Blog

By Fariba Nawa
March 28, 1999
Argus/ANG

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is one of four articles in a series that probes into the unsolved Fremont bombings investigation.

Fremont — Linda Wasserman has found a way to cope with the fear that whoever planted a bomb in front of her home is still out there. She pretends it never happened.

On Sunday afternoon, March 29, 1999, Wasserman returned from church to find a Raley’s bag sitting on her front porch. Inside were wires, a digital watch and jugs of flammable liquids. She called to her husband, Bob, a councilmember and former Fremont police chief, who came out of the house, took one look and knew it was a bomb.

The Wassermans discovered the bomb the same day an explosion ripped up the porch of Police Chief Craig Steckler’s home. The bomber or bombers targeted Mission San Jose homes and a water tank on the district’s hills. Two bombs destroyed a Corte de Sol house where a 17-year-old girl was sleeping. No one was injured.

The bomb at the Wassermans’ home was defused by experts but it frightened and spooked Linda Wasserman. She still doesn’t feel comfortable talking about the incident.

“It was shocking and bizarre. And it has become unreal, like it didn’t happen,” she said.

Initially, the victims were fearful, astonished and angry. Now, most have moved on.

The family who lived in the Corte de Sol house was bewildered at first. They said the week of the bombings that they had no idea who or why anyone would target their house. Neighbors in the upscale area said they don’t know the family’s whereabouts today.

Their estimated $1.5 million home overlooking the Bay sits empty. The two-story, four-car garage home a year later still bears scars from the bombing. The windows that had blown out are boarded and a temporary bright blue covering remains atop the roof. Builders had said last April it would take six to eight months to fix the house.

Up the hill, a block away on Vista del Sol, a bomb was planted in a house under construction. It exploded while bomb crews were trying to disarm it. Its owners repaired the damage and moved in a few months ago. They declined to comment about the bombings.

Vista del Sol, which leads to Corte del Sol, was blocked to through traffic by the city after the explosions. The barrier still was up two weeks ago, but since has been removed. City Engineer Dick Asimus said the city had just forgotten about the barrier.

Some residents said they wished their street would remain closed. Their neighborhood, known as Mission View, had turned into zoo last year, with investigators, the media and curious onlookers. Some neighbors had unsuccessfully tried to make it a private road, one resident said.

None of the residents interviewed gave their names. They said they had talked enough about the explosions and wanted to forget about it.

“I don’t hear neighbors talking about it anymore. People figured it was about it anymore. People figured it was an isolated incident,” said a woman at a Vista del Sol house.

She said she’s not very concerned that no one has been arrested. She feels safe, especially because police frequently patrol the area, the woman said.

Bob Wasserman, 65, Steckler, 55, and his wife, Casey, 53, also said they wouldn’t allow their lives to be controlled by fear. They said they took security precautions to protect themselves, and went on with their lives.

As city officials and members of law enforcement, Steckler and Wasserman said they thought of a few people who may have wanted to threaten or kill them.

It was not the first time either of them had been threatened, but it was the most frightful because their families had been victimized, Wasserman and Steckler said.

“I’m still angry and frustrated because it was an attack on my family. The person who did it is a coward.” Steckler said. “I wouldn’t let it change my lifestyle. That’s exactly what the suspect would want.”

Steckler, Fremont police chief for seven years, was a bodyguard in Southern California for Henry Kissinger when he was secretary of state.

Steckler said one of the hardest parts of the ordeal has been his dual roles of victim and police chief. He has disciplined himself not to meddle in the investigation and to let detectives do their job.

“I can’t tell them that this is the most important case. They have other cases just as important,” he said.

Casey Steckler seems to have taken the blast at her home in stride. It took three weeks and $20,000 to rebuild their porch, she said.

But in the initial days after her home was bombed, she was shaken. It dawned on her that her peaceful world could suddenly turn violent, she said.

And she has changed some of her habits. She doesn’t leave the garage door open anymore. She’s now more aware of her surroundings.

“When something happens, your radar goes up. You become more alert and aware.” A hairdresser for 35 years, Casey Steckler said she dealt with her emotions by discussing them with her clients.

She has come to a few conclusions regarding the bombings. Whoever did it was upset but not out to kill the couple, and it wasn’t anything personal, she said. “I think we’re seeing more and more people getting frustrated. It always seems to get to a radical pitch.”

She wants to see the bomber or bombers behind bars, but that’s one of the last things on her mind, she said. “I have four children and nine grandchildren to worry about.”

