What's Goin On: May 2016

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Justice Department Will Seek Death Penalty For Charleston Church Shooter Dylann Roof!

38-Year-Old Man Found Hanged in Tree in Ohio, Authorities Call It a Suicide

Andrew Jones earned straight As and a football scholarship, but he wasn't allowed to walk across the stage at Amite High's graduation Wednesday (May 18) because he wouldn't shave his goatee.

Two Tennessee pastors are among 32 arrested for human trafficking during undercover sting

“We want anyone responding to these ads to think there may be a TBI Agent on the other end of it.” —Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Director Mark Gwyn

According to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI), 32 people have been arrested in Knoxville, Tennessee for human trafficking during a 3-day undercover operation :

KNOXVILLE – A three-day operation by Special Agents with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and detectives with the Knoxville Police Department to combat human trafficking in Knoxville has resulted in the arrest of 32 men and women on prostitution and human trafficking-related charges. Two of the men, including a children’s minister, responded to ads for what they thought were girls under the age of 18. The Knoxville anti-trafficking operation, called “Operation Someone Like Me”, is the fifth operation of its kind in the state between the TBI and partner agencies to help identify, investigate and prosecute trafficking, and rescue victims.
With the partnership including the Knoxville Police Department, Community Coalition Against Human Trafficking, End Slavery Tennessee, and Second Life Chattanooga, TBI Agents and intelligence analysts embarked on an undercover operation to identify potential victims of trafficking, arrest those seeking to purchase illicit sex from a juvenile, and learn more about the specific nuances of this type of crime.

Human traffickers all around us. If you’re buying or selling, you are part of the $150 billion business — and part of the crime. Two of the men arrested during the sting were church pastors. Jason Kennedy, a pastor for children aged birth through fifth grade at Grace Baptist Church responded to ads soliciting underaged girls. The TBI records say he negotiated a $100 fee for a half hour of sex with two females — one girl being a minor. The other pastor is Zubin Parakh of Lifehouse Church in Oak Ridge, right outside of Knoxville, was also charged for responding to an ad for sex with a female minor. Three hundred contacts were made in response to ads posted on Background.com (a google search shows the site no longer exists).
The Knoxville Police Chief David Rausch calls human trafficking the “scourge on society” and states his department is committed to doing all that’s necessary to protect victims. TBI Assistant Special Agent Margie Quin said:

“We’re changing the conversation about human trafficking. These operations are designed to identify and help victims of trafficking, as well as take these predators off the street.

A public awareness campaign was launched last year in Tennessee called ItHasToStop. The operation also helps identify victims of sex/human trafficking and offers services that include housing, counseling and addiction treatment.
Below are the names of the individuals charged in the human trafficking sting.

Michael Clayton, 43, Clinton, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Larry Quarles, 52, New Market, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Gerrado Merchant, 36, Jacksboro, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

James Perkins, 50, Sweetwater, TN- Patronizing Prostitution

Greg Hensley, 44, Mascot, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Jaton Johnson, 38, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution, Simple Possession

Samuel Rivers, 27, East Point, GA – Patronizing Prostitution, Unlawful Possession of a Weapon, Simple Possession

Prashante Bhakta, 35, Columbus, NC – Patronizing Prostitution

James Warren, 32, Newport, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Dariusz Jurczak, 45, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Gary Bauer, 56, Heiskell, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Nicholas Rains, 24, Maryville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Ignacio Jimenez, 38, Maryville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Patrick Douthat, 27, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Brandon Slatton, 22, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Jeffrey Sweeney, 63, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Robert Aiken, 48, Jacksboro, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Atari McNabb, 28, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Zubin Parakh, 32, Oak Ridge, TN – Patronizing Prostitution, Trafficking

Jonathan McCarthy, 30, Augusta, GA – Patronizing Prostitution

Jose Juarez, 38, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Robert Lambert, 40, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Cornelius Turner, 26, Memphis, TN – Promoting Prostitution, served with warrant out of Shelby County

Jerry Rhode, 41, Strawberry Plains, TN – Patronizing Prostitution

Zachary Desha, 24, Knoxville, TN – Promoting Prostitution

Jason Kennedy, 46, Knoxville, TN – Patronizing Prostitution, Trafficking

Kelsey Martin, 23, Boaz, KY – Prostitution

Alexis Phelps, 21, Knoxville, TN – Prostitution

Shirley Henry, 23, Clinton, TN – Prostitution

Stephanie Thomas, 26, Knoxville, TN – Prostitution

Crystal Myers, 37, Knoxville, TN – Prostitution

As for the victims of human trafficking, many are right in front of us in hotels, airplanes, nail salons, truck stops, in elder care centers ... they are held captive through coercion, force and threats. There are an estimated 20.9 million victims of human slavery, with 1.5 million in North America. Sex-trafficking is often the most common and most lucrative in the business of selling human beings. TED talk speaker Tony Talbott makes an incredibly disturbing summation about sex trafficking:

"It's all about the money. Human trafficking is insanely profitable. If you really think about it; You can sell a kilo of Heroin once; You can sell a 13-year-old girl 20 times a night, 365 days a year.”

In order to attenuate human trafficking, we need national discourse. Much can be prevented through awareness. There are tell-tale signs all around us. For additional information, visit The National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC), online which operates 24 hours, 7 days a week. You can also call call 1-888-373-788 or text BeFree (233733). If you suspect any kind of human trafficking, you can submit a tip to DHS or visit: ICE.gov.

Monday, May 23, 2016

Baltimore officer found not guilty on all charges in Freddie Gray case

Published May 23, 2016

A judge in Baltimore Monday found a police officer not guilty on all charges against him in connection with the death of Freddie Gray in police custody, months after another officer's trial ended in a hung jury. Meanwhile, riot-trained officers from outside Baltimore started to arrive in the city in case of any unrest.
Officer Edward Nero faced second-degree assault, misconduct in office and reckless endangerment charges. Prosecutors said the 30-year-old unlawfully arrested Gray without probable cause and was negligent when he didn't buckle the prisoner into a seat belt.
"Officer Edward Nero, his wife and family are elated that this nightmare is finally over," defense attorney Marc Zayon responded.
In a lengthy analysis read from the bench, Baltimore Circuit Judge Barry Williams said Nero's partner, Officer Garrett Miller, detained and arrested Gray himself. Williams said Nero did not act "corruptly" with an intent to commit a crime.

