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From the Los Angeles Times

Schwarzenegger signs bills to aid search for missing children

Governor approves 76 measures, including one allowing people to bet on which racehorses will lose.

By Patrick McGreevy, Los Angeles Times

September 25, 2010

Reporting from Sacramento

Measures to improve the search for missing children, protect intoxicated minors who call 911 for help and expand betting on horseracing in California are among dozens of bills signed into law by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, he announced Friday.

With less than a week left to act on 765 pieces of legislation, the governor also vetoed 43 bills, including measures that would exempt many state workers from furloughs, regulate pet insurance and outlaw dormancy fees on gift cards.

A requirement that minors wear helmets while skiing and snowboarding will not become law even though Schwarzenegger signed it to show his support. SB 880 by Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) cannot take effect without a companion measure, which the governor vetoed, requiring ski resorts to provide the public with safety plans and reports of fatalities.

Schwarzenegger said the helmet bill would "help prevent avoidable injuries to children" but added that AB 1652, the linked measure, "may place an unnecessary burden on resorts, without assurance of a significant reduction in ski and snowboard-related injuries and fatalities."

The package of missing-person bills signed by Schwarzenegger was championed by Moe Dubois, the father of 14-year-old Amber Dubois, one of two teenagers killed in San Diego County by convicted sex offender John Albert Gardner III.

AB 33 will allow law enforcement agencies to obtain and better use a list of registered sex offenders when a child is reported abducted by a stranger. It also improves police training in missing-persons cases.

The measure was written by Assemblyman Pedro Nava (D-Santa Barbara), who also authored AB 34, a related bill signed by the governor that requires the state Violent Crime Information Center to share information on cases with the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System.

Schwarzenegger also signed AB 1999, which gives immunity from prosecution to people younger than 21 for drinking alcohol in cases in which they call 911 to report an alcohol-related medical emergency.

The governor also approved a bill to boost California's distressed horseracing industry by allowing people to bet on horses to lose beginning in 2012. The measure, SB 1072 by Sen. Ron Calderon (D-Montebello), also seeks to lure the nation's top horses by allowing a larger share of bets to be used for purses.

Schwarzenegger also signed a bill to help finance operation of a new private hospital to replace the closed Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital. AB 2599 by Assemblywoman Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) requires that the hospital be reimbursed from the Medi-Cal health insurance program for the poor at a higher rate than other institutions are guaranteed.

In all, the governor said he has signed 76 bills into law.

The governor's vetoes hit two bills that would have exempted many state workers from unpaid furloughs that he has used to trim the budget.

AB 1765 by Assemblyman Jose Solorio (D-Santa Ana) would have exempted workers from the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and the Employment Development Department from being furloughed during high unemployment.

AB 2008 by Assemblyman Juan Arambula (I-Fresno) would have exempted employees of the Franchise Tax Board and the Board of Equalization, who help collect tax revenue that helps in a state budget crisis.

On both bills, Schwarzenegger wrote in his veto message that "while there may be a need to exempt specific employees from furlough, that exemption should be determined on a case-by-case basis depending on the exigencies of the fiscal crisis."

And the bill regulating pet insurance, AB 2411, is not necessary because the state Department of Insurance already has authority to oversee the industry, Schwarzenegger wrote in his veto message.

He also rejected the measure barring dormancy fees on gift cards, writing in his veto message that SB 885 by Sen. Ellen Corbett (D-San Leandro) "can place an additional burden on small businesses that offer gift certificates and cards."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-arnold-bills-20100925,0,7225227,print.story

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Schwarzenegger signs bills to aid search for missing children

Governor approves 76 measures, including one allowing people to bet on which racehorses will lose.

By Patrick McGreevy, Los Angeles Times

September 25, 2010

Reporting from Sacramento

Measures to improve the search for missing children, protect intoxicated minors who call 911 for help and expand betting on horseracing in California are among dozens of bills signed into law by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, he announced Friday.

With less than a week left to act on 765 pieces of legislation, the governor also vetoed 43 bills, including measures that would exempt many state workers from furloughs, regulate pet insurance and outlaw dormancy fees on gift cards.

A requirement that minors wear helmets while skiing and snowboarding will not become law even though Schwarzenegger signed it to show his support. SB 880 by Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) cannot take effect without a companion measure, which the governor vetoed, requiring ski resorts to provide the public with safety plans and reports of fatalities.

Schwarzenegger said the helmet bill would "help prevent avoidable injuries to children" but added that AB 1652, the linked measure, "may place an unnecessary burden on resorts, without assurance of a significant reduction in ski and snowboard-related injuries and fatalities."

The package of missing-person bills signed by Schwarzenegger was championed by Moe Dubois, the father of 14-year-old Amber Dubois, one of two teenagers killed in San Diego County by convicted sex offender John Albert Gardner III.

AB 33 will allow law enforcement agencies to obtain and better use a list of registered sex offenders when a child is reported abducted by a stranger. It also improves police training in missing-persons cases.

The measure was written by Assemblyman Pedro Nava (D-Santa Barbara), who also authored AB 34, a related bill signed by the governor that requires the state Violent Crime Information Center to share information on cases with the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System.

