into the sound of a bull.As the story goes, around 560 B.C.E. in the seaside colony of Akragas (now modern-day Sicily), there was a tyrannical ruler by the name of Phalaris. Phalaris realm was wealthy and lovely, but the cruel ruler commanded it with an iron fist.Perilaus, the court sculptor, approached Phalaris one day with the concept for the Brazen Bull, proposing it as a means to execute condemned prisoners and provide a deterrent spectacle for the populace. It was effectively a melodic torture device.Perilaus statue was a brass cast of a bull, hollow inside, with a door on one side through which a victim could be placed in the statue. Once the door was sealed, a fire would be lit underneath the bronze bull. The metal would then heat up, causing a slow and truly agonizing death for the person inside.Additionally, the device was engineered to convert the screams of the suffering victim into sounds that were eerily similar to the bellowing of a bull, thanks to a complex system of tubes and stops.Wikimedia CommonsPhalaris allegedly had Perilaus design the brazen bull torture device, but its existence remains uncertain to this day.Perilaus intended for this form of execution to not only serve as a punishment but also as a warning to others, as the physical torment was compounded by the psychological terror of the execution. Perilaus believed this method transforming the victims screams into a bullish yell would please the ruthless and cruel ruler.However, the story goes that Phalaris, upon hearing the proposal and seeing the bull, was horrified not by its cruelty but by Perilaus inventiveness in devising such a torment.To test the device, Phalaris ordered Perilaus to enter the bull and demonstrate the sound mechanism. Once Perilaus was inside, Phalaris ordered a fire lit beneath the bull, subjecting Perilaus to the very torture he had devised.According to some accounts, before Perilaus could die from the heat, Phalaris had him removed and then thrown off a hill, executing him in a less inventive manner.But again, like many stories from antiquity, the truth about the Brazen Bull is hard to verify.Was The Bronze Bull Of Phalaris A Real Torture Device Or Just A Myth?A depiction of how the Brazen Bull worked.Famed poet and philosopher Cicero recalled the Brazen Bull as fact, and as proof of a cruel rulers viciousness in his series of speeches In Verrum: which was that noble bull, which that most cruel of all tyrants, Phalaris, is said to have had, into which he was accustomed to put men for punishment, and to put fire under.Cicero later used the symbol of the Brazen Bull to represent Phalaris cruelty, and wondered if his people may have fared better under foreign dominion rather than be subject to their own rulers brutality.[To] consider whether it was more advantageous to the Sicilians to be subject to their own princes, or to be under the dominion of the Roman people when they had the same thing as a monument of the cruelty of their domestic masters, and of our liberality.Wikimedia CommonsFamed Roman statesman Cicero spoke of the Brazen Bull as a real torture device in ancient Greece, but historians remain not fully convinced.Of course, Cicero was a political operator and often used his speech to paint Phalaris as a villain. Fellow historian Diodorus Siculus wrote that Perilaus remarked:If you ever wish to punish some man, O Phalaris, shut him up within the bull and lay a fire beneath it; by his groanings the bull will be thought to bellow and his cries of pain will give you pleasure as they come through the pipes in the nostrils.Diodorus Phalaris asked Perilaus to demonstrate his meaning, and when he climbed in the Brazen Bull, Phalaris had the artist shut in and burned to death for his loathsome invention.Mentions of the Brazen Bull appeared in the works of other ancient writers including Pindar and Lucretius, which could lend some level of historical credence to its existence. Their accounts, among others, describe the Brazen Bull being used in public executions, but modern historians have cast doubt on the story.PicrylKnown as the Brazen Bull of Phalaris, this rumored torture device could be made of iron, bronze, or brass.In particular, the legend of the Brazen Bulls creation contains numerous elements of classical myths and legends, especially poetic justice, lessons about hubris, and irony. Perilaus being the Brazen Bulls first victim, for example, is a classic example of irony, and many consider the story to be an allegory or embellishment of Phalaris cruelty. Moreover, there has never been any archaeological evidence that the Brazen Bull existed in ancient Greece, nor was it depicted in ancient art. That said, a lack of physical evidence does not necessarily serve as proof that the Brazen Bull existed it simply means that no physical evidence can confirm that it did. Whether evil tyrant or vigilante leader, one thing is clear: Phalaris and his Brazen Bull make a story for the ages.After reading about the horrifying Brazen Bull, learn about some more torture devices like the rack or the rat torture method. Then look inside the declassified C.I.A. torture manual from the Cold War.The post The History Of The Brazen Bull, The Bronze Torture Device Allegedly Used In Ancient Greece appeared first on All That's Interesting.

There has been a lot of conversation going on in the gaming community about ARC Raiders and its matchmaking system. There seems to be a ton of confusion surrounding it and many players do not fully understand how it works.

Steam user reviews are getting a super useful feature in the new beta version of the Steam and Steam Deck clients, with gamers now able to upload their PC's hardware specs alongside their reviews. Not only does this give the option for a very public way to brag about your gaming PC, but it will mean reviews become a lot more useful, thanks to the added context. A game being review-bombed due to poor performance on old hardware? You'll know if a review is just adding to that storm. Meanwhile, if a review references consistently poor performance even on high-end hardware, the data will be there to back up the claim. Piggybacking off Steam's existing ability to scan your system hardware and use this for its monthly Steam Hardware Survey reports, among other things, the new system isn't relying on unreliable users to put in their own data. The only downside is that attaching your hardware specs is optional, so if folks are going to complain about performance on a new game while using a 15-year-old graphics card, you might not know about it.Read the full story on PCGamesN: Valve just made Steam user reviews infinitely more useful with the option to add your gaming PC specs