Internet making it easier to become a terrorist

'JihadJane' and other U.S. suspects don't need militant training camps, officials say. They just go online.

By Bob Drogin and Tina Susman

March 11, 2010

Reporting from Washington and New York

The abrupt transformation of Colleen R. LaRose from bored middle-aged matron to "JihadJane," her Internet alias, was unique in many ways, but a common thread ties the alleged Islamic militant to other recent cases of homegrown terrorism: the Internet.

From charismatic clerics who spout hate online, to thousands of extremist websites, chat rooms and social networking pages that raise money and spread radical propaganda, the Internet has become a crucial front in the ever-shifting war on terrorism.

"LaRose showed that you can become a terrorist in the comfort of your own bedroom," said Bruce Hoffman, professor of security studies at Georgetown University. "You couldn't do that 10 years ago."

"The new militancy is driven by the Web," agreed Fawaz A. Gerges, a terrorism expert at the London School of Economics. "The terror training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan are being replaced by virtual camps on the Web."

From their side, law enforcement and intelligence agencies are scrambling to monitor the Internet and penetrate radical websites to track suspects, set up sting operations or unravel plots before they are carried out.

The FBI arrested LaRose in October after she had spent months using e-mail, YouTube, MySpace and electronic message boards to recruit radicals in Europe and South Asia to "wage violent jihad," according to a federal indictment unsealed this week.

That put the strawberry-haired Pennsylvania resident in league with many of the 12 domestic terrorism cases involving Muslims that the FBI disclosed last year, the most in any year since 2001. The Internet was cited as a recruiting or radicalizing tool in nearly every case.

"Basically, Al Qaeda isn't coming to them," Gerges said. "They are using the Web to go to Al Qaeda."

In December, for example, five young men from northern Virginia were arrested in Pakistan on suspicion of seeking to join anti-American militants in Afghanistan.

A Taliban recruiter made contact with the group after one of the five, Ahmed Abdullah Minni, posted comments on YouTube praising videos of attacks on U.S. troops, officials said. To avoid detection, they communicated by leaving draft e-mail messages at a shared Yahoo e-mail address.

Hosam Smadi, a Jordanian, was arrested in September and accused of trying to use a weapon of mass destruction after he allegedly tried to blow up a 60-story office tower in downtown Dallas. The FBI began surveillance of Smadi after seeing his anti-American postings on an extremist website.

And Ehsanul Islam Sadequee and Syed Haris Ahmed, two middle-class kids barely out of high school near Atlanta, secretly took up violent jihad after meeting at a mosque.

"They started spending hours online -- chatting with each other, watching terrorist recruitment videos, and meeting like-minded extremists," the FBI said in a statement after the pair were convicted of terrorism charges in December.

Prosecutors alleged that the pair traveled to Washington and made more than 60 short surveillance videos of the Capitol, the Pentagon and other sensitive facilities, and e-mailed them to an Al Qaeda webmaster and propagandist.

U.S. authorities also closely monitor several fiery Internet imans who use English to preach jihad and, in some cases, to help funnel recruits to Al Qaeda and other radical causes.

The best known is Anwar al Awlaki, an American-born imam who is believed to be living in Yemen. U.S. officials say more than 10% of visitors to his website are in the U.S.

Among those who traded e-mails with Awlaki were Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist charged with shooting and killing 13 people in November at Ft. Hood, Texas, and Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian charged with trying to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight over Detroit on Christmas Day.

Mahdi Bray, executive director of the MAS Freedom Foundation, part of the Muslim American Society, noted that many extremist websites featured fiery images, loud music and fast-moving videos of violence and death.

"They use video games and hip-hop to bring young people in, sometimes in very benign ways," he said. "Then they make this transition by showing all the horrific things" and by then, some would-be recruits are hooked.

Salam Al-Marayati, executive director of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, said his group had struggled to compete with the instant attention that grisly videos of beheadings, roadside bombs or masked men with weapons draw on the Internet.

"They get the backdrop of the Afghani mountains or the battlefields of Somalia," he said. "We're speaking from conference centers and quiet halls. Somehow, we have to figure out a way to make our message more newsworthy. We've issued YouTube videos, and it barely gets a couple of hundred hits."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-na-internet-jihad12-2010mar12,0,1924805,print.story

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State corrections officials defend new law, say violent criminals will get heavier monitoring

State corrections officials questioned Thursday claims by the L.A. police union that the recent arrest of a man with a long criminal history showed shortcomings in a new law designed to ease prison overcrowding.

Ezra Hooker Sr., who was arrested Jan. 5 after allegedly pointing a rifle at a prostitute and leading LAPD officers on a high-speed chase in South L.A., was being monitored at the highest level of parole supervision before the incident, said Oscar Hidalgo, a spokesman for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Hidalgo also took issue with the assertion that Hooker, who had 19 previous arrests and four convictions, would have been subject to less scrutiny under the new law. He said Hooker served time in state prison in 1988 for voluntary manslaughter, making him ineligible for "non-revocable parole" that eliminates contact with a parole agent if the parolee has committed only nonviolent offenses.

"The purpose of the law is to allow agents to focus their attention on the most violent individuals and those who pose the most risk to re-offend," Hidalgo said. "So a person like this [Hooker] would have received more intensive supervision rather than less as suggested by the Los Angeles Police Protective League."

Paul M. Weber, president of the Los Angeles Police Protective League, which represents nearly 10,000 officers, maintained the Hooker case reflects what could become a growing problem for law enforcement agencies.

"Parole once meant that failure to follow rules and remain law-abiding meant a swift return to finish a sentence," Weber said. "Apparently, in the Department of Corrections' new world, parole is a game designed to see if law enforcement can manage to solve the new crimes committed by these parolees and then obtain convictions."

Last year, union officials expressed "deep concerns" about a risk assessment database used at selected state parole offices to classify and manage parolees. They warned the system would be unable to accurately sift through criminal histories and identify differences between low- and high-risk offenders.

