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From LA Times

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But federal authorities promise more oversight of the 287(g) program, and less authority for Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Arizona -- its most controversial participant.

By Anna Gorman

October 17, 2009

Despite continuing criticism about the program, authorities announced Friday that 67 local and state law enforcement agencies across the country would continue enforcing immigration law under special agreements with the federal government, but that they would be subject to more oversight.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement also limited the authority of the most controversial participant, Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz., who is under investigation by the Department of Justice for possible civil rights violations. Arpaio can still identify illegal immigrants in the jails but can no longer conduct immigration sweeps in his community under the federal program known as 287(g).

ICE Assistant Secretary John Morton said Arpaio's sweeps were "not consistent" with the agency's priorities.

Morton announced in July that the program, which has drawn criticism about racial profiling and civil rights violations, would continue but that every agency wanting to participate would have to sign a new agreement by this week. Under the revised guidelines, the police agencies would have to focus on serious criminals and would be bound by civil rights and constitutional laws.

"The new 287(g) very clearly lays out the priorities for the program and the intention for ICE and the partnering agencies to focus on serious criminal offenders," Morton said.

Since 287(g) began, more than 1,000 local officers have been trained to enforce immigration law. More than 130,000 illegal immigrants have been identified under it, according to officials. In 2009, roughly 24,000 illegal immigrants identified have been deported.

In California, San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department has reached an agreement to continue screening for illegal immigrants at the jails but is awaiting approval by county supervisors. Los Angeles, Orange and Riverside county sheriff's departments are still negotiating their agreements with the federal government.

Of the 67 agreements announced Friday, 55 have been confirmed and 12 are awaiting approval by local agencies, federal authorities said. Ten new agencies are participating, and six elected to drop out.

The proposed agreement in Los Angeles County would give the sheriff's department more responsibility in processing illegal immigrants for possible deportation, according to a recent report by Merrick Bobb, special advisor to the supervisors. The additional responsibilities would require that the custody assistants begin the screening process before inmates are convicted, rather than after conviction, contrary to the supervisors' original direction to the sheriff's department, Bobb said.

Carl Bergquist, a policy advocate at the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, said immigration officials will have to prove that the oversight is sufficient throughout the nation.

"I think it's definitely wait and see," he said. "There was supposed to be some kind of oversight under the old program. That was never the case."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-immig-law17-2009oct17,0,7308083,print.story

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As rehab programs are cut, prisons do less to keep inmates from returning

State to eliminate 40% of funding designed to turn prisoners' lives around. Opponents say streets will be less safe as a result.

By Michael Rothfeld

October 17, 2009

Reporting from Sacramento

Gina Tatum spends her days in a compound surrounded by electrified fence in the sun-baked heart of the Central Valley, hoping to change her life.

She will soon turn 50, and after two decades in and out of prison, she says she is tired of victimizing others, tired of stealing, tired of doing drugs.

"I can't afford any more years up here -- I've lost too many," said Tatum, who is serving a four-year stint for forgery at the Valley State Prison for Women in Chowchilla. "I'm trying to learn things to change my thinking, change everything about me, so I can go home. It's so easy to get caught up here and never leave. I don't want to die in prison."

But because of cuts in the state budget, Tatum and thousands of other inmates and parolees in California are about to lose access to many of the programs the prison system has offered to help them turn their lives around.

Officials plan to chop $250 million a year from rehabilitation services, more than 40% of what the state now devotes to them and a quarter of the $1 billion it is slicing from its prison system.

The cuts occur four years after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger persuaded lawmakers to change the name of the Youth and Adult Correctional Agency to the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

"We don't want to just put the name on it," he said in 2007, proposing to expand rehabilitation services for prisoners. "We have to heal them. We have to get them ready to go out so they can get a job, connect with society and never commit a crime again."

Federal pressure

The rehabilitation services are being slashed at the moment when they may be most needed: The state is under pressure from federal courts to reduce overcrowding driven by the high rate at which inmates return to prison after they are released.

Substance-abuse treatment, vocational training and educational programs, all scheduled to be cut back, were designed to give offenders skills to help them hold jobs and make other changes. They are taught to handle anger, build self-esteem and search for the roots of their decisions to commit crimes, the better to avoid repeating them.

At eight prisons, substance-abuse programs will close; scaled-down versions will remain at only 12 of the state's 33 lockups and one of its privately run prisons. Up to 900 instructors and staff, many of whom provide academic and vocational education, could be laid off. Arts programs will no longer be available.

State officials say they will attempt to use their reduced resources more efficiently, by cycling inmates through programs for shorter periods.

"We're very much targeting the resources on those who most need it," said Elizabeth Siggins, who is in charge of rehabilitation for the state prison system.

But advocates for rehabilitation and program providers contend that the cuts mean a return to an old way of thinking, in which prisons were intended to punish but not improve those society sends there. And they say the changes could have an effect on safety in California streets and within its prisons.

Kathy Jett, formerly Schwarzenegger's top aide for prisoner rehabilitation, said gangs may attempt to fill the void created by the absence of programs.

"I think you'll start to see a shift back to lots of violence," she said. "These are pretty draconian, pretty severe cuts. . . . The wardens really are not going to have many tools to manage those inmates."

The changes could also subvert the state's recent moves to lower incarceration costs and ease crowding.

The governor and state lawmakers last month agreed to reduce supervision of parolees so fewer would be returned to prison for failing drug tests and other low-level violations. At the same time, the state is eliminating 45% of the seats in its substance-abuse programs for parolees, which experts say increases the likelihood that they will commit new crimes and go back to prison anyway.

And the state may undermine another recently enacted measure that gives inmates more time off their sentences for participating in such programs: Prisoners cannot earn the credit without access to the programs.

At Valley State, two nonprofit groups hired by the state provide rehabilitation to 756 women four hours a day, five days a week. The state has canceled a contract with one of the groups, Phoenix House, as of this month and will end a contract with Walden House as early as December. After that, officials plan to award a new contract for only 175 women to receive services.

At Walden House's program one recent day, about 125 women arrived at a building that resembles a small civic center. They sat quietly for "accountability time," arms folded, feet tapping, while attendance was checked. When the session began, women stepped to the center to perform a previously assigned task intended to teach responsibility.

One read a poem. Another recounted the day's news from television reports. A third offered inspirational proverbs. The women sang a boisterous "Happy Birthday to you -- Woooo" for one inmate.

The goal, counselors said, is to get inmates, some of whom are required to attend against their will, to connect with others and learn trust. The program is for women who have used drugs or committed drug-related crimes, but the curriculum extends beyond controlling addiction to maintaining relationships, parenting and anger management.

'The tears start'

"We ask them, 'Why are you here? What has happened in your life that brought you to prison?' " said Charmaine Hoggatt, a program director for Walden House.

"We get them to try to be honest about some of the choices they made. That's when the tears start to come, the confusion starts to come, and the guilt and the shame."

Mary Rubio, in the 23rd year of a life term for a crime she would not discuss, completed the program in 2005 and is a paid mentor to others.

"This program saved my life," said Rubio, 54. In "the jungle" of the prison dorms and yards, she said, she never could have reflected on her life, on how self-destructive she had been. In prison, "it's, you know, eat or be eaten," Rubio said. "So when I came into this program, it gave me a safe place . . . to look at my behaviors and the reason for them."

Not all inmates engage. Informed about the cutbacks, some applauded, Hoggatt said. As several women sat talking about the coming changes, they said that though they had initially resisted participating in the program, encouragement from fellow inmates and counselors helped them believe that they could make the future better than the past.

Tatum, shedding tears and brushing back hair streaked with gray, called the program "one of the best things I've ever done in my life." It could also be her last chance to save herself, she said, because with two strikes on her record, even a fight after her release could land her back in prison for the rest of her life.

'Let us stay'

"I know you help some people even though they don't want to be helped," Tatum told Hoggatt. "Those of us who want to be here, let us stay."

Tatum won't be eligible, because the state plans to put inmates in that rehabilitation program for only the three months immediately before their release dates, rather than the current three-year maximum. She is not scheduled to get out until the end of 2011.

Siggins said the inmates chosen for such services will be those deemed to be most in need or at the highest risk to offend again.

Similarly, the state will give preference in education programs to those who can most benefit, Siggins said.

With fewer teachers, the most classroom time will go to prisoners with lower reading levels, while those at higher levels or who are preparing for graduate equivalency tests will have more individual "self-study."

But David Beck-Brown, an artist and former instructor who left his job at a San Diego prison earlier this year, said that with little to do, prisoners grow restless.

"We have to have programs," he said. "We have to treat inmates with dignity. All that is going under now."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-rehab17-2009oct17,0,7834545,print.story

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California gives the poor a new legal right

Under a new law, the state will provide lawyers in key civil cases, such as those dealing with eviction and domestic abuse. Advocates say underprivileged litigants will get a better shot at justice.

By Carol J. Williams

October 17, 2009

California is embarking on an unprecedented civil court experiment to pay for attorneys to represent poor litigants who find themselves battling powerful adversaries in vital matters affecting their livelihoods and families.

The program is the first in the nation to recognize a right to representation in key civil cases and provide it for people fighting eviction, loss of child custody, domestic abuse or neglect of the elderly or disabled.

Advocates for the poor say the law, which Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed this week, levels the legal playing field and gives underprivileged litigants a better shot at attaining justice against unscrupulous landlords, abusive spouses, predatory lenders and other foes.

Although some analysts worry that it could swell state court dockets or eat up resources better spent on other needs of the poor, the pilot project that won bipartisan endorsement in the state Assembly will be financed by a $10 increase in court fees for prevailing parties.

Anybody confronted with criminal charges has a constitutional right to an attorney, as set out in the landmark Supreme Court decision in Gideon vs. Wainwright in 1963. But such a right does not apply in civil court, and the majority of citizens fighting what can be life-altering civil actions now attempt to handle their cases without professional guidance.

An estimated 4 million people seek to represent themselves in California in civil matters each year, the state Judicial Council estimates, not because they want to but because they can't afford to hire a lawyer.

"How ironic that you can be arrested for stealing a small amount of food -- a box of Twinkies from a convenience store -- and you're entitled to counsel. But if your house is on the line, or your child is on the line, or you're being abused in a domestic relationship, you don't have the same right to counsel," said Assemblyman Mike Feuer, the Los Angeles Democrat who sponsored the bill.

California's pilot project is the first in the nation to create a right of "Civil Gideon" and will be closely watched by access-to-justice advocates across the country, say legal analysts who expect the presence of lawyers to ease court congestion.

As conceived, the program will fund public interest law groups, where lawyers typically earn salaries more on the level of teachers than their well-paid colleagues from big law firms. Such legal aid groups are overwhelmed by the needs of the indigent. At least 70% of those with civil law problems are turned away for lack of funds, experts say. Groups receiving the money will be chosen by the Judicial Council, and the pilot program will be reevaluated to determine whether it should be continued beyond its 2017 funding guarantee.

"The great thing about this is that local courts and local legal aid programs will team up and provide local solutions," said Julia R. Wilson, executive director of the Legal Aid Assn. of California.

