Arrest in arson rampage reveals enigmatic mother and son

Harry Burkhart is accused of setting at least 50 fires shortly after his mother, Dorothee, had a hearing on being extradited to Germany to face numerous fraud charges.

by Victoria Kim, Carol J. Williams and Scott Gold, Los Angeles Times

January 4, 2012

For months, authorities scoured West Hollywood, carrying a photo of a squat, green-eyed woman through a bustling hive of Russian-language social clubs and cafes selling borscht and vareniki dumplings. She was Dorothee Burkhart, a fugitive wanted on a host of fraud charges in Germany.

Dorothee Burkhart was eventually arrested here and, last Thursday, she was in a courtroom for a hearing to extradite her to Frankfurt to face the charges.

Within hours, an arsonist began setting fires across a wide, significant portion of Los Angeles in a four-day assault that caused millions of dollars in damage and left many residents on edge.

The man police arrested on suspicion of starting more than 50 fires turned out to be another resident of that Russian-language nook of West Hollywood: Dorothee Burkhart's 24-year-old son, Harry.

On Tuesday, authorities were investigating the relationship between the son and mother — a relationship that appears to be mutually protective, fraught with legal troubles and laced with virulent anti-American sentiment.

Court records unsealed Tuesday only added another layer of mystery to Harry Burkhart's background, as detectives in Los Angeles try to determine whether Dorothee Burkhart's legal problems played a role in the arson rampage. Her routine criminal charges, which included falsifying the down payment on her breast augmentation surgery, received an unusual amount of attention from German and U.S. authorities, as well as Interpol, the international policing organization.

It was unclear from the records why Dorothee Burkhart became such a high-priority target in an international dragnet after her arrest warrant was issued in 2007 by a Frankfurt judge.

According to interviews with numerous law enforcement officials, Harry Burkhart lived with his mother in West Hollywood and appears to have been incensed at the aggressive, international effort to send his mother to Germany to face fraud charges.

Indeed, officials said, Harry Burkhart's strident, obscenity-laced outburst at his mother's extradition hearing last week, much of it focused on anti-Americanism, appears to have preceded the arson rampage and led to his capture.

The son "made quite a disturbance" at that hearing, said Thom Mrozek, spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles. It left enough of an impression that a law enforcement official who had worked on the case against Dorothee Burkhart viewed LAPD images of a "person of interest" Sunday and reported that the person looked "exactly like Ms. Burkhart's son," Mrozek said. The officer was an agent in the Los Angeles field office of the U.S. State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security, officials said.

Once identified, Harry Burkhart was arrested at 3 a.m. Monday by a reserve sheriff's deputy who spotted his minivan near the Sunset Strip.

By Tuesday, Harry Burkhart, a German national who had lived in California for several years, had been dubbed the "Hollywood Feuerteufel " by the German media: the Hollywood Fire Devil. Booked on arson charges, he was being held without bail. And his 53-year-old mother, coincidentally, was back in court fighting her extradition, and appeared disoriented without her son at her side.

"He should come into the court," she insisted to the U.S. marshals and other law enforcement agents in the courtroom.

She grew more agitated when the hearing began in front of U.S. Magistrate Judge Margaret Nagle.

"My first question is: Where is my son?" Dorothee Burkhart shouted. She said her son was mentally ill, adding: "What did you do to my son?… Where is he? Dead?"

"I'm not here to address anything related to your son," Nagle replied. The judge assured her: "I'm sure he has not disappeared."

Dorothee Burkhart also made statements indicating her animosity toward the authorities, suggesting at one point that she and her son might have been the targets of "German Nazis."

She refused to be represented by a public defender, glaring at a federal prosecutor while telling the judge: "I don't want an attorney from this government."

A seven-page complaint filed against Dorothee Burkhart by Assistant U.S. Atty. Cathy Ostiller said the United States was "informed through diplomatic channels" that Burkhart was charged in state court in Frankfurt with 19 counts of fraud "committed on a commercial basis and as a member of a gang."

