What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Discuss political news items / current events.
msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

updated previous post

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

msfreeh wrote:Updated





http://www.boston.com/news/politics/201 ... ice-voting" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Maine became the first state in the country Tuesday to pass ranked choice voting
Here's what that means.


Amid a national vote that rocked the political world Tuesday, voters in Maine narrowly approved a measure that supporters say will be respectively disruptive to the state’s political status quo.

With 98 percent of the vote reporting in the state, 52 percent of voters approved a ballot question making Maine the first state to implement ranked choice voting, a fundamental reform of how voters literally fill out their ballot.

In a ranked choice vote system, rather than simply voting for one candidate, voters rank their candidates by preference—first, second, third, and so on.

Then, if no candidate receives at least 50 percent of the vote after the first choices are coun



Link Du Jour
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/scien ... 07881.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
NewsScience
Climate change may be escalating so fast it could be 'game over', scientists warn
New research suggests the Earth's climate could be more sensitive to greenhouse gases than thought, raising the spectre of an 'apocalyptic side of bad' temperature rise of more than 7C within a lifetime




FBI agents destroy evidence in New York City
bombing allowing bomber to die .
FBI agents had relationship with bomber
before terrorist event.

http://www.pressherald.com/2016/11/10/s ... ys-lawyer/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


November 10 2016


Suspect in N.Y. and N.J. bombings has serious injuries, says lawyer
Ahmed Khan Rahimi was injured in a shootout with police as he was apprehended for allegedly planting bombs.

NEW YORK — A man charged with setting off bombs in New Jersey and New York shuffled slowly into a Manhattan courtroom Thursday to face federal terrorism charges as his lawyer expressed worries that a federal lockup could not adequately care for injuries stemming from his shootout with police.

Ahmed Khan Rahimi, 28, listened as U.S. Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn read him his rights and the charges against him during a brief morning appearance after he was transferred into federal custody at 5 a.m. No plea was required because he has yet to be indicted.

The Afghanistan-born U




http://www.bostonherald.com/news/local_ ... errogation" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


A federal judge blasted the FBI for failing to record the six-hour interrogation of an Everett terror suspect who was freely cooperating with agents after his uncle was shot and killed during a confrontation with police in a Roslindale parking lot last year.

Although the FBI is not bound by law to tape interrogations, U.S. District Court Judge William G.





https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... ate-change" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
climate change
Donald Trump presidency a 'disaster for the planet', warn climate scientists
Leading scientists say the climate denier’s victory could mean ‘game over for the climate’ and any hope of warding off dangerous global warming





http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/s ... -1.2868246" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Secret nude films of girls don't count as child porn, ruling says


Thursday, November 10, 2016, 7:12 PM



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politic ... -1.2867482" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

ISIS, Al Qaeda celebrate Trump victory with memes

Thursday, November 10, 2016, 11:18 AM




http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bro ... -1.2867337" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Brooklyn businessman pleads guilty to bribing NYPD cops
November 10, 2016, 12:55 PM



Alex Lichtenstein is accused of giving cops up to $6,000 per gun license to speed up the permitting process.
A Brooklyn boozehound pleaded guilty Thursday to bribing NYPD cops in exchange for expedited gun permits — while blaming the scheme on his drinking problem.

Alex "Shaya" Lichtenstein was joined in Manhattan Federal Court by around 20 supporters as he admitted to his r



https://insideclimatenews.org/news/0911 ... nge-denier" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

A Pulitzer Prize-winning, non-profit, non-partisan news organization dedicated to covering climate change, energy and the environment.

In Trump, U.S. Puts a Climate Denier in Its Highest Office and All Climate Change Action in Limbo

His anti-regulatory stances, support of unfettered fossil fuel production, and his threat to pull the U.S. out of the Paris agreement, send ripple effects worldwide.

NOV 9, 2016

Donald Trump campaigned on a platform of maximum fossil fuel production in the U.S. while rolling back environmental protections. Credit: Getty Images
Donald Trump's astonishing victory has turned the world of climate action upside down, setting back U.S. environmental policy and threatening the international drive to cut carbon pollution and slow global warming.

The stunning upset by Trump, who has routinely suggested that climate change is a hoax, threatens to unravel President Obama's climate action agenda, built on executive orders and regulations, including the Environmental Protection Agency's carbon clampdown at power plants. Trump has vowed to "cancel" the Paris climate agreement, but could cripple it by merely retreating from the U.S. commitment. As the world's second-biggest emitter of carbon dioxide pollution, the U.S. could render the global treaty meaningless, at a time when scientists are urging nations to quickly raise their ambition, or risk an escalating climate crisis.

Leading up to the election, the gulf between Trump and Hillary Clinton on climate and energy was wide and the stakes couldn't have been higher. But the campaign was not fought on those issues. And despite environmental groups pouring an enormous amount of money and people power into the race, they were unable to break through with the message that climate action is urgent.

The result sent shockwaves through the global climate talks now happening in Morocco, known as COP 22, that aim to turn the Paris agreement's promises into action. Many there expressed deep concern and disappointment.

"We are all stunned at the COP," said Saleemul Huq, a climate expert at the International Institute for Environment and Development. "No one had anticipated this result, and hence there was no plan B. We will have to think about what happens next."

In another disappointing outcome for climate advocates, Republicans maintained their control of the Senate, winning eight of 11 key races, as well as keeping their majority in the House of Representatives. Both chambers are strongly opposed to climate action policies.

The nation's climate leaders were left stunned, somber, angry and reflective. They had already prepped their wish lists for Clinton that included a massive clean energy spending program, a moratorium on fossil fuel leases on federal lands and other rules to curb the coal, oil and gas industry's impact on the atmosphere and water.

Most environmental groups had backed the Democratic nominee, despite reservations among progressives about her all-of-the-above energy approach. In her, they believed they had a leader who understands the risk of climate change and respected the science. Clinton had been challenged from the left by her primary opponent, Sen. Bernie Sanders, but climate activists were confident they would have been able to influence her policy and push her to further commitments to action. Most of all, she wasn't Trump.

Now, with little chance to have their agenda heard in Washington, environmental groups will be forced to play defense. At first, that will mean an effort to block Trump's plans, perhaps by convincing Senate Democrats to block appointments or use the filibuster. Legal challenges are another avenue, but Trump will be able to quickly make his mark on the judiciary, with his appointment of a Supreme Court justice.

Trump has signaled plans to populate his cabinet with oil industry executives and allies, to eliminate the EPA, and to cut all federal spending on the United Nations climate process. Trump has claimed that he will save $100 billion over eight years, which appears to be based on a plan to end federal funding for solar and wind energy, efficiency, batteries, clean cars and climate science, wrote Joe Romm, a former Energy Department official and founder of the Center for American Progress' Climate Progress blog.

Basically, Trump has promised an America-first, drill-baby-drill energy policy. He has promised unfettered production of coal, oil and natural gas and to "bring the coal industry back 100 percent."

Trump said he will rescind any regulations that unduly burden energy development, including the Clean Power Plan, which, if it survives legal challenges, was to have been the cornerstone of Obama's climate action legacy and the main policy for realizing the nation's Paris goals. He also said he would abolish the Waters of the U.S. rule, which the fracking industry in North Dakota has opposed. Trump said he would urge TransCanada to renew its permit application for the Keystone XL pipeline. Within his first 100 days, Trump said he would lift moratoriums on fossil fuel production in federal areas, which could clear the way to new coal leasing in the West as well as coastal oil drilling, not only in the Arctic but also the Atlantic and potentially, the Pacific.

"Western Energy Alliance is overjoyed that we will not be experiencing a third term of the Obama Administration," the industry group said in a statement this morning. "President-elect Trump understands that overregulation is killing American opportunity, and his plans to spur development of domestic s


http://ticklethewire.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Handling of Clinton Emails Is Real Scandal

Director James B. Comey

By Editorial Board
Star-Ledger

It may never be determined whether James Comey altered history by introducing a headline-grabbing non-sequitur into the Hillary Clinton email saga on the eve of the election, but this aspect of that false alarm is irrefutable:

The director of the FBI tainted this election by breaking clear rules that establish a wall between politics and criminal


http://www.reviewjournal.com/crime/cour ... e-standoff" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Posted November 10, 2016 - 11:27am
Prosecutors confirm BLM shredded documents before Bunkerville standoff



Prosecutors confirmed last week in court documents that undercover FBI agents posed as a documentary film crew to gather evidence during their investigation into the Bunkerville standoff.

Defense lawyers who have seen FBI reports of the undercover operation have said in court documents that the company’s name was Longbow Productions.


http://www.longbowproductions.com.au/pr ... ele-video/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;





http://ticklethewire.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

November Cases and the Continued Search for the Evolving Standards of Decency in Criminal Punishment
Ross Parker was chief of the criminal division in the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Detroit for 8 years and worked as an AUSA for 28 in that office.

With only a pair of criminal cases on the Oral Argument docket in November, the Court will primarily focus on civil and administrative cases. One of the criminal cases, Beckler v. United States, involves a question of interest probably only to some prosecutors and judges: whether the career offender sentencing guidelines defining a “crime of violence” warranting a sentence enhancement is unconstitutionally vague. The Court last year invalidated a similar clause (violent felony) in the Armed Career Criminal Act on that ground.

The other case, Moore v. Texas, involves yet another 8th Amendment Cruel and Unusual Punishment issue on the permissible medical standards for intellectual disability regarding a defendant’s fitness for execution.  The case involves another question which will probably not be resolved because of the absence of a Justice to fill Antonin Scalia’s seat. That question is whether long term solitary confinement on death row is itself unconstitutional as cruel and unusual.

In 1980 Bobby James Moore, age 20, shotgunned a grocery clerk to death in a robbery attempt. He was convicted and sentenced to death. Since that time he has spent more than 35 years in solitary confinement in a 60 square foot iron cell for 22 and ½ hours a day. He has no TV or association with other inmates. The medical and psychological effect of this kind of incarceration has been studied extensively, and some of the results show a deterioration ranging from mild mental disability to psychosis. In short some experts consider this to be a modern version of torture.

But can the time expended on repeated postponements caused by the defendant’s own pursuits in the Byzantine appeals process in capital cases be equated with government “torture?”

It is a gruesomely fascinating exercise to trace the evolution of torture as a means to punish. Four thousand years ago the Code of Hammurabi codified punis


http://www.nationalobserver.com/2016/11 ... mp-victory" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
National Observer
Conservative think tank says oil patch should be "jumping for joy" over Trump victory



Energy | November 9th 2016
Race Against Climate Change

Republican business mogul Donald Trump was elected president of the United States on Wed. Nov. 9, 2016. File photo by Associated Press.
Only hours after Donald Trump's stunning and historic U.S. presidential victory, a political pipeline already appears to be opening wide for an expansion of oil, gas, and coal.

While environmental activists and scientists have warned that the election of a climate-denying president in the U.S. would stall efforts to prevent dangerous global warming, political observers say the fossil fuel industry should be positively "jumping for joy."

Billionaire businessman Trump, a showman without any political or military experience, stunned most of the planet with his early-morning victory at the polls on Wednesday, and will bring a powerful pro-industry package with him to the White House that includes support for the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, a pledge to withdraw from the Paris climate agreements, and the belief that climate change is concept cr



http://ticklethewire.com/2016/11/10/dif ... residency/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Expected under Trump Presidency

Rudolph Giulian

A Donald Trump presidency likely means a very different Department of Justice, which had focused on civil rights issues under President Obama.

That means potentially dramatic changes in the leadership at the DOJ, the New York Times reports. 

Career lawyers who handle prosecutions in the Justice Department are the least likely to be affected because they handle the day-to-day work of prosecuting cases.

Many are speculating that the new attorney general will be Rudolph Giuliani, the former mayor of New York. The new AG will have the authority to implement new priorities.

Because of Trump’s promised tax cuts, there likely will be fewer resources in the Justice Department, and that could mean devoting less time to white-collar crime, which takes a significant amount of time.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/pow ... tz-breach/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



Secret Service Slammed
for IT Management Problems


The Secret Service has computer systems that are neglected and rife with bad management, according to a report by the Office of Inspector General (OIG) at the Department of Homeland Security.

The OIG launched an investigation into the Secret Service after employees breached the computer systems and leaked personal information about Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Republican, in retaliation for investigating agents’ misconduct, the Washington Post reports.

“Despite past warnings, USSS (U.S. Secret Service) is still unable to assure us their IT systems are safe,” Chaffetz said, citing the report.

The problems went well beyond the Chaffetz case.

According to the report, the “audit uncovers a myriad of problems with Secret Service’s IT management including inadequate system security plans, systems with expired authorities to operate, inadequate access and audit controls, noncompliance with logical



http://www.courier-journal.com/story/te ... /93560110/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Bevin wants Trump to 'gut' the US EPA


In the aftermath of an election that will put Donald Trump in the White House, Gov. Matt Bevin went off on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, tossing out some red meat to his base.

He told WVHU in Huntington, W.V., that there's no need anymore for the federal agency that makes sure each state plays by the same rules when it comes to the environment




http://www.climatecentral.org/news/phys ... 2016-20862" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Climate Change Doesn’t Really Care Who Was Elected
Published: November 10th, 2016
    

Donald Trump has said climate change is a Chinese hoax. His presidency raises the prospect of a climate denier atop the Environmental Protection Agency and an oil and gas billionaire running the Energy Department. He could pull the U.S. — and its 15 percent of all global carbon emissions — out of the Paris Agreement.

This information has made his supporters happy and his detractors furious. This information also matters not one iota to the climate.

Climate change doesn't care who the president is.
Credit: Carlo Allegri/REUTERS

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

News


http://liberalsociety.com/breaking-fbi- ... ald-trump/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;




BREAKING: FBI Issues FISA Warrant On Donald Trump
By Jacob Richardson
Posted on November 16, 2016

The FBI has issued a FISA warrant to investigate Donald Trump’s private Russian email server, for national security purposes. According to Louise Mensch of Heat Street:

“Two separate sources with links to the counter-intelligence community have confirmed to Heat Street that the FBI sought, and was granted, a FISA court warrant in October, giving counter-intelligence permission to examine the activities of ‘U.S. persons’ in Donald Trump’s campaign with ties to Russia.”

The account is being investigated for possible banking offenses and ties to the Russian government, and, as the report claims, the FBI has rejected claims of an investigation in order to protect the President-Elect during the campaigning process. Last week, the director of the FBI, James Comey, released a vague memo about the investigation into the Clinton Foundation, causing many to come forward and say that Comey had broken the Hatch Law, which prohibits government officials from interfering with the democratic process.


The FBI agents who spoke with the NY Times likely did not have knowledge of an investigation because the criminal and counter-intelligence parts of the FBI work “independently,” and so, an agent from one department would not necessarily have knowledge about what another department is working on. The report continues:

“The warrant covers any ‘US person’ connected to this investigation, and thus covers Donald Trump and at least three further men who have either formed part of his campaign or acted as his media surrogates. The warrant was sought, they say, because actionable intelligence on the matter provided by friendly foreign agencies could not properly be examined without a warrant by US intelligence as it involves ‘US Persons’ who come under the remit of the FBI and not the CIA. Should a counter-intelligence investigation lead to criminal prosecutions, sources say, the Justice Department is concerned that the chain of evidence have a basis in a clear warrant.”

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

http://foxsanantonio.com/news/local/mmw-angelika-nino" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


MMW: Angelika Nino
BY YAMI VIRGIN
MONDAY, DECEMBER 5TH 2016

If you have any information on Angelika Nino please call the U.S. Marshals at 210-657-8500.


The U.S. Marshals need your help to find Angelika Nino. Nino had done 97 months behind bars for 2 counts of Bank Fraud, 2 counts of Witness Tampering and 9 Counts of Wire Fraud. Nino is the ex-wife of a former FBI agent, who was in a tough situation after she was arrested for defrauding victims of more than 200,000 dollars. While doing supervised release, 5 years ordered by a judge, Nino allegedly violated the rules by failing to pay restitution. She also stopped reporting to her probation officer.

If you have any information you can call the U.S. Marshals' Lone Star Fugitive Task Force at 210-657-8500.

link du jour


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http://touch.latimes.com/#section/2426/ ... -91731669/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Dec. 5, 2016
How free coupons for patients help drugmakers hike prices by 1,000%



Matt Schmitt, an assistant professor at the UCLA Anderson School of Management, co-wrote a study that found coupons covering patients' co-pays are propelling drug companies to charge the "the highest price possible."

December 5, 2016, 9:00 a.m.
Horizon Pharma charges more than $2,000 for a month’s supply of a prescription pain reliever that is the combination of two cheap drugs available separately over the counter.

Another company, Novum, sells a small tube of a prescription skin rash cream, containing two inexpensive decades-old medicines, for nearly $8,000.

What is key to the companies’ business plan of raising prices by 1,000% or more?  

The answer: coupons that deliver Horizon’s pain reliever Vimovo and Novum’s skin cream Alcortin A for as little as nothing to the patient, while leaving America’s health system to pick up much of the rest of the price.

Experts warn that the coupons, increasingly being used by dozens of companies, are sharply adding to the nation’s medicine bill. That cost is passed along to most Americans through higher insurance premiums and taxes needed to pay for government health programs.

The success of Horizon and Novum using this strategy demonstrates how America’s convoluted and opaque system of paying for prescription drugs enables executives to set extraordinary prices on modest medicines that have been around for years. The coupons





http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20161 ... ?mobi=true" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


FBI Agent: Sting informant says he was told not to target Republicans
Updated: DECEMBER 4, 2016 —


Tyrone B. Ali, right, along with attorney Alan J.Tauber, left, arrive at the Dauphin County Court house for a hearing Monday, March 28, 2016 in Harrisburg, Pa.
by Craig R. McCoy and Angela Couloumbis, STAFF WRITERS
An FBI agent has said the undercover operative in the controversial sting run by the state Attorney General's Office told him he was discouraged from targeting Republicans, raising questions about the integrity of an investigation that has netted five convictions of Democrats.

In a new court filing by the last sting defendant still fighting charges, FBI Special Agent Robert J. Haag said that the operative, Tyron Ali, told him the state office seemed "more interested in targeting Democrats than Republicans."

And in an email Haag wrote in 2013, he said Ali told him he was "reprimanded" for contacting Republicans during the probe and instructed "not to take any initiative in contacting Republicans in the future."


On Saturday, former state prosecutor Frank Fina and Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams rejected any suggestion the probe had a partisan agenda - or that Ali was told to go after only Democrats.

Said Fina: "Never, ever was he told to steer towards one party or another."

They said the idea that Ali was told to keep clear of Republicans was a distortion of tactical decisions made to avoid certain officials for fear his cover would be blown.


Fina launched the probe before former State Attorney General Kathleen Kane shut it down. Williams resurrected the investigation into the payments and obtained the convictions.

Kane said Saturday that the filing vindicated her.

"The FBI file speaks for itself and confirms what I have always said: that this investigation was fatally flawed from the beginning."

A sworn affidavit by Haag, along with the email, quoted in length in the filing, was recently turned over by federal prosecutors in response to a demand for sting-related documents by defense








http://touch.capitalgazette.com//#secti ... -92040214/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Annapolis caucus plans rating system for law enforcement agencies





CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER CARL SNOWDEN TALKS ABOUT RACIAL ISSUES DURING A MEETING OF THE CAUCUS OF AFRICAN-AMERICAN LEADERS THAT RESULTED IN A VOTE OF NO-CONFIDENCE FOR ANNAPOLIS POLICE CHIEF MICHAEL PRISTOOP.

Updated December 3, 2016
The Caucus of African-American Leaders hopes to develop a criteria to rate departments with law enforcement officers in Anne Arundel County and the Baltimore metropolitan area.

A subcommittee of the caucus has been formed to put together those plans and the group is meeting this weekend to refine its goals and criteria before taking the plans to police leadership. The group hopes to include Anne Arundel County, Annapolis and Baltimore County fire and police departments as well as Anne Arundel and Harford County sheriff's offices.

Caucus convener Carl Snowden declined to speak on the subject as the final plans were still underway. The caucus is a local advocacy group that focuses on equality issues in the city and county.

But emails obtained by The Capital shed light on the early plans for the rating criteria.

"The idea is to create a criteria to rate police departments," Snowden wrote in his email to Caucus members and an ACLU attorney. "The proposed criteria would include how diverse their departments are, how many complaints of alleged police misconduct has been filed against the agency... How transparent is the police department?"

There currently is no rating system like it in the area, hence their desire to create it.

An Annapolis police spokeswoman declined to comment on the planned system until there were more details. ACLU attorney David Rocah declined to talk about the proposed program as well.

But The Capital did receive a copy of his response to Snowden's inquiry. He provided some guidance to set up the program and compare data especially between departments of varying sizes.

"So to make comparisons between departments, you'd need to not only file public records requests to get the total number of complaints filed by year, but you'd also need to file requests to get information on the size of the force, and perhaps look up census data for size of the jurisdiction."

While there is no rating system locally, law enforcement agencies can seek accreditation from the aptly named Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies. That agency sets up criteria within six major law enforcement areas such as relationships with other agencies, organization and management, personnel, law enforcement operations and court-related and technical services, according to the CALEA website.

The caucus is hoping to release a report from the rating system around the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, Jan. 16, according to the emails.

The emails on the caucus' rating program were sent about 10 days after the caucus held a vote of no confidence in Annapolis Police Chief Michael Pristoop. The caucus laid out several claims alleging the police department treats white and black police officers differently.

The main case they have championed is former police officer Jason Thomas, who was fired after a protracted legal battle regarding an injury he suffered while on duty.

The department claims it ordered Thomas back to work full-duty and eventually fired him when he did not return. Thomas claims his doctors ordered him back to work at least on modified or light duty. He filed a federal lawsuit on Monday alleging discrimination.

Pristoop has defended his department from these claims. The Annapolis City Council set up a subcommittee to review and investigate the claims made by the caucus.

Emails by city officials obtained by The Capital through a request under the Maryland Public Information Act after that vote show a concentrated effort to show support for the chief after the caucus vote as well as sharing stories and comments of the city's legal victories

Snowden tipped off the vote in a column in The Capital in which he discussed the caucus plan to hold the vote that night. After the vote, Alderman Ross Arnett and Jared Littmann sent emails noting their support for the chief. Arnett's support led to a resolution of support being drafted, but that was delayed after the subcommittee was created.

News media reporters also began sending inquiries after the no confidence vote. Annapolis Captain Scott Williams wrote "And so it begins" after seeing an inquiry from WBAL-TV.

Pristoop also received support from FBI Special Agent Wendy Hassett, who wrote "I like it!" when Pristoop shared a comment admonishing The Capital on a story about Thomas losing his lawsuit in state




http://www.collective-evolution.com/201 ... -involved/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

With regards to pedophellia, ever since Donald Trump brought to light the allegations against Bill Clinton and his treatment of women, others have come forward to corroborate his story.

One of the most recent examples is former U.S. State Department official Steve Pieczenik. His roles within U.S. politics were many, having been the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State under Henry Kissinger, Cyrus Vacne, and James Baker, and also serving the presidential administrations of Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Regan, and George H.W. Bush. If you’ve done research into U.S. politics, being associated with names like Kissinger and Bush is an automatic red flag. What’s even more concerning to some is that he was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a group many consider to be corrupt and even evil, operating under the guise of good deeds. However, he was removed from the membership as early as October 2012, the same time he started whistleblowing.

He says: “We know that both of them have been a major part and participant of what’s called The Lolita Express, which is a plane owned by Mr. Jeff Epstein, a wealthy multi-millionaire who flies down to the Bahamas and allows Bill Clinton and Hillary to engage in sex with minors, that is called Pedophilia.”  (source)

Here is some background coverage that was done on it last year. I’m not saying these examples are proof of a massive elitist global pedophile ring, but there have been several examples like this, and various scandals that have gone completely unreported by mainstream media.

Former U.S. representative Cynthia McKinney also knew about pedophilia within the government in 2005. She grilled Donald Rumsfeld on DynCorp’s child trafficking business of selling women and children. (source)

This is important information to share, especially with all that’s going on with the Pizzagate scandal,  which the elite are also trying to debunk. Here is another Pizzagate video put together by the underground resistance network.

It’s hardly surprising that they are trying to discredit this story, but with all of the other stories from investigations out there that are already verified, it’s important that we don’t ignore this and that somebody within the power structure actually initiates an investigation.

Investigations Reveal That It Goes Far Beyond Pedophilia

Unfortunately, investigations into this type of behaviour reveal that many working for mainstream politics, its corporate structure, the big banks, and parts of the military industrial complex (CIA, contractors, etc.) could be involved in even more disturbing things.

Not only are these children abused, they are tortured and often murdered as part of ‘satanic’ sacrifice ceremonies. Many of them, based on my research




http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/an-" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ... hirtyEight
Politics
An FBI Error Opens A Window Into Government Demands For Private Info

Dec 3, 2016 at 1:14 PM
An FBI Error Opens A Window Into Government Demands For Private Info

The Internet Archive, a nonprofit organization that has built a digital library and maintains an archive of web pages on the internet, revealed on Thursday that it had received a National Security Letter from the FBI demanding information about the services the library provided to a possible user. National Security Letters such as this one have been criticized by civil liberties groups in part because they can include a nondisclosure requirement or “gag order” that prevents recipients from revealing anything about the letters — including the fact that they received them.
This letter was particularly troublesome to privacy advocates because it contained misinformation about the rights of a letter recipient to challenge the nondisclosure requirement. The letter stated that the Internet Archive could “make an annual challenge to the nondisclosure requirement.” The Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy organization that is legally representing the Internet Archive, pointed out in a press release that the passage of the USA Freedom Act in June of 2015 changed the law to allow letter recipients to challenge the National Security Letter at any time, not just once annually. In response to the EFF’s claim, the FBI withdrew its National Security Letter, allowed the Internet Archive to publish a redacted version of the letter containing the error and promised to correct the mistake by informing everyone else who got the same erroneous language.


http://www.collective-evolution.com/201" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ... -involved/



FBI Chief Exposes MK Ultra Programs That Murder, Use, & Traffic ...
Collective Evolution-7 hours ago
FBI Chief Exposes MK Ultra Programs That Murder, Use, & Traffic Children – High .... Ted Gunderson, former FBI special agent and head of their L.A. office, ...



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Enter 'The Glass Room,' Where Privacy Goes To Die
Motherboard-5 hours ago
... Congress failed to block a procedural rule change that gives the FBI the legal authority to hack millions of computers around the globe under a single warrant.








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http://ticklethewire.com/2016/12/02/bor" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ... thorities/
Border Patrol Agent Headed to Trial for Allegedly Lying to Federal Authorities
By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
The Border Patrol agent accused of lying to federal agents about a drug conspiracy case is headed to trial in early January.
Eduardo Bazan Jr. pleaded not guilty Thursday in federal court, the Monitor reports.
Bazan, 48, of Edinburg, was arrested on Nov. 3 and has been on administrative leave since.
Authorities allege he lied to Homeland Security investigators during an Oct. 31 interview.
“Bazan admitted he had lied to agents Oct. 31, 2016, and that Bazan had in fact received information from an individual that led to a seizure of 66 kilograms of cocaine; seized on Feb. 18, 2007,” the criminal complaint reads.


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US judge won't release IDs of informants in prison gang case
Santa Fe New Mexican-
The Albuquerque Journal reports that an FBI case agent wrote in a search warrant affidavit that all nine informants would be marked for death if their identities





FBI refuses to investigate pedophile

http://www.theadvocate.com/new_orleans/ ... 569c5.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Teen at center of Mike Yenni sexting scandal reveals identity to rebut claims he is lying
BY RAMON ANTONIO VARGAS | RVARGAS@THEADVOCATE.COM DEC 3, 2016 - 7





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CIA blows up Cuban airliner

1976 bombing that killed Cuban fencing team requires painful reflection



Protesters carry portraits of victims on Oct. 6, during a 40th-anniversary remembrance of the Cubana Flight 455 bombing. (Ernesto Mastrascusa/European Pressphoto Agency)
By Kevin B. Blackistone December 4 at 7:33 PM Follow @ProfBlackistone
By noon on Oct. 6, 1976, at Seawell International Airport in Barbados, it was humid, raining and 80 degrees. A McDonnell Douglas four-engine DC-8 jet adorned with Cubana Airlines’ blue, white and red tail sat on the tarmac, just arrived from Port of Spain, Trinidad. It was in the midst of a hopscotch trip across the Caribbean that started in Georgetown, Guyana; was headed to Kingston, Jamaica; and destined for Havana, Cuba.

Among the passengers were 24 teenage athletes. They were members of Cuba’s national fencing team. They caught their country’s flagship airliner in Trinidad after competing in a tournament of Central American and Caribbean countries.

But neither the Cuban fencers nor the other 49 souls on Cubana Flight 455 made it home.

At what must have been the nadir of the U.S. government’s detestation for Fidel Castro, who died last week at age 90 after a lifetime of being a burr in Washington’s saddle on the Western Hemisphere, Cubana Flight 455 exploded in the sky above the Caribbean Sea after two bombs planted by men working for once-CIA-connected, anti-Castro Cuban exiles detonated.


The Cubana Flight 455 mass murder is not seared in our memory like the massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Games. It didn’t play out live on national television like the bloodshed in Munich. It hasn’t been memorialized in dramatic film.

But the two dozen Cuban athletes who perished represent the most horrific attack against innocent sportsmen we’ve ever seen. The downing of their flight remains a rare mid-air bombing of a civilian airliner in the Western Hemisphere.

And the U.S. government’s behavior in the 40-year wake of those deaths remains shameful.

[Fidel Castro laid to rest in private, closed-door funeral]

To be sure, just two months ago, on the 40th anniversary of Cubana Flight 455’s downing, the National Security Archive, which has done yeoman’s work on this event, asked the Obama administration to declassify what intelligence records remain on Luis Posada Carriles, the onetime CIA operative convicted in Panama of Cubana 455’s bombing but pardoned in 2004 by then-outgoing Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso, who was supported by Washington. Posada, now 88, resides in Miami.

A 1976 document sent at the time to Secretary of State Henry Kissinger by two high-ranking State Department officials who investigated Castro’s charge that the United States had downed Cubana 455 implicated Posada as the likely planner.


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From skate parks to midtown, Ryan Parrilla captures the energy of the city that never stops moving.
“We have now pursued in detail with CIA (1) what we know about responsibility for the sabotage of the Cubana airliner and (2) how any actions by CIA, FBI, or Defense attache´s might relate to the individuals or groups alleged to have responsibility,” the document stated, “… but any role that these people may have had with the demolition took place without the knowledge of the CIA.”

Posada’s co-conspirator in planning the bombing was Orlando Bosch, who was acquitted in a foreign court of the attack. But a declassified CIA report quoted Posada as saying: “We are going to hit a Cuban airplane” and “Orlando has the details.” An FBI report quoted an informant as saying that one of the men who planted a bomb on the plane called Bosch afterward to tell him that the plan succeeded.

Bosch died in 2011 in Miami, where he lived at least since 1988, when he was arrested there for violating parole. The anti-Castro Cuban community in Miami successfully lobbied President George H. W. Bush, through Jeb Bush, to grant Bosch a pardon on all charges, of which there were many, against him in the states.

Investigations showed that Posada and Bosch had hatched their plan during a meeting in Washington. Posada originally tried to defeat Castro by helping organize the failed Bay of Pigs invasion. After this he became an agent for the CIA, trained at Fort Benning and joined a series of United States-backed efforts




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Who started Fake News Planting?
The FBI





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Monday, December 05, 2016

Career of Trump's Top Ethics Lawyer Marred by Questionable Ethics
Don McGahn is a "vociferous defender" of Citizens United, among other things

Election lawyer Don McGahn was described by Politico as "one of a growing number of people with ties to the Kochs to join Trump's administration." (Photo: Getty)

The attorney named as President-elect Donald Trump's White House counsel, Donald McGahn, has been called "kryptonite to campaign finance reform," "a totally partisan politico," and "notorious for politicizing and crippling enforcement of federal campaign finance laws."

Indeed, journalist Jon Schwarz wrote at The Intercept on Sunday that McGahn "bears as much responsibility as any single person for turning America's campaign finance system into something akin to a gigantic, clogged septic tank."

As one of six members of the Federal Election Commission (FEC) from 2008-2013, McGahn "demonstrated a much stronger interest in expanding the money-in-politics swamp than draining it," Common Cause vice president Paul S. Ryan told Schwarz.

As the Center for Public Integrity reported in May, when McGahn was merely serving as an adviser to the Trump campaign:

McGahn was "perhaps the most consequential member of the FEC in its history," said Jan Witold Baran, a well-regarded Republican election lawyer and co-chairman of the election law and government ethics practice at law firm Wiley Rein. Baran said McGahn checked the authority of the agency's staff and general counsel and used his experience as a lawyer representing clients to win rights for political committees under the FEC's jurisdiction, including those the commission is investigating.

FEC Commissioner Ellen Weintraub, a Democratic appointee, who frequently clashed with McGahn while both were on the commission, sees it differently.

"He was consequential like a sledgehammer was consequential," she said, adding, "he did his best to undermine the law."

"Now, as Trump's White House lawyer, McGahn will provide crucial advice on the nomination of judges, including to the Supreme Court," Schwarz noted. "While Trump has criticized Citizens United, and called the Super PACs that sprang up in its wake 'horrible' and a 'total phony deal,' McGahn is a vociferous defender of the ruling."

As White House counsel, McGahn will also be tasked with managing and mitigating Trump's many conflicts of interest and potentially establishing a trust to manage the president-elect's business holdings.

In other words, USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism professor Marty Kaplan wrote last week, "If a U.S. foreign policy decision appears to favor a Trump commercial project, it's McGhan's job to blow the whistle on the president."

"If you think that's going to happen," Kaplan quipped, "I've got a golf course with a nice view of a wind farm that I'd like to sell you."

He's already shown he's not up to the job, Arn Pea





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Inter-Racial Couple finds spray-painted racial slurs, swastikas in Ohio home
BY ELIZABETH ELIZALDE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, December 5, 2016, 8:07 PM




FBI agent create another terrorist event


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Court: Secret spying of would-be Christmas tree bomber was OK
Ars Technica UK-
Undercover FBI agents posed as jihadis and presented Mohamud with the means to conduct the operation, which turned out to be wholly bogus. Mohamud was ...



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Child porn on government devices: A hidden security threat
Explicit images of minors, which have been discovered on federal workers' computers across the government, can be gateways for criminal hackers and foreign spies. What's the best way to combat the problem?


Daniel Payne, director of the Pentagon's Defense Security Service, admitted this spring to encountering “unbelievable” amounts of child pornography on government computers.

The comment came during an event in Virginia where military and intelligence officials gathered to address threats posed by federal workers. Mr. Payne, who spent much of his career in senior CIA and intelligence community roles before taking the Pentagon post, wanted to stress the value of monitoring employees' systems to ensure they remained fit to handle top-secret information.

But the revelation raised many more troubling questions. Who was downloading the sexually explicit and criminal material? How much of it was on intelligence agency networks? And why didn't the federal government deploy more robust technologies to keep child pornography from spreading on its networks?

While the notion of government employees and contractors with high levels of security clearance looking at child pornography was disturbing on its own, internal records retrieved through the Freedom of Information Act revealed the problem is not limited to military and intelligence agencies.

In the past three years, agencies ranging from the Postal Service to the Federal Highway Administration substantiated about 40 allegations that employees or contractors opened child

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

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Taking Back Our Lives
Tuesday, December 13, 2016
We Need Help Fighting The Banks


The other day I got a letter from my credit card bank, Citibank. It began, “We’re replacing your existing Card Agreement with a new version, which is enclosed.” They claimed that “It’s designed with you in mind,” but I doubt that.

The new Agreement is described in detail, without any indication of what is new, so I don’t know what they have changed. What hasn’t changed is the tilt of the Agreement toward Citibank. Interest rates for loans are very low these days. Rates for mortgages range between 2.5% and 4%. Auto loans are even cheaper, between 2% and 3%. My home equity loan from my local bank is 3.5%. When big banks borrow money, they pay close to zero interest.

But don’t borrow money from your credit card bank. My new Agreement, like the old Agreement, lists huge rates for money I “borrow” from Citibank. If I owe money on my card, the rate is 14.24%. If I get a cash advance, the rate is 25.49%, beginning the moment I get the money. There are also fees. A cash advance costs 5% of the amount, in addition to the interest.

These are the costs of having a credit card. We might think they are unreasonable, but getting a card means agreeing to one-sided Agreements like this one. If I didn’t like any of the changes to my Agreement, whatever they were, I could close my account.

But on one new provision in my new Agreement, I was given a choice. Citibank wants any disputes about my account to be subject to arbitration, meaning that the dispute is settled by an arbitrator, without recourse to the courts. Here’s why Citibank and other credit card companies like this idea.

An arbitration is an individual case, so consumers can’t band together in a class action suit. The result is purely monetary, so if the dispute is caused by fraud or other illegal action by the bank, they are not subject to legal penalty. The cost of arbitration is picked up by the bank and they typically select the arbitrator (do you know one?), steering lots of business to arbitrators who deliver verdicts they like. One big arbitration service, the National Arbitration Forum, had to get out of the business of consumer arbitration because it was so cozy with the banks that it was being sued by many city and state attorneys.

Wells Fargo, the current Dishonest Bank of the Year, defrauded countless customers by creating millions of fake accounts in their names. Now it is killing lawsuits filed by its customers by moving the disputes to arbitration. If successful, the bank might have to repay fees they charged to the customers, but would not be liable for penalties due to fraud. Although some judges have ruled that Wells Fargo’s fraud should be adjudicated in court, other judges have forced customers to go to arbitration.

The dishonesty of Wells Fargo over many years, cheating millions of customers for many years, and thus far escaping with no jail time for any employee, shows how insignificant we consumers are when we come up against giant corporations. Even well known people, like the Los Angeles music star Ana Bárbara, get crushed by their power. A Wells Fargo employee created sham accounts and credit lines in her name, took out more than $400,000 of her money, then regularly went to her house to steal her Wells Fargo statements from her mailbox. She had to cancel appearances, costing her hundreds of thousands of dollars. Instead of her day in court, Bárbara will have to go to arbitration.

Protection for the consumer can only come from the government. The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 takes its name seriously. Dodd-Frank does not let banks force consumers into arbitration for the biggest loans we take out, mortgage and home equity loans. It created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to write regulations to implement that change. It also asked the CFPB to study credit card arbitration agreements and report to Congress.

The government effort to examine credit card “agreements” about arbitration is why my bank offered me the chance to opt out of arbitration. All I had to do was write a letter to them saying I rejected the arbitration provision of my “updated Card Agreement”. I did that. Thank you, Dodd-Frank.

Republicans have fought against Dodd-Frank since it was first discussed in Congress. They tried to prevent the CFPB from ever being formed. Donald Trump has said he would dismantle Dodd-Frank, saying, ““Dodd-Frank has made it impossible for bankers to function.” Trump’s selection for Secretary of the Treasury, who will oversee banking regulations, is Steven Mnuchin. Mnuchin worked for Goldman Sachs, a financial firm that got a $10 billion bailout from the federal government in 2008. He made billions by foreclosing on homeowners during that financial collapse. His main qualifications for running Treasury is that he was Trump’s campaign finance chairman.

Dodd-Frank makes it less possible for the big banks to push us into tilted arbitration when the banks act like Wells Fargo. It’s an equalizer for the little consumer dealing with the big banks. Without it, we’re at their mercy.

Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
Published in the Jacksonvill

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

link du jour

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Blink Tank



Brilliant Zero Point Energy inventor
Gerard Morin


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San Bernardino County deputy accused of having sex with teen in Explorer program

A 14-year veteran of the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department has been arrested and booked on suspicion of having unlawful sexual intercourse with a teenage girl participating in the department’s youth Explorer program, authorities said.

Deputy David Israel Ceballos, 34, was arrested Friday evening and his bail was set at $100,000. He is accused of unlawful intercourse and sexual penetration with a foreign object on a minor, the sheriff’s department



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L.I. police nab disgraced ex-NYPD cop for allegedly choking wife

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Saturday, December 31, 2016, 8:07 PM







SHARKHUNTERS is pleased and proud to present these wartime books for your enjoyment.

“Hitler in Argentina!”
(BRAND NEW January 2014)

We are all taught that the Red Army surrounded Berlin and that, faced with capture by the Soviet Union, Adolf Hitler and his new wife Eva Braun (Hitler) committed suicide in the Führerbunker. Don’t believe it – Josef Stalin knew better as did most of the world leaders of the time! Stalin even made a great fuss about Hitler’s escape in statements he made in July of 1945 – more than two months after the alleged suicide.

As you read through this book taken from the file of a Spanish spy who worked for the Reich and who saw Hitler and Eva Braun forcibly drugged and removed from the Führerbunker under orders of Martin Bormann, you will realize that Hitler’s suicide was a well conceived escape plan by the man who desperately had to keep the Reich, and thereby Hitler, alive…..Martin Bormann. This book also contains photos of places Hitler lived in Argentina, interviews with people there and in Europe – FBI and OSS files clearly stating that they and the United States Government knew that Hitler did not die in Berlin.


Reviews of this book are at the bottom of this page.

As of early May 2014……..one of the TOP SELLING books from Amazon.

End of 2016 – Amazon #1 BEST SELLER in LATIN

also see

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Martin Bormann – A New Body of Evidence

When anyone mentions the name Martin Bormann most baby-boomers will know who he was, they will also be quick to tell you that even though there was a wild goose chase across the globe to find him, he certainly died in 1945, proved they say, by the finding of his bones in Berlin in 1972. Martin Bormann Hitler’s right hand man and chancellor, the man that controlled all of the vast Nazi loot was tried in absentia in October 1946 at the Nuremberg trials. Found guilty of war crimes and sentenced to death by hanging, Bormann evaded the noose due to his mysterious disappearance.

Two Nazi witnesses at the Nuremberg trials testified to the fact that they had seen Bormann and fellow Nazi, Dr Ludwig Stumpfegger dead, only hours after fleeing the bunker where Hitler had supposedly put a bullet through his brain. One going as far as to say that he had even seen Bormann’s dead ”moonlit face”.

From 1945 the hunt for Martin Bormann was on. During the confusion of those early post war years, the West German government kept the heat up, but UKUSA’s ‘hunt’ was only, If anything, luke-warm. A concentrated search effort had been made in 1945 around the site of the supposed ‘moonlit’ scenario of Bormann and Stumpfegger, with who he was last seen alive. With the advantage of hordes of allied troops on the ground to co-ordinate a thorough search, no stone was left unturned. The same was done independently by a Russian recon group, after Lieutenant General Konstantin Telegin, of the Soviet 5th Shock Army was delivered of a diary said to be of Bormann’s, found near the same site.

In those early post war years, it was not yet a ‘cold case’, with memories still fresh and the ground still soft. Any such corpses although decomposed, would have certainly been on, or near the surface and easily identifiable with the minimum of forensics; but not as much as a scrap of flesh was found of either man. At least they had some disputable charred remains of Hitler, but the bodies of Bormann and Stumpfegger had literally vanished into thin air, along with the Nazi loot.

But after construction workers came across human remains near the Lehrter station in Berlin in 1972, the world’s press gathered to hear if this was indeed Bormann. Bormann’s Nazi dentist Dr Hugo Blaschke was called and he recalled from memory his former patient’s dental physiology and gave testimony that they were one and the same, the case was closed. It was not until 1998 that due to modern science the remains were subjected to a DNA forensic study by the West German prosecutor. The reason for this new 1998 investigation was that in 1996 Christopher Creighton, aka John Ainsworth-Davis a former British Naval Intelligence agent and member of the covert British group C.O.P.P (Combined Operations Pilotage Parties) had published a book, OPJB(Operation James Bond). In the book, Creighton using a pseudonym claims that along with Ian Fleming, he was instructed by Winston Churchill and Desmond Morton the head of Secret British intelligence section V to rescue Martin Bormann from a burning Berlin in May 1945. The book, passed off as a novel to protect Creighton from serious breach consequences of the Official Secrets Act unsettled the German government so much that a thorough forensics and DNA investigation was carried out on the remains. The forensic results came back after the legal medical team matched blood from a Bormann relative, the match was positive.

A confirmation of the remains being those of Bormann was released to the world’s press, along with the statement that Martin Bormann had certainly died in 1945 at the site his remains were found.

Due to the 1998 DNA confirmation of the Skeleton, Modern historians teach their students that stories of Bormann escaping to South America are false, nothing more than the rantings of conspiracy theorists and madmen. Investigative journalists and even former intelligence agents have been continually slandered after they have released information to the contrary, that there has been a cover up by the western allies, that not only did Bormann escape, but his escape was orchestrated by the British intelligence services with the support of the United States government.

Anyone that dares to raise any questions as to the true dynamics of Bormann’s disappearance and death, are discredited based only on the DNA match which confirm the remains as being




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Former FBI agent Grimm wants his law license back in southeast NY


Staten Island's former congressman, Michael Grimm, who was convicted for tax evasion has asked a federal appeals court to reinstate his law license.
on December 31, 2016 at 3:00 PM, updated December 31, 2016
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y -- Former Congressman Michael Grimm, who was convicted for tax evasion, is appealing a federal court ruling to reinstate his law license in the southern district of New York, where he was previously disbarred.

Attorneys for Grimm maintain that he should get a one-year suspension instead of disbarment from practicing law in the federal court system in the southern district of New York, said a source who requested anonymity.

Grimm voluntarily agreed to a two-year suspension of his law license in the state of Connecticut, and an interim suspension in New York state, as of September, said the source.

New York state's appellate division has yet to hand down a final disciplinary action against Grimm. But federal grievance officials in the southern district of New York disbarred him.

Grimm's lawyers argue others convicted of worse crimes have eventually been allowed to practice law again, and they want the federal court to hold off on its disciplinary action until the state rules on the case.

"Federal c







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Was Claim by Department of Homeland Security and FBI About Russian Hacking Fake News?

Posted on Dec 31, 2016



On December 29, 2016, the Hill posted an article discussing a 13-page report that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security presented as “evidence” of Russian hacking in US elections.

