THE MAN CLOSED HIS apartment door and entered the cool evening. He stretched his legs and twirled his arms in three clockwise circles. The man took a deep breath, put on his hoodie, and then started on his nightly run. He turned left on Hurlbut Street toward Pasadena Avenue and then turned left again. The man let his legs stretch out in long strides as his muscles slowly warmed up. He concentrated on his breathing. The man imagined Faustina’s beautiful face and wondered how she would react when he made his request of her. Would she storm out of the room? Would she smile and say, Yes, of course, how could you even doubt my decision? Or would Faustina remain silent and simply stare at this man who would dare to ask her for such a thing?
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JOSÉ DÍAZ-BALART: |
In other news, early this morning, the FBI raided the headquarters of one of the nation’s largest reanimation facilities in Oxnard, California, seizing computer hard drives and records a month after President Cadwallader formally shut down the industry, though allowing for a repurposing of the technology. For more, we turn to NBC correspondent Emilie Ikeda for the story from Oxnard. Hello, Emilie. |
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EMILIE IKEDA: |
Hello, José. |
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JOSÉ DÍAZ-BALART: |
What can you tell us about this FBI raid? |
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EMILIE IKEDA: |
Well, José, the scene here at Clerval Industries in Oxnard is now calm, but as you can see in this tape from earlier this morning, the FBI was swift and thorough. I have with me president and CEO of Clerval, Akilah Hosseini, who agreed to answer a few questions for us. Ms. Hosseini, why would the FBI raid your facilities, and do you think it was politically motivated? |
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AKILAH HOSSEINI: |
Thank you, Emilie. We at Clerval Industries have always followed protocol when reanimation was legal, and we have complied with the new law and stopped our reanimation program with a move toward using the technological breakthroughs for other medical treatments, such as multiple transplant surgical techniques. |
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EMILIE IKEDA: |
But what have been the allegations, if you know, to support the FBI search? |
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AKILAH HOSSEINI: |
Well, there were some breaches in protocol early on in the reanimation program, that’s true across the industry, but we at Clerval Industries moved quickly to put in place best practices and prevent any further breaches, and to cure past breaches where possible. |
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EMILIE IKEDA: |
What sort of breaches? |
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AKILAH HOSSEINI: |
Well, you know, the most common breach involved a few rogue employees making contact with reanimation subjects after reanimation and sharing personal information about the subjects’ past lives, that sort of thing. All done with good intentions but against protocol. But again, we moved quickly and put in a fail-safe system to prevent this from happening again in the future. There have been no recent reports of these kinds of breaches. |
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EMILIE IKEDA: |
Then why has the FBI gotten involved now? |
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AKILAH HOSSEINI: |
I hate to say it, but I do think it’s political. With those midterms looming, I think the raid was meant to grab headlines and make a political point. But it’s not fair to our employees, who worked hard under the prior law and are now readjusting under the current reanimation ban. And even with the repurposing of the technology after the ban, we did have to trim our workforce to be leaner and more efficient to adjust to the new situation. But over time, we may be able to ramp up again as new breakthroughs are made. |
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EMILIE IKEDA: |
Next steps for you? |
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AKILAH HOSSEINI: |
We will continue to fully cooperate with the FBI because, quite frankly, we have nothing to hide. And if we find any additional breaches, we will deal appropriately and swiftly with those then. |
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EMILIE IKEDA: |
Thank you, Ms. Hosseini. José, back to you. |
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JOSÉ DÍAZ-BALART: |
Thank you, Emilie. Interesting report. Let’s see how all of this develops. |