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From the Los Angeles Times

LEBANON: Employers hurt foreign maids with impunity, rights group says

Justice Lebanese-style: A Lebanese employer in 1999 beat and burned two maids with a hot iron. 

The employer received a fine of  $ 333. 

In a new report  presented at a news conference in Beirut on Thursday, the New York-based rights group Human Rights Watch offered some troubling statistics on the Lebanese justice system's track record for protecting the rights of migrant workers in Lebanon.

The 54-page study, titled "Without Protection," concluded that the Lebanese judiciary generally failed to protect the rights of foreign maids who accuse their employers of mistreating them and that employers accused of abuse frequently go unpunished or only receive light sentences. 

The report also found that migrant workers face many obstacles to justice in Lebanon, resulting in their reluctance to report abuse to the authorities.

For the report, Human Rights Watch conducted a review of 114 Lebanese judicial decisions and police reports affecting domestic workers. It also conducted interviews with several lawyers and diplomats and nearly 30 domestic workers, among others.

In not one of the more than 100 cases reviewed did researchers find that an employer faced charges for incidents such locking their live-in maids inside the house for long periods of time, starving them or confiscating their passports.

According to Human Rights Watch's statistics, the Lebanese judiciary even appears to go easy on employers when it comes to cases involving accusations of severe abuse and mistreatment of domestic workers. An example would be a case from 1998 in which an employer beat a maid from Sri Lanka to death and was given an 18-month jail sentence.

Nadim Houry, Beirut director for Human Rights Watch, warns that wide-scale impunity for employers accused of abuse sets a dangerous precedent.

"Bad employers know that they will not be held accountable," he told Babylon & Beyond."The importance of the judiciary is not just for the cases at hand, but to send a strong message of deterrence. Workers are denied justice, and the Lebanese judicial system -- which is supposed to protect them from abusive employers -- ends up being complicit in the violations."

Domestic workers themselves face a myriad of obstacles in pursuit of justice.

Among the bigger problems they face, Houry told reporters at the news conference, are the lack of information pamphlets outlining the rights of foreign maids in Lebanon, written in their own languages; lengthy judicial processes (especially when workers are the plaintiffs); restrictive visa policies and the country's kafeel , or sponsorship system.

If a maid leaves her kafeel , or employer, who is sponsoring her stay in Lebanon -- even to file a legal complaint -- the worker immediately loses the right to live in Lebanon and could face time in detention and deportation, according to Human Rights Watch.

Lebanese law enforcement and judicial officials add to the domestics' misery, Houry said.

"Policemen, prosecutors, judges ... consider certain behavior normal [like locking a worker in, or keeping her passport, or not giving her a day off] even though the penal code considers forced confinement a crime. So they are insensitive to certain behaviors," he said.

Human Rights Watch estimates that about 200,000 migrant domestic workers, mainly from Sri Lanka, Ethiopia, the Philippines and Nepal, are employed in Lebanese households.

Previous media reports and research by rights groups suggest the workers suffer from very high death rates. The deaths of eight domestic workers were reported in the country during the last month, and a 2008 report from Human Rights Watch said that on average one domestic worker dies each week in Lebanon.

Given the alarming statistics, a number of local human rights organizations and foreign embassies have set up shelters and hot lines for maids in need. In June, the Lebanese Ministry of Labor set up its own hot line for workers' complaints.

Gilbert Asuque, the Philippines' ambassador to Lebanon, told Babylon & Beyond that his embassy is housing 98 Filipino domestic workers in its shelter and that the embassy staff has set up a 24-hour hot line for their citizens in Lebanon.

Wm Primarathmam, the Sri Lankan consul in Lebanon, told Babylon & Beyond that his embassy also offers a shelter for maids claiming abuse and that the embassy now checks up on host families before the maids' arrival in Lebanon.

"We contact the ladies who are coming, the sponsors and the agencies. If the contract and the pay is OK, we approve," he said. "After they arrive, we contact them after one month, then two months, then three months ... to minimize all the problems."

Human Rights Watch called on Lebanese authorities to provide foreign maids with access to legal aid and interpreters, reform the sponsorship system and launch a special labor inspection unit to monitor households and create a list of blacklisted employers.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2010/09/lebanon-domestic-workers-abuse-rape-maids-ethiopia-phillippines-failure-justice-court-police-securit.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BabylonBeyond+%28Babylon+%26+Beyond+Blog%29

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Native Americans and others demonstrate through downtown Seattle to protest the shooting of John T. Williams, a troubled but popular woodcarver.

Seattle in turmoil over police-involved shootings The killing of a Native American is the latest to prompt scrutiny of rules on using force. By Kim Murphy, Los Angeles Times September 17, 2010 Reporting from Seattle John T. Williams was a fixture in downtown Seattle with his carving knife and blocks of wood, which he fashioned into artful totems characteristic of the DididahtFirst Nation, his Canadian native tribe. He drank heavily and was hard of hearing in one ear, to the point that Williams — known for telling elaborate stories about the characters in his totems — was often incoherent and oblivious, said several of his friends and relatives. He didn't drop his 3-inch knife when a Seattle police officer ordered him three times to do so at a crowded downtown intersection on Aug. 30.

Did he hear the order? Was he thinking of turning his knife into a weapon? These are questions for which answers may never be known. A little more than a minute after the officer stepped out of his car, Williams lay dying on the sidewalk with four gunshot wounds to the chest.

The case is one of a wave of shootings and beatings involving the Seattle Police Department, prompting widespread public demand for a rethinking on the use-of-force policies and policing in minority communities, particularly one of its biggest and least understood, Native Americans.

Newly installed Chief John Diaz this week announced a top-end overhaul to ramp up training and reemphasize community relations in a department that recently earned national praise for its neighborhood policing.

"We have lost some of that through the years, that sense of connection, the social fabric that keeps all of us together," Diaz said this week. "We really are talking about building peace in every one of those contacts. We can't get them right 99% of the time. We have to try to get them right 100% of the time."

Lately, the average hasn't been close.

In April, Seattle police made national headlines with a video of a gang detective stomping a Latino man who was prone on a sidewalk and warning that he was going to "beat the … Mexican piss out of you, homey. You feel me?"

In June, another video emerged. This time, an officer was seen punching a 17-year-old African American girl in the face when she intervened in the arrest of her girlfriend for jaywalking.

The worst string of violence began in August, with three officer-involved shootings in three weeks. During the same period, a knife-wielding man was shot to death by police in neighboring Tacoma and a 74-year-old Baptist pastor investigating a noise in the nursery next to his home late at night was shot to death by a sheriff's deputy after he allegedly moved to pull out a gun.

Diaz said he would ask two outside police departments to independently review the Williams inquiry once it was completed.

"This incident raises, as do other incidents in the past, very serious concerns about the preparation of our officers and concerns about racial profiling within the department," said Mayor Mike McGinn. "The can of worms is open."

Williams was shot by Ian Birk, 27, who had been with the department for two years. Williams, 50, was a longtime fixture on the downtown scene, coming from a Canadian First Nation family known for more than five generations for their traditional carvings.

"We've been buying from the Williams family since about 1904," said Alex Castas, general manager of Ye Olde Curiosity Shop, one of the city's best-known waterfront tourist businesses. "John was a fantastic carver, maybe the best that I've seen."

At the Downtown Emergency Service Center, where Williams was in housing for chronic alcoholics, administration director Nicole Macri said Williams often regaled the staff and residents with stories about the creatures in his carvings. Yet he could be aggressive when drunk, as he frequently was, and on at least two occasions he was accused of aggressively touching and exposing himself to staff members.

"John's life experiences were complicated. They cannot be simplified to say he was a harmless individual and therefore he should not have been shot by the police. Maybe he should not have been shot, but it's not because he never hurt anyone in his life," Macri said.

"But saying that, he was very well-loved by many people who worked here, and by many of the clients and residents of the building where he lived."

The center was holding a memorial service for Williams on Thursday. Separately, a street march was held through downtown, beginning at the shooting scene.

Holding one of Williams' totems aloft and beating Native American drums, about 200 protesters marched to City Hall. Some hooted Indian battle cries. "John T. was murdered: Who's next?" shouted one woman.

On Wednesday, a City Council committee took testimony from a crowd of more than 200 who urged the city to adopt better training on policing of the Native American community and on techniques for deescalating conflicts.

