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From Los Angeles Times

LAPD seeks tighter regulations on toy guns

Chief Charlie Beck urges law requiring BB guns to be brightly colored to avoid confusion with authentic firearms.

by Sam Allen, Los Angeles Times

June 7, 2011

Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck is proposing that the city require BB-gun replicas of actual firearms to be brightly colored so that police officers don't mistake them for real weapons.

The proposal, which the Los Angeles Police Commission will consider Tuesday, comes after two shootings involving officers and people with replica weapons, including one in which a teenager was wounded. Under the new rule, all such toys sold inLos Angeles would have the "entire exterior surface of the device white, bright red, bright orange, bright yellow, bright green, bright blue, bright pink or bright purple."

Guns would also be allowed if they were "constructed of transparent or translucent materials which permits unmistakable observation of the device's complete contents."

"This change will not ban such devices but will aid law enforcement in differentiating real firearms from BB devices and imitation firearms. It will also prevent the sales and possession of BB devices and imitation firearms in the city of Los Angeles that are similar in size and appearance to actual firearms," Beck wrote in a memo.

The guns come in various models that closely resemble real weapons such as Berettas, shotguns and pistols. Law enforcement experts say the toys can easily be mistaken for the real thing, especially in a situation in which an officer must react quickly and decisively.

On Dec. 16, three boys were playing with the guns on North Verdugo Road in Glassell Park when two LAPD officers stopped to investigate. An officer fired at one of the boys, believing the boy's gun was a real weapon, according to an LAPD news release. The boy was shot in the torso and underwent surgery.

Capt. David Lindsay, who headed the Northeast Division when the shooting occurred, said the division had faced several incidents in recent months involving toy guns, and noted that they have been taken from gang members and robbery suspects.

"It's a consistent issue for us. I saw the guns the kids had that night from a distance of 3 or 4 feet; when you first look at them, they look identical to a particular style of handgun, a Beretta 92F," Lindsay said in an interview earlier this year. He has since been transferred to a different position.

Los Angeles City Councilman Greig Smith said the December incident alarmed him and his staff because a local activist warned them about the toy guns several months earlier.

Les Salay, a Vietnam veteran, firearm instructor and father of three, had contacted Smith and presented him photographs of Airsoft guns that his daughter had purchased from ice cream trucks outside two schools near his family's Chatsworth home.

Salay said he had asked his daughter Ashley, 12, to try to purchase the guns because he wanted to see if vendors would sell them to her. She was able to buy several guns from the ice cream trucks, he said, two of which had warnings on them that they were intended for ages 18 and older.

"At an ice cream truck, there is no parent who can say 'no, no, no, you can't have that,' " said Salay, who also teaches gun safety to Boy Scouts. "To sell a 12-year-old girl a gun that looks like a real gun is a tragedy waiting to happen. And now it has happened."

The Los Angeles City Council passed an ordinance banning the sale of toy guns from ice cream trucks in 2005, but several distributors interviewed by The Times said some trucks still carry the guns.

"It's a few renegade trucks that do it," said Fred Karamati, owner of Avalon Ice Cream, a distributor in Los Angeles. He said that he no longer sells the guns to truck operators, but that they are widely available at toy wholesalers throughout the city.

Smith, who is also an LAPD reserve officer, said the guns pose a problem for police because officers typically have only seconds to react in a situation in which they believe a subject is armed. He considered a citywide ban of the replica weapons earlier this year.

"If you see something that just looks like a gun, you're going to shoot," Smith said after the Glassell Park shooting. "That's what you're trained to do. Your mind doesn't have enough time to process whether it's a real gun or a fake gun."

His office said Monday that he supported Beck's proposal.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lapd-fake-guns-20110607,0,2769926,print.story

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With reported rapes, the DSK case is the exception

The perceived equality and fairness of a U.S. justice system, as shown by the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case, does not square with the experience of the vast majority of those who report rapes in this country.

by Marianne Mollmann

June 7, 2011

The charges filed recently against former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn have perpetuated a myth: that the U.S. justice system moves swiftly and effectively to resolve allegations of sexual assault.

In the wake of Strauss-Kahn's arrest, the media, particularly in Europe, have highlighted the perceived equality and fairness of a justice system that allows an immigrant single mother with relatively few financial resources to challenge an internationally renowned politician who is able to post a $1-million cash bail. To be sure, this is a remarkable situation, but unfortunately it is not the experience of the vast majority of those who report rapes in this country.

Strauss-Kahn may or may not be guilty, but we do know that every two minutes someone is sexually assaulted in the United States, according to the Department of Justice's Crime Victimization Survey. We also know that an estimated 60% of these assaults go unreported.

So the question is, do the 40% who are not reluctant to contact the authorities for help actually see justice done?

The answer: It depends.

Nationally, police arrest a suspect in only half of the sexual assault complaints they receive. Most of those arrested are prosecuted, but fewer than two-thirds of those prosecuted are convicted. Moreover, not all those convicted are sentenced to incarceration. In the end, an estimated 1 out of 16 rapists spends time in jail.

Some jurisdictions have better records than others. In 2009, Human Rights Watch published a report about the appalling response to sexual violence in Los Angeles County, where arrest figures had been declining and — more to the point — the physical evidence taken from rape victims that might have helped lead to a DNA match and a prosecution was systematically filed away without being sent for testing. The situation in Los Angeles has improved since then, but there are other places where this isn't the case. In 2010, we published a report about Illinois, showing similar problems.