Schwarzenegger also signed AB 1999, which gives immunity from prosecution to people younger than 21 for drinking alcohol in cases in which they call 911 to report an alcohol-related medical emergency.

The governor also approved a bill to boost California's distressed horseracing industry by allowing people to bet on horses to lose beginning in 2012. The measure, SB 1072 by Sen. Ron Calderon (D-Montebello), also seeks to lure the nation's top horses by allowing a larger share of bets to be used for purses.

Schwarzenegger also signed a bill to help finance operation of a new private hospital to replace the closed Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital. AB 2599 by Assemblywoman Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) requires that the hospital be reimbursed from the Medi-Cal health insurance program for the poor at a higher rate than other institutions are guaranteed.

In all, the governor said he has signed 76 bills into law.

The governor's vetoes hit two bills that would have exempted many state workers from unpaid furloughs that he has used to trim the budget.

AB 1765 by Assemblyman Jose Solorio (D-Santa Ana) would have exempted workers from the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and the Employment Development Department from being furloughed during high unemployment.

AB 2008 by Assemblyman Juan Arambula (I-Fresno) would have exempted employees of the Franchise Tax Board and the Board of Equalization, who help collect tax revenue that helps in a state budget crisis.

On both bills, Schwarzenegger wrote in his veto message that "while there may be a need to exempt specific employees from furlough, that exemption should be determined on a case-by-case basis depending on the exigencies of the fiscal crisis."

And the bill regulating pet insurance, AB 2411, is not necessary because the state Department of Insurance already has authority to oversee the industry, Schwarzenegger wrote in his veto message.

He also rejected the measure barring dormancy fees on gift cards, writing in his veto message that SB 885 by Sen. Ellen Corbett (D-San Leandro) "can place an additional burden on small businesses that offer gift certificates and cards."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-arnold-bills-20100925,0,7225227,print.story

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Obama condemns Ahmadinejad's allegations about 9/11

'It was offensive. It was hateful,' Obama says of the Iranian president's statement to the U.N. that most Americans believe the U.S. fabricated the 9/11 terror attacks against New York and Washington.

By Christi Parsons and Michael Muskal

Los Angeles Times

September 24, 2010

Reporting from New York and Los Angeles

A day after he said the diplomatic door was open to Iran, President Obama on Friday sharply condemned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for his allegation that most Americans believe the United States fabricated the 9/11 terrorism attacks against New York and Washington.

Speaking before the United Nations General Assembly hours after Obama spoke, Ahmadinejad made his comments in a broad attack against the United States and its policies in the Mideast. U.S. officials walked out to protest the Iranian president's speech.

“It was offensive. It was hateful,” Obama said on Friday in an interview with BBC Persian news service. The White House released an excerpt of the interview broadcast to the Iranian people in their main language, Farsi.

“And particularly for him to make the statement here in Manhattan, just a little north of ground zero, where families lost their loved ones, people of all faiths, all ethnicities who see this as the seminal tragedy of this generation, for him to make a statement like that was inexcusable,” Obama said.

On Sept. 11, 2001, Islamic terrorists stole four jetliners and sent them on suicide missions against the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington. About 3,000 people died in the attacks, which toppled the trade center.

In the past, Ahmadinejad has taken provocative positions such as denouncing Israel and denying that the Holocaust killed 6 million Jews in Europe. He has been roundly condemned for such positions in the past by the United States and its allies. Ahmadinejad has addressed the annual opening of the General Assembly before and western diplomats have walked out to protest his anti-Israel comments.

In his Thursday speech, Ahmadinejad argued that only U.S. officials believed a terrorist group was responsible for the 2001 hijackings. He said others believe that some parts of the U.S. government were involved to hide the effects of a declining economy and to protect its ally, Israel.

“The majority of the American people as well as most nations and politicians around the world agree with this view,” Ahmadinejad claimed.

In his speech, Obama stressed that the diplomatic door was open to Iran for talks about its nuclear program but he repeated that the West would continue to sharply oppose Iran's development of nuclear weapons including the use of sanctions which have not ended the dispute so far.

As he has before, Obama continued to separate the Iranian people from their government's actions in  pursuing a nuclear program. Obama has continually praised the people while seeking to halt the program by tightening sanctions, which often have a crippling effect on people.

“This is not a matter of us choosing to impose punishment on the Iranians,” Obama told the BBC. “This is a matter of the Iranians' government I think ultimately betraying the interests of its own people by isolating it further.”

Asked why sanctions would work now, when Iran has been under sanctions for decades, Obama defended their use.

“We do think that the sanctions raise the costs for the government,” Obama said. Most of these sanctions are targeted at the regime, at its military. And we think that over time hopefully there's enough reflection within the Iranian government that they say to themselves, you know, this is not the best course for our people; this is not the best course for Iran.”

Among the effect on regular people has been rising prices on food and medicine. “Are you not worried that this might backfire, that the people of Iran would be looking at America and wondering why they're being punished in this process,” the interviewer asked.