The complaint details about $45,000 worth of alleged embezzlement of renters and landlords with whom Dorothee Burkhart did business between 2000 and 2006.

The largest sum listed in the complaint was for 7,680 euros, or about $10,000, allegedly owed to a clinic in Frankfurt where she had breast augmentation surgery in the summer of 2004.

According to the complaint, Burkhart told the clinic that the payment had been made through a bank transfer, and the surgery was completed the next day. However, the complaint said, the funds had never been transferred, "and Burkhart did not have any intention of paying for the surgery."

Her penchant for landing in legal disputes appears to have continued in the United States.

Ken McLeod, the manager of an apartment building on North Poinsettia Place where Dorothee Burkhart and her son once lived, said Dorothee Burkhart paid $1,200 monthly rent after moving in to the one-bedroom apartment but balked at a supplemental city fee of $2.96.

McLeod said he showed her the lease agreement explaining the fee, but she accused him of trying to extort her, at one point writing him a letter calling him a "monster."

Like her son, Dorothee Burkhart remains an enigma. Court documents, for instance, describe her as a German national, but in court, she spoke German as haltingly as English, and at a previous hearing had been granted a Russian-language interpreter. She described herself to a former landlord as "Canadian German."

Victoria Nuland, a U.S. State Department spokeswoman, said it was also unclear how the Burkharts had gained entry to the United States. Federal immigration officials said they believed Harry Burkhart was in the United States with a legal visa that is due to expire in two weeks. But authorities could not find a visa file for Dorothee Burkhart.

Dorothee Burkhart was in Frankfurt as recently as October, court papers said, before flying into Las Vegas and then accompanying her son to the German Consulate in Los Angeles to renew her son's passport. But immigration officials said Tuesday that the court document is incorrect and that the last time she entered the country was in 2007.

Meanwhile, she appears to have created a business offering "sensual Tantra massage."

A website listing Dorothee Burkhart as administrator and the address she and her son shared on Sunset Boulevard says that a woman named "Annabelle" provides "soul-relaxation massage." The site's advertisements also note the masseuse's "curvaceous body shape."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-0104-hollywood-arson-20120104,0,1021006.story

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New York firebomb attacks: Man admits hurling Molotov cocktails

According to the Associated Press, the man, whose name was not released, is facing arson-related charges, but it was unclear whether additional hate-crime charges would be lodged against him, police said.

All five attacks occurred within about two hours Sunday evening.

After examining a surveillance video of a man hurling a fiery bottle Sunday night at a home used as a Hindu place of worship and then driving away, police were able to track the suspect through the type of car and its Virginia license plate.

Authorities were investigating the possibility that the five attacks were hate crimes because they involved places of prayer, including an Islamic cultural center on the Van Wyck Expressway in Jamaica, Queens.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and other city officials gathered Tuesday morning at the Islamic center to quell concerns about a possible tie between the attacks and religious or cultural hate.

“As I said before, we don't know what the motive was,” Bloomberg told reporters in a statement aired on NY1. “But in New York City, as you know, we have no tolerance for violence, and certainly no tolerance for discrimination.”

“Whether it was senseless violence or a hate crime will be determined down the road. But in either case, we're just not going to tolerate it in this city,” he said.

In four of the five attacks, glass Starbucks bottles were used to make the weapon, according to Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, who also spoke to reporters after the meeting Tuesday morning. He noted that, after the first attack on a Queens convenience store, the owner told police that a man was removed from the store last week after trying to steal a container of milk and a bottle of Starbucks Frappuccino.

As workers were pushing the man out of the store, Kelly told reporters, “He said words to the effect of, ‘We're going to get even. We're going to get back at you.' ”

Police said the man was initially taken into custody because his car was seen both at the convenience store and on the video.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/nationnow/2012/01/new-york-police-question-a-suspect-about-arson-attack-on-islamic-center-deli.html

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Military expert with explosives in airport was in prior incident

A military demolitions expert who faces charges in Texas that he tried to bring explosives onto a civilian aircraft was involved in another incident of attempting to transport contraband on an airplane, federal officials said on Tuesday.