"This is plain murder is what it is," Robert Satiacun, a relative of Williams' who hosts a local Native American talk radio program, told the council. "I think we have a last-straw scenario going here. The natives are restless, and we better come up with some answers pretty tout de suite."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-seattle-police-shooting-20100917,0,3226229.story

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A formula for foster care success

Two products of California's foster care system urge the governor to sign AB 12, which would enable the state to collect federal dollars dedicated to boosting foster kids' chances of success.

OPINION

By Miles Cooley and George White

September 17, 2010

A partner in a large Los Angeles law firm and a 17-year-old kid from Compton wouldn't appear to have a lot in common. But both of our lives have been indelibly marked by the violence and neglect in our early lives, and changed by California's foster care system. So we speak from experience when we urge Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to sign a bill (AB 12) that would enable our state to collect federal dollars dedicated to boosting foster kids' chances of success.

Miles was kidnapped and held for days by drug dealers in Sacramento when he was 2 years old, and at just 5 years old found his mother dead of a drug overdose. He entered the foster care system at age 6 and experienced a world of upheaval in the early years before finding his way to college and eventually earning a law degree from UC Berkeley.

George is from gang-infested Compton, lived in six foster homes, moved from school to school and yet graduated from high school last year and now attends college.

Ours are among the few foster care stories with happy endings. Most of our peers in foster care wind up homeless, incarcerated or dead. Most foster youth are kicked out of the program and left on their own at the age of 18, so it is no surprise that more than half of former foster youth are arrested or in jail, according to a 2010 study from Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago.

The fact that more than half of foster youth will be unemployed and that more than 25% will be homeless on turning 18 no doubt contributes to that grim statistic. Pregnancy, prostitution, drugs, violence and poor health also often follow unemployment, homelessness and lack of guidance.

Well-regarded academic studies have shown that when young adults stay in foster care until age 21, their outlook for education, housing stability and mental health dramatically improve. Those three additional years of support help keep these young people safe, in school, off the streets and out of jail. A 2009 University of Washington study concluded that supporting California youth in foster care after age 18 returns $2.41 for every state dollar committed.

We were among the few exceptions who found additional support in the current system. Miles was fortunate to find a foster parent who kept him in her home for three years after high school so he could attend community college and then transfer to a four-year university. Currently, most foster youth do not have a stable environment after foster care.

George had the support of one of the few nonprofit agencies able to provide a stable environment, which allowed him to graduate from high school and attend college. There are too few nonprofits to provide such support, and the ones that exist have been forced to cut services.

The statistics are grim, but we know firsthand the difference that supporting foster youth until age 21 can make.

The California Fostering Connections to Success Act, AB 12, passed in August and awaiting the governor's signature, would take advantage of new federal money specifically set aside for expanding foster care. California would not have to spend a single new dollar from the state's general fund.

The governor started his California political career by signing the landmark Proposition 49, creating afterschool programs for the children of our state. Now, he has the opportunity to sign into law AB 12, perhaps the most important piece of bipartisan legislation in the history of our state.

Both of us emerged from our experiences in foster care with a message of hope: Foster youth are not broken people; they are resilient and smart, with latent talents and hopes. This is why AB 12 must be signed into law if there are to be more like us. Let us put the most vulnerable among us — at-risk foster youth — before politics.

Miles Cooley is a partner in a Los Angeles law firm and a board member of the John Burton Foundation. George White is attending his first year at Columbia College Hollywood. Both serve on the board of directors of Peace4Kids, a private nonprofit that provides direct services to youth in foster care.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-cooley-fostercare-20100917,0,3683946,print.story

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Good for California foster care

The governor should sign AB 12, which would align our foster care programs with new federal guidelines while pumping millions of dollars of federal money into the state.

OPINION

September 17, 2010

For years, Washington and Sacramento foolishly threw away money by paying to place abused and neglected children with strangers, even after studies and experience showed conclusively that most would be better off with members of their extended families. Finally, in the last several years, policy has caught up with reality and government is ready to provide smarter, more cost-effective and results-oriented support to steer foster children to successful, independent adulthood. All that remains to get California on track is Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's signature on AB 12, the landmark bill to align programs here with new, rational federal guidelines while pumping millions of dollars of federal money into the state — money that otherwise would be left on the table.

Were the bill in front of the governor in any other year, undoubtedly he would sign it without hesitation to secure his legacy — not yet widely known — of improving the prospects for California's thousands of abused and neglected children. But this year presents a quandary, with the state nearly $20 billion in the hole and without a spending plan a record 79 days after the constitutional budget deadline. The bill would make the state more humane and in the long run more efficient, but in the short run it requires new spending. Failing to sign would be foolish, but signing would commit to spending money we don't have. What should he do?

Fine-tuning in the final days of the legislative session, driven by the Schwarzenegger administration and child advocates, has made an already smart bill more prudent and responsive to budget reality. A badly needed transitional housing program to ensure that foster children don't end up on the street when they turn 18 would still be funded, but within an existing spending allocation. Counties, which otherwise would have to foot the bill for government's failure to steer children in its care to adulthood, would pay nearly $9 million of the cost of helping former foster kids make it to age 21 while getting work or into college. Those changes remove more than a third of the state general fund costs that otherwise would have been added to the state budget.

Further savings would be realized by limiting the number of youths who can be placed in costly group homes, which should be used primarily as specialized care facilities for those with particular needs. And as a necessary concession to fiscal reality, new support for adults aging out of foster care would be delayed and staggered over a three-year period. Significantly, the Legislature and the next governor would have the power to review the progress of the program and to decide in 2014 whether to complete the job by making the final appropriation for adults completing the transition from foster care.

Schwarzenegger should sign the bill without further delay.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-0917-foster-20100917,0,3532130,print.story

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From the New York Times

Roma, on Move, Test Europe's ‘Open Borders'

BUCHAREST, Romania — This city is full of stark, Soviet-era housing blocks, and the grimmest among them — gray towers of one-room apartments with communal bathrooms and no hot water — are given over to the Roma population.

Roma like Maria Murariu, 62, who tends to her dying husband in a foul-smelling room no bigger than a jail cell. She has not found work in five years.

“There is not much for us in Romania,” she said recently, watching her husband sleep. “And now that we are in the European Union , we have the right to go to other countries. It is better there.”

Thousands of Romania's Roma, also known as Gypsies, have come to a similar conclusion in recent years, heading for the relative wealth of Western Europe, and setting off a clash within the European Union over just how open its “open borders” are.

A summit meeting of European leaders on Thursday degenerated into open discord over how to handle the unwanted immigrants. President Nicolas Sarkozy of France vowed to keep dismantling immigrant camps and angrily rejected complaints from European Commission officials that the French authorities were illegally singling out Roma for deportation.

Migration within the 27 nations of the European Union has become a combustible issue during the economic downturn. The union's latest expansion, which brought in the relatively poor nations of Romania and Bulgaria in 2007, has renewed concern that the poor, traveling far from home in search of work, will become a burden on wealthier countries. The migration of the Roma is also raising questions about the obligations of Romania and Bulgaria to fulfill promises they made when they joined the union. Romania, for instance, mapped out a strategy for helping the Roma, but financed little of it. Mr. Sarkozy has demanded that the Romanian government do more to aid the Roma at home.

Much of Western Europe has reacted with hostility to itinerant Roma, who often have little education or practical skills. Some Roma have found marginal jobs collecting scrap iron or painting houses. But others have signed up for welfare or drifted into begging and petty thievery, living in unsightly camp sites.

In recent weeks, Mr. Sarkozy has tried to revive his support on the political right by deporting thousands of them, offering 300 euros, about $392, to those who go home voluntarily, and bulldozing their encampments.

The European Commission has threatened legal action against Paris over the deportation, calling it disgraceful and illegal.

The dispute peaked at lunch Thursday between Mr. Sarkozy and José Manuel Barroso , the president of the commission, the European Union's executive body.

“There was a big argument — I could also say a scandal — between the president of the European Commission and the French president,” said the Bulgarian prime minister, Boyko Borisov, according to the Bulgarian daily Dnevnik.

Mr. Sarkozy denied a major rift, and remained unswayed. “We will continue to dismantle the illegal camps, whoever is there,” he said at a news conference. “Europe cannot close its eyes to illegal camps.”

Expulsions seem unlikely to offer a long-term solution. Many of the deported Roma are already planning their return.

Privately, some Romanian officials snicker over the French action. “They are just giving the Roma a paid vacation,” one official said.