“I am obviously concerned about the Iranian people, and they are trying to live their lives,” Obama said. “The question is, ‘Can the Iranian regime take a different approach that would help its people as opposed to harm its people?'”

As he has before, Obama minimized the threat of an invasion of Iran by the United States or Israel. He has also said that nothing is off the table.

“I don't take war lightly. I was opposed to the war in Iraq. I am somebody who's interested in resolving issues diplomatically,” Obama said.

Iran has a right to the peaceful use of nuclear power, Obama said and he called on Iran to take the steps to assure the world that it is not interested in nuclear weapons.

“if they take those constructive steps in serious negotiations, then not only should there not be a threat of war but there also won't be the sanctions that are currently in place,” he said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-obama-iran20100924,0,1436254,print.story

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California murderer's execution OKd

Judge rules Albert Brown can be put to death by lethal injection Wednesday at San Quentin.

By Carol J. Williams, Los Angeles Times

September 25, 2010

A federal judge on Friday cleared the way for the first execution in California in nearly five years when he refused to halt murderer-rapist Albert Greenwood Brown's death by lethal injection, scheduled for Wednesday.

U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel expressed concern about the limited time he had to evaluate the state's newly revised execution procedures and gave Brown the choice of being put to death by a single injection, as practiced in Washington and Ohio, instead of by the state's three-drug method.

Fogel expressed inner conflict over his ruling, saying his court was "painfully aware that however it decides a case of this nature, there will be many who disagree profoundly with its decision. The moral and political debate about capital punishment will continue, as it should."

But the state has "a strong interest in proceeding with its judgment," the judge conceded. He said he was offering the single-injection option to alleviate his residual concerns about the potential for the three-injection method to subject condemned inmates to cruel and unusual punishment.

In as many as seven of the previous 11 lethal-injection deaths carried out at San Quentin State Prison, there were reports that the prisoner might not have been fully anesthetized by the first injection, the powerful barbiturate sodium thiopental, Fogel noted in his ruling.

"The fact that nine single-drug executions have been carried out in Ohio and Washington without any apparent difficulty is undisputed and significant," Fogel said, giving Brown that option.

Fogel had asked the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation earlier this week whether it could use the single-injection method. Attorneys for the state told Fogel the corrections staff needed only three days to retrain the execution team for the one-drug method, in which a much larger dose of the barbiturate would put the prisoner into a deep sleep as his organs shut down.

One of Brown's attorneys, John R. Grele, said the legal team was weighing its options and might appeal to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. The motions panel for September consists of three judges appointed to the court by former President George W. Bush.

On Monday, Brown's lawyers are expected to argue before a Marin County court that the state did not follow mandatory procedures when it went about drafting the new lethal-injection policy to address deficiencies identified by Fogel when he effectively stayed executions with a ruling in 2006.

Santa Clara University law professor Ellen Kreitzberg, an expert on the death penalty, said Friday's ruling surprised her.

Five years ago, she said, Fogel spent a lot of time meticulously examining the setting, training and testing that lay behind California's lethal injection process before finding flaws in it. But the judge's ruling in Brown's case came without his having examined the new execution chamber that has been built in the meantime and without his examining the training for those who administer the drugs.

"There are so many unanswered questions and so many uncertainties that to allow the execution to go forward with those is really troubling," said Kreitzberg, who opposes the death penalty. "It's surprising after five years that everyone is rushing to have these executions move forward so quickly."

Brown had petitioned Fogel's court last week to join the case brought by fellow death row inmate Michael Morales, who had challenged the state's former lethal-injection procedures as violating the Constitution's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.

Attorneys for the state objected, claiming the procedures challenged by Morales are no longer in use. They were replaced by new protocols approved by a state agency in late July.

After halting Morales' execution in February 2006, Fogel held hearings that led to his ruling that the former execution methods risked exposing prisoners to unconstitutional levels of pain.

Among the deficiencies Fogel identified were insufficient training of the execution team and cramped conditions and poor lighting in the gas chamber that was then in use for lethal-injection executions. Two other prisoners were executed by lethal gas in the early 1990s, bringing to 13 the number put to death by the state since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976.

Corrections officials in 2007 built a new Lethal Injection Chamber — four times larger than the gas chamber — and unveiled the facility on Tuesday.

There are 708 prisoners on California's death row, but only a few have exhausted all appeals and are eligible to be issued death warrants.

Brown, 56, was convicted of the aggravated murder of Arlington High School student Susan Jordan in 1980 in Riverside. The 15-year-old was walking to school when Brown pulled her into an orange grove, raped her and strangled her with her shoelaces. He called the girl's parents and told them where to find her body.

Brown had been paroled four months earlier from a prison term imposed for the 1977 rape of a 14-year-old girl.

A Riverside County judge last month ordered Brown's execution for Wednesday.

John Hall, a spokesman for the Riverside County district attorney's office, said prosecutors were pleased with Fogel's ruling.

"This is a horrific case with horrific facts," Hall said. "This man showed no remorse. He never claimed innocence.... It's time for this family to finally see justice. It's been delayed too long already."