He also said the state failed to prove that Nero was informed and aware of an updated transport policy regarding seat belts.
"As the eyes of the nation are upon us, I have no doubt we will all exhibit behaviors that represent the very best of Baltimore," Police Commissioner Kevin Davis said.
"Although the criminal case against Officer Edward Nero has come to a close, the internal investigation has not. With that, Officer Nero's status will remain unchanged. He will remain in an administrative capacity while this investigation continues," police spokesman T.J. Smith added.
"Officer Nero is relieved that for him, this nightmare is nearing an end. Being falsely charged with a crime, and being prosecuted for reasons that have nothing to do with justice, is a horror that no person should ever have to endure," the Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police responded.
As the verdict was read, Nero dropped his head down and his attorney placed a hand on his back. The courtroom was quiet. When the judge said he was not guilty, Nero stood up and hugged his attorney, and appeared to wipe away a tear.
Several angry protesters surrounded Nero's brother as he left the courthouse protected by armed security officers, shouting "no justice, no peace."
"This is our American system of justice and police officers must be afforded the same justice system as every other citizen in this city, state, and country... In the case of any disturbance in the city, we are prepared to respond. We will protect our neighborhoods, our businesses, and the people of our city," Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said.
Nero opted for a bench trial rather than a jury trial. A judge declared a mistrial for Officer William Porter in December.
Gray died April 19, 2015, a week after his neck was broken in the back of a police transport van while he was handcuffed and shackled but left unrestrained by a seat belt.
His death set off more than a week of protests followed by looting, rioting and arson that prompted a citywide curfew. His name became a rallying cry in the growing national conversation about the treatment of black men by police officers.
Tessa Hill-Aston, president of the Baltimore chapter of the NAACP, said the case "speaks to a lack of training, lack of protocol" that officers didn't see that Gray should've been buckled into the seat.
On the morning of April 12, 2015, Nero, Miller and Lt. Brian Rice were on patrol in Baltimore's high-crime area of the Western District when Rice made eye contact with Gray and he ran away. Rice called for backup, and Miller and Nero responded. According to testimony, Miller, who'd jumped off his bicycle, caught up with Gray and placed him in handcuffs.
Nero's attorney, Marc Zayon, said Nero touched Gray to help him up from the ground after he'd been handcuffed and was asking for an inhaler.
Gray was placed in the back of the transport van, seated on the wagon's bench.
A few blocks away the van stopped, and Rice and Miller took Gray, who police said had been kicking, screaming and shaking the van, out of the wagon, placed him in leg irons and replaced his metal cuffs with plastic ones. The officers, with Nero's help, loaded Gray back into the van, sliding him into the compartment on his belly and head-first.
That was the second and last time Nero touched Gray, his attorney said during the trial.
Prosecutors said the officers should never have arrested Gray without first patting him down to determine whether or not he was armed and dangerous. In failing to do so, the officers violated the rules for a routine stop. Without probable cause, Gray never should have been taken into custody, they said.
The judge disagreed.
Shortly after Gray's death, State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby charged six officers. Three of them are black; Nero and two others are white. The other officers are set to have separate trials over the summer and into the fall.
The assault charge against Nero carried a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and reckless endangerment carried a punishment of up to five years.
Nero's attorney argued his client didn't arrest Gray and that it was the police van driver's responsibility to buckle in detainees. The judge said police training materials dealing with transport safety were clearly aimed at drivers.
The defense also sought to convince the judge that the department's order requiring that all inmates be strapped in was more suggestion than rule because officers were expected to act with discretion based on the circumstances of each situation.

Sunday, May 22, 2016

AdChoices The 12 Craziest Hubble Pictures Of All Time

Popular Science

Josh Hrala 5/4/2016

1/13 SLIDES © NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team/A. Nota/Westerlund 2 Science Team

Celestial Fireworks

A series of young stars glimmer in the distance like fireworks in the sky. This image was released in April 2015 to celebrate Hubble's 25th anniversary.
The Hubble Space Telescope has continuously unleashed a stream of jaw-dropping intergalactic imagery since it launched on April 24, 1990. Not only do these images, which look more like paintings at first glance, allow researchers to study distant worlds, galaxies and nebulae, they have captured the minds of the general public, getting us genuinely excited about space exploration. But here's some sad news: despite all of these wonderful things, Hubble is getting older.
In a few short years, Hubble's technology will become fully outdated and NASA will let it drift to a fiery death in the atmosphere, like some crazed band of space Vikings. Once gone, at least we know we'll have the gold-encrusted James Webb Space Telescope to keep the images flowing in. With time marching on, let's not worry about what will happen to everyone's favorite space telescope and, instead, take a look at some of the most amazing pictures it's given us over the years.

Patriots at the gate: The Americans preparing for battle against their own government