Investigation continues as Mission district victims rebuild their lives
By Fariba Nawa
March 28, 1999
Argus/ANG Newspapers

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is one of four articles in a series that probes into the unsolved Fremont bombings investigation.

Fremont — A year after a round of bombings terrorized the city and made national headlines, there are signs the investigation may be revving up again. Bomb evidence finally has been processed and a federal grand jury has been formed to look into the case, say sources close to the investigation.

But officials won’t talk about tests on evidence taken from bomb sites or the role the grand jury many be playing. The latest activity could lead to an indictment or a dead end. “This is a sensitive, difficult investigation. There’s no need to share most aspects of it with the public,” said George Grotz, FBI spokesman.

One year ago, a shared sense of shock consumed the public during a 53-hour period rocked by a series of explosions.

In the early morning hours of March 29, 1998, the first bomb went off at the Mission San Jose home of Police Chief Craig Steckler. Later that day, another bomb was found and defused at the home of former police chief and current Councilmember Bob Wasserman.

That night, two bombs gutted $1.5 million home on Corte del Sol off Hunter Lane. A 17-year-old girl sleeping in the house was awakened by the blast and was rescued by a neighbor.

BOMBS: MOST INTENSIVE INVESTIGATION IN CITY’S HISTORY LAUNCHED

A block away, another bomb was discovered the next day at a house under construction on Vista del Sol. It exploded while being defused, but no one was injured. The sixth bomb already had exploded when found March 31 in a backpack on a water tank in the hills above those neighborhoods.

The bombs that went off caused hundreds of thousands of dollars in property damage to the million-dollar homes off Hunter Lane and to Steckler’s porch, inspectors said.

The incidents launched the most intense investigation in the city’s 42-year history, even though no one was injured. And residents wondered why their peaceful city had become a target of terror.

Now, victims say, while they want the bomber or bombers caught, they have moved on with their lives. Most say they have overcome the shock, anger, and fear they felt then, but they continue to take extra security precautions.

At one time, about 10 local investigators and 60 federal agents were working on the case. Now, three local and three federal investigators continue to work on the case, though Steckler said that catching the bomber or bombers remains one of the the Police Department’s highest priorities.

No suspects have been charged and rewards totaling $87,000 remain unclaimed.

Now, however, the formation of a grand jury — standard for federal felony crimes — may be a sign that the case is progressing, legal experts said.

While sources close to the investigation confirm that a grand jury has been formed, no one connected with the case will say what role it is playing.

“Unless a grand jury returns and indictment, its existence and deliberations are a secret, I could go to jail if I tell you about it,” said Matt Jacobs, assistant U.S. attorney in San Francisco, speaking about the grand jury process in general.

A grand jury can either hear evidence to indict a suspect or it can be used by federal prosecutors to gather more evidence, said Charles Weisselberg, a professor at Boalt School of Law at the University of California, Berkeley. A grand jury has broad subpoena power, greater protection for the people involved in a case, and less potential for abuse since the hearing isn’t public, Weisselberg said.

The deliberations could result in an arrest or lead nowhere, he said.

In the last year, authorities have focused on a former mission San Jose man, but no arrests have been made. Police have refused to name anyone as a suspect, and have never identified the Mission San Jose man.

According to news report by KTVU Channel 2, however, a search warrant was served at the former Fremont home of Rodney Blach last May. Investigators served another search warrant at his current residence in San Diego last September. Boxes of evidence — including handwritten notes in the garbage that said “arrange bomb stuff, assemble map collage and do moustache” — were reportedly confiscated in the May search, according to KTVU.

Investigators also found baseball caps, including one with the slogan “Fremont Bombs-R-Us,” as well as computers and several items that could be used to make bombs, such as wires, drills and batteries, according to the television report.

Blach is a chemical engineer who worked as a micro analyst in the Chicago Police Department from 1974 to 1979. He could not be reached for comment.

Tracy Hite, spokeswoman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, said that the forensic evidence police were hoping would lead to an arrest has been analyzed. Hite would not say when the results came in or discuss the findings. The evidence included explosive particles taken from the crime scenes.

“There was a mountain of evidence and debris. It took quite awhile to sort through and cross analyze,” Hite said.

TASK FORCE STILL IN PLACE

An ATF task force — including chemists and explosive enforcement officers — formed soon after the incidents is still in place, Hite said. In the last few weeks, several more people have been assisting the two AFT agents who are working with police and an FBI agent on the case full time.

