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April 10, 2011

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Not targeted but not safe, young illegal immigrants push for a new policy

Young activists had pinned their hopes on the Dream Act. When it was put to bed, they started a new strategy: 'Coming out' as illegal immigrants and protesting their uncertain fates in this country.

Seven college-age Latinos gathered in downtown Atlanta and passed around a microphone, announcing to the world that they were coming out of the shadows as illegal immigrants.

Then, in an act of civil disobedience, they sat down in the middle of a busy street and announced it again to a large and chanting crowd. When they were hauled off to jail, they even declared their status to a pair of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers — who proceeded to do nothing.

Wednesday, after a night in jail, the seven were free again, clutching misdemeanor tickets issued by the city for blocking traffic.

So what, one might ask, does it take for an illegal immigrant to get deported in the United States of 2011?

That turns out to be a good question, particularly for immigrants who, like the Georgia youths, call themselves "the Dreamers" — that is, immigrants who might have achieved legal status through the federal Dream Act.

The legislation would have offered a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants who were brought to the United States at a young age, had lived here for at least five years, had stayed out of trouble and enrolled in college or served in the military.

Los Angeles Times

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The 9/11 trials at Guantanamo will create a distressing legacy

Once the military commission apparatus becomes established, every future administration will have a ready instrument to arrest, judge and sentence wholly within the executive branch, evading the separation of powers carefully calibrated in the Constitution.

The system of military commissions that will try Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four other alleged 9/11 plotters contains a dirty little secret. Hardly anybody talks about it, but it's a key reason for concern as the apparatus becomes established.

It is this: The commissions can operate inside the United States, and they have jurisdiction over a broad range of crimes. Nothing in the Military Commissions Act limits the military trials to Guantanamo detainees, or to people captured and held abroad, or even to terrorism suspects. Nothing prevents the commissions from trying noncitizens, arrested inside the country, whom the president unilaterally designates as "unprivileged enemy belligerents." In other words, the law permits military officers to try non-Americans from Alabama and Arkansas as well as Afghanistan.

The Obama administration's decision last week to shift the high-profile 9/11 case from federal court is bound to move the military system toward legitimacy. The commissions lack the seasoned body of precedent that guides civilian courts, so their procedures will have to survive litigation by defense lawyers. But once the commissions gain stature and become the "new normal," every future administration will have a ready instrument to arrest, judge and sentence wholly within the executive branch, evading the separation of powers carefully calibrated in the Constitution. The judicial branch has no role except on appeal, where only the federal court for the D.C. circuit may review a verdict and sentence after the trial.

Los Angeles Times

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Newly Born, and Withdrawing From Painkillers

BANGOR, Me. — The mother got the call in the middle of the night: her 3-day-old baby was going through opiate withdrawal in a hospital here and had to start taking methadone, a drug best known for treating heroin addiction, to ease his suffering.

The mother had abused prescription painkillers like OxyContin for the first 12 weeks of her pregnancy, buying them on the street in rural northern Maine, and then tried to quit cold turkey — a dangerous course, doctors say, that could have ended in miscarriage. The baby had seizures in utero as a result, and his mother, Tonya, turned to methadone treatment, with daily doses to keep her cravings and withdrawal symptoms at bay.

As prescription drug abuse ravages communities across the country, doctors are confronting an emerging challenge: newborns dependent on painkillers. While methadone may have saved Tonya's pregnancy, her son, Matthew, needed to be painstakingly weaned from it.

Infants like him may cry excessively and have stiff limbs, tremors, diarrhea and other problems that make their first days of life excruciating. Many have to stay in the hospital for weeks while they are weaned off the drugs, taxing neonatal units and driving the cost of their medical care into the tens of thousands of dollars.

Like the cocaine-exposed babies of the 1980s, those born dependent on prescription opiates — narcotics that contain opium or its derivatives — are entering a world in which little is known about the long-term effects on their development. Few doctors are even willing to treat pregnant opiate addicts, and there is no universally accepted standard of care for their babies, partly because of the difficulty of conducting research on pregnant women and newborns.

New York Times

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What's in a Lethal Injection ‘Cocktail'?

THE latest controversy over the always controversial subject of capital punishment: the drugs used to execute people on death row.

Lawyers for death row inmates in Texas and Arizona have filed challenges to the executions questioning the use of specific drugs in the lethal injection of their clients. (Last week, the Supreme Court stayed the executions for other reasons.)

These challenges have been prompted by a shortage of one of the drugs, sodium thiopental, an anesthetic. The American manufacturer of sodium thiopental, Hospira, recently announced that it would no longer produce the drug, and manufacturers in Europe do not want to supply the drug if it will be used in executions. Some executions have been postponed while states try to sort out the drug situation.

In Texas, which carries out more executions than any other state, the controversy is focused on the proposed switch from sodium thiopental to pentobarbital in a three-drug cocktail.

What is the difference?

The two drugs come from the same family: barbiturates, drugs that depress the central nervous system. So, in general, said Dr. John Dombrowski, director of the Washington Pain Center and a board member of the American Society of Anesthesiologists, “it's like if you ask me what's the difference between Johnnie Walker Blue, Black and Red — they're all scotch.”

New York Times

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Principal Apologizes For Mock Auction of Black Students in Virginia

ORFOLK, Va. - The superintendent of Norfolk, Va., schools apologized Saturday for a controversial classroom lesson involving the mock auction of black students.

Apparently, during a fourth grade teacher's lesson on the Civil War, students were separated by race. White students on one side and African American and mixed-race students on the other, who were then offered up for auction, Virginia's Fox 43 news reports.

In an April 6 letter to the students' parents and guardians, Principal Mary B. Wrushen wrote, "I recently became aware of a history lesson that was presented to the students in Ms. Jessica Boyle's fourth grade class. Although her actions were well intended to meet the instructional objectives, the activity presented was inappropriate for the students."

Wrushen added that she intends to follow up with the teacher to make sure this never happens again. "The lesson could have been thought through more carefully, as to not offend her students or put them in an uncomfortable situation," Wrushen said in the letter.

The letter also said a guidance counselor is available to discuss any concerns with students concerning the classroom lesson. Superintendent Dr. Richard Bentley said the school district does not condone this type of lesson. "It was wrong. It was outside the boundaries of the curriculum and appropriate instructional practices," Bentley said.

Fox News

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April 9, 2011

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13 more bodies found in Mexico mass graves

The bodies were found in a different spot in the state of Tamaulipas than graves where 59 corpses were found earlier. Authorities found those bodies while investigating kidnappings of bus passengers.