Officials with the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation have touted their computer risk-assessment tool as a way to better identify lower-risk offenders, whom parole agents would spend less time monitoring and who might be eligible for targeted programs instead of being put back behind bars.

State officials said their aim is to prevent “a revolving-door effect” by providing incentives to local law enforcement to charge parolees with new crimes, potentially resulting in longer prison sentences.

The average caseload for parole agents statewide before the law was passed was 70 parolees per agent. When fully implemented, the new law is expected to drop the figure to 48 parolees for each agent.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/03/state-corrections-officials-say-la-police-union-criticisms-misplaced.html#more

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Divided appeals court rules Pledge of Allegiance doesn't violate Constitution

A divided federal appeals court Thursday reversed itself, ruling that the Pledge of Allegiance doesn't violate the constitutional prohibition against state-mandated religious exercise even though it contains the phrase “one nation under God.”

The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling in 2002, which deemed that requiring students to recite the pledge violated their rights to be free of religious indoctrination by the government, was one of the most controversial to come out of the court that is second only to the U.S. Supreme Court in its power to determine law for nine Western states and two Pacific territories.

The appeals court's earlier decision had been reviewed by the Supreme Court in 2004, but the justices dodged the constitutional question on procedural grounds, throwing out the lawsuit brought by a Sacramento atheist and leaving intact the wording of the patriotic declaration.

Also decided Thursday was a challenge brought by the same plaintiff, Michael Newdow, to the phrase “In God We Trust” printed on the national money. The same three-judge panel ruled that an earlier case had found the phrase to be a national motto and that its placement on U.S. coins and currency wasn't required by any government statute.

In Thursday's ruling, written by Judge Carlos T. Bea, an appointee of President George W. Bush, the judges ruled 2-1 that Newdow and others who joined his lawsuit didn't have standing to challenge the 1954 amendment to the pledge adding the words “under God” because no federal statute requires them to recite it.

Senior Circuit Judge Dorothy W. Nelson joined Bea in the ruling, but Judge Stephen Reinhardt dissented, writing that “the state-directed, teacher-led daily recitation in public schools of the amended ‘under God' version of the Pledge of Allegiance... violates the Establishment Clause of the Constitution.”

Nelson and Reinhardt were both appointed to the court by President Carter.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/03/divided-appeals-court-rules-pledge-of-allegiance-doesnt-violate-constitutuion.html#more

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From the Wall Street Journal

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Ex-New Orleans Officer Pleads in Shooting Cover-Up

NEW ORLEANS—A second former New Orleans police officer pleaded guilty Thursday to covering up the deadly shooting of unarmed residents after Hurricane Katrina, with a judge calling the plot a despicable scheme that immeasurably compounded the storm's damage.

Jeffrey Lehrmann, who left the police department in 2006 and is a special agent at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Phoenix, pleaded guilty to misprision of a felony, which means he had knowledge of a crime and didn't report it. Another former officer pleaded guilty last month a conspiracy charge.

"I have neither imagined or heard of more despicable conduct by law enforcement officers," U.S. District Judge Lance Africk said of the case against the former homicide detective.

A court filing Thursday outlines new details about the alleged cover-up that followed the Sept. 4, 2005, shootings on the Danziger Bridge, which also led to a Justice Department investigation.

The filing says police fabricated two nonexistent witnesses, kicked spent shell casings off the bridge weeks after the shooting and held a secret meeting in a gutted-out police building to make sure officers who shot at unarmed civilians got their false stories straight before taping interviews.

The filing also reveals how police investigators carried out a plot to plant a gun to make it appear the shootings were justified.

Several weeks after the shooting, Mr. Lehrmann drove to an unidentified investigator's home, where the investigator retrieved a bag from a storage container in his garage. When Mr. Lehrmann asked him what was in the bag, the investigator responded, "a ham sandwich." Inside was a revolver.

"After the investigator assured the officers that the gun was 'clean,' they all went along with the plan to plant the gun," the filing says.

Investigators didn't collect critical evidence from the scene, including spent shell casings. In fact, Mr. Lehrmann allegedly saw an unidentified sergeant kick casings off the bridge.

And in the weeks after the shooting, Mr. Lehrmann and other investigators discussed how they could blame their failed investigation on Hurricane Katrina and "use the storm to help make the entire situation 'go away,'" the filing says.

After Thursday's hearing, a reporter approached Police Superintendent Warren Riley in a coffee shop near the courthouse and told him about some of the details in the filing.

"Unbelievable," said Mr. Riley, who has said he felt betrayed by the cover up. "All I can say is, 'Wow.'"

The shootings initially were seen as a symbol of the confusion and lawlessness that followed in the weeks after Katrina hit—only to become a mark of shame on the police department once the cover-up emerged.

Mr. Lehrmann, 38 years old, of Anthem, Ariz., faces a maximum sentence of three years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Sentencing has been set for June 10. He is free on $25,000 bond.

Michael Lohman, a retired New Orleans police lieutenant, pleaded guilty last month to conspiracy to obstruct justice, but prosecutors said Mr. Lehrmann was the first to agree to cooperate with the Justice Department probe. State charges of murder or attempted murder against seven other officers were thrown out by a judge.

Ronald Madison, 40 and mentally disabled, and James Brissette, 19, were killed and four others shot as they crossed the bridge in search of food. The officers claimed they opened fire only after being shot at. Lance Madison, who accompanied his brother, Ronald, testified less than a month later that a group of teenagers started shooting at them before they encountered police.

"This has been a devastating time for our family and for the citizens of this city," Romell Madison, one of Ronald's brothers, said after the hearing. "We want to ensure that this doesn't happen to anyone else."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703625304575115541691254182.html?mod=WSJ_World_LEFTSecondNews#printMode

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From Fox News

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Al Qaeda Suspect Worked at U.S. Nuclear Plants

March 12, 2010

An American charged in Yemen with being a member of Al Qaeda had worked at nuclear power plants in the U.S., a spokesman for a group of plants in New Jersey said Thursday. But a state official said the man did not breach security there.