Some advocacy groups hailed Fogel's decision.

"Today's ruling marks the end of the injustice in this case, and we may be near the end in many others, where the sentences have been delayed for reasons that have nothing to do with the guilt of the murderers or the fairness of their trials," said Kent Scheidegger, legal director for the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation in Sacramento.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-execution-20100925,0,6542248,print.story

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Detained but not represented

A recent report by the Chicago-based National Immigrant Justice Center found that 80% of detainees are held in facilities whose location makes it difficult to find and retain an attorney.

OPINION

September 25, 2010

Federal policy on immigration has tilted toward enforcement in recent years, and the number of deportation proceedings has risen sharply. As a result, the nation's detention centers, where immigrants often are held while their cases are adjudicated, have become increasingly overburdened. One of the many negative consequences of the 60% increase in the number of people held since 2004 is detainees' dwindling access to legal counsel.

Having a lawyer makes a difference. A 2005 Migration Policy Institute study found that the odds of success double when detainees seeking to become lawful permanent citizens have attorneys. For those seeking asylum, the odds of success increase sixfold. Also, in many cases attorneys succeed not by helping detainees remain in the United States but by assisting efforts to speed deportation proceedings, freeing them to return home.

Yet a recent report by the Chicago-based National Immigrant Justice Center found that 80% of detainees are held in facilities whose location makes it difficult to find and retain an attorney. The detention center in El Centro, for example, has more detainees than any other in the country, but because of its location, they have the least access to attorneys. At more than a quarter of the nation's 300 facilities, there is no access at all to legal aid from the nongovernmental organizations that provide low-cost and pro bono attorneys for detainees, and the federal government's legal orientation programs— which are not an adequate substitute for an attorney but are nevertheless of much assistance — are available in only 17% of facilities. Lastly, rules regulating telephone access to attorneys are cumbersome to the point of hindering access.

Some of the recommendations in the report, such as expanding legal orientation programs to all facilities and easing telephone restrictions, seem obvious steps that need to be taken. Others, however, require a rethinking of detention that would minimize the population being held. The U.S. spends $5.9 billion annually holding thousands of people who have not been accused of a crime and pose no threat to society. Surely some of them could be placed on a form of parole or under house arrest, reducing expenses for taxpayers and increasing access to legal representation. To be fair, the Department of Justice has made progress in improving overall conditions in the detention centers, and officials maintain that it is equally committed to improving detainees' access to legal counsel. To that end, the department should give serious weight to suggestions from those who work most closely with those being held.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-detention-20100925,0,2652725,print.story

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Snuff out pot measure

Proposition 19 is poorly thought out, badly crafted and replete with loopholes and contradictions.

OPINION

September 24, 2010

Marijuana is the most popular illegal drug in the United States. Seventy years of criminal prohibition, "Just Say No" sloganeering and a federal drug war that now incarcerates 225,000 people a year have not diminished the availability or use of — or apparently the craving for — cannabis. And helping meet the demand is California, the nation's top grower. Marijuana production here results in an estimated $14 billion in sales, and its cultivation and distribution are now tightly woven into the state's economy. It is grown in homes, in backyards and even in national parks, including Yosemite.

Marijuana is popular, plentiful and lucrative, costing about $400 a pound to grow and yielding $6,000 a pound on the street. So it is perhaps inevitable that an attempt would be made to legalize it, as Proposition 19 — the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 — purports to do. The act would authorize possession of one ounce of marijuana for personal consumption by people 21 and older, permit marijuana use in private residences or public places licensed for on-site consumption, and allow marijuana cultivation in private residences for personal use. It includes strong restrictions regarding the sale or use of marijuana to or around minors, and would permit city and county governments to regulate and tax it. Proponents of the proposition say it would bring public policy on marijuana into line with that on alcohol and cigarettes, both of which can be dangerous and deadly but are nonetheless legal. It is the criminalization of the drug that creates social problems, they say, including a violent drug war at the border, fueled in part by black-market profits, and millions of lives damaged by overzealous enforcement rather than by the drug itself.

The proposal has riveted national attention on California, as did Proposition 215, the Compassionate Use Act of 1996, which permitted the medicinal use of marijuana. Thirteen states have since adopted similar measures, and public approval for medical marijuana has increased significantly. Californians' independent streak and willingness to challenge federal authority have galvanized the national debate on legalization. The question now is whether we will do it again. Will we thumb our noses at Washington and blaze another new trail?

We should not.

Whether marijuana should be legal is a valid subject for discussion. Californians ought to welcome a debate about whether marijuana is any more dangerous than alcohol, whether legalization would or would not increase consumption, and whether crime would go down as a result of decriminalization. But Proposition 19 is so poorly thought out, badly crafted and replete with loopholes and contradictions that it offers an unstable platform on which to base such a weighty conversation.

Its flaws begin with the misleading title: Regulate, Control and Tax Act. Those are hefty words that suggest responsibility and order. But the proposition is in fact an invitation to chaos. It would permit each of California's 478 cities and 58 counties to create local regulations regarding the cultivation, possession and distribution of marijuana. In other words, the law could change hundreds of times from county to county. In Los Angeles County alone it could mean 88 different sets of regulations.