Trey Scott Atwater, who completed three military deployments in Afghanistan, is scheduled to be arraigned in district court late Tuesday afternoon, FBI Special Agent Michael Martinez said in a telephone interview from El Paso. Martinez said he could not give any other details except that Atwater would be charged with a felony of trying to bring explosives onto a flight.

Atwater, 30, was arrested Saturday at a security checkpoint at Midland International Airport after explosives in military-grade wrapping were discovered in his luggage. Atwater, who told investigators that he was an explosives expert, said he was surprised to find the explosives, believed to be C-4, in the military bag, which he grabbed to transport children's items, according to the criminal complaint filed Tuesday with the U.S. District Court for West Texas.

The complaint goes on to state that the Midland incident was Atwater's second over the holidays.

Atwater, of Hope Mills, N.C., was briefly detained Dec. 24 at the airport in Fayetteville, N.C., when he was flying to his relatives' home in Midland. Screeners found a military smoke grenade in his bag. The grenade was confiscated, and Atwater was admonished but allowed to continue his trip to Texas, the complaint states.

Atwater's rank has not been officially released, but the complaint notes that he served with the 7th Special Forces Group and returned to the United States in April after his third deployment in Afghanistan. He is believed to be assigned to Ft. Bragg in North Carolina, where special operations forces are located.

According to the complaint, Atwater was stopped at about 9:30 a.m. on New Year's Eve at the Midland airport by Transportation Safety Administration employees. Atwater was heading to Dallas-Ft. Worth International Airport. In his carry-on luggage was material with military markings showing it was C-4.

Atwater explained that he had not used the bag since returning from Afghanistan, but that it was standard operating procedure to keep two blocks of C-4 in it while on the battlefield. He said he had grabbed the bag, which had been stored in a garage, to carry children's items on the flight and did not notice any explosives in the main compartment of the bag.

When investigators later asked him about the incident involving the smoke grenade, Atwater acknowledged that it had happened. He said that he had forgotten to mention it in his earlier interview with officials, the complaint states.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/nationnow/

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From Google News

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Florida

Bartow Restoring Its Community Policing Efforts

BARTOW | Bartow is resurrecting its community policing efforts.

Staffing cutbacks forced the city's police department to shelve that unit several years ago, but with the Community Redevelopment Agency's help, it's making a comeback.

The City Commission, which has final approval of CRA spending, agreed Monday night to allocate $25,000 for the project.

Police Chief Joe Hall said he will initiate neighborhood meetings and assign officers, including bicycle patrols, to neighborhoods in the CRA district.

"We want to get officers more involved with the residents so they can get more information to us," Hall said. "Our goal is to prevent crime from happening in the first place."

He said his department will continuously monitor the crime trends in the city, and specifically the CRA district, to see where the need is.

"For us, we don't have a high violent crime rate, but we do have a high property crime rate," he said. "We have been keeping data on that, and it's widespread, but there are areas that are more prone to property crimes. If we can get the public to partner with us, we can get that crime rate down."

Hall said property crimes had been going down in Bartow, but were beginning to creep higher in recent months.

For the first six months of 2011, reflecting the most recent statistics available, Bartow posted 495 burglaries and thefts, compared with 507 for the same period in 2010 and 525 in 2009, according to state statistics.

Patrick Brett, the CRA's executive director, said redevelopment won't happen when there's even the perception of a crime problem.

"That's redevelopment 101," he said. "Economic redevelopment is impossible to do if there appears to be a crime problem. This program is designed to monitor trends and address problems early."

The CRA's district includes downtown Bartow and the Broadway Avenue commercial area, along with residential neighborhoods in West Bartow and East Bartow.

Hall said few property crimes in Bartow involve a forced entry, which is where the neighborhood initiatives come in.

"About 80 percent of the crimes we encounter involve unsecured property," he said. "Through awareness, the public can help us prevent that."