Sharif Mobley, a 26-year-old natural-born U.S. citizen, was arrested in Yemen earlier this month and is accused of killing a guard in an attempt to break out of a hospital.

The FBI, the State Department and other authorities said they were trying to gather information about Mobley. But the allegations appeared to illustrate a phenomenon U.S. intelligence officials have warned about: American Muslims becoming radicalized and joining terrorist movements overseas.

Mobley was identified by Yemeni officials as a Somali-American. Mobley moved to Yemen about two years ago, supposedly to learn Arabic and study Islam, a former neighbor said.

Before that, Mobley worked for several contractors at three nuclear power plants in New Jersey from 2002 to 2008, PSE&G Nuclear spokesman Joe Delmar said. Mobley carried supplies and did maintenance work at the plants on Artificial Island in Lower Alloways Creek, and worked at other plants in the region as well.

He satisfied federal background checks as recently as 2008, Delmar said, adding that the plant is cooperating with authorities.

Mike Drewniak, a spokesman for New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, said that his office had been told that Mobley was always supervised, caused no problems and was not believed to have breached security at the plants.

It's unclear whether Mobley worked at any of the region's other power plants. Joe Szafran, a spokesman for Exelon Corp., which owns nuclear plants at three facilities in eastern Pennsylvania, referred questions to the FBI.

While some acquaintances were startled by the news out of the Middle East on Thursday, a former classmate said that Mobley had strong religious views in high school, often trying to convert friends to Islam, and became increasingly radical, especially after they graduated in 2002.

Roman Castro, 25, who did a tour with the Army in Iraq, said the last time he saw Mobley, about four years ago, Mobley yelled, "Get the hell away from me, you Muslim killer!"

Classmates who graduated with Mobley from Buena Regional High School in 2002 expressed shock at both his suspected Al Qaeda ties and his deadly escape attempt in Yemen.

Dawn Bass said she was "shocked" to learn of the allegations, adding that Mobley had been known as a friendly "sweetheart" in high school.

"He was always showing off in the back of the classroom doing his karate moves and stuff," Bass told FoxNews.com. "But he was just a regular kid, he was always talking to everybody — he was not shy."

Mobley's mother, meanwhile, told WMGM-TV the accusations are false but did say that when she last spoke to her son in late January he was in Yemen. She said the FBI had visited her for questioning but insisted her son has never been in trouble and is a good Muslim.

Mobley's father, Charles, said the family was waiting for further information.

"We don't know nothing, we're trying to hear something," Charles Mobley told WMGM-TV.

An FBI spokesman did not immediately return a call, but a law enforcement official told The Associated Press that authorities don't believe Mobley's job at the nuclear plant was related to his activities in Yemen. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter.

Also, Mohammed Albasha, spokesman for the Yemeni Embassy in Washington, said there was no immediate connection between Mobley's activities or capture in Yemen and his work at the plants.

Mobley was arrested in Yemen in a roundup of suspected Al Qaeda members this month and was being treated at a hospital in San'a when he got into a shootout with guards during an escape attempt, killing one and wounding another, said Mohammed Albasha, spokesman for the Yemeni Embassy in Washington.

U.S. officials worry that Yemen is becoming the next significant terrorist staging ground because of signs that lower-level Al Qaeda operatives have been moving into the country from the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region.

The Al Qaeda branch in Yemen was linked to the failed Christmas Day bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner. Also, Maj. Nidal Hasan, the Army psychiatrist accused of killing 13 people in a shooting rampage at Fort Hood last year, had exchanged e-mails with an extremist cleric in Yemen.

In response to the threat, the Pentagon has proposed spending $150 million to help Yemen battle insurgents within its borders.

Somali-Americans have become a particular concern to American security officials. Young Somali-American men have been traveling from the U.S. to fight jihad in Somalia, raising fears they are receiving terror training and returning to the U.S. ready to launch attacks.

Americans are valuable to terrorist groups, in part because they can travel easily, without arousing much suspicion.

"The U.S. passport is the gold standard," said Fred Burton, a former U.S. counterintelligence agent who is now a vice president at STRATFOR, a global intelligence company in Austin, Texas.

Mobley was among 11 Al Qaeda suspects detained this month in a security sweep in San'a, the capital, officials said. He was taken to the hospital over the weekend after he complained of feeling ill. He snatched a gun from a security guard and shot him, then got into a shootout that ended with anti-police terrorism capturing him, authorities said.

In Yemen, killing a guard during an escape attempt could result in execution by a firing squad.

Mobley graduated from high school in 2002 in the rural southern New Jersey town of Buena, and afterward lived in Philadelphia and Newark, Del. Castro said that in the past few years, Mobley organized religious pilgrimages to the Middle East for other Muslims.

Mobley's mother, Cynthia Mobley, told WMGM-TV in Atlantic City, N.J., that her son is "an excellent person who's never been in trouble" and "a good Muslim."

As his father, Charles Mobley, pulled out of the family's driveway on the way to see a lawyer Thursday, he said: "I can tell you this: He's no terrorist."

Abdel-Hadi Shehata, imam of the Islamic Society of Delaware, said Mobley used to live one floor below him in an aging apartment complex in Newark and occasionally visited the society's Newark mosque to pray. Shehata said Mobley, who had a wife and young daughter, moved to Yemen about two years ago.

"I think to learn Arabic or something like that ... and to learn more about the religion Islam," he said.

Shehata said Mobley never discussed politics or his religious views with him, but sometimes would ask his advice about how to pray and how to cleanse himself.

Marisa Porges, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said many Arabic language scholars travel to Yemen to study the language because the dialect there is so useful. She said there is a risk that even those who travel there to study can become radicalized.