Some legal analysts, however, see the project as a misplaced priority, especially given the persistent shortcomings in a criminal justice system many say is increasingly plagued by instances of wrongful conviction.

"I think it is of considerable doubt that this is the best use of scarce resources on behalf of the poor," said Lawrence Rosenthal, a Chapman University professor of civil rights law, arguing that the tens of millions to be devoted to civil case representation would be better spent on law enforcement, quality day care or lead paint eradication in low-income communities. "There are a lot of questions that nobody asks when this kind of bill gets passed, because everyone is too busy applauding that more money is going to be paid to lawyers."

Three years ago, the American Bar Assn. called on states to provide a right to counsel in civil cases in which "basic human needs" are at stake. Since then, nine states have made moves to afford limited civil representation, but California will be the first to extend that to a broad array of family law and social justice issues.

"A lot of states have moved forward bit by bit. What is noteworthy about the California situation is that the proposed pilot projects are in a lot of the core areas people have been pushing for, like foreclosure and landlord-tenant disputes," said Russell Engler, a professor at New England Law in Boston.

Over the four-plus decades since the Gideon ruling, legal researchers have documented that when litigants have lawyers in civil cases, more just and cost-effective outcomes are reached.

For example, women seeking restraining orders against abusive partners were successful 83% of the time when they had legal representation, compared with 32% without an attorney, according to a 2003 report by University of Baltimore law professor Jane C. Murphy. Giving civil litigants the legal advice they need to work out a settlement ahead of their court dates also cuts down on post-judgment appeals and the costly social services incurred when parents lose their rights simply because they don't know how to navigate the legal system, analysts say.

"In abuse-and-neglect cases, if parents don't have representation, children spend more time in foster care, and that's very expensive for the state," said Laura K. Abel, deputy director of the Justice Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law.

The project gives hope to the legions of unrepresented civil litigants such as Angela Rhoden, 31, who said she was forced to leave her job in Atlanta earlier this year to come to Los Angeles after the father of her 10-year-old son seized the boy during a visit here and refused to return him.

"When I came to California, I didn't have legal representation, nor could I afford it. I didn't even have a job at the time," said the mother, whose case was recently taken up by the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles.

"To a certain extent, you know your rights," she said. "But if you have a lawyer to speak on your behalf, the court just takes you more seriously."

Irma Green, an ailing 62-year-old surviving on $890 a month in disability benefits, said she would have been unable to fight off an eviction notice from her landlord in South L.A. if she hadn't had an attorney represent her for free.

"I can't tell you how bad it feels when you're sick and you're a senior citizen and they're kicking you out of your home," she said, crediting the intervention of Neighborhood Legal Services with preventing her from becoming homeless.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-civil-gideon17-2009oct17,0,2206555,print.story

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Setbacks weaken Al Qaeda's ability to mount attacks, terrorism officials say

Al Qaeda and its allies remain a threat, particularly because of an increasing ability to attract recruits from Central Asia and Turkey to offset the diminishing number of Arab and Western militants.

By Sebastian Rotella

October 17, 2009

Reporting from Washington

As Al Qaeda is weakened by the loss of leaders, fighters, funds and ideological appeal, the extremist network's ability to attack targets in the United States and Western Europe has diminished, anti-terrorism officials say.

Nonetheless, Al Qaeda and allied groups based primarily in Pakistan remain a threat, particularly because of an increasing ability to attract recruits from Central Asia and Turkey to offset the decline in the number of militants from the Arab world and the West.

Al Qaeda's relative strength these days is of crucial importance in the complex debate in Washington over future U.S. troop levels and tactics in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Although factions within the Obama administration differ on how best to deal with the Taliban in Afghanistan, all agree that the paramount priority is defeating Al Qaeda. Unlike the Afghan Taliban, the terrorist network Al Qaeda remains committed to a holy war against the West with a goal of matching or surpassing its devastating attacks in 2001.

Western intelligence officials say that the group, already under pressure from U.S. drone strikes and facing a likely Pakistani army assault on its sanctuary, has been further racked by internal division and rifts with tribal groups.

"Some pretty experienced individuals have been taken out of the equation," a senior British anti-terrorism official said in a recent interview.

"There is fear, insecurity and paranoia about individuals arriving from outside, worries about spies and infiltration," said the official, who requested anonymity because of the sensitive topic. "There is a sense that it has become a less romantic experience. Which is important because of the impact on Al Qaeda the brand, the myth, the idea of the glorious jihadist."

Al Qaeda last spilled blood in the West in July 2005 when bombing attacks on the London transportation system killed 52 people. Global cooperation and aggressive infiltration by Western spy services have thwarted subsequent plots, and a stepped-up campaign of drone strikes has killed many Al Qaeda leaders and intensified divisions among extremist groups.

"There are tensions about AQ as an entity," the British official said. "It has embedded itself in [northwestern Pakistan] over the course of years with marriages, links to tribes. The drone strikes appear to be straining those bonds with the locals."

Some Arabs and Westerners still trek to the training compounds of Waziristan, though the numbers have shrunk as intelligence services get better at tracking and capturing trainees. British militants thought to have trained in Pakistan during the last year and a half number in the tens, not the hundreds, the official said.

French authorities say only small numbers of militants from France are going to Pakistan. Italian anti-terrorism officials have not detected any recruits from their country traveling to Pakistan since 2005 or '06, said Armando Spataro, a top terrorism prosecutor in Milan.

The dwindling supply of foreign recruits results partly from an ideological backlash in the Muslim world, experts say.

President Obama cited the debilitated condition of the terrorist network last week during a visit with U.S. counter-terrorism officials.

"Because of our efforts, Al Qaeda and its allies have not only lost operational capacity, they've lost legitimacy and credibility," he said.

The number of failed plots in the West, whether directed or inspired by Al Qaeda, also shows that the quality of operatives has declined, scholar Marc Sageman testified at a hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week.

"Counter-terrorism is working," said Sageman, a former CIA officer and New York Police Department expert. "Terrorist organizations can no longer cherry-pick the best candidates as they did in the 1990s. There is no Al Qaeda recruitment program: Al Qaeda and its allies are totally dependent on self-selected volunteers."

In several recent cases, Western trainees in Pakistan allegedly had contact with Mustafa Abu Yazid, also known as Said Sheik, a longtime Egyptian financial boss. Abu Yazid acts as the day-to-day chief of the network while Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman Zawahiri, spend their time eluding capture, said the British official.

The training and direction of Westerners had largely been coordinated by one individual: Rashid Rauf, a Pakistani Briton who died in a missile strike in November. Investigators believe Rauf was the handler of British operatives in plots dating back to a failed 2004 bombing in London.

A French trainee who confessed this year detailed to French police the relatively small size of the network. Walid Othmani, who is of Tunisian descent, said he trained in the Waziristan region with a mostly Arab contingent of 300 to 500 fighters, according to a French police report provided by a defense lawyer.

"The chief of the Arabs is . . . of Egyptian origin," Othmani told interrogators. "The Arab group is mostly people of Saudi origin. You find people from the Middle East, North Africans, blacks, Turks and a majority of Arabs."

Anti-terrorism officials said Othmani's estimate largely matches previous intelligence.

The French militant also described a trend that may signal a new threat: the rise of Turks and Central Asians.

"There's a big Turkish group, the Arab group [the smallest of the groups], two rather large Uzbek groups, a group of Uighurs from Turkestan [the region in China officially known as Xinjiang] . . . the largest of the groups," he said under questioning. "There are also two Kurdish groups and finally a mixed group led by an Uzbek."

Western investigators worry about the Uzbek-led Islamic Jihad Union. The IJU broke off in 2002 from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, a longtime Al Qaeda ally.

The IJU has made a name for itself as a Turkic-speaking alternative to Al Qaeda for Turks and Central Asians. The Turkic groups produce Internet propaganda in amounts that rival those of Al Qaeda, and have threatened Germany because of its military presence in Afghanistan.

"For the Turkic groups, Germany is America," said Evan Kohlmann, a terrorism expert who works with law enforcement around the world.

The IJU also directed a group of converts and Turks from Germany who were convicted of plotting to bomb U.S. military targets in Germany in 2007.

An IJU video recently obtained by Kohlmann shows Germans training in Pakistani badlands along with a muscular man with a shaved head who brandishes an automatic rifle. The video identifies him as an American.

"Law enforcement is deathly afraid of these groups," Kohlmann said.

Recent attacks in Pakistan highlight other threats to the West. The bold strikes on military and government targets were blamed on joint teams of Pakistani Taliban and Punjabi militant groups, both allies of Al Qaeda that could protect or rejuvenate the network.

"The ties between Al Qaeda and the Pakistani Taliban are closer and closer," Jean-Louis Bruguiere, a veteran French anti-terrorism magistrate, said in an interview. "Then you have the danger of other Pakistani networks like Lashkar-e-Taiba that have had complicity in the past with elements of the state. Al Qaeda might be diluted, but it could become part of a larger threat."

Two Americans with links to Lashkar were convicted this summer in Atlanta of conspiring with militants in Canada and Europe and filming prospective targets in Washington.

In contrast, the Pakistani Taliban, like its Afghani counterpart, rarely surfaces in plots against the West.

One murky case hints at the potential: the arrests last year of a group of Pakistanis in Barcelona, Spain. Then-Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mahsud allegedly sent would-be suicide bombers to Barcelona, shadowed by a Pakistani informant working for French intelligence.

The informant called in a police raid when the suspects allegedly said they were about to commit a suicide attack on the Barcelona subway. No explosives were found, however. Some French and Spanish officials said the imminence of the attack was exaggerated and the links to Mahsud, who died in an airstrike this year, were unclear.

Nonetheless, the alliance between Al Qaeda and the Pakistani Taliban raises concern, Bruguiere said.

"Such ambitions by the Pakistani Taliban cannot be excluded, because they want to join in the global jihad," Bruguiere said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-alqaeda17-2009oct17,0,3139081,print.story

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Joint U.S.-Mexican police patrols among proposed fixes for the border

Mexican and U.S. police patrolling the border together?  

That radical idea is one of the recommendations made by a blue-ribbon panel of scholars, diplomats and other experts that spent most of the year searching for “a new vision” in dealing with cross-border issues as diverse as migration, security and water.  

“It's time to do something different, even if it is provocative and controversial,” said Andres Rozental, a former deputy foreign minister of Mexico and co-chair of the so-called Binational Task Force on the United States-Mexico Border.

The task force was put together by the Los Angeles-based Pacific Council for International Policy and the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations . It presented its findings at a conference in a Mexico City hotel Tuesday night.  

Recommendations included an urgent, comprehensive reform of immigration laws in the U.S.; creation of a binational border-development administration; establishment by Mexico of a federal police force for the border; and the easing of monopolies in Mexico to spur competition and private investment.    

But the point that really got the room buzzing was a recommendation to “cross-deputize” Mexican and U.S. border police for joint operations.  