Mexican authorities announced Friday the discovery of 13 more bodies in the violence-torn border state of Tamaulipas, where 59 bodies were unearthed in eight pits earlier this week.

It was not immediately clear if the latest two graves, found Thursday, were related to the others.

The 13 bodies, all men and thought to be Mexican, were discovered in a different spot than the other graves, a state official said. Authorities found the previous bodies while investigating mass kidnappings of passengers from buses passing through the area.

Last year, 72 migrants from Central and South America were found slain on a remote ranch in the same region. That massacre was blamed on the Zetas, an ultra-violent drug gang that engages in migrant-smuggling, extortion and kidnapping.

Tamaulipas officials have only begun identifying the latest bodies. Preliminary evidence suggests that the 59 bodies found earlier were of Mexicans, not foreign migrants, officials said.

Los Angeles Times

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Police search for suspect in Santa Monica synagogue explosion

Police release a photo of the suspect, Ron Hirsch, 60, also known as Israel Fisher, saying they thought he was behind Thursday's blast outside Chabad House.

Police on Friday were searching for the suspect in a Santa Monica synagogue explosion that authorities had earlier believed to be an accidental blast.

Santa Monica police released a photograph of the short and heavyset suspect, Ron Hirsch, 60, also known as Israel Fisher, saying they thought he was behind Thursday morning's blast outside Chabad House on 17th Street between Broadway and Santa Monica Boulevard. Police described Hirsch as a transient.

"Hirsch should be considered extremely dangerous," said a police bulletin sent to other law enforcement agencies.

He is described as white, 5 feet, 7 inches tall, 207 pounds, with brown hair and green eyes.

The bulletin said Hirsch was known to frequent synagogues and Jewish community centers in search of charity, among them Congregation Bais Yehuda on North La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles.

Los Angeles Times

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2 men charged with hate crime in assault at O.C. park

Two men were facing hate crime and assault charges Friday for allegedly yelling anti-Semitic slurs while beating and robbing a man in a Coto de Caza park, Orange County prosecutors said.

The 23-year-old victim, whose name was not released, suffered a broken jaw, nose and eye socket; severe facial bruising; cuts; cracked ribs, and a concussion, authorities said. The assault occurred about 6:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Orange County sheriff's deputies arrested Matthew Gregory Branstetter and Nolan John Wickham, both 19-year-old Rancho Santa Margarita residents. Each was charged with aggravated assault and second-degree robbery with potentially harsher sentencing for committing a hate crime, prosecutors said.

The suspects -- along with a third accomplice who has not yet been arrested -- allegedly demanded money from the victim, who told them he had none. They allegedly went on to kick and punch him while yelling anti-Semitic slurs, and stole his jacket and cellphone, prosecutors said.

Los Angeles Times

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It's time to let the Chowchilla kidnappers go free

Public emotions over their 1976 crime are not reason enough keep Chowchilla kidnappers in prison.

One memorable moment during the Chowchilla kidnapping trial came during the testimony of one of the young victims. A girl testified that during the ordeal, she had tried to get everyone to sing, "If You're Happy and You Know It, Clap Your Hands."

"No one clapped," she said in a small, plaintive voice.

The 1976 kidnapping was full of moments that set it apart from most crimes. The nation's panic when an entire school bus of children disappeared along with their driver. The victims' daring escape. The discovery that the kidnappers were not professional thugs, but three affluent young men.

These are some of the factors that make a case special in society's collective emotional memory. They ensure that the events won't be forgotten no matter how much time has passed and that anger at the perpetrators will remain long afterward.

But public emotions are not a solid foundation for true justice. The time has come to let the Chowchilla kidnappers go.

Los Angeles Times

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April 8, 2011

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Border agents foil several attempts by sea smugglers

Mexican sea smugglers appear to be ramping up their efforts to land illegal immigrants and drugs on California beaches, with U.S. border agents foiling at least five smuggling attempts in the first five days of this month.

In one day alone, April 4, authorities from the multi-agency Maritime Unified Command seized three vessels, one of them an abandoned panga near Dana Point with 740 pounds of marijuana on board, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials.

Authorities that day also seized a 16-foot pleasure craft near San Diego's Shelter Island carrying four illegal immigrants, and intercepted a boat off Del Mar with 12 illegal immigrants on board. Three other men on that fishing vessel were charged with human smuggling.

On April 1, border agents arrested six illegal immigrants after their Bayliner pleasure craft landed ashore at Moonlight Beach in Encinitas. On April 5, a U.S. Coast Guard cutter intercepted a boat 20 miles off La Jolla carrying 16 Mexican nationals, two of whom were charged with alien smuggling.

Los Angeles Times

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U.S. not doing enough to decrease drug consumption, former Mexican president says

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox, a onetime U.S. ally in the war on drugs who now pushes for drug legalization, said the U.S. is not doing enough to decrease drug consumption and stop the flow of weapons to Mexico.

Prohibiting drugs doesn't work, Fox said at a news conference in San Diego, and while Mexico has failed to defeat organized crime groups, the U.S. has also failed to control drug distribution within the country.

Fox, a member of the conservative National Action Party, or PAN, drew a comparison between drug use, and people's sexual orientation and a woman's right to an abortion.

“We're talking about the last frontier of prohibition. Tell me something else that is prohibited today? Abortion is permitted. Marriage between same-sex (people) now is permitted … smoking cigarettes is permitted, alcohol is permitted,” Fox said.

Fox, who was in San Diego raising funds for his presidential library, has become an outspoken proponent of drug legalization, joining other prominent former Latin American politicians who believe law enforcement efforts to defeat organized crime groups are futile.

Los Angeles Times

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Los Angeles and Long Beach ports are on the front lines of a crackdown on counterfeit goods

The busiest port complex in the U.S. accounts for about 40% of illegal goods, including fake electronics, toys, cigarettes and designer jeans and handbags.

The massive Long Beach warehouse is as well stocked as any big-box discount store, filled with brand-new electronics, designer jeans, famous-label handbags and toys.

And cigarettes. Cartons and cartons of them, seemingly enough to supply a small kingdom.

There are no shoppers, however. All of the goods in this 500,000-square-foot warehouse were seized by federal agents — mostly counterfeits, along with banned items such as elephant ivory and drug paraphernalia.

Smuggling is on the rise, with seizures by U.S. Customs and Border Protection up 35% in fiscal year 2010 from 2009. And the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are the front line.

The twin ports account for about 40% of all seizures by Customs and Border Protection. That reflects their status as the nation's busiest port complex and as the main cargo gateway from Asia, whose workshops are as good at making knockoffs as they are at making the real thing.