Wikileaks has repeatedly stated that the source of its leaks was a disgruntled Democratic Party


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Chicago Top Cop, Who Ran Mobbed-Up Jewelry Theft Ring, Dies
December 31, 2016 10:30 AM
Filed Under: Chicago Police, Jewelry Theft Ring, Obituary, William Hanhardt
CHICAGO (CBS) — William Hanhardt, a former high-ranking Chicago Police official who spent years in prison for running a mob-connected jewel-theft ring, has died at age 88.

Hanhardt, a former deputy police superintendent and chief of detectives, died Friday at Highland Park Hospital from complications from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, according to his family.

He had been living in Deerfield and previously lived in the Far Northwest Side’s Edison Park neighborhood, where the funeral is scheduled for Tuesday.

Hanhardt has been described as one of the most crooked cops in Chicago history, with federal prosecutors saying he ran a mob-tied, highly sophisticated theft ring that stole tens of millions of dollars worth of jewelry from salesmen across the country. He worked



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Home / Dissent NewsWire / McCain’s Surprising Tribute to Abraham Lincoln Brigade Forgets History of FBI Harassment


March 30, 2016 by Chip Gibbons


During the Spanish Civil War (1936-39), almost forty thousand men and women from fifty-two countries, including 2,800 Americans volunteered to travel to Spain and join the International Brigades to help fight fascism. The U.S. volunteers served in various units and came to be known collectively as the Abraham Lincoln Brigade. Source: ALBA

“The adverse information about him, which was brought out by our lawyer, was that he had once belonged to the Communist party, and had attempted to enlist in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade during the Spanish Civil War.” – Kurt Vonnegut, Deadeye Dick 1

It has been over a decade since I first read Vonnegut’s Deadeye Dick, but I still remember that sentence jumping out at me. It made enough of an impression that I could almost recall it verbatim from memory, even as I discovered when trying to find the passage, that I had forgotten the novel’s major plot point. The sentence stood out to me, because while being aware of American history I knew of the relentless repression that members of the Communist Party faced, at sixteen years of age I could not not fathom how anyone could view attempting to join the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, a group of American volunteers who fought in the Spanish Civil War on behalf of the Republican government against fascists, fascist that were backed by Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, as adverse information. 2

If one was to read Senator John McCain’s “Salute to a Communist” in last week’s New York Times, they would be left with a similar impression. After all, here we have a conservative Republican (of the US variety, not the Spanish) Senator writing fairly laudatory words about someone he concedes was an “unreconstructed Communist” because he joined the Abraham Lincoln Brigade. The Communist in question was Delmer Berg, who was the last known surviving member of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and recently passed away at the age of 100.*

A Legacy of Repression

Yet, Vonnegut’s depiction of official attitudes to veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade circa 1944 is fairly accurate. As Peter N. Carroll, author of The Odyssey of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, told the Dissent NewsWire, “Senator McCain’s surprising tribute to the Abraham Lincoln Brigade showed a rare appreciation for the moral courage of those 2,800 Americans who defied US neutrality laws to fight against fascism during the Spanish Civil War. Unfortunately, he gives scant attention to the harsh response they received from federal and state agencies upon their return.”

While returning veterans were deemed heroic in progressive circles, they





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How An Infant Ended Up On Terror No-Fly List: Top Stories of 2016
Patch.com-15 hours ago
The placement of Baby Doe, an Alameda County, CA, infant whose parents have Michigan ties, “highlights the recklessness the FBI engages in when



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New Russian Hacks? No, Old Ukrainian Malware Found
Center for Research on Globalization-
The utility company found the malware by scanning for a malware signature published in a lame recent assessment by Homeland Security and the FBI. Dubious






MS legislator pushing animal cruelty bill
Hattiesburg American
In 2015, the FBI added animal cruelty to the National Incident Based Reporting System. The yearly list tracks crime such as homicides and armed robberies





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Dog Killing FBI Agent Gets a “Slap on the Wrist” VIDEO
Sunday, July 12th, 2009
There are times when I’m not sure why I ever actually expect more from our justice system.  Last February, a Waco, TX FBI agent, a sniper and member of the FBI SWAT team, Lovett Leslie Ledger, Jr. shot and killed a neighbor’s little 3-lb chihuahua named Sassy, with a pellet rifle and although indicted for felony animal cruelty the only ones who paid for this crime were the dog with its life and the family who lost their tiny little furry family member.

Cyndi Mitchell, who lives across the street from FBI agent, Lovett Leslie Ledger, told authorities that she witnessed Ledger shoot the dog in front of her house with a pellet rifle on Feb. 29.
Mitchell has said that her dogs were barking and she went to the door and saw Sassy walking on Estes Road in front of her house.
The dog lurched to one side upon being shot, then rolled into a yard where she died, she has said.
“I’ve never heard a noise like that from an animal,” Mitchell said, describing it as “a screaming sound.”
As neighbors gathered around the fallen dog, Ledger took the pellet gun, turned and walked inside his house with one of his children.
Initially when confronted by authorities about the crime, Ledger lied but changed his story when witnesses came forward.
He was later indicted by a grand jury for cruelty to animals, a state jail felony punishable by up to two years in a state jail and a $10,000 fine.

Pleading no contest, Judge Matt Johnson in 54th District Court sentenced Ledger to two years deferred probation and ordered to perform 300 hours of community service. Not only that, if he completes the term of probation, the conviction will be expunged from his record.

FBI spokesman Erik Vasys said Wednesday the agency will determine whether Ledger faces any sanctions, which could range from suspension to dismissal, after an internal inquiry is completed. Initially it was reported that if convicted of the felony, that would mostly likely be the end of his career, with Ledger getting deferred adjudication probation, the FBI will probably just let him get away with it too. After all, if the justice system doesn’t care, why should they. It was “just a dog” after all!

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Bonus Read


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Taking Back Our Lives

Tuesday, January 10, 2017

Trump’s Billionaire Cabinet


Donald Trump won election as our next President partly by appealing to Americans who are unhappy with the way the economy has left them behind, while benefitting only the wealthy.

Nearly all Americans told pollsters just before the election that they think the American economy is rigged in favor of the powerful. Almost 90% said the economy is rigged to benefit the rich generally, banks and bank executives in particular, and corporations.

Trump told these angry voters that they were right: middle-class Americans can't get ahead, because big political donors, big businesses and big bureaucrats are keeping wages down and hogging all the gains of the growing economy for themselves. Only he could fix this broken system. “The economy is rigged. The banking system is rigged. There’s a lot of things that are rigged in this world of ours, and that’s why a lot of you haven’t had an effective wage increase in 20 years, folks. And we’re going to change it.”

Trump specifically pointed the finger at Wall St. He told an audience in Ottumwa, Iowa, “I know the people on Wall Street. I'm not going to let Wall Street get away with murder. Wall Street has caused tremendous problems for us. I don’t care about the Wall Street guys. I’m not taking any of their money.” He stressed the unfairness of the tax system. “The hedge fund guys are getting away with murder. They're paying nothing, and it's ridiculous.”

Now that he has won election with those arguments, Trump has been assembling his team to run the government. His cabinet choices are not yet complete, and none of them have been confirmed by the Senate. But his selections so far give us some idea of what he plans to do.

Trump’s cabinet will be the richest group in American history, dominated by the very people he criticized on the campaign trail. For Secretary of Commerce, Trump is nominating Wilbur L. Ross Jr., a billionaire Wall St. speculator. He owned Sago Mine, a West Virginia coal mine where a dozen miners lost their lives in a 2006 explosion. His company settled a lawsuit for negligence in their deaths. A few months ago, Ross’s company paid a $2.3 million fine for charging his investors excess management fees.

Just under Ross, Trump is nominating Todd Ricketts as Deputy Commerce Secretary. His father founded the online broker Ameritrade. Ricketts is even richer than Ross, and is co-owner of the Chicago Cubs and CEO of Ending Spending, an organization “dedicated to educating and engaging American taxpayers about wasteful and excessive government spending,” according to its site.

As head of the Small Business Administration, Trump selected another billionaire, Linda McMahon, former chief executive of World Wrestling Entertainment, and one of Trump’s biggest donors. The Treasury Department will be headed by Steven Mnuchin, another big donor and a former Goldman Sachs executive, now CEO of a hedge fund. He is worth only about $665 million.

Much further down the list of richest Americans, Trump’s Secretary of Labor will be Andrew F. Puzder, chief executive of CKE Restaurants, which owns fast-food outlets Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr. Puzder opposes increasing the minimum wage, because his restaurants would have to pay more to their workers, meaning less income for shareholders.

Another billionaire with input into Trump’s economic policies will be Carl Icahn, a Special Adviser on Regulatory Reform. Icahn began as a stockbroker and now is one of the richest Americans, buying and selling companies and a business partner with Trump.

Another cabinet secretary who is worth billions will be Betsy DeVos, Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Education, whose family started the multilevel marketing company Amway. Amway has been successfully sued in the US, Canada and the United Kingdom for fraud, and has paid millions in fines.

Rex W. Tillerson will head Trump’s State Dept. He was president and chief executive of Exxon Mobil, and will get a severance package worth $180 million for leaving his job. Some other billionaires have been appointed by Trump to serve on his economic advisory committee or inaugural committee.

The Republican-dominated Senate appears to be rushing the process of confirming these nominations. They have scheduled six hearings for this Wednesday, apparently hoping to minimize media scrutiny. Several of Trump’s picks have not completed the usual vetting process, which includes tax returns and ethics clearances, which might be complicated for some of the billionaires with vast financial holdings. The head of the Office of Government Ethics, Walter M. Shaub Jr., has said that the Senate has never before held hearings before his office completed its review.

We don’t know yet exactly what policies Trump will direct his cabinet to implement, or even if they all will be confirmed. This is what we do know: none of them have shown the slightest interest in the economic plight of the voters who backed Trump. They are precisely the people who have profited the most from the financial system that Trump said was rigged against most Americans.

Trump not only took plenty of money from the Wall St. Guys. Now he is hiring them to run the government.

Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
Published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, January 10, 2017




http://www.latimes.com/politics/essenti ... story.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

JAN. 10, 2017, 3:04 P.M.
REPORTING FROM WASHINGTON
California's Rep. Dana Rohrabacher is latest lawmaker to pull down painting in Capitol depicting police as pigs


Hours after members of the Congressional Black Caucus rehung the controversial painting depicting police officers as pigs that Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine) pulled down Friday, it's been pulled down twice more by Republican House members.

The painting depicts a clash between police and protesters on a street. In it, gun-w





http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.2943045" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Donald Trump engaged in 'perverted sexual acts,' report says

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Tuesday, January 10, 2017, 7:23 PM

An unconfirmed report says that Donald Trump engaged in "perverted sexual acts" while at a Moscow hotel in 2013.
Russian intelligence monitored Donald Trump engaging in "perverted sexual acts" during his stay in a luxury Moscow hotel, according to an unconfirmed report about compromising material on the President-elect.

A document published in full by BuzzFeed News on Tuesday said that during a 2013 trip to the Russian capital, Trump made Russian prostitutes defile a bed where President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama had stayed on a previous occasion.

The accusations are unconfirmed, tho






http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bro ... -1.2943015" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Every victim. Every time.

That was the message from dozens of women who gathered Tuesday outside Brooklyn’s 94th Precinct to protest an NYPD commander’s dismissive comments about rape.

Days after Capt. Peter Rose landed in hot water for suggesting at a community council meeting last week that some rapes aren’t as bad as others, he was lambasted by representatives of one of the nation’s largest women’s groups.






https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/ ... enhut-fbi/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;




January 10, 2017


From FBI reject to private warlord: the rise of George Wackenhut
File on GEO Group founder illustrates Bureau’s reluctantly close ties to for-profit security

In early February 1945, a 26-year-old man from Upper Darby, Pennsylvania submitted his application for employment to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Like many of his generation, he had just finished his time in the U.S. Army, first in Hawaii and then in Virginia, where he was a Physical Reconditioning Officer and learned to be a fine marksman. Now he wanted a job with the feds, preferably in a position as a physical education instructor and a starting annual salary of $3500.

At the time, the Bureau could offer him no such position; he could take another job at half his asking price. The young man respectfully declined, and the agency felt no great loss. After all, as his files noted, they weren’t too keen on the cut of his jib anyway.



It would not be the last time Hoover’s agency would hear from him. In the decades to come, his relationship to the Bureau would vacillate between one of mutual respect to skepticism and sycophancy. He would, not so long later, get his job with the men in black, and from there he would soon turn his employment into leverage in the private sector, as he would go on to help create - then lead - one of the largest private security firms in the country, an organization that would branch out into corrections and evolve into today’s biggest global name in private imprisonment, GEO Group.

But, at the end of World War II, this man, clocking in at just under 6-feet tall and 190 pounds, was just known as George R. Wackenhut.



Despite ultimate FBI employment of about four years, Wackenhut’s FBI file is hundreds of pages long, a collection of his applicationd assessments, clippings kept by a Hoover concerned by the use of his Bureau’s name to promote profit, and Wackenhut’s letters to its directors - first Hoover and then each other - offering support and help with each transition and public criticism.



By the time George attempted FBI employment again five years after his first attempt, the observing agent had upgraded his impression of the applicant.



This time, it seems, the well-kept man who had spent the intervening years as Chairman of the Physical Education Department at John Hopkins University looked to be a better match for the Agency.



His neighbors and former employers offered positive reviews during the FBI’s background check, though maybe his wife talked too much - not necessarily more than many other ladies but enough to count her as the talkative sort.

On January 27, 1951, J. Edgar Hoover sent Wackenhut his appointment letter. He would make $5000 a year and join the other agents who, at the time, were working six days a week. He would undergo training at Quantico, Virginia, where he made a good impression, and then he was assigned to Atlanta, Georgia, primarily working on check fraud.



His tenure with the Bureau only lasted until 1954, when he submitted his resignation letter, requesting in the process a signed photograph of Mr. Hoover; the man himself obliged.



After three years, a transfer to Indiana, commendations and censures, Wackenhut would join three others to begin their own private security and investigative firm: Fidelifax.



From the outset, it seems, Hoover’s Bureau was concerned about the possibility of their crossing over into the FBI’s jurisdiction, banking on their federal connections and obstructing their own inquiries into the Communist menace.



Nonetheless, Wackenhut kept up friendly relations with his connections at the Bureau, even as the name - Security Services Corporation - and personnel changed.

In 1961, Wackenhut officially introduced Hoover, by way of letter, to the evolution of the security company: The Wackenhut Corporation.



From its inception, the legality of the private security and investigative force has been under question, which nonetheless did little to prevent it from growing quickly.



Meanwhile, the Bureau remained interested in Wackenhut’s personal life, for record-keeping purposes. A rumor regarding the infidelity of both Wackenhut and his wife found its way into the files.



http://www.haaretz.com/us-news/1.764248" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Wall Street Journal
Jewish Insider's Daily Kickoff - January 10, 2017
Haaretz-
Why? An F.B.I. agent based in Paris, Eugene Casey, had learned about Mr. Ramírez's letter to me. In a magazine called The Journal of Counterterrorism and ...


FBI Octopus

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/10/busi ... rster.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

DealBook|Former Top Justice Dept. Lawyer to Join Morrison ...
New York Times-
His prior experience includes serving as chief of staff and senior counsel to Robert S. Mueller III, a former director of the F.B.I. Mr. Carlin was later named to the ...



http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/fbis-use-best- ... be-1600279" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Best Buy 'Geek Squad' technicians outed as paid FBI informants in ...
International Business Times UK-
The case, brought forward in a Californian district court, suggests the FBI placed a ... On 5 January 2012, the filings show, Meade emailed FBI agent Tracey Riley ...


http://motherboard.vice.com/read/314-ac ... pose-trump" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

This Group Wants Scientists to Run America
Motherboard-
Shaughnessy ran for Congress in Pennsylvania again in 2016, but lost to Brian Fitzpatrick, a former FBI agent. She says she can use the experience from her ...





http://www.militaryaerospace.com/press- ... rence.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Advantest Opens Registration for VOICE 2017 Developer Conference
Military & Aerospace Electronics
The VOICE 2017 general session in Palm Springs will also feature a keynote on Cyber Security, by former FBI special agent Chris Tarbell, one of the most




http://fox17.com/news/nation-world/car- ... ter-banner" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Did police egg car leave anti-Semitic note left after Md. couple hung Black Lives Matter banner?
Monday, January 9th 2017





http://www.wfmj.com/story/34220902/da-s ... lly-victim" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

DA says woman arrested in sex fantasy hoax was really victim
WFMJ-Jan 9, 2017
... his commitment to jihad, unaware his words were secretly being recorded by the FBI? .... The man that links the two women is Ian Diaz, an agent with the U.S. ...





https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... a-contacts" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

FBI chief given dossier by John McCain alleging secret Trump ...
The Guardian-
Senator John McCain passed documents to the FBI director, James Comey, last month alleging secret contacts between the Trump campaign and Moscow and ...






http://www.wzzm13.com/news/crime/hearin ... /384866627" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Hearing set for FBI agent accused of shooting at Grand Rapids police
WZZM13.
Hernandez, an eight-year veteran of the FBI with a spotless record, was arraigned last month on two assault charges, including assault with intent to commit ...




http://www.aim.org/aim-column/the-top-t ... s-of-2016/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The Top Ten Misreported and Underreported Stories of 2016
Accuracy In Media
Now that Clinton has lost, postmortems of the election abound: media pundits blame fake news, FBI Director James Comey's FBI investigation, WikiLeaks, and ...







http://deadline.com/2017/01/boston-bomb ... 201882410/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Boston Bombing Book 'Maximum Harm' From ABC News Producer ...
Deadline-
... investigation of the Boston Marathon bombing and the accused brothers which uncovered evidence of one of the brothers' pre-existing relationship to the FBI



http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/fe ... ag-w460272" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Why Lawyers Are Freaking Out About Jeff Sessions as Attorney ...
RollingStone.com
That would make Sessions the top law enforcement officer of the United States, in charge of everything from protecting civil rights to overseeing the FBI.




http://www.local10.com/news/crime/bso-d ... t-shooting" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
CRIME
BSO deputy suspended after tape leaked of Fort Lauderdale airport shooting
Cameraman recording video seen in reflection, mayor says

By Terrell Forney - Reporter , Amanda Batchelor - Senior Digital Editor
Posted: 12:18 PM, January 10, 2017
Updated: 9:40 PM, January 10, 2017






http://blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com/20 ... g-program/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Nebraska Bill Would Restrict ALPR Data, Help Block National ...
Tenth Amendment Center (blog)
With the FBI rolling out facial a nationwide recognition program, and the federal government building biometric databases, the fact that the feds can potentially ...



http://www.dailyfreeman.com/general-new ... apons-case" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Kingston activist Shabazz asks to withdraw guilty plea in weapons ...
The Daily Freeman-
If Shabazz, 61, is allowed to wirthdraw his plea, he would stand trial on the 16-count indictment against him for allegedly selling weapons to undercover FBI ...
p


https://www.indianagazette.com/news/ind ... ,25680265/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Magistrate in Indiana running for third term
Indiana Gazette
He is a graduate of the Pennsylvania State Police Municipal Police Academy, The FBI National Academy and Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where he ...








https://www.romper.com/p/jeff-sessions- ... work-29257" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Jeff Sessions' Conflicts of Interest Are Reportedly Missing From ...
Romper-
Each Cabinet appointee is required to submit to an FBI background check, a financial disclosure, and a letter clearly stating any conflicts of interest, which is







http://www.nj.com/hudson/index.ssf/2017 ... _amid.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Police qre reportedly investigating the Jersey City Police Department's off-duty private security program.
on January 10, 2017 at 10:27 AM, updated January 10, 2017 at 3:30
UPDATE: 12 OFFICERS IDENTIFIED

In the midst of a federal probe of off-duty work performed by Jersey City police officers, the city has stripped 12 cops of their guns and placed them on non-enforcement duty.

The city confirmed the move this morning in a statement from city spokeswoman Jennifer Morrill. Morrill did not reveal the names of the 12 officers.

The news comes as the police department braces for arrests that sources with knowledge of the federal probe say are expected this month. The officers are being investigated possibly for taking improper payments in relation to the off-duty work program, according to law-enforcement sources.







https://caseclosedbylewweinstein.wordpr ... any-means/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

« * Tara O’Toole, the undersecretary for biosecurity at Homeland Security Department, says that the FBI did not establish that the anthrax came from USAMRIID but that it was merely the FBI’s “working hypothesis” and a “supposition”; she mentioned other active hypotheses.* GAO: Why did the FBI redact this 302 interview statement in which its expert collecting samples explained that some of her material resembled the mailed anthrax? Who was responsible for the redaction and what was justification? »
* FBI genetics expert Claire Fraser-Liggett … I think that the (FBI’s use of the) evidence on science probably was misleading … I have no way to know whether or not Bruce Ivins was really the perpetrator

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Bonus read

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.2946394" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Philly teachers encouraging week of lessons on Black Lives Matter
Saturday, January 14, 2017, 11:54 AM


Teachers in Philadelphia plan a Black Lives Matter week
Inform

PHILADELPHIA — A teachers' organization in Philadelphia is encouraging teachers to wear Black Lives Matter T-shirts and buttons and provide lessons on the movement every day for one week.

The Caucus of Working Educators, a faction of the teachers union, is developing lessons plans and curriculum ideas for teachers of grades from kindergarten through high school for the week of Jan. 23. The plans, distilled from the movement's 13 guiding principles, such as embracing diversity and globalism, will be available online , organizers said Friday.

"The vast majority of students that we serve are black, and it's important to affirm the lives of our students," said co-organizer Charlie McGeehan, who is white and teaches high school humanities at The U School, where students work on solving real-world problems.


The organizers said more and more educators are signing on every day, but they don't hav



http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


County sheriff's deputy has been ordered to spend 180 days in jail and five years on probation after pleading guilty to sexually abusing a 12-year-old Costa Mesa girl.

Jovanni Argueta, 26, pleaded guilty Jan. 11 in Orange County Superior Court to committing a lewd or lascivious act with a minor younger than 14 and attempted unlawful sexual intercourse, both felonies. He also pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of disobeying a restraining order, a

Argueta must register as a sex offender for the term of his probation. If he violates probation, he would have to register as a sex offender for life.



http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.2954868" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

NYPD Mounted Unit cop busted for having phone sex with girl, 16



Wednesday, January 25, 2017, 4:00 AM



David P. Stagliano, 38, of Ronkonkoma, was busted Friday and suspended from the NYPD.
A cop in the NYPD’s mounted unit had phone sex with a 16-year-old Long Island girl and sent her video of himself masturbating, according




http://www.elpasotimes.com/story/news/c ... /97004524/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Man gets 15 years in teen sex trafficking case

A man who said he was “attracted to the fast life” was sentenced to 15 years in prison


Link du jour


http://mattofboston.com/tuesday-morning ... tey-48039/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/wom ... d8cad56ee1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



http://jfk.hood.edu/Collection/Weisberg ... m%2001.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



https://ricefarmer.blogspot.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


http://touch.latimes.com/#section/1133/ ... -92411716/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



http://www.motherjones.com/politics/201 ... g-evidence" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politic ... -1.2954880" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Heat is Online
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-01-24/n ... ee/8205356" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



NSW heatwave: Records tumble in Moree, while Sydney set to swelter with top of 40C
By Danuta Kozaki


http://www.latimes.com/local/california ... story.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

JAN. 22, 2017, 6:24 P.M.
Long Beach sets all-time rainfall record; widespread flooding across Southern California
A powerful storm dumped record-breaking rainfall in parts of Southern California, flooding freeways and numerous surface streets.

Southern Los Angeles County was particularly hard hit, with dozens of streets flooded from the Palos Verdes Peninsula through Long Beach and into Orange County.

The National Weather Service said Long Beach Airport set an all-time rain record at 3.87 inches. Other parts of Southern California, including L




http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.2953870" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;






Man exonerated after two cops accused of planting meth on him
BY CHRISTOPHER BRENNAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Monday, January 23, 2017, 8:27 PM



http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow ... story.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

January 24, 2017, 4:50 p.m.
Dozens of wrongful conviction lawsuits still are pending against the city of Chicago, a high-level city attorney told aldermen Tuesday, even after a yearslong parade of settlements of such cases have already drained tens of millions of dollars from the pockets of taxpayers.

At least two of the pending cases involve allegations from the era of Jon Burge, First Assistant Corporation Counsel Jane Elinor Notz said, referring to the disgraced former police commander who is alleged to have led a team of detectives in the 1970s and 1980s that tortured false confessions out scores of African-American suspects

. And there are 25 other cases in which convictions were reversed and the people initially found guilty later accused police of misconduct, she said.

Notz spoke during a Finance Committee meeting at which aldermen recommended approval of a $4 million settlement in the lawsuit filed by Shawn Whirl, who spent nearly a quarter-century behind bars in a case linked to the Burge era.

Ald. John Arena, 45th, noted the human and financial costs of the Burge era and other police misconduct cases, saying it highlighted the need to implement the recommendations in a recent U.S. Department of Justice report that concluded the city does not effectively deal with police misconduct.

"Decades later, the city — the taxpayers of Chicago — are still trying to make restitution because of that approach to policing that hopefully collectively we can weed out from our police force," said Arena, referring to settlements surrounding the Burge era.

The Burge-era litigation and claims against the city and Cook County state's attorney's office have cost taxpayers more than $111 million, according to one tally. And all police misconduct settlements since 2004 have cost the city more than $500 million.

The numbers are relevant as some aldermen







http://www.chron.com/politics/election/ ... o-12227285" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Menu
Photos: Protest signs from Donald Trump's Inauguration Day from around the world





http://touch.latimes.com/#section/1130/ ... -92359716/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;





L.A. to pay $5.2 million in wrongful imprisonment case



Los Angeles will pay $5.2 million to end a legal battle with a man whose murder conviction was tossed out.

The settlement with Reggie Cole is the latest in a string of legal payouts that are spurring the city to borrow at least $50 million to avoid dipping into its emergency reserve funds.

Cole and his friend Obie Anthony were convicted in the murder of Felipe Gonzales Angeles, who was shot to death outside a South L.A. brothel in 1994.

At trial they insisted they were innocent, and no physical evidence connected the pair to the crime. The two were later freed and both sued the city for wrongful imprisonment. Attorneys alleged that LAPD detectives had used illegal methods and concealed crucial evidence in the case.

Two years ago, the city agreed







http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.2954762" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



Secret Service agent did not want to take bullet for Trump
BY CHRISTOPHER BRENNAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Tu




http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politic ... -1.2954647" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Politics
President Trump institutes media blackouts at EPA, USDA
Updated: Tuesday, January 24, 2017


http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.2955150" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The lawmaker was already in hot water after paying $1,000 fine last year for misuse of state property. He admitted to engaging in mutual masturbation in 2015 with a woman on Skype.

Kintner reported the cybersex to the Nebraska State Patrol after the woman threatened to expose him if he didn't pay her $4,500.

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Blink Tank


This Country Has The Most Humane Prison System

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_B0Bt16BflY" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;






Link du jour


https://www.theguardian.com/media/galle ... g-pictures" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;





http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.2971384" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;




An East Harlem cop with an “odd fetish” on the job illegally stuck his finger in a disabled man’s anus during a bogus search at a bodega, a new lawsuit claims.

John Hidalgo says he went to a deli on E. 106th St. between First and Second Aves. on Sept. 7 to buy his daughter candy.

After greeting the clerk, a plainclothes NYPD officer in the store told Hidalgo he had a “bulge” in his shirt — which Hidalgo explained was his cell phone in a belt holder. He showed the officer the device.


But the officer, identified in the suit as Officer Febres from the 23rd Precinct, insisted on conducting a search. Despite not finding contraband, he allegedly “slipped his hands up into Plaintiff's shorts, and reached his hand to his underwear and started fondling, squeezing, jerking and pinching Plaintiff's testicles through his underwear,” Hidalgo's Manhattan federal lawsuit alleges.



http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bro ... -1.2971767" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;




A tattoo artist who alleges he was sodomized by police in a subway station and the city are still far apart on a settlement amount to end the long-running suit.

Michael Mineo, 32, is keeping on with a police brutality suit after two previous trials ended in hung juries.

Three officers were previously acquitted of criminal charges connected to the 2008 incident in which Mineo alleged cops restrained him and sodomized him with a police baton during his arrest for smoking marijuana in a Prospect Park subway station.


During a Monday court date, city lawyer Karl Ashanti said the sides haven’t had any recent settlement talks.

Michael Mineo at the courthouse where officer Richard Kern testified at his trial for aggravated sexual assa





Heat is Online



This is February? 80°F in Denver, 99° in Oklahoma, 66° in Iceland, 116° in Australia



By: Bob Henson , 4:17 PM GMT on February 14, 2017


The strong, recurrent Pacific jet stream that’s been delivering massive amounts of rain to California has also been pushing mild Pacific air downslope off the Rockies and eastward, keeping the southern two-thirds of the U.S. absurdly warm for early February. From New Mexico to Virginia southward to the Gulf Coast, trees and shrubs are budding out en masse up to three weeks ahead of schedule (see Figure 1). In Texas, Dallas-Fort Worth recorded its last freezing temperature on January 8. With no freezes expected into at least the last week of the month, there’s a chance that the Jan. 8 reading of 20°F will be DFW’s last freeze of the winter. That would eclipse the earliest final freeze of the season (Feb. 5, 2000), in records extending back to 1899. The February warmth comes after a three-month span that was milder in Texas than any Nov/Dec/Jan period since the 1930s Dust Bowl, according to state climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon.

The warm, moist air prevailing along the South has been teaming up with occasional jet-stream intrusions to produce severe thunderstorms, including an unusually large number of tornadoes for the year thus far. This includes six confirmed tornadoes across southeast Louisiana on February 7, with an EF3 twister causing more than 30 injuries and damaging or destroying more than 600 homes in and near East New Orleans (see the detailed National Weather Service survey report on all six tornadoes). As of February 13, NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center had tallied 163 U.S. tornadoes for the year thus far, not quite a record but far above average. On Tuesday morning, NOAA/SPC placed parts of the western and central Gulf Coast under a slight risk of severe weather, with a small enhanced-risk area along the central Texas coast near a large thunderstorm complex that had already produced several tornado reports west of Houston.


Figure 1. An index of the seasonal progress of leafy plants shows conditions 20 days or more ahead of schedule over large parts of the South and Southwest as of Sunday, February 12. Image credit: USA National Phenology Network via @TheresaCrimmins.


Figure 2. Spectators watch as a tornado-damaged water tower comes down in Rowlett, TX, on Monday, Feb. 6, 2017. Workers toppled the Dallas-area water tower that was severely damaged during a 2015 tornado outbreak blamed for more than a dozen deaths. Image credit: Vernon Bryant/The Dallas Morning News via AP.

Close to the century mark in Oklahoma
While there’s been quite a few ups and downs to the national temperature picture in recent days, with frequent frontal passages, the low temperatures haven’t been all that low and the highs have been unusually high, as noted by WU blogger Steve Gregory. For the month to date through February 12, NOAA had compiled a preliminary total of 1207 daily record highs and 10 daily record lows, for a staggering ratio of more than 100 to 1. It’s a picture in line with recent months: November 2016 had the largest ratio of record highs to lows of any month in modern records. It’s also consistent with the inexorable effect of human-produced greenhouse gases in boosting temperatures to make record warmth more widespread and extreme than record cold.

One especially strong pulse of warm air jet pushed across the Southern Rockies and into the South from Friday into Sunday. As the already-mild air descended the Rockies, it warmed further due to downslope compression, leading to some eye-popping readings. Several stations in southwest Oklahoma soared into the upper 90s on Saturday. The town of Magnum hit an astounding-for-February 99°F, which tied the state record for any winter month (Dec/Jan/Feb) that was set at Arapaho on Feb. 24, 1918.

Here’s a sampling of the all-time February heat records set over the past several days. In many cases, you have to go to mid-March to find comparable warmth!

Friday 2/10:
Wichita Falls, TX: 94°F (next-earliest reading at least this warm was 98°F on 3/1/2006; records began in 1923)
Liberal, KS: 90°F (next-earliest 90° was 3/11/1989; records began in 1893)
Amarillo, TX: 89°F (next-earliest 89° was 3/10/1989; records began in 1892)
Goodland, KS: 87°F (next-earliest 87° was 3/10/1989; records began in 1895)
Denver, CO: 80°F (next-earliest reading at least this warm was 81°F on 3/16/2015; records began in 1872). A cooperative observing station at the site of Denver’s former Stapleton Airport, where official readings were taken until the mid-1990s, reported 83°F.

Saturday 2/11:
Lubbock, TX: 91°F (next-earliest reading at least this warm was 95°F on 3/11/1989; records began in 1911)

Sunday 2/12:
Norfolk, VA: 82°F (ties all-time monthly high set on 2/4/1890 and other dates; records began in 1874)



Figure 3. High temperatures across Oklahoma on Saturday, February 11, were similar to readings one might expect in early July. Image credit: Oklahoma Mesonet, @okmesonet.



Figure 4. Temperature departures from average for the period February 1-12, 2017. The warm anomalies will likely persist, as models are calling for continued milder-than-average weather over most of the nation through late February. Image credit: NOAA/CPC Climate Prediction Center.


Cold enough to ski; too mild to ice-climb
The abnormally mild February hasn’t put a dent in Colorado’s bang-up ski season. The highest slopes are still more than cold enough to support a healthy snowpack even with above-average temperatures. At opensnow.com, Joel Gratz noted that the statewide snowpack as of Sunday, February 12, had already matched the level reached during the early-April peak of an average year. “What an awesome season so far with more to come!” exclaimed Gratz. Meanwhile, at Colorado’s lower elevations, those hankering for winter recreation felt the pinch of unseasonal warmth. The state’s Ouray Ice Park climbing venue was forced to close for the season on Friday, February 10, a full month earlier than average. “While we still hold a glimmer of hope for this season at the Park, that is fading fast,” said the park in a plaintive online statement.

Surges of warmth continue to funnel into high Arctic
The strong jet streams crossing the U.S. of late have spun up several powerful Northeast snowstorms (see embedded video below) and gone on to push very mild, moist air deep into the Arctic. One such spike arrived late last week, with temperatures of 50°F or more above average approaching the North Pole as reported by Capital Weather Gang and The Weather Network (Canada).

Well downstream from the nor’easter that was slamming eastern New England on Monday, a swath of low-latitude air pushed the temperature at Eyjabakkar, Iceland, up to 19.1°C (66.4°F). If validated, this will rank a full 1°C (1.8°F) above the previous national record for February, set at Dalatangi on Feb. 17, 1998, according to international weather records researcher Maximiliano Herrera. He adds that temperatures in the free atmosphere over central Sweden were analyzed above the freezing mark on Monday at heights of up to 11,000 feet.

Unsurprisingly, the extent of Arctic sea ice remains at record-low levels for mid-February. Moreover, the extent of Antarctic sea ice is on the brink of setting a record-low value for any time of year.


Figure 5. This year is lagging all other years since records began in 1979 for sea ice extent in February. Image credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center.


Figure 6. Smoke billows from a wildfire near Mudgee, Australia, on Monday, Feb. 13, 2017. The fire has consumed more than 5000 hectares (12,350 acres) of bush and grasslands northwest of Sydney. Image credit: New South Wales Rural Fire Service via AP.

Eastern Australia blisters in all-time record heat
Another swarm of heat records invaded eastern Australia, where a brutal summer is unfolding. Port Macquairie, where records have been kept since 1910, broke its all-time record for any date on Sunday with a scorching high of 46.6°C (115.9°F). That’s an incredible 3.3°C (5.9°F) above the city’s previous all-time high. “You don’t break [100-plus-year] records by 3C,” noted Andrew Watkins (@windjunky). An even older all-time high fell at Toowoomba, Queensland, where a maximum of 40.3°C (104.5°F) was the first reading above 40°C (104°F) since records began at Toowoomba way back in 1869. Fire danger across parts of tinder-dry New South Wales has been at near-





http://www.dailyclimate.org/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Investors with $2.8 trillion in assets unite against Donald Trump’s climate change denial.
The world’s biggest investors are joining forces to unite against Donald Trump in the fight against climate change. The Independent, United Kingdom.

US EPA workers try to block Pruitt in show of defiance.
Employees of the Environmental Protection Agency are calling their senators to try to defeat Scott Pruitt’s confirmation to run the agency. New York Times.

Trump administration takes down public-facing directory of Energy Department employees.
The Department of Energy has taken down its public-facing employee directory, making it far more difficult for journalists and members of the public to locate email addresses and phone numbers for agency personnel. Mashable.






http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/exc ... -1.2974812" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


EXCLUSIVE: Sergeant in charge of Bronx cop indicted for drunken driving on the job placed on modified duty
BY ROCCO PARASCANDOLA
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, February 16, 2017, 4:13 PM





https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... rth-dakota" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Veterans at Standing Rock see police retribution after arrest and charges
Charges against military veterans on their way to Standing Rock have raised concerns that they’re being targeted for aiding Native American activists
Matthew Crane, a founding member of VeteransRepsond, was charged with possession of medical marijuana. ‘It makes me sick that veterans are being attacked.’
Matthew Crane, a founding member of VeteransRepsond, was charged with possession of medical marijuana. ‘It makes me sick that veterans are being attacked.’

Police have filed charges against two US veterans supporting Standing Rock, holding one in jail for several days, raising concerns that law enforcement is trying to prevent them from aiding activists at the Dakota Access pipeline.





http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyp ... -1.2972518" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;





SEE IT: Pregnant 17-year-old girl screams in agony as NYPD cops shock her with Taser in the Bronx
BY GRAHAM RAYMAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Tuesday, February 14, 2017, 4:02 PM







http://ticklethewire.com/2017/02/14/dea ... a-website/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


DEA Removes Misleading Information about Marijuana from Its Website


The DEA has removed from its website information deemed inaccurate about marijuana following months of public pressure.

Americans for Safe Access, a national nonprofit dedicated to making cannabis legal, filed a legal request with the Justice Department last year in hopes of forcing the DEA to remove factually inaccurate information, the L.A. Daily Post reports.

The nonprofit claimed there were more than 25 false statements on the DEA’s website, including inaccuracies about marijuana causing psychosis and irreversible cognitive declines.

“The DEA’s removal of these popular myths about cannabis from their website could mean the end of the Washington gridlock” said Steph Sherer, executive director of Americans for Safe Access. “This is a victory for medical cannabis patients across the nation, who rely on cannabis to treat serious illnesses. The federal government now admits that cannabis is not a gateway drug, and doesn’t cause long-term brain damage, or psychosis. While the fight to end stigma around cannabis is far from over, this is a big first step.”





http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.2960167" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Former inmate claims Ohio jail guards raped her after she was refused epilepsy medication



: Tuesday, January 31, 2017, 3:05 AM





http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/cus ... -1.2972414" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Customs officer busted for letting drug smugglers through JFK airport inspections






Tuesday, February 14, 2017, 3:11 PM






http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.2973897" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Brooklyn jail officer accused of sexually assaulting female inmate in Westchester County women’s jail


Wednesday, February 15, 2017, 9:36 PM

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/ ... ttack.html

'60 Minutes' Reveals Undercover FBI Agent On Scene At Garland, TX Prior toTerror Attack
143 Shares
Posted By Ian Schwartz
On Date March 26, 2017

On this week's broadcast of CBS News' 60 Minutes, correspondent Anderson Cooper reports an undercover FBI agent tracking jihadists responsible for the Garland, Texas terrorist attack was on the scene prior to the commission of the act.





http://woodtv.com/2017/03/27/body-cam-v ... t-at-grpd/

Body Cam Video Shows Drunk, Armed FBI Agent at Grand Rapids Police Department


A drunk and armed FBI agent walked inside Grand Rapids Police Department headquarters after his partner was arrested for shooting at officers.
Agent John Salazar hasn’t been charged, even though he was in possession of a gun while being drunk. He also appeared to drive to police headquarters, WoodTV.com reports.
His partner, Ruben Hernandez was in custody after firing at a Grand Rapids officer outside of a gym.
Body cam footage shows Salazar acting strangely.
Records obtained by 24 Hour News 8 show that Salazar and Hernandez bought 12 beers at a steakhouse before going to Sensations Showgirls nightclub for five more drinks.


http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2017/m ... police-de/

Louisville mayor asks FBI to investigate police department after sex abuse allegations
SUNDAY, MARCH 26, 2017, 1:07 P.M.
LOUISVILLE – A former participant in a Boy Scouts-affiliated career apprentice program for teenagers has alleged that two Louisville Metro Police Department officers sexually abused him in their homes and vehicles while they were working with him, and the city’s mayor has asked the FBI to look into the police department’s actions.
The accuser has alleged that the officers assaulted and raped him from when the boy was 17 years old until he was 19, at times filming the sex acts. He also alleged that police department officials – including the police chief and the head of internal affairs – knew about and covered up the assaults, which allegedly occurred while the victim was taking part in the Youth Explorer program to learn about policing and criminal justice as a potential career path.
The investigation appears to have begun in September, when Louisville police executed a search warrant at the home of officer Brandon Wood. There, investigators found videos of a sexual nature that allegedly involved the victim and Wood. Another police officer, Kenneth Betts, is also accused of abusing the victim. Betts left the force in 2013; Wood remains a police officer and is on administrative assignment. No charges have been filed in the case.





http://ticklethewire.com/2017/03/27/par ... s-arrival/

Parker: Police Officer Liability in Shootings Argued Before Gorsuch’s Arrival

Ross Parker was chief of the criminal division in the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Detroit for 8 years and worked as an AUSA for 28 in that office.

The muddied area of the law in civil actions against police officers involved in a shooting is one where Justice Neil Gorsuch’s participation and vote could make a difference, most likely in favor of protecting the officers. The Supreme Court heard argument last week in County of Los Angeles v. Mendez, a Section 1983 action against the county and two LA Sheriff’s Deputies.
It is an old legal adage that bad facts make bad law. From a law enforcement perspective, the case presents that kind of context.
First the present atmosphere surrounding police shootings, particularly of minority members, particularly where a rule or policy violation is present, is very unforgiving of split second decisions by police officers in the heat of situations reasonably perceived to be dangerous. See The War on Cops by Heather Mac Donald. One publication has described the case as involving the question if the police can “troll you and then shoot you.”
Second the atmosphere was especially stacked where the victim was, after the fact, found to be an innocent who suffered serious injuries.
The deputies were seeking a parole violator in 2010 when they knocked and announced their identity at a house in Los Angeles and then entered and searched it. In violation of the 4th Amendment, they lacked either an arrest or search warrant. Finding no one, two of them were sent to check a dilapidated shack in the backyard behind the house. Without announcing their identity or purpose, they opened the door with guns drawn. Not knowing who they were, Mendez picked up a BB gun he used to kill rats but did not point it at the officers. The deputies opened fire with 15 shots wounding Mendez and his pregnant girlfriend. Mendez later had to have his leg amputated because of his injuries.
The “Provocation” Rule
At the conclusion of the federal bench trial, the judge sustained liability and awarded the plantiffs $4 million in damages. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the judgment under the alternative theories that the officers had provoked the threatening situation and that their constitutional violation, under the circumstances, was the proximate cause of the excessive force causing the injuries.

The “provocation” rule is opposed by law enforcement because it ignores principles of qualified immunity and focuses on events prior to the reasonableness of the officers’ action at the time of the shooting. Such a rule would, they argue, encourage police to hesitate and thus result in increased danger to both them and the subjects. The legal analysis has been widely discredited by other appellate courts.
Plaintiffs argue that it is unfair to shield officers from liability for unreasonably dangerous situations which they created or contributed to by their own actions.
The wide gap in views on what legal principles and analysis should be employed by the parties and lower courts was reflected by the apparent attitudes by the 8 Justices during oral argument last week. Even the fundamentals of the law in this area are confusingly uncertain.
The case could very well end up in a 4-4 tie between the Justices who support a finding that an unconstitutional entry satisfied proximate cause for the injury (likely Kagan, Sotomayor, Breyer, and Ginsburg) and those who could discern no proximate cause between any constitutional violation and the result (likely Roberts, Alito, Thomas and Kennedy). A tie would uphold the 9th Circuit’s affirmance of liability and damages. Of course predicting individual votes in a murky area of the law is a perilous course taken only by the most stalwart of columnists (who have nothing to lose).
Ominously the 13 Amicus Curiae briefs are split almost equally divided in their support of the two sides of the case.
Almost Justice Gorsuch’s disciplined and conservative approach could bring clarity in this area. Of course it is likely to be a clarity very unhelpful to the victims of police shootings.






https://oig.justice.gov/special/9704a/00exesum.htm

Unabomber CIA NSA FBI Conspiracy funding Echelon, Clathrate Gun ...
www.unabombers.com/
An expose of the FBI's Unabomber Cover-up. ... FBI Agent Frederick Whitehurst's congressional report also accused agent Thurman of fabricating evidence ...


Manhunt: Unabomber: Scripted Discovery Series Debuts in August
TV Series Finale-
The scripted drama stars Sam Worthington as FBI agent Jim “Fitz” Fitzgerald and Paul Bettany as Ted Kaczynski. The debut episode is a two-hour special.

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

http://www.sfchronicle.com/news/article ... 043623.php



The hottest story about Trump and Russia you never heard

April 2, 2017 Updated: April 2, 2017 6:00am
12
Photo: Evan Vucci, Associated Press In this March 31, 2017, photo, President Donald Trump listens during a meeting with the National Association of Manufacturers in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington. Slim majorities of Americans favor independent investigations into Trump’s relationship with the Russian government and possible attempts by Russia to influence last year’s election according to a new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)




.This season of “Homeland,” the TV espionage thriller that continues to grip me, is particularly dark and twisted. But it has nothing on real life, as President Trump’s regime and the deep state continue to wrap their oily tentacles around each other’s throats. In season six of the Showtime series, brilliant bipolar spook Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes) thinks she has safely escaped the CIA vortex, only to be dragged into the whirlpool of a violent Washington power struggle that pits a female president-elect (yes, the show’s writers were just as fooled by Hillary Clinton’s “inevitability” as the rest of us) against a ruthless CIA faction aligned with a vast Breitbart News-type fake news operation. Nuclear peace in the Middle East hangs in the balance. Ho-hum. Like I said, art pales before reality in today’s Washington.