Rozental and fellow co-chair Robert C. Bonner, former Drug Enforcement Administration chief, were quick to explain that did not mean Mexican police would be enforcing U.S. laws, or vice versa. They would patrol together and share information, Bonner said -- seemingly simple tasks that both sides have traditionally resisted.  

The task force suggested that changes in both nations' capitals may have opened an opportunity. The Mexican government, it said, has “moved beyond a reflexive preoccupation with sovereignty” that thwarted cooperation on law enforcement, while a new administration in Washington has bluntly acknowledged its shared responsibility for the trafficking of drugs and weapons.  

“Both governments seem ready to replace nationalist finger-pointing with a 21st century approach to border management that benefits both sides,” the group's report concluded.  

You can read more about the task force and its report here , or in Spanish here.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/laplaza/2009/10/joint-usmexican-police-patrols-among-panels-fixes-for-the-border.html

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From the Daily News

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Swine flu hits hard — claims 11 more kids

WASHINGTON — Swine flu is causing unprecedented illness for so early in the fall — including a worrisome count of child deaths — and the government warned Friday that vaccine supplies will be even more scarce than expected through this month.

Federal health officials said 11 more children have died in the past week because of the virus.

Manufacturer delays mean 28 million to 30 million doses, at most, will be divided around the country by the end of the month, not the 40 million-plus that states had been expecting. The new count from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention means anxiously awaited flu-shot clinics in some parts of the country may have to be postponed.

It also delays efforts to blunt increasing infections. Overall, what CDC calls the 2009 H1N1 flu is causing widespread disease in 41 states, and about 6 percent of all doctor visits are for flu-like illness — levels not normally seen until much later in the fall.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says about half of the child deaths since September have been among teenagers.

And overall for the country, deaths from pneumonia and flu-like illnesses have passed what CDC considers an epidemic level.

The CDC's Dr. Anne Schuchat (SHU'-kit) says, "These are very sobering statistics."

This new strain is different from regular winter flu because it strikes the young far more than the old, and child deaths are drawing particular attention. Eighty-six children have died of swine flu in the U.S. since it burst on the scene last spring — 43 of those deaths reported in September and early October alone, said CDC's Dr. Anne Schuchat.

That's a startling number because in some past winters, the CDC has counted 40 or 50 child deaths for the entire flu season, she said, and no one knows how long this swine flu outbreak will last. Half of those early fall child deaths are among teenagers, also surprising as preschoolers are thought to be most vulnerable.

Also in contrast to regular winter flu, swine flu sometimes can cause a very severe viral pneumonia in otherwise healthy young adults, the World Health Organization warned Friday.

Typically, influenza weakens people so they're vulnerable to bacterial pneumonia, especially those over age 65. But the new H1N1 can dive deeper into the lungs, in "small subsets" of patients who go into respiratory failure within days, said WHO medical officer Dr. Nikki Shindo.

"Do not delay the treatment," she said as WHO ended a three-day meeting of 100 international flu specialists gathered in Washington.

The new swine flu strain also may have hit some pigs at the Minnesota State Fair in late August, animals possibly infected by some sick 4-H students. If the infection is confirmed, it wouldn't be a surprise: A sick farm worker first infected pigs in Canada last spring, and herds have been hit in Australia and Argentina, too. The virus doesn't spread to humans who eat pork.

Fortunately, most people recover from the new strain with simple at-home care, just as with the regular flu. While there aren't precise counts, states have reported more than 2,000 deaths from pneumonia or flu-like illnesses to the CDC since Aug. 30. And Schuchat said other tracking systems show those deaths have reached the level that each year is used to declare an influenza epidemic, months early.

As of Wednesday, states had ordered 8 million of the 11.4 million doses of swine flu vaccine the government has ready to ship. Just over half of the vaccine now available is in shot form and the rest as a nasal spray. First in line for scarce H1N1 vaccine are supposed to be pregnant women, anyone age 6 months to 24 years, health care workers and people under 65 with flu-risky conditions.

CDC's Schuchat urged patience, saying eventually enough vaccine will be here for everyone who wants it: "I know this is frustrating for people."

Regular winter flu kills 36,000 Americans a year, and around the country some clinics aren't getting shipments of seasonal vaccine as quickly as expected either, as manufacturers juggle the extra work. About 82 million doses of seasonal vaccine have been shipped, and 114 million eventually will arrive, enough for typical demand, Schuchat said.

Also Friday, judges in New York granted temporary restraining orders blocking mandatory flu vaccinations for health care workers who argued they should have a choice. In addition to New York, many hospitals nationwide have mandated shots for their employees this year so they don't infect patients or have to miss work.

Even though swine flu is all that's circulating here now, the regular winter flu that targets older adults has hit other countries along with the new H1N1. South Africa packed in two distinct flu seasons in one winter. WHO's Dr. Vivek Shinde said the extremely early swine flu start in the Northern Hemisphere increases the chance that those countries, too, will get a double-whammy, making it important not to skip the seasonal shot.

"There is a lot of winter left between now and April," he told the WHO meeting.

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Two presidents push public service

Jon Ward

COLLEGE STATION, Texas | A day after telling supporters in San Francisco that he was cleaning up a mess left for him by former President George W. Bush, President Obama came to his predecessor's adopted home state Friday to honor his father, former President George H.W. Bush, for his public service.

Mr. Obama arrived deep in enemy political territory to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Mr. Bush's inaugural address and call to action that led to the creation of the Points of Light Institute, the nation's largest volunteer-management and civic organization.

The president lauded the 41st commander-in-chief, who is now 85 years old, for being a leader "who promoted the ethic of service long before it was fashionable," and for choosing a life of service over "a life of comfort and privilege."

And Mr. Obama urged the young people in the crowd of more than 2,000 inside Texas A&M's Rudder Auditorium to press forward in serving others even if it does not seem to make a difference. The president, who was born more than a decade after Mr. Bush fought as a Navy pilot in World War II, cited Mr. Bush's wartime sacrifices to hammer home the point.

"If President Bush could fly 58 combat missions when he was younger than many of you here today, and keep on fighting even after he was shot down and nearly captured by the enemy, then surely you can keep going when your service project gets a little tough," Mr. Obama said at the campus that's home to Mr. Bush's presidential library.

Mr. Obama said his own work in promoting volunteerism was building on the efforts of the first President Bush, as well as former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

That was his only remark about the second President Bush, who Mr. Obama used as a punching bag in his run for the White House. One day earlier, Mr. Obama slammed the second Bush administration in New Orleans for its response to Hurricane Katrina and then flew to San Francisco for a fundraiser, where he said part of the reason his first year in office has been so challenging is that he is "cleaning up somebody else's mess."

The remark did not go unnoticed by members of the former Bush administration, who have watched Mr. Obama routinely blame the ongoing economic crisis and other problems on the man he followed into the White House. Some of them have spoken out publicly, though Mr. Bush and his father have remained silent.

"It's his standard line, so I guess nothing surprises me sometimes," said Dana Perino, who served as press secretary for the Bush White House from 2007 t hrough the end of his term.

But the 41st president is notoriously protective of his son's legacy and has often bristled in the past at harsh criticisms.

In an interview with CBS Radio prior to the event, Mr. Bush said that during his son's time in office critics "just hammered him mercilessly and I think obscenely a lot of the time."

He singled out MSNBC personalities Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow for their criticism of the second President Bush, calling them "sick puppies."

"The way they treat my son and anyone who's opposed to their point of view is just horrible," the elder Bush said.

But he also said that the intense political sniping has "moved to a new president" with attacks that "sometimes cross the lines of civility."

"People ought to be civil," he said. "I worry about yelling at people and this yelling mentality that seems to accompany presidents."

During his appearance with Mr. Obama, the senior Mr. Bush had nothing but positive words for Mr. Obama, though his introductory remarks prior to Mr. Obama's 20-minute speech were brief.

"I salute the president for his leadership on this issue," said Mr. Bush.

The first President Bush recalled that when he first met Mr. Obama in 2005 during a visit to refugees of Hurricane Katrina, he was impressed that the then-senator from Illinois did not chase TV cameras but was instead genuinely interested in the plight of the storm survivors.

The elder Mr. Bush, who underwent hip replacement surgery two years ago, walked with a cane and took slow, small steps when he appeared on stage. But he spoke with a clear, direct voice and showed no signs of deteriorating health, which had been rumored when he did not attend Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's funeral in August.

Ron Kaufman, who was a key adviser to the elder Mr. Bush during his years as president and vice president to Ronald Reagan, said there was no political subtext to Mr. Bush's decision more than six months ago to invite Mr. Obama to appear with him at Friday's event.

"It is what it is," said Mr. Kaufman, who is now an influential Washington lobbyist and top strategist and fundraiser for the man who may challenge Mr. Obama in 2012, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. "The greatest club in the world is former presidents. They all have mutual respect for one another."

Mr. Kaufman also said that the elder Mr. Bush and Mr. Clinton have become good friends even though their political warfare during the 1992 presidential campaign "was a lot harsher in some respects than some of the bashing of Bush folks by Obama folks."

Nonetheless, one note circulating among Republicans Friday was the fact that the deficit this year - $1.4 trillion - is greater than the combined deficit of the last four years of the Bush administration.

Mr. Obama said service was an issue that transcended political differences, and argued that it is vital to the country's "national priorities," including a return to economic health, a cleaner environment, and national security.

The president also told the overwhelmingly conservative audience that volunteerism is important because the government can only do so much.

"The need for action always exceeds the limits of government," he said. "There's a lot that government can't and shouldn't do, and that's where active and engaged citizens come in."

Outside the speech were about 100 protesters who, despite the president's rhetoric, believe he intends to create a government-run health care system and raise taxes, among other things.

One protester held a giant yellow flag with the Revolutionary era slogan "Don't Tread on Me," and another person held a sign that said, "You lie," echoing the words of Rep. Joe Wilson, South Carolina Republican, during the president's recent speech to Congress.

The first president Bush, who sat onstage as Mr. Obama spoke, was also joined on the dais by Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, who served as CIA director under the elder Mr. Bush and was Texas A&M's president from 2002 to 2007.

The event represented a coming together of two leaders from different parties, different generations, and radically different backgrounds.

This point was no more obvious than when Mr. Obama's domestic policy adviser, Melody Barnes, took part in a panel before the president's speech.

"I understand there is a tradition, a sign of friendship and respect," said Miss Barnes, an East Coast lawyer with a long record of work in civil rights issues.

"So the first thing I'm supposed to do, substantively, is say 'howdy.' "

The crowd roared back, "Howdy!"

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/17/two-presidents-push-public-service//print/

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Saturday, October 17, 2009

Law agencies make new pact on illegal deportation

Audrey Hudson

Department of Homeland Security officials have signed new agreements authorizing nearly 70 state and local law enforcement agencies, including a contentious Arizona sheriff, to help arrest and deport illegal immigrants charged with violent or criminal acts.

Under the new agreements, Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz., who has come under fire for his immigration sweeps, will continue to work with federal authorities when illegal immigrants are booked into his jail. But Sheriff Arpaio's office will not be given the power to arrest such people, as it previously had, federal officials said.