Still, advocates for the Roma hope that the latest conflict will force the European Union to get serious about helping the Roma, who are openly reviled in most Eastern and Central European countries where they have lived in large numbers for centuries, most often under appalling conditions.

“There is nothing to focus the minds of policy makers like an army of poor people heading your way,” said Bernard Rorke, the director of Roma Initiatives for the nonprofit Open Society Foundation.

There is little reliable data on the Roma population. Originally from India, the Roma were virtual slaves until the 19th century, working for aristocrats and in monasteries.

When democracy took hold, they were freed. But they were landless, uneducated and dark-skinned, and they had few prospects.

Human rights activists say that Roma women are often sent to separate maternity wards. Their children, when they attend school, are frequently steered into classes for the mentally handicapped.

In Romania, one census counted 500,000 Roma. But some advocates say the number is closer to two million.

Those who make it out of abject poverty rarely admit their ancestry — a factor that makes it harder for Roma to combat the discrimination they face, advocates say.

In the years that Romania was negotiating to get into the European Union, it promised programs to help the Roma integrate into Romanian society.

But government officials concede that few materialized. “I think you will see the current administration do better,” said Ilie Dinca, the director of the Romanian National Agency for Roma.

Budget cutbacks have hurt the few successful efforts that exist. Hundreds of mediators hired to help the Roma get their children into school and receive health benefits have been fired recently.

“What you see here these days is terrible conditions,” said Nicolae Stoica, who runs Roma Access, an advocacy group. “They have no hope of getting jobs. If they get 20 euros a month from collecting scrap metal, that's a lot. How can we tell them not to go to France and beg on the streets?”

Flortina Ghita, 21, said her family once lived in a building in the center of Constanta, Romania's second largest city. But city officials evicted them, saying the buildings had structural damage. The family now lives in shacks made of carpets, scraps of corrugated tin and plastic sheeting set up not far from railroad tracks. The only source of water is a train station more than a mile away.

Mrs. Ghita said her family had been told to fill out forms to get housing, but no one can read. Her son, Sorim, 5, is not in school, she said, because she cannot afford the clothing, notebooks and class fees.

Still, the Ghita family was savvy enough about Europe. Mrs. Ghita had paperwork showing that her mother had been to Belgium for medical care. “Her sister lives there and she helped us,” Mrs. Ghita said.

Experts say the Roma population has been battered by a combination of factors. Crafts that once sustained them, such as making brass pots and shoeing horses, are now obsolete. Recent European regulations standardizing the sale of livestock pushed them out of one of their few remaining businesses because they could not handle the required paperwork.

Some aspects of Gypsy culture have not helped matters, experts say. It is a clannish, strongly patriarchal society where youngsters are pushed into early marriage and education has not been much valued.

Not all Roma are poor, however. In the village of Barbulesti, about 40 miles northeast of Bucharest, there are signs of success. The village is a bright cluster of mustard- and ketchup-colored houses, with gaudy turrets and ornate gutters, many still under construction.

The village has a Roma mayor, Ion Cutitaru, 59, the only one in the country, he says. He estimates that a third of the village's 7,000 residents have moved to Western Europe. They look for work there, he says, but beg when they can find nothing else.

“They make do,” he said, “and then they come back and build their houses.”

Twenty-eight Roma residents from Barbulesti were recently expelled from France. Among them was Ionel Costache, 30, who said he would return to France in a week or two.

“My son, who had eye problems, he got a 7,000-euro operation there that he would never have gotten here. And when you don't have work, you can still eat with their social assistance,” he said. “France is a much better place than Romania.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/world/europe/17roma.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&ref=world&adxnnlx=1284721052-poy7sidLPXFLSRzzMV2H9Q&pagewanted=print

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South Korea Sends Food Aid to North

SEOUL, South Korea — A convoy of trucks crossed the border with North Korea on Friday, carrying food aid to North Korea for the first time in nearly three years, as officials from both Koreas met to discuss reunions of families separated by the Korean War six decades ago.

The humanitarian gestures followed months of tensions set off when a South Korean warship sank in March in what Seoul concluded was a North Korean torpedo attack. Forty-six sailors died in the incident.

Nine trucks carried a total of 203 tons of rice that civic groups and opposition political parties in South Korea have donated for victims of recent flooding in North Korea.

The shipment followed 530 tons of flour a South Korean provincial government and civic groups sent by truck to the North on Thursday. The shipment of rice, the staple food of Koreans, came ahead of the full-moon harvest Korean holiday of Chuseok next week.

Since President Lee Myung-bak came to power in Seoul in early 2008, Seoul has been reluctant to provide rice, or any other large shipment of aid, to the North until Pyongyang moved toward giving up nuclear weapons . The sinking of the ship further soured inter-Korean relations.

In the past week, however, Seoul approved the civic groups' aid shipments, as well as a separate Red Cross plan to send 5,000 tons of rice. The approval followed conciliatory gestures from North Korea, including a proposal to resume a Red Cross program of arranging temporary reunions of families split by the 1950-53 war.

In the North Korean border town of Kaesong, officials from both Koreas discussed the date, venue and size of the proposed reunions. The last such reunions were held a year ago.

North Korea wanted to hold the reunions at its Diamond Mountain resort in late October, Chun Hae-sung, a government spokesman in Seoul, said. South Korea demanded that the two sides make reunions regular and more frequent to allow aging Koreans to reunite, although briefly, with their relatives before they die.

North Korea denies it sank the South Korean ship, but Seoul and Washington toughened sanctions against the North. Recent flooding was expected to worsen food shortages in the North, which even in a year of good harvest, cannot produce enough to feed its estimated 23 million population properly.

Both U.S. and South Korean officials insist that North Korea should make more gestures of reconciliation toward South Korea before six-party talks can resume on ending the North's nuclear weapons program. Seoul suspects that North Korea wants to restart six-party talks to divert attention from the ship sinking and to weaken international resolve to implement sanctions.

“I don't think six-party talks can proceed properly without improvement in relations between the Koreas,” said Hyun In-taek, the unification minister of South Korea, during a speech at a forum in Seoul on Friday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/18/world/asia/18korea.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Educating Women Saves Children, Study Finds

LONDON (AP) — Giving young women an education resulted in saving the lives of more than four million children worldwide in 2009, according to a new study published Friday.

American researchers analyzed 915 censuses and surveys from 175 countries tracking education, economic growth, H.I.V. infection rates and child deaths from 1970 to 2009.

By using statistical models, the researchers found that for every extra year of education women had, the death rate for children under 5 dropped by almost 10 percent. They estimated that 4.2 million fewer children died in 2009 than in 1970 because women of child-bearing age in developing countries were more educated. In 1970, women in developing countries ages 18 to 44 had attended about two years of school. In 2009, it was about seven years.

The study was paid for by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and was published Friday in the London-based medical publication Lancet .

“Investments in education pay off” by providing better health in the future, said the study's lead author, Emmanuela Gakidou, an associate professor at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington .

Educated women tend to use health services more and often make better choices on hygiene, nutrition and parenting.

“This reminds us that in addition to having crucial interventions like immunization, we need to invest more into education,” said Dr. Mickey Chopra, the health chief at Unicef , who was not involved in the research. Dr. Chopra said more money should be invested in education but not at the expense of health programs.

Professor Gakidou said considerable progress had been made in Asia and Latin America, where women in some countries are more educated than men. But she noted a dismal situation in six countries where women typically go to school for less than a year: Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Niger and Yemen.

Not everyone was convinced that the study's conclusions were right.

“It sounds plausible that education is related to child mortality, but finding a correlation does not prove causation,” said William Easterly, a professor of economics at New York University who specializes in foreign aid.

He questioned the statistical methods used in the paper and said the authors had not adequately considered other factors that might have been responsible for the fall in child deaths.

Others said the focus should be on economic development rather than on specific health or education initiatives.

“Education is not much good if the health facilities and infrastructure don't exist,” said Philip Stevens, a senior fellow at International Policy Network, a London-based research institute. “If a country is massively misgoverned, like Sierra Leone, no amount of education is going to put bread on the table for children.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/world/europe/17london.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Recession Raises Poverty Rate to a 15-Year High

The percentage of Americans struggling below the poverty line in 2009 was the highest it has been in 15 years, the Census Bureau reported Thursday, and interviews with poverty experts and aid groups said the increase appeared to be continuing this year.

With the country in its worst economic crisis since the Great Depression , four million additional Americans found themselves in poverty in 2009, with the total reaching 44 million, or one in seven residents. Millions more were surviving only because of expanded unemployment insurance and other assistance.