“We’re still following leads on various aspects of the case,” she said. A hot line (            510-494-4856 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 510-494-4856 end_of_the_skype_highlighting ) set up to take tips was inundated with calls immediately after the bombings. Now, the phone rarely rings, Fremont Detective Dennis Madsen said. Many pieces of the case were put together in the first few months following the explosions. All six bombs were linked, although the first two were made differently form the other four, police said last year.

The first pair were sophisticated incendiary devices with timers, while the other four were pipe bombs, police said.

Some of the victims said they believe the bombs were not meant to kill Steckler’s wife, Casey, said she believes they were only a threat. Investigators agree, one source said. Wasserman, who said authorities update him on the case once in a while, last heard from them in late February. There doesn’t seem to be many more leads, he said.

“There’s certainly a very solid suspect. The primary effort is to find some direct evidence … more than circumstantial,” Wasserman said.

Many residents are wondering if the bomber — or bombers — will ever be caught. But Tim Rollisson, Alameda County Water District board member and a witness during the investigation, said he is sure the case will be solved.

“I’m thoroughly confident that they will arrest parties involved,” he said. “I have no doubt in my mind at all. The wheels of justice just take time.”

CASE MAY BE UNSOLVED

However, criminologist Marc Neithercut suggested that if forensic evidence has not yielded an arrest yet, the case may remain a mystery for a long time.

Neithercut, a criminal justice professor at California State University, Hayward, who has researched bombing investigations, said people tip law enforcement agencies on who a culprit is, but forensic evidence is what convicts the bomber in most cases.

“The bombing cases that get solved, get solved quickly. The ones that don’t go on and on,” he said.

A similar assessment of the Fremont case was made in April 1998, three weeks after the bombings, by police Sgt. Greg Gerhard: “We may need to face up to the fact that this may never be solved.”

Stores add product lines, departments
By Fariba Nawa
October 19, 1998
ANG

Mainstream businesses across America have tapped into a golden market in the last few years, economic experts say.

The Hispanics in America are great consumers and feeding their demands has become profitable. The number of Hispanics and their buying power are rapidly growing; people are becoming more culturally aware and American culture is becoming more Hispanic, factors that experts cite as the reasons for the marketing frenzy.

And while some companies catered to the ethnic group previously, only recently have their product lines expanded and their marketing strategies become more sophisticated. “It’s taken these companies this much time to settle that (Hispanics) are not going away. By 2025, they’ll be the majority in California,” said Terry Alderete, the former executive director of the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce in Alameda County.

The 1.1 million Hispanics living in the Bay Area make up the richest ethnic community, with an average household income of $43,395, according to reports issued by Spanish television station KSTS.

“More and more people are finding that if you respect another person’s ethnicity, they’re more interested in buying products from you,” said Joan Lawton, vice president of Erlich Transcultural Consultants. The Woodland Hills-based firm conducts marketing and consumer research.

HISPANICS: NATIONAL CHAINS IN ON ACT

In Fremont, Newark and Union City, where an estimated 45,250 Hispanics live, some grocery, music and department stores, and restaurants have joined the rising number of businesses attempting to draw Hispanic consumers.

This year, the Wherehouse music store, a West Coast chain, introduced Tu Musica, a new department opened in Wherehouse outlets in Hispanic populated areas. And the company opened two stores in southern California entirely dedicated to Hispanic music.

At the store in Newark’s NewPark Mall, Tu Musica takes up 20 percent of store space and brings in 7 percent of the $4,000 weekly total sales.

PRODUCT LINE INCREASE

Manager Brian Kates said the shop has sold Hispanic music for a while but recently increased its product line by 10,000 pieces, including CDs, cassettes and videotapes. The increase came with a change in marketing strategy to become a neighborhood store, which caters to the preference of the local population, Kates said.

“It was an attempt to capture a new market. Music retailers avoided the Latino genre. A lot of mom and pop stores sold what we’re selling now,” he said.

The Tower Records music chain also has changed its product line nationwide but at the store in the Fremont Hub Shopping Center the number of pieces hasn’t increased. The store has just shifted its selections of Hispanic music.

Marc Baknine, the buyer at the Fremont store, said instead of randomly stocking Hispanic pop music, Tower is only choosing what sells well. And these days modern pop, such as Ricky Martin and Enrique Iglesias, is making profits, Baknine said. With the new selections on the shelves, sales have climbed by 20 percent in the Fremont store.

The buyer said he noticed the rise in popularity of Hispanic music with the success of Hispanic singer Selena, who was killed in 1995.