© Matt McClain/The Washington Post B.J. Soper works on welding a target that he and fellow members of the Central Oregon Constitutional Guard were going to use for firearms training on March 4 in… REDMOND, Ore. —BJ Soper took aim with his AR-15 semiautomatic rifle and fired a dozen shots at a human silhouette target. Soper’s wife and their 16-year-old daughter practiced drawing pistols. Then Soper helped his 4-year-old daughter, in pink sneakers and a ponytail, work on her marksmanship with a .22-caliber rifle.
Deep in the heart of a vast U.S. military training ground, surrounded by spent shotgun shells and juniper trees blasted to shreds, the Central Oregon Constitutional Guard was conducting its weekly firearms training.
“The intent is to be able to work together and defend ourselves if we need to,” said Soper, 40, a building contractor who is an emerging leader in a growing national movement rooted in distrust of the federal government, one that increasingly finds itself in armed conflicts with authorities.
Those in the movement call themselves patriots, demanding that the federal government adhere to the Constitution and stop what they see as systematic abuse of land rights, gun rights, freedom of speech and other liberties.
Law enforcement officials call them dangerous, delusional and sometimes violent, and they say that their numbers are growing amid a wave of anger at the government that has been gaining strength since 2008, a surge that coincided with the election of the first black U.S. president and a crippling economic recession.
Soper started his group, which consists of about 30 men, women and children from a handful of families, two years ago as a “defensive unit” against “all enemies foreign and domestic.” Mainly, he’s talking about the federal government, which he thinks is capable of unprovoked aggression against its own people.
The group’s members are drywallers and flooring contractors, nurses and painters and high school students, who stockpile supplies, practice survival skills and “basic infantry” tactics, learn how to treat combat injuries, study the Constitution and train with their concealed handguns and combat-style rifles.
“It doesn’t say in our Constitution that you can’t stand up and defend yourself,” Soper said. “We’ve let the government step over the line and rule us, and that was never the intent of this country.”
Law enforcement officials and the watchdog groups that track the self-styled “patriot” groups call them anti-government extremists, militias, armed militants or even domestic terrorists. Some opponents of the largely white and rural groups have made fun by calling them “Y’all Qaeda” or “Vanilla ISIS.”
Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors extremism, said there were about 150 such groups in 2008 and about 1,000 now. Potok and other analysts, including law enforcement officials who track the groups, said their supporters number in the hundreds of thousands, counting people who signal their support in more passive ways, such as following the groups on social media. The Facebook page of the Oath Keepers, a group of former members of police forces and the military, for example, has more than 525,000 “likes.”
President Obama’s progressive policies and the tough economic times have inflamed anti-government anger, the same vein of rage into which Donald Trump has tapped during his Republican presidential campaign, said Potok and Mark Pitcavage, who works with the Anti-Defamation League and has monitored extremism for 20 years.
Much of the movement traces its roots to the deadly 1990s confrontations between civilians and federal agents at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, and in Waco, Tex., that resulted in the deaths of as many as 90. Timothy McVeigh cited both events before he was executed for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people, and he said he had deliberately chosen a building housing federal government agencies.
Now a “Second Wave” is spreading across the country, especially in the West, fueled by the Internet and social media. J.J. MacNab, an author and George Washington University researcher who specializes in extremism, said social media has allowed individuals or small groups such as Soper’s to become far more influential than in the 1990s, when the groups would spread their message through meetings at local diners and via faxes.
The movement received a huge boost from the 2014 standoff at Cliven Bundy’s ranch in Nevada, where federal agents and hundreds of armed supporters of Bundy faced off in a dispute over the rancher’s refusal to pay fees to graze his cattle on federal land.
When federal agents backed down rather than risk a bloody clash, Bundy’s supporters claimed victory and were emboldened to stage similar armed face-offs last year at gold mines in Oregon and Montana.
In January, dozens of armed occupiers, led by Bundy’s sons Ammon and Ryan, took over the headquarters buildings of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge near rural Burns, Ore., an action that later resulted in the death of Robert “LaVoy” Finicum, an occupier who was shot by state troopers.
Soper has been in the middle of all of it. He says he has tried to be a more moderate voice in a movement best known for its hotheads. He spent a month living in his RV at Burns, trying to talk the occupiers into standing down.
Two days after Soper’s last visit to the refuge, Finicum was killed in an operation in which the Bundys were arrested. An independent local investigation concluded that the shooting was justified, although the U.S. Justice Department is investigating several FBI agents for possible misconduct. Soper considers Finicum’s death “murder.”
That kind of talk is “a big deal,” said Stephanie Douglas, who retired in 2013 as the FBI’s top official overseeing foreign and domestic counterterrorism programs. “Free speech doesn’t make you a terrorist just because you disagree with the government. But if you start espousing violence and radicalizing your own people toward a violent act, the federal government is going to take notice.”
Shortly after the Bundy ranch confrontation, two of Bundy’s supporters who had been at the ranch, Jerad and Amanda Miller, killed two police officers and a civilian and also died in a Las Vegas shooting rampage. Police said the couple left a note on the body of one the officers they had shot point-blank.
It said: “This is the beginning of the revolution.”
Until two years ago, BJ Soper was a creature of ESPN.
Settled down after spending much of his 20s as a professional rodeo rider, he lived with his second wife and their two daughters on a pastoral plot of land with horses, dogs, cats, chickens and a majestic view of the snow-capped Cascades.
He spent his days building sheds and doing other small carpentry jobs and his weekends watching sports on TV. He played softball. He hunted and fished. He followed his mother’s advice and stayed away from politics: She taught him young that registering to vote was just a way for the government to call you to jury duty.
Then the TV news was filled with footage from the Bundy ranch, and he was shocked. Government officials said Bundy had been abusing grazing rights and refusing to pay his fees for two decades, so they finally sent in armed agents to round up his cattle grazing on federal land. Officials said they had shown great restraint and patience with Bundy. But to Soper, it appeared that they were bullying him.
He wondered: “Do we really have federal armed agents out there pointing guns and threatening to kill people over cows? What in the hell is going on here?”
He started doing research on the Internet and quickly tapped into what seemed to be thousands of voices arguing that the federal government had lost track of the constitutional limits on its power.
“At that point, I had heard of Waco, Texas, and I had heard of Ruby Ridge, and quite honestly, I thought, ‘Oh, that’s just a bunch of crazies up there, and they got in a gunfight with the government,’ ” he said. “But that’s not the truth.”
The more he read, the more convinced he was that the government was “out of control,” and he was amazed by the number of people who felt the same way.
“I was very disappointed with myself,” he said. “I realized that we’re here in the predicament that we’re in as a country because my generation, and my parents’ generation, have done nothing. We let this happen. We got used to our cushy lives where everything’s easy. We have forgotten what’s really important. We’ve forgotten what liberty and freedom really mean.”
It was like being shaken out of a lifetime of slumber, he said: “Before 2014, I was blind. I wasn’t awake. I wasn’t paying attention. But Bundy Ranch woke me up.”
Suddenly, his weekends watching the San Francisco 49ers or the Portland Trail Blazers seemed like anesthesia numbing him against real life.
“I lived like 90 percent of Americans, oblivious to everything that was going on, from the time I was 18 until the Bundy Ranch happened,” he said. “I just said, ‘I can’t sit back and do nothing. I’ve got to get involved.’ I feel responsible for where we’re at, because I’ve done nothing my entire life.”
His response was to start his Central Oregon Constitutional Guard, which he said was partly to protect against the government, but partly a way to get back to a simpler America.
“As a kid, life was easy,” he says on the group’s website. “No worries. Very little threats. I would ride my bike around all over the neighborhood for hours on end. Play with friends and show back up for dinner without worry.”
Critics say such talk is naive nostalgia for a 1950s America that wasn’t ever really such a homespun paradise in the first place. And they say the groups that have sprung up in response are far more dangerous than Soper and others want to make them seem.
“The idea that he needs to face down the government with weapons I think is really, really wrong,” Potok said. “They don’t really say that, but I think that is what is right under the surface.”
Soper’s research also led him to some of the Internet’s favorite conspiracy theories, including a purported U.N. plot to impose “One World Government.” And Soper, like most in the patriot movement, became a believer.