Hall said the department, with 41 sworn officers, will use existing officers in this program.

"We won't be hiring anyone new to do this," he said. "This money will pay for the overtime for these officers."

City commissioners approved the measure Monday night without comment. The vote was unanimous.

http://www.theledger.com/article/20120103/NEWS/120109828/1134?Title=Bartow-Restoring-Its-Community-Policing-Efforts-

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Wisconsin

Green Bay Police Begin District Policing: Updated

Starting Tuesday, Green Bay police changed the way they do business. The police department is doing "district policing," which means changes to how they fight crime and how the community can help them do it.

"Now we're going to have officers assigned to certain districts, where they'll have ownership with it, can partner with neighborhoods and business owners," Captain Joe Deuster said.

"It's a new position here at the police department. Nobody's done it before," Captain Jim Runge said. "Usually when you step into a position there's a template or footsteps you can follow in, so we're kind of creating this for ourselves."

Police divided the city into four districts with one captain in charge of each zone.

Captains will receive daily reports of police calls in their districts and spend more time getting to know residents and the problems they want fixed.

"I can break it down by district and put it on a map and see where things are happening and see where are the trends and who's causing these issues -- who's involved? Where do they come from?" said Galvin.

Residents think it will make a big difference reducing crime.

"We're going to become familiar with the police officers and they're going to become familiar with us, and therefore we can work together to lower the crime rate and keep the city safe," Jim Haskins of the Olde Norwood Neighborhood Association said.

Haskins has lived in Green Bay for many years. Tonight he's optimistic about its future, thanks to the city's new district policing idea.

"I know the captain had said that the cops are going to be in a neighborhood as if they own the neighborhood," Haskins said. "I love that."

"This is really making it community policing department-wide. Everybody's a part of it, everybody's got to buy in, everybody has to work on problem solving," Runge said.

On the surface, the department looks the same. There's still a chief, and officers still work major crimes together no matter where they are.

But on a daily basis residents will now see the same officers in the same neighborhoods, focusing on neighborhood problems.

They hope by working more closely with neighborhoods, they'll reduce crime and make the community safer.

"What I always look at is how many calls are the guys having to go to and if we can reduce those calls for service. That allows them more proactive time to address the things they never had time to do," Captain Bill Galvin said.

The captains say the traditional reactive approach to police work needed revamping in order to truly reduce calls for service.

"We were reacting to calls. We'd get a call, we'd go to the call and handle it. Now we're going to try to put together these trends, and we can get out there the next day and next day and try to head it off," Deuster said.

Police will spend more time in the neighborhoods, attending meetings and getting to know neighbors, hoping they'll learn about problems and root them out before they get out of control.

As one of four district captains overseeing the city of Green Bay, Galvin plans to spend a lot more of his time in neighborhoods and out of the police station.

"My plan is to either get out of the office and either drive by myself or get with an officer and say, 'I'm going to be with you for this shift, let's see what's going on,'" he said.

And on its first day, neighbors are eager to do their part.

"We're very much on board with it, and I'm glad they filled us in," Haskins said.

Sarasota Police seek citizen involvement to halt crime

Police and government can try, but without citizen involvement, solving the ongoing crime problem in Newtown will be nearly impossible, Sarasota city commissioners were told Tuesday night.

And the commission later voted to fund a trip to a North Carolina city where intense citizen involvement is apparently working.

There were eight murders in Sarasota in 2011, all but one of which took place in Newtown, the historically black neighborhood that has remained dangerous despite years of effort and calls for a stop to the violence.

To reverse the trend, top city officials are hoping to mimic similar communities that have beaten their crime statistics by getting more citizens involved.

Responding to last year's rash of murders, police commanders last month began targeting the area, with a surge that emphasized surveillance and foot patrols to stop crime before it happens.

Though police say the effort has been successful — in part due to the recent arrest of a man carrying an assault rifle — a much broader community effort is needed to turn around the neighborhood, Sarasota Police Chief Mikel Hollaway said Tuesday night.