“The record industry is looking for anything to move units,” he said.

Since 1991, Sears, Roebuch and Co. with 875 stores nationwide, has embarked on one of the most extensive projects to lure Hispanics using catalogues, advertising and clothing specific to the tastes of the ethnic group.

SELENA SPORTSWEAR LAUNCH

Recently, Sears launched the Selena line of sportswear in 50 of its 14 stores that serve the Hispanic community. The clothes were so popular that the company tripled the number of stores that carried the products, said Linda Bladley, a Sears spokeswoman. The Sears store at NewPark Mall received only a rack full of the Selena clothes line in August. The garments are selling but the products aren’t enough to make an impact in sales, said Luani Jones, manager of the women’s department.

While more Mexican restaurants and taquerias are sprouting up in the area, established restaurant chains are adding more Mexican items to their menus. Lyon’s restaurant in Newark will come out with a new menu in February that includes burritos, tacos and enchiladas. Lyon’s Latin menu now only includes nachos and quesadillas.

“The market’s out there. We can sell it,” said Larry Jackson, manager. But some businesses catered to Hispanics long before the present hype. Lucky Food Centers implemented neighborhood marketing in the early 1980s, said spokeswoman Judie Decker.

The Lucky store on Decoto Road in Union City is one of the 40 designated Hispanic stores in Northern California that sells specialized products, including jalapenos and tamale dough.

Decker said the products and sales have remained consistent. The population growth hasn’t had a dramatic effect on Lucky, she said.

Locally, corporate competition has not yet hurt small businesses that have been catering just to Hispanics, Alderete said.

SMALL SHOPS ESTABLISHED

The mom and pop supermarkets and specialized shops owned and run by Hispanics actually carry products that big stores don’t, she said. And most of the small businesses have established themselves in their areas. They have a loyal customer base. Besides, there are so many Hispanics and they spend so much money that any business serving them will benefit, Alderete added.

Susie’s Party Supplies in Newark has been providing pinatas and other specialized merchandise for seven years. And business has never been better, said Sucy Guzman, owner.

“We get busier and busier,” Guzman said.

And large and small businesses can complement each other to meet consumer needs, she said. She may sell pinatas but when customers ask for a guaybera – a pleated, hip-long Mexican shirt for men — Guzman said she sends them to J.C. Penney.

Living with HIV has few secrets

10-year-old Newark boy with AIDS chooses openness to educate others about his disease
By Fariba Nawa
February 10, 1998
ANG/Oakland Tribune

NEWARK — Ten-year-old Sam Fox takes 27 pills a day.

Three are for depression. The other 24 are for AIDS and its side effects.

The bouncy fifth-grader with the bright eyes contracted the HIV virus in his mother’s womb and developed full-blown AIDS nine months later. It’s a diagnosis few of his classmates at Graham Elementary School know — and few perhaps would believe — of the popular class clown and athlete.

Yet Sam and his adoptive parents have gone out of their way to share what many families would keep a secret. Over the last four years, Sam has spoken on television and before live audiences in a family campaign to educate the public on AIDS His parents, Paul and Marilyn Fox, first started talking about Sam’s disease publicly when they thought he would soon die.

He is still very much alive. But Sam seems all too aware that he lives with death. As early as preschool he warned his best friend that he might die.

“The first thing that comes to mind when I think of being HIV positive is I don’t want to die,” Sam wrote in a speech for Sonoma State University students a few months ago. “I get sad sometimes.”

Sam is one of three children age 12 and under in the Tri-Cities and eight in Alameda County diagnosed with AIDS, according to the state Office of AIDS. Children make up less than 1 percent of AIDS patients in Alameda County, and almost all of them are born with the HIV virus.

AIDS: KIDS MORE VULNERABLE TO GETTING FULL-BLOWN DISEASE

Children must also fight harder than adults to stay alive because they tend to develop full-blown AIDS twice as fast, within five years. Sam has already attended the funerals of two friends with AIDS, who died at nine and 14 years old.

Despite the severity of the disease in children, new treatments and medication are making a dramatic impact on their life spans and health, said Dr. Ann Petra, Sam’s pediatrician at Children’s Hospital in Oakland.

And as the numbers of deaths from AIDS decline, focus is shifting to life with the disease.

Last year, Sam wrote a letter to the Federal Drug Administration pleading for children to be allowed protease inhibitors, the latest drug cocktail then reserved for adults. In August, President Clinton announced that drug companies must test new treatments for children, not just adults.