"It's often the case that their being there makes an individual more vulnerable to radicalization," she said.

Umar Hassan-El, assistant imam at the Islamic Society of Delaware's mosque in Wilmington, Del., said he roomed with Mobley during a 2004 pilgrimage to Mecca.

The worst Mobley did, Hassan-El said, was forget to pick up his clothes or interrupt discussions among older Muslims.

"He gave no indication that he would join a group that he's alleged to be a part of right now," said Hassan-El. "I never heard that boy ever talk about shooting anybody, killing anybody."

As a teenager, Mobley studied martial arts at Yi's Karate Institute in Sewell, N.J., earning his black belt after three years, according to the master of the dojo, Chom Sam Kim.

"He was very athletic, and had a good respect and attitude," Kim said. Kim said he was surprised to hear the allegations against Mobley: "I never saw anything abnormal about him during the time he was here."

http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,589022,00.html

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Sex Offender Suspected in California Teen's Murder Broke Parole

March 11, 2010

Associated Press

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — 

A convicted sex offender charged with murdering one California teenager and under investigation for another killing violated his parole by moving too close to a school but was allowed to remain free, according to records obtained Thursday by The Associated Press.

Had John Albert Gardner III been returned to prison in 2007 he would have been evaluated for commitment to a state mental hospital as a sexually violent predator. He also would have qualified for wearing an electronic tracking device for the rest of his life.

"It was just an incompetent decision that didn't protect public safety," said state Sen. George Runner, who wrote Jessica's Law, the sex offender law approved by voters in 2006.

"And now we have, what, two victims and who knows what else is out there?" he said.

The parole records show state officials found Gardner illegally living within a half-mile of a school in September 2007 and decided to keep him on parole. The records show at least five later violations, the last on Sept. 8, 2008, just 18 days before Gardner was let go from parole supervision and his location-tracking GPS bracelet removed from his ankle.

Each time, the decision was "COP:" Continue on Parole.

"All the indications were there saying that this was a very serious situation," said Nancy Kincaid, spokeswoman for the state Department of Mental Health. "A very serious evaluation would have been followed all the way through."

Gardner's attorney, Michael John Popkins, did not return a telephone message. He is under a court-ordered gag order not to talk about the case.

Gardner, 30, served five years in prison and three years of parole after pleading guilty in 2000 to molesting a 13-year-old neighbor girl.

He pleaded not guilty last week to murdering Chelsea King, 17, whose presumed body was found March 2 buried in a park near her hometown of Poway north of San Diego.

He also is charged with assaulting a woman in the same park in December, and is a suspect but has not been charged in the disappearance of 14-year-old Amber Dubois as she walked to school in Escondido in early 2009.

Her skeletal remains were found Saturday on an Indian reservation.

"There was nothing to indicate then that he would do this, or allegedly do this," said Oscar Hidalgo, spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. "I guess one can always look back, but we don't have the luxury."

In fact, Gardner was considered to be a low- or moderate-risk sex offender, based on the assessment in use at the time, Hidalgo said.

He wasn't sent back to prison in September 2007 because he corrected the residency violation by moving away from a college campus that had a day care center, Hidalgo said.

He had six other technical violations — one more than shown in the records obtained by the AP, Hidalgo said.

Four involved letting the battery on his ankle bracelet run low, one for missing a meeting with his parole officer, and one for alleged marijuana possession that couldn't be substantiated.

"These are considered minor. Quite frankly if we were to blanket the system of parolees with minor offenses, we would ... overwhelm the system. We'd close the system down," Hidalgo said.

Laura Ahearn, executive director of New York-based Parents for Megan's Law and The Crime Victims Center, said parole agents missed a chance to possibly put Gardner away for years.

"A technical violation is an opportunity to take sexual predators off the street. Most would be looking for that opportunity," she said. "He could have been confined, and this may never have happened."

If officials ruled that Gardner violated his parole, they could have sent him back to prison, though most serve only about four extra months behind bars. However, the new prison term would have extended his parole supervision.

The violation also would have put Gardner under the jurisdiction of Jessica's Law and permitted lifetime electronic monitoring. In addition, it would have permitted Gardner's evaluation as a sexually violent predator, potentially keeping him locked up in a state mental health hospital for years.

Gardner couldn't be committed to a state mental hospital after the 2000 case because the law then required at least two victims. Jessica's Law now allows evaluations after just one.

Kincaid, the mental health spokeswoman, said Gardner might have been committed for having an underlying mental disorder and a likelihood that he would reoffend. However, the law involving commitment generally requires that the victim be a stranger. In this case, his victim was a neighbor who had known and trusted him for a year.

Gardner's 2000 probation report included comments from a psychiatrist who concluded he had "significant predatory traits" and should be kept in prison for as long as possible.

Kincaid said it was unclear from the records if the traits would qualify him as a sexually violent predator under the law.

The AP independently obtained computer-generated portions of Gardner's parole record after the corrections department reported it had routinely destroyed its paper field notes a year after Gardner was released from parole.

The department disclosed Tuesday that portions of the file were transferred to Gardner's central file.

http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,588991,00.html

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Police Release Photos Calif. Serial Killer Took of Girls

March 11, 2010

Associated Press

SANTA ANA, Calif.  — 

Prosecutors said convicted serial killer Rodney Alcala used his camera to gain the trust of young women and now they fear photographs he snapped decades ago could contain images of more potential victims.

Hundreds of Alcala's photographs, apparently taken before his first arrest in 1979, were released by Huntington Beach police Wednesday, featuring women and girls in candid and posed shots. Some show them naked and engaging in sex acts.

Most of the dozens of subjects in the photos have never been identified and now police are asking for the public's help in figuring out who the women are.

A jury recommended death Tuesday for Alcala, 66, in the murders of a 12-year-old girl and four women dating back to the seventies

Prosecutors said Alcala, an amateur photographer and UCLA graduate, used his camera to put his victims at ease.