There’s so much political drama and intrigue unfolding by the hour in the nation’s capital that not even news junkies can keep up with it. In the latest reality episode of Trump’s Washington, FBI Director James Comey emerged as the liberal media’s hero. The towering, 6-foot-8 lawman is now portrayed as the only one with the power to bring down the clownish, orange-haired villain — by laying bare the truth about his corrupt pact with Russian archenemy Vladimir Putin. Now that’s entertainment!

But sorry, I’m not buying this story line. James Comey? The same wily Washington operator who tipped the election to Trump in the final days of the presidential race by reviving Clinton’s email issues? He’s no hero of mine.






http://macedoniaonline.eu/content/view/31721/61/

Kucinich: Who Influenced US Elections? His Name is James Comey
MINA-Mar 31, 2017
Two-time US Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich discussed the hearing. ... “I would also say that there is plenty of proof that FBI Director Comey ...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/na ... a48d3b4ccc

April 3 at 11:47 PM
Attorney General Jeff Sessions ordered Justice Department officials to review reform agreements with troubled police forces nationwide, saying it was necessary to ensure that these pacts do not work against the Trump administration’s goals of promoting officer safety and morale while fighting violent crime.

In a two-page memo released Monday, Sessions said agreements reached previously between the department’s civil rights division and local police departments — a key legacy of the Obama administration — will be subject to review by his two top deputies, throwing into question whether all of the agreements will stay in place

http://www.clarionledger.com/story/news ... /99743248/
April 1, 2017
Tishomingo Police Officer Russ Robinson committed suicide March 24 after admitting to authorities he had molested minors.

His admission came after the Alcorn County Sheriff’s Department, with assistance from the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation, questioned the 53-year-old officer about allegations he molested a 17-year-old boy after flashing his headlights to get the teen to pull over.



RELATED:x-deputy gets 40 years for sex crimes against children

It was not the first time molestation allegations had arisen against Robinson, but it was the first time authorities took action to address them.

Several years earlier, Robinson, a deputy then for Tishomingo County, left his part-time job at Brooks Grocery in Iuka following another such accusation.

Asked if Robinson had been fired, owner Davis Brooks replied, “I don’t want to comment. That’s private information.”

Asked if Robinson had been fired because he allegedly molested a young male there, Brooks replied, “I told you before, that’s private information.”

Robinson left the Tishomingo County Sheriff's Department after a new sheriff was elected in 2015 and began working for the Tishomingo Police Department.

Tishomingo Police Chief Mike Kemp said he was aware that authorities on March 23 were questioning Robinson about molestation allegations.

“(The allegations of molestation) happened in another county,” Kemp said. “I knew he wasn’t charged.”

He said Robinson was still working for the police department at the time of his death.

Asked about Brooks Grocery, Kemp said Robinson was never fired from there.

“There were some innuendoes,” Kemp said. “We determined that he resigned from Brooks Grocery. I don’t think there was any molesting. Certainly no charges were made.”

The rumor, Kemp said, was that Robinson had said something inappropriate.

“Nobody ever contacted us or said anything,” he said. “I had heard the rumor, but until I had concrete information, there was nothing I could do.”

Asked if he questioned Robinson about this, Kemp said no.

He explained that he was never approached by anyone with any information.

But Kemp was working at the sheriff’s department several years ago with Robinson and then-narcotics officer Jeff Palmer.

Palmer’s estranged wife, Leigh, recalled him coming home several years ago and talking about a surveillance video from Brooks Grocery, which supposedly showed molestation by Robinson.

She said he worried this matter could "come back and bite them” since no criminal action was taken against Robinson.

Palmer denied all of this, saying it was a lie and that his wife has admitted under oath to lying in the past when she was mad.

Documents show Jeff Palmer's veracity was called into question when he failed a polygraph test in which he was asked about using drug buy money for personal use.

Palmer, who is no longer in law enforcement, had been suspended from the state Bureau of Narcotics after he was accused of falsifying and forging vouchers “for the purchase of information and evidence








http://www.journalnow.com/opinion/colum ... 24276.html

Paul Ohm: Internet bill could give FBI massive power
By Paul Ohm The Washington Post Apr 2, 2017

Many are outraged about congressional efforts to eviscerate Internet privacy regulations set by the Federal Communications Commission under President Barack Obama. But a frightening aspect to the current bill remains underappreciated: If signed, it could result in the greatest legislative expansion of the FBI’s surveillance power since 2001’s Patriot Act.

Don’t believe anyone who suggests that the law merely returns us to the state of the world before the FCC finalized its landmark privacy rules in October. The obvious reason Internet service providers (ISPs) burned through time, money, political capital and customer goodwill to push for this law was to ask for a green light to engage in significantly more user surveillance than they had ever before had the audacity to try.

This must be the reason, because on paper, the law accomplishes little. President Trump’s handpicked choice to head the FCC, Ajit Pai, already began work to roll back these rules in a more orderly fashion. Make no mistake: ISPs aren’t just asking for relief from a supposedly onerous rule; they want Congress’s blessing. With Trump’s signing of the bill, diminishing the FCC’s power to police privacy online, ISPs will feel empowered — perhaps even encouraged — by Republicans (no Democrats voted for this measure) to spy on all of us as they never have before. And spy they will.

How, then, does this law — which would directly affect only private behavior — benefit the FBI? From 2001 to 2005, I worked for the Justice Department and spent a lot of my time advising law-enforcement agents and prosecutors who wanted to track Internet behavior. Many of our investigations led directly to a specific IP address — the identifier for a particular computer or device — which then prompted a request to an ISP for more information. Tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of these requests arrive at ISPs around the country every year.

Many — perhaps most — of these requests do not involve criminals; instead, they lead to victims of crimes, mere witnesses or otherwise innocent people. These requests have typically sought only information about the identity of the person associated with the IP address because the FBI understands that this is the only information ISPs tend to

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html


L.A. NOW
Why some of the most controversial police shootings aren't on video

Kate MatherThe LAPD has acknowledged that failing to turn on body-worn cameras before a critical incident is a concern and said it is trying to remedy the issue. But similar failures by officers are bedeviling police agencies around the co




http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3015570

La. officer gets 40 years for fatally shooting autistic boy, 6
BY CHRISTOPHER BRENNAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Friday, March 31, 2017, 7:


Blink Tank

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=m8yvIecDL1Q


http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/p ... -1.3015368

former police officer who most recently worked as a dentist in Pennsylvania was charged with raping an unconscious patient while she was under anesthesia.

Wade Newman served as a State College police officer from 1991 to 1994 before he shifted into his dentistry career. He’s been the executive officer of Bellefonte Family Dentistry for 17 years and previously served as the president of the Pennsylvania Dental Association, the Centre Daily Times




http://ticklethewire.com/2017/04/04/hom ... -gun-work/

Homeland Security Employee Gets 18 Months in Prison After Bringing Gun to Work

A Homeland Security employee who brought a loaded gun to work was sentenced to 18 months in prison Monday.

Jonathan Leigh Wienke, 46, was convicted in December of making a firearm violation of the National Firearms Act by attaching a silencer to his pistol, NBC Washington reports.

Wienke was found with a gun, knife, pepper spray, thermal imaging equipment and radio devices at his job at agency headquarters on Nebraska Avenue in northeast Washington D.C.

A search warrant of his home turned up 19 firearms and up to 50,000 rounds of ammunition.

An agent said in cour documents that there was “probable cause



http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bro ... -1.3016296

An NYPD officer was caught on tape asking Brooklyn high school students if they want to “ride the lightning” while carrying what appeared to be his unholstered Taser at his side, according to a viral video posted on YouTube.

The footage, uploaded on Saturday, appears to show two officers trying to herd kids away from the corner of Bedford Ave. and Campus Road by Midwood High School on March 16.

The teenagers can be heard talking back to the cops as they tried to move them along, with one student picking up a handful of snow.

That’s when one of the officers is seen on video pulling out what appears to be his Taser.

Donor, cops in corrupt scheme hope bribery ruling clears them

One police officer is shown holding his baton and pulling out his taser as he and his partner shoo away a group of students from the front of Midwood High School. (ALEX VITALE VIA YOUTUBE)
“Do you wanna ride the lightning?” he asks on the footage, adding “you better walk away” as the rowdy youths cross the street.

CUNY Prof. Alex Vitale, who shot and uploaded the video, said that he didn’t know why the officers were there, but their actions appeared unwarranted.

“The whole interaction seemed like an abuse of authority,” said Vitale



http://nypost.com/video/suspect-fatally ... wn-weapon/



Suspect fatally shot with his own weapon
April 4, 2017
Police bodycam footage has been released from an incident in Utah in which a man was shot by police with his own gun. Nicolas Sanchez had been approached by officers after they had been called about a suspicious individual trespassing, and when he


http://fortune.com/2017/04/01/comey-fbi-reporter-outed/


How a Reporter Outed Undercover Accounts Likely Belonging to FBI Boss James Comey
Robert Hackett
Apr 01, 2017




http://www.wkbw.com/news/buffalo-man-ch ... -fbi-gates




Buffalo man charged after crashing into FBI gates


FBI Lie Bomb

1.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/a ... story.html





2.



http://www.nytimes.com/1988/08/21/us/fb ... court.html


F.B.I. KEPT A FILE ON SUPREME COURT
Special to the New York Times
Published: August 21, 1988
The Federal Bureau of Investigation kept a confidential file on the United States Supreme Court from 1932 until at least 1985, according to recently obtained F.B.I. documents.

The 2,076-page file, much of it compiled during the tenure of Director J. Edgar Hoover, contains everything from suspicions about possible Communist influences on the Court in the 1950's to the use of Court employees as F.B.I. sources. The file was obtained by Alexander Charns, a Durham lawyer and freelance journalist, under the Freedom of Information Act.

Other F.B.I. documents, obtained by earlier freedom of information requests, show that the F.B.I. wiretapped or monitored conversations involving four men who served on the Court: Earl Warren, William O. Douglas, Abe Fortas and Potter Stewart.

It is not clear from the documents whether all the conversations occurred while the four were on the Court. Nor is it clear, in most instances, whether the F.B.I. listened to actual conversations of the four Justices, or conversations involving them. Stewart's Voice Is Heard

Justice Stewart, who served on the Court from 1959 to 1981, was heard in two monitored conversations. He was not the target of the wiretap, the bureau documents show. The dates of the conversations and the target of the investigations that occasioned the wiretaps were not revealed.

Ramsey Clark, who was Attorney General from 1967 to 1969 and as such officially in charge of the F.B.I., said he had not been aware of such a file on the Supreme Court.

Told of the file, whose existence was first reported last week in The Durham Morning Herald, Mr. Clark described the disclosure as worrisome ''considering the history of the F.B.I. and its ideology.'' Mr. Clark said he did not recall ever being asked to authorize electronic surveillance of a Justice or being told of a wiretap involving a Justice.

Spokesmen for the F.B.I. repeatedly declined to comment. Material Changes With Years

Kenneth O'Reilly, professor of history at the University of Alaska at Anchorage and author of ''Hoover and the Unamericans,'' said that wiretapping was so pervasive from the 1940's to the 1960's that ''virtually everyone was overheard'' who was important in Washington politics.

The documents, which include newspaper articles, clippings from The Congressional Record and internal F.B.I. memorandums, show the F.B.I.'s relations with, and changing attitude toward, the Court from 1932 to 1985.

The earlier material includes references to personal favors, such as help with travel arrangements, that the bureau furnished the Justices and their families. Much of the material after Mr. Hoover's death in 1972 includes references to security checks for prospective Court employees that the F.B.I. furnished at the Court's request.

In the late 1950's, the F.B.I. became increasingly concerned about what it believed were pro-Communist decisions by the Court. F.B.I. records previously released show that Justice Douglas's loyalty was questioned by Mr. Hoover and his top aides in that era because of his views involving the Constitutional rights of Communists. Rosenberg Case Is Mentioned

Also, according to the file, select Court employees served as F.B.I. sources of information during the Rosenberg atomic spy case in the early 1950's.

The chief of the Supreme Court police, Capt. Philip H. Crook, was described in a 1953 memorandum as having ''furnished immediately all information heard by his men stationed throughout the Supreme Court building. He kept special agents advised of the arrival and departure of persons having important roles in this case.''

An F.B.I. memorandum states that Harold B. Willey, then Clerk of the Supreme Court, made suggestions to F.B.I. agents as to the best places to be in order to ''know at once what action individual judges, or the court as a whole, was taking. They also advised as soon as legally possible any action contemplated by the defense lawyers.''

A few days after the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg in 1953, an F.B.I. memo recommended that Mr. Willey; T. Perry Lippitt, the





http://staging.hosted.ap.org/dynamic/st ... 5-18-17-43
CAN HACK BUT NOT SHOOT? FBI MAY EASE ENTRY FOR CYBER AGENTS


WASHINGTON -- Aspiring federal agents who can hack a computer with ease but can't shoot their way out of a paper bag could soon find the FBI to be more welcoming.

In a series of recent speeches, FBI Director James Comey has hinted the bureau may adjust its hiring requirements to attract top-notch cyber recruits, the better to compete with private sector companies who can lure the sharpest technical minds with huge salary offers.

He's floated the idea of scrapping a requirement that agents who leave the FBI but want to return after two years must re-enroll in the bureau's storied but arduous Quantico, Virginia, training academy. He's also lamented, half-jokingly, that otherwise qualified applicants may be discouraged from applying because

msfreeh
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https://uk.news.yahoo.com/fbi-agent-pue ... 30316.html



FBI agent in Puerto Rico accused of kicking neighbor's dog



May 2 2017
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico

An FBI agent in Puerto Rico has been accused of kicking his neighbor's Yorkshire terrier in the head.

Police said Tuesday that 46-year-old Timothy Boruff was charged with animal abuse and posted a $500 bond. He is scheduled to appear in court May 17.

Authorities say the alleged incident occurred April 21 in the upscale private community of Palmas del Mar along Puerto Rico's eastern coast.





http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2017/05/02/ ... oplifting/



2 Investigators: Chicago Detective Has Rap Sheet For Shoplifting


May 2, 2017 10:20 PM

Cherie Hendricks, a veteran Chicago Police Department detective, was arrested at a Louisiana Walmart on Christmas Eve for stealing $113.50 worth of reading glasses and coffee mugs.

She was placed into a court-ordered diversion program, typically reserved for first time offenders.

This wasn’t Hendricks’ first incident, the 2 Investigators have learned.

Hendricks was arrested for shoplifting more than $200 worth of vitamins in 2013 at a Lakeview Whole Foods, but has not faced any discipline. The Chicago Police Department opened an internal investigation after Hendricks was caught. Four years later, the 2 Investigators were told that probe is still “open and active.”

The U.S. Department of Justice’s investigation into the Chicago Police Department, completed last January, found “officers are too rarely held accountable for misconduct” and “when investigations do occur they are glacially slow.”

David Bradford, a former police chief and executive director of Northwestern University’s Center for Public Safety, said the lack of discipline is detrimental because “it produces bad morale within the good officers of the department and puts the credibility of the whole agency in question with the community.”

Only recently, after the 2 Investigators started asking questions, did Chicago police finally close the internal investigation and recommend Hendricks be terminated.

The matter now goes before the Police Board.

CBS 2’s Brad Edwards caught up with Hendricks but she declined to discuss the allegations.

Hendricks was placed on desk duty in 2013, but has continued to collect an annual salary of more than $90,000. Additionally, taxpayers have picked up nearly $25,000 worth of educational expenses for her since May 2016, according to city records.

It’s unknown if she was convicted of theft in the 2013 case.

Her case doesn’t appear in Cook County court records and a Chicago Police spokesperson said her case had been expunged.

The police spokesperson says the internal probe dragged on in part because Hendricks went on medical leave.





http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/doj ... 2ff86254cf


04/29/2017 07:01 pm ET |


Chicago Was On The Verge Of Police Reform. Then Trump Picked Jeff Sessions To Run The DOJ.
The city will serve as a bellwether for how — or if — the Justice Department will fight police abuse under the new attorney general.







CHICAGO ― In the final months of the Obama administration, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division scrambled to complete its biggest-ever investigation of a city police department: a 13-month probe of Chicago’s 12,000-strong police force that wrapped up just a week before President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

For more than a year, the division’s lawyers reviewed thousands of Chicago Police Department documents, visited all 22 police districts, went on 60 ride-alongs, reviewed 170 police shooting files, examined over 425 incidents of less-lethal force, interviewed 340 department members and talked to about 1,000 Chicago residents.

Their final report, issued Jan. 13, recognized the tough job officers had in Chicago as they dealt with spiking gun violence, and praised the “diligent efforts and brave actions of countless” officers. But a “breach in trust” eroded Chicago’s ability to prevent crime, because officers were able to escape accountability when they broke the law, the report found. Because “trust and effectiveness in combating violent crime are inextricably intertwined,” the report found “broad, fundamental reform” was needed in Chicago.

Without a formal legal agreement to reform — known as a consent decree — and independent monitoring, the report concluded, reform efforts in Chicago were “not likely to be successful.”


JI SUB JEONG/HUFFPOST
Jeff Sessions, Trump’s attorney general, disagrees. In recent weeks, Sessions has expressed deep skepticism about the role of the federal government in fixing broken police departments, leaving serious doubts about the ultimate outcome of the Justice Department’s work in Chicago.

Sessions wants the Justice Department to serve as the “leading advocate for law enforcement in America.” While admitting he hadn’t read the full Chicago report, he called it “anecdotal” and “not so scientifically based.” Earlier this month in Baltimore, a Justice Department lawyer said Sessions had “grave concerns” about an agreement previously reached between that city and the Obama administration. A federal judge signed off on the deal over Sessions’ objections.

In an interview with a conservative radio host this month, Sessions seemed to suggest that Justice Department investigations and consent decrees were resulting in “big crime increases.” In an op-ed for USA Today last week, Sessions wrote that consent decrees could amount to “harmful federal intrusion” that could “cost more lives by handcuffing the police instead of the criminals.” There’s too much focus on “a small number of police who are bad actors,” Sessions wrote, and “too many people believe the solution is to impose consent decrees that discourage the proactive policing that keeps our cities safe.”



https://www.sebastiandaily.com/news/loc ... icle-6216/


Fla. K-9 found dead in cruiser parked outside courthouse
The National Weather Service reported the high in central Florida on Friday afternoon was 88 degrees






http://9-11themotherofallblackoperation ... exual.html



"The Mother Of All Black Ops": Female FBI Agent Discusses Sexual Harassment At The Bureau & Suicide Of Her Husband -- Did The FBI Drive Him To It? - blogger
9-11themotherofallblackoperations.blogspot.com › ...
Sep 26, 2006 - Perhaps it wasn't his fight against terrorism that caused Brad Doucette to commit suicide, but instead, his knowlege and possible complicity in the FBI's obstruction of justice which took place during the ...




http://abc7.com/society/fbi-to-host-rar ... a/1945142/


FBI COMING TO LOS ANGELES LOOKING TO RECRUIT WOMEN, MINORITIES

LOS ANGELES The FBI is hosting a rare recruiting event in Los Angeles on May 9 in hopes of diversifying its team with more women and minorities.

In the more than 13,000 special agents, 83 percent are Caucasian, 6.5 percent are Hispanic, 4.5 percent are Asian and about 4.4 percent are black.

"It's pretty important to have a general population in the FBI that matches the general population in the community because sometimes people relate better to people who they perceive are like them," explained Cathy Kramer, an FBI special agent.

The event is part of the Diversity Agent Recruitment Program.

The FBI said director James Comey will speak to applicants about his major push to hire talented women and minorities.

"He has absolutely pinned diversity as one of his core values in the FBI, and he added that just a few years ago, when he came on board," Kramer said.





https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=celH-szTQqQ




Martin Luther King was murdered by FBI when he arrived at the hospital.. - YouTube
YouTube › watch
Video for mlk pepper hospital youtube
Duration: 12:09
Posted: Jul 2, 2016
Combined segments from an interview with the honorable ...







http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/l ... 101226050/



Alleged mutilations proceeded despite surveillance
The Detroit News-
Detroit — FBI agents were unable to stop a doctor from allegedly mutilating the genitalia of 7-year-old girls at a Livonia clinic despite installing a secret video ...


http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/FBI-Ha ... 51803.html


FBI Has Open Case File on Dallas Shooter Who Killed Roommate ...
NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth-
Eric Jackson, Special Agent in Charge of the Dallas FBI, said Tuesday the bureau had an active, open investigation into Brown prior to the shooting and that they ...

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ykZtPoUdpBQ



The "Phony Science" in Law Enforcement - YouTube
YouTube › watch
Video for the phony science youtube
Duration: 3:59
Posted: May 3, 2017
"Nobody should lose their whole life over a false ...

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles ... at-bayrock


Trump, Russia and a Shadowy Business Partnership
An insider describes the Bayrock Group, its links to the Trump family and its mysterious access to funds. It isn't pretty.

June 21, 2017, 4:00 AM EDT

Trump, Arif and Sater, at right, Trump Soho launch party, 2007 Photographer: Mark Von Holden/WireImage
The special counsel’s investigation of the White House has come more sharply into focus.

Robert Mueller is examining whether President Donald Trump obstructed justice when he fired James Comey as director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Washington Post recently reported. As we've heard for months now, there is also a probe of possible collusion between Trump's campaign team and the Kremlin to tilt the 2016 election in the president's favor.

But the Justice Department inquiry led by Mueller now has added flavors. The Post noted that the investigation also includes "suspicious financial activity" involving "Russian operatives." The New York Times was more specific in its account, saying that Mueller is looking at whether Trump associates laundered financial payoffs from Russian officials by channeling them through offshore accounts.





Trump has repeatedly labeled Comey's and Mueller's investigations "witch hunts," and his lawyers have said that the last decade of his tax returns (which the president has declined to release) would show that he had no income or loans from Russian sources. In May, Trump told NBC that he has no property or investments in Russia. "I am not involved in Russia," he said.

But that doesn't address national security and other problems that might arise for the president if Russia is involved in Trump, either through potentially compromising U.S. business relationships or through funds that flowed into his wallet years ago. In that context, a troubling history of Trump's dealings with Russians exists outside of Russia: in a dormant real-estate development firm, the Bayrock Group, which once operated just two floors beneath the president's own office in Trump Tower.

Bayrock partnered with the future president and his two eldest children, Donald Jr. and Ivanka, on a series of real-estate deals between 2002 and about 2011, the most prominent being the troubled Trump Soho hotel and condominium in Manhattan.

During the years that Bayrock and Trump did deals together, the company was also a bridge between murky European funding and a number of projects in the U.S. to which the president once lent his name in exchange for handsome fees. Icelandic banks that dealt with Bayrock, for example, were easy marks for money launderers and foreign influence, according to interviews with government investigators, legislators, and others in Reykjavik, Brussels, Paris and London. Trump testified under oath in a 2007 deposition that Bayrock brought Russian investors to his Trump Tower office to discuss deals in Moscow, and said he was pondering investing there.

"It's ridiculous that I wouldn't be investing in Russia," Trump said in that deposition. "Russia is one of the hottest places in the world for investment."

One of Bayrock's principals was a career criminal named Felix Sater who had ties to Russian and American organized crime groups. Before linking up with the company and with Trump, he had worked as a mob informant for the U.S. government, fled to Moscow to avoid criminal charges while boasting of his KGB and Kremlin contacts there, and had gone to prison for slashing apart another man’s face with a broken cocktail glass.

In a series of interviews and a lawsuit, a former Bayrock insider, Jody Kriss, claims that he eventually departed from the firm because he became convinced that Bayrock was actually a front for money laundering.

Kriss has sued Bayrock, alleging that in addition to laundering money, the Bayrock team also skimmed cash from the operation, dodged taxes and cheated him out of millions of dollars. Sater and others at Bayrock would not comment for this column; in court documents they have contested Kriss's charges and describe him, essentially, as a disgruntled employee trying to shake them down.


Jody Kriss in a luxury unit in a building he is developing in New YorkPhotographer: Jeff Brown for Bloomberg
But Kriss's assertion that Bayrock was a criminal operation during the years it partnered with Trump has been deemed plausible enough to earn him a court victory: In December, a federal judge in New York said Kriss's lawsuit against Bayrock, which he first filed nine years ago, could proceed as a racketeering case.

(I have my own history in court with the president. Trump sued me in 2006 when I worked at the New York Times, alleging that my biography, “TrumpNation,” had misrepresented his business record and his wealth. Trump lost the suit in 2011; my lawyers deposed him and Sater during the litigation. Trump's representatives didn't respond to repeated interview requests for this column.)

Trump has said over the years that he barely knows Sater. In fact, Sater — who former Bayrock employees say met frequently with Trump in the Trump Organization's New York headquarters, once shepherded the president's children around Moscow and carried a Trump Organization business card — apparently has remained firmly in the orbit of the president and his closest advisers.

Sater made the front page of the New York Times in February for his role in a failed effort — along with Trump’s personal attorney, Michael Cohen — to lobby former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn on a Ukrainian peace proposal.

Comey was still Trump's FBI director when he testified before the House Intelligence Committee in March about Russian interference in the 2016 election. During that hearing, Comey was asked if he was "aware of" Felix Sater, his criminal history and his business dealings with the Trump Organization. Comey declined to comment.

It's unclear whether Sater and Bayrock are part of Mueller's investigation. But Mueller has populated his investigative team with veteran prosecutors expert in white-collar fraud and Russian-organized-crime probes. One of them, Andrew Weissmann, once led an FBI team that examined financial fraud leading to the demise of Enron. Before that, Weissmann was a prosecutor with the U.S. attorney's office in Brooklyn and part of a team that prosecuted Sater and mob associates for investment scams in the late 1990s.

However the Mueller probe unfolds, a tour of Trump's partnership with Bayrock exposes a number of uncomfortable truths about the president's business history, his judgment, and the possible vulnerabilities that his past as a freewheeling dealmaker — and his involvement with figures like Sater — have visited upon his present as the nation's chief executive.

Zegna Suits and Luxury Cars

Sater was born in the Soviet Union in 1966 and emigrated with his parents to the heavily Russian enclave of Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, when he was about eight years old. He attended Pace University before dropping out when he was 18, then found his way to Wall Street where he worked as a stockbroker.

His early years on Wall Street, according to the recollections of his one-time business partner, Salvatore Lauria, were flush. By his mid-20s, Sater was collecting expensive watches, spending thousands of dollars on Zegna suits and buying luxury cars. That all came to a brief halt in 1993 when he was sent to prison for using the stem of a broken margarita glass during a bar fight two years earlier to attack another stockbroker; Sater’s victim needed 110 stitches to hold his face together.

When Sater emerged from prison 15 months later, he found his way back into trouble. With a group that included Lauria (who admits to having had ties to organized crime figures and grew up in New York as a close friend of a prominent Mafia boss), Sater opened an investment firm on the penthouse floor of 40 Wall Street, a Trump-owned building in Manhattan. From there, according to federal prosecutors, Sater and his team set about laundering money for the mob and fleecing about $40 million from unwitting and largely elderly investors, a number of whom were Holocaust survivors.

By the time law enforcement authorities eventually caught on to the 40 Wall Street operation, Sater had fled to Russia. Lauria visited him there.

Sater "was always hustling and scheming, and his contacts in Russia were the same kind of contacts he had in the United States," Lauria wrote in a 2003 memoir, "The Scorpion and the Frog." "The difference was that in Russia his crooked contacts were links between Russian organized crime, the Russian military, the KGB, and operatives who played both ways, or sometimes three ways."

Sater, who had been charged with racketeering and money laundering by the U.S. attorney's office in Brooklyn in connection with the 40 Wall Street scam, eventually decided to return to America and face those charges. He had a card to play, however: his knowledge, gleaned from contacts in Russia, about a small stock of Stinger antiaircraft missiles loose on the black market in Afghanistan that were of interest to U.S. intelligence officials.


"We were hoping for a free ride or a get-out-of-jail-free card for our crimes on Wall Street," Lauria wrote of Sater's maneuvering with U.S. officials.

Sater told authorities that he could use his Russian contacts to buy the Stingers and, according to court filings in Kriss's lawsuit and other accounts, a deal was struck in December 1998. Sater pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges and then entered into a cooperation agreement with the government that sealed court records in the case and allowed his sentencing to be postponed for 11 years. (Sater would ultimately only pay a $25,000 fine and never go to prison.)

Many years later, as part of her confirmation hearings to become President Barack Obama's attorney general, Loretta Lynch would note that the cooperation deal she made with Sater when she was the U.S. attorney in Brooklyn lasted for a decade — from 1998 to 2008 — and that Sater gave the government "information crucial to national security and the conviction of over 20 individuals, including those responsible for committing massive financial fraud and members of La Cosa Nostra."

At some point after becoming an informant, Sater also recast himself as a real-estate savant. He made his way to a Manhattan real-estate investment firm, APC Realty, where he raised money for deals and where he met Kriss in 2000.

Kriss, a native of Miami and a business graduate of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, was an aspiring real-estate developer who was in his early 20s when they met. He says he was initially captivated by Sater.

“Felix knew how to be charming and he knew how to be brutally nasty,” says Kriss. “He has a talent for drawing people in. He has charm and charisma. But that’s what con men do.”

After APC began to fall apart in 2002, Kriss decided to strike out on his own back home in Miami, doing real-estate deals. Sater made his way to a small Hong Kong investment bank that used him as a New York-based rainmaker for real-estate deals.

In addition to his new life as a real-estate investor and government informant, Sater owned a comfortable home in Sands Point, Long Island, a toney New York suburb that was a setting for “The Great Gatsby.” He also had a wife and three daughters and was a member of an Orthodox synagogue in neighboring Port Washington. On one occasion Sater brought his rabbi with him to meet U.S. intelligence officials in New York, where, the rabbi said, agents praised Sater's service to the country.

When Sater received a community service award at his synagogue on another occasion, a band played "Hail to the Chief." Sater gave an acceptance speech in which he noted that he was "not a very religious person" but that his goal in life was to "repair the world or make it a better place."

'Air of Success'

About a year after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Sater joined Bayrock, a company that marketed itself as a property developer and had opened Manhattan offices on the 24th floor of a well-known building at 725 Fifth Avenue: Trump Tower.

In late 2002, Sater phoned Kriss and invited him to consult at Bayrock, bragging about a deep-pocketed investor, Tevfik Arif, who was partnering with him in search of bigger deals.

Arif, born in Kazakhstan, was a former Soviet official who had relocated to Turkey to make his fortune. He ran several upscale, seaside hotels there that catered almost exclusively to Russians, according to Kriss, and he had also redeveloped a shopping center in Brooklyn. At one point in his post-Soviet years, Arif also reportedly took over a former Kazakh state-owned chromium producer with his brother.

Like Sater, Arif had a home in Sands Point and Kriss says that Arif brought his children there from Turkey to learn English. (Arif's representatives declined to respond to a list of questions about his business history, including how he met Sater and brought him to Bayrock, citing ongoing litigation.)

Bayrock was initially funded, in part, with a $10 million investment transferred to the firm by Arif's brother in Russia, who, according to Kriss's lawsuit, was able to tap into the cash reserves of a Kazakh chromium refinery. (A spokeswoman for Arif declined to comment on that allegation.)

A marketing document Bayrock once circulated to prospective investors noted that Alexander Mashkevich, an oligarch born in the former Soviet Union, was one of Bayrock's primary sources of funding. Mashkevich's firm, the Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation, was based in Kazakhstan and elsewhere and had interests in chromium, aluminum, coal, construction, and banking. (A person close to Mashkevich, who requested anonymity because of the Kriss-Bayrock litigation, said Mashkevich never invested in Bayrock.)

Bayrock never seemed to be short of money, however. According to Kriss’s lawsuit, the team running the little development firm in Trump Tower could locate funds "month after month, for two years, in fact more frequently, whenever Bayrock ran out of cash." If times got tight, Bayrock's owners would "magically show up with a wire from 'somewhere' just large enough to keep the company going."

Kriss says that Sater and Arif wooed him to Bayrock by offering him 10 percent of the firm's profits. Bayrock’s Trump Tower offices gave “an air of success to it,” Kriss says. Bayrock also gave Kriss, then 28 years old, the opportunity to work with Trump.

It was Sater who initially developed the relationship with Trump, according to Kriss and court records from Trump's lawsuit against me. Sater had made the acquaintance of three Trump Organization executives who then introduced him to their boss. When the Bayrock team met Trump in 2002, the future president was enduring a long stretch in the financial wilderness, having narrowly escaped personal bankruptcy in the early 1990s.

He eventually emerged from that mess as a pariah among big banks. He was also a determined survivor and tireless self-promoter and he parlayed those skills into recreating himself as a branding machine and golf course developer in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Kriss says that it was Arif and Sater who pitched the future president on the idea of launching an international chain of Trump-branded, mixed-use hotels and condominiums. And Bayrock got to Trump at a time when his “brand” could help get a little extra attention for a condo project, but didn’t amount to much more than that.

“Trump was trying to build his brand and Bayrock was trying to market it,” Kriss recalls. “It wasn’t clear who needed each other more. This was before the show, remember.”

The “show,” of course, was “The Apprentice.” It aired for the first time on Jan. 8, 2004, and became a sensation that vaulted Trump into reality TV stardom. In the real world, Trump's casinos were faltering. But on reality TV, Trump posed as a successful leader and dealmaker who embodied a certain kind of entrepreneurial flair and over-the-top billionairedom — an impression that stuck with tens of millions of TV viewers.

The popularity of "The Apprentice" also gave the Bayrock-Trump partnership added zing.

“That put Bayrock in a great position once the show debuted,” Kriss says. “The show did it for Trump, man. Nobody was interested in licensing his name before that.”

The hook at Bayrock, for Trump, was an 18 percent equity stake in what became the Trump Soho hotel, a steady stream of management fees on all Bayrock projects and the ability to plaster his name on properties without having to invest a single dollar of his
It’s not clear how carefully Trump vetted his Bayrock partners. But his lack of concern about their backgrounds — and the potential risk to his own reputation from dealing with them — was part of a pattern. In Atlantic City, he had partnered with men with organized crime ties. Later, he and his children struck deals in Brazil and Azerbaijan with partners who had murky backgrounds or unusual legal entanglements.

Sater said in court filings that he disclosed his securities fraud conviction to members of the Trump Organization. He assumed they had told Trump, but he wasn't sure.

"It's not very hard to get connected to Donald if you make it known that you have a lot of money and you want to do deals and you want to put his name on it," Abe Wallach, who was the future president's right-hand man at the Trump Organization from 1990 to about 2002, told me in an interview. "Donald doesn't do due diligence. He relies on his gut and whether he thinks you have good genes."

Given Arif's halting English, it was Sater and Kriss who interacted most frequently with the Trump family—and Sater the most often with Trump himself. Kriss says that most of his own contacts were with the elder Trump children, Don Jr. and Ivanka, and included drafting contracts and occasional nights on the town.

While Trump’s kids were involved in the back-and-forth with Bayrock, it was Trump himself who always had the final say.

“Donald was always in charge,” says Kriss. “Donald had to agree to every term of every deal and had to sign off on everything. Nothing happened unless he said it was okay to do it. Even if Donald Jr., shook your hand on a deal, he came back downstairs to renegotiate if his father told him to.”

The Trumps, Kriss says, saw Sater "frequently" and valued the relationship because “Felix demonstrated that he was loyal to them.” He says that at one point Sater was meeting with the future president in his Trump Tower office multiple times a week. Sater, according to a later court deposition, said that his business conversations with Trump in that office were wide-ranging and frequent — “on a constant basis."

The pair had what Sater described as "real-estate conversations," and they talked about "gathering intelligence, gathering know-how, general market discussions," and also chatted about using Sater's Russian connections to build a "high-rise, center of Moscow” that would be a “great opportunity, megafinancial home run."

Although Sater socialized with Trump, "I wouldn't call him my friend," he said in the 2008 deposition. Still, Sater said he traveled with Trump to look at deals and was proud of Bayrock's relationship with the famous developer. "Anybody can come in and build a tower," he said. "I can build a Trump Tower because of my relationship with Trump."

Bayrock and the Trumps then began laying the groundwork for domestic and international hotel-condo projects, eventually exploring deals in Turkey, Poland and Ukraine. Sater escorted Ivanka and Don Jr. on a trip to Moscow, where they looked at land for a Trump-branded hotel.

None of those overseas projects got past the planning stages. In the U.S., Bayrock and Trump projects moved forward haltingly.

In Phoenix, a one-story mall that Bayrock bought out of bankruptcy was meant to be the site of a Trump-branded tower. It became ensnared in zoning debates and then the national real-estate downturn and never got built.

Sater's dealings in Phoenix later landed him in court with a local developer who had invested in the Phoenix project, Ernest Mennes. Mennes said in a lawsuit that when he threatened to reveal Sater's criminal record, Sater told him that he would have a cousin "electrically shock Mr. Mennes’ testicles, cut off Mr. Mennes’ legs, and leave Mr. Mennes dead in the trunk of his car."

In Mennes's suit against Bayrock and Sater, he alleged that Sater also skimmed money from the Phoenix development. Bayrock and Sater settled the suit (which was later sealed and its terms left undisclosed; Sater's lawyer, in an interview with ABC News, denied Mennes's allegations).

The next project Trump and Bayrock pursued was the Trump International Hotel and Tower, a mixed-use hotel and condominium in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Announced in 2005, it later went into foreclosure.

The third and final major project Bayrock and Trump worked on together was their most high-profile effort, the 46-story Trump Soho hotel in lower Manhattan.

Trump, Sater and Arif were all photographed together at a splashy launch party for the Trump Soho in 2007. Trump also pitched the Trump Soho on an episode of "The Apprentice," promising that "this brilliant, $370 million work of art will be an awe-inspiring masterpiece."

Helping Trump and Bayrock fund that masterpiece was a fresh influx of money from an Icelandic investment bank called the FL Group. Sater and Lauria, his longtime mob associate, had jointly recruited FL, introducing the firm to Bayrock and the Trump Organization. (I’ll have more on the FL Group and Bayrock in a future column; the firm's former leaders, one of whom was later convicted of tax and accounting fraud, declined to comment or did not respond to interview requests for this column.)

Yet again, the Trump Organization — even though it signed off on the FL investment — appeared to care little about vetting a firm that came into the partnership through Sater. FL operated in a country with a porous, vulnerable banking system, and some investigators who scrutinized other Icelandic banks at the time said they suspected those banks of being conduits — unwitting or otherwise — for dirty funds from outside Iceland. (The FL Group collapsed a little over a year after it invested in Bayrock. The firm itself was never prosecuted; the leaders of a number of other Icelandic banks were prosecuted or jailed for crimes including money laundering).

Kriss said in an interview that an Icelandic competitor of the FL Group also contacted him to invest in Bayrock. When he took that offer to Sater and Arif they told him, he says, that the money behind Icelandic banks “was mostly Russian” — and that they had to take FL’s funds for deals they were doing with Trump because the investment firm was “closer to Putin."

“I thought it was a lie or a joke when they said Putin,” Kriss recalls. “I didn’t know how to make sense of it at all.”

(Kriss says he doesn't have financial records showing that Russian President Vladimir Putin had a connection to the FL Group and that his own knowledge is purely anecdotal. A Kremlin spokesman said via email that Putin had no connection to the FL Group or Bayrock.)

'Somebody Said That He Is in the Mafia'

Kriss says that in the wake of the FL deal he was owed a payout that could have ranged from about $4 million to $10 million, but that Bayrock reneged. When he persisted, he claims, Sater threatened him.

So Kriss says he accepted a $500,000 payment instead and then eventually quit. Sater, as it turns out, didn’t have much time left at Bayrock either.

In December 2007, the New York Times published an article detailing some of Sater’s past run-ins with the law and some of his ties to organized crime (the article also noted that Sater had begun using “Satter” as an alternate spelling for his last name so he could try to “distance himself from his past” if people Googled him).

Two days after the Times story ran, Trump sat for a deposition with my attorneys as part of the libel lawsuit he had filed against me for “TrumpNation.” They asked him whether he planned to sever his relationship with Sater because of Sater's organized crime ties. Trump said he hadn't made up his mind.

"Have you previously associated with people you knew were members of organized crime?" one of my lawyers asked.

"No, I haven't," Trump responded. "And it's hard to overly blame Bayrock. Things like that can happen. But I want to see what action Bayrock takes before I make a decision." (In fact, Trump had partnered in the past in Atlantic City's real-estate business with men he knew were mobbed up.)

Whenever he was asked in later years about his relationship with Sater, Trump routinely misrepresented it as distant. In a 2013 deposition taken as part of litigation surrounding Trump and Bayrock’s failed Fort Lauderdale project, Trump was asked again about his partnership with Sater.

"He was supposedly very close to the government of the United States as a witness or something," Trump said. "I don't think he was connected to the Mafia. He got into trouble because he got into a barroom fight."

"I don't know him very well," Trump added, saying that he hadn't conversed very often with Sater. "If he were sitting in the room right now I really wouldn't know what he looked like."

Trump also said that he didn't think that questions about Sater’s background meant that he should have ended his business partnership with him: “Somebody said that he is in the Mafia. What am I going to do?”

Shortly after my lawyers asked Trump about Sater, Bayrock began discussing the best way for him to resign, according to company email and court records. By 2008, Sater had left the firm.

The Trump Soho ended in failure. It opened in 2010, but many units failed to sell and early condo purchasers sued Bayrock and the Trumps. Three years later, the Trump Soho went into foreclosure with most of its units still unsold, and a new company took control of the property. Bayrock hasn’t done another deal since then. (A spokeswoman for Bayrock attributed the failures of the Trump partnerships to fallout from the 2008 financial meltdown.)

'He Seems to Have Unlimited Funds'

After Kriss left Bayrock, he set up his own development firm in New York and then sued Sater, Arif, Trump and Bayrock in Delaware in 2008, alleging that Bayrock was a criminal enterprise and demanding to be paid in full for his work there.

When the case moved to New York in 2010, it came with a twist. Sater had left a copy of his cooperation deal with the government – the one dating back to his Stinger missile and mob informant days – on the hard drive of his Bayrock computer. A Bayrock employee leaked it to Kriss’s attorney, who promptly filed it as an exhibit in court.

Trump was eventually dropped from the case and Sater began carpet-bombing Kriss with his own lawsuits, ultimately filing several separate actions that claimed, among other things, that Kriss has used the courts to prosecute him maliciously.

Sater also apparently kept busy outside of the courtroom.

Kriss says that about three years ago he started receiving threatening email from websites carrying versions of his name (“JKrissInfo.com,” for example). He soon discovered there were hundreds of other new websites that also contained false, disparaging information about him.

Kriss sued the anonymous authors of the websites for defamation and when the court ruled in his favor he was able to get a large portion of the sites delisted from Google. He says he also was able to use the court order to untangle the provenance of the websites, discovering that their registration tracked back to Sater’s home address in Sands Point.

Kriss says that goons once showed up at real-estate developments he was overseeing in Brooklyn, asking his employees if they knew the true story about their boss. Waves of letters questioning his bona fides have arrived at his office and in the mailboxes of every resident in two separate buildings where Kriss kept apartments.

Kriss says investors in his new company, East River Partners, have stood by him, but he's worried that Sater's digital vendetta may be hard to overcome. His new lawyer, Bradley D. Simon, says that he's mystified by how Sater has managed to stay afloat all these years.

“Sater was a cooperating witness for the Eastern District of New York and he continued going on a crime rampage,” says Simon. “He’s filed all kinds of frivolous lawsuits, but that’s what he does. He seems to have unlimited funds.”


MuellerPhotographer: Win McNamee/Getty Images
For his part, Sater continues to wear many hats. A couple of years after he left Bayrock, the Trump Organization hired him briefly as a consultant to prospect for real-estate deals, giving him company business cards with his name engraved on them.

More recently, Sater got enmeshed in litigation again, this time around the sale of an Ohio shopping mall — and the alleged disappearance of tens of millions of dollars — in a court case that was settled in 2013.

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Sater has also entered into a war of words with his former Bayrock partner, Tevfik Arif. Sater claims, according to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, that Arif owes him money — and that if he isn't paid he'll publicize what he describes as Arif's ties to organized crime and to tainted dealings in Kazakhstan’s metals business. (A Bayrock spokeswoman says that Sater's claims about Arif are baseless.)

Meanwhile, Trump is mired in a probe that now pivots off sensitive topics for him and his family: their money, their deals and Russia – all of which will test his promise to testify under oath to Mueller and his investigators.







Mobsters Without Borders



Trump Mansion Sold to “Mobsters Sans Frontières”

Russian "businessman" to whom Donald Trump sold his Palm Beach mansion for a purported $100 million was arrested in Russia in April of 1997 and charged with masterminding the killing of a business rival, in what law enforcement authorities called "a contract hit."

The MadCowMorningNews has uncovered an April 13, 1997 report in the official Russian news agency TASS announcing that Russian law enforcement authorities arrested Russian fertilizer king Dmitry Rybolovlev and charged him with being behind the murder of the head of another Russian chemical company, in what authorities said was a war for control of Russia’s lucrative fertilizer business.

“The suspected murderers and organizers of the crime, including the head of the FD-Kredit Bank, Dmitry Rybolovlev, have been arrested,” TASS reported.

Trump's announcement of his big sale Wednesday received wide play. It was trumpeted everywhere from the Wall Street Journal to Entertainment Tonight.

The Wall Street Journal, with perhaps unintended irony, called Rybolovlev, a 42-year-old Russian billionaire who currently ranks #59 on the Forbes list of the world's billionaires, “one of Russia's richest and most discreet businessmen.”

None of the stories mentioned Palm Beach's newest billionaire's mainline connection to the Russian Mob.

The real 'never-ending story'


How Donald Trump came to own and sell Maison de l’Amitie, his 6.5 acre Palm Beach waterfront estate, is just the latest chapter in the “Never-Ending Story,” the continuing saga of the moves and machinations of spooks & crooks and other major players in the netherworld of transnational organized crime.