Los Angeles Times

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Social experiment: Know thy neighbor

The author asked himself: Do I live in a community or just in a house on a street of people whose lives are separate from my own? And he wondered: What if he could deliberately get to know these strangers?

When I was growing up in upstate New York in the late 1950s and '60s, people didn't exercise in public the way they do now. You didn't see adults jogging, biking or power-walking on the street.

Except one. Nearly every day, a middle-aged woman of slight build walked rapidly through our suburban neighborhood, usually with her head down. No one knew her name, so we called her the Walker. She usually wore a simple blue or yellow dress, if memory serves, and when it rained she would wear a clear plastic raincoat with a hood pulled over her head. In the winter I recall a long, cloth coat, also with a hood; in driving snow she'd cover her face with a scarf.

Forty years later, when I'd moved with my wife and children back to what had been my parents' home, I was amazed to see the same woman still walking through the neighborhood.

I was, at the time, writing a book about how Americans live as neighbors and asked Grace if she'd be willing to talk with me about that. She agreed, and a few days later, I met her at her home. It turned out she lived in an apartment nearby. She'd never married, lived alone and walked each day, she said, for exercise.

Among the things I learned about Grace was that as a young woman she had studied at the Juilliard School and was an accomplished harpist and pianist.

Los Angeles Times

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Gunman Opens Fire at School in Brazil, Killing 12 Children

RIO DE JANEIRO — As family members mourned their loved ones and kept vigil at hospitals for the injured, this city searched for understanding Thursday after a shooting at a public school left 12 students dead and 12 others wounded.

Brazil is no stranger to urban violence, especially the kind of violence in gang-controlled slums that have given this city one of the highest murder rates in the world. But the specter of the schoolhouse massacre was thought to be a mostly American affliction.

On Thursday, the Tasso da Silveira elementary and middle school, a three-story aqua-and-yellow schoolhouse in the working-class neighborhood of Realengo, on the west side of Rio, joined the ranks of Columbine High School in 1999 and Virginia Tech University in 2007, sites of other school shootings. For the victims' families, the massacre brought those tragedies home.

“We hear about terrorists abroad and we think it will never happen here,” said Clemilson Perreira Chagas, 30, whose cousin Jessica Perreira, 15, was killed Thursday. “But it does.”

The police said that Wellington Menezes de Oliveira, 24, entered Tasso de Silveira around 8 a.m. A former student at the school, Mr. Oliveira told a teacher who recognized him that he was there to speak to a class.

New York Times

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Mexican Authorities, Investigating Hijacking, Find 59 Bodies

MEXICO CITY — The discovery of 59 bodies buried in mass graves in northern Mexico led officials on Thursday to acknowledge that criminal gangs had begun to inflict a new form of terror: stopping buses and removing passengers, some never to be seen again.

Reports of these abductions began to emerge two weeks ago from a long-distance bus company and from terrified passengers who had witnessed people being taken off a bus, Morelos Canseco Gomez, an official in the Tamaulipas State Interior Ministry, said in a radio interview.

Mr. Canseco said it appeared to be a new kind of crime, one in which criminals “stop the bus, select passengers, take them hostage.” He added that it was a “criminal modus operandi that has not been detected on this scale here in Tamaulipas.”

The gangs have been working along the highway between the cities of San Luis Potosi and Reynosa, which is on the border across from McAllen, Texas.

Mr. Canseco said it was unclear why gangs were removing people from buses. They may have been trying to forcibly recruit passengers as foot soldiers, or they may have intended to hold them for ransom, he said. It may also be that the missing men were heading to the United States and that the gangs took them off the bus to extort payment to get them across the border.

New York Times

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Instead of Helping, Trustee Program Is Hurting Veterans, Families Say

LANCASTER, Tex. — During the Korean War, Billy Brown faced enemy bullets, starvation and bitter cold. Now the benefits that he earned for his sacrifice have been tied up by the Department of Veterans Affairs, which in 2009 diverted his payments to trustees who have taken control not only of those funds, but of his life savings of some $100,000 as well.

Richard Wortham, Mr. Brown's son, gained power of attorney for his father four years before the department stepped in, and found out about his father's new financial minder only when he tried to withdraw money from the bank. “They said we no longer had access to his money — we could only get it from the fiduciary,” Mr. Wortham said.

What began as a broad effort to safeguard ailing veterans and their families from financial loss and abuse has turned into what lawyers and veterans' advocates call a mismanaged and poorly regulated bureaucracy that not only fails to respond to veterans' needs but in some cases creates new problems.

Families of veterans like Mr. Brown, 80, and William E. Freeman, whose sister was denied the ability to manage his benefits, and beneficiaries like Dennis Keyser, whose appointed trustee turned out to be a felon, say the system is badly flawed.

The person the department appointed to handle Mr. Brown's affairs, Marcus Brown (no relation), listed his occupation as a “cabinet specialist” and has a high school education; the family said he informed them that they would have to petition him for purchases. While the family has not accused Marcus Brown of abusing the funds — and his lawyer, Logan Odeneal, notes that his client has served as a manager of benefits for some 80 veterans and “his accountings always balance to the penny” — the family found him unresponsive and chafed at what they saw as an unnecessary imposition.

New York Times

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OPINION

When Blame Isn't Enough

THE death of Marchella Pierce, a 4-year-old girl in Brooklyn who was beaten, malnourished and tied to a bed, has again aroused anger over child welfare in New York City. Her mother stands accused of murder, and a caseworker and a supervisor were charged last month with criminally negligent homicide.

Reading about Marchella's death in September brought back painful memories. When I was the director of child welfare in the District of Columbia I often woke up at 3 a.m., fearing all that could go wrong. During my tenure, there were increases in adoptions and speedier investigations, and more children went to live with foster families rather than in institutions. But substandard care and terrible cases also continued.

Because there is so much to fix, improvements and calamities can happen simultaneously in long-troubled child welfare systems. In Washington, where I took over from a court-appointed receiver, the work ranged from reducing caseloads to overhauling information technology, contracting, licensing and personnel systems. On good days, we reminded ourselves that it was all worth it. But when a child was hurt or killed, we often reacted defensively, fearing that a misdirected public outcry could undercut our plans for reform.

After I left that job, I kept looking for solutions. For ideas, I examined institutions like airlines and some hospitals that have reduced deaths and injuries. Through rigorous data analysis, they have developed systemic approaches to safety, focusing on clear communication, minimum-staffing requirements and “fail-safe” strategies to reduce the consequences of inevitable human error. Such strategies — including checklists and passing on information at crucial moments like shift changes — can be applied to protecting children.