"We'd like to locate the women in these pictures," prosecutor Matt Murphy told the Orange County Register. "Did they simply pose for a serial killer, or did they become victims of his sadistic, murderous pattern?"

Detectives recovered hundreds of photos during court-authorized searches of Alcala's Monterey Park home and a rented storage locker.

Some photos show women posing in remote settings similar to the locale where 12-year-old Robin Samsoe's body was found in 1979. A few are of young men in sexually suggestive poses.

Jurors took just an hour to return the death recommendation after a six-week trial in which Alcala represented himself and took the stand in his own defense.

Alcala was sentenced to death twice before in the 1979 murder of Robin Samsoe, but those verdicts were overturned on appeal.

Prosecutors refiled charges in that case and added the four other murders in 2006 after investigators linked them to Alcala using DNA samples and other forensic evidence. Those cases, which had gone unsolved for decades, went on trial for the first time this year.

Alcala focused his entire defense on the Samsoe case and ignored the murders of the four Los Angeles County women murdered between 1977 and 1979.

http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,588868,00.html

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Why the Texas Textbook Wars Matter to Every American

What your kids learn about historical figures like Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein most likely depends on what happens in Texas in the next two days.

Everyone's heard the advertisement that claims, "what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas." While that's questionable, one thing that is not questionable is that what happens in the Texas education battle will not just stay in Texas.

What your kids learn about historical figures like Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein most likely depends on what happens in Texas in the next two days.

Texas is in the process of adopting its social studies standards, which only happens every ten years. The standards cover U.S. Government, American History, World History, and more, and they affect how students in grades K – 12 see America, its founding principles, and its heroes for the next decade.

More than that, because Texas is one of the largest consumers of textbooks in the nation, publishers use these curriculum standards for textbooks that are distributed in nearly every state in the union. Thus, what happens in Texas will impact the nation.

Probably for that reason, a liberal onslaught has been unleashed to try to influence these education standards. An unelected review panel, not the elected members of Texas State Board of Education (SBOE), attempted to push through a number of highly questionable changes to the standards – removing Independence Day, Neil Armstrong, Daniel Boone, and Christopher Columbus – from them. They even dumped Christmas and replaced it with Diwali. You can't make this stuff up! After a huge outcry from citizens and strong leadership by conservatives on the Texas State Board of Education, each of these changes was reversed.

Sadly, the attacks didn't stop there. Albert Einstein and Thomas Edison were removed from World History, yet Mary Kay and Wallace Amos (of Famous Amos Cookies) were added, it appears, for more “diversity.” That's unbelievable. Edison is the greatest inventor in American history with over 1,000 patents; oh, and by the way, that Einstein guy was pretty successful too!

Again, that's part of why the liberals attack. They don't like the concept of American exceptionalism, both by those who were born here and by the other great high-skilled men and women who are so attracted to the United States that they moved here from other countries.

Thankfully, the conservatives on the SBOE once again held the line. Edison and Einstein are back in World History. An attack to remove “B.C.” and “A.D.” -- denoting historical time periods before and after the birth of Christ – also lost, and, so far, the attempt to remove the statement about the religious basis of the founding of the country has failed.

These battles are not over. More votes are coming.

However, we should be encouraged. A few years ago, these attacks might have slipped through. People who were too busy and uniformed in years past are speaking out now as never before and they are realizing that their stewardship is required. As one of our great Founders, Benjamin Franklin, said, “You have a Republic, if you can keep it.”

The American people – parents, teachers, and other concerned citizens – are holding firm. Thousands of people are defending their Republic by testifying before the Board, making phone calls, and sending e-mails. It's working – conservative Board members are standing their ground, and the next generation of this country will benefit. If we continue to hold strong, our children will know about the founding principles of this country. They will know what makes it great, and they will then recognize it -- in the future -- when leaders try to violate those principles.

America is exceptional. It is the greatest country on the face of the earth… but to borrow from Franklin, only “if we can keep it.”

Kelly Shackelford, Esq., is president and CEO of Liberty Institute , a post he has held since 1997. A constitutional scholar, Mr. Shackelford has argued cases before the U.S. and Texas Supreme Courts and has testified before the U.S. Congress and the Texas Legislature. Liberty Institute is a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting freedoms and strengthening families in Texas and nationwide.

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/ci.Why+the+Texas+Textbook+Wars+Matter+to+Every+American.opinionPrint

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From MSNBC

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Deal reached on ground zero health claims

NEW YORK - After years of fighting in court, lawyers representing the city, construction companies and more than 10,000 ground zero rescue and recovery workers have agreed to a settlement that could pay up to $657.5 million to responders sickened by dust from the destroyed World Trade Center.

The settlement was announced Thursday evening by the WTC Captive Insurance Co., a special entity established to indemnify the city and its contractors against potential legal action as they moved to clean up the site after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

The deal, which still must be approved by a judge and the workers themselves, would make the city and other companies represented by the insurer liable for a minimum of $575 million, with more money available to the sick if certain conditions are met.

Most if not all of the money would come out of a $1 billion grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg called the settlement "a fair and reasonable resolution to a complex set of circumstances."

"The resolution of the World Trade Center litigation will allow the first responders and workers to be compensated for injuries suffered following their work at Ground Zero," he said in a statement.

‘Good settlement'
Marc Bern, a senior partner with the law firm Worby, Groner, Edelman & Napoli, Bern LLP, which negotiated the deal, said it was "a good settlement."

"We are gratified that these heroic men and women who performed their duties without consideration of the health implications will finally receive just compensation for their pain and suffering, lost wages, medical and other expenses, as the U.S. Congress intended when it appropriated this money," he said in a statement.

Workers who wish to participate in the settlement would need to prove they had been at the World Trade Center site or other facilities that handled debris. They also would have to turn over medical records and provide other information aimed at weeding out fraudulent or dubious claims.