As the new agreements were announced, Sheriff Arpaio launched a crime and immigration sweep Friday in northwestern metro Phoenix, according to the Associated Press.

The sheriff told the AP that he can still arrest immigrants under a state smuggling law and a federal law that gives all local police agencies more limited power to detain suspected illegal immigrants.

"It doesn't bother me, because we are going to do the same thing," Sheriff Arpaio said. "I am the elected sheriff. I don't take orders from the federal government."

As the deadline passed Friday for agencies to participate in the so-called 287(g) program, 55 agreements had been signed, and more than a dozen others were awaiting approval or were still in negotiations, including participation by 11 new departments.

At least six departments have withdrawn from the program, citing reasons including budgetary constraints, said John Morton, assistant secretary for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Critics complained that, under the old agreement, immigrants were arrested on misdemeanor charges that were never prosecuted. Instead, they were deported. The program was suspended by the Obama administration.

The new agreement allows for "greater accountability and transparency," including regular audits and closer federal inspection, said Mr. Morton.

No agencies in the District or Maryland are participating. But in Virginia, the Prince William County Sheriff's Office and Police Department, and Prince William-Manassas Adult Detention Center have renewed their agreements. So have the Manassas Police Department, Manassas Park Police Department, Rockingham County Sheriff's Office and Shenandoah County Sheriff's Office.

The program, which began in 1996, expedites the deportation of criminal aliens by identifying those already in jail to be deported after time served, and by training and enlisting local police officers to arrest those who pose a threat to local communities.

The new agreements are intended to curb reported abuses in the program: Illegal immigrants purportedly were arrested for minor offenses, and there were allegations of profiling.

Sheriff Arpaio's office will continue to conduct raids as part of a "crime suppression operation," said Deputy Doug Matteson.

"The sheriff has vowed to continue his enforcement of all aspects of immigration laws and says that the federal government's move to strip deputies of their ICE status will not change anything," Deputy Matteson said.

Sheriff Arpaio still has the authority to arrest illegal immigrants under state laws, Mr. Morton said. No details were released about Friday's' crackdown.

Asked whether ICE will take custody of any illegal immigrants possibly arrested Friday by the sheriff's office, Mr. Morton said, "We are going to respond to Maricopa County the way we would respond to any law enforcement agency in Arizona."

He added, however, that Sheriff Arpaio's raids were "not consistent" with the agency's priorities, which is to target violent criminals who are in the country illegally.

"If they give us a call, we will come and respond on the merits of it, case by case," Mr. Morton said.

Frank Sharry, executive director of the immigration reform group Americas Voice, said the sheriff has used outrageous tactics to terrorize Hispanic neighborhoods, and that has resulted in 3,500 lawsuits and a Justice Department civil rights investigation.

"Arpaio should be stopped, not re-signed," Mr. Sharry said.

Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, a pro-immigrant advocacy group, criticized the program as "misguided and ineffective."

"Succumbing to the siren call of an enforcement-only approach will not solve the immigration problem once and for all," Mr. Noorani said.

However, the Center for Immigration Studies is set to release a report on the 287(g) program, which it says has reduced immigration-related public safety problems and assists the federal government in removing illegal immigrants.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/17/law-agencies-make-new-pact-on-illegals-sheriff-sti//print/

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Saturday, October 17, 2009

Court rules to free violent N.C. inmates

Mike Baker ASSOCIATED PRESS

RALEIGH, N.C. | The violent North Carolina criminals to be freed later this month because of a court ruling and good conduct credits have racked up more than 250 infractions in prison for offenses such as fighting, weapon possession and theft.

Department of Correction records reviewed Friday by the Associated Press show the violations go as far back as the 1970s but also appear as recently as 2008, raising questions about whether the prisoners are reformed. Each one of the 20 inmates has at least two infractions, and combined they have a total of 256.

They have repeatedly been denied parole.

The inmates are scheduled to be released Oct. 29 because state courts have sided with one of the inmates, double murderer Bobby Bowden, that a 1970s law defined a life sentence as only 80 years. The state's Fair Sentencing Act in 1981 included a retroactive provision essentially cutting all those sentences in half, and good behavior and other credits have shortened the sentences to the point that they are now complete.

Bowden had argued before the Court of Appeals in 2008 that he had accumulated 210 days of good conduct credit, 753 days of meritorious credit, and 1,537 days of gain-time credit. But the 60-year-old has also racked up 17 infractions in prison, including two for weapons possession, one for damaging property and several for disobeying orders.

Others have equally long rap sheets: William Baggett, a 60-year-old convicted of a 1976 murder in Sampson County, got a fighting infraction last year - his fifth fighting offense while behind bars. Kenneth Mathis, a 55-year-old felon who went to prison in 1976 after forcing a woman into the woods and raping her, has had three sex infractions in prison. He was accused in 2005 of assaulting an inmate with the intent to commit a sexual act.

State officials believe dozens more inmates convicted three decades ago could soon be eligible for release because of credits and the 80-year law that was in place for several years in the 1970s.

Jim Woodall, the district attorney in Orange County and president of the North Carolina Conference of District Attorneys, said many in the courts system believe that criminals become less active as they grow older. But he warned that nobody can be sure whether these inmates are ready to lead normal lives.

"A person who has been in prison for a violent crime, and has gotten infractions throughout their time incarcerated, that's the best predictor for their future activity," he said.

North Carolina inmates sentenced before structured sentencing came into effect in 1994 can rapidly knock time off their prison terms. Good conduct credit automatically reduces sentences by one day for every day inmates serve with good behavior and without an infraction. Gain-time credit goes to inmates who participate in work or program activities. Prisoners can also get meritorious credit for working under special conditions, such as overtime.

Infractions can remove some of those credits.

Mr. Woodall said a person sent to prison for 10 years before structured sentencing frequently completed their term in just a couple of years. The new laws lead to shorter sentences in the courtroom but less opportunity for inmates to accrue credits, something he supports.

Seven of the inmates set for release were once on death row. All but one of them have been convicted of murder or rape, including several who targeted young girls.

"Any of these convicts could be a danger to any man, woman and child in North Carolina," said Thomas Bennett, executive director of the North Carolina Victim Assistance Network. "We have no assurance that these people have learned anything and changed."

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/17/court-rules-to-free-violent-inmates//print/

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From the Wall Street Journal

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• OCTOBER 17, 2009

  Presumption of Guilt

  In Mexico's dysfunctional legal system, an arrest most often leads to a conviction. How one street vendor, wrongly convicted of murder, won his freedom. 

  By  DAVID LUHNOW

  Mexico City

  Antonio Zuñiga's life changed when he went for a walk on Dec. 12, 2005. As he crossed a busy Mexico City avenue, two burly cops grabbed him from behind and shoved him into a patrol car.

  So began a nightmarish journey into Mexico's legal system that seems lifted from the pages of Franz Kafka. For nearly two days, the street vendor was held incommunicado and not told why he was arrested. His questions met with hostile stares from detectives, who would say "You know what you did." He says in an interview that he only learned of the charges after walking into a holding cell and being asked by a prisoner: "Are you the guy accused of murder?"

  Mr. Zuñiga, then 26, was charged in the shooting death of a gang member from his neighborhood. Ballistic tests showed Mr. Zuñiga hadn't fired a gun. Dozens of witnesses saw him working at his market stall during the time of the murder, which took place several miles away. And he had never met the victim. Still, he was found guilty by a judge at trial and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

  Mr. Zuñiga's case is not unusual in Mexico. Crooked cops regularly solve cases by grabbing the first person they find, often along with a cooked-up story from someone claiming to be an eyewitness. Prosecutors and judges play along, eager to calm a growing public outcry over high crime rates and rising violence from Mexico's war on illicit drug gangs. In practice, suspects are often presumed guilty. More than 85% of those charged with a crime are sentenced, according to Mexico's top think tank, the Center for Investigation and Development, or CIDE.

  Presumed Guilty

  Australian documentary filmmaker Geoffrey Smith won international acclaim for 2007's "The English Surgeon," a documentary about a London neurosurgeon who performs brain surgeries in the Ukraine.

  Earlier this year, Mr. Smith found himself in Mexico, where he was asked by a friend to take a look at the first cut of "Presumed Guilty," a documentary about Mexico's legal system. Mr. Smith was so moved by what he saw that he agreed to help the film's makers – lawyers Roberto Hernandez and Layda Negrete – re-edit the film. "Presumed Guilty" premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in September.

  The Wall Street Journal : What drew you to this film?

  Geoffrey Smith : I very much like law and order subjects, for two reasons really. You can tell a great deal about that society by looking at how it treats it's poor and vulnerable in its justice system. Churchill said that. The second would be that today, of course, we have cameras. If you can capture, as it unfolds, the drama of a courtroom, it's completely different than someone telling you what happens after the fact, or trying to re-create the events. This is footage of a real trial, a real unfolding drama.

  These things together make the strongest film possible. You have a great mandate to talk to a whole country about its justice system. In Mexico, this topic is very much a sore point, and it is a part of everyone's sensibility here. It's a burning issue in their lives.

  WSJ : How can a film like this change things in Mexico?

  Mr. Smith : This is a David and Goliath story of two people who took on a system. It's beautiful and so heartfelt and gives so many people inspiration that change is possible. At the screenings, you can see the righteous indignation. People are angry, but they also want to channel that anger and do something about it. I call it the positive use of anger.

  And it's not just Mexico that needs changing in its justice system. This is something that can happen to any of us. At the screening in Toronto, we had two men who were wrongly accused and spent, between them, 54 years in Canadian prisons for crimes they did not commit. It was powerful for the audience to see that this, too, happens in their own country." -- David Luhnow

  Mr. Zuñiga's story has a twist. His plight attracted the attention of Roberto Hernández and Layda Negrete, a married pair of lawyers who are also graduate students at the University of California at Berkeley. The couple took on his case, won a retrial, and in a stroke of luck, convinced a Mexican official to let them film the ensuing trial, which lasted for more than a year.

  The result is a 90-minute documentary called "Presumed Guilty" that offers a rare—and chilling—glimpse of Mexico's dysfunctional legal system. The film was an official selection at the prestigious Toronto Film Festival, and won top documentary honors at Mexico's Morelia Film Festival. Festival organizers decided to screen it in the city's central plaza, where 2,000 people turned up to watch. At a screening in Mexico City on Thursday night, the audience gave a standing ovation. Many were in tears.

  Unlike the U.S., Mexico's legal system has no jury trials. In the majority of cases, there are also no oral arguments, meaning lawyers don't stand in front of a judge to plead their client's case. Judges usually never meet the accused. Everything is done via paperwork. Judges are subject to a Napoleonic code of justice, meaning laws are strictly codified, leaving them little room for judgment.

  Most Mexicans have no idea what happens in a courtroom. Only specific parts of a trial are open to family members and others. The rest, including evidence for or against the accused, is sealed to the public until the case is closed.