He suspects that the United Nations, through a program called Agenda 21, wants to reduce the global population from 7 billion to fewer than 1 billion. He said the federal government may be promoting abortions overseas as part of that plot, and also may be deliberately mandating childhood vaccines designed to cause autism because autistic adults are less likely to have children.
Soper said he could not rule out the possibility that the U.S. government was behind the 9/11 attacks. He suspects that the government and the “medical community” have had a cancer cure for years but won’t release it because cancer treatment is too profitable for pharmaceutical companies.
“I’m not saying that’s the case,” he said, “but I like to look at all avenues.”
Soper knows those ideas sound crazy to many people, but, he said with a laugh, “It shows I just don’t trust my government.”
Those who track these groups say paranoid conspiracy theories and armed occupations undercut often-legitimate disagreements with federal policies.
Tom Gorey, a spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM), the lead agency at the Bundy ranch, said Soper and the others have “taken an aggressive anti-federal, anti-BLM posture because of [their] bizarre and discredited interpretation of the U.S. Constitution and paranoid views of the federal government.”
Said Potok: “People having nutty ideas is of very little importance except when those ideas begin to affect their actions. An awful lot of people have acted violently in defense of some of these ideas.”
Just before dusk one recent evening, 10 people hopped out of pickups on the shoulder of Route 97 in Redmond and began picking up litter near an Adopt-a-Highway sign that said “Central Oregon Constitutional Guard.”
Soper said being a patriot sometimes means spending a couple of hours picking up bottles, cans and even rotting fur from a road-kill deer — all while carrying a concealed .45-caliber pistol on his hip.
“It’s like American Express — don’t leave home without it,” said Soper, working alongside his wife, Lisa Soper, also packing a .45 in her jeans.
Passing drivers beeped and gave thumbs ups.
A white BMW pulled over, and the driver approached Soper.
“You guys the Central Oregon Constitutional Guard?” he asked.
“Yeah, we are,” Soper said. “You interested?”
“I saw you guys on Facebook,” said Glenn Golter, 42, a flooring contractor whose clothes were covered with dust after a day’s work. “I like it that you stick up for our constitutional rights.”
Soper invited Golter to join the group for its monthly meeting at a local pizza restaurant right after the cleanup. And just like that, the movement had a new member.
They drove to Straw Hat Pizza, in a strip mall on the edge of this high-desert town of 30,000 people in the Cascade Range foothills. Lisa picked some healthy greens for her husband from the salad bar, while the children and the other guys in the group ate thick, cheesy pizzas.
Across the family-style table, Alex McNeely, 25, a drywaller and “avid YouTuber,” said he became interested in the patriot movement online and joined the group to feel that he was helping to defend the country.
“There’s this D.C. mentality that if you stand up for your rights, you’re dangerous and anti-government,” said McNeely, who has an AK-47 assault rifle tattooed on his forearm. “But if I’m denied my rights, what else can I do? Am I just going to stand there and take it, or am I going to do something?”
In the Constitutional Guard, McNeely said: “I feel what we do is stand up for people who don’t have the means to stand up for themselves. I have an overwhelming desire to help people.”
They have passed out more than 2,000 pocket-size copies of the Constitution that Soper said he bought for $500, sent food and clothes to victims of forest fires in Washington state and Oregon and given Christmas presents to more than three dozen children in need.
McNeely considered joining the military when he graduated from high school, but he turned 18 the month Obama was elected in 2008, and, because of Obama’s “socialist” policies, “I wasn’t going to accept him as my commander in chief.”
“I don’t like that he wants to fundamentally change America,” McNeely said.
The group members are conservatives, do not like former secretary of state Hillary Clinton and generally support Donald Trump. Soper said he would prefer just about anyone over Clinton but would not cast a vote for president this year. He said he thinks casting his vote is “a waste of time” because Oregon’s politics are dominated by Democrats.
MacNab, the George Washington University researcher, said Trump has been a powerful recruiting tool for groups angry at the government. “The tea party built little bridges between the fringe and the mainstream,” she said. “With Trump, it’s an 18-lane superhighway. He’s literally telling them they’re right.”
One of the men indicted in the Bundy ranch case is Gerald DeLemus, who was New Hampshire co-chair of Veterans for Trump and was named by the Trump campaign as a New Hampshire alternate delegate to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.
Soper bristles when critics call him anti-government; he said he supports the government but just wants it to follow the Constitution. And he said calling his group “armed” is as relevant as saying its members wear boots, because the Second Amendment gives every American the right to carry a gun.
Soper, who carries a pocket Constitution with him everywhere, said he thinks the Constitution does not give the federal government the right to own land and that the government’s increasing emphasis on environmental regulations is putting ranchers, miners, loggers and others out of work and devastating local economies.
“We need to be able to raise and grow food,” Soper said. “Wealth comes from the land. I want to take into consideration endangered frogs. But at the same time, that frog can’t be more important than the survival of the human race.”
Everyone in the group keeps 30 days’ worth of food and emergency supplies on hand. Group members learn gardening and raising livestock. They go camping and learn survival tactics, including how to fashion a shelter, find food and water, and make a fire.
McNeely and Lisa Soper are taking an emergency medical technician class to learn to treat wounds, including combat trauma. They all are working on getting ham-radio licenses to communicate in the event that the cellphone network fails.
But a bedrock of their mission is to be an armed and trained paramilitary force. Soper said group members train on “basic infantry” skills: “working a patrol, patrolling with a vehicle, arriving at ‘contact’ and how to protect yourself and escape from that.”
“We are not soldiers,” Soper said. “But we know the basics.”
Soper said the group would be ready for an earthquake or other natural disaster, but he’s most concerned about “man-made disasters” caused by the government.
“I don’t know that it’s all that far-fetched that we have an economic collapse,” he said. “The dollar is a pretty scary investment anymore. China’s buying up all the gold. When people get hungry and thirsty and can’t feed themselves, they get desperate.”
In April 2015, Soper pulled on his paramilitary camouflage fatigues, picked up his AR-15 rifle and spent a couple of weeks “standing guard” at the Sugar Pine Mine in southwestern Oregon, where miners were having a dispute with the BLM.
The agency had ordered two miners to cease operations because they had built structures at the site in violation of the terms of their permit to mine on federal land.
The miners said the federal government was trying to force them out of business and steal their property. They also said BLM agents who served the cease-and-desist paperwork had pointed guns at them. Gorey, the BLM spokesman, said no agent ever drew a weapon.
Supporters of the miners put out a national call on YouTube for volunteers to help them, and Soper went.
“The government showed up and pointed guns at these miners,” Soper said. “Put yourself in their shoes. How are you going to respond? When you are in fear for your life, you have a right to defend yourself.”
Gorey said agents followed proper procedure at Sugar Pine and did not threaten anyone. “We’re a scapegoat for these militiamen who seem eager to wage war against the federal government,” he said.
A federal judge eventually ordered the BLM not to enforce its order until the matter could be heard in an Interior Department appeals court, where it is pending.
“The last thing I ever want to do is point a gun at another American,” Soper said. “But when the BLM picks up guns against us, when is it okay for us to defend ourselves?”
As Soper sipped a soda at the pizza parlor, his 4-year-old daughter, Kalley, asked him for more quarters to play video games. He handed over a few with a gently teasing roll of his eyes.
“We’re the guys that see the wolves for what they are,” Soper said as watched her bounce away. “And we want to protect the sheep.”
On a recent Friday morning, Soper had been at his laptop since 5 a.m., typing a furious letter to his county sheriff.
Soper had awoken to the news that government agents had arrested a dozen people in connection with the 2014 standoff at the Bundy ranch. That meant a total of 19 people, including Cliven Bundy, now faced obstruction-of-justice and firearms charges that Soper thought were unfair. He was also enraged that Bundy’s sons were still being held without bail over the occupation at the wildlife refuge.
“People are being detained without due process,” he said. “These are not our American values.”
If Bundy and his supporters faced charges, Soper said, so should the federal agents who faced off against them: “Why should law enforcement be held to a different standard?”
“The last thing I want is violence,” Soper said. “But I hope they see that if we continue down this path, we’re going to have more bloodshed in this country.”
Soper said the answer to grievances with the government is negotiation, not violence. But he said that when federal agents draw weapons on citizens without cause, citizens have the right to answer guns with guns.
“We have the right to defend ourselves from imminent danger or death,” Soper said. “I don’t believe that excludes law enforcement. When they’re not doing their duty justly, I think you have a right to defend yourself.”
Soper kept typing, warning that the government had lost “common sense.”
“I pray we find some sense of it again, otherwise a very dark future awaits us, and it is not very far down the road,” he wrote.
“Sheriff,” he said, “people are going to die.”