New York Times

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Attorney General Eric Holder Speaks at National Forum on Youth Violence Prevention Summit

Thank you, Barney [Melekian]. I appreciate your kind words, and I'm especially grateful for your leadership of the COPS Office – and your commitment to preventing and combating youth violence.

Thank you all for being here – and for being part of this critical summit.

This gathering marks an important step forward in what I know – and what I pledge – will be an ongoing conversation about how we can address violence among – and directed toward – our nation's young people.

Throughout my career, I have seen the devastating effects of youth violence. Today, as Attorney General – and, above all, as the father of three teenage children – I am determined to make the progress that our children deserve.

I know you share this commitment. Just as important, you understand what we're up against. Though you're approaching this work from a variety of perspectives, you've all seen the ways that violent crime has ravaged too many of our communities, shattered too many young lives, and stolen too many promising futures.

Dept of Justice

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Attorney General Eric Holder Speaks at the National Crime Victims' Rights Week National Observance and Candlelight Ceremony

Thank you, Laurie [Robinson]. It is an honor, once again, to be part of this annual ceremony. I want to thank you and Joye [Frost] – and your colleagues across the Office of Justice Programs and, especially, the Office for Victims of Crimes – for your work in bringing us all together this evening, and for the contributions that you make every day to bring hope, healing and – above all – justice to crime victims and their families.

I also want to welcome the other Justice Department leaders and partners who are with us – in particular, United States Attorney Ron Machen.

Your commitment to assisting and empowering crime victims is making a difference here in Washington, and across the country.

Thank you all for being here.

For exactly three decades – since National Crime Victims' Rights Week was established in 1981 – we have set aside these days of reflection as an important opportunity to signal our support for crime victims, to give voice to their suffering, and to light the way toward a hopeful future.

Tonight, as we join together to commemorate this year's National Crime Victims' Rights Week, it is clear that we are also bound by our common goals, by our shared concerns, and by our collective resolve to do more to protect those at risk and in need – and to support every person, every family, and every community now struggling to overcome the devastating effects of crime.

Dept of Justice

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April 7, 2011

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Police Lesson: Social Network Tools Have 2 Edges

Officer Trey Economidy of the Albuquerque police now realizes that he should have thought harder before listing his occupation on his Facebook profile as “human waste disposal.”

After he was involved in a fatal on-duty shooting in February, a local television station dug up the Facebook page. Officer Economidy was placed on desk duty, and last month the Albuquerque Police Department announced a new policy to govern officers' use of social networking sites.

Social networking tools like Facebook and Twitter can be valuable assets for law enforcement agencies, helping them alert the public, seek information about crimes and gather evidence about the backgrounds of criminal suspects. But the Internet can also get police departments into trouble.

Public gaffes like Officer Economidy's — his cynical job description on Facebook was “extremely inappropriate and a lapse in judgment on my part,” he said last week in an e-mail — are only one of the risks. A careless posting on a networking site, law enforcement experts say, can endanger an officer's safety, as it did in Santa Monica, Calif., last year when the Police Department went to great lengths to conceal a wounded officer's identity and location, only to have a retired officer inadvertently reveal them on Facebook.

And defense lawyers increasingly scour social networking sites for evidence that could impeach a police officer's testimony. In one case in New York, a jury dismissed a weapons charge against a defendant after learning that the arresting officer had listed his mood on MySpace as “devious” and wrote on Facebook that he was watching the film “Training Day” to “brush up on proper police procedure.”

New York Times

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Critics Call Terrorism Hearing in Manhattan Anti-Muslim

A state senator has scheduled a daylong hearing for Friday on terrorism preparedness in New York City, featuring an array of experts in law enforcement, emergency response and counterterrorism.

But his plan to take testimony in Manhattan about the threat from radical Islam is drawing sharp criticism from Muslim and interfaith groups that call the hearing anti-Muslim and incendiary — a local version of the contentious session held last month in Washington by Representative Peter T. King of Long Island.

In fact, the witness list includes Mr. King, a Republican who has promised more Congressional hearings on what he calls the radicalization of American Muslims.

The state senator, Gregory R. Ball, a Putnam County Republican who is chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans, Homeland Security and Military Affairs, said he did not intend his inquiry to focus unfairly on threats from any one group.

“But there are people who seek to hurt and destroy us,” Mr. Ball said. “We have to move beyond political correctness.”

New York Times

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EDITORIAL

Better Protecting Prisoners

The Justice Department is finalizing new rape-prevention policies that will become mandatory for federal prisons and state correctional institutions that receive federal money. The rules, based on recommendations from a Congressionally mandated commission, would be a major improvement. But the department needs to remedy several weaknesses before it issues final regulations.

Rape and other forms of sexual abuse by fellow inmates or correctional officers are a chronic hazard in prisons, jails and juvenile facilities across the country. According to federal estimates, 200,000 adult prisoners and jail inmates suffered some form of sexual abuse during 2008.

That works out to about 4.4 percent of the prison population and 3.1 percent of the jail population. The numbers are even higher in juvenile institutions, with 12 percent of the total population suffering some form of sexual abuse. Statistics showing that some institutions have higher rates of assault than others are consistent with the finding of the rape commission, which reported that some prisons had successfully created an atmosphere of safety while others tacitly tolerated assaults.

The commission came up with a long and compelling list of rape prevention recommendations, most of which have been adopted by the Justice Department. It is demanding a zero-tolerance approach to rape behind bars and will require better training of staff members, more effective ways to report assaults, more thorough investigations and better medical and psychiatric services for victims. In perhaps the most revolutionary development, prisons would be required to make sexual assault data public so policy makers could get a clear view of how well or how poorly vulnerable inmates were being protected.

New York Times

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DHS Supports Exercise of Securing the Cities Program Designed to Detect Radiological and Nuclear Threats

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April 6, 2011

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The man behind the Manhattan mosque

Businessman Sharif El-Gamal has been undeterred by the furor over his planned Islamic center near the former World Trade Center site.

When protesters flooded Lower Manhattan last Sept. 11 to vent about a planned Islamic cultural and prayer center, few knew the obscure New York businessman behind the project. Squadrons of police had to be deployed to control the angry crowds wielding bullhorns and placards, yet nobody cried out the name of Sharif El-Gamal.

The furor over what opponents call the "ground zero mosque" has receded for now, and plans for the $100-million project continue to move forward. The driving force remains the relentless El-Gamal, a Brooklyn-born college dropout who makes up in tenacity what he lacks in polish.