The proposition would have merited more serious consideration had it created a statewide regulatory framework for local governments, residents and businesses. But it still would have contained a fatal flaw: Californians cannot legalize marijuana. Regardless of how the vote goes on Nov. 2, under federal law marijuana will remain a Schedule I drug, whose use for any reason is proscribed by Congress. Sure, California could go it alone, but that would set up an inevitable conflict with the federal government that might not end well for the state. That experiment has been tried with medical marijuana, and the outcome has not inspired confidence. Up and down the state, an untold number of residents have faced federal prosecution for actions that were allowed under California law. It's true that the Obama administration has adopted a more tolerant position on state laws regulating medical marijuana, but there's no guarantee that the next administration will. Regardless, Obama's "drug czar," Gil Kerlikowske, has firmly stated that the administration will not condone marijuana's legalization for recreational purposes.

One reason given by Proposition 19 supporters for legalizing marijuana is that California is in dire fiscal straits, and taxing the cannabis crop could ultimately enrich state and local coffers by $1.4 billion a year. But again, critics say that argument is misleading. The act essentially requires local governments that choose to regulate and tax marijuana to establish new bureaucracies and departments, and much of the new revenue could be eaten up by the cumbersome process of permitting and licensing sales, consumption, cultivation and transportation.

Far from helping the state's economic outlook, Proposition 19 could cause substantial harm. For instance, it would put employers in a quandary by creating a protected class of on-the-job smokers, bestowing a legal right to use marijuana at work unless employers could actually prove that it would impair an employee's job performance. Employers would no longer have the right to screen for marijuana use or discipline a worker for being high. But common sense dictates that a drug-free environment is crucial at too many workplaces to name — schools, hospitals, emergency response and public safety agencies, among others.

The multiple conflicts with federal law, and the strong probability of confusing and contradictory municipal laws that would result from its passage, overwhelm the hypothetical benefits of Proposition 19.

From the New York Times

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List Shows Surprising Police Expenses for Summit Security

OTTAWA — Canadians were amazed to learn that hosting the world's leaders at back-to-back summit meetings on a weekend in June cost more than $1 billion , most of it for security. Their surprise was renewed this week when newly released documents provided a glimpse into how the police had managed to spend so much money in so little time.

The information provided by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to an opposition member of Parliament accounted for only about one-sixth of the overall cost of the summit meetings. But it included a wide array of unexpected or expensive items.

Among them were $13,711 for glow sticks; $62 million on accommodations and meals; $17,500 for “fireballs,” or magnetic warning lights for police cars; and $4.3 million for a temporary steel fence around a lakeside resort where the Group of 8 meeting took place.

Insects appeared to be a major preoccupation. The police spent $325,000 on kits containing insect repellent, hand sanitizer and sunscreen; $25,975 on electronic mosquito traps; and $13,900 on “bug jackets.”

The police force bought some special equipment for the meetings, including a $42,000 harpoon system to disable speedboats. It also bought $260,000 worth of digital cameras, many of them Nikon D300s's; $260,000 worth of computers; and thousands of dollars in software.

“They took the position that money was no object,” said Dan McTeague , the Liberal member of Parliament from Toronto who requested the spending information. “If it weren't so costly, it would be humorous.”

The contracts represent the latest in a series of disputes over the cost of the meetings. Canada initially agreed to host the gathering of the Group of 8 leaders in Huntsville, Ontario, a summer resort town. But before the event took place, it was superseded by the Group of 20 as the world's premier economic gathering.

Because Huntsville was too small to host the larger gathering, Canada decided to stage the events at separate locations, the Group of 8 meeting in Huntsville and the Group of 20 meeting in Toronto, an approach that sent costs soaring.

The actions of the security forces were ultimately as much a source of contention as their expenses were. Five separate reviews are under way into the efforts of the police during the Group of 20 meeting in Toronto.

The documents released by the mounted police provided an incomplete record. They did not include the cost of a much larger security fence that made much of downtown Toronto resemble a prison camp. The Canadian Security Intelligence Service declined to provide any spending information, citing national security. And the Department of Foreign Affairs referred Mr. McTeague to its broad budget estimates, which do not break out the cost of the summit meetings.

Mr. McTeague said he was puzzled by how much the police spent on equipment because the force had led a $1 billion security effort at the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver this year. He said it appeared that little, if any, of the equipment acquired for that operation was reused during the summit weekend.

Sgt. Julie Gagnon, a spokeswoman for the mounted police, said the costs incurred by the force for the meetings “were spent as per government polices and guidelines and as efficiently as possible.” The glow sticks, she added, were for “officer safety.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/25/world/americas/25canada.html?_r=1&ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Mexico: President Condemns Killing of Another Mayor

President Felipe Calderón “energetically condemned” the murder late Thursday of Mayor Prisciliano Rodríguez of the northern town of Doctor González, the fourth killing of a local mayor in less than two months. Gunmen killed Mr. Rodríguez and a local government aide, Eliseo López, on a highway in Nuevo León State, according to the state attorney general's office.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/25/world/americas/25briefs-MEXICO.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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F.B.I. Searches Antiwar Activists' Homes

F.B.I. agents executed search warrants Friday in Minneapolis and Chicago in connection to an investigation of support of terror organizations.