For the settlement to be enforced, 95 percent of the workers would need to agree to be bound by its terms.

The agreement comes with just two months to go until the first trials are to begin in the case. Thousands of police officers, firefighters and construction workers who put in time at the 16-acre site in lower Manhattan had filed lawsuits against the city, claiming it sent them to ground zero without proper protective equipment.

Third party to decide cases
Many of those workers now claim to have fallen ill. A majority complained of a respiratory problem similar to asthma, but the suits also sought damages for hundreds of other types of ailments, including cancer.

Lawyers for the city claimed it did its best to get respiratory equipment to everyone who needed it. They also had challenged some of the claims as based on the thinnest of medical evidence, noting that thousands of the people suing suffered from conditions common in the general population or from no illness at all.

Under the settlement, the task of deciding what each worker will be paid will fall to a neutral third party, to be picked by the two sides. Lawyers for the plaintiffs have previously said they favor Kenneth Feinberg, the special master who determined payouts from the federal fund set up to compensate victims of the terror attacks.

Payments will be based on a system that ranks each illness by severity and factors in potential exposure to the dust.

Some workers are likely to receive payments of only a few thousand dollars. Others could be in line to get more than $1 million, depending on their injuries.

A special insurance fund will be set up to cover workers who develop cancer in the future.

Trials postponed?
Lawyer Andrew Carboy, who represented a group of firefighters in the case, said he would urge them to accept the deal.

"The proposed settlement demonstrates that the justice system can tackle such a factually complicated and emotionally charged situation," he said. "The settlement, most importantly, will treat each worker as an individual. And their settlement will be based on the merits of their case."

Both sides in the case were scheduled to appear Friday afternoon before the federal judge handling the litigation, U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, who previously had said he favored a settlement but planned to analyze it carefully to make sure it was fair.

The settlement would mean a postponement or cancellation of the trials tentatively scheduled to begin in May. Some of the cases scheduled to be heard first included that of a firefighter who died of throat cancer and another who needed a lung transplant, as well as workers with less serious ailments, including a Consolidated Edison utility company employee with limited exposure to the debris pile and no current serious illness.

The $1 billion fund created by Congress to help insure the city has been depleted somewhat by the long legal battle in the case, with the bill so far running to more than $200 million.

The Worby, Groner, Edelman & Napoli, Bern law partnership, which represents 9,000 of the plaintiffs, is expected to take as much as a third or more of the total settlement in legal fees, based on contingency agreements it signed with each client.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35827352/ns/us_news-life/print/1/displaymode/1098/

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Police departments seeking more bilingual cops

NEW YORK - Police departments across the country are stepping up efforts to recruit officers who can speak more than one language, in some cases offering raises or even sending cops abroad as part of immersion programs.

Police chiefs hope the investment pays off by improving service to immigrant communities and easing fear of officers in those areas.

"To fight crime you have to be able to communicate," said Susan Shah of the Vera Institute of Justice in New York, which used a federal grant to review the language practices of nearly 200 law enforcement agencies nationwide.

New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly has emphasized hiring bilingual officers — especially those fluent in languages spoken in countries with terrorist ties.

"It helps immensely working with the communities in the city, the most diverse city in the world," Kelly said. "We can, in very short order, get someone on the scene who speaks the language."

That's what happened when a detective in Brooklyn heard shouting last week on a bus parked near an Arab-American community.

‘People need to feel they can trust you'
Ahmed Nasser, a native of Yemen, is one of roughly 11,000 members of the NYPD who can speak a second language. He found the bus driver accusing the passenger of not paying the fare and spitting on him.

The passenger, who was from Yemen, had already been handcuffed by a patrolman. He claimed the driver punched him, and his knee was bloodied.

Nasser spoke Arabic with the passenger, who also had a speech impediment. He was eventually let go, and neither he nor the bus driver was charged.

"People need to feel they can trust you," said Nasser, who also translates domestic violence pamphlets into Arabic. "They want to know you're really there and not to spy on you. Once they do, people will open up and talk."

One-third of NYPD employees can speak a second language. Of those, 785 are certified linguists, or expert translators, in 63 languages, including Bengali, Dari, Farsi, Arabic and Urdu. Bilingual officers do everything from intelligence gathering to undercover work to community outreach.

Third-party translators
But New York police do not rely solely on their own officers. Nearly all of the city's 76 precincts and most transit facilities are equipped with a dual-handset phone that can get a third-party translator instantly. The service costs about $1.1 million from now until June 2012, when the contract expires.

In Chicago, the nation's second-largest police force with roughly 13,000 officers, some 3,835 speak additional languages, most commonly Spanish, Polish and German. The department is also in its first year of requiring officers to take a 24-hour Spanish course during their academy training.

The Los Angeles Police Department gives raises to as many as 3,305 officers who become fluent in another language — one-third of the department. And in Dallas, where 358 members speak Spanish and another 20 or so speak Asian languages, officers can earn an extra $150 a month after they become certified that they are fluent in another language.

"We realize we have to expand our skills with the diversity of the city," Senior Cpl. Kevin Janse said.

Recent census data shows more than 20 percent of Americans speak a language other than English and 12 percent are foreign-born. Many smaller cities are also attracting increasing numbers of immigrants. Managing that change is a challenge for law enforcement.

In Lexington, Ky., officers spend a year practicing Spanish and are then sent to Mexico to improve their language skills and learn about the culture. The department's Spanish speakers have increased from two to more than 100, according to the Vera Institute.

Recruitment tough across country
Greg Ridgeway, director of the RAND Center on Quality Policing in Pittsburgh, said recruiting police is a nationwide problem, not only because of hiring cutbacks but because the supply of eligible candidates keeps shrinking.

Police departments are trying to tap into the same pool as federal law enforcement agencies and the armed forces — 25- to 35-year-olds in good shape who have little personal debt that could lure them into corruption.