With light blue eyes and reddish, curly hair, snazzy suits and upwardly mobile ambitions, El-Gamal comes across like a typical New York mashup of cultures and religions. His first real estate partner was a Hasidic Jew, and even now when he's searching for a perfect expression, he's as likely to use Yiddish as Arabic.

On a recent Friday afternoon, El-Gamal, 38, paced around his sunny Manhattan office describing like an excited teenager how he got into wheeling and dealing property.

Suddenly a voice crackled from his computer. It was a muezzin's call, programmed to remind him to pray five times a day. But instead of dropping to his knees in front of his desk, as he usually does, he headed for his buildings at 45-51 Park Place, now the most controversial prayer space in America.

By the time El-Gamal arrived, hundreds of Muslim men and a handful of women were already shoeless and murmuring prayers on the first floor of the crumbling buildings. After a brief service, almost every congregant offered a swab of saliva: The community is seeking a bone-marrow match for a Pakistani "brother" who has cancer.

"Pretty dangerous stuff," El-Gamal said dryly, before swabbing his own cheek and slipping into a subway train to return to his office.

Los Angeles Times

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Parole board grants release date for man convicted in 1976 Chowchilla kidnapping

California's parole board Tuesday upheld an earlier decision that deemed one of three men responsible for kidnapping 26 Chowchilla schoolchildren and their school bus driver in 1976 suitable for parole.

But Richard Schoenfeld, now 56, would not be scheduled for release until 2021, and his parole would have to clear several more hurdles, including a review by the governor, said Luis Patino, a spokesman for the parole board.

Photos: Chowchilla kidnappings

Any sitting governor between now and 2021 could ask the board to reconsider its decision to set a release date for Schoenfeld, Patino said.

Schoenfeld, his brother James and Fred Woods, who were all from wealthy families, were in their early 20s when they committed the crime, which would become the largest kidnapping-for-ransom case in U.S. history. The three started plotting the kidnapping after they lost $30,000 on a housing deal.

In July 1976, the three armed men commandeered the big yellow school bus from Dairyland Unified and drove it into a dry canal bottom. The children -– who ranged in age from 5 to 14 –- and the bus driver were herded into two vans and driven to a Livermore quarry.

Los Angeles Times

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Tim Rutten: Florida pastor Terry Jones and the far reach of free speech

The Koran-burning by a Florida pastor and the deadly protests it triggered in Afghanistan raise issues about free speech and Americans' attitudes toward Muslims.

In this digital age, speech has been globalized just as surely as commerce.

That's one of the lessons to be taken from the troubling sequence of events in which a tiny Florida church's distasteful publicity stunt of burning a Koran triggered five days of protest and mob violence across Afghanistan. Through Tuesday, more than 20 people had been killed, and the hand of our Taliban antagonists has been strengthened.

Terry Jones, you may recall, is the anti-Islam pastor of a Gainesville fundamentalist church with a congregation of about 30, who gained international notoriety and hours of press attention last fall by threatening to burn a Koran on the Sept. 11 anniversary. After appeals from, among others, President Obama and Gen. David H. Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Jones relented. Last month, however, he decided to hold a mock "trial" of Islam's holy book that ended with its burning.

This time, the American news media simply ignored Jones' crude cabaret of bigotry, but a video made its way onto the Internet. Then, for reasons that remain unclear, Afghan President Hamid Karzai refused to let the provocation pass. On March 24, he issued a news release demanding that the United States "bring to justice the perpetrators of this crime." On Thursday, he gave a speech condemning the burning and demanding Jones' arrest. The next day, deadly rioting erupted after Friday prayers in Afghan mosques. Sunday, in a meeting with Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry, Karzai demanded that Congress pass a resolution condemning Jones.

For their part, both Obama and Petraeus unequivocally condemned Jones' desecration of the Koran, though the president also called the killings that followed "an affront to human decency and dignity."

Los Angeles Times

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National security: When secrecy is a weapon

U.S. officials hurt our democracy by withholding information from the courts but then disclosing it to the public whenever it suits their needs.

In a recent interview with Newsweek magazine, former CIA lawyer John Rizzo spoke with surprising candor about the CIA's "targeted killing" program. He discussed the scope of the program (about 30 people are on the "hit list" at any given time), the process by which the CIA selects its targets (Rizzo was "the one who signed off") and the methods the CIA uses to eliminate them ("The Predator is the weapon of choice, but it could also be someone putting a bullet in your head"). In a wide-ranging conversation, Rizzo volunteered details about a highly controversial counterterrorism program that had previously been cloaked in official secrecy.

What was most remarkable about the interview, though, was not what Rizzo said but that it was Rizzo who said it. For more than six years until his retirement in December 2009, Rizzo was the CIA's acting general counsel — the agency's chief lawyer. On his watch the CIA had sought to quash a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by arguing that national security would be harmed irreparably if the CIA were to acknowledge any detail about the targeted killing program, even the program's mere existence.

Rizzo's disclosure was long overdue — the American public surely has a right to know that the assassination of terrorism suspects is now official government policy — and reflects an opportunistic approach to allegedly sensitive information that has become the norm for senior government officials. Routinely, officials insist to courts that the nation's security will be compromised if certain facts are revealed but then supply those same facts to trusted reporters.

Los Angeles Times

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Long Island beach body search continues Wed.

(Video on site)

OAK BEACH (WABC) -- Suffolk County police, New York state troopers, firefighters and cadaver dogs resume their grim search Wednesday for more victims of a suspected serial killer.

The searches at Gilgo Beach and Oak Beach have even extended into the small gated communities along the beachfront.

Fog, rain and sand whipped up by the wind made things tough for searchers Tuesday as they made their grim trudge through the brambled dunes with no new discoveries.

The Suffolk County Medical Examiner did not release any information on the four latest sets of remains found earlier this week. All of them are now with a forensic anthropologist at the New York City Medical Examiner's Office, where they will be subjected to DNA analysis.

The one thing police are sure of is that none of the four victims is missing Jersey City prostitute Shannan Gilbert , who vanished May 1, 2010. She had banged on the door of a home in Oak Beach before running off again, screaming that she was being chased. Gilbert, 24, had visited Craigslist client Joseph Brewer, who has not been named a suspect and is said to be cooperating with police.

WABC

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April 5, 2011

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Two men fatally shot at San Ysidro border crossing

Two men were fatally shot in Tijuana early Monday as they waited to cross into San Diego at the San Ysidro Port of Entry, said Baja California state authorities.

Sergio Salcido Luna, 25, and Kevin Joel Romero, 28, were in the line of cars approaching the border crossing at 2:40 a.m. when they were shot with a 9-millimeter weapon, according to a news release by the Baja California attorney general's office.