The searches in Minneapolis took place early in the morning at the homes of people who have helped organize demonstrations against the war in Iraq and protests held two years ago during the Republican National Convention in St. Paul.

“It is rather patently political,” said Ted Dooley, a lawyer who represents Mick Kelly, a food service worker at the University of Minnesota and one of those whose homes was searched. “My client denies any wrongdoing.”

Steve Warfield, a spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Minneapolis, said the agents executed six warrants in Minneapolis and two in Chicago.

“They were seeking evidence related to an ongoing Joint Terrorism Task Force investigation,” Mr. Warfield said. “They are looking at activities connected to the material support of terrorism.”

He said no one in Minneapolis had been arrested while the warrants were executed. He added that agents in Michigan and North Carolina had also questioned people in connection with the investigation.

Mr. Dooley said the F.B.I. broke down Mr. Kelly's door around 7 a.m. and gave a search warrant to his companion. The warrant said agents were gathering evidence related to people “providing, attempting and conspiring to provide material support” to terrorist organizations, and listed Hezbollah , the Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia .

The warrant also authorized the agents to look for information connected to the Freedom Road Socialist Organization and to unnamed “co-conspirators” and allowed them to seize items including electronics, photographs, address books and letters.

Mr. Kelly is known in Minnesota as a prominent organizer of the Anti-War Committee , a group that has protested United States military aid to Colombia and called for the removal of American soldiers from Afghanistan.

During the Republican gathering in 2008 he was a primary organizer of a march that drew thousands of participants.

Mr. Kelly was also served with a summons to appear before a grand jury on Oct. 19 in Chicago. The order directed him to bring along pictures or videos related to any trip to Colombia, Jordan, Syria, the Palestinian territories or Israel, as well as correspondence with anyone in those places.

Jess Sundin, another member of the Anti-War Committee whose home was searched, said a warrant also was executed at the group's office. She said she had not done anything to help terror groups.

“I've protested the government's policies and spoken out and tried to educate people in my community,” Ms. Sundin said. “That is the extent of what I've done.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/25/us/politics/25search.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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The Soldiers We Need at Home

FIVE years ago I was a soldier with the 82nd Airborne Division, based at Fort Bragg, N.C. But rather than heading to Iraq or Afghanistan, I was getting ready to go to New Orleans, where I would assist in the relief efforts after Hurricane Katrina.

Such work would normally be performed by the Louisiana National Guard; after all, responding to domestic emergencies is one of the Guard's core tasks. But roughly 35 percent of the state's Guardsmen were in Iraq, so soldiers from my unit were deployed to fill in.

This wasn't an isolated incident — the Pentagon has grown increasingly dependent on the Guard to perform military operations at the cost of ignoring its other duties. Even today, as a soldier in the New York National Guard, I spend much of my time preparing to fight. Unless the military can realign its priorities, the country runs the risk of being dangerously unprepared for the next major domestic disaster.

I don't mean to criticize the active-duty Army; the paratroopers deployed to Louisiana performed their job admirably (my own deployment was called off at the last minute). But the response might have been faster and more effective had it involved more of the soldiers who called that area home.

For example, the pilots in my unit sent to find stranded New Orleans residents would have benefited from a thorough knowledge of the city's layout — something many in the Louisiana Guard certainly possessed.

Despite the end of combat operations in Iraq, the situation is no better today. During a typical drill weekend, the members of my unit, the National Guard's 69th Infantry Regiment, known as the Fighting 69th, maintain our marksmanship skills at a rifle range, learn the latest anti-insurgent tactics and participate in field exercises that simulate a battlefield environment.

Given the multiple roles that the National Guard plays, this is important work. Yet during my three years with the Guard, I have had no training to prepare for a domestic emergency.

We are based at the Lexington Avenue armory, but we haven't discussed which areas of New York City are most vulnerable to terrorist attacks or natural disasters. Nor have we conducted joint training with local law enforcement to coordinate our response protocols.

The difficult fact is that, with deployments looming over every National Guard unit in the country, there is simply no time for non-combat training.

Unlike active-duty units, the National Guard trains only one weekend a month and two weeks each summer. This means that a unit facing deployment in a year has just over a month, all together, to get its soldiers ready. And thanks to the uncertainty of deployment timelines, combat training has to be done even if overseas duty isn't on the schedule.

Moreover, because Guardsmen spend the rest of their lives as civilians, free of the discipline imposed by a military lifestyle, training them is harder and takes longer than training active-duty soldiers.

As a result, the country's emergency-response structure is left with a gaping hole. Congress and the Pentagon should fill it by setting new priorities for National Guard training and deployment to emphasize domestic responsibilities.