  The film offers viewers a front row seat to an ordinary case. The result is not pretty. When asked by one of Mr. Zuñiga's defense lawyers what evidence he has against Mr. Zuñiga, the detective in charge of the case says: "He's here (in prison), right? He must have done something." Asked by the lawyer why she was prosecuting an innocent man, the prosecutor says with a weak smile: "It's my job."

  Mr. Zuñiga lost the retrial. The footage of the proceedings from the documentary, however, was so shocking that a panel of judges on an appeals court freed Mr. Zuñiga. The prosecutor did not respond to requests for comment.

  The street in Mexico City where Mr. Zuñiga was arrested, left.

  Both Mexico City's police department and the Supreme Court said they could not comment on Mr. Zuñiga's case or judicial matters in general.

  For Mr. Hernández and Ms. Negrete, this is the second time they have led to the release of an innocent man. In 2005, they filmed a 14-minute video about the legal system that featured a young man wrongly accused of stealing a car. He was released soon after.

  "It's an expensive way to fix injustice in Mexico," says Mr. Hernández, 34. The pair hope to pass a law allowing every criminal trial to be filmed. They have a Facebook page called Lawyers With Cameras.

  Someone committing a crime in Mexico has only a two in 100 chance of getting caught and punished, according to Guillermo Zepeda, a CIDE scholar. A big reason is that just 12% of crimes are reported to the police, Mr. Zepeda says. In a big deterrent, police ask many people who report crimes for money to solve the case or become suspects themselves, Mr. Zepeda says.

  According to a survey of 400 criminal cases in Mexico City carried out by National Center for State Courts, a U.S. nonprofit, in nine of 10 cases, suspects were found guilty without any scientific evidence like fingerprints or DNA. In more than six of every 10 cases, suspects were arrested within three hours of the crime, leaving little time for serious detective work, according to a study from CIDE, a top Mexican graduate school. Almost none were shown an arrest warrant, the study said.

  Mexican cops lack access to basic forensic equipment, and Mexico lacks a comprehensive national fingerprint database. Most police officers are judged on the number of arrests they make, not whether they arrest the right person. The same goes for prosecutors. "You want a good career? Accuse, Accuse, Accuse," one Mexico City prosecutor said.

  Simply being accused is bad news. Because Mexico doesn't allow bail for serious crimes, an estimated 42% of Mexico's inmates languish in jail without having faced trial—some 90,000 people, according to a study by the Open Society Institute, the New York based non-profit funded by financier George Soros.

  The medieval legal system is a major handicap for the country as it tries to modernize and bring to heel powerful drug gangs that have declared war on each other and the government. An estimated 13,500 people have died in the carnage since President Felipe Calderón took power in December 2006. Mr. Calderón has won praise for deploying 45,000 army troops to press the war against the cartels. But analysts say the offensive will stall without meaningful reform to police forces and the court system.

  Public Security Minister Genaro García, Mexico's top cop, is embarking on the first, with a goal of replacing virtually every cop in the next 15 years with college-educated policemen. Last year, Congress amended the Constitution to incorporate the presumption of innocence into modern Mexican law, as well as allow oral trials in most cases. The problem: Mexican states have until 2016 to implement the changes.

  As part of that reform, the Calderón government won a change allowing police to detain suspects without an official warrant for up to 40 days, from just two days previously. The government argues it needs to do this for the drug war. Having won that concession, however, advocates say the Calderón government is now dragging its feet in implementing the judicial reforms that might make cops and judges more accountable.

  "Right now, the government is going for security instead of justice. But security and justice are linked," says Ernesto Canales, a prominent commercial attorney, Mexico's leading crusader for judicial reform and the man who sponsored "Presumed Guilty" together with the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and other donors. If ordinary Mexicans can grow to trust police and the courts, they are much more likely to work with authorities to catch drug gang members, he says. And until Mexican cops learn how to investigate, they'll never be able to penetrate drug cartels and dismantle them.

  Mr. Calderón's office did not respond to requests for comment.

  In Mr. Zuñiga's case, he was accused of murder based on the testimony of a single person and nothing else. That person, it turned out, was the cousin of the gang member who had been killed and was arrested as a suspect shortly after the shooting.

  The suspect, Victor Daniel Reyes, initially told police in two separate interviews that his cousin was shot by three other gang members, nicknamed Luis, Ojitos (Little Eyes), and Crucitos (Little Cross). He said Luis, the gang leader, fired the gun. He never mentioned Mr. Zuñiga, according to court testimony.

  The day after the murder, police took Mr. Reyes to the neighborhood to find the three gang members. After hours of searching, Mr. Reyes pointed to Mr. Zuñiga crossing the street. "He did it," said Mr. Reyes, according to court documents.

  Only in his third interview with police, after Mr. Zuñiga was arrested, did Mr. Reyes mention Mr. Zuñiga by name as the assassin. The three gang members originally described as the murderers were never arrested by police, or questioned. The police released Mr. Reyes after he named Mr. Zuñiga. Mr. Reyes couldn't be located to comment.

  "When they first grabbed me on the street, my first thought was 'I'm being kidnapped,'" Mr.Zuniga said during an interview at a Mexico City restaurant. "I didn't even know they were cops until I heard voices on their scanner."

  It was during his first police interrogation that Mr. Zuñiga says he missed his opportunity to get out of his predicament. After he repeatedly insisted he was innocent, one of the police sidled up to him and suggested he could make the whole thing go away by offering them money, and lots of it. But Mr. Zuñiga said no, in part out of principle and in part because he didn't have much money. "You just blew it," the cop said, according to Mr. Zuñiga.

  In the three months it took for Mr. Zuñiga's case to come to trial, he was sent to Mexico City's rough Reclusorio Oriente prison. He shared a small cell with 20 inmates. He slept on the floor, under a cabinet. Cockroaches climbed over his face at night.

  His girlfriend, Eva Gutierrez, threw a party to raise money so that Mr. Zuñiga, who goes by his nickname Toño and left school in the 8th grade, could buy food in prison—something most inmates have to buy. A local man hired to help with the party turned out to be Marco Antonio Arias, the man who won his freedom thanks to Mr. Hernandez's first documentary. When Mr. Arias found out what the party was for and heard Mr. Zuñiga's story from Ms. Gutierrez, he put her in touch with Mr. Hernández and Ms. Negrete.

  The couple didn't think they could free Mr. Zuñiga, but hoped to publicize the case by making a video. "The first thing they told me when we spoke on the phone was 'you're screwed,'" says Mr. Zuñiga.

  Upon reviewing his case, the couple realized that his lawyer at the trial was not even a lawyer; he had forged his legal identification. That was enough to ask for a retrial. In Mexico, retrials go to the same judge as the initial ones.

  The documentary footage follows what happens next. The judge, Hector Palomares dons his robe this time around and sits behind a makeshift desk. Mr. Zuñiga says Mr. Palomares never emerged from his office at his first trial. Mr. Palomares declined to comment for this article.

  At one point, the witness, Mr. Reyes, is asked by one of Mr. Zuñiga's defense lawyers to describe the three gang members whom he'd originally accused. He describes each one. Asked to describe Mr. Zuñiga, the man he later accused, he can't.

  The detectives who arrested the street vendor and handled his case testified, but claimed they didn't remember anything. "We have a lot of cases," says Jose Manuel Ortega, the lead detective, shrugging his shoulders. "I can't remember all of them." Mr. Ortega declined to comment.

  At the height of the retrial, Mr. Zuñiga confronts his accuser face-to-face. As the pair talk in stilted tones and pause so a stenographer can transcribe each word, the drama builds. Finally, Mr. Reyes admits he never saw who killed his cousin.

  But Judge Palomares upheld his initial guilty sentence.

  "It was like a kick in the stomach," said Mr. Zuñiga in the interview. "It was my life they were throwing away." He had been in jail for nearly three years at that point.

  Mr. Hernández and Ms. Negrete took the case to the appeals court. They showed the footage of the trial. After seeing the footage an appeals court judge pushed hard to get him released. Mr. Zuñiga was freed on April 3 of last year. Other inmates were so amazed that they kept asking him to see his release paper, to touch it.

  He is not entirely free from his ordeal. A few months ago, he got a text message on his cellphone: "Don't worry. We'll soon get you back in here where you belong." He says he didn't want to the number back, out of fear. He says he has gone into hiding, to protect Ms. Gutierrez, who is now his wife, and their baby girl.

  Judge Palomares is still on the bench in a Mexico City court. Detective Ortega is still an active duty cop.

  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704322004574475492261338318.html#printMode
  
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• OCTOBER 16, 2009

  Five Convicted For Australia Terror Plot

  Associated Press

  SYDNEY -- Five men were convicted Friday of plotting a terrorist attack by stockpiling bomb-making instructions and purchasing explosive chemicals in Australia's largest terrorist conspiracy.

  The Muslim men, ages 25 to 44, were convicted of plotting Australia's largest terrorist conspiracy in a bid to force the government to change its policy on Middle East conflicts. Video courtesy of Reuters.

  A jury deliberated for a month before finding the men guilty of conspiring to commit acts in preparation for a terrorist attack. Each face a maximum sentence of life in prison.

  During the trial, which began in November 2008, prosecutor Richard Maidment told the jury in New South Wales state Supreme Court that the men planned to use explosive devices or firearms to commit "extreme violence" in a bid to force Australia's government to change its policy on Middle East conflicts.

  Justice Anthony Whealy restricted the media from publishing the men's names on the Internet.

  The men were arrested in a series of raids on their homes in 2005. Maidment said during the trial that the raids turned up bomb-making instructions and militant Islamist material

  including footage of planes flying into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, and images of beheadings. The prosecutor also said the men purchased explosive chemicals and guns between July 2004 and November 2005.

  The jury was also told one man participated in a terrorist-run paramilitary training camp in Pakistan, and three others attended similar camps in New South Wales to prepare for an attack.

  Whealy had instructed the jury to put aside any prejudices when coming to its verdict, and to remember the Muslim faith was not on trial.

  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125565775251089243.html#printMode
  
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• OCTOBER 16, 2009, 5:43 P.M. ET

  Sheriff Continues Tough Tactics Against Illegal Immigrants

  By MIRIAM JORDAN

  In defiance of efforts by the U.S. government to rein in his tactics against illegal immigrants, Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz., on Friday launched a major crime-suppression operation in the suburbs of Phoenix.

  The operation took place on the same day that the Department of Homeland Security announced that it had signed revised agreements that enable 55 state and local law-enforcement agencies to arrest illegal immigrants who commit serious crimes. The revised agreements are meant to assert greater oversight over a federal immigration program that enlists and trains local police to identify suspected illegal-immigrant criminals in jails and on the streets.

  The program, known as 287g, was designed to target drug dealers, gang members and human smugglers. But it has been criticized for promoting racial profiling and serving as an excuse for local law-enforcement to hunt down illegal immigrants.

  More

  • Arizona Sheriff's Powers Cut
    10/07/09

  Mr. Arpaio's deputies will no longer have the authority to check the immigration status of people in the streets during their course of duty. From now on, their participation will be limited to checking the status of people booked into a jail, according to DHS.