In fact, the prevailing failure to try to convict rapists is directly related to the way police and prosecutors treat victims, their testimony and the evidence. It is telling that the media description of the alleged victim in the Strauss-Kahn case highlights her religious devotion and life struggles — factors that in many people's eyes would make her a more credible witness. But victims without those attributes are often perceived very differently. Police officers sometimes abandon a rape case because, based on initial interviews and context alone, they don't believe the alleged victim is a credible witness.

Research suggests that 3% to 8% of rape complaints are false — similar to the proportion of other crime complaints. But researchers have found that police officers are much more likely to mistrust an alleged rape victim than they are to mistrust other victims, particularly if the woman alleging sexual assault doesn't conform to police notions of how a woman should act.

This course of action may seem logical: Few would want the police to waste valuable resources on investigations of crimes that didn't really happen. However, experience from jurisdictions such as New York — where all rape kits, as the physical evidence is called, are processed — reveals that a subjective analysis of victim credibility can be wrong. After New York decided to test every rape kit, and not just the ones from cases in which the police officer subjectively felt the allegation was likely to be true, the arrest rate rose over five years from 40% to 70% of complaints filed, and the proportion of convictions grew too. The point here is not that New York's response to sexual violence is perfect but rather that the decision to pursue rape cases — whether or not police find the victim credible by subjective measures — can result in more prosecutions.

The U.S. justice system deals unevenly with sexual violence. A state-by-state analysis of relevant legislation, policies and crime statistics would most likely show that the record is better where victim rights are a priority and where "tough on crime" rhetoric is backed by across-the-board action.

But let's go back to the broader issue of sexual violence and that fact that a woman is sexually assaulted in the United States every two minutes. Whatever the outcome of the proceedings against Strauss-Kahn, this high-profile case has brought the subject of sexual assault into the realm of public discussion, and that is a good thing. But as long as rape and sexual assault are so common in the United States, we can hardly say the system is working just fine.

Marianne Mollmann is women's rights advocacy director at Human Rights Watch.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-mollmann-rape-20110607,0,833705,print.story

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Underage drinkers and supermarkets

A union-backed bill that would require alcohol purchases to be made at a staffed checkout stand should be put back on the shelf.

June 6, 2011

The ranks of supermarket cashiers are being thinned by technology in the form of self-serve checkout stands. Although customers can't strike up nodding acquaintances with the computerized machines, many like the convenience. But the union that represents supermarket employees argues that automated checkouts lack more than personality. Despite built-in precautions, the union claims, computerized stations allow underage customers to purchase alcohol.

The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union is backing a bill by Assemblywoman Fiona Ma (D-San Francisco) that would require alcohol purchases to be made at a traditional, staffed checkout stand. But while AB 183, which was approved by the Assembly, might save some union jobs, there is little evidence that it would reduce underage drinking. It would particularly affect the Fresh & Easy grocery chain, which is entirely self-serve.

Automated checkout stands are supposed to lock up when a customer scans alcohol, sending a signal to an attendant that an identification check is needed. But various studies have found that the machines fail to do this in a small percentage of cases. What's more, customers can sometimes override a freeze by quickly scanning another item or a credit card, researchers reported. Occasionally, even when the machine has done its job, clerks don't bother to come over to check identification but just override the lock from a distance with a hand-held device.

The most careful and comprehensive of the studies, conducted in 2010 by San Diego State University, sent teams of young adults — who looked even younger than their ages — to a total of 216 stores. It found that for one reason or another, identification wasn't checked 8.4% of the time at the automated stands. The machines failed slightly more often than that, but observant clerks filled the void in almost all of those cases.

With a less than 1-in-10 chance of sneaking an alcoholic beverage past the machines, it's unlikely that underage drinkers would flock to self-checkout lanes. They're more likely to obtain liquor by getting an adult to buy it for them. For that matter, various studies have found that clerks at regular stands are even more likely than self-check stands to let underage shoppers buy alcohol without an ID check.

But even if the bill were passed, nothing would keep underage customers from at least trying to sneak alcohol past the machines. They could still occasionally override or otherwise fool the machines' locking mechanism. A more effective approach would be to increase fines for failure to check ID at either type of checkout.

A similar bill was approved by the Legislature last year but vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Gov. Jerry Brown has not taken a position on AB 183, but the bill should never even reach him. Self-checkout stands might be bad for grocery workers, but for now, they are not a significant source of underage drinking.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-alcohol-20110606,0,5107408,print.story

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From Google News

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Immigration Program Rejected by Third State

by Henry J. Reske

Massachusetts has joined Illinois and New York in refusing to participate in a fingerprint-sharing program key to the Obama administration's immigrant enforcement program. The move by Obama ally Gov. Deval Patrick is the latest blow to the program that has been meeting with resistance, The New York Time's reports.

All three states that have refused to participate have large immigrant populations and are led by Democratic governors. Federal authorities, however, maintain the Secure Communities program is mandatory and that state cannot opt out.

In a June 3 letter to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Massachusetts secretary of public safety and security, Mary Elizabeth Heffernan, said, “We are reluctant to participate if the program is mandatory and unwilling to participate if it is voluntary,” the Times reported.

An official with the Department of said the program would be expanded into Massachusetts because it was required by a federal law passed after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. “We are not going to stop this program because of the governors,” the official said, according to the Times, “It is a program that is mandated by law that has the support of the administration and the Congress.”

Under the program, anyone booked into a jail would have their fingerprints checked against the FBI criminal database and against a Homeland Security database of immigration violations. The Secure Communities program started under the George W. Bush administration and was expanded by President Barack Obama.

It is currently operating in more than 1,300 localities and 42 states. Despite the action by the state, Boston started a Secure Communities program in 2008, the Times reported.

http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/immigration-devalpatrick-obama/2011/06/07/id/399091

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