Planners should examine which units are most likely to be needed by their home states — places like New York, which faces a heightened risk of terrorist attacks, or Louisiana, where another hurricane could wreak havoc — and remove them from overseas deployment lists.

Those units should then receive extensive training for responding to domestic emergencies, with a special focus on the challenges faced by their home states.

As the conflict in Iraq winds down, the Pentagon needs to let the National Guard go back to what it does best: responding to natural and manmade disasters.

Stephen Snowder, a sergeant in the New York National Guard, was an intelligence analyst for the Army in Iraq from 2006 to 2007.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/25/opinion/25snowder.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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‘What Do You Want From Us?'

OPINION

An extraordinary front-page newspaper editorial on Sunday in Ciudad Juárez cast a chilling light on the mortal dangers faced by journalists in Mexico's escalating drug wars. The editorial, in El Diario, was an open letter to the drug cartels who have slaughtered tens of thousands, including dozens of journalists — two from El Diario in the last two years.

“Explain to us what you want from us,” the letter said . “What are we supposed to publish or not publish, so we know what to abide by? You are at this time the de facto authorities in this city, because the legal authorities have not been able to stop our colleagues from falling.”

The letter came a day after the funeral of a young El Diario photographer, Luís Carlos Santiago, who was cut down by gunmen at a shopping mall. A message was later hung on a street corner warning the police that they would be killed in the same way.

El Diario has shown great courage in the past. We hope it will not silence itself now. Whatever happens, the editorial provides a terrifying description of the state of anarchy in Juárez — and a reminder of the federal government's failure to protect the press.

El Diario, whose police reporter was killed two years ago, is far from the only victim. The prosecutor investigating that death was also killed. The Committee to Protect Journalists says more than 30 journalists have been killed or have disappeared in Mexico in the last four years. Four were abducted this year. Last month, a car bomb exploded outside an office of Televisa, a leading national network. In a report this month, the group also found “vast self-censorship” taking hold in Mexico, as reporters and editors choose survival over freedom.

The Mexican government needs to do more to aggressively investigate and prosecute violence against the press. And it needs to do more to protect judges, mayors, civil servants and human-rights workers and police officers. The United States also has a clear responsibility to rein in the guns and money that allow the cartels to spread this reign of terror. What is at risk here is nothing less than the survival of Mexico's democracy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/25/opinion/25sat4.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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From the Chicago Sun Times

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Stranger's kindness brings burned girls 'some happiness'

TRIP TO DISNEY WORLD | He read their story in Sun-Times, then decided to help family

September 25, 2010

BY NATASHA KORECKI

The story in the Sun-Times earlier this month told how the lives of two Chicago girls had been forever changed by a fire set by a rival of their mother.

It detailed how now, even two years later, they can't go out in the sunlight for long and still have to wear special, clear masks 23 hours a day to help heal their physical scars.

And how the psychological wounds remained so raw that, just three weeks ago, the girls pleaded with a judge to send the arsonist and her accomplice away to prison for the longest time possible in the girls' young imaginations: "until they have no more birthdays."

Steven Goldman, a criminal defense lawyer from Glenview who has two kids of his own, read the story and knew he had to do something.

"Why not bring some happiness to them, even if it's just for a little while?" said Goldman, who was moved by the crayoned self-portraits sketched by Ariel Reyes, 8, and her sister Alondra, 5, that appeared on the paper's front page.

"I thought: This is so horrible. They should go to Disney World. That's where kids love to go. That's where my kids would love to go. That's the happiest place for kids."

So he's making it happen. He's sending the two girls and their parents to Walt Disney World in Florida for five days. They leave Monday.

"I'm in a fortunate position where I can send these girls to Disney World," said Goldman, who often works out of the Skokie courthouse. "I usually help the defense. I thought it would be nice to help the other side now."

Goldman covered airfare, admission to Disney, meals, plus some spending money and gifts for the girls when they arrive.

"Oh, my God, I started to cry," the girls' stepmother and primary caregiver, Susana Lugo, said of hearing the news.

"They were tears of joy," said her husband, Juan Reyes.

Reyes and Lugo didn't say anything to the girls at first because they were afraid the offer was too good to be true. But once they knew it was genuine, they told Ariel and Alondra when they got home from school.

"They kept saying, 'Come on, you're playing with us, you're playing,' " Lugo said.

The sisters love Disney. Ariel, not surprisingly, is a big fan of Ariel from "The Little Mermaid." They plan to dine with the Disney princesses for a meal while in Orlando.

This stranger's generosity has given a big lift to a family trying to emerge from a dark time since the fire that night of Nov. 7, 2008, Reyes said.

The girls were asleep when Margarita "Flaca" Gonzalez, aided by an accomplice, set fire to the apartment where the girls were sleeping that night with their birth mother, Janelle Fermaintt -- Gonzalez's intended target. Gonzalez and Fermaintt had been involved in an escalating, back-and-forth fight over a man that had gone on for months. It ended that night, with Gonzalez pouring gasoline outside the door and setting fire to Fermaintt's apartment in the 5600 block of North Elston, where the mother was asleep with the girls.