But, he said, police departments, have achieved considerable success in attracting candidates from ethnic communities, especially newer ones where being an officer is seen as a respectable job.

For many New York officers, their second language is simply part of their culture. Officer Michael Belogorodsky, a native of Ukraine, helped investigate a suspected con artist who had targeted non-English speakers by posing as a travel agent. After speaking in Russian with several alleged suspects, police arrested a 40-year-old man and charged him with stealing more than $26,000 from a dozen people.

"I was fortunate enough to be able to get the information on these victims, contact them myself, jot down the information, keep it all together," said Belogorodsky, national president of the Russian American Officers Association. "When we had enough ... we contacted the district attorney's office."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35822392/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/print/1/displaymode/1098/

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From  the White House

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A New Era of Partnerships: Advisory Council on Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships Presents Final Report of Recommendations

This week, the President's Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships presented its final report of recommendations to senior Administration officials at a day-long briefing at the White House.

This first-of-its-kind White House advisory group made up of diverse religious and community non-profit leaders was appointed by the President last spring to develop recommendations on how the government can better partner with faith and neighborhood based organizations. The Council represented leaders from across religious, political and ideological lines, who came together in a spirit of civility and respect to address some of the most pressing issues facing government and nonprofits. They deliberated over months of proceedings and dozens of conference calls and developed more than 60 consensus recommendations.

The Council's recommendations included:

• Providing greater clarity on guidelines for how religious charities receive and utilize government funds to provide social services;
  
  
• Encouraging government to work with faith and community-based groups to streamline access to benefits for the unemployed and the most vulnerable;
  
  
• Promoting strategic partnerships between Fortune 500 companies, community organizations, domestic violence groups, veterans and those in the Fatherhood field to promote responsible father engagement in the lives of children; and
  
  
• Bringing the power of 370,000 houses of worship across the country to the fight of climate change by greening buildings and promoting environmental stewardship in their congregations.

The Council presented these recommendations to a powerhouse line up of Administration officials, including Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Kathleen Sebelius, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, Melody Barnes, Director of the Domestic Policy Council, Denis McDonough, Chief of Staff of the National Security Staff and Dr. Raj Shah, Administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development.  Council members then had a warm greeting with President Obama to receive his thanks and gratitude for their work.

We note with pride the respect and civility Council and Taskforce members have shown one another throughout this process. The White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships will be working with Administration officials to assess the recommendations, and we encourage you to review the entire Council report (pdf) .

Mara Vanderslice is the Deputy Director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships and the Coordinator of the President's Advisory Council

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/03/11/a-new-era-partnerships-advisory-council-faith-based-and-neighborhood-partnerships-pr

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From the FBI

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DELIVERING THE FUTURE

The Biometric Center of Excellence

03/11/10

You're seen it before in spy movies—someone gains access to a secret room through a thumbprint or eye scan.

It's not just fiction anymore. Systems like this now exist in both the private and public sectors. They're based on what's called “biometrics” —measurable behavioral and biological (anatomical as well as physiological) characteristics that can be used for recognition.

Over the years, biometrics has been incredibly useful to the FBI and its partners in the law enforcement and intelligence communities—not only to authenticate an individual's identity (you are who you say you are), but more importantly, to figure out who someone is (by a fingerprint left on a murder weapon or a bomb, for example), typically by scanning a database of records for a match.

FBI Biometrics Over the Years The FBI has been using various forms of biometric identification since its earliest days—from photographs and fingerprints in its first years (and assuming responsibility for managing the national fingerprint collection in 1924)…to our Laboratory's pioneering work on raising latent finger, palm, and other soft tissue prints from evidence…to applying handwriting analysis in the Lindbergh kidnapping case in 1932. In the 1960s, we began automating and computerizing our collections of biometric data. As technology advanced through the 1980s and into the 1990s, we revitalized our tried and true fingerprint processes by partnering with law enforcement to develop our Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS), which reduced response time of search requests from months to minutes. Now, we've begun development of the Next Generation Identification System, a logical evolution of IAFIS that will ultimately include additional forms of biometric identification—like faces, tattoos, and palm prints. In a related area, we began DNA analysis in our Laboratory in the late 1980s and sponsored the Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, which came online in the late 1990s. CODIS, which has revolutionized the use of the “genetic fingerprint” to establish guilt or innocence in criminal investigations, stores DNA profiles from around the country in a series of national, state, and local databases—all linked via computers for use by crime labs everywhere. And we continue to look to new scientific advances to increase the range and quality of our biometric identification capabilities.

The FBI has been a leader in biometrics for years. We began managing the nation's fingerprint collection back in 1924. Starting in the 1980s, we helped pioneer the use of DNA—a kind of “genetic fingerprint”—as a way to establish guilt or innocence in criminal investigations. More recently, we've begun exploring the addition of biometric identifiers like faces, tattoos, irises, and palm prints into our automated fingerprint system. See the sidebar for more details on our biometric initiatives over the years.

The BCOE will build upon our expertise in using biometric science and technology to solve cases and protect the nation. Key activities will include:

• Coordinating current FBI biometric systems—such as our systems for fingerprints and DNA—and exploring new biometric technologies that can be turned into usable tools for law enforcement and intelligence agencies;
  
  
• Engaging a team of experts to address privacy and other important legal, policy, and procedural issues related to the use of biometric systems.
  
  
• Working with partners in government (such as the Department of Defense), academia (like the University of West Virginia), and the private sector (such as the International Association for Identification) on research and development efforts;
  
  
• Ensuring interoperability between FBI biometric systems and other federal, state, and international biometric systems; and
  
  
• Developing biometric training for our law enforcement and intelligence partners, establishing biometric standards, and certifying biometric products.

Progress so far. Although it's just getting started, the BCOE already has some accomplishments under its belt: a 10-month study assessing the current biometric landscape and providing a roadmap for the future ; the creation of a Facial Identification Scientific Working Group; and soon, a new Biometric Center of Excellence website will be available to the public. 