And the numbers could have climbed higher: One way embattled Americans have gotten by is sharing homes with siblings, parents or even nonrelatives, sometimes resulting in overused couches and frayed nerves but holding down the rise in the national poverty rate, according to the report.

The share of residents in poverty climbed to 14.3 percent in 2009, the highest level recorded since 1994. The rise was steepest for children, with one in five affected, the bureau said.

The report provides the most detailed picture yet of the impact of the recession and unemployment on incomes, especially at the bottom of the scale. It also indicated that the temporary increases in aid provided in last year's stimulus bill eased the burdens on millions of families.

For a single adult in 2009, the poverty line was $10,830 in pretax cash income; for a family of four, $22,050.

Given the depth of the recession, some economists had expected an even larger jump in the poor.

“A lot of people would have been worse off if they didn't have someone to move in with,” said Timothy M. Smeeding, director of the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin .

Dr. Smeeding said that in a typical case, a struggling family, like a mother and children who would be in poverty on their own, stays with more prosperous parents or other relatives.

The Census study found an 11.6 percent increase in the number of such multifamily households over the last two years. Included in that number was James Davis, 22, of Chicago, who lost his job as a package handler for Fed Ex in February 2009. As he ran out of money, he and his 2-year-old daughter moved in with his mother about a year ago, avoiding destitution while he searched for work.

“I couldn't afford rent,” he said.

Danise Sanders, 31, and her three children have been sleeping in the living room of her mother and sister's one-bedroom apartment in San Pablo, Calif., for the last month, with no end in sight. They doubled up after the bank foreclosed on her landlord, forcing her to move.

“It's getting harder,” said Ms. Sanders, who makes a low income as a mail clerk. “We're all pitching in for rent and bills.”

There are strong signs that the high poverty numbers have continued into 2010 and are probably still rising, some experts said, as the recovery sputters and unemployment remains near 10 percent.

“Historically, it takes time for poverty to recover after unemployment starts to go down,” said LaDonna Pavetti , a welfare expert at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal-leaning research group in Washington.

Dr. Smeeding said it seemed almost certain that poverty would further rise this year. He noted that the increase in unemployment and poverty had been concentrated among young adults without college educations and their children, and that these people remained at the end of the line in their search for work.

One indirect sign of continuing hardship is the rise in food stamp recipients, who now include nearly one in seven adults and an even greater share of the nation's children. While other factors as well as declining incomes have driven the rise, by mid-2010 the number of recipients had reached 41.3 million, compared with 39 million at the beginning of the year.

Food banks , too, report swelling demand.

“We're seeing more younger people coming in that not only don't have any food, but nowhere to stay,” said Marla Goodwin, director of Jeremiah's Food Pantry in East St. Louis, Ill. The pantry was open one day a month when it opened in 2008 but expanded this year to five days a month.

And Texas food banks said they distributed 14 percent more food in the second quarter of 2010 than in the same period last year.

The Census report showed increases in poverty for whites, blacks and Hispanic Americans, with historic disparities continuing. The poverty rate for non-Hispanic whites was 9.4 percent, for blacks 25.8 percent and for Hispanics 25.3 percent. The rate for Asians was unchanged at 12.5 percent.

The median income of all households stayed roughly the same from 2008 to 2009. It had fallen sharply the year before, as the recession gained steam and remains well below the levels of the late 1990s — a sign of the stagnating prospects for the middle class.

The decline in incomes in 2008 had been greater than expected, and when the two recession years are considered together, the decline since 2007 was 4.2 percent, said Lawrence Katz, an economist at Harvard. Gains achieved earlier in the decade were wiped out, and median family incomes in 2009 were 5 percent lower than in 1999.

“This is the first time in memory that an entire decade has produced essentially no economic growth for the typical American household,” Mr. Katz said.

The number of United States residents without health insurance climbed to 51 million in 2009, from 46 million in 2008, the Census said. Their ranks are expected to shrink in coming years as the health care overhaul adopted by Congress in March begins to take effect.

Government benefits like food stamps and tax credits, which can provide hundreds or even thousands of dollars in extra income, are not included in calculating whether a family's income falls above or below the poverty line.

But rises in the cost of housing, medical care or energy and the large regional differences in the cost of living are not taken into account either.

If food-stamp benefits and low-income tax credits were included as income, close to 8 million of those labeled as poor in the report would instead be just above the poverty line, the Census report estimated. At the same time, a person who starts a job and receives the earned income tax credit could have new work-related expenses like transportation and child care. Unemployment benefits, which are considered cash income and included in the calculations, helped keep 3 million families above the line last year, the report said, with temporary extensions and higher payments helping all the more.

The poverty line is a flawed measure, experts agree, but it remains the best consistent long-term gauge of need available, and its ups and downs reflect genuine trends.

The federal government will issue an alternate calculation next year that will include important noncash and after-tax income and also account for regional differences in the cost of living.

But it will continue to calculate the rate in the old way as well, in part because eligibility for many programs, from Medicaid to free school lunches, is linked to the longstanding poverty line.

Reporting was contributed by Rebecca Cathcart in Los Angeles, Emma Graves Fitzsimmons in Chicago, Malcolm Gay in St. Louis, Robert Gebeloff in New York and Malia Wollan in San Francisco.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/us/17poverty.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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The Recession's Awful Impact

OPINION

The Census Bureau's latest report on poverty and health insurance coverage is bleak. With millions of Americans out of work, it could hardly be otherwise.

The record number of people last year without health insurance — 50.7 million, up from 46.3 million in 2008 — provides stark evidence of why the country desperately needs the health care reforms enacted in March. It is also another reminder of why government safety-net programs, despite all of the recent demagoguery, are so essential in times of trouble.

The report details the recession's huge human toll. The number of people living in poverty last year climbed to almost 43.6 million, up from 39.8 million in 2008. The percentage of people living in poverty also climbed — to 14.3 percent, the highest rate since 1994. Poverty was defined as pretax cash income below about $22,000 for a family of four.

Federal assistance kept the damage from being even worse. Expanded unemployment benefits helped keep three million families above the poverty line. Food stamps and tax credits helped ease the pain for millions.

The driving force for the huge jump in the number of uninsured was a 6.5 million drop in private health care coverage as employers laid off workers or eliminated health benefits. The percentage of people covered by employment-based health insurance dropped to 55.8 percent in 2009 from 58.5 percent the previous year. That is the lowest level of employer coverage since 1987.

Again government programs picked up some of the slack. Medicaid, in particular, performed yeoman work, covering many of the laid-off workers with low incomes. That put a further strain on state budgets.

The new health reform law will ease these problems. It will greatly expand Medicaid for the poor (mostly at the federal government's expense) and will provide subsidies to middle-income people to help buy policies on new insurance exchanges. Most of these changes start in 2014, but some measures, such as tax credits to help small businesses cover their employees, will help people retain coverage right now.

These latest dismal numbers from the Census Bureau underscore why health care reform is vital. And they show, once again, why Republican vows to repeal it are exactly what the country doesn't need.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/opinion/17fri2.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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30 Years Later, Freedom in a Case With Tragedy for All Involved

HATTIESBURG, Miss. — A little after 10 o'clock on Thursday morning, it was all up to Phillip Bivens. Just like that. The judge adjourned the hearing and Mr. Bivens, standing in a red jumpsuit in the corner of the courtroom, could all of a sudden do anything he wanted. After 30 years in prison, he was not sure what that was.

“Take it easy, I guess,” he said. “Try to ease my mind.”

Mr. Bivens, 59, and Bobby Ray Dixon, 53, two men who were serving life sentences, were exonerated by a judge on Thursday morning, their guilty pleas to the charge of murder erased. The judge said it was likely that another man, Larry Ruffin, would soon be cleared for the same murder.

There was no special hurry in his case. Mr. Ruffin died in prison eight years ago.

The expected ruling would be one of only a handful of posthumous exonerations nationwide, and taken with Thursday's events, a rare triple exoneration.

Nonetheless, said Emily Maw, the director of the Innocence Project of New Orleans , the law center that pressed for the men's release, the case has been nothing but a series of tragedies.

On a warm night in early May 1979, a man broke into the home of Eva Gail Patterson, raped her and cut her throat in front of her 4-year-old son. Ms. Patterson, whose 2-year-old was sleeping in the next room and whose husband was working offshore on an oil platform, stumbled to her neighbor's carport, where she collapsed and died. The 4-year-old, Luke, told the police that a single man, “a bad boy,” had killed his mother.