"It is time now for the Newtown community to take the lead in helping to solve these issues," the chief said. "We tend to dictate what we think ought to be done in the community instead of listening to the community."

Hollaway and his commanders cited case studies that found family intervention is a stronger crime deterrent than the threat of incarceration.

With political steam from Commissioner Willie Shaw, who represents Newtown and who has held community discussions about gun violence there, the commission voted to take the efforts a step further.

The commission voted unanimously Tuesday night to fund a trip for police commanders and community leaders to High Point, N.C., where broad community efforts to report and stop crime have achieved marked success and have been lauded by academic experts.

"We have to have education on board, we need the School Board on board," Shaw said. "This isn't a Newtown problem."

"Until we take full ownership of it, we will continue to find ourselves in the same way," he added. "This is a hurricane. We are in the eye of the storm."

City staff will return to the commission later this year with a budget for the trip, which commissioners urged should include local ministers and spiritual leaders.

It is unclear how much the study will cost.

City Manager Bob Bartolotta said his staff will help spark the effort, but warned that true community policing should be championed by community leaders.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20120103/ARTICLE/120109881/-1/news?Title=Sarasota-Police-seek-citizen-involvement-to-halt-crime

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California

Police foot patrols help with crime drop in SF

But Police Chief Greg Suhr told us that foot patrols are a big part of the community policing techniques – and “community policing” was indeed mentioned in the release – responsible for the drop.

“They're big. When we talk about increasing community involvement, that definitely includes foot patrols,” Suhr told the Guardian, explaining his policy of having a visible police presence in high-crime corridors like mid-Market, 3rd and Palou streets, and parts of the Mission District. “People should always see a cop on foot or on a bike in some places.”

For a long time, the SFPD resisted getting cops out of their cars and onto the streets – even in the first couple years of then-Mayor Gavin Newsom's tenure, when the city had almost twice the 50 murders it experienced each of the last two years -- until it became a pitched political battle in the city.

Sup. Ross Mirkarimi and other progressives on the Board of Supervisors and the Police Commission locked horns with Newsom and then-Police Chief Heather Fong over the issue in 2010. After Newsom vetoed legislation to require foot patrols, Mirkarimi and Sup. David Campos co-authored a ballot measure requiring them, Measure M, which was narrowly defeated after SFPD began to implement them on its own.

“I believe that any analysis will eventually show – and they should really do this study – that community policing and foot patrols have a lot to do with this drop,” Campos, a former Police Commissioner, told us. “Community policing and foot patrols are the most pro-active way to reduce crime in any given neighborhood.”

Suhr agrees, something that Campos recognizes and praises the new chief for, saying he's much better than his predecessors on the issue. “Chief Suhr has been very supportive of community policing,” Campos said. “He's been very good about working with us to make it happen.”

Suhr said that the department needs to have enough personnel in the stations to take calls, do investigations, and otherwise process information. “Everyone else should be on the street trying to get in front of this stuff,” he told us.

He does still defend the department's opposition to Prop. M, noting that it would have micromanaged SFPD in a way that he didn't think was appropriate. But he's also a true believer in foot beats and other community policing techniques, and he said things are better today than “years ago, when there wasn't as much open communication as there is now.”

As for the Mayor's Office and its failure to give credit directly to foot patrols, Press Secretary Christine Falvey told us, “Foot Patrols, the Ambassador Program and other efforts are all critical pieces of Community Policing, which is referenced as part of the success we have seen in getting the crime rate down in San Francisco.”

Her office's press release follows:

San Francisco, CA— Today Mayor Edwin M. Lee and Police Chief Greg Suhr released the year end crime statistics showing continued historic low crime trends for the City. Mayor Lee and Chief Suhr announced that 2011 violent crime rates in San Francisco are down 6 percent from last year.

“Violent crime in San Francisco remains at historic lows because of stronger community partnerships, targeted approaches to violent crime and aggressive crime prevention strategies,” said Mayor Lee. “Despite some tough economic times, Chief Suhr and the San Francisco Police Department are working to make our City the safest big city in the United States through the best use of 21st century technology, strategic deployment of police resources, the use of innovative crime fighting strategies and successful partnerships with our diverse communities and neighborhoods.”