Billionaire mogul Trump supposedly received a massive windfall, selling a property for one of the the highest prices ever paid in the United States that he had scooped-up at a bankruptcy sale five years earlier.

Trump’s self-promoting announcement yesterday may inadvertently provide a public service, shining a spotlight on the dark 21st Century phenomenon of the corruption of hapless nation-states by the insidious forces of global organized crime, who clearly appear to have a leg up in the contest.

News accounts identified Dmitry Rybolovlev, the man whose investment company purchased Trump’s lavish 6.3-acre estate, as, variously, a ‘Russian businessman,’ a ‘Russian oligarch,’ a ‘mysterious Russian billionaire.,’ a ‘Russian fertilizer magnate’ and a ‘fertilizer billionaire.’

The Russian oligarch’s fortune increased by an amazing $10 billion, just in the past year, according to London’s Financial Times.

And all this time we thought the hot tip was plastics.
iRybolovlev runs Uralkali, a Soviet-era fertilizer company founded in the 1930’s, and his designation as “fertilizer king” should have been newsworthy, marking him as the first person from that industry to splash in quite such dramatic fashion onto the “lifestyles of the rich and famous” Palm Beach social scene.

But the fertilizer business— as an explanation for a $13 billion fortune—left suspicions. No one in the recorded history of Planet Earth has ever made $10 billion dollars in fertilizer before, let alone in just one year.



Link du jour


http://ricefarmer.blogspot.com/2017/06/ ... -2017.html

THE USE OF MUSIC
IN PSYCHOLOGICAL OPERATIONS

SGM Herbert A. Friedman (Ret.)

http://www.psywarrior.com/MusicUsePSYOP.html


http://www.occurrencesforeigndomestic.c ... lobal-war/






http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-fi-e ... t12aH-2la1


California invested heavily in solar power. Now there's so much electricity that other states are sometimes paid to take it
By IVAN PENN

JUNE 22, 2017



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3270193


LAPD officer arrested for sex with 15-year-old cadet involved in theft of police cruisers



BY CHRISTOPHER BRENNAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Thursday, June 22, 2017, 7:17 PM



http://buffalonews.com/2014/02/17/fbi-d ... -40-years/

FBI documents confirm murder of activist missing for 40 years

The Robinson family circulated this “missing” poster in South Dakota.
By Phil Fairbanks
Published Mon, Feb 17, 2014


For the first time since her husband went missing 40 years ago, Cheryl Robinson can go to bed at night knowing what happened to the man she and her kids want so desperately to find.

The only questions now are why was he killed and where is he buried.

Robinson always suspected her husband, civil rights activist Ray Robinson, was murdered at Wounded Knee, S.D., where he had gone to support the American Indian Movement (AIM) in its fight against the federal government.

She also suspected he was killed because someone believed he was a government informant.



Thanks to the work of two Buffalo lawyers, Robinson now knows that her husband, a disciple of Martin Luther King Jr. and Jesse Jackson, was shot to death, and that the FBI suspects the killers were members of AIM.

Newly released documents from the FBI shed new light on what many consider one of America’s great unsolved murders and confirm what Robinson’s family has long suspected – that he was murdered at Wounded Knee.

“There have been rumors for years, and there’s multiple people who say he was shot,” Robinson said recently. “We just want some answers.”

They got some of those answers when the FBI, in response to a Freedom of Information request by their lawyers, released hundreds of pages of previously secret documents regarding Robinson.

The documents date back to 1973, the year of the Wounded Knee occupation, and for the first time reveal evidence that the FBI gathered over the years.

They cite confidential sources and witnesses who claim to have firsthand knowledge of what happened to the civil rights activist.

“They confirm the rumors that have been floating out there for years,” said Michael Kuzma, one of the Robinson family’s Buffalo-based lawyers. “The only missing part of the puzzle is where Ray’s buried.”

Ray Robinson, well known within civil rights circles, traveled to Wounded Knee with the intention of preaching his message of nonviolence and building a bridge between Indians and African-Americans.

By the time he backpacked into the Pine Ridge Reservation, a 71-day siege, an often-bloody confrontation with a federal government many thought had ignored treaties between the two sides, was well under way.

What happened next was, until now, unclear, but the speculation always centered around the belief that Robinson was shot and killed during the occupation.

“That was the story from the very beginning,” said Cheryl Robinson, who now lives in the Detroit area. “That he was shot in the knee and allowed to bleed to death.”

The newly released records provide few details about how Robinson was murdered but make it clear the FBI believes AIM was involved in the killing.

As recently as 2000, the Minneapolis office of the FBI developed information that the civil rights activist was killed by “militant members of the American Indian Movement.”

A memo documenting the new evidence says a confidential source had come forward with new information indicating “Robinson had been tortured and murdered within the AIM occupation perimeter, and then his remains were buried ‘in the hills.’ ”

The memo indicates the new evidence came from someone who took part in the Wounded Knee occupation and was present when AIM leaders talked about Robinson.

That same FBI memo also mentions a confidential witness who allegedly recorded a conversation in which AIM leader Vernon Bellecourt spoke of Robinson and said AIM, “really managed to keep a tight lid on that one.”

Bellecourt, who is not linked to the murder, has since died.

“I think AIM members were involved in Ray’s murder,” said Barry Bachrach, a Massachusetts lawyer working with the Robinsons. “They were very, very paranoid about informants and may have thought he was an informant.”

In the FBI’s eyes, the evidence of AIM’s possible involvement in Robinson’s disappearance was strong enough to warrant a criminal investigation.

It’s not clear from the documents if that investigation, separate from the one into his disappearance, was actually started and, if it was, where it went.

For a variety of reasons, Cheryl Robinson is skeptical.

She says the FBI never interviewed her about why her husband was there or, even basic information, like what he was wearing.

If there was an investigation, she thinks the FBI is covering up the results in an effort to protect its informants.

“It’s speculation on my part but there’s no other answer to the question of why they didn’t do more,” she said. “They never interviewed who they should have.”

Bachrach agrees.

“This is a case they don’t want solved,” he said. “A murder occurred. Why wasn’t it pursued and why wasn’t it pursued aggressively?”

Robinson and her lawyers think the answer may lie in FBI documents that are still confidential and they are currently working to make public.

“Why did they sit on this?” Kuzma said of the information suggesting AIM was involved in Robinson’s killing. “I think the most valuable information is still being withheld.”

The FBI declined to comment on the Robinson case, except to confirm that its 40-year investigation into his disappearance was closed when the documents were released.

“If new information comes forward, the FBI could reopen the investigation, depending on the information that comes forward,” said Gregory Boosalis, division counsel for the FBI in Minneapolis.

When asked about the allegations that it used informants at Wounded Knee and might be withholding evidence in an effort to protect them, Boosalis said the FBI could not comment.

Robinson’s lawyers say there’s a long history of sloppy or improper investigations by the government and they point to the case of Anna Mae Aquash, an AIM member whose body was discovered three years after the standoff.

Aquash was originally determined to have died of exposure, but a second autopsy found a gunshot wound to her head.

In 2004, 28 years after Aquash’s body was found, two men were convicted for her murder. The evidence also indicated she was shot because AIM members believed she was an FBI informant.

Even now, decades after Wounded Knee, the American Indian Movement continues to operate and one of the leaders is Vernon Bellecourt’s brother Clyde.

“I hear these rumors all the time,” Bellecourt said of the FBI memos claiming AIM was involved in Robinson’s murder. “It’s just another attempt by the FBI to get involved in legitimate organizations like ours by making crazy charges.”

When asked about the memo suggesting his brother had knowledge of Robinson’s murder, Bellecourt said it was news to him.

“I was pretty close to my brother and he never mentioned one word about that,” he said.

While the newly released documents shed light on Robinson’s disappearance, they stop well short of answering the question his widow and children have been asking for decades.

Where is Robinson buried?

One of the family’s lawyers thinks the FBI might know.

“They were watching everybody and everything,” said Buffalo attorney Daire Brian Irwin. “It’s just amazing to me that his body just went missing.”

With that in mind, Irwin, Kuzma and Bachrach have hired a private investigator who is circulating posters around Wounded Knee seeking information about where Robinson is buried.

“I never give up hope,” said Cheryl Robinson. “That’s all I want to know. Just tell me where he’s buried.”

She says her children were very young when their father went missing, but are nevertheless anxious to find his body.

“He’s there but just out of reach,” she said of her kids’ interest in their father. “We’ve never had a funeral. We’ve never had a burial. And that’s important to the kids.”





http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3269926



Indiana air conditioning plant to send 700 jobs President Trump bragged about saving to Mexico



GINGER ADAMS OTIS
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, June 22, 2017, 5:44 PM





http://gizmodo.com/leaked-files-show-ho ... 1796165706



Leaked Files Show How the CIA Can Hack Your Router to Spy on You

Dell Cameron
6/16/17 11:28am
The CIA has had the ability to turn routers and network access points into surveillance devices for years, according to secret documents published by WikiLeaks on Thursday.

In the latest installment of its Vault 7 series of leaks, WikiLeaks has disclosed an alleged CIA program known as CherryBlossom. The purpose of the initiative is to replace a router’s firmware with a CIA-modified version known as FlyTrap. In some cases, WikiLeaks says, physical access to the device may not even be necessary.

The potential applications of this toolkit are harrowing. With control over their router, a remote observer could monitor the target’s local network and internet traffic and inject malicious malware for a variety of purposes—injecting keyloggers to collect passwords or seizing control of a device’s camera and microphone, for example.

Further, CherryBlossom would allow the CIA to detect when a person is using their home network and divert the user’s traffic through predetermined servers.


Most of the router listed in the leak are older models, indicating that the documents themselves may be somewhat outdated, though there are undoubtedly plenty of targets still using the affected devices. One document, which is not dated, lists over 200 WiFi devices allegedly susceptible to the CherryBlossom program..

Once FlyTrap is deployed successfully, agents are able to monitor the target using a web-based platform called CherryWeb, the documents say. The command-and-control server that receives the data collected by FlyTrap is codenamed CherryTree.

The CherryBlossom disclosure is part of an ongoing WikiLeaks series titled Vault 7 which began on March 7 with the leaking of weaponized 0-day exploits used by the CIA in targeting a wide range of US and foreign products, including iPhones, Android devices, and Samsung TVs.

The CIA did not immediately respond to a request





http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3269461

California teen shot and killed by police aiming for dog

BY MEGAN CERULLO
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, June 22, 2017, 2:52 PMz






As Commissioner of Youth Services in Massacusetts Jerome Miller
shut down all the reform schools



http://www.ncianet.org/dr-jerome-g-mill ... age-of-83/

Dr. Jerome G. Miller, Co-Founder of NCIA, Dies at the Age of 83

Dr. Jerome G. Miller With saddened hearts, we announce that Dr. Jerome G. Miller, Co-Founder of NCIA, passed away on August 7, 2015. Dr. Jerome Miller, better known as “Jerry”, was compassionate and committed to the human service and juvenile corrections field throughout his 60 year career. “We at NCIA owe a lot to Dr. Miller. He was my mentor, my inspiration and instilled in me the need to provide services to those most in need. He lived his life with the tenets of unconditional care and the need to provide individualized plans for all those we serve. His constant theme was to treat each client as we would want our own family and friends treated. These are all values I have tried to instill in NCIA. He was a prolific writer and always spoke from his heart”, stated Herb Hoelter, Co-Founder & CEO of NCIA. Since Herb & Jerry founded NCIA in 1977, Jerry has had a profound impact on our company’s continued success. With Jerry’s expertise, NCIA became known for influencing public policy in the development and growth of alternatives to incarceration across the United States. Through NCIA, Dr. Miller opened the Augustus Institute, one of the first community-based clinics for the treatment of sex offenders, and helped numerous jurisdictions in closing or reducing juvenile prison populations throughout the country. He also authored and assisted on numerous books and studies including the Real War on Crime (HaperCollins, 1996) and Search and Destroy: African American Males in the Criminal Justice System (Cambridge University Press, 1996; 2nd edition 2011). Dr. Miller was a powerful force in the justice system and we are grateful for all his efforts, as NCIA wouldn’t be the same without him. His funeral was held on Friday, August 14, 2015. Below are links to Dr. Miller’s obituaries from the New York Times and Washington Post:
http://wapo.st/1N9TOj7


http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/us/je ... aries&_r=0






http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/cou ... -1.3270166

Convicted mobster sees 40-year sentence restored by federal court after receiving reduction for explosives tip
regarding Oklahoma City bombing


BY ANDREW KESHNER
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, June 22, 2017, 7:06 PM

A federal appeals courts has reinstated the full 40-year sentence of a convicted mobster who passed along a tip leading to the recovery of explosives stashed away in the one-time home of convicted Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols.


http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/off ... -1.3269932


SEE IT: Off-duty NYPD cop just stands there as friend beats FDNY battalion chief's son unconscious in bar parking lot




BY GRAHAM RAYMAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Thursday, June 22, 2017, 7:01 PM



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politic ... -1.3269478

President Trump and White House staffers are illegally deleting messages, lawsuit says
BY JASON SILVERSTEIN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Thursday, June 22, 2017, 3:13 PM



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3269247


KING: Until these two Supreme Court cases are successfully challenged, police brutality will continue



NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, June 22, 2017, 2:00 PM



http://www.nydailynews.com/newswires/en ... -1.3270457

At Glastonbury, Depp asks about assassinating the president




Thursday, June 22, 2017, 8:12 PM



https://robertscribbler.com/2017/06/21/ ... -the-east/



Scribbling for environmental, social and economic justice


U.S. Climate of Troubles: Record Heat Out West, Severe Floods in the East

Yesterday a record heatwave affecting 40 million people cracked pavement, grounded flights, threatened power grids and risked serious injuries across the Southwestern U.S. Meanwhile, today, a heavily moisture laden tropical storm Cindy is threatening to dump 10 to 15 inches or more of rain on parts of the U.S. Southeast. A pair of opposite weather extremes of the kind we’ve come to expect more and more of in a world that’s warmed by about 1.2 C above 1880s averages.


(Very extreme weather conditions settled over the U.S. on June 20. Today, Cindy is expected to bring extraordinary rainfall totals to the U.S. Gulf Coast. Video source: ClimateState.)

Record-Shattering Western Heat

Yesterday, the mercury struck a scorching 127 degrees F in Death Valley California — the hottest June 20th ever recorded for that heat-blasted lowland. Meanwhile, Death Valley-like heat spilled out over a large swath of the southwest. Phoenix fell just shy of its daily record as temperatures struck 119 F. And Las Vegas tied its all-time record of 117 F (which was set just four years ago on June 30th). Needles, Daggett and Barstow in California joined Kingman in Arizona and Desert Rock in Nevada to also break previous heat records as temperatures soared to between 111 and 115 F across these cities and towns.



(Record heat hammered the U.S. West on Tuesday spiking fire hazards, grounding planes, causing power outages and increasing the risk of heat injury. Image source: National Weather Service.)

All these severe high temperatures took a serious toll as both cities and citizens fell under blast-furnace-like conditions. In Phoenix, 43 flights were grounded. Aircraft could not generate enough lift for a safe take-off in the thin, low-density hot air. Total number flights grounded since Monday now tops 50 for the city — with more expected Wednesday when temperatures are expected to hit 118 F.

As flights were grounded in Phoenix, fires began to spark across the Southwest. Several fires ignited in Southern California including a large 950 acre blaze near Big Bear. In Utah, hundreds of people were forced to evacuate a ski town when a weed-killing torch ignited a swiftly spreading fire. And in southwest Arizona, a wildfire burned 8 structures as more than 100 firefighters rushed to contain the blaze. Firefighters across the southwest struggled against some of the most difficult conditions imaginable — extreme heat, blustery southerly winds, and rapidly-drying vegetation.

Record heat also overwhelmed grids when customers cranked up air conditioning and high temperatures put a major strain on power lines and transformers. With California temperatures climbing to historic levels yesterday, power outages were reported across Central Valley and on into the Bay area. Extreme warming of road surfaces caused highways to buckle even as hospitals prepared for a surge of various heat-related injuries from burns, to heat exhaustion, to heat stroke.



(Recent warming of ocean surfaces to well above average ranges off the U.S. West Coast have likely boosted the development of the recent western heatwave. Ocean surface warming is a signature condition of human-caused climate change. Image source: Earth Nullschool.)

A strong high pressure system and a large associated ridge aided by abnormally warm waters off the U.S. West Coast are the primary regional causes of the most recent heatwave. The pool of warm water in the Northeast Pacific — somewhat reminiscent of the Hot Blob that formed in the nearby ocean zones during 2014 and 2015 — appears to be boosting the development of upper level ridges and related surface heat over the region as temperatures climb to 10 to 25 F or more above normal for many locations. Despite recent record winter and spring rainfall for parts of the region, this new heatwave is starting to again advance drought conditions across the Southwest. Yet another hard shift in weather extremes from wet and cool to dry and hot that can likely be linked to climate change.

Cindy Ushers in Severe Flooding across the Gulf Coast

While the west scorches under extreme heat, the weather threat to the U.S. Southeast comes in the form of severe flooding. In the Gulf of Mexico, a sprawling Tropical Storm Cindy is interacting with a stalled frontal system to spike moisture levels in the atmosphere above the U.S. Gulf Coast. Already, between 3 and 9 inches of rain have fallen over parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida and Alabama. But the slow-moving, heavy rain bearing Cindy is poised to dump still more.



(24 hour rainfall totals show that heavy precipitation in the range of 3 to 9 inches have already fallen across the Gulf Coast. Cindy is expected to bring even more over the coming days. Image source: NOAA.)

According to NOAA QPC predictions for the next week, as much as 8.5 additional inches of rainfall could impact already-flooded parts of SE Louisiana. And when all is said and done, the system is forecast to drop between 10 and 15 inches or more of rainfall over parts of the area. The storm is not presently expected to rival last year’s August rain event which dumped up to 30 inches over the same region. Of course, with climate change boosting rainfall potentials by warming the Gulf of Mexico and spiking atmospheric moisture and instability, the unexpected can certainly happen. Let’s just hope that’s not the case with Cindy. But 10-15 inch rainfall totals are certainly disruptive enough. And with some streets in New Orleans already seeing 2-3 feet of flooding as more storms rush in from the Gulf, this event is certainly far from finished.

Links/Credits:

National Weather Service

ClimateState

Earth Nullschool

NOAA

Tropical Storm Cindy Pushes Toward Central Gulf Coast

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Link du jour
http://ricefarmer.blogspot.com/2017/06/ ... -2017.html

https://www.theguardian.com/news/galler ... lin-ballet

https://mobile.twitter.com/TrinedayKris

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/new ... -1.1420501


http://www.techtimes.com/articles/21064 ... should.htm



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/j ... -1.3278359




http://wizbangblog.com/2017/06/26/prose ... stigation/


DID THE FBI RETALIATE AGAINST MICHAEL FLYNN BY LAUNCHING RUSSIA PROBE?
SECRET MEMOS SHOW TRUMP ADVISER ROILED BUREAU BY INTERVENING IN AGENT’S DISCRIMINATION CASE BEFORE HE WAS TARGETED IN RUSSIA CASE.



The FBI launched a criminal probe against former Trump National Security Adviser Michael Flynn two years after the retired Army general roiled the bureau’s leadership by intervening on behalf of a decorated counterterrorism agent who accused now-Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe and other top officials of sexual discrimination, according to documents and interviews.

Flynn’s intervention on behalf of Supervisory Special Agent Robyn Gritz was highly unusual, and included a letter in 2014 on his official Pentagon stationary, a public interview in 2015 supporting Gritz’s case and an offer to testify on her behalf. His offer put him as a hostile witness in a case against McCabe, who was soaring through the bureau’s leadership ranks.

The FBI sought to block Flynn’s support for the agent, asking a federal administrative law judge in May 2014 to keep Flynn and others from becoming a witness in her Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) case, memos obtained by Circa show. Two years later, the FBI opened its inquiry of Flynn.

The EEOC case, which is still pending, was serious enough to require McCabe to submit to a sworn statement to investigators, the documents show.

The deputy director’s testimony provided some of the strongest evidence in the case of possible retaliation, because he admitted the FBI opened an internal investigation into Gritz’s personal conduct after learning the agent “had filed or intended to file” a sex discrimination complaint against her supervisors.

McCabe eventually became the bureau’s No. 2 executive and emerged as a central player in the FBI’s Russia election tampering investigation, putting him in a position to impact the criminal inquiry against Flynn.

Three FBI employees told Circa they personally witnessed McCabe make disparaging remarks about Flynn before and during the time the retired Army general emerged as a figure in the Russia case.

The bureau employees, who spoke only on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, said they did not know the reason for McCabe’s displeasure with Flynn, but that it made them uncomfortable as the Russia probe began to unfold and pressure built to investigate Flynn. One employee even consulted a private lawyer.

“As far as the troops in the field, the vast-majority were disgusted with the Russia decision, but that was McCabe driving the result that eventually led [former FBI Director James] Comey to make the decision,” said a senior federal law enforcement official, with direct knowledge of the investigation.

Read the whole thing. The rot appears to be deep set in both the FBI and the DOJ.






http://www.blacklistednews.com/EXPOSED% ... 8/Y/M.html

(GLOBALINTELHUB.COM) – 6/26/2017 — Drugs have been a part of human society forever – however far back you go, humans have used drugs in one form or another; medicine, recreation, spirituality (Shamans of simple tribes often ate psychedelics). In the world today there is an interesting schism between the puritan “America” and “Europe” about this issue – in Europe they consider drug addiction a health issue, and in places like Switzerland you can literally get strong narcotics like heroin from the Government. In America it’s the opposite, there is an exploding prison population for small non-violent offenses. But as with many things in America there are lots of ironies and hypocrisies, America also has the highest per capita rate of users of legal pharmaceuticals ‘drugs’ – and is one of the only countries in the world where drug companies are allowed to advertise on TV (In Europe you won’t see commercials for Prozac, Viagra, or other questionably useful drugs).

As the CIA represents the main head of the octopus that controls America’s society on behalf of their Illuminati owners, it is only fitting that the CIA has its hand in the international drug trade. It is also an interesting side note that since its early days the CIA has been interested in drugs for the use of interrogation, mind control, crowd control, and other purposes. In fact there have been suggestions based on circumstantial evidence that the entire ‘hippie’ movement came straight out of a CIA drug lab vis a vis Tim Leary and other affiliated icons.

The inspiration of this article is the book and legend of Gary Webb, the book is Dark Alliance – a must read for any trader or investor. Here’s a real blueprint how groups like the CIA manipulate markets. While the story of Dark Alliance which was originally published in a small California regional newspaper the San Jose Mercury News, this story has been re-published in nearly every major news source there is ranging from the NYTimes, Washington Post, LA Times, hundreds of foreign newspapers, etc.. The book is a great example of how to properly research a topic where its difficult to find information (in this case, because most of the CIA involvement was ‘secret’ and thus information was classified or destroyed, mostly). In trading, information is also difficult to find – analysts can learn a great deal from reading this book and understanding how one investigative journalist broke open the biggest secret the CIA had in its closet of deep secrets: The CIA was managing the international drug trade. The book concludes with the impeccable logic of the agency and how they could be involved in such dastardly deeds. When the topic was officially investigated it was discovered that the CIA had a secret legal agreement with the Department of Justice (DOJ) stating that through the CIAs business of spying, it was not their obligation to report illegal activities they witnessed to the DOJ (such as drug trafficking) as it may compromise their intelligence gathering. And lo and behold, most of the CIAs international assets happened to be major drug kingpins like Manuel Noriega. So based on this understanding, no employee of the CIA ever directly brought drugs into the USA, and likely never touched the operation directly. It was CIAs job to provide logistic support, planes, pilots, operational instructions, airfields, needed gear, and most importantly – protection from prosecution in USA due to ‘national security.’ And there were side benefits to this operation. They got to redirect funds from Central and South American cocaine to the fledgling contra revolution in Nicaragua which the US Congress didn’t want to continue funding. They got to destroy the black community in South Central Los Angeles with the crack explosion (not only by health, but by using it as a tool to pass draconian laws). They also could easily use the information on the drug trade to go after their enemies in Central America. It seemed to be a win-win-win for USA. And according to this secret agreement with DOJ it was all legal!

Before continuing, let’s un-muddy the waters about key points on this issue. An investigation found that no CIA employee was found bringing illicit narcotics into USA. That’s probably true. In “Dark Alliance” there is no suggestion that the CIA itself was bringing drugs into the country. The drug kingpins such as Norwin Meneses, Danilo Blandon, and others – were simply protected as ‘assets’ – the CIA not only looked the other way, they stopped other US Government investigators from uncovering anything substantial. Several instances where the drug operations were discovered by DEA, FBI, and others – turned into a situation where they were instructed to cease the investigation and if they did not, the individual was targeted.

So how is all this connected to the markets? The CIA is a fairly large organization, 20,000 employees working in the US and in practically every country in the world. Their operations are vast, just to name a few not commonly known but public CIA operations, they are active angel and seed investors in Silicon Valley and have even created a budding DC based VC community that develops technology with primarily intelligence and military applications (such as face recognition). The most absurd example of a CIA project was when they hired psychologist BF Skinner to train pigeons to aid in missile guidance systems:

One of the most seemingly preposterous military programs of all time occurred during WWII, when famed behavioral psychologist B.F. Skinner was enlisted by the government to try and train pigeons for use in a missile guidance system. At the time, Skinner was known as one of the major practitioners of operant conditioning, a system that used reward and punishment as a means of controlling behavior. With these ideas in mind, Skinner placed a series of specially trained pigeons inside missiles. A camera on the front of the missile recorded its flight path, which was then projected on a screen for the pigeon to see. The birds were trained to recognize the missile’s intended target, and they would peck at the screen if it was drifting off course. This information was fed to the weapon’s flight controls, which would then be changed to reflect the new coordinates. Skinner was originally given $25,000 to get the project up and running, and he actually managed to make some minor progress with it. But government officials were never quite able to get past the obvious absurdity of the program, and it was eventually shut down. .. and another one “Acoustic Kitty”

Most people wouldn’t think of the common house cat as being a potential master of espionage, but the CIA sure did. In the 1960s, American intelligence is said to have spent over $20 million on “Acoustic Kitty,” a top-secret project that used cats as recording devices. The project took a group of specially trained cats and surgically implanted microphones, antennae and batteries into their tails, and then set them loose near the Russian embassy. The idea was that an unassuming cat would be able to stride right up to groups of communist officials and listen in on their conversation, which it could then beam back to agents with its sophisticated radio equipment. The plan was eventually put into action, but the first cat sent into the field was supposedly run over by a taxi before it could make a recording, and operation ‘Acoustic Kitty” was abandoned shortly thereafter.
Why did we use this ridiculous example? Because it is a known project, that the CIA was using Pigeons to guide missiles – it’s not so hard to believe they provided drug traffickers with the logistic and legal support needed to bring Cocaine into USA (and many other activities). For more absurd CIA programs see this article.

But the primary role of the CIA, is that of intelligence gathering and analysis which puts them right in the middle of the information war – and the battlefield is the financial markets. As we explain in our book Splitting Pennies Understanding Forex – the only thing that backs the US Dollar are bombs. Basically, the US Military, and in this case the CIA primarily, protects the US Dollar globally. If you look at any foreign CIA operation it’s all about one thing: money. Cuba became an enemy only after the communist government nationalized US owned businesses there (effectively, seized). You can literally overlay a global map of CIA activity which is negatively correlated with Coca Cola and McDonald’s sales (which are all denominated in US Dollars). And by the way, that is the connection to the CIA and FX – wherever there’s a foreign market, there is the CIA. They fight for market domination of the US Dollar (and the US corporations and culture that comes with it) no different than a major US corporation competes for market share. But their ‘client’ is one single entity: The US Government (and US Citizens, but rich ones). They are protecting capitalism at the front lines – fighting communism while making a few dollars along the way – what could be more American than that? They use the same playbook as they’ve developed internally for most of their operations – thus, by understanding the Contra-Cocaine operation one can understand any operation. They aren’t really so different.

Here’s a document that shows how the CIA has been supporting the US Dollar, regarding Gold markets (bear in mind, this document is dated 1970, one year before Nixon created the free floating FX regime we use today, which means the US Dollar was pegged to Gold). CIA support of US Dollar and USD interests is implied; that’s at the core of what they do – it is their doctrine. Intelligence gathering, is the tactical level and Communism, and other threats to the USD global hegemony are strategies. And relatively speaking, they do a good job. The USD has never been used so widely around the world, the US stock market has enjoyed a bull run never seen before in history. All the crap in the news and investigations into their drug operations are really an irrelevant side issue – what the CIA was created for, they succeed.

Probably, let’s hope this is not the case, probably – there wasn’t a CIA plot to bring Cocaine into America and turn it into crack and flood the black community. These were all convenient circumstances to achieve what they wanted operationally – fund a covert war and at the same time make a little money and use the issue to ruin their local enemies. Central America has few natural resources to speak of without sophisticated mining and/or manufacturing operations to tap them; in other words, there isn’t any ‘oil’ to exploit, as in the middle east. The one thing that is easy to grow and is more valuable than any other naturally growing substance, is Coca (when refined into Cocaine). And as explained in the book, before it was realized that it could be turned into crack – Cocaine was the habit of the Elite themselves, due to price and the fact that you could literally continue working while you were high on the powder (such as Wall St. traders during the trading session). So while it seems extreme, and the crack epidemic of Los Angeles is clearly a huge social problem – it isn’t really surprising that the CIA was involved in such profitable business. Similar circumstantial evidence suggests that a similar operation was run in Afghanistan, a land where the Poppy plant grows wild. George H.W. Bush’s CIA nickname was George “Poppy” Bush. Like “Grandpappy” right? In the book Gary Webb claims that Pablo Escobar had a photo of “Poppy” standing in front of a huge pile of cash and cocaine, but the photograph never surfaced and he was killed shortly after making this statement about the photograph (it may be another funny coincidence).

In conclusion – this book is a must read for any trader or investor: Dark Alliance. Also it’s a must read for any lawyer – as this is a unique situation where you have a hidden hand protecting defendants in Federal cases with ‘national security’ – silencing witnesses (with gag orders) and other mechanisms not common in district courts.




http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bro ... -1.3277420

Brooklyn priest sexually abused woman who sought spiritual guidance: lawsuit
BY JAMES FANELLI
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, June 26, 2017, 4:00 AM



https://dublinsmickdotcom.wordpress.com ... oh-canada/


Canada Becomes First Western Country To Legalize Bestiality-Vaccinate Them-Fluoridate Them And Provide Animals For Comfort-Oh Canada!
Posted on June 25, 2017
Canada legalizes bestiality
Having sex with animals is now legal in Canada, according to an astonishing new ruling by the Canadian Supreme Court.

According to the law on bestiality – citizens are now permitted to have sexual relations with animals as long as there is no penetration involved.

Independent.co.uk reports: The determination stemmed from a case involving a British Columbia man convicted of 13 counts sexually assaulting his stepdaughters – including one count of bestiality. But the man, identified only as “DLW”, was acquitted of the bestiality count with the new ruling.

DLW’s attorneys argued that bestiality linked to “buggery” – or sodomy – with animals beginning with an 1892 criminal code. Bestiality was first used in a 1955 code, but still was not defined to encompass every sex act with animals.

“Although bestiality was often subsumed in terms such as sodomy or buggery, penetration was the essence – ‘the defining act’ – of the offence,” the court said.

Thus, the court ruled by a 7–1 majority that bestiality required penetration.

“There is no hint in any of the parliamentary record that any substantive change to the elements of the offence of bestiality was intended,” the ruling reads.

According to court record DLW smeared peanut butter on the genitals of his victims and had the family dog lick it off while he videotaped the act.

Court documents disclose that DLW attempted to have the dog perform intercourse on the stepdaughter, but that ultimately failed.

DLW is serving a 16 year prison sentence. He brought the bestitality conviction to the court on appeal.

Justice Rosalie Abella was the lone dissenter, and had suggested that the court deny the appeal.

“Acts with animals that have a sexual purpose are inherently exploitative whether or not penetration occurs,” she wrote.

Representatives for Animal Justice, who brought the case to the Supreme Court, said the ruling should encourage Parliament to act on changing “outdated” laws that fail to protect the country’s animals.

“As of today, Canadian law gives animal abusers license to use animals for their own sexual gratification,” executive director of Animal Justice Camille Labchuk told The Independent via emailed statement. “This is completely unacceptable, contrary to societal expectations, and cannot be allowed to continue.”

Animal Justice implored Parliament to pass the Modernizing Animal Protections Act.

“This much-needed bill updates the animal offences in the Criminal Code,” Ms Labchuk added, “and closes this dangerous loophole to make it crystal clear that all forms of sexual activity between a person and an animal are unacceptable.”

Source
British PM Theresa May: Pedophiles Should be Allowed to Adopt Children Too

Read more at: http://www.neonnettle.com/features/968- ... ildren-too

With Theresa May on seriously shaky ground as the current Conservative leader and British Prime Minister, details of an executive order she made that would give more rights to child




FBI Octopus


The NSAC Overturns the Verdict in the Rigondeaux-Flores Fight
The Sweet Science-
The brouhaha put NSAC Executive Director Bob Bennett (pictured) on the hot seat. An ex-Marine and former FBI Special Agent, Bennett, 63, was appointed to ...




Rockland County Police Academy Graduates 28
Patch.com-
The graduation will be the last for Police Academy Director Steven Heubeck, a former FBI agent and Army Intelligence official who is retiring. Recruits came from ...





http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.3277307


NYC correction boss worked from his Maine home and is eligible for fat check from piling up unused vacation time
BY GREG B. SMITH REUVEN BLAU
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, June 26, 2017, 4:00 AM






http://fox4kc.com/2017/06/26/jackson-co ... -officers/


Jackson County Jail raid leads to charges against four, including two correctional officers


POSTED 7:02 PM, JUNE 26, 2017,






http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html

LOCAL L.A. Now
Nearly three dozen illegal weapons found in home of LAPD officer accused of unlawful sex with teen cadet, sources say






http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3279944

Texas police chief accused of calling beauty queen a ‘black b---h’ resigns


BY ELIZABETH ELIZALDE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, June 26, 2017, 9:12 PM






http://www.openminds.tv/mark-oconnell-u ... 2017/40427

Mark O'Connell – UFOs and Astronomer Dr. J Allen Hynek – June ...
Open Minds UFO
We also delve into a couple topics suggested by listeners, including the rumors that Hynek was a double agent and was working for the CIA or FBI to derail UFO ...






http://www.nydailynews.com/newswires/ne ... -1.3279905

Weed killer Roundup ingredient going on California list as cancerous



Monday, June 26, 2017, 7:48 PM




http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/w ... -1.3279057

Washington convenience store owner sentenced to 8 years for fatally shooting shoplifter
BY MINYVONNE BURKE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, June 26, 2017, 2:19 PM


http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3279112


Ohio councilman tired of spending city money suggests EMS stop responding to
overdoses



Monday, June 26, 2017, 3:07 PM





http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3279645





Vandals scrape words off historic Emmett Till sign in Mississippi



Monday, June 26, 2017, 6:26 PM




http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ups ... -1.3279059

Upstate New York judge forced to step down for tormenting ex-girlfriend, threatening legal action
BY GLENN BLAIN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, June 26, 2017, 2:15 PM




“… We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did….”

Nixon Policy Advisor Admits He Invented War On Drugs to Suppress ‘Anti-War Left and Black People’

https://jezebel.com/nixons-policy-advis ... 1766359595





http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyp ... -1.3279082

NYPD cop allegedly paid for sex acts while working undercover prostitution stings



BY LAURA DIMON GRAHAM RAYMAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, June 26, 2017, 2:31 PM

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Link du jour


http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/ ... 268140.php



http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Cons ... 281708.php


http://www.cjpc.org/sex-offender-policy ... sopri.html

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3317367


http://www.nydailynews.com/newswires/ne ... -1.3318232


http://www.sfgate.com/news/crime/articl ... 280957.php



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3318890

WATCH: Video captures white Georgia officer viciously beating black woman with baton
while she is laying on floor
BY CHRISTOPHER BRENNAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Tuesday, July 11, 2017, 8:35 PM




https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/07/11/us- ... nee-policy


US: Press FBI Nominee Wray on Independence, Detainee Policy


(Washington) – The US Senate Judiciary Committee should vigorously question Christopher Wray, the nominee for director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), on ensuring the bureau’s independence and his role in post-September 11, 2001 detainee policy, Human Rights Watch said today. Wray’s confirmation hearing is slated for July 12, 2017.

President Donald Trump nominated Wray after firing James Comey as FBI director in the midst of the FBI’s investigation into possible collusion between the Trump presidential campaign and Russia to intervene in the 2016 US presidential election.

“Christopher Wray needs to demonstrate to the Senate that he will uphold the FBI’s independence, which is critical for the bureau being an impartial law enforcement agency,” said Maria McFarland Sanchez-Moreno, US program co-director at Human Rights Watch. “Senators also need clarity from Wray about his role in abusive detainee policies after 9/11 and his positions on surveillance, protest movements, and other issues affecting basic rights.”

As FBI director, Wray would be in charge of all federal investigations aimed at enforcing federal law and would play an important role in counterintelligence operations. The FBI conducts investigations in a range of areas including terrorism, cyber-crime, federal civil rights violations, corporate and banking fraud, and public corruption.

As a lawyer, Wray has alternated between working for the Justice Department, including heading the criminal division and handling corporate fraud cases, and private practice, representing corporate interests in criminal and regulatory actions. More recently he was the personal attorney for Trump’s former transition director, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. The firm where he currently works also advises the Trump family business, media reports say.

Senators should question Wray about his involvement in US detainee policy after the attacks of September 11, 2001, Human Rights Watch said. As head of the Justice Department’s criminal division, Wray may have had information about the mistreatment of detainees amounting to criminal conduct by members of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), civilian contractors and other personnel.

However, in 2004 after reports surfaced of detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, Wray suggested at a public hearing that he had no knowledge of the abuses before they were reported by the media. Days later, the media reported that the Justice Department had already been investigating allegations of detainee abuse by the CIA, prompting Senator Patrick Leahy to write a letter to the attorney general urging him to clarify Wray’s testimony.

Documents since made public as part of a Freedom of Information Act request by the American Civil Liberties Union indicate that the CIA Office of Inspector General had sent Wray a memo three months earlier referring the case of Manadal al-Jamadi to Wray for “possible violations of criminal law.” Jamadi died due to “blunt force injuries complicated by compromised respiration,” according to the memo, shortly after his arrest and detention in CIA and then military custody in Iraq. By that time, at least six detainees had died in CIA or Defense Department custody in Iraq and Afghanistan, including at least two and perhaps three, whom the Justice Department had known about and were investigating.

“Wray needs to explain what and when he knew about CIA detainee abuse and his response,” McFarland Sanchez-Moreno said. “The issue gets to the heart of whether Wray will use his powers to carry out criminal investigations in the face of enormous political opposition.”

Wray also played a key role in the FBI PENTTBOMB investigation following the 9/11 attacks, during which more than 750 mostly Arab or Muslim men who had violated US immigration law were detained, ostensibly for ties to terrorism. Many of these men, deemed “special interest” detainees, were held for prolonged periods, averaging 80 days, without knowledge of, or the ability to contest, the terrorism allegations. Though many had overstayed their visas or entered the US illegally, as Human Rights Watch and Inspector General’s reports found, the men normally would not have been detained or would have been held in immigrant detention centers with access to visitors and attorneys.

Instead, they were held under a “hold until cleared” policy even if there was no basis for the terrorism allegations, and even in some cases after judges had ordered their release on bond or deportation orders and they could be returned to their home countries. Both reports found that these measures were not justified on national security grounds.

Many of these detainees were put in maximum-security prisons under what the inspector general’s report described as a “communications blackout,” that in some cases lasted for weeks. During that time, the detainees’ families and lawyers didn’t know where they were or why they had been locked up. Wray, who was then Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General, supported these measures, according to the Inspector General’s report. The report says that he and a colleague told the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) director, Kathy Hawk Sawyer, “to ‘not be in a hurry’ to provide the September 11 detainees with access to communications – including legal and social calls or visits – as long as the BOP remained within the reasonable bounds of its lawful discretion.”

Incommunicado detention can facilitate serious human rights violations, including torture and ill-treatment, and violates US obligations under international law. In addition to being denied access to lawyers and families and arbitrarily detained, many of the PENTTBOM detainees subject to the communication blackout were physically abused, slammed into walls, kicked, dragged by handcuffs, and verbally harassed, according to the report.

Senators should question Wray about areas of FBI work that directly affect the rights of Americans, Human Rights Watch said. Little is known about Wray’s views on communications surveillance, but as with then-Deputy Attorney General Comey and others, he reportedly was willing to resign in protest in 2004 over the prospective re-authorization of a large-scale secret monitoring program.

It’s up to the Senate to ensure that its next director will uphold the bureau’s independence and respect rights.
Maria McFarland Sanchez-Moreno
Co-Director of US Program
However, the FBI has access to enormous troves of information assembled using electronic surveillance powers greatly expanded since 9/11. Therefore, it will be important for Senators to question Wray about how he would use US communications surveillance authorities. They should also question whether he, like Comey, would support the creation of “encryption backdoors” for law enforcement. Human Rights Watch, digital security experts, and privacy groups have opposed this because it would create vulnerabilities that criminals and others could exploit, broadly undermine cybersecurity, and give rise to a risk of rights abuses by unscrupulous governments and officials.
A related area of concern is the FBI’s practice, documented by Human Rights Watch, of targeting for investigation American Muslims and particularly vulnerable people, including those with intellectual and mental disabilities and the indigent, who were not involved in terrorist activity and may never have been were it not for the FBI’s involvement and encouragement.

Senators should question Wray about his response to emerging protest movements, such as Black Lives Matter, whose motives President Trump has criticized. The FBI has a history of abuses against domestic dissenters, notably the COINTELPRO investigations, aimed at carrying out surveillance on, smearing, and discrediting anti-war and civil rights groups between 1956 and 1971.

Questions should focus on the FBI’s ability to safeguard the rights of protesters. Senators should also seek a firm commitment from Wray to continue the FBI’s investigations into civil rights violations by local police departments, despite Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ moves towards reducing the Justice Department’s role in civil rights enforcement.

“The FBI has broad powers and plays a critical role as the chief federal law enforcement agency in the United States,” McFarland Sanchez-Moreno said. “It’s up to the Senate to ensure that its next director will uphold the bureau’s independence and respect rights.”



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3317904


KING: Recent stories of injustice in America you may have missed



July 11, 2017, 12:25 PM


The injustice review is a new column I will be writing every Tuesday to review recent cases of injustice from the past week that could easily get lost in the news cycle of Trump's America.

One of the most difficult aspects of my job is that so many of you keep informed about incidents of injustice in America that I sincerely struggle to keep up. I write at least one story a day about injustice in America, but that barely scratches the surface of how bad things truly are. I hope to use this new column to track and expose even more cases.

The Indianapolis Police Shooting of Aaron Bailey

On June 29, Indianapolis police shot and killed Aaron Bailey, a 45-year-old black man, after a traffic stop. He was unarmed. The shooting has a single eyewitness, Shiwanda Ward, who recently spoke to the press. In this video, she said Bailey was injured by airbags after their car crashed and that police shot him right there on the spot "for no apparent reason."

Local police, and now the FBI, are investigating the shooting.

KING: Police brutality fight is David versus an army of Goliaths
Columbus Officer Zachary Rosen fired for stomping a handcuffed man

Columbus, Ohio, police officer Zachary Rosen was involved in the 2016 shooting death of Henry Green, a beloved young man in the community. Rosen was not indicted by a grand jury after the shooting, and activists in Columbus have fought nonstop for Rosen to be fired — something that finally happened after video showed him stomping on a handcuffed man. Now, he must be arrested. What he did to a nonviolent man in handcuffs was not just against department policy, it should be classified as an illegal assault. Firing him is simply not enough.

Philando Castile
Philando Castile (JIM MONE)
Officer who shot and killed Philando Castile given $48,500 settlement

After shooting and killing a man who did absolutely nothing to deserve such violence, Officer Jeronimo Yanez was just given a $48,500 settlement in an agreement to leave the department. This man — who openly admitted that he first pulled over Philando Castile because he thought his nose resembled that of an armed robbery suspect — shot and killed Castile for no apparent reason whatsoever, then was given a load of cash? Not only is that bogus, it's a true symptom of just how difficult it is to hold terrible cops accountable. The man literally just got paid after killing Philando Castile. My blood is boiling.

The Louisiana police killing of Dejuan Guillory

Early in the morning of July 7, 27-year-old Dejuan Guillory, a black man, was shot and killed by police in the rural Louisiana town of Mamou, La. Guillory was unarmed. According to the attorney of the only eyewitness to the shooting:

"They were both on the ground. Guillory was on the ground, on his belly, his hands behind his back, and the officer had a gun trained at Guillory's back, maybe a foot or two from Guillory's body. They were still arguing back and forth but Guillory was on the ground as directed. His hands were behind his back. Guillory said 'Please don't shoot me; I have three kids.' He was not resisting. All of a sudden, a shot rang out."

KING: No, I won't be writing about black-on-black crime
Dejuan Guillory was shot to death by a Ville Platte sheriff's deputy, and his girlfriend Dequince Brown's lawyer alleges that Guillory was lying on his stomach with his hands on his back when he was shot.
Dejuan Guillory was shot to death by a Ville Platte sheriff's deputy, and his girlfriend Dequince Brown's lawyer alleges that Guillory was lying on his stomach with his hands on his back when he was shot. (FACEBOOK)
According to attorneys for the eyewitness, the officer, Paul LeFleur, then shot Guillory at least three more times. An autopsy report on Guillory has not yet been released.

Police in Colorado shoot and kill six people in five days

This year is on pace to be the deadliest measured for police brutality in America. In a span of just five days last week, police in Colorado shot and killed six people. To give that some perspective, in 2013, police in Finland, which has 5.3 million residents, fired six bullets the entire year.