Tuesday, May 17, 2016

City Pays Offenders Cash To Lower Crime Rates!

Medical White Scientist Says The Black Community Is Being Targeted By The Medical System, They Are Deliberately Being Poisoned

Federal court orders Cleveland, Mississippi schools to desegregate. ‪After 50 years

https://www.facebook.com/rolandsmartinfanpage/videos/10153701126152831/

Friday, May 13, 2016

Trayvon Martin death: Zimmerman handgun 'auction reaches $65m'

Image copyright Reuters

Image caption Zimmerman at the time of his arrest and Martin pictured three years before his death

An online auction for the pistol used to kill unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin has apparently reached $65m (£45m), organisers say.

The sale has been plagued by fake bidders including "Racist McShootface".
George Zimmerman, who shot and killed the teenager, had planned to auction what he called "an American icon" on the website Gun Broker on Thursday.
But the web posting was removed just as the auction was due to begin with a reserve price of $5,000 (£3,450).
United Gun Group is now hosting the auction.
In a statement on Twitter they defended the sale of the gun on their site. They were "truly sorry" for the Martin family's loss but said it was their goal to "defend liberty".
"Unless the law has been violated, it is the intention of the United Gun Group to allow its members to use any of the available features. While not always popular this is where we stand."

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Mr Zimmerman said the gun was recently returned to him

On Friday afternoon, the top bidder was a user named Craig Bryant.
Mr Zimmerman, 32, a neighbourhood watchman, was cleared over the death of the 17-year-old in February 2012 after saying he acted in self-defence.
Does the gun belong in a museum?
In an online posting to announce the auction, Mr Zimmerman said that he would use the profits to "fight" the Black Lives Matter movement and oppose Democrat Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign.
A lawyer for the Martin family told the Washington Post that "it is insulting to this family that he would decide that he would sell the gun that he killed their child with".
"Think about what that means: This is a gun that took a child's life and now he wants to make money off of it."
On the auction site, Mr Zimmerman said it was recently returned to him by the US Department of Justice.
He claimed that the Smithsonian museums had expressed interest in buying the 9 mm handgun, but Smithsonian officials denied that in a statement.
Speaking to a Florida television station, Mr Zimmerman had defended the auction saying "I'm a free American, and I can do what I'd like with my possessions."