Larry Ruffin, 19 at the time, was picked up a few days later. The night of the murder he had been on leave from a halfway house, where he was sent after stealing some beer from a store. Over the next few weeks, he gave several statements, contradictory on many points but all conforming to the same basic storyline: He had raped and killed Ms. Patterson, and he had acted alone.

Mr. Ruffin soon recanted, however, saying that he had been physically coerced by law enforcement officials into confessing, and maintained his innocence. Over a year later, just before Mr. Ruffin's trial was set to begin, the police interviewed Mr. Dixon, who had been with Mr. Ruffin at the halfway house at the same time. Mr. Dixon told them that Mr. Ruffin had killed Ms. Patterson, but said that he had been with him that night. Mr. Dixon, who pleaded guilty to murder, apparently said Mr. Bivens was with them as well, though no records exist of that first interview.

Mr. Bivens, who had returned to his home in California several months earlier, was arrested by police officers who showed up at his door one night.

“I'd never been on a airplane before,” he said on a car ride out of Mississippi after the hearing. “I thought they were going to kill me. I thought they were going to get me up there and push me out.”

Back in Hattiesburg, he was told he could be facing the death penalty unless he pleaded guilty. Law enforcement officials showed him pictures of the crime scene and asked what he remembered, he said. He had never met Mr. Dixon before, he said, but, fearing for his life, he backed up Mr. Dixon's account.

“All of these things, it's hard to push them out of my mind,” he said on the car ride, staring out the window. “I don't like to think about it. I feel like I should have been stronger than that.”

The trial, in the winter of 1980, was based almost exclusively on the three statements.

On the stand, Mr. Dixon, who described himself as a “hard learner” who could barely read, began to contradict his own testimony. Finally, he said that he had not been with the other two that night and that he did not even know what Ms. Patterson looked like. He said that he had been kicked in the head by a horse as a child and ever since had suffered seizures.

“I don't have the right mind,” he said on the witness stand. “My mind comes and goes, and I don't like to see nobody took away for nothing they ain't done.”

Mr. Ruffin was convicted, though a hung jury prevented a death sentence. He was sentenced to life in prison and died of a heart attack in 2002.

Mr. Dixon, whose seizures were so frequent in prison that guards gave him a baseball batting helmet, developed lung cancer last year, which has since spread to his brain.

A couple of years earlier, lawyers for the Innocence Project had received an application for help from Mr. Dixon through a corrections officer. The lawyers, pointing to studies that show the frequency of false confessions, requested a DNA test of the evidence from the rape kit.

In July, the results came back. They implicated a man named Andrew Harris, who had lived just up the road from Ms. Patterson. In 1982, he was convicted of a rape outside Hattiesburg and is now serving a life sentence.

Law enforcement officials are now investigating his connection to the Patterson case.

Mr. Dixon was granted medical parole after the test results came in and has been out of prison since. Only Mr. Bivens remained.

The courtroom on Thursday was full of people who last came together 30 years ago. Mr. Ruffin's family members wore “Free at Last” T-shirts, maintaining that freedom is a state that can be still achieved by the dead.

Mr. Dixon was there, smiling and leaning on a cane carved by his brother. The Patterson family, including Luke, now in his 30s, was sitting the front row. The district attorney, the same man who had been in the post in 1979, represented the state.

After the hearing, Mr. Dixon was taken by his brother a few dozen miles out of town to a sun-dappled clearing among pine trees, the site of Mr. Ruffin's grave. The Ruffin family prayed, sang hymns and released balloons, and Mr. Dixon broke into sobs.

Earlier, Mr. Bivens stood across the street from the courthouse, in brand-new clothes still bearing the creases of the display shelf. He carried his belongings in a pillowcase: two Bibles, a pair of flip-flops, some shampoo, some socks. The lawyers took him to lunch and then drove him to New Orleans.

He was planning to stay in housing there that was set up especially for exonerated prisoners. Maybe, he said, he could find a job gardening. And he was thinking about looking up his old girlfriend, the one he was about to marry before the police arrived at his door that night.

It is important to have people around you, he said. They keep you from thinking about things too much. And they serve as an alibi, just in case.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/us/17exonerate.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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Cartoonist in Hiding After Death Threats

A cartoonist in Seattle who promoted an “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day” last spring is now in hiding after her life was threatened by Islamic extremists.

The cartoonist, Molly Norris, has changed her name and has stopped producing work for a local alternative newspaper, Seattle Weekly, according to the newspaper's editor, Mark D. Fefer.

Mr. Fefer declined an interview request Thursday, citing “the sensitivity of the situation.” But in a letter to readers about Ms. Norris on Wednesday, he said that “on the insistence of top security specialists at the F.B.I. , she is, as they put it, ‘going ghost': moving, changing her name, and essentially wiping away her identity.”

The F.B.I. declined to comment on the case.

Ms. Norris attracted attention after she published a poster on the Internet in April satirically proposing that people draw figures of the Prophet Muhammad on May 20.

She indicated that the proposal was a protest of censorship by Comedy Central, which edited out references to Muhammad from an episode of “South Park” that month. That episode also triggered threats from extremists. Islam forbids depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.

In 2005, a Dutch cartoonist named Kurt Westergaard published a depiction of Muhammad that led to multiple death threats and alleged assassination attempts. He was presented an award this month for freedom of speech by Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany.

The poster by Ms. Norris spread on the Internet and spawned Facebook groups both for and against the idea. She quickly tried to tamp down the controversy, apologizing to Muslims and at one point joking that the event should be renamed “Everybody Draw Al Gore Day.” The protest movement continued in the spring largely without her involvement.

In July, Anwar al-Awlaki , the radical Yemeni-American cleric who is accused of ties to Al Qaeda , said in a document published on the Internet that Ms. Norris “should be taken as a prime target of assassination,” according to the NEFA Foundation, a private group that monitors extremist Web sites, which translated the document.

Mr. Awlaki stated that Ms. Norris and other unnamed people in the United States and Europe “are expressing their hatred of the Messenger of Islam through ridicule.” In a controversial step, the Obama administration this year authorized the Central Intelligence Agency to kill Mr. Awlaki, who is in hiding.

Seattle Weekly started to publish cartoons by Ms. Norris about two months ago. Her last cartoon appeared in the Sept. 8 issue.

Ms. Norris did not respond to e-mail messages on Thursday. Her personal Web site has been taken offline.

Michael Cavna, a writer for Comic Riffs, a Washington Post blog about comics, said that he contacted her on Thursday and that she verified Mr. Fefer's version of events.

Mr. Fefer wrote that Ms. Norris had likened her situation “to cancer — it might basically be nothing, it might be urgent and serious, it might go away and never return, or it might pop up again when she least expects it.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/us/17cartoon.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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From the Chicago Sun Times

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Will tax gift keep on giving?

CONGRESS | If lawmakers don't act soon, nearly everyone will face big increases

September 17, 2010

BY STEPHEN OHLEMACHER

Here's some pressure for lawmakers: If they don't reach agreement on extending soon-to-expire Bush-era tax cuts, nearly all of their constituents back home will get big tax increases.

A typical family of four with a household income of $50,000 a year would have to pay $2,900 more in taxes in 2011, according to a new analysis by Deloitte Tax LLP, a tax consulting firm. The same-size family making $100,000 a year would see its taxes rise by $4,500.

MORE THAN HALF FAVOR SOAKING THE RICH: POLL

More than half of the country backs raising taxes on the richest Americans, according to a new Associated Press-GfK poll. The survey found:

Wealthier families face even bigger tax hikes. A family of four making $500,000 a year would pay $10,800 more in taxes. The same family making $1 million a year would get a tax increase of $52,300.

The estimates are based on total household income, including wages, capital gains and qualified dividends. The estimated tax bills take into account typical deductions at each income level.

Democrats have been arguing for much of the last decade that tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 under former President George W. Bush provided a windfall for the wealthy. That's true, but they also reduced taxes for the working poor, the middle class, and just about everyone in between.

Those tax cuts expire at the end of the year, setting the stage for a high-stakes debate just before congressional elections in November. If Congress fails to act, families at every income level will see more taxes being withheld from their paychecks come January.

The tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 reduced marginal income tax rates at every level. They also provided a wide range of income tax breaks for education, families with children and married couples.

Taxes on capital gains and dividends were reduced, while the federal estate tax was gradually repealed, though only for this year.