Florida's first and only black state's attorney was racially profiled by police

Aramis Ayala is Florida's first and only African-American state's attorney — making her one of the most powerful and influential figures in their justice system. That didn't stop police from pulling her over for flimsy reasons. Watch the outrageous video of the incident here.






http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/sco ... -1.3318292

Hundreds of NYPD cops turn backs to de Blasio in protest as he speaks at funeral for slain police
officer



July 11, 2017, 3:11 PM

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Link du jour



https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yIHS9bBQuZU

http://www.pravdareport.com


http://www.occurrencesforeigndomestic.c ... y-justice/


http://www.michaelmckevitt.com/the-fram ... collusion/

THE COLLUSION
JUNE 22ND, 2006

In the summer of 2000, members of MI5 and the FBI met in the Washington office of the FBI. The purpose of the meeting was to finalise the details of the stitch up of Michael McKevitt. Back in the mid 1990’s the FBI had supplied MI5 with a paid informant, David Rupert. Rupert had worked with the FBI since 1974. He was a multiple bankrupt and a career informant for 30 years, working initially with the FBI and later with MI5. During those years he was arrested for cheque and wire fraud as well as suspected white slavery having been found with a 15 year old run-away in his truck. He was never charged or convicted of any of the above. However his informant services where used extensively throughout the same period.

Rupert travelled to Ireland spying on Irish citizens from the early 1990’s. During the mid 90’s Rupert was introduced to MI5 who according to him directed and controlled his actions while in Ireland. At one point the FBI funded the lease of a Bar and adjoining caravan and camping holiday park in Co. Leitrim as a base for Rupert to spy from. Rupert claimed the park was being used by IRA sympathisers and duly sent the names, addresses and telephone numbers of all the families mainly from Belfast who had holidayed in the park to the FBI and MI5. This was at a time when Loyalist death squads were receiving information from state forces to set up and murder selected individuals on their instructions. The Garda authorities were aware of Rupert passing details on to FBI/MI5 about Irish citizens yet they chose to allow this to happen.

Throughout his stay in Ireland Rupert claimed he forwarded all of the relevant intelligence he had acquired to MI5 via encrypted e-mails. Between 1997 and 2001 Rupert posted 2166 e-mails to his paymasters in British intelligence.

According to an article in Forum Magazine:

“On 11 April 1998, Rupert dispatched his most controversial e-mail to MI5 headquarters. It was almost five months before the now infamous maroon Vauxhall Cavalier would decimate the centre of Omagh town and kill 29 people. For this reason the e-mail was all the more startling because in it Rupert informed MI5 that a dissident republican group was planning a car bomb attack in Omagh. The April car bomb attack in Omagh was eventually frustrated by Gardai south of the border. However, MI5 management knew the threat was only postponed and not extinguished. Within days MI5 e-mailed Rupert: “We disrupted the intention to use the car bomb, but maybe not for long”. MI5 obviously foresaw the strong likelihood of a renewed attempt to bomb Omagh. However, MI5 now held the advantage over the would-be car bombers in that from as early as April 1998 it knew Omagh was a likely target for a dissident republican car bomb attack.

Omagh bomb August 1998.

Rupert’s e-mails were not the only pre-August 15th information in MI5’s possession which pointed to a dissident republican attack in Omagh. A second key piece of intelligence came to light on August 4 when an anonymous phone-caller warned British intelligence of a planned dissident republican gun and bomb attack in Omagh on August 15. MI5 subsequently claimed that it dismissed this anonymous phone-warning as a rogue RUC Special Branch call. However, this was a poor attempt at distraction. The importance in all of this is that whereas Rupert provided specific details with regard to the proposed location of the planned bombing, this phone-warning supplemented his e-mail intelligence by not only confirming the location, but also providing the all important precise date of the planned attack.

However, the windfall of dissident republican intelligence did not end there. MI5 possessed a third piece of high-grade information which indicated that a car bomb attack was scheduled for mid-August. Two days before the Omagh bombing, FRU agent Kevin Fulton met with a Real IRA informant whose clothing, according to Fulton, was covered in dust particles of homemade explosives. Fulton correctly suspected that a car bomb attack was in an advanced stage of planning. Fulton provided British intelligence with the agent’s name and car registration number. Yet once again this vital piece of intelligence was ignored.

But perhaps the most startling disclosure concerning MI5’s foreknowledge of Omagh came during the inquest into the bombing. According to the Sunday Business Post (26/8/2001) leading British barrister Michael Mansfield QC, acting for Lawrence Rush, cross-examined several RUC witnesses. It emerged that a warning specifying the precise location of the bomb had not been passed on to local officers in time to clear the area.

“After that, we started getting threatening calls. We were told by the RUC that our name was on a death-list,” Solicitor Des Doherty said.

The RUC also confirmed to Doherty that a newspaper report of a spy satellite picking out the car used to transport the bomb was correct.

Doherty said. “It is understood that when the RUC contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation in America, they produced information from the satellite.”

This suggests that the maroon Vauxhall Cavalier contained a tracking device which enabled a US GPS satellite not only to follow the car’s movements but also pinpoint its exact location on the day of the bombing. At the request of MI5, US intelligence would have monitored the car as a priority and would have conveyed this surveillance data to MI5 without delay. Yet MI5 chose not to relay this information to RUC officers on the ground on August 15. Furthermore, the presence of a tracking device on the maroon Vauxhall Cavalier indicates the involvement of an MI5 agent in the planning or the execution of the Omagh bombing, at some point between the unlawful procurement of the maroon Vauxhall Cavalier and the detonation of the explosives on August 15.

After the Omagh bombing MI5 ordered Rupert out of Ireland as a matter of urgency. An August 16 MI5 e-mail instructed Rupert to “insulate yourself from the Gardai” [MI5 to David Rupert, E-mail 305, 16-08-98]. Later that night Rupert was ordered to: “Collect tickets at Belfast City Airport…You’ll be here [London] for two nights. We need to talk. It’s extremely important” [MI5 to David Rupert, E-mail 329, 17-08-98]. Rupert’s MI5 handlers obviously feared that their agent might be gripped as part of a massive cross-border investigation and that – if placed under sufficient pressure – Rupert might disclose the prior bomb warning he had conveyed to MI5 in early April in relation to Omagh. Indeed all of Rupert’s MI5 e-mails on Omagh were subsequently withheld from Nuala O’Loan when she conducted her large-scale investigation into the intelligence background to the tragic bombing. By late August 1998 there were a number of skeletons inside MI5’s cupboard.






https://www.irishcentral.com/news/fbi-a ... -237765331

An FBI agent gave Whitey Bulger 40 pounds of plastic explosives most of which was sent to the IRA a key witness in the Whitey Bulger trial has stated.

Steve Flemmi is the prosecution key witness already serving life without parole who says he accompanies Bulger on most of his murder sprees, including the strangling of Flemini’s own girlfriend, Debra Davies, because she knew the two men were FBI informers.

On Friday Flemmi testifies that in the 1980s, FBI agent John Newton gave him and Bulger a case of C-4 explosives to send to the IRA.

“It was a surprise when we got it,” Flemmi old the court adding that he believed that Newton, who was a former Green Beret, got the plastic explosives while in military training.

Newton had the explosives in his South Boston home and arranged for the two gangsters to come and pick it up. Newton has denied the accusation.

Links to the IRA have surfaced in the trial. Bulger was very close to senior IRA figure Joe Cahill, meeting him frequently in Boston after he smuggled him across the border from Canada on a supporters bus when the Boston Bruins hockey team were playing a Canadian side.

Bulger idolized Cahill according to Kevin Cullen and Shelley Murphy two Boston Globe writers who have written a definitive book on Bulger called “Whitey Bulger”

Bulger had an Irish passport obtained legally through his grandparents nationality in 1987.

Following the explosives hand over, the IRA worked with the Bulger gang on getting more weapons which ended when the Valhalla trawler left Gloucester, Mass in 1984 chock full of guns and explosives for the IRA. The 7 and half tons of weapons was estimated to have cost $1 million dollars

The arms were handed off to an Irish fishing trawler the Marita Ann but that boat was stopped and boarded by Irish navy officials tipped off by an IRA mole.







http://www.enewscourier.com/news/local_ ... 983af.html

ALEA visits FBI center at Redstone Arsenal


Officials with the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency on Monday addressed attendees of the inaugural FBI Analytical Writing Course at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, according to a press release.

ALEA Secretary Hal Taylor, state Bureau of Investigation Director Gene Wiggins and Alabama Fusion Center Director Jay Moseley spoke about the value of the analytical products to the intelligence and law enforcement communities and the importance of the two-week training, which concluded Friday.

They also expressed thanks to the FBI for providing this training to fusion center intelligence analysts from across the nation.

Fusion centers were created by state and local public safety executives in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and given the mission of assisting in the identification, prevention, mitigation, response and recovery of terrorist acts and other major criminal activity.

“Every day across the 79 fusion centers in 50 states and three U.S. territories, personnel assigned to lead and work in fusion centers from state and local law enforcement, homeland security, fire, public health and emergency management agencies, working alongside federal law enforcement and homeland security partners, are accomplishing that mission,” the release said. “They work to identify behavior that is reasonably indicative of pre-operational planning associated with terrorism or other criminal activity. Fusion center staff are also accomplishing their public safety mission with the protection of privacy, civil rights and civil liberties as a core function of their analytical activities.”

At the heart of every fusion center is an analyst who has the task of developing data into the intelligence products used to identify and prevent threats to communities and aid in the mitigation, response and recovery when public safety resources are unable to stop the threat. The National Network of Fusion Centers has more than 1,000 analysts supported through the development of training courses with federal partners.




https://www.propublica.org/article/davi ... -terrorist

The American Behind India's 9/11—And How U.S. Botched Chances to Stop Him - ProPublica


Jan 24, 2013 - Officials say David Coleman Headley slipped through the cracks despite repeated warnings to U.S. ... Indian authorities think the U.S. knew more than it has revealed about the FBI informant's activities ...






indiamond6.ulib.iupui.edu:81/MS09070614g.html

The Framing of Michael McKevitt: Omagh, David Rupert, MI5 & FBI Collusion

Excerpt from the booklet, The Framing of Michael McKevitt

The Blanket is serialising the booklet.

Marcella Sands • 22 June 2006

In the summer of 2000, members of MI5 and the FBI met in the Washington office of the FBI. The purpose of the meeting was to finalise the details of the stitch up of Michael McKevitt. Back in the mid 1990’s the FBI had supplied MI5 with a paid informant, David Rupert. Rupert had worked with the FBI since 1974. He was a multiple bankrupt and a career informant for 30 years, working initially with the FBI and later with MI5. During those years he was arrested for cheque and wire fraud as well as suspected white slavery having been found with a 15 year old run-away in his truck. He was never charged or convicted of any of the above. However his informant services where used extensively throughout the same period.

Rupert travelled to Ireland spying on Irish citizens from the early 1990’s. During the mid 90’s Rupert was introduced to MI5 who according to him directed and controlled his actions while in Ireland. At one point the FBI funded the lease of a Bar and adjoining caravan and camping holiday park in Co. Leitrim as a base for Rupert to spy from. Rupert claimed the park was being used by IRA sympathisers and duly sent the names, addresses and telephone numbers of all the families mainly from Belfast who had holidayed in the park to the FBI and MI5. This was at a time when Loyalist death squads were receiving information from state forces to set up and murder selected individuals on their instructions. The Garda authorities were aware of Rupert passing details on to FBI/MI5 about Irish citizens yet they chose to allow this to happen.

Throughout his stay in Ireland Rupert claimed he forwarded all of the relevant intelligence he had acquired to MI5 via encrypted e-mails. Between 1997 and 2001 Rupert posted 2166 e-mails to his paymasters in British intelligence.


According to an article in Forum Magazine:


“On 11 April 1998, Rupert dispatched his most controversial e-mail to MI5 headquarters. It was almost five months before the now infamous maroon Vauxhall Cavalier would decimate the centre of Omagh town and kill 29 people. For this reason the e-mail was all the more startling because in it Rupert informed MI5 that a dissident republican group was planning a car bomb attack in Omagh. The April car bomb attack in Omagh was eventually frustrated by Gardai south of the border. However, MI5 management knew the threat was only postponed and not extinguished. Within days MI5 e-mailed Rupert: "We disrupted the intention to use the car bomb, but maybe not for long". MI5 obviously foresaw the strong likelihood of a renewed attempt to bomb Omagh. However, MI5 now held the advantage over the would-be car bombers in that from as early as April 1998 it knew Omagh was a likely target for a dissident republican car bomb attack.

Rupert's e-mails were not the only pre-August 15th information in MI5's possession which pointed to a dissident republican attack in Omagh. A second key piece of intelligence came to light on August 4 when an anonymous phone-caller warned British intelligence of a planned dissident republican gun and bomb attack in Omagh on August 15. MI5 subsequently claimed that it dismissed this anonymous phone-warning as a rogue RUC Special Branch call. However, this was a poor attempt at distraction. The importance in all of this is that whereas Rupert provided specific details with regard to the proposed location of the planned bombing, this phone-warning supplemented his e-mail intelligence by not only confirming the location, but also providing the all important precise date of the planned attack.

However, the windfall of dissident republican intelligence did not end there. MI5 possessed a third piece of high-grade information which indicated that a car bomb attack was scheduled for mid-August. Two days before the Omagh bombing, FRU agent Kevin Fulton met with a Real IRA informant whose clothing, according to Fulton, was covered in dust particles of homemade explosives. Fulton correctly suspected that a car bomb attack was in an advanced stage of planning. Fulton provided British intelligence with the agent's name and car registration number. Yet once again this vital piece of intelligence was ignored.

But perhaps the most startling disclosure concerning MI5's foreknowledge of Omagh came during the inquest into the bombing. According to the Sunday Business Post (26/8/2001) leading British barrister Michael Mansfield QC, acting for Lawrence Rush, cross-examined several RUC witnesses. It emerged that a warning specifying the precise location of the bomb had not been passed on to local officers in time to clear the area.

"After that, we started getting threatening calls. We were told by the RUC that our name was on a death-list," Solicitor Des Doherty said.
The RUC also confirmed to Doherty that a newspaper report of a spy satellite picking out the car used to transport the bomb was correct.
Doherty said. "It is understood that when the RUC contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation in America, they produced information from the satellite.”

This suggests that the maroon Vauxhall Cavalier contained a tracking device which enabled a US GPS satellite not only to follow the car's movements but also pinpoint its exact location on the day of the bombing. At the request of MI5, US intelligence would have monitored the car as a priority and would have conveyed this surveillance data to MI5 without delay. Yet MI5 chose not to relay this information to RUC officers on the ground on August 15. Furthermore, the presence of a tracking device on the maroon Vauxhall Cavalier indicates the involvement of an MI5 agent in the planning or the execution of the Omagh bombing, at some point between the unlawful procurement of the maroon Vauxhall Cavalier and the detonation of the explosives on August 15.

After the Omagh bombing MI5 ordered Rupert out of Ireland as a matter of urgency. An August 16 MI5 e-mail instructed Rupert to "insulate yourself from the Gardai" [MI5 to David Rupert, E-mail 305, 16-08-98]. Later that night Rupert was ordered to: "Collect tickets at Belfast City Airport...You'll be here [London] for two nights. We need to talk. It's extremely important" [MI5 to David Rupert, E-mail 329, 17-08-98]. Rupert's MI5 handlers obviously feared that their agent might be gripped as part of a massive cross-border investigation and that - if placed under sufficient pressure - Rupert might disclose the prior bomb warning he had conveyed to MI5 in early April in relation to Omagh. Indeed all of Rupert's MI5 e-mails on Omagh were subsequently withheld from Nuala O'Loan when she conducted her large-scale investigation into the intelligence background to the tragic bombing. By late August 1998 there were a number of skeletons inside MI5's cupboard.

We now know MI5 possessed four pieces of high-grade intelligence which forewarned of a dissident republican car bomb attack in Omagh on August 15. The earliest intelligence data was dated 11 April. Then came the anonymous August 4 phone-call, Kevin Fulton's August 13 intelligence report and finally the satellite monitoring of the Vauxhall Cavalier arising from a tracking device planted by a British agent involved in the Omagh bombing. Yet notwithstanding this avalanche of intelligence MI5 made no attempt to intercept the bomb How can this operational decision be rationally explained? What was the motivation of MI5 management? Did British intelligence want to protect the identity of its agent at all costs? Or was this yet another "securocrat" plot to subvert the peace?

MI5 management did not want to scupper the peace process, but it did want to protect the identity of its agent and, at the same time, drive - what it hoped would be - the final nail into physical force republicanism at an exceptionally sensitive time in the Irish peace process.”





http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.3351677

Queens man says NYPD detectives planted cocaine, marijuana in his apartment in suit
BY ANDREW KESHNER
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, July 24, 2017, 1:20 PM


A Queens man is suing to chop down a conviction he blames on detectives who planted evidence.

Anthony Lopez says there's no way cocaine and marijuana were found at his Jamaica apartment — unless police put it there during a bogus 2014 search.

And he says it's no coincidence that two officers at the search, Detectives Kevin Desormeau and Sasha Neve, are now facing criminal charges in Manhattan and Queens for allegedly lying in court documents and testimony about facts in other cases.

Lopez says he was boxed into accepting a misdemeanor plea on a weapons possession charge. In his July 17 lawsuit, Lopez asked a Brooklyn federal judge to rule that his civil rights were violated by the detectives and the NYPD, which he claims failed to train its investigators.











http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/cou ... -1.3349919


Court cop who forced a woman to perform sex act inside Brooklyn courthouse may face felony charges


Sgt. Timothy Nolan approached the woman on Oct. 21 as she waited for her boyfriend to post bail at the Schermerhorn St. building during the court’s lunch break, according to the victim.

The 26-year-old stay-at-home mom said the officer asked her to walk with him into the sixth-floor stairwell. Then he exposed himself and began to molest her, she said.

Off-duty NYPD cop arrested after leaving scene of accident
“He should be criminally charged. I don’t want this to happen to anyone else,” said the woman, who was alerted that she will be called to testify before a grand jury in the coming days.

The woman said she immediately reported she was attacked. Nolan was not arrested, but instead he was transferred to the Bronx.











http://dailycaller.com/2017/07/23/exclu ... ides-home/


EXCLUSIVE: FBI Seized Smashed Hard Drives From Wasserman Schultz IT Aide’s Home

7:49 PM 07/23/2017
FBI agents seized smashed computer hard drives from the home of Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s information technology (IT) administrator, according to an individual who was interviewed by Bureau investigators in the case.

Pakistani-born Imran Awan, long-time right-hand IT aide to the former Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairwoman, has since desperately tried to get the hard drives back, the individual told The Daily Caller News Foundation’s Investigative Group.


http://ticklethewire.com/2017/07/22/fbi ... -levinson/

FBI Denies AP Report About Missing Ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson
ticklethewire.com-
FBI Denies AP Report About Missing Ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson ... to safely return Robert (Bob) Levinson home to his family,” the FBI said in a statement.





FBI Octopus



Trump critics failing their own ethics tests
ReporterNews.com-
Media experts rushed to his side and claimed that the memos were like his personal diary, and one CNN legal analyst (and former FBI agent) Asha Rangappa ...



http://www.latimes.com/local/california ... story.html

How an ex-FBI profiler helped put an innocent man behind bars



JULY 20, 2017
Raymond Lee Jennings wipes away tears during a hearing in a downtown L.A. courtroom. After new evidence was discovered and a former FBI profiler withdrew his testimony, a judge declared Jennings factually innocent. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
Exasperated, Jeffrey Ehrlich paused the true-crime television show every couple of minutes. The same thought kept running through the attorney’s mind: “No, that's wrong.”



The episode of “Killer Instinct” highlighted how the work of a retired FBI profiler had helped convict Ehrlich’s client of killing an 18-year-old woman in a Palmdale parking lot.

There were no fingerprints left behind, no murder weapon. But clues from the crime scene caught the profiler’s attention. The driver’s-side window of the victim’s car had been lowered several inches, suggesting to the profiler that the teen had rolled it down when someone who looked trustworthy approached. And her tube top was askew — a sign, the profiler said, of a botched sexual assault.






http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html

Claremont college suspends students for demonstration against pro-police speaker



Claremont McKenna College has suspended three students for a year and two others for a semester for blocking access to a campus event to protest a speaker known for defending police against Black Lives Matter activists.

The action, announced last week, arises out of an April 6 demonstration during which students and others ignored temporary barriers and blocked entrances to the Athenaeum and Kravis Center, where author and commentator Heather Mac Donald was scheduled to speak.

Many participants chanted “black lives matter” and “black lives — they matter here.”

At the time, campus officials and security decided not to make arrests or force the estimated 250 protesters to disperse. Instead, Mac Donald spoke before a handful of observers while the college live-streamed the event. Her 30-minute talk also was made available for later viewing.






https://www.dallasnews.com/news/texas/2 ... poop-prank

Fired San Antonio officer who made feces sandwich was involved in another poop 'prank'


Jan 26, 2017 - A San Antonio police officer fired last year for giving a poop sandwich to a homeless man took part in another feces-related





https://newsone.com/52571/top-5-worst-n ... y-moments/

Top 5 Worst NYPD Brutality Moments



The recent incident with Michael Mineo claiming he was sodomized with a baton by police officers in Brooklyn has shown that police brutality is still a major problem in New York. This is not the first time a minority male has been sodomized by an NYPD officer.


Its seem as if most incidents of brutality in New York involve either sodomy or the shooting of unarmed and innocent civilians. As disturbing as the events actually are, even more disturbing is the amount of times that officers are acquitted for their actions. Here are some of the most disturbing occurrences of police brutality in New York in recent memory.

1. Abner Louima.



What happened to Abner Louima would’ve been disturbing if it happened in the Abu Graib prisons. Abner Louima was at a club in Brooklyn when a fight broke out. Policeman, Justin Volpe, mistakenly took Louima for a man who sucker punched him and began beating him up on the street.

Justin Volpe



Officers took Louima back to the precinct where Volpe continued to beat him. Volpe Kicked him in the testicles and sodomized him with a broomstick, causing critical internal damage. After he was done, Volpe, proudly displayed the excrement and blood stained broomstick to his co-workers and boasted that he had broken a man. Volpe then threatened to kill Louima and his family if he told anyone.

Volpe admitted in court to sodomizing Louima and was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Only one other cop involved in the incident, Chris Schwartz, served any time. Louima sued the city successfully for $5.8 million.

2. Sean Bell



Sean Bell was killed on the morning of his wedding day at a strip club in queens. After leaving the nightclub, Bell and his friends were confronted by a plainclothes undercover officer who did not identify himself. When Bell sped off the officer along with his back up, let off 50 rounds into Bell’s vehicle, killing him and severely injuring his friends.

Although nobody in the car was found with a gun, police continued to smear Bell’s character after the incident as if Bell and his friends were under investigation and not the police officers. The officers were charged with manslaughter, reckless endangerment and assault but we’re all acquitted. Protests erupted all over New York and Al Sharpton was arrested.

Watch a Short Movie on Sean Bell

3. Amadou Diallo



Diallo was an immigrant from the republic of Guinea who despite his education worked selling DVD’s and socks on 14th St while studying at night. While returning to to his home after a meal, Diallo caught the eye of 5 NYPD officers who believed he fit the description of a serial rapist. The officers followed him to his apartment door. When Diallo reached into his jacket, a police officer yelled gun and the other officers let off 41 shots, 19 hitting Diallo. No gun was found on Diallo, only a wallet he pulled out to identify himself.



The officers were charged with second-degree murder and reckless endangerment but were acquitted after the trial was moved from the Bronx to more cop-friendly Albany, New York. Diallo’s mother sued the city for $61 million (20 million plus a million for each shot fired) and wound up being awarded $3 million.

Watch The Trailer For The Amadou Diallo Movie

4. Randolph Evans

15 year old Randolph Evans was shot and killed on Thanksgiving Night in 1976. Officer, Robert Torsney, was called to a housing project in Brooklyn to investigate a man with a gun. He met with group of young black men and proceeded to shoot the unarmed Evans for no given reason. Although he never was treated for epilepsy, Torsney’s defense maintained that he killed Evans because of a rare case of epilepsy and he was acquitted on the grounds of mental insanity.

5. Alberta Spruil.



Albert Spruil was a 57 year old church-going city worker. Her only crime was living in the wrong neighborhood. Cops believed that there was a large amount of guns, drugs and vicious dogs in her Harlem apartment. Without knocking they battered her door in and threw a flash grenade into her apartment. Although they found now weapons or drugs in her apartment, they put her in handcuffs. Despite the fact that she told them she had a heart problem, it took an hour and half to get her to the hospital where she was pronounced dead. The no knock raids have also killed a 92 year old black woman in Atlanta. Although no officers were charged in the incident, Spruil’s family collected $1.6 million for the






http://www.localnews8.com/news/pocatell ... /591833973


Pocatello police 'reviewing' video of man filming FBI building following his arrest
Officer: Photography is violating voyeurism laws


Posted: Jul 23, 2017 06:18 PM MDT
Updated: Jul 23, 2017 07:05 PM



A Chubbuck man claims the Pocatello Police Department violated his First Amendment rights when officers arrested him for recording video from outside the FBI office.

“I stopped directly across the street and filmed vehicles entering the FBI complex for approximately 10 minutes before a police car drove up behind me,” Sean Johnson wrote to KIFI/KIDK reporter Chris Oswalt in an email. “I was standing on the sidewalk across the street from the complex, near a bus stop. I was just standing there filming, not saying anything to anyone, nor waving my arms around or otherwise causing a commotion.”

The video recorded in June, which is posted on YouTube, has just over 1,800 views. Johnson said he posted the video to raise awareness of “local police force's attitude and knowledge towards First Amendment activity.”

In the video, which starts with Johnson zooming in on the license plate of a vehicle pulling into a secured parking lot, an exchange can be heard between a Pocatello officer and Johnson begin about 27 seconds into the video.



“Everything alright?” the officer asked. Johnson does not acknowledge the officer until the unidentified officer tells Johnson he “got a call” that Johnson “was recording the FBI building.”


“That's correct, I am,” Johnson can be heard saying in the video.

During the nearly six-minute video, the officer continually explained to Johnson that he was conducting a criminal investigation into Johnson's recording.

"Right now I am conducting a criminal investigation,” the officer is heard saying. “We got a report that you were recording the FBI building. So I need to see your identification"

"What crime?" Johnson replied. “Public voyeurism,” the officer answered.

Idaho code does not have a public voyeurism law. There is, however, a video voyeurism code. It is listed under “Chapter 66: Sex Crimes.” Much of the code is targeted at sex crimes and sexual exploitation of another person. It does not address filming from a public right way, which is a protected federal right.

“Did you get their permission to record?” the officer asks Johnson in the video.

“Do I need their permission?” Johnson asks in a reply. “Absolutely,” the officer is heard saying. “It is called public voyeurism,” he continues.


The officer continually uses public voyeurism as grounds for his conversation with Johnson, telling him he needs permission to record a federal building and employees.

A three-page memo to all federal employees and law enforcement from August 2010 says otherwise. In the memo, it clearly reads “remember the public has the right to photograph the exterior of Federal Buildings from publicly accessible spaces, such as streets, sidewalks, parks or plazas.”

The memo goes onto say the recording of federal buildings cannot impede on law enforcement operations. Johnson is charged with resisting or obstructing officers.

Throughout the six-minute video, officers can be heard repeatedly asking Johnson for his ID. Each time, he provides little information until officers place him under arrest, explaining their reasoning.

"I gave you plenty of opportunities to provide identification,” the officer is heard. “You didn't identify yourself. I'm conducting an investigation for unlawful reason of you providing identification. So tell me who you are. Sean Johnson? That's a pretty common name."

“I was taken to jail and held for 15 hours until I paid my bail of $300 directly from my own account,” Johnson wrote in his email. “I have since retained an attorney and the expectation is that the charge of 'obstruction and delay' will be dropped by the prosecutor.”

The Pocatello Police Department said it is aware of the “YouTube video concerning filming of the FBI facility. The department is looking into the matter."


Hundreds of comments have flooded the police department's Facebook page starting the night of Saturday, July 23. Following several comments regarding the video and arrest, a spokesperson said the police department's Facebook page was taken down by an employee, but could not elaborate on why.”

“That will be determined this week,” city spokesperson Logan McDonnell said in a phone call with Oswalt.

The Facebook page has since been restored.

Johnson says he is considering legal action against the city.

"I am definitely considering it, but since my pretrial conference has not even happened yet I think it's a bit early yet," Johnson wrote. "The conference had been rescheduled to 8/10 due to a delay of the city providing materials as part of the discovery process."

Pocatello Police were criticized by the public earlier this month when a video surfaced showing an officer appearing to be sleeping on the job. The department said it was investigating that video back on July 1. Today, the department says the officer is still employed.

“As it is a personnel issue, we cannot comment further," a statement said.



http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/07 ... -case.html


FBI turns over 7,000 documents from Weiner laptop in Clinton-tied case







http://www.climatecentral.org/news/flor ... date-21631

South Miami Just Made a Huge Rooftop Solar Decision




Published: July 20th, 2017
South Miami this week became the first city outside of California to require all new homes to install solar panels on their roofs. Six cities in the Golden State began requiring solar to be installed on new homes over the past few years. But in Florida, where voters killed proposed solar restrictions last year, South Miami is now a pioneer.

This week, the South Miami City Commission in a 4-1 vote approved a law requiring solar panels to be installed on all new homes built in the city.

Solar panels line the exterior wall of an apartment building in Santa Monica, Calif.
Credit: LimelightPower/flickr
Mayor Philip Stoddard says the city is trying to cut its carbon footprint because the region will be deeply affected by climate change, especially as sea levels rise.

“We’re down in South Florida where climate change and sea level rise are existential threats, so we’re looking for every opportunity to promote renewable energy,” Stoddard said. “It’s carbon reduction, plain and simple. We have a pledge for carbon neutrality. We support the Paris Climate Agreement.”

Stoddard said he expects only a few new homes and other buildings to be built in South Miami this year because the city of about 11,000 is surrounded on all sides by dense urban development and has very little space for new construction. But the requirement for new homes complements the city’s push for existing homeowners to put solar on their roofs.



It also sets an example for other cities that may be considering doing the same thing.

Action to expand renewables on the local level is critical at a time when the federal government has stepped back from advocating for renewable energy, said Jeremy Firestone, director of the Center for Carbon-free Power Integration at the University of Delaware.

Rooftop solar helps wean America’s electric power system off coal and natural gas power plants that pollute the atmosphere with large amounts of carbon dioxide. President Obama made support for rooftop solar a part of his Climate Action Plan, which the Trump administration has abandoned.

“These mandates will have an effect locally,” Firestone said. “As to the larger effect, they would hopefully move states to increase the fraction of (electricity) generation that has to be dedicated toward renewable energy.”

A solar panel is insallted on a San Francisco rooftop.
Credit: Brian Kusler/flickr
Solar installation mandates would also help accelerate the acceptance of rooftop solar across the country, said K Kaufmann, spokeswoman for the Smart Electric Power Alliance, a nonpartisan renewable energy education organization in Washington, D.C.

As solar panel costs have fallen in recent years, a growing number of homes have installed them, often with the assistance of companies such as SolarCity, which helps to finance and install photovoltaic panels.

Rooftop solar makes up only a tiny fraction — less than 1 percent — of all the electricity generated in the U.S.. The amount of electricity generated by solar panels installed on homes and businesses across the country is expected to grow by 70 percent by the end of next year.

So far, the largest city in the country to mandate rooftop solar panels is San Francisco, which began requiring them on most new buildings beginning in January. The city mandates that solar panels, a “living roof,” or a combination of the two occupy between 15 and 30 percent of the surface area of a new rooftop. A “living roof” is covered with grass, trees or other vegetation.

Other California cities that have mandated solar panel installations include Culver City, San Mateo, Lancaster, Sebastopol and Santa Monica.

In Florida, the rooftop solar mandate didn’t come easily for South Miami.

Florida utilities and other groups launched a ballot initiative last year in an attempt to limit the expansion of rooftop solar. The proposed amendment to the state constitutional would have allowed utilities to charge fees to solar panel owners as a way to make up for the loss of revenue when homeowners generate their own electricity, according to Politifact.



The state’s largest utilities spent more than $20 million to support the ballot initiative, but the measure failed at the polls in November. South Miami’s electric utility, Florida Power and Light, which supported the ballot measure, did not respond to a request for comment.

In June, the South Miami solar mandate was opposed by the Washington, D.C. lobbying group Family Businesses for Affordable Energy, which says on its website that homeowners expose themselves to “predatory companies” that hide various costs associated with solar installations. The group did not respond to requests for comment.

“Despite all our sunshine, public utilities have spent tens of millions of dollars to fight solar,” Stoddard said. The measure’s defeat helped clear the way for the city to push solar panel installations for both new and existing homes.

“I expect to see a lot more




http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html

Sex, joy rides and car chases: Scandal in LAPD youth cadet program sparks alarm and calls for reform

The police officer talked strategy with the young cadets as they prepared for an obstacle course competition.

Should the strongest person go first? The tallest? Teamwork was important, said the officer, Ruby Aguirre.

As the teenagers — addressing everyone with a “Sir” or “Ma’am” — powered across monkey bars or scrambled to catch footballs in Elysian Park earlier this month, the scene seemed straight out of a recruiting brochure for the Los Angeles Police Department’s cadet program, which enrolls over 2,000 local youths.

But a recent scandal involving cadets, stolen police cars and illicit sex was not far from their minds.


The disturbing events have illuminated deficiencies both in the cadet program and in how the LAPD keeps tabs on its cars and other equipment.

The department’s written manual governing contact between cadets and adults has not been updated in more than a decade, even though a police officer was recently convicted of sexual crimes involving a 16-year-old cadet.

In the LAPD’s equipment rooms, officers say a culture of laxity has become the norm, creating opportunities for anyone — volunteers, cadets or officers — to walk off with property.

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/wikileaks-say ... 52745.html

Wikileaks Says Robert Mueller Gave Russia Nuclear Material - But That's Not The Whole Story

July 2017
Wikileaks has released a classified US State Department from 2009 that appears to prove Special Counsel Robert Mueller, head of the Trump/Russia probe, once supplied the Russians with nuclear material.


The claim, if true, would be a hugely damaging revelation that would throw the whole investigation into chaos and incri

Only it isn’t and Wikileaks knows it.

The text and tweet released by Wikileaks more than suggests Mueller is guilty of a serious crime, passing on nuclear material to the USA’s superpower rival.

6. (S/Rel Russia) Action request: Embassy Moscow is requested to alert at the highest appropriate level the Russian Federation that FBI Director Mueller plans to deliver the HEU sample once he arrives to Moscow on September 21. Post is requested to convey information in paragraph 5 with regard to chain of custody, and to request details on Russian Federation’s plan for picking up the material. Embassy is also requested to reconfirm the April 16 understanding from the FSB verbally that we will have no problem with the Russian Ministry of Aviation concerning Mueller’s September 21 flight clearance.
But the section it omitted from the tweet changes the entire context of Mueller’s actions.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller departs after briefing members of the U.S. Senate on his investigation into potential collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign on Capitol Hill in Washington, US, June 21.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller departs after briefing members of the U.S. Senate on his investigation into potential collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign on Capitol Hill in Washington, US, June 21.
More
It reads:

2. (S/NF) Background: Over two years ago Russia requested a ten-gram sample of highly enriched uranium (HEU) seized in early 2006 in Georgia during a nuclear smuggling sting operation involving one Russian national and several Georgian accomplices. The seized HEU was transferred to U.S. custody and is being held at a secure DOE facility. In response to the Russian request, the Georgian Government authorised the United States to share a sample of the material with the Russians for forensic analysis.
This text is included in the document linked to in the tweet but it’s clear many people did took it at face value.




Wikileaks used to be a force for good in the world, playing a major role in the release of the Snowden files and exposing events like the killing of journalists by US forces in Iraq.

But more recently the group and its founder, Julien Assange, have been accused of pandering to a pro-Russian agenda.



Assange has been eager to assist the Trumps in the ongoing probe into possible collusion between the President’s associates and Russia during the 2016 US election.

Read More






http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2017 ... -theorist/

Behind the Headlines
Robert Mueller, Conspiracy Theorist
He’s unfit to be special counsel

Posted on July 31, 2017
When former FBI chief Robert Mueller was appointed as Special Counsel to preside over the “Russia-gate” probe, official Washington sang hosannas. Democrats, Republicans, the pundits, and the cocktail party chatterers of every persuasion swooned over his “impeccable” credentials.

That should’ve served as a warning sign, right there. Because what are those credentials? What is the Mueller record, and why does it inspire confidence in all the usual suspects?

Mueller has been consistently wrong about every important investigation he’s been involved in: and not only that – he’s erred on the side of a group-thinking warmongering and utterly clueless political class.

Let’s start with the most egregious case: the “Amerithrax” investigation. When, in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, letters containing anthrax showed up at the offices of NBC, the New York Post, and two US Senators, then FBI Director Mueller mobilized his agency to get to the bottom of a crime that shocked the nation – and helped push us into the Iraq war. Colin Powell used the anthrax attacks in his talking points for war with Iraq, telling the United Nations:

“Less than a teaspoon of dry anthrax, a little bit about this amount – this is just about the amount of a teaspoon – less than a teaspoon full of dry anthrax in an envelope shutdown the United States Senate in the fall of 2001. This forced several hundred people to undergo emergency medical treatment and killed two postal workers just from an amount just about this quantity that was inside of an envelope.”

The Iraqis, intoned Powell, had never accounted for their biological weapons. The implication was clear: the Iraqis were behind the anthrax attacks. Americans were told by their government that another terrorist attack utilizing biological weapons was imminent: they rushed to the hardware stores and bought up duct tape and plastic tarps. Mueller appeared before Congress, testifying that cooperation between Iraq and al-Qaeda on US terrain represented a direct threat:

“Secretary Powell presented evidence last week that Baghdad has failed to disarm its weapons of mass destruction, willfully attempting to evade and deceive the international community. Our particular concern is that Saddam may supply al-Qaeda with biological, chemical, or radiological material before or during a war with the US to avenge the fall of his regime. Although divergent political goals limit al-Qaeda’s cooperation with Iraq, northern Iraq has emerged as an increasingly important operational base for al-Qaeda associates, and a US-Iraq war could prompt Baghdad to more directly engage al-Qaeda.”

A month later, the invasion of Iraq began.

And the anthrax investigation dragged on. The probe focused on one Steven Hatfill, a former employee of USAMRIID, the primary US government bio-weapons research lab. Given the weaponized nature of the anthrax contained in the letters, FBI investigators were convinced that a scientist connected to anthrax research was the culprit. But why fixate on Hatfill?

This focus was due largely to the efforts of two individuals who were not experts in the field. Instead of homing in on the science – trying to trace the peculiar anthrax strain found in the deadly missives, which had killed 17 people – the FBI investigation under Mueller’s direction was based on purely circumstantial evidence uncovered by two individuals with little to no scientific knowledge: one was Don Foster, a Vassar College professor whose claim to fame was tracking down Newsweek columnist Joe Klein as the anonymous author of Primary Colors, a roman a clef about Bill Clinton’s scandal-plagued career. The other was Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, a molecular biologist and former advisor to President Clinton on bio-weapons, who believed that the anthrax attacks were the unintended consequence of a secret CIA project gone awry and that the FBI wasn’t making any arrests because it would reveal the government’s responsibility for the whole affair.

Like the amateur “investigators” of the Twitterverse, who today weave elaborate conspiracy theories linking various Trump administration figures to murky Russian operatives, Foster had done some digging and uncovered a pile of circumstantial “evidence” pointing to Hatfill: he dug up an interview with Hatfill during his tenure at the National Institutes of Health in which he outlined how bubonic plague could be manufactured and launched in someone’s garage. Foster also found an unpublished novel written by Hatfill that described a biological warfare attack on Washington, D.C. More “clues”: Hatfill had been in Rhodesia during an anthrax outbreak that occurred during the 1970s, and had been a student at a medical school in the town of Greendale – the name of the made up school listed as the return address on the anthrax letters.

Rosenberg was also on to Hatfill’s trail, and she got together with Foster, comparing notes: they had independently come to the same conclusion – Hatfill was the likely culprit. Foster had previously gone to the FBI, which initially rejected his evidence: Hatfill, they told him, had a good alibi. Yet the Foster-Rosenberg team of amateur sleuths soldiered on: Rosenberg carried out a public campaign explicating her pet theories, including authoring a “Possible Portrait of the Anthrax Perpetrator” that did not name Hatfill but surely described him to a tee, even naming one of his friends.

Still, the FBI was uninterested in the Foster-Rosenberg sleuthing effort – but this changed when the two amateur investigators met with Senate staffers, including those whose offices had been targeted by the anthrax letters. The FBI agent in charge of the probe was brought into the meeting. As David Freed, writing in The Atlantic, put it:

“Rosenberg criticized the FBI for not being aggressive enough. ‘She thought we were wasting efforts and resources in a particular—or in several areas, and should focus more on who she concluded was responsible for it,” [FBI agent Van] Harp would later testify.

“’Did she mention Dr. Hatfill’s name in her presentation?’ Hatfill’s attorney, former federal prosecutor Thomas G. Connolly, asked Harp during a sworn deposition.

“’That’s who she was talking about,’ Harp testified.

“Exactly a week after the Rosenberg meeting, the FBI carried out its first search of Hatfill’s apartment, with television news cameras broadcasting it live.”

From that day forward, Hatfill’s life became a living nightmare. Then Attorney General John Ashcroft declared that Hatfill was a “person of interest.” The FBI trailed him everywhere. The media hounded him. He was driven out of two jobs. His friends abandoned him. His home was trashed by agents, as was his girlfriend’s apartment. He was constantly stopped by local police. He became a pariah. Although ultimately exonerated when the “evidence” against him collapsed – Hatfill was awarded a $5.82 million settlement after enduring six long years of torture – his life was effectively destroyed. And all because Robert Mueller fell for a conspiracy theory that had no basis in fact.

As Freed notes, President George W. Bush was constantly needling Mueller about the slowness of the anthrax investigation, and there was tremendous pressure for the FBI Director to come up with something. The hysteria level in the country was reaching new heights on a daily basis. The theory of Hatfill’s guilt filled a need for Mueller, both politically and career-wise. As Freed writes:

“There was enough circumstantial evidence surrounding Hatfill that zealous investigators could easily elaborate a plausible theory of him as the culprit. As fear about the anthrax attacks spread, government and other workers who might have been exposed to the deadly spores via the mail system were prescribed prophylactic doses of Cipro, a powerful antibiotic that protects against infection caused by inhaled anthrax. Unfamiliar to the general population before September 2001, Cipro quickly became known as the anti-anthrax drug, and prescriptions for it skyrocketed.”

Pursuing the trail pioneered by Foster and Rosenberg – Hatfill’s good alibi was apparently forgotten – the FBI tried to tie together the bits and pieces of information linking Hatfill to the attacks into a legally airtight case – and they failed. But that didn’t stop them from leaking to the media all along the way. As Freed writes: “The result was an unrelenting stream of inflammatory innuendo that dominated front pages and television news. Hatfill found himself trapped, the powerless central player in what Connolly describes as ‘a story about the two most powerful institutions in the United States, the government and the press, ganging up on an innocent man. It’s Kafka.’”

Is any of this beginning to sound familiar?

Here is a politically important case, in which several high-level people have been targeted: investigators come into the probe assuming the identity of the responsible party, and are engaged thereafter in looking for confirmation of their assumption.

The parallels with the “Russia-gate” investigation are glaringly obvious: despite the lack of any real forensic evidence, the investigation is based on the assumption that the Russians, under the direction of Vladimir Putin, interfered in the 2016 presidential election by “hacking” the DNC and John Podesta’s emails, handing them over to WikiLeaks, and otherwise engaging in a concerted campaign to keep Hillary Clinton out of the Oval Office. All evidence to the contrary – and there’s plenty of it – is being pointedly ignored. Instead, the Russian conspiracy theory is being pushed by political actors with dubious (and quite obvious) motives, with the probe headed up by a man with a history of succumbing to political pressure in order to get “results.”

Like the Foster-Rosenberg conspiracy theory targeting Hatfill – and the “evidence” the Bush administration utilized to drag us into war with Iraq – bits and pieces of “intelligence” are being strung together to depict a Vast Russian-Trumpian Conspiracy to steal the 2016 election. A meeting with the Russia ambassador: a meeting with some Russian lawyer; the selling of condos to Russian clients; bit and pieces of intercepted communications leaked by anonymous intelligence officials. The whole thing resembles the “factoids” touted by the Bush era “Office of Special Plans” that were disseminated in the media to mislead the public and the Congress into going along with the Iraq war.

Rod Rosenstein’s letter appointing Mueller as Special Counsel assumes a conclusion and then seeks evidence to confirm it: the letter takes as a given the role of the Russian government and gives Mueller the authority to probe “links” – the same carefree methodology that led to Hatfill’s years-long persecution at the hands of the government and its media accomplices.

Speaking of media accomplices, the worst was undoubtedly New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, who persistently passed along Rosenberg’s unverified accusations under the thinly-veiled protective shield of prefacing it with “some say.” Weeks after Hatfill was exonerated, Kristof dashed off a reluctant-sounding pseudo-apology: that he’s now among the chief expositors of the Russia-gate conspiracy theory should come as no surprise.

Mueller’s weakness for convenient conspiracy theories that complement the conventional wisdom in Washington make him the worst possible choice for a special counsel. His tendency toward groupthink made him a key player in the campaign to lie us into the Iraq war. His utter lack of epistemological integrity in targeting an innocent man for the anthrax attacks – and refusing to clear Hatfill two years after investigators concluded he wasn’t the perpetrator – demonstrate his unfitness so clearly that one can only marvel there was no public outcry at his appointment. These flaws are more than likely to produce the same results in the Russia-gate probe – albeit on a much larger scale.