The truck the men were traveling in had California license plates, and one Mexican media outlet reported that they were U.S. citizens. But Baja California Atty. Gen. Rommel Moreno Manjarrez said at a news conference that he could not confirm the men's citizenship.

The U.S. consul general's office in Tijuana has yet to release information on their citizenship.

Los Angeles Times

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Obama administration won't pursue civilian trials for 9/11 suspects

The administration acquiesces to GOP demands that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four suspected co-conspirators be tried before a military tribunal at Guantanamo Bay.

Grim Sleeper case: Eight more women could be victims of serial killer, LAPD says

Los Angeles police detectives are investigating the possibility that eight additional women were victims of the man accused of being the Grim Sleeper serial killer.

Lonnie Franklin Jr. has already been indicted for 10 slayings of women in South Los Angeles stretching over more than two decades. He has been in custody awaiting trial since his arrest in July.

In a statement previewing a news conference scheduled for Tuesday, LAPD detectives said they were turning to the public for help finding eight more women, all of whom are known to have had some connection with Franklin.

Six of the women are reported missing persons, one is the victim of an unsolved murder, and one is unidentified.

Although police have eyed four of the women as possible victims for some time, the other four are additions to the investigation.

Los Angeles Times

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Miranda rights and terror suspects

New Justice Department guidelines on reading terror suspects their Miranda rights strike a good balance between the needs of law enforcement and the rights of the arrestees.

There was an uproar when it was revealed that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the so-called Christmas Day bomber, was read his Miranda rights. The hysterical reaction obscured a real dilemma for law enforcement: how to obtain what could be vital information about terrorist plots without denying suspects their legal rights. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. and the FBI have produced guidelines that adroitly balance the two interests.

Issued Oct. 21 but made public only recently, the guidelines will not please those conservatives who insist that suspected terrorists shouldn't be Mirandized at all. But they strike us as reasonable and, equally important, useful in heading off efforts in Congress to weaken Miranda.

The guidelines say that if applicable, "agents should ask any and all questions that are reasonably prompted by an immediate concern for the safety of the public or the arresting agents without advising the arrestee of his Miranda rights." This advice is consistent with a 1984 Supreme Court decision making an exception from the Miranda requirement for questioning motivated by a concern for public safety.

Los Angeles Times

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Three bodies found near Long Island beach

The remains of eight victims have now been found just steps from Ocean Parkway, a highway leading to popular Jones Beach, about 45 miles east of New York City. The bodies of four missing prostitutes were found in December while investigators were searching for another missing woman who worked as an escort and was last seen in the area nearly a year ago.

The disappearance of that woman, Shannan Gilbert of Jersey City, N.J., remains a mystery, although Suffolk County Police Commissioner Richard Dormer said Monday that because detectives have been conducting an ongoing search for her, they already have her DNA and other forensic information, which should accelerate the identification process.

Last week, investigators found a fifth body about a mile east of where the first four were located. That discovery prompted police to resume a widespread search of a seven-mile stretch of the north side of the highway on Monday, a search that yielded the remains of three additional victims.

WaynePost.com

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Dolan, TSA's 500th Pupp

TSA Welcomes Its 500th Puppy! Aprile 4, 2011 Meet Dolan, TSA's 500th puppy to be born into the TSA Puppy Program. Each of the puppies are named after a 9/11 victim to honor their memory, and this puppy was named after Capt. Robert Edward Dolan Jr., who lost his life in the attack on the Pentagon. Dolan was born at Lackland Air Force Base and if he meets our high standards will be trained by the TSA's National Explosives Detection Canine Team to become an explosives detection dog. Puppies that don't meet our standards are offered to other agencies or adopted by loving families.

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Statement of the Attorney General on the Prosecution of the 9/11 Conspirators

In November 2009, I announced that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other individuals would stand trial in federal court for their roles in the terrorist attacks on our country on September 11, 2001.

As I said then, the decision between federal courts and military commissions was not an easy one to make. I began my review of this case with an open mind and with just one goal: to look at the facts, look at the law, and choose the venue where we could achieve swift and sure justice most effectively for the victims of those horrendous attacks and their family members. After consulting with prosecutors from both the Department of Justice and Department of Defense and after thoroughly studying the case, it became clear to me that the best venue for prosecution was in federal court. I stand by that decision today.

As the indictment unsealed today reveals, we were prepared to bring a powerful case against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his four co-conspirators – one of the most well-researched and documented cases I have ever seen in my decades of experience as a prosecutor. We had carefully evaluated the evidence and concluded that we could prove the defendants' guilt while adhering to the bedrock traditions and values of our laws. We had consulted extensively with the intelligence community and developed detailed plans for handling classified evidence. Had this case proceeded in Manhattan or in an alternative venue in the United States, as I seriously explored in the past year, I am confident that our justice system would have performed with the same distinction that has been its hallmark for over two hundred years.

Dept of Justice

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April 4, 2011

Report details prosecutorial misconduct, pushes for transparency

The Northern California Innocence Project finds 102 California cases, and 31 from Los Angeles County, in which prosecutors engaged in misconduct. The group, based at the Santa Clara University School of Law, is advocating more transparency in how misconduct is addressed.

California courts last year found that Los Angeles County prosecutors withheld evidence, intentionally misled jurors or committed other types of misconduct in 31 criminal cases, according to an Innocence Project report released last week.

The decisions involved convictions dating back as far as 1984 and were among 102 California cases in which the group found that courts identified prosecutorial misconduct.

In 26 of the cases — nine in Los Angeles County — the courts cited the misconduct in decisions to order a new trial, set aside a sentence or bar evidence, according to the Northern California Innocence Project, which is based at the Santa Clara University School of Law.

Los Angeles County accounts for about a quarter of the state's felony criminal filings and one-third of felony trials.

The study is part of an effort by the Innocence Project to highlight the scope and effects of prosecutorial misconduct, which the group says has led to wrongful convictions and costly retrials. In a study released in October, the Innocence Project listed more than 700 California cases in which state and federal courts identified prosecutorial misconduct in rulings from 1997 to 2009.

The Innocence Project has called for greater transparency in how local and state agencies respond to such cases and has urged the State Bar of California, which investigates claims of attorney wrongdoing, to examine all prosecutorial misconduct findings. Courts are not required to report cases to the state bar if they decide the misconduct was harmless.

http://www.latimes.com

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LAPD officer shot, ctitically wounded; dragnet launched for gunman

A Los Angeles police officer was shot and critically wounded early Monday responding to a domestic violence call in the San Fernando Valley, according to multiple law enforcement sources familiar with the incident.