President Obama wants to extend the tax cuts for individuals making less than $200,000 and joint filers making less than $250,000 in adjusted gross income. That's income from wages, capital gains and dividends, before standard deductions and exemptions are subtracted.

Republicans and a growing number of Democrats in Congress want to extend all of the tax cuts, at least temporarily.

On Thursday, House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio said he wants an up-or-down vote on extending all of the tax cuts before congressional elections in November.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) wouldn't commit to vote on any tax proposals before the election. She did, however, pledge to address them by the end of the year. "The only thing I can tell you is that the tax cuts for the middle class will be extended by this Congress," Pelosi told reporters Thursday.

Making all of the tax cuts permanent would add about $3.9 trillion to the national debt over the next decade, according to congressional estimates. Obama's plan would cost a little more than $3 trillion over the same period.

http://www.suntimes.com/business/2719230,CST-NWS-taxcuts17.article

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Saddam's U.S. victims to get $400 million

IRAQ | Americans were tortured under his regime

September 17, 2010

BY SAMEER N. YACOUB

BAGHDAD -- The Iraqi Cabinet unanimously approved a $400 million settlement for Americans who say they were abused by Saddam Hussein's regime, the government spokesman said Thursday.

The agreement represents a significant step forward for Iraq and could bring an end to years of legal battles by Americans who claim to have been tortured or traumatized under Saddam's regime dating back to the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

The deal is likely to anger Iraqis who consider themselves the victims of both Saddam's regime and the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and they wonder why they should pay money for wrongs committed by the ousted dictator.

Saddam's government held hundreds of Americans hostage during the run-up to the 1991 Gulf War, using them as human shields in hopes of staving off an attack by the U.S. and its allies, and many have since pursued lawsuits against the Iraqi government.

The settlement needs to be approved by the Iraqi parliament, a big hurdle, given the likely public outcry over the deal and the fact that the legislature has met only once since the March 7 elections. The vote produced no clear winner, leaving Iraq still without a new government.

Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh did not mention the dollar amount that Iraq had agreed to pay in the statement released Thursday, but Iraqi officials previously have said that according to the agreement, signed Sept. 2, Iraq would pay about $400 million to Americans affected by the Kuwait invasion.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/world/2719224,CST-NWS-saddam17.article

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From the White House

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Fighting to Protect Consumers

Over the past several weeks, the President and I have had extensive conversations about the vital importance of consumer financial protection.

The President asked me, and I enthusiastically agreed, to serve as an Assistant to the President and Special Advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.  He has also asked me to take on the job to get the new CFPB started—right now.  The President and I are committed to the same vision on CFPB, and I am confident that I will have the tools I need to get the job done.

President Obama understands the importance of leveling the playing field again for families and creating protections that work not just for the wealthy or connected, but for every American. The new consumer bureau is based on a pretty simple idea:  people ought to be able to read their credit card and mortgage contracts and know the deal.  They shouldn't learn about an unfair rule or practice only when it bites them—way too late for them to do anything about it.  The new law creates a chance to put a tough cop on the beat and provide real accountability and oversight of the consumer credit market.  The time for hiding tricks and traps in the fine print is over.  This new bureau is based on the simple idea that if the playing field is level and families can see what's going on, they will have better tools to make better choices.

If the CFPB can succeed at leveling the playing field,  we can go a long way toward repairing a gaping hole in the budgets of millions of families.  But nobody has ever thought or argued that the consumer bureau can fix everything.  Lost jobs, stagnant incomes, rising costs for college, dwindling retirement savings—there's a lot of work to be done.

When she was 16, my grandmother, Hannie Reed, drove a wagon in the Oklahoma land rush.  Her mother had died, so she was up front with her little brothers and sisters bouncing around in the back.  When I was growing up, she talked about life on the prairie, about marrying my grandfather and making a living building one-room schoolhouses, about getting wiped out in the Great Depression.  She was hit with hard challenges throughout her life, but the moral of her stories was always the same:  she would solve her problems one at a time by pulling up her socks and getting to work.

It's time for all of us to pull up our socks and get to work.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/09/17/fighting-protect-consumers

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New Spanish Language PSA's Highlight the Importance of Preparing Today

No matter where you live, emergencies can happen anytime, anywhere.

Whether it's a personal emergency, a car accident, or a large scale disaster, an earthquake, taking a few simple steps now to prepare, can keep your family safe and secure.

The problem is, too few families in our country are taking those steps. According to a 2009 Advertising Council survey, 55 percent of Americans have taken steps to become ready – an improvement over previous years, but still not enough.

Whether you live in a city or in a rural area, along a coast or in a central state, it's imperative that all Americans take steps to prepare for a natural or man-made disaster. These steps are as simple as getting an emergency supply kit, making a plan for how you will communicate with your family if a disaster strikes, and being informed of the types of emergencies that can happen in your area and how to respond. 

Since President Obama took office, the Department of Homeland Security and Federal Emergency Management Agency have worked aggressively to engage all of our partners in an effort to expand and solidify our entire national emergency response team, and to ensure that as a nation we are prepared for the next natural or man-made disaster.

While the efforts of our partners, which include other federal entities, the governors and local officials, local first responders, the private sector and faith based groups, go a long way, the truth is there is one member of the team whose success or failure to prepare will dictate the outcome of the next disaster:  the public.

The reality is we cannot succeed unless everyone does their part. That is why during the month of September, National Preparedness Month, we encourage all Americans to take steps now to increase their personal preparedness.

September 15th also marked the start of Hispanic Heritage Month, and this year, we are focusing special attention on reaching out to the Hispanic community. In fact, a 2010 survey by The Advertising Council found that just 34 percent of Hispanic Americans report having created a family emergency plan, despite being our nation's fastest growing population.

That's why today, FEMA, working with The Advertising Council, is launching new Spanish-language public service advertisements that highlight the importance of preparing today to help reduce the consequences of a disaster tomorrow. The PSAs encourage everyone to visit FEMA's Spanish-language preparedness website, www.listo.gov, where families and individuals can download a family emergency plan, an emergency kit checklist and find other tips on how to better prepare for an emergency.  var params = { allowscriptaccess: "always", allowfullscreen: "true" }; swfobject.embedSWF("http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/Zswt_h6QSAM&hl=en&fs=1&showinfo=0", "flashcontent", "480", "295", "8", null, {}, params);

You can also check out the English version of the PSA.

Being personally prepared is not only important for your family, but for your entire community.  En la unión está la fuerza.

Your decision now to have a plan and basic supplies, defines whether our first responders are able to focus precious resources on our most vulnerable citizens or whether they must exhaust those resources on those who could have and should have been prepared, but chose not to.

Being prepared strengthens our communities and saves lives.  As we've seen time and time again, during emergencies, the fastest response is neighbor helping neighbor. So this September, please take the time to visit www.listo.gov or www.ready.gov . Join us in working to build stronger, more prepared communities.

Craig Fugate is the Administrator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/09/16/new-spanish-language-psa-s-highlight-importance-preparing-today

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From ICE

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ICE continues outreach campaign to combat human trafficking

WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is reaching out directly to the American public and soliciting their help in the agency's latest initiative in combating the crime of human trafficking.

As part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) "Blue Campaign" launched in July, ICE has continued its efforts to educate the public about the plight of human trafficking victims. ICE has designed and placed an anti-trafficking message in foreign language newspapers across the United States. These advertisements highlight some of the indicators of human trafficking and encourage the public to report suspected instances of trafficking. The public can notify ICE by calling 1-866-DHS-2-ICE if they suspect that someone is being exploited.

"We ask that the public remain alert to potential victims. We recognize how powerful the media and advocates of all kind can be in helping us rescue these individuals." said ICE Director John Morton. "Through the "Blue Campaign's" focus on prevention, protection, prosecution, and partnership, we will work together to bring these human rights abuses to justice."

The cornerstone of the Blue Campaign is to identify potential human trafficking victims, empower them to seek help, provide information and referrals, rescue them from their traffickers and connect them to services and support that are available to them. ICE is making every effort to prevent human trafficking in the United States by prosecuting the traffickers and rescuing and protecting the victims. The greatest challenge facing law enforcement in the fight against human trafficking is victim identification. Therefore, it is key that the public be educated about trafficking in order to recognize and report the potential victims that live and work among us.