Homicides were at their second lowest annual rate of any year in San Francisco since the 1960s again in 2011.

In 2011, total violent crime in San Francisco was down six percent from 2010 and shows a reduction of 18 percent compared to 2008:

In 2011, total property crime in San Francisco was up three percent from 2010.

The SFPD continues to pursue innovative crime reduction strategies including a “task force style” response to all crimes of violence. Increased community policing efforts, improved approach in assisting those suffering from mental illness and those with limited English proficiency, town hall community meetings and the decentralization of traffic officers and Beach/Park Patrols for safer streets and neighborhoods are also critical to the reduction of crime in San Francisco. In addition, the formation of the new Special Victims Unit allows our City's most vulnerable populations the compassion and consideration they deserve.

“The year end crime statistics are an indication to the people of San Francisco of how well the men and women of the San Francisco Police Department are serving this City,” said Chief Suhr. “Our goal is for San Francisco to be the safest big city in America, and the men and women of the SFPD in partnership with our communities are committed to this end. We will achieve this goal by reducing crime and the perception of crime through the use of innovative crime fighting strategies, accessing the best technology available, predictive policing, strategic planning, and working collaboratively with all those concerned. There is nothing we cannot achieve when we all work together for the common good.”

http://www.sfbg.com/politics/2012/01/03/police-foot-patrols-help-crime-drop-sf

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Police Find Child Abusers on Facebook

Police increasingly look to Facebook to investigate crimes, as an Arizona couple was arrested after allegedly binding their babies with duct tape and posting photos on the social network.

The young parents, Frankie and Kayla Almuina, are facing charges of child abuse after one of the mother's Facebook friends anonymously tipped off the Arizona Child Abuse Hotline.

According to Reuters, the couple's 2-year-old boy and a 10-month old girl were shown on the mother's Facebook page with duct tape on their wrists and ankles and with their mouths taped shut. The boy was also pictured hanging upside down from an exercise machine.

The parents told police the photos were “all in fun,” but a sheriff's department official said the children appeared to be “in sheer terror.”

Investigators seized about a dozen similar photos from the Almuina home and arrested the couple. Their children were turned over to another family member, while the parents were sent to jail.

The Arizona news came as police and prosecutors look to social media sites to prove illegal connections between people and to help build their cases.

For example, last year, when U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot, prosecutors said they expected to use the “Goodbye friends” message alleged gunman Jared Loughner posted to MySpace hours before the crime as evidence against him.

The Arizona case isn't the first time parents have been arrested in connection with posting abusive photos online. According to CNN, a 21-year-old Chicago man is facing charges of aggravated domestic battery after posting a picture of his 22-month-old daughter, who was bound with painter's tape across her mouth, her wrists and ankles, with a caption “This is wut happens wen my baby hits me back. ; ).”

Even benign postings can help, or hurt, a case. A New York boy who had been charged with a robbery in Brooklyn, jokingly complained on Facebook about breakfast at his dad's house in Manhattan, supported his claims that he was otherwise engaged at the time of the crime. The charges were dropped.

Police are also starting to scan social media sites to help prevent crime. A New York Police Department unit was created this past summer specifically to comb social media sites for information on planned crimes and their perpetrators.

The special NYPD unit also scours sites for evidence of already-committed crimes, because many youthful offenders post information about their criminal misdeeds, not realizing the postings can be used against them.

However, in the Arizona cases, the arrests weren't made until after anonymous tipsters alerted authorities, showing the public still plays an important role in helping police fight crime and tracking down criminals who use their Facebook status updates to boast about their illegal activities.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/mobiledia/2012/01/03/police-find-child-abusers-on-facebook/print/

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From ICE

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Child predator watch: Homeland Security Investigations in tri-state area protects children in US and around the world

PHILADELPHIA – U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) made a total of 52 criminal arrests, resulting in 35 indictments and 38 convictions of child predators in the tri-state area in 2011.