The officer, who was not immediately identified, was taken to Providence Holy Cross Hospital in Mission Hills after being shot at least twice by the suspect. THe shooting occurred around 4 a.m. inside a residence in the 13600 block of Dronefield Avenue.

Sources said one of the gunshot wounds was to the officer's upper torso and that he was listed in critical condition. The suspect was reported to still be inside the residence as LAPD officers swarmed the neighborhood after the shooting.

The circumstances of the shooting were sketchy but sources said it appeared that the officer responded to the home after a help call went out from the fire department. Authorities had responded to the residence earlier and it was believed that the suspect had already left the location.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com

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Putting a check on deaths of foster kids

A new L.A. County report outlines the distressing statistics: About 200 children die each year, victims of accidents, natural causes or, too often, suicide or murder.

A new L.A. County report on the deaths of children who come into contact with its foster care system is, in one sense, depressingly unsurprising. It highlights with startling precision the short, brutal lives that so many of this county's young people endure. Year after year, tens of thousands of children fall under the scrutiny of the Department of Children and Family Services — some glancingly or peripherally, others in more sustained ways — and 200 or so of those children die annually, victims of accidents, natural causes or, too often, suicide or murder.

The children who die follow certain patterns. They are more likely to be Latino or black than white. They are often infants — of the 175 who died in 2010, 47 did not live to their second birthday — or in their teenage years, when gangs exert their fatal force. They tend to live — and die — in the county's poor neighborhoods, and they often are children of adults who themselves endured abuse as young people. Of the 32 children who died with open cases in the department last year, 20 had been returned to their homes, and 12 were in foster or group homes or specialized facilities such as psychiatric centers.

Those are sobering findings, but not particularly useful ones. They remind any reader that poor, abused children are at the mercy of forces beyond their control, and that many simply do not make it through. What those numbers do not say, however, is how the county could do a better job of protecting those under its care.

According to the new report, 43 children with some connection to DCFS were the victims of homicide last year, eight more committed suicide, and 22 died in accidents. (An additional 18 died of natural causes, and 84 deaths were either undetermined, pending or ruled not a case for the coroner.) How many of those were preventable? Was there anything the county could have done differently that might have given those young people a chance at adulthood?

The report does not answer those critical questions, but advocates and county supervisors are pressing on various fronts. The Board of Supervisors recently replaced the head of DCFS, giving the agency a chance to start fresh. And Assemblyman Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles) is gamely pushing a bill that would open dependency courts, where decisions about foster care are made, to public scrutiny, offering that critical piece of the system a chance to prove itself under genuine accountability. Those are promising developments; with time, perhaps the sad numbers revealed in this report will give way to more optimistic statistics.

http://www.latimes.com

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A hidden threat to drivers

U.S. traffic safety officials should get a better handle on the problem of missing air bags in used vehicles.

In 2008, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released a study examining fatal accidents in which a car's air bag should have deployed but didn't. The most common reason wasn't poor manufacturing by automakers. It was that the air bag was simply missing, never replaced after a previous crash.

The numbers weren't large, averaging 51 accidents a year nationwide over the five years studied. But that doesn't mean there's no cause for concern. Who knows how many more cars are on the road without air bags? Presumably a whole lot more than the 51 that happen to get into accidents each year. Many used cars being offered for sale have been in accidents, then salvaged and resold, possibly without air bags. And the buyers may never know.

Air bags cost $1,000 to $3,000, expensive enough — and difficult enough to check on — that some auto repair shops charge for replacing them but don't do the work. In 2009, a jury awarded $15 million to a couple whose son was killed in a truck whose air bags they paid to have replaced after they bought it as a salvage vehicle. The steering column had instead been stuffed with paper. A 2008 investigation by National Public Radio uncovered other cases in which repair shops had stuffed paper or other materials into the air bag compartment, or simply left it empty.

Most consumers aren't aware that when they buy a used car, they should have a trustworthy, independent mechanic check the air bags. And because the NHTSA never looked further into the issue of all those missing air bags, there are no estimates of how many drivers are unknowingly driving without this protection.

http://www.latimes.com

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EDITORIAL

Fixing the Mistake With Young Offenders

There is new evidence that state governments are finally understanding what a tragic mistake they made during the 1990s when they began trying ever larger numbers of children as adults instead of sending them to the juvenile justice system.

Prosecutors argued that harsh sentencing would protect the public from violent, youthful predators. But it has since turned out that most young people who spend time in jails and prisons are charged with nonviolent offenses. As many as half are never convicted of anything at all. In addition, research has shown that these young people are vulnerable to battery and rape at the hands of adult inmates and more likely to become violent, lifelong criminals than those who are held in juvenile custody.

A new study by the Campaign for Youth Justice, a Washington advocacy group, shows that state legislatures across the country are getting the message. In the last five years, the authors say, 15 states have passed nearly 30 pieces of legislation aimed at reversing policies that funnel a quarter of a million children into the adult justice system each year.

Ten states, including Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana and Nevada, have cut the number of offenses that get youthful offenders automatically transferred to adult courts. Three states have expanded the jurisdiction of the juvenile courts, so that children under 18 are no long automatically prosecuted as adults. And several states have limited the circumstances under which young people can be housed in adult lock-ups before or after conviction.

Momentum is building for similar reforms all across the country. For example, Nebraska is considering a bill that would give people sentenced as juveniles to life without parole an opportunity to petition for reductions.

Far too many children are still being sentenced by adult courts and confined to adult prisons. But this study shows that the tide has begun to turn.

http://www.nytimes.com

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Pastor Terry Jones Receives Death Threats After Koran Burning

Florida Pastor Willing to Die for His Beliefs Even at the Expense of American Soldiers

Terry Jones, the Florida pastor who supervised the burning of the Koran last month, said he's not backing down after receiving death threats.

Jones said he feels no responsibility for the violence sparked by his church's action, including the violent protest at a United Nations complex in Afghanistan Saturday that left at least 11 people dead - and 20 killed in weekend violence.

Jones said his beliefs are more important - even at expense of American soldiers.

"Perhaps in the long run, we may save hundreds or thousands," Jones said.

When asked what would he say to the mother of American soldier about his statement, he said, "We don't take it lightly...we can't let it eat us up."