The advertisements will appear in the Chinese, English, Korean, Spanish, and Thai languages in 50 different newspapers. They began running this month in daily, weekly, and monthly newspapers that have a combined circulation of 1.97 million readers per issue. Total readership of these papers is approximately 5 million per issue. The goal of the campaign is to alert the public about the existence of human trafficking in communities nationwide and prompt a "call to action" for individuals who encounter possible victims.

If anyone knows or suspects someone is being held against their will, ICE strongly urges them to contact the ICE tip line anonymously at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE.  Individuals can also view or download the public service announcement (PSA) by clicking here . Additional information on human trafficking is available by clicking  here .

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/1009/100916washingtondc.htm

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Gang suppression effort nets 23 arrests in New York

NEW YORK - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced Thursday the arrests of 23 suspected gang members and gang associates during a two-week suppression effort conducted throughout the Bronx, Brooklyn, Long Island and Queens.

Among those arrested during the enforcement operation which concluded Sept. 15 was an 18-year-old Trinitarios gang member in Brooklyn whose criminal history includes arrests for attempted murder, gang assault and weapons charges. Another was a 32-year-old "MS-13" gang member in Long Island whose criminal history includes arrests for assault on a child, larceny and weapons charges.

Other individuals taken into custody had criminal histories including arrests for rape, narcotics trafficking and distribution, robbery, and false impersonation. Others arrested during the operation were members of the Latin Kings, Wild Chicanos, Niños Malos, 18th Street and Jamaican Posse. Two loaded firearms were seized during the operation including a .357-caliber revolver and a .9mm semi-automatic handgun.

Agents and officers from the ICE Office of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and from the ICE Office of Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) conducted the operation. Since May, the ICE Violent Gang Units have arrested a total of 170 suspected gang members and associates in New York City, Westchester County and Long Island.

"Transnational gangs operate as criminal organizations that prey on immigrants as well as citizens in our communities," said James T. Hayes Jr., special agent-in-charge of ICE HSI in New York. "Gang activity often includes a combination of criminal activities, including narcotics and weapons trafficking. ICE's unique authorities allow us to dismantle transnational gang networks through the enforcement of either criminal or administrative laws. So at the end of any potential jail time, these gang members will be promptly returned to their native countries."

"By partnering with HSI, we can identify, arrest and remove the criminal gang members from the streets who may be responsible for a significant portion of crime in the area," said Christopher Shanahan, field office director for ICE ERO in New York. "We will continue to combine our administrative and criminal authorities to address these threats."

All of the individuals arrested in the operation were foreign nationals. The majority of the foreign nationals were from El Salvador, but the group also includes citizens from Mexico and Jamaica. Those foreign nationals who are not being prosecuted on criminal charges are being processed for removal from the United States.

Since Operation Community Shield began in February 2005, ICE agents nationwide have arrested more than 18,000 gang members and gang associates. As part of the effort, HSI's National Gang Unit (NGU) identifies violent street gangs and develops intelligence on their membership, associates, criminal activities and international movements to deter, disrupt and dismantle gang operations. Transnational street gangs have significant numbers of foreign-born members and are frequently involved in human and contraband smuggling, immigration violations and other crimes with a connection to the border.

To report suspicious activity, call ICE's 24-hour toll-free hotline at: 1-866-347-2423 or visit www.ice.gov.

Operational photos can be downloaded at the following website:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/53734286@N04/sets/72157624925909156/

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/1009/100916newyork.htm

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From the FBI

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Fifty-Three Defendants Charged in New Jersey in Coordinated Identity Theft and Fraud Takedown

NEWARK, NJ—Fifty-three individuals were charged today in connection with widespread, sophisticated identity theft and fraud, including 43 individuals charged with participating in one large-scale criminal enterprise, United States Attorney Paul J. Fishman and FBI Special Agent in Charge Michael B. Ward announced.

In addition to those charged in the single conspiracy, six other criminal Complaints charge 10 additional individuals with identity theft and fraud offenses. Forty-seven defendants were arrested this morning as a result of a coordinated law enforcement investigation. Of the remaining defendants, one is in state custody on unrelated charges, and five remain at large.

The defendants arrested this morning are scheduled to appear before United States Magistrate Judges Claire C. Cecchi and Madeline Cox Arleo throughout the day in Newark federal court.

According to the criminal Complaints filed in these cases:

Sang-Hyun Park et al., Mag. No. 10-4147 (CCC)

Sang-Hyun Park, a resident of Palisades Park, N.J., was the leader of a criminal organization headquartered in Bergen County, N.J. Park and his co-conspirators (the "Park Criminal Enterprise") obtained, brokered, and sold identity documents to customers that were used to commit credit card fraud, bank fraud, tax fraud, and other crimes. The 43 defendants charged in connection with the enterprise played various roles as Park's staff, identity brokers, credit build-up team, and collusive merchants, as well as customers seeking fraudulent services. The defendants and their respective responsibilities are outlined in a chart appended to this release.

Members of the Park Criminal Enterprise obtained social security cards, most beginning with the prefix "586," from various brokers. Social Security cards with that prefix were issued by the United States to individuals, usually from China, who were employed in American territories, such as American Samoa, Guam, and Saipan. After selling Social Security cards with those numbers to its customers, the Park Criminal Enterprise used these "586" Social Security cards and numbers (which corresponded to Chinese names) to obtain genuinely issued driver's licenses, identification cards, and other identity documents from various states or to manufacture counterfeit driver's licenses and other counterfeit identity documents. Although the identities were Chinese, the vast majority of the Park Criminal Enterprises' customers were of Korean descent.

The Park Criminal Enterprise engaged in the fraudulent "build up" of credit scores associated with the Chinese identities. They did so by adding the Chinese identity as an authorized user to the credit card accounts of various co-conspirators who received a fee for this service—members of the enterprise's credit build up teams. By attaching the Chinese identities to these existing credit card accounts, the teams increased the credit scores associated with the Chinese identities to between 700 and 800. The members of the build up teams knew neither the real person to whom the identity belonged nor virtually any of the customers who had purchased the identities.

Credit scores are relied on by banks, credit card companies, finance companies, and lenders, among others, when deciding whether or not to issue credit or grant loans to consumers. These credit scores were built up for use in identity theft and financial fraud for profit.

After the credit build process was completed, members of the Park Criminal Enterprise instructed, coached, and conspired with its customers to use the fraudulent identities with good credit scores to open and obtain bank accounts; bank and retail credit cards; debit cards; lines of credit; and loans—including loans guaranteed by the United States Small Business Administration ("SBA"). In particular, the Park Criminal Enterprise then "busted out" the fraudulently obtained credit cards by making purchases on the cards—often for liquor or expensive merchandise that they then sold—or by engaging in "kkang," a Korean slang phrase referring to the use of collusive merchants who, for a fee, charged these credit cards using their credit card machines for the purpose of obtaining cash. These "kkang" transactions were sham transactions; no goods or products were sold. After making the charges, the Park Criminal Enterprise made payments—drawn on other fraudulently opened, unfunded bank accounts—to the various credit card companies. Credit card companies credited the accounts for the amounts of the payments before they learned that they were bogus. The Park Criminal Enterprise then made a second round of charges on the cards. Ultimately, the credit card bills were not paid, resulting in significant financial losses to the companies.

In addition, the Park Criminal Enterprise used the fraudulent identities to defraud banks, car leasing companies, and the IRS.

During the course of the investigation, cooperating witnesses and an undercover federal agent purchased and obtained social security cards, a genuinely issued driver's license and identification card from Illinois, a counterfeit Nevada driver's license, and a counterfeit New York license. In addition, federal agents and law enforcement officers used court-authorized wiretaps to capture incriminating conversations among members of the Park Criminal Enterprise and other co-conspirators, some of which are described in the criminal Complaint.

In total, the Park Criminal Enterprise and its coconspirators caused millions of dollars in financial losses to the United States and banks, credit card companies, lenders, and others.

U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman stated: "The sheer scope of the fraud—and the organization that allegedly committed it—is remarkable. This type of crime puts all of us at risk, not just because of the cost to our financial institutions, but also because of the threat posed by fake identification documents. Yet, as patient and painstaking as the defendants were in designing and executing their scheme, they were still no match for the dedication, diligence, and hard work of the law enforcement agents and prosecutors who target identity theft and organized crime."

