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With Cigarettes Banned In Most Prisons, Gangs Shift From Drugs To Smokes

"With tobacco products now banned by the federal Bureau of Prisons and the majority of state prison systems, the price of a single Marlboro inside now reaches twenty dollars. A policy intended to produce health benefits and reduce fire risk has created a cash cow for prison gangs like the Mexican Mafia and Aryan Brotherhood, and the guards willing to work with them. Everyone involved in bringing the tobacco in gets paid by PayPal or Western Union. 'This one Sureño dude had shit on smash here. He literally made over $100,000 in a couple of years getting tobacco in like this. The homie came up. He was about his business,' the prisoner says." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingWith Cigarettes Banned In Most Prisons, Gangs Shift From Drugs To Smokes

Prison Gang Ran Prison, Sold Drugs, Had Sex With Female Officers And Made A Profit

"Federal prosecutors say 13 female correctional officers, seven inmates and five others with gang ties have been charged with plotting to smuggle drugs, cellphones and other contraband into the Baltimore jail and other corrections facilities. An indictment unsealed Tuesday said the ring also involved sex between inmates and guards that led to four of the officers becoming pregnant by Tavon White, leader of a jailhouse gang called the Black Guerrilla Family. He is held at the Baltimore City Detention Center, awaiting trial on a charge of attempted murder. The indictment claims the gang ran the scheme from inside the detention center." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingPrison Gang Ran Prison, Sold Drugs, Had Sex With Female Officers And Made A Profit

Phoenix Police Officer Is Sunk By Own Cam

"Richard Greco, in an interview with a Phoenix police internal investigator, said his employers had selected less than five minutes out of hundreds of hours of video to paint an inaccurate picture of his work as a patrol officer. The footage captures him cursing at suspects and witnesses, and making disparaging remarks about them to other officers, including referring to one as 'retarded,' calling another a 'jackass' and another a 'bitch.' When that revelation was combined with a 2008 disciplinary action Greco received for making inappropriate comments about female co-workers in the presence of other police officers, it was enough to terminate the 10-year veteran last year." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingPhoenix Police Officer Is Sunk By Own Cam

WVNS59 News Station Deletes Video Of Officer Threatening Driver, Reporters Defending Officer

"WVNS 59 posted this video in their website and Facebook; when the news came on for the evening the video was edited so as the man seemed uncontrollable and was in the wrong. If you listen at around 1:52 it sounds like the officer seems to say something along the lines of 'turn the camera off because if he gets out again I'm going to kill him.'" Continue reading →

Continue ReadingWVNS59 News Station Deletes Video Of Officer Threatening Driver, Reporters Defending Officer

The Case of the Missing $700 Billion

"1. Banks took $700 billion in bailout money and paid off their high-interest debt. That included FDIC-insured CDs, which they called in, leaving seniors and savers without many viable alternatives for safe investing. 2. Banks stopped lending to the public because they found a better deal. If you could take billions of dollars from the government and lend it back to them by buying US bonds, wouldn't you do the same thing? 3. Banks turned a big profit and paid out handsome bonuses to their higher-ups. 4. By reducing interest rates in the public sector, the Treasury reduced the cost of its own massive debt.[...]" Continue reading →

Continue ReadingThe Case of the Missing $700 Billion

Oliver Stone on NSA Spying

"Some have claimed that Americans don't care about the revelations that the NSA is conducting massive surveillance on our private communications. But Oliver Stone isn't buying it. In a video produced with the ACLU, Director Oliver Stone shares some of his reflections on the NSA spying program and the disastrous legacy of unchecked government abuse of power. All Americans should stand up for our civil liberties at this critical moment in history, he says-- by asking our representatives in Congress to roll back the surveillance state." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingOliver Stone on NSA Spying

Kremlin turns back to typewriters to avoid security leaks

"The throwback to the paper-strewn days of Soviet bureaucracy has reportedly been prompted by the publication of secret documents by anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks and the revelations leaked by former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden. The Federal Guard Service, which is also in charge of protecting President Vladimir Putin, is looking to spend just over 486,000 rubles ($14,800) to buy a number of electric typewriters. Pro-Kremlin newspaper Izvestia said the state service was looking to purchase 20 typerwriters because using computers to prepare top-secret documents may no longer be safe." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingKremlin turns back to typewriters to avoid security leaks

Yes, You Have Something to Fear, Even if You’re a Law-Abiding Person

"Whether we’re talking about NSA spying, cross-border collection and sharing of private financial data by tax-hungry governments, pointlessly intrusive money-laundering laws, or other schemes to give the state more power and authority, we’re often told that 'if you’re a law-abiding person, you have nothing to fear.' But that assumes government is both competent and trustworthy. You don’t have to be a crazed libertarian like me to realize that those two words are not a good description of Washington. If we cross the wrong bureaucrat, our lives may be ruined – particularly since there are very few checks and balances to restrain these petty tyrants." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingYes, You Have Something to Fear, Even if You’re a Law-Abiding Person

Latin America demands answers from U.S. on spying

"Governments voiced a mix of outrage and concern after the Brazilian daily O Globo, citing documents leaked by fugitive former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, said several nations were targets of US electronic surveillance. The snooping included lifting data on leftist Venezuela’s oil and military purchases and Mexico’s drug war and energy sector as well as mapping the movements of a Marxist guerrilla group in Colombia, the newspaper said. The Mexican daily Excelsior reported Wednesday that Pena Nieto’s predecessor had allowed the United States to install a system to intercept phone calls and Internet chatter." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingLatin America demands answers from U.S. on spying

Yahoo wants to make its NSA PRISM fight against U.S. FISA court public

"Yahoo has called on Fisa, the secretive US surveillance court, to let it publish its legal argument against a case that gave the government 'powerful leverage' in persuading tech companies to co-operate with a controversial data-gathering program. In a court filing first reported by San Jose Mercury News the company argues the release would demonstrate that Yahoo 'objected strenuously' in a key 2008 case after the National Security Agency (NSA) demanded Yahoo customers’ information. Yahoo’s move comes as its rivals have also pushed for the government to provide more public clarity on their surveillance of people’s online lives." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingYahoo wants to make its NSA PRISM fight against U.S. FISA court public