Children with HIV — small as their numbers are — also present public schools with a potential powder keg. Under the Federal Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, public schools with more than 15 employees must give equal access to physically challenged children, including AIDS patients.

However, families are not required to disclose to schools if their children have AIDS, or they can ask for the information to be kept private.

Sam’s family has chosen to go public instead.

The Foxes became Sam’s foster parents in his infancy and adopted him at age 2. Soon after, they retired from 15 years of foster parenting sick children. Sam needed all the time they could give him.

As Sam grew older, they told him –and others — that he had AIDS.

Sam seems both to want and avoid open discussion about his illness. He’s most comfortable sharing his feelings about the disease at public gatherings with other AIDS patients present, his mother says.

Yet he is sometimes embarrassed to talk about AIDS with other children, because he says they’ll ask too many questions. He’d much rather talk about soccer.

And when his mother expresses her wish to find a cure for his disease on a recent afternoon, he drops his eyes and stares at his feet.

Marilyn Fox handles media for the family. She seems to talk about Sam’s illness in an attempt to educate the public, but also to find the support she herself needs. Familiar territory

Both the disease and the media are familiar territory for this mother, who has lived through the deaths of two other foster children with the HIV virus. She chooses her words slowly, careful to present the community’s response in a positive light.

Residents in the Foxes’ modest Newark neighborhood who know about Sam’s disease have mostly accepted the family, his mother says. She dismisses any incidents of intolerance as minor, apparently not wanting to dwell on what might be painful.

Yet there have been incidents. Fox matter-of-factly lists them with no anger in her voice, almost as if she had expected them

The first obstacle was enrolling Sam in pre-school. No private pre-school would accept him until the 1990 federal disability act, she says. The caretakers at one school told Fox she had to clean Sam up herself if he bled or soiled his diapers.

Facing prejudice When Sam joined a private elementary school, a mother threatened to take her child out. A family dentist in the area refused to see him. Some of Sam’s friends disappeared as soon as they found out he has AIDS.

Yet Fox — who has three biological and two adopted sons – says she doesn’t get upset at what she calls minor prejudices.

“If I don’t laugh, I cry,” she says. “If you fear my child, then I don’t want you around him.”

Family friend Julia Eggers had known Sam since he went to kindergarten with the now 9-year-old daughter Mary. Eggers was shocked to learn of Sam’s disease from his mother.

“I couldn’t believe this kid was going through this, Sam’s more mature than any of us,” Eggers says.

But her daughter still goes to the movies and on trips with Sam, and Fox babysits her 5-year-old son. Many parents have not shared her attitude, Eggers says.

“Marilyn always worries that when Sam makes a friend, will he keep him?” she says. Indeed, Mary remembers times when Sam was taunted by classmates, who knew about his disease. One girl called Sam stupid and hit him, Mary recounts. He said nothing back.

When Sam told another girl he had AIDS, she stayed away, Mary recalls. Her father apparently feared Sam’s sweat or saliva might give her AIDS.

At Graham Elementary, only Sam’s teachers were told about his disease.

“We decided to be discreet. We didn’t want to stir up the community. People have different points of views,” says Principal Joan Ernst, who is uncomfortable talking about Sam with the media.

Like his mother, Sam avoids talking about painful memories and insists no one has ever treated him badly. If other children taunt Sam about AIDS, his response would be “You won’t catch it,” he says.

HE GETS DEPRESSED

Yet he’s depressed quite often. He goes to his room and shuts himself in with his cat Cagney. He doesn’t like to sleep. So he stays up until the wee hours of the morning at times, reading or just lying in bed.

“It’s boring when I sleep. There are no dreams,” Sam says.

He takes part in an AIDS support group every other week and sees a therapist every month.

Sam has little contact with his biological family, although he occasionally visits his grandmother. The Foxes are his family.

Sometimes Sam seems to forget about AIDS. He plays, whines and gets into trouble like any 10-year-old. At 52 pounds and 3 feet 10 inches, Sam continues to grow, shoot hoops, compete in Little League or soccer, and play Nintendo video games.

“He’s just like a normal kid,” Marilyn says.

That’s a long way from the infant whom doctors predicted would live for two years. Now AIDS experts don’t predict life spans. The Foxes have been told the sky’s the limit.

The couple is hopeful about the future — and so is their son.

Sam envisions wearing a cap and gown, standing in line to receive his high school diploma with the graduation class of 2005. And he dreams of becoming a professional soccer player when he grows up.