FBI Special Agent in Charge Ward stated: "The activity in this instance was a virtual crime superstore, with one-stop shopping for a variety of criminal needs. Individuals could obtain Social Security numbers under a false identity, receive assistance in obtaining an out of state driver's license under that same false identity, quickly build a fraudulent credit history, and then open bank and credit accounts. With assistance, individuals could then conduct numerous frauds with the assistance of collusive merchants and others steeped in white collar crime. The criminal activity was sophisticated, and the extent of the fraud committed by this group is believed to be substantial, if not staggering."

The Criminal Complaint charges the following offenses:

Count One charges the named defendants with conspiracy to unlawfully produce identification documents; to transfer, possess, and use a means of identification to commit other crimes; to commit credit card fraud; and to buy and sell Social Security cards. The charge carries a maximum potential penalty of five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

Counts Two through Five charge the named defendants with aggravated identity theft. The charges carry a mandatory minimum term of two years in prison.

Counts Six through Eight charge the named defendants with conspiracy to commit wire fraud. The charges carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

Count Nine charges the named defendant with money laundering. The charge carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

Count 10 charges the named defendant with unlawfully using identification documents to defraud the United States. The charge carries a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

United States v. Jung-Woo Shim, Mag No. 10-4161(CCC)

Jung-Woo Shim, 36, of Palisades Park, N.J., is a broker who conspired with others to "bust out" credit cards and who advertised his services in a local Korean newspaper. Shim obtained three different driver's licenses in three different Chinese names using "586" Social Security numbers, then used these fraudulently obtained identities to get credit cards, which he then charged but did not pay—causing losses to various credit card companies.

Shim is charged with three counts of unlawfully producing an identity document. Each count carries a maximum term of 15 years in prison and up to $250,000 fine. He is also charged with aggravated identity theft, which carries a two-year mandatory prison term.

United States v. Jong-Nam Kim and Yu-je Jo, Mag No. 10-4148 (CCC)

Jong-Nam Kim, 24, and Ju-Je Jo, 36, both of Ridgefield Park, N.J., were brokers who conspired with each other and others to bust out credit cards and engage in various fraud schemes. As part of their scheme, Kim and Jo sold a Confidential Informant ("CI") a fraudulently obtained Social Security card and explained to the CI how the scheme operated. Kim told the CI that he/she would fly to Los Angeles, California to obtain a driver's license after purchasing the Social Security card. Thereafter, the credit score related to this fraudulently obtained identity would be built up. Jo explained that the CI could, using the fraudulent identity, make between $30,000 and $40,000 from a credit card scheme; between $25,000 and $35,000 by obtaining a personal line of credit; and approximately $60,000 by engaging in a check cashing scheme. Kim explained that the CI could also use the credit cards to purchase high-end products such as Rolex, Chanel, and Louis Vuitton with credit cards obtained using the fraudulent identity. Kim told the CI that he/she could expect to make between approximately $80,000 and $150,000 through the scheme, and advised that it would cost him/her approximately $8,000 up front and $7,000 later for the social security card, driver's license, and credit build up. The CI paid the defendants $4,000 in cash for the social security card on August 20, 2010, and $3,000 in cash on August 31. On September 10, 2010, the defendants gave the CI a genuine social security card belonging to a person with a Korean name.

The defendants are charged with conspiring to unlawfully produce identification documents. This charge carries a maximum term of 15 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine. The defendants are also charged with unlawfully selling a Social Security card, which carries a maximum potential penalty of five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

United States v. Kang-Hyok Choi, Mag. No. 10-4163 (CCC)

Kang-Hyok Choi, 35, of Valley Stream, N.Y., fraudulently obtained four different identification cards and driver's licenses in three different Chinese names using legitimately issued but fraudulently obtained "586" Social Security numbers. In May of 2008, Choi allegedly murdered three individuals in Bergen County, N.J., and stole a number of credit cards from one of the victims. Choi then used the stolen credit cards to obtain approximately $100,000 and flew to Los Angeles using one of his Chinese aliases. Choi was arrested in Los Angeles on May 18, 2008, based on a New Jersey arrest warrant. At the time of his arrest, law enforcement officers seized approximately $88,000 in cash, $14,000 in casino chips, 27 credit cards, two driver's licenses, and two identification cards, none of which was in Choi's name.

Choi, who has been in state custody since his arrest, is now charged federally with one count of access device fraud, which carries a maximum term of 10 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

United States v. Su-Chin Lee, Mag. No. 10-4164 (CCC)

Su-Chin Lee, 35, of Palisades Park, N.J., fraudulently obtained a driver's license from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation in a Chinese person's name using a legitimately issued but fraudulently obtained "586" Social Security number, then used the fraudulently obtained identity to get credit cards. She got cash advances using the credit cards and made numerous fraudulent charges which she did not pay, causing losses to various credit card companies totaling approximately $49,000. She also obtained a $10,000 line of credit from a bank, which she withdrew in its entirety and failed to repay.

Lee is charged with one count of unlawfully producing an identity document, which carries a maximum term of 15 years in prison; one count of unlawful use of a social security card, a charge which carries a maximum term of five years in prison; and one count of access device fraud, which carries a maximum term of 10 years in prison. All three counts also carry a maximum $250,000 fine.

United States v. Yoon-Sang Kim, Mag. No. 10- 4166 (CCC)

Yoon-Sang Kim, 44, of Allendale, N.J., was arrested on August 17, 2010, in Fort Lee, N.J. while driving a vehicle registered to his wife. During a search of the vehicle, law enforcement officers found several counterfeit identifications with Kim's photograph in other people's names. Kim was arrested this morning on a federal Complaint which charges him with using one of these counterfeit identities, which corresponded to a photocopy of a "586" Social Security card found during a search of the vehicle, to open bank accounts and operate shell companies for the purpose of committing fraud. The shell companies used credit card machines to bust out credit cards. During the search of the vehicle, law enforcement officers also recovered photocopies of more than $220,000 in sales receipts from the shell companies operated by Kim, which were generated by the shell companies' credit card machines and which corresponded to the credit cards and photocopies of credit cards found during the search.

Kim is charged with one count of knowingly possessing, with the intent to use unlawfully, five or more identification or false identification documents, which carries a maximum term of five years in prison and a up to a $250,000 fine; and one count of access device fraud, which carries a maximum term of 10 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

United States v. Chun-O Kim, Mag No. 10-4165 (CCC)

The Complaint charges five individuals: Chun-O Kim, 44, of Edgewater, N.J., the principal owner and operator of a purported general contracting company headquartered in Englewood, N.J.; Hosin Kim, 45, of Edgewater, the husband of defendant Chun-O Kim and the principal of a purported wholesale construction supply company operating out of Englewood; Nathan Buschman, 31, a branch manager at a bank in Edgewater; and Zakchary Benji, 28, a loan officer at a bank in Clifton, N.J.

Chun-O Kim conspired with others to make and use false, fictitious, and counterfeit documents to obtain lines of credit and commercial loans for herself and her co-conspirators. In furtherance of the scheme, Nathan Buschman and Zakchary Benji created false documents, including false reports of site visits, that created the illusion that the businesses seeking the loans existed and were legitimate. They processed lines of credit or loans knowing them to contain materially false statements and representations. Many of these lines of credit and loans were guaranteed by the United States Small Business Administration ("SBA"), a federal agency. The SBA provides assistance to small businesses by guaranteeing loans issued by certain banks. In total, defendant Chun-O Kim and her co-conspirators defrauded financial institutions in Bergen County, N.J., and elsewhere in excess of $1 million.

The defendants are charged with one count of fraud related to identification documents and one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud, each of which carries a maximum potential penalty of five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

U.S. Attorney Fishman praised special agents of the FBI, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Michael B. Ward in Newark; IRS - Criminal Investigations, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Victor W. Lessoff; the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Peter T. Edge; and the Small Business Administration Office of Inspector General, Eastern Region, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Aaron Collins, for their work leading to today's charges. Fishman also singled out detectives in the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office—under the direction of Prosecutor John L. Molinelli and the Office's Chief of Detectives Steven Cucciniello—for their indispensable work in pursuing this investigation. He also thanked the Englewood Police Department, under the direction of Chief of Police Arthur O'Keefe, and the Fort Lee Police Department, under the direction of Chief of Police Thomas O. Ripoli, for their contributions.

The government is represented by Assistant United States Attorneys Anthony Moscato, Andre Espinosa, and Barbara Llanes of the U.S. Attorney's Office Criminal Division in Newark.

The charges and allegations contained in the Complaints are merely accusations, and the defendants are considered innocent unless and until proven guilty.

http://newark.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/pressrel10/nk091610.htm

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