ICE HSI investigations protect children from sexual predators, including Internet child pornographers, child sex traffickers and those who travel overseas for sex with minors. The ICE HSI office in Philadelphia, which oversees investigations in Pennsylvania, Delaware and West Virginia, investigated and concluded the following significant cases this year.

• Paul Edward Pavulak, 67, from Delaware and a registered sex offender, was sentenced to life in prison plus 10 years on child pornography charges in October. The ICE HSI investigation revealed that he developed an online relationship with a woman in the Philippines. After meeting the woman and her daughter, he and a Philippine national attempted to produce child pornography of the two-year-old girl via a web camera. Pavulak described the movie as the girl's "training video." ICE HSI agents seized his computers and discovered thousands of images of child pornography from infants to mid-teens engaging in sexual acts with adult males.
  
  
• Mark Anthony Permenter, 32, of Hampton Township, Pa., was sentenced to 30 years in prison in September. He pleaded guilty to the charge in January 2011. According to court documents, Permenter had contact with an undercover postal inspector and sent him a sample of his child pornography via the Internet. The investigation revealed that Permenter had taken photographs of multiple girls under the age of seven whom he had contact with or watched.
  
  
• Stacey Wright-Farmer of Squire, W.Va., was sentenced in February to the maximum statutory term of 20 years in prison for involving a minor in her care in child pornography. Farmer previously pleaded guilty in June 2010, admitting that from February through May 2009, she produced images of a minor in her care engaged in sexually explicit conduct at her home in McDowell County. Farmer was also sentenced to life on supervised released and ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $982.53 to the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources.
  
  
• Kenneth Schneider, 47, of Philadelphia, was sentenced in December to 15 years in prison for sexually abusing a minor boy when they resided and traveled together. Schneider, an international attorney, shared his residence in Moscow with the 12-year-old boy, a former Russian ballet dancer.
  
  
• Mark Allen Heil, 42, of Bel Air, Md., was sentenced in July to 14 years in prison followed by a lifetime of supervised release for attempted enticement of a minor and possession of child pornography. He actively chatted online with an undercover Delaware state trooper for the purpose of traveling to Delaware and engaging in sex acts with the alleged child of the undercover officer. An ICE HSI computer forensics examination of Heil's computer revealed more than 9000 images of child pornography and 500 transcripts of chats between him and other child sex offenders in the three months preceding his arrest. Some of his chat partners purported to be adults with custody of children whom they were molesting.
  
  
• Christopher J. Stephani, 41, of Columbia Crossroads, Pa., was sentenced in August to more than 12 years in prison for receiving and distributing child pornography. Stephani used a computer to download and distribute more than 800 images and 35 movies of child pornography between 2008 and March 4, 2010.
  
  
• Thomas Gordon, Jr., 46, of Philadelphia, was sentenced in November to 11 years in prison and a lifetime of supervised release on child pornography charges. Gordon, a former Transportation Security Administration screener posted multiple files depicting graphic child exploitation to his Facebook and Photobucket accounts.
  
  
• Steven Tadlock, 45, of Pennsylvania, was sentenced to six years in prison on child pornography and obstruction of justice charges. Tadlock distributed images over the Internet to other users and engaged in chats about how to groom children for sexual activity. He also destroyed a computer external hard drive to obstruct the investigation.
  
  
• Jamie Hall, 37, a former U.S. Air Force technical sergeant stationed at Dover Air Force Base, was sentenced to six years in prison and five years of supervised release in January. He engaged in online conversations with a New Hampshire detective who posed as an 18-year-old boy interested in trading child pornography. Hall sent numerous images of child pornography and posted additional images to a publically available website and expressed interest in identifying a young teenage boy with whom he could engage in a sexual relationship.
  