  "We ultimately determined his sweeps were not consistent with the priorities of the revised program," said John Morton, the head of Immigration & Customs Enforcement, a unit of the DHS, when asked about the restrictions on Mr. Arpaio.

  But the man who calls himself "America's toughest sheriff," announced later Friday that his deputies would continue to round up illegal immigrants in the streets. About 200 deputies and posses fanned out across northwestern Maricopa County, in the vicinity of Phoenix, according to a spokesman for the sheriff.

  "We arrest anyone who breaks the laws in the streets, including enforcing illegal immigration," Mr. Arpaio said. That includes "going out and making traffic stops" to find people in the country illegally. "It's the same thing we have always done."

  Mr. Arpaio has said he can persevere with the backing of a state law targeted at human smugglers. According to the law, illegal immigrants can be arrested for smuggling themselves into the state.

  Asked about Mr. Arpaio's defiant stance, Mr. Morton said that the 287g program "very clearly lays out the priorities for the program and the intention to focus on serious criminal offenders."

  An estimated 11.5 million immigrants, mainly from Latin America, live in the U.S. illegally. The 287g program has been hailed by politicians and groups who favor tough measures, particularly deportation, to rid the country of illegal immigrants.

  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125572635599690761.html#printMode

Teens Leading the Way in Campaign to End Distracted Driving

Our campaign to make driving safer has found great support from a welcome corner: America's teens.

This weekend, Teen Kids News , a television program with teen reporters, will feature a segment by teens for teens on the dangers of distracted driving. I'm impressed with their commitment to solving this problem. TKN airs across the country in many of the nation's markets: you can find a channel near you and its air-time here .

Right now, on the Teen Kids News website, they're featuring a video report called "Driving Safety for Kids" that shows the risk and prevalence of distracted driving. The report would be good enough, but the fact that they've got it featured at the top of their home page is even better.

Folks, while we wait for employers around the country to follow President Obama's lead with policies to reduce employee distracted driving, the kids are taking it to the airwaves.

On hotnewz.tv , another news outlet with young reporters speaking to a young audience, they're showing a great video segment telling youth about the Drive To Life PSA challenge , which I've already written about in this blog.

These efforts by our young people really give me hope. We know that teens are less-experienced drivers, and we know that they are inclined by habit to use the technologies that distract drivers.

And now we know that they are becoming true partners in our efforts to stop this deadly practice.


Ray LaHood is Secretary of Transportation

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/Teens-Leading-the-Way-in-Campaign-to-End-Distracted-Driving/

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October 16, 2009

ICE ANNOUNCES STANDARDIZED 287(g) AGREEMENTS WITH 67 STATE AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT PARTNERS

WASHINGTON-Assistant Secretary for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) John Morton today announced standardized Memorandums of Agreement (MOAs) with 67 state and local law enforcement agencies to participate in 287(g) partnerships-improving public safety by prioritizing criminal aliens who are a threat to local communities, ensuring consistent and uniform policies and providing a force multiplier for ICE's immigration enforcement efforts across the country.

"Coordinating with our state and local partners is important to smart and effective enforcement of our immigration laws," said Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. "These new agreements promote public safety by prioritizing the identification and removal of dangerous criminal aliens and ensure consistency and stronger federal oversight of state and local immigration law enforcement efforts across the nation. The rules set forth in these agreements will enhance our efforts to work together effectively with our local partners."

"These new partnerships are an essential tool for law enforcement to identify and remove dangerous criminal aliens from local communities," said Assistant Secretary Morton. "Standardizing these agreements allows us to better use the resources and capabilities of our law enforcement partners, facilitates accountability and ensures that all participating jurisdictions are following uniform standards throughout the country."

The state and local law enforcement partnerships announced today conform to the standardized 287(g) MOA announced by Secretary Janet Napolitano and Assistant Secretary Morton in July-strengthening ICE's overall immigration enforcement strategy by aligning local operations with ICE's major priorities, specifically the identification and removal of criminal aliens.

The 287(g) program acts as a force multiplier, training officers from local jurisdictions to carry out smart, effective immigration enforcement efforts aligned with ICE priorities. Throughout the country, 1,075 local officers have been trained through 287(g)-bolstering national immigration enforcement efforts and saving hundreds of millions of dollars.

From January 2009 to date, 287(g)-trained local officers are credited with the removal of approximately 24,000 aliens nationwide and have identified 48 percent more criminal aliens than during the same period in 2008.

The new partnerships include the Jail Model, in which local law enforcement agencies designate Jail Enforcement Officers to identify aliens already incarcerated within their detention facilities who are eligible for removal, as well as the Federal Task Force Model, in which agencies designate officers to work with Federal agents in locating, processing and removing criminal aliens from the United States.

• 55 agreements have been signed by ICE and the partnering agency;
• 12 agreements have been reached and await approval by the local jurisdiction's supervisory authority; and
• Six agreements have negotiations underway.
• Six jurisdictions did not re-sign the new 287(g) agreement or withdrew during negotiations for a variety of reasons, including implementation of the Secure Communities program, budgetary constraints and limited program utilization.

The new MOA clearly defines the objectives of the 287(g) program, outlines the immigration enforcement authorities granted by the agreement and provides guidelines for ICE's supervision of local agency officer operations-including information reporting and tracking, complaint procedures, and implementation measures.

To address concerns that individuals may be arrested for minor offenses as a guise to initiate removal proceedings, the new agreement requires participating local law enforcement agencies to pursue all criminal charges that originally caused the offender to be taken into custody.

The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996 added Section 287(g) to the Immigration and Nationality Act, which authorizes the DHS Secretary to enter into agreements with state and local law enforcement agencies to perform immigration officer functions. Pursuant to these agreements, designated officers who receive appropriate training and function under the supervision of sworn ICE officers are permitted to perform immigration law enforcement duties.

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/0910/091016washingtondc.htm

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October 16, 2009

LA-area attorney, 2 business associates charged with work visa fraud

Feds seek to seize 30 vacant cemetery plots allegedly bought using proceeds from scheme

LOS ANGELES - A local immigration attorney and two of his business associates were arrested Thursday on federal criminal charges for allegedly orchestrating a decade-long employment visa fraud scheme, and using the profits to purchase several hundred thousand dollars worth of vacant cemetery plots.

Kelly Einstein Darwin Giles, 46, the owner of a West Covina, Calif., law practice formerly known as the East West Law Group, was taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. He was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport as he returned from an out-of-town trip. His two business associates, Joseph Wai-man Wu, 50, and Wu's wife, May Yin-man Wu, 43, were arrested Oct. 15.

The defendants are accused of setting up nearly a dozen shell companies to file fraudulent employment visa petitions on behalf of their clients. Many of the petitions were for H-1B visas, which are reserved for foreign workers with specialized skills, such as accountants and information technology professionals. Authorities say the aliens named in those visa applications never worked for the defendants or the fictitious companies.

ICE agents executed a search warrant at Giles' law office Oct. 15 and seized immigration applications and documents, financial records and computer equipment. At this time, the three defendants are charged in a criminal complaint with visa fraud. The Wus made their initial appearance in federal court Thursday afternoon where a U.S. Magistrate Judge set bond for each at $250,000. Giles is due in court Oct. 16.

"Attorneys are sworn to uphold the law, and those who instead manipulate the system through fraud deserve criminal prosecution," said Acting U.S. Attorney George S. Cardona. "United States immigration laws are intended to provide benefits to individuals who meet specified criteria - not immigration attorneys and opportunists who manipulate the system for personal financial gain."

During Thursday's enforcement actions, ICE agents served notice on a local mortuary seeking to seize 30 vacant burial plots and 20 blank grave monuments. Authorities allege the grave sites, located in Inspiration Meadow and the Garden of Gratitude at Rose Hills Memorial Park in Whittier, Calif., were bought by the defendants using proceeds from the visa fraud scheme. ICE investigators emphasize Rose Hills had no involvement in the criminal activity.

According to funeral professionals, cemetery plots appreciate at a rate of up to 10 percent per year and are less susceptible to economic downturns than other types of real estate. It is believed the seizure action is the first in the Central District of California involving grave sites. If the plots are ultimately forfeited to the government, they would be sold at public auction.

"Cemetery plots are certainly a novel way to attempt to launder the proceeds from criminal activity, but as this case shows, we will follow the money trail wherever it leads," said Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for ICE John Morton. "ICE's message is simple - America's legal immigration system is not for sale, and we will investigate and prosecute those who compromise the integrity of our system simply to enrich themselves."

The arrests and searches are the culmination of a 2½-year ICE-led investigation that also involved the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of the Inspector General and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' (USCIS) Fraud Detection and National Security Unit. USCIS' Fraud Detection Unit developed the original lead on the case.

"This case is a perfect example of the effective collaboration between ICE and USCIS to combat fraud and protect the integrity of our immigration system," said Jane Arellano, district director for USCIS in Los Angeles.

During the course of the investigation, the affidavit alleges the defendants told several of their alien clients to lie if questioned by authorities about the visa scheme. One of those clients agreed to secretly record two of his meetings with Giles and Joseph Wu. The affidavit contains excerpts from those recorded conversations in which Giles tells the cooperating witness not to be concerned about lying to investigators saying "they will make threats in hopes that someone will…crack," but they are "bluffing."

According to the nearly 200-page case affidavit, the defendants charged from $6,000 to $50,000 to file fraudulent employment visa petitions on behalf of alien clients. So far, investigators have identified about 100 aliens for whom fraudulent petitions were filed. Authorities say some of those foreign nationals may have ultimately adjusted to U.S. permanent resident status and received "green cards." Agents are continuing to review immigration records to identify any ineligible foreign nationals who may have received employment visas as a result of the defendants' actions. USCIS will revoke or deny the petitions and subsequent applications involving aliens who fraudulently obtained benefits.

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/0910/091016losangeles.htm

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October 16, 2009

3 sentenced for recruiting Chinese women for prostitution

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - The ring leader and two others who ran a massage parlor scheme that recruited women from China to work as prostitutes in the U.S. were sentenced in federal court this week. These sentences resulted from a joint investigation conducted by the following agencies: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the FBI, the Overland Park (Kansas) Police Department, the Independence (Missouri) Police Department, and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.

Ling Xu, aka "Cherry," 48, was sentenced Oct. 14 by U.S. District Judge Fernando J. Gaitan, Western District of Missouri, to eight years and two months in federal prison without parole. Xu was sentenced for leading and organizing a criminal scheme to coerce her employees, whom she recruited from China, to engage in prostitution. Her co-conspirators Zhong Yan Liu, aka "Lucky," 37, and Cheng Tang, aka "Tom," 23, were each sentenced Oct. 13 by Judge Gaitan to five years in federal prison without parole.

The court also ordered each defendant to forfeit $452,500 to the government, which represented the proceeds of the unlawful activity. An additional $60,497 seized by the FBI during the execution of federal search warrants at the defendants' residences and businesses was also ordered to be forfeited.

Each defendant pleaded guilty to coercing persons to travel across state lines to engage in prostitution and illegal sexual services. They also pleaded guilty to money laundering by wiring more than $500,000 from the proceeds of that unlawful activity to China. Xu also pleaded guilty to aggravated identity theft for using the passports and identification of her female workers in order to make most of those wire transfers.

