
Allegations of a forced confession, manipulated evidence fuel Illinois day care worker's push for clemency
CBSN
Melissa Calusinski has served 16 years of a 31-year prison sentence for the death of Benjamin Kingan, a 16-month-old whom she cared for at an Illinois day care center. She has long insisted she is innocent.
"This is not where I belong," Calusinski told "48 Hours" correspondent Erin Moriarty. "I'm gonna continue to fight no matter what 'cause I did not do this."
"48 Hours" has been covering this case for more than a decade, and over the years, Melissa's appeals have failed. But she and her attorney, Kathleen Zellner, are not backing down. Now, they are taking their fight out of the court system and straight to the governor of Illinois, J.B. Pritzker, and his prisoner review board.

The U.S. confirmed at least a dozen deaths from whooping cough last year, according to preliminary figures released this week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That marks the most fatalities from the bacterial infection since a 2017 surge of the illness, which is also known as pertussis.

As vaccination rates decline, widespread outbreaks of diseases like measles and polio could reemerge
Health officials in western Texas are trying to contain a measles outbreak among mostly school-aged children, with at least 15 confirmed cases. It's the latest outbreak of a disease that had been virtually eliminated in the U.S., and it comes as vaccination rates are declining — jeopardizing the country's herd immunity from widespread outbreaks.