Identity

Hatfield police were trying to confirm the identity of a man who was hit and killed Friday night as he walked across Route 309. Officer Robert Turner, who is in charge of the investigation, said he hadn't been able to locate the man's next of kin. The man, believed to be homeless and in his 60s, was wearing dark clothes when he tried to cross the highway near Janes Lane about 9:40 p.m., police said. He was hit by a southbound 1984 Oldsmobile driven by Laurie Abrams, 27, of White Plains, N.Y. Police said Abrams attempted to avoid the man by swerving to the left, but didn't see him in time to avoid hitting him. The man was thrown 35 feet into the air after impact.

Burlington City police have recovered the body of a man who drowned in the Delaware River two or three months ago, but are still seeking his identity, according to the deputy Burlington County medical examiner. Dr. Nime Tchourumoff said the body was pulled from the river near Burlington Island at about 4 p.m. Friday. He said an autopsy has revealed that the man, who was probably about 30 years old, died of drowning, and had been in the river for two to four months. Tchourumoff, who performed the autopsy, said he was called by police about 3 p.m. Friday, and when he reached the scene at 4:10 p.m., the body was being pulled from the river.

In Different for Girls, a remarkable sex comedy about love in the age of transgenderism, the old boy-meets-girl plot line gets a twist and a snip. Here Boy No. 1 meets Boy No. 2, Boy No. 2 grows up and gets a sex change, and Boy No. 1 falls for her - although Boy No. 1 worries about his feelings. Do his desires for a post-op transsexual make him gay? Does that make any sense? And what will his mates make of it? With generous amounts of humor and humanity, Different for Girls addresses these and other knotty questions of gender and sexual identity.

Her name is Vera, but he insists that you call him Bauer. You read that correctly. Biologically speaking, Vera is an 18-year-old young woman. Her sexual identification, however, is male - a choice that unnerves friends and would-be lovers who can't understand why this gentle creature walks with such a macho swagger. Vera is the feature debut of Brazilian filmmaker Sergio Toledo, whose disturbing and provocative film takes a straightforward look at the oblique subject of sexual identity.

With each and every loss, the Flyers are embarking on new territory and tempting fate. In their entire 40-year history, no Flyers' team has ever started a season 2-8-1. This one, however, is perilously close to doing that. A loss tonight at the Wachovia Center against the Chicago Blackhawks will seal the Flyers' fate as the worst start in club history. The Flyers were dismembered by 8-2 Saturday night against the Pittsburgh Penguins, who have now outscored them, 12-2, in two games.

The soldier who comes home from war a changed man is a familiar figure in fiction. But what about someone who behaves entirely differently and still claims to be the man who left? The possibilities and ambiguities posed by this intriguing question were explored a decade ago by Gerard Depardieu and Nathalie Baye in the masterful French production The Return of Martin Guerre. Given Hollywood's sorry record for recycling - and usually ruining - foreign-film material, the pessimists among us were dreading the return of Richard Gere in Sommersby.

In what police believe was a case of mistaken identity, a Darby Township man was shot in the chest during a pickup football game Sunday afternoon in Conway Park on Hook Road. Calvin Bernard Gilbert, 19, of the 1000 block of Pine Street, Darby Township, was shot once in the left side of the chest by a gunman who fled the scene in a 1975 maroon Cadillac. Gilbert was listed in good condition yesterday in Mercy Catholic Medical Center, Fitzgerald Division, after emergency surgery to remove the bullet.

Police in Whitemarsh Township are trying to determine the identity of a middle-aged woman found floating in the Schuylkill near Conshohocken on Wednesday morning. Officers received a call at 11:25 from people who were rowing and saw the body being carried east by the current, Police Lt. Christopher Ward said. The body came to rest by a dock near Cherry and Washington Streets, where police and rescue workers recovered it, Ward said. He said the body had not been in the water long.

The new Performing Arts Centre in Toronto opened this fall with a revival of Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein's "Showboat. " The opening was stormy because of a picket line of protesters, who felt the musical denigrated blacks. In October the producers flew in the eminent black American historian Henry Louis Gates Jr., who attempted in a lecture to place the musical in historical context. Some critics responded with indignation at what they saw as a typical display of American imperialism.

When Amanda Peet learned she was booked as a guest on David Letterman's show this month, she called her sister Alisa, an intern at Temple University Hospital, to get the lowdown on shingles. The actress wanted to give the information to the talk-show host, who was diagnosed with the illness earlier this year. "I wanted to . . . help enlighten him," she said. "I'm really upset that he had shingles. " Alas, Peet never got to proffer medical advice to Letterman, thanks to the tight shooting schedule of her latest film, an untitled project with Jack Nicholson and Diane Keaton.