After Xu was arrested, she discussed plans to have any worker who testified against them killed. Xu stated that she was going to have Liu kill a female worker and her family for $5,000 upon his release from custody (she did not yet realize they would be held without bond).

Xu and Liu are married to other persons, with whom they have limited contact, and were living together with Xu's son, Tang. Xu, Liu and Tang were involved in operating "China Rose Massage" and "China Villa Massage/Lin Dynasty" in Overland Park. At the time charges were filed, they were preparing to open "Victoria Square" in Overland Park and a new location in Wichita, Kan. They also operated a nearby residence that was used for prostitution. Xu headed these businesses, and was the lead owner and operator. Xu also employed and paid Liu and Tang for their work and assistance in committing the offenses.

Xu, Liu and Tang recruited female Asians to travel to the Kansas City area to work as masseuses. They facilitated the women's travel, including, but not limited to, booking and purchasing their flights. They flew the women into the Kansas City, Mo., International Airport and then transported them to the businesses. As managers of the businesses, Xu and Tang signed massage therapy license applications for the women to obtain massage therapy licenses with the city of Overland Park.

Xu, Liu and Tang worked the female Asians from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. every day. The female workers, who were not paid, lived inside the massage parlors, where they performed sexual services on male patrons in exchange for money. Xu, Liu and Tang also used a nearby apartment, within walking distance of one of the massage parlors, to have the female Asian workers provide extended sexual services to some male patrons. Xu, Liu and Tang operated surveillance cameras inside the massage parlors to monitor the female Asian workers.

Xu, Liu and Tang used businesses, such as "888 Market" and "Ho's Oriental Market," to wire at least $452,500 in proceeds from the prostitution businesses, via Western Union, to several locations in China. Xu wired at least $343,600 in this manner between 2005 and 2006. Of this amount, Xu wired $318,600 by illegally taking and using the female workers' passports and identification. Liu wired at least $74,500, and Tang wired at least $34,400.

When the search warrants were executed on her massage parlor, Xu locked herself in the bathroom and began flushing evidence down the toilet. Three law enforcement agents had to physically remove her from the toilet to stop the destruction. Officers salvaged as much as they could from the toilet stool and dried it. The documents included the Western Union receipts and ledgers used to document and maintain the profits made from the customers of the female workers.

"These sentences send a strong message that ICE continues to work closely with our law enforcement partners to dismantle human trafficking organizations that seek to profit from others' misery," said Gilbert Trill, assistant special agent in charge of ICE's Office of Investigations in Kansas City. "Although we can't erase the suffering and humiliation experienced by these victims, we pledge that we will continue to identify and protect the victims, and prosecute their captors."

All three defendants are Chinese nationals residing in Overland Park, Kan. and are subject to deportation after they complete their prison sentences.

In a separate case resulting from this investigation, the owner of two Johnson County massage parlors has pleaded guilty to inducing women to travel across state lines for the purpose of prostitution. Wei Li Pang, also known as Linda, 39, a Chinese national and U.S. permanent resident residing in Overland Park, will be sentenced on Oct. 26. Pang co-owned and operated "Asian Massage Health Center" in Olathe, Kan., and owned and operated "Oriental Massage" in Mission, Kan.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Cynthia L. Cordes, Western District of Missouri, is prosecuting this case.

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/0910/091016kansascity.htm

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From UNICEF

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Child protection from violence, exploitation and abuse

UNICEF ‘Progress for Children' report advances child-protection goals

By Amy Bennett

NEW YORK, USA, 5 October 2009 – Children around the world are experiencing fundamental infringements of their human rights, and suffering physical and psychological harm that has wide-reaching, sometimes irreparable effects.

VIDEO: Watch now

These are some of the conclusions reached by a new UNICEF report, ‘Progress for Children: A Report Card on Child Protection', released by Executive Director Ann M. Veneman in Tokyo.

“A society cannot thrive if its youngest members are forced into early marriage, abused as sex workers or denied their basic rights,” said Veneman. “Understanding the extent of abuses of children's rights is a first step to building an environment where children are protected and have the opportunity to reach their full potential.”

Child protection strategy

As the 20th anniversary year of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), 2009 is a critical year for child protection. And while many children's rights have been protected thanks to the adoption of the CRC, much work remains to be done to create a protective environment for them worldwide.

“This report on harmful practices and abuse of children comes just six weeks before the 20th anniversary,” said Veneman. “The evidence of continuing harm and abuse must inspire the world to greater effort to guarantee the rights of all children, everywhere.”

The ‘Progress for Children' report has been issued in accordance with UNICEF's comprehensive strategy for child protection, adopted by the Executive Board in June 2008. Drawing upon detailed data, the new report examines both the short- and long-term implementation of that strategy.

‘Data for action'

Collecting the data means connecting the dots to build a framework comprising laws that protect children; communities that no longer accept harmful practices against children; and governments that are committed to protecting the most vulnerable.

“We need data for action,” said UNICEF Chief of Child Protection Susan Bissell. “If we know that one child is affected by a violation, that's enough to take action,” she added. “But importantly, we can be sure that what we do is the right thing [if] our actions are based on evidence.”

‘Progress for Children' presents the data collected so far to build a compelling case for better protection programmes in countries where millions of children are subject to trafficking, live without parental care, or lack proper documentation to attend school and receive basic health care. Additional millions of boys and girls are forced to work under harmful conditions. Still more children face violence or abuse in their homes, schools or communities, in institutions or while in detention.

Call to action

Based on the available data, however, some progress is evident. For example, ‘Progress for Children' notes that in Bangladesh, Guinea and Nepal – three countries where child marriage is prevalent – the median age of marriage is rising, although it is still below 18 years of age.

The report also identifies a slow decline in female genital mutilation/cutting in countries where such abuse has been common.

On the other hand, there are many areas where better data collection is needed to form a more complete picture of child-protection challenges. ‘Progress for Children' concludes with a call to action urging governments, lawmakers, communities, and the public and private sectors to build a more protective environment for children.

“We have a broad agenda in child protection, and it calls upon everybody to take action,” noted Bissell. “The North and the South, East and West – we are all bound in this child-protection agenda. There is no country untouched by child-protection concerns and violations.”

http://www.unicef.org/protection/index_51312.html?q=printme

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UNICEF: Without a protective environment, it's a harsh life for children

UNICEF releases groundbreaking Report Card on Child Protection

TOKYO, 6 October 2009 - While progress is being made in reducing some violations of children's rights, not enough is yet known about the extent of abuses against children. Violence and exploitation remain a harsh reality in the lives of many children around the world.

Millions of boys and girls around the world are subject to trafficking, are without parental care, or lack documentation they need to attend school and access basic health care. Millions more are forced to work under harmful conditions, while others face violence or abuse in their homes, in their schools, in their communities, in institutions or while in detention, often from the adult entrusted with their care.

These issues are reviewed in a new UNICEF report -- “Progress for Children: A Report Card on Child Protection,” -- released by UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman in Tokyo today.

Children in such circumstances are experiencing fundamental infringements of their human rights, and suffering physical and psychological harm that has wide-reaching and sometimes irreparable effects.

“A society cannot thrive if its youngest members are forced into early marriage, abused as sex workers or denied their basic rights,” said Veneman. “Understanding the extent of abuses of children's rights is a first step to building an environment where children are protected and have the opportunity to reach their full potential.”

The report gathers together for the first time data on a range of issues that impact on children, including sexual abuse and trafficking, child marriage, physical punishment of children, child labour, birth registration, the harmful traditional practice of female genital cutting, and attitudes toward violence against women inside marriage.

Some abuses – such as sexual exploitation and trafficking – are usually committed in conditions of secrecy and illegality, which makes collection of accurate data challenging.

Where data are available, some progress is evident. For example, the data shows that in Bangladesh, Guinea and Nepal – three countries where child marriage is prevalent – the median age of marriage is rising, although it is still below 18 years of age. The report also identifies a slow decline in female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) in countries where such abuse is common.

Included in the report's findings are:

• More than half the children in detention worldwide have not been tried or sentenced.
• In some parts of the world, the births of two out of three children were not registered in 2007. In Somalia and Liberia less than 5 per cent of births are registered. Birth registration is an important element in building a protective environment for children for a range of reasons, including that without a birth certificate they are more vulnerable to sexual exploitation, trafficking and illegal adoption.
• More than 150 million children between 5 and 14 years of age are engaged in child labour.   Child labour is often both a result and a source of poverty. It can compromise a child's education and perpetuate the poverty that pushed them into the workforce.
• More than half of women and girls in developing countries think that wife-beating is acceptable and, younger women are as likely to justify wife-beating as older women. In most regions, neglecting the children is the most commonly cited justification for wife-beating.

The report also offers a strategy to improve child protection, identifying five areas of activity that are needed to improve protective environments for children: 1) improving child protection systems; 2) promoting social change; 3) enhancing protection in emergencies; 4) strengthening partnerships for greater impact; and 5) collecting reliable data and using such data to achieve concrete results for children.

“This report on harmful practices and abuse of children comes just six weeks before the 20th Anniversary of the Convention of the Rights of the Child,” said Veneman. “The evidence of continuing harm and abuse must inspire the world to greater effort to guarantee the rights of all children, everywhere.” 

http://www.unicef.org/media/media_51311.html?q=printme

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UN Secretary-General's study urges action to stop violence against children

By Jane O'Brien

NEW YORK, USA, 12 October 2006 – One of the most detailed studies of violence against children ever conducted shows that millions around the world are being subjected to the worst forms of abuse with little or no protection.

The UN Secretary-General's Study on Violence against Children, presented to the General Assembly yesterday, examines the problem in five settings – the home, schools, institutions, at work and in the community.

Although there is a chronic lack of data, the report concludes that violence happens everywhere, is usually inflicted by a person known to the child and is invariably hidden or left unpunished.

Testimonies to violence

“Children continue to fear and experience violence in every country of the world,” says Professor Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro, the independent expert appointed by the Secretary-General to lead the study. “Violence cuts across all social, cultural, religious and ethnic lines. From extreme situations such as communities affected by armed gangs to the daily routine of schools, children face a range of very different forms of violence.”

The study involved thousands of consultations with governments, non-governmental organizations, experts and most important, children themselves. Many gave testimonies to the violence they had experienced or witnessed.

Harry Lopez, 18, works in some of the most violent neighbourhoods in Caracas, Venezuela. He leads workshops at a local NGO where children and young people can meet and talk.

“Listening to a child telling me that he cannot come out of his house because he is afraid that he will be a victim of violence – that he is afraid to play in his neighbourhood because this could even mean losing his life – these are the ones who have pushed me to work against violence,” he says.

Duty to protect children

“It's critical that people start to think of violence against children as an unacceptable reality that needs to be addressed, not as isolated but tragic occurrences that just happen,” notes UNICEF's Chief of Child Protection, Karin Landgren. “The findings of this report point us in two directions. They gives us a concrete set of recommendations for states to act on, and highlight the need for far more research and study.”