If Mueller carries out his mandate as special counsel the way he conducted the Amerithrax investigation, it will be as if Louise Mensch, Eric Garland, and Seth Abramson are providing the FBI with leads and guidance – just as Don Foster and Barbara Hatch Rosenberg did in the Hatfill case. But with this difference: hard scientific evidence – tracing the anthrax variant contained in the deadly letters – eventually led the anthrax probe in a different direction. In the case of Russia-gate, there is no science, only the guesswork of various self-interested cyber-security firms like CrowdStrike, which first fingered the Russians as the DNC/Podesta hackers. The inherent subjectivity of hacking attribution, and the extreme politicization of the investigation, will block this kind of corrective.

Which will empower Mueller to make it up as he goes along. Or, paraphrasing David Freed writing about the anthrax investigation fiasco: If there is “enough circumstantial evidence” surrounding the Trump administration that “zealous investigators could easily elaborate a plausible theory” of them as the culprits in a collusion scheme involving the Kremlin, then that is what we can expect to see.

This goes way beyond the Trump administration, Russia-gate, and the current political brouhaha over the 2016 presidential election: this is about the epistemic corruption that is rife in our political class. It is a pandemic born of groupthink, hypocrisy, smugness, and the willingness to fabricate “facts” in order to achieve political ends. It is a deadly disease, and it is killing us. The only antidote is a free media untethered to political interests and answerable only to the truth – and that is precisely what we don’t have right now. The media is complicit in all this: indeed, they are the carriers of the bacillus that is destroying this country. What happens when a free society poisons itself? I’m afraid we’re about to find out.

Important note: I don’t want to leave the impression that Mueller got it right when he targeted scientist Bruce Ivins as the culprit. In fact, the “evidence” marshaled against Ivins – who committed suicide before he could be brought to trial – was pretty much on the same level as the allegations made against Hatfill. I wrote about the Ivins case here. I also wrote about the anthrax attacks here, here, and especially here, in 2003, where I upheld Hatfill’s innocence and pointed in the direction of the probable perpetrators.

In short, Mueller never got it right.






http://www.herald.ie/news/courts/blood- ... 82880.html

Blood spray expert will say Jason was struck in the head as he lay ...
Herald.ie
Molly Martens (33), his second wife, and Thomas Michael Martens (67), his father-in-law, a retired FBI agent and lawyer, both deny second degree murder.










Link du jour

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/addi ... -1.3366164

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=01mTKDaKa6Q

https://fightgangstalking.com


https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2017/ ... -surrender


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=502zLfzUWmc




We brought John DeCamp to speak at our 12 annual conference investigating crimes
committed by FBI agents held at Bates College in the spring of 2001.
Featured on the program with John was Michael Ruppert, Black panther Darruba Bin Wahid,
Daryl Cherney of Earth First//Judy Bari fame, attorney John Clarke of Vince Foster murder coverup fame
and Frank Wilkinson of NCARL.
I spoke to John's son over 1 year ago and was told DeCamp had Alzheimers and was in the VA.




http://www.omaha.com/news/legislature/j ... 3c728.html

John DeCamp remembered as one of Nebraska's most accomplished, controversial lawmakers



Jul 29, 2017

During an unsuccessful bid for statewide office, former State Sen. John DeCamp once corrected someone who noted he brought to the race good name recognition.

“I’ve got name recognition, but it’s not all good,” he said with his trademark cackle.

Indeed, the 16-year state legislator from Neligh who died Thursday was at the same time one of the most accomplished and controversial lawmakers the Nebraska Legislature has seen. The colorful DeCamp was a power broker and wheeler-dealer of the first order, a pivotal figure in the success or failure of countless bills during his run in the Statehouse from 1971 to 1987.

DeCamp proved a man of both accomplishment and controversy outside the Legislature, too. The former Army captain in Vietnam spearheaded efforts to airlift thousands of orphans from the country; but he was also the author of an infamous memo that fanned rumors of child abuse by prominent Omaha figures during a 1990 investigation of a savings and loan failure.

DeCamp died at the state veteran’s home in Norfolk, where he had lived for more than two years. He was 76. DeCamp had recently been suffering from Parkinson’s and other illnesses, his family said.

A colleague in the Legislature once said DeCamp was “attracted to controversy like a moth to flame.” DeCamp never shied away from such talk, saying he earned his reputation by being in the middle of the fray and getting things done.

“Controversy is a part of accomplishment,” he once said. “Find me a guy that isn’t controversial in some quarter and I’ll show you a guy that hasn’t done a damn thing in his life.”

That certainly can’t be said of DeCamp, who very early cut his own path in life.

A native of Neligh in northeast Nebraska, DeCamp ran away from home at age 13 after his parents separated. Over the next eight years, he’d sell magazine subscriptions in Washington, D.C., spend time in a Minnesota boarding school, work as a cabin boy on a passenger liner and assist an American geologist working in Iran.

Despite not having a high school diploma, at age 21 he enrolled in the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, which then only required a high school “certificate of attendance.” It took him just five years to earn both bachelor’s and law degrees.

DeCamp then enlisted in the Army and spent two years as an infantry captain in Vietnam. That’s where he met his wife, Nga, who worked for the U.S. government as a secretary.

In 1975, DeCamp was instrumental in organizing Operation Babylift, which placed some 2,800 children orphaned by the war in American and Canadian homes. He was honored in Washington for his efforts.

Vietnam is also where DeCamp launched his political career. In 1970, he filed for Legislature from overseas and mailed home — postage-free — 20,000 letters promoting his campaign. He returned to the States in time for the general election and won.

In Lincoln, the new senator from Neligh showed he had the wit, smarts, eloquence and determination to become a major player in Nebraska’s unique 49-member, one-house lawmaking body. He soon was getting his hand into nearly every big issue, becoming a major negotiator and back-room dealer.

Before long, lobbyists, aides to governors and fellow senators were beating paths to his first-floor office or hobnobbing with him after hours at the Nebraska Club.

He’d help a senator on his bill and collect an IOU he could cash in later. He searched for compromise, married unrelated issues, cut deals, counted votes and shepherded bills through to passage. His bent was conservative and Republican, but he would work with anyone.

“John could operate in a back room or out in the rotunda,” said longtime lobbyist Walt Radcliffe. “He was always trying to bring parties together, to find common ground. He wanted to be a part of things.”

DeCamp delighted in the process. He got up to speak frequently. He darted in and out of the chamber to talk to staff, lobbyists and other senators. He’d pace up and down the aisle as the process droned on, and then gleefully rub his hands together when it came time for a big vote.

During what would turn out to be his last year in the Legislature, DeCamp in 1986 pushed a major phone deregulation bill on behalf of the industry — one his good friend and fellow senator Loran Schmit bitterly opposed.

Schmit recalled that when a legal opinion appeared to torpedo the bill, DeCamp maneuvered to get the Legislature to adjourn early for the week. That gave industry lobbyists time over the weekend to shore up support for the controversial measure. It passed.

“I used to chide him about that,” Schmit said. “But he did a lot of good stuff.”

DeCamp was instrumental in passing major bank deregulation bills (he chaired the banking committee for a decade), a 1977 rewrite of the state criminal code, creation of local lodging taxes, stronger drunken driving laws, restrictions on abortion, and a medical malpractice law that tilted strongly in the interest of doctors.

He also could be caustic and was prone to exaggerate if it advanced his cause, sometimes rubbing colleagues the wrong way. But session after session, he was a powerful force.

“If there’s anyone who knew the art of the deal, it’s John DeCamp,” said former senator Vard Johnson of Omaha.

DeCamp also proved a bit of a political survivor. He once came within a vote of being stripped by colleagues of his banking chairmanship. He barely won re-election in 1982 after it was disclosed he had spent nearly $19,000 in campaign contributions on mortgage payments, gold coins, medical expenses and office furnishings.

In 1986, his history of controversy — and the fact he spent nearly all his time in Lincoln rather than his home district — finally caught up to him. He was defeated in a bid for a fifth term.

DeCamp moved to the rotunda as a lobbyist and was an overnight success. By 1990, he was collecting nearly $200,000 in annual fees. But over the next three years that practice dwindled to almost nothing. While DeCamp liked to be involved in everything, successful lobbying requires focus on single issues and attention to detail.

“There just wasn’t enough action in the lobby for him,” Radcliffe said.

There also were other self-inflicted wounds that helped make him a pariah with the establishment.

In 1990, DeCamp injected himself into the legislative investigation that followed the failure of Franklin Community Federal Credit Union. He wrote a widely circulated memo naming five men he said were suspected of child abuse and drug abuse. A grand jury in Omaha would later say the memo lacked any factual basis and was written for political gain.

DeCamp always defended the memo, saying it helped lead to the convening of the grand jury, and he later wrote a book about the case. Schmit, who was chairing the Legislature’s investigation, said the memo proved counterproductive.

“John could run amok,” Schmit said.

DeCamp numerous times tried to get back into public office — running for attorney general in 1990, governor in 1994, U.S. Senate in 1996 and 2000, and the Legislature in 2006 — but failed each time. As he faded from public life, he practiced law, becoming known for defending anti-government militia members, and owned a variety of businesses. He also was a member of several veterans organizations.

DeCamp is survived by his wife and their four children: daughters Jennifer Lecher of Clarinda, Iowa, Shanda Erb of Columbus, and Tara DeCamp of Omaha; and son Johnny. DeCamp donated his body to science. His family is planning a memorial service at a later date.

“He wasn’t all good, but he sure as hell wasn’t all bad,” Schmit said. “He helped a lot of people, including 2,800 children. If there’s a heaven, John is going there.”





https://www.policeone.com/officer-misco ... ECD-death/

Two Nebraska officers charged
in ECD deathAsked why he didn't charge the LEOs with murder or manslaughter, Attorney Don Kleine said, "there's no evidence whatsoever that these officers intentionally killed" the man





http://www.houstonchronicle.com/neighbo ... 719122.php

Cops crack down on public sex at Memorial Park - sort of
Houston Chronicle-
He said students, a pastor and even an FBI agent have been among those charged in recent years. When they are caught, he said, the apprehension goes ...
At least six people have been arrested for indecent exposure in the last six months, Silva said.

The last high-profile case goes back to 2013, when seven men were arrested in one day.

One was a Harris County sheriff's deputy, Christopher Toomey, who had been a deputy for four years when he was nabbed. Police had operated stings on Picnic Loop for years before that, Gracia said.

One reason he suspects men continue to use a forested spot just feet from cyclists and family picnics despite monthly arrests is "the thrill of getting caught."

Apprehensions go smoothly

He said students, a pastor and even an FBI agent have been among those charged in recent years.








http://www.ktvq.com/story/36005296/mac- ... uter-users


Mac malware caught silently spying on computer users
Posted: Jul 30, 2017 5:55 PM EDT
Updated: Jul 30, 2017 5:55 PM EDT

Mac users typically think they're immune to malware. But a new strain used for spying reminds us even Macs can be compromised.

Researchers found an unusual piece of malware, called FruitFly, that's been infecting some Mac computers for years.

FruitFly operates quietly in the background, spies on users through the computer's camera, captures images of what's displayed on the screen and logs key strokes.

Security firm Malwarebytes discovered the first strain earlier this year, but a second version called FruitFly 2 subsequently appeared.

Patrick Wardle, chief security researcher at security firm Synack, found 400 computers infected with the newer strain and believes there's likely many more cases out there.

It's unclear how long FruitFly has been infecting computers, but researchers found the code was modified to work on the Mac Yosemite operating system, which was released in October 2014. This suggests the malware existed before that time.

It's unknown who is behind it or how it got on computers.

Thomas Reed of Malwarebytes called the first version "unlike anything I've seen before."

Wardle says there are multiple strains of FruitFly. The malware has the same spying techniques, but the code is different on each strain.

After months of analyzing the new strain, Wardle decrypted parts of the code and set up a server to intercept traffic from infected computers.

"Immediately, tons of victims that had been infected with this malware started connecting to me," said Wardle, adding he could see about 400 infected computer names and IP addresses.

He believes this reflects only a small subset of infected users.

The discovery of FruitFly reminds users that although Mac malware is considerably less widespread than Windows, it still exists.

"Mac users are over-confident," Wardle said. "We might not be as careful as we should be on the internet or opening up email attachments."

Apple (AAPL, Tech30) did not respond to a request for comment.

Mac malware has increased in recent years. According to a report from McAfee, Mac malware skyrocketed in 2016, but most of it was adware or malicious advertising as opposed to targeted spy campaigns.

Wardle said FruitFly is completely new for Macs. He alerted national law enforcement to the malware. The FBI said it does not confirm or deny the existence of investigations.




http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.3368435


NYPD chief loses 45 vacation days after failing to report officer who allegedly pulled gun on him at end of affair



BY THOMAS TRACY
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Sunday, July 30, 2017, 4:01 AM






http://sfbayview.com/2017/07/assata-sha ... struggles/


Assata Shakur: She who struggles
July 30, 2017


Meet a sista, comrade, soldier, warrior, guerrilla who exemplifies the meaning of revolution through the life that she lives, transforming from the day of her birth to this present day. Born with the slave name JoAnne Deborah Byron, after her emancipation from the shackles of capitalism she took on the name we’re most familiar with, Sista Assata Olugbala Shakur – Assata meaning “she who struggles,” Olugbala meaning “love for the people,” Shakur meaning “the thankful.”


From exile in Cuba, Assata Shakur continues to inspire revolutionary thought and movements.
Assata was raised by a small tribe of family members who instilled the toughness of surviving the racist South with a strong sense of personal dignity and respect. But because of how deep the claws of capitalism were gouged into the social fibers of the family tribe, the key to living a successful life was having your American piece of the pie or living the American dream, a dream that was and is only an illusion, a lure to keep you in a guided trance, sinking deeper into the trenches of capitalism. Thus it became young Asssata’s dream to live such a life.

So much so in her teens she began to rebel against the family tribe to experience life her way, out on her own. Our young naive sista immediately got engulfed into the fast street life and took to small, petty larceny crimes as means of survival. In no time our young brave sista began to master street survival tactics, and life out on the streets started to become easy and very dangerous at the same time.

This fast paced lifestyle was not the cup of tea that filled her. But it was a lifestyle she could count on to get by.

After her emancipation from the shackles of capitalism she took on the name we’re most familiar with, Sista Assata Olugbala Shakur – Assata meaning “she who struggles,” Olugbala meaning “love for the people,” Shakur meaning “the thankful.”

Assata’s early college years came at a time when struggle and the activity of Black consciousness and nationalism was on an upswing. The beat of Afrikan drums could be heard throughout the college campus and ghetto neighborhood, and talk of revolution began to be expressed in many ways.


“Assata, Winnie and Harriet” – Art: Kevin “Rashid” Johnson, 158039, FSP, P.O. Box 800, Raiford FL 32083
Assata began to dive deeper into her Afrikan heritage and her identity as a New Afrikan woman surviving on the blood-soaked stolen soil of a forgotten people. Her love for her people began to be expressed in her words: “I love Black people. I don’t care what they are doing, but when Black people are struggling, that’s when they are most beautiful to me.”

Assata’s studies and intrigue guided her closer toward her revolutionary destiny. This is when Assata began to extract her old capitalist ways of thinking – replacing them with a more revolutionary way of thinking. As she shed more and more of her capitalistic ways, she became more and more revolutionary, and as she became more revolutionary, her destiny as a New Afrikan woman became clear to her and her responsibility to her people became a clear conscious thought and part of her daily activities.

Assata’s story of revolutionary change reads like many of our own. Assata is a strong Afrikan soldier who dared to take revolution on her own shoulders and carry it to its next transition, and her contributions, sacrifices and struggles will always be historic, a guiding light for those who dare to bear the torch, and our sista will always be a living martyr for the struggle.

Thus let us give tribute to our sista in arms by highlighting her contribution to the struggle we maintain today.

Power to all the people who don’t fear freedom!

In a spirit of love,

Jabari Scott

Send our brother some love and light: Aaron Jabari Scott, H-30536, CSP Cor 3A-2-143, P.O. Box 3461, Corcoran CA 93212.

Exiled Panther Assata Shakur feted at 70!

by the New Jersey Black Panther Party Commemoration Committee

On Sunday, July 16, a cross section of activists, artists and humanitarians came together to salute Assata Shakur, the long exiled Black Panther who resides in Cuba, to mark her 70th birthday. The gathering was called For the Love of Freedom: Assata Is Always Welcome Here, An Honoring of 70 Years of a Committed Life.

It was not the usual maligning of Shakur in connection with the bounty on her head that comes from the New Jersey State Police, the FBI and the law enforcement community. Instead, it was an evening of poetry, dance, song and testimony, appreciating the activist’s lifetime commitment to the struggle for human dignity.

On Sunday, July 16, a cross section of activists, artists and humanitarians came together to salute Assata Shakur, the long exiled Black Panther who resides in Cuba, to mark her 70th birthday.

Shakur was born on July 16, 1947, to a proud, independent Black family from Wilmington, North Carolina. At the turn of the 20th century, Wilmington was the site of a vicious ethnic cleansing attack that literally ran legions of African Americans from the town. Shakur’s grandparents dared to be landowning business persons against this violently segregated background. It is from this background that would emerge her own commitment and courage that she would take into the Black Panther Party as a college student.


The FBI and New Jersey State Police joined forces to produce this “wanted” poster for Assata Shakur, a woman who is not, judging from the photos, armed and dangerous, except ideologically. Note the mention that she has a bullet wound on the “underside of right arm,” proving she had her hands raised when she was shot.
When the Black Panther Party was faced with the dangerous distinction of being labelled the “greatest threat to the internal security” of the country by the FBI, and when New York chapters of the party came under particular attack after surviving the NY 21 case, a case where 21 Panthers, officers and rank and file members were put on trial for bogus conspiracy charges to commit terrorist acts, charges that would have landed them in prison for the rest of their lives, Shakur and a number of other Panthers opted to go underground and create the Black Liberation Army to continue their fight.







http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/p ... -1.3368520

Philippine cops gun down 14 people including mayor denounced by Duterte, arrest daughter in drug raid






http://www.politico.com/blogs/under-the ... ars-241127

Judge balks at FBI’s 17-year timeline for FOIA request



07/29/2017 01:17 PM EDT
Getting answers to Freedom of Information Act requests is often a protracted and tiring process, but how long a wait is too long?

One federal judge just came up with an answer: 17 years.

U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler bluntly rejected the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s proposal that documentary filmmaker Nina Seavey wait until the year 2034 to get all the law enforcement agency’s records for a request pertaining surveillance of anti-war and civil rights activists in the 1960s and 1970s.

The request involved an unusually large amount of material — about 110,000 pages of records at the FBI and more at other agencies — but Seavey said waiting almost two decades for the complete files wasn’t viable for her.

“Literally, they were talking 17 years out. I’m 60 years old. You can’t do that math,” the George Washington University professor and documentarian told POLITICO this week. “It wasn’t going to work for me.”

The FBI said it has a policy of processing and releasing large requests at a pace of 500 pages a month, while Seavey, represented by D.C. transparency lawyer Jeffrey Light, had proposed 5,000 pages a month. (At one point, the FBI thought it had about 150,000 pages of responsive records, which would’ve meant a 25-year wait.)

Justice Department lawyers and the FBI argued that going faster than 500 pages a month would disrupt the agency’s workflow and create the possibility of a few massive requests effectively shutting down the rest of the their FOIA operation.



http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.3370009



Correction officer caught smuggling marijuana into Manhattan jail:






http://www.sctimes.com/story/news/local ... 524028001/


Domestic terrorism probe spotlights Minnesota




4:47 p.m. CT July 30, 2017 | Updated 4:55 p.m. CT July 30, 2017

To the FBI, they were part of a Minnesota militia group possibly gearing up for a violent showdown with the government.

Members of the group, called United Patriots of Minnesota 3%, say they’re nothing more than patriots defending hard-won liberties secured by a handful of forefathers who stood against tyranny.

No one has been charged in the investigation, which spilled into public view recently when a federal judge unsealed search warrants in the case. But the probe underscores the complexity of balancing protected speech with trying to root out domestic terror.

Soon after agents kicked in the door to his Red Wing home last December, Jason Thomas documented the aftermath of the raid on Facebook: photos of belongings strewn across his kitchen and a copy of the search warrant, signed by a federal judge, alleging that Thomas and his fellow United Patriots members schemed to illegally obtain and use powerful weapons.

The raid of Thomas’ home followed months of infiltration by a paid FBI informant who documented what agents said was firearms training in Stillwater and Albert Lea and chatter on a secret Facebook page that Thomas helped run. Another man under investigation allegedly built AR-15 assault rifles out of unfinished rifle kits for members whose criminal backgrounds prevented them from legally acquiring firearms.

In court documents, the FBI described the “3 percenters” as a militia that “believes in the violent resistance to, or intended overthrow” of the government. The group formed after Barack Obama’s 2008 election to the presidency. Its name derives from the belief that the American Revolution was waged by just 3 percent of the population.


In applying for warrants, federal agents noted multiple Facebook posts by Thomas, including a March 2016 guarantee that he would “be one of the first to start killing Feds.”

“I’ll openly say that like I always have,” Thomas wrote. “And am actually trying to build up our capacity to challenge them.”

Thomas said in an interview that the remarks cited in the search warrant application were taken out of context. He described United Patriots as a “civil defense” unit and said he was concerned that the Obama administration would confiscate privately owned firearms.




http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/jef ... 8434b6b2f3




Jeff Sessions’ Assault On Gay Workers Revealed Yet Another Lie He Told At Confirmation Hearings
The attorney general vowed to “ensure” civil rights protections for LGBTQ people.



Donald Trump is angry with Jeff Sessions for recusing himself in the Russia collusion investigation. But that hasn’t stopped Trump from giving Sessions carte blanche to enforce his brutal hard-right agenda ― one reason why, in fact, conservatives have defended Sessions against Trump’s attacks ― and that includes what are clearly his plans to dismantle LGBTQ rights.

The reason Sessions had to recuse himself from the Russia investigation, of course, is because it became known that he had several meetings with Russian officials during the election, while serving in the Trump campaign, though he claimed during his confirmation hearings that he hadn’t ever met with such officials.

But now we know that’s not the only thing Sessions lied about.

In his opening statements back in January, Sessions said, ”I understand the demands for justice and fairness made by our LGBT community.” He vowed to “ensure ... protecting their rights and their safety,” which he said would be “fully enforced.”

But last week Sessions’ Justice Department used precious time and federal expense to tell a federal appeals court, via a 36-page brief, that employers should legally have the right to fire gay, lesbian and bisexual people based on their sexual orientation. If employers deem homosexuality as immoral, Sessions believes they should be able to tell gay, lesbian or bisexual employees to pack their things and go if they are found out, destroying lives, affecting their families and livelihoods. It’s abhorrent ― and the complete opposite of what the civil rights office at the Department of Justice should be doing.

The DOJ isn’t party to this case. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals didn’t invite it to file a brief. Sessions clearly decided to take it upon himself to influence the court, in a case in which a now deceased skydiver claimed he was fired from his job because he was gay (his survivors have continued with the case). According to the Center for American Progress, 10 percent of gay, lesbian and bisexual people report having been fired because of their sexual orientation while a staggering 47 percent of transgender people have reported being fired based on their gender identity.

The ACLU’s Ria Tabacco Mar, in a New York Times op-ed, explained the significance of the case that Sessions is attempting to sabotage using the influence of the DOJ:

This latest blow to civil rights by the Trump administration comes at a moment of tremendous promise: The Second Circuit appears poised to expand protections for lesbian and gay workers under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the federal law that bars on-the-job discrimination on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin and religion.

Earlier this year, it agreed to reconsider a pair of its decisions from the 2000s that wrongly concluded that discriminating against people based on their sexual orientation isn’t covered by the statute’s ban on sex discrimination.

Coming on the heels of a landmark decision in April from the federal appeals court in Chicago that overruled similar precedent, the news that the Second Circuit would revisit its old conclusions was applauded by the L.G.B.T. community as heralding the end of another barrier to equality.
Trump has given all of his anti-LGBTQ lieutenants ― from Betsy DeVos and Tom Price to Ben Carson and Mike Pence ― free rein to assault LGBTQ rights and, just as profoundly, he has listened to their counsel on the issue. That’s why we’ve seen protections for transgender and gay students threatened, elimination of data collection on LGBTQ seniors and a devastating attack, via Twitter, on transgender people serving in the military.

For Sessions, if he remains at the Justice Department (there have been unconfirmed reports that Trump is thinking of moving him to head up Homeland Security), it means a sustained assault at a time when LGBTQ people are subject to hate crimes attacks more than any other minority group, with transgender women of color disproportionately affected in the worst way.

During his confirmation hearings, senators pointed out how Sessions had vehemently opposed adding gay and transgender people to existing hate crimes laws, which the justice department is charged with enforcing ever since the bill he opposed became law in 2009.

“Today, I’m not sure women or people with different sexual orientations face that kind of discrimination,” Sessions said at the time. “I just don’t see it.”

In his questioning, Sen. Leahy of Vermont brought Sessions back to his opposition to queer people being protected under hate crimes statutes, and pointed to current statistics:

Last year the FBI said that LGBT individuals were more likely to be targeted for hate crimes than any other minority group in the country. We can study this forever but that’s a pretty strong fact. And in 2010 you stated that expanding hate crimes protections to LGBT individuals was unwarranted, possibly unconstitutional. You said the bill has been said to cheapen the civil rights movement. Especially considering what the FBI is found, do you still feel that way?′
Sessions responded: “Mr. Chairman the law has been passed, the Congress has spoken, you can be sure I will enforce it.”

And in June at a summit at the Justice Department, Sessions focused in on murders of transgender people.

“We have and will continue to enforce hate crime laws aggressively and appropriately where transgendered individuals are victims,” Sessions said. “Last month, Joshua Brandon Vallum was sentenced to 49 years in prison for assaulting and murdering Mercedes Williamson. This is the first case prosecuted under the Hate Crimes Prevention Act involving the murder of a transgender person.”

But the historic case prosecuted under the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, signed by President Obama, was prosecuted entirely by the Obama Justice Department in 2016. Last December, Vallum finally pleaded guilty to the horrific stabbing murder of 17-year-old Williamson in Alabama in 2015. (It was the sentencing, by a




https://robertscribbler.com/2017/07/28/ ... -d-c-area/


Strange Summer Nor’Easter Drops 3 Inches of Rain in 45 Minutes Over Parts of D.C. Area
Climate change related hydrological events. Rain bombs. These are somewhat uncomfortable subjects. But it’s a basic fact that if you warm the Earth, you also crank up rates of evaporation and precipitation. And since we’ve warmed the Earth by about 1.2 C above preindustrial levels by burning fossil fuels and dumping so much carbon into the atmosphere, we’ve loaded the climate dice for producing both more extreme rainfall and more extreme drought events.


In the mid-Atlantic today, a strange summer Nor’easter is dropping multiple inches of rain over parts of Maryland, Virginia and Delaware in very short time periods. In an area just northwest of Silver Spring, M.D., an amazing 3.19 inches of rain fell in just 45 minutes.

A resident of Gaithersburg, M.D., I experienced a comparable deluge situation in which my hilltop residence and home office saw a river forming in its back yard. Just about an hour before, my phone was sending me warnings to avoid the valley regions. Considering the flooding we saw in the hills, it’s tough to imagine what the low-lands might have looked like.


(Extreme rainfall creates streams through the hilltop residences of Gaithersburg, MD on July 28 as a strange summer Nor’Easter taps very high atmospheric moisture levels over the region to produce 1-4 inch per hour rainfall rates.)

It’s worth noting that 1 inch per hour rainfall rates are considered to be extreme. But the short-period volumes of rain being produced by this system (1-4 inch per hour rates) are pretty much off the charts. It’s coming from a storm that has been fueled by an upper level trough dipping down over Canada. One that pushed a large frontal system over the Great Lakes region on Wednesday night. This front then moved across the Ohio Valley on Thursday and out over the Atlantic by Friday. Packed with cooler temperatures, the front ran over ocean waters that are ranging between 1 to 4 degrees Celsius above average. The extra ocean heat helped to create a very moisture-rich environment. A coastal low subsequently forming in this very wet column of air began cranking that moisture over the mid-Atlantic even as its associated instability produced some extraordinarily powerful rainstorms.



(Sea surface temperature anomaly map shows a hot blob of ocean water temperatures off the U.S. East Coast in the range of 1-4 C above average. A deep-digging trough has enabled a strong coastal low to form and feed on the amazing amount of moisture bleeding off this warm water to produce an odd summer nor’easter and related extreme rainfall over the U.S. East Coast. A number of the factors enabling the strength of this system are aspects of human-forced climate change. Notably — the deep summer trough and the very warm Atlantic Ocean surface waters. Image source: Earth Nullschool.)

Meanwhile, the Gulf of Mexico’s warmer than normal waters have throughout the spring and summer produced tropical levels of moisture over southern and central sections of the Eastern U.S. — fueling numerous extreme rainfall events and adding even more punch to this particular event.

Already warm summer waters produce a serious amount of water vapor. But punch up ocean temperatures to the above average ranges we see today and you get even more moisture bleeding out. If an odd, deep, cool summer trough runs through it, then it provides a big kick of atmospheric instability in a region where there’s already an abnormal amount of fuel for storms. Both the ability of troughs to dig deeper over the U.S. East Coast and the added ocean heat and moisture are arguably aspects related to human-caused climate change. So to talk about this particular event without adding that context would not really be looking at the whole weather and climate picture.

(UPDATES TO FOLLOW AS NEEDED)

Links:

Summer Nor’easter Wallops Mid Atlantic

Earth Nullschool

National Weather Service — DC/Baltimore

Understanding the Jet Stream

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Link du jour

https://mobile.twitter.com/riotwomennn/ ... 20/photo/1


http://www.stopfbi.net/supporting-organ ... committees

https://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk

https://www.muckrock.com/foi/united-sta ... ral-25951/


http://farsightpresentations.com/RV_Pro ... nRuse.html

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesig ... n-pictures

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/gal ... n-pictures

https://www.muckrock.com/foi/brownsvill ... nts-40182/




http://www.motherjones.com/politics/201 ... perations/


How the FBI in Boston May Have Pursued the Wrong “Terrorist”
Two years ago the FBI focused on a suspect with a far-fetched scheme—right as it stopped tracking the Boston Marathon bomber.
TREVOR AARONSONAPR. 23, 2013 10:00 AM




http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/que ... -1.3408575


NYPD cop commits suicide inside his Queens home
BY JOHN ANNESE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Sunday, August 13, 2017, 6:15 PM


https://www.courthousenews.com/sheriffs ... rers-life/

Sheriff’s Misconduct May Spare Mass Murderer’s Life
By DON DeBENEDICTIS
A state judge will decide next week whether the worst mass murderer in the history of Orange County, California, must face the death penalty or can avoid it because of misconduct by the sheriff.

SANTA ANA, Calif. (CN) — A state judge will decide next week whether the worst mass murderer in the history of Orange County, California, must face the death penalty or can avoid it because of misconduct by the sheriff.

Scott DeKraai murdered his ex-wife and seven others at a Seal Beach hair salon in October 2011. He confessed almost immediately and pleaded guilty to murder in May 2014.

For the past three months, Orange County Superior Court Judge Thomas Goethals has been considering whether he should bar the death penalty in the case because the sheriff’s department violated DeKraai’s rights by intentionally and repeatedly hiding information about a secret program to use jailhouse informants against criminal defendants — including DeKraai.





https://www.courthousenews.com/wildfire ... as-budget/

Declining Coal Revenue, and Wildfires, Bust Montana's Budget
By DAVID REESE
Three years of declining revenue from coal mining in eastern Montana have left the state’s books in tough shape, with officials saying state agencies will have to find ways to cut $93 million from their budgets.



https://www.courthousenews.com/labor-gr ... uary-bill/

Unions Want Records on Sheriff's Fight Against Sanctuary Bill
By MATT REYNOLDS
Two labor groups have sued Los Angeles County Sheriff Jim McDonnell seeking a court order to release communications between his department and the Trump administration about California’s sanctuary bill.



https://www.courthousenews.com/californ ... ds-pruitt/

California AG Demands EPA's Vetting Records on Pruitt
By NICK CAHILL
Accusing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency of withholding ethics documents regarding its chief Scott Pruitt, California’s attorney general on Friday sued the regulator for failing to comply with a Freedom of Information Act request.



https://www.courthousenews.com/climate- ... od-season/

Climate Change Wreaking Havoc on Europe’s Flood Season
August 11, 2017







http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3410220

Florida Uber passenger dies after driver punches him during fight over directions
BY MINYVONNE BURKE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, August 14, 2017, 10:55 AM




https://rightsanddissent.org/news/trump ... ed-anyway/

Trump’s Pick To Head The FBI Wouldn’t Say Whether He’d Spy on Mosques. The Senate Confirmed Him Anyway.

August 3, 2017 by Chip Gibbons


Should the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) spy on mosques absent probable cause of a crime? Should the FBI participate in the creation of a Muslim registry? It would seem like answering “no” to both questions should be a prerequisite for being confirmed as FBI director. Yet, Christopher Wray declined to answer several variations of exactly those two questions and was still confirmed FBI director by a vote of 92 to 5.

Both the FBI and Trump have a troubling intolerance for dissent. Trump during his campaign called for widespread surveillance of mosques and the FBI already has confidential informants crawling throughout the Muslim community. Trump floated the idea of a Muslim registry and the FBI has a dark history of compiling information on people for exercising their First Amendment rights. As a result, any potential FBI director, especially one handpicked by Trump, needed to face questioning about their willingness to uphold the values of the First Amendment.

Wray did face several questions about his willingness to spy on the Muslim community, though the bulk of them came not during the televised hearing, but as Questions for the Record (QFRs), written questions submitted after the hearing.

Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) asked Wray if as FBI director he would go along with the creation of a Muslim registry. While Wray stated he would be faithful to the law and the Constitution, he said he did not “know enough about the specific proposal or plans that anyone is talking about[…]” to comment definitively. By comparison, when asked about a Muslim registry during his confirmation hearing for Attorney General, Jeff Sessions stated that he opposed a Muslim registry and it would “raise serious constitutional problems.” (In her QFRs, Sen. Hirono indicated that Wray had said during the hearing he would not participate in a Muslim registry, but he plainly stated that he did not know enough to answer the question).

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Sen. Hirono both sent written questions to Wray asking about Trump’s campaign trail calls for surveillance of mosques. Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) submitted a question about surveillance of houses of worship more broadly. In all three cases, Wray declined to answer stating that he could not speculate about hypotheticals. To be clear, these were not open-ended questions that could be reasonably interpreted to include instances in which a house of worship was in fact involved in some type of criminal activity. Coons specifically asked Wray about surveillances of houses of worship when there is no “probable cause of criminal activity.” Leahy specifically asked about “general surveillance of mosques unrelated to a specific, ongoing investigation.”






http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3409968

Mass. cop mocks Charlottesville car ramming on Facebook: 'Hahahaha love this'



BY CAITLYN HITT
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, August 14, 2017, 8:53 AM



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politic ... -1.3410084

Trump calls out Merck’s African-American CEO for protesting President’s silence on white nationalists
BY TERENCE CULLEN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Monday, August 14, 2017, 10:14 AM




http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3410063

SEE IT: Black Charlottesville man, Deandre Harris, viciously beaten with metal poles by white supremacists
BY MINYVONNE BURKE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, August 14, 2017, 10:04 AM

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/ ... -memorial/

“Please say NO to Satan” Emails capture Minnesota city’s clash over a proposed Satanic war memorial
by Evan Anderson, Lucien Greaves
August 21, 2017
After Belle Plaine, Minnesota erected a memorial depicting a solider kneeling at a cross, the Satanic Temple proposed a memorial of their own own - and as recently released emails show, there was Hell to pay for the beleaguered city council.
Read More

https://www.ksl.com/index.php?sid=45515 ... es-in-utah

FBI sees no evidence of rise in hate rhetoric, extremism in Utah
By Dennis Romboy | Posted Aug 22nd, 2017 @ 6:19pm





https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00728261


The selling of the police: Media, ideology, and crime control



Jon ChristensenJanet Schmidt





http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1 ... ccess=true

Electronic Media and State Control: The Case of Azscam
David L. Altheide

The significance of mass media formats for social control and public order is illustrated with materials from a “sting” operation conducted by the Phoenix Police Department and county control agents against elected state officials in Arizona in 1991. Videotaped materials of lawmakers accepting “bribes” to support a bill legalizing gambling were distributed to the various news media for public presentation before a single trial. The “programming” culminated in 7 (8 percent) members of the legislature resigning, and then being replaced by nonelected officials, without benefit of any court proceedings, with only one legislator opting for a trial. The implications for social control are discussed.


https://scholar.google.com/scholar?star ... 5&as_vis=1

“What if she's from the FBI?” The effects of covert forms of social control on social movements
D Cunningham, J Noakes - … and governance: Crime control and …, 2008 - emeraldinsight.com
... for non-support, providing information about his personal problems to cooperative media contacts
to ... effects in our above discussion of how covert forms of social control can create ... The FBI would
''plant provocateurs to create conflict,'' Cleveland Sellers remembers; ''[t]hey know ...




https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF01115022

Reflections onThe Strategy of Social Protest
WA Gamson - Sociological Forum, 1989 - Springer
... The Miami FBI boasted about one television program run by a local station at its instigation, that
"Each and every film segment produced by the station was submitted for our scrutiny to insure
that we were ... These covert means of control did not draw any media attention at the ...





https://link.springer.com/article/10.10 ... 009-0078-7

How security agencies control change: Executive power and the quest for autonomy in the FBI and CIA
PS Roberts - Public Organization Review, 2009 - Springer
... Experts, too, rendered a verdict that echoed throughout the media: the FBI was
ill-equipped for counterterrorism (Hill 2002). ... 8. Though the FBI has some control over
its responsibilities, the agency is forever at the mercy of events. ...


http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/i ... 2/art00001

Fighting Black Power-New Left coalitions: Covert FBI media campaigns and American cultural discourse, 19671971
J Drabble - European Journal of American Culture, 2008 - ingentaconnect.com
... Hate Groups: targeting and tactics Powers argued that FBI targets 'had little control over whether ...
Targets of FBI operations 'became symbols of dangerous cultural tendencies', and cultural
meaning was ... had full rights to self-defence: the main issue for the media became whether ...
Cited by 6 Related articles All 3 versions Cite Save


Between 1967 and 1971, the FBI launched covert action programs against Black Nationalist and New Left organisations. FBI agents used surreptitious entry, electronic surveillance, and informants to acquire and covertly distribute material to police, Congress, the media, elected officials and the Internal Revenue Service. These operations thwarted fund raising, recruiting, organising, and favourable publicity, prevented coalition building, and harassed movement leaders. To capitalise on ideological, organisational and personal conflicts, create factionalism, and provoke conflict between organisations, FBI agents made anonymous telephone calls and created counterfeit movement literature, cartoons and other notional communications. This caused activists to lose respectability among white liberals, Black moderates, and other movement activists. Since FBI agents were well schooled in the historical legacy of American racist discourse, the Bureau's covert operations drew upon deeply rooted countersubversive anxieties concerning miscegenation in American culture, in order to prevent stable or effective Black Nationalist-New Left coalitions from forming.





http://www.marquette.edu/library/archiv ... es25.shtml

FBI (FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION) RECORDS
WALTER WINCHELL



https://books.google.com/books?id=Rl_AJ ... bi&f=false

Surveillance in America: Critical Analysis of the FBI, 1920 to the Present
By Ivan Greenberg




http://www.paperlessarchives.com/winchell.html


WALTER WINCHELL FBI FILES

3,900 pages of files copied from FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C., and archived on CD-ROM, covering Walter Winchell. Files include many correspondences between Winchell and J. Edgar Hover. Walter Winchell maintained a steady exchange of correspondence with Hoover for over thirty years. The famous newspaper columnist discussed FBI cases with former Director Hoover and provided publicity for the






http://spartacus-educational.com/USAwinchell.htm



Walter Winchell


Walter Winchell was born in New York City on 7th April 7, 1897. After leaving school he worked for a vaudeville troupe. It soon became clear that he was not going to be a success in this profession and in 1920 he found work as a journalist for Vaudeville News . Four years later he joined the Evening Graphic .

Winchell's career did not take off until he was recruited by the New York Daily Mirror in 1929, a newspaper owned by William Randolph Hearst. Winchell started a gossip column, entitled On-Broadway. Winchell used his connections to publish confidential information about people in the public eye. His work appeared in nearly 2,000 newspapers and he also did a Sunday radio broadcasts. Combined, they reached 50 million homes. His attorney, Ernest Cuneo, has argued that "when Walter finished broadcasting on Sunday night, he had reached 89 out of 100 adults in the U.S." Bernard Weinraub has pointed out: "From Table 50 at the Stork Club - he never picked up the tab - Winchell held court like a prince, beckoning prizefighters, movie stars, debutantes, royalty and gangsters to his table. He demanded to know what they were doing but talked most of the time himself." Jennet Conant has argued that "Winchell was a powerhouse widely feared because of his penchant for exposing the private lives of important public men - from mistresses and pregnancies to divorces - which gave him plenty of bargaining chips to trade for information about what was going on inside their businesses or agencies."

Ralph D. Gardner, a fellow journalist, has argued: "Feeding the public’s craving for scandal and gossip, he became the most powerful - and feared - journalist of his time.... The columns, written in his own style, were composed of short sentences connected by three dots. Fed by press agents, tipsters, legmen and ghost writers, he possessed the extraordinary ability to make a Broadway show a hit, create overnight celebrities; enhance or destroy a political career. The workaholic Winchell was first to announce big-name marriages and divorces, Hollywood romances, exploits of socialites, international playboys, debutantes, mobsters and chorus girls, plus latest reports of café society antics... He would also give timely plugs to show-biz unknowns or has-beens who were sorely in need of a helping hand. At the same time he savaged any whom he perceived to be his enemies." Winchell was a powerhouse widely feared because of his penchant for exposing the private lives of important public men - from mistresses and pregnancies to divorces - which gave him plenty of bargaining chips to trade for information about what was going on inside their businesses or agencies. The New York Times described Winchell as "the country’s best-known, widely read journalist as well as its most influential."

Winchell, who was Jewish, was one of the first journalists to condemn Adolf Hitler and isolationist groups such as the American First Committee. Winchell argued that "isolation ends where it always ends - with the enemy on our doorstep", and introduced a regular feature called "The Winchell Column vs. the Fifth Column." Later, Ernest Cuneo, who was working with the British Security Coordination (BSC), claimed: "FDR was at war with Hitler long before Chamberlain was forced to declare it. I was eyewitness and indeed, wrote Winchell's stuff on it."

Winchell was a staunch supporter of President Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal throughout the 1930s. He also held strong views on civil rights and frequently attacked the Ku Klux Klan. The author of The Irregulars: Roald Dahl and the British Spy Ring in Wartime Washington (2008) has argued: "He had morphed from a Broadway critic to a political commentator who thought nothing of weighing in on domestic and international affairs... A typical Winchell column would contain several dozen separate references to individuals and events, ranging from minor celebrity sightings, along the lines of spotting Marlene Diettrich at the Stork Club, his nightly hangout, to an impassioned denunciation of Nazi sympathizers or some other disreputable homegrown fascists."

Benjamin de Forest Bayly has suggested that William Stephenson, who was head of BSC, was very close to Winchell: "He liked propaganda. And propaganda was really one of the important things he did. He saw to it, before even Pearl Harbor, that the anti-British feeling there was squelched by writers. He got all sorts of people to write things that helped that... Winchell was a man who actually got a reputation for being a very straightforward person, and he did a lot of propaganda work for Bill Stephenson. If Bill could sell him on why the U.S. should do this, and if it did that, then Winchell would be your man."

Winchell became a close friend of J. Edgar Hoover, the head of the FBI, in 1938. Curt Gentry, the author of J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets (1991): "Unquestionably each used the other. It was Winchell, more than any other journalist, who sold the G-man image to America; while Hoover, according to Cuneo and others, supplied Winchell with inside information that led to some of his biggest scoops.... In addition to the tips, Hoover often supplied Winchell with an FBI driver when he was travelling; assigned FBI agents as bodyguards whenever the columnist received a death threat, which was often."

In early August 1939 Winchell received a message from a contact that suggested that Louis Lepke Buchalter was willing to surrender to the FBI if a deal was possible. Lepke was unwilling to surrender to New York's district attorney, Thomas Dewey, as he had vowed to execute him. Winchell now made a radio broadcast appealing to Lepke to give himself up: "Attention Public Enemy Number One, Louis 'Lepke' Buchalter! I am authorized by John Edgar Hoover of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to guarantee you safe delivery to the FBI if you surrender to me or to any agent of the FBI. I will repeat: Leapke, I am authorized by John Edgar Hoover."

On 24th August Winchell received another message from Lepke. He phoned J. Edgar Hoover: "My friends, John, have instructed me to tell you to be at Twenty-eighth Street and Fifth Avenue between ten-ten and ten-twenty tonight. That's about half an hour. They told me to tell you to be alone." Curt Gentry explains that "Hoover was not on foot, and he wasn't alone. Unknown to Winchell, more than two dozen agents had the corner under surveillance. Having picked up Lepke several blocks away, per instructions, Winchell pulled up beside the director's distinctive black limousine. Then he and Lepke got into the back of the FBI vehicle." Winchell later recalled that Hoover was "disguised in dark glasses to keep him from being recognized by passersby".

Louis Lepke Buchalter was tried on federal charges and sentenced to fourteen years in Leavenworth (Hoover had promised him he'd get only ten years and that with good behaviour he'd be out in five or six). The Chicago Tribune published a story that the FBI and the Justice Department had made a deal with Lepke, to keep him from telling what he knew about the Roosevelt administration's links with Murder Incorporated. President Franklin Roosevelt was so angry about the accusation he ordered that Lepke should be handed over to Thomas Dewey. When Abe Reles agreed to provide evidence against Buchalter, he was tried for murder. Found guilty, Buchalter was executed at Sing Sing State Prison on 4th March, 1944.

After the Second World War Winchell became obsessed with the threat of communism. When Josephine Baker complained about the racial-discriminatory policies of the Stork Club in New York City he retaliated by calling her a communist and began a campaign which prevented her from getting her visa to enter the US renewed. He was criticised by fellow journalists, including Ed Sullivan, who said, ''I despise Walter Winchell because he symbolizes to me evil and treacherous things in the American setup.''