They all got out, escaping through a window. But the girls were badly burned -- on their faces, hands, arms and legs. They were placed on life support. At one point, it didn't look like Alondra, then 3, would make it.

But slowly the girls began to improve. Now recovered, they still go through an intense routine every day to treat their scars and also must wear special garments, as well as the masks, to protect their skin.

They were able to speak with the judge before she sentenced Gonzalez, who faced up to 50 years in prison and got 25. Her accomplice got 19 years.

But that's the past. The future, very soon, is Disney World.

"This is going to be the perfect time for them," said Lugo. "It's not summer summer, so it's not too hot. We're going in the afternoon so the sun won't bother them."

The family hasn't met Goldman. They didn't even know the name of their benefactor until Friday, when Goldman, who'd made the arrangements through a victims' coordinator and initially had asked to remain anonymous, agreed to be named.

But Lugo said she had a message to pass along to him from her family:

"People have really big hearts," she said. "And I thank you from the bottom of my heart."

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/2743750,CST-NWS-burned25.article

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From the White House

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Emergency Planning for the Entire Community

Today marks the close of our first ever National “Getting Real” Conference, that brought together leaders from emergency management and disability communities to continue the discussion about how we can plan for the entire community, not just part of it.  The three day forum was held in Baltimore.

All too often in emergency management we plan for what's easy.  We plan for middle class people that have cars, a high school education, English as their primary language, and so on.

We don't plan for what's real.  We don't plan for children, the elderly, or people with disabilities.

Bringing together people from a wide variety of backgrounds, including advocates, leaders from non-profit organizations, federal, state and local government, is about taking the next step in changing the way the emergency management community plans – and who we plan for.

When I came to FEMA I knew we had a lot of work to do in planning for real.  That's why we created the Office of Disability Integration and Coordination (ODIC), to provide guidance, tools, methods and strategies to integrate and coordinate emergency management efforts to meet the needs of all citizens, including children and adults with disabilities and others with access and functional needs.

And that's why we put together this conference, to move the dialogue forward.  I often say, FEMA is not the team, we're only part of the team.  Only by working together and planning for the entire community, can we successfully respond to and recover from the next disaster.

For more information on how you and your family can be prepared, visit www.ready.gov .

Craig Fugate is the Administrator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/09/24/emergency-planning-entire-community

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From ICE

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ICE arrests 32 in Atlanta-area operation targeting criminal aliens and immigration fugitives

ATLANTA - More than 30 criminal aliens, immigration fugitives and immigration violators are facing deportation and criminal charges following a four-day enforcement operation spearheaded by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Office of Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Fugitive Operations Teams (FOTs) in the Atlanta area.

During the operation, which concluded today, ICE made a total of 32 arrests in Houston, Peach, Bibb, Dougherty, Toombs, and Thomas counties.

Of those taken into custody, 13 were aliens with prior criminal convictions, four had been previously deported who returned to the United States illegally after being removed, and 15 were immigration fugitives who failed to comply with a final order of deportation issued by an immigration judge.

Their criminal histories included prior arrests and convictions for a variety of violations, including reentry after deportation, driving under the influence of alcohol, weapons violations, and assault and disorderly conduct among others. Since many of the individuals have outstanding orders of deportation or have been previously deported, they are subject to immediate removal from the country.

"A top priority for the Atlanta Field Office is to locate and arrest criminal aliens and ultimately remove them from our country in a safe and humane manner," said Felicia Skinner, field office director of ICE ERO in Atlanta. "This operation is yet another example of the critical roles that multi-agency cooperation and targeted immigration enforcement play in protecting our communities."

The U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Georgia has accepted prosecution for the four aliens who reentered the U.S. after being deported. If convicted, they face a sentence of up to 20 years in prison.

The remaining aliens will be held by ICE pending the completion of their criminal cases, a hearing before an immigration judge, or the completion of travel arrangements.

The group included 13 males and two females from six different countries - Mexico (13), El Salvador (2), Guatemala, (9), Honduras (5), India (1), China (2).

This enforcement action was spearheaded by ICE's Fugitive Operations Program, which is responsible for locating, arresting and removing at-large criminal aliens and immigration fugitives. ICE's Fugitive Operations Teams (FOTs) give top priority to cases involving aliens who pose a threat to national security and public safety, including members of transnational street gangs and child sex offenders.

In fiscal year 2010 (through Aug. 20), ICE's FOTs nationwide have made 30,787 arrests. More than 89 percent of those arrests involved immigration fugitives and aliens with prior criminal convictions.

As a result of the FOT's efforts, the nation's fugitive alien population continues to decline. Estimates now place the number of immigration fugitives in the United States as slightly under 525,000, a decrease of more than 71,000 since October 2007.

ICE's Fugitive Operations Program is just one facet of the Department of Homeland Security's broader strategy to heighten the federal government's effectiveness at identifying and removing dangerous criminal aliens from the United States. Other initiatives that figure prominently in this effort are the Criminal Alien Program, Secure Communities and the agency's partnerships with state and local law enforcement agencies under 287(g).

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/1009/100924atlanta.htm

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