  
• Roger Wesley Farris II, 41, of Waynesboro, Va., was sentenced to 44 months in prison and 15 years of supervised release on his conviction related to attempting to arrange for sex with a minor child. The investigation began as an undercover operation in which Farris contacted an agent posing as the uncle of a 10-year-old child in an effort to arrange sex with the child. Farris told the agent that he would pay $700, plus $50 for gas money, if the uncle would bring the child from West Virginia to a hotel in Pittsburgh. Farris was arrested on March 5, 2008, at a hotel in Pittsburgh.
  
  
• Richard Boerckel, 68, of Pennsylvania, was sentenced in November to 30 months in prison and five years of supervised release. He was charged in August after ICE HSI conducted an undercover investigation into the operators and subscribers of websites containing child pornography.

"Sexual predators are exploiting and abusing our children for their own personal gratification," said John P. Kelleghan, special agent in charge of ICE HSI in Philadelphia. "HSI and our law enforcement partners will not tolerate this behavior and will use every tool at our disposal to stop them in their tracks."

Operation Predator is a nationwide ICE HSI initiative to protect children from sexual predators, including those who travel overseas for sex with minors, Internet child pornographers, criminal alien sex offenders, and child sex traffickers. ICE HSI encourages the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity through its toll-free hotline at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE or by completing its online tip form. Both are staffed around the clock by investigators.

Suspected child sexual exploitation or missing children may be reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, an Operation Predator partner, at 1-800-843-5678 or http://www.cybertipline.com.

For more information about ICE HSI's predator investigations, visit ICE.gov.

http://www.ice.gov/news/releases/1112/111230philadelphia.htm

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From the Department of Homeland Security

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DHS Announces "If You See Something, Say Something" Campaign Partnership with the National Hockey League

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) today announced a new partnership between DHS' "If You See Something, Say Something™" public awareness campaign and the National Hockey League (NHL) - highlighting the Department's continued partnership with the sports industry to ensure the safety and security of employees, players and fans.

"Every citizen plays a critical role in identifying and reporting suspicious activities and threats," said Secretary Napolitano. "By expanding the 'If You See Something, Say Something™' campaign to the NHL, we are working together to ensure the safety and security of employees, players, and fans."

As part of the Department's "If You See Something, Say Something™" partnership with the NHL, a Public Service Announcement will be read before and during games, and campaign graphics will appear on the videoboard and on ribbon boards. Safety messaging will also be printed on the back of NHL Winter Classic credentials for staff, players, and volunteers. In addition, the Department has partnered with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and City of Philadelphia to place "If You See Something, Say Something™" advertisements throughout Philadelphia at airports and gas stations, and on buses, trains and billboards.

"We are honored to use a great platform like the Winter Classic to play our part in helping keep America safe," said NHL Vice President of Communications Jamey Horan.

The "If You See Something, Say Something™" campaign - originally implemented by New York City's Metropolitan Transportation Authority and now licensed to DHS for a nationwide campaign - is a simple and effective program to engage the public and key frontline employees to identify and report indicators of terrorism, crime and other threats to the proper transportation and law enforcement authorities.

Over the past year, DHS has collaborated with federal, state, local and private sector partners to expand the "If You See Something, Say Something™" campaign, and with the Department of Justice on the nationwide SAR Initiative - an administration effort to train state and local law enforcement to recognize behaviors and indicators related to terrorism, crime and other threats; standardize how those observations are documented and analyzed; and ensure the sharing of those reports with the Federal Bureau of Investigation-led Joint Terrorism Task Forces for further investigation.

Recent expansions of the "If You See Something, Say Something™" campaign include partnerships with numerous sports teams and leagues, transportation agencies, private sector partners, states, municipalities, and colleges and universities. DHS also unveiled new Public Service Announcements (PSAs) which have been distributed to television and radio stations across the country.

DHS will continue to expand the "If You See Something, Say Something™" campaign nationally to help America's businesses, communities and citizens remain vigilant and play an active role in keeping the country safe.

For more information, visit www.dhs.gov.

http://www.dhs.gov/ynews/releases/20111229-dhs-partnership-nhl.shtm

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