Winchell also gave his support to Joseph McCarthy. As Ralph D. Gardner has pointed out: "In the 1950’s Winchell’s direction took an odd turn that was distressing to millions of readers. He became a supporter of Sen. Joseph McCarthy, filling his pages and broadcasts with vindictive, denunciatory tirades and mean-spirited accusations that resulted in lawsuits and loss of media outlets. He had climbed to the top and tumbled." In 1963 New York Daily Mirror, a newspaper who he worked for 34 years, closed, his life as a columnist came to an end.

Walter Winchell died of prostate cancer on 20th February, 1972.




https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... 89x7548344

Broadcaster Paul Harvey had close ties to FBI - USATODAY.com
USA Today › 2010-01-22-harvey-fbi_n
Jan 22, 2010 - Paul Harvey, the news commentator and talk-radio pioneer whose staccato style made him one of the nation's most familiar voices, had close ties to the FBI, documents reveal. Photo shows Harvey


https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/ ... 0s-part-1/

CIA’s 60 year war with the Government Accountability Office: the ‘90s Part 1
by Emma Best
August 22, 2017
In 1994, CIA’s Director of Congressional Affairs wrote a memo to the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) seeking, and receiving, affirmation of the Agency’s policy for dealing with the Government Accountability Office (GAO). The memo not only spelled out the Agency’s “hard line approach” to the GAO, it made explicit the Agency’s intention to not to answer inquiries from the GAO that involve “so called “oversight” information.”
Read More



http://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/2017/0 ... ladelphia/


Camden Summer Camp Kids Get Up Close With FBI In Philadelphia

August 22, 2017 7:31 PM By David Madden






http://articles.courant.com/2006-02-04/ ... l-activity


Sex Assault Against Minor Charged
Former FBI Agent, Scout Leader Accused Of Driving Boy To Maine To Commit Acts
February 04, 2006
A retired Connecticut FBI agent has been charged with traveling to Maine in the middle 1990s to engage in sexual activity with a boy who was a member of a Boy Scout troop the agent led, the U.S. Attorney's office said.

William Hutton, 63, of Killingworth, was indicted on four counts of traveling between states with a minor for the purpose of sexual activity, federal prosecutors said. The indictment was returned Wednesday, but sealed from public view until Hutton's arrest and presentation in court Friday.




http://www.thestate.com/news/local/crim ... 31217.html




student sues Richland County sheriff, Richland 2 school district

Second student arrested at Spring Valley High School speaks out

Spring Valley student Niya Kenny talks about her arrest Monday.

Jessica Koscielniak McClatchy

Kenny’s attorney, Bakari Sellers, said he will hold a media availability Wednesday at 1 p.m. to discuss the lawsuit.

Richland 2 spokeswoman Libby Roof said the district does not comment on pending lawsuits.

Sheriff Leon Lott said, “Sadly, lawsuits are part of our job. Our system is designed for them to be addressed in court and not through the media.”

The student who was tossed was not identified by police, as she was a juvenile. Kenny was 18 at the time. Both left school.

Kenny was arrested by Fields after she “stood up and protested the assault of the minor,” the lawsuit said. Kenny was then “cuffed and paraded through three different offices” and then placed in a paddy wagon, the suit said.

Then Kenny “was wrongly expelled, forced to miss her prom and graduation,” the suit said.

Then-Richland 2 Superintendent Debbie Hamm and Lott later said school administrators should not have called the school resource officer into the classroom after the student would not put away her cellphone when asked to by a teacher. Lott told The State newspaper that deputies are in schools to deal with crimes, not discipline issues. But he also was critical of Fields’ actions.

Fifth Circuit Solicitor Dan Johnson declined to bring charges against the deputy. Lott also asked the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office to investigate whether any civil rights had been violated. Fields is white; the former students are African-American.

Federal authorities in January said they didn’t have enough evidence to bring charges.

Fields, also in January, filed a defamation and negligence lawsuit against the sheriff’s department, also naming Lott and the school district as defendants.

Kenny, in conjunction with the American Civil Liberties Union of South Carolina, also has filed suit in federal court, challenging the disturbing-school charge that’s at the root of the case. The suit asserts the S.C. law has overly broad language that has been used “to draw thousands of adolescents into the juvenile and criminal justice systems.”

Critics say the law unfairly criminalizes students’ actions, is unconstitutional and unfairly affects black students more than whites.

The incident has prompted a broader look at the role of school resource officers in classrooms nationwide.



https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/ ... hs-mayday/



Even amid emerging white supremacist threat, Homeland Security is still caught up on leftist groups
by Curtis Waltman
August 22, 2017
With the resurgence of the American left, we wanted to see whether or not any agencies were tracking the 2017 May Day demonstrations. Documents we received from the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis show that Antifa was specifically targeted and that DHS was sourcing its intelligence from a white supremacist website called “Occidental Dissent.”
Read More


FBI Octopus

Atlantic Beach Mayor: Next target of former FBI agent and UNF ...
UNF Spinnaker-
UNF instructor and former FBI Special Agent, Ellen Glasser, is running for mayor of Atlantic Beach. Glasser teaches several classes in criminology and the legal ...




https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/ ... -juggalos/

The Denver Police’s field guide to Juggalos
by JPat Brown
August 21, 2017
Back in 2010, Deputy Chris Pratt of Denver Police’s Gang/Intelligence Unit got fed up with his department’s lack of operational knowledge regarding the threat posed by the vicious street gang known as “Juggalos.” Pratt put together a guide on the “fanatical followers” of Insane Clown Posse. And now, thanks to public records, you too can know what it means to be “down with the clown.”
Read More


https://www.courthousenews.com/arizona- ... ying-guns/

Arizona Supreme Court Orders Tucson to Stop Destroying Guns




http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/ ... 590538001/

Iowa protest groups accused in federal lawsuit by Dakota Access pipeline developer

The developer of the Dakota Access pipeline has filed a sweeping federal lawsuit that includes allegations of participation in a criminal enterprise against three Iowa activist groups, including the Sierra Club, Bold Iowa, and Mississippi Stand.

Energy Transfer Partners of Dallas, Texas, listed the lawsuit's defendants as Greenpeace International, Earth First!, BankTrack, and other organizations and individuals. The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in North Dakota and seeks damages of not less than $1 billion.

"This case involves a network of putative not-for-profits and rogue eco-terrorist groups who employ patterns of criminal activity and campaigns of misinformation to target legitimate companies and industries with fabricated environmental claims and other purported misconduct, inflicting billions of dollars in damage," the lawsuit claims.

The suit alleges that a number of co-conspirators, including the three Iowa activist organizations, were involved in a criminal enterprise. The alleged purpose was to fraudulently induce donations, interfere with pipeline construction activities, and damage Energy Transfer’s critical business and financial relationships, the plaintiffs said.

The complaint also alleges the criminal enterprise incited, funded, and facilitated crimes and acts of terrorism to further these objectives.



https://www.courthousenews.com/congress ... -drilling/

Congress Picks Sides on Trump Plan to Expand Offshore Drilling






https://robertscribbler.com/2017/08/23/ ... pproaches/

The Heavens Continue to Unleash Their Fury on Southeast Asia — 24 Million Now Impacted by Flooding as Hato Approaches
The far heavier rains of a warming world have fallen hard over Southeast Asia for nearly two months. In India and Nepal more than 18 million have been affected. But the floodwaters in these higher lands have combined into great torrents flooding downstream into Bangladesh. A country that is now witnessing its worst flood in 100 years as one-third of its low-lying land mass is covered by water.



(According to news reports, one-third of Bangladesh’s land mass is now covered by flood waters. August 19 satellite shot of Central Bangladesh shows raging rivers and flooded lowlands. Image source: NASA Worldview.)

The damage for such a poor country sitting at the forefront of a growing climate-change-based destruction from the recent extreme rain event has been tremendous. At least 115 people have died. Nearly six million have been impacted. The government has run out of medicine, water purification tablets, and temporary shelters for the hundreds of thousands of people displaced. More than 400,000 hectares of crops have been destroyed. Fully half a million homes have been damaged or lost. And there is not enough food or water to go around.

Fears of water-borne illness such as cholera are running high and calls for international aid in the flood-stricken state have grown more and more urgent. But the worst is not yet over as floodwaters from Nepal and India continue to swell Bangladesh’s multiple waterways over banks and into communities through central and southern parts of the country. And more rain may be on the way as another powerful storm system gathers.



(This is what happens if you keep burning fossil fuels. According to recent scientific reports, the global number of record-breaking rainfall events has increased dramatically during recent years. This increase has coincided with global temperatures exceeding the 1 C warmer than 1880s temperature threshold. Higher global temperatures amp up the hydrological cycle by squeezing more moisture out of land and ocean surfaces. A warmer atmosphere that’s more heavily loaded with moisture adds move convective energy to thunderstorms which tends to spike rainfall potentials for the strongest storms to higher levels. Image source: Increased Record-Breaking Precipitation Events Under Global Warming.)

In the Indian States of Bahir and Assam more than 430 people have lost their lives as schools have been buried under 8 feet of water, crops have been destroyed, roads have been washed out and power has been disrupted. As with Bangladesh, concern over contaminated water supplies has brought with it fears of water-borne illness as a gargantuan disaster relief effort gets underway.

Nepal has likewise seen its share of the pain and heartbreak. There, more than 140 people have perished in the floods as 40,000 families have been severely impacted.



(Hato, lower left, sets its sights on an already foundering Southeast Asia on August 22nd. Image source: NASA Worldview.)

In total, more than 800 lives have been lost so far throughout these three countries. But the worst may be yet to come as, later this week, the remnants of Typhoon Hato will begin to affect the already-devastated region. Hato’s new injection of moisture and thunderstorms will bring back the potential for severe flooding over Nepal, India, and Bangladesh. Refilling rivers before they have a chance to subside and potentially generating yet one more major flood pulse for the lowlands.

Links:

Floods Claim More than 800 Lives Across India and Nepal

24 Million People Impacted by Flooding in India, Bangladesh and Nepal

NASA Worldview

Increased Record-Breaking Precipitation Events Under Global Warming

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html

L.A. Sheriff's Department psychologist convicted of sex crimes against children under 10

Maya LauContact Reporter
A former Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department psychologist was convicted Friday of multiple sexual assaults of two young children, officials said.

Michael Dane Ward, 45, faces a possible life sentence for the crimes, which involved oral copulation, sodomy and lewd acts on children under the age of 10, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office said in a statement.

The victims were a boy and girl, prosecutors said.

Ward, whose work with the Sheriff’s Department had involved advising and training law enforcement officers, was relieved of duty when he was arrested by the Sheriff’s Department’s Special Victims Bureau last year. The assaults were unrelated to his job, officials said.



The boy and girl, who were assaulted between October 2013 and November 2015, testified against Ward at trial. Jurors deliberated for three days before finding Ward guilty of four counts of lewd acts on a child, two counts of forcible lewd acts on a child under 14, three counts of oral copulation of a child 10 years old or younger and one count of sodomy with a child under 10.

Both children were under the age of 10 at the time they were assaulted, according to the district attorney’s office.





http://www.latimes.com/opinion/readersr ... story.html



It wasn't poor training that led to a mentally ill inmate's death. It was a lack of humanity by his jailers.



Andrew Holland died in January in the San Luis Obispo County jail after spending 46 hours strapped, naked, in a restraint chair. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)


To the editor: As the father of a daughter with special needs, this shakes me to my core. For the San Luis Obispo County jailers to shackle a naked and schizophrenic Andrew Holland to a chair for two days, covered in his own filth, with minimal food and water is reprehensible. (“Naked, filthy and strapped to a chair for 46 hours: a mentally ill inmate's last days,” Aug. 23)

And this happened after Holland was in isolation for 10 days. His parents were not allowed to visit him or give him the medication he needed. Why?

According to your reporting, this was the third death of an inmate in San Luis Obispo County in nine months. For the county to pay out $5 million before the parents even filed a claim or a lawsuit speaks volumes.

To know this happens in California is beyond depressing. My heart goes out to Holland’s parents.





https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2 ... 120530.htm

Breakthrough device heals organs with a single touch
Device instantly delivers new DNA or RNA into living skin cells to change their function
Date:
August 7, 2017
Source:
Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center
Summary:
Researchers have developed a device that can switch cell function to rescue failing body functions with a single touch. The technology, known as Tissue Nanotransfection (TNT), injects genetic code into skin cells, turning those skin cells into other types of cells required for treating diseased conditions.


Link du jour

http://www.pressherald.com/2017/08/26/f ... r-justice/





http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-h ... story.html

Should California spend $3 billion to help people buy electric cars?




http://www.denverpost.com/2017/08/26/de ... ss-parade/


Hundreds join topless march in downtown Denver
The march down the 16th Street Mall and back will begin at 1:30 p.m.
By JOELLA BAUMANN | jbaumann@denverpost.com | The Denver Post
PUBLISHED: August 26, 2017 at 11:09 am | UPDATED: August 26, 2017 at 3:36 pm




http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-n ... story.html

Here's how a Texas oilman's vision spawned a homeless shelter extraordinaire

Doug SmithHaven for Hope is a 22-acre shelter with a split personality: One side is campus where homeless people rebuild their lives. Next to it is a squalid sleeping pad for hundreds.





http://www.pressherald.com/2017/08/26/t ... tching-it/


Twitter retaliation: Stephen King says he’ll block Trump from watching ‘It’
After President Donald Trump blocked the author on Twitter, King tweeted 'No clowns for you, Donald. Go float yourself.'







http://www.pressherald.com/2017/08/25/p ... onal-seat/

Poliquin says he dodges press for fear of losing congressional seat
In a recording leaked to the media, Maine's Republican U.S. representative says he drove the press crazy by avoiding speaking, including on whether he supported Donald Trump's candidacy.


The discussion about Rep. Poliquin, including his remarks, runs from 21:36 to 33:32 of the podcast.

In a secret audio recording released Friday, Maine’s 2nd District U.S. Rep. Bruce Poliquin told a group of supporters that he avoids speaking on the record with the press because he’s afraid he would lose his seat in the next election.

Poliquin, a Republican, has gained a notorious reputation for dodging state and national media, including during the 2016 presidential campaign, when he would not say whether he supported the candidacy of Donald Trump.

In a recording leaked to the media, Maine's Republican U.S. representative says he drove the press crazy by avoiding speaking, including on whether he supported Donald Trump's candidacy.
In a recording leaked to the media, Maine's Republican U.S. representative says he drove the press crazy by avoiding speaking, including on whether he supported Donald Trump's candidacy.
“You think the press is bad in Maine? It’s unbelievable and they are dying to get you on record to say whatever and that becomes the next, so …” Poliquin said, explaining why he doesn’t talk to reporters. “It would be stupid for me to engage the national media and give them and everybody else the ammunition they need.”

In May, Jim Newell, a writer for the online publication Slate, reported Poliquin ducked into a restroom to avoid questions on the Republicans’ Affordable Care Act replacement bill.

Poliquin at first headed for the women’s bathroom before realizing his mistake. “Unfortunately it was the door to the women’s restroom that he had first run to, so he corrected himself and went into the men’s room. When he emerged several minutes later, he was wearing his earbuds and scurried away,” Newell wrote.

But speaking to a friendly crowd of supporters at an event in Bangor hosted by the conservative Maine Heritage Policy Center, Poliquin said there was a strategy behind his hiding from the press, especially at the national level.





http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/T ... 988914.php


Temperature records could fall as heat wave strikes Bay Area
By Jenna Lyons Updated 2:28 pm, Saturday, August 26, 2017



https://robertscribbler.com/2017/08/26/ ... more-days/


Scribbling for environmental, social and economic justice
Not time to Let Our Guard Down With Harvey; Rainstorm Expected to Last 5-9 More Days
As of early afternoon on Saturday Harvey was about to be downgraded to a strong tropical storm after slamming into the Texas coast as a Category 4 monster hurricane packing 130 mph sustained winds. Residents along the coast are just now starting to assess the initial damage from this first major blow. However, the big rain event that is Harvey is just now getting started.



(Harvey’s rains expand over Eastern Texas at 245 PM EST. Image source: National Weather Service.)

According to the National Hurricane Center, the storm’s forward speed has now slowed down to about 2 miles per hour in a north-bound direction. Meanwhile, its shield of encircling rains is expanding to cover most of eastern Texas. These rains are very intense — producing accumulations of more than 1 inch per hour in many locations. And with Harvey stalling out, such heavy rains are expected to persist over basically the same region and at a similar high intensity for at least the next four days. After that time, Harvey is expected to persist and rains of lighter, but still flood-producing force, may continue to fall over parts of Texas for up to five more days.



(Harvey has already dumped nearly 15 inches of rain on some locations. Despite this fact, NOAA is still predicting more than 20 inches of additional rain. Some models are indicating that final totals could range from 40-60 inches in some locations after a 6-10 day rain event. Image source: NOAA.)

It’s worth noting that though up to 15 inches of rain have already fallen from Harvey, the longer range models still show in excess of another 20 inches coming from the storm over the next week. Many models indicate that more than 40 inches of rain could fall in total. And some of our best models yesterday indicated a potential for up to 60 inches in some locations by the time all is said and done.

In other words, this storm is far from over. The main event, in which Harvey may ultimately produce historic rainfall totals, is just getting ramped up. So now is not the time to relax our guard.

(UPDATED 1)

Links:

See Notes on Climate Change’s Influence on Harvey Here

The National Hurricane Center

National Weather Service

NOAA

Rainfall Rising Nearing 15 Inches in Some Locations

Global Forecast System Model Reanalysis

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

Link du jour

https://journals.aps.org/rmp/





https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... tudy-finds

Anti-inflammatory drugs may lower heart attack risk, study finds
US scientists find heart attack survivors given canakinumab injections have fewer future heart attacks and lowered cancer risk by half


Sunday 27 August 2017 23.25 EDT First published on Sunday 27 August 2017 05.00 EDT

Anti-inflammatory injections could lower the risk of heart attacks and may slow the progression of cancer, a study has found, in what researchers say is the biggest breakthrough since the discovery of statins.

Heart attack survivors given injections of a targeted anti-inflammatory drug called canakinumab had fewer attacks in the future, scientists found. Cancer deaths were also halved in those treated with the drug, which is normally used only for rare inflammatory conditions.

The controversy over statins has revealed something: the nocebo effect is real

Statins are the mainstay drugs for heart attack prevention and work primarily by lowering cholesterol levels. But a quarter of people who have one heart attack will suffer another within five years despite taking statins regularly. It is believed this is because of unchecked inflammation within the heart’s arteries.

The research team, led from Brigham and Women’s Hhospital in Boston, tested whether targeting the inflammation with a potent anti-inflammatory agent would provide an extra benefit over statin treatment.

The researchers enrolled more than 10,000 patients who had had a heart attack and had a positive blood test for inflammation into the trial, known as the Cantos study. All patients received high doses of statins as well as either canakinumab or a placebo, both administered by injection every three months. The trial lasted for four years.

For patients who received the canakinumab injections the team reported a 15% reduction in the risk of a cardiovascular event, including fatal and non-fatal heart attacks and strokes. Also, the need for expensive interventional procedures, such as bypass surgery and inserting stents, was cut by more than 30%. There was no overall difference in death rates between patients on canakinumab and those given placebo injections, and the drug did not change cholesterol levels.


Dr Paul Ridker, who led the research team, said the study “usher in a new era of therapeutics”.

“For the first time, we’ve been able to definitively show that lowering inflammation independent of cholesterol reduces cardiovascular risk,” he said.

“This has far-reaching implications. It tells us that by leveraging an entirely new way to treat patients – targeting inflammation – we may be able to significantly improve outcomes for certain very high-risk populations.”

The hospital said the reductions in risk were “above and beyond” those seen in patients who only took statins.

Ridker said the study showed that the use of anti-inflammatories was the next big breakthrough following the linkage of lifestyle issues and then statins


“In my lifetime, I’ve gotten to see three broad eras of preventative cardiology,” he said. “In the first, we recognised the importance of diet, exercise and smoking cessation. In the second, we saw the tremendous value of lipid-lowering drugs such as statins. Now, we’re cracking the door open on the third era. This is very exciting.”

But there were some downsides to the treatment. The researchers reported an increase in the chances of dying from a severe infection of about one for every 1,000 people treated, although this was offset by an unexpected halving of cancer deaths across all cancer types. In particular, the odds of succumbing to lung cancer were cut by over 75%, for reasons the team do not yet understand. The researchers are planning further trials to investigate canakinumab’s potentially protective effect against cancer.

Dr Paul Ridker, who led the study, which was published in the New England Journal of Medicine, said it had far-reaching implications.



http://www.richmond.com/news/ap/man-acc ... a81c0.html

FBI Informants identified in Charlottsville Violence?


Man accused of firing gun at Charlottesville rally among three charged with violence
By ALLISON WRABEL The Daily Progress


CHARLOTTESVILLE — A Maryland man accused of firing a gun during the white nationalist Unite the Right rally this month has been charged with discharging a firearm within 1,000 feet of a school in an incident that may have been caught on video.

Richard Wilson Preston, 52, was arrested Saturday and is currently in the custody of the Baltimore County Detention Center in Towson, Md. Charlottesville police said in a news release Saturday that Preston fired the gun Aug. 12 in the 100 block of West Market Street, which is a corner of Emancipation Park, where the rally was held.

In addition to Preston’s arrest, Daniel Patrick Borden, 18, has been charged with malicious wounding related to an aggravated assault that day near the Market Street Parking Garage. He was arrested Friday and is currently in the custody of the Hamilton County Criminal Justice Center in Cincinnati.

Related to that same assault, Alex Michael Ramos, 33, also has been charged with malicious wounding. Ramos is currently wanted by the Charlottesville police and has a last known address in Marietta, Ga.








http://www.workers.org/2017/08/27/dick- ... ancestors/

Dick Gregory returns to his ancestors



August 27 2017

His name was Richard Claxton Gregory, born Oct. 12, 1932, in St. Louis, Mo. But the world knew him as Dick Gregory, comedian, human rights activist, social critic and presidential candidate.

As a young man, he won an athletic scholarship as a runner, which took him to college.

But he really hit his mark as a comedian who told side splitting jokes about U.S. segregation and racism. He once joined Malcolm X at his 1964 speech at the Audubon Ballroom, a meeting of the Organization of African-American Unity in New York.

Gregory did what he always did: he told jokes. One of his most famous ones came after Malcolm introduced him as a “revolutionary” and “freedom fighter.”

Gregory: “If the FBI ever taps your phone (like they tap mine) … See, they didn’t know … FBI wasn’t used to tapping no colored folk’s phone. Yeah, they come in with $10,000 worth of equipment, so they could tap my phone, and 2 days after they set all that equipment up, my phone got cut off!”

The ballroom erupted in hearty laughter. Most of his bit was about J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI.

It is chilling to note that the FBI regarded him as a “militant black nationalist,” and his file was collected under the “Black nationalist hate group” section.

Gregory, fearlessly outspoken on a variety of social issues, once called the Mafia “the filthiest snakes that ever existed on this earth.”

What did the FBI do? They sent his statement to the Mafia! Truly. Imagine that.

Gregory was a friend to both Malcolm X and Martin L. King Jr.

He sacrificed a multimillion dollar comedy career to take the front lines of the Black Freedom struggle, where he suffered arrest, police beatings and became a target of FBI discontent.

He lived through 84 U.S. winters and, in a 1968 presidential race, he garnered 47,712 votes.

Dick Gregory returns to his Ancestors.





http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/c ... 26597.html



This suspected drug lord says the feds destroyed evidence proving he was an informant

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/c ... rylink=cpy

AUGUST 27, 2017 5:36 PM

A highly prized Colombian defendant has accused U.S. law enforcement agencies of destroying Blackberry messages and withholding emails that he claims would show he was working for them as a confidential informant in the federal government’s battles against South America’s underworld.

Henry De Jesus Lopez Londoño, who was extradited to Miami on a cocaine-trafficking conspiracy charge last year, says the missing text messages and emails would reveal that federal agents authorized him to infiltrate dangerous criminal organizations with specific assignments — and that he wasn’t committing crimes on his own.

His lawyers claim he was an “undercover asset” for three federal investigative agencies from the fall of 2008 until the end of 2011, before his arrest the following year in Argentina. Prosecutors counter that the agents’ text messages to and from the informant were lost because their Blackberry phones were replaced and cannot be found. They






http://chicago.suntimes.com/chicago-pol ... -to-slide/

As violence persists, CPD murder 'clearance rate' continues to slide
Chicago Sun-Times-
The FBI counts the number of murders solved in a given year — even if the murder took place years earlier — against the number of slayings in the calendar ...

Chicago Police detectives have solved fewer than one in five murders committed this year, the lowest rate of closing murder cases since at least 2006 — and likely a historic low, police statistics show.

Seven months into 2017, the city’s police department had “cleared” fewer than 20 percent of murder investigations involving homicides that had taken place since Jan. 1, adding to a recent dip amid a decades-long trend of unsolved homicides in the city, according to the police data studied by crime analyst Jeff Asher.



Last year, the city tallied 781 murders and only 204 arrests, a 25 percent clearance rate by Asher’s calculations

A homicide is considered cleared when an offender is arrested, charges are filed, or when the suspect is dead or has fled the country. Asher’s figures are based on cases closed in the same calendar year in which they occurred.

The Chicago Police Department says its murder “clearance rate” stands at 34 percent — a 5-percent improvement over last year — but CPD’s calculations are based on different parameters used by the FBI. The FBI counts the number of murders solved in a given year — even if the murder took place years earlier — against the number of slayings in the calendar year. So far this year, CPD has closed 142 murder cases, including 42 from previous years.


http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html

Judge denies El Cajon officer's attempt to dismiss lawsuit against him in fatal shooting




http://www.wspynews.com/news/local/will ... c5146.html

Will There Be a Settlement Announced Monday in James Doe's Lawsuit Against Pedophile and Former Speaker of the U.S. House Dennis Hastert?
Aug 27, 2017


Hastert did not appear in court on August 11th in a second lawsuit that was filed by another former Yorkville School District student, who is called Richard Doe in court documents.

Richard Doe claims Hastert assaulted Doe in the bathroom at the old Game Farm property in Yorkville when Doe was a fourth grade student in 1973 or 1974.



https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... o-playbook

Harvard scientists took Exxon’s challenge; found it using the tobacco playbook
A new study finds a stark contrast between Exxon’s research and what the company told the public

Wednesday 23 August 2017 06.00 EDT Last modified on Wednesday 23 August 2017 06.02 EDT

Read all of these documents and make up your own mind.

That was the challenge ExxonMobil issued when investigative journalism by Inside Climate News revealed that while it was at the forefront of climate science research in the 1970s and 1980s, Exxon engaged in a campaign to misinform the public.

Harvard scientists Geoffrey Supran and Naomi Oreskes decided to take up Exxon’s challenge, and have just published their results in the journal Environmental Research Letters. They used a method known as content analysis to analyze 187 public and internal Exxon documents. The results are striking:

In Exxon’s peer-reviewed papers and internal communications, about 80% of the documents acknowledged that climate change is real and human-caused.
In Exxon’s paid, editorial-style advertisements (“advertorials”) published in the New York Times, about 80% expressed doubt that climate change is real and human-caused.





https://robertscribbler.com/2017/08/27/ ... n-the-way/


Harvey’s Flooding is Already Catastrophic and Another 2-3 Feet of Rainfall is on the Way
by robertscribbler
For Houston, a city that hosts a massive oil industry, it's the climate change related flood version of the Fort McMurray fire. And we may well be witnessing, at this time, a tragedy that we could have at least in part prevented, but didn't.

August 27, 2017

*****

Last week at this time, meteorologists were tracking a tropical cyclone moving across the Caribbean. 5-7 day models indicated that the system would enter the Gulf of Mexico by late week. This Gulf was hotter than normal. And for the past three months it had been dumping an over-abundance of moisture into an unusually deep summer trough over the Eastern U.S. This interaction between two features related to human-forced climate change was already producing very severe thunderstorms that generated record rainfall over cities like Kansas City, Missouri.

Harvey was already very moisture rich. It had issued from a tropical convergence zone and monsoon cycle that had already hit unusually high intensity due at least in part to abnormally warm ocean surface waters injecting much higher than normal moisture loads into the tropical atmosphere. And early last week there was some serious concern that intense tropical moisture in the form of Harvey could combine with a Gulf and Eastern U.S. weather and climate pattern that had already produced unprecedented rains to generate ultimately catastrophic and unprecedented results.

These fears have now been realized.

View of downtown Houston right now, from Instagram https://t.co/7wSWxM1z9s pic.twitter.com/ffkDkSdOK1

— Christopher Ingraham (@_cingraham) August 27, 2017

As of this morning, Houston and Southeast Texas had received upwards of 30 inches of rainfall -- with up to 26 inches falling in just one 24-hour-period. In many places, the most rain ever to fall over a one day timeframe was breached.

As we have seen so often around the world from globally increasing instances of record rainfall, roads flooded, cars were abandoned, and people were forced to climb onto their rooftops for safety from the rising waters. In a Houston that is increasingly looking like post-Katrina New Orleans, more than 1,000 emergency calls for water rescues had been received by this morning. And with rivers hitting never-before-seen heights in a flood-prone city that is also facing the effect of rising sea levels, the rains were showing little sign of abating.

In total, as much as 1-3 feet of additional rain is still expected from the storm. In the worst case, this would bring ultimate rainfall totals to between 50 and 60 inches. In a litany that we are hearing everywhere now -- this would be the worst rainfall event Texas has ever seen in our records. It might, ultimately, be the worst flood from rainfall the U.S. has ever seen.



(September 1 GFS model shows remnants of Harvey interacting with a tropical cyclone south of Baja to continue to pull rains over Texas and Louisiana. Image source: Earth Nullschool.)

Moreover, weather models now indicate that Harvey may slowly track back toward the Gulf of Mexico. If this happens, a storm that is already pulling severe volumes of moisture in from the Gulf could be somewhat re-invigorated. Such a result would bring a second pulse of intense rains to parts of Southeast Texas and possibly Louisiana. Even more concerning is the fact that later this week Harvey shows a possible interaction with another stationary tropical cyclone forming near the southern tip of Baja in the Pacific. The two storms appear to interact to draw still more moisture from the abnormally warm Gulf over Southeast Texas later this week. Of course, this forecast potential is still a longer range uncertainty. But the models do appear to continue to indicate a persistent heavy rainfall potential for an already flooded region over an unprecedented long time frame.

(UPDATES TO FOLLOW)



http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-hou ... story.html


NATION
In Houston, pleas for help go out over social media: 'Please send help. 911 is not responding'



When the rainfall turned torrential late Saturday night, and water began pouring into his living room, KeRon Hooey sloshed down the block to the highest ground in the neighborhood: his neighbor’s two-story house.

He and 10 others, including two elderly neighbors, spent the night on the second floor, watching the waters rising out of the nearby Buffalo Bayou and spreading across their quiet subdivision, Wood Shadows II.


All night, Hooey dialed emergency numbers – 911, 311, the Coast Guard, local police stations – only to find wait times of more than two hours, or lines so busy that his calls were dropped. So he turned to Twitter.

“Entire Wood Shadows II neighborhood is under water,” Hooey wrote in a Tweet posted at 4:23 a.m. Then he shared his address.



http://www.independent.co.uk/environmen ... 84076.html

Tillerson brings Exxon's denial to the State Department
Climate change: Rex Tillerson tells US diplomats to dodge questions on Paris Agreement

Secretary of State tells envoys told to be deliberately vague if asked about the international accord by foreign countries

The Independent (U.K.), Aug. 10, 2017

US diplomats should sidestep questions from foreign governments on what it would take for the Trump administration to re-engage in the global Paris climate agreement, according to a diplomatic cable seen by Reuters.

The cable, sent by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to embassies, also said diplomats should make clear the United States wants to help other countries use fossil fuels.

In the wake of President Donald Trump's announcement in June that the United States would withdraw from the accord, the cable tells diplomats to expect foreign government representatives to ask questions like "Does the United States have a climate change policy?" and "Is the administration advocating the use of fossil fuels over renewable energy?"

If asked, for example, "What is the process for consideration of re-engagement in the Paris Agreement?", the answer should be vague. "We are considering a number of factors. I do not have any information to share on the nature or timing of the process," the cable advises.

A US State Department official declined to comment on the cable.

Mr Trump, a Republican, had campaigned on a promise to "cancel" the Paris deal, saying he believed it would cost the US economy trillions of dollars while leaving developing nations such as China unfettered. In sharp contrast to the previous administration of President Barack Obama, a Democrat, Mr Trump has several times called climate change a hoax.

In June, Mr Trump left the door open to re-engagement with the Paris Agreement if the terms improved. The United States will "start to negotiate, and we will see if we can make a deal that's fair," he said.

The State Department guidance clarifies that right now, "there are no plans to seek to re-negotiate or amend the text of the Paris Agreement".

But it adds: "The President is sincere in his commitment to look for a path to re-engage that takes into account his concerns for US economic growth and energy security."

The Paris accord, agreed by nearly 200 countries in 2015, seeks to limit planetary warming by curbing global emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases that scientists believe drive global warming. The United States, under the Obama administration, had promised to cut emissions as much as 28 per cent from 2005 levels by 2025.

Separate from the diplomatic cable, the Trump administration is reviewing a draft report written by scientists across 13 federal government agencies that shows the effects of climate change pose dire, near-term threats to the United States.

The Environmental Protection Agency declined to comment on the draft, which The New York Times published on Monday.
The report puts the White House in the awkward position of either clearing the report's findings or editing them.

The diplomatic guidance makes clear that the United States intends to attend global climate summits during the prolonged process of withdrawing from the Paris deal to protect US interests. The next summit is in November.

A US official said a major priority in these talks would be to beat back attempts to have separate standards in the guidance on emissions cuts for rich and poor nations - long a sticking point in negotiations.

"There's certainly nothing in the policies of this administration that would make us think that we should be acting differently," the official said on condition of anonymity to discuss the internal memo.

The cable also anticipates questions over why the United States has changed its policy to make it easier for global development banks such as the World Bank to finance coal-fired power projects. In 2013 the Obama administration said the United States would oppose most coal projects, guidance since altered by the Trump administration.

"The new principles will allow the (United States) the flexibility to approve, as appropriate, a broad range of power projects, including the generation of power using clean and efficient fossil fuels and renewable energy," the cable said.

http://www.independent.co.uk/environmen ... 84076.html









see
https://www.vera.org/publications/price ... ing-trends




also see
Children have no one to defend them before politicians.

We know child abuse produces post traumatic stress syndrome in children.

http://www.acesconnection.com/g/aces-in ... ood-trauma


Pipeline to Prison May Start with Childhood Trauma | ACEs in the Criminal Justice System | ACEsConnection
ACEs Connection › blog › pipeline-to-pr...
Aug 29, 2016 - The likelihood of criminal behavior in adulthood increased by 28 percent and violent crime by 30 percent, ... Yet the consequences of behavioral problems for children of color, especially those who live in ...


We know PTSD produces criminal behaviour in children.


https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3662280/


Adverse childhood experiences and adult criminality: how long must we live before we possess our own lives? - NCBI
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov › pubmed
by JA Reavis - ‎2013 - ‎Cited by 65 - ‎Related articles
Groups (nonsexual child abusers, domestic violence offenders, sexual offenders, and stalkers) were compared ... CONCLUSIONS: On the basis of a review of the literature and current findings, criminal behavior can ...







We have a chance to cut crime by cutting child abuse

http://www.vachss.com/updates_page.html

In my 40+ years on the front lines, I've been interviewed countless times, in endless venues. But I've yet to be asked this question: "What do you consider the most important issue in American child protection today?" My answer would be: Closing the (deliberately inserted) loophole in the Federal Child Prevention and Treatment Act which permits states to allow "representation" of children in abuse/neglect cases by lay volunteers [such as "CASA" or non-lawyer "Guardian ad Litem"]. That's right: those accused of abuse are guaranteed lawyers; those alleged to be victims of abuse are not. That is fundamentally and foundationally wrong. Morally and ethically unacceptable. Devoid of logic. Guaranteed to produce the worst results. And the LAW in (far too) many states. Changing that law is the current task of the Legislative Drafting Institute for Child Protection. And I don't know of more important work. Before you decide to support us (or not) look at the facts:

The difference between representation by attorneys and "representation" by lay volunteers.

The damage that results.

Where I stand on this issue.

Where do you stand?



http://www.vachss.com/graffiti_wall/whe ... e_tell.jpg

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

https://robertscribbler.com/2017/09/05/ ... rn-storms/


This is the Climate Pattern Scientists Warned Us About — Wildfires Approach 8 Million Acres in U.S. During Summer of Extreme Western Heat, Severe Eastern Storms
“If the same weather persists for weeks on end in one region, then sunny days can turn into a serious heat wave and drought, and lasting rains can lead to flooding.” — Dr. Stefan Rahmstorf.

“The warming of the Arctic, the polar amplification of warming, plays a key role here. The surface and lower atmosphere are warming more in the Arctic than anywhere else on the globe. That pattern projects onto the very temperature gradient profile that we identify as supporting atmospheric waveguide conditions.” — Dr. Michael Mann.

******

To say that, for the U.S., it’s been hot out west and stormy in the east this summer is a bit of an understatement. For while the east has seen numerous storms producing local-to-national record rainfall amounts, the west has been baking under heatwaves that appear to have set off one of the worst years for wildfires nationally on record. This is an extreme summer weather pattern that recent scientific studies have linked to human-caused climate change.



(Severe western wildfires blanket northern U.S. under a massive plume of smoke. Image source: NASA Worldview.)

Last week, extreme heat baked the U.S. west coast. On Friday, San Francisco hit a record high of 106 degrees (F), striking up to 102 (F) on Saturday. Regions further inland near Eureka hit a Death Valley-like 115 F. 36 million Californians fell under a heat advisory as excessive heat warnings ranged on up the west coast through Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia.

The heat wave — which was just the most recent of many for the region this year — baked hills and valleys covered with new vegetation springing up after unusually heavy winter rains. Setting off a spree of wildfires that has seen very severe burn rates throughout summer.

Los Angeles County in Burbank experienced its largest fire on record Saturday as a massive blaze swept through the hills — igniting 7,000 acres before being tamped down by the oddly northward tracking remnants of a tropical storm drifting through the region on Sunday.


The fire spurred the response of 1,000 firefighters, forced 700 people to evacuate, closed route 210 for a time and consumed three homes. Assisted by the rains and moisture flowing off the remnants of Lidia, firefighters have now managed to contain 30 percent of this particular blaze. But with many more fires continuing to burn throughout the west, the region is far from out of the proverbial woods.

According to the National Interagency Fire Center, 70 large fires continue to burn in the western states of Montana, California, Oregon, and Washington. The vast majority of these fires remain uncontained. And at least two exceed 100,000 acres in size. Smoke from these fires has been cycling into the upper level winds for some time now — with most of the northern U.S. falling under a high altitude smoke plume (see top image above).


In total, more than 7,800,000 acres have burned so far in the U.S. this year. This represents the second worst fire year on record so far compared to the last ten years and may ultimately beat out 2006 as the second worst fire year ever recorded. By end 2006, 9 million total acres had burned. During the worst fire year for the U.S. — 2015 — 11 million acres burned in total. By this time during 2015, nearly 9 million acres had been consumed compared to 2017’s present total near 8 million acres.

These fires are occurring primarily in the west where a persistent high amplitude ridge in the Jet Stream has formed. This ridge keeps enabling heatwaves to bake the region and spike fire dangers. And it’s a weather feature that some scientists are saying is linked to human-caused climate change — which is causing the Arctic to warm, while pulling meridional south-to-north upper level winds into the polar zone and producing a wavier jet stream during extreme weather patterns.



(A study produced by a team of scientists including Dr. Michael Mann in March linked extreme summer weather patterns to polar warming and a wavier jet stream.)

The net effect is to create a kind of Halo of Storms and Heatwaves over the middle and upper latitude regions of the world. Earlier this year, The Scientific American noted:

What we think happens is that when there is a ridge forming in a location where Arctic warming can intensify it, that makes the ridge strong and builds it even farther northward. It creates an even bigger wave in the jet stream. You get a stronger ridge over western North America and a stronger southward dip that is farther toward eastern North America.

A subsequent scientific study lead by Dr. Michael Mann and presented in March of this year found that:

… analysis of both historical model simulations and observational surface temperature data, strongly suggests that anthropogenic warming is impacting the zonal mean temperature profile in a manner conducive to wave resonance and a consequent increase in persistent weather extremes in the boreal summer.

And this is exactly what we’ve seen over the U.S. this summer. A stronger than normal ridge in the west fueling record heatwaves and wildfires and a stronger than normal trough in the east fueling more extreme storms. This is a pattern of juxtapposed extremes. One that appears to be fueled by climate change related factors.

Links:

NASA Worldview

National Interagency Fire Center

Largest Wildfire in Los Angeles History Burns Amid Record-Setting Heat

The Arctic is Getting Crazy

Extreme Weather Events Linked to Climate Change’s Influence on the Jet Stream

A Halo of Storms and Heatwaves







http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3469666

Cop shoots Ohio journalist at traffic stop after confusing camera, tripod for gun
BY NICOLE HENSLEY
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Tuesday, September 5, 2017, 7:02 AM





https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/let ... ll:opinion



Mental health and the courts: a difficult spiral
There’s an alternative to criminal justice system for the mentally ill, but lawmakers balk

“Who needs Mental Health Court?” by Elissa Ely (Opinion, Aug. 25) describes an all-too-common scenario in Massachusetts: A person whose mental illness causes him to believe he is not ill refuses needed treatment and becomes caught up in the criminal justice system. Even Mental Health Court isn’t enough.






http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3470362

Ohio police officer fatally shoots man he was transporting to homeless shelter
BY JESSICA SCHLADEBECK
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Tuesday, September 5, 2017, 11:08 AM



http://www.fox5dc.com/news/local-news/278638662-story

Secret Service officer gives hot meal to homeless man




https://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/US-Sec ... O18,31.htm

US Secret Service Special Agent Salaries | Glassdoor
Glassdoor › Salaries › Special Agent
Jun 6, 2017 - Average salaries for US Secret Service Special Agent: $119161. US Secret Service salary trends based on salaries posted anonymously by US Secret Service employees.



https://www.dallasnews.com/news/texas/2 ... poop-prank

SAPD officer admits to providing feces sandwich to homeless man


Dec 8, 2016 - Matthew Luckhurst, the San Antonio police officer who was fired for providing a feces sandwich to a homeless man in May, admitted to doing so, according to SAPD documents r





http://www.realcostofprisons.org/materi ... s_LWOP.pdf


also see


https://books.google.com/books/about/Li ... v0ZwEACAAJ

Life Without Parole: A Reconsideration


Gordon Haas, Lloyd Fillion
Criminal Justice Policy Coalition. Norfolk Lifers Group, 2010 - Parole - 44 pages




http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/m ... -1.3469591

Man’s parents fly from India to Florida to help beat his ‘disobedient’ wife: police
BY JESSICA CHIA
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Tuesday, September 5, 2017, 2:50 AM
w





Blink Tank

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=27JjfRtPY2k





Link du jour
http://www.acadiamagic.com/CadillacMountain.html

http://www.delanceystreetfoundation.org


https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... aine-coast

http://www.seva.org/site/PageServer?pagename=maui


https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... nt-poverty

http://humankindness.org

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/201 ... nal-action

https://fortunesociety.org






http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/05/politics/ ... index.html

Mueller, Congressional Committees Clashing Over Investigations into Russian Meddling



The special counsel investigation into Russia’s election meddling is beginning to clash with three different congressional probes of the same issue.

CNN reports that special counsel Robert Mueller was blocked from obtaining the Senate Intelligence Committee’s transcript of an interview with former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort.

The various congressional committees aren’t sharing a lot of information, and Mueller is keeping lawmakers “out of the loop,” CNN reported.

CNN wrote:

The previously undisclosed fight, described to CNN by multiple sources, underscores the new challenges as congressional committees and Mueller’s operation head into a more intense phase of their parallel — and sometimes, conflicting — investigations into Russian election meddling and any collusion with Trump associates.

There are three committees on Capitol Hill competing for information and witnesses — and there is little, if any, communication among them, even as congressional officials say they all are preparing to intensify the pace of their inquiries this fall. While the Hill investigations into Russia’s meddling have been underway since the beginning of the year, the next few months could be the most consequential in terms of hearing from witnesses and gathering documents, sources say.



https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/categ ... ane-record

Category 5 Irma the 5th Strongest Atlantic Hurricane on Record

Dr. Jeff Masters · September 5, 2017, 2:13 PM


Above: Infrared-wavelength [or visible-wavelength] GOES-16 satellite image of Category 5 Hurricane Irma as of 9 am EDT Tuesday, September 5, 2017. Image credit: RAMMB / CIRA@CSU.
Hurricane Irma intensified into an extremely dangerous high-end Category 5 storm with top sustained winds of 180 mph on Tuesday morning, putting it among the strongest Atlantic hurricanes ever observed. Irma's winds are the most powerful ever measured in an Atlantic hurricane north of the Caribbean and east of the Gulf of Mexico. Measurements from Hurricane Hunter aircraft found peak winds of close to 180 mph, well above the 157-mph threshold for Category 5 strength. At 11:07 am EDT, a dropsonde in Irma's eye measured a central pressure of 927 millibars, 4 mb lower than the previous pass, so Irma is still strengthening.

Irma radar
Figure 1. Radar image of Irma from NOAA hurricane hunter aircraft N42RF, taken at approximately 7 am EDT Tuesday, when the aircraft first observed Category 5 winds. Image credit: Tropicalatlantic.com and Google Earth.