Shootings left one man dead and one man critically injured Saturday morning, Philadelphia police said, in two separate incidents. A 21-year-old man was shot multiple times in the chest and arms inside an apartment on the 1400 block of West Loudon Street in the Logan neighborhood. The man, whose identity was not released by police, was taken to Einstein Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 7:26 a.m. No arrests have been made in the homicide, and no weapons were immediately recovered.

Oh, look: a letter from the IRS. My electronically filed tax return has been received . . . and rejected. Some crook filed a tax return via my Social Security number (stolen). Hello, identity theft. Hello, faceless cyber-burglars beyond reach. It's a multibillion-dollar industry, according to the U.S. Treasury inspector general for tax administration, who pegs the cost at $21 billion over the next five years. I'm but one of millions who have had their IDs stolen. Like them, I'm now scurrying to restore my info and shore up protection against these slimy genius hacker-creeps.

On the day we moved to Philly in 1976, my two fellow Syracuse emigres and I went to a restaurant and ordered Cokes. "Three Coe-ewks," the waitress nodded. I thought she was calling us "kooks" - which we certainly were - but when we asked for directions and she advised us that our destination was "down-y shtreet," we realized our new city was a different universe, linguistically. Alas, in the same week a venerable Northeast Philly cheesesteakery replaces its slur-ish name, "Chink's," and Philadelphia Daily News columnist Helen Ubinas bravely wonders aloud whether it's time to rename the Italian Market, we also hear that the city's distinctive diphthongs are disappearing.

A 27-year-old Lindenwold man was killed and two other people were injured in a shooting early Sunday morning outside the Twenty Horse Tavern in Camden. The dead man, whose identity was not released, was shot at 3:17 a.m. while sitting in a car outside the bar on the 800 block of North Second Street, according to a joint statement by Camden County Prosecutor Warren Faulk and Camden Police Chief Scott Thomson. The man was pronounced dead three hours later at Cooper University Hospital.

Chester County police knew something else was amiss when they saw the driver of the car suspected in a hit-and-run crash throw credit cards out the window - lots of them. David Carroll and Rochelle Fraser, both of South Jamaica, New York have been charged with identity theft, forgery, theft and other related crimes, according to the West Whiteland Township police. On Jan. 25, Carroll was allegedly involved in a hit-and-run accident on North Pottstown Pike in Exton. Police saw Carroll's car traveling south on Route 100 after the crash.

Stephane Hessel, 95, a concentration-camp survivor and member of the French Resistance whose 32-page book, Time for Outrage , became a best-seller and an inspiration for the left in Europe and the United States, died Tuesday in Paris. The book came out in 2010 as a rallying cry against the gap between rich and poor. Mr. Hessel said he wanted to imbue France's youth with the fervor of those who held out against the Nazis. Its first run was 8,000 copies. It sold millions of copies and became an inspiration for the Occupy Wall Street movement.

DEAR HARRY: I'm a young, married guy whose mother got hit with identity theft a year ago. It was a problem, but it got straightened out with zero loss to her. It was emotionally aggravating, however, and she did need a visit to her doctor. I want to avoid that as much as possible. I see all kinds of ads for companies that will do that for me, but they seem to be more about boasting than protecting. There have to be things I can do for myself. Help! WHAT HARRY SAYS: The most important thing is to be alert so you can catch a stolen identity before it gets too far. Get an annual credit report from each of the major reporting agencies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

CLEARWATER, Fla. - The Washington Nationals went 80-81 in 2011 and established optimism inside and outside the organization for 2012 with a strong 17-10 finish in the final month. The Phillies went 81-81 in 2012, but the fact that they went 44-30 after July 13 did not seem to carry the same weight compared with the way the Nationals had played in the final month of the previous season. Those were proud moments in the Phillies' clubhouse at the end of last season. Ryan Howard referenced "the comeback" that fell short again last week.

THEY SAY 90 percent of a movie is casting, and it's at least 99 percent of "Identity Thief. " This a flimsy road movie whose main achievement is to pair cinema's most adroit straight man with its biggest comedy wild card. Jason Bateman is the former - stoic, unflappable, with the low-key verbal dexterity that makes him a peerless counter-puncher paired with zanier co-stars in movies such as "Horrible Bosses. " Here, he shares the screen with the volatile Melissa McCarthy, a rumbling volcano of out-there energy, the X-factor in movies such as "Bridesmaids" and recently released "This is 40. " The premise, in broad strokes, plays to their strengths.

IDENTITY THEFT IS a crime that's easy to dismiss. Until it happens to you. Just imagine: You've filed your tax return and are eagerly awaiting your refund. It's money you desperately need to pay some bills or buy whatever you've been hankering for. But then you get a notice from the IRS saying that your return has been rejected. You won't be getting a refund because it already has been claimed. You've become a victim of identity theft. Now, identity theft becomes very real. And it's getting frustratingly real for a growing number of taxpayers.