Image copyright AP

Image caption Zimmerman has had several encounters with police since being acquitted

Analysis - Nick Bryant, BBC North America correspondent

Few cases in recent years have been more racially sensitive or led to such an anguished national conversation as the killing of Trayvon Martin. It sparked demonstrations around the country, prompted President Obama to remark that if he had a son, he'd have looked like the black teenager and brought about the first use on social media of the hashtag "Black Lives Matter."
So the decision of the former neighbourhood watchman, George Zimmerman to put the gun he used up for auction not only seems extraordinary but also cruel and callous - especially since he refers to the weapon on the online site as an "American icon."
This is not the first time that Zimmerman has sought to cash in on his notoriety. His first painting of an American flag, emblazoned with the words "God One Nation with Liberty and Justice For All," sold on eBay for the staggering sum of $100,000. But it did not impress critics, who called it "primitive" and "appalling."
Harsher language will no doubt be used to describe the sale of the pistol that killed Trayvon Martin.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Protests were launched nationwide following Martin's death, which helped to create the Black Lives Matter movement

Congressman Hakeem Jeffries said on Thursday that "Trayvon Martin's cold-blooded killer should be in prison. Instead, he is trying to profit from the stunning miscarriage of justice."
Florida police did not arrest Mr Zimmerman for six weeks after the shooting in Sanford, Florida, provoking mass rallies in Florida and throughout the US.
Police justified their decision not to detain him by citing the state's controversial "stand your ground" law, which allows a citizen to use lethal force if he or she feels in imminent danger. Police initially said the law prevented them from bringing charges.
Profiles: Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman
Mr Zimmerman's defence said Trayvon Martin had punched their client, slammed his head into the pavement and reached for Mr Zimmerman's gun. Prosecutors accused Mr Zimmerman of telling a number of lies.
The case led to protests in several cities in the US and to the birth of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Mr Zimmerman's name has been in news headlines several times since his closely watched trial.
Twice, assault charges against his girlfriend were dropped.

Why Have So Many People Never Heard Of The MOVE Bombing?

Email

May 18, 20158:04 PM ET

Gene Demby

A policeman stands guard on Pine Street in West Philadelphia near the remains of 61 row houses days after they were destroyed by fire on May 13, 1985, when police dropped explosives into a house occupied by members of the radical group MOVE.

George Widman/AP

After my stories last week on the 30th anniversary of the MOVE siege in West Philadelphia in 1985, in which Philadelphia police dropped a bomb on a residential neighborhood, leaving 11 dead — including five children — we were surprised by how many people told us they'd never heard of the bombing.

I'd never heard of the MOVE bombing before this @GeeDee215 story. Unbelievable. http://t.co/jRlmyYgR6e pic.twitter.com/sq6xFmkidK
— Steve Mullis (@stevemullis) May 14, 2015

At first, we thought the knowledge gap might be generational. My Code Switch teammate Kat Chow, who was born years after the MOVE incident, had never heard of it. But another NPR colleague who's about a generation older hadn't either.
Maybe it was regional. On Twitter, a few people told us the bombing never landed on their radars until they moved to the Philadelphia area. But even though Tasneem Raja, my editor on Code Switch, grew up 20 minutes north of Philly and attended a "hippie" (her words) Quaker high school where events like the Kent State shootings got a lot of airtime in class, she remembers hearing about MOVE only from her dad, never in school.
I grew up in Philly during and after the bombing. My elementary school was the kind of place where we we learned Afrocentric songs and teachers dressed in kente cloth, while my high school was overwhelmingly black. We never discussed it in class, either.

The neighborhood where the compound of the radical group MOVE was located.

Code Switch

I'm From Philly. 30 Years Later, I'm Still Trying To Make Sense Of The MOVE Bombing

What gives? It's seems incredible that so many people had never heard about the time American law enforcement bombed U.S. citizens on U.S. soil, which, on top of the deaths, left dozens of bystanders' homes destroyed in an uncontrolled fire that the police commissioner told firefighters not to put out right away. The details are so extreme, so over-the-top. How have we forgotten this?
I put the question to Robin Wagner-Pacifici, who teaches at the New School and has written books on MOVE and other fringe militant groups involved in bloody government standoffs, including the Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas, and the Weaver family in Ruby Ridge, Idaho. She has noticed that while those groups identified with each other to a degree, referring to each other in their manifestos as fellow victims of the state, they don't seem to feel the same way about MOVE. "They created this kind of genealogy," she says, "but none of them mentioned MOVE."
She thinks the reason was ideological: MOVE's quasi-Rastafarian, anti-technology, pro-animal-rights worldview doesn't neatly fit on any part of the political spectrum, while other militant groups she has studied had some degree of overlap. And you can't lump MOVE in with other black power movements of the time, either; black radical groups often bristled at their tactics.
In the universe of violent fringe movements that ended in deadly mayhem, MOVE occupies a lonely branch. To some degree, maybe this helps explain why the story of MOVE isn't better known: If few people feel like your ideological kin, few people feel cause to carry your torch.
Wagner-Pacifici also traces this relative obscurity back to the players involved. Unlike other fringe groups she has studied, MOVE's final confrontation wasn't with a big federal agency like the FBI or the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. They clashed with local Philly cops and some state police. So while the story of Ruby Ridge has been folded into the larger national debate on gun control and the limits of federal power, the political implications of MOVE were seen as more provincial and self-contained. And unsurprisingly, local politicians were all too eager to move on and leave those implications behind.
Of course, Ferguson protesters faced off against local law enforcement, too, and Ferguson city cops would have loved if Michael Brown's death had stayed a hyperlocal affair. But technology has changed everything in the decades since May 13, 1985. If the MOVE bombing were to happen today, bystanders would be furiously uploading videos to YouTube, spawning Twitter hashtags and interconnected protests in cities around the country. CNN would be camped out in West Philly for weeks, to say nothing of the countless think-pieces.
If MOVE happened today, it might be quickly folded into the classroom, as has happened with other recent incidents of police violence. Teachers have all the materials at their fingertips: clips from livestreams, links to mainstream news articles and personal blogs, embeddable tweets, and so on. Back in the mid-80s, you'd have to wait around for the inevitable Frontline documentary or for an academic to publish a book. History gets commodified and redistributed much more quickly today.
The MOVE story faded into relative obscurity partly because no one connects with their cause today, and largely because the mechanisms to preserve the story weren't in place yet. But had it happened now, it would be much harder to forget.