Professor Pinheiro calls for states to take primary responsibility in preventing violence against children by providing a robust legal framework: “That means prohibiting all forms of violence against children whenever it occurs and whoever is the perpetrator. It also means investing in prevention programmes to address the underlying cause of violence.

“Children cannot afford for this study to be just another report that gathers dust on shelves around the world,” he adds. “We have a duty to ensure that children enjoy their right to live a life free from violence.”

http://www.unicef.org/protection/index_36134.html?q=printme

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From the CDC

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Emergency Preparedness and You

The possibility of public health emergencies arising in the United States concerns many people in the wake of recent hurricanes, tsunamis, acts of terrorism, and the threat of pandemic influenza. Though some people feel it is impossible to be prepared for unexpected events, the truth is that taking preparedness actions helps people deal with disasters of all sorts much more effectively when they do occur.

To help, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the American Red Cross have teamed up to answer common questions and provide step by step guidance you can take now to protect you and your loved ones.

Get a Kit

• Gather Emergency Supplies
  By taking time now to prepare emergency water supplies, food supplies and disaster supplies kit, you can provide for your entire family.

Make a Plan

• Develop a Family Disaster Plan
  Families can cope with disaster by preparing in advance and working together as a team.

Be Informed

• Learn How to Shelter in Place
  Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the American Red Cross have teamed up to answer common questions and provide step by step guidance you can take now.
  
• Understand Quarantine and Isolation
  When quarantine and isolation may be called for, what they are, and how they work.
• Maintain a Healthy State of Mind
  Tools for coping with disaster for adults, parents, children, students, and seniors.

http://emergency.cdc.gov/preparedness/

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Human Trafficking

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Individuals Interested in Helping to Combat Human Trafficking

TOOLKIT

Human Trafficking in the U.S.

Human Trafficking is a highly complex issue that affects potentially thousands of foreign and domestic men, women, and children in the United States. No one is certain how many people are trafficked in the United States every year. The US Government, state agencies, and various non-governmental organizations throughout the US are committed to preventing trafficking, protecting victims of trafficking and prosecuting traffickers.

It is important to know the difference between trafficking and smuggling , and the difference between trafficking and exploitation, as not all cases of labor exploitation or prostitution are instances of trafficking. The US federal statute, Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 , has created guidelines for federal officials to recognize situations of trafficking, as the situations are usually extremely complex. Trained authorities and service providers, after interviewing the trafficked person, can be the best judge of whether there is a trafficking situation (instances of force, fraud, or coercion constitute sex or labor trafficking).

American girls as trafficking victims?

Underage American girls, many of them runaways or throwaways, also get caught up in forced prostitution in the United States . These can also be considered instances of trafficking, though again, trained authorities and service providers would be the best judge. For more information about American girls caught up in forced prostitution, read Who Is There to Help Us ?

**It should be noted that despite the depiction of trafficking on the recent Lifetime Channel mini-series, Human Trafficking , to date, there have not been any instances of American girls or boys kidnapped for the international commercial sex trade in Southeast Asia or anywhere else in the world .

The following information is provided so that American citizens feel EMPOWERED to be able to recognize what a victim of trafficking might look like, and act accordingly.

REPORT INSTANCES OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING!

If you suspect someone has been trafficked, call the:
Department of Health and Human Services -sponsored, toll-free, 24 hour
NATIONAL HOTLINE: +1-888-3737-888
or

Department of Justice -sponsored, toll-free, 24 hour
Trafficking in Persons and Worker Exploitation Task Force Complaint Line
+1-888-428-7581

These hotlines will help you determine if you have encountered victims of human trafficking, will identify local resources available in your community to help victims, and will help you coordinate with local social service organizations.

You may also call:

• Your state's Attorney General victim/witness coordinator
• Your local FBI field office
• Additional information on reporting suspected cases within the U.S. can be accessed through the Department of Justice
• A local nongovernmental organization (NGO) which provides services to victims of trafficking in your area (if you don't see your state listed, contact director@humantrafficking.org .)

If you have information about the COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION of a child in the U.S. or abroad , you can do the following:

• Notify U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement at 1-866-DHS-2ICE
• Contact your local FBI field office
• Report at www.cybertipline.org

HOW TO RECOGNIZE A VICTIM OF TRAFFICKING

RED FLAGS TO LOOK OUT FOR A TRAFFICKING VICTIM:

• Living with Employer
• Poor Living Conditions
• Multiple People in Cramped Space
• Inability to Speak to an Individual Alone
• Employer Holding Identity Documents
• Signs of Physical Abuse
• Submissive or Fearful
• Unpaid or Paid Very Little
• Under 18 and in Prostitution
• Heavy security at the commercial establishment including barred windows, locked doors, isolated location, electronic surveillance. Women are never seen leaving the premises unless escorted.
• Victims live at the same premises as the brothel or work site or are driven between quarters and "work" by a guard. For labor trafficking, victims are often prohibited from leaving the work site, which may look like a guarded compound from the outside.
• Victims are kept under surveillance when taken to a doctor, hospital or clinic for treatment; trafficker may act as a translator.
• High foot traffic especially for brothels where there may be trafficked women indicated often by a stream of men arriving and leaving the premises.

Trafficking victims are kept in bondage through a combination of fear, intimidation, abuse, and psychological controls. While each victim will have a different experience, they share common threads. Trafficking victims live a life marked by abuse, betrayal of their basic human rights, and control under their trafficker. The following indicators in and of themselves may not be enough to meet the legal standard for trafficking, but they indicate that a victim is controlled by someone else and, accordingly, the situation should be further investigated.

IF YOU ARE ABLE TO ASK QUESTIONS OF A PERSON YOU THINK HAS BEEN TRAFFICKED , THESE ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT QUESTIONS TO ASK:

• Can You Leave Your Job if You Want?
• Can You Come and Go as You Please?
• Have You Been Hurt or Threatened if You Tried to Leave?
• Has Your Family Been Threatened?
• Do You Live With Your Employer?
• Where Do You Sleep and Eat?
• Are You in Debt to Your Employer?
• How did you arrive at this destination?
• Do You Have Your Passport/ID? If Not, Who Has It?

Very Important : You do not want to create a situation of greater danger for this person. Ask questions with great care and sensitivity. The person may be traumatized and not be able to speak about his/her experience. Most trafficking victims will not readily volunteer information about their status because of fear and abuse they have suffered at the hands of their trafficker. They may also be reluctant to come forward with information from despair, discouragement, and a sense that there are no viable options to escape their situation. Even if pressed, they may not identify themselves as someone held in bondage for fear of retribution to themselves or family members.

Anyone can report suspected trafficking cases. If the victim is under 18, U.S. professionals who work in law enforcement, healthcare, social care, mental health, and education are mandated to report such cases. Through a grass-roots community-wide effort and public awareness campaign, more professionals on the front line can readily identify the trafficking victim and have him/her treated accordingly.

INDICATORS THAT OFTEN POINT TO A PERSON HELD IN A TRAFFICKING CONDITION

Health Characteristics of a Trafficked Person
Some of the health problems that may be evident in a victim include:

• Malnutrition, dehydration or poor personal hygiene
• Sexually transmitted diseases
• Signs of rape or sexual abuse
• Bruising, broken bones, or other signs of untreated medical problems
• Critical illnesses including diabetes, cancer or heart disease
• Post-traumatic stress or psychological disorders

Other Important Signs
In addition to some of the obvious physical and mental indicators of trafficking, there are other signs that an individual is being controlled by someone else. Red flags should go up for police or aid workers who notice any of the following during an intake. The individual:

• Does not hold his/her own identity or travel documents
• Suffers from verbal or psychological abuse designed to intimidate, degrade and frighten the individual
• Has a trafficker or pimp who controls all the money, victim will have very little or no pocket money

YOUR INVOLVEMENT 
U.S. NONGOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS (NGOs)
Over the last four years,  U.S. nongovernmental organizations and service providers (psychologists, attorneys, advocates, etc.) have received grants from the US Government to provide services to victims of trafficking throughout the US. It is possible that an NGO in your area accepts donations or volunteers.

a) Support financially or donate other materials to a local nongovernmental organization combating human trafficking
b) Volunteer with a local NGO if you have relevant skills

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
If you are interested in donating to, or volunteering with, International Organizations in other countries, you can see the list of International Organizations in Asia which accept donations and volunteers . If you would like more information, contact director@humantrafficking.org

DOES YOUR STATE HAVE A HUMAN TRAFFICKING STATUTE?

Advocate to your State Representatives or Senators for your state to pass anti-human trafficking statutes on human trafficking to support the federal level statutes. The Department of Justice has written a Model State Anti-Trafficking Criminal Statute .

The following states have passed various state-level statutes on trafficking:
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Georgia
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Louisiana
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
South Carolina
Texas
Washington State
Bills are pending in:
New Jersey
Ohio
Pennsylvania

Bills are pending in:
New Jersey
Ohio
Pennsylvania

UNDERSTAND THE DIFFERENT ASPECTS OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING

Sex Trafficking: Victims of sex trafficking are often found working in establishments that offer commercial sex acts, i.e. brothels, strip clubs, pornography production houses. Such establishments may operate under the guise of:

• Massage parlors
• Escort services
• Adult bookstores
• Modeling studios
• Bars/strip clubs

Not every person working in these establishments will have technically been trafficked. It would be necessary for trained authorities or service providers to interview each person individually to determine trafficking.

Labor Trafficking: People forced into indentured servitude can be found in :

• Sweatshops (where abusive labor standards are present)
• Commercial agricultural situations (fields, processing plants, canneries)
• Domestic situations (maids, nannies)
• Construction sites (particularly if public access is denied)
• Restaurant and custodial work

How Do People Get Trapped Into Sex or Labor Trafficking?

No one volunteers to be exploited. Traffickers frequently recruit people through fraudulent advertisements promising legitimate jobs as hostesses, domestics, or work in the agricultural industry. Trafficking victims of all kinds come from rural, suburban, and urban settings. There are signs when commercial establishments are holding people against their will.

INCREASE PUBLIC AWARENESS ABOUT HUMAN TRAFFICKING

Host a discussion or open forum about Human Trafficking at your local church, college, school, synagogue, or civic group. Many Americans are still unaware of how widespread the problem is and how it may even be happening in their own backyards. The more people learn about this human rights abuse, the more "eyes and ears" are available to help report suspected cases and prevent further abuses. To request a speaker for your group, contact director@humantrafficking.org .

For more information on how you can help to combat trafficking, contact:

Andrea Bertone, Director
www.HumanTrafficking.org
Academy for Educational Development
Washington, DC
director@humantrafficking.org
Phone: +1.202.884.8916

Information for this Toolkit was taken from multiple places, including METRO DC ACTS Wallet Card; Tips for Recognizing Victims of Trafficking in Persons ;  Citizen Action: How Can I Help End Modern-Day Slavery? ; U.S. Policy Alert on Human Trafficking

http://www.humantrafficking.org/countries/united_states_of_america/helplines

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