Yet in many ways he’s already had to grow up faster than most children his age. “I want people to know how it feels to have HIV,” he says. “So that if they have a friend with it, they won’t tell them, ‘Oh, I don’t want to play with you.’”

By Fariba Nawa
December 19, 1997
ANG/Oakland Tribune

Fremont — It took just six hours in the end to treat the disease that gave Cyndi Walentiny uncontrollable tremors for 20 years.

The Fremont resident had suffered for all her adult life from a nervous system disease that destroyed her career and prevented her from even eating or drinking without trembling. But in October, Walentiny went through a breakthrough operation that wired electric charges to her brain.

Approved by the Federal Drug Administration in August, the surgery treats patients with movement disorders, such as Parkinson’s disease or essential tremor disorder, which afflicts Walentiny. The 40-year-old is the eighth and youngest person in the state to undergo wiring since FDA approval.

In the $20,000 to $30,000 operation, doctors fix a charged implant under the skin below the collar bone and wire it to the brain. Patients simply switch on the battery-operated implant with a heavy magnet the size of a quarter, and turn it off when they are sleeping.

The operation blocks the brain cells that cause the tremors rather than destroying them. This blocking prevents some of the side effects and risks that come from killing cells, which can be as severe as paralysis. Doctors can also simply remove the implant if it causes complications.

The procedure boasts an 80 percent success rate and has drawn nationwide attention. Walentiny’s operation at Summit Medical Center in Oakland was filmed by 48 Hours, the CBS news magazine show.

More than two million people in the United States have essential tremor, a progressive disease similar to Parkinson’s that triggers body parts to shake uncontrollably.

When Walentiny first heard about the new treatment on the television program two years ago, she was scared. But after years of taking numerous medications without any improvement, Walentiny decided to gamble.

TREMORS: FORCED TO GO ON DISABILITY

“It was taking the risk of surgery or living with tremors for the rest of my life,” she said.

Living with essential tremor was like being in jail, she said. “My hands and legs would shake so bad, I couldn’t drink, eat, write or do most of the things everyone takes for granted,” she said.

Over the years, the trembling spread from Walentiny’s right arm and leg to her left side. A former supervisor in the electronics industry, she went on disability. Walentiny said she felt depressed and helpless.

She could not really be there for her husband and three children, she said. “When I drove my children to school, I couldn’t keep my foot on the brake at the stoplights,” she said.

She kept busy by joining the parent-teacher association in her children’s school and volunteering on the community emergency response team. Yet even doing small tasks such as pouring punch at a meeting was like climbing a mountain. And it embarrassed her when strangers saw her shake, she said.

Two months ago, Walentiny got the help she so desperately wanted at Summit Medical Center.

The surgery was lead by Dr. Laszio Tama, head surgeon at Pacific Neurosciences Institute in Orinda. Tamas said he was skeptical of the operation at first. But after years of research at Pacific Neurosciences and more than a dozen experimental operations, he is convinced that the treatment performs miracles.

He and other neurologists mapped out Walentiny’s brain, shaved her hair, bolted a halo on her head and then numbered her brain. She remained conscious as the surgeons made a dime-size hole in her skull. They then stuck a charged probe inside her brain to find and block the tremor cells that made her right side shake.

Finding the right cells that made her right side shake is the challenge, Tamas said. “(The cells are) smaller than a grain of rice,” he said.

A nervous but excited Walentiny had to keep awake so she could guide the doctors in their probing.

“I was laughing because I was so happy during the surgery,” she said. As the doctors probed, she responded by shaking. It’s like searching for a house on a road map, Tamas said.

The operation has changed Walentiny’s life. On the recent afternoon in her Ardenwood home, she talked excitedly about how much better her life was and pointed to her deep brain stimulation implant.

“I’m turned on,” she said.

She is once again able to paint and draw, her favorite hobbies. On the window sill in her house stood a sculpture of Mrs. Santa Clause.

“I just finished painting that,” she said proudly.

Walentiny can eat with chopsticks, cut vegetables with a knife, write long letters to her friends and serve punch at her children’s school meetings. She laughs at having to be careful of the metal detectors at airports and theft detectors in stores, which can be triggered by her implant.

It’s not over yet. The operation only took care of her right side, so that her left arm and leg still shake. The FDA has not yet approved a bilateral surgery. That could take a few years, she said.

But she is already planning to write a book about her illness — and its treatment.

“Having this condition is like being held captive by your body,” she said. “I don’t want other people to go through the same thing I did.”