South Carolina Man Accused Of Killing, Burning And Burying 2 Men Is Granted Bail

Thursday, May 12, 2016

The gun George Zimmerman said he used on Trayvon Martin is up for auction again after being delisted

By Wesley Lowery, Travis M. Andrews and Niraj Chokshi May 12 at 4:12 PM

George Zimmerman, who shot and killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin and was acquitted of all charges, is selling the gun he says was used in the 2012 shooting. This is far from Zimmerman's first controversy since his acquittal in 2013. (Jenny Starrs/The Washington Post)

After one online gun seller pulled his listing, George Zimmerman has found a new website on which he plans to auction the gun he said he used to kill Trayvon Martin.
Zimmerman initially posted the 9mm pistol on GunBroker.com on Wednesday night, more than four years after he shot and killed Martin, an unarmed black teenager.
“I am honored and humbled to announce the sale of an American Firearm Icon,” read Zimmerman’s description of the gun, a Kel-Tec PF-9. “The firearm for sale is the firearm that was used to defend my life and end the brutal attack from Trayvon Martin on 2/26/2012.”
But on Thursday morning, that listing vanished from Gunbroker, which later said in a statement that it wanted “no part” in the sale of a firearm whose use in the fatal 2012 shooting in Florida sparked a nationwide debate over race relations and “stand your ground” laws.
“We reserve the right to reject listings at our sole discretion, and have done so with the Zimmerman listing,” the statement read. “We want no part in the listing on our web site or in any of the publicity it is receiving.”
Undeterred, Zimmerman found a new place to sell the weapon.
“Unfortunately, Gun broker was not prepared for the traffic and publicity surrounding the auction of my firearm,” he said in an email to The Post on Thursday. “It has now been placed with another auction house.”
Todd Underwood, owner of UnitedGunGroup.com, confirmed Thursday afternoon that Zimmerman’s gun is now listed on his site, which Underwood described as a “pro-Second Amendment community” created this year after Facebook banned private gun sales.
“I talked to George Zimmerman earlier today and told him that as long as all laws are being followed, he can list the gun on our site,” Underwood told The Post. “I don’t support it, I don’t condone it, I don’t have anything against it. It’s his property, it’s his decision.”
Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter in the fatal shooting of Martin in Sanford, but was acquitted by a Florida jury in July 2013.
“Why shouldn’t he be selling it?!” Underwood said when asked about outrage sparked by Zimmerman’s auction plans. “Here’s the thing, parents lost their child and as a father it breaks my heart to even contemplate going through what they went through.

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“But when you look at the facts of the case, he was charged and he was exonerated by a jury of his peers. This shouldn’t even be a story. A gentleman who did nothing wrong is selling a personal possession of his to the highest bidder.”
Zimmerman said in the listing that proceeds of the auction will be used to “fight [Black Lives Matter] violence against Law Enforcement officers” and to “ensure the demise of Angela Correy’s persecution career and Hillary Clinton’s anti-firearm rhetoric,” though he hasn’t described how that would happen.

[George Zimmerman’s many, many controversies since the Trayvon Martin case]

Corey, whose name was misspelled, is the special prosecutor who was appointed by then-Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) to investigate Martin’s shooting death.
An attorney for Martin’s family said Thursday that Zimmerman’s plan to auction the gun was “insulting and disrespectful.”
“It is insulting to this family that he would decide that he would sell the gun that he killed their child with,” Daryl D. Parks, one of the attorneys for the family, told The Washington Post. “Think about what that means: This is a gun that took a child’s life, and now he wants to make money off of it.”
On both auction websites, Zimmerman claimed the case number from the trial is written on the gun in permanent marker and that “The Smithsonian Museum in Washington D.C.” has expressed interest in “owning and displaying the firearm,” though he did not specify which museum.
The Smithsonian Institution, which operates 19 museums, refuted that claim Thursday morning, before the gun disappeared from the auction site.

We have never expressed interest in collecting George Zimmerman’s firearm, and have no plans to ever collect or display it in any museums
— Smithsonian (@smithsonian) May 12, 2016

“The firearm is fully functional as the attempts by the Department of Justice on behalf of B. Hussein Obama to render the firearm inoperable were thwarted by my phenomenal Defense Attorney,” Zimmerman wrote, “I recognize the purchaser’s ownership and right to do with the firearm as they wish.”
He closed the description with si vis pacem para bellum, which means “If you want peace, prepare for war” in Latin.
Bidding opens at $5,000.

[Anger flows at acquittal of George Zimmerman in death of Trayvon Martin]

Zimmerman told Fox affiliate WOFL on Wednesday that he “recently received [the gun] back from the Department of Justice. They took it after my trial, after I was exonerated.”
He told the Orlando station that he had received death threats since listing the firearm on Gunbroker.com but decided to continue with the sale anyway.
“What I’ve decided to do is not cower,” he said. “I’m a free American. I can do what I want with my possessions.”
Parks, the attorney for Martin’s relatives, said Thursday that “the family does not want to dignify this with a response. Everyone agrees this is insulting and disrespectful. Without question, as time passes, we are seeing more and more the real person — who George Zimmerman really is versus who he was portrayed to be by his defense team.”

[George Zimmerman inserted himself into 2016 politics. Now a Clinton ally is tying him to Trump.]