In 2014, the BCOE will move into a new facility—the Biometrics Technology Center—co-located with the Department of Defense's Biometrics Task Force, a partnership that makes sense given our joint biometric collection and identification efforts in recent years in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

http://www.fbi.gov/page2/mar10/biometrics_031110.html

Statement Before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Ad Hoc Subcommittee on State, Local, and Private Sector Preparedness and Integration

Good morning Chairman Pryor, Ranking Member Ensign, and members of the subcommittee. I am pleased to be here today to discuss the FBI's efforts to combat public corruption.

The FBI recognizes that fighting public corruption is vital to preserving our democracy, protecting our borders, and securing our communities. In fact, it is one of our top investigative priorities, along with counterterrorism, counterintelligence, and cyber crimes. Whether in the back of a squad car, at a border crossing, in a courtroom, or within the halls of Congress, our public officials must carry out their duties in a just and legal manner.

We are directing resources to root out public corruption across the country, but we cannot and, fortunately, do not do it alone. We rely heavily on our partners at all levels of law enforcement. To address this particular threat, the FBI continues to focus on areas where our involvement will have a substantial and lasting impact and where the FBI has a specific skill or expertise that will contribute to the success of the operation or investigation. Often times we bring our expertise to bear on joint investigations with our partners in federal, state, and local law enforcement. We stand shoulder to shoulder to combat corrupt officials, both operationally and through the sharing of vital intelligence.

Through our vigilance, we have achieved some notable successes. In the past two years alone, our efforts have helped convict 1,600 federal, state, and local officials. We have another 3,200 public corruption cases pending, approximately 2,500 of which involve corruption of public officials. But more remains to be done. Because the interests at stake are so important and the magnitude of the problem so great, we have deployed approximately 700 agents to fight corruption around the country.

The Southwest border is a particular focus of our corruption-fighting efforts. Of the 700 agents leading our charge against public corruption, approximately 120 are working along the Southwest border. We coordinate our investigative efforts along the borders with the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General (DHS OIG), Customs and Border Protection Internal Affairs (CBP-IA), Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement - Office of Professional Responsibility. The result is over 400 public corruption cases originating from that region. In fiscal year (FY) 2009, there were over 100 arrests and over 130 state and federal cases prosecuted.

Our 12 border corruption task forces along the Southwest border share information with the Southwest Intelligence Group (SWIG), the El Paso Intelligence Center (EPIC), and Mexican legal attachés to both identify and disrupt Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) from utilizing and soliciting United States public officials to commit criminal activities.

Stronger cooperation with the governments of Mexico and countries in Central America is an interagency goal of the United States government and one that we are working hard to realize. Most recently, the FBI's McAllen office hosted 30 Mexican police officers from all levels of law enforcement—local, state, and federal—for a week of training and information sharing. The Mexican American Liaison and Law Enforcement Training, or MALLET, is a week-long program, featuring modules in ethics, firearms, and various investigative techniques to build law enforcement contacts with the Mexican government and foster international cooperation generally.

One particular case highlights the potential national security implications of public corruption along our nation's borders. In that case, an individual gained employment as a border inspector for the specific purpose of trafficking in drugs. Through our collaborative efforts and a year-long investigation, this former public official pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to import more than 1000 kilograms of marijuana into the United States and received more than $5 million in bribe payments. This individual has since been sentenced to 22 years in prison.

In another extensive undercover investigation, the FBI and its partners netted corrupt officials from 12 different federal, state, and local government agencies who allegedly used their positions to traffic in drugs. To date, 84 of those subjects have pled guilty to related charges.

While the threat posed in the region is real, the Southwest border is not and should not remain the only focus of our efforts. As with other criminal priorities, the FBI utilizes a threat-based, intelligence-driven proactive approach to combating all criminal enterprise. Through information sharing, collaboration, and coordination, we are able to identify and address threats early on.

The FBI recognizes the very real threat public corruption at our nation's borders and all other ports of entry pose. We are working lock-step with our law enforcement partners to address that threat. At FBI Headquarters, for example, we have established the National Border Corruption Task Force. Consisting of representatives from the FBI, DHS OIG, U.S. Customs and Border Protection - Internal Affairs, and TSA, this task force ensures general guidance and oversight of border corruption programs across the country.

Each day, the federal government is charged with protecting over 7,000 miles of land bordering Canada and Mexico, 95,000 miles of U.S. shoreline, and over 300 ports of entry across the United States. Each of these entry points has the potential for criminal and/or terrorist organizations to exploit corrupt officials willing to misuse their official positions for financial and/or personal gain.

In July 2008, for example, the FBI and DEA supported Canadian law enforcement in the arrest of eight people, including a customs agent, suspected of smuggling cocaine and marijuana, contraband cigarettes, and illegal immigrants over the Quebec-New York border. This underground network reportedly ferried hundreds of kilograms of cocaine from Colombia into Canada via the Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle border crossing. This is one of many investigations along our northern border.

In fact, in FY 2009 alone, FBI field offices along the nation's Canadian border conducted nearly 300 public corruption investigations. A corrupt border official might think that a bribe is sufficient payment for allowing a carload of drugs through the nation's borders. The ultimate cost, however, might be significantly higher if that carload includes members of a terrorist cell or ingredients for a weapon of mass destruction.

Through trend analysis, intelligence and information sharing, and the utilization of lessons learned and best practices, we are uniquely positioned to address the very real threat of border corruption and the risk it poses to our national security head-on.

To that end, our National Border Corruption Task Force is coordinating with other impacted divisions at FBI Headquarters. These include the FBI's Directorate of Intelligence, Counterintelligence Division, Counterterrorism Division, and Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate. By working together, sharing information, and becoming more nimble in our approach, we are making great strides.

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to testify before you today and share the FBI's work in combating public corruption. I am now happy to answer any questions.

http://www.fbi.gov/congress/congress10/perkins031110.htm

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