Irma is poised to deliver a punishing blow to the northern Lesser Antilles Islands on Tuesday night and Wednesday. As of 11 am EDT Tuesday, Hurricane Warnings were in effect for the northern Leeward Islands, the U.S. and British Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico. Tropical storm-force winds are expected to spread into the Lesser Antilles on Tuesday night, reaching the Virgin Islands on Wednesday morning, Puerto Rico on Wednesday afternoon, and the Dominican Republic on Thursday morning (Figure 2). As of 8 am EDT, most of southern Florida, Cuba, and The Bahamas were in the 5-day cone of uncertainty for Irma.

Irma forecast
Figure 2. Most likely arrival time of tropical-storm-force winds from Irma, as of the 11 am EDT Tuesday, September 5, 2017 advisory from NHC.
Satellite images on Tuesday morning showed a spectacular hurricane with a large eye surrounded by extremely intense eyewall thunderstorms with very cold cloud tops, indicating that they extended high into the atmosphere. Irma had excellent upper-level outflow on all sides. Conditions were favorable for even more strengthening, with wind shear a low 5 – 10 knots. Sea surface temperatures (SSTs) were a very warm 29.5°C (85°F), and the total heat content of the ocean was a high 60 kilojoules per square centimeter, giving the storm plenty of heat energy to fuel intensification. The surrounding atmosphere has been steadily moistening, as seen on precipitable water imagery, with a mid-level relative humidity near 55%, according to the 12Z Tuesday analysis from the SHIPS model. The eye of Irma was just beginning to be seen on Martinique radar.

Intensity forecast for Irma
According to Dr. Phil Klotzbach, Irma is tied with Rita (2005) and Mitch (1998) as the fifth strongest hurricane in Atlantic records going back to 1851, based on maximum wind speed. Irma is the first Atlantic hurricane outside of the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico known to attain 180-mph sustained surface winds. The lowest central pressure measured outside the Caribbean and Gulf was 919 mb in Hurricane Gloria (1985), versus Irma's most recent central pressure of 927 mb, but Irma could end up breaking this record as well. The highest winds of any Atlantic hurricane are 190 mph, set by Hurricane Allen (1980), and Irma may approach that record.

For the next five days, wind shear, SSTs, and ocean heat content will remain very favorable for development, with Irma passing over slightly warmer waters of 29.5 - 30°C (85 - 86°F) later this week. Mid-level relative humidity is predicted to slowly rise, reaching 65% by the end of the week. We can expect one or more eyewall replacement cycles (ERCs) this week, which will act to temporarily weaken the hurricane by perhaps 10 mph, followed by re-intensification.

Three of our four most reliable intensity models—the HWRF, COAMPS-TC, and LGEM—predicted in their Tuesday morning runs that Irma would be a Category 4 or 5 hurricane with 130 - 160 mph winds through Saturday, and the official NHC forecast of a Category 4 or 5 hurricane for the remainder of the week looks reasonable. The only major impediment to Irma’s strength would appear to be interaction with land; a close pass or direct hit on Hispaniola or Cuba could potentially damage or destroy the hurricane’s inner core and knock it down to Category 2 or 3 strength.


Potential impact on the islands
Only three hurricanes in the satellite era (since 1966) have hit the Leeward Islands with winds of 150 mph of greater: David (1979), Hugo (1989), and Lenny (1999). All three hurricanes caused major damage on the islands they hit, and we can expect Irma to cause extreme damage to any islands it makes a direct hit on. At this time, it appears that The Bahamas are at highest risk of receiving the most devastating wind and storm surge impacts from Irma, though the islands at the extreme northern end of the Lesser Antilles chain and the northern Virgin Islands may also receive direct hits.

Irma will assume a more west-northwesterly track over the next day, which would bring the core of the hurricane just north of the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico on Wednesday. The northern portions of both locations are in the cone of uncertainty, and could recieve a direct hit. Irma is expanding in size, and is predicted to increase the radius of its tropical-storm force wind area by about 10 - 15 miles every day. As of 11 am EDT Tuesday, tropical storm-force winds extended out 140 miles from the center, and hurricane-force winds extended out 35 miles from the center. Most of the islands along Irma’s path will be on the weaker left side, where the wind and storm surge impacts will be less than on the right side of the storm.

The 11 am EDT Tuesday Wind Probability Forecast from NHC highlighted a number of islands that might be at risk of hurricane-force winds on Tuesday and Wednesday. The highest odds were for Barbuda and Saint Maarten, with a 87 - 90% chance of hurricane-force winds. For the northern Virgin Islands and northern Puerto Rico, a 41 - 66% chance was given.

The 6Z Tuesday run of the HWRF model predicted that much of The Bahamas and eastern portions of Cuba may receive rains of 8 – 16” from Irma, and these rains will be capable or causing life-threatening flash floods and mudslides. Hopefully, these core of the 8 - 16" rain swath will stay offshore from Puerto Rico and Hispaniola, but these islands could well be affected by torrential rain.

Irma forecast
Figure 3. The 20 track forecasts for Irma from the 0Z Tuesday, September 5, 2017 GFS model ensemble forecast. Image credit: CFAN.
Irma forecast
Figure 4. The 0Z September 5, 2017, track forecast by the operational European model for Irma (red line, adjusted by CFAN using a proprietary technique that accounts for storm movement since 0Z), along with the track of the average of the 50 members of the European model ensemble (heavy black line), and the 50 track forecasts from the 0Z Tuesday European model ensemble forecast (grey lines). Image credit: CFAN.

Irma forecast
Figure 5. The 0Z September 5, 2017, track forecast by the operational European model for Irma (red line, adjusted by CFAN using a proprietary technique that accounts for storm movement since 0Z), along with the track of the average of the 50 members of the European model ensemble (heavy black line), and the track forecasts from the “high probability cluster” (grey lines)—the four European model ensemble members that have performed best with Irma thus far. Image credit: CFAN.
Long-range outlook for Irma
Irma poses the most serious hurricane threat to northern Cuba and Florida since at least Hurricane Andrew (1992). Since Sunday night, computer models have agreed that Irma will continue west-northwest before making a fairly sharp right-hand turn in the vicinity of the Florida Straits over the weekend. The level of agreement among models and over time has been quite high for a forecast in the 5-day range. Given this agreement and Irma’s Category 5 strength, residents of Florida must take this hurricane with the utmost seriousness.

What is not yet certain is whether Irma will travel along Florida’s west coast or its east coast, offshore from one or the other, or along the spine of the Florida peninsula. Any of these paths could bring significant and potentially devastating impacts to large parts of the state. There remains a small chance that Irma will make a sharp enough turn to miss Florida and head north through The Bahamas, but the stakes are too high for Floridians to count on that possibility.

Based on model guidance from Monday night (00Z Tuesday), it appears that the most likely outcome is for Irma to arc slightly leftward as it approaches the Florida Straits, moving just inland over northern Cuba for perhaps 12-24 hours. Much of Irma’s circulation would remain over water, and northern Cuba is a much less mountainous region than southern Cuba, so it is less likely to disrupt Irma’s circulation and cause a major drop in intensity. Cuba has a well-organized hurricane warning and response program that will go a long way to ensure public safety should Irma make landfall. Still, severe damage would be possible if Irma does strike northern Cuba, and Irma’s intensity could easily remain at Cat 4 after it leaves Cuba, as indicated by our most reliable models. If Irma stays just north of Cuba, it will likely maintain Category 4 or 5 strength through at least Sunday, as predicted by NHC.

NHC's official 5-day forecast as of 11 am EDT brings Irma to the Florida Keys by Sunday morning. At this point, it appears the most likely course for Irma after its right-hand turn is to move northward near Florida’s west coast or up the western side of the peninsula from around Sunday into Monday. This is the scenario favored by the operational 00Z Tuesday run of the European model, as well as two of the highest-probability ensemble members from that run. The other three highest-probability Euro tracks keep Irma offshore, either to the west or east of the Florida peninsula; one of those three tracks results in a landfall in the Florida Panhandle, and the other two would be a devastating blow to The Bahamas. The operational 00Z, and the ensemble members from the 00Z Tuesday GFS model run, are more tightly clustered around a track near or just off Florida’s west coast, but again with some variation. The 06Z run of the GFS takes Irma near Miami and along Florida’s east coast.

The take-home message: while it is too soon to rule out other possibilities, Irma has a good chance of moving northward close enough to the Florida peninsula for significant impacts to large parts of the state, potentially devastating in some areas. Irma may be moving at 10 mph for a day or more after it makes its northward turn, which will prolong the period of high winds and heavy rains within its circulation. Even if it moves along Florida’s west coast, residents on the East Coast could still receive hurricane-force winds, significant storm surge, and torrential rains of 10 - 15” or more. Depending on Irma’s track, some areas could experience 8 hours or more of hurricane-force wind and 24 hours or more of tropical-storm-force wind. The National Hurricane Center reminds us not to focus on the exact forecast track, though, especially at the longer ranges, since the average NHC track errors are about 175 and 225 miles at days 4 and 5, respectively.

Donna track
Figure 6. Track of Hurricane Donna of 1960.
Comparison with Hurricane Donna of 1960
The best historical analogue for a hurricane that follows the current NHC forecast for Irma may be Hurricane Donna of 1960, which tore through The Bahamas and the Florida Keys just northeast of Marathon as a Category 4 storm with 140 mph winds. The hurricane continued to the northwest along the southwest coast of Florida, passing over Naples and Fort Myers before turning inland to the northeast. Donna maintained Category 2 strength into central Florida, then weakened to a Category 1 storm as it passed near Orlando, and exited the coast near Daytona Beach. Donna then made landfall near Wilmington, NC and on Long Island, New York as a Category 2 storm. Donna killed 148 and caused $387 million in damage (1960 dollars).

If Donna were to hit today, damage would likely be more than $50 billion, according to three separate estimates. ICAT estimates a loss of $66 billion; according to a 2006 AIR Worldwide publication, “What would they cost today? The estimated impact of historical catastrophes on today’s exposures”, a repeat of Donna in 2005 would have caused $26 billion in insured losses. This includes loss to property, contents, direct business interruption, and additional living expenses for residential, mobile home, commercial, and auto exposures. Since uninsured losses from a hurricane are typically roughly equal to insured losses, this would put the cost of a repeat Donna at $52 billion in 2005. That was 12 years ago, and according to a 2006 report by AIR Worldwide, catastrophe losses should be “expected to double roughly every 10 years because of increases in construction costs, increases in the number of structures and changes in their characteristics.” Thus, a repeat of Donna in 2017 could be expected to generate roughly $100 billion in losses. An independent analysis done in 2012 by Karen Clark & Company, “Historical Hurricanes that Would Cause $!0 Billion or More of Insured Losses Today”, found that a repeat Donna in 2012 would have done somewhat less damage (but still a staggering amount): $25 billion in insured losses, or roughly $50 billion in total losses.

94L
Figure 7. Enhanced infrared image of 94L as of 1315Z (9:15 am EDT) Tuesday, September 5. Image credit: NOAA/NESDIS.
Tropical Storm Jose forms in central Atlantic
A tropical wave located about 1500 miles east of the Leeward Islands developed into Tropical Storm Jose on Tuesday morning. As of 11 am EDT, Jose was moving west-northwest at 10 - 15 mph with top sustained winds of 40 mph. Satellite images on Tuesday morning showed plenty of spin, and heavy thunderstorm activity was gradually increasing and growing more organized. Conditions were favorable for development, with moderate wind shear of 15 - 20 knots, SSTs near 28.5°C (83°F), and a moist surrounding atmosphere.

The 0Z Tuesday operational runs of our three reliable models for predicting tropical cyclone genesis—the GFS, European and UKMET models—all predicted further develompent of Jose. Residents of the Lesser Antilles Islands should keep an eye on this system, since approximately 40% of the 50 members of the 0Z Tuesday European model ensemble forecasts showed 94L affecting the Lesser Antilles late this week. The official NHC forecast as of 11 am Tuesday takes Jose well north of the Leeward Islands as a strong Category 2 hurricane by Saturday. The super long-range GFS model forecasts of 94L/Jose show it performing an unusual clockwise loop in the mid-Atlantic next week, but such long-range forecasts are of low reliability.

Because Jose and Irma are more than 1000 miles apart, their tracks are unlikely to be influenced by the Fujiwhara effect. However, outflow from Irma could produce vertical shear that may slow Jose's development later this week.

95L
Figure 8. Enhanced infrared image of 95L as of 1342Z (9:42 am EDT) Tuesday, September 5. Image credit: NASA/MSFC Earth Science Branch.
Gulf of Mexico disturbance 95L may develop
A trough of low pressure in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico’s Bay of Campeche was designated Invest 95L on Monday night. The system was producing increasingly organized heavy thunderstorms on Tuesday morning, as seen on satellite imagery. SSTs are very warm, near 30.5°C (87°F), but wind shear is high, 20 – 30 knots. Our three reliable models for predicting tropical cyclone genesis all developed the system in their 0Z Tuesday runs, predicting that it would affect the coast of Mexico between Veracruz and Tampico with heavy rains late this week. Strong upper level winds out of the northwest over the Gulf of Mexico should keep 95L bottled up in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico near the coast of Mexico this week. None of the 0Z Tuesday operational model runs nor the 70 members of the GFS and European model ensemble runs intensified 95L into a hurricane. In its tropical weather outlook issued at 8 am EDT Tuesday, the National Hurricane Center gave this system 2-day and 5-day odds of development of 50% and 60%, respectively.

Bob Henson co-wrote this post.

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politic ... -1.3480726

STASI: Backseat tryst between wife of Trump ethics adviser and young Virginia inmate has our heads spinning
Linda Stasi
LINDA STASI
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, September 8, 2017, 1:40 PM



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3480803



Days after connecting hurricanes to ‘climate change agenda,’ Rush Limbaugh evacuates Florida as Irma closes in
BY DAN GUNDERMAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, September 8, 2017, 2:33 PM


Link du jour


https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesig ... d-85m-sale


http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/g ... -1.3481133


https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/ ... -abu-daoud

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... lth-crisis


http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainmen ... -1.3478110


http://www.occurrencesforeigndomestic.c ... resonance/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... trepreneur


http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3482124





http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3480575


Amateur photographer behind viral golf course wildfire photos speaks out
BY MEGAN CERULLO
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, September 8, 2017, 12:31 PM




https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ts-victims

Does Betsy DeVos care more about those accused of rape than its victims?





http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-irm ... story.html



Trump's Mar-a-Lago ordered to evacuate as Hurricane Irma takes aim at Florida



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2 ... -1.3480471

Two American college students in Italy say police raped them


Friday, September 8, 2017, 7:24 PM


ROME
Florence prosecutors on Friday were investigating allegations by two U.S. students that they were raped by Carabinieri policemen who escorted them home in a patrol car from a nightclub, allegations the U.S. State Department said it was taking very seriously.

Italian authorities said the 21-year-old students were questioned by prosecutors for several hours a day earlier about their allegations. The women accused the officers of raping them early Thursday morning in their apartment building. The police officers were reportedly waiting to be questioned. The Carabinieri are a corps of paramilitary police.

Italian media say three patrol cars went to a nightclub to investigate a fight. Two cars left after calm was restored, but the third remained. The women, who reportedly spent the evening in the nightclub, told authorities that the officers drove them to their apartment building and raped them.

News reports described witnesses as confirming they saw the women enter the patrol car.

Uber driver charged with raping female passenger who blacked out
A State Department official indicated the department was aware of the media reports that the two students were assaulted by police in Italy and that such allegations are taken seriously.

The U.S. Embassy in Rome, when asked about the investigation, sent an email saying: "Due to the sensitive nature of this case and to protect the privacy of those involved, we have no further comment."

The U.S. consul general in Florence met for about an hour with Florence's police chief Friday morning about the case, the Italian news agency ANSA said.



The women were described as having arrived in Florence several months ago to study the Italian language at an Italian
Florence, with its many museums and churches full with Renaissance masterpieces, is an in-demand destination for many Americans, and a year or a few months of study in the city at U.S. university programs or at Italian institutions is very popular.

One heavily followed crime case involved the murder of American woman Ashley Olsen in her flat in January 2016. Later that year, a court




https://www.cato.org/blog/associated-pr ... misconduct

NOVEMBER 2, 2015 9:00AM
Associated Press Reports A Thousand Cases of Sexual Misconduct by Law Enforcement

On Sunday, the Associated Press released the results of a year-long investigation into sexual misconduct by police officers across the country. They found that about 1,000 officers were decertified for some type of sexual misconduct—consensual sex on duty, sexual assault, coercion, child molestation/pornography, statutory rape, inter alia—over a six year period. The Morning Call listed the general rules governing misconduct and decertification—where applicable—in each state.

The AP story reported that the 1,000 number is “unquestionably an undercount” of offenders because of the scattershot nature of police misconduct reporting, prosecution, and internal administrative discipline across states and departments. Indeed, such is the nature of tracking any kind of police misconduct.

At the National Police Misconduct Reporting Project (NPMRP), we track all kinds of police misconduct from sexual misconduct to domestic violence to DUI and drug related corruption. Looking at the preliminary data through October 30, NPMRP has tracked at least 130 news reports of sexual misconduct* by American law enforcement personnel in 2015. Almost all were criminal in nature. Many cases had multiple victims and happened over a period of years, supporting the AP claim that many cases go unreported.

You can look at the cases we’ve tracked below the fold. You can read more about NPMRP at PoliceMisconduct.net, follow the @NPMRP Twitter feed, and like our facebook page.

Jurisdiction/Agency State Date of Report Summary of Incident
Jal NM 1/5/15 Chief resigned after being caught having sex in ambulance while on duty.
Milan NM 1/5/15 Officer arrested for sexual assault and providing alcohol to a minor.
Oklahoma City OK 1/9/15 Officer fired and charged with multiple counts of sexual assault against motorists, all of whom were women of color.
Memphis TN 1/12/15 Officer sentenced to one year, suspended, and two years of probation for sexual misconduct.
Plano TX 1/12/15 Officer arrested for child pornography distribution and indecent contact with a minor.
Duluth GA 1/13/15 Officer fired and arrested for sexual battery of an acquaintance.
Homerville GA 1/13/15 Officer arrested for sexual assault of jail inmate.
Irwindale CA 1/14/15 Officer sentenced to nine years in prison for sexually assaulting woman after traffic stop.
Ocala FL 1/16/15 Officer arrested and fired for soliciting sex from 16-year-old sex worker.
Aledo IL 1/21/15 Officer charged with aggravated sexual assault with a weapon.
Highstown NJ 1/26/15 Officer faced administrative discipline for having sex on duty.
Atlantic City NJ 1/27/15 Officer pled guilty to misconduct and sexual assault of a minor.
Falfurrias TX 2/10/15 Officer arrested for sexual assault of a child.
New York NY 2/11/15 Sergeant charged with rape for actions against girl under 15 years of age.
Mansfield OH 2/13/15 Officer indicted on 40 counts, including 25 felonies, related to sexual battery, burglary, and tampering.
Rothschild WI 2/17/15 Officer resigned and charged with sexual assault.
Broward County FL 2/18/15 Deputy sentenced to five years for coercing undocumented immigrants into having sex.
Shreveport LA 2/19/15 Officer arrested for aggravated rape and intimidation.
Adams County OH 2/20/15 Chief deputy charged with multiple rape counts for actions at his home with 15-year-old girl.
Chatham County GA 2/25/15 Deputy fired and arrested for filing false statements and sexual assault of an inmate.
Grand Rapids MI 3/3/15 Officer charged with home invasion and sexual assault of his ex-girlfriend.
Memphis TN 3/3/15 Officer arrested for performing a lewd act and solicitation of a minor.
New Orleans LA 3/4/15 Officer arrested for solicitation of prostitution.
Orange Beach AL 3/9/15 Officer indicted on two counts of sexual abuse of a child under 12.
Long Beach MS 3/12/15 Officer indicted on multiple counts of statutory rape for actions with 15-year-old girl.
New York NY 3/12/15 Two officers went to Seattle to interview rape victim and went drinking with her. They were all very drunk and they convinced her to come back to their hotel, where one officer eventually crawled into bed with her and ripped her shirt while making sexual advances. They pled guilty to administrative charges, were sentenced to forfeit vacation time and were transferred out of their departments, but ultimately kept their jobs as police officers.
Exeter CA 3/13/15 Officer sentenced to 45 days in jail for sex with a minor who was in department’s youth program.
McLennan County TX 3/13/15 Constable fired and arrested for soliciting sex from a minor.
Syracuse NY 3/16/15 Officer indicted for misconduct for having sex with woman who called police for help.
Pitt County NC 3/18/15 SRO arrested for statutory rape of a 15-year-old student.
USCBP (Ysleta, TX) USCBP 3/19/15 Agent arrested for sexual assault of a child.
Hardin County TX 3/20/15 Deputy pled guilty to making false statement in a child pornography investigation.
Seminole County FL 3/24/15 Deputy fired and arrested on molestation charges.
New York NY 3/27/15 Officer arrested for repeated sexual assaults of 16-year-old girl at church where he served as pastor.
Indiana Excise Police IN 3/31/15 Officer arrested for sexual misconduct with a minor.
Eugene OR 4/6/15 Officer sentenced to seven years for child pornography possession and hiding cameras in police bathroom.
Vidalia GA 4/6/15 Suspended and charged with statutory rape of a 15-year-old girl.
Ohio State Police OH 4/10/15 State trooper was sentenced to five years in prison for throwing out traffic tickets in exchange for sexual favors.
Fairfax County VA 4/16/15 Officer charged with child pornography possession.
Indiana University-Bloomington IN 4/17/15 Officer resigned after he was accused of raping a student.
Butler County OH 4/22/15 Deputy arrested for a sex crime against a minor.
Park Ridge IL 4/22/15 Officer suspended for sending sexual images to woman who recently had contact with the police.
Wichita KS 4/30/15 Retired officer tried for multiple counts of sexual contacts with minors during last several years of his career.
Hillsborough NC 5/5/15 Officer sentenced to 20-33 months, suspended, for sexual contact with two 13-year-old children.
Washington County OR 5/8/15 Sergeant resigned during investigation into sexual harassment and misconduct.
Bethel OH 5/12/15 Officer resigned after indictment for rape and sexual battery.
St. Clair County MI 5/12/15 Deputy fired and arrested for sexual misconduct for having sex w/ jail inmate.
Bossier Parish LA 5/14/15 Deputy fired and arrested for solicitation of prostitution.
Orange County FL 5/14/15 Deputy resigned before he was arrested for child pornography.
Onslow County NC 5/15/15 Deputy charged with solicitation of child pornography.
Chicago IL 5/18/15 The City settled a lawsuit with a woman who claimed two officers sexually assaulted her while they were on duty.
Washington DC 5/18/15 Officer arrested for sexual abuse of a minor and child pornography.
Lincoln County WI 5/21/15 Deputy resigned after his arrest for molesting a 15-year-old girl.
New York State Police NY 6/1/15 Trooper acquitted on 3 of 4 rape charges. Jury hung on fourth charge.
Winona County MN 6/4/15 Deputy fired and arrested for solicitation of prostitution.
Greece NY 6/5/15 Officer sentenced to four years in prison and 10 years supervised release for child pornography conviction.
Ann Arbor MI 6/8/15 Officer sentenced to 11 months in jail for offering leniency to female suspect in exchange for sex.
Brandenburg KY 6/11/15 Officer’s trial for child rape postponed until April 2016.
Williams County ND 6/11/15 Deputy arrested for child pornography.
Oklahoma State Police OK 6/12/15 Trooper ordered to stand trial for rape of motorist during traffic stop.
Tallahassee FL 6/15/15 Officer arrested for solicitation of prostitution.
New York State Police NY 6/17/15 Trooper arrested for sexual assault of woman in Atlantic City.
Amarillo TX 6/19/15 Officer fired after sexual assault allegation.
DeKalb County GA 6/19/15 Deputy sentenced to 1 year in prison and 9 years of supervised release for soliciting prostitution on duty.
Seaside Park NJ 6/19/15 Officer arrested for sexual contact with minor.
Dane County WI 6/25/15 Deputy convicted of sexual assault for actions against a woman who was serving her sentence in home confinement.
Phoenix AZ 6/29/15 Officer arrested for kidnapping and sexual assault against a woman in custody.
Tuscon AZ 6/29/15 Two officers resigned; 5 others under investigation for involvement with sex workers.
Champaign IL 7/6/15 Officer arrested for sexual assault and domestic battery.
Fairfax County SC 7/7/15 Deputy sentenced to 20 years for sex crimes against 11-year-old child.
Phoenix AZ 7/14/15 Officer pled guilty to sexual contact with a minor.
Dallas TX 7/22/15 Officer arrested and fired for sex acts against a child.
Sacramento CA 7/22/15 Officer was convicted for repeatedly raping elderly woman at senior living facility.
Maypearl TX 7/23/15 Chief terminated and charged for sex acts against minors.
Hartsville IN 7/24/15 Deputy town marshal arrested for attempted solicitation of a child.
Portland OR 7/24/15 Officer placed on leave after he was accused of demanding sexual acts from a woman.
Fresno CA 7/28/15 Officer resigned after being discovered in prostitution investigation.
Dallas TX 7/31/15 Officer pled guilty to aggravated assault after he was charged with raping a woman who was sleeping. He received a five-year suspended sentence.
Mt. Pleasant NY 8/3/15 Chief pled guilty to child pornography charges.
Whitehouse TX 8/3/15 Chief resigned one week after an assault charge for unwanted sexual advances against him was dropped.
Las Vegas NV 8/4/15 Detective sentenced to 3 years of probation for attacking a sex worker.
Boscawen NH 8/6/15 Former officer who was then chief of Canterbury was arrested for sexual assault of a minor for actions while employed in Boscawen.
Jackson County NC 8/7/15 Deputy pled guilty to obstruction for covering up underage drinking and statutory rape charges.
Pasco County FL 8/7/15 Deputy arrested for soliciting sex from a minor.
San Bernadino County CA 8/7/15 Deputy accused of sex with jail inmate.
Spearsville LA 8/12/15 Chief convicted of child rape sentenced to life imprisonment.
Cleveland TN 8/14/15 Two officers suspended for sexual misconduct.
Sevier County TN 8/14/15 Deputy sentenced to 90 days of house arrest after he pled guilty to misconduct for having sex with woman while on duty.
Emmett Township MI 8/17/15 Officer suspended for sexual assault arrested again for sexual assault.
Greece NY 8/17/15 Officer fired and arrested for sexual harassment and stalking.
Kiowa OK 8/18/15 Officer fired and charged with abduction and sexual seduction for actions against a 15-year-old girl.
Oakland FL 8/19/15 Officer charged with child molestation and child pornography.
Elburn IL 8/20/15 Officer charged with 33 counts related to sexual abuse of a child over 10 years.
Gretna LA 8/20/15 Officer arrested for child pornography.
DEA (McAllen, TX) DEA 8/21/15 Agent arrested for accessing child pornography.
Haskell AR 8/21/15 Officer arrested on sexual assault and child pornography charges.
Oak Ridge TN 8/21/15 Officer fired amid statutory rape allegations. He left his previous law enforcement position after being accused of indecent exposure.
Eagle County CO 9/8/15 Deputy sentenced to 180 days–90 in jail, 90 in work release–for sexual assault.
Kern County CA 9/9/15 Deputy sentenced to two years in prison for sexual battery.
San Mateo CA 9/9/15 Deputy found guilty of child molestation.
Maryland State Police MD 9/10/15 Trooper indicted for forcing a woman to perform sex act at gunpoint.
Michigan State Police MI 9/10/15 Trooper found guilty on four counts of 2nd degree criminal sexual conduct.
Birmingham AL 9/11/15 Officer indicted for rape and sexual abuse of a child.
Shelby County TN 9/11/15 Deputy arrested for statutory rape.
Spalding County OH 9/11/15 Captain charged with aggravated assault, influencing witnesses, stalking, sexual battery, and other charges against department employees.
Germantown TN 9/14/15 Officer fired while rape charge pending.
Memphis TN 9/15/15 Officer arrested for sexual battery, official misconduct and oppression.
East St. Louis IL 9/21/15 Officer on leave for suspected sexual assault off duty.
Isabella County MI 9/21/15 Deputy pled no contest to attempting to extort sexual favors from suspects.
Port St. Lucie FL 9/23/15 Officer arrested for child pornography.
Fairview OK 9/24/15 Officer arrested for child pornography.
San Antonio TX 9/25/15 Three officers charged with sexual assault and official oppression.
San Jose CA 9/25/15 Officer charged with rape fired.
Crestview FL 9/29/15 Officer resigned in lieu of termination amid sexual battery allegations.
Greenville TN 10/2/15 Officer sentenced to 18 months for having sexual relationships with several jail inmates.
Kentucky State Police KY 10/5/15 Trooper pled guilty to sex with a minor. Four other law enforcement officers were terminated or charged for sexual contact with same girl.
University of Oklahoma OK 10/7/15 Officer arrested for breaking into a car, stealing cell phone, and attempting to send or access sexual content with that phone.
Spring ISD TX 10/15/15 SRO arrested for sexual assault against a minor.
Watervliet NY 10/15/15 SRO pled guilty to sodomy charges against student at his school.
Chicago IL 10/19/15 Two officers under investigation for sex trafficking.
Tulsa County OK 10/19/15 Deputy found guilty of sexual battery and indecent exposure while in uniform.
Walton County GA 10/19/15 Deputy arrested for child pornography.
Fort Smith AR 10/22/15 Resigned after his arrest for solicitation.
Henderson TX 10/22/15 Officer accused of sex crimes against a child.
Adams County CO 10/26/15 Deputy fired for sexual assault on duty.
Cypress-Fairbanks ISD TX 10/26/15 SRO sentenced to one year for pulling over motorist and asking for sexual favor in exchange for looking other way on misdemeanor charge.
Live Oak FL 10/29/15 Officer fired for child pornography possession.
Boynton Beach FL 10/30/15 The City settled lawsuit for over $800,000 brought by a 21-year-old woman who accused officer of raping her last year. The officer was acquitted at trial.
Los Angeles County CA 10/30/15 Deputy was arrested for child molestation.
Spokane WA 10/30/15 Spokane Co. Sheriff accuses city police of covering up sexual assault against SCSO employee.


*This number was compiled by searching the @NPMRP Twitter feed using the terms “rape,”“sex,” “sexual,” “pornography,” “solicitation,” and “molestation.” Other cases of stalking, harassment, and other charges that may be sexual in nature would not necessarily be counted in these searches.







http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/m ... -1.3481196


Mass. woman admits to taking grandson to meet pervy NYPD cop — but never engaged in sex acts with child
BY ANDREW KESHNER
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, September 8, 2017, 6:45 PM



http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ccr ... -1.3481005

Civilian Complaint Review Board recommends NYPD discipline cop who killed Eric Garner
BY THOMAS TRACY GRAHAM RAYMAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Updated: Friday, September 8, 2017, 8:21 PM





http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/off ... -1.3482730

cop cuffed for attacking his girlfriend during fight over their pets
BY THOMAS TRACY
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Saturday, September 9, 2017, 12:33 PM



Officer Christopher Doll was the second of two city employees to be arrested within five hours early Saturday, officials said.

Doll’s girlfriend told police Doll, 44, hit her in the face inside their Bensonhurst home during the 3:30 a.m. fight about their pets.

Responding officers charged Doll, a 15-year NYPD veteran who earned more than $120,000 last year according to public records, with assault and harassment.


Meanwhile, an off-duty city correction officer surrendered at the 107th Precinct stationhouse in Flushing after allegedly attacking his girlfriend.

Tyrell Gaines, 30, was arguing with his 23-year-old girlfriend about baby-sitting arrangements inside their Flushing home when he punched her in the face about 1 a.m. Saturday, according to cops.

Gaines, who earned nearly $63,000 last year at the Department of Corrections, stormed off but surrendered to cops six hours later, officials said.

Police charged him with








http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/fdn ... -1.3481954

FDNY union rep threatened with racist letter after helping fellow EMT suspended for hanging noose in ambulance
BY JOHN ANNESE ESHA RAY RICH SCHAPIRO
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Saturday, September 9, 2017, 5:00 AM

msfreeh
Level 34 Illuminated
Posts: 7683

Re: What does the smart criminal justice consumer do?

Post by msfreeh »

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... -1.3527444

LAPD officer arrested after he kills three people in deadly crash hours after posting ‘don’t drink and drive’ video from a bar
BY JESSICA SCHLADEBECK
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, September 28, 2017, 9:36 AM



http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/buzzf ... le/2635887

Buzzfeed presses FBI, DOJ, Comey, and Clapper for answers about Trump dossier
by Diana Stancy Correll | Sep 27, 2017, 8:58 PM






The Latest: Senate able to interview 2 FBI officials
Updated 6:35 pm, Wednesday, September 27, 2017




http://www.lmtonline.com/business/techn ... 235864.php

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on congressional investigations into Russia's interference in the 2016 election (all times local):
7:30 p.m.
The Justice Department has agreed to allow the Senate Judiciary Committee to interview two FBI officials close to fired director James Comey — under certain conditions.



https://www.circa.com/story/2017/09/27/ ... tor-mccabe

Retired agent Jeff Danik: FBI won't respond to FOIA on Deputy Director McCabe




Retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jeff Danik, who spent more than 28 years with the bureau, as a supervisor in the counter-terrorism division and special overseas advisor, says he's now fighting to ensure that the American people get the truth about what allegedly happened inside the FBI during the investigation into former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Danik, who recently retired and says he has taken on pro-bono work to help FBI whistle blowers, told Circa he is frustrated by what he sees as failure in the bureau's leadership. He says he is concerned that the FBI is keeping necessary information from the American people regarding the bureau's investigations into Clinton's email server and how it was handled by officials in the bureau. He submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request in October 2016, on current Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.

Circa has written numerous stories regarding the three federal inquiries into McCabe. They are concerning alleged Hatch Act Violations, sexual discrimination allegations and a congressional investigation launched by Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles Grassley. The Iowa Republican requested in a letter that the Department of Justice's Office of Inspector General investigate whether McCabe may not have properly disclosed campaign payments to his wife by Clinton supporters on his ethics report and should have recused himself from her email case.

On November 8 and 9, 2016 the FBI acknowledged they received FOIA letters from Danik and denied his request. Danik appealed to the Justice Department and in June of 2017 the DOJ wrote that the FBI should search for and turn over any pertinent documents. Danik said the FBI is still stonewalling him, so he's now filing a joint FOIA lawsuit against the FBI with Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group that has successfully obtained documents government officials have tried to keep from the public.

Question and Answer with Jeff Danik:

Jeff Danik: I was in the FBI for 28 years. I was a supervisor for a good number of those years. I was assigned overseas in counter-terrorism roles. I was assigned to FBI headquarters in terrorism roles. I had a lot of experience with criminal work here in the states mainly in the Miami division of the FBI.

Sara Carter: And currently?

Jeff Danik: Currently, I advise companies on due diligence and I provide litigation support services in criminal cases.

Sara Carter: Are a lot of your clients retired or current FBI agents?

Jeff Danik: Yes, the ones that don't pay me.


Sara Carter: Let's start from the beginning. You put in a FOIA [Freedom of Information Act Request] request with regard to Andrew McCabe. Can you talk a little bit about that? And the reason for putting in that request for those internal communications?

How much do you know about these former US presidents?
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Jeff Danik: Sure. The story broke in the newspaper that Hillary Clinton used a private email account ... I believe that was the first part of the story that broke. A lot of us wondered why there wasn't an immediate case opened up into that because it's just a very strange occurrence. I decided to go and ask for email and text on the executives that I figured would have been in the loop on opening that case and speaking about what to do initially on it if anything.

Sara Carter: What was the response you got from the FBI when you submitted your FOIA request?

Jeff Danik: Just the standard FOIA response that you get out of the FBI. A stop sign, forget it, pound sand. They say in a letter that is boilerplate but that's what I got back from them on this.

I don't know if they don't want those records out because it pulls back the curtain and lets you see the framework of these investigations or maybe they are afraid of what it actually says and who it reflects on.
Jeff Danik, retired supervisory special agent with the FBI

Sara Carter: Why do you think they've been so closed off from giving any of this information, either with you or others you've asked for the same type of internal communications?

Jeff Danik: I think the records are very telling in the FBI. I was in the FBI a long time. If I was allowed to conduct the investigation into who knew what when regarding the Hillary Clinton email server, I could put that timeline together very quickly. There's a huge electronic footprint now Sara in the FBI between text and email and instant messaging. The way that the documents are prepared in the official system. This is a large footprint that is left on an investigation and it can be quickly retrieved. You can tell very quickly the efficiency, the speed at which investigation was taken or not undertaken. I don't know if they don't want those records out because it pulls back the curtain and lets you see the framework of these investigations or maybe they are afraid of what it actually says and who it reflects on. I guess it's possibly somewhat that some of the records they do believe are shielded under the law, but they haven't made a very good point of that [in this] FOIA case.

Sara Carter: There's been a lot of concern among former agents who have specifically stated that they believe a lot of information has not been made public that would expose probably certain obstruction within the FBI into the investigations into the Hillary email Clinton server scandal and other issues with regard to Andrew McCabe's behavior and others inside the FBI. Have you been hearing these same complaints that I've been hearing and what can you say about them?

What I can say unequivocally is that nobody in the FBI ... I would think no single employee would stick up, back stop or condone what James Comey did.
Jeff Danik, retired Supervisory Special Agent


Jeff Danik: I like to be very cautious about speaking for others. Do my friends and do people I associate with talk about those? Yes they definitely do. What I can say unequivocally is that nobody in the FBI ... I would think to a single employee would stick up, back stop or condone what James Comey did. He walked out of the FBI with a document and leaked it to the press. Every single agent knows that's wrong. Every single employee knows that's wrong. So, when you talk about what's the tenor of the psyche inside the investigative core in the FBI and the support staff, on that particular point, you can speak for everybody. I would like to see one person come forward and say "Yeah he did the right thing by doing that."

Sara Carter: Robyn Gritz, one retired former special agent at the FBI said to me in an interview that it was like a cancer inside the FBI and senior level. Can you talk a little bit about that? Is her description of what maybe some of the agents feel is happening within top management a reflection of something new that's in the FBI? Or is it something that's maybe reflective of bureaucracy for the length of time that you spent within the bureau?

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Jeff Danik: I'll say for sure at the top of the FBI, at the executive levels of the FBI, there are definitely some stone cold heroes up there. I want to make sure I say that. But the problem is, there's a huge number of those heroes at the street agent level of the FBI. The brick agents that are out doing the work daily. Huge numbers of heroes there, but as you get up to the top, those heroes have a hard time making it upper management. It's a very closed controlled group. A lot of us feel, I definitely feel that the promotion structure is rigged. That there's a lot of backdoor hiring of friends to get jobs higher up and then those executives ... And it's happening Sarah time and time again, where they're using their positions for their own personal benefit. Now we see that in the Hillary Clinton investigation. It seems to be spilling out outside of the bureau too.

Sara Carter: Do you believe, Jeff, that there's a politicization of the FBI on those levels that kind of go against the core of the FBI being very nonpartisan and not playing a role in politics?

Jeff Danik: It's allowed some of these anomalies that we see exist but by in large the executives are parlaying their positions for personal benefits after retirement to things like that. That they get better jobs and good jobs and that type of thing. That's the systemic issue most people see. The politicalization of it is minor. Even though there are people with very very strong opinions on both side of the political aisle in the FBI, it really isn't a problem. It's just those are much more isolated. In this case with the deputy director and his involvement with his wife running for Virginia state senate and getting all this money from the Clinton friendship with the governor, that is an anomaly but it's something that is a focus of my FOIA. What happened in that situation?

Sara Carter: Let's talk about that FOIA because that's what led you to this point. When you didn't get a response back from the FBI, what happened with the response you got back from the DOJ?

Jeff Danik: The first thing I did was appeal the FBI's rejection of my request for the records. As I recall, their initial rejection said that the records were personal and that I hadn't particularly described them. These are boilerplate kind of rejection excuses the FBI gives. Then, of course I wrote the FOIA, being able myself if I was sitting at the computer, which I've done myself inside the FBI. I wrote the FOIA so that if I had gotten my FOIA, I could easily search the word strings and the records myself and produce what I wanted. I knew it was particularly described enough. That's what I told in my appeal. I even put that in there that listen, these records are well enough described that I could do it myself. Give me five minutes with a computer and I'll show you. It went through the process with the department of justice. That's where you appeal your FOIA rejection from the FBI initially is. It's a waiting game with them. I will say that the DOJ office was fairly responsive. I even talked to them on the phone once and I got a favorable opinion out of them on these records, that at least that the FBI should re-institute the FOIA and search for responsive records.

Sara Carter: After you got that response back from the DOJ, what had the response been from the FBI?



Sara Carter: You sought help afterwards, after [the FBI] failed to respond to you?

Jeff Danik: There's a lot of cops, there's a lot of agents out there that think people committed crimes, did things wrong, you don't talk about it. You have to internalize that because it's not fair to the person. Either you climb in the ring with your evidence and fight 'em out in court or you keep your mouth shut. It's the same way with these email documents and these text documents. If they exist and if they're incriminating or if they're exculpatory let's get 'em and let's find that out. The only way to do that is litigate. It seems like in today's society especially with the bureau, the only avenue you have is litigation. That's what Judicial Watch does best.

Sara Carter: What do you expect will be the result of this FOIA lawsuit with Judicial Watch? This combined FOIA lawsuit. Do you expect to get the documents?

Jeff Danik: I think they'll take two actions. First action they'll take is to say it's an ongoing investigation now and we've thought up that excuse now to thwart you with. Secondarily, to the extent they do have to dump email and text on me as the DOJ has ordered them, what they'll do is lay them out publicly for everybody to get at once so they don't think I have exclusivity to it. But what they don't realize is I don't care about exclusivity. I'd give them to anybody. I don't even care if I get them as long as Judicial Watch gets them.

Sara Carter: Explain why this is so important to the American people? Why should they care? Why do they need to know what's going on here?

Jeff Danik: Well it's two fold - they need to know what happened in that investigation because it is a extremely divisive issue with the













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Facing a tiny dating pool, NYC Mormons turn to new app


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http://robertscribbler.com/2017/09/27/c ... n-records/

Climate Change Related Extreme Weather Rocks World, Weird Major Hurricane Forms East of Bermuda, Cyclone Energy Closing in on Records
by robertscribbler
Around the world, the litany of climate change related extreme weather events reached an extraordinary tempo over the past week. And it is becoming difficult for even climate change deniers to ignore what is increasingly obvious. The weather on planet Earth is getting worse. And human-caused global warming is, in vast majority, to blame...

Climate Change Related Extreme Weather Spans Globe



(Climate and Extreme Weather Events for September 17 through 24.)

Puerto Rico is still knocked out a week after Maria roared through. With Trump basically ignoring this worst in class blow by a hurricane ramped up by human-caused climate change, it will be a wonder if this territory of 3.4 million U.S. citizens ever fully recovers.

In other and far-flung parts, Brazil is experiencing an abnormally extreme dry season. Australia just experienced its hottest winter on record. In Teruel, Spain, thunderstorms forming in a much warmer than normal atmosphere dumped half a meter of hail. Antarctic sea ice is hitting record lows after being buffeted by warm winds on at least two sides. And in Guatemala, Mexico, Poland, the Congo, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, India and Oklahoma, there have been extreme or record floods.

Weird Major Hurricane in Central Atlantic

#Lee is now a major hurricane with max winds of 115 mph - the 7th Atlantic hurricane season on record with 5 Cat. 3+ hurricanes by Sep 27. pic.twitter.com/Ily2L8xwlv

— Philip Klotzbach (@philklotzbach) September 27, 2017

More locally to the U.S., in the North Atlantic warmer than normal surface waters have fueled the odd development of hurricane Lee into a category 3 storm. It's not really that strange for a major hurricane to develop in the Atlantic during September. It's just that we'd tend to expect a storm of this kind to hit such high intensity in the Gulf of Mexico, or over the Gulf Stream, or in the Caribbean. Not at 30.6 N, 56.8 W in the Central North Atlantic south and east of Bermuda and strengthening from a weaker storm that was torn apart in the Inter-Tropical-Convergence-Zone, before drifting considerably to the north over what would typically be a less favorable environment.

But typical this present hurricane season is not. Maria, which is still a hurricane after ten days, is presently lashing coastal North Carolina with tropical storm force gusts as it moves ever so slowly to the north and east. With Irma lasting for 14 days, Jose lasting for 17, and Lee lasting for 13 so far, 2017 may well be the year of years for long duration, intense storms. Meanwhile, a disturbance to the south of Cuba shows a potential for developing into yet another tropical cyclone.

Closing in on Record Accumulated Cyclone Energy



(2017 Accumulated Cyclone Energy for the North Atlantic. Image source: Colorado State University.)

Storms lasting for so long and hitting such high intensity produce a lot of energy. And the primary measure we have for that expended energy is ACE or Accumulated Cyclone Energy. 2017 is bound to achieve one of the highest ACE measures for any Atlantic Hurricane Season. Since 1851, only 8 years have seen an ACE value hit above 200. Present 2017 ACE is at 194 and climbing. Highest ever ACE values were recorded in 2005, at 250, and 1933 at 259.

Individual storm ACE values are also impressive with 2017 presently showing 3 storms with an individual ACE higher than 40. Only 27 storms with a 40+ ACE value are ever recorded to have formed in the Atlantic. Irma, so far, is the highest ACE for 2017 at 66.6 -- which is the second highest individual storm ACE ever for the Atlantic. Jose produced an ACE of 42.2 (24th) and Maria an ACE of 41.4 (26th).

If 2017 continues to produce strong, long-lasting storms over a record hot Atlantic, it is easily within striking distance of these numbers. The restrengthening of Lee to major hurricane status so far north and out in the Atlantic was yet one more surprise that shows how much energy the Atlantic is bleeding off this year. Such a tendency will likely continue through October but with storms probably not forming quite so frequently as during September and originating in regions closer to the Caribbean and U.S.

Links:

Puerto Ricans Waiting For Aid a Week After Maria's Devastation

When Does it Rain Again in Brasil?

Hail Storm Causes Chaos in Teruel

Antarctic Sea Ice Hits Another Record Low

Colorado State University

The National Hurricane Center

2017 Atlantic Hurricane Season

Accumulated Cyclone Energy



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