Read the Full Transcript of "Nightline's" Interview with Terry Jones

Top U.S. officials including General David Petreaus and Mark Sedwill, NATO civilian representative in Afghanistan condemned the burning saying they "hope the Afghan people understand that the actions of a small number of individuals, who have been extremely disrespectful to the holy Koran, are not representative of any of the countries of the international community who are in Afghanistan to help the Afghan people."

http://abcnews.go.com

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Duke lacrosse accuser arrested in boyfriend's stabbing

The woman who accused three Duke University lacrosse players of rape five years ago was arrested Sunday, suspected of stabbing her boyfriend, police said. Officers responding to a call early Sunday about a stabbing at an apartment in Durham, North Carolina, found a 46-year-old man who had been stabbed in the torso, police said. He was taken to Duke University Hospital for treatment of serious injuries.

Officers later arrested the man's girlfriend, Crystal Mangum, 32, at a nearby apartment. She was charged with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill, inflicting serious injury, police said. Mangum was placed in the Durham County Jail without bond. Officers said the stabbing occurred during an argument at the couple's shared apartment. In March 2006, Mangum claimed to have been sexually assaulted by three players on the Duke lacrosse team while performing as a stripper for a team party.

North Carolina's attorney general later found no credible evidence that the attacks ever occurred and the charges were dropped. The scandal, however, forced the cancellation of the men's lacrosse season that year and the resignation of team coach Mike Pressler. It also led to widespread criticism of Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong, who was later disbarred for his handling of the case.

Mangum was arrested in February 2010 on attempted murder charges after a fight with her then-boyfriend. She was also accused of arson, identity theft and resisting arrest, among other charges. CNN affiliate WTVD-TV reported the arrest happened after she set fire to a pile of the boyfriend's clothes while her children were at home.

In a June 2010 interview with the station, Mangum said her boyfriend had attacked her, and that her involvement in the Duke lacrosse case had influenced police handling of the case. "I do feel that I am being unjustly treated because of preconceived notions about my character in the media," Mangum said at the time. In December, a jury found Mangum guilty of child abuse in the case but could not agree on a first-degree felony arson charge, which could have resulted in a seven-year sentence, WTVD reported.

http://www.cnn.com

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9/11 victims' families voice displeasure over plans to place unidentified remains 70ft below ground

A group of 9/11 victims' families spoke out Sunday against placing their loved ones' still-unidentified remains 70ft below ground in a museum. Protesters said they want officials to contact the families of all 2,749 victims of the terror attack for their opinions before building a below-ground repository inside the museum.

"We are not against the remains at the museum, but the fact they want it on a public setting and 70 feet below ground level," said Norman Siegel, the group's lawyer. Sally Regenhard , whose firefighter son Christian died on 9/11, said family members should make the final decision about the remains.

"The city is making human remains an attraction of the museum," Regenhard said. "We demand a separate [location] above ground, fully accessible to the public area - not in the basement of a museum." Rosemary Cain, whose firefighter son George also died at Ground Zero, said the families have the "right to consultation."

"[Mayor] Bloomberg does not own the remains," Cain said. Museum spokesman Michael Frazier said victims' families were told about the location of the repository years ago.

"In 2006 the museum had a huge gathering where they talked about with the families and said exactly what was going to happen with the remains," Frazier said. Frazier said the repository will be under the control of the city medical examiner's office and will not be open to the public. Nearly 10 years after the attack, remains of only 59% of the people who died at Ground Zero on 9/11 have been identified.

http://www.nydailynews.com

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NY mass shooting survivor wants magazine limits

Shirley DeLucia, who played dead under her desk at the American Civic Association in Binghamton, said the only point of those magazines is to inflict "as much carnage as possible," like in the January shooting in Tucson that killed six people and wounded 13, including U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Wong, with 30-bullet magazines and two handguns, shot most of his victims multiple times. He killed himself as police arrived.

"How many mass shootings will it take for Congress to protect us?" said DeLucia, who was shot in the abdomen. "The horror of that day haunts me through flashbacks, nightmares, and lasting physical effects. I live with it every day and I'll have to live with it for the rest of my life, but if there's one thing I can do to prevent future violence, it's to express my fervent support for this."

Pending legislation would ban magazines holding more than 10 rounds. Binghamton's Mayor Matthew Ryan, Police Chief Joseph Zikuski and Broome County District Attorney Gerald Mollen plan to gather Monday to mark the second anniversary of the April 3, 2009, shootings in the city of 42,000 about 10 miles north of the Pennsylvania state line. They all support that legislation.

Richard Aborn, president of the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City, said growing support from law enforcement nationally should make the message clear. According to doctors and police, mockery of Wong's poorly spoken English, anger over losing a factory job and a severe, undiagnosed mental illness led the embittered Vietnamese immigrant to strap on a bulletproof vest and target people who, like him, had traveled from afar in hopes of bettering their lives. The murdered at the immigrant services center included 11 students, a teacher and a part-time caseworker.

http://www.mercurynews.com

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Mexican Rights Body Says Over 5,000 Missing Since ‘06

Fairfax County Virginia Police Get New Technology

Officers now have a new crime-fighting scanner. The Fairfax County police department is just beginning to determine the effectiveness of its newest crime fighter: A camera mounted on their cars that can read license plates in a flash.

"The readers scan for stolen vehicles, stolen license plates, and AMBER alerts," said Officer Tawny Wright with the FCPD public information office. "On an average patrol shift (11.5 hours), the devices might scan around 7000 license plates, far more than any officer could view and run manually, which increases the likelihood of detecting a vehicle or person potentially involved in criminal activity," she said in an e-mail.

County police now have 26 of the cameras, three at each of the county's eight district stations and one in the Criminal Investigations Bureau. Each device costs $23,000. All but three were purchased through a federal grant, Officer Wright said. The police started installing the cameras in December 2010 and is still in the process of putting them in the designated cars, she said. "But to give you an idea of how well they work, the license plate readers can accurately scan as many plates as we can pass by even at interstate speeds, regardless of weather or light conditions and we've had minimal, if any, issues with the devices."

Since mid-January, the devices have registered four returns or "hits," and at least one arrest," she said. Fairfax County has become the latest police department to get the new crime fighting equipment. The camera is linked to a computer that is linked to the Virginia Crime Information Network and to the National Crime Information Center.The cameras scan license plates looking for stolen cars, stolen plates, plates wanted in connection to an outstanding warrant or in connection to a police lookout.

The camera is linked to a computer that is linked to the Virginia Crime Information Network and to the National Crime Information Center, McAllister said. The cameras scan license plates looking for stolen cars, stolen plates, plates wanted in connection to an outstanding warrant or in connection to a police lookout. "It's a neat tool for our officers," said Lt. Mike McAllister, the former deputy commander of the McLean Police District. Lt. McAllister has a new assignment in the central command center.

http://annandale.patch.com

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