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) criticized Zimmerman’s decision to sell the gun in a statement issued shortly before the sale was halted then moved to the second auction site.
“Trayvon Martin’s cold-blooded killer should be in prison,” Jeffries said. “Instead, he is trying to profit from the stunning miscarriage of justice that occurred three years ago in a Florida courtroom. It should shock the conscience of every decent American that this man is peddling his murder weapon for sale. America must reject this merchant of death once and for all.”
This isn’t the first time Zimmerman has caused controversy by selling a personal item. In August, he teamed up with Florida Gun Supply — a store that had publicly declared itself a “Muslim-free zone” — to sell prints of a painting by Zimmerman depicting a Confederate battle flag. It included the inscription, “The 2nd protects our 1st,” presumably referring to the Second and First amendments.
This post has been updated.

Hold Up: Poultry Processing Workers Wear Diapers To Work Because They Aren’t Allowed Bathroom Breaks!

Friday, May 6, 2016

The DEA is Top Drug Dealer in US and ATF is Top Gun Trafficker

Wednesday, May 4, 2016

Entire Florida Police Dept Busted Laundering Tens of Millions for International Drug Cartels

Justin Gardner | The Free Thought Project
Bal Harbour, FL – The village of Bal Harbour, population 2,513, may have a tiny footprint on the northern tip of Miami Beach, but its police department had grand aspirations of going after international drug traffickers, and making a few million dollars while they were at it.
The Bal Harbour PD and the Glades County Sheriff’s Office set up a giant money laundering scheme with the purported goal of busting drug cartels and stemming the surge of drug dealing going on in the area. But it all fell apart when federal investigators and the Miami-Herald found strange things going on.

The two-year operation, which took in more than $55 million from criminal groups, resulted in zero arrests but netted $2.4 million for the police posing as money launderers. Members of the 12-person task force traveled far and wide to carry out their deals, from Los Angeles to New York to Puerto Rico.
Along the way, the small-town cops got a taste of luxury as they used the money for first-class flights, luxury hotels, Mac computers and submachine guns. Meanwhile, the Bal Harbour PD and Glades County Sheriffs were buying all sorts of fancy new equipment.
Besides these “official” uses of the money, confidential records obtained by the Miami-Herald show that officers withdrew hundreds of thousands of dollars with no record of where the money went.

“They were like bank robbers with badges,” said Dennis Fitzgerald, an attorney and former Drug Enforcement Administration agent who taught undercover tactics for the U.S. State Department. “It had no law enforcement objective. The objective was to make money.”

The operation, which was not fully reported to federal authorities, funneled millions of dollars to overseas criminals and interfered with investigations being carried out on known money launderers.
The latest revelations show that at least 20 people in Venezuela were sent drug money from the Florida cops, including William Amaro Sanchez, the foreign minister under Hugo Chavez and now special assistant to President Nicolas Maduro.
They wired a total of $211,000 to Sanchez, even while the U.S. government was investigating Venezuelan government leaders involved in the drug trade. Instead of reporting their knowledge of Sanchez to federal agencies, the cops went on laundering money, taking their cut, and all the while aiding Sanchez in his machinations, which likely included political corruption.

Four other Venezuelan criminals and smugglers were major recipients of the millions being wired from the Bal Harbour PD and Glades County Sheriff’s Office, including a figure tied to one of the largest drug cartels in the hemisphere.
These actions violated strict federal bans on sending illegal money overseas, and the Florida cops never investigated the backgrounds of the people receiving their laundered drug money.

“I can’t think of a more podunk town than Bal Harbour — not in a bad way. But in the sense that these cops would have otherwise been stopping traffic or shooting radar,” said Ruben Oliva, who has represented alleged narco-traffickers since the 1980s. “In reality they were being launderers. The minute they started doing busts, it would have been over

This is like a movie. You’ve got these guys and they’re flying all over. They’re saying, ‘Hey, I’m in the big leagues.’ I’ve seen every kind of law enforcement money-laundering investigations. I’ve never seen anything like this. It’s really one for the ages.”

After the Department of Justice busted the Bal Harbour PD for misspending seized money to pay police salaries, the Miami-Herald began deeper investigations and found a much bigger pool of money that was never noticed by the feds. Soon after that, the ambitious sting operation—which was really just a money-making scheme—began to fall apart.

“The Miami Herald gained unprecedented access to the confidential records of the undercover investigation, reviewing thousands of records including cash pickup reports, emails, DEA reports, bank statements and wire transfers for millions of dollars. The inquiry found:

Police routinely withdrew cash — thousands at a time — totaling $1.3 million from undercover bank accounts, but to this day there are no records to show where the money was spent. “In all my years of law enforcement, I’ve never seen anything like it,” Chief Overton said.

Bal Harbour officials say they cannot find receipts for hundreds of thousands in expenses, including five-star hotel bookings, dinners that ran up to $1,000 and scores of purchases like laptops, iPads, electronic money counters, flower deliveries, and even iTunes downloads.

While posing as launderers, police delivered nearly $20 million to storefront businesses in Miami-Dade to launder the money for drug groups — gathering critical evidence against the business owners — yet took no action against them. Years later, the businesses are still open, some still suspected by federal agents of laundering for the cartels.”

Cash deposits to SunTrust Bank totaling $28 million do not appear anywhere in police records. It’s no coincidence that the operation was launched “at a time law enforcement agencies across Florida were looking to boost their budgets during one of the state’s toughest economic periods.”

“We had to find a revenue stream,” said Duane Pottorff, chief of law enforcement for Glades. “It allowed us to have resources we wouldn’t normally have.”
Federal authorities and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement have launched probes into the Bal Harbour police, which will surely confirm the rampant abuses of power. However, the fact that these types of shady operations, carried out with the help of agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement, can occur at all is even more troubling.
Government creates a black market of drugs and blood money through prohibition, then under the War on Drugs it grants itself the power to break the law and get involved in money laundering operations. While the professed goal is to “sting” the bad guys, government rakes in millions upon millions of dollars to further bolster its prohibition and war on drugs.
The War on Drugs is the real scheme that should be investigated